[Foundation-l] Shavian Wikis

[Joe]

On 2/11/05 5:50 PM, "Brion Vibber" <brion at pobox.com> wrote:

> For those not familiar with Shavian:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shavian_alphabet
> 
> It's a phonetic (well, phonemic ;) alphabet for the English language,
> developed in response to a contest specified for in George Bernard
> Shaw's will.

Thanks for clarifying.  I didn't think to mention this earlier. ^_^;

> While a very neat thing, it's needless to say not in common use for
> writing English.

I suppose that depends on how you define "common".  There are a number of
people currently using it in the shawalphabet Yahoo! Group and on the
Ikonboard at shavian.org.  I also had a pen pal who I wrote in Shavian
(insignificant, yes :), but he seems to have dropped off the face of the
Earth.

> Since it's not even a language unto itself, and only a small handful of
> hobbyists use it at all, it's very unlikely that any Wikimedia projects
> will be established using Shavian writing. You might ask Wikicities --
> http://www.wikicities.com/ -- which is where the Toki Pona wiki got
> moved. (Toki Pona is a hobbyist conlang.)

I had the same concern about how to implement Shavian since it isn't really
a language.  I've wondered if there's a way to offer a single Wiki in
multiple scripts, but this may be the product of an over-imaginative mind.
I'll be checking out Wikicities (never been there before) if this still
doesn't sound reasonable.

> Tok Pisin is a creole language which is spoken natively by actual
> people. The 'Simple English' Wikipedia was created long, long ago and to
> this day it's unclear what its intended mission is.

If the English loanwords in Tok Pisin were spelled the same as their English
origins, much of it would be mutually intelligible.  Besides the slight
difference in grammar and various words from other languages, the biggest
difference is in spelling.  This isn't meant to be an exact match,
though--just an example.  I recognize the difference.

I can't say I really understand the purpose of the "Simple English"
Wikipedia either.  It sounds like a good idea though, perhaps for use by
children or ESL students?.  There's been talk of merging it with the en:
Wikipedia, which could be described more accurately as simply removing it.
Perhaps if there were a Shavian Wiki, it would face the same fate.

Regards,
Joe