EXTRA: ISO an ex-standards-body? (Norwegian blues: beautiful plumage...)

Welcome to a special IT Blogwatch EXTRA: as Richi Jennings watches bloggers' reactions to the latest development in the standards war over Microsoft's OOXML file format. Not to mention a shed-load of optical illusions...

Egan Orion tightens his belt and reaches for the stars:

Norwegian members of the Technical Committee of that country's International Standards Organisation (ISO) body Standard Norge have resigned their posts to protest the approval of Microsoft's OOXML document formats proposal in defiance of the majority recommendation. In all, 13 of the committee's 23 members have resigned.
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In Standard Norge deliberations regarding OOXML earlier this year, only two members – Microsoft and Statoil – voted for approval, while the remaining 21 voted against it. Defying the overwhelming vote, the officials of Standard Norge went ahead and approved OOXML anyway, and transmitted that "decision" to ISO.
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Translation of the ... letter of resignation: ... "Through the OOXML work, Standard Norway has shown, with a clear margin, that they are not fit to represent Norway in the ISO ... chose to defy their own technical committee and vote yes to a specification that is immature, useless, and unworthy of being called an ISO standard ... misled the committee members ... continuously changed [the process] behind the scenes."

Ryan Paul adds:

The standardization process for Microsoft's office format has been plagued with controversy. Critics ... allege that procedural irregularities and outright misconduct marred the voting process in national standards bodies around the world. Norway ... reversed its vote against approval despite strong opposition to the format by a majority of the members who participated in the technical committee.

Standards Norway has defended its conduct and asserts that its vote in favor of OOXML approval was based on the outcome of a public inquiry in which a majority of the responses it received encouraged support of OOXML. The standards body has also admitted, however, that a significant number of those responses were identical submissions authored by Microsoft.
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Fallout from the OOXML controversy continues to be felt around the world. ISO is facing a revolt from dissatisfied participants who feel that their technical input was ignored, and national standards bodies from various countries are suffering internal friction over alleged misconduct.

Benjamin "zoobab" Henrion:

Remember that Standards Norway was voting Yes with the support of only 2 companies (Microsoft and Statoil), and against the will of the rest of the technical committee ... Here is also a list of irregularities of the broken Norwegian process.
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It seems that Norwegians has also made the experience of the broken chairman phenomena, similar to what happened in other countries.

I wonder what Roy Schestowitz has to say:

This is justified also by hundreds of other irregularities that were properly documented ... It’s looking very grim for ISO. Last week we argued that ISO, whose reputation is the only thing it must rely on, was dying. Several countries may already bypass ISO recommendations.
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The exodus in Norway is not necessarily good news. It sure makes a very strong statement that harms ISO, but ... leaves vacancies for more Microsoft ‘puppets’ to take over, i.e. even more stacking. It’s those who are most angry who leave first and thereby leave empty seats for greater Microsoft obedience. It was the same inside ISO’s very core.
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The good news is that ODF continues growing ... [but] this harms Microsoft’s biggest and fattest cow cash. Since Microsoft perceives high income as a privilege or a right, as opposed to merely an opportunity, it is willing to just stomp and destroy whatever stands in its way, including once-respected standards bodies. Everybody loses.

Hemogoblin agrees:

My first thought was "It's good that these people are taking a stand against injustice.", but my second thought was "These principled people just resigned. Norway's board is entirely corrupt now." Bummer.

But lysergic.acid thinks different:

I think this form of passive protest is important as it draws attention to the corruption at hand. If nothing else, it's garnered media attention and highlighted how serious an issue this is.

I think all principled members of ISO need to show solidarity and resign together. A mass exodus from the organization would force the industry to stop ignoring the issue. It says to governments and companies who care about standardization that ISO is no longer a legitimate vendor-neutral standardization body.

Mikel Kirk cheers:

When principled people withdraw from an endeavor, they take with them the credibility they leant to it. The credibility of principled participants is all a standards body has to offer.
They are by their action hastening a day when a new, credible standards body can displace the corrupt corpse of ISO. Good on 'em.

And finally...

• Why are we surprised by only some of the things that we see? [hat tip: B3ta]

Other Computerworld bloggers:

• SJVN: Thunderbird continues to idle rather than drive
• Mitch Betts: Coping with economic calamity
• Seth Weintraub: The MacBook Brick
• Preston Gralla: Ballmer: We're David to Google's Goliath
• Sharon Machlis: Cybersecurity expert on why voting systems are inherently insecure

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Richi Jennings is an independent analyst/adviser/consultant, specializing in blogging, email, and spam. A 22 year, cross-functional IT veteran, he is also an analyst at Ferris Research. You can follow him on Twitter, pretend to be Richi's friend on Facebook, or just use boring old email: blogwatch@richi.co.uk.

Previously in IT Blogwatch:

• Skype caught in Chinese PR SNAFU
• Ballmer gets down with the cool kids
• Market crisis: watch bloggers react