Proposals for closing projects/Closure of Beta Wikiversity

From Meta, a Wikimedia project coordination wiki

The result of the following proposal for closing a WMF project is to KEEP the project. Please, do not modify this page.

The following discussion is closed: No consensus. Though further steps of integrating Incubator and Beta.Wikiversity should be done — vvv 07:26, 26 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
No consensus, but the majority (especially amongst the participants of Wikiversity) is against closure. There is no consensus on any "integration" (as yet to be specified) of incubator and beta wikiversity. Hillgentleman 07:36, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
[reply]

I propose to close Beta Wikiversity. As far as I know, its initial purpose was to collobrate in developing Wikiversity policies and principles. But currently it's a clone of Wikimedia Incubator. I suggest to close it, because:

  1. It's duplicate of Wikimedia Incubator
  2. It's worse organized than Wikimedia Incubator (no prefixes)

VasilievV 2 16:47, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Clarification

This is NOT a proposal to shut down Wikiversity itself. 68.15.28.125 17:39, 14 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Support

  1. SupportVasilievV 2 16:47, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  2. Support SPQRobin 16:48, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  3. Support Many people don't understand where to put there new wikiversities. --OosWesThoesBes 16:48, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  4. Support Incubator also has the test-admin group which allows more independence for the testprojects. --MF-W 16:50, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  5. Support because as far as I'm aware it would be better for the function of this Wiki to be merged into Meta and Incubator although I'm willing to reconsider should someone highlight a problem with doing so. Adambro 16:57, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  6. Support - 1 place = much better organization of incubated projects, import, etc. Danny B.
  7. Support That's a chaotic place. Voz da Verdade 21:01, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  8. Support - Incubator is more independent and more active ...--Cometstyles 12:51, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  9. Support Per Cometstyles. --SF-Language 17:36, 30 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  10. Support 其他地方都可以找到我們需要的知識,Wikipedia和Wikibook等已經足夠了,我覺得這個實在很多餘,造成編寫人力更分散. — The preceding unsigned comment was added by 140.121.211.120 (talk) 06:45, 31 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    machine translation: Can be found in other places we need the knowledge, Wikipedia and Wikibook enough, and so on, I think this is more than many, resulting in the preparation of a more decentralized human.
  11. Support Beta Wikiversity is catastrophically disorganised and isn't user friendly. Wikimedia Incubator, on the other hand, is much better in both ways. The creation of Beta Wikiversity was a huge mistake in the first place. Runningfridgesrule 16:25, 12 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  12. Support - per the requester, WM incubator is better organised, and the "Old Wikisource" should be closed too --Cradel 15:15, 13 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  13. Support per nom. --Ficell 05:33, 15 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  14. Support --Balasyum disputatio 12:06, 18 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  15. Support 140.109.103.226 13:37, 14 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  16. Support I support the closing, because this Beta = ( Meta + Incubator ) applied for the case of Universities , in other terms Beta is a superfluous duplication of existing functionalities, and hence Beta is a wasting of human resources. Prohlep 17:00, 20 July 2008 (UTC) Just one more: it is wort while to check that who are behind the current 16 supports and 36-1=35 opposes? I am - personally - in a neutral situation: I have never used any of Meta, Incubator and Beta, but I have just carefully read and evaluated the debate, and in parallel to this I checked the role, the functionality of the three projects in comparison. Do keep in your mind, while the democracy is desperately seeking after the majority in numbers, the both of science and religion are driven by their clean truth. (this is a citation from myself) Prohlep 17:21, 20 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  17. Support — MrDolomite • Talk 05:11, 25 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  18. Support it's true that wikiversity isn't a very great innovation. IMO, the knowledges it holds could be fetched from elsewhere, yet they could be more "accurate" than what's inside wikiversity. –Lamphare 09:22, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  19. Support - SterkeBak 16:35, 28 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  20. Support - Андреева Наталья 12:07, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  21. Support we have the Incubator for new proposals now so why leave this wiki open? I see no point. WashingManwithwings 20:31, 24 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose

  1. Oppose Et pourquoi pas oldsource tant qu'on y est ? Le problème avec un incubateur unique est justement le conflit des titres, ce qui à pousser incubateur à mettre en place des préfixes. Et je vous dit pas le problème pour faire un lien propre puisqu'automatiquement on doit utiliser un lien (qui contient le préfixe) avec un texte alternatif (qui lui est très identique au lien mais sans contenir son préfixe). betawikiversit, lui utilise la structure en catégorie. une wikiversité en incubation se trouve sous sa catégorie qui est le code ISO du langage et cette catégorie et sous-catégories contiennent les pages. De plus que/comment faire des liens interwikis puisqu'incubateur renvoie directement vers wikipédia, alors que betawikiversity renvoie uniquement vers les wikiversités. Le système fonctionne (pour le moment) donc pourquoi le supprimer ? Crochet.david 17:24, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Somebody willing to translate into English, please? Thanks. Danny B.
    • Very loose translation: (1) The incubator had an organisational problem with conflict of titles, which led to the prefix system and I think David sees this as a cludge rather than an advantage; (2) Beta uses a category system (and other structural methods) instead which is better; (3) Interwiki links work better on beta, because they link to WV's, whereas the incubator just links to WP (it sounds as if he's pointing out that the interlanguage links would all get screwed up if the pages were moved to the incubator); (4) if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Interpretation: I think that while the French doesn't express it quite that well, David is basically saying that there is structure, and it's different (even if not as good), and that transferring it would break all the current organisation and create far too much work. --McCormack 17:43, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  2. Oppose I just know after my OneNote and my sandbox wikiversity is the most useful wiki for me. and I need a place instead.Saeed.Veradi 17:34, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • And why not oldsource until we are there? The problem with a single incubator is precisely the conflict of titles, which pushes incubating to use prefixes. And I do not tell you the problem to establish a proper link since one must automatically use a link (which contains the prefix) with an alternative text (which is very identical to the link but without containing its prefix). Betawikiversity, uses the structure of categories. A wikiversity in incubation is under its category which is the ISO code of the language and this category and subcategories contain the pages. Moreover than/how to establish interwiki links since incubator returns directly towards wikipedia, whereas betawikiversity returns only towards the wikiversities. This system works (for the moment) so why remove it?A corrected machine translation by SPQRobin 17:57, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  3. Oppose I rather agree with David Crochet's last sentence - why waste time on transferring if everything's currently working? If anyone in the pro-list has time to devote to a transfer of content, I can happily come up with a list of a dozen really valuable re-organisational drives for English WV content which you can spend time on instead. --McCormack 17:34, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Simple solution: when BetaWV would be closed, projects which are currently at BetaWV wait until they have their own wiki, while new requests go to Incubator. SPQRobin 18:23, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Sorry, but this sounds like an excellent way to make more work for the Wikiversitains (since it would spread things out over more than one project, require more use of multiple watchlists, make the RC feeds less useful, etc.). --SB_Johnny|talk|books 19:11, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Oooh, how terrible. Would you really want to watch pages in foreign languages? And if: you also don't complain that you need to have multiple watchlists to watch pages in multiple Wikipedias, Wikibookses or even the still existing Wikiversities. --MF-W 14:38, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    It is en.wv's fault that there are so many re-organisation things. But merging beta.wv's testprojects to Incubator would be quite easy; like closing a Wikipedia or Wiktionary or any other project, just the difference would be to add prefixes depending on category by automatic search and replace in an XML file. --MF-W 14:38, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  4. Oppose - Incubator tries to be too many things to too many people, and doesn't provide the flexibility that new language projects need. What new language projects need to work is a place like Beta Wikiversity that can foster them and has an entire community of people familiar with the sort of project being created. New Wikiversity language projects have been more successful from being within a framework specific to Wikiversity than other projects have on Incubator. More projects have closed in recent times from the Incubator module of doing things. If anything, its the Incubator that needs to be discontinued in favor of more projects like Beta Wikiversity. Beta Wikiversity is also more than just about providing a home for new Wikiversity languages. Beta Wikiversity also provides a presents for Wikiversity participants from any Wikiversity to work together to share ideas, work out problems, etc. in ways that a mailing list alone cannot do. --darklama 17:33, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Also about "Beta's organization being worse than incubator", it works for Wikiversity. Forcing all proposed projects to use the same organizational modules I think is one of the many reasons why many proposed projects that start off on the Incubator and make it off the Incubator, end up closing. Different types of projects have different organizational needs and other needs that are restricted in the Incubator approach. One size does not fit all. A project that succeeds within Incubator is not as likely to succeed as a separate project using the same approaches that were used in the Incubator. Not as many adjustments are needed for a new Wikiversity project to succeed from the transition from Beta Wikiversity to its own separate project. --darklama 18:30, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • - On which facts are your first sentences based? Why do you think BetaWV is "better" than Incubator?
      - "More projects have closed in recent times from the Incubator module of doing things." 1) We don't decide this and 2) Wikiversity is new and there are many more languages (with many more speakers, and thus many more contributors) which can have a Wikiversity. This is also the reason for your sentence "New Wikiversity language projects have been more successful"
      - "...to work together to share ideas, work out problems, etc." And what about Meta? There is enough place here, imo.
      - "its the Incubator that needs to be discontinued in favor of more projects" So let's start an incubator for every WMF project. I don't think every incubator would have a community maintaining it, etc. SPQRobin 18:10, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      • I think my extended elaborate of my own response may have answered some your first question, of why I think BetaWV is better than Incubator. I wasn't suggesting or implying that the Incubator decides which projects get closed, merely that I think projects are more frequently closed as result of having to reside in the Incubator first. Yes Wikiversity is new, however I think Wikisource projects also are less frequently closed from being separate from the Wikimedia Incubator. I just didn't think it was appropriate to mention it before since this is about closing Beta. I think the frequency has more to do with Incubator and less to do with Wikiversity being new. Wikiversity and Old Wikisource do have a community right now to maintain it, so for them it makes sense. I think the Incubator could be phased out as it becomes less important and each WMF project has its own incubator with a community to maintain it. What about Meta? I don't think this effects Meta at all. Meta would still be for proposing new wiki projects and for other things that apply to all Wikimedia projects. --darklama 18:56, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        • For what I meant about Meta, see #Hub. SPQRobin 19:52, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
          • No duplication is involved. Meta is for sharing ideas, working out problems, etc. that effect all Wikimedia projects, while Beta Wikiversity, is strictly for sharing ideas, working out problems, etc. that only effect Wikiversity projects/communities. Its like the difference between foundation-l and wikiversity-l. One has a broader scope and audience than the other, but not every discussion on wikiversity-l belongs on foundation-l. --darklama 13:37, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  5. Oppose - I disagree with the closure of this project. Wikiversity Beta is still an environment for international communication and still used for the developing of the Wikiversity polices. That is one big reason, why it can´t be closed. Than I should disagree with point no. 2. It's worse organized than Wikimedia Incubator (no prefixes)! Noone evaluated and compared both approaches. There are four ways, how it can be organized: category, disimbiguation, prefix or namespace. Wikiversity Beta organizes incubating projects in the catogories and until this time there were no problems with the organization.--Juan de Vojnikov 18:23, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  6. Oppose - (after edit conflict) Beta has successfully "breeded" 4 new Wikiversities - also due to that community members help newcomers with Wikiversity related questions. We have a unique way and view of the wikiverse (see also mentorship for admins) which we can pass on to the new Wikiversity communities (see also Standing on the shoulders of giants). I am not sure if on incubator this would be a given ? The 9 own language WVs need a place to meet - e.g. on beta we have already multilingual pages which help to communicate more efficient. And I am not sure if we should force the members from the soon-to-be-developed WVs to another environment which at least would need from them more effort in organizing the pages. ----Erkan Yilmaz (Wikiversity:Chat, wiki blog) 18:27, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  7. Oppose - Whether or not it was a good idea to start beta.wv in the first place isn't really the ssue, since it has become somewhat of a hub for the various projects to organize, build communities in preparation for new language wikis, and serves as a place where the various Wikiversity communities can communicate, advise, and encourage. The wikiversity mission and scope is profoundly different than the other sorts of projects that are organized on the incubator (as a seemingly but not actually trivial example, "[[code:project:Article]]" seems to refer quite specifically to a wikipedia project... as far as I know most Wikiversitys don't have articles), so keeping them all together in a smaller place with a community who knows what to expect and how to help seems quite sensible. --SB_Johnny|talk|books 18:30, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  8. Oppose Looking ja.wikiversity development I think beta wikiversity is highly helpful as well as oldwikisource. It helps a newly launched test-project develop within a global project in a strong tie, from the usual communication to key policy translations. --Aphaia 19:08, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  9. Oppose The closure of project is proposed and there are no more of 2 sentences to state the reasons. Until I see real arguments, I can only oppose to that. ---- (user_page|chit chat|email) 19:36, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  10. Oppose "1. It's duplicate of Wikimedia Incubator" <-- The Wikimedia Foundation Board created the central Wikiversity hub. I think that a proposal such as this one, that tries to reverse a Board decision, should first be brought to Board. "It's worse organized than Wikimedia Incubator (no prefixes)" <-- It serves the needs of the Wikiversity community. Is it constructive for people from outside Wikiversity to try to impose their personal biases on the Wikiversity community? No. --JWSurf 19:55, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  11. Oppose Ive never even herd of incubator dose it even exist yet?. WV has become a meeting place for to many projects, learning groups v:Portal:Media, and original research groups v:Bloom_clock. I ask the people who have proposed the closing of wikiversty to cite there source for there 2 reasons. The preceding unsigned comment was added by Eadthem (talk • contribs) 20:14, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
