Html: "Seeked" is not a word

[anthonygood]

https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/media.html#event-media-seeked

The past tense of "seek" is "sought". Is there a reason the non-standard word "seeked" was used?

It makes us look like a bunch of deviants.

[annevk]

Thanks for reporting this!

As far as I can tell this was added in 2d78c7000ad6f81d3a0a7eab8b6ca3eae88fc5aa with a brief explanation at https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-whatwg-archive/2008May/0167.html as to why, but I cannot find a justification of picking "seeked" over "sought".

It wouldn't surprise me if it was just to keep the names all similar and more approachable for non-native speakers.

I suppose we could consider changing the spelling in prose.

[anthonygood]

Many thanks for your (very prompt) reply @annevk.

Perhaps @Hixie can shed some light on this unhappy neologism?

[guest271314]

English is an equivocal language. There are no immutable standards for the meanings of words. A single word can have several different definitions depending on context. New words and phrases are constantly created and added to the lexicon of the english language. Here "seeked" has already been defined at https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/media.html#event-media-seeked. There is no prohibition within the english language for either adding new words or phrases nor arbitrarily changing or adding to the definitions of words or phrases.

[guest271314]

"Seeked" is a word. The word was brought into existence and codified, if not before, certainly at https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/media.html#event-media-seeked.

[guest271314]

To further illustrate the potential issues (that is, the "slippery slope") within the scope of attempting to speak or only use "proper" english words in prose or technical writings, would we not also be compelled to address the words, including, but not limited to

requires a context

• "web"
• "dev"
• > What is async?
  Where you wash your hands?

attributes

• pingback

elements

• <noscript>

other words created and/or attributed to and defined by the HTML specification

• "Microdata"

[anthonygood]

Some of those examples are abbreviations. The rest of them are words.

[guest271314]

How do we verify what a "word" means? There is no universal authority for the meanings of english language words. Nor is there any prohibition as to the arbitrary creation, definition and promulgation of english words.

"web" and "dev" each require a _context_ relating "World Wide Web" "develop(ment|er)". Each word or abbreviation could have an entirely different (and unintended) meaning than one might expect, depending on context

Definition

The context provides detailed background information about the definition, its relevance, and in the case of data element definitions, the appropriate use(s) of the element described. The Context field may also contain links to more detailed documentation describing these aspects.

For example

Context:

Microdata is data on the characteristics of units of a population, such as individuals, households, or establishments, collected by a census, survey, or experiment. (Survey Design and Statistical Methodology Metadata, Software and Standards Management Branch, Systems Support Division, United States Bureau of the Census, Washington D.C., August 1998, Section 3.4.4, page 39).

• Glosarry of Statistical Terms

5 Microdata
5.1 Introduction
5.1.1 Overview
This section is non-normative.

Sometimes, it is desirable to annotate content with specific machine-readable labels, e.g. to allow generic scripts to provide services that are customized to the page, or to enable content from a variety of cooperating authors to be processed by a single script in a consistent manner.

For this purpose, authors can use the microdata features described in this section. Microdata allows nested groups of name-value pairs to be added to documents, in parallel with the existing content.

The rules for the determining the meaning of words (construction), begins with

1. What the word meant when originally used.

2. If there is ambiguity as to the meaning of the word, a dictionary or technical paper is used to determine what the word means.

3. If there is still ambiguity as to the meaning of the word, the history of the word (including amendments, legislative notes, expert opinions, etc.) is reviewed.

The above applies to common words, patent claims, statutes, articles of incorporation (nation state and commercial), administrative regulations, papal bulls, historical documents and artifacts, etc.

Given the above rules for determining what a word means, the HTML standard definition of "Microdata" would necessarily have to be set aside for the term "Microdata" as used in the statistical domain.

But since english is an equivocal language (capable of or intended to be deceptive; one word can have more than one meaning), it is possible for both "Microdata" as used in the statistical domain, and "Microdata" as used in the "web" or HTML domain to exist exist in their own respective domains - without there being ambiguity as to their meanings.

