"We feel that the best standards are open standards," technology industry commentator Colin Jackson, a member of the Technical Advisory committee convened by StandardsNZ to consider OOXML, said at the event. "In that respect Microsoft is to be applauded, as previously this was a secret binary format."
Microsoft's opponents suggest, among a host of other concerns, that making Open XML an ISO standard would lock the world's document future to Microsoft.
They argue that a standard should only be necessary when there is a "market requirement" for it.
IBM spokesperson Paul Robinson thus describes OOXML as a "redundant replacement for other standards".
Quoting from the ISO guide, Robinson said that a standard "is a document by a recognised body established by consensus which is aimed at achieving an optimum degree of order and aimed at the promotion of optimum community benefits".
It can be argued that rather than provide community benefit, supporting multiple standards actually comes at an economic cost to the user community.
"We do not believe OOXML meets these objectives of an international standard," Robinson said.
