subject: [WikiEN-l] We need a pedia split

body:
On 06/05/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 5/6/06, Cheney Shill <halliburton_shill at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > I definitely agree with this, but Phil is right about the coverage (although not about the application of undue weight which is for NPOV determination).  It seems like all this pop-culture stuff (which also includes the likes of the Britneys of the world and wrestling entertainment) could be dumped, umm, I mean reorganized, into another wiki project, such as Mediapedia, Wikipop, or WikiStuffNobodyWillCareAbout100YearsFromNow.  I think it would be better, for both groups to have admins dealing with the type of content they are dedicated to and interested in.  I see a lot of inactive admins and it would be interesting to see how many have decided to take an indefinite leave of absence because they spend 90% of their time dealing with content and user disputes involving articles they have no interest in.~~~~Pro-Lick
>
> I have no interest in either 18th century philosophers or pop culture.
> Admins can steer clear of stuff that doesn't interest them if they
> want to.

I've just been advised that non-admins and ex-administrators have no
right to edit or make decisions about things on Wikipedia, nor advise
other users or interact with teh Jimbo.

Clearly myself and several others are in violation of this and will
need to be punished as soon as possible.

> The pop culture section appears to be one of our most popular so it
> stays. Other than the copyvios there I can ignore it for the most
> part.

"...so it stays." Hm. Reflection of something's status in popular
culture, as opposed to its status as a cult classic, for instance,
would surely count as evidence of notability, no?

Rob Church


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Rob Church

subject: [WikiEN-l] We need a policy to deal with new policies

body:
On 06/05/06, Mark Gallagher <m.g.gallagher at student.canberra.edu.au> wrote:
> We don't need to try to "build up an online business such as
> [Wikipedia]".  We *are* Wikipedia.  You can be, too.  But you've got a
> few misconceptions to drop, first.

Starting with dropping the attempts to flame people who are not of her
gender, and an insistence that Commonwealth English is wrong.

Rob Church


list: wikitech-l

subject:
[Wikitech-l] [Mediawiki-l] [WikiEN-l] Upload by default
	toCommons?

body:
On 06/05/06, Platonides <Platonides at gmail.com> wrote:
> "Filip Maljkovic" wrote:
> > Rob Church wrote:
> >> [snip]
> >> Now for the relevant bit. It's been discussed before, a little, and I
> >> touched upon it in a recent discussion sparked off from the newbie's
> >> questions...but it could be feasible for us to replace our
> >> Special:Upload pages with something a bit more intelligent. Making use
> >> of the licencing dropdowns, we could, I think, redirect free images to
> >> Commons in a seamless fashion (after checking existence and providing
> >> a courteous note to the user, of course).
>
> If we already had the unique login system, it would only be a fact of <form
> action changing at the user level.

No. The idea is to handle the upload from the home wiki, so to speak;
the user shouldn't ever need to be directed somewhere on Commons. And
this particular aspect has nothing to do with single sign-on (although
it's needed before we can go ahead with it, since images must be
associated with an uploader).

Rob Church


subject: [WikiEN-l] We need a policy against vote-stacking

body:
On 05/05/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 5/5/06, Philip Welch <wikipedia at philwelch.net> wrote:
> > On May 5, 2006, at 12:38 AM, Steve Bennett wrote:
> >
> > > That's a major problem. Perhaps if we change the emphasis from
> > > "deleting it", with its connotations of purging it from the surface of
> > > the earth, to "moving it out of Wikipedia"?
> >
> > Gah! Enough with these stupid euphemisms!
> >
>
> You mean differently intelligent

No, it's a euphemism. Even *I* agree with Phil on this one.

> > "Voting" has changed to "finding consensus", but the process remains
> > the same. User conduct regulation is called "dispute resolution", but
> > focuses mainly on finding a pseudo-judicial basis to ban troublesome
> > editors.
>
> Not true. Article RFCs can resolve dissputes. I don't know about medation.

What the hell does a *request for comment on an article*[0] have to do
with resolving a dispute between two or more users?

> I reserve the right to continue to use the description Vaporise in
> edit and deletion summeries.

"I reserve the right to continue to blah blah blah"

You don't have any, and putting "vapourise" would be both emotive and
potentially misleading for someone who's trying to use your edit
summary/deletion comment to...gasp...work out what the hell your
rationale is.

Rob Church


from_name: Platonides

subject: [Wikitech-l] Threads: any plans

body:
"Phil Boswell" wrote:
> That looks very interesting, and kind of similar to an idea I had myself.
> I
> haven't seen the interface yet because I didn't bother creating an account
> and whilst IPs can view source on locked pages, they can't edit unlocked
> pages (which is an interesting way round to have it :-).
Yes, the same was to me. So i used the &action=raw instead of action=edit.
It doesn't seem to send proper Conetn-Type but downloading is ok too.

They use special extensions Special:Newthread (not listed at specialpages)
and probably the edit form is tweaked too.

They format it through several templates:

{{ForumThreadHeading|title|title}}
{{ForumNewPost|UserID=Foo|Date=29 February 2006|Text= .......}}
{{ForumReplyPost|UserID=Joe|Date=30 February 2006|Text=....}}

> They seem to be using an extension to provide the "most recent
> discussions"
> view, sourced from a particular namespace JOINed with a given category.
Yes:
<recentpages>
namespace=Discussion
|category=User_Introductions
|limit=50
|template=DiscussionsOnIndex
|top=sticky
</recentpages>

> I was wondering whether it would be possible to arrange that a given
> namespace could be set up to work like this from the ground up, rather
> than
> spatchcocking it into existing pages...
Sure.

>I have no idea, for example, how they
> manage to prevent ordinary wikicode from messing up their nice orderly
> conversations.
> --
> Phil
I guess they do it with the templates. Don't know wat would happen if we
started writeng there invalid wiki syntax and closing the template mark. ;)


subject: [WikiEN-l] We need to recognize that advocating is a basic right

body:
On 06/05/06, Steve Bennett <stevage at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 5/5/06, Philip Welch <wikipedia at philwelch.net> wrote:
> > Incidentally, why don't we have free-content paparazzi tracking down
> > celebrities to take pictures for Wikipedia articles?
>
> Because, from the little I know about it, being a paparazzo is a hell
> of a lot harder and takes more skill than one generally thinks.

Not to mention the negative publicity that would feed back to the
project. "Wikipedia hires paps to harrass celebs..."

Rob Church


from_name: geni

subject: [WikiEN-l] meshing (was: Re: AfD on unencyclopedic content)

body:
On 5/6/06, Mark Gallagher <m.g.gallagher at student.canberra.edu.au> wrote:
>   But if Wikitravel's licence is more restrictive than ours (say,
> refusing to allow commercial use) then we cannot use it, because we
> promise anyone who re-uses content from Wikipedia that it's okay for
> commercial use.
>

Ours is more restictive due to that DRM clause.

--
geni


from_name: Daniel R. Tobias

subject: [WikiEN-l] "should not be written by an interested party

body:
On 4 May 2006 at 01:49, Molu <loom91 at yahoo.com> wrote:

> So wikipedians like me who have (unsucessfully) supported the userboxes are all bad people just clogging up the system?

Just the ones who top-post to the wikien-l list.  And maybe also the
ones who don't use an RFC-compliant line length of under 80
characters.

--
== Dan ==
Dan's Mail Format Site: http://mailformat.dan.info/
Dan's Web Tips: http://webtips.dan.info/
Dan's Domain Site: http://domains.dan.info/


body:
On 5/6/06, Rob Church <robchur at gmail.com> wrote:
> What the hell does a *request for comment on an article*[0] have to do
> with resolving a dispute between two or more users?
>

If the disspute is about content it could settle the disspute.

>
> "I reserve the right to continue to blah blah blah"
>
> You don't have any, and putting "vapourise" would be both emotive and
> potentially misleading for someone who's trying to use your edit
> summary/deletion comment to...gasp...work out what the hell your
> rationale is.
>
>
> Rob Church

No has complained yet.

--
geni


from_name: Mark Ryan

subject: [WikiEN-l] Apology

body:
On 06/05/06, Philip Sandifer <snowspinner at gmail.com> wrote:
> I would like to apologize for suggesting that Julie Harding is on
> crack. The term was an unfortunate choice of metaphors to express my
> concern that Ms. Harding's posts were incoherent and nonsensical. I
> have no reason to believe that Ms. Harding is currently or has ever
> been using crack, any other form of cocaine, or any other drug that
> was not prescribed by a licensed medical professional. My sincere
> apologies if my previous e-mail led anyone to think otherwise.

Anyhow, upon me telling Julie she would stay on moderation for a
while, she sent me a photo allegedly of herself, told me that she was
"pretty and intelligent" and that she was quitting. She also seemed to
take offense to me identifying myself as the list administrator in my
email to her. I'm not sure what that was all about, but it sure was
funny.

~Mark Ryan


list: foundation-l

from_name: folengo at netcourrier.com

subject: [Foundation-l]The status of smaller languages on the Wikimedia	Commons

body:
When he says "The result is what is important" (09:32, 6 May 2006
 (UTC)) (see link 1 below), Arnomane seems to be following a
philosophy likely to be disrespectful of individuals, risking to
 condone humiliation as a routine practice.  "The principle that the
 end justifies the means is in individualist ethics regarded as the
 denial of all morals. In collectivist ethics it becomes necessarily
 the supreme rule." (Friedrich A. Hayek, link 2 )

On that same Template_talk:Lang-mp page, at 14:43, (UTC),
 Mormegil uses the worded "forced" (albeit with quotation marks) to
express what happened. One shouldn't be forced (with or without
 quotation marks). I am convinced that a smile is more powerful than
 Arnomane's stick, because whenever I asked (in Spanish, with a
smile) for a translation on the Spanish village pump of Commons,
or on the Japanese village pump of the Japanese Wikipedia, or on
 the Chinese village pump of the Chinese Wikipedia,  I found
 everytime people who provided the needed translations.

