Anthere wrote:
As a matter of interest, I would be curious to know how those internationals, that are split between wikipedias assume
that. I find
extremely disconcerting to see two parts of a "common" project being so different. It is a bit like that psychological disorder :-)
I feel this too. When I try to provide "crosstalk" from En: policies to Fr: and vice-versa, I get no results. fr: says "but we're not en:" en: says "but we are en:!"
Each wikipédia has his own rules. Often the same than en:, but not everytime. I think each wikipedia must have his own rules. Respecting some choosed by the wikimedia fundation, npov for instance.
It could be a work for the wikimedia fundation ?
Constans, Camille (C.C.) wrote:
Each wikipédia has his own rules. Often the same than en:, but not everytime. I think each wikipedia must have his own rules. Respecting some choosed by the wikimedia fundation, npov for instance.
I wanted to just say that although the parameters of this are naturally open to question, I support this in concept. A lot of customs (I wouldn't use the word 'rules') are going to be culture-specific and there are many options where there is no universally "correct" answer. NPOV is non-negotiable everywhere, but a lot of the details are going to work out differently in different languages.
Americans and Japanese people, for example, are culturally very different. So naturally what is considered rude behavior on the two wikis is going to be different. Americans wear their shoes in the house, as filthy as that sounds.
--Jimbo
Jimmy Wales wrote:
Constans, Camille (C.C.) wrote:
Each wikipédia has his own rules. Often the same than en:, but not everytime. I think each wikipedia must have his own rules. Respecting some choosed by the wikimedia fundation, npov for instance.
I wanted to just say that although the parameters of this are naturally open to question, I support this in concept. A lot of customs (I wouldn't use the word 'rules') are going to be culture-specific and there are many options where there is no universally "correct" answer. NPOV is non-negotiable everywhere, but a lot of the details are going to work out differently in different languages.
Americans and Japanese people, for example, are culturally very different. So naturally what is considered rude behavior on the two wikis is going to be different. Americans wear their shoes in the house, as filthy as that sounds.
Customs may be different. Things like how deletions are handled, or bans, and so on: these will vary of course.
But the problems have not been "social", they have been to do with technical things and principles.
* providing sufficient information on copyright status on image pages * not using proprietary formats such as PDF * not using animated images except where essential to *meaning* (eg article on animation) * not using colours in tables excessively * not using fancy formatting (complicates wiki markup, adds no meaning to articles: en: has this problem with someone who's made fancy borders in maths theorems, but at least when I complained about it, people on the en: mailing list AGREED with me.) * not writing articles from the perspective of a particular country. (A frequent problem is articles that don't state where a city is, because it's in the country of the language of the particular WP. Another is the article on trams on the Swedish WP, which speaks only on trams in Sweden.) * treating WP as a neutral space: eg not putting up big banners for holidays which not everyone in the world shares
If these apply to en:, they surely apply everywhere. The problem is that when people from en: try to pass on these principles, which en: has set out by sole virtue of it having had more time to determine them, they are not always well-received.
"Constans, Camille (C.C.)" :
Each wikipédia has his own rules. Often the same than en:, but not everytime. I think each wikipedia must have his own rules. Respecting some choosed by the wikimedia fundation, npov for instance.
Each wp have its own customs, but should share the same rules, I guess.
In theory, each wp entry should be the perfect translation of the same entry in any language, don't you think ? (IMO encyclopedic goal is to try to reach universalism.)
Then, basic rules should be the same, and the Chinese NPOV is to be the same as French one or Rwandese one.
(I new in wp so feel free to correct my likely mistakes)
Ruimu a écrit:
"Constans, Camille (C.C.)" :
Each wikipédia has his own rules. Often the same than en:, but not everytime. I think each wikipedia must have his own rules. Respecting some choosed by the wikimedia fundation, npov for instance.
Each wp have its own customs, but should share the same rules, I guess.
In theory, each wp entry should be the perfect translation of the same entry in any language, don't you think ? (IMO encyclopedic goal is to try to reach universalism.)
Then, basic rules should be the same, and the Chinese NPOV is to be the same as French one or Rwandese one.
(I new in wp so feel free to correct my likely mistakes)
Hello Ruimu,
I do not think in theory each wp entry should be a translation of the other languages. It is too ideal :-) I think each should have its specificity, its special taste. Then we can inspire from the other versions to set each local version.
you are true that chinese npov should be the same than french or rwandese one of course. But that might be expressed differently.
ant
Anthere wrote:
Ruimu a rit:
"Constans, Camille (C.C.)" :
Each wikipia has his own rules. Often the same than en:, but not everytime. I think each wikipedia must have his own rules. Respecting some choosed by the wikimedia fundation, npov for instance.
Each wp have its own customs, but should share the same rules, I guess.
In theory, each wp entry should be the perfect translation of the same entry in any language, don't you think ? (IMO encyclopedic goal is to try to reach universalism.)
Then, basic rules should be the same, and the Chinese NPOV is to be the same as French one or Rwandese one.
I do not think in theory each wp entry should be a translation of the other languages. It is too ideal :-) I think each should have its specificity, its special taste. Then we can inspire from the other versions to set each local version.
you are true that chinese npov should be the same than french or rwandese one of course. But that might be expressed differently.
I agree with Anthère. There are very few rules that should apply in the same way to all languages. The idea of NPOV should apply to all languages, but the way it's implemented is going to change. Something might be a problem for one language, but not for another.
The issue of whether to use simplified or traditional characters in Chinese will be an issue since not all Chinese speaking countries have adopted simplified characters. This won't matter very much to English or French speakers who would only occasionally write in Chinese characters.
