The idea is that the browser would be able to apply the right encoding to the document it retrieves if no encoding is specified for the document in any other way. The use of this attribute on an aorlinkelement is currently deprecated by the HTML5 specification,so you should avoid using it on those elements.In addition,there are some things to consider before using this attribute. Firstly,it is not well supported by major browsers.Secondly,it is hard to ensure that the information is correct at any given time. The author of the document pointed to may well change the encoding of the document without you knowing. If the author still hasn’t specified the encoding of their document,you will now be asking the browser to apply an incorrect encoding. And thirdly,it shouldn’t be necessary anyway if people follow the guidelines… and mark up their documents properly.