    You've never heard about Incubator? So how can you have an opinion about this? SPQRobin 20:46, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  12. Oppose Wikiveristy Beta is a far better environment and a far better system for getting new Wikiversity languages started off than is the Incubator. I instead suggest that the Incubator itself be closed, and that each Wikimedia Project (Wikipedia, Wikibooks, etc.) have its own "Beta" wiki for new languages in that Project. Dovi 07:38, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  13. Oppose - See #Rebuttals.Hillgentleman 09:17, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  14. Oppose I don't think that this will help anybody. We won't have any new wikiversity for months as it will confuse the communities in Beta, and Incubator will become more chaotic. Also, Beta hosts some research, and a lot of discussions about Wikiversity policies that won't continue if the project closes (Incubator can't host any research or any discussion about the project).--ZaDiak 12:47, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  15. Oppose Beta Wikiversity is on its way to be a good alternative for scholar discussions and learning projects. The only problem is that people don't really know WV well. Give it some time and it will grow as wikipedia. Only 2 years ago I asked a professor about wikipedia and he answered that it is the worst encyclopedia existing. Now professors suggest us to search problems and diseases in wikipedia first before looking them up in some books. I'm sure that WV can do it the same way. Think positive and let it grow!!! Bertinho 12:58, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  16. Oppose The "beta" should be kept but it should be renamed to be something like "international.wikiversity.org". The incubator activity should be moved to the Wikimedia Incubator and the "international" should become a multi-lingual collaboration platform for all the accepted Wikiversity projects in different languages. --Teemul 22:42, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  17. Back in the good ol' days when Beta Wikiversity was created, its primary purpose was intended to be a global coordination platform where Wikiversity editors from all languages would create guidelines, mainly about original research. Despite the work I've done to create a multilingual platform to facilitate such discussion, beta wikiversity has quite failed in its purpose to create such guidelines. Should we start all this again, perhaps would we choose another solution that would include Incubator. That said, don't try to fix what ain't broken; if the users from beta wikiversity feel it's useful, then why bother? Is there a fundamental risk keeping it as an incubator for Wikiversity projects? Let me put this another way; we should probably encourage new wikiversities to incubate on Wikimedia Incubator. And maybe Beta wikiversity will die in the end because it won't be useful any more. But not now; now beta wikiversity is useful, so it shouldn't be closed. guillom 07:55, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    If I understand you correctly, to use Incubator also for Wikiversities while keeping BetaWikiversity, I would totally agree. SPQRobin 18:03, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  18. Oppose it seems to me there are some strong arguments against this given by a number of the folk above. guillom & Johnny seem to put it well with other valid points too --Herby talk thyme 08:03, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  19. Oppose. Beta Wikiversity was explicitly set up for two things: 1) to act as an incubator for new projects, and 2) to coordinate inter-language Wikiversity issues/policies etc. It was set up slightly in an experimental mode - but also to act in much the same way as does http://wikisource.org. If anything, I would suggest beta wikiversity be ported to http://wikiversity.org in line with the Wikisource model. I can't see any reason for this (current) proposal, and note that all participants from Wikiversity so far have voiced opposition to it, and only support comes from non-Wikiversity participants (at least that I can recognise). I'd also like to take up Guillom's suggestion to make beta wikiversity more useful - but certainly not to close it. Cormaggio @ 21:29, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  20. Oppose I don't think it is nice to lose an unique culture of Wikiversity ... --Tmnk 14:05, 30 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  21. At this point I can't support the closure, although it may need some work to become more useful. Ral315 (talk) 17:07, 30 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  22. Oppose I am developing more traditional courses at Wikiversity. I cannot see any place for that at http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page Please show me where you have traditional courses at the incubatorium. Robert Elliott 9:20am June 1, 2008 PST
  23. Oppose I will probably argue just like Dovi above (No. 11): just like oldwikisource is the better environment for new wikisources, so the wikiversity beta is the better environment for wikiversities. Yet 2006/2007 I opposed the idea of the incubator where people decide who have good experiences with wikipedias but practically no experiences with wikisource, wictionary, wikinews etc. Rename incubator in wikipedia beta and let other sister projects do their job. -jkb- (cs.source) 13:34, 3 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  24. Oppose: I dislike closing any projects. It's better to search what new to open and not what to close. Closing a project is like throwing out, by force, their members who like it. Anyone dislike a peoject may just choose another instead. It's inpolite to destroy people's work. Spreading it is almost equal to destroy it. If other projects need anything from an other project they are freely able to take it without erase it from the previous possition. Dublicating isn't a reak problem and any subject cannot be realy the same in different projects. --Vchorozopoulos 20:41, 11 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  25. Oppose for now. If my memory serves me, I remember hearing for a long time that a variety of traditional academics disliked Wikipedia and ceased contributing essentially because the were "bitten" too often. Decentralization may be a good thing with respect to incubating projects, and it may allow for some projects to develop in a way that will be better for everyone. --Emesee 20:43, 14 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  26. Oppose per sb_johnny. Monobi (talk) 04:08, 17 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  27. Oppose Türkçe Wikiversity'nin kapatılmasına karşıyım.Çünkü Türkiye gelişmekte olan bir ülke ve böyle sitelere ilgi oldukça yoğun. 21.34 , 17 Haz 2008
  28. Oppose --Ladykosha 22:19, 23 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  29. Oppose I was one of the very early critics of the Beta Wikiversity.... for a whole bunch of reasons. One of them was that I thought there wasn't a sufficient group of people that could keep the project rolling in the first place, and that it was created outside of the "rules" that were established for new Wikiversity projects or even any Wikimedia projects at all. Indeed its creation seemed to harken back to the days when nearly anything and everything was created on the fly just because you could convince somebody on the Mediawiki dev team to create a new sister project (like the German Wikiversity, BTW). Either that or you had an "inside track" with somebody on the top echlons of the WMF that most of us mere mortals never could get. I'm not here to re-open these old wounds, but this project closure proposal seems to be a "see, I told you so" back from elsewhen. Even so, I am opposed to its closure on the basis that it seems to be more or less doing what it was advertised to do. It is somewhat disorganized, but so is nearly any Wikimedia projects. On top of that, there is certainly an active community who is dedicated to watching over the content on this wiki and to help use it for inter-wiki communications as well as to foster the growth of the larger Wikiversity community. Indeed, I would love to see something like this project developed for Wikibooks or Wikinews in terms of inter-language communications and overall project promotion. Those advocating for the closure of the Beta Wikiversity don't seem to have even spent any time even reviewing the larger Wikiversity community or have even looked at the content which is here. The Wikimedia Incubator has always seemed Wikipedia-centric, as is frankly Meta. There certainly is an unmet need that would result from this project's closure that wouldn't be effectively met elsewhere or approached with dedication to the overall goal of trying to develop and improve upon the concept of Wikiversity. --Roberth 01:19, 28 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  30. Oppose --Johney 15:11, 1 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  31. Oppose. I am pursuaded by the arguments to keep it. --Bduke 11:37, 2 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  32. Oppose Wikiversity Beta has no prefixes; but it has categories and it is organised very well. This isn't a problem.--88.228.78.203 07:29, 5 July 2008 (UTC)see below[reply]
  33. Oppose Wikiversity Beta has no prefixes; but it has categories and it is organised very well. This isn't a problem.--Srhat 07:30, 5 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  34. Oppose Kapatılması gerçekten gereksiz.Çünkü ilgi yoğun.--78.165.158.53 16:28, 12 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  35. Oppose Original research is allowed in English Wikiversity, but not Wikipedia where absolute NPOV policy may be potentially affected. As Chinese Wikiversity is not yet available, where will I be able to post Chinese original researches if Beta Wikiversity is closed? When Multilingual Wikisource has had language subdomains breaking away to serve languages with significant users, it is still open to accept texts that do not fit in any language subdomains. For similar reason, I strongly oppose closing Beta Wikiversity in a way that will leave original researches nowhere to go while not fitting in any language subdomains. When users post original researches to Wikipedia articles, Wikiversity should be introduced to them, but closing Beta Wikiversity may worsen the problems on Wikipedia.--Jusjih 02:15, 17 July 2008 (UTC) (admin on Multilingual, English, and Chinese Wikisources, English and Chinese Wikipedias, and several other Wikimedia sites)[reply]
  36. Oppose per Hillgentleman OhanaUnitedTalk page 01:50, 18 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  37. Oppose It is an area specifically for the development of wikiversities. I think the logic of incubiator is centralized almost all project depend from there without any merit (in theory). Perhaps there should be create betawikipedia, and betawikibooks and others. So putting emphasis on the specificity of the new communities created. I do not agree that the betawikiversity must included in this list, is multilingual project and venture deals with the creation of new communities and I do not think that should be seen as a competitor wikiversities in other languages, you can join in a special category that does not seem as competitive project. --Consta 16:09, 18 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  38. Oppose So much work has been done it is un-wiki to propose a complete closure. If it comes to it, I don't see any reason why not portion project incubation (lol!) between the two! 196.30.123.2 07:09, 21 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  39. Oppose Agree with many of the reasons given above. Beta serves an important function and the role it serves (and the need for it) will only grow as new language versions of wikiversity get created. --mikeu 18:31, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  40. Oppose --Ilaria 06:53, 18 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  41. Oppose Every in-service operation needs a testbed for exploring proposed evolutionary improvements and getting the kinks out before installing them in the main service. Without a testbed, changes have to be tested on the live system, with all the dangers and disruptions inherent in doing so. It is more intelligent and more efficient to explore evolutionary improvements on a separate testbed, where unforeseen problems are less disruptive. —Moulton 19:53, 18 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  42. Oppose 多言語版ウィキソース(Multilingual Wikisource)があるため。--ゆいしあす@jawikisource 12:28, 19 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  43. Oppose I am not convinced that incubator provides a better place to incubate new projects. I suggest that this proposal be terminated, and someone does a proper analysis of incubator, oldwikisource and betawikiversity, and writes a report of pros & cons. John Vandenberg 15:42, 15 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Neutral

