subject: [WikiEN-l] GNAA Deleted!

body:
Tony Jacobs wrote:

>> From: "The Cunctator" <cunctator at gmail.com>
>>
>> I for one think it's pathetic that Wikipedia is giving up on the
>> mission of
>> being a complete encyclopedia because there exist specialty sites on
>> particular areas of knowledge.
>
> I disagree. Wikipedia can't be all things to all people, and I think
> it's silly to try.  Wikipedia should consider itself one of a
> community of wikis, specifically, the encyclopedic one, with academic
> standards.  Why not allow for there to be multiple sources of
> information, and let the different ones specialize in different things
> and get good at what they do?

I agree with Cunc that such a turn of events would be pathetic, but I
don't think we are there yet.  There are, nevertheless, some busy people
who would like us to go down that path.

It's not a matter of being all things to all people, nor is it a matter
of an expansive view that would negate standards of quality.  I have no
debate with other wikis that want to specialize; such wikis would make
for a healthy environment.  The fact that these other wikis would not be
bound by NPOV would make for a dynamic situation, but not one where we
should abandon those topics.

Ec


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Steve Bennett

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

body:
On 11/30/06, Daniel P. B. Smith <wikipedia2006 at dpbsmith.com> wrote:
> What I meant is that _in Wikipedia,_ uncited material is not high-
> quality material.

What do you mean by "high quality"?

> _In Wikipedia,_ that's indeed by definition, and the "definition" in
> question is Wikipedia's verifiability policy.

You seem to mean "desirable". As opposed to "inherently worthwhile".
Does a random visitor care whether we think the material is desirable
or not?

> Wikipedia is different, because Wikipedia does not select or judge
> the competence or credentials of its editors.

And it relies on its readers to form their own opinions about the
accuracy of its articles. And providing sources helps that process.
But it is not true that the absence of sources renders a given page
"low quality".

Steve


list: wikitech-l

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

body:
On 11/30/06, Nick Jenkins <nickpj at gmail.com> wrote:
> The English Wikipedia definitely has circular categories, or at least it used to [indirectly, not directly - there was some talk
> about this a few months ago]. :-)

I don't think anyone would complain if the developers announced that
recursive categories were no longer supported, and would fail
gracefully if attempted.

Steve


from_name: brion at pobox.com

subject: [Wikitech-l] MediaWiki automated test run failure 2006-12-01

body:
An automated run of parserTests.php showed the following failures:

Reading tests from "/home/brion/src/wiki/phase3/maintenance/parserTests.txt"...
Running test TODO: Table security: embedded pipes (http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2006-April/034637.html)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Link containing double-single-quotes '' (bug 4598)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Template with thumb image (with link in description)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: message transform: <noinclude> in transcluded template (bug 4926)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: message transform: <onlyinclude> in transcluded template (bug 4926)... FAILED!
Running test BUG 1887, part 2: A <math> with a thumbnail- math enabled... FAILED!
Running test TODO: HTML bullet list, unclosed tags (bug 5497)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: HTML ordered list, unclosed tags (bug 5497)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: HTML nested bullet list, open tags (bug 5497)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: HTML nested ordered list, open tags (bug 5497)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Parsing optional HTML elements (Bug 6171)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Inline HTML vs wiki block nesting... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Mixing markup for italics and bold... FAILED!
Running test TODO: 5 quotes, code coverage +1 line... FAILED!
Running test TODO: dt/dd/dl test... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Images with the "|" character in the comment... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Parents of subpages, two levels up, without trailing slash or name.... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Parents of subpages, two levels up, with lots of extra trailing slashes.... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Don't fall for the self-closing div... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Always escape literal '>' in output, not just after '<'... FAILED!

Reading tests from "/home/brion/src/wiki/phase3/extensions/Cite/citeParserTests.txt"...

   2 new PASSING test(s) :)
      * ISBN with space-delimited number
      * ISBN with multiple spaces, no number
Passed 451 of 471 tests (95.75%)... FAILED!


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

body:
On 11/30/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> AIUI there is more than one bot out there changing it back to "links".

I really ought to keep a list of these situations. I see it quite
frequently: people who decide to enforce some preference that isn't
goverened by the MoS on the whole of Wikipedia. There are people who
change this:

==Heading==
Text

To:

==Heading==

Text

and vice versa. There are people who change this:
==Heading==

to this:

== Heading ==

and vice versa.

AWB (AutoWikiBrowser) enforces several "clean-up" methods on articles
that aren't strictly dictated by the MoS, such as stub tags coming
after categories (or is that before...) and generally reducing the
possibility of common sense intervening.

Moral of the story: Please *don't* inflict a personal choice on
Wikipedia at large unless the MoS unambiguously states a very clear
preference for your choice.  In this case, the MoS seems pretty clear
that "External links" is the preferred spelling. I seem to recall that
either was acceptable but can't seem to find that now.

Steve


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

body:
On 11/30/06, charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com
> I'm not trying to rid enWP of lists, though in a sense they have to some extent had their day. Their functionality is still much superior to categories, in some important respects.

The logical way to combine their functionality would be to put the
hand-ordered hand-annotated list in the text section of the
[[Category:...]] page. But no one seems to do this, least of all on
commons where the ambiguity over pages and categories is a real
nuisance.

Steve


from_name: David Gerard

subject:
[WikiEN-l] On Completeness and Restrictiveness (was Re:
	GNAADeleted!)

body:
On 30/11/06, The Cunctator <cunctator at gmail.com> wrote:

> My take is that you can define the quality of Wikipedia to be a function of
> both the depth of coverage (using that as shorthand for the whole
> specific/accurate/verifiable/sourced class of concepts) and the breadth of
> coverage (i.e. not missing information).

Yes. The *breadth* of en:wp's coverage is actually a reason I've heard
from many who speak another language natively for preferring en:wp as
a reference - there's more likely to be something, anything, on a
given subject here than anywhere else, and a better something than
you'd get from a Google search.

Our breadth is a strength, not a weakness. We don't have to have a
30,000-byte article on something to be a useful source on it.

- d.


from_name: Tels

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

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

*Moin*,

On Thursday 30 November 2006 22:45, Michael Sha wrote:

*Your* *post* *sounds* *very* *smart* *and* *intriguing*, *please*
*subscribe* *me* *to* *your* *new*s*letter*.

B*e*s*t* *w*i*s*h*e*s*,*

*t*e*l*s***asterisk***

- --
 Signed on Fri Dec  1 00:50:31 2006 with key 0x93B84C15.
 Visit my photo gallery at http://bloodgate.com/photos/
 PGP key on http://bloodgate.com/tels.asc or per email.

 "In my opiniation, "burglarize" is a perfectionally validative
 wordification. How else would reportization of the securitial/policial
 forceship appearize to be importantive enoughly to be respectative by
 the massmediaship and influentate the societyness?" SharpFang (651121)
 on 2004-12-13 at /. about "burgle" vs. "burglarize"

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iQEVAwUBRW9uc3cLPEOTuEwVAQL3aQf/QowiSdA2tSEGcTTxckMNXv8Qj1wytrGf
5QQ4V0WQROHb4mD8Bu3o4Xki/FMysWQUv2amABBSnaDL6hh/mqxhbBEwgybqm/J1
6UmMWQOIh6T5BrW+54jowqizPs8VQAZN758fwDvzezEYFY9KlyZOxhcwoKcmithe
YiBjzMH/wNmgWhNn7GqL18O+6UQpGiITADspa2gnXQN9QCj8pD+yYtqmZV4dTFW0
g4seBO5YyN50RGMKIpUWBGrpqYhCHLHNCcaHLQPY3PqznCEV9owT7f0yJpuiZDJQ
6gV9or+LlCEhV1aTwGtA2usfcfZj9c5uJ9JHxm/85QvrKZkgnABWyA==
=aRRM
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


from_name: Oldak Quill

subject: [WikiEN-l] GNAA Deleted!

body:
On 01/12/06, Bryan Derksen <bryan.derksen at shaw.ca> wrote:
> The Cunctator wrote:
> > Why can't Wikipedia be all things to all people?
>
> Hear hear!
>
> When I finally became completely sick of the menagerie of stub templates
> that decorated the bottoms of most of the pages I saw, I didn't go on a
> grand crusade to delete them all from Wikipedia. Instead I just edited
> my stylesheet and made them invisible. It'd be neat if we could do that
> with entire articles, being able to eliminate everything in
> [[Category:Fictional]] or [[Category:High schools]] from one's personal
> view of Wikipedia could have saved a lot of bloodshed over the years.

I agree with both of your sentiments, we are large enough to contain
an incredible amount of information about a myriad subjects. My
approach is more practical: if you don't want to read articles about
Pokemon characters, don't.

--
Oldak Quill (oldakquill at gmail.com)


list: commons-l

from_name: Brianna Laugher

subject: [Commons-l] Wikimedia Commons 1M

body:
Hello,

Commons is proud to announce it now has over one million uploaded
files. The one millionth file, as determined by
en:User:Daveydweeb/commons:User:RandyWang who was watching the logs at
the time (or closely after), is a photograph of a sealife viewing
gallery at Singapore Zoo, part of a series taken by User:Terence Ong
in a visit to the zoo.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Singapore_Zoo_37.JPG

Congratulations Terence!