I think "notafish"'s idea(3) of "launching a massive
 translation rally"is a good idea. I am ready to go to every village
 pump of every concerned Wikipedia, use babelfish or Google
 language tool when I can, or leave a message in French or English
 when I can't, and recruit a voluntary translator for the Main Page
 in each language. It is also possible to use all our connections to
 people who know someone, who know someone... who knows a
 given language, as Brianna (4) who says she knows someone who
 speaks arabic. It is also possible to use the History of the pages in
 the various languages to find the names of the people who wrote
 them. I think this is a workable alternative to Arnomane's threats,
 but I am fearful of implementing it in conditions that would enable
 Arnomane to think that his threats are showing positive results,
and of going to these village pumps as a message bearer of a
 threat.

Links
1) http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Template_talk:Lang-mp
2) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_to_Serfdom
3) http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/foundation-l/2006-May/006988.html
4) http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/foundation-l/2006-May/006995.html

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Teofilo


list: wikimedia-l


from_name: jf_wikipedia at mac.com

subject: [WikiEN-l] Criticism sections on bios of living people

body:
See a pertinent discussion about an extension to [[WP:NPA]] now under
a poll for consensus:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Wikipedia_talk:No_personal_attacks#Poll:_Off-wiki_Personal_Attacks

The new extension is here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:NPA#Off-
wiki_personal_attacks

-- Jossi

On May 5, 2006, at 10:06 PM, A wrote:

> 2. If an editor is engaging in vicious personal attacks offsite, then
> coming here and demanding civility, is that a violation of the letter
> and/or spirit of the project?


from_name: Erik Moeller

body:
On 5/6/06, A <jokestress at gmail.com> wrote:

> 3. Are "criticism" sections valid in general, or do they just become a
> repository for quibbles and an amplifier of relatively insignificant
> hatecruft about a person?

They are not only valid, in many cases they are necessary. Wikipedia
is not Wikinfo, writing from a "sympathetic point of view". I hope
that nobody would argue that we should have an article about [[Ann
Coulter]], [[Michael Moore]], [[Uri Geller]], or [[Alexander
Lukashenko]] that does not include criticism. Important public and
political figures in particular may affect, through their action or
inaction, an entire society. To not describe the reaction in
encyclopedic terms, or worse, to only describe one side of the
reaction, completely undermines the purpose of an encyclopedia.

However, a simple fact is that often, the critics are few, disgruntled
individuals, and the subjects of the biography are little known
outside a particular circle of people. When "criticism" becomes
synonymous to "people who don't like me on MySpace", it leaves the
realm of encyclopedic interest. In addition to the number and
notability of the critics, we should examine the substance of their
claims. Do they actually qualify as criticism under any reasonable
definition? Is a reader served by having this information?

The existing guidelines strike me as sufficient to deal with the issue
on a case by case basis. But trying to get everyone in Wikipedia to
send us flowers (not saying you are) would be as dangerous as an
"anything goes" policy.

Erik


list: commons-l

subject:
[Commons-l] French village pump (was the status of smaller
	languages)

body:
Brianna
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/foundation-l/2006-May/006995.html

? (fr) Commons:Bistro Maintained, but not very active (6 topics).
?

Actually the French Bistro has around 5 new topics per month. The
 preceding months have been recently archived, and this is why it
 looks so short.

I like your idea of classifying which language community is active
 or not. I'll try to write a longer answer to your interesting point of
view.

Teofilo


body:
I agree with SM.

In reading the article, I see that the featured critics are (a) not
notable, (b) not significant, and (b) they are just people that don't
particularly like this person's journalistic style.  Had the
criticism been reported in mainstream media, or other third reputable
third party, that would have been a different situation. Blogs and
personal homepages are not reliable sources as primary sources as per
[[WP:RS]] .

-- Jossi

On May 6, 2006, at 6:07 PM, slimvirgin at gmail.com wrote:

> On 5/6/06, A <jokestress at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Having said that, I started editing a biography this week that led to
>> a troubling series of events. The article in question, [[Xeni
>> Jardin]], is about a blogger for [[Boing Boing]]. I did not know who
>> she was when I started editing, but I saw that there was a lot of
>> controversy about inclusion of a "Criticism" section, including a
>> "xenisucks.com" site.
>
> Hi Jokestress, that blog is not a reliable source within the terms of
> the policies. Blogs may only be used as primary sources about the
> author of the blog. To be used as third-party sources about any other
> topic, the blogger has to be a widely known and acknowledged expert in
> the area he's commenting on. For this kind of anonymous or
> quasi-anonymous gossip, a blog is never acceptable. We err on the side
> of caution when writing living biographies.
>
> Sarah
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


body:
My view is that unless we try we will never know... The great think
about WP, is that it has not be tried before. It came to birth under
the right conditions, and only time will tell if the project is
successful or not. Yes, we are experiencing birth pains, but that is
only proof that the project is alive. Yes, we are attracting
criticism, but that only shows that we are doing something right...

So, I would not put too many limitations. Let it happen. Let people
contribute, trivia or not. Let time be the judge.

-- Jossi

On May 6, 2006, at 3:03 AM, Peter Ansell wrote:

> How objective can even a group of people be? They will all bring to a
> debate their preconceptions to both importance and notability. It is
> possible that some would say that any but the most popular nineteenth
> century musical composers have had little influence outside of the
> classical music arena. However, it would seem silly not to allow
> articles on more than just the top four or five composers from the
> nineteenth century simply because they haven't had mainstream impact.
> I think that an encyclopedia should document more then just the
> majority subjects in society. What practical harm is there to an
> online encyclopedia having articles which are well written and detail
> verifiable facts about the less well known aspects of "devoted
> communities"?
>
> Peter


subject:
[Wikitech-l] [Mediawiki-l] [WikiEN-l] Upload by
	defaulttoCommons?

body:
>> If we already had the unique login system, it would only be a fact of
>> <form
>> action changing at the user level.
>
> No. The idea is to handle the upload from the home wiki, so to speak;
> the user shouldn't ever need to be directed somewhere on Commons. And
> this particular aspect has nothing to do with single sign-on (although
> it's needed before we can go ahead with it, since images must be
> associated with an uploader).

I understood the idea. But instead of doing it at the base, we could do it
on the top. It could then me more or less transparent but wouldn't matter
too much. And both methods need the single sign-on (or at least some kind of
identifying as user at project), so i wouldn't say it has nothing to do with
single sign-on, as it's a blocker.


from_name: Michael Bimmler

subject: [WikiEN-l] Apology

body:
On 5/6/06, julieharding1 at charter.net <julieharding1 at charter.net> wrote:
> ---- Philip Sandifer <snowspinner at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I would like to apologize for suggesting that Julie Harding is on
> > crack. The term was an unfortunate choice of metaphors to express my
> > concern that Ms. Harding's posts were incoherent and nonsensical. I
> > have no reason to believe that Ms. Harding is currently or has ever
> > been using crack, any other form of cocaine, or any other drug that
> > was not prescribed by a licensed medical professional. My sincere
> > apologies if my previous e-mail led anyone to think otherwise.
> >
> > Best,
> > Phil Sandifer
> > _______________________________________________
> > WikiEN-l mailing list
> > WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> > To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>
> Thank you for your formal apology.  I am to assume that someone spoke to you about your behavior.  Right now I am enraged.  I just spent over six hours editing the front page issues for you guys and for some reason, your program wouldn't take it from me.  Wikipedia is supposed to be the encyclopedia that anyone can edit?  Well, I just edited a whole section for you!  Goodnight

Assuming that you wanted (and failed) to edit Wikipedia's Main Page:
This is not possible for non-sysops for vandalism prevention reasons
(see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Protection_policy)
Regards
Michael

> ----redhawk1972
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

--
Regards
Michael Bimmler

Wikimedia CH - Verein zur F?rderung Freien Wissens
www.wikimedia.ch


from_name: Peter Ansell

body:
On 5/5/06, Molu <loom91 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> In practice any such implementations will lead to elitism. Trolls or no trolls, we look a contributions and not contributors, so everyone should be able to make their say count. A rule that allows only established bridge experts to vote on bridge deletions will be disastrous. The ideal process involves a large part of the community, not a small focused minority who are not statistically representative of the community.
>
>   Molu

Right now the AfD process is mostly controlled by the "small focused
minority" who find it worth their while to comment on every AfD. I
would put it forward that this process does not involve a large part
of the community, although it is setup to allow anyone to contribute,
many people prefer to put effort into developing articles rather than
trying to argue, generally with futile results due to the "majority
vote" closing techniques used which negate focused comments further
than referring to the "nom" or their impression of "notability",
mostly using the "google test".

Peter


from_name: Steve Bennett

subject: [WikiEN-l] Julie Harding

body:
On 5/6/06, John Lee <johnleemk at gawab.com> wrote:
> I have just approved several emails from Julie and rejected a number of
> others. Most of those rejected were unnecessarily incivil, but I think I
> let a slightly more innocuous one through. It seems Julie has since
> unsubscribed from the list. I was considering letting WikiEn-l know, but
> I think they'll figure out all this on their own. :p
>
> (Just letting the other admins know, in case I should have just
> discarded the lot.)

I dunno, I rejected a couple earlier, which had vague threats and
other nonsense. I don't think she was worth losing too much sleep
over...

