Michael Everson wrote:

>
> At 11:03 -0400 2005-09-01, Peter T. Daniels wrote:
>
> >I know for a fact that one of them, John Victor Singer, is not "a Vai,"
> >and not a "user of the Vai script."
>
> Yes, John Singler [sic] is not a Vai. He worked

You want me to start marking your typos?

> with me and with Chuck Riley and with José Rivera
> and with our Vai informants to encode Vai. It was
> a pleasure to work with John, who has at all
> times been helpful and courteous, and supportive
> of the proposal document which in many ways he
> helped to refine.
>
> >The details of the proposal are of no concern,
> >since if it's implemented it won't be accessible
> >to the people who could actually benefit from it
> >-- the users of traditional Vai literacy, almost
> >all of whom are not literate in English.
>
> Encoding a script in the Universal Character Set
> makes that script available for interchange. Vai
> people who use computers will be able to write
> and exchange Vai texts using the Vai code
> positions.
>
> Encoding a script in the Universal Character Set
> does not magically localize computer operating
> systems into minority languages. It does not
> change the sociolinguistic nature of computing in
> the early 21st century, freeing users of (e.g.
> African) syllabic scripts from the burden of
> having to learn to read an alphabet. It's
> unrealistic to pretend that they will not have to
> learn an alphabet. They will, and you want to
> play games and pretend that it's cultural
> imperialism that will force them to learn an
> alphabet if they want to use computers, then you
> can blame all of western civilization on that.
>
> For my part, I am proud of the work we have done
> to encode Vai, and I am content that my efforts
> to make software available that will enable
> computer-using Vais to enter Vai text will, in
> fact, benefit computer-using Vais.

I.e., few to none of the Vai people.
--
Peter T. Daniels grammatim@...