[gnso-idn-wg] Passing on a request for aliasing of IDNs
hi, I know this issue really isn't on the table yet, but I want to pass on the content of an issue that several people passed on to me in Geneva last week at the IGF consultations. I got essentially the same request from 2 native Arabic speakers and 1 native Chinese speaker. The request surprised me as I had not given it consideration, but after several hours of conversations, it starts to make sense. The request was that IDN always be established with an unencoded ascii alias (staying out of the implementation details). I was given 3 basic reasons: - A concern that if site or email addresses can only be accessed with an IDN keyboard, then those using IDNs will essentially be cut off from the rest of the internet. I.e those without the right keyboard would not be able to communicate with them. - A compounded concern that this would lead to greater pressures for isolation and restriction of freedom of expression in certain countries. - A concern that when these people travelled abroad, they would be unable to communicate with people back home if they did not bring their national keyboards with them - i.e. it would prevent them using cyber cafes, borrowing a western friend's laptop or using the ubiquitous keyboard one finds at conferences etc. Obviously one could require them to use the xn-- encoding but this is almost as bad as using IP addresses (actually IPv4 addresses might be easier to use then the xn-- encoding - IPv6 might be a challenge) In any case I felt I should pass this concern on to this group. a.
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