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IBM Threatens To Leave ISO Over OOXML Brouhaha
barnackle writes "In addition to threatening to leave certain standards organizations over the OOXML shenanigans, IBM created new guidelines for its own participation in those organizations in an attempt to pressure the ISO and ECMA to be more fair in their approval procedures."
If Sun other large tech companies join them, it will do a lot more good. IRTFA (some kind soul bought me a /. subscription and you can't comment on stories that come "in the future") and part of the end of the article explains why IBM just can't leave the standards bodies. They have their own standards to push, for instance.
Free Martian Whores!
It seems to me this will have little meaning in the long run. It's been shown the ISO is deep in the pockets of M$. Do they really care what IBM thinks or does? I mean they already got their money right?
Surely IBM will have more influence over future ISO decisions if it remains a member. This is particularly true of a 'Big Player' like IBM who will carry a lot of clout.
'Outsiders' can be discounted far more easily as they are simply not part of the process, and could therefore be said to be irrelevant.
IBM should collaborate with other large firms (but presumably not Microsoft) to enforce due diligence in future decisions.
Smivs on the intertubes!
today, dont you think ? it is to me at least.
Read radical news here
Some countries are already making noises about not automatically adopting ISO standards. The more countries that adopt this "a la carte" approach to ISO, the more it will weaken ISO. The more countries that adopt the a la carte approach "until such time as ISO gets its act together" the more pressure there will be on ISO to get its act together.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Surely IBM will have more influence over future ISO decisions if it remains a member.
And surely ISO will be able to stay more relevant if it can retain IBM as a member. Standards bodies can be discounted for more easily if "Big Players" are simply not part of the process.
If IBM were pulling out simply because they weren't getting what they wanted, then the whole thing would seem childish. But when a standards body is approving bad standards because it's being manipulated/corrupted, and attempts to clean up the corruption are not being successful, then the appropriate thing for other "big players" to do is drop support for that standards body.
if you are unable to see the underlying deep meaning in a veiled statement such as the parent post, dont waste your mod points !.
this post is offtopic. not parent.
though since you have modded faultily, this post has somewhat become on-topic.
now work on this paradox you just created and prepare a paper on it until monday, 09.45 sharp. i want pie charts in appendix.
Read radical news here
I don't think IBM feels like much of a 'Big Player', considering how much the ISO listened to them in regards to the OOXML stuff. If the ISO is going to act so stupid here, ignoring IBM, why should IBM expect their remarks to be considered by the ISO in the future? While it's true that MS isn't going to... influence the ISO's decisions quite so strongly on every tech-related issue as it did here (and so IBM will still have some voice) it is still a better idea to act now. If this happens again (and again and again), IBM won't have as much ground for fighting it. They'd have to justify why they didn't fight quite so hard before, and even if they make a perfectly reasonable argument (ie, your argument) the very fact they're put in that position weakens them.
IBM - and anyone else who cares to (and is in the position to) make a stance against the ISO's actions - must do it immediately and make it clear.
"A witty saying proves nothing." - Voltaire
It's not very accurate, and it is not very relevant to the topic at hand. Also, it is rather incendiary.
So the 'troll' mod may be undeserved, but if so only because 'flamebait' might be more accurate.
Those who advocate genocide deserve every protection afforded by law, and none afforded by common human decency.
it tells you ms is more experienced in doing dirty footwork than ibm is.
and we all know that from the stories of last 2 years on slashdot, even if not our own experiences, though ms fanbois may disagree.
Read radical news here
"It is only that IBM is a technically competent competitor that it *can* compete and win on a level playing field that they promote good standards."
Sure, that's why they were investigated by the DOJ for a decade.
The difference between IBM and MS is that IBM knew how to play the game with politicians before the investigation started. MS made the mistake of thinking they didn't need to grease any palms. They know better now.
Why was this modded "troll"? Would you mod IBM "troll" too?
"Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something" - Plato
and STILL not obeying the courts.
I think MS wins the "dirty little shitbag" contest.
PS as for MS using IBM's leaving as a stick to beat them with, when MS has shit in the pool, stop playing in it. m'kay?
So what you're saying is you're unable to separate the message from the messenger?
It doesn't matter a damn if IBM owns and operates Groklaw if the information on it is correct and stands up to scrutiny. To date, it has. So what's the problem?
