Dear all,
I believe there is something wrong with the way
wikisource.org works. As
the main languages have been moved to subdomains, the remaining texts
that remain on
ws.org belong in languages that are understood by very
few people.
This makes it nearly impossible for
ws.org admins to know what these
texts are about, and whether the texts being added actually are
acceptable for wikisource. Sometimes we do not even know in which
language these texts are written.
I believe admins should not be clueless about the texts they manage.
The reason why we did not create subdomains for all languages is that
'small languages' do not have a large enough community to maintain them.
We did not want to have dead wikis, where things go unwatched.
However, the current situation is that these 'small languages' are not
properly maintained; it is impossible for admins who do not understand a
language to know if texts are vandalized, or if they fullfill the
requirements of Wikisource. Thus the goal is not reached.
My point of view is that we should try to move all texts currently on
ws.org to subdomains, based on language similarity and expertise. Texts
should be hosted where the competent admins are. For example, texts
written in Low German (Plattdüütsch) should be hosted on nl.wikisource,
because the admins of that subdomain are the more likely to understand
these texts. And so on.
Of course,
ws.org should maintain a list of languages, pointing to the
right subdomain.
Thomas