[Foundation-l] A simple question on languages.

[Aphaia]

On Jan 25, 2008 7:16 AM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 24/01/2008, cohesion <cohesion at sleepyhead.org> wrote:
> > On Jan 24, 2008 2:46 PM, Nathan <nawrich at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > I don't think its useful to look at limiting languages in terms of
> > > 'resources' available for providing Wikimedia projects. As Aphaia and
> > > Gerard point out, what we're dealing with is volunteer resources -
> > > which cost the Foundation nothing and can't be required or redirected
> > > in any case.

> > I don't know if that's entirely true. I mean, it's nice if volunteers
> > can translate everything. But it's certainly conceivable that the
> > Foundation might want to issue press releases or statements or
> > something in these N languages regardless of volunteer support, even
> > if that means paying for an occasional translation.
> >
> > The answer to this question would conceivably be very useful, I don't
> > see any reason to discourage people from finding it.

I basically agree with Nathan if we talk on volunteer resources only
it would be pointless, so now I think it reasonable for us to proceed;
is there any need to spend money and hire even occasional translators
for a specific need? I think this question should be considered
seriosly in the light Cohesion cast, like press releases or any other
official communications from the WMF to particular language speaking
commnity.

> If the WMF wants to translate things, the number of languages would be
> much smaller than the numbers we're talking about. I can see the WMF
> paying for translations into major languages, or languages used by
> people directly affected by what the press release is about, but
> translating into even just dozens of languages would be prohibitively
> expensive.

Yes.
And as Danny mentioned properly, we need to consider how monolingual
communities can be reached. Then we would find a big Wikimedia
language community but monolingual and in a weak tie with the rest of
the project or the information from WMF is not fully effectively
addressed to their society in general, and in my opinion specially in
case WMF expect a potential revenue from business in that language
society (selling live feed, deal on logos etc). Then the first
question of Greg makes a sense and cast another light I think: how
many languages we need to access the vast majority - either the whole
of this globe, thus the potential readership or our current
readership.

Here the mere stats about native language speakers or the size of
project doesn't make a sense. We need a stats of literal communication
ability including L2. An interesting example is the Arabic language
case I guess ... there we may find a large community but good at
another more influential language(s).  Arabic people have a large
population, but for Wikimania 2008 Mido said to me English would be
the first and only working language for the whole team  --- including
the local team: typing Arabic he said (and if I don't misunderstand)
was annoying even for native speakers and "slower" than English and
because of diverse Arabic dialects English sometimes was used as
lingua franca among the Arab(!), at least in the Middle East, so
although I convince Arabic language is an invaluable addition to the
press release set and whatsoever, I am inclining not to think it a
part of necessary language kit unless we are under a pressing need to
involve many Arabic speakers.

If you know a reliable and latest stats about language competency
including the 2nd language, please let us share it! While I disagree
on that they are "required", it is definitely what Transcom wants to
refer for determining their priority. It has been my long time
headache to think  who should I contact at first when we lack German,
Polish and Japanese for a certain document.

-- 
KIZU Naoko
http://d.hatena.ne.jp/Britty (in Japanese)
Quote of the Day (English): http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/WQ:QOTD