Bonum Certa Men Certa

OOXML: Forced Upgrades, Forced Obsolescence

Deprecated Microsoft



”OOXML is already (mis)used as a tool that creates the problems it purports to have solved.“The hyperlink above leads to a previous very recent writeup on this topic. Even amid heated discussions in ISO, Microsoft was not too shy to reveal just why OOXML must be shot down. OOXML is already (mis)used as a tool that creates the problems it purports to have solved.

The scoop came from Slashdot, but other articles have since then appeared, including in C|net. It is worth mentioning that Paul Allen, the co-founder of Microsoft, owns C|Net. This explains the bias and the endless flow of Microsoft lobbyists that come from C|Net. Here are just a couple of examples. It's not just Bill Gates' so-called 'charity' that buys media companies (and invests in predatory oil companies).

Anyway, here is Groklaw's response to this new discovery:

First, although Microsoft claims the blocked file formats are "insecure", I don't believe it. Read Rob Weir's Legacy Format FUD on that. If you read the Microsoft how to work around this, you find out it involves changing some things in your registry. But what is interesting is, among the file formats blocked are things like Word 97 for Windows and Word 2001 for the Mac. A lot of people have documents in those formats. I do myself. So here's what I think might work: open your document in OpenOffice.org, the latest version. It can open those types of documents and many, many more. Then save your document in a format that will work with Office 2003. Then ask yourself two questions: do we need ODF to ensure that we can open documents in the future without such difficulties? I'd answer yes, we do. And the second question I'd be asking is: why am I still using Microsoft products when they are nothing but troubles? And finally, if Microsoft ever again has the nerve to tell us that we need another standard document format to ensure backward compatibility for all those old documents, I think I will laugh. That is clearly not at the top of Microsoft's list of to do items.


Here is another response:

It makes an interesting comparison between OOXML (Microsoft's new proposed office document standard) and the much older RTF standard. It argues that Microsoft will use OOXML to further lock in their customers, and to continually make it difficult for any competitor to produce OOXML compatibility, while officially being able to claim 'standard compliance', just like they have done in the past with RTF. And since Microsoft has shown its strategy with RTF in the past, why - the article asks - should we assume anything else from Microsoft today?

[...]

Why should we believe for a second that Microsoft's intent is not exactly the same with OOXML as it was with RTF?


Here is what Sam Hiser has to say:

Trouble is these changes to the format will never make it into the Office 2007 software products -- which are shipping as we speak. And Microsoft has never intended for the new XML formats (with file extensions .docx, .xlsx, .pptx) implemented in Office 2007|8 to fully reflect the OOXML specification.

Along with disabling the legacy document formats in Office 2003 through service pack 3, these measures together represent on their face Microsoft's "Customer Pull-Up" strategy designed to coerce customers to move into the company's next-generation lock-in tank. The Pull-Up is insidious because customers, under what appears to them to be their own free will, purchase new Microsoft software fearing that to be without access to Microsoft's newest document formats they will not be able to do work.


Here is another serious complaint about this forced upgrade stunt, followed by some suggestions.

The solution is simple: open standards.

1. Begin thinking about how you can use open source software, which doesn’t cost any money at all, to replace closed source alternatives that will only lock you into proprietary formats. For example, use OpenOffice instead of Microsoft Office. It’s just as good as Microsoft Office for most tasks, and best of all, it’s free!

2. Save your files in ODT (OpenDocument) format, a popular open-source document format that any programmer can implement for free, so that there will always be software to open your old documents. That’s what many US states and other national governments are beginning to do.

3. Always, always keep good backups and migrate those backups to new mediums promptly so that you don’t have 5.25″ floppy disks hanging around anymore. Right now, your files should be stored on CDs and hard drives, not 3.5″ floppies, 5.25 floppies, ZIP disks, LS120 disks, etc.


Remember that with Microsoft formats, your own precious information, some of which can be vital and have sentimental value, will be accessible only as long as Microsoft permits it.

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

Advocacy of Software Freedom Changed, LUGs Became Less Relevant
The way we see it, support groups like LUGs sort of outlived their usefulness when it became easier to install GNU/Linux
For the Second Time in a Few Weeks Microsoft Lunduke Makes False Accusations Against Senior Red Hat Staff to Incite a Despicable 'Troll Army'
Nothing that Microsoft Lunduke claims or says can be trusted
Compromised by NVIDIA Proprietary Library
Meanwhile in Boston there are "[r]oundtable talk with FSF volunteers (both in-person and online)"
How Software Patents Were Viewed or Their General Status Changed Over Time
A rough summary
 
