
Dammit – should I give up on open source in government - lifeisstillgood
http://www.mikadosoftware.com/articles/dammit
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neilwilson
The response to that is surely very simple.

"Since government has absolutely no faith in community development we have
loaded the contract with sufficient margin to employ lots of people who will
specifically maintain the code used in the project.

Which is precisely what any closed source developer has to do.

But by supporting this bid the government will make government maintained code
available for free to any other enterprise that wants to use it and gain the
benefit of any development they may choose to do to that code.

This eliminates duplication across the economy and makes the economy more
efficient overall.

PS. I hope you none of you are using Android phones"

~~~
dTal
Exactly this, though word it more nicely and in such a way that the benefits
obviously accrue to _them_ , rather than the more abstract "economy". They
want to treat it exactly the same as a commercial offering, so you should too.
Just note that the licence you endeavour to develop the software under lends
them additional flexibility to, for example, hire other support workers
outside of your contract.

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skybrian
GitHub is full of abandoned open source projects. It's a valid concern.

I'm not the sort of person who bids for government contracts, but to
speculate, perhaps answering this question would mean deciding on which Linux
distro to use and figuring out which maintenance contract they should buy. If
the other software they'll be using is supported as part of the Linux distro,
maybe that's enough?

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ams6110
Government work does not attract bright, creative people. It attracts people
who want security, and this tends to result in bureaucracy, a lot of process
and rules, and very little thinking or risk taking. Anything that doesn't fit
"we've always done it this way" will be viewed with fear.

~~~
Angostura
Did you have to go to a special shop to buy a brush that broad? There are
plenty of bright, creative people who work in government

~~~
santoshalper
My perspective from working as a DoD and FedGov contractor is that while the
idea of working for the government appeals to very many talented people, the
actual experience of working for the government will ultimately push them to
the private sector.

There are many reasons, but the simplest is that the government just doesn't
pay terribly well and tends to promote based on seniority rather than ability.

~~~
tetromino_
On the other hand, government employment can be very attractive for two
reasons.

1\. Subject area. If you want to work on pure science or on making the world a
better place, then a career in a government research lab would be far more
compatible with your dreams than work in the private sector would be.

2\. Secure employment + good medical benefits. If you are supporting a family
and have limited savings, then a lower-paying government job that won't
terminate you unless you personally do something egregious becomes more
attractive than a higher-paying private sector job that might terminate you
tomorrow for reasons outside your knowledge or control. Doubly so if you know
you (or your dependent) have an expensive medical issue that might affect you
in a few years - knowledge that you _will_ have a paycheck and you _will_ have
medical coverage can feel far more secure than hoping that you won't be
between private sector jobs and Congress won't gut Obamacare.

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616c
Sadly I have seen both sides of govt contracting, open stacks and proprietary,
and I feel like the passionate such as yourself lose regardless. I hope you
keep up the good fight. O'Reilly has a whole OSS in gov conf in DC and I hope
your ilk make even a little headway.

My two cents.

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xxxdarrenxxx
I wonder if a portion is simply not a figurative allergy.

"Government" is a concept that stands or falls by control, regulation and
ownership, or lack thereoff.

All characteristics that naturally go the opposite direction compared to the
inherit nature off open source or it's ideal envisionment.

More realistically, one can't deny the power money (profit) has to motivate
and maintain a service. In practise this tends to almost naturally lead to a
company wanting to hold rights to their products "secrets" and/or try to sell
for as much as they can get away with.

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cheez
Imagine your job is to implement a new software-based process. Something goes
wrong. The server is down. Who do you call?

This is why open source is treated like a leper: there is no one to call or
the support is so disparate that it's hopeless.

Solve the problems that lead them to making those decisions.

~~~
kspaans
Now imagine that the company you bought the software from no longer exists.
You're correct about one of the issues with FLOSS adoption, but you're framing
it wrong: any software can have support issues. The biggest advantage of FLOSS
that the government has written and shared is that they can get competitive
bids for maintenance contracts, rather than being stuck with one vendor.

~~~
thehardsphere
"They can get competitive bids instead of be stuck with a single vendor" can
be translated as "they have to go through a complicated months long process to
find a contractor instead of dial a 1-800 number and get the patch in two
weeks."

~~~
kspaans
They already had to go through the months-long process to get that 1-800
number in the first place (unless of course they "just choose IBM"). FLOSS
doesn't short-ciruit that, it just shifts it to a different phase of
procurement.