On the other hand, there were a couple of messages from someone else
on moderation, so I took him off mod, but I don't remember who :/
Daniel someone?

Steve


subject: [WikiEN-l] Julie Harding

body:
Well, that was silly. :/

Steve


body:
On 5/5/06, Sigvat Stensholt <sigvats at mi.uib.no> wrote:
> My personal opinion here is that an expert should be able to provide a good
> enough argument that a lay-person is convinced to make a "keep" vote.

I was once told by an admin when I inquired that it was up to the
previous voters to be persuaded to change their votes, after other
opinions had been entered. I would like to see some sort of guideline
that recognises the progression of arguments, and gives the initial
delete contributors less weight unless they find arguments to rebutt
later keep votes.

I respect your method of deciding but it does not seem to be a widely
held view on how to do the process. I have voted keep for numerous
different reasons on AfD's, where everyone else was voting "nn delete"
and the delete vote has (from my very subjective impressions of
history) always been upheld.

In general, I would also like to see some sort of guideline and
enforcement for notifying major contributors to an article in advance
of nomination, not just letting them see the banner on the page, or
notifying them after the start of the process.

Peter


body:
On 5/6/06, Philip Welch <wikipedia at philwelch.net> wrote:
> It's not about someone (me) liking one thing or another. It's about
> objective importance and notability. Pokemon's influence even within
> contemporary popular culture is minimal outside a devoted community
> of fans.

How objective can even a group of people be? They will all bring to a
debate their preconceptions to both importance and notability. It is
possible that some would say that any but the most popular nineteenth
century musical composers have had little influence outside of the
classical music arena. However, it would seem silly not to allow
articles on more than just the top four or five composers from the
nineteenth century simply because they haven't had mainstream impact.
I think that an encyclopedia should document more then just the
majority subjects in society. What practical harm is there to an
online encyclopedia having articles which are well written and detail
verifiable facts about the less well known aspects of "devoted
communities"?

Peter


from_name: slimvirgin at gmail.com

body:
On 5/6/06, A <jokestress at gmail.com> wrote:
> Having said that, I started editing a biography this week that led to
> a troubling series of events. The article in question, [[Xeni
> Jardin]], is about a blogger for [[Boing Boing]]. I did not know who
> she was when I started editing, but I saw that there was a lot of
> controversy about inclusion of a "Criticism" section, including a
> "xenisucks.com" site.

Hi Jokestress, that blog is not a reliable source within the terms of
the policies. Blogs may only be used as primary sources about the
author of the blog. To be used as third-party sources about any other
topic, the blogger has to be a widely known and acknowledged expert in
the area he's commenting on. For this kind of anonymous or
quasi-anonymous gossip, a blog is never acceptable. We err on the side
of caution when writing living biographies.

Sarah


body:
On 5/6/06, Cheney Shill <halliburton_shill at yahoo.com> wrote:
> geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
>     On 5/6/06, Steve Bennett wrote:
>     > Speaking for myself, the existence of Pokemon is not directly a
>     > problem. But Wikipedia would certainly be better off if somehow all
>     > the effort that was expended on Pokemon articles was somehow invested
>     > in other ways.
>
>     Pokemon are massive. How many pokemon can you name? How many uk canals
>     (my area) can you name?
>
> I agree with Steve.  My solution would be as I stated in "pedia split".  Both groups would be happy.  Both would have admins interested and dedicated in them.  It's really not a question of what's huge at the moment.  It's more a question of WP:NOT and how they fit into the sum of the world's knowledge.  I'm sure there are elements of Pokemon that still deserve coverage by an encyclopedia, such as story and animation techniques and its impact on children, the economy, etc.  Leave that here.  Move the rest to Wikipop or whatever brand name you'd like to give it.  If nothing else, 99% of the disputes over whether [insert 15-minute celebrity is encyclopedic or not would go away.  That seems like a significant enough benefit to pursue.~~~~Pro-Lick

Strangely enough that idea sounds great. There are many people who are
willing and able to develop articles. I am opposed to deletion simply
because of its negative impact on people possibly staying on with
wikipedia to do the massive number of editorial tasks that are needed
by any large scale literature project.

By keeping their interest in developing they may move from the "pop"
pedia to the more focused "professional" looking pedia which has a
spectrum of topics which have developed to the point where people can
actually quote them. Right now I would NEVER suggest to anyone that
they quote wikipedia in any sort of scholarly work. This is because of
the huge lack of control over which articles are at a post-draft
stage. By separating articles by maturity, it would be clear which
articles have been verified enough to provide a sufficient level where
they are able to be quoted.

Of course, my rant above does not put any time limitations on the
above. But I think that a decision about such issues as a lack of
scholarly respect for the encyclopedia currently should be a factor in
the time frame of any proposal.

Peter


body:
On 06/05/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> No has complained yet.

The typical Wikipedian response.

Rob Church


from_name: Anthony DiPierro

body:
On 5/6/06, Erik Moeller <eloquence at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 5/6/06, A <jokestress at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > 3. Are "criticism" sections valid in general, or do they just become a
> > repository for quibbles and an amplifier of relatively insignificant
> > hatecruft about a person?
>
> They are not only valid, in many cases they are necessary. Wikipedia
> is not Wikinfo, writing from a "sympathetic point of view". I hope
> that nobody would argue that we should have an article about [[Ann
> Coulter]], [[Michael Moore]], [[Uri Geller]], or [[Alexander
> Lukashenko]] that does not include criticism. Important public and
> political figures in particular may affect, through their action or
> inaction, an entire society. To not describe the reaction in
> encyclopedic terms, or worse, to only describe one side of the
> reaction, completely undermines the purpose of an encyclopedia.
>
Criticism should certainly be part of an article, but I've always
found it poor writing style to put it in its own section.

Anthony


from_name: Steve Block

subject: [WikiEN-l] Verifiability equating to notability

body:
Anthony DiPierro wrote:
> The first half of your post answered my questions.  I haven't decided
> if I agree yet :), but it does make sense.
>
> On 5/2/06, Steve Block <steve.block at myrealbox.com> wrote:
>>> But as I pointed out when the comment was first made, it's not clear
>>> whether or not the four-way stop on that intersection is verifiable
>>> without resorting to original research.  It might be, and it might not
>>> be.  It would, of course, be the job of the person adding the
>>> information to show that it is.
>> But what, in this instance, is original research?  Is sourcing from
>> public archives original research?  Is reading a book original research?
>>   Is looking at a map original research?
>>
>> Steve block
>>
> The way I see original research is basically any text which can't be
> derived trivially from a published source.  That's my understanding,
> without looking at any Wikipedia pages.
>
> Now I suppose "derived trivially" is subject to some dispute there.  I
> like the way Steve Bennett explained this, though I think we have to
> allow interpretation (including context) to the extent that no one
> would reasonably dispute the interpretation.
>
> And that's another factor that has to be kept in mind.  NOR is, more
> than anything, a fallback for when there is a disagreement.  If no one
> (who isn't banned, anyway) has a problem with the text as its written,
> then NOR can safely be ignored.  NOR comes into place when someone,
> (anyone acting in good faith), reads a statement in a Wikipedia
> article, then reads the source or sources, and isn't *convinced* that
> the statement is true.
>
> To answer your questions...  The main source of original research in
> the four-way-stop case would be direct observation.

See I agree, but I take that to mean that looking at a website is also
original research.

> Sourcing
> from public archives wouldn't be original research as far as I'm
> concerned.

However, there is a line of argument that me going to the public records
office to look up someone's date of birth is original research, since I
can't verify that the certificate I get is for the person I claim it to
be for.  SO sourcing from public archives is a contentious area.

Steve block

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body:
Phil Boswell wrote:
>
> geni wrote:
>> On 5/4/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
>>> THEN, some admin comes along and says, gee, the vote is 27-3 to delete,
>>> but frankly, this bridge guy knows what he is talking about, so I am
>>> going to close it with a keep.
>> Not going to happen. There is no way you are going to get 27 people
>> who care enough to  vote delete. With they way AFD is currently set up
>> any significant minority can have the articles they want kept kept in
>> most cases.
>> So all of those "nn, delete" pile-ons are simply a figment of my
>> imagination?
>
>>> So, what's our bridge guy to do?  Well, one thing he can do is go around
>>> to all the other bridgipedians (great word, huh?) and point it out to
>>> them.    Vote stacking?  Maybe, but don't we prefer that these bridge
>>> people come in and have a say?
>> He could contact the other people who voted on the AFD. Most of them
>> will be prepared to listen to reason.
>>
> You are obviously aware of AfD discussions which have simply escaped my
> notice.
>
> Please provide links to AfD discussions which contain reasonable arguments
> like those suggested which are not then countered by piled-on "nn, delete"
> entries; even better would be a "nn, delete" replaced with a "keep" as a
> result of listening to reason. I would like to sooth my tortured soul with a
> bit of good-natured discussion...

It's old now, but I'm proud of
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Votes_for_deletion/Shooting_Fish

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from_name: John Lee

subject: [WikiEN-l] Reply to Tony - advocacy is a fact of life

body:
John Tex wrote:

>Hi Tony,
>
>I'm sorry if I jumped to the wrong conclusion.  Perhaps "right" was not the
>best word choice.  I'll change my statement to "advocacy is a fact of life".
>
>Johntex
>
>
Well, so is rudeness. Doesn't mean we resign ourselves to incivility.