Press releasey stuff here, improvements and translations welcome:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Press_releases/1M

The logo mosaic is now frozen, as well:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_logo_mosaic

regards,
Brianna
user:pfctdayelise


list: foundation-l

subject: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons 1M


list: wikimedia-l

subject: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons 1M


from_name: Darko Bulatovic

subject: [Foundation-l] Montenegrin wikipedia -

body:
On Montenegrin request for new wikipedia I found this resolution:

*This request has been rejected following discussion with the Special
projects language subcommittee
<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special_projects_subcommittees/Languages>.
Wikis should not be split along political lines, and we encourage
Montenegrin editors to collaborate with Serbian editors in a single wiki
or, at the very least, to have Montenegrin pages alongside Serbian
pages. If political divisions make this difficult, please note that the
Wikimedia Foundation's goal is giving every single person free,
/unbiased/ access to the sum of all human knowledge, and not information
from individual political communities.*

I am asking members of Special projects language subcommittee to give
evidence that this request was driven by political lines. I am asking
for reference in past that committee has made same decision on same
situation. I am asking members of committee to give deeper guidelines to
us what should we do next in this situation.

Also wider explanation of this decision could be helpful.

Thank you,

Darko Bulatovic

President of IT Association of Montenegro


subject: [Foundation-l] Montenegrin wikipedia -


subject: [Foundation-l] Montenegrin request for new language wikipedia

body:
On Montenegrin request for new wikipedia I found this resolution:

**This request has been rejected following discussion with the Special
projects language subcommittee
<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special_projects_subcommittees/Languages>.
Wikis should not be split along political lines, and we encourage
Montenegrin editors to collaborate with Serbian editors in a single wiki
or, at the very least, to have Montenegrin pages alongside Serbian
pages. If political divisions make this difficult, please note that the
Wikimedia Foundation's goal is giving every single person free,
/unbiased/ access to the sum of all human knowledge, and not information
from individual political communities.**

I am asking members of Special projects language subcommittee to give
evidence that this request was driven by political lines. I am asking
for reference in past that committee has made same decision on same
situation. I am asking members of committee to give deeper guidelines to
us what should we do next in this situation.

Also wider explanation of this decision could be helpful.

Thank you,

Darko Bulatovic

President of IT Association of Montenegro

p.s. Sorry for wrong mail posting.


from_name: Mark Clements

body:
"Manuel Schneider"
<manuel.schneider at wikimedia.ch> wrote in message
news:200611292354.45509.manuel.schneider at wikimedia.ch...
> well, it's me, as I'm known since 15 years in all kind of computing
fields,
> including Wikipedia, MediaWiki and the IRC channels.
>

According to your user page at mediawiki.org
(http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/User:80686) you were born in 1981.

In which particular field were you known at the age of 10?

- Mark Clements (HappyDog)


body:
To others that find this interesting,

I have found that this decision is very biased, as it is based on
assumptions  not on arguments. I have tried to communicate with  members
of subcommittee but They found it unrelevant and made decision to deny
this request (you will find my attempt on this mailing list).  The
explanation is colored by political  vocabulary  with no  particular
reason, it is only driven on assumption - not real facts at least they
didn't show them.

On request  page  was started a "war" against Montenegrin wikipedia
where mostly Serbs voted against Montenegrin Wikipedia. Legitimate
votes, but Montenegrin votes was deleted and marked as sock puppets -
even it was not true. I don't understand why stewards dint check this
votes again, but on page you will find many accusation on my name that
stewards/Admin didn't try to clear. Why? I don't understand. I have
called them several times but with no success.
Our test wiki (wikii.itam.ws) was attacked several days by members of
meta wiki on Mediawiki website originated from Serbia, deleting our
pages and mocking on our State name changing it to Albania,etc. We lost
several days in fight against vandals and tried to talk with stewards
about what happen on meta request page, this was very difficult to us,
but stewards didn't reacted swift in this situation clearing up the
discussion there (maybe they did have some other work to do I don't
know). I have called them about 20 times. At end I was blocked by no
particular reason, and discussion was heated by some serbs which
political agitated and insulted some people from Montenegro. That made
reaction that leaded to page protection.
I have talked with stewards about my ban on meta and they agreed to
unblock me and to give me a chance to explain all on my talk
page(user:Ego_and_his_own). On which I was also false accused, but no
one reacted.
Page was on subcommittee "desk" almost a week before new policy was on
stage, but never less the request was judged on new policy, this is not
normal in common law or in common decision making rules. But never less
on that page request there was more than 5 people willing to contribute
to Montenegrin wikipedia, which is basic rule from new policy. In
discussion also was enough material to be positive to this request. At
least to ask for some clearance on some questions, but members of
committee didn't find this necessary.

I would like to see some of yours opinions regarding this issue as this
looks very strange to me.

Thank you

Darko Bulatovic


from_name: Jim Schuler

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

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

In answer to this strawman: libel is is illegal, personal attacks are
covered under the TOS, and vandalism speaks for itself.

--
Jim
http://iacobomus.blogspot.com/


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 30/11/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 11/30/06, Jim Schuler <jim62sch at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > >
> > > Some day I'll remember not to post philosophical points here.  I
> simply
> > > don't have the time to explain how fear and ignorance are the catalyst
> > > for censorship.
> >
> > And when we remove personal attacks, vandalism, or libel, are we
> > censoring as well?
>
> Of course. But, at least in the case of libel, it is necessary to our
> continuing function.
>
> --
> Oldak Quill (oldakquill at gmail.com)

I don't see removing libel as censorship -- libel falls under the category
of "crying fire in a crowded theatre when there is no fire", thus it is not
free speech as intended by any constitution that allows free speech.

--
> Jim
> http://iacobomus.blogspot.com/


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

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

In this case, I don't see us as fighting but as discussing.  Yes, the
discussion may get heated at times, but that's OK, as discussions, heated or
calm, are how we build consensus.  In other words, there's a value to this
exercise, so long as it doesn't degenerate into pettiness.

--
Jim
http://iacobomus.blogspot.com/


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

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

Of course, we then need to define "stupid".  What is stupid to one is not
necessarily stupid to another.  Objectivity is a good thing, subjectivity is
not, hence Wiki's cornerstone NPOV policy.

--
> Jim
> http://iacobomus.blogspot.com/


from_name: Daniel P. B. Smith

subject: [WikiEN-l] Phrase, fable, popular culture

body:
> From: Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net>
>
> Alphax (Wikipedia email) wrote:
>
>> charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com wrote:
>>
>>> I glanced yesterday at a recent dictionary 'of phrase and fable',
>>> which had a Pokemon article.
>>
> It's amazing how pop culture articles make people squirm so much.  I
> don't really do anything with them, but they have never bothered me.
> Pop culture is as important a part of culture as history or science.
> Naturally, we want to make sure that fictional characters aren't put
> forth as something more real than they are,   If we confine
> ourselves to
> "scholarly treatment" it strikes me as though we would be putting
> on the
> same pompous airs of superiority that are often attrivbuted to
> ivory towers.

1) A "dictionary of phrase and fable" sounds like a _perfectly_ good
source for Wikipedia material.

2) I think that by definition an "encyclopedia" does _and must_ carry
a bit of what might be spun as "the same pompous airs of superiority
that are often attributed to ivory towers." Just as there are such
things as journalistic standards, we have a commitment to accuracy
that goes beyond what is required of USENET postings and web forums.
Any dedication to standards seems pompous to those who do not share it.

3) What makes me squirm about pop culture articles is their general
low quality, lack of references, and air of inexperience. I think a
good deal of them are being written from personal expertise. The edit
wars I see on some of them convince me that these self-appointed
experts have quite different opinions about the supposed content of
the supposed canon, and the reader has no way to know which is
correct. When people argue about the canon known as the Bible, they
customarily cite chapter and verse. So, for that matter, do
Holmesians. So should... what should I call them? Pokemonitors?

4) I do think that the "distanced" tone with which, say, Homeric
mythology, and folklore are conveyed, is very misleading. (It doesn't
help that a lot of it was filtered through Victorian English
translations).

I think a lot of this stuff was pop culture in its time. I suspect
the ancients regarded Mars or Apollo in a way that is much closer to
the way we regard Superman or Batman than to the way we regard the
characters of Wagner's operas.

Homer was a superstar performer, and he probably riffed on his lyre
like Bruce Springsteen. I've always heard that educated Greeks did
not believe the gods and goddesses were real. I suspect the less
educated ones may have had a degree of belief that was like the
degree of belief that fans of professional wrestling have in their
sport.

I assume I'm not the only person who, as an adolescent, discovered a
passage in the Odyssey, which, for some reason was not part of our
assigned reading in class. The one about how Hephaestus catches Ares
and Aphrodite making love. Literally catches them at it. Traps them.
Nude. In a contraption of metal chains. Then calls all the gods and
goddess to come and see them. Who stand around admiring Aphrodite and
making coarse jokes. I'll bet I'm not the only adolescent that
thought that was pretty hot. Did I mention that they were chained up
nude, in the act, and exhibited to a crowd of acquaintances? Nude?


subject: [Foundation-l] Vandalism and small wikis

body:
geni wrote:
> On 11/30/06, elvis at chan.de <elvis at chan.de> wrote:
>
>> Quoting geni <geniice at gmail.com>:
>>
>>
>>
>>> However there is no need for a separate wikipedia unless it can be
>>> shown there is a language barrier.
>>>
>> a reason could be the conservation of a slowly dying language.
>>
>>
>
> And the benifit of doing that would be?
>

What you are saying ???? People dig ashes to find something new, and you
dont care? Wow
> No matter In this case we are not talkina about a dying language. We
> are tlaking about something that may or may not be a language.
>
>
I have asked you,and I will ask you again, do you even know anything
about this topic?

Thank you,

Darko


from_name: Dan Jacobson

subject:
[Wikitech-l] [Bug 8056] forgot to translate navigation, e.g.,
	zh-tw?

body:
You can easily test 99.9% of the cases when something is not zh-tw:
$ echo ??|iconv -t big5
iconv: illegal input sequence at position 0

S> What do you expect it to show up as?

$ echo ??|iconv -t gb2312|iconv -f gb2312 -t big5|iconv -f big5
??


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

body:
< second % is stuck to the link following it

b> Try describing the problem...?

