[odf-discuss] Documenting support for ODF 1.1?

[marbux]

On 6/1/07, Daniel <daniel.carrera at zmsl.com> wrote:
>
> marbux wrote:
> > His post speaks for itself. You are free to interpret it as you wish.
> > Knowing Patrick and having read his post myself, I am comfortable with
> my
> > reading of it.
>
> You are also comfortable with your reading of the word "may" in ODF 1.0
> which you feel requires OpenOffice to preserve unknown foreign tags
> inserted by the Foundation plugin.


Let's see. This has nothing whatsoever to do with the subject under
discussion. It appears that its only possible motive was an attempt to
undermine my credibility rather than addressing what I said. That makes it
ad hominem argumentation. You try to kill the messenger instead of
responding to the message. This is one of the unprincipled kinds of
arguments you habitually make, Daniel, that cause me to stop responding to
you.

That said, I already told you  that your position was so far out in left
field in arguing that "MUST" and "MAY" are synonyms that I wasn't going to
bother to respond. Nothing has changed.

> 2 members, if OASIS doesn't blink first. Down from 29. A situation OASIS
> > has not only tolerated but also affirmatively encouraged for over 2
> years.
>
> So... the Foundation vastly exceeded the number of members allowed by
> OASIS rules... OASIS spent two years talking to the Foundation asking it
> to follow the rules... the Foundation never tells its sponsored members
> that it is breaking OASIS rules or that OASIS is asking for a change...
> and you think that this means that now OASIS should tolerate the same
> rule breaking in perpetuity?


There you go again. A 2-point straw man argument, putting words in my mouth
I never said. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man >. You are a glutton
for punishment. I did not say that OASIS "spent two years talking to the
Foundation asking it to follow the rules." I said that OASIS had spent over
two years encouraging the Foundation to do what it was doing.

On top of that scarecrow you stack another, that I supposedly "think that
this means that now OASIS should tolerate the same rule breaking in
perpetuity?" I said nothing of the sort. I said that the fact that OASIS had
assured Gary when they asked him to switch to the small corp. membership
that it would not result in any change in the number of members the
Foundation was sponsoring raised Foundation rights of action under specific
bodies of law governing such situations. It does not matter what OASIS rules
say. What does matter is what they told Gary to get him to renew using the
small business corporation membership. Gary -- and the Foundation -- were
legally entitled to rely on that representation and did so.

It's the same kinds of law that kick in when a used car salesman tells a
customer that the car has never been in a wreck. When the customer learns to
his detriment that the car has a bent frame and broken glass under the rear
seat, it doesn't matter what the sales contract says. The OASIS
representation to Gary was conduct inconsistent with later assertion of the
right to enforce the OASIS rules during the life of the Foundation's term of
OASIS membership that Gary paid for. It became a contract term, a warranty,
a waiver of rights, and estoppel also applies. This is really fundamental
legal stuff here. OASIS can't say "sign on the dotted line and you get
this," then turn around later and say "you didn't pay for this so you can't
have it anymore." This is business law 001 stuff, hardly complicated stuff.
It's about fair dealing.

The Foundation's current membership runs out, which is December 31, 2007. I
have proposed a settlement with OASIS in which the Foundation would agree to
limit itself to 15 sponsored members for the remainder of the year to allow
time to either work this out or for the members to make other arrangements.
I think it is a generous offer because the Foundation is legally entitled to
the number of TC members it was sponsoring when the representation was made
by staff and Gary relied on the representation, 29 sponsored members.

As it is, I have difficulty believing that your mischaracterizations of what
I said were not intentional. " My statements were not ambiguous. "This is
one of the most unethical and cowardly of debating tactics, since the person
using the Straw Man has so little confidence in their own position that they
cannot even address the real position of their opponent! At the heart of the
Straw Man Argument is deception."
<http://www-personal.umich.edu/~lilyth/strawman.html<http://www-personal.umich.edu/%7Elilyth/strawman.html>>
I have just seen you do it far too many times before. But whether wilful  or
not, it is straw man argumentation. You argue from your words, not mine.

> Any theory on why at this precise juncture did OASIS suddenly
>
> Suddenly? Haven't discussions been going on for many months? How long
> have you known about this problem?


Again, another straw man argument.  Your snips say far more about the
integrity of your argument than your words. I have already stated when OASIS
first raised the issue. You now ignore that you previously claimed that
OASIS had been discussing it with the Foundation for a year. I will presume
from the fact that you had no answer to that fact that you have now conceded
it.  And I fail to see the relevance of how long I have known about the
issue other than another attack on the messenger rather than the message, so
I'll chalk up one more ad hominem argument.

> become so concerned about the Foundation having too many TC members
>
> And yet it offers those members who contributed to the spec fee-waived
> membership...


After it blew up in the OASIS staffer's face and IBM intervened to get the
fee-waived memberships. There were no offers of fee-waived memberships
before then.

And you still offer no reason for the coincidence of the OASIS sudden
decision to reverse two years of encouraging the Foundation to recruit
independent expertise to help on the ODF specification with the evolution of
the numbered lists dispute, which strangely enough coincides with Sun's
decision to push for a vote on the list proposals. Hey, if you can't win the
election, get rid of the voters who might vote the wrong way, eh? And why
were Sun staffers bragging off the list that Sun had made that complaint
that OASIS says they never received? All coincidence, of course.

> That's right. But when it goes public, do you think it can still support
> > OASIS ODF? Can you spell F-O-R-K and comprehend who caused it?
>
> Uhmm... you are planning to fork ODF because KDE, Sun and IBM agreed on
> one thing but the Foundation wanted something else?


