subject:
[Foundation-l] Re: Intent to launch pt., pl., ro. Wikinews;
	further procedure

body:
No, please keep it to the procedure we agreed upon just a couple of days
ago.

When I suggested that we added this requirement of "activity", there
were two reasons

* activity shows interest, so avoid missed launches such as the french
wikinews one

* past activity of at least 2 editors on a wikipedia (for example)
indicates that at least 2 editors are aware of our basic principles and
in particular NPOV requirement.

Again, the is a security measure. If 5 people, not even one oldby on one
of our project, decide to  launch a wikinews with no experience at all,
there is rather high risk that some of our principles are not respected;
and since it is not in a language we necessarily manage, it might go on
for a long time.

You mentionned yourself that wikinews was a tricky project, with rather
serious liability issues. I agree with this. And this is just as much a
reason to avoid launching by people who just happened to visit a couple
of days sooner and found the concept great. We need at least 2
experienced people.

Anthere

Erik Moeller a ?crit:
> As per the procedure on
>
>    http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikinews/Start_a_new_edition
>
> I'd like to launch three new editions later today or tomorrow:
> Portuguese, Polish, and Romanian. For Portuguese, I count Carlosar as a
> valid vote, because he has made 3000+ edits on the English Wikinews, and
> he is a native speaker.
>
> For future editions, I'd also like to suggest changing the language
> procedure in the following way:
>
>    The "activity on existing Wikimedia projects" requirement can be
>    dropped if a few support pages (FAQ, Mission Statement, etc.) are
>    created on Meta for the project to be launched. These can be
>    translations or original creations.
>
> Such an effort indicates a genuine interest in working on a Wikinews
> edition in a language. It also reduces the dependency of new projects on
> existing ones -- we already know that many key people working on
> Wikinews have not done substantial work on Wikipedia or other Wikimedia
> projects. There would still be a requirement of at least 5 signatures,
> so it's not just one person playing an overarching role.
>
> If this works out, perhaps we can substitute one procedure for another;
> I prefer the translation procedure, because it also makes sure that
> certain pages are in place before the wiki is set up (a problem on some
> new editions which were essentially blank for several days).
>
> I'd like to credit the Memory Alpha wiki for this procedure, which has
> successfully used it for setting up new languages.
>
> Regards,
>
> Erik


list: wikimedia-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Anthere


list: foundation-l

subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews

body:
>The news we can integrate via a single platform. So any one from any
>location can submit a news. But that wil go only through the
>moderators. So once two people submit one news automatically the
>second will go down.

>Here we can create users, trusted journalists, moderators and admins.
>So What we going to do

>Answering the rest....

>First of all the editors have to think about that. Thats what i mean by top

I think it is high time I go back to the english wikinews to look at what is going on...
I was not aware there was (or planning to be ?) different status such as admin and moderators.

Hmmm, oh well.

>I dint mean english and german is top

>There is nothing elctric in my statement!!

Electric ? :-))))

---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
 Yahoo! Search presents - Jib Jab's 'Second Term'


subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Lane, Ryan

body:
This sounds like a good thing to possibly integrate with my LDAP patch
(http://bugzilla.wikipedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=814).
Many organizations are going to smart cards, and use LDAP for
authentication. Thomas and I are working on integrating his email
notification with my LDAP patch, maybe I'll be able to integrate this as
well.

Ryan Lane
Naval Oceanographic Office

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	wikitech-l-bounces at wikimedia.org
> [SMTP:wikitech-l-bounces at wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Frank Wales
> Sent:	Thursday, February 17, 2005 11:23 PM
> To:	Wikimedia developers
> Subject:	[Wikitech-l] Client certificate-based user login mechanism
>
> On Wed, 2005-02-16 at 07:20 +0100, Thomas Gries wrote:
> > I have such a patch for loadFromSession() see
> > http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1360 Auto-login /
> > Auto-account-creation by hostname for intranet MediaWikis. The patch
> > code itself has not yet been uploaded but is rather short.
> >
> > Brion and Marcus: let me know, if you are interested - pls .study for
> > this the text on the bugzilla; then I would revisited my code and upload
>
> > the patch as a diff.
>
> In related news, I've just written a first working version of a patch
> to loadFromSession() which logs you in as the Common Name from a
> client certificate presented by your browser as part of the SSL
> handshake to a secure Apache server.  Not very elegant yet, but
> it seems to work okay.  In effect, it punts the problem of
> getting the user's credentials up to Apache, but for what we're
> doing, that makes more sense anyway.
>
> My questions are:
>
> 1) anyone interested in the patch (with documentation on how
>    to set up Apache to pass in the bits MW needs, etc., once
>    I get the time to scribble some down)?
>
> 2) ought I to append it to Thomas's bug #1360 discussion, or
>    should this go elsewhere?
>
> Note that I'm still in the middle of tweaking this for production
> use, and since I only started looking at MW's code a few hours
> ago, I probably have some cleaning up to do before it's very
> presentable.
>
> But I'm happy to toss it out with some notes anyway for comment,
> especially if it turns out that I'm doing something majorly wrong.
> --
> Frank Wales [frank at limov.com]
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l


from_name: Erik Moeller

body:
Anthere-

>
> * activity shows interest, so avoid missed launches such as the french
> wikinews one

Actually, it doesn't. French Wikinews would have passed the edit count
requirements (haven't checked user duration); as you yourself said,
Greudin is a very active user on fr.wikipedia and has pledged support
for the French Wikinews, yet he has only made a handful of edits there.

Translating/creating policies seems to be a much better test of actual
interest in doing work. Once you do that, that shows a commitment to the
project.

>
> * past activity of at least 2 editors on a wikipedia (for example)
> indicates that at least 2 editors are aware of our basic principles
> and in particular NPOV requirement.

What better test could there be for people understanding a policy like
NPOV than requiring them to translate it?

> Again, the is a security measure. If 5 people, not even one oldby on
> one of our project, decide to  launch a wikinews with no experience at
> all, there is rather high risk that some of our principles are not
> respected;

I don't see it that way. Just because someone has been on Wikipedia for
months doesn't mean that they respect policies at all. Quantity is not
quality, and measuring quality is almost impossible while keeping the
process scalable and fair. One could even argue that malicious trolls or
otherwise harmful users who know how to manipulate policies in their
interest are more likely to come from our existing user base. In fact,
Wikinews will especially attract people who are fed up with Wikipedia
and want to work on another wiki.

> and since it is not in a language we necessarily manage, it might go
> on for a long time.

This is more likely if key policies like NPOV are *not* translated. If
we can agree on which parts of our policies are not negotiable, we can
make sure that they are in place. One of these policies can even include
instructions on what to do if your wiki doesn't follow the Wikimedia
spirit (contact stewards etc.).

Future projects don't necessarily match our current userbase. To tie the
process for creating new language editions directly to that userbase
seems needlessly restrictive. Building a small community on Meta and
writing key pages before launching the project is also simply good
planning -- exactly the kind of thing that could have helped to prevent
the current fr.wikinews.org situation, much more so than algorithmic
requirements whose actual predictive value is very low, as that
experience has shown.

Regards,

Erik


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Emmanuel Engelhart

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Re: [Wikitech-l] French wikipedians requesting to
 install Wikiforum extension on French Wikipedia

body:
On Fri, 18 Feb 2005 14:48:32 +0900
Guillaume Blanchard <gblanchard at arcsy.co.jp> wrote:

Hi all

That's my feeling too.
We all need a forum system compatible with the wiki principes.
Guillaume worked on it, and provides now a first version which is useable.
French wikipedians have massive voted YES to try this new feature.
So, I hope too, that our main developpers will bring it on fr:

Best regards

Kelson

> Hi all,
> After my previous e-mail about Wikiforum [1] I got many feedbacks from
> users, but only few from developers. I made all requested fix, then,
> _nothing. I can't personally force developers to look closely at this
> extension likewise I can't force them to install it even if there is no
> problem. Hoping a strong mobilization of the French community can do
> that, we organized a pool few days ago [2]. The result is limpid: 55
> French users are now requesting this extension (0 against and 5 that
> prefer "real" forum or Usenet). 55 users for a pool in 2 days is very a
> lot for the French community (ie. vote to decide arbitrators' rules have
> actually 30 votes in 9 days) and I hope you will respect it by:
> - Install this extension "as it" on French Wikipedia.
> or:
> - Look at the source [3] and give me a list of needed
> security/performance fix.
> You can still test this extension on Amgine's server [4].
> Thanks,
>
> Aoineko
>
> [1] Description:
> -- French: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikip%C3%A9dia:Wikiforum
> -- English (few information): http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikiforum
> [2] Pool to implement Wikiforum on French Wikipedia:
> http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikip%C3%A9dia:Prise_de_d%C3%A9cision/Mise_en_place_du_Wikiforum
>
> [3] Sources are on the CVS repository at "/extensions/wikiforum" (please
> don't change the pagination while I'm developing)
> [4] Test server: http://test-wikipedia.saewyc.net/index.php/Special:Forum
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>

--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Le coeur a ses raisons que la raison ne conna?t pas.
	-- Blaise Pascal
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Emmanuel Engelhart      ICQ UIN : 53388731   TEL (+49)(0)6.22.15.88.03.31


subject:
[Wikitech-l] French wikipedians requesting to install Wikiforum
	extension on French Wikipedia


from_name: Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Re: [Wikitech-l] French wikipedians requesting to
	install Wikiforum extension on French Wikipedia

body:
I was prepared to say that I'm against the idea until I tried it.

For me the key is: I can edit other people's posts.  This keeps it a
wiki, and this has very important social implications.

I would be opposed to much use of talk pages that allow for
discussions that don't let other people edit.

It is very important as a matter of mutual trust that we *can* edit
comments, even if we almost *never* do, as a matter of custom.

Public restaurants might be much safer if every table was in a
different room with a locked door.  That way, no one could hit each
other.  But it's good for society that we sit at restuarants
peacefully together.  Sure, people *could* hit each other, but they
*don't*.  (Usually :-))

I like it.

