Talk:International Organization for Standardization

ISO and Copyrights

What's the copyright status of the standard documents? They are for sale in the ISO website Davidme 03:29 Feb 5, 2003 (UTC)

[1]: The material on ISO Online is subject to the same conditions of copyright as ISO publications, and its use is subject to the user's acceptance of ISO's conditions of copyright for ISO publications, as set out below. Any use of the material, including reproduction in whole or in part to another Internet site, requires permission in writing from ISO.

[2] The short country names from ISO 3166-1 and the alpha-2 codes are made available by ISO at no charge for internal use and non-commercial purposes. The use of ISO 3166-1 in commercial products may be subject to a licence fee.

Is this GFDL-compatible? Davidme

No, the ISO standards are public, in that they are published, and you can use them to claim conformance. But while the standards documents are available for purchase, they are pretty expensive. You can get a license from ISO to reprint or include a standard in another publication, but the license is also expensive, and their terms for any on-line use are so prohibitve that almost no online versions exist. Lou I

Why no mention about this being self-defeating? Many small (or non-profit) software developers are forced to use incomplete and frequently inaccurate 3rd-party specifications or old ISO drafts due to the prohibitive cost of ISO documents. This issue works directly against the mandate of ISO. Boardhead 16:37, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

While ISO standards are copywrited, most published final standards are the result of draft versions submitted or updated by members. The U.S. government's standards body NIST maintains that since these were frequently created with public funds, the draft version is public domain. Lou I 19:48, 31 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Discussion before Article Update

The ISO (IMHO) is not an non-governmental organization. I expect to update the article in September to reflect that opinion, but have placed this note and will allow at least two weeks for comments. Lou I 19:48, 31 Aug 2003 (UTC)

On the ISO website (here) I found this statement:

ISO is a non-governmental organization: its members are not, as is the case in the United Nations system, delegations of national governments. Nevertheless, ISO occupies a special position between the public and private sectors. This is because, on the one hand, many of its member institutes are part of the governmental structure of their countries, or are mandated by their government. On the other hand, other members have their roots uniquely in the private sector, having been set up by national partnerships of industry associations.

-- Heron

Heron and I have pretty well agreed to include something like the following statement: "While the ISO defines itself as an NGO, its ability to set standards which often become law makes it more powerful than most NGOs, and in practice it acts as a consortium with strong links to governments and major corporations." Lou I 18:56, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)

History and 4 number label: I was hoping to get a brief history which explains its special and powerful role, its origins, growth and key moments of emergence of power, and presumably of replacing other organisations (IEC is still powerful in the electrotechnical field). I was also concerned that the second last paragraph describes the "ISO 99999:yyyy:title" label format standard, and the very next para. labels a standard as ISO 9660 Garry

About that format... That was confusing. Neither of the two examples given adheres strictly to the format, which seems pretty embarrassing. Can somebody who knows what he's doing correct that in whatever way it needs to be corrected? -- Anon

Disambiguation with ISO Rating

Okay, this one's probably been done to death, and if it has feel free to point me to the discussion (assuming it's archived somewhere). BUT... has it been decided by consensus somewhere that the ISO page should be a redirect here and not a disambiguation page that also points to ISO rating? I understand that ISO rating is an American standard and all, but right now if I search Wikipedia for ISO -all- I get is pointers to this page. ISO rating gets swallowed up and is pretty much unfindable. --Bcordes 17:21, Jun 30, 2004 (UTC)

Replying to my own comment, ISO rating got redirected to Film speed, which is turns out is an ISO standard. So, I added an entry for ISO 5800 on List of ISO Standards and added a redirect at ISO 5800 to Film speed. Searching for "ISO film" gives you a link to ANSI, which gets you to the right place. So I'm happy now. :) --Bcordes 21:51, Jul 25, 2004 (UTC)

Connection back to IEC

I'm fairly new to Wiki, so I won't be surprised if I've missed this. Essentially, there is a very large group known as ISO/IEC Joint Technical Committee 1, that exists to handle the overlap in responsibilities for International Standardization between ISO and IEC. It consists of a number of sub-committees which are subsequently divided into working groups. I think there should be some type of entry for ISO/IEC JTC1, but I'm at a loss at how to apporach this. Should it be a stand-alone article or is there a way to link the ISO and IEC article together and capture the material?

