subject: [WikiEN-l] Untagged image help

body:
On 1/23/06, Stan Shebs <shebs at apple.com> wrote:
> Matthew Brown <morven at gmail.com> wrote:
> >How many of the untagged images are old, prior to the requirement for
> >image tagging?
> >
> Not so many, less than 10% that I've seen - previous retroactive
> image-tagging initiatives must have caught most of them.

Also WP was much smaller then and people were less concerned, as I
recall, with illustrating articles.

-Matt


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: David Gerard

subject: [WikiEN-l] Admin list--privacy

body:
Tony Sidaway (f.crdfa at gmail.com) [060123 10:13]:
> On 1/22/06, Hermione1980 <slytherinchaser49 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > --- Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:

> > > If ever admitted to any mailing list for
> > > administrators only I will
> > > publish all contents on my public blog.  Be warned.
> > > I will not
> > > tolerate cliques within Wikipedia.

> > Best get cracking on how to get the ArbCom mailing
> > list contents, too.

> No.  some arbcom discussions need to be private.

What Danny needs is a list for matters of similar or greater consequence,
e.g. discussions of legal consequence and so forth. You may have noticed
how every time Jimbo coughs it's misquoted in newspapers around the world.
Perhaps a list with all 800 admins isn't that list, but that's the sort of
list he's talking about.

- d.


from_name: Matt Brown

subject: [WikiEN-l] Pointless deletions, bogus guidelines

body:
On 1/23/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
> On 1/22/06, Matt Brown <morven at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Are you sure this is the correct reading of the GFDL?  I see it as
> > meaning that you cannot take a GFDL'd document and relicense it.  NOT
> > that the original author cannot release their own original work under
> > multiple licenses.
>
> I don't see any other way to read it.  It doesn't say you can't
> relicense the document.  It says you can't "copy, modify, sublicense,
> or distribute the Document except as expressly provided for under this
> License" and that doing so (actually, according to the language,
> merely "attempt"ing to do so) will "automatically terminate your
> rights under this License."

Technically speaking, though, "the Document" is only the GFDL-licensed
version.  If you work on an original, non-GFDL version and then
relicense a version as GFDL which you release, then the wording cannot
affect the parent document.

Also, if you are the original author, you are not relying on any
rights granted by the GFDL.  The GFDL grants people who are not the
copyright holder the right to distribute.  If you are yourself the
copyright holder, you do not require the GFDL in order to distribute
the work - you are using your natural rights as a copyright holder,
not any additional rights the GFDL grants you.

I suspect at the very least that my reading is the reading the FSF
intended, and that the ambiguity is thanks to rather poor legal
wording of the license, rather than original intention.

-Matt


from_name: Phil Boswell

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: A Wikipedia lynching

body:
"Rob Smith" <nobs03 at gmail.com> wrote in
message news:52a8cf060601221206t3fe7d93bm41bfe58f23696658 at mail.gmail.com...
[snip]

I selected this because it's the quickest to refute:
> Here he refers to Prof. Klehr's work as "outrageous McCarthyite POV
> Red-baiting defamatory Blacklist
> "
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_Americans_in_the_Venona_papers&diff=34527735&oldid=34519165

No he doesn't.

He earlier added some commentary on the list which according to the edit
summary "added critical POV to balance page list".

This was then removed with the comment "this page is a list of names, not a
forum to debate their significance".

The edit in question restres the commentary with the summary"Revert:
Otherwise this is an outrageous McCarthyite POV Red-baiting defamatory
Blacklist".

In other words, the words you quote above refer to our article on the
subject, not to the list itself, with the disclaimer that this description
covers a version of the list without commentary.

My phrase of the week: ingenuous cobblers [1]

HTH HAND
--
Phil
[[en:User:Phil Boswell]]
[1] definitional nitpickers can go hang, I like it and I'm taking it home
for a pet :-)


subject: [WikiEN-l] Dealing with crap deletion nominations

body:
Rob (gamaliel8 at gmail.com) [060123 10:04]:
> On 1/22/06, David Gerard <fun at thingy.apana.org.au> wrote:

> > My proposed idea remains: shut down AFD/DRV for a month. Make it three
> > months.

> Only if we expand the speedy deletion criteria accordingly.  We really don't
> want to deal with a three month backlog of garage bands and ads for Bob's
> Muffler Shop.

Straw man. Wikipedia runs 4000 new articles/day, 2000 of which are shot on
sight; AFD is maybe 200 articles a day *nominated* at present, which is a
trickle by comparison. It really will not make substantial difference
unless people start nominating to make a point. Which is shooting
behaviour.

By the way, Kim Bruning and Gmaxwell just ran numbers on Wikipedia articles
which might actually support Pure Wiki Deletion as a generally good idea.
I desperately await Kim's writeup, 'cos I doubt Greg's going to make one.
But it's the first thing I've seen resembling evidence. Basically, over 90%
of Wikipedia articles have one or two editors, and only 100-200 (out of
900k) have over 100 editors, and Kim thinks there's a good case for
declaring all those prima facie pathological until firmly proven otherwise.
So (1) being big does not mean we have to go from consensus to voting and
(2) does not mean AFD is the only possible way to run a deletion mechanism.
Fantastically interesting stuff.

- d.


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Eugenia Tenneriello

subject: [Wikitech-l] How mediawiki stores data and page links

body:
Hello,
 i would like to know how mediawiki stores data and page links.
I've also another question.
Does any indexation of the db tables start when a new article is added or a link is created?
I use MySql and my purpose is data storing offline with the creation of new istances of my categories and adding links to the new pages into the old ones .
Thanks in advance,
Eugenia Tenneriello


list: foundation-l

from_name: Angela

subject: [Foundation-l] Figures, and what made the fundraiser take off?

body:
On 1/23/06, Jeremy Tobacman <tobacman at gmail.com> wrote:
> To see in more detail how the recent fund drive went, I started looking at
> the raw data and put some figures together here:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Tobacman/Stats/Fundraising

Thanks for making these stats. It's interesting to have this sort of overview.

>    How can we figure out what made this fundraiser take off?

I'm not sure there's any one answer. Jimmy's appeal
<http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Personal_Appeal> was put out on
the 31st which certainly had an effect, but the timing (Christmas
ending) and the press around this time could also have played a part
in the take off in the final week.

Angela


list: wikimedia-l


body:
David Gerard (fun at thingy.apana.org.au) [060123 10:38]:

> By the way, Kim Bruning and Gmaxwell just ran numbers on Wikipedia articles
> which might actually support Pure Wiki Deletion as a generally good idea.
> I desperately await Kim's writeup, 'cos I doubt Greg's going to make one.
> But it's the first thing I've seen resembling evidence. Basically, over 90%
> of Wikipedia articles have one or two editors, and only 100-200 (out of
> 900k) have over 100 editors, and Kim thinks there's a good case for
> declaring all those prima facie pathological until firmly proven otherwise.
> So (1) being big does not mean we have to go from consensus to voting and
> (2) does not mean AFD is the only possible way to run a deletion mechanism.
> Fantastically interesting stuff.

Gmaxwell has left the project, which is annoying for many reasons, and this
reason is because the scripts and such he was running are on the
toolserver. But here's two diagrams to start you off:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Articles_distinct_histo.png

That's how many editors per article. Note that ALMOST ALL articles have one
editor, maybe two. And only 200 or so have over 100 editors (123 over 1000
editors), and almost all those are way overedited for the wiki process
(e.g. G.W. Bush, which is THE busiest article on the wiki and arguably
pathological).

   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Articles_distinct.png

- same thing as above in CDF. Breakdown of editors per article.

- d.


from_name: Anthere

subject: [Foundation-l] Re: Figures, and what made the fundraiser take off?

body:
Jeremy Tobacman wrote:
> To see in more detail how the recent fund drive went, I started looking at
> the raw data and put some figures together here:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Tobacman/Stats/Fundraising
> .  Comparing this most recent fundraiser to the two earlier fundraisers in
> 2005, it seems very clear that *something* happened to make the week
> following 12/28/2005 a very good one for the Foundation.  More specifically,
> previous fundraisers had tended to fizzle, and this one seemed to be taking
> a similar path until its New Year's fireworks.
>
>    How can we figure out what made this fundraiser take off?
>
> Maybe additional data, tests, or experiments could help in future planning--
> It would be great if we could have the techniques in place for such
> remarkable success from the very beginning of the next fundraiser.
>
> Jeremy

Hiya,

Very interesting !
Another point of comparison that might be worth... Alexa's traffic
during that time.
http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?&range=3m&size=large&compare_sites=&y=t&url=http://www.wikipedia.org#top

More visitors ---> more donations ?

Ant


from_name: Nicholas Moreau

subject: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Canada

body:
Wikimedia Canada/*Wikim?dia Canada* hopes to soon join the international
organization ranks. Some users, including myself, have started to develop
the bare basics of what the project would be, and hope that it will soon
morph into a full-fledged chapter.

Any Canadians on the list are encouraged to join, and anyone that wishes to
lend their guidance and/or advice to this chapter is greatly welcomed to do
so.

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

Nick Moreau


subject: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Canada


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Another AfD example -- a serious proposal to fix it

body:
"Kat Walsh" <mindspillage at gmail.com> wrote in
message news:8e253f560601201327gbd28a80v3b8d847e9c0c0f3e at mail.gmail.com...
[snip]
> I also like the idea of "speedy keep" being more widely used; if
> someone comes up with a really strong justification for why something
> should not be deleted, particularly if it completely rebuts the
> nominator's reason for nominating it, why waste time arguing about it?

Hmmm.

Isn't this what SnowSpinner's {{user recovery}} template was esentially all
about?

Or am I getting confused with his "expertise and deletion" notice?

> Perhaps this is what a "deletion cabal" could do: simply make the call
> to speedy pull a nomination, rather than penalize the nominator. I'd
> imagine anyone whose nominations were continually getting pulled for
> being inappropriate would eventually start to think about them more,
> no penalty necessary.

I'd think anyone who nominations were getting pulled that often should be
considered for a WP:POINT time-out...

HTH HAND
--
Phil
[[en:User:Phil Boswell]]


body:
David Gerard (fun at thingy.apana.org.au) [060123 10:52]:

> Gmaxwell has left the project, which is annoying for many reasons, and this
> reason is because the scripts and such he was running are on the
> toolserver. But here's two diagrams to start you off:
>
>     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Articles_distinct_histo.png
>
> That's how many editors per article. Note that ALMOST ALL articles have one
> editor, maybe two. And only 200 or so have over 100 editors (123 over 1000
> editors), and almost all those are way overedited for the wiki process
> (e.g. G.W. Bush, which is THE busiest article on the wiki and arguably
> pathological).
>
>    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Articles_distinct.png
>
> - same thing as above in CDF. Breakdown of editors per article.

