On 21/01/07, Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com wrote:
There is also the fact that Wikipedia is not well known in many countries. When our articles are found positively in search engines, it will slowly but surely help us get to the tipping point where Wikipedia is a household name. It is not even well known in countries like Italy. We need good relations to get us where we will be a well established movement outside of the English language as well. It helps when we have friends like Google.
On a slight variation on this topic:
What can we do for countries where people routinely use the English wikipedia and ignore their own language Wikipedia? I try to push local Wikipedias when talking to the press (and far too many seem to be unaware of their own language Wikipedia) and mention the international character talking to the English-language press. That hopefully does a little, but not enough.
One factor appears to be that en:wp has achieved usefulness. (If Wikipedias weren't actually useful, wikipedia.org wouldn't be a top 10 site on Alexa.) I think this is two things:
1. Incredible breadth of coverage - journalists LOVE en:wp because it's the universal backgrounding resource on any subject, if approached with due caution. 2.Very up-to-date.
Britannica may have more consistent writing quality and more consistent fact-checking, but it's not there on people's desks and it's not kept obsessively up-to-date.
So what can small Wikipedias (say, under 100,000 articles) do to achieve these effects - breadth and being up-to-date - as well? Are there other tacks they should try taking to achieve greater public awareness?
[cc: to wikien-l for further ideas]
- d.
How easy would it be to put a featured article symbol next to the links to other language versions of a page when the other version is a featured article (or equivalent) on that wiki?
It might help persuade people that other language wikipedias are worth reading.
On 21/01/07, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.com wrote:
How easy would it be to put a featured article symbol next to the links to other language versions of a page when the other version is a featured article (or equivalent) on that wiki?
It might help persuade people that other language wikipedias are worth reading.
It's a nice ide - so nice that we do it already :-)
There's a CSS hack for it; as well as the interwiki link, you use {{Link FA|xx}} which gives an interwiki with a little star. It's not perfect - it needs manual maintenance - but it works well enough...
See, for example, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon - half a dozen of the interwiki links are FAs.
On 1/21/07, Andrew Gray shimgray@gmail.com wrote:
There's a CSS hack for it; as well as the interwiki link, you use {{Link FA|xx}} which gives an interwiki with a little star. It's not perfect - it needs manual maintenance - but it works well enough...
Opera 8.5 gives a little black dot rather than a star.
On 21/01/07, geni geniice@gmail.com wrote:
On 1/21/07, Andrew Gray shimgray@gmail.com wrote:
There's a CSS hack for it; as well as the interwiki link, you use {{Link FA|xx}} which gives an interwiki with a little star. It's not perfect - it needs manual maintenance - but it works well enough...
Opera 8.5 gives a little black dot rather than a star.
IE 7 does as well, but only whilst loading - it eventually turns into a small pale gold star. I think it used to be an actual image of the FA-star, now changed, but don't quote me on that.
It's a nice ide - so nice that we do it already :-)
There's a CSS hack for it; as well as the interwiki link, you use {{Link FA|xx}} which gives an interwiki with a little star. It's not perfect - it needs manual maintenance - but it works well enough...
See, for example, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon - half a dozen of the interwiki links are FAs.
It's a tiny little star in place of the bullet point. If I wasn't looking for it, I would never notice it. How about a full size star after the link?
On 1/21/07, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.com wrote:
It's a nice ide - so nice that we do it already :-)
There's a CSS hack for it; as well as the interwiki link, you use {{Link FA|xx}} which gives an interwiki with a little star. It's not perfect - it needs manual maintenance - but it works well enough...
See, for example, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon - half a dozen of the interwiki links are FAs.
It's a tiny little star in place of the bullet point. If I wasn't looking for it, I would never notice it. How about a full size star after the link?
Am I completely crazy, but wasn't that star WAY bigger before? I remember seeing a big star a while ago and liking it a whole lot, but these guys are barely visible.
--Oskar
Oskar Sigvardsson wrote:
Am I completely crazy, but wasn't that star WAY bigger before? I remember seeing a big star a while ago and liking it a whole lot, but these guys are barely visible.
