As a regular rail user, I sometimes use real-time train information and was intrigued to learn that the Office of Rail Regulation is currently holding a consultation on real-time train information until 28th February.
However, the ORR is clearly confused as to what open standards (such as web standards. Ed.) really are, as shown by the following sentence from the consultation page:
So that we are able to apply web standards to content on our website, we would prefer that you email us your response in Microsoft Word format.
Firstly, MS Office formats are closed, proprietary formats, unlike the Open Document Format (ODF) used by more sensible office suites.
Secondly, does the above statement imply that the ORR uses MS Word to edit its web content? MS Word has a hard time behaving like a word processor. 🙂 When used for HTML it produces some of the sloppiest mark-up known. As Homer Simpson would say: “Doh!”