Are There Actually ANY XHTML Compliant Blogs?

Something in one of your posts will always end up “breaking” the XHTML.

Why? The only reason it would do that is if you don’t have complete control over the markup. If you’re referring to your comments, then that may be true. However, if you enable comment moderation, you can have complete control over comment markup as well.
– Lars

So, you go in and edit all non-compliant comments???
What’s the reward? I’m just trying to determine what the benefit is for going to such lengths to achieve xhtml compliance…

Yep, that’s what I do, but I don’t get that many comments.
The reward? Not that much if you don’t take advantage of the extensibility possibilities (AFAIK Jaques Distler is one of the few that does so on a weblog).
I’d say the main advantages of XHML are future proof markup, slightly faster rendering (arguably), and geek pride.
– Lars

I worry about the things I can control in the markup, i.e.: site structural markup and the content I provide. If you control what tags can be placed in the comments you also have a lot of control over whether or not they are standards compliant.
The goal of XHTML standards compliance is just that – being compliant with the standards. As Lars mentions, there are some rewards.
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Here is my two cents. This is a paradigm. If folks do not know, or maybe are unaware of the benefits of valid markup then in an obscure way, then to that person there are no benefits. It only really makes sense if the person has another goal, into which valid mark up fits in. Valid markup because its valid is pointless.
Building accessible web sites is something many folks are interested in. The geek pride is right. But that pride is increasingly shared by a lot of folks. And for those of us who really care how our sites work as well as how seem to look then valid mark up, css, and stuff really matter. We may not achieve it. Or even enough of it. But we all have very valuable guidelines. No one will quibble if one post invalidates a site. But there is no reason why it should. Text is always valid and the parser now runs pretty well. But for some folks any type of invalidation is the beginning of a slippery slope. We just dont like it. And no we are not Nazis.

There are enough examples out there, especially among the xhtml/css webdesigners:
https://www.simplebits.com/
https://www.sidesh0w.com/
https://www.9rules.com/whitespace/
https://www.stopdesign.com/
https://annevankesteren.nl/
https://www.stijlstek.nl/

My website is XHTML and CSS compliant.

@ mark :
This page is not Valid XHTML 1.0 Transitional! (just after validating main page)

Mine is Valid XHTML 1.0 Transitional (although the MySql servers not working at the moment – so you won’t be able to check) – for me it means a couple of things…
1. Easy of coding – your not flinging about alot of useless tags
2. Updating – to change my site design to the current one required the addition of ONE extra div to move from two column to three column and coding with CSS is quicker (IMHO)
3. Semantic coding (although not quite the same as having validating code) means that I rank higher in search engines – it also improves accessibility (for the most part – those idiots using Images OFF CSS ON may have a few problems)
4. So long as you restrict what tags can be used in your comments and you yourself don’t start going and putting in invalid tags etc then you’ll be fine – so far I haven’t found a comment breaking my site
5. At the moment browsers are still quite quirky eg IE’s CSS rendering problems and also PDA’s that parse the screen CSS rather than mobile CSS but in the future as more browsers become compliant there will be more importance on having valid code (HTML4 or XHTML)

Yes

I’m not anal about fixing comments, though I do try to keep my posts valid. I check once a week or so and fix any mistakes. It’s like keeping my office clean. It’s not a requirement, but it makes life easier in the long run if everything is kept in the right place.

Mine is – I like it that way.

MaxT,
are you sure? Prior to posting that comment I validated it. It isn’t valid at the moment because I’m using a style tag inside the body, though I can fix that.

Slumberland is currently valid XHTML Transitional, though I just had to fix some bad characters that were included in a blockquote I had pasted in.
Older posts on the blog are probably not entirely valid (the posts go back more than 4 years and have been imported in from two other blog programs), but I do try to keep the site valid now. The main page is generally valid unless I make a typo or (as mentioned above) paste in something invalid without realizing it.

back in the day valid markup wasnt all that important ..because what worked in one browser didnt in the other (the browser war era) … and so it was futile to try and validate … you either alienated one set of browser users or spent endless hours providing workarounds to the valid code ..negating the whole point.
but now browsers from all creators are becoming more and more compliant. so it IS important and just plain smart, to try and have valid code. You can then rest assured that your site will look pretty much the same across all platforms and it shows you care about your ENTIRE site …not just how long your link list is.
i dont have 30+ posts and a long list of comments … but i validate now, and i plan to when i DO actually have that many. I don’t add a single piece of code without validating it immediately afterward and working through any bugs … simply because its too much of a hassle to do it 6 months later. … sorta like checking/changing your oil BEFORE the light comes on ; )