subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Full nice handbag

body:
Well, if you wanted to write a well referenced article
on a baby that was saved from drowning by a family
dog, and could really make it easily verifiable, I
would not try to deleted it. I certainly don't think
this should be our priority, but I don't think it
would do any harm. No one who was not looking for it
would find it in any event.
Mark

--- Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:

> Mark Richards wrote:
>
> >Yes, anything verifiable and factual should.
> 'Notable'
> >is just someones POV about what they think is
> >important.
> >
> >
> I think you inclusionist folks severely
> underestimate just how much
> ridiculous stuff is verifiable and factual.  I could
> start typing in
> entries for everyone who died in Atlanta each die,
> using the obituary
> section of the local newspaper as a source, and
> these are verifiable and
> factual.  There are plenty of "human interest"
> stories published in the
> paper, like "family dog  saves baby from drowning!".
>  These are
> verifiable and factual (verifiable in the
> newspaper's archives), but not
> notable.  Etc.
>
> -Mark
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Address AutoComplete - You start. We finish.
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail


list: foundation-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Fred Bauder

body:
Believe it or not, we still don't enough active involved editors in many
areas. I think many things will work out when we have more input from a
broader base. For example about 4 people regularly edit the Tibet article,
they fight a bit, but a few dozen actual Tibetans would change the mix.
Likewise the half dozen who edit in the communist area would face a new
dynamic if a few dozen who actually lived under communism weighed in.

This is true of our administrative and policy areas too, a very thin group
in terms of numbers and diversity of viewpoint.

Fred

> From: Andre Engels <andreengels at gmail.com>
> Reply-To: Andre Engels <andreengels at gmail.com>, Wikimedia Foundation Mailing
> List <foundation-l at wikimedia.org>
> Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 18:30:01 +0200
> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List <foundation-l at wikimedia.org>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Re: Arbitration committe and content
>
> On Thu, 28 Oct 2004 10:15:31 -0600, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
>> We do have a way to decide using [[Wikipedia:Neutral point of view]]. All
>> significant points or view are to be included in the article. There are fine
>> points to be decided, such at how much proportional space viewpoints are to
>> be alloted but our policy is quite clear on the main point. Most POV
>> disputes are centered around censoring opposing viewpoints and almost all
>> POV warriors are in the wrong.
>
> Still, this begs the question of what is a 'significant' point of
> view. Also, as you say, there are those finer points. Do we show the
> points of view as equals, or do we say "this is what most experts
> think, but others say that"? Which is given first, or do we first
> state the part that both agree on and only then the opinions? How much
> should be written on a certain POV?
>
> And then there are the arguments that aren't about POV at all, but
> about inclusion (whether inclusing in Wikipedia as a whole or in a
> particular article) or about the way Wikipedia is to look like.
>
> Every day Wikipedia has many of those decisions. In many cases there
> is just someone editing the way s/he likes it, and nobody who cares
> noticing. In many other cases a short discussion gets to an agreeable
> answer. But there still isn't anything to get to answer when it is
> not.
>
> Andre Engels
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l


subject: [Foundation-l] Re: Arbitration committe and content


list: wikimedia-l


list: wikien-l

body:
So, he's calling editors who disagree with him "Zionist [[hasbara]]
campaigners". I looked at our [[hasbara]] article and it seems to not amount
to much more than saying that an editor is trying to present Israeli actions
from an Israeli viewpoint. I think in many cases that might be a fair
characterization. The question is, how, with almost no Palestinian editors,
except for a few radicallized stand-ins, could any other viewpoint be
expressed without a special effort by advocates for Israel to ensure the
Palestinian perspective is expressed fairly. Expecting mythical people who
are "un-involved" to somehow fix things is going to be a long wait. Folks
who are un-involved will find something to edit that they are involved in,
not that hornet's nest.

Fred

> From: "JAY JG" <jayjg at hotmail.com>
> Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 12:27:14 -0400
> To: wikien-l at Wikipedia.org
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Problematic behavior and ad hominem attacks
>
> Harry's quesion is not about how to cover the issue, but rather about how to
> deal with persisent ad hominem comments.  " Zionist [[hasbara]] campaigners"
> is a label User:Alberuni has placed on those who disagree with him, and the
> strawman arguments attributed to those editors are actually invented by
> User:Alberuni.


from_name: NSK

subject: [WikiEN-l] Solving the US-centrism problem

body:
I have noticed that many people believe that a number of Wikipedia articles
are very US-centric and I think in some occasions this is true. I would say
that you might need more non-US contributors.

Have you considered using geotargeting advertisement for solving this problem?
For example, you could target ads to places like India, Japan, South Africa,
UK, Brazil or Canada.

--
NSK
Admin of http://portal.wikinerds.org
Project Manager of http://www.nerdypc.org
Project Manager of http://www.adapedia.org


from_name: Andrew Lih

subject: [WikiEN-l] Sysops

body:
On Thu, 28 Oct 2004 05:53:39 +0300, NSK <nsk2 at wikinerds.org> wrote:
> AFAIK when someone becomes sysop [s]he remains sysop forever.
>
> I propose sysops should be evaluated every 3-6 months; during the eval people
> will vote on which sysops should be kept and which should become again users.

Check out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators

Traditionally, WP has stated it "should be no big deal" to become a
sysop. The debates on RfA show otherwise, but even so, there has been
little interest in instituting a reaccreditation system.

-Andrew (User:Fuzheado)


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Alfio Puglisi

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: sysop vs. admin

body:
On Thu, 28 Oct 2004, NSK wrote:

>On Thursday 28 October 2004 04:10, Andrew Lih wrote:
>> The two terms (sysop and admin) are used interchangeably in the
>
>Thanks. Do you think people will get confused in my community if I decide to
>use the two terms for different access levels? Or should I use them
>interchangeably like you?

I found that "admin" is easier to understand, since it's related to
similar non-wikipedia terms. Ironically "sysop" is a more accurate
description of the job, which is often limited to maintenance: the term
"administrator" suggets some power over the other users, while in reality
a sysop is just providing services to the others, and accepting
responsability for what he/she does.

Alfio


from_name: Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales

subject: [WikiEN-l] Apology for "anti-US" remark

references:
<BDA538F5.2CA85%cunctator@kband.com>
	<8C81D4B4-28C9-11D9-B8D5-0003931DCE20@ropersonline.com>
	<000401c4bcea$3be4dc40$9e7c0450@Galasien>

body:
Charles Matthews wrote:
> Jens Ropers wrote
>
> > Well, I'm trying to engage in a discussion every U.S. citizen I can.
>
> Does it have to be on this list?  Which is dedicated to improving Wikipedia,
> rather than airing divisive issues that *ought to be* off-topic, even if
> posters here can't all stick to that.

Agreed completely.

I'm not alone in having a very tight schedule, and wading through a
general debate about foreign policy is not really what we're here for.

Everyone who is tempted to write about such matters, on all sides,
should really try not to do it here.  Write each other privately if
you must.

--Jimbo


subject: [WikiEN-l] Jew Watch

body:
steven l. rubenstein wrote:
> On Oct. 26 UncleBungle made the following contribution to the Jew Watch
> talk page:
> "I'm not going to start an edit war User:Slrubenstein."
> I don't really like other people posting comments to pages in my name.  Is
> this something I just have to watch out for and delete, or do we have some
> policy on this?  Clearly it is not at the level of a banable offense -- I
> am not even sure if it is enough to ask for mediation.

I think it's a bannable offense, without question.  Whether it would
be sensible to pursue, given how long it takes to get through the
process, is a different question.  It will depend on the behavior of
the individual user.

This is the sort of thing where I think a faster process than ArbCom
would be quite helpful.

--Jimbo


from_name: Jens Ropers

subject: [WikiEN-l] Apology for "anti-US" remark

body:
On 28 Oct 2004, at 00:52, Stan Shebs wrote:

> Jens Ropers wrote:
>> On 27 Oct 2004, at 22:56, Stan Shebs wrote:
>>> Jens Ropers wrote:
>>>> With the possible difference being that a complaint that others are
>>>> biased against you just sounds so much more convincing if you're
>>>> not engaged in an illegal war at the same time.
>>> Careful on the nationalism thing
>> Huh?
>> What nationalism thing???
>> And why should I be careful about it??
> Nationalism is when you treat every member of a nation as being
> equivalent to the nation's government, to the point of treating
> the government's political opponents as they were supporters. It's
> like saying Tutu and Mandela must be in favor of apartheid because
> they didn't renounce their South African citizenship and move to
> another country. Wikipedia is already over-politicized by people
> who are smart enough to know better.

I fail to see how your charge applies to what I did and I feel you're
quoting me out of context.
I wrote my above single sentence in reply to this:

> I find this issue of semantics is kind of annoying, because although
> I'm a strong Bush opponent, I tend to agree with Ed's phrasing.  It is
> not *in principle* "anti-US" or "anti-US-military" bias, but I'd argue
> that *in practice* many people do have an anti-US bias that leads them
> to look for and promote stories that make the US look bad.  This has
> nothing to do with anti-Bush bias---it was the same people doing the
> same thing when Clinton was president and bombing Kosovo.
> -Mark

This concerned how the US as a whole is perceived and I did not set
that scope. I merely responded to Mark.

That said -- and this is just a ''general'' point -- yes, one may be
opposed to what other people in charge are doing but attempts to claim
exemption only go that far. There comes a point where a sufficiently
nasty stain will rub off on everybody and like it or not unless one is
actively resisting the associated wrongs, one will likely have to
shoulder the collective guilt as well. I'm German born and bred so
trust me, I do know something about collective guilt.

>>> I hate Bush as much as anybody, but if Europeans and USians
>>> are not in agreement, it's as much a failure of the Europeans
>>> to sell their ideas in Iowa as it is of the US to sell its ideas
>>> in Belgium. Bush would get even more votes if the average US
>>> voter got a look at how much anti-US sneering by Europeans is
>>> found on WP talk pages.
>> True, and both any sneering and the defiant "hurt pride" protest vote
>> for Bush are unconsidered, immature reactions. However, IMHO Ed's
>> initial post clearly shows that there are Americans who already are
>> so much in defiant denial mode that they will perceive even factual
>> NPOV points argued against "their guy" as "sneering". I mean. Ed's
>> outraged initial post sounded as if there was an evil Democratic
>> conspiracy to loot and kill.
>
> Well, duh, there are extremists on every side. I was reacting
> to how you tarred somebody else with the same brush.
>
>>> Not setting much of an example for
>>> international cooperation!
>> Oh, but we are! We Wikipedians are actually talking. Which is ''way''
>> better than doing a "Freedom Fries" routine or accusing all Americans
>> of being daft, respectively.
>
> You are talking, but are you listening? If the choice of US president
> matters so much to Europe, then why aren't the Europeans supporting
> Kerry in a way that will get him some more votes?

Yes? And that way is?
/me is sitting on the edge of my seat with both ears cupped.

