subject: [WikiEN-l] Only Hard Cases?

body:
Delirium wrote:
>...
>Perhaps it's a personal opinion, but I think we
>ought to strive to be as open and accomodating
>as possible, and avoid banning as much as
>possible, since that's basically a "we give up,
>this person cannot work within Wikipedia" decision.
>...

I hope this will become the general ethos of the dispute resolution process.
If not, then, IMO, we would have failed. However, arbitration is on the tail
end of that process so I imagine that a fair number of arbitration cases will
result in some type of editing sanction period (such as slowdowns, not able
to edit certain articles or kinds of  articles, not able to edit in a certain
namespace(s), not being able to edit at all for a short term, and not being
able to edit at all for a long term).

-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)


list: wikipedia-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Optim

subject: [Wikipedia-l] bylaws part II

body:
if I understand well, it is impossible to become
a member of the Foundation without exposing a
real identity (full name etc), so anonymous
members are not allowed.

If I continue to understand well,  a person who
cannot reveal a real identity can continue having
a user account on Wikipedia or contribute as
anonymous IP address.

Is my understanding right?

--Optim

--- Anthere <anthere8 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Section 2. USER ACCOUNTS OF MEMBERS. All
> applicants for contributing or
> volunteer active membership shall maintain a
> user account on one or
> several Wikimedia projects (i.e. Wikipedia of
> any language, Wikibooks,
> etc.), complete and sign the form of
> application provided by the
> Foundation on it?s web site and submit the
> application the Secretary
> along with payment of the year?s membership
> dues, if applicable, through
> such web site or by mail. Such application
> shall include an agreement by
> the applicant to abide by the Foundation's Code
> of Ethics, submission
> standards and other policies as are time to
> time adopted or modified by
> the Board of Trustees.
>
>
> Here are the following cases as regards
> participants
>
> * participant using his real name as a user
> name (example Tim Starling)
> * participant using a pseudonyme as a user
> name, but whose real name is
> displayed on his user page or is generally
> known per mailing list
> (example Cimon)
> * participant using a pseudonyme as a user
> name, but whose real name is
> known only from a limited number of
> participants (I will avoid putting
> an example here)
> * participant using a pseudonyme as a user
> name, and whose real name is
> totally unknown of
> * participant per ip
>
> Which ones may be members ?
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
>
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l

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list: wikitech-l

from_name: Ivan Krstic

subject: [Wikitech-l] European squid

body:
On Sat, 24 Jan 2004 08:21:41 +0100, Jens Frank <JeLuF at gmx.de> wrote:
> You're sure their machines are in Europe?

Jens,

it appears that even though they have a egs.edu domain hosted in
California, they also run out of Switzerland, specifically from
egsuniversity.ch (phone number given at the bottom of egs.edu matches the
one at http://www.egsuniversity.ch/index.php?option=contact&Itemid=6).

egsuniversity.ch is definitely in Switzerland, and my packets from Europe
route from GEANT/DANTE over gblx, then Tiscali, and end up at
server-r001.hostpoint.ch after 17 hops.

Cheers,
Ivan


list: wikien-l

from_name: Ira Stoll

subject: [WikiEN-l] Policy Suggestions

body:
That's exactly what I'm getting at. The wikipedia should be packed with
clickable citations.The reason why I've always loved encyclopedias so much
is the quality of the information, and the impartial manner in which it was
presented. Citations (particularly linkable) bring with them evidence for
belief, and an option for the reader to learn further, investigate for
themselves (by clicking on it). A basic of polite discourse (and a policy in
my debate club) was to accept another's argument so long as it is logical,
and to accept their premise so long as you could not disprove it (like thru
a citation). What I Don't like about the wikipedia is when the truth (or a
way of interpreting it) is removed from an article, regardless of the
quality of citation, due to overriding majority POV. My suggestions are
meant to address that. JackLynch

>On Fri, 23 Jan 2004, Rick wrote:

>Wikipedia is not a list of citations.
>
>RickK
>Ira Stoll <irastoll at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>*only replace text that you know to be wrong (inaccurate), and replace it
>with something that has a citation to back it up. If they have a reasonable
>difference, based on citation, allow both POV to be presented
>
>I don't understand your POV, Rick. Are you saying that we should have _no_
>citations or mention of references so readers can verify facts or
>quotations?
>If so, wouldn't that undermine the credibility of Wikipedia?

>Geoff

_________________________________________________________________
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from_name: Jimmy Wales

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws

body:
Anthere wrote:
> A. CONTRIBUTING ACTIVE MEMBERSHIP: Active membership in this Foundation
> shall be limited to volunteers who have contributed to any Wikimedia
> project prior to the election ballot request deadline after their
> application for membership and payment of annual dues. All active
> members shall have the right to vote in this Foundation at any
> membership vote for the Contributing Active Member Representative to the
> Board of Trustees.
>
> Why shall only those contributing before the election be considered
> members ? What about all those who will join next month ? Did I
> misunderstand something here ?

Membership is annual.  For any given year, you can vote only if you've
paid your annual dues before the election.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] bylaws part II

body:
Anthere wrote:
> * participant using his real name as a user name (example Tim Starling)
> * participant using a pseudonyme as a user name, but whose real name is
> displayed on his user page or is generally known per mailing list
> (example Cimon)
> * participant using a pseudonyme as a user name, but whose real name is
> known only from a limited number of participants (I will avoid putting
> an example here)
> * participant using a pseudonyme as a user name, and whose real name is
> totally unknown of
> * participant per ip

Only actual individual humans who submit a membership application, as
per the bylaws can be members.  The membership application should have
a checkbox for those who wish to preserve their anonymity.

--Jimbo


subject: [Wikipedia-l] bylaws part II

body:
Optim wrote:
> if I understand well, it is impossible to become
> a member of the Foundation without exposing a
> real identity (full name etc), so anonymous
> members are not allowed.
>
> If I continue to understand well,  a person who
> cannot reveal a real identity can continue having
> a user account on Wikipedia or contribute as
> anonymous IP address.
>
> Is my understanding right?

That's right.  As to what sort of procedure I ought to use to ensure
that there is not rampant vote fraud from fake names (because even if
I say you have to be a person and can only vote once, how am I to know
without such absurdities as requiring identification), I'm open to
suggestions.

But, in the best wiki spirit, my guess is that this will not be an
appreciable problem.  We will learn from experience, but mostly I
think we can trust people to do the right thing.

--Jimbo


from_name: Fred Bauder

subject: [WikiEN-l] Unadmissible Evidence

body:
What went on in mediation should simply not be considered at the arbitration
stage. So claims, true or false, are irrelevant.

Fred

> From: Anthere <anthere8 at yahoo.com>
> Reply-To: anthere8 at yahoo.com, English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Sat, 24 Jan 2004 10:37:25 +0100
> To: wikien-l at wikipedia.org
> Subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Mr. Natural Health has refused mediation with the
> community
>
>>He
>> may even make false claims about what went on in mediation; hence, the
>> full legalistic set of rules will have to include some kind of waiver of this
>> confidentiality.


from_name: zero 0000

subject: [WikiEN-l] Policy Suggestions

body:
--- Vicki Rosenzweig <vr at redbird.org> wrote:

> Conversely, the presence of a citation doesn't stop a
> statement from *being* strongly POV.

Well put.  In fact many edit wars start precisely when
someone thinks they have the right to insert some POV
just because they can identify a web site with the same
POV.  Although we need to allow the opinions of important
parties in some issue to be reported in attributed form,
a web site does not count as an important party.

In other words, a citation is something that adds value
to part of an article that deserves to be there regardless
of the citation.  It isn't be used as an excuse for adding
something that wouldn't be allowed without the citation.

Zero.

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subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: bylaws part II

body:
Anthere wrote:
> After all, we accept donations, and agree to keep the names of the
> donators private. Why could not we just do that as well for the members ?

Yes, I see good reason to permit people to select to have their name
be held in confidence.  And I see no harm in it.

--Jimbo


subject: [Wikipedia-l] bylaws III

body:
Anthere wrote:
>  F. HONORARY MEMBERSHIP: An Honorary membership may be bestowed upon
> any person or organization who has made a significant contribution to
> the Foundation upon a recommendation by the Board of Directors and
> approval by the general membership at the General Meeting of the
> Foundation. Honorary members shall not be required to pay dues and shall
> not be eligible to hold office or vote.
>
> What do we define as approval by the general membership ?

A vote.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws Part IV

body:
Anthere wrote:
> Are we writting here that the board may have the right to erase a user
> account from Wikipedia, just upon the argument that the user in question
> decided to resign from the foundation ?
>
> Are we saying that the board of the foundation is having any power as to
> decide who is allowed or not allowed to have an account ?

The board of the foundation has the power to decide who is allowed or
not allowed to have an account, just the same as I have always had
that power, ultimately.  That's all it means.

--Jimbo


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws V

body:
Anthere wrote:
> Section 1. POWERS. The powers of the corporation shall be exercised, its
> properties controlled, and its affairs conducted by a Board of Trustees
> to be comprised initially of five trustees. All trustees must be active
> (contributing or volunteer) or life members of the Foundation.
>
> What is the difference between a corporation and a foundation ?

"Wikimedia Foundation, Inc." is the name of a nonprofit corporation.

"foundation" is not, so far as I know, a formal legal term in the U.S.

> When the next elections take place, will there be 2 trustees to elect,
> or 4 ?

2 -- a contributing member representative and a volunteer member
representative

> Do members have any other role than electing trustees to decide of
> everything for them ?

I don't like the phrasing of that question.  The trustees no more
"decide of everything for the members" than I have done traditionally.

Nothing about the foundation changes the way our culture is organized
here, in which members -- editors -- do everything, as they see fit,
within the bounds of our social norms.

