from_name: Mark Williamson

body:
Hi all,

Ron has done quite a job on the article [[Katt]], in a huge effort to
convert it from Patentplatt to real Platt.

Diff: http://nds.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Katt&diff=21797&oldid=18531

Mark

On 06/07/05, Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi Boris,
>
> I personally think that if in that sample the only extreme differences
> are "mer" and the future tense, this should not be insurmountable.
>
> Brazilian and Iberian Portuguese similarly have some vast differences
> in verb conjugations (although they use the same orthography...), yet
> they have a single Wikipedia.
>
> I'm sure many Portuguese people are a little bit annoyed when they see
> people using the second-person singular conjugations for both
> second-person singular and second-person plural... but then, they're a
> little bit used to it since Portuguese often visit Brazilian websites,
> read Brazilian books, watch Brazilian movies... and vice-versa but to
> a lesser degree.
>
> Nevertheless, the fact alone that you were able to identify it as the
> future tense (as opposed to just completely not knowing) counts for
> something.
>
> Surely, although it might be a bit annoying at first, such a
> linguistic difference as use or non-use of the future tense is
> surmountable.
>
> Mark
>
> On 05/07/05, Boris Lohnzweiger <BorisLohnzweiger at web.de> wrote:
> >
> > Hi Servien!
> >
> > Thanks for informing me about that. I must admit, I've never heard or read about ANS. So, like the name suggests that's supposed to work in but countries? A good idea for sure. However (and that's a big however), as far as I can tell noboby in Germany ever writes that way. Just have a look a websites from Germany written in nds. You won't ever find all those y's and v's there. Neither in Plattd??tsch literature you can find in book stores in Northern Germany. While that ANS spelling system might be a good thing in theory, I think you just couldn't re-educate thousands of people in order to have one single nds Wikipedia. But I guess I don't have to convince _you_ anyway.
> >
> > Thanks for the sample phrase. Here's my try:
> >
> > "Wenn <or "As"> en Minsch nich faken noog ruut <"na buten" would also work> k?mmt ward he ook nich <equivalent for "h?yl" would be "heel" but is usually not used here> bruun <future tense "w?yrden" also omitted here> s?nnern blievt witt. <Note: I can`t really think of a word for "pale" now - you could possibly take "bleek" (without "witt" in that case) but I'm not 100% sure here>
> >
> > Even though I have tried to stick to your wording as closely as possible, I think the differences are quite tremendous here. They go far beyond spelling. What was most striking to me was the use of the future tense in your sample phrase. The Plattd??tsch I know just doesn't have that - just like in spoken High German where that tense is not used either. But also the word "mer" (that's like "maar" in Dutch, isn't it?) wouldn`t be understood by readers in Germany. Other differences are less severe, of course. E. g. "genog" instead of "noog" would surely be understood, especially since we have "genug" in German. But take "kump" (do you speak an "?" or an "u" there?) for "k?mmt" for example or even "ie/y" instead of "he". If the decision about a Dutch Low Saxon Wikipedia were in my hands and I had to make that decision solely based on this one example - I would most definately create it! Not because I want to separate Dutch and German wikipedians - it's the 21st century and thank God we're good neighbours - but only of the language facts.
> >
> > Boris
> >
> > Servien Ilaino <servien at gmail.com>, wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org schrieb am 05.07.05 15:33:43:
> >
> > Hi Boris,
> >
> > The orthography used in that text seems to me is de Algemeyne
> > Neddersassische Schryvwys'... I also used to use it, but people don't
> > seem to understand it quite as well in the Netherlands and Germany, I
> > must honestly say I understand the ANS writing system way better then
> > the one you used at the bottom (of course there are words which are
> > completely unknown to me...)
> >
> > Here is a sample of DLS in ANS writing system:
> > As 'n mins ny vaak genog buyten kump sal y ok ny h?yl bruyn w?yrden
> > mer sal y spyrwit blyven.
> >
> > And here in the traditional one:
> > As 'n mins nie vaok genog buut'n kump zal ie ok nie heul bruun wurd'n
> > mer zal ie spierwit bliev'n/blyv'n.
> >
> > This is the one I use:
> > As 'n mins nie vaok genog buten kump sal ie ok nie heul bruun wurden
> > mer sal ie spierwit blyven. (it's a mixture of the traditional one and
> > a little from ANS, I don't use the apostrophes because like in the
> > word blyv'n is pronounced as "bliem" and this is confusing because
> > bak'n [bake] is also pronounced differently like "bakng".)
> >
> > (Translation of the text:
> > If a person doesn't go outside much then he won't have a tanned look,
> > but will be pale white.)
> >
> > Servien
> >
> > 2005/7/5, Boris Lohnzweiger <BorisLohnzweiger at web.de>:
> > >
> > > > Ahh wait, I see here the accusation is that it's in "Patentplatt", which is "based on Missingsch.
> > >
> > > Ok "Patentplatt" or "Fernsehplatt" (TV Platt) as it is called sometimes - that really seems to happen. I think that word is less misleading. Of course, different people will have different views on what is unique and what is not. Languages like German or French have had established unified standards for centuries, so there is hardly ever any doubt what's linguistically correct or not at de: or fr:. Obviously, at nds: you don`t have that degree of unambiguousness. I would really appreciate any efforts to improve the linguistic quality of the Low Saxon Wikipedia. After all, it is still at an early stage. Unfortunetaly, I can't really help here for, being a native in High German, I'd probably only worsen the problem of "Patentplatt".
> > >
> > >
> > > > A sample of 'real' Low Saxon written in "AGS" orthography:
> > > > Lyk so kanst dat in 'n paar dialekten vun de ?nner-Elv' (in Hamborg un kuntray) ook seggen.  "Wat" kan daar in s?kse vellen lyk as "dat" un > "dey" bruken.  I dou dat ook vaken, man tou meyrst wen ik snakken dou.
> > >
> > > Where does that come from? The vocabulary is mostly alright. But the spelling looks awfully articifial to me. Never before have I seen anyone using "y" in written Platt. And why should you write "v" when you say "f". Just too make look "less German"? Also, the diphtong "ou" might somehow reflect the pronounciation but is certainly not usually used in Northern Germany. And why should one want to use "kk" instead of "ck"? Just because it's written that way in the Netherlands?? And why is there an apostrophe in " Elv' "? Just because the word is "Elbe" in High German. Complete nonsense, in my humble opinion. I don't want to comment comment on the "real Platt" word "kuntray" but the "I" at the beginning of the last sentence is either Bavarian or English but surely not Platt.
> > >
> > > Coming from the "?nner-Elv'" myself, let me try it:
> > >
> > > Liek so kannst dat in'n poor Dialekten vun de ?nnerelv (in Hamborg un ?mto) ook seggen. "Wat" kann dor in d?sse/s?kse F?llen liek as "dat" un "de" bruken. Ick/Ik do dat ook faken, man tomeest wenn ick/ik snack.
> > >
> > > Hmm...
> > >
> > > Boris
> > >
> > > Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com>, wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org schrieb am 05.07.05 08:34:13:
> > >
> > > Hi Boris,
> > >
> > > I'm a bit perplexed as this accusation has been made by a number of
> > > people on Lowlands-l, most of the accusers being native speakers of
> > > Low German, and at least one (RF Hahn) also speaking Missingsch. Ahh
> > > wait, I see here the accusation is that it's in "Patentplatt", which
> > > is "based on Missingsch".
> > >
> > > Accusations: "Unalike the Laich Saxon edeetion whase warkers dinna
> > > actually ken the leid.
> > > (It's oor Jonny's pet plaint, his windmill faes, an that richtly.)"
> > >
> > > "It doesn't help that language competency is wanting in the current
> > > WikiPlatt team.  Those folks are enthusiastic, and I laud that.  But
> > > they don't know the language well enough.  Much or most of it is
> > > "Patentplatt" (based on Missingsch), i.e. invented on the basis of
> > > German.  I am not at all opposed to introducing technical neologisms,
> > > but there needs to be first of all a firm grasp of the basic language,
> > > the grammar and the authentic idiom."
> > >
> > > Information on Patentplatt: "The number of Lowlands Saxon speakers ...
> > > would be large if it included people who are somewhat conversant ...
> > > and it would be even larger if it included those who ... can really
> > > only manage lexically, idiomatically and grammatically deficient,
> > > German-based, "made-up Platt" (Patentplatt)."
> > >
> > > This is very concerning, and is clearly a major factor in the
> > > difficulty people from the Netherlands are having reading NDS.wiki. I
> > > just dashed off an e-mail to Ron to remind him that he is always
> > > welcome to "fix" the Patentplatt, because of course it's Wikipedia.
> > >
> > > Obviously, this isn't the only factor, and I'm not sure if it's even
> > > the greatest factor. But, I feel that we should explore that.
> > >
> > > A sample of 'real' Low Saxon written in "AGS" orthography:
> > >
> > > Lyk so kanst dat in 'n paar dialekten vun de ?nner-Elv' (in Hamborg un
> > > kuntray) ook seggen.  "Wat" kan daar in s?kse vellen lyk as "dat" un
> > > "dey" bruken.  I dou dat ook vaken, man tou meyrst wen ik snakken dou.
> > >
> > > Hmm...
> > >
> > > Best
> > > Mark
> > >
> > > On 04/07/05, Boris Lohnzweiger <BorisLohnzweiger at web.de> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > Hi Mark!
> > > >
> > > > I was quite perplexed to read that they write Missingsch in the Low Saxon Wikipedia. So I just went there and checked out ten random pages. Having grown up in a rural area near Hamburg, it`s easy for me tell apart Low Saxon from Missingsch. The whole issue seems to be very exaggerated. All ten articles I've read were without a doubt in Plattd??tsch. Of course single articles might not be - I haven`t checked the whole Wikipedia. However, one can note that depending on the subject of the article the share of words that very closely resemble standard German words or are even identical (in writing !) is sometimes quite high. But this is a usual phenomenon in Low Saxon. Generally speaking, the more scientific a text gets the closer it comes to Hochdeutsch. Surely, sometimes this can lead to the fact that certain passages of articles don`t look too much like Platt. This can been seen very clearly in this article: http://nds.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reptilia . It has two sections, both written by the same author, as far as I can tell. The first ("Nordd??tsche Slangen") is very "pure" Low Saxon. The second ("Systematik") looks very much like standard German, due to its topic. I think even without knowing both languages in detail you can easily tell the difference. But this is not to be confused with Missingsch. You just couldn`t say that differently or more "real", if you want.
> > > >
> > > > I don`t who actually brought up this Missingsch issue (native speaker? hobby linguist?). But as a matter of fact, nds-WP is written in Low Saxon. If individual pages are in other languages (which to some degree happens in many Wikipedias) the guys at nds can certainly cope with that. However,  I disbelieve that this part of the reason native speakers of Low Saxon in the Netherlands ask for a separate WP.
> > > >
> > > > Boris
> > > >
> > > > Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com>, wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org schrieb am 04.07.05 01:38:06:
> > > >
> > > > Also, it seems to me that Walter, Wouter, and Servien are intent on
> > > > ignoring the issue of nds.wiki being in Missingsch rather than real
> > > > nds. But this is a real issue, and we need to deal with it. I have
> > > > personally received complaints from members of lowlands-l about
> > > > nds.wiki being in Missingsch, which is not actually Low Saxon but
> > > > rather a "contact variety".
> > > >
> > > > Surely, mutual intelligiblity would be increased very much if this
> > > > huge problem were solved. I'm sure one of the main problems is the
> > > > fact that it's written in Missingsch.
> > > >
> > > > Perhaps before starting nds-nl.wiki, somebody should start
> > > > real-nds.wiki, and after that we can see if things are any better.
> > > >
> > > > Mark
> > > >
> > > > _________________________________________________________________________
> > > > Mit der Gruppen-SMS von WEB.DE FreeMail k?nnen Sie eine SMS an alle
> > > > Freunde gleichzeitig schicken: http://freemail.web.de/features/?mc=021179
> > > >
> > > >
> > >
> > > --
> > > SI HOC LEGERE SCIS NIMIVM ERVDITIONIS HABES
> > > QVANTVM MATERIAE MATERIETVR MARMOTA MONAX SI MARMOTA MONAX MATERIAM
> > > POSSIT MATERIARI
> > > ESTNE VOLVMEN IN TOGA AN SOLVM TIBI LIBET ME VIDERE
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > Wikipedia-l mailing list
> > > Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> > > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
> > >
> > > _________________________________________________________________________
> > > Mit der Gruppen-SMS von WEB.DE FreeMail k?nnen Sie eine SMS an alle
> > > Freunde gleichzeitig schicken: http://freemail.web.de/features/?mc=021179
> > >
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > Wikipedia-l mailing list
> > > Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> > > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
> > >
> > _______________________________________________
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> > Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
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> >
> > ______________________________________________________________
> > Verschicken Sie romantische, coole und witzige Bilder per SMS!
> > Jetzt bei WEB.DE FreeMail: http://f.web.de/?mc=021193
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Wikipedia-l mailing list
> > Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
> >
>
> --
> SI HOC LEGERE SCIS NIMIVM ERVDITIONIS HABES
> QVANTVM MATERIAE MATERIETVR MARMOTA MONAX SI MARMOTA MONAX MATERIAM
> POSSIT MATERIARI
> ESTNE VOLVMEN IN TOGA AN SOLVM TIBI LIBET ME VIDERE
>

