An angry fix
Some of the best minds working in web standards have been quietly or loudly abandoning the W3C. Björn Hörmann is the latest. His reasons for leaving the W3C QA Group make compelling reading (hat tip: Terje Bless). I believe in W3C standards, particularly the ones you and I use every day, but I worry about the direction in which the W3C is headed.
Beholden to its corporate paymasters who alone can afford membership, the W3C seems increasingly detached from ordinary designers and developers. Truth be told, we and our practical concerns never drove the organization. But after ordinary designers and developers spent nearly a decade selling web standards to browser makers and developing best practices around accessibility and semantics, one hoped the W3C might realize that there was value in occasionally consulting its user base.
Alas, the organization appears unconcerned with our needs and uninterested in tapping our experience and insights. It remains a closed, a one-way system. Like old-fashioned pre-cable TV advertising. Not like the web.
To be fair, the W3C solicits community feedback before finalizing its recommendations. But asking people to comment on something that is nearly finished is not the same as finding out what they need and soliciting their collaboration from the start.
We require coherent specifications based on our and our users’ actual needs. Upcoming accessibility and markup specifications fail on both counts. We require validation tools that work and are kept up to date. Instead, tools are still broken years after problems are reported.
Two things could happen. Either the W3C will make a course correction, or the standards-based design community will look elsewhere.
Tags: web standards, w3c, wcag, xhtml, web design, microformats
Filed under: Accessibility, Design, Standards, Tools, development, industry
[...] Zeldman About Standards and what is going awfully wrong at the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) – a must read today. [...]
[...] And rightfully so, he alludes to the notion that the W3C may be pandering to its corporate masters and avoiding concrete discussion w/ those in the trenches of the developing community. It had to be said sooner than later. [...]
[...] It seems like problems concerning the W3C are arising, new standards are going nowhere and our great fathers of the W3C are sleeping. At least, this is the impression Björn Höhrmann gives us in his public statement concerning his departure from the W3C. Well-known and respected standards evangelist Jeffrey Zeldman seems to agree and adds his comments: Beholden to its corporate paymasters who alone can afford membership, the W3C seems increasingly detached from ordinary designers and developers. [...]
[...] Some of the folks long involved with the W3C have been wandering or stomping away as of late. The problem seems to be detachment from the “ordinary designers and developers”. I’m struggling to figure out what that means for the Mobile Web Initiative. Good or bad? [...]
[...] Jeffrey Zeldman brocarde l’incapacité du W3C à se mettre à l’écoute des besoins des développeurs et designers Web, et prédit que la communauté finira par se tourner vers autre chose faute de n’avoir pas été entendue. Je ne connais pas assez bien le fonctionnement du W3C pour prendre position à ce sujet, mais je vous recommande la lecture de la réponse de Karl Dubost qui est un modèle de diplomatie sans la langue de bois. [...]
[...] 17 July 2006 10 am eastern [...]
[...] An Angry Fix, by Jeff Zeldman brought to our attention the case of Björn Hörmann leaving W3C’s QA Development. (That’s Quality Assurance Development, for those unfamiliar with the term.) Hörmann, who has chosen to “discontinue my participation” writes: “I believe for our society to progress it’s essential that our culture, our knowledge, and our society itself are as accessible as possible to everyone; web standards are how we choose to achieve this on the World Wide Web, and for us to communicate, especially if we have special needs or novel ideas about information access, it depends on compliance to web standards. With this in mind I became interested in assuring standards compliance on the Web and involved in the development of tools meant to help in this respect at the World Wide Web Consortium seven years ago.” [...]
[...] If even Jeffrey Zeldman starts worrying, then there’s definitely something rotten in the kindgom of W3C. [...]
[...] There’s been discussion in the community about unrest at the W3C. This isn’t exactly news to most, particularly if you’ve been following the WCAG 2.0 saga. This time, however, the criticism comes from a strong voice, none other than Jeffrey Zeldman. Skip to comment form [...]
[...] The web is taking a strange turn of late. Important people of our internet future are voicing their anger at how the W3C is and with people that matter leaving we have to start finding yet a new body, a new leader to lead us into our promised land. [...]
[...] An angry fix [...]
[...] Negli ultimi mesi il W3C ha attirato critiche e sfiducia, e la tensione è alle stelle: Joe Clark manda al diavolo le WCAG 2, Maurizio Boscarol parla di balcanizzazione dell’accessibilità, e Jeffrey Zeldman fa il punto della situazione, e conclude: o il W3C si mette in riga, avvicinandosi alle esigenze degli sviluppatori, o la comunità dei sostenitori degli standard web comincerà a guardare altrove. [...]
