body:
Hi Slomox,

I find it interesting that you refer to the Sass orthography, when
Heiko recently reverted changes by Reinhart Hahn to attempt to bring a
page into accordance with the Sass orthography.

"Der neue Sass" makes a few important phonetic distinctions that you
guys don't make. When Ron added them, as well as fixing you guys' poor
grammar, his changes were reverted by HeikoEvermann.

Re running down admins... Slomox, both you and HeikoEvermann state
very clearly that your native language is Hochdeutsch, not Platt.
Important decisions such as orthography shouldn't be made by
second-language speakers only, and neither should the entire interface
be translated and thousands of articles created mostly by
second-language speakers (look at na: for a worst-case scenario; ga:
still has problems because much of its initial content, and the user
interface, was written in poor Irish by a second-language speaker).

Re Platt being the same as Low Saxon... this is laughable at best.
"Platt" includes East Low German, as well as real actual Low Saxon.
You guys actually note this on your mainpage, so it's strange that you
deny it here.

The solution to this problem as I see it: Fix the grammatical problems
with nds.wiki which are the result of contributor incompetency. Add
nessecary orthographic distinctions. Introduce orthographic converter
based on the model I constructed.

And then, after this, there needs to be a recognition that nds.wiki at
the current time can only be for Northern and Western Low Saxon, ie
excluding Plautdietsch, Westphaelsch, Eastphaelsch... otherwise we
open the Pandora's box of incomprehensibility.

Mark

On 10/07/05, wiki at marcusbuck.org <wiki at marcusbuck.org> wrote:
> Hello.
>
> I find it a bit weird, that you discuss about nds.wikipedia on the mailing list
> and not even post a message on nds.wikipedia. I found this discussion by chance
> after some people came into the wiki making changes without knowing really what
> they do.
>
> Some people here are running down admin and other users of nds.wikipedia, which
> are the only people really active on that wiki for long time. They are engaged
> on making it a better usable resource in Low Saxon language and we introduced a
> common orthography based on the wordbook by Johannes Sass to make it consistent
> so you don't have to know all the regional variants of the language, which are
> for some cases mutually unintelligible. The orthography by Sass is based on the
> most widely used dialect, that is also mostly used when spoken in supra-regional
> media.
>
> I think some people discussing here are speaking out of their ivory tower and
> don't know what is really going on at the "base". I see some Dutch engaged
> here. Let me say: Dutch variant of Low Saxon is not understandable for most of
> German Low Saxon speakers (Sure, they are understandable near the border). Some
> state the wiki is in Plattd??tsch rather than Low Saxon. This is so true as it
> is not true. Plattd??tsch is the most important variant of Low Saxon (Low Saxon
> is an academic classification) and the common name of the language in Germany.
> If no Dutch contribute it is no wonder, when the wikipedia is more and more
> germanized (or shall the German learn Dutch and Nedersaksisch to balance the
> Dutch contribution deficits?)
>
> You don't need all your fingers to count all regular contributors to the wiki.
> Why do so much people argue here about the content of the wiki and nobody of
> the people, who obviously know so much about the language, contributes?
>
> I'm a little bit angry because of the behaviour of some.
>
> --~~~~
> Greets, Slomox
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> 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


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Timwi

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Re: Why will David Gerard not answer this simple
	question?

body:
Norath Norath wrote:
>
> Which piece of policy justifies an instant and
> indefinate block for asking a question of another
> admin?

You keep insinuating this, but I strongly doubt that you were blocked
for that. You were most likely blocked for something else, and you were
probably told what this something else was, but you probably just don't
see that it's a wrong, or you felt justified in doing it, and so you
feel the block was unjust.

Reflect upon it, think about what you were /really/ blocked for, and
stop doing it.

Timwi


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Mark Williamson

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Dutch-Low Saxon test-mainpage

body:
Oho! What's this I see?

Servien is not a native speaker either? Who here _is_ a native speaker?

Although Ron isn't subscribed to this list, so far as far as I can
tell he's the only native speaker who has even contributed to this
discussion. So Walter was wrong when he was saying that native
speakers had told me things... hmm.

Heiko said, "For me wikipedia (and KDE op Platt) are a means to spread
knowledge about Plattd??tsch. My goal is to create a Low Saxon
wikipedia that people with little to none Low Saxon background can use
to relearn an almost forgotten language."

Well Heiko, the Wikimedia foundation DISAGREES with you. The goal of
ANY Wikipedia should be primarily to spread knowledge about
EVERYTHING, *in* that language.

You should not simplify your language or use grammar of a more
widely-spoken language (-> Patentplatt/Fernsehplatt), nor should it be
your goal that people relearn a language from Wikipedia. If they want
to relearn Platt, you can write a Wikibook at http://de.wikibooks.org/
called "Relearning Plattdeutsch".

For teaching and learning languages, you go to Wikibooks. For learning
and writing about ANYTHING, just using language as a medium, you go to
Wikipedia.

Mark

On 10/07/05, Heiko Evermann <heiko.evermann at gmx.de> wrote:
> Hi Servien,
>
> > The reason why I don't post is because that Wiki doesn't "support" my
> > dialect... You are very wrong in saying (at least I think so) that in
> > Germany are the most "important" dialects of Low Saxon... on the Nds
> > Wiki you just ignore those Dutch dialects with about 1.8 million
> > speakers...
> That is a problem that several minority languages share all over the world.
> Due to the lack of a common written language, the language has fragmented
> into regional dialects long ago.
>
> > The reason why Dutch speakers don't contribute is because
> > the writing system is completely incomprehensible!
> We are talking about a wikipedia, so I would like to remind you of the NPOV
> policy: it is completely incomprehensible to *them*. It is perfectly readable
> for people from this side of the border.
>
> > I think you look a
> > bit narrow minded at this subject... the guy who wrote the book was
> > most likely German (at least I presume!) and he did not invent the
> > spelling for international use, just as in Holland we didn't invent
> > the spelling for international use.
> In fact it was designed that way. The idea was to make it easy for people with
> a High-German background to recognize the words as much as possible.
> Therefore e.g. special characters like a with the little o above were not
> used.
>
> > If you want to use it for a
> > international purpose than you have to adapt the writing system (as
> > you mentioned it's spoking in every continent except the Antarctic).
> Unfortunately there is no writing system for Low Saxon that is universally
> accepted. There is one on this side of the border that you do not understand,
> one on your side of the border that we do not understand. Plus a proposal for
> a common spelling by R.F. Hahn that might be interesting, but unfortunately
> it is incomprehensible on both sides of the border. So which way do you want
> to go?
>
> > If I post on Nds, they complain that they don't understand the writing
> > and change it to German-based spelling... I'm not German so why would
> > I have my messages in German-based spelling?!
> Wikipedia articles tend to be written in a collaborate manner. Someone starts
> a page, someone else adds something. Yet someone else corrects something etc.
> Unfortunately your spelling and our spelling are mutually exclusive. And
> frankly, I do not want to have an article that changes orthography each time
> the paragraph changes. This might work for Portuguese and Brazilian
> Portuguese, but not for writing systems that are way apart.
> >
> > "Johannes Sass" didn't invent a very good orthography to my opinion,
> > he should have a least looked at both major-LS speaking countries and
> > made a compromise of both writing systems, or better yet look at the
> > Old LS writing system when it used to be a official language in 1500!
> Whether or not it was a good orthography is not for us but for history to
> decide. I think we are not the ones to fix it. Over time the Sass orthography
> has gained more and more popularity in Germany. And we need such a unity to
> protect what is left of Low Saxon in Germany, which oftentimes is very
> little. For me wikipedia (and KDE op Platt) are a means to spread knowledge
> about Plattd??tsch. My goal is to create a Low Saxon wikipedia that people
> with little to none Low Saxon background can use to relearn an almost
> forgotten language. Besides: that is precicely the reason why I am very much
> opposed to any linguistic experiments like the allgemeyne schrievwies by
> Hahn. We came to the same conclusion for KDE op Platt. Again: the Sass-based
> spelling is a common ground on this side of the border.
>
> > If Plattd??tsch is the name for the dialects in Germany then why is it
> > called that, you're not the only LS speakers in the world as mentioned
> > almost every continent! Why not make the ISO code PT than?
> 1) the common name for Low Saxon on German is not "Nedersaksisch", but
> "Plattd??tsch". If you ask people about Plattd??tsch, they know what you are
> talking about. If you ask them about Nieders?chsisch, they won't understand
> what language you are talking about. Please have a look at
> http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nedersaksisch:
> "Het begrip
> Het begrip "Nedersaksisch" werd tot in de jaren '90 van de 20e eeuw alleen
> door historisch taalkundigen gehanteerd. Sprekers van de Nedersaksische
> vari?teiten refereerden aan hun dialect met de naam van een plaats of streek
> (Achterhoeks, Drents, Veluws, Elspeets enz.), of met de aanduiding Plat (ook
> Plat, Platduits). Onder invloed van diverse streektaalbewegingen heeft de
> politiek het begrip overgenomen en uiteindelijk als streektaal erkend. Een
> uniforme cultuurtaal zit er nog lang niet in, mede doordat iedere poging van
> uniformering (spelling en woordenschat) als wezensvreemd voor de grote
> vari?teit aan voornamelijk mondelinge dialecten wordt afgewezen."
> From this I conclude that
> * the term "Platduits" is well-known also on your side of the border
> * The term "Nedersaksisch" is very recent in Dutch, it is only 15 years old.
> 2) It is not up to us or to you to invent ISO-Codes. The ISO code for our
> language is nds. Please look it up on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_639.
> It stands for "German, Low; Low German; Saxon, Low; Low Saxon". Now we have
> the following options:
> * either we share this ISO code somehow, or (if you do not like that)
> * *YOU* sort it out with the ISO-committee and *YOU* get yourself a new one,
> because we are legitimate users of this ISO code.
>
> The best way to go in my opinion is to start nds-nl.wikipedia.org. If you do
> not like us to continue as nds.wikipedia.org we can move it to
> nds-de.wikipedia.org and make a common portal page on nds.wikipedia.org to
> direct users to the new address. Besides: If you had been the first to go and
> would have written an nds.wikipedia.org in Dutch spelling, I would have voted
> to start an nds-de.wikipedia.org.
>
> As I said quite some time ago: both variants of the language do not mix. And
> it is not just the spelling. Modern Low Saxon lacks quite a number of words
> for modern things and ideas and on our side of the border we have the
> tendency to fill in the gaps with High German words (or with words that we
> "plattify") and on your border you are doing the same thing. A perfect
> example for this your proposed main page on
> http://nds.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruker:Servien/Heufdbladsyde. Some examples
> * chemistry:  Scheikunde: this happens to be exactly the Dutch word. In
> Germany we say "Chemie" and I doubt that there is an original LS word.
> *  medicine: Geneeskunde: this happens to be exactly the Dutch word. In
> Germany we say "Medizin" and this happens to be the High-German word.
> * religion:  "Religie": happens to be exactly the Dutch word. For latin-based
> words on "-ion" we retain the ending "-ion" in our variants of Low Saxon,
> which happens to be the way it is done in High-German.
> *  Kleunruumte ("talk room"): Kleun can be a variant of our spelling "kl??n",
> but ruumte sounds very much like Dutch "ruimte". On our side of the border we
> have "ruum", which is very close to High-German "raum".
> * suggestion: "suggesties": First of all we have a non-latin word for that:
> V?rslag. And concerning latin imports on "-tion" we have the ending
> "-tschoon" and you use "-tie", which happens to be exacly like the Dutch
> system.
>
> So my conclusion is very simple: you claim to do everything better, but your
> own proposal is just a proof that your own Low Saxon has a heavy Dutch bias.
> Or should I conclude from this that you too are not a native speaker? (In
> fact this is the case as can be seen from
> http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gebruiker:Servien)
>
> The only way to go on from here is to accept that it is time for you to go
> your way and for us to go our way. Then both nds wikipedias can flourish.
> Otherwise we would just go on quarreling over words. Why is that so difficult
> to see?
>
> Besides you got your 5 signatures that you wanted to have. So why don't you
> just start nds-nl.wikipedia.org.
>
> Kind regards,
>
> Heiko Evermann
>
>
> >
> > Servien
> _______________________________________________
> 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:
Slomox, how would you know whether or not it is written in a corrupted
form of Low Saxon? IT ISN'T YOUR NATIVE LANGUAGE!

