body:
Anthere-

> Thank god I was there to avoid decisions being taken hastily for other
> people, without asking them their opinion :-)

The software is changed constantly without asking people from all
Wikipedias for their permission first. The MediaWiki namespace suddenly
appeared out of nowhere, some people probably don't like it, others love
it. Soon there will be image auto-resizing support. And so forth.

Compare the software development process to editing an article on
Wikipedia. When I want to make a big change to a controversial article, I
announce it on the talk page first. When I want to make a minor change, an
addition or a clear improvement, I just do it. If it turns out to be a bad
idea, it can always be reverted.

We should do the same with features: use common sense. And I think that
allowing sysops to ban signed in users for vandalism only is a minor
change that could have just gone through without discussion, provided
there would have been an announcement "Only do this for XY" to the mailing
lists.

> I suspect it is potentially more risky on wikipedias where there are few
>   editors, and only one sysop though.

I think there are enough places to run to in case something goes wrong.
It's tougher if you don't speak English.

> But in any cases, I support dissolution of the international mailing list.

Brion, are you following this?

> That is why I mentionned the &bot=1.

It's an interesting concept. I hope you don't miss any edits. Note,
however, that in order to mark a user as a bot, you need developer
permissions -- again a dependency on Brion & Co.

> It is even more frustrating for a vandal I guess, to see that his vandal
> contribution entirely disappear.

Indeed.

>> A wiki-based digest service would surely be helpful. If you want to write
>> summaries of the mailing list for the wikis, you have my full support.
>> Failing that, the mailing list is the place where policy decisions like
>> that are made.

> I think that my suggestion to do as you did the other time (which was to
> add a message to all village pumps, even in english, with a link to the
> announcement) was more positive than this comment.

I disagree. I think a mailing list digest service, either on Meta or on a
newly created page on each Wikipedia, would be more useful than a "clog
the pumps" function, which, I fear, could be easily abused for spamming.
(Also, it would probably lead to discussions taking place on the pumps,
instead of on the mailing list.) Generally, every non-English Wikipedia
should have at least one ambassador who takes care of summarizing relevant
discussions in their native tongue. I'm sure if we organize a call for
volunteers we find enough people.

Regards,

Erik


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Peter Jaros

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
On Jan 10, 2004, at 8:57 PM, Anthere wrote:

> I went to the article about clitoris for a tiny comparison, as a huge
> number of african girls are circonsized as well (some of them being
> french, as this is still practiced in secret among african
> immigrants). It is also practiced in other countries; A minority, just
> like masculine circoncized, but a relevant number anyway.
>
> There are no pictures of circonsision in the article.

There should be (I think).  Care to look for one? :)

> And no picture in particular showing a natural clitoris with a label
> saying "un-circoncized clitoris".
>
> What would you feel when seeing the pict of a perfectly classical (for
> us) clitoris, with the label being not "clitoris" but being
> "uncirconcized clitoris" ? Would it feel quite right ?
>
> Would it ?

I understand your point, but I think it's a matter of context.  If we
show an "uncircumcised penis" (this all goes for "clitoris" too) next
to a "penis", then yes, that is POV: one is implied to be "normal".  If
we show an "uncircumcised penis" next to a "circumcised penis" (as you
did on [[circumcision]]) the implication is that the circumcised one
had something done to it, namely a circumcision.  That's not POV,
that's fact, and it's also closer to your opinion.

But hey, a penis is a penis is a penis, folks.

> The topic of female circonsision is only very shortly mentionned in
> two lines at the bottom of the article. And that's it. Not mentionned
> in the anatomy. Not additional link.
>
> Now, I wonder what an african reading these two articles, one
> proeminently talking about a practice he does not really know about,
> and another hardly mentionning what is cultural norm to him, would
> think.

Your points here are truly valid.  Let's fix the clitoris article.

Peter

---
Funding for this program comes from Borders without Doctors: The
Bookstore Chain That Sounds Like a Charity.
		--Harry Shearer, Le Show


from_name: Erik Moeller

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
Alex-
> No one is talking about advocacy here.  If you want to
> advocate either way, then join one of the pro or anti
> circumcision groups.  If you want to be objective then
> don't suggest that an article about genitals should feature
> genitals that have been altered by a medical procedure.

This medical procedure is also a wide-spread cultural phenomenon.
Having a picture of an intact and a circumcised penis in an article about
the human penis does not mean that you take circumcision for granted. In
fact the article links to the one about [[circumcision]] three times, and
describes the procedure and its cultural background briefly.

Our job as an encyclopedia is to inform. And one thing people might ask
themselves when they read the article [[penis]] is: Why does my penis not
look like the one in the illustration/photo? As a matter of fact, studies
have shown that many circ'd men don't even know the difference, and don't
know -whether- they are circumcised! This should not be surprising as many
parents expect "the media" to do the job of sex education.

Of course the article should not solve the problem by showing no penis at
all. It should probably show a whole multitude of penises to illustrate
common differences in length (erect/flaccid), thickness, keratinization/
moisture, foreskin length, foreskin retractability, circumcision status
etc.

> To be culturally and socially neutral requires that one be sensitive
> and non-judgemental to all perspectives, otherwise NPOV is
> just another way to create propaganda that subtly controls by
> using sophisticated references that are hidden while appearing
> to be "objective" (whatever that means).

Well, I'm afraid that *omitting* the photo might cause this precise
problem, only that it would push things into the opposite direction. I
would prefer a solution where the image is put into context. Factual
completeness is better than political correctness.

Regards,

Erik


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Anthere

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Re: Banning user names (was Re: Why can't I ban
	Michael on Meta?)

body:
Erik Moeller a ?crit:
> Anthere-

>>This is the english policy. Is valid on the english wikipedia. Was
>>discussed and approved by english users.
>
>
> Actually, I don't think it was discussed and approved in a very open
> process.

I do not think either

It would have been activated for the non-English Wikipedias as
> well if not for your .. constant constructive criticism.

Thank god I was there to avoid decisions being taken hastily for other
people, without asking them their opinion :-)

>>How do you know that this exact policy (sysops *not* allowed to ban
>>signed-in users) is (will be) the one adopted by other wikipedias when
>>other part of the banning policy are already different in other wikipedias ?
>
>
> Certainly auto-reverting like you are practicing now can always be a fall-
> back. But I believe most vandals will be deterred by a quick ban, and I
> don't see how it can be harmful.

For pure vandalism, no, I suppose it can't be harmful.
I suspect it is potentially more risky on wikipedias where there are few
  editors, and only one sysop though.
Fortunately, thanks to my constructive criticism perhaps, a blocking log
was quickly set.

>>But some of the wikipedias do not even have sysops !
>
>
> That's why we need better language coordination over a single mailing
> list, so that those pedias which do need sysops can quickly bring this to
> general attention. I'm not even subscribed to intwiki-l.

Nod.
But...if I agree that thanks to a single mailing list, an isolated
international can easily reach help, the other way is not working so
well. A message of him is more likely to get drown is all the other
messages.
But in any cases, I support dissolution of the international mailing list.

>>Which limitations are you talking about ? The limitations that only
>>Jimbo has the right to ban loggued in users ? Sorry, too late. We
>>outgrew that limitation :-)
>
>
> right vs. ability

ok, that other limitation. True.
That is why I mentionned the &bot=1.
It is even more frustrating for a vandal I guess, to see that his vandal
contribution entirely disappear.

>>Nod. But announcement just on the technical list, or even on wikipedia
>>list is not enough. A *very* small number of international editors read
>>them.
>
>
> A wiki-based digest service would surely be helpful. If you want to write
> summaries of the mailing list for the wikis, you have my full support.
> Failing that, the mailing list is the place where policy decisions like
> that are made.

I think that my suggestion to do as you did the other time (which was to
add a message to all village pumps, even in english, with a link to the
announcement) was more positive than this comment.

Ok, here are the problems

1) how to warn people of all wikipedias that there is an important
discussion cooking
	here, how to suggest people to decide whether they want the blocking
feature. I guess it will be little controversial, but in other cases,
such as suggesting people to discuss putting ads on the site is perhaps more

2) how to discuss it at all.

2) I have no idea, except for going on to do it only in english, here,
or on meta.

for 1) we tried many things. They all more or less failed. Why ?
*Because on some wikipedias, there is no one to ensure the travelling of
the information (no one is informed, because no one follow the mailing
list very well)
*Because it takes time to report accurately information, the servers are
slow (that is the tech limitations)
*Because that requires that at least one person understand english well
enough
*Because when people are not interested by a topic, they just do not
feel like reporting it

As a result, even if some informations are reported back and fro
(Tarquin doing a nice job for that :-)), I think it is not the case on
most wikipedias.

So, where is the central place on many wikipedias, where we can be sure
one posting is read by many people ? The pump (if the pump exists, but
the concept being great, it is likely the pump will ultimately be in all
wikipedias).

Could it be possible that somehow a feature is developped, that allow
ONE person to send a unique message (likely in english) on all pumps, in
one click ?

That way, we could automatically, in one click, post a message saying

"Hello. A new feature is currently under discussion, which would allow
to specifically block a user from editing a specific page (a super
protection). The discussion is occuring there : link".

What do you think ?

(apart from "yes, you can develop it if you feel like it" :-))

> Regards,
>
> Erik

De m?me.


from_name: Jens Frank

body:
On Sun, Jan 11, 2004 at 12:07:15AM +0100, Anthere wrote:
> [lots of things]

This seems to be a policy discussion and not a technical one. Wouldn't
wikiintl-l be the place for this?

