[whatwg] the cite element

[Brian Campbell]

On Aug 16, 2009, at 7:21 AM, Ian Hickson wrote:
> On Wed, 12 Aug 2009, Erik Vorhes wrote:
>> On Wed, Aug 12, 2009 at 6:21 PM, Ian Hickson<ian at hixie.ch> wrote:
>>> On Mon, 3 Aug 2009, Erik Vorhes wrote:
>>>> It is often the most semantically appropriate element for marking  
>>>> up
>>>> a name
>>>
>>> There is no need to mark up a name at all.
>>
>> I don't understand.
>
> What is the problem solved by marking up people's names?
>
> Why is this:
>
>   <p>I live with <name>Brett</name> and <name>Damian</name>.</p>
>
> ...better than this?:
>
>   <p>I live with Brett and Damian.</p>

Has anyone claimed that the <cite> element should be used in such a  
case? The only usage I've seen offered is that the <cite> element may  
be used to mark up a persons name when that person is the source of a  
quotation; as in, when you are citing that person (hence, the term  
"cite"). In this case, you frequently do want to distinguish them from  
the quotation. It is especially common in block level quotations, such  
as a testimonial, an epigraph, or the like.

>>>> I don't think it makes sense to ignore the existing behaviour of
>>>> authors.
>>>
>>> Existing behaviour of authors is not to mark up names with <cite>.
>>
>> Except for the authors that do mark up names with <cite>
>
> There are some, but they are not the majority.

Should only the majority usage ever be allowed? Or if there is another  
usage, that is somewhat less common, but is still logically  
consistent, usefully takes advantage of fallback styling in the  
absence of CSS, and meets the English language definition of the term,  
should that also be allowed?

-- Brian