MICROSOFT'S NEARLY nine-year old blanket software licencing deal with the New Zealand government has apparently collapsed.

Remember when, back in late February, the Cabinet Office released their “Open Source, Open Standards and Re–Use: Government Action Plan”? Myself and many other FOSS commentators were obviously heartily encouraged and have talked about it and examined the policy in some detail.

Open source developer Bruno Lowagie is about to set a remarkable precedent in the F/OSS world by restricting any government body in his and my home country, Belgium, to use any product that makes use of technology originally developed by him.

Most likely you have already seen the story about a drunk driving case where the Breathalyzer's source code was turned over for third-party examination. Naturally, vast numbers of potential errors were found.

The NSW Electoral Commission (NSWEC) will leave Linux for Windows Server when it develops its new vote counting and reporting application, which is slated to cost A$1.4 million over the next two years.

Another closer look at the issue of Microsoft intersection with US politics

BOTH MICROSOFT and Novell will have a role or at least some impact at a formal, national level. Mundie's involvement is a subject that we covered yesterday [1, 2], but we wrote not as much about Schmidt's impact. Sun, Google, and Novell are all places where he worked, so his affinity towards particular companies cannot be ignored.

Thanks, in large part, to a little company called Standard Oil, Open Source isn't necessarily the first term to come to mind when one thinks of the name Rockefeller. However, that's exactly the term Mr. Rockefeller's great-grandson, Senator Jay Rockefeller, is pushing in Congress — attached to a bill to strengthen Open Source in health-care.