There is no space between the second % and the following link. Turning
off styles, ALT V Y N, and the space comes back. Or remove the Chinese
to make a pure English post, and the space comes back.


from_name: Ken Arromdee

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On Thu, 30 Nov 2006, Rob wrote:
> If there was a hypothetical Asian Nazi-like group that advocated the
> extermination of all Chinese, I wouldn't have to show that people in
> France or Canada or Estonia also found them offensive to support the
> prohbition against allowing that group to use Wikipedia userspace as a
> soapbox.

It's my impression that current Nazis don't publically advocate the
extermination of anyone.  Of course, they may just be lying, and they're
certainly connected to historical Nazis who did kill, but I could say the
same thing about Communists or certain other groups.


from_name: the wub

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

body:
Much as I hate meaningless fuss over copyright, aren't these comics
incorrectly licensed? The text is directly taken from Wikipedia articles -
presumably under the GFDL. But the images are licensed as CC-BY-SA, with no
reference to either the GFDL or fair use.

That aside, they are quite brilliant.

the wub


body:
On 01/12/06, Darko Bulatovic <mail at itam.ws> wrote:

> I would like to see some of yours opinions regarding this issue as this
> looks very strange to me.

OK: Splitting Serbo-Croatian into three wikis was a ridiculous
mistake, and does not justify compounding the error.

- d.


from_name: Peter Ansell

subject:
[WikiEN-l] "Reliable sources" guideline being treated as
	absolute policy

references:
<f30e42de0611280509o645a2a1g5a554e4a388b922e@mail.gmail.com>
	<fb7fdd9c0611280528p2e5f58ddj6fbff3c4dc59247f@mail.gmail.com>
	<fbad4e140611280541r30db09bck6b5562fffd6f3ee@mail.gmail.com>
	<f30e42de0611280549p781614d3hc43c2ae8ca2a10d5@mail.gmail.com>
	<2244.63.151.8.141.1164722527.squirrel@www.internationalhouseofbacon.com>
	<bscpm2p0i11u0gga2qec13uc237tbun3u7@4ax.com>
	<456D30F0.7060800@shaw.ca>
	<7qqrm29onedcsgrlgbfboe05ab8uucsr73@4ax.com>
	<456E3C2B.4030104@shaw.ca>
	<1d0um2hro7ma93oum14sturmvat8ankm24@4ax.com>

body:
On 01/12/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
> On Wed, 29 Nov 2006 19:04:27 -0700, Bryan Derksen
> <bryan.derksen at shaw.ca> wrote:
>
> >> Indeed.  Absence of any claim to validity is what is at issue, and the
> >> absence of any sources is one of the diagnostic factors.  very few
> >> sourced articles are flagged for A7.
>
> >But even then it's still not not a remotely _reliable_ diagnostic
> >factor. For example, if there were an article whose text consisted of:
> >"Marty McFoo was a German actor who won several national awards for his
> >portrayal of Julius Caesar on TV."
> >This article would be completely unreferenced, but nevertheless it
> >asserts the subject's notability just fine.
>
> This is arse about face though. Marty McFoo is an actor who has played
> in some things[reliable source] which have been popular[reliable
> source] is unlikely to be tagged, whereas with no reliable sources it
> might well be (we have any number of deletion candidates which make
> vague unsubstantiated assertions, after all).
>

Of course we now get so far into wiki-lawyering that we have to
explicitly say that things are "popular" enough to get into the
"popularity" based wikipedia.

Peter Ansell


from_name: Jimmy Wales

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

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

And furthermore, and this is important in this particular example,
rational people are completely capable of distinguishing between someone
with sincerely held but deeply misguided beliefs or attitudes who is
sincerely trying to nevertheless work well with others to create a fair
encyclopedic set of articles on difficult topics, and someone who is
just slapping stuff on a userpage to try to yank people's chains.

This is not a case of censorship of the poor repressed Nazis.  This is a
simple simple simple case of blocking a troll and moving on with life
without worrying about it.

--Jimbo


from_name: Ryan Wetherell

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

body:
Could you elaborate?

--Ryan

On 12/1/06, The Cunctator <cunctator at gmail.com> wrote:
> I think Wikipedia would be better if categories were done in the style of
> userboxen.
>
> On 11/30/06, David Ashby <humble.fool at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > On 11/30/06, Steve Summit <scs at eskimo.com> wrote:
> > > > And what better tie-in than Naziism.
> > > > Mike Godwin would laugh and laugh...
> > On 11/30/06, Ryan Wetherell <renardius at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > I think I'll be deleting my political-geared userboxes, just to be safe.
> >
> > I'm up for deleting all userboxes, but that's neither here nor there.
> >
> > -humblefool
> > _______________________________________________
> > WikiEN-l mailing list
> > WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> > To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
> >
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Rob

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 12/1/06, Jim Schuler <jim62sch at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/30/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > On 11/30/06, Jim Schuler <jim62sch at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > Some day I'll remember not to post philosophical points here.  I simply
> > > don't have the time to explain how fear and ignorance are the catalyst
> > > for censorship.
> >
> > And when we remove personal attacks, vandalism, or libel, are we
> > censoring as well?
>
> In answer to this strawman: libel is is illegal, personal attacks are
> covered under the TOS, and vandalism speaks for itself.

Hardly a strawman.  Removing vandalism, libel, and personal attacks
are normal, widely accepted rules in a semi-public or private sphere
such as Wikipedia and necessary for WP to function as a usable and
relatively non-offensive workspace for rational adults to contribute
to the project.  I would argue that removing pro-Nazi propaganda or
statements advocating Nazisim falls into the same category as the
other rules.


from_name: shi zhao

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

body:
This article NO NYT, is IHT. article of  NYT published today.

