Mark Williamson wrote:
For that matter, in the computerless world, even
languages such as
German and French and Spanish are relatively rare. We are talking here
about targeting entire continents such as Africa which are best served
by native-language content which we cannot currently provide in any
way shape or form. We have growing Arabic and Afrikaans Wikipedias, a
minimal Swahili Wikipedia, just beginning Wolof, Bambara, Zulu,
Somali, and Amharic Wikipedias, and can already obviously provide
English, French, and Portuguese-language content for those Africans
who can speak these languages fluently.
I'd question that: I think Africa is "best served" by whatever
content
the most people can read, which is likely to be English. Even expanding
to say, four languages, the best choices are likely to be English,
French, Arabic, and Swahili (although I can't find very good statistics
on this). Unless you have a plan to simultaneously publish editions in
500 different languages, publishing in the major languages---i.e. those
that the most people are able to make use of---seems like the best plan.
-Mark