[CS-FSLUG] Massachusetts, OpenDocument & The Church

[Michael Bradley, Jr.]

> On Sep 26, 2005, at 6:45 PM, Don Parris wrote:
>
> Well, Massachusetts has finalized it's decision to adapt the
> OpenDocument format, along with PDF, as the official document formats
> for the Commonwealth.  While I applaud their decision, I wonder if it
> carries implications for churches and other Christian ministries?
> Should Christian ministries begin seriously considering adapting a
> similar requirement for their documents?  If so, on what grounds?

For many churches and communities, the move to FOSS and open  
standards will, in my opinion, need to have very clear practical  
advantages.

Not that FOSS and open standards don't already have practical  
advantages; but sometimes there are ease-of-use issues which, in the  
judgement of those users who are less zealous/adventurous than  
ourselves, aren't made up for by the "furthering of ideals" which is  
involved in the use and support of FOSS.

Earlier this year, I spent several months living, working, and  
praying with the a missionary community in Kingston, Jamaica (see  
http://www.missionariesofthepoor.org/ ; their site doesn't load  
properly in Safari but looks fine in Firefox). They have about 15  
computers in daily and day-long use at their "headquarters" in  
Jamaica, and probably about that many spread among their worldwide  
missions.

They could benefit greatly from the use of FOSS in terms of lower  
costs. But there is no way they could or would make the switch today  
since they have no IT infrastructure or resources. Their PCs are  
running Windows and work well most of the time; further, no one has  
ever complained to them that they couldn't read a M$ Office file  
attachment which they sent out via e-mail.

Any FOSS advantage or appeal just hasn't reached critical mass yet in  
order for justify a "FOSS experiment" on their part.  I hope it does  
someday soon, though.

I imagine that many groups are in similar situations.

In the Hearts of Jesus and Mary,

Michael Bradley, Jr.

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