Subject: Re: [lojban] Re: html tag ethics

From: Robert LeChevalier <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 10 Dec 2002 06:15:36 -0500

I don't disagree with you, but here is why I want to keep more historical 
awareness.

At 08:22 PM 12/9/02 -0500, Craig wrote:
>"Loglan", according to the courts, is a generic term for a language based on
>logic.

It is also the specific name for a language PROJECT to design a linguistic 
test bed language. When I refer to the language associated with that 
project, it is Loglan/Lojban, but the project has always been called the 
"Loglan Project" even when I am discussing only Lojban.

>Lojban is a loglan; so is TLI Loglan, as is Guaspi (which should have
>some random punctuation in the name, but I don't remember what), also Plan B
>and its parody Plan C.

I'll note since And and I were talking about Lojban Mark II, that if I 
recall which one it is correctly, Plan B was Jeff Prothero's attempt to 
hypothesize what a Loglan Mark II might be like. If it wasn't that one, 
then Prothero had another one under a different name.

>Lojban is not Plan C, but both *officially* fall under the heading of Loglan.
>
>However, nobody uses the name "Loglan" except to mean TLI Loglan, which is
>*not* the same as Lojban.

The official name of this language, in English, is "Lojban - A Realization 
of Loglan".

But who uses official names.

> Even you refer to "Loglan", meaning TLI's implementation of JCB's idea,

We officially use "TLI Loglan" to refer to JCB's language. If we were to 
only use "Loglan" to refer to JCB's language, and only use "Lojban" for 
ours, we could undo the court-ruling that "Loglan" is generic.

> >=> using keywords in the meta description tag which is not related to the
> >page content"
>
> >Loglan is certainly "related" to lojban. Some people say lojban *is* Loglan.
> >(I think they are different words in different languages for the same 
> thing.)
>
>You know full well that's not the kind of relationship they mean.

I don't think he does.

But the bottom line is that we are trying to cooperate with TLI, not to 
undercut them (at this stage, they'll live or die without our help), and 
perceptions can be more important than reality. If we start promoting 
"Loglan" on our web pages merely in order to get hits from Steven's 500 
looking for Loglan, it LOOKS to everyone else like "hype" and "poaching", 
and will be understood by TLI and by most readers as such. It would be 
better to negotiate a relationship whereby TLI puts a more prominent link 
on their page pointing to ours as another implementation of JCB's ideas 
with an active community, and we put a respectful link on our page 
acknowledging their site as documenting what we recognize as the 
predecessor language to Lojban. This is honest, aboveboard, and 
communicates the way the languages relate to each other.

That is the sort of thing I am trying to do with Bob McIvor (and if he and 
Robin want to work out mutually acceptable wording for mutual pointers 
along the lines I describe above, I approve)

lojbab

-- 
lojbab [email-masked]
Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc.
2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA 703-385-0273
Artificial language Loglan/Lojban: http://www.lojban.org