from_name: MacGyverMagic/Mgm

subject: [WikiEN-l] ATTN: Truthholder

body:
How do posts like these get through to the list?
I don't want my inbox filling up with crap like this.
User talk pages don't usually get locked, so if they did, this user
obviously did something very wrong. I say ignore it until he can talk
without name calling.

Mgm

On 2/15/07, Flame Viper <flameviper12 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> Message: 12
> Date: Thu, 15 Feb 2007 14:19:50 -0600
> From: "Truth Beholder"
> Subject: [WikiEN-l] Fwd: Fascistopedia as Slashdot notes it,
> definitely
> To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> Message-ID:
>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
>
> And now the fascist patrol has locked my page so I can't request unblock,
> how fucking fascist typical of fascistopedia.
>
> Slashdot was right, you're nothing but a bunch of arrogant fascist
> assholes.
>
> Truth Beheld, Wikipedia is a bunch of Fascist Assholes.
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Truth Beholder
> Date: Feb 15, 2007 2:14 PM
> Subject: Fascistopedia as Slashdot notes it, definitely
> To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org
>
> So I followed a slashdot link to an essay on you fascists and to a user
> discussion on your admins noticepage and I noticed one of your bad faith
> people closed the discussion despite people raising questions.
>
> I made a note and went on and was trying to edit wording on the atomic
> energy page when one Theresa Knott comes along and decides to be a fascist
> bitch.
>
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%3AAdministrators%27_noticeboard%2FIncidents&diff=108404754&oldid=108404198
>
>
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:TruthBeholder&action=history
>
> She even goes around lying what she does too, claiming the discussion
> wasn't
> blocked when clearly the note left there by the bad faith admin facsists
> said otherwise.
>
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3ATruthBeholder&diff=108407885&oldid=108406787
>
>
> Wikipedia's just a bunch of lying fascists I see.
>
> TruthBeholder, beholding the truth of the fascistopedia.
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>
>
> End of WikiEN-l Digest, Vol 43, Issue 104
> *****************************************
> Please stop being an asshat. You were blocked because you joined Wikipedia
> and immediately started calling us "fascists" and making a scene.
> If you want someone to agree with you and sympathize with your point of
> view, calling them "fascist assholes" won't help.
>
>
> ---------------------------------
> We won't tell. Get more on shows you hate to love
> (and love to hate): Yahoo! TV's Guilty Pleasures list.
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

subject: [WikiEN-l] Fwd: Fascistopedia as Slashdot notes it, definitely

body:
On 2/15/07, Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 15/02/07, Stan Shebs <stanshebs at earthlink.net> wrote:
> As an idle comment, I saw the best Silly Internet Threat ever on the
> wiki the other day:
>
> "I have found out some of you people's real names. I'm going to report
> you to the IRS and get you audited. Justice will be done, one way or
> another" [paraphrased]
>
> I love the mindset that implies.

If that implies I get to move to the States so the IRS can actually audit
me, I'm all for it.
How much do they tax on 100 euros of savings?

Mgm


list: textbook-l

from_name: Iamunknown

subject: [Textbook-l] Regarding fair use

body:
I really don't want fair use to go totally away, but I agree that it should
be significantly limited. The clause, "Because of our commitment to free
content, this non-free media should not be used when it is reasonably
possible to replace with free media that would serve the same educational
purpose," in Kat Walsh's statement comes to mind. While I have expreseed
concern on-wiki and on-mailing list before about unlicensed images, many
which, if licensed properly, would remained unlicensed and used under fair
use, I think that we should not outright ban unlicensed content used under
fair use. In particular, we should allow very very limited use of non-free
media when it would be practically impossible to use free media -- the media
used in the European History wikibook comes to mind -- and for small textual
quotations. What are everyone else's feelings?

-Iamunknown


from_name: the wub

subject: [WikiEN-l] We're famous!

body:
On 14/02/07, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> http://www.beevnicks.com/d/20070209.html
> http://www.beevnicks.com/d/20070212.html
> http://www.beevnicks.com/d/20070213.html
>
> I can smell the AFD from here ...

Meanwhile in good comics{{POV-statement}}, Cat and Girl had a typically
philosophical strip featuring wp the other day.

http://www.catandgirl.com/view.php?loc=428

"Wikipedia is the uncertainty of knowledge made official"

--
the wub


from_name: geni

subject: [WikiEN-l] Kris Straub PWNZed Wikipedia

body:
On 2/15/07, Parker Peters <parkerpeters1002 at gmail.com> wrote:
> http://www.halfpixel.com/2007/02/15/delete-wikipedia/
>
> But still, you've got to laugh, when the wool is pulled over Wikipedia's
> eyes this easily, no?
>
> Let's see if this gets through, or if the Cabal wants to still try thinking
> that they can stop the truth from being heard

You're slow. yesterdays news:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:AN/I#more_webcomics_stuff

>... for I know there is a Cabal
> now.
>
There are several what of it.

--
geni


from_name: Bryan Derksen

subject: [WikiEN-l] Kris Straub PWNZed Wikipedia

body:
SonOfYoungwood at aol.com wrote:
> I think it proves that certain factions or editors are becoming too
> deletionist.

And how. Just a few days ago someone posted on the talk page of a
webcomic's article that they were interested in doing some cleanup work
on it, including splitting a section on some characters out of the main
article, but they were concerned that it would draw the attention of AfD
and get both the character article and the main article deleted. I was
initially quite annoyed that it has come to this, with editors becoming
hesitant to _make improvements_ for fear of being noticed, but after
checking out the current kerfuffle over webcomics I grudgingly agreed
that the split attempt should be put off for now in favor of a more
careful incremental approach. Some excessive details started getting
trimmed, some references started getting added.

Today I find the article posted on AfD anyway. It's a five-year-old
Keenspot comic that's had two books published and currently ranks #11
out of the 1796 webcomics rated by topwebcomics.com. By the Alexa
rankings it's got about half the readership of Sluggy Freelance. It was
described by the nominator as "yet another non-notable web comic, whose
notability, influence, and appeal seems very limited."

If the article had been just about the printed paper books would this
have ever even been an issue?


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Jim Wilson

subject: [Wikitech-l] Massive Hook Proposal

references:
<45D349F0.1010603@pobox.com>
	<NABBJGECPILFNLFEAPIKKELLKAAA.nickpj@gmail.com>
	<7c2a12e20702150738p12288a0ahade460e2f681a2a8@mail.gmail.com>
	<er47bs$p9k$2@sea.gmane.org>

body:
> Correct me if I'm wrong, but this looks like you're going to instantiate
> the "normal" class if the extension provided an object of the wrong
> class. It would be way more helpful to the extension developer if it
> threw an exception or some sort of error message instead, e.g. "Error:
> ".typeof($objResult)." is not a subclass of ".self::getRealClass() or
> something like that.

You're reading it correctly.  At minimum we should wfDebug something out
(both on success and failure).

Since the new Factory would allow anyone to hijack anything, the failure to
instantiate a custom class may very well constitute an unrecoverable system
error.  Meaning, the system content may become so dependent on the existence
of the extension that it wouldn't make sense not to have it.

This could be the case for an alternate Parser, for example.  If suddenly
(after an upgrade) the alternate Parser were no longer invoked, many pages
could become totally unviewable (or at least severely mangled).

On 2/16/07, Timwi <timwi at gmx.net> wrote:
>
> Simetrical wrote:
> > Might it be a good idea, in these factory functions, to check whether
> > the object returned is an instance of the intended class?  Like, if
> > someone replaces all Title objects with MyTitles that *don't* extend
> > Title, that would cause some havoc, not least as we start adding type
> > hinting.  It's probably best to catch that particular mistake early.
> >
> > So instead of "if ($objResult === NULL)", something like:
> >
> > if (!is_object($objResult) || !is_a($objResult, self::getRealClass()))
> > // must use is_a because instanceof doesn't work with strings
>
> Correct me if I'm wrong, but this looks like you're going to instantiate
> the "normal" class if the extension provided an object of the wrong
> class. It would be way more helpful to the extension developer if it
> threw an exception or some sort of error message instead, e.g. "Error:
> ".typeof($objResult)." is not a subclass of ".self::getRealClass() or
> something like that.
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>


from_name: Phil Boswell

subject: [Wikitech-l] Wikitech-l Digest, Vol 43, Issue 25

body:
Timwi wrote:
>
> Brion Vibber wrote:
>> [blah blah blah]
>> Everybody, please don't bother discussing alternative bold and italic
>> markup. That's not on the table right now.
> thanks for this message. However, please may I cheekishly take the
> liberty to point out that it could have been worded less
> authoritatively?
I was under the impression that Brion is *paid* to give authoritative
answers.

Or have I misunderstood horribly?

HTH HAND
--
Phil
--
View this message in context: http://www.nabble.com/Re%3A-Wikitech-l-Digest%2C-Vol-43%2C-Issue-25-tf3226249.html#a9005243
Sent from the Wikipedia Developers mailing list archive at Nabble.com.


subject: [Wikitech-l]  Tag extension whitespace parsing

body:
There's been some recent discussion in the mediawiki IRC channel about the
Parser's handling of whitespace in tag extension output.  Specifically, if
the output of a tag contains leading whitespace or consecutive newlines,
they are replaced with <pre> blocks and </p><p> combos respectively.

I'm planning to fix this, and I was curious which version(s) would receive
the fix when finished.  Does this qualify as something which would be
backported, or only in the latest release?  Thanks in advance.

-- Jim R. Wilson (jimbojw)


from_name: William Pietri

subject: [WikiEN-l] Short-lived retreat

body:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
>> Then why do we allow people to edit articles at all. Under strict
>> risk/reward analysis, that was the wrong thing to do. Yet by doing the
>> "wrong thing" we have created something quite significant. In my
>> opinion, your assessment of risk/reward is more appropriate to a
>> well-established institution than to a cutting-edge web project.
>>
>
> In what way was it the wrong thing to do? The gain from allowing
> everyone to edit is enormous. The risk is significant, but manageable.
>

I believe his point is that until Wikipedia proved it could work,
allowing everybody to edit was seen as impossible, as way too risky to
work.

