[Foundation-l] English Wikipedia ethnocentric policy affects other communities

[Gerard Meijssen]

Hoi,
Gregory you have not insulted me, you have upset me. The first would 
prevent cooperation, the second does not.
There are two distinct things to consider. Functionality and time.
With the software that prevents mixed script user names, a large part of 
the problem has been resolved. Anthere made a good suggestion in that 
when we get SUL we can provide some metrics about a user for instance an 
indicator for bureaucrat / admin / steward some metrics of positive 
edits. These metrics would punish POV pushers and talk page warriors.
At this moment we sadly do not have SUL, so it is not easily possible to 
verify that a user is indeed that user of that other project.

As to the seriousness of the problem, consider what Aphaia said about 
this and how pained she is as a result. You call yourself a monoglot, 
the problem is that you only see what you have learned to see. The 
problem of languages other than some 100 of the more economically 
important is that  they are not supported on the Internet. The majority 
of these are in Latin. The wish to make the Internet accessible in other 
scripts than Latin is another big battle field. Neil says that our 
problems are a picknick compared to this. When you consider that the 
tools that create the Internet and other computer generated content do 
not really support the use of languages as only 15% of the web content 
has a language code and much of it is not correct according to the 
Standards.

With SUL things will be different in the WMF, this is when it will be 
possible to find where a user is active, this is when Anthere's proposal 
can be implemented. Let us hope that Brion will be able to finish this soon.

So yes, let us work together but do not deny that the problem is 
serious, it is very much outside of your terms of reference.
Thanks,
     GerardM

Gregory Maxwell schreef:
> On 12/22/06, Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen at gmail.com> wrote:
>   
>> Hoi,
>> Some people congratulated me with the outcome of this affair. My
>> reaction was that it did not feel like a victory because I feel bruised
>> by the experience. Having said this, your suggestion that there has been
>> no substantiation about the grievance that was put forward is seriously
>> wrong. The notion that it is up to you to revert this change continues
>> to make this affair even more painful. Simply reverting this change and
>> thereby denying that many of the reasons why this policy was put in
>> place is seriously wrong.
>>
>> I have to say I am increasingly upset by this affair.
>>     
>
> Gerard, I don't mean to insult you. I agree that we need to improve
> our behavior.
>
> It's not at all clear to me that the enwiki community supports a
> complete removal of that text... in fact, quite the opposite: A
> recommendation against non-locally-readable question seems as well
> supported as it ever was from the on wiki discussion. That some people
> mostly outside the enwiki editing community have been especially loud
> about the matter does not by itself justify the complete removal.
>
> I have provided a list of all accounts that have been blocked that
> have non-ascii characters. It is clear from even the most cursory
> glance that the majority of these were created not by speakers of
> other languages but as attempts to be cute or harmful.
>
> After reading these painful threads and factoring in the above data, I
> can only conclude that the view that enwikis policy was created as a
> result of "ethnocentricism" rather than because such usernames are
> widely used for vandalism and due to the inconvenience they present,
> has yet to be supported by anything concrete.
>
> This doesn't mean that I am dismissing your position: I share the view
> that an improvement should be made, I do not share the your position
> on the level or seriousness of the problem not your ease of dismissing
> the real troubles that unprouncable/untypable names present to
> shameful monoglots like myself.
>
> Can we stop fighting against each other and instead work with each other?