> Guardian readers
> lecturing Iowans in letters was a really dumb idea, I can't believe
> that in all the millions of Europe there isn't anyone with a better
> idea for two-way dialogue.

Well, I'm trying to engage in a discussion every U.S. citizen I can.
I'm trying to spread the word among non-Americans that there's still a
"different America" struggling to get out and that not all Americans
support those U.S. politicians who are now widely regarded as
ne'er-do-wells (to use a mild expression). I'm trying to be visible
towards that end and I had a T-shirt for a certain candidate freshly
printed very recently and am wearing it over my other clothing.
All that's probably not much, but if you've got better ideas what I
could do then PLEASE do tell me at the earliest possible opportunity.
Because I have a stake in the outcome too -- 3/11 (Madrid) has shown
that; we're a lot more exposed over here, especially in terms of
geography, and it's very evident here how al Qaeda just grows more
powerful the longer Bush is in office.
>
> Stan

-- ropers [[en:User:Ropers]]
     www.ropersonline.com

http://www.archive.org/movies/details-db.php?
collection=independent_news&collectionid=Mosh


from_name: JAY JG

body:
>From: "csherlock at ljh.com.au" <csherlock at ljh.com.au>
>Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
>To: wikien-l at wikipedia.org
>Subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: More anti-US bias in Current Events
>Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 23:37:58 +1000

>Ray Saintonge wrote:
>>Sheldon Rampton wrote:
>>  In the course of a Canadian Broadcating Corporation program on the US
>>election it reported on a survey of whom Canadians would vote for if they
>>could.  80% favored Kerry.  That's an astounding ratio, but I suspect that
>>a similar result would be found in many countries.
>It wasn't just Canada. The Sydney Morning Herald, and numerous other
>International papers did the same poll and got similar results. I can find
>the article if you want because I read it just the other day. It was on the
>front page!

The presentation given here is a bit misleading; in the poll in question,
while 22% said they'd vote for Bush, only 60% said they'd vote for Kerry.


subject: [Foundation-l] Wikinews licensing

body:
On Thursday 28 October 2004 11:17, you wrote:
> dual-licensing GFDL and CC-BY, and possibly other licenses?

You could allow every contributor to choose the license of his choice. So,
ever page would have a different license. That's what I do in some of my
projects.

> (my personal favorite, the public domain, has relatively little support).

I am very interested in learning more about your reasoning on public domain
and why it's your favourite. If you have enough time, please give me some
reasons why a site admin should allow wikiauthors to choose public domain for
their contributions. If you wanted to make me support PD, what would you tell
me?

(the reason I ask is because I allow GFDL and CC-by-sa in my wikis and I am
considering adding support for standard copyright, BSDL, other CC, and
perhaps PD, so I am evaluating the pros and cons and I am trying to listen to
as many opinions as possible)

--
NSK
Admin of http://portal.wikinerds.org
Project Manager of http://www.nerdypc.org
Project Manager of http://www.adapedia.org


subject: [Foundation-l] Wikinews licensing


subject: [WikiEN-l] Sysops

body:
On Thu, 28 Oct 2004 07:19:29 +0300, NSK <nsk2 at wikinerds.org> wrote:
> On Thursday 28 October 2004 06:34, Andrew Lih wrote:
> > sysop. The debates on RfA show otherwise, but even so, there has been
> > little interest in instituting a reaccreditation system.
>
> So you mean this had been already discussed?

Yes, in several different forms - fixed terms, expiring inactive
sysops. See for example:

http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2004-June/thread.html#28400
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2004-June/028410.html

-Andrew (User:Fuzheado)


body:
>From: Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net>
>Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
>To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
>Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Problematic behavior and ad hominem attacks
>Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 08:45:29 -0600

>I believe complete coverage of such events may require setting forth
>several
>points of view at some length. It would be nice if there were no Zionists
>who have such views, but such is not the case nor is it the case that
>extermination is not the view of some Palestinians.
>
>Fred
>
> > From: Harry Smith <lance6wins at yahoo.com>
> > Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> > Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 07:02:52 -0700 (PDT)
> > To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> > Subject: [WikiEN-l] Problematic behavior and ad hominem attacks
> >
> > What is the proper way of dealing with this type of
> > behavior?
> >
> > :::Your statements are accurate and clear but it won't
> > matter. Even if there was a massacre, the Zionist
> > [[hasbara]] campaigners will spin the description of
> > events until it bears no resemblance to reality. See
> > what they did to [[Muhammad al-Durrah]]. To these
> > extremists, Arab civilians killed by the Israeli
> > military do not constitute evidence of a massacre.
> > Like the Nazis who said "the Jew is a parasite, the
> > only good Jew is a dead Jew", the extremist Zionists
> > believe, "'Palestinians' are terrorists, they hide in
> > refugee camps, Israel is just defending herself." All
> > crimes are absolved. Destroy the enemy. Blame the
> > victim. Repeat until death. It's the nature of the
> > conflict. --[[User:Alberuni|Alberuni]] 01:20, 28 Oct
> > 2004 (UTC)
> >
> > taken from Talk:Operation Defensive Shield

Harry's quesion is not about how to cover the issue, but rather about how to
deal with persisent ad hominem comments.  " Zionist [[hasbara]] campaigners"
is a label User:Alberuni has placed on those who disagree with him, and the
strawman arguments attributed to those editors are actually invented by
User:Alberuni.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: More anti-US bias in Current Events

body:
On 28 Oct 2004, at 08:31, Ray Saintonge wrote:
> As to Canada's role, there was nothing to apologize for.  If a draft
> were reinstituted we should certainly be open to accepting refugees
> from it.
>
> Ec

http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0414/solomon.php
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/04/19/
wdes19.xml&sSheet=/news/2004/04/19/ixnewstop.html
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2004/05/26/473319-ap.html
http://www.cbc.ca/stories/2004/02/19/awol040219
http://www.tomjoad.org/WarHeroes.htm

Any questions?

-- ropers [[en:User:Ropers]]
     www.ropersonline.com

http://www.archive.org/movies/details-db.php?
collection=independent_news&collectionid=Mosh


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: sysop vs. admin

body:
On Thursday 28 October 2004 12:35, Alfio Puglisi wrote:
> I found that "admin" is easier to understand, since it's related to
> similar non-wikipedia terms. Ironically "sysop" is a more accurate
> description of the job, which is often limited to maintenance: the term
> "administrator" suggets some power over the other users, while in reality
> a sysop is just providing services to the others, and accepting
> responsability for what he/she does.

A very nice reply. Thanks.

--
NSK
Admin of http://portal.wikinerds.org
Project Manager of http://www.nerdypc.org
Project Manager of http://www.adapedia.org


from_name: Sheldon Rampton

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Apology for "anti-US" remark

body:
Stan Shebs wrote:

>  You are talking, but are you listening? If the choice of US president
>  matters so much to Europe, then why aren't the Europeans supporting
>  Kerry in a way that will get him some more votes? Guardian readers
>  lecturing Iowans in letters was a really dumb idea, I can't believe
>  that in all the millions of Europe there isn't anyone with a better
>  idea for two-way dialogue.

Why was the Guardian's gambit a "really dumb idea"? And if you think
it's easy to come up with a better approach, what's your proposal?

There's nothing terribly intrusive about simply sending letters to
people in the United States, and the Guardian set things up so that
no one in Ohio would receive more than a single letter from their
readers. In any given week, I receive dozens of unsolicited letters
from companies trying to sell me products, organizations asking for
my money, and campaigns trying to sell me their candidates. Getting
one letter from someone in the UK would hardly be a burden and would
actually be a refreshing improvement over the mail I usually get.

The objection can't possibly be that we object to outside meddling,
given the numerous ways that the United States routinely meddles in
other countries' elections. So what's the problem?

What I found most shocking about the Guardian campaign was the
vitriolic response from Bush supporters. One person, for example,
called the British "stupid, yellow-toothed pansies ... I don't give a
rat's ass if our election is going to have an effect on your
worthless little life." Other responses were full of similar
profanity and insults. The level of overt hatred toward the British
is all the more striking since England is in fact the best ally that
the Bush administration has in its war in Iraq. If nothing else,
these responses may help educate a few Brits firsthand about the ugly
depths to which American politics has fallen, which in turn might put
some additional pressure on the Labour Party to change course.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uselections2004/story/0,13918,1329858,00.html


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Ashar Voultoiz

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Sortable tables

body:
Nick Triantos wrote:
> I'm thinking about trying to implement sortable tables in mediawiki.
> I'd probably try to make the table headers pass some parameter through
> to the rendering engine by attaching some &T1=col1 or something similar
> to the URL.
>
> Any opinions?  Great idea?  Stupid idea?  Someone else working on
> something similar?
>
> -Nick

It can be done client side using javascript. Have a look at some examples:
  http://webfx.eae.net/dhtml/sortabletable/demos.html

Pro:
  _ datas are requested from server only once
  _ cpu usage is client side

Con:
  _ javascript

--
Ashar Voultoiz - WP++++
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Hashar


from_name: Arne Klempert

subject: [Foundation-l] Wikinews licensing

body:
On Thursday, October 28, 2004 11:22 AM
NSK <nsk2 at wikinerds.org> wrote:

> On Thursday 28 October 2004 11:17, you wrote:
>> dual-licensing GFDL and CC-BY, and possibly other licenses?
>
> You could allow every contributor to choose the license of his
> choice. So, ever page would have a different license. That's what I
> do in some of my projects.

Would you please try to understand how and why wikis work - especially
the most successful one - before annoying us with ideas from your
recently started projects?

>> (my personal favorite, the public domain, has relatively little
>> support).
>
> I am very interested in learning more about your reasoning on public
> domain and why it's your favourite. If you have enough time, please
> give me some reasons why a site admin should allow wikiauthors to
> choose public domain for their contributions. If you wanted to make
> me support PD, what would you tell me?

Have you considered to read the given link?
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikinews/License_straw_poll

Have you ever considered to search on your own before asking busy people
stupid questions?

Please come back when you really know the ropes of at least one
Wikimedia project or your own ideas are well proven. Until then you
should be *very* silent - at least on this mailing list. Thank you.

