Oliver Bell’s Weblog

Reuters is reporting that we’ll have to wait another day before we see the final outcome of the DIS29500 ballot from ISO, the reason given seems pretty rational when you consider the level of the noise in the blogosphere at the moment.

“Because ISO needs first to inform its worldwide membership of national standards bodies of these results, a press release on this subject will be issued on Wednesday, 2 April, 2008,” ISO spokesman Roger Frost said in an e-mail message.

Microsoft have responded with a “holding statement“, given that lots of people are asking and there isn’t really much to say until we see a final result.

“We respect ISO’s desire to first inform its National Body members and all the people who have worked so hard during this process. This has been a remarkable process, involving literally thousands of technical experts, technology consumers, and governments in 87 countries, whose input has helped to improve Ecma’s submitted Open XML standard. Out of respect for the standards process, we will not comment before the final results are known.”

And from DIN, the German national standards body a direct statement addressing allegations that have been thrown at them and their decision making process over the last few days.

The reports currently circulating the Internet regarding voting procedures in DIN’s Standards Committee on Information Technology and Selected IT Applications (NIA) on ISO/IEC DIS 29500 “Office Open XML file formats” are false and misleading.

On the final point, if I have learned one thing over the last year it is that the decision making processes involved in standards creation are complex ones.

While many people seem to believe that they are the final decision maker, when you dig into the process it is only in very few countries where one group or one committee get to make the final and complete decision on what the countries vote will be.

Finally, Patrick Durusau brings a little levity to the moment with his latest post, a non-standard guide to standards behaviour.

The following is a short guide to behaviour in standards committees and standards making in general.

1. Disparage the honesty (intellectual or moral) of others.
2. Disagreement with you is always the result of evil plans and designs.
3. Compromise is just another word for cowardice.
4. Rules should be followed, but only when to your advantage.
5. Chairs, conveners, editors, should be serve only so long as their views agree with yours.
6. People change positions but only by selling out.
7. People who agree with your opponents are clones/whores/lackies.
8. People who agree with you are besieged servants of truth, justice and human rights.
9. Never forget past transgressions, both real and imagined.
10. Remember to always point out the failures of others.

He then goes on to say.

Writing useful standards requires us to move beyond such behaviours.

I have not included examples of those behaviours because that simply starts the cycle all over again. We need to dust ourselves off and resolve to do better in the future and then simply to do so.

There is no profit (if you are of the commercial persuasion) or future (if you are one of the save the world types) or good work (if you are simply trying to write good standards) in pawing over old hurts.

Sound advice.