LANGUAGE SUBTAG REGISTRATION FORM (R3): pinyin

[John Cowan]

Michael Everson scripsit:

> And things like this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibetan_Pinyin and  
> this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinyin#Other_languages make me  
> really nervous about *binding* "pinyin" to either "zh" or "zh-Latn".

"pin1yin1" *in Chinese* means "alphabet", any alphabet, so one might
speak of English being written in pinyin (as opposed to writing it in
yingzi; see the wonderful http://zompist.com/yingzi/yingzi.htm ).

But *in English*, the term "Pinyin" unqualified means ISO 7098, the
international standard method of romanizing Chinese.  The subtag "pinyin"
should be applied to nothing else, as you have already agreed.

-- 
John Cowan    http://ccil.org/~cowan  cowan at ccil.org
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