NoOOXML

CompTIA lobbyist and ex-ECMA general secretary Jan van den Beld blogs about the value of the ISO system.

ECMA turned out to be a commercial means of privileged access to the ISO system and was totally captured. As many persons from his lobbying side he also takes the DIN press release as a means of counter-attack:

This would follow on the heels of the false claims by the opponents of Open XML adoption of irregularities in the NB process essentially anywhere the NBs voted against their interests. For example, we have seen them attack reputable organizations like the DIN of Germany who took the unusual action of putting out a press release to respond to the manufactured “controversy” with a statement that says reports currently circulating on the web about the voting procedures conducted in connection with the ISO/IEC DIS 29500 Office Open XML are “wrong and misleading.”

Indeed the misconception was that the vote was not about the standard but about the regularity of the procedure. This message was covered by all sides of the debate and esp. print journalism. The result of the vote 7:6 sounds convincing, DIN formally decided everything was right and no formal reasons could be found to overturn the national decision. In fact no "controversy" was manufactured but the very controversy was subject to the vote.

Soon, however, we will know how far they are willing to go with the scorched earth campaign if, after the final ballot results, you see calls for appeals in JTC 1, from these companies or their allies.

Indeed, we can expect that all these appeals will be overturned. This is no reason to abstain from using these legitimate means.