I just asked Kim's permission to quote from him on #wikimedia last night.
At the end is the URL with the original data, bz2 compressed (16MB file,
expands to about 70-odd MB).

I've deleted the words of everyone except Kim and myself. Also, Kim wants
to note that:

[23:58] <kim_register> you can take my irc discussion too if you like
[23:59] <kim_register> though note that I'm a lot less collected on irc
[23:59] <kim_register> so with disclaimer
[23:59] <kim_register> and I reserve the right to not mean half of what
I said ;-)

Note also that all credit for the heavy lifting on this one goes to
gmaxwell.

- d.

[23:41]  <kim_register> I have something cool to show him that gmaxwell
drew ^^;;
[00:03]  <kim_register>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Articles_distinct_histo.png
[00:03]  <kim_register> BINGO!
[00:03]  <kim_register> most articles are only edited by a couple of users
[00:03]  <kim_register> do you see, do you SEE how far left that single
peak is?
[00:03]  <kim_register> it's almost invisible
[00:03]  <kim_register> OMG this is cool!
[00:03]  * kim_register raves
[00:04]  <kim_register> death to all the wikidemocracy folks
[00:04]  <kim_register> long live consensus!
[00:04]  <kim_register> (well, maybe not death to them, but...)
[...]
[00:05]  <kim_register>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Articles_distinct.png
[00:05]  <kim_register> heres a [[CDF]] view
[00:06]  <kim_register> GOAAAL
[00:06]  <kim_register> I mean wooohooo
[00:06]  <kim_register> sorry
[00:06]  <kim_register> :-)
[00:06]  <kim_register> I'm so happy :-)
[00:07]  <kim_register> thank Gmaxwell too :-)
[00:19]  <kim_register>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Articles_distinct_loghisto.png
[00:19]  <kim_register> here's a scaled one
[00:19]  <kim_register> it's LOG SCALED, so be DARN careful interpreting
it, if you're not used to log scaling
[00:20]  <kim_register> I'm noting how many editors edit each article
[00:20]  <kim_register> This basically shows that most articles have few
editors
[00:21]  <kim_register> brian0918, I'm using them to show that consensus
will still work
[00:21]  <kim_register> and the whole voting thing is silly
[00:21]  <kim_register> so we don't need to make drastic policy changes
"because the wiki is too big now"
[00:21]  <kim_register> all that is pure nonsense, is what these graphs
prove
[00:21]  <kim_register> the wiki segments conversations into small
managable areas that can be handled by consensus
[00:22]  <kim_register> brian0918, well, we'll do some more graphs
[00:22]  <kim_register> but these are pretty darn indicative already
[00:22]  <kim_register> I don't expect to see drastically different results
elsewhere
[00:22]  <kim_register> if it's this clear here
[00:22]  <kim_register> it's not going to differ by orders of magnitude
elsewhere :-)
[00:25]  <kim_register> oh gosh
[00:25]  <kim_register> anyway, I love these graphs
[00:27]  <kim_register>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Articles_distinct_logcdf.png
[00:27]  <kim_register> tricky to read one
[00:27]  <kim_register> (01:27:05) nullc: well there really is only one
thing to say..
[00:27]  <kim_register> (01:27:12) Kim Bruning: yeah
[00:27]  <kim_register> (01:27:17) nullc: that articles have few editors.
[00:27]  <kim_register> (01:27:21) Kim Bruning: *grin*
[00:32]  <kim_register>     * 67.20% have been edited by less than 10
distinct Users/IPs.
[00:32]  <kim_register>     * 86.07% have been edited by less than 20
distinct Users/IPs.
[00:32]  <kim_register>     * 91.90% have been edited by less than 30
distinct Users/IPs.
[00:32]  <kim_register>     * 99.21% have been edited by less than 150
distinct Users/IPs.
[00:33]  <kim_register> 01:33:12) nullc: 72% of the articles have 11
editors or less.
[00:36]  <kim_register> so we'll throw out all articles with > 200 editors
[00:36]  <kim_register> that's maybe 100 or so
[00:36]  <kim_register> and then see the new graphs
[00:36]  <kim_register> this is kinda cool ;-)
[00:37]  <kim_register> I'm willing to bet that the >200 editor set also
has trouble with NPOV
[00:37]  <kim_register> as well as many other things
[00:46]  <kim_register> Ok, so based on this alone
[00:46]  <kim_register> normal wikipedia policy should be consensus
consensus consensus
[00:46]  <kim_register> large pages can best be split and transcluded
[00:47]  <kim_register> transcluded sections will survive AFD anyway, since
even those will have like 50 editors or so
[00:47]  <kim_register> this way we can keep a consistent and coherent
policy across the entire encyclopedia namespace
[00:47]  <kim_register> now we need to consistentize in wikipedia namespace
[00:47]  <kim_register> this has low priority in theory
[00:47]  <kim_register> but is going to be tricky in practice
[00:47]  <kim_register> but like WOOT
[00:47]  <kim_register> love those numbers!
[00:47]  <kim_register> yippee!
[00:48]  <kim_register> we don't need to change much at all, even though
we've grown so much!
[00:50]  <kim_register> well I need to get some cooperative fire support
[00:50]  <kim_register> you're already helping keep them down ;-)
[00:50]  <kim_register> I'll have to recruit some more :-)
[00:50]  <kim_register> I'll start one by one :-)
[01:18]  <DavidGerard> kim_register: that's fantastic to read
[01:19]  <DavidGerard> and squares with my experience also: articles are
either contentious or ghost towns
[01:19]  <DavidGerard> with a few in between
[01:25]  <kim_register> yes
[01:25]  <kim_register> we're going to have so much fun fixing policy this
year :-)
[01:25]  <kim_register> I'd love to have special dispensation from jimbo
though
[01:25]  <kim_register> otherwise it's going to be hell fighting through
wikinomic
[01:26]  <kim_register> alternately we can just start policy from scratch
[01:26]  <kim_register> though that too might have some downsides...
[01:26]  <kim_register> but basically, the graphs show that wikipedia
policy will still work
[01:26]  <kim_register> and that it scales well
[01:26]  <kim_register> our job is to make sure it STAYS that way ;-)
[01:29]  <kim_register> DavidGerard, I have the base dataset in my mailbox
now. Do you want me to forward you a copy?
[01:31]  <DavidGerard> nonono, i believe your graphs ;-) what I'm
interested in is your writeup
[01:31]  <DavidGerard> kim_register: jimbo is just a little tired of
wikinomic
[01:32]  <DavidGerard> the stupidity and shittiness of afd is now causing
wikipedia lots of real world problems
[01:32]  <DavidGerard> i.e., the foundation is getting a lot of mail from
the aggrieved
[01:32]  <DavidGerard> and then the fuckwits tried CFDing [[Category:Living
people]] or whatever it was called
[01:32]  <DavidGerard> and jimbo killed the CFD
[01:32]  <DavidGerard> and it was *recreated*
[01:32]  <DavidGerard> THREE TIMES
[01:33]  <DavidGerard> and jimbo saw what moronic shit was said on that CFD
[01:33]  <DavidGerard> and thunder and lightning came down from the
heavens.
[01:33]  <kim_register> hello mindspillage , greg is messing with lovely
pristine numbers. Maybe might be fun if you could help him out :-)
[01:33]  <kim_register> DavidGerard, *ghrin*
[01:33]  <kim_register> DavidGerard, what kinda writeup are you expecting
btw?
[01:33]  <DavidGerard> AFD is about to discover that the rest of wikipedia
does in fact have a few things to say about the standard of behaviour
there.
[01:34]  <kim_register> and I mean, there's a zillion bits of info :-)
[01:34]  <kim_register> that we haven't explored yet
[01:34]  <kim_register> but the graph with the single peak all the way left
..
[01:34]  <kim_register> that does it for me
[01:34]  <kim_register> DavidGerard, I'm going to propose killing all > 100
participant pages, one way or the other
[01:34]  <DavidGerard> kim_register: hah!
[01:34]  <kim_register> DavidGerard, still need data for wikimedia
namespace to be sure that's a great idea
[01:35]  <DavidGerard> permanent semiprotect?
[01:35]  <kim_register> no, I mean kill
[01:35]  <kim_register> as in mark as deprecated
[01:35]  <DavidGerard> hmm.
[01:35]  <kim_register> use a different system
[01:35]  <DavidGerard> :-O
[01:35]  <DavidGerard> gosh!
[01:35]  <DavidGerard> case my case please
[01:35]  <DavidGerard> case by case i mean
[01:35]  <DavidGerard> but may basically be a good idea
[01:36]  <kim_register> Well, there are roughly 100-200 cases to consider
[01:36]  <kim_register> guesstimating by current data
[01:36]  <kim_register> actually probably much less
[01:36]  <kim_register> articles as a general case can be split up and
transcluded
[01:37]  <kim_register> leaving only wikipedia namespace stuff
[01:37]  <kim_register> the latter hasn't been looked at
[01:37]  <kim_register> not yet
[01:37]  <kim_register> so these are prelim findings so far :-)
[01:37]  <kim_register> wikipedia namespace will need some case by case
work on splitting, yes :-)
[01:38]  <kim_register> for all the *FDs, we can replace the whole lot with
true wiki deletion I'll wager
[01:38]  <kim_register> some people will hate it :-)
[01:38]  <kim_register> mindspillage, we'd need to check stats on that :-)
[01:38]  <kim_register> DavidGerard, but it would be too early to say
things about wikipedia namespace
[01:39]  <kim_register> in any case, on articles, there should be no
problems even now
[01:39]  <DavidGerard> well. gosh!
[01:40]  <DavidGerard> i eagerly await your writeup ;-)
[01:42]  <kim_register> LOL
[01:42]  <kim_register> I HATE WRITEUPS
[01:43]  <DavidGerard> cut'n'paste your comments here. or get greg to write
it up ;-)
[01:47]  <DavidGerard> if you make preliminary notes and make your data
available (as available as you can), then that will be enough for fun
[01:47]  <kim_register> grin

The data file: http://bruning.xs4all.nl/~kim/kim_query1.bz2

[02:10]  <kim_register> page_id | distinct_editors | oldest_revision |
rev_count |
[02:10]  <kim_register> 2004_distinct | 2004_rev_count | 2003_distinct |
2003_rev_count |
[02:10]  <kim_register> 2002_distinct | 2002_rev_count
[02:11]  <kim_register> (this is the key to the bz2 file)


subject: [WikiEN-l] Admin list--privacy

body:
Ray Saintonge (saintonge at telus.net) [060123 11:28]:
> David Gerard wrote:

> >What Danny needs is a list for matters of similar or greater consequence,
> >e.g. discussions of legal consequence and so forth. You may have noticed
> >how every time Jimbo coughs it's misquoted in newspapers around the world.
> >Perhaps a list with all 800 admins isn't that list, but that's the sort of
> >list he's talking about.

