[WikiEN-l] Wikipedia, a world without borders with borders?

[b m]

L.S.

I am a newly registered user, but not new to wikipedia, i registered to
contribute. But i have noticed something that strikes me as quite odd. Being
fluent in both my mothertongue, Dutch, and English, i traverse from one
wikilanguage to another. While doing so i noticed some things. When i
registered in order to be able to edit pages, i read an email by Jimbo Wales
in which he notified everyone that citing references was very important, and
another in which he stated that (negatively) biased writing is to be dealt
with harshly. With this in mind (and seeing that it works well on the
English wikipedia) i went back to Hollandipedia, where i saw a different
picture. For example, search for Einstein on the English wikipedia, and
you'll find a nice long article with (as of now) 55 notes and a long list of
references. Now, for the sake of argument, click on "Nederlands" in the
other language list. It doesn't matter whether you can read it or not, just
scroll down (it's also a long article, right?) to where the references and
notes ought to be. You'll find none. Not one reference or note on an article
about Einstein. How is that possible when keeping in mind what Jimbo has
said?
It is possible because wikipedia has (for lack of a better word) cultural
borders. On the Dutch wikipedia it's more about quantity than about quality.
For such a small language it has a huge amount of articles. The downside is
that i can find a factual error of spelling/grammar mistake in just about
every article. They are hastily compiled and left that way. (however, there
are of course plenty of well written articles by dedicated people who try to
maintain a standard, but they are not the rule in my opinion)
So there's a "quantity over quality" way of doing things on the dutch
wikipedia...i was sure it was unintentional.
It appears though, that the gap between the Dutch and English wikipedia is a
bit wider than that. The Dutch don't have a "citation needed" template, it
was voted off or carried off by the admins, i haven't studied that topic too
intensely. Either way, it was proposed, and it's not here now. So, instead
of being able to flag unreferenced articles with "citation needed" or
something similar, we are supposed to discuss it on the discussion page.
Which is a pain, of course. My question is, how independent are
wikicountries? If Jimbo says something, and the English wikipedia has a
system for something, isn't it odd that the Dutch (or any other language)
doesn't? One can see the result in the Einstein article. Overdoing it is one
thing, but not one single reference? And on the discussion page they talk
about a lot, but not about that. Is it desirable that a connected system
like wikipedia has "autonomous zones" that make their own rules? Or is that
freedom? But what about the basic rules the founder holds so dear? They
don't apply to people who come from somewhere else? I would really like
those questions answered by someone! There are more examples of things not
overlapping when crossing a language barrier, but this struck me most.
Also, as i understood, anyone can be elected to the wiki Board (if they
qualify). So the country does not matter, but still the countries don't all
play by the same rules?

Another strange thing, which has less to do with wikiborders, and more with
real ones, according to Dutch copyright law it is apparently forbidden to
display album covers on the Dutch wikipedia (as stated int he Dutch image
use policy). But the English one shows them just fine. My question is, since
wikipedia is hosted and founded in the US, what does it matter that a
Dutch-language article wants to have an album cover. Is it forbidden just
because the language is different? One click away resides a nice hi-res
album cover on the English wikipedia. I'm confused about the legal framework
on this one.

One last thing!
On the topic of keeping a neutral perspective in any article: If a muslem
writes an article about Muhammad, and he adds "Peace be upon him", which he
is required to do according to his beliefs, can that article still be
(perceived as) neutral? Someone reading it might wonder. Same goes for other
religions and their ritual ways of writing things ("the Messiah", not naming
God by his name, etc), this example is one I actually saw recently. (google
search domain wikipedia.org for "peace be upon him").
If this is not a neutral view however, could someone required by faith to
write that way still write about those topics that require mentioning the
prophet? Especially since a muslem probably has more knowledge about these
things, that would be odd.

I'm sorry if this is too lengthy or not posted to the right forum (forgive
my youthful ignorance), i really do wonder about these things.