from_name: Steve Bennett

body:
Hi,
  Time for hiercharchies of admins? Give "rollback" powers to anyone
with half a clue. Save temporary block powers for people with a whole
clue.  Save permanent block/ban powers for people with demonstrated
good judgement, preferably on the previous levels.

Not to make it a prestige thing, of course...

Steve

On 1/4/06, Jake Nelson <duskwave at gmail.com> wrote:
> All this discussion of admin standards is pretty funny, when so many of
> the longtime admins who end up pontificating on policy got their post
> within virtually no support votes at all... hell, look at mine, not that
> I consider myself that much of an oldtimer: 3 votes. That's it. I'd been
> on Wikipedia all of two months, with only ~600 edits. Even then (which
> was late 2003), there was some discussion of how it might be too HARD
> for people to become admins, as we then (and much, much, much more now)
> needed more people able to fight vandals effectively.
>
> It's often underappreciated just how important that little rollback link
> is for efficiently removing vandalism from a large number of pages. And
> we need more people to have it. Many times, I'll set Recent Changes to
> hide logged-in users, 500 edits to a page, and 'diff' everything on that
> page... and while all those edits will have scrolled off the view of
> anyone else trying that by the time I'm done, there'll still be a bunch
> of uncaught blatant profanity edits that slipped through. It's like a
> firehose sometimes. (I'm inclined to make some strained simile involving
> strainers or buckets and not enough, etc... but I won't.) It's simple:
> WE NEED MORE ADMINS.
>
> I do agree with the 'admin status is no big deal' line of thought. If we
> invest too much in it, it gets hard to get people on the team rolling
> back vandalism and taking care of speedy-delete material (though a
> standard policy of simply blanking pages instead of worrying about
> deletion would help on that score). Furthermore, it fosters the very
> annoying trend to drag every admin into ever more arcane WikiPolitics
> and layers of bureaucracy... the powers are there to be a janitor, not a
> legislator. They're unrelated. (I don't enjoy spending my time on
> talkpages... if I want to have a discussion with someone, I use email or
> MUX, not a wiki page... and VFD is a bilious slimefest I'd be happy to
> see gone entirely.)
>
> Maybe giving people block/ban powers is a big deal, however. Since the
> proposals for bureaucrats, Arbitrators, and the like eventually did go
> through, maybe block powers can be split off of adminship and given to
> some other userclass, and we can thoroughly establish once and for all
> that an admin's job is maintenance. Maybe even rename the label:
> 'Maintainer', 'Janitor', etc. I don't really care what you call it, but
> apparently 'Administrator' gets people thinking too much about it
> meaning you're the boss... and I have to admit it gets heavily
> misinterpreted outside WP: If I tell someone that I'm an administrator
> on Wikipedia, they think I'm saying I'm on the Foundation board, or a
> siteadmin, or a developer. As WP's public pfoile continues to rise,
> that'll be more of an issue as "Wikipedia Administrator" J. Random
> Wikipedian gets quoted in a news article as an authoritative source of
> official opinion.
>
> Further, when we find there's a bad admin, this doesn't mean "we need to
> make it harder for people whose main contribution is vandal-fighting to
> be an admin", it means, fire their ass, deadmin them, and then get
> someone else. If all they do is get in fights with other uses or throw
> their weight around on talkpages, they don't need the anti-vandal tools.
>
> -- Jake Nelson
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Kirill Lokshin

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Userbox compromise proposal (Was: Proposal on userbox
	disagreement)

body:
On 1/4/06, Carbonite <carbonite.wp at gmail.com> wrote:
> I think it's possible to reach a compromise where users can keep their
> userboxes (even the silly ones) while eliminating (or at least greatly
> reducing) the potential for creating POV factions. I wanted to get
> some feedback here before tossing it out to the wolves.
>
> The core of my proposal is that anything that doesn't help to create
> the encyclopedia shouldn't exist as a userbox template. Instead, it
> should exist as code which users would be free to paste onto their
> user pages. Thus, to anyone viewing a user's page, the userboxes would
> look exactly as they do now, but the harmful side-effects (easy
> identification of POV factions, increased server load, etc..) would
> mostly be eliminated.
>
> Userboxes that do help in building the encyclopedia would be allowed
> to remain as templates. This would include the Babel templates or
> anything that concerns a user's skills or expertise.
>
> The "approved" userbox template would be listed in central location
> and any user could add them to their user pages. There would have to
> be consensus to approve any new templates.
>
> The "unapproved" userboxes would also be listed a central location,
> but they could be added to this repository by anyone. They would exist
> only as code and an example of what the userbox looks like. This code
> would have to be free of fair-use images and must not include any
> categories. Any "unapproved" userboxes that existed as templates could
> be speedily deleted.
>
> With this setup, a userbox stating "This user is a Democrat" would be
> no different that a sentence on their user page stating that they're a
> Democrat. The user wouldn't be included in a category and couldn't be
> identified through Whatlinkshere. There also wouldn't be any concerns
> about censorship or stifling of free speech.
>
> I'm sure this proposal could use some development, but it's a start. Thoughts?

