----- Original Message ----- From: "Delirium" delirium@hackish.org
Interlanguage links are already done with [[zh-tw:]] and [[zh-cn:]], so perhaps we could simply split zh.wikipedia.org into zh-cn.wikipedia.org and zh-tw.wikipedia.org, with zh.wikipedia.org being a disambiguating portal? Of course, this is more up to Chinese-speakers than it is to myself; just a suggestion that would be consistent with our current usage. Having separate interlanguage links going to one encyclopedia that is effectively written in a mixture of two writing systems that are often not mutually intelligible is more than a little bit odd.
!!!
A relatively small effort is asked to full-form characters users to get used to simple forms, and the reverse. If you are a little bit used to it, the very largest part of simplification is obvious and only few "not obvious" simplified characters would need a check in a dictionnary. Those two scripting habits are very far from "two mutually unintelligible languages". In Mainland China, where I leave now, I do often see full form characters, for instance in some good and relatively expensive restaurants or hotels. It looks fancy... Most educated people do know enough of them to be quickly confortable reading a book in full-forms. On the other hand, simple form characters are often derivated from the common (and sometime very ancient) usage in fast hand script and. I know that simple forms hurts the eyes of some Taiwanese people, and I understand that (I'd be hurted in French spelling be simplified). But I don't agree with "simple english" comparison. One can easily write complex sentences using rare words in simple-form, right ? The difference between zh-tw and zh-cn is much closer to the difference between en-gb and en-us, and I didn't see any kind of "british english" wikipedia on my screen.
I don't agree also with the idea of a "tw.wikipedia.org". Full forms are used in many Chinatowns world wide and is not a specifically Taiwanese language. In Paris for example there are some Chinese language newspapers and most of them are in full forms, but the readers are mostly from Guangdong or such other places in Southern China while only few are from Taiwan.
What I agree with is that the present choice for chinese wikipedia is far from perfect. I guess a kind of option that you can change in "your prefs" would be better : you choose your prefered display and, if a page has the two versions, you are sent on the one you prefer. I have no idea of the feasability of such a thing.
Last word : I'm far from a defender of simplified forms, I often think full forms carry more semantics and phonetics and often have more "qi" (energy) and harmony, I'd prefer the writing-system reform to have been much softer, if any.
(gbog)