In French and English, as well as in the other languages of the old colonial powers, the languages have evolved separately in the mother country and each of its former colonies. France lost control of Canada in 1763 when it was still a monarchy, so that a lot of ideas that were fundamental to the French Revolution did not automatically become a part of Canadian thinking. That alone can make a single translation impossible.
Ec
From: Ray Saintonge on Thursday, December 11, 2003 2:45 PM Anthere wrote:
Ruimu a rit:
"Constans, Camille (C.C.)" :
Each wikipia has his own rules. Often the same than en:, but not everytime. I think each wikipedia must have his own rules. Respecting some choosed by the wikimedia fundation, npov for instance.
Each wp have its own customs, but should share the same rules, I
guess.
In theory, each wp entry should be the perfect translation of the same entry in any language, don't you think ? (IMO encyclopedic goal is to try to reach universalism.) Then, basic rules should be the same, and the Chinese NPOV is to be the same as French one or Rwandese one.
I do not think in theory each wp entry should be a translation of
the
other languages. It is too ideal :-) I think each should have its specificity, its special taste. Then we can inspire from the other versions to set each local version. you are true that chinese npov should be the same than french or rwandese one of course. But that might be expressed differently.
I agree with Anthère. There are very few rules that should apply in
the
same way to all languages. The idea of NPOV should apply to all languages, but the way it's implemented is going to change. Something might be a problem for one language, but not for another.
I have to say that on principle and as a matter of policy I strongly disagree with Ray and Anthere. The overall goal *does* need to be that each wp entry should be the perfect translation of the same entry in any language.
Each language version should *not* have its own special taste.
As a matter of course the fact that languages are intertwined with ethnicity, nationality, and modes of expression means that the same content will be discussed differently in different languages.
As a matter of course the fact that Wikipedia is a volunteer project means that contributions are shaped by the contributors' individual priorities. As French-speakers have statistically different priorities than English-speakers or Chinese-speakers, as a matter of course the language versions will have differently weighted contributions.
But we should not have *as a goal* different priorities, different discussions of the same content. The goal, as Ruimi said, is to try to reach universalism.
It's a lot easier for Wikipedia contributors if we celebrate ethnic differences--and no matter how you slice it, celebrating the forking of the Wikipedia concept for each language is doing just that (and I'd be happy to hear convincing arguments otherwise)--but it's not better for Wikipedia.
That said, we're still growing and I think there are many significant errors in judgment in terms of establishing policy for the English-language version of Wikipedia, and I'm not advocating using universalism as a club to make every language follow en.wiki's example.
I *am* advocating two things: 1. Making it clear that the ultimate goal is universalism and consistency across all languages. 2. Improving the software to allow for better integration of the different languages (e.g. one user account, the option to have multiple languages in recent changes and watchlists, etc.) 3. Stop using mailing lists and use bulletin-board type systems integrated with Wikipedia.
This is all we'd have to do, I suspect, to make sure that we do work towards the ultimate goal of universalism and consistency.
--tc
On Thu, 11 Dec 2003, The Cunctator wrote:
I have to say that on principle and as a matter of policy I strongly disagree with Ray and Anthere. The overall goal *does* need to be that each wp entry should be the perfect translation of the same entry in any language.
Well, I do agree with them. Each Wikipedia should on its own try to be as good as possible. If two Wikipedias have different articles on the same subject, cross-fertilizing might be one way of improving the articles, but I see no need whatsoever to wish that they would be the same.
Each language version should *not* have its own special taste.
I disagree. Dutch Wikipedia will mostly be read in the Netherlands and Belgium, Spanish in Spain and the Americas. Thus it is very logical to me that Dutch Wikipedia on its page "province" discusses, apart from the general definition of what a province is, the Dutch and Belgian situation in more depth, while referring to a separate page for the Spanish provinces, and that the Spanish Wikipedia does it the other way around.
As a matter of course the fact that languages are intertwined with ethnicity, nationality, and modes of expression means that the same content will be discussed differently in different languages.
As a matter of course the fact that Wikipedia is a volunteer project means that contributions are shaped by the contributors' individual priorities. As French-speakers have statistically different priorities than English-speakers or Chinese-speakers, as a matter of course the language versions will have differently weighted contributions.
But we should not have *as a goal* different priorities, different discussions of the same content. The goal, as Ruimi said, is to try to reach universalism.
I disagree. Strongly. If universalism as a goal is made official, I'm out of here. I find this one of the problems with Wikipedia as it currently is (although there are other, even greater problems). I do not think Wikipedia should tell everything about everything. An encyclopedia should select and summarize information.
This is all we'd have to do, I suspect, to make sure that we do work towards the ultimate goal of universalism and consistency.
Your ultimate goal is not mine. Farewell.
Andre Engels
From: Andre Engels on Friday, December 12, 2003 5:36 AM On Thu, 11 Dec 2003, The Cunctator wrote:
<snip>
But we should not have *as a goal* different priorities, different discussions of the same content. The goal, as Ruimi said, is to try
to
reach universalism.
I disagree. Strongly. If universalism as a goal is made official, I'm out of here. I find this one of the problems with Wikipedia as it currently is (although there are other, even greater problems). I do not think Wikipedia should tell everything about everything. An encyclopedia should select and summarize information.
This is all we'd have to do, I suspect, to make sure that we do work towards the ultimate goal of universalism and consistency.
Your ultimate goal is not mine. Farewell.
I won't even get into that. The idea that slightly different ideas about what the perfect Wikipedia would be in the far future is enough to make you leave is, frankly, bizarre.
I think you also misinterpreted what I meant by universalism.