No. That is another straw man argument putting words in my mouth that I
never uttered. In fact, you quote but then ignore what I said,
mischaracterizing it. I said, "do you think it [the Foundation plug-in]
***can*** still support
> OASIS ODF?" The issue is not "wanted." The issue was whether the
Foundation *can* support the OASIS flavor of ODF in its plug-in. The
Foundation does not have the luxury of tweaking Word's page layout engine.
(That is an issue you and I have discussed before.)  By sleight of keyboard
you attempt to mischaracterize my statement as a raising an issue of desire
rather than technical incompatibility.

Your mischaracterization also is directly aimed at my motive rather than my
message, so I will award you another ad hominem  argument as well. Two
points with one sentence. Bravo, Daniel!

Both Sun and KDE admitted that their proposal traded off compatibility with
apps that only support list tuples, which includes MS Word and ODF 1.0 apps.
They said it was justified by their desire for new features in their own
apps that require list triples. The mystery is why KDE and Sun insisted on
doing it in a way that broke compatibility with MS Office and ODF 1.0 apps
when the Foundation/Novell proposal gave them what they said they wanted
*and* maintained compatibilty with ODF 1.0 apps and MS Word. The whizzy new
features they say compel ODF 1.2 to break compatibility were never
identified.

> Do you want
> > Microsoft Office writing a different flavor of ODF than the rest of the
> ODF
> > world? When that happens, will you blame the Foundation?
>
> Will it be Microsoft writing a "different flavour" of ODF or will it be
> the Foundation? If Microsoft writes a plugin that makes files that don't
> follow the ODF spec and calls them ODF I will blame Microsot. If the
> Foundation writes a plugin that makes files that don't follow the
> ODFspec and calls them ODF I will blame the Foundation. Same for any
> other implementor. Seems fair to me.


Ah, but what if the Foundation's plug-in writes to something called, e.g.,
Libre ODF? Seems fair to me, especially if Libre ODF (or should we call it
Lawful ODF?) is not application-specific the way OASIS ODF is.


> Think, man, and throw some market share figures into the equation.
>
> What's the market share of the Foundation plugin?


It's not what it is today, it is what it will be after a few government
procurement contracts. There is definitely a market out there for a
Microsoft Office plug-in that natively reads and writes to a format
Microsoft does not control. See the Precedent page. And my reading of the
Agreement on Government Procurement says procurement officials are required
*not* to specify international standards if those standards tilt the
competitive playing field. Ditto as to their adoption as national standards
under the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade. Then there's that pesky
thing called antitrust law.

I  find it very interesting that you choose to blame the Foundation and me
for what was done by Sun and the others who voted for breaking compatibility
with MS Office. Just a tad of bias there, perhaps?

> Well, let's put it this way, then. The TC managed to reconcile every
> > previous ballot where a no vote occurred. No one even tried this time
> > except Patrick and me.
>
> I have never thought of you as a reconciliatory figure. On the contrary,
> you always seem divisive to me.


There you go with another ad hominem argument. Daniel. So you say I lie
about trying to get folks to reconcile their differences, eh? You are very
quick with the insults but short on substance.

> You're more concerned with finding fault
> > with me than you are with searching for the truth.
>
> Some times it scares me when people say "searching for the truth" like
> that. Marbux, have you considered the other points of view on this
> issue? Not just me or Alex, but consider, do you really think that David
> Faure and Thomas Zander and KDE are out to break ODF? Or Sun and IBM? Is
> it reasonable to think that everyone outside the Foundation (KDE, Sun,
> IBM, me, Alex, or whoever) is either blinded or actively trying to hurt
> you?


Wow! An entire pile of straw men lumped into an ad hominem attack for a
flourishing finish, transforming me from merely "divisive" to a paranoid nut
case. Let's see. How should I score this. It's an extension of the previous
"divisive" ad hominem attack, so playing by Scrabble rules you'd get repeat
points for the original "divisive" ad hominem attack as well as the points
for the paranoid nut case attack. So let's call that two points so far.

And you get another strawman point for the false premise that "everyone
outside the Foundation" is comprised only of "KDE, Sun, IBM, me, Alex, or
whoever." So chalk up another strawman. Let's add another half-point for the
grammatical error in "whoever." It should be "whomever." So that's three
points plus a bonus half-point. (I know; I'm too generous.)

Then your malicious innuendo (<
http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=innuendo>) portrays me as
believing that an entire list of people and organizations "is either blinded
or actively trying to hurt [me]." Clearly ad hominem argument that I've
already awarded one point for. Hmm ... the Scrabble rules don't seem to
cover this. What the heck, let's give you another point for every entity
listed. So that's seven more (I've already given you a half-point for
"whoever," so have decided not to count "whoever" for lack of specficity.)
So you get 10-1/2 points so far for one paragraph.

But it's also a strawman argument since I didn't say the words you put in my
mouth, so, oh, heck, let's just double it. So 21 points total, for a single
paragraph!

Ah yes, the old paranoid nut case ad hominem attack. Daniel, if you were
trying for subtlety, you failed miserably. But you sure got lots of points
for unprincipled argument!

And it seems that once again, unprincipled argument is all you have loaded
in your gun. Do you  even have a glimmer of why I decide to just move on
when you get like this?

You are a troll, Daniel.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.opendocumentfellowship.com/pipermail/odf-discuss/attachments/20070601/19eb6de4/attachment-0001.html