Hot on the heels of a ComputerWorld article discussing the death of all open formats legislation this year, there comes rumbling that New York is now trying its hand at similar legislation. There are some notable differences between this effort and previous ones:
New York State Bill A08961, sponsored by Democratic Assemblywoman RoAnn M. Destito, proposes the state study how government documents are created, exchanged, and preserved and how these documents can be used in a way that “encourages appropriate government control, access, choice, interoperability, and vendor neutrality,” according to the text of the bill.
The primary difference appears to be one of scale and ambition:
- this bill doesn’t attempt to mandate anything
- only encourages “vendor neutrality” and “interoperability”
- doesn’t attempt to define what “open formats” mean - which has been a sticking point for previous bills
On one hand, you could say it’s so watered down as to be almost, but not quite, meaningless. On the other hand, that may be what it takes to get over the first hurdle. One thing’s for sure - Microsoft has drawn a line in the sand, and you can expect them and their cronies to fight this tooth and nail.
Read the article at InfoWorld.
Tags: News, odf, open formats
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