The problem is that a lot of organizations see foss as purely a free thing and not an investment. If they put half the money they spent on licensing into paying people to improve the foss packages they use, the ecosystem would transform and everyone would benefit. Massive cost savings overall, and it would push paid software to work harder to compete (who knows, it might even force Microsoft to offer decent privacy policies and remove ads from their manipulative desktop)
Organizations like school systems don't have a great track record managing custom software projects. They don't know what to look for and who to hire, and how much things should cost. It's very likely that these problems would translate into funding FOSS development as well. Also, it's a big headache to manage custom development compared to buying or downloading an off the shelf package.
It’s hard to predict whether you could make MS products in foss with global cooperation at lower cost to taxpayers (since it can be expensive to get politicians to agree with goals across international borders).
great to see the "H-word" used as a slur, again (great for my own sense of antagonistic prejuidice being alive and well that is).
for a more constructive reinforcement of what a "hippy way" might be, in business and government:
anti-rascist, that is actively inviting and communicating with others socially; inclusive generally; valuing cooperation; building and valuing talent for its own sake; bringing in arts to shared spaces; generally vegetarian; health proactive; tolerance of personal drug use including tobacco; deeply environmentalist; generally opposed to military-style administration; generally opposed to authoritarian governments; use of non-monetary trade goods; valuing education and definitely advanced education.
are these things "fail" in City Administration as the parent comment implies ? not necessarily
Hiring developers to work on specific package improvements is what is normally done. Could be legally binding, probably would be a standard employment agreement but you could do it through a hippie way (coding circle?).
