Michael Dolan Dot Com

Thursday, August 30th, 2007

PC World exposes Microsoft’s OOXML Sweden scam; Gerrit says “Microsoft has many tricks…”

I saw this PC World article through Bob Sutor’s blog. Interesting tactics - not sure how this gives ISO any credibility. I think it’s time for a re-vote… not only did Microsoft pay for votes, they also suggested the partners try and make it look legit by attending a couple meetings after as well… this is an international standards voting process by technical experts??

In an information e-mail that, according to Microsoft, was sent to “a few” partner companies, the software giant stated that its partners were expected to register to vote with SIS and “take part in the meeting on Aug. 27 to vote yes for Office Open XML.”

Microsoft’s partners were also requested to attend more meetings after the vote in order to prove “their sincere participation”.

Gerrit has an interesting post bringing together a number of really good links over at his blog.

It is interesting to watch as Microsoft tries different strategies in dealing with the open source community, open standards and interoperability. This interesting ballot box management trick with OOXML is clever (oh, and if it is so good, repeat it, over and over again). Basically, manage the voting populace to ensure that only your voters turn out for a vote.