Value for money?
It's rather ironic that it takes a world financial crisis to make the custodians of public money accept what has been a no-brainer to many of us for several years. If government is charged with getting best value for the taxpayer it should not require a 170 billion budget deficit to focus the mind. That is not in any way to be taken as a criticism of Gary and Fiona who have taken the initiative ahead of the national agencies and stepped up to the plate to provide some brave and practical action. Practical action is a necessity because talk is easy, research is easy, writing papers is easy. What is difficult is shifting business models to support sustainable open source development, supporting take up and change management associated proprietary vendor lock-in backed by multi-million dollar marketing budgets. As Prince Charles said at the climate summit, politicians and civil servants will be remembered for the actions they took, not what they talked about. It seems increasingly clear to me that companies that have their business models based on selling licenses for digital resources, either software or content, are increasingly vulnerable. Companies with new business models that are independent of selling licenses lower barriers to entry and take up. Google recently disrupted the satnav supply market by giving sat nav facilities away free in their phones and they give away the hardware and software designs of those devices too. Why? Because it lowers barriers to take up and increases the number of people using their search and advertising business models. While some supply companies will be unaffected, the interesting thing is that all are vulnerable and it is very difficult to predict who might get hit next. The evidence is that central government has not yet understood the basic economics. (So why should we be surprised? ;-) ) While risk averse quangos proclaim leadership and publish colourful brochures it should be remembered that the proof of the pudding is in the eating. Minor symbolic gestures while entrenching the status quo with hundreds of millions in projects like curriculum on-line simply demonstrate that the emperor has no clothes.