Arne (akl)


subject: [Foundation-l] Wikinews licensing


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Templates and key-value pairs

body:
kelvSYC wrote:
> I know that this idea, as is, will probably be rejected on the grounds
> of it being applicable to only a small minority of articles on en (or
> any other pedia) and of little use in any other Wikimedia project, but
> if I throw it out here, perhaps some generalization of this idea could
> be created.
>
> Here goes:
>
> In the world of sports, teams are often abbreviated in some manner.  For
> example, in the [[National Hockey League]], LA refers to the [[Los
> Angeles Kings]] while in [[Major League Baseball]], LA refers to the
> [[Los Angeles Dodgers]].  Because of the recent proliferation of stuff
> that requires an abbreviation be linked to a team (eg. such as an
> article about a sporting event), you'd like abbreviations be linked to a
> team's article (ie. in an article about baseball, you'd want [[Los
> Angeles Dodgers|LA]]).  However, this can be cumbersome and
> time-consuming, especially for large amounts of articles or teams (eg.
> the ongoing project where one article is given for each World Series).
> What I propose is some form of "key-value pairing" to the way templates
> work.  Granted, all this can be done without the use of this "switch
> statement" by the use of multiple template pages, so this is in the
> interest of "keeping it all in the same page" or "keeping things
> relatively compact".
>
> The way it would work is if you have a template such as {{MLB|LA}}, for
> example, the template would expand to [[Los Angeles Dodgers|LA]].  In
> each template page, you'd have a set of keys and a set of values that
> these keys would refer to.  For example:
>
> Template:MLB
> {{{
> ANA -> [[Anaheim Angels|ANA]],
> BOS -> [[Boston Red Sox|BOS]],
> ...
> TEX -> [[Texas Rangers|TEX]],
> TOR -> [[Toronto Blue Jays|TOR]]
> }}}
>
> Then, when a template is called, a key is specified, and the wiki
> software would print the value associated with the key.  Should no key
> be specified, or an invalid key is specified, some kind of fallback
> behaviour would kick in.
>
> You can, of course, have additional template parameters in the normal
> sense.  For example,
>
> Template:a
> {{{b -> [[B|{{{c}}}]]}}}
>
> You could have something like {{a|b|c=foo}}} and it would print out
> [[B|foo]].
>
> As I have stated above, this is completely optional and can be
> implemented in other ways, but this idea is just for the sake of
> convienience.  What are your thoughts on this idea?

Let's port SQL to wikisyntax :o)

Seriously, why not using some hardcoded template and subst ?

Ex:
Template:MLB/ANA
Template:MLB/BOS

Then you {{subst:MLB/ANA}} and blam [[Anaheim Angels|ANA]] appear :o)

--
Ashar Voultoiz - WP++++
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Hashar


from_name: Magnus Manske

subject: [Wikitech-l] MySQL

body:
user_Jamesday wrote:

>The Jeremy Zawodny book?:)
>
>
The very one :-)

>Temporary table use by server, per second:
>
>           total       on disk
>Ariel      1.06         0.204
>Suda       0.164        0.162
>Bacon      0.13         0.13 (all)
>
>So, temporary tables which use the disks aren't really that frequent.
>
>Suda uses its smaller drive pair for temporary and log tables. The database servers have 6 hot swap bays. Taking one drive for temporary tables would cost two drives in the main array. I don't think it's worth doing. I do recall some discussion with Silicon Mechanics about an internal bay which can hold a SATA drive and adding a 36GB 10K RPM SATA drive for temporary tables might be worth doing. Or for Suda, the 36GB drive not currently in use. But they are infrequent enough that I'm not really worried.
>
>
OK.

>All of the database servers have write buffering turned on and it makes a significant difference. All are ordered with battery backup. Possible exception is Bacon where I need to check to see if it has the battery and ask Jimbo to order that module (about US$100) if not.
>
>
Cool.

>The indexes are fair to good for most queries but not good enough for the special pages. I'm deliberately waiting on suggesting big changes there until after the next release of the software. Getting the schema changes for cur/old is far more important and I don't want to distract people from them. See the meta page. I plan to script the special page updates first to prove what is faster, then submit those scripted versions for PHP implementation for the live site. This will involve temporary tables and/or summary tables, to get perfect indexes and to avoid using long duration read queries on cur.
>
>A few queries force the right index. Generally MySQL gets it right - only one case where it doesn't now. See the Querybane page for that one and for the queries which are problematic enough to need special handling. The cur/old schema change and search query deal with most.
>
>
We should of course wait for the new DB schema to be set up before
fiddling with the indices. :-)
What I meant was that currently, we have (for example) a (cur_title) and
a combined (cur_namespace,cur_title) index, last time I checked. A
single (cur_title,cur_namespace) index (note the order!) would be sorted
for cur_title and should suffice. That would save memory, for both RAM
and disk.
I just notice that we also have a
(cur_namespace,cur_title,inverse_timestamp) index. Triple indexing of
cur_title is a little overkill, IMHO.

>One query which needs work is the category list. See link below which explains the problems with it. Needs a periodically generated summary table. Querycache can't currently do the job because it lacks a field for the initial limit value.
>
>
Maybe we should just get rid of the alphabetical list display and
replace it with a tree-like display. That will get rid of the
LIMIT,OFFSET thing - we can just query for subcategories of a category,
using cur_namespace, cur_id , cl_from and cl_to.

Magnus


subject: [Foundation-l] Interwiki Cooperation; NSK

body:
On Thursday 28 October 2004 11:16, Ray Saintonge wrote:
> Wikisource documents are open to be edited, very little substantive

If Wikisource is a repository of source texts, why it isn't a section of
Wikipedia? Well, I know it isn't encyclopedic... But Wikipedia is also an
almanac full of articles on years and dates, so it would be a possibility to
have a Sources section too, which could attract more contributors.

> but the exploiters also have to follow the GFDL rules.  They have no
> right to claim that they have the copyright on your dissertation.

I wonder how I will be able to track an exploiter in Madagascar or in Siberia
who would claim the copyright :/

> The subject comes up from time to time, but the difficulty is obtaining
> permissions to change the licensing for existing articles.  Many of the
> contributors are no longer available, or anonymous.

Another reason why I don't allow anons in most of my wikis and I require
contact information.

Anyway, a possible solution would be to keep Wikipedia as it is and open a
Wikipedia2 with other licensing options (probable a per-page model, with GFDL
and CC options).

--
NSK
Admin of http://portal.wikinerds.org
Project Manager of http://www.nerdypc.org
Project Manager of http://www.adapedia.org


from_name: Charles Matthews

subject: [WikiEN-l] Apology for "anti-US" remark

body:
Jens Ropers wrote

> Well, I'm trying to engage in a discussion every U.S. citizen I can.

Does it have to be on this list?  Which is dedicated to improving Wikipedia,
rather than airing divisive issues that *ought to be* off-topic, even if
posters here can't all stick to that.

Charles


from_name: Delirium

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:

> As to Canada's role, there was nothing to apologize for.  If a draft
> were reinstituted we should certainly be open to accepting refugees
> from it.

Oh, I don't disagree.  I was just pointing it out as a particularly
striking bit of evidence that the rest of the world wasn't only against
the US war in Vietnam, but so actively against it as to be willing to
take whatever legal means they had at their disposal to work against it
(short of sanctions, of course).

As for this war, I seem to recall that at least one Canadian court has
ruled the opposite---that regardless of the legality of the initial
invasion, since the current occupation is sanctioned by a UN Security
Council resolution, it's not illegal and therefore those avoiding it are
not elegible for refugee status.  (Of course, Canadian refugee laws may
have also changed in the past 30 years.)

-Mark


from_name: Gerard Meijssen

subject: [Wikitech-l] MySQL

body:
Magnus Manske wrote:

>
>> One query which needs work is the category list. See link below which
>> explains the problems with it. Needs a periodically generated summary
>> table. Querycache can't currently do the job because it lacks a field
>> for the initial limit value.
>>
>>
> Maybe we should just get rid of the alphabetical list display and
> replace it with a tree-like display. That will get rid of the
> LIMIT,OFFSET thing - we can just query for subcategories of a
> category, using cur_namespace, cur_id , cl_from and cl_to.

Getting rid of the alphatbetical list is a bad idea, if anything it
would be great if the alphabetical sort was improved so that it would
include uppercase and undercase and special characters together eg: sS?
etc. Creating a tree like content for a tree-like display is a wikipedia
only feature and would detract from its usefullness for wiktionary.

Thanks,
GerardM


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Full nice handbag

body:
Mark Richards wrote:

>Yes, anything verifiable and factual should. 'Notable'
>is just someones POV about what they think is
>important.
>
>
I think you inclusionist folks severely underestimate just how much
ridiculous stuff is verifiable and factual.  I could start typing in
entries for everyone who died in Atlanta each die, using the obituary
section of the local newspaper as a source, and these are verifiable and
factual.  There are plenty of "human interest" stories published in the
paper, like "family dog  saves baby from drowning!".  These are
verifiable and factual (verifiable in the newspaper's archives), but not
notable.  Etc.

-Mark


from_name: Erik Moeller

subject: [Foundation-l] Wikinews licensing

body:
NSK-
>> (my personal favorite, the public domain, has relatively little support).

> I am very interested in learning more about your reasoning on public domain
> and why it's your favourite. If you have enough time, please give me some
> reasons why a site admin should allow wikiauthors to choose public domain
> for their contributions. If you wanted to make me support PD, what would you
> tell me?

Two reasons:
1) It's compatible with everything. Never, ever worry about this crap
again. Ask yourself if you realistically want to go after "infringers".

2) Copyleft requires enforcement, i.e. coercion. I believe this sends the
wrong message, is a bad long-term strategy, and does not reflect well on
our movement. As an opponent of copyright law, I also don't want to give
people the argument that copyleft needs copyright to work.

That said, the differences are often exaggerated, so I don't lead personal
crusades about the issue.

If you want a detailed discussion, you should talk to Jamesday on
irc.freenode.net.

Regards,

Erik


subject: [Foundation-l] Wikinews licensing


from_name: Walter Vermeir

subject: [Wikitech-l] technical contact for the mailings lists

body:
I need some new lists for the dutch wikipedia. I am not successful in getting
responds from User Fire for several weeks. I need a other contact for mailing
lists requests. Who can help?

[[w:gebruiker:walter]]


body:
Sheldon Rampton wrote:

> Why was the Guardian's gambit a "really dumb idea"? And if you think
> it's easy to come up with a better approach, what's your proposal?

People do not like to be told by those in other countries who to vote
for.  This is a fairly universal phenomenon: I guarantee that if some
non-Greek newspaper set up a letter-writing campaign to Greeks
supporting a particular side in their elections, the other side would
gain a boost in support.  (Possibly a Cypriot paper could get away with
this, but not beyond that.)

If I were an undecided voter, wavering between Bush and Kerry, and I
received a letter such as the following (an actual example):

"First of all, if you back Kerry, you will be voting against a savage
militaristic foreign policy of pre-emptive killing which has stained the
great name of the US so hideously in recent times."

I can't imagine this would make me actually more likely to vote for
Kerry.  It would make me wonder why the person writing to me could not
have laid out some more reasoned arguments, but it will not really
change my vote.

(And I say all this as a staunch opponent of Bush... if my reaction is
negative, imagine the reaction of *actual* undecided voters...)

-Mark


from_name: Matt Brown

body:
On Thu, 28 Oct 2004 08:09:17 -0700, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
> Charles Matthews wrote:
>
> More to the point is a general antipathy toward advertising of any kind.

What is being discussed, I believe, is not advertising ON wikipedia,
but advertising BY wikipedia?

-Matt


from_name: Rick

subject: [WikiEN-l] Jew Watch

body:
It IS a bannable offense to sign someone else's name to a comment.

