The Open Source Presidency
March 27th, 2009 by John Dragoon
An update of our physical infrastructure isn’t the only critical target of the U.S. government’s economic stimulus initiatives. A compelling case can be made that a significant refresh and update of our technical infrastructure is equally if not more critical to our long term growth and competitiveness. The private sector has been more aggressive than the public sector in adopting a number of technical and business model advances. One such example is the adoption of rapidly maturing open source technologies as the backbone of technical infrastructures. Not only does open source offer compelling cost advantages, but also the innovation cycles are often shorter and more compelling than fully proprietary approaches.
Novell thinks the U.S government has an opportunity and obligation to aggressively explore and promote the use of open source. We posted our views on the benefits and call to action in a article we wrote for Forbes.com that was posted today.
To be clear, there are many great examples of the use of open source within the public sector. We just believe that today’s economic realities present a catalyst for more aggressive adoption.
John