Patent Threats In OOXML

An anonymous reader notes an initiative by the New Zealand Open Source Society to weigh in on the question of standardizing Microsoft's OOXML. The organization has authored a white paper (available in several formats, HTML here) laying out the ways in which the OOXML spec falls short of what a standard should be. From the article: "'If OOXML goes through as an ISO standard, the IT industry, government and business will [be] encumbered with a 6,000-page specification peppered with potential patent liabilities' said New Zealand OSS President Don Christie. 'Alarm bells are going off in many parts of the world over OOXML. Normally ISO draft standards would be drawn up by a number of stakeholder organizations, involving an often slow process of consensus building and knowledge sharing. Since many aspects of the office document format remain proprietary, OOXML has not taken this development track.'"

Comments

Re:if ISO approves it, they become irrelevant.

[kurt555gs]

Normally I would say that the above article is your typical GNAA type Slashdot troll. However since it is about Microsoft, and their evil OOXML, I think it should be modded up for being Insightful.

Cheers

Simple Solution.

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, the US could simply pass a law deemimg it to be a standard (like weights and measures) free of all patent copyright issues at the stroke of the pen.

The trouble is backward compatibility from MS-WOD for DOS to now, and the next 20 years - in the future. As legal documents change/ break with regularity, they need a standard that stays true - and MS is not it.