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Last week, the European Commission published the draft guidelines for the CRA and opened a comment session open to all stakeholders until the end of March. In its first version, the consultation page allowed users to download the draft guidelines and related communication in PDF format, and the feedback template in proprietary XLSX format only. For this reason, we protested through a post and an open letter to the European Commission, asking that the feedback template also be provided in the open and standard ODS format. Within 24 hours, officials from DG CONNECT—responsible for the CRA—responded positively to our request and added the template in ODS format. This is an important first step towards the interoperability that proprietary formats do not allow, and indeed seek to limit by making the DOCX, XLSX, and PPTX formats increasingly different from a standard with the addition of unnecessary complexities. To all those individuals who insist on considering OOXML a standard because it has been approved by ISO, and to all software that supports OOXML by using it as the default format, we remind you that you are going against not only your own interests but also the interests of all citizens of the

Many interpreted the last article in this series as an attack on Microsoft for using the OOXML format against users’ interests. However, this was only one of my objectives, as I also wanted to raise users’ awareness of fake open-source software, such as OnlyOffice, which partners with Microsoft in a strategy to lock users in. Users are already aware of the advantages of standard, open formats because they access sites every day whose content is accessible thanks to the HTML format. This is a standard, open format that was first developed and then defended by its inventor, Tim Berners-Lee. He prevented Microsoft from transforming it into a proprietary format with Internet Explorer 6. This forced users to have two versions of a site: one in a standard format and one in a proprietary format. Fortunately, Microsoft’s strategy failed in the case of HTML because the W3C – unlike the ISO – never recognised the changes to the format “forced” by Internet Explorer as valid. This was because Internet Explorer did not display sites in the standard format correctly. Ultimately, this forced the company to develop a browser that complies with all standards, thus allowing users to choose their preferred browser

Open standards don’t make headlines. Instead, they work quietly behind the scenes to define how information is created, shared and stored. However, as digital ecosystems become more complex and centralised, open standards are becoming increasingly important. One of the best examples is the Open Document Format (ODF), the native format of LibreOffice documents. Open standards in the evolving digital world The current digital environment is characterised by certain trends, such as cloud platforms, subscription software, artificial intelligence-based tools, and tightly integrated ecosystems. While these tools are powerful, they also increase the lock-in effect exerted by Big Tech. Open standards act as a counterbalance. They provide shared rules that anyone can implement to maintain system interoperability and user control. When a format is open, no single company can decide how information is stored or who has access to it. With ever-increasing data volumes and documents being transformed into long-term digital archives, this independence is becoming critical. ODF was designed with one simple goal: to enable users to read and edit documents on any platform and with any software at any time. This goal is still absolutely valid today. Because ODF is openly specified and standardised, it allows for the coexistence of