[clue-talk] HTML Mail -- Was: The War On...?

[Timothy Klein]

On Dec 30, 2004, at 3:03 PM, Jed S. Baer wrote:
> Just look at it. I has stuff like <blockquote> and <pre> for the most
> part. I guess it parses the quote leaders and tries to figure out what
> constitutes a block. Hmm, now I'm having dastardly thoughts on how to 
> muck
> up that parser. <evil grin>
>
> OK, as much as I hate HTML formatted mail, no I won't really 
> deliberately
> try to mess with it. But I'd like to. Mwahahahahahhaa!

This makes me wonder.  I'm not a big fan of HTML either, because I used 
to use mutt, where it is very annoying.   I like the option of using a 
plain text reader, even though I don't anymore, and HTML gives that 
problems.  Sending text and HMTL is better than just HTML, but just 
wastes bandwidth.

But my question:  how much chance do you think we have of winning this 
one?  Sure, it is easy to enforce plain-text on a list like this one, 
with such and odd-ball collection of netiquet savy hackers.

But it is hard outside that audience.  I try and get my young, 
tech-savvy (but not really hackerish) cousins to quit sending me HTML 
mail, and they think I am a dinosaur.  They have actually told me that 
that "this ain't the 80s anymore" (I'm the same age as them, dammit!).  
My Mother doest' understand the issue at all, but she knows that her 
email client supports colors and fonts, so why the hell can't she use 
them?  My cousin includes a vcard, and two JPGS of his daughter on 
every email he sends from work (!).

Some days, I start to wonder if I should just give in.

Is this a losing battle, a la the 'correct' usage of the term "hacker?"

Tim
--
Timothy Klein: tecce at silverklein.net
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AIM: TangoCKilo; ICQ:289210734
Hello_World.c:  17 Errors, 31 Warnings