subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
On 9/16/05, Snowspinner <Snowspinner at gmail.com> wrote:
> For what it's worth, I disagree. I think that in an encyclopedia,
> which values peer-reviewed sources and academic knowledge
> particularly highly, there is a real case to be made that professors
> at accredited universities are notable. The way I see it, pretty much
> all professors, whether PhDs, JDs, or whatever, have made some sort
> of contribution to their field - law review articles, dissertations,
> other publications. If we're the sum total of human knowledge, we'd
> cover all those contributions. Thus articles on the professors seem
> sensible by default.
>
> I'll go one further, in fact. I think everyone who has been main or
> sole author on a publication in a peer-reviewed scholarly journal
> deserves a Wikipedia article. Yes, this would include a whole lot of
> grad students. But if they're making or have made verifiable
> contributions to their field, we should be including them. No question.

My brother was one of three main authors of a published article in a
peer-reviewed scholarly journal as an <u>undergrad</u> student.  But
there's no way I would agree that he deserves an article on that basis
alone.

Combine that with his name on several patents as inventor or
co-inventor, that he's a highly desired public speaker in one of his
fields of expertise, the books he's credited in, and the books he's in
the process of writing and I think he's getting closer.

But based on a single article?  That seems a little extreme to me.  If
you felt the compulsion, it would be better to summarize each of the
thousands of peer reviewed journal articles themselves and mention
each otherwise not-notable-enough-for-an-article-of-their-own authors
there.

--
Michael Turley
User:Unfocused


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Timwi

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Notes pages idea

body:
> "This article is in an embryonic [[notes]] stage, where notes are
> being compiled. You can add to [[/notes|these notes]], or bring bring
> the article to the [[WP:STUB|fetal]] level."

"Once the article is [[Wikipedia:How to write a great article|born]], it
can grow until it reaches [[Wikipedia:Peer review|puberty]]. At this
point, it should [[Wikipedia:Featured article candidates|get engaged]]
and eventually [[Wikipedia:Featured articles|marry]]. Optionally, it may
[[:Category:Articles to be split|have children]]. It will finally
[[Special:Ancientpages|grow old]] and eventually [[WP:AFD|die]]."

Timwi


from_name: Phroziac

subject: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia the go-to place for trademark bodies

body:
But isn't Linux trademarked to Linus?

On 9/16/05, MacGyverMagic/Mgm <macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Actually that should be non-generic. A generic term--one that is not
> > commonly associated with a particular brand--cannot be trademarked..
> Often it happens the other way around, though. A trademarked name
> turning generic.
> _______________________________________________
> 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: Phil Sandifer

subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
On 9/16/05, Michael Turley <michael.turley at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 9/16/05, Snowspinner <Snowspinner at gmail.com> wrote:

> My brother was one of three main authors of a published article in a
> peer-reviewed scholarly journal as an <u>undergrad</u> student.  But
> there's no way I would agree that he deserves an article on that basis
> alone.

In this case, I would probably say to redirect him to an article on
the article in question.

-Snowspinner


from_name: MacGyverMagic/Mgm

subject: [WikiEN-l] Why changing the deletion process is a bad idea

body:
> You have reversed my argument.  They were not encyclopedic because they
> were bestsellers; rather thay became bestsellers because they were
> encyclopedic.  With events like the recent hurrican Katrina it is not
> unusual for people to ask, "What was the biggest previous hurrican?"  or
> "Were there any other famous hurricanes that began with the letter
> 'K'?"  You underestimate the thirst that people may have for information
> that may otherwise be trivial or useless.  If they can come to us to
> discover these things that they could not find anywhere they will come
> back.  We need only insure that even our trivial information is
> verifiable.
>
> Ec
See [[Hurricane]] and [[Category:Hurricanes]] should be the answer to
those example questions. We don't need an article [[Biggest
hurricane]] or [[List of hurricanes starting with the letter K]].


list: wikipedia-l

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sample ASL/English entry

body:
On 9/16/05, HHamilto at doe.k12.ga.us <HHamilto at doe.k12.ga.us> wrote:

> Making Wikipedia able to handle video will make it more up-to-date. Text
> and pictures were top-o -the-line in the '80's.
I've been using the internet for around 10 years, and I don't remember
anything looking like Wikipedia...

> Making an ASL/English Wikipedia will provide the deaf community
> particularly students a powerful learning tool. An encyclopedia is a
> learning tool, not simply a collection of articles.
Why does it need to be bi-lingual again, yet can't be hosted on the
english wiki?


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sample ASL/English entry

body:
On 9/16/05, Phroziac <phroziac at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 9/16/05, HHamilto at doe.k12.ga.us <HHamilto at doe.k12.ga.us> wrote:
>
> > Making Wikipedia able to handle video will make it more up-to-date. Text
> > and pictures were top-o -the-line in the '80's.
> I've been using the internet for around 10 years, and I don't remember
> anything looking like Wikipedia...
oops. Should be "anything looking like Wikipedia back then".


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Violation of Blocking Policy

body:
Brian Brockmeyer wrote:
>
> "I have blocked him for 24 hours. --Phroziac"

You were blocked for a mere 24 hours. Geez. Find something else to do
and come back tomorrow. You'll get over it.


from_name: Snowspinner

subject: [WikiEN-l] Undeletion policy

body:
On Sep 16, 2005, at 2:17 PM, MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:

> I don't see how people can form a valid opinion about undeleting an
> article if they can't compare the original AFD/VFD against the article
> that was deleted. Temporary undeletion may even uncover additional
> research that could seal an undeletion without doubt.
>
> There may be consensus to delete, but if the last vote went against
> consensus and provided a valid reason, the reason "AFD was valid"
> makes no sense at all.

I have been known to disregard "AFD was valid" as a reason for not
undeleting. Then again, I'm also a firm believer in temporary
undeletion of VFU articles so people can see what they're voting on,
and usually do so when I'm actually looking at VFU.

-Snowspinner


from_name: Michael Turley

subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
On 9/16/05, Sam Korn <smoddy at gmail.com> wrote:
> You will excuse me, but Tony's comments lead me to believe strongly
> that he is talking about victory over deletionists rather than victory
> over bad content.

How does a "deletionist" lose if the bad content or lack of content is
replaced or supplemented with good content?

Nominating something for deletion should be motivated by a desire to
improve the encyclopedia, not focused on whether any one specific
action is taken.

>From what I've seen, Tony's comments in AfD debates have referenced
winning over delete voters, not winning "against deletionists".

Again, assume good faith; "win-win" is the goal.  This isn't a zero sum game.
--
Michael Turley
User:Unfocused


subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
On 9/16/05, Phil Sandifer <snowspinner at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 9/16/05, Michael Turley <michael.turley at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 9/16/05, Snowspinner <Snowspinner at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > My brother was one of three main authors of a published article in a
> > peer-reviewed scholarly journal as an <u>undergrad</u> student.  But
> > there's no way I would agree that he deserves an article on that basis
> > alone.
>
> In this case, I would probably say to redirect him to an article on
> the article in question.

I might add that my brother was not just "a" main author, he was the
primary author of this particular article, which itself doesn't really
need a Wikipedia article.  There were several others where he was
credited, all as an undergrad.

If there were an article such as "List of published authors in the
journal Science" and "List of published authors in the Journal of the
American Medical Association" with the names of each article for each
peer reviewed journal and publication, I would add him where
applicable without delay.

However, I'm pretty sure such articles should not exist.

--
Michael Turley
User:Unfocused


from_name: Tony Sidaway

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Criteria for deletion (was: Afd "votes" with no real
	reasons given)

body:
On 9/16/05, Poor, Edmund W <Edmund.W.Poor at abc.com> wrote:
>
>
> The only difference is [someone] claimed the right to stop all
> merges until the end of the 5-day vote.
>

That is unusual. You should be able to merge during the AfD, and this should
be taken into account by the closer. You'd have to leave the AfD tag around.
Don't get phased by the rule lawyers, if what you do makes sense there
shouldn't be much of a problem.


from_name: David Gerard

body:
Ed Poor wrote:

> Can users simply:
> (1) Tag any article as "unmergeable" for a five-day period, to
> (2) Force a vote on whether it should be kept or deleted?

You are quite correct. I've removed ", merge" from [[template:vfd]].
Whoever put it there was on crack.

- d.


body:
On 9/16/05, MacGyverMagic/Mgm <macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 9/16/05, Michael Turley <michael.turley at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 9/16/05, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > On 9/16/05, Poor, Edmund W <Edmund.W.Poor at abc.com> wrote:
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > The only difference is [someone] claimed the right to stop all
> > > > merges until the end of the 5-day vote.
> > > >
> > >
> > >
> > > That is unusual. You should be able to merge during the AfD, and this should
> > > be taken into account by the closer. You'd have to leave the AfD tag around.
> > > Don't get phased by the rule lawyers, if what you do makes sense there
> > > shouldn't be much of a problem.
> >
> > I agree with Tony Sidaway, however, the problem I've seen with merging
> > during an AfD discussion is that the person doing the merge fails to
> > include all the information from the article being discussed,
> > therefore giving the appearance of significantly changing the topic of
> > discussion by fiat.
> >
> > If the merge is handled as a two step process, it may reduce the
> > complaints.  The two steps I suggest are:
> > 1: Copy the article into the merge target verbatim, making absolutely
> > no changes or edits.  Note this in the edit summary.
> > 2: Edit the merged article using your judgement.  Note as appropriate
> > in the edit summary.
> >
> > In this way, the content of the article is undeniably still present,
> > even to people who don't know enough to look back at the redirect's
> > history, and any accusations of a "stealth delete" can be fully
> > dismissed.  The argument can then proceed about whether the
> > information was worth saving or not, or can proceed to a revert war
> > over the merge, but at least this way if anything is removed,
> > everything is very clear and open about how the content "survived the
> > merge, but then was edited out by use of an editor's judgement".
> >
> Yes, I think that could work. This way merges during an AFD period can
> still be undone by consensus, but bold moves or merges aren't
> stiffled.
>
> Do you have the time to write a proposal?

I am planning to review what's out there, and look for a way to
improve it during the day tomorrow.  I won't be a bit upset if I find
that someone else has already digested this into the appropriate pages
or has already proposed doing so.  ;)

--
Michael Turley
User:Unfocused


subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
On Sep 16, 2005, at 2:24 PM, MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:

>>
> I'd prefer including their contribution over their person.

