Wiktionary:Votes/pl-2018-04/Disallowing appendix-only languages

Disallowing appendix-only languages
Voting on: Deleting Category:Appendix-only constructed languages and all its contents, by which I mean its subcategories, their subcategories and so on along with all pages in all these categories. The question of whether to let any of the affected languages into mainspace is not voted on here. Rationale: see Beer_parlour/2018/April.__Gamren (talk) 10:52, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

From WT:CFI, the following will be removed. However, the following ones should have lexicons in the Appendix namespace: Quenya, Sindarin, Klingon, and Orcish. __Gamren (talk) 15:01, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

Schedule:
 * Vote starts: 00:00, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Vote ends: 23:59, 5 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Vote created: Gamren (talk) 10:52, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Discussion:
 * [[Image:Wikt rei-artur3.svg|20px]] Beer_parlour/2018/April
 * See also Votes/2018-02/Moving Lojban entries to the Appendix

Support

 * 1)  As vote-starter.__Gamren (talk) 11:39, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 2)  --Vahag (talk) 16:18, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 3)  It's an arbitrary symbolic but not practical exclusion.--Prosfilaes (talk) 21:43, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

Oppose

 * 1)  The wholesale removal of entire languages with communities of speakers is, in my opinion, antithetical to the basic vision of Wiktionary. Given practically all the material under consideration is verifiable, and most of it is readily attestable in use in texts and corpora, I also do not see what useful purpose mass deletion would serve. (Lojban has a corpus in which its words can be checked for attestation and usage; Quenya, Sindarin, Klingon, and likely others have published texts in which the same can be done.) Furthermore, such deletion would leave us lacking entries for etyma of attested terms in natural languages that were borrowed from these constructed languages. Overall, the rationale that the information is ‘unverifiable’, and that the only sources available are prescriptive, is demonstrably false for the biggest languages affected by this proposal. On a different note, the proposal doesn’t specify how the text of WT:CFI is to be amended to conform to it. As it currently stands, it would apparently delete all the material in the appendix but still allow the subsequent re-creation of much of it, following CFI. — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 14:10, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
 * I amended the proposal, is this acceptable?__Gamren (talk) 15:01, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes, that resolves that part of my objection. — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 20:31, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 1) . A proposal that is really against the aims of Wiktionary, and which would make our entries less useful. I recently started a vote to move Lojban into the appendix so that I could save our content, which couldn't survive in mainspace. The idea that someone would want to simply delete all that content wholesale is exceedingly distasteful. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 16:22, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
 * The results of a small experiment by Vorziblix told of here would seem to show that most of our Lojban entries would survive just fine in mainspace.__Gamren (talk) 18:55, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
 * , you seem to have given the wrong link. Also, your reasoning is absurd: you seem to support making them LDLs, and you want to achieve that by deleting them. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 22:25, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
 * I meant to link here, sorry. And I don't see the absurdity of my position. I support keeping and adding words that are verifiably in use. I oppose keeping and adding words that are not. As far as I can tell, these appendices are not required to satisfy any criteria for inclusion whatsoever', so User:Gamren/Appendix:Lojban/æ'µobli is fine, yes?__Gamren (talk) 05:33, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * such a word ( æ'µobli ) would properly be deleted as it does not fit the criteria for a Lojban word, as it would be deleted as an English word. It may not be deleted quickly, as it may not come to the attention of Lojban maintainers. Perhaps that points to the need for tools such as Recent Changes to a particular Appendix.  I certainly would monitor such a recent changes page (if it existed) to verify that the Lojban appendix (or Lojban in mainspace) were accurate.  Jawitkien (talk) 13:18, 25 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Here you go.__Gamren (talk) 05:33, 1 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Thank you greatly :) Jawitkien (talk) 14:03, 1 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Re: "[...] to move Lojban into the appendix so that I could save our content, which couldn't survive in mainspace": Not really. The content could have survived in mainspace just fine, as long as relaxed verification criteria were provided. And relaxed verification criteria will have to be provided anyway, regardless of the location. No one has explained to my satisfaction why appendix space is better than mainspace with a badge of shame and different inclusion criteria. --Dan Polansky (talk) 07:49, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 1) . Maybe I would support moving them all to the mainspace. This would mean technically disallowing appendix-only languages. But don't delete them altogether. --Daniel Carrero (talk) 17:30, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
