LaTeX is still massively used to typeset and print up academic papers.

I had to write a paper with it. I found it so horrible that I ended up not writing the paper (on a very interesting topic) and failed class. I just assumed the professor was nutty and kept onto some weird niche software.

Nope, the professor was requesting that you use the standard typesetting software. Some of your classmates might have to write many papers, and hence it's good that they start learning.

Apparently. It's a shame that researchers hae to use such software. Probably part of why research is so conservative and slow. Why not a funky html "paper"? With interactive formulae, clickable links (hey, wasn't PageRank based on references? Maybe time to turn that around) to references. Most important, a clickable link to an academic profile.

Please explain to me how to type the fraction (a^2+b^2-c^2)/(2ab), which is the simple $\frac{a^2+b^2-c^2}{2ab}$ in TeX, so that the numerator appears above the denominator in HTML. Or any non-TeX layout.

A div/span with vertical aligment containing 2 divs, of which one has border-bottom or border-top set.

Please give an example of this. What's the markup? It's almost certainly more long winded and harder to read.

Now make it machine-searchable.

You can put clickable links in LaTeX.

And if you're including mathematical formulae, which scientific academia will do, HTML is rubbish for formulae.

Can anyone explain the downvotes? Thanks.

I didn't downvote but, pretty much every academic in the CS/physics/stats/math I've met uses LaTeX. Even a bunch of linguists I know use LaTeX.

It's definitely not perfect--I really wish there were something better--but for writing technical academic papers, it seems like far and away the best.

Only someone not related to typesetting can say that LaTeX is dead. Exactly the opposite is true. Even though there are good alternatives these days such as InDesign and (I hate to say that:) MS Word (which now has a much better formula editor and OpenType Math fonts), great developments are taking place, for example LuaTeX. Not directly LaTeX but TeX: I have built a high quality database publishing system based on LuaTeX: http://speedata.github.com/publisher/

MS Word: Note that the formula editor is very carefully based on the algorithm in Tex, as MS have documented in a tech report.

Hilariously, they screwed up the implementation, which does not match the specification in their tech report: http://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/20487/why-does-ms-wor...

I think that page could benefit from some examples created by speedataPublisher; now I only see a list of features and requirements, not what I'm able to create with it.

I am working on it. Thanks for pointing it out once more!

You write unjustified aggressive phrases, which are clearly at odds with lots of people. That's why I consider you a troll and downvote you.

Go and find some download stats for some LaTeX distributions. LaTeX is still used in academia everyday, and I conject that it is used to generate docs in business too.

LaTeX is about as far from dead as the desktop computer.

LaTeX gets plenty of use in academic circles. Research papers, theses, etc.