Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-10-03 Thread Tom Morris 
On Monday, October 3, 2011, Michael Peel wrote:

> I have to admit (from a completely personal viewpoint) that this sounds
> like a reason _not_ to support minority language Wikipedias. I personally
> much prefer the trend towards more people speaking a single language, or set
> of main languages, rather than encouraging more small niches of people
> speaking their own language. The former makes it a lot easier to communicate
> with more people on a global basis and hence gain more knowledge, whereas
> the latter does the complete opposite.
>
> For me, the key points are increasing the availability of knowledge for
> those that only understand that language; increasing the body of knowledge
> that's shared between multiple languages to make it easier to learn a more
> common language; and to preserve information & culture specific to that
> language (which, of course, would ideally also be translated to other
> languages).
>
>
The issue becomes slightly more philosophical: languages *are* a form of
knowledge though. A simple argument: if I know how to express the statement
"Snow is white" in English, I know one thing. If I know how to say it in
German, I know two things. In either state though, when I use it, I'm still
expressing only one fact about the world.

Expressing the facts is a matter of primary importance: it is important to
the misson of sharing the sum of all human knowledge that we tell people
whether snow is white, but we should also be sharing the more implicit,
linguistic knowledge.

Basically: language is a component part of the "sum of all human knowledge",
not just a means of expressing that knowledge.

-- 
Tom Morris



-- 
Tom Morris

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-10-03 Thread Chris Keating 
>
>
> > On 30 September 2011 13:04, Thomas Dalton 
> wrote:
> >>
> >> Indeed. Part of the issue there is that the number is diminishing so
> >> much that there aren't enough speakers left to really produce a good
> >> encyclopaedia (there's something like 60,000 global speakers)
> >
> > The whole point is that encouraging minority language wikipedias helps
> > revitalise the language.
>
> I have to admit (from a completely personal viewpoint) that this sounds
> like a reason _not_ to support minority language Wikipedias. I personally
> much prefer the trend towards more people speaking a single language, or set
> of main languages, rather than encouraging more small niches of people
> speaking their own language.


I'd tend towards the opposite viewpoint; personally I think contributions in
particularly rare languages are particularly valuable, and that linguistic
(and hence cultural) diversity is important in stopping the whole world
ending up dull, identical and boring.

But thinking about what Wikimedia UK ought to do, rather than the more
abstract point, I would argue that since we represent the whole UK, we ought
to at least aspire to doing work in all the languages spoken in the UK.

Chris
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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-10-03 Thread Michael Peel 

On 30 Sep 2011, at 13:19, Andrew West wrote:

> On 30 September 2011 13:04, Thomas Dalton  wrote:
>> 
>> Indeed. Part of the issue there is that the number is diminishing so
>> much that there aren't enough speakers left to really produce a good
>> encyclopaedia (there's something like 60,000 global speakers). The
>> problem is even more apparent when you realise that what speakers
>> there are tend to be a lot older than our core contributing
>> demographic.
> 
> The whole point is that encouraging minority language wikipedias helps
> revitalise the language.  These wikipedias will never compete with
> enwp for completeness, but you only need a handful of good wikipedians
> who are fluent in the language to be able to produce a reasonable
> number of good quality articles, which can have a beneficial impact on
> increasing language acquisition amongst the young, which in turn will
> tend to increase the number of contributors in that language as time
> goes on.

I have to admit (from a completely personal viewpoint) that this sounds like a 
reason _not_ to support minority language Wikipedias. I personally much prefer 
the trend towards more people speaking a single language, or set of main 
languages, rather than encouraging more small niches of people speaking their 
own language. The former makes it a lot easier to communicate with more people 
on a global basis and hence gain more knowledge, whereas the latter does the 
complete opposite.

For me, the key points are increasing the availability of knowledge for those 
that only understand that language; increasing the body of knowledge that's 
shared between multiple languages to make it easier to learn a more common 
language; and to preserve information & culture specific to that language 
(which, of course, would ideally also be translated to other languages).

