subject: [WikiEN-l] unsourced, unverifyable, weee

body:
On Wed, 29 Nov 2006 20:18:02 -0500, "Gregory Maxwell"
<gmaxwell at gmail.com> wrote:

>On the subject of the unsourced... While looking up some info on
>british coinage today I ran across a cruftlink to [[Money in Harry
>Potter]]. Talk about unsourced! it runs wild with rampant speculation,
>routinely slips into the fictional universe, and I especially enjoy
>the bit towards the end where it lapses into first person (search for
>" I ").  It's bad enough that I'd probably check it carefully for
>copyright violations before doing anything other than putting a
>deletion notice on it.

We need a {{crap article}} template...

Guy (JzG)
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Phil Sandifer

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On Nov 30, 2006, at 4:17 PM, Thomas Dalton wrote:

>> I indef blocked and deleted the page.  Why are we even talking
>> about this?
>
> Because Wikipedia doesn't generally ban users based on political
> affiliation? Banning someone for being a Nazi when it isn't illegal
> and they aren't causing any disruption is discrimination, pure and
> simple.

Nobody was banned for being a Nazi. They were banned for proclaiming
it on their userpage. Which is disruptive. You are welcome to edit
Wikipedia as a Nazi, or as a pedophile, or as anyone else. You are,
however, expected not to use Wikipedia as a platform for proclaiming
controversial views.

What's hard here?

-Phil


from_name: Steve Bennett

subject: [WikiEN-l] Handling unreferenced but likely-valid material

body:
On 11/30/06, Daniel P. B. Smith <wikipedia2006 at dpbsmith.com> wrote:
> > From: "Steve Bennett" <stevagewp at gmail.com>
>
> > I don't think deleting accurate, high-quality, unreferenced material
> > is in Wikipedia's best interests. Asking for a source, yes. Adding
> > sources, yes. But *deleting* good material? No.
>
> Unsourced material is not high-quality material.

I'll interpret that as "Uncited material can by definition never be
considered 'high-quality material'."

And then I'll strongly disagree. Newspapers, encyclopaedias and many
other sources of high-quality information regularly do not cite their
sources. If we take one of our best featured articles and remove the
references section, it is still much better than a shorter article
that does cite its sources. And streets ahead of an article which
false cites its sources...

Don't get me wrong, citing sources is good - but for us, its primary
use is a defence against nonsense and worse. The sources are a means
to quality, not a form of quality themselves.

Steve


from_name: Jim Schuler

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Nobody was banned for being a Nazi. They were banned for proclaiming
> > it on their userpage. Which is disruptive. You are welcome to edit
> > Wikipedia as a Nazi, or as a pedophile, or as anyone else. You are,
> > however, expected not to use Wikipedia as a platform for proclaiming
> > controversial views.
> >
> > What's hard here?
>
> Is everyone displaying any of the userboxes on these pages
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:GRBerry/German_userbox_solution#Political_parties
> going to banned?
>
> The only reason I can see for treating Nazis differently from anyone
> else is because people don't like Nazis. It boils down to banning
> someone for being unpopular.
>
> If Wikipedia were based in Germany, it would be an obvious ban for
> breaking the law, but Wikipedia is under US jurisdiction, and the US
> doesn't have any such law.

I would assume that the reasoning is that the negative image potentially
created by tolerance of such a user box outweighs any free-speech rights
(besides, wiki under the TOS has set its own limits on free speech as do
most web-based institutions).  Note: this is an attempt at an explanation,
not a taking of sides, so no hate mail.  ;)


from_name: Rob

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:

> Is everyone displaying any of the userboxes on these pages
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:GRBerry/German_userbox_solution#Political_parties
> going to banned?
>
> The only reason I can see for treating Nazis differently from anyone
> else is because people don't like Nazis. It boils down to banning
> someone for being unpopular.
>
> If Wikipedia were based in Germany, it would be an obvious ban for
> breaking the law, but Wikipedia is under US jurisdiction, and the US
> doesn't have any such law.

Do you believe that the Nazi party is no different from any of those
other parties, or is this just a cheap rhetorical device?  Be honest.

Do you also not see the difference between free speech in the public
sphere and in the private sphere?  While the principles of and laws
regarding free speech should of course apply to Nazis like they do to
everyone else, Wikipedia is not obligated by those principles and laws
to provide a soapbox for Nazis.


from_name: The Cunctator

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
GODWIN GODWIN GODWIN

On 11/30/06, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Nobody was banned for being a Nazi. They were banned for proclaiming
> > it on their userpage. Which is disruptive. You are welcome to edit
> > Wikipedia as a Nazi, or as a pedophile, or as anyone else. You are,
> > however, expected not to use Wikipedia as a platform for proclaiming
> > controversial views.
> >
> > What's hard here?
>
> Is everyone displaying any of the userboxes on these pages
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:GRBerry/German_userbox_solution#Political_parties
> going to banned?
>
> The only reason I can see for treating Nazis differently from anyone
> else is because people don't like Nazis. It boils down to banning
> someone for being unpopular.
>
> If Wikipedia were based in Germany, it would be an obvious ban for
> breaking the law, but Wikipedia is under US jurisdiction, and the US
> doesn't have any such law.
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


list: foundation-l

subject: [Foundation-l] News to me

body:
I didn't realize Danny Mayer was a cofounder of Wikipedia. You learn
something new every day!

From: "Adriana Iwashko" <IwashkoA at newschool.edu>
To: < artdesignstudies at newsite.newschool.edu>
Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 16:04:36 -0500
Subject: Open Source- The Vera List Center for Art and Politics
Panel Discussion
"Open Source: On the Line"
Monday, December 4, 2006 - 6:30 p.m.
The New School, Theresa Lang Community and Student Center
55 West 13th Street, 2nd floor
New York City
Admission: $8, free for all students, as well as members of
Rhizome.org<http://rhizome.org/>
and New School faculty, staff and alumni with valid ID

Panelists:
Cory Arcangel, artist
Joy Garnett, artist
Patrick May, Director of Technology, Rhizome.org <http://rhizome.org/>
Daniel Mayer, Co-founder, Wikipedia
Laura Quilter, Founder, Fair Use Network

Moderator:
Christiane Paul, Adjunct Curator of New Media Arts, The Whitney Museum
of American Art

A panel on the aesthetic and political possibilities afforded by open
source systems, and related debates around copyright and intellectual
property.

The panelists will examine sites like Wikipedia and
Digg.com<http://digg.com/>as well as
p2p networks and social networking sites, and the practices and
challenges inherent to each. They will also explore artworks, arts
institutions, and businesses that have sought to adopt open source
models, and touch on current challenges to the continuation of this
ethos such as "net neutrality" legislation.

Organized by Rhizome, in association with the Vera List Center for Art
and Politics.

This event is presented as part of the Vera List Center's program
cycle on "The Public Domain," and on occasion of Rhizome's tenth
anniversary.

UPCOMING EVENTS:

Friday, December 1, 2006 - 6:00 and 8:00 p.m.
"AIDS and the Politics of Science"
"Beyond Lament: AIDS and the Arts"
2 panels commemorating World AIDS Day, and the 25th anniversary of
epidemic's beginning, organized by the Wolfson Center for National
Affairs

Wednesday, December 6, - 7:00 p.m.
"Image Ownership and Usage in the Digital Age"
Wednesday, December 6, 2006 - 7:00 p.m.

With Michelle Bogre, Parsons The New School for Design
Richard Ellis, Senior Vice President, Getty Images
Barbara Hoffman, Arts and Intellectual Property Lawyer

Presented as part of the Aperture Foundation's series "Confounding
Expectations: Photography in Context."


list: wikimedia-l

subject: [Foundation-l] News to me


list: wikipedia-l

subject: [Wikipedia-l] News to me


from_name: James Hare

subject: [Foundation-l] News to me

body:
Reminds me of that website that said Citizendium was founded by the
Wikimedia Foundation.

On 11/30/06, The Cunctator <cunctator at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I didn't realize Danny Mayer was a cofounder of Wikipedia. You learn
> something new every day!
>
> From: "Adriana Iwashko" <IwashkoA at newschool.edu>
> To: < artdesignstudies at newsite.newschool.edu>
> Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 16:04:36 -0500
> Subject: Open Source- The Vera List Center for Art and Politics
> Panel Discussion
> "Open Source: On the Line"
> Monday, December 4, 2006 - 6:30 p.m.
> The New School, Theresa Lang Community and Student Center
> 55 West 13th Street, 2nd floor
> New York City
> Admission: $8, free for all students, as well as members of
> Rhizome.org<http://rhizome.org/>
> and New School faculty, staff and alumni with valid ID
>
> Panelists:
> Cory Arcangel, artist
> Joy Garnett, artist
> Patrick May, Director of Technology, Rhizome.org <http://rhizome.org/>
> Daniel Mayer, Co-founder, Wikipedia
> Laura Quilter, Founder, Fair Use Network
>
> Moderator:
> Christiane Paul, Adjunct Curator of New Media Arts, The Whitney Museum
> of American Art
>
> A panel on the aesthetic and political possibilities afforded by open
> source systems, and related debates around copyright and intellectual
> property.
>
> The panelists will examine sites like Wikipedia and
> Digg.com<http://digg.com/>as well as
> p2p networks and social networking sites, and the practices and
> challenges inherent to each. They will also explore artworks, arts
> institutions, and businesses that have sought to adopt open source
> models, and touch on current challenges to the continuation of this
> ethos such as "net neutrality" legislation.
>
> Organized by Rhizome, in association with the Vera List Center for Art
> and Politics.
>
> This event is presented as part of the Vera List Center's program
> cycle on "The Public Domain," and on occasion of Rhizome's tenth
> anniversary.
>
>
> UPCOMING EVENTS:
>
> Friday, December 1, 2006 - 6:00 and 8:00 p.m.
> "AIDS and the Politics of Science"
> "Beyond Lament: AIDS and the Arts"
> 2 panels commemorating World AIDS Day, and the 25th anniversary of
> epidemic's beginning, organized by the Wolfson Center for National
> Affairs
>
> Wednesday, December 6, - 7:00 p.m.
> "Image Ownership and Usage in the Digital Age"
> Wednesday, December 6, 2006 - 7:00 p.m.
>
> With Michelle Bogre, Parsons The New School for Design
> Richard Ellis, Senior Vice President, Getty Images
> Barbara Hoffman, Arts and Intellectual Property Lawyer
>
> Presented as part of the Aperture Foundation's series "Confounding
> Expectations: Photography in Context."
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


subject: [Foundation-l] News to me


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Magnus Manske

subject: [Wikitech-l] [WikiEN-l] Time for preformatted empty articles?

