Anthere wrote:
My experience with the american press during the past
year has been
extremely unpleasant. If you listen to all the radio shows
interviewing editors, it has been strictly restricted to
english-speaking editors, so usually only reporting on english
experience, which is not necessarily the only representation *we* have
of the project.
What's wrong with discussing the English-language encyclopedia when
talking to an English-speaking audience? The articles on Wikipedia in
the German media focus on the German-language Wikipedia, which makes
sense as well. Sure, from a sociological point of view it's interesting
that Wikipedia serves many different communities, but if you're just
trying to get information (which is, after all, the purpose of an
encyclopedia), the most useful information is the information written in
a language you can read.
I also think that the most revolutionary aspects of Wikipedia have
nothing to do with multilingualism. Producing encyclopedias in multiple
languages has been done before; collaboratively producing a wiki
encyclopedia hasn't been. *Even* if it were only in one language
(regardless of which language), it'd still be a revolutionary project.
-Mark