from_name: Nick Jenkins

subject: [Wikitech-l] new dumps ?

body:
> > The "latest" directory is not useful for this purpose (e.g. http://download.wikipedia.org/enwiki/latest/ points to
> > files from approx
> > Aug-17, which looks to be the latest dump where everything reported as succeeded;
>
> Right, for consistency.

Yes, but how often does somebody intentionally download and use every single file from a dump? Most people need either one or two of
the dump files; the rest are simply irrelevant to them.

The latest directory is using a lowest-common-denominator approach (latest run where everything succeeded). This file would
essentially be a highest-common-denominator approach (latest successful version of each individual file). Maybe both have their
place.

However, I've realised it would be useful to include for each data type the date on which the dump run was started, e.g.:
---------------------------------------
  <dump type="site_stats.sql.gz">
      <desc>A few statistics such as the page count.</desc>
      <url>http://download.wikipedia.org/enwiki/20060925/enwiki-20060925-site_stats.sql.gz</url>
+     <dump_run>20060925</dump_run>
      <size_in_bytes>451</size_in_bytes>
      <timestamp>2006-09-24T16:29:01Z</timestamp>
      <md5sum>e4defa79c36823c67ed4d937f8f7013c</md5sum>
  </dump>
---------------------------------------

.. that way anyone that needs multiple files can hold off downloading them until all the "dump_run" fields match up, so as to more
easily avoid problems of mixing files from different dumps. (It's true that this field can currently be pulled from the directory in
the <url> field, but if a different field is used then the url can point just about anywhere, such as potentially using different
hostnames for different dumps, or changing directory structure.)

Anyway, it's just a suggestion, and if you don't like it, well, there's not much I can do about it ;-)

All the best,
Nick.


list: foundation-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Brad Patrick

subject: [Foundation-l] Taipei chosen to host Wikimania 2007

body:
On 9/29/06, Alison Wheeler <wikimedia at alisonwheeler.com> wrote:
> One thing I would definitely say though is that this process did point up
> a few things that need sorting before the next city is chosen.
>
> 1. Travel costs; should be researched centrally by WMF or someone
> independent from all the bids. It was clear that this caused great
> friction in this year's bids as Taipei - by their own admission - used
> this year's prices without taxes and surcharges even though actual-date
> flight information and charges were available and used by other bids. This
> meant that the bids information was clearly biased and inconsistent and
> could mislead the analysts.
>

Whether or not the data were or were not biased or inconsistent, they
are certainly subject to change, gas prices, politics, etc.

> 2. What is the *point* of Wikimania? Is it just for editors of Wikimedia
> projects? Is it for technical/academic purposes? Is is (as we in London
> had planned) a way to expand the 'reach' and use of the Wikimedia projects
> to the wider population and not just those already in the FLOSS/wiki
> sphere?
>

This is the most poignant criticism of the process.  You are exactly
right.  What the purpose of a gathering is will change over time, as
WM has - WM05-06-07.  It is certainly not for the convenience of the
majority of editors.  It is, apparently in 2007, a "bold move" and
"evangelical" for a huge population of users who are on the rise.  But
yes, the point is, this discussion has not reached consensus.

> 3. Extending from both of these points is that of who the attendees are;
> the demographics of our editors and how much disposable income they have
> to be able to fly around the world. In essence this is an old-fashioned
> network routing calculation as whilst some people may be expensed to
> attend Wikimania (the board, for example, and some presenters) most
> attendees aren't and if we aim for 'free and open source' then we should
> also aim for 'cheap and easy travel' too.
>

See above.  NP complete problems are notoriously difficult to solve. =)

> 4. A last thought on location is the one of language and locality. The
> nationality of the host location and its 'default language' don't have
> that much effect on the conference itself - our working language is
> english, after all - but they do on the attendees ability to travel
> in-country and enjoy anything the location might offer outwith the
> conference.
>

We shall see how that works out.

> Could I also suggest that we should be seeking an 'independence of view'
> from all people concerned with deciding on a venue or employees of same.
> Brad's support for Torino during the selection period, and Jimbo's recent
> comment here are, to my mind, very out of place and could easily suggest
> to many that there is pressure being brought on them.
>

Third-person use alert:

Brad commented that the Torino bid looked great.  Please note,
however, the following:

a) Brad was *never* asked - not *once* to have any input in the
process by any member of the community, board member, or jury member.
Had I not been following along on the wiki myself, I would never had
known about the selection process, deadlines, applicants, finalists,
or winner.  Does *that* strike you as odd?

b) Brad explicity understood this process to be a *community* process
(the merits of which we - and do - disagree about) - see above - but
consider the response if he jumps in and says "I'm running this now".
/me doesn't think that would be acceptable.

c) So long as there was not rampant fraud or other evidence of
hijacking, which judging by the fall out might not be a clear answer,
why should this not be considered to be an acceptable community
process?  If you are suggesting that anything Jimbo or I said to
anyone had an effect, please show me where to look for its effect,
because it sure isn't in the result.

> I was dishearted, indeed, to see that people were making suppositions
> about different candidate cities external to the information those cities
> made available about their offerings and that - if geographical
> considerations are to form a part of the decision-makiong process - they
> need to be clarified in advance and applied equally.
>

Which "people" were making what suppositions?  I don't understand the
implication you are trying to reach, save for your feeling screwed.
As for me, I have never been to any of the *applicant* cities, much
less finalists, except Orlando, FL.  If you want to know about the
United States, I'm your man.  I am very widely traveled on this
continent.  If you want to know about elsewhere, ask Jimbo.  He's does
laps around other world travelers.  But how external knowledge of a
place fits in to your argument, sorry, does not compute.

> Alison Wheeler

--
Brad Patrick
General Counsel & Interim Executive Director
Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
bradp.wmf at gmail.com
727-231-0101


list: wikimedia-l


list: wikien-l

from_name: Laura Scudder

subject: [WikiEN-l] Citationgate: expertise and verifiability

body:
Looking at the things tagged by the reviewer
(http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special_relativity&diff=78107405&oldid=77881051),
almost every single one would warrant a "This is accepted by virtually
all scholars" note.  Where does it end?  Should every factual
statement have such a tag?  Surely students can figure out what a
References section is and just pick up one of those books.

I'm am very pro-citation when it helps us build a better encyclopedia,
but I'm anti-"let's footnote everything even though it appears in any
textbook on the subject and is totally uncontroversial, just to
satisfy a process decision".

On 9/29/06, Nathaniel Sheetz <preparing at psu.edu> wrote:
> On 9/29/06, Mak <makwik at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > I've just attempted to explain why having inline citations can be
> > misleading. If a fact is widely agreed on, and you ascribe it to a single
> > source or author, it makes it seem as though that person is the sole
> > proponent of that idea, when in fact pretty much everyone in the field is
> > in
> > agreement.
>
>
> You don't have to list just one person in the citation.  What's wrong with
> including <ref>This is accepted by virtually all scholars, including
> Einstein in ''Book X'', Murphy in ''Article Y'', and Jones in "Article
> Z''.</ref>  Then put the bibliographic information in the references
> section, as usual.
>
> Also, in response to the original post, citations do more than just serve as
> a way to verify the facts of an article.  They also show where the material
> came from, which is helpful for anyone doing research on a topic (high
> school, college, etc.) who can't directly cite Wikipedia (not many teachers
> allow that).  Our articles need to be written so that they can be used by as
> many people as possible, and I think that one way to do that is to
> religiously cite sources.
>
> Nathaniel ([[User:Spangineer]], a real nuisance to many on FAC when it comes
> to citations)
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Michael Billington

subject: [Wikipedia-l] [[Wikipedia:Practical process]]

body:
I remember reading this essay before, it's a good one.
My opinion however is that we should not create process wihout removing (or
somehow downgrading the importance of) some other process. This could be
done by merging policies/guidelines into eachother. It is (IMO) the best way
to counter instruction creep.
-- Michael Billington


list: commons-l

from_name: David Gerard

subject:
[Commons-l] Ogg Theora is too hard to play. We need
	YouTube-style Flash streaming video.

body:
On 29/09/06, SJ <2.718281828 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Better yet, let's allow uploads of material in any format -- and offer
> a conversion service, storing the result in a free format.

This is a *fantastic* idea. Where would the server need to be hosted? Hungary?

- d.


from_name: philip sampson

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Fwd: whom I have to ask for approval of
 Gilekiwikipedia?how find a developer?

body:
STOP !

_________________________________________________________________
Be the first to hear what's new at MSN - sign up to our free newsletters!
http://www.msn.co.uk/newsletters


from_name: Jeffrey V. Merkey

subject: [Foundation-l] Corporate vanity policy enforcement

body:
Brad,

One very easy solution to all of this is to segregate the live edited
wikipedia site from the published site scraped by the
search engines.

In other words, setup the community server "anyone can edit" at
something like draften.wikipedia.org and publish reviewed
dumps of the community server to a read only external server for
scraping like I am doing at Wikigadugi. I have ZERO
vandalism problems , ZERO content dispute problems, and ZERO vanity page
problems and I host the entire English
wikipedia as well as several other languages.

Very simple solution. People won't waste the time creating vanity pages
when they know they may not get published in the
"official" external official site.

