You could be forgiven for thinking that Open Standards are a rather dull topic. Specifications are probably the most boring kind of reading known to man.Who will be able to read what you wrote? Who can you share documents with? Will you be able to read your own writings in the future, or will it all be locked into proprietary file formats developed by companies that have long since disappeared, leaving you sitting on a pile of digital toxic waste?

Yet the politics of Open Standards are far from boring. Right ahead of Document Freedom Day, not one but two hot issues are flaring up in the European Union.

The first is the European Interoperability Framework (EIF). This used to be a recommendation by the European Commission to use Open Standards and Free Software in the public sector. The Commission is currently revising the text. FSFE has seen the latest version, and it looks bad. Instead of showing European countries how to make their public sector IT systems work together thanks to Open Standards, as the original EIF did, the current version basically says “do whatever you feel like”. If the EU member states adopt this version, there will be no further push for Open Standards and open document formats in their public sector.

The second issue that is hot in Europe right now is the Digital Agenda. Neelie Kroes, newly installed as head of the Directorate General (somewhat like a ministry) for the Information Society (INFSO), is proposing an ambitious policy framework. The version we have seen talks about the importance of Open Standards and public sector procurement:

Procurement practices and rules for ICT products and services must be adapted to ensure that public authorities – including EU institutions – can make the best use of the full range of open standards. Interoperability across all policy fields, notably eHealth, eGovernment, Green ICT, and cloud computing-related initiatives must also systematically be promoted.

There is also an explicit link to the EIF revision:

An update of the European Interoperability Framework will be an important step in this regard.

As far as we know, this sort of thing doesn’t sit well with everyone in the European Commission. DG INFSO appears to be under huge pressure from other DGs to remove the reference to Open Standards from the text, and make it less ambitious overall.

FSFE is active on both issues, talking to policy makers and calling public attention to the problem. What’s at stake here is the fate of Open Standards in Europe’s public sector in the coming years.

This makes Document Freedom Day even more important. This is a day where we can show why Open Standards and open document formats in the public sector matter to us all.

This is just what people in Romania have done last week. Their public administrations are using proprietary file formats, making life difficult for Free Software users. So these activists went and told their public administration: “I can’t read your documents!”

It looks like they had a great day out! More images here.

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