2006/12/1, roc <sdnyroc at gmail.com>:
> FYI. An article by NYT senior writer Mr. Howard French on the
> difference between Chinese and English Wikipedias was published on the
> International Herald Tribune yesterday at
> http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/11/29/news/wiki.php and
> http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/11/29/business/wiki.php. Many Chinese
> Wikipedians were extremely disappointed by the profound bias, shallow
> research, and jammed untrue descriptions. You can read the forwarded
> message from Lawrence Lo (Lorenzarius), and a blog entry from Joseph
> Wang (Roadrunner) at http://twofish.wordpress.com/. There were also
> private communications from other Chinese Wikipedians on their similar
> opinions .
>
> The take-home messages are:
>
> 1) Chinese Wikipedia has and conforms to a high standard of NPOV, and
> Chinese Wikipedians take this policy seriously.
>
> 2) There is no such thing called "self-censorship" at Chinese
> Wikipedia; indeed any intention for such practice at Chinese Wikipedia
> will be denounced by most Chinese Wikipedians.
>
> 3) Chinese Wikipedia is written by people from various places of the
> world, including Mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Asia, America,
> Europe, etc. Indeed, editors from Mainland China are disproportionally
> scarce because of the current block obviously imposed by the PRC
> government (though it never admitted that).
>
> I am not going to list all the false/misleading statements in the
> report, as it is super easy to identify chunks of them by any one who
> is able to read the following Wikipedia articles in both English and
> Chinese. There Wikipedia articles were used as examples in the report.
> If you like, check both the current and past versions when the report
> was prepared/published.
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_Zedong
> http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/???
> (http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%AF%9B%E6%B3%BD%E4%B8%9C)
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Taiwan
> http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/????
> (http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%8F%B0%E7%81%A3%E6%AD%B7%E5%8F%B2)
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwanese_aborigines
> http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/?????
> (http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E8%87%BA%E7%81%A3%E5%8E%9F%E4%BD%8F%E6%B0%91)
>
> By the way, the part of Taiwan's history cited in this IHT report from
> English Wikipedia and deemed correct was actually wrong. Luckily, that
> part in the actual English Wikipedia article has been corrected in
> last August.
>
> Best regards,
>
> roc
> --
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Lawrence Lo <lorenzarius at gmail.com>
> Date: 2006/11/29 ?? 11:21
> Subject: Re: [Wikizh-l] Chinese-language Wikipedia presents different
> view of history
> To: Andrew Lih <andrew.lih at gmail.com>
> Cc: wikizh-l at wikimedia.org
>
>
> I call this report biased BS. A wiki as we all know is continuously
> evolving, singling one edition of one article does not prove anything.
> For instance the last sentences in the opening paragraph of the
> current edition
> (http://zh.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=%E6%AF%9B%E6%B3%BD%E4%B8%9C&oldid=3020691)
> of the article in question now reads:
>
> He [Mao] was also the initiator of a series of political movements
> such as the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, resulting
> in the abnormal deaths of many Mainland people and great destructions
> to many Chinese cultural and historical monuments. He had a great
> influence on the 20th century's China and the world.
>
> And obviously omission does not equal self-censorship. Self-censorship
> is when a person knows something but intentionally avoids to mention
> it. But IMO the more realistic situation with most Mainland
> contributors is that they don't know that "something" to begin with.
> When a man is taught since birth that "A is right", how can you
> criticize him for not knowing that somebody in the other part of the
> world thinks that "B is right"? In fact, the Chinese Wikipedia is a
> great place for people from different parts of the Chinese-speaking
> world to get to know things that we didn't know, to understands things
> from the other perspectives.
>
> On 11/29/06, Andrew Lih <andrew.lih at gmail.com> wrote:
> > FYI, some of our own famous ZH Wikipedians mentioned...
> >
> >
> > http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/11/29/news/wiki.php
> >
> >  Chinese-language Wikipedia presents different view of history
> > By Howard W. French
> > The New York Times
> >
> > Just who was Mao Zedong?
> >
> > According to the English-language version of Wikipedia, the popular
> > online encyclopedia, he was a victorious military and political leader
> > who founded China's modern Communist state. He was also a man many saw
> > as "a mass murderer, holding his leadership accountable for the deaths
> > of tens of millions of innocent Chinese."
> >
> > Switch to Wikipedia in Chinese, and one discovers a very different
> > man. There, Mao Zedong's reputation is unsullied by any mention of a
> > death toll in the great purges of the 1950s and 1960s, or for what
> > many historians call the greatest famine in human history.
> >
> > In recent weeks, the Chinese government has demonstrated its hostility
> > toward the emergence of a credible source of reference material that
> > escapes its control by frequently blocking access to Wikipedia, whose
> > Chinese version, though still far smaller than its English-language
> > counterpart, is growing by leaps and bounds.
> >
> > But on sensitive questions of China's modern history or on hot-button
> > issues, the Chinese version diverges so dramatically from its English
> > counterpart that it sometimes reads as if it were approved by the
> > censors themselves.
> >
> > This gulf in information and perspective comes across powerfully in
> > the entry on Mao, which is consistently one of the most frequently
> > searched and edited topics in the Chinese version, and in the entry on
> > historical watersheds, like the Tiananmen Square massacre, the Great
> > Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution.
> >
> > Chinese Wikipedia users and critics say that the differences highlight
> > the resilience here of a system of information control whose reach
> > goes well beyond simple censorship.
> >
> > In each of its language versions, Wikipedia is collaboratively written
> > and edited by online enthusiasts, and contributors to the
> > Chinese-language site explain the differences in content by citing the
> > powerful influence of Chinese education, which often provides a neatly
> > sanitized national perspective on sensitive aspects of the country's
> > past.
> >
> > This parochialism is reinforced by the blocking of foreign Web sites,
> > and by the conformism of the carefully censored mass media.
> > Alternative viewpoints are sometimes available, but usually only to a
> > restricted circle of people who have the means and determination to
> > seek them out.
> >
> > For some, the Chinese version of Wikipedia was intended as just such a
> > resource, but its tame approach to sensitive topics has sparked a
> > fierce debate in the world of online mavens over its objectivity and
> > thoroughness.
> >
> > In a recent discussion on the encyclopedia's Web site about the Mao
> > legacy, a user with the online name Manchurian Tiger wrote, "If anyone
> > can prove that Mao's political movements didn't kill so many people,
> > I'm willing to delete the wording that 'millions of people were
> > killed.'" Rather than contribute to encyclopedias, those who wish to
> > pay tribute to Mao, he added, should "go to his mausoleum."
> >
> > Another user replied angrily: "If you want to release your emotions,
> > use a bulletin board. Wikipedia is not your toilet." In the end, the
> > entry on Mao included no death toll from either famine or political
> > purges.
> >
> > Indeed, in its present form, the Chinese Wikipedia introduction to Mao
> > Zedong could hardly be more anodyne: "One of the main founders and
> > leaders of the Communist Party of China, the People's Liberation Army
> > and the People's Republic of China," it reads. "He introduced a series
> > of political movements such as the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural
> > Revolution. He had a great influence over 20th-century China and the
> > world."
> >
> > On the evidence of entries like this, for the moment, the fight over
> > editorial direction of Wikipedia in Chinese is being won by
> > enthusiasts who practice self-censorship.
> >
> > "Most of the people who contribute to Wikipedia rarely touch upon
> > political topics," said Yuan Mingli, a frequent contributor from
> > Shanghai. "They prefer to write about things like technology. There
> > are other things in life."
> >
> > Others denounce compromises on content as a deviation from the
> > original mission of Wikipedia, which they say is to spread reliable
> > information and to seek truth. In any case, they add, self- censorship
> > has already proved na?ve because the government still frequently
> > blocks access for most Chinese Internet users.
> >
> > "There is a lot of confusion about whether they should obey the
> > neutral point of view or offer some compromises to the government,"
> > said Isaac Mao, a well-known Chinese blogger and user of the
> > encyclopedia. "To the local Wikipedians, the first objective is to
> > make it well-known among Chinese, to get people to understand the
> > principles of Wikipedia step by step, and not to get the thing blocked
> > by the government. The government doesn't buy into their attitude."
> >
> > After Mao Zedong, few questions are treated as more sacrosanct in
> > China than the status of Taiwan, which every pupil is taught is
> > irrevocably part of China. To publicly suggest that Taiwanese have any
> > historical basis for asserting their independence from China would be
> > a career-ending offense for anyone in academia or in the media.
> >
> > The English-language version of the encyclopedia speaks of a Japanese
> > shipwreck off Taiwan in 1871, in which 54 crew members were beheaded
> > by Taiwanese aborigines. Japan demanded compensation from China, only
> > to be told that Taiwan was not within China's jurisdiction. The
> > Chinese-language entry on Taiwan, meanwhile, is silent on the
> > jurisdiction question.
> >
> > Similarly, the English-language Wikipedia mentions the settlement of
> > Taiwan by aborigines who are genetically related to Malaysians, about
> > 4,000 years ago. It also places the first meaningful settlement of the
> > island by Chinese in the 16th century.
> >
> > The Chinese version of Wikipedia, though, merely speaks of cultural
> > affinities with Malaysians and speculates about the possible
> > exploration of the island by Chinese as far back as the third century.
> >
> > A parallel, and purely homegrown, effort at creating an online
> > encyclopedia in China, Baidu Baike, skirts controversies like these
> > altogether. Baidu Baike, which is owned by the biggest Internet search
> > engine company in China, asserts that Taiwan's original inhabitants
> > "came from mainland China directly or indirectly," and not from
> > Malaysia.
> >
> > Similarly, a user who searches for the Tiananmen Square massacre will
> > find no entry.
> >
> > As online reference sites grow in popularity here, Baidu Baike
> > benefits from government efforts to block Wikipedia, just as the same
> > company's search engine once benefited from similar blockage of
> > Google.
> >
> > Baidu Baike, much of whose content appears to be copied directly from
> > Wikipedia, would not release detailed user statistics, saying only
> > that it has "several million" users each day. A spokeswoman for the
> > company, Zhang Yan, said it is guided by the editorial policy of not
> > "judging the existing national system with malice."
> >
> > Asked to explain what this meant, Zhang said, "Anyone who is Chinese knows."
> > _______________________________________________
> > Wikizh-l mailing list
> > Wikizh-l at Wikipedia.org
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikizh-l
> >
>
>
> --
> http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Lorenzarius
> Tel: +852 95825791
> _______________________________________________
> Wikizh-l mailing list
> Wikizh-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikizh-l
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>

--
Chinese wikipedia: http://zh.wikipedia.org/
My blog: http://talk.blogbus.com
CNBlog: http://blog.cnblog.org/weblog.html
Social Brain: http://www.socialbrain.org/default.asp
cnbloggercon: http://www.cnbloggercon.org/

[[zh:User:Shizhao]]


from_name: Manuel Schneider

body:
> In which particular field were you known at the age of 10?
In this age I weren't known anywhere. I started using this name (not knowing
that it will later be used by Intel for all CPUs > Pentium) because I was
young and stupid and found the naming scheme from Intel interesting ;-)

In these days I was mostly sitting around the old nice telnet chat of CCC in
Berlin and made my first steps in computing and the later upcoming Internet.
--
Regards
Manuel Schneider

Wikimedia CH - Verein zur F?rderung Freien Wissens
Wikimedia CH - Association for the advancement of free knowledge
www.wikimedia.ch


body:
> Just out of curiosity: what made you decide to use a name equivalent
> (theoretically) to the *successor* of the Pentium, two years before
> the Pentium itself debuted?
We won't be able to get the right idea behind it, but I found the naming
scheme interesting, was young and needed a "cool" name... so I used that one.
Now all newer Pentiums are named 80686 - which is quite funny as in these days
nobody thought of that.

But as nobody used this name except me I was keeping it... as nickname in
chats, ICQ, domain name... whatever. I use it as a username anywhere but - if
you have a look at my wiki contributions - I use my full name as a signature
because I support the demand for "real" users.
--
Regards
Manuel Schneider

Wikimedia CH - Verein zur F?rderung Freien Wissens
Wikimedia CH - Association for the advancement of free knowledge
www.wikimedia.ch


from_name: Jay R. Ashworth

body:
On Wed, Nov 29, 2006 at 10:29:18PM +0000, Rob Church wrote:
> > Author:   80686
>
> With all due respect, what kind of ridiculous username is that?

It's Pentium-II, Rob.

Cheers,
-- jra
--
Jay R. Ashworth                                                jra at baylink.com
Designer                          Baylink                             RFC 2100
Ashworth & Associates        The Things I Think                        '87 e24
St Petersburg FL USA      http://baylink.pitas.com             +1 727 647 1274

	(I've been informed that the 'divorce' quote makes me look
	misogynistic, even though Jennifer Crusie is (pretty obviously)
	a female romance novelist.  So I've removed it. :-)


body:
On Thu, Nov 30, 2006 at 05:54:40PM -0500, Simetrical wrote:
> On 11/29/06, Manuel Schneider <manuel.schneider at wikimedia.ch> wrote:
> > well, it's me, as I'm known since 15 years in all kind of computing fields,
> > including Wikipedia, MediaWiki and the IRC channels.
>
> Just out of curiosity: what made you decide to use a name equivalent
> (theoretically) to the *successor* of the Pentium, two years before
> the Pentium itself debuted?

Clearly, he was ahead of his time.

Cheers,
-- jra
--
Jay R. Ashworth                                                jra at baylink.com
Designer                          Baylink                             RFC 2100
Ashworth & Associates        The Things I Think                        '87 e24
St Petersburg FL USA      http://baylink.pitas.com             +1 727 647 1274

	(I've been informed that the 'divorce' quote makes me look
	misogynistic, even though Jennifer Crusie is (pretty obviously)
	a female romance novelist.  So I've removed it. :-)


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Death Phoenix

subject: [Wikipedia-l] News to me

body:
Hey, if we have someone inventing the Internet...