Jeff

Brad Patrick wrote:

>Brad Patrick wrote:
>
>
>>Dear Community:
>>
>>The volume of corporate vanity/vandalism which is showing up on
>>Wikipedia is overwhelming.  At the office, we are receiving dozens of
>>phone calls *per week* about company, organization, and marketing
>>edits which are reverted, causing the non-notable, but
>>self-aggrandizing authors, to scream bloody murder.  This is as it
>>should be.  However, I am issuing a call to arms to the community to
>>act in a much more draconian fashion in response to corporate
>>self-editing and vanity page creation.  This is simply out of hand,
>>and we need your help.
>>
>>We are the #14 website in the world.  We are a big target.  If we are
>>to remain true to our encyclopedic mission, this kind of nonsense
>>cannot be tolerated.  This means the administrators and new page
>>patrol need to be clear when they see new usernames and page creation
>>which are blatantly commercial - shoot on sight.  There should be no
>>question that someone who claims to have a "famous movie studio" and
>>has exactly 2 Google hits - both their Myspace page - they get nuked.
>>Ban users who promulgate such garbage for a significant period of
>>time.  They need to be encouraged to avoid the temptation to recreate
>>their article, thereby raising the level of damage and wasted time
>>they incur.
>>
>>Some of you might think regular policy and VfD is the way to go.  I am
>>here to tell you it is not enough.  We are losing the battle for
>>encyclopedic content in favor of people intent on hijacking Wikipedia
>>for their own memes.  This scourge is a serious waste of time and
>>energy.  We must put a stop to this now.
>>Thank you for your help.
>>
>>-Brad Patrick
>>User:BradPatrick
>>Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
>>
>>
>_______________________________________________
>foundation-l mailing list
>foundation-l at wikimedia.org
>http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>
>
>


from_name: Artur Fijałkowski

body:
2006/9/29, Ilya Haykinson <haykinson at gmail.com>:
> I suggest that if we change our attitude and allow alternative,
> actually-workable presentation of our media, we will be more correctly
> fulfilling our mission.  Let's allow Flash for audio and video.
>
> -ilya haykinson

And of course YOU will pay patent fees to Macromedia for using Flash ?
Second thing that those flash movies (like eg. on youtube) are
disgusting - it's impossible to simply download it, it' working to
slow on my machine, the player is wrong designed, etc.

I think that the right way is to teach people how use free tools and
force them to use it, then force everybody to use properiaty software,
couse it's easier for windows users...

AJF/WarX


from_name: Mak

body:
In addition, in my view, adding specific citations can be misleading for
widely believed/understood/known facts.

For instance, if I write that "Anthony Newcomb says that Alfonso Fontanelli
was one of the foremost madrigalists of 16th century Italy", or in other
words "Alfonso Fontanelli was one of the foremonst madrigalists of 16th
century Italy<ref>Newcomb blah blah</ref>", that implies that other major
scholars of music in 16th century Italy such as Alfred Einstein, do /not/
believe that Fontanelli was a foremost madrigalist, which isn't the case.
It's widely thought that he was. It shouldn't need an inline citation,
because all the major sources agree on it.

But since practically no-one on-wiki is an expert on 16th century Italian
music, they insist on inline citations, so that someone could potentially go
"check" that "fact". I think inline citations can be very important, but I
don't think every single factual assertion in an article should have to have
an inline citation, especially when an article really  is simply echoing
accepted non-controversial scholarship, such as, for instance, [[Dido and
Aeneas]], which just received a GA review request for inline citations. It's
getting ridiculous.

[[User:Makemi]]

On 9/29/06, charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com>
wrote:
>
> "Peter Jacobi" <peter_jacobi at gmx.net>
>
> > In the unlikely case anyone interested has missed it: There
> > are some troubles re mandatory in-line citing and science
> > articles.
> >
> > It all started with a warning put at large number of "good
> > articles" that they will be delisted soon for lack of
> > in-line cites. This immediately got the response, that standard
> > textbooks facts are not and should not be in-line cited, the
> > references section will name selected textbooks and one cannot
> > judge the correctness without having some context anyway.
>
> It is certainly foolish in many cases, and make-work, to reference
> specific and uncontroversial well-known facts. What is more it will tend to
> make articles unreadable, and effectively unwriteable also. This style is
> essentially only fit for very careful writing in doctoral dissertations with
> particularly terrifying examiners in mind.
>
> It seems clear that enWP could get overrun by nutty lawyering types, if a
> firm line is not taken. Is there not a 'statute of limitations' of sorts
> appropriate? When a piece of science is over 50 years old, one expects to
> read about the details of the original papers in a historical article. And
> the chances are that there are so many textbook citations that picking just
> one isn't a great help to students.
>
> Charles
>
> -----------------------------------------
> Email sent from www.ntlworld.com
> Virus-checked using McAfee(R) Software
> Visit www.ntlworld.com/security for more information
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Akash Mehta

subject: [WikiEN-l] Call for volunteers: clean up sep11.wikipedia.org

body:
Hi Erik / Eloquence,

I'm doing some maintenance now, and I was wondering whether or not we keep
links to wikipedia articles of the same name? If so, I can cleanup the
non-interwiki links but it seems a bit of an overload. Also, do we delink
red links? [[Special:Wantedpages]] can help us clear up all the red links,
and as we won't be adding any major content soon, I don't see the purpose of
keeping the links.

On 9/29/06, Erik Moeller <erik at wikimedia.org> wrote:
>
> On 9/28/06, Erik Moeller <erik at wikimedia.org> wrote:
> > http://sep11.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Community_Portal
>
> As part of the Wikipedia name purging, this is now at:
> http://sep11.wikipedia.org/wiki/September_11:Community_Portal
>
> --
> Peace & Love,
> Erik
>
> Member, Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees
>
> DISCLAIMER: Unless otherwise stated, all views or opinions expressed
> in this message are solely my own and do not represent an official
> position of the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.
> _______________________________________________
> 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] Process wonkery

references:
<s7lah2pihqs0vqiecpaifbaphj43urt5a5@4ax.com>
	<47683e960609241202h58eebc8fua913fdc8802ae10c@mail.gmail.com>
	<ef754g$jmb$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<fbad4e140609252350s7644b094hff6edc5ab124865f@mail.gmail.com>
	<451B9BCC.5020400@wikia.com>
	<fb7fdd9c0609280359p34dbcbc8s23dca1adb00e814@mail.gmail.com>
	<451BC6B8.8040201@wikia.com> <efh9sc$c7h$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<fbad4e140609281317u1ec7257en6117a1ceff2c64bc@mail.gmail.com>
	<f80608430609281319w1b4c9225n3cf4d3be35e8b338@mail.gmail.com>

body:
On 28/09/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 9/28/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:

> > You haven't experienced the amazing feats of Jimbomancy some
> > wikilawyers and obsessives will stretch to. "This edit is ABSOLUTELY
> > IMPERATIVE because Jimbo suggested on a mailing list in 1989 that
> > something like it would be a good idea."

> That would be the anti process lot (yes I can provide examples).

That would be both and I can too. Both sides make the error of
assuming precedent is binding rather than just a very good idea.

- d.


from_name: Anthony

subject: [Foundation-l] Proposal re: sep11.wikipedia.org

body:
On 9/28/06, Robert Scott Horning <robert_horning at netzero.net> wrote:
> Anthony wrote:
>
> >On 9/26/06, James Hare <messedrocker at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> >>I recognize that, but I didn't work it properly. In order to comply, AND
> >>delete extremely old edits, we have to copy the older edit history over to
> >>the talk page. But space is not a pressing issue, so why don't we do what we
> >>have been doing, which has not been a problem? Hard disk drives are cheap.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >If the wiki is truly not within the scope of the mission of the
> >foundation, which *many* people feel is true, then having it on
> >Wikimedia's servers and domain names confuses people as to what is the
> >mission of the foundation.
> >
>
> This, to me, is an ex-post facto redefinition of the scope and mission
> of the Wikimedia Foundation, or something akin to backronyms.  This is
> only outside of the scope of the WMF because those involved with the day
> to day affairs of the WMF just don't want to be bothered with this.  It
> isn't part of some more noble and legalistic attitude that seems to be
> presented here.
>
Actually I don't think this is a redefinition of the Wikimedia
Foundation.  By the time the Wikimedia Foundation the September 11th
wiki, which predated Wikimedia, had already become a ghost town.
There was talk at this time of expanding the scope, into a place for
memorials of all sorts, but this never came to happen.  I made a
half-hearted effort to revive the wiki about this time, along with a
few other Wikipedians (many of whom made a better effort than me), and
in retrospect these efforts clearly failed.

All that said, I *still* don't think it's time to give up.  Rather, I
think, we should make an effort to fit the September 11th wiki into
the scope of the Wikimedia Foundation.  However, I don't this is
important enough to fight for, *if* there is someone else willing to
take over the project (and apparently there is).

> I am suggesting that I and some others have a contrary viewpoint here,
> and it shouldn't be assumed that this is an unanimous decision to shut
> down this project in this manner.  I admit that sometimes decisions like
> this need to be made, but please be honest about why they are being made
> rather than trying to sugar coat them to be for reasons that really
> don't exist.
>
Pretty much everything on the wiki is GFDL.  You don't need permission
from Erik or the foundation or anyone else to take everything and host
it on your own.  That's why I don't really see this as that big of a
deal.

I don't think the reason for shutting down the wiki is dishonest,
though I suppose it is exaggerated.  With a little bit of leadership I
think the wiki could be made to fit into the scope of Wikimedia.
However, over the past few years that leadership has not taken over.

But let me ask this.  In what way do *you* feel the wiki currently
fits into the scope of Wikimedia?  And how many others do you think
are willing to work with you on the project as you envision it?  If
you can't get at least 10 or 20 people supporting this vision, I think
the project will probably be *better* outside the hands of Wikimedia.
In fact, in some ways I think it might be better outside the hands of
Wikimedia anyway.

Anthony


from_name: Mark Williamson

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Fwd: whom I have to ask for approval of
	Gilekiwikipedia?how find a developer?

body:
Excuse me?

On 29/09/06, philip sampson <sampsonphilip at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> STOP !
>
> _________________________________________________________________
> Be the first to hear what's new at MSN - sign up to our free newsletters!
> http://www.msn.co.uk/newsletters
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
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>

--
Refije dirije lanm? yo paske nou posede pw?p bato.


body:
I've just attempted to explain why having inline citations can be
misleading. If a fact is widely agreed on, and you ascribe it to a single
source or author, it makes it seem as though that person is the sole
proponent of that idea, when in fact pretty much everyone in the field is in
agreement.

If you look at [[Dido and Aeneas]] you will see that it does cite it's
sources. In the oh-so-cryptically named "References" section. It does not
have inline citations because when I wrote the majority of the article, I
was 1) brand new 2) inline citations had not become all the rage 3) *it
doesn't contain controversial assertions. No one has challenged a single
fact in the article. If you know anything about either the work or Purcell
or English Baroque music, you probably won't challenge any of the article's
assertions because they are *not* controversial.

