stevertigo wrote:
Mark Williamson node.ue@gmail.com wrote:
I would like to add to this that I think the worst part of this idea is the assumption that other languages should take articles from en.wp.
The idea is that most of en.wp's articles are well-enough written, and written in accord with NPOV to a sufficient degree to overcome any such criticism of 'imperial encyclopedism.'
Suppose for a minute that your proposal were implemented, and all the machine translation problems were overcome. Would English NPOV be so good that community members in the target language would be incapable of making substantive improvements? And if they did make substantive change, how would you reconcile the divergence when both versions were subsequently edited?
Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote
Key to the growth of Wikipedias in minority languages is respect for the cultures that they encompass, not flooding them with the First-World Point of View. What might be a Neutral Point of View on the English Wikipedia is limited by the contributions of English writers. Those who do not understand English may arrive at a different neutrality. We have not yet arrived at a Metapedia that would synthesize a single neutrality from all projects.
I strongly disagree. Neutral point of view has worked on en.wp because its a universalist concept. The cases where other language wikis reject English content appear to come due to POV, and thus a violation of NPOV, not because - as you seem to suggest - the POV in such countries must be considered "NPOV.
I'm disinclined to accept your universalist conjecture. It sounds too much like intelligent design for linguistics. When I visit the bookstores in another country I am struck by the difference in emphasis that they put on different topics. This alone is bound to lead to different neutralities.
Ray