- From: Martin Duerst <duerst@it.aoyama.ac.jp>
- Date: Mon, 05 May 2008 11:19:10 +0900
- To: Leif Halvard Silli <lhs@malform.no>, John Cowan <cowan@ccil.org>
- Cc: Gunnar Bittersmann <gunnar.bittersmann@web.de>, Frank Ellermann <hmdmhdfmhdjmzdtjmzdtzktdkztdjz@gmail.com>, www-international@w3.org
At 09:57 08/05/05, Leif Halvard Silli wrote: > >John Cowan 2008-05-05 02.16: >> Leif Halvard Silli scripsit: >> >> > Let's say I was a Swiss German Language enthusiast, using Apache, with a > site in Swiss German and English. Main target audience: German > speakers, 99,99% of them without 'gsw' enabled. >> If you want to target German-speakers, write in Standard German. >> Otherwise you are in the position of someone writing in Icelandic and >> targeting Nynorsk users. They won't have a clue. >> > >That comparsion does't hold water for a second. How so? >> > You may say I should not tag it as 'de', but can you say positively what > I should I do then, to reach my audience? Teach the hundred millions of > Germans how to insert 'gsw' into their browser? >> >> Don't use language negotiation, but explicit links instead. >> > >All language negotation seems to require a direct link fallback. > >> > > People in Germany (and Switzerland!), used to read German >> > > every day, but rarely if ever seeing or reading Swiss German, have, >> > > relatively speaking, much more difficulties. I'm Swiss, [...] >> > > I fail to see that this is a real argument against 'de-gsw'. >> >> He really really doesn't want to see gsw even if it's available, >> *even though* he speaks gsw natively. The fallback is worse than useless. >> > >I assume that he is interested if he visits my web site. I might be interested in a site about Swiss German containing some comparisons between dialects or temporal comparisons, some literary work in Swiss German, or some audio content. But as for myself, I'd want the descriptive text on this Web site to be written in standard German, so that I can actually read it without guessing and spending lots more time than necessary. I'd assume that at least 99% of the Swiss German speaking population, even real hard-core Swiss German enthusiasts, would prefer that. The argument that I would want to read everything in Swiss German if I visit a Web site that is completely in Swiss German doesn't really work, because it's circular. Regards, Martin. #-#-# Martin J. Du"rst, Assoc. Professor, Aoyama Gakuin University #-#-# http://www.sw.it.aoyama.ac.jp mailto:duerst@it.aoyama.ac.jp
Received on Monday, 5 May 2008 09:25:19 UTC