I know you don't like to hear it, but to me, as somebody who started
pushing wikis before Wikipedia existed, your arguments against the
possibility of broadening adminship sound regrettably like the arguments
I used to get (and, amazingly, still get) about how open-to-anybody
editing is impossible.

> All decisions should be made by comparing the risk and the reward. The
> difference between a well-established institution and a cutting-edge
> web project is simply one of degree - we are willing to take more risk
> to get the same gain, but no unlimited risk. We still have to balance
> it.

And I think that's the difference in perspective. Is Wikipedia a
well-established institution? Or a cutting-edge web project?

The other day, I went to a BayCHI presentation by the folks at NetFlix.
They are several years older than Wikipedia, their model is much
clearer, and as a publicly traded company with a half-billion dollars in
revenue, they face at least as much scrutiny. You would think that would
put them more toward the well-established end of the spectrum.

However, they're continuously and aggressively experimenting. They view
what they've done so far as a beginning, not an end. They act as a
cutting-edge web project does.

Personally, I think that's the right attitude for Wikipedia as well. Six
years is a fantastic start, but against the 236 years that Britannica's
made it, it's not much at all. I'd like Wikipedia to have the same run.

William


from_name: Jeff Raymond

subject: [WikiEN-l] Kris Straub PWNZed Wikipedia

body:
MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:

> He tricked the real people in this debate because they were simply sloppy in
> handling it.

Sure, but he also proved something - he knows that Wikipedia believes -
falsely - that webcomics aren't "notable," and that he can say anything
about any webcomic and likely get it deleted.
>
> The rules are fine as they are as long as the deleting admin actually
> applies them.

Yeah, but that can't be trusted anymore, either.  Look at how the DRV is
going for it.  Look at how the DRV is going for Gregory Kohs.  It
doesn't matter if the rules are applied properly, it simply matters as
to whether the rules are applied in a way that fits Wikipedia's biases
in some subject areas.

-Jeff

--
Name: Jeff Raymond
E-mail: jeff.raymond at internationalhouseofbacon.com
WWW: http://www.internationalhouseofbacon.com
IM: badlydrawnjeff
Quote: "As the hobbits are going up Mount Doom, the
	Eye of Mordor is being drawn somewhere else."
	- Sen. Rick Santorum on the war in Iraq.


from_name: Rich Holton

subject: [WikiEN-l] Short-lived retreat

body:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
>> I don't think that "this user doesn't need the tools" is ever a valid
>> reason to deny adminship. Trust is a valid criteria. Need is not.
>
> It's the risk/reward thing again. Giving someone the admin bit is
> taking a risk, for that risk to be worth it we need to have a
> reasonable expectation that they'll do something useful with it.
>

Then why do we allow people to edit articles at all. Under strict
risk/reward analysis, that was the wrong thing to do. Yet by doing the
"wrong thing" we have created something quite significant. In my
opinion, your assessment of risk/reward is more appropriate to a
well-established institution than to a cutting-edge web project.

-Rich


from_name: Marc Riddell

subject: [WikiEN-l] Admin burnout

body:
on 2/15/07 4:16 AM, William Pietri at william at scissor.com wrote:

> Some of my work involves getting software development teams to change
> the way they do things. One of the things I've noticed over the years is
> that people who are stressed, frustrated, or overworked are averse to
> change. It can lead to a downward spiral, where nobody has the time to
> improve things so they have more time.

Persons who are stressed are preoccupied with the effects that stress is
having on them, not the source. They are in pain. That?s why it is important
to remove them from the source. You are expecting a person to listen to you
suggesting alternative ways of doing something while they are still occupied
with doing what they know ? it is at least familiar.

Imagine a person driving a car at 70 miles an hour over a road that is very
difficult to navigate, but is familiar to them. You know a different, and
better, route. You want to teach them about that route, but for them to
listen to you they are going to have to take their hands off the steering
wheel while still in motion. They?ve got to pull over to the side of the
road and stop the car. Now they will be in a more receptive frame to listen
to alternatives.

Marc Riddell


from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [WikiEN-l] Admin burnout

body:
William Pietri wrote:

>Ray Saintonge wrote:
>
>
>>What you describe seems like a sign of frustration and siege mentality.
>>[...]
>>Every admin should severely limit the amount of time he spends on admin
>>duties.  Spending a greater proportion of time on what really matters
>>helps maintain a vision of what this is all about.
>>
>>
>Some of my work involves getting software development teams to change
>the way they do things. One of the things I've noticed over the years is
>that people who are stressed, frustrated, or overworked are averse to
>change. It can lead to a downward spiral, where nobody has the time to
>improve things so they have more time.
>
>Could that be a problem in this discussion?
>
>I have a hard time telling how stressed or burnt out the average admin
>is, so this is an actual question, not a rhetorical one.
>
These are good points.  It seems too that these stress factors also
extend to preventing any change that could relieve that stress.  It's a
bit like having inward opening fire-escape doors that can't be opened
because the crowd is pushing so tightly against them.

Your question is a valid one.  How would you suggest that we go about
testing that hypothesis.

Ec


from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] Tag extension whitespace parsing

body:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Jim Wilson wrote:
> There's been some recent discussion in the mediawiki IRC channel about the
> Parser's handling of whitespace in tag extension output.  Specifically, if
> the output of a tag contains leading whitespace or consecutive newlines,
> they are replaced with <pre> blocks and </p><p> combos respectively.

The general problem IIRC is that until the extension block's contents
are replaced it's not necessarily clear whether it should be treated as
a block element or an inline element.

Eg, you may need to wrap a <math> in <p>s but you shouldn't so wrap
something that outputs itself as a <p> or a <pre> or whatever, or you
end up with odd spacing and inconsistent markup.

> I'm planning to fix this, and I was curious which version(s) would receive
> the fix when finished.  Does this qualify as something which would be
> backported, or only in the latest release?  Thanks in advance.

Backporting questions can usually be answered pretty easily:

a) Is it a security fix? no

b) Is it vital for the software to run? no

So, probably no. :)

In particular note that a change to parser behavior is the kind of thing
we really *don't* want to introduce in a preexisting stable branch.

As an example of 'vital' fixes; a bug that causes MediaWiki to fail on a
certain version of MySQL or a certain major web server might have a
decent chance of being backported to the latest release branch if it's
not a large change.

- -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com / brion @ wikimedia.org)
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subject: [WikiEN-l] Requirements for Adminship

body:
on 2/16/07 8:21 AM, Thomas Dalton at thomas.dalton at gmail.com wrote:

> On Wikipedia "consensus" is used to mean "consensus of people that
> decided to express an opinion". We don't hold referendums on policy
> decisions. Every time a proposal for a new system of selecting admins
> has been discussed, it has been rejected. That is a consensus to keep
> things pretty much as they are. It's possible that some new proposal
> might gain approval, but none have so far.

I realize I am straying from the main subject of this thread, but I wanted
to ask a question based on what was said above. When a new proposal (in
whatever area) is presented, how and where is the final decision made as to
whether that proposal becomes policy or not; and who ultimately makes it?

Marc Riddell


from_name: Daniel R. Tobias

subject: [WikiEN-l] We're famous!

body:
On 16 Feb 2007 at 11:10, "Earle Martin" <wikipedia at downlode.org>
wrote:

> Is there any page in the Wikipedia: namespace where we links to
> webcomics featuring WP are collected? If so, shall we start one?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_in_webcomics

--
== Dan ==
Dan's Mail Format Site: http://mailformat.dan.info/
Dan's Web Tips: http://webtips.dan.info/
Dan's Domain Site: http://domains.dan.info/


subject: [WikiEN-l] Admin burnout (deputy admins)

body:
Thomas Dalton wrote:

>>Nieve?  Obsolete Scottish dialect for clenched fist?  Spanish for snow?
>>
>>
>In what way does a sarcastic comment about my spelling make a useful
>contribution to this conversation? It was obvious what I meant.
>Language exists to transfer meaning from one person to another, as
>long as that aim is achieved does the spelling really make any
>difference?
>
It was perfectly obvious that no rational person knew what the fuck you
meant with that collection of letters.  That's why I checked the
dictionary.  Language does indeed serve to transfer meaning from one
person to another.  In this case the aim was not achieved.

Some misspellings are obvious, some are completely misleading, and
others are meaningless nonsense.  Meaningless nonsense may be less
drastic than misleading people, but in either case it is not the
responsibility of the reader to divine your intent.

I can and have frequently made allowances for those with dyslexia or for
whom English is not their native language, and would for other
understandable dysfunctionalities in the use of language.  Perhaps, as
subsequent messages have suggested, you did mean "na?ve".  Recognizing
that would be more appropriate than trying to justify a misspelling.

Ec


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Berto 'd Sera

body:
> Wikimedia already has a longstanding preference not to split Wikipedias
> into separate ones for each dialect, as much as possible.
As you say. AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE. That is, we will try our best to have a
self translating system, if that is not possible because of local political
extremism we will be left with two chances:
1) impose our will over ro.wiki with pure strength
2) have 2 separate wikies

Berto 'd Sera
Personagi dl'ann 2006 per l'arvista american-a Time (tanme tuti vojaotri)
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1569514,00.html

-----Original Message-----
From: wikipedia-l-bounces at lists.wikimedia.org
[mailto:wikipedia-l-bounces at lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Delirium
Sent: Friday, February 16, 2007 12:59 AM
To: wikipedia-l at lists.wikimedia.org
Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] Conspicuous only in its absence (was Moldavian)

Berto 'd Sera wrote:

>Hi!
>
>
>>First of all, the WMF does *not* want to have any content in the Moldovan
>>dialect (Romanian as *spoken* in the historic region of Moldavia, which
>>would currently comprise Eastern part of Romania and Moldova with
>>Transnistria included).
>>
>>
>Right the opposite. ANY encyclopedic content in an ISO recognized entity
(thus including the Moldovan Linguistic Entity) is desirable. It's about the
planet, not about you and your country, in case you ain't clear with it.
>
>
Therefore
nobody would support splitting the English Wikipedia into
American-English and British-English and Australian-English Wikipedias,
and similarly a *lot* of effort was put into keeping the Chinese
Wikipedia from splitting into Simplified and Traditional Chinese
Wikipedias, and efforts to split off a Cantonese Wikipedia have also
been consistently opposed.