	Regards,

		JeLuF


body:
Jens Frank a ?crit:
> On Sun, Jan 11, 2004 at 12:07:15AM +0100, Anthere wrote:
>
>>[lots of things]
>
>
> This seems to be a policy discussion and not a technical one. Wouldn't
> wikiintl-l be the place for this?
>
> 	Regards,
>
> 		JeLuF

I just realised I ccied instead of cced.
But my ccied were sent to wikipedia-l, not intl-l.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
Alex T. a ?crit:
> Many people agree with you Anthere, even
> in the United States. This is an issue that has
> become galvanized because of the supposed
> "antisemite" connotations of circumcision (though
> moslems also practice this form of male genital
> mutilation as a religious right of the parents).
> J. Steven Svoboda, a Harvard Law School
> graduate started this UN recognized NGO:
> http://www.arclaw.org/
>
> There are also some other sites to look at:
> http://www.mgmbill.org/
> http://www.noharmm.org/home.htm
>
> This is a serious problem. If you chose to
> discuss it on this list it would not be a rant,
> Anthere, as I think most list members respect
> and value your opinions. It is certainly related
> to the issue of NPOV and is not off topic
> because of the discussion about what would
> be an accurate, unbiased depiction of the
> human anatomy.

I thank you for this comment Alex.
But, it is *not* whether circumsition is *good* or is *bad* the idea
that I am desperatly trying to get through.

And in seems my comparisons are just not being understood.

I am currently hesitating just removing the pictures of the article, at
the risk of an edit war.

or explaining a little bit more crudely what I think here, at the risk
of seing my comments be seen offending by american editors.

I guess I go remove the pictures then. If someone disagrees, I'll try to
  explain again why I think the labels under the pictures ARE POV, and
why the second picture does not best belong to this article. The first
does not bring much more than the diagramm and the third provides.


from_name: Martin Harper

subject: [WikiEN-l] Legal advice

body:
> User:Anthony DiPierro claims on Wikipedia:Possible copyright infringements
> that Wikipedia is violating his copyright by not releasing the entirety of
> an article he modified under GFDL (Al Gore) including images, some of which
> may have been used under fair use. The images were included after his
> modifications. He claims the entire article, including images, must be
> released under GFDL to avoid breaking the license. I'm not a lawyer, I'm
> just confused (heh) and worried that this may become a problem.. probably
> just me being weird.

> - Evil saltine

Firstly, legal questions should be posted to wikilegal-l (or resolved on wikipedia, of
course). I'm cross-posting this one.

Some claim that we only release Wikipedia text under the GFDL, (see
[[meta:permission grant extent]]). As far as I know, Jimbo has not explicitly clarified
this. However, this claim is not sustainable when the images are embedded within
the article using "inline links". In this case, the image and the text form a single
document.

My reasoning is based on the various cases where people created HTML pages that
embedded content from another server - there are a bunch of examples at
http://www.linksandlaw.com/linkingcases-framing.htm. In these cases, it was argued
that inline linking creates a derivative work. Note that the GFDL only gives
permission to create a derivative work if the resulting work is also released under the
GFDL.

If the fair use image (or, indeed, quote) would probably also be fair use for all
(reasonable) downstream users, and its copyright status is explicitly marked, then
we're probably ok, but we do typically ask the image uploader to add as much detail
as they can on the image description page, so sub-licensees can decide whether to
take the risk. However, if the fair use claim relies heavily, on, for example,
Wikipedia's non-profit status, then we should remove it, and may be in danger of
infringing our contributors copyright.

If an image is vital, note that normal linking (not "inline linking") does NOT create a
derivative work.

-- Martin "IANAL" Harper


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
Erik Moeller a ?crit:
> Alex-
>
>>Many people agree with you Anthere, even
>>in the United States. This is an issue that has
>>become galvanized because of the supposed
>>"antisemite" connotations of circumcision (though
>>moslems also practice this form of male genital
>>mutilation as a religious right of the parents).
>
>
> This is not the place for a circumcision flamewar. Many people feel that
> in spite of lacking a foreskin, they are fully sexually functional, and
> may even believe in the supposed medical benefits of the procedure. As a
> matter of fact, there are some recent studies which promote the belief
> that circumcision even prevents HIV. I say "promote the belief" because
> these studies are fundamentally methodologically flawed, but it is easy to
> see that people might believe them, given that they have been published in
> peer reviewed (US) journals and have received widespread (international)
> media attention.
>
> There are people who believe just as forcefully that circumcision is
> right, decent and proper as I believe that it is wrong, harmful and
> pointless, and there are internally consistent arguments that can be made
> for both sides. Few subjects are as eligible to turn into long lasting
> flamewars as this one. Please do not encourage rants on this subject --
> they do not really contribute to a debate about inclusion standards.
>
> Wikipedia is not Usenet. It's not a place for advocacy of any kind. If
> anything, we should talk about how to make the article [[circumcision]]
> better, not about what's morally wrong with the procedure. Otherwise we
> might as well talk about the international arms trade, social equality,
> global warming and electronic voting machines, all very serious issues.
>
> Regards,
>
> Erik

I am going to improve the article right now, by moving to it what
currently DOES NOT belong to the penis article. Which is *absolutely*
the only position I have been holding.
I was talking of NPOV and american bias, not of any morality issues.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
I am glad you understood Alex, and explained better than I did what the
issue was. Thanks :-)
I moved the pictures to the circumcision article.

Alex T. a ?crit:
> I think you missed my point Eric. The point being that
> Anthere has a perfectly valid complaint.  There is nothing
> NPOV about circumsicion.  It is not a fact, it is something
> that people do. As such it should not be used to slant an
> article one way or the other.
>
> No one is talking about advocacy here.  If you want to
> advocate either way, then join one of the pro or anti
> circumcision groups.  If you want to be objective then
> don't suggest that an article about genitals should feature
> genitals that have been altered by a medical procedure.
>
> Showing a circumsicised genital, male or female, is a culturally charged
> act, not something that should be taken for granted in an
> encyclopedia that is trying to be neutral.  If someone wants
> to write an article about circumcision, that is where a circumsized
> male and female genitalia belong, just like I would not put an image
> of a person being murdered in an article about some purely
> private civil law topic such as breach of contract.
> It is just not appropriate.
>
> Certainly the pros and cons of circumcision should be
> discussed on the circumcision page, not on a page about
> genitals, male or female, otherwise, you are right Eric,
> Wikipedia will be nothing more than another verison of Usenet
> that is used to distort knowledge rather than clarifying
> what is knowledge and what is opinion.
>
> My main point being that Anthere bringing this up is showing that
> NPOV is not as easy as some people will make it out to be.
> To be culturally and socially neutral requires that one be sensitive
> and non-judgemental to all perspectives, otherwise NPOV is
> just another way to create propaganda that subtly controls by
> using sophisticated references that are hidden while appearing
> to be "objective" (whatever that means).
>
> Hopefully you will now understand where I am coming from,
> if I telegraphed my opinions and they did not register I hope
> this explaination gets through.
>
> Alex756
> From: "Erik Moeller" <erik_moeller at gmx.de>
> To: <alex756 at nyc.rr.com>
> Cc: <anthere8 at yahoo.com>; <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Sent: Saturday, January 10, 2004 6:09 PM
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia
>
>
>
>>Alex-
>>
>>>Many people agree with you Anthere, even
>>>in the United States. This is an issue that has
>>>become galvanized because of the supposed
>>>"antisemite" connotations of circumcision (though
>>>moslems also practice this form of male genital
>>>mutilation as a religious right of the parents).
>>
>>This is not the place for a circumcision flamewar. Many people feel that
>>in spite of lacking a foreskin, they are fully sexually functional, and
>>may even believe in the supposed medical benefits of the procedure. As a
>>matter of fact, there are some recent studies which promote the belief
>>that circumcision even prevents HIV. I say "promote the belief" because
>>these studies are fundamentally methodologically flawed, but it is easy to
>>see that people might believe them, given that they have been published in
>>peer reviewed (US) journals and have received widespread (international)
>>media attention.
>>
>>There are people who believe just as forcefully that circumcision is
>>right, decent and proper as I believe that it is wrong, harmful and
>>pointless, and there are internally consistent arguments that can be made
>>for both sides. Few subjects are as eligible to turn into long lasting
>>flamewars as this one. Please do not encourage rants on this subject --
>>they do not really contribute to a debate about inclusion standards.
>>
>>Wikipedia is not Usenet. It's not a place for advocacy of any kind. If
>>anything, we should talk about how to make the article [[circumcision]]
>>better, not about what's morally wrong with the procedure. Otherwise we
>>might as well talk about the international arms trade, social equality,
>>global warming and electronic voting machines, all very serious issues.
>>
>>Regards,
>>
>>Erik
>


body:
Erik Moeller a ?crit:

> Compare the software development process to editing an article on
> Wikipedia. When I want to make a big change to a controversial article, I
> announce it on the talk page first. When I want to make a minor change, an
> addition or a clear improvement, I just do it. If it turns out to be a bad
> idea, it can always be reverted.
>
> We should do the same with features: use common sense.

Hum. Yes, that is a curious but valid comparison.

>>But in any cases, I support dissolution of the international mailing list.
>
>
> Brion, are you following this?

:-)

>>That is why I mentionned the &bot=1.
>
>
> It's an interesting concept. I hope you don't miss any edits. Note,
> however, that in order to mark a user as a bot, you need developer
> permissions -- again a dependency on Brion & Co.

Why could not we mark a user as a bot ? Which are the arguments against ?

> I disagree. I think a mailing list digest service, either on Meta or on a
> newly created page on each Wikipedia, would be more useful than a "clog
> the pumps" function, which, I fear, could be easily abused for spamming.

True, it could be.

> (Also, it would probably lead to discussions taking place on the pumps,
> instead of on the mailing list.)

So what ? When people are discussing a policy, do you seriously think
they are discussing it in english just for pleasure ? No, they discuss
it together in their native tongues. Trying to restrict discussions to
the mailing list, in a language many people are not confortable with or
do not know is not a solution to empower people.

In any cases, we are slipping from the initial point, which was "how to
tell people of a feature, and ask them if they want it". I suggested
"going toward" these people to offer them the information. Just dropping
it on the mailing list and waiting for them to come to retrieve it might
sound the simplest solution, but practically, that does not work very well.

Generally, every non-English Wikipedia
> should have at least one ambassador who takes care of summarizing relevant
> discussions in their native tongue. I'm sure if we organize a call for
> volunteers we find enough people.

