From: Tim Starling
<t.starling(a)physics.unimelb.edu.au>
Wouter Steenbeek wrote:
> I have trouble relating to this. What do you
think Wikipedia's goals
are
(or
should be)? Why do you contribute to Wikipedia?
Do you mean I should withdraw from Wikipedia because I am wasting time?
No, I mean that I have trouble relating to it, and I'm wondering why you
contribute to Wikipedia. I'm waiting with curiosity and an open mind.
Don't be ashamed of your beliefs.
I agree with you that Wikipedia's /main/ goal is still to spread as much
information as possible to the world's population, in their native language
wherever possible. When Wikipedias are too small to provide full information
to the reader, he can enhance this information with bigger Wikipedias.
Besides, I think the Wikipedia phaenomenon is a tool to make languages
emancipate and being used aside. A language is one of the most important
culture bearers there are, and fictional languages are culture bearers as
well, even more so than IALs, and as real and existant as the latter group.
Though you might think an encyclopaedia in a language noone speaks is no
use, in my opinion it is, when someone reads it. Klingon and possibly Quenya
and Sindarin Wikipedia(s) will never make out more than only a small part of
the whole collection of Wikipedias, so I think we should view it/them as (a)
side project(s), secondary or even tertiary, but in no way useless, that is,
if it/they ever grow(s) to a considerable magnitude.
Wouter
_________________________________________________________________
Gebruik MSN Webmessenger op je werk en op school
http://webmessenger.msn.com/