A new wave of open source at the Dutch government and public sector

Free and open source software seemed to have dissappeared in the Dutch government after the end of the program "Nederland Open in Verbinding” (NOiV)". Nothing is further from the truth, concrete projects remained where an open source collaboration was successful. The last couple of years a number of trends have coincided that have resulted in open source again getting a prominent place in government:

• Increasing reliance on free and open source software in IT
• Call for a more transparent government
• The open source way of working becoming more common
• The rise of the Open Source Program Office (OSPO) as a pattern to establish open source in the IT-organization

In my presentation I'll briefly go over the history of open source in the public sector in the Netherlands, what trends now coincide, how this leads to a new wave of free and open source software at the government and how the community at large can be involved.

Nico Rikken

Nico works to increase the level of Free and Open Source Software in the Netherlands and the energy sector. His main involvement is in the Free Software Foundation Europe, Linux Foundation Energy and the TODO Group.