With EOOXML now in the "contradiction" phase at ISO/IEC, what does a "contradiction" mean in context?

Microsoft (technically Ecma International) has initiated the ISO standardization process for Ecmas Office Open XML, Microsoft's response to requests that it support the OpenDocument standard. The attached documents were sent by Emca to all JTC1 members in addition to the specification.

OpenDocument has changed the desktop landscape. In the era of proprietary, closed office file formats, often the only realistic method of achieving interoperability with other office applications was to create applications that ran on one of the major office suite's application programming interfaces. In the emerging OpenDocument milieu, far more applications support the file format directly and need no longer be dependent on an office suite's APIs. But with dozens of ODF-supporting apps available, how does the user get the right application to open an ODF document? This article is a conceptual draft of one solution for discussion purposes.

Alfresco's new OpenDocument Virtual File System feature is a notable advance in free and open source applications supporting OpenDocument. Alfresco now offers drag-and-drop conversion of Microsoft Office documents to archive formats such as ODF with workflow-engine scriptable processing of the resulting files.