Special to ag-IP-news Agency
BRUSSELS - Microsoft itself is the surprise winner of the Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure (FFII) "Kayak Prize 2007", offered by the FFII in its OOXML call for rejection of Microsoft's Office Open XML (OOXML) standards proposal. The software monopolist is honored as "Best Campaigner against OOXML Standardization".
On September 3rd, ISO announced that the Microsoft proposal had not gathered enough support to be accepted as it is. ISO will now review the comments made on the proposal, and make a final decision in February 2008.
"We could never have done this by ourselves. By pushing so hard to get OOXML endorsed, even to the point of loading the standards boards in Sweden, Denmark, Switzerland, Portugal, Italy, and beyond, Microsoft showed to the world how poor their format is. Good standards just don't need that kind of pressure,” FFII President Pieter Hintjens explains.
“All together, countries made over ten thousands technical comments, a new world record for an ISO vote. Microsoft made a heroic - and costly - effort to discredit their own proposal, and we're sincerely grateful to them," he added.
The FFII Board says the monopolist can collect its prize of 2,500 Euros, minus the cost of registering the noooxml.org domain, 12 euros.
"We ran a cheap campaign, mostly through that single website. So we're happy with a token reimbursement of our costs. Several of the Kayak prize nominees told us they did not want any financial reward for their work. So if Microsoft does not send someone to the award ceremony, we'll give the money to the Peruvian earthquake fund," FFII Vice-President Alberto Barrionuevo said.
Around 50,000 people from almost a hundred countries have signed the FFII's petition against OOXML to date.
"OOXML is not yet dead, even though it's been seriously discredited. Microsoft has one last chance to fix the design flaws and patent problems, and present a clean proposal next February. We think they will make cosmetic fixes and then push all the harder. It's exactly the worst approach and will alienate many governments, possibly spelling the end of their global office monopoly," Hintjens concludes.
