I noticed tonight that the number of hits returned by Google to a search of "Silverlight" now slightly exceeds the number for "SVG" (16.3 million to 16.0 million in my search from the Eastern US using IE for Windows)[1].
So I followed up with a bit of reading on Silverlight in Wikipedia[2]. In Wikipedia's collective evolution toward making arguments "balanced," I noticed a) that the first reference to SVG in that article appears, to my thinking, just a little bit late for something which is, in fact, so directly derived from an open standard [3] and b) that when SVG is finally mentioned (rather near the end of the article), one person is cited as denouncing Microsoft's "ignoring of open standards" Another person is cited with a rather interesting contrasting argument I had never heard before. To paraphrase comments attributed to David Betz a .Net specialist, "Microsoft would have altered the SVG specification to integrate it with .NET, rather than the reverse. Consequently, he thinks the 'choice by Microsoft to use XAML over SVG, served to retain the SVG standard by not adding proprietary technology [to SVG]'. " Hmmm... I thought; perhaps Microsoft has been supporting standards after all. They have chosen not to adopt them and thence spared us from inevitably ruining them. What a curious perspective. I am still trying to reason it all out. The entire neural activity these strange thoughts engendered was just enough to make me want to read a little further. Mr. Betz's 2007 "article" [4][5] begins with a most interesting claim: "Recently there have been comments floating around the internet and around conferences that Microsoft's Silverlight needlessly uses XAML as its mark up language where it should have used SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics). The argument here is based on the idea that since SVG is a vector technology accepted in all web browsers except IE, Microsoft should have used it instead of XAML and then simply added support for SVG to IE. While this seams to some to be a valid criticism and a good point to some of the web standards world, it is absolutely groundless and carries no weight." Aha! There you have it web standards world! While your criticism may appear valid, "it is absolutely groundless and carries no weight." "it is absolutely groundless and carries no weight." "it is absolutely groundless and carries no weight." Such amazing language! Such certainty! Such absolute candor and fearlessness! A more careful scholar might tend to qualify one's writing with the occasional "maybe", "might", "perhaps" or even "possibly." And it this person who has written the final word on Silverlight v standards in a Wikipedia article that has been nominated as "good"?[6] Oh my! poor Wikipedia! We had such hopes for the public encyclopedia. It will now have to abandon its good work with SVG and use Silverlight and go bankrupt and then only good things can be said about Silverlight. But how else could any argument against such certainty ever be expected to end? Certainty MUST always have the last word in an argument with uncertainty. (or must it? I confess I don't really know). We may clearly deduce from this final sentence, without the slightest bit of extrapolation, I think, that some in the web standards world must also, therefore, carry no weight. Clearly, if such people espouse such groundless notions they must be weightless! It is a rare idea that is labeled "heavy" in these days of lackadaisical profundity and six-pack wisdom, so is it not to be expected that a certain amount of weightlessness might infect our conversations, allowing us to float a bit from the well-grounded, established truths of positivism and certainty?[7] I was wondering if any of us fluent in Wikification might be tempted to write a brief rebuttal of this apparent absurdity, simply to help the public encyclopedia regain a bit of credibility on the topic. If nothing else, I suppose, someone should add a little note to the Wikipedia article that mentions that someone in the web standards world who does seem to carry some weight [8], has in fact made public statements contrary to Mr. Betz's conclusion. It was just all so bizarre, I had to share. DD [1] I noticed in Germany that Google numbers are different than in the US and noticed also that numbers differ depending what browser you use. [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silverlight [3] I wondered if an open standards organization might, in the future, become tempted to enforce a copyright on its standard that prevents so blatant a derivative artwork, in violation of the Berne treaty on copyright. I wonder.... That would be more fun than either Apple v Microsoft over look and feel or Netscape v Microsoft over unfair competition. The fear of damages might just... ahh... speculation is such a joy! I know the moderators here sometimes fuss when talk become litigious, so please be assured, dear moderators, that this is purely the most delicious of speculation, nothing more. [4] http://www.netfxharmonics.com/2007/06/Silverlights-Adoption-as-Public-De-Facto-Standard.aspx [5] When opinions such as this become citations in our public encyclopedia, it may give cause to question the very fabric of the public encyclopedia. [6] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silverlight#Relationship_to_existing_Web_standards [7] It is interesting that in HTML5's inclusion of almost everything webbish in its purview, "reasoning with uncertainty" and "emotion" are not included, http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-svg-ig/2008JulSep/0035.html perhaps because of a rarity of uncertainty. 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