Use of languages other than English

[beowuuf]

it's only right and fair that everyone should be allowed to enjoy the forums equally

Agreed - we are obviously just passionately arguing about the right way for that to happen, as you say and as I hope everyone arguing realises you invest alot here. No one is shouting down your points on the merit or you personally - they merely have a passionate view on the subject too. That worries me, since if it is even partially based on emotional and not logical feeling, and yet we haven't had a debate or argument about it before, then it may mean what has happened previously been going on has worked and what is proposed now .

That of course might not have been true, but it seems the only hidden feelings that have come up in this debate is what adamo mentioned, about we haven't supported non-english translations enough - no one has passionately said they hated exclusive posts, merely that they have just ignored them

You feel that we should be inclusive all the time for all to equally enjoy the forum, which is valid. I saw it that, to equally enjoy the forum in a small community, we can all instead be equally exclusive in small amounts, as long as it is different people being exclusive for different reasons. A flashchat or forum runnign joke, a non-english chat, etc is fine as long as it happens in one place once, with different poeple. In that regard it is more the duty of all us regualrs, not non-english speakers, to ensure we don't get too carried away in others' threads outwith normal topics. Again, Gambit you have been the best of us to point this out when we don't notice it.

I think that while no one would complain, insisting on a common language all the time is inviting a constant niggle for all non-english speakers that may harm the forum in the background, while non-english posts are a temporary niggle to some of us, that in the end only harm only the posters because we won't reply and they don't get full community attention.

we may as well not have any moderators

There will be times when we might accidentally delete a genuine poster if he posts in a language no one knows and translates - I'm not completely liberal, I'd be guilty of doing just that to ensure they weren't a spammer. I just try to make sure that the guildelines around and the ones I stick to myself err on the side of caution and friendliness.

I guess you and I have said our bit, cows obviously has a more important thing to deal with right now than this, so I guess we can leave it to the other mods and the rest of the forum to say anything else they feel. We can pick this up again tomorrow if it is felt that a change is needed.

Anyway, as we were!

AS we were meaning we have a range of people with a range of feelings, thoughts, and knowledge as admins and mods who can ensure that we aren't excluding people - you are seen as a rules person merely because you tend to take on that difficult task more than the rest of us to ensure the forum and people can communicate freely without being irritated or mis-understood or expluded. I just hope that because we have a range of passionate opinions, that means we manage to muddle through to a good correct path. I think voting for one extreme or another invites the problems you and I have both outlined.

Anyway, goodnight for now! I've said too much and too little I think

[beowuuf]

It's an interesting point. I don't recall many other moderators jumping in to stop Trolling or stopping topics from getting a wee bit too personal.

Well said - it's true Gambit is the most active admin in this regard. While it might be verbose as PaulS is saying, at least we are discussing it because he raised the concern

[Gambit37]

Expluded? Nice typo!

I'm sleeping soon too. Next couple of days I'm viewing lots of flats and preparing for my new job on Monday, so I don't know when I'll respond further to this, but happy to leave it here for a while to see other people's views.

[Sophia]

it's only right and fair that everyone should be allowed to enjoy the forums equally

I agree with that. But! To me, it seems to increase access for those who are not so proficient in English (and thus increase their ability to enjoy the forums on an equal basis as more English-fluent people) if posts to them are made in their native language, with occasional paraphrasings/translations in English to allow those who don't speak that language to chime in and participate, and to make sure they're not being redundant. Isn't that fair to all?

[Gambit37]

Yes, it's a noble intention and for you or anyone else to discuss things in other people's native language -- that's commendable. The problem is that making concessions like this means that others are still left out. Having gone over some previous threads where foreign languages have been used, it's clear that summaries/paraphrasings are NOT happening and whole threads are completely off-limits to English speakers. That's just as bad as what we've been discussing.

If you can all ssure me that this won't happen again, we can see how things pan out.

[beowuuf]

I think that a similar straw poll is needed from the non-english speakers to see how many threads they feel exluded from by colloqueal english or UK/USA biased threads aswell.

If it really is a serious problem one way or the other, then it perhaps needs addressed, if it is happening equally as much, but not with a simple split in the forum, then it is I think acceptable - after all, it's only us high post counters that read every single forum thread all the time, surely! As long as there are enough new applicable topics to join in with, no one can feel left out.

[cowsmanaut]

Ok, let's put this out there.