It's not mine either, but I was told by R. F. Hahn that you guys are
using Fernsehplatt, ie Platt with Hochdeutsch grammar. He is a native
speaker, and you aren't. So who should we believe here? Him, or you?

A recap of all the major players in this arguments:
- Me, with a level of nds-0. Maybe able to understand nds-1, but not speak it.
- Servien, with a level of nds-3. Not a native speaker.
- HeikoEvermann, with a level of nds-3. Not a native speaker, but an
admin and very bossy and authoritarian at that.
- Slomox, with a level of ???. Not a native speaker.
- Waerth, with a level of ???. Not a native speaker.
- Wouter, with a level of ???. Maybe a native speaker.

So, basically nobody here is a native speaker, except maybe Wouter?
Well, why are we even doing this then? A new Wikipedia should never be
created without a native speaker. So even if nds-nl IS ever to be
created, there should be a native speaker first.

Mark

On 10/07/05, Marcus Buck <wiki at marcusbuck.org> wrote:
> Mark Williamson wrote:
>
> >Hmm... according to the ISO, "nds" does not include East Low German.
> >Only Low Saxon. Seems this Wikipedia is not in accordance...
>
> Plattd??tsch covers the non-frankish parts of Low German, but there is no ISO
> code for this portion. I don't know the discussion held when creating
> nds.wikipedia, but I think it was intended to cover this portion, but the code
> nds was chosen, because he was the best-matching code therefore. It would be
> silly to separate East Low German and Low Saxon, because they are closely
> related.
>
> Servien Ilaino wrote:
>
> >You are very wrong in saying (at least I think so) that in
> >Germany are the most "important" dialects of Low Saxon...
>
> Important is not the right word, yes (sometimes the correct English words are
> lacking).
>
> >The reason why Dutch speakers don't contribute is because
> >the writing system is completely incomprehensible!
>
> Long time no writing system was given and nevertheless any Dutch contributed.
>
> It is not possible to write an Low Saxon/Plattd??tsch/Low German whatever
> wikipedia understandable to all speakers in all parts of the Netherlands and
> Germany without inventing a common writing and a common standard for the use of
> words not common. But this invention can't be task of a wikipedia, but must be
> based on a broad consensus in language community. Therefore we need two
> projects for the main varieties Dutch-influenced and German-influenced Low
> Saxon. (coming back to the original issue)
>
> I hope nobody will think anymore, nds.wikipedia is mainly written in a corrupted
> form of Low Saxon, this is not true.
>
> Slomox (Marcus Buck)
>
> _______________________________________________
> 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: [WikiEN-l] Re: more active censorship

body:
JAY JG wrote:
> From: Timwi <timwi at gmx.net>
>
>> The more I read from you, Jay, the more I notice that it is full of
>> strawmen. Which is kind of ironic, because you were usually the one
>> who most vocally told other people they were setting up strawmen,
>> especially without explaining why you think they are strawmen.
>
> An analogy is not a strawman argument.

I didn't say it was; your posting nevertheless had a strawman argument
in it, and this is another one.

> And the more I read from you, Tim, the less I respond to. ;-)

Who? "Tim"? Oh, you're referring to me? My name isn't Tim.

Timwi


list: wikitech-l

from_name: ilooy

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Wikitech-l Digest, Vol 24, Issue 18

body:
Hi all,
I recently posted a message requesting
the setting up of a Ladino language
sub-domain:
http://lad.wikipedia.org/    and
http://lad.wiktionary.org/

But I haven't received news that it would
be set up. According to the stipulations
on the Request page on Meta and the
discussions on Wikipedia-l the Ladino
Wikipedia and Wiktionary would have
the support needed. I was informed that
any of our developers could set this up.

Could one of our hard at work developers
take the time to set this up for us...

Also, once the sub-domain is set up
what are some links to go to with
instructions on how to translate the
interface etc.

I would very much appreciate your help.
With regards always,
Jay B.
en:User:ILVI
ilooy.gaon at gmail.com


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: more active censorship

body:
Pat Carr wrote:
>
> The assertion was that the general case is that blocks are renewed
> "very quickly". This does seem to be true, since most blocks are
> placed due to ongoing edits. Thus, the blocked user will usually hit
> edit soon after the block is in effect.

OK, this might apply to the majority cases, but it is still a wrong
thing to do precisely because of the minority cases such as the
following example:

Imagine you're such an editor who got caught up in an edit war. You then
make a decision to stop, close your browser and cool off at pretty much
the same time that an admin decides to block you for some policy
(personal attacks, say).

The next day -- 20 hours later -- you have cooled off and you vow to
approach the issue with a clearer mind now. You discover you're banned
for the next 24 hours. Your cooling off is instantaneously undone.

Timwi


from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Shouldn't we kick paedophiles off Wikipedia?

body:
Jon wrote:

>There are very few views that are viewed as so taboo as paedophilia. And let's be honest here - you wouldn't ask either of those two users to babysit for you, so let's stop the nonsense about "open-mindedness". I'm not open-minded about grown men wanting to have sex with pre-pubescent girls - and I imagine that goes for 99%+ of the population.
>
>As far as you asking me not to be emotive about it - that's silly - who wouldn't be emotive about it (and I'm not even a parent)!
>
>Let me ask the question again - is Wikipedia a haven for paedophiles? If so, I can see many parents banning their children from using it - to the detriment of us all.
>
Failing to condemn paedophilia does not mean supporting it.

Ec


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Renaming users

body:
Oh. Then I shouldn't be a bureaucrat?

No, no, just kidding.

But it doesn't matter much since I won't be a bureaucrat until the
Great Reckoning in 3 years, 4 months, and 9 days.

Mark

On 10/07/05, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
> Ros' Haruo wrote:
>
> > As a user with different names on different language Wikipedias, I only
> >hope if somebody changes my name they let me know...
> >
> Any bureaucrat who starts doing things like that probably should not be
> a bureaucrat.
>
> Ec
>
> _______________________________________________
> 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: Mark Ryan

subject: [WikiEN-l] The ongoing trolling

body:
Hi Ruy.

You're perfectly right. I had you confused with another mailing list
contributor entirely. I apologise for any confusion this may have
caused.

~Mark Ryan

On 7/10/05, Ruy Lopez <ruy.lopez at mail.com> wrote:
> Ultrablue says:
>
> > Ruy Lopez is moderated on this mailing list, which you
> > were probably unaware of. I approved his post above, but did not
> > notice the text: "those of you not coming to this list to kiss the ass
> > of Ayn Rand reading porn magnate Jimbo Wales".
>
> As far as I can recall, I don't believe I've ever posted to this list
> before, although it's possible I did months ago and forgot.  Anyhow, I
> was not signed up to this list, I just signed up to it yesterday because
> I was informed I was called a vandal on it by Jimbo Wales.  Perhaps a
> year ago I would have tried to walk the high road instead of slinging
> mud back, but I guess I have gotten too used to Wikipedia mud-slinging.
> Which is one reason I have noted that I now spend most of my time
> editing on other wiki encyclopedias.


from_name: Skyring

subject: [WikiEN-l] The ongoing trolling

body:
On 7/10/05, El C <el.ceeh at gmail.com> wrote:
> I, myself don't know either way--assume good
> faith is indeed a harsh mistress

Nevertheless, it is one deserving of your embrace.

--
Peter in Canberra


from_name: Alphax

subject: [WikiEN-l] Thank you RickK

body:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: RIPEMD160

Tony Sidaway wrote:
> Alphax said on July 5:
>
>> Michael Turley wrote:
>>
>>> I'm always disappointed when I hear of people leaving, but I'd rather
>>> have an unstable person leave because of a failed admin nomination than
>>> promote an unstable person to adminship.  At least this way, the
>>> instability has only driven a single user away.
>
>> Um, you seem to forget the case of RickK - an unstable admin who left
>> and deleted pages when they went...
>
> This is a great inflated bubble of an argument.
>

Yes it is. I'm sorry I wrote that.

> Firstly we're told that RickK was unstable.  No evidence is presented.
>

I know, it was in the context of the previous posts. A very poor choice
of words on my part.

