Portals, flags, chaos

Wiki system message commons?

com

10 Jan 2005 10 Jan '05

5:41 p.m.

A global portal is a fine idea; has been for many moons. But why in the world did this change happen with such little notice? I've been largely offline for the past week, and didn't see the initial conversation; afaict the idea of a portal seems to have gone from suggestion on wikipedia-l to reality in the span of a day, without notice on the en wikipedia. It was not at all urgent, and the sudden change breaks the usability of existing links and shortcuts [though I'd heard a portal was being set up, this is how I found out just now that the portal is still English-centric, hard to navigate, and slow to load]. I wish everyone had waited to implement this until the portal were more usable and better announced, and redirection policy better discussed. But perhaps noone else noticed... +sj+ (For instance, I think anyone coming form a US or UK IP with browser-lang set to English should still get redirected to the en: main page, perhaps with a visible line atop the current page-layout with links to the portal and a language dropdown... this will help a vast # of visitors who hit [www.]wikipedia.org)

Show replies by date

10 Jan 10 Jan

5:50 p.m.

On Mon, 10 Jan 2005 12:41:38 -0500, Sj <2.718281828(a)gmail.com> wrote:

...

I've been largely offline for the past week, and didn't see the initial conversation; afaict the idea of a portal seems to have gone from suggestion on wikipedia-l to reality in the span of a day, without notice on the en wikipedia.

I singled out the en: wikipedia because anyone using URL shortcuts, or posting links to "wikipedia.org" and expecting them to get to the en: main page, would have -- until last week -- intended to direct readers to en. -- +sj+

Paweł 'Ausir' Dembowski

6:14 p.m.

S> I singled out the en: wikipedia because anyone using URL shortcuts, or S> posting links to "wikipedia.org" and expecting them to get to the en: S> main page, would have -- until last week -- intended to direct readers S> to en. And that's why I think they should *not* be redirected automatically. This portal makes people more aware of the existance of other language Wikipedias. -- Ausir Wikipedia, wolna encyklopedia http://pl.wikipedia.org

Pete/Pcb21

8:28 p.m.

Paweł 'Ausir' Dembowski wrote:

...

This portal makes people more aware of the existance of other language Wikipedias.

Playing devil's advocate a little, but why should I care, really, that there is a Japanese Wikipedia. There are Japanese amazons and googles too, but they are not forced down my throat. Pete p.s. here "I" means a "casual reader of English encyclopedias"

Paweł 'Ausir' Dembowski

8:28 p.m.

PP> Playing devil's advocate a little, but why should I care, really, that PP> there is a Japanese Wikipedia. There are Japanese amazons and googles PP> too, but they are not forced down my throat. PP> Pete PP> p.s. here "I" means a "casual reader of English encyclopedias" Then use the correct address for English Wikipedia, which is en.wikipedia.org. -- Ausir Wikipedia, wolna encyklopedia http://pl.wikipedia.org

Pete/Pcb21

8:40 p.m.

Paweł 'Ausir' Dembowski wrote:

...

Like I'm forced to use www.amazon.co.us to avoid amazon's portal?

Delirium

11:55 p.m.

Paweł 'Ausir' Dembowski wrote:

...

Then use the correct address for English Wikipedia, which is en.wikipedia.org.

Well, since the "correct" address keeps changing, from www.wikipedia.com to www.wikipedia.org to en.wikipedia.org (and on occasion including en2.wikipedia.org for good measure), one might forgive the casual reader for being a bit confused... -Mark

Till Westermayer

9:03 p.m.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . till we *) . . . Hi Pete/Pcb21, maybe here you (the casual English encylopedias readers) are the minority. It benefits everyone else. Till

...

Pawe| 'Ausir' Dembowski wrote:

...

> This portal makes people more aware of the existance of other > language Wikipedias.

...

Playing devil's advocate a little, but why should I care, really, that there is a Japanese Wikipedia. There are Japanese amazons and googles too, but they are not forced down my throat.

...

Pete

...

p.s. here "I" means a "casual reader of English encyclopedias"

...

_______________________________________________ Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l(a)Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l

__ . / / / / ... Till Westermayer - till we *) . . . mailto:till@tillwe.de . www.westermayer.de/till/ . icq 320393072 . Hirschstraße 5. 79100 Freiburg . 0761 55697152 . 0160 96619179 . . . . .

Pete/Pcb21

9:56 p.m.

Till Westermayer wrote:

...

