2003-06-13 16:05 (UTC+1)

Vilka spr�k?

This short-lived fragment from the TLS is fun:

In the first place, the website of the Convention appears in eleven official EU languages. The number of official languages is set to burgeon, as ten new member states are admitted to the club. The Constitution will be valid in twenty-one tongues (including Estonian, Finnish, Irish, Maltese, Lithuanian and Slovenian).

EU officials and parliamentarians are shielded from the trials of Babel because they have bevies of translators. Anyone able to translate from Latvian into Greek or from Slovenian into Finnish is assured of a prosperous livelihood in the Brussels bureaucracy. For ordinary folk, the absence of any agreement to use one or two common languages will prove a high barrier. If citizens of the new Europe cannot speak to each other, how can they hope to create a live polity? In practice, English is likely to be the lingua franca. It is a sign of Continental prejudice that the EU refuses to recognize this....

At which point the article is truncated, before the author could correct the impression he gives of being a graceless twit. Even if it were inappropriate to translate everything into each language, this is the Constitution for crying out loud - surely it's worth pulling some stops out for the cornerstone of the EU?

Besides:

Europeiska unionen �r en demokratisk organisation och m�ste d�rf�r kommunicera med sina medborgare p� deras eget spr�k, likas� med medlemsstaternas regeringar och myndigheter, samt med f�retag och andra organisationer i hela EU.

[The European Union is a democratic organisation and must therefore communicate with its members in their own language, as well as the governments and official bodies of member states and companies and other organisations across the EU.]

As for those wicked fat-cat Latvian to Greek translators, our charmless friend appears to have missed some memos:

The introduction with the next enlargement of many new languages will make it necessary to simplify some of the Commission's working methods with an impact on use of languages. Examples include some translators moving on from translating solely into their mother tongue to translating into the "relay languages" of English, French and German; focusing on the real needs of the delegates in interpretation of meetings, to allows for optimal use of limited human resources (for example asymmetrical interpretation where many languages are interpreted into only a few); an increase in use of external translators to work on documents not considered related to core activities; or rationalisation and harmonisation of decision-making procedures (so that the Commission's internal current practice of examining documents on the basis of three language versions - the so- called "oral procedure" - or more whenever it is legally compulsory will be extended to the "written" decision procedure used for documents of a more technical nature, although all documents of a general legislative or regulatory nature will continue to be translated into all official languages before being sent to the other institutions).

The EU has many flaws, for sure, but it is working towards a radically new vision of a Europe in which nobody should ever feel obliged to invade Czechoslovakia, while all this twit apparently has to offer is lies about the burden of translation and an insistence that Foreigners should all speak English, dammit. Bah!

[TLSing via Language Hat]

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2003-06-13 10:09 (UTC+1)

The prinsess and the piggies, and the EU farm policies.

Kronprinsessan Victoria �r mitt uppe i en praktikperiod inom svenskt jord- och skogsbruk. P� torsdagen pl�jde och harvade hon och gullade med lyckliga grisar.

Kronprinsess Victoria is in the middle of a practical period in Swedish forestry and farming. On Thursday she ploughed and harrowed and gullade with happy pigs.

I don't know what "gullade" means (it's clearly the past tense of the verb "gulla") and when kronprinsesses are doing it with pigs it's best not to take risks, I always say. But what, you will be asking yourselves, does the lovely prinsess make of the EUs farm policies, and the reforms that will be needed in them as the union grows to accommodate some of the big, poor and largely agricultural economies to the East? (I bet Madeleine gets asked that all the time, too, don't you?)

TT: Var �r bra och d�ligt f�r Sverige med EU:s jordbrukspolitik?
- Det �r i alla fall n�got som inte jag ska svara p�, bem�tte Victoria.
- Men det var intressant att f� prata om det. Jag f�r se bredden och f�r en annan f�rst�else f�r Sveriges jordbruk.

[TT: "What are the pros and cons of the EU's farm policy for Sweden?"
"I'm certainly not going to answer that," answered Victoria, "But it was interesting to discuss them. I got to see a quite different perspective on Sweden's farms."]

The family business is in safe hands, don't you think?

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2003-06-12 16:15 (UTC and a bit)

Suspected fatal shark attack in UK!

