Posted on 09/29/2005 6:03:01 AM PDT by Halfmanhalfamazing
David Berlind over at ZDNet wrote a remarkable article called Did Microsoft send the wrong guy to Massachusetts' ODF hearing?. If you missed this article, you'll have missed the equivalent of what Intel's Andy Grove called an inflection point. This one has the potential to have more impact than the release of the first Pentium processor.
...
Microsoft has essentially alienated the rest of the IT industry. I can't remember a single company that had so many people working in harmony against it, including IBM at the height of its arrogance. The Java Community Process provides just one example of an industry working again a company.
(Excerpt) Read more at onlamp.com ...
My reasoning is simply if they have a real monopoly there would not be a product that they could drop Microsoft for. That is not the case, they were able to switch. I also did not state that it was not news worthy, just that it shows that Microsoft does not have a monopoly. If you wish to show me that they are a monopoly, please point out a barrier that they have erected to prevent Massachusetts from making this change.
Taxpayer money should not be spent on products that lock public data in a vendor-specific straitjacket. As usual, the only thing you're interested in is keeping public data locked into a proprietary, undocumented Microsoft format without considering the long-term implications.
Data portability is a lot more important than whether the source code of the applications is open source or not. A lot of files and public documents created by Microsoft products today will be inaccessible in the future. It probably won't be possible to access a Word 1998 document in 2098.
Microsoft had an opportunity to use XML format to avoid the problem - but if I understand correctly, they elected to use some undocumented binary formats in an XML wrapper which fails to resolve their data portability problem.
The benefit of ODF is that it has an open, published vendor-neutral specification. A hundred years from now, it will still be possible to open an ODF file - or write a program to do so.
I haven't decided yet if the state should have specifically mandated ODF format, but public data that needs to be archived for future access should be encoded in a open, documented format (unless there is some compelling reason, like encrypted military data).
I look forward to Microsoft losing more of these battles - until they eventually do the right thing and open their file format specifications in a complete, transparent manner.
You don't need a bill number when an executive branch passes an order demanding something. And in this case, it's demanding something that's unproven and contrary to industry standards.
I posted before I read some of your other posts wherein you distinguished between market dominance and your definition of the word "monopoly". I, and I believe most people, don't use the word in the absolute sense to indicate that there are absolutely positively no alternate products available. That has not been a necessary factor in antitrust litigation for decades, hence the misunderstanding. Using your definition, of course they don't have a monopoly.
Then it's not a law. Quit pretending it is.
Also from your very own article :
Not so, said Kriss. The state will still buy closed-source software when it's best for the job. But it will make an effort to find good open-source substitutes. Kriss can't understand Pacheco's problem with the plan.",b>Everybody I've spent time with in the technical community thinks it's terrific," he said.
I think ShadowAce's beef with you using the term "laws" is that laws usually constrain the actions of those outside the government. So when you say they are "passing laws" against Windows, Office, etc., it can sound as if they are restricting the legal rights of Mass citizens with regard to their software choices. What they're doing is simply choosing what to do with their software dollars the same as any individual or company has the right and ability to do. They're not improperly leveraging government authority against a specific entity, which is what someone reading your posts might conclude.
All of this is speaking with regard to the future, since as I understand it none of the formats are yet in production form, so we are of course speaking hypothetically.
Microsoft's new formats will be in XML format, openly readable and royalty free. The incompatibility acutally lies with the "free software" GPL license, which forbids compatibilty with any format that includes patents, even if rights to use the patents are given away as Microsoft intends to do. The GPL license is what is close minded, not MS's new formats.
Thanks, what do you propose we call these edicts by their executive branch then? How about "mandates"?
I'd be comfortable with "policy."
What is DRM?
DRM = Digital Rights Management
Note that the "rights" being spoken of here aren't your rights as a consumer, but rather is referring to the "right" of a company to restrict how you may use a product you purchase from them.
Let's say you buy a CD of the group "Anonymous 4" called "11,000 Virgins" (it's not/i> what you think - I highly recommend it as some of the most beautiful music ever to be recorded). The supporters of DRM want to be able to prevent you from being able to rip the contents of that disk to your computer so you can put it in your playlist there, into your iPod, or however else you chose to use it. I'm not talking here about giving it to friends or anything else like that. Many in the music industry want to have to buy a copy for each device you want to use it on. If they had their way they'd get rid of the "doctrine of first sale" and put second hand music stores out of business as well.
There is much more to this, and it would be a good idea for you to look more fully into it as it will affect you eventually. Big Media&tm; want to do away with products like Tivo (and all other PVRs), just like they attempted to squash the VCR years ago.
WHo is a thief?
According to Jack Valente, anyone who hums "happy birthday" without paying royalties to ASCAP or RIAA is a thief. Not only that, but extending the length of copyright to infinity minus one day would satisfy the constitutional requirement that copyright be for a "limited time".
How is Open Document Format used? Is it similar to .txt or .rtf?
These two are best answered together. The Open Document Format (ODF) is a spcification for a file format that was agreed to by a collection of companies and organizations. The idea behind it was to have a vendor-independent file format that was easily parsable with 3rd party tools and was fully documented.
The reason such a file format is important to a government body like the state of Mass., is that it allows citizens in the state to conduct business with the state through electronic documents without specifying the software they must use to do so. This will encourage competition among software vendors as they will have to compete based on conformance to the standard and on such things as product features, reliability, speed, and usability.
Can it be used in Microsoft Word, or wordpad?
At the present time, Microsoft does not support the OpenDoc format in any of their products.
If not, how?
OpenOffice, StarOffice, AbiWord, Koffice all support, or will support the OpenDoc format in the near future.
If Microsoft wants to compete, they'll have to either support the format natively in their software, or they can make a 'filter' available to allow the import and export of OpenDoc documents, much like they already do for WordPerfect and Lotus 123.
Assachusetts want to get something for nothing, and will therefore get exactly what it pays for.
I'm glad to see more governments taking action on data portability issues and long-term access requirements. That data should belong to the taxpayers, not Microsoft.
When modern, forward-looking data portability standards are established at government entities like GSA and the Pentagon, Microsoft will be disqualified from bidding if they continue down their current path - and then they will drop their anti-GPL data restrictions. That will be a good thing.
I completely disagree. It's the GPL software license that is incompatible with the US patent system, and should be re-written to become more compatible with existing US law and our industries. It's a blatant attempt to break the US patent system and intellectual property rights, and not surprising the liberals in Mass are going right along with it.
Such as the one Mass. is proposing as well :
Not so, said Kriss. The state will still buy closed-source software when it's best for the job. But it will make an effort to find good open-source substitutes. Kriss can't understand Pacheco's problem with the plan.I posted it here again for your benefit. Now that you are agreeing with the article, I don't understand this quote from you :
I expect the govenrnment of Mass to suffer for their decison.
How will they suffer? They just expanded their choices.
Then obviously, you've not read anything about Office 12. They are using ODF for their format. It will still have the names of .DOC, .XLS, .PPT, but the format will be used so that any application that handles ODF format will be able to use it.
Office 2003 uses an XML prototyping for the document storage. The documents are incompatable with previous versions unless you save them in the prior version format.
The new version will be readable by nearly anything, and they have even said there may be plugins to allow back-level versions of Office to read them.
Paul
Ridiculous, Mass provides a moving target that Microsoft never can meet. In this case, they said formats had to be open, then when Microsoft provided an open format, they changed their interpretation of "open" to be literally "free".
Guilt by association is so lame and puerile...
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