LD wrote:"eugh? The way you use it, it sounds bad, but I don't
see what's wrong with SAMPA. I don't see why we have
the need for a "readable" system in the first place.
If you mean "readable" as in "looks similar to English
spelling", you're out of luck. Even the most complex
system cannot match the utter irrationality of English
spelling."

Well, this is nice -- but you seem to have picked up my bad habit of talking out of both sides of my mouth... On the one hand your all for Sampa, on the other hand, you dont care if its actually *readable or not. Hmm. :)

> Still, where phonetic descriptions are used, some
> direction toward an
> international standard is a good idea.
> -S-
 
LD: "Exactly. And the other systems have been developed
over several years by phonetics professors. We could
never do better than them. Oh, yeah, we do have
professors here. But it would still be hard to do well
at making a complex system like this."

Professors certainly are smart -- what with all that schoolin' and fundin' and stuff. Golly jee whiz, Ah wood'na daresay 'et we kin jus a'go changing da po'fessa's lang'age. Geez. Dat wood bee sum kinda fool 'be tawkin like dat dere. Go a'changin lang-widge! Haw, Haw. How d'zat happ'n?

-S-