Subject: [Ietf-languages] Hong Kong, Macao, and Description fields for region subtags

From: "Doug Ewell" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 31 Jan 2022 12:37:27 -0700

The region subtag record for Taiwan ('TW') in the Registry uses the Description "Taiwan, Province of China" because that's the name used by ISO 3166-1.

Based on a discussion at work about country definitions and names that can cause Certain Governments to raise objections, or even to forbid the use of certain software, I'm thinking about proposing changes to the records for Hong Kong (HK) and Macao (MO) to use the names "Hong Kong (SAR of China)" and "Macao (SAR of China)" instead.

Note that neither of these "SAR of China" names is the name used in ISO 3166, or in MARC 21 (not one of our core standards). UN M49 spells them out in full: "China, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region" and "China, Macao Special Administrative Region". We don't normally get Description fields for countries from M49, only for supranational entities such as "Western Africa".

Before I go down the path of submitting forms, please let me know if you feel this is a really good or really bad idea.

--
Doug Ewell, CC, ALB | Lakewood, CO, US | ewellic.org