Laura wrote:
>> Maciej are you open to a disclaimer of some sort that recognizes
>> minority descent?
Maciej replied:
>I don't think a disclaimer recognizing minority dissent is the
>appropriate way to deal with dissent.
I guess this is sorta at the core of why in the spring of 2007 I took so strong
a stand against the Design Principles. It seemed that anything that purports to
extend the charter of what the group is working on should not be done by simple
majority rule. A stronger criterion for consensus should be required if this is
to focus the activity of the entire group. I believe that the way to begin this
undertaking of designing a new HTML would have been to collaboratively and
consensually visualize the ends to which we are working and to let the
procedural guidelines follow, as corollaries from that.
My strong suspicion has been that WHATWG with its four score of working group
members (and guaranteed parliamentary dominance) had already visualized the
outcome and then used that visualization to derive a set of procedures that
would guarantee the outcome. It has been my belief for more than two years that
the word "principles" is too strong ("guidelines" would be better), that it
would be better use of time to collectively visualize what we seek to
accomplish, and that the aphorisms that help to inform us how best to proceed
(analogous to the editor's preferences on drawing from many sources) would
continue to borrow from many sources. There are hundreds of design principles
at play in this effort, outside those few that are in the DP document, many of
which have been overtly stated at several points in this corpus of discusssion.
Were it not for the fact that I have witnessed many (seemingly) reasonable
suggestions dismissed with no logic other than allusion to the mighty
principles and for the fact that the extant disclaimer that already accompanies
them has been ignored, I might concur with the assessment that they are useless
but "mostly harmless." Alas, I have seen more evidence of their misuse than of
their utility.
respectfully,
David