I did find a single entry that referenced JTC1, but there was no link, not even a link to a non-existent article. Colin 23:22, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I suggest that you create a new section in this article titled == ISO/IEC JTC1 ==, explaining what it is and linking to IEC. You can add a similar section to the IEC article, linking to ISO. If somebody later decides to make this a separate article, then that's easily done, but the most important thing is to get the information out of your head and in to Wikipedia. Hope this helps. --Heron 16:11, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Thanks Heron. I've done that, hopefully what I've added makes sense. Continuing with my attempts to get a handle on the whole Wikipedia concept, I noticed that there was an abbreviated list of national bodies that contribute to IEC listed on that page. Obviously there is also a similar list for ISO. I would guess, though, that such a list would do better as its own article, "National Standards Organizations" or similar. Sort of like the link to a list of International Standards on this page (I haven't followed it yet to see what's there). Thoughts?

I really don't want to become known as "Mr Standards", I know the perfect individual for that title and I will never be as knowledgeable nor anal about standards as he is. I will, however, contribute as I can.

Nice work, Colin. You'll find a long list of NSOs at Standards organization, so you won't have to type them all in. --Heron 15:11, 27 Aug 2004 (UTC)

W3C is open source, right?

"...businesses started creating private consortia like W3C...". Huh? If I'm not mistaken, W3C is a non-profit open source organisation and certainly not privately owned. And I even believe that it already existed before private companies started to take part in it (because they realised that they could never surpass it through individual efforts). Though I'm not sure about that last bit. I'm in the middle of another edit so I don't have the time to research this now.

DirkvdM 08:43, 2005 Apr 19 (UTC)

It's private in the sense that it's not government-affiliated the way ISO is (as opposed to private in the sense that it's not traded on the stock market). Although it's non-profit and it's hosted by three universities, W3C is a pay-to-play organization. No individual members are allowed; you have to be a big organization that can pay a big chunk of cash up front, and then you have to subsidize the salary of several staff members whom you send to W3C (and they now become W3C's researchers, not yours). That's why most of the W3C members are large private corporations, since it's so expensive to subsidize W3C work. Furthermore, Tim Berners-Lee is the benevolent dictator who has the final say.

ISO is "public" in that it's an international quasi-governmental institution affiliated with the U.N., it's allegedly a "democracy" of standards institutions where each country can vote. To be part of it (that is, as an individual), you have to be credentialed by your country's "official" standards organization. In most cases the "official" organization is a government agency, with the exception of the U.S., where our official government standards agency is actually NIST but ANSI (a private organization) is the ISO representative because it has better lobbyists.

I put "public" in quotes, since most people don't have the government connections (or the time, money, or energy) to get credentialed so they can go participate in ISO's ridiculously inefficient meetings (try reading ISO Bulletin sometime to see what I mean). But the general idea behind ISO (at least as those clowns see it) is that if each government standards agency is careful to represent the "will" of that government's constituents, then hopefully the eventual ISO consensus on a standard will represent a delicate global consensus of consumers and businesses of all sizes (as opposed to the views of Microsoft and Adobe and any other giant corporation joining this week's consortium).

In contrast, the IETF approach is to let anyone join who wants to volunteer, although as Berners-Lee discovered, the IETF approach also has its problems. --Coolcaesar 09:21, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Ok, got that. But still, the text seems misleading to me. So I did a little research this time and adapted the text. Alas, the only way I could do that was to really alter it, something I don't usually like to do - I prefer to leave the text intact and add a clarification. I hope I haven't stepped on any toes :). Oh, and I've found that the W3C isn't Open Source, but Open Software, which isn't the same but comes close. DirkvdM 11:00, 2005 Apr 21 (UTC)

"or iso"?

