From nobody@digitalkingdom.org Fri May 25 10:34:11 2007 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-beginners); Fri, 25 May 2007 10:34:13 -0700 (PDT) Received: from nobody by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.63) (envelope-from ) id 1Hrdg2-0004t9-RB for lojban-beginners-real@lojban.org; Fri, 25 May 2007 10:34:11 -0700 Received: from rlpowell by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.63) (envelope-from ) id 1Hrdg2-0004t2-25 for lojban-beginners@lojban.org; Fri, 25 May 2007 10:34:10 -0700 Date: Fri, 25 May 2007 10:34:09 -0700 To: lojban-beginners@lojban.org Subject: [lojban-beginners] Re: BPFK Taskmaster Message-ID: <20070525173409.GE7871@digitalkingdom.org> References: <743376.28032.qm@web88015.mail.re2.yahoo.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <743376.28032.qm@web88015.mail.re2.yahoo.com> User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.13 (2006-08-11) From: Robin Lee Powell X-archive-position: 4672 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-beginners-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-beginners-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: rlpowell@digitalkingdom.org Precedence: bulk Reply-to: lojban-beginners@lojban.org X-list: lojban-beginners On Fri, May 25, 2007 at 05:48:21AM -0700, ANDREW PIEKARSKI wrote: > coi rodo > > I'm excited that something is finally happening to ensure that > tasks are actually done (I hope this isn't premature). Since > starting on lojban about 6 months ago, I've communicated my > concerns about the inadequacy of learning materials (e.g. no > simple 'approved' texts for beginning beginners) and problems with > vocabulary (e.g. the error in having {kisto} mean both Pakistani > and Pushtu, the inappropriateness of having {xingu'e} mean India). > The responses by 'the powers that be', while sympathetic, have > left me with the impression that the mechanisms or processes for > getting these things resolved are weak or non-existent. That is very true, and has (almost) nothing to do with the BPFK. We are all volunteers: no-one, to my knowledge, has ever received compensation other than satisfaction for Lojban work. This means that if no-one feels like working on beginner material, it doesn't get done. Simple as that. (Having said that, I think http://www.tlg.uci.edu/~opoudjis/lojbanbrochure/lessons/book1.html is pretty good, but I haven't been a rank beginner for a long time). On the other hand, most of the really skilled Lojbanists *are* BPFK members, and most of us prioritize BPFK work about other Lojban work. The problem is that BPFK work is hard and slow, so many of us end up not doing much of anything at all. It's my hope and belief that after the BPFK is done an explosion of things like beginner materials will occur. As for vocabulary nits specifically, those are at least partly the BPFK's purview. In the extra-specific case of cultural gismu, however, those are known to be fundamentally flawed *by their nature*; it is expected for speakers to understand this and not be assholes about it. Regardless, the BPFK won't be putting serious work into them until the cmavo are done. > So while the appointment of a taskmaster is essential, the > definition of the tasks and their prioritization is vital. Here's > a suggestion. Why not poll beginners (real beginners) on what > they find to be the biggest impediments to learning lojban? Because it has nothing to do with the BPFK's mission to know that information. If someone else wants to gather that information, they can feel free. The BPFK is *not* interested in making major changes to the language unless a serious problem exists; "the CLL contradicts itself" is a serious problem, "it's hard to learn" is not (the exception is things that are actually *impossible to learn, the only one of which that's been talked about to my knowledge are certain cmevla morphology issues). > On the issue of vocabulary, I agree 100% with Martin (I think it > was he) that having general usage finally determine the meaning of > a lujvo is unrealistic in a community as small as ours. This way, > 20 years from now, we will still be arguing over the right word > for 'neighbour' and still won't have a word for 'sports'. Umm. No-one's arguing over these things. If there's more than one, use whichever you like. There's more than one way to say many things in Lojban; that doesn't make any of them wrong. Having said that, the whole point of jbovlaste is to be a central repository of The Right Word(s); I'm going to be working on it more to make it easier to use (including self-sign-up pages, although I'm hoping someone else will do that). -Robin -- http://www.digitalkingdom.org/~rlpowell/ *** http://www.lojban.org/ Reason #237 To Learn Lojban: "Homonyms: Their Grate!" Proud Supporter of the Singularity Institute - http://singinst.org/