[html4all] Introductionsm or a Who's who of html4all

[Philip TAYLOR]

Philip TAYLOR (I capitalise my last name so as
to avoid confusion with the "other" Philip Taylor
who is also a member of the HTML 5 group).
Professional webmaster for many years, prior
to which I specialised in computer typesetting
(TeX).  A member of London University for about
35 years (Westfield College, Bedford College,
Royal Holloway and Bedford New College).  I care
deeply about standards and accessibility, and
am pleased that my College is at last starting
to pay real attention to these.  Very ambivalent
about the whole HTML 5 issue, which I see as more
of a rubber-stamping exercise for existing bad
practice than a real attempt to define how
HTML /should/ evolve.  Given a choice, I'd
throw the entire HTML WG baggage away and
start again, using HTML 4.01 Strict as the
starting point.  Do not believe that uses of
HTML other than for the creation of web pages
(e.g., the use of HTML for e-mail) should
influence the design of HTML.  Believe that
so-called "blogs" (what on earth was wrong
with "web logs" ?) are simply vanity publishing
brought into the 21st century, have never
created one, and have no intentions of ever
doing so.  Pedant, possibly a dinosaur, definitely
not a Luddite.  Think that Corel should be d at mned
to the fires of Hell for all eternity for
killing off HoTMeTaL PRO after buying out
SoftQuad.  Reluctant convert to Dreamweaver,
but still writes own JavaScript rather than
replying on DW's so-called "behaviours".
Lives in a Microsoft-based world (but will
always use TeX in preference to Microsoft Word),
believes that VMS was the finest operating system
(and Algol 68 the finest programming language) yet
invented. Looks at C programs with unconcealed
incredulity.  Wonders how Unix users stay sane
(that is, if they do).  Tends to get carried
away when sending e-mail ...