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I think most of the hype of XML being magic is waning. There's a new myth being propagated, though. I've seen a spate of articles of late that characterize XML as a failure. XML is characterized as a "tower of Babel". The problem, according to these articles, is the lack of standardized vocabularies. Without those, XML is utterly useless. Once those standard vocabularies are established, though, systems will magically connect and talk to each other over the internet, ecommerce will hum along without human intervention like a well-oiled machine, interoperability issues will become a forgotten thing of the past. This seems to me pretty consistent with how the popular media tends to treat just about any new technology -- it's either a panacea or an utter failure; there's almost nothing in between. Complex subtleties are reduced to simple caricatures. Everything is cast in black and white. How many times have we heard a TV news story about an imminent cure for cancer/AIDS/whatever anytime a scientist makes an incremental advancement in understanding? I think the same phenomenon is at work, here. Some of it is natural fallout from trying to summarize a broad topic "in a nutshell". But much of it, I think, results from a combination of marketing hype and honest naiveté. In time, the myths fade, only to be replaced by new ones. Fortunately that does not stop those with more balanced perspectives from recognizing the real value -- and shortcomings -- of new tools and finding useful, innovative ways to solve problems with them.
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