Out of the way

I am in Maputo, Mozambique, in a W3C workshop about how the Mobile Web (in my mind the web in general) can help the developing world develop.

Interesting times...

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I spent a few days in Beijing recently. Interesting place...

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Two people who I have been really lucky to know and work with. in a remarkably nice place.

Once again achieving fame. Probably for the wrong reasons...

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Björn Höhrmann has been one of teh most prolific commenters on W3C's work, for several years, and has made some very valuable contributions. Not least of those is his work in the group I co-chair, both as an editor of a specification and in helping us ensure the high quality of others.

He recently decided to withdraw from the QA-dev group, and wrote a long message about what was wrong with W3C as an explanation.

In some of his message, he makes some valid points. He describes what I too consider a process failure in the development of a specification from the HTML working group as a source of dissatisfaction.

He describes some poor management of volunteers' efforts, and insensitivity to them, which I think is in fact a valid criticism, and some responses that seem like bad decisions. W3C seems to prefer to do its own graphics. Although there are some good graphic artists within the team, they generally seem to outsource the work and end up with some very dull graphics that don't seem well-designed for the uses to which they are often put. One of Björn's complaints is, at length, about this. It seems a fairly small thing (although I have shared this frustration too).

The rest of it is about financial management. Having worked on the team, and having a fair insight into how the finances work at W3C, I can only say that in this Björn is simply misinformed (at best). A quick glance at W3C's public documentation shows that most of its members (somewhere around 75% in general) are paying about €6000 or less per year. After MIT takes its cut of the money, the organisation spins out the rest pretty well in general

On the whole, while some of his criticism is accurate in its detail, it seems misdirected. It is true that W3C relies heavily on volunteers, and in my opinion their record in treating them with respect is sometimes patchy. But for the rest it relies on a team of people for whom I have a great deal of respect. A small number of people are doing a huge amount of work, and mostly doing it very well for a very small amount of money, working extemely hard, under a great deal of pressure.

For all that I appreciate Björn's undoubted intellect, his great personal contribution to W3C, his forthright approach, and the fact that his criticisms are not factually wrong (except in his quote of Jeffrey Zeldman;s wildly wrong claim about finances), I think the result in this case is unfair, using a few selected examples to imply an overall picture that is by and large a misrepresentation.

By and large. If I wanted to add to Björn's tales of woe, there are a couple more good examples of things handled very badly, which should surprise nobody. There are a lot of things handled very well every day, and over years. It's the balance that counts.

If he has more time to work on WebAPI stuff, then I benefit. But I'm inclined to think I would trade the extra time (and it is something I actually value very highly) for a rewriting of his complaints to include the thanks that are due to so many of the W3C team for the many great things they do.

J'etais en France il y a une semaine, pour la "W3C Technical Plenary Meeting". C'est une des semaines les plus dures que je prevois chaque année. Mais c'est aussi un evènement que j'attends chaque deux ans (quand il se passe en France) avec impatience.

Comme toujours, c'etait interessant. Je bossait pas mal d'heures - plus que quand je travaillais pour W3C même, avec plus investi, parce que maintenant j'ai des responsibilités en plus, et c'est plus important comme opportunité de discuter avec des gens importants a ce que je cherche a faire.

Comme toujours je suis sorti la plupart des soirs, si non toujours trop tard, ni me suis-je couché assez tôt, en générale. Mais bon, les matins je me suis reveillé pour recommencer.

Comme toujours j'ai vu des amis, y compris ceux qui je n'ai pas assez vu recemment. Mais cette année j'avais en plus la chance de rencontrer quelques amis qui je n'ai pas vu depuis plusiers années, et qui m'ont manqué dans ces temps.

Et j'ai nagé. Pas beaucoup - je suis maintenant en troisième (de trois) chez Opera cette année, sans avoir vraiment fait assez. En plus, il faisait froid dans l'eau. Mais bon, c'est mieux ça que le fin de la semaine, quand je suis tombé un peu malade.

Merci à W3C pour l'evènement, à Koalie et tous qui ont aidé pour l'organiser. J'attends la prochaine...

(et merci Libby pour la photo)