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ISO Miscounted Cuban OOXML Vote
An anonymous reader notes Groklaw's coverage of the apparent mix-up ISO made with Cuba's vote in the matter of recommending OOXML as a standard. Cuba apparently voted against OOXML in September, but ISO recorded their vote as a "yes" — which is odd on its face, as Microsoft is forbidden to sell any products in Cuba. The Cuban NB head has apparently now officially responded to the BRM, but Groklaw's PJ notes that verification remains problematical, and "...the bottom line to me is that a process that worked perfectly well when folks all trusted each other falls into chaos when there are allegations of dirty tricks or undue pressure."
"the bottom line to me is that a process that worked perfectly well when folks all trusted each other falls into chaos when there are allegations of dirty tricks or undue pressure" ...well DUH...
Dealing with unfairness and undue pressure is a central theme in building societies and groups that work. If everyone were good and played fair, any system would work. We need social systems precisely because some people do not play fair. Thus, we have checks and balances in our American political system. Where are the checks and balances here?
The author is basically saying, the system is flawed because it does not take into account certain facts about human nature, and fails at one of the most basic tasks any socio-political system should strive to accomplish, namely limiting the ability of participants to put undue pressure on each other and use dirty tricks.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
And those standards went through, I'd guess, on the non-fasttrack route? Like the SQL standard? That took years to go through.
The abuse here is trying to push OOXML through on fast track, when it's obvious to anyone following the process that this should take the same route as SQL, for example. But that wouldn't be quick enough for Microsoft to stem the organisations mandidating open standards to look at their options, and choose OpenDocument over OOXML.
No tyrant thrives when every subject says no.
Your characterization of the Groklaw crowd is quite inaccurate. Plenty of people there are familiar with standards processes. And yes, they know that there has been controversy before, but rarely has there been controversy of this magnitude, to my knowledge, NEVER in the fast-track process. The purpose of the fast-track process is to expedite the formalization of what are already de facto standards, which means standards that are well thought out and carefully written, that exist in multiple implementations, and on which there is substantial consensus. Microsoft's attempt to use the fast-track process for OOXML is outrageous given that OOXML is a bloated mess, has yet to be implemented by anyone, not even Microsoft, and is a single-company effort on which there is no consensus.
The author is basically saying, the system is flawed because it does not take into account certain facts about human nature,
I'd argue that it's impossible to build a system that will work when people don't respect it. For example - the third-party payola loophole farce. Another example - democracy might work when people respect it, but the rules mean nothing to "I have a PhD in violence" Mugabe.
In essenence, the rules themselves are only useful if they are followed in spirit. When they are not followed in spirit, then we need more clarifying rules until we come down to some basic rules that are followed in spirit. That's why are law books are so large - and it's still not large enough for people like Darl McBride... proof that the more we disrespect each other, the bigger the rule book needs to become.
The traditional solution is to turn your back to people fail to follow the spirit of the rules. You just tell them that they can go bother someone else. You can't force other people to learn ethics, and there'll always be that fuzzy area where the amorale can do horrible but legal things like deliberately spread disinformation about global warming. These people should be charged with treason, because they are subverting the public good.
When an untrustworthy entity enters a situation where a certain level of trust is already assumed (M$ and ISO), then the rulebook needs to catch up *a lot*.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
PJ says: "...the bottom line to me is that a process that worked perfectly well when folks all trusted each other falls into chaos when there are allegations of dirty tricks or undue pressure."
But standards operations have ALWAYS been about cutthroat politics and dirty tricks to gain competitive advantage. (For instance: There's stuff in an international protocol standard from the '70s or so that was transparently-crufty weirdness a US delegation proposed to get the French to back down from something they didn't like - but the French instead embraced the cruft wholeheartedly and the US negotiators couldn't admit it was just a bluff...)
The ideal is to standardize exactly what you're already marketing (or are about to release), so you continue to sell it and become (or become more) the dominant and entrenched market player while everybody else is delayed while they make changes - and become incompatible with their previous prototypes or products. This is a massive advantage even if you DO have to give up your patent locks on the technology to make it into a standard.