If you really wanted to be thorough, you'd need two further qualifications:

1. No images in userboxes, since the usage list for, say, a donkey
used in the Democrat userbox would show all the user-page inclusions
of the code.
2. Similarly, no links to articles in userboxes.  If, say, the code
for the Democrat userbox contained [[U.S. Democratic Party]], a
determined individual could examine Whatlinkshere for that article to
identify all users with the code.  There would be some false
positives, obviously, from unrelated users having the link on their
userpage; but not so many that this would be infeasible.

The other option, obviously, is to avoid relying on technological
solutions to an essentially social problem ;-)

Kirill Lokshin


list: wikitech-l

from_name: kate

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: templatelinks-related changes

body:
Phil Boswell:
> Was this the set of changes which removed the "offset" parameter from
> [[Special:Whatlinkshere]]?

> The new "from" parameter, which seems to work on datestamps, is intriguing
> but hardly conducive to "ignore the first N entries".

> Can we have the "offset" parameter back, please?

i think it's unlikely any "offset" parameters will be added in the future
(at least, i hope not).

the reason offset was removed from several pages (Contributions,
Whatlinkshere) is that it requires the database to search though every
entry to find the offset you want.  a request for starting at a particular
record is much faster because it can be found quickly from the index.

k.


from_name: Michelle Kinney

subject: [WikiEN-l] Administrators and dispute resolution

body:
geni wrote:

>See the backlog at WP:CP? I don't care if the admins fixing it are any
>good at disspute resolution.
>
>
>--
>geni
>
>
>
I dunno, I'm not so bad at dispute resolution, but I'm much happier with
the mop and bucket.

PSST -- any other admins who have some free time, WP:CP still needs a
lot of work

Jareth (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Jareth)


from_name: Carbonite

body:
On 1/4/06, Kirill Lokshin <kirill.lokshin at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/4/06, Carbonite <carbonite.wp at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I think it's possible to reach a compromise where users can keep their
> > userboxes (even the silly ones) while eliminating (or at least greatly
> > reducing) the potential for creating POV factions. I wanted to get
> > some feedback here before tossing it out to the wolves.
> >
> > The core of my proposal is that anything that doesn't help to create
> > the encyclopedia shouldn't exist as a userbox template. Instead, it
> > should exist as code which users would be free to paste onto their
> > user pages. Thus, to anyone viewing a user's page, the userboxes would
> > look exactly as they do now, but the harmful side-effects (easy
> > identification of POV factions, increased server load, etc..) would
> > mostly be eliminated.
> >
> > Userboxes that do help in building the encyclopedia would be allowed
> > to remain as templates. This would include the Babel templates or
> > anything that concerns a user's skills or expertise.
> >
> > The "approved" userbox template would be listed in central location
> > and any user could add them to their user pages. There would have to
> > be consensus to approve any new templates.
> >
> > The "unapproved" userboxes would also be listed a central location,
> > but they could be added to this repository by anyone. They would exist
> > only as code and an example of what the userbox looks like. This code
> > would have to be free of fair-use images and must not include any
> > categories. Any "unapproved" userboxes that existed as templates could
> > be speedily deleted.
> >
> > With this setup, a userbox stating "This user is a Democrat" would be
> > no different that a sentence on their user page stating that they're a
> > Democrat. The user wouldn't be included in a category and couldn't be
> > identified through Whatlinkshere. There also wouldn't be any concerns
> > about censorship or stifling of free speech.
> >
> > I'm sure this proposal could use some development, but it's a start. Thoughts?
>
> If you really wanted to be thorough, you'd need two further qualifications:
>
> 1. No images in userboxes, since the usage list for, say, a donkey
> used in the Democrat userbox would show all the user-page inclusions
> of the code.
> 2. Similarly, no links to articles in userboxes.  If, say, the code
> for the Democrat userbox contained [[U.S. Democratic Party]], a
> determined individual could examine Whatlinkshere for that article to
> identify all users with the code.  There would be some false
> positives, obviously, from unrelated users having the link on their
> userpage; but not so many that this would be infeasible.
>
> The other option, obviously, is to avoid relying on technological
> solutions to an essentially social problem ;-)
>

You're certainly correct on those points, but this proposal would go a
long way towards addressing the current problems with userboxes. I
think this issue needs to be solved by a combination of technical
solutions (making the userboxes simply a statement than a membership
in a faction) and social solutions (any suggestions?).

