Just a general comment. We would still face the problems they mention since it would just be a way of coding. 1 - It is true that big and little endian is a problem. The idea of using something else than binary for images is just unacceptable. To use the same words it is very untechnical to suggest this.
Data have to be contained in one single file.
Users are not computer people. The organization that most scientists use to store their files is just a mess. They seldom use the full advantage of a hierarchical organization of directories. Thus how can we imagine that they will correctly manipulate a paar of files. This is just the view of theoreticians, not of people creating images.