I agree that black should be #000 for the sake of semantics. Though it's pretty popular opinion to never use black in design: http://ianstormtaylor.com/design-tip-never-use-black/

" Argument: Don't use black because nothing in nature is actually black.

False Conclusion: Don't use black on a web page because nothing in nature is actually black.

False Assumption: The black on a web page is actually pure black.

True Conclusion: Use black if you want to - it won't be pure black, it will simply be the darkest you can get.

PS. This is also true for paint: Black paint is also not pure black. " -ars https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6581935

Kinda unrelated story: I ran into trouble using "true black" (A combo of CMYK) on a van wrap. In all the testing I did, it looked fine, but outdoors, it looked green. But photos of the wrap looked fine. (the camera has a uv filter?) Figured out that the cyan ink fluorescenced in daylight with that combo of ink and material at least. And converted it to just black ink for the next ones.

Monitor and ink manufacturers make a real effort to get as near to pure "does not exist in nature" black as possible. Nature does not.

And, of course, almost pure black does exist in nature (look in a deep hole some day). It's only rare.

Is this why you see a lot of web pages that are some mid-shade grey background with another mid-shade grey text, resulting in extremely low contrast and increased difficulty in reading?

haha probably. It seems this as if this concept can only take you so far :P

At least they didn't redefine white.

Pretty easy to change if you want :) I just rarely use straight black.