Re: [lojban] la .alis.

[Robin Lee Powell <rlpowell@digitalkingdom.org>]

On Sun, Mar 28, 2010 at 09:03:56PM +0100, Michael Everson wrote:
> On 28 Mar 2010, at 20:29, Robin Lee Powell wrote:
> 
> > I'll speak up (briefly, since it wasn't requested) for that
> > side: I won't buy a book claiming to be Lojban that uses
> > seriously non-Lojban-standard typographic conventions,
> 
> Fair enough. Does that mean you wouldn't buy such a book if it
> were in Tengwar? 

I would not, but for different reasons (Tengwar is a crappy writing
system; too much self-similarity).

The problem I have is that the primary Lojban orthography uses Latin
characters, and what I very much do not want is to have people
showing up and using a non-standard Latin character orthography and
pointing at a published book as justification.

> > and I will decry it to anyone who asks.
> 
> That seems mean-spirited. :-(

It's not particularily intended that way.

As one of the half-dozen-or-so people who most often has to deal
with newbies coming up with obnoxious crap ("Why can't Lojban be in
hexademical?" took up many hours of my time once, for example), I
feel fully justified taking steps in advance to avoid additional
rounds of such annoyance.

> Ca'n't you enjoy a bit of fun? (Note how I wrote "ca'n't" there --
> just as Carroll did.) 

Certainly, when the bit of fun doesn't add to my workload around
here.  Again, as the hardest working person in the community, for
... at least the last 5 years, if not longer (with the possible
exception of Matt Arnold since he took over the book fulfillment),
not pointlessly adding to the crap I have to deal with is high on my
priority list.

> Ca'n't you appreciate an exercise in typography using Victorian
> conventions for a Victorian book?

That's a vacuous argument; are you saying that you would use
Victorian typographic conventions for a version published in Hebrew?

> > There is an exception, however: I care very little about how
> > stress is indicated.  Stress marking (specifically between using
> > caps or using an accent mark) has been a long-standing point of
> > largely non-acrimonious discussion; as far as I can tell, that's
> > an issue on which the community is somewhat divided, but no-one
> > really cares all that much.
> 
> So... you're flexible when you wish to be. Fair enough. :-)

I suppose.

I'm flexible about things that are not yet 100% formalized, or that
are specifically formalized as flexible, or where a good reason by
my standards exists; "capitalizing the whole syllable looks
ugly/like shouting" seems valid to me; "capitalize proper names
because that's how English does it" most *certainly* does not.

A lot of people in the community (myself included obviously) are
really, *really* averse to any changes that are specifically brought
in from natural languages, *especially* English.

I only speak two languages comfortably; English, and Lojban.  I have
to work really hard to avoid my English corrupting my Lojban, and I
do so because if I wanted English, I'd just speak English. Having
someone from outside the community try to apply English conventions
to Lojban and then publish it really bothers me because it's exactly
the opposite of what many of us are trying to do, and publishing it
means it'll be preserved for posterity, so that future generations
of newbies can make our lives more difficult.

(I suppose one could argue that "all caps is shouting" is an English
convention, but I tend to think of it as an Internet convention;
*shrug*)

> > Contrast this with using captials to mark the beginning of
> > sentences or proper names which, as And says, is very much
> > not-OK to most Lojbanists.
> 
> Well, I'm certainly not the first person to take an interest in
> such a convention, according to the archives of this list. Sure,
> plenty of people don't care for it, but at the end of the day I'm
> not trying to do any harm.

I'm aware you're not *trying* to.  You're going to succeed, though.

-Robin

-- 
They say:  "The first AIs will be built by the military as weapons."
And I'm  thinking:  "Does it even occur to you to try for something
other  than  the default  outcome?"  See http://shrunklink.com/cdiz
http://www.digitalkingdom.org/~rlpowell/ *** http://www.lojban.org/

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