</p> is only required in XHTML but not in HTML. Some times you have to close it anyway , e.g. when you align the paragraph left/right/center.
Would mixing the usage of </p> as in the following be a bad idea? Note that there is no ending </p> tag in the 1st and 3rd paragraph.
<h1>My article</h1>
<p>This is my 1st paragraph.
<p class="align=right">This is my 2nd paragraph</p>
<p>This is my 3rd paragraph.
Reasons why I don’t want to close the P-tags:
- Easy to work with in my CMS (more demanding code to make it XHTML)
- 1kb lighter files
Correct
Incorrect. The only time you need an explicit end tag is when you want to end the paragraph and immediately follow it by something that is allowed inside a paragraph (such as text or an inline element). This is usually a bad idea.
Only that consistency is a virtue which aids in code maintenance.