Hi
I was asked yesterday if it was mandatory that during votes for new languages creation, the editor * has an account on meta * has an account on any already existing project
I do not know what the current policy is. I am hesitant to be in favor of one or another. I would rather say the voter should be at least a participant to another language, because this would imply he at least know the concept. However, I am not sure this should be mandatory... except that....
Someone raised a complaint about the current vote here : http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages#Murcian_.28Murcian...
On this new languages, we have * anon ips voting * accounts on meta with no edits voting * accounts on meta with just a user page on meta voting * accounts on other projects voting.
Fact is, I made a bunch of quick semi-random checks (in short, on red meta accounts in particular), and admittedly, many of them are probably sharing the same living-room...
I fear the editor who complained is probably right in mentionning sock puppetry... though we can not entirely prove it of course. Which raise the question of how fair is a vote on a controversial language, when half voters are not current participants and may not even be different poeple ?
What should we do ?
Ant
The same problem exist for andalousian language. Many anon votes. Sockpuppetry chances raise high as well.
In short, the voting system as is is a pure joke. What do you suggest ?
Ant
Anthere wrote:
Hi
I was asked yesterday if it was mandatory that during votes for new languages creation, the editor
- has an account on meta
- has an account on any already existing project
I do not know what the current policy is. I am hesitant to be in favor of one or another. I would rather say the voter should be at least a participant to another language, because this would imply he at least know the concept. However, I am not sure this should be mandatory... except that....
Someone raised a complaint about the current vote here : http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages#Murcian_.28Murcian...
On this new languages, we have
- anon ips voting
- accounts on meta with no edits voting
- accounts on meta with just a user page on meta voting
- accounts on other projects voting.
Fact is, I made a bunch of quick semi-random checks (in short, on red meta accounts in particular), and admittedly, many of them are probably sharing the same living-room...
I fear the editor who complained is probably right in mentionning sock puppetry... though we can not entirely prove it of course. Which raise the question of how fair is a vote on a controversial language, when half voters are not current participants and may not even be different poeple ?
What should we do ?
Ant
The user should be registered in meta with a minimum of numbers of edits.
This solution can be reduce the problem of sockpuppets (but not solve).
Ilario
-- Messaggio originale -- To: foundation-l@wikimedia.org From: Anthere Anthere9@yahoo.com Date: Mon, 21 Nov 2005 18:41:59 +0100 Subject: [Foundation-l] Re: new language policy Reply-To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List foundation-l@wikimedia.org
The same problem exist for andalousian language. Many anon votes. Sockpuppetry chances raise high as well.
In short, the voting system as is is a pure joke. What do you suggest ?
Ant
Anthere wrote:
Hi
I was asked yesterday if it was mandatory that during votes for new languages creation, the editor
- has an account on meta
- has an account on any already existing project
I do not know what the current policy is. I am hesitant to be in favor of one or another. I would rather say the voter should be at least a participant to another
language, because this would imply he at least know the concept. However, I am not sure this should be mandatory... except that....
Someone raised a complaint about the current vote here : http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages#Murcian_.28Murcian...
On this new languages, we have
- anon ips voting
- accounts on meta with no edits voting
- accounts on meta with just a user page on meta voting
- accounts on other projects voting.
Fact is, I made a bunch of quick semi-random checks (in short, on red
meta accounts in particular), and admittedly, many of them are probably
sharing the same living-room...
I fear the editor who complained is probably right in mentionning sock
puppetry... though we can not entirely prove it of course. Which raise the question of how fair is a vote on a controversial language, when half voters are not current participants and may not even
be different poeple ?
What should we do ?
Ant
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Anthere, as for a language Andalusian exists - I think it is the same for Murcian. This has nothing to do with policies. I know some info from different sources on Andalusian, but I am about to prepare two presentations (yes now there are two: 1) Wiki projects , 2) OmegaT and OpenOffice.org) for the translator's conference in Cracow this week. After that I will have more time to care about these things (at least I hope so, unless my customerso do not "secretly meet ;-)" and send work all together.
I know one thing that could be interesting: for Andalusian I know that people access through a computer at the university - at home they only have very expensive dial in connections - maybe this could be a reason for sharing the same IP. It is something to ask. It could also be the case for Murcian.
Considering how things are here on the Amalfi coast I would not wonder that Andalusia has more or less the same problems.
Sorry for keeping information so short.
Ciao, Sabine
Anthere wrote:
The same problem exist for andalousian language. Many anon votes. Sockpuppetry chances raise high as well.
In short, the voting system as is is a pure joke. What do you suggest ?
Ant
Anthere wrote:
___________________________________ Yahoo! Messenger: chiamate gratuite in tutto il mondo http://it.messenger.yahoo.com
Anthere wrote:
The same problem exist for andalousian language. Many anon votes. Sockpuppetry chances raise high as well.
In short, the voting system as is is a pure joke. What do you suggest ?
Currently everyone seems to acknowledge that the existing system is no longer functional. When Angela came up with it, it was a very good solution to the problem that we faced at that time, but as time has gone on, and we have more and more Wikipedias and we are more and more well known, that system has broken down. We run the risk of making very poor judgments, being hoaxed, etc.
1. I do not support the concept of a "seed wiki" because the test of what is a proper decision in this area does not depend solely on the ability of a motivated group of people to push their agenda. I have no doubt whatsoever but that we could have a successful (in the sense of article count and participation) wiki in "pig latin dialect" (a joke language seen in many humorous machine translators on the net) if a group of funny people decided to make it. A seed wiki is not the answer.