--Jimbo


list: wikien-l

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: The Censorship Lie

body:
Christiaan Briggs wrote:
> >Editorial control is what we do everyday in deciding what stays in our
> >out. Censoring would be to delete all mention of a specific item
> >including systematically deleting any reference or access to the
> >subject matter. Censorship is not continuing to provide easy access to
> >information or images while not forcing it on everyone. Read Farenheit
> >451 for (albiet extreme) real censorship - or other efforts in the
> >past to systemically burn books to remove them from the library and
> >prevent all access. Limiting access is often called censorship but is
> >not.
>
> What you are pointing to are the different levels of censorship. This
> discussion may involve a proposal of low-level censorship but it is
> censorship none the less.

If you use the word "censorship" so broadly, you rob it of genuine
meaning.  When we correct a grammatical error, are we censoring the
error?  When we decide that a picture of George Washington goes on the
George Washington page, rather than the Thomas Jefferson page, are we
censoring?

We make editorial judgments all the time, on all kinds of things.
Should we put a scandal about a politician high in the article or
further down?  Should we show a picture at the top of the page, or the
bottom?  Should we show a picture directly or via a link?

If all of those things are censorship, then censorship doesn't sound
so bad after all.

I don't care for this argument for another reason.  Many of us who
propose putting the image on a link are literally prepared to risk our
lives to fight censorship, should be become necessary.  We are
extremely opposed to censorship.  Calling us censors is a "low blow"
then, because it causes us to fear that we have done something
terribly out of line with our own principles.

This is why I think it is important to move this debate away from
questions of "censorship" -- which is manifestly is not -- and towards
"quality of presentation of information".

--Jimbo


subject:
[Wikitech-l] French wikipedians requesting to install Wikifor um
	extension on French Wikipedia

body:
Lane, Ryan wrote:
> I personally don't understand the reasoning to want to edit other people's
> posts. Can you give an example of a good reason to edit someone's post?
> Truthfully, I think its more of a detriment than a benefit to be able to
> edit someone's posts. I can think of a ton of bad reasons to edit another
> persons post, but very very few good reasons.

It's the wiki way.  Having the ability to edit what other people write
gives rise to a culture of co-operation rather than confrontation.

We don't have a strong culture of refactoring, but it is traditional
in a wiki to refactor discussions, which means, for someone to come
through and take a large discussion and neutrally summarize what it
was all about.  Everything is in the edit history, and of course
people can refactor the refactoring.

Basically, having a system open where people *can* do something bad,
but don't, gives rise to a spirit of helpful togetherness.  Building
barriers out of fear of bad behavior gives rise to a spirit of
mistrust.

> It would be MUCH better to have a system where the user making the
> post allowed/disallowed people to edit their posts. If I'm signing
> my posts, I don't want someone to edit it to change my opinion to
> side with theirs. For instance, if this email were a part of a
> thread in a forum, you could change it to make it look like I side
> with your argument, and most people wouldn't notice.

We don't really have any problems with people doing stuff like that.
It would be a massive social faux pas to edit someone's post to change
your opinion.  Just because it is *possible* doesn't mean that it's a
*problem*.

It's like saying we need a law to prevent people from going into
elevators together, because if we don't, people might stab each other.
Well, yeah, they might, but we're better of in a positive social
environment than a too-cautious social environment.

This is similar to a discussion we had about protecting user pages,
and there was very universal agreement that with only rare exceptions
(heroic vandal fighters like RickK for example, whose user page would
be a constant mess, and even there of course I would encourage him to
try to keep it unprotected if he can) user pages should be unprotected.

--Jimbo


from_name: Stacey Greenstein

subject: [WikiEN-l] proxy blocked

body:
If it's an autoblock, then it wasn't done on purpose.

On Fri, 18 Feb 2005 12:37:09 +0000, Jake Waskett <jake at waskett.org> wrote:
> The NTL proxy server 62.252.192.12 is blocked again. Could someone unblock?
>
>  It says clearly on that IP's user page that it is a known proxy - why do
> admins persist in blocking anyway?
>
> Autoblocked because you share an IP address with "JonGwynne". Reason "3RR".
>
> On Wednesday 16 February 2005 16:04, David Gerard wrote:
> > Jake Waskett (jake at waskett.org) [050217 02:40]:
> > > The IP 62.252.192.12 is a transparent proxy server, owned by the UK cable
> > > company NTL.
> > > It is presently blocked by Jayjg: Autoblocked because you share an IP
> > > address with "JonGwynne". Reason "violation of 3RR".
> > > Could someone unblock this IP please?
> >
> > Unblocked. Here's to someone coding bug 550 ...
> >
> >
> > - d.
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


list: wiktionary-l

from_name: cookfire

subject:
[Wiktionary-l] The Japanese Wiktionary have been
	locked	temporarily

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:

>eG wrote:
>
>
>
>>Dear Wiktionary community,
>>
>>The Japanese Wiktionary have been locked until we'd establish the basic
>>policies. In brief, the matter was lack of motivated and dedicated
>>contributors there. That's shame but true. Here I report the reason and
>>background in detail.
>>
>>This project has 2,000 articles and seems to be not so inactive.
>>However, many of members think the current state is terrible. Many of
>>articles have been edited by sock-puppets and vandal(s) who seems to be
>>banned from Wikipedia. Most of basic policies remain untouched. We had
>>tried to do something several times, those were failed. One of major
>>reasons of the failure was copyright issues under Japanese law, I
>>suppose. There are three admins but now they are inactive and two of
>>them have expressed their will to resign, moreover, no one requested for
>>adminship. Thus, the Wiktionary became bleak. It also might threaten
>>novel contributors.
>>
>>I'm afraid vandals and non-cooperative people waste the project if we
>>would leave actual status. There are less motivated people than
>>non-preferables. So I proposed the temporal closure on the Village pump.
>>The suggestion and discussion were absolutely open. I announced it
>>clearly on the Main page and head of Recentchanges. All of visited
>>people must be noticed. After a week, as you know, the result was 8
>>supports and 1 objection. Now the oppose seems to accept this suggestion
>>because s/he did not express opposing argument when I ascertained the
>>request and s/he seems to be cooperative to solve the issues. After the
>>counting, we got 4 new supports, including 1 sysop. Most of us think we
>>have to have such policies before editing and stop to edit now. To
>>establish those policies would be an effortful work and take long time.
>>
>>This is the reason and background.
>>
>>I hope my next post would be a report of re-open of the Japanese Wiktionary.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>This is a regretable situation. Still I find it hard to believe that a
>project with only 2,000 articles would have such a problem with vandalism.
>
>Effective policies are built up while people edit, and will often change
>over time. New people will want to have an opportunity to participate in
>the development of policies. Setting policies before people can edit may
>just make things more difficult.
>
>I don't know what special problems you have with Japanese copyright law,
>but my experience has been that wiktionaries would have fewer problems
>with copyrights than wikipedias.
>
>Ec
>
>
When reading the eG's message, I was also wondering what is so special
about Japanese copyright law that it makes building up a free dictionary
harder than in other languages. I must say that I do understand the
problem with vandalism. Since the summer the English Wiktionary gets a
lot of vandalism and spamvertising too. The months before that the
problem was far less. The French, Dutch and Spanish Wiktionaries are
relatively calm as far as vandalism is concerned, but maybe the Japanese
Wiktionary attracts Chinese spammers as well. What I see as a solution
is to create a broad base of sysops, so obvious vandalism and
spamvertising can be killed on the spot (and thus only wastes the time
of one person). Of course the trick is to find dependable people who are
able and want to consacrate a lot of time to the project. It takes a bit
of time for them to show up, but they do exist.

Good luck,

Polyglot


from_name: Daniel Mayer

body:
--- "Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales" <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> Public restaurants might be much safer if every table was in a
> different room with a locked door.  That way, no one could hit each
> other.  But it's good for society that we sit at restuarants
> peacefully together.  Sure, people *could* hit each other, but they
> *don't*.  (Usually :-))

<offtopic>
And in some cultures its is perfectly fine for complete strangers to be seated
at the same table in a restaurant in order to fill every seat. But as an
American, that just really freaks me out.
</offtopic>

:)

-- mav

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail - Easier than ever with enhanced search. Learn more.
http://info.mail.yahoo.com/mail_250


from_name: Thomas Gries

subject:
[Wikitech-l] ENotif+EAuthent EN+EA for Mediawiki 1.4 -- under
	contruction

body:
Pre-announcement to avoid double-efforts:
I start back-porting EN+EA from HEAD to REL1_4, expected release date of
patch: +/-23./24. Feb. 2005
Tom
RE:
http://bugzilla.wikipedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=454
http://meta.wikipedia.org/Enotif
http://meta.wikipedia.org/Eauthent


from_name: Nicolas Weeger

subject:
[Foundation-l] Intent to launch pt., pl., ro. Wikinews;	further
	procedure

body:
> For future editions, I'd also like to suggest changing the language
> procedure in the following way:
>
>    The "activity on existing Wikimedia projects" requirement can be
>    dropped if a few support pages (FAQ, Mission Statement, etc.) are
>    created on Meta for the project to be launched. These can be
>    translations or original creations.

As Ant, i support the activity requirement. The reason is that it's
better imo to "know" people, how they behave for instance, who intend to
launch a wikinews. If you let a total "stranger" start a new language
edition, you open doors to many abuses - translating NPOV rules & such
is NOT synonym with agreeing to them. And how can you check the
translation is correct unless you speak the language? :)

> Regards,
>
> Erik

Nicolas


from_name: dpbsmith at verizon.net

subject: [WikiEN-l] FWIW: definition of "censorship"

body:
One dictionary (AHD4) defines "censor" as:

1. A person authorized to examine books, films, or other material and to
remove or suppress what is considered morally, politically, or otherwise
objectionable. 2. An official, as in the armed forces, who examines personal
mail and official dispatches to remove information considered secret or a
risk to security. 3. One that condemns or censures. 4. One of two officials
in ancient Rome responsible for taking the public census and supervising
public behavior and morals. 5. Psychology The agent in the unconscious that
is responsible for censorship.

and "censorship" as

1. The act, process, or practice of censoring. 2. The office or authority of
a Roman censor. 3. Psychology Prevention of disturbing or painful thoughts or
feelings from reaching consciousness except in a disguised form.

In both cases, "censorship" carries the implication that there is some
clearly identifiable _authority_, usually a specific _office_ and sometimes a
single official; e.g. the Lord Chamberlain or the Hays Office or the NBC
Standards and Practices office or the New England Watch and Ward society or
or the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith or the MPAA Ratings Board.

