[Foundation-l] Supporting languages is supporting people

[GerardM]

Hoi,
As long as people communicate in a language it is a living language. When
people stop using a language, it dies. This has little to do with the number
of people involved; a language spoken by 7000 people in Papua New Guinea may
be as vibrant as ever when there is little communication with an outside
world. What makes a dying language is something you only realise when you
compare census figures. When a language that is not doing well, when it
finds new champions, the language may undergo a revival. To me this is
completely legitimate as it proves that the language is not dead; there are
people that care to communicate in their language.

In the Wikimedia Foundation we are careful when introducing new languages.
There are good reasons for it. We want a project to be a success and we
insist on a good user experience so a localised user interface is a must. We
attempt to check if the language is indeed the language that is advertised.
We are looking for a small group of people that is big enough to make it
likely that we will have a community. There are several hoops to jump
through before a new language gets its own project.

What is problematic is when people look at these "other" languages and imply
that having these other languages as well is ok as long as they do not
interfere with what they consider "primary" languages. This means that these
languages should politely stay in the background and not need investments
because they prevent what is considered "primary". The problem is very much
in how this attitude is perceived. It may be that good faith should be
assumed, but given how barbed the exchanges can be and given how much the
perspectives differ it is hard if not impossible to reconcile differences
with those that are of the opinion that we should ensure that we provide the
infrastructure for all languagea that can qualify as a WMF language.

It is said that we are not in the business of supporting languages. The fact
of the matter is that we support every language that qualifies for a
Wikipedia. Effectively we support the languages the most that are read the
most. So we do a sublime job on our biggest projects. It is assumed that the
smaller projects should develop like the big projects did. The situation is
often not comparable. It is assumed that all languages are equal and are
able to make use of our MediaWiki software. Sadly this is not the case.
Sadly it takes effort and investments to get necessary glyphs in Unicode.
Sadly it means that assumptions about languages, true for the "primary"
languages, are not true for all languages. Sadly it means that business is
not as usual and as this upsets the status quo people get upset.

The Wikimedia Foundation aims to provide information to all people. The last
two years at Wikimania we have been told that we are really going to make an
effort in Africa. We have been told that our organisation is getting
organised and is at the threshold where we can request for the funding of
projects and manage these projects as well. With this promise to support
these other people and their other languages with the promise that we will
be able to work on projects and aim for some longer term goals we can reach
out to these other people and give them the opportunity and the channel to
share their knowledge with us. In this way they may become one with us.

We have to adapt and allow for change. We have to adapt and change what
prevents others to share their knowledge with us. We cannot change
everything but there is so much that we can do. Within the Wikimedia
Foundation we are a multitude. We do not all share the same ideals. That is
fine. What I ask for is that those that care for the less resourced
languages are "allowed" to actively do what is needed to support more people
to share their knowledge by enabling them to be heard, to be read.

Thank you,
   GerardM