Mike
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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-30 Thread Peter Coombe 
Interesting stat of the day: The second most visited Wikipedia in the
UK is Polish.
http://stats.wikimedia.org/wikimedia/squids/SquidReportPageViewsPerCountryBreakdownHuge.htm

The non-English 'local' languages don't even register in that
breakdown, being less than 0.1% of pageviews. Of course this could be
taken two ways:
* We shouldn't spend too much time on them if they're of such minority interest
* We need to spend time promoting them better, and making them viable projects

Pete / the wub


On 30 September 2011 18:05, Richard Farmbrough  wrote:
> It is certainly the case that there is  (European) money around these
> languages, indeed I have been trying to get the content of the European
> funded dictionaries released CC-By-...
>
> It is important to remember, though, as Thomas pointed out (and was
> pointed out by members of both Lang Com and WMF staff at Wikimania)
> that the aims of language revitalisers (or saviours), while closely
> allied with ours, are not identical.
>
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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-30 Thread Richard Farmbrough 
It is certainly the case that there is  (European) money around these 
languages, indeed I have been trying to get the content of the European 
funded dictionaries released CC-By-...

It is important to remember, though, as Thomas pointed out (and was 
pointed out by members of both Lang Com and WMF staff at Wikimania)  
that the aims of language revitalisers (or saviours), while closely 
allied with ours, are not identical.

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-30 Thread Thomas Dalton 
On 30 September 2011 13:26, Richard Symonds  wrote:
> It also gives us the benefit of government support for those languages - as
> with, for example, the Catalan Wikipedia, which is encouraged rather a lot
> by the regional government. I wouldn't be surprised if the Welsh Wikipedia
> was the largest general reference work ever written in that language.

True. There are definitely grants available for projects benefiting
the Welsh language, and those are probably among the easiest grants
for us to get. The rest of our work can then benefit from the
economies of scale you get by doing more stuff. I'm not sure we would
be able to get similar grants for Scots or Scottish Gaelic (there
probably are grants from Gaelic, but not anywhere near as many as for
Welsh).

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-30 Thread Thomas Dalton 
On 30 September 2011 13:19, Andrew West  wrote:
> The whole point is that encouraging minority language wikipedias helps
> revitalise the language.

Revitalising languages isn't what we're here to do, though. We're here
to provide free and open content/knowledge. Ideally, we do that in the
user's own language, but only because that's the most use to the user
not because we're trying to promote the language.

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-30 Thread Richard Symonds 
It also gives us the benefit of government support for those languages - as
with, for example, the Catalan Wikipedia, which is encouraged rather a lot
by the regional government. I wouldn't be surprised if the Welsh Wikipedia
was the largest general reference work ever written in that language.

 
-Original Message-
From: wikimediauk-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org
[mailto:wikimediauk-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Andrew West
Sent: 30 September 2011 13:20
To: wikimediauk-l@lists.wikimedia.org
Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

On 30 September 2011 13:04, Thomas Dalton  wrote:
>
> Indeed. Part of the issue there is that the number is diminishing so
> much that there aren't enough speakers left to really produce a good
> encyclopaedia (there's something like 60,000 global speakers). The
> problem is even more apparent when you realise that what speakers
> there are tend to be a lot older than our core contributing
> demographic.

The whole point is that encouraging minority language wikipedias helps
revitalise the language.  These wikipedias will never compete with
enwp for completeness, but you only need a handful of good wikipedians
who are fluent in the language to be able to produce a reasonable
number of good quality articles, which can have a beneficial impact on
increasing language acquisition amongst the young, which in turn will
tend to increase the number of contributors in that language as time
goes on.

Andrew
[[User:BabelStone]]

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-30 Thread Andrew West 
On 30 September 2011 13:04, Thomas Dalton  wrote:
>
> Indeed. Part of the issue there is that the number is diminishing so
> much that there aren't enough speakers left to really produce a good
> encyclopaedia (there's something like 60,000 global speakers). The
> problem is even more apparent when you realise that what speakers
> there are tend to be a lot older than our core contributing
> demographic.

The whole point is that encouraging minority language wikipedias helps
revitalise the language.  These wikipedias will never compete with
enwp for completeness, but you only need a handful of good wikipedians
who are fluent in the language to be able to produce a reasonable
number of good quality articles, which can have a beneficial impact on
increasing language acquisition amongst the young, which in turn will
tend to increase the number of contributors in that language as time
goes on.