Carbonite


from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad

body:
Kelly Martin wrote:

>On 1/3/06, Stan Shebs <shebs at apple.com> wrote:
>
>
>>Somebody compared userboxes to bumper stickers, and I think it's very
>>apt. While we may dislike seeing cars covered with bumper stickers,
>>we don't (usually :-) ) try to pass laws regulating the number or
>>type of bumper stickers on a car, nor do we try to outlaw the
>>printing of bumper stickers.
>>
>>
>There have actually been attempts to pass such laws, and in some cases
>they've even been passed.  Such laws are unconstitutional in the
>United States, however, and so they don't last.
>
>Wikipedia is not a free speech forum, however, and does not have to
>worry about restrictions on advertisement, personal promotion, etc.
>being found unconstitutional.
>
Maybe the bumper sticker analogy wasn't the best.  If you wan't to
plaster your car completely over with bumper stickers, hey, it's still
your car.  The graffiti on NewYork City subway cars might have been more
to the point.

Ec


from_name: Tony Sidaway

subject: [WikiEN-l] Userbox fads

body:
On 1/4/06, Nathan Russell <windrunner at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> If users are engaging in personal attacks, racism, homophobia, or what
> have you in userboxes, talk pages, wikipedia_talk pages, or anywhere
> else on WP, that should be dealt with in terms of WP:NPA, WP:CIVIL,
> and their sister policies.  Not in terms of userboxes being a bad
> thing, but in terms of some userboxes (and some users' use of
> userboxes) being disruptive to the community and being individually
> taken to TFD as such.

Oh I completely agree. The babel boxes, etc, indeed most userboxes,
are fine. Some may be used for attacks and must be deleted.  Some
promote factionalism by providing a handy directory for the pushers of
various points of view (I have identified three such cases in the past
three weeks) and they must also go.  I don't thinkk we need be overly
concerned about "powered by alcohol" and other joky stuff.


from_name: Kelly Martin

subject: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad

body:
On 1/4/06, Stan Shebs <shebs at apple.com> wrote:
> We have a settled policy that users can do pretty much anything
> they like on their user pages and subpages, within the bounds of
> civility.

That is plainly false.

Kelly


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Magnus Manske

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Wikipedia Day 2006 : 5 years wikifying knowledge

body:
Bring back CamelCase links! :-)

/me hiding

Magnus


subject: [WikiEN-l] Worthy admins? (was "The userbox fad")

body:
On 1/4/06, Steve Bennett <stevage at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi,
>   Time for hiercharchies of admins? Give "rollback" powers to anyone
> with half a clue. Save temporary block powers for people with a whole
> clue.  Save permanent block/ban powers for people with demonstrated
> good judgement, preferably on the previous levels.

I think the software has been capable of doing something of this sort
for ages.  There was even some kind of policy proposal for handing out
rollback privs to anyone who looked clueful and showed willing (easy
to spot, you just look at the best rc patrollers who haven't yet got
the privs).


subject: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad

body:
Tony Sidaway wrote:

>On 1/3/06, SCZenz <sczenz at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>>Yes, we can certainly illegalize any userboxes we like.  The question is,
>>are the productive users we're going to lose (and there are some) if we
>>crack down on userboxes worth it?  And who should decide?
>>
>>
>We may lose them, but they'll be welcome on livejournal and myspace.
>I cannot imagine losing any serious contributor just because we say
>"no, we don't allow people to create userboxes that place them into
>categories by point of view--it promotes factionalism and has in the
>past resulted in serious attempts to subvert consensus."
>
When a person wants a particular POV to prevail it should make it easier
to shop for votes.  Targeted <s>spam</s> advertising is always more cost
effective than sending the ad to everybody.

Ec


subject: [WikiEN-l] User boxes and what disrupts Wikipedia

body:
On 1/4/06, Leif Knutsen <vyerllc at gmail.com> wrote:
> - Aren't there at least half a dozen other ways that people could round up
> votes for one cause or another, anyway; and wouldn't we just get
> "off-campus" userbox phenomena if we banned them here?

Sure, we can't stop that.  We can slow things down by not handing
pushers a very powerful tool for subverting our policies of neutrality
and consensus.


subject: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad

body:
Ben Emmel wrote:

>Why do you not view the religion or viewpoint boxes the same as those with
>geographical location or language? If I am doing some RC patrol, and notice
>a questionable edit to a Hindu article, wouldn't a [[Category:Hindu
>Wikipedians]] be useful? That way, I can search out a user to look into the
>edit. Same thing goes for an edit to an article on Communism: I don't claim
>to be an expert on that subject, so shouldn't I be able to search out an
>editor using [[Category:Communist Wikipedians]]?
>
:-D
Interesting choce of example!  Would people be on that list because they
saw themselves as communist, or because others saw them as communist?.
Those two sub-groups are likely to look at the concept of communism
quite differently.

