The PlayFrance.Digital collective, born in April 2020, brings together more than 300 French digital actors, a majority of whom are entrepreneurs. This collective militates for a sovereign digital, that is to say the constitution of a solid ecosystem that constitutes a third way, neither American (GAFAM & Co) nor Chinese (BATX & Co). We would like to see the development of French or possibly European solutions across the entire digital value chain, from hardware to software, not forgetting data, the new black gold for the development of the industry of the future. We do not want to relive the equivalent of the oil crisis, because we have not taken the right measures, in a phygital society that has also become seriously deindustrialized.
One of the strong measures taken by the PlayFrance.Digital collective is the will that the state and local authorities devote at least 50% of its digital budget to French players. This has the double objective of allowing the emergence of a solid and sustainable ecosystem and to free us from a dependence of the public sector on foreign players, which recent events have shown us are not our friends… This is also taken up by the IT50+ and the Objectif France movement in its digital program.
Among the signatories are the leaders of Cozycloud, Digimind, Jalios, Jamespot, Olvid, Mailo, Marketor, Smartrezo, Talkspirit, Tilkal, Whaller, Wimi but also Forum Atena, Inter-Ligere, Les Cas d’or or other digital actors such as JM Billaut, L. Bretones, D. Douani, F Elboin, J. Toledano, D. Fayon, yours truly, and many others.
PlayFrance. Digital, has just published its charter based on the fact that both for health solutions (Health Data Hub), to manage the loans guaranteed by the State (PGE at BPI), that for defense or industrial issues the government chose American solutions, vassalizing us to the policy and the goodwill of the United States (Azure, AWS, etc. …). We even see a Secretary of State in charge of digital technology proudly wearing a T-shirt with the colors of one of the big American digital companies… Can you imagine a Minister of Agriculture sponsoring Californian wines?
PlayFranceDigital Charter
Purpose of the document
The purpose of this document is to define a charter to which each member of the collective commits to adhere, in order to adopt common values and a common definition of our digital sovereignty. This charter has the value of an ethical and benevolent commitment in the relations between members of the collective and also towards the actors of digital sovereignty who have not yet joined the collective, or do not wish to join it.
Context
In April 2020, a collective “Play France Digital” was formed to promote software solutions from French (European) publishers. Several actions, mainly of communication, have been conducted and we have started to make a voice distinct from the “big” players and, unfortunately, from the government.
The evolution of GAIA-X, which we could have hoped would be the basis of a new strategy by taking the lever of the “cloud” as a support point, has been very disappointing. The coup de grâce was given by the recent choices of the government with its notion of “trusted cloud” that can rely on US technologies and its “cloud at the center” orientation that will push, at a forced march, the administrations into the jaws of the wolf.
It is important to remember that the challenges of digital sovereignty apply to the entire digital value chain:
- Hardware (PC / Smartphone / Servers / Routers / Supercomputers / Processors / Networks / Telephony)
- Software (from the lowest to the highest layers)
- The data
An opportunity
While many actors are small, they have difficulty making themselves heard in the face of the GAFAMs’ steamroller and the inertia that governs the choices of large companies and administrations reluctant to go off the beaten track, their solutions are not examined.
Moreover, they are sometimes competitors, but they may share a common interest that exceeds them all, according to the adage “Strength in numbers”. A small group of actors, more committed, is convinced that a greater coherence of actions should result from the adoption of some rules allowing to establish a sincere partnership between those who want to work towards this objective.
Commitments
All signatories of the Charter commit to:
- Support the fight for our digital sovereignty.
- -To follow the implementation of the following elements constituting the sovereignty of our solutions:
- Offer sovereign hosting, especially for their French customers. Alternative hostings are quite possible in the conquest of an international market, but it is necessary to propose differentiated but watertight hostings. Operated by a player with a majority of French and European capital
- Tracking devices must be considered in relation to sovereignty objectives and in respect of individual liberties
- Use existing sovereign solutions such as social networks, media for collective communications in addition to social networks and GAFAMs solutions that are still essential today.
- To offer their solution or platform free of charge for the collective and within the strict framework of the collective.
- To propose to each member of the collective a preferential rate that does not unbalance its economic model, nor that of its sovereign competitors who may also be in the collective. The objective is to support each other and create an ecosystem.
- To carry, and support all new and innovative initiatives (Sponsorship of developers, start-ups)
- To establish a table of equivalence which will allow to put in comparison with each American or Chinese solution the French equivalent solution(s). This will allow each member to better understand the positioning of each, but it can also be used in our various communications
Self-regulation
The rules have been stated simply enough to reflect the spirit of the proposed action.
Their free acceptance is the necessary condition to be able to give and receive from this mini-community. The rule “you have to give in order to receive” is supposed to be understood as “fuel” for the common actions.
Parasitic” behavior is obviously intolerable and would be, among other deviations, a reason for exclusion from this group which relies on the sincerity of its members.
