XML and ConciseXML

In case folks think I'm making this stuff up, I just got
an email from the InformIT newsletter that reaches about
1 million developers.

The featured article is called:
"Processing XML with Java: Reading XML"
"Reading an XML document is a complicated, error-prone operation.
Elliotte Rusty Harold discusses how to use an XML parser to read the
document for you."

Here's the URL:
http://www.informit.com/content/index.asp?product_id={30915BCB-25BD-40
89-A4BF-244D25BC7301}&011903

The first XML document shown is the following:

<methodResponse>
  <params>
    <param>
      <value><double>28657</double></value>
    </param>
  </params>
</methodResponse>

In ConciseXML, it becomes the following:
28657

Both forms are expressing the same thing, an
integer returned from a method call.

XML 1.0 took: 126 characters.
ConciseXML took: 5 characters.

Isn't there anyone out there who thinks it
is ridiculous to have a syntax that uses
126 characters to express an integer?