[Foundation-l] Projects in simple languages

[Milos Rancic]

After a month of on-list talk -- sometimes very heated, sometimes very
quiet -- Language committee has agreed about the next wording of the
part of the new policy [1] related to the simple languages:

* Can there be wikis in "simple" languages?
*: Yes, in principle. But two special criteria would need to be met: the
language should be a "world language" with many L2 users, and there must
be a reliable, published specification of the controlled language to be
used. Examples are [[w:en:Basic English|Basic English]] and
[[w:fr:Français fondamental|Français fondamental]]. (In reality it does
not appear that there ''are'' many controlled languages other then
English and French.)

In practice, it means that:
* It is likely that just Wikipedia in simple French would be approved.
If there are reliable and published specifications of other world
languages (Russian, Spanish, Arabic etc.), group interested in creating
project in simple language has to present it to the LangCom.
* It is likely that border cases would be discussed in Language
committee on case-by-case basis. For example, German is not a world
language, but at least discussion would be opened if strong arguments
would be given, including widely accepted definition of simple language.
* It is not a matter of LangCom would any Wikipedia (or any other
Wikimedia project) host project in corresponding simple language inside
of a separate namespace -- with or without specification.