--
SI HOC LEGERE SCIS NIMIVM ERVDITIONIS HABES
QVANTVM MATERIAE MATERIETVR MARMOTA MONAX SI MARMOTA MONAX MATERIAM
POSSIT MATERIARI
ESTNE VOLVMEN IN TOGA AN SOLVM TIBI LIBET ME VIDERE


list: foundation-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [Foundation-l] Fair Use and Registered Trademarks

body:
I'm inclined to generally agree.  There is a likelihood of confusion
between the trademark and the publication, but there are also easily
available techniques for dealing with that.  Writing a suitable
disclaimer and linking to it from every extracted article should be more
than enough to satisfy their objections about trademark infringement.

There is another version on line at  http://1911encyclopedia.org/ .They
suggest (or almost insist) that articles from them be referenced as from
"LoveToKnow 1911 Online Encyclopedia. ? 2003, 2004 LoveToKnow."  Their
references to the Britannica are restricted to their front page.  This
suggests that they may have had similar discussions with them as Project
Gutenberg.

Their claim to copyright may be spurious.  The only factor that would
strongly support their claim to originality is the high level of OCR
errors. :-)

Ec

Jean-Baptiste Soufron wrote:

> Well, trademark law has limited applications, mainly to commercial
> matters. And I don't see how using the 1911 public domain
> encyclopedia can infringe the Britannica trademark. They can pretend
> it does, but to sum it up, Britannica is a work, the title of this
> work and a trademark.
>
> Once the work is public domain, anybody is entitled to reproduce it
> under under its right title since this title is itself part of the work.
>
> Thus, the trademark only protects Britannica from competitive uses
> (like if someone tries to launch a Britannica book collection).
>
> Basically, the reproduction Britannica 1911 edition is not using the
> trademark Britannica, but the title Britannica.
>
> It is always important to remember that Trademark Law is much more
> restrictive than Copyright Law.
>
> I cc Michael Hart in case he remembers anything about this settlement
> with Britannica.
>
> Jean-Baptiste Soufron
>
> Le 6 juil. 05 ? 14:09, Robert Scott Horning a ?crit :
>
>> I've come across a potential legal issue that has an impact across
>> several Wikimedia projects that I'd like to bring up for general
>> discussion.
>>
>> I've been trying to find a home for the 1911 Wikipedia (for more
>> details, see the new project page), and I've been attempting to  move
>> it to Wikisource, with the following discussion at the  Scriptorium:
>> http://wikisource.org/wiki/Wikisource% 3AScriptorium#1911_Wikipedia
>>
>> The larger issue I am seeking input from the regulars of this
>> mailing list is in regards to proper use of registered trademarks
>> for larger projects.  In this case it is how a registered trademark
>> can be properly used or avoided when a project is tied to something
>> that inevitably has strong references to registered trademarks.
>>
>> In this case it is in reference to the 1911 edition of the
>> Encyclopedia Britannica, where a whole sub project is going to be
>> based on content from that set of volumes.  This issue could also
>> deal with How-to books in Wikibooks or even Star Trek or Star Wars
>> trivia entries in Wikipedia, which is again why I'm posting this
>> issue here rather than other Foundation lists.
>>
>> In particular for the Encyclopedia Britannica, this issue already
>> came up with Project Gutenberg where Encyclopedia Britannica's  legal
>> team forced Project Gutenberg into a policy statement.  Keep  in mind
>> that prior to this official statement, Project Gutenberg  routinely
>> referenced the associated text with the Encyclopedia  Britannica by
>> name.  What resulted was the following:
>>
>>    "The Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia is a reproduction of a 1911
>>    edition of a famous encyclopedia. The text has not been updated.
>>    Although the text is in the public domain in the United States, the
>>    original publisher still has a valid trademark in the original  title
>>    of the encyclopedia. The original publisher offered Project
>>    Gutenberg a license to use the trademark, but the terms of the
>>    license were not consistent with the volunteer noncommercial nature
>>    of Project Gutenberg or its primary goal of distributing electronic
>>    text with the fewest possible restrictions. In order to avoid the
>>    possibility of trademark infringement, all references to the
>>    original title and the original publisher have been changed or
>>    deleted. Because of numerous references embodying possible
>>    trademarks, the entire preface has been omitted. The original
>>    publisher of the 1911 print encyclopedia was not and is not  involved
>>    in any way with the creation, editing or distribution of the  Project
>>    Gutenberg Encyclopedia. Any errors which may have occurred in the
>>    conversion to electronic form can not be attributed in any way to
>>    the original publisher. In order to avoid possible future trademark
>>    infringements or confusion in the minds of the public, this
>>    electronic version should be referred to as the Project Gutenberg
>>    Encyclopedia. The name of the original print encyclopedia should  not
>>    be used in any way in connection with this electronic text."
>>
>> I am suggesting that the Wikimedia Foundation follow the lead of
>> Project Gutenberg in this case and try to avoid implied endorsement
>> by also avoiding the use of registered trademarks when possible.
>> The real question then is how and in what cases should registered
>> trademarks be omitted?  Obviously there shouldn't be much of a
>> problem for a Wikipedia article about a company, but it gets into
>> grey areas when you get into a collection of articles that could be
>> refered to by using a registered trademark, such as Ford mussle  cars
>> or kinds of SPAM.
>>
>> Obviously each Wikimedia project will end up having to deal with
>> this issue independently on the fine points, but it wouldn't hurt  to
>> establish some general policy guidelines either.  Any general
>> assistance would be appreciated.
>


list: wikimedia-l


list: wikien-l

from_name: Haukur Þorgeirsson

subject: [WikiEN-l] Non-free images, there has to be a better way

body:
>> This argument is getting a bit tired. Do you have an
>> [[IBM 360]] in your backyard?
>
> Someone appparently does:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:IBM360-65-1.corestore.jpg
>
> GNU FDL.
>
> So you see, giving up too easily is a bad idea.

Again, I'm sorry for making that typo. The system
in question is the [[IBM 1360]]. Three images showing
it were recently uploaded to Wikipedia with explicit
permission of the copyright holders. They were deleted
on sight in accordance with your decree.

According to the uploader all IBM 1360 units have now
been disassembled. Obtaining a free image may not be
possible. We certainly don't have any now. This is an
article which would greatly benefit from having pictures.

>> And, sadly, it seems that Jimbo's fatwah against UWP has
>> increased the number of far-fetched rationalizations for
>> fair use on Wikipedia.
>
> I consider this quite unfortunate.  I think that our use of fair-use
> should be restricted solely to pictures of absolute historical
> importance for which there is no possibility of a free alternative.

I would be fine with such a policy. And I argue that
if we can tolerate a few fair-use images where they
are the only ones available we can also tolerate a
few used-with-permission images where those are the
only ones we can obtain. See [[Z machine]] for another
example.

Regards,
Haukur


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Adam Matei

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Special:export utility does not include all revisions
	in xml file

body:
Hi,

I was trying to export some entries using the special:export utility and
although I unchecked the box, to get all the revisions, the xml output file
includes only the last revision. Is there something I am missing or is this
utility partially disabled?

Thanks.

SM


from_name: Carlos

subject: [Wikitech-l] URLs

body:
Kate wrote:

>we now have the choice to replace "action=" with a new path:
>
>        - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
>        - http://en.wikipedia.org/edit/Main_Page
>
>however, at the same time, we could implement a change in the way domain
>names are used, that has been discussed several times in the past:
>
>        - http://wikipedia.org/en/article/Main_Page
>        - http://wikipedia.org/en/edit/Main_Page
>
>

Will "article", "edit", etc., be localizable?

Thanks.


