Subject: [Ltru] IANA ISO 3166 related Registries

From: Jefsey Morfin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 03 Jul 2005 04:02:50 +0200

The fundamental reason I opposed and will continue to oppose the current 
Draft is that it uses the IANA Registry to attach and disseminate worldwide 
a new language attribute concerning national and linguistic communities 
without involving them. This langtag also confuses these communities and 
cultures since it can only discriminate through the generic language code, 
its generic script code, and the code of a country.

What can be conceived for a solitary linguist classifying its library or 
sorting his notes, does not make sense when considering a network, all the 
more when the words being used are not defined, neither as concepts nor as 
the way their are instantiated: what is a language, what is the nature 
descriptive or normative of the langtag, if its for the reader, for the 
author, for the relational exchange? This is not acceptable when these 
langtags will be de facto imposed to languages independently of the laws 
and policies which may identify, define, support them.

The position adopted by the USA concerning the control of the root file 
results in the continuation of the IANA contract and therefore the 
dependance of the considered Registry from the US Government. Under the 
circumstance, AFRAC (whose purpose in life is to provide a proper reference 
system to French people) has concerted with similar projects under 
consideration in Europe, Africa, Asia, South America and Canada. The 
consensus is that every IANA Registry using ISO 3166 codes will be from now 
on deemed representing an US position, unless it is transferred to the 
ICANN IANA zone, on such case the authority should be the GAC. The 
consensus is that generally the US point of view on local culture does bear 
enough weight to be worth the continuation of the effort engaged since 
December. Also it is that priority will be given to the root files and that 
any organisation proposing a distributed IANA copy will support the langtag 
Registry decided by its own Culture Ministry.

It is also agreed that the US position should be read as a support of the 
International Standards simplification (in this case as ISO 11179, ISO 
639-3, ISO 639-4, ISO 639-6, ISO 3166). The consensus is therefore to use 
the ISO tags or built from ISO tables, and to use x-tags. 

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From: "Randy Presuhn" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 2 Jul 2005 21:17:25 -0700

Hi -

Trying to understand whether any new issues are being raised...

> From: "Jefsey Morfin" <[email-masked]>
> To: <[email-masked]>
> Sent: Saturday, July 02, 2005 7:02 PM
> Subject: [Ltru] IANA ISO 3166 related Registries
>

> The position adopted by the USA concerning the control of the root file

What position in what forum are you talking about?

> consideration in Europe, Africa, Asia, South America and Canada. The

Is this in conjunction with your http://intlnet.org/eadmin.htm project?
Who would be the liaison contact for the IETF?

> consensus is that every IANA Registry using ISO 3166 codes will be from now

The consensus of whom?

> ICANN IANA zone, on such case the authority should be the GAC. The

The logic of how the use of an ISO international standard could be construed
as representing a US position completely eludes me.

> consensus is that generally the US point of view on local culture does bear

I'm curious to learn what this "US point of view on local culture" is,
and where (and by whom) this weighty pronouncement was made.

> Registry decided by its own Culture Ministry.

I don't think the US even has a Culture Ministry.  If there is one, it goes by
some other name and keeps a *very* low profile.

> It is also agreed that the US position should be read as a support of the

Agreed by whom?  The US position where?

> the ISO tags or built from ISO tables, and to use x-tags.

The consensus of whom?

Randy

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From: r&d afrac <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 03 Jul 2005 17:15:32 +0200

>What position in what forum are you talking about?

Sorry, due to its importance I expected this information was known to 
everyone. I sent the URL in another mail.

>Who would be the liaison contact for the IETF?

as previously explained ICANN published the ICP-3 document. IETF 
disregarded the call. Intlnet carried this experimentation along with the 
ICANN guidlines (named dot-root). This permitted to identify both the needs 
(as the USA do today) and ways to address them. We incorporated AFRAC to 
explore the solutions we identified. The architectural stability of the 
world digital ecosystem and the end to end principle call for (at least) 
the national distribution of the reference sources (IANA): Common 
Refeference Centers. The NICSO has the mission to advise Govs, ccTLDs and 
National Internet Communities over the transition.

> > consensus is that every IANA Registry using ISO 3166 codes will be from now

The people I polled who are involved in the study/project of a CRC projects 
interested in the AFRAC work.

>as representing a US position completely eludes me.

Read the US Statement of Principles.

>I'm curious to learn what this "US point of view on local culture" is

the many who would like to know it!

>I don't think the US even has a Culture Ministry.

This is precisely the problem :-)

>If there is one, it goes by some other name and keeps a *very* low profile.

You may know that in many countries of the world, this Ministry is a key 
one. What is really a problem is that ietf-languages may consider deciding 
anything about languages and countries without involving these Ministries. 
And that this Draft does not consider them.

>Agreed by whom?

By some who have the capacity to do it and that the US position 
acknowledges as in charge, as far as it has been quickly discussed 
evaluated. There is no reason to think ohers would see it differently: they 
share the same interests as the US Governments, within the frame of their 
own culture and policies. Obviously now the international community is to 
organise its intergovernance.

With the hope that this WG will cease to be one of its problem.  The USA 
considered their critical infrastructure but also the American way of life 
(http://whitehouse.gov/pcipb) . Other countries consider also the same 
their language and culture. This WG will obviously not be an international 
problem, but certainly its Registry will be a reason for national 
alternative-IANA, based on the international community solutions (ISO).

jfc