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Good day, good morning.

~bartender, I'll have an infinite amount of coffee today.

It's been a while since I last posted around these parts of the web, or anywhere on the whole internet, for that matter. Indeed, I've been mostly away for the last few months. Not that I've been completely disconnected, I do watch stuff on youtube, though not as much as I used to, and not the kind of content that the so-called algorithm tries to force-feed you with. In other words, I've been judicious in my use of internet content.

I have actually been frequenting the pub, both the midnight pub and the smol pub, but mostly as a viewer, reading every new post but not actively participating. Whenever I open a web browser it's either to find the meaning of a word, perhaps some concrete piece of information (such as the location of a city or the date of a certain event), or to peruse the pubs and see what is new. I've been staying away from "social media" and from anonymous boards and all that garbage. Which brings me to the topic of today's discussion.

For many years it was the English-

speaking internet where I spent the

The problem goes beyond mere

politics, though, and I would say

This has already become a bit of a

long rant, but these are points

I leave this to your consideration,

and cordially invite you to *use

I have another "observation" to make.

During my time at university I had a very rare opportunity. A group of us went to the library (special appointment) to have a look at some really important works. I remember only two of them:

* "Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica" by Sir Isaac Newton, published in 1687!

* some Introduction to Geometry.

The second one was a smallish piece, and I could read the first few paragraphs: "A point is a nothing (has no extent in dimension). A (straight) line consists of points ..." I could read the text and understand it to some extent. It was written in Latin.

So my point is this: at other times, other languages were the "lingua franca" of some large region. It does change over time, provided you are tuning your time scale and patience.

Cheers,

~ew

English is the only "other" language I am able to communicate beyond food, shelter, transport. I'm not fluent in Spanish any more, and I was never able to read a book in Spanish. This place is mostly English. If it were not, I would probably not be interested --- just because I cannot decipher Chinese script, for example.

Sadly, English is my native language, and I live in the heart of the Beast. I do speak and read Spanish, and can struggle through French with a little help. But I don't think I'm going to pick up Arabic or Chinese any time soon. And while I have a little tlhIngan Hol, it's not very practical for online interactions.

I do also code switch between standard English and a non-standard dialect, but that dialect is only written as either standard, or in cringe-worthy "eye dialect".

It's an interesting take, but I

don't particularly agree. I think

I guess the language you chose to write in must depend on what you are trying to achieve. If you have something important and major to say to the world, say it in english, so everyone will here you. If it's more personal or cultural, write it in your own tongue, so it sounds and reads like it should.

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