Leisure talk about Web standards and Div+CSS

The term "Web Standards" has been around for a long time, but what exactly are Web Standards? How do we implement them? Is DIV + CSS layout considered a Web Standard? What are the benefits of implementing Web Standards?

I wonder how everyone used to think about the questions above. At least I naively thought before that "DIV + CSS layout is compliant with Web Standards." Below is a conversation between Bruce Wolf and an old friend. After reading it, I hope everyone will have a deeper understanding and recognition of "Web Standards"!