> Some things do need to be kept confidential, but an organization needs
> well-defined rules for when things must be kept in-camera.  Trying to
> apply that to a list of 800 would be ludicrous.

Well, yeah. But from discussions on IRC today, I think that's what Danny
actually needs - stuff that's causing Foundation-level trouble. So if the
required level of cabalism isn't admin, perhaps a higher level!

(On my user page, I list all my Wikipedia jobs and my criterion for
cabalism: If you are accused of being in the Cabal, count how many
Wikipedia jobs you have. If it's ten or more, you are.)

- d.


from_name: MacGyverMagic/Mgm

subject: [WikiEN-l] [Fwd: [HelpDesk-l] Complaint: Service abuse]

body:
On 1/23/06, Alphax (Wikipedia email) <alphasigmax at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I thought this was absolutely priceless...
>
> -------- Original Message --------
> Subject:        [HelpDesk-l] Complaint: Service abuse
> Date:   Sun, 22 Jan 2006 19:49:48 +0000
> From:   <NAME REMOVED>
> Reply-To:       Help desk for questions about Wikimedia projects
> <helpdesk-l at Wikimedia.org>
> To:     helpdesk-l at wikimedia.org
>
> Staff members of the world's biggest online encyclopedia,
>
> I am writing this email in complaint to how easy the service can be
> abused by just about anyone on the internet. While in theory it is a
> positive idea to allow people to willingly submit or update articles, it
> gives anyone the power to submit nothing but complete nonsensical,
> biased and generally fictional information that does not reflect on the
> reality of the subject.
>
> Today I was outraged in coming to terms with this when I realized an
> article of interest was willingly changed by someone who was clearly
> closed-minded and totally against the subject:
> http://www.encyclopediadramatica.com/index.php/FA
>
> You may not know much on the subject, however, I believe that it would
> be fair a proposal to request changing your contribution system to allow
> all contributions to articles to be submitted directly to members of
> staff to review the contributions first, in order to confirm the
> certainty of the article by researching for facts about it online. If
> the contribution is approved, it can then be displayed in the article.
>
> Further, I personally request that you remove the biased, untrue article
> edit and replace it with the much more accurate revision in the
> article's history:
> http://www.encyclopediadramatica.com/index.php?title=FA&oldid=47793
> <http://www.encyclopediadramatica.com/index.php?title=FA&oldid=47793>
>
> Thank you very much for taking the time to read my email of concern, and
> thanks in advance for taking care of the situation in any way possible.
> - A Wikipedia user
>
> --
> Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
> Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
> "We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
> Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP

Encyclopedia Dramatica isn't a mirror, is it? I think they got the wrong
address.

Mgm


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Michael Bimmler

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] This is a 'first-timer' - should I
	havemissunderstood somehting then please have mercy for me

body:
2006/1/22, Michael Laudahn <ml at worldimprover.net>:
>
> And once again: I really think we can from now on do without any more
> comments from Germany, as long as they don't develop. I thought this was
> clear already after my last message, but Till Westermayer proves that I was
> mistaken.
>

I don't know anything about this case/whatever and I don't want to
engage in this matter however your logic sounds strange to me:
As this is obviously a matter of the german Wikipedia, why shouldn't
people of dewp be allowed to state their point? And, if you say (I
didn't look into this one either), that the normal processes for such
a matter in dewp did not work and now your post should be a kind of
appeal to international Wikipedia Community, why shouldn't dewp-people
be allowed to defend their point of view?
Regards
Michael
dewp-user but quite neutral in this case
--
An eternity is very, very long, especially towards the end


from_name: Justin Cormack

subject: [WikiEN-l] Untagged image help

body:
On 23 Jan 2006, at 02:48, Jay Converse wrote:

> I've always wondered why there isn't a drop-down box to allow the
> image
> uploader to select the copyright that they think fits best and then it
> auto-inserts the template when the image info page is created.  Is
> there a
> technical reason behind this?

There is isnt there?

There is on commons.

Its a very long time since I uploaded an image on en.

Justinc


from_name: Aerik Sylvan

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Try #2: Idea for learning spam filter

body:
I just had an inspiration!  Now that I'm thinking about it, if this
counting-url-posted-in-the-last-x-hours things works out, maybe the best way
to implement it would be for that to be part of the captcha code - if you
try to post the same url anywhere in the wiki more than x times in y hours,
you have to answer a captcha.  Perhaps then, at some higher threshold, it
either a) adds it to the spam blacklist or b) operates as a short term spam
blacklist - you can't post it more than some number of times (10? 25?) in y
hours - this gives the community time to respond and blacklist the url if it
is indeed spam.  This still does not address the possibility that some
legitimate need may arise to post an url into 100 pages, but it is a much
"softer" but still effective solution.  I'm liking it better and better...
maybe set different thresholds for logged in users vs. anonymous users...

Best Regards,
Aerik


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Re: [Flag] Re: Another AfD example -- a seriousproposal
	to fix it

body:
"Travis Mason-Bushman" <travis at gpsports-eng.com>
wrote in message news:BFF6F744.94C8%travis at gpsports-eng.com...
> On 1/20/06 6:02 PM, "Tony Sidaway"
> <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
>>  But there should be more
>> emphasis on improvement.
> Agreed. But nobody's listening.
> Again, I point out that there are 15,000+ articles piled up on the Cleanup
> queue. I am *not* just going to tag an article "Cleanup" and let it sit
> there for six months. That is *not* a solution.
> Fix the Cleanup system, get an actual Cleanup Patrol going to deal with
> these articles, and I'll be much less tempted to just speedy or AFD
> borderline tripe that I can't make heads or tails of, but sure shouldn't
> just hang around on the encyclopedia like it is.

Isn't this the exact point? If the effort put into relentless AFD nomination
and discussion were put into CLEANUP instead, that backlog could be cleared
much earlier.

And those articles which would have been AFD'd in the meantime? They'll turn
up in the CLEANUP queue later on, and you can fix them then.

It is actually much better to have a sub-standard article, clearly marked as
such and requesting assistance, than a hole in the ground with a sign saying
"the last article on this subject was a crock: don't even consider writing
another because we'll nuke you until you glow in the dark and then shoot you
full of lead".
--
Phil
[[en:User:Phil Boswell]]


subject: [WikiEN-l] Untagged image help

body:
On 23 Jan 2006, at 02:02, Peta Holmes wrote:

> On English Wikipedia there is a list of untagged  images, it
> started at 38 000+, about 6000 of these have been tagged in  5
> weeks; see [[Wikipedia:Untagged images]]. From the several hundred
> I  have tagged, 2/10 can be speedied as orphaned fair use images;
> 7/10  have no source and/or no license information and most likely
> would only  be able to be used as fair use; ~1/10 is a logo, album
> cover or a gfdl  image without a template. Tagging these images is
> a big drain on  contributors time, especially if they aren't admins.
>
>   Technically all these images identified as untagged are
> speediable if  they are tagged as no license or no source, so on
> behalf of the  untagged images project I am looking for someone who
> could write a bot  to tag these all these images and notify the up
> loader.

There was one for a bit. Alas the small number of people who write
bots, and the incredible bureaucracy involved
in running them makes this hard.

>   There needs to be a better mechanism to deal with the lack of
> copyright  information provided for images, and  the incorrect
> copyright  information that is being added to images as a result of
> the license  drop down box. Is it possible for all images uploaded
> to Wikipedia to  be tagged as no licence by defalut, forcing the
> uploader to provide  copyright information after the image is
> uploaded?

Remove the norification requirement and just speedy all untagged images.

Justinc


from_name: Chuck Smith

subject: [Wikitech-l] putting Eo Wikipedia on DVD-Rom?

body:
In July 2006, we plan to release a short Esperanto documentary (20-30
min) on DVD and we would also like to include the complete Esperanto
Wikipedia for viewing offline.  I looked at
http://static.wikipedia.org/ and read that if this were put on the
web, it would be a trademark violation.  So, what would be the best
and easiest way to get a version of the Esperanto Wikipedia that users
could view on a DVD-Rom?

Thank you,
Chuck


from_name: Tony Sidaway

body:
On 1/23/06, Phil Boswell <phil.boswell at gmail.com> wrote:
> "Kat Walsh" <mindspillage at gmail.com> wrote in
> message news:8e253f560601201327gbd28a80v3b8d847e9c0c0f3e at mail.gmail.com...
> [snip]
> > I also like the idea of "speedy keep" being more widely used; if
> > someone comes up with a really strong justification for why something
> > should not be deleted, particularly if it completely rebuts the
> > nominator's reason for nominating it, why waste time arguing about it?
>
> Hmmm.
>
> Isn't this what SnowSpinner's {{user recovery}} template was esentially all
> about?

You may be thinking of some other template.  The one you have named is
placed on userpages by admins who are willing to brave the wrath of
WP:DRV by actually undeleting and userfying (non-copyright infringing,
non-defamatory) stuff for people who want to use it.  It's based on a
notice David Gerard put on his talk page a while back.

[...]
>
> I'd think anyone who nominations were getting pulled that often should be
> considered for a WP:POINT time-out...

I suggest the we just point at them and laugh.


from_name: Anthony DiPierro

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Google Earth copyright (now that you bring it up)

body:
On 1/23/06, Jei <jei at cc.hut.fi> wrote:
> Interesting. What about pictures of people? - If I put makeup on my face
> and call it a work of art, and someone takes a picture of me in a public
> place, do my copyrights still apply?

Sounds like a reasonable argument to me.  It would depend, of course,
on whether or not the jury agreed with you that the makeup was a work
of art.  In the case of applying lipstick it probably wouldn't be -
getting a full body tatoo on the other hand...

> Or if I jog regularly and spend time
> shaping and trimming my body, does my unique physique retain it's
> copyrights in a similar photograph situation?
>
> // Jei

I doubt it.  You're not really the author of your body's unique
physique - it's much more accidental.  I'm not really sure how to
reconcile that argument with copyright on some "modern art", though.
Who knows, maybe you could convince a judge that you do have a
copyright on your body's unique physique.  I'd be willing to listen to
any precedents you can come up with.

Don't forget though, that in addition to copyright laws, pictures of
people are subject to privacy and publicity laws as well.

Anthony


from_name: SCZenz

body:
I'd suggest that end-running the forum because you disagree with its
current regular users is an error.  We need to hash out disagreements
about how things are to be run, even if it's difficult, not form
separate warring fiefdoms.

