Master Foo's Taxation Theory of Microformats

"Complexity is like taxation.", Master Foo began. "Producers and consumers alike will always see a tax as unfair unless they can see benefits to themselves in paying it. XML - as classically articulated - suffers from the fact that the costs and benefits associated with its usage occur in different places in the value chain. As a publisher, I will definitely benefit from XML but as a consumer, I will only benefit from it if I have (a) technical expertise and (b) non-trivial integration requirements. If I just want to print or search or e-mail or copy/paste, the XML appears to be an unfair complexity tax to me."



"But Master Foo", a third expert began, "we all agree that the simple things should be simple and that the hard things should be possible. It is unfortunate that XML is perceived as complex. Perhaps this is just a passing phase while browsers/e-mail readers/word processors and so on become more XML aware? Perhaps the simple case of printing/searching/copy/pasting will be simple in a few years time?"



"I remember a visit from the SGML experts to this very mountain, about 20 years ago. They said the same thing. Then the XML experts came about 10 years ago. They said the same thing too. I detect a pattern..."



More beard stroking ensued as Master Foo struggled to deliver himself of this thought:



"History has shown that the only way to reduce information processing complexity to zero is for applications on the value chain to have build-it knowledge of the information formats they work with. XML, RDF, UML and so on are not formats so much as meta-formats. Consequently, built-in knowledge of any of these does not amount to zero complexity. XML is not a file format. It is a file format for file formats. This distinction is all important when calculating complexity.



"Today, XML is suffering from the fact that users realize how little the phrase 'XML aware' actually means. The complexity persists all the way along the value chain. They compare the ease of handling word processor files or HTML files with the handling of XML files and scratch their profit/loss spreadsheets in wonder. Why is it so complicated?"



Master Foo paused, his eyes twinkling in a way that indicated that he knew the answer but wanted one of the experts to say it first...



"Perhaps..", one of the experts began. "Perhaps we need some way to reduce the complexity tax by hiding the XML better than we have done heretofore..."



"Go on", said Master Foo with the faint hint of a smile crossing his lips.



"Perhaps we can use the fact that mainstream file formats are migrating rapidly to fixed XML-based notation i.e. XHTML, ODF, RSS/Atom and so on..."



"Yes, go on...", said Master Foo.

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