4 ms·

> Aside: my personal belief is that the political charge here lies with Unicode having codepoints for such countries, and downstream dependents of Unicode can r

> Aside: my personal belief is that the political charge here lies with Unicode having codepoints for such countries, and downstream dependents of Unicode can readily point the finger. Displaying monochrome text of a country abbreviation instead of a flag doesn't seem like it would appease those who don't want the country acknowledged, anyhow; a "missing glyph" type of thing would come closer. Flags are Political Symbols. ISO Country Codes are not. People rally around flags. Flag color symbolize beliefs/ideals. Flag crests and images contain political messages. ISO Country Codes are just a couple of letters that might (but not necessarily do) reflect a Country Name. It's generally not just "don't want the country acknowledged", it's "don't want dissidents rallying to that flag". For instance, the parts of China that believe Taiwan is and always shall be a part of China don't have a problem with naming Taiwan as such, they see that as the "province name"; they do have a problem with the national flag of Taiwan, which intentionally represents and symbolizes its independence from China. I can't blame Microsoft for not wanting to support flags. Politics are hard. Flags can be the hard mode of Political Symbols. (Also Microsoft's stance is interesting in the way that it came from that Windows 95-era map-based Time Zone picker. The number of lawsuits they had over effectively "single pixel" border disputes was absurd. Flags are way more political than borders.)

themacguffinman 2y ago
I can blame Microsoft. Every other tech company and OS figured out how to make it work and they're not exactly buckling under the weight of legal or political pressure on the matter of flags.
- WorldMaker 2y ago
  If you had the choice between "no lawsuits at all" and "lawsuits in random months by random countries for things that can escalate to violence and wars" you wouldn't take "no lawsuits at all"? Even if very few of the lawsuits actually escalate to violence or war, is any risk of violence/war worth it? Ethics would suggest "all my competitors are doing it" isn't a great answer here, either, and certainly doesn't remove the risk. I can respect the "no lawsuits at all" preference here.
  - account42 2y ago
    Ethics don't dictate that you preemptively submit to the demands of bullies just in case they might do something bad if you don't.
    - WorldMaker 2y ago
      Not playing the game at all is very different from playing the game according to the demands and rules of bullies. The only way to win is not to play, just ask WOPR.
hunter2_ 2y ago
It's a bit confusing that folks who consider Taiwan a province and not a country wouldn't take issue (or at least see it as a minor issue relative to the presence of a flag) with it being included among ISO country codes. In other words, if Microsoft were to be walking on eggshells enough to omit flags wholesale, I'm surprised they don't also omit all things that enumerate ISO country codes. I see your point that flags elicit a different reaction out of people than territorial classifications, but simultaneously it seems to be the classification which elicits disagreement. "You can call it a country so long as you don't assign a flag" seems like the wrong place to draw a line in the sand. Presumably, provinces can have flags!!
- WorldMaker 2y ago
  In this case, Microsoft also isn't saying "this is an ISO country code", it's just outputting the letters embedded in the ZWJ sequence as worst case fallback letters in an intentionally ugly fallback font block. Those letters come from ISO country codes in working flag emoji, but Microsoft's approach is "dumb passthrough", Microsoft isn't making any political decisions or validating the ISO country codes are actually ISO country codes or anything, it's just outputting "raw data" from the emoji contents itself. Windows also doesn't have an "ISO Country Code Picker" here. They don't provide tools to make flag emoji at all.

themacguffinman 2y ago

I can blame Microsoft. Every other tech company and OS figured out how to make it work and they're not exactly buckling under the weight of legal or political pressure on the matter of flags.

WorldMaker 2y ago
If you had the choice between "no lawsuits at all" and "lawsuits in random months by random countries for things that can escalate to violence and wars" you wouldn't take "no lawsuits at all"? Even if very few of the lawsuits actually escalate to violence or war, is any risk of violence/war worth it? Ethics would suggest "all my competitors are doing it" isn't a great answer here, either, and certainly doesn't remove the risk. I can respect the "no lawsuits at all" preference here.
- account42 2y ago
  Ethics don't dictate that you preemptively submit to the demands of bullies just in case they might do something bad if you don't.
  - WorldMaker 2y ago
    Not playing the game at all is very different from playing the game according to the demands and rules of bullies. The only way to win is not to play, just ask WOPR.

hunter2_ 2y ago

It's a bit confusing that folks who consider Taiwan a province and not a country wouldn't take issue (or at least see it as a minor issue relative to the presence of a flag) with it being included among ISO country codes. In other words, if Microsoft were to be walking on eggshells enough to omit flags wholesale, I'm surprised they don't also omit all things that enumerate ISO country codes. I see your point that flags elicit a different reaction out of people than territorial classifications, but simultaneously it seems to be the classification which elicits disagreement. "You can call it a country so long as you don't assign a flag" seems like the wrong place to draw a line in the sand. Presumably, provinces can have flags!!

WorldMaker 2y ago
In this case, Microsoft also isn't saying "this is an ISO country code", it's just outputting the letters embedded in the ZWJ sequence as worst case fallback letters in an intentionally ugly fallback font block. Those letters come from ISO country codes in working flag emoji, but Microsoft's approach is "dumb passthrough", Microsoft isn't making any political decisions or validating the ISO country codes are actually ISO country codes or anything, it's just outputting "raw data" from the emoji contents itself. Windows also doesn't have an "ISO Country Code Picker" here. They don't provide tools to make flag emoji at all.