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Requests for new languages/Wikipedia Coptic 3

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submitted verification final decision

This language has been verified as eligible.
The language is eligible for a project, which means that the subdomain can be created once there is an active community and a localized interface, as described in the language proposal policy. You can discuss the creation of this language project on this page.

Once the criteria are met, the language committee can proceed with the approval and will verify the test project content with a reliable neutral source, such as a professor or expert.

If you think the criteria are met, but the project is still waiting for approval, feel free to notify the committee and ask them to consider its approval.

A committee member provided the following comment:

Eligible per langcom discussion. --MF-W 15:44, 29 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • The community needs to develop an active test project; it must remain active until approval (automated statistics, recent changes). It is generally considered active if the analysis lists at least three active, not-grayed-out editors listed in the sections for the previous few months.
  • The community needs to complete required MediaWiki interface translations in that language (about localization, translatewiki, check completion).
  • The community needs to discuss and complete the settings table below:
What Value Example / Explanation
Proposal
Language code cop (SIL, Glottolog) A valid ISO 639-1 or 639-3 language code, like "fr", "de", "nso", ...
Language name Coptic Language name in English
Language name ⲙⲉⲧⲣⲉⲙ̀ⲛⲭⲏⲙⲓ Language name in your language. This will appear in the language list on Special:Preferences, in the interwiki sidebar on other wikis, ...
Language Wikidata item Q36155 - item has currently the following values:
 Item about the language at Wikidata. It would normally include the Wikimedia language code, name of the language, etc. Please complete at Wikidata if needed.
Directionality LTR Is the language written from left to right (LTR) or from right to left (RTL)?
Links Links to previous requests, or references to external websites or documents.
Site URL cop.wikipedia.org langcode.wikiproject.org

Settings
Project name ⲃⲓⲕⲓⲡⲁⲓⲇⲉⲓⲁ "Wikipedia" in your language
Project namespace ⲃⲓⲕⲓⲡⲁⲓⲇⲉⲓⲁ usually the same as the project name
Project talk namespace "Wikipedia talk" (the discussion namespace of the project namespace)
Enable uploads yes Default is "no". Preferably, files should be uploaded to Commons.
If you want, you can enable local file uploading, either by any user ("yes") or by administrators only ("admin").
Notes: (1) This setting can be changed afterwards. The setting can only be "yes" or "admin" at approval if the test creates an Exemption Doctrine Policy (EDP) first. (2) Files on Commons can be used on all Wikis. (3) Uploading fair-use images is not allowed on Commons (more info). (4) Localisation to your language may be insufficient on Commons.
Optional settings
Project logo File:wikipedia-logo-v2-en.png This needs to be an SVG image (instructions for logo creation).
Default project timezone Africa/Cairo "Continent/City", e.g. "Europe/Brussels" or "America/Mexico City" (see list of valid timezones)
Additional namespaces For example, a Wikisource would need "Page", "Page talk", "Index", "Index talk", "Author", "Author talk".
Additional settings Anything else that should be set
Once settings are finalized, a committee member will submit a Phabricator task requesting creation of the wiki. (This will include everything automatically, except the additional namespaces/settings.) After the task is created, it should be linked to in a comment under "final decision" above.

Proposal

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Previously it has been said that the language is dead and has no native speakers, however, there are ~300 native speakers which still use it in their families, as you can see here and here. There are problems with the ISO 639 data which considers the language as dead, therefore it is not. --Ochilov (talk) 17:26, 15 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion

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Arguments in favour

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  1. Support Let's not let this language die! --Ochilov (talk) 17:26, 15 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
    It's died already. --Wolverène (talk) 11:06, 23 July 2017 (UTC
    Depends :) Ethnologue marked Coptic as Dormant (not Dead), as it is still used by church (similar to the Latin status). -- ⲡⲓⲙⲟⲩⲓ (talk) 10:00, 12 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  2. Support, if anybody will edit this wiki. Ilya Drakonov (talk) 17:35, 15 March 2016 (UTC).[reply]
  3. Support, I guess that the Coptic Wikipedia has to exist in families of Wikipedia. Kotika (talk)
  4. Support, if it is not dead, no problem to give a chance. What is the worst it could happen? We close it?--Alexmar983 (talk) 03:59, 16 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  5. Support, Languages dead. --Mtherwjs (talk) 04:16, 16 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  6. Support, Satnam S Virdi (talk) 06:48, 16 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  7. Support, Vyacheslav84 (talk) 16:12, 20 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  8. Support, I can not understand Wikimedia policy - better slangs like Jamaikan Creole, Fiji Hindi or Tok Pisin rather than significant, sacred languages... In fact, incubator projects in these languages (like Coptic, Ancient Greek, Livonian, Prussian (ex-incubator wiki)) are much better maintained than wikis in so called "creole" languages... A language musn't be spoken everyday to be a cultural language - good example is Sanskrit which never was a spoken language but all serious Indian literature have been created only in Sanskrit. Plebeity - that's Wikimedia policy... Hugo.arg (talk) 07:30, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    We shouldn't think that those who speak creole languages are somewhat retarded or smth. --Wolverène (talk) 23:27, 20 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  9. Support, --ⲡⲓⲙⲟⲩⲓ (talk) 01:21, 4 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  10. Support, --Ayour2002 (talk) 11:47, 16 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  11. Support, --Danishjaveed (talk) 00:16, 21 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  12. Strong Support per Hugo.arg, Coptic Wikipedia is far better maintained and far more active than many of the small wikis with fewer than 50 active editors. Same goes for Ancient Greek Wikipedia, which I hope to see launched out of Incubator too. Voltairacus (talk) 21:45, 6 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  13. Support --PastelKos (talk) 12:21, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  14. Support Memkompreneble necesas al Vikipediujo ankaŭ kopta versio!! La kopta lingvo nombriĝas inter la plej altvaloraj lingvoj antikvaj de la mondo kaj ĝi estas identecilo por la multo da egiptaj kristanoj - ĝi ja estas daŭre en liturgia uzo se mi ne eraras. Ankaŭ la alfabeto ege interesas. Ekzakte la samaj argumentoj kiuj validas kaj valoras por havo de malnovgreka Vikipedio aplikeblas ankaŭ por kopta versio. Mi volonte helpus verkadi artikolojn se mi regus la koptan. -- Giorno2 (talk) 18:52, 11 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  15. Support, --Parsehos (talk) 17:13, 4 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Arguments against

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  1. Against A language spoken by ~300 people is destinated to die in less than one generation and we don't know how many editors would have this project, so I think that it's not the case to open a Wikipedia with probably a few or no edits in a normal week. --Gce (talk) 22:04, 28 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  2. My vote against (actually kind of skepticism) will not change anything, 'cause the LangCom veryfied it already as eligible. It's just still unclear about the purpose of the wiki. A kind of experiment? This will not surprise anyone, it just will be the same unsuccessful story like it happened to Gothic or Church Slavonic Wikipedias : it's not even about dormant languages, it's about dormant Wikipedias. Language revival? Hebrew and Massachusett languages have been successfully revived without a help of Wikipedia. This should depend on the Coptic community and/or diaspora IRL, nothing would force Copts to study and regularly speak their traditional language without their wish. Creating an "online centre" for language revitalisation activists? Reminds me the case with the Votic Wikipedia : the Language Committee refrained from the opening of this project because the game "Let's speak a language we don't actually do and invent a new grammar for it!" is not about the sharing knowledge with the world. --Wolverène (talk) 23:27, 20 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  3. Oppose as the language has an extremely small number of speakers, meaning there is not much practical use in having a Wikipedia in this language. Rubbish computer (Talk: Contribs) 12:30, 1 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

General discussion

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