Comment by wizzwizz4
1 month ago
They're negatively affected by a lack of openness. Some proprietary XML nonsense that's well-documented makes interoperability a week's work, maximum. Meanwhile, Microsoft's incomprehensible "open standard OOXML", supported by every document editor I care to name, is a huge impediment to interoperability. Limiting myself to even the well-designed ODF format means there are features I can't implement in my software: standardisation comes at the expense of innovation.
In software, the problem is closedness, protectionism, and undocumentedness, not proprietary wheel reinvention.
>In software, the problem is closedness, protectionism, and undocumentedness, not proprietary wheel reinvention.
Quite simply, the first three problems are actually caused by proprietary wheel reinvention.
Correct. But proprietary wheel reinvention is necessary (albeit clearly not sufficient) for progress, so we mustn't prohibit it!
No it isn't necessary for progress.
Standards can be (and are) developed cooperatively and these still allow and encourage progress.
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