On Apr 11, 2006, at 3:00 AM, Steve Bennett wrote:
I did not raise this issue to bash Americans. Nor would I have a complaint if a state in the US were disambig'ed with a terristory in Pakistan. But for a mere state in the US to be considered somehow "equal" in importance, interest, searchability as a *country* just seems wrong. I'm really having trouble putting into words exactly why I feel that way, so I'll leave it for a bit and come back to it.
Current political status is really somewhat of an irrelevant topic. What about 20 years ago, when Georgia was simply part of the USSR? Georgia wasn't "a country" then, but it was largely the same place.
Here's the objective metrics:
Total GDP, Per-Capita GDP, Population, Foreign Trade, Land Area, No. of Wiki-Links: The US State Sovereignty, membership in int. organizations: The Nation
Now, this Wikipedia is written in English. (Arguments about African customers are irrelevant, as organizational style will change in a translation to an African language). There are 8 million people in Georgia (the state), almost all of whom speak English. There are 300 million people in the United States, likewise. Georgia (the country) is not an English-speaking country.
There are 380 million people who speak English as a first language. Some 79% of English-speakers are thus Americans. Now, assuming that British, Australians, Canadians, New Zealanders, et. al. are all more interested in the country than the state, they only make up some 21% of the English-speaking population. You're asking to inconvenience 4/5 of the potential user base for en. out of the belief that sovereignty and membership in international organizations not only outweigh all other considerations, but overwhelm it so much that the default page should not be a disambiguation page.
That's anti-Americanism.