Microsoft views the Internet as the most exciting growth opportunity for the computing industry and for our own business. We are committed to helping the industry grow as fast as possible; we appreciate the role that successful open standards can play in accelerating growth by letting every vendor participate.

Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) is the most basic and fundamental data format of the World Wide Web. Support for HTML standards ensures that content can be viewed by any browser as the creator intended. As with the ASCII character set, agreement on the most basic data format is critical to interoperability and the continued growth of the industry. Imagine the chaos of the computer industry without the ASCII standard for text. The need for interoperability goes beyond the browser. Authoring tools create HTML, databases emit HTML, screen readers for the visually-impaired need to "speak" HTML and so on across the entire Internet.

Previous proprietary HTML extensions from Microsoft and other vendors have confused the market, hampered interoperability and been ill-conceived with respect to the design principles underlying HTML (and its SGML parent).

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), headed by Tim Berners-Lee, is the driving body for enhancements to HTML. The efforts of the W3C include the HTML version 3.2 specification, CSS1 Stylesheets and the Platform for Internet Content Specification (PICS) as well as ongoing work to enhance stylesheets and define a layout specification. The W3C has been instrumental to the extraordinary growth of the Internet. Every major industry player participates in W3C and has publicly endorsed the W3C’s standards work. Among the expectations for W3C members:

• Bring new ideas which impact HTML to the group’s attention, as opposed to keeping them secret.
• Implement ideas that have achieved consensus in the group.
• Follow the architectural principles guiding the group, rather than release alternatives which ignore or contradict these principles.