body:
On 11/30/06, Steve Bennett <stevagewp at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/30/06, Evan Prodromou <evan at prodromou.name> wrote:
> > We use a little trick with MediaWiki:Newarticletext on Wikitravel to
> > make a little menu of preload options:
> >
> > http://wikitravel.org/wiki/en/index.php?title=A_page_that_does_not_exist&action=edit
> >
> > It's not beautiful, but it does the job pretty darn well, and most of
> > our new articles have the right template selected now.
>
> It's actually pretty elegant, but I can't see it working well for
> something as diverse as Wikipedia. Travel is ultimately a pretty
> constrained topic. Wikipedia isn't...the structure of articles tends
> to be dependent on the theme more than on the category. For certain
> very specific classes of articles (hurricanes, members of certain
> groups like WWF wrestlers...) templates effectively do exist (dictated
> by WikiProjects) but it would be a pretty esoteric list of templates
> to choose from. The idea is good, but it would need a slightly
> different implementation...

I have
* Templator [1] to pre-fill templates (currently in German only)
* PrepBio [2] to generate whole biography stub pages
* A coordinate template generator [3]
* A wikitext book generator from ISBN [4]
* A reference generator [5]

These could be combined into a single package to ease article creation.

Magnus

[1] http://tools.wikimedia.de/~magnus/templator.php
[2] http://tools.wikimedia.de/~magnus/prepbio.php
[3] http://tools.wikimedia.de/~magnus/coord_gen.php
[4] http://tools.wikimedia.de/~magnus/isbn2wiki.php
[5] http://tools.wikimedia.de/~magnus/makeref.php


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:
> The difference between the Nazis and many other regimes is in degree,
> not type. Where is the line drawn?

On 11/30/06, Tony Jacobs <gtjacobs at hotmail.com> wrote:

> Isn't it pretty far outside of our purview to be providing a soapbox for
> some controversial political parties and not others?  Why do we allow any of
> this crap?  What justifies allowing people to proclaim their affiliation
> with one party and not another?  I'll agree that Nazi is beyond the pale,
> but where, precisely, is "the pale"?

I believe (or hope, perhaps) that Wikipedia administrators are
rational adults and capable of discerning the difference between an
acceptable use of a Wikipedia userpage and the unacceptable use of it
as a soapbox for views "beyond the pale", and as such can discern the
difference between a normal, sane political party and one that
advocates the extermination of whole categories of other human beings.


from_name: Kurt Maxwell Weber

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On Thursday 30 November 2006 16:07, Rob wrote:

> I believe (or hope, perhaps) that Wikipedia administrators are
> rational adults and capable of discerning the difference between an
> acceptable use of a Wikipedia userpage and the unacceptable use of it
> as a soapbox for views "beyond the pale", and as such can discern the
> difference between a normal, sane political party and one that
> advocates the extermination of whole categories of other human beings.

You mean like the various leftist parties, including the Canadian Social
Democrats, the US Democrat and Communist parties, etc.?
--
Kurt Weber
<kmw at armory.com>
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subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On Thursday 30 November 2006 16:16, Rob wrote:
> On 11/30/06, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:
> > This discussion is null anyway since the user doesn't seem to be using
> > the userbox in seriousness. It seems to be some kind of in-your-face
> > humour.
>
> Of course. And that kind of trolling is pretty much covered under
> Wikipedia rules prohibiting disruption.

How was it "disruptive"?  What actual problems did it cause?

--
Kurt Weber
<kmw at armory.com>
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from_name: Earle Martin

body:
On 30/11/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
> We need a {{crap article}} template...

Once again, Encyclopedia Dramatica has beaten us to the punch.

http://encyclopediadramatica.com/index.php/Template:Crap

--
Earle Martin
            http://downlode.org/
http://purl.org/net/earlemartin/


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On Thursday 30 November 2006 16:56, geni wrote:
>
> Well ok lets go for an example directly involveing genocide:
>
> This user supports the Scythians.

This user is a Turk.

This user is a Communist.

etc., etc., etc.
--
Kurt Weber
<kmw at armory.com>
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subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> This discussion is null anyway since the user doesn't seem to be using
> the userbox in seriousness. It seems to be some kind of in-your-face
> humour.

Of course. And that kind of trolling is pretty much covered under
Wikipedia rules prohibiting disruption.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
The only problem with fighting trolls is that it encourages them.

On 11/30/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 30/11/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 11/30/06, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > This discussion is null anyway since the user doesn't seem to be using
> > > the userbox in seriousness. It seems to be some kind of in-your-face
> > > humour.
>
> > Of course. And that kind of trolling is pretty much covered under
> > Wikipedia rules prohibiting disruption.
>
>
> Or specifically, the "don't be a blatant dick" subclause.
>
>
> - d.
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


subject:
[Wikitech-l] Startup looking for Superstar Wiki Developer (SF
	Bay Area)

body:
Do you get paid by the asterisk?

On 11/30/06, Michael Sha <sha at deas.harvard.edu> wrote:
>
> We are a consumer web startup that's building a lot of really interesting
> features on top of an existing wiki platform (Mediawiki is one of the five
> we've narrowed it down to) and we're looking for a superstar developer
> with
> wiki experience to join the team.
>
> *We are a company:*
>
> Who wants to use the power of Wiki to solve a big problem for
> consumers.  Part
> of our vision involves extending the functionality of one of the major
> wiki
> platforms with innovative features that pose exciting technical
> challenges.
> Be one of the first people to join a consumer web startup which could put
> a
> lot of large companies out of business.
>
> *You are someone who:*
>
>    - Is *scary smart* and someone we can *trust* will find the *right
>    answers* to hard problems you may have never solved before.
>    - Is *technically brilliant*, *versatile*, and* creative*.
>    - Your * teammates* love working with.  You also have *friends* like
>    you who would *love* to *work with you* as we continue to grow.
>    - Will *passionately bust your ass* at the prospect of building
>    something that will revolutionize a $100B+ industry.
>
> Specifically, we need someone who has a lot of valuable*
> experience*building and extending the feature set of wiki platforms.
> You also need experience designing and building highly-available and fault
> tolerant *consumer web *applications with *performance*, *scalability*, *
> stability*, and *security* in mind.  This means you're very adept at:
>
>    - Building and extending the functionality of a wiki platform
>    - Database experience (optimizing SQL and writing software that uses
>    SQL to access databases)
>    - Distributed systems (hands-on experience preferred, academic
>    experience is OK)
>    - C/C++
>    - LAMP (PHP, Python, Perl)
>
> Past experience with the following will make you even better able to
> contribute to the team:
>
>    - Innovative approaches to UI design (AJAX, Flex/Actionscript/Flash)
>    - Designing and implementing production websites (HTML, CSS, XML,
>    Javascript, etc.)
>    - Database admin experience (setting up, maintaining and optimizing
>    Oracle, MySQL or PostgreSQL databases)
>
> *You will:*
>
>    - Start with ideas, design products and features, architect a
>    technical solution, then build, test, and launch it.
>    - Help build and grow the engineering team as we expand over time.  If
>    you also want to lead this team, that's in the cards, if you show us
> you
>    can.
>
> *We will:*
>
>    - Be a group of the smartest, most trustworthy, passionate, and
>    interesting people you know.
>    - Make sure you have what you need to be happy and productive.
>    - Compensate you with a flexible mixture of cash and equity.
>    - Make great teammates united around a vision of how to solve some
>    pretty important problems for people.
>
>
> Interested candidates should send your resume to
> stealth.job at gmail.com<stealth_mode at gmail.com>with Wiki Guru in the
> subject line.
> Please also include in your email a summary of your past work with wiki
> platforms (which ones you've worked with and what your contributions have
> been to them).
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:

> Remember, there is a difference between modern neo-nazi parties and
> the German Nazi party of the 1930s and 40s. They may have the same
> political beliefs, but they are different parties. This user is not a
> mass murderer, he just happens to agree with one on political issues.

If anything, the modern Nazi advocate is worse, because he or she has
no excuse for not knowing what the Nazi agenda is really about.  A
modern Nazi is of course not a mass murderer, merely a wannabe mass
murderer, but the only difference between the two is skill and
opportunity.


from_name: Darko Bulatovic

subject: [Foundation-l] Vandalism and small wikis

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:
> Governments also need style manuals for official publications, but these
> do not have the force of law for non-governmental operations.  Our
> schools never make reference to any kind of official spelling or grammar
> when teaching children.  English, more than any other language is based
> on history, custom and usage.  There is such a thing as poor language
> skills for native speakers, but one feature that makes it very difficult
> for the health of other languages is the easy acceptance by English of
> ways of speaking drawn from other languages.
>
>
>
Ray,

Here is not same situation, In all publications or education there must
be followed rules thats are called "Pravopis" and they are in some part
very strict. As this is not my  field and I have trouble to talk about
it on English, I hope you will understand at least some of this. Our
language is very different from English as there are many rules (because
many native English speakers have problem to learn our language). One
example there are "Rodovi" which change construction of sentence, which
in English is absent. This is based on ( Him, She, it).

Darko Bulatovic


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 11/30/06, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Remember, there is a difference between modern neo-nazi parties and
> > the German Nazi party of the 1930s and 40s. They may have the same
> > political beliefs, but they are different parties. This user is not a
> > mass murderer, he just happens to agree with one on political issues.
>
> If anything, the modern Nazi advocate is worse, because he or she has
> no excuse for not knowing what the Nazi agenda is really about.  A
> modern Nazi is of course not a mass murderer, merely a wannabe mass
> murderer, but the only difference between the two is skill and
> opportunity.

