# FOSS smashed one Microsoft monopoly. After 20 years of failure, it’s time to smash another

- URL: https://talkfuse.com/story/foss-smashed-one-microsoft-monopoly-after-20-years-of-failure-its-time-to-smash-another/
- Published: 2026-07-27T08:30:00+00:00
- Updated: 2026-07-27T08:48:23+00:00
- Original publisher: The Register
- Original article: https://www.theregister.com/columnists/2026/07/27/foss-smashed-one-microsoft-monopoly-after-20-years-of-failure-its-time-to-smash-another/5278040
- Topics: Software

## Key points

- OOXML became an ISO standard in 2008 but Office still isn't truly interoperable
- Microsoft defaults to "transitional" OOXML, not the cleaner "Strict" version
- Author compares this to Microsoft's failed 1990s bid to dominate the internet

## Summary

Register columnist Rupert Goodwins argues that despite Microsoft Office's OOXML format being formally standardised as ISO/IEC 29500 back in 2008, Microsoft has effectively kept users locked into its ecosystem by defaulting to a "transitional" version of the format rather than the cleaner "Strict" variant, as highlighted by The Document Foundation. This matters because it shows how nominal compliance with open standards can still leave a vendor's software as the only reliable way to render documents faithfully, undermining the original goal of breaking Microsoft's document-format monopoly.

The piece draws a contrast with the 1995 "Internet Tidal Wave" memo, in which Bill Gates sought to make Microsoft dominate the emerging internet by bundling Internet Explorer with Windows and pushing IE-only content, at a time when Microsoft had roughly five to ten times as many users as there were people online. That strategy ultimately failed, as open-source internet protocols, servers and browser engines out-innovated and displaced Microsoft's proprietary approach — a victory the author contrasts with the ongoing, unresolved struggle to free document formats from Office's continued de facto control.

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