[Gatac]

CSS is plenty flexible and powerful, yes, but I venture to say that 95% of the websites out there don't use it and don't have to. When I just want some text to be in bold, you can bet that I'm not going to write a CSS class to do that. I'm not denying that CSS is wonderful and confirms to the abstract trinity of HTML-Javascript-CSS as in Content-Design-Interactivity, but there's literally everything AND the kitchen sink in the specs, so if I call it elephantine, I do believe that I have a good reason to do so. The fact that I haven't done any coding in a few years and still remember most of the Netscape tags versus basically nothing with CSS proves squat, but I don't think I'm the only one who has that problem.

Compatibility problems weren't caused by CSS; that started with the use of non-standard tags, but it could've been headed off at the pass if they'd gotten off their ass in getting CSS done. By the time browsers could reasonably be expected to support CSS, the damage was already done. Never mind that it's theoretically far superior - it simply came too late. Add the smothering market percentage of Internet Explorer and its ludicrously slow upgrade cycle, and you know why the web is such a formatting mess today.

The problem with all solutions (including XHTML) is that it's easier to write broken HTML than it is to get everything right. It's no-win - as long as browsers can render non-compliant HTML, things won't change, and if they suddenly switch to strict enforcement of standards, then the web will be nothing more than the world's largest collection of error messages. Kinda like recycling - brilliant idea, but it took (and will still take) a lot of time before it's really widespread.

Gatac