[Wikipedia-l] Re: www portal: "The Free Encyclopedia" in Japanese?

Sun Jan 9 15:56:48 UTC 2005

Anthere (anthere9 at yahoo.com) [050109 18:05]:
> Mark Williamson a écrit:

> >One prediction I have is that somebody will suggest adding flags to
> >make it easier to choose languages. This is a BAD idea because there
> >are speakers of French in Japan, speakers of Thai in Malta, speakers
> >of Catalan in Greece, etc; also some languages are indigenous to more
> >than one country, or they don't have a corresponding flag (for
> >diaspora languages such as Yiddish and Ladino), or it's not
> >recognizable to most speakers of the language.

> Not a prediction. It was already done. And reverted.
> Opinions ?

I dislike the flag idea, because it's supposed to be languages, not
countries. (Bosian, Croation and Srpski having separate wikis
notwithstanding.)

Furthermore, you just *know* some idiot will change the UK flag to a US
flag. Then another will revert it. Then someone will put both on. Then
someone else will object to a language having *two* flags. Then soeone else
will use that horrible split US/UK flag I've seen on some multilingual
portals. Then someone will protect the page. I suspect flags will provide
too much material for idiocy.

- d.