In my opinion, lack of accessibility is the main *real* argument against the widespread adoption of Free and Open Source Software.
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In my opinion, lack of accessibility is the main *real* argument against the widespread adoption of Free and Open Source Software.
I reckon, if, especially European, governments and institutions really are serious about digital sovereignty, they should invest serious money (I'm talking billions with "B") into that area.
@mina I don't think billions are necessary. I think of Affinity, an excellent suite for working with graphics and publishing. It was built as a competitor to Adobe CS, and sold for a reasonable onetime payment. It copied the Adobe original where it made sense and introduced some nice features. So, they definitely did not invest billions, IMHO more in the low millions area. Therefor I think some tens of millions would be enough with a motivated team AND no red tape. So with the EU we're doomed.
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@mina I don't think billions are necessary. I think of Affinity, an excellent suite for working with graphics and publishing. It was built as a competitor to Adobe CS, and sold for a reasonable onetime payment. It copied the Adobe original where it made sense and introduced some nice features. So, they definitely did not invest billions, IMHO more in the low millions area. Therefor I think some tens of millions would be enough with a motivated team AND no red tape. So with the EU we're doomed.
It's about the whole infrastructure, the desktop environments, the installers and especially the development tools.
Every € invested in that would be a far more sustainable investment, than trying to build a European Google, ChatGPT, Oracle or Facebook in the hands of European billionaires instead of US-American ones.
Money has no Motherland, anyway.
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In my opinion, lack of accessibility is the main *real* argument against the widespread adoption of Free and Open Source Software.
I reckon, if, especially European, governments and institutions really are serious about digital sovereignty, they should invest serious money (I'm talking billions with "B") into that area.
@mina I think investments make sense, but indeed a transparent strategy where the society can contribute to on where the investment should go would help. At the moment, there is very little data on what software is critical in organisations and private households. Additionally we need to shape an idea in which direction it should go. Everyone must help here.
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@mina I think investments make sense, but indeed a transparent strategy where the society can contribute to on where the investment should go would help. At the moment, there is very little data on what software is critical in organisations and private households. Additionally we need to shape an idea in which direction it should go. Everyone must help here.
The thing is: This aspect is constantly overlooked, not only by governments, but also often treated very dismissively within the FOSS community.
I only became aware of this, thanks to my bubble here.
I really had no idea, how much better are the MacOS and Windows ecosystems in that aspect, as I am personally not affected.
So, what I try to do, is to rise awareness.
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In my opinion, lack of accessibility is the main *real* argument against the widespread adoption of Free and Open Source Software.
I reckon, if, especially European, governments and institutions really are serious about digital sovereignty, they should invest serious money (I'm talking billions with "B") into that area.
@mina btw. please feel free to share your feedback on open source with the EC: https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/better-regulation/have-your-say/initiatives/16213-European-Open-Digital-Ecosystems_en - European and non-European citizens can contribute
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@mina btw. please feel free to share your feedback on open source with the EC: https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/better-regulation/have-your-say/initiatives/16213-European-Open-Digital-Ecosystems_en - European and non-European citizens can contribute
Good idea!
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In my opinion, lack of accessibility is the main *real* argument against the widespread adoption of Free and Open Source Software.
I reckon, if, especially European, governments and institutions really are serious about digital sovereignty, they should invest serious money (I'm talking billions with "B") into that area.
@mina Maybe an investment in accessibility QA would be a good start?
Most FOSS projects don't have paid QA and can't provide coverage for use cases outside the developers' own experience of the world. That leads to genuine ignorance of how their projects exclude people who may not be able to or have little time to file detailed bug reports.
A QA agency could start with that - later phases could focus on providing funding to submit PRs fixing the issues found
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It's about the whole infrastructure, the desktop environments, the installers and especially the development tools.
Every € invested in that would be a far more sustainable investment, than trying to build a European Google, ChatGPT, Oracle or Facebook in the hands of European billionaires instead of US-American ones.
Money has no Motherland, anyway.
I am a DevOps engineer at the Qwant web search engine and I do not see billionaires in our staff.
But lots of hard but exciting work.
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@mina Maybe an investment in accessibility QA would be a good start?
Most FOSS projects don't have paid QA and can't provide coverage for use cases outside the developers' own experience of the world. That leads to genuine ignorance of how their projects exclude people who may not be able to or have little time to file detailed bug reports.
A QA agency could start with that - later phases could focus on providing funding to submit PRs fixing the issues found
"QA" means "Quality assessment"¹?
If so, your idea is an excellent one, indeed!
¹I *always* try to avoid using acronyms, abbreviations and specific terms, which might be unfamiliar for part of my target audience, in my posts. This is, for me, also a part of being inclusive.
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