-Mark

_______________________________________________
Wikipedia-l mailing list
Wikipedia-l at lists.wikimedia.org
http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l


body:
btw - there's now a bug to track this issue:

http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=8997

(Oh, and I don't drink alcohol - but I'd love an espresso anytime :)

-- Jim

On 2/16/07, Tels <nospam-abuse at bloodgate.com> wrote:
>
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> Moin,
>
> On Friday 16 February 2007 13:38:47 Jim Wilson wrote:
> > There's been some recent discussion in the mediawiki IRC channel about
> > the Parser's handling of whitespace in tag extension output.
> > Specifically, if the output of a tag contains leading whitespace or
> > consecutive newlines, they are replaced with <pre> blocks and </p><p>
> > combos respectively.
> >
> > I'm planning to fix this, and I was curious which version(s) would
> > receive the fix when finished.  Does this qualify as something which
> > would be backported, or only in the latest release?  Thanks in advance.
>
> If you fix this, I owe you a beer.
>
> Tels
>
>
> - --
> Signed on Fri Feb 16 13:58:18 2007 with key 0x93B84C15.
> View my photo gallery: http://bloodgate.com/photos
> PGP key on http://bloodgate.com/tels.asc or per email.
>
> "People who are rather more than six feet tall and nearly as broad
> across the shoulders often have uneventful journeys. People jump out at
> them from behind rocks then say things like, 'Oh. Sorry. I thought you
> were someone else.'" -- Terry Pratchett
>
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>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>


from_name: Ken Arromdee

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Deletions - do we cut a bit of slack for the Third
 World

body:
On Fri, 16 Feb 2007, Brian Salter-Duke wrote:
> Should we, as I suggest there, cut a bit of slack for artciles about
> something in the Third World, or do we just accept the "no reliable
> third party sources for notability" mantra.

This is a special case of a fundamental problem with Wikipedia: the demand
for sources and notability produces a heavy bias towards things which are on
the Internet and can be easily found.

I'd say to accept it, but I'm hard pressed to find a reason to do so other
than IAR.  (Which proves that IAR can apply to *anything*...  how many of
you thought there would ever be a case where it needs to be used to ignore
notability?)


body:
Hi again!

> for each dialect

I also have to remind you that the use of the expressions "Langiage" and
"Dialect" is not going to be an ISO standard anymore, and therefore your
assertion is... 100% political.

Sorry, it's not me making the ISO codes. If you're not happy with ISO, then
you should write to ISO, not to me or to this list.

Also, I'm busy with important things in my life (your mood is not), so I
will not answer anymore on this subject, until there is an interesting
*realistic* position.

Bye
Berto 'd Sera
Personagi dl'ann 2006 per l'arvista american-a Time (tanme tuti vojaotri)
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1569514,00.html

-----Original Message-----
From: wikipedia-l-bounces at lists.wikimedia.org
[mailto:wikipedia-l-bounces at lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Delirium
Sent: Friday, February 16, 2007 12:59 AM
To: wikipedia-l at lists.wikimedia.org
Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] Conspicuous only in its absence (was Moldavian)

Berto 'd Sera wrote:

>Hi!
>
>
>>First of all, the WMF does *not* want to have any content in the Moldovan
>>dialect (Romanian as *spoken* in the historic region of Moldavia, which
>>would currently comprise Eastern part of Romania and Moldova with
>>Transnistria included).
>>
>>
>Right the opposite. ANY encyclopedic content in an ISO recognized entity
(thus including the Moldovan Linguistic Entity) is desirable. It's about the
planet, not about you and your country, in case you ain't clear with it.
>
>
Wikimedia already has a longstanding preference not to split Wikipedias
into separate ones for each dialect, as much as possible.  Therefore
nobody would support splitting the English Wikipedia into
American-English and British-English and Australian-English Wikipedias,
and similarly a *lot* of effort was put into keeping the Chinese
Wikipedia from splitting into Simplified and Traditional Chinese
Wikipedias, and efforts to split off a Cantonese Wikipedia have also
been consistently opposed.

-Mark

_______________________________________________
Wikipedia-l mailing list
Wikipedia-l at lists.wikimedia.org
http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l


from_name: Guy Chapman aka JzG

subject: [WikiEN-l] ATTN: Truthholder

body:
On Fri, 16 Feb 2007 00:45:27 +0100, "MacGyverMagic/Mgm"
<macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote:

>User talk pages don't usually get locked, so if they did, this user
>obviously did something very wrong. I say ignore it until he can talk
>without name calling.

What problem cold there possibly be with the edits of a foul-mouthed
aggressive inarticulate bigot?  Oh, wait...

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


from_name: Samuel L Bronkowitz

subject:
[WikiEN-l] I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by
	JPGordon

body:
Hello,

I've been editing Wikipedia for quite a while, but decided to make an
account recently and signed up. I continued my normal editing (mostly typo
and fixes on random articles, which seems to be a way to find a lot of your
mistakes) but noticed a problem on the Administrators' Noticeboard and left
my opinion there.

A user included me in a CheckUser for speaking up on the issue. They accused
the user PSPMario, who seems to have edited only on the Playstation 3 and
Playstation Portable articles, of being a sockpuppet of someone after he
reported two users he suspected of being a sockpuppet.

I find it a very bad precedent to immediately accuse someone of being a
sockpuppet, for trying to report a potential problem themselves. I find this
equally problematic to say that "identical additions of info" happen when we
give users the tools in difference comparison to easily copy content from an
earlier edit to a later edit. PSPMario says he was replacing something he
saw that was missing when he returned to the page, and I believe him,
because there is no reason for me not to believe him.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#I_think_I_see_a_sockpuppet

The result of the Checkuser came back as "likely."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/RunedChozo

I am not sure what this means. I know I am no sockpuppet, and given the
writing style of PSPMario, I am reasonably certain he is not a sockpuppet
either.

I do not know when we started using weasel words for CheckUser, which ought
to be a yes or no answer, but this sets a very bad precedent for abuse of
the CheckUser system. Additionally, we have users trying to get everyone
they can blocked, no matter what their edits or edit history, based on the
results of weasel-worded RFCU postings.

This situation is a detriment to Wikipedia.

Thank you for your time.


body:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Jim Wilson wrote:
> Thanks Brion,
>
>> Eg, you may need to wrap a <math> in <p>s but you shouldn't so wrap
>> something that outputs itself as a <p> or a <pre> or whatever, or you
>> end up with odd spacing and inconsistent markup.
>
> Do you happen to know where in the Parser (trunk) this decision is made?

IIRC you want to start hacking around doBlockLevels().

- -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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Version: GnuPG v1.4.2.2 (Darwin)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFF1e5nwRnhpk1wk44RAjb2AJ9lz9C69PSXJ7WScB8BnrkrBfHFlgCfYL3p
kl8qAq5X6FziQ/0fvRPgf0Y=
=PzRJ
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Conspicuous only in its absence (was Moldavian)

body:
Hi again!

Sorry for the previous mail about "moods". Everyday I have a number of
stupid sophistic emails from a person using a nick similar to yours and I
was pretty upset by the fact that "you" had made it thru my spam filter by
writing direct to the list.

It was just a similar nick and the same boring subject, in the end :) Thank
God I check email addresses before deleting them.

Berto 'd Sera
Personagi dl'ann 2006 per l'arvista american-a Time (tanme tuti vojaotri)
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1569514,00.html


from_name: Brian Salter-Duke

subject: [WikiEN-l] Deletions - do we cut a bit of slack for the Third World

body:
Please take a look at:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Kathmandu_University_High_School_%28second_nomination%29#.5B.5BKathmandu_University_High_School.7CKathmandu_University_High_School_.28second_nomination.29.5D.5D

Should we, as I suggest there, cut a bit of slack for artciles about
something in the Third World, or do we just accept the "no reliable
third party sources for notability" mantra. It is just a stub and the
information seems well supported by the external link to the School
site. Not perfect, I agree, but I do not suppose Kadmandu newspapers are
searched by Google and that is not perfect either. I would welcome views
in general on this sort of thing, without asking any of you to intervene
in that discussion for deletion.

Brian

--
          Brian Salter-Duke            b_duke at bigpond.net.au
               [[User:Bduke]]  mainly on en:Wikipedia.
           Also on fr: Wikipedia, Meta-Wiki and Wikiversity


subject: [WikiEN-l] Limited Sysop

body:
Guettarda wrote:

>On 2/15/07, Gary Kirk <gary.kirk at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>>I don't agree with users who don't have sysop- or above (in the
>>'hierarchy') level access viewing deleted revisions.
>>
>>How many users would have this permission, and how would they get it?
>>Autoconfirm-style number of good edits  + time on project = 'editor'
>>level?
>>
>>
>I am inclined to agree with Gary.  If the bar for adminship has been raised
>too high, then lets do something to lower it - but having a discussion here
>isn't the way to do it.  It needs to be among the regular RFA voters, and
>there needs to be some sort of broad consensus of what adminship should be.
>Coming up with a new status won't help - unless there is broad consensus,
>the same people are likely to vote in the same way they do now.
>
>The "standards" for admins isn't something that can be changed top-down.  It
>has developed in a bottom-up fashion in the community.  The only way to
>change it is to change opinions in a bottom-up manner
>
I can understand where someone active in the RfA process would want
policy revision discussions in a place that would primarily attract
those who would support the status quo.  This is consistent with having
winning as a superior goal to getting things right.  The discussions on
this mailing list are much less favorable to the status quo.  Broad
consensus requires a broad base.  Although I have never asked to be an
admin on this project, this does not mean that I never considered the
possibility.  When  I first did consider this one of the requirements
for being an admin was to join the mailing list.  Admittedly, given our
large niumber of admins, this would no longer be practical.