Ec


from_name: Nyenyec N

body:
I can't see how this solves anything.

You can still use Google for example to find everyone.

http://tinyurl.com/9w6yj

User's will be able to solicit votes whether there are user template
boxes or not. Finding editors speaking a certain language or
geographical location can help rallying troops for long standing
national enmity POV wars. (Think Asia, Eastern Europe, etc)

People can go through the talk page archives to find anyone who has
expressed a certain POV in the past. I've seen this for example at an
[[Intelligent Design]] straw poll.

The general problem is that with a growing number of editors the
consensus building starts to give way to [[mass politics]].

Fewer and fewer editors know or remember each other by name.

I'm not sure if there is an easy solution. Maybe an eBay rating /
Slashdot karma like system is the way to go.

nyenyec

On 1/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/4/06, Carbonite <carbonite.wp at gmail.com> wrote:
> [..]
> >
> > With this setup, a userbox stating "This user is a Democrat" would be
> > no different that a sentence on their user page stating that they're a
> > Democrat. The user wouldn't be included in a category and couldn't be
> > identified through Whatlinkshere. There also wouldn't be any concerns
> > about censorship or stifling of free speech.
> >
> > I'm sure this proposal could use some development, but it's a start. Thoughts?
>
> Looks good.  Perhaps a bot to chase around doing the necessary
> substing of unapproved templates, or at least to identify candidates
> that someone can fix manually--the code to do this is trivial.
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Phil Boswell

references:
<dpa1hn$sfs$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<dpghvh$vub$1@sea.gmane.org><2865989.9xvRbK9qQp@hyacinth.local>
	<dpgk3s$7f4$1@sea.gmane.org>

body:
"Tim Starling"
<t.starling at physics.unimelb.edu.au> wrote in
message news:dpgk3s$7f4$1 at sea.gmane.org...
> kate wrote:
>> Phil Boswell:
>>>Was this the set of changes which removed the "offset" parameter from
>>>[[Special:Whatlinkshere]]?
>>>The new "from" parameter, which seems to work on datestamps, is
>>>intriguing
>>>but hardly conducive to "ignore the first N entries".
>>>Can we have the "offset" parameter back, please?
>> i think it's unlikely any "offset" parameters will be added in the future
>> (at least, i hope not).
>> the reason offset was removed from several pages (Contributions,
>> Whatlinkshere) is that it requires the database to search though every
>> entry to find the offset you want.  a request for starting at a
>> particular
>> record is much faster because it can be found quickly from the index.
> Right, we've known for a while about the poor performance of offset
> clauses.
> The problem was fixed in several places already. I was doing some work on
> Special:Whatlinkshere while I was working on templatelinks, and took the
> opportunity to fix it there as well. Like Kate says, the offset parameters
> are gone for good.

Fair enough: thanks for a speedy and complete response.

If you're making these various pages more uniform, would it be terrifically
complicated to add NAMESPACE dropdown selectors to each one?

It would actually be handy to be able to restrict Special:Whatlinkshere to a
particular namespace.
--
Phil
[[en:User:Phil Boswell]]


subject: [WikiEN-l] Proposal on userbox disagreement

body:
On 1/4/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
>
> It also seems extremely odd to me that a project with the goal of
> giving people free access to the sum of all human knowledge would
> engage in a discussion over whether or not it is appropriate for
> people to provide information about themselves on their user page.

I've no idea how it mutated into that in some minds.  The issue is not
giving information, but abuse of the template and category systems to
faciliate the subversion of consensus and neutrality, of which I've
been able to give three examples in as many weeks without raising a
sweat.  Userboxes are increasing very rapidly in numbers--1500 new
ones last month, nearly doubling their numbers, and 250 in the first
three days of this month, suggesting exponential growth at this stage
in their growth cycle.  The number of political belief userboxes has
increased tenfold since the beginning of December, so the fact that
we're getting so many such instances at this early stage is
particularly worrying.


from_name: Chris Jenkinson

body:
Steve Bennett wrote:
> Hi,
>   Time for hiercharchies of admins? Give "rollback" powers to anyone
> with half a clue. Save temporary block powers for people with a whole
> clue.  Save permanent block/ban powers for people with demonstrated
> good judgement, preferably on the previous levels.
>
> Not to make it a prestige thing, of course...

