Is Microsoft OOXML the best deal open source can get?

The Microsoft Office formats are in the news again. Massachusetts has backed-down and accepted the Microsoft Office OOXML format as a standard while the companies in Microsoft’s open source orbit promise they will work together on conversion routines between OOXML and Open Office’s ODF.

Many in the open source community are angry. They see the conversion work as phony, and the standards-setting as fixed. Once more it’s promises of what might happen in exchange for acceptance of the Microsoft monopoly.

Bob Sutor of IBM sees Microsoft trying to get its PDF-replacement approved by ECMA as a standard and smells a rat.

Is Microsoft OOXML the best deal open source can get?