why distinctions within XHTML?

[Blair Murri]

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	David Brownell [SMTP:david-b at pacbell.net]
> Sent:	Tuesday, August 31, 1999 1:08 AM
> To:	Ann Navarro
> Cc:	XML-Dev Mailing list
> Subject:	Re: why distinctions within XHTML?
> 
> Ann Navarro wrote:
> > 
> > Part of the problem here is what is and what isn't confidential
> discussions
> > in a WG. If this were a W3C-internal list, I could be more forthcoming
> ...
> 
> And of course, that's the cause of a lot of the problems.
> 
> The more I watch things at W3C, the more I feel that the Web should be
> driven instead by a standards organization with public accountability.
> Being accountable to vendors who have vested interests in bloatware (as
> key parts of new barriers to entry) isn't the right model.
> 
> Somebody did the basic math in a comment:  three variants of XHTML will
> very quickly add an order of magnitude to the complexity of the systems
> built with it.  That's a deterrent to the use of XHTML, and discards the
> simplification that's long been at the core of the XML movement.
> 
> - Dave
> 
	I agree with Dave.  The more I look, the more I am convinced that
the W3C is not the right standards body to deal with XML, which is being
employed in many arenas that have absolutely nothing to do with the web.  In
fact, if/when the true potential of XML is realized, the web will be a minor
player in that.  SGML is/was not the native language of the web.  HTML was
derived for that purpose.  XML is/has the potential to be used for much more
then internet publishing of information.  The web has benefited from many
technological contributions, many of which predate the web by a couple of
decades, and most of the technology that goes into it is not at all web
specific (connection oriented stream TCP communications, MIME,
request/response, etc.).  To think that XML is a web-only or even a
web-mostly language is to miss the boat so far as to not even notice the
ripples.

	Frankly, one has to question the W3C's ability to deliver a good
product (I mean, *3* version 4 HTML's?????)  Let's get real here.  This body
has only one goal in mind, and that is to create *us* and *them*, and leave
*us* on top no matter the cost.

Blair L. Murri
Sr. Programmer/etc.
WavePhore, Inc.

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