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   RE: [xml-dev] political blather (WAS Re: Advice: inline node edit ing, o

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>1.  Anyone with "20 years on the 'net" knows that anti-threads
>spawn anti-anti threads and so forth.  They will quickly create
>more traffic on an unmoderated list than the original.

No, not really.  I've found that riling a few of the worst offenders 
usually cuts down on the noise a great deal.  There is nothing 
special about xml-dev that detracts from this.  Nobody likes a 
bitchslap, least of all 'oldtimers'.

All you have to do is ask yourself "is this political diatribe 
*really* worth sending to a few thousand strangers who are only 
really interested in me and accessible to me as a group because of my 
interest in XML?"

If you can honestly say 'yes' to that question, then ... fine.  Allow 
me to break rank and wax philosophical for a few lines, then:

>See what Joe says about the philosophical issues of SGML
>and now XML.  It isn't just a 'freakin' technology because
>it sets as one of its principal requirements, freedom from
>the lifecycle of the host.  That is a political requirement
>and now a technical necessity.

Rubbish, this 'principle requirement' is a technical one and always 
has been, since the day that data became separable from code.  XML 
does not produce freedom from anything!

XML happens to be a good data-organization technique; it lends itself 
to rapid philosophical advances, technology-wise, in any realm in 
which it is applied, and new ways of thinking about old problems.

But it seems that making XML into a 'political' subject is the only 
thing left for some people to do with it, since as a technology - and 
any technology is only as good as you use it - XML solves so many of 
the problems which many 'consultants', 'engineers', and 
'professionals' were counting on to pay their bills.

That XML, and the XML culture in general, is being bashed into a 
territory rife with philosophical/political issues as demonstrated 
here on xml-dev belies the stagnation of the dataprocessing industry 
more than anything else.  Do we really need another re-interpretation 
of Schemas?  How many engineers does it take to come up with a 
namespace system which works for the good of all?

XML is a very broad, very workable technological solution to a lot of 
political/beauracratic problems in this industry, which I guess is 
why the politics/beauracracy surrounding XML itself is thicker than 
the biomass at the base of many a monkey-laden tree... if there were 
more wide-spread *USE* of XML, there'd be a lot less talk about its 
politics.

XML is good for this industry, but this industry has not been good for XML.

>One more thing:  nerves will fracture in the haiku/anti-ku
>season which starts next month.  Get your syllable counters ready!

Wicked.  I can't wait.

-- 

;

Jay Vaughan
r&d>>music:technology:synthesizers - www.access-music.de/
                 *




 

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