India Third to Appeal ISO's OOXML Approval

I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "India is now the third country to appeal the ISO's approval of OOXML, with their appeal arriving just before the deadline last night. According to PC World, this makes OOXML the first BRM process under ISO/JTC 1 to be appealed, which leaves us in uncharted territory. Although there was substantial confusion in the comments on yesterday's story, Brazil is really appealing, not merely disapproving, of OOXML, having sent a letter that begins with 'The Associação Brasileira de Normas Técnicas (ABNT), as a P member of ISO/IEC/JTC1/SC34, would like to present, to ISO/IEC/JTC1 and ISO/IEC/JTC1/SC34, this appeal for reconsideration of the ISO/IEC DIS 29500 final result.' Groklaw speculates that this may have something to do with Microsoft hedging their bets by supporting ODF 1.1 in Office 2007, though we probably won't see any more countries appeal now that the deadline has passed."

Fourth country on the way

[David Gerard]

Andy Updegrove says a fourth country may also have appealed [consortiuminfo.org].

Re:India

[Anonymous Coward]

In most of the world, shaking the head is a NO (and nodding is a YES).

If you read somewhere that Indians shake their head for a YES, that is incorrect (I lived in India 25 years). There is an interesting "Indian head-roll" which is just an acknowledgment you are being heard and understood, rather than an agreement, though it can be (and has been) considered a weak form of agreement.

-srr

Re:They won't count.

[bigpicture]

The math, the math, India is the No.2 most populous country and Brazil is No.5, with India expected to be No.1 within 15 years, because of China's population control measures. The opinion of a significant market of PC and smart phone users, probably does matter to MS.

Re:If not Important, why is msft so desperate?

[Insanity Defense]

The Open Office/Star Office file format was the basis for ODF but it received fairly extensive reworking in the process of creating ODF.

Re:Fourth country on the way

[hedwards]

TFA was somewhat vague on how many total appeals there were. It sounded like just 3, then a bit later, they indicated that they wouldn't announce the total list until later.

I was pretty sure that Norway in particular was going due to the abusive manner the discussions were held.

Re:Banana peal.

[Anonymous Coward]

Note to moderators

The purpose of all these off-topic posts so early in the thread is to reduce the number of points available for insightful or interesting comments.

Microsoft evangelists do not like open discussion of their failures. Use your points to upmod good comments, not downmod red herrings.

Re:Banana peal.

[Anonymous Coward]

And I've never met a Microsoft Evangelist

Meet Your Local Microsoft Evangelists [microsoft.com]

Re:Three countries wasting taxpayers' money

[Insanity Defense]

The rasons that S.A. and you cite are straight out of MS-haters' talking points, alsmost as if the MS-Haters themselves wrote the appeal. This is not a surprise, since a large percentage of the original OOXML objections were penned directly by the MS-hating portion of IBM, headed by Rob Weir and Bob Sutor.

Come of with some real reasons with real evidence, otherwise S.A. is wasting everybody's time on a witch hunt.

So you don't think that having over 80% of the proposed resolutions for issues with OOXML not being discussed by anyone outside of ECMA is significant? You don't think that fast tracking a specification that is between 6000 and 7000 pages long is inappropriate? I think that the specification is too large for the fast track. I think that allowing ECMA as Microsofts agent to control without over sight so many of the fixes to objections is unacceptable.

All that ignores the scandals associated with the "passing" of OOXML.

South Africa, Brazil, India and Denmark have all objected now. Do you think that all four nations are now being controlled by "Microsoft hating geeks"? I think that unlikely. I think it more likely that they have valid objections. We will just have to wait and see how it works out.

Given Microsofts past history (and convictions around the world) I think it more likely that the objections are valid. Microsoft does have a history of trying illegal methods to stifle competition. Did they not in the DOJ vs Microsoft case falsify evidence that was presented to the judge?