SCZenz

On 1/23/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/23/06, SCZenz <sczenz at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I know I'm getting into this late, but I'm gonna start from the top anyway...
> >
> > Why not reform WP:DRV into something everyone can live with?  We could
> > give it more authority to overrule AfD, based on things other than
> > process, for example.
>
> Deletion review already has powers of content review (which it
> inherited from its predecessor, Votes for undeletion) under the
> deletion policy.  This fact is not well known and is routinely denied
> by regular users of that forum.  The culture of DRV is in a worse
> state than that of AFD and it's far more process-bound; I'd suggest
> that looking there for a solution would be a mistake.
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


body:
On 1/22/06, Matt Brown <morven at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/22/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
> > Sure, Tony can grant other rights to people outside the GFDL.  But,
> > according to the GFDL, if anyone actually exercises those rights the
> > GFDL itself is automatically revoked.
> >
> > IOW, according to the GFDL, you can use one license or the other - you
> > can't use both (so to call the GFDL a "non-exclusive license" deserves
> > some caveats).
>
> Are you sure this is the correct reading of the GFDL?  I see it as
> meaning that you cannot take a GFDL'd document and relicense it.  NOT
> that the original author cannot release their own original work under
> multiple licenses.
>
> -Matt

I don't see any other way to read it.  It doesn't say you can't
relicense the document.  It says you can't "copy, modify, sublicense,
or distribute the Document except as expressly provided for under this
License" and that doing so (actually, according to the language,
merely "attempt"ing to do so) will "automatically terminate your
rights under this License."

Now, that's just what the license says.  I don't know if a judge would
enforce such a rule.  It is rather unconscionable.

Anthony


body:
The reason for what you call process-fetishism is letting all editors
feel that they have a voice in deletion rather than just a few admins.
 I know we can't overdo it, but the goal is laudable.

SCZenz

On 1/23/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/23/06, SCZenz <sczenz at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I'd suggest that end-running the forum because you disagree with its
> > current regular users is an error.  We need to hash out disagreements
> > about how things are to be run, even if it's difficult, not form
> > separate warring fiefdoms.
>
> Oh even if we had a working process, this wouldn't limit the scope of
> action of individual administrators and editors.  The processes are
> only supposed to be there to make things easier; let's not fetishize
> them as an end in themselves.
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Michael Laudahn

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] This is a 'first-timer' - should I
	havemissunderstoodsomehting then please have mercy for me

body:
Would you believe it - another german 'fuzzy'

'I don't know anything about this case/whatever and I don't want to
engage in this matter however your logic sounds strange to me':

What kind of contribution is this intended to be? The case is described in
the thread opener. If you are unwilling to read it, why do you write in
then? Can your commentary under these circumstances be other than rant?

'As this is obviously a matter of the german Wikipedia, why shouldn't
people of dewp be allowed to state their point?'

You would be more than welcome to participate in a discussion that deserves
this name. If you, however, continue - and systematically so - to avoid the
real question, then you show that something is wrong with you: Either you
are unable to, or you prefer not to understand (for whatever reasons).

'And, if you say (I didn't look into this one either), that the normal
processes for such a matter in dewp did not work and now your post should be
a kind of appeal to international Wikipedia Community, why shouldn't
dewp-people be allowed to defend their point of view?'

If you only did so. You haven't even started to plead your case. Instead,
you continue insisting that there isn't one.

The issue again, and in a nutshell: Why is it not possible on german
Wikipedia pages describing people or institutions to insert something that
is usual on correspondent anglo-saxon Wikipedia pages: i e a section that
lists not only 'neutral' (?) and acclaiming websites, but also such that are
critical? I had given an example for that in the thread opener.

I have described everything very clearly and in all necessary details in
that first, slightly extended but almost complete contribution. You would
be very well advised to take five minutes of your precious time and read
this text, trying to follow the clear logic exposed there.

International readers: Read the contributions from germans *) in this
thread, and you'll understand why german society is 'kaputt', and why it
apparently cannot be repaired. The german legal system does its part to keep
things in their sad state, cf http://worldimprover.net/EN/en4.html , so the
'elite' of the political-juridical complex **) can continue their parasite
existence at the expense of the german public.

'dewp-user but quite neutral in this case':

What are you tryin to insinuate? You are active enough to be a member of
this list, so are probably more than just a 'user'. I would consider you
part of the german Wikipedia structure. As such, you cannot be neutral, as
experience has shown. Wikipedia has become a power instrument, and it is
treated like that, at least in Germany.

*) I was born there, and german is my mother tongue. Still, due to my
extended polyglot and worldwide CV (cf
http://worldimprover.net/EN/en8.html ) I ask myseld if I should consider
myself a member of that nation anymore - at least not a typical one.

**) Remeber the defunct Soviet Union's military-industrial complex, which
destroyed the country? Is something similar happening to Germany through its
equivalent?


body:
Ok, so you're saying that undeletion doesn't need oversight, but crap
deletion does?  Aren't crap deletions supposed to be shot down by the
community just as well-reasoned BOLD undeletions are supported?

SCZenz

On 1/23/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/23/06, SCZenz <sczenz at gmail.com> wrote:
> > The reason for what you call process-fetishism is letting all editors
> > feel that they have a voice in deletion rather than just a few admins.
> >  I know we can't overdo it, but the goal is laudable.
> >
>
> Afd gives all a hand in the process.  After I've done a resurrection
> it's a doddle to tag it for deletion (which sometimes I do anyhow as a
> matter of form).  The response is usually very highly supportive.  See
> for instance the results of the second AfDs of Tally and SuperOffice.
> The near-unanimous vote to keep in each case is not untypical of my
> resurrections.
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


body:
I'd support changes like that, actually.  The problem, as always, is
that what's obvious to one person is not always obvious to all.  I am
concerned, therefore, that people could feel cut off from their
ability to participate by one admin's "obvious" decision.  Perhaps the
solution is to have people say '''Speedy Merge''' or similar, and do
so once a few people have agreed to that idea?

SCZenz

On 1/23/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/23/06, SCZenz <sczenz at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Ok, so you're saying that undeletion doesn't need oversight, but crap
> > deletion does?  Aren't crap deletions supposed to be shot down by the
> > community just as well-reasoned BOLD undeletions are supported?
> >
>
> I don't have a great overweening analysis of the thing, I just
> undelete good stuff that gets deleted (and I've had to do too much of
> that, recently).  What I've said on this and other threads is that I
> agree with the idea of defetishizing the deletion process.  I've
> expressed support for the idea of letting people cut an AfD short by
> make obvious merges and redirects, for instance.
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Tim Starling

subject: [WikiEN-l] #wikipedia-en-admins

body:
The IRC channel #wikipedia-en-admins has now been created, with mode +is, i.e. secret and
invite-only. It currently has an access list of 64 people. I am opposed to its existence. To call a
forum which admits 800 people "almost public" is bizarre. You admit 800 but you exclude thousands of
active contributors. Wikipedia has always attempted to encourage newcomers and to assume good faith,
but it's a clear violation of that principle to assume that the rest of the world, those 6 billion
non-administrators, have nothing useful to contribute to the discussions we wish to undertake.

Imagine if you joined Wikipedia today. How would you feel about the formidable barriers against your
potential contribution to Wikipedia's decision-making process? How would you feel about having tens
of admins declaring new policy, stating their rationale but refusing to enter into discussion with
you on equal terms, on the basis that it had already been decided in private?

-- Tim Starling


from_name: geni

body:
On 1/23/06, John Lee <johnleemk at gawab.com> wrote:
> I like the "crap nominations" part. I have seen people in places like
> Wikipedia Review saying they intentionally disrupt Wikipedia by
> nominating a few articles in bad faith every day. Putting a stop to bad
> faith acts is an action nobody should be opposing, regardless of who is
> doing it or why. The road to hell may be paved with good intentions, but
> the road to a good encyclopedia sure damn ain't paved with bad ones either.
>
> John Lee
> ([[User:Johnleemk]])

You belive the people at Wikipedia Review?

--
geni


from_name: Guillaume Blanchard

subject: [Wikitech-l] Quick Preview

body:
Hi all,
I wrote a JavaScript to allow pages Quick Preview without any server
access.
I don't know for other language, but many French use Preview option
(that use bandwidth, SQL access and server CPU parsing) to reread their
text many time before submit changes because read Wiki code is not so
easy. The idea is to make a limited parser to allow text rereading
without any cost for our servers.
You can test it on French Wikipedia. Actually, the script only support
(partly) the more basic features (titles, bold, italic, etc.) but it may
be easy to extend it to support almost all the WikiSyntax. Except:
missing articles (red link), templates and images. It works on Firefox,
Mozilla and Konqueror and don't work (yet?) on... suspense... MSIE.
I think this optional feature (if JS is not active the button just don't
appear) may save lot of servers resources and is really cheap (parsing
is only executing if Quick Preview button is pressed) and I would like
to have support from other developers to help improve it. It may be good
to include this feature into MediaWiki software in the future.
Regards,

Aoineko / Guillaume Blanchard


body:
On 1/23/06, MacGyverMagic/Mgm <macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote:
> Encyclopedia Dramatica isn't a mirror, is it? I think they got the wrong
> address.
>
> Mgm

Encyclopedia Dramatica has nothing to do with us in any way shape or
form other than useing the same family of software.

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] Edit warring at [[WP:NPOV]]

body:
A certain user (User:Bensaccount) has been editing this page rather heavily
in the last few days, including edit warring with a few other editors over
his changes.  I haven't examined all of his edits, but at least some of them
are questionable.  For instance, he is arguing that the section entitled
"Why should Wikipedia be unbiased?" should be completely removed because it
is "almost 100% repetition of what has been said in section 2: The neutral
point of view, and some other sections also."

Beyond his seeking potentially questionable changes, it's rather
embarrassing I think for Wikipedia to have an edit war occuring over such a
key policy.  I've posted a request for folks to visit the page at AN and
ANI, seemingly to no effect, so I figured I'd post here as well.

k.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: #wikipedia-en-admins

body:
Jay Converse wrote:
> I disagree with this assessment entirely.  I highly doubt the community
> would support secret decision making.  A consensus would be immensely hard
> to reach simply because you and 15 people go "Well we discussed this and we
> have our reasons".  I highly doubt the community would stand for that at
> all.

Here is the channel topic as it was for about 10 hours before I started writing my post:

"English Wikipedia Administrators' noticeboard, on IRC. Discussions are private and sometimes
privileged. Do not repost without permission. If decisions are made as the result of discussions,
the reasoning should be provided on-wiki."

