[Wikipedia-l] Re: Re: Wikipedia English English

[Jack & Naree]

On 23/09/05, Jack & Naree <jack.macdaddy at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> What seems clear is that Mark has been consistently argumentative,
> facetious, and fallacious; and even more so since this post.
> Not satisfied with trying to start a "row", he wants to ban me for not
> agreeing with him.
> I think he is coming across as needlessly aggressive and pompous.
> However wrong or stupid anyone thinks my posts are, vomiting bile through
> the keyboard is out of order.
> Mark clearly didn't check his facts before digging his troll-hole, and now
> looks silly, that's not my fault. I apologise for using caps, I did it to
> distinguish my text from his, not for any other reason, Mark's drivel didn't
> get me remotely excited or annoyed - clearly you can't tell teh emotional
> content of everything in text form.
> Anyway, You can't just label everyone you disagree with a troll or make
> trollish statements like "x is so obviously trolling us" and not expect a
> negative response, if you don't understand what a troll is, search
> wikipedia.
>  I came here not to spend time arguing with impulsive, petulent,
> self-important twats like Mark, but to try and get a change that someone
> else proposed, in fact.
>  If you look trough Wikipedia, there is stuff on Commonwealth English, and
> on the differences.
>  In the article it is recognised that some Canadians use a lot of
> Americanisms; however a lot of Canadians resent being mistaken for
> Americans, and like to align themselves with the Commonwealth.
> So some may find the term suits them.
>  What's abundantly clear is that the language of the USA is markedly
> different to that of the British Isles. In Grammar, vocabulary, spelling,
> and semantics; and this means that it can make it unintelligible to non-US
> English speakers. It IS legitimate and accurate to call it a foreign
> language from the perspective of an English speaker from England and the
> British Isles in general, because a large amount of commonly used vocab,
> grammar, syntax and semantics are both unintelligible (to varying degrees);
> and simply not accepted as the way to speak the language (more than just
> spelling).
> Evidence has been posted (not by me) on this list (see the Wictionary
> posts) that AmE and BrE (OED terms) have distinct orthographies.
> Would anybody on this list disagree that AmE is a clearly distinct dialect
> of English? It would appear not.
> These two factors alone seem to be enough for other dialects to get a
> Wikipedia.
> Whether "British English" gets it's own Wiki is up to British people
> contributing. The problem is having an "English Wikipedia" that's mostly
> American-English, and a "British English" one. It's like splitting
> Portuguese into a "Portuguese Wikipedia" that's actually
> Brazilian-Portuguese, and having a "Lusitanian Portuguese" one for
> Portuguese Portuguese; as has also been noted, this issue is not simply one
> about English.
>  Rowan's suggestion of a machine translation solution to the problem is
> worth looking at to satisfy Wikipedia "Unionists", but the needs of
> Wikipedia "Nationalists"can't be bullied and ostracised as "trolls".
>
 what's the betting somebody focusses on me not proofreading that last
sentence rather than the content - and you call *me* a troll!

  On 23/09/05, Rowan Collins <rowan.collins at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > On 23/09/05, Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > 1) I don't call people I disagree with barking mad, unless they really
> >
> > > are barking mad.
> >
> > I didn't say you "always" or "often" did it. I merely pointed out that
> > it seemed rather hypocritical to complain that somebody was emotional
> > enough to [presumably deliberately] use all caps in an e-mail, when
> > you yourself had just got emotional (and personal) enough to accuse
> > that person of being "barking mad".
> >
> > > 2) Yes, but how many of them? I never said with absolute certainty
> > > that all of those were BS examples, only that much of the list was BS.
> >
> >
> > No, but you did confidently state that "The vast majority of those
> > aren't even real differences", followed by a set of examples, which
> > were, presumably, among those which you thought were in fact "BS" -
> > otherwise what are they examples of? That many of the examples you
> > picked were then confirmed as differences by other users considerably
> > weakens your position, does it not?
> >
> > > None of the examples which I made it clear I was fairly certain were
> > > universal were objected to
> >
> > So, the lists linked to weren't 100% brilliant. Perhaps a comment that
> > "I'm not sure all those examples are accurate" would have been a
> > better comment? And remember, nobody on this list [as far as we know]
> > actually *wrote* either of those lists, they just pointed them out as
> > a convenient example.
> >
> > > even many of the ones which were
> > > objected to proved a point, for example "autumn" vs "fall": there's
> > > one variant that's understood in both places, and another that is only
> > > understood in one. Which one should be chosen?
> >
> > That's not proof that there's no difference (which you were, to put it
> > charitably, strongly implying); it's proof that there is a difference
> > for which a compromise solution exists. An interesting point, but not
> > one which warrants labelling anyone "barking mad".
> >
> > To respond to the implied suggestion that we always use "autumn", I'd
> > guess it would more of a reader-oriented policy than a writer-oriented
> > one. In my experience, US writers tend to more commonly and naturally
> > use "fall", so even if they'd understand "autumn" easily enough, it
> > might require conscious thought (or correction by other users) to
> > always *write* it. Not that that's a fatal flaw, just a thought for
> > discussion.
> >
> >
> > [I'm not sure arguing about definitions of "troll" gets us anywhere,
> > so I shall pass over that part of the discussion]
> > --
> > Rowan Collins BSc
> > [IMSoP]
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> >
>
>