Archaic scripts (was: Re: New version:draft-ietf-idna-tables-01.txt)

[Gervase Markham]

Vint Cerf wrote:
> I interpret your position to lie mostly on the utility axis and your 
> argument to be of the form "it isn't useful to include these scripts"
> 
> Others may say, "but what's the harm?"

I would note that this line of argument got us where we are today. As I 
have understood the process thus far, one of the big differences in 
IDNAbis will be that someone needs to provide a positive reason to 
include a character or set rather than forcing someone else to provide a 
positive reason to exclude it.

On the cuneiform point, only a handful of people worldwide have 
keyboards set up to type those letters, and only a further handful have 
fonts to display them. Even if that small group wants to set up a 
website about cuneiform (entirely possible) that doesn't mean it 
requires a cuneiform domain name - and, in fact, if it had one, it would 
significantly restrict its readership.

If cuneiform gets in, IMO it would be a sign that the process is still 
broken in the way outlined above.

Gerv