The mostly unending dialogs in wiki are quite puzzling (see for example the talk-page ‘hindouisme’). 

I have to recognize, having been for years insulted because I said i.e. that it does not suffice to add an ‘s’ to build plural in Sanskrit or because I dared to add the ‘scientific’ etymology of guru to the nirukta etymology ‘dispelling darkness’, I lost my temper and was blocked, having ‘implicitly’ insulted the guy, having presented an Original Research (my words: « La philosophie indienne est souvent décriée dans les milieux scientifiques comme trop bigote et je trouve important de montrer que ces préjugés ne sont pas fondés et que les indiens ne sont pas dénués d’esprit critique »  “Indian philosophy is often slandered in scientific world as too religious and I think it’s important to show that this prejudice is ill-founded and not every Indian is devoid of critical mind”) and having an ‘expert editor’ position (that’s bad and punishable!). 

Elisa won’t be surprised that the guy was actually involved in ‘neutralizing’ the accusations against Dieudonné

I think that if we don’t act/write against obscurantism, the next decades could become a bit difficult.

Sincerely yours,


Fabrice Duvinage
10, rue Alfred Mézières
54000 Nancy
0652825128
http://fabriceduvinage.voila.net/


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Today's Topics:

   1. Fwd:  fr.wikipedia and ohter non sa.wikipedia (Dominik Wujastyk)
   2. fr.Wikipedia and other non sa.wikipedia (elisa freschi)
   3. Re: fr.Wikipedia and other non sa.wikipedia (Jean-Luc Chevillard)


----------------------------------------------------------------------

Message: 1
Date: Thu, 30 Jan 2014 11:01:13 +0100
From: Dominik Wujastyk <wujastyk@gmail.com>
To: Indology <indology@list.indology.info>
Subject: [INDOLOGY] Fwd:  fr.wikipedia and ohter non sa.wikipedia
Message-ID:
        <CAKdt-CdAp0pXXOfzVja0gyFdjpkyeTK4ZAiEdbj0M1UuCL7ETQ@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"

If there is a taboo, I break it all the time.  :-)

I think Wikipedia is an amazing experiment.  It's got flaws, obviously, but
overall I consider it one of the most exciting developments in global
knowledge-sharing that's ever taken place.  Up there with Gutenberg,
surely.  I have an Android phone, which now understands spoken questions,
and often answers them from Wikipedia.  It's completely amazing to have an
encyclopedia in one's pocket.  And the whole model of globalized
collaborative writing is extraordinary, and new.

I was at a lecture a couple of years ago when the speaker was criticizing
something in one of the Wikpedia entries. I had a laptop, and before the
lecture was even finished, I had updated the Wikipedia page to reflect the
lecturer's corrections.  This kind of thing raises all sorts of interesting
new questions about the nature of academic knowlege storage and
transmission, what we trust, and how we manage our relationshop to our
sources.  The history-tracking feature of Wikipedia is absolutely critical
to its value.

There are fights in Wikipedia, of course, over contentious issues.  But the
system and the m
??
anagers address this issue of conflict, and surprisingly often,
? things calm down after a while.
I
?would?
imagine there's quite a struggle going on right now at
?fr.?
Wikipedia.
?org?
about Devadatta (Dieudonn?).
? [I checked, and yes there is.]?


An indological case in point is the Wikipedia account of the California
textbook controversy over Hindu history
dispute<https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=California_textbook_controversy_over_Hindu_history>that
started in 2005.  If you click "View history" you'll see how much of a
struggle there's been between factions.  It's been stable for quite a time
now, and it's short, factual, and the emotional and aggressive language of
the early versions has been purged and has stayed purged.  Numerous
sockpuppets <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sockpuppet_%28Internet%29> were
active in the early years, but they were eventually blocked by the
Wikipedia managers.  I would say that the CTCHH dispute is an example of
the Wikipedia system working rather well.  It took several years to work,
and the angry middle period was unpleasant.  One has to be patient in such
cases, and take the long view.

