Blackmoor Vituperative

A vote to make Microsoft Office document formats an international standard was approved on Thursday, according to a Microsoft representative.

At the general assembly of Ecma International in Zurich, Switzerland, Microsoft’s Office Open XML–a set of specifications detailing the document formats in Microsoft’s office — was certified as a standard.

In addition, the membership-based standards organization voted to propose Office Open XML to the larger International Organization for Standardization (known as ISO) for standards approval through its fast-track process, a Microsoft representative confirmed.

The vote to accept Microsoft’s submission as a standard was expected. The ISO standardization process typically takes about nine months, according to experts.

(from ZDNet, Microsoft sails through document standard vote)

The Ecma vote was a rubber stamp. The real hurdle will be ISO. For the sake our digital future, I hope that they vote against recognizing Microsoft’s proprietary format as a standard.