[Foundation-l] Re: Officially protesting against GerardM being thecontactperson withregards to kennisnet

Thu Jul 28 12:48:59 UTC 2005

> Ola, cool down both of you.

I am quite calm now - working high voltage conversion faciliteis (don't 
know if the translation in EN is correct ... but I have to keep calm to 
do this kind of work)

>
> We like and respect both of you, and Gerard as well.

I know that :-)

>
> Now, Sabine. As long as a discussion occurs privately, you may not 
> know there was ever private discussion. It is only when such 
> discussions occur publicly that everyone suddenly discovers things 
> (and complain things should be discussed privately first).
>
> Fact is that these discussions have occured privately, then 
> semi-privately on irc.
> Fact is that other people than Waerth have complained about Gerard 
> being often a bit overbearing, but are not willing to say it aloud.
> Fact is it is not only about Kennisnet, but also about the Dutch 
> association.

I know that as well - I read quite a lot, but really don't have time to 
answer publicly - I do this only when it comes to projects where I am 
involved and spent time in them

>
> On the other hand, it is most unfortunately frequent that those being 
> very very bold are also very very criticized by others... for being 
> bold, for going to quickly etc... Some people are bold and quick, but 
> often take no time to listen to others and act in a consensual way. 
> Others are more hesitant, slow, more respectful, but listen more than 
> they act, so do far less.
> We need all types. If only the first bold type, wikipedia would be a 
> battlefield. If only the second type, few things would get done. So it 
> might be good that we have Gerard being bold (and sometimes upsetting 
> people) and Waerth being openly critical of Gerard actions.
>
> The only things that really is important, is that all voices are heard 
> in the end... and currently, as an observer of the past months, I fear 
> it is not so clear that all voices were heard and all opinions taken 
> into account.
>
> Waerth is part of our community, just as is Gerard or you, or other 
> dissenters. I do not think we should say to anyone part of the 
> community  to shut up. Maybe to talk differently, maybe to act 
> differently, but not to shut up.

The thing I don't accept is first throw in a few lines accusing and then 
afterwards telling what it is about.

>
> And in any cases, distress is obvious, I do not think we should 
> dismiss it. And I say this not only because of Waerth email (as usual, 
> very impetuous as Waerth always is), but also because of other voices 
> I have heard (less impetuous, but critical as well).
>
> I have unfortunately no idea what we could do at this point... :-(
> Maybe talking about it publicly if people have the willingness to do 
> so ? (without fear)

See, the thing is, we have been talking about UW, tbx phrases etc. in 
Wiktionary for almost a year now - just some days ago I went back and 
had a look at "when UW" started in our minds, when we started to talk to 
people to share contents and to simplify things - it was the 31st of 
August 2004 - I also wrote in my blog about this.

I wrote quite a lot about UW just like Gerard does - what I know is that 
he asks many even one by one and even outside wiktionary and wikipedia 
about their opinion - where I told him "you will need to stop at a 
certain point" since nothing is perfect he said that things need to be 
as perfect as possible for a good startup and was writing mails and 
talking to I don't know how many people one by one - not only through 
the lists since mails sent to the list often don't seem to be read. It 
also happened to me more than just once.

A translator's community is involved with UW - these people don't have 
the time and are not willing to subscribe to further lists. Me being 
active in UW and for now mainly seen on the Italian wiktionary even if I 
often do things in the background nobody knows of (see the letter to the 
Pope etc. - btw. it seems as if the answere is there :-)) in mainly the 
Italian translator list's and in OmegaT and some other OpenSource 
projects I receive over 500 e-mails a day. So I often must choose and 
often I choose to talk to single people where I know they will give me 
feedback instead of writing to a list where people do not seem to be 
interested. That's all.

Consider this: after mails I wrote about Ultimate Wiktionary where I 
also mentioned with who I am co-operating people that now show interest 
don't even know who is in the project. It doesn't matter if I am 
mentioned or not, otherwise I would make more buzz about that on lists 
(really most Italian translators know that I am the one to talk to about 
that in Italian ... they read my mails and I receive their feedback :-)

When I tell Gerard that I would just go ahead instead of discussing 
points that lead to no-where he instead tells me that those people are 
important for him. He wants to talk to them as even after some 
apparently useless mails there could be an important point to consider 
and to make our work more perfect - all too often he is right. And then 
someone comes and tells things that are completely different even says 
that he makes things in a hidden way or influences an organisation on 
what to answer or not - this is simply not true since all the 
information about the idea of UW (at the beginning these writings are 
about wiktionary - the name UW came about later no) is there - it can be 
found on meta and in discussion lists, in beer parlours and additionally 
to that in many many single e-mails that cost hours and hours to write 
just to have "that one opinion".

I have been working with Gerard for almost a year on that now - and God 
knows how many hours we spent considering every single category that 
could be interested (and often we have very different opinions), asking 
them, finding out how and how not to do things. I am the interface 
mainly to one user group of UW - translators - Gerard cares about most 
of the others.

I would never be aggressive publicly - but what I read was simply too 
much - I am told that I never worked together with Gerard and so I could 
not know what kind of person he is - I did - nearly every day - and I 
know him as a person that knows very well what to do and in particular 
when to do it - he listens carefully to others and considers at the same 
time all the information he already has in mind - that's where decisions 
come out. Then he writes the articles, blogs, mails etc. where he 
presents all the information he gathered and combined - and these are 
the points where to start from. If we re-consider what already has been 
done only since someone did not show up at the beginning, we will never 
reach te goal. Ultimate Wiktionary is a dream for many of us - it has 
been dreamt thousands of times in linguist's and translator's lifes.

Kennisnet: they are among the most important partners for us - they are 
doing what all organisations should do - imagine all schools of the 
world contributing only one article in whatever project a day ... 
normally these contributions of pupils are then reviewed by their 
teachers, so they have a generally good quality. I myself used some 
articles of wikipedia in German lessons - they can be used - the 
difficulty is to choose the right ones. My two pupils that will be back 
in autumn will read many articles this year and study the terminology 
they hopefully will find on wiktionary. We need organisations like 
Kennisnet - they allow teachers to say: let's do similar things ... and 
this brings potential editors and of course many many users. These today 
very young users one day are grown up - and they will take our dream 
pojects to success.

See we are at a turning point - and as always when there's a turning 
point at the beginning there are only some supporters and many critics. 
This really doesn't matter since it is normal. Time is due for changes. 
You can see the "wind of changes" in so many things. And localisation in 
a globalised world is the basics for communication. If it is being 
stopped here, well, it really doesn't matter since then it will be 
someone else to do it. The thing is: it will happen, there's no doubt - 
the question is only: are we going to be part of it or not.

I still underline: taking a private or semi private discussion here in 
such a way is not the appropriate way. There was no reason for an 
aggression like that. There could have been a simple mail that stating 
the situation and the considerations to that.

And now I am going back to the electrical current ... and if in approx. 
half a year's time Sardegna will be without electrical current you will 
know whose fault it is :-)

I'll read the other mails I did not answer up to now hopefully this 
evenings if my two earthquakes allow it.

Ciao, Sabine

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