John


subject: [WikiEN-l] We need a pedia split

body:
Guy Chapman aka JzG wrote:
> On Sat, 6 May 2006 14:13:06 +0200, you wrote:
>
>> The point of Wikipedia is being an encyclopedia and stuff that's popular
>> today should be covered. I personally don't care for Star Wars and Pokemon,
>> but others obviously do. None of us are in the position to determine what
>> people will care for in 100 years.
>
> This is true.  So we should have an article on Pokemon.  But there are
> articles on, for example, online games, which add pretty much nothing
> at all to the FAQ from the game site itself, and there are articles on
> Pokemon related subjects which are of no conceivable interest to
> anyone who is not already into Pokemon.  Is that good or bad?  I don't
> know.  It does seem that there is a tendency for fans to use Wikipedia
> as a sort of Myspace, building vast temples to their small gods.

For an example, see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Endless_Online_%282nd_nomination%29

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body:
On 5/6/06, Steve Bennett <stevage at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 5/6/06, Peter Ansell <ansell.peter at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I was once told by an admin when I inquired that it was up to the
> > previous voters to be persuaded to change their votes, after other
> > opinions had been entered. I would like to see some sort of guideline
> > that recognises the progression of arguments, and gives the initial
> > delete contributors less weight unless they find arguments to rebutt
> > later keep votes.
>
> Why not just scrap the concept of a vote entirely, and make it more
> like a judge deciding a case. Everyone can present an argument. If
> there is a *compelling* argument for keeping, it's kept. If there's a
> reasonable case for deletion, it's deleted.
>
> So there would be no point adding "delete as per nom". You would only
> add a comment if it was different to what other people had said, or
> you wanted to point to sources that proved notability or whatever. As
> it is, lots of people can vote without having any idea of actual
> notability guidelines or whatever.

That suggestion shows promise, as it avoids the "piling on votes"
problem as there are no votes. I like it!

> > In general, I would also like to see some sort of guideline and
> > enforcement for notifying major contributors to an article in advance
> > of nomination, not just letting them see the banner on the page, or
> > notifying them after the start of the process.
>
> Could be done automatically if everyone who has the article in their
> watchlist received a talk page message. Having the article in your
> watchlist demonstrates you care a bit - but doesn't confirm that you
> will actually see the AfD.
>
> Steve

Still have to be careful as newbies may not check the "watch pages i
edit" box, and hence not have a functioning watchlist for their
articles. But otherwise it seems like a good suggestion.

Peter


from_name: Matt Brown

body:
On 5/6/06, Steve Bennett <stevage at gmail.com> wrote:
> Well, of course, but at the same time, we're totally missing articles
> on some actual genuinely interesting and notable subjects. I was
> shocked to find that there are some Ch?teaux in the Loire Valley that
> don't have an article.

In some of my chosen subjects, the red-link count is rather high.
E.g. the lists of historic railroad companies in the US is probably
only half-populated, and I doubt we have all of them even on the lists
yet.  The red links include some pretty notable systems indeed, of
significant historical importance.

At the same time, I'm quite aware that many people might consider an
article on a Pokemon more interesting and relevant than one about an
obscure 19th century railroad company.  I choose, mostly, to avoid
making judgments on the worth of subjects, only their verifiability.

-Matt


from_name: Guy Chapman aka JzG

subject: [WikiEN-l] Ha Ha Ha you are so funny Jimbo!!

body:
On Sat, 6 May 2006 12:07:59 -0700, you wrote:

>Admins aren't police. Admins are people who can block people from
>editing a website and delete articles. To even compare admins to
>police is lunacy.

Yup.  We're just the janitors.

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] We need a pedia split

body:
On Sat, 6 May 2006 12:41:33 -0400, you wrote:

>I can't recall the names of the articles, but there was a series of
>16th-century samurai bios up for deletion recently on the grounds that
>they were "non-notable retainers" ;-)

Should have stuck them on a deck of Pokemon cards, they'd have been
safe as houses then.

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


from_name: Thommandel at aol.com

subject: [WikiEN-l] Ha Ha Ha you are so funny Jimbo!! # 3

body:
In a message dated 5/6/2006 2:08:28 P.M. Central Daylight Time,
wikipedia at philwelch.net writes:

I don't  know anything about cosmology. I do know something about
bias--since  you are biased towards plasma cosmology, perhaps
neutrality is  perceived by you as a negative bias? I know that
Wikipedia tends to  avoid giving undue weight to non-standard  theories.

Your reply is reasonable and adult like. Thanks for that.  However you
seemed to have selected parts of my letter and ignored the important (to me)
parts. Rather than further confuse the issue, allow me to take it one point at a
time.

My main concern is Hubble's regard for redshift. Cosmological redshift is
one of the three legs that the big bang theory is based on.  The standard
theory has it that this observed redshift is Doppler induced, i.e., the faster a
star is receding, the more it's light is shifted toward the red. They know the
light has been shifted because certain spectral lines, frequencies which
absorb  energy, are found to have been shifted. Thus they can tell the red light
was  actually a different frequency (color) when it started out.

In your article about Hubble, it is written and I quote "Edwin  Powell Hubble
(_November 20_ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/November_20) , _1889_
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1889) ?_September 28_
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/September_28) , _1953_ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953) ) was an _American_
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States)  _astronomer_
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astronomer) ,  noted for his discovery of _galaxies_
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galaxy)  beyond the _Milky Way_
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milky_Way)   and the cosmological _redshift_
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redshift) . Edwin Hubble was one  of the first to argue that the red shift of distant
galaxies is due to the _Doppler effect_
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doppler_effect)  induced by  the expansion of the universe. He was one of the leading
astronomers of modern  times and laid down the foundation upon which _physical
cosmology_ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_cosmology)   now rests."

The controversy revolves around the "cause" of this redshift.   Remember that
while the redshift has in fact been observed, the "cause" for the  redshift
is theoretical.  (It was achieved by adding "c" the velocity of  light to the
original equations) The big bang theory ASSUMES the redshift is  Doppler
induced and THEREFORE indicates velocity much like the train whistle  changing in
tone as it passes by you.

They key phrase here is "Edwin Hubble was one of the first to argue that  the
red shift of distant galaxies is due to the _Doppler effect_
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doppler_effect)  induced by  the expansion of the universe."

This is simply not true.   In the Journal of the Royal  Astronomical Society
of Canada, in a paper on  the Centennial  Celebration of Hubble's birth, A.
Sandage writes that Hubble himself did not  consider redshift as an indicator of
expansion, Sandage wrote:  "Hubble  concluded that his observed log N(m)
distribution showed a large departure from  Euclidean geometry, provided that the
effect of redshifts on the apparent  magnitudes was calculated as if the
redshifts were due to a real expansion. A  different correction is required if no
motion exists, the redshifts then being  due to an unknown cause. Hubble
believed that his count data gave a  more reasonable result concerning spatial
curvature if the redshift correction  was made assuming no recession.  To the very
end of his  writings he maintained this position, favoring (or at the very
least keeping  open) the model where no true expansion exists, and therefore that
the  redshift "represents a hitherto unrecognized principle of nature". This
viewpoint is emphasized (a) in The Realm of the Nebulae,  (b) in his reply
(Hubble 1937a) to the criticisms of the 1936 papers by  Eddington and by
McVittie, and (c) in his 1937 Rhodes Lectures  published as The Observational
Approach to Cosmology (Hubble 1937b). It  also persists in his last published
scientific paper which is an account of his  Darwin Lecture (Hubble 1953). "
<ref>http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/diamond_jubilee/1996/sandage_hubble.html</ref>
Also in
Hubble?s 1937 book (The Observational Approach To  Cosmology)-- "Hubble
himself made  it clear that he was very uncomfortable with the ?recession factor?
being  attributed to him as ?The Hubble Expansion?." If one just sticks to
the facts, Hubble concluded, "There is no  evidence of expansion and no
restriction of the time scale, no trace of spatial  curvature..."

Therefore it is clear that Hubble DID NOT argue that redshift meant
expansion.  The truth is that Hubble argued just the opposite, that the  redshift was
caused by an unknown (at that time) mechanism.  And Wikipedia  is incorrect
stating otherwise.

It was the later cosmologists that argued that redshift meant  expansion, not
Hubble.  Your encyclopedia states in the Hubble section  "Hubble's law is the
statement in _physical cosmology_
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_cosmology)   that the _redshift_ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redshift)  in light
coming from  distant _galaxies_ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galaxy)   is
_proportional_ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proportionality_(mathematics))   to
their distance. The law was first formulated by _Edwin Hubble_
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edwin_Hubble)  and _Milton  Humason_
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milton_Humason)  in _1929_ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1929)   after
nearly a decade of _observations_ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Observations) .
It is  considered the first observational basis for the expanding space
paradigm and  today serves as one of the most often cited pieces of evidence in
support of the  _Big  Bang_ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang) ."

(In the above statement which sounds true, the incorrect part is "...the  firs
t observational basis... It was assumed, not observed.)

There is a modern twist in the story line. In the 197o's William Tifft
observed that the light coming from distant stars and galaxies is "quantized."  It
has periodicity.
This observation has been verified and confirmed many times over.  It  is
considered inconsistent with expansion since expansion would blur out the
spectral lines. (An alternative explanation  favored by creationists often  cited by
some is that the earth is at the center of the Universe...)

Now, If I were to go to your articles which make the statement that Hubble
proved expansion, the inclusion of this comment by Hubble as reported by
Sandage  would not be accepted.  It was reverted out of the redshift article, with
no explanation, reverted out of the alternative cosmology article with the
explanation that it is already in the plasma cosmology article, and was reverted
 out of the plasma cosmology article with the explanation that it is of
historical interest only.

So, Hubble did not believe that redshift meant expansion, but as the story
filters down it becomes just the opposite, in some places (elsewhere)I have
read  something like "Hubble proved that the Universe is expanding."