Best,
Dominik


On 29 January 2014 17:41, Fabrice Duvinage <fabrice.duvinage@gmail.com>wrote:

> Is there any taboo about contributing to Wikipedia? Though I guess many
> indologists are not against knowledge-sharing for free and improving the
> general knowledge about India, I am the only indologist/sanskritist in the
> fr.wikipedia and feel like hell about it  How is it in other wikis: en, de,
> etc,?
> Sincerely yours,
> Fabrice Duvinage
> 10, rue Alfred M?zi?res
> 54000 Nancy
> 0652825128
> http://fabriceduvinage.voila.net/
>
> _______________________________________________
> INDOLOGY mailing list
> INDOLOGY@list.indology.info
> http://listinfo.indology.info
>
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Message: 2
Date: Thu, 30 Jan 2014 11:22:48 +0100
From: elisa freschi <elisa.freschi@gmail.com>
To: Fabrice Duvinage <fabrice.duvinage@gmail.com>
Cc: Indology <indology@list.indology.info>
Subject: [INDOLOGY] fr.Wikipedia and other non sa.wikipedia
Message-ID: <5C0C32A3-5900-4B67-A75D-592FDF97DF67@gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"


Fabrice,

I do contribute to Wikipedia (and even write Indological reviews on Amazon or on PhilPapers) whenever I happen to read an article and find something incorrect in it, although I try hard to look for more reliable sources (e.g., the Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy). However, I never contributed to the Italian, French or German Indological sections of Wikipedia. Why so? Because they are much worse, as far as I can judge, than the English version and because I see no point in scattering energies through many Wikis. I understand that it makes sense to contribute to the, e.g., German Wiki when I have something important to add about Austrian Literature or about any other German-specific topic. But I do not think that there are enough Italian or German Indologists who do not read English. Nor am I ready to start to engage in a war against the English super-potency (although I can feel the paradox of preserving the Indian ideo-diversity while neglecting the European linguistic diversity). Further, quite frankly, French, Italian or German Indologists in fact need to be able to read English without any hesitation.
Long story short: perhaps you are the only one contributing to the French Wikipedia, but not the only French speaking Indologist who contributes to Wikipedia.

elisa


Dr. Elisa Freschi
Institute for the Cultural and Intellectual History of Asia
Austrian Academy of Sciences
Apostelgasse 23
1030 Vienna
Austria
Phone +43 1 51581 6433
Fax +43 1 51581 6410
http://elisafreschi.com
http://oeaw.academia.edu/elisafreschi

On 30/gen/2014, at 11:01, Dominik Wujastyk wrote:

> If there is a taboo, I break it all the time.  :-)
>
> I think Wikipedia is an amazing experiment.  It's got flaws, obviously, but overall I consider it one of the most exciting developments in global knowledge-sharing that's ever taken place.  Up there with Gutenberg, surely.  I have an Android phone, which now understands spoken questions, and often answers them from Wikipedia.  It's completely amazing to have an encyclopedia in one's pocket.  And the whole model of globalized collaborative writing is extraordinary, and new.
>
> I was at a lecture a couple of years ago when the speaker was criticizing something in one of the Wikpedia entries. I had a laptop, and before the lecture was even finished, I had updated the Wikipedia page to reflect the lecturer's corrections.  This kind of thing raises all sorts of interesting new questions about the nature of academic knowlege storage and transmission, what we trust, and how we manage our relationshop to our sources.  The history-tracking feature of Wikipedia is absolutely critical to its value.
>
> There are fights in Wikipedia, of course, over contentious issues.  But the system and the m ??anagers address this issue of conflict, and surprisingly often,? things calm down after a while. I  ?would? imagine there's quite a struggle going on right now at ?fr.?Wikipedia. ?org? about Devadatta (Dieudonn?). ? [I checked, and yes there is.]?
>
> An indological case in point is the Wikipedia account of the California textbook controversy over Hindu history dispute that started in 2005.  If you click "View history" you'll see how much of a struggle there's been between factions.  It's been stable for quite a time now, and it's short, factual, and the emotional and aggressive language of the early versions has been purged and has stayed purged.  Numerous sockpuppets were active in the early years, but they were eventually blocked by the Wikipedia managers.  I would say that the CTCHH dispute is an example of the Wikipedia system working rather well.  It took several years to work, and the angry middle period was unpleasant.  One has to be patient in such cases, and take the long view.
>
> Best,
> Dominik
>
>
> On 29 January 2014 17:41, Fabrice Duvinage <fabrice.duvinage@gmail.com> wrote:
> Is there any taboo about contributing to Wikipedia? Though I guess many indologists are not against knowledge-sharing for free and improving the general knowledge about India, I am the only indologist/sanskritist in the fr.wikipedia and feel like hell about it  How is it in other wikis: en, de, etc,?
>
> Sincerely yours,
> Fabrice Duvinage
> 10, rue Alfred M?zi?res
> 54000 Nancy
> 0652825128
> http://fabriceduvinage.voila.net/
>
> _______________________________________________
> INDOLOGY mailing list
> INDOLOGY@list.indology.info
> http://listinfo.indology.info
>
> _______________________________________________
> INDOLOGY mailing list
> INDOLOGY@list.indology.info
> http://listinfo.indology.info


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------------------------------

Message: 3
Date: Thu, 30 Jan 2014 13:06:33 +0100
From: Jean-Luc Chevillard <jean-luc.chevillard@univ-paris-diderot.fr>
To: Indology <indology@list.indology.info>
Subject: Re: [INDOLOGY] fr.Wikipedia and other non sa.wikipedia
Message-ID: <52EA4049.9030702@univ-paris-diderot.fr>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed

I have occasionally contributed to the Tamil Wikipedia
(and to other Wikipedias), although not frequently.

As an example,
the following page

"http://ta.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E0%AE%86%E0%AE%A3%E0%AF%8D%E0%AE%9F%E0%AF%81_%E0%AE%B5%E0%AE%9F%E0%AF%8D%E0%AE%9F%E0%AE%AE%E0%AF%8D_%E0%AE%85%E0%AE%9F%E0%AF%8D%E0%AE%9F%E0%AE%B5%E0%AE%A3%E0%AF%88"

(alias "http://ta.wikipedia.org/s/kk3")

was created by me,
at a time when I was cataloguing old Tamil books
which had belonged to the late T.V. Gopal Iyer (1926-2007).