--Jimbo


subject: [WikiEN-l] Another Type of Inadmissible Evidence

body:
I think we need to consider what they destroy and how without consideration
of what good things they have done. In other words, if some one is accused
of destructive behavior, evidence that they wrote a good article or were
polite in some other context is inadmissible evidence. After it is
determined that we are dealing with someone who regularly transgresses, then
as we consider remedies we might consider all the wonderful things they did.

Fred

> From: Anthere <anthere8 at yahoo.com>
> Reply-To: anthere8 at yahoo.com, English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Sat, 24 Jan 2004 09:26:55 +0100
> To: wikien-l at wikipedia.org
> Subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Arbitration progress report #2
>
>
>> Basically the same question as above; when are people "highly detrimental to
>> wikipedia"? The current policy, by my interpretation, states that someone is
>> highly detrimental to wikipedia if their personal attacks are extreme. Which
>> is obviously far from a clear-cut answer.
>
> But the practice is that someone is highly detrimental to Wikipedia,
> when the sum of what he brings is lower that the sum of what he destroys.
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws VI

body:
Anthere wrote:
> These bylaws may be altered, amended or repealed and new Bylaws may be
> adopted by a majority of the entire Board of Trustees at any regular
> meeting or special meeting, provided that at least ten days written
> notice is given of intention to alter, amend or repeal or to adopt new
> Bylaws at such meeting.
>
> Do I understand well when reading that all powers are in the hands of
> the board only, that only board has the power to empeach one of the
> board member if necessary, that the board will then replace the missing
> member, and that only board decide of any bylaws modifications ?

If I understand your question, the answer is yes.


subject: [Wikitech-l] Front page rendering broken in Opera

body:
Hello all,

The current Wikipedia front page breaks rendering in Opera badly; the bug
has been submitted to Opera developers as bug #135287. Until they resolve
the issue, could someone with the appropriate permissions please apply the
following quickfix?

Find this line in the page:
العربية
(Araby) -

and replace it with:
العربية
(Araby) -

The only change is the addition of a non-breaking space before the "end
right-to-left" character code, but after this, Opera renders the page
correctly.

Apologies if tech-l is not the right place for this.

Cheers,
Ivan


subject: [Wikitech-l] Installing MediaWiki when you are not root.

body:
Sure, We've done it on Ibiblio and on various hosts. Generally the way to
use install.php is to modify it so you are imputing the Mysql password you
have been assigned by the host rather than the root password, which you
don't have.

That particular bug, never saw before though.

Fred

> From: Timwi <timwi at gmx.net>
> Reply-To: Wikimedia developers <wikitech-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Sat, 24 Jan 2004 11:55:40 +0000
> To: wikitech-l at wikipedia.org
> Subject: [Wikitech-l] Installing MediaWiki
>
> Is it possible to install MediaWiki on a server on which I am not root?


subject: [WikiEN-l] Swimming

body:
Me too, but as most members of the committees have never been wet before
they have to carefully design the best way to swim before they jump in. I
tried throwing them in, but they wiggled and wiggled and got away.

Fred

> From: "Dan Drake" <dd at dandrake.com>
> Reply-To: Dan Drake <dd at dandrake.com>, English Wikipedia
> <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Fri, 23 Jan 2004 13:10:29 -0800 (PST)
> To: "WikiEN-L" <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Mr. Natural Health has refused mediation with the
> community
>
> It amazes and distresses me that it is suddenly impossible to deal with a
> couple of destructive bozos (no, please don't offer me a position mediating
> or arbitrating these two cases) without weeks of major effort by some of
> the best people on Wikipedia to find a perfect system.


from_name: Vicki Rosenzweig

subject: [WikiEN-l] Policy Suggestions

body:
At 03:16 AM 1/24/04 -0600, Ira Stoll wrote:
>That's exactly what I'm getting at. The wikipedia should be packed with
>clickable citations.

In some cases, the useful citations aren't to online material--making them
clickable would
entice people to, say, the chance to buy a book, rather than actually
providing more
information.

>The reason why I've always loved encyclopedias so much is the quality of
>the information, and the impartial manner in which it was presented.
>Citations (particularly linkable) bring with them evidence for belief, and
>an option for the reader to learn further, investigate for themselves (by
>clicking on it). A basic of polite discourse (and a policy in my debate
>club) was to accept another's argument so long as it is logical, and to
>accept their premise so long as you could not disprove it (like thru a
>citation). What I Don't like about the wikipedia is when the truth (or a
>way of interpreting it) is removed from an article, regardless of the
>quality of citation, due to overriding majority POV. My suggestions are
>meant to address that. JackLynch

People who ignore the NPOV policy aren't going to stop because there's a
citation.
Conversely, the presence of a citation doesn't stop a statement from
*being* strongly
POV.


from_name: Jens Frank

subject: [Wikitech-l] European squid

body:
On Sat, Jan 24, 2004 at 02:33:50AM -0500, Ivan Krstic wrote:
> On Sat, 24 Jan 2004 08:21:41 +0100, Jens Frank <JeLuF at gmx.de> wrote:
> >You're sure their machines are in Europe?
>
> Jens,
>
> it appears that even though they have a egs.edu domain hosted in
> California, they also run out of Switzerland, specifically from
> egsuniversity.ch (phone number given at the bottom of egs.edu matches the
> one at http://www.egsuniversity.ch/index.php?option=contact&Itemid=6).
>
> egsuniversity.ch is definitely in Switzerland, and my packets from Europe
> route from GEANT/DANTE over gblx, then Tiscali, and end up at
> server-r001.hostpoint.ch after 17 hops.

12 ms round trip time is good, too. If that's where the squid will be,
this looks very nice.

	JeLuF


from_name: Daniel Ehrenberg

subject: [WikiEN-l] Citations.

body:
daniwo59 at aol.com wrote:
> Hi,
>
> There's been some talk about the use of citations as
> sources and evidence. I
> think we are treading on very thin ice here. For
> example, I am not a big fan
> of George W. Bush. I even have two books, "The Bush
> Dyslexicon" by Mark Crispin
> Miller and "The Lies of George W. Bush" by David
> Corn, which lambast him
> based entirely on his quotations. While I happen to
> like the books, I would hardly
> base an article on them--if I did, I would be
> attacked for bias and POV, even
> though all of the quotations are well documented. We
> have to be very careful
> here.
>
> Danny

I'm not sure which articles these are, but if you have
a list or something, could you contact the author(s)
and ask them to find the original source of the
information (ie. where those books got the information
from)? That kind of book usually does almost no
original research and is very well-cited.

If that is impossible, you could just prefix the
sentences with stuff like "Many believe..." to give it
an NPOV.

LDan

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from_name: Sean Barrett

subject: [WikiEN-l] CafePress Wikipedia items

body:
> Sean-
> > I am pleased to report that I ordered two Wikipedia tile coasters from
> > CafePress on [[19 January]], and received them in perfect order on
> > [[23 January]].  A very smooth, satisfactory, and recommendable
> > transaction.
>
> How is the quality of the coasters? Is the text recognizable, are there
> any pixelization effects?

For those who haven't seen the coaster at the CafePress site, it is a
tile some 11.5cm (4.5 inches) square, showing a Wikipedia edit window
in the Cologne Blue style, editing the [[Editing Wikipedia]] article.
The edit summary is "Wikipedia rocks!"

I didn't notice when I ordered, but the Wikipedia logo is the old
quote-ball, not the new puzzle-ball.

The edit text box is barely 6cm (2.35 inches) tall and holds 31 lines
of text.  I haven't seen text that small since I refinanced my house.
It is readable at the moment, even with my several-decades-old
eyeballs, but I seriously doubt that it will remain so after a few
months of impacts from mug bottoms.  Even now, the text is blurred
(not pixellated) in places, an effect somewhat like the output of a
laser printer that is running out of toner.

On the other hand, the blue of the sidebar menu is vivid, the swollen
lines of text in the quote-ball logo are recognizable as text (tho it
cannot be read) and the tile itself is decent quality.  For less than
$10 each, I am satisfied.

However, I must warn those of sensitive social consciousnesses that
these coasters were made in China.

--
 Sean Barrett     | I'm not bad, I'm just drawn
 sean at epoptic.com | that way. --Jessica Rabbit


from_name: Erik Moeller

subject: [WikiEN-l] CafePress Wikipedia items

body:
Sean-
> I am pleased to report that I ordered two Wikipedia tile coasters from
> CafePress on [[19 January]], and received them in perfect order on
> [[23 January]].  A very smooth, satisfactory, and recommendable
> transaction.

How is the quality of the coasters? Is the text recognizable, are there
any pixelization effects?

There are now $20 in commission. I've configured Cafepress to send me a
check when there are $100, which will be passed on to Wikimedia.

It would probably be preferable to send the commission checks directly to
Jimbo. To do so I need the full address and federal tax ID.

Regards,

Erik


from_name: Anthere

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Notice to defendent in the case of arbitration

body:
Dan, I *deeply* thank you for the mail you sent to apologize for writing
as a non member (usually, people do not)

Do not forget to register soon :-)

anthere

Dan Drake a ?crit:
> PMFBI again, but after following this case for a week or more, I don't
> understand this.
>
> On Fri, 23 Jan 2004 17:23:17 UTC, Fred Bauder
> <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
>
>>If he does I will revert it and protect the page.
>>
>>
>>From: Rick <giantsrick13 at yahoo.com>
>>
>>
>>He will just delete it as soon as it is posted to his Talk page.
>>
>>RickK
>>
>>Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
>>A notice should be placed on Mr. Natural Health's talk page quoting the
>>complaint and linking to Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration.
>>
>
>
>
> So what if he deletes it? Bad behavior, but it's his talk page. The point
> of posting the notice would seem to be to inform him of the fact that
> arbitration is requested. When the notice goes up on his talk page, he's
> informed. If he decides to ignore the notice, then I suppose there's a
> procedure for handling that. If he claims he never got the notice -- well,
> gimme a break! What are archives for?
>
> OTOH, if a disputant deletes the official public arbitration notice on the
> RFA page, then just ban his/her ass.  Naturally, the charge of vandalizing
> the RFA page is one he has to be allowed to defend himself against, but if
> that charge is established, you can forget all the other issues and all
> those complexities and doubts and ambiguities and procedural
> complications, and just ban his ass.
>
> What am I missing here?


from_name: Ulrich Fuchs

subject: [Wikipedia-l] foundation of a German registered association

body:
> I hereby appoint Kurt to be Vice President, Germany, of the
> international Wikimedia Foundation.

