On Thu, Jun 24, 2010 at 10:08 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dal...@gmail.com> wrote: > On 24 June 2010 15:04, Ziko van Dijk <zvand...@googlemail.com> wrote: >> - Scope and name: Maybe it would practically make no big difference >> whether the project is called "simple" or "for kids". Poor readers and >> adult beginning readers (natives or not) tend to read texts that are >> meant for children anyway. It could make a difference in promoting, >> though. A scope question can also be whether certain kinds of explicit >> images are allowed. > > I strongly disagree. There is a big difference between simple language > and simple concepts. Children need simple concepts (basically, you > can't assume as much prior knowledge because they haven't had time to > learn things that adults consider to be common knowledge). Adults that > are just learning a language need simple language because they haven't > learnt complicated vocabulary yet. >
I would put the accent in this concept most of all because there are not only adults but also students who has an intermediate level of knowledge of a foreign language. The problem of different linguistic "registers" (this is the technical name of the problem) is well known. An article about some legal issues can be easy for a no-technical reader, but can be judged weak for a lawyer. The trend is for a technical and exhaustive language but this will put Wikipedia in the condition to lose his own popular position in the preferences of readers. In Italian Wikipedia, for example, we have had long time ago a project with the aim to create a structure of any article of physics with a section for "easy readers". The project has failed because the most difficult point for a physician is to explain a complicated concept with easy concepts (and not necessary with easy words). In any case my vision is a Wikipedia where there are three buttons for each articles: easy, intermediate, advanced and any person can select their level hiding the unnecessary sections and the technical words. Ilario _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