Neutral #66.0.47.5 20:42, 28 May 2008 (UTC) Wikimedia Incubator is better, but having two similar projects will decrease the traffic and make accidents less likely.  :)[reply]

Neutral TWFred 14:13, 16 July 2008 (UTC) I'm still undecided on this issue. Please list:[reply]

  • Benefits of closure of Beta
    • Effort and costs of administrators and contributors
    • Clarity in navigation
    • Better service to non English students and teachers
  • Benefits of continuing with Beta
    • Effort and costs of administrators and contributors
    • Clarity in navigation
    • Better service to non English students and teachers

Thanks, TWFred 14:13, 16 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Neutral Beta Wikiversity is the same as Incubator. However, I think that many people have had their translations and is the place for preparing wikiversities such as Japanese and other languages. It is somewhat too late for closure because many people have done a lot of jobs in it, including me. I stay neutral because, as well, it could be moved to Incubator. But I think having more beta websites are good so the old one isn't full with massive translations and pages. The site would definitely load very slowly. With these reasons make me couldn't decided whether to close or to keep Beta Wikiversity. I stay neutral --Passawuth 15:43, 16 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Neutral I'm not sure, I don't like the idea of projects getting closed down, and beta Wikiversity has got a lot (or) some user's interested in helping out. Dark Mage 18:59, 25 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Neutral Is there a clear cost-benefit analysis on the issue? --Jcarroll 19:18, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

Page name conflicts

As you can see here, Limburgish people are not able to start pages about Geography or History as Czech already "possesses" them. I will continue to oppose untill a solution has been found. --OosWesThoesBes 19:19, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, Czech has now its own wiki, but though e.g. Dutch has the same name for e.g. Geography. SPQRobin 19:27, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Right, this is one of the biggest issues on multilingual sites where betaversity belongs to. Icubator solves this very practically with prefixes, which allow lot of regular tasks unlike mixed wikis do. (btw, good news for you: I'm in a import phase, so you'll have a chance to usurp those pages soon ;-))
Danny B. 19:32, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This is true. But the problems are here for us to find a key. And there were two keyes offered in the reactions. Lets read it.--Juan de Vojnikov 21:22, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Many people are affraid they'll "loose" their pages, some I've spoken to really believe they will loose their pages. Is it categoriszisredd? (srry, don't know the word) --OosWesThoesBes 19:35, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Excuse me? By which way they can loose their pages?--Juan de Vojnikov 21:22, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi guys, I am sorry that something is unsatisfying for you, but I personally didn't hear yet such a complaint. Only if it is spoken out - like now - we can help. Please write in future your ideas/feedback on these pages: betawikiversity:Wikiversity:Babel and/or betawikiversity:Wikiversity:Request custodian action
Then people can come together and think of a way: e.g. moving pages, finding/implementing a new guideline or when a new WV is finally breeded that after the import that page is deleted. Let's talk to find a solution. ----Erkan Yilmaz (Wikiversity:Chat, wiki blog) 21:30, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thread was initiated at beta - would be great, if you could continue there with your ideas (since this page is about the proposal). ----Erkan Yilmaz (Wikiversity:Chat, wiki blog) 21:38, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hub