> Secondly we're told that RickK "deleted pages" when he went.
>
> Well actually all RickK did when he went was delete his user space
> articles.   As he was a member in good standing when he left, he was
> surely entitled to do so.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ALog&type=delete&user=RickK&page=
>

I think discussion after the event has proved otherwise - for the same
reason that people are encouraged to archive their talk pages instead of
just blanking them (or at least providing links to diffs before
blanking). Deleting his user and talk pages was felt by at least some to
be innappropriate. Again, it was in the context of previous discussion.

> I object strongly to the characterisation of RickK as an unstable
> administrator.  He was one of the best we've had, he worked long and hard,
> and he finally decided he'd had enough.  I wish he would come back, but if
> he's had enough then we should be thanking him for his long and faithful
> service.  Which I do gladly.  Thank you RickK.
>

I have absolutely no idea what RickK did as an admin; but from what I
saw of him on Wikipedia, you didn't want to get on the wrong side of him.

Feel free to block me, moderate me on the mailing list, revert every
contrib I have ever made, delete my user page, launch an RFAr, etc. I
have offended TEH 1337 CABAL, and should be punished.

- --
Alphax
OpenPGP key: 0xF874C613 - http://tinyurl.com/cc9up
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
There are two kinds of people: those who say to God, 'Thy will be done,'
and those to whom God says, 'All right, then, have it your way.' - C. S.
Lewis
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.1 (MingW32)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFC0OZd/RxM5Ph0xhMRA1j2AJ94owvjrOvnrFJm42nDZY1HZw8lwwCeMAa4
2ckfqbnRZL7+W0QmIrn+8LU=
=RAox
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


list: foundation-l

subject: Fwd: [Foundation-l] Fair Use and Registered Trademarks

body:
Robert Scott Horning wrote:

> Jean-Baptiste Soufron wrote:
>
>>> We never had to make any settlement with Britannica, or with Oxford,
>>> when they complained about "The Oxford Book Of English Verse," as they
>>> never asked us to.  Oxford *did* blow some smoke about the OED, but it
>>> was just that, and a decade ago, as I recall.
>>>
>>> I think we will post the first page of the original OED, to test
>>> the winds,
>>> esp. since I own a first edition, and can thus prove it is from 1888.
>>>
>>> We should be able to publish nearly all of the first edition,
>>> except those
>>> few volumes published after 1922. . .I can send a list, if you like.
>>>
>>> I should add that PG has TWO different teams working on the
>>> Britannica,
>>> and the other one mentions the name much more.
>>>
>>> I got one message from the ex-CEO of Britannica, whom I know through
>>> other means, and explained that I had had nothing to do with the
>>> second one.
>>>
>>> mh
>>
> I am curious what prompted the inclusion of the previously mentioned
> legal disclaimer in with PG texts for Encyclopedia Britannica then?  I
> know a good CYA is always in order, but it seemed a little extreme in
> this case, particularly because content was removed.  There must be
> more to the story than what Michael Hart is suggesting here.

You're welcome to explore the background yourself.  CYA could very well
have been a motivating factor, but the ground that PG gave up was not
that big.  When it comes to a 250 year old institution whose ability to
survive much longer is questionable, granting them the opportunity to
save face is a gracious act..

As for the OED, even some volumes published after 1922 are now in the
public domain by the 70 year rule.

Ec


list: wikimedia-l


from_name: Tony Sidaway

subject: [WikiEN-l] Thank you RickK  -reply and thanks to alphax

body:
Alphax said:
>
>> Firstly we're told that RickK was unstable.  No evidence is presented.
>>
>
> I know, it was in the context of the previous posts. A very poor choice
> of words on my part.

Thanks for moderating and explaining your statements.  Not a lot of people
trouble to do that and I'm grateful.

>
> I have absolutely no idea what RickK did as an admin; but from what I
> saw of him on Wikipedia, you didn't want to get on the wrong side of
> him.

Well I seldom agreed with him, and he knew it.  I valued his work, and
still do.

>
> Feel free to block me, moderate me on the mailing list, revert every
> contrib I have ever made, delete my user page, launch an RFAr, etc. I
> have offended TEH 1337 CABAL, and should be punished.
>

TINC :)


from_name: Servien Ilaino

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Dutch-Low Saxon test-mainpage

body:
That was exactly my point, also "Platt" is a very limited concept, it
only refers to German-LS instead of internationally used LS, the ISO
code is NDS but the name for the Wiki is Plattd??tsch and includes
East-German, how do you get that right?

About the point being native speaker, of course you don't really need
to be a native speaker as long as your knowledge of the language is
good. What is a mothertongue exactly if you dream and speak in it,
than I have a few mothertongues... I sometimes dream in Nds and I
speak it sometimes but if I'm on another language Wiki I write in that
language (of course)...

