“The comment period for the new draft Massachusetts
office-file-format policy ended last Friday the 9th. During the
week before that date, there was some pretty intense back-room
politics going on. There are a ton of industry associations and
lobbying groups, including: Mass Software Council, Technet New
England, Mass High Tech Council, Mass Network Communications
Council, Associated Industries of Massachusetts, and AeA. You can
bet that every one of them was coming under pressure last week to
speak up pro or contra the state’s position. Since you have IBM and
Sun on one side of this issue and Microsoft (plus, I hear, Adobe,
which is weird) on the other, you can also bet that they were
getting pulled both ways. I’m pretty sure that a lot of them ended
up with a statement along the lines of ‘On the subject of the new
draft from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, we’re in favor of
motherhood and apple pie.’ But, I got my hands on a copy of the
other side’s talking points, and I think they make interesting
reading…”