[Foundation-l] Fwd: [Commons-l] Making Wikimedia Commons less frightening

[Waerth]

The commons issue is not just a language issua. If it was it was 
solvable. It is a hositility issue. Where people who upload the second 
picture of the same object (like a TukTuk) get told it is not necassary 
because the project already has one picture of a TukTuk ..... The 
problem is that the commoners do not understand that the project was 
started to make things easier for all the other wikimedia projects. 
Instead they have now become a hindrance to the wikimedia projects.

And when you try to upload something locally it is removed and moved to 
commons where it will be removed again ... so a lot of work for nothing. 
Which is exactly why I do not upload any of the 100's of pictures of 
Thai artists that I have taken while performing with them. I can do 
without the hassle. And I am an experiences wikimedian. Can you imagine 
how strangers perceive the aggressive behaviour at commons?

Waerth
> Hoi,
> When people from other projects tell me that this is one of the reasons why
> they do not bother with Commons, I have to disbelieve them? Try to find
> "paard" and you will not be served in the same way as with "horse" the
> search result is inferior. Dutch is not the worst option, try "ίππος"  and
> you find nothing. This is Greek and it also means horse.
>
> It is indeed ridiculous that for people who do not read / write English,
> Commons not a resource that is functional as a resource where you find
> freely lincensed pictures. It is however a fact. Do some studies and ask
> people to find images, people who do not read English. Try it in Arabic,
> Russian, German, Mandarin, French or Dutch. When that does not convince you
> try Neapolitan, Nepali, Bangla, Hindi or Xhosa. Have them search for things
> that are of interest to a seven year old. Things like a horse...
>
> I have had the financing to create a demonstration project that demonstrates
> that this is a problem that can be solved. Our resources were limited so the
> result is not as polished as I would hope for, but it does include the
> category tree translated.
>
> So the bad news is that Commons is unusable for everyone who does not read
> English and the good news is, that it is a solvable problem.
> Thanks,
>       GerardM
>
> 2008/12/9 Brion Vibber <brion at wikimedia.org>
>
>   
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>> Gerard Meijssen wrote:
>>     
>>> Hoi,
>>> Commons provides no benefit except for sharing the same picture to people
>>> who do not read / write English. They cannot possibly find pictures and
>>> consequently for them Commons is useless.
>>>       
>> That's simply ridiculous.
>>
>> Many files, categories, and galleries are labeled in multiple
>> languages... or even not in English at all. :)
>>
>> Certainly it'll be *more useful* as we're able to add more widespread
>> tag/category translations to help automate cross-language search, but
>> the notion that people "cannot possibly find pictures" or that the site
>> is "useless" is ridiculous and undermines the legitimate portion of your
>> position (that it would be good to add more multilingual features to
>> Commons).
>>
>> - -- brion
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