What the...? Australia abstains on OOXML vote

Stephen Withers
Tuesday, 04 September 2007 10:56

Business IT - Technology

Standards Australia has cast an 'abstain' vote on the proposed adoption of Microsoft's Open Office XML as an international standard.

While not as embarrassing as the Swedish Institute of Standards choosing to abstain after one member appeared to vote twice in its internal process, the Standards Australia decision seems bizarre.

According to Standards Australia officials, the outcome is the result of a lack of consensus. "If a clearer position becomes evident in Australia over the next six months, Standards Australia would be able to take that position to the JTC1 committee and vote accordingly," said program manager Alistair Tegart.

But isn't it the job of those proposing a standard to make their case? If consensus cannot be reached, surely the only responsible decision to to vote against the proposal. If a proposed standard is voted down, its backers can always return with a modified version, but it would be a bigger challenge to fix a faulty standard after it has been ratified. (Both IBM and Oracle opposed the proposal during the internal US process, with IBM referring to its low quality and Oracle concerned about the large number of unresolved issues.)

"Due to lack of support and stakeholder commitment to ongoing engagement in the International Standards development process in this area it was not viable to convene an appropriate technical committee," said Tegart. "The decision to abstain is the most responsible position we can take at the moment and reflects the strongly held and diverse views of the Australian stakeholders that have taken part in the process."

Among other nations, Brazil, Britain, Canada, China, France, India, Japan and New Zealand have reportedly voted against the proposal, while Germany, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Portugal, Switzerland, Trinidad and Tobago, and the US have voted in favour. The result is expected to be announced in the next day or two.

Ironically, the next meeting of the ISO/IEC JTC1 committee is being held in Australia early next month.

A final decision on the standard will not be made until early 2008.