We have a number of people who love DM, and would appreciate a site like this one, however, know about 5 words of english. So, they see there are some people here who speak "insert language here" and so think "Great, I can ask this question and maybe someone can answer it who knows more english and my language" so they post.

This person should absolutely be within their right to do that. It should also be within their right to have others respond in kind.

Now we could challenge the statement that if we ensure everything be in english, then we do exactly what you complain about Gambit. We prevent that person from being able to understand.What's worse is that we are preventing them from even the chance to feel at all comfortable here.

Perhaps it's my canadian attitude, that you can feel free to speak any language you like around me. If you are telling your friend I'm an ugly bastard, I don't much care. That simply makes you and A-hole. What should it matter to me?

I think many people unecesarrily get all uptight when they can't understand what someone near them is saying. This forum is a bit like a home away from home for many of us, and when others come in and leave messages we don't understand, we can feel like we are being excluded in our own place. I understand that feeling, however.. it's likley unfounded and unreasonable.

I personally would like as many people to come here and feel welcome as possible. I would find it a good sign to see threads that were entirely in german, or Japanese. A sign that we are expanding and accepting others even though we do not speak the same language, we can all share this place, and our love for this game. I would say that's commendable.

I personally think that an even better solution is to have a mod who speaks each of the languages we represent. I also think that many of us can use babelfish to get most of the info from posts in other languages. Which incidentally translates most of the common languages, including japanese... as an example, I was able to translate their entire conversation easily just now. I also, do not see the japanese characters.. just a lot of ??????? instead of symbols. Takes a short bit of effort, and you can read it.

SO, in conclusion.. I would like to say, that while it would be nice if people remembered to also provide and english translation. However, if they do not.. they should not be taken and flogged for it either. If they are in some way not capable... or somehow uncomfortable with their poor english skills. I do not want to force them to accomodate me. If I'm all that worried about it.. a quick trip to

http://babelfish.altavista.com/

will solve it for me. end of story.

that's my feelings on it.. but as I've said before.. I'm not the only one who should make decisions around here. My intent from the start was to share ownership of these forums with the other mods.

I just think that setting a mandatory english rule is going to make some people uncomfortable and less likley to share in this forum.

[Gambit37]

I already compromised on anything mandatory.

What I suggested was that if a thread is started in English it should remain in English. For me, that's good manners. Changing the language of a thread part way through is simply rude to the other contributors and I won't tolerate that. Clearly none of you agree with that view, but it's important to ME.

So, given that none of you agree with me, what is the way forward on this issue?

[beowuuf]

Given what has been said I do not think we can nor should have a 'this is how it will be and this is how we will move forward' decision for general cases.

On an instance by instance basis you, as a normal board member, can already ask for translations or can raise concerns to the person who has started the thread, as everyone can.

On an instance by instance basis we as mods and admins can certainly discuss a thread any of us have concerns over - if you want to continue the discussion on Tonari's thead explicitly we can do it in the moderator forum or in a seperate thread to seperate the issues.

Other than that, I can't see what more can be said - no one is uncomfortable with the situation previously, and no one has stepped forward feeling they would be championed by a shift in our moderating style in regards to non-engluish threads. However some people are uncomfortable, myself included, with this new need to have guidelines on non-english speaking in threads. I think that would imply that such guidelines are currently not needed. I believe we should allow the discussion to drop until such times as we do need a reactionary set of guidelines because of compliants from board members new or old.

Does this sound fair? And do we need to discuss the Tonari thread as a seperate instance that needs action?

[beowuuf]

My above post is written while very distracted at work and while I am tryign to concentrate on about two quality documents, so I hope no tone will be implied by anyone - I can't check it over

[Gambit37]

I'll go along with whatever happens next, but I *will* complain again if I feel that multi language threads are becoming detrimental to everyone's enjoyment of the board, and especially if the language of threads is changed part way through.

My original complaint is probably not specific enough, but the issue of CHANGING languages is my main complaint. I still maintain that this is rude and disrespectful and am frankly amazed that no one else shares this view.

[cowsmanaut]

How about a sub fora for questions in alternate languages. For those who wish to ask questions in annother language. They can refference the main thread in their post. However it should be clear that if they wish to speak in something other than english, they should post here. It should still be for registered users, to cut down on the potential spam. and also moderated by users who can speak the languages. As mentioned before, if there is a topic that is not understood by any of the mods, or by babelfish, we can then think about if it's potentially spam and delete it if needed.