Servien

2005/7/10, Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com>:
> As it so happens, it appears Heiko sends all communication in
> Hochdeutsch, occasionally proceeded by "moin moin" to make it sound
> more Platt-ish. Slomox, the other most active current admin, is also
> not a native speaker of Low Saxon (but rather Hochdeutsch),
>
> With these people running this nokieksel op 't patentplatt, it's no
> wonder it's... in patentplatt.
>
> I'm sure they're also the ones deciding orthographic policy...
>
> Also, the nds.wiki mainpage says it's in Plattd??tsch (ie, flat
> german)... and in parenthesis after it says "Plattd??tsch", it says
> "neddersassisch un oostnedderd??tsch" (Low Saxon and East Low German).
>
> Hmm... according to the ISO, "nds" does not include East Low German.
> Only Low Saxon. Seems this Wikipedia is not in accordance...
>
> Hmm.
>
> Mark
>
> On 10/07/05, Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Boris,
> >
> > As Ron noted in the messages I copied here, "?" varies to "oe", since
> > of course not everybody has that keyboard.
> >
> > Servien says people will just use the German-based spelling instead.
> > In fact, the distinctions added by Ron _are_ part of the German-based
> > spelling.
> >
> > When he says "better publications", I'm sure he means _in_  rather
> > than _on_, but if you need clarification I could ask.
> >
> > Interestingly enough, the distinctions are actually made in "Der neue
> > Sass" the orthographical ? bible ? of nds.wiki... and yet
> > HeikoEvermann, whose own self-declared nds-competency is only "nds.3",
> > reverted the changes anyways and was quick to send me a series of very
> > stern messages in Hochdeutsch when I changed back suspecting a
> > misunderstanding. I don't know Hochdeutsch well but I know enough to
> > know that Heiko was cross.
> >
> > Mark
> >
> > On 10/07/05, Boris Lohnzweiger <BorisLohnzweiger at web.de> wrote:
> > >
> > > Just a few final remarks from me on the Dutch Low Saxon issue.
> > >
> > > > Even though the consensus is to go along with the German-based orthography
> > > > (which alienates speakers in the Netherlands), I strongly suggest that the
> > > > usual orthographic neglect not be perpetuated.
> > >
> > > Ok, now I can understand the meaning. Once again, a very good idea. Once again, very academic, too. Reinhard "Ron" Hahn seems to be a very intelligent man. If articles are written in his phonetically more correct way, it surely won't do any harm. But does he really think, you can talk a majority of volunteer, amateur editors into using a method of spelling they are not used to? That "?" is not even on their keyboard.
> > >
> > > > According to him, such distinctions are made in "better" Platt publications.
> > >
> > > Does '"better" Platt publications' mean publications written _in_ Platt or academic publications written _on_ the subject of the Low Saxon language? Linguists often have different ways of writting things down, due to the specific needs of their science. By the way, did you know "th" stands for two different sounds in English? So what about a spelling reform at en: ?
> > >
> > > I think if Wikipedia in Low Saxon is supposed to flourish you'll have meet people were they are.
> > >
> > > Boris
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com>, wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org schrieb am 10.07.05 07:44:03:
> > >
> > > Boris,
> > >
> > > Ron's justification is given below. According to him, such
> > > distinctions are made in "better" Platt publications.
> > >
> > > From Ron:
> > >
> > > "Even though the consensus is to go along with the German-based orthography
> > > (which alienates speakers in the Netherlands), I strongly suggest that the
> > > usual orthographic neglect not be perpetuated.  In ordinary spelling,
> > > people do not distinguish the diphthong /ei/ (written <e(e)>) from the
> > > monophthong /ee/ (written <e(e)>), and they do not distinguish the
> > > dipthong /?i/ (written <??>) from the monophthong /??/ (written <?(?)>).
> > > As a result of this overly casual spelling method, most learners -- which
> > > includes most younger people -- mispronounce numerous words on the basis
> > > of spelling.  Thus, continuing this spelling in a reference resource would
> > > be tantamount to serious neglect and perpetuation of mispronunciation.  So
> > > far, these distinctions are made only in better publications, in which the
> > > monophthongs are written <?(?)> and <?> (or <oe>) respectively.  (In some
> > > academic conventions they use <e(e)> and <?(?>) with an _ogonek_ (hook),
> > > which, however, is typographically awkward.)"
> > >
> > > And then later, this:
> > >
> > > "They do reflect important distinction both phonemically and phonetically.
> > >
> > > For example:
> > >
> > > /leev-n/ ["le:v=m] ~ ["lE:v=m] <L?ven> 'life'
> > > /leiv-n/ ["leIv=m] ~ ["laIv=m] <Leven> 'loving'
> > > Spelling without distinction: Leven
> > >
> > > /beed-n/ [be:d=n] ~ ["bE:d=n] <b?den> 'to beg', 'to pray'
> > > /beid-n/ ["beId=n] ~ ["baId=n] <beden> 'to offer'
> > > Spelling without distinction: beden
> > >
> > > /veet-n/ ["ve:t=n] ~ ["vE:t=n] <W?ten> 'knowledge'
> > > /veitn/ ["veIt=n] ~ ["vaIt=n] <Weten> 'wheat'
> > > Spelling without distinction: Weten
> > >
> > > /??v at r/ ["2:v3`] ~ ["9:v3`] <?ver> ~ <oever> 'over', 'across'
> > > /?iv at r/ ["9Iv3`] ~ ["OIv3`] <?ver> '(river/lake) bank)
> > > Spelling without distinction: ?ver, ?ver
> > >
> > > /l??v-t/ [l2:ft] ~ [l9:ft] <l?vt> ~ <loevt>  'praises'
> > > /l?iv-t/ [l9Ift] ~ [lOIft] <l??vt> 'believes'
> > > Spelling without distinction: l??vt ~ l??ft"
> > >
> > > From what I can tell, though, it's definitely not an exaggeration to
> > > say it was "fake" before and is real now -- things that were awkward,
> > > German-syntax-based ways of saying things were modified to more
> > > natural, genuinely Platt/Nedersaksisch ways of saying things.
> > >
> > > Mark
> > >
> > > On 09/07/05, Boris Lohnzweiger <BorisLohnzweiger at web.de> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > Ron has done quite a job on the article [[Katt]], in a huge effort to
> > > > convert it from Patentplatt to real Platt.
> > > >
> > > > Hi Mark!
> > > >
> > > > Nice job. As far as I'm able to able to judge, the overall language quality of the article was clearly improved. But I think it's an exaggeration to say the article was written in a fake Platt before and is "real" now. Authenticity is often a matter of perspective. Most of the alterations made are not so much about real vs. phony but rather a matter of spelling, dialect differences or even a matter of taste. Some changes aren't really necessary e. g. replacing the very common "mooken" by a seldomly used "m?ken". One thing I really can't grasp is why Ron/Reinhard introduces the letter "?" (which is never used in Germany), e. g. when replacing the authentic Platt word "?kelnaam" by a weird-looking "?kelnaam" for no visible reason.
> > > >
> > > > Best,
> > > > Boris
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com>, wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org schrieb am 08.07.05 01:18:55:
> > > >
> > > > Hi all,
> > > >
> > > > Ron has done quite a job on the article [[Katt]], in a huge effort to
> > > > convert it from Patentplatt to real Platt.
> > > >
> > > > Diff: http://nds.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Katt&diff=21797&oldid=18531
> > > >
> > > > Mark
> > > >
> > > > On 06/07/05, Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > > Hi Boris,
> > > > >
> > > > > I personally think that if in that sample the only extreme differences
> > > > > are "mer" and the future tense, this should not be insurmountable.
> > > > >
> > > > > Brazilian and Iberian Portuguese similarly have some vast differences
> > > > > in verb conjugations (although they use the same orthography...), yet
> > > > > they have a single Wikipedia.
> > > > >
> > > > > I'm sure many Portuguese people are a little bit annoyed when they see
> > > > > people using the second-person singular conjugations for both
> > > > > second-person singular and second-person plural... but then, they're a
> > > > > little bit used to it since Portuguese often visit Brazilian websites,
> > > > > read Brazilian books, watch Brazilian movies... and vice-versa but to
> > > > > a lesser degree.
> > > > >
> > > > > Nevertheless, the fact alone that you were able to identify it as the
> > > > > future tense (as opposed to just completely not knowing) counts for
> > > > > something.
> > > > >
> > > > > Surely, although it might be a bit annoying at first, such a
> > > > > linguistic difference as use or non-use of the future tense is
> > > > > surmountable.
> > > > >
> > > > > Mark
> > > > >
> > > > > On 05/07/05, Boris Lohnzweiger <BorisLohnzweiger at web.de> wrote:
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Hi Servien!
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Thanks for informing me about that. I must admit, I've never heard or read about ANS. So, like the name suggests that's supposed to work in but countries? A good idea for sure. However (and that's a big however), as far as I can tell noboby in Germany ever writes that way. Just have a look a websites from Germany written in nds. You won't ever find all those y's and v's there. Neither in Plattd??tsch literature you can find in book stores in Northern Germany. While that ANS spelling system might be a good thing in theory, I think you just couldn't re-educate thousands of people in order to have one single nds Wikipedia. But I guess I don't have to convince _you_ anyway.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Thanks for the sample phrase. Here's my try:
> > > > > >
> > > > > > "Wenn <or "As"> en Minsch nich faken noog ruut <"na buten" would also work> k?mmt ward he ook nich <equivalent for "h?yl" would be "heel" but is usually not used here> bruun <future tense "w?yrden" also omitted here> s?nnern blievt witt. <Note: I can`t really think of a word for "pale" now - you could possibly take "bleek" (without "witt" in that case) but I'm not 100% sure here>
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Even though I have tried to stick to your wording as closely as possible, I think the differences are quite tremendous here. They go far beyond spelling. What was most striking to me was the use of the future tense in your sample phrase. The Plattd??tsch I know just doesn't have that - just like in spoken High German where that tense is not used either. But also the word "mer" (that's like "maar" in Dutch, isn't it?) wouldn`t be understood by readers in Germany. Other differences are less severe, of course. E. g. "genog" instead of "noog" would surely be understood, especially since we have "genug" in German. But take "kump" (do you speak an "?" or an "u" there?) for "k?mmt" for example or even "ie/y" instead of "he". If the decision about a Dutch Low Saxon Wikipedia were in my hands and I had to make that decision solely based on this one example - I would most definately create it! Not because I want to separate Dutch and German wikipedians - it's the 21st century and thank God we're good neighbours - but only of the language facts.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Boris
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Servien Ilaino <servien at gmail.com>, wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org schrieb am 05.07.05 15:33:43:
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Hi Boris,
> > > > > >
> > > > > > The orthography used in that text seems to me is de Algemeyne
> > > > > > Neddersassische Schryvwys'... I also used to use it, but people don't
> > > > > > seem to understand it quite as well in the Netherlands and Germany, I
> > > > > > must honestly say I understand the ANS writing system way better then
> > > > > > the one you used at the bottom (of course there are words which are
> > > > > > completely unknown to me...)
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Here is a sample of DLS in ANS writing system:
> > > > > > As 'n mins ny vaak genog buyten kump sal y ok ny h?yl bruyn w?yrden
> > > > > > mer sal y spyrwit blyven.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > And here in the traditional one:
> > > > > > As 'n mins nie vaok genog buut'n kump zal ie ok nie heul bruun wurd'n
> > > > > > mer zal ie spierwit bliev'n/blyv'n.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > This is the one I use:
> > > > > > As 'n mins nie vaok genog buten kump sal ie ok nie heul bruun wurden
> > > > > > mer sal ie spierwit blyven. (it's a mixture of the traditional one and
> > > > > > a little from ANS, I don't use the apostrophes because like in the
> > > > > > word blyv'n is pronounced as "bliem" and this is confusing because
> > > > > > bak'n [bake] is also pronounced differently like "bakng".)
> > > > > >
> > > > > > (Translation of the text:
> > > > > > If a person doesn't go outside much then he won't have a tanned look,
> > > > > > but will be pale white.)
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Servien
> > > > > >
> > > > > > 2005/7/5, Boris Lohnzweiger <BorisLohnzweiger at web.de>:
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > Ahh wait, I see here the accusation is that it's in "Patentplatt", which is "based on Missingsch.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Ok "Patentplatt" or "Fernsehplatt" (TV Platt) as it is called sometimes - that really seems to happen. I think that word is less misleading. Of course, different people will have different views on what is unique and what is not. Languages like German or French have had established unified standards for centuries, so there is hardly ever any doubt what's linguistically correct or not at de: or fr:. Obviously, at nds: you don`t have that degree of unambiguousness. I would really appreciate any efforts to improve the linguistic quality of the Low Saxon Wikipedia. After all, it is still at an early stage. Unfortunetaly, I can't really help here for, being a native in High German, I'd probably only worsen the problem of "Patentplatt".
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > A sample of 'real' Low Saxon written in "AGS" orthography:
> > > > > > > > Lyk so kanst dat in 'n paar dialekten vun de ?nner-Elv' (in Hamborg un kuntray) ook seggen.  "Wat" kan daar in s?kse vellen lyk as "dat" un > "dey" bruken.  I dou dat ook vaken, man tou meyrst wen ik snakken dou.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Where does that come from? The vocabulary is mostly alright. But the spelling looks awfully articifial to me. Never before have I seen anyone using "y" in written Platt. And why should you write "v" when you say "f". Just too make look "less German"? Also, the diphtong "ou" might somehow reflect the pronounciation but is certainly not usually used in Northern Germany. And why should one want to use "kk" instead of "ck"? Just because it's written that way in the Netherlands?? And why is there an apostrophe in " Elv' "? Just because the word is "Elbe" in High German. Complete nonsense, in my humble opinion. I don't want to comment comment on the "real Platt" word "kuntray" but the "I" at the beginning of the last sentence is either Bavarian or English but surely not Platt.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Coming from the "?nner-Elv'" myself, let me try it:
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Liek so kannst dat in'n poor Dialekten vun de ?nnerelv (in Hamborg un ?mto) ook seggen. "Wat" kann dor in d?sse/s?kse F?llen liek as "dat" un "de" bruken. Ick/Ik do dat ook faken, man tomeest wenn ick/ik snack.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Hmm...
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Boris
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com>, wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org schrieb am 05.07.05 08:34:13:
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Hi Boris,
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > I'm a bit perplexed as this accusation has been made by a number of
> > > > > > > people on Lowlands-l, most of the accusers being native speakers of
> > > > > > > Low German, and at least one (RF Hahn) also speaking Missingsch. Ahh
> > > > > > > wait, I see here the accusation is that it's in "Patentplatt", which
> > > > > > > is "based on Missingsch".
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Accusations: "Unalike the Laich Saxon edeetion whase warkers dinna
> > > > > > > actually ken the leid.
> > > > > > > (It's oor Jonny's pet plaint, his windmill faes, an that richtly.)"
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > "It doesn't help that language competency is wanting in the current
> > > > > > > WikiPlatt team.  Those folks are enthusiastic, and I laud that.  But
> > > > > > > they don't know the language well enough.  Much or most of it is
> > > > > > > "Patentplatt" (based on Missingsch), i.e. invented on the basis of
> > > > > > > German.  I am not at all opposed to introducing technical neologisms,
> > > > > > > but there needs to be first of all a firm grasp of the basic language,
> > > > > > > the grammar and the authentic idiom."
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Information on Patentplatt: "The number of Lowlands Saxon speakers ...
> > > > > > > would be large if it included people who are somewhat conversant ...
> > > > > > > and it would be even larger if it included those who ... can really
> > > > > > > only manage lexically, idiomatically and grammatically deficient,
> > > > > > > German-based, "made-up Platt" (Patentplatt)."
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > This is very concerning, and is clearly a major factor in the
> > > > > > > difficulty people from the Netherlands are having reading NDS.wiki. I
> > > > > > > just dashed off an e-mail to Ron to remind him that he is always
> > > > > > > welcome to "fix" the Patentplatt, because of course it's Wikipedia.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Obviously, this isn't the only factor, and I'm not sure if it's even
> > > > > > > the greatest factor. But, I feel that we should explore that.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > A sample of 'real' Low Saxon written in "AGS" orthography:
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Lyk so kanst dat in 'n paar dialekten vun de ?nner-Elv' (in Hamborg un
> > > > > > > kuntray) ook seggen.  "Wat" kan daar in s?kse vellen lyk as "dat" un
> > > > > > > "dey" bruken.  I dou dat ook vaken, man tou meyrst wen ik snakken dou.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Hmm...
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Best
> > > > > > > Mark
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > On 04/07/05, Boris Lohnzweiger <BorisLohnzweiger at web.de> wrote:
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > Hi Mark!
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > I was quite perplexed to read that they write Missingsch in the Low Saxon Wikipedia. So I just went there and checked out ten random pages. Having grown up in a rural area near Hamburg, it`s easy for me tell apart Low Saxon from Missingsch. The whole issue seems to be very exaggerated. All ten articles I've read were without a doubt in Plattd??tsch. Of course single articles might not be - I haven`t checked the whole Wikipedia. However, one can note that depending on the subject of the article the share of words that very closely resemble standard German words or are even identical (in writing !) is sometimes quite high. But this is a usual phenomenon in Low Saxon. Generally speaking, the more scientific a text gets the closer it comes to Hochdeutsch. Surely, sometimes this can lead to the fact that certain passages of articles don`t look too much like Platt. This can been seen very clearly in this article: http://nds.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reptilia . It has two sections, both written by the same author, as far as I can tell. The first ("Nordd??tsche Slangen") is very "pure" Low Saxon. The second ("Systematik") looks very much like standard German, due to its topic. I think even without knowing both languages in detail you can easily tell the difference. But this is not to be confused with Missingsch. You just couldn`t say that differently or more "real", if you want.
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > I don`t who actually brought up this Missingsch issue (native speaker? hobby linguist?). But as a matter of fact, nds-WP is written in Low Saxon. If individual pages are in other languages (which to some degree happens in many Wikipedias) the guys at nds can certainly cope with that. However,  I disbelieve that this part of the reason native speakers of Low Saxon in the Netherlands ask for a separate WP.
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > _________________________________________________________________________
> > > Mit der Gruppen-SMS von WEB.DE FreeMail k?nnen Sie eine SMS an alle
> > > Freunde gleichzeitig schicken: http://freemail.web.de/features/?mc=021179
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> >
> >
> > --
> > 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
> >
>
>
> --
> 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
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>
>
>