Andrew
[[User:BabelStone]]

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-30 Thread Thomas Dalton 
On 30 September 2011 13:07, Richard Symonds  wrote:
> Welsh people don't all speak English: I used to work with people from north
> Wales who couldn't speak a word of it. They /only/ spoke Welsh. Unusual,
> perhaps, but it happens.

Our article says: "[M]onoglot Welsh speakers are now virtually
non-existent, except among mother tongue speakers below school age as
well as small numbers of elderly people in traditional Welsh speaking
regions. Almost without exception, Welsh speakers in Wales also speak
English[.]" (although there is a citation needed tag in there)

So I think it is sufficiently unusual that we don't need to worry too
much about it.

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-30 Thread Richard Symonds 
Welsh people don't all speak English: I used to work with people from north
Wales who couldn't speak a word of it. They /only/ spoke Welsh. Unusual,
perhaps, but it happens.

-Original Message-
From: wikimediauk-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org
[mailto:wikimediauk-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Thomas
Dalton
Sent: 30 September 2011 13:05
To: wikimediauk-l@lists.wikimedia.org
Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

On 30 September 2011 11:31,   wrote:
> There's a lot of discussion about Scots But what of Scottish Gaelic?
> That's a very distinct language and of real benefit to those who still
speak
> it - though that number is diminishing.

Indeed. Part of the issue there is that the number is diminishing so
much that there aren't enough speakers left to really produce a good
encyclopaedia (there's something like 60,000 global speakers). The
problem is even more apparent when you realise that what speakers
there are tend to be a lot older than our core contributing
demographic.

I'd be inclined to say that Scots isn't really a separate language and
Scottish Gaelic is too small to ever be a successful project, so we
shouldn't really worry about either. If there are speakers of either
language that want to do something, the chapter can support them
through microgrants. I wouldn't advise a proactive approach by the
chapter.

The main argument is that there is essentially no-one that speaks
Scots or Scottish Gaelic that doesn't also speak fluent English. That
means our efforts will have significantly more impact if we
concentrate on English. (Welsh is substantially larger, so it might be
worth reaching out to the Welsh community, even though they all speak
English too.)

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-30 Thread Thomas Dalton 
On 30 September 2011 11:31,   wrote:
> There's a lot of discussion about Scots But what of Scottish Gaelic?
> That's a very distinct language and of real benefit to those who still speak
> it - though that number is diminishing.

Indeed. Part of the issue there is that the number is diminishing so
much that there aren't enough speakers left to really produce a good
encyclopaedia (there's something like 60,000 global speakers). The
problem is even more apparent when you realise that what speakers
there are tend to be a lot older than our core contributing
demographic.

I'd be inclined to say that Scots isn't really a separate language and
Scottish Gaelic is too small to ever be a successful project, so we
shouldn't really worry about either. If there are speakers of either
language that want to do something, the chapter can support them
through microgrants. I wouldn't advise a proactive approach by the
chapter.

The main argument is that there is essentially no-one that speaks
Scots or Scottish Gaelic that doesn't also speak fluent English. That
means our efforts will have significantly more impact if we
concentrate on English. (Welsh is substantially larger, so it might be
worth reaching out to the Welsh community, even though they all speak
English too.)

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-30 Thread iain.macdonald 
There's a lot of discussion about Scots But what of Scottish Gaelic? That's a very distinct language and of real benefit to those who still speak it - though that number is diminishing.


 Original Message 
Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"
From: geni <geni...@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, September 30, 2011 3:00 am
To: wikimediauk-l@lists.wikimedia.org

On 29 September 2011 22:29, Deryck Chan <deryckc...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Edinburgh probably isn't very representative of the lot. Bring on the
> Glaswegians and Aberdeen Dorics! My classmate from Aberdeen claims clearly
> that he's *bilingual* in Doric [Scots] and English, as do most natives of
> Aberdeen. I think there are lots of native Scots speakers who realise Scots
> is different enough from English that it has become a different language,
> and it's our job to promote their awareness of a Scots Wikipedia.

Except the history suggests the reverse Scots was a separate language
that has largely merged into English.

