[Latingp] Sharp S and Allocatable vs Blocked

[Michael Bauland]

Hi Dennis,

On 05.09.2019 21:02, Tan Tanaka, Dennis via Latingp wrote:
> The primary reason we are considering this case is due to the IDNA
> issue. And the proposed allocatable solution is to minimize the
> misconnection issue that arises with certain browsers. The linguistic
> argument is a moot point (in my opinion) greatly in part because it is
> not a clear cut rule (i.e. swapping sharp s with “ss”, or vice versa,
> can alter the meaning of a word) and it can be argued that the target
> market of sharp S (Germany) has been conditioned (by their country code
> registry operator) that domain names using sharp s and “ss” are different.

I have to disagree here for two reasons:
1. Although Germany is the main market (due to the large population) we
must not forget Austria and Switzerland (and there are also border
regions in neighbouring countries where German is the mother tongue).
Those countries also speak the same language (well, more or less at
least). At least for Swiss people there is no real difference between ß
and ss as they spell all their words with ss instead of ß ... while at
the same time accepting ß when reading as a totally valid spelling.

2. Even though Denic (.de registry) decided to make ß and ss different,
it's hardly the case that the people in Germany are "conditioned" in any
way. From my experience (I haven't read any official studies related to
this topic) I would say that more than half of the people aren't even
aware that they can use ß in domain names.

Cheers,

Michael

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