Please not to dive into shark tank - it may cause distress:

A comedian could be prosecuted by an aquarium after he dived into a shark tank as a publicity stunt and then two days later one of the fish died.

Did the horrid man scare 'oo, poor ickle shark? Bad man!

Asked if the centre would prosecute, [a spokesperson] said: "If it turns out that there was no other reason for that shark to die then we would seriously think about it, yes."

Detective Inspector Harry "Snapper" Organs of the Yard was unavailable for comment at the time of going to press.

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2003-06-12 13:11 (UTC+1)

They don't like it up 'em, Sir.

In his conclusion, H portrays English as the greatest threat to the survival of most languages, including Spanish (particularly in Latin America) and his own native tongue, French. Ironically, H omits mentioning the danger that French itself poses to the survival of such languages as Breton, Proven�al or Occitan.

[Gary H Toops, reviewing Claude Hag�ge's Halte � la morte des langues in Language, v.79 no.1, March 2003]

Oh my aching sides but I will never tire of these (such) stuffs. Linguistics is such a bitchy discipline that it would be worth following even if it wasn't intrinsically interesting.

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2003-06-12 11:15 (UTC+1)

As any fule kno:

Let be a family of vector spaces and their direct sum. For each we define a linear mapping by the rule , where if , and . It is clear that is injective, and hence its image is a subspace of , isomorphic to . This subspace is called the component subspace of the index in , and is often identified with .

Dieudonn�, Foundations of Modern Analysis

This is from the very sarcastic appendix on linear algebra, which I'm reading to repair my deficiencies in the subject since it is the most fiercely compressed self-contained account imaginable. Two pages of that stuff (and the quoted material is "obvious" when you unpack it, but Dieudonn� has of course not limited himself to finite or even countable dimension here) in an evening and my brain is crying Uncle, but that would be a good ten pages in a lesser treatment.

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2003-06-11 16:33 (UTC+1)

Jack and the Booklist

One of the local (big chain) bookshops has just emailed me again to enquire about my reading list, by which they mean of the many courses I shall be teaching come Autumn. Last year I disabused them, but they don't seem to learn. I wonder what would happen if I claimed to be teaching a course in Computational Mythology which required everyone to read, say, La Pens�e sauvage, Norbert Weiner's Cybernetics, assorted papers by Shannon, some Marshall McLuhan, Italo Calvino's collection of Italian folk-tales, The Golden Bough and the Lisp 1.5 programmer's manual.

Maybe I should appoint myself Acting Privatdozent and actually teach the course, too, dammit. Or maybe we're not in 19th century Germany anymore. (You do know that Schopenhauer started his career by deliberately scheduling his lectures to clash with those of Hegel, whom he despised, with the obvious-to-everyone-else result that nobody showed up, right? Pretty bloody optimistic for a pessimist, if you ask me.)

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2003-06-11 11:42 (UTC+1)

Birthdaypartyprinsess and stuff

Princessan Madeleine's 21st birthday party was probably insanely glamourous and that, but I was washing my hair last night and couldn't make it. Aftonbladet doesn't seem to have been invited either so their coverage is all papparazzi exit shots and stuff, which isn't really all that engrossing really.

Meanwhile, the BBC is reporting on the plans to teach British childrens languages at primary schools:

There have been longstanding concerns about the lack of modern language skills - and the government has a target to provide language lessons for 7 to 11 year olds by the end of the decade.

One problem is that there aren't any teachers, but never mind - this continues to be an intriguing experiment, and I'm sure it will only get more interesting when they get around to actually doing stuff. I kind of suspect that "by the end of the decade" it will be even less imperative to know French (which is almost certain to be the main language taught in this scheme - they're talking of shipping in French persons for the purpose) than it is now, and that's pretty unimperative. The language market is already very asymmetric and becoming more so, and there simply isn't a compelling economic case for a British person to learn any one of the second languages offered, even if you think there's a moral case for learning any one of them as a counterweight to smug insularity (in which case it would make almost as much sense to teach Dutch or Basque as French or German, and it would certainly amuse me if they did).

