Ebb and flow (was Re: Naisek Pages Updated)

Hallo!

On Wed, 30 Jul 2008 02:39:40 -0700, David J. Peterson wrote:

> Things have changed even since 2000, when I first joined
> Conlang.  Back then, I think it was still possible to know
> every single conlanger on the internet, and every single
> conlang.  New projects were often new, because there
> wasn't much to compare to.  Now, who knows how many
> there are?  And wheels are getting reinvented, and ideas
> are being imitated.  I think it's a natural step.  What happens
> next is a handful of us figure out what has been done, what
> hasn't, and then produce something radically original.  Then
> imitation returns, and the same thing happens again.
True.  There was more of a "pioneer spirit" in the year 2000,
which was also when I joined CONLANG.  There was more uncharted
territory than there is today, more things to be done for the
first time.

Yet, things weren't really better back then.  The list just
overflew with off-topic posts; there were usually about 200
to 400 posts per day, with only about 50 being even marginally
on topic.  (Or so it felt to me - I never actually counted.)

> Ebb and flow, though.  I, for one, haven't put out any new
> conlang sketches or ideas in a couple years because I haven't
> done anything new; just steadily worked on the old ones.
Same to me.  I am mostly working on Old Albic right now, and
don`t have much to post.  Most of the grammar is in a nearly
finished state, and the bulk of work left to do is in vocabulary.

> Every so often I'll post something about one of them that
> comes up (like the Kamakawi orthography, or...what was
> before that?  That problem I had with Sheli's tonal history?),
> but other than that, I haven't had anything to add.  It might
> be the same with a lot of folks here.  I've also made a
> concerted effort to only post about something that's finished
> that I want people to look at (but not necessarily comment
> on), or to post *specific* questions about something I'm trying
> to complete, or am having problems with.
You are exactly like me in this regard.

> I'm sure things will pick back up in a bit.  It's just ebb right
> now.
Perhaps.  It lies with us to fill this list with posts pertaining
to our projects.

On Wed, 30 Jul 2008 19:53:04 +0200, Henrik Theiling wrote:

> Hi!
>
> David J. Peterson writes:
> >...
> > Ebb and flow, though.  I, for one, haven't put out any new
> > conlang sketches or ideas in a couple years because I haven't
> > done anything new; ...
>
> Fascinating!  It was a bit different for me, I think: I also wanted to
> do original stuff in the beginning, but Conlang taught be there is not
> much to be originally done anymore, at least it seems you would have to
> be very inventive.
Yes.  Just about everything has been done already, has its
precedents.  But that doesn't mean that there is nothing left
to be done, of course.

> This did not put me off the least, however, because all those ideas
> seemed so interesting to be expored by myself.  Þrjótrunn is a typical
> example: there are zillions of romlangs and many, many diachronical
> conlangs applying which sound shifts you can imaging to Vulgar Latin,
> but I had not done it myself.  And it turned out to be one of the most
> interesting and entertaining things to do in the past few years.
Sure.  Making a romlang now is not the same as making a
romlang in '96 (or whenever Andrew came up with Brithenig).
Yet, the possibilities are not entirely exhausted, even if
many of the more plausible scenarii such as Britanno-Romance
or Germano-Romance have been taken.

> Without Conlang and so much stuff explored, I would never have done it
> and I would never had appreciated romlangs so much.
I also got various ideas here.  The degree-of-volition marking
system of Albic, for instance, resulted from a discussion of
active/stative systems in this list eight years ago.  Without
CONLANG, Old Albic would not be what it is today, and I would
never have been inspired by Brithenig to do Germanech.

... brought to you by the Weeping Elf

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