On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 3:49 AM, Joseph Seddon josephseddon@googlemail.comwrote:
Lets see some bids :)
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2011/Bids
Seddon
Let me guess, North America will win this time? I don't think Australia has had a turn yet either.
--- El vie 11-sep-09, Al Tally majorly.wiki@googlemail.com escribió:
2009 at 3:49 AM, Joseph Seddon josephseddon@googlemail.com wrote:
Lets see some bids :)
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2011/Bids
Seddon
Let me guess, North America will win this time? I don't think Australia has had a turn yet either.
Well, We haven't seen a French speaking host yet, so the République de Québec might not be a bad idea anyway. Another bilingual Wikimanie?
Otherwise, I think is already Antarctica's turn.
Mariano Cecowski.
Yahoo! Cocina
Encontra las mejores recetas con Yahoo! Cocina.
On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 1:44 AM, Mariano Cecowski marianocecowski@yahoo.com.ar wrote:
Another bilingual Wikimanie?
Before we say that we need to evaluate how the bilingual nature worked this time around.
On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 11:48 AM, Casey Brown lists@caseybrown.org wrote:
On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 1:44 AM, Mariano Cecowski marianocecowski@yahoo.com.ar wrote:
Another bilingual Wikimanie?
Before we say that we need to evaluate how the bilingual nature worked this time around.
Feel free to ask WM2009 attendees :).
galio
2009/9/13 Galileo Vidoni galio2k@gmail.com:
On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 11:48 AM, Casey Brown lists@caseybrown.org wrote:
On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 1:44 AM, Mariano Cecowski marianocecowski@yahoo.com.ar wrote:
Another bilingual Wikimanie?
Before we say that we need to evaluate how the bilingual nature worked this time around.
Feel free to ask WM2009 attendees :).
Presumably there will be a formal post mortem, where this issue will be given a lot of consideration.
Like the formal post mortem we were supposed to have of WM 2008 which I have yet to see materialise?
Seddon
On Sun, Sep 13, 2009 at 2:54 AM, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.comwrote:
2009/9/13 Galileo Vidoni galio2k@gmail.com:
On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 11:48 AM, Casey Brown lists@caseybrown.org
wrote:
On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 1:44 AM, Mariano Cecowski marianocecowski@yahoo.com.ar wrote:
Another bilingual Wikimanie?
Before we say that we need to evaluate how the bilingual nature worked this time around.
Feel free to ask WM2009 attendees :).
Presumably there will be a formal post mortem, where this issue will be given a lot of consideration.
Wikimania-l mailing list Wikimania-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimania-l
On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 9:52 PM, Galileo Vidoni galio2k@gmail.com wrote:
Feel free to ask WM2009 attendees :).
But that's not systematic and it's not that simple. :-) It's a multi-layered issue with the attendees, the would-be attendees (didn't some people say they wouldn't come because it was bilingual?), and especially the organizers all having important comments.
On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 9:54 PM, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.com wrote:
Presumably there will be a formal post mortem, where this issue will be given a lot of consideration.
I'm pretty sure the local team is actively working on one internally first and then they'll publish it to the community for more feedback. If they're not, I know quite a few people who would be interested in putting their own post-mortem together.
On Sun, Sep 13, 2009 at 7:13 AM, Joseph Seddon josephseddon@googlemail.com wrote:
Like the formal post mortem we were supposed to have of WM 2008 which I have yet to see materialise?
Supposed to have? There was a lot of work put into it, http://wikimania2008.wikimedia.org/wiki/Post-mortem and even a survey: http://wikimania2008.wikimedia.org/wiki/Survey. Granted, this isn't the best-looking and easy to access post-mortem we could've made, but at least it was one of the early attempts at teaching future organizers what to do. We're supposed to get better every year, not let the mistakes of last year hang over our heads. :-)
2009/9/13 Casey Brown lists@caseybrown.org:
Supposed to have? There was a lot of work put into it, http://wikimania2008.wikimedia.org/wiki/Post-mortem and even a survey: http://wikimania2008.wikimedia.org/wiki/Survey. Granted, this isn't the best-looking and easy to access post-mortem we could've made, but at least it was one of the early attempts at teaching future organizers what to do. We're supposed to get better every year, not let the mistakes of last year hang over our heads. :-)
You have linked to a list of people interested in taking part and an agenda. That is the preparation for a post-mortem, not a post-mortem. Where are the conclusions?
