XML vs. HTML: A lesson learned very early on for me when I was a young Internet troll just beginning to learn HTML to customize my Neopets profile page. 

Michael Wesch’s video “The Machine is Us/ing Us” described the disconnect between content and format when it comes to HTML (which I used to make my 1999 Neopets background a picture of Sailor Moon) and XML (which any sane web designer who wants to share their content uses to make all of their stuff format-free). The creation of XML also allowed commonfolk, or a large sector of internet users who aren’t familiar with HTML, CSS, or the like, to create content without having to buy HTML For Dummies like eight-year-old me.

One of the coolest parts of Wesch’s video was how he described how XML allows websites to “mash” content together, like allowing Flickr to map people’s photos and further integrate user-generated material.

What I found interesting was the “teaching the machine” idea, and then Wesch’s transition: “The machine is using us… the machine is us.” As someone who has been part of the internet community for a long time, beginning with Neopets chat rooms and continuing on to YouTube friendships and internet-enabled communities, this really struck home for me. Wesch’s discussion of what we need to rethink is exactly right, and I think really ties into his video’s title. “We” own the internet… but can “we” control it? Or is it controlling us?