Doug wrote: > Perhaps that is Peter's point: that some day, changes in the membership > and market pressures (which have shown to be an influence on other ISO > committees) could result in a different attitude toward the written > policies of WG2 from that which currently exists. <excision of digression> > <digression> > </digression> </excision of digression>
> It seems clear that the current "enlightened" WG2 membership is > committed to both the letter and spirit of the current stability policy > (to the dismay of Peter, who would like to see certain changes in names, > combining classes, etc.). But there is really no way we can predict > whether the eventual successors to Ken, Michael, Rick, Michel, etc. will > share the same commitment. This is not a matter of personalities here. One of the reasons why "national bodies" (the standardization organizations of the various countries that participate in the ISO framework) make longterm commitments to participation in the ISO standards is to ensure the *stability* of the standards that concern them. With an ISO standard as important as 10646 in the docket, you can be assured that there will be continued U.S. national interest (among others) to ensure that continued stability in key points in the standard. As long as *anyone* is proposing changes to that key standard, it is unlikely that U.S. participation will drop off, even if Ken, Michael, Michel, Rick, and whoever else talk about stability on the Unicode list retire and pass on the torches to some younguns to take over. When 10646 becomes as ossified as ASCII, which *nobody* in their right minds (or even slightly addled minds) is suggesting would be benefited by further tinkering, then the national body participation will drop off, and 10646 will be unchanged and unchangeable, simply because there will be no participation and no means of change. It will simply become an unchangeable, published, final standard. Because of its scope, however, 10646 is still very much alive right now, with lots of people still bringing in suggestions for additions and changes. And so we have to have these arguments and make decisions between allowable additions and bad ideas that would be destabilizing. > Remember that most of us once believed in > the stability of ISO 3166 as well. Different case, however. Not all ISO standards are created alike. --Ken
