Over in the UK, some people are noticing how the Open Source approach might be applied to completely different fields. Geoff Mulgan writes:

"As has happened with the web - those cities, organisations and nations that move fastest to embrace open methods are likely to benefit in all sorts of ways - economic, social and cultural. There is also a deep political and moral imperative to make the most of open methods since they are one of the most important ways to make a reality of such much-abused words as 'empowerment'."

Open source revolution | eGov monitor. A full 77-page PDF report is available here.