Tell us about Simple English Wikipedia

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Simple Wikipedia

SEWP on ENWP – SEWP site

Questionaire

Contributors

Wikimedia Statistics can be difficult to interpret. What is your impression, how many steady contributors do you have?

Around 20 - 25

It is hard to say, because people leave, and others come along. I think we are about 20-25 people who contribute regularly.

Are your contributors mostly native speakers?

As a constructed language, native speakers do not exist. Most of our contributors are native or fluent speakers in English.

Where do your contributors live (regions/country)?

Probably America, but some European ones

The United States, Europe (mainly the UK, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland), Australia and Singapore

How common is it that your contributors meet in real life?

Not at all

There has never been a scheduled meetup, but there was once when two editors met up in London.

Other Wikipedias

Do you have special contacts with another Wikipedias (maybe in related languages)?

There is also Simple English Wiktionary, Wikiquote and Wikibooks.

Do you translate a lot from other Wikipedias? Which ones?

Yes, the English one mostly, but some French and German Wikis help us as well

Organization and support

Is there a Wikimedia chapter in your country? How does your language relate to it?

Not sure

We do not have enough active contributors to need to form a chapter; we don't have a large enough concentration.

Are there work groups in other organizations about Wikipedia?

Yes

Your Wikipedia and the linguistic community

Is there a language institution for your language, like an Academy, or a club of people interested in your language? Do you have contact with them?

English Wikipedia and the other SEWP above

Who (else) supports you?

Some of ENWP, other foreign projects

How looks your public outreach for your edition? Do you have flyers, give lectures, trainings etc.?

Nope, besides interwiki links on other articles

Do you get feedback from readers?

Rarely

What other encyclopedias exist in your language?

Simple English Wiktionary, Wikiquote and Wikibooks.

The Simple English Wikiquote and Wikibooks are both permanently locked.

Content

Does your edition concentrates on certain topics, like your region and language, or Latin Wikipedia on Roman history and Christianity?

No, we like to have all kinds of topics

The breadth of our topics depends on what the contributors want to add. We have an extensive amount of articles on Belgian municipalities and Romanian rivers, for instance.

We do not focus on a certain type of article; the Simple in Simple English refers to the language used, not the content.

Did your edition enjoy text donations, for example from older encyclopedias?

Many articles are derived from the English Wikipedia (which in some cases may have adopted from the 1911 Brittanica or other free ones), where we simplify the wording and sentence structure to Simple English. We discourage straight copy and pastes and will delete those.

Language

Is there a generally accepted norm about your language (spelling, dictionary, pronunciation)?

Yes, but there are differences between American and English spelling

How do you deal with different spellings, dialects etc. (like B.E. lift and A.E. elevator)?

Depends on who's writing the article. If an article is mostly in BE, it stays in BE

We generally rely on the English Wikipedia as our guide on how to name articles. Sometimes we keep articles at certain titles because of the incoming links to them.

Depends on where and what the article is about and where the writer is from. Articles about America should use American spelling, articles about Canada should use Canadian spelling and articles about other Anglophone countries (and the rest of the world) should use British spelling.