Just a small piece of history of the Global Wikipedia movement, see below mail thread. Thought to share it here also.<div><br></div><div>For those who are wondering about the origin of Indic / Indian subcontinent language Wikipedias, here it is.</div>

<div><br></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><font size="4"><b>2002</b></font></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><br>

</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><b style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); ">June</b></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102); "><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); ">:</span> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><b style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102); ">Assamese</b></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102); ">,</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><b style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102); ">Punjabi</b></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102); ">, </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><b style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102); ">Nepali</b></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102); ">, </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><b style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102); ">Oriya( Odia)</b></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><br style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102); ">

</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><b style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); ">December</b></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102); "> : </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><b style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102); ">Malayalam</b></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><br>

</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><br></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><font size="4"><b>2003</b></font></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><br>

</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><b style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102); "><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); ">February:</span> Bhojpuri<br>

<span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); ">May: </span>Marathi<br><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); ">June:</span> Kannada<br><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); ">July:</span> Hindi, Kashmiri<br><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); ">September: </span>Tamil<br>

<span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); ">December: </span>Telugu, Gujarati, Sanskrit, Sindhi</b></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><br style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102); ">

</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><br></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><font size="4"><b>2004</b></font></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><br>

</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><b><span style="color: rgb(0, 51, 51); ">January: <span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 102); ">Bengali, Urdu, Sinhala</span></span></b></span><br>

<div><br></div><div>Regards<br>Tinu Cherian <br><br><div class="gmail_quote">---------- Forwarded message ----------<br>From: <b class="gmail_sendername">phoebe ayers</b> <span dir="ltr">&lt;<a href="mailto:phoebe.wiki@gmail.com">phoebe.wiki@gmail.com</a>&gt;</span><br>

Date: Wed, May 11, 2011 at 4:43 AM<br>Subject: [Foundation-l] happy birthday, Wikipedias<br>To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List &lt;<a href="mailto:foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org">foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org</a>&gt;<br>

<br><br>Tomorrow (May 11) is another anniversary date: it&#39;s been 10 years<br>
since the first group of non-English Wikipedias came online.<br>
Originally with spelled-out names rather than language codes, these<br>
sites were:<br>
<br>
<a href="http://catalan.wikipedia.com" target="_blank">catalan.wikipedia.com</a><br>
<a href="http://chinese.wikipedia.com" target="_blank">chinese.wikipedia.com</a><br>
<a href="http://esperanto.wikipedia.com" target="_blank">esperanto.wikipedia.com</a><br>
<a href="http://french.wikipedia.com" target="_blank">french.wikipedia.com</a><br>
<a href="http://deutsche.wikipedia.com" target="_blank">deutsche.wikipedia.com</a><br>
<a href="http://hebrew.wikipedia.com" target="_blank">hebrew.wikipedia.com</a><br>
<a href="http://italian.wikipedia.com" target="_blank">italian.wikipedia.com</a><br>
<a href="http://japanese.wikipedia.com" target="_blank">japanese.wikipedia.com</a><br>
<a href="http://portuguese.wikipedia.com" target="_blank">portuguese.wikipedia.com</a><br>
<a href="http://spanish.wikipedia.com" target="_blank">spanish.wikipedia.com</a><br>
<a href="http://russian.wikipedia.com" target="_blank">russian.wikipedia.com</a><br>
<br>
(from <a href="http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2001-May/000116.html" target="_blank">http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2001-May/000116.html</a>)<br>
<br>
The idea of having Wikipedias in multiple languages came from Jimbo in<br>
March 2001 (<a href="http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2001-March/000048.html" target="_blank">http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2001-March/000048.html</a>);<br>
note that the original German Wikipedia was actually set up at that<br>
time, making it the second-oldest Wikipedia. Though the idea of using<br>
two-letter domain codes was first raised then, after the above sites<br>
were brought online in May there was further discussion, and the sites<br>
were switched to two-letter codes a few days later:<br>
<a href="http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2001-May/000132.html" target="_blank">http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2001-May/000132.html</a>.<br>
<br>
Happy tenth birthday, Wikipedias! (and many more!)  May all of our<br>
language editions flourish.<br>
<br>
-- phoebe<br>
<font color="#888888"><br>
<br>
--<br>
* I use this address for lists; send personal messages to phoebe.ayers<br>
&lt;at&gt; <a href="http://gmail.com" target="_blank">gmail.com</a> *<br>
<br>
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