In a snit that Microsoft was able to push its OOXML file format through to ISO standardization, IBM, a big backer of the OOXML-opposing ODF file format, has instituted a new corporate policy that suggests it will pull out of standards bodies whose rules don’t conform to what it thinks their process, membership and IP policies should be.

It said it was going to embark on a review of its memberships and is encouraging other companies to adopt similar principles.

It claims the exercise will improve the quality and transparency of standards and promote the “equal” participation of developing countries and the open source community.

It says it wants governance rules that “ensure technology decisions, votes and dispute resolutions are made fairly by independent participants protected from undue influence.”

It also wants standards bodies to collaborate with developer communities to ensure that interoperable open software standards can actually be implemented and are freely available.

It said IP policies should be “clear, simple and consistent” so “standards developers and implementers to make informed technical and business decisions.”

It says it will “work for process reform in standards organizations so that proxies or surrogates cannot be used in standards creation and approval.”

IBM said its newfound principles were inspired by an online conversation it had this summer with 70 “independent, forward-thinking experts across the globe from academia, standards-setting, law, government and public policy” who “debated the question of whether standard setting bodies have kept pace with today’s commercial, social, legal and political realities.” (See http://www.research.ibm.com//files/standards_wikis.shtml

It’s planning an invitation-only summit in November under Yale University’s auspices to “flesh out recommendations from the online discussion and begin steps toward improving the standards-setting environment.”