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Difference between revisions of "Talk:Countries and regions"

(Language discussions: The reason for non-English discussion pages having English titles is so that us English speakers can spot when someone's made a non-discussion page in a foreign language. I)
m (Language discussions: The reason for non-English discussion pages having English titles is so that us English speakers can spot when someone's made a non-discussion page in a foreign language. I)
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:(In Latin America, Brazil is the only country that speaks Portuguese.)
 
:(In Latin America, Brazil is the only country that speaks Portuguese.)
  
:The reason for non-English discussion pages having English titles is so that us English speakers can spot when someone's made a non-discussion page in a foreign language.  If someone makes a page called "ฟต์แวร์", I can't tell if that's ok or not.  But if that page is "Discuss this wiki in Thai", then I know that's grand.  I'll still have difficulty separating spam from real discussion :-) but that's a risk I'll take.
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:The reason for non-English discussion pages having English titles is so that us English speakers can spot when someone's made a non-discussion page in a foreign language.  If someone makes a page called "ฟต์แวร์", I can't tell if that's ok or not.  I can't even tell if it's spam or not.  But if that page is "Discuss this wiki in Thai", then I know that's grand.  I'll still have difficulty separating spam from real discussion on that one page :-) but that's a risk I'll take.
  
 
:(FWIW: the original plan for dealing with other languages was that we'd soon have an fr.swpat.org, es.swpat.org, etc.  Seeing how much work it's been getting one wiki to this stage, I'm now wondering if there's a less ambitious / more achievable goal we could set for providing info in other languages.  Maybe this wiki should be in English and the endsoftwarepatents.org site should contain a few summaries which could be translated) [[User:Ciaran|Ciaran]] 12:22, 14 August 2009 (EDT)
 
:(FWIW: the original plan for dealing with other languages was that we'd soon have an fr.swpat.org, es.swpat.org, etc.  Seeing how much work it's been getting one wiki to this stage, I'm now wondering if there's a less ambitious / more achievable goal we could set for providing info in other languages.  Maybe this wiki should be in English and the endsoftwarepatents.org site should contain a few summaries which could be translated) [[User:Ciaran|Ciaran]] 12:22, 14 August 2009 (EDT)

Revision as of 12:23, 14 August 2009

The continent where New Zealand is

According to Wikipedia, New Zealand is on a continent called "Australia". I haven't looked into in which authorities agree or disagree, but I suspect this is an outdated nomenclature which isn't used by the average person on that continent (or at least, not by people in the countries other than the Commonwealth of Australia). Since I don't live there, I'm obviously open to correction. For now I've used the name "Oceania" for that continent. Yes, I know that "Oceania" has other meanings, but if there's no perfect answer, then I'll opt for the name the least likely to cause confusion/annoyance. Ciaran 05:41, 13 August 2009 (EDT)

I could not find a reference to New Zealand as a part of Australia. Wikipedia does seem inconsistent though. It says that:
  • Australia is both a country and a continent.
  • New Zealand is part of Zealandia, a continent nearly half the size of Australia that is otherwise almost completely submerged (I'd suggest Zealandia is a continental plate rather than a continent).
  • Oceania is treated as a continent.
  • Australasia is a region of Oceania and comprises Australia, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea (implying that Australia is part of the continent of Oceania).
  • "Continent" includes Australia, but not Zealandia or Oceania.
I'll bet the standard reference works are equally confused too. So I guess we can group things pretty much as we like. Given that Tuvalu hosts so many .tv domains, I wonder whether it's patent laws might be significant enough to be covered by ESP Wiki? If so, then "Oceania" is our best choice. If we are content to confine our Pacific coverage to Australia, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea then the other possible choice is "Australasia". steelpillow 08:01, 14 August 2009 (EDT)

Latin vs South America

Discussion moved from User talk:Ciaran

Would "Latin America" be better than "South America"? The former has been given a category, but the latter has not. steelpillow 16:40, 13 August 2009 (EDT)

I'm not really sure. I think the Latin America category is good since Mexico, Cuba and other central American countries are linguistically, culturally, and economically closer to South America than they are to the USA and Canada. By contrast, a "North America" or "Asia" category probably wouldn't be very useful since the countries in those regions are much less interdependent/homogeneous than the countries in Latin America (or Europe).
As for what label to use in the countries and regions table, I can't think of any strong reason to choose either over the other, except that if we use "Latin America", we'd have to change the "continent" column heading to something vague like "region". (I know "Oceania" isn't exactly a continent, but I put a note on Talk:countries and regions about that.) Ciaran 19:20, 13 August 2009 (EDT)
I think that "South-plus-Central", i.e. Latin, is culturally more sensible although Mexico's economic ties to the USA and Canada might lead to minor anomalies. Then, if we go for "Latin" and "North" Americas then we can put Mexico in whichever we prefer. I do not think there is a sensible substitute for the word "Continent". If we explain that we use it in a cultural sense as much as geographic, that would allow us leeway for both Latin America and Oceania. steelpillow 08:18, 14 August 2009 (EDT)
Ok, I've changed it to Latin America and added a note. Eventually, someone from central America will tell us if we've done the right thing or not. Ciaran 08:47, 14 August 2009 (EDT)

Language discussions

I added a new column linking to the "Discuss this wiki" pages for different languages. Please revert if you don't like it.

I don't know which countries speak Portuguese vs. Spanish, so I could only fill in half the list.

Also, wouldn't it be better if these pages were titled in the discussion language, for example "Discuss this wiki in French" should move to "Discutez ce wiki en Francais" (or whatever an educated Frenchman would say)?

steelpillow 12:13, 14 August 2009 (EDT)

(In Latin America, Brazil is the only country that speaks Portuguese.)
The reason for non-English discussion pages having English titles is so that us English speakers can spot when someone's made a non-discussion page in a foreign language. If someone makes a page called "ฟต์แวร์", I can't tell if that's ok or not. I can't even tell if it's spam or not. But if that page is "Discuss this wiki in Thai", then I know that's grand. I'll still have difficulty separating spam from real discussion on that one page :-) but that's a risk I'll take.
(FWIW: the original plan for dealing with other languages was that we'd soon have an fr.swpat.org, es.swpat.org, etc. Seeing how much work it's been getting one wiki to this stage, I'm now wondering if there's a less ambitious / more achievable goal we could set for providing info in other languages. Maybe this wiki should be in English and the endsoftwarepatents.org site should contain a few summaries which could be translated) Ciaran 12:22, 14 August 2009 (EDT)