IBM says "Nay" to Microsoft ECMA committee

ECMA International has approved the creation of a technical committee to standardize Microsoft's Office Open XML document formats, according to a representative at IBM, which is an ECMA member. IBM voted against the creation of the committee and Hewlett Packard abstained, the IBM spokesperson said.

The first meeting of the technical committee is expected to take place on December 15. In late November, Microsoft announced it plan to standardize the XML-based document formats of Office through ECMA, and then ISO, in part to ensure that customers, notably governments, can have long-term access to documents.

The formation of the Office Open XML committee at ECMA Thursday comes on the heels of a flurry of commentary regarding Microsoft's move. Earlier this week, the "terms of reference" regarding the committee proposal. On Wednesday, Ed Black, the president of lobbying group CCIA urged ECMA's president to reject the Microsoft proposal, arguing that it "does not meet basic principles of openness."

IBM voted against the proposal because of its concerns over proprietary extensions to the Office XML formats and questions over intellectual property rights, according to the IBM spokesman. IBM has not yet decided whether it will participate in the technical committee.

Novell, which, like IBM, is backing the rival OpenDocument productivity application standard, had previously indicated that it would participate in the ECMA technical committee.