I've seen many arguments saying that betaversity serves as a hub, meeting point of community, coordination etc. Well, you guys should know, that this is what Meta is for. Incubator should be a site to put pages to, Meta should be communication hub. No need for extra site which duplicates existing functions.
Danny B. 19:32, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Separate mailing lists exist for similar reasons, so why bother having separate mailing lists for each WMF project than? Have everyone subscribe to meta-l at lists.wikimedia.org since Meta should be the communication hub for all projects. Wikipedia, Wikiquote and Wiktionary are all types of books, which duplicates the function of Wikibooks, so lets merge them too while we're at it. I see nothing wrong with having both a project hub like Old Wikisource and Beta Wikiversity and a WMF-wide hub like Meta. Already most WMF projects have a portal to allow visitors to see if a project exists in there language, which could be the starting point for WMF project hubs. Some purposes may be similar, but that doesn't make them duplications. I think a parallel could be drawn between Meta being like a National or State government with laws, policies and services that effect everyone within there borders, and Old Wikisource or Beta Wikiversity being like a local government with laws, policies and services that effect only the locals. Put another way foundation-l serves everyone, wikiversity-l serves Wikiversity, Meta serves everyone, Old Wikisource serves every Wikisource community, and Beta Wikiversity serves every Wikiversity community. I think the Incubator does a poor job of serving the needs of individual WMF projects in testing and in establishing interest new language projects. I think this failure is demonstrated by the many projects have closed. I see mainly Meta and Incubator contributors are having problems with projects like Beta Wikisource existing, why is that? I don't think giving reasons like Beta duplicates existing functions or preference for a different way of organizing things is going to sway anyone whose used Beta and prefers its approach over Incubator. A preference for one way of doing things over another should not justify closing a project in light of an active community who uses it and support its approach. --darklama 20:53, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
All closed projects are wikis that were created when there were just some voting about the opening of a new project, no real requirements were there. This has changed since the Langcom has existed, and has nothing to do with Incubator. --MF-W 13:41, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Indeed. Meta has for some time not served very well as a communication hub outside of its best use as a conduit between stewards and the projects. Beta.wv has on the other hand been serving quite well as a conduit between the existing projects and the potential projects, in large part because it is focused on the scope and content of the 'versities. All the wvs are messy because it takes a long time to build them and organize them, so of course beta will be messy too. The important thing is that it serves its function, and judging by some of the comments in favor of closing it I'd be quite concerned that this functionality will be lost in the merger. There's no stone tablet out there saying all discussions belong here or there, and as we've found on en.wv the best way to encourage content is to encourage people to make it wherever they're comfortable doing so. The "power struggle" atmosphere at meta is just the kind of thing we need to avoid (and most of the pro-closure comments are easily read in that light). Successful admins (custodians, etc.) on Wikiversity projects need to have a much lighter hand and different approach compared to the other projects, and I'm afraid I don't see any evidence of that here. --SB_Johnny|talk|books 09:22, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Rebuttals

Wikiversity Beta's achievements speaks for itself. Greek and Japanese and Czech wikiversities were hosted during its incubation, and had close supports by actual wikiversitians who know what the project is about. Please notice that, because of its community emphasis, it is harder to start a new wikiversity than any other language project, for it requires an active community of at least ten editors.

As for the arguments.

1. It's duplicate of Wikimedia Incubator 2. It's worse organized than Wikimedia Incubator (no prefixes) (-VVVasiliev)

1. No. 2. May be or may be not. Still, projects are expected to move out and content pages are to be deleted. That may be a cause for improvement of organisation and not for closure. We have had substantial discussions on this point on betawikiversity:wikiversity:babel. Why didn't you take part?
1. Oh, really? Prove how does Wikiversities Beta differs from Incubator projects — VasilievV 2 12:58, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Vasiliev VV, The burden of proof is on you, or, if I may say so, the prosecution. Hillgentleman 13:16, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

3. Support Many people don't understand where to put there new wikiversities. --OosWesThoesBes 16:48, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

There are much better solutions. Your suggestion is analogous to killing a frog with a bulldozer.
I don't understand that comparison... Anyway, people are confused they need to create new wikiversities somewhere else than Incubator. We have already needed to delete a few Wikiversities at Incubator. This discourages them... SPQRobin 21:21, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
In todays wikiverse every project is just 1 click away - I assume updating an appropriate (help-)page at incubator could solve this. Send them please to beta, we will gladly help them.
About the deleted WV pages - would be great if you point them - so we could evaluate if we should import them to beta. Thank you, ----Erkan Yilmaz (Wikiversity:Chat, wiki blog) 21:44, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This was done - see the import log at BetaWV. SPQRobin 17:53, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Wonderful, ----Erkan Yilmaz (Wikiversity:Chat, wiki blog) 08:45, 31 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
People are also always confused about which project there idea is most appropriate for, doesn't mean we should call for Wikipedia's closure. Confusion can be reduced by improving help pages and even refer on the main page, if it makes sense, people to Beta Wikiversity. Even with improvements, every wiki gets its fair share of visitors who are confused about where there contributions should go. --darklama 21:58, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

4. Support Incubator also has the test-admin group which allows more independence for the testprojects. --MF-W 16:50, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Wikiversity is a uniquely dynamic project in wikimedia; our goal is not only to produce black and white text but also to host learning communities and even original research. Incubator admins would not have the necessary experience.
That's logical - all people with experience of Wikiversity are now at BetaWV. If everyone works together on one wiki, we can bind our knowledge and share experience... SPQRobin 21:31, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The longer I think about it: this proposal was a bad way if the hope was to foster cooperation between (beta) Wikiversity and Incubator participants. There are so many means to achieve a goal. ----Erkan Yilmaz (Wikiversity:Chat, talk) 08:19, 7 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

5. Support because as far as I'm aware it would be better for the function of this Wiki to be merged into Meta and Incubator although I'm willing to reconsider should someone highlight a problem with doing so. Adambro 16:57, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

You are suggesting to split the policy discussions and incubations into two projects; having to jump from one wiki to another would be a nuissance for wikiversitians.
Eh, this is already the case. For example, all the requests at requests for new languages, and all information and policies of the language subcommittee. At Incubator we constantly need to point them at those pages when they ask questions... SPQRobin 21:16, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
As it is now, wikiversitians need only to focus their work in one site - betawikiversity:. Participants in new projects may need to come to meta occasionally to voice their opinions and perhaps share their experience, but usually they don't need to be bothered. Hillgentleman 17:15, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

6. Support - 1 place = much better organization of incubated projects, import, etc. Danny B.

No. See above.

