Tim Parenti wrote:

I'd be interested in any insights he might have to share about the Kolkata change.

If memory serves that was Arthur David Olson's decision when he was maintainer, but I can share my two cents. In English, the name "Kolkata" is far more common than "Calcutta" nowadays, so a name change was in order. In contrast, "Kiev" is far more common than "Kyiv", so a name change does not seem appropriate. The tz database prefers commonly-used English-language names to the correct or official names. For example, it uses America/Los_Angeles even though "Los Angeles" is not my city's official name. More generally, it's better to err on the side of conservatism about name changes, partly because of the hassle for everybody when the names change, and partly to avoid political discussions that distract from the project.

On Wed, Apr 1, 2015, at 01:49, Paul Eggert wrote:

If memory serves that was Arthur David Olson's decision when he was maintainer, but I can share my two cents. In English, the name "Kolkata" is far more common than "Calcutta" nowadays, so a name change was in order.

It seems that this privileges India's ability to define the English names of its cities, as a country with English as an official language, vs other countries' ability to do so.

On 31 March 2015 at 21:45, Tim Parenti <tim@timtimeonline.com> wrote:

This is a question of *translation*, NOT transliteration. The tz project endeavors to use the name as it is actively used and spelled in the English language, regardless of how speakers of other languages would transliterate their name into the English alphabet (e.g., we use "Rome" instead of "Roma", "Athens" instead of "Athena", etc.)

Or, for that matter, "Moscow", which Simon quite naturally used in his (English-language) message. Cheers, Philip

As a different example, China changed the transliteration of Peking to Beijing but the Portuguese name (at least in Brazil) is still "Pequim" and I presume that it will take many decades for "Beijing" to become mainstream... if it ever happens. // Leonardo. On 31/03/15 21:04, Paul Ganssle wrote:

All of which has no bearing on the mainstream English spelling of the city. There's also an Asia/Saigon instead of Asia/Ho_Chi_Minh_City and Asia/Rangoon instead of Asia/Yangon. There's no reason to read any political meaning into the English word - it's just what English-speaking people call it.

I notice that you seem to have failed to change your cut-and-paste, but my guess is that your arguments won't fly over on Wikipedia either, because, as in this case, maximizing clarity and minimizing confusion is what's important in this application, not some more general concept of social justice.

On 3/29/2015 15:33, sam.ua wrote:

...

Dear Florian.

perhaps you are not aware of the history between Ukraine and Russia. Let me remind you that Moscow has pursued the destruction of Ukraine, Ukrainians and the Ukrainian language and culture for many centuries. This ethnic cleansing continues today with the Russification of Ukraine. Once you destroy a nation's identity --their language, culture and history, it's quite easy to convert them into mindless robots, who are easy prey for the imperialist. Even in 1991, as we achieved our long overdue independence , Ukrane was over 80-90% pro-Russian. after two plus decades those same people, who were once slaves to the empire, have been schooled on the true history of Ukraine and understand just how devious Moscow was in it's ethnic cleansing of the Ukrainian people. Little over a year ago we got rid of the last remaining remnant of that Soviet-Russian past - the Putin puppet Yanykovych. Our cities are nearly rid of Lenin and Stalin - two monsters that murdered tens of millions of Ukrainians, but as the links you provided show, that past is still a part of the present. We are gradually getting rid of it. The issue of Kyiv vs Kiev is precisely the past vs the present. Kyiv is today, it's also what it was in the old Ruthenian-Ukrainian chronicles that date back to the 9th century. It became Kiev under Russian rule and now it's once again Kyiv.

The war in Eastern Ukraine - the invasion by Russia, is a last attempt too keep Ukraine under Russia's orbit. we don't want that. My generation doesn't want that. Once again Kyiv vs Kiev is a part of that ugly past. I can promise you that all of our sites will one day be Kyiv and that the term will be the one used wide-spread and worldwide. But we need to do this one step at a time and wikipedia is a big part of this. This has to be corrected and the general population will then become familiar and accept the new word, it's very easy to spell and pronounce.

I kindly ask that you respect our history, our past and what is currently happening in eastern Ukraine. it's no accident that where the Russian population - 15% of Ukraine's population. lives and breathes, there is a war. the same way Stalin killed my forefathers and replaced them with Russians from Russia, we are battling for the existence of our own unique identity.

Kyiv is and will always be the proper transliterated version of our capital. there is no argument today that can supercede that. Thank you kindly, Simon Kostenko

---- On сб, 28 бер 2015 11:27:35 +0200 *Florian Weimer<fw@deneb.enyo.de>* wrote ----

* Simon:

>> Many government web sites in the Ukraine still use the “Kiev” >> transliteration

> For example?

“While the Obama administration has publicly acknowledged it is considering supplying Kiev with arms, backed by hardline EU countries like Poland and Lithuania, German Chancellor Angela Merkel has vehemently opposed the move.”

<http://www.kmu.gov.ua/control/en/publish/article?art_id=248025420>