(For non-native English speakers who don't know what 'pig latin' is, it is a way of speaking English practiced mostly by either parents trying to say things in front of children in a way that children don't understand, or spoken by children for fun once they learn the trick.
Orfay Onnay-ativenay Englishay eakerspay oohay on'tnay ownay atwhay igpay atinlay isay....]
2. I strongly support that legitimately existing small languages be encouraged to start Wikipedias in their language either for direct purposes of need (i.e. if many people speak only the small language) or for language/cultural preservation purposes (i.e. if no one at all speaks only the small language, for example Cornish, which was a dead language which is now being revived and which has a 600 article wikipedia and 200 converstaional speakers).
3. I very strongly oppose the creation of new wikis for dialects which are highly mutually intelligible with existing languages, and doubly so if the dialects are being put forward as separate languages for political purposes. For example, I oppose the creation of an African-American Vernacular English Wikipedia ("ebonics") because it is not sufficiently different from Standard English _and_ because it's creation would be fairly obviously done for political purposes.
4. We must acknowledge that there are very many complex situations in the world of languages, situations which can not be addressed by simple prejudiced views of what languages we should have. Additionally we must acknowledge that mistakes have been made in the past, but that these mistakes do not justify or set a precedent for future mistakes.
Among the more interesting complexities have to do with orthography. Serbian and Croatian are, in my non-expert opinion, two very slightly distinct dialects of exactly the same language, but with two different orthographies and (sadly) a very politically charged situation. This is a special case, because rightly or wrongly (my opinion: wrongly) we now have two wikipedias with separate communities, and there is no easy solution. I intend to visit Croatia and Serbia next year to try to encourage the communities there to find a positive way to merge -- but of course it will be up to them in the end.
-------
In my next email, I will outline what I think is a possible solution to this dilemma.
--Jimbo
On 11/22/05, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
Anthere wrote:
The same problem exist for andalousian language. Many anon votes. Sockpuppetry chances raise high as well.
In short, the voting system as is is a pure joke. What do you suggest ?
Currently everyone seems to acknowledge that the existing system is no longer functional. When Angela came up with it, it was a very good solution to the problem that we faced at that time, but as time has gone on, and we have more and more Wikipedias and we are more and more well known, that system has broken down. We run the risk of making very poor judgments, being hoaxed, etc.
- I do not support the concept of a "seed wiki" because the test of
what is a proper decision in this area does not depend solely on the ability of a motivated group of people to push their agenda. I have no doubt whatsoever but that we could have a successful (in the sense of article count and participation) wiki in "pig latin dialect" (a joke language seen in many humorous machine translators on the net) if a group of funny people decided to make it. A seed wiki is not the answer.
This is a strawman. Having a "seed wiki" doesn't imply that we allow small groups to push their agenda nor does it imply that a "pig latin" Wikipedia would develop.
A "seed wiki" is not a wiki where anything goes, it's simply a wiki where a developer doesn't have to get involved in trying out a new project idea. Should Wikipedia limit new article creation to developers, because otherwise we'll wind up with articles written in pig latin? There will always be rules in a seed wiki. If you don't want "pig latin" wikis, then you set the rules so that they aren't allowed.
(For non-native English speakers who don't know what 'pig latin' is, it is a way of speaking English practiced mostly by either parents trying to say things in front of children in a way that children don't understand, or spoken by children for fun once they learn the trick.
Orfay Onnay-ativenay Englishay eakerspay oohay on'tnay ownay atwhay igpay atinlay isay....]
On 11/21/05, Anthere Anthere9@yahoo.com wrote:
Hi
I was asked yesterday if it was mandatory that during votes for new languages creation, the editor
- has an account on meta
- has an account on any already existing project
I do not know what the current policy is. I am hesitant to be in favor of one or another. I would rather say the voter should be at least a participant to another language, because this would imply he at least know the concept. However, I am not sure this should be mandatory... except that....
Someone raised a complaint about the current vote here :
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages#Murcian_.28Murcian...
On this new languages, we have
- anon ips voting
- accounts on meta with no edits voting
- accounts on meta with just a user page on meta voting
- accounts on other projects voting.
Fact is, I made a bunch of quick semi-random checks (in short, on red meta accounts in particular), and admittedly, many of them are probably sharing the same living-room...
I fear the editor who complained is probably right in mentionning sock puppetry... though we can not entirely prove it of course. Which raise the question of how fair is a vote on a controversial language, when half voters are not current participants and may not even be different poeple ?
What should we do ?
Ant
Hoi, When you read many of the nay-sayers, you can read in many of their remarks that this many of these language problems are really political. Not only is it denied that many of these languages are languages, it is also suggested that people who ask for some recognition are extremists that should make do with the one and only language that suffices for all.
When you know about these languages, I often wonder what a good reason is for supporting a language. One of the languages that is voted down because it 'does not exist' is Stellingwerfs. Stellingwerfs has a very active language community; a dictionary has been published the bible is being translated into Stellingwerfs and now there are these people who think it does not need its own wikipedia. Now Stellingwerfs is not as politicial as the Spanish languages. Then again take an other infamous example; the nds-nl is denied because people consider that it should be part of the nds-de. What people do not mention is that the nds-de has a vocal community that insists on an orthography that is German oriented. This is a great example of a language where there is NO standard orthography. The same can be said for Limburgs, there is something of a 'standard' orthography but it does not match the language that is actually spoken. The Limburg wikipedia is alive and well. It gets mentioned in the press I am really happy with it. However if a good example needs to be found of a WIkipedia that also does not have a 'standardised' spelling have a look at Neapolitan or Sicilian. The Napolitan WIkipedia for instance has already more than 3000 articles.. the amount of local involvement is great. It is there because local people are entheausiastic about this project.