The controversy does not exist only in Wikipedia.  While it is  favorite
characterization by the big bang folks to regard alternative  cosmological
theories as "fringe theories" there are many notable figures who  have disagreed with
the big bang conjecture. One is Halton Arp, who was forced  to move to
Germany to continue his studies.  His works shows that spatially  correlated
galaxies have vastly different redshifts

My complaint is that the plasma cosmology article is populated by big bang
advocates with their obvious to me bias toward their theory, a bias which they
frequently acknowledge.  It doesn't seem right to me that one advocating a
certain viewpoint can edit the opposing viewpoint in a disparaging manner. And
when it comes to deleting evidence that runs contrary to their belief, then
we  have a new area of concern.  Something akin to a janitor rewriting the
equations on the blackboard at night.

Point two. I did not start this warring.  I started out in good faith  with
good intentions. But I was insulted, threatened, intimidated, reverted,
blanked, ridiculed and called just about every name in the book. (I don't
understand why some think calling names is effective, it only speaks about the  name
caller) I am used to dealing with professionals and professionals do not  talk
in the manner I have come to know here. It almost seems like the people,  some
of them anyhow, are college kids with nothing better to do inbetween  classes.
 Professionals do not resort to ad hominum attacks for any reason.  That is
because an attack on the person only indicates that attacker has no  better
argument going for him. It is an admission of failure.  I am not  going to simply
lie down and take it for the sake of civility because I have  seen very
little of that here.  I will suggest that your organization  consider creating a
Wikipolice with the sole purpose of infiltrating articles in  order to ferret
out those admins who are effectively rotting away what was  originally probably
one of the best ideas anyone ever thought of.  It is  very dangerous to assume
that everyone is doing the right thing, especially when  the operating
philosophy is something like the first comment I heard from this  list "A good
Wikipedian can do as he damn well pleases"

Tommy Mandel

"The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatsoever
that it is not utterly absurd. " ? Bertrand Russell


subject: [WikiEN-l] We need a pedia split

body:
On Sat, 06 May 2006 22:23:31 +0100, you wrote:

>For an example, see
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Endless_Online_%282nd_nomination%29

Dear old Yuckfoo.  Always so polite, and so predictable: "keep please,
this is notable".  Unverifiable, yes, unsourced of course, by common
consent impossible to substantiate from any reputable independent
source - but *notable*.  Google 1, Policy 0.

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] Julie

body:
Julie wrote:

>obviously my
>opinion must count for something because my e-box is full.

Too many jokes.

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


from_name: brion at pobox.com

subject: [Wikitech-l] MediaWiki automated test run failure 2006-05-07

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

Running test Table security: embedded pipes (http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2006-April/034637.html)... FAILED!
Running test Magic Word: {{NUMBEROFFILES}}... FAILED!
Running test BUG 1887, part 2: A <math> with a thumbnail- math enabled... FAILED!
Running test Language converter: output gets cut off unexpectedly (bug 5757)... FAILED!
Running test HTML bullet list, unclosed tags (bug 5497)... FAILED!
Running test HTML ordered list, closed tags (bug 5497)... FAILED!
Running test HTML ordered list, unclosed tags (bug 5497)... FAILED!
Running test HTML nested bullet list, open tags (bug 5497)... FAILED!
Running test HTML nested ordered list, closed tags (bug 5497)... FAILED!
Running test HTML nested ordered list, open tags (bug 5497)... FAILED!

Passed 303 of 313 tests (96.81%) FAILED!


from_name: Mark Gallagher

body:
G'day Julie,

> ---- Steve Bennett <stevage at gmail.com> wrote:
>> On 5/5/06, Pete Bartlett <pcb21 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>>> Yep if you could just spend a couple of minutes unifying the
>>> licences for us Guy that would be great ;-).
>>
>> Wikitravel and Wikipedia have incompatible licenses?
>
> You guys just like to complain.  So go ahead and tell everyone, what
> are the consequences that the licenses...(you are spelling it wrong!)

No, he isn't.  You need a better dictionary; one that recognises that
the world outside the USA does not necessarily speak American.

> are incompatible?  They are both separate entities.  They are both
> businesses.  People should be happy that they are licensed.
> Enlighten us, what are these horrible consequences? -Julie

Wikipedia and Wikitravel are both under "free" licences.  This means
that we both allow our content to be re-used, under certain conditions
(for example, always citing the original authors, derivative works must
be licenced the same way).  In theory, then, we could share our content.
  But if Wikitravel's licence is more restrictive than ours (say,
refusing to allow commercial use) then we cannot use it, because we
promise anyone who re-uses content from Wikipedia that it's okay for
commercial use.

This may not seem particularly terrible, depending on your view of
copyright law, but it's certainly not a Good Thing.

--
MarkGallagher
"What?  I can't hear you, I've got a banana on my head!"
- Danger Mouse

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body:
G'day Julie,

> ---- Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
>
>> On May 5, 2006, at 8:56 AM, Mark Gallagher wrote:
>>
>>> "Wikipedia could be really cool, if only it weren't an
>>> encyclopaedia."
>>
>> Truer words were never spoken. In fact, a number of alternatives to
>>  Wikipedia have the possibility of being very profitable. THINK AND
>>  GROW RICH... Just do it somewhere else.
>
>> That spelling of encyclopedia is exactly why Wikipedia is what it
>> is.   Don't let the front door hit you on your way out.  There's
>> plenty of other places on the web for you to get the kicks you're
>> looking for.   If you're that eager, why don't you try and build up
>> an online business such as this on your own. Then, you'll really
>> find out how hard all of this is.

I'm not sure which one of us you're referring to: Fred Bauder,
administrator and arbitres and long-time contributor to Wikipedia, or
Mark Gallagher, administrator and long-time contributor (but not, thank
goodness, arbitres).

I've written hundreds of articles and made thousands of edits.  Fred
Bauder has gone further, not merely working to improve the encyclopaedia
but also contributing to its good governance with a verve and dedication
matched by very few on the project.  And we're not alone: there are
thousands of people who've done as much, or more.

We don't need to try to "build up an online business such as
[Wikipedia]".  We *are* Wikipedia.  You can be, too.  But you've got a
few misconceptions to drop, first.

--
MarkGallagher
"What?  I can't hear you, I've got a banana on my head!"
- Danger Mouse

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from_name: Rob Church

subject: [Wikitech-l] Announcement: New mailing list for internationalisation

body:
I'd like to announce the creation of a new mailing list dedicated to
centralising discussion regarding MediaWiki internationalisation.
Details can be found at
http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-i18n.

MediaWiki's support for multiple languages, and the provided
translations, is dependent upon volunteers to maintain the language
files the software uses, and it's fair statement to point out that a
lot of these are out of date or missing entries.

When a developer adds a new feature which requires an interface
message, it's added to the English-language localisation files, and
sometimes the files corresponding to another language, if spoken, e.g.
I might add a new feature and provide English and French messages.
This doesn't help other languages, such as German or Russian.
Likewise, removals or renaming of messages don't propagate to other
languages (although I intend to write a couple of quick scripts to
help make this convenient), leaving obsolete messages behind.

What would be awesome is if each language had a maintainer who was
active in helping to keep their specific language up to date. Some
languages do seem to have de facto maintainers; Rotem Liss, for
example, has adopted Hebrew, and we receive frequent patches from him
in response to updates we make.

I'd therefore like to take this opportunity to extend a welcome to
anyone interested in helping to clean up their spoken language's
translations to join the list and see what it's all about and what
needs doing. I am, of course, happy to answer questions prospective
maintainers have, and Niklas Laxstr?m is another figure you might want
to contact.

Rob Church


from_name: Peter Jacobi

body:
Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
> > 1. Is a "____sucks.com" blog a notable or reliable source?
>
> I would say it depends on its content and readership. It might be,
> but you have to take a look at it. In this case there seems to be
> substantial readership and contents could probably be used in the
> context. "Hostile critics, writing on ...sucks point out blah blah."
> In some cases sites like this may engage in serious research which
> can lead you to reliable verifiable material. (For example Xenu.net,
> an anti-Scientology site).

I assume you want to inject some "ignore all rules here",
as [[WP:V]] quite clearly states:

> Self-published sources

> Anyone can create a website or pay to have a book published, and
> then claim to be an expert in a certain field. For that reason,
> self-published books, personal websites, and blogs are largely not
> acceptable as sources. Exceptions may be when a well-known,
> professional researcher in a relevant field, or a well-known
> professional journalist, has produced self-published material.
> In some cases, these may be acceptable as sources, so long as
> their work has been previously published by credible, third-party
> publications. However, exercise caution: if the information on the
> professional researcher's blog is really worth reporting, someone
> else will have done so.

We all like [[Space opera in Scientology doctrine]], but if its
only source would be xenu.net, it would have been deleted.

Regards,
Peter Jacobi
[[User:Pjacobi]]

--
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Jetzt GMX TopMail testen: http://www.gmx.net/de/go/topmail


from_name: Daniel Arnold

subject:
[Foundation-l] The status of smaller languages on the Wikimedia
	Commons

body:
Am Samstag, 06. Mai 2006 18:57 schrieb amgine at saewyc.net:
> The promotion and translation subcommittee is very interested in helping
> with translation tasks. Their page is at
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Communications_subcommittees/PT but they
> may be contacted via the Communications Committee mailing list at
> wmfcc-l at mail.wikimedia.org (this list is moderated to reduce spam.)
>
> The Communications Committee holds weekly meetings to be available to the
> community. You can see the schedule and agenda for meetings on the
> Committee's page on Meta:
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Communications_committee

Well there is already a project in Commons perfectly suited for that case and
people are working right now in there and I really wonder why people seem to
think that an translation effort of Wikimedia Commons needs to be coordinated
by a "sub commitee" (sorry if I read that word I read "be aware of
bureaucracy").

