NoOOXML

Brussels, 2 April 2008 — ISO members failed to disapprove the Open XML format. Microsoft has compromised the International Standards Organisation (ISO) during the rush to get a stamp for their Office OpenXML (OOXML), using unfair practices such as committee stuffing in several countries and political interventions of ministers in the standardization process.

The much-debated open document standard Office Open XML (OOXML) has been approved by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), according to a document obtained by Intellectual Property Watch.

ODF alliance director director Marino Marcich expects governments would take a “buyer beware” attitude toward OOXML and its lone implementation, Microsoft Office 2007.

CSI just accepted ODF as their national standard.

Confidential sources say that President Sarkozy has intervened himself in the French position on Microsoft OOXML, asking members of the committee to revert their position, and support an abstention. Our sources say he was approached by a lobbyist during his 3-days trip in England. The intervention has been made on Friday.

openmalaysiablog.com lists the final results of the countries voting for DIS 29500 (more popularly known as Microsoft OOXML). See http://www.openmalaysiablog.com/2008/03/the-last-lap.html

On wednesday the International Standards Organization is expected to announce the approval.

21 NO against 2 YES (Microsoft and their partner Statoil) and the Standards Body still vote YES. "If it is now market forces which take over ISO work, then that is something completely different" says Steve Pepper, a volunteer in standards work for 13 years.

i rregularities keep being reported , this time in Norway. Here's how they shuffled the deck in Norway. So they put everyone out of the room, and Standards Norway, three people were left in the room, and they usurped the decision and made it their business to decide to approve anyway. If it was happening in only one country, you might think it was local difficulties. But when it happens in place after place, one can only conclude that Microsoft, although outnumbered in a fair vote, has sufficient clout behind the scenes. A formal protest regarding the Norwegian vote on ISO/IEC DIS 29500 has benn submitted by the chairman of the comittee.

Some people are not very good at distinguishing Carbon Copy and Blind Carbon Copy. Hopefully, Carbon Copy helps when Microsoft Singapore asks to send letters of support of OOXML to the national Standards Body.

A Brazilian delegate reveals how the BRM was manipulated.

PolishLinux reports that the chairman of the committee continued its frenzy with counting the members who don't cast any vote as voting for the standard. You don't vote, so you vote in favor of the standard. What the heck?

Groklaw reports that Bill Gates took the phone to lobby Mexico to vote for OOXML.

Why would an organisation that promotes ISO 9000 all of a sudden want to ditch Total Quality Management and set up a repair shop?

Microsoft's US brand ranking falls dramatically.

How can it be that a committee with technically skilled people from a developed nation votes approval to a premature specification? Technical arguments are of minor importance when commercial pressure dictates the work program. DIN itself reportedly even assisted the process to get compromised.

In Britain the standard body is said to make the limbo for an eventual Open XML approval. The BSI seemed to set the highest quality standard among ISO members in the OOXML review process.

Romania voted 'yes' to adopting OOXML as an ISO standard, with 15 votes for it, 6 against and 5 abstentions. There is strong suspicion of ballot-stuffing and the Romanian Standardization Organization has so far refused to offer any information other than the vote distribution.

The Chairwoman of the polish Technical Committee has distributed documentation about the BRM authored by Microsoft. She has also changed the voting rules for the email ballot to "If you don't vote, it is counted as a YES", and she has threatened to sue committee members if they spread accusations. What a nice broken chairwoman they have in Poland.

Yesterday, Microsoft and Milan-based Sourcesense announced they collaborate to contribute code to Apache POI, a Java library for manipulating Microsoft Office files. This collaboration has two possible consequences: either it will turn POI into the greatest patent laundry of all time, or it will help Microsoft to launch a patent ambush on the project. Feel free to decide which one is more likely.