Debates about Naziism aside, either all political userboxes are allowed or
none are, as every political party is considered to be offensive by
someone.  One point: we need to watch for mission (anti-user box) creep.


subject: [WikiEN-l] GNAA Deleted!

body:
On 11/30/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
>
> On Thu, 30 Nov 2006 13:51:19 -0500, "The Cunctator"
> <cunctator at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >I have nothing against specialists, but I also see no reason that they
> >shouldn't be subsumed in the gaping maw of Wikipedia.
>
> Canonical policies on neutral point of view, no original research and
> verifiability?

Canonical, shmanonical. I was talking about specialists, not fabulists.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Jim Schuler <jim62sch at gmail.com> wrote:

>
> Debates about Naziism aside, either all political userboxes are allowed or
> none are, as every political party is considered to be offensive by
> someone.  One point: we need to watch for mission (anti-user box) creep.

Yes, but the consensus is amongst the vast majority of non-Nazis that
they are offensive.  There is no need for an all or nothing
requirement here.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Yes, but the consensus is amongst the vast majority of non-Nazis that
> > they are offensive.
>
> Evidence?

Oh, please.

> >There is no need for an all or nothing
> > requirement here.
>
> So you would be ok with a "this user is a supporter of the GIA" userbox?

Case by case basis decided by rational adults, not all or nothing or
everything but Nazi.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 30/11/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Yes, but the consensus is amongst the vast majority of non-Nazis that
> > they are offensive.  There is no need for an all or nothing
> > requirement here.
>
> The concensus among most non-Republicans is that they are morally
> offensive. The same goes for the Democrats. So what?

This is an absurd comparison.  Rational people are completely capable
of distinguishing between normal partisan politics and a group which
advocates mass extermination.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 11/30/06, Jim Schuler <jim62sch at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >
> > Debates about Naziism aside, either all political userboxes are allowed
> or
> > none are, as every political party is considered to be offensive by
> > someone.  One point: we need to watch for mission (anti-user box) creep.
>
> Yes, but the consensus is amongst the vast majority of non-Nazis that
> they are offensive.  There is no need for an all or nothing
> requirement here.

That's utter nonsense.  Would you delete a page and ban the user who has a
Communist userbox?  Yes or no?  Communists were responsible for far more
deaths than the Nazis (hell, Hitler was an amateur compared to Uncle Joe and
the Beloved Chairman Mao), and we (the Western nations) were allied with a
genocidal paranoid butcher during WWII in order to defeat another genocidal
paranoid butcher.

Picking and choosing what is "acceptable" is, to me, often an example of
fear and ignorance.


from_name: MacGyverMagic/Mgm

body:
We need a cleanup tag. The writers in this article use the wrong sources who
don't know the value themselves either. They should be using
http://www.hp-lexicon.org/wizworld/money.html who take their info straight
from J.K. Rowling as much as they can. The article should be about the
appearance of the money and what can be bought with it instead of just the
bloody exchange rate. We don't need all theories. Most of them can be blown
out of the water anyway by something called exchange rate fluctuation.

Mgm

On 11/30/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
>
> On Wed, 29 Nov 2006 20:18:02 -0500, "Gregory Maxwell"
> <gmaxwell at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >On the subject of the unsourced... While looking up some info on
> >british coinage today I ran across a cruftlink to [[Money in Harry
> >Potter]]. Talk about unsourced! it runs wild with rampant speculation,
> >routinely slips into the fictional universe, and I especially enjoy
> >the bit towards the end where it lapses into first person (search for
> >" I ").  It's bad enough that I'd probably check it carefully for
> >copyright violations before doing anything other than putting a
> >deletion notice on it.
>
> We need a {{crap article}} template...
>
> Guy (JzG)
> --
> http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Jim Schuler <jim62sch at gmail.com> wrote:

> That's utter nonsense.  Would you delete a page and ban the user who has a
> Communist userbox?  Yes or no?  Communists were responsible for far more
> deaths than the Nazis (hell, Hitler was an amateur compared to Uncle Joe and
> the Beloved Chairman Mao), and we (the Western nations) were allied with a
> genocidal paranoid butcher during WWII in order to defeat another genocidal
> paranoid butcher.
>
> Picking and choosing what is "acceptable" is, to me, often an example of
> fear and ignorance.

"Fear and ignorance"?  Seriously, let's tone down the rhetoric here,
please.  How is saying that Wikipedia has no obligation to be a Nazi
soapbox motivated by "fear and ignorance"?  How is saying that
Wikipedia should have rules of conduct that dictate that certain
behaviors are outrageous, rules of conduct which are entirely similar
to rules used in many, many other private spheres, motivated by "fear
and ignorance"?


from_name: Simetrical

subject: [Wikitech-l] [MediaWiki-CVS] SVN: [18007] trunk/extensions

body:
On 11/29/06, Manuel Schneider <manuel.schneider at wikimedia.ch> wrote:
> well, it's me, as I'm known since 15 years in all kind of computing fields,
> including Wikipedia, MediaWiki and the IRC channels.

Just out of curiosity: what made you decide to use a name equivalent
(theoretically) to the *successor* of the Pentium, two years before
the Pentium itself debuted?


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:

>
> So you can't back it up. Remeber there are parts of the world outside
> europe and the US.

Oh, I was wondering what was on the other side of that big blue space
on the map.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > "Fear and ignorance"?  Seriously, let's tone down the rhetoric here,
> > please.  How is saying that Wikipedia has no obligation to be a Nazi
> > soapbox motivated by "fear and ignorance"?
>
> Please be showing where wikipedia has been acting as a nazi soapbox.

No obligation to provide a soapbox to Nazis via a userpage. You know
perfectly well what I'm saying.

> > How is saying that
> > Wikipedia should have rules of conduct that dictate that certain
> > behaviors are outrageous, rules of conduct which are entirely similar
> > to rules used in many, many other private spheres, motivated by "fear
> > and ignorance"?
>
> Because in this case they would appear to be backed by the appeal to
> popularity logical fallacy.

Whatever.  There's nothing fallacious about saying that these rules of
conduct which work perfectly fine in most private and semi-public
spheres will work perfectly fine here.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Oh, I was wondering what was on the other side of that big blue space
> > on the map.
>
> If you recall china's recent history it is likely that there is a
> greater cultral bias against imperal japanese than agaist the distant
> nazis. China makes up a significant part of the worlds population so
> for you claim to hold you would need to show (amoung other things)
> that a significant percentage of chinese found certian references to
> the nazis offensive.

If there was a hypothetical Asian Nazi-like group that advocated the
extermination of all Chinese, I wouldn't have to show that people in
France or Canada or Estonia also found them offensive to support the
prohbition against allowing that group to use Wikipedia userspace as a
soapbox.


from_name: Liviu Andronic

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Moldovan Wikipedia (sry)

body:
On 11/30/06, Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com> wrote:
> So what is it? What is your native language? You said it was Moldovan,
> I guessed it was French, and now you are telling me I have poor
> English. Make a choice, sir.
It is interesting how you guessed that I was a native French speaker,
_after_ I have publicly presented myself as a native Moldovan - hence,
speaker (my first
comment<http://mo.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Main_Page#The_Moldovan_section_of_Wikipedia_should_be_deleted>on
this
mo.wiki matter). You have a remarkable intuition. Chapeau.

As for English.. English isn't a problem; your attitude is.

Have a nice week

--
Liviu


from_name: Bryan Derksen

subject: [WikiEN-l] GNAA Deleted!

body:
The Cunctator wrote:
> Why can't Wikipedia be all things to all people?

Hear hear!

When I finally became completely sick of the menagerie of stub templates
that decorated the bottoms of most of the pages I saw, I didn't go on a
grand crusade to delete them all from Wikipedia. Instead I just edited
my stylesheet and made them invisible. It'd be neat if we could do that
with entire articles, being able to eliminate everything in
[[Category:Fictional]] or [[Category:High schools]] from one's personal
view of Wikipedia could have saved a lot of bloodshed over the years.

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subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 11/30/06, Jim Schuler <jim62sch at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > That's utter nonsense.  Would you delete a page and ban the user who has
> a
> > Communist userbox?  Yes or no?  Communists were responsible for far more
> > deaths than the Nazis (hell, Hitler was an amateur compared to Uncle Joe
> and
> > the Beloved Chairman Mao), and we (the Western nations) were allied with
> a
> > genocidal paranoid butcher during WWII in order to defeat another
> genocidal
> > paranoid butcher.
> >
> > Picking and choosing what is "acceptable" is, to me, often an example of
> > fear and ignorance.
>
> "Fear and ignorance"?  Seriously, let's tone down the rhetoric here,
> please.  How is saying that Wikipedia has no obligation to be a Nazi
> soapbox motivated by "fear and ignorance"?  How is saying that
> Wikipedia should have rules of conduct that dictate that certain
> behaviors are outrageous, rules of conduct which are entirely similar
> to rules used in many, many other private spheres, motivated by "fear
> and ignorance"?

Some day I'll remember not to post philosophical points here.  I simply
don't have the time to explain how fear and ignorance are the catalyst
for censorship.

Also, the inferrences you draw are not supported by what I wrote.

Finally, Wiki has no obligation to be a soapbox for anything, not just those
things people find offensive.


from_name: David Ashby

subject:
[WikiEN-l] oh joy, oh rapture,
	oh bliss: the userbox wars are reignited

body:
> On 11/30/06, Steve Summit <scs at eskimo.com> wrote:
> > And what better tie-in than Naziism.
> > Mike Godwin would laugh and laugh...
On 11/30/06, Ryan Wetherell <renardius at gmail.com> wrote:
> I think I'll be deleting my political-geared userboxes, just to be safe.

I'm up for deleting all userboxes, but that's neither here nor there.

-humblefool


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > If there was a hypothetical Asian Nazi-like group that advocated the
> > extermination of all Chinese, I wouldn't have to show that people in
> > France or Canada or Estonia also found them offensive to support the
> > prohbition against allowing that group to use Wikipedia userspace as a
> > soapbox.
>
> Again that phrase "use Wikipedia userspace as asoapbox". I've seen the
> userspace used as a soapbox for real. This wasn't it.