From my perspective I do not mind to have many wikipedias. I do want wikipedias by local people who are interested in doing this. I would welcome many projects. We will see what works and what does not. If people who start a project steal a page out of the Neapolitan book we will do exceedingly well. The argument that we do not need to revive languages is problematic in my opinion. The problem is that WE do not revive these languages, it is the people wo are the community of this wikipedia who do that. When they do well they will become us as well. My point is, do we want to be inclusionist or do we want to exclusionists. There is always a reason why we should not do something. The point is that it is not you who is doing it, it is you who is denying someone else.
As to anonymous people voting, might it be possible that they are actually be people speaking that language that say they want to get involved? (assume good faith) And given all these people who are NOT going to involve themselve in a language why would they vote against, what is it to them?
Thanks, GerardM
GerardM wrote:
On 11/21/05, Anthere Anthere9@yahoo.com wrote:
Hi
I was asked yesterday if it was mandatory that during votes for new languages creation, the editor
- has an account on meta
- has an account on any already existing project
I do not know what the current policy is. I am hesitant to be in favor of one or another. I would rather say the voter should be at least a participant to another language, because this would imply he at least know the concept. However, I am not sure this should be mandatory... except that....
Someone raised a complaint about the current vote here :
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages#Murcian_.28Murcian...
On this new languages, we have
- anon ips voting
- accounts on meta with no edits voting
- accounts on meta with just a user page on meta voting
- accounts on other projects voting.
Fact is, I made a bunch of quick semi-random checks (in short, on red meta accounts in particular), and admittedly, many of them are probably sharing the same living-room...
I fear the editor who complained is probably right in mentionning sock puppetry... though we can not entirely prove it of course. Which raise the question of how fair is a vote on a controversial language, when half voters are not current participants and may not even be different poeple ?
What should we do ?
Ant
Hoi, When you read many of the nay-sayers, you can read in many of their remarks that this many of these language problems are really political. Not only is it denied that many of these languages are languages, it is also suggested that people who ask for some recognition are extremists that should make do with the one and only language that suffices for all.
When you know about these languages, I often wonder what a good reason is for supporting a language. One of the languages that is voted down because it 'does not exist' is Stellingwerfs. Stellingwerfs has a very active language community; a dictionary has been published the bible is being translated into Stellingwerfs and now there are these people who think it does not need its own wikipedia. Now Stellingwerfs is not as politicial as the Spanish languages. Then again take an other infamous example; the nds-nl is denied because people consider that it should be part of the nds-de. What people do not mention is that the nds-de has a vocal community that insists on an orthography that is German oriented. This is a great example of a language where there is NO standard orthography. The same can be said for Limburgs, there is something of a 'standard' orthography but it does not match the language that is actually spoken. The Limburg wikipedia is alive and well. It gets mentioned in the press I am really happy with it. However if a good example needs to be found of a WIkipedia that also does not have a 'standardised' spelling have a look at Neapolitan or Sicilian. The Napolitan WIkipedia for instance has already more than 3000 articles.. the amount of local involvement is great. It is there because local people are entheausiastic about this project.
From my perspective I do not mind to have many wikipedias. I do want wikipedias by local people who are interested in doing this. I would welcome many projects. We will see what works and what does not. If people who start a project steal a page out of the Neapolitan book we will do exceedingly well. The argument that we do not need to revive languages is problematic in my opinion. The problem is that WE do not revive these languages, it is the people wo are the community of this wikipedia who do that. When they do well they will become us as well. My point is, do we want to be inclusionist or do we want to exclusionists. There is always a reason why we should not do something. The point is that it is not you who is doing it, it is you who is denying someone else.
Thanks for your long and detailed answer Gerard.... but it is not the point I really raise. I absolutely do not want right now to enter into issues of whether a language should or should not exist, but only in the issue of "if we make a vote, this vote must be fair. If not, then let us not do any vote at all". And "if we choose the vote option, how to make a vote fair" ?
As to anonymous people voting, might it be possible that they are actually be people speaking that language that say they want to get involved? (assume good faith) And given all these people who are NOT going to involve themselve in a language why would they vote against, what is it to them?
Thanks, GerardM
I assume good faith up to a certain point. After some point, this is not good faith, this is innocence :-)
My problem is that if we start a project because there are 10 supporters, we sort of hope that a certain momentum will exist from the very beginning. When it actually turns out that only 1 person is behind 10 supports... errrrr.... there is no momentum.
And if a language is started with 10 supports and 5 oppose. And the 10 supports are only one person... is there sense in making a vote at all ?
Ant
Hoi, When it comes to voting, I hate voting because so often the people who vote are not the ones that suffer the consequences. What we have seen in the votes are all kinds of motivations that I have tried to debunk. When you understand what is behind a vote (in any direction) you often find that the reasoning given does not really make sense.
What I do not like is that voting is the only obstacle for a Wikipedia. When a Wikipedia has been squatted by people who do not know the language and make a 'best effort' of writing in a language, we are not willing to say this should not be. I think this is appalling. I think more highly of an intellectual effort like the Klingon one than of this mongrel languages.
