We're much better off with formats that were documented with inter compatibility in mind in the first place. Historically, it's been quite difficult to build products that work with MSO formats as MS not only did not help meaningfully but actively seeks to hinder others from doing so - plus the format is buggy and odd. Read what Wikipedia has to say on the history of the .doc format:
>Some specifications for Microsoft Office 97 binary file formats were published in 1997 under a restrictive license, but these specifications were removed from online download in 1999. Specifications of later versions of Microsoft Office binary file formats were not publicly available. The DOC format specification was available from Microsoft on request since 2006 under restrictive RAND-Z terms until February 2008. Sun Microsystems and OpenOffice.org reverse engineered the file format. Microsoft released a .DOC format specification under the Microsoft Open Specification Promise. However, this specification does not describe all of the features used by DOC format and reverse engineered work remains necessary.
I don't disagree. I'm just sensitive to the "open standards /rock/" thing. It glosses over a lot of nuance. What I'm trying to suggest is that something being an "open standard" does not necessarily make it better. Historically, there have been a number of open standards which have been failures for technical reasons, political reasons (within the community behind the standard), no good reason, etc.
>Some specifications for Microsoft Office 97 binary file formats were published in 1997 under a restrictive license, but these specifications were removed from online download in 1999. Specifications of later versions of Microsoft Office binary file formats were not publicly available. The DOC format specification was available from Microsoft on request since 2006 under restrictive RAND-Z terms until February 2008. Sun Microsystems and OpenOffice.org reverse engineered the file format. Microsoft released a .DOC format specification under the Microsoft Open Specification Promise. However, this specification does not describe all of the features used by DOC format and reverse engineered work remains necessary.