I think the use of the term "self-censorship" muddies the waters. It's NOT
the same thing.


subject:
[Wiktionary-l] Re: [Wikitech-l] Re: Fwd: [Foundation-l] Import
	question

body:
jellings wrote:

>Obviously my question has caused a serious issue.  I am thankful to
>those who have offered help.
>
>My goal was NOT to do a bulk loading into en.wiktionary.org or
>wikipedia.org via a bot or anything else.  I wanted to do this on my
>own installation from a file of my own work.  I tried looking around
>on different wiki groups for the answer but was unsuccessful.
>
>Slightly disappointed, but still working on it,
>
>John
>
Do not get discouraged. Your proposal is being discussed. This is the
normal way of doing things on a community project. We all want the
project to prosper and grow. If you choose to submit your contributions
at a rate of say 5-10 per day, people will be able to look at them, say
what they think about them, extend them, improve them, provide you with
feedback etc. An issue you have to think through is how to deal with
already existing entries? Do you merge them manually? Do you expect the
community to merge them? We are relatively few. That's why we need to
protect ourselves against bulk submissions. Ideally all the material
gets checked by at least two other people. One thing we do have, is
time. There is no hurry. We will get there. If it's not in 10 years, it
will be in 20 or more before we have the basics covered. Complete it
will never be, anyway. There's always going to be room for improvement.
Welcome to the Wiktionary project(s)

Polyglot


from_name: Ray Saintonge

body:
jellings wrote:

>Obviously my question has caused a serious issue.  I am thankful to
>those who have offered help.
>
>My goal was NOT to do a bulk loading into en.wiktionary.org or
>wikipedia.org via a bot or anything else.  I wanted to do this on my
>own installation from a file of my own work.  I tried looking around
>on different wiki groups for the answer but was unsuccessful.
>
You are certainly blameless in what you did.  What you did was a bit
like reaching to pull open a door only to find that someone was pushing
it at high speed on the other side.  Perhaps your intention was not
clearly expressed at first, but that happens to all of us.  You had no
way of knowing that automated processes would be so controversial.

Still, if you find a way to contribute some of your material I'm sure it
will be appreciated.  Good luck on your own installation.

Ec


body:
Hi Aoineko,

let me be clear: I share your goal of improving Wikimedia's discussion
systems. I think there are a number of serious usability issues with
Wikiforum as it is right now, though:

1) The current two-table setup is very confusing. It is not intuitively
clear why some threads have preview and some do not, nor is the preview
function itself obvious from the icon. The function of the top box is
not visually distinguished from the function of the bottom box in any
way. I suggest combining the two boxes into one, and making the preview
function clearer (an eye may be a better visual representation,
additional text might also help).

2) One of the key features of forums is the ability to sort threads by
their publication date. Wikiforum uses "Oldest First", and it does not
appear to be possible to change that. The page is titled "50 latest
threads", which creates an intuitive expectation of "Newest First". I
think "Newest First" should be the default, as it is in most forums, but
it would be nice to be able to sort the table by whatever criteria
desirable. (The default sorting order could also be voted on after the
system has been in use for a while.)

3) Being able to chronologically go beyond the 50 threads displayed on
the index page ("Next 50") seems like a fairly critical feature to me.

4) The "Post a comment" ("+" in Monobook) link is missing. This is quite
a serious issue, as it makes Thread: pages *more* cumbersome than talk
pages, which have that link. Besides easy appending, it also encourages
users to add a section title, which increases the editability of long pages.

5) There is no reason for a Thread: page to have a separate Thread talk:
page - that just adds confusion.

Design-wise, Wikiforum should be ready to handle subforums on different
topics, rather than just having one big forum on Special:Forum, but that
feature doesn't need to exist immediately.

I do agree with the idea of trialling the system on one wiki before
putting it into use on all wikis. The key question is: How will
Wikiforum affect our discussion workflow? Will threads just disappear
into nowhere, where previously people at least made a token effort to
move threads to relevant talk pages or build structured archives? Will
the Thread: namespace become a huge mess that nobody can wade through?
Category: tags could potentially prevent that, and collaborative thread
categorization is an interesting approach to handling discussions.

I'm therefore not saying Wikiforum will fail, but I do believe that we
need to collect data about its use, and that the above usability issues
should be addressed before taking it live anywhere.

Regards,

Erik


from_name: Yann Forget

subject: [Wikipedia-l] NSM88, deletion of user page image, personal attacks

body:
Hi,

This mail belongs to wikien-l [1]
Please don't send off topic subjects here, so to keep the list readable for
everybody.

Regards,
Yann

[1] http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

--
http://www.non-violence.org/ | Site collaboratif sur la non-violence
http://www.forget-me.net/ | Alternatives sur le Net
http://fr.wikipedia.org/ | Encyclop?die libre
http://www.forget-me.net/pro/ | Formations et services Linux


from_name: Karl A. Krueger

subject:
Child porn and wikipedia (was [WikiEN-l] Re: Autofellatio - NO to
	that image)

body:
On Thu, Feb 17, 2005 at 01:14:26PM -0000, Tony Sidaway wrote:
> But the chap in the autofellatio picture is clearly an adult having a
> whole heap of fun.  The girl in the Lolicon picture is submitting to
> child abuse, and the presentation is, or is intended to be, erotic.
> Perhaps the fact that the latter picture is an anime drawing is the
> reason why it seems to fly under so many radars.

One obvious distinction is that one is a photograph, being cited as
evidence that a certain act is possible.  The other is a drawing,
serving as an example of a genre of drawing.

(And it's not really clear to me that the model in the photograph is
having a whole heap of fun.  He's a porn actor; he's paid to do that,
whether he gets a nasty crick in his back from it or not.  Plus he looks
as if he's about to burst a blood vessel either in his forehead or his
... somewhere else.)

--
Karl A. Krueger <kkrueger at whoi.edu>


from_name: Charles Matthews

subject: [WikiEN-l] "The God-King drives a Hyundai"

body:
Daniel Mayer wrote

> That does not describe Jimbo at all.

Mav seems to be right there - no Google hits at all for 'Hyundai
antipattern'.

Charles


subject:
[Wikitech-l] French wikipedians requesting to install Wikifor
	um extension on French Wikipedia

body:
I personally don't understand the reasoning to want to edit other people's
posts. Can you give an example of a good reason to edit someone's post?
Truthfully, I think its more of a detriment than a benefit to be able to
edit someone's posts. I can think of a ton of bad reasons to edit another
persons post, but very very few good reasons.

It would be MUCH better to have a system where the user making the post
allowed/disallowed people to edit their posts. If I'm signing my posts, I
don't want someone to edit it to change my opinion to side with theirs. For
instance, if this email were a part of a thread in a forum, you could change
it to make it look like I side with your argument, and most people wouldn't
notice.

Ryan Lane
Naval Oceanographic Office

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	wikitech-l-bounces at wikimedia.org
> [SMTP:wikitech-l-bounces at wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales
> Sent:	Friday, February 18, 2005 10:48 AM
> To:	wikipedia-l at wikimedia.org; Wikimedia developers
> Subject:	Re: [Wikitech-l] French wikipedians requesting to install
> Wikiforum extension on French Wikipedia
>
>
> I was prepared to say that I'm against the idea until I tried it.
>
> For me the key is: I can edit other people's posts.  This keeps it a
> wiki, and this has very important social implications.
>
> I would be opposed to much use of talk pages that allow for
> discussions that don't let other people edit.
>
> It is very important as a matter of mutual trust that we *can* edit
> comments, even if we almost *never* do, as a matter of custom.
>
> Public restaurants might be much safer if every table was in a
> different room with a locked door.  That way, no one could hit each
> other.  But it's good for society that we sit at restuarants
> peacefully together.  Sure, people *could* hit each other, but they
> *don't*.  (Usually :-))
>
> I like it.
>
> --Jimbo
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l


body:
<snipped some parts>
> And let's not forget about
> http://usemod.com/cgi-bin/mb.pl?AssumeGoodFaith - the very idea of a
> wiki is to be open and welcoming to newcomers, rather than requiring
> people to be members of an existing "clique". If the risk of malicious

I'm not saying to be closed to newcomers, quite the opposite.
But i'm saying to not let newcomers start new projects like that -
slightly different :)

> Regards,
>
> Erik

Regards too
(my english isn't as good as to let me use other polite words, sorry :p)

Nicolas


body:
Nicolas Weeger-

> And how can you check the
> translation is correct unless you speak the language? :)

How do I know the "regular" is not actually a troll without speaking the
language? How do I know that the only reason he wants to start a
Wikinews isn't that he hates Wikipedia after having spent several months
there? How do I know his intentions are good? You could require one of
the people to be a sysop, but that seems like an onerous requirement. An
algorithmic contribution check is *not* a quality check.

Let's be realistic here. What kind of person would intentionally
manipulate policies and get away with it under the auspices of other
users: a random person who's never been involved in our projects, or
someone who is intimately familiar with them? Furthermore, remember that
there would still be a requirement of *multiple users* participating.
How likely is it that a malicious person would get away with
deliberately falsely translating something like NPOV when working with 4
others?

And let's not forget about
http://usemod.com/cgi-bin/mb.pl?AssumeGoodFaith - the very idea of a
wiki is to be open and welcoming to newcomers, rather than requiring
people to be members of an existing "clique". If the risk of malicious
people ruining the project was so big, then Wikipedia itself could never
have been started. Yes, Wikinews is different -- but a Wikinews edition
which is likely to attract attention from the outside is also likely to
attract attention from the inside, allowing us to deal with malicious
users. Yes, Wikinews is different -- and that's why we should be
welcoming to *people* who are different and not yet part of our community.

Regards,

Erik


subject: [Foundation-l] Day 0 Fund Drive Report

body:
Our first quarter 2005 fund drive officially started at midnight UTC Friday
morning.

On Day 0 (Thursday eastern US timezone since PayPal data are not available in
UTC) we made $1,023.19 (USD) through PayPal (other sources unkown). As of right
now we have generated a total of $7,043.80 in the fund drive (PayPal only;
other sources unkown), so Day 1 looks like it will be big.

Some choice comments from Day 0:
See http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Fund_drives/2005/Q1/Day_0

"Amazing. I've spent many many hours here over the last couple months learning
about our world. Please keep it up!" by Sean Vaughan

"I wanted to be the first" by Daniel Wool (hi Danny!)

