Talk:Australia hits new Telstra privatization hurdles

Looks good. The title was a bit long and there were some run-on sentences, but those were easily fixed. Same for the spelling error. One of the sources had a completely different title, I am guessing they revised the title, so I change your source title to match. A pic of the Telstra logo would be nice. StuRat 03:06, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

I considered this, but wasn't sure of the legalities of a logo. The image page on Wikipedia for the Telstra logo claimed fair use, which wouldn't let it get onto Commons, and I wasn't sure about Wikinews policy. Dorian Gray 03:08, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

British/American spelling

Note that words such as "privatisation" are not misspelled. Using an "s" is such words is British/Australian spelling. The standard on Wikipedia is to leave such words spelled the way that they were written originally. I think the same should apply on Wikinews, lest we end up reverting each other for something which is quite minor. - Borofkin 00:38, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

I thought that if "Privatisation" was an english spelling, then the OED dictionary or other UK dictionary would have that listed. I assumed that since dictionary.com showed no listings in *any* dictionary, that it was not a OE/AE (Original English / American English) spelling issue. ----RossKoepke^Talk 00:47, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

Hmmmm, you're right, it isn't in the OED. Well, um, it certainly is a standard way to spell the word. See, for example, this article in the Guardian, titled "The privatisation of war", or this in Forbes titled "Court rules Budapest airport privatisation invalid". - Borofkin 00:57, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

Interesting, examining Google results, 'privatisation' seems to be mostly concentrated in African (Malawi, Uganda, Zambia) and South Asia countries (Pakistan, India, Nepal).

• • • • Google results across all domains: 2.7 million vs. 6.7 million in favor of 'Z'.
      • Searching only .uk domains: 500,000 vs 43,000 in favor of 'S'.
      • Searching .au domains: 212,000 vs. 15,000 in favor of 'S'.

So apparently it is a word more commonly used in the Queen's English....but why the heck isn't it in the OED? (or any other dictionary?). ----RossKoepke^Talk 13:34, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

I was wondering the same thing myself. Perhaps it is because the British Empire favours government provision of services rather than neo-liberal free-market ideology. :-) - Borofkin 23:52, 5 September 2005 (UTC)