Guess we'll just have to disagree on that point.  It seemed to be a
pretty clear (though almost certainly insincere) advocacy of Nazism.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Jim Schuler <jim62sch at gmail.com> wrote:

>
> Some day I'll remember not to post philosophical points here.  I simply
> don't have the time to explain how fear and ignorance are the catalyst
> for censorship.

And when we remove personal attacks, vandalism, or libel, are we
censoring as well?


from_name: Steve Summit

body:
And what better tie-in than Naziism.
Mike Godwin would laugh and laugh...


from_name: George Herbert

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
>
> Rob wrote:
> > On 11/30/06, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> Remember, there is a difference between modern neo-nazi parties and
> >> the German Nazi party of the 1930s and 40s. They may have the same
> >> political beliefs, but they are different parties. This user is not a
> >> mass murderer, he just happens to agree with one on political issues.
> >
> > If anything, the modern Nazi advocate is worse, because he or she has
> > no excuse for not knowing what the Nazi agenda is really about.  A
> > modern Nazi is of course not a mass murderer, merely a wannabe mass
> > murderer, but the only difference between the two is skill and
> > opportunity.
>
> In this case, it is not so much about Nazi or non-Nazi.  It's about
> trolling.  Don't feed the trolls.
>
> Do you know what trolls like to eat?  They thrive on getting good people
> to fight with each other.  Yum Yum.  It's boring.  Best to treat it as
> boring and move on.
>
> --Jimbo
>

Nuking this guy didn't harm having accurate or balanced coverage of
Nazi-ism.

The "rest of us" tend to be in situations where kicking people off the
project without due process is a pretty bad thing to have happen, but I
can't disagree that simply being done with him was probably best for us
all.  Good call.

--
-george william herbert
george.herbert at gmail.com


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Phil Sandifer <Snowspinner at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> On Nov 30, 2006, at 4:51 PM, Tony Jacobs wrote:
> >   I'll agree that Nazi is beyond the pale, but where, precisely, is
> > "the pale"?
>
> There is no definition of "the pale." This is Calvinball. When things
> are stupid, we kill them. The end. No details, no "process," just
> "That is stupid," followed by "bang."
>

Most of us don't really get to play Calvinball with trolls.  That's probably
a good thing.

Jimbo does.  That's probably also a good thing.

--
-george william herbert
george.herbert at gmail.com


from_name: Anthony

subject: [WikiEN-l] GNAA Deleted!

body:
On 11/30/06, Tony Jacobs <gtjacobs at hotmail.com> wrote:
> >From: "The Cunctator" <cunctator at gmail.com>
> >Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> >To: "English Wikipedia" <wikien-l at wikipedia.org>
> >Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] GNAA Deleted!
> >Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 11:32:21 -0500
> >
> >I for one think it's pathetic that Wikipedia is giving up on the mission of
> >being a complete encyclopedia because there exist specialty sites on
> >particular areas of knowledge.
>
> I disagree. Wikipedia can't be all things to all people, and I think it's
> silly to try.  Wikipedia should consider itself one of a community of wikis,
> specifically, the encyclopedic one, with academic standards.  Why not allow
> for there to be multiple sources of information, and let the different ones
> specialize in different things and get good at what they do?
>
Well, the biggest problem with that is that the other sources
invariably don't hold themselves to as high a standard as Wikipedia.
Is the content free?  Is it written from a neutral point of view?  Is
it verifiable?  Is the project controlled by a non-profit charity?
Are there ads plastered all over the place?

Wikipedia can't be all things to all people, but it should strive to
be a complete encyclopedia.

Anthony


from_name: geni

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Michael Bimmler <mbimmler at gmail.com> wrote:
> I just came across the following userpage
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Blind14
> which shows a "This user is a nazi"-userbox quite prominently,
> depicting a swastika in a clearly non-enzyclopedic contect (i.e. as a
> personal non-scientific reference / symbol of adherence). I'm not sure
> about legislation in US but I wonder whether this could be an offense
> against law.

Nope totaly legal in the US. PRobably not legal in germany probably
legal in the UK.

>Feel free to comment on whether it is a violation of
> Wikipedia policies, I won't comment this, as I didn't take part in the
> Great Userboxes War.
> Michael

Ignore them there is nothing to be gained by feeding the !trolls.

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] GNAA Deleted!

body:
On 11/30/06, The Cunctator <cunctator at gmail.com> wrote:
> Why can't Wikipedia be all things to all people?

See [[Cat]]. There is a finite number of pics you can put in one article.

--
geni


from_name: Thomas Dalton

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
> Nope totaly legal in the US. PRobably not legal in germany probably
> legal in the UK.

Indeed, the only country that has laws against being pro-nazi, to my
knowledge, is Germany. As long as it isn't in the template space, we
might as well let it be.


from_name: Guettarda

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Kurt Maxwell Weber <kmw at armory.com> wrote:
>
> On Thursday 30 November 2006 16:56, geni wrote:
> >
> > Well ok lets go for an example directly involveing genocide:
> >
> > This user supports the Scythians.
>
> This user is a Turk.
>
> This user is a Communist.
>
> etc., etc., etc.

There's a difference between "groups which have commited genocide" (who
hasn't?) and espousing ideologies which endorse genocide.


from_name: Michael Bimmler

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
I just came across the following userpage
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Blind14
which shows a "This user is a nazi"-userbox quite prominently,
depicting a swastika in a clearly non-enzyclopedic contect (i.e. as a
personal non-scientific reference / symbol of adherence). I'm not sure
about legislation in US but I wonder whether this could be an offense
against law. Feel free to comment on whether it is a violation of
Wikipedia policies, I won't comment this, as I didn't take part in the
Great Userboxes War.
Michael


from_name: roc

subject:
[Foundation-l] heavily biased BS (Fwd: [Wikizh-l] Chinese-language
	Wikipedia presents different view of history)

body:
FYI. An article by NYT senior writer Mr. Howard French on the
difference between Chinese and English Wikipedias was published on the
International Herald Tribune yesterday at
http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/11/29/news/wiki.php and
http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/11/29/business/wiki.php. Many Chinese
Wikipedians were extremely disappointed by the profound bias, shallow
research, and jammed untrue descriptions. You can read the forwarded
message from Lawrence Lo (Lorenzarius), and a blog entry from Joseph
Wang (Roadrunner) at http://twofish.wordpress.com/. There were also
private communications from other Chinese Wikipedians on their similar
opinions .

The take-home messages are:

1) Chinese Wikipedia has and conforms to a high standard of NPOV, and
Chinese Wikipedians take this policy seriously.

2) There is no such thing called "self-censorship" at Chinese
Wikipedia; indeed any intention for such practice at Chinese Wikipedia
will be denounced by most Chinese Wikipedians.

3) Chinese Wikipedia is written by people from various places of the
world, including Mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Asia, America,
Europe, etc. Indeed, editors from Mainland China are disproportionally
scarce because of the current block obviously imposed by the PRC
government (though it never admitted that).

I am not going to list all the false/misleading statements in the
report, as it is super easy to identify chunks of them by any one who
is able to read the following Wikipedia articles in both English and
Chinese. There Wikipedia articles were used as examples in the report.
If you like, check both the current and past versions when the report
was prepared/published.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_Zedong
http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/???
(http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%AF%9B%E6%B3%BD%E4%B8%9C)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Taiwan
http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/????
(http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%8F%B0%E7%81%A3%E6%AD%B7%E5%8F%B2)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwanese_aborigines
http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/?????
(http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E8%87%BA%E7%81%A3%E5%8E%9F%E4%BD%8F%E6%B0%91)

By the way, the part of Taiwan's history cited in this IHT report from
English Wikipedia and deemed correct was actually wrong. Luckily, that
part in the actual English Wikipedia article has been corrected in
last August.

Best regards,

roc
--

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Lawrence Lo <lorenzarius at gmail.com>
Date: 2006/11/29 ?? 11:21
Subject: Re: [Wikizh-l] Chinese-language Wikipedia presents different
view of history
To: Andrew Lih <andrew.lih at gmail.com>
Cc: wikizh-l at wikimedia.org

I call this report biased BS. A wiki as we all know is continuously
evolving, singling one edition of one article does not prove anything.
For instance the last sentences in the opening paragraph of the
current edition
(http://zh.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=%E6%AF%9B%E6%B3%BD%E4%B8%9C&oldid=3020691)
of the article in question now reads:

He [Mao] was also the initiator of a series of political movements
such as the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, resulting
in the abnormal deaths of many Mainland people and great destructions
to many Chinese cultural and historical monuments. He had a great
influence on the 20th century's China and the world.

And obviously omission does not equal self-censorship. Self-censorship
is when a person knows something but intentionally avoids to mention
it. But IMO the more realistic situation with most Mainland
contributors is that they don't know that "something" to begin with.
When a man is taught since birth that "A is right", how can you
criticize him for not knowing that somebody in the other part of the
world thinks that "B is right"? In fact, the Chinese Wikipedia is a
great place for people from different parts of the Chinese-speaking
world to get to know things that we didn't know, to understands things
from the other perspectives.

