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Requests for new languages/Wikipedia Pre-reform Russian

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Pre-reform Russian Wikipedia

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submitted verification final decision
  This proposal has been rejected.
This decision was taken by the language committee in accordance with the Language proposal policy based on the discussion on this page.

The closing committee member provided the following comment:

This wiki fails several criteria for approval, notably an ISO 639 code and sufficient uniqueness to require a new wiki. The sole purpose of allowing a new edition of Wikipedia is to make encyclopedic content accessible to more human beings; allowing this edition will not do that, because all modern pre-reform Russian readers can presumably read post-reform Russian. —{admin} Pathoschild 15:34:17, 06 November 2007 (UTC)
Proposal summary
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Arguments in favour

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Nowdays a great amount of languages have two different Wikipedia projects. One is of modern language and another is a either a classical or alternative or pre-reform or imperial variant of the same language. For example two belorussian, three english, korean in hangul and in hanja, several chineese variants and so on. I suggest a special project for pre-reform Russian language. The reform in 1917 was a great challenge for whole well-educated part of Russian society. It affected in different ways. On the one hand it made language easier for poor classes to learn to write and to read, on the other hand a lot of hidden meaning of the words were lost. Nowdays a very big number or Russian speaking peolpe are interesting in old orthography and pre-reform rules, many of them have books, written in this classical orthography, some even sometimes using old variants in usual writing. The main reason for me to offer this project is the fact that the majority of great russian authors such as Fyodor Dostoevsky, Lev Tolstoy, Ivan Turgenev ans so on have written in that very language using that very meanings, spelling and orthograpy, not mordern one. Sura 15:31, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I support this request — it is to bear in mind that it is not only orthography that changed during the reform (and since then), but the whole language as well — vocabulary and style too, and even grammar to some extent. And many important extralinguistic features as well (like units of measurement etc.). — Lozman 23:47, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I strongly support this request. The difference in language is not only yat and yer missing after 1917/1918 reform. Three more letters were lost: decimal I, fita, and izhitsa. Many homonyms start to be homographs. For example, in the modern Russian everybody and everything ("все"), peace and world ("мир"), God and idol ("бог") have the same spelling. As a result, sometimes it is difficult to understand old texts spelled in the modern style. For example, there is a misinterpretation of the title of Leo Tolstoy's novel "War and Peace", as "War and the World" or "War and Society". Many negative aspects of the reform are discussed in the Dmitry Likhachev's article (written in 1928). Also, I do not understand the users, who are against the request for Pre-reform Russian Wikipedia. Why several wikipedia projects may exist in Romanian (http://ro.wikipedia.org, http://mo.wikipedia.org), Belarusian (http://be.wikipedia.org, http://be-x-old.wikipedia.org), Bulgarian (http://bg.wikipedia.org, http://mk.wikipedia.org), Serbian (http://sr.wikipedia.org, http://hr.wikipedia.org, http://bs.wikipedia.org, http://sh.wikipedia.org), Norwegian (http://no.wikipedia.org, http://nn.wikipedia.org), and many other languages but not in Russian? --Daniil Naumoff 12:17, 3 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, Bolsheviks have made great changes in Russian, not only in orthography. As founder of Siberian wikipedia, I support this proposal - Siberian wikipedia shows how common people spoke before the Revolution, and this wikipedia will show the way how the upper classes spoke. --Yaroslav Zolotaryov 08:39, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes. "Siberian" Wikipedia is the greatest scam & fraud in Wiki's history. It's hoax and anti-russian project. --Pauk 09:34, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Not at all. Just your manner to write this in any place where I appear testifies that this is very necessary project. --Yaroslav Zolotaryov 09:40, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
