Today is Document Freedom Day (DFD) 2014. DFD is an annual celebration of and opportunity to promote the use of open formats and standards for digital documents and takes place on the last Wednesday in March each year.
Document freedom means documents that are free can be used in any way that the author intends. They can be read, transmitted, edited, and transformed using a variety of tools.
Open standards are formats which everybody can use free of charge and restriction. They come with compatibility “built-in” – the way they work is shared publicly and any organisation or person can use them in their products and services without asking for permission. Open Standards are the foundation of co-operation and modern society.
However, don’t just take my word for it.
Below are some testimonials for open standards and document freedom from people with a bit more influence than your ‘umble scribe.
Neelie Kroes, Vice-President, European Commission
I know a smart business decision when I see one – choosing open standards is a very smart business decision indeed.
Stephen Fry, actor, screenwriter, author, playwright, journalist, poet, comedian, television presenter and film director
Open standards make sense. What makes no sense is that large companies in the field still do not understand this. It is time once and for all to end the pointless nonsense of one document sent on one platform being incomprehensible to the user of another.
Chris DiBona, Open Source Manager, Google
Over time, files that have been saved in closed formats tend to be less and less accessible to their creators. We prefer people to use modern and truly open formats like ODF whenever possible to ensure that they can continue to access and enjoy their work today and into the far future.
Happy DFD 2014!