I'll say it again. [[Dido and Aeneas]] cites its sources in the form of
references. If you want to check anything, all you have to do is look at a
fairly short article in Grove and a fairly short introduction in an edition.
It doesn't give inline citations because it doesn't say anything
controversial, and no one has challenged anything in it.

Makemi

On 9/29/06, David Russell <webmaster at davidarussell.co.uk> wrote:
>
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> Mak wrote:
> > It shouldn't need an inline citation,
> > because all the major sources agree on it.
> >
> > But since practically no-one on-wiki is an expert on 16th century
> Italian
> > music, they insist on inline citations, so that someone could
> potentially go
> > "check" that "fact". I think inline citations can be very important, but
> I
> > don't think every single factual assertion in an article should have to
> have
> > an inline citation, especially when an article really  is simply echoing
> > accepted non-controversial scholarship, such as, for instance, [[Dido
> and
> > Aeneas]], which just received a GA review request for inline citations.
> It's
> > getting ridiculous.
>
> First of all, if 'all the major sources agree on' a particular fact,
> then where is the problem in citing one of them? Good Articles need to
> demonstrate compliance with the Manual of Style at the very least (if
> not all the other various guidelines on different issue) - and if people
> had followed [[WP:CITE]] in the first place then there wouldn't be the
> problem with the GA review, would there? It's not as if it is a brand
> new guideline that may be under dispute or unknown - WP:CITE has been
> around since 2002, if some editors decided to ignore it then it's no
> surprise that others objected to their work being elevated to GA status.
>
> Cynical
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
> Version: GnuPG v1.4.5 (MingW32)
> Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org
>
> iD8DBQFFHUsgg8fvtQYQevcRAvY9AKCDjr35cKRmp8NeQevbiv1/YxSeiACfTEuo
> 9hKeAnibb3O5hC7USJ9Gd3w=
> =AznJ
> -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Delirium

body:
Mak wrote:
> I'll say it again. [[Dido and Aeneas]] cites its sources in the form of
> references. If you want to check anything, all you have to do is look at a
> fairly short article in Grove and a fairly short introduction in an edition.
> It doesn't give inline citations because it doesn't say anything
> controversial, and no one has challenged anything in it.
>

That seems reasonable to me, and I think this is a major problem with
the current wikilawyering approach to footnotes (which bears resemblance
to the footnote-heavy style of pedantic academic writing that's mostly
fallen out of fashion in academia itself).  Footnotes make sense when a
specific claim should be attributed to a specific source, especially if
it's controversial.  Even some non-controversial claims could use
footnote citations, such as dating an ancient battle to a specific date
(cite a generally-accepted timeline).  When I'm writing articles that
contain no unusual or controversial claims, though, it seems silly  to
keep using footnotes after every sentence, so I just place the reference
in the "References" section.

Interestingly, this is standard style in most of the technical articles,
maybe because the pedants know not to poke their head in there.  Most
good mathematics articles contain a footnote-free exposition of the
subject, with some references at the end, and footnotes only to point
out where authorities disagree, where there's a significant minority
view, or to point to particularly notable proofs.

-Mark


subject: [WikiEN-l] Corporate vanity policy enforcement

body:
Dear Community:

The volume of corporate vanity/vandalism which is showing up on
Wikipedia is overwhelming.  At the office, we are receiving dozens of
phone calls *per week* about company, organization, and marketing edits
which are reverted, causing the non-notable, but self-aggrandizing
authors, to scream bloody murder.  This is as it should be.  However, I
am issuing a call to arms to the community to act in a much more
draconian fashion in response to corporate self-editing and vanity page
creation.  This is simply out of hand, and we need your help.

We are the #14 website in the world.  We are a big target.  If we are to
remain true to our encyclopedic mission, this kind of nonsense cannot be
tolerated.  This means the administrators and new page patrol need to be
clear when they see new usernames and page creation which are blatantly
commercial - shoot on sight.  There should be no question that someone
who claims to have a "famous movie studio" and has exactly 2 Google hits
- both their Myspace page - they get nuked.  Ban users who promulgate
such garbage for a significant period of time.  They need to be
encouraged to avoid the temptation to recreate their article, thereby
raising the level of damage and wasted time they incur.

Some of you might think regular policy and VfD is the way to go.  I am
here to tell you it is not enough.  We are losing the battle for
encyclopedic content in favor of people intent on hijacking Wikipedia
for their own memes.  This scourge is a serious waste of time and
energy.  We must put a stop to this now.

Thank you for your help.

-Brad Patrick
User:BradPatrick
Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.


from_name: GerardM

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Fwd: whom I have to ask for approval of Gileki
	wikipedia?how find a developer?

references:
<20060928025320.22740.qmail@web30807.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
	<742dfd060609282340qdeef18ag6a2acb70bf4992f9@mail.gmail.com>
	<efitqc$qgt$1@sea.gmane.org>

body:
Hoi,
Many people are in favour of adding Gilaki to the list of languages.. There
is one issue outstanding as far as I am concerned. At WiktionaryZ the Babel
templates are in an Arabic script.. The first Gilaki word however is in both
the Latin and this Arabic script.

Another issue is that the language is called Gilaki and only Wikipedia calls
it Gileki ..

It would be nice to have these issues resolved first..

Thanks,
    GerardM

http://wiktionaryz.org/WiktionaryZ:Gilaki

On 9/29/06, Tim Starling <tstarling at wikimedia.org> wrote:
>
> SJ wrote:
> > 48 supports, no opposition, 5 actively interested editors including a
> > native speaker.  It certainly has the requisite # of interested
> > parties.  Wikitech-l is perhaps more likely to grab the attention of a
> > developer who can set up the new wiki... where did you send previous
> > emails about this?
> >
>
> I think it's probably about time that we created a batch of new wikis. Are
> there any other suitable candidates that we can do at the same time?
>
> -- Tim Starling
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


list: wikitech-l

subject:
[Wikitech-l] [Wikipedia-l] Fwd: whom I have to ask for approval
	of Gileki wikipedia?how find a developer?


subject:
[Wikitech-l] [Wikipedia-l] Fwd: whom I have to ask for approval
	of Gileki	wikipedia?how find a developer?

body:
Hoi,
Many people are in favour of adding Gilaki to the list of languages.. There
is one issue outstanding as far as I am concerned. At WiktionaryZ the Babel
templates are in an Arabic script.. The first Gilaki word however is in both
the Latin and this Arabic script.

Another issue is that the language is called Gilaki and only Wikipedia calls
it Gileki ..

It would be nice to have these issues resolved first..

Thanks,
    GerardM

http://wiktionaryz.org/WiktionaryZ:Gilaki

On 9/29/06, Tim Starling <tstarling at wikimedia.org> wrote:
>
> SJ wrote:
> > 48 supports, no opposition, 5 actively interested editors including a
> > native speaker.  It certainly has the requisite # of interested
> > parties.  Wikitech-l is perhaps more likely to grab the attention of a
> > developer who can set up the new wiki... where did you send previous
> > emails about this?
> >
>
> I think it's probably about time that we created a batch of new wikis. Are
> there any other suitable candidates that we can do at the same time?
>
> -- Tim Starling
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>
_______________________________________________
Wikipedia-l mailing list
Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l


from_name: Carl Peterson

body:
On 9/29/06, charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com>
wrote:
>
> "Peter Jacobi" <peter_jacobi at gmx.net>
>
> > In the unlikely case anyone interested has missed it: There
> > are some troubles re mandatory in-line citing and science
> > articles.
> >
> > It all started with a warning put at large number of "good
> > articles" that they will be delisted soon for lack of
> > in-line cites. This immediately got the response, that standard
> > textbooks facts are not and should not be in-line cited, the
> > references section will name selected textbooks and one cannot
> > judge the correctness without having some context anyway.
>
> It is certainly foolish in many cases, and make-work, to reference
> specific and uncontroversial well-known facts. What is more it will tend to
> make articles unreadable, and effectively unwriteable also. This style is
> essentially only fit for very careful writing in doctoral dissertations with
> particularly terrifying examiners in mind.
>
> It seems clear that enWP could get overrun by nutty lawyering types, if a
> firm line is not taken. Is there not a 'statute of limitations' of sorts
> appropriate? When a piece of science is over 50 years old, one expects to
> read about the details of the original papers in a historical article. And
> the chances are that there are so many textbook citations that picking just
> one isn't a great help to students.

The other consideration for standard textbook references is that there may
be a dozen or more references to a single textbook (or indeed, the article
could be based entirely on one or two textbooks), which is cumbersome to
cite in-line. While using the reference name shortcut shortens things up,
it's still very tedious (and very distracting) if about every other sentence
has a citation link and every equation present has a citation link.

Carl


from_name: Nathaniel Sheetz

body:
On 9/29/06, Mak <makwik at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I've just attempted to explain why having inline citations can be
> misleading. If a fact is widely agreed on, and you ascribe it to a single
> source or author, it makes it seem as though that person is the sole
> proponent of that idea, when in fact pretty much everyone in the field is
> in
> agreement.

You don't have to list just one person in the citation.  What's wrong with
including <ref>This is accepted by virtually all scholars, including
Einstein in ''Book X'', Murphy in ''Article Y'', and Jones in "Article
Z''.</ref>  Then put the bibliographic information in the references
section, as usual.

Also, in response to the original post, citations do more than just serve as
a way to verify the facts of an article.  They also show where the material
came from, which is helpful for anyone doing research on a topic (high
school, college, etc.) who can't directly cite Wikipedia (not many teachers
allow that).  Our articles need to be written so that they can be used by as
many people as possible, and I think that one way to do that is to
religiously cite sources.

