On Mon, Dec 19, 2011 at 8:01 PM, Ravishankar <span dir="ltr">&lt;<a href="mailto:ravidreams@gmail.com">ravidreams@gmail.com</a>&gt;</span> wrote:<br><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
Theo, <br><br>Clearly, links in sidebars are not getting enough eyeballs. It is also hard to look for one&#39;s own language when there are too many interwiki links. Unless you are intentionally looking for it, it is hard to notice.<br>
</blockquote><div><br></div><div>The placement of the inter-wiki language links was more of a usability decision. WMF undertook the usability initiative a couple of years ago, and decided to place it there in the current skins. </div>
<div> </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
<br>What I am suggesting is a country specific clear navigational aid which is a best practice that all major websites follow (WordPress, Google, Facebook all show Indic language version links if I access from India.</blockquote>
<div><br></div><div>And I&#39;m saying, that is similar to what we tried. We had a banner informing only Indian editors, both logged-in and anon, that there is a version of Wikipedia in their own language. </div><div> </div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><br>
It will be interesting to analyze why the banners did not work. If we are inviting people to contribute, only people who would like to contribute may check. The behavior may be different when we try different messages. Also, I am not looking to convert people to editors. Merely getting more readers and increasing awareness about the existence of local language versions is a great win.<br>
</blockquote><div><br></div><div>At the time, my intention wasn&#39;t as much as getting editors but raising awareness of the Indic Wikis. We didn&#39;t have analytics on during the last tests, but I suppose click-through rates and other information could be utilized for an analysis. </div>
<div><br></div><div>My point was, we tried it for months, it did not make any measurable impact. The approach was very similar to what you are proposing, I believe someone even suggested that exact proposal during that time. I asked around and maybe there was some technical solution to making an en.wp sitenotice geolocated to india that would pull the same info as the language side-bar but place it on top. It doesn&#39;t seem technically hard to pull off.</div>
<div><br></div><div>Anyway, I suppose I can throw something together for a banner or test but I am not inclined towards trying it now, we just concluded the Wikiconference, and banners for India ran non-stop for over 3 months, which lead into the fundraiser banners lasting the last couple of months followed by the research study and editor trends. It is time to give central notices for India some rest, it needs some gap unless we start loosing visibility for banners in India, all together.</div>
<div><br></div><div>Regards<br>Theo</div><div><br></div></div>