Ben Langhinrichs’ has some interesting stats via Google on the relative number of ODF vs. OOXML documents on the web. His numbers show that there are 162,700 ODF documents vs. 1993 OOXML documents, and 26% of the OOXML documents are on microsoft.com. See his post for caveats and predictions.
I still stand by my blog post from March, “Why OOXML will ultimately fail,” where I asserted, in part,
This is how I think it will play out: PDF will continue to see widespread use, ODF uptake will increase at the expense of the Microsoft binary formats, and OOXML will be odd man out. Sure, we’ll see some people use it until they realize they can’t easily exchange them with others. Microsoft’s big challenge will be to get people to stop using the older binary formats and start using OOXML. This is a major challenge and is by no means certain. Indeed, the situation is confused because in Office 2007 there is even an option to use proprietary binary Excel macros extending OOXML.
Also See: An “OOXML is a bad idea” blog entry compendium
Yeah well that is obvious, the scheming about “what precisely entails OOXML”, the “Pseudo Defined Definitions” and the utter disregard for any standard! And now indeed that they extend their XML format with..indeed binairy stuff!
That might fool someone in the top position in a business that has control over what software is used but in the end it are the users that have to make the difference. And when users find that they can’t open their “extended” OOXML file somewhere they will be quite simply, not happy!
Still a long way for ODF to bind itself into the hearts..and the wallets of the business but atleast it is open as in that if you got an ODF file it will open in any of the editors. Even the smaller editors!
I have a steak bet with Sam Hiser, who says OOXML will fail. Well, since he feels so strongly, I do have to take the opposite side of the bet. No matter who wins, I get to eat steak.
I wonder if my public ODF files saved within Google Docs are included in those stats? I hope so, since I’m using it more and more for short correspondence and online document viewing/sharing.