Best wishes

-- Jean-Luc Chevillard


On 30/01/2014 11:22, elisa freschi wrote:
>
> Fabrice,
>
> I do contribute to Wikipedia (and even write Indological reviews on
> Amazon or on PhilPapers) whenever I happen to read an article and find
> something incorrect in it, although I try hard to look for more reliable
> sources (e.g., the Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy). However, I
> never contributed to the Italian, French or German Indological sections
> of Wikipedia. Why so? Because they are much worse, as far as I can
> judge, than the English version and because I see no point in scattering
> energies through many Wikis. I understand that it makes sense to
> contribute to the, e.g., German Wiki when I have something important to
> add about Austrian Literature or about any other German-specific topic.
> But I do not think that there are enough Italian or German Indologists
> who do not read English. Nor am I ready to start to engage in a war
> against the English super-potency (although I can feel the paradox of
> preserving the Indian ideo-diversity while neglecting the European
> linguistic diversity). Further, quite frankly, French, Italian or German
> Indologists in fact need to be able to read English without any hesitation.
> Long story short: perhaps you are the only one contributing to the
> French Wikipedia, but not the only French speaking Indologist who
> contributes to Wikipedia.
>
> elisa
>
>
> Dr. Elisa Freschi
> Institute for the Cultural and Intellectual History of Asia
> Austrian Academy of Sciences
> Apostelgasse 23
> 1030 Vienna
> Austria
> Phone +43 1 51581 6433
> Fax +43 1 51581 6410
> http://elisafreschi.com <http://elisafreschi.com/>
> http://oeaw.academia.edu/elisafreschi
>
> On 30/gen/2014, at 11:01, Dominik Wujastyk wrote:
>
>> If there is a taboo, I break it all the time.  :-)
>>
>> I think Wikipedia is an amazing experiment.  It's got flaws,
>> obviously, but overall I consider it one of the most exciting
>> developments in global knowledge-sharing that's ever taken place.  Up
>> there with Gutenberg, surely.  I have an Android phone, which now
>> understands spoken questions, and often answers them from Wikipedia.
>> It's completely amazing to have an encyclopedia in one's pocket.  And
>> the whole model of globalized collaborative writing is extraordinary,
>> and new.
>>
>> I was at a lecture a couple of years ago when the speaker was
>> criticizing something in one of the Wikpedia entries. I had a laptop,
>> and before the lecture was even finished, I had updated the Wikipedia
>> page to reflect the lecturer's corrections.  This kind of thing raises
>> all sorts of interesting new questions about the nature of academic
>> knowlege storage and transmission, what we trust, and how we manage
>> our relationshop to our sources.  The history-tracking feature of
>> Wikipedia is absolutely critical to its value.
>>
>> There are fights in Wikipedia, of course, over contentious issues.
>>  But the system and the m
>>  ??
>> anagers address this issue of conflict, and surprisingly often,
>> ? things calm down after a while.
>> I
>>  ?would?
>>  imagine there's quite a struggle going on right now at
>> ?fr.?
>> Wikipedia.
>>  ?org?
>>  about Devadatta (Dieudonn?).
>> ? [I checked, and yes there is.]?
>>
>>
>> An indological case in point is the Wikipedia account of the
>> California textbook controversy over Hindu history dispute
>> <https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=California_textbook_controversy_over_Hindu_history> that
>> started in 2005.  If you click "View history" you'll see how much of a
>> struggle there's been between factions.  It's been stable for quite a
>> time now, and it's short, factual, and the emotional and aggressive
>> language of the early versions has been purged and has stayed purged.
>> Numerous sockpuppets
>> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sockpuppet_%28Internet%29> were active
>> in the early years, but they were eventually blocked by the Wikipedia
>> managers.  I would say that the CTCHH dispute is an example of the
>> Wikipedia system working rather well.  It took several years to work,
>> and the angry middle period was unpleasant.  One has to be patient in
>> such cases, and take the long view.
>>
>> Best,
>> Dominik
>>
>>
>> On 29 January 2014 17:41, Fabrice Duvinage <fabrice.duvinage@gmail.com
>> <mailto:fabrice.duvinage@gmail.com>> wrote:
>>
>>     Is there any taboo about contributing to Wikipedia? Though I guess
>>     many indologists are not against knowledge-sharing for free and
>>     improving the general knowledge about India, I am the only
>>     indologist/sanskritist in the fr.wikipedia and feel like hell
>>     about it  How is it in other wikis: en, de, etc,?
>>
>>     Sincerely yours,
>>     Fabrice Duvinage
>>     10, rue Alfred M?zi?res
>>     54000 Nancy
>>     0652825128 <tel:0652825128>
>>     http://fabriceduvinage.voila.net/
>>
>>     _______________________________________________
>>     INDOLOGY mailing list
>>     INDOLOGY@list.indology.info <mailto:INDOLOGY@list.indology.info>
>>     http://listinfo.indology.info <http://listinfo.indology.info/>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> INDOLOGY mailing list
>> INDOLOGY@list.indology.info <mailto:INDOLOGY@list.indology.info>
>> http://listinfo.indology.info <http://listinfo.indology.info/>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> INDOLOGY mailing list
> INDOLOGY@list.indology.info
> http://listinfo.indology.info
>




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