7. Support That's a chaotic place. Voz da Verdade 21:01, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

How so? I suggest that you browse through our categories. All pages are carefully categorised.

Hillgentleman 09:11, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

9. Support - Incubator is more independent and more active ...--Cometstyles 12:51, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Why are such comparisons relavent at all? Of course incubator: is more active. It serves much more projects, and is much more chaotic proportionally. However it has nothing to do with betawikiversity:'s being a successful project. "Independent"? What do you mean by that? And how is incubator more independent than Beta and how is that relevant? Hillgentleman 13:22, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Some dependency is a good thing, because it allows people trying to create new Wikiversity language projects, to learn and share from the experience of other Wikiversity contributors and the Wikiversity language projects that have come before them. This allows for a better and more stable concept of the project early on and allows for a more accurate measure of when a project is ready to stand on its own. Being "independent" would mean that these useful benefits would be lost. Incubator's independence and lack of connection with any existing projects means that new language projects have to start from scratch without the benefit of other projects' experiences, and has resulted for other projects that use Incubator, in new projects being prematurely created and than closed. Also Beta Wikibooks provides a useful template for forming new Wikiversity projects and requires less initial work to begin new language projects. This means more activity can be focused on the proposed project's contents and less on how its going to work. --darklama 14:00, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

11. "Support Beta Wikiversity is catastrophically disorganised and isn't user friendly. Wikimedia Incubator, on the other hand, is much better in both ways. The creation of Beta Wikiversity was a huge mistake in the first place. Runningfridgesrule 16:25, 12 June 2008 (UTC)" - In your user-friendliness, which "users" are you talking about? So far in this discussion, actual wikiversitians (i.e. the users) favour beta over incubator, because it is a much friendly place! Hillgentleman 16:53, 12 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Other idea

I read in some oppose comments to incubate new Wikiversities at Incubator, but keep BetaWikiversity for coordination between the Wikiversities. I would like to see what support this would have. SPQRobin 18:14, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Support

  1. SPQRobin 18:14, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  2. Support I support this clever proposal, if the original proposal (i.e. the closure of Beta Wikiversity) will not be successful (i.e. the Beta will remain for some purpose) Prohlep 17:01, 20 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  3. Support. I think it's a good idea to divide labour between the two. 75.0.4.97 09:29, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  4. ...

Oppose

  1. Active participants from new wikiversities have expressed their preferences of beta. Imposing your opinions from outside is not the wiki way to go. Hillgentleman 18:30, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  2. This would mean that the helpers at beta would have to also watch yet another website (since beta will not be closed) which is additional effort. This could result perhaps that some now-active helpers wouldn't do this, which means a loss for the Wikiversity project since beta has a working community with specific knowledge regarding Wikiversity issues (which is not guaranteed at incubator). As far as I see beta is doing their job at "breeding" the Wikiversities - there are now recently created another 2 new WVs. Also many arguments and voices were given against this proposal which shows the community is active (since the proposal was introduced is just a little more than 2 days). I think this proposal has helped and will help that the beta community will foster even more. Thanks for this to all of you. Why change a system that is running and works ? Would be great to optimize incubator with their issues than trying to disrupt (this is how some might see this proposal) a working community. ----Erkan Yilmaz (Wikiversity:Chat, wiki blog) 18:55, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  3. Je reste sur la position que betawikiversité est le meilleur lieu pour faire naître les wikiversité puisqu'il y a une équipe qui suit tout ce qui s'y fait, qui peut répondre à des attentes. Lorsqu'une wikiversité nait, les utilisateurs ne quitte pas betawikiversité pour aller dans la nouvelle wikiversité, les wikiversité s'entraident entre-elle justement grâce au fait qu'il existe un lieu dédié pour cela. Crochet.david 19:02, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  4. As I see in the comments of the opposers of closing beta, many arguments are about the better environment of beta than incubator, but you still insist on creating new WVs in incubator, this just doesn't make sense. ---- (user_page|chit chat|email) 19:15, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  5. Helping to foster the development of new Wikiversities involves coordination, and less effort is involved with Beta where a community already exists to help booster involvement in new Wikiversities. Requiring projects to be instead started on Incubator would be disruptive to a process that works. I think any continuation of this proposal is a bad idea in light of there being support to keep Beta, there being an active Beta community and active development, and most of the discussion in favor of closing Wikiverisity seems to be centered around a preference for Incubator over Beta Wikiversity by Incubator participants. As a result some people might see this as Incubator denouncing Beta Wikiversity which would be against rule 11 of Closure of WMF projects. The same policy also states its preferable to address critical issues than to close projects, so how is any of the reasons for closing Beta Wikiversity of such a critical nature that the only way to resolve it is to close Beta Wikiversity? Also I think the scope of a project is outside of the language subcommittee's or Incubator's control to change, so if this has become a matter of scope than this needs to be discussed and decided elsewhere. --darklama 20:01, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  6. Not realistic. The proposed plan may duplicate works (basic policies should be provided for new language projects) and the community maintains it on betawikiversity. --Aphaia 05:19, 30 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  7. Oppose as above, because Beta is a better environment and a superior system for new project languages, far better than the Incubator. Other projects (Wikipedia, Wikibooks, etc.) should each have their own Beta instead of the Incubator. Finally, see my comment here regarding page-name conflicts. Dovi 05:47, 30 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A pragmatic point

Folks, If you want to start research or teaching even with external funding with wikiversity but you haven't got your own language project yet, would you rather host it on beta, with the support of wikiversitians, and the domain name "wikiversity.org", or on incubator? This is highly plausible, since Beta wikiversity has already been actively used as a teaching and studying tool (see, e.g. betawikiversity:category:pages by subject and betawikiversity:category:FI).Hillgentleman 02:49, 30 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Another pragmatic point

Could anybody please put a link to the project proposed for closure at the top of this page? Anybody visiting this page and not knowing about the project will have to roll down searching for a link to the place. Thank you. —91.107.2.128 14:47, 30 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Alternate solution for solving conflicts

Some have argued above that there were title conficts in Beta Wikiversity, for the simple reason that it curently does not use language code prefixes in its title names (for example Luxemburgish vs. Czech names for starting a "Geography" portal). However, the same people have argued that the various Betawiki pages were (normally) categorized by a language code (this remains to verify).

Is it possible to rename pages according to this categorizing to add the prefix and ease the transition, while also avoiding conflicts here?

If there's an issue with the compatibility of localized templates that use {{BASEPAGENAME}}, how can this be solved?