I considered this, but I think there are too many cases where it
would be too unclear what to do. I'm thinking off-handedly of, say,
an article on the Freudian death drive and the notion of "creative
descruction," particularly as it applies to David Cronenberg's film
_ExistenZ_. Add the content of this (quite important) article to
[[Death drive]], [[Creative destruction]], and [[ExistenZ]]? Or an
article on the article title?

Since many fields - particularly the humanities - have a real sense
of intellectual movement and development over the course of
somebody's work, a central article on the scholar that lays out the
body of work seems to me tremendously helpful. If they only have one
article, sure - redirect their name to the article. But for anyone
with a body of work, it seems to me that a summary of that body of
work is notable.

-Snowspinner


from_name: HHamilto at doe.k12.ga.us

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sample ASL/English entry

body:
GerardM has it exactly right regarding the use of sign language orthography
and the common user. I hope Kinnessnet will be willing to host signed
videos


body:
On 9/16/05, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Ed Poor wrote:
>
> > Can users simply:
> > (1) Tag any article as "unmergeable" for a five-day period, to
> > (2) Force a vote on whether it should be kept or deleted?
>
>
> You are quite correct. I've removed ", merge" from [[template:vfd]].
> Whoever put it there was on crack.
>

I've also edited it to reflect the current guide to deletion on moving.
Moving can be done as long as the person doing the move maintains all
relevant links.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: RSS feed not working for Google Personal

body:
Phil Boswell wrote:
>
> The response was as follows:
>   Your search
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Recentchanges&feed=rss
>   was blocked by that feed's robots.txt.
>
> What's going on?

It means that Wikimedia have kindly asked Google not to access certain
parts of the site (namely everything in /w/) and that Google is kind
enough to abide by it.

Timwi


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sample ASL-English entry

body:
In response to Mark Williamson.
I have evaluated beta versions of the sign avatar programs that are
available and there are some problems at the moment.
1- their vocabulary is very limited
2- adults I have shown the avatars to don't like them, kids seem to
3-- they cannot clearly express much of the facial grammar and body shifts
that are of importance for ASL
4- the user must be sophisticated in translating between English and ASL to
assemble the appropriate text that the avatar will turn into ASL
5- They are expensive - about $3500 for each copy of the software. (a
person can now add video from their camcorder to a computer, edit ,
compress and upload it for much less, digital video is becoming a common
tool for all to use, Sign Avatars are not)
Someday the avatars may be a viable solution but not now


list: foundation-l

from_name: Poe, Marshall

subject: [Foundation-l] New Proposal: WikiMemory

body:
First, thanks to everyone for the input. As a newbie, I really appreciate it. Let me address some of the good points you made.

1. How does Wikimemory fit Wikimedia?s mission?
	As I understand it, Wikimedia?s mission is to present the sum of human knowledge (and, more generally, ?content?) to all of humanity, free, by means of wikis.  The ?data? that will be gathered on Wikimemory is part of human knowledge--it?s the part we use to understand the past. Empirically speaking, historical artifacts such as memoirs *are* the past, or at least the only evidence we have of it. You can?t see the past, or go visit; you can only look at what?s survived until the present. Moreover, if we don?t gather all these memories, they will be lost (they are recorded presently in peoples? heads and nowhere else). For the first time in history we have the ability to easily record and store the memories of a huge section of humanity.  If we do it, the future will be richer for it (e.g., bad actors won?t be able to deny their bad deeds?it?s be on the record for everyone to see).

2. How is Wikimemoir different from Wikimemorial
In terms of purpose, the two are different: Wikimemorial memorializes tragedies, while Wikimemoir records significant firsthand accounts of important events. In terms of data-type, Wikimemory?s content is similar to *part* of the content on Wikimemorial (or 911wiki), namely, memoirs.  There will be no memorials on Wikimemory, at least as I conceive it.  The only metadata will be commentary on the primary sources (see below).

3. How?s it different from Wikipeople?
	Apart from the commentaries on the memoirs, Wikimemory is all data and no metadata; Wikipeople is all metadata (biographies). Put another way, Wikimemory is a primary source; Wikipeople is a secondary source.  Both are very valuable, and neither can really exist without the other.

4. Why a Wiki (or, To edit or not to edit)?
To me, this is the most interesting question of all because it points up a conflict between two principles.  On the one hand, we want to be open and allow everyone to edit all content.  On the other hand, we want to gather and disseminate the sum of human knowledge to everyone, free.  In the case of Wikimemory (and several other wikis), these principles run up against one another.  Let me try to explain.
It seems to me that there are two kinds of wikis, differentiated by the kind of data they gather. What might be called ?scientific? wikis record the present state of *human knowledge*, that is, metadata or secondary sources.  I have in mind Wikipedia, Wikispecies, etc. In contrast, what might be called ?documentary? wikis gather, preserve and disseminate *artifacts*, that is, data or primary sources.  I have in mind 911Wiki, Wikisource, Wikiquote, Wikicommons, and Wikimemory.

Now here?s the interesting part: the scientific wikis can be expected to become more valuable in an opensource environment as they are edited, but the documentary wikis can be expected to become less valuable as they are edited.  For example, the Wikipedia *entry* on the ?Magna Carta? will improve as we learn more about the document and its context, but the Wikisource *edition* of the ?Magna Carta? will only become less valuable as it is edited further away from its original, canonical state (the words as they were written in 1215).  Or to take a hypothetical example from Wikimemory, the Wikipedia *entry* on ?Abu Graib Prison? will get better as historians uncover more about what happened there, but a Wikimemory *memoir* by one of the prisoners will only lose value if it is changed from its original disposition (that is, if it is vandalized).
And here?s where we run into a contradiction of principles or aims. If we stick to the open-source principle, then we won?t be able to present historical artifacts, because they may be inaccurate reflections of the originals (due to vandalism). This contradicts the all-human-knowledge principle.  If, in contrast, we prioritize the all-human-knowledge principle, then we?ll probably be forced to make finished entries on  ?documentary? wikis read-only. This violates the open-source principle.

Which is the superior principle?  I?d say it?s the all-human-knowledge principle.  There?s a lot to be gained by relaxing our stand on open-source here.  For this reason I propose that discuss making the finished content on Wikimemory read-only in some or most cases. Moreover, we can still be true to our open-source principles by allowing users edit metadata (explanatory information about the memoirs) to the site. To return to our example, a well-annotated Magna Carta is much easier to understand than a Magna Carta in isolation.  And such annotations would be (in the sense meant before) ?scientific,? they would improve as we learned more.

All the Best, Marshall


list: wikimedia-l

subject: [Foundation-l] New Proposal: WikiMemory


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sample ASL-English Entry

body:
Mark,
The ASL users in the US and  Canada are ASL-English bilingual to varying
degrees. Mexico has its own sign language as do other countries. If there
are ASL users there, they must be visiting.
hjh


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Afd "votes" with no real reasons given

body:
Michael Turley wrote:
> On 9/16/05, Phil Boswell <phil.boswell at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>ISRTBC HTH HAND
>
> ISRTBC?
> WTF?

In sanktam regem tenet benedictus claudandus? No, seriously, I have no
idea. I wish people would stop using such acronyms at all. I notice that
Wikipedia articles are often full of them. Somewhere in the middle of an
article the non-American reader is suddenly expected to know what the
ACLU is (often much more obscure ones, this is just one that came to
mind). It's really frustrating, especially when there is also no
article, redirect or disambiguation page under that acronym.

Searching for ISRTBC, Google asks if I may have meant "ISRC", while
dictionary.com suggests "ASARABACCA"...

Timwi


from_name: Worldtraveller

body:
If that's so, then you should be able to sort the problem by using this
form of the link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Recentchanges?feed=rss

WT

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Timwi [mailto:timwi at gmx.net]
> Sent: 16 September 2005 2:47 PM
> To: wikien-l at wikipedia.org
> Cc: wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> Subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: RSS feed not working for Google Personal
>
>
> Phil Boswell wrote:
>>
>> The response was as follows:
>>   Your search
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Recentchanges&feed=rss
>>   was blocked by that feed's robots.txt.
>>
>> What's going on?
>
> It means that Wikimedia have kindly asked Google not to access certain
> parts of the site (namely everything in /w/) and that Google is kind
> enough to abide by it.
>
> Timwi
>
> _______________________________________________
> 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: wikitech-l

from_name: Nick Jenkins

subject: [Wikitech-l] Wiki dump organization

body:
Brion Vibber wrote:
> Doro?y?ski Janusz wrote:
> > So, is any chance that people can take from
> > download.wikimedia.org .sql dumps? Xml dumps are completely
> > useless for them.
>
> No you can't get SQL dumps. :)
> * The schema and compression formats keep changing, which breaks
> things for people trying to get at the data.
> * There is no longer any equivalent to the "cur table" for
> current-revision-only SQL dumps.
> [...snip...]
> If you like you can use the mwdumper tool to convert the XML dumps to
> local-import-friendly SQL instead of using importDump.php (which as you
> note needs a bug fix).

Can I please make a suggestion? Can the XML format be run through the
mwdumper (or equivalent), and the result SQL _of that process_ be
compressed and uploaded to the database dump site? That way everything
can change from MediaWiki perspective, and it won't make any
difference to whether or not the SQL dumps can be created (as long as
the XML dumps can be created, the SQL ones can too). Please spare a
though for those of who don't care for XML religion, and who simply
want to get the data into a database.

Also, can we please have back the "is_redirect" field in the XML (and
XML->SQL) output, that used to be in the cur SQL dump? ( Yes, I know I
can generate it myself, but it is useful data, and may well be useful
to many people - making each and every one of those users
independently generate this info seems counterproductive).

Diff of a page's XML might look like this:
==================================================
  <page>
    <title>AccessibleComputing</title>
    <id>10</id>
    <revision>
      <id>15898945</id>
      <timestamp>2003-04-25T22:18:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ams80</username>
        <id>7543</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor />
+     <redirect />
      <comment>Fixing redirect</comment>
      <text xml:space="preserve">#REDIRECT [[Accessible_computing]]</text>
    </revision>
  </page>
==================================================

Jakob Voss wrote:
> When I tried to parse the current German XML dump I discovered the
> following malformed sequence (in [[de:India]]):
>
> [[got:��...

I got similar errors on EN running "xmllint
20050909_pages_current.xml" on Debian Linux. Xmllint seems to be quick
way to test the validity of the XML dump.

All the best,
Nick. (aka EN user:Nickj).


body:
TINMC!
(The m is for mini..)


from_name: Delirium

subject: [Foundation-l] New Proposal: WikiMemory

body:
Traroth wrote:

>Well... Why not ? Are you people OK with testimonies
>like "I was there when US army shooted on Hotel
>Palestine in Bagdad" or "I was in the jails of Abu
>Graib" ?
>
>
I think this sort of thing would be very problematic.  When it comes to
contentious topics, like Israel-Palestine, people have repeatedly
demonstrated that they are willing to completely fabricate eye-witness
accounts to make one or the other side look bad.