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Phil Boswell

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Re: pie: against redundancy

body:
"Mark Williamson" <node.ue at gmail.com> wrote in
message news:849f98ed05070708111753eb44 at mail.gmail.com...
> People say that "Wiki" is derived from the Hawai'ian word wikiwiki.
> However, I have an inside source that says that Ward Cunningham got it
> from an unabridged dictionary. "Wiki" or "Wicky" is from the
> Anglo-Saxon "wici", which comes from the Proto-Germanic root
> "*hveik-", which is from the Proto-Indo-European root "*weigh-"

...which as any viewer of "The Beiderbecke Affair" can attest, has survied
to this day as the war-cry of the Nukey-Brown brigade:

"Away the lads!"

...which basically means, in polite terms, "let's go chaps!", usually in
preparation for some sort of fight, except in the above mentioned program
where it was used as an expression of sexual ecstasy, which annoyed the
protagonist's girlfriend no end since she naturally expected his mind to be
on things other than football at sensitive moments.

Then again, to a native of Newcastle, the two are closely related :-)

HTH HAND
--
Phil
[[en:User:Phil Boswell]]
Now look what you've done, you've gotten me whimsical again :-)


subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Natural languages and new Wikipedias;
	Chinook Jargon?

body:
You're not realising the meaning of "natural language" here. It
doesn't mean a language that is "natural", but rather a language that
was formed by natural processes rather than having been intentionally
conceived.

"Natural language" includes pidgins, creoles, most jargons, mixed
languages, and the like as they weren't intentionally constructed --
creolisation and related processes are natural processes, whereas an
opthamologist writing a book trying to teach a language that until
then hadn't existed is not a natural process.

I have some problems with the creation of a Chinook Wawa Wikipedia.
Nowadays, the creation of a Wikipedia generally requires the
demonstration that it will actually be active. I encourage you and
other Chinook Wawa speakers and enthusiasts to set up a "test
Wikipedia" at http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Test-wp/wawa/ on the
model of the Scots, Cantonese, and other test Wikipedias.

You can also do the same for Ladino (I would recommend
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Test-wp/lad/ ), and it would probably
have a better chance of getting created sooner if you did.

Please note that, as noted at
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Proposed_policy_for_wikis_in_new_languages
, the current policy or lack thereof means that a new Wiki can be
created at the whim of a developer. Thus, 5 supporters is not a hard
and fast requirement. If you have 3 people, and the 3 of you build a
test Wikipedia of a considerable size, it's quite possible that a
Wikipedia could be created for you anyhow.

Mark

On 07/07/05, Ros' Haruo <rosharuo at gmail.com> wrote:
> In the discussion on setting up Ladino, Angela gave some useful
> information which included that (paraphrasing from memory) "for
> natural languages, once there are five supporters and no objections,
> it can be set up".
>
> I'm interested in how the standards differ for "unnatural languages",
> and/or what the line of demarcation is (or are there several). I'm
> also interested in what happens if there *is* an objection to a
> particular language. As an Esperantist (but not denaska) I always see
> a red flag in the phrase "natural languages", since subjectively to me
> Esperanto is quite as natural as my original native langauge, English,
> and much more natural than my attempts at, say, Dutch. But the case I
> have in mind is Chinook Jargon. I've been talking up the idea of a
> Chinuk Wawa Wikipedia on CJ mailing lists, and there is some favorable
> response. But is it a "natural language"? (And if not, what hoops does
> it have to jump through to get a wiki?) It started out, after all, as
> sort of the Esperanto of the Northwest Coast. Now it survives in
> actual spoken use mainly on the Grand Ronde Reservation in Oregon,
> though there are hundreds of people around the world who use it to
> some extent in writing (including on the web), most of whom use a form
> closer to the original pidgin than to the creole now spoken at GR; but
> all these people consider themselves in some sense members of a single
> language community.
>
> Haruo
> --
> Meet the Whole World Halfway ? Learn and Use Esperanto!
> www.lernu.net
> Mia TTTejo : http://www.scn.org/~lilandbr/
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>
>
>

--
SI HOC LEGERE SCIS NIMIVM ERVDITIONIS HABES
QVANTVM MATERIAE MATERIETVR MARMOTA MONAX SI MARMOTA MONAX MATERIAM
POSSIT MATERIARI
ESTNE VOLVMEN IN TOGA AN SOLVM TIBI LIBET ME VIDERE


from_name: Alphax

body:
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Ray Saintonge wrote:
> AFAIK we have not yet received any official take-down orders.  That's
> disturbing in its own peculiar way.  Receiving a few of these gives us
> an idea of which way the wind is blowing.  Without them we are only
> speculating about what might happen.  Until we receive such notices it
> should be enough to be reasonable.  Winnability should not enter into
> the discussion until after the notice.  So far, case reports don't give
> a conclusive picture, but some decisions have been favorable.  I'm
> probably more optimistic than you.
>

See [[Wikipedia:Request for immediate removal of copyright violation]].

- --
Alphax
OpenPGP key: 0xF874C613 - http://tinyurl.com/cc9up
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
There are two kinds of people: those who say to God, 'Thy will be done,'
and those to whom God says, 'All right, then, have it your way.' - C. S.
Lewis
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subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: pie: against redundancy

body:
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Ros? Haruo wrote:
> So what is Proto-Indo-European for "wiki" anyway?
>

Well, "wiki" is Hawaiian(sic) for "fast" or "quick". Which raises a
disturbing point - we are building "quickie" projects? :)

- --
Alphax
OpenPGP key: 0xF874C613 - http://tinyurl.com/cc9up
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
There are two kinds of people: those who say to God, 'Thy will be done,'
and those to whom God says, 'All right, then, have it your way.' - C. S.
Lewis
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from_name: Finne Boonen

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Dutch-Low Saxon test-mainpage

body:
On 7/4/05, Servien Ilaino <servien at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi everyone,
>
>
> Veerder lykt et myn 'n goed idee ?m hierover te disk?ssieern in et
> NDS, k?'w drekt sien wies NDS goed genog is ?m dit te verstaon haha!
> :-)
>
> Groetnis!
> Servien!
>
>

Zelfs ik versta het, en ik kom van Antweren en Brussel :)

Finne
--
"Maybe you knew early on that your track went from point A to B, but
unlike you I wasn't given a map at birth!" Alyssa, "Chasing Amy"
http://hekla.rave.org/cookbook.html - my crossplatform dieet/recipe app


body:
Also, please note that a native of highly-competent fluent speaker
should be around for any new Wikipedia.

Recent problems with adminship and earlier problems with various other
things on the Irish Wikipedia arose due to the fact that one of the
first members and the first administrator and then bureaucrat is not a
fluent Irish speaker; other similar and related problems have arisen
elsewhere (on mi: with Perl, on na: with Belgian Man, on sm: with
Robin Patterson, etc).

Mark

On 07/07/05, Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com> wrote:
> You're not realising the meaning of "natural language" here. It
> doesn't mean a language that is "natural", but rather a language that
> was formed by natural processes rather than having been intentionally
> conceived.
>
> "Natural language" includes pidgins, creoles, most jargons, mixed
> languages, and the like as they weren't intentionally constructed --
> creolisation and related processes are natural processes, whereas an
> opthamologist writing a book trying to teach a language that until
> then hadn't existed is not a natural process.
>
> I have some problems with the creation of a Chinook Wawa Wikipedia.
> Nowadays, the creation of a Wikipedia generally requires the
> demonstration that it will actually be active. I encourage you and
> other Chinook Wawa speakers and enthusiasts to set up a "test
> Wikipedia" at http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Test-wp/wawa/ on the
> model of the Scots, Cantonese, and other test Wikipedias.
>
> You can also do the same for Ladino (I would recommend
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Test-wp/lad/ ), and it would probably
> have a better chance of getting created sooner if you did.
>
> Please note that, as noted at
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Proposed_policy_for_wikis_in_new_languages
> , the current policy or lack thereof means that a new Wiki can be
> created at the whim of a developer. Thus, 5 supporters is not a hard
> and fast requirement. If you have 3 people, and the 3 of you build a
> test Wikipedia of a considerable size, it's quite possible that a
> Wikipedia could be created for you anyhow.
>
> Mark
>
> On 07/07/05, Ros' Haruo <rosharuo at gmail.com> wrote:
> > In the discussion on setting up Ladino, Angela gave some useful
> > information which included that (paraphrasing from memory) "for
> > natural languages, once there are five supporters and no objections,
> > it can be set up".
> >
> > I'm interested in how the standards differ for "unnatural languages",
> > and/or what the line of demarcation is (or are there several). I'm
> > also interested in what happens if there *is* an objection to a
> > particular language. As an Esperantist (but not denaska) I always see
> > a red flag in the phrase "natural languages", since subjectively to me
> > Esperanto is quite as natural as my original native langauge, English,
> > and much more natural than my attempts at, say, Dutch. But the case I
> > have in mind is Chinook Jargon. I've been talking up the idea of a
> > Chinuk Wawa Wikipedia on CJ mailing lists, and there is some favorable
> > response. But is it a "natural language"? (And if not, what hoops does
> > it have to jump through to get a wiki?) It started out, after all, as
> > sort of the Esperanto of the Northwest Coast. Now it survives in
> > actual spoken use mainly on the Grand Ronde Reservation in Oregon,
> > though there are hundreds of people around the world who use it to
> > some extent in writing (including on the web), most of whom use a form
> > closer to the original pidgin than to the creole now spoken at GR; but
> > all these people consider themselves in some sense members of a single
> > language community.
> >
> > Haruo
> > --
> > Meet the Whole World Halfway ? Learn and Use Esperanto!
> > www.lernu.net
> > Mia TTTejo : http://www.scn.org/~lilandbr/
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Wikipedia-l mailing list
> > Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
> >
> >
> >
>
>
> --
> SI HOC LEGERE SCIS NIMIVM ERVDITIONIS HABES
> QVANTVM MATERIAE MATERIETVR MARMOTA MONAX SI MARMOTA MONAX MATERIAM
> POSSIT MATERIARI
> ESTNE VOLVMEN IN TOGA AN SOLVM TIBI LIBET ME VIDERE
>

--
SI HOC LEGERE SCIS NIMIVM ERVDITIONIS HABES
QVANTVM MATERIAE MATERIETVR MARMOTA MONAX SI MARMOTA MONAX MATERIAM
POSSIT MATERIARI
ESTNE VOLVMEN IN TOGA AN SOLVM TIBI LIBET ME VIDERE


subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Policy clarification: separate Wikipedias for
	cultures, peoples, and countries, or for languages?

body:
Hi all,

I would like to ask for some clarification of Wikimedia policy.

Is it considered acceptable to have spearate Wikipedias for different
cultures and peoples rather than languages? Are any existing
Wikipedias considered in this capacity?

Robin Patterson has asserted on mi: that rather than a Wikipedia in
the Maori language, it's intended as a Wikipedia for the Maori people,
and thus extensive usage of the English language is OK or even good,
since only 5% of Maori people are fluent in Maori.

