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Nice try, but the problem with this is that typography is _really_ complex. For example, there is a rule in English typography (I'm not sure if it's often used
by mbork_pl 3y ago
Nice try, but the problem with this is that typography is _really_ complex. For example, there is a rule in English typography (I'm not sure if it's often used today though) that when you have a quotation spanning several paragraphs, you should put an _opening_ quote at the beginning of each paragraph – but only one _closing_ one at the end of the quote.
- yencabulator 3y agoWe've let go of other historical typographic and spelling conventions, it's time to let go of that one too.
- kristjansson 3y agoComputers exist to represent, transmit, and display _human_ communications. If a computer system cannot represent a human utterance we should extend the representational capacity of the computer system, not force the human to conform to the limitations of the technology.
- yencabulator 3y agoI'm also all for eliminating overly complicated typographical conventions from places where they are technologically possible.
- account42 3y agoComputers also generally don't support scribbles in the margins of your document. Or stylized glyph variants except a few that have been grandfathered in, e.g. ꙮ. Neither does the computer support whatever ligatures you might make up on the spot. One thing that makes computers more powerful than analog tools is that they are much much much more structured. So while we should not take computer limits for granted I think that the opposite extreme is just as if not even more absurd.
- mbork_pl 3y agoIt would be quite sad. Besides, it is not an arbitrary convention, it serves a purpose.
- account42 3y agoNo it doesn't. Unbalanced quotation marks are a crime against humanity.