Based on the input from the previous couple of days, I am listing
them. Some of them are in the form of the request for comment, some of
them are in the form of the proposal. So, please, comment if you
disagree with some of the items.
== Membership ==
* Accepting any new member would still require consensus of those who
expressed their opinion. (Nothing has changed.)
* LangCom members should read messages in a timely fashion (at least
twice per week), and to contribute on such decisions, where
appropriate, within the deadline, or otherwise presumably at least
once per month (this could be a simple +1). Lapses in participation
would result in a "warning" after three months, and revocation of
membership after six. (Note: This is actual proposal for the policy
change!)
* At this moment of time we have 17 members. One of them has very
specific role (Zadiak, Wikiversity). I don't remember if I heard at
all three of them. Five of them are quite quiet during the last few
years.
While it's good to create a general limit of 10-15 members, I think it
is not useful at the moment, as we don't have all necessary expertise
inside of the committee. However, on the long run, we could limit
accepting new members from already covered areas.
In relation to Wikimedia and computers in general we are pretty strong
and I see no reason to increase the number of LangCom members based on
those types of expertise.
However, we lack in expertise and connections related to, most
importantly, South (and Central) America and Southeast Asia (including
Austronesian languages). It would be good to have somebody for the
languages of New Guinea (~1500 of them).
I would also like to see a little bit of ethnnolinguistic diversity
inside of the committee. At the moment we are 16/17 native
Indo-European speakers and just two members are not of European
ancestry. In other words, I think another African member should be
welcome, as well.
My proposal (so, please, comment this paragraph if you don't agree or
you want to make addition or change!) is to publish on wikimedia-l
that we are searching for three member profiles, which should be,
ideally, similar to Oliver: (1) A Wikimedian and expert in South and
Central American indigenous languages; (2) A Wikimedian and expert in
Southeast Asian (including Austronesian) languages; (3) A Wikimedian
and expert in New Guinea languages.
That would raise the number of LangCom members to 20 and from this
point of time, we should wait to lose at least 7-8 members before
adding any new.
== Voting ==
This is also proposal, so read it and comment if you don't agree or
you want any addition.
1) No voting
1.1) According to the Closing projects policy [1], particular member
of the committee analyzes discussion and, if decides that the project
should be closed, sends the request to WMF Board.
1.2) Clear-cut situations for making a language eligible for Wikimedia
projects: the language has a valid ISO 639-3 code, there are no
significant issues in relation to the language itself, the population
of speakers is significant, request made by a native speaker. In this
case, any committee member can mark language / project eligible.
1.3) Approval without obvious formal requirements. No project will be
approved without them.
2) Simple majority (of those who expressed opinion)
2.1) Eligibility of a language with a valid ISO 639-3 code, but
without significant population of native speakers. (Note: this covers
ancient, constructed, reviving and languages with small number of
speakers.)
2.2) Eligibility of a language without a valid ISO 639-3 code, but
valid BCP 47 code. (Note: this covers Ecuadorian Quechua.)
2.3) Eligibility of a language with significant collision between
prescriptive and descriptive information. (Note: this covers
"macrolangauges".)
2.4) Project approval if not 1.3.
3) 2/3 majority (of those who expressed opinion)
3.1) Any change of the rules, including the committee's role in
possible changes of the Language proposal policy [2] and Closing
projects policy [1].
4) Consensus (of those who expressed opinion)
4.1) A new member of the Language committee should not be opposed by
any of the current committee member.
[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Closing_projects_policy
[2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Meta:Language_proposal_ policy
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