Linked by Thom Holwerda on Tue 4th Sep 2007 21:40 UTC, submitted by archiesteel
Microsoft has failed in its attempt to have its Office Open XML document format fast-tracked straight to the status of an international standard by the International Organization for Standardization. The proposal must now be revised to take into account the negative comments made during the voting process. Microsoft expects that a second vote early next year will result in approval, it said Tuesday. That is by no means certain, however, given the objections raised by some national standards bodies.
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Member since:
2005-07-02
I can't say for sure, but I'll venture that it's because it aims at being a true portable standard, and not one that tries to incorporate all kinds of legacy MS cruft, which is what OOXML does (legacy support should be handled by *applications*, not file formats).
ODF may have been incomplete in some ways (though that is matter to debate), but it was designed from the ground up to be truly platform-neutral.
MS is already trying to spin this in a positive light, saying that a majority of participants voted yes, and that this indicates that its chances of being accepted after the "regular" process are good, but make no mistake: this is a slap in the face for MS, and seriously hampers their underhanded efforts to retain control of the "standard" office file format (and thus, of the desktop).
This is a good day for ODF supporters.