To actively explore the feasibility of promoting public code in Taiwan, and incorporate diverse suggestions during the policy planning phase, the Ministry of Digital Affairs (moda) and the citizen technology community launched the "Public Code．Opinion Collection" webpage (https://polis.tw/9nfw3ch6yj) on October 15th. The moda has invited the public to participate in online discussions about public code issues until November 15th.
The moda explained that public code refers to government-developed software source code treated as public property and made accessible to the general public. This concept has emerged in Europe since the 2010s, and the free software and open-source communities in Taiwan have been actively advocating for it.
The moda has initiated policy research on public code and aims to solicit suggestions from the public. In line with this objective, a symposium on the promotion of public code for the citizen technology community was held at Academia Sinica on October 15th, in conjunction with the g0v community's "Happy 11th Birthday Hackathon” event. The moda invited the citizen technology community to share information, and they also engaged the citizen technology community in a way familiar to them, creating a “Public Code． Opinion Collection” webpage (https://polis.tw/9nfw3ch6yj) to gather opinions from individuals across the country.
The moda utilizes the Polis structure to construct the webpage, allowing for the instant categorizations of users into groups based on their qualitative suggestions. This feature facilitates the rapid presentation of common values and differences of each group, fostering open discussion and focus. The hope is that this approach can accommodate diverse perspectives from various ethnic groups and encourage citizen participation.
The moda stated that the opinion collection on the webpage is not limited to hackathon participants or citizen technology communities, and will remain open until November 15th. Anyone with ideas concerning public code is encouraged to engage in online discussion. The moda will also organize symposiums involving the public sector, industry, and academia to further gather feedback and opinions from all parties.
Sources：MODA