-- 
geni

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-29 Thread geni 
On 29 September 2011 22:29, Deryck Chan  wrote:
> Edinburgh probably isn't very representative of the lot. Bring on the
> Glaswegians and Aberdeen Dorics! My classmate from Aberdeen claims clearly
> that he's *bilingual* in Doric [Scots] and English, as do most natives of
> Aberdeen. I think there are lots of native Scots speakers who realise Scots
> is different enough from English that it has become a different language,
> and it's our job to promote their awareness of a Scots Wikipedia.

Except the history suggests the reverse Scots was a separate language
that has largely merged into English.

-- 
geni

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-29 Thread Deryck Chan 
Edinburgh probably isn't very representative of the lot. Bring on the
Glaswegians and Aberdeen Dorics! My classmate from Aberdeen claims clearly
that he's *bilingual* in Doric [Scots] and English, as do most natives of
Aberdeen. I think there are lots of native Scots speakers who realise Scots
is different enough from English that it has become a different language,
and it's our job to promote their awareness of a Scots Wikipedia.

However, for those in Edinburgh who aren't sure whether they're speaking
Scots or just Scottish English, I agree that pushing them to contribute or
read a Scots Wikipedia isn't the best of ideas.

(Re geonotices)
Geonotices are opt-out rather than opt-in. However, geolocation often isn't
very good in the UK, and it's possible that your IP is tagged to the wrong
place all the time.

On 29 September 2011 22:17, Brian McNeil wrote:

> On Wed, 2011-09-28 at 13:53 +0100, Harry Burt wrote:
> > On Wed, Sep 28, 2011 at 1:45 PM, HJ Mitchell 
> wrote:
> > > The same could be said of Welsh, or Latin, or a handful of other
> languages
> > > with a dedicated Wikipedia. I'm on the fence as to the usefulness of
> these
> > > projects, but I thought I'd just point out that there are a few of
> them. ;)
> > >
> > > Harry
> > > (HJ Mitchell)
> >
> > Oh, sure. But Scots is the most marginal case of the lot, I think,
> > which is why I was reminded of it by the original post.
>
> I'm going to chime in here onHarry's post, as-opposed to getting further
> down the rabbit hole on this discussion.
>
> I live in Edinburgh. I am surrounded by people who speak Scots. They
> don't even know they do so. If you mention Scots as a language to them,
> they *might* think of the poetry of Rabbie Burns. If they're smart, they
> may say they speak a Scottish dialect of English.
>
> Personally, I would say the difference between Scots and British English
> is more than the difference between Brit.Eng and U.S.Eng, but less than
> the difference back to Shakespearean English.
>
> I'd go as far as saying you can only call it a distinct language if
> you're one of the people south of the border who demanded subtitles for
> Rab C. Nesbitt.
>
> Whether or not the sco language code is justified, is a point I'll defer
> to linguists on. As I say, Burns is the best-known example of it, and
> I've no passion to glorify the poetic musings of an ex-tax collector.
>
>
> Brian McNeil.
> --
> http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Brian_McNeil - Accredited Reporter.
> Facts don't cease to be facts, but news ceases to be news.
>
>
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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-29 Thread Brian McNeil 
On Wed, 2011-09-28 at 10:02 +0100, Michael Peel wrote:
> On 28 Sep 2011, at 09:58, Harry Burt wrote:
> 
> > Sorry to ask such a tangential question, but what is WMUK's position
> > on non-English wikis that might be suitable for a Scottish audience
> > (e.g. Scots)? Will it seek to actively promote interest in them?
> 
> In general, yes, most definitely.
> 
> In reality, we need to have speakers of the language, and people from the 
> appropriate geography, involved so that it's not just English people 
> promoting them. ;-) Finding those people has proved to be very tricky in the 
> past (as is currently being demonstrated by the few people that have signed 
> up or left apologies for the Edinburgh wikimeet this Saturday, 
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Meetup/Edinburgh_3 ).

Mike,

I think I've identified the biggest problem there: Geonotices are opt-in
only. I've *never* been presented with one, and I'm not even sure where
I'd enable such.

