Users Should Enlist In Standards Wars.

This article focuses on the absurdities and complexities in the standards development process in the information technology industry in the U.S. This is demonstrated by Burton Group's Catalyst conference in 2003, which deals with the Service Provisioning Markup Language standard developed by the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards. The author comments that standards are often speak of as though they are the result of a logical exercise that promises to rationalize some technology sector or another. But in actuality, standards emerge both because of and despite a convoluted web of ideas, relationships, and business needs.