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . till we *) . . . Hi Pete/Pcb21, maybe here you (the casual English encylopedias readers) are the minority. It benefits everyone else. Till

But why would a French-speaker want to read the Japanese Wikipedia either? www.wikipedia.org ends up as not particularly useful to anyone, and hard to make non-ugly. Thus not much of a benefit, and we have to weigh against the "broken" links to www.wikipedia.org that have built up over the years.

Paweł 'Ausir' Dembowski

9:55 p.m.

PP> www.wikipedia.org ends up as not particularly useful to anyone, and hard PP> to make non-ugly. Thus not much of a benefit, and we have to weigh PP> against the "broken" links to www.wikipedia.org that have built up over PP> the years. Unlike Amazon, other languages are not just foreign divisions of the American company, but Wikipedia is an attempt at making a real multilanguage encyclopedia. Are you saying that Wikipedia should be US-centric? -- Ausir Wikipedia, wolna encyklopedia http://pl.wikipedia.org

Pete/Pcb21

10:23 p.m.

...

Wikipedia is an attempt at making a real multilanguage encyclopedia.

I agree this. I do think though that getting from that point to "we must have www.wikipedia.org in N languages with virtually no content" is a leap of faith more than a leap of logic.

Stan Shebs

11:29 p.m.

Pete/Pcb21 wrote:

...

Wikipedia is an attempt at making a real multilanguage

encyclopedia.

I agree this. I do think though that getting from that point to "we must have www.wikipedia.org in N languages with virtually no content" is a leap of faith more than a leap of logic.

One could take it as a "marketing opportunity" - think of Apple's OS X install process, which also has the delicate task of getting the user's language without causing confusion, rage, or worst of all, a support call. :-) It starts off with snappy music and flashy graphics, with floating "Welcome" signs in different languages, then goes to a plain text menu saying something "use XXX as the main language" written in each language, with English at the top. (No flags, BTW.) While a WP portal doesn't necessarily need music and animations, a graphically-attractive portal should be able to get people more excited about WP, while at the same time unobtrusively directing them to the language of choice. As several people have observed, most users should only ever see the portal once, so it's much more about first impressions than daily use. As an example of positive spin, I think even a parochial English speaker would appreciate an encyclopedia whose material on Mexico or Greece has been worked on and crosschecked by bilingual natives of those places. (Yes, I know that argument has all kinds of holes, but marketing is as much about emotional response as logic.) Another idea is to illustrate the portal with a collage built from our featured pictures, particularly ones evoking different parts of the globe. People are then choosing preferred language while feeling, for a moment anyway, like citizens of the world. Stan

Stephen Forrest

10:39 p.m.

On Mon, 10 Jan 2005 22:55:35 +0100, Paweł 'Ausir' Dembowski <fallout(a)lexx.eu.org> wrote:

...

Wikipedia ought not be US-centric, or English-centric. In the short term, however, it benefits Wikipedia to be useful to people who wish to use it, and I would suspect there are still more of these interested in en: than any other language. There will be considerable numbers of casual readers who will be deterred by having to make any choice on language, however trivial. At the very least, the current portal could be changed to say "Select your preferred language" or some such thing. I suspect there are many English speakers who would not even recognize the list currently on www.wikipedia.org as a list of languages. People who have no exposure to languages beyond their own can have a very low tolerance for reading foreign words before flinging up their hands in exasperation. (Even here in Canada, an English-speaking country that is more bilingual than most, I have known people who have become confused, irritated, or even enraged at hearing "for English, press one" on voicemail systems.) For a larger solution: I suggest we seriously consider the idea of auto-forwarding based on some combination of user location or browser language settings. Of course, a user must be able to override this. Steve

Walter Vermeir

11 Jan 11 Jan

12:14 a.m.

[cut]

...

interested in en: than any other language. There will be considerable numbers of casual readers who will be deterred by having to make any choice on language, however trivial. At the very least, the current portal could be changed to say "Select your preferred language" or some such thing. I suspect there are many English speakers who would not even recognize the list currently on www.wikipedia.org as a list of languages. People who have no exposure to languages beyond their own can have a very low tolerance for reading foreign words before flinging up their hands in exasperation. (Even here in Canada, an English-speaking country that is more bilingual than most, I have known people who have become confused, irritated, or even enraged at hearing "for English, press one" on voicemail systems.)