On Sun, Sep 13, 2009 at 9:56 AM, Casey Brown lists@caseybrown.org wrote:
On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 9:52 PM, Galileo Vidoni galio2k@gmail.com wrote:
Feel free to ask WM2009 attendees :).
But that's not systematic and it's not that simple. :-) It's a multi-layered issue with the attendees, the would-be attendees *(didn't some people say they wouldn't come because it was bilingual?)*, and especially the organizers all having important comments.
I know that, of course, and that's why we are working on the postmortem thing. But if you want to know how did the multilingual aspect of the conference work out, you still may have to ask actual Wikimania attendees. I'm sorry but "would-be" attendees, no matter the reasons that prevented them from participating, just can't provide feedback on the issue.
I would like to say that saying you wouldn't go somewhere because it has a bilingual program is plainly, blatantly stupid. I don't know if someone did effectively say that, and if someone did so he must have misunderstood something. What I did hear were thankful compliments from both local and foreign attendees praising the simultaneous translation service and the possibility of having people present or attend conferences in their native language. This last group is way bigger that, let's suppose, no more than five people that may have misunderstood the bilingual approach and avoided registering for this year (and I still don't get to know them).
Wikimania 2009's program was extremely packed up, with up to five parallel sessions taking place during the whole three days. We did not cancel any activity in English because of the activities in Spanish. The Program Committee, of which I was a member, did not reject any proposal based on language prescriptions or quotas. Spanish language content was just an addition, an extra possibility we planned to offer right from Buenos Aires' bid submission back in late 2007/early 2008. The jury evidently valued that, because it was one of our key proposals for hosting Wikimania.
Excuse me, but no one can reasonably state that he would not attend a conference because it is not English-only: he may just stay within the English language activities, which were plenty and most of them in Wikimania 2009, and so did many attendees without ever having to hear a word in Spanish! What is more, what would you say to the sizeable amount of people that just had the possibility of attending their first Wikimania because content was being held and translated into the sole language they speak? I must highlight that simultaneous translation worked not only for having English sessions in Spanish: *all* of the presentations in Spanish were translated into English, and I punctually remember Samuel Klein telling the audience during the Q&A session that he was glad of having had the possibility to attend some particular presentations (originally) in Spanish.
If Wikimedia's policy of multilingualism and the strategic planning process' aim of expanding Wikimedia's reach in the Global South are more than just words --and I indeed believe it--, then Wikimania should also progressively cease to diminish when possible its anglocentric nature. And it's not anglocentric, I think, by choice, as someone may misunderstand, but by force. We can all understand that English is the "first global language", that the Foundation is based in the US and that the biggest Wikimedia projects are those in English. But, on the other side, we all also know that Wikimedia projects are available in hundreds of languages and that the Foundation's policy is to host projects and contents in every possible language.
It is thus clear that Wikimania 2009's multilingual approach can't be understood as an anomaly, as something subject to much opinion, as if the English-speaking population was to have the last world on where or not should the rest of the world have the opportunity of *also* (i.e. not *only*) having Wikimania in their language(s). It was not a whim from the organizing team but a rational, expectable, needful step for having future bilingual and let's hope multilingual editions of Wikimania. Nobody is talking of cutting out English language contents here, just of enabling other people, other voices and other POVs to take part of the conference.
I don't know if the Gdansk team has foreseen the possibility of having sessions in Polish for 2010 --I think they didn't, but I may be happily wrong--, but I would love for example to see a bilingual English-French conference in Montréal, and a tri, quatri, polilingual Wikimania some day in the future. I think most of you will agree with me here.
The only possiblity of thinking of bilingualism as something negative may have been this year's experience being a disaster, but thankfully I think that was not the case.
Best regards,
galio (from the former WM2009 Organizing Team)
P.S.: You may excuse my English, I certainly go better with Spanish.
