It will soon be possible to access the Chosun Ilbo online by typing in the name in Hangeul (조선일보.한국), instead of Latin script. At the opening ceremony of the 36th meeting of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), president Rod Beckstrom said that a board meeting on Friday will approve plans for a multilingual address system.
Using the Internet will become much easier for many around the world if they can use their own alphabet. Korean is already used as part of web addresses, but the name of the country at the end of the address always had to end in Latin script such as ".kr."
The bit of news is the domain names, I guess, because I always thought Hangeul URL names were possible. I can't find any just now, but I see that typing 네이버, or 한국일보, or 다음, of 인터파크 into my browser will take me directly to those pages. The Chosun Ilbo says that's been around since October, 2000:
Microsoft Korea (MSK) and Real Names are to offer Korean domain services, which allows people to type in Korean Hangeul characters to visit Internet sites. For example, to read the Chosun Ilbo, people do not have to type in "www.chosun.com" in English but simply "조선일보" in the search box of the Internet Explorer browser, explained Kim Ki-hun, the Korean manager of Real Names on Monday.
Therefore, to go to the President's Office, Chong Wa Dae, instead of writing "www.bluehouse.go.kr", "www.chongwadae.go.kr" or "www.cwd.go.kr," Koreans can just type in the Korean word, "청와대."
11 comments:
The ability to arrive at a site like Naver or Daum by typing 네이버 and 다음 etc. has to do with your (or in the majority of cases in Korea - your service provider's) DNS settings. In Korea most (all) Domain Name Servers will redirect you to the top hit that matches what you type in - in this case Naver or Daum. In other cases you'll get a search page. If you were to type in 다음 on a US or UK computer who's DNS was not set up this way you would probably get a redirect to a search page or such.
The introduction of non-latin domain names means you'll be able to go to the specific site your looking for, just as you would if you typed English.
This is both a good and a bad thing, Sociolinguists on The Internet will tell you that the domination of English favours those for whom it is a first language, perpetrates the "digital divide" etc. On the other hand it has the effect of virtually closing off portions of the internet that people who don't speak a particular language can't access more readily. (Notwithstanding Google of course.) And the last thing Korea needs is to be putting up further barriers around it's little portion of The Tubes.
"I always thought Hangeul URL names were possible"
I did, too. Hangeul email addresses have been possible, too.
Dude, I knew just by looking at the title of this article, you were going to throw in some negative cheap comment again which you assuredly did at the end. Now, I thought this article in the Ilbo was proper and good and interesting.
Why must you go off and have to be juvenile and include something to ridicule Koreans again when it comes to something neutral? I mean, is there something wrong with the way Koreans like to refer to V-lines and S-lines? This isn't necessarily English, but it's a form of Korean. So why ridicule it? So yeah, obviously Korean's aren't going to pronounce it properly. They don't speak English as a first language. Duh. They don't have to because it isn't necessarily English. It's a Korean expression.
Should French people ridicule you for not pronouncing Paris as Paree? how about "nonchalant" or the host of other French-derived words? I'm betting you would say that they are English words now so you pronounce them in the American way. Same with Koreans that use English, Koreans pronounce English in the Korean way. No need to ridicule. It comes off as being prudish and looking down your nose at Korea when you bring up petty things like this.
Brian, news of this change at ICANN is big all over the world, not just Korea. It's a major, major change, and the description in the article you gave doesn't really seem particularly out of line.
The examples you gave of typing 네이버, 한국일보, or 다음, or 인터파크 into your browser are just your (clever) browser and/or search engine set up to do that.
What this means is things like www.네이버.com or even www.네이버.캄
Indeed, kushibo, this IS a big deal, which is why I posted about it.
Stafford, thanks for the clarification.
AK, "dude," yeah, I pulled the ending of the post. Sorry you think you've come to expect a "negative, cheap comment," but I suspect that's just selective reading.
Anyway, to reiterate it's a big step, and an important one to stopping the dominance of English on the internet. And, yeah, it's in line with a lot of the Korean(-language) pride articles the Chosun Ilbo's been writing. If you've been reading you'll know I think there's too much English in Korea, and this is one way to perhaps change that.
But, I still thought Hangeul web addreses (not domain names) were already possible. Maybe I was just confused with the browser tricks Stafford and kushibo explained.
Brian,
I forget the name of it, but there is a Korean company selling software that supposedly allows you to do what Kushibo was talking about. If you saw the ads that might be what you are thinking of. But the ICANN proposal will let anybody do it without installing new software.
Does this mean a big new 'land grab' in the world of internet domain names? Or has ICANN decreed 'if you own the English name you get your native language name as well'? At this point www.네이버.캄 translates to www.%B3%D7%C0%CC%B9%F6.%C4%AF - definitely a 'WTF?' unless you're a uber nerd.
I don't think the question should be 'can it be done' but 'should it be done' - what's wrong with typing in naver.com instead of 네이버?
Let's hope websites in hangeul are meant / designed to be used only by locals... Trying to type in hangeul is hard enough for the average teacher in Korea - it's somewhat more challenging if not in Korea (or if the hangeul symbols aren't on your keyboard).
Trying to type in hangeul is hard enough for the average teacher in Korea - it's somewhat more challenging if not in Korea (or if the hangeul symbols aren't on your keyboard).
Out of curiosity, Chris, what makes it difficult for the average teacher in Korea? Presumably everyone here has a Bachelor's Degree and some keyboarding skills, so I always figured that looking at a series of keys and matching up the characters wouldn't be that hard. ;)
For people outside of Korea / with computers that don't have the keys labeled there are plenty of handy guides on the internet that list which Hangeul letters correspond to letters on a QWERTY keyboard. I (mostly) learned to touch-type in Hangeul while in the United States because it was much easier than constantly checking a crib sheet!!
I don't think the question should be 'can it be done' but 'should it be done' - what's wrong with typing in naver.com instead of 네이버?
Because some people like typing in their native language instead of remembering two completely different input systems?
It might also solve naming issues where multiple spellings are possible (Kim Yuna/Kim Yeon-a; Busan/Pusan; Jiufen/Jioufen/Chiufen/Jiǔfèn/Jiu3fe2n/Chiu3-fen4), although there are plenty of other reasons not to adopt such a system on a global scale.
I was personally enjoying my global domination over the internet because I'm a native English speaker. Oh well...
I think this is a bad idea. It's just bad. What about fragmenting the internet even further seemed a good idea to anyone? I'd say that since the damn latin letters are on every keyboard, they're really not that inconvenient to use and since half the world uses the Latin alphabet anyways, it does make the most sense to use that one. Now what if I want to get all my reliable news from Xinhua news and I can't type 新華通訊社 into my browser? How will I know how the Chinese government feels about every single little thing? (they do seem to have a lot of feelings about things, no?)
Seriously, was there someone out there who had managed to master 1000s of Chinese characters or the absurdly complicated Indian script and couldn't figure out 26 extra little characters? The internet works because of standards. Now we have 100s of them to add to the list. I bet you next, someone is going to complain that they can't program in C++ in Cyrillic.
annoying...
Good points, Nik.
Thank you sir.
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