One (of the many i'm sure) problems here you defined are:
"...who would love to have a way to embed interactive graphs and tables into your papers to make them more understandable for the reader..."
The solution however may not necessarily be a private 'reader', 'player', or 'binary'. Though the 'format' may be 'open' this single implementation isn't.
You bring up Adobe which isn't a very good business case to follow as the very reasons I brought up are pressing the industry to move toward open implementations[1][2], away from 'free' binary distributions and plugins (for a various list of reasons from security[2], to access on other systems/apps).
This really isn't 1999, and CDF isn't yet a popular nor a de-facto standard[1] much like PDF was. Besides you and I are much more capable these days with newer and _open_ technologies are we not (browser, linux, open documents, etc...)?
Speaking of documents, other examples of 'perceived' open standard files are Microsoft's ill faded OSP[3] promise which spawned traction for OD/F[4] and other.
These reasons are why HTML5/CSS3/JS as a basis to create an open two way street for 'documents' and/or formats are so powerful. It is not enough to only provide an 'open' format, but also an open implementation. This way both use of and implementation of such product be beneficial toward academic progress. Why wouldn't that alone be worth it?
Thus a likely more popular solution I am proposing to your problem could be a service that uses HTML5/CSS3/JS in the delivery which solves your problem in a WYSIWG general user manner. Especially so as the very tools (your browser, and a million libraries must I really list them all?), UIX experience, and entrepreneurs (HN! Y-comb!) already exist!
To your quote "Some problems are best solved by large corporations trying to make money" I would say the same to "Some problems are best solved by small groups of entrepreneurs or open source developers trying to make money and/or looking for peer fame."
I would go further in saying that for 'open' standards and implementations, that small group of entrepreneurs or open source developers are the ones carrying the torch of open-ness [5][6][7][8][and on and on...] and innovation.
One (of the many i'm sure) problems here you defined are: "...who would love to have a way to embed interactive graphs and tables into your papers to make them more understandable for the reader..."
The solution however may not necessarily be a private 'reader', 'player', or 'binary'. Though the 'format' may be 'open' this single implementation isn't.
You bring up Adobe which isn't a very good business case to follow as the very reasons I brought up are pressing the industry to move toward open implementations[1][2], away from 'free' binary distributions and plugins (for a various list of reasons from security[2], to access on other systems/apps).
This really isn't 1999, and CDF isn't yet a popular nor a de-facto standard[1] much like PDF was. Besides you and I are much more capable these days with newer and _open_ technologies are we not (browser, linux, open documents, etc...)?
Speaking of documents, other examples of 'perceived' open standard files are Microsoft's ill faded OSP[3] promise which spawned traction for OD/F[4] and other.
These reasons are why HTML5/CSS3/JS as a basis to create an open two way street for 'documents' and/or formats are so powerful. It is not enough to only provide an 'open' format, but also an open implementation. This way both use of and implementation of such product be beneficial toward academic progress. Why wouldn't that alone be worth it?
Thus a likely more popular solution I am proposing to your problem could be a service that uses HTML5/CSS3/JS in the delivery which solves your problem in a WYSIWG general user manner. Especially so as the very tools (your browser, and a million libraries must I really list them all?), UIX experience, and entrepreneurs (HN! Y-comb!) already exist!
To your quote "Some problems are best solved by large corporations trying to make money" I would say the same to "Some problems are best solved by small groups of entrepreneurs or open source developers trying to make money and/or looking for peer fame."
I would go further in saying that for 'open' standards and implementations, that small group of entrepreneurs or open source developers are the ones carrying the torch of open-ness [5][6][7][8][and on and on...] and innovation.
[1] "was originally a proprietary format controlled by Adobe", http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portable_Document_Format
[2] http://andreasgal.com/2011/06/15/pdf-js/
[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenDocument
[4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Open_Specification_Pr...
[5] http://blog.documentfoundation.org/2011/06/01/statement-abou...
[6] http://www.infoworld.com/d/application-development/oracle-ha...
[8] http://tirania.org/blog/archive/2011/Jul-18.html