Basically all we need are people that just do things without large meetings,
scedules and debates and start working up the tasks at:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Help_page_maintenance

For sure I appreciate any help but it is more than just that single minor
important main page that needs to be translated but real help pages like this
one:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:First_steps

Regards,
Daniel Arnold


body:
Am Samstag, 06. Mai 2006 18:13 schrieb folengo at netcourrier.com:
> On that same Template_talk:Lang-mp page, at 14:43, (UTC),
>  Mormegil uses the worded "forced" (albeit with quotation marks) to
> express what happened. One shouldn't be forced (with or without
>  quotation marks). I am convinced that a smile is more powerful than
>  Arnomane's stick, because whenever I asked (in Spanish, with a
> smile) for a translation on the Spanish village pump of Commons,
> or on the Japanese village pump of the Japanese Wikipedia, or on
>  the Chinese village pump of the Chinese Wikipedia,  I found
>  everytime people who provided the needed translations.

Teofilo I have read your "pleasant comments with a smile" at Wikimedia Commons
Village pump countless times and I don't know if I must be Budha or something
in the like in order to bear your distortion of facts with a smile.

I just remember one comment from you that you refuse to participate at
translating of help pages until I do not fully agree with your far fetched
unwiki like proposal you provided those days. Shall I go more into details?

>  I think this is a workable alternative to Arnomane's threats,
>  but I am fearful of implementing it in conditions that would enable
>  Arnomane to think that his threats are showing positive results,
> and of going to these village pumps as a message bearer of a
>  threat.

Pardon? Well again as remaked above you refuse to do something good because
you think that I would count your efforts as my personal success and as proof
of everything I do. What a nonsense. By the way can you translate:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:First_steps

into French? Just in order to start with some real work in order to finally
support French in a decent way in Commons... For sure you won't start because
you think that I could crow over you. Would be nice if you can proof me wrong
that you do not believe that and just start translating this crucial tutorial
(Hint: If you translated it it would be your valuable work not mine. You
would get the credit not me and I don't care about credit for me).

Regards,
Daniel Arnold / Arnomane


from_name: Anthere

body:
Daniel Arnold wrote:
> Am Samstag, 06. Mai 2006 18:57 schrieb amgine at saewyc.net:
>
>>The promotion and translation subcommittee is very interested in helping
>>with translation tasks. Their page is at
>>http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Communications_subcommittees/PT but they
>>may be contacted via the Communications Committee mailing list at
>>wmfcc-l at mail.wikimedia.org (this list is moderated to reduce spam.)
>>
>>The Communications Committee holds weekly meetings to be available to the
>>community. You can see the schedule and agenda for meetings on the
>>Committee's page on Meta:
>>http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Communications_committee
>
>
> Well there is already a project in Commons perfectly suited for that case and
> people are working right now in there and I really wonder why people seem to
> think that an translation effort of Wikimedia Commons needs to be coordinated
> by a "sub commitee" (sorry if I read that word I read "be aware of
> bureaucracy").
>
> Basically all we need are people that just do things without large meetings,
> scedules and debates and start working up the tasks at:
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Help_page_maintenance
>
> For sure I appreciate any help but it is more than just that single minor
> important main page that needs to be translated but real help pages like this
> one:
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:First_steps
>
> Regards,
> Daniel Arnold

I would like to clarify something, which appears to be misunderstood.

Committees (and subcommmittees) do not exist to *replace* local
communities to do things. They can help local communities, or not.

The primary role of committees is to do what the Foundation should do.
It is distinctly different.

Ant


body:
Am Samstag, 06. Mai 2006 19:24 schrieb SJ:
> I find the discussion of "uselang=" the most interesting on that page.
>  This would be a crude first step towards giving anonymous readers
> more of a say in how they browse the site.  Perhaps uselang choices
> could also be pulled from browser settings, and potentially set as a
> cookie independent of them logging in (for those who never create /
> don't want accounts).

The problem is that many people like me look at different languages on a daily
basis in order to work in Wikimedia Commons that's why I personally was
reserved on these "uselang" link in the language templates.

But I would really appreciate a cookie based solution that way that anonymous
users can choose their interface language or directly set it via browser
language settings. There exists even a patch for it but it was rejected due
to caching problems:

http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=3665

So as there is code existing I don't think a solution hacked into the wiki
page code with negative side effects is the best way to go but a clean
solution that satisfies all people way better in the MediaWiki software.

Regards,
Daniel Arnold / Arnomane


from_name: Kernigh

subject: [Foundation-l]A Wikisource Definition (was: RfC: A Free Content	and Expression Definition)

body:
Erik Moeller <eloquence at ...> writes:

> We have seen this with Wikibooks. Intended as a place to
> collaboratively write textbooks, this definition clashes with a much
> more inclusive practice that has long tolerated materials such as game
> guides, jokes, or dating tips. How much do we know about the way the
> meaning of Wikibooks or Wikisource is interpreted in other languages
> than English, when we don't have a shared definition of its mission
> which itself is literally translated into these languages?

I now comment about en.wikibooks. My comments are invalid for the other
language editions of Wikibooks.

The page at http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikibooks:What_is_Wikibooks
gives little idea of what Wikibooks is for, instead giving a long list
of "Wikibooks is not".

  (De facto, though, the clause that "Wikibooks includes books based
  on Wikipedia articles" allows textbooks for any topic that has a
  Wikipedia article. I am thinking of abolishing this, because it could
  be trouble to let Wikipedia determine the scope of Wikibooks.)

>From what I know, en.wikibooks and the Wikimedia Foundation do not
understand each other well. For example, on the talk page [2]

 [2] http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikibooks:What_is_Wikibooks

I started reading from one user:

> Whichever one of us is right, however, does not really matter as it
> does not change the fact that the President of the Wikimedia
> Foundation, in his role as President of the Wikimedia Foundation,
> has stated that going forward computer and video game guides (and
> other books not meeting the criteria that they must be similar to
> textbooks used for accredited learning of some description) should
> not be on wikibooks and should (within a generous timeframe) be
> removed. Come the end of the day, and whether you agree with it
> or not, his decision is final.

... as if every edit or mailing list post from [[User:Jimbo Wales]]
is a policy decree even when not explicitly stated as such!

Then from another user:

> "Jimbo says" IMHO is not justification any more and not legally
> binding because the WMF exists specifically to deal with decisions
> like this.  This is a policy decision that affects a good many users
> and is being done arbitrarily, not through some sort of community
> concensus process such as most of our current policies have been
> adopted. If this is to be changed and accepted as an official act
> of the WMF, it should be done as an official action by the WMF
> board. It hasn't been done that way.

... as if the Presidency of Wikimedia is a meaningless position!

Thus the role of the Wikimedia Foundation in Wikibooks is unknown.

It has been worse than this. On 1 March 2006, we finally adopted our
naming policy:

  http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikibooks:Naming_policy

Wikibooks is now divided into textbooks. Each textbook has a page at
[[Book Name]], and all other pages of that textbook must follow the
slash convention: [[Book Name/Chapter Name]]. Older textbooks can use
other conventions provided that the page name starts with the book name.

>From 10 July 2003 to 28 February 2006, there was no naming policy, and
we still have many pages that require merging into books.

One principle though is clear, and has always remained constant since
the founding of the project.

Wikibooks always was and is built around the GNU Free Documentation
License (with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no
Back-Cover Texts). Wikibooks is free content.

  (This might not be true of images and uploaded files. Some of us give
  little attention to local uploaded files because we use Wikimedia
  Commons for most things. However, two proposed policies would help:
    http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikibooks:Image_use_policy
    http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikibooks:Fair_use_policy
  Together, they should require that all images are either free images
  or belong to one of four strict fair use categories.)

To contrast, http://wikitextbook.co.uk is NOT free content.

-- [[Wikibooks:en:User:Kernigh]]
   http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/User:Kernigh


body:
Am Sonntag, 07. Mai 2006 02:13 schrieb Anthere:
> I would like to clarify something, which appears to be misunderstood.
>
> Committees (and subcommmittees) do not exist to *replace* local
> communities to do things. They can help local communities, or not.
>
> The primary role of committees is to do what the Foundation should do.
> It is distinctly different.

I am really sorry for that rant but I am just a little bit frustrated as I
have advertised our need for translation help countless times in some
wikipedias (namely de.wp and fr.wp) with limited success and just feared that
we will be sceduled somewhere and then there will be nice supportive calls
and again not many more people jump in.

There are some people that just jumped in there by themselves and just do
stuff which is really nice. Interestingly these people mainly come from
"minor languages" (minor either in the aspect of speakers or in the aspect of
less people from that language in Commons). Perhapes this is due to the fact
that they just want to support their language and are thus motivated doing
the work themselves rather than starting a regular political debate like
Teofilo has done many times before.

Arnomane


from_name: Dan Rosenthal

subject: [WikiEN-l] Apology

body:
Pfft. I want pictures.

