Microsoft cant even get word 2007 to translate to the old format properly.
When obviously you would have meant, "Microsoft can even get word 2007 to fail to translate to the old format properly."
You don't want the new machines with the new Microsoft Office to turn out documents that the old machines can easily read ... Microsoft has had various "features" to make it difficult to easily produce backwardly compatible files since Word 6.0 at least (before then I was using WordPerfect 5.1, but I assume they were doing the same tricks back before that as well).
It does double duty, first in getting organizations to upgrade across the board rather than "only those who need the new features", second, in interrupting the progress made by other applications in being able to both produce and consume Word and other Microsoft Office files. I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.
If the change underneath breaking backward compatibility was made early enough (on what that department thought were sound grounds) to be deeply embedded in the new code, and the broken compatibility was uncovered late enough in usability testing, then its a corporate decision regarding the cost of fixing the problem, including slipping release dates, and the cost of retaining the problem. I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.