Is "iso" (lower-case) a standard/accepted way to refer to ISO? I've never seen it -- except from slang referring to ISO-9660 disc images such as "I'll burn that iso now", which I believe to be not relevant to this article, or at least not meant as in the context "iso" was listed. I suggest removing the or "iso" bit at the opening paragraph. --LodeRunner 04:26, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

Joint Technical Committee

The article states a committee was formed but give no date at all.

"To deal with the consequences of substantial overlap in areas of standardization and work related to information technology, ISO and IEC formed a Joint Technical Committee known as the..."

When, dang it?

Where are these standards followed?

In what countries are the ISO standards followed? I suppose not all standards are followed everywhere, but some overview of which countries adhere to the most important ones or at least try to follow them would be useful, if only as an indication. Especially China is interresting since it contains at least 1/5 of the world population, but I haven't a clue what they use there. Or should I limit this question to the metric system? DirkvdM 10:57, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

That would be a huge mess and far too large for an article. I'm sure it would make a great book, though. There are literally thousands of ISO standards, some of which are followed in most countries and some of which are followed in only a handful or none at all. Limiting the scope to "important" standards wouldn't solve the problem. For example, I could make a good argument that the ISO standards for screw threads and the sizes of shipping containers are important because of their widespread and successful global implementation, but on the other hand, most people (including much of the Wikipedia audience) would find such standards to be incredibly boring.

Part of the problem is that to really understand ISO, you have to read its journal, ISO Bulletin, which is ridiculously expensive and notorious for its bland content, so practically no libraries bother to carry it. For example, the only library in all of Northern California that has a large archive of ISO Bulletin issues is the engineering library at UC Davis. In contrast, almost every academic library in California subscribes to far more interesting professional journals like Communications of the ACM. --Coolcaesar 20:31, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, there's an interresting one. Are any ISO standards followed in the USA. Like I said, maybe I should limit the question to the metric system (and thus ask this there), but this is the sort of thing I mean. The USA don't use the metric system, so I sort of assumed they wouldn't be bothered about other (relatively minor?) standards. But now I understand that is not the case? DirkvdM 08:40, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Some ISO standards are relatively common well known in the U.S. For example, ISO 9001 (quality control) is widely observed and many companies (especially on the West Coast) have huge signs on their buildings to announce their ISO 9001 compliance to passerby. Also, JPEG and MPEG are widely used in the PC context and are well-known (at least by all computer users who regularly work with graphics). Others, like ASN.1 and most of the other OSI standards, are relatively rare and obscure, because the market has preferred to use standards from private NGOs like W3C, IEEE, and IETF. --Coolcaesar 01:21, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Just check Metric System. All countries except for Liberia, Myanmar and the United States uses the metric system as a primary or sole system of measurement. Ran4 (talk) 19:55, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

ISO standards are not laws. So there is no country which automatically follows them. ISO makes it very clear on their website that sovereigns do not cede any of their sovereignty by participating in ISO. ISO standards a "voluntary" standards. In general, there are three ways that a country uses ISO standards. The first is where the country's standards body adopts the ISO standard as a national standard. In some countries, this may carry some idea that people are therefore supposed to use that standard, in particular where the government runs the national standards body (which is often not the case.) The second way is where a government (for example) has preferential procurement policies which mean that tenderers etc must take ISO standards into consideration (even if to say "we don't use it because it is not optimal because of XYZ"). The third is where a government explicitly adopts a standard by law. In the case of health and safety standards, this kind of adoption may be the expectation/goal of the developers of the standards. In the case of other standards, such as the information technology standards, this is usually not the expectation/goal of the developers of the standard. But in all these cases, it is the responsibility of the adopter to decide which standards to adopt: ISO material makes it very clear, and even speaks in terms of ISO standards being a "library" (i.e. of technologies). Rick Jelliffe (talk) 08:05, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Is ISO an acronym or not?

