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How to design formats that succeed โ simplicity, community, timing
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| name | format-design |
| description | How to design formats that succeed โ simplicity, community, timing |
| license | MIT |
| tier | 1 |
| protocol | FORMAT-DESIGN |
| allowed-tools | ["read_file","write_file"] |
| origin | Anil Dash โ 'How Markdown Took Over the World' (2025) |
| lineage | ["Richard Gabriel โ 'Worse is Better' (1989)","Jon Postel โ Robustness Principle (1980)","John Gruber โ Markdown (2004)","Anil Dash โ 'How Markdown Took Over the World' (2025)"] |
| related | ["markdown","yaml-jazz","plain-text","postel"] |
| tags | ["moollm","philosophy","design","standards","worse-is-better"] |
"Smart people think of good things that are crazy enough that they just might work, and then they give them away, over and over, until they slowly take over the world." โ Anil Dash
Format Design is the art of creating data formats, protocols, and conventions that actually get adopted. It's not about technical superiority โ it's about fit, timing, and community.
Markdown beat Textile. JSON beat XML. RSS survived. Why?
From Anil Dash's "How Markdown Took Over the World" (January 2025):
"'Markdown' as a name is clever as hell. Get it โ it's not markup, it's markdown."
MOOLLM parallel: YAML Jazz, SOUL-CHAT, K-lines โ memorable names that reward understanding.
"Millions of people were encountering the idea that it was too difficult or inconvenient to write out full HTML by hand."
Not abstract improvement. A specific, felt problem.
Test: Can you describe the pain point in one sentence? Can users?
"The format is based on the ways people had been adding emphasis and formatting to their text for years or even decades."
People already used *asterisks* for emphasis in email. Markdown just formalized it.
Principle: Don't invent new behaviors. Codify existing ones.
"Both were spearheaded by a smart technologist who was also more than a little stubborn."
A champion who believed, advocated, and refined. Community built around a person.
Requirement: Someone must care deeply enough to keep pushing.
"Markdown was part of a community that could build on it right from the start."
Prior art (Textile), beta testers (Aaron Swartz), early adopters (bloggers).
Principle: No format succeeds alone. Build with others.
"Various communities that were implementing Markdown could add their own 'flavors' as they needed."
CommonMark for standardization. GitHub-Flavored for tables. Obsidian for wikilinks.
Principle: Core should be simple. Extensions should be possible.
"You can get people to change their behaviors when they're using a new tool."
Blogging was new in 2004. People were already learning new habits.
Timing matters: Launch during transitions (new platforms, new tools, new eras).
"Markdown is a raw material that has to be transformed into HTML, it perfectly fit this new workflow."
Build pipelines became standard. Markdown fit the compile-to-output model.
Principle: Align with emerging workflows, not legacy ones.
"It only takes one glimpse of a source Markdown file for anyone to understand how they might make a similar file of their own."
Inspectable. Learnable by example. No teaching required.
Test: Can someone learn your format by looking at one example?
"There are no legal restrictions around Markdown. Nobody's been afraid to use the format."
No patents. No licenses. No approval needed.
Principle: Generosity enables adoption. Give it away.
Richard Gabriel (1989):
"Simplicity is the most important consideration in a design."
| MIT/Stanford ("The Right Thing") | New Jersey ("Worse is Better") |
|---|---|
| Correctness is paramount | Simplicity is paramount |
| Consistency matters | Interface should be simple |
| Completeness required | 80% solution acceptable |
| May sacrifice simplicity | May sacrifice correctness |
The simpler thing:
Examples:
"If you're using ALL of C++ in your projects you're 'doing it wrong.' It is not a well-designed language." โ @calmbonsai, Hacker News
Complex formats that aren't fully used are worse than simple formats fully used.
"Be liberal in what you accept, and conservative in what you send."
Accept:
Output:
From HN:
"CommonMark Markdown is a rough superset of HTML, like how YAML is a superset of JSON."
Successful formats often nest:
Benefit: Easy migration path from simpler format.
| Factor | Score |
|---|---|
| Brand | โ Clever name |
| Problem | โ HTML too verbose |
| Existing behavior | โ Email conventions |
| Champion | โ John Gruber |
| Community | โ Bloggers |
| Timing | โ Blog era |
| Simple | โ 10 minute learning curve |
| Inspectable | โ Raw = readable |
| Free | โ No restrictions |
| Factor | Score |
|---|---|
| Brand | โ Obscure name |
| Problem | โ Same as Markdown |
| Existing behavior | โ ๏ธ Some |
| Champion | โ ๏ธ Dean Allen (less visible) |
| Community | โ ๏ธ Smaller |
| Timing | โ Same era |
| Simple | โ ๏ธ Slightly more complex |
| Inspectable | โ Yes |
| Free | โ Yes |
| XML | JSON | |
|---|---|---|
| Verbosity | High | Low |
| Types | Complex | Simple |
| Parsing | Hard | Easy |
| Learning | Weeks | Hours |
| Adoption | Declined | Dominant |
When creating new formats (skill cards, room files, etc.):
Red Flags:
Green Flags:
From Anil:
"The people who make the real Internet and the real innovations also don't look for ways to hurt the world around them, or the people around them."
Formats succeed when:
Generosity scales. Greed doesn't.
FORMAT-DESIGN
Invoke when: Designing new formats, evaluating existing ones, choosing between options.
"Nearly every bit of the high-tech world, from the most cutting-edge AI systems at the biggest companies, to the casual scraps of code cobbled together by college students, is annotated and described by the same, simple plain text format."
That format wasn't designed by a committee. It was created by one person to solve their own problem, tested by a teenager, and given away for free.
Design like that.
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