Published eye-witness accounts can also be fabricated, of course, but
have the benefit that since they're in the public sphere of published
work, the more questionable oens have often attracted published
refutations.  Similarly, books on controversial subjects are often
reviewed in the 'book review' sections of journals.  A purported
eyewitness account added directly to a wiki doesn't benefit from any of
that sort of peer review.

-Mark


subject: [Foundation-l] New Proposal: WikiMemory


from_name: Fastfission

subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
On 9/16/05, Phroziac <phroziac at gmail.com> wrote:
> You have a point, but his notability or lack thereof shouldn't be
> decided with speedying. The no assertion of notability thing is for
> things like [[Sam Toupin]]. This article is basically about some 15
> year old girl who likes DDR.

But... but.... I thought that "article does not assert notability" was
a criteria for speedy deletion? Wasn't that what you were complaining
about? At what level are you objecting to the policy -- the fact that
someone speedied something under this criteria, or the criteria
itself?

FF


from_name: Phil Boswell

body:
"Worldtraveller"
<wikipedia at world-traveller.org> wrote in
message news:57472.62.25.109.196.1126879570.squirrel at 62.25.109.196...
> From: Timwi [mailto:timwi at gmx.net]
> Sent: 16 September 2005 2:47 PM
> > Phil Boswell wrote:
> >> The response was as follows:
> >>   Your search
> >> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Recentchanges&feed=rss
> >>   was blocked by that feed's robots.txt.
> >> What's going on?
> > It means that Wikimedia have kindly asked Google not to access certain
> > parts of the site (namely everything in /w/) and that Google is kind
> > enough to abide by it.
> If that's so, then you should be able to sort the problem by using this
> form of the link:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Recentchanges?feed=rss

You beauty, that works a treat. Which would likely explain all the hassle
I've been having trying to get the various Wikicities feeds into the same
page.

Would it be really stupid to ask why the URL sin't presented in this form on
the actual page?
--
Phil
[[en:User:Phil Boswell]]


subject: [WikiEN-l] Undeletion policy

body:
On 9/16/05, JAY JG <jayjg at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> VfU is not
> intended to be "AfD round two";

Oh but it is. That is one of my key points: an argument improperly neglected
(for instance, if conditions mentioned in the original nomination have been
met--which is grounds for a keep result unless there is some overriding
reason to delete, such as a copyright violation). Or say an editor finds
that an article has been deleted while he was otherwise occupied, and he
raises the necessary undelete quorum. Or perhaps the article was deleted by
a consensus on AfD despite the well documented fact that the subject was the
President of Mauritania for six months.

Some AFU participants seem to be deliberately neglecting this function. A
validly closed AfD *can* be challenged on AFU. Those who seek to deny a VFU
undelete on the sole grounds that the closed AfD was formally valid should
be told that their opinions will be ignored as inconsistent with deletion
policy.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
Check this halfway decent stub, and the history:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matti_H%C3%A4yry

It was tagged as a speedy, under A7, but there is an assertion of
notability. We need better wording for the speedy policy page.


subject: [Foundation-l] New Proposal: WikiMemory

body:
Just a quick reply to Mark on peer review. The memoirs would not be anonymous. Any reporter worth his or her salt would try to track down the witness to see if he/she were credible.  If the source could not be found, or was found to be less than credible, then the reporter/researcher wouldn't use him/her. This is SOP in all credible journalism, and works the same for all sources, no matter where they come from.  Moreover, if a user (such as a reporter) finds that a source is not credible, then this could be added to the metadata (a bit like the discussions on Wikipedia entries).

You are certainly right that controversial events will attract POV accounts, and even falsified accounts. We'll have to trust that users will understand this, and help identify bad actors.  But I would say that for the vast majority of memoirs, POV won't really come into play.  I saw one of the last Led Zeppelin concerts with the original line up.  My POV is that it was great, but I have a lot of other observations that Zep fans and folks interested in the history of Rock and Roll will be interested in. Particularly in 100 years.

-----Original Message-----
From: foundation-l-bounces at wikimedia.org on behalf of Delirium
Sent: Fri 9/16/2005 3:24 PM
To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] New Proposal: WikiMemory

Traroth wrote:

>Well... Why not ? Are you people OK with testimonies
>like "I was there when US army shooted on Hotel
>Palestine in Bagdad" or "I was in the jails of Abu
>Graib" ?
>
>
I think this sort of thing would be very problematic.  When it comes to
contentious topics, like Israel-Palestine, people have repeatedly
demonstrated that they are willing to completely fabricate eye-witness
accounts to make one or the other side look bad.

Published eye-witness accounts can also be fabricated, of course, but
have the benefit that since they're in the public sphere of published
work, the more questionable oens have often attracted published
refutations.  Similarly, books on controversial subjects are often
reviewed in the 'book review' sections of journals.  A purported
eyewitness account added directly to a wiki doesn't benefit from any of
that sort of peer review.

-Mark

_______________________________________________
foundation-l mailing list
foundation-l at wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l


subject: [Foundation-l] New Proposal: WikiMemory


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Re: Re: Afd "votes" with no real reasons given

body:
Ask Katefan0 if you can use her cabal toaster?

On 9/16/05, Phil Boswell <phil.boswell at gmail.com> wrote:
> Oh, and FWIW my Cabal (TINC) mug didn't arrive; who was supposed to be
> mailing it to me again?


from_name: Jamie Bliss

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Upgrading from 1.4.9 to 1.5rc4

body:
Juanma Barranquero wrote:
> Yesterday I upgraded my (tiny) 1.4.9 installation to 1.5rc4, which was
> a relatively trouble-free affair (I used the web install with the same
> values as on the original install, instead of running "php
> update.php").
>
> I spent quite a while trying to determine how to set up the navigation
> toolbar; the only reference to it is in RELEASE-NOTES, and erroneously
> mentions MediaWiki:navbar. Fortunately, after a (long) while I
> discovered the MediaWiki_FAQ on the web, which nicely explains the
> whole issue. Not a big deal.
>
> More puzzling was the fact that I was getting errors about unknown
> variables while loading an extension. From LocalSettings.php I load
> extensions/MyExtensions.php, which starts with the following code:
>
>   function __autoload($class_name) {
>       require_once($class_name . '.php');
>   }
>
>   require_once('MyFunctions.php');
>
>   SpecialPage::addPage(new UnlistedSpecialPage('MyExtension'));
>
> For some reason, that used to work OK on 1.4.9, but on 1.5rc4 I was
> forced to add
>
>   require_once('SpecialPage.php');
>
> before the call to addPage(). Is that expected?

Ug. Whoever wrote that extension should remove it.

> Now, the only thing I miss is a way to customize $wgBookstoreListEn
> which doesn't involve hacking languages/language.php (because I must
> remember to update it every time I upgrade, which is a PITA). Setting
> it in LocalSettings.php does not work. Any ideas?

Write an extension function to change it after initialization.

-- Jamie
-------------------------------------------------------------------
http://endeavour.zapto.org/astro73/
Thank you to JosephM for inviting me to Gmail!
Have lots of invites. Gmail now has 2GB.


from_name: The Cunctator

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Article deletion

body:
On 9/16/05 12:43 PM, "Timwi" <timwi at gmx.net> wrote:
> SPUI wrote:
>> Timwi wrote:
>>> SPUI wrote:
>>>> The state has decided to spend money [...] That to me says "notable".
>>> Does that make every citizen of a country that spends money on issuing
>>> passports automatically notable?
>> No. If you had taken the time to read the whole thing, I also said that
>> the state has decided to mark these roads with special signs to make it
>> easier to get around.
> Go figure. The state has decided to keep a register of all passports to
> make it easier to find criminals.
>> Stop trolling.
> Pointing out the absurdity of your argument is hardly trolling. By
> contrast, polemic remarks such as this one are more typical of trolls.

Look, ma! The monkeys are throwing their own poo at each other!

--tc (Pass the popcorn!)


from_name: Timwi

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: All information?

body:
Alphax wrote:
> Timwi wrote:
>>Dan Grey wrote:
>>
>>>I have the hypothesis that "[[WP:NOR]] and [[WP:V]] dictate perfectly
>>>what should and should not be in WP". Someone prove that wrong
>>
>>Suppose your hypothesis were true. Then there would be no disagreement
>>on what should and should not be in WP. Contradiction. QED.
>
> Where is the contradiction exactly? Metaphysical semantics?

No, logic. Adding rigour:

Suppose the hypothesis were true. Then there would be no disagreement on
what should and should not be in WP. Then there would be no discussion
about it. Yet AfD as well as assorted talk pages are filled with endless
such discussions. Therefore, the hypothesis is false. QED.

> The hypothesis was that "[[WP:NOR]] and [[WP:V]] dictate perfectly
> what should and should not be in WP".

This hypothesis is true only if *both*
| (A) "Everything that satisfies both [[WP:NOR]] and [[WP:V]] should be
in WP"
*and*
| (B) "Everything that fails either [[WP:NOR]] or [[WP:V]] should not be
in WP"
are true.

> Find something which fails one of them and everyone agrees we should
> have an article on, and you have disproved the hypothesis.

Yes, because this disproves subhypothesis B.

Alternatively, find something which *doesn't* fail *any* of the two, and
yet *not* everyone agrees we should have an article on it, and you have
also disproved the hypothesis (by disproving subhypothesis A). Examples
for this exist en masse.

Timwi


body:
Phil Boswell wrote:
> [cross-posted to wikien-l and wikitech-l, adjust follow-ups as necessary]

[also cross-posted]

> I just tried to add the RecentChanges RSS feed to my Google Personal page at
> http://www.google.com/ig and was met by a rude response.
>
> I copied the link from [[Special:RecentChanges]] (
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Recentchanges&feed=rss )
> and pasted it into the appropriate box.
>
> The response was as follows:
>   Your search
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Recentchanges&feed=rss
>   was blocked by that feed's robots.txt.
>
> What's going on?

try
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Recentchanges?feed=rss

--
-- Jamie
-------------------------------------------------------------------
http://endeavour.zapto.org/astro73/
Thank you to JosephM for inviting me to Gmail!
Have lots of invites. Gmail now has 2GB.


subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: RSS feed not working for Google Personal


from_name: Mark Williamson

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sample ASL-English entry

body:
With this, you are assuming that we're talking about software that
converts from English to ASL.

