Also, people are talking about Language vs Dialect. Does it matter?
Who cares if Serbian is a language separate from Croatian? It is entirely irrelevant. What *is* relevant, is that _IN WRITTEN FORM_ Croatians, Bosnians, and Serbians can all understand each other at maybe greater even than 99%. There is a question of writing system, but unlike some cases, there is a direct 1-to-1 symbol correspondence (sort of).
Wikipedia is NOT about petty politics. It is NOT about having a place to promote a culture or a country. It is NOT about whether or not a language is different enough from another. It is about Building an Encyclopaedia, first and foremost.
And every situation should be considered from THAT PERSPECTIVE. Serbian, Croatian, and Bosnian Wikipedias are growing quite large now. Imagine how much bigger it would be if they shared a single Wikipedia? It would be among the largest!! That excites me, and that's why I copied a few dozen articles to sh.wp. And, if you put petty politics and patriotic feeling aside and remember that we're here to build an encyclopaedia, it should excite you too!!! Sure, maybe it will require a little more work to integrate such different communities. But will it be worth it? I think ultimately, the answer is "yes".
But such an outcome cannot be reached without the cooperation of each community.
Obviously, there are still strong divisions from the wars. But please, let's not let that divide us on Wikipedia. Wikipedia should be something that unites us.
The English Wikipedia unites Brits, Americans, Australians, Serbians, Italians, Christians, Hindus, Jews, Buddhists, Muslims, young and old. Yes, there is sometimes infighting -- the Ukrainians and Russians will disagree. But in the end there is fraternity, and the encyclopaedia is all the better for it!!!!!
Why, then, can't a Neo-Štokavian Wikipedia unite Bosnian, Serbian, Croatian, Montenegrin, Metohijan, and Hercegovinian, Muslim, Catholic, and Orthodox?
Mark
On 13/01/06, Mark Williamson node.ue@gmail.com wrote:
From what I understand, at least of Miloš's view, he hopes one day to have a united Neo-Štokavian Wikipedia, perhaps called the "Wikipedia in Our Language" or something similarly uniting.
That means, I think, that everybody here has, ultimately, the same goals.
Whether or not sh.wiki would eventually be the breeding ground for a Neo-Štokavian Wikipedia is uncertain.
But one thing which is certain about sh.wiki: it has already served to unite people from different countries under the same goals. A large group? No. But, a group nonetheless. I know that among the main supporters of sh.wp, some are based out of Serbia and others out of Croatia. I don't think there are any Bosnians nor Montenegrins (nor Zlatiborians ;p) involved, though.
The main issue seems to be the current structure of sh.wiki.
If sh.wikipedians really dream that some day, all speakers of Serbo-Croatian "languages" can be united with one Wikipedia, I think it is up to them to take the first reconciliatory step, namely, form community ties with the Serbian, Croatian, and Bosnian Wikipedias.
Also, a power structure needs to be formed. Although it should be OK to block a person who is unquestionably vandalising pages, anybody else should be blocked, but later it needs to be discussed with the other admins. A full agreement should be reached among admins before making a final decision.
Also, for better oversight, I think sh.wp should try to recruit people from other Wikipedias, or recruit non-Wikipedians to join sh.wp. With a larger community, there is a bigger diversity, and eventually more admins, which leads to better oversight of admin actions.
Really, sh.wiki is not in a position to be confrontational. In English, there is a saying, "you get more flies with honey than with vinegar", which means, you will get further by diplomacy and attempts at reconciliation and genuine goodwill, than petty bickering.
Someone will probably say, "Oh, well, *we're* not arguing, it's them." But this is never the case. For any argument, there are two people.
And it's obvious that many people here share the same ideals.
And let's get one thing straight -- NOBODY, again, NOBODY (save perhaps Mav) wants to FORCEFULLY unite projects without democratic agreement from all of them.
Mark
On 11/01/06, Milos Rancic millosh@mutualaid.org wrote:
On 1/11/06, Dejan Cabrilo dcabrilo@gmail.com wrote:
Milos, you first said that nobody tagged POV articles as such, and that I should've. We concluded that I did. Now you are saying that I didn't attempt to improve them, but did tag them. I did try to improve some, but I was constantly reverted and even rolled back by some admins (I can look into those). So, don't tell me I am not saying truth again, please.
Try it again with ONE article, first (please, use some which where you are more familiar) and if you would have some problems, they will be solved. But, please, don't behave aggressive.
It doesn't matter if our edition is called Serbo-Croatian, or Neo-Shtokavian, or "our language". It's about not being country, or ethno-centric, but information centric.
Do you think that building one more community is a right way to make differences smaller? I don't think so. In this moment the right way is, as I see, to work inside of present communities. When sh: grows up to 10 people, we would have a lot more difficult situation because the space for possible merging would be filled with one more community.
However, as I said, one of the important reasons why I am not for closing sh: in this way is a possibility of deactivating couple of active sh: Wikipedians.
In other words, the only possible way for relocking of sh: is your (i.e. sh: Wikipedians) intention to do so; as well as your start to work in all of other three encyclopedias/communities on the long process of merging content. Is it possible?
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-- "Take away their language, destroy their souls." -- Joseph Stalin
-- "Take away their language, destroy their souls." -- Joseph Stalin