Archive of UserLand's first discussion group, started October 5, 1998.

Re: Standards, W3C, and Patents

Author:David Carter-Tod
Posted:7/31/2000; 9:29:23 AM
Topic:Standards, W3C, and Patents
Msg #:19300 (In response to 19289)
Prev/Next:19299 / 19301

While I think standards are vital, I think the open-ness of document formats might more accurately describe what has been critical in the Napster situation. One of the reasons for our institution's wholesale investment in MS Office was market momentum backed by the fact that the document formats were not open to competitors, so conversions became a nightmare hurdle. We just couldn't pass documents around from institution to institution.

It was even painful between Office versions on different platforms. No guesses on what the dominant platform is now.

Every chance I get I urge us to embrace open document formats.

David

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