From gordon.dyke@bluewin.ch Sat Nov 24 10:01:52 2001 Return-Path: X-Sender: gordon.dyke@bluewin.ch X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-8_0_0_1); 24 Nov 2001 18:01:53 -0000 Received: (qmail 52065 invoked from network); 24 Nov 2001 18:01:52 -0000 Received: from unknown (216.115.97.167) by m11.grp.snv.yahoo.com with QMQP; 24 Nov 2001 18:01:52 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO mta1n.bluewin.ch) (195.186.1.210) by mta1.grp.snv.yahoo.com with SMTP; 24 Nov 2001 18:01:51 -0000 Received: from oemcomputer (213.3.49.49) by mta1n.bluewin.ch (Bluewin AG 6.0.032) id 3BFF928800013850 for lojban@yahoogroups.com; Sat, 24 Nov 2001 19:01:44 +0100 Message-ID: <009701c17511$d6c4cc80$172103d5@oemcomputer> To: Subject: [lojban] presentation of lojban Date: Sat, 24 Nov 2001 18:59:21 +0100 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.50.4133.2400 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.50.4133.2400 From: "G. Dyke" X-Yahoo-Profile: gregvdyke > > At 05:05 PM 11/23/01 -0500, Rob Speer wrote: > > >On Fri, Nov 23, 2001 at 04:30:19PM -0500, pycyn@aol.com wrote: > > > > I would downplay our > > > > community -- by the time it was 45, Esperanto had several million > > > relatively > > > > competent speakers and a library of several hundred (perhaps thousand) > > > books; > > > > even if you put Lojbans age at 10 or so, Esperanto -- with only the > > > > international snail mail of the end of the 19th century -- had many > > > times our > > > > number of competent speakers and dozens of books. > > Yes, but the only reason it's not doing as well is that there are so many > other things on offer... and also the fact that it is very easy to make > mistakes when writing in lojban as if it were LRD (SAE - lo'e ropno bangu) ; > international snail mail meant it was a lot easier to get things about - I > blame (and thank) john cowan for my not getting involved earlier - if lojban > were mentionned in his sig at the time, I'd have come across it much > quicker. > > > >On that end, I think we need either an update of lojban.org or a new > > >site that we can point people interested in Lojban to - someone coming > > >across the web page now would get the impression that nothing has been > done > > >with the language for a year, and if they persist in being interested, > > >they're directed to various aging web sites and old texts. It's a wonder > > >anyone at all shows up on lojban-beginners, because I haven't seen it > > >publicized _anywhere_. > > > > Lojban has not been publicized anywhere, in part because we have been so > > poor on follow-through to anyone who responds, except to sell them a book > > and/or point them to the list. We have not had a usable introductory > > packet since 1993, and Nick's brochure update is to be the replacement for > > that, at the publication of which we may be more able to deal with > > significant new queries about the language. > > I think he meant that "lojban beginners" hadn't been publicized - I only > found it through searching egroups for lojban. Here's my views on the > subject of publicizing: > > Imagine jaybob, who has never heard of lojban being told (by me for > instance) "I'm involved in a language called lojban. - Oh really (he's > English, this jaybob). - yeah, go to lojban.org!" (I new perfectly well that > I should have told him about the wiki and the list, but I can't remember the > urls) He goes, and is not impressed by what he sees (visually that is) - the > message about frames is a dead give-away that this page has not been touched > for some timeand most of the links lead to incomprehensible text pages. He > finally finds a link : learning lojban - I hope for his sake that he chooses > robin and nick's lessons... He then learns a bit, and, feeling brave, he > subscribes to lojban mailing list... the subjects all seem rather obscure or > uninteresting to him (some people seem to spend loads of time posting > messages full of cvs's - zo'o) does he find out about lojban-beginners, the > wiki, #lojban? not for some time and he will probably have left by then. > > What should we do to help jaybob? > > have loads of portals (any lojban page is in effect a portal), but make sure > they all point to the main centers of the community, not just having a > webring: > -jboste (should not be the first list he subscribes to) > -lojban-beginners (perfect if he wants to find out more about the language > and to post his first lojban) > -the wiki (if he wants to find out still more about the language) > -#lojban > > others: > -several links to specific wiki pages: list of active members, some sort of > introduction to the wiki (and to the lojban community in general, I'll put > that up on the wiki this weekend maybe) etc... > -the lessons > -alt.language.artificial.lojban (I will certainly be there most days as I > can't have yahoo mailing lists at my college) > -cvs > -other lojban pages (the bilingual pages like jezrax's -or mine, but it > doesn't really count - are best) > > projects (if we coordinate our efforts into a fixed list of projects, we > should have finished within six months): > -a reader : and I'm sorry, a translation of an english reader is of no use, > something in tune with the lessons - I still can read very little without > the gi'uste > -a faq : I think this is the same as the introduction I'm thinking of > putting up on the wiki - the faq questions are, at the moment only > informative to ex loglanists ;-) > ...? > -translations into french, german, spanish, esperanto?...?... of basic > introductory material > -more mp3 downloads of people talking > > (these are all projects that I often think about but rarely get round to > doing...) > > >Finances remain extremely tight, so we cannot print-publish > > both of Nick's books at once, but getting the brochure done will give us a > > shot to grow a market that will finally pay off the remaining printing > debt > > from the reference grammar. Then, after his lesson book is published, we > > will more seriously resume efforts on some sort of dictionary publication. > > Why do you want a dictionary so much? and why do you want to publish? what's > wrong with pdf formatting the lessons and the book and letting people > download? > > Which reminds me : could we have a pdf formatted set of lessons? > > BTW I like xod's portal > -- > http://www.myepfl.ch/gregory.dyke > > .i lo'e to'e makcu cu djica lenu tolcumla morsi kei lo telda'a > .i lo'e je'a makcu cu go'i to'ebo le se go'i > >