"I have learned so much from this site. I used to be frustrated because I
couldn't read about things on sites like Encarta, but now I can and it's all
here." by Anonymous

"I absolutely love Wikipedia, I have never donated to anything before but I
gladly do to this!" by Anonymous

"WikiPeida rocks!" by David Ouziel

And my personal favorite:

"May the fleas of a thousand camels infest the underpants of your enemies"
by Christopher J Hutten Czaps

Daniel Mayer,
Wikimedia CFO

PS - there still is much translating work to do at http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Translation_requests/WMF/Fundraising_pages

__________________________________
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subject: [Foundation-l] Day 0 Fund Drive Report


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Day 0 Fund Drive Report


from_name: Tony Sidaway

subject:
Child porn and wikipedia (was [WikiEN-l] Re: Autofellatio - NO
	to	that image)

body:
Nicholas Knight said:
> Tony Sidaway wrote:
>> Nicholas Knight said:
>>
>>>Tony Sidaway wrote:
>>>
>>>>the chap in the autofellatio picture is clearly an adult having a
>>>>whole heap of fun.  The girl in the Lolicon picture is submitting to
>>>>child abuse, and the presentation is, or is intended to be, erotic.
>>>
>>>Sometimes it's better to just let your opponent in a debate make your
>>>point for you. You're doing a beautiful job making my point for me.
>>
>>
>> Hardly.
>
> Yeah, it relies on you not realizing you're doing it.

Anybody else ever wondered if they're living in a Peewee Herman movie?


subject: [Foundation-l] Day 0 Fund Drive Report

body:
Our first quarter 2005 fund drive officially started at midnight UTC Friday
morning.

On Day 0 (Thursday eastern US timezone since PayPal data are not available in
UTC) we made $1,023.19 (USD) through PayPal (other sources unknown). As of
right now we have generated a total of $7,043.80 in the fund drive (PayPal
only; other sources unknown), so Day 1 looks like it will be big.

Some choice comments from Day 0:
See http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Fund_drives/2005/Q1/Day_0

"Amazing. I've spent many many hours here over the last couple months learning
about our world. Please keep it up!" by Sean Vaughan

"I wanted to be the first" by Daniel Wool (hi Danny!)

"I have learned so much from this site. I used to be frustrated because I
couldn't read about things on sites like Encarta, but now I can and it's all
here." by Anonymous

"I absolutely love Wikipedia, I have never donated to anything before but I
gladly do to this!" by Anonymous

"WikiPeida rocks!" by David Ouziel

And my personal favorite:

"May the fleas of a thousand camels infest the underpants of your enemies"
by Christopher J Hutten Czaps

Daniel Mayer,
Wikimedia CFO

PS - there still is much translating work to do at http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Translation_requests/WMF/Fundraising_pages

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


subject: [Foundation-l] Day 0 Fund Drive Report


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Day 0 Fund Drive Report


body:
Writing this idea off by saying "its the wiki way" is somewhat of a cop out.
If every discussion was settled with that argument, then there wouldn't even
be the option of protecting pages. Just because someone *shouldn't* do
something, doesn't mean they won't. I'm betting there are enough trolls out
there to prove that a protection system is needed. If not now, I'm sure
it'll come when a forum system is in place.

I'm not saying that the security should be turned on from the very start,
but I do think it should at least be included so that it can be turned on if
need be.

Another good reason for a good security system for talk pages is because
this software is used by a lot of other people than just the wikipedia
sites, and I've heard from quite a bit of them that they wish the software
had this type of feature.

Ryan Lane
Naval Oceanographic Office

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	wikitech-l-bounces at wikimedia.org
> [SMTP:wikitech-l-bounces at wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales
> Sent:	Friday, February 18, 2005 11:05 AM
> To:	Wikimedia developers
> Subject:	Re: [Wikitech-l] French wikipedians requesting to install
> Wikifor um extension on French Wikipedia
>
> Lane, Ryan wrote:
> > I personally don't understand the reasoning to want to edit other
> people's
> > posts. Can you give an example of a good reason to edit someone's post?
> > Truthfully, I think its more of a detriment than a benefit to be able to
> > edit someone's posts. I can think of a ton of bad reasons to edit
> another
> > persons post, but very very few good reasons.
>
> It's the wiki way.  Having the ability to edit what other people write
> gives rise to a culture of co-operation rather than confrontation.
>
> We don't have a strong culture of refactoring, but it is traditional
> in a wiki to refactor discussions, which means, for someone to come
> through and take a large discussion and neutrally summarize what it
> was all about.  Everything is in the edit history, and of course
> people can refactor the refactoring.
>
> Basically, having a system open where people *can* do something bad,
> but don't, gives rise to a spirit of helpful togetherness.  Building
> barriers out of fear of bad behavior gives rise to a spirit of
> mistrust.
>
> > It would be MUCH better to have a system where the user making the
> > post allowed/disallowed people to edit their posts. If I'm signing
> > my posts, I don't want someone to edit it to change my opinion to
> > side with theirs. For instance, if this email were a part of a
> > thread in a forum, you could change it to make it look like I side
> > with your argument, and most people wouldn't notice.
>
> We don't really have any problems with people doing stuff like that.
> It would be a massive social faux pas to edit someone's post to change
> your opinion.  Just because it is *possible* doesn't mean that it's a
> *problem*.
>
> It's like saying we need a law to prevent people from going into
> elevators together, because if we don't, people might stab each other.
> Well, yeah, they might, but we're better of in a positive social
> environment than a too-cautious social environment.
>
> This is similar to a discussion we had about protecting user pages,
> and there was very universal agreement that with only rare exceptions
> (heroic vandal fighters like RickK for example, whose user page would
> be a constant mess, and even there of course I would encourage him to
> try to keep it unprotected if he can) user pages should be unprotected.
>
> --Jimbo
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l


from_name: Richard Holton

subject: [Wikitech-l] E-mail address change at MediaZilla?

body:
Aside from creating a new account, is there any way of changing your
e-mail address at MediaZilla?

-Rich Holton
en.wikipedia:User:Rholton


from_name: Viajero

subject: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia citation

body:
A long section of the Wikipedia article on John Negroponte, Bush's
recent appointee to the newly-created position of "intelligence czar",
was cited by Washington journalist Sam Smith in the 17 February edition
of his email newsletter "Undernews".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Negroponte
http://www.prorev.com/indexa.htm


from_name: csherlock at ljh.com.au

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: "The God-King drives a Hyundai"

body:
Mmmmm... sandworm....

Charles Matthews wrote:
> As I recall from the Dune books, a real God-Emperor goes around on a sort of
> trolley.  We can't deny Jimbo the prescience, but I think the transformation
> to sandworm will take work.
>
> Charles


from_name: Rick

subject: [WikiEN-l] proxy blocked

body:
--- Tony Sidaway <minorityreport at bluebottle.com>
wrote:

> Jake Waskett said:
> > The NTL proxy server 62.252.192.12 is blocked
> again. Could someone
> > unblock?
> >
> > It says clearly on that IP's user page that it is
> a known proxy - why
> > do
> > admins persist in blocking anyway?
> >
> Apart from the technical fixes which are being
> addressed in other replies,
> I'd like to ask people with experience of this
> whether the IP autoblock is
> visible to the admin when he blocks a user.

No.  When you block by name, you have no idea which
IPs they're using.  That's part of the privacy issue.
Sysops are not allowed to know the IPs of logged in
users.

RickK

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from_name: Lane, Ryan

subject: [Wikitech-l] Client certificate-based user login mechanism

body:
Frank,

Yes, my patch no longer supports 1.3. If you could add it to the CVS
version, that would be good. Also, it would be nice if it was either in a
comment to 814, or linked to from there.

Thanks,

Ryan Lane
Naval Oceanographic Office

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	wikitech-l-bounces at wikimedia.org
> [SMTP:wikitech-l-bounces at wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Frank Wales
> Sent:	Friday, February 18, 2005 11:37 AM
> To:	Wikimedia developers
> Subject:	RE: [Wikitech-l] Client certificate-based user login
> mechanism
>
> Ryan,
>
> Thanks for replying.
>
> On Fri, 2005-02-18 at 08:29 -0600, Lane, Ryan wrote:
> > This sounds like a good thing to possibly integrate with my LDAP patch
> > (http://bugzilla.wikipedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=814).
> > Many organizations are going to smart cards, and use LDAP for
> > authentication. Thomas and I are working on integrating his email
> > notification with my LDAP patch, maybe I'll be able to integrate this as
> > well.
>
> Sure, why not?  How should I proceed?  Shall I e-mail you a patch
> and some notes on what I've done, and you can quickly give me your
> opinion on the approach, or shall I go ahead and add them as
> a comment to bug 814, which might seem somewhat tangential to
> anyone reading it who doesn't see this exchange?  I note that
> the bug includes patches for a version I'm not currently
> using (my patch is against 1.3.9) -- I'm happy to move to
> the latest CVS version on a dev box and redo it, if User.php
> is a lot different since 1.3.9.  Let me know, so I don't
> clutter up the bug commentary; thanks.
>
> [I presume just posting stuff on this list would be overly
> noisy for others, so I won't follow up more here.  Anyone
> else interested in the details of what I've done should just
> ping me directly.]
> --
> Frank Wales [frank at limov.com]
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l


subject: [Wikipedia-l] "The God-King drives a Hyundai"

body:
Stan Shebs wrote:

> As an interesting data point relating to quality vs EB, I've been
> going through 1911EB articles thought not to be in WP (about half
> just need a redir), and cross-checking with present-day EB at the
> same time - it's remarkable how some present-day EB articles are
> nearly word-for-word identical with their 1911 versions, except
> for being shortened by leaving out detail, references, and
> citations, tsk tsk.

I've long felt that the 1911EB should be carried in its entirety on
Wikisource, as should the 1921 12th edition.  (The 12th was just a
repeat of the 11th edition with 3 supplementary volumes, which probably
explains why it is so seldom mentioned.)  That would be an enormous
task.  Aside from the first volume which is in Project Guttenberg, the
"Love to know" version that is now on line is bloody awful.  The people
who put that project together appear to have forgotten about
proofreading.  Their creative content to support any copyright claims
lies primarily in their massive collection of OCR typos, and in their
random selection of excluded pages.

