IT: Petition to support Open Source law in Marche region

The draft law will make the use of Open Standards mandatory for all public documents and for all Internet services that are offered by public administrations. "Access to documents or web services should not discriminate against the users' IT system", explains Matteo Vitali, one of the Open Source advocates and a member of the Linux User Group in the city of Fano.

Marche is not the only region developing laws on Open Standards and Open Source. Similar laws were adopted in Toscana, Umbria,  Puglia, Emilia Romagna and Friuli Venezia Giulia.

The Marche proposal also stipulates that local government should be able to share all their software applications with other public administrations. "This law says public administrations by default should use Open Source applications."

The same group that is organising the petition is helping to draft the text of the law proposal. The text can be edited on a wiki website. "This is one way in which people can participate in the democratic process", says Vitali.

Two months after its launch the petition website has 68 signatures. Vitali: "More people signed the petition, but their signatures still need to be validated." He estimates there are about a hundred persons actively involved in drafting the proposal.

The draft law was originally submitted by Michelle Altomeni, a member of the Communist Party and a council member of the Marche Region.

Vitali expects the law to be submitted to the Marche council this September. It could take a few months more before it comes to a vote, he says. "We hope that soon after that, the Marche public administration will begin an IT migration project. We know that could be difficult as well as costly. But we are sure that the migration process to Open Source is a wise long term investment. That is what public administrations should focus on."

Further information:

Petition website (in Italian)

Proposed Open Source law (in Italian)