OSC Members save at LinuxWorld Expo

The Open Source Consortium is offering a great deal for companies wanting a stand at LinuxWorld?. The cheapest commercial LinuxWorld stands normally cost over £1000. We are able to offer our members a limited number of 2m x 1m stands for just £500. The stands include table, chairs and lighting.

Our presence at LinuxWorld in October will be bigger than last year, including not only the OSC stand and member stands but a speaking slot. We're looking at ways to promote the OSC members who help out (we're a volunteer organisation so it seems only fair that the people who put more in get more out). If you haven't volunteered to help already and would like to, contact Rick Timmis (rick at uglyrock.org).

Becta locks OSS out of schools

The Open Source Consortium, in partnership with other concerned organisations, is urging Becta to re-think it's current strategy of developing frameworks which effectively lock most OSS out of those schools using them.

The hundreds of British institutions currently using Moodle successfully, for example, might be surprised to discover that Becta believes they're making a mistake - that Virtual Learning Environments should be chosen from 16 vendors Becta believes are large enough not toimpose a high risk.

In doing so, the risk of large companies wasting even more public money (need I mention the NHS, CSA or Inland Revenue IT fiascos), not tomention the risk of proprietary lock-in, seem to have been largely ignored.

For more information, or to get involved, email Iain Roberts (iain.roberts at opensourceconsortium.org).

OSC Conference, West Midlands

In partnership with a number of other OSS-friendly organisations, the OSC is putting on a two day conference, probably in November in the West Midlands. We expect it to be a great opportunity for members to learn from each other and from a range of speakers as well as a chance for some valuable networking.

Working with local authorities

The OSC continues to work with local authorities through SOCITM (the society of public sector IT managers) and focused on listening to what they need us to do to make it as easy as possible for them to do business with OSC members.

Voluntary sector

The OSC continues its close relationship with the NCC (National Computing Centre). Currently we are helping the NCC with its efforts to increase the use of OSS in the UK voluntary sector.

Join the OSC

If OSS is part of your company's business or you want to support the objectives of the OSC, we'd like you to join the OSC and help us grow OSS as a sector in the UK. Visit www.opensourceconsortium.org to join.

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