Re: two questions for candidates

[Richard Stallman <rms gnu org>]

    > Right on, but you could make sure not only geeks noticed the many poison
    > pills of OOXML. This discussion is an evident proof one of the poison
    > pills is getting at people.

    This discussion is not about supporting OOXML.

The discussion is about how to prevent OOXML from becoming an ISO
standard, which would enable Microsoft to present it as an "open
standard" and help it win a major battle against our community.

No one has suggested that we should do this in a dishonest way.
However, honesty does not require pretending that Microsoft is honest.
It also does not judging OOXML in a half-blind way based solely on the
technical aspects of the spec.

The many flaws (technical and legal) in OOXML are real problems
because they make it hard, or dangerous, to support OOXML in free
software.  By contrast, if ODF has a few technical flaws, they don't
matter much, because its principal implementation is already free
software.