I do not consider familiarity with a lot of rules for dealing with
problem people to be essential to an admins job.  Not everyone who wants
to be an admin wants to spend his time shovelling that kind of muck.
Some will indeed use the new tools in very limited circumstances to
improve an area of interest where there will be a perfectly happy
consesnsus to delete certain articles in favour of others, and they will
do it without recourse to some kind of general list dimninated by those
who have neither interest in nor understanding of the subject.  There
are other possibilities that are not some kind of police work.

Sometimes the most depressing thing about democracy (which, as has been
repeatedly stated, Wikipedia is not) is watching it in action.  It so
often ignores the fundamental principles for why it exists in the first
place, and becomes paralyzed because of that.  I do not hide nor make
any apologies for my clearly leftish political sentiments, and yet I can
find more common cause with some of the right wingers around here about
the governance and future of Wikipedia than I can with some of those who
purport to want a more democratic system.

We haven't yet figured out how to make broad consensus scale, and until
we do (probably not in my lifetime) we still need leadership.  This may
sometimes seem to be a top down construct, but the enemy on the other
side is stagnation.  Consensus is not achieved by moving the discussion
into a forum where your view will prevail.  The wise leader will always
leave open the possibility that he may be in error, and as a consequence
will take his actions with that in mind.

You say that changes should be brought about from the bottom up.
Philosophically I agree, but at some point life has to go on.  Saying
that decisions need to be made from the bottom up does not alone succeed
in bringing about those changes, because there will always be new
objections.

Could we start perhaps, when we speak of "coming up with a new status",
stop using the word "status", and think in terms of "privilege"?

Ec


subject: [WikiEN-l] An idea for deletions

body:
Thomas Dalton wrote:

>>>I have a worrying feeling that would be spammed by nonsense requests
>>>too often to be useful...
>>>
>>>
>>Dude. AGF. Or at least "Give it a chance".
>>
>>
>AGF has nothing to do with it. AGF means giving people the benefit of
>the doubt, not giving proposals the benefit of the doubt - a proposal
>doesn't have faith, good or bad.
>
Proposals come from people.

Ec


subject: [WikiEN-l] Your comments on wikien-l regarding adminship

body:
Timwi wrote:

>Luna wrote:
>
>
>>>There is no reason to
>>>believe that Wikipedia has now reached a perfect state and requires no
>>>further changes to the way it works.
>>>
>>>
>>True, but that doesn't even come close to implying that this particular
>>crazy idea should be implemented.
>>
>>
>You are right; however, it *does* refute the previous argument that
>tried to justify that it "should not" be implemented.
>
>The reason it should be implemented is because nobody can currently know
>whether it will work better than the current situation or not because
>no-one's tried it before. If it doesn't work out, we can still go back
>to the old system, but then we'll at least *know* that it didn't work
>and can address whatever problems came up. I have given several ideas
>why I think it might work, and why the proposal addresses existing problems.
>
That's why I suggested a random sample of 100 - subject only to some
fairly low level conditions that indicate a willingness to stick around,
and no obvious signs of dementia.  Track that 100 for three months to
see what happens.  Also track the 100 most recent RfA appointments and
compare the statistics for the two groups.  Why should anybody object to
controlled results?

>>What's the line of defense when somebody lines up 20-30 admin socks,
>>blocking and desysopping everyone in sight, resysopping each other and
>>retaliating when anyone tries to stop them?
>>
>>
>Surely this is the same old argument that also says that wikis can't
>work because anyone could rack up 20-30 socks and keep reverting their
>favourite articles to their favourite biased version.
>
>If you let more people be admins, there *will be* enough admins around
>to block 20-30 misbehaving accounts. Notice that if one of them gets
>blocked (desysopped) for good reason, one of the socks resysopping him
>would also qualify as misbehaving; eventually all of the socks will be
>blocked (desysopped). Vandals will soon realise that it is not worth it,
>and after a short initial rage, people will stop even attempting to
>create 30 sockpuppet accounts.
>
The idea that there could be 30 sockpuppets in a random sample of 100
users is out of touch with reality.

Ec


from_name: Steve Bennett

subject: [WikiEN-l] Main & Sub Categories

body:
On 2/16/07, Marc Riddell <michaeldavid86 at comcast.net> wrote:
> appears in that Category, but not in the Category: Cancer deaths. Shouldn't
> he appear in this Category also since cancer is what he died from? It seems
> the only way to accomplish this is to include both Categories in his
> Article. However, when I have done this in the past, in other similar
> situations, I have gotten a whole lot of grief. What gives?

This discussion pretty well summarises a perennial problem with
categories. There are two choices: Put the article in the broad
category and its subcategory, or just in the subcategory.

Problems with putting it in both categories: The broad category can
get unmanageably large and impossible to navigate.
Problems with putting in just the subcategory: There is no software
support to retrieve the set of all articles in all subcats and the
broad category. There is also no sufficiently tight definitino of
"subcategory" to distinguish between true (taxonomic) subcategories
and rough (thematic) subcategories. A lung cancer death is truly a
cancer death. But someone born in Strasbourg is not truly someone born
in France[1] (and there are much better examples than this).

Steve
[1] IIRC, Strasbourg has previously been part of Germany, so you can't
assume that a Strasbourgeois was actually born in France.


subject: [Wikitech-l] Exporting sections of pages

body:
On 2/16/07, Jay R. Ashworth <jra at baylink.com> wrote:
> There was a fairly extensive discussion on this list a couple weeks ago
> -- which I thought you had participated in -- about microformats (I
> think the buzzword was) which amounted to "custom-made attributed to
> HTML tags which would be usable for semantic extraction, but ignored by
> browsers".

I'm sure I've never heard that term before, but fortunately
[[Microformats]] got me up to speed. (Is there anything Wikipedia
can't do :))

> This topic, and the approach you and I forsee, is sort of an offshoot
> thereof...

I guess. What would the syntax look like to the user?

Steve


subject: [WikiEN-l] Main & Sub Categories

body:
On 2/16/07, Marc Riddell <michaeldavid86 at comcast.net> wrote:
> Excellent assessment, Steve. The question, for me, remains is software
> support to retrieve the set of all articles in all subcats and the
> broad category being developed? I sincerely hope so.

I believe there are some extensions and some hacks around that allow
this kind of thing. Nothing planned in the main branch of MediaWiki
that I've heard of, but that doesn't stop anyone writing it. But the
lack of a way of distinguishing tight subcat relationships from
general ones places limits on how effective this can be. Currently
there's nothing stopping a category including itself indirectly as a
subcategory.

Steve


subject: [WikiEN-l] ATTN: Truthholder

body:
On 2/16/07, MacGyverMagic/Mgm <macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote:
> How do posts like these get through to the list?
> I don't want my inbox filling up with crap like this.
> User talk pages don't usually get locked, so if they did, this user
> obviously did something very wrong. I say ignore it until he can talk
> without name calling.

He's on moderation now. Wikipedia Airlines apologises for any stomach
upsets that may have occurred.

Steve


body:
Thanks Brion,

> Eg, you may need to wrap a <math> in
s but you shouldn't so wrap
> something that outputs itself as a
 or a
 or whatever, or you
> end up with odd spacing and inconsistent markup.

Do you happen to know where in the Parser (trunk) this decision is made?

On 2/16/07, Brion Vibber <brion at pobox.com> wrote:
>
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> Jim Wilson wrote:
> > There's been some recent discussion in the mediawiki IRC channel about
> the
> > Parser's handling of whitespace in tag extension output.  Specifically,
> if
> > the output of a tag contains leading whitespace or consecutive newlines,
> > they are replaced with
 blocks and

 combos respectively.
>
> The general problem IIRC is that until the extension block's contents
> are replaced it's not necessarily clear whether it should be treated as
> a block element or an inline element.
>
> Eg, you may need to wrap a <math> in
s but you shouldn't so wrap
> something that outputs itself as a
 or a
 or whatever, or you
> end up with odd spacing and inconsistent markup.
>
> > I'm planning to fix this, and I was curious which version(s) would
> receive
> > the fix when finished.  Does this qualify as something which would be
> > backported, or only in the latest release?  Thanks in advance.
>
> Backporting questions can usually be answered pretty easily:
>
> a) Is it a security fix? no
>
> b) Is it vital for the software to run? no
>
> So, probably no. :)
>
> In particular note that a change to parser behavior is the kind of thing
> we really *don't* want to introduce in a preexisting stable branch.
>
>
> As an example of 'vital' fixes; a bug that causes MediaWiki to fail on a
> certain version of MySQL or a certain major web server might have a
> decent chance of being backported to the latest release branch if it's
> not a large change.
>
> - -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com / brion @ wikimedia.org)
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
> Version: GnuPG v1.4.2.2 (Darwin)
> Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org
>
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> sGqN/YMkmw4MQaF71plviwY=
> =A6pj
> -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>


from_name: Mark Ryan

subject: [WikiEN-l] Kris Straub PWNZed Wikipedia

body:
On 16/02/07, Parker Peters <parkerpeters1002 at gmail.com> wrote:
> Let's see if this gets through, or if the Cabal wants to still try thinking
> that they can stop the truth from being heard... for I know there is a Cabal
> now.

No, it's just some concerned people who make a judgment call and come
to the conclusion that the majority of people who read the list aren't
interested in hearing about your physical health or your LiveJournal.

~Mark Ryan


subject: [WikiEN-l] Short-lived retreat

body:
On 2/16/07, zetawoof <zetawoof at gmail.com> wrote:
> > The problem is that there are two different fields of Wikipedia work: Editing and maintenance. Editing is the general writing and improvement of articles, citing, cleanup, categorisation, etc...
>
> None of which require an admin bit.

Categorisation is easier with an admin bit: you can rename and delete
categories.
Cleanup is easier with an admin bit: you can speedy delete bad articles.
Improvement of articles may be easier with an admin bit: you can
rename all articles, merge histories and so forth.

