A few years ago, when people pitched opensource to government, it was all about the price, lower operational and infrastructural costs and to improve technology. Then the professional consultant woke up and the market shouted for the lack of support, integration and resources with knowledge to operate that new technology. That was the picture when I worked for the Portuguese Ministry of Justice.

Fast forward 7 years, we’re facing the same issue, but with the “cloud”. The same main reason that people pitch is around price, to lower operational and infrastructural costs, and improve current technology stack. Then the other side keeps shouting about support, about the legacy that they’ve sold years ago and how hybrid cloud is probably the best thing.

It is obvious to understand that the “other” side is the big consultancy firms, big software companies and those legacy systems integrators and suppliers. The same “old”.

For me and for Methods Digital (were I run the Infrastructure and Platforms practice), moving to the cloud is not about technology or even price – that’s too obvious – but rather a new way and opportunity to change current processes and workflows, in an agile, secure and affordable methodology. It’s about design and architecture, on how to give a new hope to the current legacy infrastructures, applications and businesses.

This FUD used on cloud now was previously used on opensource – exactly the same. History repeats itself.