Re: [egov-ms] Groups - FLOSS Webinar slides (FLOSS Webinar.pdf)uploaded

Dear John
> The slides used by Charles Schulz and John Borras in their recent webinar
> on FLOSS (Free, Libre and Open Source Software).
>
> View Document Details:
> http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/document.php?document_id=35591
>
> Download Document:
> http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/35591/FLOSS%20Webinar.pdf
>    

This is great material.  Has the egov effort also considered
focussing on open standards?  There are still many governments
that make reference to (or even specify) standards that are not
publicly available.  The situation is particularly acute in the U.S.
As we know, most standards bodies over the past two decades
have shifted to publicly available standards where developers
developers can "click and download" any version.

Unfortunately, by the way, one of the model documents you
cite in your slides in this presentation is ironically not publicly
available.  ISO/IEC 26300:2006 costs CHF 325 to view!

Governments need to demonstrate leadership here.  Citing
standards that cost hundreds of dollars to view is not a good
policy direction as such standards are simply unlikely to be
used in today's IT world.  Government by emphatically refusing
to cite such standards (and certainly not using them) would
quickly change the practices of the shrinking number of
troglodyte standards bodies still engaging in these practices.

--tony