In a report to be presented at the World Bank yesterday, a group that includes senior government officials from 13 countries will urge nations to adopt open-information technology standards as a vital step to accelerate economic growth, efficiency and innovation.
The 33-page report is a road map for creating national policies on open-technology standards and comes at a time when several countries -- and some state governments -- are pursuing plans to reduce their dependence on proprietary software makers, notably Microsoft, by using more free, open-source software.
The project, begun by the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at the Harvard Law School, gathered government officials from China, India, Thailand, Denmark, Jordan, Brazil and elsewhere at a three-day meeting in Silicon Valley in February to discuss technology standards and economic development. The meeting was followed by e-mail exchanges, conference calls and postings on a shared Web site.
The group defines an open standard as technology that is not owned by a single company and is openly published. Still, there is a huge debate in industry and among policymakers about how far openness should go.
The report makes clear that government policy should "mandate technology choice, not software development models." It also points out that open-technology standards -- the digital equivalent of a common gauge for railroad tracks -- are not the same as open-source software. Open source is a development model for software in which code is freely shared and improved by a cooperative network of programmers.
Even so, the spread of open-source software in recent years has probably been the most striking example of the benefits of openly sharing information technology to reduce costs and make it easier for users themselves to innovate.
"Open source does not define an open information and communications technology ecosystem, but it can be an important transformative element," the report states. "To date, open source has been the most disruptive element of the entire open agenda, provoking re-examination of information and communications technology ecosystems and policies."
Even though the report did not name any companies, Microsoft, the world's largest software maker, has been the prime target of open-source advocates. And the Berkman Center sought support from IBM and Oracle, two Microsoft rivals, to help pay for the three-day conference. Both are champions of Linux, the popular open-source operating system that is an alternative to Windows from Microsoft.
Microsoft is a corporate sponsor of the Berkman Center. In the last few years, Microsoft has been an active participant in Internet and Web groups that have developed standards so that data can be shared by different software programs. That allows the information -- about a person or bank account, say -- to be exchanged, but the digital equivalent of the envelope carrying the information can be proprietary.
Some countries and states want to go further, promoting the adoption of open formats for documents, spreadsheets and presentations, which are alternatives to Microsoft's formats for its dominant Office programs like Word, Excel and Powerpoint.
Massachusetts, for example, recently proposed shifting to open-document formats in government offices. The comment period for its proposal ended yesterday.
Microsoft, in a statement, said standards for data sharing are a good idea, but "we don't believe that the proposed mandate for a single document format is the best solution for achieving these goals."
Charles Nesson, a law professor at Harvard and a founder of the Berkman Center, said the group's report was intended mainly to make a "rational business case for having a broad base of open technology standards" and that both proprietary and open-source software could work on top of that standards layer.
But as more standards are added, the layer gets thicker, moving into the markets for proprietary software. "It is a phenomenon that pushes up against Microsoft," Nesson said.
The government is aiming to recruit 1,096 foreign English teachers and teaching assistants this year, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. The foreign teachers would work closely with elementary and junior-high instructors to create and teach courses, ministry official Tsai Yi-ching (蔡宜靜) said. Together, they would create an immersive language environment, helping to motivate students while enhancing the skills of local teachers, she said. The ministry has since 2021 been recruiting foreign teachers through the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which offers placement, salary, housing and other benefits to eligible foreign teachers. Two centers serving northern and southern Taiwan assist in recruiting and training
WIDE NET: Health officials said they are considering all possibilities, such as bongkrekic acid, while the city mayor said they have not ruled out the possibility of a malicious act of poisoning Two people who dined at a restaurant in Taipei’s Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 last week have died, while four are in intensive care, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. All of the outlets of Malaysian vegetarian restaurant franchise Polam Kopitiam have been ordered to close pending an investigation after 11 people became ill due to suspected food poisoning, city officials told a news conference in Taipei. The first fatality, a 39-year-old man who ate at the restaurant on Friday last week, died of kidney failure two days later at the city’s Mackay Memorial Hospital. A 66-year-old man who dined
RESTAURANT POISONING? Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Victor Wang at a press conference last night said this was the first time bongkrekic acid was detected in Taiwan An autopsy discovered bongkrekic acid in a specimen collected from a person who died from food poisoning after dining at the Malaysian restaurant chain Polam Kopitiam, the Ministry of Health and Welfare said at a news conference last night. It was the first time bongkrekic acid was detected in Taiwan, Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Victor Wang (王必勝) said. The testing conducted by forensic specialists at National Taiwan University was facilitated after a hospital voluntarily offered standard samples it had in stock that are required to test for bongkrekic acid, he said. Wang told the news conference that testing would continue despite
‘CARRIER KILLERS’: The Tuo Chiang-class corvettes’ stealth capability means they have a radar cross-section as small as the size of a fishing boat, an analyst said President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday presided over a ceremony at Yilan County’s Suao Harbor (蘇澳港), where the navy took delivery of two indigenous Tuo Chiang-class corvettes. The corvettes, An Chiang (安江) and Wan Chiang (萬江), along with the introduction of the coast guard’s third and fourth 4,000-tonne cutters earlier this month, are a testament to Taiwan’s shipbuilding capability and signify the nation’s resolve to defend democracy and freedom, Tsai said. The vessels are also the last two of six Tuo Chiang-class corvettes ordered from Lungteh Shipbuilding Co (龍德造船) by the navy, Tsai said. The first Tuo Chiang-class vessel delivered was Ta Chiang (塔江)