That is,... stupid (yes, being my notoriously blunt self). Whilst the
WMF does not want to irk people to the extent Facebook does with their
perpetual extreme makeovers, there is nothing wrong with saying "we have
a real-world event in your area, click here to view, or here to disable
such notices".

We could easily be missing dozens of people with 4-figure-plus edit
counts because it might be intrusive to tell them fellow Wikimedians are
in the area.

Incidentally, Rock Drum has done a great job on tarting up the Wikimedia
in Scotland page! Kudos are due there.

Brian McNeil.
-- 
http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Brian_McNeil - Accredited Reporter.
Facts don't cease to be facts, but news ceases to be news.


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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-29 Thread Brian McNeil 
On Wed, 2011-09-28 at 13:53 +0100, Harry Burt wrote:
> On Wed, Sep 28, 2011 at 1:45 PM, HJ Mitchell  wrote:
> > The same could be said of Welsh, or Latin, or a handful of other languages
> > with a dedicated Wikipedia. I'm on the fence as to the usefulness of these
> > projects, but I thought I'd just point out that there are a few of them. ;)
> >
> > Harry
> > (HJ Mitchell)
> 
> Oh, sure. But Scots is the most marginal case of the lot, I think,
> which is why I was reminded of it by the original post.

I'm going to chime in here onHarry's post, as-opposed to getting further
down the rabbit hole on this discussion.

I live in Edinburgh. I am surrounded by people who speak Scots. They
don't even know they do so. If you mention Scots as a language to them,
they *might* think of the poetry of Rabbie Burns. If they're smart, they
may say they speak a Scottish dialect of English.

Personally, I would say the difference between Scots and British English
is more than the difference between Brit.Eng and U.S.Eng, but less than
the difference back to Shakespearean English.

I'd go as far as saying you can only call it a distinct language if
you're one of the people south of the border who demanded subtitles for
Rab C. Nesbitt.

Whether or not the sco language code is justified, is a point I'll defer
to linguists on. As I say, Burns is the best-known example of it, and
I've no passion to glorify the poetic musings of an ex-tax collector.


Brian McNeil.
-- 
http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Brian_McNeil - Accredited Reporter.
Facts don't cease to be facts, but news ceases to be news.


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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-28 Thread Andrew West 
On 28 September 2011 16:13, Deryck Chan  wrote:
> Being a founding sysop of the Cantonese Wikipedia and a member of WMHK, I've
> had experience handling skepticism towards regional language Wikipedias.
>
> Where speakers of that language (both first and second) are concerned, I
> think it is the chapter's duty to promote the project rather than feed the
> skepticism. It is important for the chapter to make clear to the public the
> Wikimedia movement's position about regional languages and projects in those
> languages.

I fully agree.

The British governement has made various commitments with regard to
regional languages in the UK



and the regional language versions of Wikipedia are one very real way
of helping promote the wider use of these languages.

Andrew
[[User:BabelStone]]

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-28 Thread Deryck Chan 
Being a founding sysop of the Cantonese Wikipedia and a member of WMHK, I've
had experience handling skepticism towards regional language Wikipedias.

Where speakers of that language (both first and second) are concerned, I
think it is the chapter's duty to promote the project rather than feed the
skepticism. It is important for the chapter to make clear to the public the
Wikimedia movement's position about regional languages and projects in those
languages.
On Sep 28, 2011 2:26 PM, "Fae"  wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I agree with Tom that WMUK supports open knowledge across all the
> projects, that includes the Tamil Wikipedia as well as the Welsh and
> Scots one.
>
> As a trustee I'm keen that we can demonstrate our commitment to
> diversity and international collaboration. That's one of the reasons
> we were excited to have bragging rights for the Derby Museum articles
> existing in 100+ languages and for the V&A museum to involve live
> collaboration in multiple languages in multiple countries.
>
> As part of the GLAM UK task force I am also interested in developing a
> sustainable GLAM network of e-volunteers. As there is significant
> interest in Welsh, Scots and Gaelic (Scottish and Irish) these are
> specific opportunities to support new Wikimedians for local languages.
> Rather than being tempted to pre-judge importance based on whether any
> particular language version of Wikipedia being currently weak, I
> suggest we prioritise our support based on genuine community interest.
> If more people living in the UK come forward wanting to do an exciting
> project on the Somalian Wikipedia, that will probably get more of our
> attention and be more of a priority for any funding than a proposal
> for a Welsh project with only one supporter.
>
> I agree that the Scots Wikipedia needs improvement, that makes it a
> great opportunity for a spontaneous proposal for funding from a group
> of Wikimedians with Scots language skills which the board can then
> judge on its own merits, I can assure you that all the trustees would
> love to receive such proposals.
>
> Cheers,
> Fae
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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-28 Thread Andrew West 
On 28 September 2011 13:53, Harry Burt  wrote:
>
> Oh, sure. But Scots is the most marginal case of the lot, I think,
> which is why I was reminded of it by the original post.