(shaking my head in disagreement)

> Regards,
>
> Erik

toujours


from_name: Ruimu

subject: [WikiEN-l] External links and attributions

body:
> However, wiki-markup has no convenient way of representing footnotes and
> citations.

Not only wiki markup: Footnotes aren't easy to display and to use with html
pages and computer screens. PSs aren't useful anymore in e-mails, as one can
edit inside the text (what wasn't possible in hand written letters). I guess
that footnotes go the same way: they aren't useful anymore, as additional
info can be added inside the text itself or simply linked on.

If I do recall well, inline external links are bad because their targets can
change after a while and become obsolete. In a perfect world, citations
wouldn't point on, say, a newspaper article, but on a cached copy, or on
some archiving (and trusted) web-site, and not only carry an URI, but a
date. On wiki editor pov, this could be done simply by coding like this:

    As Untel said in LA Time, "bla bla bla" [[Citation:http://blabla.bla]]

After edit, the thing could become  [[Citation
11/1/2004:http://blabla.bla]], will simply display as [1], and would be a
link on whether the cached page or the original one (maybe depending on
whatever the original page has been modified or not). I don't know if
wikipedia could handle the caching of those pages, but I suppose this to be
legal, as google already does.

(Only a little idea poping in my head)


body:
Brion Vibber a ?crit:

> I was initially skeptical but after seeing it in action I'm quite taken
> with it; it greatly reduces the annoyance factor of a flood vandal with
> relatively little effort. That the vandalism is still in the edit
> histories is not that big a deal compared to the potential for abuse of
> an unrecoverable rollback that actually disappeared the edits.
>
> It could use some refinement; making this the default behavior for
> rollback, making the 'show hidden edits' in RC easier to use and more
> prominent, perhaps a count of the number of hidden edits if any; and
> some way of noting the gravity of rollback (ie, that it should _not_ be
> used for reverting a change you just don't like, but is meant only for
> base vandalism, particularly massive flood vandalism).
>
> Separately: setting up sysops and marking accounts as official bots and
> such certainly is something that shouldn't be a bottleneck on the
> developers. Feel free to make some suggestions (or write the code :) for
> a less centralized setup.

Actually, the main default I might see to it, is that we loose
perspective of the level of the vandalism still ongoing. Some users
sometimes say "he, we won, he left Wikipedia in the end". To which we
have to answer, that no, actually, he was just there 2 hours later.

There is not even a need to block the ip if he is already gone, because
he never comes back under the same ip. So, if one does not block the ip,
as soon as the stuff is reverted, everything that happened is invisible.
Even if we do block the ip, it is unblocked very quickly. So
practically, there is little way we can track what happened.

To a certain extent, I find it a little bit troubling, as it may be seen
as an unfair and hidden process, especially from the newbie perspective.

but well...


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
Daniel Mayer a ?crit:

> Leave the photo of the circumsized penis at [[penis]]. Nothing wrong with it
> being there as a compare/contrast photo set with uncircumcised penis. You
> also allude to a very important point - a great many men (perhaps most) in
> the U.S. are circumsized and it has nothing to do with religion.
>
> -- mav

A circumsized penis is not the natural state of a penis. It is pov to
label a regular penis by describing him not being a non-natural state of
a penis

A "missing" picture is not alluding the fact some penis are circonsized,
the text is explaining circoncicion and there is a link to this article.

Wikipedia is not a source of information for America only. And the rest
of the world does not necessarily want to hear about America only.

American men are far from being the majority of men on planet.

The fact penis are circoncized for religion or for social reasons is
irrelevant to the article on penis. It is highly relevant to the article
on circonsizion.

Circonsision or not circonsision is not a very important point about
penis. The very important points about penis is that it allows you to
1) urinate
2) make children
3) give pleasure (controversial)
4) feel pleasure (controversial)

I would not have thought I would spend my evening with penises


subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Why can't I ban Michael on Meta?

body:
Daniel Mayer a ?crit:
> Anthere wrtote:
>
>>Why would you alone take such an important decision ?
>
>
> The policy on how to deal with this is already there - only simple vandals are
> to be blocked. I've already wasted a dozen or so hours trying to keep a step
> ahead of logged-in vandals. I don't wish that on anybody.

Sorry to hear about that; Are you working alone on these pedias ? You
should call for help if that is too heavy


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
Daniel Mayer a ?crit:
> Anthere wrote:
>
>>A circumsized penis is not the natural state of a penis. It is pov to
>>label a regular penis by describing him not being a non-natural state of
>>a penis
>
>
> It seems that you are most offended by the label so then label the circumsized
> one as circumsized and the other one as intact.

Yes. Which is why I also suggested that only the regular picture be kept
at the top, with the mention "penis". And that circoncized one be moved
at the bottom (there is a small paragraph introducing the topic, where
it would relevant possibly).

Then, I realised there were NO pictures of circoncized penis in the
circonsision article. So I thought that the pictures were more relevant
there, and that moving both allowed comparison.

On the penis article, there is a diagram which I think is sufficiently
informative.

I was considering moving the semi erected picture as well to the
erection article (as this article has no picture at all either), then
Brion stopped the writing of the database....and...

>>Wikipedia is not a source of information for America only. And the rest
>>of the world does not necessarily want to hear about America only.
>
>
> Within the bounds of NPOV, the English Wikipedia is first and foremost by and
> for the English speaking world (with an emphasis on the needs of native
> speakers - other languages have their own 'pedias, so this is only fair). It
> has already been noted that a large part of that world has very significant
> percentages of their male population with circumsized penises. So to not
> include a photo of circumsized penis while including one of an obviously
> intact penis is POV.

I respectfully disagree that the english wikipedia is first and
beforemost for the english speaking world. Unless you agree to include
most Europe for example, as most adults now speak a reasonable amount of
english.

We do not build a project with a special pov depending on languages and
cultures supposed to be associated to specific country. An article on
the english wikipedia is supposed to be neutral for american readers,
but supposed to be neutral for french readers as well. If not (actually,
it is not), we can't claim our goal is to be neutral.

> But I see you moved both photos to [[circumcision]] while retaining the photo
> of an erect penis (which is, of course, more difficult to tell if it is
> circumcised or not). While not ideal, I can live with that since the
> comparison is more relevant to that article.

Good.
The picture is not very good unfortunately.
It would be best as Erik says, that we have more pictures of different
states.

>>American men are far from being the majority of men on planet.
>
>
> So they should be ignored then? Since when has Wikipedia been a place where
> only majority views are expressed?

You can't claim seriously circunsision is being ignored in that article
Mav. It is mentionned in the anatomy part, AND there is a special
paragraph as well AND there is also a link at the bottom. It is
mentionned quite proeminently and clearly. I would like that minority
views are always expressed as clearly.

------

This is not just for Mav.

I went to the article about clitoris for a tiny comparison, as a huge
number of african girls are circonsized as well (some of them being
french, as this is still practiced in secret among african immigrants).
It is also practiced in other countries; A minority, just like masculine
circoncized, but a relevant number anyway.

There are no pictures of circonsision in the article.

And no picture in particular showing a natural clitoris with a label
saying "un-circoncized clitoris".

What would you feel when seeing the pict of a perfectly classical (for
us) clitoris, with the label being not "clitoris" but being
"uncirconcized clitoris" ? Would it feel quite right ?

Would it ?

The topic of female circonsision is only very shortly mentionned in two
lines at the bottom of the article. And that's it. Not mentionned in the
anatomy. Not additional link.

Now, I wonder what an african reading these two articles, one
proeminently talking about a practice he does not really know about, and
another hardly mentionning what is cultural norm to him, would think.


from_name: G. W. Bauer

subject: [WikiEN-l] User:Wik

body:
I noted that the user Wik has listed at least

* Angela
* RickK
* Hephaestos
* Jiang

all sysops, on Problems users the last three days!

--

_________________________________________________________________
Hotmail snakker ditt spr?k!
http://www.hotmail.msn.com/cgi-bin/sbox?rru=dasp/lang.asp - F? Hotmail p?
norsk i dag


subject: [Wikitech-l] Edit toolbar added

body:
I've added a phpBB style edit toolbar (JavaScript-based) to the edit
screen. It can be disabled in the user prefs. There's plenty of new text
in Language.php to translate (tooltips, mostly).

The toolbar should work in all JavaScript browsers, but with different
results:

1) Mozilla and IE: Select text and click a button to apply that tool (e.g.
select text and click "bold" icon to make it bold). If you do not select
text and click the button, you get an example text (e.g. '''Bold text''').

2) All(?) others: Select and apply is not supported - you only get the
example text. Still useful as a learning tool.

In my version of Mozilla, select+apply works well unless the text is more
than a screenful. In that case, the cursor jumps to the top again. Not so
in IE. Not sure if this is a browser or JS bug. The JS is copied mostly
from phpBB.

Committed to CVS unstable, please report any bugs you find.

Regards,

Erik


from_name: Elisabeth Bauer

subject: [WikiEN-l] congratulations

body:
Hello,

I just wanted to congratulate the English wikipedia on Dannies
departure. I am sure the neutrality and objectivity of Wikipedia will
very much profit from it.

If you don't think so, there's work to do:

     * Al-Aqsa Intifada
     * Anti-Israel movements
     * Anti-Semitism
     * Arabs and anti-Semitism
     * Christian-Jewish reconciliation
     * Deir Yassin massacre
     * Dhimmi
     * First Intifada
     * Golan Heights
     * Hezbollah
     * History of Israel
     * History of anti-Semitism
     * Islam
     * Islam and Judaism
     * Islam and anti-Semitism
     * Islamism
     * Israeli-Palestinian conflict
     * Israeli-Palestinian conflict timeline
     * Israeli attack on USS Liberty
     * Israeli settlement
     * Israeli terrorism
     * Israelis and anti-Palestinian racism
     * Jenin
     * Jewish fundamentalism
     * List of massacres committed during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war
     * Muhammad
     o List of Muslims
     o Palestinian refugee
     * PLO and Hamas
     * Palestine
     * Palestine Liberation Organization
     * Palestinian
     * Palestinian Authority
     * Palestinian territories
     * Proposals for a Palestinian state
     * Rachel Corrie
     * Six-Day War
     * Terrorism against Israelis
     * The Bible in Islam
     * Wahhabism
     * West Bank
     * Yasser Arafat
     * Zionism and racism
     * Zionist conspiracy theories regarding the September 11, 2001
Terrorist Attacks

these are some of the articles linked from [[Wikipedia:NPOV dispute]].
Minus talk and wikipedia pages, they make up almost 30% of all articles
which are currently under a neutrality dispute.

greetings and have fun,
elian
PS: could someone please delete my user account on en?


