“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic” – Arthur C Clarke.

This blog has always argued that content creators need to broaden their skills. They should know a little bit about design and a little bit about the code underlying what they create.

Employers agree. A quick survey of current web editor job advertisements shows that they are demanding:

• “Sound understanding of HTML and HTML editing, including basic CSS”
• “Basic knowledge of HTML coding”
• “competence in HTML and other web mark-up languages, Photoshop and CSS”

But with the adoption of increasingly complex methods for presenting content, that idea needs qualification.

It’s now clear that the latest generation of languages like CSS3 and HTML5 are putting coding skills beyond the reach of many web editors. Presentation is now looking a little like magic. Add javascript frameworks, the need for responsive web design, the fragmentation of browser standards and a host of other changes, and you have to ask whether it’s worth an editor spending the time to learn what the job descriptions above are asking for.

If you’re a web editor whose primary skill is researching, writing, summarising, proofing or whatever, developing a “basic knowledge of HTML coding” will eat into the time you should spend on perfecting your writing, proofing, etc, and in any case looks increasingly pointless when the technology is marching ahead so fast.

Of course, you can’t buck the market. This isn’t advice for web editors to ignore what employers say they want, but for them (and employers) simply to question their priorities.