Hi,
2009/9/14 Galileo Vidoni galio2k@gmail.com
<snip>
I would like to say that saying you wouldn't go somewhere because it has a bilingual program is plainly, blatantly stupid. I don't know if someone did effectively say that, and if someone did so he must have misunderstood something. What I did hear were thankful compliments from both local and foreign attendees praising the simultaneous translation service and the possibility of having people present or attend conferences in their native language. This last group is way bigger that, let's suppose, no more than five people that may have misunderstood the bilingual approach and avoided registering for this year (and I still don't get to know them).
Actually I think I was one of the people who said something along these lines, but there's of course more behind it. First of all, one should realize going to Wikimania is a huge investment of money and time. To me personally, the bilingualism was a down side of the program. This was not even so much because I thought there would be less English sessions because of that, but because I had the impression that it would give a certain atmosphere where there would be a clear division in the community between the Spanish speaking people not speaking English and the English speaking people not speaking Spanish. This would be enforced by the program being partially in Spanish. So yes, I found it as a down side, and even at the conference (in the end, I was able to go, and glad I went) I think that the bilingualism caused some trouble - for example because the announcements were made in Spanish at moments almost nobody carried a translation device, or because translation devices don't work perfectly.
So... I hope this doesn't make me plainly, blatantly stupid. You can agree or disagree, but please, people make their own choices, and might have actually reasons why they think something is important or not.
<snip> Excuse me, but no one can reasonably state that he would not attend a conference because it is not English-only: he may just stay within the English language activities, which were plenty and most of them in Wikimania 2009, and so did many attendees without ever having to hear a word in Spanish! What is more, what would you say to the sizeable amount of people that just had the possibility of attending their first Wikimania because content was being held and translated into the sole language they speak? I must highlight that simultaneous translation worked not only for having English sessions in Spanish: *all* of the presentations in Spanish were translated into English, and I punctually remember Samuel Klein telling the audience during the Q&A session that he was glad of having had the possibility to attend some particular presentations (originally) in Spanish.
Sure, there are good reasons to /have/ bilingual sessions, and to have some Spanish sessions too. However, that does /not/ mean that other people can't estimate those arguments differently then you, and might find it no longer worth while to invest the time and money to go to Wikimania. And as I explained above, what you describe was actually part of my argument. There would be a separation of the present people into two groups, and for some part that is what happened. Now to make a good analysis of the pro's and con's for that, you should be open to cricism I think, even from the unreasonable people who did not attend for whatever reason. Most of the times they might say things you find stupid, but you'd be surprised that some of them actually have a reasoning behind it.
<snip>
I don't know if the Gdansk team has foreseen the possibility of having sessions in Polish for 2010 --I think they didn't, but I may be happily wrong--, but I would love for example to see a bilingual English-French conference in Montréal, and a tri, quatri, polilingual Wikimania some day in the future. I think most of you will agree with me here.
Well, I for sure do not agree here. There might be bilingual sessions for practical reasons, but I do not think it should be a goal on itself. Language is a mean, not a goal. In Europe there are plenty of multilingual meetings and we call that the European Parliament. Very expensive and tiring imho.
The only possiblity of thinking of bilingualism as something negative may have been this year's experience being a disaster, but thankfully I think that was not the case.
I think bilingualism always carries a risk and a down side. It doesn't have to destroy the conference, but it certainly doesn't have to improve it either. I can't tell from my position with the current information whether it was actually an improvement or not of the conference.
Best regards,
galio (from the former WM2009 Organizing Team)
P.S.: You may excuse my English, I certainly go better with Spanish.
Oh, your English is just fine, don't you worry :)
Best, Lodewijk
PS: I realize that not being very pro multilingualism is considered politically incorrect, rude and stupid to do in public. I'll just apologize in advance for this ;-)
Hoi, A well reasoned and rounded argument about the pros and cons of a translation service at a conference does not make you anti multilingualism. I admit to having had reservations about multi language conferences because for me a conference is very much a place where I meet people and develop new and existing relations. When I meet too many people who do not speak a shared language tolerably well, it removes a large part of the rationale for going to a conference.
Now there are other parts to making use of a translation service, a translation service is excellent for people who consider themselves not competent enough to follow the speaker in the other language. It also may be because the speaker is not confident in speaking in English. As long as there is some ability to speak a shared language, the building of relations will still work fine.