No! I wrote in this page earlier than you. I am neutral to old-Russian project, because it's true. But old-Russian is not used today. It means Old-Russian Wiki is waste of time and job. Better let write articles in modern Russian Wikipedia!--Pauk 09:56, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I mean you attitude to the Siberian Wikipedia, for sure, because nobody obliged you to explain your position about this wiki in this discussion. --Yaroslav Zolotaryov 10:05, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Stop it! It is not a correct place for discussing of "Siberian" Wikipedia. --Daniil Naumoff 10:07, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Surely! So why Pauk discuss it? --Yaroslav Zolotaryov 10:14, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  1. I support this request. This is a very good idea. Why opposing? — Dmitry-spb 18:51, 16 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  2. I support. Normal historical Projekt. --Deutscher Friedensstifter 17:01, 17 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Absolutely!! Let's open this "Russian of the 19th Century" project, stimmt! Und also, German of the same century, warum denn nicht! Wait, which German: Prussian, Bayer, Schwabish? What the heck, let's open them all, for 19th century, they are as deserving as Russian, ja? And for 17th century too. And for 15th. Why miss 12th? And Chinese of the Qing dynasty, it was so cool! Oh my, time to renew my Britannica subscription and just let it go. Elephas 00:33, 19 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Der Jiddisch Wiki schließen -- Ihre nächste Schritt werden? Sind Sie Antisemit? Auch, Sie nutzen Ihre besser wissen dem Englisch und Deutsch -- das ist Willkür! --Deutscher Friedensstifter 16:20, 19 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Moi, Antisemit?? Doch, ich bin Josef Göbbels er selbst und auch Josef Stalin wieder mal leibhaftig geboren! Das soll ganz klar sein, nicht wahr? Isn't it all obvious from what I wrote? ;) Elephas 19:45, 19 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Ei warum fragen Sie? Wollen Sie darüber reden? --Deutscher Friedensstifter 09:19, 21 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Not really, the little dirty tricks you are using in discussion makes debating with you pointless. First you put a word in my mouth about the Yiddish encyclopedia which I never mentioned, then based on this little fraud you moved into Antisemitism. No mentioning of my original question: so if we make a separate Wiki for the Russian language of the 19th century, is it ok to make another one for the 18th century (which was very, very different), another dedicated wiki for the 17th century, yet another one for 16th century and so forth ad infinitum? And if we do that, would it be ok to create a wiki for all known dialects of German, English, French, Romanian, Arabic, and all 6000 languages for each century in history? Let's see, about 6000 languages alive, plus 10000 dead languages multiplied by 50 centuries - that's about 500,000 unique wikis, give or take? Yes, to spread the darn knowledge! Because we can! That's just laughable. Elephas 04:43, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Had Anybody did request to create all of You accounted languages? For what all your Demagogie? Lets to resolve Problemen by them Creation, Jawohl? --Deutscher Friedensstifter 20:40, 24 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  3. I support, too. We need to keep our history.- —192.103.98.4 05:04, 21 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    - said an anonymous IP from Mississippi, USA. Right, let's open dedicated Wiki in Russian language of the 19th century AD to keep the history of the US state of Mississippi! Brilliant! Elephas 04:43, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Elephas, if you really know so much, why you think it's not russians in Mississipi? Правду говорят:"Настоящими патриотами становятся за границей" (English:People come to real patriots when living far of Motherland.). I know many russian people, that live for example in Germany, but they love them Motherland more than people, that live in Russia. — Dmitry-spb 13:01, 24 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  4. I support. Section in Russian with the spelling reform, opening - is a worthy project. Unlike slowed projects Zolotarjov (ru-sib, ru-lat), the normal idea, which undoubtedly will find many supporters, and the section will have quite high interest. Сый 10:49, 2 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Argument against

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  • I don't believe that it is desirable to have multiple Wikipedia editions for the same language. What you are suggesting, as I understand it, is a second Russian Wikipedia edition, where the only difference is that it uses the pre-revolutionary orthography. Apart from that, it would be written in the same standard Russian. While this indeed would parallel the two existing Belarusian editions (in Tarashkevich and normative orthographies), the current split in the Belarusian community is a most undesirable situation which everyone in Wikimedia would like to see overcome ASAP. In short, there is no linguistic distance big enough to warrant a separate edition.
