Found through a post on soc.culture.esperanto.

Paul Gubbins on BBC Radio 4 ( Britain ).

See, or rather hear, the following :-

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00t833q

Skip to the 27 minute mark.

Too busy to go into a rant about your failure to inform people beforehand.

I liked the bit about his wife not wanting to have anything to do with it!

The Dutch music group made me cringe a little, but that's a matter of taste, I suppose. Overall, a positive and light-hearted interview. Nice one.

Was good except for later in the programme when they read out the email from some uninformed stultulo saying that Klingon has as many speakers as Esperanto so should the UN start holding conferences in that too? I know the beeb has a duty to air different points of view but it's cynical people like that who need to open their minds a little. Unless he was a Klingon speaker who genuinely believes one day it will fulfill it's rightful role as a universal auxiliary language, in which case I understand his frustration.

Esperanto has been in the British press quite a lot recently, no doubt thanks to the hard work of the Esperanto lobby.

Definitively, BBC likes very much Esperanto

Hispanio:Definitively, BBC likes very much Esperanto

I do, too. Klingon is the opposite of Esperanto. Very hard to learn, difficult to converse in, lacking words/vocabulary, and has fewer speakers than Elvish really. I mean, can you call a person who knows one sentence a speaker?

philodice:

Hispanio:Definitively, BBC likes very much Esperanto

I do, too. Klingon is the opposite of Esperanto. Very hard to learn, difficult to converse in, lacking words/vocabulary, and has fewer speakers than Elvish really. I mean, can you call a person who knows one sentence a speaker?

:::ulling out a soapbox printed with the banner "Mi bedaŭras sed mi bezonas defendi mian alian lingvon" and stepping onto it::::::

As someone who has studied both tlhIngan Hol and Esperanto, I won't argue the truth that there are tons more Esperanto speakers than those who speak Klingon, but I do strongly disagree that Klingon is difficult to learn and lacks words/vocabulary.

I will grant it can be difficult to pronounce some Klingon words for a new speaker and, yes, Esperanto words in general are far easier to pronounce but how many of us stumble over scii? It's no harder to learn how to say scii than learning to pronounce ngeD for example. And like Esperanto, the alphabet is phonetic; once you learn how the sounds correspond with the alphabet, you know how any word you see written is pronounced.

Being based on European languages, Esperanto has an advantage with words that non-speakers can recognize, but tlhIngan Hol is still far easier to learn than most natural languages since its grammar, while not totally regular, is far more regular than any natural language.

Plus, Marc Okrand, the Zamenhof of Klingon, to this day will give Klingon speakers new words and answers questions on grammar problems when he comes to the yearly convention the Klingon Language Institute holds. He's even been known to go to a bar and have a drink with the people who attend after the formal stuff is finished. How many of us would like to have the chance to talk with Zamenhof over drinks?

As for more people speaking Elvish, I don't know how many people speak Elvish, so I'll just say I suspect there are more Klingon speakers than Elvish speakers. For Klingon, I'd guess world wide there are maybe 1,000 people who are fluent and several times that who can get by with a dictionary in hand.

There are just as many false ideas going around about Klingon as there are about Esperanto.

I'm not here to convince anyone to speak an admittedly geeky/nerdy language (Klingon), but I also don't like seeing the falsities perpetuated either.

Plus Esperanto is over 120 years old, tlhIngan Hol is barely over 20 years old. I don't think Klingon is doing bad for so young a language.

('ej jIQochbe', *Esperanto* parHa' BBC -- kaj mi akordas, BBC ŝatas Esperanton -- and I agree, the BBC likes Esperanto)

Ok, I'll get off this soapbox now. Sorry for the length of this post.

NiteMirror:"Mi .. bezonas defendi mia alia lingvo" and stepping onto it::::::..Sorry for the length of this post.

Mi bezonas defendi mian alian lingvon.
The length of the post is quite excusable, but you forgot the accusative.

Miland:

NiteMirror:"Mi .. bezonas defendi mia alia lingvo" and stepping onto it::::::..Sorry for the length of this post.

Mi bezonas defendi mian alian lingvon.
The length of the post is quite excusable, but you forgot the accusative.

oops, darn those printers! I've got to find another banner maker.

Correction made.

NiteMirror:how many of us stumble over scii?

For some reason not me, maybe because German has the word Szene /scene/.

NiteMirror:
Plus, Marc Okrand, the Zamenhof of Klingon, to this day will give Klingon speakers new words and answers questions on grammar problems when he comes to the yearly convention the Klingon Language Institute holds. He's even been known to go to a bar and have a drink with the people who attend after the formal stuff is finished. How many of us would like to have the chance to talk with Zamenhof over drinks?

Well, that's just because Esperanto is a lot older so its creator has already died. What will Klingon do if Okrand dies?

NiteMirror:And like Esperanto, the alphabet is phonetic; once you learn how the sounds correspond with the alphabet, you know how any word you see written is pronounced.

This makes me wonder, is there any conlanger who actually goes out of their way to make spelling a pain in the Equus africanus asinus? (well, I might, but I'm not a real conlanger ) - Maybe a better question would be "are there any conlangers of International Auxiliary languages who purposely try to make spelling hard?"