Similarly, he wanted to add English content to the Samoan Wikipedia
because "tens of thousands" of Samoans speak English fluently. It
should be noted that neither of these languages are his native
languages. Maori, he lists as a Babel template level of 1 (his French
and German are better), yet he is the sole administrator at the Maori
Wikipedia. He noted on his Samoan userpage that he knows only a
handful of Samoan words, yet he tried to apply there for sysop
anyways.

Mark


body:
On 7/5/05, Servien Ilaino <servien at gmail.com> wrote:
> The y's were initially used to make it look more "trendy and hip" but
> people who used it said it looked too much like
> (Westlauwers-)Frisian... the v's are probably used because in Dutch
> the f and the v are pronounced the same and where used as a compromise
> so that it wouldn't look too much like German.

just a small intermezo, in correct Dutch pronounciation the f and the
v are 2 different sounds. Only some parts of the Netherlands mash the
2 together in one sound.

Finne

--
"Maybe you knew early on that your track went from point A to B, but
unlike you I wasn't given a map at birth!" Alyssa, "Chasing Amy"
http://hekla.rave.org/cookbook.html - my crossplatform dieet/recipe app


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Hi

body:
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Jtkiefer wrote:
>> Hmm, perhaps the mailing list admins should start moderating the posts
>> of established users on the list in addition to new subscribers?
>>
>> --Michael Snow
>>
>
> I think the admins do not like to  for several reason:
>
> A) More work for the listadmins and believe it or not I'm pretty sure
> they have lives (we're still trying to confirm whether this is true or
> not and may or may not need to put a {{disputed}} tag on it. :)
>
> B) It makes user reluctant to join in a conversation when they aren't
> sure whether their message will get through and if it does if it will
> still be relevant due to the backup caused by having to approve
> individual messages one by one.  Thus negating the whole point of having
> a message list.
>
>
> I'd be interested to hear if anyone agrees/disagrees/ or has any
> thoughts on these ideas.
>

If you are bothered by the content of this mailing list, you need a
better spam filter or a better crap filter (or both).

Trip, trap, trip, trap over the bridge...

- --
Alphax
OpenPGP key: 0xF874C613 - http://tinyurl.com/cc9up
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
There are two kinds of people: those who say to God, 'Thy will be done,'
and those to whom God says, 'All right, then, have it your way.' - C. S.
Lewis
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from_name: Lars Aronsson

body:
Mark Williamson wrote:
> People say that "Wiki" is derived from the Hawai'ian word wikiwiki.
>
> However, I have an inside source that says that Ward Cunningham got it
> from an unabridged dictionary. "Wiki" or "Wicky" is from the
> Anglo-Saxon "wici", which comes from the Proto-Germanic root
> "*hveik-", which is from the Proto-Indo-European root "*weigh-"

This is because the VIKIngs, descendants of [[Leif Ericson]], when
they got fed up with the climate of Newfoundland, quickly went on
to populate Hawaii.

--
  Lars Aronsson (lars at aronsson.se)
  Aronsson Datateknik - http://aronsson.se


from_name: Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason

subject: [Wikitech-l] URLs

body:
> does anyone have comments on or object to this change?

I like the current urls, a subdomain looks much better and is easier
to remember than a subdirectory.


from_name: Aphaia

subject:
[Foundation-l] Issues regarding admin(s?) on wikinews,
	effects: globally

body:
On 7/7/05, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> Ilya Haykinson wrote:
> > Ok, I'm really confused. There has indeed been some heated editing on
> > Wikinews which caused the departure of one admin (who I hope will come
> > back someday) and the temporary banning of another for violating the
> > 3RR -- not an unusual thing.
>
> Why is 3RR regarded as bannable policy on Wikinews?  It seems unlikely
> to be needed at this early stage, and certainly if it was adopted
> incautiously from English Wikipedia, this is a decision which should be
> reconsidered.

In my opinion, it depends, and if Wikinews is suffered already by edit
wars (I don't know if it would be or not),  it would be helpful. But
we could go in a softer way prausibly.

An editor has proposed recently on Wikqiuote a modified version of
3RR, instead of blocking two involved party, protect the page in
question, and invite editors to its talk. After a while, a sysop
unprotect the page, and if then someone try to ignore on-going
discussion and make an edit not reflecting the latest discussion
intentionally, (except a genuine newcomer), then blocking his or her
account cumlatively (first 24 hours, then 48 hours ...)

It is not the official policy yet, and still its early and
experimental stage, but seems to work fairly. Just for your
information.

--
Aphaea@*.wikipedia.org
email: Aphaia @ gmail (dot) com


from_name: Jean-Baptiste Soufron

body:
Well, trademark law has limited applications, mainly to commercial
matters. And I don't see how using the 1911 public domain
encyclopedia can infringe the Britannica trademark. They can pretend
it does, but to sum it up, Britannica is a work, the title of this
work and a trademark.

Once the work is public domain, anybody is entitled to reproduce it
under under its right title since this title is itself part of the work.

Thus, the trademark only protects Britannica from competitive uses
(like if someone tries to launch a Britannica book collection).

Basically, the reproduction Britannica 1911 edition is not using the
trademark Britannica, but the title Britannica.

It is always important to remember that Trademark Law is much more
restrictive than Copyright Law.

I cc Michael Hart in case he remembers anything about this settlement
with Britannica.

Jean-Baptiste Soufron

Le 6 juil. 05 ? 14:09, Robert Scott Horning a ?crit :

> I've come across a potential legal issue that has an impact across
> several Wikimedia projects that I'd like to bring up for general
> discussion.
>
> I've been trying to find a home for the 1911 Wikipedia (for more
> details, see the new project page), and I've been attempting to
> move it to Wikisource, with the following discussion at the
> Scriptorium: http://wikisource.org/wiki/Wikisource%
> 3AScriptorium#1911_Wikipedia
>
> The larger issue I am seeking input from the regulars of this
> mailing list is in regards to proper use of registered trademarks
> for larger projects.  In this case it is how a registered trademark
> can be properly used or avoided when a project is tied to something
> that inevitably has strong references to registered trademarks.
>
> In this case it is in reference to the 1911 edition of the
> Encyclopedia Britannica, where a whole sub project is going to be
> based on content from that set of volumes.  This issue could also
> deal with How-to books in Wikibooks or even Star Trek or Star Wars
> trivia entries in Wikipedia, which is again why I'm posting this
> issue here rather than other Foundation lists.
>
> In particular for the Encyclopedia Britannica, this issue already
> came up with Project Gutenberg where Encyclopedia Britannica's
> legal team forced Project Gutenberg into a policy statement.  Keep
> in mind that prior to this official statement, Project Gutenberg
> routinely referenced the associated text with the Encyclopedia
> Britannica by name.  What resulted was the following:
>
>    "The Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia is a reproduction of a 1911
>    edition of a famous encyclopedia. The text has not been updated.
>    Although the text is in the public domain in the United States, the
>    original publisher still has a valid trademark in the original
> title
>    of the encyclopedia. The original publisher offered Project
>    Gutenberg a license to use the trademark, but the terms of the
>    license were not consistent with the volunteer noncommercial nature
>    of Project Gutenberg or its primary goal of distributing electronic
>    text with the fewest possible restrictions. In order to avoid the
>    possibility of trademark infringement, all references to the
>    original title and the original publisher have been changed or
>    deleted. Because of numerous references embodying possible
>    trademarks, the entire preface has been omitted. The original
>    publisher of the 1911 print encyclopedia was not and is not
> involved
>    in any way with the creation, editing or distribution of the
> Project
>    Gutenberg Encyclopedia. Any errors which may have occurred in the
>    conversion to electronic form can not be attributed in any way to
>    the original publisher. In order to avoid possible future trademark
>    infringements or confusion in the minds of the public, this
>    electronic version should be referred to as the Project Gutenberg
>    Encyclopedia. The name of the original print encyclopedia should
> not
>    be used in any way in connection with this electronic text."
>
> I am suggesting that the Wikimedia Foundation follow the lead of
> Project Gutenberg in this case and try to avoid implied endorsement
> by also avoiding the use of registered trademarks when possible.
> The real question then is how and in what cases should registered
> trademarks be omitted?  Obviously there shouldn't be much of a
> problem for a Wikipedia article about a company, but it gets into
> grey areas when you get into a collection of articles that could be
> refered to by using a registered trademark, such as Ford mussle
> cars or kinds of SPAM.
>
> Obviously each Wikimedia project will end up having to deal with
> this issue independently on the fine points, but it wouldn't hurt
> to establish some general policy guidelines either.  Any general
> assistance would be appreciated.
>
> --
> Robert Scott Horning
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


from_name: Kate

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: statistics now available

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote in gmane.science.linguistics.wikipedia.technical:

> It wouldn't surprise me if the US figures were even lower.  There's
> already been a comment about the hits for South Africa being
> ridiculously low.  The US national domain, .us, is relatively uncommon,
> and many people from other countries use a .com, .org, .net or even .gov
> domain.  One wonders to what extent that has been factored into the
> statistics.

statistics are based on IP data from RIRs, not domains (which we don't log
or do lookups for).

however, the current small sample size introduces possible errors from
problems during log collection (now resolved, but will take a while to be
removed from the statistics).

> Ec

kate.


from_name: Kyle Lutze

subject:
[Foundation-l] Issues regarding admin(s?) on wikinews,	effects:
	globally

body:
Nathan Reed wrote:

>I chatted with Apple/Kyle for a few moments on IRC and it appears he
>was goaded into posting by NGerda (who has been "helping him out with
>some stuff"). Kyle was led to believe the block might have been
>handled in the wrong way and in his words, "got kinda pissed and just
>started writing an email". He's acknowledged that the post might have
>better been directed to wikinews-l -- if it should have been sent at
>all.
>
>I think we can expect some clarification tomorrow.
>
>-Chiacomo
>
>
Ok, to clarify now that I have some time. It wasn't NGerda who told me,
it was Amgine. I would post the logs, but I'm against posting private
logs in general.

So basically Amgine told me that he felt that Erik keeps disregarding
the community and wiki process, and that everybody has to keep cleaning
up after him; Not that he was abusing his powers.

I talked to NGerda on the phone today, he isn't pissed too much, I guess
it was something along the lines of NGerda thought one story should be
covered the most while five other dudes thought the london story should
be the main covered article, or something like that.

>From there, NGerda got a temporary ban for 3rr, but made a good point.
Whoever the other five people are also should've been banned as they
could technically be considered one body that had also commited the
"horrendious(sp?)" crime of 3rr.

