OS X 10.2.4 non-standard & unconstitutional

Michael Everson everson at evertype.com
Tue Apr 15 17:44:19 CEST 2003


I see little option but to respond to the following message which has 
been sent to this forum.

At 15:35 +0100 2003-04-15, Marion Gunn wrote:

>Irish objectors to that non-standard and unconstitutional langtag 
>are being told it was chosen by and/or given the IETF stamp of 
>approval by an IETF-appointed langtag reviewer, which (unless that 
>claim is bogus) makes its chain of responsibility go back directly 
>to IETF/IANA.

Well, this is about as untrue as you can get.

In the first place, no language tag is involved. What is involved is 
an informative user string in Apple Mac OS software. This has nothing 
to do with RFC 3066 or my role as IETF language tag reviewer.

In the second place, Marion's claim that there is anything 
"unconstitutional" about the use of the word "Gaelic" to denote the 
Irish language is a load of piffle. It is based on a misuse of the 
word "unconstitutional" and is simply a red herring, nothing more 
than a rhetorical device.

In the third place, while Marion seems to be trying to blame me 
personally for insulting the Irish language, I am not responsible for 
the informative user-string in question. I am however partially 
responsible for the specification of the two locales for Ireland 
which ship in Mac OS X, and am, rightly, proud of my association with 
Apple and of the locales in question.

In the fourth place, the software has been available worldwide for 
nine months and it is only in the last two days that any "Irish 
objectors" have turned up. I have, however, as I have said elsewhere, 
raised the question with my NSAI colleagues, who are also Irish, in 
order to determine whether an NSAI recommendation ought to be made.

Finally, I would like to request that Marion please watch what she is 
saying. She appears to be attempting to defame me either personally 
or professionally on a public forum, however studiously she manages 
to avoid typing my name.
-- 
Michael Everson * * Everson Typography *  * http://www.evertype.com


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