On Sat, 26 Nov 2005, Bob W wrote:
UK is the United Kingdom, which is the name of the political entity consisting of England, Scotland and Northern Ireland, so you must turn the
Wales?
UK domain name into 'United Kingdom', however much like Middle Earth that may seem. Strictly speaking, England, Scotland and Wales do not exist as countries. Wales was annexed into England in the 13th or 14th century. England and Scotland became the United Kingdom of Great Britain through the Act of Union of 1701 (?). Later it became the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and following the creation of Eire in 1920 (?) it became the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. In recent years the Welsh, Scottish and Irish have had devolved regional parliaments, with limited powers.
The Welsh the Scots and the *Northern* Irish have these devolved parliaments; the Republic of Ireland (EIRE) is a different country, with its own parliament.
If you use the word England to refer to the whole of the UK you will tend to upset a lot of the Welsh, Scots and Irish. So unless you specifically mean England without Scotland, Wales or Ireland, stick to United Kingdom (UK) or Great Britain (GB).
I am not sure GB and UK are interchangeable really; I am led to believe that GB is a subset of UK, lacking NI. But I am an immigrant, not a local.
Kostas