RickK

"steven l. rubenstein" <rubenste at ohiou.edu> wrote:
On Oct. 26 UncleBungle made the following contribution to the Jew Watch
talk page:
"I'm not going to start an edit war User:Slrubenstein."
I don't really like other people posting comments to pages in my name. Is
this something I just have to watch out for and delete, or do we have some
policy on this? Clearly it is not at the level of a banable offense -- I
am not even sure if it is enough to ask for mediation. Still, it is wrong
and I wonder if there is some community response. I appreciate any
suggestions/thoughts,

Steve

Steven L. Rubenstein
Associate Professor
Department of Sociology and Anthropology
Bentley Annex
Ohio University
Athens, Ohio 45701
_______________________________________________
WikiEN-l mailing list
WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

__________________________________________________
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http://mail.yahoo.com


body:
Just for the record, Australia and South Korea sent troops to Vietnam, so it wasn't the whole world opposed.

RickK

Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:
Ray Saintonge wrote:

> As to Canada's role, there was nothing to apologize for. If a draft
> were reinstituted we should certainly be open to accepting refugees
> from it.

Oh, I don't disagree. I was just pointing it out as a particularly
striking bit of evidence that the rest of the world wasn't only against
the US war in Vietnam, but so actively against it as to be willing to
take whatever legal means they had at their disposal to work against it
(short of sanctions, of course).

As for this war, I seem to recall that at least one Canadian court has
ruled the opposite---that regardless of the legality of the initial
invasion, since the current occupation is sanctioned by a UN Security
Council resolution, it's not illegal and therefore those avoiding it are
not elegible for refugee status. (Of course, Canadian refugee laws may
have also changed in the past 30 years.)

-Mark

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

---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail - Helps protect you from nasty viruses.


body:
The Guardian published several profanity-filled letters in response to their silly campaign.  Were they so naive as to think that anybody, including Americans, would be open to having people from other countries lecturing them about whom to vote for?

'RickK

Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:
Sheldon Rampton wrote:

> Why was the Guardian's gambit a "really dumb idea"? And if you think
> it's easy to come up with a better approach, what's your proposal?

People do not like to be told by those in other countries who to vote
for. This is a fairly universal phenomenon: I guarantee that if some
non-Greek newspaper set up a letter-writing campaign to Greeks
supporting a particular side in their elections, the other side would
gain a boost in support. (Possibly a Cypriot paper could get away with
this, but not beyond that.)

If I were an undecided voter, wavering between Bush and Kerry, and I
received a letter such as the following (an actual example):

"First of all, if you back Kerry, you will be voting against a savage
militaristic foreign policy of pre-emptive killing which has stained the
great name of the US so hideously in recent times."

I can't imagine this would make me actually more likely to vote for
Kerry. It would make me wonder why the person writing to me could not
have laid out some more reasoned arguments, but it will not really
change my vote.

(And I say all this as a staunch opponent of Bush... if my reaction is
negative, imagine the reaction of *actual* undecided voters...)

-Mark

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

---------------------------------
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Yahoo! Mail Address AutoComplete - You start. We finish.


from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] LDAP Authentication

body:
On Oct 28, 2004, at 1:52 PM, Lane, Ryan wrote:
> I have added LDAP authentication to MediaWiki. Unfortunately, I'm not
> sure
> where to go to get the newest unstable cvs version of the software, so
> I
> have added it to the 1.3.7 version.

You can pull from Sourceforge's anonymous CVS server, which is up to
about half a day behind, or another mirror one of our devs has set up
which update more frequently. See:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki_from_CVS

It's probably best to attach patches to enhancement bug records on our
bugzilla at http://bugzilla.wikipedia.org/ rather than posting them to
the list; e-mail formatting can break lines and other lovely things.

I'd recommend to always use the -u option to diff, also; it makes the
diff easier to read and it can be applied more reliably to modified
files.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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from_name: Mikhail Abraham

subject: [Wikitech-l] Uploading MIDI files

body:
I have been directed by User:IMSoP to contact this mailing list in regards
to uploading MIDI files for use on wikipedia. See:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Sound#Trying_to_upload_MIDIs

At least two wikipedians (including myself) would like to be able to add and
use MIDI files on wikipedia, as was the capability in the past. We believe
they are a common format and allow for smaller file sizes. It has been
suggested by User:Raul654 that MIDI files are unsuitable because their
performance is unpredictable, and by User:Camembert that they are not
currently allowed for security issues.

I request that someone with the capabilities "modify the file
includes/DefaultSettings.php" as per
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Images_and_other_uploaded_files to allow
the uploading of MIDI files. If this is not possible or unadvisable, I would
request an explination either here or or at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Sound#Trying_to_upload_MIDIs.
That way we can settle the issue and inform the interested parties of the
reasons why.

Thanks,
Mikhail, wikipedia User:Hyacinth

_________________________________________________________________
Get ready for school! Find articles, homework help and more in the Back to
School Guide! http://special.msn.com/network/04backtoschool.armx


body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:

>Sheldon Rampton wrote:
>   In the course of a Canadian Broadcating Corporation program on the US
>election it reported on a survey of whom Canadians would vote for if they
>could.  80% favored Kerry.

Actually, I didn't write this. Someone else did.

--Sheldon Rampton


from_name: Lane, Ryan

subject: [Wikitech-l] LDAP Authentication

body:
I have added LDAP authentication to MediaWiki. Unfortunately, I'm not sure
where to go to get the newest unstable cvs version of the software, so I
have added it to the 1.3.7 version. I'm sure the difference in
includes/SpecialUserLogin.php between the versions isn't great, but can
anyone tell me an easy way to get the latest unstable (through a web browser
preferably)?

I also have a few problems with using LDAP authentication in certain
circumstances, and would like to get some input from the community on them.
First let me describe how i've implemented it:

I've added 6 options to DefaultSettings.php and LocalSettings.php which are
the following when used by an admin:

$wgUseLDAP = true;
$wgLDAPDomainNames = array("testADdomain","testLDAPdomain");
$wgLDAPServerNames =
array("testADdomain"=>"testADserver.example.com","testLDAPdomain"=>"testLDAP
server.example.com testLDAPserver2.example.com");
$wgLDAPSearchStrings = array("testADdomain"=>"TDOMAIN\\USER-NAME",
"testLDAPdomain"=>"cn=USER-NAME,ou=people,dc=example,dc=com");
$wgLDAPUseSSL = true;
$wgLDAPUseLocal = true;

In this example, there are three different domains, one is local, one is an
Active Directory domain, and the other is a normal LDAP domain (Sun
directory server, openLDAP, etc). The user must provide the search string
for a user's distinguished name (USER-NAME is substituted in
SpecialUserLogin.php with the actual user's loginname). Using SSL is
optional (although it is the default) and so is using the local domain
(which is the wiki itself, and is not on by default). Of course, using LDAP
is off by default.

When using LDAP, passwords are not stored in the database (unless users
create accounts on the local domain). Blank passwords are no longer allowed
since we wouldn't want people using the local domain logging in as domain
users.

The interface for logging in is slightly different when using LDAP as well.
Since the LDAP directory will be managing user accounts and passwords, I
have removed the "mail me a new password" button, and the validate password
field (unless $wgLDAPUseLocal is true). I have added a selection box that
will allow users to choose which domain they wish to authenticate against
(in the above example, the options would be "testADdomain",
"testLDAPdomain", and "local").

My problems are not how I have it currently implemented, but with features
that could be added later. For instance, large sites (wikipedia, and the
like) i'm sure do not want to handle user accounts manually; small sites,
and organizations that use it internally probably do. A feature that could
be added to the basic LDAP authentication is the ability for the wiki to add
user accounts and manage passwords like it does currently. The problem with
this is that most LDAP directories cannot work in this fashion. For
instance, if the wiki was to mail a new password to a user, it would need to
change the password on the LDAP directory which would cause the user's old
password to no longer work. Obviously this is a huge DoS situation. Adding
user accounts is less of a problem, but because of time considerations, I
cannot implement it.

Below is my patch (let me know if my formatting is unusable):

DefaultSettings.php (add):

$wgUseLDAP = false;
$wgLDAPDomainNames = array("");
$wgLDAPServerNames = array("");
$wgLDAPSearchStrings = array("");
$wgLDAPUseSSL = true;
$wgLDAPUseLocal = false;

Language.php (add):

'yourdomainname' => 'Your LDAP Domain'
'blankpasswordnotallowed' => 'Blank passwords are not allowed.'

SpecialUserLogin.php (diff old new):

20c20
< 	var $mLoginattempt, $mRemember, $mEmail;
---
> 	var $mLoginattempt, $mRemember, $mEmail, $mDomain;
24a25
> 		$this->mDomain = $request->getVal( 'wpDomain' );
130a132
> 		global $wgUseLDAP, $wgLDAPUseLocal;
137,138c139,140
< 		if ( 0 != strcmp( $this->mPassword, $this->mRetype ) ) {
< 			$this->mainLoginForm( wfMsg( "badretype" ) );
---
> 		if ( "" == $this->mPassword ) {
> 			$this->mainLoginForm( wfMsg(
"blankpasswordnotallowed" ) );
140a143,149
>
> 		if ( !$wgUseLDAP || "local" == $this->mDomain ) {
> 			if ( 0 != strcmp( $this->mPassword, $this->mRetype )
) {
> 				$this->mainLoginForm( wfMsg( "badretype" )
);
> 				return;
> 			}
> 		}
173c182,188
<
---
>
> 		if ( $wgUseLDAP && "local" != $this->mDomain ) {
> 			if ( !$this->ldapBind() ) {
> 				return;
> 			}
> 		}
>
175c190
< 		$u->setPassword( $this->mPassword );
---
> 		if ( !$wgUseLDAP ) { $u->setPassword( $this->mPassword ); }
192c207,208
<
---
> 		global $wgUseLDAP;
>
205,208d220
< 		if (!$u->checkPassword( $this->mPassword )) {
< 			$this->mainLoginForm( wfMsg( "wrongpassword" ) );
< 			return;
< 		}
209a222,231
> 		if ( $wgUseLDAP && "local" != $this->mDomain ) {
> 			if ( !$this->ldapBind() ) {
> 				return;
> 			}
> 		} else {
> 			if (!$u->checkPassword( $this->mPassword || "" ==
$this->mPassword )) {
> 				$this->mainLoginForm( wfMsg( "wrongpassword"
) );
> 				return;
> 			}
> 		}
231a254,297
>
> 	/* private */ function ldapBind()
> 	{
> 		global $wgLDAPDomainNames, $wgLDAPServerNames,
$wgLDAPSearchStrings;
> 		global $wgLDAPUseLocal, $wgLDAPUseSSL;
>
> 		if ( $wgLDAPUseSSL ) {
>                         $serverpre = "ldaps://";
>                 } else {
>                         $serverpre = "ldap://";
>                 }
>
> 		$tmpservers = $wgLDAPServerNames["{$this->mDomain}"];
> 		$tok = strtok($tmpservers, " ");
>                 while ($tok) {
>                         $servers = $servers . " " . $serverpre . $tok;
> 			$tok = strtok(" ");
>                 }
> 		$servers = rtrim($servers);
>
>                 $tmpuserdn = $wgLDAPSearchStrings["{$this->mDomain}"];
>                 $userdn =
str_replace("USER-NAME",$this->mName,$tmpuserdn);
>
>                 $userpass = $this->mPassword;
>                 $ldapconn = @ldap_connect( $servers ) or die( "Could not
connect
> to LDAP server.");
>                 if ( $ldapconn ) {
>                         ldap_set_option( $ldapconn,
LDAP_OPT_PROTOCOL_VERSION, 3
>  );
> 			# Some LDAP Servers will do an anonymous bind if a
> 			# blank password is used, no matter what the
username
> 			# is. To avoid this, it shouldn't be allowed.
>                         if ( "" == $userpass ) {
>                                 $this->mainLoginForm( wfMsg(
"wrongpassword" ) );
>                                 return false;
>                         }
>                         $bind = @ldap_bind( $ldapconn, $userdn, $userpass
);
>                         if (!$bind) {
>                                 $this->mainLoginForm( wfMsg(
"wrongpassword" ) );
>                                 return false;
>                         }
> 			return true;
>                 }
> 	}
323a390
> 		global $wgUseLDAP, $wgLDAPDomainNames, $wgLDAPUseLocal;
328a396
> 		$ydn = wfMsg( "yourdomainname" );
385a454
> 		$encDomain = wfEscapeHTML( $this->mDomain );
413a483,497
> 		if ($wgUseLDAP) {
> 			foreach ($wgLDAPDomainNames as $dom) {
> 				$doms = $doms . "<option>$dom</option>";
> 			}
> 			if ($wgLDAPUseLocal) {
> 				$doms = $doms . "<option>local</option>";
> 			}
> 	$wgOut->addHTML("
$ydn:
>
> 	<select tabindex='9' name=\"wpDomain\" value=\"{$encDomain}\">
> 	$doms
> 	</select>
>
");
> 		}
>
415,416d498
< 			$encRetype = htmlspecialchars( $this->mRetype );
< 			$encEmail = htmlspecialchars( $this->mEmail );
418c500,505
< 	$ypa:
---
> 	$nuo
");
>
>
> 		if (!$wgUseLDAP || $wgLDAPUseLocal) {
> 			$encRetype = htmlspecialchars( $this->mRetype );
> 	$wgOut->addHTML("
$ypa:
422,424c509,513
< 		$nuo

