Re: Creating a metaconlang; anyone want to join?

On Nov 30, 2007 8:33 PM,  <li_sasxsek@...> wrote:
> In today's ultra-paranoid government, I wouldn't be one bit
> surprised if they took notice and started looking for something like
> this.  It's not too far from the idea of steganography.
I presume they already have *something* like this for cases where
spies have to meet in hostile territory under observation...

And no, it's not at all far from steganography.

> We do still use tone, we just don't use it phonemically.  I'm not
> sure using it is an option.  Clicks are certainly an option, and
> maybe even sighs or other cues could be used.  Do they all have to
> be audible, or are we going to mix in some body language?
Certainly!

In fact, that's a desirable feature; anything you can do in person is
a potentially exploitable substrate channel. (E.g. suppose how far you
stand from people, or at what angle, were "phonemic"?)

For the paranoid types, it'd ensure that people just listening in on
your conversation only get the 'plain' version... would beat the "wink
and mouth, then write something with the music turned up" version of
avoiding it given on TV. ;)

(This isn't particularly my goal as such, so much as just a cute
bonus. The goal is more simply, to have an extra information channel
riding on top of normal conversations, that can be done in real time,
to make people who are 'in' on it have better and possibly secret
communication.)


One thing that Alex points out, correctly, is that a-c are
significantly different tasks.

A = create a conlang on a very limited channel
B = find features unmarked (or marked inefficiently) in carrier
language, bind them to unused 'phoneme's (plus a bit)
C = combo of B&D, such that substrate is not arbitrary to the 'true' message
D = encode A using the erstwhile (substrate) content as a sort of one-time-pad

B is the version I'm most interesting and think is most plausibly
implementable as a usable, real-time metalanguage.

- Sai

P.S. Check your mail setup. Your reply-to is set as your personal
address rather than the list address...