Antiquated HTML Snippets and Artefacts

A recent blog post titled **“HTML relics”** published on Vale.rocks has attracted attention on Hacker News, where it received 105 up‑votes and 29 comments. The article examines the persistence of legacy HTML tags that are no longer part of the modern web standard but remain in widespread use across many websites.

The post catalogs a range of deprecated elements—such as ``, `<center>`, ``, ``, ``, `<strike>`, `<tt>`, `<big>`, ``, `<marquee>`, and `<blink>`—and explains why they survive in contemporary code. It notes that browsers continue to support these tags for backward compatibility, which can lead to accessibility issues and hinder CSS‑based styling. The author provides concrete examples of how these tags appear in real‑world sites and offers guidance on replacing them with semantic HTML and CSS, emphasizing best practices for clean, maintainable markup.

The discussion generated by the post underscores a broader industry concern: the need for developers to audit legacy codebases and adopt current standards. By highlighting the continued use of obsolete tags, the article serves as a reminder that modern web development relies on semantic structure and styling through CSS rather than outdated presentation tags.