It was recently reported that Microsoft was discovered to have payed off companies to join the standards organization deciding OOXML. On the surface this is shady, but there are longer term consequences as well. For those that don’t remember GIF images for a long while were created and used regularly without designers or developers needing to be concerned with what that format brought with it. As things developed Unisys and Compuserve went through a patent dispute and the internet at large was threatened with having to pay royalties for using the format. Yikes.
Another example was the patent dispute with Eolas over web objects automatically playing, or starting without user interaction. They of course went after the fat wallets at Microsoft, but the collateral damage was Flash. As a direct result of this patent dispute flash developers were robbed of a really simple, practically foolproof means of deploying flash animation over the web. The workarounds after the dispute generally rely on JavaScript, and JavaScript can be turned off in browsers leaving Flash site out in the cold.
Now comes Office Open XML (OOXML), an open standard XML document format, developed and designed by Microsoft. Call me a paranoid skeptic, but when has Microsoft ever done anything that wouldn’t net them money? Considering that this is a format that was created for Microsoft Office 2007, and Office has always been the bread winner for Microsoft how many people would like to take bets that Microsoft will want to license this format out, after it is adopted as a standard?
There are a number of groups that are proposing competing standards, most of which are not aligned with Microsoft, but with the Open Source Software movement. Even if you aren’t as conspiracy minded as I am consider this consequence. Let’s say everyone adopts this new standard, all our documents, businesses, and vital records are now written into this format.
- Who’s to say it’s the best format for long term interoperability, storage, and security of content?
- Shouldn’t we all have a stake in what format the worlds documents are archived in?
- Are all the applications and implications being considered for the future?
With those questions in mind think about the company that is proposing the standard.
- Microsoft does not have a good track record for supporting open standards.
- Microsoft has a history of writing proprietary software that locks everyone else out of developing for that software/OS.
- Microsoft has been found guilty in U.S. and European courts for practicing non-competitive monopolistic business practices.
- Despite the proliferation of the standards movement in the web development community, Microsoft still produced a barely standards compliant browser.
- If Microsoft has paid companies to vote in favor of adopting their standard, they expect to recover this investment long term.
Even without the conspiracy I am high skeptical that Microsoft is the best source for developing anything with the word “Open” in the name, it’s not in their nature. And while I am saddened by Microsoft’s buying of votes, it is expected behavior. What I am most appalled by is the mechanism in place in the standards organization that allowed a single company to buy the organization and ratify Microsoft’s standard.