When the voting is as political as it apparantly is with these Spanish languages you can expect all the bad things when voting happens including ballot stuffing. So when you find people who are passionate about their language let them have their wikipedia. When it is not viable recognise it for a non viable project and kill it off.
When you want to decide these things with a vote, you will deny the people who believe in their language and want to make it happen. You do not give anything to the people who do not know this language. In a way it is discrimination pure and simple. When you have some quality and quantity demands for the continued existence of a project, you make it more honest. When a project fails to meet these criteria, it means that the people who asked for it are not the persons to do a good job. Lock it maybe save and delete it and wait for better times.
My opinion is therefore clear; do not have votes but have quality and quantity demands.
NB Given the amount of wikipedias where the language exists because of its army, denying new wikipedias for this reason is problematic. Either a wikipedia exists because of some language criteria and quantitative and qualititative demands or it should not.
Thanks, GerardM
On 11/21/05, Anthere Anthere9@yahoo.com wrote:
GerardM wrote:
On 11/21/05, Anthere Anthere9@yahoo.com wrote:
Hi
I was asked yesterday if it was mandatory that during votes for new languages creation, the editor
- has an account on meta
- has an account on any already existing project
I do not know what the current policy is. I am hesitant to be in favor of one or another. I would rather say the voter should be at least a participant to another language, because this would imply he at least know the concept. However, I am not sure this should be mandatory... except that....
Someone raised a complaint about the current vote here :
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages#Murcian_.28Murcian...
On this new languages, we have
- anon ips voting
- accounts on meta with no edits voting
- accounts on meta with just a user page on meta voting
- accounts on other projects voting.
Fact is, I made a bunch of quick semi-random checks (in short, on red meta accounts in particular), and admittedly, many of them are probably sharing the same living-room...
I fear the editor who complained is probably right in mentionning sock puppetry... though we can not entirely prove it of course. Which raise the question of how fair is a vote on a controversial language, when half voters are not current participants and may not even be different poeple ?
What should we do ?
Ant
Hoi, When you read many of the nay-sayers, you can read in many of their
remarks
that this many of these language problems are really political. Not only
is
it denied that many of these languages are languages, it is also
suggested
that people who ask for some recognition are extremists that should make
do
with the one and only language that suffices for all.
When you know about these languages, I often wonder what a good reason
is
for supporting a language. One of the languages that is voted down
because
it 'does not exist' is Stellingwerfs. Stellingwerfs has a very active language community; a dictionary has been published the bible is being translated into Stellingwerfs and now there are these people who think
it
does not need its own wikipedia. Now Stellingwerfs is not as politicial
as
the Spanish languages. Then again take an other infamous example; the
nds-nl
is denied because people consider that it should be part of the nds-de.
What
people do not mention is that the nds-de has a vocal community that
insists
on an orthography that is German oriented. This is a great example of a language where there is NO standard orthography. The same can be said
for
Limburgs, there is something of a 'standard' orthography but it does not match the language that is actually spoken. The Limburg wikipedia is
alive
and well. It gets mentioned in the press I am really happy with it.
However
if a good example needs to be found of a WIkipedia that also does not
have a
'standardised' spelling have a look at Neapolitan or Sicilian. The
Napolitan
WIkipedia for instance has already more than 3000 articles.. the amount
of
local involvement is great. It is there because local people are entheausiastic about this project.
From my perspective I do not mind to have many wikipedias. I do want wikipedias by local people who are interested in doing this. I would
welcome
many projects. We will see what works and what does not. If people who
start
a project steal a page out of the Neapolitan book we will do exceedingly well. The argument that we do not need to revive languages is
problematic in
my opinion. The problem is that WE do not revive these languages, it is
the
people wo are the community of this wikipedia who do that. When they do
well
they will become us as well. My point is, do we want to be inclusionist
or
do we want to exclusionists. There is always a reason why we should not
do
something. The point is that it is not you who is doing it, it is you
who is
denying someone else.
Thanks for your long and detailed answer Gerard.... but it is not the point I really raise. I absolutely do not want right now to enter into issues of whether a language should or should not exist, but only in the issue of "if we make a vote, this vote must be fair. If not, then let us not do any vote at all". And "if we choose the vote option, how to make a vote fair" ?
As to anonymous people voting, might it be possible that they are
actually
be people speaking that language that say they want to get involved?
(assume
good faith) And given all these people who are NOT going to involve themselve in a language why would they vote against, what is it to them?
Thanks, GerardM
I assume good faith up to a certain point. After some point, this is not good faith, this is innocence :-)
My problem is that if we start a project because there are 10 supporters, we sort of hope that a certain momentum will exist from the very beginning. When it actually turns out that only 1 person is behind 10 supports... errrrr.... there is no momentum.
And if a language is started with 10 supports and 5 oppose. And the 10 supports are only one person... is there sense in making a vote at all ?
Ant
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
then, I suppose you would rather support the idea of letting new languages develop on a seed wiki... and see to which point it is viable ?
This still raise the issue of "when do we consider a language should be removed from the seed wiki and put in the live wiki" (even though the entire content might be a hoax :-)) ?
Ant
GerardM wrote:
Hoi, When it comes to voting, I hate voting because so often the people who vote are not the ones that suffer the consequences. What we have seen in the votes are all kinds of motivations that I have tried to debunk. When you understand what is behind a vote (in any direction) you often find that the reasoning given does not really make sense.