  • Further, I cannot follow you when you say that there are three English Wikipedias. There is, indeed a single English Wikipedia plus the Simple English edition, which is loosely based on Basic English (which, btw. would not be seen fit for purpose if proposed today). And, yes, there is the Anglo-Saxon Wikipedia, which is clearly not in English, but in an ancient predecessor language, which is just as distant from modern English as Old Church Slavonic from modern Russian or Bulgarian. (and btw. the ang wiki is not exactly a flourishing edition, quite the opposite) Therefore the English situation is quite different from what you are proposing for Russian. There is a single Wikipedia for Americans, Brits, Australians, Indians, New-Zealandians etc. There is a single French Wikipedia, a single Spanish, a single Portuguese and a single German edition. If this proposal would be approved, what would come next? German in old orthography (which has been reformed a few years ago)?
  • While language history and classical forms of languages are fascinating matters in their own rights, they are not principal goals of Wikipedia. Wikipedia is about creating an Encyclopaedia - a comprehensive written compendium that contains information on all branches of knowledge or a particular branch of knowledge. For this purpose, language is a means not an end it is own right. If your primary interest is in language, I would suggest using other types of projects, such as Wikisource or Wikibooks.
  • No ISO code;
  • Again, it simply is the same language: Every Russian will be able to read texts in pre-revolutionary orthography, despite the additonal ъs and ѣs. No reason to have a separate project. --Johannes Rohr 19:55, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I fully understand your arguments. I see that the situation occured in Wikipedia concerning variant of languages is not very appreshiated. But the existing of those Wikipedias is a fact. And belorussian also. So I do not believe there would be double standards for one and for other communities. If for example the Wikipedia in Hanja (Korean) will be approved (I know Korean and the situation is the same as I suggest!) the reasons you mentioned would be almost outdated.

Again there are different Wikipedias: old church also. But ! The old slavonic language is a realy dead one, noone speaks it and no one uses grammer rules of old slavonic! There are no books instead of church-related and a few civil written in this language. But the Wikipedia exists! As for difference in language - there are not only yat and er missing after 1917. A great number of grammar rules has been changed. For example after the reform some phrases in poetry became to be without rythm (sorry for explanation in poor English). But even this is not the last reason. In Pre-reform Wikipedia we may use russian measuring system instead of international, many nations still keepning and preserving their measuring system and russians still remember some. There are a lot of interesting things that can be done in this Wikipedia and would be met with pleasure by a great amount of people. Sura 08:16, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • All right, there is a language like this one. It is dead, but who cares since there's a Latin Wikipedia. However, the content that is already there does not conform to it, it is just Russian with a couple of changes (e.g., "е"->"ѣ"). If you want to make a Wikipedia in that language, start learning it first. --Ru.spider 15:04, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Learning what? Pre-reform Russian? I know it rather well to create articles on it. Sura 16:21, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Then why does almost every article in the current ru-old incubator have errors in it? Besides that, will you be able to check all newly created articles and all edits for errors? Will you be the only contributor? --Ru.spider 09:06, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Could you tell me when the language has died? I have seen a person who rememberd the rules from her childhood. --Daniil Naumoff 16:54, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The language died when its widespread usage was halted in favour of another language (namely, modern Russian). Also, speaking about that person you know - will she be able to become an active contributor? How many articles will she write a day? What will become of the project if anything happens to her? --Ru.spider 09:06, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Actually the language did not die. There are about 150 million people in the world speaking Russian as a primary, native tongue, that's a fair count for a live language. The language changed, or rather emerged, shedding everything that did not make sense anymore. It happened to other languages around: Kemal Ataturk radically changed writing system which made writing much, much easier to master and use, chairman Mao has simplified Chinese characters, bolsheviks did one good thing of getting rid of the archaic stuff in Russian that did not make sense anymore to simplify learning and usage. The stuff they rid of, it used to make sense at some time in the past in some of the Slavic dialects that later merged into "Gread Russian Language" (Велико-Русский Язык) - the letter "ъ" actually was readable some time in the past it was pronounced as a reduced "e". "ѣ" was pronounced distinctly from "e", it was more closed and strongly articulated. As the standard of the language formed, all those fringe things were trimmed to make something that works fine so far, namely Contemporary