PS I was at Wikimania, and I was happy with the translators.. They did a good job and I found that my experience of Wikimania did not suffer at all. Wikimania 2009 is certainly one of the best Wikimanias I have been to. Thanks, GerardM
2009/9/14 effe iets anders effeietsanders@gmail.com
Hi,
2009/9/14 Galileo Vidoni galio2k@gmail.com
<snip>
I would like to say that saying you wouldn't go somewhere because it has a bilingual program is plainly, blatantly stupid. I don't know if someone did effectively say that, and if someone did so he must have misunderstood something. What I did hear were thankful compliments from both local and foreign attendees praising the simultaneous translation service and the possibility of having people present or attend conferences in their native language. This last group is way bigger that, let's suppose, no more than five people that may have misunderstood the bilingual approach and avoided registering for this year (and I still don't get to know them).
Actually I think I was one of the people who said something along these lines, but there's of course more behind it. First of all, one should realize going to Wikimania is a huge investment of money and time. To me personally, the bilingualism was a down side of the program. This was not even so much because I thought there would be less English sessions because of that, but because I had the impression that it would give a certain atmosphere where there would be a clear division in the community between the Spanish speaking people not speaking English and the English speaking people not speaking Spanish. This would be enforced by the program being partially in Spanish. So yes, I found it as a down side, and even at the conference (in the end, I was able to go, and glad I went) I think that the bilingualism caused some trouble - for example because the announcements were made in Spanish at moments almost nobody carried a translation device, or because translation devices don't work perfectly.
So... I hope this doesn't make me plainly, blatantly stupid. You can agree or disagree, but please, people make their own choices, and might have actually reasons why they think something is important or not.
<snip> Excuse me, but no one can reasonably state that he would not attend a conference because it is not English-only: he may just stay within the English language activities, which were plenty and most of them in Wikimania 2009, and so did many attendees without ever having to hear a word in Spanish! What is more, what would you say to the sizeable amount of people that just had the possibility of attending their first Wikimania because content was being held and translated into the sole language they speak? I must highlight that simultaneous translation worked not only for having English sessions in Spanish: *all* of the presentations in Spanish were translated into English, and I punctually remember Samuel Klein telling the audience during the Q&A session that he was glad of having had the possibility to attend some particular presentations (originally) in Spanish.
Sure, there are good reasons to /have/ bilingual sessions, and to have some Spanish sessions too. However, that does /not/ mean that other people can't estimate those arguments differently then you, and might find it no longer worth while to invest the time and money to go to Wikimania. And as I explained above, what you describe was actually part of my argument. There would be a separation of the present people into two groups, and for some part that is what happened. Now to make a good analysis of the pro's and con's for that, you should be open to cricism I think, even from the unreasonable people who did not attend for whatever reason. Most of the times they might say things you find stupid, but you'd be surprised that some of them actually have a reasoning behind it.
<snip>
I don't know if the Gdansk team has foreseen the possibility of having sessions in Polish for 2010 --I think they didn't, but I may be happily wrong--, but I would love for example to see a bilingual English-French conference in Montréal, and a tri, quatri, polilingual Wikimania some day in the future. I think most of you will agree with me here.
Well, I for sure do not agree here. There might be bilingual sessions for practical reasons, but I do not think it should be a goal on itself. Language is a mean, not a goal. In Europe there are plenty of multilingual meetings and we call that the European Parliament. Very expensive and tiring imho.
The only possiblity of thinking of bilingualism as something negative may have been this year's experience being a disaster, but thankfully I think that was not the case.
I think bilingualism always carries a risk and a down side. It doesn't have to destroy the conference, but it certainly doesn't have to improve it either. I can't tell from my position with the current information whether it was actually an improvement or not of the conference.
Best regards,
galio (from the former WM2009 Organizing Team)
P.S.: You may excuse my English, I certainly go better with Spanish.
Oh, your English is just fine, don't you worry :)
Best, Lodewijk
PS: I realize that not being very pro multilingualism is considered politically incorrect, rude and stupid to do in public. I'll just apologize in advance for this ;-)
Wikimania-l mailing list Wikimania-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimania-l
Hi,
Because I speak only English (and German), but no Spanish, I had no personal advantage of bilingual aspects of the conference. Nevertheless I support the idea of multilingual Wikimania.
