Who is the ODF Alliance?

There is no doubt that the ODF Alliance has been a major success since launching less than 5 months ago. As of today, the Alliance lists 274 members from 45 countries plus 1 international organization.

I do not know if a breakdown of membership gives us any clues about the next governments to adopt ODF, but it does present some interesting things. Here are the top 25 countries of origin (and number of ODF Alliance members):

US (54)
France (19)
UK (18)
Germany (14)
Netherlands (14)
Australia (13)
Denmark (10)
Italy (10)
Canada (9)
Czech Rep (9)
Poland (9)
India (7)
China (6)
Switzerland (6)
Hungary (5)
Portugal (5)
Russia (5)
Spain (5)
Ireland (4)
Norway (4)
Sweden (4)
Belgium (3)
Brazil (3)
Mexico (3)
New Zealand (3)
Taiwan (3)

No surprises at the top with the U.S. and European countries dominating the top of the list.

But there a few interesting points. 31 members from Eastern Europe. That is more than Asia which has 26. Only 9 members from Latin America. Africa has only 1 member from South Africa. No South Korea. No Thailand. Only 1 from Japan. Given the strength of Asia in open technologies like open source software, it may be fertile ground for ODF if a greater push is made.

And maybe it will be Eastern Europe that provides the next ODF adopter, as Sam Hiser predicted here.

Next Stop for ODF: Asia?

Maybe it was just a lucky guess. Or maybe I was just name dropping. Or maybe I had a psyhic connection created during the year that I lived in Kuala Lumpur. Who knows? But there is new forward motion for the OpenDocument Format (ODF) in Asia. Location: Malaysia.

It seems that Malaysia is not content to boast the world's tallest building. Now it is aiming to be the first country in Asia to endorse ODF.

Hasan Saidin has blogged about an ODF proposal made to the SIRIM, the national standards developing agency appointed by Malaysia's Department of Standards Malaysia.

Today, a meeting of SIRIM's technical committee on e-commerce unanimously approved a "project" to make ODF an official standard in Malaysia, perhaps as soon as end of 2006. This initiative did not appear from nowhere. Malaysia voted "Yes" for ODF to become an ISO standard. Now, it may be headed to official adoption in Malaysia, and a place at the center of Malaysia's national ICT agenda.