That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about programs that
generate signing (in any signed language, not just ASL) from specific
instructions, thus there are no limits on their vocabulary or grammar.

Mark

On 16/09/05, HHamilto at doe.k12.ga.us <HHamilto at doe.k12.ga.us> wrote:
>
> In response to Mark Williamson.
> I have evaluated beta versions of the sign avatar programs that are
> available and there are some problems at the moment.
> 1- their vocabulary is very limited
> 2- adults I have shown the avatars to don't like them, kids seem to
> 3-- they cannot clearly express much of the facial grammar and body shifts
> that are of importance for ASL
> 4- the user must be sophisticated in translating between English and ASL to
> assemble the appropriate text that the avatar will turn into ASL
> 5- They are expensive - about $3500 for each copy of the software. (a
> person can now add video from their camcorder to a computer, edit ,
> compress and upload it for much less, digital video is becoming a common
> tool for all to use, Sign Avatars are not)
> Someday the avatars may be a viable solution but not now
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>

--
SI HOC LEGERE SCIS NIMIVM ERVDITIONIS HABES
QVANTVM MATERIAE MATERIETVR MARMOTA MONAX SI MARMOTA MONAX MATERIAM
POSSIT MATERIARI
ESTNE VOLVMEN IN TOGA AN SOLVM TIBI LIBET ME VIDERE


body:
On 9/16/05, Phil Boswell <phil.boswell at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> Would it be really stupid to ask why the URL sin't presented in this form
> on
> the actual page?
>

I'm sure Tim or Brion know the answer to this, but I'd hazard a guess that
the /w form bypasses the squid caches.

In general, reader activities have the /wiki form of the URL, and in those
cases it's okay if the reader sees a cached squid proxy copy of the page,
whereas editing activities (edit, history, what links here, and special
pages) tend to have the /w form of the URL. In those cases the request would
normally be performed by a script in realtime, and the squid proxies aren't
running PHP code and have no database access so they can't do that.

The squids are basically dumb mirrors that sit in between the reader and the
Wikipedia system and only fetch a page from the system if they have no
up-to-date copy in their cache.


from_name: geni

body:
On 9/16/05, Poor, Edmund W <Edmund.W.Poor at abc.com> wrote:
> This is BAD because

on the other hand it is good because it creates a very strong
psycological boundry against continueing a AFD battle once the 5 days
are up

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] Undeletion policy

body:
On 9/16/05, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Oh but it is. That is one of my key points: an argument improperly neglected
> (for instance, if conditions mentioned in the original nomination have been
> met--which is grounds for a keep result unless there is some overriding
> reason to delete, such as a copyright violation). Or say an editor finds
> that an article has been deleted while he was otherwise occupied, and he
> raises the necessary undelete quorum. Or perhaps the article was deleted by
> a consensus on AfD despite the well documented fact that the subject was the
> President of Mauritania for six months.

I don't think there is anything in policy to stop you relisting a
deleted article on AFD. could be interesting to try.

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] Undeletion policy

body:
On 9/16/05, JAY JG <jayjg at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> >From: Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com>
> >
> >However this only highlights the absurdity of the extremely onerous VFU
> >requirements. Taken alongside the worrying trend on VFU to deprecate the
> >function of reconsidering the merits of neglected arguments, anyone would
> >think we were trying to *avoid* remedying mistaken deletions.
>
> The assumption being that many of the articles raised on VfU have actually
> been mistakenly deleted.
>

Of recent cases, I'd say that "List of gags in Airplane" is probably a
mistaken deletion, as was "Gary takes a bath" and obviously "Elf only Inn".
Yes, I think it's a fair assumption that a good proportion of articles
appealed on VFU have actually been mistakenly deleted. It doesn't seem
sensible to assume otherwise.

What concerns me is the presence of onerous and unnecessary barriers to
undeletion. Temporary history undeletion should probably be provided as a
matter of course unless there are, for instance, copyright reasons not to do
so. I don't see any sense in requiring people to make a case about an
article most participants cannot see.


body:
"Michael Turley" <michael.turley at gmail.com>
wrote in message news:d148b68705091605485dc7e2e6 at mail.gmail.com...
On 9/16/05, Phil Boswell
<phil.boswell at gmail.com> wrote:
> > ISRTBC HTH HAND
> ISRTBC?
> WTF?
> I've been away from Usenet too long, and don't like or use IRC or IM.

I sit (or stand, depending on the configuration of your system) ready to be
corrected.

Sorry, I don't recall how that one started; I think it derived from ISC
(i.e. I stand corrected) but don't trust my memory (I don't :-).

Oh, and FWIW my Cabal (TINC) mug didn't arrive; who was supposed to be
mailing it to me again?
--
Phil
[[en:User:Phil Boswell]]
who is, for the hard of understanding, joking about the Cabal (TINC,
ThereHasNeverBeenACabal, IWouldn'tWantToJoinACabalThatWouldAcceptMe :-)


subject: [WikiEN-l] Undeletion policy

body:
On 9/16/05, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> I don't think there is anything in policy to stop you relisting a
> deleted article on AFD. could be interesting to try.

I think it would be disruptive to restore a deleted article after an AfD and
insist on a rerun of the vote. I've suggested something called deletion
challenge, which would be a one-off rerun that could be performed with or
without temporary undeletion (the latter to be performed if any admin thinks
it is merited). It did not find any favor, however. While I would favor this
because it would place the challenge in exactly the same forum inwhich the
original vote took place, and would use exactly the same mechanisms but a
slightly different decision-making process, there is also something to be
said for having a separate review forum.

But something needs to be done about the barrier to undeletion. To be
consistent with deletion policy, undeletion should be performed unless there
is a consensus to keep deleted. At present there is a majority rule and a
quorum.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sample ASL-English Entry

body:
http://www.rid.org/terpfaq.html "Certain Caribbean countries and areas
of Mexico also use ASL."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ "American Sign Language is the dominant
sign language in the United States, English-speaking Canada and parts
of Mexico."

According to the Wikipedia article, it's also used in the Philippines,
Singapore, Hong Kong, C?te d'Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Togo, Benin,
Nigeria, Chad, Gabon, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Central
African Republic, Mauritania, Kenya, Madagascar, Zimbabwe.

Now, last time I checked, the primary language of the Philippines is
Tagalog, that of Hong Kong is Cantonese, that of Benin, Burkina Faso,
Central African Republic, Chad, C?te d'Ivoire, Democratic Republic of
the Congo, Gabon, Madagascar, and Togo is French (also Sango in the
Central African Republic, Arabic in Chad, Malagasy in Madagascar, and
Ewe and Kabiye in Togo), and that of Mauritania is Hassaniyya.

Now, is it just me, or does it seem entirely unreasonable to have a
single Wikipedia in ASL, English, Spanish, Tagalog, Chinese, French,
Sango, Arabic, Malagasy, Ewe, Kabiye, and Hassaniyya?

Mark

On 16/09/05, HHamilto at doe.k12.ga.us <HHamilto at doe.k12.ga.us> wrote:
>
> Mark,
> The ASL users in the US and  Canada are ASL-English bilingual to varying
> degrees. Mexico has its own sign language as do other countries. If there
> are ASL users there, they must be visiting.
> hjh
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>

--
SI HOC LEGERE SCIS NIMIVM ERVDITIONIS HABES
QVANTVM MATERIAE MATERIETVR MARMOTA MONAX SI MARMOTA MONAX MATERIAM
POSSIT MATERIARI
ESTNE VOLVMEN IN TOGA AN SOLVM TIBI LIBET ME VIDERE


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sample ASL/English entry

body:
> First of all ASL is only used in North America. When there will be no
> "paper copies" there is no real loss given the current amount of paper
> copies. So I do not know what you have been smoking and that is a *need
> to know* in order to get a similar experience

This is incorrect. Quite a few websites say it's also used in African
and Asian nations as well, and one of those sites is enwiki.

Mark


from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] Wiki dump organization

body:
Brion Vibber wrote:
> If you can narrow down the request a bit that makes it more likely we'll
> slip something into the backup script. :)

Anyway, there's a dump running currently, and it does not yet include
such changes. The next one can, though, if we can agree on what to add.
(Also the SQL dump output needs to actually be tested before we dedicate
a few gigs to it.)

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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from_name: Phroziac

subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
On 9/16/05, Fastfission <fastfission at gmail.com> wrote:
> The whole of its content was just:
>
> "Matti H?yry is Professor of Bioethics and Philosophy of Law at the
> University of Manchester. He studied philosophy and ethics in
> Helsinki, Finland, and he is Adjunct Professor of Practical Philosophy
> at the University of Helsinki."
>
> Where's the assertion of notability? Being a fellow with a job which
> you went to school for is not in itself notable to the world at large,
> even if that job is being professor at a prominent university. What
> *is* an assertion of notability? Perhaps that's what needs to be
> clarified. To me, an assertion of notability would be a statement
> about something this fellow has *done*, not the job he happens to
> hold. Unless that job is in itself notable, which I suppose is where
> you and I probably differ on this (I don't think that being a
> professor is in-and-of-itself notable, but that might be because
> everyone I spend time around is planning on being a professor
> somewhere or another, eventually).
>
> FF
You have a point, but his notability or lack thereof shouldn't be
decided with speedying. The no assertion of notability thing is for
things like [[Sam Toupin]]. This article is basically about some 15
year old girl who likes DDR.

On 9/16/05, Timwi <timwi at gmx.net> wrote:
> A better way would be to have a {{csda7}} template which explains what
> it means in plain English and non-Wikipedian language. But that's just a
> suggestion.

If CSD A7 is what I think it is, that would be {{nn-bio}}.

And, I would much prefer people used {{d}} instead of {{db}} if
they're going to give a cryptic comment like that. Assuming CSD A7 is
what I think it is, that would be {{nn-bio}}


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Query on ASL

body:
> About the existing ASL orthographies such as Stokoe and SignWriting,
> aside from the issue of copyrighted or patented or whatever systems,
> and aside from the issue of their not being (currently) known by a
> majority of ASL signers, I haven't seen the questions addressed (or
> even asked) (1) are the systems relatively easy to learn if you
> already know ASL ? rather like a phonetic alphabet or syllabary ? say
> with a discrete symbol for each chereme and an intuitive way of
> handling stress exaggeration or whatever you call the way a sign can
> be exaggerated in whole or in part (sort of like lengthening a

Yes, in fact Stokoe is easier to learn for ASL users than users of
other signed languages (many of the symbols for handshapes are based
on which letters use which handshapes in ASL fingerspelling, making it
less intuitive for, say, BSL users, although not impossible as it's
certainly been used for BSL as well)

SuttonSignWriting is supposed to be easy to learn, but the fact that
it has two differing systems (one for printing and one for
handwriting) makes it a bit more confusing.