Russian Sandard Language ("современный русский язык") - and that's what those 150 million people around the world speak. That's what they use to communicate, to share knowledge. Any arbitrary time's snapshot, whatever time in the past, place on Earth, social stratum or ethnicity that is gone should be only a subject to trained professional. I don't see trained professionals in this project, only one, maximum two ignorant, delusional, fraudulent individuals. Elephas 14:57, 30 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I just wonder, when (by your opinion) the language died? Please, tell me the year. --Daniil Naumoff 15:33, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I have no intention of answering a question you know the answer to, because it is being raised only to heat things up and I do not participate in wiki flames. If you are really wondering, GFGI. --Ru.spider 16:00, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • In fact, the language stopped developing and is only used now when specialists need to read something, new texts are not created in this language and ain't supposed to be. One of many consequences is that for Wikipedia we need a bunch of new words: for example, I see "Интернетъ" (Internet) on the first page. Why not Интѣрнетъ? Интернѣтъ? Iнтѣрнѣтъ? The language is not suitable for creating new texts, which is what Wikipedia is about. --Ru.spider 15:04, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Интернетъ with no doubt. The grammar rules may be easily adopted to modern words. Sura 16:21, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
A language is formally defined by a set of words and phrases allowed in it. If you add your own words, will it still be considered the same pre-1917 language? If yes, why do you think so? If no, remember that original research is not welcomed in Wikimedia. Why can't you be satisfied with a Wikia project? It's much easier to get approved, and it offers the same capabilities as Wikipedia, including easy linking to Wikimedia projects. --Ru.spider 09:06, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
"Интернетъ" - I am agree. --Daniil Naumoff 16:56, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
"You are agree"? What on Earth does that suppose to mean? --Ru.spider 09:06, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think we'll get anywhere if we start nitpicking on each other's grammar. Moreover, the meaning here is perfectly clear, I'm sure. Edricson 09:37, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Please try to understand that this is not just me being grumpy - User:Daniil Naumoff makes two claims: that he is "able to contribute with an advanced level of English" (on his userpage) and that he knows old-style Russian spelling well enough to become one of the major contributors (he has put "N" by his name - it means he considers himself to be a native speaker). Putting aside the fact that he cannot be a native speaker if he is younger than 90, as well as the fact that on his userpage on Russian Wikipedia he only claims basic knowledge of the old rules (ru-old-1), my strong opinion is that a person making this kind of basic mistakes in English and claiming advanced knowledge of it cannot judge his language skills adequately. --Ru.spider 14:05, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I am a native Russian speaker but it does not mean that I write without mistakes. Even an illiterate person can be a native speaker. And it is totaly different stoty about (ru-old-1). By this I just wanted to express that I am far from an ideal. I can drop (ru-old-1) from my page if it makes you happy. --Daniil Naumoff 15:33, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
You cannot possibly be a native pre-reform Russian speaker, unless you were born before the reforms took place. You can put whatever you want on your userpage, it will not make me happy nor unhappy. An illiterate person can be a native speaker, but I wouldn't think about entrusting a Wikipedia sector to such a person. --Ru.spider 16:00, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Fluent in old Russian? That's one very rare skill, only a handful people can claim that, all narrow field specialists, all known by name to the very small community of scholars. I never heard of a scholar in Old Russian sciences named "Naumov", who was your teacher? Someone still alive, please?? I would like to talk to him/her, ask how good of a student you were and why your grammar is so poor, did you sleep through the classes or something? Or it's same old "Мы академиёвъ не кончали, у нас кожная кухарка можот управлять гусударствомъ" ? Elephas 14:34, 30 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
And why not "Iнтѣрнѣтъ"? LOL. That's quite a game they are playing - trying to figure out how to write words that appeared in Russian long after the XIX-early XX century snapshot was long over with, frozen in time with grammar, vocabulary and all. There was no internet, no aviation, no computer languages. The old-ru crowd should not use these words unless the goal is to try to change Russian grammar back to the early XX century status just like the Russian state flag has been reverted back to pre-1917 state. Russian writer Voinovich predicted this in his novel "Moscow 2024" - that after overthrowing communists, power-hungry Imperial Russia revivalists will change everything back from grammar to common laws... Elephas 14:34, 30 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Group of Internet-users preferring old writing does exist but I don't think it to be enough notable for having their own Wikipedia.