Nathaniel ([[User:Spangineer]], a real nuisance to many on FAC when it comes
to citations)


body:
Brad Patrick wrote:
> Dear Community:
>
> The volume of corporate vanity/vandalism which is showing up on
> Wikipedia is overwhelming.  At the office, we are receiving dozens of
> phone calls *per week* about company, organization, and marketing
> edits which are reverted, causing the non-notable, but
> self-aggrandizing authors, to scream bloody murder.  This is as it
> should be.  However, I am issuing a call to arms to the community to
> act in a much more draconian fashion in response to corporate
> self-editing and vanity page creation.  This is simply out of hand,
> and we need your help.
>
> We are the #14 website in the world.  We are a big target.  If we are
> to remain true to our encyclopedic mission, this kind of nonsense
> cannot be tolerated.  This means the administrators and new page
> patrol need to be clear when they see new usernames and page creation
> which are blatantly commercial - shoot on sight.  There should be no
> question that someone who claims to have a "famous movie studio" and
> has exactly 2 Google hits - both their Myspace page - they get nuked.
> Ban users who promulgate such garbage for a significant period of
> time.  They need to be encouraged to avoid the temptation to recreate
> their article, thereby raising the level of damage and wasted time
> they incur.
>
> Some of you might think regular policy and VfD is the way to go.  I am
> here to tell you it is not enough.  We are losing the battle for
> encyclopedic content in favor of people intent on hijacking Wikipedia
> for their own memes.  This scourge is a serious waste of time and
> energy.  We must put a stop to this now.
> Thank you for your help.
>
> -Brad Patrick
> User:BradPatrick
> Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.


subject: [WikiEN-l] How to deal with direct requests for articles?

body:
Hang on, if the PR people start contributing, odds are that sooner or later
they'll write an article (not on themselves or a client, just in general)
and then they'll have a confronting AfD and leave Wikipedia permanently.
What can we do about encouraging people to contribute without creating
policy violating articles? Of course, I know when I started out editing, I
created [[Php MMORPG]] and [[Telstra India Call Centre Clip]]. The former I
speedied and the latter was prodded by another editor, then prod2ed it and
in the end both were deleted. These articles didn't conform to policy in
terms of notability or referencing, and weren't worth keeping, but I (as a
relatively normal policy-unaware contributor at the time) didn't know any of
this. Maybe the welcome templates should link to simplified versions of
article creation guidelines?

On 9/28/06, Stephen Streater <sbstreater at mac.com> wrote:
>
>
> On 28 Sep 2006, at 12:36, Oskar Sigvardsson wrote:
>
> > On 9/28/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> >> My phone number and email are publicly available for media contact
> >> purposes. This means, of course, I get emails and calls about
> >> *everything*.
> >>
> >> A common call is "How do I get an article about me/my book/my
> >> achievement?"
> >>
> >> Now. What's a helpful answer to this? Better than "You don't, someone
> >> else has to write one," because you *know* they'll just write a
> >> really
> >> bad one themselves and it'll all end in a tearful AFD entry and
> >> someone hating or fearing Wikipedia henceforth.
> >>
> >> Assume that referring them to a web page or policy page is less good
> >> than being able to answer on the phone right there.
> >>
> >> Ideas please?
> >>
> >>
> >> - d.
> >
> > Fist off all, this should really be in our FAQ (I've just skimmed over
> > it, man it's big, and I couldn't find it). Someone should put that in.
> >
> > To answer your question, if I were to get those calls I would calmly
> > explain that we have fairly high standards on what people can be
> > subjects of articles. Tell them that if they deserve to have an
> > article in wikipedia, they will. Just not written on request or by
> > themselves. Point out that if they do write an article on themselves,
> > it is very likely it will be deleted and it is not always a nice
> > discussion to read. You might also want to point out that you yourself
> > doesn't have an article, I can imagine that would convince some people
> > ;)
>
> I would suggest that they start contributing to Wikipedia.
> After a period, their name will be recognised by other
> passing editors who will be surprised that they don't have
> an article yet, and they will write one.
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Andrew Gray

body:
On 29/09/06, Birgitte SB <birgitte_sb at yahoo.com> wrote:

> > (quoting my email:)
> > *how can we make such fortunate results not
> > disappear down the drain?
>
> This is a good question and others have suggested
> trying to convert the Turin bid a European conference
> if not an Italian one.

I would be very interested in attending a conference in Torino,
certainly, if the details are broadly the same as they were before -
it's accessible enough from most of Europe that we could get a lot of
attendees for whom Taipei is simply not a possibility, and the
European community as a whole is sufficiently diverse and active that
it seems the most likely to be able to support a regional conference.

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


from_name: charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com

body:
"Peter Jacobi" <peter_jacobi at gmx.net>

> In the unlikely case anyone interested has missed it: There
> are some troubles re mandatory in-line citing and science
> articles.
>
> It all started with a warning put at large number of "good
> articles" that they will be delisted soon for lack of
> in-line cites. This immediately got the response, that standard
> textbooks facts are not and should not be in-line cited, the
> references section will name selected textbooks and one cannot
> judge the correctness without having some context anyway.

It is certainly foolish in many cases, and make-work, to reference specific and uncontroversial well-known facts. What is more it will tend to make articles unreadable, and effectively unwriteable also. This style is essentially only fit for very careful writing in doctoral dissertations with particularly terrifying examiners in mind.

It seems clear that enWP could get overrun by nutty lawyering types, if a firm line is not taken. Is there not a 'statute of limitations' of sorts appropriate? When a piece of science is over 50 years old, one expects to read about the details of the original papers in a historical article. And the chances are that there are so many textbook citations that picking just one isn't a great help to students.

Charles

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


from_name: Robert Scott Horning

body:
GerardM wrote:

>PS I am totally behind the notion that we should not have non-encyclopedic
>content in Wikipedia.. for me it is a matter of strategy.
>
>Thanks,
>   GerardM
>
>
While on the surface I totally support this idea and philosophy, the
problem is in the details.  There is a legitimate reason to have
encyclopedic articles about major notable businesses and organizations
such as Coca-Cola and General Motors.  The problem is when the POV of
these articles shift from a NPOV exercise to simply a glowing P.R.
astroturfing exercise that wipes out any criticism or negative (to the
company) publicity, even if it is factual and verifiable.

I'm currently engaged directly in one of these efforts where there have
been close to 100 edits about a particular company that has been edited
to wildly different points of view and little middle ground is seemingly
possible.  Some of the edits are by (I suspect) employees of the company
in question.

As for business that are not notable, that is of course subject to
interpretation but even then some sort of good faith ought to go into
some of the suggestions.  Historical significance should play as much a
role as Alexa ranking or other factors.  John's "Gently Used Cars"
should not be considered a notable business by all of these factors and
more, and certainly does not deserve note in Wikipedia, even if it might
help improve rankings on Google for their website.  This is perhaps one
of the motivations for this type of behavior, unfortunately.

There are some companies that while small now, did have a small but
important historical significance to the area where they are located, or
to the industry they are in.

Somehow I don't think that most of the web pages that Brad is
complaining about here really fit this sort of criteria.

--
Robert Scott Horning


from_name: geni

subject:
[Foundation-l] The Foundation is not a wiki (was Re: RfC: Key
	priorities for my work)

body:
On 9/25/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> The elections for arbcom will most likely be run again this year
> precisely as last year.
>

So has the general lack of support or your suggestion persuaded you
that your involvement is no longer required or am I going to be trying
to recruit candidates for the system that apparently everyone thought
sucked last time. An answer before October the 1st would be useful.

--
geni


from_name: Sean Barrett

subject: [WikiEN-l] Seth Finkelstein in the Technology Guardian

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

David Gerard stated for the record:

> On 29/09/06, Matt R <matt_crypto at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
>
>
>>* If a biography subject is genuinely notable, then whether or not he wants an
>>article on himself or not to exist is irrelevant. We would try and communicate
>>that fact tactfully, of course.
>
>
>
> Done that. "I'm afraid an MBE probably means you're at least
> marginally notable. It's a pretty important and public form of
> recognition."

O RLY?  If a mere MBA is borderline notable (it isn't, of course) I may
have to rethink taking the [[PMP]] exam.

Not really, but the thought did cross my mind.

- --
 Sean Barrett     | Let us all go worship Loki.
 sean at epoptic.com | He's the Norse God of Chaos,
                  | Which is why this verse
                  | doesn't rhyme or scan or nuthin'.
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Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

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=Xrz4
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body:
Hoi,
There are several projects where there are groups fighting each other
because their project was envisioned to be only about one specific
orthography or script. It is in my opinion much better to solve these issues
first and be sure that there will be no such fight in the future.

Thanks,
    GerardM

On 9/29/06, Tim Starling <tstarling at wikimedia.org> wrote:
>
> GerardM wrote:
> > Hoi,
> > Many people are in favour of adding Gilaki to the list of languages..
> There
> > is one issue outstanding as far as I am concerned. At WiktionaryZ the
> Babel
> > templates are in an Arabic script.. The first Gilaki word however is in
> both
> > the Latin and this Arabic script.
> >
> > Another issue is that the language is called Gilaki and only Wikipedia
> calls
> > it Gileki ..
> >
> > It would be nice to have these issues resolved first..
>
> Couldn't we create it first and resolve the issues later? Unless you are
> suggesting that the existence of these issues implies that the proposers
> don't know anything about the language, I don't see any problem with
> changing either the default text direction or the language name after the
> wiki is created.
>
> -- Tim Starling
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


body:
Hoi,
There are several projects where there are groups fighting each other
because their project was envisioned to be only about one specific
orthography or script. It is in my opinion much better to solve these issues
first and be sure that there will be no such fight in the future.

Thanks,
    GerardM

On 9/29/06, Tim Starling <tstarling at wikimedia.org> wrote:
>
> GerardM wrote:
> > Hoi,
> > Many people are in favour of adding Gilaki to the list of languages..
> There
> > is one issue outstanding as far as I am concerned. At WiktionaryZ the
> Babel
> > templates are in an Arabic script.. The first Gilaki word however is in
> both
> > the Latin and this Arabic script.
> >
> > Another issue is that the language is called Gilaki and only Wikipedia
> calls
> > it Gileki ..
> >
> > It would be nice to have these issues resolved first..
>
> Couldn't we create it first and resolve the issues later? Unless you are
> suggesting that the existence of these issues implies that the proposers
> don't know anything about the language, I don't see any problem with
> changing either the default text direction or the language name after the
> wiki is created.
>
> -- Tim Starling
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>
_______________________________________________
Wikipedia-l mailing list
Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l


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

David Russell stated for the record:

> Sean Barrett wrote:
>
>>>O RLY?  If a mere MBA is borderline notable (it isn't, of course) I may
>>>have to rethink taking the [[PMP]] exam.
>>>
>>>Not really, but the thought did cross my mind.
>>>
>
>
> An MBE is different from an MBA. One is a UK honour, the other is an
> exam. Unless that was a typo, in which case I'll shut up :)
>
> Cynical

No, it was a failure somewhere between my reading of the original and
typing of my reply, probably caused by bad drugs.  I'll have a word with
my LDS dealer.