Watch the FSF Party Live (via Livestream)
It's in WebM format, which is widely supported by now
When Microsoft "Integrates" Something With "AI" It Means It's Losing Money and Is Generally Hopeless
how did Bing fare after 36 months of LLM slop being hyped up as "replacement" for search?
Most Certificates Don't Improve Security, They Mostly Increase Downtime (for No Good Reason)
The 'Gemini sites' (capsules) are a growing force
The statCounter Site Has Data Integrity Problems
Maybe we'll get back to statCounter when its data becomes more "stable" again
10 Ways to Combat Software Patents
software patents are loathed also by proprietary software developers
"Just a Little Bit of Meat..."
Free software "absolutism" is not a radical stance, more so if the only "radical" belief the user possesses is that he or she must be in control of his or her software, and by extension his or her computer
Red Hat is Ignoring the Free Software Community, It's a "Fortune 1000" Vendor
Red Hat's blog also participates a lot in promoting of Wall Street's latest pump-and-dump "AI" scheme
Free Software Foundation Party Has Begun
We shall be focusing a lot on software patents today
Former Head of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Lina Khan Knows Whatever Microsoft Touches Will Die
Just like Skype (as recently as months ago) [...] When Microsoft grabs things, or when it buys things, it almost never ends well
Slopwatch: Fake Articles About LibreOffice in Austria and Wine 10.16
very short
Links 04/10/2025: "attempted Coup" Noted in Facebook, Russia Kills Journalists via Drones
Links for the day
Gemini Links 04/10/2025: Anesthesia and Baudpunk
Links for the day
Links 04/10/2025: "Privacy Harm Is Harm", Criticism Outlawed in US
Links for the day
Garmin Uses Linux for Some of the Garmin Products, Now It's Sued by Strava Using Software Patents
Software patents should never have been granted in the first place
Richard Stallman Will Give a Talk in Sweden in 6 Days
Dr. Stallman, despite his battle with cancer is still alive and mentally sharp
FSF Turns 40
We'll be focusing on patent-related topics this weekend
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, October 03, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, October 03, 2025
Gemini Links 04/10/2025: Distro Hopping and "Part Time"
Links for the day
We Are Turning 19 in One Month, FSF Turns 40 in 3 Hours (CET)
For our anniversary next month we still have no concrete plans
Patent Docs (or PatentDocs) Learned the Wrong Lessons From the Death of TypePad
Had they gone ahead with an SSG, they'd become a lot more future-proof
USPTO Patent Bubble Already Imploding, After Decades of Artificial Inflation, Entire Offices Close for Good
we can deduce that financial pressures (lack of "demand" for monopolies) play a role
TikTok is Not Harmless (Being CheeTok in the US Will Advance Orange Agenda)
Social control media isn't "fun and games"; it's a digital weapon that lets hostile groups or nations infiltrate others, then turn them against themselves
Andy Farnell and Helen Plews Explain What "Modern" Tech Does to Old People
Imposing terrible tech "religion" on people is not helping them
Tomorrow the Free Software Foundation (FSF) Turns 40 and Its Web Site is Still Slow Due to DDoS by LLM Slop Bots
For an advocacy group, uptime is important (for its message to remain accessible)
Slopwatch: Google News as a Firehose of LLM Slop About "Linux"
Google News is really bad
Datamation, Where I Used to Publish Articles, Appears to Have Been Sold to TechnologyAdvice Only to Become a Slopfarm
I'd prefer to not associate with that site anymore
Links 03/10/2025: "NPR’s Economics Lessons Come With Neoliberal Spin" and Canada Post at Risk
Links for the day
Gemini Links 03/10/2025: Panic Attacks and Food Adulteration
Links for the day
Links 03/10/2025: Lawyers Caught Using LLM Slop Explain Why They Did It, LibreSSL 4.1.1 and 4.0.1 Released
Links for the day
FSF Board Grew 50% Since Last Year, Has New President, Turns 40 in Two Days
It's a good move for the FSF and - by extension - for software freedom
Links 03/10/2025: Conflicts, Death of TypePad, and TikTok/CheeTok Gives a Boost to Far Right Groups in Europe
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, October 02, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, October 02, 2025
Slopwatch: Linux Journal, Google News, and LinuxSecurity
They carry on polluting the Web with fake articles
Gemini Links 02/10/2025: Kubernetes With FreeBSD and robots.txt
Links for the day
Links 02/10/2025: 'Open' 'AI' Resorting to Gimmicks and Fake Funding, Europe’s ‘Drone Wall’ Discussed
Links for the day
Links 02/10/2025: Brave Passes 100M Users Milestone, Kodak Selling Its Own Film Again
Links for the day
Michael “Monty” Widenius: It Started in 1983 With Richard Stallman (RMS)
The other co-founder of MySQL is a bit notorious for confronting RMS rather viciously
su lisa && rm -rf /home/ibm/power
Novell was ruined by another person from IBM, Ronald Hovsepian
A Record Demand at Microsoft: Demand to Cancel
What we're witnessing is a very ungraceful destruction of XBox
Microsoft is Losing Europe
Hence all the "support" and "discount" offers that are limited to Europe
The Free Software Foundation Starts Fund-raising for 40th Anniversary
New pop-up 2-3 days ahead of the 40th anniversary event
Systemd Breaks Networking in Debian and Microsoft Staff Rushes to Make Face-Saving Excuses in LWN
Microsoft's bluca is already there in the comments, his Microsoft money pays for LWN to let him leave comments early
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, October 01, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, October 01, 2025
What the End of XBox Will Look Like: a Fiery Crash
XBox is the next Skype. It won't last much longer. Expect many more layoffs.
Richard Stallman is Going to Finland to Give a Talk Next Thursday
A day later he speaks in Sweden
Gemini Links 02/10/2025: SMTP Pipelining and End of ROOPHLOCH 2025
Links for the day