Unicode encoding policy

["Martin J. Dürst"]

On 2014/12/24 09:50, Tex Texin wrote:
> True, however as William points out, apparently the rules have changed,

I hope the rules get clarified to clearly state that these are exceptions.

> so it isn’t unreasonable to ask again whether the rules now allow it, or if people that dismissed the idea in the past would now consider it.
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> Personally, I think this is the wrong place for it, and as has been suggested numerous times, it makes sense to host the discussion elsewhere among interested parties.
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> Although, I am not interested in the general case, there is a need for specialized cases. Just as some road sign symbols are near universal,

Actually not. I have been driving (and taking drivers' licences tests) 
in Switzerland, Japan, and the US. There are lots of similarities, but 
it'd be difficult for me to come up with an example where they are all 
identical (up to glyph/design differences).

Please see for yourself e.g. at:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_signs_in_Switzerland
http://www.japandriverslicense.com/japanese-road-signs.asp
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_signs_in_the_United_States

In the US, there are also differences by state.

> there is a need for symbols for quick and universal communications in emergencies. Identifying places of safety or danger on a map, or for the injured to describe symptoms, pains, and the nature of their injury (or first aid workers to discuss victims’ issues), or to describe the nature of a calamity (fire, landslide, bomb, attack, etc.), etc.

Such symbols mostly already exist. For a quick and easy introduction, 
see e.g. http://www.iso.org/iso/graphical-symbols_booklet.pdf.

If use of such symbols is found in running text, or if there is a strong 
need to use them in running text, some of these might be added to 
Unicode in the future. But they wouldn't be things invented out of the 
blue for marketing purposes, they would be well established already.

> William, You might consider identifying where there are needs for such universal text, and working with groups that would benefit, to get support for universal text symbols.

So the first order of business for William (or others) should be to 
investigate what's already around.

Regards,   Martin.