Clearly they do intend to make decisions. Decisions are an unavoidable outcome of on-topic
discussion. We've seen decisions made on #wikipedia and introduced on to the wiki in this way, but I
don't mind that because IRC conversation is faster and more productive than wiki-based chat, and the
forum is non-exclusive.

> I see the channel as a way to quickly get help for administrative duties
> that non-admins can't provide help on.  As a relatively new admin, I run
> into new problems that I can't figure out myself on a semi-frequent basis.
> It'd be nice to have the availability of a dedicated admin group to respond
> in a much more immediate way than talk pages.  I personally happen to prefer
> IRC correspondence to talk page correspondence for quick issues.

Try #wikipedia.

-- Tim Starling


from_name: David Gerard

subject: [WikiEN-l] An article rescued simply by changing its subject

body:
Sean Barrett wrote:
>Tony Sidaway stated for the record:

>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TomorrowNow

>Yeah, sure, Tony, but you're being very inconsiderate here.  Think of
>all the people who wouldn't have been able to go to sleep with that warm
>glow of satisfaction that only comes from a day spent deleting other
>people's work.

That's a terribly negative way of looking at it. The most
inconsiderate thing is that there is no process to do what Tony did,
so therefore the restoration was OUT OF PROCESS! This is an
unforgivable offence to the community (all praise) and Tony should
probably be blocked again for the effrontery. Or RFCed again. Or
something.

- d.


body:
On 1/23/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 1/23/06, MacGyverMagic/Mgm <macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Encyclopedia Dramatica isn't a mirror, is it? I think they got the wrong
> > address.
> >
> > Mgm
>
> Encyclopedia Dramatica has nothing to do with us in any way shape or
> form other than useing the same family of software.
>
>
> --
> geni

Then how did that message land on our doorstep?
Mgm


from_name: Mark Wagner

subject: [WikiEN-l] Untagged image help

body:
On 1/23/06, Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 23/01/06, Guettarda <guettarda at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > The problem is that it (obviously) isn't compulsary.  There would be no
> > untagged images if the upload only worked if you selected a tag.  That said,
> > we'd probably end up with spurious tags if we forced tagging...which might
> > lead to more problems
>
> Force tag, have a default {{untagged}}, purge everything with this
> agressively? Similar to David's article-boilerplate proposal,
> really...

That would certainly make it easier for me to use OrphanBot to speed
up the removal process. --~~~~


from_name: Jimmy Wales

subject: [WikiEN-l] Arbcom Committee announcement

body:
In line with the community vote, I am appointing the following
candidates as per their rank-order in percentage vote:

Alpha tranche (2008)
---
Mindspillage
Filiocht
Charles Matthews
Morven

Gamma tranche (2007)
---
Mark (Raul654) - incumbent
Ben (Neutrality) - incumbent
Simon P.
Dmcdevit

Beta tranche (2006)
---
Sean Barrett (The Epopt) - incumbent
Theresa Knott - incumbent
Sam Korn
Mackensen

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

And then in the interests of expanding the committee and maintaining
continuity, I'm also making the following appointments (all candidates
met with community approval, percentages listed below):

Alpha - JamesF - 75.42%
Gamma - FredB  - 73.61%
Beta - JayJG   - 69.75%

--Jimbo Wales


body:
On 1/23/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/23/06, MacGyverMagic/Mgm <macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Encyclopedia Dramatica isn't a mirror, is it? I think they got the wrong
> > address.
> >
> > Mgm
>
> Encyclopedia Dramatica has nothing to do with us in any way shape or
> form other than useing the same family of software.

Actually, ED is a Wikipedia fork, much the way the Comixpedia wiki is:
it was set up when a number of articles the founders thought important
were deleted by VfD.

--
Mark Wagner
[[User:Carnildo]]


from_name: Stan Shebs

body:
Peter Mackay wrote:

>
>Which leads me to ponder about how vulnerable WP is to similar
>frivolononsense. We do the best we can and someone sues us because their
>face is in the "body art" article or something.
>
My ideal future is that WP has such a high reputation among jurists
that the judge dismisses the case and jails the plaintiff's lawyer
for having the temerity to cast aspersions on the judge's favorite
online reference.

We could get to that state sooner by just adding hagiographic
biographies of all the judges that might hear our case - we can
see from de:'s case what could happen if we don't.

:-) :-)

Stan


from_name: Omegatron

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Meta templates and Qif on :en

body:
> This is one template that could *really* do with something built into
> the software.  If it was even slightly possible that I could work this
> myself, I would attempt to do so.

Agreed.  Citations and references should really be built into the
software.  Lack of sources in articles is a *much* bigger problem than
any of this meta-template nonsense.

Infoboxes and taxoboxes could be built-in, too.

In the meantime, "complex" single templates are better than 15
different forks of the same template.


from_name: Rowan Collins

subject: [Wikitech-l] Enabling Interwiki

body:
On 23/01/06, John D. Mann <john.d.mann at gmail.com> wrote:
> I'm thinking that I need to compile a list of all the Interwiki codes and
> their matching URLs in order to enable this, but then I wonder why they are
> included in the /maintenance/ directory as sql files.  Are we supposed to
> commit this sql to our databases in order to use them, or is there more to
> it and/or something completely different that I am missing?

See http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Guide_for_system_administrators_for_setting_up_interwiki_linking

Basically, yes, all you need to do is add to / edit the 'interwiki'
table in the database. As it happens, I'm seeing if I can hack
together a Special: page for viewing and editting these right now, but
when/whether it will be included in the distribution, I wouldn't like
to wager.

--
Rowan Collins BSc
[IMSoP]


subject: [WikiEN-l] Merkey libels Wikipedians

body:
Guettarda wrote:
> So what is this LKML that he is talking about? "He posts death threats on
> Wikipedia and LKML..."
>
The Linux Kernel Mailing List, I presume.

grm_wnr


from_name: Rob Church

subject: [Wikitech-l] Enabling Interwiki

body:
Looks like we're all thinking along the same lines; I was going to
write a Special:Interwiki page at some point. At least this would
avoid duplication of effort. :-)

Rob Church

On 23/01/06, Rowan Collins <rowan.collins at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 23/01/06, John D. Mann <john.d.mann at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I'm thinking that I need to compile a list of all the Interwiki codes and
> > their matching URLs in order to enable this, but then I wonder why they are
> > included in the /maintenance/ directory as sql files.  Are we supposed to
> > commit this sql to our databases in order to use them, or is there more to
> > it and/or something completely different that I am missing?
>
> See http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Guide_for_system_administrators_for_setting_up_interwiki_linking
>
> Basically, yes, all you need to do is add to / edit the 'interwiki'
> table in the database. As it happens, I'm seeing if I can hack
> together a Special: page for viewing and editting these right now, but
> when/whether it will be included in the distribution, I wouldn't like
> to wager.
>
> --
> Rowan Collins BSc
> [IMSoP]
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>


from_name: Travis Mason-Bushman

subject: [Flag] Re: [WikiEN-l] Dealing with crap deletion nominations

body:
How about we look at a crap UNdeletion nomination, to show that process
is not entirely a fetish of the "deletionists."

[[Gfxvoid]], currently on [[Wikipedia:Deletion review]]. An article
about a non-notable forum which fails [[WP:WEB]] guidelines and
received a pile of delete votes - a metric crapload of deletion votes,
including speedy deletion votes. Not a single keep vote was cast. An
admin sensibly speedily deleted the article and closed the debate.

Now here we have it thrown up on Deletion Review for no other reason
than "non-notable, spam is not a CSD criterion."

Well, so what?

I think this just even further proves Tony and David's point, that the
deletion process is hopelessly overbureaucratized.

-FCYTravis


subject: [Flag] Re: [WikiEN-l] [Fwd: [HelpDesk-l] Complaint: Service abuse]

body:
> Actually, ED is a Wikipedia fork, much the way the Comixpedia wiki is:
> it was set up when a number of articles the founders thought important
> were deleted by VfD.

ED and Uncyclopedia are two forks which benefit Wikipedia in two ways -
they provide a place to blow off steam from Wikipedia and they provide
a place for all the random Internet shite and bloggerel which may in
some way be interesting to someone but is in no way particularly
encyclopedic.

-FCYTravis


from_name: Stephen Bain

subject: [WikiEN-l] Merkey libels Wikipedians

body:
"He is known to post messages on Wikipedia and LKML which solicit
violence and murder of US Citizens, and which are libel."

Because you'd be so worried about a hit order being libellous.

--
Stephen Bain
stephen.bain at gmail.com


subject: [Wikitech-l] Enabling Interwiki

body:
On 23/01/06, Rob Church <robchur at gmail.com> wrote:
> Looks like we're all thinking along the same lines; I was going to
> write a Special:Interwiki page at some point. At least this would
> avoid duplication of effort. :-)

Well, I thought of it first! :p
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Interwiki_map#Discussion_from_the_en.village_pump
[although that's probably more something to be ashamed of, forgetting
about it for that long...]
I was reminded of it by http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=3745

Confusingly, Domas is also working on interwiki stuff at the moment,
but I don't think it cuts across what I'm doing, which is just reading
and writing the database table.

--
Rowan Collins BSc
[IMSoP]


from_name: Jei

body:
On Sun, 22 Jan 2006, Michael Snow wrote:

> Justin Cormack wrote:
>
>> US law doesnt recognise copyright of sculptures in photos - only
>> 2D art, as there is creativity in making the picture of the sculpture.
>
> Wrong. The creativity involved in making a derivative work does not
> exempt it from the copyright in the original work. Sculptures are
> absolutely just as capable of having copyright as any other work of art.
>
> There is a federal district court case holding that under particular
> circumstances, a sculpture's copyright was dedicated to the public
> domain under a theory of general publication. But otherwise, a
> photograph of a sculpture is subject to the copyright of the sculpture.

Interesting. What about pictures of people? - If I put makeup on my face
and call it a work of art, and someone takes a picture of me in a public
place, do my copyrights still apply? Or if I jog regularly and spend time
shaping and trimming my body, does my unique physique retain it's
copyrights in a similar photograph situation?

// Jei


from_name: Ryan Delaney

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: #wikipedia-en-admins

references:
<dr1el4$pda$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<6b397ba40601221841w416f2da0j2b0229e9ff32fcc4@mail.gmail.com>
	<dr1go4$tk5$1@sea.gmane.org>

body:
As for the "decisions" thing, I assume they are talking about decisions re:
admin actions, like blocking and page protection. Personally, I'm not as
interested in opinions from non-admins about administrative actions.  There
are two reasons for this: First off, people who are not admins don't have
the kind of experience with these problems -- from the perspective of
someone trying to solve it -- to be able to talk about it with some kind of
awareness. Second, I assume (perhaps naively) that if someone were able to
understand admin-related situations, think them through, and come to a
decision, they would be admins themselves already.

