english spelling reform has been proposed by many people since webster, such as george bernard shaw, who proposed a new phonetic alphabet for english. in some cases webster's changes have been widely adopted in britain: the spelling "programme" came from the french; us "program" is clearly simpler, and more consistent with word endings in english. in our modern world, english orthography is still a problem. in some countries (notably, france) a national committee can give advice and direction as to spelling. english has long escaped from national custody.