Do you think that that type of people know how to use a encyclopedia or even know what a encyclopedia is? I am sorry to say but someone who does not know what to do when he gets a list of languages on the main page of a website does not belong before a computer but before a TV. -- [[w:nl:gebruiker:walter]]

Rowan Collins

10 Jan 10 Jan

10:49 p.m.

On Mon, 10 Jan 2005 22:55:35 +0100, Paweł 'Ausir' Dembowski <fallout(a)lexx.eu.org> wrote:

...

Unlike Amazon, other languages are not just foreign divisions of the American company, but Wikipedia is an attempt at making a real multilanguage encyclopedia. Are you saying that Wikipedia should be US-centric?

This is a good point - sitting here in the UK, I frequently forget that amazon.com will take me to the *US* site; perhaps if I was in Germany, it would try harder, but Nicholas Knight suggests this kind of thing isn't very reliable. I notice Google.com now redirects to Google.co.uk, which is nice, so maybe it *is* possible, but Google have a hell of a lot of resources to throw at this kind of thing, and yet have taken years to get that working. I remember seeing references to them doing this for Canada long ago, and wondering why the same trick couldn't be used for the UK; I believe they do it by IP address of something. Which means, of course, that it wouldn't be much good for a strictly *language*-based, rather than *geographic* test, which is what Wikipedia.com needs... -- Rowan Collins BSc [IMSoP]

Till Westermayer

10:19 p.m.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . till we *) . . . Hi Pete/Pcb21,

...

But why would a French-speaker want to read the Japanese Wikipedia either?

S/he would learn to enter fr.wikipedia.org the next time (or maybe even www.wikipedia.fr, if that exists). But if the French-speaker is actually a German exchange student wanting to learn Japanese it would be helpful to see the possibility. Also it makes wikipedia look like a truly international project, which is a good thing, I'd say.

...

www.wikipedia.org ends up as not particularly useful to anyone, and hard to make non-ugly.

I like the new proposal (without flags, but with a short intro text).

...

Thus not much of a benefit, and we have to weigh against the "broken" links to www.wikipedia.org that have built up over the years.

They are not broken. As it was said repeatly, www.wikipedia.org/ Something still links to en.wikipedia.org/Something, and the mere extra click necessary to go to "English" doesn't count as a broken link in my eyes. (Maybe we should add a <ugly> pop-up box explaining all English users that there are other languages, indeed; and that they should bookmark en.wikipedia.org (or go to www.wikipedia.us) if they don't want to see them.</ugly>). Till __ . / / / / ... Till Westermayer - till we *) . . . mailto:till@tillwe.de . www.westermayer.de/till/ . icq 320393072 . Hirschstraße 5. 79100 Freiburg . 0761 55697152 . 0160 96619179 . . . . .

Christopher Mahan

10:55 p.m.

--- Pete/Pcb21 <pete_pcb21_wpmail(a)pcbartlett.com> wrote:

...

But why would a French-speaker want to read the Japanese Wikipedia either?

Maybe, maybe not. It's for them to decide.

...

www.wikipedia.org ends up as not particularly useful to anyone, and hard to make non-ugly. Thus not much of a benefit, and we have to weigh against the "broken" links to www.wikipedia.org that have built up over the years.

How about a beautiful png world map with language zones rather than countries. Then, drill down to regions, then drill-down to areas. I bet it could be made really cool. Otherwise, I say just a list of languages, in their language, with, AT THE TOP, the browser's default language. Also, a "Keep this selection as a cookie on my computer" checkbox. ===== Chris Mahan 818.943.1850 cell chris_mahan(a)yahoo.com chris.mahan(a)gmail.com http://www.christophermahan.com/ __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - Helps protect you from nasty viruses. http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail

Stephen Forrest

11:07 p.m.

On Mon, 10 Jan 2005 14:55:19 -0800 (PST), Christopher Mahan <chris_mahan(a)yahoo.com> wrote:

...

How about a beautiful png world map with language zones rather than countries. Then, drill down to regions, then drill-down to areas. I bet it could be made really cool.

Such a thing would be nice, but it's important also to realize that other interfaces would also be necessary: we have wikipedias in extinct languages (Anglo-Saxon, Gothic) or languages which are important but have a very small geographical range at present (Latin). Steve

7082

days inactive

7083

days old

wikipedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org

Manage subscription

17 comments

10 participants

tags (0)

participants (10)

Christopher Mahan
Delirium
Paweł 'Ausir' Dembowski
Pete/Pcb21
Rowan Collins
Sj
Stan Shebs
Stephen Forrest
Till Westermayer
Walter Vermeir