onsdag 04 august 2004, 07:03, skrev [EMAIL PROTECTED]: > I wonder if you get support from your government? If you get support > is it financial or did government write a statement which says:" Use > open software...etc.".
From the government we don't get that kind of support, even if some of the governmental bodies has a lot to say on universal access to Information and Communication Technology. They often refer to The Norwegian Board of Technology[1]. The Directorate for Primary and Secondary Education support Microsoft actively. [1] http://www.teknologiradet.no/files/7polished_copy.htm SLX Debian Labs has filed an official complaint[2] to the The Norwegian Competition Authority with three questions after a speech from Eva Hildrum Director General, Ministry of Transport and Communications, Norway at GUADEC 2004. I've made a summary that shows how The Directorate for Primary and Secondary Education support Microsoft actively by demand use of Microsoft products at schools. The Norwegian Competition Authority has made a thrilling letter[3] to the Directorate, but I've got no time translating it - and it's in Norwegian. Here is our questions: - The Directorate for Primary and Secondary Education give away MS Windows 2k pro and Win ME pre-installed on reused computer with no licences fee. The Directorate has an agreement with a private supplier to sell reused computers from public offices to schools. The other suppliers of reused computers also get the MS Windows-licences with no licence cost. How is it possible for the Directorate to give this Microsoft discount? Other manufacturers don't have this possibility. - We also ask a question on how the national discount agreement with 530 municipalities and public offices can have a licence cost of 329 NOK (48 USD) annually, and in the schools 130 NOK (19 USD), that is a 60% discount on the national discount. How is it possible to give this discounts? The negotiators for the municipalities told us that the lowest price on these products was the price they negotiated. And suddenly there is a 60% discount added to the products, to the same institutions. In Norway the municipalities and city councils owns the schools. - Our last question is about how The Directorate for Primary and Secondary Education assume that the schools have a customer relationship to Microsoft when doing preparation to national exams for the last year pupils. [2] Our letter with questions (in Norwegian): (nb) http://developer.skolelinux.no/brev/konkurranse_gratis_msw2k.html [3] The question from the The Norwegian Competition Authority to the The Directorate for Primary and Secondary Education: (nb) http://developer.skolelinux.no/brev/20040729_k-tilsynet1av2.png http://developer.skolelinux.no/brev/20040729_k-tilsynet2av2.png (nb pdf) http://developer.skolelinux.no/brev/20040730_k-tilsynet2av2.pdf That said: SLX Debian Labs was established in the fall 2003. The goal was to give the work of free and open source software (FOSS) a credible organisational environment in Norway, working together with free and open source developers internationally. This in answer to a question from The Norwegian Ministry of Education and Research. They want to contribute so that the large voluntary work done by Skolelinux and others, can continue to the advantage of the schools, providing a proper framework for following up these efforts. The Skolelinux project started as a voluntary effort June 2nd 2001. Now Skolelinux is a formal part of the Customised Debian Distribution[4] known as Debian Edu. [4] http://people.debian.org/~tille/debian-med/talks/200406_ltk/ So we try to keep our breath ... ;-) > What I mean is that are you kind of forced to think how to use > money wisely or did it just happen that we now can enjoy Skolelinux? The background for our work is a 201 pages preliminary study/project-plan[5], where 4/5 of the founding came from private persons or companies. 1/5 was paid for by The Ministry of Education and Research. The support from the government was political initiated, with huge help from the "Norwegian Language Union" (Noregs m�llag). The amount was 200.000 NOK (23736 EUR) to the preliminary study (also known as the project-plan for Skolelinux). [5] http://developer.skolelinux.no/forprosjekt.html The money we have is a handled by a foundation, privately founded. 534061 EUR has been put into the SLX Debian Labs from private money. Skolelinux/Debian Edu are gaining more and more political support every day, but a lot of public administrations fights back. Skolelinux/Debian Edu has undergone some heavy evaluation from independent institutions. One of the report is from Statskonsult[6]. Statskonsult is a state-owned limited company that deals with public management development. [6] http://developer.skolelinux.no/rapporter/statskonsult_2003_24_eng.pdf We have been nice for 3 years now - explaining, sharing knowledge, and so on. Now we just ask some question about competition to other parts of the government that support and execute the ICT-requirements in education. It seems to me that administrations don't take open standards, and competition seriously. They has a lot of job to do on their hand. The organisation which asking the complicated questions are The Norwegian Competition Authority. Norway has implemented the strictest competition law in Europa, so their letter[3] should be interesting. If you are relatively fluent in Swedish, it should be no problem reading the letter from the Competition Authority in Norwegian. Unfortunately I can't prioritise to translate this to english. Sincerely Knut Yrvin -- Project manager (cel: +47 908 95 765) Skolelinux Norway and OpenOffice translation to Norwegian. Office 1: SLX Debian Labs Forskningsparken, Gaustadalle 21, 0349 OSLO, NORWAY. Office 2: IT-Staff Akershus County Council, Schweigaards gate 4, 0185 OSLO, NORWAY