It also needs to be remarked that the original 1911EB was full of
illustrations which the present online version omits, and mathematical
and chemical expressions that are totally garbled by treating them as
ordinary text.  The 1911EB also had many interesting maps, including
many on fold-out pages which would be a particular challenge.  This is
in part because of the way that maps were drawn in 1911.  Their way of
showing mountainous territory combined with a desire to show as vany
small hamlets as possible often gives a cluttered appearance to these maps.

In brief if we were ever to take this on seriously, we could have a much
better product than what is already on line.

Ec


from_name: Alexander Sigachov

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] French wikipedians requesting to install Wikiforum
	extension on French Wikipedia

body:
> After my previous e-mail about Wikiforum [1] I got many feedbacks from
> users, but only few from developers. I made all requested fix, then
> ...

it is probably necessary to create request for enhancement in bugzilla.

--
Cxion la plej helan
Alexander Sigachev


subject:
[Wikitech-l] Re: [Wikipedia-l] French wikipedians requesting to
 install Wikiforum extension on French Wikipedia


from_name: Jim Higson

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Re: xml wiki representation

body:
Brion Vibber wrote:

> Jim Higson wrote:
>> What should be the output from something like:
>>
>> ** foo
>> ** bar
>>
>> Should there be a 'phantom' listitem to contan the nested list, such as:
> [snip]
>> Or is it valid for a List to directly contain a list, ie:
>
> In HTML, a list cannot directly contain another list; the child list
> must sit inside a list item. If you break the list tree by skipping a
> level in this way you will get a phantom bullet point.

I take the attitude that the wiki XML representation doesn't have to follow
HTML too closely. Having said that, it does make semantic sense that a
listitem would contain the nested list, because it will usually be a
subclause of that item.

At the moment my 'parser' adds phantom items if two levels of list start at
once, and gives them a phantom="true" attribute. This is ok, but maybe it
is unnecessary because the XML-to-whatever formatter could just look to see
if items have text nodes and if not format them without markers. I don't
want to just invent attributes as I need them, in case my xml strays too
far from the flex/bison parser's.

Maybe one way I could help would be drawing up a DTD? That way the validity
of parser output could be easily checked.

My little parser does lists completely reliably now (I'm guessing the
flex/bison one would gets this right too?). Even though I'm not using a
parser generator, I'm using a lot of 'proper parser' techniques. Some
output:

* normal list...
* ...easy!
** nested
*#** bit odd here!
#*** huh?
#*#*:# who would write this awful wikitext?
#*# at least it parses!
* Oh, the joy of parse trees!
# foo

# bar
** baz
# bac

<list type="bullet">
        <listitem>
                normal list...
        </listitem>
        <listitem>
                ...easy!
                <list type="bullet">
                        <listitem>
                                nested
                        </listitem>
                </list>
        </listitem>
        <listitem phantom="true">
                <list type="numbered">
                        <listitem phantom="true">
                                <list type="bullet">
                                        <listitem phantom="true">
                                                <list type="bullet">
                                                        <listitem>
                                                                bit odd here!
                                                        </listitem>
                                                </list>
                                        </listitem>
                                </list>
                        </listitem>
                </list>
        </listitem>
</list>
<list type="numbered">
        <listitem phantom="true">
                <list type="bullet">
                        <listitem phantom="true">
                                <list type="bullet">
                                        <listitem phantom="true">
                                                <list type="bullet">
                                                        <listitem>
                                                                huh?
                                                        </listitem>
                                                </list>
                                        </listitem>
                                </list>
                        </listitem>
                        <listitem phantom="true">
                                <list type="numbered">
                                        <listitem phantom="true">
                                                <list type="bullet">
                                                        <listitem phantom="true">
                                                                <list type="indent">
                                                                        <listitem phantom="true">
                                                                                <list type="numbered">
                                                                                <listitem>
                                                                                who would write this awful wikitext?
                                                                                </listitem>
                                                                                </list>
                                                                        </listitem>
                                                                </list>
                                                        </listitem>
                                                </list>
                                        </listitem>
                                        <listitem>
                                                at least it parses!
                                        </listitem>
                                </list>
                        </listitem>
                </list>
        </listitem>
</list>
<list type="bullet">
        <listitem>
                Oh, the joy of parse trees!
        </listitem>
</list>
<list type="numbered">
        <listitem>
                foo
        </listitem>
</list>
<list type="numbered">
        <listitem>
                bar
        </listitem>
</list>
<list type="bullet">
        <listitem phantom="true">
                <list type="bullet">
                        <listitem>
                                baz
                        </listitem>
                </list>
        </listitem>
</list>
<list type="numbered">
        <listitem>
                bac
        </listitem>
</list>


subject:
[Wiktionary-l] The Japanese Wiktionary have
	been	locked	temporarily

body:
cookfire wrote:

>When reading the eG's message, I was also wondering what is so special
>about Japanese copyright law that it makes building up a free dictionary
>harder than in other languages. I must say that I do understand the
>problem with vandalism. Since the summer the English Wiktionary gets a
>lot of vandalism and spamvertising too. The months before that the
>problem was far less. The French, Dutch and Spanish Wiktionaries are
>relatively calm as far as vandalism is concerned, but maybe the Japanese
>Wiktionary attracts Chinese spammers as well. What I see as a solution
>is to create a broad base of sysops, so obvious vandalism and
>spamvertising can be killed on the spot (and thus only wastes the time
>of one person). Of course the trick is to find dependable people who are
>able and want to consacrate a lot of time to the project. It takes a bit
>of time for them to show up, but they do exist.
>
The English Wiktionary with more than 56,000 articles should expect more
attention from spamdals than a project with only 2,000 articles.  A
complete shutdown just doesn't seem like a constructive solution to the
problems.  They may, as you suggest, need more sysops, but my guess is
that the problem is deeper than that.  It could be an overly rigid
attitude toward rules.

Ec


subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews requirement

body:
Anthere a ?crit :
> I regret that you use fallacies so much Erik.
> Trying to remove the requirement that 2 over 5 people are regulars so as to start a project,
> by arguing that these 2 might be trolls or want to destroy wikipedia, strike me as deeply dishonnest.
>
> I was deeply deeply unhappy of the creation of the french wikinews,
> because this creation was not done according to the support of the french community.
> The result is a broken project, which I deeply regret.
>
> I find disquieting that you tried to cool down people like notafish and I by agreeing to add a new requirement
> for the creation, only to try to cancel it two weeks later.

I agree with Anthere on a few points. You agreed on rules, you should
imo apply'em on a few projects creation before asking for a change - so
you can argue why it's better to change, based on experience and not
just because you feel it would be better.

I too regret how fr: was created - for reasons others have explained. I
don't have anything against creating new projects, but i think we must
make sure it won't be such a mess (i am not blaming anyone, just stating
facts). And changing rules all the time makes for a real mess in my opinion.

I understand your motivations are to create more wikinews. Fine, but in
due time, no need to rush, wait for community to ask loudly for a wikinews.

Nicolas Ryo


subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews requirement


from_name: Kate Turner

references:
<cuq5bq$5ps$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<4210C423.3060904@web.de>	<cuqj47$rag$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<cv1qq7$5s2$1@sea.gmane.org> <4214F1B2.9020501@pobox.com>
	<cv4les$sqf$1@sea.gmane.org>

body:
Jim Higson wrote in gmane.science.linguistics.wikipedia.technical:

> #*#*:# who would write this awful wikitext?
> <list type="indent">

note that ":" is not "indent", but rather a definition list, i.e. <dl>, <dt>
and <dd> in html.  compare:

; term : definition
; term 2 : definition 2
: definition without term

the use of : for indentation is a side-effect of how definition lists are
generally rendered in browsers.

kate.


from_name: Jake Waskett

subject: [WikiEN-l] proxy blocked

body:
The NTL proxy server 62.252.192.12 is blocked again. Could someone unblock?

 It says clearly on that IP's user page that it is a known proxy - why do
admins persist in blocking anyway?

Autoblocked because you share an IP address with "JonGwynne". Reason "3RR".

On Wednesday 16 February 2005 16:04, David Gerard wrote:
> Jake Waskett (jake at waskett.org) [050217 02:40]:
> > The IP 62.252.192.12 is a transparent proxy server, owned by the UK cable
> > company NTL.
> > It is presently blocked by Jayjg: Autoblocked because you share an IP
> > address with "JonGwynne". Reason "violation of 3RR".
> > Could someone unblock this IP please?
>
> Unblocked. Here's to someone coding bug 550 ...
>
>
> - d.


body:
On Fri, Feb 18, 2005 at 10:01:34AM -0600, dpbsmith at verizon.net wrote:
> I think the use of the term "self-censorship" muddies the waters. It's NOT
> the same thing.

And yet the term has been widely used and discussed among authors and in
discussion of the mass media.  Many people clearly do consider
self-censorship a real and troubling phenomenon, and one worth
discussing and doing things about.

Google for "self-censorship" is quite enlightening.  Here's the first
hit, a USA Today column which relates comments by CNN's "top war
corresponmdent, Christiane Amanpour":

http://www.usatoday.com/life/columnist/mediamix/2003-09-14-media-mix_x.htm

	Said Amanpour: "I think the press was muzzled, and I think the
	press self-muzzled. I'm sorry to say, but certainly television
	and, perhaps, to a certain extent, my station was intimidated by
	the administration and its foot soldiers at Fox News. And it
	did, in fact, put a climate of fear and self-censorship, in my
	view, in terms of the kind of broadcast work we did."

Here, "self-censorship" clearly refers to people's choosing not to speak
frankly because they fear retaliation.  That retaliation doesn't have to
be in the form of official censorship (say, criminal charges) but can be
in the form of refused access, defamation in other media, and so on.  (I
doubt that many journalists want to hear their names mentioned on Bill
O'Reilly's show, for instance.)

The second hit is a National Geographic article describing scientists
who avoid doing research in controversial areas, even when official
rules do not ban the research:

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/02/0210_050210_censorship.html

	Such constraints include the threat of social sanction.
	Scientists may stay away from research not because it's illegal,
	but because it breaches an unspoken rule about what is
	appropriate to study and what is not.

