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Re: bold vs. strong, italics vs. emphasis

for

From: John E Brandt
Date: Dec 15, 2012 12:07PM

Bevi,

I too was confused about this topic and wrote a blog entry about the
confusion about 18 months ago (reference below). I know the topic was
discuss here in this list then and has been several times in the past as
well.

As you can tell from the comments here now, there is no "official answer" as
to the distinction. I recall that in WAI WCAG 1.0 they began several of the
guidelines with the phrase "until user agents..." indicating the hope
perhaps that someday the technology would catch up with the real world and
solve some the access problems.

As I noted in that old blog entry, "... I can even remember a time when
there was serious talk that these tags would eventually be used by screen
reader software (and all text to speech applications) in a way that would
actually "express" the emphasis in the aural output. But that technological
advancement has not happened (yet)."

Someday...

Here is my old blog entry if you need something to help you sleep...
http://jebswebs.net/blog/2011/06/html5-i-b-em-strong-whats-the-scoop/
Short URL: http://tinyurl.com/3p8xm22

~j

John E. Brandt
www.jebswebs.com
<EMAIL REMOVED>
207-622-7937
Augusta, Maine, USA