Steve


from_name: Earle Martin

subject: [WikiEN-l] We're famous!

body:
On 16/02/07, the wub <thewub.wiki at googlemail.com> wrote:
> Meanwhile in good comics{{POV-statement}}, Cat and Girl had a typically
> philosophical strip featuring wp the other day.

Is there any page in the Wikipedia: namespace where we links to
webcomics featuring WP are collected? If so, shall we start one?

--
Earle Martin
            http://downlode.org/
http://purl.org/net/earlemartin/


subject: [WikiEN-l] In hospital

body:
On 16/02/07, Sean Black <smblac at gmail.com> wrote:
> If it's too much to work to moderate a mailing list, maybe you shouldn't be
> doing that. I'm not going to say that all the moderators are just lazy and
> not really doing their jobs, because that's terribly unfair, and I'm sure
> there's a lot of work to be done. But instead of giving a reasonable
> explanation and saying that we're just supposed to accept completely idiotic
> junk posted to this list isn't fair. Moderators are supposed to, you know,
> *moderate*.
>
> ~~sean

The message in question was let through by one of the list admins by
mistake. It looked relatively alright, but turned out to be off-topic.
Human error. We'd already established this in private, and I figured
it would be best to just let the thread die through lack of responses,
but people jumping up and down and complaining about the terrible
moderation job we are doing have made that impossible.

And what's with the ridiculous assertions that we're not moderating?
Do you have access to the moderation queue or something? This user has
had 10 emails approved and 9 rejected.

~Mark Ryan


body:
On 2/16/07, Brion Vibber <brion at pobox.com> wrote:
> Everybody, please don't bother discussing alternative bold and italic
> markup. That's not on the table right now.

Which was my original question: has it absolutely been ruled out. Answer: yes.

Thanks,
Steve


subject: [WikiEN-l] Kris Straub PWNZed Wikipedia

body:
On Fri, 16 Feb 2007 11:34:00 +0200, Bogdan Giusca <liste at dapyx.com>
wrote:

>Exactly. Reliable sources suck! For web content, we should have less
>strict standards and allow regular blogs and forum/usenet posts as
>sources!

Nope.  What we should do is assess sources according to - well, their
reliability.  A random blogger is not reliable.  A politically
opinionated blog is often not reliable.  Some blogs are reliable for
some things and not for others.  Blogs are ephemeral, and often
someone will post an error then correct it in a subsequent posting.

If the sole sources for an article are blogs, I would say that is
prima facie evidence that the subject is not encyclopaedic.  I have
little problem with a blog traceable to an identified authority being
used as a source for individual facts.

However, if there are no substantial independent secondary sources -
meaning profiles of the subject in the news media and the like - then
we can't have an article because without sources of independent
critical review we can't verify neutrality.  Plus it's likely
ephemera, take it to Cruftpedia :-)

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


from_name: Bogdan Giusca

subject: [WikiEN-l] Kris Straub PWNZed Wikipedia

body:
Friday, February 16, 2007, 3:48:59 AM, Jeff wrote:

>> I think it proves that certain factions or editors are becoming too
>> deletionist.

> The sooner we start making RS subject-specific the better.  This
> nonsense has got to stop.

Exactly. Reliable sources suck! For web content, we should have less
strict standards and allow regular blogs and forum/usenet posts as
sources!

PS: I can't wait for the policy to change, in order to start writing
a few articles about me and my blog, referencing them from the blogs
of my friends and family.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Short-lived retreat

body:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
>> I believe his point is that until Wikipedia proved it could work,
>> allowing everybody to edit was seen as impossible, as way too risky to
>> work.
>>
>> I know you don't like to hear it, but to me, as somebody who started
>> pushing wikis before Wikipedia existed, your arguments against the
>> possibility of broadening adminship sound regrettably like the arguments
>> I used to get (and, amazingly, still get) about how open-to-anybody
>> editing is impossible.
>>
>
> I understand what you're saying, but I think I've found the flaw in
> your argument. You are saying that Wikipedia has proven all the people
> that said a wiki could never work wrong - I'm not sure that's the
> case.
>
> Wikipedia has shown that a pure wiki doesn't work (beyond a certain
> size). We've had to introduce blocks and protection, both of which go
> against the idea of a wiki. We've compromised, and as such have
> managed to make a viable website.
>

Well, actually, I don't think that was my point. My point was about the
right attitude to risk.

I'm not sure there ever was such a thing as a "pure wiki" in the way
that you describe it. Ward, after all, had root and wasn't afraid to use
it; he's a pretty pragmatic guy. Regardless, that sort of idealistic
purity is not something I've argued for or am arguing for here.

Just to be clear, I agree that having some number of trusted people with
some limited set of special powers is probably necessary. And I agree
that some of the various proposals are unlikely to work as offered. But
I'm not particularly focused on any of them.

My point is that the particular solution we have now is unlikely to be
the right one for the next couple of hundred years, and I don't think
it's even a great one for the next year. Given the necessity of change,
I'm concerned about attitudes and arguments that seem to apply more or
less equally against any sort of innovation.

Maybe that's not how you're intending to come across. However, in
describing Wikipedia as a "well-established institution", in claiming
"our aim is to reduce risk to the minimum
possible," and arguing against proposed changes without offering
alternatives or constructive criticism, that's the impression I'm getting.

> There have been multiple requests for evidence that opening up
> adminship won't work - pre-admin Wikipedia is that evidence. It didn't
> work, and that's why admins were created in the first place.
>

I think that's evidence that getting rid of admins won't work. I agree,
and I don't think anybody is advocating that. But it's not proof that
opening up adminship to any degree along the spectrum won't work.

Did you happen to see this bit on semi-protection?

http://blog.jimmywales.com/index.php/archives/2006/06/17/the-new-york-times-gets-it-exactly-backwards/

I think this is the right spirit to bring to these discussions on
administrative power, not just editing power. If we're looking for a
direction to move in, I think the default bias should be to seek more
openness, and that we should move in more closed directions only with
reluctance and a sense of (hopefully temporary) defeat.

William


from_name: David Ashby

subject: [WikiEN-l] We're famous!

body:
One more for the pile: http://www.achewood.com/index.php?date=02152007

and let's see if it exists: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray's_Urine

-david


body:
I wish to update my earlier message; the two users who filed this CheckUser
request are now spending quite a bit of time making false charges at me at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#How_RunedChozo_was_and_should_be_handled,
and a third has jumped in who is just making accusations over and
over.

I find this highly unfair, as I have no relation to any of this or the pages
in question beyond my stated opinion that administrator and editor
misbehavior has occurred and that the case's resolution was not conducted in
proper respect for policy and civility.

User JKelly has now acted on these false accusations and banned me from
editing, as well as defacing my user page with a Scarlet Letter harassment
token.

You can see my edit history for yourself. I have not done anything bad to
warrant this kind of abuse, yet I have received it from multiple users and
at least one trigger-happy administrator now, as well as one administrator
willing to completely misrepresent CheckUser results.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/CountPointercount

This comment was left, but I'm now unable to respond in my own defense
thanks to the abuse by JKelly.
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%3AAdministrators%27_noticeboard%2FIncidents&diff=108647990&oldid=108647687

This is blatantly unfair practice. Since JKelly and other abusive
administrators and editors are more than willing to behave in this manner, I
have no choice but to come here for redress.

Thank you for your time.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Samuel L Bronkowitz <countpointercount at gmail.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2007 9:48 AM
Subject: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by JPGordon
To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org

Hello,

I've been editing Wikipedia for quite a while, but decided to make an
account recently and signed up. I continued my normal editing (mostly typo
and fixes on random articles, which seems to be a way to find a lot of your
mistakes) but noticed a problem on the Administrators' Noticeboard and left
my opinion there.

A user included me in a CheckUser for speaking up on the issue. They accused
the user PSPMario, who seems to have edited only on the Playstation 3 and
Playstation Portable articles, of being a sockpuppet of someone after he
reported two users he suspected of being a sockpuppet.

I find it a very bad precedent to immediately accuse someone of being a
sockpuppet, for trying to report a potential problem themselves. I find this
equally problematic to say that "identical additions of info" happen when we
give users the tools in difference comparison to easily copy content from an
earlier edit to a later edit. PSPMario says he was replacing something he
saw that was missing when he returned to the page, and I believe him,
because there is no reason for me not to believe him.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#I_think_I_see_a_sockpuppet

The result of the Checkuser came back as "likely."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/RunedChozo

I am not sure what this means. I know I am no sockpuppet, and given the
writing style of PSPMario, I am reasonably certain he is not a sockpuppet
either.

I do not know when we started using weasel words for CheckUser, which ought
to be a yes or no answer, but this sets a very bad precedent for abuse of
the CheckUser system. Additionally, we have users trying to get everyone
they can blocked, no matter what their edits or edit history, based on the
results of weasel-worded RFCU postings.

This situation is a detriment to Wikipedia.

Thank you for your time.


from_name: William Pietri

subject: [WikiEN-l] Admin burnout

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:
>> One of the things I've noticed over the years is
>> that people who are stressed, frustrated, or overworked are averse to
>> change. It can lead to a downward spiral, where nobody has the time to
>> improve things so they have more time.
>>
>> Could that be a problem in this discussion?
>>
>> I have a hard time telling how stressed or burnt out the average admin
>> is, so this is an actual question, not a rhetorical one.
>
> These are good points.  It seems too that these stress factors also
> extend to preventing any change that could relieve that stress.  It's a
> bit like having inward opening fire-escape doors that can't be opened
> because the crowd is pushing so tightly against them.
>
> Your question is a valid one.  How would you suggest that we go about
> testing that hypothesis.
>

Hmm... Great question.

Almost all of the work I've done in this area is with groups small
enough where I can just go ask people to get a feel for what's going on.
That's not such a good option here.

The only starting point I can think of would be some sort of job
satisfaction survey for admins, with additional questions to see how
much time they're spending and on what. Has that been done recently? And
if not, would people find that useful?

