So this is just weird. Just a few weeks ago after it was leaked that Open Source WA was going to be shut down, the WA Government backflipped denying funding issues amidst community frustration. The Department of Industry and Resources in Perth then committed to keeping the Open Source WA centre open.
Then less than a month later it is announced the Open Source WA project is axed due to “budgetary constraintsâ€. What is going on here!
The Open Source WA centre acted as a point of education, training, piloting and experimenting with Open Source software for businesses and education. It was a free centre and a great resource. For what it is worth, the centre was very well run by Kevin Russell and his team there and I would hope it can continue to run. I would hope we would start seeing such centres in every state.
I complained a few weeks ago to every pollie listed on the site, and got no responses at all.
It’s a bit early to conclude “conspiracy” but such a result wouldn’t shock me. The crew running OSWA have been polite, helpful & consistent across the board, and everyone who mentions them to me gives them high praise, so I sincerely doubt that the motivation for shutting them down is as clean & honest as it could be.
It is a pity that such a brilliant initiative should be allowed to die (or be killed). I think that such initiative should have served as a model for other nations to follow. I implore the necessary authourities to reconsider its stand and restore the centre. I believe there is more to it than meet the eye about the case.