Re: PC Magazine, John Dvorak - depressing reading

[Alex Milowski:]

| Hmmm, I hope this isn't a common misconception.  I am over-joyed
| (really, I am) that Microsoft has embraced XML, but the idea comes
| from the people on the ERB and this XML development list.  Microsoft
| knows this.  We know this.  How about the rest of the world?

I think that the general view is fairly summed up in a cartoon that
appeared on the front page of Le Monde Informatique (a teaser for the
article that Todd Freter translated for us a couple of days ago).  It
caricatures Netscape as the Roadrunner and Microsoft as Wiley Coyote.
The Netscape Roadrunner is comically suspended in air between two
signs labeled "HTML" and "XML" that point in opposite directions,
trying to look in both directions at the same time and emitting a
pathetic "Bip Bip" (which is, I guess, what roadrunners say in
French).  The Microsoft Coyote is standing next to the XML sign
holding under his arm signs that he has removed labeled "WWW" and
"STANDARDS" and saying, eyes closed in smug satisfaction, "Ça va
être plus dur de courir vite dans les deux directions..."

This perception is unfortunate for all of us (including Microsoft,
actually) but hardly unexpected; I've been predicting it in internal
reports for several months now.  I don't think that it gets better
until real XML support starts coming from several other directions and
it becomes obvious even to people at Dvorak's level that this is not
just a Microsoft initiative.  I think that individual implementations
like Peter Murray-Rust's magnificent effort can play a large role in
bringing about this change in perception.

Jon

Received on Friday, 2 May 1997 18:20:24 UTC