I mean, this is getting bizarre.

And while you’re at it, could you find the time to let us know why there is so much cruft in the actual ECMA 376 specification instead of their substance being abstracted and left in the specification and their surface matter put elsewhere in an appendix?

I don’t get it; I just don’t get it.

If you want to read more about how we found it, check out these two posts:
http://uf.freeculture.org/2007/04/18/microsoft-lobbying-on-open-standards-bill/
http://uf.freeculture.org/2007/04/01/legislature-2007-state-of-florida-it/

Thanks for blogging about the issue.

In a direct sense I agree with amd-linux — Microsoft seems to have gone to the Karl Rove school of dirty tricks.

One word sums up Microsoft’s behavior in all this: desperation. As you noted, “In a healthy standards body, a single “No” vote should not be a newsworthy event, and should certainly not be something that Microsoft is still complaining about 6 months later.“

The attacks by Microsoft supporters on those who disagree with their unprecedented cakewalk toward ISO certification are direct signs of desperation. They are lashing out because they know the days are numbered for their failed file format and that the world — that is, governments, industry, and everywhere but the US and parts of Western Europe — will not chain its entire data structure to a corporation. IBM sided with open source long ago, and it’s won them new clients around the globe. Sun has be enlivened by open source and has expanded its mission thanks to the possiblities that ODF provides. Users are excited this year — not by anything Microsoft has released — but by Ubuntu 7.04.

The encroachment of open source will continue to Microsoft’s frustration, no matter ISO’s outcome.

And that anti-ODF lobby paper is enlightening too. Has anyone written a rebuttal? If not they should (and preferably a spoof “National Lampoons Whitepaper on how bad ODF is”).

Chris

Now for the serious stuff. Every organization that contemplates prescribing an Office Standard is preparing for the case MS forces MSOOXML through ISO.

So they ALL add the condition that any standard should be “Controlled by an open industry organization with a well-defined inclusive process for evolution of the standard.”. This will clearly disqualify MSOOXML because MS would have to allow IBM and Sun to participate in the governement of the standard.

So I think administrations everywhere take no chances at MS being able to strongarm ISO into accepting a rubber stamped MSOOXML standard, and clearly state they DON’T want it.

Btw, I still feel odd about a voting procedure where many or most participants will be fired if they vote against MSOOXML.

(and in response to MS fans, we know how Steve and Bill treat opposition; Peter Quinn was obviously forced to resign for voting against MS. Now PROVE that IBM has fired a representative who voted against IBMs strategic plans)

Winter

And I think this statement is also clear, pointing out that the preservation project that Microsoft contributed to is not about how the museum will delivery content: “Some people think we are adopting Microsoft formats as our standard for digital preservation. This is not right; we are striving to make sure that content we receive in MS formats will be preserved.” He continued: “What format will we deliver? We deliver a lot of articles and in many formats. We deliver content in PDF, Office Open, ODF, TIFF —whatever format the customer wants.”

I don’t get it. This has nothing to do with preservation or formats or standardization, it is about the library budget and whether they may have to limit hours or charge some sort of entrance fee. These are issues that almost any public library system has to deal with when their budget is cut or does not grow to match increased costs.

I suppose it would be interesting to see how the Open Document Format petition ranks against others of the 7,000, but I don’t get the pertinence of this one to Rob’s theme.

“Welcome to the petition creation page.

“There are over 7,000 petitions on this site. Before creating a new petition, please use this box to check whether a petition already exists which makes your point. If so, please add your name to that petition. We will not create duplicate petitions making identical points.

“Once you’ve done your search, you can continue to create a new petition, or to sign an existing one.”

So it is nice that it is hosted by 10 Downing Street, but I’m not sure what the point is other than that.

It seems to be transparent in terms of signatories, although I suppose the thing can be gamed without too much trouble, which is not too different than any other on-line petition scheme.

I personally think petitions for this sort of thing are lame, including the ones set up by Microsoft.