Similarly, with "seeked", the source for the words' definition with the HTML standard or domain of the "web" is well defined and can be directly referenced. There is no ambiguity as to what "seeked" means relevant to an HTMLMediaElement.

Were the language _not_ equivocal, then your assessment would be accurate as to "seeked" not being a word, but that is not and cannot be the case with the english language; else it would not be possible for terms such as "tweet" to be defined as anything other than a "bird's chirp". But the english language is not static; Merriam-Webster (see 2.) recognizes this fact

2 : a post made on the Twitter online message service

Note that is apparently presumed that "post" would be understood as not being, for example, part of a fence, but relevant to the Internet, where "post"s are content uploaded to Internet forums.

It should also be noted that the basic criteria for determining the origin and meaning of words is quite thorough. It is by using the fundamental rules that we can conclusively determine with certainty that

• Champollion could not have "deciphered" the so-called "hieroglyphics" of ancient egypt, as it is impossible to convert a symbol to a letter or a word; certainly not the secret language and script of the egyptian priesthood as compared to the common langauge and script, the former requiring at least 40 years of study before the possibility of initiation into the institution; any person who claims to have "deciphered" or "transliterated" the hieroglyphics of ancient egypt to english or any other language is simply lying; as the British Museum will admit to, when pressed;

• The works attributed to Plato, Socrates, and Aristotle, Herodotus cannot be verified as there is no alphabet which can be attributed to the groups to whom those persons purported to belong to write the numerous works; nor can it confirmed that any of those pen names are related to any person whom actually walked on this planet at any time;

• The term "white", as used to describe a class of persons was invented in the colonies of britain in the late 1600's, following a number of rebellions culminating in Bacon's Rebellion of 1676; the term simply did not exist in the form used today; not that anyone whom _self-identifies_ as "white" or "black", or the legal class "some other race", ever bother to actually read the definitions of those terms which reference fictional geography and groups which are impossible to find in the real world; e.g., there is no de jure nation called "North Africa" nor can such a land mass be found on any map, from which a "white" class is legally the "original people"; similarly "one of the black races of Africa" does not exist outside of the document which invented the fiction;

Etc., etc.

For this reason, no person should have any qualms about creating, inventing, modifying, mixing, etc. the english language, as it is truly open-source.

[ljsikuade]

How do we verify what a "word" means?

What is love?

[Hixie]

Here, this normative definition of the English variant that was used to write the HTML standard should put this discussion to rest: http://ian.hixie.ch/bible/english

[anthonygood]

Thanks for taking the time to comment @Hixie!

I'm only too keen for this discussion to reach a terminus of any kind. However, the actual question was: is there a reason the non-standard word "seeked" was used?

• That "seeked" is non-standard I hope isn't up for debate (the entry in your folk dictionary confirms this)
• That language and its so-called standards are subject to change isn't in question either
• The subject of inquiry is why this non-standard word was used, and (by implication) what process or discussion preceded its inclusion

My assumption is that there was/is no process or discussion.

[Hixie]

It's not non-standard, the standard for the English language used in the spec defines it.

But as to why "seeked" was used rather than "sought", the answer is easy: "onsought" sounded dumb.

[ljsikuade]

You sound dumb. 👎

[annevk]

@ljsikuade that's not acceptable here. Please read https://whatwg.org/code-of-conduct.

[anthonygood]

It's not non-standard, the standard for the English language used in the spec defines it.

If you're referring to your rather quaint dictionary, I'm afraid it has no currency, so cannot be considered a standard (in the sense of "a form of language that is widely accepted as the usual form").

But as to why "seeked" was used rather than "sought", the answer is easy: "onsought" sounded dumb.

Now this. This is what I waited over a year for.

The non-standard word "seeked" was used because of its comparable euphony according to the bizarre and private poetics of @Hixie.

I believe my query has been satisfactorily answered.