I don't know about HamNoSys. It's based on Stokoe, but it's far more
complex (you could perhaps compare Stokoe and HamNoSys to the Spanish
alphabet and the IPA -- Stokoe itself is relatively straightforward,
but the precise way in which a specific series of characters is signed
may differ slightly between signed languages, similar to how the
pronounciation of the Latin alphabet sequence "calpricap" differs
across languages although usually very similar; HamNoSys on the other
hand is more precise)

Mark


subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
On 9/16/05, Sam Korn <smoddy at gmail.com> wrote:
> This is what is wrong with AfD: people thinking they can "win".  We
> aren't here to win.  We're here to build an encyclopaedia.  If an
> article not being deleted is victory to you, you should look at why
> you are editing.  Your aggressive inclusionist (their word, not mine)
> attitude epitomises the struggles AfD has.

But what would it hurt to keep this article?


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Undeletion policy and VFU still out of step--advice
	sought

body:
My attempt to restore the head of the VFU page to correctly quote the
undeletion policy has been reverted. I have edited the "purpose" section of
the VFU page to state solely that the authoritative description of the
purpose of the page is in the undeletion policy.

What does one do in a case where some editors insist on replacing a correct
citation of official policy with a form of words which is directly contrary
to it?


from_name: Sam Korn

body:
On 9/16/05, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> What does one do in a case where some editors insist on replacing a correct
> citation of official policy with a form of words which is directly contrary
> to it?

Discuss on talk pages.  If that doesn't work, try an RFC.  This
certainly seems a good reason to use one to me: it is of wide
community interest et c.

Sam


subject: [WikiEN-l] Undeletion policy

body:
On 9/16/05, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 9/16/05, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> > I don't think there is anything in policy to stop you relisting a
> > deleted article on AFD. could be interesting to try.
>
>
>
> I think it would be disruptive to restore a deleted article after an AfD and
> insist on a rerun of the vote.

I wasn't suggesting you restore it  I was jsuting seeing how you could
mess with the rules to atchive odd results.

--
geni


from_name: Gerard Meijssen

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sample ASL/English entry

body:
Kelly Martin wrote:

>On 9/16/05, HHamilto at doe.k12.ga.us <HHamilto at doe.k12.ga.us> wrote:
>
>
>>Videos could be stored on the Commons and linked to from the English text
>>page but the video file size limit would need to be increased dramatically
>>from 2MB. The sample video in the link above is about 1.5 minutes and is
>>16MB.
>>
>>
>
>You are kidding, right?  You want a 16MB video attached to each
>article in enwiki?  That would take up, what, about 10TB?  Are you
>going to pay for that storage array?  How about the added bandwidth?
>
>ASL (like all sign languages) should be a text encyclopedia written in
>a generally accepted orthography for ASL; users who cannot read the
>orthography (illiterate users) may utilize tools to generate
>computer-generated signed videos from the text, the same way that an
>illiterate English-speaking person may use a speech synthesis tool to
>have an article in English read to him.
>
>Kelly
>
Hoi,
The question of cost is something that is something that should be
seperate from this discussion. In the past I have informed the Wikimedia
community that Kennisnet would be willing to undertake the streaming of
content for Wikimedia. I did ask Jan-Bart if Kennisnet would be willing
to host signed content. I have not had an answer yet.

Many organisations are willing to spend a considerable sum of money to
help people like the deaf to have the resources that other people take
for granted. The idea that because of the "cost of video" we would not
be able to do these things is therefore premature. The conclusion that a
signed language needs to have an orthography is not necessarily correct.
Mark has informed us quite correctly that many deaf people do not know
how to write their signed language in one of the representations of
signed languages. Technically I am not sure that you can call them
orthographies.

There is *no* generally accepted orthography for any of the signed
languages. Even the computer generated videos are not generally
accepted. Calling people who cannot read one of the "orthographies"
illeterate is a bit of a stretch. Typically illitereate is used for the
inability to understand the pervasive written language. Typically this
would be written English in America. When you require people to write
one of the "orthographies" in order to contribute to an ASL wikipedia,
you will disqualify most of the people who can sign ASL. This means that
what you want a Wikipedia to be (the ability of everyone to contribute)
a dream. "I have a dream ...."

Thanks,
    GerardM


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Improper speedy taggings

body:
Phroziac wrote:
> Check this halfway decent stub, and the history:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matti_H%C3%A4yry
>
> It was tagged as a speedy, under A7, but there is an assertion of
> notability. We need better wording for the speedy policy page.

We definitely need to place the use of cryptic, unexplained and
ridiculous codes like "CSD A7" under ban penalty. I happen to be lucky
enough to know what "CSD" means because I've been a Wikipedian for long
enough, but this places the contributor at an extremely heavy
disadvantage (and clearly is more than rude), and if not even I knew
what A7 meant (before this example enlightened me) then clearly there is
something majorly lacking in Wikipedians' communication skills repertoire.

What would YOU think if you contributed to some site, and then it said:
"This page meets Wikipedia's criteria for speedy deletion. The given
reason is: CSD A7"?

A better way would be to have a {{csda7}} template which explains what
it means in plain English and non-Wikipedian language. But that's just a
suggestion.

Timwi


from_name: Tony Sidaway

subject: [WikiEN-l] Undeletion policy

body:
On 9/16/05, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> I wasn't suggesting you restore it I was jsuting seeing how you could
> mess with the rules to atchive odd results.

Er, thanks but no thanks. I know VFU is a bit weird at the moment, but that
no excuse for taking an article deleted in process through AfD again, for a
post-mortem rerun.


from_name: JAY JG

subject: [WikiEN-l] Undeletion policy

body:
>From: Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com>
>
>On 9/16/05, JAY JG <jayjg at hotmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > VfU is not
> > intended to be "AfD round two";
>
>
>Oh but it is. That is one of my key points: an argument improperly
>neglected
>(for instance, if conditions mentioned in the original nomination have been
>met--which is grounds for a keep result unless there is some overriding
>reason to delete, such as a copyright violation). Or say an editor finds
>that an article has been deleted while he was otherwise occupied, and he
>raises the necessary undelete quorum. Or perhaps the article was deleted by
>a consensus on AfD despite the well documented fact that the subject was
>the
>President of Mauritania for six months.
>
>Some AFU participants seem to be deliberately neglecting this function. A
>validly closed AfD *can* be challenged on AFU. Those who seek to deny a VFU
>undelete on the sole grounds that the closed AfD was formally valid should
>be told that their opinions will be ignored as inconsistent with deletion
>policy.

VfU is an appeals court, not "let's keep voting on this till we get the
result we want".

Jay.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Article deletion

body:
SPUI wrote:
> Timwi wrote:
>
>> SPUI wrote:
>>
>>> The state has decided to spend money [...] That to me says "notable".
>>
>> Does that make every citizen of a country that spends money on issuing
>> passports automatically notable?
>
> No. If you had taken the time to read the whole thing, I also said that
> the state has decided to mark these roads with special signs to make it
> easier to get around.

Go figure. The state has decided to keep a register of all passports to
make it easier to find criminals.

> Stop trolling.

Pointing out the absurdity of your argument is hardly trolling. By
contrast, polemic remarks such as this one are more typical of trolls.

Timwi


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: All information?

body:
Alphax wrote:
>
>>>>>I have the hypothesis that "[[WP:NOR]] and [[WP:V]] dictate perfectly
>>>>>what should and should not be in WP". Someone prove that wrong
>
> Well, I know that the hypothesis is false at present,

Aaah. Well, that casts quite a different light on your stance.

> If overnight [...]

So now we're talking about a what-if, i.e. a hypothetical scenario. Yes,
if overnight we suddenly agreed on everything and there was no longer
any need for any discussion, then Wikipedia (and indeed the whole world)
would be a much more pleasant environment (and a much easier one to be
productive in). But people don't all agree and never will.

> would the hypothesis then be true?

That question is tautologous. :)

> That's because we haven't tried it yet. Take a snapshot, go through and
> remove everything which violates [[WP:NOR]] or [[WP:V]] (and include
> everything which meets both) and tell me what you have. Then we will see
> if the hypothesis is true or not.

It's your parenthesis that is the important part. I don't think there is
much that violates NOR or V at the moment, so there's not much to
remove. But including everything which meets both means including a lot
of things (schools, roads, people, etc.) that people quite vocally deem
_not notable_. NOR and V are relatively objective criteria, but
notability is quite a lot less so, and there will never be a
hard-and-fast rule (algorithm) that determines boolean notability.

Timwi


subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
I've had a look at, and done a small edit on, this chap's article. I'm
pretty convinced I could get him through a AfD, not trouble. I've taken on
much tougher cases and I nearly always win.


from_name: Andrew Gray

subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
On 16/09/05, Fastfission <fastfission at gmail.com> wrote:
> Unless that job is in itself notable, which I suppose is where
> you and I probably differ on this (I don't think that being a
> professor is in-and-of-itself notable, but that might be because
> everyone I spend time around is planning on being a professor
> somewhere or another, eventually).

Note that UK "professorship" is a couple of grades above US
"professorship"; not that that makes it notable, but it's closer than
it may initially seem. Not sure about Finland, mind you.

--
- Andrew Gray
  andrew.gray at dunelm.org.uk


body:
Oh great, now someone has gone to the undeletion policy talk page and
described taking content into account as "absurd" and proposes to remove
reference to content, and replace it with a reference to proper procedure
being performed.

This is utterly bonkers!


subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
On 9/16/05, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> I've had a look at, and done a small edit on, this chap's article. I'm
> pretty convinced I could get him through a AfD, not trouble. I've taken on
> much tougher cases and I nearly always win.

This is what is wrong with AfD: people thinking they can "win".  We
aren't here to win.  We're here to build an encyclopaedia.  If an
article not being deleted is victory to you, you should look at why
you are editing.  Your aggressive inclusionist (their word, not mine)
attitude epitomises the struggles AfD has.

Sam


body:
On 9/16/05, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> Oh great, now someone has gone to the undeletion policy talk page and
> described taking content into account as "absurd" and proposes to remove
> reference to content, and replace it with a reference to proper procedure
> being performed.
>
> This is utterly bonkers!

hmmm no.  Listing it on VFD would be utterly bonkers.

