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

[Frederick Noronha]

I agree... What would be worse is if the "systemic bias" follows the
traditional fault lines, which we have been so concerned about for so
long. After all, the New Media and its bottoms-up approach was meant
to make things "different". That's why we have so much faith in it,
and would like to invest our volunteer efforts here. Maybe, it is time
we recognised this problem and began to deal with it: how do
initiatives like the Wikipedia deal with non-English, non-visible,
largely non-digitised and oral societies (which have wealth of their
own, but not in a traditionally 'recognisable' sense)? To push a topic
to Wikia just because *we* can't recognise it's worth is unfair to the
topic. We can't also enter the vicious cycle of argument believing
that because-it-isn't-there-it-isn't-prominent (how does it become
'prominent' in the first place, if it is being rejected on these
grounds)?

Yet, there must be *some* way out. Am optimistic... FN

On 08/01/07, J.L.W.S. The Special One <hildanknight at gmail.com> wrote:
> 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.

-- 
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