Operation Souveränität: Bundestag plant Durchbruch von Microsoft & Co.
https://www.heise.de/en/news/Operation-Sovereignty-Bundestag-plans-a-breakthrough-from-Microsoft-Co-11162864.html
Von P4ris3k
Operation Souveränität: Bundestag plant Durchbruch von Microsoft & Co.
https://www.heise.de/en/news/Operation-Sovereignty-Bundestag-plans-a-breakthrough-from-Microsoft-Co-11162864.html
Von P4ris3k
10 Kommentare
Based on the article and how such commissions work in Germany it will take them 15 years to “evaluate” meanwhile getting several kickbacks from ms for signing long term contracts
I’m certainly no expert in this field, but it seems to me you can’t beat American software by just creating more platforms. What’s needed is a pan-European standard—one with seamless integration with existing American software, open-source, and mandatory for all EU members.
Only then can we create something truly compelling that doesn’t lose functionality for users and offers a vast market for developers. Otherwise, we’ll just end up with another 6-8 platforms competing with each other, while the end-user will still find it easier to just use the global (i.e., American) solution.
We can criticize China all we want, but the truth is they’ve weaned themselves off American software, and they wouldn’t have many problems if Trump suddenly decided to block their access to Windows or Office 365.
How is the succes rate of IT projects in Germany actually? Pretty certain in Belgium such project would fail. Can’t even modernize software for the federal police over here.
When I was working in a German company recently, people were being asked to move *to* the Microsoft ecosystem, away from Google
And the moment a more ‚convenient‘ POTUS emerges, they’ll move back again.
Seen in München.
The french Gendarmerie is running their [distro](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GendBuntu) since 2005
It was a tiny scandal because they bypassed ‚higher authorities‘ – eg politicians – as to not be disturbed by lobbying.
Complete opposite of what happened in München.
Unless we make a Silicon Valley in Europe, this and the other posts about this, it’s just propaganda.
First you need the tools, then you make the service.
Let’s push for Linux. Choose a distribution or make a new one. Europe can do it.
Make possible for European companies to invest in the platform and company that will develop it.
I’d buy stocks for sure.
Now let’s see the rest of Germany do the same.
It’s the right way to go.
Every user (EU Institutions, Countries, Regions, Cities, agencies, etc.) can use them and instead of paying for licenses, they could fund their development, making the product better for everyone in the process.
If you think about it, why should a Government pay for a product that depends on a single company to exist and to receive support? Everything could happen that makes it a risk. Such company may be bought by another company and the product ceased to be developed. Or, in this case, such company may be part of another jurisdiction and be subject to that Country’s whims. Contracts exist, of course, but having the means to continue running the product and even improving it whenever you want is the best.
The current situation, where almost the entire world is reliant on a single company (Microsoft) for the platform to run their desktop computing on (Windows) and their office suite (MS Office), is frankly, absurd, illogical and crazy.
The EU is actually in an excellent position to embrace open source software since there is very little in the area of big European software developers. What I think is needed is a minor budget, let’s say a few hundred million euros a year, to hire software engineers that embed with all the important open source projects (OSes, office software, email handling etc) and force them to integrate. Or just make forks of all the important open source projects and make these forks integrate into software packages that are easy to use for public sector users. Having decent software makes it easier to nudge bureaucracies to actually use them. And a few million European bureaucrats are a formidable user base which will most probably encourage further development, guaranteeing free and functioning software and indirectly undermining the American software giants.