Mark Crispin scripsit:
Is ASCII formally abolished as the lingua franca of email addresses,
meaning that some people will be unable to use ASCII addresses?
All email addresses will continue to have an ASCII *representation*, which
will not, for most people, have mnemonic value. It may therefore be useful
to have two email addresses, one which can be decoded into a non-ASCII
representation and is good for fellow-countrymen, and another which cannot
be decoded, but has mnemonic value for those who use the Latin script.
If so, how many email addresses will a diplomat (or any other individual
engaged in multinational business) need?
That's like asking how many languages should appear on your business card.
As many as the different kinds of people with whom you habitually interact.
If not, doesn't that create a two tier world of persons who have usable
international addresses and those who have domestic-only addresses? It is
not difficult to envision that in many countries, an ASCII address would
be a privilege available only to select individuals (much as a phone line
with international dialing).
No address is quite domestic-only, though it may be a meaningless jumble
to people who are interacting with the ASCII representation. Still,
a good friend of mine has the already very annoying email address of
<Onederful111s(_at_)[censored](_dot_)net>, yes lower-case ell followed by three
digit ones. Go figure.
Many decades ago, one of my professors told me something that I have
always kept in mind since: "you have to learn to walk before you learn to
run."
Actually, running before walking is quite possible in child development. :-)
--
I marvel at the creature: so secret and John Cowan
so sly as he is, to come sporting in the pool
jcowan(_at_)reutershealth(_dot_)com
before our very window. Does he think that http://www.reutershealth.com
Men sleep without watch all night? --Faramir http://www.ccil.org/~cowan