User talk:Imperfect Commitment/AoHW
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- I've copied parts of Grin's translated statement from User:Imperfect Commitment/AoHW so I could respond to it here.
When the Hungarian Wikipedia was born - when I established it - our rules were quite simple: Everyone should be sensible and civilized, and should respect the traditions [/customs] of the "Wikipedia", since at that time, the only Wikipedia which had significant traditions was the English one.
- Staying sensible and civilized sound a great start for the guidelines on any wiki.
To help the prospective contributors, I translated some of those principles, but I didn't have enough time to translate more than 200 articles alone.
- I think this is a good start, but just because principles work well in one wiki doesn't mean they are right for every wiki, especially a wiki with a different background and of a different size to the English Wikipedia.
As time went by, new participants joined the project, and everyone was busy with writing articles, or with translating pages which help civilized contributors. So the articles which were about [/which were related to] less civilized users were still not translated.
- Yes, it makes sense not to have those until you need them. A wiki can look too confusing if you start with more policies than you really need.
The usual way how Wikipedias (and other wikis) work is that the one who starts a [wiki] project determines a set of rules, and those, who join in later may either accept these or may leave the project.
- I disagree with this. I think there needs to be a way for new editors to come in and influence old policies. They should not have to accept them or leave. Surely having the option of discussing the existing policies and reworking them until there is consensus would be a better option?
The guidelines which should be followed are those which are accepted (=not disputed) guidelines on EnWiki
- I don't understand why this has to be the case. Why can a separate community not make their own rules? People are more likely to respect the policies if they know they exist because of consensus within their own project. If they feel these rules are just given to them, there is less reason to follow them.
- A similar issue came up recently on the Swedish Wikipedia. Please see my comments at sv:user talk:Angela, since that might help in explaining my opinion about whether policies should just be taken from the English Wikipedia.
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- I also want to say thanks for sharing your opinion on this issue. Imperfect Commitment 29 June 2005 11:25 (UTC)
[edit] A summary of the situation in HuWiki
- oops, edit conflict
I don't think you should fear "retaliation" from Grin at all. I can't even think about how he could "retaliate" for bringing this issue here.
This issue is a tricky one. Let me give you my summary. My understanding is:
Policies in HuWiki were established in one of the following ways:
- Translated from English by Grin at the beginning (sometimes with incomplete translations)
- Translated from English by some other editor, when it seemed to be necessary (e.g. when we experienced the first personal attacks, I translated the corresponding policy from English)
These were used in practice and new users were pointed to them on a regular basis if I remember correcly.
Some of the policies like WP:SOCK, WP:BAN, WP:BLOCK, WP:3RR, WP:CIV were not translated or not translated in full or never needed to be used until recently, since we never had any real problem users before.
The question of how policies are decided was never explicitly written down in HuWiki, but I think the understanding always was that the key policies are the same as in EnWiki.
Also to my knowledge, there was never a vote on any of the key policies in HuWiki. The whole idea of suggesting new policies, or changing existing ones is pretty new. That's why it's a problem that all this was not put into writing until recently.
We're about 150 active editors right now (20 editors with 100+ edits a month). About 10 editors participate in any kind of vote on a regular basis. (Even policy votes.) We go through our first vote to ban, the first blocks for 3RR and a lot of other firsts.
I think the situation is unfortunate. I tried to push Grin about 6 weeks ago but unfortunately he's been busy with personal stuff. But he assembled a list of the key English policies and asked other editors to help him translate the missing ones and help clarify the points where they are not applicable in HuWiki. We made good progress I think.
We're on the right track but that doesn't mean that these issues should not be discussed openly. We can use the wisdom and input from English editors and Hungarian editors, too. This means you, Imperfect Commitment. You should not fear retaliation of any kind.
nyenyec ☎ 29 June 2005 03:07 (UTC)
I agree and think User IC overacts a bit. Gubbubu 29 June 2005 05:57 (UTC)
Nyenyec, Gubb: I hope you're both right. Maybe I didn't understand Grin's principles (and opinion) well. --Imperfect Commitment 29 June 2005 11:13 (UTC)