Ryan


from_name: Guettarda

subject: [WikiEN-l] Untagged image help

body:
On 1/23/06, Wikiacc <wikiacc at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 1/22/06, Jay Converse <supermo0 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I've always wondered why there isn't a drop-down box to allow the image
> > uploader to select the copyright that they think fits best and then it
> > auto-inserts the template when the image info page is created.
>
> There is.

The problem is that it (obviously) isn't compulsary.  There would be no
untagged images if the upload only worked if you selected a tag.  That said,
we'd probably end up with spurious tags if we forced tagging...which might
lead to more problems

Ian (Guettarda)


subject: [WikiEN-l] Untagged image help

body:
On 1/23/06, Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 23/01/06, Guettarda <guettarda at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > The problem is that it (obviously) isn't compulsary.  There would be no
> > untagged images if the upload only worked if you selected a tag.  That
> said,
> > we'd probably end up with spurious tags if we forced tagging...which
> might
> > lead to more problems
>
> Force tag, have a default {{untagged}}, purge everything with this
> agressively? Similar to David's article-boilerplate proposal,
> really...
>
>
That's a really good idea.  Terribly simple.

Ian


from_name: SCZenz

subject: [WikiEN-l] Dealing with crap deletion nominations

body:
Maybe there are a few specific problems--like the ones Jimbo
identified recently--that can be addressed quickly, and then more
discussion about what to do with the "culture"?  I don't see the need
for the kind of sweeping changes you've suggested.

SCZenz

On 1/23/06, David Gerard <fun at thingy.apana.org.au> wrote:
> SCZenz (sczenz at gmail.com) [060124 07:38]:
>
> > I'd suggest that end-running the forum because you disagree with its
> > current regular users is an error.  We need to hash out disagreements
> > about how things are to be run, even if it's difficult, not form
> > separate warring fiefdoms.
>
>
> I'd suggest backing up and reading the previous discussion. The AFD/DRV
> culture is poisonous enough to be causing problems at the Foundation level;
> this shit has to stop, and to stop quickly. Leaving it in the hope it will
> improve is not an option.
>
>
> - d.
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Wikiacc

subject: [WikiEN-l] I was blocked for an unexisting policy

body:
On 1/21/06, Sam Spade <samspade.thomasjefferson at googlemail.com> wrote:
> project. Heck, if they listed all the different ways people have
> historically disrupted our project, it would be so long and useless a
> list as to be disruptive itself.

Not to mention [[WP:BEANS]]...

--
~~~~
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Wikiacc


subject: [WikiEN-l] Untagged image help

body:
On 1/22/06, Jay Converse <supermo0 at gmail.com> wrote:
> I've always wondered why there isn't a drop-down box to allow the image
> uploader to select the copyright that they think fits best and then it
> auto-inserts the template when the image info page is created.

There is.

--
~~~~
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Wikiacc


from_name: Peter Mackay

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: #wikipedia-en-admins

body:
> From: wikien-l-bounces at Wikipedia.org
> [mailto:wikien-l-bounces at Wikipedia.org] On Behalf Of Ryan Delaney

> As for the "decisions" thing, I assume they are talking about
> decisions re:
> admin actions, like blocking and page protection. Personally,
> I'm not as interested in opinions from non-admins about
> administrative actions.  There are two reasons for this:
> First off, people who are not admins don't have the kind of
> experience with these problems -- from the perspective of
> someone trying to solve it -- to be able to talk about it
> with some kind of awareness. Second, I assume (perhaps
> naively) that if someone were able to understand
> admin-related situations, think them through, and come to a
> decision, they would be admins themselves already.

I don't think anyone is disputing the desirability of having an admin
discussion list where non-admins can't post. Non-admins shouldn't be able to
participate in such a list, and the reasons given above go a long way
towards justifying this.

The question is more about how open the archives of such a list should be,
and there are two main arguments for this. The first is tramsparency of
process, and the second is that with 800 participants the thing will leak
anyway.

Peter (Skyring)


subject: [WikiEN-l] Untagged image help

body:
On 1/23/06, Guettarda <guettarda at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/23/06, Wikiacc <wikiacc at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > On 1/22/06, Jay Converse <supermo0 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > I've always wondered why there isn't a drop-down box to allow the image
> > > uploader to select the copyright that they think fits best and then it
> > > auto-inserts the template when the image info page is created.
> >
> > There is.
>
>
> The problem is that it (obviously) isn't compulsary.  There would be no
> untagged images if the upload only worked if you selected a tag.  That said,
> we'd probably end up with spurious tags if we forced tagging...which might
> lead to more problems

Quite. When the selector was introduced, quite a few uploaders were
"license roulette"-ing and tagging obviously copyrighted images as
anything they could find, usually tags like GPL and
CopyrightedFreeUse.

