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[News] [Rival] Microsoft's Newham Department to Face Challenge Over Proprietary OOXML

  • Subject: [News] [Rival] Microsoft's Newham Department to Face Challenge Over Proprietary OOXML
  • From: Roy Schestowitz <newsgroups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Wed, 01 Jul 2009 20:04:48 +0000
  • Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.advocacy
  • User-agent: KNode/0.10.9
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Help Me Go Mano a Mano with Microsoft

,----[ Quote ]
| Next week, I'm taking part in a debate with a Microsoft representative about 
| the passage of the OOXML file format through the ISO process last year. Since 
| said Microsoftie can draw on the not inconsiderable resources of his 
| organisation to provide him with a little back-up, I thought I'd try to even 
| the odds by putting out a call for help to the unmatched resource that is the 
| Linux Journal community. Here's the background to the meeting, and the kind 
| of info I hope people might be able to provide.      
| 
| Not surprisingly, the meeting is neither for my nor Microsoft's benefit, but 
| for that of Richard Steel, who is CIO of the London Borough of Newham. Those 
| with good memories may recall that back in 2003 it looked like Newham was 
| going to switch to open source, in what could have been a real breakthrough 
| for free software in the UK, but that it then changed its mind and signed a 
| long-term - and secret - deal with Microsoft. Winning Newham was so important 
| to Microsoft that it helped set up a competitive trial...      
`----

http://www.linuxjournal.com/content/help-me-go-mano-mano-microsoft

OOXML is evidently a fraud, likewise those who support it.


Related:

Microsoft influencing partner NGOs to support OOXML in India

,----[ Quote ]
| Microsoft is encouraging its business partners to promote its Office Open XML 
| specification (OOXML) to the Indian Bureau of Standards (BIS) and Ministry of 
| IT. This move has incensed supporters of the rival OpenDocument Format (ODF) 
| who fear that the "soft" Indian state may not be able to stand up to 
| Microsoft pressure tactics.    
`----

http://www.linux.com/feature/128528


Microsoft "persuades" NGOs to support OOXML

,----[ Quote ]
| Our friends at Linux Delhi have put up a copy of the form letters that 
| Microsoft has been sending NGOs on the OOXML issue. Apparently, these NGOs 
| have been sending copies of these letters to the Ministry of IT and Bureau of 
| Indian standards.    
`----

http://osindia.blogspot.com/2008/02/microsoft-persuades-ngos-to-support.html


Developers around the world, unite!

,----[ Quote ]
| Monopoly and proprietary software have an advantage in influencing state and 
| governmental institutions because of their large market base and ready 
| capital. Unscrupulous ways of influencing state governments have persisted in 
| India, for example, where executives of proprietary software cajole 
| government heads to promote their brands in lieu of some form of charity 
| given. FLOSS activists must overcome this huge challenge in order to get 
| their philosophy accepted and model implemented for the good of people who 
| are still on the barren side of the digital divide.       
`----

http://thepost.com.pk/OpinionNews.aspx?dtlid=147277&catid=11


Using NGOs to Push Agendas

,----[ Quote ]
| The extent to which Microsoft can go in its efforts to get OOXML is
| interesting. Microsoft has "persuaded" several non-profit organizations to 
| bombard the Indian IT Secretary and the Additional Director General of the 
| Bureau of Indian Standards with letters supporting its OOXML proposal. A copy 
| of the form letter they have been circulating to NGOs is given below. 
| Somebody should interview these NGOs to see how much they really know about 
| OOXML and open standards.      
| 
| The sequence of events leading up to the spamming of GoI? is:
| 
| Letter from an NGO thanking Microsoft (name changed to protect their
| identity) 
`----

http://wiki.linux-delhi.org/cgi-bin/twiki/view/OpenStandards/MsNgoLobby


Microsoft Looks for the Big Guns in OOXML In-Fighting

,----[ Quote ]
| Bill Gates has reportedly been making phone calls to the Secretary of Defense 
| and the Secretary of Commerce to push the American National Standards 
| Institute to ignore the votes of its advisory committees and vote "yes" on 
| ISO standardizing Microsoft's Open Office XML (OOXML) format, the one in 
| competition with the OpenDocument Format (ODF) pushed by IBM and Sun.    
| 
| Gates reportedly picked up the phone when the last INCITS ballot failed by 
| one vote to support Microsoft. 
`----

http://xml.sys-con.com/read/419573_p.htm


Fighting Megatron: five steps to freedom

,----[ Quote ]
| The free software world is being attacked by a large, wealthy, brutal 
| monopolist, who I’ll call “Megatron” for today. As I wrote last month, 
| Megatron is driving its OOXML tank through the village church of open 
| standards, doing unspeakable things to the ISO process, with the intention of 
| locking in a generation of computer users to its stack of patented, 
| restricted, and undocumented formats. It’s about freedom, some of us want it, 
| others want to take it away from us.      
`----

http://www.freesoftwaremagazine.com/blogs/fighting_megatron_five_steps_to_freedom