In the paragraph "The name", ISO is referred to be a name from Greek, but in the first line, it is an acronym. Which choice to be held? --Ch. Rogel 10:10, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

I can't see where we say that it's an acronym. What am I missing? --Heron 11:28, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

"Other languages" pronunciation

I've removed the added pronunciation guide for "most other languages", which read: [ˈaɪsəʊ], in most other languages [ˈɪsʊ]. Given that most other languages don't even possess the vowels given here, and that each probably has their own pronunciation for the word, I can't credit that there exists a single "non-English" pronunciation for ISO (and if there did, it would more likely be [iso], or perhaps [izo]). If someone has evidence in support of the other pronunciation, though, feel free to restore it. Thylacoleo 07:03, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

The name

We have "The reason it is in all caps in writing is that it appears that way in the Organization's logo (above). " This is plainly ridiculous. There are countless organisations and companies that have all-caps logos, but we don't do this for them. Are there any better explanations? Crazeman 22:06, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

ISO Guides

Can a section on ISO Guides be started? I am interested in Guide 34.TJMQAM 21:03, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

SPAM?????????

How can you possibly consider a link to the ISO website in an article on ISO to be spam? That is rediculous! Please do not revert it agvain without providing an explanation. Jerry lavoie 22:51, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

NOT SPAM —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jeepcomanche1 (talk • contribs) 03:33, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Map Colors

Hey, I liked the map on the article, but people with Daltonism like me will have trouble to understand it. Would someone be kind enough to change the colors? :) Thanks. Yes,I came to the discussion page for the same request.I have the same problem. My suggestion would be to replace red with blue.Thx.

Languages

Does anybody else think it's amusing that the International Organization for Standardization logo is in both English and French? I guess they haven't gotten around to standardizing that yet.

Yes, & the English part of the logo is in "American English" not "International English". Swampy 124.179.92.243 (talk) 13:42, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Where is ISO?

anybody know where is the location of this organization? It's strange to look around and not to find the actual place where ISO Members meet! AshrafSS 05:07, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

I think they're based in Geneva. They say so right on their home page, which currently has an announcement that they just consolidated from several buildings into one building in Geneva. --Coolcaesar 05:57, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

The secretariat is in Geneva. However, all standards voting is done by National Bodies, the decision-making on committees is by delegations from National Bodies. These committees have meetings anywhere in the world, as convenient to the delegations. Rick Jelliffe (talk) 08:08, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Free ANSI Standards Link doesn't work

http://webstore.ansi.org/ansidocstore/free_standards.asp link break. When I visit the link, it says “Sorry! The page cannot be found”. So anyone who know the correct link, update the link.

This is not suitable anyway. This page is on the toipic of ISO. Sticking links to just one national standards body (ANSI in this case) is not appropriate. ANSI is not ISO, and neither is DIN, BSI, SCC or the others. Linking to them on this page does not stack up with logic. Linking to just one of them, especially so. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.127.65.218 (talk) 09:32, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Note that a link to that page, or the ANSI shop, is appropriate from this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ansi. Ditto the content articles for the other national standards bodies. That is where such links belong, not on the ISO article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.127.65.218 (talk) 09:37, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I strongly disagree with bot-signed 75.127.65.218. The linked page as much as another one I introduced (and that works) belongs in both the ANSI and the ISO articles and probably also in the IEC article. See my reaction in the hereunder section. Thus please update that link as the first not-signing contributor asked. — SomeHuman 07 Sep2007 12:11 (UTC)

ANSI Sales Links

Regarding the link addition to the so-called ANSI search engine, this clearly states that it is a NATIONAL resource, and every result of search leads to the sales option from the ANSI shop! The sham is paper thin. It is a sales driver by a single national standards body.

If ANSI's was inserted, so should every other standards body's search facilities. It is a nonsense. These sorts of links belong on the articles for the national bodies themselves. In this case http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ansi

One other point. A link to the search facility of a standards shop isn't appropriate on an article explaining what ISO is. Even if it was, that search facility should clearly be the one on ISO's site, rather ANSI's.

SomeHuman continues to re-add the commercial ANSI sales link. The facts are above. This search 'front' returns items from the ANSI sales shop. SCC, BSI and many other orgs also have similar sale search facilities. NONE are appropriate here, because this article discusses ISO.

Also, if one WAS appropriate, it would be ISO's own search facility!