William


from_name: Matthew Benedict

subject: [Textbook-l] Textbook-l Digest, Vol 33, Issue 8

body:
Now that I have thought some more about it, I do feel that the use of
fair use images should be limited, but the problem is where do we draw
the line? We'd have to ask ourselves if the value of using the images
in the book outweighs the legal risk of listing it under fair use,
especially if the books will eventually be published in some manner,
as I presume is one eventual goal for any book on the project. I think
that only in extreme cases (such as maybe those european history
images) should fair use be presumed, and these cases should be clearly
defined, perhaps on a case-by-case or strict categorical basis.

As for textual quotations, I think (correct me if I'm wrong) that the
presumption of fair use for these (provided they are properly cited of
course) is more common than the presumption of fair use for images. If
we're going to do that we'll need some kind of standard method to
describe the rationale for the fair use argument, like wikipedia has
for images (i.e. this is a screenshot used only for illustration, this
is a low-res company logo used to show what it looks like, etc).

Speaking of citation, one problem with current fair use images is that
a lot of them don't really cite the source properly; i.e. who created
it? From what source was it derived? This information should be in the
image page, but often they just have descriptions of what the image
is, not where it came from or who the current copyright holder is,
which can cause problems of its own.

Regards,

Mattb112885

On 2/16/07, textbook-l-request at lists.wikimedia.org
<textbook-l-request at lists.wikimedia.org> wrote:
> Send Textbook-l mailing list submissions to
>         textbook-l at lists.wikimedia.org
>
> To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit
>         http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/textbook-l
> or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to
>         textbook-l-request at lists.wikimedia.org
>
> You can reach the person managing the list at
>         textbook-l-owner at lists.wikimedia.org
>
> When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
> than "Re: Contents of Textbook-l digest..."
>
> Today's Topics:
>
>    1. Regarding fair use (Iamunknown)
>
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Iamunknown <iamunknown at gmail.com>
> To: textbook-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> Date: Fri, 16 Feb 2007 00:52:49 -0700
> Subject: [Textbook-l] Regarding fair use
> I really don't want fair use to go totally away, but I agree that it should
> be significantly limited. The clause, "Because of our commitment to free
> content, this non-free media should not be used when it is reasonably
> possible to replace with free media that would serve the same educational
> purpose," in Kat Walsh's statement comes to mind. While I have expreseed
> concern on-wiki and on-mailing list before about unlicensed images, many
> which, if licensed properly, would remained unlicensed and used under fair
> use, I think that we should not outright ban unlicensed content used under
> fair use. In particular, we should allow very very limited use of non-free
> media when it would be practically impossible to use free media -- the media
> used in the European History wikibook comes to mind -- and for small textual
> quotations. What are everyone else's feelings?
>
> -Iamunknown
>
>
> --===============8126416904983688626==--
> _______________________________________________
> Textbook-l mailing list
> Textbook-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/textbook-l
>
>


from_name: Timwi

body:
Brion Vibber wrote:
>
> [blah blah blah]
>
> Everybody, please don't bother discussing alternative bold and italic
> markup. That's not on the table right now.

Hi Brion,

thanks for this message. However, please may I cheekishly take the
liberty to point out that it could have been worded less
authoritatively? You see, while it is of course perfectly within your
rights and freedoms to leave the bold/italic mark-up the way it is, I am
finding it somewhat objectionable that you are implying that we should
all stop discussing it. Perhaps a better way to respond would be
something like: "Bold and italic mark-up is not on the table right now,
so I am going to ignore the rest of this thread." This will tell the
participants that the discussion is futile, but does not imply that it
is in some way "forbidden".

Thanks,
Timwi


subject: [Wikitech-l] Massive Hook Proposal

body:
Simetrical wrote:
> Might it be a good idea, in these factory functions, to check whether
> the object returned is an instance of the intended class?  Like, if
> someone replaces all Title objects with MyTitles that *don't* extend
> Title, that would cause some havoc, not least as we start adding type
> hinting.  It's probably best to catch that particular mistake early.
>
> So instead of "if ($objResult === NULL)", something like:
>
> if (!is_object($objResult) || !is_a($objResult, self::getRealClass()))
> // must use is_a because instanceof doesn't work with strings

Correct me if I'm wrong, but this looks like you're going to instantiate
the "normal" class if the extension provided an object of the wrong
class. It would be way more helpful to the extension developer if it
threw an exception or some sort of error message instead, e.g. "Error:
".typeof($objResult)." is not a subclass of ".self::getRealClass() or
something like that.


list: foundation-l

from_name: Rufus Pollock

subject: [Foundation-l] Open Knowledge 1.0: London, Saturday March 17th 2007

body:
Dear All,

List members might be interested in this Open Knowledge event we are
organizing which will take place in London in March. One of our
particular aims is to keep space (physical and temporal) at the event
for 'extra', and perhaps unplanned, presentations, demos and workshops.
So if you are working on something related to open knowledge that you'd
like to tell people about please let us know and come along.

Regards,

Rufus Pollock

                     Open Knowledge 1.0
             Saturday 17th March 2007, 1100-1830
                     Limehouse Town Hall
                 http://www.okfn.org/okcon/
           Organized by the Open Knowledge Foundation

   * Programme: http://www.okfn.org/okcon/programme/
   * Registration: http://www.okfn.org/okcon/register/
   * Wiki: http://okfn.org/wiki/okcon/

On the 17th March 2007 the first all-day Open Knowledge event is taking
place in London. This event will bring together individuals and groups
from across the open knowledge spectrum and includes panels on open
media, open geodata and open scientific and civic information.

The event is open to all but we encourage you to register because space
is limited. A small entrance fee of ?10 is planned to help pay for costs
but concessions are available.

## Speakers

### Open Scientific and Civic Data

   * Tim Hubbard, leader of the Human Genome Analysis Group at the
Sanger Institute
   * Peter Murray-Rust, Professor in the Unilever Centre for Molecular
Science Informatics at Cambridge University
   * John Sheridan, Head of e-Services at the Office of Public Sector
Information

### Geodata and Civic Information

   * Ed Parsons, until recently CTO of the Ordnance Survey
   * Steve Coast, founder of Open Street Map
   * Charles Arthur, freeourdata.org.uk and Technology Editor of the
Guardian

### Open Media

   * Paula Ledieu, formerly Director of the BBC's Creative Archive
project and now Managing Director and Director of Open Media for Magic
Lantern Productions
   * Fleur Knopperts of DocAgora
   * Zoe Young of http://www.transmission.cc/

## Theme: Atomisation and Commercial Opportunity

Discussions of 'Open Knowledge' often end with licensing wars: legal
arguments, technicalities, and ethics. While those debates rage on, Open
Knowledge 1.0 will concentrate on two pragmatic and often-overlooked
aspects of Open Knowledge: atomisation and commercial possibility.

Atomisation on a large scale (such as in the Debian 'apt' packaging
system) has allowed large software projects to employ an amazing degree
of decentralised, collaborative and incremental development. But what
other kinds of knowledge can be atomised? What are the opportunities and
problems of this approach for forms of knowledge other than Software?

Atomisation also holds a key to commercial opportunity: unrestricted
access to an ever-changing, atomised landscape of knowledge creates
commercial opportunities that are not available with proprietary
approaches. What examples are there of commercial systems that function
with Open Knowledge, and how can those systems be shared?

Bringing together open threads from Science, Geodata, Civic Information
and Media, Open Knowledge 1.0 is an opportunity for people and projects
to meet, talk and plan things.


list: wikimedia-l


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Fwd: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by
	JPGordon

body:
I am filing one more update. I do not know if any of these will get through,
but I am trying my best.

I have filed a request for Unblock as noted in the blocking notes page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3ACountPointercount&diff=108652004&oldid=108617558

I also must note that, now that I am blocked, there is constant posting of
libelous statements about me to the earlier discussions. It seems that now
that JKelly has abusively blocked me, a large number of people wish to
ingratiate themselves somehow by piling on.

It saddens me that this is the atmosphere of wikipedia. I may very well
simply leave, for this is showing me a bad side I had not seen before, and
Wikipedia is fast becoming something I do not wish to be a part of if this
is the true feeling and mentality of the editors here.

In sincerity,
Thank you for your time.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Samuel L Bronkowitz <countpointercount at gmail.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2007 12:05 PM
Subject: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by JPGordon
To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org

I wish to update my earlier message; the two users who filed this CheckUser
request are now spending quite a bit of time making false charges at me at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#How_RunedChozo_was_and_should_be_handled,
and a third has jumped in who is just making accusations over and
over.

I find this highly unfair, as I have no relation to any of this or the pages
in question beyond my stated opinion that administrator and editor
misbehavior has occurred and that the case's resolution was not conducted in
proper respect for policy and civility.

User JKelly has now acted on these false accusations and banned me from
editing, as well as defacing my user page with a Scarlet Letter harassment
token.

You can see my edit history for yourself. I have not done anything bad to
warrant this kind of abuse, yet I have received it from multiple users and
at least one trigger-happy administrator now, as well as one administrator
willing to completely misrepresent CheckUser results.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/CountPointercount

This comment was left, but I'm now unable to respond in my own defense
thanks to the abuse by JKelly.
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%3AAdministrators%27_noticeboard%2FIncidents&diff=108647990&oldid=108647687

This is blatantly unfair practice. Since JKelly and other abusive
administrators and editors are more than willing to behave in this manner, I
have no choice but to come here for redress.

Thank you for your time.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Samuel L Bronkowitz <countpointercount at gmail.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2007 9:48 AM
Subject: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by JPGordon
To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org

Hello,

I've been editing Wikipedia for quite a while, but decided to make an
account recently and signed up. I continued my normal editing (mostly typo
and fixes on random articles, which seems to be a way to find a lot of your
mistakes) but noticed a problem on the Administrators' Noticeboard and left
my opinion there.

A user included me in a CheckUser for speaking up on the issue. They accused
the user PSPMario, who seems to have edited only on the Playstation 3 and
Playstation Portable articles, of being a sockpuppet of someone after he
reported two users he suspected of being a sockpuppet.