Thanks for the correction.

- --
 Sean Barrett     | Let us all go worship Loki.
 sean at epoptic.com | He's the Norse God of Chaos,
                  | Which is why this verse
                  | doesn't rhyme or scan or nuthin'.
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

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=AMYQ
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from_name: Birgitte SB

body:
--- Gatto Nero <gattonero at gmail.com> wrote:

> Should we deny that sj said Taipei was chosen 'cause
> "in the end they
> had the most surplus sponsorship, in fact"?
>
>

The above makes me think of an uncomfortable question
or two.

Will any member of the jury be employed by Wikimania
2007?  Will any member of jury be in a position to
decide how sponsorship monies are spent (i.e. drafting
budgets or who receives scholarships)?

Now a positive answer to one of those questions does
change that Taipei was chosen in good faith.  The
people on the jury are some of the most experienced
Wikimania organizers here.  So it would be natural
they would be selected for the jury, and equally
natural that they will be heavily involved in
organizing Wikimania 2007.  However, I would certainly
like to see that future Wikimania juries are selected
with a negative answer to these questions in mind.
Any possible perception of corruption should be
avoided at all costs.

Birgitte SB

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
http://mail.yahoo.com


from_name: Robth

body:
On 9/29/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> Verifiability is important and in most cases, references are *good* -
> the reader has no idea who the authors are, so only has the text and
> maybe what references are clickable to figure out the text's value
> from. Do please continue :-)
>
>
> - d.

What citations do is massively simplify the process of verifying any
given statement.  If a statement is not specifically cited, it could,
for all the reader knows, come from anywhere in any of the books used
as references, which, on most articles, would be a large amount of
material to go through looking for confirmation of one specific
statement.  A citation to single web page or page in a book or
journal, on the other hand, makes it possible for the reader, or
another editor, to quickly check the accuracy of that statement.  A
while ago, I briefly attempted to check the accuracy of a few cited
facts in every article that came through FAC; I eventually couldn't
keep up, but while I was at it I was able to correct a few factual
errors in articles, despite knowing nothing about the subject, because
of good citations.  (I also found out that a startling number of
citations did not point to anything that verified the article's
statements, but that's a different issue.)

The problem is to balance the desire for this kind of verifiability
with the desire not to clutter up the article excessively.  It's
convenient for me that this issue comes up now, because I was thinking
about this last night while I was writing; the result can be seen at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Arginusae.  To summarize, I
think it's possible to cite just about every statement in an article
to a small page range in a specific source by using notes that say
"Unless noted otherwise, all details given here regarding X topic can
be found in Y source, pp.234-250", and, as several other people have
noted, it's possible to show scholarly consensus by saying something
like "The account given here is that preferred by modern scholars; see
X Source, 123-140, Y source, 522-543, and Z source, 90-100".  By
getting slightly creative with footnotes in this way, it's possible to
produce an article that's thoroughly cited without being misleading
about the origins of its statements.

Now if anybody wants to take on an actually pointless MoS requirement,
I'm currently signing up able-bodied individuals for my crusade
against the proscription on starting section headers with the definite
article...


body:
--- Birgitte SB <birgitte_sb at yahoo.com> wrote:

>
>
> --- Gatto Nero <gattonero at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> > Should we deny that sj said Taipei was chosen
> 'cause
> > "in the end they
> > had the most surplus sponsorship, in fact"?
> >
> >
>
> The above makes me think of an uncomfortable
> question
> or two.
>
> Will any member of the jury be employed by Wikimania
> 2007?  Will any member of jury be in a position to
> decide how sponsorship monies are spent (i.e.
> drafting
> budgets or who receives scholarships)?
>
> Now a positive answer to one of those questions does
> change that Taipei was chosen in good faith.

Excuse me

Now a positive answer to one of those questions does
*not* change that Taipei was chosen in good faith.

The
> people on the jury are some of the most experienced
> Wikimania organizers here.  So it would be natural
> they would be selected for the jury, and equally
> natural that they will be heavily involved in
> organizing Wikimania 2007.  However, I would
> certainly
> like to see that future Wikimania juries are
> selected
> with a negative answer to these questions in mind.
> Any possible perception of corruption should be
> avoided at all costs.
>
>
> Birgitte SB
>
> __________________________________________________
> Do You Yahoo!?
> Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam
> protection around
> http://mail.yahoo.com
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
>
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
http://mail.yahoo.com


body:
Didn't see anyone mention this article from yesterday,

http://technology.guardian.co.uk/weekly/story/0,,1882027,00.html

title, "I'm on Wikipedia, get me out of here", by [[Seth Finkelstein".

Charles

-----------------------------------------
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from_name: The Uninvited Co., Inc

subject: [WikiEN-l] Call for volunteers for OTRS permissions queue

body:
If you are an admin on ENWP and are interested in copyright and
permissions issues, I would like to encourage you to become involved in
the permissions OTRS team.  For an idea of what's involved, take a look
at http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/OTRS/permissions-en-guide.

Participants must understand copyright issues as they affect Wikipedia,
understand and support the project's position on copyright and fair
use, and have a history of keeping their cool.

If interested, email me off-list.

The Uninvited Co., Inc.


body:
> I was looking at this earlier today and changed my preferences to notify for new tickets in permissions-en.
>
> One questions that might be of interest to others then I'll contact you off-list.
>
> Do you know the usual volume and how long it takes to handle each ticket?
>
> Sydney

There are typically 2-3 new tickets per day in addition to spam and
misdirected mail.  Proper handling takes around 10 minutes per ticket,
since several replies are generally sent and the ownership needs to be
confirmed, then documented on the wiki.

The Uninvited Co., Inc.


from_name: daniwo59 at aol.com

body:
 What Gerard suggests is NOT a solution. There are reasons people are spamming Wikipedia and not adding content to Yellowiki. We are the fourteenth largest website in the world, while Yellowiki does not count in the top one hundred thousand. We have a consistently high google rating and our links ensure that they will have a high google rating, Yellowiki does not. We can offer some modicum of respectability, while they cannot Compare these two statements: "Look at me! I'm in the encyclopedia!" v. "Look at me! I'm in the phonebook! "

 The fact is that they do not want to be on Yellowiki, which no one has ever heard of. They want to be on Wikipedia, which is a household name. And for that we need real solutions.

 Danny

 -----Original Message-----
 From: gerard.meijssen at gmail.com
 To: foundation-l at wikimedia.org
 Cc: bpatrick at wikimedia.org
 Sent: Fri, 29 Sep 2006 1:48 PM
 Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Corporate vanity policy enforcement

  Hoi,
There are two issues that may be addressed. There is an apparant need for
organisations to be VISIBLE. They want to use Wikipedia for that while we do
not consider them to be of relevance in an encyclopedic setting. The content
that they created would be of some value to Yellowikis. This is where this
information is welcomed.

By moving it sideways, we do exactly what is current practice for other
content that does not fit Wikipedia. We are not as confrontational as we
could be, but the teflon quality of our projects would be increased and this
may lead to fewer angry people in our projects as well.

PS I am totally behind the notion that we should not have non-encyclopedic
content in Wikipedia.. for me it is a matter of strategy.

Thanks,
   GerardM

On 9/29/06, Jeffrey V. Merkey <jmerkey at wolfmountaingroup.com> wrote:
>
>
> Brad,
>
> One very easy solution to all of this is to segregate the live edited
> wikipedia site from the published site scraped by the
> search engines.
>
> In other words, setup the community server "anyone can edit" at
> something like draften.wikipedia.org and publish reviewed
> dumps of the community server to a read only external server for
> scraping like I am doing at Wikigadugi. I have ZERO
> vandalism problems , ZERO content dispute problems, and ZERO vanity page
> problems and I host the entire English
> wikipedia as well as several other languages.
>
> Very simple solution. People won't waste the time creating vanity pages
> when they know they may not get published in the
> "official" external official site.
>
> Jeff
>
> Brad Patrick wrote:
>
> >Brad Patrick wrote:
> >
> >
> >>Dear Community:
> >>
> >>The volume of corporate vanity/vandalism which is showing up on
> >>Wikipedia is overwhelming.  At the office, we are receiving dozens of
> >>phone calls *per week* about company, organization, and marketing
> >>edits which are reverted, causing the non-notable, but
> >>self-aggrandizing authors, to scream bloody murder.  This is as it
> >>should be.  However, I am issuing a call to arms to the community to
> >>act in a much more draconian fashion in response to corporate
> >>self-editing and vanity page creation.  This is simply out of hand,
> >>and we need your help.
> >>
> >>We are the #14 website in the world.  We are a big target.  If we are
> >>to remain true to our encyclopedic mission, this kind of nonsense
> >>cannot be tolerated.  This means the administrators and new page
> >>patrol need to be clear when they see new usernames and page creation
> >>which are blatantly commercial - shoot on sight.  There should be no
> >>question that someone who claims to have a "famous movie studio" and
> >>has exactly 2 Google hits - both their Myspace page - they get nuked.
> >>Ban users who promulgate such garbage for a significant period of
> >>time.  They need to be encouraged to avoid the temptation to recreate
> >>their article, thereby raising the level of damage and wasted time
> >>they incur.
> >>
> >>Some of you might think regular policy and VfD is the way to go.  I am
> >>here to tell you it is not enough.  We are losing the battle for
> >>encyclopedic content in favor of people intent on hijacking Wikipedia
> >>for their own memes.  This scourge is a serious waste of time and
> >>energy.  We must put a stop to this now.
> >>Thank you for your help.
> >>
> >>-Brad Patrick
> >>User:BradPatrick
> >>Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
> >>
> >>
> >_______________________________________________
> >foundation-l mailing list
> >foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> >http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
> >
> >
> >
>
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>
_______________________________________________
foundation-l mailing list
foundation-l at wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

________________________________________________________________________
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body:
 That does not solve any problems. The problem is not that they want to be online. Many of them have their own websites which get considerable traffic. The problem is that they want to be on Wikipedia. That is all they want. And as long as they are not on Wikipedia, they will keep coming back, regardless of whether they are on Yellowiki or not.

