New Labour (re)discovers Open Source?

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Maybe it’s the downturn, but this statement by Tom Watson, the UK Minister for Digital Engagement is interesting.

Open Source has been one of the most significant cultural developments in IT and beyond over the last two decades: it has shown that individuals, working together over the Internet, can create products that rival and sometimes beat those of giant corporations; it has shown how giant corporations themselves, and Governments, can become more innovative, more agile and more cost-effective by building on the fruits of community work; and from its IT base the Open Source movement has given leadership to new thinking about intellectual property rights and the availability of information for re–use by others.

This Government has long had the policy, last formally articulated in 2004, that it should seek to use Open Source where it gave the best value for money to the taxpayer in delivering public services. While we have always respected the long-held beliefs of those who think that governments should favour Open Source on principle, we have always taken the view that the main test should be what is best value for the taxpayer.

Over the past five years many government departments have shown that Open Source can be best for the taxpayer – in our web services, in the NHS and in other vital public services.

But we need to increase the pace…

The literary merry-go-round

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I’m reading Elizabeth Bowen’s letters (scrupulously edited by Victoria Glendinning) and came on this passage from a letter dated 30th September 1959:

“I’m quite sorry to be going back to London tomorrow. Next weekend, that is, Saturday, I’m going to stay the weekend with Cyril Connolly… I must discover whom he’s living with now, before I get there. — I don’t know whether he’s again settled down with Barbara since George Weidenfeld traded her back to him.”

At this stage there’s a footnote. It reads:

“Barbara Skelton married Cyril Connolly in 1950. He divorced her in 1956 citing the publisher George Weidenfeld as co-respondent. She married Weidenfeld in 1956, and he divorced her in 1961 citing Cyril Connolly as co-respondent.”

This is the same Cyril Connolly who famously observed (in Enemies of Promise) that “there is no more sombre enemy of good art than the pram in the hall.”

Gud 4 da kids

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Phew! Just seen this BBC NEWS report.

Text speak, rather than harming literacy, could have a positive effect on the way children interact with language, says a study.

Researchers from Coventry University studied 88 children aged between 10 and 12 to understand the impact of text messaging on their language skills.

They found that the use of so-called “textisms” could be having a positive impact on reading development.

The study is published in the British Journal of Developmental Psychology.

“Children’s use of textisms is not only positively associated with word reading ability, but it may be contributing to reading development”, the authors wrote in the report.

On this day…

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… in 1993, a bomb exploded in the garage of New York’s World Trade Center, killing six people and injuring more than 1,000 others. Turned out to be just a dry-run for the main event.

Quote of the day

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“I will not spend a single penny for the purpose of rewarding a single Wall Street executive, but I will do whatever it takes to help the small business that can’t pay its workers or the family that has saved and still can’t get a mortgage.”

Barack Obama, addressing the US Congress yesterday. Wouldn’t it be nice to hear something as unequivocal from Broonie?

Aw shucks…

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Poor little Harvard. According to a NYT report its endowment (which pays for a third of its operating costs)

is on the verge of posting its biggest loss in 40 years. With much of its money tied up for the long term, it is scrambling to meet some obligations.

Harvard has frozen salaries for faculty and nonunion staff members, and offered early retirement to 1,600 employees. The divinity school has warned it may not be able to cover tuition for all its students with need, the school of arts and sciences is cutting its billion-dollar budget roughly 10 percent, and the university president said this week than the unprecedented drop in the endowment was causing it to delay its planned expansion, starting with a $1 billion science center, into the Allston neighborhood of Boston.

The school has even added to its debt by issuing $1.5 billion in new bonds, its largest such offering ever.

It seems that the endowment, the largest of any university in the world, has shrunk by at least $8 billion, to $29 billion, since July. Couldn’t happen to a nicer university.

Interesting footnote. The article says that part of Harvard’s current problem is that it became highly ‘leveraged’ on the advice of Larry Summers, its former president.

The endowment was squeezed partly because it had invested more than its assets, a leveraging strategy that can magnify results, both good and bad. It also had invested heavily in private equity and related deals, which not only lock up existing cash but require investors to put up more capital over time.

What’s interesting about that? Er, Larry Summers is now one of Obama’s leading economic advisers!