Microsoft Open XML campaign slammed

Dismayed at the length of time it will take for the ISO to confirm or deny the standard, Vole has started an online petition in favour of fast tracking. News.com says that the petition, which was uploaded to Microsoft's UK site on March 29, asks businesses to show their support for the Open XML format being fast-tracked through the standardisation process.

According to Mark Taylor, the founder of the Open Source Consortium the petition is just a sham trying to make it look like there is grass roots support for the standard.

He said that Vole could not get grass roots support for Open XML and so it was having to fake it. Taylor said that if there was any support for the standard the petition would have been done ages ago.

However it is unlikely that Vole's the Open XML standard could be rushed. The specifications run to 6,000 pages which is a few times more than the "Lord of the Rings" so ISO would be hard pressed to run that through quickly, unless it is a very wet summer.

More here.