From the dictionary,
u.ni.ver.sal: 1. Of, relating to, extending to, or affecting the entire world or all within the world; worldwide: "This discovery of literature has as yet only partially penetrated the universal consciousness" (Ellen Key). 2. Including, relating to, or affecting all members of the class or group under consideration: the universal skepticism of philosophers. 3. Applicable or common to all purposes, conditions, or situations: a universal remedy. 4. Of or relating to the universe or cosmos; cosmic. 5. Knowledgeable about or constituting all or many subjects; comprehensively broad.
Huh. That's strange, I have trouble finding some definition which seems antithetical to what you've said are your goals.
By the way, what I (and I suspect Ruimi) specifically mean by having universalism as a goal for Wikipedia is that my goal is for Wikipedia to be applicable or common to all purposes, conditions, or situations.
On Fri, 12 Dec 2003, The Cunctator wrote:
Your ultimate goal is not mine. Farewell.
I won't even get into that. The idea that slightly different ideas about what the perfect Wikipedia would be in the far future is enough to make you leave is, frankly, bizarre.
Perhaps. Of course we can have different goals, and that should not be much of a problem as in the great majority of the cases the goals are nevertheless in the same direction. But if it's going to be talked about as "the goal of the project" rather than "my goal" - then I'm not so sure any more whether I belong here.
By the way, what I (and I suspect Ruimi) specifically mean by having universalism as a goal for Wikipedia is that my goal is for Wikipedia to be applicable or common to all purposes, conditions, or situations.
Very well, I can live with that. Or at least, I can live with the way it has till now been implemented on Wikipedia.
Andre Engels
"RS" == Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net writes:
RS> France lost control of Canada in 1763 when it was still a RS> monarchy, so that a lot of ideas that were fundamental to the RS> French Revolution did not automatically become a part of RS> Canadian thinking. That alone can make a single translation RS> impossible.
Oh, _come now_. The English-speaking countries of the world also have very different histories, and we don't have forks of en.w.o. for each such country.
Diversity of opinion *within* national boundaries is going to be about the same as diversity of opinion *across* national boundaries. If Wikipedians can develop the skills to overcome the first, we can apply those same skills to overcome the second.
I don't think there's any Wiki project out there that can afford to turn away editors who can make a contribution just because of their postal address. Any project like Wikipedia needs all the help it can get.
Vive la différence!
~ESP
Evan Prodromou wrote:
"RS" == Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net writes:
RS> France lost control of Canada in 1763 when it was still a RS> monarchy, so that a lot of ideas that were fundamental to the RS> French Revolution did not automatically become a part of RS> Canadian thinking. That alone can make a single translation RS> impossible.
Oh, _come now_. The English-speaking countries of the world also have very different histories, and we don't have forks of en.w.o. for each such country.
Diversity of opinion *within* national boundaries is going to be about the same as diversity of opinion *across* national boundaries. If Wikipedians can develop the skills to overcome the first, we can apply those same skills to overcome the second.
I don't think there's any Wiki project out there that can afford to turn away editors who can make a contribution just because of their postal address. Any project like Wikipedia needs all the help it can get.
????? So what's your argument? I didn't suggest forks. I supported diversity. I said nothing about turning away editors. Your comments are non-sequiturs.
Ec
Ruimu wrote:
In theory, each wp entry should be the perfect translation of the same entry in any language, don't you think ? (IMO encyclopedic goal is to try to reach universalism.)
I see what you're getting at, but I'm not so sure that it's right.
Consider an article on the [[Statue of Liberty]], which was a gift from France to the United States. Both articles will state that fact, and give some details, but the French language article might quite naturally and properly say more about some of the particularly French aspects of the story.
Readers in different languages will have somewhat different backgrounds and interests. Different backgrounds mean that we must take into account different assumptions on what the reader will already be familiar with. Different interests mean that we must take into account different emphasis on what the reader will expect to learn from an article.
Then, basic rules should be the same, and the Chinese NPOV is to be the same as French one or Rwandese one.
But yes, NPOV is the same, and in the _essentials_, there should be very little difference between articles in different languages.
--Jimbo
From: Of Jimmy Wales on Friday, December 12, 2003 10:43 AM
Ruimu wrote:
In theory, each wp entry should be the perfect translation of the
same
entry
in any language, don't you think ? (IMO encyclopedic goal is to try
to
reach
universalism.)
I see what you're getting at, but I'm not so sure that it's right.
Consider an article on the [[Statue of Liberty]], which was a gift from France to the United States. Both articles will state that fact, and give some details, but the French language article might quite naturally and properly say more about some of the particularly French aspects of the story.
Readers in different languages will have somewhat different backgrounds and interests. Different backgrounds mean that we must take into account different assumptions on what the reader will already be familiar with. Different interests mean that we must take into account different emphasis on what the reader will expect to learn from an article.
I'm not convinced that we should have as a goal that the articles reflect the biases of the readership. I would expect both entries on the Statue of Liberty to tell the complete story. I have trouble seeing this as anything other than a defense of provincialism.
Then, basic rules should be the same, and the Chinese NPOV is to be the same as French one or Rwandese one.
But yes, NPOV is the same, and in the _essentials_, there should be very little difference between articles in different languages.
If NPOV is the same, then we shouldn't have as a goal articles which reflect different biases.
The Cunctator wrote:
Readers in different languages will have somewhat different backgrounds and interests. Different backgrounds mean that we must take into account different assumptions on what the reader will already be familiar with. Different interests mean that we must take into account different emphasis on what the reader will expect to learn from an article.
I'm not convinced that we should have as a goal that the articles reflect the biases of the readership. I would expect both entries on the Statue of Liberty to tell the complete story. I have trouble seeing this as anything other than a defense of provincialism.
