[Foundation-l] Reconsidering the policy "one language - one Wikipedia"

[Milos Rancic]

On Fri, Jun 25, 2010 at 9:56 PM, Birgitte SB <birgitte_sb at yahoo.com> wrote:
> I am not asking you to prove anything about this project.  I just want to know where you got the idea that this proposal can be accurately summarized as a " Wikipedia fork with dumb language"  and that the proto-contributors are biased adults with an ideological agenda. I don’t recall ever seeing a link to the actual proposal in this thread and I am wondering where you have read discussion and ideas of these Germans who are interested in contributing to a Medical Encyclopedia for Children.
>
> I can't help but wonder if you have an accurate understanding of what is being proposed. I would like to read their ideas for myself rather than accepting your characterization at face value.
>
> I am only asking for links to the discussion of this proposal.  Not links that prove/disprove the scientific basis of anything.

Actually, it is not about strong claims, but more about aggressive
attitude, which Ziko mentioned. So, yes, I am more aggressive than I
should be. In brief, I am very irritated by something which I see as
amateurish attempt, as well as by parallels with events a month ago.
But, it is true that I should work on being less aggressive in emails.

Two issues formed my position toward the particular project proposal
because of the consequences of such approach:

1. They tried to make "article for children" besides regular article
about some term at German Wikipedia.
2. They asked for Simple German Wikipedia.

Related to the first issue, I've already explained what does mean
"article for children" in previous emails. My position toward such aim
can be summarized in the second sentence of my first email from this
thread [1]. This is aggressive position, but I really think that. I
don't say that those persons are dumb, but that their intention is
dumb, ageist and discriminatory.

I've already asked a number of questions related to making *one*
"article for children". What does mean "children"? What is scientific
basis for their original research? Etc. When someone tries to make
*one* article for all ages of minors, I can just say that such person
is amateur in pedagogical sense.

Related to the second issue, they've clearly shown that their
intention is to make Simple Wikipedia in German. Simple-like projects
can have their own purposes. However, Simple English Wikipedia is
proof that they don't fulfill any of those purposes [which could be
discussed further]. Making such proposal, instead of, for example,
trying to make their own wiki project, says that they are amateurs in
tech sense. Trying to make it on a wiki project says that they are
amateurs in social sense [which could be discussed further]. Trying to
do that on one Wikipedia without reading documentation says that they
are amateurs in full sense.

To conclude about proposers: Starting a project without a clear idea
how the project should be materialized is amateurish. And we don't
need amateurs to stay behind a Wikimedia project which intends to
teach children.

The third issue, which irritated me the most, has been initiation of
talk about Wikimedia project for children in the context of family
friendly Wikipedia. This doesn't have anything with the original
proposers, but with worrying climate inside of the core of
Wikimedians.

It also should be noted that I was talking in general terms: Why
creating a project for children is bad if not well articulated.

[1] - Writing dumb articles because of thinking that children are dumb
is dumb. And not just dumb, but deeply ageist and discriminatory.