On 11/29/06, Andrew Lih <andrew.lih at gmail.com> wrote:
> FYI, some of our own famous ZH Wikipedians mentioned...
>
>
> http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/11/29/news/wiki.php
>
>  Chinese-language Wikipedia presents different view of history
> By Howard W. French
> The New York Times
>
> Just who was Mao Zedong?
>
> According to the English-language version of Wikipedia, the popular
> online encyclopedia, he was a victorious military and political leader
> who founded China's modern Communist state. He was also a man many saw
> as "a mass murderer, holding his leadership accountable for the deaths
> of tens of millions of innocent Chinese."
>
> Switch to Wikipedia in Chinese, and one discovers a very different
> man. There, Mao Zedong's reputation is unsullied by any mention of a
> death toll in the great purges of the 1950s and 1960s, or for what
> many historians call the greatest famine in human history.
>
> In recent weeks, the Chinese government has demonstrated its hostility
> toward the emergence of a credible source of reference material that
> escapes its control by frequently blocking access to Wikipedia, whose
> Chinese version, though still far smaller than its English-language
> counterpart, is growing by leaps and bounds.
>
> But on sensitive questions of China's modern history or on hot-button
> issues, the Chinese version diverges so dramatically from its English
> counterpart that it sometimes reads as if it were approved by the
> censors themselves.
>
> This gulf in information and perspective comes across powerfully in
> the entry on Mao, which is consistently one of the most frequently
> searched and edited topics in the Chinese version, and in the entry on
> historical watersheds, like the Tiananmen Square massacre, the Great
> Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution.
>
> Chinese Wikipedia users and critics say that the differences highlight
> the resilience here of a system of information control whose reach
> goes well beyond simple censorship.
>
> In each of its language versions, Wikipedia is collaboratively written
> and edited by online enthusiasts, and contributors to the
> Chinese-language site explain the differences in content by citing the
> powerful influence of Chinese education, which often provides a neatly
> sanitized national perspective on sensitive aspects of the country's
> past.
>
> This parochialism is reinforced by the blocking of foreign Web sites,
> and by the conformism of the carefully censored mass media.
> Alternative viewpoints are sometimes available, but usually only to a
> restricted circle of people who have the means and determination to
> seek them out.
>
> For some, the Chinese version of Wikipedia was intended as just such a
> resource, but its tame approach to sensitive topics has sparked a
> fierce debate in the world of online mavens over its objectivity and
> thoroughness.
>
> In a recent discussion on the encyclopedia's Web site about the Mao
> legacy, a user with the online name Manchurian Tiger wrote, "If anyone
> can prove that Mao's political movements didn't kill so many people,
> I'm willing to delete the wording that 'millions of people were
> killed.'" Rather than contribute to encyclopedias, those who wish to
> pay tribute to Mao, he added, should "go to his mausoleum."
>
> Another user replied angrily: "If you want to release your emotions,
> use a bulletin board. Wikipedia is not your toilet." In the end, the
> entry on Mao included no death toll from either famine or political
> purges.
>
> Indeed, in its present form, the Chinese Wikipedia introduction to Mao
> Zedong could hardly be more anodyne: "One of the main founders and
> leaders of the Communist Party of China, the People's Liberation Army
> and the People's Republic of China," it reads. "He introduced a series
> of political movements such as the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural
> Revolution. He had a great influence over 20th-century China and the
> world."
>
> On the evidence of entries like this, for the moment, the fight over
> editorial direction of Wikipedia in Chinese is being won by
> enthusiasts who practice self-censorship.
>
> "Most of the people who contribute to Wikipedia rarely touch upon
> political topics," said Yuan Mingli, a frequent contributor from
> Shanghai. "They prefer to write about things like technology. There
> are other things in life."
>
> Others denounce compromises on content as a deviation from the
> original mission of Wikipedia, which they say is to spread reliable
> information and to seek truth. In any case, they add, self- censorship
> has already proved na?ve because the government still frequently
> blocks access for most Chinese Internet users.
>
> "There is a lot of confusion about whether they should obey the
> neutral point of view or offer some compromises to the government,"
> said Isaac Mao, a well-known Chinese blogger and user of the
> encyclopedia. "To the local Wikipedians, the first objective is to
> make it well-known among Chinese, to get people to understand the
> principles of Wikipedia step by step, and not to get the thing blocked
> by the government. The government doesn't buy into their attitude."
>
> After Mao Zedong, few questions are treated as more sacrosanct in
> China than the status of Taiwan, which every pupil is taught is
> irrevocably part of China. To publicly suggest that Taiwanese have any
> historical basis for asserting their independence from China would be
> a career-ending offense for anyone in academia or in the media.
>
> The English-language version of the encyclopedia speaks of a Japanese
> shipwreck off Taiwan in 1871, in which 54 crew members were beheaded
> by Taiwanese aborigines. Japan demanded compensation from China, only
> to be told that Taiwan was not within China's jurisdiction. The
> Chinese-language entry on Taiwan, meanwhile, is silent on the
> jurisdiction question.
>
> Similarly, the English-language Wikipedia mentions the settlement of
> Taiwan by aborigines who are genetically related to Malaysians, about
> 4,000 years ago. It also places the first meaningful settlement of the
> island by Chinese in the 16th century.
>
> The Chinese version of Wikipedia, though, merely speaks of cultural
> affinities with Malaysians and speculates about the possible
> exploration of the island by Chinese as far back as the third century.
>
> A parallel, and purely homegrown, effort at creating an online
> encyclopedia in China, Baidu Baike, skirts controversies like these
> altogether. Baidu Baike, which is owned by the biggest Internet search
> engine company in China, asserts that Taiwan's original inhabitants
> "came from mainland China directly or indirectly," and not from
> Malaysia.
>
> Similarly, a user who searches for the Tiananmen Square massacre will
> find no entry.
>
> As online reference sites grow in popularity here, Baidu Baike
> benefits from government efforts to block Wikipedia, just as the same
> company's search engine once benefited from similar blockage of
> Google.
>
> Baidu Baike, much of whose content appears to be copied directly from
> Wikipedia, would not release detailed user statistics, saying only
> that it has "several million" users each day. A spokeswoman for the
> company, Zhang Yan, said it is guided by the editorial policy of not
> "judging the existing national system with malice."
>
> Asked to explain what this meant, Zhang said, "Anyone who is Chinese knows."
> _______________________________________________
> Wikizh-l mailing list
> Wikizh-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikizh-l
>

--
http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Lorenzarius
Tel: +852 95825791
_______________________________________________
Wikizh-l mailing list
Wikizh-l at Wikipedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikizh-l


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
> I have a feeling that most of central Europe has banned any sort of pro-Nazi
> sentiment from being expressed publicly.

Austria might have done, but other than that, I don't think so.
Reading the relevant Wikipedia articles shows that quite a few
European countries have Neo-nazi parties (some even gaining seats in
parliaments occasionally), so there certainly isn't a widespread ban.


from_name: Tony Jacobs

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
>From: Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net>
>Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
>To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
>Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes
>Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 22:36:20 +0000
>
>On Thu, 30 Nov 2006 13:34:19 -0800, "Tony Jacobs"
><gtjacobs at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> >It bothers me that we consider it our place to draw that line.  Can we
> >please just ban political userboxes already, and avoid having to make
>calls
> >about why being a Nazi is so much worse than supporting [YOUR LEAST
>FAVORITE
> >REGIME HERE]?
>
>Not even close.
>
>That user's page contained:
>
>(Slipknot) This User is a Maggot
>(GRRR!) This User thinks copyright/fair use is a bitch
>(image) This User disagrees with the existance of WP:Point because
>Wikipedia is not censored
>(swastika) This User is a Nazi
>(image of raised middle finger) This User's middle name is offensive
>and he honestly couldn't care less about you
>(BOMB!) The only sport this User plays is Yo Momma
>
>The user has less than a dozen mainspace edits, several of which were
>re-introducing unsourced images removed from the article by others.
>
>The user has edited mainspace once since September.
>
>The user has a history of copyright violations and has been blocked
>for vandalism.
>
>We have already wasted more time discussing this than the user is
>worth to the project, on that evidence.  It's worth debating the likes
>of SPUI and nobs01 because they are as productive as they can be
>maddening.  This one?  I think not.
>

Personally, I wasn't discussing that user at all, but the principle of
tolerating some political userboxes and not others.

GTB

_________________________________________________________________
Get free, personalized commercial-free online radio with MSN Radio powered
by Pandora http://radio.msn.com/?icid=T002MSN03A07001


subject: [WikiEN-l] GNAA Deleted!

body:
>From: Anthony <wikilegal at inbox.org>
>Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
>To: "English Wikipedia" <wikien-l at wikipedia.org>
>Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] GNAA Deleted!
>Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 18:49:59 -0500
>
>On 11/30/06, Tony Jacobs <gtjacobs at hotmail.com> wrote:
> > >From: "The Cunctator" <cunctator at gmail.com>
> > >Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> > >To: "English Wikipedia" <wikien-l at wikipedia.org>
> > >Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] GNAA Deleted!
> > >Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 11:32:21 -0500
> > >
> > >I for one think it's pathetic that Wikipedia is giving up on the
>mission of
> > >being a complete encyclopedia because there exist specialty sites on
> > >particular areas of knowledge.
> >
> > I disagree. Wikipedia can't be all things to all people, and I think
>it's
> > silly to try.  Wikipedia should consider itself one of a community of
>wikis,
> > specifically, the encyclopedic one, with academic standards.  Why not
>allow
> > for there to be multiple sources of information, and let the different
>ones
> > specialize in different things and get good at what they do?
> >
>Well, the biggest problem with that is that the other sources
>invariably don't hold themselves to as high a standard as Wikipedia.
>Is the content free?  Is it written from a neutral point of view?  Is
>it verifiable?  Is the project controlled by a non-profit charity?
>Are there ads plastered all over the place?
>
>Wikipedia can't be all things to all people, but it should strive to
>be a complete encyclopedia.
>

I agree.  It's just the definition of "encyclopedia" where we seem to
differ.  I think an encyclopedia is a teriary source, grounded in
independent research.

GTB

_________________________________________________________________
Get free, personalized commercial-free online radio with MSN Radio powered
by Pandora http://radio.msn.com/?icid=T002MSN03A07001


from_name: gabriela sanhuezagaray

subject: [Wikipedia-l] (no subject)

body:
Por favor si pueden mandeme la informaci?n en espa?ol, aunque leo ingles,
hay algunas palabras que desconozco.
Gracias

_________________________________________________________________
Charla con tus amigos en l?nea mediante MSN Messenger:
http://messenger.latam.msn.com/


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
Is this user editing nazi-related articles or with a pro-nazi POV?
If not, I think we can safely ignore them.

