I see that a couple of people are busy porting Encyclopedia Libre ( http://enciclopedia.us.es/ ) articles to the Spanish Wikipedia. This raises a /very/ important question;
Which project are we going have our interlanguage links point to? AstroNomer has already finished translating language-ES.php and wants the developers to install the new Phase III software for the Spanish Wikipedia on the Wikipedia server.
This of course would be a slap in the face of the Encyclopedia Libre folks - many of whom want more cooperation with Wikipedia. But there is a very vocal few who hate Wikipedia.
What is everybody's preference here? Should we majorly help revive the Spanish Wikipedia by upgrading their software or should we put our support behind Encyclopedia Libre. Remember, EL broke away from the Spanish Wikipedia over a misunderstanding (and they still have slanderous and unfair statements about Wikipedia on their about page see: http://enciclopedia.us.es/wiki.phtml?title=Enciclopedia+Libre+Universal+en+E... )?
Encyclopedia Libre currently has more articles and more users/contributors but they don't seem to have a software development team (just a person or two). Also many thousands of their "articles" are just templates so their absence from the Spanish Wikipedia isn't that big of a deal. Also, simplified logistics is a reason why it makes more sense to keep everything on server(s) that our developers can access.
However, my gut feeling tells me that we should at least try to work with EL and then if that doesn't work our fallback plan would be to upgrade the Spanish Wikipedia and put all of our support behind them. However, if we do go this route and EL upgrades and we point our interlanguage links there, then what about all the work that is going on right now at the Spanish Wikipedia?
I just want to have this decided so that I can start contributing (I'm such a WIkipediaholic that I could majorly help revive the Spanish Wikipedia by porting EL material but I don't want to have duplicated effort between two very similar projects if it can be avoided).
I think this is very important because the project that gets our new software, inter-language links, support and future inter-language functionality is probably the project that will endure. I know it will be the project I contribute to.
Any other thoughts on this?
-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
On Sun, Sep 29, 2002 at 10:25:00PM -0700, Daniel Mayer wrote:
What is everybody's preference here? Should we majorly help revive the Spanish Wikipedia by upgrading their software or should we put our support behind Encyclopedia Libre. Remember, EL broke away from the Spanish Wikipedia over a misunderstanding (and they still have slanderous and unfair statements about Wikipedia on their about page see: http://enciclopedia.us.es/wiki.phtml?title=Enciclopedia+Libre+Universal+en+E... )?
I don't know the history, but looking around there a bit it seems to me that it'd be futile to try and collaborate with a project run by people so bitter and twisted...
--- Khendon jason@jasonandali.org.uk wrote:
I don't know the history, but looking around there a bit it seems to me that it'd be futile to try and collaborate with a project run by people so bitter and twisted...
There have been major misunderstandings on both sides. There are a vocal few who seem to really hate Wikipedia, but there seem to be others who want to cooperate.
Stephen G.
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I think this is very important because the project that gets our new software, inter-language links, support and future inter-language functionality is probably the project that will endure. I know it will be the project I contribute to.
Any other thoughts on this?
Since you indicated quote
This of course would be a slap in the face of the Encyclopedia Libre folks - many of whom want more cooperation with Wikipedia. But there is a very vocal few who hate Wikipedia.
/quote
It seems that the most natural move would be to ask their community what they think about it. You state some would like more cooperation, and a few hate Wikipedia. Well, that's to them to discuss together maybe and conclude whether they would like more cooperation, or even coming back to us, or reversly absolutely not loose their "independance".
Since some of them are busy porting articles from one to the other encyclopedia, maybe would these even decide to move back to a *revived* and *updated* es.wiki.
It sounds as if part of the misunderstanding was related to .com and Larry being paid, no ? If these were the most painful issues, these are no more. Of course, there was maybe more to the disagreement and maybe it went too far for *any* reconciliation to be possible. But, still, maybe the first step would be to ask whether their feelings changed or not.
