Actually, that&#x27;s exactly what HTTP 2.0 is :)  They&#x27;re keeping the exact same message semantics, while changing the encoding to binary and also changing the network transfer part.<p>I&#x27;d be a little concerned about fixing it in place, but it&#x27;s perhaps possible that HTTP is done evolving, and this will be a win.  HTTP has gotten so much usage far beyond its original intent.<p>As an aside, I chafe against the implicit assumption in your message that binary is more space-efficient than text. :)  Compressed text and binary formats are the same size (e.g. JSON vs protocol buffers), and compression is almost free these days in terms of CPU.<p>And sometimes uncompressed text is SMALLER than binary, i.e. in the case of encoding numbers.  Many data sets have lots of zeros and small numbers, and it takes 1-3 bytes to encode a zero in text (&quot;0&quot;, &quot;0,&quot;, &quot;0.0&quot;) while it takes 4-8 bytes to encode in most binary formats.  A CSV file vs. a memory dump of the same numbers can show this.<p>Numbers encoded as ASCII is a built-in &quot;varint&quot; format, which shouldn&#x27;t be underestimated.