<

< 	$ye:
---
>
");
> 		}
>
> 			$encEmail = htmlspecialchars( $this->mEmail );
>         $wgOut->addHTML("
$ye:
427a517
>
443,445c533,534
<
< 		$wgOut->addHTML("
<

---
>
> 		$wgOut->addHTML("

447c536,538
<
$efl

---
>
$efl
");
> 	if (!wgUseLDAP) {
> 		$wgOut->addHTML("
449,451c540,546
<

< 	</form>\n" );
< 		$wgOut->addHTML( $endText );
---
>
");
> 	} else {
> 		$wgOut->addHTML("
");
> 	}
>
> 	$wgOut->addHtml("
</form>\n" );
> 	$wgOut->addHTML( $endText );

----------------
Ryan Lane
NAVOCEANO


from_name: Angela

subject: [WikiEN-l] Fwd: Regarding Wrong Encyclopedia Entries

body:
This was sent to the board address. Forwarded here since OTRS is down.
Could anyone help to research these points please?

Dear Sir or Madam

Through books and cross-checking information of your
encyclopedia entries:

Swiad Gamsachurdia, writer, president of Georgia
and
Eduard Schewardnadse, USSR foreign minister, dictator

I believe the information given on your site (from
1989 onwards) to be wrong in parts and in other parts
wrongly interpreted. I have no time to go into details
and leave you to research these two entries, also
taking into account non-encyclopedic information.

Yours faithfully

<name removed>

Switzerland


from_name: csherlock at ljh.com.au

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Drive-by deletion

body:
John Lee wrote:
> I disagree. The anon should have explained how it was relevant already,
> through the entry. If the entry shows no sign of notability, it should
> be VfDed.
>
> What frustrates me the most about the current process is the lack of an
> intermediary stage between speedy deletes and VfDs. We get articles
> which are 100% delete on VfD, so having them there is a waste of time,
> processor cycles, whatever. But if we speedy them, then anthony and the
> inclusionist gang whine up our asses to restore them, as deleting them
> wasn't in line with policy. And I agree. I only speedy the real crap,
> the real stuff that is 100% proven unencyclopedic, such as entries made
> up of phrases such as "i do pot", "i am in love with u", "green cheese",
> obvious user tests, etc. (contrary to what many inclusionists have
> claimed, there are *many* articles created everyday which are clearly
> unworthy of inclusion)

Sometimes the ability to say that you have followed through a particular
process and show transparency in decision making is more important than
the importance of the article. Imagine if we didn't do this at all!
Hardly inclusive. So I don't agree that its a waste of time, processor
cycles, etc.

TBSDY


from_name: Andre Engels

subject: [Wikitech-l] How much does Wikimedia cost a day?

body:
On Tue, 26 Oct 2004 17:30:06 -0400, user_Jamesday
<user_jamesday at myrealbox.com> wrote:

> Total to handle being around the 200th most visited English language site according to Alexa is over US$436 per day or US$0.30 per minute. About 21 requests per cent including capital costs but that's misleading long term because eventually we will stop needing to buy so much hardware.

But 'eventually' can be far in the future. I think we will keep
needing to buy more and more for the time being. As long as we keep
growing faster than Moore's law, hardware costs will only increase,
not decrease.

Andre Engels


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Drive-by deletion

body:
NSK wrote:
> On Saturday 23 October 2004 10:54, csherlock at ljh.com.au wrote:
>
>>there was a "You sad bastard" thread that was started on Kuro5hin.org
>
>
> I don't know this thread but if it was something unusual that attracted the
> interest of some people I might be interested to see it. I want to write some
> short articles on unusual online culture. What's the URL?
>

If you like. Search for "You sad bastard" on google. First link is
Kuro5hin. Also see:

http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2004/5/18/13843/3909
http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2003/8/30/74813/7164
http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2004/5/27/8119/68817

It happened from a diary someone posted about Lunix (sorry, Linux).
Someone responded to a post with the message title "You sad bastard"
with the message "You mentioned Linux and sex appeal in the same
sentence." To which I replied with a "You sad bastard." "You mentioned
Linux and sex appeal in the same sentence". This spawned thousands and
thousands of replies. Eventually scoop's database couldn't handle it any
more and refused to show the user's diary. Excellent DoS attack if I do
say so myself.

TBSDY


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Drive-by deletion

body:
NSK wrote:
> On Saturday 23 October 2004 10:54, csherlock at ljh.com.au wrote:
>
>>there was a "You sad bastard" thread that was started on Kuro5hin.org
>
>
> I don't know this thread but if it was something unusual that attracted the
> interest of some people I might be interested to see it. I want to write some
> short articles on unusual online culture. What's the URL?
>

More links:

http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2004/6/5/52136/53976
http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2004/6/21/173532/358

TBSDY


from_name: Ray Saintonge

body:
Delirium wrote:

> Ray Saintonge wrote:
>
>> As to Canada's role, there was nothing to apologize for.  If a draft
>> were reinstituted we should certainly be open to accepting refugees
>> from it.
>
> Oh, I don't disagree.  I was just pointing it out as a particularly
> striking bit of evidence that the rest of the world wasn't only
> against the US war in Vietnam, but so actively against it as to be
> willing to take whatever legal means they had at their disposal to
> work against it (short of sanctions, of course).
>
> As for this war, I seem to recall that at least one Canadian court has
> ruled the opposite---that regardless of the legality of the initial
> invasion, since the current occupation is sanctioned by a UN Security
> Council resolution, it's not illegal and therefore those avoiding it
> are not elegible for refugee status.

I'm not familiar with the case; please give a citation if you have one.
What makes me most doubtful is the time scale since the invasion of
Iraq.  These kinds of cases tend not to be decided very quickly except
perhaps at the lowest judicial level.  I could certainly see people
taking this as far as possible in the courts.  What is the number of the
UN resolution are you referring to?  The resolutions that insisted that
Iraq allow inspectors spoke only of serious consequences in a general
way, and avoided being specific.

> (Of course, Canadian refugee laws may have also changed in the past 30
> years.)

That's another story with a far bigger scope than just Americans who
don't want to go to Iraq.  Every time the government tries to simplify
the process it becomes more complicated.  There is a lot of controversy
involved at many levels, including what to do with those who have
engaged in common criminal activities while waiting for their cases to
be decided, or what to do with otherwise well-behaved women from poor
countries who have had citizen children during their wait but have not
adequately met the criteria for refugees.  Without prejudice to why they
come, Americans, who already speak English and a litigious tradition can
game the system very effectively for a long while.

Ec


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Full nice handbag

body:
Delirium wrote:

> Mark Richards wrote:
>
>> Yes, anything verifiable and factual should. 'Notable'
>> is just someones POV about what they think is
>> important.
>
> I think you inclusionist folks severely underestimate just how much
> ridiculous stuff is verifiable and factual.  I could start typing in
> entries for everyone who died in Atlanta each die, using the obituary
> section of the local newspaper as a source, and these are verifiable
> and factual.  There are plenty of "human interest" stories published
> in the paper, like "family dog  saves baby from drowning!".  These are
> verifiable and factual (verifiable in the newspaper's archives), but
> not notable.

How many instances can you cite of culling obituaries for material, or
family dog stories?  It seems pointless to generate arguments for the
rejection of articles that nobody has written.

Ec


from_name: Mark Richards

subject: [WikiEN-l] Deletion as POV

body:
You're quite right, I unreservedly retract the remark.

I meant to say that the ideas about 'notablity' and
'encyclopedicness' were inconsistant, arbitrary,
damaging and POV.

No disrespect to individuals was intended.

