Douglas Crockford on the near disaster that was ES4. If you’re looking for choice quotes about standard bodies, this article is full of them. Like this:
Simplicity should be highly valued in a standard. Simplicity cannot be added. Instead, complexity must be removed. …
It turns out that standard bodies are not good places to innovate. … Standards bodies should not be in the business of design.
But there’s also a take about another standard work that needs to shape up:
I see similar stories in HTML5. The early work of WHATWG in documenting the undocumented behavior of HTML was brilliant. It went off the rails when people started to just make new stuff up. There is way too much controversy in HTML5. I would like to see a complete reset with a stronger set of design rules. Things can be much worse than the way things currently are. Having smart people with good intentions is necessary but not sufficient for making good standards.
I have the same lingering concern that HTML5 is doing too much too fast. It’s all good ideas that are worth doing, but time-to-market does not a good standard make. On the contrary. So take the time, move some features out, reschedule them for HTML 6. There will be an opportunity to add stuff later, there will not be an opportunity to reset a poorly conceived spec.