"If it was never intended for end users, then perhaps you could rename
this request as "provide an end-user-friendly log configuration format"
(that would live alongside the current one). It's hardly unusual that
users should be able to troubleshoot systems themselves by requesting
more (or different) logging, is it?"

It's unlikely that this would be provided as part of the Python stdlib:
requirements which are truly end-user-friendly are also likely to be
application-specific. When the configuration format was devised I did
seek feedback - but people with strong opinions on the issue told me
they'd prefer to roll their own. I'm fine with that; you can't please
all of the people all of the time and I sadly can't devote much time to
this at the moment.

"For example, log4py's format looked like this:
[my_logger]
LogLevel: Normal
Target: my_filename.log"

Looks fine for logging to files only. Does log4py support the wide range
of output sinks that Python logging does? If not, then the more
complicated logging configuration would seem reasonable as there are
more options in Python logging.

"As for mentions of this issue online, I linked to one such on my
comp.lang.python posting."

I'm not sure which posting you mean - I didn't see any recent postings
by you on c.l.py (I look at it via the corresponding Google group).

Re. the links you posted - Richard Jones' thread came out shortly after
logging was released and was largely about documentation and the need
for casual-use functionality which was subsequently provided by
basicConfig(). The MarkMail thread which you linked to doesn't appear to
raise the same points you did - Steve Hindle's original post of 17 May
2006 mentions only in point 4 about "crufty config file syntax", with no
specifics, and I can only find 3 messages in that thread - 2 by Steve
Hindle and one by Aahz which simply suggests moving the discussion to
c.l.py. I checked the Baypiggies archive on mail.python.org - same thing.

My suggestion would be - if you want to promote a simpler config file
syntax for logging, implement one and upload it on PyPI, and post
announcements on c.l.py and c.l.py.announce. If there is demand for this
functionality, people can easily download your package from PyPI and use
it. After all, logging.config is a separate sub-module and need not be
loaded at all.