>On 7/6/05, Erik Moeller <erik_moeller at gmx.de> wrote:
>
>
>>Kyle Lutze:
>>
>>
>>>let me clarify really fast:
>>>Erik is his real name
>>>Xirzon is his IRC nick
>>>Eloquence is his wikinews name
>>>Ida_mayhem is his bot name
>>>
>>>
>>Hi,
>>
>>yes, things can be a bit confusing sometimes. I intend to change my
>>username to my real name once we have single login.
>>
>>
>>
>>>Ok, I have now been informed that nGerda was blocked validly.
>>>
>>>
>>I'd be happy to post the relevant IRC log for anyone interested. I was
>>actually very reluctant to block Nick, because we get along quite well,
>>and because he has made many good contributions. However, I was the only
>>admin who was not involved in the dispute and who was available at the
>>time. 3RR is documented policy on Wikinews as it is on Wikipedia. I have
>>never blocked a sysop on Wikinews before, as far as I can remember. I
>>have also never created a sock puppet on a Wikimedia wiki, ever.
>>
>>
>>
>>>As for the specific examples, I'm making those fools dig up evidence now
>>>as I'm a tad bit embarrassed that they told me lies in the first place.
>>>
>>>
>>There is a big brouhaha going on at the moment about Amgine's departure
>>and his plans for a new "Open Wikinews". Those who want to read the
>>whole mess can do it at
>>http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikinews/Open_English
>>http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Wikinews/Open_English
>>
>>Meanwhile, I'm inviting an open discussion about the future of the
>>project, which I will announce separately.
>>
>>Best,
>>
>>Erik
>>
Aphaia wrote:

On 7/7/05, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:

>Ilya Haykinson wrote:
>
>
>>Ok, I'm really confused. There has indeed been some heated editing on
>>Wikinews which caused the departure of one admin (who I hope will come
>>back someday) and the temporary banning of another for violating the
>>3RR -- not an unusual thing.
>>
>>
>Why is 3RR regarded as bannable policy on Wikinews?  It seems unlikely
>to be needed at this early stage, and certainly if it was adopted
>incautiously from English Wikipedia, this is a decision which should be
>reconsidered.
>In my opinion, it depends, and if Wikinews is suffered already by edit
>wars (I don't know if it would be or not),  it would be helpful. But
>we could go in a softer way prausibly.
>
>An editor has proposed recently on Wikqiuote a modified version of
>3RR, instead of blocking two involved party, protect the page in
>question, and invite editors to its talk. After a while, a sysop
>unprotect the page, and if then someone try to ignore on-going
>discussion and make an edit not reflecting the latest discussion
>intentionally, (except a genuine newcomer), then blocking his or her
>account cumlatively (first 24 hours, then 48 hours ...)
>
I like the protect it idea.

Kyle


from_name: Anthere

subject: [Foundation-l] Re: Social issues for the newer projects

body:
Michael Snow a ?crit:
> These are some thoughts prompted by the incident on Wikinews recently
> discussed on this list. They are general in nature, and decidedly *not*
> directed at any particular individual. I venture to say that anyone who
> thinks they know what individuals I have in mind is *highly* likely to
> be mistaken. However, I think the general principles are important to
> consider, especially for those who are trying to shepherd the
> development of Wikimedia's younger projects (i.e., everything but
> Wikipedia).
>
> Wikipedia is clearly our most successful project. It attracts the bulk
> of our contributors and is easily the best at producing quality content.
> In the process, it has become a solid, well-functioning community. This
> is because it consists of people who can collaborate well, and for those
> who cannot, the system allows people of good will to exert various
> pressures until the problem cases either change their ways or leave.
> These factors are self-reinforcing and thus allow for continued
> improvement (this is not predestined, and we should avoid complacency,
> but that is a topic for another day).
>
> None of the other projects, in my opinion, is yet particularly
> successful at any of these things - attracting contributors, creating
> quality content, or developing a sustainable community. They are still
> in earlier stages, so I'm not saying they can't, or even that they
> should be further along than they are. And they do have fine content
> occasionally, but need the contributor base and the community atmosphere
> in order to bring the content to a higher level overall.
>
> The contributor base is a huge problem, because none of the other
> projects brings in enough new people on its own; they all grow by virtue
> of Wikipedia's coattails. But people strongly attracted to Wikipedia are
> more likely to stay there, so the other projects end up with those who,
> for whatever reason, did not fit in.
>
> Why do some people not fit in? In some cases it's due to legitimate
> disagreements over how broadly Wikipedia should extend, so we often talk
> about other projects as ways to accommodate content not included in an
> encyclopedia. This is fine, and people who are less comfortable in the
> Wikipedia community for this reason are not a problem. Let them work on
> the project they like best, and they can team up with those people who
> never would have even tried Wikipedia, but contribute now because they
> really love the idea of Wiktionary or Wikinews or whichever project.
>
> The problem is with people who don't quite fit in with our community
> ideals. By this I don't just mean NPOV, but the need for collaboration
> and consensus-building. This kind of person starts out on Wikipedia, and
> would likely have stayed there if they had been successful in that
> community. They don't leave on account of a block, nor are they even
> obviously violating any policy. But when they grow frustrated with the
> give and take of the process (not having their way, essentially), they
> migrate to one of the other projects to try again.
>
> These people, if there are too many in a project, will drag the
> community down instead of up, and the content will ultimately suffer as
> well. I am concerned at having observed several cases (again, no names)
> follow this pattern. I'm not talking about people trying to push a
> political agenda in one place and then the next - those are easier to
> recognize and deal with. Rather, I mean people whose Wikipedia careers
> show that they have difficulty recognizing community sentiment and
> understanding when a consensus is developing. The problem may manifest
> itself in a different way on the next project, but its cause remains the
> same.
>
> One also hopes that people can learn and do better with a fresh start in
> a new project. Some of these users will improve and avoid their
> Wikipedia errors, but some will not. I think it is important for those
> trying to guide the newer projects to watch for problems of this sort,
> and be especially diligent in fostering a community ethic on the project.
>
> --Michael Snow

Nod. I think what you wrote here is very true.

A strong mind in a small community will have a major impact in the way
it develops. It is one of the major risk of small projects, especially
when the strong mind knows well the general structure and level s/he can
use on people. This is even more problematic in small projects isolated
for language reasons.


from_name: Stan Shebs

body:
Fastfission wrote:

>On 7/6/05, Stan Shebs <shebs at apple.com> wrote:
>
>
>>On the other hand, I would estimate 90% of those images are also
>>effectively serving as free advertising for their respective
>>copyright holders. Companies pay all kinds of money to get their
>>logos displayed on the front pages of websites with far fewer eyeballs
>>and much less reputation; band managers and book agents don't want
>>their client's WP articles to be the only ones without attractive
>>visuals, and rising stars don't want paparazzi-style candid
>>shot to be the first thing that WP readers see about them.
>>
>>
>
>You really think so? Most of those that I've seen don't even have
>their ultimate source listed. They say things like, "Taken from such
>and such website," where such and such website is usually violating
>copyright. They don't say things like, "If you're interested in a
>larger picture of this, contact Getty Images" or something like that.
>
>
I mostly look at articles, not the image category, so maybe that skews
my impression.

One important thing that distinguishes us from, say, p2p outfits, is intent.
Our goal is not to enable people to share a top 40 song with 1,000 of their
"closest friends", wink wink nudge nudge, but to make a reputable reference
work. I wouldn't fault Disney, for instance, for objecting to a Mickey Mouse
image illustrating a slamfest entitled [[The evil deeds of the evil
Disney corporate
thugs]], but we don't (usually) have that kind of article. Another thing
we do
is to have extensive discussion (like this thread) of what is and is not
OK, and
the discussion is a matter of public record. If it ever got to the point
of a judge
scrutinizing our policies and practices, I think we would be found to be
taking
more care about all this than the average volunteer organization or private
website (as you observe, there are many copyright-violating websites in the
world).

So as to cull out the unnecessary fair use images, I think we should be
making
passes over those, and not be shy about deleting ones that offer nothing
over
free versions. Ideally, every fair use image's description page will have a
special justification for its existence, something that we can defend to any
skeptics.

> But anyway. I'm not a lawyer, and certainly not a copyright lawyer. I
>might -- if nobody objects -- make a few informal e-mails to some
>academics who I do consider bonafide experts in this subject and ask
>them their thoughts on these questions, which I'll happily relay to
>the list. But I won't do that immediately, so if someone has any
>objections, please let me know (I should note, I will make no gestures
>that I represent WP in any way).
>
>
We should be completely open and upfront about this, no reason to
sneak around. For my part, I've been researching postage stamp
copyrights, which seem to be complicated, and yet in practice, every
stamp dealer in the world publishes thousands of copyrighted
images every year, and nobody seems to mind. Curious, eh?

Stan


from_name: Mark Bergsma

subject: [Wikitech-l] URLs

body:
?var Arnfj?r? Bjarmason wrote:
>>does anyone have comments on or object to this change?
>
>
> I like the current urls, a subdomain looks much better and is easier
> to remember than a subdirectory.

Well that depends on who you ask, I for one think the opposite :)

--
Mark

mark at nedworks.org


from_name: Jimmy Wales

subject: [WikiEN-l] The ongoing trolling

body:
Skyring wrote:
> Grab yourself a sockpuppet account, dive into an edit war, start
> correcting stuff and see what happens when other ditors don't know who
> you are.

I'm sorry, but I would personally find this to be unethical behavior.

But I could be convinced to do it if you could show me some links

> Then try to forget that you are well-regarded and experienced here and
> you have a great deal of power. Put yourself in the shoes of a new
> editor doing what they see as the right thing and encountering
> statements like this one: "I will revert you twice a day, for the rest
> of history if needs be. Plus I have more allies than you, so your
> attempts to restalinise this article must fail."
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3AKhmer_Rouge&diff=14835971&oldid=14831760

But in this case, this response was absolutely valid.  Ruy Lopez was
engaging in an ongoing campaign of vandalism of the article, and letting
him know that we're more patient than he is, is exactly the right thing
to do.

> This is from an editor, one heavily supported by admins and ArbCom
> members, who manages to get away with the most shocking abuse, often
> involving sexual connotations.

Please show me a diff involving sexual connotations?

>
> Comments form an Arbcom member about protecting this editor, despite
> his long history of abuse may be found here:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_arbitration/Skyring/Proposed_decision&diff=prev&oldid=17772684

This comment does not tell me anything particularly useful.  It is
widely acknowledged, even by Adam himself, that he's often difficult.
He doesn't cross the line, but if we put users on a spectrum of
usefulness/difficulty, certainly he scores very very high on usefulness
and higher than average on difficulty.

Adam has no special protection from me or the ArbCom.