Swiss Cheese [for OOXML]

,----[ Quote ]
| The present spin doctors of Microsoft and ECMA managed to convince Mr. 
| Thomann to reject every serious technical and general concern we had 
| regarding OOMXL by pointing to compatibility reasons. At the end we had a 
| majority against Microsoft but which (giving the unfair rules) results in a 
| Swiss vote for Microsoft. Mr. Thomann was fretting and fuming at the end of 
| the meeting how it can be that successful international companies (we had 
| representatives from IBM, Google, ...) vote against the best interest of 
| their customers and theirself!       
| 
| Yes, this is how the democratic system at SNV / ISO works. After the meeting 
| I could not eat as much as I wanted to puke... 
`----

http://www.noooxml.org/forum/t-15521/swiss-cheese


Interview with Ecma’s Secretarie General

,----[ Quote ]
| The following is an interview of Jan van den Beld, the Secretarie General of 
| Ecma International.  
| 
| [...]
| 
|       (ramble on multiple and proprietary 'standards')
| 
| DB: But don’t you think that encourages patent wars?
| 
| JvdB: I have never thought so deeply about it (how the pemission of multiple 
| standards encourages patent wars). In a way yes, of course, there are hardly 
| any subjects in hi-tech where no patents are involved. That is one of the big 
| worries about bodies being concerned with patents So, we stay out of it. If 
| you have a patent, you get an unconditional right and what you do with your 
| patent is your business. You can ask "is that good?" Well that’s an 
| interesting question.       
`----

http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?page_id=2259


No is no, to OOXML

,----[ Quote ]
| I’ve heard several reports of supporters of OOXML trying to get national 
| standards bodies to change their votes from “NO with comments” to “YES with 
| comments” because “it’s the same thing.” The logic, which I’ll explain in a 
| later post, is that any comments will trigger a ballot resolution meeting, so 
| there is no need to be so negative and vote NO.    
`----

http://www.sutor.com/newsite/blog-open/?p=1762


IBM is still locked out of the Portuguese OOXML meeting

,----[ Quote ]
| In spite of various communications, we [IBM] are still locked out and will 
| not be allowed to participate. Microsoft will be there, as well as a special 
| Microsoft guest, as will various Microsoft business partners, and others.  
`----

http://www.sutor.com/newsite/blog-open/?p=1755


OOXML does not buy its way in Italy

,----[ Quote ]
| Particularly noteworthy is the fact that among those favouring the adoption 
| of the standard without reservation a large majority is made of business 
| partners of the proposing entity [Microsoft], a law firm retained by the 
| latter, the official certified business partners association of the proposing 
| entity.     
`----

http://www.piana.eu/cms/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=52&Itemid=1#0


Packing The Court At The ISO?

,----[ Quote ]
|      ...P member countries ('participating member' countries) sending 
|     representatives, and I am interested to note the majority of
|     their representatives are, as individuals, also Microsoft employees.
| 
| [...]
| 
| How can they not see that OOXML (ECMA 376) is unwanted by anyone outside of 
| Microsoft? How about it Brian Jones? Are you really so desperate that you
| have to resort to that?
`----

http://lnxwalt.wordpress.com/2007/03/23/packing-the-court-at-the-iso/


Guest Commentary: The converter hoax

,----[ Quote ]
| Microsoft maintains that while it would have been easy to support the Open 
| Document Format (ODF) natively, it had to move to MS-OOXML because this was 
| the only way for them to offer the full features of its office suite. But if 
| Microsoft itself is not able to represent its internal data structures in the 
| Open Document Format (ODF) in its Microsoft Office suite, how could an 
| external conversion program from MS-OOXML accomplish this task? The answer to 
| both questions is that it is not possible because two things cannot be the 
| same and different at the same time.       
`----

http://www.heise.de/open/artikel/92735
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