I'm curious if any editors would be interested in a Translatathon (portmanteau of "translate" and "marathon"), a Wikipedia competition encouraging multilingual editors to translate and promote Good- or Featured-class English Wikipedia articles at other language projects. For example, an editor might earn points for translating and promoting Grammy Award for Best Disco Recording ( at English Wikipedia) to quality status at Spanish Wikipedia (exists, but not quality status), or German Wikipedia (does not exist). This seems like a great way to get quality content developed at other language projects, and I'm not sure there are major translation competitions or initiatives hosted here at English Wikipedia. Might be fun to organize a one-month pilot competition. Of course, I'm open to other names, rules, judging, forms of recognition (barnstars?), etc. I just wanted to float the idea here and see if any other editors had thoughts or previous experience to share.
Thanks! ---Another Believer (Talk) 22:58, 19 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- Given that the Village Pump is a page that attracts a lot of new and new-ish editors who aren't necessarily familiar with all our policies, just a few reminders to anyone considering taking part in this (or just inspired to start translating):
- Don't even consider posting unedited machine translations into the Wikipedia article space unless you have a particular urge to be indefblocked (if you're not fluent in both languages, don't consider translating articles between Wikipedias);
- Anything translated must credit what you translated it from in the first edit summary, or it will be treated as a copyright violation;
- It's strongly recommended to put the {{translated page}} template on the talk page of any article you create here;
- If you're translating from another language to en-wiki, bear in mind that our rules on sourcing are generally much stricter than those of the other Wikipedias, and you need to check the sources in the article to confirm that they actually conform to our definition of "reliable source" (and also that they actually say what the article claims they say);
- If you're translating from en-wiki to another language, bear in mind that each Wikipedia has different policies and procedures for how they handle incoming translations, a list of which can be found here.
- By no means let any of the above put you off, but be careful; translation has a long history of getting people into trouble very quickly if they're not sure what they're doing. ‑ Iridescent 00:44, 20 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- Iridescent, This is all incredibly helpful, thank you. I think part of what I envision is a relatively small but experienced group of editors who would be more than willing to adhere to these recommendations and organize their own activities, much like the Guild of Copy Editors, WikiCup, or some other variant of a WikiProject. I would not be opposed to having specific rules that require strict adherence to what you've outlined. The idea here is to establish a group of editors who are motivated to translate properly, support one another, and perhaps even form a sense of community. I'd love to participate in a project like this, but I only speak English, unfortunately. Thanks again for your feedback. I'm curious to read what others think as well. ---Another Believer (Talk) 00:51, 20 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- @Iridescent: a few things to keep in mind:
- Some projects (esp dewiki) make heavy use of transwiki history imports - so before starting over there get familiar with their requirements)
- To create a new article with WP:CXT here you must be extended confirmed, but you can work around this by creating it in Draft: space. We will not heavily "advertise" this (such as by putting up a banner) but it can be useful for organizers.
- If creating a page here, we can always bring in the original history from the other project (and again this is especially useful if it comes to here from dewiki). To do this, FIRST make your translated article here, THEN drop a request at WP:RFPI.
- Good luck! — xaosflux Talk 00:56, 20 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Tdslk: I know we've discussed translation projects before. I'm curious what you think about this, and specifically, if you have any insight into how the GOCE model could be applied here. If you're uninterested, no worries, just wanted to invite you to the conversation. ---Another Believer (Talk) 22:30, 20 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- Hi @Another Believer:! Yes, this is definitely something I am interested in. I think there is a lot of potential for projects and coordination of translation efforts across Wikipedias. I am a bit nervous about calling anything a "competition," though, except maybe for single best article. Anything that incentivizes quantity would run the risk of generating lots of poor-quality translated content. @Iridescent: points out some other important considerations around translation projects. Tdslk (talk) 05:45, 22 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- Tdslk, Totally understand re: "competition". But, isn't GOCE also a competition of sorts? Ditto the WikiCup, which seems to focus on quality. I'm just trying to think of a fun way to incentivize participation, and I'd definitely be open to whatever rules other editors think are best. Just getting the ball rolling here and trying to gauge interest. ---Another Believer (Talk) 14:29, 22 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- There are competitive awards associated with our drives, but they aren't taken very seriously by most participants. Even so, we still sometimes have problems when an editor decides to game the system for a barnstar. Policing a multilingual competition is inherently tricky; what if the winning editor is accused of making poor quality machine translations into, say, Esperanto? We'd need judges fluent in every Wikipedia language. It would be easier if we were only judging translations into English, but you suggest below that that is not what you have in mind. Anyway, I would be happy to discuss this further at another talk page as you suggest. Tdslk (talk) 19:20, 23 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- Another Believer, is your goal to "export" high-quality articles from the English Wikipedia? Or the other way around? The considerations are very different. For example, if you're "exporting", then none of the local rules about needing to make 500 edits before you can translate an article apply, and most editors will have access to machine translation (which is generally available English-to-other, but not other-to-English). WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:34, 22 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- WhatamIdoing, I guess I'm open to whatever, but I had envisioned translating good English Wikipedia articles into other languages, and having them promoted to quality status locally as well. I realize the processes of promoting quality content are content consistent across all projects, but again, this initiative is really just about translating quality content and creating/improving content at other projects. Again, I'm just getting the ball rolling here and I would welcome all to continue the conversation and determine project/competition goals/rules. If there is enough interest, I would welcome forking this conversation to Wikipedia:Translatathon or wherever. ---Another Believer (Talk) 17:39, 22 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- Right. So I think you need to talk to User:Amire80, who probably knows more about translation than anyone else.
- As for the competition aspect, creating 'missing' articles is often more valuable than updating an medium-quality one to good quality. It's also easier to measure. The new m:Programs & Events Dashboard might be useful for tracking participants. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:12, 22 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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