--
~~~~
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Wikiacc


from_name: John Lee

body:
David Gerard wrote:

>Some AFD regulars seem to view AFD/DRV as an independent fiefdom which
>claims dominion over all Wikipedia content, but resists all comment from
>outside (e.g. wikien-l) as interference. *Unfortunately*, it's been causing
>real problems for the Foundation of late. Unbelievable rudeness about
>outsiders, stupendously crap nominations to make a point, actively driving
>away outside experts, etc.
>
>Here is a suggestion: good faith is not enough when the good-faith actions
>are stupidly destructive. Incivility on *FD = 24 hour ban from all *FD
>pages and deletion of comment. Sufficiently crap nomination = 1 month ban
>from all *FD pages.
>
>Ideas?
>
>
>- d.
>
>
>
>
I like the "crap nominations" part. I have seen people in places like
Wikipedia Review saying they intentionally disrupt Wikipedia by
nominating a few articles in bad faith every day. Putting a stop to bad
faith acts is an action nobody should be opposing, regardless of who is
doing it or why. The road to hell may be paved with good intentions, but
the road to a good encyclopedia sure damn ain't paved with bad ones either.

John Lee
([[User:Johnleemk]])


from_name: Guillaume Blanchard

subject: [Wikitech-l] Quick Preview

body:
Ivan Krstic wrote:
> Guillaume Blanchard wrote:
>
>> I would like
>> to have support from other developers to help improve it. It may be good
>> to include this feature into MediaWiki software in the future.
>>
>
> There have been previous efforts to this end which are in various stages
> of completion. The difficulty with integrating a JS-based live preview
> into MediaWiki proper is that it requires developers to keep track of
> two separate parsers written in different languages, and neither of
> which is an actual parser.
Why the previous JS Quick Preview didn't still on the live site? Can you
indicate me those scripts and/or theirs programmers?
There was a project to use a XML intermediate format for parsing; any
news about that?
I don't think Quick Preview must be a carbon copy of the PHP parser. The
goal is just to offer a readable version of the WikiSyntax code we are
editing. Imho, fully support text styles, links and tables may be enough.
Regards,

Aoineko / Guillaume Blanchard


from_name: geni

body:
On 1/23/06, MacGyverMagic/Mgm <macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote:
> Then how did that message land on our doorstep?
> Mgm

Quite a few people appear to be under the impression that
wiki=wikipedia. We get a lot of missdirected messages. Quite a lot
about university aplications.

--
geni


from_name: Dominik Bach

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re:Re: Confusing Interwiki Links

body:
this works for me. But isn't it a little too technical for the ordinary user?

Dominik

>

Add the following into your user CSS (e.g. [[User:Dominik/monobook.css]]):

.interwiki-en { font-weight: bold }
.interwiki-ca,
.interwiki-bs,
.interwiki-ko { display: none }

(of course, customize the language codes according to your wishes)

HTH,

-- [[cs:User:Mormegil | Petr Kadlec]]

______________________________________________________________
Verschicken Sie romantische, coole und witzige Bilder per SMS!
Jetzt bei WEB.DE FreeMail: http://f.web.de/?mc=021193


from_name: David Gerard

subject: [WikiEN-l] Edit warring at [[WP:NPOV]]

body:
Katefan0 wrote:

>Beyond his seeking potentially questionable changes, it's rather
>embarrassing I think for Wikipedia to have an edit war occuring over such a
>key policy.  I've posted a request for folks to visit the page at AN and
>ANI, seemingly to no effect, so I figured I'd post here as well.

Considering this is *the* key Wikipedia content policy, I've blocked
the idjit for blatant disruption and 6RR. I've also protected the
page. Any admin who thinks the block or protection is egregious, *you*
can childmind him. In the meantime, experienced admins are welcomed to
try to fix the page.

- d.


from_name: Sam Korn

body:
On 1/23/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> Quite a few people appear to be under the impression that
> wiki=wikipedia. We get a lot of missdirected messages. Quite a lot
> about university aplications.

And about joining our football (soccer to the Yanks) academy.

--
Sam


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Admin meeting

body:
On 1/23/06, John Lee <johnleemk at gawab.com> wrote:
> Bureaucrat? Adminship is no big deal, but bureaucratship sure is, and I
> have no doubt that every single one of the bureaucrats on en is
> trustworthy. The only problem is that most of them (with the *possible*
> exceptions of Raul, Linuxbeak and Ilyanep) are rather isolated from
> those in the trenches. (At least Raul deals with our featured article
> issues, Linuxbeak is active on ANI and other similar fora, and
> Ilyanep...well, I've seen him around so he can't be that high up in the
> ivory tower yet.)

We must have separation of powers to avoid the tumbling blocks of hell
falling on our big toenails.

--
Sam


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Admin meeting

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:

> daniwo59 at aol.com wrote:
>
>> The fact that there are so many admins is one of teh key reasons why
>> I  think that such a meeting is so important. It is vital for people
>> to get to know  one another a little better and see who the active
>> admins are.
>
> Perhaps you should be encouraging more people to show up at Wikimania.
> O:-)
>
> Ec

Not all of us have the money or time to spend 12 hours flying to a
foreign land. :-p

John Lee
([[User:Johnleemk]])


from_name: Michael Laudahn

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] This is a 'first-timer' - should I have
	missunderstood something then please have mercy for me

body:
You're right, 'skimming' the issue is hardly the appropriate way to deal
with it. You would have to take five minutes and READ concentratingly the
thread opener.

As mentioned in the inter-german correspondence since then, the discussion
is about the refusal of the german Wikipedia hierarchy to accept also
critical weblinks on their pages, not just neutral or acclaiming ones. This
is something normal in e g anglo-saxon countries. Cf down on
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_B._MacDonald .

The replies from Germany were an insisting type of pretending to 'nix
verstehn' ('not understand'), although they did understand - no doubt. How
do YOU react when people try to treat you this way? Some sarcasm could be
among the choices at one's disposal, according to my logic.

Why you have chosen to react emotionally instead of rationally, I don't want
to speculate over at this time. However, wouldn't you be free to correct
this attitude at any given moment?


body:
On 1/23/06, Phil Boswell <phil.boswell at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Do you see the need?  I don't.  All I see is people wanting to use one
> > template in all situations, where they could easily use multiple
> > templates.
>
> This is known as "template forking" and is regarded as evil.

Are taxoboxes evil?  No, I think not.  Yet they are a good instance of
multiple templates cleanly giving an effect that could be achieved by
ugly single templates (I have seen attempts, with {{taxobox}} to
destroy this good work).  I have also seen templates that seek to use
one template for programmes, characters and various other pages
relating to the same manga series.

> Take for example the classic {{book reference}}. The simplest possible
> instance is just the title of the book. This can later be embellished with
> the name of the author, possibly with a link to an appropriate article.
> Later additions can include the publisher and ISBN, to distinguish between
> different editions and to enable a reader to find an actual copy.
>
> If you fork this template (and this was actually done before the advent of
> condition "tricksiness"), you have to use a different template every time
> you incrementally improve the accuracy of your citation. Your choice can
> even be affected by the order in which your embellishments are added!
>
> Since accurate citation of sources is a key requirement for a good Wikipedia
> article, making this any harder than necessary is not good.

This is one template that could *really* do with something built into
the software.  If it was even slightly possible that I could work this
myself, I would attempt to do so.

--
Sam


from_name: Ilya N.

body:
Allow me to be the first to congratulate the new Arbitrators.

On 1/23/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
>
> In line with the community vote, I am appointing the following
> candidates as per their rank-order in percentage vote:
>
> Alpha tranche (2008)
> ---
> Mindspillage
> Filiocht
> Charles Matthews
> Morven
>
>
> Gamma tranche (2007)
> ---
> Mark (Raul654) - incumbent
> Ben (Neutrality) - incumbent
> Simon P.
> Dmcdevit
>
>
> Beta tranche (2006)
> ---
> Sean Barrett (The Epopt) - incumbent
> Theresa Knott - incumbent
> Sam Korn
> Mackensen
>
> --------------------
>
> And then in the interests of expanding the committee and maintaining
> continuity, I'm also making the following appointments (all candidates
> met with community approval, percentages listed below):
>
> Alpha - JamesF - 75.42%
> Gamma - FredB  - 73.61%
> Beta - JayJG   - 69.75%
>
> --Jimbo Wales
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

--
~Ilya N.
http://w3stuff.com/ilya/ (My website; DarkLordFoxx Media)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Ilyanep (on Wikipedia)


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Admin meeting

body:
Kelly Martin wrote:

>On 1/22/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>>>There are Foundation-level issues that need to be kept to some degree
>>>of confidence.
>>>
>>>
>>Then they stay at foundation level.
>>
>>
>
>There aren't enough people at "foundation level" to deal with them.
>They *have* to push them out to the people on the ground or they won't
>get done.
>
>Apparently, we need some level between "admin" and "steward"/"board
>member", since our admins are little more than a ragtag bunch of
>rabble anyway.
>
>Kelly
>
>
Bureaucrat? Adminship is no big deal, but bureaucratship sure is, and I
have no doubt that every single one of the bureaucrats on en is
trustworthy. The only problem is that most of them (with the *possible*
exceptions of Raul, Linuxbeak and Ilyanep) are rather isolated from
those in the trenches. (At least Raul deals with our featured article
issues, Linuxbeak is active on ANI and other similar fora, and
Ilyanep...well, I've seen him around so he can't be that high up in the
ivory tower yet.)

John Lee
([[User:Johnleemk]])


from_name: Andrew Gray

body:
On 23/01/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:

> Quite a few people appear to be under the impression that
> wiki=wikipedia. We get a lot of missdirected messages. Quite a lot
> about university aplications.

It doesn't help that a large number of wikis that people run across
run MediaWiki, which has a very recognisable "default style"...

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


from_name: Tony Sidaway

body:
On 1/23/06, John Lee <johnleemk at gawab.com> wrote:
> Seriously.
> [[TomorrowNow]] is a valid subject; its CEO plainly isn't.)
>

You know a couple of days ago we were discussing this kind of thing on
wikien-l and there was this feeling that if there were crap AfDs we
should be prepared to discuss what to do about the article in the
broader sense, not just deleting it.  I accordingly closed the AfD and
invited all interested parties to discuss what to do about the
article.

Somebody re-opened the AfD, some more people voted delete and it was
closed as a delete.  While annoying, this obviously wasn't the end of
the thing precisely because there was so much agreement that the
company is important and so much material in the deleted revisions.

Oh sure there were a couple of odd moments.  A history undeletion that
I made was speedied, the Seth Ravin page was protected from
recreation, and so on.  I was accused of all kinds of crimes against
process (good!) Minor stuff.  But the solution was easy to implement,
the new version took only a small amount of research and rewriting,
and I'm reasonably proud of the result.

Yes, I'm satisfied with the end result.  But you will notice that I
had to fight *against* encrustations of process every single step of
the way.  An attempt to implement good ideas suggest here was
rebutted, the AfD was closed without due notice being taken of the
feeling that the company was important enough for an article, and a
straightforward history undeletion was nearly capsized.  All because
the process has been fetishized and the use of thought deterred and
marginalized.  One chap even put a note on my take page suggesting
"you're angling for another undeletion".  As if this was a *bad* thing
in the circumstances!  Of course I was anglng for undeletion!  We do
not delete good material from the encyclopedia.

But the problem is that I had to do it.  There is no process to
support what I did,  the process that we have deters it, and many of
those committed to that process actually think people shouldn't be
allowed to do it and are probably abusing their editing and
administrator powers when they do.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Pointless deletions, bogus guidelines

body:
The clause anthony cites does not apply to the copyright holder, but
to a non-copyright holder  who wants to use the licensed
material--that person obviously may not modify the terms of the
license (the "You" in the wording of the license).  The copyright
holder retains full rights.


body:
On 1/23/06, SCZenz <sczenz at gmail.com> wrote:
> I know I'm getting into this late, but I'm gonna start from the top anyway...
>
> Why not reform WP:DRV into something everyone can live with?  We could
> give it more authority to overrule AfD, based on things other than
> process, for example.

Deletion review already has powers of content review (which it
inherited from its predecessor, Votes for undeletion) under the
deletion policy.  This fact is not well known and is routinely denied
by regular users of that forum.  The culture of DRV is in a worse
state than that of AFD and it's far more process-bound; I'd suggest
that looking there for a solution would be a mistake.


from_name: Sean Barrett

subject:
[WikiEN-l] illegel removal By Ragib to try modification of some
	parts

body:
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Hash: SHA1

joalex stated for the record:

> friends,
> this user  *Ragib* had banned my IP adress since I edited a page.He alleged
> me as  "*vandalism* " even without a sufficient cause.I think he banned me
> because he is in favour of PAKISTAN in which I modified some parts according
> to my knowledge.my IP is  *202.56.231.116* and my username is Cutejoe.
> This is a attack on the freedom of press in which I tried to keep
> up.ShameWikipedia Shame, of this unmatured Admin.
> joe

1) Ragib did the right thing -- you are a vandal.

2) What is this "freedom of the press" thing you refer to?

- --
 Sean Barrett     | A book should serve as the ax for the
 sean at epoptic.org | frozen sea within us. --Franz Kafka
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from_name: Jon

subject: [WikiEN-l] Edit warring at [[WP:NPOV]]

body:
Actually, Bensaccount has been improving the guidance on NPOV and appears to have been quite willing to discuss his reasoning, when questioned on the talk page.

  More importantly, the version of this page before this revert by Katefan0 to a November 2005 version, was better and "fixing" the page would involve reverting back to Ben's last version first.

  Incidentally, David, I believe the word you were looking for was eejit not idjit:) Take care.

  Jon

  (jguk)

David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
  Katefan0 wrote:

>Beyond his seeking potentially questionable changes, it's rather
