An independent group would not be any better as that could backfire on AMD or still cripple performance for nVidia depending on who has the bigger pocket and who are willing to spend. Anybody can be bought today the numbers just have to be high enough.
then the same thing could be said about OpenGL, so we're back to square one of needing an API per manufacturer again
and come now matt, are we really that naive?
AMD knew that TressFX would give their GPU's benchmark scores over the then top cards from their competitor, why would they lock out the competition's cards knowing that it would make them look bad?
if AMD control the API, they would keep on doing the same thing, putting things in it that they know perform better on their own cards, of course they would
if AMD we as magnanimous as you were trying to make out, they would have already given NV full access to Mantle, which of course they haven't, and they also wouldn't rent a room directly opposite Nvidia's conference and start trying to get press up to their hotel room to show them canned benchmarks
we already know what nvidia's response to mantle is going to be - an ARM chip integrated on to the GPU to handle draw calls
nvidia will overcome efficiency with brute force, just like they always do
as we've seen from yesterday, they are also pushing OpenGL / Linux / Mac / crossplatform tools, so while AMD may have fingers in consoles, Nvidia look like they've stolen a march on them in cross OS Personal Computer platform development (along with OpenGL being supported on PS4)
interesting things ahead from both sides - competition, ulitmately, should be good for the consumer, either in fighting price wars, or ever rapidly increasing fidelity