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: congratulations

body:
Elisabeth Bauer a ?crit:
> Hello,
>
> I just wanted to congratulate the English wikipedia on Dannies
> departure. I am sure the neutrality and objectivity of Wikipedia will
> very much profit from it.

I still have not really understood why he left. I can't help to think
that it *can't* be just because of Jimbo's comments.

?


from_name: Robert

subject: [WikiEN-l] Please stop the harassment and censorship.

body:
Anthere writes about Danny and Jimbo:
> I still have not really understood why he left. I can't
> help to think that it *can't* be just because of Jimbo's
> comments.

Your sarcasm towards Jimbo does not make Wikipedia a better
place. Please desist.

Danny has made it clear why he left. There are over 100,000
articles on Wikipedia, and he made sure that he had to get
his way on every one that he edited. The first time he was
rebuffed on *one* article, he deleted his account and ran
away. Now some other user is running away as well, all
because some people would rather blatantly censor
information than jointly edit articles.

In contrast, I have seen a few regular users on this very
list get strongly rebuffed, and most of their edits
rebuffed on some articles (not just one.) Yet they don't
leave the project in a huff; most people here understand
that this is a group effort that strives to incorporate
multiple points of view.

Those people that cannot stand the sight of points of view
other than their own will eventually burn out.  It is up to
you which kind of user you would like to be.

It is not just me who feels this way: Others agree that
discussion is superior to politically motivated censorship:
>From the article's talk page.

"I just stumbled onto this article (I usually try to steer
clear of things like this). But it would be wrong to remain
silent on this one, Danny. This is nothing whatsoever wrong
or innacurate with the last sentence of the material you
have censored (it is factually accurate, just read the
textbooks; if you don't like the adjectives then change
those, but they are actually understated!), nor with the
bulk of the quotations. The material is entirely relevant
to the subject at hand. It is shameful of you to have
played the silly game of expunging the material time and
again. I don't intend to play that game or get involved in
this any further, but I do hope that others with not only
add back the material but make sure that Danny agrees to no
more censorship based on his obviously extreme political
biases. This is a real test for Wikipedia."

This person is correct.

By the way, Martin and Viajero are again *lying* about the
content of the article and are deleting vas chunks of it.
They are putting words into the mouth og Yassir Arafat and
others, makign them out to be saying the opposite of what
they actually are saying.

I understand that both of these people have a hatred of
Israel, but that does not give them the right to falsify
information and censor material. Sadly, this "edit war" is
not over.

I also am having problems with Martin, as AGAIN he is
treating me absuively on my own home page. I have already
made clear that this person is forbidden to do so; I will
not have people with pro-CI beliefs continually harass me.

Robert

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus


subject: [WikiEN-l] Please stop Martin (MyRedDice)'s harassment

body:
Please stop Martin (MyRedDice)'s harassment. He won't stop
writing hateful notes to me on my home page.

> Just so we wouldn't miss the point, you repeated
> yourself six times. Don't worry, we all got the message.
> We're just upset you didn't bugger off like you promised
> to. Go away already

American readers should know that "bugger off" means "fuck
off".  (It literally means "go fuck an animal, or "go have
anal sex", depending on the context.)

New users should be aware that Martin has also harassed me
in the past by bullying me with his support of anti-Semitic
Christian Identity posts by others; Even Danny admitted
that these Christian Identity (if not Nazi posts) posts
were anti-Semitic; he was the author of the "anonymous"
letter to the Wiki-En list. (Funny, back then few people
supported Danny. People disagreed with the proof offered
simply because of personal hatred of me. I wonder what
people think of Danny now that they now it was him whose
message I forwarded? Will they now admit that blatant
anti-Semitism is wrong?  Or will they hate Danny?)

I have not been in a debate with Martin; I have not been
makign remarks on his page; I have not been discussing
anythign with him at all. There is no reason for his
continuted remarks. Yet anytime I make an edit that has to
do with Jews and Israel, Martin goes haywire and begins a
hateful harassment campaign against me.  I don't know why
he keeps doing this, but his behaviour is a violation of
Wikipedia etiquette. Please do something to stop his
harassment.

Robert

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Daniel Mayer

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Wikimedia PayPal donations for 2003

body:
A month, by month summary and links to each month's detailed PayPal
transactions is now on Meta. For privacy purposes all names, email addresses,
and other personal info has been removed from the data.

If I have blotted out your name and/or user name in a comment field and you
want to have your name and/or user name restored then just email me, drop a
message on my Meta talk page or fix the page yourself. :-)

NOTE: This page and its subpages will probably be protected in a day or two.
http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_PayPal_donations_for_2003

If my presentation of the data is unclear, then please say so on the talk
page.

Source file (OpenOffice Calc format - feel free to add graphs or better
formating/analysis):
http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Wikimedia_PayPal_History_(Aug-Dec_2003).sxc

-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)

PS Ray Saintonge has also developed a daily summary but I haven't had time to
double check the data he used to obtain those numbers (there were several
errors in the data I gave him).


from_name: Nikos-Optim

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
--- Delirium <delirium at rufus.d2g.com> wrote:
> Now one might argue that circumcision is a bad
> modification, while
> shaving is a good (or neutral) modification, but
> that's also a POV claim.
> -Mark

ForYourInformation:

Shaving is considered a bad modification by many
religious sects. Shaving is also discouraged by some
mystics. There are lots of people who don't like
shaving.

I just wanted to show that it is very difficult to say
that some claim is neutral. Most claims are POV :)

How can we keep Wikipedia NPOV while most claims are
POV? I think the best way is to present all claims and
write "X says that Y is wrong" or "Z says that A is
right", that is, reporting all POVs and giving
references. When we write an article we should think
"I don't know the truth, I am only a reporter, the
reader will decide what is true".

--Optim

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus


from_name: Fred Bauder

subject: [WikiEN-l] Going Off in a Huff

body:
People make mistakes, usually on both sides of any disputed issue. Usually,
over time upon taking thought these mistakes can be corrected. A major
project like Wikipedia with a bright future deserves handling with some
perspective. One bad editor, RK, and one misjudgment, Jimbo's, do not
somehow make an entire project worthless.

Regarding Jimbo: I think it is important that you create an account under
some persona, edit some articles, get into an edit war or two, and in
general get grounded in the realities of this project.

Fred

> From: Anthere <anthere8 at yahoo.com>
> Reply-To: anthere8 at yahoo.com, English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Sun, 11 Jan 2004 05:01:02 +0100
> To: wikien-l at wikipedia.org
> Subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: congratulations
>
>
>
> Elisabeth Bauer a ?crit:
>> Hello,
>>
>> I just wanted to congratulate the English wikipedia on Dannies
>> departure. I am sure the neutrality and objectivity of Wikipedia will
>> very much profit from it.
>
> I still have not really understood why he left. I can't help to think
> that it *can't* be just because of Jimbo's comments.
>
> ?
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
> >>Wikipedia is not a source of information for
> America only. And the rest
> >>of the world does not necessarily want to hear
> about America only.
>

I consider English Wikipedia as International, and I
want it to be International.

> I went to the article about clitoris for a tiny
> comparison, as a huge
> number of african girls are circonsized as well
>
> There are no pictures of circonsision in the
> article.
>
> And no picture in particular showing a natural
> clitoris with a label
> saying "un-circoncized clitoris".

I haven't visited the articles you mention, but if we
don't have photos or diagrams we should add them ASAP,
either as inline images or links to images or external
links.

--Optim

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
Arvind Narayanan wrote:
>And as already has been stated, United States != world.
>[[Curcumcision]] says that a sixth of penises worldwide are
>circumcised. I would argue that that is not a large enough
>number in the current context.

Wrong. A sixth of the entire male population of the world is a huge number.
But that is a moot issue since the article is in English and written for an
English speaking audience. I would venture to guess that among male English
speakers the percentage is even higher.

-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
Nikola Smolenski wrote:
>I estimate that, of 3,000,000,000 available penises in the world,
>only around 650,000,000 are circumcised, while 2,350,000,000
>are not.

LOL! /Only/ 650,000,000. What an insanely small number!

-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)


subject: [WikiEN-l] Going Off in a Huff

body:
Fred Bauder wrote:
>Regarding Jimbo: I think it is important that you create an account under
>some persona, edit some articles, get into an edit war or two, and in
>general get grounded in the realities of this project.

Peter the Great did it - why not Jimbo?

-- mav


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
Nikos-Optim wrote:
>I consider English Wikipedia as International, and I
>want it to be International.

That is a rather odd statement since many languages (esp. French, Arabic and
Spanish) are international. English just happens to be one of the most
international (meaning there are people who speak English in many different
nations).

All those people are part of the English Wikipedia's audience.

But as I've stated before there is a primary audience (those whose native
language is English) and a secondary audience (those whose native language is
something other than English).

-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)


from_name: Nikola Smolenski

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
On Saturday 10 January 2004 12:52, Daniel Mayer wrote:
> And as already has been stated, a large number of penises are circumcised -
> especially in the United States.