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


from_name: David Gerard

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

body:
On 01/12/06, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
> MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:

> >Unfortunately, there are people who think categories are superior to lists
> >in all regards. I like to think there are exceptions.

> One shouldn't be taken as superior, they are just different and
> complementary approaches to organizing knowledge.

The guideline is [[WP:CSL]].

- d.


from_name: Bryan Derksen

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

body:
David Gerard wrote:
> On 01/12/06, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
>> MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:
>
>>> Unfortunately, there are people who think categories are superior to lists
>>> in all regards. I like to think there are exceptions.
>
>> One shouldn't be taken as superior, they are just different and
>> complementary approaches to organizing knowledge.
>
>
> The guideline is [[WP:CSL]].

[[Wikipedia:Categories, lists, and series boxes]], to save everyone the
trouble of looking it up.

-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 250 bytes
Desc: OpenPGP digital signature
Url : http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/attachments/20061201/249024bb/attachment.pgp


from_name: Travis Derouin

subject: [Wikitech-l] block titles extension

body:
Hi,

I added a simple extension that provides the ability to prevent articles
with certain title names from being saved or created. A spam problem we have
on wikiHow - which appears to be coming from a bot - is that several
articles are created with URLs for title names. This is a pretty straight
forward way of preventing this:

http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:BlockTitles

Travis


from_name: Yann Forget

body:
Darko Bulatovic a ?crit :
> Sabine Cretella wrote:
>
>>>I don't understand you very well here. Many language (mostly
>>>European)are having nation marks (English, French, German, Russian,
>>>Albanina, Greek, Italian, ....)
>>>
>>You forgot that German is spoken in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and
>>Italy all three happily living together on one wiki - and of course:
>>there are some differences among these four versions of German, but
>>nevertheless they are ONE language.
>>French is spoken in France, Canada, Switzerland etc. and they work on
>>one Wikipedia.
>>Dutch is spoken in the Netherlands, Belgium and France and they work on
>>one Wikipedia.
>>Italian is spoken in Italy and Switzerland and they work on one Wikipedia.
>>English is spoken in Great Britain, USA, Australia, New Zealand etc. and
>>they all work on one Wikipedia.
>
> That is very specific case, As in Switzerland live Italians, Germans and
> Franks. In Montenegrin case in Montenegro lives 45% Montenegrin s, 35%
> Serbs, Albanians, Bosnnjaks,...
> On other cases those countries was colonies of mayor European empires.

There is nothing specific about that. The examples given by Sabin e is
perfectly valid. The problem is that you don't want to admit it.

> Thank you for joining discussion,
> Darko Bulatovic

Regards,

Yann


from_name: The Cunctator

subject: [WikiEN-l] GNAA Deleted!

body:
On 12/1/06, charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com
<charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com> wrote:
> "The Cunctator" wrote
>
> > I'd just like to remind people that Wikipedia was doing quite well in the
> > Age Before Required Sourcing.
>
> Yeah. But there has been something of a 'phase change'; and that is not for no reason. Several really. The readers are less tolerant of and amused by errors; the editing community has largely preferred a more academic approach over time. Nothing scales 'with impunity' (I think this is the fundamental theorem of computer science ...)

I'll buy the second but would dispute the first point. The level of
tolerance of and amusement by errors seems to have remained quite
static.


body:
Hi,

Darko Bulatovic a ?crit :
>
> Will we ask for it or talk here if we don't thing there is language
> barrier? This started to look like philosophic question. We already get
> proposal from Serbian community, also we wait from Croatian community
> and Bosnian community. But for now there is no consensus between them.
> If there ever be one we will participate.

If you really mean to participate in a common Wikipedia for all variant
of the Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian, then do it!
There is http://sh.wikipedia.org/ which is just meant for that.

See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serbocroatian_language

Regards,

Yann


from_name: Rob Smith

body:
On 12/1/06, Daniel P. B. Smith <wikipedia2006 at dpbsmith.com> wrote:

> I think a lot of this stuff was pop culture in its time....
>
> Homer was a superstar performer, and he probably riffed on his lyre
> like Bruce Springsteen. I've always heard that educated Greeks did
> not believe the gods and goddesses were real....

So true, but it wasn't just a system of belief; it was a an
educational tool couched in entertainment.  In the pre-broadcast &
electronic transmission eras, social gatherings whittled the hours
away around the campfire. Homer couldn't protect his stuff by
copyright, and less gifted wannabe's toured provincal venues
bootlegging his material.

Nobs01


subject: [Foundation-l] Montenegrin wikipedia -

body:
Hi,

Please don't mix the topics in one thread.

Regards,

Yann


subject: [Foundation-l] Montenegrin wikipedia -


from_name: Daniel Kinzler

subject: [Commons-l] SVG chessboard transparency

body:
Erik Moeller wrote:
> The servers appear to be configured to render transparency in SVG
> using a chessboard pattern:
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:LithuanianHistory.svg
>
No, actually this is a background image set using CSS. The chessboard
pattern is not part of the png (try "view image").
> Is that actually desired by anyone? It seems more useful for debugging
> purposes than for actually using images
It wouldn't be a good idea for Wikipedias, but at least for Commons, it
is quite helpful: it allows you to see on first glance which images have
transparency where. This avoids images with a white background to be
considered redundant to ones with a transparent background, and helps
people to see which images are suitable for use on a colored background
(especially for icons) .

I feel this setup is badly needed at least for image description pages.
I also like to have it on galleries and in categories, but that may be a
matter of taste. Also, the "chessboard" could easily be turned on and
off using a bit of JS code... or of course your custom monobook.css.

-- Daniel


from_name: Darko Bulatovic

body:
Yann Forget wrote:
> Darko Bulatovic a ?crit :
>
>>
>> That is very specific case, As in Switzerland live Italians, Germans and
>> Franks. In Montenegrin case in Montenegro lives 45% Montenegrin s, 35%
>> Serbs, Albanians, Bosnnjaks,...
>> On other cases those countries was colonies of mayor European empires.
>>
>
> There is nothing specific about that. The examples given by Sabin e is
> perfectly valid. The problem is that you don't want to admit it.
>
>
>> Thank you for joining discussion,
>> Darko Bulatovic
>>
>
> Regards,
>
> Yann
>
>
Yann,

How much do you know about this? You are angry at me Yann? That I called
you to not make assumptions? Your assumptions affect half of million
people Yann.I hope that you relise that, as  I don't really understand
you. Sabin did at least showed  her point of view  here, and you just
make comments without any argument.

Regards,
Darko Bulatovic


from_name: Nathaniel

subject: [Wikitech-l] tiff files?

body:
I hope this is the right place to ask this question:  is there a technical
reason for not hosting TIFF files on Wikimedia servers?  Commons forbids
them, and apparently has since the beginning.  However, it would be helpful
for Wikisource if TIFF files of scans of public domain works could be
uploaded and used for proofreading and/or archival.

Thanks!

Nathaniel / User:Spangineer


from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] tiff files?

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

Sherool wrote:
> On Fri, 01 Dec 2006 18:12:50 +0100, Ilmari Karonen wrote:
>> I'm genuine interested; there are things the TIFF format can do that PNG
>> can't, but I'd like to know which features you need and why.
>
> I would guess the ability to include multiple "pages" in one file.

Which, of course, is an ability that's very poorly supported.

- -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2.2 (Darwin)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFFcIbXwRnhpk1wk44RAidGAJ9EeJCw/a85soDy+pqqpiaERKRmpwCgili1
WfipcwIX1H6/fdR/cYPvqYs=
=bQIe
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


from_name: charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com

subject: [WikiEN-l] Phrase and fable

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote

> Pop culture is as important a part of culture as history or science.

I doubt even the Beatles will have the long-term consequences of Crick-Watson. Pop culture is the bunch of sticks that makes flimsy individual elements into something with a higher breaking point.

Charles

-----------------------------------------
Email sent from www.ntlworld.com
Virus-checked using McAfee(R) Software
Visit www.ntlworld.com/security for more information


from_name: Ray Saintonge

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

body:
David Gerard wrote:

>On 01/12/06, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
>
>
>>MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Unfortunately, there are people who think categories are superior to lists
>>>in all regards. I like to think there are exceptions.
>>>
>>>
>>One shouldn't be taken as superior, they are just different and
>>complementary approaches to organizing knowledge.
>>
>>
>The guideline is [[WP:CSL]].
>
That's fine with me.  By complementary I refer to both lists and
categories as boxes.  In categories one starts with the objects
(articles) and tries to find the box in which it belongs.  In lists one
starts with the box and looks for objects to put in it.

Ec


subject: [WikiEN-l] GNAA Deleted!

body:
"The Cunctator" wrote

> I'd just like to remind people that Wikipedia was doing quite well in the
> Age Before Required Sourcing.

Yeah. But there has been something of a 'phase change'; and that is not for no reason. Several really. The readers are less tolerant of and amused by errors; the editing community has largely preferred a more academic approach over time. Nothing scales 'with impunity' (I think this is the fundamental theorem of computer science ...)

Charles

-----------------------------------------
Email sent from www.ntlworld.com
Virus-checked using McAfee(R) Software
Visit www.ntlworld.com/security for more information


from_name: Anthony

body:
On 12/1/06, the wub <thewub.wiki at googlemail.com> wrote:
> Much as I hate meaningless fuss over copyright, aren't these comics
> incorrectly licensed? The text is directly taken from Wikipedia articles -
> presumably under the GFDL. But the images are licensed as CC-BY-SA, with no
> reference to either the GFDL or fair use.
>
> That aside, they are quite brilliant.
>
> the wub

Presumably text and images under different licenses can be combined to
form an aggregate work.  Wikipedia articles do this all the time.