 -----Original Message-----
 From: gerard.meijssen at gmail.com
 To: foundation-l at wikimedia.org
 Sent: Fri, 29 Sep 2006 3:15 PM
 Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Corporate vanity policy enforcement

  Hoi,
By saying that we are big and they are small, it must be clear that it
is NOT a solution right ??. So the solution is to be blunt and destroy
all the effort that these people did put into what they hoped to be
acceptable for Wikipedia.

By moving it to Yellowikis, Yellowikis gets content that it wants to
have; their content is GFDL as well so there is NO problem in doing
exactly this. By providing an alternative we give less of a reason to
complain and we provide Yellowikis with the content that is what they
are there for. What you could appreciate is that by having such a teflon
strategy, we will be better able to ruthlessly remove from Wikipedia
what is not encyclopedic in the first place.

Thanks,
    GerardM

daniwo59 at aol.com wrote:
>  What Gerard suggests is NOT a solution. There are reasons people are spamming
Wikipedia and not adding content to Yellowiki. We are the fourteenth largest
website in the world, while Yellowiki does not count in the top one hundred
thousand. We have a consistently high google rating and our links ensure that
they will have a high google rating, Yellowiki does not. We can offer some
modicum of respectability, while they cannot Compare these two statements: "Look
at me! I'm in the encyclopedia!" v. "Look at me! I'm in the phonebook! "
>
>  The fact is that they do not want to be on Yellowiki, which no one has ever
heard of. They want to be on Wikipedia, which is a household name. And for that
we need real solutions.
>
>  Danny
>
>  -----Original Message-----
>  From: gerard.meijssen at gmail.com
>  To: foundation-l at wikimedia.org
>  Cc: bpatrick at wikimedia.org
>  Sent: Fri, 29 Sep 2006 1:48 PM
>  Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Corporate vanity policy enforcement
>
>   Hoi,
> There are two issues that may be addressed. There is an apparant need for
> organisations to be VISIBLE. They want to use Wikipedia for that while we do
> not consider them to be of relevance in an encyclopedic setting. The content
> that they created would be of some value to Yellowikis. This is where this
> information is welcomed.
>
> By moving it sideways, we do exactly what is current practice for other
> content that does not fit Wikipedia. We are not as confrontational as we
> could be, but the teflon quality of our projects would be increased and this
> may lead to fewer angry people in our projects as well.
>
> PS I am totally behind the notion that we should not have non-encyclopedic
> content in Wikipedia.. for me it is a matter of strategy.
>
> Thanks,
>    GerardM
>
> On 9/29/06, Jeffrey V. Merkey <jmerkey at wolfmountaingroup.com> wrote:
>
>> Brad,
>>
>> One very easy solution to all of this is to segregate the live edited
>> wikipedia site from the published site scraped by the
>> search engines.
>>
>> In other words, setup the community server "anyone can edit" at
>> something like draften.wikipedia.org and publish reviewed
>> dumps of the community server to a read only external server for
>> scraping like I am doing at Wikigadugi. I have ZERO
>> vandalism problems , ZERO content dispute problems, and ZERO vanity page
>> problems and I host the entire English
>> wikipedia as well as several other languages.
>>
>> Very simple solution. People won't waste the time creating vanity pages
>> when they know they may not get published in the
>> "official" external official site.
>>
>> Jeff
>>
>> Brad Patrick wrote:
>>
>>
>>> Brad Patrick wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>> Dear Community:
>>>>
>>>> The volume of corporate vanity/vandalism which is showing up on
>>>> Wikipedia is overwhelming.  At the office, we are receiving dozens of
>>>> phone calls *per week* about company, organization, and marketing
>>>> edits which are reverted, causing the non-notable, but
>>>> self-aggrandizing authors, to scream bloody murder.  This is as it
>>>> should be.  However, I am issuing a call to arms to the community to
>>>> act in a much more draconian fashion in response to corporate
>>>> self-editing and vanity page creation.  This is simply out of hand,
>>>> and we need your help.
>>>>
>>>> We are the #14 website in the world.  We are a big target.  If we are
>>>> to remain true to our encyclopedic mission, this kind of nonsense
>>>> cannot be tolerated.  This means the administrators and new page
>>>> patrol need to be clear when they see new usernames and page creation
>>>> which are blatantly commercial - shoot on sight.  There should be no
>>>> question that someone who claims to have a "famous movie studio" and
>>>> has exactly 2 Google hits - both their Myspace page - they get nuked.
>>>> Ban users who promulgate such garbage for a significant period of
>>>> time.  They need to be encouraged to avoid the temptation to recreate
>>>> their article, thereby raising the level of damage and wasted time
>>>> they incur.
>>>>
>>>> Some of you might think regular policy and VfD is the way to go.  I am
>>>> here to tell you it is not enough.  We are losing the battle for
>>>> encyclopedic content in favor of people intent on hijacking Wikipedia
>>>> for their own memes.  This scourge is a serious waste of time and
>>>> energy.  We must put a stop to this now.
>>>> Thank you for your help.
>>>>
>>>> -Brad Patrick
>>>> User:BradPatrick
>>>> Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
_______________________________________________
foundation-l mailing list
foundation-l at wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

________________________________________________________________________
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from_name: Hsiang-Tai Chien

body:
There is no secret sponsorship for Taipei anymore. They are DotAsia.org and
Chung-Hwa Telecom in Taiwan and they did promise the amount as we listed in
the bidding page. And I believe there will be more amounts because now we
have more sponsors willing to help.

We keep it secret before the bidding final because DotAsia.org has bussiness
in many cities, and they do not wish to offend their customers in those
cities so they ask us to keep it secret until the bidding result is out.

And if you wish to know, a employee from DotAsia.org now is in our team to
help for organizing Wikimania 2007.

I wish to remind that we should respect the sponsors because they recognize
the vision of Wikimedia Foundation and they are willing to help us to host
this big WM event.

For the flight price, the fare we listed on the bidding page is the fare we
checked in *this* August. And yes it might have estimation errors because
the fare is changing every day and it should be firmed when the time of
Wikimania 2007 is coming closely. It would be also related with what travel
agency you choose and how you take the flight.

Thanks and best regards,
H.T.

-----Original Message-----
From: foundation-l-bounces at wikimedia.org
[mailto:foundation-l-bounces at wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Gatto Nero
Sent: Friday, September 29, 2006 3:06 PM
To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Taipei chosen to host Wikimania 2007

2006/9/29, GerardM <gerard.meijssen at gmail.com>:

> In Taipei we will have a completely different event from the event in
> Frankfurt and Boston. Each time we learned new things and the
> resulting offers for hosting were different as a consequence. Not
> allowing for this by saying in advance that Turin does not have to do
> "the work" again is imho stupid. In order for Turin to be a competitor
> next year, they have to analyse what went wrong; was it their offer,
> their presentation sheer bad luck?

Turin is not in Asia.
(Oh, and we didn't talk about "secret sponsorship", right: how came that a
bid as been even shortlisted with this sort of "Yes, you have to trust us:
we have a huuuuuge sponsor but we cannot tell you who, secret secret!"?
Not talking about strange flight cost, strange "surplus sponsorship"
and other funny reason...)

[Beware: this is Gatto Nero's opinion, not "Wikimania2007Torino Bidding
Team"'s opinion] _______________________________________________
foundation-l mailing list
foundation-l at wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

___________________________________________________
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 http://messenger.yahoo.com.tw/


subject: [Foundation-l] Taipei chosen to host Wikimania 2007


from_name: Alison Wheeler

body:
On Thu, September 28, 2006 12:07, David Gerard wrote:
> The procedure as it is evidently needs work, since other bidders (e.g.
> London) are disappointed at their hard work being pretty much wasted.
and
> The current system seems to ensure a lot of volunteer time and effort
> being futile. This is damaging to the project.

Coming a little late to this discussion, could I (as one of the leads on
the London bid) say that (a) I don't see the need for a bidding process as
at all 'damaging' nor, other than the first few hours after the decision
was announced am I that disappointed. Yes, the work is 'wasted' by some
views, but much of it will get recycled into other projects (the schools
outreach and community outreach programmes we had been planning are still
likely to go ahead in some form, for instance) and if you think we were
depressed be glad you weren't Paris at the latest declaration of the city
to host the Summer Olympics in 2012! So far as I am concerned I am happy
that Taipei will be hosting in 2007 and wish them well.

One thing I would definitely say though is that this process did point up
a few things that need sorting before the next city is chosen.

1. Travel costs; should be researched centrally by WMF or someone
independent from all the bids. It was clear that this caused great
friction in this year's bids as Taipei - by their own admission - used
this year's prices without taxes and surcharges even though actual-date
flight information and charges were available and used by other bids. This
meant that the bids information was clearly biased and inconsistent and
could mislead the analysts.

2. What is the *point* of Wikimania? Is it just for editors of Wikimedia
projects? Is it for technical/academic purposes? Is is (as we in London
had planned) a way to expand the 'reach' and use of the Wikimedia projects
to the wider population and not just those already in the FLOSS/wiki
sphere?

3. Extending from both of these points is that of who the attendees are;
the demographics of our editors and how much disposable income they have
to be able to fly around the world. In essence this is an old-fashioned
network routing calculation as whilst some people may be expensed to
attend Wikimania (the board, for example, and some presenters) most
attendees aren't and if we aim for 'free and open source' then we should
also aim for 'cheap and easy travel' too.

