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[News] Tim Bray Slams ISO for Denial of Microsoft Wrongdoings

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OOXML: Everything’s Just Fine

,----[ Quote ]
| Especially when ISO’s head honcho Alan Bryden goes on the record to say 
| (quoting from Reuters) that “criticisms that a fast-track process was abused 
| to rush through the Microsoft standard were unfounded” (note Reuters doesn’t 
| use quotation marks, so presumably they’re summarizing Bryden).   
| 
| Um, excuse me, doesn’t it seem wildly inappropriate for the chief executive 
| of an allegedly-neutral international agency to comment dismissively on an 
| in-progress appeal? If I were on ISO’s Board of Directors or equivalent, I’d 
| be hauling Mr. Bryden in right now for a short unpleasant interview.   
| 
| Whatever; the damage is done. I really hope my personal impression, based on 
| the OOXML experience, that ISO alternates between bumbling and whorishness, 
| is wrong. The world needs a reasonably competent and transparent standards 
| organization whose integrity is not a standing joke.   
`----

http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/200x/2008/06/30/ISO-Says-Everything-is-OK

ISO is corrupted. Watch what RMS said last week.


Last week:

What do Free and Open Source Software Leaders Think of Microsoft?

,----[ Quote ]
| Second, talking about the standards fight in which Microsoft succeeded in
| having its OOXML format accepted as an open standard in rivalry to the ODF
| format favored by OpenOffice.org and other free office applications, Stallman
| notes that "Microsoft corrupted many members of ISO in order to win approval
| for its phony 'open' document format, OOXML. This was so governments that
| keep their documents in a Microsoft-only format can pretend that they are
| using 'open standards.' The government of South Africa has filed an appeal
| against the decision, citing the irregularities in the process."
`----

http://itmanagement.earthweb.com/osrc/article.php/12068_3753076_3


Related:

The Norway Vote - What really happened

,----[ Quote ]
| But lo… at this point, the “rules” were changed. The VP asserted that “Ecma
| has clearly made steps in the right direction.” The most important thing now
| was to ensure that OOXML came under ISO’s control so that it could
| be “further improved”. However, the committee was not allowed to discuss
| this.    
|
|     The VP thereupon declared that there was no consensus, so the decision
|     would be taken by Standard Norway.
|
|
| Halfway through the proceedings, a committee member had asked for (and
| received) assurance that the Chairman would take part in the final decision,
| as he had for the DIS vote back in August. It now transpired that the BRM
| participants had also been invited to stay behind. 23 people were therefore
| dismissed and we were down to seven. In addition to Standard Norway’s three,
| there were four “experts”: Microsoft Norway’s chief lobbyist, a guy from
| StatoilHydro (national oil company; big MS Office user), a K185 old-timer,
| and me. In one fell swoop the balance of forces had changed from 80/20 to
| 50/50 and the remaining experts discussed back and forth for 20 minutes or so
| without reaching any agreement.        
|
|     The VP thereupon declared that there was still no consensus, so the
|     decision would be taken by Standard Norway.
|
|
| The experts were dismissed and the VP asked the opinion of the Secretary (who
| said “Yes”) and the JTC1 rep (who said “No”).
|
|     The VP thereupon declared that there was still no consensus, so the
|     decision would be taken by him.
|
|
| And his decision was to vote Yes.
|
| So this one bureaucrat, a man who by his own admission had no understanding
| of the technical issues, had chosen to ignore the advice of his Chairman, of
| 80% of his technical experts, and of 100% of the K185 old-timers. For the
| Chairman, only one course of action was possible.  
|
| [...]
|
| The meeting was a farce and the result was a scandal. But it’s not over yet,
| and one thing is clear: the “little one” is unfit to represent the interests
| of Norwegian users. It’s time he was told, “Roll over, roll over…”  
`----

http://topicmaps.wordpress.com/2008/04/18/the-norway-vote-what-really-happened/


Computer experts stage street protest in Oslo against Microsoft document format
as standard

,----[ Quote ]
| OSLO, Norway: Roughly 60 data experts staged a rare and noisy street
| demonstration in downtown Oslo on Wednesday to protest the adoption of
| Microsoft Corp.'s document format as an international standard and against
| Norway voting for the move.  
|
| [...]
|
| He claimed the committee ignored the advice of the vast majority of the
| Nordic nation's software experts, was pressured by Microsoft and
| displayed "scandalous behavior."  
`----

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/04/09/business/EU-TEC-Norway-Digital-Demonstration.php


OOXML triggers demonstration in Norway: "Let's throw OOXML out of ISO"

http://www.noooxml.org/forum/t-52412/ooxml-triggers-demonstration-in-norway:let-s-throw-ooxml-out-of-iso


Demonstration outside ISO conference

,----[ Quote ]
| Steve Pepper, the former Chairman of the Norwegian committee responsible for
| deciding the Norwegian vote on OOXML, is calling for a demonstration to take
| place outside the building where SC34, the ISO committee that has been landed
| with OOXML, is holding its spring plenary.  
|
| The demonstration will take place outside Håndverkeren, Rosenkrantzgate 7,
| Oslo, Norway, on Wednesday April 9 at 12.00. Among the slogans are:
|
| * No to ISO approval of OOXML!
| * Defend the integrity of ISO!
| * Microsoft: Support ODF!
| * Ecma: Withdraw OOXML!
| * Norway must say no to OOXML!
`----

http://blogs.freecode.no/isene/2008/04/07/demonstration-outside-iso-conference/


The AFNOR Affair: Interview with  Frédéric Couchet, Ex. Dir. APRIL, on OOXML in
France