Mark

--- Andrew Lih <andrew.lih at gmail.com> wrote:

> Folks, stop.
>
> I don't care about litigious definitions of what is
> a "personal
> attack." The level of discourse disintegrated when
> the word "stupid"
> was carted out.
>
> Please take this to:
>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Votes_for_deletion
>
> -Andrew (User:Fuzheado) and a WikiEN-L admin
>
>
> On Thu, 28 Oct 2004 18:12:16 -0500, Guanaco
> <guanaco at cox.net> wrote:
> > This is clearly targeting on RickK's ideas about
> deletion, and Mark did
> > not personally attack him in any way.
> >
> > Mark Richards wrote:
> >
> > He is pointing out how stupid and inconsistant
> your
> > ideas of 'notablity' and 'encyclopedic' are.
> >
> > If it had been "He is pointing out how stupid and
> inconsistant you are,"
> > *that* would have been a personal attack.
> >
> > Guanaco
> >
> >
> >
> > Rick wrote:
> >
> > >Calling me stupid isn't a personal attack?
> > >
> > >RickK
> > >
> > >Mark Richards <marich712000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > >I'm sorry Rick, I don't see the personal attack.
> > >
> > >Mark
> > >
> > >--- Rick wrote:
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >>Personal attack by Mark Richards. Who's going to
> be
> > >>the first to jump on the "Mark, you should stop
> > >>making personal attacks" bandwagon? Wanna bet
> not a
> > >>single solitary person? Where's the admin
> > >>suggesting that Mark stop posting about this? I
> > >>refrained for several days, because I was asked
> to,
> > >>but I'm not going to keep refraining when I'm
> the
> > >>subject of attacks like this and NSK's, and
> dont'
> > >>have the right to defend myself, and when Mark
> keeps
> > >>churning out the same arguments.
> > >>
> > >>RickK
> > >>
> > >>Mark Richards wrote:
> > >>
> > >>He is pointing out how stupid and inconsistant
> your
> > >>ideas of 'notablity' and 'encyclopedic' are.
> > >>
> > >>
> > >
> > >
> > >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > WikiEN-l mailing list
> > WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> >
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
> >
>
>
> --
> Andrew Lih
> andrew.lih at gmail.com
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
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body:
Delirium wrote:

> Sheldon Rampton wrote:
>
>> Why was the Guardian's gambit a "really dumb idea"? And if you think
>> it's easy to come up with a better approach, what's your proposal?
>
> People do not like to be told by those in other countries who to vote
> for.  This is a fairly universal phenomenon: I guarantee that if some
> non-Greek newspaper set up a letter-writing campaign to Greeks
> supporting a particular side in their elections, the other side would
> gain a boost in support.  (Possibly a Cypriot paper could get away
> with this, but not beyond that.)
>
> If I were an undecided voter, wavering between Bush and Kerry, and I
> received a letter such as the following (an actual example):
>
> "First of all, if you back Kerry, you will be voting against a savage
> militaristic foreign policy of pre-emptive killing which has stained
> the great name of the US so hideously in recent times."
>
> I can't imagine this would make me actually more likely to vote for
> Kerry.  It would make me wonder why the person writing to me could not
> have laid out some more reasoned arguments, but it will not really
> change my vote.
>
> (And I say all this as a staunch opponent of Bush... if my reaction is
> negative, imagine the reaction of *actual* undecided voters...)

There is still a distinction to be made between what one says, and how
one says it.  We all have friends whose support would make them better
enemies.

U. S. foreign policy has a serious effect on the lives of people in
other countries.  That's reason enough for us to try to influence its
elections.

Ec


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Full nice handbag

body:
Exactly - this is a straw man.
Mark

--- Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:

> Delirium wrote:
>
> > Mark Richards wrote:
> >
> >> Yes, anything verifiable and factual should.
> 'Notable'
> >> is just someones POV about what they think is
> >> important.
> >
> > I think you inclusionist folks severely
> underestimate just how much
> > ridiculous stuff is verifiable and factual.  I
> could start typing in
> > entries for everyone who died in Atlanta each die,
> using the obituary
> > section of the local newspaper as a source, and
> these are verifiable
> > and factual.  There are plenty of "human interest"
> stories published
> > in the paper, like "family dog  saves baby from
> drowning!".  These are
> > verifiable and factual (verifiable in the
> newspaper's archives), but
> > not notable.
>
> How many instances can you cite of culling
> obituaries for material, or
> family dog stories?  It seems pointless to generate
> arguments for the
> rejection of articles that nobody has written.
>
> Ec
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

__________________________________
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Yahoo! Mail Address AutoComplete - You start. We finish.
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from_name: Rebecca

subject: [WikiEN-l] Preliminary Deletion

body:
Since when has this been?

I haven't paid enough attention to this project to judge how I'd vote,
but what on earth gives this the right to be automatically imposed,
instead of being put to a vote, like every other recent major policy
change, such as the failed managed deletion idea?

-- ambi

On Wed, 27 Oct 2004 23:35:10 +0100, James D. Forrester
<james at jdforrester.org> wrote:
> [Evil top-posting and over-quoting counter-surgency attempted ;-)]
>
> On Wednesday, October 27, 2004 11:23 PM, RickK wrote:
>
> > John Lee <johnleemk at gawab.com> wrote:
> >
> > > Sannse suggested to me on IRC that we conduct a trial run of
> > > this policy before a permanent implementation. Do you guys
> > > agree? And if yes, how long would you suggest it should be?
> > >
> > > John Lee
> > > ([[User:Johnleemk]])
> >
> > Has there been a vote?
>
> Err. This is a proposal. First there is a general notice as to whether
> people think it's a good idea, and if no-one objects (in a forum as large as
> this, real consensus is... rare), it is implemented; only if there are any
> direct objections, or there is indirect worry of others' such concerns
> under-represented here, should there be anything as crude and anti-Wiki as
> "a vote". This is known as "the Wiki way". No?
>
> > RickK
>
> [Snip]
>
> Yours,
> --
> James D. Forrester
> Mail: james at jdforrester.org | jon at eh.org | james.forrester at orange.net
>       csvla at dcs.warwick.ac.uk || [[en:User:Jdforrester]] on Wikipedia
> IM  : ICQ:15108888 | MSN:jamesdforrester at hotmail.com | YM:Jdforrester
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: John Lee

subject: [WikiEN-l] Preliminary Deletion

body:
To Rebecca, Rick, and whoever else is interested:

The vote is scheduled for this Friday, beginning at midnight UTC. The
questions are available at [[Wikipedia:Preliminary Deletion/Vote]].
Basically, voters will be asked to judge whether the policy should be
implemented, and whether a trial should be conducted before a permanent
implementation. I'm hoping somebody can provide suggestions on how long
this trial should last so that can be added to the question (I'm
personally considering a three-week to a month long trial).

John Lee
([[User:Johnleemk]])

Rick wrote:

>Has there been a vote?
>
>RickK
>
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] Deletion as POV

body:
Anthony DiPierro wrote:

>>>Rambot articles are of disputable encyclopedicness.
>>>
>>>
>>Places are certainly encyclopedic.
>>
>>
>Places are no more indisputably encyclopedic than schools or people.
>
>
Once more inclusionists impress me with their pedantry. By places, I
generically mean human settlements.

>
>
>>>Articles on years and numbers, and lists are of disputable
>>>
>>>
>encyclopedicness.
>
>
>>Depends on the subject. Most of them are encyclopedic, though (I don't
>>really understand why we need lists now when we have categories, though).
>>
>>
>
>Can you point to a single encyclopedia that has articles on years?  What
>about non-cardinal numbers?  Lists I think are clearly unencyclopedic.
>
>
A definition of "Encyclopedic" should not be based on what other
encyclopedias do. I see no reason why years aren't encyclopedic (shite,
I sound like a darned inclusionist!). What happened in a year is an
encyclopedic topic. Lists, I do agree, they are dubiously encyclopedic,
but depending on their content, they can be good. Maybe a synopsis of
the articles linked to would make it more encyclopedic.

>
>
>>It just means Britannica is paper.   Wikipedia is not. Statistics can be
>>twisted to back any argument. Since Wikipedia is not paper, we can
>>afford more articles.
>>
>>
>Well, encarta isn't.  But that Wikipedia is inherently more inclusive than
>traditional encyclopedias is exactly the point.  Taking a standard like
>"encyclopedic" and applying it on an article by article basis makes no
>sense.  I agree that articles need to be encyclopedic, but to me that's
>about topic, and not about specific instances.  People, schools, companies,
>places, these are topics which are in encyclopedias.  Verbs, adjectives,
>years, non-cardinal numbers, these aren't.
>
>
Encyclopedic is not necessarily "topics most encyclopedias cover". What
happened in a year is certainly encyclopedic; years, lists, etc. are a
matter relating to organisation, not content. Other encyclopedias
organise the information we have differently.

>
>
>>I did not argue for an ignorance about what goes on in VFD; what I was
>>saying is that much of the articles on which there is such heated
>>argument (most common example: schools) are often not as relevant to the
>>creation of an enyclopedia.
>>
>>
>
>Well, that's clearly just your opinion.  Those who are arguing for inclusion
>of these schools obviously don't feel that way.
>
>
They're relevant, but tell me why I should value a school substub more
than a substub about the Prime Minister of Thailand.

>
>
>> Schools are relevant only to the population of a certain area.
>>
>>
>That's more relevant than many of the other articles in an encyclopedia.
>I'm sure I only have to hit "random page" 5 or 6 times before I find
>something just about no one cares about.  But, I mean, should I count "Franz
>Werfel"?  I'd bet my chemistry teacher changed more lives than he did.
>"Hustle is a British TV drama series"?  I mean, more people have heard about
>it, maybe, but has it really affected anyone's life?  I mean, c'mon, you
>agree we should have articles on places.  Those are relevant to just as many
>people as schools.  In fact, one solution to schools other than deletion is
>to merge them with their town and redirect.
>
>
Yes, I agree. I personally have no problem with having school substubs
merged into their town articles.

>And you want to talk about substubs?  Rambot articles have less useful
>information than most school articles.
>
>
Population, maps, location, etc. I'd say most Rambot and school articles
are nearly equal, but the Rambot articles at least contain some relevant
information.

>[[342]].  There's a year I bet gets a ton of hits, from google searches and
>the like.  I mean, I always search on random years when I'm bored.   [[163
>(number)]].  This makes us look good?
>
>
It's a manner of organisation. The information within is encyclopedic.

I think the real debate here is organisation. I don't think school
substubs deserve a separate article - Mark Richards and anthony do. But
we agree that they should be in the encyclopedia. We just disagree over
where they should be.

>
>
>>Obscure mathematical or scientific concepts, or an
>>obscure architect, etc., on the other hand, probably have contributed
>>more to the world than any one school.
>>
>>
>
>Depends on the concept, and on the school.
>
>
Exactly.

>>In short, school articles are nice to have, but higher
>>priority should be given to those who have done things on a
>>global/national/state-level basis.
>>
>>
>
>So now they're nice to have?  Before I thought you said deleting them would
>cause no harm.  Deleting school articles causes two problems.  They remove
>something that's nice to have and they waste time on deletion that could be
>spend improving articles that are in your opinion more important.
>
>
Yes, deleting them will cause no harm. A school article is nice to have,
but if it's a substub, I see no reason for it to have its own article.

>>Having substub school articles makes us look bad.
>>
>>
>Most of the school listings aren't substubs, but if you think substubs make
>us look bad, move them to the talk page until they're finished.
>
>
Better yet, move them to the town article. Often finding third-party
references for towns on the web is easier than doing so for the school,
so you can easily write up something about the town if it doesn't
already have its own article.