What I do not like is that voting is the only obstacle for a Wikipedia. When a Wikipedia has been squatted by people who do not know the language and make a 'best effort' of writing in a language, we are not willing to say this should not be. I think this is appalling. I think more highly of an intellectual effort like the Klingon one than of this mongrel languages.
When the voting is as political as it apparantly is with these Spanish languages you can expect all the bad things when voting happens including ballot stuffing. So when you find people who are passionate about their language let them have their wikipedia. When it is not viable recognise it for a non viable project and kill it off.
When you want to decide these things with a vote, you will deny the people who believe in their language and want to make it happen. You do not give anything to the people who do not know this language. In a way it is discrimination pure and simple. When you have some quality and quantity demands for the continued existence of a project, you make it more honest. When a project fails to meet these criteria, it means that the people who asked for it are not the persons to do a good job. Lock it maybe save and delete it and wait for better times.
My opinion is therefore clear; do not have votes but have quality and quantity demands.
NB Given the amount of wikipedias where the language exists because of its army, denying new wikipedias for this reason is problematic. Either a wikipedia exists because of some language criteria and quantitative and qualititative demands or it should not.
Thanks, GerardM
On 11/21/05, Anthere Anthere9@yahoo.com wrote:
GerardM wrote:
On 11/21/05, Anthere Anthere9@yahoo.com wrote:
Hi
I was asked yesterday if it was mandatory that during votes for new languages creation, the editor
- has an account on meta
- has an account on any already existing project
I do not know what the current policy is. I am hesitant to be in favor of one or another. I would rather say the voter should be at least a participant to another language, because this would imply he at least know the concept. However, I am not sure this should be mandatory... except that....
Someone raised a complaint about the current vote here :
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages#Murcian_.28Murcian...
On this new languages, we have
- anon ips voting
- accounts on meta with no edits voting
- accounts on meta with just a user page on meta voting
- accounts on other projects voting.
Fact is, I made a bunch of quick semi-random checks (in short, on red meta accounts in particular), and admittedly, many of them are probably sharing the same living-room...
I fear the editor who complained is probably right in mentionning sock puppetry... though we can not entirely prove it of course. Which raise the question of how fair is a vote on a controversial language, when half voters are not current participants and may not even be different poeple ?
What should we do ?
Ant
Hoi, When you read many of the nay-sayers, you can read in many of their
remarks
that this many of these language problems are really political. Not only
is
it denied that many of these languages are languages, it is also
suggested
that people who ask for some recognition are extremists that should make
do
with the one and only language that suffices for all.
When you know about these languages, I often wonder what a good reason
is
for supporting a language. One of the languages that is voted down
because
it 'does not exist' is Stellingwerfs. Stellingwerfs has a very active language community; a dictionary has been published the bible is being translated into Stellingwerfs and now there are these people who think
it
does not need its own wikipedia. Now Stellingwerfs is not as politicial
as
the Spanish languages. Then again take an other infamous example; the
nds-nl
is denied because people consider that it should be part of the nds-de.
What
people do not mention is that the nds-de has a vocal community that
insists
on an orthography that is German oriented. This is a great example of a language where there is NO standard orthography. The same can be said
for
Limburgs, there is something of a 'standard' orthography but it does not match the language that is actually spoken. The Limburg wikipedia is
alive
and well. It gets mentioned in the press I am really happy with it.
However
if a good example needs to be found of a WIkipedia that also does not
have a
'standardised' spelling have a look at Neapolitan or Sicilian. The
Napolitan
WIkipedia for instance has already more than 3000 articles.. the amount
of
local involvement is great. It is there because local people are entheausiastic about this project.
From my perspective I do not mind to have many wikipedias. I do want wikipedias by local people who are interested in doing this. I would
welcome
many projects. We will see what works and what does not. If people who
start
a project steal a page out of the Neapolitan book we will do exceedingly well. The argument that we do not need to revive languages is
problematic in
my opinion. The problem is that WE do not revive these languages, it is
the
people wo are the community of this wikipedia who do that. When they do
well
they will become us as well. My point is, do we want to be inclusionist
or
do we want to exclusionists. There is always a reason why we should not
do
something. The point is that it is not you who is doing it, it is you
who is
denying someone else.
Thanks for your long and detailed answer Gerard.... but it is not the point I really raise. I absolutely do not want right now to enter into issues of whether a language should or should not exist, but only in the issue of "if we make a vote, this vote must be fair. If not, then let us not do any vote at all". And "if we choose the vote option, how to make a vote fair" ?
As to anonymous people voting, might it be possible that they are
actually
be people speaking that language that say they want to get involved?
(assume
good faith) And given all these people who are NOT going to involve themselve in a language why would they vote against, what is it to them?
Thanks, GerardM
I assume good faith up to a certain point. After some point, this is not good faith, this is innocence :-)
My problem is that if we start a project because there are 10 supporters, we sort of hope that a certain momentum will exist from the very beginning. When it actually turns out that only 1 person is behind 10 supports... errrrr.... there is no momentum.
And if a language is started with 10 supports and 5 oppose. And the 10 supports are only one person... is there sense in making a vote at all ?
Ant
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Anthere wrote:
then, I suppose you would rather support the idea of letting new languages develop on a seed wiki... and see to which point it is viable ?
This still raise the issue of "when do we consider a language should be removed from the seed wiki and put in the live wiki" (even though the entire content might be a hoax :-)) ?
