It's Ravi Message

Hello List,
I have been following this list for a while. I am a recent contributor on Wikipedia and have followed Unicode developments in my country ever since 1997. I can tell here that my.wikipedia.org works, there is hardly anything wrong with it (just a few bugs with Normalization).  The only reason there is resistance there in regards to fonts is simply because people do not like change. Trying to find technical reasons for Zawgyi would be simply naive. I agree that Unicode 5.1 would not work easily on older machines. I do not have any stastical data, but I can assert that about 90% of users in Myanmar are on Windows XP (Service Pack 2).  ICafes are also very friendly towards it's customers and are willing to allow installation of software. I live here. I know what I am talking about. So what other reason are there not to go 5.1?

I have a question for Mr. Everson. Why do you say that my.wikipedia doesn't work and is broken? The only thing that was needed was a slight change in the CSS. The only reason all this war broke up was becuase Htoo Myint Naung resisted to change the CSS to allow inclusion of other Fonts. Also, Mr. Everson why do you allude to the notation that other Unicode 5.1 just might not be compliant? If there are problems with these fonts, just spell it out. Even assuming there are problems, I still think it shold be included. Because we want a hihgly inclusive process in Wikipedia. The older CSS (not the current one) made Wikipedia pretty much exclusive. The whole problem is I believe our people resist too much to change. Our task here is therefore to actually start promoting the use of Unicode like Victor mentioned. I have done my part in the country here promoting it. I have brought users to Wikipedia and asked the to start converting the older articles. I am doing that myself. I would not like to see the community split. And I believe it won't. Non Unicode fonts are about to become irrelevant soon, except in niche markets.  One of the reason why strong protest started.

I am however sad that contributors were not asked to join this list. Hintha, Zawthet, me, Fox and a few other's opinion should have been taken. We could have given the view from the trench. Had Okisan not mentioned about this list on MyanmarITPros I would not have kown about it. Well, let's all call it a day now and move on and make Wikipedia grow.

Love,
Ravi.