Standards New Zealand will host forums this week that could determine New Zealand’s position on Microsoft’s controversial Open XML file format in a crucial international vote on September 2.

This paper examines whether OOXML can be fully implemented by vendors other than Microsoft and concludes that a number of application specific and undisclosed behaviours (as well as a number of other technical flaws) in the proposed standard make this impossible.

Basically, members of the free software community can and should do more than just watch the fight and rest on their laurels: the more people that fight, the more likely we are to win this battle, which is anything but over.

The normally boring world of international standards has turned into a bloody fist fight between the most brutal monopolist of modern times, and the Community. Just the name, “Office Open XML” makes my head spin, and when I start to read Microsoft’s so-sincere explanations that “users demand multiple standards”, my blood begins to boil. But before I turn green and rip off my shirt, let me take a deep breath and look calmly at how Microsoft is trying to do to ISO what Borat wanted to do to Pamela.

Microsoft has suffered a setback in the quest to have its Open XML document format approved as an ISO standard. A vote on July 13 by the committee established to formulate the United States' position on whether or not to support the application for ISO approval failed to achieve the two-thirds majority necessary to approve the move.

Just like the UK National Archives fell for the myth of better archival through MS-OOXML, which has been analysed in more depth in a recent followup article in the BBC Technology news, influential groups like Gartner have swallowed the converter claim hook, line and sinker.

What company with hugely established infrastructure doesn't seek to maintain the status quo when faced with a disruptive change? Microsoft's response to Linux and open source is like a textbook case of the five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. Here's how these stages have manifested for Microsoft.

In [a] letter released Friday, Microsoft execs Tom Robertson and Jean Paoli stress that customers worldwide deserve choice and flexibility in standard file formats. They also paint Microsoft as taking pains to avoid confrontation over standards.