“Extended Comment on Language Trees and Zipping”, Joshua Goodman2002-02-21 (; similar)⁠:

This is the extended version of a Comment submitted to Physical Review Letters [criticizing Benedetto et al 2002].

I first point out the inappropriateness of publishing a Letter unrelated to physics.

Next, I give experimental results showing that the technique used in the Letter is 3× worse and 17× slower than a simple baseline.

And finally, I review the literature, showing that the ideas of the Letter are not novel.

I conclude by suggesting that Physical Review Letters should not publish Letters unrelated to physics.