Yet SomeHuman continues to add the ANSI link, despite all these facts. Could someone from Wikipedia intervene? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.127.65.218 (talk) 10:39, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I responded on my talk page, where unsigning IP-er had left a message after reverting 3 times, without any edit comment on any of these reverts directing to this article talk page but addressing his concerns in the edit comment (thus I did not have to look further) and I would not have found anything here either... The above IP-er meanwhile reverted a fourth time. So far for a discussion. Hereunder the relevant copy from my talk page:

ANSI

Please DISCUSS this issue, rather than engaging in edit wars. This is why there is a discussion page for each article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.127.65.218 (talk) 10:34, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I do not take lessons from anonymus IP contributors that first revert three times and then start to "talk" without signing their comment. It would also have been appropriate to state what you are talking about (not about the ANSI article but about an external link called NSSN provided by ANSI in the ISO article, dear other readers of my talk page) in the page where you had introduced this section, this is not a chat box. And above IP's 4th revert without giving a chance to discuss, allows blocking. For now putting appropriate tag on 75.127.65.218's talk page and then undoing this unadmissable destruction of useful content.
The accusation of spam in edit comments was inappropriate, the NSSN search site is provided by ANSI and merely gives a short explanation (which is free) of what a specific ISO, ANSI, DIN international standards are available. As ANSI is the U.S. National Comittee of the IEC (USNC/IEC - notice that this links to a page at www.ansi.org) that is part of ISO (ISO/IEC), it is thus appropriate in particular on the ISO article, and the only other appropriate places would be in the ANSI article and the IEC article; there is not even a specific WP page about the U.S. National Committee, and probably not about the National Comittees of 156 other countries. ANSI sets ANSI-standards and propagates ISO, ISO/IEC (and thought those, DIN, Deutsches Institut für Normung) standards that are internationally followed like no other standards, and provides these links comprehensively like no other NGO does anywhere, certainly not in English language as the NSSN does, which is the preferred language on this English language Wikipedia. The NSSN is not a black-listed spammer and ANSI as NGO not a commercial organisation. Hence "NSSN: A National Resource for Global Standards, search engine by ANSI" is a proper External link that allows readers to look up an international standard (at least what it is about, or the other way around to find the specification's code). Of course, as one looks up a specific standard, there is a link where as to buy the comprehensively detailed standard specifications, which 'products' are not available from any competitors from the institutions that have set and guard the standards in the first place. Readers of WP are not likely to "buy" the detailed specifications simply because that possibility is there, there is no publicity whatsoever. — SomeHuman 07 Sep2007 12:20 (UTC) This section will be copied into the article's talk page.

P.S. It may be even more appropriate to put the advanced search page of the NSSN in the article instead. It facilitates searching only ISO/IEC specifications. — SomeHuman 07 Sep2007 12:29 (UTC)

You are simply not 'getting' it are you? You are also dressing ANSI up in cotton wool. One of their objectives is to SELL standards, which is why they ADERTIZE expensively, aggresively and widely.

This so called search engine simply returns products for sale from ANSI. Standards for sale. By them. It is a front for sales efforts.

Contrary to what you imply, ANSI is NOT ISO. There is no more reason to put the ANSI link here, than SCC, BSI, or any of the others. None whatsoever. All those and the rest provide product (standard) search in a similar way to ANSI. They return standards to buy, just as ANSI does. Yet again and again you place the link to ANSI on this page. Why is that?

No, the truth is that this article is not appropriate for ANY of those links. None at all. The article is on ISO itself. Please read it. It is not helpful to end it by saying: go here and buy some standards from ANSI, BSI or whoever.

Even if that was in some way useful for this article, then the ISO search engine should be linked to, and no other. There is no escaping this fact.

Finally, I have spent countless man days editing Wikipedia, so inuendo is not appreciated. 75.127.65.218 14:13, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

That makes it all the more inappropriate not to sign your previous comments anywhere – I'm glad to finally see an improvement here above – and certainly gives little excuse for having committed WP:4RR.

