The problem is, "most of the world" - especially the most of the world
without computers - doesn't speak English.
For that matter, in the computerless world, even languages such as
German and French and Spanish are relatively rare. We are talking here
about targeting entire continents such as Africa which are best served
by native-language content which we cannot currently provide in any
way shape or form. We have growing Arabic and Afrikaans Wikipedias, a
minimal Swahili Wikipedia, just beginning Wolof, Bambara, Zulu,
Somali, and Amharic Wikipedias, and can already obviously provide
English, French, and Portuguese-language content for those Africans
who can speak these languages fluently.
Most of the other places where the vast majority is computerless speak
primarily languages with small or nonexistant Wikipedias. Take, for
example, Bhutan. How large is the Dzongkha Wikipedia?
Or Khmer. How big is the Khmer Wikipedia?
I just hope we don't send out copies in languages people can't read or
can barely read. That would be linguistic imperialism at its worst,
suggesting to these people that their langauge is not good enough
because we can't provide them material in it. In places like Cambodia
or Bhutan this may not be too harmful because the national language is
the source of a lot of national pride, but elsewhere (African nations,
Native America, aboriginal Australia, autonomous Russia) it could
contribute to the already worrysome trend of rapid decline of minority
languages.
Until now languages of the "have nots" have been largely protected by
the absence of mass media and other technology which usually serves
only to hurt minority languages (although it can help in many cases),
but mass distribution of for example Wikipedia in an LWC could be
devastating to many languages which until now had relatively secure
futures.
This is not to say we should limit access to information to save
languages. However, we should think carefully before mass distribution
of print editions - what language do these people speak best, and can
we provide content in that language? If not, would it be possible to
launch a campaign for the growth of a native-language Wikipedia?
My point is, I would be heartbroken if English copies of Wikipedia
print editions are handed out in schools on Hopi, or the school in
Havasupai, or schools in the Tohono O'odham Nation or the Navajo
Nation or the Gaeltachta.
Mark
On Tue, 22 Feb 2005 21:09:25 +1100, David Gerard
<fun(a)thingy.apana.org.au> wrote:
[crossposted to wikipedia-l, wikien-l, wikitech-l]
Daniel Mayer (maveric149(a)yahoo.com) [050222 20:25]:
"A small price to pay for a project like
this. But get a move on with all those
ambitious plans for paper versions. Most of the world doesn't have computers."
by Anonymous
The closest we appear to have to an active plan for this is ... mine!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:David_Gerard/1.0
This relies on rating code (so as to let the Wiki do the work - editorial
committees don't scale, editors with opinions will).
Jimbo's idea - which passes the "simple brilliant elegance" test - is to
set up ratings on a large Wikipedia (e.g. en:!) and just gather data for a
month or whatever. Then release the data for everyone to look at and make
sense of.
This relies on someone who knows PHP writing rating code, or better yet
beating Magnus Manske's existing rating code into production quality ...
I could install MediaWiki at home (it runs on FreeBSD, right?) and hack on
it here. And, ahahaha, learn PHP, of which I know not a jot or tittle. And
I haven't written anything longer than a quickie shell script since 1993.
"Rusty" isn't in it.
So if SOMEONE ELSE who is interested and KNOWS PHP could come forward, that
would be *really good*!
- d.
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