It is indicative for the high personal expectations, that some people argue they did not profit from English->Spanish translations, because they don't speak Spanish, and therefor it is wrong to spend resources on simultaneous translations. If you look at how Wikimania should be, you can't only look at your personal interests, you have to look at everyone's interests. And as a matter of fact, not everyone potentially interested in Wikimedia speaks English. Those people's participation entirely depends on translations. We have to realize that the lack of multilingualism leads directly to a decrease of diversity.
What is in my opinion arguable and has to be considered in-depth, is if simultaneous translations are worth the effort. They require translators and a lot of tech (which unfortunately did not always work as anticipated). This is imho the question to evaluate: Do the benefits (more diversity, more participation) outweigh the disadvantages (costs, high effort)?
Concerning the "division of the community", I disagree. Of course if there is a language barrier, you can't talk to everyone. But is it really such a great difference if you have, let's say, * 400 English-speaking attendees, or * 400 English-speaking AND 200 non-English-speaking attendees? You can't even talk to all 400 English-speaking guests (not even close), so why does it matter? Is it a social problem to approach a person and then turn to someone else if you find out he doesn't speak your language?
I don't think the majority of English-speaking attendees saw bilingualism as a problem (not to speak of non-English-speakers). The disadvantages for English-speaking guests are minor compared to both the upsides and downsides of a multilingual conference mentioned above.
(This is just my opinion and I don't think you are stupid if you otherwise)
Regards,
Church of emacs
Ps.: Wikimania 2009 was great! It was my first Wikimania and I am thrilled to meet everyone again next year in Gdansk! :)
Galileo Vidoni wrote:
On Sun, Sep 13, 2009 at 9:56 AM, Casey Brown <lists@caseybrown.org mailto:lists@caseybrown.org> wrote:
On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 9:52 PM, Galileo Vidoni <galio2k@gmail.com <mailto:galio2k@gmail.com>> wrote: > Feel free to ask WM2009 attendees :). > But that's not systematic and it's not that simple. :-) It's a multi-layered issue with the attendees, the would-be attendees *(didn't some people say they wouldn't come because it was bilingual?)*, and especially the organizers all having important comments.
I know that, of course, and that's why we are working on the postmortem thing. But if you want to know how did the multilingual aspect of the conference work out, you still may have to ask actual Wikimania attendees. I'm sorry but "would-be" attendees, no matter the reasons that prevented them from participating, just can't provide feedback on the issue.
I would like to say that saying you wouldn't go somewhere because it has a bilingual program is plainly, blatantly stupid. I don't know if someone did effectively say that, and if someone did so he must have misunderstood something. What I did hear were thankful compliments from both local and foreign attendees praising the simultaneous translation service and the possibility of having people present or attend conferences in their native language. This last group is way bigger that, let's suppose, no more than five people that may have misunderstood the bilingual approach and avoided registering for this year (and I still don't get to know them).
Wikimania 2009's program was extremely packed up, with up to five parallel sessions taking place during the whole three days. We did not cancel any activity in English because of the activities in Spanish. The Program Committee, of which I was a member, did not reject any proposal based on language prescriptions or quotas. Spanish language content was just an addition, an extra possibility we planned to offer right from Buenos Aires' bid submission back in late 2007/early 2008. The jury evidently valued that, because it was one of our key proposals for hosting Wikimania.
Excuse me, but no one can reasonably state that he would not attend a conference because it is not English-only: he may just stay within the English language activities, which were plenty and most of them in Wikimania 2009, and so did many attendees without ever having to hear a word in Spanish! What is more, what would you say to the sizeable amount of people that just had the possibility of attending their first Wikimania because content was being held and translated into the sole language they speak? I must highlight that simultaneous translation worked not only for having English sessions in Spanish: *all* of the presentations in Spanish were translated into English, and I punctually remember Samuel Klein telling the audience during the Q&A session that he was glad of having had the possibility to attend some particular presentations (originally) in Spanish.
