Microsoft wants you to use its photo file format

THE SOFTWARE FIRM famous for its proprietary file formats said it wants its HD Photo file format to be a standard for digital photography.

Microsoft got its best spinning machine out of the cupboard to explain what HD Photo is: "This new, next-generation digital image format offers the best solution for digital image editing and storage and unlocks the potential for digital photography on devices, applications and services."

Microsoft also announced that it intends to standardise the technology and will be submitting HD Photo to an appropriate standards organisation shortly.

Unpick that.

The Vole claims HD Photo is twice as efficient as JPEG at compression and has less "damaging artefacts".

The real question is whether you can trust Microsoft with a file format it's pushing. We don't think so. µ