About that first page, yup. Make me think of all these decisions we take one day or another, only to realise it was maybe the wrong one, not dare admit we changed our minds, and just keep our feet deeply rooted in the ground. It looks easier sometimes to follow somebody we don't agree so much with anymore, rather than exposing ourselves.
Of course, you need to count on the deep pride of spanish people when raising the subject, but at least, if they send you to hell, you'll know what to do next :-)
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As I have written before in http://www.nupedia.com/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2002-August/003869.html I favor Enciclopedia Libre, because that's where the action is.
I would ask EL whether they agree that our interlanguage links point to them, and if they say yes, scrap our Spanish Wikipedia. Of course, whether they say yes or no, they are always free and welcome to use the Phase III software and our translation file on their server.
Administratively, this is very nice. If they want a change in software, configuration, or hardware, they have to do it themselves. Less work for us, more control for them. I expect that many active international Wikipedias will go that route over time.
Asking them to return to the American server, or simply importing their articles to the Spanish Wikipedia, would no doubt both be interpreted as insulting. (The importing would also require some sort of acknowledgement and link back per GFDL.)
Axel
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Axel Boldt wrote:
Administratively, this is very nice. If they want a change in software, configuration, or hardware, they have to do it themselves. Less work for us, more control for them. I expect that many active international Wikipedias will go that route over time.
I expect and hope for the opposite, a united world community, working together in peace and harmony for the betterment of all. I oppose Balkanization, or the assumption that differences are more important than similarities.
There are many benefits to working together -- a positive change to internationalization features will benefit all languages, not just one. Going off into separate groups, with separate servers, separate software is a step away from harmony.
There's nothing wrong with people starting competing projects if they want. But that doesn't mean that we should not pursue a strategy of inclusiveness.
We want input from Spanish speaking people. That input will be harder to get if there is a totally separate Spanish organization, and if we tell Spanish newcomers "go away, there's a Spanish project for you".
I don't think our using their content, or them using ours, is any kind of insult. Why should it be? That's the whole point of the free license.
--Jimbo
--- Jimmy Wales jwales@bomis.com wrote:
Axel Boldt wrote:
Administratively, this is very nice. If they want
a change in software,
configuration, or hardware, they have to do it
themselves. Less work
for us, more control for them. I expect that many
active international
Wikipedias will go that route over time.
I expect and hope for the opposite, a united world community, working together in peace and harmony for the betterment of all. I oppose Balkanization, or the assumption that differences are more important than similarities.
There are many benefits to working together -- a positive change to internationalization features will benefit all languages, not just one. Going off into separate groups, with separate servers, separate software is a step away from harmony.
A world-wide community doesn't have to use the same server. Part of the tension we've had with the other language projects is that they feel the people running the server haven't been responsive to them. If the contributors have control over their server, this problem is eliminated.
We don't need a centralized server to work as one organization.
Stephen G.
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Stephen Gilbert wrote:
A world-wide community doesn't have to use the same server. Part of the tension we've had with the other language projects is that they feel the people running the server haven't been responsive to them. If the contributors have control over their server, this problem is eliminated.
Well, I think that happened back when I was a major bottleneck at the server level. Currently, we have several people who can do stuff on the server, which reduces the bottleneck considerably.
We don't need a centralized server to work as one organization.
Right, but we do need one organization to work as one organization.
--Jimbo
--- Jimmy Wales jwales@bomis.com wrote:
Stephen Gilbert wrote:
A world-wide community doesn't have to use the
same
server. Part of the tension we've had with the
other
language projects is that they feel the people
running
the server haven't been responsive to them. If the contributors have control over their server, this problem is eliminated.
Well, I think that happened back when I was a major bottleneck at the server level. Currently, we have several people who can do stuff on the server, which reduces the bottleneck considerably.