Ant
Why do it difficult with seedwiki's. Give languages a chance on a real wiki for say three months. If they haven't created 100 articles of some length by then (so not 1 line, but lets say approx 10 lines at least) we lock them. Also make a requirement that a new language has one "adopter" an experienced wikipedian that regardless if he speaks the language or not will guide the new wikipedians on the pad of NPOV etc. And who will be a preliminary admin so he will be able to kick vandalism. This should be a commitment by that person. If the adopter fails the commitment and the wiki gets spammed out of existence we lock it. Also an adopter shouldn't be able to adopt more than one language at the same time.
By doing this you help a language to seriously start up and give people in the fledgling community someone to learn from. The adopter could even help think of a strategy to make the fledgling wikipedia reach at least 100 articles of reasonable quality.
This way we can ensure a language gets a serious chance. If the native speakers of that language do not take that chance we lock the pedia. Plain and simple.
Give people a fair chance. Do not make a decision by voting. If there are a couple of people (could be even one very active person) who claim they speak the lingo and an experienced wikipedian willing to adopt the language give it a chance. This is equal opportunity. Everyone gets a shot. If you blow it you blow it and your next requests will not be taken seriously!
Waerth/Walter
Walter van Kalken wrote:
Anthere wrote:
then, I suppose you would rather support the idea of letting new languages develop on a seed wiki... and see to which point it is viable ?
This still raise the issue of "when do we consider a language should be removed from the seed wiki and put in the live wiki" (even though the entire content might be a hoax :-)) ?
Ant
Why do it difficult with seedwiki's. Give languages a chance on a real wiki for say three months. If they haven't created 100 articles of some length by then (so not 1 line, but lets say approx 10 lines at least) we lock them. Also make a requirement that a new language has one "adopter" an experienced wikipedian that regardless if he speaks the language or not will guide the new wikipedians on the pad of NPOV etc. And who will be a preliminary admin so he will be able to kick vandalism.
How can a person recognize POV behaviour if he doesn't at least have a basic reading knowledge of the language?
Ec
Anthere wrote:
then, I suppose you would rather support the idea of letting new languages develop on a seed wiki... and see to which point it is viable ?
This still raise the issue of "when do we consider a language should be removed from the seed wiki and put in the live wiki" (even though the entire content might be a hoax :-)) ?
Objective criteria can be established for this.
1. A key set of interface pages must have been written in or translated into the language, 2. There must be a minimum number of articles exceeding a specified length written in the main namespace of the project, and 3. There must be a minimum number of contributors, EACH of whom has written a minimum number of qualifying articles in the main namespace.
Perhaps there could be others too.
Ec
Ray Saintonge wrote:
Anthere wrote:
then, I suppose you would rather support the idea of letting new languages develop on a seed wiki... and see to which point it is viable ?
This still raise the issue of "when do we consider a language should be removed from the seed wiki and put in the live wiki" (even though the entire content might be a hoax :-)) ?
Objective criteria can be established for this.
- A key set of interface pages must have been written in or
translated into the language, 2. There must be a minimum number of articles exceeding a specified length written in the main namespace of the project, and 3. There must be a minimum number of contributors, EACH of whom has written a minimum number of qualifying articles in the main namespace.
Perhaps there could be others too.
Ec
Nod. I think these are good criteria; But I presume interface can only be translated really if there is a separate independant project, rather than a unique seedwiki ?
Ant
Anthere wrote:
Ray Saintonge wrote:
Anthere wrote:
then, I suppose you would rather support the idea of letting new languages develop on a seed wiki... and see to which point it is viable ?
This still raise the issue of "when do we consider a language should be removed from the seed wiki and put in the live wiki" (even though the entire content might be a hoax :-)) ?
Objective criteria can be established for this.
- A key set of interface pages must have been written in or
translated into the language, 2. There must be a minimum number of articles exceeding a specified length written in the main namespace of the project, and 3. There must be a minimum number of contributors, EACH of whom has written a minimum number of qualifying articles in the main namespace.
Perhaps there could be others too.
Ec
Nod. I think these are good criteria; But I presume interface can only be translated really if there is a separate independant project, rather than a unique seedwiki ?
Not necessarily. The seed could begin with interface in an agreed more common language, where the translated interface as ordinary pages in the appropriate namespace. These could be transferred to the proper place when the project is promoted.
Ec
Objective criteria can be established for this.
- A key set of interface pages must have been written in or
translated into the language, 2. There must be a minimum number of articles exceeding a specified length written in the main namespace of the project, and 3. There must be a minimum number of contributors, EACH of whom has written a minimum number of qualifying articles in the main namespace.
Perhaps there could be others too.
Ec
Nod. I think these are good criteria; But I presume interface can only be translated really if there is a separate independant project, rather than a unique seedwiki ?
Please consider that the interface is one of the most difficult parts to do - with Neapolitan I have part of it online, part of it here and we are still thinking on how to call certain things in Neapolitan - because there are no "official terms" for many things - often people use English, some Italian and some an Englis/Italian that has been adapted to Neapolitan. I'd say the interface cannot be ready fast - it takes quite a lot of time to decide, because this is one of these very particular situations where thanks to Wikipedia neologisms are being created. I very much listen to young people when they talk about computers and internet to understand, but believe me: it is more than just "translating some words".
I'd leave a lot of time for the interface, but I would expect that some basic articles can be written by anyone: descriptions of towns, churches, museums etc.
Ciao, Sabine
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Sabine Cretella wrote:
Objective criteria can be established for this.
