Re: First Draft of W3C version of URL Spec

On Sep 2, 2014, at 12:57 , Marcos Caceres <marcos@marcosc.com> wrote:

> On September 2, 2014 at 3:53:34 PM, David Singer (singer@apple.com) wrote:
>>> OK, so you want to minimize convergence of specs, and maximize  
>> disparity? Also strange.
> 
> Please see my original post. It outlined the issues with copy/pasting the WHATWG specs. Please also see Anne's and Hixie's responses: they basically summarize all the problems. 
> 
> Again, the simple request is for the W3C to please stop copy/pasting the WHATWG specs. 
> 
> Jeff, can we please get an acknowledgement that this will now stop?  

I think what you have is an acknowledgement that we hear that a few people (you included) have an issue, and we’re discussing it. Why anyone should stop doing anything because you personally say so is less clear to me. I seem to recall that when people do something in the WhatWG, and others ask for it to stop, the reply is often along the lines of ‘no’ (and not always so respectfully phrased, at that).

Look, you and Anne work for an organization that approved the WebApps charter with this as an explicit deliverable.  Your organization said absolutely nothing in the charter review <https://www.w3.org/2002/09/wbs/33280/webapps-2014/results>, despite having you and 10 other people as members of the working group <https://www.w3.org/2000/09/dbwg/participants?org=35507&order=group>, so approval was real if tacit. I believe that there was also informal discussion before it happened.  So perhaps you can understand that your cries of ‘help! help! I am being persecuted!’ may be taken as a little hyperbolic.  There were at least two good times to raise these concerns, and neither opportunity was taken.

That you are now, on a third occasion, getting a respectful hearing, when your emails, despite appealing for respect, rather remarkably lack exhibiting it, is, I think, evidence that people take the broader web community and its needs seriously.

I beg you to consider the possibility that by engaging in respectful dialog, listening to what others have to say, and understanding their concerns, we may be able to find a way ahead that is more acceptable to the broader community than simply adopting your initial preferred outcome.


David Singer
Manager, Software Standards, Apple Inc.

Received on Tuesday, 2 September 2014 21:50:07 UTC