I think this works as a good compromise and was suggested to me by someone here who has seen similar happenings the the forums she frequents where they all out tell them to go off and make their own forum in their own language. Which personally makes it sound cold.

Thoughts on this sub fora? Call it the international Thread, have sophia, trant, Adamo, and who ever wants to represent annother language or two on there. In the name add a few words in covered languages to attract them to that location to post.

This also gives us a place to put messages that go off into annother language. So at least they have a home, and for those who wish to continue in english.. they do not need worry about passing 10 posts in german, french, itallian, japanese, or whatever..

moo

[beowuuf]

For me the disagreement then seems to be that that I would view any changes in topic/language that don't aid the original poster of the thread to be rude unless you know the poster would not mind, while you view any such OT rude. So we basically agree except in what will hopefulyl be rare instances that can be resolved by talking directly to the originator of the thread.

Your feeling seems to be that any posts are the domain of the community as a whole, and no one should be excluded from participating in a thread. My feeling is that the post should be the domain of the poster, and that no one poster should feel excluded from explanding the community of posts with their own wide or narrow topic, as long as they don't make a habit of flooding the board with alot minimal interest/accessability posts in prominent forums.

I don't think either of these viewpoints are invalid, I would simply think we are focusing on the wrong problem. The point is that alot of the english spken posts are limited accessibility to other countries. For example, we post alot about 'have you seen this english-spoken tv series.' I would hope that other countries could post about their own shows too, even though they would be limited appeal topics, as everyone should be equally free to post topics - and besides, we then would have the rare opportunity to hear about good shows that we otherwise never hear of thanks to the limited distribution of TV around the world.

Anyway, I would prefer to archive this post, and create a new sticky post where people can post about all the niggles on the fourm. We could link top this discussion, put up adamo's request for non-english translations, and see if other topics get raised too.

[beowuuf]

Oops, double post - sorry cows!

Sub-forum - Personally I think that is a little against community spirit to section people off. That would be like, on a night out, if two people at the table start speaking their own language for a moment in a private conversation. If it went on all night then fine, you'd think it rude, if it went on during a conversation with a few people, it would be rude,but otherwise where's the harm, and you certainly don't tell them to piss off to a table by themselves until they're done

[Gambit37]

Just as addition to this thread, I would like to all draw your attention to these previous threads:

http://www.dungeon-master.com/forum/vie ... hp?t=24892
http://www.dungeon-master.com/forum/vie ... hp?t=24639

[beowuuf]

You are right, it's a plague!

Seriously, the two poeple who posted have not come back, so therefore by them posting in english we would have gained nothing apparantly.

One post is a complaint that they can't read the forum in another language, so more supports adamo's complaint not this discussion

The second post I would draw your attention to linflas's reply:

mostly stuff that everybody knows, but translated in a funny way for french readers

Or, in other words, nothign that isn't covered for the english speakers in so many topics, but something nice for the french speakers to laugh at. I don't see the harm.

I stand by my previous post - if it happens to much from a poster or in a fourm, it's a problem, if we are so startved for topics we have to jump on a new poster posting in a different language or in a minimal interest topic then I don't know what that says about us.

I was going to try and type something creative on the computer, I think I will toddle back to bed and watch some DVDs for a while instead - catch up on this thread in a little bit!

[Gambit37]

I was more posting those to show other people's reactions from the other side: several people asked for translations of French and claimed it was elitist! You see, we can take this issue either way.

Oh, and also to show that my view hasn't changed in 18 months...

[Joramun]

There are like 3 examples of non-english conversation in the whole forum !

As a french, I would probably never have registered on the forum if my level in english was too low.

I think DM community is international, and it's a bit sad if people who loved DM can't talk about it because the only forum about it is in english and they can't communicate or understand correctly what is going on !

So allowing to communicate with people like Tonari, who made the effort of speaking in english in the first place, is only fair !
Besides he contributed the community with a dungeon, which is apparently great, and in english !

Not helping him or other new users to join by being overly strict would be the sign of the community slowly decaying.

[Gambit37]

You're coming late to the party. I retracted a whole bunch of that stuff and refocussed on the real issue that bothers me: changing languages part way through a thread.

I'm off out now to look at more flats but I feel I need to make a post clearing up my position as people don't seem to know where I stand anymore. I'll do that later.

