Today I had a completely new experience with Microsoft. In a meeting we discussed how Microsoft operates in the Standards and Interoperability world.

From the Microsoft HQ, Tom Robertson (General Manager Standards Strategy Group) and Jason Matusow (Director of Standards Affairs) tried to get familiar with how the dutch IT business partners (and their customers) see Microsoft in the Standards battle. The current illustrative battle is about ODF and OpenXML (but a lot more examples passed, in favour and against Microsoft).

Is OpenXML a standard? Is it an open standard? And (as one attendee stated) is it a real standard? If you answered NO on one of these questions what is the reason? Is there any IT company that is a better player in this field?

It is true that Microsoft has not fullfilled its promises to some standard claims but to me it is more an interesting topic for lawyers and attorneys than it is for IT-Architects.

On the end of the day the only thing that counts for our customers is if the application of all those standards and interop capabilites works out for the problem at hand. And that makes that you sometimes have to choose for one standard and in other occasions for the other. As long as the IT-industry thinks that added-value and intelectual property is in the way we communicate or in the way we store data the world of IT-consumers will live with multiple standards and proprieatry interop tweaks. Over time it will be come clear which standards prevail. That might not necessary be the best/smartest standard or interoperability heaven but it will be that with the most used/usefull applications.