  • Why not using a language code suffix instead here (with the advantage that cross-language collaboration will be easier if they share some non-localized common templates or even some pages, that wold be localized only when needed after starting from a common default (note that such shared pages could be categorized here using all the relevant language codes)?
  • alternatively, we could use language code prefixes separated by a minus-hyphen '-' (or even a colon ':' if this does not conflicts with supported project codes) instead of a slash '/' to avoid the problem with BASEPAGENAME...

This would be interesting for example with regional language variants that have lot of common vocabularies or that are most mutually understandable (such as the regional variants of Italian, German, Russian, or for various creoles).

Verdy P 03:10, 12 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

On beta we know what we are doing, and I can explain it to you. However, this is not the place to discuss the matter. Please go to betawikiversity:wikiversity:babel if you want to know more about beta or to make suggestions. Hillgentleman 03:51, 12 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"This is not the place to discuss the matter" ! Hhhhuh!!!! How impolite such thing can be. I did not want to raise another issue, just to propose something which is relevant to this discussion, that is linked to here even from wikiversity and betawikiversity by a global notice at the top of pages.
Sorry then, but I will certainly not listen your order. Here nobody certainly "knows what we are doing", otherwise this discussion would have not taken place.
No, I have absolutely no opinion about which place is the best: Betawikiversity or incubator.
Anyway both places are made for testing things temporarily, they are not made to keep things permanently. However, moving things from one site to the other will not help: let's just wait until the evaluation ends for each (language/project) pair. So effectively, one or the other is comdemned to close sometime.
The only thing that I suggest is to keep the language evaluation more easily managed on the place where they are, to avoid collisions and problems between each tested project.
Next time avoid to use the "professoral" tone. I can certainly express myself my own opinion, and I have definitely NOT said to other to go elsewhere when giving their own. I was not taking any position on the existing "pros" and "cons" of the closure or keeping of Beta Wikiversity, but it's true that whatever the place, it needs better management of naming conventions to avoid collisions (Incubator has also suffered at the begining from exactly the same problems, and this has caused difficulties when migrating project out of Incubator, either because the language-specific project wiki was accepted and the Incubator data had to be cleaned, or because the beta project has been closed by decision, until further notice, and the Incubator also needed cleanup).
Anyway, the solutions needed on incubator or on betawikiversity are exactly the same, even if betwikiversity focuses only on a multilingual wikiversity, excluding other projects. But Wikiversity is also very to progress, in every language (including English) compared to other projects (my opinion is that Wikiversity as a whole is still a beta, in opposition to the other WMF projects tested on Incubator, whose objectives are much clearly defined). (My opinion that Wikiversity tries to duplicate the work made in Wikipedia, Wikitionnary for the linguistic departments, and Wikibooks for the creations of "lessons" will not be useful except for limited areas but not strictly divided per language).
Wikiversity problems are also contradicting some WMF rules: no private research or creation. As everything there can't find any reliable sources about the arbitrary choice of "lessons" and "chapters", it won't ever succeed. Tnis huge work seems really useless from the start (it's not even useful for the beginners, there's absolutely NO pedagocic method, or if one is used, it will contradict other methods used in other countries in official programs).
So unless the Wikiversity project is restructured and subdivided using the classicication of official programs used in various countries (then it can have relaible sources), it will never succeed.
In fact I don't like the term "Wikiversity", when it can just focus on very early levels for beginners; it won't provide any diploma. I would have much favored the term "Wikischool". For the universitary level, the more useful data are encyclopedic (Wikipedia is perfect), linguistic (Wiktionnary is perfect), publications and authors creations with signatures (or Wikibooks), or interest between history and news (Wikinews), and they all require judgement and research by readers, something that Wikiversity completely forgets, and in fact tries to avoid, taking its visitors for more stupid than what you want to call them: students (but where are effectively the qualified professors? Where are the students-professors interaction? How an you measure your progresses? Nowhere in Wikiversity. So may be it's not even a Wikischool, just a "Wikilessons for stupid beginners" and WV already violates the NPOV. Verdy P 15:38, 14 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Verdy, I understand your good intentions. But please be cool. The content organisation of Wikiversity Beta is certainly a community affair, and should be discussed in its proper context, inside the community, and certainly not imposed from outside on meta. That is why I suggested that you should visit Wikiversity Babel. And yes, your first suggestion is very similar to the way it works on beta. In fact, this perceived "problem" of wikiversity organisation was brought up by a new wikiversitian who wanted to use a pagename that had been used by another language. We had a little discussion on betawikiversity:wikiversity:babel and the matter is settled. Wikiversity organisational matters are internal affairs, and do you think meta-wikimedians or incubatorians who had rarely taken part in wikiversity can know better than experienced wikiversitians? This discussion is about Beta's merit as a whole, and not about a particular (soluble and solved) "problem". And any wikimedian who do not even try to understand the mission of wikiversity and the role of beta, fail to understand the way we work, ignore our solutions and still shout "problem! You can't solve it! You had better follow incubator!" is highly suspecious of argument from personal incredulity. :) Hillgentleman 19:36, 14 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
How impolite you can still be, when you are driving me to w:argument from ignorance. That's a way to say that I'm ignorant. I just proposed something to calm the dabates above, just because handling multilingual contents it has been experienced years ago in Meta and Commons, and also later on Incubator when it was created (and I also helped reorganizing things and recover from the initial namespace clash...)
I'm not ignorant of the subject I told just above initially which was only about your existing multilingual class that has been solved elsewhere. Verdy P 00:29, 15 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Verdy, let's be cool. Argument from ignorance ("argumentum ad ignorantiam") is a technical term for a logical fallacy, with a specific meaning (a claim that a premise is true only because it has not been proven false or is only false because it has not been proven true. - from en. wikipedia) . It is about an argument and not about a person. And please notice that, even as I am referring to that wikipedia resource, the logical fallacy that I described is not, strictly speaking, argument from ignorance. Note also that neither have I said that you have committed that mistake, nor have I ever said or thought that you were ignorant. This is too far afield from the main discussion and I apologise if you feel that I am impolite or I have made you unhappy. You are a thoughtful wikimedian and it has never been my intention to upset you. Hillgentleman 09:28, 15 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
On the raison d'etre of the wikiversity project, enough has been said before. And yes, wikiversity tries to explore just outside the limits of NPOV (with its wikiversity:wikiversity:Disclosures idea) and NOR (with betawikiversity:wikiversity:research guidelines). Wikipedia, even with a straightforward goal, took 3-5 years to really take off. Wikiversity with its extra complexity and dynamics will probably take more. We don't know whether wikiversity will succeed. But we are happy to try. And it is fun.Hillgentleman 19:57, 14 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I still have doubts about Wikiversity as a whole, Beta or not (given the very poor policies and contents it is effectively hosting, and lack of organization. Anyway NPOV will remain a strong problem for your project if you structure it by language only, as it will be impossible to make normative references. I'd much prefer seeing it organized its departments by country and class level, and then by discipline, just like it is in the real life for schools and universities around the world, and then find ways for the various departments to collaborate and exchange contents. The initial goal of separating languages in unrelated domains is not necessarily the best, when there's need for multilingual classrooms (notably in linguistic departments); for the higher scholar levels like universitary levels (where monolingual classrooms, not necessarily the home language, are better), the raison d’être of departments in Wikiversity disappears when all is better organized and linked in Wikipedia with much higher quality and richness of contents, and probably a much better collaboration between the existing Wikipedias through Babel and Wikipedia embassies. Verdy P 00:29, 15 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Enough has been said on the limits of wikipedia, which is one of the things which sparked wikiversity. I need only say that wikipedia has a definite goal, to collect and distribute well-grounded information. But it is not a place for people across the globe to form learning communities, develop knowhows and explore the limits of the current state of the art. Hillgentleman 09:56, 15 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Look