--
geni


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Sample ASL/English entry

body:
1) Videos take up heaps more space than audio. A very short sample
article (the English version was only 4 or 5 sentences long, a total
of 88 words compared to the average 348.6) turned into a 1.5 minute,
16MB video. Now, imagine a much longer article -- the average article
on enwiki is 348.6 words long. Now, multiply that by 100000. Then, add
to that the fact that there are over 100 signed languages in
widespread use in the world today, and you get a perfect nightmare.
That ends up with over 600TB of video... an astronomical amount of
space, not to mention the bandwidth costs. Angela said that space and
bandwidth aren't a concern -- I sincerely doubt that anybody has that
much space to donate to such a project. And that's just the first
hundred-thousand articles, at the level plwiki is today.

2) It's my opinion that if Wikipedia were to be based more on spoken
than on written materials, we should rely more on speech synthesis. Do
some people have problems with speech synthesis? Yes. Is some software
of better quality than other? Yes. Can some software be difficult to
understand if you're not listening very carefully? Yes. But it's
certainly better, I think, than having to re-record an article every
time a revision is made.

3) What about unwritten spoken languages? Should they get their own
Wikipedias, or should they just be uploaded as spoken translations of
enwiki articles? It doesn't make sense to me to limit ASL to videos
uploaded to enwiki.

Mark

On 16/09/05, Timwi <timwi at gmx.net> wrote:
> Kelly Martin wrote:
> >
> > Then it sounds to me like ASL is not yet mature enough, as a language,
> > to merit a Wikipedia of its own.  If ASL signers are not willing to
> > accept synthetic signing, then I suggest that they need to adjust
> > their attitudes (or else improve the quality of sign synthesis
> > software).
>
> Interestingly, though, English speakers are usually not willing to
> accept synthetic speech when they can have real speech from a real human...
>
> > It's not practical to record hundreds of thousands of
> > videos to facilitate access for a relatively small community.
>
> ... and yet, the [[Wikipedia:WikiProject Spoken Wikipedia]] aims to
> record hundreds of thousands of audio files to facilitate access for a
> relatively small community (the blind).
>
> Personally I think videos of ASL translations of Wikipedia articles
> should just be a WikiProject like Spoken Wikipedia. Just like our sound
> files, the video files would be a translation of a particular revision.
> When the file becomes out of date due to heavy editing of the article,
> re-recording should be considered, but since we haven't got very far
> yet, we are concentrating on recording new articles first.
>
> Timwi
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>

--
SI HOC LEGERE SCIS NIMIVM ERVDITIONIS HABES
QVANTVM MATERIAE MATERIETVR MARMOTA MONAX SI MARMOTA MONAX MATERIAM
POSSIT MATERIARI
ESTNE VOLVMEN IN TOGA AN SOLVM TIBI LIBET ME VIDERE


from_name: Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason

subject: [Wikitech-l] My Watchlist RSS Feed

body:
Isn't it possible to just use HTTP authentication with RSS/Atom feeds?
Or is this a problem for some reason?


subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
On 9/16/05, Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> Note that UK "professorship" is a couple of grades above US
> "professorship"; not that that makes it notable, but it's closer than
> it may initially seem. Not sure about Finland, mind you.
>

He's not just any professor. He holds umpteen chairs in Finland and England.
He's a the university's BPA rep, he's the head of their centre for
professional ethics, back in Finland he's Permanent Expert on Bioethics,
National Research and Development Center for Welfare and Health. And that's
only half of it.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
On 9/16/05, Sam Korn <smoddy at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 9/16/05, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I've had a look at, and done a small edit on, this chap's article. I'm
> > pretty convinced I could get him through a AfD, not trouble. I've taken
> on
> > much tougher cases and I nearly always win.
>
> This is what is wrong with AfD: people thinking they can "win". We
> aren't here to win. We're here to build an encyclopaedia. If an
> article not being deleted is victory to you, you should look at why
> you are editing. Your aggressive inclusionist (their word, not mine)
> attitude epitomises the struggles AfD has.
>
>
But I do win. And it is a struggle. A struggle to make an article so good
that it cannot be deleted. Otherwise why would anyone want to hang out on
AfD? And as a by-product Wikipedia gets some pretty good articles.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
On 9/16/05, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> But I do win. And it is a struggle. A struggle to make an article so good
> that it cannot be deleted. Otherwise why would anyone want to hang out on
> AfD? And as a by-product Wikipedia gets some pretty good articles.

You win against whom?  You may succeed.  But you don't win.  If you
think you do, you should consider that everyone (well, near everyone)
on Wikipedia wants to _improve_ it.  So your attitude of seeing
victory is simply not helpful.

Sam


from_name: Michael Snow

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Re: Criteria for deletion (was: Afd "votes" with no real
 reasons given)

body:
David Gerard wrote:

>Ed Poor wrote:
>
>
>>Can users simply:
>>(1) Tag any article as "unmergeable" for a five-day period, to
>>(2) Force a vote on whether it should be kept or deleted?
>>
>>
>You are quite correct. I've removed ", merge" from [[template:vfd]].
>Whoever put it there was on crack.
>
>
Thanks for doing that. I was a little surprised today when I discovered
that my attempt to boldly forge a compromise over a disputed deletion,
by merging [[Harry Potter trolling]] to [[Internet troll]], got reverted
- fortunately, in a polite and professional manner - on the grounds that
this kind of resolution is not allowed while the discussion is underway.

--Michael Snow


from_name: Ashar Voultoiz

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Wikipedia API?

body:
Mark wrote:
> There is a Perl client library:
>
>   http://search.cpan.org/~markj/WWW-Mediawiki-Client-0.27/

Wonderful, thanks for the link :)

--
Ashar Voultoiz - WP++++
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Hashar
http://www.livejournal.com/community/wikitech/
IM: hashar at jabber.org  ICQ: 15325080


from_name: Rowan Collins

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: My Watchlist RSS Feed

body:
On 16/09/05, Timwi <timwi at gmx.net> wrote:
> Rowan Collins wrote:
> > The basic problem is that people see the watchlist as private
> > information - watching someone else's could facilitate anti-social
> > users "stalking" those pages, etc.
>
> I don't understand why this is a problem. The user will just have to
> decide whether they prefer to have their watchlist public or to not use
> RSS. A little checkbox (with a warning attached) would be all it takes.

Yes, that is what has been suggested in the past; the general
consensus usually emerges that it would be nice to also provide a
minimal piece of security, such as a "secret" URL token generated when
the user opts in. But the main point is, no-one's implemented it yet.

--
Rowan Collins BSc
[IMSoP]


subject: [Wikitech-l] Pagerights in MediaWiki

body:
On 16/09/05, Sascha Brockmeyer <Brockmeyer.S at atlas.de> wrote:
> How can i safe articels in a way, that only SYSOPS can change anything or
> create new texts.

Please read http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Preventing_Access which
discusses some of the configuration options available for locking down
access to a wiki.

--
Rowan Collins BSc
[IMSoP]


from_name: Nick Jenkins

subject: [Wikitech-l] Wiki dump organization

body:
> This would triple the disk space requirements for the data dumps
> (quadruple after the next major upgrade, quintuple the time after
> that...)

Surely it should only double the disk space requirements? XML format
dumps I would say are the same size, or possibly even slightly larger,
than SQL dumps. After all, the main content is the article text, and
that's the same in both (apart from some extra slashes in SQL), but
you lose the overhead of the XML gumpf. I'd be surprised if wasn't a
wash, or close enough to as makes no real-world difference.

Besides, most people I think probably don't want every revision ever.
Nor do they probably want talk pages. In other words, one extra file,
namely the SQL version of pages_public.xml.gz, whose size is going to
almost the same. For EN, the largest of all, that's only ~ 900 megs.
For 900 meg it stops people whining.

> you can transform to whatever local format you
> need. (And we provide software for you to do that if you like.)

What most people need is get it into a database for further work, and
the fact there's software for this at all shows there's demand for it.

And what's the point of every user who wants an SQL dump downloading
the XML version, downloading mwdumper, downloading mono, setting up
mono, running mwdumper, and creating the dump? Wouldn't it make more
sense to run the conversion software as part of a general fortnightly
database dump cron job that did all the XML stuff, then took the XML
file, converted it to SQL, and compressed it? That way the problem is
solved once, in one place, forever, for all users who want SQL format.

> and maybe a couple people might use some of them every once in

Au contraire - most people who want dumps will use them all the time!

Tell you what: If you don't believe me, try making one, uploading it,
and then _next_ dump add a README that says "SQL dumps have been
discontinued due to a lack of interest and demand from users. If you
disagree, please address your comments to Brion on the wikitech-l
mailing list (email: wikitech-l at wikimedia.org)". And then see what
happens. :-)

> > Also, can we please have back the "is_redirect" field in the XML (and
> Hmm, can probably do that yeah.

Sounds great, thank you!

All the best,
Nick.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sample ASL/English entry

body:
Alphax wrote:

>HHamilto at doe.k12.ga.us wrote:
><snip>
>
>
>>Videos could be stored on the Commons and linked to from the English text
>>page but the video file size limit would need to be increased dramatically
>>from 2MB. The sample video in the link above is about 1.5 minutes and is
>>16MB.
>>
>>
>>
>
>I'm on dialup, you insensitive clod. If videos *are* used in a signed
>Wikipedia, there will never be paper copies, and you will make in
>inaccessable to everyone except those fortunate enough to be on high
>incomes in Europe or North America, most of whom can read well enough
>that they won't go to the bother of learning how to use whatever
>technology is required to produce signed articles. If this is the road
>you end up going down, you can take your project, stick it in a pipe,
>and smoke it.
>
>
First of all ASL is only used in North America. When there will be no
"paper copies" there is no real loss given the current amount of paper
copies. So I do not know what you have been smoking and that is a *need
to know* in order to get a similar experience

>
>
>>Making Wikipedia able to handle video will make it more up-to-date. Text
>>and pictures were top-o -the-line in the '80's.
>>
>>
>>
>
>Text was the baseline. Today's baseline is text and pictures, not Flash
>and streaming media. Go over the baseline and everyone loses.
>
>How would you feel if the Foundation said "We're not going to have any
>content in anything other than Esperanto because we think that everyone
>should be capable of learning this language"?
>
Even when supporting signed languages is a bit tricky at this moment in
time, it is not an excuse to not want to support signed languages. When
we start supporting signed languages and it is currently a bit
problematic, it does not mean that it will remain problematic over time.

Thanks,
    GerardM


body:
On 16/09/05, Phroziac <phroziac at gmail.com> wrote:
> But isn't Linux trademarked to Linus?

Evidently not. (RTFA)

--
Rowan Collins BSc
[IMSoP]


from_name: SPUI

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Article deletion

body:
Timwi wrote:
> SPUI wrote:
>
>> Stop trolling.
>
> Pointing out the absurdity of your argument is hardly trolling. By
> contrast, polemic remarks such as this one are more typical of trolls.