See [[Wikipedia:Requests for rollback privileges]].

Chris


from_name: geni

subject: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad

body:
On 1/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> I make no claims about conspiracy. The purpose of creating a userbox
> is to permit users of a certain type (originally, with certain useful
> skills) to be quickly identified.  The purpose of creating a political
> or religious userbox is to enable users with common beliefs  to be
> identified quickly.

Evidence?

>  Of the userboxes listed on the beiefs page, over
> 90% were created since December 1, and a substantial number of those
> were created within the past couple of weeks, so it's definitely a
> push.

Not really AYBABTU photoshops went from minimal to balistic in a very
short space of time. I don't think it is legit to claim there was a
push to create them.
--
geni


from_name: Anthony DiPierro

body:
On 1/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/4/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
> >
> > Well, I took a brief look at the RfC for Kelly, and apparently one of
> > the deleted userboxes was "User_Christian".
>
> I'd say that's a no-brainer delete.  Just the other week I had to
> block some wacko who insisted on using Wikipedia to spout exhortations
> to kill muslims.  The harder it is for people like that to play
> hunt-the-thimble when searching for people who might agree with their
> nonsense, the better.
>
Yes, information is bad.  We should definitely blame the spread of
information for the fact that idiots act like idiots.  This fits in
perfectly with a foundation whose mission is giving people free access
to the sum of all human knowledge.

Anthony


body:
On 1/4/06, Philip Sandifer <snowspinner at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On Jan 3, 2006, at 9:16 PM, SCZenz wrote:
> >
> > 3. I've also heard (from Tony, I'm not sure if you've said it), that
> > many userboxes are being used for inappropriate vote-garnering.  If
> > that's true, we can darn well build a consensus to delete them.
>
>
> You just built it. Right there. You showed how they do not conform to
> Wikipedia's policy and purpose. Thus, assuming they do exist, they
> can be deleted freely. Because that's what consensus is - the
> conclusion of a sensible discussion.
>
> Or do you mean we can hold a stupid poll to delete them?
>
> -Phil

Of course those of us who have been around for any length of time will
already have an unoficial list of those who would be likely to support
a certian position if we called on them. Userboxes don't work so well
for that since people we be able to spot the pattern.

--
geni


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Fair use outside of mainspace (was: Proposal on
	userbox...)

body:
On 1/4/06, jkelly at fas.harvard.edu <jkelly at fas.harvard.edu> wrote:
>
>   "Fair use" images aren't allowed in template- and user-space by our current
> guidelines (although there was some edit-warring where that clause was removed
> last week, if I recall).  Enforcing this in any way is problematic, because the
> number of people who like to decorate their userpages with professional graphic
> design is larger than the number of people devoted to free content.
>
>                       Jkelly

cheack out the wikiproject on fair use. I suspect there are more of us
than you think.

--
geni


from_name: Ryan Delaney

subject: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad

body:
On 1/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> When the house is on fire, you don't hold a discussion.  It's been
> suggested elsewhere that the usera engaged in this fad are not regular
> editors.   They can go back to wherever they came from.

The house isn't on fire. The mere fact that a lot of people oppose your view
should clue you in to the possibility that you might be missing something
and discussion is a good idea. If you are so convinced that you are right
that you won't talk about it, then maybe it's you who should go to
Livejournal.

Ryan


subject: [WikiEN-l] New York Times article on WP v. EB

body:
On 1/3/06, Fastfission <fastfission at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> At times the author seems downright explicitly against the model of
> EB: "The idea that perfection can be achieved solely through
> deliberate effort and centralized control has been given the lie in
> biology with the success of Darwin and in economics with the failure
> of Marx."
>

Um, I think that he means Lenin.  As I understand it, Marx mainly
concentrated on the downside of Adam Smith's vision.  He would, I
expect,  have been as appalled by the alienation and exploitation of
the labourer under Marxism-Leninism as he was under late Victorian
laissez-faire capitalism.


from_name: slimvirgin at gmail.com

subject: [WikiEN-l] Rewrite of Verifiability policy

body:
On 1/4/06, Jon <thagudearbh at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
> There is a proposed rewrite of the Verifiability policy on http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Verifiability/temp&action=submit .
>
>   So far it has had positive reviews, and there have been a number of amendments made as a result of its exposure on the Wikipedia talk:Verifiability page and on IRC.

Please note too that it has also had objections, and because it's one
of only three editorial policies, and the one dealing with sourrces,
it's important that no loopholes be opened in a drive to be succinct.

Sarah


body:
On 1/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:

> Sure, we can't stop that.  We can slow things down by not handing
> pushers a very powerful tool for subverting our policies of neutrality
> and consensus.

