Jony Rosenne wrote:
*Except by Jony, who is always encouraging us to use markup to make distinctions.
I don't recall saying anything like this in this Phoenician discussion.
Acknowledged. My point was not about that discussion in particular, but about the generic question of to what degree plain-text is a requirement, regardless of what one wants to do within it. Your frequent refrain that distinctions of shape, for what you consider to be the same character (and note that I am not agreeing or disagreeing with any particular judgement), should be handled in 'mark-up' presupposes something other than plain-text in terms of displaying that distinction. You frequently remind us that there are distinctions that are useful to some people, desirable in some circumstances, but which do not constitute a *requirement* in plain-text. Fair enough. For this same reason, I don't automatically accept the argument, made by Michael earlier today, that 'There is a requirement for distinction for X in plain-text'.
On what basis do we decide that X is necessary in plain-text while Y should be done with mark-up or some other 'higher level protocol'?
John Hudson