- A key set of interface pages must have been written in or
translated into the language, 2. There must be a minimum number of articles exceeding a specified length written in the main namespace of the project, and 3. There must be a minimum number of contributors, EACH of whom has written a minimum number of qualifying articles in the main namespace.
Perhaps there could be others too.
Ec
Nod. I think these are good criteria; But I presume interface can only be translated really if there is a separate independant project, rather than a unique seedwiki ?
Please consider that the interface is one of the most difficult parts to do - with Neapolitan I have part of it online, part of it here and we are still thinking on how to call certain things in Neapolitan - because there are no "official terms" for many things - often people use English, some Italian and some an Englis/Italian that has been adapted to Neapolitan. I'd say the interface cannot be ready fast - it takes quite a lot of time to decide, because this is one of these very particular situations where thanks to Wikipedia neologisms are being created. I very much listen to young people when they talk about computers and internet to understand, but believe me: it is more than just "translating some words".
I'd leave a lot of time for the interface, but I would expect that some basic articles can be written by anyone: descriptions of towns, churches, museums etc.
I appreciate that difficulty, and would limit that requirement to certain *key* interfaces; what is "key" would need to be defined. In the Neapolitan example it might be acceptable to keep the less important interfaces temporarily in Italian, but I'm sure that in an active project the members would consider that leaving it that way would be an embarassment.
The dominance of English in technical language can be a big problem for the guardians of major languages. It could be almost impossible for minor languages that lack any significant educational establishment. This puts us in an awkward situation. The descriptivist/prescriptionist divide is an ongoing concern for wiktionaries. To be true to our principles we should only include words that are actually used, not in English, not in Italian, and certainly not in minor languages. If we on the outside propose words for the Neapolitans then Neapolitan won't be Neapolitan anymore.
Ec
IMHO it is difficult to decide: 1.if the criteria is the number of articles an user can be use a bot and increase this number; 2.if the criteria is the number of users this limit can be avoid with a large number of sockpuppets.
In any case cannot be defined a special rule to define the removal of a Wikipedia because in italian, for example, we have used a program of affiliation of minor languages to help them.
In my opinion should be defined a mixed criteria (articles+users) but the removal can only be done after a new votation.
Ilario
then, I suppose you would rather support the idea of letting new languages develop on a seed wiki... and see to which point it is viable
?
This still raise the issue of "when do we consider a language should be
removed from the seed wiki and put in the live wiki" (even though the entire content might be a hoax :-)) ?
Ant
I will send it again as I am under the impression nobody read it.
Anthere wrote:
then, I suppose you would rather support the idea of letting new languages develop on a seed wiki... and see to which point it is viable ?
This still raise the issue of "when do we consider a language should be removed from the seed wiki and put in the live wiki" (even though the entire content might be a hoax :-)) ?
Ant
Why do it difficult with seedwiki's. Give languages a chance on a real wiki for say three months. If they haven't created 100 articles of some length by then (so not 1 line, but lets say approx 10 lines at least) we lock them. Also make a requirement that a new language has one "adopter" an experienced wikipedian that regardless if he speaks the language or not will guide the new wikipedians on the pad of NPOV etc. And who will be a preliminary admin so he will be able to kick vandalism. This should be a commitment by that person. If the adopter fails the commitment and the wiki gets spammed out of existence we lock it. Also an adopter shouldn't be able to adopt more than one language at the same time.
By doing this you help a language to seriously start up and give people in the fledgling community someone to learn from. The adopter could even help think of a strategy to make the fledgling wikipedia reach at least 100 articles of reasonable quality.
This way we can ensure a language gets a serious chance. If the native speakers of that language do not take that chance we lock the pedia. Plain and simple.
Give people a fair chance. Do not make a decision by voting. If there are a couple of people (could be even one very active person) who claim they speak the lingo and an experienced wikipedian willing to adopt the language give it a chance. This is equal opportunity. Everyone gets a shot. If you blow it you blow it and your next requests will not be taken seriously!
Waerth/Walter
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Walter van Kalken wrote:
I will send it again as I am under the impression nobody read it.
Anthere wrote:
then, I suppose you would rather support the idea of letting new languages develop on a seed wiki... and see to which point it is viable ?
This still raise the issue of "when do we consider a language should be removed from the seed wiki and put in the live wiki" (even though the entire content might be a hoax :-)) ?
Why do it difficult with seedwiki's. Give languages a chance on a real wiki for say three months. If they haven't created 100 articles of some length by then (so not 1 line, but lets say approx 10 lines at least) we lock them.
We have any number of languages with Wikis that never got anywhere, and it's very difficult to get rid of them. Having new languages in a separate project impresses on people the need to perform or have the project killed. It leaves them under the axe.
By doing this you help a language to seriously start up and give people in the fledgling community someone to learn from. The adopter could even help think of a strategy to make the fledgling wikipedia reach at least 100 articles of reasonable quality.
Ultimately, the survival of a project will depend on the speakers of the language. The adopter could be helpful, but it may not be his language.
This way we can ensure a language gets a serious chance. If the native speakers of that language do not take that chance we lock the pedia. Plain and simple.
Eventually it could even be deleted. Perhaps lock it after three months of complete inactivity; delete it after six months.
Give people a fair chance. Do not make a decision by voting.
I agree that voting gets us nowhere. Better to have a standard for starting and retaining a seed wiki, and a higher standard for promoting it to full wiki status.
