This is a bit of a rhetorical question, I suppose, as well as an old standby gripe. Why are we stuck with Word, and doc as a submission format? I happen to like to write with a text editor and then format with latex or docbook or html or something like that. I always thought it was best to seperate content from presentation. I'm just complaining. If anybody has any idea about how to work around this problem it would be great. If not, no biggie, I'm just venting. Feel free to complain with me!
I'm not "stuck" with Word, I use it because I believe it's far and away the best tool for the job. As for DOC, sometimes agents and editors want DOC, and sometimes they want RTF. What's the problem? Or are you just an OpenDocumant fanatic?
You can think what you want, but you're the writer, not the agent, and not the editor, and both have sound and solid reasons for wanting the format they ask for.
Separating content from presentation is just plain silly. If you want to do this, if you want to write in a text editor and format in latex or anything else, go ahead. Who cares? It's your time, and if you want to waste it, fine. But don't waste the time of agents and editors.
As an editor, I don't care what tools you use, whether you want to separate content and presentation, or whether you want to carve the words into stone, etc. But when you send me something to read and to edit, you'd darned well better have it the way I need and want it because I have to deal with hundreds of writers, and we all must be on the same page. Word is the only tool I've found that guarantees this, though any good word processor is fine on the writing end.
But as long as you have proper format and proper file format when you actually send it, fine, however you do it.
OpneDocument has nothing to do with it. That isn't a writing argument, it's a philosophical argument, and one I couldn't care less about. And if I can't open an OD file, and you send one anyway, you're just flat out of luck.
It's silly to say DOC isn't even compatible with itself, but if you don't like DOC, send rtf. But don't send me an OD because I don't have time to mess with it.