Well, I didn't mean "biases". Perhaps my example is not so good.
Suppose you were writing an introductory article on Macintosh OS X for an audience of Windows users, and another introductory article for audience of Linux users. The two audiences will naturally have different backgrounds and interests, and so each article will naturally take that into account, even if the two articles cover much of the same ground.
If NPOV is the same, then we shouldn't have as a goal articles which reflect different biases.
Yes, I do agree with this, but I think that there can be differences between article versions, even where both are NPOV.
--Jimbo
----- Original Message ----- From: "Jimmy Wales" jwales@bomis.com To: wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Sent: Saturday, December 13, 2003 12:14 AM Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Press release : Logo putschonthe FrenchWikipedia !
If NPOV is the same, then we shouldn't have as a goal articles which reflect different biases.
Yes, I do agree with this, but I think that there can be differences between article versions, even where both are NPOV.
Your split between backgrounds and interests is maybe helpful to differentiate two kinds of adaptations that can be done to a given audience. Take the example of [[Confucius]]. In the en: article, there are explanation on some key words/concepts (Li, Ren, ...) that will not make so much sense if purely translated into Chinese, I guess. Here the background differences change the expression of the topic. So I'm not sure that both article (en:Confucius and zh:Kongzi) could be expressed the same way, but, imo, they should dive both to the same depth (I'm not arguing that it's always possible to do so), because en: reader and zh: reader should be supposed to have the same amount of interest in the topic. (Again, I may be wrong on WP underlying goals, but I feel that "encyclopedic" POV is not only neutral, but "universal", I mean here that any topic is interesting in this POV)
From: Jimmy Wales The Cunctator wrote:
Readers in different languages will have somewhat different backgrounds and interests. Different backgrounds mean that we
must
take into account different assumptions on what the reader will already be familiar with. Different interests mean that we must
take
into account different emphasis on what the reader will expect to learn from an article.
I'm not convinced that we should have as a goal that the articles reflect the biases of the readership. I would expect both entries on
the
Statue of Liberty to tell the complete story. I have trouble seeing
this
as anything other than a defense of provincialism.
Well, I didn't mean "biases". Perhaps my example is not so good.
Suppose you were writing an introductory article on Macintosh OS X for an audience of Windows users, and another introductory article for audience of Linux users. The two audiences will naturally have different backgrounds and interests, and so each article will naturally take that into account, even if the two articles cover much of the same ground.
A few points: that's not what we do on Wikipedia. We write [[Macintosh OS X]] with the goal of writing it from an omniscient perspective for an unknown audience.
"Backgrounds and interests" is another way of saying "biases". It's true that Windows and Linux users have different background knowledge, but on Wikipedia that is accounted for in that when we write [[Macintosh OS X]] is built on a [[BSD]] variant, the Linux users don't need to click on [[BSD]]. One man's background knowledge is another man's click.
I simply don't think it's possible to come up with an example of text on Wikipedia which would benefit from being substantively different in different languages. I'd love to be proven wrong.
I should note that when I say that "perfect translation" is a goal, I'm more or less using that as a tautology, where "perfect translation" means "communicating with equal success all of the meaning (denotation and connotation) in either language." It does not mean a one-to-one word translation, nor does it actually exist. (I always think that goals which can be approached but not achieved are the best ones for Wikipedia to have.)
For example Seamus Heaney's translation of Beowulf and George Chapman's translation of the Iliad are certainly better than word-for-word translations; then again, is Chapman's version better than Pope's? Is it better than the translation by Leconte de Lisle? What about Chen Minhua's translation? Chapman's better for English speakers, but no matter what, something is changed in the translation.
(And one would expect the Wikipedia in English--or in any language--to discuss Chapman, Pope, Leconte de Lisle and Chen Minhua.)
Now, when we're dealing with content that ideally is perfectly factual, that avoids implied meaning, a lot of the problem of judging translation goes away.
And guess what? At Wikipedia we strive to avoid implied meaning.
If NPOV is the same, then we shouldn't have as a goal articles which reflect different biases.
Yes, I do agree with this, but I think that there can be differences between article versions, even where both are NPOV.
Well, since I don't believe that an article can be neutral point of view, or even that an article can be truly neutral, I can't disagree with the proposition.
Do you believe that an article can be truly neutral?
The Cunctator wrote:
A few points: that's not what we do on Wikipedia. We write [[Macintosh OS X]] with the goal of writing it from an omniscient perspective for an unknown audience.
Not "for an unknown audience" but "for readers of a given language".
And we should not pretend that we don't make assumptions aboout what our readers know. When we mention New York City, we don't normally say "New York, a large city in the United States" because we can naturally assume that English speakers know such a thing. But if we mention Tianjin, we might very well say such a thing, because we don't naturally assume that English speakers would know.
"Backgrounds and interests" is another way of saying "biases".
No, it isn't. It's entirely different. Backgrounds and interests can lead to biases, of course. But they aren't the same thing _as_ biases.
I simply don't think it's possible to come up with an example of text on Wikipedia which would benefit from being substantively different in different languages. I'd love to be proven wrong.
Well, I think it's hard to come up with examples of articles that could not, in some way, benefit from being substantively different in some aspect, in at least some different languages.
Imagine an article about an event in World War II that happened in Catalonia, Spain. In English, that article ought to contain _within it_ an explanation of where Barcelona is, how close it is to France, or whatever. Sure, we could leave it to a click for readers to figure out for themselves, but the narrative is much more smooth if we acknowledge that the typical "unknown" reader in English will need that basic information in order to process the article.