4. A last thought on location is the one of language and locality. The
nationality of the host location and its 'default language' don't have
that much effect on the conference itself - our working language is
english, after all - but they do on the attendees ability to travel
in-country and enjoy anything the location might offer outwith the
conference.

Could I also suggest that we should be seeking an 'independence of view'
from all people concerned with deciding on a venue or employees of same.
Brad's support for Torino during the selection period, and Jimbo's recent
comment here are, to my mind, very out of place and could easily suggest
to many that there is pressure being brought on them.

I was dishearted, indeed, to see that people were making suppositions
about different candidate cities external to the information those cities
made available about their offerings and that - if geographical
considerations are to form a part of the decision-makiong process - they
need to be clarified in advance and applied equally.

Alison Wheeler


from_name: Phil Sandifer

subject: [WikiEN-l] Citationgate: expertise and verifiability

body:
On Sep 29, 2006, at 12:34 PM, David Russell wrote:

>
> First of all, if 'all the major sources agree on' a particular fact,
> then where is the problem in citing one of them? Good Articles need to
> demonstrate compliance with the Manual of Style at the very least (if
> not all the other various guidelines on different issue)

Baloney. MoS is a hellhole of process - exactly what Good Articles
were made to get around. Good Articles need to be pretty darn good -
not perfectly adhere to an absurd bit of process that grew
organically in a manner similar to kudzu.

> - and if people
> had followed [[WP:CITE]] in the first place then there wouldn't be the
> problem with the GA review, would there? It's not as if it is a brand
> new guideline that may be under dispute or unknown - WP:CITE has been
> around since 2002, if some editors decided to ignore it then it's no
> surprise that others objected to their work being elevated to GA
> status.

[[WP:CITE]] is unfollowable - both because it's impossible to edit
practically while citing a source every line, and because it's
another piece of crap MoS page.

-Phil


body:
On Sep 29, 2006, at 3:26 PM, Jake Waskett wrote:

> On Fri, 2006-09-29 at 14:15 -0400, Robth wrote:
>> The problem is to balance the desire for this kind of verifiability
>> with the desire not to clutter up the article excessively.
>
> What's wrong with a technical solution? Write the article with lots of
> inline references, but make it a user preference whether or not to
> show
> them.

Go write the code.

-Phil


from_name: Mak

body:
<snip>
Would it be all that hard to provide a specific page reference as a
footnote. e.g. (hypothetical example) <ref>See, for example, J. Doe
/Origins of Somethingorother/ p.29, J. Bloggs /Somethingorother
explained p.60</ref>.</ref>? And there is no need to cite a source after
every fact - after every paragraph or subtopic would be fine. But no
citations is unlikely to result in a successful GA review, at least
unless/until the proposed changes to the GA criteria are accepted.
</snip>

Inline citations have now been added to Dido and Aeneas, easily enough
(there are no page numbers given, because Grove online doesn't have page
numbers, and this particular article is short enough to not have
sub-sections). The point is that if reasonable references are given, inline
citations should not be necessary for uncontroversial facts. If you look at
actual encyclopedias, you will notice that they don't have inline
references, especially for generally accepted facts.

Please not that I am not against inline references, and I am a big fan of
creating good bibliographies for articles. I just think the current fashion
of requiring an inline citation for every little thing is not helpful or
productive. I think it lessens the usefulness of inline citations, because
they are splattered everywhere. It's not that I /can't/ do it, it's just
that I think
adding inline citations for each fact in an article misrepresents the nature
of the information. Generally, in actual academic artilces, inline citations
are used for comments, or controversial material. If the accepted reference
work is given in the references section, every piece of information taken
from that source shouldn't need to be cited to that source specifically.

User:Makemi


from_name: Oldak Quill

body:
On 29/09/06, Ilya Haykinson <haykinson at gmail.com> wrote:
> We say we want to encourage adoption of open formats.  That's fine and dandy
> -- let's only allow open formats in uploads.  But a large part of our
> mission is delivering content and I feel that we've been burying our head in
> the sand by pretending that there's no problem with access.  I would venture
> to say that the vast majority of our users cannot watch or hear any
> multimedia files off of our websites.  I would also suggest that they are
> not likely to, in the next several years at best.
>
> I suggest that if we change our attitude and allow alternative,
> actually-workable presentation of our media, we will be more correctly
> fulfilling our mission.  Let's allow Flash for audio and video.

I think we all recognise that there is a problem with access, but I do
not think that the solution to this problem is the use of non-free
formats. The most important reason for this is that I'm not sure we
could be considered to be delivering "free content" if it is delivered
in a patent-laden format.

It is important that we (the project) do not sacrifice our ideals and
aims for the problems of this particular year. We should focus our
energy on finding solutions which enable us to continue delivering
truly free content to users. The suggestion that we convince Mozilla
to bundle OGG with Firefox sounds good to me. Another possibility is
that we could also come up with methods for delivering the codecs to
the end user more easily.

--
Oldak Quill (oldakquill at gmail.com)


body:
Oh, and on a slightly different note, when I made an experiment of extremely
close citations on [[Concerto delle donne]] (now an FA), when other users,
even experienced ones with advanced degrees, edited the text, they would
move information without moving the correct citation. The only resolution to
that I could find was to attach references to single sentences, which as you
can see results in an article with a list of citations practically as long
as the article. And this is on a fairly non-controversial topic.
Makemi


from_name: SJ

body:
On 9/29/06, Gatto Nero <gattonero at gmail.com> wrote:
> 2006/9/29, Gianluigi Gamba <gigamb at tin.it>:
> > Gatto Nero, I understand your disappointment, but
> >
> > * disappointing 7 teams out of 8 was unavoidable;
> > * the jury decided legitimately taking into account all the available
> > information they had - they have the right and the duty to consider
> > geo-political strategies for better achieving the goals of the Foundation.
> > And I might be wrong, bringing access to the free knowledge where such free
> > knowledge is somehow obstacled is one of them.
> >
> > suspicious innuendos about how the decision has been taken aren't of any
> > help for anyone.
>
> Should we deny that Taipei has been shortlisted with no secure
> sponsorship at all?
> (Just read what their bid said about sponsor at the time of the
> shortlisting decision:
> "The bidding team has contacted several potential sponsors. Some of
> them have shown great interest in sponsoring Wikimania and covering
> the core expenses in total on venue, accommodation, and catering. If
> Taipei is selected as the host city for Wikimania 2007, the detailed
> sponsorship arrangement will be finalized. According to our
> conservative estimation, local sponsorship will be no less than
> NT$1,500,000 (US$45,600+)."
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikimania_2007/Taipei&oldid=435116#Local_sponsorship_opportunities
> )
> Why then include Taipei and exclude the other? On which basis?

I don't recall any bid including signed sponsorship contracts; so in every case
sponsorship was in some way "not fully secure".   Sponsorship was also only
one of many factors in the decisions (and conspiracy theories aside,
it never seemed
like the most important one).

> Should we deny that sj said Taipei was chosen 'cause "in the end they
> had the most surplus sponsorship, in fact"?

Out of context.  Taipei was not chosen "because" of sponsorship, at
least that was not the
deciding factor for me, though (see above) that was one of the factors
considered
for every bid.

The above quote (I did not say 'because') was in response to the claim
that Turin had full sponsorship, unlike other bids; when in fact it
was not the only bid with full sponsorship (and in some ways that bid
had less sponsorship than Taipei's; cf. breakfasts).  Again, beyond
noting the bids for which all major costs were covered, the specifics
of sponsorship amount or surplus was not a deciding factor in the
discussion.

> Should we deny that this decision caused a rift and quite a fight
> between the components of the jury?

It's funny, it caused a rift a day and a half after the decision,
after a lot of emotional comments from the community; it did not
during the jury discussion.

-- SJ


from_name: David Gerard

subject:
[WikiEN-l] needed: Greg's study showing most en: articles have one
	or two editors

body:
Needed quickly for a journalist - a link to Greg Maxwell's study
showing most en: articles have only one or two editors and aren't at
all controversial. The journalist was very interested and wants some
numbers. I said I'd email him a link asap.

- d.


from_name: Mark Williamson

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Gileki wikipedia is waiting for a provider to
	getstarted

body:
Didn't they already?

On 29/09/06, Platonides <Platonides at gmail.com> wrote:
> "Mohammad Rastgaar" wrote:
> > Hello,
> >
> >  Gileki language has been supported by many, and there are some
> > organizations which want to promote the Gileki wiki once it get started. I
> > have contacted few providers but did not get any response. Does any body
> > know how I can find a provider to work on this case?
> >
> >
> >  thanks,
> >  Rastgaar
>
>
> A provider?? You should start writing the articles for the Gileki wiki on
> the incubator wiki  ( http://incubator.wikimedia.org ) until a proper wiki
> is set up.
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>

--
Refije dirije lanm? yo paske nou posede pw?p bato.


body:
On 29/09/06, Mak <makwik at gmail.com> wrote:

> But since practically no-one on-wiki is an expert on 16th century Italian
> music, they insist on inline citations, so that someone could potentially go
> "check" that "fact". I think inline citations can be very important, but I
> don't think every single factual assertion in an article should have to have
> an inline citation, especially when an article really  is simply echoing
> accepted non-controversial scholarship, such as, for instance, [[Dido and
> Aeneas]], which just received a GA review request for inline citations. It's
> getting ridiculous.

This needs posting to WT:FAC. They get attacks of weird fashion in
citation format that spread out through the wiki.

I mean, I see their point: verifiability. Ideally, there should be a
secondary source that already says "was widely considered". But it can
get stupid, yes.

- d.


from_name: David Russell

body:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
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Mak wrote:
> It shouldn't need an inline citation,
> because all the major sources agree on it.
>
> But since practically no-one on-wiki is an expert on 16th century Italian
> music, they insist on inline citations, so that someone could potentially go
> "check" that "fact". I think inline citations can be very important, but I
> don't think every single factual assertion in an article should have to have
> an inline citation, especially when an article really  is simply echoing
> accepted non-controversial scholarship, such as, for instance, [[Dido and
> Aeneas]], which just received a GA review request for inline citations. It's
> getting ridiculous.

