Standards to the People!

The details come from Geir Isene, who you may recall from this prior entry was part of the Standards Norge OOXML mirror committee that overwhelmingly voted to disapprove OOXML, only to be overruled by Standards Norge officials (who voted to approve). He later reported that committee chair Steve Pepper filed a protest with ISO over that vote (Standards Norge released an explanation of its action that you can find here). Now, Geir reports that Pepper is calling for a public demonstration to protest the Norwegian vote. The demo will be held on Wednesday when SC34, the ISO committee that normally deals with document format standards (and voted on ODF).

Having grown up in the era of civil rights and anti-(Vietnam) war demonstrations, I can't help thinking it will be significant if any meaningful number of people respond to his call, bringing the same energy and commitment to the exercise of their civil rights on line that they have brought to bear to defend those same rights in pre-virtual days.

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