from_name: Thomas Gries

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Has someone good contacts to Sourceforge
	staff	(keepers, webmasters) ? I need a sniplet from the SF account
	***script***	(timezone OFFSETS)

body:
> The thing to remember is that there aren't fixed offsets for all these
> thanks to daylight saving time (which may vary as to whether it's
> applied, which hemisphere-style it's applied to, when it enters and
> leaves,

see ref [3a]  for this

> etc

Brion,

- thanks (also for enotif message texts refurbishing)

It is clear, that the most difficult thing is to get the current dates
(and time-of-dates) when DST actually changes.
In my bugzilla, everything has been said, especially about the (very)
problems with the DST - I posted numerous updates (this has come to an
end now, because I have all the needed information at hand)

[0] http://bugzilla.wikipedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=505
Ref [3a] in [0] = http://www.worldtimezone.com/daylight.html


from_name: David 'DJ' Hedley

body:
A feature in Mediawiki to allow a preference for logged-in users to "Disable
editing" could be useful. A password could be set for the preference, so it
would be needed to re-enable editing. Schools could benefit from this, if
they could set-up one account for the network.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Anthere" <anthere9 at yahoo.com>
To: <wikien-l at wikipedia.org>
Sent: Sunday, July 10, 2005 7:13 PM
Subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: On parents banning their children from Wikipedia

>
>
> Tony Sidaway a ?crit:
> > Someone identifying himself as thagudearbh at yahoo.co.uk  writes:
> >
> >
> >
> >>I can see many parents banning their children from using it - to the
> >>detriment of us all.
> >
> >
> > I never understand this argument, although it always seems to be
advanced
> > to excuse to repugnant bit of crusading.
> >
> > If I shut the extraneous details of the crusade out of my mind, it
always
> > seems to come down to asking myself the following question:
> >
> > What material effect would result from parents banning their children?
> >
> >
> > And obviously the answer is that more children would use Wikipedia.
> > Wikipedia as Rock and roll.
> >
> > So how could this be to the detriment of Wikipedia?
>
> I do not think it is to the detriment of Wikipedia proper, but yes, I do
> not allow my children to use Wikipedia by themselves. And I will not
> before a few years (until I really lose control on what they do on the
net).
>
>
> I do not qualify myself as a highly traditional and restrictive parent.
> Quite the opposite actually. But in three years, I saw enough image
> material on wikipedia, that I do not consider suitable for them to see
now.
>
> It may be that I am a minority *here*, but I also think parents are a
> minority amongst involved editors. I do not see it as detrimental to the
> encyclopedia; simply, Wikipedia as is is for adults, not for children.
> There is nothing wrong with this.
>
> ant
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: wiki at marcusbuck.org

body:
Hello.

I find it a bit weird, that you discuss about nds.wikipedia on the mailing list
and not even post a message on nds.wikipedia. I found this discussion by chance
after some people came into the wiki making changes without knowing really what
they do.

Some people here are running down admin and other users of nds.wikipedia, which
are the only people really active on that wiki for long time. They are engaged
on making it a better usable resource in Low Saxon language and we introduced a
common orthography based on the wordbook by Johannes Sass to make it consistent
so you don't have to know all the regional variants of the language, which are
for some cases mutually unintelligible. The orthography by Sass is based on the
most widely used dialect, that is also mostly used when spoken in supra-regional
media.

I think some people discussing here are speaking out of their ivory tower and
don't know what is really going on at the "base". I see some Dutch engaged
here. Let me say: Dutch variant of Low Saxon is not understandable for most of
German Low Saxon speakers (Sure, they are understandable near the border). Some
state the wiki is in Plattd??tsch rather than Low Saxon. This is so true as it
is not true. Plattd??tsch is the most important variant of Low Saxon (Low Saxon
is an academic classification) and the common name of the language in Germany.
If no Dutch contribute it is no wonder, when the wikipedia is more and more
germanized (or shall the German learn Dutch and Nedersaksisch to balance the
Dutch contribution deficits?)

You don't need all your fingers to count all regular contributors to the wiki.
Why do so much people argue here about the content of the wiki and nobody of
the people, who obviously know so much about the language, contributes?

I'm a little bit angry because of the behaviour of some.

--~~~~
Greets, Slomox


from_name: Anthere

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: On parents banning their children from Wikipedia

body:
Tony Sidaway a ?crit:
> Someone identifying himself as thagudearbh at yahoo.co.uk  writes:
>
>
>
>>I can see many parents banning their children from using it - to the
>>detriment of us all.
>
>
> I never understand this argument, although it always seems to be advanced
> to excuse to repugnant bit of crusading.
>
> If I shut the extraneous details of the crusade out of my mind, it always
> seems to come down to asking myself the following question:
>
> What material effect would result from parents banning their children?
>
>
> And obviously the answer is that more children would use Wikipedia.
> Wikipedia as Rock and roll.
>
> So how could this be to the detriment of Wikipedia?

I do not think it is to the detriment of Wikipedia proper, but yes, I do
not allow my children to use Wikipedia by themselves. And I will not
before a few years (until I really lose control on what they do on the net).

I do not qualify myself as a highly traditional and restrictive parent.
Quite the opposite actually. But in three years, I saw enough image
material on wikipedia, that I do not consider suitable for them to see now.

It may be that I am a minority *here*, but I also think parents are a
minority amongst involved editors. I do not see it as detrimental to the
encyclopedia; simply, Wikipedia as is is for adults, not for children.
There is nothing wrong with this.

ant


from_name: Robin Shannon

subject: [Foundation-l] Re: London 7/7, and Wikinews

body:
>On 7/9/05, David Gerard <fun at thingy.apana.org.au> wrote:
> We tried watching BBC News 24 for a bit, but it just annoyed us. Too much
> repetition to fill space even by 11:30am. The BBC websites were fantastic
> though.
>

Speaking from australia, i know nothing of the bbc's funding, but one
gets the feeling from what i saw of that broadcast that it has been
cut back quite a bit.

--
hit me: <robin.shannon.id.au>
jab me: <robin.shannon at jabber.org.au>

upgrade to ubuntu linux: <http://www.spreadubuntu.org/>


body:
Skyring a ?crit:
> On 7/11/05, Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
>>It may be that I am a minority *here*, but I also think parents are a
>>minority amongst involved editors. I do not see it as detrimental to the
>>encyclopedia; simply, Wikipedia as is is for adults, not for children.
>
>
> You mean for using, rather than editing? 8^)
>
> But yes, fully concur. Perhaps this ties in with the "writing for the
> audience" approach, and WP is very rarely written with children in
> mind. Start typing "rude words" into WP and you will definitely see
> material that is not "school-safe". Images or articles about violence
> and violent events can also pop up without a real lot of warning.

More precisely, my kids are 7 and 8.
In terms of using, this is not only a question of unsuitable images, but
simply that one does not explain things the same way to an adult than to
an 8 years old. This is purely a question of maturity.

As for editing, my 8 years old has edited wikipedia.
I fear it is quite unsuitable to edit as well at this age. It is a
little bit too complicated. The interface is mostly done with a textual
and uniform approach, while kids mostly like icons and colors. This is
kinda boring for them. If we were making a wiki for young, we would need
to simplify the interface and make it more friendly.

Naturally, their editing will have sentences of poor quality, many
spelling and grammar mistakes, so is likely to irritate regular editors.