> I'm not trying to refight old battles here, merely pointing out that
> in my experience, thuggery, threats and hypocrisy are what a new
> editor may expect if he gets on the wrong side of "the old soldiers"
> here.

I don't see much evidence of that.  Of course there are better and worse
examples of everything.  But what we're discussing is a handful of
really wild accusations that people are randomly banned if they cross
old timers, etc.  A lack of perfection is certainly something that we
always need to be rigorous about examining... but hardly justifies wild
trolling from users who seem to offer no actual evidence of injustice.

I appreciate you offering a few diffs, and hope you'll offer more.  I'd
particularly like to see where you got the conclusion that Adam Carr
"manages to get away with the most shocking abuse, often involving
sexual connotations."

--Jimbo


from_name: Michael Snow

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Non-free images, there has to be a better way

body:
Haukur ?orgeirsson wrote:

>I would be fine with such a policy. And I argue that
>if we can tolerate a few fair-use images where they
>are the only ones available we can also tolerate a
>few used-with-permission images where those are the
>only ones we can obtain.
>
If they truly are the only ones we can obtain, then they're almost
certainly fair use for us anyway. The permission should be noted, but
isn't critical. But there's a huge difference between an image being the
only one of its kind we can get under any circumstances, and being the
only image some editor is able to get a hold of.

In the past, even with Wikipedia-only permissions discouraged, far too
many users have thought it sufficient just to ask for permission without
asking for permission under a free license. Allowing this would
encourage people to be even more lazy about getting free images.

--Michael Snow


from_name: Wouter Steenbeek

body:
>From: Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com>
>
>Wouter, I disagree. Old Saxon is, in my belief, mutually
>comprehensible with all other early West Germanic languages. We should
>thus use Common West Germanic. Though not attested, with a little
>effort we should be able to write in it.

Old Low West Germanic, bien entendu. Old High German /is/ attested and quite
different. I could contribute in Old Maastrichtian, attested in the
Wachtendonck Psalms. We could thus join the request for a Wikipedia in Old
Norse, reinforce the dormant Gothic one and work together with the
Anglo-Saxon edition. When all this succeeds, and other projects like Old
Irish, Troubadourish (Middle Proven?al), Vulgar Latin, Church Slavonic, Old
Greek (Homeric? Classical? Koine?) etc. Wikipedias are created in the mean
time, we can request a PIE Wikipedia, reconstructing the language by what is
known and enhancing it with adapted borrowings from Classical and modern
languages. That's what i call back to your roots!

Wouter

_________________________________________________________________
MSN Webmessenger: altijd en overal beschikbaar http://webmessenger.msn.com/


from_name: Fred Bauder

body:
He's right. However Wikinfo welcomes this sort of thing. [[New
Zealand from a Maori viewpoint]]. I would rather Wikipedia just
changed its policy, but the position seems entrenched.

Fred

On Jul 7, 2005, at 7:27 PM, Andrew Lih wrote:

> Mark, so far Wikipedia's been organized around language, and not
> culture, because the latter would likely jeopardize the goal of NPOV.
>
> NPOV works is because there can only be *one* article about abortion,
> Gdansk, Diaoyutai or scientology in English. Editors have to come to
> some type of consensus in that one article. Accommodating "different
> cultures" with different Wikipedias would be akin to forking and
> reduce the incentive to arrive at the consensus that makes Wikipedia
> useful.
>
> -User:Fuzheado
>
> On 7/8/05, Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Hi all,
>>
>> I would like to ask for some clarification of Wikimedia policy.
>>
>> Is it considered acceptable to have spearate Wikipedias for different
>> cultures and peoples rather than languages? Are any existing
>> Wikipedias considered in this capacity?
>>
>> Robin Patterson has asserted on mi: that rather than a Wikipedia in
>> the Maori language, it's intended as a Wikipedia for the Maori
>> people,
>> and thus extensive usage of the English language is OK or even good,
>> since only 5% of Maori people are fluent in Maori.
>>
>> Similarly, he wanted to add English content to the Samoan Wikipedia
>> because "tens of thousands" of Samoans speak English fluently. It
>> should be noted that neither of these languages are his native
>> languages. Maori, he lists as a Babel template level of 1 (his French
>> and German are better), yet he is the sole administrator at the Maori
>> Wikipedia. He noted on his Samoan userpage that he knows only a
>> handful of Samoan words, yet he tried to apply there for sysop
>> anyways.
>>
>> Mark
>> _______________________________________________
>> Wikipedia-l mailing list
>> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
>> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>>
>>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


from_name: SJ

subject: [Foundation-l] Social issues for the newer projects

body:
On 7/7/05, SJ <2.718281828 at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 7/7/05, Erik Moeller <erik_moeller at gmx.de> wrote:
>
> > So, in that respect, Wikinews is quickly growing beyond the point where
> > the effect you mention is highly significant. I also think that in terms
> > of "quality content", the community has produced some excellent material
> > so far - on par with the best Wikipedia has to offer.
>
> Surely you exaggerate.  The pinnacle of Wikinews content is still a

On a very serious note, I would like to mention what many of you may
already know : that the Wikinews overview of today's catastrophe in
London is among the finest in the world.  Please read it if you have
not done so already.

http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Coordinated_terrorist_attack_in_London

~sj~


from_name: Erik Moeller

body:
Michael,

I think the process you describe - the people joining being people who
left Wikipedia for some reason - *does* exist. We certainly have a
number of users who quit Wikipedia and joined Wikinews. And certainly,
we have to be aware of their sensibilities. So thanks for pointing this out.

However, we also have a constant influx of people from Wikipedia who
simply wish to know what Wikinews is about, and who either like it and
become contributors, or who don't like it and go back to Wikipedia. Some
of these people may eventually quit Wikipedia entirely, not because they
don't like it, but because they find Wikinews more interesting. That
doesn't mean they didn't "fit into" Wikipedia. As crazy as this may
sound, it is not impossible to like another project more and still like
Wikipedia. :-)

For Wikinews in particular there's also the process of discovery through
blogs that link to us and news sources that copy our content. This
should not be underestimated. Today, Wikinews was slashdotted and linked
from many, many blogs due to the tragic London terrorist attacks. It has
received an unprecedented influx of new contributors, many of whom are
not Wikipedians. The main story about the attack has received more than
500 edits so far (much, much kudos to Dan100 for being on the case from
the first hour).

So, in that respect, Wikinews is quickly growing beyond the point where
the effect you mention is highly significant. I also think that in terms
of "quality content", the community has produced some excellent material
so far - on par with the best Wikipedia has to offer.

As unfortunate as the recent conflict on en.wikinews.org is, it also
demonstrates that Wikinews is growing large enough to *have* such
conflicts. Wikipedia did have similar conflicts in the early days -- big
fights between LMS and Cunctator, H.J. and 24, the Spanish fork, and so
on. You don't know what a huge deal it was when Wikipedia got its first
trolls! Learning to deal with conflict is part of growing up. Call it
the puberty phase of the wiki. :-)

The next level is that the community becomes large enough for conflict
to generally be accepted as a part of life, and for conflict resolution
mechanisms to be developed, refined, and applied regularly. From the
perspective of the rest of the Wikimedia community, seeing Wikinews grow
up may be disturbing. What has the kid done this time! But please do
recognize that this is a natural process, and it needs to happen. While
babies are cute and innocent, they can't do much besides screaming,
consuming food, and excreting waste products. ;-)

Best,

Erik


body:
Erik Moeller wrote:

> So, in that respect, Wikinews is quickly growing beyond the point
> where the effect you mention is highly significant. I also think that
> in terms of "quality content", the community has produced some
> excellent material so far - on par with the best Wikipedia has to offer.
>
> As unfortunate as the recent conflict on en.wikinews.org is, it also
> demonstrates that Wikinews is growing large enough to *have* such
> conflicts. Wikipedia did have similar conflicts in the early days --
> big fights between LMS and Cunctator, H.J. and 24, the Spanish fork,
> and so on. You don't know what a huge deal it was when Wikipedia got
> its first trolls! Learning to deal with conflict is part of growing
> up. Call it the puberty phase of the wiki. :-)
>
> The next level is that the community becomes large enough for conflict
> to generally be accepted as a part of life, and for conflict
> resolution mechanisms to be developed, refined, and applied regularly.
> From the perspective of the rest of the Wikimedia community, seeing
> Wikinews grow up may be disturbing. What has the kid done this time!
> But please do recognize that this is a natural process, and it needs
> to happen. While babies are cute and innocent, they can't do much
> besides screaming, consuming food, and excreting waste products.

Disputes themselves are not surprising and part of normal development, I
agree. In this metaphor, what I'm worried about is not the child's
growing pains, it's the issue of who is raising the child.

Out of interest, I took a glance at the lists of administrators for some
of these projects, because admins are often seen as role models and help
set the tone for a project. The most administrators on any project
outside of Wikipedia is barely over 20 (not counting meta and commons).
Naturally, at any given time several of such a group will have dropped
out of activity. That leaves more like 10-15 people to provide guidance.
In this dynamic, a group of even two or three problematic admins can
lead things seriously astray.

I hope that as more major events improve Wikinews' profile as an
independent project, it will grow out of this stage. My comments are
directed just as much to the other projects, and potentially apply to
small language Wikipedias as well. Wikinews is moving more quickly
toward maturity than some of the other projects, but its community is
still too small to be sure it will keep going in the right direction.
And I think that the ability to be confident in Wikinews as a community,
more than anything else, is what would allow us to feel secure in moving
it out of "beta".

--Michael Snow


subject: [Foundation-l] we did it

body:
Fantaaaastic.  Time for a good July press release...

On 7/7/05, Przykuta <przykuta at o2.pl> wrote:
> We have 2M arts now :))))

--
++SJ


subject: [Foundation-l] we did it


from_name: Angela

body:
On 7/7/05, Ros' Haruo <rosharuo at gmail.com> wrote:
> In the discussion on setting up Ladino, Angela gave some useful
> information which included that (paraphrasing from memory) "for
> natural languages, once there are five supporters and no objections,
> it can be set up".

I wrote it like that because I don't think there is consensus on the
question of whether Wikimedia should have any more constructed or
fictional languages.

