sad commentary on our ability to spread the word in areas which really count

[William O'Higgins]

On Wed, May 11, 2005 at 08:26:37PM -0400, bob wrote:
>http://homepage.mac.com/yaztromo/iblog/C721686556/E320292175/

The article supports what my wife said - there was almost no one at the
conference who understood enough about Open Source to counter the
profoundly uninformed opinions (not positions - positions can be
supported) of the panelists.  

What amuses me is the opinion that Open Source software in general and
Linux specifically is not mature/stable/supported enough for "real"
work.  The author of the linked article makes much of the fact that the
Canada Health Infoway has $1.8 B CDN to spend on medical informatics.
This is a pittance, and Canada's health information is trivial compared
to systems already in place.  JP Morgan Chase is an investment bank with
$1.2 T (trillion) USD in holdings - you cannot tell me that they take
their information systems lightly - and they are using Linux, supported
by IBM to the tune of $5 B USD.  China and Brazil, both with massive
resource-driven economies, are committed to using Linux.  

Christopher Browne's comments are very much on point - it takes a great
deal of knowledge about the systems currently in place to make a
realistic proposal, but I contend that there are people ready and able to
produce medical informatics systems based on Open Source infrastructure
and licensed under Open Source licenses available right now, if people
care to look, and value the benefits provided by freedom.
-- 

yours,

William

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