That same section would be boring and stupid for speakers of Catalan, and we can safely assume that a mere link will suffice for the majority of readers in that case.
(And one would expect the Wikipedia in English--or in any language--to discuss Chapman, Pope, Leconte de Lisle and Chen Minhua.)
Yes, we do agree about that of course.
Now, when we're dealing with content that ideally is perfectly factual, that avoids implied meaning, a lot of the problem of judging translation goes away.
And guess what? At Wikipedia we strive to avoid implied meaning.
Yes, but at the same time, we frequently and wisely make assumptions about our readers all the time.
Do you believe that an article can be truly neutral?
Yes, very much so. Neutrality is an ideal, but it is an achievable ideal.
--Jimbo
From: Jimmy Wales The Cunctator wrote:
Do you believe that an article can be truly neutral?
Yes, very much so. Neutrality is an ideal, but it is an achievable ideal.
Please, show me the money.
Consider this point: the entire enterprise of science is designed to allow/force people to produce truly neutral articles, and obviously it's imperfect at best.
Creating a truly neutral article is equivalent to creating a truly neutral map. It's just not possible.
Within the constraints of an accepted framework one can do a reasonably good job (e.g. "If we accept this limited model of the world as being true...") but we can't ever work within a truly neutral frameork.
--tc
The Cunctator wrote:
A few points: that's not what we do on Wikipedia. We write [[Macintosh OS X]] with the goal of writing it from an omniscient perspective for an unknown audience.
Sorry, this is plain nonsense, since the audience is not unknown. We know that the readers of the English Wikipedia understand English, and this implies that they have already heard of Shakespeare (an English playwright) and Bristol (a town in England).
To achieve neutrality, you would have to stop people on the English Wikipedia from describing any details about cities or counties in Pennsylvania and Ohio, because those details can be as irrelevant to a Russian reader as are details about Russian places of the same size to an English-speaking audience. Since Russia and the U.S. are about the same size (population anyway), you can only describe as many U.S. cities as Russian ones, whether that is ten or a thousand.
Still, the existing (and natural) bias towards readers of the target language can be an interesting observation. One could make a list of all cities of the world with a population of more than half a million, only to make readers realize they easily recognize cities where their language is spoken, while they've never heard of the other ones.
Note that the rather famous city of Bristol only has 381,000 inhabitants, while the city of Szczecin has 419,000, but how many English speakers know where Szczecin is?
Lars Aronsson wrote:
The Cunctator wrote:
Note that the rather famous city of Bristol only has 381,000 inhabitants, while the city of Szczecin has 419,000, but how many English speakers know where Szczecin is?
You mean Stettin? (ducks)
:-)
Stan
What exactly is discussed on the mailing list that can't or shouldn't or isn't discussed on wikipedia-proper? -oliver
On Sat, 2003-12-13 at 02:45, Oliver Brown wrote:
What exactly is discussed on the mailing list that can't or shouldn't or isn't discussed on wikipedia-proper?
Definitely questions that new modules and langugaes face.
I never understood why most of the issues that relates to real world (and which seemed like hell of a lot of noise to me) is not captured on the wiki?
With new languages the issues of untested fonts, encodings, web browser rendering etc limit our ability to use the wiki as effectively as in the established ones in the begginning stages.
Maybe I am in the wrong list...
Ramanan
Nothing, but operationally you reach the group who reads the lists, but might not be following a particular discussion on Wikipedia.
Fred
From: "Oliver Brown" oliver@kingturtle.com Reply-To: wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 18:45:24 -0800 To: wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Subject: [Wikipedia-l] curiosity
What exactly is discussed on the mailing list that can't or shouldn't or isn't discussed on wikipedia-proper? -oliver
Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
On Sat, 2003-12-13 at 16:09, Fred Bauder wrote:
Nothing, but operationally you reach the group who reads the lists,
lists in plural?
Are there other lists I should scan for what I need to find out and/or keep up with.
Again, my interest is to understand Wikipedia better to structure a newly started language module. There are few unanswered questions AFAIK.
Ramanan
From: "Oliver Brown" oliver@kingturtle.com Reply-To: wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 18:45:24 -0800 To: wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Subject: [Wikipedia-l] curiosity
What exactly is discussed on the mailing list that can't or shouldn't or isn't discussed on wikipedia-proper? -oliver
Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
Here's a URL to all the lists:
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo
It strikes me that this list might be useful to you:
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/intlwiki-l
Which deals with "Wikipedia multilingual issues"
Fred
From: Ramanan Selvaratnam rama@ukfsn.org Reply-To: rama@ukfsn.org, wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2003 16:26:17 +0000 To: wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] curiosity
On Sat, 2003-12-13 at 16:09, Fred Bauder wrote:
Nothing, but operationally you reach the group who reads the lists,
lists in plural?
Are there other lists I should scan for what I need to find out and/or keep up with.
Again, my interest is to understand Wikipedia better to structure a newly started language module. There are few unanswered questions AFAIK.
Ramanan
From: "Oliver Brown" oliver@kingturtle.com Reply-To: wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 18:45:24 -0800 To: wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Subject: [Wikipedia-l] curiosity
What exactly is discussed on the mailing list that can't or shouldn't or isn't discussed on wikipedia-proper? -oliver
Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
Thanks Fred for most helpful info.
It seems it was me who was contributing some noise to this after all.
Regards,
Ramanan
PS: If anyone is still breaking their heads over :)any questions I might have posed, most have been answered offlist.