Anthony


subject:
[WikiEN-l] On Completeness and Restrictiveness (was
	Re:	GNAADeleted!)

body:
David Gerard wrote

> Our breadth is a strength, not a weakness. We don't have to have a
> 30,000-byte article on something to be a useful source on it.

We have been trying to empty the ocean of Google with the teaspoons of stubs of a couple of paras, from the early days. This indeed is one of our great strengths.

In other words we have people willing to do this, on _anything_ really; and we have other people willing to see that this pile of stubs - the stack of filing cards filled in at the library, as it used to be for scholars, has value. In a hypertexted world, it does have the great value, that the pigeonholes created fill up gradually.

Charles

-----------------------------------------
Email sent from www.ntlworld.com
Virus-checked using McAfee(R) Software
Visit www.ntlworld.com/security for more information


from_name: Mark Wagner

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
On 11/30/06, Rich Holton <richholton at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> It will be interesting if the one thing to last out of Watterson's comic
> is the word "Calvinball".
>
> I loved that comic. Too bad he retired.

A good cartoonist knows when to retire.  A bad cartoonist keeps
turning out the same old thing, year after year.

--
Mark
[[User:Carnildo]]


body:
I think Wikipedia would be better if categories were done in the style of
userboxen.

On 11/30/06, David Ashby <humble.fool at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > On 11/30/06, Steve Summit <scs at eskimo.com> wrote:
> > > And what better tie-in than Naziism.
> > > Mike Godwin would laugh and laugh...
> On 11/30/06, Ryan Wetherell <renardius at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I think I'll be deleting my political-geared userboxes, just to be safe.
>
> I'm up for deleting all userboxes, but that's neither here nor there.
>
> -humblefool
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: geni

body:
On 12/1/06, Darko Bulatovic <mail at itam.ws> wrote:
> What you are saying ???? People dig ashes to find something new, and you
> dont care? Wow

Languages don't need to be liveing in order extract information from
them. Late Egyptian has been dead for over 2000 years. We can still
extract informatrion from it. However this is irrelivant since if
Montenegrin is indeed a seperate language there is no evidence it is
dying.

> I have asked you,and I will ask you again, do you even know anything
> about this topic?

Enough to ask questions. In this case the relivant question is what is
the general view of the experts in the field?

--
geni


from_name: roc

body:
now it is on NYT as well.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/01/world/asia/01wikipedia.html. very
sad such an article get published there. -roc

2006/11/30, shi zhao <shizhao at gmail.com>:
> This article NO NYT, is IHT. article of  NYT published today.
>
> 2006/12/1, roc <sdnyroc at gmail.com>:
> > FYI. An article by NYT senior writer Mr. Howard French on the
> > difference between Chinese and English Wikipedias was published on the
> > International Herald Tribune yesterday at
> > http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/11/29/news/wiki.php and
> > http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/11/29/business/wiki.php. Many Chinese
> > Wikipedians were extremely disappointed by the profound bias, shallow
> > research, and jammed untrue descriptions. You can read the forwarded
> > message from Lawrence Lo (Lorenzarius), and a blog entry from Joseph
> > Wang (Roadrunner) at http://twofish.wordpress.com/. There were also
> > private communications from other Chinese Wikipedians on their similar
> > opinions .
> >
> > The take-home messages are:
> >
> > 1) Chinese Wikipedia has and conforms to a high standard of NPOV, and
> > Chinese Wikipedians take this policy seriously.
> >
> > 2) There is no such thing called "self-censorship" at Chinese
> > Wikipedia; indeed any intention for such practice at Chinese Wikipedia
> > will be denounced by most Chinese Wikipedians.
> >
> > 3) Chinese Wikipedia is written by people from various places of the
> > world, including Mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Asia, America,
> > Europe, etc. Indeed, editors from Mainland China are disproportionally
> > scarce because of the current block obviously imposed by the PRC
> > government (though it never admitted that).
> >
> > I am not going to list all the false/misleading statements in the
> > report, as it is super easy to identify chunks of them by any one who
> > is able to read the following Wikipedia articles in both English and
> > Chinese. There Wikipedia articles were used as examples in the report.
> > If you like, check both the current and past versions when the report
> > was prepared/published.
> >
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_Zedong
> > http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/???
> > (http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%AF%9B%E6%B3%BD%E4%B8%9C)
> >
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Taiwan
> > http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/????
> > (http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%8F%B0%E7%81%A3%E6%AD%B7%E5%8F%B2)
> >
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwanese_aborigines
> > http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/?????
> > (http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E8%87%BA%E7%81%A3%E5%8E%9F%E4%BD%8F%E6%B0%91)
> >
> > By the way, the part of Taiwan's history cited in this IHT report from
> > English Wikipedia and deemed correct was actually wrong. Luckily, that
> > part in the actual English Wikipedia article has been corrected in
> > last August.
> >
> > Best regards,
> >
> > roc
> > --
> >
> > ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> > From: Lawrence Lo <lorenzarius at gmail.com>
> > Date: 2006/11/29 ?? 11:21
> > Subject: Re: [Wikizh-l] Chinese-language Wikipedia presents different
> > view of history
> > To: Andrew Lih <andrew.lih at gmail.com>
> > Cc: wikizh-l at wikimedia.org
> >
> >
> > I call this report biased BS. A wiki as we all know is continuously
> > evolving, singling one edition of one article does not prove anything.
> > For instance the last sentences in the opening paragraph of the
> > current edition
> > (http://zh.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=%E6%AF%9B%E6%B3%BD%E4%B8%9C&oldid=3020691)
> > of the article in question now reads:
> >
> > He [Mao] was also the initiator of a series of political movements
> > such as the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, resulting
> > in the abnormal deaths of many Mainland people and great destructions
> > to many Chinese cultural and historical monuments. He had a great
> > influence on the 20th century's China and the world.
> >
> > And obviously omission does not equal self-censorship. Self-censorship
> > is when a person knows something but intentionally avoids to mention
> > it. But IMO the more realistic situation with most Mainland
> > contributors is that they don't know that "something" to begin with.
> > When a man is taught since birth that "A is right", how can you
> > criticize him for not knowing that somebody in the other part of the
> > world thinks that "B is right"? In fact, the Chinese Wikipedia is a
> > great place for people from different parts of the Chinese-speaking
> > world to get to know things that we didn't know, to understands things
> > from the other perspectives.
> >
> > On 11/29/06, Andrew Lih <andrew.lih at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > FYI, some of our own famous ZH Wikipedians mentioned...
> > >
> > >
> > > http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/11/29/news/wiki.php
> > >
> > >  Chinese-language Wikipedia presents different view of history
> > > By Howard W. French
> > > The New York Times
> > >
> > > Just who was Mao Zedong?
> > >
> > > According to the English-language version of Wikipedia, the popular
> > > online encyclopedia, he was a victorious military and political leader
> > > who founded China's modern Communist state. He was also a man many saw
> > > as "a mass murderer, holding his leadership accountable for the deaths
> > > of tens of millions of innocent Chinese."
> > >
> > > Switch to Wikipedia in Chinese, and one discovers a very different
> > > man. There, Mao Zedong's reputation is unsullied by any mention of a
> > > death toll in the great purges of the 1950s and 1960s, or for what
> > > many historians call the greatest famine in human history.
> > >
> > > In recent weeks, the Chinese government has demonstrated its hostility
> > > toward the emergence of a credible source of reference material that
> > > escapes its control by frequently blocking access to Wikipedia, whose
> > > Chinese version, though still far smaller than its English-language
> > > counterpart, is growing by leaps and bounds.
> > >
> > > But on sensitive questions of China's modern history or on hot-button
> > > issues, the Chinese version diverges so dramatically from its English
> > > counterpart that it sometimes reads as if it were approved by the
> > > censors themselves.
> > >
> > > This gulf in information and perspective comes across powerfully in
> > > the entry on Mao, which is consistently one of the most frequently
> > > searched and edited topics in the Chinese version, and in the entry on
> > > historical watersheds, like the Tiananmen Square massacre, the Great
> > > Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution.
> > >
> > > Chinese Wikipedia users and critics say that the differences highlight
> > > the resilience here of a system of information control whose reach
> > > goes well beyond simple censorship.
> > >
> > > In each of its language versions, Wikipedia is collaboratively written
> > > and edited by online enthusiasts, and contributors to the
> > > Chinese-language site explain the differences in content by citing the
> > > powerful influence of Chinese education, which often provides a neatly
> > > sanitized national perspective on sensitive aspects of the country's
> > > past.
> > >
> > > This parochialism is reinforced by the blocking of foreign Web sites,
> > > and by the conformism of the carefully censored mass media.
> > > Alternative viewpoints are sometimes available, but usually only to a
> > > restricted circle of people who have the means and determination to
> > > seek them out.
> > >
> > > For some, the Chinese version of Wikipedia was intended as just such a
> > > resource, but its tame approach to sensitive topics has sparked a
> > > fierce debate in the world of online mavens over its objectivity and
> > > thoroughness.
> > >
> > > In a recent discussion on the encyclopedia's Web site about the Mao
> > > legacy, a user with the online name Manchurian Tiger wrote, "If anyone
> > > can prove that Mao's political movements didn't kill so many people,
> > > I'm willing to delete the wording that 'millions of people were
> > > killed.'" Rather than contribute to encyclopedias, those who wish to
> > > pay tribute to Mao, he added, should "go to his mausoleum."
> > >
> > > Another user replied angrily: "If you want to release your emotions,
> > > use a bulletin board. Wikipedia is not your toilet." In the end, the
> > > entry on Mao included no death toll from either famine or political
> > > purges.
> > >
> > > Indeed, in its present form, the Chinese Wikipedia introduction to Mao
> > > Zedong could hardly be more anodyne: "One of the main founders and
> > > leaders of the Communist Party of China, the People's Liberation Army
> > > and the People's Republic of China," it reads. "He introduced a series
> > > of political movements such as the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural
> > > Revolution. He had a great influence over 20th-century China and the
> > > world."
> > >
> > > On the evidence of entries like this, for the moment, the fight over
> > > editorial direction of Wikipedia in Chinese is being won by
> > > enthusiasts who practice self-censorship.
> > >
> > > "Most of the people who contribute to Wikipedia rarely touch upon
> > > political topics," said Yuan Mingli, a frequent contributor from
> > > Shanghai. "They prefer to write about things like technology. There
> > > are other things in life."
> > >
> > > Others denounce compromises on content as a deviation from the
> > > original mission of Wikipedia, which they say is to spread reliable
> > > information and to seek truth. In any case, they add, self- censorship
> > > has already proved na?ve because the government still frequently
> > > blocks access for most Chinese Internet users.
> > >
> > > "There is a lot of confusion about whether they should obey the
> > > neutral point of view or offer some compromises to the government,"
> > > said Isaac Mao, a well-known Chinese blogger and user of the
> > > encyclopedia. "To the local Wikipedians, the first objective is to
> > > make it well-known among Chinese, to get people to understand the
> > > principles of Wikipedia step by step, and not to get the thing blocked
> > > by the government. The government doesn't buy into their attitude."
> > >
> > > After Mao Zedong, few questions are treated as more sacrosanct in
> > > China than the status of Taiwan, which every pupil is taught is
> > > irrevocably part of China. To publicly suggest that Taiwanese have any
> > > historical basis for asserting their independence from China would be
> > > a career-ending offense for anyone in academia or in the media.
> > >
> > > The English-language version of the encyclopedia speaks of a Japanese
> > > shipwreck off Taiwan in 1871, in which 54 crew members were beheaded
> > > by Taiwanese aborigines. Japan demanded compensation from China, only
> > > to be told that Taiwan was not within China's jurisdiction. The
> > > Chinese-language entry on Taiwan, meanwhile, is silent on the
> > > jurisdiction question.
> > >
> > > Similarly, the English-language Wikipedia mentions the settlement of
> > > Taiwan by aborigines who are genetically related to Malaysians, about
> > > 4,000 years ago. It also places the first meaningful settlement of the
> > > island by Chinese in the 16th century.
> > >
> > > The Chinese version of Wikipedia, though, merely speaks of cultural
> > > affinities with Malaysians and speculates about the possible
> > > exploration of the island by Chinese as far back as the third century.
> > >
> > > A parallel, and purely homegrown, effort at creating an online
> > > encyclopedia in China, Baidu Baike, skirts controversies like these
> > > altogether. Baidu Baike, which is owned by the biggest Internet search
> > > engine company in China, asserts that Taiwan's original inhabitants
> > > "came from mainland China directly or indirectly," and not from
> > > Malaysia.
> > >
> > > Similarly, a user who searches for the Tiananmen Square massacre will
> > > find no entry.
> > >
> > > As online reference sites grow in popularity here, Baidu Baike
> > > benefits from government efforts to block Wikipedia, just as the same
> > > company's search engine once benefited from similar blockage of
> > > Google.
> > >
> > > Baidu Baike, much of whose content appears to be copied directly from
> > > Wikipedia, would not release detailed user statistics, saying only
> > > that it has "several million" users each day. A spokeswoman for the
> > > company, Zhang Yan, said it is guided by the editorial policy of not
> > > "judging the existing national system with malice."
> > >
> > > Asked to explain what this meant, Zhang said, "Anyone who is Chinese knows."
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > Wikizh-l mailing list
> > > Wikizh-l at Wikipedia.org
> > > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikizh-l
> > >
> >
> >
> > --
> > http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Lorenzarius
> > Tel: +852 95825791
> > _______________________________________________
> > Wikizh-l mailing list
> > Wikizh-l at Wikipedia.org
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikizh-l
> > _______________________________________________
> > foundation-l mailing list
> > foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
> >
>
>
> --
> Chinese wikipedia: http://zh.wikipedia.org/
> My blog: http://talk.blogbus.com
> CNBlog: http://blog.cnblog.org/weblog.html
> Social Brain: http://www.socialbrain.org/default.asp
> cnbloggercon: http://www.cnbloggercon.org/
>
> [[zh:User:Shizhao]]
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


