list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Berto

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Monobook

body:
Hi!

I am in the process of importing templates into pms. Yet we appear to have
no "infobox bordered" class in our monobook. Is there any standard source I
can get it from? Also, how do I edit the monobook.css file? The "system
messages" special page does not show it, it only shows a comment to it. Do I
just add stuff there?

Berto


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [WikiEN-l] Are phone books reliable sources?

body:
Anthony DiPierro wrote:

>On 6/2/06, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
>
>
>>Steve Bennett wrote:
>>
>>
>>>On 6/1/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>>No, it doesn't.  However, it does mean that a phone book isn't a
>>>>*reliable* source.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>I don't think it's ever been stated that Wikipedia only incorporates
>>>material from known, infallible sources. Our minimum requirements are
>>>much more vague however - words like "reliable" and "verifiable" get
>>>used a lot, but with no clear definition.
>>>
>>>Given that, providing the source of all information and taking steps
>>>not to ridiculously misuse sources (eg, quoting speculative material
>>>
>>>
>>>from a tabloid and presenting it as established fact), is what we
>>
>>
>>>should be aiming for. So far, we're not even close.
>>>
>>>
>>I essentially agree.  Some people still argue that Wikipedia itself is
>>not a reliable source.  On the other hand "Scientific American" for this
>>month used [[Sudoku]] as a reference in an article on the same subject.
>>
>>
>Wikipedia *isn't* a reliable source.  I certainly don't think it
>should be used as a reference in another encyclopedia article.
>
>Unless Scientific American was using the Wikipedia article for a
>trivial piece of information which is already obvious, I think they
>made a big mistake.  Even Jimbo has said that Wikipedia shouldn't be
>used, for instance, as a reference in an academic paper.
>
It's not Jimbo's call.  It's up to the editorial staff of the magazine
that is considering use of the Wikipedia material.  We use references to
the 1911 Britannica.  They may be out of date, but for some subjects
they are as accurate as anything else.

Ec


from_name: Jimmy Wales

subject:
[WikiEN-l] cancelation of the deletion review of the satanism
 userbox

body:
Molu wrote:
> This is what I was talking about. When admins consider themselves
> empowered to completely ignore community consensus on the ground "I
> know better". The userbox debate has provided the highest amount of
> this shit, with admins speedying templates kept the day before at
> TfD. Don't give me that crap about best interests of the
> encyclopedia, it's subjective and you have no right to overrule
> community by the virtue of being an administrator. This makes me
> sick. Thankfully someone with good sense has restored the debate.

For me, "the community" means "the community of people here to build a
high quality encyclopedia in a spirit of mutual respect and love," not
"the community of whoever happens to show up and make a userbox."

Now, respect and love means taking it easy on people who think that
"this user is a satanist" is a good userbox, but it also means making
sure they understand that this is Not How We Behave.

--Jimbo


from_name: George Herbert

subject:
[WikiEN-l] cancelation of the deletion review of the satanism
	userbox

body:
On 6/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:

> I don't have an attitude problem.  I don't have to piss people off.
> However it seems to me that some people are queuing up to be pissed
> off over trivia.  There is no substance to the complaint.
>
> And that is quite a different situation.
>

It's not trivia to them, Tony.

Whether in the greater scheme of things it's a trivial matter, whether what
you're doing is the best course for WP in the long term... don't matter.

The way you're approaching the problem is pissing people off.  Other admins
aren't pissing people off over this probem.  It's gotten bad enough that
someone RfC'ed you over it.

Purity of heart and the best of intentions for the long term interests of WP
don't justify abusing people.  The ends don't justify the means.  They
particularly don't justify the means over such a trivial matter.

--
-george william herbert
gherbert at retro.com / george.herbert at gmail.com


list: textbook-l

subject: [Textbook-l] Use of this mailing list...

body:
Lord Voldemort wrote:
> Just wondering if this list gets very much use.  Any ideas?  Wouldn't
> this be the appropriate place for the whole "game guides" discussion?
> Thanks.

It would be great for me if it were, since I get a ton more work done
when I am offline than when I am online.


list: foundation-l

from_name: Anthony DiPierro

subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed

body:
On 6/4/06, Anthere <Anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Anthony DiPierro wrote:
> > On 6/3/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> >
> >>I agree completely.  But when we post everything we can publicly, have
> >>open meetings, have community committees, and then people don't read it,
> >>well, I don't agree that this is "being cut off".
> >>
> >
> > A list of resolutions which have passed, in most cases without vote
> > counts or any other information, with pending resolutions not even put
> > into the view for months, is not "everything you can publicly".
> >
> > In fact, I asked your CFO over a year ago for a copy of the latest
> > 990, which is by law publically available and the IRS recommends for
> > it to be posted on the foundation's website.  I have received nothing
> > other than the very first 990-EZ which has finally arrived on the
> > Guidestar website.  You haven't posted everything you can publicly.
> > Not even close.
>
> Not the CFO fault :-)
>
I know.  The CFO told me he didn't even have the document yet, even
though it had already been filed.  Looking up the dates, the fiscal
year ended June 30, 2004, the 990-EZ was originally due on November
15, 2004, assuming two extensions were granted it was then due by May
15, 2005, it's dated April 1, 2005 (ha), it was stamped as received by
the IRS on June 28, 2005, the CFO still didn't have a copy of it on
August 6, 2005, and on June 6, 2006 the document still isn't posted
anywhere on the foundation website (though it is now available through
Guidestar).

> Our fiscal year run from june to june. The Foundation was created in
> 2003, but I am not sure the 990 2003 would make much sense to you. I
> never saw it myself, though I was told my name appeared on it.

Your name and what seems to be your address.

On or about January 6, 2006 I found a copy on the Guidestar website.
I uploaded it to Wikimedia commons, and Delphine M?nard deleted it.
There was talk at that point about blacking out the officer addresses
"and SSNs" (which I put in quotes because the document on Guidestar
doesn't have any SSNs in it; it contains the EIN of the organization
which is public knowledge and can be found on Florida's corporate
information site) and uploading it to the foundation site.  This was
supposedly taken to the internal mailing list.

> The 990 of 2004 was only recently sent. It actually contains some errors
> which should be fixed soon. Since it is a public document, I suppose we
> can put it on Foundation website once fixed? Or add a link if it is
> available somewhere on the web ? Will check that.
> As for the 990 2005, it is too early for it to exist.
>
> Ant
>
I certainly would like a copy, and I'd rather not wait for Guidestar
to get around to scanning it in first.  Additionally, if the
organization is at all interested in transparency posting a copy of
the latest 990s on the foundation website would be the appropriate
response.

Anthony


list: wikimedia-l

subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed


from_name: Steve Bennett

subject: [WikiEN-l] To: Jimmy Wales - Admin-driven death of Wikipedia

body:
On 6/4/06, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
> Wrong, going through Jayjg's posts would not show a "pattern of
> extreme POV pushing". It would show a few instances of POV edits.
> There is a huge difference. I have criticized Jayjg sharply but what
> you are saying is not based on his record. It is a gross exaggeration.

Formal definition of "POV pushing" required. Anyone?

Steve


body:
Andrew Gray wrote:
> The world outside Wikipedia, with which I have a great deal of contact
> through the joy that is OTRS, generally fails to understand that the
> Foundation does not write the entire damn encylopedia itself.

Progress is being made, then.  They used to assume I wrote the whole
thing myself.  Now, they have begun to grasp that this might be the work
of, hmm, 3 or 4 people at least? ;-)


from_name: James D. Forrester

body:
Steve Bennett wrote:

> Formal definition of "POV pushing" required. Anyone?

Yes, oh yes, absolutely, yes please. Let's wikilawyer ourselves to
death, defining anything and everything to maximal precision and minimal
accuracy. I can't wait.

Yours sincerely,
--
James D. Forrester
Wikimedia : [[W:en:User:Jdforrester|James F.]]
E-Mail    : james at jdforrester.org
IM (MSN)  : jamesdforrester at hotmail.com


subject: [WikiEN-l] Types of categories

body:
On 6/4/06, Roger Luethi <collector at hellgate.ch> wrote:
> On Sun, 04 Jun 2006 18:07:15 +0200, Steve Bennett wrote:
> > That actually seems to fix the problem. I saw this with The Beatles
> > for example. John Lennon was in category "The Beatles" (thematic), and
> > that category was in "British rock bands" (taxonomic), leading to the
> > conclusion that Lennon was a British rock band.
>
> It's mostly scripts that get confused. I suspect most normal users won't be
> confused but find that convenient.
>
> Say I navigated down to "British rock bands" (taxonomic), discover The
> Beatles and would like to see what WP has got on them. With the proposed
> system, I need to open the article, scroll down to the bottom -- nope, if
> there is a category for them, the article can't be in it, so scroll back up
> several pages worth of navigation boxes, external links, and references to
> spot the "See also" section which hopefully contains a link to the category
> "The Beatles" if there is one.
>
> I'm not sure we can convince people that it's a win overall.
>
You could always put "See also: [[:Category:The Beatles]]" (I think
that's the syntax) in the  description for [[Category:British rock
bands]].


from_name: Jesse W

body:
On Jun 4, 2006, at 6:48 PM, Tony Sidaway wrote:
> On 6/5/06, George Herbert <george.herbert at gmail.com> wrote:
>> On 6/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>> It's not trivia to them, Tony.
>
> That is the problem in a nutshell.  Their signatures on a discussion
> page are more important than the aims of improving the readability and
> ease of editing on the  discussion page.  Their lack of perspective is
> thus a problem for Wikipedia.
Certainly.  But you pissing them off *does not solve the problem.*
That is the problem with your approach, in a nutshell.  As you said,
the lack of readability of the discussion page is not the problem -
certain editors "lack of perspective" is the problem.  You pissing off
those editors is not going to change their "lack of perspective".

Jesse Weinstein


body:
Anthony DiPierro wrote:

>On 6/2/06, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
>
>
>>Anthony DiPierro wrote:
>>
>>
>>>On 5/31/06, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>>And we
>>>>haven't even mentioned the usefulness of the yellow pages in
>>>>establishing the existence of a business over a time frame.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>>It's even easier to put false information into the yellow pages section.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>So?  That doesn't mean that every entry has false information.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>No, it doesn't.  However, it does mean that a phone book isn't a
>>>*reliable* source.
>>>
>>>
>>That conclusion is not logical..If you are going to be imposing such
>>strict criteria on one kinde of publication you should be applying these
>>criteria to them all.  Very few publications would pass your test of
>>reliability.
>>
>>
>What other reliable publications are there that are easy to put false
>information into?  I don't think we should consider as reliable
>sources wikis, or random Internet websites, or the newspaper
>classifieds sections either.
>
>There are millions of academic publications - ones that actually
>attempt to verify the information they publish.  To call that "very
>few" is ludicrous.
>
I am perhaps less willing than you to idolize the "peer-reviewed"
academic publications.  There have certainly been recent instances where
medical publications with very high repute like the New England Journal
of Medicine have had to print retractions because of bad material that
was supplied to them.  Doing a full scale peer review, especially in the
sciences can be an expensive undertaking.  Who pays for that?  Even
sending someone to review the author's source data is expensive.  Once
you have somebody there, establishing that the data was cooked amounts
to undertaking a forensic audit.  Even governments prefer to believe the
self-evaluations provided by pharmaceutical companies.  If things are so
shaky in such a crucial area as medicine, one can only wonder about less
important subjects.  Maybe the whole peer review process is a myth, and
wikis have a greater potential for effective peer review.

At least if the "National Enquirer" reports that as a result of a
Hollywood startlet's friendliness with her German shephard she gave
birth to a "humadog" I know that they are the ultimate authority on such
matters, and I better not waste my time looking for peer reviews.

Ec


body:
On 6/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 6/5/06, George Herbert <george.herbert at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 6/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> > It's not trivia to them, Tony.
>
> That is the problem in a nutshell.  Their signatures on a discussion
> page are more important than the aims of improving the readability and
> ease of editing on the  discussion page.  Their lack of perspective is
> thus a problem for Wikipedia.
>

Your solution is to simply piss them off, which eventually gets you RfC'ed
and/or drives them away.

Other editors approach porblems of this ilk with discussions, friendly
requests on talk pages, new policy proposals.  And only resort to nuclear
efforts for serious and sustained crisis situations.

It doesn't matter if the problem is their signatures.  You need to treat
them better.  And that's your problem, not theirs.

--
-george william herbert
gherbert at retro.com / george.herbert at gmail.com


body:
On 6/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:

> Well obviously I don't know I'm going to piss someone off until I do.

Oh, please.  This stretches credulity.  Surely you've noticed the pattern by
now.

--
-george william herbert
gherbert at retro.com / george.herbert at gmail.com


subject: [WikiEN-l] Types of categories

body:
On 6/4/06, Roger Luethi <collector at hellgate.ch> wrote:
> On Sun, 04 Jun 2006 11:31:02 -0400, Anthony DiPierro wrote:
> > Once the software is written to compute intersections of categories
> > within the Mediawiki software, it would be relatively simple to
> > recategorize the articles into their parent categories, such that no
> > information was lost.  The way this would be done is that all articles
> > in a subcategory which had multiple parent attribute categories would
> > be automatically moved into the parent categories.  This would be
> > repeated until no such situations continued to exist.  The ad-hoc
> > structure could still be kept, but it could be calculated on the fly
> > (along with new types of intersections which could be easily added).
>
> So instead of in the category "Bridges in France", the "Pont du Gard" would
> now be in the categories "Bridges" and "France"!?
>
No, it'd be in "Bridges" and "Buildings and structures in France".

> > (Now that I do this on an example, I see that this algorithm would
> > probably have to be tweaked to deal with subcatgories of
> > [[Category:Categories by topic]], but that's not too bad.)
>
> I suspect there are more corner cases than we imagine.
>
I'm not sure, but I have downloaded the latest db to start playing with this.

> > > For instance, how do you connect the districts of Paris to the category
> > > Paris? What is a subset of the parent attribute "Paris": "Districts of
> > > Paris", or "Quartier Latin", or neither? Does it bother you if the article
> > > on a French district is now in a subcategory of "Capitals in Europe"?
> > >
> > [[Category:Paris]] is a theme, not an attribute, so [[Category:Paris]]
> > should not be a subcategory of [[Category:Capitals in Europe]].
>
> One problem I'm seeing here is that your proposal focuses on one single
> type of hierarchies. Paris, France, Europe are now all themes. So if I
> ask for an intersection of categories "Bridges" and "France", the results
> include bridges that for any reason are related to the "France" theme.
> There is no way to ask for Bridges in France, or Paris.
>
We could always make "Buildings and structures in France" a
subcategory of "Stuff in France".  But you're right, it's not quite as
clean as I had expected.

I wonder though if this is just another aspect of the
[[Category:Categories by topic]] issue.

> One solution would be to create "is part of" or "is in" categories in
> addition to the "is a" categories. Then you can have a hierarchy with "Pont
> du Gard" -> "France" -> "Europe", or "cylinder" -> "engine" -> "car".
>
> We'd have two indepent types of categories, plus a third, the catch-all
> "theme".
>
> > > female human beings and your example [[Category:Feminine hygiene]]? How
> > > about [[Category:Women's rights]]? Add an umbrella cat "Somehow related to
> > > women" maybe?
> >
> > [[Category:Women]] could be a subcategory of [[Category:Woman]].
>
> Heh. Looking at [[Category:Women]], it's now a subcat of both
> [[Category:People]] and [[Category:Humans]].
>
The latter should probably be [[Category:Humanity]] :).

Here's another fun fact.  [[Category:Humans]] is a subcat of
[[Category:People]].  Ick.

And now that I look at it, [[Category:Humans]] is also a subcat of
[[Category:Apes]] (presumably a theme).  'Course that wouldn't have
interested me if I was acquainted with the terminology that "humans"
are "apes" :).

OK, this plural/singular thing probably isn't going to work.

> > mistakes all over again.  The advantage of my proposal to not allow
> > themes as subcategories of attributes is that it can be implemented
> > today, without much disruption, and without modifying any code.
>
> What I missed in your proposal is how you retain existing theme
> information. Duplicate categories in a theme namespace?
>
> Roger

Yeah.  So if [[Category:Humans]] was a theme and an attribute, we'd
split it into [[Category:Humans]] (the attribute) and
[[Category:Humanity]] (the theme), or something.

I suppose the plural/singular thing is still useful as a rough
guideline.  If things are kept separated it doesn't have to be
followed strictly.

Anyway, I'm starting to think things are too far gone by now.  Might
as well just wait for the features first and then start reorganizing
things.  But I've got a little bit of hope, and my import script of
the downloaded data is still running.

Anthony


from_name: Rob

subject: [WikiEN-l] Oddball question

body:
On 6/3/06, John Lyden <rasputinaxp at gmail.com> wrote:
> I recently indef-banned another sock of ENorcross (See
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#Indef_ban_of_Almost_Famous
> at AN/I) and requested a checkuser. Eric has decided (in addition to
> posting personal information to my talk page in a...somewhat
> threatening manner, see its deletion log) to correspond with me
> through myspace. In addition to a message he sent me at 4:16AM EDT
> saying that "wikipedia has you whipped, boy", he sent the following
> via myspace:

I've had some dealings with him and while he is extremely offensive
and tempermental, Eric can be reasonable and even apologetic at times.
 If you wish I can attempt to discuss this with him via email.


from_name: Guy Chapman aka JzG

subject: [WikiEN-l] Time to start discussing solutions?

body:
On Sun, 4 Jun 2006 11:27:13 -0400, you wrote:

>Actually, you appear to be a classic example of the much more common
>kind of "admin-abuse"; that is, difficult editors abusing admins who
>have been far too patient with them to begin with.

That is a much more concise (and polite) version of what I was going
to say.  Policy advice from indef-blocked POV pushers is one of the
many things we don't need.

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] status qou vs reform

body:
On Sun, 4 Jun 2006 16:58:41 +1000, you wrote:

>Userbox policies will never actually gain consensus. In the end Jimbo
>will actually enforce his stated view, but the example isn't as bad as
>you make it out to be.

I'd say the consensus was that Jimbo Is Always Right :-)

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


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Aww, so cute,
 a banned user is trying to take us down with a DMCA
 notice	(Forwarded email)

body:
geni wrote:

>On 6/2/06, Death Phoenix <originaldeathphoenix at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>>On 6/2/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Wait untill you see some try to claim you can't deleted stuff claimed
>>>as fair use becuase that consitutes giving legal advice.
>>>
>>>
>>[[WP:BEANS]] ;-)
>>
>>
>Doesn't apply becuase it has already been tried:
>
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Copyright_problems#A_proposal
>
Simply giving legal advice is not the practice of law.  Practice would
require doing it as some kind of business.

Ec


subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed

body:
On 6/4/06, Anthere <Anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Anthony DiPierro wrote:
> > On or about January 6, 2006 I found a copy on the Guidestar website.
> > I uploaded it to Wikimedia commons, and Delphine M?nard deleted it.
>
> Copyrighted ?
>
No, the reason given was "this is obsolete, and certainly not to be
uploaded on Commons."
http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ALog&type=delete&user=&page=Image%3AWikimedia+990+2004.pdf

In a couple emails the rationale was given that the address was
incorrect (IIRC the original foundation address was the same as
Jimbo's home address), that such documents are official, and that they
have no place on the commons (which is "supposed to be a media
repository, not really a place for such official documents").  My
response was that "I really don't care where you put it."  I also said
that "if someone provides me with a copy with the officer address
information blacked out, I won't personally distribute the copy with
the address information included.  I don't personally care about the
addresses."  (though I did find the purchase price of Jimbo's
residence mildly interesting)  Anyway, I never got a copy with the
address info blacked out.

> > There was talk at that point about blacking out the officer addresses
> > "and SSNs" (which I put in quotes because the document on Guidestar
> > doesn't have any SSNs in it; it contains the EIN of the organization
> > which is public knowledge and can be found on Florida's corporate
> > information site) and uploading it to the foundation site.  This was
> > supposedly taken to the internal mailing list.
>
> I have no memory of that discussion... which does not prove it did not
> take place...
> Dunno what are SSN's and EIN...
>
SSNs are social security numbers, which are generally considered to be
sensitive personal information.  For most living people they're hard
to obtain, though many CEOs of publically traded corporations had
their SSN published on the SEC website (a US government organization
website) up until about 1999.

EINs are employer identification numbers.  They are essentially the
corporation equivalent of the SSN, but they are not considered to be
sensitive information.  Most states, including Florida, publish the
EINs of all corporations on their websites.

Anthony


subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] HTML normalization, transclusions, nesting

body:
Nick Jenkins wrote:
> [Brion Vibber wrote] :
>> First paragraph
>>
>> Second paragraph
>
> Just thinking aloud, but could this be made equivalent to:
>
> ==============================
> '''First paragraph
>
> Second paragraph
> ==============================

Well, what do you mean by "equivalent to" here?

Wiki bold/italics (with ''...'' and '''...''') are handled on per-line basis
currently, cut off at the end of the line. This means that within a single
paragraph we can have:

  normal'''bold
  normal

which converts to output:

normalbold

So what's the desired behavior for this input:

  normalbold
  ?????

Should it close off the inline tag at the end of the paragraph:

normalbold
  ?????

or at the end of the line?

normalbold
  ?????

Further what about the interaction between  and ''' used together? Are they
separate? How should we treat something like this:

  bold'''????'''????

The most sensible probably is to continue thinking of  and ''' as distinct
items, resulting in output like this:

  bold????????

The nested bolds are perfectly legal, if pointless. :)

It would probably *not* make sense to treat that as equal to:

  '''bold'''????'''????'''

which would render as:

  bold????????

To return to the original question: to do that, we probably need to know where
the paragraph boundaries are at the time HTML normalization is done. That
probably means either doing block level conversion to HTML *before*
normalization, or doing them together in one pass.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

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body:
On 6/4/06, James D. Forrester <james at jdforrester.org> wrote:
> Steve Bennett wrote:
>
> > Formal definition of "POV pushing" required. Anyone?
>
> Yes, oh yes, absolutely, yes please. Let's wikilawyer ourselves to
> death, defining anything and everything to maximal precision and minimal
> accuracy. I can't wait.

Currently there seems to be confusion over the term. Maybe you could
just answer these questions instead:
* does POV pushing have to be intentional?
* does POV pushing have to be in bad faith?
* is someone who is genuinely correcting bias in an article "POV pushing"?
* is someone who *thinks* they're doing the above (but is actually
introducing bias) "POV pushing"?
* is systematically adding examples of your own country, culture,
religion, language etc to a wide range of articles "POV pushing"?

Thanks,
Steve


from_name: Anthere

subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed

body:
Jimmy Wales wrote:
> Anthony DiPierro wrote:
>
>>By the way, you still haven't answered who made the proposal to
>>install you as President.
>
>
> I explained it fully.  The resolution was proposed when it seemed that
> we might need something simple to show the German courts.  When that
> became unnecessary, we never bothered to complete it.
>
> I would not even call it a "proposal".  It was in the drafting stages. I
>  do not remember now who wrote what was there... possibly it was me.
>
> --Jimbo

I confirm. It was you.

Ant


subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed


from_name: Matt Brown

subject: [WikiEN-l] The admin problem

body:
On 6/4/06, Sam Spade <samspade.thomasjefferson at googlemail.com> wrote:
> Those are the sorts of questions which need answered, not how to best
> punish the guy who presents facts which annoy others.

Another key to the problem here, Sam.  You don't see yourself as
having an opinion; you see yourself as bearing the Truth.  You
percieve your biases as neutral.

-Matt


from_name: abu hamza

body:
yes, i have made my first submission,
feels like a court of law :-), i knew my jury service would come in handy.

>From: Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net>
>Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
>To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
>CC: Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net>
>Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] To: Jimmy Wales - Admin-driven death of Wikipedia
>Date: Sun, 4 Jun 2006 14:49:27 -0600
>
>The arbitration committee will be hearing this matter
>
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/
>Saladin1970_appeal
>
>Fred
>
>On Jun 4, 2006, at 2:15 PM, Jimmy Wales wrote:
>
> > BJ?rn Lindqvist wrote:
> >
> >> It is not. A user named Saladin1970 was recently indefinitely banned
> >> by administrators because his political views was diametrically
> >> opposite to theirs.
> >>
> >
> > Ai yi yi.  I think you should take another look at this case.  I
> > see no
> > reason to think that political views had anything to do with it.
> >
> > --Jimbo
> > _______________________________________________
> > WikiEN-l mailing list
> > WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> > To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
> >
>
>_______________________________________________
>WikiEN-l mailing list
>WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
>To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
>http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

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


list: wiktionary-l

from_name: Claudi Meneghin

subject: [Wiktionary-l] Lombard wiktionary

body:
Hello,
  I am sysop at Lombard wikipedia. We would like a Lombard
wiktionary to be created, so I would like to ask you if this item should be
discussed at metawiki or if it's enough that a Lombard wikipedia exists.
Maybe I had already made such a request: if so, and if a Lombard
wiktionary is being created, please ignore this and let me apologize for
duplicating request.
      Sincerely yours,
      Claudi Meneghin

---------------------------------
 Faites de Yahoo! votre page d'accueil sur le web pour retrouver directement vos services pr?f?r?s : v?rifiez vos nouveaux mails, lancez vos recherches et suivez l'actualit? en temps r?el. Cliquez ici.


from_name: Troy Hunter

subject: [Foundation-l] Breaking promises (was Re:  Where we are headed)

body:
Anthere wrote:
> Erik Moeller wrote:
> > On 6/4/06, Troy Hunter <troyhunter0 at lycos.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> >> http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Resolution_committee_conduct
> >
> >
> > With regard to this resolution in particular, which tried to guarantee
> > a minimal level of openness in the committees:
> > - Why was it rejected -- what were the arguments against it? Who voted
> > against it?
> > - Is any similar resolution planned for the future?
> >
> > Erik
>
>
> Tim and Michael against. Angela and I for. Jimbo abstained.

This is a violation of Jimmy's promise to never vote against Anthere and Angela except on matters of grave importance. The September 2004 Wikimedia Quarto states:

"To date, Tim and Michael have played a minimal part in board discussion and decisions, and there is no plan to change this. In order to ensure that the community voice is real, Jimbo has pledged, as a matter of convention, never to vote against Angela and Anthere, unless he feels that it is an issue of an absolutely fundamental change of direction for the project -- which is not likely to happen, since Angela, Anthere and Jimbo share the essential values of the community and the project. So as a practical matter, power is in the hands of the two democratically elected board members on most issues, and Jimbo defers to that."

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WQ/1

Restated in February 2005:

"Angela and Anthere are unbelievably good as board members, and we have
a casual agreement between us that if the two of them ever vote in one
direction, I will defer to them, so that it does not matter how Tim
and Michael vote.  The only exception I would make to this is if they
wanted something that I felt endangered us in some very extreme way --
but this is basically impossible because they are so good at what they
do."

http://article.gmane.org/gmane.science.linguistics.wikipedia.misc/20359

and in April 2005:

http://article.gmane.org/gmane.org.wikimedia.foundation/2922

Jimmy wrote:
> The first resolution was something that we discussed at the
> board level but never quite came to a firm conclusion.  I think that's
> one which we will revisit at some point in the future.  The general idea
> was to make sure that committees not engage in excessive secrecy, which
> is a good idea, but at the same time, we did not want to encumber them
> with a lot of paranoia that they have to announce evertything all the
> time.  Different board members had different perspectives on how to get
> those central points across.

Yes, different board members had different perspectives. That's to be expected, they come from different backgrounds. Some of them represent the community, some do not. But the elected members were not arguing for an "absolutely fundamental change of direction", were they?

--
_______________________________________________

Search for businesses by name, location, or phone number.  -Lycos Yellow Pages

http://r.lycos.com/r/yp_emailfooter/http://yellowpages.lycos.com/default.asp?SRC=lycos10


from_name: daniwo59 at aol.com

subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed

body:
We get plenty of matching gift requests. In some instances we meet the
criteria for matching, in other instances we don't. In any event, eachrequest is
accompanied by a form, whgich we must fill out. I do that quite regularly--I
even have a separate folder for matching gift requests. There is a place to put
 the EIN on the form. It is usually sent with a copy of our 501 (c) 3
letter.  The fact that it is not posted prominently does not, to the  best of my
knowledge, hinder donations and matching gifts in any way  whatsoever.

Danny

In a message dated 6/4/2006 9:26:14 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
Anthere9 at yahoo.com writes:

Okay.
Yes, we received such propositions from employees (donations  to a
charity from their paychecks). afaik, that number is not published.  That
might be a choice.
An alternative is that such programs must be  made available by the
employer himself, who can contact us beforehand  (through OTRS...) and
make the number available for the  employees.

Michael ? opinion ?


subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed


body:
On 6/1/06, Piotr Derbeth Kubowicz <derbeth at wp.pl> wrote:
> No, such debate should be completely public, only a small number of
> people use this list.

We should publicize the list, then.  A lot of policy discussions work
much better in email that on wiki, in my experience.


subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed

body:
Anthony DiPierro wrote:
> On 6/3/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
>
>>I agree completely.  But when we post everything we can publicly, have
>>open meetings, have community committees, and then people don't read it,
>>well, I don't agree that this is "being cut off".
>>
>
> A list of resolutions which have passed, in most cases without vote
> counts or any other information, with pending resolutions not even put
> into the view for months, is not "everything you can publicly".
>
> In fact, I asked your CFO over a year ago for a copy of the latest
> 990, which is by law publically available and the IRS recommends for
> it to be posted on the foundation's website.  I have received nothing
> other than the very first 990-EZ which has finally arrived on the
> Guidestar website.  You haven't posted everything you can publicly.
> Not even close.

Not the CFO fault :-)

Our fiscal year run from june to june. The Foundation was created in
2003, but I am not sure the 990 2003 would make much sense to you. I
never saw it myself, though I was told my name appeared on it.
The 990 of 2004 was only recently sent. It actually contains some errors
which should be fixed soon. Since it is a public document, I suppose we
can put it on Foundation website once fixed? Or add a link if it is
available somewhere on the web ? Will check that.
As for the 990 2005, it is too early for it to exist.

Ant


subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed


from_name: Roman Maurer

subject: [Wikipedia-l] bureaucrats changing userrights?

body:
Hello!

I have bureaucrat status on sl-wiki.  Recently there was a situation in which I
wanted to revoke certain person promotion to bureaucrat, because the nomination
procedure was not followed.  http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:User_rights
says that bureaucrats can change such user rights.

When I tried to visit the http://sl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Userrights,
MediaWiki said that I am not authorized to do anything on this page (ie.: "You
should have userrights permissions. See Wikipedia:Administrators").  Same
situation is on http://sr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Userrights (I have
bureaucrat status there too).

I need some clarification.  Are local bureaucrats really supposed to change user
rights, as written on Meta, or not?  If they are, is there anything we should do
before we can use them?
--
        Pozdrav,
          Roman  (romanm at sl-wiki)


from_name: BJörn Lindqvist

body:
On 6/4/06, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
> I have copied his statement regarding his request for arbitration to
> the proper page and unblocked him so he can participate in
> arbitration. I am hopeful he is just a new user who made some newbie
> mistakes, but have no opinion as to whether he should be permitted
> another chance.

Thank you Fred. If more admins acted like you there would be much less
stuff to complain about. Unfortunately, with the current environment
and policies like "wheel warring," it doesn't seem easy to always do
the right thing.

--
mvh Bj?rn


from_name: geni

subject: [WikiEN-l] status qou vs reform

body:
On 6/4/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:

> I'd say the consensus was that Jimbo Is Always Right :-)
>
> Guy (JzG)

Umm his plan to apoint arbcom directly?

--
geni


from_name: Tomasz Wegrzanowski

body:
On 6/4/06, Roman Maurer <roman.maurer at amis.net> wrote:
> I need some clarification.  Are local bureaucrats really supposed to change user
> rights, as written on Meta, or not?  If they are, is there anything we should do
> before we can use them?

In the configuration used on Wikipedia, bureaucrats can only do the following:
* set sysop
* set bureaucrat
* set bot
* remove bot

And in particular, they cannot remove sysop/bureaucrat flags.

If the community wants to revoke someone's rights,
they're supposed to ask a steward. (and preferably not one involved in
the project)

On the other hand, in the default MediaWiki configuration,
bureaucrats can set and remove any flags they want.


body:
On 6/4/06, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:

> >I just looked at the new Scientific American (ah, the advantages of
> >working in a library) and skimmed the article.  I may have missed it
> >but I don't see any instances of the author citing Wikipedia as a
> >source.  The article does include a link to Wikipedia under a list of
> >"More to Explore" weblinks, which seems an entirely proper use.
> >
> This all depends on how rigidly you look at the term "source".
> Scientific American does not typically have a lot of footnotes, but it
> does give opportunities such as this for further exploration.  Are you
> saying that this makes the magazine less credible?

Please don't put words in my mouth.


from_name: Kelly Martin

subject: [Foundation-l] List admin needed

body:
I already do this for wikien-l and checkuser-l, so I know what is involved.

Kelly

On 6/4/06, Angela <beesley at gmail.com> wrote:
> Are there any volunteers to help with the administration and
> moderation of this mailing list? Please contact me off-list if you can
> help.
>
> Thanks.
>
> Angela.
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


subject: [Foundation-l] List admin needed


from_name: Wildrick Steele

subject: [Wikitech-l] title case mapping and Wiktionary links

body:
On 04/06/06, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
>
> Phil Boswell wrote:
>
> >Steve Summit wrote:
> >
> >
> >><snip/>
> >>At some point, once Tim recovers from (or becomes inured to) his
> >>horror at sending us down this slippery slope in this hell-bent
> >>handbasket, we can think about introducing a proper built-in
> >>{{exists:}} operator, to eliminate the need for the bizarre
> >>compare-the-substitution-to-the-redlink hack.  (Though I *am*
> >>appreciative of whoever devised it...)
> >>
> >>
> >This has now been done, for anybody interested:
> >http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/ParserFunctions#.23ifexist:
> >
> This is all very welcome.  Does it or can it extend to words that differ
> only by the presence, absence or variation of diacritics?  A dictionary
> that aspires to include all words in all languages faces some
> significant challenges in making these terms accessible to people who
> have no idea about how to enter words with diacritics in the search
> box.  Some _may_ be able to handle letters that fall within ISO 8859-1,
> but even they will have significant difficulties when things get a
> little more exotic.
>
> Ec
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>

What would be useful (and perhaps not very difficult to implement) is have
[[MediaWiki:Edittools]] available at [[Special:Search]].

--
Cheers,
Wildrick
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/User:Vildricianus


from_name: Austin Hair

subject: [Foundation-l] Breaking promises (was Re: Where we are headed)

body:
On 6/4/06, Troy Hunter <troyhunter0 at lycos.com> wrote:
> Anthere wrote:
> > Tim and Michael against. Angela and I for. Jimbo abstained.
>
> This is a violation of Jimmy's promise to never vote against Anthere and Angela except on matters of grave importance. The September 2004 Wikimedia Quarto states:
>
> "To date, Tim and Michael have played a minimal part in board discussion and decisions, and there is no plan to change this. In order to ensure that the community voice is real, Jimbo has pledged, as a matter of convention, never to vote against Angela and Anthere, unless he feels that it is an issue of an absolutely fundamental change of direction for the project -- which is not likely to happen, since Angela, Anthere and Jimbo share the essential values of the community and the project. So as a practical matter, power is in the hands of the two democratically elected board members on most issues, and Jimbo defers to that."

I don't really see the argument, here.  Abstention from a vote in
favor of others is the usual manner of "deferring" in any
pseudo-democratic system, and certainly doesn't qualify as "voting
against" anyone.

Austin


subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed

body:
On 6/4/06, Anthere <Anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Okay.
> Yes, we received such propositions from employees (donations to a
> charity from their paychecks). afaik, that number is not published. That
> might be a choice.
> An alternative is that such programs must be made available by the
> employer himself, who can contact us beforehand (through OTRS...) and
> make the number available for the employees.
>
> Michael ? opinion ?

This number is public knowledge, available to any of us through a
simple Web search, and has already been mentioned on this list.

Austin


subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed


body:
On 6/4/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> http://stats.wikimedia.org/EN/TablesWikipediansEditsGt100.htm
>
> I am not sure why these stats are incomplete after January.

Due to a shift in how the data is stored. I think there is a signpost
article on it somewhere.

>
> from November to December, the number of "very active users" in en went
> from just over 2000 to just under 3000.  That 50% jump included a fair
> number of people who were new to the process, and coincides with the
> start of some "old timer" versus "newcomer" cultural fights about things
> like userboxes.
>

That conflict has been going on for a long time. Userboxes isn't about
old timer vs newtimers. The real oldtimes have mostly stayed out of
things. More midtimers vs a mixture.

> This is why there is a perception that at times there have been
> conflicts between "admins" and "the community".  In the past, there was
> no question at all that "the community" and "the admins" were just about
> exactly the same people.
>
> --Jimbo

Been a devide of sorts for as long as I have been around. However
admins are a lot stonger than they used to be. The community could
control admins through policy. Now the number of admins means they can
pretty much get what policy they want and mid timers are starting a
trend of ignoreing it in any case. Non admins are becomeing
increaseingly powerless.
--
geni


from_name: Steve Bennett

subject: [Wikitech-l] Some statistics I wish I had...

body:
Do we have a database dump pre-formatted for this kind of statistics?
That is, simply date, page, user and edit summary for every edit,
without the actual diffs or current page content.

Steve

On 6/4/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> (Sorry for the cross posting, but there are several groups who might
> find this interesting.)
>
> For years now, it has been common for people to claim that "all the good
> editors are jumping ship" or "we are losing our best people".
> Generally, this has not proven to be true: people come and go, to be
> sure, but as some people drift away, others have drifted in.  Whether
> the rate of burnout is "too high" or "too low" or "just right" is quite
> hard to say.
>
> However, it ought to be possible to at least quantify what that rate
> actually is, by using the Erik Zachte statistics or a modification of them.
>
> I would be fascinated if we could figure out such statistics as
>
> "For any given edit, what is the average length of service of the
> editor?"  "For any given edit, what is the median length of service of
> the editor?"  These could be measured by either time since first edit,
> or total number of edits or (perhaps best) some weighted average of the
> edit history.
>
> It would be nice to track that number over time... are we becoming
> "younger" as a community, "older" as a community?  Staying about the
> same?  Are old-timers sticking around longer than they used to, or
> jumping ship faster?
>
> There are also a whole set of related questions around newbies:
>
> Are newbies more likely to stick around, or less likely to stick around,
> than they were a year ago.  Some people feel we are being overrun by
> newbies, others feel that we are becoming a more closed and cliqueish
> community which does not welcome newbies.
>
> I would measure this by saying "Of people who made at least 100 edits a
> month ago, how many of them made at least 100 edits this month".  And
> similar stats for "at least 10 edits".  (Merely looking at "new
> accounts" would not be right, because we had a huge spike in new account
> creation when it became necessary to have an account to create a new page.)
>
> --Jimbo
>
>
> --
> #######################################################################
> #    Office: 1-727-231-0101       |  Free Culture and  Free Knowledge #
> #    http://www.wikipedia.org     |     Building a free world         #
> #######################################################################
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>
>


body:
On 6/4/06, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
> No, but discussion of the editing must prove fruitless.

So POV pushing is not simply an editing pattern, it is an
edit/discussion pattern?

Steve


body:
Austin Hair wrote:
> On 6/4/06, Troy Hunter <troyhunter0 at lycos.com> wrote:
> > Anthere wrote:
> > > Tim and Michael against. Angela and I for. Jimbo abstained.
> >
> > This is a violation of Jimmy's promise to never vote against
> > Anthere and Angela except on matters of grave importance. The
> > September 2004 Wikimedia Quarto states:
> >
> > "To date, Tim and Michael have played a minimal part in board
> > discussion and decisions, and there is no plan to change this. In
> > order to ensure that the community voice is real, Jimbo has
> > pledged, as a matter of convention, never to vote against Angela
> > and Anthere, unless he feels that it is an issue of an absolutely
> > fundamental change of direction for the project -- which is not
> > likely to happen, since Angela, Anthere and Jimbo share the
> > essential values of the community and the project. So as a
> > practical matter, power is in the hands of the two democratically
> > elected board members on most issues, and Jimbo defers to that."
>
> I don't really see the argument, here.  Abstention from a vote in
> favor of others is the usual manner of "deferring" in any
> pseudo-democratic system, and certainly doesn't qualify as "voting
> against" anyone.

There was indeed some ambiguity in the phrasing of the statement in the Wikimedia Quarto, as to whether abstention is a loophole. However the second statement I quoted, which was directly from Jimbo, had no such ambiguity, to my reading. I'll quote it again since you've snipped it.

"Angela and Anthere are unbelievably good as board members, and we have
a casual agreement between us that if the two of them ever vote in one
direction, I will defer to them, so that it does not matter how Tim
and Michael vote.  The only exception I would make to this is if they
wanted something that I felt endangered us in some very extreme way --
but this is basically impossible because they are so good at what they
do."

Abstention is clearly not a way to make it "so that it does not matter how Tim and Michael vote". Jimbo promises to defer to Angela and Anthere's judgement, not to the judgement of all 4 remaining Board members. An abstention does the latter, not the former.

Are you saying that while "deferring to the judgement of Angela and Anthere", the three unelected Board members nevertheless reserve the right to veto any of their proposals? In what way is that deferring?

--
_______________________________________________

Search for businesses by name, location, or phone number.  -Lycos Yellow Pages

http://r.lycos.com/r/yp_emailfooter/http://yellowpages.lycos.com/default.asp?SRC=lycos10


from_name: Sam Spade

subject: [WikiEN-l] The admin problem

body:
On 6/4/06, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
> That was based on your repeated insistence that National Socialism
> was some sort of socialism. You fought like a bulldog for that point.
> You probably could not have chosen an axe to grind that would have
> been more disruptive.
>
> Fred

Actually your wrong, it's based on my opposition to atheism which
caused a gang of POV warriors to spill over from Human to God to fight
w me. They then noticed Infinity0's

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Socialism/Archive_7#Discussion_of_User:Sam_Spade

on talk socialism. Combined, they started a RfC, which caught the
notice of Bishonen, the only person who had the right connections to
make an ArbCom case viable. She didn't fulfill the requirements of
participating in the RfC (she had never tried to resolve anything with
me, and had indeed deleted my attempt to discuss matters w her on her
talk page),

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3ABishonen&diff=47139590&oldid=47138162

but that didn't seem to matter. Due to her anger with me (which has
nothing to do with socialism btw, but instead related to a separate
personality conflict I had LONG ago w a friend of hers, El C), she
rammed through the ArbCom case, despite my having made significant
compromises (of which you are aware).

The fact that you accepted the case is sad, but understandable. The
fact that you think it has to do with the fact that National Socialism
is a form of socialism (which it is by any authoritative definition I
have ever heard) is based on your own POV, Mr. Bauder. You've made it
clear in the past that my position on this issue annoys you.

The truth is, I have no "axe to grind". Instead, heartened by having
received my 1st featured article (Human), I decided to try for another
(socialism). In order to do so I sought out a communist friend of mine
who also happens to be a wikipedia editor, and tried to figure out the
best way to improve Socialism w his assistance. That was going ok
until Infinity0 started reverting and belligerently failing comprehend
the obvious (NPOV, not pro-socialist POV is ment to dominate). The
rest is history.

My question is, what is a better article, my version of Socialism:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Socialism&oldid=46504293

or what currently stands:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism

my version of the God intro:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=God&oldid=46819733

or the current version:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God

And finally, what is abetter version of Human, the featured article
version i endorsed:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Human&oldid=24562750

or the secular humanist version we find today:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human

Those are the sorts of questions which need answered, not how to best
punish the guy who presents facts which annoy others. Our goal needs
to be quality articles, not personality politics.

SS


body:
This is an example of why I find the questions "Who voted for it?" and "Who
voted against it?" immensely troubling. In a true democratic system, the
secret  ballot allows people to vote their conscience, rather than voting for
popularity, material reward, fear of censure, and whatnot.

A commitment to openness should not be misused so cynically.

Danny

In a message dated 6/4/2006 10:30:20 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
troyhunter0 at lycos.com writes:

Anthere  wrote:
> Erik Moeller wrote:
> > On 6/4/06, Troy Hunter  <troyhunter0 at lycos.com> wrote:
> >
> >
>  >>  http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Resolution_committee_conduct
>  >
> >
> > With regard to this resolution in particular,  which tried to guarantee
> > a minimal level of openness in the  committees:
> > - Why was it rejected -- what were the arguments  against it? Who voted
> > against it?
> > - Is any similar  resolution planned for the future?
> >
> > Erik
>
>
> Tim and Michael against. Angela and I for. Jimbo  abstained.

This is a violation of Jimmy's promise to never vote against  Anthere and
Angela except on matters of grave importance. The September 2004  Wikimedia
Quarto states:

"To date, Tim and Michael have played a  minimal part in board discussion and
decisions, and there is no plan to change  this. In order to ensure that the
community voice is real, Jimbo has pledged,  as a matter of convention, never
to vote against Angela and Anthere, unless he  feels that it is an issue of an
absolutely fundamental change of direction for  the project -- which is not
likely to happen, since Angela, Anthere and Jimbo  share the essential values
of the community and the project. So as a practical  matter, power is in the
hands of the two democratically elected board members  on most issues, and Jimbo
defers to  that."

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WQ/1

Restated in February  2005:

"Angela and Anthere are unbelievably good as board members, and  we have
a casual agreement between us that if the two of them ever vote in  one
direction, I will defer to them, so that it does not matter how  Tim
and Michael vote.  The only exception I would make to this is if  they
wanted something that I felt endangered us in some very extreme way  --
but this is basically impossible because they are so good at what  they
do."

http://article.gmane.org/gmane.science.linguistics.wikipedia.misc/20359

and  in April  2005:

http://article.gmane.org/gmane.org.wikimedia.foundation/2922

Jimmy  wrote:
> The first resolution was something that we discussed at  the
> board level but never quite came to a firm conclusion.  I  think that's
> one which we will revisit at some point in the  future.  The general idea
> was to make sure that committees not  engage in excessive secrecy, which
> is a good idea, but at the same  time, we did not want to encumber them
> with a lot of paranoia that  they have to announce evertything all the
> time.  Different board  members had different perspectives on how to get
> those central points  across.

Yes, different board members had different perspectives. That's  to be
expected, they come from different backgrounds. Some of them represent  the
community, some do not. But the elected members were not arguing for an  "absolutely
fundamental change of direction", were they?

--
_______________________________________________

Search for  businesses by name, location, or phone number.  -Lycos Yellow
Pages

http://r.lycos.com/r/yp_emailfooter/http://yellowpages.lycos.com/default.asp?S
RC=lycos10

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


from_name: Ilmari Karonen

subject: [WikiEN-l] Community vs Encyclopedia

body:
Joe Anderson wrote:
> On 6/4/06, Alphax (Wikipedia email) <alphasigmax at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>Historically, Meta was the place where a lot of "community" stuff
>>happened. At some point (probably the first half of 2005) things which
>>would normally have been transwikied to meta: started appearing in the
>>Wikipedia: namespace, and staying there.
>
> Interesting point Alphax. Many Wikipedian organisations are located on the
> meta over the Wikipedia: space (see m:Category:Wikipedian associations)
>
> However, most new one's are either User: or Wikipedia:

I think lack of single login (and particularly of shared watchlists),
combined with the disproportionate growth of Wikipedia (and particularly
of the English Wikipedia), is probably one of the major causes of this.

I can keep track of what's going on in Wikipedia, or at least in the
areas I frequent or have frequented, by looking at my watchlist.  But I
have no idea what's going on at meta unless I load up my watchlist there
in a separate tab -- and in any case, since I so rarely go there, I only
have a handful of pages watched there (mostly administrative or
technical project pages) and don't really know where most of the
discussion is going on.

There are other technical and social reasons too, of course.  But I
think that's a big one.

--
Ilmari Karonen


from_name: Sam Korn

subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed

body:
On 6/4/06, Troy Hunter <troyhunter0 at lycos.com> wrote:
> No, I certainly wouldn't suggest using such criteria to select a CEO. But Jimmy says that the CEO will not be an outsider, so I would like to know what the definition of an outsider is. If a candidate had less than, say, half a dozen edits, we might be forgiven for thinking of them as an outsider. Is this the case?

If I might accurately quote what Jimbo said...

On 6/4/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> Erik Zachte wrote:
> > * The idea that a contractor, possibly an outsider (?), is charged with
> > paving the way for a true CEO, is yet another example of top down
> > management.
>
> Why do you suppose that an outsider would be chosen for this?

That, to me, says that Jimbo and the Board have not yet decided who
the contractor should be.  It also suggests to me that they have no
preconceived ideas about who should fill the role.  I'd guess that
they will choose the best candidate, whether or not that candidate is
a member of the community, novice, experienced or otherwise.

Though that's not to say that being part of the community wouldn't
have an impact.

Just my ?.02's worth.

--
Sam


subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed


from_name: Earth Engine

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Regulations on the Protection of the Right of
	Communication through Information Network(draft)

body:
(This is becomming the a new internet copyrights law of China)

Regulations on the Protection of the Right of Communication through
Information Network(draft)
September 8, 2005

Article 1

These Regulations are formulated, in accordance with the Copyright Law of
the People's Republic of China (hereinafter referred to as the Copyright
Law), for the purposes of protecting the right of communication through
information network of copyright owners and copyright-related right owners
(hereinafter referred to as right owners) and encouraging the communication
to the public of highly rated works, performances, and sound and video
recordings.

Article 2

For the purpose of these Regulations, (1) "information network" means an
information system that is capable of making available to the public of
works, performances, or sound and video recordings by wire or wireless means
in such a way that members of the public may access these works,
performances, or sound and video recordings from a place and at a time
individually chosen by them;

(2) "technological measures" means effective devices or methods used by
right owners or exclusive licensees for preventing or restricting
unauthorized or unlawful access to, or communication to the public of, their
works, performances, or sound and video recordings through information
network;

(3) "electronic rights management information" means texts, numbers or codes
that identify works, performances, or sound and video recordings as well as
their right owners or exclusive licensees, or that specify the terms and
conditions of use of the works, performances, or sound and video recordings,
when any of these items of information appears in connection with the
communication to the public through information network of works,
performances, or sound and video recordings.

Article 3

The right of communication through information network enjoyed by right
owners in their works, performances, or sound and video recordings consists
of both the right to communicate by themselves, and the right to authorize
other persons to communicate, their works, performances, or sound and video
recordings to the public through information network.

Anyone who uploads other persons' works, performances, or sound and video
recordings to a network server for public access, reproduction or use in
other means shall obtain authorization from, and pay remuneration to, the
right owners, except where otherwise provided for in laws or regulations.

Article 4

In the following cases, a work may be used without authorization from, and
without payment of remuneration to, the copyright owner, provided that the
name of the author as well as the title and source of the work are
indicated, depending on the circumstances, and that the other rights enjoyed
by the copyright owner are not prejudiced:

(1) re-pasting another person's remarks at a BBS to another BBS, except
where the copyright owner declares that re-pasting is not permitted;

(2) unavoidable representation or quotation of another person's published
work on information network for the purpose of reporting current events;

(3) communication to the public through information network of an article on
current political, economic or religious topics published by other media,
except where the copyright owner declares that communication in other means
is not permitted;

(4) communication to the public through information network of a speech
delivered at a public gathering, except where the copyright owner declares
that communication in other means is not permitted;

(5) provision by a public library of a published work in its collection with
its own network reading system for public reading within its premises,
provided that the network reading system does not provide copy service and
is able to effectively prevent further communication through information
network of the work provided for network reading;

(6) reproduction of another person's webpage for the purpose of providing
searching service, provided that the technological measures adopted by the
right owner or exclusive licensee are not circumvented, and that no copy
function is furnished;

(7) translation of a published work of a Chinese citizen, legal entity or
any other organization from Han language into any of minority nationality
languages, as well as communication of the translation to the public through
information network;

(8) use of software for non-profit purposes in the course of repairing
computers or other devices as well as systems or networks, or demonstrating
their functions.

The first paragraph shall also be applicable to the limitations on rights of
performers and producers of sound and video recordings.

Article 5

Except where the copyright owner declares in advance that the use of his
work is not permitted, a distance education institution which meets all of
the following conditions, in providing network distance education for
implementing the nine-year compulsory education and the national educational
planning, may use passages of a work, a short written work or musical work,
or a single work of fine art or photographic work which has been published
to produce textbook software for network distance education, without
permission from the copyright owner, provided that the name of the author as
well as the title and source of the work are indicated, that remuneration is
paid according to regulations, and that the other rights enjoyed by the
copyright owner according to law are not prejudiced:

(1) the textbook software is only provided to students registered with the
said distance education institution;

(2) the distance education system is able to effectively prevent further
communication through information network of the work used in the textbook
software;

The first paragraph shall also be applicable to the limitations on the right
of communication through information network of performers and producers of
sound and video recordings.

Article 6

Except where the copyright owner declares in advance that the use of his
work is not permitted, a public library which meets all of the following
conditions may provide a published work in its collection with its own
network reading system for public reading to registered readers outside its
premises, without permission from the copyright owner, provided that the
name of the author as well as the title and source of the work are
indicated, that remuneration is paid according to regulations, and that the
other rights enjoyed by the copyright owner according to law are not
prejudiced:

(1) the work provided for network reading has been lawfully published for
more than three years;

(2) the network reading system does not provide copy service;

(3) the network reading system is able to precisely record the times the
work has been read and to effectively prevent further communication through
information network of the work provided for network reading.

Article 7

Except where the copyright owner declares in advance that reproduction or
excerpting is not permitted, a written work, work of fine art or
photographic work, after being published in a newspaper or periodical or on
information network, may be reproduced or used as excerpts or data in
another newspaper or periodical or on information network, provided that the
name of the author as well as the title and source of the work are
indicated, that remuneration is paid according to regulations, and that the
other rights enjoyed by the copyright owner according to law are not
prejudiced.

Article 8

No one shall circumvent technological measures adopted by right owners or
exclusive licensees without their permission to weaken or disable the effect
of their technological measures, except where otherwise provided for in
these Regulations.

Article 9

In any of the following cases, those who circumvent technological measures
without permission of the right owner or exclusive licensee shall not bear
legal liabilities:

(1) for the use permitted by law of works, performances, or sound and video
recordings communicated through information network;

(2) for the research concerning encryption on information network for
non-commercial purposes;

(3) for technical testing to identify or rectify security defects of
information network for non-commercial purposes;

(4) for the research concerning browser filtering technologies for
non-commercial purposes;

(5) for investigation of illegal or criminal activities on information
network.

Article 10

Right owners or exclusive licensees, in adopting technological measures,
shall not disrupt or harm other persons' computers or other devices or
systems, nor shall they threat network security or information security.

With regard to the technological measures that may still affect normal
access to or use of works, performances, or sound and video recordings after
their lawful circumvention, the right owners or exclusive licensees shall
specify their uses and features in an explicit form.

Article 11

No one shall remove or alter electronic rights management information of
works, performances, or sound and video recordings without permission of the
right owners or exclusive licensees, except where otherwise provided for in
these Regulations.

The following acts shall not be performed without permission of the right
owners or exclusive licensees:

(1) communicating to the public through information network false electronic
rights management information;

(2) communicating to the public through information network works,
performances, or sound and video recordings whose electronic rights
management information has been removed or altered without permission of the
right owners or exclusive licensees.

Article 12

Where it is impossible for a radio station or television station to avoid
removing or altering the electronic rights management information in
broadcasting works, performances, or sound and video recording by way of
analogue signals, due to technical or financial difficulties, the said radio
station or television station shall not bear legal liabilities.

Article 13

Anyone who illegally uploads other persons' works, performances, or sound
and video recordings to a network server for public access, reproduction or
use in other means, or who commits any other illegal act prohibited by these
Regulations, shall bear civil liability, depending on the circumstances.
Where public interests are impaired, the copyright administrative department
may order the person to discontinue the infringing or illegal act,
confiscate his unlawful gains and impose a fine. If the circumstances are
serious, the copyright administration department may also confiscate the
instrument mainly used for the infringing or illegal activities. Where the
act constitutes a crime, criminal liability shall be investigated according
to law.

Article 14

Anyone who provides the service for storing network content only through
automatic technological process shall not bear compensatory liability for
storing infringing or illegal network content if one of the following
conditions is met:

(1) the service provider does not know that the network content which he
stores is infringing or illegal;

(2) the service provider takes down the network content within five days
from the time he knows or he ought to know that the specific network content
which he stores is infringing or illegal.

The first paragraph shall also be applicable to searching service providers
of network content.

Article 15

A right owner, when finding infringing or illegal network content, may send
a notification that meets all of the following conditions to the storage
service provider or searching service provider of such content, asking for
its take-down:

(1) the notification is in a written or printed form, or sent in an email;

(2) the notification indicates the name and address of the right owner or
exclusive licensee;

(3) the notification requests a take-down of the infringing or illegal
network content and specifies its URL address;

(4) the notification is signed by, or affixed with a seal of, the right
owner.

In the absence of proof to the contrary, it shall be presumed that the
storage service provider or searching service provider ought to know that
the content he stores is infringing or illegal once receiving from the right
owner a notification that meets all of the conditions specified in the first
paragraph.

Article 16

A storage service provider, who takes down specific network content after
receiving the notification provided for in the first paragraph of Article
15, shall not be held liable for breach of contract if one of the following
conditions is met:

(1) the service provider notifies the content provider in three days after
taking down the specific network content;

(2) the service provider recovers the specific network content that has been
taken down in seven days after knowing of the withdrawal of the notification
by the right owner or of a ruling by the people's court that the specific
network content is not infringing or illegal.

Article 17

The right owner or exclusive licensee may, for the purpose of litigation or
application for provisional measures, apply to the people's court for
requesting the network service provider to offer necessary network
registration information. The network service provider who refuses to offer
such information without reasonable ground shall bear corresponding legal
liabilities.

Article 18

When finding an infringing or illegal act that impairs public interest, the
right owner or exclusive licensee may apply to the copyright administrative
department for investigation and administrative sanction.

In order to investigate and handle infringing or illegal cases that impair
public interest, the copyright administrative department may request the
network service provider to offer necessary network registration
information. The network service provider who refuses to offer such
information without reasonable ground shall bear corresponding legal
liabilities.

Article 19

Anyone who suffers a loss because of a wrong take-down of specific network
content according to the notification from the right owner may request the
right owner to bear the compensatory liability.

Article 20

The right owner or exclusive licensee who violates the provisions in Article
10 of these Regulations shall bear corresponding legal liabilities.

Article 21

These Regulations shall be effective on 2006.

--
   ? ? ?
?            ?
?            ?
?            ?
?            ?
?            ?
?            ?
?            ?


from_name: Brion Vibber

body:
Nick Jenkins wrote:
>> It would probably *not* make sense to treat that as equal to:
>> bold????????
>
> Why not? It makes perfect sense to me!  ;-)
>
> There is no such thing as a double-bold.

Sure it does. You could even make the style sheet show it that way, if you
really wanted. :)

> There is no bold-bold, and
> there's no point in hiding that from people, or in pretending that
> such a thing exists by giving them two independent bolding mechanisms
> that refuse to talk to each other.

Like, say,  and ?

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

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from_name: Roger Luethi

subject: [WikiEN-l] Types of categories

body:
On Sun, 04 Jun 2006 18:07:15 +0200, Steve Bennett wrote:
> > Okay, that's equivalent to Steve's Amelie-Paris relation. I agree that's a
> > problem.
>
> The problem there, now that I think about it, is that Paris should not
> be in the category "Paris" (as was pointed out by someone else).

Yeah, although it's a very common thing to do. The alternative is to write
"See also: [[Category:Paris]]" in the Paris article, which is harder to
find (especially if there are many external links or references). That's
a very practical reason, though.

> Amelie should be in the category "Paris"

If Amelie goes into that category, then the category means "related to
Paris" and becomes almost meaningless. Do we add every movie that's got an
Eiffel Tower in it? Every article on people who were born there, died
there, or lived there? Even if the category remained small, how is such a
vague piece of information useful? ... It seems that Amelie should be in
"Films set in Paris" (or something like that), and that category should be
in the category "Paris".

> The article Paris should be in the category "European capitals" (say)
> The article Paris should not be in the category "Paris"
> The category "Paris" should not be in the category "European capitals".
>
> Actually, even simply obeying this last rule would solve it: Paris
> *the article* belongs in the taxonomic category (Paris *is a* European
> capital) , but "Paris" the category is thematic, so should only belong
> to thematic categories: maybe "Europe" in this case.
>
> That actually seems to fix the problem. I saw this with The Beatles
> for example. John Lennon was in category "The Beatles" (thematic), and
> that category was in "British rock bands" (taxonomic), leading to the
> conclusion that Lennon was a British rock band.

It's mostly scripts that get confused. I suspect most normal users won't be
confused but find that convenient.

Say I navigated down to "British rock bands" (taxonomic), discover The
Beatles and would like to see what WP has got on them. With the proposed
system, I need to open the article, scroll down to the bottom -- nope, if
there is a category for them, the article can't be in it, so scroll back up
several pages worth of navigation boxes, external links, and references to
spot the "See also" section which hopefully contains a link to the category
"The Beatles" if there is one.

I'm not sure we can convince people that it's a win overall.

> > But even if we maintained a complete and up-to-date system of subcats, we'd
> > still make it hard for people to find articles using categories. For some
> > fairly sensible reasons, the rule is to include articles only to the
>
> I have never completely understood these "sensible reasons". It's
> redundant from a taxonomic point of view, but since category
> navigation works so badly (there is no way to easily see everything in
> a category and all its subcats), it often seems to work well from a

It's a trade-off. The sensible reason is that while your argument is
correct, a category that contains hundreds of entries is equally unusable.

> It's ok if a category consists entirely of subcategories, but if there
> are both articles and subcats in it, then not having an article in the
> category by virtue of the fact that it's included in a subcat is
> awkward and doesn't work well.

The higher category often serves as a waiting room for articles that have
not been sorted into a subcat or make for a tiny subcat only (several
subcats [[Category:Astronauts by nationality]] contain only one or two
articles).

> Hmm, the difficulty is deciding what "subcategory" really means. I
> assume you're getting at the fact that a taxonomic subcategory should
> simply be getting more specific, and leading to more specialised
> subjects (so "Capitals of Europe" might have subcat "Capitals of
> Western Europe" or "Capitals of the European Union"), maintaining the
> "X is a Capital of Europe" mantra.
>
> In this case, it would seem best that "Districts of Paris" was a
> category of the thematic category "Paris".

(I know it doesn't work too well with this example, but bear with me) And
"Districts of Paris", being an attribute, is also in (taxonomic) "Districts
of European Capitals" which in turn is in (thematic) category "Europe",
right?

> > Or going back to [[Category:Women]]: You could declare that only articles
> > on instances of women (i.e.  biographies) can ever be under that category,
> > and that only sets of such articles can ever be subcategories of the
> > category women. -- You could even create a separate [[Category:Woman]],
>
> This is a perfect example of a problem aluded to in the MoS on
> categories: Women is both a taxonomic category (it's a plural) and a
> theme (eg, Women throughout the ages, or whatever). Disaster is
> inevitable from that point onward.

We can fix that.

> The taxonomic category "Women" could be split immediately into
> fictional women and real women, then into living and dead women, then
> again by various means.

So "living women" is taxonomy, but "Living persons" is an attribute?

One obvious problem here is that you don't have the strict hierarchy that
you proposed in your initial posting. For Bridges and France, there are
natural hierarchies of higher or more generic concepts. The relations
between France and Europe or between bridge and structure are directed.
Women, living, and fictional have no directed relations. You could use them
in any order.

And another thing I just noticed: The taxonomy in Category:Bridges breaks
down after only one level, category [[Category:Buildings and structures]]
which is a subcategory of four themes and nothing else. [[Category:Nobel
Peace Prize winners]], one of your examples for an attribute, on the other
hand, contains a stack of "Nobel laureates", "Prize winners", "People".

Your definitions of taxonomies and attributes need work :-).

> > subcategories like "female reproductive organs" containing articles like
> > uterus. -- But how would you express the undisputed relationship between
> > female human beings and your example [[Category:Feminine hygiene]]? How
> > about [[Category:Women's rights]]? Add an umbrella cat "Somehow related to
> > women" maybe?
>
> With a separate, thematic, category. What would you call it? I don't
> know. In practice, this would probably only work through a whole
> separate structure, leaving Categories only for taxonmic categories
> ("X is a Y"), and creating a structure called Subjects or Themes or
> something.

Distinct namespaces for different types of categories. It would involve
some coding and the migration must be planned, but it might be easier to
explain and easier to maintain. It would also be another small step towards
a semantic web.

Roger


from_name: Redvers @ the Wikipedia

body:
Jimmy Wales wrote:

>I think it would be reasonable to have some sort
>of process other than ArbCom whereby admins are
>from time to time or upon particular
>circumstances renominated for adminship.
>The danger, of course, is that such a process
>could be used by trolls as a hammer against some
>of our more active admins.

This is right in both parts. It is very easy for an
admin (I speak as one myself) to feel somewhat special
and elevated. Admins are, after all, only human like
everyone else. And human beings are an intensely
hierarchical species - I speak as a Brit, the most
hierarchical of all subgroups of Homo Sapiens in the
western hemisphere.

And, of course, that feeling of being "somewhat
special" will have its effects. We dislike WP:OWN of
articles, but admins and long-term users all suffer
from "ownership" of the project as a whole. As a
general rule, this is a Very Good Thing. Without
people feeling ownership of Wikipedia, the project
would be doomed.

But the same problems that exist in editors owning
articles exist in editors owning Wikipedia. We don't.
The public, the users, the readers - they own
Wikipedia. The person who drops in, reads a single
article and goes away better informed, or with
something to put in her high school essay or something
new to add to his mate's point of view... they own
Wikipedia. They are the customers. We - the editors
and admins - are the burger-flippers, serving the
customers what they want when they want it. We know
more about how the burgers are made and what goes into
the making of them than do the customers on the other
side of the window. But that doesn't mean we have any
authority over the customers. That's not what we're
(not) paid for.

(BTW, the Wikipedia critics forget that point more
than the real editors and admins do - as a hint to
them: that ol' interweb thing, it doesn't exist just
for you. Honestly.)

However (and there had to be one), however: the first
call for me to be desysoped was just 12 hours after I
was given the admin buttons. I deleted an article that
someone else had tagged CSD-A7; it was a recreation of
a CSD-A7, which was a recreation of a CSD-A7. Three
editors, two admins and me all agreed that this chap's
high school career didn't need to be in an
encyclopedia.

The chap in question contacted my talk page, emailed
me and even emailed someone else asking them to
contact me, all with the same message: I had been
wrongly "promoted" and should go immediately.

A day later, a similar thing happened. Since then, a
week on Wikipedia isn't complete without someone
somewhere telling me that I should be desysoped for
enforcing Wikipedia rules... or writing to a talk page
asking someone for their opinion on a rule(!)

Any method of evaluating admins needs to remove these
people from the process. They have nothing to add to
it. If they could create a de-admin process with a
single click, they would. And once created that
process would attract every nutjob, troll and person
who skim-reads a page into voting an admin out of the
extra buttons. QED: no more admins in about 12 days.

Nevertheless, there should be a way of allowing
comment on admin actions and behaviour. Writing to
admins' talk pages and email doesn't satisfy the
critics, even if they even bother. They tend to go to
Esperanza or AIV first. Or to RfA to try to become an
admin. Or even directly to the Anti-Wikipedia Forum
for Obsessive Nutters or whatever it's called.

A route where they could vent would be useful to the
complainant, the community and even the admin
themselves. We can rely on the community to spot a
malicious or ill-informed editor making a complaint,
as a rule, and thus reject them (although the critics
say *all* complaints are valid... mind you, they're
busy ringing people up at work, writing to employers
and calling the police over *interweb content
disputes*, so they've already somewhat blotted their
copybooks in the scale and sanity departments).

There's a clear, easy and unabusable "Request for
Comment on Administration Actions" system that must
exist somewhere. Soemthing that would give everyone
useful feedback, help decide policy and would be
non-judgmental unless an admin had gone mad with
her/his buttons and a 'crat hadn't spotted it.

What this system is, I don't know. But there must be
one. Simple, easy to use, hard to abuse... surely the
internet allows for that somewhere? A system that
could recognise that admins are human and therefore
are not perfect, but that there's a difference between
falability and maliciousness? Above all, a system that
ensures that mistakes are learnt from, rather than
punished (Lar, MSK, do you hear me? Enough with the
punishment fetish, please...) and thus that we grow
and develop from it.

But I'm at a loss as to what that system is. There
*must* be one. Somewhere.

-> REDVERS

___________________________________________________________
Try the all-new Yahoo! Mail. "The New Version is radically easier to use" ? The Wall Street Journal
http://uk.docs.yahoo.com/nowyoucan.html


from_name: Arne Klempert

subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed

body:
On 6/4/06, Troy Hunter <troyhunter0 at lycos.com> wrote:
> > Why do you suppose that an outsider would be chosen for this?
>
> Do you have any candidates in mind at the moment? How
> many edits do each of them have?

Oh yeah, let's adopt the Requests for Adminship process for chosing
Wikimedia Foundation's employees and contractors. Or let's just count
the edits, then probably a bot will become CEO. And thanks to Free
Software anyone can write his own CEO. Great idea! ;)

-- Arne (akl)


subject: [Foundation-l] Where we are headed


from_name: Guy Chapman aka JzG

subject: [WikiEN-l] status qou vs reform

body:
On Sun, 4 Jun 2006 22:19:45 +0100, you wrote:

>Umm his plan to apoint arbcom directly?

There may have been an element of irony in my comment.

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] Types of categories

body:
On Sun, 04 Jun 2006 11:31:02 -0400, Anthony DiPierro wrote:
> > That's why nobody made it, but not why it shouldn't be done.
> >
> I'd say it's both.  There shouldn't be categories with only one
> article in them.  IMO that's just common sense.

Yes, for all (current) practical purposes. My point was that there are
other reasons that should stop people from creating such categories whether
or not there is more than one article in it.

> compute category intersections.  But the software doesn't do this, so
> people make do with what they've got.

Right. When making suggestions, we need to be careful to indicate whether
we propose a work-around for broken software or if we are talking about
an ideal solution, or something in between. Plus the problem we are trying
to solve. I know I failed already in this short thread :-).

> Once the software is written to compute intersections of categories
> within the Mediawiki software, it would be relatively simple to
> recategorize the articles into their parent categories, such that no
> information was lost.  The way this would be done is that all articles
> in a subcategory which had multiple parent attribute categories would
> be automatically moved into the parent categories.  This would be
> repeated until no such situations continued to exist.  The ad-hoc
> structure could still be kept, but it could be calculated on the fly
> (along with new types of intersections which could be easily added).

So instead of in the category "Bridges in France", the "Pont du Gard" would
now be in the categories "Bridges" and "France"!?

> (Now that I do this on an example, I see that this algorithm would
> probably have to be tweaked to deal with subcatgories of
> [[Category:Categories by topic]], but that's not too bad.)

I suspect there are more corner cases than we imagine.

> > For instance, how do you connect the districts of Paris to the category
> > Paris? What is a subset of the parent attribute "Paris": "Districts of
> > Paris", or "Quartier Latin", or neither? Does it bother you if the article
> > on a French district is now in a subcategory of "Capitals in Europe"?
> >
> [[Category:Paris]] is a theme, not an attribute, so [[Category:Paris]]
> should not be a subcategory of [[Category:Capitals in Europe]].

One problem I'm seeing here is that your proposal focuses on one single
type of hierarchies. Paris, France, Europe are now all themes. So if I
ask for an intersection of categories "Bridges" and "France", the results
include bridges that for any reason are related to the "France" theme.
There is no way to ask for Bridges in France, or Paris.

One solution would be to create "is part of" or "is in" categories in
addition to the "is a" categories. Then you can have a hierarchy with "Pont
du Gard" -> "France" -> "Europe", or "cylinder" -> "engine" -> "car".

We'd have two indepent types of categories, plus a third, the catch-all
"theme".

> > female human beings and your example [[Category:Feminine hygiene]]? How
> > about [[Category:Women's rights]]? Add an umbrella cat "Somehow related to
> > women" maybe?
>
> [[Category:Women]] could be a subcategory of [[Category:Woman]].

Heh. Looking at [[Category:Women]], it's now a subcat of both
[[Category:People]] and [[Category:Humans]].

> mistakes all over again.  The advantage of my proposal to not allow
> themes as subcategories of attributes is that it can be implemented
> today, without much disruption, and without modifying any code.

What I missed in your proposal is how you retain existing theme
information. Duplicate categories in a theme namespace?

Roger


from_name: Troy Hunter

body:
Danny wrote:
> This is an example of why I find the questions "Who voted for it?" and "Who
> voted against it?" immensely troubling. In a true democratic system, the
> secret  ballot allows people to vote their conscience, rather than voting for
> popularity, material reward, fear of censure, and whatnot.

Firstly, a true democratic system delegates authority to elected representatives of the people. That is not the case here, authority is delegated to a Board, the majority of which is unelected. Two out of five members have very little claim to a mandate. What right do they have to follow their conscience?

Secondly, in a true democratic system, the participation of the people is not limited to a periodic vote. Ongoing oversight from a well-educated, well-informed public is necessary, to prevent an abuse of power. This allows the people to ensure that their elected representatives do indeed serve their interests. It allows them to make an informed choice at the next election, and to organise opposition.

For these reasons, in the World's major democracies, representatives do not have a secret vote. Representatives must be held accountable. They must be held to their promises.

> A commitment to openness should not be misused so cynically.

What commitment? The resolution we're talking about was debated 6 weeks ago. Why wasn't it announced or publically debated back then? Why didn't we know who voted in favour and against?

--
_______________________________________________

Search for businesses by name, location, or phone number.  -Lycos Yellow Pages

http://r.lycos.com/r/yp_emailfooter/http://yellowpages.lycos.com/default.asp?SRC=lycos10


from_name: John Lyden

subject: [WikiEN-l] Oddball question

body:
On 6/4/06, Rob <gamaliel8 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I've had some dealings with him and while he is extremely offensive
> and tempermental, Eric can be reasonable and even apologetic at times.
>  If you wish I can attempt to discuss this with him via email.

Considering what he's doing now, I find it difficult to believe that
he's reasonable at all. He seems sociopathic, not apologetic.

-Ras

--
John Lyden - rasputinaxp at gmail.com
"The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to
live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same
time..." -Kerouac


from_name: Lord Voldemort

subject: [Foundation-l] List admin needed

body:
On 6/4/06, Kelly Martin <kelly.lynn.martin at gmail.com> wrote:
> I already do this for wikien-l and checkuser-l, so I know what is involved.

Didn't she say "off-list"? You suuure you know how to work it? ;-)
--LV


subject: [Foundation-l] List admin needed


subject: [WikiEN-l] Saladin1970 (new thread)

body:
On Fri, 26 May 2006 14:58:41 +0200, you wrote:

>Most people
>here didn't know there is a real Abu Hamza that incites hatred and
>most people wouldn't have cared about his email address unless someone
>had accused him for it.

You have a citation to back that claim?  I'm sure you wouldn't make
bold assertions without getting the basic facts straight, right?

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


body:
On 6/4/06, Troy Hunter <troyhunter0 at lycos.com> wrote:
> There was indeed some ambiguity in the phrasing of the statement in the Wikimedia Quarto, as to whether abstention is a loophole. However the second statement I quoted, which was directly from Jimbo, had no such ambiguity, to my reading. I'll quote it again since you've snipped it.
>
> "Angela and Anthere are unbelievably good as board members, and we have
> a casual agreement between us that if the two of them ever vote in one
> direction, I will defer to them, so that it does not matter how Tim
> and Michael vote.  The only exception I would make to this is if they
> wanted something that I felt endangered us in some very extreme way --
> but this is basically impossible because they are so good at what they
> do."
>
> Abstention is clearly not a way to make it "so that it does not matter how Tim and Michael vote". Jimbo promises to defer to Angela and Anthere's judgement, not to the judgement of all 4 remaining Board members. An abstention does the latter, not the former.
>
> Are you saying that while "deferring to the judgement of Angela and Anthere", the three unelected Board members nevertheless reserve the right to veto any of their proposals? In what way is that deferring?

I didn't snip it thinking it was relevant, because I see no
substantial difference between the two quotes.  Should the two object
to any proposal, it's certainly the case that a simple absention will
result in the failure of a motion.  This is what checks and balances
are all about.

By the same token, any motion?which by its very nature changes the way
in which the Foundation is run?must meet a very high standard, for the
sake of "community transparency," and you can't expect someone to
actively change his vote based on what other people may or may not
think.  We don't look upon Jimmy as our supreme dictator, but neither
do we expect him to be a simple puppet.  Expand the Board, yes, but
don't require the current trustees to compromise their beliefs.

Austin


from_name: Minh Nguyen

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Monobook

body:
Berto wrote:
> Hi!
>
> I am in the process of importing templates into pms. Yet we appear to have
> no "infobox bordered" class in our monobook. Is there any standard source I
> can get it from? Also, how do I edit the monobook.css file? The "system
> messages" special page does not show it, it only shows a comment to it. Do I
> just add stuff there?
>
> Berto

Hi Berto,

The largest Wikipedia editions tend to have heavily modified
monobook.css and common.css stylesheets that you can choose from.
(Common.css applies to all skins, not just the Monobook skin.) You
probably won't need most of any of these stylesheets for the time being,
though.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:Monobook.css>
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:Common.css>
<http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:Monobook.css>
<http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:Common.css>
<http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:Monobook.css>
<http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:Common.css>
<http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:Monobook.css>
<http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:Common.css>

In Special:Allmessages, you can click on the link under the "Name"
column. If you have admin privileges, you can then click "edit" to add
the CSS code, and your new code will appear in place of that comment at
Special:Allmessages.

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


from_name: Platonides

body:
"Steve Bennett" wrote:
> Do we have a database dump pre-formatted for this kind of statistics?
> That is, simply date, page, user and edit summary for every edit,
> without the actual diffs or current page content.
>
> Steve

I'd support such kind of dump, the history but without the text of the
version.