  • Best way for languages that has different writing modes is a Wikipedia with bi-alphabet page as Serbian-Croatian is. (Let's first omit possible inability of automated transliteration). I don't think that users do need a "ѣize" inlay.
  • The orthography rules did change (for example, writing of звезда and копейка). Even spread of typewriters, that had no Ѳ, changed the usus. This affected other means of printing: old posters of Фёдор Шаляпин (Chaliapin) had either Ѳ or Ф. There is no reason to choose 1916 rules and not earlier ones. So, there could be no straight rules due to unability of choice. Конст. Карасёв 17:47, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I share Johannes' concern that this may not be about an encyclopedia. Just as with ru-sib, and, as far as I can understand, with the Belarusian split, it's not as much about the language as about people having issues with what they see as NPOV (but what may actualy be MPOV). I am worried that this wikipedia may turn into a sandbox for a certain group of people with views that could not commonly be accepted as neutral elsewhere (not to name names here). Edricson 07:50, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    To avoid this, it would make much more sense to create a WikiSource project in this language. For instance, I do not approve a whole Wikipedia sector dedicated to it and supported by a hanful of people, but I would certainly find WikiSource useful - it can start as a collection of old public domain texts and can later be extended with texts created by Sura and other contributors who claim to know the language well enough to write in it. --Ru.spider 09:06, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    This might make sense, but I do not see how the existing Russian Wikisource cannot attain the same aim (barring community consensus there, though I do not think anyone will protest it). Edricson 09:35, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    It most certainly can, but apparently the authors of this proposal are not interested to join an already existing project for some reason. --Ru.spider 14:05, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • No dramatic change either in phonetics or grammar or syntax after 1918. Lexical changes were sometimes considerable as the society changed and new things appeared, but the same holds for every cultural language in the 20th century Europe; the role of "Bolsheviks changing Russian language" is extremely exaggerated both by Bolsheviks themselves and by their opponents. No unified spelling standard before 1918 (Grot's rules were often neglected even in central papers). There can be virtually nothing in this wiki that could not be yielded by a semi-automatic bot replacement from Modern Russian (only with manual disambiguation of few cases like мiръ and миръ, -ые in Masc. vs. -ыя in Fem. and Neut. and some others). So no linguistic raison d'être for this wiki can be seen. --Mitrius 08:06, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
We have a lot of homographs, not just few cases. Several examples for you. --Daniil Naumoff 15:33, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Most of the examples provided on that page are easily eliminated by using letter Ё (YO). Its usage is mandatory in Russian Wikipedia. --Ru.spider 16:00, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • It's usual in Russia to see local neo-nazi on a football match. This ensured that I can say with confidence that Russian Empire flag is one of their usual attributes, along with celtic cross etc. It's not excluded that different people favourable to nazi will be attracted by the possibility to use such authority as Wikipedia to propagate nazi ideas because they could speak "Russian Empire language" and amount of other contributors is relatively small. Once again, I hope this "isn't excluded", not "very possible", but anyway it's very unpleasant possibility. — Ash063 21:57, 13 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Using such kind of arguments you can propose to close all wikipedia projects. --Daniil Naumoff 07:56, 14 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
No, surely no. But Wikipedia should treat all potentially dangerous wiki-projects very guardedly, shouldn't it? — Ash063 14:43, 14 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • What are reasons for creating an encyclopedia in some language?