Sorry Jimmy, but that's exactly the top-down strategy that should be
reconsidered soon.

Uli


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Arbitration progress report #2

body:
> Basically the same question as above; when are people "highly detrimental to
> wikipedia"? The current policy, by my interpretation, states that someone is
> highly detrimental to wikipedia if their personal attacks are extreme. Which
> is obviously far from a clear-cut answer.

But the practice is that someone is highly detrimental to Wikipedia,
when the sum of what he brings is lower that the sum of what he destroys.


body:
> Yes, I can see that might be possible, but it is for this reason that
> I think it wise if we consult with a German attorney.

Just got the information here on the german list that it might be *illegal*
for german attorneys to work pro bono (the money they might charge and must
charge is stricltly reglemented here, and they must not not do stick out
their head too much with anything that could be interpreted as "advertising
themselves"). So probably it will get hard to find one. We have two attornies
or at least law-professional among the german contributors (I guess), but one
prefers to stay anonym and the other already didn't want to be admin because
of the possible legal implications...

Uli


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws

body:
We are currently trying to translate the bylaws (thanks Jeff !)

A paragraph raised my attention

A. CONTRIBUTING ACTIVE MEMBERSHIP: Active membership in this Foundation
shall be limited to volunteers who have contributed to any Wikimedia
project prior to the election ballot request deadline after their
application for membership and payment of annual dues. All active
members shall have the right to vote in this Foundation at any
membership vote for the Contributing Active Member Representative to the
Board of Trustees.

Why shall only those contributing before the election be considered
members ? What about all those who will join next month ? Did I
misunderstand something here ?


subject: [WikiEN-l] CafePress Wikipedia items

body:
> However, I must warn those of sensitive social
> consciousnesses that
> these coasters were made in China.
>
> --
>  Sean Barrett

That's mildly ironic, considering that Wikipedia was
banned in China.

__________________________________
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subject: [Wikipedia-l] bylaws part II

body:
Section 2. USER ACCOUNTS OF MEMBERS. All applicants for contributing or
volunteer active membership shall maintain a user account on one or
several Wikimedia projects (i.e. Wikipedia of any language, Wikibooks,
etc.), complete and sign the form of application provided by the
Foundation on it?s web site and submit the application the Secretary
along with payment of the year?s membership dues, if applicable, through
such web site or by mail. Such application shall include an agreement by
the applicant to abide by the Foundation's Code of Ethics, submission
standards and other policies as are time to time adopted or modified by
the Board of Trustees.

Here are the following cases as regards participants

* participant using his real name as a user name (example Tim Starling)
* participant using a pseudonyme as a user name, but whose real name is
displayed on his user page or is generally known per mailing list
(example Cimon)
* participant using a pseudonyme as a user name, but whose real name is
known only from a limited number of participants (I will avoid putting
an example here)
* participant using a pseudonyme as a user name, and whose real name is
totally unknown of
* participant per ip

Which ones may be members ?


subject: [Wikipedia-l] bylaws III

body:
  F. HONORARY MEMBERSHIP: An Honorary membership may be bestowed upon
any person or organization who has made a significant contribution to
the Foundation upon a recommendation by the Board of Directors and
approval by the general membership at the General Meeting of the
Foundation. Honorary members shall not be required to pay dues and shall
not be eligible to hold office or vote.

What do we define as approval by the general membership ?


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws Part IV

body:
Section 4.2. WRITTEN RESIGNATION. Any member may resign from the
Foundation by submitting a written resignation to the Secretary. Such
resignation shall be effective as of the date received by the
Foundation, unless said resignation specifies another date. The Board at
it?s sole discretion may maintain or remove any such user?s account from
any of its projects upon such resignation.

Wait a minute there...Why should resignation from the wikimedia
foundation have ANY sort of relation with the fact of being allowed to
contribute to Wikipedia ?

Are we writting here that the board may have the right to erase a user
account from Wikipedia, just upon the argument that the user in question
decided to resign from the foundation ?

Are we saying that the board of the foundation is having any power as to
decide who is allowed or not allowed to have an account ?


subject: [WikiEN-l] User:Kevin Baas

body:
Difficult, Seems bogus, but as I am ignorant in the area there is always a
nagging doubt that maybe he's on to something. But on to something, however
well-founded and creative, is not fulfilling our encyclopedic mission which
is to render established knowledge in an authoritative, but condensed
package. So the onus is on him to back up whatever he puts forth with cited
authority.

I would suggest you request mediation of him and the mediation committee.

Fred

> From: "Charles Matthews" <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com>
> Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Sat, 24 Jan 2004 16:26:20 -0000
> To: "Wikien list" <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Subject: [WikiEN-l] User:Kevin Baas
>
> The clarifications on this list of 'WP norms' and 'WP due process' are very
> welcome.
>
> There is an ongoing problem, as far as I'm concerned, with [[User:Kevin
> baas]].  As anyone who reads his home page can see, he has a certain
> research program in mind.  As far as I can see, it has no merit; but that's
> not really the point.
> Comments such as his (on [[Talk:Real computation]]) "don't you guys have a
> sense of shame?" cause a deterioration of the atrmosphere. The current
> [[Real computation]] page seems to me eminently sensible.  I don't think
> this kind of bullying comment should be applied, just because the page
> content casts doubt on Kevin's research 'proposal'.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws V

body:
Section 1. POWERS. The powers of the corporation shall be exercised, its
properties controlled, and its affairs conducted by a Board of Trustees
to be comprised initially of five trustees. All trustees must be active
(contributing or volunteer) or life members of the Foundation.

What is the difference between a corporation and a foundation ?

When the next elections take place, will there be 2 trustees to elect,
or 4 ?

Do members have any other role than electing trustees to decide of
everything for them ?


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws VI

body:
These bylaws may be altered, amended or repealed and new Bylaws may be
adopted by a majority of the entire Board of Trustees at any regular
meeting or special meeting, provided that at least ten days written
notice is given of intention to alter, amend or repeal or to adopt new
Bylaws at such meeting.

Do I understand well when reading that all powers are in the hands of
the board only, that only board has the power to empeach one of the
board member if necessary, that the board will then replace the missing
member, and that only board decide of any bylaws modifications ?


from_name: Daniel P.B.Smith

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Packed with clickable citations

body:
> Message: 4
> Date: Sat, 24 Jan 2004 03:16:31 -0600
> From: "Ira Stoll" <irastoll at hotmail.com>
> Subject: [WikiEN-l] Policy Suggestions
> To: wikien-l at Wikipedia.org
> Message-ID: <Law12-F47IGOHE44UQu0001b8be at hotmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed
>
> That's exactly what I'm getting at. The wikipedia should be packed with
> clickable citations.The reason why I've always loved encyclopedias so
> much
> is the quality of the information, and the impartial manner in which
> it was
> presented. Citations (particularly linkable) bring with them evidence
> for
> belief, and an option for the reader to learn further, investigate for
> themselves (by clicking on it). A basic of polite discourse (and a
> policy in
> my debate club) was to accept another's argument so long as it is
> logical,
> and to accept their premise so long as you could not disprove it (like
> thru
> a citation). What I Don't like about the wikipedia is when the truth
> (or a
> way of interpreting it) is removed from an article, regardless of the
> quality of citation, due to overriding majority POV. My suggestions are
> meant to address that. JackLynch

I agree completely. Lack of citation and traceability is IMHO a big
glaring
deficiency in traditional encyclopedias, and it's one that should be
remediable
in a hypertext encyclopedia. (However, like so much about Wikipedia,
there's no big barrier to "just doing it" and hoping that others will
follow suit. Much as I'd like better Wiki-apparatus for the purpose).

As for "Wikipedia is not a list of citations"—fine; neither is
Lauren Hillenbrand's "Seabiscuit: An American Legend," but every
darn statement she make in that readable, popular bestseller is
documented and attributed.

The omniscient viewpoint adopted by textbooks below the college
level and encyclopedias is intellectually dishonest. When an educated
person reads any factual matter, the question "Why should I believe
this?"
is (or should always be) in the back of their mind. "Because it's in a
book
and 'they' wouldn't print it if it weren't true?" "Because the style of
writing
gives me the impression the author knows what he's talking about?"

Verifiability is important. (And it's just as important for
noncontroversial
facts as for controversial facts).

One of the nice things about Wikipedia is that it gives us an
opportunity to think about the nature of knowledge
and authority.

--
Daniel P. B. Smith, dpbsmith at world.std.com alternate:
dpbsmith at alum.mit.edu
"Elinor Goulding Smith's Great Big Messy Book" is now back in print!
Sample chapter at http://world.std.com/~dpbsmith/messy.html
Buy it at http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1403314063/


from_name: Dan Miller

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: WikiEN-l Digest, Vol 6, Issue 105

body:
Hi, I just had a somewhat weird problem with the wiki.
 I wanted to see if we had an article on "tin can", so
I typed it in and hit go.  On my screen showed up the
article "Ford Model T", redirected from "Tin Lizzie".
Why would this occur? Meelar

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from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws

body:
Anthere wrote:

> We are currently trying to translate the bylaws (thanks Jeff !)
>
> A paragraph raised my attention
>
> A. CONTRIBUTING ACTIVE MEMBERSHIP: Active membership in this
> Foundation shall be limited to volunteers who have contributed to any
> Wikimedia project prior to the election ballot request deadline after
> their application for membership and payment of annual dues. All
> active members shall have the right to vote in this Foundation at any
> membership vote for the Contributing Active Member Representative to
> the Board of Trustees.
>
> Why shall only those contributing before the election be considered
> members ? What about all those who will join next month ? Did I
> misunderstand something here ?