In my opinion, the case of Groklaw is a great example of the public benefit of anonymous speech. If she had outed herself she might have been sued, pulled into court, lost her job, even physically harrassed. But by keeping her anonymity - and her integrity - she's been able to make a pretty big impact in the case, at least to us nerds who care about such things. She did exactly the right thing.
Names are meaningless. And even if you had it, what good what that do? What are you going to do, drive to that address, demand to see her bank statement to ensure there's no payments from IBM?
Where the information comes from is irrelevant. The quality of the information is the only thing that matters. Groklaw has stood the test of time, in my opinion, so you're doing yourself a disservice by downrating it on that basis.
Let my new 7-digit UID be a lesson to all - write down your passwords.
And another "fascinating" comment by someone who did not RTFA and has no knowledge of the subject.
The /. title changed it to "ISO" instead of "Standards Bodies". That said the TFA did only reference ISO and ECMA, of which IBM is in fact a member.
And ECMA is a member of ISO. So is ANSI, of which you might think IBM is part of? And you'd actually be right.
You said yourself, ISO is comprised of various national standards bodies. Who do you think comprises these bodies? Fairies? ISO is comprised of groups that IBM is a member of. Therefore is it reasonable to state that IBM as a member of several of the bodies that comprise ISO is thus a member of ISO. As such, they can actually leave the ISO by leaving the standards bodies that comprise ISO.
Furthermore nearly every national standards body is in fact incorporated or whatever their country equivalent is. As such, your assertion that "there is no concept of corporate membership" is demonstrably false. ANSI is a not-for-profit U.S. corporation, and is a member of ISO.
QED.
My Suburban burns less gasoline than your Prius.
I do not question Groklaw as a source at all.
That's right. You flat out rejected Groklaw as a source due to PJ's anonymity, rather than grant it any benefit of the doubt given PJ's track record. That's far more disingenuous than merely raising unfounded questions about Groklaw's corporate connections.
A lot of companies conform to ISO standards for two reasons:
The first being that it brings in more money. Once you're ISO certified, people take you a little more seriously.
Secondly, it really helps companies that are disorganized with their documentation to be a whole lot more organized, which has a lot of huge benefits.
This thread has gotten pretty confused (yeah, I must be new here...) Ignoring who said what, there are two important issues at stake: (1) is Groklaw a good source, and (2) is IBM a good source? There is a third unimportant issue: (3) is Groklaw speaking for IBM?
The answers are: (1) yes, (2) not really, and (3) who cares.
Assume for the sake of argument that Groklaw is part of IBM. IBM ain't stupid, they understand their audience, and they know that we perceive a difference between independent information and corporate spin. They understand the benefit of preserving Groklaw as a clean source of information, so that it can be perceived as having integrity. If IBM wants to lie, they can pay an advertising agency to do it.
The point is that you can (for the time being) trust Groklaw even if they are a face of IBM, because it's in IBM's interest to keep them good.
Basically, when the facts make me look good, I would always rather somebody else tell them, even if she criticises me from time to time. If I have to feed her to keep the news coming, well that kind of sucks, but it is better to do that at arm's length than to try telling people how good I am myself.
If you desperate geeks still don't like it, the concept is "wingman."
Let's not throw out the baby with the bathwater here. ISO (and ANSI, BSI, etc.) standards are very important in basically every field of industry. Just because they fucked up bad on digital document formats doesn't mean that we don't need them to define, you know, the standard root radius of a bolt.
Karma: pi (Mostly due to circular reasoning in posts).
I still wonder if this is exactly what Microsoft wanted all along.
So many IT companies purporting to adhere to ISO standard this and that, against which MS, the king of proprietary, cannot compete. Much better to pull the rug out from under them by discrediting the standards body they are accredited against.
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
Only on the surface.
In my experience, a company who is not organized attempting to become ISO certification just slathers a lot of lipstick on a pig, and it's also my experience that the ISO auditors fall for it every damned time.
As an engineer who has to pay lip service to a few ISO standards, but is given no resources to actually fulfill the spirit of the processes, it's all a bunch of bullshit.
(CMMI is even worse - that takes a ton more effort and I've yet to see a company really do it correctly. I'm sure some of them have to exist, but most either document every nanosecond of work (and can't use it in any meaningful way) or don't document anything but still try to get through their audit with a level 3 or 4 and then stop doing it again for another 2 years until they need recertified. Christ I need a new job.)