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2003-06-10 10:49 (UTC+1)

Heb-heb-hebdo

Point de Vue has a Kronprinsfred special on the occasion of his 35th birthday, and continues to pine after an announcement re. l'affaire Knudella, more cautiously than some:

Billedbladet cependent, comme la presse danoise ensemble, interpr�te les moindres informations. La magazine ose m�me une date pour leur mariage: �l'�t�, sans doubte le 23 ao�t�.

[Billedbladet however, like the Danish press in general, interprets at the least hint. The magazine even risks a date for the marriage: "summer - the 23rd of August, for sure."]

We von Bladets stick together through thick and thin, of course, but between yourself and mine, Varied Reader, cousin Billed has always had an impetuous streak. If I'm any guide to Danish public opinion, which is admittedly fairly unlikely, the prevailing mood would be "yeah, just get on with it, already," although there would also be a minority hoping that KPF will surprise everyone and elope with Britney Spears (or, better yet, Brad Pitt).

Even less plausible, but apparently true, Le Point has some truly startling revelations:

D'apres les sp�cialistes, le vieille m�fiance des Fran�ais face � l'anglais serait plus une pudeur d'adolescent coinc� qu'un r�elle incapacit� a susurrer le �through� de Shakespeare.

[...] Confront� � la difficult� de communiquer en plusieurs langues depuis son internationalisation, notamment depuis son alliance avec Nissan en 1999, Renault a mis 6 millions d'euros sur la table pour augmenter le niveau d'anglais de ses saleri�s, cadres et non cadres. Au risque de terroriser son personnel, Louis Schweitzer, son pr�sident, � m�me d�cret� l'anglais deuxieme langue officielle de la maison!

[According to specialists the traditional French distrust of English was more like adolescent shyness than a real inability to whisper the "through" of Shakespeare.

[...] Confronted with the difficulty of communicating in several languages as a result of growing internationalisation, not least its 1999 alliance with Nissan, Renault has earmarked 6 million Euros for improving the standard of English of both executive and non-executive employees. At the risk of terrorising his staff CEO Louis Schweitzer has even declared English the company's official second language!]

Blimey. The mind, she boggle, is it not? The magazine also reviews a selection of English cassette (�K7�; say it en fran�ais and you'll see) and multimedia courses, and features the micro-city of Wells (as in "the baby-eating bishop of Bath and", yes) in its holiday section. I've been to Wells, and the town-dominating cathedral - which has a list of bishops going back to �thelpants and whatnot carved on a special bishop-name-carving-stone - is worth a look, although the whole experience is much improved by a festive covering of snow and some wide-eyed Japanese tourists to show around (not included). And plenty of beer, but you knew that.

Also, Desbladet remains committed to giving you, our Varied Reader, the best bladeting experience possible, so we are trying out a new message board service for your comfort and convenience. Do let us know what you think!

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2003-06-10 08:45 (UTC+1)

On the Middle-East Peace Process

"Crawling at your feet," said the Gnat (Alice drew her feet back in some alarm), "you may observe a Bread-and-butter-fly. Its wings are thin slices of bread- and- butter, its body is a crust, and its head is a lump of sugar."
"And what does it live on?"
"Weak tea with cream in it."
A new difficulty came into Alice's head.
"Supposing it couldn't find any?" she suggested.
"Then it would die, of course."
"But that must happen very often," Alice remarked thoughtfully.
"It always happens," said the Gnat.

[Alice through the Looking Glass, Ch. III]

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2003-06-09 11:19 (UTC+1)

Of time and travel

My body is not back on Yoorpean time, that's for sure, but let's try and jolt it back by reminiscing of the Eurovision Song Contest, somewhat belatedly.

I only caught the second half of the radio-cast, since I was faffing urgently in a packing manner (I left the next day) and the cricket had run a bit late to allow England to demolish Zimbabwe in just three days (spookily, I got back to find England demolishing Zimbabwe in just three days again. It's just as well they're rubbish or we'd have to recallibrate our expectations) and so I missed the hilarious antics of Russia's finest comedy "lesbians", although I can't imagine there's much point to them on the radio. Of the songs I heard, I thought Norway's was the best (and I'm not just saying that - I went for Malta last year, remember?) and the UK truly and deeply deserved their historic nil points - it was a wretched song, delivered grotesquely out of tune. They've changed the system again so we don't have to sit out next year, of course, but it's surely about time we sent a song (and performer(s)) that aren't a major international embarrassment?