[...] Traditionell ist ein Webstandards-Verfechter auch ein überzeugter W3C-Anhänger – zumindest grundsätzlich. In der letzten Zeit erleidet diese Eintracht und Symbiose Rückschläge. Björn Höhrmanns W3C-Kritik aus den eigenen Reihen bekam eine neue Qualität, als sich einer der bekanntesten Protagonisten der Webstandards-Bewegung mit ihm solidarisierte und seine Kritik mit Schärfe weiterführte: Jeffrey Zeldman konstatiert in seinem Blog-Beitrag An angry Fix eine tatsächliche Trennung zwischen dem W3C und der Webentwickler-Community: we and our practical concerns never drove the organization. [...]
This scares me. If the W3C loses resepectability and authority, are we headed back to the bad old days?
I think we’re looking at a course correction on the part of the W3C. They need to pay attention to what our community is doing and work more closely with us. A little bird tells me that they know this, and that positive changes may be in the offing.
[...] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-qa-dev/2006Jul/0011 http://www.zeldman.com/2006/07/17/an-angry-fix/ http://www.alistapart.com/articles/tohellwithwcag2/ http://www.dzr-web.com/people/darren/blog/2006/07/12/is-the-w3c-failing-us/ [...]
[...] Jeffrey Zeldman gibt ihm Recht. [...]
[...] An angry fix [...]
[...] According to that definition, the way I’m proposing noscript be used is perfectly legitimate. Despite that, the validator has a little problem with it. However, given recent dissention with the W3C process and validator, voiced by Zeldman and Hoehrmann, I think that perhaps we should err on the side of usability and accessibilty as opposed to some automated checklist. [...]
[...] Diskusjonen rundt W3Cs utvikling har i det siste svirret i de store bloggene på nettet. Sjefen sjøl støtter Björn Hõrnmanns grunner for å forlate orgranisasjonens arbeidsgrupper. Utviklingen i W3C er for treg, for komplisert og lite målrettet. Arbeidsdokument, arbeidsgrupper og utkast på formater ingen bruker, ingen ønsker å bruke og ingen kommer til å bruke dukker stadig opp. Standardene som alle ønsker og tror kan videreutvikle dagens www blir forglemt eller stagnert i nye smårettelser og lite praktiske dokumenter. Aktivisten og WASP-sjefen Molly Holzschlag forsøker å parere angrepet fra Zeldman, men får liten støtte fra andre sterke krefter. [...]
[...] Jeffrey Zeldman: An angry fix [...]
[...] – Tecnorantes y El verdadero negocio en la web 2.0 – Un argentino en Japón un excelente blog que descubrí y habla sobre la cultura japonesa, la vida de un inmigrante en una “cadena” de producción y algunas cosas más.. – RBA habla del “grupo étnico más diverso del planeta… y de porque “el nuevo terra no cuela aqui” dos posts realmente BUENOS sobre el ambiente de innovación y del mercado hispanoparlante.. notas polémicas pero realmente buenas – end of wires y otro país con mas de 1 móvil por persona – rubendomfer vuelve al ruedo – Fabio de paso habla de la creatividad.. – Proletarium y una muestra de como se puede aprovechar internet – alt1040 y un “psphone” ¿? – Andrés y una forma simple de probar anuncios de Adsense sin tener problemas – Pensamientos Despeinados vuelve al 95 gracias a Dattatec… igual con como me trató DH a mi.. que se yo – Wwwhat’s new? con dominio propio.. se me pasó :S – display: NONE y una lista de Manuales con licencia Creative Commons (lo posteó hace tiempo pero me pareció interesante como idea y como recurso) – gorkaff Patento las patentes… – SigT y algo más del plagio en la red – Ricardo Galli y una solución más para protegerse de spammers… lo que hace que mi HTACCESS sea ya gigante :S – tecniart y la resaca de las burbujas – Atalaya y un negocio “oficial” de parking de dominios :S – ALT1040 y los “Perdidos” de verdad – Rascacielos (de tintachina) sigue y sigue :) – OJObuscador hace Historia de los Buscadores y es muy completa – Error500 anuncia que Writely está abierto para nuevos usuarios – Isopixel pide datos de Programas P2P para Mac – terremoto, que ultimamente esta activo al 100%, y un nuevo libro para mi wish-list – Jeffrey Zeldman (en inglés) pero me sorprende que no haya eco de esta noticia.. luego de mucho pelear por los estándares ver como se “abren” los grandes es triste. [...]
