"with the proliferation of issues and a scarcity of resources to address them all, leaders inside and outside government are turning to the principles of participation, collaboration, transparency, and efficiency to address the challenges facing our country and the world." - Tim O'Reilly
News and Events
Open Source for America to Celebrate First Anniversary with Key Milestones for Open Source Technologies in Government
- OSFA Announces Inaugural Open Source Awards Program
- OSFA sponsors openness study to assign letter-grade to Cabinet-level agencies surrounding transparency, participation and collaboration
- OSFA launched with 70 founding members; membership now exceeds 1,700 organizations and individuals
Portland, Ore. – OSCON – July 21, 2010 – Open Open Source for America (OSFA), an organization of technology industry leaders, non-government associations, and academic and research institutions promoting the use of open source technologies in the U.S. federal government, today marks its first anniversary and celebrates key milestones for open source in government during the past 12 months. Visit OpenSourceforAmerica.org for more information.
During its first year, OSFA sponsored a study to measure openness within government. The study is scheduled to be released in the third quarter of 2010 and will culminate in a report card assigning a letter-grade to Cabinet-level agencies based on public transparency, participation and collaboration. A number of factors relating to access and transparency will be evaluated, including Freedom of Information Act processes, public access to agency documents, use of online public participation tools, and technology procurement procedures. Agency representatives from the Administration's newly formed Open Government Working Group were invited to participate in the study.
Additionally, the coalition formed targeted working groups by subject area to help educate decision makers in the U.S. federal government about the advantages of using free and open source software.
Since OSFA's formation last July, the U.S. federal government has made several key announcements that signal movement toward the adoption and usage of open source technologies.
- In October 2009, the Deputy CIO for the Department of Defense issued a memo noting that open source software should be considered alongside other software options in the procurement process, and referencing publicly-auditable code, unrestricted modification, licensing costs, and freedom from vendor reliance as benefits unique to open source.
- Also in October 2009, the White House announced the migration of Whitehouse.gov to an open source platform to increase security and facilitate greater public input.
- In December 2009, President Obama issued the Open Government Directive, instructing the head of every federal department and agency to take specific actions to open their operations to the public. Open source principles of transparency, participation, and collaboration were at the center of the Directive and open source technologies provide a means for government departments and agencies to adhere to these principles while gaining multiple benefits across their IT infrastructures.
“It's encouraging to see the many advancements made by the U.S. federal government over the past year to create a more open and transparent government,” said Michael Tiemann, vice president, Open Source Affairs at Red Hat and a member of the OSFA board of advisors. “Open source and open government share many of the same principles. OSFA has made great strides, in a short time period, to educate government leaders on the power of participation, collaboration and transparency within the open source software development model, and how government can benefit from its use.”
To commemorate its first anniversary, Open Source for America is launching its inaugural Open Source Awards Program. Nominations are open to all OSFA members and will be accepted from Friday, July, 23, 2010 through Friday, Aug. 20, 2010 at opensourceforamerica.org.
There are three award categories: Individual Contributor, Open Source Project and Open Source Deployment in Government.
- Individual Contributor award will recognize one internal OSFA member and one external contributor who has made significant contributions in the promotion and use of open source solutions in the U.S. government during the past year.
- The Open Source Project category will recognize an open source project that has shown promise and benefit for U.S. government use.
- The Open Source Deployment in Government category will honor a U.S. government agency or body that has shown commitment to the use of open source, through policy and/or adoption.
Winners will be announced in September 2010. Judges will consist of a number of open source luminaries drawn from the OSFA Technical Steering Committee and Board of Advisors. Rules and guidelines can be found at opensourceforamerica.org/awards/.
To join Open Source for America and help build support for the use of open source technologies, visit the OSFA website at www.opensourceforamerica.org.
About Open Source for America
Open Source for America (OSFA) is an organization of technology industry leaders, non-government associations and academic and research institutions dedicated to advocating the use of open source software in the U.S. Federal government. Participation in Open Source for America is open to any individual or entity signing the campaign's mission pledge at: www.opensourceforamerica.org.
Open Source for America to Measure Openness and Transparency Across U.S. Federal Government Agencies
Open Source for America Announces Openness Study on Six-Month Anniversary of the Obama Administration's Open Government Directive
Washington, D.C. – June 8, 2010 – Open Source for America (OSFA), an organization of technology industry leaders, non-government associations and academic and research institutions promoting the use of open source technologies in the U.S. Federal government, announced today its sponsorship of a study to measure openness in government. The study, which is scheduled to be released in Q3FY2010, will gauge openness and transparency across federal agencies and will culminate in a report card assigning a grade to each federal agency based on its public transparency, participation and collaboration. Visit OpenSourceforAmerica.org for more information about the study and the organization.
The Obama Administration has emphasized the need for greater government transparency. President Obama issued a transparency and openness memo the day after he took office and the Administration has taken many steps over the past several months to continue its momentum in creating an open government. Today marks the six-month anniversary of the Open Government Directive, directing executive departments and agencies to take specific actions to implement principles of transparency, participation and collaboration.
“Open Source for America applauds and supports the Administration's efforts to engage citizens in a spirit of transparency, participation and collaboration,” stated Tom Rabon, executive vice president, Corporate Affairs at Red Hat, Inc. and a member of the OSFA steering committee. “When the President directs such a massive undertaking, agencies benefit from outside review and we're happy to help them measure their progress toward openness objectives.”
The study will be conducted by experts from within OSFA. These experts will consider a number of factors relating to access and transparency identified by OSFA members and the community at large as key indicators of openness. Factors OSFA will evaluate include Freedom of Information Act processes, public access to agency documents, use of online public participation tools, and technology procurement procedures, among others. Agency representatives from the Administration's newly formed Open Government Working Group will be invited to participate in the study.
