// Change the HTML5 data-* attribute
$('#poem').attr('data-poet', 'William Shakespeare');

console.log( $('#poem').attr('data-poet') );
//>> "William Shakespeare"

jQuery.data = function(key) { return jQuery.attr(‘data-’ + key); } works fine for me.

also, see this fiddle : http://jsfiddle.net/h7UZ9/1/ get data method is a bit buggy isnit ?

From the documentation: “When the data attribute is an object (starts with ‘{‘) or array (starts with ‘[‘) then jQuery.parseJSON is used to parse the string; it must follow valid JSON syntax including quoted property names.”

Valid JSON requires double quotes for property names and string values.

objects work –

<div id="novel" data-novelist='{"firstname": "Jose", "lastname": "Saramago"}'>Blindness</div>

objects undefined or appear as string

<div id="novel" data-novelist="{'firstname': 'Jose', 'lastname': 'Saramago'}">Blindness</div>