I think that ASP / PHP way of embedding code in HTML using '<% %>' is butt ugly, even more so when you need to use if / else branching constructs:

<% if($some_condition) { %>
    <b>Some text</b>
<% } elsif($some_other_condition) { %>
    <b>Some other text</b>
<% } else { %>
    <b>Yet more text</b>
<% } %>
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Yuck! (Don't your eyes just glaze over when reading that?) Is that what branching looks like in your templating system?

The Mason way of embedding is simpler and more economical.
Contrast

<table border="0">
<%
  for ( @names ) {
    >> <tr>
    >>   <td color="#333333">$_</td>
    >> </tr>
  }
%>
</table>
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with

<table border="0">
% for ( @names ) {
    <tr>
      <td color="#333333"><% $_ %></td>
    </tr>
% }
</table>
<%doc> This is table.mas </%doc>
-----------------------------------
# now to assign this HTML to a variable:
my $html = $m->scomp('table.mas');
[download]

If you want to re-invent wheels, why not re-invent one that hasn't been re-invented yet (in Perl)? :-) Be well.