-Swatjester

On 5/7/06, Mark Ryan <ultrablue at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 07/05/06, Dan Rosenthal <swatjester at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Mark Ryan: You fail to answer the key question: was she hot?
> > -Swatjester
>
> I do not feel qualified to make that sort of a judgment. She also
> appears to have made the same assertion about her pure intelligence
> on-wiki:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:General_Eisenhower/WikiSurvey
>
> I'll let that page speak for itself. She'd make a fair point if she
> wasn't pushing the "I am incredibly beautiful and intelligent" line,
> because we'd be able to stop laughing for a while.
>
> ~Mark Ryan
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

--
Dan Rosenthal
IWVO National Legislative Director


from_name: Philip Welch

body:
On May 7, 2006, at 1:14 AM, Steve Bennett wrote:

> On 5/7/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
>> Criticism should certainly be part of an article, but I've always
>> found it poor writing style to put it in its own section.
>
> I think it depends on the subject of the article. When talking about
> borderline dictators, for example, I find it works quite well in its
> own section. You describe the person's life, achievements, invasions
> etc, building a fairly positive image of the person. Then the
> criticism section might go "However, Bloggs has frequently been
> criticised, especially in the United States, where he is seen as a
> dictator...." As a reader, I find this style much more palatable -
> you're not caught up with the "yes he is, no he's not" all the way
> through, where every sentence has been hacked together by supporters
> and detractors.
>
> On the other hand, a genuinely controversial character like Michael
> Moore, doesn't need this treatment. His controversy is his career.
> Pretty much everything he has done had an immediate critical response,
> which he was aware of and probably responded to, so it makes more
> sense to put those criticisms in the body of the article.
>
> Do I have any supporters on this? :)

Indeed. Very insightful analysis.

--
Philip L. Welch
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Philwelch


from_name: Brianna Laugher

body:
On 05/05/06, Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen at gmail.com> wrote:
> A summary of what happened is nice. It is not what I am really
> interested in. What I am interested in is having things announced before
> they happen. This will have, as an effect, that people do not have the
> excuse that they did not know. They will have less reason to moan (they
> will anyway). When you say nobody told us, you mean nobody told you.
> Fine. This has been discussed at previous occasions when we had a flash
> in the commons pan.

Sorry, Commons people are not mind-readers. If you wanted Commons to
make announcements on any mailing list you should have told us. I will
consider this our first instance of being "informed".

It will be a very long time between announcements at any rate. What
have we implemented so far that should have been announced? If you are
again referring to the PNG deletion thing, how many times can I say
that we never had an official policy supporting that? So we would
never have announced anything there anyway. It is wrong to assume that
behind every action of every Commons admin lies a policy. This is not
true on any project, even en.wp. And as Arnomane said, we try to
minimise our official policies (if only to minimise the amount of
translation required).

Brianna


subject: [WikiEN-l] Apology

body:
I wasn't aware this was a humor-free list.

-Swatjester

On 5/7/06, BJ?rn Lindqvist <bjourne at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 5/6/06, Dan Rosenthal <swatjester at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Mark Ryan: You fail to answer the key question: was she hot?
> > -Swatjester
>
> That is not how you behave on a public mailing list. Please desist.
>
> --
> mvh Bj?rn
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

--
Dan Rosenthal
IWVO National Legislative Director


from_name: Cheney Shill

subject: [WikiEN-l] systemic bias

body:
"Daniel R. Tobias" <dan at tobias.name> wrote:

    On 5 May 2006 at 13:26, Raphael Wegmann wrote:

    > As if common anti-islam bias among the editors weren't enough,
    > even administrators, who outed themselves as free speech extremists
    > on the Image-Display talk page, which has been created for this
    > content dispute, abuse their administrator privilege by simply
    > blocking editors they disagree with.

    "Free speech extremists", huh? Extremism in defense of liberty is no
    vice... :-)

Apparently including the extreme of stopping the free speech of those they disagree with.~~~~Pro-Lick

---------------------------------
Love cheap thrills? Enjoy PC-to-Phone  calls to 30+ countries for just 2?/min with Yahoo! Messenger with Voice.


from_name: Anthony DiPierro

body:
On 5/7/06, Steve Bennett <stevage at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 5/7/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
> > Criticism should certainly be part of an article, but I've always
> > found it poor writing style to put it in its own section.
>
> I think it depends on the subject of the article. When talking about
> borderline dictators, for example, I find it works quite well in its
> own section. You describe the person's life, achievements, invasions
> etc, building a fairly positive image of the person. Then the
> criticism section might go "However, Bloggs has frequently been
> criticised, especially in the United States, where he is seen as a
> dictator...." As a reader, I find this style much more palatable -
> you're not caught up with the "yes he is, no he's not" all the way
> through, where every sentence has been hacked together by supporters
> and detractors.
>
You know, when you put it that way, I'm not sure the criticism itself
is even useful.  Shouldn't it be enough to state the facts, and let
someone decide for themselves whether or not the person is a dictator?
 "X has been frequently criticised" is a statement I think we should
avoid.  Quoting prominent figures is fine, mentioning rallys and other
organized protests is OK.  But just taking a general sentiment and
applying it to a country, for instance, is not appropriate in my book
(unless you can cite a poll I'd even say it amounts to
non-verifiable/original research).

> On the other hand, a genuinely controversial character like Michael
> Moore, doesn't need this treatment. His controversy is his career.
> Pretty much everything he has done had an immediate critical response,
> which he was aware of and probably responded to, so it makes more
> sense to put those criticisms in the body of the article.
>
> Do I have any supporters on this? :)
>
> Steve


from_name: Steve Bennett

body:
On 5/7/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
> Criticism should certainly be part of an article, but I've always
> found it poor writing style to put it in its own section.

I think it depends on the subject of the article. When talking about
borderline dictators, for example, I find it works quite well in its
own section. You describe the person's life, achievements, invasions
etc, building a fairly positive image of the person. Then the
criticism section might go "However, Bloggs has frequently been
criticised, especially in the United States, where he is seen as a
dictator...." As a reader, I find this style much more palatable -
you're not caught up with the "yes he is, no he's not" all the way
through, where every sentence has been hacked together by supporters
and detractors.

On the other hand, a genuinely controversial character like Michael
Moore, doesn't need this treatment. His controversy is his career.
Pretty much everything he has done had an immediate critical response,
which he was aware of and probably responded to, so it makes more
sense to put those criticisms in the body of the article.

Do I have any supporters on this? :)

Steve


body:
On 5/7/06, Matt Brown <morven at gmail.com> wrote:
> At the same time, I'm quite aware that many people might consider an
> article on a Pokemon more interesting and relevant than one about an
> obscure 19th century railroad company.  I choose, mostly, to avoid
> making judgments on the worth of subjects, only their verifiability.

If I can offer one comment on the "worth" of having a Wikipedia
article on a topic, it's that for your obscure 19th century railroad
companies, Wikipedia might be the *only* readily accessible source on
that topic. That is, for someone without access to a library, all
their info might come from Wikipedia. For Pokemon, the reverse is the
case - almost everything in our articles is likely to have come from
the internet, if it was sourced at all.

Steve


subject: [WikiEN-l] Apology

body:
None of the taunting that's gone on is really picture-perfect behavior. I
think we should just let this one rest.

k

On 5/7/06, Dan Rosenthal <swatjester at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I wasn't aware this was a humor-free list.
>
> -Swatjester
>
> On 5/7/06, BJ?rn Lindqvist <bjourne at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > On 5/6/06, Dan Rosenthal <swatjester at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > Mark Ryan: You fail to answer the key question: was she hot?
> > > -Swatjester
> >
> > That is not how you behave on a public mailing list. Please desist.
> >
> > --
> > mvh Bj?rn
> > _______________________________________________
> > WikiEN-l mailing list
> > WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> > To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
> >
>
>
>
> --
> Dan Rosenthal
> IWVO National Legislative Director
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] Ha Ha Ha you are so funny Jimbo!! # 3A

body:
In a message dated 5/6/2006 2:08:28 P.M. Central Daylight Time,
wikipedia at philwelch.net writes:

I'll be square with you: we tend to be
dismissive of people  who offer complaint #2 because most of them are
kooks. Proving  you're not a kook requires calmness, civility, and
refraining from  being as much of a prick as you're being right now.

Hi Phil;

In my preceding letter I presented the requisite evidence that Hubble  did
not discover/believe/endorse/support the assumption that redshift means
expansion. I presume that the necessary corrections will be made in Wikipedia  and
other publications which depend on Wikipedia research.

Being regarded a prick in this situation is an  honor. Thank you for that.
Very often there is a fine line between a kook  and a visionary. This is
especially evident in cosmology witness Galileo, who  was blocked from the church and
Bruno who was burned at the stake for  harboring views which have since been
accepted. Keep in mind that Ptolemy was  once regarded as the supreme
authority on cosmology, and at that time all  others were considered kooks. Indeed
science is replete with visionaries who  when they first presented their ideas
were regarded as kooks.

The big bang cosmological model is extremely important as it forms the  basis
of a vast amount of scientific research in the Western world.  But,  as
stated therein, and supported by the observations of Thomas Kuhn in his  book "The
Structure of Scientific Revolutions",  the viewpoint is based  on fear of
retribution rather than pure science.  The details are in the  letter.

I would just like to add something not mentioned in the letter, or  Wikipedia
for that matter.  While the entire scenario of the big bang  depends on a
Doppler interpretation of the redshifted light coming from  galaxies,  the
observation of periodicity or quantized (jumps) light is  definitive evidence
falsifying the Doppler interpretation.  Much if not  alll science depends on
interpretations.  In many cases there are two  interpretions available to explain an
observation. In the case of jumping  light (my simple word) one interpretation
is that the earth is at the center  of the Universe, and the galaxies are
spaced in layers much like an onion.  Believe it or not this interpretation is
often used by the  Creationists.  The other interpretation is that the redshift
is an  intrinsic property of the photon/medium.  As I stated earlier,
expansion,  if it existed, would blur out these jumps, and the fact that they can be
detected is observational evidence that expansion is not a fact.  And
without expansion, there is not need for a big bang, no need for a beginning  coming
from nowhere, no need for an Inflation that suspends the laws of  physics, no
need for the yet to be seen Dark Energy, Dark Matter and Black  holes.