Look, Wikiversitians should thank our interwiki friends for their valuable comments. However, many of the commenters, including the original proposer, missed two important points:

  • Beta uses the same simple subpage idea to organise its multilingual contents as this very Meta
  • Learning projects on Beta are NOT "test projects"; they are for real. For example, from the early days Ciprian (a Romanian professor) has been using beta to teach his courses in computer science. And this fact alone makes the incubator and its naming convention unwieldy and unsuitable. And we can also see that the scope of beta cannot be covered by the union of meta and incubator. Hillgentleman 17:21, 12 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If it's to be used as a convenience for a signle professor in a single school, the solution is definitely not a WMF-hosted project, but to say that such projects should be installed using Mediawiki on some other local website in its own domain: it's up to the professor then to manage the contributions and its students. Up to him to manage its own naming conventions...
This is creative work, not beta and effectively real, but not managed in a way that can permit useful cooperation, because it requires unbalanced roles. Wikiversity is not a free test lab for use by some professors ans its students in classrooms. Verdy P 15:45, 14 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"Wikiversity is not a free test lab for use by some professors ans its students in classrooms." - (beta) Wikiversity can be used by anybody for their learning - let it be an individuum or a group (why not even for vandals ?). We are a learning environment - what can not be considered learning ? I hope people do not view (beta) Wikiversity as "just" another Wikibooks or another Wikipedia. On other Wikimedia projects some ideas can get disturbed right at begin - but we welcome them. More about Wikiversity's mission. ----Erkan Yilmaz (Wikiversity:Chat, talk) 18:22, 14 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Verdy, I am confused by your statement that "This is creative work, not beta and effectively real, but not managed in a way that can permit useful cooperation, because it requires unbalanced roles.". Can you be more specific? Further, I am afraid that you have missed the point. Apologies for not having been clear enough. Let me put it this way: One of Wikiversity Beta's principal goals is to encourage development of wikiversity language projects, and to provide space for them to gain critical mass. If, in this happy case, an academic wants to use wikiversity to do some real teaching or research, but the participants in his language has not reached critical mass to develop into an independent project, Beta is happy to be his host. And I can safely say that academics usually have little time or mood to follow any sophisticated naming convention. Our goal is to attract them and give them the most freedom to do what they want to do; We don't want to drive them away. Notice that "Wikiversity Beta" is just a name, and in practice has little to do with the "beta phase" in software development.Hillgentleman 19:22, 14 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I had already understood your intent (Wikiverity Beta is not beta software), but this is still the way it is used most of the time: individual works, with little intent to collaborate except within some defined wamll groups. And it is used for fund by the students of some classroom, or just to allow some professor to post their work without even taking any effort in formatting it or making it usable by other people (so I've seen things like dates of exams, locations of classrooms, agendas, results of a test (but without the questions, or the complete corrections), that only interests the students in a specific school... This does not even have any pedagocic value for other similar classrooms in the same discipline and in the same country and language.
Really, if you want Wikiversity to take off, reconsider it from a pedagogic point of view. And also describe a policy for allowing newcomers to start experimenting in a "safe" place, but then progressively migrate their work to the true Wikiversity departments with a better structure than just a (early broken) linguistic division. May be this is the raison d'être of Beta Wikiversity to accept newcomers, so that they create initial contents, that may be dropped later (in any language, inclusing those with official Wikiversity wikis open). But I think that you'll soon be exposed to maintenance problems dut to lack of volonteers, that are split in separate groups.
Look for example how a better project could be developed rapidly to something usable: Wikispecies. This is a perfect department of knowledge, that is well structured, made accessible from a multilingual point of view, and with links to all other relevant ressources on WMF projects (most often Wikipedias and Commons, but also Wikitionaries). It is rather stable, and already a very dense source of information and classification. You may argue that this was a specific project, but the way i perceive the works needed from a pedagocic point of view is that each department of knowledge will have its specific structure as well, where the lingual subdivision in separate communities does not offer something better for users, and does not help reaching the critical mass.
The subdivision per language was made too soon in Wikiversity that should have remained multilingual on a single site before some languages were distinguished for simplicity, when they reach a large enough mass (for now I think it would just concern English, and only in some specific departments, and I'm not sure that such split should exclude other languages from the detached subproject: the separate department, for example mathematics, should remain multinlingual as well until it reaches a critical mass as well...) Verdy P 00:47, 15 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Disagree entirely that Wikispecies is truly multilingual. The Mediawiki software does not fully support multilingualism on a single wiki, period. And it may still take many years until it does. It is extremely difficult in a place like Commons, for instance, to create language-specific communities and materials like those on single-language wikis. (This may be OK, however, because Commons is meant to create materials shared across languages and not to support such communities.) On Wikispecies this hardly exists either. Plus, there are languages that are not supported at all (such as RTL languages Hebrew, Arabic), and therefore do not function at all (or with great difficulty) on Commons, Wikispecies, Incubator, or here at Meta.
The Mediawiki software does, however, completely support multilingual communities when divided into individual languages. Thank goodness that Wikiversity was designed from the beginning with language subdivisions. You are also mistaken that languages using Wikiversity Beta or "Old" Wikisource are only temporary. On the contrary, they are real language projects producing real materials from the very moment they begin (and not just waiting to hatch in an "incubator"). Some will eventually be able to move to wikis for their own language and will want to do so, and some will not. Some will even choose, for their own reasons, to remain at the central wiki for good (such as Hindi at wikisource.org). What is good is that all of them, from the very beginning, work within the sphere of the relevant project (Wikiversity, Wikisource) as fully true and legitimate parts of that project. They are not just unhatched eggs.
It is time for this proposal to be finally be ditched. Dovi 06:15, 15 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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no.--Terveisin:CHELLBER 114 (Keskustele) 18:41, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]