I agree that it is debatable whether some of the marginal wikipedias
have much value, although in the case of Scots it is perhaps because
it is generally quite understandable to most English speakers that
makes the Scots Wikipedia seem less useful than say Welsh or Irish
Wikipedias.



However, I do think that Wikimedia UK ought to offer support and
encouragement to other language wikis with UK connections if needed.
The following is a list of other language Wikipedias that could be
considered to come under the purview of Wikimedia UK:

Simple English

73,631 articles

Welsh

33,944 articles

Irish

13,294 articles

Scottish Gaelic

8,459 articles

Scots

7,153 articles

Manx

3,900 articles

Norman (including Guernésiais, Jèrriais and Sercquiais)

3,473 articles

Anglo-Saxon

2,720 articles

Cornish

2,188 articles

Andrew
[[User:BabelStone]]

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-28 Thread Fae 
Hi,

I agree with Tom that WMUK supports open knowledge across all the
projects, that includes the Tamil Wikipedia as well as the Welsh and
Scots one.

As a trustee I'm keen that we can demonstrate our commitment to
diversity and international collaboration. That's one of the reasons
we were excited to have bragging rights for the Derby Museum articles
existing in 100+ languages and for the V&A museum to involve live
collaboration in multiple languages in multiple countries.

As part of the GLAM UK task force I am also interested in developing a
sustainable GLAM network of e-volunteers. As there is significant
interest in Welsh, Scots and Gaelic (Scottish and Irish) these are
specific opportunities to support new Wikimedians for local languages.
Rather than being tempted to pre-judge importance based on whether any
particular language version of Wikipedia being currently weak, I
suggest we prioritise our support based on genuine community interest.
If more people living in the UK come forward wanting to do an exciting
project on the Somalian Wikipedia, that will probably get more of our
attention and be more of a priority for any funding than a proposal
for a Welsh project with only one supporter.

I agree that the Scots Wikipedia needs improvement, that makes it a
great opportunity for a spontaneous proposal for funding from a group
of Wikimedians with Scots language skills which the board can then
judge on its own merits, I can assure you that all the trustees would
love to receive such proposals.

Cheers,
Fae
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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-28 Thread Harry Burt 
On Wed, Sep 28, 2011 at 1:45 PM, HJ Mitchell  wrote:
> The same could be said of Welsh, or Latin, or a handful of other languages
> with a dedicated Wikipedia. I'm on the fence as to the usefulness of these
> projects, but I thought I'd just point out that there are a few of them. ;)
>
> Harry
> (HJ Mitchell)

Oh, sure. But Scots is the most marginal case of the lot, I think,
which is why I was reminded of it by the original post.

--
Harry (User:Jarry1250)

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-28 Thread HJ Mitchell 
The same could be said of Welsh, or Latin, or a handful of other languages with 
a dedicated Wikipedia. I'm on the fence as to the usefulness of these projects, 
but I thought I'd just point out that there are a few of them. ;)
 
Harry
(HJ Mitchell)  



From: Harry Burt 
To: wikimediauk-l@lists.wikimedia.org
Sent: Wednesday, 28 September 2011, 13:32
Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

On Wed, Sep 28, 2011 at 12:10 PM, Tom Morris  wrote:
> Say we had access to a library in Britain that had substantial
> material on Latin American history primarily in the languages of those
> nations (Spanish and Portugese). Say we then had the opportunity to go
> and help them learn how to edit Wikipedia and add texts to Wikisource
> and images to Commons: it may end up that they are going to primarily
> edit ptwiki or eswiki or ptwikisource, but that's fine. If it seems
> like a good opportunity to further the mission of the Wikimedia
> movement and it is practical to do it with our funding and whatever.