Whatever you have against ANSI, it is not a simple comercial business, it's a non-governmental organisation (NGO) and also the link to its NSSR happens to be on an .org domain (not that the latter gives a full guarantee). I did not imply that ANSI is ISO, but ANSI is indeed the official representative for ISO in the United States, it is also the official representative for IEC. Each of the 157 countries has such representation.

And the money (if any reader would like to spend it, which appears most unlikely and the site does not try to convince anyone "to please buy") for the complete detailed version of any specification (intended for businesses that have to follow the specifications and do not need WP to get the address), goes to the owner (or at least whatever part the issuer of the specification agreed with its representative). Neither ANSI nor ISO nor... are simple businesses that are on some competing market. They fulfill a unique task in the best interest of, well, just about anyone in the world, really. But their immense work cannot be free, people have to eat, you know. It does not make them commercial, and ANSI is definitely not a "shop" or "front for sales efforts"; it is the American National Standards Institute. A link to whatever representative the ISO might have in Portugal would most likely not help many readers of the English language Wikipedia, would it?

The interest for the readers of WP is the convenience of finding a short explanation about ISO specifications that are mostly only referred to by some non-informative ISO 0000 ... code, which occur abundantly in any line of technology etc. Or one can lookup a few keywords to see what standards exist.

Your idea of commercialism does not correspond to what one can find described at WP:SPAM in particular also because the ISO is represented precisely by ANSI (in the largest English-speaking country) that has a great international reputation for setting standards itself as well. The link however, does not push ANSI standards but delivers all standards from all relevant standardization organisations equally.

Apparently, the fact that you have encountered references to ANSI standards everywhere (mainly outside Wikipedia) has made you come to think it is something like MicroSoft. It is not. Bill Gates does not get rich by ANSI or ISO and I don't know anyone who would.

— SomeHuman 07 Sep2007 14:46 (UTC)

Sorry to intervene in your private row guys, and especially sorry SomeHuman, because IPwhatever is correct. If any search should be linked to it should be ISO's search and not one individual country delegate's. I agree as well that search adds nothing to this wikipage. 80.86.83.20 15:06, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Red IP contributors supporting red IP contributors... oh well. Of course it adds to the page, because people wanting to find anything about an ISO standard will actually intentionally come and look for a useful link precisely on this page. You do not seem to understand that people do not just see Wikipedia as some 'book' to find an encyclopaedic explication on some topic (which is often not even very reliable, unfortunately). Why, do you think, it is a normal practice on WP to provide external links? There is also a good reason to provide the ANSI link as well on this page, because not every reader will come with an ISO code at hand, some may want to find out which international standards apply for a specific topic and would like the ability to search for all related standards, without having to go to each article page and do the same repetitive job again and again. Hereunder is a copy of what I just added to the 4RR report:

Aftermath (?): Meanwhile I provided an even more appropriate "advanced search" link, which was replaced by the IP-contributor with one that does about the same but only for ISO standards (not necessarily an improvement, because readers might prefer a search engine that looks for all international standards as the ANSI link could do as well as looking only for ISO/IEC) though incorrectly calling it "ISO advanced search", which in turn I replaced by the actual ISO advanced search page. For me it is not worth a further 'fight' though I would prefer having both the ISO and the more general ANSI links there, for the practical reason I just stated. See current history (edits of 2007-09-07 14:13, 14:24 and 15:30). — SomeHuman 2007-09-07 15:46 (UTC)

Afterthought: btw 80.86.83.20, the 'private row' was not about a link going either to the ISO or to the ANSI search engine, but about having the ANSI search engine or nothing; the ISO one had been unknown. I'm happy with it being in the article now, though both would still be better.