from_name: Andrew Lih

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
Please consider this an end to this thread.

Too many bit spilt alraedy on what seems to be, in this particular
case, a completely obvious action. Thanks.

-Andrew (User:Fuzheado)
A WikiEN-L moderator, when he needs to be

On 12/1/06, Rich Holton <richholton at gmail.com> wrote:
> George Herbert wrote:
> > On 11/30/06, Phil Sandifer <Snowspinner at gmail.com> wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >> On Nov 30, 2006, at 4:51 PM, Tony Jacobs wrote:
> >>>   I'll agree that Nazi is beyond the pale, but where, precisely, is
> >>> "the pale"?
> >> There is no definition of "the pale." This is Calvinball. When things
> >> are stupid, we kill them. The end. No details, no "process," just
> >> "That is stupid," followed by "bang."
> >>
> >
> > Most of us don't really get to play Calvinball with trolls.  That's probably
> > a good thing.
> >
> > Jimbo does.  That's probably also a good thing.
> >
> >
> It will be interesting if the one thing to last out of Watterson's comic
> is the word "Calvinball".
>
> I loved that comic. Too bad he retired.
>
> -Rich Holton
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: David Gerard

body:
On 01/12/06, Darko Bulatovic <mail at itam.ws> wrote:
> David Gerard wrote:
> > On 01/12/06, Darko Bulatovic <mail at itam.ws> wrote:

> >> I would like to see some of yours opinions regarding this issue as this
> >> looks very strange to me.

> > OK: Splitting Serbo-Croatian into three wikis was a ridiculous
> > mistake, and does not justify compounding the error.

> Do you think that negation of one language is much bigger mistake?

But it isn't a language. It's barely a distinct dialect.

- d.


from_name: Daniel P. B. Smith

subject: [WikiEN-l] GNAA Deleted!

body:
> From: <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com>
>
> "The Cunctator" wrote
>
>> I'd just like to remind people that Wikipedia was doing quite well
>> in the
>> Age Before Required Sourcing.
>
> Yeah. But there has been something of a 'phase change'; and that is
> not for no reason. Several really. The readers are less tolerant of
> and amused by errors; the editing community has largely preferred a
> more academic approach over time. Nothing scales 'with impunity' (I
> think this is the fundamental theorem of computer science ...)

And in that age, when you said anything you were told that everyone
understood that Wikipedia was a work in progress, and that sourcing
would happen eventually.

Well, the work in progress is progressing, and that means that more
and more "eventually" is now.

I was doing quite well in the age when I wore diapers, but eventually...


body:
Darko Bulatovic wrote:

>Yann Forget wrote:
>
>
>>Darko Bulatovic a ?crit :
>>
>>
>>>That is very specific case, As in Switzerland live Italians, Germans and
>>>Franks. In Montenegrin case in Montenegro lives 45% Montenegrin s, 35%
>>>Serbs, Albanians, Bosnnjaks,...
>>>On other cases those countries was colonies of mayor European empires.
>>>
>>>
>>There is nothing specific about that. The examples given by Sabine is
>>perfectly valid. The problem is that you don't want to admit it.
>>
>>
>Yann,
>
>How much do you know about this? You are angry at me Yann? That I called
>you to not make assumptions? Your assumptions affect half of million
>people Yann.I hope that you relise that, as  I don't really understand
>you. Sabine did at least showed  her point of view  here, and you just
>make comments without any argument.
>
I don't think that Yann was expressing anger.  His suggestion to use the
sh.wikipedia was a constructive one.  Of Montenegrin, Serbian, Albanian,
and Bosnian mentioned above most people outside of the Balkans would see
only Albanian as different enough from the others to merit being called
a language.  To say that this issue will affect half a million people
(by which I assume you mean the entire population of Montenegro) is
overly dramatic; most of those people will just carry on normally with
their lives no matter how the arguments here are resolved.

The five of us who have so far participated with you in this discussion
are from five different countries (none of which is Serbia), and five
different native languages.  I have seen three of the others regularly
participate in discussions about language, so I would pay attentiont
their opinions even when I don't agree with them.

If you really want to do things for the Montenegrin language you could
do better than argue in favour of the correlation  between nation and
language.  Begin by giving references to existing Montenegrin dictionary
and grammar books, showing Montenegrin words in Wiktionary and how they
differ from other Serbo-Croatian languages, show us the important
differences in Montenegrin grammar, or.add important out-of-copyright
books by Montenegrin authors to Wikisource.

Ec


subject: [Wikitech-l] tiff files?

body:
On 12/1/06, Ilmari Karonen <nospam at vyznev.net> wrote:

> What do you need TIFF files for that PNG can't handle?
>
> I'm genuine interested; there are things the TIFF format can do that PNG
> can't, but I'd like to know which features you need and why.

I'm not sure of all the technical details, but see the Wikisource discussion
at
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Wikisource:Scriptorium/Archives/2006/11#TIFF_files_on_Wikimedia_Commons.
>From what I understand, PNG's aren't all that great for photographs (or in
the Wikisource case, scans of pages of books and other documents) and don't
work well with scanset, and JPEG's are ridiculously large for the same
amount of information as is in a TIFF.  Discussion on Commons (
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Village_pump#TIFF_files.3F) seemed
to suggest that the real problem was image size, but again, it looks like
JPEG's would end up being bigger than the TIFF's.

At the end of the day, we'd like to be able to store large images that are
as detailed as possible, and be able to use them for proofreading on
Wikisource.