I find it a very bad precedent to immediately accuse someone of being a
sockpuppet, for trying to report a potential problem themselves. I find this
equally problematic to say that "identical additions of info" happen when we
give users the tools in difference comparison to easily copy content from an
earlier edit to a later edit. PSPMario says he was replacing something he
saw that was missing when he returned to the page, and I believe him,
because there is no reason for me not to believe him.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#I_think_I_see_a_sockpuppet

The result of the Checkuser came back as "likely."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/RunedChozo

I am not sure what this means. I know I am no sockpuppet, and given the
writing style of PSPMario, I am reasonably certain he is not a sockpuppet
either.

I do not know when we started using weasel words for CheckUser, which ought
to be a yes or no answer, but this sets a very bad precedent for abuse of
the CheckUser system. Additionally, we have users trying to get everyone
they can blocked, no matter what their edits or edit history, based on the
results of weasel-worded RFCU postings.

This situation is a detriment to Wikipedia.

Thank you for your time.


from_name: Rich Holton

subject: [WikiEN-l] Short-lived retreat

body:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
>> I believe his point is that until Wikipedia proved it could work,
>> allowing everybody to edit was seen as impossible, as way too risky to
>> work.
>>
>> I know you don't like to hear it, but to me, as somebody who started
>> pushing wikis before Wikipedia existed, your arguments against the
>> possibility of broadening adminship sound regrettably like the arguments
>> I used to get (and, amazingly, still get) about how open-to-anybody
>> editing is impossible.
>
> I understand what you're saying, but I think I've found the flaw in
> your argument. You are saying that Wikipedia has proven all the people
> that said a wiki could never work wrong - I'm not sure that's the
> case.
>
> Wikipedia has shown that a pure wiki doesn't work (beyond a certain
> size). We've had to introduce blocks and protection, both of which go
> against the idea of a wiki. We've compromised, and as such have
> managed to make a viable website.
>
> Wikipedia is not a pure wiki, it's the closest we've managed to stay
> to a wiki without causing problems that are beyond our ability to
> manage. We've managed to stay very close, but we have had to step away
> in order to solve a few problems. Adminship is the main way we've done
> that.
>
> The proposal for opening up adminship is basically a proposal to move
> back to a pure wiki. Wikipedia started off as a pure wiki, and it
> worked ok at first, but as it grew it get unmanageable and required
> the creation of admins.
>
> There have been multiple requests for evidence that opening up
> adminship won't work - pre-admin Wikipedia is that evidence. It didn't
> work, and that's why admins were created in the first place.
>

I thought *this* discussion was about whether need was a factor in
giving people admin status. I've said that the only real issue is trust.
What I understand you to have said was that even if we trust someone, if
they don't *need* admin status, we should not give it to them.

Have I misunderstood somewhere?

-Rich


body:
Additional issue:

It appears someone's bot is doing damage, removing threads that are not
remotely irrelevant:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%3AAdministrators%27_noticeboard%2FIncidents&diff=108652761&oldid=108652596

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Samuel L Bronkowitz <countpointercount at gmail.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2007 12:22 PM
Subject: Fwd: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by JPGordon
To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org

I am filing one more update. I do not know if any of these will get through,
but I am trying my best.

I have filed a request for Unblock as noted in the blocking notes page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3ACountPointercount&diff=108652004&oldid=108617558

I also must note that, now that I am blocked, there is constant posting of
libelous statements about me to the earlier discussions. It seems that now
that JKelly has abusively blocked me, a large number of people wish to
ingratiate themselves somehow by piling on.

It saddens me that this is the atmosphere of wikipedia. I may very well
simply leave, for this is showing me a bad side I had not seen before, and
Wikipedia is fast becoming something I do not wish to be a part of if this
is the true feeling and mentality of the editors here.

In sincerity,
Thank you for your time.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Samuel L Bronkowitz < countpointercount at gmail.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2007 12:05 PM
Subject: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by JPGordon
To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org

I wish to update my earlier message; the two users who filed this CheckUser
request are now spending quite a bit of time making false charges at me at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#How_RunedChozo_was_and_should_be_handled,
and a third has jumped in who is just making accusations over and
over.

I find this highly unfair, as I have no relation to any of this or the pages
in question beyond my stated opinion that administrator and editor
misbehavior has occurred and that the case's resolution was not conducted in
proper respect for policy and civility.

User JKelly has now acted on these false accusations and banned me from
editing, as well as defacing my user page with a Scarlet Letter harassment
token.

You can see my edit history for yourself. I have not done anything bad to
warrant this kind of abuse, yet I have received it from multiple users and
at least one trigger-happy administrator now, as well as one administrator
willing to completely misrepresent CheckUser results.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/CountPointercount

This comment was left, but I'm now unable to respond in my own defense
thanks to the abuse by JKelly.
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%3AAdministrators%27_noticeboard%2FIncidents&diff=108647990&oldid=108647687

This is blatantly unfair practice. Since JKelly and other abusive
administrators and editors are more than willing to behave in this manner, I
have no choice but to come here for redress.

Thank you for your time.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Samuel L Bronkowitz < countpointercount at gmail.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2007 9:48 AM
Subject: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by JPGordon
To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org

Hello,

I've been editing Wikipedia for quite a while, but decided to make an
account recently and signed up. I continued my normal editing (mostly typo
and fixes on random articles, which seems to be a way to find a lot of your
mistakes) but noticed a problem on the Administrators' Noticeboard and left
my opinion there.

A user included me in a CheckUser for speaking up on the issue. They accused
the user PSPMario, who seems to have edited only on the Playstation 3 and
Playstation Portable articles, of being a sockpuppet of someone after he
reported two users he suspected of being a sockpuppet.

I find it a very bad precedent to immediately accuse someone of being a
sockpuppet, for trying to report a potential problem themselves. I find this
equally problematic to say that "identical additions of info" happen when we
give users the tools in difference comparison to easily copy content from an
earlier edit to a later edit. PSPMario says he was replacing something he
saw that was missing when he returned to the page, and I believe him,
because there is no reason for me not to believe him.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#I_think_I_see_a_sockpuppet

The result of the Checkuser came back as "likely."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/RunedChozo

I am not sure what this means. I know I am no sockpuppet, and given the
writing style of PSPMario, I am reasonably certain he is not a sockpuppet
either.

I do not know when we started using weasel words for CheckUser, which ought
to be a yes or no answer, but this sets a very bad precedent for abuse of
the CheckUser system. Additionally, we have users trying to get everyone
they can blocked, no matter what their edits or edit history, based on the
results of weasel-worded RFCU postings.

This situation is a detriment to Wikipedia.

Thank you for your time.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Limited Sysop

body:
MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:
> Admins clearly need to be
> familiar with rules, but that doesn't mean they have to do all the possible
> admin tasks. If someone wants to stick with one task, I'm happy to allow
> them to do that as long as they know the rules for that specific field.
>
> I like the idea of splitting all the powers and grant specific powers
> depending on what the admin in question wants to do.

That's very appealing. I know developer time is always a concern, but
going from one bit to a few bits could be a pretty modest change. And
that might make the RfA process less about whether the applicant is a
tree among shrubs and more about their fitness for some particular purpose.

> I do wonder what to do
> about newbies who are told to contact an administrator about an issue. How
> are they supposed to know if a certain admin can help them?
>

Would that matter much? Assuming they have found an admin directly and
semi-randomly rather than going through the various filters and funnels
in places like [[WP:AN]], then I'd expect the task-specific admin still
would know where to send the newbie. Especially if the "welcome, new
admin" guide had ways for these limited admins to get help themselves.

William


body:
This has also had the unintended effect of SERIOUSLY messing up the page, as
it appears every thread below it is "archived" due to the bad coding left
behind on the out-of-process closed discussion from earlier as well.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Samuel L Bronkowitz <countpointercount at gmail.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2007 12:24 PM
Subject: Fwd: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by JPGordon
To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org

Additional issue:

It appears someone's bot is doing damage, removing threads that are not
remotely irrelevant:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%3AAdministrators%27_noticeboard%2FIncidents&diff=108652761&oldid=108652596

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Samuel L Bronkowitz <countpointercount at gmail.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2007 12:22 PM
Subject: Fwd: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by JPGordon
To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org

I am filing one more update. I do not know if any of these will get through,
but I am trying my best.

I have filed a request for Unblock as noted in the blocking notes page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3ACountPointercount&diff=108652004&oldid=108617558

I also must note that, now that I am blocked, there is constant posting of
libelous statements about me to the earlier discussions. It seems that now
that JKelly has abusively blocked me, a large number of people wish to
ingratiate themselves somehow by piling on.

It saddens me that this is the atmosphere of wikipedia. I may very well
simply leave, for this is showing me a bad side I had not seen before, and
Wikipedia is fast becoming something I do not wish to be a part of if this
is the true feeling and mentality of the editors here.

In sincerity,
Thank you for your time.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Samuel L Bronkowitz < countpointercount at gmail.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2007 12:05 PM
Subject: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by JPGordon
To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org

I wish to update my earlier message; the two users who filed this CheckUser
request are now spending quite a bit of time making false charges at me at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#How_RunedChozo_was_and_should_be_handled,
and a third has jumped in who is just making accusations over and
over.

I find this highly unfair, as I have no relation to any of this or the pages
in question beyond my stated opinion that administrator and editor
misbehavior has occurred and that the case's resolution was not conducted in
proper respect for policy and civility.

User JKelly has now acted on these false accusations and banned me from
editing, as well as defacing my user page with a Scarlet Letter harassment
token.

You can see my edit history for yourself. I have not done anything bad to
warrant this kind of abuse, yet I have received it from multiple users and
at least one trigger-happy administrator now, as well as one administrator
willing to completely misrepresent CheckUser results.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/CountPointercount

This comment was left, but I'm now unable to respond in my own defense
thanks to the abuse by JKelly.
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%3AAdministrators%27_noticeboard%2FIncidents&diff=108647990&oldid=108647687

This is blatantly unfair practice. Since JKelly and other abusive
administrators and editors are more than willing to behave in this manner, I
have no choice but to come here for redress.

