Thanks geni
but this raises more questions...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Non-free_content#Other_Wikimedia_proj... that section states that "some projects never accept fair use" that seems contradictory to what geni just said. Is that because there has been legal trouble in the past? Or to prevent trouble in the future? It seems odd to me that on the same website/domain there are different image use policies.
As for the low quality content on NL, i agree that EN was conceived a couple of years earlier, but the Dutch wiki has over 300k articles, that's a number that suggests a large userbase, and high quality. But as i demonstrated, an article about the most famous scientist of the last 100 years cites 0 sources. I believe that is wrong. On the Dutch wiki the image use policy is enforced with vigor, but the "citing references" issue is hardly addressed. I think that is wrong. I agree that Jimbo can't interfere with every wiki in every language, -but- the Dutch wiki is in the top 10 of wikis in size. And i believe that on other large wikis the same issue applies. The German wiki is second in size, and has only 3 references in the article about Einstein. Wouldn't it be reasonable is there was something of a rapporteur to the board for the larger wikis, so that at least the top 10 wikis look generally the same? The Dutch wiki gets a fair amount of press coverage, it would be a shame if it were negative press, would't it?
As for NPOV, I have seen more examples of the sort on various articles, even about animals. Some articles echo a sort of "Greenpeace" sound, whether it be deliberate or not. The Dutch wiki also has no template for "this article is written like an advertisement". Not because they had no time to make one, but because for some reason, they have no desire for it.
My question, can, and is it desirable, that Jimbo or some other official intervenes? Or is citing references only vital in the English wiki? I tend to look at the English wiki before looking at the Dutch one, for this very reason, the quality is so low on many Dutch articles, and sometimes the facts differ substantially from the English articles, as if the author did not compare or check his facts. Do we want other language wikis to be inferior because they are not under strict regulations?
Shoombooly