See
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Non-natural
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Tolkien_languages
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Artificial_languages_equal_rights

The policy itself isn't exactly agreed on, but nothing better has yet
replaced it:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Policy_for_wikis_in_new_languages

There are slightly different policies for Wikinews
(<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikinews/Start_a_new_edition>), and
new projects (<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/New_project_policy>),
and the rules for Wikisource are still under discussion
(<http://wikisource.org/wiki/Wikisource:Language_domain_requests>)

Angela


from_name: Phil Sandifer

subject: [WikiEN-l] The ongoing trolling

body:
To clarify for Jimbo, the users in question were [[User:Lleague of
Responsible Trolls]], who's userpage was a dead ringer for 162, and
[[User:Involved in trolling]], which I consider equally obvious. I'm
not sure why David blocked Norrath, but I suspect it had to do with
being an admitted sockpuppet intended purely to protest the
aforementioned blocks who was posting on Sam Spade's userpage asking
if there was an "organized resistance" against the rogue admins.

-Snowspinner

On Jul 7, 2005, at 7:00 PM, Norath Norath wrote:

>
> I have been permanently blocked by David Gerard for
> asking Snowspinner why he blocked two other users,
> apparently with no reason in policy. I suppose you
> will put this message down to 'wild trolling' by users
> with no justification. If asking an admin why he is
> breaking policy is trolling, then yes, I am.
>
> Norrath
>
> __________________________________________________
> Do You Yahoo!?
> Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
> http://mail.yahoo.com
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Jack Lynch

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Categories and NPOV: Libraries?

body:
And thats the way it should be done, by intended subject, not by
editorialising wikipedians.

Jack (Sam Spade)

a book expounding a
physics theory will be shelved under physics, and whether it's a    good
book by a Nobel Prize winner or a crappy book by a kook isn't the
cataloging system's job to judge.

-Mark


from_name: Skyring

subject: [WikiEN-l] The ongoing trolling

body:
On 7/7/05, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:

> It may be noted for the record that I don't fear retribution from any
> admins, ok?  And I watch this constant ongoing trollfest and I tire of
> it.  You show me good evidence of an administrator abusing their admin
> powers, and the ArbCom not acting on it, and I'll do something.  This is
> my promise to the community, my final role here, to prevent
> authoritarian cliques from controlling the process.
>
> But, I see essentially no evidence of this, and a whole ton of whining.
>
> One thing that is absolutely 100% notably absent from these complaints
> is links to diffs and actual examples of admin abuse.

With all due respect, Jimbo, may I suggest that you are looking at
this from exactly the wrong point of view.

Grab yourself a sockpuppet account, dive into an edit war, start
correcting stuff and see what happens when other ditors don't know who
you are.

Then try to forget that you are well-regarded and experienced here and
you have a great deal of power. Put yourself in the shoes of a new
editor doing what they see as the right thing and encountering
statements like this one: "I will revert you twice a day, for the rest
of history if needs be. Plus I have more allies than you, so your
attempts to restalinise this article must fail."
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3AKhmer_Rouge&diff=14835971&oldid=14831760

This is from an editor, one heavily supported by admins and ArbCom
members, who manages to get away with the most shocking abuse, often
involving sexual connotations.

Comments form an Arbcom member about protecting this editor, despite
his long history of abuse may be found here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_arbitration/Skyring/Proposed_decision&diff=prev&oldid=17772684

No-one is disputing that this editor is not a good editor. But when it
is made clear at the highest levels that there are different standards
for different editors - and I quote the same ArbCom member referring
to the same editor in a private email six months ago: "By the way,
xxxx is like that with everyone. It's his schtick. I think I've seen
him be polite towards someone about once. ;)" - I think that one is
entitled to come to a certain conclusion.

I'm not trying to refight old battles here, merely pointing out that
in my experience, thuggery, threats and hypocrisy are what a new
editor may expect if he gets on the wrong side of "the old soldiers"
here.

--
Peter in Canberra


subject: [WikiEN-l] The ongoing trolling

body:
While I often find myself in the role of being the "go to guy" in
cases of nubie biting and admin misconduct, I have to heartily agree w
Jimbo regarding recent complaints on the mailing list. I have to say
(and I have said this more than once) these rude and tiresome
complaints about say... image edit warring on [[feces]] desensitize
admins to real problems and legitimate complaints.

So... if any of the recent complainers ''truly'' care about improving
the wikipedia, please go find some evidence worthy of an arbcom
case... or maybe, just maybe.. improve an article?

Jack (Sam Spade)

On 7/7/05, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> Skyring wrote:
> > Grab yourself a sockpuppet account, dive into an edit war, start
> > correcting stuff and see what happens when other ditors don't know who
> > you are.
>
> I'm sorry, but I would personally find this to be unethical behavior.
>
> But I could be convinced to do it if you could show me some links
>
> > Then try to forget that you are well-regarded and experienced here and
> > you have a great deal of power. Put yourself in the shoes of a new
> > editor doing what they see as the right thing and encountering
> > statements like this one: "I will revert you twice a day, for the rest
> > of history if needs be. Plus I have more allies than you, so your
> > attempts to restalinise this article must fail."
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3AKhmer_Rouge&diff=14835971&oldid=14831760
>
> But in this case, this response was absolutely valid.  Ruy Lopez was
> engaging in an ongoing campaign of vandalism of the article, and letting
> him know that we're more patient than he is, is exactly the right thing
> to do.
>
> > This is from an editor, one heavily supported by admins and ArbCom
> > members, who manages to get away with the most shocking abuse, often
> > involving sexual connotations.
>
> Please show me a diff involving sexual connotations?
>
> >
> > Comments form an Arbcom member about protecting this editor, despite
> > his long history of abuse may be found here:
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_arbitration/Skyring/Proposed_decision&diff=prev&oldid=17772684
>
> This comment does not tell me anything particularly useful.  It is
> widely acknowledged, even by Adam himself, that he's often difficult.
> He doesn't cross the line, but if we put users on a spectrum of
> usefulness/difficulty, certainly he scores very very high on usefulness
> and higher than average on difficulty.
>
> Adam has no special protection from me or the ArbCom.
>
> > I'm not trying to refight old battles here, merely pointing out that
> > in my experience, thuggery, threats and hypocrisy are what a new
> > editor may expect if he gets on the wrong side of "the old soldiers"
> > here.
>
> I don't see much evidence of that.  Of course there are better and worse
> examples of everything.  But what we're discussing is a handful of
> really wild accusations that people are randomly banned if they cross
> old timers, etc.  A lack of perfection is certainly something that we
> always need to be rigorous about examining... but hardly justifies wild
> trolling from users who seem to offer no actual evidence of injustice.
>
> I appreciate you offering a few diffs, and hope you'll offer more.  I'd
> particularly like to see where you got the conclusion that Adam Carr
> "manages to get away with the most shocking abuse, often involving
> sexual connotations."
>
> --Jimbo
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: David Friedland

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: URLs

body:
I'd be for replacing the action links with subdirectories, but against
putting all language wikis in the same subdomain, because I think that's
much more of a "cultural" change than changing the URLs for edit pages
and so on.

Also, why can't articles just be at the root?

so:

http://en.wikipedia.org/Main_Page
which is equivalent to
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
and
http://en.wikipedia.org/article/Main_Page

but also:
http://en.wikipedia.org/edit/Main_Page
http://en.wikipedia.org/history/Main_Page
and hopefully...
http://en.wikipedia.org/delete/Main_Page
http://en.wikipedia.org/protect/Main_Page
http://en.wikipedia.org/move/Main_Page
etc.

- David

Kate wrote:
> hi,
>
> in 1.5, we have the possibility of changing URLs used for projects.
>
> previously, there were two forms of URLs:
>
>         - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
>         - http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Main_Page&action=edit
>
> we now have the choice to replace "action=" with a new path:
>
>         - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
>         - http://en.wikipedia.org/edit/Main_Page
>
> however, at the same time, we could implement a change in the way domain
> names are used, that has been discussed several times in the past:
>
>         - http://wikipedia.org/en/article/Main_Page
>         - http://wikipedia.org/en/edit/Main_Page
>
> as well as being nicer from a technical perspective, i think this reduces
> the disconnection between different languages of the same project.  so, i'd
> like to propose that we move to the last form of URLs at some point.
>
> does anyone have comments on or object to this change?
>
> kate.


from_name: Fastfission

body:
On 7/7/05, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
> >(Which to me says, if we are not going to purge all of them, then we
> >should try and subcategorize them into smaller fair use categories,
> >similar to those used for book covers and so forth, but expand to
> >other relatively "safe" things such as "historical images" and
> >"headshots" and "large scientific instruments" or something like
> >that.)
> >
> That seems sensible.  Can't we just adapt the existing category system
> for this purpose?

Yes, I think so. Sub-categories for "fair use" also would likely mean
that the image so tagged had been thought about a bit by at least one
person and would hopefully cut down on the things needed for review.

> One also has to distinguish between civil and criminal infringement.
> Criminal infringement is a highly unlikely scenario because of the need
> to prove wilfulness and outright refusal to comply when there is no
> doubt about the person's copyrights.  There would also need to be
> "commercial advantage or private financial gain".  That would require a
> level of stupidity beyond what our most ardent copyright crusaders would
> exhibit.
>
> For civil infringements, which can only be based on specific items, the
> claimant needs to jump through a few hoops before he gets his big payoff.
>     He needs to have issued a takedown notice.
>     He needs to have registered his copyright.  This is not needed for
> simply owning the copyright, but is needed to start an infringement action.
>     He needs to sort out which court has jurisdiction and where the
> possible trial would take place
>     He needs to counter any reasonable fair use defense that we may
> raise at trial.
>     He needs to elect to have statutory penalties apply.  This one's a
> no-brainer since a claim on profits would get him laughed out of court,
> and actual damages to him will likely be negligible.

Hmm... well, maybe. Again, I'm not a lawyer, but I've heard of people
claiming damages for other things which clearly had no proof of damage
or obvious deficit. Additionally, it would not be hard for a company
like Getty Images or Corbis to say, "We make our income licensing
photographs to publications, and you're blatantly using them in yours
without paying us a cent."

> This is not an argument for a you-can't-catch-us attitude.  It is a
> strong argument against copyright paranoia.

I still don't think it is paranoia to say that in this day and age it
is not a good idea to sit willingly on 14,000 pieces of copyrighted
works, each of which say on them, "We know this is probably a form of
infringement, but we think we're safe by threatening a preemptive
invocation of one small and relatively weak part of U.S. copyright
law." Since many of the companies we'd be infringing upon are those
which make their business selling photographs to, say, news sources
and encyclopedias, I don't think we're quite out of the clear in any
sense. What's the old Burroughs quote -- paranoia is just knowing
exactly who is out to get you? ;-)

FF


from_name: Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Special:export utility does not include all
	revisions in xml file


body:
Well, the real question is -- what's the point of categories? It is
for useful taxonomy. It is neither to be sympathetic nor to be
editorializing. Would it be "useful" to have "Creationism" filed under
"Science"? I don't think so. For a library with a fixed and rigid
category system (none of these fancy computer nested categories so
easy to change), it makes sense that they wouldn't sub-categorize too
far down. We're not fixed by such a technical limitation though, and I
don't think it is much of a stretch to say "is in the canon" and "it
is not in the canon" is a useful organizing principle -- not just in
terms of finding other information, but in terms of quickly evaluating
the probable reliability of said information.

