Change to this http://docs.python.org/py3k/library/stdtypes.html as suggested by Nick Coghlan here http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/python/dev/969817

"The formatting operations described here are modelled on C's printf()
syntax. They only support formatting of certain builtin types, and the
use of a binary operator means that care may be needed in order to
format tuples and dictionaries correctly. As the new string formatting
syntax is more powerful, flexible, extensible and handles tuples and
dictionaries naturally, it is recommended for new code. However, there
are no current plans to deprecate printf-style formatting."

I’d like to make a patch with Nick’s text and a few examples.

New changeset 80069bbae26d by Gregory P. Smith in branch '3.2':
Issue #14123: Explicitly mention that old style % string formatting has caveats
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/80069bbae26d

New changeset 98a1855ebfe1 by Gregory P. Smith in branch 'default':
Issue #14123: Explicitly mention that old style % string formatting has caveats but is not going away any time soon.
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/98a1855ebfe1

Apparently this was too urgent too wait for my patch :)

Not closing yet, as there are still phrasing issues discussed on python-dev.

I can't see too much sense in leaving this open, what are your opinions?

The only issue seems about the use of the word "deprecate", but I think it's fine, so I'll close this issue.