Hoi,

At this time, we made big progress by having a policy in place whereby ISO-639-3 defined languages can gain eligibility from the WMF language committee. Eligibility to allow the addition of labels in Wikidata without any requirement for localisation as is per the policy for any other project. At the same time we have a situation where it is technically possible to have languages enabled for Wikidata only.

The plan is to ask to enable all eligible languages that have an Incubator presence for Wikidata first. What needs doing is for someone to make a list of the languages involved. Obviously, we want to see what impact it has. Combined with the Reasonator, it has a great potential as it does provide fall back languages that can be configured.

When new languages are requested, it will be ISO-639-3 only as per the policy. Good arguments will need to be provided because we will not engage in Wikidata as a "post stamp collection" of any and all languages/ Consequently, the involvement of native speakers will be an important plus.

If this feels like me "throwing cold water" on the enthusiasm for many more languages then do understand that Wikidata does not support Wiktionary yet. When lexical values become possible it is soon enough to revisit things again.

Thanks,

GerardM

On 6 May 2014 20:55, P. Blissenbach <publi@web.de> wrote:

Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen@gmail.com> wrote:

> Hoi,Purodha what you say about Ethnologue is very biases,

> wrong and often hardly relevant.

I am sorry if my contribution was biased. My main goal was to
warn that there are more than 7000-odd languages, extending
ISO 639-3 is time consuming, and that we have the BCP47 defining
language variants in addition to ISO 639.

> When you know your history,
> Ethnologue was asked if they would bring in their expertise
> and system in the ISO processes because the existing ISO-639-2
> was extremely inadequate. When it was included, it became
> part of an established process whereby experts from national
> standard bodies decide on the further development. Effectively
> the role of Ethnologue is one of administrator, not initiator.

Thrue.

> Saying that all the issues about languages is because to Ethnlogue
> is completely false.

I was not meaning to say that.

> The notion if there are many more languages is
> very much open to debate. There is no good answer.

Sure, it depends. Also, I do not want to put blame on anyone.
Naturally, whatever you collect, you start somewhere, it will take time,
and at some point you have an incomplete, but growing list. That is how
I see Ethnologue. I keep mailing them data knowing that they are going
to need their time to verify and process it.

Taking into account what we likely have to use as a definition for
"language" is, whether or not labels, lexemes, or similar, are spelled
pronunced, signalled, or syntactically/grammatically put together differently
enough to warrant that we call them distinct from another "language".
I am well aware that this is a foggy thing and there are many instances
that can cause controversies.

> When you are interested in looking beyond the ISO-639-3 consider
> the ISO-639-6. It aims to include any and all language variants
> and it is not that interested in using the political term what
> language has become.

I was considering to mention it in my post. I did not, mainly for bevity.

Yet also, I doubt, it's in a useful state already. Last fall or late summer,
it had almost twice as many entries as ISO 639-3, language coverage in my
main field was as incomplete as ISO 639, it was not publicized in a well
usable way (Website down since long. Before that, queryable in a
complicated and inefficient manner for individual entries and small
sets only. No listings available online. No details beyond language
names. Good news: the web site is partly online again as of today.)

Yes, I do consider ISO 639-6. I am happy about it's clearer and
simpler approach to the subject matter, and I am looking forward to using
it, as its coverage grows.

Purodha

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