xml-dev - Re: standards body parallel

["Christopher R. Maden" <crism@lexica.net>]

At 00:42 15-10-2000 -0700, Ronald Bourret wrote:
>3) When Microsoft comes out with a mistake-filled version 1.0, they
>receive a huge amount of flak. (Interestingly, when Open Source software
>does the same thing, people call it an open process. The only difference
>I see is business model.)

Actually this illustrates Simon's point nicely.

An Open Source project is explicitly open.  People looking at the interim 
fruits of that project largely understand that they're allowed to see this 
*precisely* to find the mistakes and help fix them (if only just by 
reporting them).

But Microsoft (and other traditional software companies) claim that their 
process is superior, and that what's being released is the end result of a 
careful quality-controlled process.  So people expect the public fruit to 
be of superior quality - and it's not.

But the W3C system's explanation is a very simple one: the IETF failed to 
get buy-in from the browser vendors in its effort to develop HTML (both 2.0 
and 3.0).  The W3C was able to get that buy-in, but only at the cost of 
closing the process.  The alternative, at least as perceived at that time, 
was a "best viewed with" world.

As for large companies drowning out smaller ones, at an IETF meeting, every 
attendee gets one vote.  Larger companies can afford to send more people; 
I've seen attempts to stack a vote there.  In the W3C, each organization 
gets one vote, and no more.  I've voted against Microsoft, and my vote 
counted exactly as much as theirs; I've voted with them, and my vote was 
exactly as powerful as theirs.

Implementation experience *does* count, and large companies can afford 
focus groups, user testing, etc.  The WGs do listen to that.  More 
importantly, they listen to the public - a CR *can not* be released until 
*every* comment on the public comments list has been responded to.  Maybe 
the responses aren't satisfactory, but they're published publicly for 
everyone to see the WG's reasoning.

-Chris
--
Christopher R. Maden, Senior XML Analyst, Lexica LLC
222 Kearny St., Ste. 202, San Francisco, CA 94108-4510
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