Or people that are fed up with deletionism and the shit that comes with it.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Improper speedy taggings

body:
On 9/16/05, Sam Korn <smoddy at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> You win against whom? You may succeed. But you don't win. If you
> think you do, you should consider that everyone (well, near everyone)
> on Wikipedia wants to _improve_ it. So your attitude of seeing
> victory is simply not helpful.

You may not find it helpful to you. I find it helpful to me to think that I
make Wikipedia a visibly better place by improving small stubs to the point
where their useful informational content ensures that they will not be
deleted. Others have a boast list about how many articles they have created
from scratch, still others a list of featured articles. But for me the
greatest feeling is to see people vote "keep" and express admiration for,
and thanks for, the deathbed cleanups that I perform.

Whom do I win against? Well that's the wrong question. If Wikipedia is
improved, we all win.


from_name: Alphax

subject: [WikiEN-l] Violation of Blocking Policy

body:
Brian Brockmeyer wrote:
> User:Arigold reported me on the Wikipedia:Administrators'
> Noticeboard/3RR for alleged violation of the 3-revert rule, which was
> not the case.  Phroziac, who handled Arigold's complaint, readily
> acknowledged that there had been no 3RR violation, writing:
>
> "Maybe I'm blind, but i don't see any four reverts from him that fall
> into a 24 hour period. However, that is gaming the system, and I have
> blocked him for 24 hours. In the future, please sign posts on pages like
> this with ~~~~ --Phroziac (talk) 15:20, 15 September 2005 (UTC)"
>
> By Phroziac's own admission, I did not violate the 3RR, yet he proceeded
> to block me anyway with no basis in Wiki's Blocking Policy.
>
> His claim that I was "gaming the system" amounts to nothing more than an
> affirmation that I did NOT violate the 3RR.  Even still, it lacks all
> merit, since there were merely 4 reverts in a 5 day span (19:36
> September 9 to 19:54 September 14, the date of my last reversion that
> precipitated Phroziac's block), which hardly evinces any kind of intent
> to manipulate and exploit the 3RR.  The 3RR prohibits 3 reverts within a
> 24-hour window.  I made 4 in 100+ (interestingly enough, the same # as
> AriGold, who was NOT blocked).  Neither the 3RR was violated, nor its
> spirit, was violated.  Not even close.

Actually, it was. You continued to revert without discussing why you
were doing so on the article's talk page, or the talk page of the other
editor who was reverting you. /That/ is why we have the 3RR.

--
Alphax                      |   /"\
Encrypted Email Preferred   |   \ /     ASCII Ribbon Campaign
OpenPGP key ID: 0xF874C613  |    X   Against HTML email & vCards
http://tinyurl.com/cc9up    |   / \


subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: My Watchlist RSS Feed

body:
On 16/09/05, Thomas Gries <mail at tgries.de> wrote:
> Rowan Collins wrote:
> >>>The basic problem is that people see the watchlist as private
> >>>information - watching someone else's could facilitate anti-social
> >>>users "stalking" those pages, etc.

> See my comment http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=471#c13
> wherein I suggest a token method,
> the token only mailed on watchlist owner's request to his e-mail
> address, similar to Confirmmail method.

Yes - or my comment #8 on that bug, which reads in part:
> ...the most widely usable solution would be to let the user opt in in preferences to make
> their watchlist public, and then generate a secret random token that has to go
> in the URL to view it. (Noting that this provides only imperfect protection...

I don't really see the need for e-mail addresses to be involved,
unless that happens to make the code much simpler for some reason -
the decisions of whether to register an e-mail address and whether to
activate an RSS watchlist are completely unrelated. The way I pictured
it, the "secret" token would just show up on the preferences page once
the user opted in.

--
Rowan Collins BSc
[IMSoP]


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Re: new request for ASL/English wikipedia

body:
Gerard Meijssen wrote:
> Alphax wrote:
>
<snip>
>> It sounds an awful lot to me like sign language is an othorgraphy, not a
>> distinct language. Having "American sign language" to the exclusion of
>> Auslan, British sign language, et. al. is incredibly US-centric.
>>
>> Can I ask just one question: how many deaf people with Internet access
>> are illiterate in whatever the audible version of their language is?
>> Any? Are there any websites which are "written" in sign language?
>>
>> Until these questions are answered, I don't see why (or indeed *how*)
>> Sign Language Wikipedias can exist.
>>
> Hoi,
> There is no "audible" version of a sign language. With an ASL wiki there
> is also room for wikis for the other sign languages.
>

Hi Gerard,
Please read further down the thread, you will see that Mark addressed
this issue already. There is a sizeable number of people in favour of
signed Wikipedias; what remains to be seen is *how* it will be done.

(Edit: I've just read furthur down the thread, where you talk about how
we shouldn't wait for everything to be perfect before we start. That is
quite true, but at present, I don't think that even the basics of a
signed wiki have been worked out. Yet again I am forced to ask: Is there
any existing literature in sign language?)

Oh, and if all these people for whom sign language is their primary
language have only a 4th-grade reading level, how are they supposed to
even get on the internet and contribute to a signed Wikipedia? The last
time I checked, teaching literacy was *not* a primary goal of the
Wikimedia Foundation.

--
Alphax                      |   /"\
Encrypted Email Preferred   |   \ /     ASCII Ribbon Campaign
OpenPGP key ID: 0xF874C613  |    X   Against HTML email & vCards
http://tinyurl.com/cc9up    |   / \


from_name: Zephram Stark

body:
Travis Mason-Bushman <travis at gpsports-eng.com> wrote:
>[[WP:NOT]] overly legalistic or bureaucratic.  That's what
>[[WP:IAR]] is for.  Nobody's going to "call to the carpet"
>Phroziac for issuing a perfectly respectable block against
>someone who is clearly gaming the system. You still haven't
>explained why you kept unilaterally removing information
>without ever discussing anything. As I said, the ultimate check
>on blocking is that there are more than 500 Wikipedia admins
>capable of blocking and unblocking. The fact that not one of
>them has done anything speaks volumes about your case,
>or lack thereof.
>-FCYTravis @ en.wikipedia

I wouldn't say that despondency speaks volumes about Mr. Brockmeyer's case.  I think it says more about degradation in our system.  Wikipedia was founded on the concept of the best article naturally rising to the top.  Now we see administrative power artificially influencing which article become permanent.  Mr. Brockmeyer is naturally confused because Wikipedia purports itself to be a society of equals, and he doesn't feel like an equal.  He played within the rules, just like the administrator that blocked him, but that administrator made up a new rule: Thou shalt not game the system.  Where is gaming the system on the "exhaustive list of the situations that warrant blocking?" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Blocking_policy#When_blocks_may_be_used
It's not there.  It's one that Phroziac made up.  How can he do that?!!  It's easy in an overgrown hierarchical system like this one.  The guy on the top simply cannot keep up with all of the complaints about his administrators, so he can no longer stem corruption.  It's why every hierarchical system in history has failed.

Societies of equals endure as long as they can keep anyone from gaining power over the system.  In my opinion, getting Wikipedia back to the concept of a society of equals must be our number one priority if we are to be considered a reliably and NPOV resource.  I realize that different people have different jobs, like sysop and administrator, but the tools available for those jobs must not be allowed to influence the articles.  When there is evidence of this, no matter how much we love Phroziac, we must take away his tools for the sustainability and reliability of this incredible project.  If he wants to run for administrator again in the future, I would love to entertain his application.

If the administrators can't monitor themselves, the only alternative I can see is of creating a secret ballot system for votes of no confidence available to all editors.

Zephram Stark
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subject: [Wikitech-l] My Watchlist RSS Feed

body:
On 16/09/05, ?var Arnfj?r? Bjarmason <avarab at gmail.com> wrote:
> Isn't it possible to just use HTTP authentication with RSS/Atom feeds?
> Or is this a problem for some reason?

*sigh*

Sorry, that's a rude start, but this conversation seems doomed to go
round in circles every few months - until someone implements a decent
solution, I guess. See, for example,
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2004-December/026562.html
- where Brion points out that even if most RSS readers can use HTTP
authentication, MediaWiki can't, so it's not really all that helpful.

Also, remember that RSS readers come in all shapes and sizes,
including web-based aggregators, and telling people to type their
username and password into those as plain text (i.e. in the URL) is
*far* worse than just making their watchlist public. Hence the need
for an authentication token that's not the user's normal password, and
hence it might as well just be at the end of the URL, rather than in
the special "user:pass at host" format.

And in case anyone's about to mention some RSS readers supporting
cookies (because they're built into browsers):
http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=471#c12:
> But anyway, the sense in which that approach is kind
> of hacky is that it's not really a "deficiency in other RSS readers" - they're
> not web browsers, so they don't support rendering and submitting an HTML form
> (currently the only way of logging in). Who knows whether or not they'd support
> cookies in general, but the question is how to do the authentication in the
> first place.

I remain convinced that the only reasonable solutions, which will
apply to *all* RSS readers, are:
1) allow users to opt-in to RSS, and make sure they realise this means
anyone can look at it
2) allow users to opt-in, and give them a pseudo-secret URL when they do

If anyone can come up with anything equally flexible but more secure,
fine; if not, anyone interested in this feature should work on
implementing it on those principles. (IMHO)

--
Rowan Collins BSc
[IMSoP]


subject: [WikiEN-l] Undeletion policy

body:
On 9/16/05, Snowspinner <Snowspinner at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> On Sep 16, 2005, at 2:17 PM, MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:
>
> > I don't see how people can form a valid opinion about undeleting an
> > article if they can't compare the original AFD/VFD against the article
> > that was deleted. Temporary undeletion may even uncover additional
> > research that could seal an undeletion without doubt.
> >
> > There may be consensus to delete, but if the last vote went against
> > consensus and provided a valid reason, the reason "AFD was valid"
> > makes no sense at all.
>
> I have been known to disregard "AFD was valid" as a reason for not
> undeleting. Then again, I'm also a firm believer in temporary
> undeletion of VFU articles so people can see what they're voting on,
> and usually do so when I'm actually looking at VFU.
>

There is currently a proposal for a policy change to undeletion policy to
remove any last vestige of content-based decision making on VFU.

