Question

I am reading over HTML5 docs on W3C site now, and I just read this:

Note: The section element is not a
generic container element. When an
element is needed for styling purposes
or as a convenience for scripting,
authors are encouraged to use the div
element instead. A general rule is
that the section element is
appropriate only if the element’s
contents would be listed explicitly in
the document’s outline.

So, I interpret that as “Do not style section elements. Use DIV instead.” But I’ve seen a few websites that style all of the HTML5 elements, and guess what? I ‘Viewed Source’ of that W3C link below where it says not to style a section element, and they styled it themselves! WTF?
http://www.w3.org/TR/html5/sections.html#the-section-element

Or should I interpret the above statement as:

“You can style section elements, so long as the contents of the section element would be listed explicitely in the document’s outline.”?

Answer 1

The HTML5 spec does not state that you shouldn’t apply CSS styles to the section tag, but rather that you shouldn’t include section tags simply for styling/scripting purposes, as that affects the semantic layout of your document.

From the section about section:

The section element represents a generic section of a document or application. A section, in this context, is a thematic grouping of content, typically with a heading. [emphasis added]

Compare to the section about div:

div elements can be useful for stylistic purposes or to wrap multiple paragraphs within a section that are all to be annotated in a similar way. [emphasis added]