XHTML Syndication?
Anil Dash proposes to use XHTML itself for content syndication. He calls for a standardised way of posting entries to a weblog - "All that would be needed is standardization of names and classes for page elements like DIVs and headers. A post/entry title would always be an H3, with a class set to "title", for example. Permanent links would always be P tags with their classes set to "permalink". Simple". I do not think it would be so simple. By doing so, although we are reducing our work of maintaining a seperate file for syndication( RSS/RDF), we are locked in the names & styles that we use on a page. I personally feel RSS is better. His argument is weak because given the automation of creating syndicated content, it is easier and cleaner to maintain seperate files for content and syndication. As Timothy Appnel says - RSS is for machine processing while XHTML is designed for display. We should not forget that. I think we should concentrate on improving the RSS standard rather than thinking about new formats. All this and my RSS file is still not perfect.