Item: The W3C HTML Working Group charter is expiring.

Item: Discussion on what to do is inconclusive.

Item: Things are pretty quiet in the WhatWG.

Conclusion: The best thing to do about HTML is nothing.

As Sam Ruby points out, interest in work on “vocabulary” (by which they mean the actual angle-bracketed thingies that go into HTML) seems pretty lacking.

Me, I think HTML is done. Which doesn’t mean I think that the whole Web-programming platform is in a good state:

The browser-as-a-platform is based on a lousy programming language addressing a lousy object model and using a lousy stylesheet language for visuals. Each of those could and should be replaced by something better. HTML? Not perfect, but plenty good enough.

Not only is HTML finished; Even if we wanted to improve it, there are no obvious candidates to do the work. The W3C has repeatedly walked down blind HTML alleys. The WhatWG model was never remotely sustainable.

Let’s down tools and focus on more important problems.