Rationale for creating software with global scope

Implementing
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What factor was the deciding point to make this project a worldwide use, as opposed to customizing it to a country such as the US?

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The US has a very poor track record of developing health information technology which works with different use cases. Whether those use cases are different locations in the US or half-way around the planet, the flexibility of the software is the same. However, that’s not really the reason… as OpenMRS started in Africa (Kenya) and was designed based on lessons learned from Regenstrief and others. The Millennium Villages Project needed a platform to implement in 10 sub-saharan African countries. This all combined with the open source community to produce a global platform, albeit especially designed for low-resource settings, wherever they were.

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Thanks for the response @akanter

The background to this project makes it all the more interesting

What an awesome project this is!

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Here is a great Google Tech Talk by @paul and @burke about the rationale and history:

I can’t even put into words how much I love this community and how special it is. I’m not even sure what it is about the community, but I love it.

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