(Next year, as I say every year, I shall try to find myself somewhere where people actually like the event, festivities for the having of.)

I did try explaining Eurovision to American persons, you will rejoice to know, but I don't know if they got it. (I suspect it has to be experienced to be properly understood.)

2003-06-07 17:17 (UTC+1)

Desbladet Business Focus

[Update: This really was written while drunk on Budweiser, the King of Beers(TM), in a hotel room in Utah, posted from my mum's house in London, and now fixed up from my office in Bristol.]

- Hi, welcome to Desbladet Business Focus, I'm Des von Bladet.
- And I'm Janet Cohost. Today we'll be talking about Google. Des, how do you see Google's business model?
- Well, Janet, Google's core strength is as an information broker.
- An information broker?
- Exactly. A broker is someone who connects people who have something, some commodity, with people who want it.
- And that is what Google does with information.
- Right! Tell Google what you want to know about, and it'll find you the site that has that stuff, and they do that better than anyone else in the business.
- That's for sure! But isn't the business model different there? Brokers usually charge a fee for each transaction? Google doesn't charge, but it does have advertising.
- Well, that's a good point, Janet. But Google's model of advertising is a remarkably well-thought out scheme that allows them to leverage their core strengths and actually turn relatively small, "niche" [he pronounces this "nitch" and makes the air-quotes gesture] markets into real bankable profits.
- So they don't need to rely on the big clients like Funyuns, America's favoritest - and onioniest snack?
- No, although Funyuns are both lip-smackingly tasty and surprisingly low in fat, so I'm sure that they'd be only to pleased to handle the account if it came their way.
- But Funyuns aside -
- Hey, put them my side would ya? [Both chuckle]
- How does Google's advertising fit in with their role as information brokers?
- It's really very similar, Janet. As Hari Seldon might have said, any sufficiently well-targeted advertising is indistinguishable from a useful service.
- Huh?
- Well, think of advertising, in particular the kind of pay-per-click-through advertising that Google does, as eyeball brokering.
- More brokering?
- Sure! Advertisers are people who want eyeballs looking at their stuff, and Google can find them the people who want to see that stuff.
- And this time, they do get paid for it!
- Exactly. So they can manage to make money almost as a sideline from hooking people up with the information they're looking for.
- And how do you see Google's recent purchase of Blogger?
- I think that's a real win-win deal, and at the heart of that is Blogspot.com.
- The free hosting service for Blogger blogs?
- Sure. If you're brokering eyeballs then blogs are absolutely the best kind of content you could imagine - it's generated for you completely free and each blog typically draws a set of regular, repeat visitors with a core set of interests. And of course each free blog at Blogspot.com has an obligatory banner advert every time it's loaded.
- And if there's one thing Google knows about any web-site, it's what key words are a good match for it - that comes straight out of the data they're collecting for their search engine anyway.
- Yes.
- So they have a huge collection of sites, each with a loyal audience of repeat visitors, plus surf-through traffic, and they know exactly what they've come there for? It's an advertiser's dream!
- Right, Janet, and -
- And what's more, the whole process is automated. And Google's algorithm's are going to be eating the so-called "Semantic Web"'s lunch for a looong time to come.
- That's for sure, for sure.
- What Google seems to have grasped is something that a lot of telecommunications and media people seem to have missed.
- It is?
- Sure! Selling content may be where the glamor is, but it's also risky. Creating communication infrastructure and getting out of the way is where the steady money is, and Google is the best there is at increasing the liquidity of content and making money out of the process.
- "Liquidity"?
- Liquidity, yes.
- Right. And that's all from Desbladet Business News for today, brought to you with the great taste of Pepsi.
- It's Mormon for Coke!

[Inspired by Torill, who blogged on the subject again recently, although I'm not going to dig out the citation on a machine this hostile for sure sorry.

Link added, hoorah for Linux boxen]

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2003-06-07 17:13 (UTC+1)

Back home

Staying with my mother, slept 15 hours straight last "night". Before that I launched a raid on the local second-hand bookshop and scored a book of phonetic readings by Daniel Jones, which appears to be signed by Daniel Jones, hurrah (for a pound, hurrah).

Next up, the long-promised long post.