>>I doubt that assessment.  If you look through the articles actually on
>>VfD, a relatively small percentage are actually controversial (the
>>school example being one).
>>
>>
>
>If was a rough number, but I think it was if anything a low estimate.  For
>every school we delete, there are 100 others that aren't written for fear
>that they'll just be deleted.  There are hundreds of thousands of schools.
>There are millions of teachers, nearly a million actors, hundreds of
>thousands of movies, etc.  Deletionists are keep *all of these* out of
>Wikipedia.
>
>
I laugh at your exaggerated statement. Movies and actors - if they have
an entry on IMDB, they absolutely should be kept. They are verifiable.
If their articles are deleted, it's a shame. I think few deletionists
would agree with me. Sometimes inclusionists just love giving
deletionists positions they don't hold.

>Anthony
>
>
John Lee
([[User:Johnleemk]])


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Drive-by deletion

body:
But the wastage can be reduced. That's why I've proposed
[[Wikipedia:Preliminary Deletion]].

John Lee
([[User:Johnleemk]])

csherlock at ljh.com.au wrote:

> John Lee wrote:
>
>> I disagree. The anon should have explained how it was relevant
>> already, through the entry. If the entry shows no sign of notability,
>> it should be VfDed.
>>
>> What frustrates me the most about the current process is the lack of
>> an intermediary stage between speedy deletes and VfDs. We get
>> articles which are 100% delete on VfD, so having them there is a
>> waste of time, processor cycles, whatever. But if we speedy them,
>> then anthony and the inclusionist gang whine up our asses to restore
>> them, as deleting them wasn't in line with policy. And I agree. I
>> only speedy the real crap, the real stuff that is 100% proven
>> unencyclopedic, such as entries made up of phrases such as "i do
>> pot", "i am in love with u", "green cheese", obvious user tests, etc.
>> (contrary to what many inclusionists have claimed, there are *many*
>> articles created everyday which are clearly unworthy of inclusion)
>
>
> Sometimes the ability to say that you have followed through a
> particular process and show transparency in decision making is more
> important than the importance of the article. Imagine if we didn't do
> this at all! Hardly inclusive. So I don't agree that its a waste of
> time, processor cycles, etc.
>
> TBSDY


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Full nice handbag

body:
Wow, no inclusionist's jumped on you for that yet? Inclusionists believe
anything *verifiable* should be in an encyclopedia, notability be damned.

John Lee
([[User:Johnleemk]])

csherlock at ljh.com.au wrote:

> Pete/Pcb21 wrote:
>
>> The relentless discussion about deletion that I am just catching up
>> with on this mailing list prompted to review a deletion decision that
>> got on my nerves back in June. "Full nice handbag co" was a pathetic
>> little article about a textile company in Hong Kong. It was never
>> much of an article, but it was real, neutral, factual, verifiable. It
>> was very narrowly VfDed (with a small majority of about 55-60% voting
>> delete) on grounds of non-notability. Following deletion, I objected
>> at VfU - my grounds for undeletion were that the reasons for deletion
>> were so tenuous (see below) and the majority so small that we should
>> have erred on the side of caution and kept the article
>>
>> Notability is extremely subjective. To my mind, a manufacturing
>> company of twelve years standing is more notable than a minor
>> character in a Lord of the Rings book. But others disagree. The VfU
>> eventually failed - both to get the article undeleted and to raise
>> the issues about systematic biases of domain of knowledge of editors
>> affecting deletion.
>>
>> Perhaps I shouldn't have, but I came to the conclusion that I would
>> be helping Wikipedia if I was bold and reinstated the article anyhow.
>> Unfortunately good old RickK got in a right tizz about this. Rick and
>> I have exchanged words that just about stay civil on our talk pages,
>> and Theresa Knott helpfully suggested I come here to the mailing list
>> (a kind of higher court than VfU if you will, and one arena more open
>> to more philosophical/esoteric debates) to see if I want did was
>> reasonable.
>>
>> So here I am, throwing myself open to community opinion,
>>
>> Pcb21
>
>
> Out of interest, exactly why is that article notable? Serious question.
>
> TBSDY


subject: [WikiEN-l] Deletion as POV

references:
<BAY10-DAV20zRPTNZSt00004cdc@hotmail.com>	<4180BDBD.9080603@gawab.com>
	<4180BF0A.20709@runawaynet.com>

body:
Nicholas Knight wrote:

> John Lee wrote:
>
>> Once more inclusionists impress me with their pedantry. By places, I
>> generically mean human settlements.
>
>
> And we could have known this how?

Considering the topic was Rambot articles...

>
>> A definition of "Encyclopedic" should not be based on what other
>
>
> Just what IS your definition of "Encyclopedic"? Defining it by saying
> "X is encyclopedic, Y is not" doesn't count.

Independently verifiable knowledge. This of course, includes schools,
etc., but like I've said, I don't dispute we should keep information on
them. I do dispute them having separate articles when they are not
necessarily well-known on their own.

John Lee
([[User:Johnleemk]])


body:
On Wed, 27 Oct 2004 23:17:28 +0200, Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Arbitration applied directly to validity of articles may be
> interpretated by "arbitration comittee will have the authority to do
> anything it will decide to ensure neutrality or accuracy of articles.
> Anything might be reverting to a specific version or deletion."
>
> In short, I claim that the sentence as written is allowing arbitration
> committee to become a sort of super-editor which has authority to decide
> over the community what is correct from what is not.
>
> I do not recognise this as being acceptable within wikipedia rules, and
> I do not see that as being helpful in any way in our theoretical goal of
> reaching NPOV. Quite the opposite.

Well, very simply speaking, we have to have _some_ way to decide what
an article is going to look like in the case of conflict. There are
various possibilities for that:
* We take the POV of the one who shouts loudest
* We take the POV of the majority of editor
* We take the POV of the person with the longest breath
* We take the POV of the most civil person
* We take the POV of a group of selected editors not involved in the conflict
* and perhaps a number more

Your statement implies that #4 is not a good way to go. I was
wondering which one you _do_ agree with then?

> This said, there are two different groups of people, and each group is
> giving a different interpretation of the sentence. I proposed a new
> sentence to replace, but this does not hide the fact that some users
> indeed *want* an arbitration committee to decide for the community what
> is neutral and accurate in case of dispute, rather than the community
> itself.

The problem with letting 'the community' decide is that 'the
community' does not have an opinion. To get a community decision, you
need to have discussion until everyone agrees, or you have to have a
vote. Voting is considered not a good idea, and getting everyone to
agree is often undoable. So unless you have someone with the authority
to say "The discussion is over, and this is the outcome", community
decision means that the person with the longest breath gets to decide,
or if there is enough breath on both sides, the issue is never going
to be decided.

Andre Engels


from_name: sannse

subject: [WikiEN-l] Jew Watch

body:
steven l. rubenstein wrote:
> On Oct. 26 UncleBungle made the following contribution to the Jew Watch
> talk page:
> "I'm not going to start an edit war User:Slrubenstein."
> I don't really like other people posting comments to pages in my name.
> Is this something I just have to watch out for and delete, or do we have
> some policy on this?  Clearly it is not at the level of a banable
> offense -- I am not even sure if it is enough to ask for mediation.
> Still, it is wrong and I wonder if there is some community response.  I
> appreciate any suggestions/thoughts,
>
> Steve

This is the edit in question:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Talk:Jew_Watch&diff=6882438&oldid=6881953

The talk page guidelines say:

"Don't misrepresent other people: Typing errors, grammar, etc are always
fair game, and remove personal attacks where you can, but don't edit
someone's words to have them say something they don't believe in."

Whether that specifically covers signing as another user isn't clear -
but generally, doing so is considered a Very Bad Thing to say the least.

*However* ... reading the context of the text, I believe that
UncleBungle was actually trying to direct the comment /to/ you, rather
than pretend to /be/ you.  It's just unfortunate that your name was at
the end of the sentence and the style he chose for your name is the same
as you use for your sig (something he may not have realised as your sig
did not appear on the page at the time).  What I think UncleBungle
intended the text to say was something like:

"I'm not going to start an edit war User:Slrubenstein, so I'll discuss
this here... -- UncleBungle"

I'm sure UncleBungle could confirm if my interpretation is correct, but
it looks to me to be a misunderstanding.  He could do with being
reminded to sign his posts too - that would help make things clearer in
itself.

--sannse


from_name: Guanaco

subject: [WikiEN-l] Deletion as POV

body:
This is clearly targeting on RickK's ideas about deletion, and Mark did
not personally attack him in any way.

Mark Richards wrote:

He is pointing out how stupid and inconsistant your
ideas of 'notablity' and 'encyclopedic' are.

If it had been "He is pointing out how stupid and inconsistant you are,"
*that* would have been a personal attack.

Guanaco

Rick wrote:

>Calling me stupid isn't a personal attack?
>
>RickK
>
>Mark Richards <marich712000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>I'm sorry Rick, I don't see the personal attack.
>
>Mark
>
>--- Rick wrote:
>
>
>
>>Personal attack by Mark Richards. Who's going to be
>>the first to jump on the "Mark, you should stop
>>making personal attacks" bandwagon? Wanna bet not a
>>single solitary person? Where's the admin
>>suggesting that Mark stop posting about this? I
>>refrained for several days, because I was asked to,
>>but I'm not going to keep refraining when I'm the
>>subject of attacks like this and NSK's, and dont'
>>have the right to defend myself, and when Mark keeps
>>churning out the same arguments.
>>
>>RickK
>>
>>Mark Richards wrote:
>>
>>He is pointing out how stupid and inconsistant your
>>ideas of 'notablity' and 'encyclopedic' are.
>>
>>
>
>
>


body:
On Thu, 28 Oct 2004 10:15:31 -0600, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
> We do have a way to decide using [[Wikipedia:Neutral point of view]]. All
> significant points or view are to be included in the article. There are fine
> points to be decided, such at how much proportional space viewpoints are to
> be alloted but our policy is quite clear on the main point. Most POV
> disputes are centered around censoring opposing viewpoints and almost all
> POV warriors are in the wrong.

Still, this begs the question of what is a 'significant' point of
view. Also, as you say, there are those finer points. Do we show the
points of view as equals, or do we say "this is what most experts
think, but others say that"? Which is given first, or do we first
state the part that both agree on and only then the opinions? How much
should be written on a certain POV?

And then there are the arguments that aren't about POV at all, but
about inclusion (whether inclusing in Wikipedia as a whole or in a
particular article) or about the way Wikipedia is to look like.

Every day Wikipedia has many of those decisions. In many cases there
is just someone editing the way s/he likes it, and nobody who cares
noticing. In many other cases a short discussion gets to an agreeable
answer. But there still isn't anything to get to answer when it is
not.

Andre Engels


from_name: Phil Sandifer

subject: [WikiEN-l] Jew Watch

body:
I think this was a very misleading description. As I look at the edit
in question, it looks to me as though the statement was meant to be "I
am not going to start an edit war, Slrubenstein." I base this on the
fact that there is substantial amount of text after the "sig" and that
the rest of the text is unsigned, as are most of Bungle's posts.

So I don't think this is bannable, simply because I don't think the
comment was in your name at all.