Mgm

On 11/30/06, James Hare <messedrocker at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I have a feeling that most of central Europe has banned any sort of
> pro-Nazi
> sentiment from being expressed publicly.
>
> On 11/30/06, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > Nope totaly legal in the US. PRobably not legal in germany probably
> > > legal in the UK.
> >
> > Indeed, the only country that has laws against being pro-nazi, to my
> > knowledge, is Germany. As long as it isn't in the template space, we
> > might as well let it be.
> > _______________________________________________
> > WikiEN-l mailing list
> > WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> > To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
> >
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Jimmy Wales

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
Rob wrote:
> On 11/30/06, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Remember, there is a difference between modern neo-nazi parties and
>> the German Nazi party of the 1930s and 40s. They may have the same
>> political beliefs, but they are different parties. This user is not a
>> mass murderer, he just happens to agree with one on political issues.
>
> If anything, the modern Nazi advocate is worse, because he or she has
> no excuse for not knowing what the Nazi agenda is really about.  A
> modern Nazi is of course not a mass murderer, merely a wannabe mass
> murderer, but the only difference between the two is skill and
> opportunity.

In this case, it is not so much about Nazi or non-Nazi.  It's about
trolling.  Don't feed the trolls.

Do you know what trolls like to eat?  They thrive on getting good people
to fight with each other.  Yum Yum.  It's boring.  Best to treat it as
boring and move on.

--Jimbo


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Phil Sandifer <Snowspinner at gmail.com> wrote:
> Bullshit. The only reason to display that userbox is to cause
> disruption. Ban the idiot, delete the userpage, no angst required.

Banning take effort. Better to ignore and wait untill they go away.

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
> Banning take effort. Better to ignore and wait untill they go away.

I can't see what grounds we can ban them on anyway. They are perfectly
entitled to be a Nazi, we may not like it, but "I don't like you"
wasn't on the list of reasons to ban someone last time I checked.

We don't ban people for stating other political affiliations on their
user pages, so we can't ban Nazi's for doing it.


from_name: Steve Bennett

subject: [WikiEN-l] Time for preformatted empty articles?

body:
On 11/30/06, charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com

> Plus it would slow down making redirects to cut boilerplate text. I do a lot of redirects ... I do mean thousands.

I was going to say, it should be possible to disable this feature for
experienced users.

Steve


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Alphax (Wikipedia email) <alphasigmax at gmail.com> wrote:
> Thomas Dalton wrote:
> >> Nope totaly legal in the US. PRobably not legal in germany probably
> >> legal in the UK.
> >
> > Indeed, the only country that has laws against being pro-nazi, to my
> > knowledge, is Germany. As long as it isn't in the template space, we
> > might as well let it be.
> >
>
> The use of insignia of organizations that have been banned in Germany
> (like the Nazi swastika or the arrow cross) may also be illegal in
> Germany, Austria, Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic, France, Brazil and
> other countries, depending on context. In Germany, the applicable law is
> paragraph 86a of the criminal code (StGB), in Poland ? Art. 256 of the
> criminal code (Dz.U. 1997 nr 88 poz. 553).
>
> (Bonus points if tell me where it came from)

[[Swastika]]?

--humblefool


subject: [WikiEN-l] Trivial categories

body:
On 11/30/06, charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com
> You're putting an awful lot of faith in the completeness and accuracy of our own information ... which in this case changes or should change every time one of a whole bunch of people publishes a preprint with a new collaborator. (By the way, do you update ENs at the preprint or journal publication stage, which might be years on?) It's a fun trivia game, but nightmarish, and EN2 is really the maximum we should allow on the site.

Heh, I wasn't being serious. The Erdos number 1's might be interesting
- there are probably hundreds of those, given that he produced
something like 650 papers and rarely worked alone. But I wouldn't go
beyond that as a category. Even a list of Erdos numbers would be of
pretty marginal value as it would be unlikely to be complete, even for
low numbers.

Steve


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
> I indef blocked and deleted the page.  Why are we even talking about this?

Because Wikipedia doesn't generally ban users based on political
affiliation? Banning someone for being a Nazi when it isn't illegal
and they aren't causing any disruption is discrimination, pure and
simple.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
> Nobody was banned for being a Nazi. They were banned for proclaiming
> it on their userpage. Which is disruptive. You are welcome to edit
> Wikipedia as a Nazi, or as a pedophile, or as anyone else. You are,
> however, expected not to use Wikipedia as a platform for proclaiming
> controversial views.
>
> What's hard here?

Is everyone displaying any of the userboxes on these pages
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:GRBerry/German_userbox_solution#Political_parties
going to banned?

The only reason I can see for treating Nazis differently from anyone
else is because people don't like Nazis. It boils down to banning
someone for being unpopular.

If Wikipedia were based in Germany, it would be an obvious ban for
breaking the law, but Wikipedia is under US jurisdiction, and the US
doesn't have any such law.


from_name: Alphax (Wikipedia email)

subject: [WikiEN-l] Phrase and fable

body:
charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com wrote:
> I glanced yesterday at a recent dictionary 'of phrase and fable',
> which had a Pokemon article.
>
> Here's a thought, addressed to one part of 'what do we do about
> popular culture articles?' A new wiki, Wikifable, could be a place to
> transwiki material which was basically narrative treatment of myths
> (Norse, manga, soap operas ...). WP itself should be left with
> analytical and scholarly treatment of myths. Wikifable would have to
> work out its own protocols (canon, fourth wall, sources ...) but they
> could be independent of WP's.
>

Ah good, I can go braindump my speculations on The Ring Cycle... you do
realise that this would be perfect for Wikia, right? And that we should
be a little more liberal in our attitude to external links? You can
almost guarantee that an external link will survive if it's to
"{{PAGENAME}} Wiki"...

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP

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from_name: Edward Z. Yang

subject: [Wikitech-l] [Bug 8101] rendering in firefox

body:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Dan Jacobson wrote:
> < second % is stuck to the link following it
>
> b> Try describing the problem...?
>
> There is no space between the second % and the following link. Turning
> off styles, ALT V Y N, and the space comes back. Or remove the Chinese
> to make a pure English post, and the space comes back.

Hi Dan, please reply to bugs via the Bugzilla interface here:
<http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/>
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from_name: Phil Sandifer

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On Nov 30, 2006, at 4:51 PM, Tony Jacobs wrote:
>   I'll agree that Nazi is beyond the pale, but where, precisely, is
> "the pale"?

There is no definition of "the pale." This is Calvinball. When things
are stupid, we kill them. The end. No details, no "process," just
"That is stupid," followed by "bang."

-Phil


from_name: Rory Stolzenberg

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
>
> Rob wrote:
> > On 11/30/06, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> Remember, there is a difference between modern neo-nazi parties and
> >> the German Nazi party of the 1930s and 40s. They may have the same
> >> political beliefs, but they are different parties. This user is not a
> >> mass murderer, he just happens to agree with one on political issues.
> >
> > If anything, the modern Nazi advocate is worse, because he or she has
> > no excuse for not knowing what the Nazi agenda is really about.  A
> > modern Nazi is of course not a mass murderer, merely a wannabe mass
> > murderer, but the only difference between the two is skill and
> > opportunity.
>
> In this case, it is not so much about Nazi or non-Nazi.  It's about
> trolling.  Don't feed the trolls.
>
> Do you know what trolls like to eat?  They thrive on getting good people
> to fight with each other.  Yum Yum.  It's boring.  Best to treat it as
> boring and move on.
>
> --Jimbo
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

In this case, I agree with the block under WP:COMMONSENSE (the guy was
certainly a troll, look at the other things on his userpage), but there seem
to be people here who think it would be OK to block all Nazis/people with
offensive ideologies even if they're not trolling, which doesn't seem like a
good idea to me.


body:
Nonsense, that wasn't even a userbox.

On 11/30/06, Steve Summit <scs at eskimo.com> wrote:
>
> And what better tie-in than Naziism.
> Mike Godwin would laugh and laugh...
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Oldak Quill

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 30/11/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> Do you believe that the Nazi party is no different from any of those
> other parties, or is this just a cheap rhetorical device?  Be honest.
The difference between the Nazis and many other regimes is in degree,
not type. Where is the line drawn?

--
Oldak Quill (oldakquill at gmail.com)


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Caricatures ,
	fair use photographs and illustratice comics

body:
On 11/30/06, Steve Block <steve.block at myrealbox.com> wrote:
>
> On the admin noticeboard there's discussion about a user who has created
> illustrative comics, which basically illustrate the summary of an
> article, an example can be see here,
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Tony-clifton-web-rev.JPG . I've made
> the suggestion that maybe we could get the artist to create caricatures
> of living people, and thus perhaps solve the problem of using
> copyrighted images in articles of people simply to illustrate the person.
>
>
> --
> No virus found in this outgoing message.
> Checked by AVG Free Edition.
> Version: 7.1.409 / Virus Database: 268.15.2/560 - Release Date: 30/11/06
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

You, sir, are brilliant!


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Tony Jacobs <gtjacobs at hotmail.com> wrote:
> How many people does a regime have to kill before proclaiming your
> association with it is a bannable offense?
>

Well since we don't ban declarations of christanity and the Taiping
Rebellion killed over 20 million I guess something in excess of 30
million.

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Jim Schuler <jim62sch at gmail.com> wrote:
> I would assume that the reasoning is that the negative image potentially
> created by tolerance of such a user box outweighs any free-speech rights

Too late it is already known we allow pedophiles to edit.

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
> > Do you believe that the Nazi party is no different from any of those
> > other parties, or is this just a cheap rhetorical device?  Be honest.
> The difference between the Nazis and many other regimes is in degree,
> not type. Where is the line drawn?

Exactly.

I would suggest simply forbidding political userboxes, removing them
from any userpage on which they appear and unbanning this user.

Remember, there is a difference between modern neo-nazi parties and
the German Nazi party of the 1930s and 40s. They may have the same
political beliefs, but they are different parties. This user is not a
mass murderer, he just happens to agree with one on political issues.

And I don't think Godwin's law applies to a discussion about Nazis. We
aren't comparing anything to Nazis, in fact, we're comparing Nazis to
other things - perhaps a converse to Godwin's law? ;)


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> I believe (or hope, perhaps) that Wikipedia administrators are
> rational adults and capable of discerning the difference between an
> acceptable use of a Wikipedia userpage and the unacceptable use of it
> as a soapbox for views "beyond the pale", and as such can discern the
> difference between a normal, sane political party and one that
> advocates the extermination of whole categories of other human beings.

