curious: why is M$ a voting ARB member?

Isn’t there a conflict of interest there? (directX)

Judging from MS’s behaviour in general, I would guess that they would have Dave Aronson do everything in his power to slow down any progress of OGL (especially of 2.0 getting agreed on).(?)

Come to think of it, where were they (MS) in the September meeting?

I’m sure that making Microsoft part of the ARB was a pretty good idea back when they were supporting OpenGL (ie, back before Direct3D). I don’t know what the procedure is, or if there is a procedure, for removing a member of the ARB.

I don’t think we need to get personal and start levelling conspiracy charges at Dave Aronson here. MS suffers just as much from internal politics and backbiting as any other megacorp; probably more so given their pathologically macho culture. It’s safe to say that folks there working on “unpopular” technologies (i.e. open standards) don’t get much in the way of support, which is probably frustrating enough without the rest of the world having a go at them as well. IIRC Eric has talked to Dave in the past and gotten some useful info out of him.

MS may be a bad company, but it has some good people. Take a look at the Microsoft Research website sometime. Don’t tar 'em all with the same brush.

As for ARB membership, I agree it’s a bit of a joke at this stage, but since the ARB is open anyhow I don’t see that it’s a big deal. It’s not as if Dave is turning up to meetings and voting against anything constructive.

Sorry, I didn’t mean anything against Dave personally. What I said was, “…I would guess that they would have Dave Aronson do…”. He is a MS employee after all. For all I know, he could be a great guy who really gets behind the open standards and gets his picture put up as a dartboard in the directX team lounge.

Why would you say “it’s a bit of a joke at this stage”?