Another hit is a 2000 report summary from the Pew Research Center for
the People and the Press, describing self-censorship in journalism.  It
details journalists' avoiding of stories which are "too boring or
complicated" and therefore won't sell newspapers, as well as stories
that "conflict with organizational interests" or "could adversely affect
advertisers", and stories that might damage the journalists' careers.

http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=39

	Perhaps surprisingly, peer pressure -- fear of embarrassment or
	potential career damage -- is mentioned by about half of all
	journalists as a factor for avoiding newsworthy stories.

On Wikipedia, "self-censorship" could reasonably include choosing not to
speak frankly because one fears "social sanction" such as having one's
work deleted; as well as "retaliation" in the form of flaming or hostile
criticism, others' withdrawal of cooperation or support, or simply
unpleasant association of an editor's name with a particular icky
subject or controversy.

On the Web at large, including Wikipedia, "self-censorship" could
include avoiding certain topics because one wants to avoid being blocked
by censorware, or have one's site considered "pornographic" or "extreme"
or otherwise unpleasantly thought of.

--
Karl A. Krueger <kkrueger at whoi.edu>


references:
<cuq5bq$5ps$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<4210C423.3060904@web.de>	<cuqj47$rag$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<cv1qq7$5s2$1@sea.gmane.org> <4214F1B2.9020501@pobox.com>
	<cv4les$sqf$1@sea.gmane.org> <cv4ltd$ui3$1@sea.gmane.org>

body:
Kate Turner wrote:

> Jim Higson wrote in gmane.science.linguistics.wikipedia.technical:
>
>> #*#*:# who would write this awful wikitext?
>> <list type="indent">
>
> note that ":" is not "indent", but rather a definition list, i.e. <dl>,
> <dt>
> and <dd> in html.  compare:
>
> ; term : definition
> ; term 2 : definition 2
> : definition without term
>
> the use of : for indentation is a side-effect of how definition lists are
> generally rendered in browsers.

Thanks for the note.

I'd used : as a bauble[1] since that's how wiki2xml and (I think)
flexbisonparse handle them.

I hadn't come across the ; and : notation before.

[1] My converter calls the list chars (# and *) 'baubles', which is nice
when you're writing code to decorate (parse) trees. One of the things with
parsers is you have to think of so many names for things!

A definition list is still a list - maybe <list type=definition> would be a
good representation for items starting with ;

--
Jim


body:
>> I personally don't understand the reasoning to want to edit other
people's
>> posts. Can you give an example of a good reason to edit someone's post?
>
>It's usefull to add line feed inside a mail to answer a specific
>question. In wiki this can be used to obfuscate thread but it's
>more often correctly used.
>

Yes, adding line feed is useful in email. But you aren't destructively
updating the email, you are making a copy of the mail, and responding to
those points in your own email. This is exactly how normal forums work. I'd
have to say most of the talk pages I've seen don't truly make much sense. A
lot of the time they are used incorrectly, and you can't always follow the
discussion (if there is actually any discussion going on at all). In a real
forum you see a time trail, and a discussion that (generally) makes sense.

I understand the want to refactor discussion pages, or to summarize a
discussion page. Those should be separate pages, and any changes should be a
copy of the posts, not the posts themselves. I understand there is a history
and anyone can follow a discussion through the history, but that is a pretty
poor way of following a discussion.

>> Truthfully, I think its more of a detriment than a benefit to be able to
>> edit someone's posts. I can think of a ton of bad reasons to edit another
>> persons post, but very very few good reasons.
>>
>> It would be MUCH better to have a system where the user making the post
>> allowed/disallowed people to edit their posts. If I'm signing my posts, I
>> don't want someone to edit it to change my opinion to side with theirs.
For
>> instance, if this email were a part of a thread in a forum, you could
change
>> it to make it look like I side with your argument, and most people
wouldn't
>> notice.
>
>We have history to catch such behavior, w/o history I'll agree with
>you. Also what about vandalism, spam etc. A feature to disable edit
>of comments means than some sort of user (sysop ?) must be able to
>edit/remove other comments, not a good idea to give more work to
>sysops. It'll also raise the problem of giving more power to sysops,
>seeing some flame war about sysops power I doubt allowing only them
>to edit comments will be welcome.
>

Yes, I agree with you here. Vandalism and spam would definitely be a
problem, and would put a burden on sysops. I don't think a system like this
would work on the larger wikis. I'm sure the small and medium sized wikis
would be fine with this. I'm sure most organizations that are using
mediawiki internally would actually prefer being able to control this.

I guess I could always just write an extension later on for this type of
functionality. I'm just playing lobbyist for smaller wikis.

Ryan Lane
Naval Oceanographic Office


from_name: Cathy Ma

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Re: Quenya language request,
	and Chinese Wikipedia again

body:
Hi all,

I'm a native HK-Cantonese speaker - as I have been intrigued by your
intense discussion I have been asking my friends around - 'have you
ever seen/written an article in full Cantonese?'

The answers vary but in sum, none of us have ever written anything in
full Cantonese in the context of article-writing.  Contrary to what
you may believe, it is actually hard to write in full-Cantonese
without mixing in formal Chinese in a passage.  But on an
interpersonal level - that is much easier and we do write short memos
an notes to one another in Cantonese.

On the other hand, in Hong Kong, most subtitles we have on TV or
movies are in formal Chinese, which can be another example showing how
accustomed we are to converging from Cantonese to formal Chinese and
vice versa.

Of course my perspective can be skewed - but from the perspective of a
native speaker, it is hard to write in full Cantonese.

And btw, mainland Cantonese is not the same as HK Cantonese.  We have
extra terms that mainland Cantonese wouldn't understand and vice
versa.  So my belief is that unless we are talking about a cultural
jamming hub, it will not be too hard to foresee that the Cantonese
page will have a hard time in retaining the critical mass in
sustaining a viable Cantonese page.

Finally, we were taught Classical and formal Chinese in Cantonese -
and actually some of the famous ancient poems which still recited by
most of us were written by Cantonese.  I am proud of my mother-tongue
and at the same time I do not see that having to write in
formal-chinese is an insult to us.  Simply because there are some
terms in Cantonese we don't even know how to write -  Cantonese is a
verbal language and we base on the tone to communication.  But of
course, I love to see more Cantonese speakers voice out their opinions
on this.

-cathy

On Thu, 17 Feb 2005 17:37:41 -0800 (PST), Felix Wan
<felixwiki at earthsphere.org> wrote:
> On Thu, February 17, 2005 12:30 pm, Mark Williamson said:
> > Hi Felix,
> >
> > Many of the responses there anger me because they almost go so far as
> > to say that Cantonese is worthless as a language.
> >
> > What about the guy who said something like "You will hardly get 50
> > characters in without wondering why Cantonese has so much 'junks'"?
> >
> > Or the people who said "Cantonese should only be used for informal
> > things." without giving a valid reason?
> >
> [snipped]
>
> That is what I have said: I expect fierce opposition from Chinese, even
> native Cantonese speakers.  It is not easy to unlearn. ^_^  Compared to
> those responses, people here are quite enlightened and respecting.
>
> However, also look at the brighter side.  If there was not such a debate,
> I may not have done so much research and found this group of enthusiasts:
> http://www.cantonese.org.cn/
>
> There are some excellent articles on why we should encourage Cantonese
> speakers to write their own speeches:
> http://www.cantonese.org.cn/ungoo/article/writemyhand.htm
> http://www.cantonese.org.cn/ungoo/article/poorcantonese.htm
> The first one is written in Cantonese, the second in standard Chinese
> (Mandarin).
>
> They have even compiled a list of Cantonese specific words, with
> references, and they stated on the web site to release the following
> two pages to the public domain:
> http://www.cantonese.org.cn/ungoo/master/dictionary1.htm
> http://www.cantonese.org.cn/ungoo/master/dictionary2.htm
>
> Those can be a good starting point for the orthography of the potential
> Cantonese Wikipedia.
>
> Felix Wan
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] proxy blocked

body:
An exception list sounds like a splendid idea.

In the meantime, could someone remove the block?

On Friday 18 February 2005 14:11, David Gerard wrote:
> Jake Waskett (jake at waskett.org) [050219 01:03]:
> > The NTL proxy server 62.252.192.12 is blocked again. Could someone
> > unblock? It says clearly on that IP's user page that it is a known proxy
> > - why do admins persist in blocking anyway?
>
> Because what gets blocked is the username - the IP is then blocked next
> time he tries logging in. This is effective against violators on fixed or
> dialup IP numbers, but is not so good when the IP is a large ISP proxy. An
> exceptions list may be useful for the blocking code ...
>
> cc'd to wikitech-l - is this reasonably easy to implement? Anyone got any
> time to do so?
>
>
> - d.
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


from_name: Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales

body:
David Gerard wrote:
> Fred Bauder (fredbaud at ctelco.net) [050217 23:28]:
>
> > As our policy is currently written, running off neo-nazis or Stalinist (or
> > Trotskyist or Maoist) revolutionaries is not permitted. Nor is exclusion of
> > open advocates of Islamic (or Zionist) terrorism. In my opinion we should
> > change that policy and permit exclusion of open advocates of totalitarian
> > ideologies and terrorism.
>
>
> I'm not sure we actually *need* this as yet. The Wikipedia immune system
> appears to be working fine from here.

I'm with David.

When the stormfront people started talking about taking over
wikipedia, I assured everyone that we will not allow that to happen.
I meant that.  We will change the rules if we have to do so.

But David's right... we don't need to change the rules yet.  The rules
already take into account plenty of ways to deal with this sort of
thing.

--Jimbo


from_name: Brion Vibber

body:
Richard Holton wrote:
> Aside from creating a new account, is there any way of changing your
> e-mail address at MediaZilla?

Doesn't seem to be available from user preferences, but I think I can do
it from the admin panel. You want your account moved from the yahoo to
the gmail one?

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews requirement

body:
Anthere wrote:

>* understanding that the project is a collaboration, that a sysop is not the boss, and that being the sysop of a project absolutely does not mean that the sysop should restrict access to pages such as the main page.
>
Unfortunately main pages need to be protected more quickly than others.
When a vandal alters the main page to redirect to his home page or to a
porno page the effect can be to put the whole project off line until
somebody can fix it.  For a big project many knowledgeable people are
available to react quickly, but it is also a greater magnet for
vandals.  A small project may have these problems less often, but it may
stay there longer before being fixed.  Solving this problem should be
done in a way that minimizes damage to collaborativeness.