Nathaniel


body:
David Gerard wrote:
> On 01/12/06, Darko Bulatovic <mail at itam.ws> wrote:
>
>
>> I would like to see some of yours opinions regarding this issue as this
>> looks very strange to me.
>>
>
>
> OK: Splitting Serbo-Croatian into three wikis was a ridiculous
> mistake, and does not justify compounding the error.
>
>
> - d.
> _______________________________________________
>
>

Do you think that negation of one language is much bigger mistake?

Darko Bulatovic


from_name: Gerard Meijssen

body:
Darko Bulatovic schreef:
> David Gerard wrote:
>
>> On 01/12/06, Darko Bulatovic <mail at itam.ws> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>> I would like to see some of yours opinions regarding this issue as this
>>> looks very strange to me.
>>>
>>>
>> OK: Splitting Serbo-Croatian into three wikis was a ridiculous
>> mistake, and does not justify compounding the error.
>>
>>
>> - d.
>> _______________________________________________
>>
>>
>>
>
> Do you think that negation of one language is much bigger mistake?
>
> Darko Bulatovic
Hoi,
Sabine asked some colleagues (translators) on the mailing lists for
professional translators about Montenegrin, the universal answer is that
Montenegrin and Serbian is the same language. The point here is that
when it DOES make a difference, translators will have business by
adapting it for use on the Montenegrin market. In this a text prepared
for the Dutch market is different from a Belgian market because there
being a big discrepancy in the vocabulary .. all this does not deny us
both speaking Dutch.

Thanks,
    GerardM


from_name: Luna

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

body:
>Maybe the preformat should appear only when an IP address creates a page...

Except that IPs can't create pages in the main namespace. :p Don't recall
how long ago that was disabled.

All in all, this seems like an interesting idea, but also like something
that might be easier to work out on-wiki than off. Anybody care to suggest a
particular sandbox to play around in?

On 11/30/06, dmehkeri at swi.com <dmehkeri at swi.com> wrote:
>
> >
> > > > Plus it would slow down making redirects to cut boilerplate text. I
> do a
> > lot of redirects ... I do mean thousands.
> >
> > > I was going to say, it should be possible to disable this feature for
> > > experienced users.
> >
> >
> > Maybe. OTOH, just have a look through [[Special:Newpages]] on a Sunday
> > afternoon US time. You'll consider hitting Ctrl-A before typing
> > #REDIRECT to be a small price to pay.
> >
> > - d.
>
> Maybe the preformat should appear only when an IP address creates a
> page...
>
> - another d.
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: David Ashby

body:
And we would have a standard look or oversight or anything, so
categories could all determine their own colors!  Think of
[[Category:Military History]] with a pink box, large white text, and
an image of a drill instructor yelling at the camera!

Awesome idea.  Let's implement it immediately. --humblefool

On 12/1/06, The Cunctator <cunctator at gmail.com> wrote:
> I was kidding. But imagine at the bottom of an article instead of just
> listing the categories it belonged to in "boring" text each category had its
> own pretty colored box with some goofy icon.
>
> That would be AWESOME.
>
> Again, I'm not being serious.
>
> On 12/1/06, Ryan Wetherell <renardius at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > Could you elaborate?
> >
> > --Ryan
> >
> > On 12/1/06, The Cunctator <cunctator at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > I think Wikipedia would be better if categories were done in the style
> > of
> > > userboxen.
> > >
> > > On 11/30/06, David Ashby <humble.fool at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > On 11/30/06, Steve Summit <scs at eskimo.com> wrote:
> > > > > > And what better tie-in than Naziism.
> > > > > > Mike Godwin would laugh and laugh...
> > > > On 11/30/06, Ryan Wetherell <renardius at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > > I think I'll be deleting my political-geared userboxes, just to be
> > safe.
> > > >
> > > > I'm up for deleting all userboxes, but that's neither here nor there.
> > > >
> > > > -humblefool
> > > > _______________________________________________
> > > > WikiEN-l mailing list
> > > > WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> > > > To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> > > > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
> > > >
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > WikiEN-l mailing list
> > > WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> > > To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> > > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
> > >
> > _______________________________________________
> > WikiEN-l mailing list
> > WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> > To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
> >
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


subject:
[Foundation-l] semi-on-topic regarding the
	Serbo-Croato-Bosnio-Montenegrin language

body:
http://uncyclopedia.org/wiki/You_Know_You%27re_Croatian_When

- d.


from_name: Erik Moeller

subject: [Commons-l] SVG chessboard transparency

body:
On 12/1/06, Daniel Kinzler <daniel at brightbyte.de> wrote:
> No, actually this is a background image set using CSS. The chessboard
> pattern is not part of the png (try "view image").

Ah, that makes sense. Might be nice to have a little JavaScript link
to hide/show it, but otherwise it seems fine.
--
Peace & Love,
Erik

Member, Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees

DISCLAIMER: Unless otherwise stated, all views or opinions expressed
in this message are solely my own and do not represent an official
position of the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.


from_name: Gregory Maxwell

subject: [Wikitech-l] tiff files?

body:
On 12/1/06, Nathaniel <spangineer at gmail.com> wrote:
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Wikisource:Scriptorium/Archives/2006/11#TIFF_files_on_Wikimedia_Commons.
> >From what I understand, PNG's aren't all that great for photographs (or in
> the Wikisource case, scans of pages of books and other documents) and don't
> work well with scanset, and JPEG's are ridiculously large for the same
> amount of information as is in a TIFF.  Discussion on Commons (
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Village_pump#TIFF_files.3F) seemed
> to suggest that the real problem was image size, but again, it looks like
> JPEG's would end up being bigger than the TIFF's.

PNG and TIFF are in the exact same boat in this regard.  JPEG isn't
necessarily bigger, but rather we should expect objectionable
artifacts in JPEGs.

The misconception that PNGs are somehow low quality for continuous
tone images appears to be rampant in our community and it needs to be
stopped. What PNGs actually are is space inefficient, and while people
might argue that *space is cheap*, bandwidth is not and until we have
cross-format thumbnailing, size will remain a major factor in our
selection of upload formats.

We also have the worry that "TIFF" doesn't actually tell us what it
is.. TIFF is one of those generic wrappers which people can (and do)
shove all sorts of random crap into... including proprietary/patented
formats (I've seen TIFFs stuffed with Mr.SID for digital
orthophotography), although it's not that common since most things
can't read such tiffs.

> At the end of the day, we'd like to be able to store large images that are
> as detailed as possible, and be able to use them for proofreading on
> Wikisource.

The best format for this is dejavu, which we support, but we don't
have support for either the browser plugins or serverside
autoconversion.

The only advantage I see for tiff is that some of the browser plugins
have nice navigation abilities.. but the same is true for dejavu... if
we're going to put something up that needs a browser plugin it should
be the free software solution. Dejavu  also happens to have MUCH
better compression, and it would also be an acceptable lossy solution
for photographs as well.. better than jpeg.


body:
On 01/12/06, Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen at gmail.com> wrote:
> David Gerard schreef:

> > http://uncyclopedia.org/wiki/You_Know_You%27re_Croatian_When

> Hoi,
> I am afraid it is a bit off topic ..

It gives an idea of the nationalism involved. But perpetuating the
mistake of having separate Serbian, Croatian and Bosnian Wikipedias
really just is not going to happen.

- d.


from_name: Alphax (Wikipedia email)

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
>> Nope totaly legal in the US. PRobably not legal in germany probably
>> legal in the UK.
>
> Indeed, the only country that has laws against being pro-nazi, to my
> knowledge, is Germany. As long as it isn't in the template space, we
> might as well let it be.
>

The use of insignia of organizations that have been banned in Germany
(like the Nazi swastika or the arrow cross) may also be illegal in
Germany, Austria, Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic, France, Brazil and
other countries, depending on context. In Germany, the applicable law is
paragraph 86a of the criminal code (StGB), in Poland ? Art. 256 of the
criminal code (Dz.U. 1997 nr 88 poz. 553).

(Bonus points if tell me where it came from)

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

-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 569 bytes
Desc: OpenPGP digital signature
Url : http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/attachments/20061201/3a420c02/attachment.pgp


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

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

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Greg_Williams

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

-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 569 bytes
Desc: OpenPGP digital signature
Url : http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/attachments/20061201/9105e247/attachment.pgp


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
Tony Jacobs wrote:
<snip>
>
> Personally, I wasn't discussing that user at all, but the principle of
> tolerating some political userboxes and not others.
>

I demand that every instance of "GOP" be a piped link to whichever
bloody stupid party it stands for. We're not all 'Merkins, y'know?

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

-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 569 bytes
Desc: OpenPGP digital signature
Url : http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/attachments/20061201/25282214/attachment.pgp


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nazi userboxes

body:
Rob wrote:
> On 11/30/06, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:
>> On 30/11/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> Yes, but the consensus is amongst the vast majority of non-Nazis that
>>> they are offensive.  There is no need for an all or nothing
>>> requirement here.
>> The concensus among most non-Republicans is that they are morally
>> offensive. The same goes for the Democrats. So what?
>
> This is an absurd comparison.  Rational people are completely capable
> of distinguishing between normal partisan politics and a group which
> advocates mass extermination.
>

Historically, the USA supported facism.

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

-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 569 bytes
Desc: OpenPGP digital signature
Url : http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/attachments/20061201/fc8ac5bc/attachment.pgp


subject: [Wikitech-l] tiff files?

body:
On 12/1/06, Sherool <jamydlan at online.no> wrote:
> I would guess the ability to include multiple "pages" in one file. If you
> scan a 1000 page book most document scanners will let you save it as a
> single multi-page TIFF file, and that is a heck of a lot easier to upload
> than 1000 PGN images would be.

Dejavu supports multipage documents. We support .djvu uploads.

http://djvulibre.djvuzone.org/

Sure, you'll need a viewer plugin/app but tiff is in the same boat.