    1. To propagate free knowledge for speakers of this language? There are no people in the world for whom pre-reform Russian can be considered native.
    2. Because this language is different enough from others? Every Russian speaker would understand 100% of the pre-reform text, and if we imagine someone transported from 19th century to our time, he will certainly understand today's Russian (new words are irrelevant, nobody proposes to create a pre-industrial English Wikipedia, for example).
    3. Because this language has historical importance? But Pushkin and Dostoevsky, Lermontov and Tolstoy wrote in Russian, and even though their language evolved a little, it is still alive and is spoken by 260 million people.
    4. Because someone think that ъ appended to every word ending on consonant is cool? Your door is here. MaxSem 20:15, 19 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • On top of my arguments in the discussions above and below, here's one more: rampant, shameless plagiarism. Wikipedia contributors are often criticized for this sin. As of this project, I expected it to be worse than average. Since, as I expected, this project is concocted for entertainment not for knowledge, it is to be run by persons incompetent in the subject of the Russian language specifics of the XIX century. Which results in: improper grammar as I quoted below, nil content and/or plagiarism. Examples of the latest: this page - [[1]] is yanked out of here: [[2]], carbon copy, no updates or added content. Subsequently, this one -- [[3]] is swiped from here - [[4]], this one - [[5]] from here - [[6]] and so forth. What else can ignorant game players do beside stealing and faking. Elephas 21:51, 26 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    There is no plagiarism! All articles you have mentioned are coppied directly from the Explanatory Dictionary of the Live Great Russian language of Vladimir Dal (and it is indicated in every article) but not from any site in internet. --Daniil Naumoff 09:18, 30 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    That's what I referenced, Dal's Dictionary online, which has the whole dictionary posted long, long, long ago. The ru-old incubator articles I referenced above do not indicate where they are swiped from. You copied a few articles from another source, adding no content and not providing clear indication where they are taken from - and that does fall under definition of plagiarism. Every single article in that project is either stolen from some place else without providing the source clearly (plagiarised) or is a stub with just bad grammar but no useful content, or just plain fraud, laughable BS like this: [[7]] - this language does not exist, never existed and there are no plans to develop it, it makes no sense to develop it because it's about as useless as a nail in the head with all existing computing languages. The only point to tout it is having so much contempt for the rest of the (non-Russian) world that you allegedly can't stand anything non-Russian, even a computing language. Next what, Russian html - <хтмл><башка>....</башка><тело>...</тело> and now how do you spell "meta" in old Russian LOL. Hey, they say, we hate anything non-old-Russian so bad that we refuse to use anything non-old-Russian so let's fake everything old-Russian... What else, Old Russian JavaScript? The only Russian-based computing language named "Almir" used by Soviet made computer "Mir" went out of the window in early 80s and never came back. Even the most popular Soviet computers of the BESM series used mostly Fortran... To reiterate,
            • The author actually has admitted plagiarism, he just uses a different name for it but in common language it's plagiarism by definition. The links I provided should have made it clear - on one side, there is a full dictionary online that existed quite for some time and on the other hand, ru-old project only copied a handful of articles from there without providing clear indication of the source, nor a link and adding no content.
            • Since there are just no enough users to even swipe efficiently, they could not swipe as much as a dozen articles from the Dal dictionary. It looks like one-lad masturbative entertainment project like ru-sib. Anyone has access to the IP addresses of all the "guys" involved in this project? There should be less IP addresses than there are alleged participants unless the real participant uses proxies to fake a crowd.
            • Whatever is not stolen is faked.
