The W3C has announced the creation of a new Activity in the User Interface Domain, the Device Independence Activity that "is working to ensure seamless Web access with various kinds of devices".

The new activity appears to be the reorganization and merging of several separated ongoing activities:

The Device Independence Activity is newly created and merges the "Mobile Access Activity" and "TV and the Web Activity" to facilitate interchange in the interest of device independent Web access and authoring. This new Activity is not added to the Mobile nor the TV & the Web Activity, but rather, replaces them.

And its motivation is to attempt to keep all the new ways of accessing the Web compatible:

W3C has particular interests in device independent Web access and single authoring. The World Wide Web Consortium and its Members are well-positioned to lead developments to avoid incompatible solutions. The Consortium is working towards making the information of the World Wide Web accessible to various devices and achieving Web device independent authoring.

The Device Independence Activity is led by Kazuhiro Kitagawa and includes four groups:

• TV & the Web Interest Group chaired by Philipp Hoschka -- should expire in February 2001
• Mobile Access Interest Group chaired by Mark Baker
• Device Independence Working Group chaired by Hidetaka Ohto
• CC/PP Working Group chaired by Johan Hjelm