---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Anivar Aravind anivar.aravind@gmail.com Date: 2008/4/15 Subject: [FSUG-Bangalore] Groklaw picked up NITC Students Open Letter & Todays Hindu Report To: Free Software Users Group - Bangalore fsug-bangalore@mm.gnu.org.in

http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20080414181840439

Anyway, the protests continue, for the simple reason that people are disgusted by what they saw, I gather, and they understand what's at stake. In India there was an Open Letter to Wipro, Infosys and TCS published recently by students at the National Institute of Technology. It begins like this:

This letter is to express our deep disappointment over your open support to the OOXML format forced through ISO by Microsoft. Being the top IT giants and thus the representatives of the IT industry in the country, it is a great shock to us that you do not stand with academia of the country and its representatives like the IITs, IIMs and IISc in supporting the Open Document Format (ODF) which is a true Free and Open Standard already recognised as an ISO Standard.

Of course, India voted against OOXML, but the students noticed the vote breakdown:

1. National Informatics Center - NO 2. Center for Development of Advanced Computing - NO 3. Computer Society of India - NO 4. Department of IT - NO 5. IBM - NO 6. Institute for Electronic Governance - Absent 7. Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad - NO 8. Indian Institute of Science - NO 9. Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi - NO 10. Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay - NO 11. Infosys - YES 12. Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkatta - NO 13. Manufacturers Association of IT - Abstain 14. Microsoft - YES 15. National Association of Software and Services Companies - YES 16. National Institute of Smart Governance - Absent 17. Reserve Bank of India - Absent 18. Red Hat - No 19. Standardization Testing and Quality Certification Directorate - NO 20. Sun - NO 21. Tata Computer Services - YES 22. Wipro - YES (for changing India's vote from NO to Abstain)

The students noticed such fine details, and their letter was a request for an explanation. By the way, did you notice that Sun voted No? Just to put to rest the conspiracy theorists out there busily spinning some fables.

Todays Hindu Report doesn't get all the details right, but they noticed the same thing the students did:

The BIS, which represents India at ISO, had 19 members of which 13 voted against Microsoft's OOXML. Many academics and colleges (NIT-Calicut among others) have written open letters to TCS, Infosys, NASSCOM, Wipro (that voted to abstain) and Microsoft (voted in favour of OOXML). There is a rising fear among academics and advocates of free software standards that BIS will come under pressure in the absence of any national policy. Tamil Nadu and Kerala are the only two States who have a policy in place.

"Very big voices like NASSCOM and Infosys that have not participated in even one meeting have voted irresponsibly. We fear that if such lobbying continues, academics and individuals like us will be put on the defensive, unless there is a policy in place," said Nagarjuna G., professor at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, who was part of the technical committee of BIS. This committee alone identified 200-odd technical flaws in OOXML's 7,000 page document — the Open Document Format is 600 pages — and more than 1,000 others were identified internationally.

I see I am not alone in viewing OOXML as a move of aggression. Microsoft must be realizing by now by the outpouring of dismay all over the world that this isn't just a typical vendor fight, where winner takes all and everyone shakes hands and moves on. The public cares about ODF, because it realizes it will impact every one of us directly, and we see the obvious, that OOXML is a spoiler. This has nothing to do with market share.

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