French Parliament Votes To Give Priority To Free Software

[ka9yhd]

"The French Parliament just wrote into law the first instance of Free Software priority in a public service, by adopting the Bill on Higher Education and Research. [Advocacy association April], after extensively contributing to the debate, especially welcomes this vote and congratulates Deputies and Senators for recognizing the importance of Free Software in the Public Service for Higher Education, since it alone can ensure equal access to the future public service. April hopes that this first step will be followed by other legislation in favor of Free Software. It also thanks all the persons who mobilized and contacted the Parliament Members."

http://news.slashdot.org/story/13/07/10/0233216/french-parliament-votes-to-give-priority-to-free-software

[mimas]

And in the other hand, there was a similar formulation in the "enseignement secondaire" (school for the 11 to 18 years old) law but it was replaced by "free software existence should be considered".

http://www.pcworld.fr/business/actualites,parlement-donne-priorite-logiciel-libre,540209,1.htm

[djohnston]

And in the other hand, there was a similar formulation in the "enseignement secondaire" (school for the 11 to 18 years old) law but it was replaced by "free software existence should be considered".

http://www.pcworld.fr/business/actualites,parlement-donne-priorite-logiciel-libre,540209,1.htm

One step forward, one step backward.

[mimas]

The CEO of INRIA (Institut national de recherche en informatique et en automatique) is opposed to give priority to Free Software.
His position raised some of his people against him because it's not reflecting the institute position, but the position of a lobby, and they learned the "official" INRIA position by reading the news. So, the priority given to free software may be just a political maneuver (one succeed, the other failed or vice-versa). Wait and see.

INRIA in WP : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/INRIA
and the INRIA and Microsoft research lab : http://www.msr-inria.fr/