And I do realize that the impact on Western science would be profound,
Professors would lose their jobs, texts would have to be rewritten, and in  general
science would have to be retaught.  Not to mention Wikipedia  would have to
be corrected...

I present here an excerpt from the letter to  be found at
_http://www.cosmologystatement.org/_ (http://www.cosmologystatement.org/)

An Open Letter to the Scientific  Community
cosmologystatement.org
(Published in New Scientist, May 22,  2004)
The big bang today relies on a growing number of  hypothetical entities,
things that we have never observed-- inflation,  dark matter and dark energy are
the most prominent examples. Without them,  there would be a fatal
contradiction between the observations made by  astronomers and the predictions of the big
bang theory. In no other field  of physics would this continual recourse to
new hypothetical objects be  accepted as a way of bridging the gap between
theory and observation. It  would, at the least, raise serious questions about the
validity of the  underlying theory.
But the big bang theory can't survive without these  fudge factors. Without
the hypothetical inflation field, the big bang does  not predict the smooth,
isotropic cosmic background radiation that is  observed, because there would be
no way for parts of the universe that are  now more than a few degrees away in
the sky to come to the same  temperature and thus emit the same amount of
microwave radiation.
Without some kind of dark matter, unlike any that we  have observed on Earth
despite 20 years of experiments, big-bang theory  makes contradictory
predictions for the density of matter in the universe.  Inflation requires a density
20 times larger than that implied by big bang  nucleosynthesis, the theory's
explanation of the origin of the light  elements. And without dark energy, the
theory predicts that the universe  is only about 8 billion years old, which is
billions of years younger than  the age of many stars in our galaxy.
What is more, the big bang theory can boast of no  quantitative predictions
that have subsequently been validated by  observation. The successes claimed by
the theory's supporters consist of  its ability to retrospectively fit
observations with a steadily increasing  array of adjustable parameters, just as the
old Earth-centered cosmology  of Ptolemy needed layer upon layer of
epicycles.
Yet the big bang is not the only framework available  for understanding the
history of the universe. Plasma cosmology and the  steady-state model both
hypothesize an evolving universe without beginning  or end. These and other
alternative approaches can also explain the basic  phenomena of the cosmos,
including the abundances of light elements, the  generation of large-scale structure,
the cosmic background radiation, and  how the redshift of far-away galaxies
increases with distance. They have  even predicted new phenomena that were
subsequently observed, something  the big bang has failed to do.
Supporters of the big bang theory may retort that  these theories do not exp
lain every cosmological observation. But that is  scarcely surprising, as their
development has been severely hampered by a  complete lack of funding.
Indeed, such questions and alternatives cannot  even now be freely discussed and
examined. An open exchange of ideas is  lacking in most mainstream conferences.
Whereas Richard Feynman could say  that "science is the culture of doubt", in
cosmology today doubt and  dissent are not tolerated, and young scientists
learn to remain silent if  they have something negative to say about the standard
big bang model.  Those who doubt the big bang fear that saying so will cost
them their  funding.
Even observations are now interpreted through this  biased filter, judged
right or wrong depending on whether or not they  support the big bang. So
discordant data on red shifts, lithium and helium  abundances, and galaxy
distribution, among other topics, are ignored or  ridiculed. This reflects a growing
dogmatic mindset that is alien to the  spirit of free scientific inquiry.

The letter has been signed by over five hundred  (500) parties.

I am not the only one...

tommy mandel


from_name: Daniel R. Tobias

body:
On 4 May 2006 at 18:15, "Anthony DiPierro" <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:

> I certainly don't know modern art when I see it.  In fact, I think
> there is a lot of disagreement over what modern art is.

I have a vague, stereotypical, and probably decades out-of-date
impression of what "modern art" is, but I have no clue whether it has
anything in common with what the art world actually uses the term to
refer to, if they actually still use the term at all.

I generally think that giving labels like "modern" to things is a bad
idea, since such a label is intrinsically relative.  If some
particular type of art was labeled "modern art" in the 1950s, should
it still carry that label 50 years later when it's not quite so
modern?  Is the sort of art the avant-garde is making now
"postmodern"?  What comes *after* postmodern to reflect the
generation after *that*?  Post-postmodern?  And then there's "retro",
reflecting art, culture, and design that intentionally goes back to
an earlier era... but you've got a lot of earlier eras to choose
from, so that doesn't really designate a particular one.

--
== Dan ==
Dan's Mail Format Site: http://mailformat.dan.info/
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subject: [WikiEN-l] systemic bias

body:
On 5 May 2006 at 13:26, Raphael Wegmann <raphael at psi.co.at> wrote:

> As if common anti-islam bias among the editors weren't enough,
> even administrators, who outed themselves as free speech extremists
> on the Image-Display talk page, which has been created for this
> content dispute, abuse their administrator privilege by simply
> blocking editors they disagree with.

"Free speech extremists", huh?  Extremism in defense of liberty is no
vice... :-)

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from_name: charles matthews

body:
"Michael Snow" wrote

> 3. For people who have been involved in a significant amount of
> controversy, putting all of this material in a criticisms section makes
> the article unbalanced. It may also generate disproportionate attention
> to the criticisms. Again, this is a failure to create a neutral article.

I think that's probably right.  For example, any prominent politician is
likely to have much citable criticism of his/her actions; and that should be
dealt with topic by topic, as a general rule.  But there are other types of
case.

>> The existing guidelines strike me as sufficient to deal with the issue
>> on a case by case basis.

Agree.

> The guidelines are perhaps adequate, because this is partly a cultural
> issue. But it's been clear for a while that we have serious systemic and
> cultural issues on articles dealing with living people.

Yup.  About all that currently can be said is that

- they make up at least 10% of enWP articles (perhaps 15% - any guesses?)
- they mostly fall into a few main areas: politicians, sports, the arts and
music, media and writers, academia, technology, business, religion,
military.

We may well need to have guidelines sector-by-sector for these.

Charles


from_name: Rob

subject: [WikiEN-l] Blocked IP address

body:
On 5/6/06, Atlantis Marketing <extremewealth at gmail.com> wrote:

> 67.60.69.69.

I can't find any edits under this IP address.


subject: [WikiEN-l] systemic bias

body:
Raphael Wegmann <raphael at psi.co.at> wrote:

    charles matthews wrote:
    > As far as I'm concerned, Wikipedia decisions should not be taken on the
    > basis that someone might be offended.

    As far as I'm concerned, WP:NPA, WP:Wikiquette and WikiLove
    are the best and most important guidelines Wikipedia has.

All other things equal, I agree with Charles.  I still have no idea what article you are talking about, but assuming the content is relevant to the article, meets verifiability, and does not give undue weight to something, the only other question that remains is whether it is somehow presented with more bias than the sources present it.  The policies/guidelines you mention are not relevant to article content.  They are for dealing with others on Wiki, not how the article is written or presented.  My advice is remember this, archive it, and when you are involved in another article (or some other aspect of the article in dispute) where WP:V, WP:NPOV, and WP:NOR favor your position, reference this and make sure that the rules are applied consistently.~~~~Pro-Lick

---------------------------------
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subject: [WikiEN-l] systemic bias

body:
On 5 May 2006 at 14:29, Raphael Wegmann <raphael at psi.co.at> wrote:

> Thank you for pointing out that distinction. Back on this issue:
> Anti-Islam bias (regardless of whether it's systematic or systemic)
> results in one-sided articles on certain topics, which is IMHO
> derogatory to an encyclopedia. And putting the JP cartoons in the
> article increases systemic bias by driving away muslim editors.

But suppressing some content that's otherwise relevant simply because
it offends some particular group and thus drives them away, is itself
a form of one-sidedness, in which the group with the thinnest skin
about such things gets to dictate the content and tone of the related
articles.

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subject: [WikiEN-l] We need a policy against vote-stacking

body:
On 5 May 2006 at 12:57, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 5/5/06, Steve Bennett <stevage at gmail.com> wrote:
> > It just doesn't seem fair to delete an article on one school of a
> > given type while keeping others. And I suspect "notability" there is
> > very much dependent on the social milieu of the voters...
>
> So you are saying there is no difference between Eton and Sacred Heart
> school, Nowheresville

There are some categories of things where having a complete set of
articles on them would seem to be a net benefit, even if some of the
members are of relatively questionable notability.  One of them is
the set of cities, towns, villages, hamlets, etc.; for the United
States, these were filled in a long time ago by a robot, and having
such gazetteer info handy can be useful even if some of the places
are pretty marginal.  Many of those geographical entries have since
been fleshed out into well-done articles, but even the ones with just
the raw data can be useful.  Doing a similar thing with the places
(however minor) in other countries would be a positive step even if
some might call it "geocruft".

Similarly, it's good that there's an article on every one of the
popes of the Catholic Church, even though some of the early ones have
a pretty much complete lack of info about them personally or about
any notable things they might have done while in office (if any).

I don't know whether schools are one of the things that falls into a
similar situation, but there may be some who believe so.

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from_name: BJörn Lindqvist

subject: [WikiEN-l] Apology

body:
On 5/6/06, Dan Rosenthal <swatjester at gmail.com> wrote:
> Mark Ryan: You fail to answer the key question: was she hot?
> -Swatjester

That is not how you behave on a public mailing list. Please desist.

--
mvh Bj?rn