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Open Source Group: Microsoft 'Promise' Not Enough

A leading open source legal advocacy group this week lashed out at Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) regarding what it calls uncertainty about the free use of the company's specifications for its Office application suite file formats.

Microsoft, in turn, lashed right back.

On Wednesday, the Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC) issued a white paper criticizing Microsoft's contribution, in particular, of its Office Open XML (OOXML) specification to what the software firm calls its "Open Specification Promise" (OSP) initiative.

Among the issues that the SFLC white paper raises are questions regarding whether Microsoft could draw open source developers into working with the OOXML formats and then withdraw them, or later versions, from OSP protection.