>When someone will start a new wikinews, it is VERY likely a wikipedia will already exist in that language, so there is no need to translate ANYTHING. THe editor can just go to the relevant projet language, and COPY the NPOV rules, copy the COPYRIGHT rules. Just copy and past text does not mean this text is understood, nor that it is applied.
>
>If you mean by COPYING rules, just going to the english version and copying the rules of the english version, I will object that no project should exist which has no community able to make their own rules.
>
Exactly!  It makes me wonder about those people who feel that they
cannot function unless they have previously adopted a complete system of
rules.  Except for broad questions of fundamental principles communities
must preceed rules.  Rules must then reflect the community and codify
its practices.  They must be sensitive to a changing zeitgeist.
Sometimes we need to reflect on how centuries of paternalistic thought
have affected the way we are today.  In contrast to the diligent respect
for rules, effecting real change requires counterintuitive action.  It
requires abandoning the cosy comfort zone that rules provide.  Maybe
there should be a law that whenever a politician gives a speech to his
country's parliament he would need to do so with his clothes off.

>If you do want an example of what I mean, I invite you to visit http://wo.wikipedia.org
>
>This is a new project.
>A group of editors from an african NGO want to work on it.
>For it to start, one of those guys asked me to be sysop on it (needed for decent start).
>
>In his country, french is widely spoken, so he just copied french wikipedia rules.
>Then, as soon as he was sysop, he put some advertisement for his NGO on the main page, then when the main page was restored to a more neutral situation, he put back the advertisement (in good faith I am sure) and protected the main page.
>
Perfectly predictable when the rules are nothing but words. - not to
mention the enforced ambiguity that came from decolonisation.

>Translating/creating policies seems to be a much better test of actual
>interest in doing work. Once you do that, that shows a commitment to the
>project.
>
People need to do both.  Mere translation is a mechanical act.  There is
a need to discuss how those policies guide our activity.  Policies
beyond fundamental principles can and should vary between projects

>>Again, the is a security measure. If 5 people, not even one oldby on
>>one of our project, decide to  launch a wikinews with no experience at
>>all, there is rather high risk that some of our principles are not
>>respected;
>>
>>
>I don't see it that way. Just because someone has been on Wikipedia for
>months doesn't mean that they respect policies at all. Quantity is not
>quality, and measuring quality is almost impossible while keeping the
>process scalable and fair. One could even argue that malicious trolls or
>otherwise harmful users who know how to manipulate policies in their
>interest are more likely to come from our existing user base.
>
We live in a security-obsessed society, where everyone seems to have
forgotten that we are all mortal.

>In fact,
>Wikinews will especially attract people who are fed up with Wikipedia
>and want to work on another wiki.
>
A common phenomenon that affects all projects.  Most of us like to
contribute without being trapped on a merry-go-round of bickering.

>This is more likely if key policies like NPOV are *not* translated. If
>we can agree on which parts of our policies are not negotiable, we can
>make sure that they are in place. One of these policies can even include
>instructions on what to do if your wiki doesn't follow the Wikimedia
>spirit (contact stewards etc.)
>
Maybe that would have prevented the total shutdown that is taking place
on the japanese wiktionary.

Yes the key policies do need to be translated, but only to the extent
that they provide an operating framework.  We all have a vision of what
NPOV means, but its details are the subject of endless inconclusive
debates.  Too many people end up trying to call balls and strikes when
they are standing in the outfield.  They know the rulebook thoroughly,
but they were holding the book upsidedown when they learned it.

Ec


subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews requirement


body:
Lane, Ryan wrote:
> I'm sure most organizations that are using
> mediawiki internally would actually prefer being able to control this.

If your employees are vandalizing each other's comments, I think you've
got problems a wiki isn't going to solve no matter what you tack onto it.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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from_name: Robin Shannon

subject:
[Foundation-l] Proposal for the application for a grant that has
	to be applied for before the 20th]

body:
Fucking brilliant idea, but im not quite sure about the ideas to spend
the money. Exactly what is needed on the software front that isnt
currently provided by wikimedia?

paz y amor,
[[User:The bellman]]

On Thu, 17 Feb 2005 03:51:48 +0100, Gerard Meijssen
<gerard.meijssen at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hoi,
>
> I have posted http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/IFAP it is an outline for a
> proposal for a $45.000,- grant. We need to apply before the 20th of this
> month. Please, do understand that if we apply for this grant, we have to
> spend money the way we describe. It does not help if you think we should
> not spend the money. We either do or we do not apply and, that way we do
> not benefit and neither do the people who benefit most who are
> incidentally not the people who get paid.
>
> This proposal aims to achieve three things:
> * cooperation with the Open Office org by creating a dictionary
> integrated into wiktionary for languages they work on. This is a win win
> situation
> *a dictionary and translations dictionary that helps translators and
> students of languages; wiktionary is a many to many dictionary
> *better functionality for wiktionary that will prevent a lot of double
> work and removes the need for running bots to share our work.
>
> I hope we agree that this is a feasible project and that we can move
> forward with this proposal.
>
> Thanks.
>    GerardM
>
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>

--
hit me: robin.shannon.id.au
jab me: saudade at jabber.zim.net.au

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons
Recombo Plus License. To view a copy of this license, visit
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/sampling+/1.0/


from_name: Rebecca

subject: [WikiEN-l] The Censorship Lie

body:
Unfortunately, it isn't that simple. What would the default setting be?

-- ambi

On Fri, 18 Feb 2005 01:06:48 +0000, Christiaan Briggs
<christiaan at last-straw.net> wrote:
> Well let's start a page of the meta where we can thrash the idea out
> and get some input from coders.
>
> Christiaan
>
> David Gerard wrote:
>
> > Christiaan Briggs:
> >
> >> The beauty is we don't have to come to an agreement; many of us have
> >> been able to agree to a technical solution that skirts around the
> >> whole
> >> issue and leaves censorship up to the enduser. So why we're still
> >> debating instead of implementing the idea I'm not entirely sure.
> >
> > Because email is easier than coding ;-)
> >
> > (I so need to learn enough PHP to hack Mediawiki.)
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Mark Williamson

body:
I'm not shocked at all that you are being so confrontational.

Mark

On Fri, 18 Feb 2005 07:46:22 -0500, Stirling Newberry
<stirling.newberry at xigenics.net> wrote:
>
> On Feb 18, 2005, at 2:30 AM, MilchFlasche?? wrote:
>
> > Hi Striling,
> >
> > I was a little shock seeing you still speculating that Cantonese is
> > merely a "dialect" of "Chinese".
>
> I'm a little shocked that you are confusing Cantonese's status as a
> written dialect and a spoken language. I'm a little shocked that you
> take a lecturing tone, and a little shocked that you seem to want to
> make this an adversarial relationship.
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


subject: [Wikitech-l] Creating broken wikis

body:
Someone or something has been making new wikis with the 1.3 schema.
These appear to work on 1.4 until someone tries to create a login
account, at which point changes to the user tables cause a failure.

One recent example is bm.wiktionary.org.

If some person is setting these up manually on the server, I need to
know what procedure you're following so it can be fixed. If there is
still some sort of automated wiki creation script running, I need to
know about it so it can be tracked down and fixed.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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from_name: Guillaume Blanchard

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] French wikipedians requesting to install Wikiforum
 extension on French Wikipedia

body:
Hi all,
After my previous e-mail about Wikiforum [1] I got many feedbacks from
users, but only few from developers. I made all requested fix, then,
?nothing. I can't personally force developers to look closely at this
extension likewise I can't force them to install it even if there is no
problem. Hoping a strong mobilization of the French community can do
that, we organized a pool few days ago [2]. The result is limpid: 55
French users are now requesting this extension (0 against and 5 that
prefer "real" forum or Usenet). 55 users for a pool in 2 days is very a
lot for the French community (ie. vote to decide arbitrators' rules have
actually 30 votes in 9 days) and I hope you will respect it by:
- Install this extension "as it" on French Wikipedia.
or:
- Look at the source [3] and give me a list of needed
security/performance fix.
You can still test this extension on Amgine's server [4].
Thanks,

Aoineko

[1] Description:
-- French: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikip%C3%A9dia:Wikiforum
-- English (few information): http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikiforum
[2] Pool to implement Wikiforum on French Wikipedia:
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikip%C3%A9dia:Prise_de_d%C3%A9cision/Mise_en_place_du_Wikiforum

[3] Sources are on the CVS repository at "/extensions/wikiforum" (please
don't change the pagination while I'm developing)
[4] Test server: http://test-wikipedia.saewyc.net/index.php/Special:Forum


subject:
[Wikitech-l] French wikipedians requesting to install Wikiforum
 extension on French Wikipedia


from_name: Tony Sidaway

subject: [WikiEN-l] proxy blocked

body:
Jake Waskett said:
> The NTL proxy server 62.252.192.12 is blocked again. Could someone
> unblock?
>
> It says clearly on that IP's user page that it is a known proxy - why
> do
> admins persist in blocking anyway?
>
Apart from the technical fixes which are being addressed in other replies,
I'd like to ask people with experience of this whether the IP autoblock is
visible to the admin when he blocks a user.  If so then it's a good idea
to check [[User:<the autoblocked ip number>]] and [[User talk:<the
autoblocked ip number>]] to see if it's noted as a shared proxy, and then
lift the IP block if it is.  Not being an admin I'm not sure if is
feasible with current software and configuration on "wikien".
If someone confirms that this *is* feasible, I'll write it up as a
guideline for admins and link to it from the blocking policy (as a See
also) and from the Admin noticeboard.


from_name: Ginu George

subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews requirement

body:
As news considered let it be 24X7 always. So need more than 5 people
in the team i think

And if you all prefer mark one specific domains, as they have
expertise, like politics, business, technology etc etc..

So more than a number the team needs good journalists rather than just
information providers..