Wikipedia talk:Undeletion policy

I'm not going to participate; I don't think it will fly, but if it does I'm
not going to wear myself out trying to stop it.


from_name: Thomas Gries

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: My Watchlist RSS Feed

body:
Rowan Collins wrote:

>>>The basic problem is that people see the watchlist as private
>>>information - watching someone else's could facilitate anti-social
>>>users "stalking" those pages, etc.
>>>
>>>
(In reply to Brion's comment #2
<http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=471#c2>)
 > The tricky part with the watchlist is authentication

See my comment http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=471#c13
wherein I suggest a token method,
the token only mailed on watchlist owner's request to his e-mail
address, similar to Confirmmail method.

Having this information (i.e. the token), the correct RSS feed is delivered


subject: [WikiEN-l] Topic warriors

body:
Daniel P. B. Smith wrote:
> We all know about "POV warriors." I'm fortunate or wimpy enough not
> to have been involved in articles with serious long-standing POV
> wars, but my impression is that _for the most part_ these things seem
> to stay under reasonable control.
>
> On the other hand, I think we are developing "topic warriors" who
> feel that a specific subject area deserves very detailed coverage,
> systematically watch VfD for any cases where articles on their pet
> topic are nominated for deletion, and oppose deletion of _any_
> article on their topic on principle, regardless of the quality of the
> article.
>

If you're talking about Wikiprojects, better get the asbestos underwear
ready... However, I've also seen many articles on AfD improve immensely
and end up being kept simply because someone knowledgable on the subject
of the article came along and improved to the point where it was no
longer suitable to delete the article.

> Unlike POV, a relatively small number of topic warriors CAN
> effectively achieve their goal. (And, of course, they are assisted by
>  Wikipedians who do _not_ accept the premise that "Wikipedia is not
> an indiscriminate collection of information.")
>

It should be noted that many of these "topic warriors" feel that
"Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information" - merely
that Wikipedia lacks decent articles in certain areas.

> NOTE NOTE NOTE ---> topic wars are FAR, FAR less damaging to
> Wikipedia and FAR less of a concern than POV wars.
>

Glad to hear it...

> Some Wikipedians undoubtedly feel that topic wars do not damage
> Wikipedia at all. My feeling is that they do,  because they
> deliberately _create_ systemic bias, and  create an area in which the
>  average quality of the articles  is lower than the rest of
> Wikipedia.
>

Hence we have a Wikiproject to counter systematic bias; also, the more
topics which *are* covered, the less that are *not*.

> They certainly damage the Wikipedia community by factionalizing it,
> creating an "us versus them" mentality, and, in some cases, publicly
>  gloating over their "success."
>

If you mean inclusionists, yes. I still call for the public execution of
the Associations of Inclusionist and Deletionist Wikipedians, and
imposing mentorships upon all editors who still claim to be editors at
the time that these projects are shut down. They are the primary cause
of the angst associated with AfD.

--
Alphax                      |   /"\
Encrypted Email Preferred   |   \ /     ASCII Ribbon Campaign
OpenPGP key ID: 0xF874C613  |    X   Against HTML email & vCards
http://tinyurl.com/cc9up    |   / \


from_name: MacGyverMagic/Mgm

body:
On 9/16/05, Michael Turley <michael.turley at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 9/16/05, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 9/16/05, Poor, Edmund W <Edmund.W.Poor at abc.com> wrote:
> > >
> > >
> > > The only difference is [someone] claimed the right to stop all
> > > merges until the end of the 5-day vote.
> > >
> >
> >
> > That is unusual. You should be able to merge during the AfD, and this should
> > be taken into account by the closer. You'd have to leave the AfD tag around.
> > Don't get phased by the rule lawyers, if what you do makes sense there
> > shouldn't be much of a problem.
>
> I agree with Tony Sidaway, however, the problem I've seen with merging
> during an AfD discussion is that the person doing the merge fails to
> include all the information from the article being discussed,
> therefore giving the appearance of significantly changing the topic of
> discussion by fiat.
>
> If the merge is handled as a two step process, it may reduce the
> complaints.  The two steps I suggest are:
> 1: Copy the article into the merge target verbatim, making absolutely
> no changes or edits.  Note this in the edit summary.
> 2: Edit the merged article using your judgement.  Note as appropriate
> in the edit summary.
>
> In this way, the content of the article is undeniably still present,
> even to people who don't know enough to look back at the redirect's
> history, and any accusations of a "stealth delete" can be fully
> dismissed.  The argument can then proceed about whether the
> information was worth saving or not, or can proceed to a revert war
> over the merge, but at least this way if anything is removed,
> everything is very clear and open about how the content "survived the
> merge, but then was edited out by use of an editor's judgement".
>
> --
> Michael Turley
> User:Unfocused
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>
Yes, I think that could work. This way merges during an AFD period can
still be undone by consensus, but bold moves or merges aren't
stiffled.

Do you have the time to write a proposal?

--Mgm


body:
On 9/16/05, Timwi <timwi at gmx.net> wrote:
> MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:
> >
> > Yeah, it is. But how are you going to get comments if people see a
> > blanked article and think "Good riddance"?
>
> The same way you "get comments" now. If there is a disagreement, you
> initiate a discussion and link to that discussion. Only instead of AfD,
> the discussion would be on the talk page. How's that any different from
> the way it's now?
Since AFD is centralized the discussions are easily accesible to everyone.
Fragmenting them across talk pages makes central management of
archived discussions and admins actually doing the final deletion or
keep.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Undeletion policy

body:
I don't see how people can form a valid opinion about undeleting an
article if they can't compare the original AFD/VFD against the article
that was deleted. Temporary undeletion may even uncover additional
research that could seal an undeletion without doubt.

There may be consensus to delete, but if the last vote went against
consensus and provided a valid reason, the reason "AFD was valid"
makes no sense at all.

--Mgm

On 9/16/05, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 9/16/05, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> > I wasn't suggesting you restore it I was jsuting seeing how you could
> > mess with the rules to atchive odd results.
>
>
>
> Er, thanks but no thanks. I know VFU is a bit weird at the moment, but that
> no excuse for taking an article deleted in process through AfD again, for a
> post-mortem rerun.
> _______________________________________________
> 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] Improper speedy taggings

body:
> I'll go one further, in fact. I think everyone who has been main or
> sole author on a publication in a peer-reviewed scholarly journal
> deserves a Wikipedia article. Yes, this would include a whole lot of
> grad students. But if they're making or have made verifiable
> contributions to their field, we should be including them. No question.
>
> -Snowspinner
> _______________________________________________
I'd prefer including their contribution over their person.


from_name: Gerrit Holl

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sample ASL/English entry

body:
Kelly Martin wrote:
> You are kidding, right?  You want a 16MB video attached to each
> article in enwiki?  That would take up, what, about 10TB?  Are you
> going to pay for that storage array?  How about the added bandwidth?

If every enwiki editor opens a gmail account, we have 2.6 GB * 437,457
users = more than a million GB, or more than 1000 TB. Should be enough
(-;

Gerrit.

--
Temperature in Lule?, Norrbotten, Sweden:
| Current temperature   05-09-16 20:29:48    3.3 degrees Celsius ( 38.0F) |
--
Det finns inte d?ligt v?der, bara d?liga kl?der.


from_name: Pawe³ Dembowski

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sample ASL/English entry

body:
Gerard Meijssen napisa?u:

> Kelly Martin wrote:

>>On 9/16/05, HHamilto at doe.k12.ga.us <HHamilto at doe.k12.ga.us> wrote:
>>
>>
> There is *no* generally accepted orthography for any of the signed
> languages. Even the computer generated videos are not generally
> accepted.
> Thanks,
>     GerardM

Can't we support all ortographies and automatically convert between
them, like with simplified/traditional Chinese?

--
Ausir
Wikipedia, wolna encyklopedia
http://pl.wikipedia.org


from_name: Brion Vibber

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Using MediaWiki to do Wiki source -> HTML as
	a	straight string transformation?

body:
Nick Jenkins wrote:
> Can I please ask a unusual question: Is there some way to get
> MediaWiki to render a page from just the wiki source, and no database?

If you do a bunch of hacking into the internals, probably...

> and without having to delve deeply into the internals of how MediaWiki
> works.

d'oh! ;)

> I'm happy for all links to either be edit links or not (i.e. no reason
> to check whether a page exists or not). Also happy for any templates
> or other inclusions in wiki strings to be ignored, so it's a straight
> string transformation, and so that there should be no reason to
> connect to or use a database.
>
> The reason I'm asking is I'm trying to scope out if it's possible to
> pass in the wiki source of an article, convert it to HTML, and then
> HTML validate that output, so as to find invalid HTML and mis-uses of
> HTML in wiki articles.

You can't guarantee that without doing template inclusions, though as
for instance template inclusions can be embedded in HTML attribute
values (yyyuuuccckkkkk!) and mistakes there are a likely source of
borken HTML output.

Strictly speaking, any invalid HTML in output is a bug in the wiki; we
_try_ to guarantee validating XHTML 1.0 transitional output, but we
don't try as hard as we should. In particular there's no validation of
attribute _values_ for those attributes which are allowed, some of which
may have some limits on the DTD, and the check for proper nesting is
extremely bad and ugly code which was hacked together a couple years ago
and no one's dared to replace it. For now we run parsed output through
the HTML Tidy library for an additional cleanup pass on Wikipedia; this
is optional in MediaWiki and requires either the tidy executable or the
PHP extension form.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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from_name: Delphine Ménard

subject: [Foundation-l] Re: [Wikimania-l] WikiMania 2006 bidding process?

body:
Hello there,

> We have been working up a bids for East London and Reading to bring
> WikiMania to  UK in 2006, and I see Toronto have also put in a strong
> bid.
>
> But I can also see Cleveland on a different page! I have just
> discovered their bid today!
>
> Where are
> 1) the planned bids
> 2) the official bids
>
> exactly on WikiPedia? Should everything be moved to MetaWiki now??
>
> Also, what are the deadlines for Wikimania 2006? Where are they
> stated precisely?
>
> Many thanks!
>
> Gordon Joly, East London
> aka
> LoopZilla

The bidding process has started at the beginning of this month. (see
here: http://mail.wikimedia.org/pipermail/foundation-l/2005-September/004184.html)

 All bids should be on meta and follow the rules explained here:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2006/Official_requirements_for_potential_host_cities,
that's also where you will find the official bids, if they are listed,
of course (I just added Cleveland to the list ;-) )

Thank you and hurray for the first European applications!

Best,

Delphine
--
~notafish


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: [Wikimania-l] WikiMania 2006 bidding process?


subject: [Foundation-l] New Proposal: WikiMemory

body:
This project wouldn't be very NPOV or verifiable, though.

--
Ausir
Wikipedia, wolna encyklopedia
http://pl.wikipedia.org


subject: [Foundation-l] New Proposal: WikiMemory