Thread: Need Volunteers and Opinions - Russian Language and Usage Site

I'm considering starting a new question and answer site (as a part of MasterRussian) where students, teachers, and native speakers can discuss the Russian language. You may be wondering how it will be different from this forum? Here's how.

It will not have discussions as forums do. It may have comments but there won't be any discussions. The purpose of the Q&A site will be to give a definitive answer to a well-formed question. For this reason, only one answer will be picked as the best answer. The best answer will be shown immediately below the question, and all other answers will be shown below.

For example, someone may ask:

Q: Which grammatical case is used for [народ] in the sentence [В метрó бы́ло мнóго нарóду]?

A good answer to this question could start with something like:

A: The genitive case is used for [народ]. When used in the meaning of "people, crowd" you can say either "много народа" or "много народу". Both endings are used in the genitive...

Questions can be asked in Russian as well.
Other good examples of questions about the Russian language (as opposed to Russian culture or politics):

Q1: What is the difference between "Мне нужно" and "Мне нужнa"?
Q2: Why is ого pronounced as ово?
Q3: What is palatalization and how to palatalize Russian consonants?
Q4: С какой буквы правильно писать слово "интернет": со строчной или прописной?
Q5: Why is the word молоко pronounced as [ma-la-ko] instead of [mo-lo-ko] as it is written?

The site will have a community like forums do. It will have leaders and moderators and you will be able to become a moderator too.

I think we have a strong community of people who are interested in learning and improving their Russian. Some foreign students can know the answer and contribute their replies. Plus, we have many Russians who would love to explain their language to foreigners.

The site will be about the Russian language only. It will not have questions about Russian culture. We want to focus on the Russian language, grammar and usage, and not be distracted by questions about culture, society, politics, etc. We can discuss other topics on this forum instead.

If you support this idea, I am looking for volunteers.

If you'd like to be a volunteer when we start the beta site, you should commit that you will use it. If you commit, you should ask good questions and give answers to questions that others asked during the beta testing.

As a volunteer, we only ask for you to create at least:
- 3 good questions about the Russian language, and
- answer 3 questions that others asked

So if you'd like to be involved in this new project, send me a PM or reply in this thread.

Please post what you think about this idea.

Кто, как и когда будет решать, какой ответ наилучший?

Why is ого pronounced as ово?

Вопрос из области почему в слове красный есть звук "с", а в слове "зелёный" нет? Как можно объяснить, почему произносится так или не так? Можно ответить на вопрос почему пишется. Почему произносится? Потому что слово такое, такой язык.

I volunteer.

Originally Posted by Marcus

Кто, как и когда будет решать, какой ответ наилучший?

Вопрос из области почему в слове красный есть звук "с", а в слове "зелёный" нет? Как можно объяснить, почему произносится так или не так? Можно ответить на вопрос почему пишется. Почему произносится? Потому что слово такое, такой язык.

Решается голосованием.
Вопрос про "-ого" может не совсем правильно сформулирован, но он касается таких слов, как "первого", "моего", "его" и т.п.
Во всех этих словах присутствует одинаковая закономерность: в окончаниях -его, -ого буква Г произносится как В.
То есть это правило, которое надо запомнить.

Вопрос должен был быть "когда", а не "почему". Я могу быть волонтёром. Зачем волонтёрам (русскоязычным) выкладывать свои вопросы, если на них всё равно, скорее всего, никто не ответит?

Originally Posted by Marcus

Вопрос должен был быть "когда", а не "почему". Я могу быть волонтёром. Зачем волонтёрам (русскоязычным) выкладывать свои вопросы, если на них всё равно, скорее всего, никто не ответит?

В моем представлении, эта служба больше подходит изучающим русский язык.
Поэтому русские волонтеры могут просто помочь с часто задаваемыми вопросами, которые будет интересно почитать иностранцам.
Тем не менее, если служба привлечет достаточно лингвистов и преподователей, то она будет полезна и носителям русского языка (сравните с gramota.ru).

I have noticed a possible bug. While I can click on my user name on the questions site to see my profile, the clickable link to the profile in the yellow messages along the top, for example when you earn another badge, leads to a page not found error.

I'll try to fix it. It's a problem with URL address.

"question and answer" doesn't work for me anymore. After pressing button "Login/Signup to post your answer" it gives the following:

500 Server Error
sorry, system error
system error log is recorded, error will be fixed as soon as possible
please report the error to the site administrators if you wish





It is both in IE and Opera.

I moved it to a subdomain http://ask.masterrussian.com
It should work now.

It doesn't work. In two browsers, even after removing all cookies.

Are you loggin in with a username or via Google?
Try to log out and then log in again. Does it help?

I've just logged in successfully in IE. I also restarted the server.

After some attempts I succeeded. Thank you!

Originally Posted by it-ogo

After some attempts I succeeded. Thank you!

It could be server caching. Usually have to wait before you see the changes.

Originally Posted by it-ogo

It doesn't work. In two browsers, even after removing all cookies.

Looks like it was a bug. If you were trying to ask a question while not yet signed in you'd get the 500 error.
But I think it works now. I updated the code.

I created a login at the page, but now it seems only OpenID and the list of other services are working? I could log in with Facebook, but that's not connected to the account I used to have...

Thanks for reporting. This problem is now fixed and you can log in with your old account.

Accounts created via openID are separate from accounts created with a username and password.

You can connect two accounts in Authentication Settings.
The URL for your account is http://ask.masterrussian.com/account/12/authsettings/ (you must be logged in to make changes)