There are very few pacifist political parties. In this case I notice
that jimbo missed the user subpage that experence suggests is more
likely to cause trouble.

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 30/11/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> I believe (or hope, perhaps) that Wikipedia administrators are
> rational adults and capable of discerning the difference between an
> acceptable use of a Wikipedia userpage and the unacceptable use of it
> as a soapbox for views "beyond the pale", and as such can discern the
> difference between a normal, sane political party and one that
> advocates the extermination of whole categories of other human beings.

The views of some users which are considered normal by most will be
considered "beyond the pale" by some. Whether views are considered
"beyond the pale" largely depends upon the experiences of the person
and the culture they live in.

This discussion is null anyway since the user doesn't seem to be using
the userbox in seriousness. It seems to be some kind of in-your-face
humour.

--
Oldak Quill (oldakquill at gmail.com)


from_name: Rich Holton

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
Alphax (Wikipedia email) wrote:
> Tony Jacobs wrote:
> <snip>
>> Personally, I wasn't discussing that user at all, but the principle of
>> tolerating some political userboxes and not others.
>>
>
> I demand that every instance of "GOP" be a piped link to whichever
> bloody stupid party it stands for. We're not all 'Merkins, y'know?
>
Not that you actually asked, but that would be the Republican party.
IIRC, GOP stands for "Grand Old Party".

Your point about Americanisms (or would that be United Stationisms?) is
well made.

-Rich Holton


subject: [WikiEN-l] The new non-stupid wiki-en thread

body:
On 11/30/06, Ryan Wetherell <renardius at gmail.com> wrote:
> By changing "links" to "link".  I think it helps to point out that
> more resources are needed, especially if the subject has an adequate
> amount of coverage elsewhere on the Internet.

Heh, why not something a little more explicit like "More resources
needed." I actually like the discordant "s": the reader realises there
is something missing, and that a problem needs fixing...

Steve


from_name: David Gerard

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 30/11/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/30/06, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:

> > This discussion is null anyway since the user doesn't seem to be using
> > the userbox in seriousness. It seems to be some kind of in-your-face
> > humour.

> Of course. And that kind of trolling is pretty much covered under
> Wikipedia rules prohibiting disruption.

Or specifically, the "don't be a blatant dick" subclause.

- d.


from_name: Guy Chapman aka JzG

subject: [WikiEN-l] GNAA Deleted!

body:
On Thu, 30 Nov 2006 11:32:21 -0500, "The Cunctator"
<cunctator at gmail.com> wrote:

>I for one think it's pathetic that Wikipedia is giving up on the mission of
>being a complete encyclopedia because there exist specialty sites on
>particular areas of knowledge.

I don't think it is.  The point here is not that it's giving up on
completeness, it's that it's *not* giving up on being an
*encyclopaedia*, compiled from credible secondary sources.

Guy (JzG)
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
George Herbert wrote:
> On 11/30/06, Phil Sandifer <Snowspinner at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>> On Nov 30, 2006, at 4:51 PM, Tony Jacobs wrote:
>>>   I'll agree that Nazi is beyond the pale, but where, precisely, is
>>> "the pale"?
>> There is no definition of "the pale." This is Calvinball. When things
>> are stupid, we kill them. The end. No details, no "process," just
>> "That is stupid," followed by "bang."
>>
>
> Most of us don't really get to play Calvinball with trolls.  That's probably
> a good thing.
>
> Jimbo does.  That's probably also a good thing.
>
>
It will be interesting if the one thing to last out of Watterson's comic
is the word "Calvinball".

I loved that comic. Too bad he retired.

-Rich Holton


subject: [WikiEN-l] GNAA Deleted!

body:
On Thu, 30 Nov 2006 13:51:19 -0500, "The Cunctator"
<cunctator at gmail.com> wrote:

>I have nothing against specialists, but I also see no reason that they
>shouldn't be subsumed in the gaping maw of Wikipedia.

Canonical policies on neutral point of view, no original research and
verifiability?

Guy (JzG)
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG


body:
On Thu, 30 Nov 2006 17:10:52 +0000, "Earle Martin"
<wikipedia at downlode.org> wrote:

>> We need a {{crap article}} template...
>Once again, Encyclopedia Dramatica has beaten us to the punch.

I think they stole the idea from Uncyclopaedia, though.

Guy (JzG)
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On Thu, 30 Nov 2006 16:11:23 -0500, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com>
wrote:

>I indef blocked and deleted the page.  Why are we even talking about this?

My instinct was right then - you beat me to the punch, though :-)

Guy (JzG)
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 30/11/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> I indef blocked and deleted the page.  Why are we even talking about this?

Discussing everything and achieving community concensus, rather than
acting on the instinct of one particular user, is a tenant of
Wikipedia.

Obviously there are exceptions when it comes to biographies about
living people, but this isn't one.

--
Oldak Quill (oldakquill at gmail.com)


from_name: geni

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> Yes, but the consensus is amongst the vast majority of non-Nazis that
> they are offensive.

Evidence?

>There is no need for an all or nothing
> requirement here.

So you would be ok with a "this user is a supporter of the GIA" userbox?

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 30/11/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> Yes, but the consensus is amongst the vast majority of non-Nazis that
> they are offensive.  There is no need for an all or nothing
> requirement here.

The concensus among most non-Republicans is that they are morally
offensive. The same goes for the Democrats. So what?

--
Oldak Quill (oldakquill at gmail.com)


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On Thu, 30 Nov 2006 13:34:19 -0800, "Tony Jacobs"
<gtjacobs at hotmail.com> wrote:

>It bothers me that we consider it our place to draw that line.  Can we
>please just ban political userboxes already, and avoid having to make calls
>about why being a Nazi is so much worse than supporting [YOUR LEAST FAVORITE
>REGIME HERE]?

Not even close.

That user's page contained:

(Slipknot) This User is a Maggot
(GRRR!) This User thinks copyright/fair use is a bitch
(image) This User disagrees with the existance of WP:Point because
Wikipedia is not censored
(swastika) This User is a Nazi
(image of raised middle finger) This User's middle name is offensive
and he honestly couldn't care less about you
(BOMB!) The only sport this User plays is Yo Momma

The user has less than a dozen mainspace edits, several of which were
re-introducing unsourced images removed from the article by others.

The user has edited mainspace once since September.

The user has a history of copyright violations and has been blocked
for vandalism.

We have already wasted more time discussing this than the user is
worth to the project, on that evidence.  It's worth debating the likes
of SPUI and nobs01 because they are as productive as they can be
maddening.  This one?  I think not.

Guy (JzG)
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On Thu, 30 Nov 2006 22:29:11 +0000, "Oldak Quill"
<oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:

>Discussing everything and achieving community concensus, rather than
>acting on the instinct of one particular user, is a tenant of
>Wikipedia.

Banning egregious trolls and trusting the judgment of Jimbo is another
tenet of Wikipedia :-)

Guy (JzG)
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/30/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > Yes, but the consensus is amongst the vast majority of non-Nazis that
> > > they are offensive.
> >
> > Evidence?
>
> Oh, please.
>

So you can't back it up. Remeber there are parts of the world outside
europe and the US.

> Case by case basis decided by rational adults, not all or nothing or
> everything but Nazi.

Well ok lets go for an example directly involveing genocide:

This user supports the Scythians.

--
geni


from_name: Steve Block

subject:
[WikiEN-l]  Caricatures ,
	fair use photographs and illustratice comics

body:
On the admin noticeboard there's discussion about a user who has created
illustrative comics, which basically illustrate the summary of an
article, an example can be see here,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Tony-clifton-web-rev.JPG . I've made
the suggestion that maybe we could get the artist to create caricatures
of living people, and thus perhaps solve the problem of using
copyrighted images in articles of people simply to illustrate the person.

--
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition.
Version: 7.1.409 / Virus Database: 268.15.2/560 - Release Date: 30/11/06


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> "Fear and ignorance"?  Seriously, let's tone down the rhetoric here,
> please.  How is saying that Wikipedia has no obligation to be a Nazi
> soapbox motivated by "fear and ignorance"?

Please be showing where wikipedia has been acting as a nazi soapbox.

> How is saying that
> Wikipedia should have rules of conduct that dictate that certain
> behaviors are outrageous, rules of conduct which are entirely similar
> to rules used in many, many other private spheres, motivated by "fear
> and ignorance"?

Because in this case they would appear to be backed by the appeal to
popularity logical fallacy.

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> Oh, I was wondering what was on the other side of that big blue space
> on the map.

If you recall china's recent history it is likely that there is a
greater cultral bias against imperal japanese than agaist the distant
nazis. China makes up a significant part of the worlds population so
for you claim to hold you would need to show (amoung other things)
that a significant percentage of chinese found certian references to
the nazis offensive.

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> No obligation to provide a soapbox to Nazis via a userpage. You know
> perfectly well what I'm saying.

Page was not being used as a soapbox. I suppose if it was ranting
about "The Fourteen Words" (although that is more white nationalists
that nazis) then yes it would be being used as a soapbox but that was
not what was going on.

> Whatever.  There's nothing fallacious about saying that these rules of
> conduct which work perfectly fine in most private and semi-public
> spheres will work perfectly fine here.

That would be extraplateing while not keeping control of you constant.
My old stats teachers would have had a fit.

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> If there was a hypothetical Asian Nazi-like group that advocated the
> extermination of all Chinese, I wouldn't have to show that people in
> France or Canada or Estonia also found them offensive to support the
> prohbition against allowing that group to use Wikipedia userspace as a
> soapbox.

Again that phrase "use Wikipedia userspace as asoapbox". I've seen the
userspace used as a soapbox for real. This wasn't it.

--
geni


from_name: Nick Jenkins

body:
> It's ok - let's go back to work and forget about it.

Hello and welcome!

