I don't think we ever resolved this last call issue. http://www.imc.org/atom-syntax/mail-archive/msg14383.html
Tim Bray wrote: > OK, WG, what do you think? I have long supported the SHOULD here, but > I can't help observing that a lot of different parties have > questioned it, I'm not 100% sure it really has consensus support, > even rough. Rob & John's alternative, as outlined above, seems like a > fair trade-off that would better reflect the community consensus and > not really harm interoperability. Anybody want to disagree? Robert Sayre