What's different about this is just the scale and the ability of the multibillion-dollar gorilla to afford tactics that weren't cost-effective enough to be common.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
No matter how high you set the bar, there will always be an "over the top".
... complications.
Ever read Milton's essay on Machiavelli? One of the points that he makes is that it's not straightforward for an outsider to judge what is barbaric in a historical or cultural context. You might think that having an assassin poison a rival city's leader is barbaric, but there is something to said for the theory that it's less barbaric than laying siege to his city and burning it to the ground. People of a more Northern European cultural background tend to look at wars in which hundreds or thousands of bystanders are killed as unfortunate, but unavoidable facts of life. Yet we feel revulsion when somebody calculates that his way forward would be eased by the carefully planned removal of a single individual whose continued sojourn among the living presents
It's the cold bloodedness that turns us off; if the same prince lost his head and smacked his rival over the head with candlestick at a banquet, we might think it is a bad act, but not necessarily a repulsive one. It can be argued, however, that calculated murder is really no more morally repugnant than indulging in the luxury of murderous, irrational rages.
Milton's point is that every society that has ever existed is somewhat hypocritical about its moral ideals. But while "everybody does it" is not a moral excuse, Milton points out that there is a great practical difference between a person willing to do the same bad things that "everybody" does, and a person who is willing to do things that the people around him find repugnant. The difference is that latter person is utterly unrestrained by any consideration at all.
Which brings us to standards committees. We all know that there is plenty of backstabbing and double-dealing involved. "Everybody" does it, although as in the case of warfare for the Northern baron or assassination for an Italian prince, there is such a thing as immoderation when it comes to enjoying a culturally sanctioned vice. But while various forms of vote manipulation may be somewhat sanctioned, altering vote counting is "over the top". It does something beyond harming the "spirit" of the process. It harms the pretense of the process.
As inferior as pretense is to principle in a moral sense, it at least functions as a more reliable restraint on depraved behavior. ISO may not do what it is "supposed" to do, but it does something that is useful. The process is useless unless it can at least maintain the pretense of fairness. Once you start altering votes, you might as well hire goons to rough up the opposition. In fact hiring goons might be somewhat preferable, because it can be done discreetly. People will notice if the votes they bought... er, cast weren't recorded properly.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Only partly true. The other, and larger, part is that the Cuban American political block is still quite powerful at a national level in the USA, and blame Castro's revolution for destroying their wealthy, antebellum culture.
Posting this one anonymously, as I have acquaintances of Cuban upper class background, who turn very ugly when questions about recent Cuban history come up.
That's a very interesting analysis. And it makes a lot of sense.
Assassination is a lot less barbaric than a full-blown war... but less 'honorable' somehow. War, on the other hand, is more barbaric, messy and painful and supposedly more 'honorable.'
But let's look at the two opposing view points to see whose lives are at risk:
1. Pro-assassination: The leaders are at risk
2. Pro-war: The non-leaders (everyone else) are at risk
Now given it is the leaders who are making the laws, policies and practices, it would seem rather natural for them to choose to put others at risk so that they, themselves are not at risk. It also goes to show why leaders are so willing to go to war and endorse torture... simply put, they aren't at risk -- everyone else is.
Of course, if we had a more true democracy in place where the people actually contribute to the ruling and regulation of their own country, there would be no point in assassination... too many heads of the snake to cut off. But as it can be seen, 'democracies' like the US don't have as many heads as it should making assassination a much more effective tool.
I realize this is way off topic, but your post got me thinking of something I haven't thought much on. Perhaps assassination is a better alternative to war and a proper democracy would make assassination pointless.
yes, no one likes having their free lunch taken away. And by 'free lunch' i mean 'feudal fiefdom'.
Simplify the rules, simplify the consequences.
What you are talking about quickly becomes the rule of the strong, and an honour culture. I most definitely do *not* want to live in an honour culture. The invention of trial by jury was a significant leap forward in the human endeavor. Same with the separation of powers.
So instead of teaching others to fear you, perhaps one could teach others to respect you because of who you are. The first will manifest in conflict, and the second in harmony.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right