-Snowspinner

On Oct 28, 2004, at 1:48 PM, Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales wrote:

> steven l. rubenstein wrote:
>> On Oct. 26 UncleBungle made the following contribution to the Jew
>> Watch
>> talk page:
>> "I'm not going to start an edit war User:Slrubenstein."
>> I don't really like other people posting comments to pages in my
>> name.  Is
>> this something I just have to watch out for and delete, or do we have
>> some
>> policy on this?  Clearly it is not at the level of a banable offense
>> -- I
>> am not even sure if it is enough to ask for mediation.
>
> I think it's a bannable offense, without question.  Whether it would
> be sensible to pursue, given how long it takes to get through the
> process, is a different question.  It will depend on the behavior of
> the individual user.
>
> This is the sort of thing where I think a faster process than ArbCom
> would be quite helpful.
>
> --Jimbo
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] Deletion as POV

body:
Regardless, I point out that the personal attacks policy on Wikipedia
does clearly state that, while not a personal attack, calling someone's
ideas stupid is, well, unhelpful.

-Snowspinner

On Oct 28, 2004, at 6:12 PM, Guanaco wrote:

> This is clearly targeting on RickK's ideas about deletion, and Mark did
> not personally attack him in any way.
>
> Mark Richards wrote:
>
> He is pointing out how stupid and inconsistant your
> ideas of 'notablity' and 'encyclopedic' are.
>
> If it had been "He is pointing out how stupid and inconsistant you
> are,"
> *that* would have been a personal attack.
>
> Guanaco
>
> Rick wrote:
>
>> Calling me stupid isn't a personal attack?
>> RickK
>>
>> Mark Richards <marich712000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>> I'm sorry Rick, I don't see the personal attack.
>>
>> Mark
>>
>> --- Rick wrote:
>>
>>
>>> Personal attack by Mark Richards. Who's going to be
>>> the first to jump on the "Mark, you should stop
>>> making personal attacks" bandwagon? Wanna bet not a
>>> single solitary person? Where's the admin
>>> suggesting that Mark stop posting about this? I
>>> refrained for several days, because I was asked to,
>>> but I'm not going to keep refraining when I'm the
>>> subject of attacks like this and NSK's, and dont'
>>> have the right to defend myself, and when Mark keeps
>>> churning out the same arguments.
>>>
>>> RickK
>>>
>>> Mark Richards wrote:
>>>
>>> He is pointing out how stupid and inconsistant your
>>> ideas of 'notablity' and 'encyclopedic' are.
>>>
>>
>>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Sj

subject: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia France

body:
Congratulations on setting up the French association, and to the new
board members!

+Sj+

On Thu, 28 Oct 2004 23:07:43 +0200, Yann Forget <yann at forget-me.net> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> The election took place tonight.
>
> The results are:
> * President: Ryo
> * Secretary: Yann
> * Treasurer: Shaihulud
>
> Thanks to all,
> Yann


subject: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia France


subject: [Wikitech-l] is this a bug?

body:
The problem is I think that when the template is used, the * is not
considered to be at the beginning of the line. This can be solved by
putting an HTML comment in the beginning of the template:

<!-- like this -->
* point 1
* point 2

If this does not work, it is something in the settings in your
MediaWiki, with which I unfortunately have no experience.

Andre Engels

On Wed, 27 Oct 2004 04:26:35 +0300, NSK <nsk2 at wikinerds.org> wrote:
> On Tuesday 26 October 2004 08:21, NSK wrote:
> > for the links, I need to have [http://target.tld LINK].
>
> I discovered that works only on the template itself and not when this template
> is used.
>
> What do I need to do in order to have links there?
>
> Thanks
>
>
>
> --
> NSK
> Admin of http://portal.wikinerds.org
> Project Manager of http://www.nerdypc.org
> Project Manager of http://www.adapedia.org
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>


subject: Lists, was Re: [WikiEN-l] Deletion as POV

body:
For once, I strongly agree with Charles.
I've never understood the "kill-the-index-phenomenon". Lists, like
indexes, are used to find other articles. Occasionally, there'll be a
particularly stupid one, but for the most part, they're extremely
useful.

-- ambi

On Thu, 28 Oct 2004 09:16:59 +0100, Charles Matthews
<charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com> wrote:
> Stan Shebs wrote
>
>
> > Charles Matthews wrote:
> >
> > >
> > >- lists directly help navigation, reducing the count of hyperlinks to the
> > >Main Page
> > >
> > >
> > ?
>
> It is not a metric that is much talked about in relation to WP, I think.
> But it is a basic way of looking at access to pages of a web site: if I
> arrive at the Front Page, and start following hyperlinks, how many times is
> the minimum I need to get to a given page/a typical page/all pages that
> aren't orphans.  A well-designed site has a median value of 4 or 5 at most,
> for this. Therefore I think cutting down on lists, even if their current
> main function is to be on a 'list of lists', is perverse.
>
> You can argue if you like that people can bridge the gaps via categories: if
> they happen to know in advance that this is the right way to find the
> shortest path.  Well, mostly they don't know this.  And I don't think we
> should remove the low-cost bus just because there may be a train on the
> route.  This goes to usability of the site, in particular by those new to
> it.
>
> Charles
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Full nice handbag

body:
Pete/Pcb21 wrote:
> The relentless discussion about deletion that I am just catching up with
> on this mailing list prompted to review a deletion decision that got on
> my nerves back in June. "Full nice handbag co" was a pathetic little
> article about a textile company in Hong Kong. It was never much of an
> article, but it was real, neutral, factual, verifiable. It was very
> narrowly VfDed (with a small majority of about 55-60% voting delete) on
> grounds of non-notability. Following deletion, I objected at VfU - my
> grounds for undeletion were that the reasons for deletion were so
> tenuous (see below) and the majority so small that we should have erred
> on the side of caution and kept the article
>
> Notability is extremely subjective. To my mind, a manufacturing company
> of twelve years standing is more notable than a minor character in a
> Lord of the Rings book. But others disagree. The VfU eventually failed -
> both to get the article undeleted and to raise the issues about
> systematic biases of domain of knowledge of editors affecting deletion.
>
> Perhaps I shouldn't have, but I came to the conclusion that I would be
> helping Wikipedia if I was bold and reinstated the article anyhow.
> Unfortunately good old RickK got in a right tizz about this. Rick and I
> have exchanged words that just about stay civil on our talk pages, and
> Theresa Knott helpfully suggested I come here to the mailing list (a
> kind of higher court than VfU if you will, and one arena more open to
> more philosophical/esoteric debates) to see if I want did was reasonable.
>
> So here I am, throwing myself open to community opinion,
>
> Pcb21

Out of interest, exactly why is that article notable? Serious question.

TBSDY


from_name: Michael Snow

body:
Fred Bauder wrote:

>Selected, non-involved editors?
>
>If they were interested or competent with respect to the subject they would be involved.
>
>
This is hardly the case. Many contributors who are both interested and
competent with respect to particular subjects nevertheless do not edit
pages on those subjects, for a variety of reasons.

1) Based on liability or ethical concerns, professionals in various
fields (doctors, lawyers, etc.) might choose not to edit articles
related to their specialty, so as not to create any relationship with
the reader or potential for malpractice complaints.
2) Contributors who also make a living from their writing might avoid
covering the same subjects on Wikipedia that they cover professionally.
This is true whether they receive income from their writing directly
(why give something away when you can get paid for it?) or are paid by
an employer (in which case the employer might argue that what they write
on the subject is work for hire, and object to having it contributed to
Wikipedia or licensed under the GFDL).
3) People with a distaste for the intense disputes that rage over some
of our more controversial pages may consciously avoid those subjects,
regardless of how interested or competent they may be.

--Michael Snow


subject: [WikiEN-l] Next up : Ubiquiwiki

body:
Slashdot picks up on the Wikibusiness article.
"Wiki, wiki, everywhere, and not a word to write!"

http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/10/28/1952230&threshold=3&tid=95

--
+sj+


subject: [WikiEN-l] Deletion as POV

body:
Not nearly as helpful as a rational and non-inflammatory explanation of
the flaws in the idea.

-Snowspinner

On Oct 28, 2004, at 7:19 PM, NSK wrote:

> On Friday 29 October 2004 02:38, Phil Sandifer wrote:
>> calling someone's ideas stupid is, well, unhelpful.
>
> Sometimes it can be helpful to avoid implementing stupid ideas.
>
> --
> NSK
> Admin of http://portal.wikinerds.org
> Project Manager of http://www.nerdypc.org
> Project Manager of http://www.adapedia.org
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] Deletion as POV

body:
Nicholas Knight wrote:

> John Lee wrote:
>
>> Nicholas Knight wrote:
>>
>>> John Lee wrote:
>>>
>>>> Once more inclusionists impress me with their pedantry. By places,
>>>> I generically mean human settlements.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> And we could have known this how?
>>
>>
>>
>> Considering the topic was Rambot articles...
>
>
> John, seriously, you need to learn to think carefully about what you
> say, because we had *NO WAY* of knowing you wanted "places"
> interpreted only as "human settlements". Describing a human settlement
> as a place is fine, but it doesn't work the other way around. The word
> "place" is not, by any definition I'd ever seen before yours,
> restricted to a human settlement. You are using words in unusual ways
> expecting others to understand, but we can't understand, because we
> aren't mind readers.

Unusual ways? Maybe. I guess it depends on your brain wiring, because
when I refer to articles on places, I tend to think of the articles we
already have, i.e. Rambot articles, not potential articles which don't
necessarily exist yet.

>>> Just what IS your definition of "Encyclopedic"? Defining it by
>>> saying "X is encyclopedic, Y is not" doesn't count.
>>
>>
>>
>> Independently verifiable knowledge. This of course, includes schools,
>> etc., but like I've said, I don't dispute we should keep information
>> on them. I do dispute them having separate articles when they are not
>> necessarily well-known on their own.
>
>
> Then it seems to me it would take about the same amount of effort for
> someone to move a substub to an appropriate parent article and place a
> redirect to that parent article as it does to go through the initial
> VFD song and dance. Certainly *less* effort than it takes to actually
> *get* the article deleted.

That's right. Often VFD is helpful in getting more relevant information,
though. For example, let's say a poorly written article on (this is a
real school) [[Tropicana National Secondary School]] was created. Let's
say the author didn't even mention where the school is located, or just
said "a school in Malaysia". How would the editor concerned know that
the information on this school should go to [[Sunway Damansara]], the
area where this school is located? He probably wouldn't, since that
school doesn't even have its own website. But if he VFDed it, it'd
probably attract my (or someone else who lives in my area - I know at
least one other editor who does) attention, and I'd be able to help him out.

Often substubs at first creation are so vague, you wouldn't know where
to move the information to. VFDing them publicises the fact that "unless
somebody can rewrite this article or show a place where this should be
moved to, it'll probably be deleted", which galvanises action. A lot of
articles that go on VFD and are rewritten probably wouldn't have been if
they were speedied or just left alone.

John Lee
([[User:Johnleemk]])