--Oskar
No you're not. I changed the CSS and JS a bit so the star replaces the bullet instead of putting the star between the bullet and the language name. I had to draw a new image which ended up looking not-quite-gold. I've now replaced it with a much more visible monobook-yellow one (you may need to clear you browser cache to see it.)
--Ruud
On 1/21/07, Ruud Koot r.koot@students.uu.nl wrote:
Oskar Sigvardsson wrote:
Am I completely crazy, but wasn't that star WAY bigger before? I remember seeing a big star a while ago and liking it a whole lot, but these guys are barely visible.
--Oskar
No you're not. I changed the CSS and JS a bit so the star replaces the bullet instead of putting the star between the bullet and the language name. I had to draw a new image which ended up looking not-quite-gold. I've now replaced it with a much more visible monobook-yellow one (you may need to clear you browser cache to see it.)
--Ruud
Ahh, yes, that's already much better, now you can actually see it without looking for it. The big star did seem a little out-of-place.
--Oskar
No you're not. I changed the CSS and JS a bit so the star replaces the bullet instead of putting the star between the bullet and the language name. I had to draw a new image which ended up looking not-quite-gold. I've now replaced it with a much more visible monobook-yellow one (you may need to clear you browser cache to see it.)
It took two shots at clearly my browser cache before I could see it, but now it's there, it's much better! Thanks!
Hoi, The first thing we can do is not compare it to the English language Wikipedia. The en.wikipedia.org is what the other projects can aspire to if that is what they want. If we are serious about making these other projects successful, we have to give them a priority that they currently do not get and give them the room to develop.
The first thing that we can do is to make sure that the localisation is done as efficiently as possible. Practically it means that the Incubator can be used like the BetaWiki used to be used for. By making Incubator the place where we do our localisation, we will need to do this only once and, this is an improvement from the laborious way it is done on for instance the Marathi projects. It however means that this software needs to be accepted by Brion and for him it currently does not have the required priority.
In order to get living and breathing language projects there are several things that help. Localisation is one. With a quality localisation we not only support one project, we allow MediaWiki to be used as a tool. This will increase the number of people that can easily help us out. A minimal amount of content for a project is the next. There have been successful projects to translate basic information that provides some infrastructure to a project. The Neapolitan Wikipedia for instance has pioneered the use of CAT or Computer Translation Tools for the creation of static content.
There are organisations that share the wish with us to provide quality information in particular languages.
I have had the privilege to learn first hand how this can be done in a pilot project. In this project Wikimedians were in charge of a translation project where English featured articles were translated in Persian. The list of articles that were to be translated was presented before the work started to prevent the notion that an American POV was pushed out. Several articles were removed as a result. We have learned a lot from this project and, are now able to do a similar project where a mix of translation and original articles can be written.
Important is that the articles selected are the ones that will have relevance. This is why a theme of "background articles to the news" was extremely valid. It is these articles that are found to be most read; the Gerald Ford article was read a lot after his death. By consistently focusing on the background information to the news, you create the relevance that will attract other people to enrich the project with other content. Things that are in the news have a tendency to get back into the news... :)
Having a mix of translations and new articles is better also because the English featured articles are overdeveloped. It is much better for the creation of a community to create a tapestry of linked articles that provide a start. Many people have a fear of starting articles. There are with some regularity opportunities for projects like this. Of importance is that they are managed well and that the core values of our projects are respected this can be ensured by having established Wikimedians play a role in this.
PS This is not to say that the small projects are the only projects that could benefit from a paid for project. When projects have a bias that exists because of an under representation of specific information, it would be one way of addressing it effectively.
PS There is room for the development of content in many more languages that we are exploring.
Thanks, GerardM
On 1/21/07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 21/01/07, Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com wrote:
There is also the fact that Wikipedia is not well known in many countries. When our articles are found positively in search engines, it will slowly but surely help us get to the tipping point where Wikipedia is a household name. It is not even well known in countries like Italy. We need good relations to get us where we will be a well established movement outside of the English language as well. It helps when we have friends like Google.
On a slight variation on this topic:
What can we do for countries where people routinely use the English wikipedia and ignore their own language Wikipedia? I try to push local Wikipedias when talking to the press (and far too many seem to be unaware of their own language Wikipedia) and mention the international character talking to the English-language press. That hopefully does a little, but not enough.
