from_name: Kelly Martin

body:
On 11/17/05, Tom Cadden <thomcadden at yahoo.ie> wrote:
> Incorrect. As it makes clear, it is governing appropiate editing styles, and used to prevent inappropriate editing style. 'Good reason', which is a term used in official reasoning on Wikipedia and elsewhere, sets a high bench mark which means 'an convincing and conclusive argument that in this one case an exception may need to be made'. It which does not cover arguments like 'we I like this', and 'I think this probably will at some stage in the future become the most used term, therefore we should push it here'. That is just POVing and is not remotely near the standard 'good reason' requires.

Look, I wrote the snippet from that ArbCom ruling I quoted a few
moments ago.  And I assure you that the above explication is not what
I had in mind when I wrote it.  Nor do I think my fellow Arbitrators
felt the same about it when they voted to include it in the ruling.

Kelly


list: foundation-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: GerardM

subject: [Foundation-l] Incubator Wiki for New Wikimedia Projects

body:
Hoi,
When a Wikimedia incubator is a seperate project and has to get admins and
policies it seems to me something of a contradiction in terminis (I hope I
spelled that correctly :) ). When a project is to become seperately, then it
needs to find its own way, it needs to find its own policies and admins.

Why should we predetermine what they will be? Is it not enough that we
provide a space for such a project, a spave where it can do whatever ? When
Wikibooks IS the incubator, it is different as there are the Wikibooks
admins and the Wikibooks policies. My point is you either have the incubator
in Wikibooks or it is only the business of the people who make up an
incubator project what is done. Obviously withing the space that exists for
any Wikimedia Foundation project.

Thanks,
GerardM


list: wikimedia-l


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Anthere

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: World Technology Awards, Wikinews review

body:
SJ wrote:
> This week, the Wikimedia Foundation was honored by a World Technology
> Award in communication, joining the ranks of other World Technology
> Network members[1].   If you made it to part of the WTN summit and
> ceremonies, please link to photos and other records of the event.   (
> http://www.wtn.net/2005/summit/ )

The *Foundation* won an *award* in *communication* ????

wait...

I really need a drink here...


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Gregory Maxwell

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Subject: cookie based sockcheck,
	a prelude to cookie based blocking

body:
There are situations where ip based blocking is overbroad (many users
behind a proxy) and situations where it is ineffective (user can
change IP). As a result some people have thought it desirable to be
able to block users based on a cookie, which although not foolproof
itself would be a useful additional tool.

I'd like to propose we implement half of that to gain something which
is useful right away but would require almost no work: Cookie based
sockcheck.

When a user edits, we request a cookie "usertoken" or whatever. If
they do not have one, we generate a long random number and give them
one. Every edit made by that browser (no matter which user is logged
in) the cookie is returned. We add an extra column to recent changes
to store this value.

A new version of sockcheck is produced that finds users who share
revisions with the same token, much like we can do with IPs already.
Viola, cookie based sockcheck.

Thoughts?


from_name: Jamie Bliss

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: http://www.splammer.com/ a real-time proxy?

body:
Neil Harris wrote:
> The Wikipedia clone site http://www.splammer.com/ appears to me to be
> copying Wikipedia content in real time, apparently by reading the raw
> Wikitext, rather than running from a dump.
>
> Could someone take a look to see whether this is the case?

Well, "real time" isn't the term I would use, since it's been about an
hour and changes haven't shown up yet (testing with [[openFIRST]]).

It appears to use Special:Export.

It is also a very poor copy, IMHO.

-- Jamie
-------------------------------------------------------------------
http://endeavour.zapto.org/astro73/
Thank you to JosephM for inviting me to Gmail!
Have lots of invites. Gmail now has 2GB.


list: wikien-l

from_name: Delirium

subject: [WikiEN-l] Arb elections poll

body:
steve v wrote:

> Personally, I dislike the fact that Jimbo made those arbitrary appointments of relatively conservative members. But he justified them at the time that the Arbcom was shrinking, a "thankless job" and needed some membership -- who am I to argue with the founder's wisdom? I could say that in a wiki world, he could have called for a special election and had newly elected temporary members in a week. But again, who am I to argue?
>
As I understand it, that was considered, but many people thought it was
counterproductive to have an election for a 6-month term, since we're
going to have regularly-scheduled elections at the end of January
anyway.  This was especially true given how acrimonious the last
election was---there was worry that few good candidates would want to go
through a mud-slinging election only to have to do it again 6 months later.

-Mark


from_name: Sabine Cretella

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Translating Wikipedia contents with OmegaT -
 technical help needed

body:
Well we are building the NAP-wikipedia and of course there are parts
where one easily can transfer data by just translating it from one
Wikipedia to the other. In this case we already uploaded the Calendar -
and now it would make sense to transfer the contents of the Italian
wikipedia there by translating it - people and events stay the same. So
what I now would like to reach is:

1) having a dump from the Italian wikipedia
2) extracting all pages of the calendar
3) translate them with the help of OmegaT

Why OmegaT? Well in the sections "Born" and "Died" after the name of the
person you vey often find just "actor, actress, writer, politician" or
whatever - this means that there would be quite a lot of 100% matches
and the translation would be much faster with the tool than without.

These lines all are created like this:
*[[name of the person]] description

Now to have the possibility to get 100% matches I need at least a line
break after
*[[name of the person]]
that needs to be taken out again after having translated the file.

Then in a second step, with the help of a bot, the translated parts can
be transferred into the articles.

Well: what I now need is some advice on how to have this done - and then
what can be done for Neapolitan can easily be repeated for other languages.

This means I need some help to get this regular expression ... I mean
some code that runs through the data, inserts the line break and after
translation takes it out again.

Who can help me with this? Btw. the TMX (translation memory) is going to
be available under GFDL for anyone - well this should be obvious.

This text was originally posted here (in order to allow to collect how
to's):
http://www.wesolveitnet.com/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=83&post_id=117&order=0&viewmode=flat&pid=0&forum=37#forumpost117

Thank you!!!

Ciao, Sabine

*****
Sabine Cretella
http://www.wordsandmore.it
s.cretella at wordsandmore.it
skype: sabinecretella

___________________________________
Yahoo! Messenger: chiamate gratuite in tutto il mondo
http://it.messenger.yahoo.com


subject:
[Wikitech-l] Translating Wikipedia contents with OmegaT - technical
 help needed


from_name: Alfio Puglisi

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Wikimentary: great news, updates

body:
It's about 300 megabytes. I watched it, it's good.

Alfio

On 11/17/05, Phil Boswell <phil.boswell at gmail.com> wrote:
> "SJ" <2.718281828 at gmail.com> wrote in message
> news:742dfd060511170130o171ebbb0j4f0fcc85b2f03bc at mail.gmail.com...
> [snip]
> > The rough cut (be the first to write a review ;-):
> >   http://www.archive.org/details/WIKIMANIA-ROUGH_CUT.mov
>
>
> Before I risk electronic indigestion, how big is this file?
> --
> Phil
> [[en:User:Phil Boswell]]
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


from_name: Sam Korn

subject:
[WikiEN-l] need to work out clear policies on MANDATORY and
	OPTIONAL rules on WP

body:
On 11/17/05, Tom Cadden <thomcadden at yahoo.ie> wrote:
>  One second issue: if we require 'most commonly used name in English' (or in whatever language in another Wikipedia) we need to be able to define an independent, verifiable, objective methodology for establishing what is the most commonly used name in English.

We have a set of criteria.  We apply these in the ways that seem best
to us.  It's called "consensus" decision making.  What it doesn't
involve is shoving your opinion down the throats of those who
disagree.  Nor does it involve repeatedly making the same point.  If
people didn't notice your point the first time, fine, repost it.  What
you got last time was people *disagreeing* with you.  Unless there's a
really really good reason, there's no need to make this mailing list
even more bitter by raking through problems that have just been
discussed at length.

I don't think there are any objective methodology in Wikipedia.
Everything is governed by common sense.  This is clearly less
inflammatory than forcing your opinion on others.

Sam


body:
Also, some sites using the same server [207.210.218.170]:
* thecorporatepage.com
* collectibleboats.com
* thelegalpage.com
* collectiblehomes.com
* freedomsailing.com
* thelegalreport.com

-- Jamie
-------------------------------------------------------------------
http://endeavour.zapto.org/astro73/
Thank you to JosephM for inviting me to Gmail!
Have lots of invites. Gmail now has 2GB.


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Re: Arbitration Committee members granted checkuser
	tool

body:
On 11/14/05, Jack Lynch <jack.i.lynch at gmail.com> wrote:
> I rather pay someone who is willing to be accountable and who we can
> therefore expect to be responsible.
>
> Jack (Sam Spade)

I rather pay for servers so we get an encyclopaedia that works.

Sam


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: [Fwd: Getting Unblocked at Wikipedia]

body:
On 11/17/05, Walter Vermeir <walter at wikipedia.be> wrote:
> Put somewhere an external contact form online that you can use to send an email
> to your Wikipedia. The OTRS-contact email address can be used. For EN is that
> info-nl at wikimedia.org And link from the page that the blocked users see to that
> contact form. This way users who are blocked can easy request for an unblock.

I'm sure people realise this, but for EN it's info-en at wikimedia.org

Sam


subject: [WikiEN-l] Unusual Wikimedia logos

body:
On 11/17/05, Sean Barrett <sean at epoptic.org> wrote:
> Quite a few images claim to be official logos or designs used by the
> Wikimedia foundation or by one of its projects.  I find that statement
> hard to believe when applied to the following images.  Does anyone
> care, or am I overly worried about what we allow to claim to be our
> trademarks?
>
> 2001australia subaru 1 1152.jpg
> Analemma in the sky.jpg
> Arche.jpg
> Beardpapaline.jpg
> Boygirl.gif
> CVU2.PNG
> Epiphanywebbrowser.png
> Filippino lippi.jpg
> Fotopoulos.png
> Grande arche de la defense no Hypercube.jpg
> Miho2.PNG
> Mozilla Firefox 1.0 front page screenshot.png
> MozillaFirefox.png
> Ncu skyline.jpg
> Photo weeping angel two maxi.jpg
> Solar-gradient.jpg

Quite a lot of these are due to Wikipedia logos appearing in the image.

