Re: Second International Symposium on Invisible XML

Dear Bethan,

All things being equal, I would rather let things lie, but you have
specifically asked, so I am replying to the list. I suggest readers
consider skimming or skipping (and I will try to be short).

First, as to "wrong decision". I come at this very differently -- I'm not
really afraid of a wrong decision. I won't be making the decision. In the
past I have often been willing to live with and even approve decisions that
went against my recommendations. C'est la vie! Other people sometimes prove
to be right and not everything is cut and dried. This is one of those
things. I won't be less interested in the tech or the conference because of
anyone's marketing strategy (I hope). I think the decision is important but
I also trust the 'powers that be' in this case to make a good choice.

I still prefer like Steven's original suggestion ("Invisible Markup", no
extension or subtitle) mainly because it inspires curiosity -- today -- in
a way that XML, and even iXML (alas!) do not. At the same time it doesn't
really risk mystification or confusion, since the next line of prose anyone
reads (after the title) will include all your favorite acronyms. I want
iXML to get top billing, in lights.

The arguments I wish to avoid are the ones with people who are incurious. I
am afraid there is a significant set of people who might be reached -- who
are curious -- but who don't ask the questions, but instead respond with
canned anxieties. Anxiety makes them incurious when they might be curious.
I don't want to talk to them about their canned anxieties -- I am not
really curious about them -- but about markup technologies.

A model title, if you like, is "Balisage: The Markup Conference". As you
know this says much less than it seems to, which is why it works -- kind of
like "Bechamel: The White Sauce Conference". I can't say what the
equivalents would be for iXML. If the title already has more than one part,
I think a subtitle is almost always too much weight. I like the words
"International" (for sending the right message) and "Symposium" (for its
oblique reference to festive beverages and sociability). And I think that
"Invisible Markup" sounds cool and enticing.

(And FWIW the title of my paper for Declarative Amsterdam breaks all these
rules. Even if papers are different, that just goes to show.)

As for the charge that I am either avoiding XML because I don't like the
name, or because I am catering to others who don't like the name -- while I
can't deny there might be such a person, I am not the one wearing that
shoe. Everything I do has the acronym all over it. When my niece (working
in a tech field) is asked what her strange relatives do, she starts with
XML.

Thanks again for reading,
Wendell




On Thu, Aug 20, 2026 at 12:15 PM Bethan Tovey-Walsh <
bytheway@linguacelta.com> wrote:

> most of the rest of the post seems to be directed at someone who wants to
> disparage, denigrate or detract from iXML. I don't know who that is, in
> this conversation.
>
>
> That person is one who, Steven has said, belongs to a group for whom XML
> is "poisoned" and for whose benefit, therefore, we should apparently leave
> the letter X out of the symposium title. The post isn't directed at that
> person; it's directed at the people who seem to me, in this conversation so
> far, to be advocating for removing the names XML and IXML from the
> symposium name on that basis.
>
> If I have failed to recognize or understand arguments against including
> IXML in the title that have been made on other grounds, I apologize, and
> I'd ask for them to be restated clearly so that I can try to follow them.
>
> I am merely defending the contrary point of view, in a balance of multiple
> considerations.
>
>
> Can you please outline these other considerations, which make you think
> that the symposium title would be better without IXML in it? I've clearly
> failed to grasp them at all.
>
> Those are not the debates to which I refer.
>
>
> I'd also like to understand what "unnecessary debates" will be brought to
> the fore by using the name IXML as part of the title. I know it can be
> frustrating to engage with younger people in a community who are not
> intimately familiar with old debates and old battles, but I'd really
> appreciate a clearer explanation of the debates you think will be reignited
> by the use of the terms XML and IXML.
>
> I'm sorry not just to let this lie, but I don't want to support the wrong
> decision here, so I would like to be able to understand the grounds for
> your preference, even if it is only a 60/40 preference, given that I've
> made a mistake in my assumption that all the arguments so far have been
> based on the need to attract people who dislike XML.
>
> Regards,
>
> BTW
>
> ****************************************************
>
> Dr. Bethan Tovey-Walsh
>
> linguacelta.com
>
> Golygydd | Editor geirfan.cymru
>
> Croeso i chi ysgrifennu ataf yn y Gymraeg
>
> On 19 Aug 2026, at 17:40, Wendell Piez <wapiez@wendellpiez.com> wrote:
>
> 
> Bethan writes:
>
> >> It only brings unnecessary debates to the forefront.
> > If the debates are about whether we want to grow our community by
> redefining it for the benefit of people who are hostile to XML, then I
> think those debates are absolutely necessary.
>
> Those are not the debates to which I refer.
>
> Also, most of the rest of the post seems to be directed at someone who
> wants to disparage, denigrate or detract from iXML. I don't know who that
> is, in this conversation.
>
> It is true that my choice of the word "defiant" imputes an intention (to a
> title and, I suppose, to those who have chosen it), when all I really have
> is an impression. In other words, I am projecting defiance, where there may
> be none. Am I the only one in this conversation who is imputing an
> intention, when all we really have is words? (I can explain my intention,
> what I mean or think I meant, yet I keep saying things that are received in
> an entirely different light.)
>
> As to "what satisfies me", you seem to be under the impression I would
> not be satisfied with the outcome you recommend, and I have not said that
> at all. I am merely defending the contrary point of view, in a balance of multiple
> considerations. Call it a 60/40 preference.
>
> Probably even that is a mistake, now, since I have made my impressions
> probably clearer than I should have. There is no use being offended because
> someone is offended by something I didn't say or didn't mean to say -- and
> my feelings (or others' feelings about my supposed feelings) are not what
> is at issue. :-) I am only answering because opinions were solicited, I
> don't even get to decide!
>
> Cheers-ish, Wendell
>
> (Then Norm writes a message that might be characterized as defiant. Or
> not!)
>
>
> On Wed, Aug 19, 2026 at 12:07 PM Bethan Tovey-Walsh <
> bytheway@linguacelta.com> wrote:
>
>> Putting 'XML' or 'iXML' defiantly into the title doesn't make anyone feel
>> better about anything:
>>
>>
>> It makes me feel better not to see the work I and my colleagues have done
>> on IXML swept into the background in favour of some nebulously-defined
>> thing that, so far, barely exists outside IXML.
>>
>> I have been on the working group that manages the invisible XML spec
>> since before v1 was published. This is my first ever experience of
>> contributing to any such project, and I'm proud of what we've accomplished.
>> Most of us were not working on "invisible markup" in general, but on IXML,
>> specifically. It came as a surprise to me to realize last year that the
>> group's official title is the "Invisible markup community group", because
>> we've all been calling it the IXML CG, and referring to meetings of the
>> IXML CG. This mailing list is the "public-ixml" mailing list. The website
>> is at "invisiblexml.org". Most of Steven's initial published work, which
>> brought us all together to work on the technology, was explicitly XML
>> focused, even when presented at general markup fora such as Balisage.
>>
>> As I've already said, I'm a big fan of invisible markup as a theoretical