I think that this paragraph in the draft was needlessly convoluted.  If
one basically defines an "active member" as a person who has contributed
to any Wikimedia project article, a "paid-up member" is then an active
member who has paid annual dues.  Defining "members" is more direct than
defining "memberships" since the latter is nothing more than the status
of being a member.  We also need to avoid confusion between the words
"contributor" and "donor", and that distinction should be made clear in
a definitions article.  Our practice has been to use "contributor" for a
person who has written or edited articles, and to use "donor" for a
person who has given money.  I had to read the second sentence several
times to make sense of it; whet it seems to say is that every member,
wheteher or not he has paid dues, has the right to vote for this position.

A provision that limits voting rights to those who were members when the
election is called, or who have been members at least 30 days (or some
other appropriate time period) is reasonable.  It helps in preventing a
flood of last minute members whose only purpose for joining is to
support some person in his election bid.

Ec


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Re: Mr. Natural Health has refused mediation with the
	community

body:
Dan Drake a ?crit:

> We do understand, of course, that if mediation doesn't succeed, and
> someone takes the same case to arbitration, a person who is not of good
> will is certain to complain that he's being put on trial twice and having to
> defend himself against the very same things that came up in mediation.

A mediator is not a judge. He is not there to put someone in accusation.

He
> may even make false claims about what went on in mediation; hence, the
> full legalistic set of rules will have to include some kind of waiver of this
> confidentiality.

full legalistic set of rules ?
May we keep the whole process simple, without setting up 15 pages rules
please :-(
It does not matter really if the disputant makes false claims about what
went on in mediation; as far as mediation is concerned, the case will be
closed

> It amazes and distresses me that it is suddenly impossible to deal with a
> couple of destructive bozos (no, please don't offer me a position mediating
> or arbitrating these two cases) without weeks of major effort by some of
> the best people on Wikipedia to find a perfect system.
>
> Ray S has said,
> "If by  our actions we only succeed in convincing the accused that the
> process is unfair, then we have undermined the mediation system, and his
> refusal to co-operate with it begins to seem more logical."
> It's undermined only to the extent that anyone else agrees that the process
> is unfair.
>
> What I don't get is the need for a long and difficult process to make sure
> that no one can find the mediation process unfair. Mediators have no power.
> If you don't expect the mediation to be fair, you can reject it. Then, if
> someone still cares, there will be a request for arbitration, which _does_
> have power to act. That's where to concentrate on fairness and the
> assurance of fairness.
>
> MNH having declined mediation, he and the mediation process are now
> irrelevant to each other. Anyone who holds that something ought to be
> done about him needs to forget the mediation process and concentrate on
> getting arbitration working.

The last I knew, MNH agreed to mediation for the article issue, but
requested arbitration for the human dispute issue.

>>(note that, de facto, it is
>>best for the mediator never to get into conflict with that editor
>>afterwards, temptation could be high :-)).
>>
>>If one of the disputant fear he might be participating in a fair system,
>>perhaps would it be for him to choose a silent overseer ?
>
>
> I'm not sure what this means -- someone on his side who will watch the
> proceedings and form an opinion (for whose benefit?) on their propriety?
> Fine, if the parties want it. But again, since mediators have no power --
> presumably not even power to send the case to arbitration -- what does it
> matter?

This is not a question of putting someone on one side or another, this
is a question of having a neutral observer watching to guarantee the
process is fair.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] bylaws part II

body:
Anthere wrote:

> Section 2. USER ACCOUNTS OF MEMBERS. All applicants for contributing
> or volunteer active membership shall maintain a user account on one or
> several Wikimedia projects (i.e. Wikipedia of any language, Wikibooks,
> etc.), complete and sign the form of application provided by the
> Foundation on its web site and submit the application the Secretary
> along with payment of the years membership dues, if applicable,
> through such web site or by mail. Such application shall include an
> agreement by the applicant to abide by the Foundation's Code of
> Ethics, submission standards and other policies as are time to time
> adopted or modified by the Board of Trustees.
>
>
> Here are the following cases as regards participants
>
> * participant using his real name as a user name (example Tim Starling)
> * participant using a pseudonyme as a user name, but whose real name
> is displayed on his user page or is generally known per mailing list
> (example Cimon)
> * participant using a pseudonyme as a user name, but whose real name
> is known only from a limited number of participants (I will avoid
> putting an example here)
> * participant using a pseudonyme as a user name, and whose real name
> is totally unknown of
> * participant per ip
>
> Which ones may be members ?

It seems that the first four are all allowed.  The user registration is
what makes a person an active member.  There is nothing preventing a
person from using his ip number as though it were a name.  A few people
have already done that.  This provison should really be integrated with
the single sign up concept to avoid any implication that being signed up
in more than one project means more than one vote.  The biggest
difficulty that I have with this section is that it relies on a number
of ideas that have not yet been defined, such as the "Foundation's Code
of Ethics".

Ec


subject: [Wikipedia-l] bylaws III

body:
Anthere wrote:

>  F. HONORARY MEMBERSHIP: An Honorary membership may be bestowed upon
> any person or organization who has made a significant contribution to
> the Foundation upon a recommendation by the Board of Directors and
> approval by the general membership at the General Meeting of the
> Foundation. Honorary members shall not be required to pay dues and
> shall not be eligible to hold office or vote.
>
> What do we define as approval by the general membership ?

Normally this would refer to a meeting of all members;  including this
reference suggests that a vote at other times, such as by a general vote
on a Meta page, would not be valid.  Unfortunately, no provision has
been made in the by-laws for such a meeting.  There is also nothing in
the by-laws to define "Board of Directors".  The simple fact that the
term was used suggests that it is at least something different from the
Board of Trustees.

Ec


from_name: daniwo59 at aol.com

subject: [WikiEN-l] Citations.

body:
Hi,

There's been some talk about the use of citations as sources and evidence. I
think we are treading on very thin ice here. For example, I am not a big fan
of George W. Bush. I even have two books, "The Bush Dyslexicon" by Mark Crispin
Miller and "The Lies of George W. Bush" by David Corn, which lambast him
based entirely on his quotations. While I happen to like the books, I would hardly
base an article on them--if I did, I would be attacked for bias and POV, even
though all of the quotations are well documented. We have to be very careful
here.

Danny
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subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: bylaws part II

body:
I have been wondering if it were not possible that someone provides the
link between his real identity and his pseudonyme, and as such is
allowed to be granted membership and voting rights under the real name.

This with keeping private the information.

After all, we accept donations, and agree to keep the names of the
donators private. Why could not we just do that as well for the members ?

Then, as soon as the link between the two names is validated, the member
is accepted for commenting and voting under his real name, without
making his wikipeida identity known publicly.

Possible ?

Optim a ?crit:
> if I understand well, it is impossible to become
> a member of the Foundation without exposing a
> real identity (full name etc), so anonymous
> members are not allowed.
>
> If I continue to understand well,  a person who
> cannot reveal a real identity can continue having
> a user account on Wikipedia or contribute as
> anonymous IP address.
>
> Is my understanding right?
>
> --Optim
>
> --- Anthere <anthere8 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>>Section 2. USER ACCOUNTS OF MEMBERS. All
>>applicants for contributing or
>>volunteer active membership shall maintain a
>>user account on one or
>>several Wikimedia projects (i.e. Wikipedia of
>>any language, Wikibooks,
>>etc.), complete and sign the form of
>>application provided by the
>>Foundation on it?s web site and submit the
>>application the Secretary
>>along with payment of the year?s membership
>>dues, if applicable, through
>>such web site or by mail. Such application
>>shall include an agreement by
>>the applicant to abide by the Foundation's Code
>>of Ethics, submission
>>standards and other policies as are time to
>>time adopted or modified by
>>the Board of Trustees.
>>
>>
>>Here are the following cases as regards
>>participants
>>
>>* participant using his real name as a user
>>name (example Tim Starling)
>>* participant using a pseudonyme as a user
>>name, but whose real name is
>>displayed on his user page or is generally
>>known per mailing list
>>(example Cimon)
>>* participant using a pseudonyme as a user
>>name, but whose real name is
>>known only from a limited number of
>>participants (I will avoid putting
>>an example here)
>>* participant using a pseudonyme as a user
>>name, and whose real name is
>>totally unknown of
>>* participant per ip
>>
>>Which ones may be members ?
>>
>>
>>
>>_______________________________________________
>>Wikipedia-l mailing list
>>Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
>>
>
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>
>
> __________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free web site building tool. Try it!
> http://webhosting.yahoo.com/ps/sb/


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws Part IV

body:
Anthere wrote:

> Section 4.2. WRITTEN RESIGNATION. Any member may resign from the
> Foundation by submitting a written resignation to the Secretary. Such
> resignation shall be effective as of the date received by the
> Foundation, unless said resignation specifies another date. The Board
> at its sole discretion may maintain or remove any such users account
> from any of its projects upon such resignation.
>
> Wait a minute there...Why should resignation from the wikimedia
> foundation have ANY sort of relation with the fact of being allowed to
> contribute to Wikipedia ?
>
> Are we writting here that the board may have the right to erase a user
> account from Wikipedia, just upon the argument that the user in
> question decided to resign from the foundation ?
>
> Are we saying that the board of the foundation is having any power as
> to decide who is allowed or not allowed to have an account ?

Perhaps the problem here is with the words "at its sole discretion".
 Most of these accounts would be removed as a result of a request by the
resigning person.  Placed where it is, it only applies to persons who
have resigned.  Presumably the issue would be considered elsewhere if it
referred to a banned user.  It is also possible that the person may wish
to return with a different identity.  Thus someone who has been active
in our internal politics may decide to come back with a less conspicuous
identity and limit his edits to a few non-controversial areas without a
lot of hassle.

