"Amir E. Aharoni" <amir.ahar...@mail.huji.ac.il> wrote: > […]
> Sometimes it is, but there is something much bigger: There are many > languages that > 1. are alive in speech (and possibly in writing) > 2. are not in danger of extinction > 3. have a large number of monolingual speakers (let's say 100,000+) > If there is no substantial Wikipedia in such a language, these people can't > read Wikipedia in *any language* because they are monolingual. Most likely > they cannot read any any encyclopedia in any language. They need a > Wikipedia not in order to preserve the language, but to have access to > *any* encyclopedic knowledge. > I speak a revitalized language, and I'm very well aware of its history. > Language preservation and revitalization are lovely things. But it's not > the main point of what Wikimedia does. "Need a Wikipedia" sounds like a great idea when you are selling Wikipedias, but for progress, betterment of humani- ty, sustainable development, etc. I think teaching those monolingual speakers a second language (for example English) is far preferable as it not only enables them to access to a few hundred or thousand articles someone paid to have trans- lated, but all articles of the English Wikipedia, plus every English article, every English book, every English blog, ev- ery English video on the InterNet. It also grows them not only intellectually, but also removes economical barriers for trading with other groups. Tim _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