Thank you for your time.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Samuel L Bronkowitz < countpointercount at gmail.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2007 9:48 AM
Subject: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by JPGordon
To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org

Hello,

I've been editing Wikipedia for quite a while, but decided to make an
account recently and signed up. I continued my normal editing (mostly typo
and fixes on random articles, which seems to be a way to find a lot of your
mistakes) but noticed a problem on the Administrators' Noticeboard and left
my opinion there.

A user included me in a CheckUser for speaking up on the issue. They accused
the user PSPMario, who seems to have edited only on the Playstation 3 and
Playstation Portable articles, of being a sockpuppet of someone after he
reported two users he suspected of being a sockpuppet.

I find it a very bad precedent to immediately accuse someone of being a
sockpuppet, for trying to report a potential problem themselves. I find this
equally problematic to say that "identical additions of info" happen when we
give users the tools in difference comparison to easily copy content from an
earlier edit to a later edit. PSPMario says he was replacing something he
saw that was missing when he returned to the page, and I believe him,
because there is no reason for me not to believe him.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#I_think_I_see_a_sockpuppet

The result of the Checkuser came back as "likely."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/RunedChozo

I am not sure what this means. I know I am no sockpuppet, and given the
writing style of PSPMario, I am reasonably certain he is not a sockpuppet
either.

I do not know when we started using weasel words for CheckUser, which ought
to be a yes or no answer, but this sets a very bad precedent for abuse of
the CheckUser system. Additionally, we have users trying to get everyone
they can blocked, no matter what their edits or edit history, based on the
results of weasel-worded RFCU postings.

This situation is a detriment to Wikipedia.

Thank you for your time.


body:
geni wrote:
> On 2/15/07, Timwi <timwi at gmx.net> wrote:
>
>>Not sure what you're talking about there, "without admin backup"?
>
> What I say. do you want to go up against 30+ socks without an admin to
> be able to throw around protection and blocking?

Why are you talking about a situation without admins? I don't know where
you got this from.

>>>Wouldn't bother with resysopping. Just keep up the attack with the
>>>next sock. or wait a few days and use that one. either way by the time
>>>all the sock are blocked it is too too late.
>>
>>Too late for what?
>
> To prevent the damage.

OK, maybe you don't know this yet, but all changes in MediaWiki can be
undone. There is no such thing as permanent damage.

>>>Because that has been what has happened with 100% of our vandals so far.
>>Yes, precisely.
> [[Irony]]

The irony lies in the fact that your ironically-meant statement is
actually true. (Well, almost. Of course there are negligible numbers of
people who are truly persistent. But on the whole, very close to 100% of
all vandals give up.)

Timwi


subject: [WikiEN-l] Requirements for Adminship

body:
Hi,

sorry for jumping into this thread without reading the other responses
first, but here's mine... :-)

Keitei wrote:
> Admins must:
> 	be neutral, above all else.

This is already wrong. An admin who does not do any blocking, protecting
or deleting, is by definition harmless, but they need not be neutral (in
what they secretly believe would deserve deletion or protection). You
would be denying adminship to such a person even though it would not
cause any harm, therefore you are turning adminship into the "big deal"
again that we are trying hard not to make it.

> Therefore, admin candidates must:
> 	demonstrate they can [...]

This is clearly wrong. What you are saying is that someone who cannot
demonstrate that they would be a good admin before they're actually an
admin, can't become admin. Catch-22!

You are also reiterating this false belief that someone who does not fit
your criteria must not ever be admin even for a minute, i.e. you are
acting as if adminship could never be removed again.

So, my corrected version of your assessment would look something like this:

- Admins must, *on the whole*,
	be neutral (in deleting, protecting, blocking)

- Therefore, an admin who deletes, protects or blocks something/someone
   unfairly, must be de-adminned. Everyone else can, by definition, be
   admin without causing harm.

Timwi


body:
The bad "discussion closed" code has now been placed around the new
discussion: one ReyBrujo "restored" the template to the wrong discussion
thread due to the hyperactive bot which removed still-ongoing threads from
the page.

This is a big problem, people trying to close off discussions relevant to
Wikipedia and to the actions of Wikipedian editors and administrators
without answering the concerns being addressed.

I have no idea whether my questions are actually reaching the list, either.
This is most disconcerting.

I am requesting an answer, but having received none, and having now seen how
Wikipedia's administrators are more than content to let abuse of this sort
go on with no answer, I am 90% certain that I will be leaving Wikipedia. I
will not make things worse or vandalize articles, but I cannot say that the
thought of doing so did not cross my mind. As I travel quite extensively, it
would be very easy for me to acquire a new IP address every time that I go
somewhere and damage Wikipedia a little bit just for the fun of doing so,
since constructive editing and the right to defend myself against basely
false accusations are being denied me.

Since I have apparently not had any of your time, I shall not thank you for
it in this missive any more.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Samuel L Bronkowitz <countpointercount at gmail.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2007 12:26 PM
Subject: Fwd: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by JPGordon
To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org

This has also had the unintended effect of SERIOUSLY messing up the page, as
it appears every thread below it is "archived" due to the bad coding left
behind on the out-of-process closed discussion from earlier as well.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Samuel L Bronkowitz <countpointercount at gmail.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2007 12:24 PM
Subject: Fwd: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by JPGordon
To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org

Additional issue:

It appears someone's bot is doing damage, removing threads that are not
remotely irrelevant:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%3AAdministrators%27_noticeboard%2FIncidents&diff=108652761&oldid=108652596

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Samuel L Bronkowitz <countpointercount at gmail.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2007 12:22 PM
Subject: Fwd: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by JPGordon
To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org

I am filing one more update. I do not know if any of these will get through,
but I am trying my best.

I have filed a request for Unblock as noted in the blocking notes page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3ACountPointercount&diff=108652004&oldid=108617558

I also must note that, now that I am blocked, there is constant posting of
libelous statements about me to the earlier discussions. It seems that now
that JKelly has abusively blocked me, a large number of people wish to
ingratiate themselves somehow by piling on.

It saddens me that this is the atmosphere of wikipedia. I may very well
simply leave, for this is showing me a bad side I had not seen before, and
Wikipedia is fast becoming something I do not wish to be a part of if this
is the true feeling and mentality of the editors here.

In sincerity,
Thank you for your time.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Samuel L Bronkowitz < countpointercount at gmail.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2007 12:05 PM
Subject: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by JPGordon
To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org

I wish to update my earlier message; the two users who filed this CheckUser
request are now spending quite a bit of time making false charges at me at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#How_RunedChozo_was_and_should_be_handled,
and a third has jumped in who is just making accusations over and
over.

I find this highly unfair, as I have no relation to any of this or the pages
in question beyond my stated opinion that administrator and editor
misbehavior has occurred and that the case's resolution was not conducted in
proper respect for policy and civility.

User JKelly has now acted on these false accusations and banned me from
editing, as well as defacing my user page with a Scarlet Letter harassment
token.

You can see my edit history for yourself. I have not done anything bad to
warrant this kind of abuse, yet I have received it from multiple users and
at least one trigger-happy administrator now, as well as one administrator
willing to completely misrepresent CheckUser results.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/CountPointercount

This comment was left, but I'm now unable to respond in my own defense
thanks to the abuse by JKelly.
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%3AAdministrators%27_noticeboard%2FIncidents&diff=108647990&oldid=108647687

This is blatantly unfair practice. Since JKelly and other abusive
administrators and editors are more than willing to behave in this manner, I
have no choice but to come here for redress.

Thank you for your time.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Samuel L Bronkowitz < countpointercount at gmail.com>
Date: Feb 16, 2007 9:48 AM
Subject: I have a problem with CheckUser as administered by JPGordon
To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org

Hello,

I've been editing Wikipedia for quite a while, but decided to make an
account recently and signed up. I continued my normal editing (mostly typo
and fixes on random articles, which seems to be a way to find a lot of your
mistakes) but noticed a problem on the Administrators' Noticeboard and left
my opinion there.

A user included me in a CheckUser for speaking up on the issue. They accused
the user PSPMario, who seems to have edited only on the Playstation 3 and
Playstation Portable articles, of being a sockpuppet of someone after he
reported two users he suspected of being a sockpuppet.

I find it a very bad precedent to immediately accuse someone of being a
sockpuppet, for trying to report a potential problem themselves. I find this
equally problematic to say that "identical additions of info" happen when we
give users the tools in difference comparison to easily copy content from an
earlier edit to a later edit. PSPMario says he was replacing something he
saw that was missing when he returned to the page, and I believe him,
because there is no reason for me not to believe him.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#I_think_I_see_a_sockpuppet

The result of the Checkuser came back as "likely."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/RunedChozo

I am not sure what this means. I know I am no sockpuppet, and given the
writing style of PSPMario, I am reasonably certain he is not a sockpuppet
either.

I do not know when we started using weasel words for CheckUser, which ought
to be a yes or no answer, but this sets a very bad precedent for abuse of
the CheckUser system. Additionally, we have users trying to get everyone
they can blocked, no matter what their edits or edit history, based on the
results of weasel-worded RFCU postings.

This situation is a detriment to Wikipedia.

Thank you for your time.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Requirements for Adminship

body:
Keitei wrote:
> I'm not thinking of the one or two people
> who might be inclined to make huge swaths of sockpuppets, but rather
> those whose own personal biases prevent them from acting in the best
> interests of others.

You're forgetting several very important points when saying that:

* There is no universal objective set of criteria that define "others'
best interests", or indeed "Wikipedia's best interests".
* The set of criteria that define "best interests" are a mixture of the
beliefs of the people who have the means to enforce them.
* If it is too difficult to become admin, you will end up getting only
admins who perpetuate what the already-established clique considers
Wikipedia's "best interests". As a result, the set of criteria for "best
interests" that are currently in force no longer reflect the set of
criteria of the entire community.

Timwi