--
Regards
Ginu George
Journalist and Media Researcher
Dubai, United Arab Emirates

On Fri, 18 Feb 2005 12:08:49 +0100, Nicolas Weeger
<nicolas.weeger at laposte.net> wrote:
> Anthere a ?crit :
> > I regret that you use fallacies so much Erik.
> > Trying to remove the requirement that 2 over 5 people are regulars so as to start a project,
> > by arguing that these 2 might be trolls or want to destroy wikipedia, strike me as deeply dishonnest.
> >
> > I was deeply deeply unhappy of the creation of the french wikinews,
> > because this creation was not done according to the support of the french community.
> > The result is a broken project, which I deeply regret.
> >
> > I find disquieting that you tried to cool down people like notafish and I by agreeing to add a new requirement
> > for the creation, only to try to cancel it two weeks later.
>
> I agree with Anthere on a few points. You agreed on rules, you should
> imo apply'em on a few projects creation before asking for a change - so
> you can argue why it's better to change, based on experience and not
> just because you feel it would be better.
>
> I too regret how fr: was created - for reasons others have explained. I
> don't have anything against creating new projects, but i think we must
> make sure it won't be such a mess (i am not blaming anyone, just stating
> facts). And changing rules all the time makes for a real mess in my opinion.
>
> I understand your motivations are to create more wikinews. Fine, but in
> due time, no need to rush, wait for community to ask loudly for a wikinews.
>
> Nicolas Ryo
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews requirement


body:
Richard Holton wrote:
> On Fri, 18 Feb 2005 13:31:13 -0800, Brion Vibber wrote:
>>Doesn't seem to be available from user preferences, but I think I can do
>>it from the admin panel. You want your account moved from the yahoo to
>>the gmail one?
>
> Thanks, Brion! That would be great.

Done. Let me know if you have any problems.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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from_name: Nicholas Knight

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: The Censorship Lie

body:
Christiaan Briggs wrote:
> These are done purely on editorial grounds. When we make a decision to
> hide or remove an image based on some people's moral objections that it
> is "pornographic", "disgusting", "sexually explicit", etc. we are not
> making a purely editorial decision.

For me, this has about as much to do with morality as my dislike of carrots.


from_name: MilchFlasche瑋平

body:
Hi Striling,

I was a little shock seeing you still speculating that Cantonese is
merely a "dialect" of "Chinese". Argh. How many times did those
witnesses talk about how different other vernaculars are from
Mandarin? Believe me, if Cantonese is merely "splitting the language",
then all Catalans or Bretons should have been hanged for treachery for
thousands of times. "Close to the standard dialect?" I'd like to ask
you to click all the sound files in this page:
http://www.ctlwmp.cityu.edu.hk/dialects/prolist.htm
The same story "North Wind and the Sun", different vernaculars from
Beijing, Shanghai, Canton, Chaozhou, Minnan and Hakka. Only after that
could we discuss how different these "dialects" are.

Yes, these IS such a problem that in China most speakers of the
vernaculars are not used to written forms, but this phenomenon is
never able to deny how foreign they sound to each other. And the
vernaculars were not written because they are long excluded from
national education. In pre-modern times, low literacy rate meant that
mostly it were the scholar-officials who would learn writing, and to
write in classic Chinese, not even the standard vernacular. Even in
this time, there WERE indeed written forms of Cantonese, Minnan, and
Wu. Unfortunately, when modern nation-building came, both nationalist
and communist government promoted almost exclusively Mandarin, and
standardized hanzi only for it, rather than let the vernaculars
develop their own written form freely, saying that it was for the sake
of "national unity". Too long have these vernaculars been
misunderstood, too long have they been deprived the freedom of
expressing. I hope people who are not familiar with such fact could
reconsider all the messages discussed before. Otherwise the responeses
could be so frustrating.

Thanks. Best regards,

[[zh:User:MilchFlasche]]

--
2005, make signs happen!


from_name: Puddl Duk

subject: [WikiEN-l] The Censorship Lie

body:
--- Christiaan Briggs <christiaan at last-straw.net>
wrote:

> Puddl Duk wrote:
>
> > The main point (in my mind) is that censorship is
> imposed on a
> > community by power of authority, and the community
> has no say.
>
> 'In your mind' is exactly the point I was attempting
> to make. Who is
> the authority when self-censorship takes place?
>
> Christiaan

Well, the point I was attempting to make was that when
the community exercises it's judgment not to use an
image, its not censorship.

Again, if you insist on such a narrow definition of
censorship then admit that you too censor, every time
you have ever reverted. Or are you going to keep side
stepping this?

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail - Helps protect you from nasty viruses.
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail


body:
Alternatively, we could store it as images online. That would take a
lot of bandwidth, but... it would preserve the original much much
better.

Mark

On Fri, 18 Feb 2005 23:49:19 +0100, Magnus Manske <magnus.manske at web.de> wrote:
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> Ray Saintonge schrieb:
> > I've long felt that the 1911EB should be carried in its entirety on
> > Wikisource, as should the 1921 12th edition.  (The 12th was just a
> > repeat of the 11th edition with 3 supplementary volumes, which probably
> > explains why it is so seldom mentioned.)  That would be an enormous
> > task.
>
> Maybe we can get a "real" copy of the 1921 edition to WikiMania, and
> have scanners/digital cameras manned with volunteers. Once we have
> everything as images, we can OCR/type/proofread online in a distributed
> fashion. We're kinda good at that :-)
>
> Magnus
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
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> Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org
>
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> jEdSswlpmeGa86ZEhU9PgT0=
> =EYeR
> -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


body:
Karl A. Krueger said:
> On Thu, Feb 17, 2005 at 01:14:26PM -0000, Tony Sidaway wrote:
>> But the chap in the autofellatio picture is clearly an adult having a
>> whole heap of fun.  The girl in the Lolicon picture is submitting to
>> child abuse, and the presentation is, or is intended to be, erotic.
>> Perhaps the fact that the latter picture is an anime drawing is the
>> reason why it seems to fly under so many radars.
>
> One obvious distinction is that one is a photograph, being cited as
> evidence that a certain act is possible.  The other is a drawing,
> serving as an example of a genre of drawing.

Yes.  An example of the eroticization of child abuse.

>
> (And it's not really clear to me that the model in the photograph is
> having a whole heap of fun.  He's a porn actor; he's paid to do that,
> whether he gets a nasty crick in his back from it or not.  Plus he
> looks as if he's about to burst a blood vessel either in his forehead
> or his .... somewhere else.)

Well, he didn't get that erection by accident.


from_name: sannse

subject: [WikiEN-l] proxy blocked

body:
Tony Sidaway wrote:
> Jake Waskett said:
>
>>The NTL proxy server 62.252.192.12 is blocked again. Could someone
>>unblock?
>>
>>It says clearly on that IP's user page that it is a known proxy - why
>>do
>>admins persist in blocking anyway?
>>
>
> Apart from the technical fixes which are being addressed in other replies,
> I'd like to ask people with experience of this whether the IP autoblock is
> visible to the admin when he blocks a user.  If so then it's a good idea
> to check [[User:<the autoblocked ip number>]] and [[User talk:<the
> autoblocked ip number>]] to see if it's noted as a shared proxy, and then
> lift the IP block if it is.  Not being an admin I'm not sure if is
> feasible with current software and configuration on "wikien".
> If someone confirms that this *is* feasible, I'll write it up as a
> guideline for admins and link to it from the blocking policy (as a See
> also) and from the Admin noticeboard.

No, admins don't get to see the IP of logged in users - the block only
shows in the List of blocked IP adresses... and there only as a
reference number, not as a checkable IP.

It's also not implemented at the time of the block, but only when they
return to Wikipedia after the block is in place.

--sannse

--
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Anti-Virus.
Version: 7.0.300 / Virus Database: 265.8.8 - Release Date: 14/02/05


from_name: Walter Vermeir

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: www.en.wikipedia.org

body:
NSK <nsk2 <at> wikinerds.org> writes:
> I cannot access www.en.wikipedia.org, I know this isn't supposed to be the
> right domain but I am sure many users make this mistake from time to time,
> and it can easily be avoided by enabling some new dns aliases.

http://www.nl.wikipedia.org works. But that is only because I asked it when NL
moved to faseIII.

It is true that it whould be good if *.XX.wikiPROJECT.org whoud point to
something. Best to xx.wikiPROJECT.org.

To www.wikiPROJECT.org whould also not be bad if that is less work.

Greetings,
[[w:nl:gebruiker:Walter]]


body:
David Gerard wrote:

>Mark Williamson (node.ue at gmail.com) [050219 09:55]:
>
>
>>On Fri, 18 Feb 2005 23:49:19 +0100, Magnus Manske <magnus.manske at web.de> wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Ray Saintonge schrieb:
>>>
>>>
>>>>I've long felt that the 1911EB should be carried in its entirety on
>>>>Wikisource, as should the 1921 12th edition.  (The 12th was just a
>>>>repeat of the 11th edition with 3 supplementary volumes, which probably
>>>>explains why it is so seldom mentioned.)  That would be an enormous
>>>>task.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>Maybe we can get a "real" copy of the 1921 edition to WikiMania, and
>>>have scanners/digital cameras manned with volunteers. Once we have
>>>everything as images, we can OCR/type/proofread online in a distributed
>>>fashion. We're kinda good at that :-)
>>>
>>>
>>Alternatively, we could store it as images online. That would take a
>>lot of bandwidth, but... it would preserve the original much much
>>better.
>>
>>
>An A4 page at 300dpi is 8.7 MB; at 600dpi it's 34.8 MB. How many pages are
>there? Time to buy a 1000-stack of DVD-Rs ;-)
>
>
The 1911EB has 29 volumes, of which the last is an index.  Each volume
has about 1,000 pages.  Add three volumes for the supplements, and we
have a mere 32,000 pages.  David, was your estimate based on colour
scanning?  Wouldn't monochrome scanning take less space?  There are very
few colour pages.

The online images is an interesting proposal.  Not long ago on the list
there was mention of a Swedish project that includes both a scanned and
OCR version of a page.  A scanned version is helpful for maintaining the
integrity of a text; a character recognized is better for applying
search functions and annotations.  The French Gallica collection in pdf
can be a tremendous resource, but is difficult to use.  There are some
interesting points to be explored, such as how much can the system handle.

The idea of having a bunch of volunteers working away in public view at
Wikimania to put something of the size of EB12 on line has great
publicity appeal, especially if these volunteers are at it round the
clock.  Whether the EB should be the only work treated that way at
Wikimania should remain an open question.  Perhaps the scanned works
should be in several languages. :-)

Ec