 * The sad thing (to me) is that the move to an appendix (which has already happened) from mainspace deleted some content already (especially some phrases with embedded blanks). To truly put Lojban back into mainspace like it was, will require looking at the backup the bot made prior to deleting entries. Not impossible, and if not done, just more work for the Lojbanistas at wiktionary.  Jawitkien (talk) 13:41, 25 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 1)  -Xbony2 (talk) 22:20, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 2) .  Seems contrary to the mission of the site, as stated above. --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 04:46, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Could you elaborate on what you feel our mission is, and how this proposal is contrary to it?__Gamren (talk) 05:33, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * There isn't much to say that either Vorziblix and Metaknowledge hasn't said. But, to be somewhat platitudinous, the goal here, it seems to me, is to document credible, verifiable language to the best of our ability.  There should be space for constructed languages on here somwhere.  I won't try to rehash the debate and complications about conlangs, but in any case we voted previously to move Lobjan from the mainspace with the others listed, so to disallow them from the Appendix at this juncture would mean deletion of the language(s, potentially), which doesn't uphold the goal I mentioned. Whether the Appendix is ideal for this purpose, I'm not sure. Maybe something radical (like a conlang namespace or something) would be better, if possible. But as this are, I'd rather keep the languages in the Appendix than delete them altogether, which seems needless. --SanctMinimalicen (talk) 23:37, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 1)  I like having notable constructed languages listed on Wiktionary. And I like having them out of the main namespace. So an appendix seems like the appropriate place to keep them. The vote at the moment calls simply for their deletion from the appendices without proposing a new place to store them, so I am against it. -Stelio (talk) 07:15, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Then perhaps I should have handled this differently.__Gamren (talk) 09:57, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 1) . LDL languages are included based on a mere single mention per entry. Similarly, it does no harm when e.g. Sindarin is included on a similar weak verification basis. Moving them all to the mainspace with a badge of shame is an alternative. I do support that verification criteria be applied to these languages, even if relaxed verification criteria. These languages are marginal lexicography but still lexicography. I do not support inclusion of any and all constructed languages, but rather only a selected set based perhaps on notability or having ISO code. --Dan Polansky (talk) 08:02, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * If we do reinclude them in mainspace, should we (as in, the Lojban editors) not first check them all for compliance with whatever criteria we (hopefully) choose?__Gamren (talk) 09:57, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * (Please include # in your posts so that the numbering does not break. Thanks!) That's an if; the vote that passed makes it unlikely. What we should do in any case, I think, is this: 1) Agree on inclusion criteria for Lojban, 2) send suspect Lojban items to RFV even if they are outside of the mainspace, and require in RFV that the agreed criteria be substantiated via quotations of use or other sources under the pain of RFV-deletion. Absent agreement: 3) For Lojban items that can be verified neither in a non-archived corpus nor in a single mention, send them to RFV; there must be some verification. --Dan Polansky (talk) 10:05, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * (Thanks for the pointer.) Several voters there expressed concern that most lemmas would fail the CFI for WDL, which does not actually seem to be the case, so a new vote might fall differently. There does seem to be opposition against conlang LDLs.__Gamren (talk) 10:40, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * In fact, let's ask them. and let's say  too: reading the latest thing Vorziblix wrote in BP, would you vote to return Lojban to its WDL, mainspace status? Currently, Lojban lemmata are not subject to any criteria for inclusion.__Gamren (talk) 10:55, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Is the website Vorziblix liked to drawn from durably archived works? If so, then the amount of durably archived Lojban material is greater than I thought, probably enough to attest all important cmavo (structure words), a good number of gismu (basic content words), and some lujvo (compound words) under CFI. If it isn't drawn from durably archived works, then not much has changed: we already knew there was lots of non-durably-archived Lojban online. —Granger (talk · contribs) 11:56, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * It's mainly drawn from mailing lists, IRC chats, and other non-durably archived sources. We would need to significantly change what sources we accept for attestation for this to be useful. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 15:11, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Forgive my ignorance, but if the texts are durably archived at korp.alexburka.com, what does it matter whether the sources are? Wouldn't it remain there when the original source was deleted?__Gamren (talk) 16:06, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * What if korp.alexburka.com gets deleted? —Granger (talk · contribs) 16:09, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Internet Archive can be considered somewhat reliable and may be used.--Zcreator alt (talk) 16:15, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * The Internet Archive has been discussed before and is not considered durably archived. And besides, korp.alexburka.com can't be usefully saved with the Internet Archive as far as I can tell—when I search for "muvdu" at https://web.archive.org/web/20170417090513/https://korp.alexburka.com/, it doesn't show me any results. —Granger (talk · contribs) 16:20, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 1) since I was invited here. I'm not really sure if this should be in CFI as written; perhaps a free license to add well-sourced and at least somewhat well-documented constructed languages in the Appendix namespace would be more to my taste. (Basically wording that allows "established" constructed languages but disallows ones that people made up in a day.) This, that and the other (talk) 22:52, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 2)  —  [ זכריה קהת ] Zack. — 01:24, 11 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 3)  per above. This is one of the things I love best about Wiktionary. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 19:52, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 4)  Jeuvke (talk) 11:49, 18 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 5)  The Lojban entries specifically are what drew me to wiktionary. I was actively working to cross-link and improve them last year. I had family issues, when I came back, to my surprise, they were gone.  Reading around, I found they have been moved to an Appendix.  Some of the markup I have made using standard templates (ux, etc) no longer works. Needless to say, this is frustrating.  If there were no people interested in a language, I could see abolishing it, but Lojban specifically has been actively used by a language community.  Unfortunately, there are more Lojban speakers than some dying natural languages Jawitkien (talk) 13:12, 25 May 2018 (UTC)
 * But then you agree that it would be better to have them in the mainspace than in Appendix, yes?__Gamren (talk) 19:04, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
 * of course I think they should be in mainspace. I have tried to do the best I can with them in the Appendix, but things that used to work like "ux" don't work in an Appendix (they wrap too many "{l|" wrappers around the words. My only surmisal was that someone wanted immediate movement on the Lojban issue rather than moving slowly and carefully Jawitkien (talk) 23:24, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
 * We've been discussing this since 2016, and discussion on what to do about the problems with attestation of Lojban entries has been going on since at least 2011. That's far from "immediate movement". —Granger (talk · contribs) 23:47, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
 * That's fair. I'm sure as a newbie, I didn't know where the discussion was happening, and I was focused on working the entries more than I was on where things were progressing. I'm sorry to accuse unjustly. Jawitkien (talk) 12:45, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
 * It's a good point that it can be hard to tell that a discussion is going on. In retrospect, maybe it would have been good to leave a note at Wiktionary talk:About Lojban to say that some of the discussions were happening. —Granger (talk · contribs) 13:40, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 1)  ←₰-→  Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk)  13:18, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 2)  Finsternish (talk) 09:51, 5 June 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't like conlangs but "all words in all languages". – Julia ☺ • formerly Gormflaith • 11:34, 7 June 2018 (UTC) Oops, I thought it was still open. I'm not seeing a decision on the Votes/Active thing, even though the source seems like it should say "failed". – Julia ☺ • formerly Gormflaith • 11:38, 7 June 2018 (UTC)
 * fixed it. Per utramque cavernam 11:45, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

Abstain

 * 1) . I don't care. Appendix languages are essentially a garbage dump anyway. --WikiTiki89 14:05, 1 June 2018 (UTC)
 * so you don't care if a language is constructed or not? That's an interesting perspective. Once it is out of mainspace and in the Appendix part of wiktionary, do you see any path for it to be moved back into mainspace ? Jawitkien (talk) 21:55, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

Decision
Fails 3–14–1 (18% support from non-abstaining voters). Hopefully we can avoid further such votes that clearly have no support from the community and have not been sufficiently discussed. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 15:00, 6 June 2018 (UTC)
 * It seems that I may have gotten my time zones confused and closed this a bit too early; the result is extremely unlikely to change, but if any more votes are cast in the remaining time, we can still count them. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 15:02, 6 June 2018 (UTC)