Last weekend, Indrek Tarand, a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) from Estonia has established the European Parliament Free Software User Group (Epfsug). With this organisation, Tarand (member of the Green alliance) aims to assist all MEPs with the use of open (source) software in the European Parliament.

The purpose of the group is to ensure that the use of open standards and open source software in the IT infrastructure of the European Parliament will increase. Epfsug seeks cooperation with anyone who believes in the value of open standards to ensuring the freedoms citizens have in today’s Information Society. For example, working with open standards is said to promote innovation as open licenses allow a user to work with, share and develop a (software) product without being accused of infringing patents or copyrights. Epfsug wants to act as an information- and knowledge center for MEPs, staff and the EP institution as a whole.

Tarand is setting an example himself by using open standards and open source software in his daily work for the European Parliament as much as possible. In his home country Estonia, the so-called e-government is highly developed. With this initiative, the Estonian MEP tries to keep the enthusiasm for open source software and open standards alive within the European institutions. Although European Commissioner for ICT Neelie Kroes from The Netherlands says in her Digital Agenda that open standards are still of paramount importance, it appeared during negotiations on the European Interoperability Framework that the support for open standards is slightly eroding in many EU countries.

Sources: EPFSUG, webwereld, University of Amsterdam (Dutch) (English)