Hello! I've joined the list in the spirit of furthering discussion and making improvements to Markdown.
The following case is one that comes out of tremendous angst that I've experienced as a digital native who grew up online in seeing the steady erosion of native support for the *bounding asterisk* convention as a result of widespread markdown adoption. I recently posted a thread to Github <https://github.com/adam-p/markdown-here/issues/621>to make my case and will repost it here (hope you don't mind): I propose the introduction of native markdown support for *bounding asterisks*, with the goal of restoring a convention of internet communication and culture. I believe that John Gruber's interpretation of bounding asterisks was well-intentioned, but largely incorrect. From a UPenn article: By "emphasis" Gruber explains that he means "informing the reader of a shift in style or voice," likening the use of bounding asterisks to "how foreign words are italicized in many publications and books." He figured it was an "Internet-ism," tracing its use to the need for a plain-text substitution for italicization or bolding. (Source <https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=4466>) "A plain-text substitution for italicization" is simply not why people use bounding asterisks online. In internet culture (particularly in subcultures of anime, gaming, and fandom), bounding asterisks are not used to *emphasize*; they're used to *emote*. The bounding convention, for those unfamiliar, places an asterisk-wrapped phrase, written in third person, adjacent to speech, written in first person. For instance: *Walks into the dark room, unable to see a thing* Now where could I have put my cheese? *flicks on the light switch* Ah, there it is! Right where I left it on the counter. *walks to the cheese and takes it, smiling with an accomplished, satisfied grin* Another use of bounding asterisks is to indicate an onomatopoeia (*nom nom nom*) as referenced in the following scholarly article <https://repository.library.northeastern.edu/downloads/neu:376918?datastream_id=content>. To quote: Expressions can also be recreated by naming the expression offset by asterisks, for example ‘*grins*’. This technique can also be used to denote onomatopoeias like ‘*gluckgluckgluck*’ recreating the sound of drinking quickly (Hentschel, 1998). There are instances in which, yes, bounding asterisks convey print-like emphasis, but in my own experience this is a much less frequent use case than emoting (though probably more frequent than exclaiming with an onomatopoeia). Nevertheless, because of the widespread adoption of markdown syntax, *it's now impossible to write native asterisk-bound phrases on a number of prominent communication platforms, including Discord, Slack, Reddit, and Skype*. I see this outcome as an unintended consequence of an original spec that misread the intention of one of the internet's truly native communication conventions (alongside emoticons and hashtag), a convention that ought to be respected and restored. I'm not alone in feeling passionate about this issue. There are threads to a similar effect here <https://www.reddit.com/r/help/comments/71hdvs/still_cant_figure_out_how_to_post_asterisks/>and here <https://www.reddit.com/r/discordapp/comments/4kkpus/can_you_please_stop_cutting_and/> and here <https://support.discord.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/360043381512-Please-allow-users-to-turn-off-auto-formatting>. In the words of one Discord user: Why should we have to use a backslash just to make a text application transmit the text we type? It's one thing to offer it as a workaround, but to use that to dismiss what others want is rude. To move the conversation forward, I propose an alternative markdown italicized syntax: *bounding double exclamation marks*. For example: Huzzah, we can !!finally!! use bounding asterisks again! *celebrates with much rejoicing*
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