Standards are produced by many organisations, some for internal usage only, others for use by a groups of people, groups of companies, or a subsection of an industry. A problem arises when different groups come together, each with a large user base doing some well established thing that between them is mutually incompatible.
There are many national and regional standards organisations, but the three international organizations having the highest international recognition are the International Organization for Standardization, the International Electrotechnical Commission, and the International Telecommunication Union. All three of these have existed for more than 50 years (founded in 1947, 1906, and 1865, respectively) and they are all based in Geneva, Switzerland. They have established tens of thousands of standards covering almost every conceivable topic. Many of these are then adopted worldwide replacing various incompatible 'homegrown' standards. Many of these standards are naturally evolved from those designed in-house within an industry, or by a particular country, whilst others have been built from scratch by groups of experts who sit on various Technical Committees.
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