My position (and what I see others taking) is not a problem with formalizing Markdown, which many see as a good thing, but the name.
If they made this an called it StackMark it would be fine.
But this feels more like a power play. Like when Microsoft came and made Visual J++ in an attempt to take control of Java from Sun. It seems oddly and unnecessarily mean spirited and hostile. The name seems designed to either engender confusion or as a slight against the original.
I'd accept that. Seems unwieldily (so it wouldn't be my choice), but I don't think it's outright hostile to the original.
We've got Disqus, Stack Overflow, GitHub, and others. John has referred in the past that he doesn't mind how GitHub has GitHub flavored mark down. This new one could be called Atwood flavored (to pick a name I know is involved). Or they could have stuck with GitHub Flavored markdown and just expand the GitHub flavor.
If they made this an called it StackMark it would be fine.
But this feels more like a power play. Like when Microsoft came and made Visual J++ in an attempt to take control of Java from Sun. It seems oddly and unnecessarily mean spirited and hostile. The name seems designed to either engender confusion or as a slight against the original.