RE: Double standards in restrictions on downloadable fonts

http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2007/12/19/internet-explorer-8-and-acid2-a-milestone.aspx




Ø  I don't understand why Microsoft participates in this process at all

Microsoft wants to make sure that organizations who have millions of pages are not broken when the next new idea is put into the standard. We also want to be involved with helping make the standard work for all parties. Because you are not involved in the CSS working group you may not see how Microsoft has worked extensively with other members to improve the standard over the past year.

Having interoperability between browsers *and* not breaking old customers is a challenging task. Having a huge set of customers who depend on IE changes not breaking their web sites adds extra responsibility for Microsoft to keep people working.

Lest you think that Microsoft does not do innovations, what browser, other than IE, supports many of the CSS3 text related functions, like multi-lingual justification and vertical text? These are not the cool things that the other browsers are doing, but they have allowed millions of people around the world to browse the web in their own language.

Sometimes it’s just a matter of perspective and prioritization on what is important. It really is okay for different groups to have different priorities. We all want the same end result...a web ecosystem that allows people to view content and interact regardless of the tools one uses.

Best regards,

Paul Nelson