,----[ Quote ]
| Frédéric Couchet: ISO standards were traditionally the result of compromise
| between competing players. With OOXML, Microsoft obtained a standard which
| none of its competitors had adopted. The first ISO standard in this area,
| Open Document Architecture (ODA, ISO 8613) was never applied. The second
| standard, OpenDocument Format (ODF, ISO/IEC 26300), was applied but never
| accepted by Microsoft. The third standard, OOXML (ISO/IEC 29500), can help
| Microsoft commercially with governments but brings nothing to the market in
| terms of convergence between competing software products, and thus has no  
| added value as a standard.      
`----

http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20080419005201783


New OOXML Scandal - A Leaked Email Surfaces in France

,----[ Quote ]
| Le Monde Informatique and LeMagIT are reporting on a leaked email from Marc
| Meyer of the French government agency, DGME, which urges that OOXML be
| quickly added to the official list of formats that can be used by government
| entities, a document titled RGI, and then the finalized v1.0 of RGI be
| quickly published, in effect locking in OOXML, before the appeals process is
| completed. The email and the media reports indicate that the RGI was put on a
| back burner last October, when ODF was already on the list, and now,
| immediately after OOXML is approved, albeit controversially, by ISO but
| before the appeals process is complete, not to mention the format, Meyer
| urges it quickly be added to the list of acceptable formats, hence making it
| hard to remove OOXML from the list later, as a fait accompli.          
|
| Worse, the email indicates that work on the document was brought to a crawl
| to wait for ISO approval of OOXML. ODF was already on the list when work on
| RGI was brought to a standstill last October. There were suspicions that the
| slowdown was deliberate, and the email is giving legs to those suspicions.  
|
| It seems that politics has reared its ugly head, and just as happened in
| Masschusetts, questions are now being asked about behind-the-scenes Microsoft
| pressure.  
`----

http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20080418111340426


Sarkozy intervenes in France to revert the OOXML position

,----[ Quote ]
| Confidential sources say that President Sarkozy has intervened himself in the
| French position on Microsoft OOXML, asking members of the committee to revert
| their position, and support an abstention. Our sources say he was approached
| by a lobbyist during his 3-days trip in England. The intervention has been
| made on Friday.    
`----

http://www.noooxml.org/forum/t-50670/sarkozy-intervenes-in-france-to-revert-the-ooxml-position


The France Shift From No to Abstain -- HP helped Microsoft France do it

,----[ Quote
| Here's the scoop from Les Echos.fr on France's sudden change from its No vote
| to Abstain. Microsoft France's President Eric Boustouller sent AFNOR a  
| letter [PDF] in French, of course. He tells a tale about OOXML and ODF
| progressing side by side and how if OOXML is approved, a group will be
| working hard to make the two more interoperable. Attached was a an HP
| statement of support for OOXML. HP sings the same song. And AFNOR?    
|
| [...]
|
| Could it be any more cynical? So, now we know that HP is not supportive of
| Linux and FOSS as we thought. Knock me over with a feather. So, they got them
| to change on the basis of promises for the future. I'm sure there's more to
| the story, of course.  
`----

http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20080331212042460


Martin Bryan: we are getting “standardization by corporation”

,----[ Quote ]
| A November informative report of Martin Bryan, Convenor, ISO/IEC JTC1/SC34 
| WG1 highlights the fallout of the ECMA-376 fast-track process for ISO. He 
| says he is 'glad to be retiring before the situation becomes impossible'  
| 
| [...]
| 
| In what is an astonishingly outspoken report, Martin Bryan, Convenor, ISO/IEC 
| JTC1/SC34 WG1 has given us insight into the total mess that Microsoft/ECMA 
| have caused during their scandalous, underhand and unremitting attempts to 
| get - what is a very poorly written specification {i.e. DIS 29500 aka OOXML, 
| AR} - approved as an ISO standard. …    
`----

http://www.noooxml.org/forum/t-30107/martin-bryan:we-are-getting-standardization-by-corporation


Microsoft accused of stacking ISO committee

,----[ Quote
| In a memo sent following his last meeting as head of the working group on 
| WG1, which is handling Microsoft’s application to make the Word format an ISO 
| standard as ECMA 376, outgoing Governor Martin Bryan (above), an expert on 
| SGML and XML, accused the company of stacking his group.   
`----

http://blogs.zdnet.com/open-source/?p=1777


Corrupt countries were more likely to support the OOXML document format

,----[ Quote ]
| Is this just a random coincidence? The median of the CPI index of the above 
| mentioned 70 countries is 3.95. Of the most corrupted half (CPI index less 
| than 3.95) 23 or 77% voted for approval (approval or approval with comments) 
| and 7 or 23% for disapproval; 5 abstained. Of the least corrupted half (CPI 
| index more than 3.95) 13 or 54% voted for approval and 11 or 46% voted for 
| disapproval; 11 abstained - see the table below.      
`----

http://www.effi.org/blog/kai-2007-09-05.en.html


Microsoft accused of more OOXML standards fiddling 

,----[ Quote ]
| However the 11 new countries are refusing to say how they will vote. These 
| include Cote d'Ivoire, Cyprus, Ecuador, Jamaica, Lebanon, Malta, Pakistan, 
| Trinidad and Tobago, Turkey, Uruguay and Venezuela. Most people seem to think 
| that these have been put there by Vole to make sure the standard gets pushed 
| through.    
`----

http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=42
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