A combative article by frustrated interface designer David Heller has been making a splash of late. Heller argues that HTML is an impedement to the web's progress; it is time we abandoned this kludgy markup language and "moved on".
Really? Haven't we heard all this before? Heller, like others before him, is right to bemoan the "lowest common denominator" approach that consicentious designers are resigned to choosing, because of the inconsistencies between browsers and platforms.
But he fails to acknowledge the reasons why HTML, against all predictions, is still with us after 10 years (and remember: web years = dog years x 7):
a) HTML is irreversibly enmeshed into the fabric of the web. Like touch-typing on a QWERTY keyboard, making pages with hypertext markup language is a skill that few, of the millions who have achieved it, would be willing to relinquish. HTML has thus gained a memetic advantage in the evolution of the early internet.
b) HTML is easy-to-do. You don't need special software (I make most of my pages in Notepad). Heller, one quickly realizes, is from a programming background. Most people who create web pages aren't. Unfortunately, many software engineers mistakenly believe that the internet is *theirs*; the rest of us ordinary users are blundering cyber-serfs.
c) HTML works. Sure, it's clunky and a page designed for IE 5.0 on Windows 98 looks different on Netscape 7.0 on an iMac. But you can still see it. It doesn't crash. It's dependable. You get the information. You get the pictures. That covers most of what the average web user wants.
HTML is dead. Long live HTML.
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