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ComputerWorld Documents Microsoft's Lobbying in Massachusetts
consortiuminfo.org — The longer and more intriguing article focuses in part on Microsoft's lobbying efforts in Massachusetts, while the shorter one reports more narrowly on Massachusetts' decision in the summer of 2005 not to approve Microsoft's XML formats as an open standards.
schestowitz- 31 diggs
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- GnuTzu, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6Microsoft's concept of an open standard has historically been a bit warped.
I remember that there was a lot of criticism about they're claim that they were using XML but not making the associated grammars (DTD's etc) available.
It would be a tragedy to have a government declare something to be an open standard while some company with a bunch of patents was still free to play a shell game with that standard.- schestowitz, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Just look at what they've pulled earlier today, using the Novell sockpuppet.
http://boycottnovell.com/2006/12/04/novell-supports-openxml/
How about this one from last week?
MA Governor-Elect Names MS Anti-ODF Lobbyist to Technology Advisory Group
,----[ Quote ]
| That person is Brian Burke, the Microsoft Regional Director for Public
| Affairs, and if that surprises you, it surprises me as well, given the
| degree of acrimonious debate and disinformation witnessed in Massachusetts
| over the last 15 months involving the Information Technology Division's
| transition to ODF.... it is my understanding that it was Burke who led
| the lobbying effort on Beacon Hill against ODF, and also urged legislators
| to introduce the amendment intended to take away much of the ITD's
| planning power generally, and as regards standards specifically, and hand
| it to a task force made up of political appointees.... Although I'm told
| that Burke announced yesterday at the first meeting of the new working
| group that he will be participating as a private citizen rather than a
| Microsoft employee, I believe that Burke should recuse himself from
| participating in any discussions or recommendations relating to
| document format standards.
`----
http://www.consortiuminfo.org/standardsblog/article.php?story=20061128161343183
- schestowitz, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Just look at what they've pulled earlier today, using the Novell sockpuppet.
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