Yes. But the point is, some people question whether (e.g.) the Scots
Wikipedia is actually useful at all, since very few people prefer to
read and write in Scots over English. And hence my original question
about whether or not WMUK/the board/individuals consider investing
their limited resources in projects which support such wikis to be
worthwhile.

I think it is clear that views differ, and so the answer is "we'll
look at projects on a case-by-case basis" :)

--
Harry

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-28 Thread Harry Burt 
On Wed, Sep 28, 2011 at 12:10 PM, Tom Morris  wrote:
> Say we had access to a library in Britain that had substantial
> material on Latin American history primarily in the languages of those
> nations (Spanish and Portugese). Say we then had the opportunity to go
> and help them learn how to edit Wikipedia and add texts to Wikisource
> and images to Commons: it may end up that they are going to primarily
> edit ptwiki or eswiki or ptwikisource, but that's fine. If it seems
> like a good opportunity to further the mission of the Wikimedia
> movement and it is practical to do it with our funding and whatever.

Yes. But the point is, some people question whether (e.g.) the Scots
Wikipedia is actually useful at all, since very few people prefer to
read and write in Scots over English. And hence my original question
about whether or not WMUK/the board/individuals consider investing
their limited resources in projects which support such wikis to be
worthwhile.

I think it is clear that views differ, and so the answer is "we'll
look at projects on a case-by-case basis" :)

--
Harry

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-28 Thread Tom Morris 
On Wed, Sep 28, 2011 at 11:54, Thomas Dalton  wrote:
> I don't think it's particularly controversial. The logistical problems
> involved with trying to promote a project in a language you don't
> speak are enough to make it an unwise venture.
>

As WMUK, we can enable people to do so, and we can be aware of
multi-lingual outreach. There's no reason WMUK should equal English,
and no reason it should equal English, Welsh, Scots/Gaelic. Our
mission is promoting free knowledge and the mission of the Wikimedia
movement in whatever way is practical in the UK.

Say we had access to a library in Britain that had substantial
material on Latin American history primarily in the languages of those
nations (Spanish and Portugese). Say we then had the opportunity to go
and help them learn how to edit Wikipedia and add texts to Wikisource
and images to Commons: it may end up that they are going to primarily
edit ptwiki or eswiki or ptwikisource, but that's fine. If it seems
like a good opportunity to further the mission of the Wikimedia
movement and it is practical to do it with our funding and whatever.

Anyway, that's my opinion.

-- 
Tom Morris


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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-28 Thread Thomas Dalton 
On 28 September 2011 10:20, Harry Burt  wrote:
> On Wed, Sep 28, 2011 at 10:02 AM, Michael Peel
>  wrote:
>> In general, yes, most definitely.
>>
>> In reality, we need to have speakers of the language, and people from the 
>> appropriate geography, involved so that it's not just English people 
>> promoting them. ;-)
>
> Fair enough. It is a fairly controversial stance though (not with me,
> I should point out). Has the rationale being expounded somewhere?

I don't think it's particularly controversial. The logistical problems
involved with trying to promote a project in a language you don't
speak are enough to make it an unwise venture.

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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-28 Thread Harry Burt 
On Wed, Sep 28, 2011 at 10:02 AM, Michael Peel
 wrote:
> In general, yes, most definitely.
>
> In reality, we need to have speakers of the language, and people from the 
> appropriate geography, involved so that it's not just English people 
> promoting them. ;-)

Fair enough. It is a fairly controversial stance though (not with me,
I should point out). Has the rationale being expounded somewhere?

--
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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-28 Thread Michael Peel 

On 28 Sep 2011, at 09:58, Harry Burt wrote:

> Sorry to ask such a tangential question, but what is WMUK's position
> on non-English wikis that might be suitable for a Scottish audience
> (e.g. Scots)? Will it seek to actively promote interest in them?

In general, yes, most definitely.