I estimate that, of 3,000,000,000 available penises in the world, only around
650,000,000 are circumcised, while 2,350,000,000 are not.


subject: [WikiEN-l] footnotes and citations

body:
On Saturday 10 January 2004 13:56, Graham Burnett wrote:
> > However, wiki-markup has no convenient way of representing footnotes and
> > citations.  In my fantasy, some hypertexty mechanism could give you the
> best
> > of both world--invisible footnotes that don't interrupt the text but can
> be
> > made visible if you want to trace the authority for something.
>
> This is exactly the sort of thing I had in mind, but didn't express too
> well due to the imbibing of far too much home-made wine last night ;-)

I was thinking about this problem. I think that probably the best way for
solving it is introducing pseudo-namespaces "Footnote:" and "Citation:".
These would display in the text as numbers, consistent with current URL
inlining:

Some text [http://site1.com], with a [[Footnote: This is a footnote]], and
then a [http://site2.com], and a [[Citation: This Book by Someone]] would
render:

Some text [1], with a [2], and then a [3], and a [4] would render:

Now, the simplest thing to do is having a link that leads to nowhere (#) and
the text of the footnote/citation would be displayed as hover text (just as,
when you hold your mouse over a link to an article for some time, the name of
the article which realy is beign linked to is displayed). The proper thing to
do, though it is a bit complicated, would be that, in addition to above, text
of the footnote/citation is actually added on the fly to the
Footnotes/References paragraph of the article, the link points to
footnote/citation's anchor, and next to the footnote/citation there is a link
(or more of them) that says "go back" and points to an anchor in the text
next to the citation number. Perhaps, as the first solution, browser
detection could be done, and browsers which are not capable of displaying
hover text would be fed with [2: This is a footnote] text instead.


subject:
[Wikitech-l] Bad situation on English Wikipedia: RC and watchlists
	down, editing still OK

body:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/* (unreachable)
http://en2.wikipedia.org/wiki/* (most pages pages reachable and editable)
http://en2.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Recentchanges (unreachable)
http://en2.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Watchlist (disabled and unreachable)

The only way to track edits is through 'Related changes'. I'm keeping an eye
on everything linked from the [[Main Page]] and [[Current events]].

If a vandal stumbles on en2 we will have no way to really see the vandalism
unless we happen to stumble upon a vandalized article.

If RC is not going to be up anytime soon, then could somebody lock the
database?

-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)


subject:
[Wikitech-l] Nevermind (was: Bad situation on English Wikipedia: RC
	and watchlists down, editing still OK)

body:
RC is back up. Surprisingly there wasn't much vandalism (at least I didn't see
any).

--mav


subject: [WikiEN-l] Scanning VS. Reading

body:
A notice for everyone who writes often on Wikipedia:

***Users do not read the page; they just scan it!***

See http://www.useit.com/alertbox/9710a.html

Personally I agree completely with the article, which
of course I haven't read but just scanned it and
scrolled quickly from start to end picking interesting
words to understand what it is all about.

May you Have PEACE PROFOUND,
--Optim

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus


from_name: Geoff Burling

subject: [WikiEN-l] Edit War on Wikipedia:Conflicts between users

body:
Almost every day I look to the Wikipedia Website to add information, or
perhaps -- even better -- to read some articles about something I
didn't know much about. And outside of an occasional email to this
list as the result of some navel-gazing, I tend to stay out of most
of the disagreements over policy. In other words, I don't go looking
to find a new reason for banning people.

But I have found one today, thanks to Wik.

As many of us have seen, Wik enters into more than his share of edit
wars. I don't know his reasoning: is he just pig-headed? Does he enjoy
pointless arguments? I don't know, & I really don't care. But it seems
to me that when someone enters into an edit war over certain pages
on Wikipedia, it should be grounds for some kind of serious reprimand,
such as a ban for 1 to 3 days.

One of those pages would be [[Wikipedia:Conflicts between users]]. Others
could include VfD, [[Wikipedia:Cleanup]], [[Wikipedia:Village Pump]],
[[Wikipedia:Pages needing attention]] -- in short any page where
discussion is important, & repeated reversions impedes that discussion.

If there is a meeting, & someone acts in an obnoxious manner which
prevents the meeting from continuing, that person can be ejected. That
is what I'm arguing we do here: these pages are where members of Wikipedia
conduct business, & must needs be kept free of reversions.

What say everyone? Shall we accept this as a precedent & ban Wik, or
is there a better solution?

Geoff


from_name: Arvind Narayanan

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
On Sat, Jan 10, 2004 at 03:52:13AM -0800, Daniel Mayer wrote:

> And as already has been stated, a large number of penises are circumcised -
> especially in the United States.
>
And as already has been stated, United States != world.
[[Curcumcision]] says that a sixth of penises worldwide are
circumcised. I would argue that that is not a large enough
number in the current context.

<dangerous topic>
What about FGM? You're probably asking "well, what about it"
because it doesn't happen in the United States. But since it
is widespread in certain cultures should we have pictures of
it alongside the female genitalia?
</dangerous topic>

Arvind
--
Its all GNU to me


subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Sites mirroring Wikipedia [Ex: mirror of Dutch
	Wikipedia]

body:
Scanning my logs, I discovered few sites using Wikipedia articles.

http://www.infosearchpoint.com/display/Chinese_poetry
http://sciencedaily.com/encyclopedia/I_Ching
http://nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Yi-Jing

Is there a page in Wikipedia where to build this list, so developers can
check if those "mirrors" aren't harmful for servers ?

- Infosearch seems to be simply a variant of WP.
- Sciencedaily seems to be a commercial website for students
- Nationmaster seems to be a big container for data and info on countries,
but I found weird results on religion pages (I hope it's a bug).


subject: [WikiEN-l] "Harassment"

body:
Dear Robert.

I don't take lessons in Netiquette from Robert "fuck you sick Nazi
bastards" Kaiser.  You made your bed. Lie in it.

Incidentally, I see you still don't know the difference between a talk
page and a home page.

-Martin


subject: [WikiEN-l] Please stop the censorship.

body:
Martin (MyRedDice) and Viajero are still engaged in
censorship of the article on "Palestinian views of the
peace process". While Danny deleted the entire article at
once, Martin and Viajero started a series of over a dozen
edits, removing each quote one at a time. They think that
no one will notice, perhaps?

The result is the same. They are deleting most of the
_content_ of the article, resulting in the same censorship
that a small but growing consensus here has condemned.

Their justifications on the Talk page contain no
references, no facts and no sources. They just have added
dozens of paragraphs of personal opinion, and are using
their own personal interpretations as grounds to delete all
this material. That is not acceptable.

If it is wrong when person X does it, it is wrong when
anyone does it. Thus, I am reverting their mass deletions.

The article, of course, does need some work. For instance,
it would be a good idea to include a wider array of
Palestinian views. The views of the average Palestinian are
not given by the Palestinian Authority alone. A great many
Palestinians sympathise with, and are members of, Hamas and
Palestinian Islamic Jihad. They have their own views of the
Peace Process with Israel, and these views should be
reported. (Many members in these groups think that no such
peace process should exist; they think Israel should be
removed sooner rather than later.)

We can also add more views of Palestinians in the pro-peace
camp. Ironically, none of the pro-Arab people here have
done anything of the sort. They just delete material. The
only person who has added any well-referenced quotes at all
showing this was *me*. So much for the false claims that
people keep hurling at me.

Also, we should add views of the Peace process by the
European Union, Russia, the USA and Israel.

What we must NOT do, however, is delete material that
pro-Arab apologists find uncomfortable. That is not
scholarship; that is just anti-Israeli propaganda. The
censorship is POV. The only way to keep NPOV is give a wide
array of Palestinian views, with quotes and sources, and
allow readers to make up their own mind.

On a related note, I also am disturbed that Martin is still
making non-stop personal attacks on me on my own home page.
As you all have seen, I was not discussing anything at all
with him...he just came at me full throttle when this issue
came up. He knows that such harassment is not acceptable.
Stick to editing in an NPOV fashion, and stop trying to
create a flame war. We have an encyclopedia to build.

Robert (RK)

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus


from_name: Viajero

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Religious Zealotry 1 - Secular Humanism 0 (was: Re:
	Effective bullying strategy. (RK))

body:
Jimbo,

Danny appealed to the list on Friday because of RK's belligerence
("bullying") over the "Peace Views" article.

Cleverly, RK immediately shifted the terms of the debate from the
underlying issues (how Palestinian POVs should be represented in WP) to
one of "censorship".

You fell for it hook, line, and sinker.

Last fall, it was obvious to Danny, Zero, and me (and perhaps others) that
the article in the original form (it has since been made less awful thanks
to the good offices of Martin and others) was a ludicrous and transparent
attempt to smuggle an anti-Palestinian editorial into Wikipedia. To those
of us with any understanding of the issues (and I am by no means an
expert) it wasn't a remotely meaningful representation of the Palestine
position. In fact, the article was a canard. It implicitly cast Israel as
the victim of apparent Palestinian duplicity with regard to the "peace
process", which is of course inane; Israel is the occupying force in the
Occupied Territories, it has a huge, well-equipped army, the backing of
the USA, and between 200 and 400 nuclear warheads. The Palestinians have
zilch; the rest of the Arab world has basically abandoned them to their
fate. The point is not whether those quotes of Arafat and others were
"true" or "accurate" or whatever but they are essentially irreverent taken
outside of the historical context and geopolitical reality of the current
Palestinian situation.

Let me draw an analogy: imagine someone submits -- just for the sake of
argument -- an article on "Cuban views of the conflict between Cuba and
the USA". It frames the issue as a debate between hardliners and
compromise-seekers, noting that Fidel calls for the destruction of the USA
in Spanish speeches and calls for reaching a compromise in English. The
Cubans destroy the USA? What a joke! Such
a comment or collection of comments -- if it were possible to take
seriously -- would only be meaningful if presented in the context of
Caribbean history and Cuba's internal political discourse.

