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Microsoft Bought Sweden's ISO Vote on OOXML?
a_n_d_e_r_s writes "The vote on OOXML looked fairly secured. Most in the Working Group in Sweden was against the vote to approve OOXML. The day of the vote, though, more companies showed up at the door. Some 20 new companies — each one payed about $2500 to be allowed to vote — and vote they did ... for Microsoft. Most of the new companies were partners from Microsoft who suddenly out of the blue joined the Working Group, payed membership fees and voted yes for approval. From the OS2World story: 'The final result was 25 Yes, 6 No and 3 Abs and this would from the start be a done deal of saying No! Jonas Bosson who participated in today's meeting on behalf on FFII said that he left the meeting in protest and so did also IBM's Swedish local representative Johan Westman.'"
Kudos to Google for being one of those to "suddenly" join, but on the "No" side. Most of the other companies on the list of new arrivals are unfamiliar to me, excepting Google and HP, and we don't officially know how HP's vote went.
Shame on the others for having no sense of decency.
My understanding, from watching Bjarne Stroustrup's lecture before about the standardization process for C++ (also through the ISO), was that you need to attend a certain number of meetings (3?) before you can vote.
Why wasn't this the case here?
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0 Whoops, silly middle mouse button...
You're right we should stop whining & petition ISO to change the rules on voting to block this kind of ballot stuffing. I doubt very much that any of these companies have seen the document spec let alone read & understand it.
This is actually one of the fairer subversions of the process - in Portugol they denied IBM & SUN access claiming the room was too full, then allowed MS partners to enter & vote. In another place, the chairman - an employee of an MS partner announced the voting procedure as
Now that's how to really stack the deck - you completely remove the option to vote against the standard.
Hmm.. Interestingly enough, the german IBM delegate then somehow managed to join the Kenyan delegation, and managed to write the objection. How can someone be both a german and kenyan delegate?
n nexed-kenyan-iso-national.html
http://ooxmlhoaxes.blogspot.com/2007/05/has-ibm-a
Sounds like both sides aren't playing fair.
If you need web hosting, you could do worse than here
The sad thing is its probably not in their best interest, but they are too stupid to see it.
- OOXML gets rejected by ISO
- Public procurement policies dictate ODF
- Microsoft supports ODF
- Customers are free of lock-in
- Larger percentage will choose F/LOSS
- costs shift from license fees to training / consulting
- more money for local companies.
Only, instead of a state, we have a corporation, Microsoft.
They buy their power with their money. And a big part of their money comes from our wallets via taxes.
I mean, a really big part.
I mean a part much bigger than what you'd think.
I mean, much bigger than what I'd think, too.
I mean, *huge*.
Then, with this power, they take away what really is common goods. Or aren't "standards"?
Communism.
irrelevant in a way because ODF looks to be fast becoming a de-facto standard regardless. out numbering OOXML something in the order of 250 to 1.
a ll-ooxml-documents.html 7 0813-1201
see:
http://www.robweir.com/blog/2007/05/so-where-are-
http://www.geniisoft.com/showcase.nsf/archive/200
of course, the MS tactic is to get OOXML recognized and then default to it across the windows suite.
but as I remember they have tried this was a number of formats before - but once a file format is recognized as a de-facto standard (MP3, HTML, JPG) they are notoriously hard to shift.
irrelevant as it may be its still a damn depressing indication of the way business is done and sensible, rational decisions are perverted to line company pockets. this sort of thing annoys me.
Perhaps it's time to write a "Capitalist Manifesto"
All ideas^H^H^H^H^Hprocesses in this post are Patent Pending. (as well as the process of patenting all postings)
Hmm. If things continue this way, and we end up with the ISO effectively rubber-stamping OOXML on the strength of purchased votes, what effect will this have on the ISO's credibility in the long run? The ISO looks after a lot more standards than just data exchange formats; will we have to consider that every single one of those standards is potentially bought and paid for by its richest benecifiaries, despite technical flaws in the standard and opposition from peers?
I can't help thinking that the OOXML standardisation effort should be shelved until one of two things becomes true: either at least two or more independent implementations, developed by distinct organisations from the specification alone, can be shown to interoperate to a degree that justifies the moniker "standard"; or preferably, a complete reference implementation, with full source code available under a BSD (or equally permissive) licence, is submitted with the proposal. In fact, I can't understand why this isn't, er, standard practice. Were it so, the OOXML efforts could be trivially dismissed on technical grounds, and this whole dog and pony show could be avoided.
This story is (anonymously) tagged "conspiracytheory". I'd like to see the coincidence theorist explain how this happened without Microsoft's trademark coordinating manipulations.
--
make install -not war
I quit my job at a Microsoft Gold Partner instead of taking their meaningless MCSD exam. The company requested I certify, because MS wanted us to have more MCSDs in order to keep our prime pricing on their products. I started out, aced the first exam, and then realized that all of the time I spent on this was solely for the company (didn't benefit me in the least, aside from signaling [that I'm a tool]). I quit and started my own Ruby on Rails-based startup (in limbo, might not fail) and became a partner at another local company heading up the (Ruby/Rails-driven) programming team. I make more money, I'm much happier, and I'm not feeding the beast.
All of you that are helping make computers more like contracts and less like lumber: fuck you. Quit your job like I did. Everyone's better off.
-knewter
is not that Microsoft bought all those votes - but that the ISO let them. And that we can't do anything about it. Or can we? I'd love to know how.
