India Third to Appeal ISO's OOXML Approval 99
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."
Re:Yawn... Is This Important? (Score:5, Insightful)
You must have been asleep for the past 2 decades, because otherwise you'd know by now that Microsoft's version of "playing nice" is creating a de facto standard that they alone control then avoiding making any changes 9even positive ones) to it so long as nobody else is in the game.
Re:They won't count. (Score:4, Insightful)
Brazil for example, is in the top 10 countries by both Internet Users and Time Spent Online, usually in the 2 top spots in the latter. Ok, most of this time is spent by teenagers in useless thing like Orkut and MSN, but whatever.
The important thing in this is: information can and WILL spread like a wildfire. And be sure that many people will embrace it.
If these "not-real" countries continue their "line of thinking", in the near future we could have more than 1 billion people that reject anything that comes from MS.
It wouldn't be wise to ignore THAT.
Re:They won't count. (Score:5, Insightful)
Yet the new technological meccas Azerbaijan and C'ote D'ivoire gets taken seriously when voting in favor of OOXML?
Something sure smells fishy.
Not about OOo (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm just some bum writer who wants to open my old files, but what about actual important documents? Right now PDF sadly is about the only way to go and feel safe the document can be read down the road.
If you're not happy with OOo's Calc, that is irrelevant to this discussion. Microsoft is going to provide support for ODF, and honestly that is enough to make me happy. I just wish they were supporting 1.2 right off the bat, instead of starting with 1.1.
MS losing business to OOo? (Score:5, Insightful)
The fact that several large governments were talking about ditching MS Office (over open file standards) is what got MS to play ball. Now that they support ODF (and likely OOXML once they iron that out as well a bit) those government agencies are likely to stay with MS Office.
Re:MS losing business to OOo? (Score:4, Insightful)
Which will happen when *drumroll* enough individual users make the switch. I didn't say that OO was beating MS Office or even universally better than it (although for my needs it actually is, which is why I have declined to install MS Office even when offered it for free-as-in-beer), just that it is becoming a credible threat for the relatively near future.
The bottom line is that Firefox has demonstrated to Microsoft that FOSS can come out of nowhere to beat the crap out of their products, and now that one of their golden geese is being threatened they aren't about to take any chances. If they lose their Office monopoly, that's easily as bad to them as losing the Windows monopoly, not least because it directly threatens that one as well (why would corporate users want to pay money for Windows to run software that runs better and safer on any number of cheaper solutions?). It seems like they are realizing that they let OO continue and grow for far too long already, and they're actually concerned they might have to compete again, and on much worse terms with a far inferior track record than the last time around.
Re:MS losing business to OOo? (Score:3, Insightful)
A minor nitpick. MS have stated their intention to support ODF. Until they deliver it's dangerous to assume or to state as fact, that support. Alex.
I wish... (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm confused... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Yawn... Is This Important? (Score:5, Insightful)
this isn't about openoffice.org, this is about people having access to their own information. This is about governments being able to read all the documents they are making now in the future. This is about unfettered, exact communication between countries.
in short, this is remarkably important. I can't think of anything more important in communication than open standards.
Re:MS losing business to OOo? (Score:4, Insightful)
Then stop using "Open Source" and start using "Free Software" and do not mention that "Free" means "Free as speech" and not "Free as beer", when ever you talk with persons who are money-slaves. Let them think that they get software for free and they dont need to pay for it. Then let the lawyers to take care of GPL and other people to understand they are actually using OSS.
Bosses and other persons who makes the decisions, dont need to know those, because they are so afraid that "Open Source" force them to publish their treasure. They are like pirates, you need to trick them. They are greedy, you need to give them to think they have control for everything.
They will learn actually...
Re:MS losing business to OOo? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:MS losing business to OOo? (Score:4, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)