Now, back to the "Peace views" article. That you had a different reaction
to the article I can only attribute to the fact that coverage of the
Middle East in the American media is pretty bad these days, and it is
nearly a fulltime occupation to keep well-informed. That's ok. But why
couldn't you trust the opinion of a Danny, an Israeli citizen who could
have explained to you that in Israel -- where the debate is more open and
frank than in the US -- mainstream opinion would regard such an article as
a bad joke, and that framing the debate in such as way is characteristic
of the marginal fringe of the ultra-Zionist Right in Israel and their
rather more numerous brethren in the USA, of whom RK is a prime example.
How could you possible perceive Danny has having an agenda in his handling
of this and fail to see RK's rabid Zionist zealotry reflected in
practically every edit he makes on the Middle East, something patently
obvious to anyone who has edited an article on the topic here.
Correspondingly, how could you POSSIBLY accuse Danny of being bullying,
when likewise those of us who have worked with him found him unceasingly
well-informed, modest, and non-confrontational???

To repeat, the issue is not one of censoring the point of view of Arafat
et al but presenting the issues in an intellectually honest manner,
something that users like Danny, Zero, 172, Adam Carr, and others
repeatedly demonstrate they are capable of doing, despite their own
particular ideological leanings, and something that Robert is congenitally
incapable of doing, whether it is Middle Eastern topics or alternative
medicine, an area where he shows exactly the same kind of blind fanaticism
and the bullying tactics that Danny denounced on Friday. You wrote:

> RK has worked to present the varying
> views of the Palestinians, and people who don't like the result just
> delete it instead of work to improve it.

Not true. It was perceived as shoddy work; it has nothing to do with
censorship. Why should the onus be on us to include "bad" material in our
articles? RK didn't take the trouble to integrate the quotes in a
responsible way in a description of the peace process; he offered them in
isolation as a blatant editorial position. We followed the existing --
admittedly imperfect -- system to vote to delete the material rather than
use it.

In closing, it is good that you involve yourself in these
disputes, but unless you are intimately involved in the day-to-day editing
process, interacting with other editors, and acquainting yourself with the
issues, you run the risk -- as you have just done -- of making things
worse.

V.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Personal attacks from Viajero are unacceptable

body:
On 01/10/04  at 05:35 PM, Robert <rkscience100 at yahoo.com> said:

> If you had taken the time to read the Wikipedia
> anti-Zionism article, or just peruse its edit history, you
> would know all this,

On the first line of the fourth line of the article, it says:

"The defining characteristic of anti-Zionism is therefore opposition to
the existence of the State of Israel

Ok. Provide us with concrete evidence that Danny and Zero have been
pushing an "anti-Zionist agenda" on Wikipedia as you charge. I don't mean
something Danny said to you on the telephone; I mean verifiable edits and
comments on Talk pages. Show us where EXACTLY where their edits reflect
activism in opposition of Israel.

V.


body:
Geoff Burling wrote:
>....
>But it seems to me that when someone enters into an
>edit war over certain pages on Wikipedia, it should be
>grounds for some kind of serious reprimand, such as a
>ban for 1 to 3 days.

Well we do business everywhere we edit around on Wikipedia, so I'll repeat my
position that a pattern of entering into edit wars with non-obvious vandals
should be considered a banable offense on a three strike basis (three such
edit wars within a certain time period, perhaps).

Confrontational people and those who don't care much about NPOV get into edit
wars often. We want to encourage cooperation and NPOV edits, no?

-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)


from_name: Stan Shebs

body:
Robert wrote:

>Please stop Martin (MyRedDice)'s harassment. He won't stop
>writing hateful notes to me on my home page.
>
Oh, the chutzpah... I'm still waiting for an apology from you for
calling me a Nazi and calling Wikipedia "Nazipedia". Until that
happens you're just a lowlife that deserves zero respect.

Stan

Just as a reminder, here is a copy of what RK sent to all of us
at the beginning of October:

"Fuck you sick Nazi bastards.

After Stevertigo was exposed for being a Nazi (and this was
PROVEN, not alleged) you sick Nazi bastards began harassing
me and vandalizing my home page.  You lied about him and
his edits, falsely accused me of saying things that SV
wrote, and then attacked me?

Then you accuse ME of being a Nazi?

Then you harassed me on my own home page, and then BANNED
me when I pointd out that such behaviour is wrong?

Never in my life I have ever seen such a community of
violent Jew haters.

Nor, for that matter, such a bunch of cowardly Jews, who
privately write me that they all agree with me, but
publicly refuse to say their names.

Fine. You win. Nazipedia it is.  I am gone.  But from now
on the word will *widely* spread about the violent
anti-Semitism that Wikipedia encourages, the way that it
allows Nazis free reign, and the way it bans those who
speak out against hatespeech.

You've just bought yourselves bad publicity, and a well
deserved reputation as a home for lying, leftist
anti-Semites.

Goodbye.

Robert RK"


from_name: Mirko Thiessen

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Going Off in a Huff

body:
Fred Bauder wrote:
> People make mistakes, usually on both sides of any disputed issue. Usually,
> over time upon taking thought these mistakes can be corrected. A major
> project like Wikipedia with a bright future deserves handling with some
> perspective. One bad editor, RK, and one misjudgment, Jimbo's, do not
> somehow make an entire project worthless.
> Regarding Jimbo: I think it is important that you create an account under
> some persona, edit some articles, get into an edit war or two, and in
> general get grounded in the realities of this project.

About edit wars and especially RK: It is difficult to imagine what it
is like to deal with RK and his ilk if you are not involved. One year
ago we had one of many discussions about banning RK. I argued against
banning him, probably because at that point of time I did not make my
own experience of being constantly insulted, accused and reverted. Now
I did not have trouble with RK, since he apparently edits other topics
than me, but there are others like him who prefer reverting and
discrediting the opponent rather than discussing. So I think I know
what it was like for Danny, and he has my respect for nonetheless
bearing with RK. I also understand his reaction of leaving Wikipedia.
RK has now a feeling of having something like an official backing for
his annoying behaviour, just have a look at
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Special:Contributions&target=RK.
Therefore it will now be even more difficult to bring neutrality into
the topics which are frequented by RK. We need more editors like
Danny, not less. I hope that someone around here knows him good enough
to persuade him to return.

Mirko (Baldhur)


subject: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia:Conflict resolution

body:
OK - I have had enough of the badly organized state of conflict resolution in
Wikipedia right now, so I've tried to summarize the escalating scale of
conflict resolution in five easy steps.

Please help me write this page and the very important associated pages
[[Wikipedia:Requests for mediation]],  [[Wikipedia:Mediation guidelines]],
[[Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration]], and [[Wikipedia:Arbitration
guidelines]].

Join the fun at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Conflict_resolution

-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)


from_name: Jimmy Wales

body:
Robert wrote:
> Danny has made it clear why he left. There are over 100,000
> articles on Wikipedia, and he made sure that he had to get
> his way on every one that he edited.

No, I think the reason he threatened to leave was that I was
personally rude to him in a way that's totally out of character for
me, and not becoming my position around here.  My actions threatened a
public loss of face for him that he didn't deserve, and I deeply
regret it.

I do not agree with the deletion of the content in question, but my
treatment of Danny was unacceptable, and I'm doing what I can to take
it back and rectify the situation.

This is really a proper issue for arbitration, not for me, and I
should have stepped back and let the process work.

--Jimbo


subject: [WikiEN-l] Going Off in a Huff

body:
Daniel Mayer wrote:
> Fred Bauder wrote:
> >Regarding Jimbo: I think it is important that you create an account under
> >some persona, edit some articles, get into an edit war or two, and in
> >general get grounded in the realities of this project.
>
> Peter the Great did it - why not Jimbo?

Ah, my hero. ;-)

But, yes, I accept that I should not have spoken so harshly at the
beginning.

Here's the problem, basically.  My own political opinion in the
Israeli/Palestinian situation is not very far from RK's.  (I don't
know his position in detail, so if it's horrifying, please don't take
me to be endorsing that.)

Because of that, I should recuse myself from further deliberations, and
offer my apologies to Danny for letting my sympathy for Rk's position
to turn into sympathy for RK, which MAY have been warranted or NOT.  But
that's really no longer for me to decide, since we have an arbitration
committee.

--Jimbo


from_name: dpbsmith at verizon.net

subject: [WikiEN-l] Genitalia

body:
Genitalia. Genitalia. Genitalia! g-e-n-I-t-a-l-i-a! Anagram for "TILE AGAIN."
It's spelled with two I's.  It ends in "Italia."

I promised myself I wasn't going to say anything, but the subject has just
been dragging on and on, and seeing the same misspelling over and over again
in the subject line is like Chinese water torture.

(Also: Gandhi, Nietzsche, and Charles M. Schulz. Not that I've seen any of
their names misspelled here lately, but I just thought I'd deal with them
now, since sooner or later they _will_ come up...)

Ah, I feel much better now.

Genitalia!


body:
great work!

--- Daniel Mayer <maveric149 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> A month, by month summary and links to each month's
> detailed PayPal
> transactions is now on Meta. For privacy purposes
> all names, email addresses,
> and other personal info has been removed from the
> data.
>
> If I have blotted out your name and/or user name in
> a comment field and you
> want to have your name and/or user name restored
> then just email me, drop a
> message on my Meta talk page or fix the page
> yourself. :-)
>
> NOTE: This page and its subpages will probably be
> protected in a day or two.
>
http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_PayPal_donations_for_2003
>
> If my presentation of the data is unclear, then
> please say so on the talk
> page.
>
> Source file (OpenOffice Calc format - feel free to
> add graphs or better
> formating/analysis):
>
http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Wikimedia_PayPal_History_(Aug-Dec_2003).sxc
>
> -- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
>
> PS Ray Saintonge has also developed a daily summary
> but I haven't had time to
> double check the data he used to obtain those
> numbers (there were several
> errors in the data I gave him).
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
>
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
Who decided which is the "primary" and the "secondary
audience" of the English Wikipedia and when this
decision took place?