On Sat, 2003-12-13 at 16:47, Fred Bauder wrote:
Here's a URL to all the lists:
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo
It strikes me that this list might be useful to you:
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/intlwiki-l
Which deals with "Wikipedia multilingual issues"
Fred
From: Ramanan Selvaratnam rama@ukfsn.org Reply-To: rama@ukfsn.org, wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2003 16:26:17 +0000 To: wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] curiosity
On Sat, 2003-12-13 at 16:09, Fred Bauder wrote:
Nothing, but operationally you reach the group who reads the lists,
lists in plural?
Are there other lists I should scan for what I need to find out and/or keep up with.
Again, my interest is to understand Wikipedia better to structure a newly started language module. There are few unanswered questions AFAIK.
Ramanan
From: "Oliver Brown" oliver@kingturtle.com Reply-To: wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 18:45:24 -0800 To: wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Subject: [Wikipedia-l] curiosity
What exactly is discussed on the mailing list that can't or shouldn't or isn't discussed on wikipedia-proper? -oliver
Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
On Fri, 12 Dec 2003, The Cunctator wrote:
I see what you're getting at, but I'm not so sure that it's right.
Consider an article on the [[Statue of Liberty]], which was a gift from France to the United States. Both articles will state that fact, and give some details, but the French language article might quite naturally and properly say more about some of the particularly French aspects of the story.
Readers in different languages will have somewhat different backgrounds and interests. Different backgrounds mean that we must take into account different assumptions on what the reader will already be familiar with. Different interests mean that we must take into account different emphasis on what the reader will expect to learn from an article.
I'm not convinced that we should have as a goal that the articles reflect the biases of the readership. I would expect both entries on the Statue of Liberty to tell the complete story. I have trouble seeing this as anything other than a defense of provincialism.
I don't agree. "The full story" is always much too long to tell. Instead, we give a summary of it. And that might well be different for different languages. The Dutch page on [[Stabilisation Force Iraq]] has a separate section on the Dutch presence in it, and the opinion of the Dutch political parties on that subject. I'd expect the English language version to mention that there are Dutch in SFIR, but not that it takes half of the first paragraph, or the discussion in the Dutch parliament.
Likewise, in the above Statue of Liberty example, I'd expect that the French version might more about the French reasons to give it, and the political opinions about it, while the English version might tell more about the reaction that the gift got in the U.S.
We cannot tell the whole story, telling the whole story is cumbersome, unreadable and laughable. Instead, we have to summarize it. Give a good deal of relevant information, so that at the end people actually get informed. Information is more important than facts. And when deciding at what level we are going to summarize, what would be better than to watch at what our readership would _want_ to read?
Andre Engels
From: Andre Engels on Friday, December 12, 2003 11:45 AM
On Fri, 12 Dec 2003, The Cunctator wrote:
I'm not convinced that we should have as a goal that the articles reflect the biases of the readership. I would expect both entries on
the
Statue of Liberty to tell the complete story. I have trouble seeing
this
as anything other than a defense of provincialism.
I don't agree. "The full story" is always much too long to tell.
Instead,
we give a summary of it. And that might well be different for
different
languages. The Dutch page on [[Stabilisation Force Iraq]] has a
separate
section on the Dutch presence in it, and the opinion of the Dutch political parties on that subject. I'd expect the English language
version
to mention that there are Dutch in SFIR, but not that it takes half of
the
first paragraph, or the discussion in the Dutch parliament.
Likewise, in the above Statue of Liberty example, I'd expect that the French version might more about the French reasons to give it, and the
political opinions about it, while the English version might tell more about the reaction that the gift got in the U.S.
We cannot tell the whole story, telling the whole story is cumbersome, unreadable and laughable. Instead, we have to summarize it.
This is so very, very true....
For stories written on paper.
It is a simple impossibility to tell the whole story in a linear narrative. But a hyperlinked text is fractal, and has an arbitrary perimeter of coverage.
Give a good deal of relevant information, so that at the end people actually get informed. Information is more important than facts.
"Information is more important than facts"? Information consists of facts.
And when deciding at what level we are going to summarize, what would be better than to watch at what our readership would _want_ to read?
Oh, I don't know, maybe watching at what level tells them the truth.
Look: I make a strong distinction between the tactics and efforts of individual Wikipedians and what is the intended overall effect. I only expect individual Wikipedians to work on what they're interested in and to include the information that they believe is important.
As long as once information (not "facts") is included in Wikipedia, it isn't removed, then the end result--for Wikipedia, not a particular entry--is the complete story.
For individual entries, I expect individual Wikipedians to keep entries as short as possible, and to extract content that forms a distinguishably distinct (sometimes largely subordinate, sometimes not) concept to a separate entry. (see [[user:The Cunctator/Agglomeration]]).
As long as that is done, then the end result for each individual entry is highly readable, concise and authoritative.
Finally, as a reader I would love to know about what the Dutch parliament's debate on the occupation of Iraq is.
I'd like to chime in in support of what Cunctator's saying. I've yet to see an example of those given that isn't a clear case of what should NOT happen. I would like to know about the Statue of Liberty in France, the Dutch parliament's position on Iraq, and all of that, but I'm only good with English. Even if I thought that assuming anything based on someone's language was other than a terrible idea, I'd say that the suggestions are opposite to what we should be doing. If we assume that those who speak Dutch are in the Netherlands, the people who'd read the Dutch Wikipedia already know quite a bit about the Dutch parliament and its stance on Iraq, and moreover, know a lot of the background. An English-language-only American might be interested in why the Netherlands is doing whatever it is that it's doing, go to the en:wikipedia, and not find anything about it, because it wasn't felt to be of interest for en-ers. Which is what this is, and I didn't see until I wrote that last line- censorship. What's being suggested in the argument that the different languages of Wikipedia should have different content is that some people, because they don't think speakers of my language would be interested in a topic, block our access to information on it. Sure, it's mild, and without malice, but one thing I cannot abide is other people choosing for me what information I should and should not be able to receive. Correspondingly, it is a good act for someone to make information available to those who would not otherwise have it- if I didn't believe that, I wouldn't be contributing. (My biggest complaint against Wikipedia is WWIN.) As such, I think that it is one of the most important contributions a user can make to bring content across the languages wherever they're able to do so. (I'm still a novice with any other language, or I'd do it myself. It might go faster if I were ever trying to learn less than 5 at a time, heh.)
