[Wikipedia-l] Re: no: or nb: (again)

[Ulf Lunde]

Here we go again!  :-)

There are several issues here.


One is the question of *discrimination or equality between the variants*
of the Norwegian language.  This has been pointed out by Mark
Williamson earlier in this thread, but seems to be largely overlooked.

On Fri Mar 4 01:30:40 UTC 2005, Lars Alvik said:

 > forexample the www.google.no is on bokmål, you have to 
 > click an extra link to get to the nynorsk version. This is more or less 
 > what i think no: should be, on bokmål but with a well placed link to 
 > nynorsk.

The above remark by Lars Alvik is discriminating and offensive
towards nynorsk users.  Why should it be like that and not
the other way around?   Is bokmål a superior language?

To better explain the offensiveness of such statements of
superiority, I risk a provocative analogy. To say:
  Bokmål is the default Norwegian language, so
  asking for "Norwegian" should give you bokmål,
  but we can put a link to nynorsk there;
is tantamount to saying something like:
  *Men* are the default human beings, so looking up
  "human being" should redirect you to "man", but
  we can have a well placed link to "woman" on that page!

(The Sami languages are a different kind of problem, because
although they are official languages in some regions of Norway,
the Sami languages do not call themselves "Norwegian", and so
probably do not want to claim the name "Norwegian Wikipedia".)

Incidentally, Lars Alvik's description of the Google interface is not true.
The address www.google.no will give you whichever Norwegian variant
you selected on your previous visit.  This is a good model for how the
address no.wikipedia.org can be made to work, too!


A second issue is *which names the inter-wiki links should show*.

To Olve Utne this is a major issue, while who gets to use the
language code "no" is a minor issue.
I see it differently.
In the name of fairness, a wiki which excludes one of the two
official forms of Norwegian, should not be given *exclusive* rights
to the language code for Norwegian.  To display the inter-wiki link
"no" as "norsk (bokmål)" is simply incorrect.

To me, it is as simple as this:
 "no" is "norsk"
 "nb" is "norsk (bokmål)"
 "nn" is "norsk (nynorsk)"
This is how the links are displayed in Wikipedia today, and it
looks good to me.

Olve proposes that we change it to be like this:
 "no" is "norsk (bokmål)"
 "nb" is also "norsk (bokmål)"
 "nn" is "norsk (nynorsk)"
I don't see any reason to make such a change.  In fact, the
case of equality vs. discrimination is a strong argument *against*
such a change.


A third issue is whether or not to *exclude nynorsk Norwegian*
from the current Norwegian Wikipedia at no.wikipedia.org.

That Wikipedia has so far been a mixed Norwegian Wikipedia,
with a user interface in bokmål, but allowing articles in any
written form of the language.  Last year a separate nynorsk
Norwegian Wikipedia appeared at nn.wikipedia.org, so now
there are two completely separate wikipedias which allow
articles written in nynorsk Norwegian.  Since nynorsk now
has its own "home", several people have proposed to disallow
it in the hitherto "Norwegian" Wikipedia, effectively changing
the older Wikipedia into a pure bokmål encyclopedia.

A vote is going on about this right now in
http://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:M%C3%A5lform
If that vote decides to turn that Wikipedia database into an
exclusively bokmål encyclopedia, I say that from that moment on
it loses its exclusive right to the language code "no", and all
links to it should thenceforth use the code "nb".  

If the vote decides to keep the mixture of written forms, that
wikipedia shall of course stay at no.wikipedia.org.  I have tried
to create a separate, pure bokmål wikipedia at nb.wikipedia.org
to achieve symmetry with the nynorsk one at nn.wikipedia.org,
but so far there has been little support for such an addition.


There are also other issues, related to *non-official written forms*
of Norwegian, but I won't go into those here, as I feel those can
wait until the main issues have been resolved once and for all.

Ulf Lunde
(user and appreciator of both Norwegian written forms
and of both Norwegian wikipedias)