[emergie]

Americans using cal/foot/elbow/galon system of measurements is quirky, but bearable.

AM/PM thing is silly, but bearable.

Malformed MM[/-.]dd[/-.]yyyy date format is one of the most confusing thing I have ever encountered and it generates serious problems.

[emj]

> it generates serious problems

I would say that by just existing it create serious problems. You can never be sure if a date if day/month or month/day, this was especially bad from year 01 to 12. During those twelve years I was a date zealot "there can be only ISO 8601".

[petee]

I think it makes sense only in the fact that we write it how we say it out loud - "February 26th, 2021." It is just another convention, albeit inconvenient for computers. I doubt the british way of saying "26th of February" was done intentionally to aid sorting...

[sixothree]

> it generates serious problems

So do time zones. So do leap seconds. So does the speed of light. I guess deal with it.

None of what you argued negates the post you replied to. He is right after all. Dates within the year are sortable by pretty much any system.

But most of all the format makes ISO 8601 quite easy for Americans to wrap their head around. So maybe stop complaining and look at 8601 as a possible solution to what you consider confusing and problematic.