Not that I have any strong opinions about this or anything... ;)
-- Jake
Jake Nelson wrote:
Which is what this is, and I didn't see until I wrote that last line- censorship. What's being suggested in the argument that the different languages of Wikipedia should have different content is that some people, because they don't think speakers of my language would be interested in a topic, block our access to information on it.
Jake, I have to just say bluntly that this bit is just complete nonsense. No one is talking about censorship nor about blocking access to information. I frankly don't know where you get off suggesting such a thing.
What we are talking about is whether we should expect that, ideally, every individual-language article in wikipedia will be essentially a translation of every other language. I say no, we shouldn't expect that, even while we expect the totality of the encyclopedias to contain essentially the same information.
The reason is that issues of presentation and emphasis to take proper account of reader backgrounds and interests will naturally lead us to organize things slightly differently in different languages.
That's not to say that we should keep secret from Jake the political reasons why France gave the Statue of Liberty to the U.S., but merely that the way that information is presented may differ significantly (NOT in terms of bias, I don't mean that) for French readers versus American readers.
Sorry if I sound grumpy, but after all that we do around here to preserve openness, I don't like to be accused of advocating censorship when nothing I'm saying could even remotely plausibly be construed as an advocacy of censorship.
--Jimbo
Jimbo, I apologize. (One of these days, I'll learn to not write to the list after a bad day...) For one, I didn't mean to attritbute any attitude of censorship to _you_... but I've seen at least one article deleted on grounds it "isn't relevant to en readers" when I disagreed with that assessment, which has made me rather touchy about that kind of thing.
-- Jake
Jake Nelson wrote:
Jimbo, I apologize. (One of these days, I'll learn to not write to the list after a bad day...) For one, I didn't mean to attritbute any attitude of censorship to _you_... but I've seen at least one article deleted on grounds it "isn't relevant to en readers" when I disagreed with that assessment, which has made me rather touchy about that kind of thing.
It's hard to blame you. Some deletions can express a POV as much as any edit. To make matters worse, once it has been deleted you no longer know what it said.
Ec
No problemo, dude. I'm sorry, too, I shouldn't have gotten so uppity about it.
Jake Nelson wrote:
Jimbo, I apologize. (One of these days, I'll learn to not write to the list after a bad day...) For one, I didn't mean to attritbute any attitude of censorship to _you_... but I've seen at least one article deleted on grounds it "isn't relevant to en readers" when I disagreed with that assessment, which has made me rather touchy about that kind of thing.
Can you tell us the example, because it's probably relevant to the ongoing discussion of deletionism. I find it hard to imagine what could possibly be 'not relevant to en readers'.
--Jimbo
Jake Nelson wrote:
I'd like to chime in in support of what Cunctator's saying. I've yet to see an example of those given that isn't a clear case of what should NOT happen. I would like to know about the Statue of Liberty in France, the Dutch parliament's position on Iraq, and all of that, but I'm only good with English.
We fully expect, and accept as tolerable, the practical state of affairs that [[nl:]] will (in all probability) always cover this better than [[en:]]. But under no circumstances can somebody argue that this sort of material is ''not'' appropriate for [[en:]] even if it's appropriate for [[nl:]]. It may not get to [[en:]] very well, due to [[en:]]'s writers' proclivities, but it is always welcome on [[en:]] whenever somebody wants to write about it.
I dont' think that my views are quite as strong as what Cunc has expressed; for example, [[nl:]]'s main page on the current war might very justifiably say more about the Dutch parliament than [[en:]]'s main page on the war. This is because introductory material must choose arbitrary examples, and these can be chosen (and dynamically changed) based on reader interest. But in either case, an ''in depth'' coverage of the parliament's position would need to go on [[Parliamentary debate in the Netherlands about the 2003 war in Iraq]] (or something along those lines), and such an article would be a Good Thing on both [[en:]] and [[nl:]]. We won't reach the perfect encyclopedia without that article on both! ^_^
-- Toby
Jake Nelson a écrit:
Which is what this is, and I didn't see until I wrote that last line- censorship. What's being suggested in the argument that the different languages of Wikipedia should have different content is that some people, because they don't think speakers of my language would be interested in a topic, block our access to information on it. Sure, it's mild, and without malice, but one thing I cannot abide is other people choosing for me what information I should and should not be able to receive. Correspondingly, it is a good act for someone to make information available to those who would not otherwise have it- if I didn't believe that, I wouldn't be contributing. (My biggest complaint against Wikipedia is WWIN.) As such, I think that it is one of the most important contributions a user can make to bring content across the languages wherever they're able to do so. (I'm still a novice with any other language, or I'd do it myself. It might go faster if I were ever trying to learn less than 5 at a time, heh.)
One action I thought very good is the following one. An article about a rather little known french artist was posted on fr: and en: some time ago. It was posted along with a handfull of articles related to him. For french people, he is rather obscure, for english people, he just does not exist. The article was listed on votes for deletion. But before deleting it, the opinion of french people about the fame of the guy was asked. Apparently, even though "nobody" for english people, people were ready to keep the article if we "decided" to keep it as well (which we did not).
