IE8: not quite standard

Basically, the argument goes like this: Microsoft screwed up standards-compliance bigtime in IE6. Then, they screwed up backwards-compatibility bigtime in IE7. Now, they'll screw up fix this in IE8 by offering this non-standard standard thingy. Right?

it's a big world out there

Other browser makers don't seem to have any of these IE problems, and politely decline the invitation to join the party.

Basically, everybody except Microsoft has a simple model of the web:

• web developers make pages that conform to web standards
• browser developers make rendering engines that conform to web standards
• browsers therefore render pages in a predictible, standard-compliant way

That's what the Acid rendering tests are all about.

Microsoft begs to differ. The whole rationalization for their IE8 hack boils down to a vision of the web in which Redmond is the center of the universe:

• web developers cobble together some HTML until it works in the then current IE browser
• when Microsoft releases a new IE version, this exposes bugs in old web pages
• a new IE must offset these old page bugs by containing the old IE bugs
• oh, we can do standards compliance as an optional extra, let's hope we don't screw up again

lock-in is the name of the game

The new page tag is expressly designed to lock a page to a specific IE version. If you buy into this Microsoft vision, it would be best to freeze web innovation altogether. Keep visiting those old buggy websites with old buggy IE versions, and hope the browser and page bugs keep cancelling each other out, as they are designed to do.

Now, wouldn't that be sweet? Reality, however, is much tougher. IE8 favours bug-for-bug backwards compatibility over standards compliance. In the long run, that's a losing game.