Microsoft ran afoul of the Justice Department for many reasons, not the least among them their incredible guilt. One telling symptom of Microsoft's unparalleled arrogance and concomitant fall, however, was their eleventh-hour conversion to the lobbying faith. While, obviously, the open source movement is in no danger of meeting Microsoft's fate, the companies whose survival depends on open source software remain nonetheless vulnerable to the depredations of the political process. Our track record in dealings with the government has not been impressive. The Communications Decency Act was defeated in the courts, not the Capitol.
Strong encryption remains a point of contention between the USA and the rest of the planet.
The weird world of patents remains an ongoing range war between profiteers and common sense. Protecting the interests of the open source industry in Washington are a few interested civil rights groups, first among them the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Linux users groups remain unconnected islands of interest, mostly deaf to each other's activities. Mainstream media exposure to, and understanding of industry concerns remains low, and the concerns of the open source movement remain consequently distant from the consciousness of the electorate and their representatives. This arrangement is no longer satisfactory, it is wasteful, and its inadequacies will only worsen with time.