> Why are you focusing on “Moroccan”, instead of on Maghrebi Arabic in general? There are quite a few reasons. - I am a Moroccan myself, I want an AI I can sp

> Why are you focusing on “Moroccan”, instead of on Maghrebi Arabic in general? There are quite a few reasons. - I am a Moroccan myself, I want an AI I can speak to the way I speak with friends. And I also want other people who can only speak my language to be able to make use of AI technology. - Constraints wise, I'm working solo on this with no funding. Can't do it all. - Maghrebi Arabic is not a language, rather a linguistic construct to try to simplify the complex web of languages spoken in North Africa that have arabic influences. On the ground, there is no such thing as Maghrebi Arabic. - My personal expertise does not lie in these other languages. I do not have the necessary background to ensure the quality of the outcome, nor the relevance of the language used. - While there might be some level of mutual intelligibility between Moroccan and Algerian for example, mostly when _speaking_, different languages in this group have very different rules, vocabularies, and most importantly different writing habits. Some of the simpler examples: * Code switching between arabic and latin scripts, which follows different conventions in each country (region even). It's already tough to cover Moroccan. * Another difference is reminiscent of the relationship between English and French. Many common words in French are rarely used in English or could mean something different entirely, and that's the same case here. * Moroccan is significantly influenced by Tamazight and Spanish, which does not hold the same way for other north African countries. Ultimately, keep in mind that NA is not a single cultural block. Not being exhaustive, but Morocco has some Andalusian components to its culture, Algeria has some Ottoman, Tunisia and Lybia were very close to Italy at some point, and it gets crazier when you zoom in closer. > (IMO a problematic term, considering the country’s language diversity) Is there a debate I am not familiar with? I am Moroccan. To whom is this a problematic term?