ASP.NET Web API vs. ASP.NET MVC "APIs" � Encosia:

If you want to bring Web API’s behavior more in line with the output of MVC’s Json() helper, you can remove XML support from your API entirely. Just add this to the Application_Start event and you’ll never see XML again...

Good riddance.  Never have I seen since a bloated, kitchen-sink approach become so unquestionably adopted.  Sure, XML does everything you'd ever need, but the times you need more than JSON (what, I've already mentioned, is little more than a home-rolled string format) really are pretty rare. 

I know I've mentioned it before, but years ago I remember getting a doc from our resident XML expert promoting its benefits, and search and replaced every occurrence of "XML" with "ASCII" before sending it back to him.  The accuracy of the doc really hadn't changed at all, somewhat surprisingly.  He took it as the good natured jabbing I intended (XML couldn't be stopped at that point), but I think, for at least that once ;^D, I was ahead of the game.

It's all zeroes and ones.  XML doesn't necessarily make something human and machine readable at the same time.  It can, but one look at OOXML tells you that this human readability isn't a requirement.

Maybe the lesson is that we underestimated our ability to read like a machine.  They are modeled after us (how can they not be?  We made them up) to some degree, after all.

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