- From: Misha Wolf <Misha.Wolf@reuters.com>
- Date: Wed, 02 Apr 2003 17:52:08 +0100
- To: "Kurosaka, Teruhiko" <Teruhiko.Kurosaka@iona.com>
- Cc: Www International <www-international@w3.org>, public-webont-comments@w3.org
In general, the string formed by concatenating: 1. a person's "lastname" 2. the string ", " 3. the person's "firstname" is meaningless, as, in general, we have no idea what "lastname" or "firstname" mean, other than the obvious: the name component some person writes last and the name component some person writes first. The implication that the resulting string is useful is not culturally neutral. Misha -----Original Message----- From: Kurosaka, Teruhiko [mailto:Teruhiko.Kurosaka@iona.com] Sent: 02 April 2003 17:04 To: Misha Wolf Cc: Www International; public-webont-comments@w3.org Subject: RE: "lastname" and "firstname" are not culturally neutral Misha, I feel the other way. The notion of the firstname and the lastname are culturally neutral (exclusing those cultures where the person's name cannot always be divided into two parts.), if you interpret the firstname and the lastname literally being the first part and the last part of the person's name. It would have been culturally biased if the text in question were: For example, one ontology may represent a person's name as a single string "givenname surname" while another may have a property for each. But I agree this can be confusing for those readers who interpret the firstname being synonym to the give name and the lastname the surname. A less confusing example would be appreciated. KUROSAKA Teruhiko p.s. Being contrarian, I am trying to answer my surname KUROSAKA when somebody ask me for my first name, but maintaining this position is difficuilt in U.S.A. -------------------------------------------------------------- -- Visit our Internet site at http://www.reuters.com Get closer to the financial markets with Reuters Messaging - for more information and to register, visit http://www.reuters.com/messaging Any views expressed in this message are those of the individual sender, except where the sender specifically states them to be the views of Reuters Ltd.
Received on Wednesday, 2 April 2003 11:52:17 UTC