Sam


from_name: charles matthews

subject:
[WikiEN-l] need to work out clear policies on MANDATORY
	andOPTIONAL rules on WP

body:
Tom Cadden wrote

> A classic example is one vote where over twenty users have voted to put a
> page at the location that is contrary to MoS policy. Arguments ranged from
>
> * well I like that name
> * well I always use it
> * I personally haven't heard any other name used
> * the Government wants it
> * it will eventually become widespread
> * I hope it eventually becomes widespread
> * I think it will eventually become widespread
> * we should be encourging it to become widespread
> * I think the old name is colonial
> and a lot of others.

Including, which you don't mention, this: "A republic of West Africa, C?te
d'Ivoire lies on the Gulf of Guinea."  From the Encyclopedia Britannica,
which pays people to get it right.

Enough wikilawywering already.

Charles


from_name: Tom Cadden

body:
Unfortunately it isn't implemented. Any attempt to point out that something is mandatory uses produce the response 'lets vote on it'. Or even worse 'lets vote to stop mandatory rules applying on this page.'

MacGyverMagic/Mgm <macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote: There already is such a distinction. Policy is non-negotiable (while
it can be changed by site-wide community debate), guidelines are
"optional", but often still a good idea to follow.

Mgm

On 11/17/05, Tom Cadden  wrote:
> I've been looking at some pages and noticed that there is a haphazard application of rules on WP, specifically a failure to distinguish between mandatory and optional rules.
>
>  (a). The APPLICATION of 'mandatory' rules in INDIVIDUAL PAGES should never be a subject for a vote.
>
>  (b). The ADOPTION of a 'mandatory' rule for Wikipedia en block should be on POLICY PAGES.
>
> 3. The APPLICATION and ADOPTION of 'optional' rules in INDIVIDUAL CASES and on POLICY PAGES should be capable of being voted on.
>
> I've come across a couple of pages tonight where notes decided that in some articles mandatory rules shouldn't be applied (usually on naming). So you find that 99 articles may follow one naming system, and one doesn't even though the MoS says it has to, because users on a page decided not to.
>
> WP needs to spell out clearly the difference in weighing between different types of rules, and so let everyone know what is a 'must' and what is a 'may'.
>
> A classic example is one vote where over twenty users have voted to put a page at the location that is contrary to MoS policy. Arguments ranged from
>
>  * well I like that name
>  * well I always use it
>  * I personally haven't heard any other name used
>  * the Government wants it
>  * it will eventually become widespread
>  * I hope it eventually becomes widespread
>  * I think it will eventually become widespread
>  * we should be encourging it to become widespread
>  * I think the old name is colonial
>  and a lot of others.
>
> None of those are criteria recognised in the Manual of Style, which sets the simple criteria 'the most common name used in English', not 'the most common name likely to be used in the future', 'the name we would like to use', or 'the name the government tells us to use' but simply the most common name in use as of now.
>
> Yet by using criteria that clash with a mandatory rule, a page is put in a different location to hundreds of thousands of others.
>
> One second issue: if we require 'most commonly used name in English' (or in whatever language in another Wikipedia) we need to be able to define an independent, verifiable, objective methodology for establishing what is the most commonly used name in English. A whole host of pages tonight had debates based on the 'well that's how I know him/her/it as' with no form of verification. Straight google searches are worthless because they link to accurate sites and inaccurate ones and other language sites still crop up in English searches if linked to English sites. (An example: last year someone put a dummy page on WP. I deleted it. It was complete fiction. But by then that page had been copied under licence. Now there are over eighty sites on the net that refer to a fact that someone completely made up on WP. The topic is an area i know a lot about. One read of it showed that it was a joke, not real, done obviously by someone who knew a lot about the topic and wanted to see if th
>  ey could
>  'create' a 'fact' that didn't exist.)
>
>  We need a clearly defined criteria for sources for establishing 'most common name':
>
> Media is key to finding 'most common name' because as they need to communicate to millions they will tend to use terminology they know their listeners/viewers will understand.
>
>  Obvious sources are
>  * media usage in the large English-speaking countries on EACH continent
>  * Broadcast usage and print usage
>  * academic usage
>  * hardcopy published usage
>  * informal governmental usage
>
> In terms of media, for example, that would mean checking BBC, New York Times, The Australian, Reuters, APTV, ITN (the real one, not ours!), South African television and print usage, Canadian tv and print usage, Indian TV and print usage, informal governmental usage in speeches, etc.
>
> Formal-legal and diplomatic terminology in contrast is not guaranteed to be mass used (indeed rarely is. How many people say French Republic for France or Poblacht na h?ireann for Ireland in real life?) and so may not help us find 'most common name'.
>
> If we don't sort out the mandatory from optional rules, and restrict votes to decision making on the latter, and Wikipedia-wide policy making on the former, then it will cause all sorts of problems as Wikipedia becomes larger. In every encyclop?dia for practical organisational purposes the Manual of Style is a mandatory requirement which no editor can breach. (If they try they get the sack.) It is bad enough finding a handful of pages that are the odd ones out and are in effect 'Manual of Style'-free zones. But the more there are, the more people can then say 'well if THEY can ignore the MoS on THEIR page, why can't WE? A professional credible encyclop?dia cannot be organised on the basis of everyone on each page making up their own rules. We created the Manual of Style and put enormous work into creating Naming Conventions directly to avoid such confusion and ensure maximum cross-article standards of clarity and comparibility.
>
>  Thom
>
>
>
> ---------------------------------
>  Win a Yahoo! Vespa NEW - Yahoo! Cars has 3 Vespa LX125s to be won Enter Now!
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>
_______________________________________________
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from_name: Galwaygirl

subject: [Wikitech-l] Dutch Main Page

body:
Hi all,

On the Dutch Wikipedia we have a recurring discussion about our new main
page. It loads very slowly at times. Some claim it's because there's too
many images and templates in it, some claim it's because servers are
slow, some claim it's due to both factors.

What do experts think? ;-)

http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoofdpagina
http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sjabloon:Inhoud (Template, versions 5 nov
2005 13:52 and up)

Btw: User:Waerth has even gone on strike until the old main page is put
back into place... (http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gebruiker:Waerth)

Thanks,

Galwaygirl


body:
On 11/17/05, Tom Cadden <thomcadden at yahoo.ie> wrote:
> Unfortunately it isn't implemented. Any attempt to point out that something is mandatory uses produce the response 'lets vote on it'. Or even worse 'lets vote to stop mandatory rules applying on this page.'

You seem to be having difficulty comprehending the difference between
rules (which are mandatory) and how they are enterpreted in each
instance (which is clearly not policy-defined).

Sam


from_name: geni

body:
On 11/17/05, charles matthews <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com> wrote:
> Including, which you don't mention, this: "A republic of West Africa, C?te
> d'Ivoire lies on the Gulf of Guinea."  From the Encyclopedia Britannica,
> which pays people to get it right.

They have a different MOS to us.

--
geni


body:
The Manual of Style is mandatory but is being overturned in once off cases as though it was purely a matter for local decision, not Wikipedia-wide policy. Instead of debating policy, this 'once off' page by page policy making is producing a mess. Efforts to point out the difference between mandatory and optional usually produces a 'no. We'll vote here on what rules to follow on this page' response, with those pointing out mandatory rules accused of 'highjacking' pages!

Stephen Bain <stephen.bain at gmail.com> wrote: On 11/17/05, Tom Cadden  wrote:
> I've been looking at some pages and noticed that there is a haphazard application of rules on WP, specifically a failure to distinguish between mandatory and optional rules.
...
> None of those are criteria recognised in the Manual of Style, which sets the simple criteria 'the most common name used in English', not 'the most common name likely to be used in the future', 'the name we would like to use', or 'the name the government tells us to use' but simply the most common name in use as of now.

WP:NC is "policy", which means it is official. But the page does carry
this proviso:

"It is important to note that these are conventions, not rules written
in stone. As Wikipedia grows and changes, some conventions that once
made sense may become outdated, and there may be cases where a
particular convention is "obviously" inappropriate. But when in doubt,
follow convention."

It's interesting to note that all of the individual naming
conventions, for example [[Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common
names)]], are specifically tagged as guidelines, and not policies.
Although they carry much weight, they nevertheless fall into your
category of the rules that "may" be followed.

--
Stephen Bain
stephen.bain at gmail.com
_______________________________________________
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subject: [Foundation-l] Wikilists Proposal

body:
I have joined this mailing list in accordance with the recommended
procedure of proposing a new wikimedia foundation project.  I have
proposed a collective of user-editable lists, known as wikilists.  You
can see my project page at the meta here:

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikilists

Thank you, I look forward to assisting the media wiki foundation as I can


subject: [Foundation-l] Wikilists Proposal


subject: [Wikitech-l] Dutch Main Page

body:
Hi!

Well considering the general slowness during the last days: I just
accessed the main page - it loads quicker than the Neapolitan one.

I don't think that there are real problems with that page - and to tell
the truth: I like it - where did you get the icons from?

Ciao, Sabine

Galwaygirl wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> On the Dutch Wikipedia we have a recurring discussion about our new
> main page. It loads very slowly at times. Some claim it's because
> there's too many images and templates in it, some claim it's because
> servers are slow, some claim it's due to both factors.
>
> What do experts think? ;-)
>
> http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoofdpagina
> http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sjabloon:Inhoud (Template, versions 5 nov
> 2005 13:52 and up)
>
> Btw: User:Waerth has even gone on strike until the old main page is
> put back into place... (http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gebruiker:Waerth)
>
> Thanks,
>
>
> Galwaygirl

___________________________________
Yahoo! Mail: gratis 1GB per i messaggi e allegati da 10MB
http://mail.yahoo.it


from_name: Andrew Venier

subject:
[WikiEN-l] need to work out clear policies onMANDATORYandOPTIONAL
	rules on WP

body:
Stan Shebs wrote:
> Most organizations that deal with international names have
> MoSes that require use of current official names; WP is somewhat
> unusual in specifying "most common", which works well with names
> familiar to the general public, but breaks down for the less-known.
Perhaps not so unusual.  For example the Anglo-American Cataloguing
Rules, which are essentially the standard MoS for libraries in US, UK,
Australia, and Canada, take a stance weighted even more heavily towards
the use of English in place names:

"23.2A1 Use the English form of the name of a place if there is one in
general use.  Determine this from gazetteers and other reference sources
published in English-speaking countries.  In case of doubt, use the
vernacular form."

A standard of "in general use" is perhaps less open to dispute than a
standard of "most common".


body:
Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote: On 17/11/05, Tom Cadden  wrote:

> A classic example is one vote where over twenty users have voted to put a page at the location that is contrary to MoS policy. Arguments ranged from
>
>  * well I like that name
>  * well I always use it
>  * I personally haven't heard any other name used
>  * the Government wants it
>  * it will eventually become widespread
>  * I hope it eventually becomes widespread
>  * I think it will eventually become widespread
>  * we should be encourging it to become widespread
>  * I think the old name is colonial
>  and a lot of others.
>
>  None of those are criteria recognised in the Manual of Style, which
> sets the simple criteria 'the most common name used in English',
> not 'the most common name likely to be used in the future', 'the
> name we would like to use', or 'the name the government tells us
> to use' but simply the most common name in use as of now.

Of course, there's also a significant number that are opposing based
on the fact that they consider the other name to be the most commonly
used in English.

 Which is why an independent evaluation procedure is needed to establish independently verifiable facts. Right now much of the debate on various pages seems to be based on

 * I believe that it is the most common name

 even when independent evaluation proved unambiguously that it isn't.

 Repeatedly waving the strawman that people are voting
to ignore the MoS, or that they all somehow are incapable of
understanding what a manual of style is, doesn't help in the least.

 Arguments such as
 >  * well I like that name
 >  * well I always use it
 >  * I personally haven't heard any other name used
 >  * the Government wants it
 >  * it will eventually become widespread
 >  * I hope it eventually becomes widespread
 >  * I think it will eventually become widespread
 >  * we should be encourging it to become widespread
 >  * I think the old name is colonial
 >  and a lot of others.

 are all 100% contrary to WP's Manual of Style. Yet they are how people vote to decide to ignore the mandatory rules of the MoS. Either the MoS is mandatory or it isn't. If it is, then votes to ignore it on grounds that conflict with the MoS are invalid.

Again, please assume *some* good faith on the part of people who
disagree with you. It costs nothing and saves on everyone's blood
pressure.

 The expressed reasons for many of the votes show no reason to assume good faith, when people willfully make decisions in open disregard of the rules thousands of other Wikipedians follow.

---------------------------------
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body:
I believe this is called MoSolatry.  It isn't healthy.  Rules (on
Wikipedia at least) really are made to be broken.

Sam

On 11/17/05, Tom Cadden <thomcadden at yahoo.ie> wrote:
>
>
> Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote: On 17/11/05, Tom Cadden  wrote:
>
> > A classic example is one vote where over twenty users have voted to put a page at the location that is contrary to MoS policy. Arguments ranged from
> >
> >  * well I like that name
> >  * well I always use it
> >  * I personally haven't heard any other name used
> >  * the Government wants it
> >  * it will eventually become widespread
> >  * I hope it eventually becomes widespread
> >  * I think it will eventually become widespread
> >  * we should be encourging it to become widespread
> >  * I think the old name is colonial
> >  and a lot of others.
> >
> >  None of those are criteria recognised in the Manual of Style, which
> > sets the simple criteria 'the most common name used in English',
> > not 'the most common name likely to be used in the future', 'the
> > name we would like to use', or 'the name the government tells us
> > to use' but simply the most common name in use as of now.
>
> Of course, there's also a significant number that are opposing based
> on the fact that they consider the other name to be the most commonly
> used in English.
>
>  Which is why an independent evaluation procedure is needed to establish independently verifiable facts. Right now much of the debate on various pages seems to be based on
>
>  * I believe that it is the most common name
>
>  even when independent evaluation proved unambiguously that it isn't.
>
>  Repeatedly waving the strawman that people are voting
> to ignore the MoS, or that they all somehow are incapable of
> understanding what a manual of style is, doesn't help in the least.
>
>  Arguments such as
>  >  * well I like that name
>  >  * well I always use it
>  >  * I personally haven't heard any other name used
>  >  * the Government wants it
>  >  * it will eventually become widespread
>  >  * I hope it eventually becomes widespread
>  >  * I think it will eventually become widespread
>  >  * we should be encourging it to become widespread
>  >  * I think the old name is colonial
>  >  and a lot of others.
>
>  are all 100% contrary to WP's Manual of Style. Yet they are how people vote to decide to ignore the mandatory rules of the MoS. Either the MoS is mandatory or it isn't. If it is, then votes to ignore it on grounds that conflict with the MoS are invalid.
>
> Again, please assume *some* good faith on the part of people who
> disagree with you. It costs nothing and saves on everyone's blood
> pressure.
>
>  The expressed reasons for many of the votes show no reason to assume good faith, when people willfully make decisions in open disregard of the rules thousands of other Wikipedians follow.
>
>
>
>
> ---------------------------------
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> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
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>


body:
As has been pointed out repeatedly, the MoS does not say 'do what Brittanica does' Brittanica is a business-orientated hardcopy encyclop?dia which follows governmental usage to avoid offending native populations because it needs them to buy their product. It is called sometimes 'Strategic Naming'.

 They follow their own MoS. We follow ours. Ours is not business based but based exclusively on the most common name principle. Objective evidence shows that the most common name of that state, as evidenced by surveys of communication vehicles worldwide, is 'Ivory Coast' by a ratio of 85:15 over Cote d'Ivoire.

 They have to follow their MoS which follows 'Strategic Naming'. We have to follow ours, which follows 'Most Common Name'. Under our MoS the name we are obliged to place the name at is Ivory Coast. Their MoS, following their criteria, produces a result that is irrelevant to us.

charles matthews <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com> wrote: Tom Cadden wrote

> A classic example is one vote where over twenty users have voted to put a
> page at the location that is contrary to MoS policy. Arguments ranged from
>
> * well I like that name
> * well I always use it
> * I personally haven't heard any other name used
> * the Government wants it
> * it will eventually become widespread
> * I hope it eventually becomes widespread
> * I think it will eventually become widespread
> * we should be encourging it to become widespread
> * I think the old name is colonial
> and a lot of others.

Including, which you don't mention, this: "A republic of West Africa, C?te
d'Ivoire lies on the Gulf of Guinea."  From the Encyclopedia Britannica,
which pays people to get it right.

Enough wikilawywering already.

Charles

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body:
I have no difficulty whatsoever in knowing what mandatory means. It means 'the criteria for forming a judgment must be as defined'. You seem not to understand that votes on mandatory issues on individual pages cannot overturn mandatory rules. They set one set of criteria and one set of criteria only for decision taking.

 A review of pages shows that some users on some pages are creating their own personalised criteria in place of the mandatory criteria and making decisions that completely conflict with the mandatory requirements of the MoS, based on their own made up criteria. That is not allowed under MoS rules.

 I don't think, Sam, you grasp the issue.

Sam Korn <smoddy at gmail.com> wrote: On 11/17/05, Tom Cadden  wrote:
> Unfortunately it isn't implemented. Any attempt to point out that something is mandatory uses produce the response 'lets vote on it'. Or even worse 'lets vote to stop mandatory rules applying on this page.'

You seem to be having difficulty comprehending the difference between
rules (which are mandatory) and how they are enterpreted in each
instance (which is clearly not policy-defined).

Sam
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from_name: Anthony DiPierro

subject: [Foundation-l] Wikilists Proposal

body:
Hi whoever you are.  I think lists should stay in Wikipedia, at least
until the projects are integrated enough to allow easy linking (no
typing of the project name for every link), red and blue links, what
links here, and all the other advantages of keeping lists on the same
project as the articles they link to.

Anthony

On 11/17/05, Jmax1632 <jmax1632 at gmail.com> wrote:
> I have joined this mailing list in accordance with the recommended
> procedure of proposing a new wikimedia foundation project.  I have
> proposed a collective of user-editable lists, known as wikilists.  You
> can see my project page at the meta here:
>
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikilists
>
> Thank you, I look forward to assisting the media wiki foundation as I can
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


subject: [Foundation-l] Wikilists Proposal


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Re: Wikipedia's provable anti-expertise bias (was How
	didthis happen (comixpedia??))

body:
On 11/17/05, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
> What's your basis for saying that they are worthless?  Putting them in a
> separate "fun stuff" section makes it clear that these are not the most
> "important" facts about the subject.

We are an encyclopaedia, not a fan site.  Almost always, these points
bear no relation to the rest of the article, are unsourced, and make
the article read badly.  They are a net loss to the encyclopaedia.

The facts therein can almost always be written into the text of the
article.  If they can't, the fact is almost certainly too irrelevant
to mention.

Sam


body:
Incorrect. As it makes clear, it is governing appropiate editing styles, and used to prevent inappropriate editing style. 'Good reason', which is a term used in official reasoning on Wikipedia and elsewhere, sets a high bench mark which means 'an convincing and conclusive argument that in this one case an exception may need to be made'. It which does not cover arguments like 'we I like this', and 'I think this probably will at some stage in the future become the most used term, therefore we should push it here'. That is just POVing and is not remotely near the standard 'good reason' requires.

Kelly Martin <kelly.lynn.martin at gmail.com> wrote: On 11/17/05, Tom Cadden  wrote:
> The Manual of Style is mandatory but is being overturned in once off cases as though it was purely a matter for local decision, not Wikipedia-wide policy.

>From [[Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/jguk 2]]:

2.2) The Manual of Style is a set of guidelines governing appropriate
editing on Wikipedia. Editors are expected to follow the Manual of
Style, although it is not policy and editors may deviate from it with
good reason.

I think you misrepresent the import of the Manual of Style.

Kelly
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body:
On 11/17/05, Tom Cadden <thomcadden at yahoo.ie> wrote:
> I have no difficulty whatsoever in knowing what mandatory means. It means 'the criteria for forming a judgment must be as defined'. You seem not to understand that votes on mandatory issues on individual pages cannot overturn mandatory rules. They set one set of criteria and one set of criteria only for decision taking.
>
>  A review of pages shows that some users on some pages are creating their own personalised criteria in place of the mandatory criteria and making decisions that completely conflict with the mandatory requirements of the MoS, based on their own made up criteria. That is not allowed under MoS rules.
>
>  I don't think, Sam, you grasp the issue.

I don't think, Tom, you grasp my point.

The MoS is the list of rules.  The rules say that the most common name
must be used.  The enterpretation is situation-specific.  In your
opinion, Ivory Coast is more common.  In others', it is C?te d'Ivoire.

*That* is a reasonable line to take.

I happen also to disagree with the naming convention, but I am happy
to follow it.

Note that I am not agreeing that "they asked for this" is the correct
line to take.

However, to recognise that other people have valid opinions might help
you.  Caveat: the MoS does not dictate what opinions are valid.

Sam


body:
On 11/17/05, Tom Cadden <thomcadden at yahoo.ie> wrote:
> Incorrect. As it makes clear, it is governing appropiate editing styles, and used to prevent inappropriate editing style. 'Good reason', which is a term used in official reasoning on Wikipedia and elsewhere, sets a high bench mark which means 'an convincing and conclusive argument that in this one case an exception may need to be made'. It which does not cover arguments like 'we I like this', and 'I think this probably will at some stage in the future become the most used term, therefore we should push it here'. That is just POVing and is not remotely near the standard 'good reason' requires.

To quote you: incorrect.  A good reason can be "we really really want to".

qv HHGTG

Sam


from_name: Sean Barrett

body:
Jack Lynch wrote:

>Thats not an ideal admin. My ideal admin has no experience being an
>admin on wikipedia, and need not be an editor. Instead, he would be
>someone paid to follow and enforce rules, not make them up as goes
>along.

You would have Wikipedia run not by those of us who love knowledge,
but rather by a squad of enforcers-for-hire?

I doubt I would enjoy the company of those who care only about money
and nothing for building a free encyclopedia.  Actually, that's a lie.
I have no doubt at all.  Bring in a mercenary Brute Squad and you lose
me.

--
 Sean Barrett     | A positive attitude may not solve all
 sean at epoptic.org | your problems, but it will annoy enough
                  | people to make it worth the effort.


from_name: Ilario Valdelli

subject: [Wikitech-l] Dutch Main Page

body:
About my knlowledge of PHP i can say that the templates are not very
slow. I programmed pages with a large number of templates without problems.

The problems can be depend to connection to DB and to the stack that
allows only a minimum number of concurrent connections.

Ilario

Galwaygirl wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> On the Dutch Wikipedia we have a recurring discussion about our new
> main page. It loads very slowly at times. Some claim it's because
> there's too many images and templates in it, some claim it's because
> servers are slow, some claim it's due to both factors.
>
> What do experts think? ;-)
>
> http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoofdpagina
> http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sjabloon:Inhoud (Template, versions 5 nov
> 2005 13:52 and up)
>
> Btw: User:Waerth has even gone on strike until the old main page is
> put back into place... (http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gebruiker:Waerth)
>
> Thanks,
>
>
> Galwaygirl
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>


from_name: Richard Austin

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Request for the creation of Samogitian and Banyumasan
	wikipedias

body:
Servien Ilaino <servien at ...> writes:

>
> Hi,
>
> I would like to request the creation of Nedersaksisch; Low Saxon (NL)
> as soon as possible, it has been discussed for over 5 months now, most
> things have been cleared up and most people agree the wiki should be
> created soon, for the benefit of the Low Saxon community in the
> Netherlands and I guess to wikipedia. There are 2 oppose votes, one
> from Node ue (who deletes the request from the approved page almost
> daily) and has been put on again by various users, the second user is
> a non-active anonymous user at meta-wiki.
>
> Romani; Vlax Romany has 1 "temporary against vote" which is also a
> non-active anonymous user at meta-wiki. The majority however supports
> the creation, and should be created as soon as possible sothat the
> Romani-community can also start with their own wikipedia.
>
> Summary:
>
> 1. Nedersaksisch
> 2. Romani
>
> More info can be found at:
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Approved_requests_for_new_languages
>
> or at: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Template:Requests for new
> languages/nds-nl and http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Template:Requests
> for new languages/Vlax Romany.
>
> Regards,
> Servien Ilaino
>

In addition to these requests there are two others which were approved about two
months ago - Samogitian and Banyumasan. The main delay has apparently been
because of a lack of codes, but binominal codes have been suggested. These have
been used in the past, and are recommended in this situation in the instructions
on the requests page itself.

The proposers are waiting anxiously, especially the Banyumasan group. They have
put a lot of work into building their test-wiki, and are getting concerned about
what will happen to this if they don't end up having a wikipedia.

Also we are currently discussing the future policy for starting new wikis. Some
users (myself included) would prefer to have wikipedias created for requests
that have already been approved before finalising this policy. It will be easier
to discuss possible changes to this policy in this situation, since we don't
have to worry about whether these changes affect requests which have already
been approved. We need to get this policy finalised as soon as possible, but I
don't think that can really happen while we have approved requests waiting.

Richard


from_name: Neil Harris

subject: [Wikitech-l] http://www.splammer.com/ a real-time proxy?

body:
The Wikipedia clone site http://www.splammer.com/ appears to me to be
copying Wikipedia content in real time, apparently by reading the raw
Wikitext, rather than running from a dump.

Could someone take a look to see whether this is the case?

-- Neil


from_name: Walter Vermeir

body:
Sam Korn schreef:
> On 11/17/05, Walter Vermeir <walter at wikipedia.be> wrote:
>
>>Put somewhere an external contact form online that you can use to send an email
>>to your Wikipedia. The OTRS-contact email address can be used. For EN is that
>>info-nl at wikimedia.org And link from the page that the blocked users see to that
>>contact form. This way users who are blocked can easy request for an unblock.
>
>
> I'm sure people realise this, but for EN it's info-en at wikimedia.org
>
> Sam

I can not believe it that I have made this mistake :(

Why is this not a wiki ...

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


subject:
[WikiEN-l] need to work out clear policies on
	MANDATORYandOPTIONAL rules on WP

body:
On 11/17/05, Poor, Edmund W <Edmund.W.Poor at abc.com> wrote:
> The article should be put at the policy-determined place (which happens to be "Ivory Coast")

In your opinion.  ;=)

Sam


subject: [WikiEN-l] Arb elections poll

body:
On 11/17/05, uninvited at nerstrand.net <uninvited at nerstrand.net> wrote:
> We have a comparatively new user to thank for [[Wikipedia:Arbitration
> Committee Elections December 2005/Straw poll]].
>
> I think the presence of this poll as well as the level of support it has
> garnered are both troubling.
>
> Wikipedians appear to be viewing the AC as some sort of generalized
> means of governance, which it isn't.
>
> uc

Arbcom rulings have been cited in policy debates. Arbcom is the single
most powerful group on wikipedia. For obvius reasons people want a say
in who is in it.

--
geni


body:
On 11/17/05, Sam Korn <smoddy at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/17/05, Poor, Edmund W <Edmund.W.Poor at abc.com> wrote:
> > The article should be put at the policy-determined place (which happens to be "Ivory Coast")
>
> In your opinion.  ;=)
>
> Sam

No really. Any halfway objective examination of the evidence shows
that "ivory coast" is used more widly. Anyone who thinks otherwise is
ignorant of the evidence or acting illogicaly .

--
geni


body:
On 11/17/05, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> No really. Any halfway objective examination of the evidence shows
> that "ivory coast" is used more widly. Anyone who thinks otherwise is
> ignorant of the evidence or acting illogicaly .

/me abandons his attempt to bring humour to the situation

Sam


body:
On 11/17/05, Poor, Edmund W <Edmund.W.Poor at abc.com> wrote:
> My point is not that "Ivory Coast" is the proper name of the country.
> Nor is it that I insist on making "Ivory Coast" the title of the
> article.
>
> 1. What I *AM* saying is that the English-name POLICY has already passed
> consensus: country articles are given the title of the most commonly
> used English-langugae name of the country. (Like "Germany" or "Italy")
>
> This is a procedural question: shall we set aside the policy and make an
> exception here? And by voting on it, or what?
>
> Policy should be the default, and an exception should be made only if
> there is consensus for an exception.
>
> What some people are trying to do is call the status quo the default
> (lots of people ganging up to thwart policy by using the French name)
> and requiring a supermajority vote to PERMIT ENFORCEMENT of the policy.
>
> 2. I am *ALSO* saying that letting a government tell Wikipedia what to
> do is a dangerous erosion of our editorial independence. We can simply
> say in the article that Ivory Coast's government "forbids" anyone -
> inside or outside their jurisdiction - to translate the country's name
> (if this is really so). But since our servers are in Florida, I think we
> can safely assume we are outside their jurisdiction.
>
> If "Ivory Coast" ever lose currency - as it no doubt will in years to
> come - then of course we'll reflect this.
>
> 3. People seem to think that the TITLE of the article makes a statement
> about the "true name" of the country. This is ridiculous. The article
> itself even says so - or would, if partisans didn't keep removing this
> statement.
>
> The article keeps saying that the offical name of the country is Cote
> d'Ivoire, and that the government has gotten other governments to use
> the French name. That should be enough.
>
> Ed Poor

Well said, Ed.  I've been trying to make this point for a couple of
days.  I disagree with your conclusion, but thank you for stating this
so clearly.  I am sure you have the sense to recognise the validity of
other people's opinions.

Sam


subject:
[Foundation-l] Cleaning up Wikibooks (was Re: Incubator Wiki for
	New Wikimedia Projects)

body:
On 11/17/05, Alfio Puglisi <alfio.puglisi at gmail.com> wrote:
> Why not simply moving them to some other place instead of outright
> deleting? This is a waste.

Some other place such as...

--
Sam


body:
Jack Lynch wrote:

>Thats not an ideal admin. My ideal admin has no experience being an
>admin on wikipedia, and need not be an editor. Instead, he would be
>someone paid to follow and enforce rules, not make them up as goes
>along.
>
>
One of the underlying aspects of Wikipedia, however, is that it's a
consensus-driven model.  The rules *are* made up as we go along, and not
in any hard and fast manner.  An outsider would really have no business
enforcing rules, or be able to do so reasonably.  And it would be quite
contrary to the model of a user-built and user-governed encyclopedia
project.

-Mark


body:
 "Tom Cadden" wrote

> As has been pointed out repeatedly, the MoS does not say 'do what
> Brittanica does' Brittanica is a business-orientated hardcopy encyclop?dia
> which follows governmental usage to avoid offending native populations
> because it needs them to buy their product. It is called sometimes
> 'Strategic Naming'.

> They follow their own MoS. We follow ours. Ours is not business based but
> based exclusively on the most common name principle.

[[Wikipedia:Wikilawyering]]:  "Wikilawyering is attempting to
inappropriately rely on legal technicalities with respect to
Wikipedia:Policies or Wikipedia:Arbitration."

'Wikilawyer' is pejorative; 'policy wonk' is not.

If blindly insisting on 'following policy' makes the English Wikipedia
factually worse, and offends our community members, and offends 'native
populations' (my God, do people still express themselves like this?) why the
hell should we do it? Making 'exclusively' a universal override is
wikilwayering.

Charles


body:
Ed Poor wrote

>If we allow people to go against policy, and then require a majority vote
>(or supermajority vote) to choose to FOLLOW policy, then Wikipedia will
>quickly be over-run by abusers.

And the sky is falling ... No panic language, please.  Ed, you seem to be
largely responsible for this farrago.

>The article should be put at the policy-determined place (which happens to
>be "Ivory Coast") and then - IF a consensus developes that this particular
>country article should be an exception to policy, THEN move it to the
>French name.

No.  The idea that policy here should allow a 'populist' over-ride of the
actual name of a nation is just stupid, with respect to the good name of
Wikipedia, actually.
>The idea that article names should be dictated to us, by whoever the
>article happens to be about is NOT GOOD POLICY. It will only lead to
>balkanization of the 'pedia. We picked "most common usage English"
>specifically to head off this sort of thing.

There you go, Ed.  If you can't take francophones as part of 'us', that's
your problem.  I could think only of two other examples, Saint-Pierre et/and
Miquelon, which has gone with 'and', and Reunion, which has compromised as
R?union, where the French is 'La  R?union'.  There is really no precedent to
be drawn here.

Charles


body:
On 11/17/05, Robert Scott Horning <robert_horning at netzero.net> wrote:

> A huge issue that has recently erupted on Wikibooks is resulting from a
> thread started by of all people Jimbo in the Staff Lounge:
>
> "In the next 24 to 48 hours, I will delete a variety of pages from
> Wikibooks which are a clear and simple violation of our charter.
> Jokebook <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Jokebook>, Getting a date
> <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Getting_a_date>, Naturism
> <http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?title=Naturism&action=edit> are all
> not textbooks and need to be moved to another site. There may be
> more.--Jimbo Wales <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/User:Jimbo_Wales>
> 17:27, 13 November 2005 (UTC)"

Why not simply moving them to some other place instead of outright
deleting? This is a waste.

Alfio


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Tower of Babel - Voting to ignore MoS,
	NCs for languagereasons.

body:
> We also have Suriname instead of Surinam.
>
> Ec

That might be wrong ...

Charles


from_name: Anthere

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Announcement of Wikizine

body:
Thank you Walter

I looked with interest at the archives.

I look forward the next issue.

Ant

Walter Vermeir wrote:
> ***************************************
>  __    __ _ _    _     _
> / / /\ \ (_) | _(_)___(_)_ __   ___
> \ \/  \/ / | |/ / |_  / | '_ \ / _ \
>  \  /\  /| |   <| |/ /| | | | |  __/
>   \/  \/ |_|_|\_\_/___|_|_| |_|\___|
>
> Year: 2005  Week:46   Special edition
>
> ***************************************
>
> An internal news bulletin for the
> members of the Wikimedia community.
>
> ///////////////////////////////////////
>
> == Announcement of Wikizine  ==
>
> I am pleased to announce the creation of Wikizine. A new internal news
> bulletin for the members of the Wikimedia community.
>
> Wikizine is an weekly publication that will list the news of the Wikimedia
> projects of the previous week. It will not be like Quatro that has full
> articles. That is not the concept. The ideal Wikizine is short. Every news
> listing contains of an one line summary and an url to some place where you
> can find more information.
>
> To subscribe go to;
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/announce-l
>
> == Why ==
>
> I, [[w:nl:gebruiker:Walter]], have found for many years that Wikipedia,
> now Wikimedia, has a very serious internall communication problem. There
> is to much information and it is highly fragmented between many wiki
> pages, mailing lists and other places. Even if you try to read everything
> you do not know all wikimedia news.
>
> I have done proposals in the past to attempt to counter this problem but
> nothing came from that. Also other attempts like "going-ons" and "Quatro"
> do not seem to be a great success.
>
> So I have decided to try to do it myself. Wikizine is an attempt in that
> direction. Of it will be an success will be depend for an large part of
> the readers and the feedback. I will try to discover all the news that
> there is about Wikimedia and report the most relevant news of in Wikizine.
> But I will fail to discover all the news. Wikizine needs to receive
> reports of things that are going on somewhere in a strange, far away wiki.
> Especially from the projects and languages from who you never hear.
>
> == Who should read Wikizine? ==
>
> Everybody who likes to do so may read it off course. But the target
> audience is definitely; stewards, ambassadors, bureaucrats and sysops,
> members of the board of one of the wikimedia foundations.
>
> It is for the people who are doing the Wiki-management. The focus will be
> on the technical aspect. News about changes in the way the wikisotware
> works, new functions. Things that are broken.  Other Wikimedia news will
> also be included but the focus is technical news that has an impact for
> the users and readers of the wiki.
>
> The idea and hope is that some of those readers will report back
> interesting news from there project and translate/communicate the news in
> Wikizine to there own community.
>
> Wikizine is distributed by the mailinglist Announce-l. This list is only
> for the postings of Wikizine, not for discussion. So it is very low
> traffic. Normally once a week.
>
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/announce-l
>
> Please inform your local community about Wikizine and report news to
> Wikizine.
>
> wikizine at wikipedia.be
>
> ///////////////////////////////////////
> Editor: [[w:nl:gebruiker:Walter]]
> ///////////////////////////////////////
>
> Disclaimer: this message is not an
> official publication of the Wikimedia Foundation.
> Wikizine makes no guarantee of validity.


body:
On 11/17/05, Sam Korn <smoddy at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/17/05, Alfio Puglisi <alfio.puglisi at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Why not simply moving them to some other place instead of outright
> > deleting? This is a waste.
>
> Some other place such as...

Well, I don't know, but since they are being deleted because of a
policy that, I understand, is stil debated, it shouldn't be difficult
to find some temporary storage.

Alfio


from_name: Stephen Bain

body:
On 11/17/05, Tom Cadden <thomcadden at yahoo.ie> wrote:
> I've been looking at some pages and noticed that there is a haphazard application of rules on WP, specifically a failure to distinguish between mandatory and optional rules.
...
>  None of those are criteria recognised in the Manual of Style, which sets the simple criteria 'the most common name used in English', not 'the most common name likely to be used in the future', 'the name we would like to use', or 'the name the government tells us to use' but simply the most common name in use as of now.

WP:NC is "policy", which means it is official. But the page does carry
this proviso:

"It is important to note that these are conventions, not rules written
in stone. As Wikipedia grows and changes, some conventions that once
made sense may become outdated, and there may be cases where a
particular convention is "obviously" inappropriate. But when in doubt,
follow convention."

It's interesting to note that all of the individual naming
conventions, for example [[Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common
names)]], are specifically tagged as guidelines, and not policies.
Although they carry much weight, they nevertheless fall into your
category of the rules that "may" be followed.

--
Stephen Bain
stephen.bain at gmail.com


body:
On 11/17/05, charles matthews <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com> wrote:
> There you go, Ed.  If you can't take francophones as part of 'us', that's
> your problem.  I could think only of two other examples, Saint-Pierre et/and
> Miquelon, which has gone with 'and', and Reunion, which has compromised as
> R?union, where the French is 'La  R?union'.  There is really no precedent to
> be drawn here.
>
> Charles
>
Francophones are not a signifact part of the english speaking community

--
geni


body:
On 11/17/05, Jack Lynch <jack.i.lynch at gmail.com> wrote:
> That is so shocklingly inaccurate I am unsure where to begin
> explaining the differences between paid employee's and volunteers to
> you.
>
>

Really? Ok the ideal admin know wikipedia backwards and has plently of
experence of being an admin on wikipedia. Sounds like sinior admins.
--
geni


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Tower of Babel - Voting to ignore MoS,
	NCs for language reasons.

body:
On 11/17/05, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
> So are you suggesting that a bunch of backwards Africans should have no
> say in what happens in the world.  The superior developed nations
> decided this already, and should not need to go over these debates
> again.  If they weren't countries then, too bad!  That sounds a lot like
> what passes as Wikipedia rule making.
>
> Ec

Ok that has to be  serious contender for strawman of the year 2005.

--
geni


from_name: Jack Lynch

body:
That is so shocklingly inaccurate I am unsure where to begin
explaining the differences between paid employee's and volunteers to
you.

Jack (Sam Spade)

On 11/17/05, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/17/05, Jack Lynch <jack.i.lynch at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I don't. What your describing is a social experiment, and the sort of
> > one I find violently objectionable. See [[communism]].
> >
> > Jack (Sam Spade)
> >
>
>
> No we cheacked what wikipedia is not and that appears not to be the case.
>
> Ok if we have paid admins it would be logical for us to recruite the
> most qualified and experenced candidates. Who just happen to be the
> most senior part of our admins team. So no change but wikimedia ends
> up out of pocket.
> --
> geni
> _______________________________________________
> 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] Arb elections poll

body:
I am before the current ArbCom, and while I felt comfortable w every
other ArbCom we have had, Jimbo's recent appointees make me feel
unsafe, and dubious of justice, despite the overwhelming evidence
against my accuser. Something must be done, the status quo cannot
continue. No justice, no peace.

