The most populous countries in the world have rejected the OOXML as an international standard but its been pushed through anyway. China, India, Brazil and South Africa have all firmly rejected OOXML as an international standard, in a re-visit of the voting process which took place during September 2007.
Although ISO has yet to officially release the result, early reports suggest that extensive lobbying has engineered a vote change in a sufficiently large number of countries so that the specification will be pushed through.
Although many developed countries initially rejected the specification, after intensive lobbying by Microsoft Corporation they have changed their votes, these include Ireland and the UK, and France, the latter in odd circumstances. Those weren’t the only problems, Norway process has been seriously flawed.
What does this mean for South Africa? First that South Africa’s standards body, SABS, is to be congratulated on running a transparent, representative process which reflects the view of South African experts on XML, and did not allow corporate lobbying to change what the experts found.
Second that South Africa stands with the most populous countries in the world, China, India and with Brazil, all of which are emerging as important global economies in rejecting the specification.
Third, that despite the rubber stamping by ISO the specification is no easier to implement, the problems remain.
Fourth, it is apparent that just as developed countries, led by Brazil have had to lead a movement for the re-orientation of the World Intellectual Property Organisation, so too it will be necessary for developing countries to engage in the reform of the International Standards Organisation. The flawed processes of ISO placed both the question of whether there should be two mutually incompatible standards, and whether there are Intellectual Property problems with the OOXML specifications beyond discussion by the national standards committees considering the standard.
National committees, thus disenfranchised, were told that they were confined to technical details. Thousands of technical problems were raised, most of which were not satisfactorily resolved during the Ballot Resolution Meeting. The consequence of these flawed processes together with intensive obbying by Microsoft has resulted in a devaluing of what an ISO standard represents.
ISO has suffered a severe blow to its reputation as an independent standards organisation, displaying vulnerability to vendor capture. What does the future hold for ISO?