Bonum Certa Men Certa

Becta, Its Microsoft Affairs, and OpenDocument Format

"The danger is that Microsoft is using strategic monopolistic pricing in the education market, with the government’s assistance, to turn our state university systems into private workforce training programs for Microsoft."

--Nathan Newman



Prior to discussing Microsoft's exclusionary deals with OEM we also discussed Microsoft exclusionary deal with British education. The gist of the story is that BECTA and Microsoft sign secret deals which more or less force all educational institutions to stick with Microsoft's prepaid-for products (thereby excluding Free software).

“They have dual roles and conflicting interests, e.g. serving Microsoft investors and 'serving' British taxpayers at the same time.”At the time, such actions and deals resulted in some outrage. Those who understand the situation -- as opposed to just assume that politicians serve their people with good cause in mind -- have called for change. There is already too much 'cheeky business' like this in the United Kingdom. We recently discussed the BBC again. In fact, much more information is yet to arrive about other government establishments that become Microsoft hostages in the hands of former/current Microsoft employees. They have dual roles and conflicting interests, e.g. serving Microsoft investors and 'serving' British taxpayers at the same time.

More recently, BECTA has been a little more responsive. It actually listened. They say it's the perception that you cannot live without Office which makes a mental barrier. With OOXML spreading around, this may actually become a technical barrier, so it's time to worry about BECTA and ODF (they made no clear statement on the issue for all we can tell).

Having made some inquires we learned that BECTA did write to BSI to tell them to vote "No" to OOXML as an ISO standard. They have also complained to the OFT about Microsoft's lack of interoperability in office suites. "They really ought to use ODF for Web site downloads again," I was told just days ago. After all, this is a government-associated establishment. A formal announcement of some sort ought to come from BECTA as it would be helpful. The ODF Alliance periodically compiles reports that serve as evidence of ODF growth and expansion.BECTA's words can be used. Here is what ZDNet UK had to report on yesterday:

Becta, the organisation that implements government educational technology policy, has claimed Windows Vista and Office 2007 should not be deployed in schools because of potential compatibility issues with earlier versions of Microsoft's software, as well as software produced by Microsoft's rivals. This view was reiterated on Wednesday in an update to a Becta report released late last year.


Here is a more comprehensive analysis from Matt Aslett, which includes valuable quotes.

“We remain concerned about the approach taken to supporting ODF in Office 2007. While the product includes the functionality to read virtually every other relevant file format ‘out of the box’, the processes for dealing with ODF files are very cumbersome. We identified ten steps that users would need to take in order to locate and install the converter that gives Office 2007 the ability to access ODF files and note that the arrangements for opening and saving ODF files in Microsoft Office 2007 are not intuitive in that they deviate from the normal approach familiar to users. We believe that these arrangements present sufficient technical difficulties for the majority of users to make them disinclined to use competitor products and this may weaken competition.”


It is important that BECTA speaks out more loudly about ODF, especially as we now have a window of opportunity while schools are getting really hassled with kids bringing in OOXML-format material.

Stephen Walli once argued that Microsoft's support for ODF is inevitable. Microsoft should just support ODF as soon as possible if it wished to remain relevant in the market. According to one source which is close to the company, this will be done sooner or later. Why procrastinate the inevitable?

Recent Techrights' Posts

Rust is Starting to Seem More Like Microsoft-hosted "Digital Maoism", Not a Legitimate Effort to Improve Security
Maybe this is very innocent, but they seem to have taken a solid, stable program from a high-profile Frenchman and looked for ways to marry it with GitHub, i.e. Microsoft/NSA
 
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, May 08, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, May 08, 2025
Links 08/05/2025: Mass Layoffs at Google Again, India/Pakistan Tensions Continue to Grow, New Pope (US) Selected
Links for the day
"Victory Day" - Part I: That is the Day Microsofters Who Assault Women Pay for Their Actions in Foreign Land (Using "Guns for Hire" Who Attack Their Own Country for American Dollars)
Adding a friend from Microsoft to the docket didn't help
Gemini Links 08/05/2025: Practical Gemini Use Case, Shutdown of the Blanket Fort Webring
Links for the day
Links 08/05/2025: "Slop Presidency", US Government Defunds Public Broadcasting
Links for the day
Lasse Fister, Organiser of Libre Graphics Meeting, Points Out the Code of Conduct is Likely Violated by the Same People Who Promote Codes of Conduct (and Then Bully Him Into Cancelling a Keynote)
I am starting to see Lasse Fister as another victim
LLM Slop Attacks Not Only Sites of Free Software Projects But Also Bug Reporting Systems (Time-wasting, in Effect "DDoS")
Microsoft, the leading purveyor and promoter of slop, is a cancer
The Richard Stallman (RMS) "European Tour" Carries on In Spite of the Nuremberg Incident
Some people spoke about how they saw yesterday's talk
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, May 07, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, May 07, 2025
The CoC Means the Founder of GNU/Linux Cannot Talk and a 72-Year-Old Man With Cancer is Somehow a "Safety" Risk?
Those who don't like RMS are not forced to attend his talks
Gemini Links 07/05/2025: A Shopping Spree and Digital Gardening
Links for the day
Links 07/05/2025: Pegasus Guilty and a Path Towards EU Without Russian Energy
Links for the day
People Used to Talk
If pets can live a measurably happy life without gadgets and "apps", why can't humans?
Outsourcing GNU/Linux to Microsoft GitHub Promoted by Microsoft LLM Slop and Army Officers
Something doesn't seem right
Weaponisation of For-Profit Dockets - Part III: No More Media Lawsuits From Brett Wilson LLP This Year, One Can Only Guess Why
People leak a lot of material to Techrights because they know, based on the track record, that the sources will be protected and whatever gets published will stay online, in full, no matter how stubborn an effort (even lawsuits and blackmail) will be sent its way
Gemini Links 07/05/2025: Adopting GrapheneOS, Further Enshittification of Flickr
Links for the day
Links 07/05/2025: CISA Gutted, Debt-Saddled (Likely Insolvent) 'Open' 'AI' (Proprietary Slop) Faking Its Financial State Again
Links for the day
Finland, Lithuania, and Latvia Fortify Their Digital Border With GNU/Linux
This month's data from statCounter is particularly interesting near the Baltic Sea
The European Patent Office (EPO) Has a Very Profound Corruption Issue, Far More Urgent an Issue Than Pronouns
a rather long document
Richard Stallman Gives Public Talk at Technical University of Liberec, Czech Republic
"For programs that you could run, and for network services that could do your own computing, under what circumstances is it reasonable to trust them?"
Today We Turn 18.5
The eighteenth "and a half" anniversary
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, May 06, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, May 06, 2025