[WikiEN-l] Fwd: Suggestion: Pronunciation on all names

[Thomas Dalton]

On 18/01/2008, Tony Sidaway <tonysidaway at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 18/01/2008, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > On a related note, it would be helpful if we, you know, used a
> > > pronunciation guide that makes sense to most English-speaking people.
> > > The IPA thing is nonsense, and I have never been able to glean more
> > > than bits of redundant pronunciation information from it.
> >
> > Agreed. IPA is great for people that know it, so it's worth including,
> > but a simple phonetic spelling should also be provided, or even just a
> > "rhymes with X".
>
> But how do you pronounce word X?   English pronunciation varies very,
> very widely (even in tiny England the range of pronunciation of simple
> words like "rub" and "new" is quite large) At least IPA has
> consistency, and if I really need to know what those funny squiggles
> mean I can click on the link in the template to see exactly that.

IPA is great for giving precise pronunciations, but simpler methods
are great for people that just want a general idea so they can read
the article (unpronounceable words can make it hard to read something,
even silently - it disrupts the flow). Oh, any less of the "tiny", if
you don't mind...