It's a very weak tool.It means that we don't have to belive the person
when they claim to be neutral on the subject any more.

--
geni


body:
On 1/4/06, Matt Brown <morven at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/3/06, Guettarda <guettarda at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 1/3/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > >
> > > Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> > >
> > > People keep seem to be forgeting this.
> >
> > Thanks Geni.  I was trying to think of a way to say that
>
> It isn't, but being able to handle a dispute in an adult and
> reasonable manner certainly IS required.  Most administrative tasks
> have a high potential to be controversial (e.g. deletion, blocking)
> and I don't want to appoint someone who won't be able to handle such
> situations.
>
> -Matt

Seen my deletion log lately? Why am I need being screamed at for
makeing controversial descissions?

--
geni


body:
On 1/4/06, Sam Spade <samspade.thomasjefferson at googlemail.com> wrote:
> The #1 admin job is dispute resolution, like it or not,

Evidence? Policy does not support your claim. The way the softwear
works does not support your claim (protection is hardly dispute
resolution it is mearly reduceing the heat). The way admin powers are
used does not support you claim (cheack the log).

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad

body:
Jake Nelson wrote:

> Ray Saintonge wrote:
>
>> We could ask, "Give an example where you were able to build
>> consensus with someone that you initially disagreed with."  I'm
>> convinced that this kind of skill is among the most important.
>
> Not everyone gets into situations where that sort of disagreement
> comes up. I don't think, in the last two years, I've ever had a
> situation that would meet your criteria. Firstly, most of the articles
> I edit significantly are ones I'm interested in, and tend to be too
> obscure to get controversy on. Secondly, even more of my edits are
> spelling, grammar, reformatting, wikifying, merges, disambiguations,
> redirects, very recently categorization... etc. Thirdly, the rest of
> what I do is quick [rollback] of blatant vandalism that there really
> isn't a consensus to build for.

It's a fair enough argument, although the third point is not logically
available for a person who is not yet a sysop.

Doing a lot of spelling fixes can make you visible.  That can be
spot-checked.  Editing in obscure topics also shows that you avoid some
of the popular debates.  That's fine. I don't think that there is one
single rule to fit all situations.  A person in a position to make the
decision should take all that into account, and should be prepared to
override a popular vote when there are inconsistencies.

Ec


from_name: jayjg

subject: [WikiEN-l] Fair use outside of mainspace

body:
On 1/4/06, grm_wnr <grmwnr at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Wp_ayb.gif
>
> Like Jimbo Wales (even though I guess he didn't put it in his userspace
> personally), David Gerard and Jayjg?

What stuff on my User page is fairuse?

Jay.


subject: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad

body:
On 1/4/06, Stan Shebs <shebs at apple.com> wrote:
>
> I have yet to see any userbox-facilitated trashing of articles.
>

I also have yet to notice any userbox-related vandalism.  Why do you
mention the fact since it has not been suggested?

What I have noticed, without even breaking a sweat, is three separate
attempts to enlist, by talk page spamming, groups of editors unknown
to the person doing the spamming, who has (helpfully for my case)
explicitly stated that he's approaching the person in question,
*because of his self-identified persuasion*.  This is obviously always
unacceptable, but here we are providing the pushers with powerful
technology to enable them to do so.


subject: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad

body:
On 1/4/06, Stan Shebs <shebs at apple.com> wrote:
> >
> A WikiProject has a list of participants, just like a category, and
> the page is typically on participant's watchlists.

Not a problem, since the project is bound by neutrality. User space is not.


body:
On 1/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/4/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
> > >
> > Yes, information is bad.  We should definitely blame the spread of
> > information for the fact that idiots act like idiots.  This fits in
> > perfectly with a foundation whose mission is giving people free access
> > to the sum of all human knowledge.
> >
>
> I think you're failing to draw an adequate distinction between
> "encyclopedia" and "webhosting/blogging/forum service".  On the former
> we seek to provide information of encyclopedic value, on the latter we
> let people chatter away, troll. argue about politics, anathematize or
> proselytize various religions by turn, insult one another and all the
> other delights of online interaction.  In general the kind of behavior
> that is commonly observed on the latter is frowned upon on this
> encyclopedia.

Not at all, if you look above at my first post in this thread, I
stated that "it seems blatantly obvious to me that knowing more about
a person facilitates consensus building.  In case you don't understand
where I was going with that, building consensus is the way Wikipedia
builds an encyclopedia.  "This was in response to the statement by
Tony who "feel[s] it's beneficial for editors to share their
background and personal views, so as to make it easier for someone
else to judge bias that may creep into their edits."