Jack (Sam Spade)

On 11/17/05, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/17/05, uninvited at nerstrand.net <uninvited at nerstrand.net> wrote:
> > We have a comparatively new user to thank for [[Wikipedia:Arbitration
> > Committee Elections December 2005/Straw poll]].
> >
> > I think the presence of this poll as well as the level of support it has
> > garnered are both troubling.
> >
> > Wikipedians appear to be viewing the AC as some sort of generalized
> > means of governance, which it isn't.
> >
> > uc
>
> Arbcom rulings have been cited in policy debates. Arbcom is the single
> most powerful group on wikipedia. For obvius reasons people want a say
> in who is in it.
>
> --
> geni
> _______________________________________________
> 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: Matt Brown

body:
On 11/17/05, Jack Lynch <jack.i.lynch at gmail.com> wrote:
> Thats not an ideal admin. My ideal admin has no experience being an
> admin on wikipedia, and need not be an editor. Instead, he would be
> someone paid to follow and enforce rules, not make them up as goes
> along.

It strikes me, Jack, that you would prefer that because you have
problems dealing with rules involving common sense and judgment and
can only deal with rules that you can, by logic, determine whether you
are doing a permitted thing.

I don't think Wikipedia should change to accomodate such a social
handicap, which is what this is.

-Matt


body:
  the MoS does not dictate what opinions are valid.

 It says it explicitly. Most common name. All one has to is example independent sources involved in communication to English speakers from a wide geographic sources to establish the facts clearly.

 US: Uses Cote d'Ivoire more than usage. A review of major publications, source books, broadcasters, communication documentation, etc pulls usage in ratio of approximately 75:25 Ivory Coast:Cote d'Ivoire.

 Africa: Majority uses Cote d'Ivoire. Ivory Coast on sources is used by around 25%. The higher echelons in society tend to use C d'I. Sources used by ordinary populations show much more usage of IC.

 Europe: Overwhelming majority usage among English sources for Ivory Coast. Cote d'Ivoire primarily used by French speakers. Other languages translate the name into their own language, and use neither the English nor French name in most cases.

 Australasia: Overwhelming usage in English for Ivory Coast.

 UK: one major publication, uses Cote d'Ivory. All others either use Ivory Coast exclusively or predominantly. Most style books recommend IC, not C d'I.

 South America: Usage primarily of IC.

 Under MoS criteria, the result could hardly be more clearcut. Only one continent uses C d'I, and even there not universally. All overs use Ivory Coast either overwhelmingly or exclusively. In random sampling of sources by state, many countries not merely do not use C d'I generally but never seem to use it anywhere other than in Letters of Credence and at the highest level of diplomatic contact. Diplomatic usage does not match MoS criteria because diplomats amount to an insignificant proportion of the electorate and their usage rarely gets outside each country's small diplomatic community of no more than a few hundred. Even within that community diplomatic usage is restricted to work and does not reflect actual human usage of individuals when outside their diplomatic functions.

 It is one of the clearest open and shut cases imaginable. Put in ordinary language, the ordinary English speaker on the planet uses Ivory Coast not Cote d'Ivoire. Those that use the latter are aware of the former. Those that use the former are rarely aware of the latter. Under MoS criteria the only place the article can be placed at is Ivory Coast. But as the vote shows, most users aren't using MoS criteria but deciding on personal whims such as 'I like it', 'that's what I hear',  'it is what will become popular', and the even more POV 'we should help encourage its usage'. None of that fits the criteria of the MoS and means that that one article is in a different location to 99% of other such articles on WP, which follow most common usage, not personal agendas.

 Thom

---------------------------------
To help you stay safe and secure online, we've developed the all new Yahoo! Security Centre.


body:
charles matthews <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com> wrote:  "Tom Cadden" wrote

> As has been pointed out repeatedly, the MoS does not say 'do what
> Brittanica does' Brittanica is a business-orientated hardcopy encyclop?dia
> which follows governmental usage to avoid offending native populations
> because it needs them to buy their product. It is called sometimes
> 'Strategic Naming'.

> They follow their own MoS. We follow ours. Ours is not business based but
> based exclusively on the most common name principle.

[[Wikipedia:Wikilawyering]]:  "Wikilawyering is attempting to
inappropriately rely on legal technicalities with respect to
Wikipedia:Policies or Wikipedia:Arbitration."

'Wikilawyer' is pejorative; 'policy wonk' is not.

If blindly insisting on 'following policy' makes the English Wikipedia
factually worse, and offends our community members, and offends 'native
populations' (my God, do people still express themselves like this?) why the
hell should we do it? Making 'exclusively' a universal override is
wikilwayering.

Charles
It comes down to the simple option: amateurishness or professionalism. You may think an amateurish make-it-up-as-you-go-along approach is OK. Many on Wikipedia find it Wikipedia's biggest flaw. Accuracy is not "making the English Community" it is knowing what you are doing. Frankly what you seem to hold up as a model is 'WikiIncompetence',  You don't seem to have noticed that Wikipedia is supposed to be an encyclop?dia, not a tabloid. Encyclop?dias have standards and if Wikipedia wants to be respected as a source book and not become an internet joke it has to have standards. Just because you have problem with definitions, professional organisation and encyclop?dic standards does not mean that everyone has.

 Thom

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


body:
Clearly I am not an ordinary English speaker.  Thank you for making
this clear to me.  My life will proceed in a dramatically improved
manner on account of this.

Setting aside sarcasm, it appears you still can't grasp that *anyone*
might disagree with you.  Cope with it.

The MoS is clear-cut.  So are many Wikipedia rules.  As I said before,
the only thing needed to make a decision is that the community really
really wants to do something.  NPOV rules.  NOR rules.  CITE rules.
Everything else is incidental, and unimportant.

You are continuing on and on about the same thing.  Please stop.  You
are persuading no-one.

The day Wikipedia puts policy above community is the day I leave.

Sam

On 11/17/05, Tom Cadden <thomcadden at yahoo.ie> wrote:
>
>   the MoS does not dictate what opinions are valid.
>
>  It says it explicitly. Most common name. All one has to is example independent sources involved in communication to English speakers from a wide geographic sources to establish the facts clearly.
>
>  US: Uses Cote d'Ivoire more than usage. A review of major publications, source books, broadcasters, communication documentation, etc pulls usage in ratio of approximately 75:25 Ivory Coast:Cote d'Ivoire.
>
>  Africa: Majority uses Cote d'Ivoire. Ivory Coast on sources is used by around 25%. The higher echelons in society tend to use C d'I. Sources used by ordinary populations show much more usage of IC.
>
>  Europe: Overwhelming majority usage among English sources for Ivory Coast. Cote d'Ivoire primarily used by French speakers. Other languages translate the name into their own language, and use neither the English nor French name in most cases.
>
>  Australasia: Overwhelming usage in English for Ivory Coast.
>
>  UK: one major publication, uses Cote d'Ivory. All others either use Ivory Coast exclusively or predominantly. Most style books recommend IC, not C d'I.
>
>  South America: Usage primarily of IC.
>
>  Under MoS criteria, the result could hardly be more clearcut. Only one continent uses C d'I, and even there not universally. All overs use Ivory Coast either overwhelmingly or exclusively. In random sampling of sources by state, many countries not merely do not use C d'I generally but never seem to use it anywhere other than in Letters of Credence and at the highest level of diplomatic contact. Diplomatic usage does not match MoS criteria because diplomats amount to an insignificant proportion of the electorate and their usage rarely gets outside each country's small diplomatic community of no more than a few hundred. Even within that community diplomatic usage is restricted to work and does not reflect actual human usage of individuals when outside their diplomatic functions.
>
>  It is one of the clearest open and shut cases imaginable. Put in ordinary language, the ordinary English speaker on the planet uses Ivory Coast not Cote d'Ivoire. Those that use the latter are aware of the former. Those that use the former are rarely aware of the latter. Under MoS criteria the only place the article can be placed at is Ivory Coast. But as the vote shows, most users aren't using MoS criteria but deciding on personal whims such as 'I like it', 'that's what I hear',  'it is what will become popular', and the even more POV 'we should help encourage its usage'. None of that fits the criteria of the MoS and means that that one article is in a different location to 99% of other such articles on WP, which follow most common usage, not personal agendas.
>
>  Thom
>
>
>
> ---------------------------------
> To help you stay safe and secure online, we've developed the all new Yahoo! Security Centre.
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

--
Sam


body:
On 11/17/05, Tom Cadden <thomcadden at yahoo.ie> wrote:
> It comes down to the simple option: amateurishness or professionalism. You may think an amateurish make-it-up-as-you-go-along approach is OK. Many on Wikipedia find it Wikipedia's biggest flaw. Accuracy is not "making the English Community" it is knowing what you are doing. Frankly what you seem to hold up as a model is 'WikiIncompetence',  You don't seem to have noticed that Wikipedia is supposed to be an encyclop?dia, not a tabloid. Encyclop?dias have standards and if Wikipedia wants to be respected as a source book and not become an internet joke it has to have standards. Just because you have problem with definitions, professional organisation and encyclop?dic standards does not mean that everyone has.

Get this: Wikipedia is no less respectable for using the French name
than for using the English one.

And please turn automatic line breaks on in your email program.

--
Sam


from_name: steve v

subject: [WikiEN-l] Arb elections poll

body:
(First of all - sorry for the formatting
problems. Yahoo mail settings appear to
have been changed somehow.)

The argument that 'holding an election
puts people through the bother of an election' is a
bit trite. Temporary
positions would not have invited a full
election process, and a speedy and
relatively informal one would have
sufficed.

-Stevertigo

--- Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:

> steve v wrote:
>
> > Personally, I dislike the fact that Jimbo made
> those arbitrary appointments of relatively
> conservative members. But he justified them at the
> time that the Arbcom was shrinking, a "thankless
> job" and needed some membership -- who am I to argue
> with the founder's wisdom? I could say that in a
> wiki world, he could have called for a special
> election and had newly elected temporary members in
> a week. But again, who am I to argue?
> >
> As I understand it, that was considered, but many
> people thought it was
> counterproductive to have an election for a 6-month
> term, since we're
> going to have regularly-scheduled elections at the
> end of January
> anyway.  This was especially true given how
> acrimonious the last
> election was---there was worry that few good
> candidates would want to go
> through a mud-slinging election only to have to do
> it again 6 months later.
>
> -Mark
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

__________________________________
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http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs


subject:
[Wikitech-l] Re: Subject: cookie based sockcheck,
 a prelude to cookie based blocking

body:
Gregory Maxwell schreef:
[cut]
> Thoughts?

Any system that gives the option to do a less stupid way of blocking
users like it is now is welcome.

http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=550

In june Tony Sidaway already had a working Mediawiki-testwiki that had
the function that IP blocks does not apply to logged-in users.

https://elektra.homeunix.org/testwiki/Main_Page

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


body:
Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
>
I don't hear much complaining about the change away from the established
English names of Bombay, Calcutta and Madras.  When the news of last
year's tsunami broke I had to pause to determine what this major
affected city of Chennai was.

You still don't get it. The only issue is 'is a name widely used in English?' Those names are now widely used. If Ivory Coast was ever to become widely known to English users as Cote d'Ivoire rather than Ivory Coast then the page under MoS rules would have to be put at Cote d'Ivoire not Ivory Coast. It all depends on usage, not personal opinion, government order or anything else. The language doesn't matter. If English users predominantly use the native language name, then the article goes in as native language name. If English users predominantly use the English variant, the the article goes in as the English variant.

 All that matters under WP MoS is usage. It is not for WP to decide what should be used. It is simply WP's job to use what IS used. And if what is used changes, we change the page. It could not be more simple.

 For years the town of Kells in Ireland (the Meath one. There are two) was officially known as ''Ceananas M?r". NOBODY ever used that name. I lived there and it was an open joke that barely 0.001% of the population used the official name. In fact the signs outside town were constantly stolen by people who wanted to have a copy of a sign to what most people regarded as a non-existent place. Under your concept of how naming works, the article would be put there even though even 0% of Irish people, let alone people internationally, would have recognised the name. In the end the town council got fed up with a name that was a national joke and returned it to Kells, in the process pissing off the 'Ceananas Mor' supporters, all three of them if the numbers attending the 'defend our name' march was anything to go by.

 Thom

---------------------------------
 Yahoo! Model Search  - Could you be the next catwalk superstar? Check out the competition now


from_name: Andrew Gray

body:
On 18/11/05, Stan Shebs <shebs at apple.com> wrote:

> Stating your case more forcefully doesn't qualify as evidence. Since
> you don't describe your sources of information,

As far as I can tell, the sources of information are users of the
English language, of course. Well, excepting encyclopedias, since for
some reason encyclopedias don't count. Or people who, in their
professional life, deal with the names of countries, since they're
diplomats and diplomats call countries by the name they ask people to
use, which shouldn't count. Or the Economist, because, well, they're
the Economist and a bit funny in the head. Or anyone who also speaks
French. Or anything produced by the US Government. Or, indeed,
regional sources. Or English-speaking Ivorians. Or the United Nations.
Or any result from a google search, because they're horribly
unreliable except when they get the right answer. Or any "myths" about
what people may use.

So, basically, any major source except the ones which use Cote
d'Ivoire, since we've just proven they don't count, use Ivory Coast,
and anyone who remembers Cote d'Ivoire in common use obviously needs
their ears tested and is really just voting to suspend policy for
their own nefarious reasons anyway.

Case closed!

[And I wonder *why* I get irritated about this debate...]

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] Arb elections poll

body:
You really think?  I somehow doubt it - even with the best intentions
of speedy and informal, it would have become quite messy, I believe.

-Matt


body:
On 18/11/05, Andrew Venier <avenier at venier.net> wrote:

> "23.2A1 Use the English form of the name of a place if there is one in
> general use.  Determine this from gazetteers and other reference sources
> published in English-speaking countries.  In case of doubt, use the
> vernacular form."
>
> A standard of "in general use" is perhaps less open to dispute than a
> standard of "most common".

I confess, knowing cataloguers, I wonder how much of this was
someone's bright idea of reducing the number of special characters
that would have to be dealt with when not strictly necessary... :-)

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


body:
Thats not an ideal admin. My ideal admin has no experience being an
admin on wikipedia, and need not be an editor. Instead, he would be
someone paid to follow and enforce rules, not make them up as goes
along.

Jack (Sam Spade)

On 11/17/05, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/17/05, Jack Lynch <jack.i.lynch at gmail.com> wrote:
> > That is so shocklingly inaccurate I am unsure where to begin
> > explaining the differences between paid employee's and volunteers to
> > you.
> >
> >
>
>
> Really? Ok the ideal admin know wikipedia backwards and has plently of
> experence of being an admin on wikipedia. Sounds like sinior admins.
> --
> geni
> _______________________________________________
> 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: Alphax (Wikipedia email)

body:
Jack Lynch wrote:
>Ray Saintonge wrote:
>> The dynamics in an organization can easily change when it has paid
>> staff. I very much prefer an environment where everyone is working
>> for the love of what they believe rather than the love of money.
>
> I don't. What your describing is a social experiment, and the sort of
> one I find violently objectionable. See [[communism]].
>

ZOMG WIKIPEDIA IS COMMUNISM SOCKPUPPET VANDAL TROLL!!!!!sin(pi/2)

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

subject: [Foundation-l] .eu domains soon

body:
--- Jan Kulveit <jk-wikifound at ks.cz> wrote:
> the 1st sunrise period for .eu domain registration is going
> to begin soon - 7 December 2005
> only domain names which are registred EU community/national
> trademarks will be registered.

Our domain applications for wikipedia.eu and wikimedia.eu have been in progress
for a month but I am not aware of the trademark application status. Apparently
anybody can still submit applications for those exact same domains
 Not good.

> Because of trademark issues and eu regulations concernig
> who can apply for .eu, I'm affraid it will be a bit
> complicated. I hope someone from the foundation can take care
> of it.

I think our legal dept needs to look at this ASAP. I?ve CCd their list.

-- mav

__________________________________
Yahoo! Mail - PC Magazine Editors' Choice 2005
http://mail.yahoo.com


subject: [Foundation-l] .eu domains soon


from_name: Mark Gallagher

subject:
a plea (was Re: [WikiEN-l] need to work out clear policies on
	MANDATORY and	OPTIONAL rules on WP)

body:
G'day Tom,

> Incorrect. As it makes clear, it is governing appropiate editing
> styles, and used to prevent inappropriate editing style.

Speaking of editing styles, do you think you could:
   a) stop top-posting, instead interweave your points with those of the
      people you're replying to, as per proper Internet custom
   b) set your email client to wrap your text

These two things would go a long way towards making your posts more
readable, and perhaps their message better-received.  Perhaps.

Cheers,

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

--
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition.
Version: 7.1.362 / Virus Database: 267.13.3/173 - Release Date: 16/11/2005


from_name: Fred Bauder

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Wiki about every person in the world

body:
Google Base has taken the project up, although not in the wiki
format, see

http://base.google.com/base/processstep1offerunauth

Fred

On Nov 18, 2005, at 7:27 AM, Milos Rancic wrote:

> As I saw some time ago, one Wikipedian has such project. Is there a
> wiki with that purpose (Wikicity or some other)?
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


from_name: SJ

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: World Technology Awards, Wikinews review

body:
/me splits a pan galactic gargle blaster with anthere... but... very
carefully...

Here's another article on (effectively) Wikinews, by a reporter who
doesn't seem to know Wikinews exists.
  http://tech.monstersandcritics.com/news/article_1062696.php/Newspaper_Web_sites_see_readership_rise

  "Moeller suggested that if print newspaper circulation continues to
flounder and newspaper Web sites don`t take off, a new type of news
source could take off."

That's Susan Moeller, of course, the journalism prof at U. Maryland.

On 11/17/05, Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> SJ wrote:
> > This week, the Wikimedia Foundation was honored by a World Technology
> > Award in communication, joining the ranks of other World Technology
> > Network members[1].   If you made it to part of the WTN summit and
> > ceremonies, please link to photos and other records of the event.   (
> > http://www.wtn.net/2005/summit/ )
>
> The *Foundation* won an *award* in *communication* ????
>
> wait...
>
> I really need a drink here...
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>

--
++SJ


from_name: Jürgen Herz

subject: [Wikitech-l] Wikimedia Servers and Organization

body:
Hello,

I used the last hours trying to dig in the infrastructural
organization of the Wikimedia servers. My starting points where
[[meta:Wikimedia_servers]] and Ganglia and my motivation was
Wikipedias slowness in the last time.

In contrast to my expectations, the database servers are far away from
being under high load. It even seems the pressure is so low, you can
easily live without holbach and webster for days (resp. over a month).
Bottlenecks are Apaches and Squids (yes, I know that's nothing new for
you).

But like all other clusters too, the load is very unequally
distributed over the machines. For example the Yahoo! squids showed
yf1003 9.39, yf1000 7.60, yf1004 1.60, yf1002 1.44, yf1001 0.73
at noon (UTC) today and similar load values (albeit with a different
distribution) at other times.

Or the Apaches in Florida:
16 Apaches with load around 15, 9 between 1.5 and 2, 8 between 1 and
1.5 and 10 less than 1.

Where does this come from, or is this wanted? Wouldn't a more balanced
load be better?

Other point: The Yahoo! Squids do virtually nothing between 18:00 and
0:00 (and machines besides yf1000-yf1004 to virtually nothing around
the clock). How nice would it be make them helping out the other
overloaded machines in Florida and Netherlands at least in these six
hours.

And no, I don't criticize anyone or know how to do it better. But
available informations look strange to me - it would be great to get
some explanations.

Speaking of explanations. I've three more simple questions:
1. Squids at lopar idle all the time since dns has been moved of them.
What where the problems with them and will they be back soon?
2. Commons is very slow since the move from the prior "overloaded"
server to the new one. Any explanation to satisfy a simple user?
And what server is the new one?
3. I read about new machines srv51-70. Where do they come from? Can't
see a recent order for them or they are mentioned on
[[meta:Wikimedia_servers]].

Thank you in advance,
Juergen


from_name: Brandon Cordy

body:
To interject (apoligies), sometimes there will be interesting information to
note, for example in a movie like [[Who Framed Roger Rabbit]], that doesn't
really belong anywhere except in a trivia section of some kind (the themes
and how they relate ot the real life streetcar vs. freeway controversy, the
Jessica Rabbit nudity controvery, that sort of thing. None of those deserve
their own section, but they can be grouped together in a trivia section.

As far as Wikipedia not being a fan site, of course it's not, but
unfortuntely many people think it is or feel that it is. That's why we have
endless coverage on Star Wars, Star Trek, and the Simpsons,and articles on
all the characters from Mariah Carey's "Glitter". AfD is flawed, because if
you suggest cutting any of this stuff down, merging, or whatever, little
Wikipedia cliques pop up and prevent anything from being done.

-b.

On 11/17/05, Sam Korn <smoddy at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 11/17/05, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
> > What's your basis for saying that they are worthless? Putting them in a
> > separate "fun stuff" section makes it clear that these are not the most
> > "important" facts about the subject.
>
> We are an encyclopaedia, not a fan site. Almost always, these points
> bear no relation to the rest of the article, are unsourced, and make
> the article read badly. They are a net loss to the encyclopaedia.
>
> The facts therein can almost always be written into the text of the
> article. If they can't, the fact is almost certainly too irrelevant
> to mention.
>
> Sam
> _______________________________________________
> 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: charles matthews

body:
 "Tom Cadden" wrote

> It comes down to the simple option: amateurishness or professionalism.

Ivory Coast is the amateurish choice here.  Others have made this point
well.  (Plonk.)

Charles


subject:
[Foundation-l] Wikimania meeting this Saturday,
	1600 UTC (and program meeting next week)

body:
Dear all,

The second global IRC chat about Wikimania '06 will be this Saturday,
at 1600 UTC, lasting around an hour.  We will have an update on
conference dates and deadlines, and further discussion of goals.
Please add to the agenda, and add your name if you plan to attend,
here:
   http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2006/Planning#Meetings

You may also see on that page that a program meeting is planned for
next Tues or Wed; date pending a bit more feedback from last year's
planners (this will be an open meeting, but scheduled to make it easy
for programme planners from last year to attend, as programmes and
programs have much in common).

-- Sj

Other ways to get involved :

1. Volunteer your time, language skills, and enthusiasm:
   http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2006/Teams

2.  Sign up for yet another mailing list (wikimania-l).  It is
currently low-traffic and primarily English-language; two things you
can help change.
   http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimania-l

3. Sign up to attend, plan carpools or offer crash space for the
event.  (harder to do
before the date is fixed, of course)
   http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2006/Attendees


subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Wikimania meeting this Saturday,
	1600 UTC (and program meeting next week)


from_name: Sean Barrett

body:
> AfD is flawed, because if you suggest cutting any of this stuff
> down, merging, or whatever, little Wikipedia cliques pop up and
> prevent anything from being done.

Those annoying people who insist on pointing out that there is no
consensus for deletion rampages sure are killjoys, aren't they?
Gosh darn them to heck!

--
 Sean Barrett     | A positive attitude may not solve all
 sean at epoptic.org | your problems, but it will annoy enough
                  | people to make it worth the effort.


subject:
[WikiEN-l] need to work out clear policies on MANDATORY and
	OPTIONAL rules on WP

body:
On 11/18/05, Tom Cadden <thomcadden at yahoo.ie> wrote:
> The Manual of Style is mandatory but is being overturned in once off cases as though it was purely a matter for local decision, not Wikipedia-wide policy. Instead of debating policy, this 'once off' page by page policy making is producing a mess. Efforts to point out the difference between mandatory and optional usually produces a 'no. We'll vote here on what rules to follow on this page' response, with those pointing out mandatory rules accused of 'highjacking' pages!

I pointed this out earlier, and so did Kelly Martin, but I think it
needs pointing out again:

WP:NC is marked "official policy", which means that it is one of the
"policies that are widely accepted and that everyone is expected to
follow".

Each of the individual naming conventions, such as [[Wikipedia:Naming
conventions (common names)]], are not official policies. They are
clearly marked as "guidelines", which means they are "less rigid rules
of thumb that are generally accepted by consensus to apply in many
cases".

So it is mandatory to consider the naming conventions, since the WP:NC
page is official policy. However, it is not mandatory to actually
implement each of the conventions, since they are merely guidelines.

--
Stephen Bain
stephen.bain at gmail.com


from_name: Puzzlet Chung

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Main Page under a namespace

body:
No, I was asking about just moving the Main Page, like German
Wiktionary, which is using Wiktionary:Hauptseite as the Main Page.
Namespace in the title is OK, if the title is accepted internally.
But, is there a reason other Wikipedias haven't done it yet?

On 11/16/05, ?var Arnfj?r? Bjarmason <avarab at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/16/05, Puzzlet Chung <puzzlet at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Korean Wikipedia is seeking for new name for the Main Page, for
> > ambiguity of the term we've chosen. Some support to put it under a
> > namespace like Wikipedia: or Portal:(which hasn't been created yet),
> > but I haven't seen any other Wikipedia had done it before. Is it OK to
> > put Main Page under a namespace?
>
> Currently the name of the main page and its url are the same, so this
> would require a change in the software (split them into visible text &
> url).
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


from_name: norial

subject: [Wikitech-l] DokuWiki -> MediaWiki Konverter

body:
Hallo

Ich m?chte von dem DokuWiki (http://wiki.splitbrain.org/wiki:dokuwiki)
Daten in das MediaWiki importieren. Die Daten sind als UTF-8 Textfile
gespeichert. Gibt es f?r sowas schon ein Konverter?
Mein Idee ist es, direkt in die mySQl-Datenbank zu importieren. Was ich
vor allem suche ist eine Routine, die ins MediaWIki am Besten ?ber eine
Funktion wie insertNewArticle schreibt. Daher muss das PHP-Skript soweit
ich das sehe nur die localsettings.php laden, zur Datenbank verbinden,
einen Admin anmelden und dann den Text, Zusammenfassung, Autor ?bergeben
und schreiben. Die Routine zum Auslesen der Daten w?rde ich nat?rlich
selbst einf?gen.
Kann mir dabei jemand helfen?

Gr??e
  andreas


from_name: Anthony DiPierro

body:
Wow, that base.google.com looks pretty neat.  I thought that was just a rumor.

Now we need a wikibase!

On 11/18/05, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
> Google Base has taken the project up, although not in the wiki
> format, see
>
> http://base.google.com/base/processstep1offerunauth
>
> Fred
>
> On Nov 18, 2005, at 7:27 AM, Milos Rancic wrote:
>
> > As I saw some time ago, one Wikipedian has such project. Is there a
> > wiki with that purpose (Wikicity or some other)?
> > _______________________________________________
> > 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:
On 11/18/05, Milos Rancic <millosh at mutualaid.org> wrote:
> I saw it and I think that there is a lot of sense to make a wiki.
>
We already have a wiki, though, Wikipedia.  It'd be better to just add
articles about people there.

> As I saw some time ago, one Wikipedian has such project. Is there a
wiki with that purpose (Wikicity or some other)?

Jnanabase has that purpose and more.  See jnanabase.com

Anthony


from_name: Gregory Maxwell

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Subject: cookie based sockcheck,
	a prelude to cookie based blocking

body:
On 11/18/05, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> >When a user edits, we request a cookie "usertoken" or whatever. If
> >they do not have one, we generate a long random number and give them
> >one. Every edit made by that browser (no matter which user is logged
> >in) the cookie is returned. We add an extra column to recent changes
> >to store this value.
> >A new version of sockcheck is produced that finds users who share
> >revisions with the same token, much like we can do with IPs already.
> >Viola, cookie based sockcheck.
> >Thoughts?
>
> Can a cookie carry between different IPs for the same browser? i.e.,
> user hangs up and dials again for a different IP?

Yes, thats what makes it useful beyond just an IP based checkuser.


from_name: FxParlant

subject: [Wikitech-l] links in template headache

body:
Thanks Brion for reminding me that
http://foo is replace into a link

But, Sorry for asking again. Is there a proper way to have this kind of
link in a template to work (Mediawiki 1.5.0)

In mw1.3, I hacked a bit the regexp in Parser.php so that anything
beginning with an '=' was left out of attributes replacement.

Here (mw1.5.0), I tried the simple  surrounding, but with
no success.

I'm really not sure there is a way to write this in wiki language, but
if someone knows...

Thanks for any solution

Fran?ois


body:
On 11/18/05, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
> On 11/18/05, Milos Rancic <millosh at mutualaid.org> wrote:
> > As I saw some time ago, one Wikipedian has such project. Is there a
> wiki with that purpose (Wikicity or some other)?
>
> Jnanabase has that purpose and more.  See jnanabase.com

Ooops, I guess it's jnanabase.org...that shows you how much I pay
attention to domain names now that we have google.


from_name: David Gerard

body:
Gregory Maxwell wrote:

>When a user edits, we request a cookie "usertoken" or whatever. If
>they do not have one, we generate a long random number and give them
>one. Every edit made by that browser (no matter which user is logged
>in) the cookie is returned. We add an extra column to recent changes
>to store this value.
>A new version of sockcheck is produced that finds users who share
>revisions with the same token, much like we can do with IPs already.
>Viola, cookie based sockcheck.
>Thoughts?

Can a cookie carry between different IPs for the same browser? i.e.,
user hangs up and dials again for a different IP?

- d.


subject: [Wikitech-l] DokuWiki -> MediaWiki Converter

body:
Hello

sorry, English is the common language for this ng. ignore my previous
posting.
I like to import wiki entries created with DokuWiki
(http://wiki.splitbrain.org/wiki:dokuwiki) in the MediaWiki database.
The data's are stored in UTF-8 text files. >Is a Converter already
available?
I think the easiest way could be an direct import into the mySQL
database. So I need an small script that use the functions of MediaWiki
like insertNewArticle. The script has to be insert the
localsettings.php, connect to the database, login an admin and insert my
text as a new page (text, summary, ...).

thanks in advance
  andreas


from_name: Stephen Bain

subject: [WikiEN-l] Country naming

body:
In an atttempt to resolve all this controversy, there is a new
proposal for a naming convention for articles about countries:

[[Wikipedia:Naming conventions (countries)]]

Please feel free to contribute on the talk page.

--
Stephen Bain
stephen.bain at gmail.com


from_name: Brion Vibber

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Subject: cookie based sockcheck, a prelude to cookie
	based blocking

body:
David Gerard wrote:
> Can a cookie carry between different IPs for the same browser? i.e.,
> user hangs up and dials again for a different IP?

Yes, but it's also trivially easy to remove or just reject. It's only an
effective measure against the painfully naive. (Of which there are many,
alas. ;)

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

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