[beowuuf]

Lol, yes, hopefully people can see Gambit's point hasn't come out of nowhere, that we have had these debates before and that he has basically said the same thing before to others:D

Heh, my attitude hasnt' changed either of course, although I must admit I am pretty lax about flashchat convos now simple because I am usually the only one on the room who can't speak and I don't care. We could maybe tighten up on havign private discussionsabout dungeons or whatnot out in the open, especially due to the slowness of flashchat at times!

I do think that the complaints were unfair in those threads - someone complains in a foreign language it's a little unfair they can't understand the forum, and the people who can understand every single other post in the forum complai nthey can't understand his complaint post! Madness I tells you!

Yeah, I think Tonari has been unfairly harsh on himself by tryign to always post in english and understand the english replies. I think what sophia did is exactly what we should be allowing to happen, evn on an internatonal forum. I'm a little sad that other forums sound liek they would . Then again, on a larger forum its easier to become clique-y and clutter up a discussion with five or ten people doing it. I believe we are still too small for such worries yet.

Anyway, to the future!

[Joramun]

I just wanted to restart the Troll

Ok, I admit : your post arrived at the same time I was typing mine...

[cowsmanaut]

While I agree there is some segregation in my idea, and while it could be construed as "piss off to some other table" to some, I think ultimately it's better than most forums who, as I mentioned above, have said "Go make your own forum if you want to speak another language". Instead we are saying, we welcome you to join us in our conversations, however, we speak english so you would need to speak english for us to understand you. If you are not ready to join in, we also have a seperate room where you can go to speak with other people in your own language without intruding on others feelings.

Which is really all this is about. I mean the main issue is this. People speaking another language in a thread and in some cases taking it over. Causing others to no longer feel welcome to post in it. The the other extreme where we tell them don't ever do it because it makes us uncomfortable.

So, personally, I think that a place where people can post in any language they desire, yet still be connected to our community is perfectly acceptable. I don't think it's a negative thing at all. Not to mention it solves most of the issues I see currently. As I said, if people end up going OT with another language it can be moved here and those who are looking for a place to ask a question in another language and to KNOW without a doubt that it will be accepted will have this place to feel comfortable.

If for some reason we see it expands a lot, then we can think about splitting it up even more much like this place:

http://www.deathfall.com/modules.php?name=XForum

which offers most of its fora in multiple languages. I'm sure there are more examples online.

I must say that I think people if possible should make some level of effort to speak the language supported by the forum, however, the more international this site becomes, the more I see those who struggle with their words because english comes hard to them, I feel we should make some allowances for them. Perhaps I'm becoming an old softy

moo

[beowuuf]

They have 12099 members though! I think for now we can manage it without adding to the existing number of forums, and it can be something to think about for the future

We'll see what everyone says to it, maybe people would welcome a non-english speakign forum we can't interrupt with us ocmplaints, whooo knows

[Joramun]

I'd suggest a subforum where anyone can speak in any language of any topic, and call it "The Troll Cave".

[beowuuf]

I'd still worry that people would get instantly harassed if they spoke another language in another forum even if legitamate and told to post there!

[cowsmanaut]

what I find amusing is each of us go super conservative in different directions. By that I specifically mean Beo, Gambit, and myself.

I would like to hear from other english as a second language people pipe up about the idea of an international posting area.

As for you mr wuuf, if anyone starts whining they are speaking other languages in the international forum.. I'd be quite enclined to slap them upside the head for you. That would be like complaining that your square wheel doesn't turn. If you wander into the international section and expect to have an english conversation.. you're uh... slightly challenged mentally.

moo

[beowuuf]

Surely the punishment for all crimes is to ban trant?

And woohoo, our three pronged conservatism must mean that we in general go in the right direct...or somehting...

[Parallax]

I was more posting those to show other people's reactions from the other side: several people asked for translations of French and claimed it was elitist! You see, we can take this issue either way.

Oh, and also to show that my view hasn't changed in 18 months...

Mmmh, then I misunderstood your intentions. When I clicked the links and found two threads started in french but later derailed into english, I thought you had posted those links to illustrate your point that it's rude to change the language midway through the thread. My bad.

Oh, and also, I think Beo overestimates mice.

[beowuuf]

Lol, we shall see who is laughing when I keep my overlords happy with cheese and you are in the slave pits

[Joramun]

But if they eat cheese, they probably speak french.
Since mice can't read, they probably didn't spot the
correct subforum for non-english conversations,
and anyway, it's unpolite to speak when you're
eating, even cheese, so they should be banned.

Don't tell me I'm overworked.