It wasn't meant as a personal dig. I simply mean that the people who are most enthusiastic about any given language project are the people who speak that language. English speakers are more likely to think of the English Wikipedia (which is also the parent project, and the largest) as the most important. Thus, the English Wikipedia will always have the most up-to-date software, etc. If the Spanish contributors have control of their own server, they can perform their own upgrades without having to go through people who are not active participants in their sub-project.
Note that agree with you that the various language projects should use the same software.
We don't need a centralized server to work as one organization.
Right, but we do need one organization to work as one organization.
Absolutely. That's why I'm enthusiastic and optimistic about convincing the EL to work under the Wikipedia name once again.
Stephen G.
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I think we need to ask ourselves precisely what we want EL to do:
1) Change the name back to Wikipedia or a convenient Spanish version of that word.
2) Use Phase III software.
3) Provide language links to wikipedia.org.
4) Run off our server.
5) Formally rejoin our project.
You can have some of these without the others. Personally, I think 2 & 4 are the least important; it's up to them to find the best infrastructure which suits them. 3) is certainly desirable, even in the absense of all the others. 5) would be very nice and probably implies 3), but 5) does not imply 2) or 4). 1) probably implies 5), but does 5) imply 1)? In other words, could we live with a member of the Wikipedia family which calls itself Enciclopedia Libre?
Axel
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Daniel Mayer wrote:
Which project are we going have our interlanguage links point to? AstroNomer has already finished translating language-ES.php and wants the developers to install the new Phase III software for the Spanish Wikipedia on the Wikipedia server.
What is everybody's preference here? Should we majorly help revive the Spanish Wikipedia by upgrading their software or should we put our support behind Encyclopedia Libre.
However, my gut feeling tells me that we should at least try to work with EL and then if that doesn't work our fallback plan would be to upgrade the Spanish Wikipedia and put all of our support behind them. However, if we do go this route and EL upgrades and we point our interlanguage links there, then what about all the work that is going on right now at the Spanish Wikipedia?
I think this is very important because the project that gets our new software, inter-language links, support and future inter-language functionality is probably the project that will endure. I know it will be the project I contribute to.
Any other thoughts on this?
As for software availability, I don't see this as an either/or proposition. There should be no particular problem with upgrading the Spanish Wikipedia without regard to what's happening at EL The software can be made available to the EL people if they want it, but integrating it with what they have is their task.
Clearly our interlanguage links should be to the Spanish Wikipedia, but nothing would prevent further links to EL where an alternate view of a subject might be represented. I also see no problem with either project copying articles from the other.
There's even something healthy about having more than one active project, in that if anything happens to one, the other is still there.
If supporting EL were to be considered as a viable first choice, I would be inclined to ask questions about their long term financial viability. What guarantee is there that they will not be a refuge for spamvertising?
Ec
Ray Saintonge wrote:
There's even something healthy about having more than one active project, in that if anything happens to one, the other is still there.
I think this is true.
If supporting EL were to be considered as a viable first choice, I would be inclined to ask questions about their long term financial viability. What guarantee is there that they will not be a refuge for spamvertising?
Well, financial viability is pretty easy for a wiki encyclopedia, I think. There is no need for employees, at least not for the central mission of the encyclopedia, and so all that's needed is a server and bandwidth. Both are getting cheaper all the time.
I'm not sure what you meant by "spamvertising" versus "advertising". In my mind, the distinction would be between advertising that is kept clearly separate from the content (banners, for example) versus advertising that masquerades as content (pseudo-articles touting some product, for example). I see little chance of this happening to them.
My concern is that they might take a particular political turn, abandoning NPOV to write an encyclopedia from a particular political point of view. There's nothing wrong with someone doing that, of course. I fully expect some motivated Christians to someday take the wikipedia content and "clean it up" to suit their perspective.
But it's not o.k. for wikipedia, which aims to be NPOV and a sort of "reference standard" that others can use for such purposes.
--Jimbo
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