A new year and what do well-respected developers still talk about? Samba founder Andrew Tridgell took the stage at LCA2009:
Andrew Tridgell, …, did not speak about this subject; rather he focused on the way Microsoft manouevred the OOXML standard through the International Standards Organisation last year, using means which are widely acknowledged as being non-kosher.
Tridgell said Microsoft had subverted the entire standards process by ramming the OOXML standard through and the company should make reparations, including an apology.
Last year there was a bunch of other outraged persons in Norway. I leave it to you for now to make up your mind how this relates to recent unexpected developments on the European level you find in the news. CTO Hakon Wium Lie explained what powers their entrepreneurial success in a Geneva conference: Genuine Open Standards and adherence of their competitors to them. As a coincidence the Open Forum Europe event happened to take place at the same time and in the same building as the Ballot Resolution Meeting for OOXML.