One small request, can we please have log messages describing the general intent and thinking behind a commit?
e.g. svn commit --message="Adding the SelectCategory extension" SelectCategory
... or if you want to write an essay, chuck it in a text file (e.g. ../msg.txt ), and commit like so:
svn commit --file ../msg.txt includes/File-You-Modified.php includes/Another-File-You-Modified.php RELEASE-NOTES

Other potentially helpful notes and stuff at: http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Commit_access  (and please feel free to add anything you
find useful).

Also, I found the SelectCategory extension gives my apache2 web server segfaults when I edit a page:
----------------------------------
[Thu Nov 30 19:56:23 2006] [notice] child pid 18508 exit signal Segmentation fault (11)
[Thu Nov 30 19:57:20 2006] [notice] child pid 16733 exit signal Segmentation fault (11)
[Thu Nov 30 19:58:46 2006] [notice] child pid 18948 exit signal Segmentation fault (11)
[Thu Nov 30 19:58:48 2006] [notice] child pid 3263 exit signal Segmentation fault (11)
[Thu Nov 30 19:59:30 2006] [notice] child pid 9535 exit signal Segmentation fault (11)
----------------------------------

With some slow binary searching I tracked it down to this line, line # 195 of SpecialCategoryFunctions.php :

//		$m_allCats = array_merge( array( $m_row['title'] => $m_prefix ), fnSelectCategoryGetChildren( $m_row['title'], ++$m_prefix ) );

... with this line commented out, will run without segfaulting, with it enabled will segfault.

At this point, it may help to see my categorylinks table, which contains some deliberately whacky category test data:
====================================
mysql> select * from categorylinks;
+---------+---------------------------------+--------------------------+---------------------+
| cl_from | cl_to                           | cl_sortkey               | cl_timestamp        |
+---------+---------------------------------+--------------------------+---------------------+
|       1 | Sydney                          | Main Page                | 2006-11-29 03:47:22 |
|    1533 | Blog                            | Fake                     | 2006-09-12 04:20:54 |
|    1534 | Fake                            | Blog                     | 2006-09-12 04:22:26 |
|    1535 | Blog                            | Fish                     | 2006-09-12 04:23:59 |
|    1536 | Fish                            | Animial                  | 2006-09-12 04:24:30 |
|    1537 | Australian_media                | Sydney                   | 2006-09-12 04:26:58 |
|    1537 | Sydney_culture                  | Media in Sydney          | 2006-09-12 04:26:58 |
|    1538 | Australian_culture              | Sydney culture           | 2006-09-12 04:27:08 |
|    1538 | Culture_by_city                 | Sydney culture           | 2006-09-12 04:27:08 |
|    1538 | Sydney                          | Culture of Sydney        | 2006-09-12 04:27:08 |
|    1539 | Australian_capital_cities       | Sydney                   | 2006-09-12 04:27:41 |
|    1539 | Cities_in_New_South_Wales       | Sydney                   | 2006-09-12 04:27:41 |
|    1539 | Metropolitan_areas_of_Australia | Sydney                   | 2006-09-12 04:27:41 |
|    1540 | Fake                            | '); alert('Ownage'); ('  | 2006-09-12 05:41:25 |
|    1541 | Fake                            | "onmouseover=alert(123); | 2006-09-12 05:44:42 |
|    1542 | Fake                            | \'); alert('Ownage'); (' | 2006-09-12 05:46:35 |
+---------+---------------------------------+--------------------------+---------------------+
16 rows in set (0.00 sec)
====================================

... and here it is as an ASCII diagram:  [cheers Tels!]
====================================

                                       +---------------------------+
                                       | Cities_in_New_South_Wales |
                                       +---------------------------+
                                         |
                                         |
                                         v
     +---------------------------+     +---------------------------+     +---------------------------------+
     | Australian_capital_cities | --> |                           | --> |            Main Page            |
     +---------------------------+     |          Sydney           |     +---------------------------------+
     +---------------------------+     |                           |     +---------------------------------+
     |     Australian_media      | --> |                           | <-- | Metropolitan_areas_of_Australia |
     +---------------------------+     +---------------------------+     +---------------------------------+
                                         |
                                         |
                                         v
     +---------------------------+     +---------------------------+     +---------------------------------+     +---------+
  +> |           Blog            | -+  |     Culture of Sydney     |     |              Fish               | --> | Animial |
  |  +---------------------------+  |  +---------------------------+     +---------------------------------+     +---------+
  |    |                            |                                      ^
  |    |                            +--------------------------------------+
  |    v
  |  +---------------------------+     +---------------------------+
  +- |                           | --> | "onmouseover=alert(123);  |
     |           Fake            |     +---------------------------+
     |                           |     +---------------------------+
     |                           | --> |  '); alert('Ownage'); ('  |
     +---------------------------+     +---------------------------+
       |
       |
       v
     +---------------------------+
     | \'); alert('Ownage'); ('  |
     +---------------------------+
     +---------------------------+     +---------------------------+     +---------------------------------+
     |    Australian_culture     | --> |      Sydney culture       | <-- |         Culture_by_city         |
     +---------------------------+     +---------------------------+     +---------------------------------+
     +---------------------------+     +---------------------------+
     |      Sydney_culture       | --> |      Media in Sydney      |
     +---------------------------+     +---------------------------+

====================================

In particular, note the circular "Blog" <--> "Fake" relationship (i.e. on this test wiki, Category:Blog has a subcategory
Category:Fake, and Category:Fake has a subcategory Category:Blog).

Then taking fnSelectCategoryGetChildren() and fnSelectCategoryGetAllCategories(), and putting them into a separate command line test
script that calls them, and running that, confirmed the problem:

================================
root at bling:/var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance# php test-script-del.php

Fatal error: Maximum function nesting level of '100' reached, aborting! in /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/includes/LoadBalancer.php
on line 404

Call Stack:
    0.0006     111672   1. {main}() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance/test-script-del.php:0
    0.1017    7094816   2. fnSelectCategoryGetAllCategories() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance/test-script-del.php:77
    0.1248    8247608   3. fnSelectCategoryGetChildren() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance/test-script-del.php:37
    0.1251    8247920   4. fnSelectCategoryGetChildren() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance/test-script-del.php:67
    0.1254    8248520   5. fnSelectCategoryGetChildren() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance/test-script-del.php:67
    0.1257    8249120   6. fnSelectCategoryGetChildren() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance/test-script-del.php:67
    0.1260    8250008   7. fnSelectCategoryGetChildren() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance/test-script-del.php:67
    0.1263    8251744   8. fnSelectCategoryGetChildren() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance/test-script-del.php:67
    0.1266    8253840   9. fnSelectCategoryGetChildren() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance/test-script-del.php:67
    0.1270    8256072  10. fnSelectCategoryGetChildren() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance/test-script-del.php:67

[ ... snip ... ]

    0.1549    8450736  93. fnSelectCategoryGetChildren() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance/test-script-del.php:67
    0.1553    8452984  94. fnSelectCategoryGetChildren() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance/test-script-del.php:67
    0.1556    8455232  95. fnSelectCategoryGetChildren() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance/test-script-del.php:67
    0.1556    8455456  96. wfGetDB() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance/test-script-del.php:52
    0.1556    8455752  97. LoadBalancer->getConnection() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/includes/GlobalFunctions.php:2054
    0.1557    8456488  98. LoadBalancer->openConnection() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/includes/LoadBalancer.php:364
    0.1557    8456568  99. LoadBalancer->isOpen() /var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/includes/LoadBalancer.php:381
root at bling:/var/www/hosts/mediawiki/wiki/maintenance#
================================

I.e. looks like if you've got circular categories, then you'll exhaust your stack or segfault by recursing infinitely.

The English Wikipedia definitely has circular categories, or at least it used to [indirectly, not directly - there was some talk
about this a few months ago]. :-)

All the best,
Nick.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 30/11/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/30/06, Jim Schuler <jim62sch at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >
> > Some day I'll remember not to post philosophical points here.  I simply
> > don't have the time to explain how fear and ignorance are the catalyst
> > for censorship.
>
> And when we remove personal attacks, vandalism, or libel, are we
> censoring as well?

Of course. But, at least in the case of libel, it is necessary to our
continuing function.

--
Oldak Quill (oldakquill at gmail.com)


from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [WikiEN-l] Phrase and fable

body:
Alphax (Wikipedia email) wrote:

>charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com wrote:
>
>
>>I glanced yesterday at a recent dictionary 'of phrase and fable',
>>which had a Pokemon article.
>>
>>Here's a thought, addressed to one part of 'what do we do about
>>popular culture articles?' A new wiki, Wikifable, could be a place to
>>transwiki material which was basically narrative treatment of myths
>>(Norse, manga, soap operas ...). WP itself should be left with
>>analytical and scholarly treatment of myths. Wikifable would have to
>>work out its own protocols (canon, fourth wall, sources ...) but they
>>could be independent of WP's.
>>
>>
>Ah good, I can go braindump my speculations on The Ring Cycle... you do
>realise that this would be perfect for Wikia, right? And that we should
>be a little more liberal in our attitude to external links? You can
>almost guarantee that an external link will survive if it's to
>"{{PAGENAME}} Wiki"...
>
It's amazing how pop culture articles make people squirm so much.  I
don't really do anything with them, but they have never bothered me.
Pop culture is as important a part of culture as history or science.
Naturally, we want to make sure that fictional characters aren't put
forth as something more real than they are,   If we confine ourselves to
"scholarly treatment" it strikes me as though we would be putting on the
same pompous airs of superiority that are often attrivbuted to ivory towers.

Ec


body:
Sorry, one more quick thing in SpecialCategoryFunctions.php :

Line 35:			$m_place = editFormTextAfterWarn;
Line 38:			$m_place = uploadFormTextAfterSummary;

Probably mean something like this:
* $m_place = "editFormTextAfterWarn";
* $m_place = editFormTextAfterWarn();
* Something else.

All the best,
Nick.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Deletions, lists, etc?

body:
MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:

>Unfortunately, there are people who think categories are superior to lists
>in all regards. I like to think there are exceptions.
>
One shouldn't be taken as superior, they are just different and
complementary approaches to organizing knowledge.

Ec