politics

A second great year on opensource.com has proven even more that openness can improve just about anything. No matter what you're interested in, we've had a story for you. A few examples: » Read more

That's the same question that crossed my mind when I came across this site. Highlighted in green at the top, "Liberty, Democracy, Transparency!" So far so good. But is this for real? » Read more

A draft executive order from the Obama administration recently surfaced titled “Disclosure of Political Spending by Government Contractors.” If signed and implemented, potential contractors bidding on federal work would be required to disclose contributions and spending two years back. » Read more

There was a bit of news coming out the European Parliament recently that could be easily overlooked. MEP Indrek Tarand (of Estonia no less), along with some non-MEP partners, started the European Parliament Free Software User Group (EPFSUG).

With goals like “assist people in using Free Software in the European Parliament” and planned sessions like “making your laptop free” it’s largely internal focused and not geared toward policy making. The acronym doesn’t quite roll off the tongue, in English at least, and the website leaves much to be desired, but there’s still something interesting here. » Read more

Jonathan Rauch wrote in the National Journal Saturday on the “radical decentralization” of the tea party. A “Tea Party Patriots coordinator and co-founder” talks about it this way:

“I use the term open-source politics. This is an open source movement.... The movement as a whole is smart.”
» Read more

Maybe some day we'll look back on the role of the manager in our organizations and laugh.

Such a quaint trend. Kind of like having The Clapper in every room of your house, or wearing multiple Swatch watches, or working out to Richard Simmons videos. Each seemed really helpful at the time, but looking back, we kind of wonder what the heck we were thinking. » Read more

In the discussions around some of my previous articles, I've noticed a trend: we seem to be focusing on cultural changes that need to be made for the open source way to be effective in contexts beyond technology. » Read more