If a community is full of Christians and they vote along their beliefs, does that mean the church controls the city?
Considering the market share of Microsoft products, is it possible that there would be more technical companies aligned with them than others? Do you think Microsoft and all of its partners should only have 1 vote? If a Microsoft partner voted against the standard, what happens to that vote?
Have you evidence of this?
I think you'll find that the law changes are only to require "open" standards, which is *why* MS are pursuing ISO certification now. If this wasn't the case, then why would a company who own (I'm guessing here) 99% of the "office" application market and have done for a good number of years, suddenly decide they need certification?
Also, the only reason OOXML gets a slating 'round these parts, is because it is a very poor "standard", and it appears to omit enough detail to make it hard (if not impossible) for anyone to create an alternative implementation.
It's worth noting that MS is entirely free to create an implementation based around ODF if they want to, and given their immense resources, they could probably do a good job of it if they so chose; but sadly, they seem to base all of their decisions on perceived threats. For example, if OOXML failed to get ISO certification (or if they had not even tried to obtain it) and a number of governments mandated open standards, given MS's *huge* installed base, I expect the majority would be far more inclined to switch to an MS ODF implementation. But MS seem to believe that if their customers had a choice, they'd leave! Microsoft lacks confidence IMHO; that's why they behave like bullies.
I don't think these twenty Servants of the Beast played by the rules of the ISO.
We (can and should) expect from that organisation decisions based on technical merit, the OOXML has no such thing.
But even if the ISO cert would be granted I eventually expect court cases evolving out of the inherent contradiction of calling it an Open Standard and at the same time referring to closed sources.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
Bullshit! Do you know just how bad OOXML is? It's so bad that the only way even Microsoft can benefit from it is by using it as a tool to prop up its monopoly. Hell, I'm not even convinced it's in Microsoft's best interests to be pushing OOXML -- its monopoly might be better served by MS Office implementing ODF, since MS Office still has great mindshare and interface advantages over OpenOffice.
Microsoft's tactic of pushing OOXML is like trying to gain territory via nuclear war: sure, they might get the territory in the end, but it'll be radioactive and worthless.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Why can't Microsoft compete without buying the outcome of the game? Are their products that poor?
Well, it's pretty obvious they're "that poor." What's interesting though is that these sort of tactics show that it's obvious not just to us but to them as well. They have far more confidence in their ability to game the system than they do in their ability to produce products that are competitive on a level playing field (though fortunately, they're often poor at gaming the system as well).
It's simply their corporate culture. I expect it may have to do with the fact that a large number of their programming workforce were hired right out of college without a lot of real-world experience, combined with the fact that their management style is apparently, management by intimidation. Combined, those factors make a pretty lousy recipe for producing quality products on time.
It is stories like this that keep me as a vocal and vehement opponent to Microsoft. In my view, this business and its practices are examples for all that is wrong with software today.
Sadly, the fact that these people joined the discussion only *after* the debate on those technical merits was over only shows that this process has become nothing more than a high-school president election in a bad B-movie. Indeed, and I will go one further: the fact that there is so much controversy over the proposal should immediately tank it, regardless of who 'wins'. Standards are based on CONSENSUS, not mob rule. Given the evident controversy, the proposal clearly is not ready for standardization, let alone by a 'fast-track' process. If at some point, the political controversy dies down, ECMA-376 matures, and the industry shows some sings of consensus, let the proposal be resubmitted. But if there is a *hint* of impropriety in the process, tank it. It is better to have fewer better standards than more mediocre ones. There is no rush (to anyone but MS) to put an ISO imprimatur on ECMA-376. ISO typically sees its mandate as standardizing best-practice, not invention. ECMA-376 does not exist in the marketplace and has no history behind it. The arguments are largely mooted by an insistence that the proposal be allowed to mature (and the politics to settle) before being standardized. Given that ISO has an existing standard in this domain, it is hard to see how anyone is (legitimately) hurt by delay.
"For legacy reasons, an implementation using the 1900 date base system shall 1 treat 1900 as though it was a leap
2 year."
What legacy reasons? Was there an ancient excel version that MS didn't bother to fix a date bug in that they are carrying through even today? Why should they? Anyone bothering to use some ancient excel version likely wouldn't bother with the brand new office 2007 and its "open" Office XML filesystem would they? I mean if they were going to change, they'd probably prefer to have it correctly working now. And what about people who want to put in data from 1900? Thats just going to screw up everyone wanting to do that!
Whats funny, is that their spec says if you DON'T want to use the screwed up 1900 system you don't have to... but then your dates have to start with 1904, with no possability of using a date earlier than that!
And you'd better not be wanting to use any dates prior to 1900, neither date system will accept it. Yeah, I'm sure no country in the EU has any useful historical data prior to 1900, after all they composed of such young countries, right?
Recruiters always told me that working for them I could "make a real difference, be a voice for the customers/end-users, unlike anywhere else". I saw that my managers, many of whom had put in 8+ years already, were just getting to a point where they were consulted during initial requirements gathering phases.
It's a simple matter of complex programming.
Better yet, I resigned from the company.
My previous employer (one of the GC partners above) has been pushing open source to be used within the company. I joined this effort thinking it could bring more focus on open formats, but I saw a while ago that this attitude did not seem to apply to top management, so I left the company. I hope others join me in doing so.
Why, yes! I AM new here.