An increase in the use of hosted applications such as webmail and Google Apps is driving the adoption of open source software behind the scenes.

Dr Malcolm Newdick, managing director at IT management and support firm Riverbank, told the Westminster eForum that many smaller companies and users either do not care, or are still very wary, about open source software.

"Ignorance is the primary reason, as well as inertia, concerns around interoperability and the 'you get what pay for' mentality that inherently distrusts anything that is free," he said.

But Newdick pointed out that these users may be surprised to learn that they are helping to drive and develop the open source community by using hosted applications over the internet.

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