The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is standardizing over 100 specifications for the open web, in at least 13 working groups. The CSS Working Group alone is in charge of 50 specifications. This does not include work on Unicode, HTTP and TLS.
New tag proposal. Not really.
The nice thing about standards is that there are so many to choose from
I was waiting to post this until the debate between W3C and WHATWG about the status of HTML5 scope was resolved. However, I have waited since February 2011. Consensus is that HTML5 is being inappropriately used as a catch-all for every standard supported by modern browsers. Modern browsers actually include much more: CSS3 styling, WOFF (web fonts), semantic web elements such as microformats, 3-D graphics including SVG, and performance enhancements. HTML5 tags are merely one part of semantic web support. As a result, terminology was modified by WHATWG. HTML is the new HTML5.
HTML5
What does that imply for the HTML5 logos and imagery introduced by W3C in January 2011? That is unclear. While still available, get your official HTML5-related logos. Here is the full-featured badge, on the right. Have a look at the official W3C HTML5 logo FAQ for an explanation.
Curious about the origins of the HTML5 logo, regardless of its future? I was. It was commissioned work by design studio Ocupop.
What now?
As best I can tell, HTML is now version-less. It is a living standard and maintained by WHATWG. A snapshot version of HTML5, updated on 14 November 2011, is approaching “last call” status. HTML5 documentation is a joint project of the W3C and WHATWG.
HTML remains in flux, as befitting a living standard. The most recent issue is <time>. HTML5 Dr. Bruce Lawson provides motivation and use cases for this element. Evolution of <time> is captured best by comments after the post. The rogue entry by a W3C impersonator was most exciting! It was masterfully dispatched by HTML5 Dr. Oli Studholme. Further discussion of the meaning of <time> was recently initiated by a WHATWG project leader.
Stray thoughts
Josh Duck’s delightful Periodic Table of the HTML5 Elements remains valid, after a name change to HTML. The <time> tag links to a pleasant web applications development company, Kaazing. The Kaazing pumpkin carving template for an HTML5 Halloween is available for download[PDF]. Although too late for 2011, the template will not be deprecated, and is portable through the year 2012 and beyond.
Earlier this month, Adobe Systems announced that it will no longer support Flash for mobile devices, with browsers to follow. This reinforces the importance of HTML as a web browser standard, due to its support of video. YouTube and Vimeo already offer HTML5 beta versions, which work nicely.
Ellie Asks Why 
[…] and many more including healthcare, publishing, pharmaceuticals, media, software and even metadata. Most have yet to be implemented. Yet many will eventually come into popular use: MathML 2.0 was comprehensively defined, tested and documented by 2003, but was quietly sidelined until the time was right. That time happens to be now, as it is one of the features supported by HTML5. […]
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