If Wikimedia's policy of multilingualism and the strategic planning process' aim of expanding Wikimedia's reach in the Global South are more than just words --and I indeed believe it--, then Wikimania should also progressively cease to diminish when possible its anglocentric nature. And it's not anglocentric, I think, by choice, as someone may misunderstand, but by force. We can all understand that English is the "first global language", that the Foundation is based in the US and that the biggest Wikimedia projects are those in English. But, on the other side, we all also know that Wikimedia projects are available in hundreds of languages and that the Foundation's policy is to host projects and contents in every possible language.
It is thus clear that Wikimania 2009's multilingual approach can't be understood as an anomaly, as something subject to much opinion, as if the English-speaking population was to have the last world on where or not should the rest of the world have the opportunity of *also* (i.e. not /only/) having Wikimania in their language(s). It was not a whim from the organizing team but a rational, expectable, needful step for having future bilingual and let's hope multilingual editions of Wikimania. Nobody is talking of cutting out English language contents here, just of enabling other people, other voices and other POVs to take part of the conference.
I don't know if the Gdansk team has foreseen the possibility of having sessions in Polish for 2010 --I think they didn't, but I may be happily wrong--, but I would love for example to see a bilingual English-French conference in Montréal, and a tri, quatri, polilingual Wikimania some day in the future. I think most of you will agree with me here.
The only possiblity of thinking of bilingualism as something negative may have been this year's experience being a disaster, but thankfully I think that was not the case.
Best regards,
galio (from the former WM2009 Organizing Team)
P.S.: You may excuse my English, I certainly go better with Spanish.
Wikimania-l mailing list Wikimania-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimania-l
On Mon, Sep 14, 2009 at 5:13 PM, church.of.emacs.ml church.of.emacs.ml@googlemail.com wrote:
Because I speak only English (and German), but no Spanish, I had no personal advantage of bilingual aspects of the conference. Nevertheless I support the idea of multilingual Wikimania.
They were doing bidirectional translation so you did have an advantage. You could have gone to a Spanish-speaking talk and had it translated for you, then asked questions in English and had them translated to Spanish for the speaker, and then heard the reply in English through your headset.
Anyway these rumored individuals who said they "wouldn't come because it was bilingual" probably had mistaken prejudgements about the implementation. Perhaps they thought a Spanish speaking person would be standing on stage with the speaker translating every sentence the speaker said?
2009/9/14 Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason avarab@gmail.com:
Anyway these rumored individuals who said they "wouldn't come because it was bilingual" probably had mistaken prejudgements about the implementation. Perhaps they thought a Spanish speaking person would be standing on stage with the speaker translating every sentence the speaker said?
Before the conference, I assumed correctly that there would be a track about Latin America with most talks in Spanish, but I didn't know there were gonna be simultaneous translations, let alone that English talks would have Spanish translations. I don't know if this was communicated in advance, maybe I missed that. I didn't particularly like having the closing ceremony partly in Spanish, especially since I wasn't expecting it and didn't grab a headset.
I'm generally supportive of the efforts to make Wikimania multilingual, and I would support similar setups with Polish and French (or whatever the language of the organizing city in 2011), but I think more consideration should be taken for people who don't speak the second language. The schedule should be more explicit about which language(s) are spoken in which sessions, including plenary sessions, so people don't end up attending a session they don't understand.
Also, we could do more outreach among people who speak only the second language; I don't know what the 2009 team did about this, but when Stallman asked (in Spanish) who didn't speak English, I saw less than ten people raise their hands.
Roan Kattouw (Catrope)
I'm an English speaker with almost no Spanish and this was my first Wikimania, so I don't have a monolingual wikimania to compare it to. To be honest I didn't use the translation service much, but it didn't significantly intrude either. But I think the idea is great and fully inline with the idea that we are building a global encyclopaedia.
The closing Spanish remarks by the head of Wikipedia Argentina needed no translation - he was obviously thanking all and sundry and I'm sure I wasn't the only "no hablo espagnol" pedian who clapped at the appropriate places. Such speeches are better made by an unintelligible enthusiast than a dull but all too comprehendable bore.
I think the big questions we will have to face in the future include:
1 Which languages have to be covered at every Wikimania? The de-facto minimum is probably now host country plus English, but that might rise in future. 2 What weighting will languages covered be given when considering bids for future Wikimanias? 3 How many attendees who only speak a particular language does it need to justify full or even partial translation? 4 With skype etc can we get the necessary translation done by volunteers over the web?
