Wikipedia:Simple pronunciation markup guide

This policy is under development and part of the Wikipedia:Policy thinktank.

Introduction

In the course of creating and editing articles, there have been times when a simple Wikipedia guide to indicating pronunciation was sorely needed. I'm not alone in noticing this.

Opponents of this view point to IPA and SAMPA as alternatives, but they are much more difficult to use for both writers and readers. They have their place in language studies, but for ordinary use Wikipedia should use a simple guide, in my view, as do many reference works. Details of my proposal are at:

Draft guide: Wikipedia:Pronunciation (simple guide to markup, American)

Arguments: Wikipedia_talk:Pronunciation (simple guide to markup, American)

This page is where we vote and debate policy. Those who wish to discuss the technical details or assist with development of the Simple Guide itself should go to this talk page.

Originated by NathanHawking 04:52, 2004 Nov 3 (UTC)

Undecided

Personally, I prefer IPA; it's scientific, unambiguous and it's an international standard. However, I am aware that some readers are not able to read IPA characters due to technical constraints. For this and other reasons simple pronuncation markup schemes are and will be used. That means that we do need a standardized "Simple Guide". And that readers should be able to learn it (it's supposed to be intuitive, but no scheme will be obvious for all, especially not for non-native English speakers). -- Kpalion 17:05, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)