Public Sector Covert Ops (2006~2014)

There’s a part of myself few know, is what I did for PostgreSQL to let’s say “infiltrate” the French Governement, so it is widely used by it.

My main point was (and still is) “why my taxes are used to pay extra license costs, when, with Open Source software, this money could be used to have local people working for the local Governement?”.

It’s just a money shift. I was (and still am) often asked like “likely your PostgreSQL thing will cost me as much as my proprietary solution, why should I then move ?”.

I answered them that they should because, first they were comparing apple and oranges. Their proprietary software has two costs actually: license fees and professional services, including support. With Open Source, that’s only one they pay for: professional services, including support.

Quite every company I know, worked or work for, have the same business model here: support, because that’s the only recurring money you can have with Open Source. Some include professional services hours in it, others don’t.

The real game changer, is that having local companies acting local, in Open Source, will benefit not only to those companies, but also to the customer. It’s a win/win operation.

The companies giving Open Source support will have time and money to contribute, be better at what they do. And the money they do will also serve the local cause, thru the taxes they pay. And by contributing to projects they make software better.

The customers will benefit from local actors speaking their language, and actively contribute to the Open Source eco-system. This guarantees the best skils, and the best insurance to have a bug covered by the company itself if at anytime a bug happens. And they do happen. The software is better and better with time, and matches perfectly the needs.

You put Public Covert Ops in the subject? …

I participated actively, many hours, many days, and actually, many years, in advocating PostgreSQL in let’s say the “highest circles of power” in France.

I’ve visited many professional groups, lobbyists, big pharma, big industries… Just to promote PostgreSQL. In the 2000~2010, PostgreSQL really needed a boost in terms of communication to this kind of audience. You can’t imagine the number of people that just didn’t know that PostgreSQL was there!

On the Public Sector, this means I have participated in groups in many Ministries, including the Prime Minister’s team. I told those exactly what I wrote here: stop being stupid organizing your own slavery buying proprietary software. The decision processes on the Public Sector is sluggish. It takes years to decide something, and many more years to actually start doing things…

They needed simple examples to understand simple things. I always used 2 simple examples so they understand things:

• Linux won the battle of OSes for servers;
• so did Apache for web-servers…

And I told them “so will PostgreSQL in the area of RDBMS-es”.

I won’t say I was alone. Nor I’ll say that only my actions were game changers here, but I’m a quite proud I took part into those battles.

The result took a long time to become visible, but as an example, in a official document sent by Jean-Marc Ayrault, Prime Minister, in September 2012, in what is know as the Circulaire Ayrault (PDF), the word was spread that Ministries should move to Open Source as much as possible.

The “mimBD” group I was part of (“mutualisation interministérielle pour les bases de données”), stated in paragraph 6.2.2.3, page 17 out of 18 that Minsitries should “promote migrations from proprietary RDBMS-es to free RDBMS-es, in particular PostgreSQL”.

Call that “lobbying” if you want. I agree it is. I’m just proud it’s “lobbying for the good”!!

Since then, many other programs, meetings, public tenders where opened. And many French companies had a chance to answer and enjoy public money so they can hire local people to do local Open Source and by the way, contribute the Global Effort of Open Source!

One criticism I expect from that is “okay you did this for Dalibo, right?”.. I’d say.. Yes and No!

Yes, and I don’t regret it at all.

Running a business, it’s not about “just” making money. When you’re CEO of a company, that “money” aspect is just a secondary objective, serving the first one. For me, the first objective has always been to be sure the payroll could be paid for everybody, like expected. You may smile, but that was a real stress. I remember early years at Dalibo when we where waiting that this particular big customer pays the bill so we can pay the salaries. Fortunately, we did not go thru this many times.

And if that worked for Dalibo, it also worked for many other companies I know. I wasn’t alone doing such covert ops, many CEOs I know in the Open Source community did the same, and still do. It’s a long fight. And we had to do it because the proprietary software representatives just did the same. That’s how it works.

And about the money, that was very simple: at this time, Dalibo wasn’t anymore “mine” or “ours” with Damien, it was already a cooperative, where everyone “shares the cake” at the end of the year.

No, because I have higher standards than “just money”.

Open Source litteraly changed my life, PostgreSQL in particular, and giving it back as much as I can is just a normal rule. When you’re certain of doing good, why won’t you continue? Those “covert ops” as I called it, where for the good of many companies, not just Dalibo. Also, it was good for my country, believe it or not: local benefits makes local taxes, and gets back to the country. I really prefer when the taxes I pay goes to (indirectly ofc) to the local school or hospital, rather than marketing.

That speech I had at this time about the “public money”, and the strong sentence I was throwing back then: “for me, public money has to be respected, it’s your money, it’s mine… it’s ours”… Was really hitting people working in Ministries. Those are here because they have high values, and one has to speak to them the right way.

I must say too I never used anything else than work, perseverance, numbers and demonstrations to convince. I neved used Fear, uncertainty, and doubt, unlike my proprietary competitors did. I have so many stories here… Maybe another time :-)

I completely left that “game” around 2014, because, mostly, things changed, the good way, and I was much more concerned by internal changes, and managing the company…

Also, commercial sector were way of magnitude more rewarding that the public sector, where, depending who’s in charge, things change for the good or the bad.

At a certain point, I understood that I had to go into politics and become a politician to continue to serve that cause… I refrained from doing that. I wanted to stay clean, and not trying to play a game I would have lost: basically, I’m too gentle, kind and friendly… not to be eaten by the 1st politician I would have faced.

And I could speek about one well known CEO of an Open Source company that did go in that political area. He was “in the plane” with the President of France visiting foreign countries for business. He had much trouble around politics. I’m happy I did not follow that path at this time.