I thought that was a very positive move. The consideration the guy was important to be included in english relied on his fame somewhere else, for other people. Otherwise, Jack, you would only have a french version to read. This would not be censorship, but definitly limiting access to information.
Second point is that if google hits constitute a "certain" indicator of inclusiveness, they may not constitute the same indicator in other languages less represented on internet.
Jimmy Wales wrote:
Ruimu wrote:
In theory, each wp entry should be the perfect translation of the same entry in any language, don't you think ? (IMO encyclopedic goal is to try to reach universalism.)
Consider an article on the [[Statue of Liberty]], which was a gift from France to the United States. Both articles will state that fact, and give some details, but the French language article might quite naturally and properly say more about some of the particularly French aspects of the story.
I'm not sure that people are in as much conflict as they think. Contrast these items:
* Given the various proclivities of the writers on [[en:]] and [[fr:]], we would naturally expect [[fr:Statue de la Liberté]] to have more info on the French aspects than [[en:Statue of Liberty]]. This is the way things would probably develop, and it's perfectly OK.
* Whatever may be written on [[fr:Statue de la Liberté]] about the French aspects, anybody that rewrites that information for [[en:Statue of Liberty]] is doing a good thing. If it's good for [[fr:]], then it's good for [[en:]], and vice versa.
You can continue to make subtler contrasts along these lines. For example, when do you break a new article [[History of the Statue of Liberty in France]] because too much has been written on the French aspects for the main article? Different languages will do this differently, but in the limit of increasing depth of Wikipedia's coverage, they will both do something like this eventually. And so on.
One may say that all languages are headed forthe same goal but that we expect each language to follow a somewhat different path. When we are all finished with all of the perfect encyclopedias, then they may well all be perfect translations of each other. But of course, we will never be finished!!! It's potential vs actual.
-- Toby
From: Toby Bartels on Friday, December 12, 2003 11:57 AM You can continue to make subtler contrasts along these lines. For example, when do you break a new article [[History of the Statue of Liberty in France]] because too much has been written on the French aspects for the main article? Different languages will do this differently, but in the limit of increasing depth of Wikipedia's coverage, they will both do something like this eventually. And so on.
One may say that all languages are headed forthe same goal but that we expect each language to follow a somewhat different path. When we are all finished with all of the perfect encyclopedias, then they may well all be perfect translations of each other. But of course, we will never be finished!!! It's potential vs actual.
Much better said than I could. The only thing I'd say different is the text of a single language can't be a perfect encyclopedia--only the work that exists in all languages is the perfect encyclopedia.
The Cunctator wrote:
Much better said than I could.
Thanks!
The only thing I'd say different is the text of a single language can't be a perfect encyclopedia--only the work that exists in all languages is the perfect encyclopedia.
Ah, but both of these are goals that we will always approach but never achieve. I strive to make Wikipedia (as a whole) the best encyclopedia possible, and I strive to make [[en:]] the best Anglophone encyclopedia possible. Neither will ever happen, but ''both'' are our goals!
(Also the goal for [[fr:]] to be the best Francophone encyclopedia, etc. But personally, I write almost exclusively on [[en:]]. That is the ''individual'' Wikipedian's parochial interests.)
-- Toby
From: Toby Bartels The Cunctator wrote:
Much better said than I could.
Thanks!
The only thing I'd say different is the text of a single language can't be a perfect encyclopedia--only the
work
that exists in all languages is the perfect encyclopedia.
Ah, but both of these are goals that we will always approach but never achieve. I strive to make Wikipedia (as a whole) the best encyclopedia
possible,
and I strive to make [[en:]] the best Anglophone encyclopedia
possible.
Neither will ever happen, but ''both'' are our goals!
(Also the goal for [[fr:]] to be the best Francophone encyclopedia,
etc.
But personally, I write almost exclusively on [[en:]]. That is the ''individual'' Wikipedian's parochial interests.)
I've always been and will continue to be a strong advocate for considering Wikipedia to be the multilanguage project.
I think it's perfectly fine for individual Wikipedians to have parochial interests. But I think it is wrong for them to expect Wikipedia as a community to promote parochial interests.
I know I'm on the losing side of this issue, but while ethnic groups have given us lots of interesting cuisine, they've also justified a few too many deaths for my taste.
And when we as a community promote the differentiation of the language versions--as entire projects--based on assumptions of distinctly different backgrounds and interests of the readership--we're differentiating our community by ethnic groups.
You should take all of the above with the caveat that if I thought that any differentiation by language was evil, I'd only work on the Esperanto Wikipedia.
What I'm saying is that our goals as a community should be higher, more neutral, less parochial, than our goals as individuals. Celebrate our differences as individuals and celebrate our commonalities as a community.
Is there a Wiki way to judge the viewing popularity of articles? It seems it would be prudent to focus most editing effort on those pages that are viewed most heavily. And it seems it would be nice to be able to access a edits to views ratio for each article.
Tom Haws "And [the angel] said unto me: Knowest thou the condescension of God? And I said unto him: I know that he loveth his children; nevertheless, I do not know the meaning of all things."
On Thu, 11 Dec 2003, Thomas Gail Haws wrote:
Is there a Wiki way to judge the viewing popularity of articles? It seems it would be prudent to focus most editing effort on those pages that are viewed most heavily. And it seems it would be nice to be able to access a edits to views ratio for each article.
Not really. There used to be [[Special:Popularpages]], and there still is, but views are not counted any more nowadays. That way, viewing a page does not influence the database, which gives an improvement in speed. Unlike other changes for improving performance, AFAIK there are no plans to change this because of the new database server.
Andre Engels
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