Re: The HTMLWG and WHATWG

Hi, Ian-

Ian Hickson wrote:
> On Mon, 2 Apr 2007, Mike Schinkel wrote:
>> OTOH, what we have right now is the worst of all worlds: two groups with 
>> each group discussing all of the same issues.
> 
> Actually, there are dozens (or more) of groups discussing the issues. Two 
> of the groups are the HTML WG and the WHATWG, but there are many more, in 
> blog comments, in forums, on IRC channels, in bug systems, etc.
> 
[...]
> 
> There are members of the WHATWG who do not _want_ to contribute via the 
> HTML WG, just like there are members of the HTML WG who do not want to 
> contribute via the WHATWG, and members who don't want to contribute in 
> either list (e.g. who prefer forums, or don't care about standards 
> development per se and would rather stay in their part of the world and 
> have us go to them). We have to cater for all these people, otherwise our 
> specification won't be good for them, and thus our spec won't be as good a 
> step forward for humanity as it otherwise could be.

Your point about taking into account the needs and wants of people not 
involved in standards (those on forums or dev-centric lists) is 
certainly well-taken.  Commitment to standards is very time-consuming, 
which few can afford.  But I'm not sure why we have to cater to people 
who are willing to contribute to WHATWG and not to the HTML WG.

The work done in WHATWG is really valuable, but HTML is a W3C 
technology.  The official standard is being specified in the HTML WG, 
which everyone is welcome to contribute to; those who chose not to are 
self-excluding.  Do you have any insight into why these people (how many 
of them are there?) would take the time to contribute to an unofficial, 
experimental standards body, and not the official one?

Regards-
-Doug

Received on Wednesday, 4 April 2007 16:46:36 UTC