“Open government can incentivize innovation by promoting accountability and inviting citizen perspectives,” continued Rabon “Citizens are most empowered when their government removes barriers to participation. In that spirit, OSFA has opened the study criteria to the public via an online distributed problem-solving production model called crowd sourcing.”
“Like open source, open government encourages innovation, promotes accountability, and invites citizen participation,” said Jim Harper of WashingtonWatch.com. “Transparency is essential to this. By measuring agencies' transparency efforts and their ability to collaborate with the public, we can reward those agencies who understand how powerful that can be.”
OSFA's goal with this report card effort is to provide the incentive to develop and leverage online tools and the distributed problem-solving model to effectively measure the adoption of open source technologies within the U.S. Federal government.
To join OSFA and help build support for the use of open source technologies, visit the OSFA website at www.opensourceforamerica.org.
About Open Source for America
Open Source for America (OSFA) is an organization of technology industry leaders, non-government associations and academic and research institutions dedicated to advocating the use of open source software in the U.S. Federal government. Participation in Open Source for America is open to any individual or entity signing the campaign's mission pledge at: www.opensourceforamerica.org.
Broad Coalition Formed to Promote Benefits and Adoption of Open Source Software in Government
Group includes diverse cross-section of technology industry leaders, associations, non-governmental
organizations, communities and academic/research institutions
Washington, D.C. – July 22, 2009 – Today, a broad cross-section of more than 70 companies, academic institutions, communities, related groups and individuals joined together to announce the formation of Open Source for America, an organization that will serve as a unified voice for the promotion of open source software in the U.S. Federal Government arena. To register or learn more about the coalition, visit www.opensourceforamerica.org.
With the U.S. Federal Government increasingly focused on utilizing and adopting technologies to better serve citizens, there is growing recognition of the freedoms that open source software and open technology solutions can provide – an open, transparent and cost-effective option – for government agencies. Gartner recently estimated by 2011 more than 25 percent of government vertical, domain-specific applications will either be open source, contain open source application components or be developed as community source.
“Open source software can help deliver improved government service – plain and simple – and the Administration recognizes this more than any in our nation’s history,” said David Thomas, principal with Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti and spokesman for the Open Source for America campaign.
The mission of Open Source for America is to serve as a centralized advocate and to encourage broader U.S. Federal
Government support of and participation in free and open source software. Specifically, Open Source for America will: help effect change in policies and practices to allow the Federal Government to better utilize these technologies; help coordinate these communities to collaborate with the federal government on technology requirements; and raise awareness and create understanding among federal government leaders about the values and implications of open source software.
The diverse Board of Advisors of Open Source for America includes respected leaders, such as Roger Burkhardt, Rishab Ghosh, Marv Langston, Chris Lundburg, Dawn Meyerriecks, Eben Moglen, Arthur L. Money, Tim O'Reilly, Stormy Peters, Simon Phipps, Mark Shuttleworth, Paul Smith, Dr. Doug Stone, Michael Tiemann, Andy Updegrove, Bill Vass, Tony Wasserman and Jim Zemlin.
Founding members of Open Source for America include: Acquia; Alfresco Software; Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.; Jono Bacon; Black Duck Software, Inc.; Josh Berkus; Ean Schuessler, BrainFood; Canonical; CodeWeavers; CollabNet; Colosa, Inc.; Continuent; Danese Cooper; Crucial Point LLC; Josh Davis; Debian; Democracy in Action; Electronic Frontier Foundation; EnterpriseDB; Bdale Garbee; GNOME Foundation; Google; JC Herz; ibiblio.org; Ingres Corporation; Jaspersoft; Mitch Kapor, Kapor Capital; KnowledgeTree; Marv Langston; The Linux Foundation; Linux Fund, Inc.; Lucid Imagination; Geir Magnusson, Jr.; Medsphere; Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti; Mercury Federal Systems; Monty Widenius, Monty Program AB; Mozilla; North Carolina State University Center for Open Software Engineering; Novell; Open Solutions Alliance; Open Source Initiative; Open Source Institute; Oracle; O'Reilly Publishing; Oregon State University Open Source Lab; Open Source Software Institute; Pentaho; RadiantBlue; Red Hat; Relative Computing Environments LLC.; REvolution Computing; Walt Scacchi, Institute for Software Research at UC Irvine; Software Freedom Law Center; SpikeSource; SugarCRM; Sunlight Labs; Sun Microsystems; School of Engineering, University of California, Merced; University of Southern Mississippi; Andy Updegrove, Gesmer Updegrove LLP; Tony Wasserman, Center for Open Source Investigation, Carnegie Mellon Silicon Valley; Zenoss, Inc.; Zimbra; and Zmanda.
Thomas continues, “Open Source for America is bringing together some of the industry's brightest minds, who will work together with policymakers and the public so that technologies enabled by the software freedoms can help make government IT deployment more secure, more cost-effective, faster to deploy, with greater privacy and the ability to help eliminate vendor lock-in. Open source software may not be a cure-all, but it could save billions of dollars, help foster innovation and empower our government to work smarter.
For recent open source developments in government, click here.
About Open Source for America
Open Source for America is a coalition of industry leaders, non-government groups and academic/research institutions organized to serve as a centralized advocate, to encourage broader U.S. Federal Government support of and participation in free and open source software. Membership in Open Source for America is open to any individual or entity signing the campaign's mission pledge. Learn more at www.opensourceforamerica.org You can also follow us on Twitter at https://twitter.com/OpenSourceGov.