Why Web Standards?

Pam Keesey

If you’re viewing this site in Internet Explorer 4.5 or earlier, or in Netscape Navigator 4.7 or earlier, chances are you’ seen this message: “This site will look much better in a browser that supports web standards, but it is accessible to any browser or Internet device. To view this site, please continue to scroll down. ” Web standards govern the implementation of different web-based innovations, phasing out previous innovations (remember the <blink> tag?) and outdated standards from one version to the next.

When I started MonsterZine, I knew basic HTML. In other words, I knew enough to get myself into a whole heap of trouble. Since then, I’ve learned a great deal, including how often designers maintain multiple sites or use outdated code to make sure that people with older browsers are able to access their sites.

In an effort to learn as much as I can about web design and web publishing, I’ve decided to join forces with the Web Standards Project Browser Upgrade Campaign. The site is still accessible to people using older browsers, but will look much better in up-to-date versions of the same browsers you’ve been using for years.

However, if you are interested in downloading a newer browser, you’ve got a lot of options. Not all new browsers are “buggy.” Even the much criticized Netscape 6.0 has come out with a newer, more funtional version (6.1). Microsoft’s Internet Explorer is up to version 5.5. But there are a lot more to choose from.

Heard of Konquerer? Opera? Lynx? The Web Standards Project has links to many different browsers, all of which adhere to the current web standards (HTML 4.0, XHTML 1.0, and CSS1, for example). Some of these browsers actually take up less disk space than their older counterparts, and all of them are free downloads. And if you’re not interested in downloading the latest browsers, you’ll still be able to access MonsterZine on any previous browser.

Despite all the headlines about the fall of the “dot.com” empire, there is no doubt that computers are revolutionizing the world wide exchange of information. Internet publishing is still in its early stages, and standards are one step toward making the Web accessible to the greatest number of people. That is why MonsterZine.com is happy to be a part of the Web Standards Project and the Browser Upgrade Campaign.

Pam Keesey is well known for her writing on women in horror, including her books Daughters of Darkness, Dark Angels, Women Who Run with the Werewolves, and Vamps: An Illustrated History of the Femme Fatale. She is the editor and publisher of MonsterZine, an online horror movie magazine that, in the words of Dr. Frank C. Baxter of The Mole People (1956), explores the meaning and significance of horror movies in the 21st century. In addition to editing horror fiction and non-fiction about horror, Pam has also worked as a technical editor, a news editor, and as an editor of occult books in Spanish.