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The Shuttleworth Foundation Supports South Africa's Appeal Against OOXML

By Pamela Jones et al.

The Shuttleworth Foundation has sent out a press relase explaining what it believes is wrong with OOXML as a standard, and stating its conviction that the the South Africa Bureau of Standards has a strong case for appeal. It says SABS expects others to join them in appealing against OOXML as an ISO standard. If the appeal is successful, then OOXML would be rejected as a standard and would have to be resubmitted, the latter being something the Foundation hopes will not happen, since it believes having two standards for the same thing reduces interoperability.

It's a matter of due process not being followed, the Foundation explains, "several vital ISO procedures were bypassed". And now, by introducing complexity into standards, there is a threat to open access to information, which "impacts negatively on education and citizen access to government services". It's about being able to open any document, edit and save, without difficulties, after all.

Full post as published by Groklaw on May 28, 2008 (boomark / email).