Finally, if there many great editors (and absolutely all were very very
very nice to my son), there are also jerks running free. Kids have a lot
of confidence and trust in adults, I do not think it is a good idea to
let anyone free to influence them without any control. It is just not safe.

ant


from_name: David Gerard

body:
Robin Shannon (robin.shannon at gmail.com) [050710 20:36]:
> >On 7/9/05, David Gerard <fun at thingy.apana.org.au> wrote:

> > We tried watching BBC News 24 for a bit, but it just annoyed us. Too much
> > repetition to fill space even by 11:30am. The BBC websites were fantastic
> > though.

> Speaking from australia, i know nothing of the bbc's funding, but one
> gets the feeling from what i saw of that broadcast that it has been
> cut back quite a bit.

No, it's just being spread too thinly ;-) They used to have two TV channels
and four or five radio services; they now have five (six?) TV channels (BBC
1-4, BBC News 24, a few other small services), seven national radio
services and a gigantic website. And you know, 24-hour news channels are
masters of filling space anyway. So the best way we found to get coverage
was to hang on LJ and watch people personally report in "I'm OK, I saw
this."

- d.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Non-free images, there has to be a better way

body:
Alphax (alphasigmax at gmail.com) [050710 16:27]:
> David Gerard wrote:
> > Jimmy Wales (jwales at wikia.com) [050710 01:42]:
> >>Zoney wrote:

> >>>a) Fair use? We're using a news broadcaster's photos for our *news
> >>>coverage* without permission? Hah! Yeah right that's fair use!

> >>You are right that this was wrong.  I would say that it was still
> >>legally fair use *for us*, i.e. not a legal problem, but my position is
> >>that just because it is legal, this is not enough for us to use something.
> >>It is a particularly good example of excessive use of fair use because
> >>there were and are a great many free images available on the web yesterday.

> > However, useing another broadcaster's news images is in fact fair use and
> > entirely appropriate in a lot of cases. This is why newscasters cover their
> > stuff in their logo.

> So... all the Wikinews images should have a Wikinews/Wikimedia
> Foundation watermark?

No, I didn't say that :-) I was mentioning a phenomenon. I think it'd
actually be bad because it would discourage open reuse. Perhaps we could
add it to the comments field of the jpeg or whatever, or at least encourage
such.

(I know when I create a JPEG for Wikipedia, I tend to add license info to
the comments field. [I've busted JPEG thieves on the net in the past who
didn't bother looking at the comments field.] I wouldn't try to require it
of everyone, though.)

- d.


from_name: J.F. de Wolff

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Writing with our readers in mind

body:
Concerning the complicated paragraph in [[Paracetamol]], I can name many
areas of Wikipedia where the science becomes so dense that the layman will
admit it sounds really good but fails to come any closer to understanding
the exact issues. Many mathematical articles stop making sense at some
point, and I admit that not every medical article is an exemplar of
lay-oriented clarity.

When initially starting WikiProject Clinical Medicine, we struggled with
this question. The decision was to escalate the level of difficulty, so all
relevant information would be covered. The lay reader would have to drop it
at some point, and none of the participants saw a great deal wrong with this.

This is not to say the paragraph in question cannot be improved upon.

JFW

--
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Anti-Virus.
Version: 7.0.323 / Virus Database: 267.8.11/45 - Release Date: 09/07/2005


subject: [WikiEN-l] A Perhaps OT Post -- My Wikipedia Talk

body:
Geoff Burling (llywrch at agora.rdrop.com) [050710 10:49]:
> On Sat, 9 Jul 2005, David Gerard wrote:

> > Hah. It's stalled at the validation feature, which is stalled at Brion not
> > liking the present code :-) But the code is getting some work and appears
> > to be moving forward, which is good.
> > What was his Yet Another suggestion?

> To ask people to rate the articles, then based on an algorythm that
> would measure the rating against how many changes had been made to
> the article in the last time period.

Oooo. That's actually an interesting wrinkle. That one could do with more
thought.

> & I wasn't all that interested in listening to a suggestion from
> someone who had only heard of Wikipedia that night & all he knew
> was what I had told him.

Aw. Don't Bite The Newbies ;-) We should take notice of the fact that
Wikipedia is a fascinating structure as a geek toy.

> I hope the latter was not the case: I would hate to discover that
> someone had come up with a good idea, & due to my own prejudices I
> failed to give it a fair hearing.

You've mentioned it here, so the idea isn't lost!

- d.


body:
Oh, and on experts using Wikipedia - I frequently check some facts on
Wikipedia before prescribing certain drugs. It was really useful when
having to decide whether a patient should have a drug intravenously or
orally. The relevant Wikipedia article informed me that of an oral dose,
80% of the drug reaches the bloodstream, which made the decision a lot easier.

Jfdwolff

--
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Anti-Virus.
Version: 7.0.323 / Virus Database: 267.8.11/45 - Release Date: 09/07/2005


body:
>From Ron (the text after the greaterthan signs is mine):

"> Hi Ron,
>
> Unfortunately, it seems that these orthographic changes you've
> introduced aren't accepted. However, the Platt Wikipedia is currently
> in a very malleable state, so it's quite possible that in the
> future, orthographic changes will be accepted.

Thanks.  Hopefully this will be the case.  The reaction, unfortunately,
seems to corroborate the allegation of lacking insight and competence that
people are talking (and joking) about outside Wikipedia, and this is not
something that stands the Wikipedia movement in good stead.  Wikipedia
deserves better.

Thanks for the effort!"

Seems to again corroborate what I've been saying.

Mark

On 10/07/05, Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com> wrote:
> Slomox, how would you know whether or not it is written in a corrupted
> form of Low Saxon? IT ISN'T YOUR NATIVE LANGUAGE!
>
> It's not mine either, but I was told by R. F. Hahn that you guys are
> using Fernsehplatt, ie Platt with Hochdeutsch grammar. He is a native
> speaker, and you aren't. So who should we believe here? Him, or you?
>
> A recap of all the major players in this arguments:
> - Me, with a level of nds-0. Maybe able to understand nds-1, but not speak it.
> - Servien, with a level of nds-3. Not a native speaker.
> - HeikoEvermann, with a level of nds-3. Not a native speaker, but an
> admin and very bossy and authoritarian at that.
> - Slomox, with a level of ???. Not a native speaker.
> - Waerth, with a level of ???. Not a native speaker.
> - Wouter, with a level of ???. Maybe a native speaker.
>
> So, basically nobody here is a native speaker, except maybe Wouter?
> Well, why are we even doing this then? A new Wikipedia should never be
> created without a native speaker. So even if nds-nl IS ever to be
> created, there should be a native speaker first.
>
> Mark
>
> On 10/07/05, Marcus Buck <wiki at marcusbuck.org> wrote:
> > Mark Williamson wrote:
> >
> > >Hmm... according to the ISO, "nds" does not include East Low German.
> > >Only Low Saxon. Seems this Wikipedia is not in accordance...
> >
> > Plattd??tsch covers the non-frankish parts of Low German, but there is no ISO
> > code for this portion. I don't know the discussion held when creating
> > nds.wikipedia, but I think it was intended to cover this portion, but the code
> > nds was chosen, because he was the best-matching code therefore. It would be
> > silly to separate East Low German and Low Saxon, because they are closely
> > related.
> >
> > Servien Ilaino wrote:
> >
> > >You are very wrong in saying (at least I think so) that in
> > >Germany are the most "important" dialects of Low Saxon...
> >
> > Important is not the right word, yes (sometimes the correct English words are
> > lacking).
> >
> > >The reason why Dutch speakers don't contribute is because
> > >the writing system is completely incomprehensible!
> >
> > Long time no writing system was given and nevertheless any Dutch contributed.
> >
> > It is not possible to write an Low Saxon/Plattd??tsch/Low German whatever
> > wikipedia understandable to all speakers in all parts of the Netherlands and
> > Germany without inventing a common writing and a common standard for the use of
> > words not common. But this invention can't be task of a wikipedia, but must be
> > based on a broad consensus in language community. Therefore we need two
> > projects for the main varieties Dutch-influenced and German-influenced Low
> > Saxon. (coming back to the original issue)
> >
> > I hope nobody will think anymore, nds.wikipedia is mainly written in a corrupted
> > form of Low Saxon, this is not true.
> >
> > Slomox (Marcus Buck)
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > 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
>

--
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: [WikiEN-l] The ongoing trolling

body:
On 7/10/05, El C <el.ceeh at gmail.com> wrote:

> >>On 7/10/05, El C <el.ceeh at gmail.com> wrote:
> >>I, myself don't know either way--assume good
> >>faith is indeed a harsh mistress
> >
> >Nevertheless, it is one deserving of your embrace.
>
> You missed the point, Pete Skyring.

No I didn't. I was making a point for you, but I don't think you've
worked it out yet. I'm not a troll, I'm not a vandal. I speak the
truth as I see it. I accept that I can make errors and I accept
correction when it is valid. If I have a major flaw it is that I am
far too quick to point out the flaws in others, and to take pleasure
in doing so, the amount of my pleasure in direct proportion to their
level of arrogance.

The Prime Minister of Australia sees the Governor-General as
Australia's head of state. That's not my opinion, it's the opinion of
the head of government, and it's not up to you or any other editor to
deny it. Furthermore, it's not just the Prime Minister of this
country, it is senior members of both parties. Simon Crean, during his
time as Leader of the Opposition also called the Governor-General the
head of state. You have the leaders of both of the major parties in
Federal Parliament saying the same thing.

That doesn't make the Governor-General the undisputed head of state,
but one point you don't seem to have grasped is that there IS a
dispute. Not between you and me and any other editor; our opinions
don't matter a damn. There is a diiference of opinion at the highest
levels of national leadership.

And now, if you look at [[Government of Australia]] we see that
someone else has stuck his head up and pointed out what I've said for
the past six months, and they have provided verifiable sources, as I
did. And surprise, surprise, we see the same mindless reverts and the
same threats coming from the same editors.

I say that you should assume good faith, Mister Admin. That's my point.

--
Peter in Canberra


from_name: Haukur Þorgeirsson

subject: [WikiEN-l] New fair use tag proposal

body:
You've raised some good points, Andrew.