Ec


from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] Installing MediaWiki

body:
On Jan 24, 2004, at 03:55, Timwi wrote:
> Is it possible to install MediaWiki on a server on which I am not root?

Yup.

> Currently, I get
> 	Fatal error: Call to undefined function: getallheaders() in
> 	/home/ajh65/public_html/w/wiki.phtml on line 22

That's a built-in function: http://www.php.net/getallheaders

Looks like you're running PHP as a CGI instead of as an Apache module.
This currently isn't supported, but if you can get it to work let us
know how. It may be sufficient to just comment out the bits that use
getallheaders (just debug code, I think).

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: New edit modus

body:
On Jan 24, 2004, at 04:26, Timwi wrote:
 > I strongly vote against enabling it by default.

Because it's buggy?

It's not going _in_ until it works. The only reason it would be on
would be that the bugs are worked out.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Minor changes by anonymous user

body:
On Jan 24, 2004, at 03:51, Timwi wrote:
> If the bug is that the POST request just simply accepts the
> wgMinorEdit variable even for anonymous users, then it is pretty
> trivial to exploit. Just add the checkbox to your edit screens using
> something like Proxomitron.

Why do we remove the checkbox anyway? It's stupid, and I find it very
annoying when I happen to be making a quick edit while not logged in.

In fact I find it downright insulting that I'm not trusted to mark a
spelling correction as "minor" without logging in.

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

body:
Daniel P.B.Smith wrote:

> I agree completely. Lack of citation and traceability is IMHO a big
> glaring
> deficiency in traditional encyclopedias, and it's one that should be
> remediable
> in a hypertext encyclopedia. (However, like so much about Wikipedia,
> there's no big barrier to "just doing it" and hoping that others will
> follow suit. Much as I'd like better Wiki-apparatus for the purpose).

But this seems to assume that the citations will all be to websites,
which isn't likely to be the case--most respected, reliable information
is still not available online.  So citations of that sort will have to
be to books or journal articles, which in many cases won't be accessible
through hypertext.

-Mark


subject: [Wikipedia-l] bylaws part II

body:
Alex T. wrote:
> That process would seem to indicate that you could require the
> application to be verified by a notary, thus ensuring that it is
> from a distinct individual.  That is usually what NPO membership
> coordinators due is verify membership status, so it is not
> outrageous to ask someone to fill out a form, get it notarized and
> mail it to someone to be entitled to vote.

It doesn't seem outrageous, no, but it does seem a bit of overkill
esp. for the first year's elections.  I would say that a bit of
commonsense on my part will go a long way towards eliminating or at
least minimizing any problems.

> Giving every user account the right to vote is obviously not an
> option if you are looking for some kind of legitimacy because one
> person could open hudreds or thousands of user accounts and capture
> the voting process that way.

I agree with that 100%.

It doesn't seem too terribly difficult, though, for the Foundation to
keep the identities of members reasonably private, though.

On Monday I will write up and post a proposed procedure for the
voting, to be critiqued well-and-good I'm sure.

--Jimbo


subject: [WikiEN-l] copyrights issues

body:
Anthere wrote:

> Could someone give us a link to a draft page of emails to send to
> someone using wikipedia content without respecting the terms of the
> licence ?
>
> I saw several times great emails examples published on the list (the
> last one was really good). Does someone know the link ? Or is there
> somewhere a page from which we can inspire ourselves to make a
> standard copyright violation notice ?

There's a page on the en: Wikipedia with a few sample letters at
[[Wikipedia:Standard GFDL violation letter]].

-Mark


subject: [Wikipedia-l] bylaws part II

body:
Alex T. wrote:

>That process would seem to indicate that you could require the application
>to be
>verified by a notary, thus ensuring that it is from a distinct individual.
>That is usually
>what NPO membership coordinators due is verify membership status, so it is
>not
>outrageous to ask someone to fill out a form, get it notarized and mail it
>to someone
>to be entitled to vote.
>
>
I personally don't like any notarization requirement, because not
everyone has easy (and certainly not free) access to a notary public.
In addition, I've actually never been a member of a NPO that required
this, and I've been a member of several organizations that had votes.
Perhaps it's different in the world of academic and professional
societies (Cognitive Science Society, Association of Computing
Machinery, IEEE, etc.), but they seem to consider the fact that they
snail-mail you the materials to be a sufficient safeguard--if you tried
to request 500 ballots to the same address, they'd notice and check into
it, and it's unreasonably difficult for most people to stuff the ballot
box by acquiring 500 different places at which they can receive mail.
About half also additionally require either a photocopy of an ID or in
the case of students or professors a letter from your institution saying
"this guy really is a [student/professor] here".

-Mark


from_name: Alex T.

subject: [Wikipedia-l] bylaws part II

body:
> That's right.  As to what sort of procedure I ought to use to ensure
> that there is not rampant vote fraud from fake names (because even if
> I say you have to be a person and can only vote once, how am I to know
> without such absurdities as requiring identification), I'm open to
> suggestions.

Membership is not designed to be anonymous: Article II sec. 2 states that to
be
a free or paying member you must submit an application of membership to the
Secretary agreeing to abide by the Wikimedia Code of Ethics, submission
standards
and policies. It can be online or via mail. Paying members could submit
their
application via the internet, i.e. if they have a verified paypal account,

That process would seem to indicate that you could require the application
to be
verified by a notary, thus ensuring that it is from a distinct individual.
That is usually
what NPO membership coordinators due is verify membership status, so it is
not
outrageous to ask someone to fill out a form, get it notarized and mail it
to someone
to be entitled to vote.

Giving every user account the right to vote is obviously not an option if
you are looking
for some kind of legitimacy because one person could open hudreds or
thousands of
user accounts and capture the voting process that way. Anyone who gets
elected to
the free volunteer position on the Board will be subject to public scrutiny.

Anyone who is on the board must divulge their identity as it will be on the
annual
tax return that Wikimedia must send into the government each year that is a
public document
so if someone later discovers that they stuffed the ballot box that will be
civil fraud
(and maybe even a crime).

Maybe Wikimedia could adopt something along the lines of that federal
electronic voting program that has been in the news lately:
http://www.serveusa.gov/public/aca.aspx

Alex R.  (en:user:alex756)


from_name: Timwi

body:
E23 wrote:

> I've found a simple bug that would make it possible for anonymous users
> to mark edits as minor. Exploiting it seems to require at least a little
> bit of effort, though. But in any case, I think you can safely assume
> this problem will soon be fixed.

If the bug is that the POST request just simply accepts the wgMinorEdit
variable even for anonymous users, then it is pretty trivial to exploit.
Just add the checkbox to your edit screens using something like Proxomitron.

Timwi


subject: [Wikitech-l] Installing MediaWiki

body:
Hi,

Is it possible to install MediaWiki on a server on which I am not root?

Currently, I get
	Fatal error: Call to undefined function: getallheaders() in
	/home/ajh65/public_html/w/wiki.phtml on line 22

at	http://www.srcf.ucam.org/~ajh65/w/wiki.phtml

Interestingly, the function "getallheaders" is indeed no-where defined
in the entire source code of MediaWiki.

Any help?

Also, your install script has a little bug: passwords with an apostrophe
in them lead to invalid SQL syntax.

Thanks,
Timwi


body:
--- Dan Miller <meelar2 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Hi, I just had a somewhat weird problem with the
> wiki.
>  I wanted to see if we had an article on "tin can",
> so
> I typed it in and hit go.  On my screen showed up
> the
> article "Ford Model T", redirected from "Tin
> Lizzie".
> Why would this occur? Meelar

The Go button isn't very predictible. If you want to
be more specific, then just type the name of the
article into the title bar of the web browser (ie.
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tin_can ).

Daniel Ehrenberg

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subject: [WikiEN-l] Policy Suggestions

body:
Ira Stoll wrote:

> That's exactly what I'm getting at. The wikipedia should be packed
> with clickable citations.The reason why I've always loved
> encyclopedias so much is the quality of the information, and the
> impartial manner in which it was presented. Citations (particularly
> linkable) bring with them evidence for belief, and an option for the
> reader to learn further, investigate for themselves (by clicking on
> it). A basic of polite discourse (and a policy in my debate club) was
> to accept another's argument so long as it is logical, and to accept
> their premise so long as you could not disprove it (like thru a
> citation). What I Don't like about the wikipedia is when the truth (or
> a way of interpreting it) is removed from an article, regardless of
> the quality of citation, due to overriding majority POV. My
> suggestions are meant to address that. JackLynch

Citations are similar in importance to footnotes in a term paper.  I
don't see linkability as important, since many or probably most)
credible works are not al all available on line.  Ultimately the burden
of proof for any assertion falls upon the one making the assertion.  The
debating club analogy doesn't work because in the heat of an oral debate
the reference sources are just not there in front of the debater.  The
standard for written material should be much higher when the person has
that longer time and opportunity to check his sources.

There is a 'prima facie' presumtion that what someone says is valid;
that persists until someone questions it.  Beyond that, simply being
"logical" is not enough, although people sometimes use that word when
they really mean intuitive.  One can challenge by pointing out a fallacy
in the argument.  At other times it is enough to simply ask, "Where did
you get that?"  The original contributor should have a reasonable chance
to respond before further action is taken, but that's difficult when the
user is an anonymous ip.

Truth by majority vote is frequently not truth at all.  It is a very
dangerous practice.  Those votes often are based on fallacious arguments
totally lacking in intellectual rigour.  The last time I looked at
[[astrology]] there was a statement there to the effect that most
astronomers believe that astrology is pseudoscience.  The word "believe"
there says something, but even when we use a less charged word like
"consider" we are no further ahead.  Whatever you may think about
astrology it is clear that it different from astronomy, and what is more
likely is that most astronomers have never studied astrology to a
sufficient extent to be able to come up with any kind of informed
opinion.  People with informed opinions may still come to the same
conclusion, but they owe it to us to let us know how well they are
informed.

