Conflict of Interest Derails UK Government Open Source Consultation 34
judgecorp writes "The UK government's consultation about the use of open source in public sector IT has been sent back to square one, with discussion results scrapped because the facilitator, Andy Hopkirk, is involved with Microsoft. Hopkirk is well regarded, but the open source community feels the debate dismissed RF (royalty free) standards in favor of the FRAND definition, which is more favorable to proprietary vendors."
Re:Respected, not ethical (Score:2, Interesting)
When crap like this is pulled there needs to be a demerit system that now weighs more heavily against the side which was found to behaving unethically. Like Proprietary software has 120 points, Open Source alternatives 119. However, due to the unethical stunt you pulled we award you 50 demerits. So the final score is Open Source 119, Proprietary 70. We will therefore use open source whenever it is feasible.
Not surprising... (Score:4, Interesting)
I've worked in Local Government IT on an account for a London Borough for over 12 years, both on the client and contractor side.
It seems pretty much mandatory that as much public money as possible spent on IT is funnelled straight to Redmond.
It's therefore not really surprising that they should invite someone strongly connected with Microsoft to discuss Open Source.