Re: ISSUE-76: Need feedback on splitting Microdata into separate specification

On Thu, Dec 3, 2009 at 10:06 AM, Julian Reschke <julian.reschke@gmx.de> wrote:
> Actually, there *are* people who think that the W3C working on two competing
> specifications for the same thing is a problem, and those probably would
> prefer the WG not even continue work on it as a separate spec.

Well, or else they'd prefer the WG not continue work on RDFa.  :)

> You claimed yourself that microdata being in the spec causes it to get more
> review. I just want both specs (microdata and RDFa) to compete on equal
> grounds. Right now they do not, and the only reason for that is that the
> editor unilaterally decided to put "his" proposal in.
>
>...
>
> So this essentially translates to "microdata should be 'in' because it's
> better than RDFa".

Right.  The argument (or a large part of it) is that they shouldn't
compete on equal grounds because microdata is better and should win.
That seems like a tenable position.  Likewise, if you believe RDFa is
clearly better, you'd presumably think microdata should be dropped and
RDFa should be made part of the main spec.  The only reason I can see
for saying two specs should compete on equal grounds is if you're
unsure which is better and would like to let the general public
decide.  Not everyone here feels that way, clearly.

It seems pretty clear that a lot of the people who want microdata out
of the spec actually want it dropped entirely, and a lot of the people
who want to keep it in the spec actually want RDFa dropped entirely.
Maybe we should have Change Proposals (or whatever is appropriate) to
do those instead?

Received on Thursday, 3 December 2009 23:00:11 UTC