Sometimes W3C is criticized for limiting the concept of Web service with a single stress on SOAP/WSDL based service, excluding the REST ones.
[...] W3C and their influence were questioned by Zeldman in An angry fix and followed up by Eric Meyer in Angry Indeed. [...]
[...] Wrong again. Here are links to the debate so far: Leaving W3C QA Dev. from Bjoern Hoehrmann on 2006-07-16 (public-qa-dev@w3.org from July 2006 Jeffrey Zeldman Presents : An angry fix Misplaced Anger: A Rebuttal to Zeldman’s Criticism of the W3C – The Web Standards Project Molly E. Holzschlag Eric’s Archived Thoughts: Angry Indeed [...]
[...] Tanto o texto do Zeldman quanto o email de despedida do Björn Hörmann (o membro em questão), mostram falhas terríveis do W3C em manter o desenvolvimento e o funcionamento de ferramentas importantíssimas como o validador de HTML, e em ouvir o que dizem e pedem os desenvolvedores (tanto os mais “distantes” como eu e você quanto os mais “próximos”, envolvidos no desenvolvimento de tecnologias em diversos grupos dentro do W3C). [...]
[...] Creo que este tipo de cosas son las que generan problemas como el de Zeldman y algunos devs abandonando la W3C [...]
[...] His assault on the W3C set a spark to the tinderbox, and suddenly we heard concerns confirming the bad state of the Consortium from respected celebs like Jeffrey Zeldmann, Molly Holzschlag, Eric Meyer, Björn Höhrmann, and Tim Berners-Lee, to name a few. [...]
Hi!
I’ve read the article and found it really nice and interesting.
W3C is a great organisation, I suppose. There are the plenty of sites, and they do everything right, controlling them, because people sometimes do not know what they do wrong. And it is their task to take care of it.
Great deal!
If W3C does not listen to leading figures like Zeldman, they better get their act staright!
[...] An angry fix [...]
[...] Many good people have expressed their concern about the state of the W3C, like Jeffrey Zeldmann, Molly Holzschlag, Eric Meyer, or Björn Höhrmann. Tim Berners-Lee responded a couple of month ago. Now he announced reforms in his blog. [...]
[...] Zeldman’s original post [...]
I dont think the W3C could possibly consult the users (or designers for that matter). Everyone would have a different opinion and/or needs and that would just make their lives more miserable. The problem in my opinion is that, the W3C was established very late. Why is it that everyone follows other standards, be it for TCP/IP, IRC etc but fails to imply with the standards imposed by the W3C? I guess its the freedom they have given (plus the time it took for it to get established ofcourse! :P). Whose going to stop them? With standards, W3C should build strict policies too. “Follow our policies or dont be a member of this organisation!”. That might sound dumb to most readers but lets face it, what else can they do?
Now, what is there for the more pedestrian users of CSS? While there were some misguided conclusions in Dvorak’s article, there were also elements of truth. CSS can be very frustrating when one is left to some sort of self-taught methodology. Standards bodies don’t provide the kinds of answers that work-a-day CSS users need in spite of protestations to the contrary. If experts can’t agree, what are those of us on the outside supposed to do? Books about CSS sometimes use valuable chapters explaining
In addition to the complaints you’ve registered here, I think the process for reviewing and grading websites is also seriously broken. Too often a page that utilizes tons of code will be downgraded for very minor infractions, and many times this means pages with tons of violations can essentially wind up with the same rating as a complex page with minor violations. In addition, there have been lots of questions raised lately about whether standards have a tendency to stifle creativity in some programmers, never allowing them to push the boundaries of what is acceptable in order to see what might be accomplished outside the rules. Generally, I think standards are a good idea, and I have use them and even promote them in the past, but I do think that there are some major issues that need to be addressed if the average programmer is going to continue to support them.
I think having multiple standards organizations in the same arena dilutes the authority of all of them. Many people setting up alternative standards organizations know this. That they are going ahead anyway may indicate recklessness, but more likely it indicates the severity of the W3C’s problems.
What’s happening to W3C? Although I’ve heard a lot of people leaving W3C, I still don’t understand what’s going on with W3C. Why are they not doing anything to get hold of these important people or clients? Are they up to something?
Truth be told, we and our practical concerns never drove the organization. But after ordinary designers and developers spent nearly a decade selling web standards to browser makers and developing best practices around accessibility and semantics, one hoped the W3C might realize that there was value in occasionally consulting its user base…
[...] have a tendency to “stifle creativity“, never allowing web developers to push the boundaries of what is acceptable in order to see [...]
Björn Hörmann has given an update on the issue which was mentionned..