> Even if would be fair use to use this to illustrate an article on the
> [[Lindisfarne Gospels]] (rare item, not much photographed, &c.)
> despite it being copyrighted... would it be fair use to use it to
> illustrate an article on, say, [[Rare-book photography]]? Sure, it's
> an example of such an image, but there's certainly thousands more of
> equal usability. How about using it to illustrate an article on
> [[Books]], or the [[Bible]]? Again, some relevance, but other images
> are just as good or better.

Indeed. Here's another example. I'd argue that it's
legitimate and inevitable fair use to use copyrighted
artwork by a living or "recently" deceased artist in
an article *about the artist*. Using it to illustrate
other articles is unnecessary and not appropriate.
Look at this image, for example:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Branstock.jpg

If we were using it in an article about the artist
[[Alan Lee]] I'd say it was fine. But we're not.
Instead we're using it to illustrate articles on
Norse mythology. I don't know enough U.S. law to
know whether that's legal or not but it's certainly
not necessary.

And just so you can see how deep our fair use problem
goes this image was recently uploaded by User:Wiglaf,
who is an admin and an excellent editor (one I'm working
with all the time). I don't mean to slight him in any
way. In fact about half of the images in
[[Category:Images from Norse mythology]] were uploaded
by him and almost all are in the public domain.

This is also an education problem for those of us who
aren't legal types and/or who aren't from the U.S.
Scandinavian editors like Wiglaf and me hear that
Wikipedia is under U.S. law and that something
called "fair use" is okay. From how it seems to
be used on Wikipedia it's natural to assume that
it works something like this:

"You can use some copyrighted material without asking
for permission as long as you don't do too much of it."

But that seems to be pretty far from the truth.

So, the people in the know need to educate those of
us who aren't really.

> This may, potentially, be a problem with the way we tag things - fair
> use inherently seems to imply "in the context of the article for which
> it was originally used". It may be fair use the second time (and
> probably is), but may not... I don't know what, if anything, to do
> about this, but thought I'd kick it out.

Right. We don't really have a technical solution
to that within our present system. But if we're
going to go through all the fair use images and
add information to them we could make sure that
we explicitly mention that we've verified that
the image is fair use for pages foo, bar and foobar.
Anyone wanting to use the image on a new page
should then add to the image information page.

Regards,
Haukur


from_name: Andrew Gray

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: New fair use tag proposal

body:
On 10/07/05, Fastfission <fastfission at gmail.com> wrote:
> Postscript:
>
> I also think it would be a good idea to create a template along the
> lines of {{fairuse-reviewed}} which would contain the normal fair use
> notice, as well as something like "The fair use criteria of this item
> has been reviewed and found satisfactory by at least one other user."
> or something like that. The process of reviewing fair use images would
> then be one of converting {{fairuse}} tags to {{fairuse-reviewed}}
> (after they had been reviewed). Perhaps a Wikiproject of some form
> would be good for this? Anyway, it would allow us to keep track of
> things. Just a thought.

I like this idea; might need a lot of manpower, though, and people do
tend to have rather wide-ranging differences in how stringently they
accept copyright restrictions. (I've more than once heard "well, it
*should* be free" used to defend copyvios, and in one delightful case
encountered someone who thought "in the public domain" meant *both*
"this information is not secret" and "this information is free to
copy"...). But I'd certainly be interested in seeing it work.

One fair-use problem, that I've been mulling over of late (I've been
incommunicado for a few days), is that of context.

With something like a publicity photo of $celebrity, "fair use" is
fairly incontrovertible. But... let's say we're dealing with the
Lindisfarne Gospels, and the much-discussed photo thereof; assume it's
tagged as fair use.

Even if would be fair use to use this to illustrate an article on the
[[Lindisfarne Gospels]] (rare item, not much photographed, &c.)
despite it being copyrighted... would it be fair use to use it to
illustrate an article on, say, [[Rare-book photography]]? Sure, it's
an example of such an image, but there's certainly thousands more of
equal usability. How about using it to illustrate an article on
[[Books]], or the [[Bible]]? Again, some relevance, but other images
are just as good or better.

As I understand fair use - I don't claim to, one set of copyright law
is confusing enough - it is quite dependent on the claim being a
reasonable one in context.

But we'd have the one image, tagged as {{fairuse}} without that
context; anyone wondering about using it in another article would
simply see that we had it, it was under a legitimate-use license of
some form, and slap it in their article, unless they were the
introspective type given to considering license details.

This may, potentially, be a problem with the way we tag things - fair
use inherently seems to imply "in the context of the article for which
it was originally used". It may be fair use the second time (and
probably is), but may not... I don't know what, if anything, to do
about this, but thought I'd kick it out.

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] Thank you RickK

body:
On 7/10/05, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
> The jewel is in the lotus, beauty that arises from muck.

Indeed. It's a fabulous creation. Not so long ago something like this
could only be found in the pages of Analog and Astounding.

One of the joys of my childhood was in getting out a volume of World
Book Encyclopaedia to look up something. Hours would pass in the blink
of an eye as I browsed from one article to another.

Wikipedia is a bit like that, with the abundance of hyperlinks to
encourage browsing and random discovery, and perhaps one of its
greatest charms is that it ISN'T a buttoned-down corporate affair.
There are gems around every corner, little labours of shared love, and
everywhere you see people hard at work improving, polishing, shaping;
and diving in to be first with an update when something changes.

There's a loving community buzzing along hard at work 24 hours a day,
and I cannot be persuaded that this is a bad thing.

--
Peter in Canberra


from_name: Mark Williamson

subject: [Wikitech-l] Tagalog Wikipedia logo

body:
As I've also noted elsewhere, the logos on quite a few other
Wikipedias are ready to switch, among them:

am.wiki
ba.wiki
bo.wiki
co.wiki
cv.wiki
ff.wiki
gv.wiki
ht.wiki
iu.wiki
kk.wiki
kl.wiki
kw.wiki
ky.wiki
ps.wiki
sc.wiki
tg.wiki
ug.wiki

there may be a few more that I've forgotten, but I'd be very grateful
if somebody could activate these logos.

Also grateful would be the communities belonging to these Wikis.

Cheers
Mark

On 10/07/05, Joseph Ballesteros <jojit.fb at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> We have created a logo for the Tagalog Wikipedia.  It is uploaded,
> protected and ready to switch.
>
> I hope that this is the right venue to request it. My apologies if it is not.
>
> One of the administrators of the Tagalog Wikipedia project had posted
> a request here: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_logos
>
> Regards,
> Jojit
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-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: Jon

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re:Writing with our readers in mind

body:
A good example of the difficulties is outlined in today's featured article on the Island Fox. The bit on the main page includes the sentence "Its small size is a result of [[island dwarfing]], a kind of [[allopatric speciation]]". Come again! To find out what that means you have to wade through the technical article [[island dwarfing]] and [[allopatric speciation]] - and to begin to understand the latter, you also have to try to understand [[speciation]]. I think it means - "It is small because it is on a small island", but why not just say that?

I have made a proposal called "Wikipedia is not an academic text" on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:What_Wikipedia_is_not , though I am sure others can think of a better wording. I suggest putting an explicit statement under a Wikipedia "policy" - and then maybe forming a WikiProject to simplify technical articles. The first aim would be to encourage existing editors of articles to simplify them - perhaps by subst'ing boilerplate text onto article talkpages outlining that the article seems to use too technical language and we'd like it to use non-technical language so it can have a wider audience - maybe also with an offer of a non-expert to help.

Jon (jguk)

Fastfission wrote:

I just want to say -- what we are talking about here is not "academic
style" but more accurately "technical style" -- something accessible
only to experts of certain types of information (which can be
philosophy or electronics or what have you). Plenty of academic
writing is nothing of the sort and should not be lumped in as such!
(the academic squeals)

The goal is to write well and comprehensibly for people with
non-technical backgrounds. Of course, there are times when our Wiki
technology allows us not to re-invent the wheel each time something
comes up, but of course this must be an issue of judgment rather than
strict policy.

FF

On 7/9/05, Dan Grey <dangrey at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 09/07/05, Jon <thagudearbh at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
> > It would be useful (if we don't already have it somewhere that I've missed) to have a firm statement that says articles should be written to be as intelligible to as many of our readers as possible, with our readers being anyone potentially searching for English-language information on the internet.
> >
> > Jon (jguk)
>
> I guess you can't force people to write in a certain style.
>
> But it's daft to write an encyclopaedia in an academic style. No
> academic in his right mind would refer to Wikipedia - I don't mean any
> offense, but that's just not it's place. They go to journals and
> texts.
>
> What it is useful - what it should be aiming for - is to make subjects
> understandable to the 99.99% of the world that *isn't* expert in that
> field.
>
>
> Dan

---------------------------------
Yahoo! Messenger NEW - crystal clear PC to PCcalling worldwide with voicemail


body:
Hi Wiki,

The reason why I don't post is because that Wiki doesn't "support" my
dialect... You are very wrong in saying (at least I think so) that in
Germany are the most "important" dialects of Low Saxon... on the Nds
Wiki you just ignore those Dutch dialects with about 1.8 million
speakers... The reason why Dutch speakers don't contribute is because
the writing system is completely incomprehensible! I think you look a
bit narrow minded at this subject... the guy who wrote the book was
most likely German (at least I presume!) and he did not invent the
spelling for international use, just as in Holland we didn't invent
the spelling for international use. If you want to use it for a
international purpose than you have to adapt the writing system (as
you mentioned it's spoking in every continent except the Antarctic).
If I post on Nds, they complain that they don't understand the writing
and change it to German-based spelling... I'm not German so why would
I have my messages in German-based spelling?!

"Johannes Sass" didn't invent a very good orthography to my opinion,
he should have a least looked at both major-LS speaking countries and
made a compromise of both writing systems, or better yet look at the
Old LS writing system when it used to be a official language in 1500!

If Plattd??tsch is the name for the dialects in Germany then why is it
called that, you're not the only LS speakers in the world as mentioned
almost every continent! Why not make the ISO code PT than?