>> approach, as well as a fan of the concrete work already done by David and
>> Ronald. But the work *I* have been doing - and the work done by almost
>> everyone else involved so far in this project - has been on IXML. It's
>> absolutely fantastic that we now want to open this up. We can (for example)
>> argue that IXML is the first, and very successful, example of how invisible
>> markup, as a theoretical or abstract approach to markup, can be put into
>> practice. I'm totally sold on that approach, and I absolutely now see the
>> value of slowly focusing more on "invisible markup" and less on IXML
>> specifically.
>>
>> But I don't find it respectful to the work already done, to the community
>> of users and implementers and theorists and scholars who have made IXML
>> successful largely because they really want to do stuff with XML, to say
>> "Yeah, that IXML thing is just going to be contentious and start arguments.
>> Better we don't mention it."
>>
>> it only brings unnecessary debates to the forefront.
>>
>>
>> If the debates are about whether we want to grow our community by
>> redefining it for the benefit of people who are hostile to XML, then I
>> think those debates are absolutely necessary.
>>
>> I am the first to say that prejudice against technologies is not like
>> prejudice against people's inherent characteristics such as race or sex or
>> disability. Nonetheless, being prejudiced against a technology to the
>> extent that you can't possibly be part of a community that mentions that
>> technology, without very serious moral or ethical reasons for your
>> objections, is infantile. And if there are serious moral or ethical
>> objections to XML (or even fairly trivial ones), I haven't yet heard them.
>> The only serious objections I've ever heard voiced against the X-stack have
>> been a combination of the technical and the political. The former I can
>> respect. The latter can get to heck.
>>
>> But it is not about hiding it, really, and I would feel better if people
>> stopped saying that. It is about what is emphasized.
>>
>>
>> Last year, IXML was in the symposium title. This year, we're proposing
>> that it should form part of a subtitle, with top billing going to
>> "invisible markup". You seem to be arguing that this still constitutes
>> "putting IXML defiantly into the title". With respect, it seems that you
>> want IXML removed altogether. If that isn't "hiding it", what is it? I'm
>> genuinely sorry if that wording makes you feel bad, but then I'd like to
>> know how you would describe things instead? Because Elisa and I have,
>> between us, offered options that de-emphasize the X, and they haven't
>> satisfied you, so it doesn't seem solely to be about what is emphasized and
>> what isn't.
>>
>> BTW
>>
>> ****************************************************
>>
>> Dr. Bethan Tovey-Walsh
>>
>> linguacelta.com
>>
>> Golygydd | Editor geirfan.cymru
>>
>> Croeso i chi ysgrifennu ataf yn y Gymraeg
>>
>> On 19 Aug 2026, at 15:54, Wendell Piez <wapiez@wendellpiez.com> wrote:
>>
>> 
>> Hello again Naming Committee,
>>
>> "iXML and Beyond" addresses my concern about limiting the scope of
>> interest implicitly in the name. But I am not sure (on balance) this is
>> better than something more like the present title. "International Symposium
>> on Invisible Markup 2076". I know the iXML in that title is invisible to
>> the unaided eye.
>>
>> But it is not about hiding it, really, and I would feel better if people
>> stopped saying that. It is about what is emphasized.
>>
>> I fully understand why we have sensitivities around the "XML" acronym: I
>> have my own. But I don't think there is a way around them. Putting 'XML' or
>> 'iXML' defiantly into the title doesn't make anyone feel better about
>> anything: it only brings unnecessary debates to the forefront. I would
>> rather stop fighting those old battles, and talk about the fabulous
>> technologies and initiatives, whatever names their creators give them.
>>
>> Thanks again for reading,
>> Wendell
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Aug 19, 2026 at 9:54 AM Dave Pawson <dave.pawson@gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> On Wed, 19 Aug 2026 at 14:42, Bethan Tovey-Walsh
>>> <bytheway@linguacelta.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>> > As Sheila and I have both ailready said, discoverability and name
>>> recognition are worth considering, so I would strongly prefer that IXML be
>>> somewhere in the subtitle, not just XML.
>>>
>>> Anyone old enough may recall the strength of feeling when the 'X' of
>>> xml was discussed?  It was the 'catch'' ,
>>> the name recognition feature that caused heads to raise.
>>>
>>> Perhaps iXML in whatever case just may be the catch here?
>>>
>>> regards
>>>
>>> --
>>> Dave Pawson
>>> XSLT XSL-FO FAQ.
>>> Docbook FAQ.
>>>
>>>
>>
>> --
>> ...Wendell Piez... ...wendellpiez.com...
>> ...pellucidliterature.org... ...raventracks.org...
>> ... xproc.zone... ...github.com/wendellpiez...
>>
>>
>
> --
> ...Wendell Piez... ...wendellpiez.com...
> ...pellucidliterature.org... ...raventracks.org...
> ... xproc.zone... ...github.com/wendellpiez...
>
>

-- 
...Wendell Piez... ...wendellpiez.com...
...pellucidliterature.org... ...raventracks.org...
... xproc.zone... ...github.com/wendellpiez...