On 11/16/06, Brianna Laugher brianna.laugher@gmail.com wrote:
The suggestion that teaching everyone English and offering them English works is equivalent to offering them works in their own language is... really appalling. We may as well shut down all the other languages and just offer Wikibooks "learn English" in x trillion languages, right? I don't think so...
The idea that humanity can unite under a single language is not appalling at all to me, rather the opposite. Some people believe this "world language" to be Esperanto, others might think it can be Chinese or English, or a new artificial language. But I don't think Wikimedia should adopt a position that implies humanity should continue to actively use hundreds or thousands of languages indefinitely. To me, supporting multilinguality is first and foremost about breaking down barriers to knowledge, but it's not the only strategy to achieve that.
Wouldn't this be a good time to expand on specific visions for each of the projects? If not here, then where?
Project charters -- TBD. Let's get the general statement sorted out first.
Seems like MediaWiki software development would be worth mentioning as well, considering how important it is to the projects...
Possibly, though I see WMF as an organization that is not focused on technology and lacks the dedication to become one.
Also seems to be some mention of project communities vitally missing here.
Yes, some additional emphasis on community (and its values) in both M&V might make sense.
Anyway my main complaint is that I don't see how either of these statements would prevent "wikistalk" being successfully proposed, or how they explain why video game guides are inappropriate for Wikibooks. Or why people shouldn't upload ten photos of their friends and dog at Commons. Or why they shouldn't write about their school teacher. Needs some adjective somewhere like EDUCATIONAL.
Perhaps - though even "knowledge" was a bit controversial, and that word is quite flexible in its interpretation. (Are 10 marginally different ways to show the same thing a useful addition of knowledge? Is unverifiable information knowledge?)
As for VG guides, I wouldn't _want_ them to be excluded from Wikimedia's scope. That Wikibooks is becoming more narrowly focused on textbooks may make sense from a strategic point of view to attract the right authors and institutions, but I don't see why we should not ever host HOWTOs about video games in a separate project, for example.