My comments about information were in response to your statement that
"the harder it is for people like that to play hunt-the-thimble when
searching for people who might agree with their nonsense, the better."
 Just because information can be used for bad doesn't mean it should
be eliminated.  Your argument that it should is directly in
contradiction with the very principles on which the WMF was built.

It's a lot easier to get along with somebody if you know who they are,
what they believe in, etc.  Do you disagree, or do you just think it
isn't important for Wikipedia editors to get along with one another?

Anthony


body:
On 1/4/06, jayjg <jayjg99 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 1/4/06, grm_wnr <grmwnr at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Wp_ayb.gif
> >
> > Like Jimbo Wales (even though I guess he didn't put it in his userspace
> > personally), David Gerard and Jayjg?
>
>
> What stuff on my User page is fairuse?
>
> Jay.
>

Oops, I see now.  I thought Yelyos had created that from scratch, I didn't
realize it was some other kind of license.  It's gone now.

Jay.


body:
On 1/4/06, Stan Shebs <shebs at apple.com> wrote:
> The irony is that with so many boxes, some people are going to
> discover that they're the only Wikipedian to hold a certain
> belief, which is likely to be more humiliating than anything else.
> I expect the fad will crest at about that point - who wants to
> advertise that they're unpopular?

Well this may apply to unpopular beliefs, but there's still the
question of the <insert any popular belief here>.

The three cases I've found happen to involve Roman Catholic
anti-abortionists, but I have no read to believe that this is the only
large and popular grouping in which these userboxes happen to be
abused.  I just happen to have noticed these cases.  I have no reason
to believe that this kind of abuse will lessen with time--indeed if
it's not strongly opposed it's very likely to grow to become a
customary form of abuse.  We don't need this.

>
> I can also see belief-haters adding themselves directly to a
> category, quietly bypassing userbox, as a way to monitor the
> category members.

Sure, there are defensive strategies.  But the defensive strategies
are all aimed at making the userboxes (insofar as they're purported to
have some kind of use) unusable.  Why risk having them in the first
place if they'll only lead to an arms race?


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: WikiEN-l Digest, Vol 30, Issue 19

body:
On 1/3/06, W. Guy Finley <wgfinley at dynascope.com> wrote:
>
> Not to sound elitist but I probably will but WHO CARES if we alienate a few
> people who are more interested in making a sticker book than an
> encyclopedia?

Quite.  Indeed, this is not the kind of user that shouldn't be welcome
on Wikipedia.  This isn't a hosting service.  A user page is provided
for the sole pupose of building an encyclopedia.


from_name: Rob

subject: [WikiEN-l] Check all deleted edits?

body:
On a related note, I'm no code monkey, but I'd think it would be pretty easy
to add a "check all" button.  Or is that idea just on a backlog of
suggestions?

On 1/4/06, Michelle Kinney <jareth at crimsonblade.net> wrote:
>
> I recall seeing a post in the past couple of months where someone had a
> solution to check all the boxes when restoring a deleted item.
> Unfortunately, I can't for the life of me figure out what I did with
> that message.  Would anyone happen to have it laying around?
>
> Thanks!
> Jareth (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Jareth)
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


body:
charles matthews wrote:

> "Carbonite"  wrote
>
>> The reality is that de-admining isn't a simple process and it's only
>
> likely to be successful in clear cases of admin misconduct. In cases
> where an admin hasn't blatantly abused his powers, but has made many
> poor judgement calls, there's not much that can be done.
>
> I certainly remember a time - and it can't have been so long ago -
> when it was generally assumed that one could reason with Wikipedians.
> Indeed we were rather reluctant to write off individuals as irrational.
>
> Does that not scale, then?

When I first joined prospective sysops were expected to join the mailing
list.

Writing off individuals is again irrational; it's more efficient to
write off whole groups. :-)

Ec


from_name: Sam Spade

body:
You could always give rollback, delete, undelete, protect and
unprotect powers to everyone, at least everyone with more than X
edits.

Of course that would require banning users that abuse that power,
which I suppose is the real problem with adminship too: no one is
stepping up and removing the powers when they are abused.

The whole theory that adminship "should be no big deal" is based on
the fact that admins have no authority and that adminship can be taken
away.  The arb committee is what's really broken.  Actually, I'd say
the arb committee never worked all that well in the first place.

Anthony

A voice of reason! The problem isn't people being voted in w too few
votes, its the very idea of a popularity contest determining our
police force. And thats what admins are, they ARE NOT JANITORS. That
has got to be one of the stupidest wiki-concepts I have come across.