First of all, if 'all the major sources agree on' a particular fact,
then where is the problem in citing one of them? Good Articles need to
demonstrate compliance with the Manual of Style at the very least (if
not all the other various guidelines on different issue) - and if people
had followed [[WP:CITE]] in the first place then there wouldn't be the
problem with the GA review, would there? It's not as if it is a brand
new guideline that may be under dispute or unknown - WP:CITE has been
around since 2002, if some editors decided to ignore it then it's no
surprise that others objected to their work being elevated to GA status.

Cynical
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from_name: Sydney aka FloNight

body:
---- "The Uninvited Co. wrote:
=============
If you are an admin on ENWP and are interested in copyright and
permissions issues, I would like to encourage you to become involved in
the permissions OTRS team.  For an idea of what's involved, take a look
at http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/OTRS/permissions-en-guide.

Participants must understand copyright issues as they affect Wikipedia,
understand and support the project's position on copyright and fair
use, and have a history of keeping their cool.

If interested, email me off-list.

The Uninvited Co., Inc.
======================================

I was looking at this earlier today and changed my preferences to notify for new tickets in permissions-en.

One questions that might be of interest to others then I'll contact you off-list.

Do you know the usual volume and how long it takes to handle each ticket?

Sydney


from_name: Gianluigi Gamba

body:
Gatto Nero, I understand your disappointment, but

* disappointing 7 teams out of 8 was unavoidable;
* the jury decided legitimately taking into account all the available
information they had - they have the right and the duty to consider
geo-political strategies for better achieving the goals of the Foundation.
And I might be wrong, bringing access to the free knowledge where such free
knowledge is somehow obstacled is one of them.

suspicious innuendos about how the decision has been taken aren't of any
help for anyone.

G. (aka Paginazero)


body:
On 29/09/06, Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:

>   Footnotes make sense when a
> specific claim should be attributed to a specific source, especially if
> it's controversial.
> Interestingly, this is standard style in most of the technical articles,
> maybe because the pedants know not to poke their head in there.  Most
> good mathematics articles contain a footnote-free exposition of the
> subject, with some references at the end, and footnotes only to point
> out where authorities disagree, where there's a significant minority
> view, or to point to particularly notable proofs.

Depends. I've learnt to use defensive inline references in articles on
recent technology because people will argue over *anything* ;-) Mind
you, that's more a specialised variety of current-events article.

- d.


from_name: Matt R

body:
--- charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com wrote:

> Didn't see anyone mention this article from yesterday,
>
> http://technology.guardian.co.uk/weekly/story/0,,1882027,00.html
>
> title, "I'm on Wikipedia, get me out of here", by [[Seth Finkelstein".

Interesting. A couple of comments:

* If a biography subject is genuinely notable, then whether or not he wants an
article on himself or not to exist is irrelevant. We would try and communicate
that fact tactfully, of course.

* There's lots of disagreement on Wikipedia about what is notable. (Yeah, I'm
observant...) My personal definition would exclude a fair bit of current
Wikipedia content (so I'm a theoretical deletionist), but I'm happy to live
with it (and hence am a de facto inclusionist) because:
1) It does me no harm. I don't have to read articles that I think are
non-notable.
2) It does other people no harm. That is, few other people want to read them
either, and for the few who do, there's little real-world harm that comes from
blantant falsehoods about (say) minor Pok?mon characters.

However, in the case of living person bios, "2" may not hold. Malicious persons
can write all kinds of false and libellous things that will quite possibly go
completely unnoticed until they've been widely mirrored across the Web.

-- Matt

Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Matt_Crypto
Blog: http://cipher-text.blogspot.com

___________________________________________________________
The all-new Yahoo! Mail goes wherever you go - free your email address from your Internet provider. http://uk.docs.yahoo.com/nowyoucan.html


subject: [WikiEN-l] the process that isn't written

body:
Can anyone think how to rephrase this better? Would it actually get
through to anyone who needs to hear it?

(I eagerly await all the people saying I should read what I wrote.)

====
Cultural expectations

These are the things we do that aren't actually codified. The feel of
the project. The social structure. This stuff is process too, but if
you contradict it you'll really upset people. Breaking a rule is just
breaking a rule; but breaking a cultural expectation is breaking
people's basic assumptions about the fabric of this small world of
ours. And upset volunteers fade away.

If you think you're keeping to the fundamental rules and the sensible
processes but repeatedly upset people in the same way, your approach
is ineffective. If you are in fact right, and cultural expectations
are getting in the way of writing the encyclopedia, you've got a hard
job ahead of you changing them. But that's the trouble with vision.
====

- d.


subject: [WikiEN-l] [Wikipedia-l] the process that isn't written

body:
Can anyone think how to rephrase this better? Would it actually get
through to anyone who needs to hear it?

(I eagerly await all the people saying I should read what I wrote.)

====
Cultural expectations

These are the things we do that aren't actually codified. The feel of
the project. The social structure. This stuff is process too, but if
you contradict it you'll really upset people. Breaking a rule is just
breaking a rule; but breaking a cultural expectation is breaking
people's basic assumptions about the fabric of this small world of
ours. And upset volunteers fade away.

If you think you're keeping to the fundamental rules and the sensible
processes but repeatedly upset people in the same way, your approach
is ineffective. If you are in fact right, and cultural expectations
are getting in the way of writing the encyclopedia, you've got a hard
job ahead of you changing them. But that's the trouble with vision.
====

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


subject: [Wikipedia-l] the process that isn't written


body:
On 29/09/06, Nathaniel Sheetz <preparing at psu.edu> wrote:

> Also, in response to the original post, citations do more than just serve as
> a way to verify the facts of an article.  They also show where the material
> came from, which is helpful for anyone doing research on a topic (high
> school, college, etc.) who can't directly cite Wikipedia (not many teachers
> allow that).  Our articles need to be written so that they can be used by as
> many people as possible, and I think that one way to do that is to
> religiously cite sources.

A separate ==Sources== section can be good for this.

> Nathaniel ([[User:Spangineer]], a real nuisance to many on FAC when it comes
> to citations)

Verifiability is important and in most cases, references are *good* -
the reader has no idea who the authors are, so only has the text and
maybe what references are clickable to figure out the text's value
from. Do please continue :-)

- d.


body:
On 29/09/06, Matt R <matt_crypto at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:

> * If a biography subject is genuinely notable, then whether or not he wants an
> article on himself or not to exist is irrelevant. We would try and communicate
> that fact tactfully, of course.

Done that. "I'm afraid an MBE probably means you're at least
marginally notable. It's a pretty important and public form of
recognition."

> * There's lots of disagreement on Wikipedia about what is notable.

* Wikipedia is inconsistent.
* Making it consistent would mean arbitrary decisions that in practice
upset people a lot. (e.g. arbitrary or culturally-biased notability
cutoffs.)
* Wikipedia tolerates things it does not condone (same reason) as long
as they aren't too awful right now.

> (Yeah, I'm
> observant...) My personal definition would exclude a fair bit of current
> Wikipedia content (so I'm a theoretical deletionist), but I'm happy to live
> with it (and hence am a de facto inclusionist) because:
> 1) It does me no harm. I don't have to read articles that I think are
> non-notable.
> 2) It does other people no harm. That is, few other people want to read them
> either, and for the few who do, there's little real-world harm that comes from
> blantant falsehoods about (say) minor Pok?mon characters.

Yeah. That we have a Britannica volume of Pokemon isn't painfully in
the reader's face.

> However, in the case of living person bios, "2" may not hold. Malicious persons
> can write all kinds of false and libellous things that will quite possibly go
> completely unnoticed until they've been widely mirrored across the Web.

Hence the new nutshell for WP:BIO. (Which I wrote *preens* Any other
bad nutshells in need of clarity?)

- d.


from_name: Tsahi Asher

subject: [Wikitech-l] can't save messages

body:
hi,
I've just upgraded from version 1.3.9 to 1.5.8, and after upgrade, I can't save
pages. when I click the Save button, I get back to the edit page. in most of the
times, it works only after I click save in the 3rd to 10th time, or even more.

if it's of any relevance, my host (sourceforge.net) doesn't allow web
applications to write to the web space, but that was the case with the previous
version too.

thanks,
tsahi
--
Tsahi Asher
Mozilla Hebrew L10n Team
http://www.mozilla.org.il


subject: [Wikitech-l] (Fwd)  can't save messages

body:
woops, wrong list. will resend to mediawiki-I

------- Forwarded message follows -------
Date sent:      	Fri, 29 Sep 2006 18:18:16 +0200
From:           	Tsahi Asher <t_asher at netvision.net.il>
Subject:        	[Wikitech-l] can't save messages
To:             	wikitech-l at wikipedia.org
Send reply to:  	Wikimedia developers <wikitech-l at wikimedia.org>
Priority:       	normal

[ Double-click this line for list subscription options ]

hi,
I've just upgraded from version 1.3.9 to 1.5.8, and after upgrade, I can't save
pages. when I click the Save button, I get back to the edit page. in most of the
times, it works only after I click save in the 3rd to 10th time, or even more.

if it's of any relevance, my host (sourceforge.net) doesn't allow web
applications to write to the web space, but that was the case with the previous
version too.

thanks,
tsahi
--
Tsahi Asher
Mozilla Hebrew L10n Team
http://www.mozilla.org.il

_______________________________________________
Wikitech-l mailing list
Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
------- End of forwarded message -------


body:
David Gerard wrote:
> > However, in the case of living person bios, "2" may not hold. Malicious
> persons
> > can write all kinds of false and libellous things that will quite possibly
> go
> > completely unnoticed until they've been widely mirrored across the Web.
>
>
> Hence the new nutshell for WP:BIO. (Which I wrote *preens* Any other
> bad nutshells in need of clarity?)

You mean WP:LIVING, I presume. Cool. One for WP:BIO wouldn't hurt, though.

Precisely because Wikipedia articles about living people can affect the
subject's life, how about we have some sort of "presumption in favour of
non-notability" for living bios? That is, if an AfD offered no consensus, then
it would be deleted, rather than kept as at present.

-- Matt

Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Matt_Crypto
Blog: http://cipher-text.blogspot.com

___________________________________________________________
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