Upon reading this charming post on the IEBlog (a clueless attempt at self-deprecatory humor concerning IE8), I am urged to quote from this old chestnut (links & emphases added, with apologies to Zeldman):
Old software does not support standards. […] It would be swell if we could have backward compatibility and pure standards compliance. But we can’t. We have to choose. […]
For years, we’ve been taught to be good little web designers, building sites that work in browsers that don’t. Each site we build the old-fashioned way becomes one more dung heap of bad code, one more web destination that will eventually stop working as browsers and standards evolve.
The longer we do it, the more doomed sites proliferate. […]
Enough already. We finally have good browsers. Let’s use them.
I am sick unto death of dragging IE kicking and screaming into the 21st century. For personal projects, I no longer give a damn about how it looks/behaves in IE. Professionally, I will continue to utilize the concept of progressive enhancement (with a much sharper edge), longing for the day when we can all kick IE to the curb.
I will shortly be adding this snippet in a strategic location in my blog template:
<!--[if IE]>
<h1>
Page look weird?
<a href="http://getfirefox.com">Get a real browser.</a>
</h1>
<![endif]-->
I really don’t care whom I offend, thanks to the example set by the IE team.