>embarrassing I think for Wikipedia to have an edit war occuring over such a
>key policy. I've posted a request for folks to visit the page at AN and
>ANI, seemingly to no effect, so I figured I'd post here as well.

Considering this is *the* key Wikipedia content policy, I've blocked
the idjit for blatant disruption and 6RR. I've also protected the
page. Any admin who thinks the block or protection is egregious, *you*
can childmind him. In the meantime, experienced admins are welcomed to
try to fix the page.

- d.
_______________________________________________
WikiEN-l mailing list
WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

---------------------------------
Yahoo! Photos ? NEW, now offering a quality print service from just 8p a photo.


from_name: Jay Converse

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: #wikipedia-en-admins

references:
<dr1el4$pda$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<6b397ba40601221841w416f2da0j2b0229e9ff32fcc4@mail.gmail.com>
	<dr1go4$tk5$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<1e20f1290601221913k7a1564e1u7a8481901cfb9a1d@mail.gmail.com>
	<dr3li1$vq6$2@sea.gmane.org>

body:
On 1/23/06, Anthere <Anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> Nathan Russell wrote:
> > On 1/22/06, Tim Starling <t.starling at physics.unimelb.edu.au> wrote:
> >
> >
> >>Try #wikipedia.
> >
> >
> > My personal experience of #wikipedia is that it tends to have a lot of
> > off-topic socialization, and on-topic discussion tends to be lost in
> > the scrolling.
> >
> > #wikimedia and #wikipedia-en tend to be better.
> >
> > Nathan aka Pakaran
> > _______________________________________________
>
> As a note.... #wikimedia is a channel dedicated to Foundation issues.
> Recently, we noticed more and more editors leaking from the #wikipedia
> channel and discussing english wikipedia issues on the Foundation channel.
>
> Please, try to avoid doing that generally. And keep discussions in the
> channel specifically dedicated. It will be very helpful for all.
>
> Thanks
>
> Ant

I think that may be a symptom of the problem that is #wikipedia's general
unwillingness to be on topic.  People are going to go where they can have a
serious discussion, whether or not that's the right place for it.

--
I'm not stupid, just selectively ignorant.


from_name: Fastfission

body:
On 1/21/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
>
> IOW, if a visual depiction of the character isn't legal, then isn't
> the entire article, which is a textual depiction of the character,
> illegal?
>
> There's just gotta be some kind of visual depiction of Darth Vader
> which is legal for distribution in an encyclopedia by anyone anywhere
> under any terms, at least with regard to copyright law (for all I know
> discussion of Darth Vader is banned in China
> or something, so I'm explicitly excepting something like that).
>

I think it is worth pointing out that copyright law (and trademark law)
affects text and images (and other forms of media) differently. It is very
easy to make a copyright-safe version of a textual account; it is very hard
in most cases to make copyright-safe versions of images or visual-based
media unless they are themselves based on "basic facts" (i.e. a diagram of
some physical principle).

The only way I know of to make "free" versions of copyrighted things would
be as knock-offs. But that not only wouldn't help our purposes at all, but
it would itself skate far closer to legal action than a "fair use" claim
probably would. But that's just a speculation.

FF


body:
On 1/23/06, SCZenz <sczenz at gmail.com> wrote:
> I'd suggest that end-running the forum because you disagree with its
> current regular users is an error.  We need to hash out disagreements
> about how things are to be run, even if it's difficult, not form
> separate warring fiefdoms.

Oh even if we had a working process, this wouldn't limit the scope of
action of individual administrators and editors.  The processes are
only supposed to be there to make things easier; let's not fetishize
them as an end in themselves.


from_name: Alphax (Wikipedia email)

subject: [WikiEN-l] [Fwd: [HelpDesk-l] Complaint: Service abuse]

body:
I thought this was absolutely priceless...

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: 	[HelpDesk-l] Complaint: Service abuse
Date: 	Sun, 22 Jan 2006 19:49:48 +0000
From: 	<NAME REMOVED>
Reply-To: 	Help desk for questions about Wikimedia projects
<helpdesk-l at Wikimedia.org>
To: 	helpdesk-l at wikimedia.org

Staff members of the world's biggest online encyclopedia,

I am writing this email in complaint to how easy the service can be
abused by just about anyone on the internet. While in theory it is a
positive idea to allow people to willingly submit or update articles, it
gives anyone the power to submit nothing but complete nonsensical,
biased and generally fictional information that does not reflect on the
reality of the subject.

Today I was outraged in coming to terms with this when I realized an
article of interest was willingly changed by someone who was clearly
closed-minded and totally against the subject:
http://www.encyclopediadramatica.com/index.php/FA

You may not know much on the subject, however, I believe that it would
be fair a proposal to request changing your contribution system to allow
all contributions to articles to be submitted directly to members of
staff to review the contributions first, in order to confirm the
certainty of the article by researching for facts about it online. If
the contribution is approved, it can then be displayed in the article.

Further, I personally request that you remove the biased, untrue article
edit and replace it with the much more accurate revision in the
article's history:
http://www.encyclopediadramatica.com/index.php?title=FA&oldid=47793
<http://www.encyclopediadramatica.com/index.php?title=FA&oldid=47793>

Thank you very much for taking the time to read my email of concern, and
thanks in advance for taking care of the situation in any way possible.
 - A Wikipedia user

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP
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body:
Plus don't forget. To 99% of people who send things like this, all
wikis are Wikipedias, and we run all of them. Even
harrypotter.slashopedia.org (for the love of god, that had better be
not a real site.)

-Luigi30


body:
On 1/23/06, SCZenz <sczenz at gmail.com> wrote:
> The reason for what you call process-fetishism is letting all editors
> feel that they have a voice in deletion rather than just a few admins.
>  I know we can't overdo it, but the goal is laudable.
>

Afd gives all a hand in the process.  After I've done a resurrection
it's a doddle to tag it for deletion (which sometimes I do anyhow as a
matter of form).  The response is usually very highly supportive.  See
for instance the results of the second AfDs of Tally and SuperOffice.
The near-unanimous vote to keep in each case is not untypical of my
resurrections.


from_name: Anthony DiPierro

body:
On 1/23/06, Matt Brown <morven at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/23/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
> > On 1/22/06, Matt Brown <morven at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > Are you sure this is the correct reading of the GFDL?  I see it as
> > > meaning that you cannot take a GFDL'd document and relicense it.  NOT
> > > that the original author cannot release their own original work under
> > > multiple licenses.
> >
> > I don't see any other way to read it.  It doesn't say you can't
> > relicense the document.  It says you can't "copy, modify, sublicense,
> > or distribute the Document except as expressly provided for under this
> > License" and that doing so (actually, according to the language,
> > merely "attempt"ing to do so) will "automatically terminate your
> > rights under this License."
>
> Technically speaking, though, "the Document" is only the GFDL-licensed
> version.  If you work on an original, non-GFDL version and then
> relicense a version as GFDL which you release, then the wording cannot
> affect the parent document.
>
I'm not sure exactly what you're saying there.  The wording doesn't
affect the document, it revokes the GFDL for someone who copies (etc.)
the document in some way outside the permissions of the GFDL.

But you do have a point that a separate version of the Document might
not be considered "the Document".  I guess that would rectify the
situation for the case of a Document dual-licensed.  Instead of one
Document, you call it two.

> Also, if you are the original author, you are not relying on any
> rights granted by the GFDL.  The GFDL grants people who are not the
> copyright holder the right to distribute.  If you are yourself the
> copyright holder, you do not require the GFDL in order to distribute
> the work - you are using your natural rights as a copyright holder,
> not any additional rights the GFDL grants you.
>
Yes, what Tony said.  I wasn't talking about the rights of the
original author, but rather the rights of the person given permission
under the GFDL.

> I suspect at the very least that my reading is the reading the FSF
> intended, and that the ambiguity is thanks to rather poor legal
> wording of the license, rather than original intention.
>
> -Matt

Well, the original intention seems clear - to revoke permission under
the GFDL to someone (other than the original author, of course) who
breaks the GFDL.  It's actually a clause originally from the GPL,
where it makes a lot more sense, because the GPL tries to tie the
permissions on distribution to the permissions on modification rather
than keep them seperable.

But in terms of the GFDL, I think it's clear that if, for instance,
you took a GFDLed document, changed an invariant section, and then
redistributed it, the intention is that you'd be breaking the GFDL and
therefore your permission under the GFDL would be revoked.  What I was
suggesting is that this clause might come into effect even if you had
permission, for instance under a separate license grant, to change
that invariant section and redistribute the document.

I think you're right that this wasn't the reason that clause was
added.  But I also don't think it's clear what the author intended to
happen in that situation.  I do think it is clear, though, that the
author wasn't thinking merely of the fact "that you cannot take a
GFDL'd document and relicense it."

Anyway, this tangent was fun and slightly educational, but it's worn
out its welcome on my part :).  Unless you have a particular question
about what I was trying to say I'm going to just leave my crazy ideas
about the GFDL as is.

Anthony


body:
Snowspinner wrote:
> How about David, an ardent deletionist, who is due for his more jobs
> after a year of excellent service to the arbcom?
>
> In fact, why don't we give David a title akin to Raul's on featured
> articles? Deletion Director. And give him broad authority to look  into
> deletion cases and force sane results. However much one agrees  with his
> claims about how systemically broken *FD is, I don't think  anyone has
> seriously argued against his extreme sanity when it comes  to, well,
> everything.
>

#'''Support''', knows music (that deals with band vanity), isn't a high
school student (that deals with schools), is Australian (that deals with
Australia-related stuff). I'm happy. ~~~~

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP
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body:
On 1/23/06, SCZenz <sczenz at gmail.com> wrote:
> Ok, so you're saying that undeletion doesn't need oversight, but crap
> deletion does?  Aren't crap deletions supposed to be shot down by the
> community just as well-reasoned BOLD undeletions are supported?
>

I don't have a great overweening analysis of the thing, I just
undelete good stuff that gets deleted (and I've had to do too much of
that, recently).  What I've said on this and other threads is that I
agree with the idea of defetishizing the deletion process.  I've
expressed support for the idea of letting people cut an AfD short by
make obvious merges and redirects, for instance.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: #wikipedia-en-admins

body:
Jay Converse wrote:
> On 1/22/06, Tim Starling <t.starling at physics.unimelb.edu.au> wrote:
>
<snip>
>>
>>Try #wikipedia.
>>
>>
>
> I've given up on #wikipedia.  There's either off-topic chat or some heated
> policy discussion going on, but every time I try to ask a question, out of
> all 150+ people in there, I don't get a reply.  Maybe you have a different
> experience, but I never seem to be listened to in there, and in fact, that
> channel was a significant reason behind my wikibreak last year.  Nothing
> like getting ignored to shoot your self-esteem in the face.
>

Some times of the day are pretty hopeless, at other times you get people
on-topic.

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP
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body:
On 1/23/06, SCZenz <sczenz at gmail.com> wrote:
>  Perhaps the
> solution is to have people say '''Speedy Merge''' or similar, and do
> so once a few people have agreed to that idea?
>

Doesn't work.  As you say, what's obvious to one isn't obvious to
most.  I think we should give editors the ability to edit through the
AfD, and let the results speak for themselves.  Our greatest asset is
the skill of our editors.  Show, don't tell.

You talk of people feeling disenfranchised because they're not
included in a discussion, but if all they have to say is "nn delete"
when an article clearly contains salvageable material, I don't think
it's a bad thing that they should feel that nobody is taking any
notice.


from_name: Ryan Delaney

body:
Hahahahaha. BJAODN.

-Ryan

On 1/23/06, Alphax (Wikipedia email) <alphasigmax at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I thought this was absolutely priceless...
>
> -------- Original Message --------
> Subject:        [HelpDesk-l] Complaint: Service abuse
> Date:   Sun, 22 Jan 2006 19:49:48 +0000
> From:   <NAME REMOVED>
> Reply-To:       Help desk for questions about Wikimedia projects
> <helpdesk-l at Wikimedia.org>
> To:     helpdesk-l at wikimedia.org
>
> Staff members of the world's biggest online encyclopedia,
>
> I am writing this email in complaint to how easy the service can be
> abused by just about anyone on the internet. While in theory it is a
> positive idea to allow people to willingly submit or update articles, it
> gives anyone the power to submit nothing but complete nonsensical,
> biased and generally fictional information that does not reflect on the
> reality of the subject.
>
> Today I was outraged in coming to terms with this when I realized an
> article of interest was willingly changed by someone who was clearly
> closed-minded and totally against the subject:
> http://www.encyclopediadramatica.com/index.php/FA
>
> You may not know much on the subject, however, I believe that it would
> be fair a proposal to request changing your contribution system to allow
> all contributions to articles to be submitted directly to members of
> staff to review the contributions first, in order to confirm the
> certainty of the article by researching for facts about it online. If
> the contribution is approved, it can then be displayed in the article.
>
> Further, I personally request that you remove the biased, untrue article
> edit and replace it with the much more accurate revision in the
> article's history:
> http://www.encyclopediadramatica.com/index.php?title=FA&oldid=47793
> <http://www.encyclopediadramatica.com/index.php?title=FA&oldid=47793>
>
> Thank you very much for taking the time to read my email of concern, and
> thanks in advance for taking care of the situation in any way possible.
> - A Wikipedia user
>
> --
> Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
> Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
> "We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
> Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>
>
>
>