One thing that's funny about all these websites: they're not helpful in supporting typographical conventions, particularly the em dash. Was just reading Tom Coates' lovely thing on Medium and I see a lot of en dashes used as em dashes: medium.com. I don't know what Medium's back-end looks like, but why shouldn't the pretty new web support or encourage proper typography, via Markdown or some such? We cannot afford to lose the em dash!
I recognize that this is possibly an extremely niche concern. But technology changes language. See also: how Twitter's 140 characters has encouraged politicians to communicate in what are essentially Prince song titles.
I hear you on typography (thus, my insistence on smart quotes on Medium) and, especially, the em dash. It pains me when I see " -- " or " - " on Medium. Rick's right that most people just don't know how to do it. Should do what Microsoft Word does and automatically convert it for people when the use "--"?
Also, what else should we do along these lines?
Very few of us habitually type "—" which is probably for the best. (Because then you start doing it in Word! Which....)
It's a little dictatorial to convert "--" to "—" in general but probably will make the future, and the future-you, happiest. After all, look how pretty it is when people do use the em dash on Medium!
Another possible way to steer clear of some trouble is to have some prompting or easy symbol-tools for attractive blockquotes and (as you probably do) linking... but without introducing anything wacky or proprietary. ("Learning" an input system seems antithetical to Medium.) That's brought to mind because the "embedding" a link here in Branch feels slightly goofy, yet is the simplest solution.
We've been throwing around more idea's on the Engineering team in this same regard. Eg, converting three sequential periods into an ellipsis is ripe to implement. The double dash's would be great too.
Nevertheless, there is still other big fish to fry but these small details are still on our radar, (right Ev ;)
Thanks for your feedback! Team Branch
