[EURO-Discuss] [At-Large] UA Days

[Evan Leibovitch]

Hi Bill,

On Wed, Apr 3, 2024 at 12:18 PM Bill Jouris <b_jouris at yahoo.com> wrote:


> It seems to me that the function of UA day is inherently NOT directed at
> end users.  It is directed at getting vendors, those who provide software
> interfaces for end users, to make provision for IDNs.
>

Is it really directed at apps developers?

Consider that some of the apps in play are open source. ICANN could simply
contribute code to Mozilla, Thunderbird, Wordpress, Signal and other
projects to make their IDN support seamless. If that support is an
in-demand feature it will make those applications more desirable in a
competitive environment.


> End users are, of course, wildly unlikely to be writing their own
> browsers, email systems, etc., so they don't really need to be involved.
>

People aren't writing browsers, email systems, etc. to satisfy the needs of
ICANN, they're trying to meet the needs of end-users. So if end users don't
care about IDNs, neither will apps developers, since they have other
priorities such as speed, security, and *end-user* focused features such as
VPNs, form auto-completion, spell-checkers, incognito modes and so on.

  (Except to the extend that it would be useful to show some user demand
> when trying to convince vendors to become IDN compatible.)
>

End-user demand for IDNs isn't "useful", it's a mandatory prerequisite.
Without such bottom-up demand, app developers have no incentive to divert
resources. In the service of i18n developers place far more emphasis on
Unicode support, multilingual UI and multilingual integrated search
engines. If these features satisfy end-user needs then there is no reason
for them to spend extra effort on IDNs. Developers may well see IDNs as
just a way for ICANN and its contractors to peddle more domains, and
without end-user interest they have no incentive to facilitate that.

One must again remind that ICANN is not a treaty-backed organization. It
has no means to impose, let alone enforce, its decisions on the world. Its
solutions must be superior and *desired*. Thus, so long as end-user demand
is not seen as a *necessary* component in advancing IDNs, they will remain
a non-priority to developers and an avoidable risk to would-be IDN
registrants.

(Aside: I truly find it amazing that this argument even needs to be made
within the community tasked with advancing end-user interests within ICANN.)

Making end users aware of the option to use non-ASCII characters for these
> is, to my mind, an entirely separate discussion.
>

If so, that "separate discussion" is the only one worth having within *ICANN
At-Large*. Other constituencies (civil society, governments, the technical
community, etc) all have their own places to define and assert their own
needs.


> Both whether it is a worthwhile effort and how to go about it if so.  It
> is also something that would really need to be deferred until something
> like Universal Acceptance is available on at least the most widespread
> browsers and email systems.
>

Chicken and egg.
If end-users don't care about IDNs, browsers and apps won't support them.
If browsers and apps don't support IDNs, end-users won't care about them.

BTW, the objective is not for browsers to implement "UA".
Support for IDNs is the solution being pitched, UA is just the name of the
marketing campaign.


>   Pitching to end users, when the software they use does not yet support
> IDNs, would be counterproductive.
>

And THAT is why, 20 years from now, ICANN will still be wondering why IDNs
never caught on.

- Evan
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