Thanks,
--Optim

--- Daniel Mayer <maveric149 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Nikos-Optim wrote:
> >I consider English Wikipedia as International, and
> I
> >want it to be International.
>
> That is a rather odd statement since many languages
> (esp. French, Arabic and
> Spanish) are international. English just happens to
> be one of the most
> international (meaning there are people who speak
> English in many different
> nations).
>
> All those people are part of the English Wikipedia's
> audience.
>
> But as I've stated before there is a primary
> audience (those whose native
> language is English) and a secondary audience (those
> whose native language is
> something other than English).
>
> -- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Genitalia

body:
are there any similar resources in English?

damn, I was learning French for many years in school
but I only remember je m'appelle now :)))

Thanks
--Optim

--- Anthere <anthere8 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> OK, if you wish.
>
> Just for references, because such pictures are not
> easy to find. I
> recommand
>
http://tropiquesante.ifrance.com/tropiquesante/biblio/doc/doc1.htm
> for
> female circonsision (or whatever the spelling).
>
> The article is very long, so can't be used as pict
> reference. I
> recommand chapter III.
>
>
>
> dpbsmith at verizon.net a ?crit:
> > Genitalia. Genitalia. Genitalia!
> g-e-n-I-t-a-l-i-a! Anagram for "TILE AGAIN."
> > It's spelled with two I's.  It ends in "Italia."
> >
> > I promised myself I wasn't going to say anything,
> but the subject has just
> > been dragging on and on, and seeing the same
> misspelling over and over again
> > in the subject line is like Chinese water torture.
> >
> > (Also: Gandhi, Nietzsche, and Charles M. Schulz.
> Not that I've seen any of
> > their names misspelled here lately, but I just
> thought I'd deal with them
> > now, since sooner or later they _will_ come up...)
> >
> > Ah, I feel much better now.
> >
> > Genitalia!
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus


from_name: zero 0000

subject: [WikiEN-l] Fwd: the price we pay

body:
Note: forwarded message attached.

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus
-------------- next part --------------
An embedded message was scrubbed...
From: zero 0000 <nought_0000 at yahoo.com>
Subject: the price we pay
Date: Sun, 11 Jan 2004 05:09:58 -0800 (PST)
Size: 5101
Url: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/attachments/20040111/21538157/attachment.eml


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: pictures of genetalia

body:
Optim wrote:
>Who decided which is the "primary" and the "secondary
>audience" of the English Wikipedia and when this
>decision took place?

It is called writing to your audience and is an age-old and fundamental
concept. All it mainly does is instruct us on the focus and the order in
which we organize information; The cultural expectations on what constitutes
the proper coverage of a subject is going to be different for different
cultures and in different languages.

Even what constitutes an encyclopedia differs by culture and language. Same is
true for the ordering of actual articles - in one culture some topics
concerning the subject are more important than they are in another culture.
So the order in which those topics are discussed in the article may differ.

All English speakers are the audience of the English Wikipedia, but native
readers - especially monolingual ones - will expect and need to have
information organized in a way that is most useful and familiar to them.
Replace "English" with any other language and the same applies there as well.

-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)


from_name: Alfio Puglisi

subject: [Wikitech-l] stats

body:
I noticed that the stats on download.wikipedia.org are still from December
6, 2003. Is it possible now to get a stat run, or it's impossible until a
decent server setup is in place?

Alfio


from_name: Evan Prodromou

subject: [Wikipedia-l] mirror of Dutch Wikipedia

body:
>>>>> "DM" == Daniel Mayer <maveric149 at yahoo.com> writes:

    DM> ??? OK, what about the author requirement? The only
    DM> alternative is for them to list 5 authors of every article.

So, I guess I'm a little confused. Is there some kind of stipulation
that download publishers don't have to credit contributors as long as
they credit Wikipedia?

~ESP

--
Evan Prodromou <evan at wikitravel.org>
Wikitravel - http://www.wikitravel.org/
The free, complete, up-to-date and reliable world-wide travel guide


from_name: Delirium

subject: [Wikipedia-l] mirror of Dutch Wikipedia

body:
Evan Prodromou wrote:

>>>>>>"DM" == Daniel Mayer <maveric149 at yahoo.com> writes:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>
>    DM> ??? OK, what about the author requirement? The only
>    DM> alternative is for them to list 5 authors of every article.
>
>So, I guess I'm a little confused. Is there some kind of stipulation
>that download publishers don't have to credit contributors as long as
>they credit Wikipedia?
>
>
As far as I can tell, this is informal policy, but I have no idea where
it stands legally.  Since technically we license under the GFDL, with no
additional caveats, it's quite possible a contributor could refuse to
recognize crediting Wikipedia as sufficient, and instead demand that
they personally be credited (if they are the only or one of five or
fewer authors).  So our policy seems to be more of an "if you do this,
we, as Wikipedia, won't hassle you, but we can't guarantee that
individuals won't hassle you".  There is a possible argument that
"Wikipedia" is the author itself of a collaborative work, which would be
a more satisfactory solution, but would not work for GFDL's text that
was originally published elsewhere and then appropriated by Wikipedia.

In any case, this discussion has gone around in circles a few times
before both here and on wikilegal, and I'm not sure anything was
resolved really.  I'd personally try to avoid being legalistic about the
whole thing, and ask people to credit us, rather than demand they credit
us as a legal matter, since if we delve too deeply into the
technicalities of our licensing, it's quite possible all sorts of things
will start to fall apart.

-Mark


body:
Robert wrote:

>In contrast, I have seen a few regular users on this very
>list get strongly rebuffed, and most of their edits
>rebuffed on some articles (not just one.) Yet they don't
>leave the project in a huff; most people here understand
>that this is a group effort that strives to incorporate
>multiple points of view.
>
>
As I recall, you called us all "Nazis" and left this project in a huff
over a previous edit war, so you might not be the best person to give us
all advice on that particular point.

-Mark


from_name: Anthere

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Please stop the harassment and censorship.

body:
Cher RK,

Robert a ?crit:
> Anthere writes about Danny and Jimbo:
>
>>I still have not really understood why he left. I can't
>>help to think that it *can't* be just because of Jimbo's
>>comments.
>
>
> Your sarcasm towards Jimbo does not make Wikipedia a better
> place. Please desist.

You may choose to see it as sarcasm RK. It was not.
You needed not to interprete in a negative way by default.
I am essentially worried for Danny, and am even more worried for the
impact on us all. You included. And Jimbo included.

> Danny has made it clear why he left. There are over 100,000
> articles on Wikipedia, and he made sure that he had to get
> his way on every one that he edited. The first time he was
> rebuffed on *one* article, he deleted his account and ran
> away. Now some other user is running away as well, all
> because some people would rather blatantly censor
> information than jointly edit articles.

I do not see any blatant censorship. I just see pain and difficulty to
realize we are different and will always be different. We will always
have different opinions, and sometimes we will not even realize that
others think different, till we are brutally confronted to the tructh.
And when something is near our heart, it is seriously difficult to admit
other opinions. Some take it more easily than others, because it is
their nature to be less easily upset. Give time. We have plenty of time :-)

> In contrast, I have seen a few regular users on this very
> list get strongly rebuffed, and most of their edits
> rebuffed on some articles (not just one.) Yet they don't
> leave the project in a huff; most people here understand
> that this is a group effort that strives to incorporate
> multiple points of view.

All people here are commited to the group effort. Being commited does
not mean we all do it right and perfect from the first try. It is not
perfection that is most valuable, it is constant improvement.

> Those people that cannot stand the sight of points of view
> other than their own will eventually burn out.  It is up to
> you which kind of user you would like to be.

It is not the sight of the other points of view that is unbearable
sometimes, to the point of leaving the project.

It is the fact that sometimes we can't work all together with civility.

All of us have a topic that can be burning, even genitalia. Is that a
reason not to stay civil ? Many important things can be said without
offending others. And actually, it often works better to stay polite.
And not only is it best for both parties to stay polite, but it is best
to assume politeness in case of a doubt. It is more confortable for the
spirit.
If  temper is lost at some point, it works wonders to apology or at
least to adopt a more friendly behavior after the crisis is resolved.

In a crisis situation, some will scream hell, some will stay cold and
attack the other, some will silently avoid the area for a while, some
will quit entirely. All attitudes are ok. Anyone can adopt one of this
attitude depending on his personality. It is respectful to accept  all
attitudes. As long as the group recovers from the crisis and go on
respecting each member. Human capital is too precious for us.

> It is not just me who feels this way: Others agree that
> discussion is superior to politically motivated censorship:
>>From the article's talk page.
>
>
> "I just stumbled onto this article (I usually try to steer
> clear of things like this). But it would be wrong to remain
> silent on this one, Danny. This is nothing whatsoever wrong
> or innacurate with the last sentence of the material you
> have censored (it is factually accurate, just read the
> textbooks; if you don't like the adjectives then change
> those, but they are actually understated!), nor with the
> bulk of the quotations. The material is entirely relevant
> to the subject at hand. It is shameful of you to have
> played the silly game of expunging the material time and
> again. I don't intend to play that game or get involved in
> this any further, but I do hope that others with not only
> add back the material but make sure that Danny agrees to no
> more censorship based on his obviously extreme political
> biases. This is a real test for Wikipedia."
>
> This person is correct.
>
> By the way, Martin and Viajero are again *lying* about the
> content of the article and are deleting vas chunks of it.
> They are putting words into the mouth og Yassir Arafat and
> others, makign them out to be saying the opposite of what
> they actually are saying.
>
> I understand that both of these people have a hatred of
> Israel, but that does not give them the right to falsify
> information and censor material. Sadly, this "edit war" is
> not over.
>
> I also am having problems with Martin, as AGAIN he is
> treating me absuively on my own home page. I have already
> made clear that this person is forbidden to do so; I will
> not have people with pro-CI beliefs continually harass me.
>
>
> Robert
>
>
> __________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
> http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Genitalia

body:
OK, if you wish.

Just for references, because such pictures are not easy to find. I
recommand
http://tropiquesante.ifrance.com/tropiquesante/biblio/doc/doc1.htm for
female circonsision (or whatever the spelling).

