Why I Oppose Microsoft’s OOXML
It was recently announced that the ISO has approved a draft standard based on Microsoft’s OOXML format, which was developed for Microsoft Office 2007 as a smaller alternative to the original binary-format files used in previous versions of the suite. I am personally opposed to Microsoft’s format becoming a standard. That’s a simple fact. The reasoning is more complex, and has (I freely admit) been influenced over the last several months by articles I have read on the subject. A good deal of those articles were (and are) hosted at NoOOXML, which also hosts a petition against the standard. The…