[Foundation-l] new language policy

Mon Nov 21 18:06:49 UTC 2005

On 11/21/05, Anthere <Anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> Hi
>
> I was asked yesterday if it was mandatory that during votes for new
> languages creation, the editor
> * has an account on meta
> * has an account on any already existing project
>
> I do not know what the current policy is.
> I am hesitant to be in favor of one or another.
> I would rather say the voter should be at least a participant to another
> language, because this would imply he at least know the concept.
> However, I am not sure this should be mandatory... except that....
>
> Someone raised a complaint about the current vote here :
>
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages#Murcian_.28Murciano.29_.2825_support.3B_12_oppose.29
>
> On this new languages, we have
> * anon ips voting
> * accounts on meta with no edits voting
> * accounts on meta with just a user page on meta voting
> * accounts on other projects voting.
>
> Fact is, I made a bunch of quick semi-random checks (in short, on red
> meta accounts in particular), and admittedly, many of them are probably
> sharing the same living-room...
>
> I fear the editor who complained is probably right in mentionning sock
> puppetry... though we can not entirely prove it of course.
> Which raise the question of how fair is a vote on a controversial
> language, when half voters are not current participants and may not even
> be different poeple ?
>
>
> What should we do ?
>
> Ant

Hoi,
When you read many of the nay-sayers, you can read in many of their remarks
that this many of these language problems are really political. Not only is
it denied that many of these languages are languages, it is also suggested
that people who ask for some recognition are extremists that should make do
with the one and only language that suffices for all.

When you know about these languages, I often wonder what a good reason is
for supporting a language. One of the languages that is voted down because
it 'does not exist' is Stellingwerfs. Stellingwerfs has a very active
language community; a dictionary has been published the bible is being
translated into Stellingwerfs and now there are these people who think it
does not need its own wikipedia. Now Stellingwerfs is not as politicial as
the Spanish languages. Then again take an other infamous example; the nds-nl
is denied because people consider that it should be part of the nds-de. What
people do not mention is that the nds-de has a vocal community that insists
on an orthography that is German oriented. This is a great example of a
language where there is NO standard orthography. The same can be said for
Limburgs, there is something of a 'standard' orthography but it does not
match the language that is actually spoken. The Limburg wikipedia is alive
and well. It gets mentioned in the press I am really happy with it. However
if a good example needs to be found of a WIkipedia that also does not have a
'standardised' spelling have a look at Neapolitan or Sicilian. The Napolitan
WIkipedia for instance has already more than 3000 articles.. the amount of
local involvement is great. It is there because local people are
entheausiastic about this project.

From my perspective I do not mind to have many wikipedias. I do want
wikipedias by local people who are interested in doing this. I would welcome
many projects. We will see what works and what does not. If people who start
a project steal a page out of the Neapolitan book we will do exceedingly
well. The argument that we do not need to revive languages is problematic in
my opinion. The problem is that WE do not revive these languages, it is the
people wo are the community of this wikipedia who do that. When they do well
they will become us as well. My point is, do we want to be inclusionist or
do we want to exclusionists. There is always a reason why we should not do
something. The point is that it is not you who is doing it, it is you who is
denying someone else.

As to anonymous people voting, might it be possible that they are actually
be people speaking that language that say they want to get involved? (assume
good faith) And given all these people who are NOT going to involve
themselve in a language why would they vote against, what is it to them?

Thanks,
GerardM