The article is very long, so can't be used as pict reference. I
recommand chapter III.

dpbsmith at verizon.net a ?crit:
> Genitalia. Genitalia. Genitalia! g-e-n-I-t-a-l-i-a! Anagram for "TILE AGAIN."
> It's spelled with two I's.  It ends in "Italia."
>
> I promised myself I wasn't going to say anything, but the subject has just
> been dragging on and on, and seeing the same misspelling over and over again
> in the subject line is like Chinese water torture.
>
> (Also: Gandhi, Nietzsche, and Charles M. Schulz. Not that I've seen any of
> their names misspelled here lately, but I just thought I'd deal with them
> now, since sooner or later they _will_ come up...)
>
> Ah, I feel much better now.
>
> Genitalia!


subject: [WikiEN-l] A proposal to improve war-prone pages.

body:
I want to make a serious proposal about the handling
of problem pages.
As we all know, there are some pages which appear to
be destined to
be battlegrounds forever.  Many of the Middle-Eastern
pages are in this
category.  Contrary to what we would like, such pages
do NOT eventually
settle into an acceptable state.  What actually
happens is that the
current set of contestants get tired then the article
remains dormant
(often in a fairly appalling state) for a while until
a new set of
contestants come along and start the war up again.  In
this process,
excellent portions of the article inevitably become
lost or distorted and
there is nearly always some arrant nonsense present.
The article does
NOT steadily get better over time but just oscillates
between several
degrees of poverty.

What I'm saying is that our current model DOES NOT
WORK AND WILL NEVER
WORK for some types of pages.  Therefore, we have to
change the model.

I propose that for particularly problematic topics
there are two versions.
One is the "official version" which is
write-protected.  The official
version is what readers get when they click on links.
The other is the
"draft version", which can be editted.  Then there is
some standard
procedure (a committee?) by which the draft version
can be copied to
the official version.

This is better than the present system of page
protection because it
does not freeze page development.  It allows additions
and variations
to be tried out and fought over off-line, then draft
editions achieving
some amount of consensus can be made official.  The
average quality
of the article as seen by outsiders would be greatly
improved.

Anyway, please consider it or improve on it.

Zero.

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus


from_name: daniwo59 at aol.com

subject: [WikiEN-l] Hello

body:
Hi

Well, well, it's been a while. First, I want to thank everyone for the kind
words that have been said to me and about me, both publically and privately. I
sincerely appreciate it.

I also want to thank Jimbo, for bending over backwards to accommodate me
while keeping within the Wiki guidelines. If I have been stubborn or said anything
that offended him, I apologize here, publically. I admit that I was skeptical
at first, but I believe that his efforts in bringing about arbitration and
dialogue will lead to a greater spirit of camaraderie among everyone who
participates in Wikipedia. I also believe that this spirit of camaraderie and
partnership is the best way to pursue and promote knowledge, which is certainly our
goal.

Given all that, I would like to apologize to everyone if my (rash) departure
created a stir. I have reconsidered my position and decided to accept Jimbo's
offer of bringing this dispute before the arbitration committee, no strings
attached. I understand that the issues to be discussed will include my behavior
regarding the text in question, but I hope they will also cover the issue of
bullying on a much wider level.

I would also like to ask that, if possible, someone who knows how restore my
personal pages. Whatever happens, I am proud of Wikipedia and would like to
have some reminder somewhere that I played some little part in building it.

Thanks,

Danny Wool
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/attachments/20040112/4ab59fd9/attachment.htm


from_name: Robert

subject: [WikiEN-l] This is getting ugly

body:
This is getting really ugly. A dozen people have nmade
personal attacks on me, all of them falsely saying that I
am making personal attacks.

Then an obviously anti-Israeli crowd is trying to define
reality by voting, and is deleting vast amounts of proven
facts in order to promote pro-Arab POV.

Facts are not defined by votes. Only hatred is.

If the consensus is that Wikipedia should promote
anti-Zionism, anti-Semitism, and hateful crowds ganging up
on one user, then that is precisely the reputation that it
will get offline.

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Genitalia

body:
I looked, but did not find one with such an approach :-(

Nikos-Optim a ?crit:
> are there any similar resources in English?
>
> damn, I was learning French for many years in school
> but I only remember je m'appelle now :)))
>
> Thanks
> --Optim
>
> --- Anthere <anthere8 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>>OK, if you wish.
>>
>>Just for references, because such pictures are not
>>easy to find. I
>>recommand
>>
>
> http://tropiquesante.ifrance.com/tropiquesante/biblio/doc/doc1.htm
>
>>for
>>female circonsision (or whatever the spelling).
>>
>>The article is very long, so can't be used as pict
>>reference. I
>>recommand chapter III.
>>
>>
>>
>>dpbsmith at verizon.net a ?crit:
>>
>>>Genitalia. Genitalia. Genitalia!
>>
>>g-e-n-I-t-a-l-i-a! Anagram for "TILE AGAIN."
>>
>>>It's spelled with two I's.  It ends in "Italia."
>>>
>>>I promised myself I wasn't going to say anything,
>>
>>but the subject has just
>>
>>>been dragging on and on, and seeing the same
>>
>>misspelling over and over again
>>
>>>in the subject line is like Chinese water torture.
>>>
>>>(Also: Gandhi, Nietzsche, and Charles M. Schulz.
>>
>>Not that I've seen any of
>>
>>>their names misspelled here lately, but I just
>>
>>thought I'd deal with them
>>
>>>now, since sooner or later they _will_ come up...)
>>>
>>>Ah, I feel much better now.
>>>
>>>Genitalia!
>>
>>
>>_______________________________________________
>>WikiEN-l mailing list
>>WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
>>http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>
>
>
> __________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
> http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus


subject: [WikiEN-l] This is getting ugly

body:
Not only have you yourself made the ugliest and most hateful personal
attacks
that I've yet seen on Wikipedia, you then have the unmitigated gall to
pretend
that you haven't done anything. It doesn't say much for Wikipedia governance
that you haven't been banned forever for your unacceptable actions.

Stan

Robert wrote:

>This is getting really ugly. A dozen people have nmade
>personal attacks on me, all of them falsely saying that I
>am making personal attacks.
>
>Then an obviously anti-Israeli crowd is trying to define
>reality by voting, and is deleting vast amounts of proven
>facts in order to promote pro-Arab POV.
>
>Facts are not defined by votes. Only hatred is.
>
>If the consensus is that Wikipedia should promote
>anti-Zionism, anti-Semitism, and hateful crowds ganging up
>on one user, then that is precisely the reputation that it
>will get offline.
>
>
>
>__________________________________
>Do you Yahoo!?
>Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
>http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus
>_______________________________________________
>WikiEN-l mailing list
>WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
>http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>
>
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] This is getting ugly

body:
Generally, although I would not expect you to admit it, Wikipedia articles
have a somewhat pro-Israeli bias. There just aren't a lot of Arabs or
Palestinians showing up here. Most pro-Palestinian edits are coming from a
liberal Israeli point of view such as Danny's

Fred

> From: Robert <rkscience100 at yahoo.com>
> Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Mon, 12 Jan 2004 07:24:25 -0800 (PST)
> To: wikien-l at Wikipedia.org
> Subject: [WikiEN-l] This is getting ugly
>
> This is getting really ugly. A dozen people have nmade
> personal attacks on me, all of them falsely saying that I
> am making personal attacks.
>
> Then an obviously anti-Israeli crowd is trying to define
> reality by voting, and is deleting vast amounts of proven
> facts in order to promote pro-Arab POV.
>
> Facts are not defined by votes. Only hatred is.
>
> If the consensus is that Wikipedia should promote
> anti-Zionism, anti-Semitism, and hateful crowds ganging up
> on one user, then that is precisely the reputation that it
> will get offline.
>
>
>
> __________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
> http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


from_name: Rick

subject: [WikiEN-l] Hello

body:
Glad to see you reconsidered, Danny. Welcome back.

RickK

daniwo59 at aol.com wrote:
Hi

Well, well, it's been a while. First, I want to thank everyone for the kind words that have been said to me and about me, both publically and privately. I sincerely appreciate it.

I also want to thank Jimbo, for bending over backwards to accommodate me while keeping within the Wiki guidelines. If I have been stubborn or said anything that offended him, I apologize here, publically. I admit that I was skeptical at first, but I believe that his efforts in bringing about arbitration and dialogue will lead to a greater spirit of camaraderie among everyone who participates in Wikipedia. I also believe that this spirit of camaraderie and partnership is the best way to pursue and promote knowledge, which is certainly our goal.

Given all that, I would like to apologize to everyone if my (rash) departure created a stir. I have reconsidered my position and decided to accept Jimbo's offer of bringing this dispute before the arbitration committee, no strings attached. I understand that the issues to be discussed will include my behavior regarding the text in question, but I hope they will also cover the issue of bullying on a much wider level.

I would also like to ask that, if possible, someone who knows how restore my personal pages. Whatever happens, I am proud of Wikipedia and would like to have some reminder somewhere that I played some little part in building it.

Thanks,

Danny Wool
_______________________________________________
WikiEN-l mailing list
WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/attachments/20040112/9b09088b/attachment.htm


from_name: Nikos-Optim

subject: [Wikitech-l] BSD, anyone?

body:
Do not use FreeBSD 5, it is too new and unstable. Use
FreeBSD 4.9 instead. If you need modern features (such
as better threading etc) use FreeBSD 5.2.

I consider FreeBSD as superior to GNU/Linux.

Yahoo web servers run FreeBSD, too.

If you need security of firewall, OpenBSD is the best.

NetBSD is very portable.

See
www.freebsd.org
www.netbsd.org
www.openbsd.org

--Optim

--- Magnus Manske <magnus.manske at web.de> wrote:
> Not that I don't truse SUSE, but at
>
>
http://bsd.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=92486&cid=7951598
> someone's very pleased with FreeBSD 5.0:
>     "Our site gets a million hits a day on a
> completely db-driven
> website. Both the Apache webserver and the two
> replicated MySQL servers
> on the backend are all running FreeBSD 5, and have
> been for months now."
> Does this configuration sound vaguely familiar? An
> alternative to
> consider in case SUSE proves unstable.
>
> Magnus
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at Wikipedia.org
>
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus