<p dir="ltr">+1@Ayden.<br>
Ï have noticed it too. <br>
According to the topic in discussion here , my question is this : is ICANN à real mulistakeholdes oganization or not ? If it is one, so diversity and multilinguism needs to be promoted within it ecosystem. Imho. </p>
<p dir="ltr">Happy New year 2019 to you all.<br>
Olevie Agbenyo </p>
<div class="gmail_quote">Le 31 déc. 2018 12:08 PM, "Ayden Férdeline" <<a href="mailto:icann@ferdeline.com">icann@ferdeline.com</a>> a écrit :<br type="attribution"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">Thanks, Sam-<br><div><br></div><div>A very small correction, I believe that comment should be attributed to James Gannon, and not Michael Karanicolas. <br></div><div><br></div><div>Best wishes, Ayden <br></div><div><div><br></div></div><div><br></div><div>‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐<br></div><div> On Friday, December 28, 2018 6:48 PM, Sam Lanfranco <<a href="mailto:lanfran@YORKU.CA" target="_blank">lanfran@YORKU.CA</a>> wrote:<br></div><div> <br></div><blockquote type="cite"><span style="font-family:Tahoma"><span style="font-size:13px"><div><span style="font-size:16px">Michael Karanicolas has written: "<span style="color:#0000ff">I
still believe that based on the ICANN meeting reports that language
services are largely unused by the community and represent a huge
overhead that we maintain purely to make ourselves look inclusive rather
than providing a set of services that are actually used by the
community</span>". </span><br></div><div><span style="font-size:16px"></span><br></div><div><span style="font-size:16px">ICAHN is not alone with this dilemma, and I also feel that the expenditures mainly result in nice optics, while miss-allocating increasingly scarce ICANN resources. In other work that I do there are a variety of approaches to deal with multiple languages and equitable access by all. Here is an effort out of the <b><i>Bibliotheca Alexandrina</i></b> to deal with the language issue at the text level. While this applies to the language of health science, there are possible lessons here with regard to ICANN's overall text strategy in a multilingual world. Admittedly we are much less down this road when it comes to simultaneous translation, but savings on any linguistic front free resources for the more difficult multilingual issues. </span><br></div><div><span style="font-size:16px"></span><br></div><div><span style="font-size:16px">Sam Lanfranco</span><br></div><div><span style="font-size:16px"></span><br></div><div><div><br></div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:32px"><div><img src="cid:5f6b2ccd@ferdeline.com" style="margin-right:0px" alt="image.png" width="219" height="123"><br></div></span></span></span></span><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:34.26px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="margin:0px"></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:34.26px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:32px">Multilingual
Science</span><span style="font-size:16px"> </span></span><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px">There
are 6500 languages
in the world, but only one language of science, English. </span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px">The
Library
of Alexandria and Scientists in Developing countries aim
to change this.</span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:13.33px"> </span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><i><span style="color:rgb(255,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px">"Health
is a state of
complete physical, mental, and social well-being and
not merely the absence of
disease or infirmity". (WHO)</span></span></i><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px"> </span></span><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px">"الصحة
هي حالة من
الصحة البدنية والعقلية والاجتماعية الكاملة وليس مجرد
غياب المرض أو
العجز"(Arabic)</span></span><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px"> </span></span><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px">Here
is the WHO
definition of Health in English and Arabic. In the next
5 years, all
journals can become multilingual.</span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:13.33px"> </span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px">The Library
of Alexandria is ushering in a new era of
multilingual science. Reducing the burden of
translation, indeed promotes
openness and scholarship.</span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:13.33px"> </span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px">“We
build too many walls and not enough bridges” (I. Newton)</span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px">One
of the major walls of science is one of different
languages.</span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:13.33px"> </span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px"><b><i>We
are writing to you with a simple idea.</i></b> In 2006 Vint Cerf
(the
father of the Internet) told us about google translate,
and we were excited to
build a language translator into our Supercourse, and
the Library of
Alexandria. However, much of it produced was
Gibberish. We tried again five years ago, and google
translate
captured the “gist” of the materials, however, it was
still a bit
messy. In the past few months we have seen a major
improvement in
translation capabilities with a new approach called </span></span><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:14px">Google
Neural Machine Translation</span></span><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px"> which
produced marked improvement in accuracy, and we feel
is now acceptable to build multilingual science world
wide.</span></span><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><b><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px"></span></span></b></span></span></span></span><br></p><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><b><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px">Multilingual
Translation of Science </span></span><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></b></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px">We
propose to establish a beta version of a translation
button to
be made available to all journals for free. We would
capture metrics
of usage, and concerns of translation. We would like to
have you join. We are
planning a 6-month beta version; after which we will
decide whether to
continue. We will help you add the button to your
journal and site.</span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:13.33px"> </span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px">Please
contact Ronald LaPorte, Ph.D. (Emeritus professor
University of Pittsburgh)</span></span><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><u><span style="color:rgb(5,99,193)"><span style="font-size:16px"><a style="color:rgb(17,85,204)" href="mailto:ronaldlaporte@gmail.com" target="_blank">ronaldlaporte@gmail.com</a></span></span></u><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px">Ismail
Serageldin, Ph.D.</span></span><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p><div><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"></span></span></span></span><br></div><p style="font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:400;line-height:20px;font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;margin:0px;text-align:left;text-transform:none;text-indent:0px;letter-spacing:normal;text-decoration:none;word-spacing:0px;white-space:normal;font-size-adjust:none;font-stretch:100%"><span style="background-color:transparent"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-size:13.33px"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-size:16px">Professor
Emeritus, Library of Alexandria, Alexandria, Egypt</span></span></span></span></span></span><br></p></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><blockquote style="border-left:solid 2px #000000;margin-left:5px;padding-left:5px"><div>---- Original Message ----<br></div><div><b>From</b>: Michael Karanicolas <<a href="mailto:mkaranicolas@GMAIL.COM" target="_blank">mkaranicolas@GMAIL.COM</a>><br></div><div><b>To</b>: <a href="mailto:NCSG-DISCUSS@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU" target="_blank">NCSG-DISCUSS@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU</a><br></div><div><b>Sent</b>: Fri, Dec 28, 2018, 12:01 PM<br></div><div><b>Subject</b>: Re: Thoughts on the Proposed ICANN Org Budget for FY20<br></div><div><br></div><div dir="ltr"><div>Interesting conversation. Thanks very much Ayden for going through the budget doc to kick this off - which is important work.<br></div><div><br></div><div>"I still believe that based on the ICANN meeting reports that language services are largely unused by the community and represent a huge overhead that we maintain purely to make ourselves look inclusive rather than providing a set of services that are actually used by the community. I haven’t looked at recent figures, but back during ICANN Dublin I believe that the majority of the interpretation channels were used by less than 10 people at huge expense to the org, we need to really look at wether language services are actually delivering any ROI or are we merely spending to look good in this area."<br></div><div><br></div><div>As an English speaker, I'm always a bit hesitant about jumping into this issue, as I know I have the privilege/advantage of having my native language as the default. It's quite possible that ICANN's main concern here is the optics, but that's not something to be entirely discounted either. As an organization that strives to be international and inclusive, I think they like having a UN-esque model of translation. Still - I wonder if there isn't a better way of doing things, like potentially arranging an opt-in system, where users could pre-request language services for a meeting, and they'd only be provided if a certain number of people registered for a given language. That could also help them be better targeted as well - and have interpreters in the sessions where they're most needed, as opposed to just in the main rooms by default. May be something that's worth raising.<br></div><div><br></div></div></blockquote></span></span></blockquote><div><br></div></blockquote></div>