Servien

2005/7/10, wiki at marcusbuck.org <wiki at marcusbuck.org>:
> Hello.
>
> I find it a bit weird, that you discuss about nds.wikipedia on the mailing list
> and not even post a message on nds.wikipedia. I found this discussion by chance
> after some people came into the wiki making changes without knowing really what
> they do.
>
> Some people here are running down admin and other users of nds.wikipedia, which
> are the only people really active on that wiki for long time. They are engaged
> on making it a better usable resource in Low Saxon language and we introduced a
> common orthography based on the wordbook by Johannes Sass to make it consistent
> so you don't have to know all the regional variants of the language, which are
> for some cases mutually unintelligible. The orthography by Sass is based on the
> most widely used dialect, that is also mostly used when spoken in supra-regional
> media.
>
> I think some people discussing here are speaking out of their ivory tower and
> don't know what is really going on at the "base". I see some Dutch engaged
> here. Let me say: Dutch variant of Low Saxon is not understandable for most of
> German Low Saxon speakers (Sure, they are understandable near the border). Some
> state the wiki is in Plattd??tsch rather than Low Saxon. This is so true as it
> is not true. Plattd??tsch is the most important variant of Low Saxon (Low Saxon
> is an academic classification) and the common name of the language in Germany.
> If no Dutch contribute it is no wonder, when the wikipedia is more and more
> germanized (or shall the German learn Dutch and Nedersaksisch to balance the
> Dutch contribution deficits?)
>
> You don't need all your fingers to count all regular contributors to the wiki.
> Why do so much people argue here about the content of the wiki and nobody of
> the people, who obviously know so much about the language, contributes?
>
> I'm a little bit angry because of the behaviour of some.
>
> --~~~~
> Greets, Slomox
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


body:
I've just dug up earlier discussions about the Platt Wikipedia, and
about Patentplatt/Fernsehplatt in general.

See:

http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0505D&L=lowlands-l&P=R455
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0506A&L=lowlands-l&P=R3044
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi-bin/wa?S2=lowlands-l&q=patentplatt&s=&f=&a=&b=

Mark

PS: If Ron Hahn says that nds.wikipedia is in Patentplatt, are you
telling us that Ron Hahn is wrong? After all, he's a native speaker
and you're not.

On 10/07/05, wiki at marcusbuck.org <wiki at marcusbuck.org> wrote:
> Hello.
>
> I find it a bit weird, that you discuss about nds.wikipedia on the mailing list
> and not even post a message on nds.wikipedia. I found this discussion by chance
> after some people came into the wiki making changes without knowing really what
> they do.
>
> Some people here are running down admin and other users of nds.wikipedia, which
> are the only people really active on that wiki for long time. They are engaged
> on making it a better usable resource in Low Saxon language and we introduced a
> common orthography based on the wordbook by Johannes Sass to make it consistent
> so you don't have to know all the regional variants of the language, which are
> for some cases mutually unintelligible. The orthography by Sass is based on the
> most widely used dialect, that is also mostly used when spoken in supra-regional
> media.
>
> I think some people discussing here are speaking out of their ivory tower and
> don't know what is really going on at the "base". I see some Dutch engaged
> here. Let me say: Dutch variant of Low Saxon is not understandable for most of
> German Low Saxon speakers (Sure, they are understandable near the border). Some
> state the wiki is in Plattd??tsch rather than Low Saxon. This is so true as it
> is not true. Plattd??tsch is the most important variant of Low Saxon (Low Saxon
> is an academic classification) and the common name of the language in Germany.
> If no Dutch contribute it is no wonder, when the wikipedia is more and more
> germanized (or shall the German learn Dutch and Nedersaksisch to balance the
> Dutch contribution deficits?)
>
> You don't need all your fingers to count all regular contributors to the wiki.
> Why do so much people argue here about the content of the wiki and nobody of
> the people, who obviously know so much about the language, contributes?
>
> I'm a little bit angry because of the behaviour of some.
>
> --~~~~
> Greets, Slomox
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> 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: Chris Jenkinson

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

Jon wrote:
> A good example of the difficulties is outlined in today's featured article on the Island Fox. The bit on the main page includes the sentence "Its small size is a result of [[island dwarfing]], a kind of [[allopatric speciation]]". Come again! To find out what that means you have to wade through the technical article [[island dwarfing]] and [[allopatric speciation]] - and to begin to understand the latter, you also have to try to understand [[speciation]]. I think it means - "It is small because it is on a small island", but why not just say that?

(could you turn on word-wrap please)

Being of a small size is advantagous on an island, so over time through
natural selection the animal evolves to become smaller. I'm not an
expert on it, but it's probably due to competition for resources -
resources on an island are limited and smaller animals need less resources.

Allopatric speciation is where two seperated groups of a species become
physically seperated (e.g. by water or mountain ranges), and over time,
through natural selection, they evolve different characteristics due to
the different environments they inhabit, eventually resulting in 2
different species, as the two different groups have sufficiently
different characteristics that they cannot reproduce, or their offspring
are not fertile.

Hope this explains it for you,

Chris

- --
Chris Jenkinson
chris at starglade.org
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.1 (MingW32)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFC0Ze9Eq6+ijeBrJ8RAqe0AKCIJ93X3NbCDcCC1xuBTtr5EzE+qwCeMbZF
ayM6vhSN+zim+KH8o83d0BA=
=6u01
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


body:
> A good example of the difficulties is outlined in today's featured article
> on the Island Fox. The bit on the main page includes the sentence "Its
> small size is a result of [[island dwarfing]], a kind of [[allopatric
> speciation]]". Come again! To find out what that means you have to wade
> through the technical article [[island dwarfing]] and [[allopatric
> speciation]] - and to begin to understand the latter, you also have to try
> to understand [[speciation]]. I think it means - "It is small because it
> is on a small island", but why not just say that?

It *does* say that. Anyone can understand that
this is what "island dwarfing" means. And it
says some more too, this phenomenon has to do
with something called "allopatric speciation".
If you're not in the know about that you can
read the relevant article, helpfully linked to.
If you're not interested in knowing you skip
the link and move on. And it's not unreasonable
to use the word "speciation" in an article about
a species. You wouldn't explain what a "diesel motor"
is in an article about a particular type of truck.

I'm sure there are pages where Wikipedia is
unnecessarily written in an inaccessible and
technical style but I don't think this is a
very good example.

The risk in always trying to simplify down to the level
of an absolute beginner in the relevant field (zoology
in this case) is that the article can get cluttered or
information lost.

Of course this is a matter of good taste and balance and
reasonable people can disagree.

Regards,
Haukur


from_name: Walter Vermeir

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: [Wiktionary-l] Changing username

body:
Tim Starling schreef:
> Brion Vibber wrote:
>
>>This tool has not been reviewed for security, and in fact a cursory
>>glance does reveal some potential problems. (Additionally we have
>>general concerns about database impact of renaming users with long edit
>>histories.)
>>
>>It should not have been turned on at this stage and I'm disabling it for
>>now, so an announcement of availability is probably premature. :)
>
>
> Fixed and re-enabled. Only users with less than 5000 edits may be renamed.
>
> -- Tim Starling

That is offcource better then nothing.  Is there no solution for the
users whit more then 5000+ edits?

Put them in an que and do the renaming when the server load is low?

I have now an long term user on the dutch wikipedia who whould like to
change his username so it is the same on all projects. This for the
single login thing.

The user "Hooft" has 11.011 contributions, renaming a user with more
than 5.000 contributions would adversely affect site performance

Current;
[[w:nl:gebruiker:Hooft]]

New;
[[w:nl:gebruiker:Rob Hooft]]

Side note; It would be nice if the user page is moved to the new user
name when doing the renaming. And that an bureacrat can delete an user
account if it is never used for an edit befor.

--
Ook een artikeltje schrijven? WikipediaNL, de vrije GNU/FDL encyclopedie
http://www.wikipedia.be


from_name: Dan Grey

body:
On 10/07/05, J.F. de Wolff <jfdwolff at doctors.org.uk> wrote:
>
> When initially starting WikiProject Clinical Medicine, we struggled with
> this question. The decision was to escalate the level of difficulty, so all
> relevant information would be covered. The lay reader would have to drop it
> at some point, and none of the participants saw a great deal wrong with this.
>
> JFW

That's a shame, because you basically made the whole thing useless to
average folk (I count myself in that group).

Dan


from_name: Charles Matthews

body:
Dan Grey wrote

>> When initially starting WikiProject Clinical Medicine, we struggled with
>> this question. The decision was to escalate the level of difficulty, so
>> all
>> relevant information would be covered. The lay reader would have to drop
>> it
>> at some point, and none of the participants saw a great deal wrong with
>> this.

> JFW

>That's a shame, because you basically made the whole thing useless to
average folk (I count myself in that group).

I think that's a misconception, in encyclopedia terms.  For one thing, those
studying an article with a technical gradient will always get different
amounts out of it, depending on what they arrive with.  For another, the
modern trend is to assume anything can be read like a light novel - but that
hasn't been historically the way with written material, and is a relatively
new development (about a century, I think, coming with popular journalism).
And a major point is that WP aims for completeness; if you have to trade off
between lack of completeness and technical density, you generally choose the
latter (which can always be improved later).

These points all apply in spades to mathematics, for example.  I think in
areas like medecine and mathematics and a few others, lay people really have
no idea quite how much could be said.  So, WP can actually tackle such
issues, but everyone should see that the time scale is measured in years,
not days or weeks.

Charles


from_name: Delirium

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Re: statistics now available

body:
Kate wrote:

> one of the larger problems is AOL, who allocate IPs registered in the
> US to
>
>all customers :-(
>
>i've added a notice to this effect at the top of the page, on David's
>suggestion.
>
>
>
According to numerous articles and press releases, the current
generation of ip-to-country mappers handle AOL users correctly.  Is it
only proprietary ones that can do that and the one we use doesn't?

See, for example: http://news.com.com/2100-1023-836138.html

-Mark


body:
> A better example of what you're talking about is [[Basalt]]. It's
> unreadable for non-geologists.

Yes, basalt could do with a layman's introduction,
though of course we should keep all the advanced
information as well.

But let's be careful not to split everyone into
"laymen" and "experts". There's a wide continuum
between those who know nothing about geology/zoology/etc.
and those who have doctorates in the field. We have
undergraduate students, high school students, avid
amateurs etc. I think *those* people may the most
likely readers of a Wikipedia article about [[basalt]].

Regards,
Haukur