Heh, I remember Mr Wales asking what could the movement do with a million dollars some time around 2006. Is anything on the horizon?
What could we do? Many things; one of them would be to get our act together and become a true leader in software and content localization. Currently we are proud about maintaining MediaWiki, a piece of software that is probably translated to more languages than any other, and that is great, but: 1. Our software localization tooling, excellent as it is, didn't become the industry standard, even though it could with better packaging. Why is it important? Because a Wikipedia in a given language doesn't exist in isolation—it exists in an environment of other programs, sites, platforms, and media. There was a (relatively) thriving software localization community in the Catalan language already in the 1990s (!), so it's not surprising that Catalan Wikipedia was the first to start after English, and is among the most successful Wikimedia projects now. Making software localization better for everybody will bring computer usage to the whole world, and we can be the leaders in it, rather than leaving it to the corporations. 2. We have the theoretical ability to write articles in any language of the world, but not everybody actually does it. Some language communities need stronger nudges than others to get going: Training about translation and scientific writing, developing terminology, developing spelling dictionaries, developing keyboards that allow convenient typing, literacy programs, etc. In a lot of languages the Bible is the only published book; this happened thanks to donations from people who want to spread their religion around the world. If it can be done with the Bible, it can be done with an encyclopedia. 3. We are influencing public policy in the area of copyright law, but we should be influencing public policy around the whole world to make localized computing and content more accessible. Lobbying needs resources. See https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Strategy/Wikimedia_movement/2017/Cycle_2/A_Truly_Global_Movement#Governments_and_computer_vendors:_Accessibility_to_localization_technology -- Amir Elisha Aharoni · אָמִיר אֱלִישָׁע אַהֲרוֹנִי http://aharoni.wordpress.com “We're living in pieces, I want to live in peace.” – T. Moore 2017-05-17 20:08 GMT+03:00 David Cuenca Tudela <dacu...@gmail.com>: > Are there any activities that could have a meaningful impact if we ask > donors for such amount of seed money? Are there reasons to do so? > > Do we have the guts to do so? > > Do we have the organizational capital to handle it? Or can we get there > soon? > > Do we have the moral right to take a lead in the world and ask for as much > resources as needed? > > Is our leader and our members willing to take big undertakings? > > Are most of us ready to live in fear while the values that we cherry most > would crumble under our own eyes? > > Would it matter much if we as a movement would disappear? Or is it a > struggle always a positive answer against the shadows in the world? > > Can we offer anything else in this world than truth, free knowledge, and an > open inclusive environment? > > Would you take best wishes from a stranger like me? > > > Micru > _______________________________________________ > 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> _______________________________________________ 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>
