| By Open Source News |
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| December 31, 2005 02:15 AM EST |
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"Even the smallest initiatives are being mitigated or stopped by some of the most unlikely and often uninformed parties...I view these circumstances as quite troubling because the good work laid out by the IT Commission is slowly being strangled and brought to a halt. And the last thing I can let happen is my presence be the major contributing factor marginalizing the good work of ITD and the entire IT community." wrote Peter Quinn (pictured) in an e-mail to his staff explaining why he has resigned from his post as CIO of the State of Massachusetts, effective January 9, 2006.
No announcement has been made as to a replacement. However, Quinn did stress to employees of the state's Information Technology Division (ITD) that his leaving did not mean that Massachusetts' progress towards ODF was ending.
The move to standardize on the OpenDocument format for all electronic documents in Massachusetts began on Sept. 1, when the proposal was first approved. The plan was quickly attacked by Microsoft, which called it "inconsistent and discriminatory." Microsoft has since submitted its new Office Open XML formats to Ecma International for standardization.
Quinn stressed that his resignation was not forced. In an interview, Quinn's prior boss Eric Kriss said that Quinn was ill prepared for the game of political football that the ODF controversy had created. "Peter is an IT professional who is not accustomed to the rough-and-tumble world of politics," Kriss said. "He found the last few months to be very distasteful, especially the Boston Globe article that seemed to imply some sort of improper influence related to his conference travel."
Quinn was cleared of any wrongdoing, as implied by the Boston Globe article, by an internal review.
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