What is the definition of "standards"?

[Joe Krahn]

Freedesktop standards now say "These are not really standards", and 
redirect to "Specifications".

IMHO, these ARE standards, just not official or authoritative like ISO 
or IEEE standards. It is common to refer to "coding standards" for 
source code conventions defined within an organization or programming 
project. The first definition of standards at dictionary.com is: 
"something considered by an authority or by general consent as a basis 
of comparison; an approved model."

Whatever the reason, I think it would be useful to give a better 
explanation of why Freedesktop is avoiding the term standards, instead 
of just "freedesktop.org is not a standards body." Maybe it is also 
partly because these are still under development and subject to change, 
or maybe it is because some people were mistakenly considering or 
referring to Freedesktop specs in a way that implied they are formal 
standards?

Joe Krahn