I find it interesting to look at records of 19th century patents.  Most
of them got nowhere by failing to produce anything of practical
importance, but they represented new ideas. Others were understated and
their true importance would not become apparent until long after the
patent expired, such as the 1842 patent on airfoils.

Ec


from_name: Yann Forget

subject: [Wikitech-l] European squid

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

Hi,

Le Saturday 24 January 2004 08:57, Jens Frank a ?crit :
> >
> > egsuniversity.ch is definitely in Switzerland, and my packets from Europe
> > route from GEANT/DANTE over gblx, then Tiscali, and end up at
> > server-r001.hostpoint.ch after 17 hops.
>
> 12 ms round trip time is good, too. If that's where the squid will be,
> this looks very nice.

Indeed, yes !

$ traceroute egsuniversity.ch
traceroute to egsuniversity.ch (217.26.52.6), 30 hops max, 38 byte packets
 1  r2d2 (192.168.0.13)  0.860 ms  0.537 ms  0.469 ms
 2  193.253.160.3 (193.253.160.3)  44.330 ms  47.591 ms  50.095 ms
 3  GE1-2-288.ncann202.Annecy.francetelecom.net (80.10.197.162)  41.623 ms
41.930 ms  41.629 ms
 4  pos1-1.nrlyo202.Lyon.francetelecom.net (193.252.101.14)  47.583 ms  43.718
ms  44.824 ms
 5  193.252.103.110 (193.252.103.110)  52.134 ms  51.429 ms  53.345 ms
 6  pos9-0.ntsta202.Paris.francetelecom.net (193.252.161.57)  50.097 ms
50.600 ms  53.384 ms
 7  193.251.126.58 (193.251.126.58)  65.860 ms  51.709 ms  54.026 ms
 8  P13-0.PASCR3.Pastourelle.opentransit.net (193.251.129.62)  117.400 ms
145.841 ms  182.498 ms
 9  so-2-0-0.par10.ip.tiscali.net (213.200.76.53)  53.344 ms  50.789 ms
53.368 ms
10  so-2-0-0.zur10.ip.tiscali.net (213.200.82.106)  65.720 ms  63.950 ms
65.847 ms
11  tiscali-ch-2.ip.tiscali.net (213.200.70.42)  65.859 ms  66.703 ms  65.714
ms
12  glatt-core-01-gig12-0-0-1.tiscali.ch (212.254.57.9)  65.285 ms  65.837 ms
65.707 ms
13  hostpoint.tiscali.ch (212.254.227.66)  64.535 ms  67.430 ms  68.310 ms
14  core01a-vl1.zrh.hostpoint.ch (217.26.48.11)  65.701 ms  66.262 ms  67.667
ms
15  server-r001.hostpoint.ch (217.26.52.6)  70.429 ms  68.936 ms  68.996 ms

- --
http://www.non-violence.org/ | Site collaboratif sur la non-violence
http://www.forget-me.net/ | Alternatives sur le Net
http://fr.wikipedia.org/ | Encyclop?die libre
http://www.forget-me.net/pro/ | Formations et services Linux
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body:
On Jan 24, 2004, at 11:56, Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:
> On Sat, Jan 24, 2004 at 11:30:25AM -0800, Brion Vibber wrote:
>> In fact I find it downright insulting that I'm not trusted to mark a
>> spelling correction as "minor" without logging in.
>
> There are serious historical reasons for that. As in older wikis,
> "minor" on Wikipedia used to mean "don't show in Recent Changes by
> default".

That was the case in phase 1 (on UseModWiki), but it was never the case
on phase 2 / phase 3 software.

<rant>
A ruthless minority of people who chose to use the "hide minor edits"
feature decided they were too lazy to look through all edits to find
vandalism and bitched until the minor edits checkbox was taken away to
get them to shut up.
</rant>

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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from_name: Evan Prodromou

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Why "Wikimedia Germany", "Wikimedia France",

body:
>>>>> "DM" == Daniel Mayer <maveric149 at yahoo.com> writes:

    DM> I agree -- that is why I support setting up a chapter system
    DM> like other international organizations.

    DM> http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2004-January/013905.html

I don't read URLs that don't point to a wiki. B-)

~ESP

--
Evan Prodromou <evan at wikitravel.org>
Wikitravel - http://www.wikitravel.org/
The free, complete, up-to-date and reliable world-wide travel guide


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: New edit modus

body:
> Eloquence wants to implement a default edit mode
> using click-buttons for formating.

I've tried the feature and it seems extremely buggy (whether the bugs
are in the features or in browsers is irrelevant).

Using that to teach newbies wiki syntax is like putting someone in a car
that has a number of malfunctions and hoping they'd use it to learn to
drive.

Implementations of the same kind of toolbar that I have seen elsewhere
(namely, LiveJournal ;-) ), weren't any better. Fortunately, they were
wise enough to not make it default.

I strongly vote against enabling it by default.

Timwi


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws V

body:
Anthere wrote:

> Section 1. POWERS. The powers of the corporation shall be exercised,
> its properties controlled, and its affairs conducted by a Board of
> Trustees to be comprised initially of five trustees. All trustees must
> be active (contributing or volunteer) or life members of the Foundation.
>
> What is the difference between a corporation and a foundation ?

"Corporation" is a broader term that includes "foundation".  More
generally incorporation is what gives an organization the legal status
to be treated as a person.  There is some variation in the use of the
term "foundation" in various jurisdictions.  Here it seems to be used in
the sense of a general non-profit corporation that is doing good for the
benefit of the community.  In other places the use of the term
"foundation" is restricted to those organizations whose primary function
is the distribution of funds for charitable purposes, often as the
result of a large bequest.

> When the next elections take place, will there be 2 trustees to elect,
> or 4 ?

Two (2) to be elected.  If there were any more there would be a serious
risk that democratic control would subvert the purposes of the organization.

> Do members have any other role than electing trustees to decide of
> everything for them ?

Ingrate!  You should be thankful when Big Brother relieves you of the
stress of participating in mind-numbing decisions. ;-)

Ec


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws VI

body:
Anthere wrote:

> These bylaws may be altered, amended or repealed and new Bylaws may be
> adopted by a majority of the entire Board of Trustees at any regular
> meeting or special meeting, provided that at least ten days written
> notice is given of intention to alter, amend or repeal or to adopt new
> Bylaws at such meeting.
>
> Do I understand well when reading that all powers are in the hands of
> the board only, that only board has the power to empeach one of the
> board member if necessary, that the board will then replace the
> missing member, and that only board decide of any bylaws modifications ?

Yeh, what did you expect?  There is nothing in that section about
impeachment, or replacing members.

(BTW Anthere. Thanks for breaking up your comments on the by-laws into
smaller eMails.  As much as I often agree with you, I do find some of
your postings a little long.  The effect is often that I put those aside
for later response.  I have some of those left in my "in box" from last
year that are still waiting until I have enough free time to answer them
with appropriate consideration.)

Ec


body:
On Jan 24, 2004, at 12:22, Erik Moeller wrote:
> Brion-
>> In fact I find it downright insulting that I'm not trusted to mark a
>> spelling correction as "minor" without logging in.
>
> On which basis should you be trusted?

Same reason I'm allowed to edit pages at whim and describe my change as
a "spelling correction".

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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subject: [Wikipedia-l] bylaws III

body:
On Jan 24, 2004, at 11:00, Ray Saintonge wrote:
>  There is also nothing in the by-laws to define "Board of Directors".
> The simple fact that the term was used suggests that it is at least
> something different from the Board of Trustees.

Florida statutes section 617.01401, paragraph 2: '"Board of directors"
means the group of persons vested with the management of the affairs of
the corporation irrespective of the name by which such group is
designated, including, but not limited to, managers or trustees.'

(Out of curiosity, why aren't we using the wikilegal-l list? It's there
for a reason; in no small part for future reference via the archives.)

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Unadmissible Evidence

body:
Just thought of mentionning that thought the below mail make it so
appear I wrote that comment, I did not.

I agree with Fred entirely.

Anthere

Fred Bauder a ?crit:
> What went on in mediation should simply not be considered at the arbitration
> stage. So claims, true or false, are irrelevant.
>
> Fred
>
>
>>From: Anthere <anthere8 at yahoo.com>
>>Reply-To: anthere8 at yahoo.com, English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
>>Date: Sat, 24 Jan 2004 10:37:25 +0100
>>To: wikien-l at wikipedia.org
>>Subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Mr. Natural Health has refused mediation with the
>>community
>>
>>
>>>He
>>>may even make false claims about what went on in mediation; hence, the
>>>full legalistic set of rules will have to include some kind of waiver of this
>>>confidentiality.
>>


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Another Type of Inadmissible Evidence

body:
Just as in justice, a jugdement declares someone guilty (or innocent) first

Which set somehow a range of punishement, depending on the crime

then the points in favor of the accused are examined. and help to decide
on which side of the range of punishement he will be.

Fred Bauder a ?crit:
> I think we need to consider what they destroy and how without consideration
> of what good things they have done. In other words, if some one is accused
> of destructive behavior, evidence that they wrote a good article or were
> polite in some other context is inadmissible evidence. After it is
> determined that we are dealing with someone who regularly transgresses, then
> as we consider remedies we might consider all the wonderful things they did.
>
> Fred
>
>
>>From: Anthere <anthere8 at yahoo.com>
>>Reply-To: anthere8 at yahoo.com, English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
>>Date: Sat, 24 Jan 2004 09:26:55 +0100
>>To: wikien-l at wikipedia.org
>>Subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Arbitration progress report #2
>>
>>
>>
>>>Basically the same question as above; when are people "highly detrimental to
>>>wikipedia"? The current policy, by my interpretation, states that someone is
>>>highly detrimental to wikipedia if their personal attacks are extreme. Which
>>>is obviously far from a clear-cut answer.
>>
>>But the practice is that someone is highly detrimental to Wikipedia,
>>when the sum of what he brings is lower that the sum of what he destroys.
>>
>>
>>
>>_______________________________________________
>>WikiEN-l mailing list
>>WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
>>http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


subject: [Wikipedia-l] bylaws III

body:
Brion Vibber wrote:

> On Jan 24, 2004, at 11:00, Ray Saintonge wrote:
>
>>  There is also nothing in the by-laws to define "Board of
>> Directors".  The simple fact that the term was used suggests that it
>> is at least something different from the Board of Trustees.
>
> Florida statutes section 617.01401, paragraph 2: '"Board of directors"
> means the group of persons vested with the management of the affairs
> of the corporation irrespective of the name by which such group is
> designated, including, but not limited to, managers or trustees.'

