Jan Hidders raved (I assume he meant "ranted"):
Jimmy Wales wrote:
For example, many many many people, not just programmers, understand how to make html <b>bold</b> and <i>italics</i>. Those are intuitive and harmless. The original Ward Cunningham wiki solution of ' and '' and ''' for different things, well, that was never very intuitive and newcomers didn't know about it.
Oh, come on! How long does it take for newcomers to grasp what '' and ''' means? I agree that in itself there is nothing wrong with <b> and <i> although I personally think they are slightly less easier to read then the WikiWiki notation and I think it is always better to simply have one notation for every mark-up.
The question isn't how easy "'''" is to learn. The question is how easy "<b>" is to learn. The answer to that is, it's pretty darned easy; therefore, since people will try it, it should be allowed. If having two ways to write the same thing is bad, then honestly "'''" should go before "<b>" does.
(Note the "if"; I think that "'''" is great -- easier to type. In fact, it should actually be rendered as <strong>, which is even harder to type but is almost always more correct.)
-- Toby Bartels toby+wikipedia-l@math.ucr.edu