[uf-discuss] Microformats vs XML

[Karl Dubost]

Sorry if it's a bit off-topic.

Le 06-05-01 à 10:56, Tantek Çelik a écrit :
> On 4/30/06 6:20 PM, "Karl Dubost" <karl at w3.org> wrote:
>> And your page is easily indexable for Marketing profiler. -1 :)
>
> Huh?
> Karl, with all due respect, this line of reasoning makes no sense.
> It is widely acknowledged that the more semantic the markup the  
> better, for
> search engines, for accessibility, for styling, etc. etc.

*Remember* that I concluded the mail by ying-yang. Nothing is all  
good or all bad.



Search engines are having their business models on indexing content  
to make money (without respecting for example the "Non Commercial"  
clause of CC.) This is tangential discussion, but it's part of what  
brings more semantics.

So yes, more semantics is good for accessibility, for styling, for my  
own benefit when I can interact with an address notebook or a  
calendar, but I don't like it when it's used to send me more spam, to  
propose me products, to "tag" me as a consumer more than a person.   
Every techonolgy has its drawback.

> Are you saying that "Marketing profiler" is a reason that semantic  
> markup is
> a bad idea?

Not a bad idea but a dangerous consequence (IMHO). It's why I block  
on my personal Web site bots. In the process of trying to remove  
myself from search engines, not because I don't want to share, but  
because I have no options for an "Non Commercial" opt-in.

> If so, this is hardly unique to microformats, and would apply  
> equally to any
> attempt at semantic XML or RDF etc. and thus is moot in any  
> comparison of
> microformats vs. XML.

Completely agreed with you. I would say even worse with RDF, because  
giving more flexibility for crawling relationships. The greater the  
power, the greater the benefits AND the damage. Ying and Yang again.

>> And you page is easily indexable to create you own index of
>> information ala Mark Pilgrim. +1
>
> Indeed.  Controlling your own data is a big plus.

Well… That's the irony of the message of these days. But really  
people don't control their data these days. Look at all the proposed  
web services, and we clearly give up the control on our data.

Take the time to read this and the comments.
http://bopuc.levendis.com/weblog/archives/-2006/03/28/ 
its_not_about_you.php
I do appreciate or appreciated many of the services that were  
proposed these last two years (so called social web) but it has  
nothing to do with controlling your data.

>> And your page has class names in English when you are using another
>> language. -1
>
> It is interesting that you should bring this up, because this is an
> ADVANTAGE of using microformats over POX (Plain Old XML), because  
> of the
> reason I pointed out in my previous email on this subject:
> the microformat use of the class attribute permits *multiple* class  
> names,
> whereas XML elements may have only *one* name.

No conflict here.
Agreed. I don't praise for XML.

> Thus with microformats, you may use both the standard microformat  
> class
> names, AND class names in your own non-English language if you wish:
>
> <span class="family-name soyad">Çelik</span>
> ("soyad" is Turkish for family-name)

you said it in a previous message. Redundancy is bad.
But yes it's one possibility or something like class="family-name 名 
前" (namae en japonais).

> Whereas with POX markup standards, you are relegated to only using the
> element names from the spec.
> <family-name>Çelik</family-name>

Agreed, I'm not advocating for XML either.

> If you care about using non-English languages for semantic markup,  
> this is a
> +1 for microformats, since they permit you to continue to do so,  
> and -1 for
> XML based standards, which typically use English-only element names.

not completely, I just want to use the class name in my own language,  
which I decided to do a while ago. A bit ala SKOS, where you can have  
labels in your own language but the matching is made at another  
level, which I found neat, because it ease the process for the user.

Thanks Tantek.

-- 
Karl Dubost - http://www.w3.org/People/karl/
W3C Conformance Manager, QA Activity Lead
   QA Weblog - http://www.w3.org/QA/
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