Bonum Certa Men Certa

Has Microsoft Just 'Pulled a Hungary' on OOXML Voting in Poland? (Updated)

We haven't a full translation yet, but early evidence seems to suggest that a panel's decision in Poland is being overriden because it is not favourable to OOXML. Watch this space in case there are more updates to come.

There was no practical reason to do that and as you remember first [Polish] comitee rejected MSOOXML with 82% votes against it, but now second comittee approved MSOOXML without single vote against it!.


We mentioned Hungary yesterday, but here is some more text in English.

Hungarian Standards Institution to reconsider its vote!


Remember that a high-level politician got involved and wanted another vote to take place, this time with more Microsoft partners involved. This brings memories of Gates and Ballmer making phonecalls to politicians, thereby flipping the vote on OOXML in the United States.

Other new stories:

OOXML approval system open to abuse

Whether or not OOXML is a good candidate for an open standard is beside the point: there is prima facie evidence of voting in bad faith, without proper consideration of all the aspects of the proposal.


Microsoft admits Swedish employee promised incentives for Open XML support

Microsoft Corp. admitted Wednesday that an employee at its Swedish subsidiary offered monetary compensation to partners for voting in favor of the Office Open XML document format's approval as an ISO standard.


Microsoft's OOXML provokes standards turmoil in France

Microsoft, notably, disagreed with this consensus, and sought for the French vote to ISO to be an abstention.


Microsoft takes off gloves in open documents battle

Microsoft’s fight to get file formats for its Word, Access, Excel and Powerpoint products accepted by the ISO standards organisation is getting nasty.


Here is another headline: INCITS confirms: US to vote for Open XML in ISO

INCITS said "No", but then, Steve Ballmer and Bill Gates started making phonecalls to politicians. It is very important to remember this.

Update: More information on Poland here.

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

Links 15/08/2026: "There Is No A.I." (Slop Plagiarism Isn't Intelligence) and Its "Impact on the Environment Is Absolutely Horrifying"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 15/08/2026: Gratitudes, "Microflier" Drones, and Literate Programming
Links for the day
IBM's PIPs and RAs (Layoffs) Going on, Interns as 'Scabs'
It seems like a consensus (also in Reddit, we took a quick look)
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, August 14, 2026
IRC logs for Friday, August 14, 2026
Gemini Links 14/08/2026: Slower Internet, Logging Off Made Easy, and Human Code
Links for the day
Links 14/08/2026: "Mystery of Dark Oxygen", People Despise Slop, and Backlash Grows Against Fake Currencies (Energy-Wasting Scam Like Slop)
Links for the day
Free Publicity
They say there's no such thing as "bad press" or that every publicity is good publicity, sometimes free publicity
Farage's fears, media hijacked by-election, what really happened in Clacton
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
It's Friday. A Ton of People Departing From IBM and Red Hat.
A mere subset of people who announce this in public at Microsoft's LinkedIn
GNU/Linux and ChromeOS Beyond 11%
Combined with ChromeOS, it's already past and beyond 11%
Chatbots/LLMs Are the Next "Clown Computing", Pure Hype, a Serious Mistake
Programs that scan text and emit something similar (but full of errors)
Links 14/08/2026: Slop 'Music' Causing Problems, Slop Data Centre Contractor Unpaid (Massive Debt), and The Cyber Show Says We're "Colonised By Wankers"
Links for the day
Fake Growth of Social Control Media is Misleading
nowadays people look for alternatives - ones not controlled by MElon, CPC, and Kapo-Berg
statCounter: Windows Down to All-Time Low of 25%, Android Leads the Pack, GNU/Linux About to Leapfrog Apple, Overtaking MacOS
The situation was very different in past years
Microsoft's Mass Layoffs (Including 'Voluntary' Secret Layoffs) Take Their Toll on Seattle
How much longer can they hide their crises?
Planet Fedora ("Fedora People") is Just IBM Staff, Former IBM Staff, and LLM Slop
this is what Fedora boils down to now
Explanation of What Will Happen to Red Hat (and Other Acquired Companies) After August
In short, a lot will be scuttled; history shows it happens over and over again
SLAPP Censorship - Part 149 Out of 200: It Took a Long Time to Show What Jason Arday (at Cambridge) and Harvey Weinstein (in Hollywood) Really Were
Really bad when society endures abuse because the abusers silence their exposers
Gemini Links 14/08/2026: 32-bit RISC-V and BlackBerry
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, August 13, 2026
IRC logs for Thursday, August 13, 2026
'Voluntary' Layoffs (a Form of Silent Layoffs): Microsoft Global Voluntary Separation Agreement (GVSA) in August 2026 and September 2026
Today and yesterday
Microsoft Sees Windows on Fire, Pours Gasoline Over It
The latest move from Microsoft defies logic
Racing Towards "Woman Zero"
They don't seem to value women
The Legacy of Gerstner (Rapid Destruction) Continues at IBM
They say IBM never recovered from Gerstner, who instead of saving the companies (IBM and others he claims credit for) set up a collision course of rapid shrinkage
Counters in Clacton Commence in 3 Hours at Clacton Leisure Centre
Even a few hundreds of votes for Pocock would be considered a great success
Swiss army to attack 2,900 domain name owners? Cult of ETH Zurich & Debian
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
IBM's Bluewashing of Confluent Carries on, More Layoffs Coming, Same Likely Applicable to Red Hat
September 30 is a day before this next phase of bluewashing at Red Hat
Headlines About Microsoft and Ransomware, But They're "SPONSORED FEATURES" at The Register MS
The Register MS habitually publishes LLM slop too
Links 13/08/2026: K-pop Suicide Due to Social Control Media, Legal Problems for Facebook Over Safety
Links for the day
'Cancel Culture' Isn't About Empathy, It's About Making Good People Homeless
Seeing what they did to RMS, remember that those "concern trolls" are about everything other than ethics and morals
Daniel Pocock in The Nerve
Lots of publicity owning to the enrollment
Why Support Daniel Pocock
Our readers who come from IBM and the EPO are certainly familiar with the tactics of censorship and what that sort of censorship leads to
SLAPP Censorship - Part 148 Out of 200: The Manosphere
Those people don't just threaten our national sovereignty, press, democracy etc. They also endanger women everywhere.
Gemini Links 13/08/2026: Health, Partial Eclipse Sketches, and Guilelessness
Links for the day
GNU/Linux Reaches 10% "Market Share" in statCounter
As of this morning
15% of IBM Marked for Potential Termination, PIPs are the "New Layoffs" (or RAs) at IBM
IBM is a dying company, but it does not want the press to say this or for people to understand that
Links 13/08/2026: "The Rise of the Measles-Industrial Complex" and Spotify Curbs Slop
Links for the day
Daniel Pocock on Australia's 9News (Nine Entertainment)
This gives visibility to software and technology issues
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, August 12, 2026
IRC logs for Wednesday, August 12, 2026