[KTBleeding]

Jedi, I both see and understand where you are coming from with that, but I don't personally think that it should be the case. I also have to disagree with this:

Originally Posted by Digital Jedi

You actually will still have to touch the templates most of the time you would have for a table based one.

If whoever they hire for this job is skilled enough, can come up with very clean and semantic markup, and knows what they're doing with CSS, then there is no doubt in my mind that I could create an entirely different looking layout without ever having to touch the markup once.

I'm not saying that will be the case every single time, but most template changes will simply be to put in additional features that are desired and not there by default.

I see what you're saying about most people not being ready for a big change like that.. but I would never let that hold me back as a business owner. If people want the old style, then they can use an older version of vBulletin. I don't feel that a web development company should hold itself back from advancing because some people may not want to learn how to use CSS correctly.

At least, AT LEAST offer two variations.. maybe keep the tables alive for people who will flip out, and also offer a clean, semantic, and tableless design for people who are ready to move forward as the internet does.

I think the one and only downside of it would be third party addons / plugins. Let's face it, the majority of programmers are not the best html developers in the world.. and vice verca. There would probably need to be two developers per addon most of the time. One for markup, the other for programming. That will never stick in this community.