I'm not challenging Florida law on this.  Rather the point is that if
only one Board exists in an organization, the same name should be used
consistently.  Having two separate Boards with different duties is a
real possibility, and the use of both terms lends support to that.  I
raised the issue last summer with the suggestion that a Board of
Trustees would be charged with maintaining  the focus and integrity of
the project, and insuring that it adheres to a few key principles.  The
Board of Trustees in the by-laws seems to do that.  A "Board of
Directors" would have broader responsibilities relating to the general
management of the project.  The Trustees would have the power to
overrule the Directors on matters that violated key principles.

> (Out of curiosity, why aren't we using the wikilegal-l list? It's
> there for a reason; in no small part for future reference via the
> archives.)

Speaking only for myself, I find that I already receive enough messages
without subscribing to yet another list.

Ec


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws V

body:
Kurt Jansson wrote:

> Ray Saintonge wrote:
>
>> Anthere wrote:
>>
>>> When the next elections take place, will there be 2 trustees to
>>> elect, or 4 ?
>>
>> Two (2) to be elected.  If there were any more there would be a
>> serious risk that democratic control would subvert the purposes of
>> the organization.
>
> Thanks, Ray, for putting the cynicism into words.

I think it's mostly a moot point as long as we ensure that the trustees
are people who have no interest in doing anything actually relating to
Wikipedia itself.  I don't expect the Board of Trustees in the near
future to be making pronouncements about banning users or article
disputes (that's the community and the mediators' and arbitrators' job)
or technical type issues (that's the developers' job), or really
anything other than legal and foundation type stuff.

I'm not sure how this could be codified though.  The board of trustees
probably *should* have the authority to do something if necessary, but
it shouldn't use that power unless it really is necessary.  It should
also be made up of people who we know though--Jimbo I'm perfectly
comfortable with, but I don't really recognize the other three as active
Wikipedians (unless they go by a different name here?).  Which is fine
for a start-up phase, but eventually I think we should have people on
there who we can trust to "not do anything unless really really necessary".

Actually I'm confused about how the selection takes place.  As far as I
can tell, the board has *five* members; two members of the Board will be
elected "within 90 days" of the adoption of the bylaws, and then
re-elected periodically.  The other three are initially Jimmy Wales,
Michael Davis, and Tim Shell.  When do we get to elect these three
slots?  Are they permanent life members of the Board?  I'm fine with
Jimbo being a permanent life member, but I'm not sure I even know who
Michael Davis and Tim Shell are, let alone know them well enough to feel
comfortable giving them a seat on the board in perpetuity.

-Mark


from_name: Oliver Brown

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws

body:
Are these Bylaws official or are they still being finalized? Because I
have a few suggestions regarding clarifications of the language.
-oliver

-----Original Message-----
From: wikipedia-l-bounces at Wikimedia.org
[mailto:wikipedia-l-bounces at Wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Jimmy Wales
Sent: Monday, January 19, 2004 3:38 PM
To: wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org; wikien-l at Wikimedia.org
Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws

Accessible now from
http://www.wikimediafoundation.org/

The link is on the left hand side.

_______________________________________________
Wikipedia-l mailing list
Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l


from_name: Michael Snow

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Other Wikipedia associations;
	registering Wikimedia trademarks

body:
With all the discussion of forming Wikipedia organizations outside the
US, it's pretty clear that it's going to happen. Even if you could turn
back the tide now, it would happen later. As for whether they can
officially use the Wikipedia name or not, I have an idea, as a
suggestion both to Jimbo and to anyone forming such an organization.

The model I would suggest is that of the various organizations (fan
clubs, essentially) that develop for cultural phenomena like Star Wars.
Generally, they're tolerated and passively encouraged, because they help
promote the project. Even though there may be some unauthorized use of
images and logos, it's rarely necessary to interfere unless a group
starts giving the impression that it's official and actually represents
the project (in this case, Wikipedia and the foundation). This fits in
well with Jimbo's Benevolent Dictator model.

If Jimbo is concerned about competing *official* Wikipedia
organizations, I think part of the solution is to register Wikipedia as
a trademark (and Wikimedia, Wiktionary, etc.) belonging to the
foundation. Use of the names already brings some protection, but
trademark registration makes things simpler if there's a dispute.
Registration in the US should be sufficient for now. Check out the Paris
Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property, which covers
international trademark protection.

I know registration has been discussed by other people (Kurt in Germany,
for example). Actually, I would recommend that nobody register any
trademarks except the Wikimedia Foundation in its official capacity. Let
Jimbo and the board take care of that; they're quite capable of handling
it, and it will prevent confusion and conflict later on.

--Michael Snow


subject: [Wikipedia-l] serious technical problems with wikipedia-l

body:
On Jan 24, 2004, at 14:45, Kurt Jansson wrote:
> There seems to be a serious technical problem with the mailinglist. I,
> and at least one other member, didn't get the following mail. I also
> can't find it in the archive. Please, could someone look into that?
> And is there a way to find out which mails I might also have missed?

I did receive the message from Arne; it went through the backup
mailserver in Germany. Unfortunately we haven't yet worked out a way to
get those included in the archives on mail.wikipedia.org. (Suggestions
welcome.)

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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subject:
[Wikitech-l] Re: [Wikipedia-l] serious technical problems with
	wikipedia-l

body:
On Jan 24, 2004, at 14:45, Kurt Jansson wrote:
> There seems to be a serious technical problem with the mailinglist. I,
> and at least one other member, didn't get the following mail. I also
> can't find it in the archive. Please, could someone look into that?
> And is there a way to find out which mails I might also have missed?

I did receive the message from Arne; it went through the backup
mailserver in Germany. Unfortunately we haven't yet worked out a way to
get those included in the archives on mail.wikipedia.org. (Suggestions
welcome.)

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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subject: [Wikipedia-l] Time to set up Wikimedia Project Committees

body:
On Jan 24, 2004, at 15:04, Alex T. wrote:
> Here is a proposal regarding the governance of individual Wikimedia
> projects;
> http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Project_Governing_Committees
>
> The idea is to give the members of each Wikipedia and all the other
> projects, the
> freedom to develop each project independently of any hierarchical
> control by
> the Board of Trustees.

Err... the members of each Wikipedia and all the projects already have
the freedom to develop each project independently of any hierachical
control by the Board of Trustees. Wikimedia exists primarily to provide
material support (ie, servers and hosting) and maintain 'brand
awareness' (the trademark, domain names), doesn't it?

Could you clarify exactly what a "governing committee" is charged with,
and what sort of authority is is meant to have for what purpose? I'm
seeing things about "content of a particular article or page on their
wiki" which sounds rather new for "committees" to be involved with
here.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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subject:
[Intlwiki-l] Re: [Wikipedia-l] Time to set up Wikimedia Project
	Committees

body:
On Jan 24, 2004, at 15:04, Alex T. wrote:
> Here is a proposal regarding the governance of individual Wikimedia
> projects;
> http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Project_Governing_Committees
>
> The idea is to give the members of each Wikipedia and all the other
> projects, the
> freedom to develop each project independently of any hierarchical
> control by
> the Board of Trustees.

Err... the members of each Wikipedia and all the projects already have
the freedom to develop each project independently of any hierachical
control by the Board of Trustees. Wikimedia exists primarily to provide
material support (ie, servers and hosting) and maintain 'brand
awareness' (the trademark, domain names), doesn't it?

Could you clarify exactly what a "governing committee" is charged with,
and what sort of authority is is meant to have for what purpose? I'm
seeing things about "content of a particular article or page on their
wiki" which sounds rather new for "committees" to be involved with
here.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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_______________________________________________
Intlwiki-l mailing list
Intlwiki-l at wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/intlwiki-l


subject: [WikiEN-l] Selection of Arbitrators

body:
Fred Bauder wrote:

>If we do allow litigants to select among arbitrators that would indeed give
>those who are knowledgeable and experienced an advantage (like in real life)
>where one party choses one arbitrator the other choses one, then the two
>chosen choose the third. In labor disputes the union choses someone friendly
>to them, likewise management, then the two chosen look for someone they can
>both work with.
>
>
I don't really like this idea.  It puts too much politics into it based
on the selection of who's voting on your case, and those who know how to
game the system are more likely to come out ahead.  It also adds yet
another beaurocratic step to the process.  I'd prefer instead a simple
vote of all members of the committee for all cases.  I very much hope
there will not be a lot of cases, so I don't see this as being a problem
workload-wise.  If there are a lot of cases, then we need to figure out
how to rework the system so that there aren't--the vast majority of
issues should, in my opinion, be decided by consensus on talk pages or,
if necessary, through mediation.

Having some sort of grandiose process I'm afraid will actually encourage
the overuse of the committee, as it makes it seem like it's normal to
refer matters to be decided through this process.  I think instead the
arbitration committee should be a "decision-making committee of last
resort", to which only relatively extraordinary matters are referred.
And so we could have a relatively minimalistic process: the committee
just votes, and thereby makes a decision (including possibly making the
decision "the committee declines to make a ruling on this matter").

-Mark


from_name: Daniel Mayer

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws V

body:
Delirium wrote:
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2004-January/014001.html

I responded on Wikilegal-l:
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikilegal-l/2004-January/000254.html

Any discussion about the by-laws is a legal matter that deals with *all* of
Wikimedia and goes beyond Wikipedia policy. Please respond to that list.

