Easy to predict. This thread should never have started. Michael was fully aware that his article would just raise passions....with no result.
The issues are part "religious" and mostly economic and freedom to provide creative features and functions. Some just are not honest enough with themselves to see, or admit they see, all sides of the discussion.
In his article, Michael refers several times to "proprietary raw formats", seemingly overlooking the proprietary nature of DNG. This is wholly owned by Adobe Systems (as is TIFF).
In discussions like this, "open" is often made to do two jobs at once. On the one hand, it is treated as a synonym for "standard". On the other, is put in opposition to the word "proprietary". Therein lies confusion.
Instead, imagine that the terms "proprietary", "standard", "closed" and "open" lie not on one scale but two. On one axis (the horizontal, say) is set out the range between completely proprietary at one end and completely standard at the other. These concepts are distinct — proprietary objects are owned by one person or organization (e.g. Adobe), while standard ones are owned by many (e.g. the members of ISO).
The other, vertical, axis has at its base the notion of an object's being open. In other words, the details of it have been published. The converse of this, at the top of the axis, is the notion of an object's being closed, or kept secret.
To simplify matters, one might position these four attributes at the corners of a four-cell matrix. Thus:
1. The upper right quadrant refers to objects or designs that are proprietary and closed. I think this is what Michael means with his "proprietary raw formats".
2. Lower right is stuff that's proprietary and open. As noted, DNG and TFF would seem to belong here.
3. The lower left quadrant encompasses material that is open and standard. Its details are readily available and its application doesn't vary (or vary much). ISO standards are an obvious example, as are those of IEEE.
4. The upper left quadrant (standard but secret) is logically possible but commercially absurd, unless it's intended for spooks or the some of the military.
Of course, none of this addresses Michael's gripe but I hope that it will help the debate. Greater precision in terminology often clarifies thinking.
Roger