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Two Open Document Standards Better Than One?
tsa writes "Microsoft says that the consumers should have the choice between multiple open standards for documents." From the article: "Microsoft's Yates said that OpenDocument and Open XML come from very different design points. 'In the future at some point there will be convergence,' he said. In the near term, the transition period from proprietary document formats to Open XML-based ones will be 'messy and complex,' he added. 'Competition between standards we believe is a very good thing.'"
We might not be able to beat one good format, but we can easily defeat two.
"standards are great, everyone should have one."
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If there are two standards, how can they be called standards?
Isn't that like having competing monopolies?
Regardless, competetion in standards is only good for a short period of time, after that there is a waste of man hours on one project to the detriment of whatever the standard is for.
Since they haven't done that yet, the rest is just speculation. It looks like legal issues will be keeping the Free world on OpenDocument for the foreseeable future.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
so up yours.
Laws are for people with no friends.
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"Competition between two standards we believe is a very good thing"
From past experience, Microsoft only believes this when the leading standard is someone elses. Once Microsoft's standard holds the most mindshare/marketshare, then they don't like competition anymore.
Just what I've observed
Using plain ol' text since 1968
Competition between standards we believe is a very good thing
Yeah, for microsoft.
You can expect this kind of horse shit from MS because they are on the weak end of the document format wars. Allow me to explain:
Competition between programs is a very good thing. No arguments. Standards are just that, standards. There has already been a shake down period, and people have agreed this is an agreed set of rules. Hence, "standard". By instigating a whole new standards "war", they hope to create confusion and chaos. And those of you who work with PHB already know the next bit: They panic and go with the safe option.
Fuck 'em. I hope against logic that they get eaten alive on this one.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
It's just marketing BS. Bleh!
Open doesn't mean what it should anymore.
Like in this article for example.
QUOTE:
Thanks to Microsoft, users will face the "unsavory prospect of two supposed standards. The truth is that only one of them is free of intellectual property encumbrances. Only one reflects multivendor support, and only one reflects openness. That standard is OpenDocument Format,"
Linux/Open Source/Anti Microsoft News
Let's see, embrace, extend, extinguish.
Embrace: Do a complete reversal; say that open standards are a great idea, far better than our own proprietary asshattery.
Extend: So yeah, we're all about open standards now and look we've got our own version OpenXML. It's obviously better (or at least that's what people will believe thanks to our unstoppable marketing department) so we'll add extra tags and change the format of existing ones. Oh by the way, this means that only Microsoft products will create this and only Microsoft products will understand this but that's not our fault, honestly.
Extinguish: Well everyone seems to be using our version of the open document format since 90% of all computer users use our software so only masochists use that 'other' standard. We'll repeatedly change the standard by making each version of our software understand only a new version of it. After everyone is frustrated by the lack of stability in a so called standard, we'll do another 180 and point out how much better and stable closed source/standards are and move everyone back to safe, trustworthy Microsoft standards that Just Works(tm).
Thanks for playing!
I got a new laptop and it had MS works installed. I used Word until the trial period expired then when I could no longer open documents I downloaded OpenOffice. Lo and behold when I try to open an MS document now it does open using Word except it does ask me to license the product.
I get the impression that Word looks for OpenOffice and if it finds it decides to go ahead and open the document!!!!
Multiple, competing open standards are fine, and being open it is usually not too difficult to translate between them. Unfortunately MS's "Open XML" standard is not open, so they are not really giving us the choice they are claiming. Open XML is format that is patented and that is licensed with a variety of important restrictions. For example, only the current version is covered by the license, it expires immediately should a new version come out. According to the letter of the license this means the benefits of backwards compatibility and even the ability to distribute a program from one day to the next are subject to MS's whim. Should MS release a new version that is intentionally broken, they could legally restrict competitors from continuing to sell or even give away a word processor.
Redistribution is completely forbidden by the licensing, leading many to believe that it was specifically designed to exclude GNU licensed applications, like Open Office, their primary competitor. How can anyone call "Open XML" and open format when the license under which that format is offered means it can't be implemented by OpenOffice?
All of this is MS marketing FUD. Closed is open. Bad is good. Ha ha we made it really hard for you to explain shit to your managers by naming our product the opposite of what it is. This is like GM calling the next iteration of their traditional cargo van "Hybrid Luxury Mobile" despite it not having a hybrid engine or any luxury features. Don't fall for their crap.
If you are Microsoft, what you have at stake are billions of dollars and your monopoly. Therefore Microsoft will do absolutely anything to protect both. They are a monopoly and this is what monopolies do.
I guess all the rest of us can do is plot our course - in this case OpenDocument - and stick to it through thick and thin.
Microsoft will contine to wriggle and bluster around this for months and months. It's part of the game. There's no point wasting any more energy on the subject. Microsoft would like nothing more than to exhaust people they will always regard as competition.
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Most MS critics are not upset because MS is winning, but because MS is using unfair and illegal means in order to win.
People have chosen to use MS software and they have chosen to give MS a majority market share.
You mean: PC manufacturers have chosen to bundle Windows and Office on every system they sell, not giving a rebate to consumers who want a new PC without Windows+Office. Having Windows+Office preinstalled on every new system gave MS a majority market share.
Joe Average will reason that, having already paid for the pre-installed software, he is going to use that software instead of buying and installing alternative software - after all, the only software Joe Average installs on his PC is the software that get's automatically installed when you surf to the wrong websites with IE as your browser.
Please stop parroting the MS marketing speak; MS Office isn't running on most PC's because the consumers chose to use it, but because the PC manufactures preinstalled it.
Maybe I can spell it out using nice, short little sentences for you.
See, the interesting part comes from the change in Word's behaviour upon installing OpenOffice. That wasn't so hard, was it?
Take for example Betamax vs VHS. That was very good thing. Oh wait, no, the other thing. A major catastorphy. It caused consumers tons of pain, cost everyone tons of money and set the industry back years.
Competition is good. Standards are good. Competition between standards: very bad.
"And we go round and round and round in the circle game."
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