English (was Re: A few hums)

[Pekka Savola]

On Thu, 24 Jul 2003, Iljitsch van Beijnum wrote:
> There is enough evidence that non-native English speakers can function 
> just fine within the IETF. Unfortunately, there are also examples to 
> the contrary, at least to some degree, as some participants can be hard 
> to understand. I do maintain that this has very likely something to do 
> with the speed at which is spoken, so it should be possible to gain 
> improvement here with some one-on-one feedback.
> 
> What I'd really like to know is how many people would like to 
> participate in the IETF but don't because of language issues. If this 
> turns out to be a large number, more effort in this area is justified. 
> But it could also be a negligible number, so no action is warranted.

Another problem I've seen, unfortunately, is that internet-drafts from 
certain people have been of *awful* language.

In a document of a dozen pages, excluding the standard boilerplates, you
can hardly find a sentence which does not break English grammar, spelling,
choice of wrong words or be otherwise difficult to understand.

Forcing people to review these seems like a waste of time from almost
everyone's perspective.  It just takes *considerably* more effort to do.

Luckily enough this is rather rare, but happens nonetheless.

-- 
Pekka Savola                 "You each name yourselves king, yet the
Netcore Oy                    kingdom bleeds."
Systems. Networks. Security. -- George R.R. Martin: A Clash of Kings