Buying the elections because the world stays asleep

You would not believe this unless you have already seen the hundreds -- if not thousands -- of documented cases where the OOXML process had been abused.

Watch this new observation:

Next week on Monday and Tuesday there will be an SC34 meeting, where the maintenance of the inexistant DIS29500 specification will be discussed. Surprise, half of the seats will be occupied by Microsoft and ECMA:

Adam Farquhar (Ecma) Alex Brown (UK) Benjamin Henrion (BE) Brett Roberts (NZ) Dave Welsh (US) Doug Mahugh (Ecma) Francis Cave (GB) Isabelle Valet-Harper (Ecma) Istvan Sebestyen (Ecma) Jasper Hedegaard Bojsen (DK) Jean Paoli (Ecma) Jean Stride (GB) Jesper Lund Stocholm (DK) Jirka Kosek (CZ) Keld Simonsen (NO) Ken Holman (CA) Kimmo Bergius (FI) Manu Setälä (FI) Michiel Leenaars (NL) Murata Makoto (JP) Patrick Durusau (US) Pia Elleby Lange (DK) Rex Jaeschke (Ecma) Shahzad Rana (NO) Wemba Opota (CI)

Some of them, Jesper Lund Stocholm for instance, are Microsoft partners and fans [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7]. This is a joke, right? And Alex Brown [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21]? Should they also bring Fidel Castro in to cast a vote on democracy?

Additionally, be sure to learn who Adam Farquhar is [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11]. Isn't he also with Microsoft and the British Library? This is ridiculous; it's a syndicate of money and influence taking over shell establishments like ISO. Some of these people trade Microsoft products for a living!

“Microsoft (and its ecosystem) is set to decide on Microsoft (and its ecosystem).”Let's pick some other examples. It's most amazing how Microsoft employees are 'dressed up' as ECMA employees. Doug Mahugh at ECMA? He works for Microsoft. Is he swapping hats for cover-up? Again? What is ECMA doing there anyway? ECMA is being paid handsomely by Microsoft. Remember Jan van den Beld, who changed directives especially for Microsoft and then left ECMA to join a Microsoft lobbying arm and behave even more aggressively?

How about Rex Jaeschke? Follow the links at will. It's all too clear to see what is happening here.

At the moment, Rick Jelliffe [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7] accuses concerned people of being "afraid of openness". He refers to OOXML, which is definitely not open. In fact, the word "Open" in the acronym should be forbidden given all the binary components which are undocumented, not to mention allergy to open source software (Microsoft reserves the right to sue open source implementations over OOXML-related patents it applies for).

One could go on and on analyzing one person at the time, or at least those who attend to serve Microsoft. The motives say it all. Microsoft (and its ecosystem) is set to decide on Microsoft (and its ecosystem).

Remember how Bryan complained and prematurely left ISO after a long career there, having witnessed how his committee got stuffed by Microsoft? He even spoke out about it.

Be sure to view this list of the attendants at the OOXML BRM. It's equally appalling, just like the BRM itself [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12]. it was controlled by ECMA, Microsoft and some other OOXML-sympathetic figures.

ISO should be utterly ashamed of itself. Ashamed. And humiliated. Tim Bray, who attended the BRM, had this to say:

"This was horrible, egregious, process abuse and ISO should hang their heads in shame for allowing it to happen. Their reputation, in my eyes, is in tatters. My opinion of ECMA was already very negative; this hasn’t improved it, and if ISO doesn’t figure out away to detach this toxic leech, this kind of abuse is going to happen again and again."

--Tim Bray

ISO is being abused by Microsoft and its affiliates that exploit ISO for their wallets. To make matters worse, ISO chose to try and bury all of this under the rug. This makes it an accomplice in a sense.

You could take a rich crook and put him in a suit. But it's still a crook in a suit, who probably made a fortune 'thanks' to bad behaviour. This must not be tolerated.

Despite all of these dirty tricks, ODF is going strong. Yesterday we wrote about NATO and ODF without sufficient certainty. It's finally more official, based on Andy Updegrove's Web site and even Heise.

NATO has included the International Standardization Organization's (ISO) certified Open Document Format (ODF) in its list of mandatory standards to promote interoperability. NATO's standards list includes Rich Text Format (RTF), extensible markup language (XML) and Office XP formats as requirements for the sharing of data.

Don't ever let dirty tricks and misconduct of biblical proportions take over your precious personal documents. Stand up for justice and digital preservation. ⬆