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IBM May Quit Technology Standards Bodies

,----[ Quote ]
| The Armonk, N.Y.-based computer maker is expected to announce the review
| Tuesday, according to company officials. IBM has become frustrated by what it
| considers opaque processes and poor decision-making at some of the hundreds
| of bodies that set technical standards for everything from data-storage
| systems to programming languages, those officials said.
`----

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1222...ws_us_business

WSJ: IBM Considers Quitting Standards Bodies

,----[ Quote ]
| The Wall Street Journal is publishing an article mentioning the OOXML fiasco,
| and the intention of IBM to leave some standards organisations (ECMA
| Microsoft-proxy is probably on the shooting line). With the disgusting
| Microsoft committee stuffing and the non-reaction of ISO, I would say this is
| something I should do now in terms of protest. The current way to define
| standards behind closed doors, closed rooms, and with archaic methods of
| patching standards proposals outside of the public eye is something that
| should be reformed.
`----

http://www.noooxml.org/forum/t-91370...andards-bodies

"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."

--Richard Stallman, June 2008


Recent:

20 August 2008 (Microsoft corrupts the ISO)

,----[ Quote ]
| Microsoft consummated its corruption of the International Standards
| Organization, which dismissed an appeal by several countries against the
| approval of OOXML.
|
| However, I think the EU's criminal investigation of this corruption is still
| live. (Is it?)
`----

http://www.stallman.org/archives/200...20the%20ISO%29


ISO's Day of Shame

,----[ Quote ]
| Riiiight: so there was insufficient support among the technical boards for
| their dirty laundry to be aired in public. What a surprise. The fact that
| standards bodies representing the second- and fourth-most populous countries
| in the world were unhappy with the way the standardisation process was
| carried out doesn't matter, apparently.
|
| Time for a new international standards body, methinks....
`----

http://opendotdotdot.blogspot.com/20...-of-shame.html


Detailed IEC Voting Results on OOXML Appeals

,----[ Quote ]
| As I reported yesterday, the OOXML appeals brought by Brazil, India, South
| Africa and Venezuela have been rejected by the Technical Management Board
| (TMB) and Standardization Management Board (SMB) of ISO and IEC,
| respectively. Â*I have now received the actual voting results for the IEC
| vote, and an indecipherable screenshot of the ISO votes. Â*I'll hope to add
| the ISO votes later on when I get more comprehensible information, but in the
| meantime, here are the IEC results.
|
| In each case, the questions included in the ballot were the same:
|
| Â* Â* a) Not to process the appeal any further
|
| Â* Â* b) To process one or more of the appeals, which would require setting up
| Â* Â* of a conciliation panel
`----

http://www.consortiuminfo.org/standa...80816081402686


UPDATE - Countries may follow South Africa in appealing Microsoft-sponsored
OOXML standard: ISO

,----[ Quote ]
| According to ISO spokesman Roger Frost, "Because the period for receipt of
| appeals remains open until the end of May, ISO will communicate on the next
| steps in early June, when it knows whether any other national bodies are
| appealing."
`----

http://www.itvendorsdirectory.ca/Onl...frica-001.html


South Africa appeals against OOXML, call your Standards Body now!

,----[ Quote ]
| The South African Standards Body SABS have lodged an appeal at ISO against
| the awful fast-track process of DIS29500, or Microsoft Office OpenXML. Please
| call your national Standards Body and ask them to support this complain. You
| have only 7 days because the deadline is 30 May, 2 months after the ISO vote.
|
| Steve Pepper, being so disgused about the intervention of a Norwegian
| bureaucrat reverting the decision of the Norwegian Technical Committee, is
| pointing at the fact that this person is also member of the ISO Technical
| Management Board (TMB), who will decide on the future of this appeal. I hope
| we will have some transparency on who is deciding what inside ISO on this
| appeal. It is time for ISO to clean up its stables, they have not been
| cleaned for several years, and they are getting dirty and smelly.
`----

http://www.noooxml.org/forum/t-61468...dards-body-now


The South Africa Bureau of Standards submits an official appeal to ISO and IEC
against OOXML

,----[ Quote ]
| At least one National Body has submitted a formal complaint to ISO and IEC.
| South Africa was rather vocal about the Fast Tracking process of OOXML from
| day one.
`----

http://www.openmalaysiablog.com/2008...uth-afric.html


ISO Fantasy

,----[ Quote ]
| What OOXML Is · The ISO process, brutal and corrupt as it was, has been
| covered to death by everyone. Its output, soon to be known as ISO/IEC 29500,
| differs from ECMA-376 in two ways. ¶
|
| [...]
|
| What Microsoft really wanted was that ISO stamp of approval to use as a
| marketing tool. And just like your mother told you, when they get what they
| want and have their way with you, they’re probably not gonna call you in the
| morning.
`----

http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/200x/2008/04/15/OOXML


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/...onstration.php


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

http://www.noooxml.org/forum/t-52412...xml-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 HÃ¥ndverkeren, 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/...so-conference/


Shenanigans Alleged on Road to OOXML Vote

,----[ Quote ]
| The events leading up to the ISO's decision on OOXML can best be described as
| strange.
|
| Take the case of KT 182, the Polish technical committee responsible for the
| OOXML standardization process, as described on Groklaw: Chairperson Elzbieta
| Andrukiewicz was instructed that KT 182 should abstain from voting if a
| consensus was not achieved. Well, it wasn't, and she said the members who
| were absent could vote by e-mail E-Mail Marketing Software - Free Trial.
| Click Here. -- but if they didn't vote, she'd take their non-response as a
| yes.
|
| Later, when presenting the results of the ballot resolution, she showed a
| slide that claimed 98 percent of the OOXML issues had been resolved during
| the KT 182 meeting.
|
| When reminded this wasn't true, and told that the author of the PowerPoint
| file was Paul Pesch, platform strategy manager at Microsoft Netherlands, she
| threatened to sue anyone who repeated the assertion that Pesch was the
| author.
|
| That slide had been shown at another meeting, and one of the Brazilian
| delegates had complained about it.
`----

http://www.linuxinsider.com/rsstory/62400.html
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