WereSpielChequers
2009/9/14 Roan Kattouw roan.kattouw@gmail.com:
2009/9/14 Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason avarab@gmail.com:
Anyway these rumored individuals who said they "wouldn't come because it was bilingual" probably had mistaken prejudgements about the implementation. Perhaps they thought a Spanish speaking person would be standing on stage with the speaker translating every sentence the speaker said?
Before the conference, I assumed correctly that there would be a track about Latin America with most talks in Spanish, but I didn't know there were gonna be simultaneous translations, let alone that English talks would have Spanish translations. I don't know if this was communicated in advance, maybe I missed that. I didn't particularly like having the closing ceremony partly in Spanish, especially since I wasn't expecting it and didn't grab a headset.
I'm generally supportive of the efforts to make Wikimania multilingual, and I would support similar setups with Polish and French (or whatever the language of the organizing city in 2011), but I think more consideration should be taken for people who don't speak the second language. The schedule should be more explicit about which language(s) are spoken in which sessions, including plenary sessions, so people don't end up attending a session they don't understand.
Also, we could do more outreach among people who speak only the second language; I don't know what the 2009 team did about this, but when Stallman asked (in Spanish) who didn't speak English, I saw less than ten people raise their hands.
Roan Kattouw (Catrope)
Wikimania-l mailing list Wikimania-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimania-l
2009/9/15 WereSpielChequers werespielchequers@googlemail.com:
1 Which languages have to be covered at every Wikimania? The de-facto minimum is probably now host country plus English, but that might rise in future.
We've only had the host language (if not English) represented once, I wouldn't say that is a de-facto minimum. It might become so, but it isn't yet.
Lodewijk writes:
I had the impression that it would give a certain atmosphere where there would be a clear division in the community between the Spanish speaking people not speaking English and the English speaking people not speaking Spanish.
I don't see how you can say that making the conference accessible to non-English speakers somehow *creates* a division in the community. True, if an event is inaccessible to a different community, they won't show up, and no division will be visible.... but it exists even more strongly then.
WereSpielChequers werespielchequers@googlemail.com writes:
But I think the idea is great and fully inline with the idea that we are building a global encyclopaedia.
I found it delightful. And utterly appropriate, given that many local attendees were visibly more comfortable discussing Wikipedia in Spanish.
The tremendous global nature of the projects really doesn't come across to most people - not the first time they hear about it, or the second or third times either. Giving everyone access to the world's knowledge "in their own language" was an important idea... we shouldn't lose sight of it.
If as a community we didn't care enough about accessibility across languages to make a global, public event comfortable for the local wikipedians to attend, what would that say about the projects as a whole?
On Mon, Sep 14, 2009 at 8:18 PM, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.com wrote:
2009/9/15 WereSpielChequers werespielchequers@googlemail.com:
1 Which languages have to be covered at every Wikimania? The de-facto minimum is probably now host country plus English, but that might rise in future.
We've only had the host language (if not English) represented once, I wouldn't say that is a de-facto minimum. It might become so, but it isn't yet.
Perhaps in the 'full coverage' sense this is true -- but talks and posters in the local language have long been a part of Wikimania.
SJ
--- El lun 14-sep-09, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.com escribió:
De: Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.com Asunto: Re: [Wikimania-l] Wikimania 2011 Para: "Wikimania general list (open subscription)" wikimania-l@lists.wikimedia.org Fecha: lunes, 14 de septiembre de 2009, 9:18 pm 2009/9/15 WereSpielChequers werespielchequers@googlemail.com:
1 Which languages have to be covered at every
Wikimania? The de-facto
minimum is probably now host country plus English, but
that might rise
in future.
We've only had the host language (if not English) represented once, I wouldn't say that is a de-facto minimum. It might become so, but it isn't yet.
I think we need to put the bilingual nature of the 2009 Wikimania in context.
First, in Argentina English is not as wide-spread as in Europe or other countries; Not having a English to Spanish in at least some of the presentations would have seriously limited the local assistance.
Secondly, being Spanish one of the most important languages in the world, and within Wikipedia with 20% of the total traffic[citation needed], having a number of Spanish speaking speakers made a lot of sense. Making them speak English to be then translated back to Spanish didn't make much sense, so we translated them to English.