One factor appears to be that en:wp has achieved usefulness. (If Wikipedias weren't actually useful, wikipedia.org wouldn't be a top 10 site on Alexa.) I think this is two things:
- Incredible breadth of coverage - journalists LOVE en:wp because
it's the universal backgrounding resource on any subject, if approached with due caution. 2.Very up-to-date.
Britannica may have more consistent writing quality and more consistent fact-checking, but it's not there on people's desks and it's not kept obsessively up-to-date.
So what can small Wikipedias (say, under 100,000 articles) do to achieve these effects - breadth and being up-to-date - as well? Are there other tacks they should try taking to achieve greater public awareness?
[cc: to wikien-l for further ideas]
- d.
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
On 1/22/07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
What can we do for countries where people routinely use the English wikipedia and ignore their own language Wikipedia? I try to push local
Start by formalising this concept, and producing a special interface for people who are reading the non-local version of their Wikipedia. For example, a user in the .fr domain whose language settings are set to FR reads a page on EN. The interface could simultaneously present him with the english and french versions of the article (assuming they exist) and perhaps suggest to him that he might like to contribute to the FR version.
Steve
On 1/22/07, Steve Bennett stevagewp@gmail.com wrote:
On 1/22/07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
What can we do for countries where people routinely use the English wikipedia and ignore their own language Wikipedia? I try to push local
Start by formalising this concept, and producing a special interface for people who are reading the non-local version of their Wikipedia. For example, a user in the .fr domain whose language settings are set to FR reads a page on EN. The interface could simultaneously present him with the english and french versions of the article (assuming they exist) and perhaps suggest to him that he might like to contribute to the FR version.
Steve
Speaking as a Swede who hardly ever visit the Swedish wikipedia (I know, I'm part of the problem, blah, blah blah ;), that would annoy the crap out of me.
--Oskar
Start by formalising this concept, and producing a special interface for people who are reading the non-local version of their Wikipedia. For example, a user in the .fr domain whose language settings are set to FR reads a page on EN. The interface could simultaneously present him with the english and french versions of the article (assuming they exist) and perhaps suggest to him that he might like to contribute to the FR version.
I like the way you're thinking, but I'm not sure I like your idea. How about (once single sign-on is set up), a global setting where you can put (in order) your preferred languages. Then, whenever you click on a link, you can have it set to either:
1) Take you to the article in the language which is highest on your list of preferred languages out of the languages that have an article on that subject (judged by the presence of interwiki links) 2) Take you to the article in the same language as the article you were reading, but with a very noticeable message at the top saying "This article also exists in LANGUAGE" if there is an article in a language you prefer. It should also say if another of your preferred languages has it as a featured article. 3) Do exactly what it does now, for those that don't like change.
If you are reading an article in one language, and another of your preferred languages doesn't have an article on that topic, it would be great if, next to "Edit this page" was a "Create this article in LANGUAGE" link - although if you clicked it, it would need to suggest you look for an article in that language that simply isn't linked and link it, before starting from scratch.
2007/1/21, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com:
What can we do for countries where people routinely use the English wikipedia and ignore their own language Wikipedia? I try to push local Wikipedias when talking to the press (and far too many seem to be unaware of their own language Wikipedia) and mention the international character talking to the English-language press. That hopefully does a little, but not enough.
Besides enwiki actually being the longer and "better story", journalists learn about their subject from other journalists. Journalists will read the articles on English Wikipedia that they can find on the net. In them, English Wikipedia is routinely referred to as Wikipedia. Of course the journalists will focus on Wikipedia = English Wikipedia, not on the "we also have Wikipedias in n number of languages". If Jimmy Wales, people on the board and others giving interviews would make sure to say English Wikipedia a bit more often when they are talking about English Wikipedia, that would probably make some kind of difference.
Of course, the major part of that effort would be wasted since the journalist will shorten English Wikipedia to Wikipedia. They are short of space, and as we all know Wikipedia most of the time _is_ used as an abbreviation for English Wikipedia.
/habj