body:
Not if it creates a bigger problem than it solves.

Fred

On Feb 19, 2006, at 4:07 AM, Steve Bennett wrote:

> On 2/19/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Pathoschild/Projects/Userboxes/
>> Policy
>>
>
> Hmm.
>
>
>> Although many editors would prefer that expression of POV be
>>
> discouraged on user pages, many others believe that bias is better
> declared.
>
> The more I think about it, the more I agree with the first. I find it
> harder to assume good faith when someone blatantly states their strong
> POV. Someone says "I am anti-abortion", then proceeds to edit pages
> pertaining to abortion - what are you going to assume? That he's there
> to fix typos?
>
> For the same reason that we don't allow strong POV usernames
> (AntiAbortionCrusader etc), shouldn't we discourage stating of POVs on
> userpages?
>
> Steve
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


list: wikipedia-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Ilya N.

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bot flagging for bureaucrats

body:
It sounds like a good idea, but you're going to have to familiarize me with
policy on the English Wikipedia about bots since I haven't really had too
much experience in that area.

On 2/19/06, Anthere <Anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> - Essjay - wrote:
> > For some time, there have been discussions of extending bot flagging to
> > local bureaucrats. I recently asked some of the stewards about it, and
> > received an overwhealming response from them in favor of doing so. I
> also
> > spoke with Angela, who indicated it was her understanding that the
> proposal
> > was waiting "for the code, not approval." Subsequently, I spoke with
> brion,
> > who said that the code was there, it was simply a matter of the devs
> being
> > told to implement it.
> >
> > It seems to me that (for once?) we have a proposal that just about
> everybody
> > likes: Local communities get to make thier own decisions about bot
> flagging,
> > and have them enacted locally, by someone who is familiar with the local
> > rules and the given debate, and the stewards are relieved from what has
> > become an unpleasant task. It also seems that both sides are waiting for
> > each other, not realizing the other side is waiting for them!
> >
> > I'd love to see this proposal enacted sooner rather than later, so I'm
> > asking: What do we need to do to get this done? Do the devs need an
> order
> > from the Board? *pokes the Board* "The Devs need an order." Do the Board
> > need to be made aware that the switch is ready to flip on thier word?
> *pokes
> > the Devs* "The Board doesn't know it's ready to go."
> >
> > What next?
> >
> > Essjay
>
> I think I have given subliminal messsages on this list, on the
> foundation list and even on wikitech list, so that at least *my* opinion
> is known on the matter. No need to poke me :-)
>
> ant
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>

--
~Ilya N.
http://w3stuff.com/ilya/ (My website; DarkLordFoxx Media)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Ilyanep (on Wikipedia)
http://www.wheresgeorge.com - Track your money's travels.


list: wikien-l

from_name: Will "Sceptre" Noble

subject: [WikiEN-l] Userboxes: A radical proposal

body:
On 2/18/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
>
> If I wasn't such a slow editor, and if I knew how to run a bot, I'd be
> likely to create a huge massive stir by going through every single
> template in the problematic categories and edit every single user page
> to subst them and/or move them to user space, deleting them all as I go.
>
> Please no one else do this... yet. :)
>
>
User:Pathochild is running a miniproject to subst deleted userboxes (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Pathoschild/Projects/Userboxes). A few
users are helping as well. Just a kind of halfway solution.
--
-Sceptre
http://tintower.co.uk


from_name: stevertigo

subject: [WikiEN-l] Improvements to diffs

body:
Thanks, Steve. That of course works, though only when
I log in. Since my password is a 147 byte Chinese
character idiom, I often read up on things without
actually logging in.

In that context I made the observance that red text on
white was a bit displeasing to my eye, and I thought
perhaps that others and their eyes might agree.

 Editor:Stevertigo

--- Stephen Bain <stephen.bain at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 2/19/06, stevertigo <vertigosteve at yahoo.com>
> wrote:
> > Red text in diffs is too hard to read. Maybe
> something
> > like a blue-purple would be better.
>
> You should be able to change this by using a custom
> stylesheet:
> Edit your [[User:Stevertigo/monobook.css]], or
> create it if it doesn't
> exist (I'm presuming you're using Monobook as your
> skin).
>
> Then add something like this:
>
> span.diffchange {
>    color: #9966FF;
> }
>
> You can set the "color" [sic] attribute to whatever
> colour you want.
>
> --
> Stephen Bain
> stephen.bain at gmail.com
> _______________________________________________
> 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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subject: [WikiEN-l] I propose adding a community namespace

body:
There are three usages for a Community namespace:
* a wiki namespace would be too redundant with
  the Wikipedia namespace
* a template namespace would also be redundant since
most
  community templates can be kept as subpages to a
  wikipedia userbox template.
* a category namespace would separate the use of the
  category namespace for content, while still allowing

  for quick access to particular subpage templates

Editor:Stevertigo

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from_name: Daniel R. Tobias

subject: [WikiEN-l] Proposal: Task forces

body:
On 18 Feb 2006 at 21:23, SJ <2.718281828 at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 2/16/06, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
> > :-D  Extend the length of the day beyond 24 hours.
>
> Now *there's* a project worth doing.  Does this involve Superman and
> world-sized gyroscopes?

It *does* happen on occasion.  If you use the UTC standard for
timekeeping, you get an extra second once in a while as leap seconds
get added to days (most recently on December 31, 2005).  This,
unfortunately, isn't all that much extra time for Wikipedia editing.
A more substantial addition is made if you go by local time in areas
that use daylight saving / summer time, where you get a 25th hour
once a year when the clocks "fall back".  Unfortunately, this is
balanced by another day in the spring when you "spring forward" and
lose an hour.

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


from_name: Geoff Burling

body:
On Sun, 19 Feb 2006, John Lee wrote:

> Is it me, or does geni appear to disagree with nearly everything ever
> proposed on the mailing list? Maybe he just likes playing devil's
> advocate, but whenever I see something by geni, I immediately know it'll
> disagree with someone somewhere. :)
>
Consider this: do you expect any statement you post to the maillist will
be agreed to by everyone reading? And is it more likely to assume that
someone will respond to diasgree than to agree?

I suspect that your question could be raised about a number of people on
this list. (And probably even me.) But writing specifically about geni,
I haven't noticed this tendency.

Geoff


from_name: Robert Merkel

subject: [WikiEN-l] Disturbing post on Reference Desk, requiring action

body:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Science#Painless_suicide

As a concerned human being, I would like to see if we can help to locate
this user ASAP and get them some help if at all possible (and assuming
they haven't acted already).

The Reference Desk didn't exactly cover itself in glory there, but
that's a second-order issue.

--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

                                           Robert Merkel
                                     robert.merkel at benambra.org
                                        http://benambra.org

I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully.
  -- George W. Bush.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------


from_name: Stan Shebs

subject: [WikiEN-l] Userboxes: A rational proposal

body:
Steve Bennett wrote:

>On 2/18/06, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
>
>
>>>I think to a degree Wikipedia has reached that stage Usenet did, where
>>>suddenly the influx of new people is beyond the rate at which they
>>>tend to acclimate to the older culture.  There are so many newbies
>>>that a newbie-culture can develop without having to join the existing
>>>one.
>>>
>
>Is this true? It's a fairly bold statement...is there evidence for it?
>
In the process of bashing on the untagged images that have
accumulated since last summer, I've noticed quite a few
accounts where they've uploaded, banged on articles, etc, yet
the talk page is blank - no one ever posted a welcome message.
There is another contingent of logins whose talk pages seem to
record mostly semi-informed discussion with other newbies. Some
stick around, some only last for a day or week.

Dunno if it it's evidence, but clearly there is a bunch whose
first interaction with the "older culture" is coming six months
after their first edit, and only because an uploaded image is
found to be missing information.

Stan


subject: [WikiEN-l] Unused userboxes

body:
Jimmy Wales wrote:

>
>As far as I can determine, and I am very much aware that I am here
>prejudicing the terms of debate, this is a cultural battle between
>wikipedians and people who have stumbled into this cool site they heard
>about on CNN where you can write whatever the hell you want and argue
>with people for fun.
>
I mentioned this a while back, and didn't get much response at the
time, but we do encourage people to create accounts ("Registering
a free account takes only a few seconds, and has many benefits.")
irrespective of whether they intend to contribute usefully or not.

We're not like a provincial university where the local legislature
has decreed that that everyone has to be accepted in regardless of
ability. Given that we now have a surfeit of volunteers, perhaps we
should be thinking about ways to gently raise the bar, rewarding
the good editors while inducing the poor ones to find another wiki
more in line with their talents.

Stan


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] rel=nofollow on talk pages?

body:
?var Arnfj?r? Bjarmason wrote:
> * It isn't actually accomplishing anything, or very little. Since we
> turned it on on all wikis except the English Wikipedia it seems to me
> that the latter hasn't received any less linkspam.

The fact that *the* highest-profile MediaWiki site has nofollow disabled can't
possibly help in encouraging link spammers to notice it's there on the rest. :)

However discouraging it from happening in the long run is only part of what
nofollow does; the main part is just in keeping the crap that does get in from
polluting the search engines we all rely on. It's called being a good citizen.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

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from_name: Steve Bennett

body:
On 2/19/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> organisations available 24/7 in many countries.  Their methodology, as
> I understand it, is similar to that of the confessional.  They'll
> listen and provide friendly advice, but they don't (except perhaps in
> exceptional circumstances) intrude.  This may be an appropriate model
> to adopt here.

Except that we don't provide advice beyond "see this URL".

Steve


from_name: The Cunctator

body:
On 2/17/06, Philip Welch <wikipedia at philwelch.net> wrote:
> Stop worrying about userboxes and write an encyclopedia already. If
> and when userboxes interfere with encyclopedia-writing activities,
> react in an appropriately minimalist fashion and proceed with the
> encyclopedia-writing.
>
> Quite frankly, the userbox fans are *not* the people disrupting
> Wikipedia with an unhealthy fixation with userboxes. This isn't to
> say that they don't *have* an unhealthy userbox fixation, but rather,
> that they engage in that fixation in a way that doesn't really
> prevent the rest of us from writing an encyclopedia.
>
> The people disrupting Wikipedia?that would be us, writing dozens of
> messages to this listserv about them. Aren't we the people who
> actually care about writing an encyclopedia? Then why don't we do
> that, instead of wasting our time compiling statistics about
> userboxes, trying to delete them, and debating the right way to do that?

The people disrupting Wikipedia, maybe, are the people writing
messages to the listserv about people writing messages to the listserv
about userboxes.

Discussing and formulating Wikipedia policy is as important a
contribution as is editing an individual article.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Improvements to diffs

body:
On 2/18/06, stevertigo <vertigosteve at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Red text in diffs is too hard to read. Maybe something
> like a blue-purple would be better.
>
> Red chould be used for minor specific changes, if
> there be a way to differentiate between different
> string lengths, but thats getting too much into the
> workings of the diff module...

'''Support'''

What I would also like is a way of jumping from the diff code to the
appropriate place in the actual text. When someone adds a chunk of
text and formatting, I like to see if they've formatted correctly,
appropriately etc. On longer articles it takes a while to find where
the actual text appears below.

So it seems the software could generate anchors #Dif1, #Dif2 etc, and
provide links to them next to the changes.

Steve


body:
On 2/19/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> > the Template namespace we are implicitly suggesting that these are
> > endorsed by the Wikipedia community,
>
> The evidence suggests they are accepted

Accepted <> endorsed or welcomed. I accept seeing piles of rotting
rubbish on the street - I don't go out of my way to change it. But I
don't welcome or endorse it.

> Admitting your POV is the first stage towards atchiveing NPOV.

I don't know if that's true. It's helpful at some stage, but finding
common ground is perhaps a better first step. Most semi-political
arguments about US foreign policy seemed to start with people
definining their allegiances ("I'm a republican") etc, and things
rapidly degenerated.

Steve


subject: [Wikitech-l] Template magick?

body:
Is there some way to write a working template that does what I'd like
it to do with this (nonworking) code?

As of [{{<includeonly>subst:</includeonly>FULLPAGENAME|oldid={{REVISIONID}}}}
this edit], this article uses content from {{{source}}}.

This is from [[Template:GFDLSource]]

As you can see, I'm trying to automatically stamp the article with a
link to the current revision.


body:
On 2/19/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Pathoschild/Projects/Userboxes/Policy

Hmm.

>Although many editors would prefer that expression of POV be
discouraged on user pages, many others believe that bias is better
declared.

The more I think about it, the more I agree with the first. I find it
harder to assume good faith when someone blatantly states their strong
POV. Someone says "I am anti-abortion", then proceeds to edit pages
pertaining to abortion - what are you going to assume? That he's there
to fix typos?

For the same reason that we don't allow strong POV usernames
(AntiAbortionCrusader etc), shouldn't we discourage stating of POVs on
userpages?

Steve


from_name: geni

body:
On 2/19/06, John Lee <johnleemk at gawab.com> wrote:
> Is it me, or does geni appear to disagree with nearly everything ever
> proposed on the mailing list? Maybe he just likes playing devil's
> advocate, but whenever I see something by geni, I immediately know it'll
> disagree with someone somewhere. :)
>
> John

The mainling list tends to be dominated by inclusionists who favor at
least a degree of centeralisation of power. I'm a rather extream
deletionist who belives in keeping power as close to the community as
posible.

As a result I'm likely to dissagree with a lot of stuff.

--
geni


body:
On 2/19/06, Steve Bennett <stevage at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 2/19/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > the Template namespace we are implicitly suggesting that these are
> > > endorsed by the Wikipedia community,
> >
> > The evidence suggests they are accepted
>
> Accepted <> endorsed or welcomed. I accept seeing piles of rotting
> rubbish on the street - I don't go out of my way to change it. But I
> don't welcome or endorse it.
>

Perhaps but the community has never been given a chance to endorse or otherwise.

> > Admitting your POV is the first stage towards atchiveing NPOV.
>
> I don't know if that's true. It's helpful at some stage, but finding
> common ground is perhaps a better first step. Most semi-political
> arguments about US foreign policy seemed to start with people
> definining their allegiances ("I'm a republican") etc, and things
> rapidly degenerated.
>
> Steve

That isn't an area I've worked in so I'm unable to comment.

--
geni


from_name: Philip Welch

body:
>> This depends--context is everything. For instance, I'm libertarian,
>> but I've edited [[Libertarianism]] because I like to pretend I know
>> something about the subject. In the interest of full disclosure I
>> might mention that I am libertarian, which might unknowingly color my
>> contributions. If I edited a lot about politics (I don't), I might
>> want to outright state, "Here are my biases, if they get in my way
>> let me know and help me improve."
>
> Not surprisingly, I see a big difference between *admitting* a bias,
> and proudly *proclaiming* a bias.  Someone who recognises that their
> bias is a problem is more likely to step back when told their edit is
> not NPOV. Someone proud of their bias is more likely to accuse that
> person of themselves having a bias.

I agree.

>> If someone's pushing a POV, you can tell from editing patterns alone.
>> On the other hand, if someone is making valuable, good-faith, albeit
>> biased contributions, it's a lot easier to assume good faith when
>> they say straight out "here's my bias, if it shows in my
>> contributions too much feel free to correct."
>
> Yep. Do you think POV userboxes express that humility?

Hmm. They might, depending on  how they were worded, and depending on
the context of their presentation. But that's a very good question to
ask.

>> Abortion in particular is the biggest issue where people's opinions
>> tend to create blind spots. Pro-lifers tend to fail to understand and
>> appreciate abortion-choice arguments while abortion-choicers tend to
>> fail to understand and appreciate pro-life arguments, and no one
>> seems willing to acknowledge that the other side holds their opinions
>> in good faith. It's these blind spots which make it utterly crucial
>> for us as editors to be open with one another about our biases so we
>> can correct one another's mistakes.
>
> What if the userbox was "People who believe in abortion are scum"? How
> would you treat their edits then? Is there a liimt to how biased a
> person can be and still make useful edits?

I'd have to look at that person's edits to judge how useful their
edits were.

>>> For the same reason that we don't allow strong POV usernames
>>> (AntiAbortionCrusader etc), shouldn't we discourage stating of
>>> POVs on
>>> userpages?
>>
>> Not if we want to get an encyclopedia written according to the
>> neutral point of view.
>
> Then shouldn't we allow strongly POV usernames?

No because that would serve no useful purpose. Allowing users to
state their biases on their userpages does serve a very useful purpose.

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


body:
> Discussing and formulating Wikipedia policy is as important a
> contribution as is editing an individual article.

Maybe, if that policy is something that would make it easier for us
to build an encyclopedia. If the policy in question isn't useful,
then we are indeed wasting time.

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


from_name: STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA

subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
I said the same thing on Kelly's talkpage, but
MegamanZero removed my message and warned to block me
for trolling.

I think that you guys should stop doing Jimbo'w work.
If he wants the userboxes gone, let him do it. It's
not like he's doing something else -- like working on
articles. I think that Jimbo doesn't want to give
concrete orders on this issue because he knows that
his decission would make him unpopular to many.
Instead, he gives a few hints on what should be done
and lets other people, like Kelly Martin, to do the
work. Jimbo, either you want the userboxes removed --
and make it happen -- or you do not. Until you decide,
the userboxes should stay. Why should the community
busy itself on debating about this week after week,
and causing people to be more confused and frustated
about it?

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
> So basically what you're saying is because Jimbo Wales is busy running
> things on the WMF board, then the userboxes should stay?
>
> That's a pretty weak argument.
>
> By your logic, if Jimbo can't write articles, why does he make us
> do them
> and then get in trouble with the press when controversial issues
> arise? If
> he can't do them himself, they should stay unwritten.

I think his argument, (and if it isn't, it's possibly a stronger
argument), is that it's not up to certain un-named admins to delete
userboxes on Jimbo's behalf, based only on their interpretation of
Jimbo's statements on the issue, because if Jimbo really wanted
userboxes to go he'd say so.

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
I'm saying that first of all, he should make a
decission -- something he hasn't done yet. He says he
wants them gone, but that's different from saying that
they should all be removed. Just today I read one of
his messages to Angela where he was giving doubts
about how to handle the situation. He mentioned
something about a bot removing all the userboxes, but
only as a solution for the near future. As a leader,
he should show more consistency and make a decission
that stands. Either that, or listen to the voice of
the community. If he does that, he would probably have
to keep the userboxes. One way or another, people are
getting fed up with this dispute.

--- "Ilya N." <ilyanep at gmail.com> wrote:

> So basically what you're saying is because Jimbo
> Wales is busy running
> things on the WMF board, then the userboxes should
> stay?
>
> That's a pretty weak argument.
>
> By your logic, if Jimbo can't write articles, why
> does he make us do them
> and then get in trouble with the press when
> controversial issues arise? If
> he can't do them himself, they should stay
> unwritten.
>
> On 2/19/06, STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA
> <wizzard_bane at yahoo.com> wrote:
> >
> > I said the same thing on Kelly's talkpage, but
> > MegamanZero removed my message and warned to block
> me
> > for trolling.
> >
> > I think that you guys should stop doing Jimbo'w
> work.
> > If he wants the userboxes gone, let him do it.
> It's
> > not like he's doing something else -- like working
> on
> > articles. I think that Jimbo doesn't want to give
> > concrete orders on this issue because he knows
> that
> > his decission would make him unpopular to many.
> > Instead, he gives a few hints on what should be
> done
> > and lets other people, like Kelly Martin, to do
> the
> > work. Jimbo, either you want the userboxes removed
> --
> > and make it happen -- or you do not. Until you
> decide,
> > the userboxes should stay. Why should the
> community
> > busy itself on debating about this week after
> week,
> > and causing people to be more confused and
> frustated
> > about it?
> >
> > __________________________________________________
> > Do You Yahoo!?
> > Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam
> protection around
> > http://mail.yahoo.com
> > _______________________________________________
> > WikiEN-l mailing list
> > WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> > To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> >
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
> >
>
>
>
> --
> ~Ilya N.
> http://w3stuff.com/ilya/ (My website; DarkLordFoxx
> Media)
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Ilyanep (on
> Wikipedia)
> http://www.wheresgeorge.com - Track your money's
> travels.
> _______________________________________________
> 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: Stephen Bain

subject: [WikiEN-l] Improvements to diffs

body:
On 2/19/06, stevertigo <vertigosteve at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Red text in diffs is too hard to read. Maybe something
> like a blue-purple would be better.

You should be able to change this by using a custom stylesheet:
Edit your [[User:Stevertigo/monobook.css]], or create it if it doesn't
exist (I'm presuming you're using Monobook as your skin).

Then add something like this:

span.diffchange {
   color: #9966FF;
}

You can set the "color" [sic] attribute to whatever colour you want.

--
Stephen Bain
stephen.bain at gmail.com


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
--- Philip Welch <wikipedia at philwelch.net> wrote:

> > So basically what you're saying is because Jimbo
> Wales is busy running
> > things on the WMF board, then the userboxes should
> stay?
> >
> > That's a pretty weak argument.
> >
> > By your logic, if Jimbo can't write articles, why
> does he make us
> > do them
> > and then get in trouble with the press when
> controversial issues
> > arise? If
> > he can't do them himself, they should stay
> unwritten.
>
> I think his argument, (and if it isn't, it's
> possibly a stronger
> argument), is that it's not up to certain un-named
> admins to delete
> userboxes on Jimbo's behalf, based only on their
> interpretation of
> Jimbo's statements on the issue, because if Jimbo
> really wanted
> userboxes to go he'd say so.
>
> --
> Philip L. Welch
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Philwelch
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

That's the main argument. The other argument is that
Jimbo is using proxies to do his work, which would
otherwise make him a target of criticism. Not that he
isn't a target already, but it seems he wants to
redirect the criticism onto others.

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body:
Hmm...the only problem is that I see arguments over 'No, this goes into
Wikipedia:. No this goes in Community:. No no nonono! " ad nauseum

On 2/19/06, stevertigo <vertigosteve at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> There are three usages for a Community namespace:
> * a wiki namespace would be too redundant with
>   the Wikipedia namespace
> * a template namespace would also be redundant since
> most
>   community templates can be kept as subpages to a
>   wikipedia userbox template.
> * a category namespace would separate the use of the
>   category namespace for content, while still allowing
>
>   for quick access to particular subpage templates
>
> Editor:Stevertigo
>
> __________________________________________________
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> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

--
~Ilya N.
http://w3stuff.com/ilya/ (My website; DarkLordFoxx Media)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Ilyanep (on Wikipedia)
http://www.wheresgeorge.com - Track your money's travels.


body:
BTW, this is really ironic, because it is in fact my Yahoo! Account that
gets 10 spam messages *a day*. But i suppose that's off-topic :P

On 2/19/06, stevertigo <vertigosteve at yahoo.com> wrote:

__________________________________________________
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_______________________________________________

--
~Ilya N.
http://w3stuff.com/ilya/ (My website; DarkLordFoxx Media)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Ilyanep (on Wikipedia)
http://www.wheresgeorge.com - Track your money's travels.


list: foundation-l

from_name: SJ

subject:
[Foundation-l] [Wikitech-l] The sad story of training material
	to learn Farsi

body:
I don't know where to put this partly-finished text...  Three related thoughts:
1) One of the reasons given for speedily deleting Wikimania
proceedings from wikibooks without discussion was that some of the
content was not in English.  I do not think that having part of a book
intended for English-speaking readers in a foreign language should be
grounds for deletion.
2) The Farsi wikibook on the english wikibooks is just a set of links
deep into the fa.wikibooks book:   http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Farsi
  Perhaps we just need Farsi training materials in more languages to
help clarify where to put them all?  The book isn't /useless/ where it
is now unless would-be authors can't effectively edit it in place.
3)  The Farsi Wikipedia just passed 10,000 articles.  Congrats  :-)

SJ

On 2/18/06, GerardM <gerard.meijssen at gmail.com> wrote:

> The timing could have been worse; Brion is busy with the integration
> of the namespace manager. It is therefore possible to have pages in
> the fa.wikibooks that are specific for the Dutch language and pages
> specific for the English language. Alternatively we could have a
> namespace for Farsi content in the nl.wikibooks. This would mean


list: textbook-l

subject:
[Textbook-l] [Wikitech-l] The sad story of training material to
	learn Farsi


list: wikimedia-l


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
Dude, I don't know what he's doing behind the scenes,
but I can imagine that he's being 'The Boss'. That,
however, doesn't change anything in my argument. How
much do you know, tho? I think that as the founder of
Wiki, he should have worked A LOT more on articles. I
read that he made somewhere below 200 edits on
articles, and this is since 2001. That would make it
what? About 40 edits in 5 years? Less than four edits
per month? Sorry, but my opinion is that he should be
a role-model for other editors when it comes to
editing. This, however, is another debate. I hope you
didn't try to weaken my argument by changing the
subject and making me look naive. Even if I were
naive, the argument stands.

--- charles matthews <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com>
wrote:

> "STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA" wrote
>
> > not like he's doing something else -- like working
> on
> > articles.
>
> How much do you actually know about the set-up?
>
> Charles
>
> _______________________________________________
> 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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subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
He removed it because I wrote that Kelly shouldn't do
his [Jimbo's] dirty work. Now that I think of it, it
does sound a bit rude, but I don't agree that it was
trolling.

--- Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 2/19/06, STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA
> <wizzard_bane at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > I said the same thing on Kelly's talkpage, but
> > MegamanZero removed my message and warned to block
> me
> > for trolling.
> >
>
> If MegamanZero did that, he was wrong.  I'll check
> into it and have a
> chat with him about this--I'm his former mentor.
> _______________________________________________
> 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: Gregory Maxwell

body:
On 2/19/06, ?var Arnfj?r? Bjarmason <avarab at gmail.com> wrote:

> Where did you get that idea from? Did you read the discussion at
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Nofollow/Vote ?

Eh, several times in the last year I had the discussion in IRC with
several users. It was a frequent misunderstanding.

> I'm against using it it because:
>
> * Most of our pages are of high quality, and and as a result they
> generally accumulate high quality links, I'd like those links to show
> up more prominently in search engine results because it'll improve the
> quality of the web in general. Nofollow harms that in a small way.

Yes, in a small way. The obvious solution is for people to use
Wikipedia rather than search engines. :)  I'm not sure as sure as your
about the general quality of our links but in any case the goal is to
make a quality free encyclopedia, not improve search engines. ... And
leaving in a commercial incentive to crap on the encyclopedia doesn't
help our goals.

> * It isn't actually accomplishing anything, or very little. Since we
> turned it on on all wikis except the English Wikipedia it seems to me
> that the latter hasn't received any less linkspam.

Do you have any objective measurment of that. I know for a fact that
we've been targeted by at least one SEO group because of our lack of
nofollow.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
I don't think I'm wrong. I think that as if you're an
editor-in-chief for a newspaper, you should have
previously worked as a journalist. Or, if you're a
coach for a football team, you should have played the
sport. I just don't see where Jimbo fits into that
picture. Sure, he might be busy today, but in the dawn
of Wiki, when there were only a handful of editors,
I'm sure he could've found the time to work on a few
articles. He even could've started a few articles from
the scratch! But hey, there's nothing wrong with being
in the spotlight. I would trade with him!

--- charles matthews <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com>
wrote:

> "STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA" wrote
>
> >I think that as the founder of
> > Wiki, he should have worked A LOT more on
> articles.
>
> You have this so wrong.  Even if his position were
> like an editor of a
> newspaper - and in a sense it has become more
> complex than that, recently -
> there would be no need to write it himself.
>
> Charles
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> 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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subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
If you have something to say to me, just do so. Don't
try to provoke me with these pitty insults.

--- Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:

> Does anybody know how to killfile a thread in gmail?
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
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> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

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body:
I've already suggested that last year, as have others.

--- Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:

> I'd like to think that a community space would work,
> but I can only
> see it filling up with trolls, malcontents and
> timewasters.  If
> someone wants to start an external community wiki or
> forum for people
> who happen to use Wikipedia, it isn't very difficult
> to do.
> _______________________________________________
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> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
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> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

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from_name: John Lee

body:
Is it me, or does geni appear to disagree with nearly everything ever
proposed on the mailing list? Maybe he just likes playing devil's
advocate, but whenever I see something by geni, I immediately know it'll
disagree with someone somewhere. :)

John


body:
On 2/19/06, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
> Definitely a problem. Not a lot of useful input from Geni.
>
> Fred

Desent is now defined as non useful imput? You may not like me trying
to shoot down your ideas but it is better it is done here before
someone starts trying to put flawed ideas into practice.
--
geni


body:
Here you go:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Jimbo_Wales&diff=prev&oldid=30980689#We_should_have_forums.21

--- Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 2/19/06, STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA
> <wizzard_bane at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> I've seen a bloke with a hat with "Wizzard" written
> on it.
> _______________________________________________
> 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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subject: [Wikitech-l] wiki buttons design

body:
Alexander Bobrov wrote:
> This January I posted improved design for wiki buttons:
> http://tactics.indians.ru/tmp/wiki/wiki6.shtml and so on.
>
> But there are still no changes in Wikipedia interface.

As you'll recall, several people expressed a dislike for them and there was no
consensus in favor.

They don't seem to fit in to the MonoBook style any better than the current
ones; if anything they're more "3-d" and fit in worse, so I wouldn't recommend
including them.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

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from_name: Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason

body:
On 2/19/06, Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 2/18/06, Neil Harris <neil at tonal.clara.co.uk> wrote:
> > I understand the reason for not
> > having rel=nofollow in the article space;
>
> You do? I'm glad someone does, because all I know about thus far
> involves a misconception about *users* not being able to follow
> nofollow links.

Where did you get that idea from? Did you read the discussion at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Nofollow/Vote ?

I'm against using it it because:

* Most of our pages are of high quality, and and as a result they
generally accumulate high quality links, I'd like those links to show
up more prominently in search engine results because it'll improve the
quality of the web in general. Nofollow harms that in a small way.
* It isn't actually accomplishing anything, or very little. Since we
turned it on on all wikis except the English Wikipedia it seems to me
that the latter hasn't received any less linkspam.


from_name: Ilya N.

subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
So basically what you're saying is because Jimbo Wales is busy running
things on the WMF board, then the userboxes should stay?

That's a pretty weak argument.

By your logic, if Jimbo can't write articles, why does he make us do them
and then get in trouble with the press when controversial issues arise? If
he can't do them himself, they should stay unwritten.

On 2/19/06, STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA <wizzard_bane at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> I said the same thing on Kelly's talkpage, but
> MegamanZero removed my message and warned to block me
> for trolling.
>
> I think that you guys should stop doing Jimbo'w work.
> If he wants the userboxes gone, let him do it. It's
> not like he's doing something else -- like working on
> articles. I think that Jimbo doesn't want to give
> concrete orders on this issue because he knows that
> his decission would make him unpopular to many.
> Instead, he gives a few hints on what should be done
> and lets other people, like Kelly Martin, to do the
> work. Jimbo, either you want the userboxes removed --
> and make it happen -- or you do not. Until you decide,
> the userboxes should stay. Why should the community
> busy itself on debating about this week after week,
> and causing people to be more confused and frustated
> about it?
>
> __________________________________________________
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> Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
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> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
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> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

--
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http://w3stuff.com/ilya/ (My website; DarkLordFoxx Media)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Ilyanep (on Wikipedia)
http://www.wheresgeorge.com - Track your money's travels.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
Is this also a part of Jimbo's work? Someone was
blocked for 24-hours for keeping their userboxes on
ther userpage. Have a look:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3AKelly_Martin&diff=40345913&oldid=40338206

--- Guy Chapman <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:

> On Sun, 19 Feb 2006 13:24:20 -0800 (PST), you wrote:
>
> >I think that you guys should stop doing Jimbo'w
> work.
>
> We are all "doing Jimbo's work".  It's his project.
>
>
> Guy
> --
> http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
>
> "To every complex problem there is a solution which
> is
> simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken
>
> _______________________________________________
> 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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body:
On 2/19/06, Philip Welch <wikipedia at philwelch.net> wrote:
> This depends--context is everything. For instance, I'm libertarian,
> but I've edited [[Libertarianism]] because I like to pretend I know
> something about the subject. In the interest of full disclosure I
> might mention that I am libertarian, which might unknowingly color my
> contributions. If I edited a lot about politics (I don't), I might
> want to outright state, "Here are my biases, if they get in my way
> let me know and help me improve."

Not surprisingly, I see a big difference between *admitting* a bias,
and proudly *proclaiming* a bias.  Someone who recognises that their
bias is a problem is more likely to step back when told their edit is
not NPOV. Someone proud of their bias is more likely to accuse that
person of themselves having a bias.

> If someone's pushing a POV, you can tell from editing patterns alone.
> On the other hand, if someone is making valuable, good-faith, albeit
> biased contributions, it's a lot easier to assume good faith when
> they say straight out "here's my bias, if it shows in my
> contributions too much feel free to correct."

Yep. Do you think POV userboxes express that humility?

> This might surprise you, Steve, but people with a strong interest in
> something generally have an opinion about it too, and vice versa.
> People usually edit articles about their own interests, after all.

Yes...I don't have any intelligent response to make to this comment at
the moment. But I'll get back to you. :)

> Abortion in particular is the biggest issue where people's opinions
> tend to create blind spots. Pro-lifers tend to fail to understand and
> appreciate abortion-choice arguments while abortion-choicers tend to
> fail to understand and appreciate pro-life arguments, and no one
> seems willing to acknowledge that the other side holds their opinions
> in good faith. It's these blind spots which make it utterly crucial
> for us as editors to be open with one another about our biases so we
> can correct one another's mistakes.

What if the userbox was "People who believe in abortion are scum"? How
would you treat their edits then? Is there a liimt to how biased a
person can be and still make useful edits?

> > For the same reason that we don't allow strong POV usernames
> > (AntiAbortionCrusader etc), shouldn't we discourage stating of POVs on
> > userpages?
>
> Not if we want to get an encyclopedia written according to the
> neutral point of view.

Then shouldn't we allow strongly POV usernames?

Steve


from_name: Anthere

body:
- Essjay - wrote:
> For some time, there have been discussions of extending bot flagging to
> local bureaucrats. I recently asked some of the stewards about it, and
> received an overwhealming response from them in favor of doing so. I also
> spoke with Angela, who indicated it was her understanding that the proposal
> was waiting "for the code, not approval." Subsequently, I spoke with brion,
> who said that the code was there, it was simply a matter of the devs being
> told to implement it.
>
> It seems to me that (for once?) we have a proposal that just about everybody
> likes: Local communities get to make thier own decisions about bot flagging,
> and have them enacted locally, by someone who is familiar with the local
> rules and the given debate, and the stewards are relieved from what has
> become an unpleasant task. It also seems that both sides are waiting for
> each other, not realizing the other side is waiting for them!
>
> I'd love to see this proposal enacted sooner rather than later, so I'm
> asking: What do we need to do to get this done? Do the devs need an order
> from the Board? *pokes the Board* "The Devs need an order." Do the Board
> need to be made aware that the switch is ready to flip on thier word? *pokes
> the Devs* "The Board doesn't know it's ready to go."
>
> What next?
>
> Essjay

I think I have given subliminal messsages on this list, on the
foundation list and even on wikitech list, so that at least *my* opinion
is known on the matter. No need to poke me :-)

ant


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
Yes, exactly my point. Admins simply enjoy blocking
others due to whatever reason they mention. I checked
that user's userpage and I found nothing in disorder.
I also checked their history. It might be an ugly
userpage, but nothing more severe than that. I don't
see why he was blocked.

--- Guy Chapman <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:

> On Sun, 19 Feb 2006 15:34:04 -0800 (PST), you wrote:
>
>
>http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3AKelly_Martin&diff=40345913&oldid=40338206
>
> Oh, one more thing: the fact that Kelly found it
> necessary to take
> that action shows just how poisonous the whole issue
> is.  Right to
> wrong (and I make no judgment on that) the simple
> fact that the
> exchange took place is an indictment of the
> corrosive nature of the
> problem.
>
> Guy
> --
> http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
>
> "To every complex problem there is a solution which
> is
> simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken
>
> _______________________________________________
> 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: Sean Barrett

subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

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

STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA stated for the record:

> Is this also a part of Jimbo's work? Someone was
> blocked for 24-hours for keeping their userboxes on
> ther userpage. Have a look:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3AKelly_Martin&diff=40345913&oldid=40338206

Your statement of why he was blocked is incorrect, as anyone actually
reading the diff can see.

- --
 Sean Barrett     | Karaoke bars combine two of the nation's
 sean at epoptic.org | greatest evils: people who shouldn't
                  | drink with people who shouldn't sing.
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references:
<odchv19k1t565rf09726mtmbslqrfa8144@4ax.com>
	<20060219184237.61470.qmail@web32212.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
	<af9c32bf0602191152j7bfd4f7al22f97d7c8c8e7a97@mail.gmail.com>
	<af9c32bf0602191154x401c5839q18f64b8a2fbd609f@mail.gmail.com>
	<r9vhv1lgcldpsvac60gt9j4fcg8ao6vmdf@4ax.com>

body:
Well I keep clicking 'report as spam' and none of it ever gets
filtered (0% of my messages ever go into the bulk mail folder)

That's why I use gmail. I get about one spam a week and 0% has ever
touched my inbox

(slightly off topic again :\)

On 2/19/06, Guy Chapman <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
> On Sun, 19 Feb 2006 13:54:23 -0600, you wrote:
>
> >it is in fact my Yahoo! Account that gets 10 spam messages *a day*
>
> Is that all?  My spam filter currently discards over a quarter of a
> million spam messages daily!  But not all for my account...
>
> Guy
> --
> http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
>
> "To every complex problem there is a solution which is
> simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

--
~Ilya N.
http://w3stuff.com/ilya/ (My website; DarkLordFoxx Media)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Ilyanep (on Wikipedia)
http://www.wheresgeorge.com - Track your money's travels.


from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [Foundation-l] The sad story of training material to learn Farsi

body:
GerardM wrote:

>The material was created at http://wikibooks.org/wiki/Farsi. It was in
>the days when everything was still there. The original material had
>one basic flaw; it was written left to right while Farsi is written
>from left to right.  While working on this material, it struck me that
>it is really sad that you have to create teaching material that is as
>basic as this for every language.
>
I don't see anything sad about it at all.  It seems perfectly normal
that newbies to Farsi or any other subject would begin at this very
basic level.

>As we were creating the concepts for what was called "Ultimate
>Wiktionary" but what is currently known as WiktionaryZ, it came to me
>that we should not have the Dutch words there as the translation for
>the Farsi content, but that we should have the translation of the
>Farsi words in the language of the student. This would mean that
>everybody can use the material.
>
This is not a Wiktionary issue; it is a grammar issue.  It is about
deciding where the to put the line between vocabulary and how it is put
together to form a language.  These lessons should be in the Wikibook
for the student's own language, where the particularities of the target
language will be explained in a way that he understands.  As long as a
lesson is a mere word list nobody will be able to learn from it.

>Today I was asked by someone where the Farsi lessons were, somebody
>actually wants to use it.. This means that all this effort had people
>use it... It meant that all the pronunciations were going to be
>listened to... The material is not there anymore .. it is not useful
>anymore ..
>
The material is still there but most of the pages appear to have been
orphaned.  See [[Talk:Farsi]] for links when someone was asking about
what to do with the orphaned pages.  It was User 83.116.146.232
<http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?title=User:83.116.146.232&action=edit>
who copied all this material to the fa:wikibooks, and re-linked to it to
create all the orphans.  His effort was incomplete as he did not do this
with the later lessons.  He has not been seen since March of last year.

>I do not doubt that the people who worked on it intended well, but at
>this moment it is not Farsi / Dutch, it is not Farsi / English it is
>certainly unusable.
>
>The timing could have been worse; Brion is busy with the integration
>of the namespace manager. It is therefore possible to have pages in
>the fa.wikibooks that are specific for the Dutch language and pages
>specific for the English language. Alternatively we could have a
>namespace for Farsi content in the nl.wikibooks. This would mean
>however that we should be able to have a namespace that is oriented in
>a different direction from the other namespaces in a database. I do
>not know if we can do this already, I am sure however that we will
>want something like this for the right to left languages like Farsi in
>WiktionaryZ.
>
The lesson pages should likely have a mixed orientation, but primarily
in the orientation of the student's own language since that is where the
instructions will go.

>Now there is one practical question remaining; what will we do with
>the Farsi lessons in the fa.wikibooks that were originally intended to
>teach Dutch people Farsi.
>
Assuming that the situation in nl:wikibooks is similar to the English
one, the situation should be explained to the fa:community.  They then
should feel free to delete them based on their own rules.

Ec


from_name: Kelly Martin

subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
On 2/19/06, STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA <wizzard_bane at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Is this also a part of Jimbo's work? Someone was
> blocked for 24-hours for keeping their userboxes on
> ther userpage. Have a look:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3AKelly_Martin&diff=40345913&oldid=40338206
>
> --- Guy Chapman <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:

Uh, dear, I blocked him because he is currently disrupting Wikipedia
and he has declared his intent to continue disrupting Wikipedia.  I
haven't even looked at his user page; the words on my talk page were
enough to establish that his intent is contrary to the best interests
of the encyclopedia.

Kelly


from_name: Guy Chapman

body:
On Sun, 19 Feb 2006 07:31:08 -0000, you wrote:

>>But maybe the boxen are
>> good, in that they warn us to look out for bias from that editor.

>That would be excellent then: we would be able to waive 'assume good faith'
>for whole scads of editors we come across.  What a relief!  Maybe I have
>misjudged the little critters.

Maybe you haven't seen my userpage.  I freely admit to strong
opinions, when I edit articles on subjects on which I have strong
opinions, I do so in good faith and I am, to the best of my ability,
neutral - but I still have strong opinions, and that means it's best
if someone else has a look.

Strong opinions and good faith are absolutely not exclusive, and being
aware of the subconscious bias of another user is not the same as
failing to assume good faith.

Guy
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk

"To every complex problem there is a solution which is
simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken


from_name: Bryan Derksen

body:
geni wrote:
> On 2/19/06, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
>
>> Definitely a problem. Not a lot of useful input from Geni.
>> Fred
>>
>>
>
> Desent is now defined as non useful imput? You may not like me trying
> to shoot down your ideas but it is better it is done here before
> someone starts trying to put flawed ideas into practice.
>
You once accused me of violating WP:POINT for making a suggestion here
on this mailing list to extend AfD's duration from a week to thirty
days. That's more than just trying to "shoot down" my idea.


from_name: Kurt Maxwell Weber

subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

references:
<8fvhv1peh797pq1lvk7crf1r5pmbfllsvn@4ax.com>
	<20060219233404.52888.qmail@web52312.mail.yahoo.com>
	<eg0iv1pqvngn5gtegbrhr8r4v18cqhg135@4ax.com>

body:
On Sunday 19 February 2006 17:42, Guy Chapman wrote:
> Oh, one more thing: the fact that Kelly found it necessary to take
> that action shows just how poisonous the whole issue is.  Right to
> wrong (and I make no judgment on that) the simple fact that the
> exchange took place is an indictment of the corrosive nature of the
> problem.
>

Many (myself included) would argue that the problem doesn't exist because of
the userboxes, but because of certain individuals with a corncob up their
respective asses who have decided that they don't like userboxes, and thus
the proper solution is for those individuals to change their behavior rather
than do anything with userboxes themselves.

--
Kurt Weber
<kmw at armory.com>


from_name: charles matthews

body:
"Guy Chapman" wrote

>>That would be excellent then: we would be able to waive 'assume good
>>faith'
>>for whole scads of editors we come across.  What a relief!  Maybe I have
>>misjudged the little critters.
>
> Maybe you haven't seen my userpage.  I freely admit to strong
> opinions, when I edit articles on subjects on which I have strong
> opinions, I do so in good faith and I am, to the best of my ability,
> neutral - but I still have strong opinions, and that means it's best
> if someone else has a look.
>
> Strong opinions and good faith are absolutely not exclusive, and being
> aware of the subconscious bias of another user is not the same as
> failing to assume good faith.

Over in my corner, I'm strongly of the opinion that User Pages are to be
used in a confidence-building way.  That would of course be the confidence
of others in me, not my confidence in my own opinions, in own opinion of my
rigorous adherence to NPOV, my patriotism with respect to the great county
of Cambridgeshire, all that.   Given that we're supposed to leave many
things at the door, I don't really hold with giving other Wikipedians the
hat-check girl's view of me, when they may simply be curious as to who
corrected their typo.

I'm completely against having Wikipedia touched by the contention and
polarizing forces so obvious in the outside world.

Charles


subject: [WikiEN-l] Arbcom has completely lost its mind

body:
Philip Welch wrote:

>>>(Where rights
>>>come in is like this: if there's a law prohibiting having sex with
>>>men, and you're convicted of it, you can take it to an appeals court,
>>>and the court can decide that your constitutional right to privacy
>>>invalidates the law against having sex with men.)
>>>
>>>
>>How do women feel about the law against having sex with men?
>>
>>
>Yeah, I realized that halfway through, but decided to keep it in
>because "the law against having sex with men, but only if you happen
>to be a man yourself" was too long-winded.
>
A court could also decide that the only kind of sex that does not
violate the right to privacy is masturbation. ;-)

Ec


from_name: Gerard Meijssen

subject:
[Foundation-l] [Wikitech-l] The sad story of training material
 to learn Farsi

body:
Hoi,
The reason for the "deep linking" into the fa:wikibooks is because the
text needs to be right to left. This is essential when learning
languages like Farsi, Arab, Lori, or Hebrew. Me being the WiktionaryZ
guy, you should be able what the solution is to make this material
useful to people who speak English, Russian or Chinese ... Just add the
translations to the DefinedMeaning of for English, Russian Chinese or
whatever language.

Yes, we will need some software for that.. but given that we are slowly
but surely getting towards the editable GEMET stuff at
http://wiktionaryz.org the moment when this bit of functionality can be
written is also coming closer. This would allow us to have these lessons
just once. The "Multilingual MediaWiki" (see Meta for specs) will help
as well..

Thanks,
    GerardM

SJ wrote:
> I don't know where to put this partly-finished text...  Three related thoughts:
> 1) One of the reasons given for speedily deleting Wikimania
> proceedings from wikibooks without discussion was that some of the
> content was not in English.  I do not think that having part of a book
> intended for English-speaking readers in a foreign language should be
> grounds for deletion.
> 2) The Farsi wikibook on the english wikibooks is just a set of links
> deep into the fa.wikibooks book:   http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Farsi
>   Perhaps we just need Farsi training materials in more languages to
> help clarify where to put them all?  The book isn't /useless/ where it
> is now unless would-be authors can't effectively edit it in place.
> 3)  The Farsi Wikipedia just passed 10,000 articles.  Congrats  :-)
>
> SJ
>
> On 2/18/06, GerardM <gerard.meijssen at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>> The timing could have been worse; Brion is busy with the integration
>> of the namespace manager. It is therefore possible to have pages in
>> the fa.wikibooks that are specific for the Dutch language and pages
>> specific for the English language. Alternatively we could have a
>> namespace for Farsi content in the nl.wikibooks. This would mean


from_name: stevertigo

body:
The irony here is that you guys have spammed this
thread with off topic comment about spam. I thought my
suggestion was reasonably constructive and concisely
put. But putting things concisely doesnt resonate well
with people who like to tug on threads.

Steven

--- Guy Chapman <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:

> On Sun, 19 Feb 2006 13:54:23 -0600, you wrote:
>
> >it is in fact my Yahoo! Account that gets 10 spam
> messages *a day*
>
> Is that all?  My spam filter currently discards over
> a quarter of a
> million spam messages daily!  But not all for my
> account...
>
> Guy
> --
> http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
>
> "To every complex problem there is a solution which
> is
> simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] Well, it made me smile ...

body:
Tough sledding on this list recently.  Try this: [[fake orgasm]]  has
{{verify}}.

Charles


from_name: Matt Brown

body:
On 2/18/06, Steve Bennett <stevage at gmail.com> wrote:
>Matt Brown <morven at byz.org> wrote:
>> I think to a degree Wikipedia has reached that stage Usenet did, where
>> suddenly the influx of new people is beyond the rate at which they
>> tend to acclimate to the older culture.  There are so many newbies
>> that a newbie-culture can develop without having to join the existing
>> one.
>
> Is this true? It's a fairly bold statement...is there evidence for it?

Only anecdotally, and personal experience/feeling.  However, having
lived on Usenet before Things Changed, I get a "I've seen this before"
sense.

Not saying the result has to be the same, of course, but I think
things are changing here.

-Matt


body:
--- Steve Bennett <stevage at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 2/19/06, Ilya N. <ilyanep at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Hmm...the only problem is that I see arguments
> over 'No, this goes into
> > Wikipedia:. No this goes in Community:. No no
> nonono! " ad nauseum
>
> That's a fair point. And at the end of the day, why
> should there exist
> a "community"? WP:NOT explicitly discourages it...

I think JW's response to Angela was fairly
conciliatory on the basic nature of community is
itself based in expression. The issue then became one
about separation from content namespaces.

Im simply adding the little factor that the Category:
namespace shouldnt be used for community purposes
either. We already have a Wikipedia namespace which
can be used to encapsulate any community wiki pages.
So, assuming its just as easy to add a separate
Community: namespace, the issue is then what
functionality should it have? Templates can be
transcluded from subpages just fine. It then makes
sense to make a separate category table for the
community.

Steven

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


body:
Tony Sidaway wrote:

>On 2/19/06, Robert Merkel <robert.merkel at benambra.org> wrote:
>
>
>>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Science#Painless_suicide
>>
>>As a concerned human being, I would like to see if we can help to locate
>>this user ASAP and get them some help if at all possible (and assuming
>>they haven't acted already).
>>
>>
>The person here didn't ask for help of that kinds, and his comments,
>such as I read them, indicate that he's in a fairly rational frame of
>mind and, if he needs to, able to seek the help he needs.  Although
>this is a public page, I suggest that an approach consistent with
>Wikipedia's privacy policy is appropriate.  The Samaritans (a
>telephone befriending organization that originated in the UK) deal
>with calls of this nature every day, and there are similar
>organisations available 24/7 in many countries.  Their methodology, as
>I understand it, is similar to that of the confessional.  They'll
>listen and provide friendly advice, but they don't (except perhaps in
>exceptional circumstances) intrude.  This may be an appropriate model
>to adopt here.
>
We had one of these a couple of years ago, which was tracked down to a
private school in Connecticut.  Based on at least one of his previous
edits I suspect that this individual is in Canada, and we do have an
extensive network of suicide prevention help lines.  See
http://www.suicideinfo.ca/csp/go.aspx?tabid=77  for a series of phone
numbers.

A person whose suicide is imminent does not need to ask about painless
methods.  He has likely gone over that territory many times before, and
has already chosen his preferred method.

In some respects he is dealing with things rationally, and he is seeking
help, but by all appearances he does not know to whom he can turn.  The
unusual demands of his father suggest that that avenue is not open.  The
reactions that he anticipates if he should talk about his concerns may
in his mind be worse than suicide.  A person in his position is
concerned about being judged if he should reveal too much about
himself.  Even picking up the phone to call the local help line can be
thwarted by this fear.  Help lines, and other public agencies can be
intimidating, and many of them are judgemental.

There is a very limited amount that we can do in the wiki, but at least
we can give anonymity to his questions and the answers.  I believe that
there are situations where suicide is an appropriate course of action,
but the last thing he needs is a debate on the morality that attaches to
either side of the issue.  The needs are more personal than that.
There is nothing wrong with being willing to help, but who would
continue to do so  would remain his choice

Ec


body:
--- Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:

> I'd like to think that a community space would work,
> but I can only
> see it filling up with trolls, malcontents and
> timewasters.  If
> someone wants to start an external community wiki or
> forum for people
> who happen to use Wikipedia, it isn't very difficult
> to do.

While your fears may have some substance, again, a
hardline approach would appear to be entirely
anti-wiki and out of character for the reasonable
people who run this site. Keep in mind that a separate
namespace wouldnt exist just to separate content from
community --but to make pruning within the community
space easier by keeping it within community rules.

Regards,
Steve

__________________________________________________
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Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
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from_name: Jesse W

body:
Since you complained that no-one responded substantively to your
proposal; here's such a response, I hope.

The proposal seems to leave out the most important part - What Would We
Use A "Community namespace" for?  It seems like this should be at least
suggested, in a proposal suggesting creating one...  It claims "three
usages", but none of them are actually uses - they are rebuttals to
objections.  What are we to *use* it for?

On Feb 19, 2006, at 10:42 AM, stevertigo wrote:
> There are three usages for a Community namespace:
> * a wiki namespace would be too redundant with the Wikipedia namespace
This seems to a rebuttal to an objection to making a new namespace
called "Wiki:" - I've never heard anyone suggest this, so I'm not sure
why it's being rebutted.
> * a template namespace would also be redundant since most community
> templates can be kept as subpages to a wikipedia userbox template.
What template namespace?  The current namespace called "Template" has
obvious use - it's the way to have templates that don't have a
namespace in front of them.  Again, I can't really see what this has to
do with the proposal - I thought this was about a new namespace called
"Community", what does this have to do with templates?
> * a category namespace would separate the use of the category
> namespace for content, while still allowing for quick access to
> particular subpage templates
Huh?  Wait, now the proposal is to create a category namespace(other
than the one we already have)?  I thought it was to create a namespace
called "Community" (for what, it is never said).  Where is this
category stuff coming from?

If I were to speculate, I would think this had to something to do with
Userboxes, but due to the complete lack of any statements about what
this "Community" namespace would be used for, I can't really tell what.

Jesse Weinstein


body:
To answer your question about the context, I was
hoping to avoid using the term "userboxes." I never
liked the term user: anyway, and the last thing I want
to be is a  part of the cesspool that's been the
userbox threads.

Yes, it (the Community namespace category field) would
serve the modest purpose of being a kind of universal
panacea for the endless userbox thread disease.

Steven

--- Jesse W <jessw at netwood.net> wrote:

> Since you complained that no-one responded
> substantively to your
> proposal; here's such a response, I hope.
>
> The proposal seems to leave out the most important
> part - What Would We
> Use A "Community namespace" for?  It seems like this
> should be at least
> suggested, in a proposal suggesting creating one...
> It claims "three
> usages", but none of them are actually uses - they
> are rebuttals to
> objections.  What are we to *use* it for?
>
> On Feb 19, 2006, at 10:42 AM, stevertigo wrote:
> > There are three usages for a Community namespace:
> > * a wiki namespace would be too redundant with the
> Wikipedia namespace
> This seems to a rebuttal to an objection to making a
> new namespace
> called "Wiki:" - I've never heard anyone suggest
> this, so I'm not sure
> why it's being rebutted.
> > * a template namespace would also be redundant
> since most community
> > templates can be kept as subpages to a wikipedia
> userbox template.
> What template namespace?  The current namespace
> called "Template" has
> obvious use - it's the way to have templates that
> don't have a
> namespace in front of them.  Again, I can't really
> see what this has to
> do with the proposal - I thought this was about a
> new namespace called
> "Community", what does this have to do with
> templates?
> > * a category namespace would separate the use of
> the category
> > namespace for content, while still allowing for
> quick access to
> > particular subpage templates
> Huh?  Wait, now the proposal is to create a category
> namespace(other
> than the one we already have)?  I thought it was to
> create a namespace
> called "Community" (for what, it is never said).
> Where is this
> category stuff coming from?
>
> If I were to speculate, I would think this had to
> something to do with
> Userboxes, but due to the complete lack of any
> statements about what
> this "Community" namespace would be used for, I
> can't really tell what.
>
> Jesse Weinstein

__________________________________________________
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Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
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subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
"STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA" wrote

> not like he's doing something else -- like working on
> articles.

How much do you actually know about the set-up?

Charles


from_name: STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA

body:
So you're saying that you delete the boxes because you
don't like their presence? I don't buy that argument.
There must be a practical reason for not wanting them.

--- Kelly Martin <kelly.lynn.martin at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 2/19/06, Drini drini <wpdrini at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Still, no value being added for having an 8 word
> template over a frivolous
> > irrelevant topic. If people want to express
> themselves, they can do so by
> > WRITING their opinions on their userpages, and
> that will even let do so on
> > their own words not being restricted to 8 words.
> >
> > It's not like they're being censored. They can
> still talk about icecream
> > flavors on their userpages. (After all, isn't
> WRITING what we are all here
> > fore?). The problem is the unnecesary waste of
> resources by having the
> > template.
>
> I don't care about the resources.  It's the culture
> of having these
> "prefabricated opinion statements" for people to
> pick and choose from.
>  Pretty much everything on my user page COULD be
> reduced to a userbox.
>  But to do so is vile and repulsive, if you ask me.
>
> Kelly
> _______________________________________________
> 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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Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
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from_name: Tony Sidaway

subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
On 2/19/06, STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA <wizzard_bane at yahoo.com> wrote:
> I said the same thing on Kelly's talkpage, but
> MegamanZero removed my message and warned to block me
> for trolling.
>

If MegamanZero did that, he was wrong.  I'll check into it and have a
chat with him about this--I'm his former mentor.


body:
On Feb 19, 2006, at 9:37 PM, stevertigo wrote:
> To answer your question about the context, I was
> hoping to avoid using the term "userboxes." I never
> liked the term user: anyway, and the last thing I want
> to be is a  part of the cesspool that's been the
> userbox threads.
I understand the motive, having done it myself. (e.g.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JesseW/First_version_revert_proposal
)
> Yes, it (the Community namespace category field) would
> serve the modest purpose of being a kind of universal
> panacea for the endless userbox thread disease.

Ok, so now we can get into how this would work (or not) - AFAIK, we
already have a namespace for community pages.  That is, pages used by
the people writing the encyclopedia(the community) to discuss, plan,
organize, etc.  It's called the Wikipedia namespace.  And we have a way
to handle categories that are part of this namespace - they are
children of Category:Wikipedia administration.  We don't specifically
divide the template namespace this way, although we could.

So I'm not sure what the difference would be between what I described
above, and the proposed "Community" namespace.  Please explain this
difference further.

Thanks,
	Jesse Weinstein


from_name: geni

subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
On 2/19/06, STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA <wizzard_bane at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Dude, I don't know what he's doing behind the scenes,
> but I can imagine that he's being 'The Boss'. That,
> however, doesn't change anything in my argument. How
> much do you know, tho? I think that as the founder of
> Wiki, he should have worked A LOT more on articles. I
> read that he made somewhere below 200 edits on
> articles, and this is since 2001. That would make it
> what? About 40 edits in 5 years? Less than four edits
> per month? Sorry, but my opinion is that he should be
> a role-model for other editors when it comes to
> editing.

No we need someone to run the foundation (some decent finacial
modeling would be nice the last lot I saw had us haveing 10 times
yahoo's traffic within 2 years). Timewise running the foundation is
not compatible with dealing with the day to day issues on
en.wikipedia.

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
"STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA" wrote

>I think that as the founder of
> Wiki, he should have worked A LOT more on articles.

You have this so wrong.  Even if his position were like an editor of a
newspaper - and in a sense it has become more complex than that, recently -
there would be no need to write it himself.

Charles


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body: Does anybody know how to killfile a thread in gmail?


from_name: Minh Nguyen

subject: [Wikitech-l] Template magick?

body:
The Cunctator wrote:
> Is there some way to write a working template that does what I'd like
> it to do with this (nonworking) code?
>
> As of [{{<includeonly>subst:</includeonly>FULLPAGENAME|oldid={{REVISIONID}}}}
> this edit], this article uses content from {{{source}}}.
>
> This is from [[Template:GFDLSource]]
>
> As you can see, I'm trying to automatically stamp the article with a
> link to the current revision.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Archivebox> uses similar code,
but it only works if you subst: the template into a page. Getting
something like this to work without subst:'ing would be great for the
Vietnamese Wikipedia, though. We have a lot of places where we'd like to
have timestamps, but users don't ever remember to use the five squigglies.

--
Minh Nguyen <mxn at zoomtown.com>
AIM: trycom2000; Jabber: mxn at myjabber.net; Blog: http://mxn.f2o.org/


from_name: MacGyverMagic/Mgm

subject: [WikiEN-l] Unused userboxes

body:
A lot of them are being subst: into pages. So you won't be able to see
they're being used from the what links here of the template itself.

Mgm

On 1/7/06, Zzyzx11 at Wikipedia <zzyzx11 at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> Here's something that crossed my mind:
>
> As the number of userboxes continues to increase, I am starting to see a
> number of them that are currently NOT being used by ANYONE. So in a couple
> weeks from now, if these same userboxes are still not being used on any
> userpage, shouldn't they be put on TFD like any other unused, orphaned
> template? Why or why not?
>
> Zzyzx11 at en.wikipedia.org
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Zzyzx11
> zzyzx11 at hotmail.com
>
> _________________________________________________________________
> Don't just search. Find. Check out the new MSN Search!
> http://search.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200636ave/direct/01/
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


body:
I'd like to think that a community space would work, but I can only
see it filling up with trolls, malcontents and timewasters.  If
someone wants to start an external community wiki or forum for people
who happen to use Wikipedia, it isn't very difficult to do.


subject: [Wikitech-l] Non-Compliant Direct-Loader of Vietnamese Wikipedia

body:
The other day the Vietnamese Wikipedia community found a
Vietnamese-language search engine, Viet99 <http://www.viet99.com/wiki/>,
that is direct-loading the entirety of vi:, as evidenced by the
up-to-datednesss of
<http://www.viet99.com/wiki/?title=Special:Recentchanges> -- compare to
<http://vi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Recentchanges>.

The website uses <http://www.vacilando.org/index.php?x=7065>, a
direct-loading PHP script. The author of that script maintains a
poorly-behaved Wikipedia mirror at
<http://www.vacilando.org/index.php?title=Main_Page>. Unlike the
Vacilando mirror, though, Viet99 removes the script-provided references
to GFDL and slap on their own Google-provided advertising and copyright
statement: "Copyright 2005, Viet99. All rights reserved." They did keep
the part of the script that provides an edit link back to the real wiki,
but that's about it. Viet99 doesn't make it clear that the Wikipedia
content isn't actually their own work, and they make no effort to
explain what Wikipedia is; the only explanation is what we added at the
bottom of our main page to make sure that no Viet99 users get
misinformed about Wikipedia.

My understanding is that this is a violation of Wikipedia's terms of use
and the GFDL, and that they should be blocked. We could find no contact
information on their website, and a whois search revealed (presumably)
their host, A Theory <http://a-theory.com/>. I posted a message to IRC
and this mailing list the day we found out about this issue, but the IRC
message got ignored (probably the wrong time of day), and my previous
e-mail never made it through to the list.

Please consider blocking this direct-loader, because it's just adding to
Wikimedia's bandwidth for Viet99's own profit.

--
Minh Nguyen <mxn at zoomtown.com>
AIM: trycom2000; Jabber: mxn at myjabber.net; Blog: http://mxn.f2o.org/


body:
On 2/19/06, STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA <wizzard_bane at yahoo.com> wrote:

I've seen a bloke with a hat with "Wizzard" written on it.


body:
On Sun, 19 Feb 2006 19:40:48 -0000, you wrote:

>I'm completely against having Wikipedia touched by the contention and
>polarizing forces so obvious in the outside world.

So am I.  But I am not certain that userboxen are more than a symptom.
Some are clearly unacceptable, like the pedo one which was blatant
trolling, and I would be happy if there were a ruling that only boxes
strictly relevant to making an encyclopaedia were permitted (Babel
etc.) buy I don't think it does harm to tell people what our biases
are. ~~~~

Guy
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk

"To every complex problem there is a solution which is
simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken


body:
On Sun, 19 Feb 2006 13:54:23 -0600, you wrote:

>it is in fact my Yahoo! Account that gets 10 spam messages *a day*

Is that all?  My spam filter currently discards over a quarter of a
million spam messages daily!  But not all for my account...

Guy
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk

"To every complex problem there is a solution which is
simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
On Sun, 19 Feb 2006 13:24:20 -0800 (PST), you wrote:

>I think that you guys should stop doing Jimbo'w work.

We are all "doing Jimbo's work".  It's his project.

Guy
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk

"To every complex problem there is a solution which is
simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken


from_name: oscar

body:
On 2/19/06, - Essjay - <essjaywiki at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> For some time, there have been discussions of extending bot flagging to
> local bureaucrats. I recently asked some of the stewards about it, and
> received an overwhealming response from them in favor of doing so. I also
> spoke with Angela, who indicated it was her understanding that the
> proposal
> was waiting "for the code, not approval." Subsequently, I spoke with
> brion,
> who said that the code was there, it was simply a matter of the devs being
> told to implement it.
>
> It seems to me that (for once?) we have a proposal that just about
> everybody
> likes: Local communities get to make thier own decisions about bot
> flagging,
> and have them enacted locally, by someone who is familiar with the local
> rules and the given debate, and the stewards are relieved from what has
> become an unpleasant task. It also seems that both sides are waiting for
> each other, not realizing the other side is waiting for them!
>
> I'd love to see this proposal enacted sooner rather than later, so I'm
> asking: What do we need to do to get this done? Do the devs need an order
> from the Board? *pokes the Board* "The Devs need an order." Do the Board
> need to be made aware that the switch is ready to flip on thier word?
> *pokes
> the Devs* "The Board doesn't know it's ready to go."
>
> What next?
>
> Essjay
> -----
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Essjay
> Wikipedia:The Free Encyclopedia
> http://www.wikipedia.org/
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l

i'm all for it, it's a *go* afaik :-)

oscar


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
On Sun, 19 Feb 2006 15:34:04 -0800 (PST), you wrote:

>Is this also a part of Jimbo's work? Someone was
>blocked for 24-hours for keeping their userboxes on
>ther userpage. Have a look:

For some reason, some users seem to think that provocative userboxen
are perfectly acceptable.  They often cite "free speech" which is
fine, they are more than welcome to go to some other encyclopaedia
which guarantees free speech, but this is not that project.  Pissing
other editors off is a fact of life, going out of your way to do so
appears to me to fall somewhat sort of the accepted norms of the
project.  But what do I know?  It's Jimbo's project.

Guy
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk

"To every complex problem there is a solution which is
simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
On Sun, 19 Feb 2006 15:34:04 -0800 (PST), you wrote:

>http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3AKelly_Martin&diff=40345913&oldid=40338206

Oh, one more thing: the fact that Kelly found it necessary to take
that action shows just how poisonous the whole issue is.  Right to
wrong (and I make no judgment on that) the simple fact that the
exchange took place is an indictment of the corrosive nature of the
problem.

Guy
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk

"To every complex problem there is a solution which is
simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken


from_name: Steve Summit

subject: [WikiEN-l] This is an interesting one or even more userbox stuff

body:
geni wrote:
> [[User:MarkSweep]] then deleted the nomination...
> [[User:MarkSweep]] then proceeds to block [[User:CFIF]] (the
> nominator) for 48 hours...
> He wasn't warned. We treat outright vandles better than that.

If that's what really happened, this is starting to really suck.
I hate to sound like I'm siding with the userbox weenies (and I
hate to use terms like "siding with" at all; factionalism is
precisely what we're trying to *avoid* here), but I have to
agree with the sentiment that this campaign against divisive
userboxes is ending up being more divisive than the userboxes
themselves.  WP_IAR is one thing, but using it to quash
dissenting voices in a retaliatory way (and especially when what
the voices are dissenting against is a perception of that very
kind of highhandedness) is a sure sign of incipient corruption,
repression, and regression.  We shouldn't be acting this way.

When Jimbo made one of the userbox-motivated-factionalism-is-bad-
for-the-project statements which some admins are now hoisting up
on pennants, I think he explicitly mentioned that he didn't want
to see it get used as a battle-standard for a reign of terror.
I don't know what all's going on over at TfD, but I would urge
the admins to be as scrupulously diffident and fair in all of
this as, for example, we expect editors to be when grappling over
the POV issues in an article.

					Steve Summit
					scs at eskimo.com


body:
?? ??? wrote:
> --- Minh Nguyen <mxn at zoomtown.com> wrote?
>
>> The website uses
>> <http://www.vacilando.org/index.php?x=7065>, a
>> direct-loading PHP script. The author of that script
>> maintains a
>> poorly-behaved Wikipedia mirror at
>> <http://www.vacilando.org/index.php?title=Main_Page>.
>
> oh dear. If you use the Google search for phrase "using
> Wikipedia Reflection Script", you can see many more sites
> which are using this script :-(.
>
> TANAKA

Yes, but at least those websites are courteous enough to leave in credit
to the script's author... just think of the websites that, like Viet99,
relegate any mention of the reflector script to an obscure comment in
the source code.

--
Minh Nguyen <mxn at zoomtown.com>
AIM: trycom2000; Jabber: mxn at myjabber.net; Blog: http://mxn.f2o.org/


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
On Sun, 19 Feb 2006 15:48:59 -0800 (PST), you wrote:

> Admins simply enjoy blocking
>others due to whatever reason they mention.

You might want to rephrase that in more neutral terms.  Some if us are
admins.

Guy
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk

"To every complex problem there is a solution which is
simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken


body:
On 2/19/06, Drini drini <wpdrini at gmail.com> wrote:
> Still, no value being added for having an 8 word template over a frivolous
> irrelevant topic. If people want to express themselves, they can do so by
> WRITING their opinions on their userpages, and that will even let do so on
> their own words not being restricted to 8 words.
>
> It's not like they're being censored. They can still talk about icecream
> flavors on their userpages. (After all, isn't WRITING what we are all here
> fore?). The problem is the unnecesary waste of resources by having the
> template.

I don't care about the resources.  It's the culture of having these
"prefabricated opinion statements" for people to pick and choose from.
 Pretty much everything on my user page COULD be reduced to a userbox.
 But to do so is vile and repulsive, if you ask me.

Kelly


from_name: Steve Bennett

body:
On 2/19/06, Ilya N. <ilyanep at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hmm...the only problem is that I see arguments over 'No, this goes into
> Wikipedia:. No this goes in Community:. No no nonono! " ad nauseum

That's a fair point. And at the end of the day, why should there exist
a "community"? WP:NOT explicitly discourages it...

Steve


subject: [WikiEN-l] Unused userboxes

body:
On 2/19/06, Stan Shebs <shebs at apple.com> wrote:
> We're not like a provincial university where the local legislature
> has decreed that that everyone has to be accepted in regardless of
> ability. Given that we now have a surfeit of volunteers, perhaps we
> should be thinking about ways to gently raise the bar, rewarding
> the good editors while inducing the poor ones to find another wiki
> more in line with their talents.

We have a surfeit of volunteers? Maybe badly utilised volunteers, but
I see evidence of a lot of work to be done and not enough people to do
it.

Gripe for today: people who make one-word edits to badly written
articles. How do we get people to be very bold on budding articles,
without using "be bold" as an excuse to rewrite established articles
from scratch without consultation?

Steve


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
On 2/19/06, STEFAN CLAUDIU TIULEA <wizzard_bane at yahoo.com> wrote:
> I think that you guys should stop doing Jimbo'w work.
> If he wants the userboxes gone, let him do it. It's
> not like he's doing something else -- like working on

Yes, let's all just pick on Jimbo, rather than having a meaningful discussion.

Steve


from_name: brion at pobox.com

subject: [Wikitech-l] MediaWiki automated test run failure 2006-02-20

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

Running test BUG 361: URL within URL, not bracketed... FAILED!
Running test External links: invalid character... FAILED!
Running test Bug 2702: Mismatched <i> and <a> tags are invalid... FAILED!
Running test A table with no data.... FAILED!
Running test A table with nothing but a caption... FAILED!
Running test Link containing "#<" and "#>" % as a hex sequences... FAILED!
Running test Magic links: PMID incorrectly converts space to underscore... FAILED!
Running test Template with thumb image (wiht link in description)... FAILED!
Running test Link to image page... FAILED!
Running test BUG 1887: A ISBN with a thumbnail... FAILED!
Running test BUG 1887: A <math> with a thumbnail... FAILED!
Running test BUG 561: {{/Subpage}}... FAILED!
Running test Simple category... FAILED!
Running test Section headings with TOC... FAILED!
Running test Media link with nasty text... FAILED!
Running test Bug 2095: link with pipe and three closing brackets... FAILED!
Running test Sanitizer: Validating the contents of the id attribute (bug 4515)... FAILED!

Passed 268 of 285 tests (94.04%) FAILED!


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo and his strategy

body:
On 2/19/06, Kelly Martin <kelly.lynn.martin at gmail.com> wrote:
> Uh, dear, I blocked him because he is currently disrupting Wikipedia
> and he has declared his intent to continue disrupting Wikipedia.  I
> haven't even looked at his user page; the words on my talk page were
> enough to establish that his intent is contrary to the best interests
> of the encyclopedia.
>
> Kelly

1 user page is not wikipedia. Incerdentaly you missed his use of
[[Image:CA-NDP-2004-Logo.png]].
--
geni


from_name: Mark Williamson

subject: [Wikipedia-l] about Chinese Wikipedia

body:
I noticed specifically that these letters use the words "evil intent".
Does this refer to counterrevolutionary ideas and feelings, or
something else?

Mark

On 19/02/06, shi zhao <shizhao at gmail.com> wrote:
> February 20, Washington Post about Chinese Wikipedia Series:
> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/19/AR2006021901335.html
>
> And unblok for zh wp letter appealing:
>
>
> *
> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/19/AR2006021900851.html
>
> *
> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/18/AR2006021800672.html
>
> --[[zh:user:shizhao]]
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>

--
"Take away their language, destroy their souls." -- Joseph Stalin


from_name: Snowspinner

body:
On Feb 19, 2006, at 5:58 PM, Tony Sidaway wrote:

> I'd like to think that a community space would work, but I can only
> see it filling up with trolls, malcontents and timewasters.  If
> someone wants to start an external community wiki or forum for people
> who happen to use Wikipedia, it isn't very difficult to do.

Wikipedia Review?

-Phil


from_name: Philip Welch

body:
> Actually my main problem with posts by "geni" is that they seem to
> have this
> strange aversion to spell-checking, and grammar seems to be optional.
>
> I actually find it difficult to read these messages because of the
> strangely
> spelt words, sometimes to the extent that the message states the
> **opposite** of what is meant (which is only discernable after some
> careful
> thought).
>
> Whether "geni" can spell or not I have no clue, but there is no
> sign of such
> ability on the mailing list. Whether or not "geni" can operate a
> spell-checker or not, I similarly have no clue: there is no sign of
> such
> ability here on the mailing list.
>
> After a bit I reach the point where I don't even bother trying to
> make out
> what "geni" wants to say: I simply click on to the next message.
>
> HTH HAND

My main problem with posts by "Phil Boswell" is that they contain
gratuitous unsolicited commentary on other people. No one cares what
you think about anyone, so just Sierra Tango Whiskey Foxtrot. Thanks.

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


from_name: Alexander Bobrov

subject: [Wikitech-l] wiki buttons design

body:
Hi,

This January I posted improved design for wiki buttons:
http://tactics.indians.ru/tmp/wiki/wiki6.shtml and so on.

But there are still no changes in Wikipedia interface.

Who can include them in the current build and when we can see them?

P.S.
To help you, I cut the new artwork down into 11 image files [23x24 png].

http://tactics.indians.ru/tmp/wiki/wiki7.shtml

If you need the extended design implementation (not just buttons, but
along with background, as in http://tactics.indians.ru/tmp/wiki/wiki6.shtml)
- send me original PHP/HTML for &action=edit and I'll rewrite it.

Alex Bobrov____________________________________________
Indian Summer Studio                 http://indians.ru/

......................................................................
Minds are like parachutes, they only work when open.
......................................................................

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


body:
On 2/20/06, Bryan Derksen <bryan.derksen at shaw.ca> wrote:
> geni wrote:
> > On 2/19/06, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
> >
> >> Definitely a problem. Not a lot of useful input from Geni.
> >> Fred
> >>
> >>
> >
> > Desent is now defined as non useful imput? You may not like me trying
> > to shoot down your ideas but it is better it is done here before
> > someone starts trying to put flawed ideas into practice.
> >
> You once accused me of violating WP:POINT for making a suggestion here
> on this mailing list to extend AfD's duration from a week to thirty
> days. That's more than just trying to "shoot down" my idea.

Hmmm neither WP:POINT AFD or WP:POINT 30 days seems to produce any
relivant emails in my inbox. So without being certian of the context I
can't comment.

--
geni