With about a week remaining to collect comments on a plan to adopt Ecma's Open XML standard, Massachusetts is mum on how the issue is fairing, but some who disagree with the action are already voicing their opinion publicly.

Andy Updegrove, a lawyer, a board member of the Linux Foundation and a Massachusetts resident is stirring controversy with comments he submitted to the Massachusetts Information Technology Department (ITD) that oppose the Open XML initiative.

"Microsoft is hardly to be blamed for lending no support to the success of the Open Document Format (ODF). But neither should it be rewarded for launching a competing, self-serving standard as a next-best defense against erosion of its dominant position," he wrote in comments submitted to the ITD.

Ecma's Open XML standard, known as Ecma-376, is based on Microsoft's Open XML, which is the default format in Office 2007. Microsoft submitted the format to Ecma, which approved it in December.

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