[Foundation-l] Please REJECT the latin wikinews project. inmediatly

[John Vandenberg]

On Sat, Jun 21, 2008 at 6:35 PM, Dan Rosenthal <swatjester at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Sat, Jun 21, 2008 at 3:52 AM, John Vandenberg <jayvdb at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> The Latin Wikisource community could and should be a boisterous
>> project, with their own Latin "Wikisource News" discussing sources and
>> topics of interest.  The opportunity to have a vibrant community in
>> the Latin language exists on four wikimedia projects, yet the project
>> namespace of these four projects is a wasteland.  If people who want
>> to work in these languages cant congregate around a project dedicated
>> to the works which make the language still worth studying, I doubt
>> that they are serious practitioners of the language.
>>
>> I think a Wikinews in Latin could work, but I would rather it be
>> rejected until such time as the existing Latin projects have a
>> functioning community, as "admin-grade" contributors and community
>> builders that are proficient in Latin should concentrate on the
>> existing projects.
>>
>> --
>> John Mark Vandenberg
>>
>> __
>>
>
> A project cannot be a boisterous, thriving project, it cannot have the
> opportunity to grow and attract users, if it is never created.

My point was that a community should develop where there is
opportunity for it to develop.  A community that care about Latin is
most likely to spring up around either the sources, or a 'pedia.  This
hasnt happened.  Thus, it is fair to say that one will not magically
appear around a newsy project.  If I am wrong, we will see a host of
current affair blogs appear in Latin to fill the void.

I do not buy into the argument that people might join a new project
but not another existing project in the same language or field.
People decide how to use their free time based on the options
available to them.  The lack of an ideal option will mean they join a
project within the available options; or, they won't.  Of those that
don't, only the most minuscule number would have been significant
contributors anyway.  It is far wiser to force the hand of those who
are proactive enough to get involved in the existing options, and
require they choose between the available options, so that they will
be a part of an existing (growing) community, rather than exerting
their efforts trying to justify their existence in a lonely project.

> Your argument
> doesn't address the fact that even English language projects, such as
> Wikiversity, are not growing with huge leaps and bounds either. English
> Wikiversity had less than 125 edits or so yesterday, around 20 or so which
> were either to Requests for Custodianship (equivalent to RFA) or the
> Custodian noticeboard. The remainder include user talk and userpage edits,
> new user creation logs, and other such stuff. Yet we wouldn't consider
> closing the english wikiversity, or denying its inclusion if it were not yet
> formed.

That is a bloody ridiculous comparison, and makes me suspect you have
not strayed far from the English Wikipedia, nor have you investigated
the Latin projects, using tools like http://stats.wikimedia.org/ .
English Wikiversity was started in mid 2006, and it is doing very well
for a fledgling project.  The Latin Wikipedia looks like it started in
mid 2002, and the other Latin projects were started in late 2004, and
all are doing very poorly.

> Not every project can be Wikipedia.

Not every language can be English.

> Wikinews, of the non-pedia
> projects, has the potential to have a steady number of new edits and growth,
> since it generally doesn't require as much prior knowledge or subject matter
> expertise as the other projects do.

Wikisource requires less skill/proficiency than Wikinews, and
Wikiquote requires even less, as it doesnt have the same foibles with
copyright.  You could go to the Latin Wikisource proofreading page I
linked to previously, and proofread a page, without even knowing
Latin.  The pagescans show you what text is required, and the Latin
alphabet is familiar to us all.  Here is the link again:

http://la.wikisource.org/wiki/Liber:De_assensione_Stoici_quid_senserint.djvu

I am not proficient at Latin, but I infrequently contribute to the
Latin Wikisource project, and promote the project widely.  I could not
in good conscience promote a Latin Wikinews, as I dont know anyone
(nor I could I even imagine someone) who cares about Latin and would
write about current affairs in Latin, but would not prefer to
catalogue and preserve Latin works on Wikisource.

> I notice there are no criticisms of
> latin wikipedia there. It's doing quite well for itself, with a functioning
> community.

The Latin Wikipedia project is doing OK, but the community is barely
functional.  CommonsTicker is the most active user in the project
namespace.

http://la.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Specialis%3ANuper+mutata&namespace=4

The Latin Wikisource project is also doing OK, but they need a lot
more members before they are self-sustaining community.

> If we don't create new projects in those languages, what kind of
> message does it send to the contributors to the already existing projects in
> that language, about the appreciation for their work?

It doesnt send any message, except if they want a Wikinews (which I
sincerely doubt they do), they should first develop a functioning
community in their existing projects available to them.

--
John Mark Vandenberg