            • Whatever is not stolen or faked is stubbish and useless
            • that's it about this project, nothing much more to say except: { { db-nonsense...Elephas 13:48, 30 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

General discussion

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  • In my opinion, this Wikipedia would be just waste of time, since it's the same language. Instead, pre-reformian Wikisource could make sense, since there are many texts in public domain in pre-revolutionary orthography. Even though these texts sometimes exist in current orthography, their original versions are useful for historical and linguistic reasons. Kv75 16:34, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Nobody use this "language". Even it's no language. It's only old orthography used before Revolution 1917. --Pauk 21:40, 7 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    It is a language. Grammar has also changed since 1917 (but not considerably). The fact is that this variant of language is not commonly used now, so Wikipedia in old-ru would make little sense. Instead, Wikisource in old-ru would be much more useful. --Volkov 06:46, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I believe that the existing Russian Wikisource should be just fine for that purpose. I don't need a second German Wikisource for w:Goethe's classical German or w:Dante's Italian. The existing Wikisource editions should accept original texts from all epochs of a language in whatever orthography they were originally written. --Johannes Rohr 23:28, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    I agree with you. It might have been justified to request wikisource in ru-old but existing ru.wikisource is perfectly OK to accept old texts. I see no reason for ru-old wiki, pretty much similar like requesting separate en-gb and en-us, en-nz, en-old, en-whatever wikipedia. --Volkov 12:40, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • This language differs from the modern Russian much more than simple English from English.--Nxx 03:37, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Yes, language of Explanatory Dictionary of the Live Great Russian language (1863-66) by Vladimir Dal obviously differs from modern one, but this difference is much less than difference between Early Modern English and Modern English. Is this a reason for creating Wikipedia in Early Modern English? Kv75 05:55, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    Dont know what is early modern english but simple english wikipedia already exists. I think any language is suitable for wikipedia if it differs from standard language more than simple English from standard English. Otherwise it is double standard.--Nxx 02:57, 12 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • By the way, will everyone who does so please stop calling it "Old Russian"? Old Russian is the language of up to around the 15th century, and has nothing to do with what we are discussing. Just as Old English is not what Shakespeare wrote in. Edricson 07:58, 9 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Yet another nonsense project concocted by a fringe group. "Old Russian", well, how old? Should it draw a line on the 19th century's norm or go further into 18th century with "паки, понеже, донедже..." etc or dive further yet down into the depths of times to the 12th century bedrock, to "Слово о плъку Игореве", would that be old enough? I guarantee, if this project is approved, a few incompetent players who won't even know or care about that snapshot of the history of the Russian language will play with this project for a few months then it will be taken over by vandals and spammers for all its worth. Elephas 04:33, 10 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • "Паки, понеже, донежде" etc. was spoken early than in 18th century. So, you think "Ru-old" is more noncense project than "ru-lat"? Or "ru-sib", Zolotarev's thought languange, which does not exist? — Dmitry-spb 18:44, 16 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • To me, ru-sib, ru-lat and this ru-old appear equally counterproductive ideas and serve no other purpose but being playgrounds for hoaxers to start with later to be surrendered to spammers and vandals. How many competent contributors are expected there? I mean, people who really know where, how and why "yer", "fita", "izhitsa", "big yus" etc were used? To give you a hint, this knowledge requires some serious knowledge of Greek whithout which those rules make no sense whatsoever. It was hard enough even for scholars of those years: a fact reflected in this saying: "Фита да ижица - розга к телу ближица." How many competent specialists who are comfortable with lexical, grammatical and other peculiarities of that time's so called "Russian" are out there? To remind you, at that time "Russian" language has not been formalized yet - there was a very clear cut distinction between dialects later obliterated by decades of Soviet media exposure. Beside, there were several official and semi-official reforms as so called "Great Russian" language was taking dominant position merging with other