This could be solved today with a short application to the Unicode consortium and a few OS updates, so I guess we made progress :)
> Parker Higgins investigated whether Prince could be honored in unicode with this symbol. (Answer – no, on three counts, as it’s personal, a logo, and protected intellectual property.)
Ƭ̵̬̊
Notoriously, they won't even allow Klingon.
I can't resist, gotta agitate about this. Unicode allocated space for the legendarily-untranslated Minoan script Linear A, for fuck's sake! Unicode allocated space for fucking Ogham script -- not that that's inappropriate, but it's unlikely to be used by the vast majority of people, now or in future, simply as a consequence of its antiquity and obsolescence.
Of course I'm revealing my 90s-trek power level here, but it's seriously puzzling (shading all the way up into quietly infuriating) that these dead languages' scripts are welcomed, while an, er, conlang that has actual living speakers can't have any of the frankly voluminous Unicodespace. QI'yaH!
Well, sorta. Not according to the Language Creation Society! From the fallout of the case where Paramount/CBS sued the Axenar guys for the temerity to make a fan film without paying them for it comes this Washington Post opinion [0] (I've added the links found in the text at [1] and [2]):
>It seemed a stretch to suggest that the plaintiffs were claiming copyright in the Klingon language itself, and the court agreed, taking the somewhat unusual step of denying LCS’s motion to file its brief [1], on the grounds that the court didn’t have to “reach the issue of whether languages, and specifically the Klingon language, are copyrightable” in ruling on the case.
>The LCS has declared victory — at least to the extent that the final ruling in the case will not hold that the Klingon language is protected by copyright. Its statement — with a translation into Klingon, for those of you who read Klingon — is posted here [2].
The situation doesn't seem as rosy as the LCS' statement suggests, but as a consequence, I feel comfortable in claiming that Paramount does not currently, successfully, claim copyright ownership of Klingon. That said, "not getting sued by Paramount in future" is a pretty good reason for Unicode to exclude anything.
Tengwar, the script used to write Quenya and Sindarin, however...
[0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/201...
[1] https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BzmetJxi-p0VN0t5MWNPOTZ4SU0...
But we're at least sure you can't patent "a procedure for producing ATP using O2 as catalyst and energy source", right?
Right?
I believe the same applies to Tengwar that too much of comes from artistic work written and/or commissioned for books still in copyright and owned by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Perhaps when more of the copyrights expire on these originating works Unicode can revisit them. Unfortunately, that's not going to happen soon. (Even Tengwar isn't expected to expire until 2044, 70 years after JRR Tolkien's death.)
I can imagine that the Unicode Consortium's general feeling on the subject is outside the scope of their mission, and that pleasing a sci-fi fandom just isn't really worth the potential for headaches, and that it's better to let them continue to rely on ConScript.
> Well, sorta.
Paramount definitely claims copyright on the “Klingon” glyphs from various ST properties that fans have mapped to the language described in The Klingon Dictionary (which is newer than the glyphs), so as far as those glyphs and any derivative works are concerned – what both the Unicode Consortium and any font makers would be concerned with – Paramount’s copyrights are a problem.
Whether they own the language beyond that may be a murky legal question, but it is also beside the point.
(And, actually, what your source supports is that Paramount definitely claims ownership of Klingon, the other party in the case disputed it, and the court found that they didn’t need to decide the issue to resolve the case. That is in no way a “sorta” on “Paramount claims copyright ownership on Klingon”. That a third-party seeking to file an amicus brief against Paramount’s claim on that point chose to do a victory dance because they were told to go away because the issue they were concerned with was ultimately not material to the resolution of the case is…interesting spin, but not much else.)
I see the problem. IANAL, but I take "Paramount claims copyright" to mean something legally enforceable; an uncontroversial legal right that they are claiming [0]. As suggested by both parent and the sources further above, that matter has yet to be settled, and wasn't addressed in the decision. The statement "Paramount claims that it has the copyright to the Klingon language" I wholeheartedly agree with (and disagree, obviously, on the ability of Paramount to claim copyright on a collaborative intellectual effort between James Doohan, Marc Okrand, and others, both due to nerd fervour and a bunch of hand-waving about the intersection of IP and morality that are beyond the scope of this tangent).
[0] Possibly this is due to the ubiquity of the phrase "copyright claim", deployed to describe the monetization of someone else's intellectual property. The uh claimant is presumed to have a legal right to the material being claimed, but it's not clear that Paramount has that legal right.
*hits inhaler*
Everywhere I look something reminds me of her...
Sounds like the only documented use was a visual pun from 600 years ago.
Your Wikipedia article says “certain manuscripts”, not a single use. (It does say it is only ever used in one specific phrase, though,)
> Любопытно очное о в слове многоочитїи в псалтыри XV века Тр.-Серг. л. No 308, где о состоит из десяти Ꙩ, соединенных в виде орнамента
I'm watching you... ꙭ
I'll happily replace Ogham, in future rants, with that fucking multiocular O mentioned in a sibling to the parent.
Copyright issues seem to be a big factor there.
Also it's a business opportunity along the lines of the star name registry.
> Parker Higgins investigated whether Prince could be honored in unicode with this symbol. (Answer – no, on three counts, as it’s personal, a logo, and protected intellectual property.)