[WikiEN-l] Making Wikipedia a multi-cultural encyclopedia

Mon Apr 14 14:05:49 UTC 2003

I think this is a very valuable analysis.

Rotem Dan wrote:
> Imagine I would write: "Rotem Dan was born in Holon, Gush-dan
> municipality" what would you understand by that?

No, but I would likely understand "Rotem Dan was born in [[Holon]],
[[Gush-dan]] municipality." (i.e. with potentially mysterious terms
linked)

Similarly, we could either write "Michael Jackson was born in [[Gary,
Indiana|Gary]], [[Indiana]]."  Or we could also add [[USA]] on there.
I think both are fine.

> (a bit extreme) example: taken from "Reverse Osmosis":
> The article starts like this:
> "Membrane separation technology in the application for water supply
> augmentation has been well recognised and is getting an important role
> in water treatment. The family of membrane processes is now very
> diverse. They are generally classified as microfiltration (MF),
> ultrafiltration (UF), ..."
> 
> This is perfect gibberish to anyone not knowledgeable (or even expert!)
> in the field. I've noticed most computer-related and social/exact
> science articles are suffering from some degrees of it.

I agree with this critique of some articles!

> There are many more types of "Cultural Biases" which are not listed.
> However, I am by no means whishing to make Wikipedia more "Politically
> correct", I understand that most writers on e-Wikipedia are from English
> speaking countries and western cultures (USA and UK especially),  this
> should be changed. Until then, please be sensitive in what you write.

Yes, I understand what you are saying, and I think it's all good.

--Jimbo