LaTeX and TeX excel when the final form of a manuscript is to be printed or be delivered as a PDF. It's possible, but not easy, to convert LaTeX to HTML, doc, or other formats. It's even harder, bordering on impossible, to convert other formats to LaTeX with high fidelity.

I believe AsciiDoc is a happy medium between Markdown and LaTeX. AsciiDoc is as powerful as DocBook, and as easy to write as Markdown.