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European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

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Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#31

Post by Mashimo »

juliangmp wrote: post #21
tomaytotomato wrote: post #15

Maybe the EU can develop its own version of Linux OS, just like North Korea. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Star_OS -- edit When legislators start getting involved they will want to inevitably have their "own" version of something and their own SLAs and contracts. The reason they went with Microsoft/IBM/Oracle and others back in the day for software solutions is; they know on a piece of paper what they are getting…

What for? Plenty of maintainers for various distros are from Europe and/or the EU. For example: https://map.debian.net/

What is this map? Almost every city in DK and Sweden shows "Kåre Olsen"

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#33

Post by fsflover »

flowerthoughts wrote: post #27

I agree with others here that focusing your eyes on _using_ open source is, at least, an incomplete view of the problem. What we (European software engineers) have been arguing, is that software that is funded by public means, such as from universities or institutions, ought to be made fully public, including ability to tweak. Thinking that open source software will help solve your budget and/or political problem is…

> software that is funded by public means, such as from universities or institutions, ought to be made fully public, including ability to tweak

Anyone who agrees with this should sign this petition made by Free Software Foundation Europe: https://publiccode.eu

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#34

Post by supermatt »

tomaytotomato wrote: post #15

Maybe the EU can develop its own version of Linux OS, just like North Korea. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Star_OS -- edit When legislators start getting involved they will want to inevitably have their "own" version of something and their own SLAs and contracts. The reason they went with Microsoft/IBM/Oracle and others back in the day for software solutions is; they know on a piece of paper what they are getting…

Finland (where Linux comes from) is in the EU. There are also a few European linux distributions you may have heard of: e.g. Debian, SUSE, Ubuntu (UK), Mandrake/Mandriva/Mageia, Knoppix, etc.

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#35

Post by sofixa »

Xelbair wrote: post #17

We'll see how it goes this time. If they once again go for creating their own forks, instead of financing development of existing software then I'll know the initiative failed. Also imho their 'questions' mentioned in the comment kinda feel like they have answer baked in - like it's foregone conclusion. Still - I hope EU will just have a decent program financing or contributing in any shape or form to development of…

> they once again go for creating their own forks, instead of financing development of existing software then I'll know the initiative failed.

Once again? When did they do that? They have been funding various open source projects (like VLC, Libre Office) for quite a while:

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#37

Post by fsflover »

mentalgear wrote: post #25
mlindner wrote: post #20

I don't see how EU can develop a thriving software industry with its love for control and regulation.

I think this was disused a few days ago in a similar HN comment thread. Turns out, the US has way more data-tapping anti-privacy laws than the EU - only that the US more or less secretly adopted them and forbids any company from telling their end-users. Whereas you hear more about "data regulation-attempts" in the EU because it actually still has very strong privacy-rules and when trying to alter them there is a real…

Here is the related discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46509019#46510983

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#38

Post by snakeboy »

abc123abc123 wrote: post #32

[flagged]

It's some utopian dream to think the death of the EU would decentralize power. It's currently a necessary evil to put pressure on the already centralized power of the US global hegemony. Without the EU, the world is controlled by the US and China.

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#39

Post by Roark66 »

fsflover wrote: post #33
flowerthoughts wrote: post #27

I agree with others here that focusing your eyes on _using_ open source is, at least, an incomplete view of the problem. What we (European software engineers) have been arguing, is that software that is funded by public means, such as from universities or institutions, ought to be made fully public, including ability to tweak. Thinking that open source software will help solve your budget and/or political problem is…

> software that is funded by public means, such as from universities or institutions, ought to be made fully public, including ability to tweak Anyone who agrees with this should sign this petition made by Free Software Foundation Europe: https://publiccode.eu

While I agree with the sentiment I'm not sure this is actually viable.

For example here in Poland the previous govt invested in huge amount of software for digital govt services. From company formation, social insurance/heathcare (things like electronic prescriptions and patient data) to tax submission at all levels.

All of this is implemented using publicly documented open standards so anyone can write a client for these services, or anyone can use official Web clients, but none of the code is open source.

This is in contrast to previous governments that tried to implement all of this using proprietary standards where the companies hired were paid billions to deliver a system and they ended up owning the data exchange protocol and a client they distributed in binary only form. And they also profited from commercial software that implemented their proprietary protocols.

That worked (for the company hired)for taxes and they made billions. But for other stuff like medical, when they had no way to sell their proprietary standards they wasted billions and years of time and delivered nothing. Then subsequent govt threw the entire project out and built it on open standards.

So based on this experience I think using well documented open data exchange standards is much more important than software itself being open source.

Who cares the server side software is open source if you still can't submit your taxes with your own python script?

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#40

Post by xbmcuser »

ngruhn wrote: post #5
xbmcuser wrote: post #3

To me this is the most amazing thing people that would turn themselves inside out against communism/socialism because of the lies they have been told. When it actually comes down to it are all for communism ie open source

Just because it's free? Let's talk again when all open source projects are funded and controlled by the state with zero competition between them and no consumer choice. Only one Linux distro, only one database, only one web framework, etc. And it's decided top-down from the state what to work on. I doubt though that these projects would have started in the first place in a communist setting.

Yours and others knee jerk reaction proves my point you are conflating autocracy with communism/socialism.
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