[Wikipedia-l] Entries for deletion.... issues from the Third World

[J.L.W.S. The Special One]

While working on articles about Singaporean movies, I've encountered a
similar problem: difficulty finding references due to systemic bias.

Some seem to have the impression that Singaporean = non-notable. I've
seen articles on many Singaporean topics, which no Singaporean would
contest the notability of, get nominated for deletion, under the claim
of non-notability.

That Wikipedia suffers from systemic bias is not surprising.

On 1/8/07, Frederick Noronha <fred at bytesforall.org> wrote:
> Hi all, Thank you all for your patience. I'm not being difficult here,
> but just feel I need to explain how things work in this part of the
> globe.... not always logically!
>
> Okay, I'm as Indian as they come... my unusual name is because I'm
> from Goa, the former Portuguese colony.
>
> My wager is that en.wikipedia.org would be far, far more
> representative of India than, say hi.wikipedia.org Sad but true. And
> there are reasons for that.
>
> Have you seen the way Indians interact with themselves? If meeting
> outside the North Indian belt, there's a good chance they  (we?) would
> be taking to each other in English. There are just so much diversity
> here, that like it or not, English often serves as a link language.
>
> Added to this, many of the Wikipedia contributors would be
> college/university-educated types, often more comfortable to express
> ideas in English than, say, in an Indian language. I've made hundreds
> of edits in English
> [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Fredericknoronha]
> but am litterally struggling to get a Konkani Wikipedia going (Konkani
> is India's smallest "national" languages, with between 1.5 to 5
> million speakers, depending whose estimates one accepts).
>
> On 08/01/07, Roberto Alfonso <rpgrca at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Hi there,
> >
> > Personally, I prefer to prod articles with notability asserted but no way
> > to verify that. In these "cases", I also check if the Wikipedia in the
> > language related to the article (in this case, hi.wikipedia.org) has an
> > entry about this topic.
> >
> > I haven't, but maybe I should suggest creating an article in the user's
> > native language. In the same way as a Google test fails, an AFD may also
> > fail due the inability of users to check the claims.
> >
> > Oh, once I even posted a note at WikiProject India to get some feedback
> > about Mair Rajputs :-)
> >
> > Roberto / ReyBrujo
> >
> > On 1/7/07, Frederick Noronha <fred at bytesforall.org> wrote:
> > > Hi all, I'm from India, a contributor to the Wikipedia. In recent
> > > times, the 'mortality' of new Wikipedia entries seems to be higher
> > > than usual. While one can understand the need for abundant caution,
> > > it's also important to allow for a diversity of concerns and issues in
> > > this space.
> > >
> > > Should we presume that because an initiative is not very visible in
> > > cyberspace (okay, we are under-digitised societies!) that it is not
> > > prominent or noteworthy? See as one example:
> > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikalp This is a campaign against
> > > censorship of documentary film in India, one which has the
> > > participation of about 250 documentary film-makers.
> > >
> > > There must be some way out. Your suggestions would be welcome. FN
> > > --
> > > FN M: 0091 9822122436 P: +91-832-240-9490 (after 1300IST please)
> > > http://fn.goa-india.org  http://fredericknoronha.wordpress.com
> > > http://www.goa-india.org http://feeds.goa-india.org/index.php
>
> --
> FN M: 0091 9822122436 P: +91-832-240-9490 (after 1300IST please)
> http://fn.goa-india.org  http://fredericknoronha.wordpress.com
>
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-- 
Written with passion,
J.L.W.S. The Special One