One of the first articles I created here is the somewhat unexciting
[[Figurative system of human knowledge]], the tree of Diderot and
d'Alembert, a wonderful artifact in the history of taxonomy (from the
famed Encyclopedie). One of the things which was considered most
heretical about the Encyclopedie was its taxonomic system -- aside
from snide little anti-clerical cross-references ("See: eucharist"
under "Cannibalism"), it also daringly classified theology as only a
sub-category of philosophy (rather than a super-category of it), and
placed "knowledge of god" precariously close to "black magic"!

FF

On 7/7/05, Haukur ?orgeirsson <haukurth at hi.is> wrote:
> Mark wrote:
>
> "[A] book expounding a physics theory will be shelved under physics, and
> whether it's a good book by a Nobel Prize winner or a crappy book by a
> kook isn't the cataloging system's job to judge."
>
> Jack added:
>
> "And thats the way it should be done, by intended subject, not by
> editorialising wikipedians."
>
> I don't see how this example is relevant for Wikipedia.
> Should any theory or discipline be put into the category
> "intended" by its proponents? And should those proponents
> get to decide what categories it *isn't* put into? So we
> must put Creationism into the Science category and we can't
> put it into the Pseudoscience category? I don't think that's
> really the NPOV. (It sounds more like the Sympathetic Point
> of View which the (no doubt fine) people on Wikinfo state
> as their goal.)
>
> Regards,
> Haukur
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: David Gerard

subject: [WikiEN-l] RE: Request to mailing list WikiEN-l rejected

body:
Michael Turley (michael.turley at gmail.com) [050707 13:08]:
> On 7/6/05, A. Nony Mouse <temoforcomments4 at hotmail.com> wrote:

> > That now makes FOUR times that Gerard has denied a message claiming
> > "personal attack" because it was critical of his constant abuses of power.

> Without seeing the rejected messages, it appears to me the David
> Gerard has been tolerant of criticism, based on what has been passed
> through.
> Perhaps it is your phrasing that prevents your messages from getting
> through.

It is. I send 'em back marked "Please try again without the personal
attacks."

- d.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Hi

body:
Michael Snow (wikipedia at earthlink.net) [050707 16:27]:
> Stacey Greenstein wrote:

> >Please people... do not feed the trolls. Let them post and ignore them...
> >they thrive on the replies.

> Hmm, perhaps the mailing list admins should start moderating the posts
> of established users on the list in addition to new subscribers?

I look forward to us having to do *less* work and only check the filters
for spam every day or so!

- d.


from_name: Walter Vermeir

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: URLs

body:
Kate schreef:
[knip]
> however, at the same time, we could implement a change in the way domain
> names are used, that has been discussed several times in the past:
>
>         - http://wikipedia.org/en/article/Main_Page
>         - http://wikipedia.org/en/edit/Main_Page
>
> as well as being nicer from a technical perspective, i think this reduces
> the disconnection between different languages of the same project.  so, i'd
> like to propose that we move to the last form of URLs at some point.
>
> does anyone have comments on or object to this change?
>
> kate.

Please do not change anything like this whit out an very serious project
wide consultation about this. Only a posting and some responds on this
mailing list (or any other list) should not result in such a very
important change.

I, and i strongly believe there are many others, see "Wikipedia" as the
global name for all the Wikipedias but have there own home Wikipedia.
Because every language Wikipedia is editorial independent and has it own
community and the identify there Wikipedia whit there own domain. The
are proud of there own Wikipedia.

It is not because you are part of a bigger community that you should
lose your identity. This is a very sensitive an important thing. There
are other things to consider besides the technical side of it.

--
Ook een artikeltje schrijven? WikipediaNL, de vrije GNU/FDL encyclopedie
http://www.wikipedia.be


from_name: Mark Williamson

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: URLs

body:
I must agree -- I don't think we should move away from the subdomain model.

Mark

On 07/07/05, David Friedland <david at nohat.net> wrote:
> I'd be for replacing the action links with subdirectories, but against
> putting all language wikis in the same subdomain, because I think that's
> much more of a "cultural" change than changing the URLs for edit pages
> and so on.
>
> Also, why can't articles just be at the root?
>
> so:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/Main_Page
> which is equivalent to
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
> and
> http://en.wikipedia.org/article/Main_Page
>
> but also:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/edit/Main_Page
> http://en.wikipedia.org/history/Main_Page
> and hopefully...
> http://en.wikipedia.org/delete/Main_Page
> http://en.wikipedia.org/protect/Main_Page
> http://en.wikipedia.org/move/Main_Page
> etc.
>
> - David
>
>
> Kate wrote:
> > hi,
> >
> > in 1.5, we have the possibility of changing URLs used for projects.
> >
> > previously, there were two forms of URLs:
> >
> >         - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
> >         - http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Main_Page&action=edit
> >
> > we now have the choice to replace "action=" with a new path:
> >
> >         - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
> >         - http://en.wikipedia.org/edit/Main_Page
> >
> > however, at the same time, we could implement a change in the way domain
> > names are used, that has been discussed several times in the past:
> >
> >         - http://wikipedia.org/en/article/Main_Page
> >         - http://wikipedia.org/en/edit/Main_Page
> >
> > as well as being nicer from a technical perspective, i think this reduces
> > the disconnection between different languages of the same project.  so, i'd
> > like to propose that we move to the last form of URLs at some point.
> >
> > does anyone have comments on or object to this change?
> >
> > kate.
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>

--
SI HOC LEGERE SCIS NIMIVM ERVDITIONIS HABES
QVANTVM MATERIAE MATERIETVR MARMOTA MONAX SI MARMOTA MONAX MATERIAM
POSSIT MATERIARI
ESTNE VOLVMEN IN TOGA AN SOLVM TIBI LIBET ME VIDERE


from_name: Haukur Þorgeirsson

body:
Mark wrote:

"[A] book expounding a physics theory will be shelved under physics, and
whether it's a good book by a Nobel Prize winner or a crappy book by a
kook isn't the cataloging system's job to judge."

Jack added:

"And thats the way it should be done, by intended subject, not by
editorialising wikipedians."

I don't see how this example is relevant for Wikipedia.
Should any theory or discipline be put into the category
"intended" by its proponents? And should those proponents
get to decide what categories it *isn't* put into? So we
must put Creationism into the Science category and we can't
put it into the Pseudoscience category? I don't think that's
really the NPOV. (It sounds more like the Sympathetic Point
of View which the (no doubt fine) people on Wikinfo state
as their goal.)

Regards,
Haukur


from_name: Ray Saintonge

body:
Fastfission wrote:

>>One also has to distinguish between civil and criminal infringement.
>>Criminal infringement is a highly unlikely scenario because of the need
>>to prove wilfulness and outright refusal to comply when there is no
>>doubt about the person's copyrights.  There would also need to be
>>"commercial advantage or private financial gain".  That would require a
>>level of stupidity beyond what our most ardent copyright crusaders would
>>exhibit.
>>
>>For civil infringements, which can only be based on specific items, the
>>claimant needs to jump through a few hoops before he gets his big payoff.
>>    He needs to have issued a takedown notice.
>>    He needs to have registered his copyright.  This is not needed for
>>simply owning the copyright, but is needed to start an infringement action.
>>    He needs to sort out which court has jurisdiction and where the
>>possible trial would take place
>>    He needs to counter any reasonable fair use defense that we may
>>raise at trial.
>>    He needs to elect to have statutory penalties apply.  This one's a
>>no-brainer since a claim on profits would get him laughed out of court,
>>and actual damages to him will likely be negligible.
>>
>>
>
>Hmm... well, maybe. Again, I'm not a lawyer, but I've heard of people
>claiming damages for other things which clearly had no proof of damage
>or obvious deficit. Additionally, it would not be hard for a company
>like Getty Images or Corbis to say, "We make our income licensing
>photographs to publications, and you're blatantly using them in yours
>without paying us a cent."
>
Proof of damage is essential in a claim for damages.  Simply saying,
"That's the way we make our living," is not enough.  Courts have ruled
that this has to be more than mere speculation about the amount of the
damages.  If the case involves a single image they need to show evidence
of just how much they were damaged by the use of that specific image
from the date of the registration.  I don't know if these companies take
the pains to register every one of their images.

>>This is not an argument for a you-can't-catch-us attitude.  It is a
>>strong argument against copyright paranoia.
>>
>>
>I still don't think it is paranoia to say that in this day and age it
>is not a good idea to sit willingly on 14,000 pieces of copyrighted
>works, each of which say on them, "We know this is probably a form of
>infringement, but we think we're safe by threatening a preemptive
>invocation of one small and relatively weak part of U.S. copyright
>law."
>
The wording of the law is that fair use is not infringement.

>Since many of the companies we'd be infringing upon are those
>which make their business selling photographs to, say, news sources
>and encyclopedias, I don't think we're quite out of the clear in any
>sense. What's the old Burroughs quote -- paranoia is just knowing
>exactly who is out to get you? ;-)
>
I presume you mean William and not Edgar Rice. :-)

Ec


from_name: Rob Lanphier

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: URLs

body:
On Thu, 2005-07-07 at 22:49 -0700, David Friedland wrote:
> Also, why can't articles just be at the root?
>
> so:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/Main_Page
> which is equivalent to
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
> and
> http://en.wikipedia.org/article/Main_Page

Because then you sorta limit your extensibility, putting articles in the
same namespace as your "api".  Imagine:
http://en.wikipedia.org/history -> article on "History"
http://en.wikipedia.org/history/protect -> history of the article
"Protect"
http://en.wikipedia.org/protect/history -> protect the article "History"
...or is it the "History" subpage of the "Protect" article?

The rewrite rules get much simpler if the syntax is:
http://<lang>.wikipedia.org/<action>/<article>

...and you have more room to grow without breaking URL permanence,
because you haven't called dibbs on too many top-level path segments.

> but also:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/edit/Main_Page
> http://en.wikipedia.org/history/Main_Page
> and hopefully...
> http://en.wikipedia.org/delete/Main_Page
> http://en.wikipedia.org/protect/Main_Page
> http://en.wikipedia.org/move/Main_Page
> etc.

This is a good idea.  It'd be really nice to get all of the technology
out of the URLs (e.g. ".php" file extensions) so that maintaining URL
permanence doesn't mean maintaining strange mappings, even if MediaWiki
is rewritten in a completely different language one day.

Rob