Some months ago, during the infamous OOXML discussion in my home country's standards body, a message came up with the URL to a microsoft site where you could apply for the Office Format Specifications. The mailing list (in spanish) is in INEN's website, but the actual link is here. As you can see, this is relatively new and probably a reaction to the criticism of microsoft's attitude.

Now, the interesting part is that apparently, asking for the document does work as can be deduced from this thread in said mailing list. The user filled a web form and faxed some documents and in a matter of weeks, he received the documents for .doc, .xls, and .ppt formats. If this is true, then it is possible to implement readers to the Office File Formats, right? RIGHT?

I just couln't let this pass. Forbes reports that the Ecuadorian IRS has closed down the offices of Microsoft in Ecuador temporarily. This is quite remarkable, since I as an Ecuadorian never expected them to actually go and close down the operation. This will probably be resolved soon, but still is still worth knowing.