I worked with hand editing XML files in the past, and I didn't really have an issue with simple XML files. I actually prefer XML in some cases. I see your poin

I worked with hand editing XML files in the past, and I didn't really have an issue with simple XML files. I actually prefer XML in some cases. I see your point if you need to edit a complex XML with multiple namespaces mixed together, but a plain XML file can be just as readable as JSON. Some JSON files can be really hard to edit by hand too. At my current workplace I often have to deal with nested JSON files, where a JSON contains values that are also JSON, but encoded and escaped so that it is difficult to edit.