Wikilegal-l sign-up page:
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikilegal-l

-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)


from_name: Zoltan

subject: [WikiEN-l] history

body:
Hello Sir.

What happens with the German population Gdansk afterwards in 1945 and Silesia ?

                                                       Regards Zoltan
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subject: [Wikipedia-l] bylaws III

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2004-January/014005.html

I responded on Wikilegal-l:
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikilegal-l/2004-January/000255.html

Please continue thread there.

-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)


from_name: Rick

subject: [WikiEN-l] Policy suggestions

body:
I didn't say that.  I said it is not a LIST of citations.  Do we really want to have to have a citation beside every single sentence of every article?

RickK

Geoff Burling <llywrch at agora.rdrop.com> wrote:
On Fri, 23 Jan 2004, Rick wrote:

> Wikipedia is not a list of citations.
>
> RickK
>
> Ira Stoll wrote:
>
> *only replace text that you know to be wrong (inaccurate), and replace it
> with something that has a citation to back it up. If they have a reasonable
> difference, based on citation, allow both POV to be presented
>
I don't understand your POV, Rick. Are you saying that we should have _no_
citations or mention of references so readers can verify facts or quotations?
If so, wouldn't that undermine the credibility of Wikipedia?

Geoff

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subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws

body:
Oliver Brown wrote:
>Are these Bylaws official or are they still being finalized? Because
>I have a few suggestions regarding clarifications of the language.

It is my understanding that the initial board met and adopted the by-laws. I
imagine this was needed to get the ball rolling so that elections can be held
for member reps. Please document your suggestions and I'm sure the full board
will consider them soon after the member reps are elected by the membership.

-- Daniel Mayer


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bylaws V

body:
>Tim Shell, and I guess also Michael Davis, are employees of Jimbo.
>They are in a relationship of economic dependence to him.

Please check your facts before making such a statement - it could lead to a
dangerous misunderstanding. Tim Shell is a co-owner of Bomis and IIRC so is
Michael Davis.

-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)


subject: [WikiEN-l] Arbitration progress report #2

body:
I second Sascha's concerns.  If you're an official representative of Wikipedia and are serving on a committee designed to make sure that people are following the policies, then it's not your place to pick and choose which policies you will enforce.

RickK

Sascha Noyes <sascha at pantropy.net> wrote:
On Friday 23 January 2004 05:51 pm, Sean Barrett wrote:
> > If you think that personal attacks on other wikipedians are OK, then
> > please advocate for the "no personal attacks" rule to get repealed.
> >
> > I advocate the enforcement of the agreed-upon rules that are specified in
> > [[Wikipedia:Policy]], which happens to include [[Wikipedia:No personal
> > attacks]]. Your characterisation of the desire of wikipedians that
> > personal attacks should halt as 'Mommy, he called me xxx" and "whinging"
> > is both condescending and illogical, given that "no personal attacks"
> > happens to be a wikipedia policy. I have quoted it before, and I shall
> > quote it again (from [[Wikipedia:No personal attacks]]):
>
> Sorry, no. I am not going to try to change the policy. Rather, when
> a case comes before the arbitration committee that consist of nothing
> more substantial than name-calling, I will recuse myself.

So what you're saying is that you don't want to enforce [[Wikipedia:No
personal attacks]]. So who will enforce this rule? As I have stated before,
we should either enforce our rules or stop paying lipservice to them and
scrap them.

> My characterization is "illogical"? Non-sequitur -- I'm not a Vulcan.
> "Condescending"? You're absolutely right. After all, my
> /six-year-old/ doesn't need my help to handle simple name-calling.

I question your suitability for the role of arbitrator based on your
condescention towards those who want the wikipedia policies enforced.

Best,
Sascha Noyes

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body:
If a person drives other, equally (or more so) valuable users because of continued abuse, isn't that detrimental to the project?

RickK

Delirium <delirium at rufus.d2g.com> wrote:
Sascha Noyes wrote:

>So what you're saying is that you don't want to enforce [[Wikipedia:No
>personal attacks]]. So who will enforce this rule? As I have stated before,
>we should either enforce our rules or stop paying lipservice to them and
>scrap them.
>
>
Well, I see a lot of our policies more as "you ought to do this" and
"you ought not do this", rather than as "if you do (don't) do this you
will be banned", which is a somewhat more strenuous pronouncement. Of
course if we have no consequences the rules are meaningless, but I don't
think we should be banning people simply for violating "the letter of
the law", so to speak. Really we should only ban people who we've
determined are highly detrimental to Wikipedia, combined with a
determination that they're unlikely to change their behavior in the near
future. In my opinion, anyway.

-Mark

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body:
I request Sean Barrett's removal from the arbitration committee.

RickK

Sean Barrett <sean at epoptic.org> wrote:
> I question your suitability for the role of arbitrator based on your
> condescention towards those who want the wikipedia policies enforced.

You told me to work to have the policy changed; I tell you to work to
have me removed. Jimbo appointed me; convince him to remove me. As
an alternative, if a simple majority of my fellow arbiters ask me to
step down, I will.

> The only argument you have given
> against enforcing such rules is that your time is too precious.

I haven't even given that argument, and I don't intend to give any
arguments. I simply refuse to be compelled to arbitrate the way you
think I should.

> So would it be correct to conclude that you either you think that nobody will
> be driven away by personal attacks, or it is not worth your time to retain
> these contributors?

Conclude what you like. I am a free man. You cannot compel me to
rule on a case I don't choose to rule on. I encourage you, however,
to work on impeaching me from the arbitration committee.

> I will also put to you my opinion that in cases where
> there has been a gross violation of policies such as "no personal attacks",
> all the arbitration committee will have to do is the following:

And I suspect that in cases where there has been a gross violation of
the "no personal attacks" policy, there will be contemporaneous
violations such as edit warring, which I agree rise to a level
requiring arbitration.

> Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

Don't forget to inform the arbitration committee of my dereliction of
duty, and impress upon Jimbo the urgency of appointing arbiters who
will always rule the way you tell them to.

--
Sean Barrett | To bite off your shadow is neither easy
sean at epoptic.com | nor painless. It demands a single-mindedness
| that is almost unknown in this day.

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from_name: Fred Bauder

subject: [WikiEN-l] Selection of Arbitrators

body:
If we do allow litigants to select among arbitrators that would indeed give
those who are knowledgeable and experienced an advantage (like in real life)
where one party choses one arbitrator the other choses one, then the two
chosen choose the third. In labor disputes the union choses someone friendly
to them, likewise management, then the two chosen look for someone they can
both work with.

Fred

> From: "Dan Drake" <dd at dandrake.com>
> Reply-To: dd at dandrake.com, English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Sat, 24 Jan 2004 22:46:34 +0000 (UTC)
> To: wikien-l at wikipedia.org
> Subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Arbitration progress report #2
>
> On Sat, 24 Jan 2004 02:16:55 UTC, Sean Barrett
> <sean at epoptic.org> wrote:
>
>>> I question your suitability for the role of arbitrator based on your
>>> condescention towards those who want the wikipedia policies enforced.
>>
>> You told me to work to have the policy changed; I tell you to work to
>> have me removed.  Jimbo appointed me; convince him to remove me.  As
>> an alternative, if a simple majority of my fellow arbiters ask me to
>> step down, I will.
>>
>>> The only argument you have given
>>> against enforcing such rules is that your time is too precious.
>>
>> I haven't even given that argument, and I don't intend to give any
>> arguments.  I simply refuse to be compelled to arbitrate the way you
>> think I should.
>> ...
>
> I assume that the arbitration process, like any other that I can think of,
> will allow some choice to the arbitrees in the selection of arbitrators.
> This raises an interesting question: the built-in advantage of people who
> have participated in Wikipedia for a while over the newcomer.  The former
> are likely to know something of the arbitrators, and can protect their
> interests by making better-informed judgments.
>
> It would be only fair, though I suppose it would be impractical, to create
> profiles of the arbitrators. Then a newbie would know what positions the
> various people have taken on the subject of arbitration, and would not
> make the mistake of accepting someone who simply refuses to enforce some
> published policy of Wikipedia because he doesn't feel like it and nobody
> can make him.  Just fpr example.
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


from_name: Anthere

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Bylaws

body:
All these answers are clear Jimbo :-) Thanks for the precisions.

Note : we must change some translations, as the terms we used are not
currently accurate. Perhaps Alex can help us in checking our translation ?

The important point I noted was regarding privacy (ie, possibility to be
a member and then to vote, under one's real name, while keeping relation
between real name and pseudonyme non visible).

I think this is very important, as it will allow the greatest majority
of the community to really be part of it. I am very glad of this :-)


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Bylaws V

body:
Jimmy Wales a ?crit:
> Anthere wrote:
>
>>Section 1. POWERS. The powers of the corporation shall be exercised, its
>>properties controlled, and its affairs conducted by a Board of Trustees
>>to be comprised initially of five trustees. All trustees must be active
>>(contributing or volunteer) or life members of the Foundation.
>>
>>What is the difference between a corporation and a foundation ?
>
>
> "Wikimedia Foundation, Inc." is the name of a nonprofit corporation.
>
> "foundation" is not, so far as I know, a formal legal term in the U.S.
>
>
>>When the next elections take place, will there be 2 trustees to elect,
>>or 4 ?
>
>
> 2 -- a contributing member representative and a volunteer member
> representative
>
>
>>Do members have any other role than electing trustees to decide of
>>everything for them ?
>
>
> I don't like the phrasing of that question.  The trustees no more
> "decide of everything for the members" than I have done traditionally.
>
> Nothing about the foundation changes the way our culture is organized
> here, in which members -- editors -- do everything, as they see fit,
> within the bounds of our social norms.
>
> --Jimbo

Good. I will see if other questions are to be reported on the french
side later on :-)

Good week end to all of you :-)