Micro$oft's OOXML becomes an I$O Standard

Finally this day has come which the M$ is awaiting since last 1.5 years. Its document standard Object Oriented XML (OOXML) has been ratified by ISO to become a standard for saving the Word Documents, Power point and spreadsheet documents in a seemingly "OPEN" format.

But where was the need to have one more standard when we already have ODF (Open Document Format). The ODF is a community based standard and has been developed by the open source community at large across the world. Was there any deficiency in that standard which needs to be fulfilled with an another standard. Anyway, OOXML doesnt have anything different from the one the ODF already offers. Then why do we need OOXML as another standard for the same thing?

For the audience who dont have the background about ODF and OOXML, it is another war between Microsoft and Open Source Community. Microsoft which has been an advocate of properitary standards and softwares wanted to out-do the Open Source community with its false propaganda of aligning its strategies to the universally accepted standards. Hence to counter ODF which was launched by the Open Source Community to have a common standard for saving the documents, presentations and spreadsheet across multiple platforms and applications, Microsoft launched its own version called OOXML. It was subjected to intense scrutinization about 1 year back by ISO and it had rejected the standard because of many reasons. Some of them which I found to be interesting was:

1. The OOXML Document was having about 32,000 pages while the existing standard ODF was specified in 50 pages.

2. The OOXML had many references to older versions of Microsoft word which are not supported by other Open source based applications like OpenOffice.

Microsoft has then lobbied around the countries of the world to make its standard an ISO Standard. India had declined to vote in favour of OOXML. Interestingly even US had voted NO for making OOXML as a standard. However it still managed to get a whopping 77% of the votes from representatives from all over the world. Nothing to get surprised -- Money is the magician here...

Now you may be interested to know why M$ invested so much of money in lobbying for its OOXML format. The reasons are simply business. Many of its top clients had started demanding that Microsoft should use Open format for storing the documents so that they can be reopened in other applications as well. Hence Microsoft was lobbying for OOXML which is a but a modified version of its existing .doc, .xml and .ppt format all clubbed together with XML support. But was Microsoft seriously committed to the development of Open Standard? No I dont think so...The OOXML will never be allowed to be edited/modified by the community. So where is the question of having an Open standard where people cannot participate to improve it.

The imminent threat which is an outcome of the above ratification:

1. Microsoft will still rule the Office World with its properitary software leaving no room for any enhancement by the community.

2. Corporates will still be enslaved by Microsoft with its proprietary products and there can be no competitor for its Office product unless the competitor pays royalty.

3. The entire concept of having a standard for inter-operatibility is diminished. Why do we need this standards for anyway?

Nevertheless, If I have been tracing down Microsoft's history well, its downfall is imminent. These are some of the moves that it is making before dying off finally. Microsoft is unable to compete with the fast emerging Web2.0 based companies. Web is the future of the world and our desktop may soon be limited within our browser. This day is not far and if you are not aware of prism, do check this site out... May be this is just a beginning of the new era.

I can envisage this scenario as much similar to the one that lead to downfall of IBM during 1990's and uprising of Microsoft as a bigger fish. But as it is said in Matrix - "Every thing which has a beginning has an end" and Microsoft story is about to END.