From nobody@digitalkingdom.org Mon Sep 05 12:49:28 2005 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-beginners); Mon, 05 Sep 2005 12:49:28 -0700 (PDT) Received: from nobody by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.52) id 1ECMy8-0006sV-3H for lojban-beginners-real@lojban.org; Mon, 05 Sep 2005 12:49:28 -0700 Received: from dsl081-049-216.sfo1.dsl.speakeasy.net ([64.81.49.216] helo=pinfu.digitalkingdom.org) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtps (TLS-1.0:RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA:32) (Exim 4.52) id 1ECMy5-0006s7-Dd for lojban-beginners@lojban.org; Mon, 05 Sep 2005 12:49:27 -0700 Received: from ms-smtp-03.texas.rr.com ([24.93.47.42] helo=ms-smtp-03-eri0.texas.rr.com) by pinfu.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.50) id 1ECLXF-0007UY-Fq for lojban-beginners@lojban.org; Mon, 05 Sep 2005 11:17:37 -0700 Received: from hypermetrics.com (cpe-66-68-164-156.austin.res.rr.com [66.68.164.156]) by ms-smtp-03-eri0.texas.rr.com (8.12.10/8.12.7) with ESMTP id j85IPFRZ003858 for ; Mon, 5 Sep 2005 13:25:15 -0500 (CDT) Message-ID: <431C8D8B.5050201@hypermetrics.com> Date: Mon, 05 Sep 2005 13:25:15 -0500 From: Hal Fulton User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.4.1) Gecko/20031114 X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: lojban-beginners@lojban.org Subject: [lojban-beginners] Two ideas I think are cool... Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed X-Virus-Scanned: Symantec AntiVirus Scan Engine X-Spam-Score: -2.6 (--) X-archive-position: 1967 X-Approved-By: hal9000@hypermetrics.com X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-beginners-bounce@chain.digitalkingdom.org Errors-to: lojban-beginners-bounce@chain.digitalkingdom.org X-original-sender: hal9000@hypermetrics.com Precedence: bulk Reply-to: lojban-beginners@chain.digitalkingdom.org X-list: lojban-beginners Two ideas: 1. For the "snob factor," assign a "number" to each person in the Lojban community. A lower number indicates old-timer status, a higher one indicates newbie status. Register all the lowest numbers (John Cowan et al.) manually, then eventually throw it open to "first come, first served." This idea is stolen from Tivoli (though it's probably been done elsewhere). At that company, it was a playful kind of status symbol: "What, you're only employee 325? Ha, beat you, I'm 297." Sometimes it was a little less than playful, as the lower numbers had more meaning: "See that guy over there? He's employee number 8." 2. A more practical idea: A test of Lojban literacy -- like an SAT for Lojban speakers. - Make it fine-grained, high-resolution. Four-digit score, like SAT or chess rankings? - Separate sections for grammar, vocabulary, reading comprehension, etc.? - Make most (all?) of it computer-gradeable. - Possible essay section? Could be computer syntax-checked. Would have to be human-graded for semantics. - Randomize the question content so you never take the exact same test twice. - Let the first test be free. - Let people take it every six months for a small fee which supports LLG. - Discount for students, I'd say. Or even free for people < 18. A test like this could provide - an objective indication of your own Lojban knowledge - incentive to learn more - playful competitiveness or bragging rights Tell me your thoughts... Hal