— SomeHuman 07 Sep2007 16:16–17:01 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:ISO French logo.svg

Image:ISO French logo.svg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

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BetacommandBot 05:34, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:ISO english logo.svg

Image:ISO english logo.svg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot 05:35, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

ISO Means Equal

Although ISO today generally represents the International Organization for Standards (sic *), it was orignally selected because it means Equal ... as in isobaric or isometric. I first read this back in 1995 from a quote by the Secretary General of the IOS organization when I was implementing ISO 9004 at my company. A search for further backup of this produced this quote taken from Searchdatacenter.com: According to ISO, "ISO" is not an abbreviation. It is a word, derived from the Greek isos, meaning "equal", which is the root for the prefix "iso-" that occurs in a host of terms, such as "isometric" (of equal measure or dimensions) and "isonomy" (equality of laws, or of people before the law). The name ISO is used around the world to denote the organization, thus avoiding the assortment of abbreviations that would result from the translation of "International Organization for Standardization" into the different national languages of members. Whatever the country, the short form of the organization's name is always ISO. Aspensummer 20:39, 30 October 2007 (UTC)Aspensummer

*Err, that'll be International Organization for Standardization then.

Incorrect Naming within Wikipedia

Many have been tidied in recent days, and 1475+ since the beginning of the year:

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organization+for+Standardization (Correct Version: Z and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organisation+for+Standardisation (Acceptable Alternative: S and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organisation+for+Standardization (Inconsistent: S and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organization+for+Standardisation (Inconsistent: Z and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organization+for+Standards%22 (Incorrect Name: for standards and Plural and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organisation+for+Standards%22 (Incorrect Name: for standards and Plural and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organization+for+Standard%22 (Incorrect Name: for standard and Single and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organisation+for+Standard%22 (Incorrect Name: for standard and Single and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organization+of+Standardization%22 (Incorrect Name: of and Z and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organization+of+Standardisation%22 (Incorrect Name: of and Z and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organisation+of+Standardization%22 (Incorrect Name: of and S and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organisation+of+Standardisation%22 (Incorrect Name: of and S and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organization+of+Standards%22 (Incorrect Name: of standards and Plural and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organisation+of+Standards%22 (Incorrect Name: of standards and Plural and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organization+of+Standard%22 (Incorrect Name: of standard and Single and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22International+Organisation+of+Standard%22 (Incorrect Name: of standard and Single and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standardization+organization%22 (Incorrect Name: Z and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standardization+organisation%22 (Incorrect Name: Z and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standardisation+organization%22 (Incorrect Name: S and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standardisation+organisation%22 (Incorrect Name: S and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standards+organization%22 (Incorrect Name: Plural and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standards+organisation%22 (Incorrect Name: Plural and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standard+organization%22 (Incorrect Name: Single and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standard+organisation%22 (Incorrect Name: Single and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organization+for+international+standardization%22 (Incorrect Name: for and Z and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organization+for+international+standardisation%22 (Incorrect Name: for and Z and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organisation+for+international+standardization%22 (Incorrect Name: for and S and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organisation+for+international+standardisation%22 (Incorrect Name: for and S and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organization+for+international+standards%22 (Incorrect Name: for standards and plural and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organisation+for+international+standards%22 (Incorrect Name: for standards and plural and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organization+for+international+standard%22 (Incorrect Name: for standard and single and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organisation+for+international+standard%22 (Incorrect Name: for standard and single and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organization+of+international+standardization%22 (Incorrect Name: of and Z and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organization+of+international+standardisation%22 (Incorrect Name: of and Z and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organisation+of+international+standardization%22 (Incorrect Name: of and S and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organisation+of+international+standardisation%22 (Incorrect Name: of and S and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organization+of+international+standards%22 (Incorrect Name: of and standards and plural and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organisation+of+international+standards%22 (Incorrect Name: of and standards and plural and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organization+of+international+standard%22 (Incorrect Name: of and standard and single and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22organisation+of+international+standard%22 (Incorrect Name: of and standard and single and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standardization+for+organization%22 (Incorrect Name: for and Z and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standardization+for+organisation%22 (Incorrect Name: for and Z and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standardisation+for+organization%22 (Incorrect Name: for and S and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standardisation+for+organisation%22 (Incorrect Name: for and S and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standards+for+organization%22 (Incorrect Name: for and Plural and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standards+for+organisation%22 (Incorrect Name: for and Plural and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standard+for+organization%22 (Incorrect Name: for and Single and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standard+for+organisation%22 (Incorrect Name: for and Single and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standardization+of+organization%22 (Incorrect Name: of and Z and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standardization+of+organisation%22 (Incorrect Name: of and Z and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standardisation+of+organization%22 (Incorrect Name: of and S and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standardisation+of+organisation%22 (Incorrect Name: of and S and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standards+of+organization%22 (Incorrect Name: of and Plural and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standards+of+organisation%22 (Incorrect Name: of and Plural and S)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standard+of+organization%22 (Incorrect Name: of and Single and Z)

