Fwd: Registration request for new subtags for Portuguese orthographies

Michael Everson everson at evertype.com
Sat Mar 21 15:59:15 CET 2015


A message I had from António.

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Bom dia, Michael.

Well, do you create & maintain standards at IETF to encode/regulate 'existing concepts'? If you do, what's stopping zoologists from encoding unicorns as viable or possible animals?

The 'concept of AO90' may exist but try asking average users both from PT  and BR to define it. In BR, where a staggering 80+ % of the population is either illiterate or functionnally illiterate, they'll probably refer to the suppression of the dieresis (trema) or of the acute accent in EI in certain words. In PT they'll refer to the suppression of C and P before a consonant letter and of the acute accent in PÁRA (s/he stops, you stop!). So much for the "concept". Angola completly rejected/quashed the "concept" by issuing a detailed report on each and every aspect of the 1990 ortography.

I understand that some of your correspondents may feel that the level of scrutiny you are using regarding the Portuguese spelling reform is higher than in other instances, but the FACT is that there was never such a useless and botched spelling reform as this one in the civilized world. The 1990 reform should be a case-study of human stupidity and scientific incompetence. It is not conceivable that such a thing could happen anywhere else in the 21st century. And the Angolans, who have to deal w a dozen of standardized national languages, know that.

- A.


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