On Fri, Aug 17, 2018 at 02:28 PM, Gene wrote:

JAWS has a copy from clipboard option and, as I recall, copy from page is the default option.

The following is not hair splitting, or at least not intentionally so.

These three objects/areas are used by JAWS (and, the equivalent, by NVDA):  Virtual cursor (buffer), clipboard (Windows system clipboard), and the actual page as presented.

I would definitely say, based on my years tutoring JAWS, that copies are, by default, not done from the virtual cursor, but from the page.  Copy and paste has always, even when what was being copied is not visible (as JAWS makes no effort to keep actual visual page and location in the virtual cursor synchronized for text), formatted as it appears if I can see it.  Anything copied, when copied, gets placed on the clipboard, which is utterly independent of the screen reader itself.

So far as I'm concerned, this is the most reasonable option, because any screen reader loads its virtual cursor when it gets its hands on something and the fact that the probability that one is likely to be primarily and exclusively communicating with individuals for whom visual formatting is "insignificant" is very, very small.  Maintaining WYSIWYG is, as has been pointed out here as the crux of the topic, very largely essential for communicating effectively with those not using screen readers, which I doubt that anyone here would argue is a far larger chunk of the world's populace than those that do.
 
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Brian - Windows 10 Home, 64-Bit, Version 1803, Build 17134  

    A little kindness from person to person is better than a vast love for all humankind.

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