BROWSE THE TALK:

Political Leaning and Free Software (kdawson, March 10, 2007, Slashdot)

00_NOP writes "HateMyTory is the world's first political rating site and occasionally gets blasted or promoted by British bloggers on either side of the political spectrum. But here's something even more intriguing: when the right come visiting they hate the site but they are disproportionately likely to be users of free software, whether that is just Firefox on top of their Windows box, or all the way with some Linux distro. But when the left rally to the cause they are more likely than not to be proprietary software users, albeit with a big bias towards Apple."

Tories: Britain Should Use Open Source: The economic spokesman for Britain's Conservatives criticizes Blair's government for its "use of no open-source software whatsoever" (Colin Barker, 3/13/07, Business Week)

George Osborne, the shadow chancellor, has criticised the government over its apparent lack of support for open source software.

Osborne said many of the world's multinational corporations are developing open source software strategies, and added that "far-sighted governments are also taking advantage of this trend".

But Osborne said the case in the UK is very different. Speaking at a conference organised by the Royal Society for the Arts, he said: "In recent months, Conservative MPs have put down parliamentary questions that reveal most central government departments make use of no open source software whatsoever."

The problem is "the cultural change has not taken place in government", he said, and, within government, the balance is weighted against open source. "There isn't a level playing field for open source software," he added.

Labour is only conservative at the top.

Posted by Orrin Judd at March 12, 2007 8:17 AM