Help Writing an Open Standards Policy?

Cornwallis writes "I'm trying to save money for a local government agency I work for by writing a policy statement to support the idea of adopting open data standards and/or Open Source software in order to contain IT expenses (by reducing licensing costs). I am thinking something along the lines of supporting open standards by not locking in to long term software contracts so that departments could be freed to adopt an alternative OS and/or desktop suite if this would work for the individual department. The idea is to unlock the stranglehold that proprietary software may have on the department IT budget. Have any of you written policy statements along these lines, and would you be willing to share? I'm not saying this would be for everybody, nor replace everything, just be an option to help my beleaguered agency in rough times."

Already available

[alain94040]

You can use any of a number of already existing policies. For instance, the Open Standards Policy [mass.gov] of Massachusetts is very nicely worded:

Commonwealth's Position

• Effective and efficient government service delivery requires system integration and data sharing.
• Technology investments must be made based on total cost of ownership and best value to the Commonwealth. Component-based software development based on open standards allows for a more cost-effective "build once, use many times" approach.
• Open systems and specifications are often less costly to acquire, develop and maintain and do not result in vendor lock-in.

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Some resources ...

[Anonymous Coward]

For some good ideas to start with, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenDocument_adoption [wikipedia.org] and then head over to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts links. You can glean a lot of the policy formulation ides from there. They built a requirement to use open document format (not necessarily open source). http://consortiuminfo.org/standardsblog/ [consortiuminfo.org] is another good resource to start with.

Other way round

[frisket]

> ...to support the idea of adopting open data standards and/or Open Source software in order to contain IT expenses (by reducing licensing costs).

I think it might get a better reception if you invert the argument: don't present adopting open source/standards as the target; present saving money as the target, and open source/standards as the method.

> ...supporting open standards by not locking in to long term software contracts [and] to unlock the stranglehold that proprietary software may have on the department IT budget.

Same here. Make the objective to unlock the stranglehold and free up dependencies...by using open source/standards.

In half a life in state-funded IT managment, I have found that most public-service IT managers and local government administrators are woefully undereducated in software selection, and either a) have never heard of FOSS, b) think it has something to do with downloading viruses from bulletin-boards, or c) simply aren't bothered one way or the other unless it saves money or makes life easier. A very, very small number are on kickbacks from suppliers, but you shouldn't work for them.

There are a gazillion other benefits, but try to present them as serendipitous by-products of using open source/standards, not as ends in themselves. The immediate end is saving money (or its equivalent).

However, before you do so, make sure you aren't making a noose for your own neck. Sometimes a department or agency which saves real money finds that this is treated as evidence that they don't need any more resources ever again. It's sometimes better to use the move to FOSS as a way to free up money to do things you said were impossible unless you got extra funding.

Good luck, and please let us know how you got on. Post the document if that is permitted.

Don't call Bruce, call a lawyer!

[julian67]

I'm extremely impressed that Bruce Perens responds with his phone number and an offer of advice, which I assume we all appreciate is based on a wealth of practical experience and success, and even more impressed that just a few posts later someone suggests that what you really need is a lawyer. What a strange world. Perhaps the anon coward who suggested a lawyer is, in fact, a lawyer?

If you ignore Bruce Perens and opt instead to call a lawyer you should get fired ;-)

btw I'm writing this from my nuclear planet. I made it last week. I have a very fast computer. The planet is OK but a bit hot (I didn't have time to put the air-con in yet).

Out-migration is key, not just formats

[Anonymous Coward]

See the writings of people like Matt Asay and others about upcoming lock-in strategies. http://asay.blogspot.com/2006/05/future-of-lock-in.html [blogspot.com]

MS is ready to yield on formats if they can lock up the data in other ways.

The key is freeing the data and keeping it free. Open formats and standards and software help, no question. But an equally important preventitive is to make certain you have iron clad contract language enabling you to move your data from that vendor's system to a competing system, at nominal hassle and cost, and, if the vendor really wants your business, at the vendor's expense if it turns out to be more than nominal.

Somone please mod me up, I know the subject I'm talking about through and through from painful experience but I have no means to self-mod and get this thought to the original poster. Thanks.