The following monitoring shows that, in the last semester, nine Italian Regions have reduced advertisement about of proprietary PDF readers on their website, and that a Region has raised increased its support to for Free Software PDF readers.

Table of Content

• Current State
• Trend
• What Italian Regions might do in the future
• Monitorings History

Current State

This is the fourth monitoring about the post campaign Free Software PDF Readers, launched by Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) in 2009 that was based on three core principles:

• Neutrality: Public institutions should not engage in advertising
• Freedom: Public institutions should not ask citizens to use non-free Software
• Open Standards: The versions of the PDF format which are Open Standards can be implemented by all PDF readers

Data collected are just rough figures because the are banally extracted searching the string "adobe reader" OR "acrobat reader" OR "adobe acrobat reader" and the string "lettore PDF libero" on regional domains, for example like:

• site:*regione.abruzzo.it "adobe reader" OR "acrobat reader" OR "adobe acrobat reader"
• site:*regione.abruzzo.it "lettore PDF libero"

Number of Google search results into Regional's domain (1 May 2017)

Italian Region		Searched word
Name	Searched Domain	"adobe reader" OR "acrobat reader" OR "adobe acrobat reader"	"lettore PDF libero"
Abruzzo	site:*regione.abruzzo.it	65	0
Basilicata	site:*regione.basilicata.it	214	0
Calabria	site:*regione.calabria.it	56	0
Campania	site:*regione.campania.it	279	0
Emilia-Romagna	site:*regione.emilia-romagna.it	248	3
Friuli-Venezia Giulia	site:*regione.fvg.it	74	0
Lazio	site:*regione.lazio.it	168	0
Liguria	site:*regione.liguria.it	77	0
Lombardia	site:*regione.lombardia.it	131	0
Marche	site:*regione.marche.it	69	0
Molise	site:*regione.molise.it	6	0
Piemonte	site:*regione.piemonte.it	231	0
Puglia	site:*regione.puglia.it	280	0
Sardegna	site:*regione.sardegna.it	66	0
Sicilia	site:*regione.sicilia.it	1250	0
Toscana	site:*regione.toscana.it	90	0
Trentino-Alto Adige	site:*regione.taa.it	3350	139
Umbria	site:*regione.umbria.it	37	0
Valle d'Aosta	site:*regione.vda.it	162	0
Veneto	site:*regione.veneto.it	261	0

Trend

In order to get an idea about the trend in supporting free PDF readers this monitoring can be compared with the 1 Nov 2016 monitoring one, for example:

248 -     2017-05-01 Emilia-Romagna "adobe reader" OR "acrobat reader" OR "adobe acrobat reader"
253 =     2016-11-01 Emilia-Romagna "adobe reader" OR "acrobat reader" OR "adobe acrobat reader"
-----
 -5 / 253 * 100 = -1.98 %

139 -     2017-05-01 Trentino-Alto Adige "lettore PDF libero"
132 =     2016-11-01 Trentino-Alto Adige "lettore PDF libero"
-----
  7 / 132 * 100 = 5.30 %

Trending in number of Google search results into Regional's domain (1 May 2017)

Italian Region		Searched word
Name	Searched Domain	"adobe reader" OR "acrobat reader" OR "adobe acrobat reader"	"lettore PDF libero"	Rel. %	Rel. %
Abruzzo	site:*regione.abruzzo.it	-15	0	-18.75%	0.00%
Basilicata	site:*regione.basilicata.it	27	0	14.44%	0.00%
Calabria	site:*regione.calabria.it	0	0	0.00%	0.00%
Campania	site:*regione.campania.it	77	0	38.12%	0.00%
Emilia-Romagna	site:*regione.emilia-romagna.it	-5	0	-1.98%	0.00%
Friuli-Venezia Giulia	site:*regione.fvg.it	-7	0	-8.64%	0.00%
Lazio	site:*regione.lazio.it	-82	0	-32.80%	0.00%
Liguria	site:*regione.liguria.it	6	0	8.45%	0.00%
Lombardia	site:*regione.lombardia.it	-22	0	-14.38%	0.00%
Marche	site:*regione.marche.it	10	0	16.95%	0.00%
Molise	site:*regione.molise.it	-1	0	-14.29%	0.00%
Piemonte	site:*regione.piemonte.it	-9	0	-3.75%	0.00%
Puglia	site:*regione.puglia.it	-1880	0	-87.04%	0.00%
Sardegna	site:*regione.sardegna.it	-25	0	-27.47%	0.00%
Sicilia	site:*regione.sicilia.it	50	0	4.17%	0.00%
Toscana	site:*regione.toscana.it	33	0	57.89%	0.00%
Trentino-Alto Adige	site:*regione.taa.it	1110	7	49.55%	5.30%
Umbria	site:*regione.umbria.it	14	0	60.87%	0.00%
Valle d'Aosta	site:*regione.vda.it	30	0	22.73%	0.00%
Veneto	site:*regione.veneto.it	10	0	-3.98%	0.00%
Average Trend		-33.95	0.35	3.40%	0.27%

A positive contribute in supporting free PDF reader is:

• any increment in "lettore PDF libero" occurrence
• any decrement in "adobe reader" OR "acrobat reader" OR "adobe acrobat reader" occurrence

therefore it is possible to draw the relative % trend in supporting free PDF readers:

What Italian Regions might do in the future

In the future Italian Regions could greatly demonstrate their interest in neutrality, freedom end open standards, if they committed:

• to place side by side the current proprietary PDF readers' advertising with the equivalent Free Software PDF readers, by a link like “Scarica un lettore PDF libero” (“Download Free Software PDF readers”) and with buttons and icons available at PDFreaders.org’s graphics section
• to recommend in their web content production guidelines, and in their web application design guidelines, an appropriate section about how to support Free Software PDF readers, motivationally explaining the eventual support for proprietary PDF readers
• to consider adding in their web content production training courses an appropriate situation focused on how to support Free Software PDF readers, motivationally explaining the eventual support for proprietary PDF readers

Monitorings History

• 2016-11 Adoption of Free Software PDF readers in Italian Regional Public Administrations (third monitoring)
• 2016-05 Adoption of Free Software PDF readers in Italian Regional Public Administrations (second monitoring)
• 2015-11 Adoption of Free Software PDF readers in Italian Regional Public Administrations