Slavic, Ugric, Turkic etc talks active in the region. Take a look at "Civic Script" introduced by Peter the Great, it was even more radical that what the Bolsheviks did after they seized power. I doubt very much that people who really know this subject will find time and reason to contribute. It will be just a bunch of kids doing nothing else but playing with words ending each with "ъ" and replacing random "и" with "i". And radicals without clear purpose, having fun with bashing of the communist era.Elephas 00:32, 19 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • You are now mixing pre-reform Russian with an Old Church Slavonic language. I don't yet know much about people, which founded this project. But I can tell you, in Old Church Slavonic Wikipedia, where I work, too, they are only two peoples, which really know something about Old Church Slavonic orphography and grammar. - Dmitry-spb 09:32, 19 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • First, it's not "mixing", it's "confusing" in English. Second, I am not confusing ritual service language of the Russian Orthodox Church ("Церковнославянский") with anything, because it's not even Russian to start with. Third, Zolotaryov, is it you with a new nickname? По передёргиванию узнаю фраера. И не болит голова у дятла... Elephas 12:42, 19 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
            • I am not Zolotarev. And thanks to God for it! А насчёт фрарера - давай-ка, петух, дятел, стриж, или кто ты там, конь в пальто, обойдёмся без личных оскорблений! Ru-old is not a neo-sib project. Yes, Zolotarev is trying to do it into one. But, I hope, it will be not the same, like ru-sib. We all really hope, and we'll do all to it will not became into this. About my English - yes, it's not so good. I am not a robot to know all, mr. Elephant. - Dmitry-spb 17:23, 20 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
              • No, you are not a robot, of course. Robots are pretty intelligent creatures compared to the old-ru, ru-sib and other hoaxes alike. As I expected, ignorance rules the discussed project. Here's one example: [[8]] - "исповедуют" is written incorrectly, because the root of this word is "вѣд"... That won't matter for those playing with this project, it's all for fun not for knowledge; they don't care how it really was written. Another illustration of this scam: [[9]] - Russians did not use "Самолётъ" for an aircraft at that time, they used "аэропланъ", and "Самолётъ" in 19th century was a name of a shipping company shipping goods by boats. Compare that pathetic stub with a real article: [[10]] - there is a world of difference. And last but not least: [[11]] - this tell it all of what they are up to. COMPUTERS in OLD RUSSIAN of 19th century? What's next, article on programming languages in Sanskrit, Ancient Egyptian, Babilonian? This is total BS. Like there is not enough garbage in wikis already. Elephas 04:30, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
                • Я смотрю, целых 3 дня ответ писал. Сильно, слоник, сильно! Скоро и возражать нечего будет тебе:). We write with pre-reform orphography, not language - that say people that run this project. Ru-old is not a hoax, like ru-sib. This project will work, and it will not be a Zolotarev's club. And what name can you offer for computers in old Russian? - Dmitry-spb 13:28, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
                  • Да что ты димочка, какие три дня. В отличии от вас золотарёвых, у меня работа и времени терять некогда чтобы сочинять себе головную боль которая никаких коврижек на стол моей семье не принесёт. У меня максимум на эти дела 30 минут в день и то слишком много. А олд-вру клуб уже точь-в-точь русиб, разве что с "ъ" на конце, та же жалкая фантазия, бред и беспонтовые хохмы. As of writing about computers in Old Russian, I don't see a point of doing so, this is plain stupid. They had no computing terms in 19th terms, no purpose, no agenda, they had "calculators" at that time which were all human and paid by the hour. Anyone seeking real knowledge on computers will not go to ru-old or ru-sib, they will go to at worst, ru.wikipedia.org and at best, to msdn, java.sun.ru, rubyforge.org etc.
                    • "В отличие от вас, Золотарёвых", это как? Золотарёв здесь не причём, как я уже раз 500 повторял. В отличие от вас, животных, мы люди часто бываем объективными. Я понимаю, что в зоопарке сидеть неприятно, но что делать? Каждому - своё :D. "Беспотновые хохмы, бред, жалкая фантазия" - где это всё найдено? Тем более, проект только зарождается! Рувика тоже в самом начале не ахти была. About anyone, who seeking real knowledge of computers - yes, I repeat, YES, he goes to Ruwiki or the other sites (for example sites at least you wrote). Nobody denies it. Ru-old is not computer-wiki it is just Wikipedia project! If you remember - Wikipedia is free encyclopedia! If people want to write about computers - please! It can be Somali Wikipedia, English Wikipedia, or Old Church Slavonic Wikipedia! - Dmitry-spb 13:15, 24 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
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