XML separates structure and content from presentation, enabling the same XML source document to be written once and displayed in many ways: by a web browser, on a monitor, within a cellular-phone display or translated into voice for a multi-media museum exhibit. In this way, an XML document can outlive the authoring and display technologies that were available at the time it was written.

Platform-independent XML will continue to have the most impact on the web. Outside of the internet, XML will continue to serve those who produce documents intended to appear across multiple media. Large-scale document publishers like the publishing industry will convert from SGML to XML. Companies and organizations will take advantage of XML's inherent extensibility to meet new challenges and applications.

XML also holds the promise of becoming a standardized mechanism for the exchange of data as well as documents. For example, XML may become a way for databases from different vendors to exchange information across the Internet.

It is still too soon to determine exactly where XML is heading. But the possibilities are fascinating, a big reason why there is so much excitement surrounding XML.