I think all in all the translations back or forth worked pretty well in general.
As for the complains regarding the closing ceremony; it's true, Patricio Lorente gave the final thanking in Spanish, but it was actually directed to the local volunteers and associate organizations. I'm sorry if you felt excluded.
As for the party invitation; attendees were supposed to be aware of it as we informed it through several channels; Patricio was inviting all volunteers, associates and technical staff to join us.
Back to the topic; we can think of UN-style presentations with translations from and to 198 languages, but its usefulness is questionable.
For the time being, the use of translation in Wikimania will probably have to be studied on per-case bases, though a general consent on its usefulness could/should be agreed on before Gdansk.
Cheers/Saludos/Do widzenia, Mariano Cecowski
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Roan Kattouw wrote:
Before the conference, I assumed correctly that there would be a track about Latin America with most talks in Spanish, but I didn't know there were gonna be simultaneous translations, let alone that English talks would have Spanish translations. I don't know if this was communicated in advance, maybe I missed that. I didn't particularly like having the closing ceremony partly in Spanish, especially since I wasn't expecting it and didn't grab a headset.
I'm generally supportive of the efforts to make Wikimania multilingual, and I would support similar setups with Polish and French (or whatever the language of the organizing city in 2011), but I think more consideration should be taken for people who don't speak the second language. The schedule should be more explicit about which language(s) are spoken in which sessions, including plenary sessions, so people don't end up attending a session they don't understand.
I didn't feel bothered by the use of Spanish in some sessions, or even to some extent in the closing ceremonies. We do want to attract people from the host country and its near neighbours, and having some sessions in its language is a very small price to pay for that. IIRC, however, one element that was in Spanish only at the closing session was instructions about going to the party. If anything should be stated in both languages it's practical instructions of this kind.
Ec
please iam getting too many e-mails from this e-mail list ...
could it be possible that I could be removed from the list .....
thanx
Baz
Date: Sun, 13 Sep 2009 12:13:02 +0100 From: josephseddon@googlemail.com To: wikimania-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikimania-l] Wikimania 2011
Like the formal post mortem we were supposed to have of WM 2008 which I have yet to see materialise?
Seddon
On Sun, Sep 13, 2009 at 2:54 AM, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.com wrote:
2009/9/13 Galileo Vidoni galio2k@gmail.com:
On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 11:48 AM, Casey Brown lists@caseybrown.org wrote:
On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 1:44 AM, Mariano Cecowski marianocecowski@yahoo.com.ar wrote:
Another bilingual Wikimanie?
Before we say that we need to evaluate how the bilingual nature worked this time around.
Feel free to ask WM2009 attendees :).
Presumably there will be a formal post mortem, where this issue will be given a lot of consideration.
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2009/9/13 osama Ahmadani osamaza@hotmail.com:
please iam getting too many e-mails from this e-mail list ... could it be possible that I could be removed from the list ..... thanx
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On Sun, Sep 13, 2009 at 10:51 AM, osama Ahmadani osamaza@hotmail.comwrote:
please iam getting too many e-mails from this e-mail list ... could it be possible that I could be removed from the list ..... thanx
Baz
Date: Sun, 13 Sep 2009 12:13:02 +0100 From: josephseddon@googlemail.com To: wikimania-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikimania-l] Wikimania 2011
Like the formal post mortem we were supposed to have of WM 2008 which I have yet to see materialise?
Seddon
On Sun, Sep 13, 2009 at 2:54 AM, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.comwrote:
2009/9/13 Galileo Vidoni galio2k@gmail.com:
On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 11:48 AM, Casey Brown lists@caseybrown.org
wrote:
On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 1:44 AM, Mariano Cecowski marianocecowski@yahoo.com.ar wrote:
Another bilingual Wikimanie?
Before we say that we need to evaluate how the bilingual nature worked this time around.
Feel free to ask WM2009 attendees :).
Presumably there will be a formal post mortem, where this issue will be given a lot of consideration.
Wikimania-l mailing list Wikimania-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimania-l
Have more than one Hotmail account? Link them together to easily access both. http://clk.atdmt.com/UKM/go/167688463/direct/01/
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