Hi,
I'm glad to see there's this discussion on the issue of minority languages, since I think it's very important to formulate a policy that encourages the growth of these Wikipedias
On 10/11/05, Arbeo M arbeo_m@yahoo.de wrote:
Sadly, it's a fact that roughly half of all Wikipedias are clinically dead at present. Being enthusiastically
Yes, I think it's a trend that people simply apply for Wikipedias and then abandon them, but is there anything particularly wrong with that? The point I'm trying to make here is - are 4 articles in a minority language worse than none at all? I don't think so. That's why *any* contribution should be seen as beneficial.
Node said:
Some ideas:
- Find language activists, or people who have a website about the
language
- Find people on ICQ who claim to speak the language, and let them
know about that WP
- Let governmental or other official or authoritative organisations
know about that WP
- Get grant money to initially pay people to write good articles /
translate articles, especially in countries with a low per-capita income (sub-saharan Africa, for example), and when a sizable article base has been established, it will be much easier to attract new editors. This includes having people write articles offline, and then typing it up yourself.
- Depending on the size of the WP and the narrowness of its reader
base, you can put a sitenotice up at one WP that another WP exists -- the Romanian WP did something similar for a proposal for a Vlax Romany WP, and it was relatively successful.
These are all things that have worked in the past. There are obviously many more possibilities.
Mark
I think contacting NGOs and governments is fairly unproductive - I've actually worked with many NGOs here in Romania and they do some great things but when it comes to supporting Wikipedia, they never reply back :) I've contacted three of them in relation to the Vlax Romany Wikipedia - only one, RomaniCRISS, replied, but then they didn't reply the second time.
I think the idea that we implemented at the Romanian WP for the Vlax Romany WP was actually very successful. We realised that there were many Roma people in our readership, and we actually got three native speakers out of that notice. It would be a good idea for projects like Samogitian, the Italian languages, etc.
Thanks,
Ronline
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