In reality, we need to have speakers of the language, and people from the 
appropriate geography, involved so that it's not just English people promoting 
them. ;-) Finding those people has proved to be very tricky in the past (as is 
currently being demonstrated by the few people that have signed up or left 
apologies for the Edinburgh wikimeet this Saturday, 
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Meetup/Edinburgh_3 ).

Thanks,
Mike


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Re: [Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-28 Thread Harry Burt 
Sorry to ask such a tangential question, but what is WMUK's position
on non-English wikis that might be suitable for a Scottish audience
(e.g. Scots)? Will it seek to actively promote interest in them?

--
Harry (User:Jarry1250)

On Tue, Sep 27, 2011 at 11:20 PM, Brian McNeil
 wrote:
> I've created [[Wikimedia in Scotland]] on the WM UK wiki, and would
> really appreciate if someone could create a specific Common.css page for
> it.
>
> Required is [[MediaWiki:Common.css/Wikimedia in Scotland]] with the
> following content:
>
> #p-logo  a
> { background-image:
> url('http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/2d/Wikimedia_in_Scotland-4.5%22.png/150px-Wikimedia_in_Scotland-4.5%22.png')
>  !important;
>  }
>
> Once a hard refresh is done, this should then cause the Wikimedia in
> Scotland graphic I've created to be displayed as the Wiki logo for that
> page only.
>
> Ideally, we then 'tart up' this page a little and have the new
> scotwiki.org domain point to it. With help from Peter Weiss, I've a
> QRcode which includes a Saltire and points to scotwiki.org.
>
> If we're to make use of this, then I believe one of the key functions of
> the page should be to encourage people to create accounts to upload
> images, and to perhaps join WMUK.
>
> Scotland is, largely, in need of a drive to recruit contributors who
> venture outside when the daystar is visible; or, tap into the wide
> international visitor base, get them improving the quantity and quality
> of images, then expand coverage across multiple languages.
>
> I'll be discussing this further with Fae on Friday and Saturday, but my
> gut instinct is to start with images. The number of people I see -
> apparently on holiday - and lugging round £4K+ of camera equipment in
> Edinburgh is almost-frightening. Bringing such people into the WMF fold
> just seems sensible. rather than a photo they share with friends and
> family for 20-30 views per month, they can end up with thousands of
> views and encourage others to build and translate content around quality
> images.
>
>
>
>
> Brian McNeil.
> --
> http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Brian_McNeil - Accredited Reporter.
> Facts don't cease to be facts, but news ceases to be news.
>
>
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[Wikimediauk-l] A little wiki "hacking"

2011-09-27 Thread Brian McNeil 
I've created [[Wikimedia in Scotland]] on the WM UK wiki, and would
really appreciate if someone could create a specific Common.css page for
it.

Required is [[MediaWiki:Common.css/Wikimedia in Scotland]] with the
following content:

#p-logo  a
{ background-image:
url('http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/2d/Wikimedia_in_Scotland-4.5%22.png/150px-Wikimedia_in_Scotland-4.5%22.png')
 !important;
 }

Once a hard refresh is done, this should then cause the Wikimedia in
Scotland graphic I've created to be displayed as the Wiki logo for that
page only.

Ideally, we then 'tart up' this page a little and have the new
scotwiki.org domain point to it. With help from Peter Weiss, I've a
QRcode which includes a Saltire and points to scotwiki.org.

If we're to make use of this, then I believe one of the key functions of
the page should be to encourage people to create accounts to upload
images, and to perhaps join WMUK.

Scotland is, largely, in need of a drive to recruit contributors who
venture outside when the daystar is visible; or, tap into the wide
international visitor base, get them improving the quantity and quality
of images, then expand coverage across multiple languages.

I'll be discussing this further with Fae on Friday and Saturday, but my
gut instinct is to start with images. The number of people I see -
apparently on holiday - and lugging round £4K+ of camera equipment in
Edinburgh is almost-frightening. Bringing such people into the WMF fold
just seems sensible. rather than a photo they share with friends and
family for 20-30 views per month, they can end up with thousands of
views and encourage others to build and translate content around quality
images.




Brian McNeil.
-- 
http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Brian_McNeil - Accredited Reporter.
Facts don't cease to be facts, but news ceases to be news.


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