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&q=site:wikipedia.org+%22international+standard+of+organisation%22 (Incorrect Name: of and Single and S) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.73.229.140 (talk) 09:40, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

... and then there are all of those with "intenational" instead of "inteRnational" within too.

Headline text

The current version of the article reads, literally, that International Organization for Standardization (Organisation internationale de normalisation), widely known as ISO, is a corrupt international standard-setting body composed of representatives from various national standards organizations... this is clearly POV and although I do not know what could be the reasons behind the claim, the link is given does not clearly state it and, even if it did, this is hardly the encyclopedic tone that one would expect from wikipedia. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 190.45.251.100 (talk) 16:05, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

American English

In the 'Name and abbreviation' section it says American English is one of the official languages of ISO. However, their website doesn't seem to support this. I can't find any explicit statement on the style of English they use, but their usage suggests it's not American, for example, they use the spellings 'centre', 'programme' and 'aluminium'. It appears to follow the Oxford spelling style, so I suggest we change it to that, but I would like to find a reference. Potahto (talk) 17:00, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Pardon me for following you around ;) Yes, ISO uses Oxford spelling, but first of all, American English isn't the official language of anything on earth, since it's not even a language in the first place--according to, duh, ISO. Organization vs. organisation is just a spelling convention and has nothing to do with language; furthermore, the spelling organization is not an Americanism at all, although many British people (and even more Australians and New Zealanders) think it is. Let's just say that the logos are written in English and French--no doubt about that. Jack^(Lumber) 18:42, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, that sentence used to read "English and French," but it was changed by an anonymous British editor on February 3, 2008; in addition, the same editor seems to think that "American English" is spoken in America and "English" is spoken in England. Which is not entirely wrong, although it implies two different POVs. Jack^(Lumber) 18:53, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, watching Hollyoaks can have side effects :). Thinking -ize is an Americanism seems to be a common mistake everywhere, perhaps a reflection of how quickly language can change (although that might be a bad example). Often the mistakes people make are more interesting than what they get right. An American friend of mine used to think 'parameter' was spelt 'parametre' in Britain... Anyway, that's off-topic. Potahto (talk) 10:19, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

no entiendo nadita de lo que esta ahi asi k me voy a salir de la pagina bye bye

International Standards may be in English and/or French. They may be translated into national languages as part of adoption as a national standard. Japan does this, for example. My understanding is that any national version of English is allowed: it depends on which spell-checker the standard's editor wants to use. For example, Australian English is mid-way between US and British English in spelling: sometimes both variants are allowed: a standard written by an editor from Australia/Pacific/South East Asia could well use that. The editor has a deal of discretion: spelling is a non-issue compared to consistency. Rick Jelliffe (talk) 08:14, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Link to "Available standards" broken?

I'm not sure about this, but it looks to me like the "Available Standards" link is broken. It now links to what looks to me like a container shipping company. However, my Spanish/Portugese isn't much good, so somewhere in there _may_ be a link to some ISO standards...

A red link is added to see....

my comment at Talk:List of ISO standards#A topic of... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 222.64.219.44 (talk) 02:44, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

BTw, where is the Agricultural microbiology located in the division of ISO then?--222.64.219.44 (talk) 02:54, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

My this question is based on the following information
http://scholar.google.com/scholar?as_q=Agricultural+microbiology&num=10&btnG=Search+Scholar&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_occt=title&as_sauthors=&as_publication=&as_ylo=&as_yhi=&as_allsubj=all&hl=en&lr=&newwindow=1 --222.64.219.44 (talk) 02:59, 29 May 2009 (UTC)