02.15.08
OpenDocument Format Already Implemented in the Netherlands; OOXML Crimewatch Tidied Up
As we stated about a week ago, the European Commission is currently investigating Microsoft’s behaviour in pursuit of ISO certification for OOXML.
One good bit of news which comes from Europe is that there is concrete evidence of ODF taking over parts of the continent. From Erwin:
Apparently the adoption of ODF by the City of Heerenveen and the City of Groningen had some impact on the decision.
In other important news, the folks from FFII are accumulating and making more accessible a list of Microsoft’s many sins in pursuit of that rubber stamp for its ‘ODF killer’, which is simply a proprietary format sheltered by a huge deal of bribery, lies, political manipulation and vote-rigging.
You are free to inspect the irregularities website that documents few cases reported by the online press and blogs. We got much more reports on an informal base per email. The Swedish single employee story is not credible, actually committee stuffing took place in Sweden.
On loopholes, that’s another subjective call, but since Microsoft competitors managed to establish control over a standards initiative with potentially dire consequences for one of Microsoft’s most important business domains, we are not surprised that Microsoft (legitimately, albeit with what some consider to be poor standards etiquette) exploited the loopholes. As we noted, we assume ISO will update its procedures to eliminate the loopholes in the future.
What?
Microsoft competitors managed to establish control over a standards initiative…
What?
Microsoft competitors managed to establish control over a standards initiative with potentially dire consequences for one of Microsoft’s most important business domains, we are not surprised that Microsoft …exploited the loopholes.
???
but since Microsoft competitors managed to establish control over a standards initiative with potentially dire consequences for one of Microsoft’s most important business domains, we are not surprised that Microsoft (legitimately, albeit with what some consider to be poor standards etiquette) exploited the loopholes.
This article is actually focused on a Microsoft proxy called “the Burton Group” (mentioned in [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25]). █
Highlight: Novell was the first to acknowledge that Microsoft FUD tactics had substance. Novell then used anti-Linux FUD to market itself. 
Highlight: Xandros let Microsoft make patent claims and brag about (paid-for) OOXML support. 
Highlight: Linspire's CEO not only fell into Microsoft arms, but he also assisted the company's attack on GNU/Linux. 
Highlight: Microsoft craves pseudo (proprietary) standards and gets its way using proxies and influence which it buys. 
Highlight: The invasion into the open source world is intended to leave Linux companies neglected, due to financial incentives from Microsoft. 
Analysis: Xen, an open source hypervisor, possibly fell victim to Microsoft's aggressive (and stealthy) acquisition-by-proxy strategy.