-----Original Message----- From: Nick Coghlan [mailto:ncoghlan@gmail.com] As I understand it, it's more a matter of folks finding the context switch between Markdown and non-Sphinx reStructuredText a pain (with the main differences being double-backticks for inline code and `link text <link target>`_ instead of [link text](link target) for hyperlinks) and not being aware of (or caring about) the dire lack of commercial investment in tooling support for upstream Python software distribution (since all the redistributors have their own software distribution platforms that they recommend their users use instead).
As someone who writes quite a bit of non-sphinx Restructured Text, and a lot of Markdown (because I have to), I have zero sympathy for the argument of context switching. I can come up with an overblown analogy, but I will just reduce it to "it's not complicated to keep the two syntaxes straight".