Calling himself “Steve Jobs’ best customer,” a politician in charge of a government efficiency drive in the U.K. hopes to end the “monopoly” from companies like Microsoft, Fujitsu, BT and HP.
Ian Watmore, former head of the e-Government Unit, is now CEO of the coalition government’s Efficiency and Reform Group. He’s calling for smaller, less expensive IT projects (capping them at £100m), criticizing the previous administration’s “over-ambitious projects.”
The reform group has promised to open up procurement to smaller firms, who face a blockade from companies like HP, BT and Fujitsu, who together get about a third of central government contracts.
Watmore believes open source would be great for government, but that Apple is probably the next best thing:
“I personally would like to see people move off Microsoft products onto open source or use Apple technology. I use Apple at home. I know it’s not very open but I use it. I love it, it works and I think it is great – I’m Steve Jobs’ best customer.
But 95% of the business and government world still use Microsoft for its basic desktop products because it is reliable and it works. I think we, in government, have an opportunity to change that game quite dramatically, particularly on desktop technology, by getting greater use of open products.”
Here in the U.S., Cult of Mac talked to a city council member who brings his own iPad to work; there have been numerous discussions on whether Apple products are more cost efficient for government use or not.
Would you like to see more Apple products in your local government?
Nicole Martinelli is a San Francisco freelance writer who heads up Cult of Mac Magazine, our weekly publication available on iTunes. You can find her on Twitter and Google+. If you’re doing something new, cool and Apple-related, email her.
40 responses to “Politician Heading Efficiency Task Force Calls for More Apple in Government”
Yes! Apple is way better than Microsoft. Now in days “it works” is not enough. Technology has the capability of so much to be satisfied with “well it works?.” We have to keep moving forward people!
^_^
The only things I can see wrong with switching over to Apple products. If someone finds an exploit, they have access to our entire Government. Also, that would mean Apple control of the government. Who knows? They can go evil and get access to whatever they want. There needs to be a diverse field of electronics being used in the government so no one product can be accessed and our government gets cyber-attacked. Otherwise, I recommend iPads and iPhones to everyone! :-)
Couple things.
1) There are already exploits in Windows, and the Government still uses it. So, someone finding an exploit in OS X doesn’t change anything.
2) I really like Apple products, and use them at home. There should not be a “monopoly” within the Government on any technology. Apple, MS and LINUX should also have there uses. Going “open source”, particularly where the product can run across those platforms would be ideal. It may be hard to find many of them these days. Does Open Office run on OS X?
Dang. Poor grammar/statement. “all have their uses” not “also have there uses”.
Doesn’t matter. It make for a better looking, sexier government. But enterprise wise I go open source or Microsoft. I been on a Mac and love it for consumer and private reasons, but I don’t see much enterprise from the company. Enterprise is Microsoft bread and butter where consumers are apple. For government and business, It works is good.
Windows is so full of holes it’s lacey. Apple OS X however, is a certified UNIX operating system, which makes it a heck of a lot harder to steal data from. It’s more likely that hackers (of the government supported, criminal, or for-the-fun-of-it varieties) will be able to muscle their way into governmental computers running Windows. Look at the malware that showed up on some of the stock market servers. No one knows how it got there or how long it had been there. They don’t even know exactly what it does.
Policemen have to drive American cars. I don’t know why the government shouldn’t at least look at buying computers made by an American company.
Why yes, OpenOffice does run on OS X. And quite a bit better than MS’s joke of Office for Mac. And it’s FREE :)
Brandon I think Apple will start to drive heavily into business soon. The iPad and iPhone have opened doors to this that they would be stupid to ignore really. It will be difficult for any business to make a switch because unless people have used the Mac OS they just wouldn’t be able to cope with such a drastic OS change so it would require a lot of training. I would like to see it happen but it might not be for a while. Microsoft will for sure still dominate this market for many years.
It would be good if the UK government to bring more Apple to the UK government, and maybe that would filter through in to Education, as in my school of 700+ pupils, hardly anyone knows of any computer besides Windows. So if they then go to a place of work that uses Apple machines say in Media they will be lost. As schools could use PC’s for everyday things like Word Docs, and then use Mac’s for media stuff like video editing and digital art. As my schools IT systems are barley even able to load a stripped down version of Photoshop!
I am a government lawyer chained to an awful Dell PC at work. But when I go to court for hearings or for trial, I take my MacBook and my iPad. Ironically, my agency higher-ups all carry iPads, but they won’t get them for the legal staff. I think it would save money in the long run, by reducing downtime when the PCs inevitably crap out and in IT management. But it will never happen until Apple can produce a competitive bid.
I don’t know about completely ridding the government of Windows computers, but I’d like to see Apple devices at least have about 25% usage share. I realize that Apple doesn’t have much set in place for bulk buying of Apple equipment, but there should be some third parties that would benefit from setting up that sort of stuff. I merely feel that corporations should give Apple some play when employees might prefer using Apple computers. It’s totally unfair for IT to completely lock out a company that seems to be popular with consumers.
Yes. I use this on my Mac and not Office. I have also use ThinkFree Office which is not free but very low cost and it worked very well for me.
Windows PC makers cartel makes money out of deal with governments and IT guys.
He actually said open source.
All over the world governments showered money on open source projects but continue on giving Microsoft open doors.
It will not happen.
Perhaps when the IT is no longer influential..
Most computers are made in the Far East. They are however designed by an American Company. But the same might be said about HP or Dell.
I think Apple would be smart to offer its products to government agencies in bulk at a discount. Have you ever known anyone who, once having become competent on a Mac, to go back to a PC?
There’s a side-benefit everyone is overlooking. An Apple product tends to just work. And it works in an elegant, intelligent manager. The benefit, then, is that people who use Apple products tend to get so married to the “elegant and intelligent” way of doing this, they bring that mentality to everything else that they do. In this case, that’s government work. If using an Apple product will make Government employees focus more on the simplicity of government and quality of government, then I’m all for it! We all should be!
Well sort of, many XSI, 3DS Max and Microsoft centric developers use Macs with Windows OS
Mac w/o OS (X) is not 100% Mac.
AH!
“I use Apple at home. I know it’s not very open but …”
But it is open, quite open. It is Microsoft’s operating system which is closed (it is proprietary, whereas Mac OS X is Unix and based on completely open standards).
I am delighted to hear one of our MPs advocating the use of a secure, open and reliable technology in the UK.
Apple technology has a great deal to offer people in the UK, not least those in early education.
Perhaps the UK could too become “Insanely great”.
I would agree with the sentiments that in the long run savings could be made from reduced tech support, especially since Apple are gradually taking the intuitive features of iOS over to future version of OSX. Those tech support departments, IT managers and consultancy firms have gobbled up quite a bit of tax payer’s money over the last decade from what I understand. :/