It might be worth noting that British Librarians have their own pertinent petition regarding preserving accessibility and freedom here:
http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/library/

While it is hard to think that Microsoft will change their tactics, it becomes obvious that they seem to far less effective when they don’t have any way of controlling the flow of information and have to buy their friends.

Welcome to the Information Age.

http://lnxwalt.wordpress.com/2007/03/23/packing-the-court-at-the-iso/
“To the beautiful city of Oslo to attend the first SC 34 meeting of the year, and in particular to progress DSDL. SC34 suddenly has a lot of new P member countries (’participating member’ countries) sending representatives, and I am interested to note the majority of their representatives are, as individuals, also Microsoft employees.“

Boycott Novell also has descriptions of this from other bloggers here; read the comments section halfway down for a collection, up to that date of April 6/07:
http://boycottnovell.com/2007/04/06/ooxml-five-month-iso-ballot-process-begins/

It worries me that this is going on to this day as you’ve noted, yet you’ve employees from ODF-supporting companies aren’t doing the same….why is that???

Here’s something you may not know: Microsoft, especially in Redmond, is quite liberal. I think I probably speak for the majority of Redmondites in saying I’d rather have Rob Weir as President than George Bush. (No sarcasm at all, and that’s more about George than you, Rob. :-))

Cheers,
Doug

That quote from the British Library was from November 2005, before the TC even was formally created by Ecma and before it even met for the first time. He is not commenting on the OOXML specification. How could he be, when it wasn’t even started yet?

Of course, cynics mights also note that this quote came just two weeks after Microsoft announced that they were investing $2.5 million in a digitization project at the British Library.

As he says, “I anticipate that the resulting standardized formats will have excellent preservation properties.” Note the word “anticipate”. That is the nice thing about the British — they have a different word for everything, and each ones means something.

In any case I wonder whether he thinks that what he anticipated actually was accomplished and whether he is pleased with the results? Would he say that the OOXML specification, filled with bitmasks, dependencies on Windows, dependencies on undocumented behaviors from previous versions of Office, with incorrect calculations of leap years, etc., whether this indeed has what he would call, in retrospect, “excellent preservation properties”?

Oh, and next time you want to call someone “stupid”, maybe you want to give your name and stand by your words. Or are you are you a coward as well as stupid?

-Rob

http://newsbreaks.infotoday.com/nbreader.asp?ArticleID=16059

“Adam Farquhar, head of e-Architecture for the British Library, commented: “We think it’s fantastic that Microsoft is opening up the MS Office formats to standardization.”"

“The British Library’s Farquahr said: “I think that it is significant that Microsoft is taking this step. Microsoft is listening to customers who want to ensure that they have full access to the content that they have created. The route that they are following—standards-based followed by standardization—is a very positive one, and I anticipate that the resulting standardized formats will have excellent preservation properties. There are many alternate routes that they could have taken!”"

As a German, may I point out that Microsoft in my country is more and more becoming a synonym for the “bad” America – in a bitter row with your current president, the Guantanamo camp and the war in Iraq.

Microsoft is damaging the reputation of your great nation.

What we are seeing is Microsoft clawing its way kicking and screaming against the tide of open formats. The thing is that people are wising up and want control of their data. And once there is enough groundswell around open formats, their dirty tricks will be ineffective. They know this, which is why you see them opening up so many fronts.

I personally get a little giggly at their attempts because it just highlights their desperation.

Dave’s recurring response? “Don’t like the GPL? Tough. Adapt or die.”

Link here.

I once knew a man who could easily have been in a similar situation – he was a retired Collingwood player – AFL, for the incognoscenti – who was playing Aussie Rules on the amateur level in New Zealand. He said on one occasion that every winter he put on weight – then for the NZ Aussie Rules season in early spring, he burnt it off, quite rapidly.

It makes a difference when you’ve got some motivation – for one thing, you stop complaining and play as hard as you can.

I think Microsoft has lost the will to compete in a field they regard as their own by right – if MS Office 2k7 was supposed to drive the adoption of MS Windows Vista, it hasn’t succeeded so far, and if MS Office 2k7 was supposed to drive the adoption of ECMA 376, it likewise hasn’t succeeded.