On Sat, 3 Sep 2016 14:21:22 -0700, Asmus Freytag (c) wrote: > I don't think that there should be a place on this list for accusing > people of dishonesty and / or spreading "neo-nazi junk"; and I don't > know what the marriage status of the editors has to do with anything. > > The central concern of the FAZ article appears to be the role that > private entities play as gate-keepers of modern communication. That's > actually a valid concern (see issues like net-neutrality, algorithm > based search returns and news-feeds and the like). The fact that fine > distinctions of a technical nature may have been handled with less > precision than insiders would prefer, is perhaps sloppy, but pretty > typical for journalism in general. > > None of that warrants the kind of loaded language used here. > > A./ > > PS: must admit, I haven't followed the FAZ in a while, so I have no > personal knowledge of any changes that may have happened in recent > years, but in earlier times the Feuilleton (the section that this > article appeared in) used to be fairly liberal in outlook, certainly not > given to the extremist views that they are accused of here. And I can > detect no evidence that the charges below have any merit.
I admit that I mistook my language level. In front of the long discussion on the Unicode List triggered by that FAZ paper, Iʼve ended up bursting out. The main concern as Doug Ewellʼs last question underscores it, is whether the attack against the Unicode Consortium is justified in any way, or is mere calumny. Further research brings up that the author of the paper is a very young freelance journalist.[1] That confirms my suspicion that having no children in age of using an iPhone, he doesnʼt feel concerned with Appleʼs choice. However he is right in that, at the very end of his article he points out the risk of the waterpistol emoji being intended as such and received on Android: “Die in Codes formulierte Entwaffnungspolitik kehrt sich in ihr Gegenteil, wenn ein iPhone-Nutzer seine Freunde zu einer Wasserschlacht einlädt und ihnen per SMS ein Wasserpistolen-Emoji schickt: Dann erscheint auf dem Samsung-Gerät keine Wasserpistole, sondern ein Revolver. Und das könnten die Empfänger womöglich missverstehen.” [revised Google translation: “The disarmament policy that is formulated in codes is reversed into its opposite when an iPhone user invites his friends to a water fight and sends them a water pistol emoji by SMS: Then the Samsung device does not display a water pistol, but a revolver. Something that the receivers could possibly misunderstand.”] Arguing by this very rare case is consistent with the facts-twisting used in other parts of the article. This casts a crude twilight on the authorʼs approach. Harsh wording such as “doppelzüngig” (deceitful, speaking of Apple and Microsoft); “schleift das Recht auf freie Meinungsäußerung” (grinds the right on Free Speech, as of Apple), pointed as a “Skandal”; “zeugt von einer verqueren Sicht der Dinge” (brings evidence of an awry/askew/screwy point of view) contrasts with an obvious lack of knowledge when talking of Unicode as both proposing and accepting emoji… As is outlined by a readerʼs comment, while emoji are formally in the first place, the demonstration is biased with a mix-up involving speech, then applied to emoji to make the reader believe that the Orwell-reminiscence is really well-placed. Unicode and big tech companies are always patient targets for attacks of that kind. As pointed by another commenting reader: A tempest in a teapot. I remember the FAZ feuilleton over a decade ago too, appearing to me always as high-quality journalism. A quick look at the last article from the same author[2] makes me believe that truth and accuracy still conform to the standard. In return, Iʼm left back with the troublesome question: Why do they hate Unicode, Apple and Microsoft? Marcel [1] https://www.linkedin.com/in/adrian-lobe-aa3057b7 [2] http://www.faz.net/aktuell/feuilleton/debatten/wer-haftet-fuer-luegen-die-algorithmen-verbreiten-14416032.html