If there are a couple of people (could be even one very active person) who claim they speak the lingo and an experienced wikipedian willing to adopt the language give it a chance. This is equal opportunity. Everyone gets a shot. If you blow it you blow it and your next requests will not be taken seriously!
Agreed
Anthere wrote:
My problem is that if we start a project because there are 10 supporters, we sort of hope that a certain momentum will exist from the very beginning. When it actually turns out that only 1 person is behind 10 supports... errrrr.... there is no momentum.
The simple solution would be to require them to start on Wikicities (or some other external site) and gather, say, 500 articles (now, that *is* momentum), before their wiki is "promoted" to a Wikipedia or Wiktionary in the new language, or some other kind of official Wikimedia Foundation project.
I have no opinion on whether this is a *good* solution, but it's a simple one. I'm a technical guy, and appreciate simple solutions. It would direct energy towards creating articles, rather than creating sock puppets.
Hello
On 11/22/05, Anthere Anthere9@yahoo.com wrote:
Hi
I was asked yesterday if it was mandatory that during votes for new languages creation, the editor
- has an account on meta
- has an account on any already existing project
I do not know what the current policy is.
I'm afraid we have no an established policy on new lang edition vote at all at least for Wikipedia .. for Wikinews there is A fixed rule but I am not sure IF it could be applied on Wikipedia ...
For Wikinews vote the current policy says: *All voters should have an account on meta *Some voters should have a resonable amont of edits on the same lang project. *All voter should have edits on a certain project.
It works for Wikinews fairly ... as far as Japanese Wikinews is concerned. 5 supports, including 4 regular ja users could indicated a certain number of potential contributors. On the other hand, as for Wikipedia vote, we can't use the second criteria though. In my humble opinion the second one is the core of those rules: a new launched project should be have a number of regular who can prove themselves to be a regular editor on the target language. But for most Wikipedias, there is no previous project in the same language.
Let me run a random thought ....
My general opinion about voting eligibility on meta is "a registered user whose user page has a link to at least one local project". But I am not sure if it is the case for the current issue. Perhaps it would be nice to say "at least one supporter should be so-and-so" but I am very dubious if we expect all voters have been fairly active on another language project.
So my proposal is, let them start a test wiki somewhere, on meta or on a separate wiki, and if they have some core project documents (like NPOV, Licensing and copyright, Requests for adminship ... and "Ignore all rules" if preferable) and a certain number of pages of test articles and then ask the community to vote - support or deny their proposal.
Somehow it is more generous than for potential Wikinewsies, but I don't think it unfair; the communities we can guess behind the proposal are different, so such difference could be reasonable, hopefully.
-- Aphaea@*.wikipedia.org email: Aphaia @ gmail (dot) com
People vote for two very distinct things, in the same voting process. 1) Should this language get its own language wikiprojects? 2) Should we create a wikiproject for this language NOW, given the amount of support it has?
There should be an ongoing project devoted to identifying the set of languages for which the answer to 1) is YES.
For 2), the voting process should require some evidence that the voter is interested and able to contribute on the resulting wiki if it is created (to avoid dead wikis). A fine way to demonstrate such evidence is to have a space on the same wiki as the votes (in this case, on meta) where people can edit a sample main page... say "[[m:Voro Wikipedia]]" and its subpages.
This way a) proving you're not a sockpuppet also develops the fledling project; the contributions can later be transwikied to the new lang-project.
SJ
On 11/22/05, SJ 2.718281828@gmail.com wrote:
created (to avoid dead wikis). A fine way to demonstrate such evidence is to have a space on the same wiki as the votes (in this case, on meta) where people can edit a sample main page... say "[[m:Voro Wikipedia]]" and its subpages.
Giving people a way to translate the interface before requesting new project creation would also be helpful; we should perhaps have a separate space for that on Meta, or even a separate wiki devoted to such translations.
-- ++SJ
SJ wrote:
People vote for two very distinct things, in the same voting process.
- Should this language get its own language wikiprojects?
- Should we create a wikiproject for this language NOW, given the
amount of support it has?
There should be an ongoing project devoted to identifying the set of languages for which the answer to 1) is YES.
For 2), the voting process should require some evidence that the voter is interested and able to contribute on the resulting wiki if it is created (to avoid dead wikis). A fine way to demonstrate such evidence is to have a space on the same wiki as the votes (in this case, on meta) where people can edit a sample main page... say "[[m:Voro Wikipedia]]" and its subpages.
This way a) proving you're not a sockpuppet also develops the fledling project; the contributions can later be transwikied to the new lang-project.
SJ
True...
At the same time, I think editors on meta are however tired to see wikipedia type pages in minor languages being developped there. Overall, allowing the pages to be developped on meta is likely to be poorly accepted.
Ant
On Tue, 22 Nov 2005, Anthere wrote:
For 2), the voting process should require some evidence that the voter is interested and able to contribute on the resulting wiki if it is created (to avoid dead wikis). A fine way to demonstrate such evidence is to have a space on the same wiki as the votes (in this case, on meta) where people can edit a sample main page... say "[[m:Voro Wikipedia]]" and its subpages.
This way a) proving you're not a sockpuppet also develops the fledling project; the contributions can later be transwikied to the new lang-project.
SJ
True...
At the same time, I think editors on meta are however tired to see wikipedia type pages in minor languages being developped there. Overall, allowing the pages to be developped on meta is likely to be poorly accepted.
I'm all in favor of a separate seed-wiki for this...
And a separate translation-wiki for organizing interface translations, site-wide message translations, &c.
SJ
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