The #1 admin job is dispute resolution, like it or not, and good
dispute resolution is not indicated by the % of interested voters who
happen to be a part of ones clique, faction, or cabal ;)

RfA needs a compete overhaul, and a 30 vote minimum is NOT the answer.
Jimbo told me that RfA is working great, perhaps we'd better clue him
in?

Sam Spade


body:
On 1/4/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
>
>
> It also seems extremely odd to me that a project with the goal of
> giving people free access to the sum of all human knowledge would
> engage in a discussion over whether or not it is appropriate for
> people to provide information about themselves on their user page.
>
> Anthony
> _______________________________________________

It depends upon what information. If a userbox states that the editor is a
catholic or methodist or whatever that's ok. Although I still don't think a
userbox should be used for it. If a person states "This user supports the
Global Illegalisation of *same sex
marriage<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Same_sex_marriage>
*." or "this user hates George Bush" I do mind. Although I do personally
agree with one of them, and I am pro same sex marriage.

Garion


body:
Steve Bennett wrote:

>What's strange to me is that it seems that WP is one of the few places
>where you could really provide a comprehensive CV of all the good you've
>done and why you should be admin.  Why not ask candidates to provide X
>diffs demonstrating their dispute resolution skills, and invite
>nay-sayers to provide diffs of bad judgement? Simple statistics should
>mandatorily be collected which would show roughly what sort of Wikipedia
>member they are: How many different talk pages have they left comments
>on? How many user talk pages have they left 2 or more comments on?
>
Were those comments polite?

Ec


body:
On 1/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/4/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
> >
> > It's a lot easier to get along with somebody if you know who they are,
> > what they believe in, etc.  Do you disagree, or do you just think it
> > isn't important for Wikipedia editors to get along with one another?
>
> I work well with many editors and seldom give a thought to their
> backgrounds, native tongue, politics, religion or personal outlook on
> life.  That they share with me an ability to cooperate is evident from
> their behavior and the results of our cooperation.
>
So, I guess your answer is that you don't know if it's easier, because
you've never tried it.

> I am very suspicious of the suggestion that having editors categorized
> by beliefs and convictions helps Wikipedia, and I see no evidence that
> this is so.  Moreover Wikipedia survived very well to the point of
> 800,000 articles without any significant user categorization by
> belief.  I am aware of three recent cases in which that categorization
> was used in attempts to further factional ends, and I am also aware
> that the number of such boxes has increased tenfold in one month.  The
> balance is thus tipping strongly against conviction-related userboxes.

You're entitled to your opinion.  I hope you don't think everyone else
shares it with you, though.

Anthony


subject: [WikiEN-l] Trust metric Was: Userbox compromise proposal

body:
Currently several tasks in Wikipedia require editor's to make a guess
about the trustworthyness of other editors.

Right now it's all informal. Is the editor:
* a friend?
* trusted by a friend?
* distrusted by a friend?
* logged in?
* a sysop?
* a user with more than N article namespace edits?
* on the ArbCom?
* a longtime editor?

Does she have:
* a lot of thank you notes, barnstars, etc on her user page?
* a history of conflicts, blocks, bans, RFCs etc?
* a history of conflict with a friend?

It takes time to evaluate all this so mostly a through evaluation is
done only for a handful of other editors one interacts with.

But imagine that you had an assistant who could do this for you and
come up with a number and insert that number whenever you see a
signature or browse RC, RFA, RFC and all others?

Just like it's impossible to spend minutes evaluating each seller on eBay.

The big challenge is to come up with a system that doesn't bog down
the servers and cannot be easily gamed.
It doesn't need to be perfect the first time, just better than
nothing. Slashdot's rating system for example evolved for several
years.

BTW users of Cryptoderk's Vandalfighter app already use a crude
version of this when they add users to their temorary or permanent
whitelists / blacklists.
Its immensely useful for RC patrol.

-- nyenyec

On 1/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/4/06, Nyenyec N <nyenyec at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > I'm not sure if there is an easy solution. Maybe an eBay rating /
> > Slashdot karma like system is the way to go.
>
> Possibly a trust metric.  I seem to recall that Slashdot's system lets
> you see friends, freaks, friends of friends, friends of freaks, etc,
> but I'm not sure that this sort of thing helps. In Slashdot's case I
> think the tinkering with Karma and the like developed into an arms
> race, and in any case Slashcode is more user-tunable; reading at level
> 3 I never see any nonsense, but you can't operate a decision-making
> process in that way.
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


body:
On 1/4/06, Jon <thagudearbh at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
>   The redraft does, however, clarify existing practice, and I think it leaves no loopholes - by being straightforward and not allowing for complicated exceptions, and by having fewer words to argue about, loopholes are eliminated.

Jon, tightening wording can eliminate loopholes but it can also
introduce them. I haven't looked at the draft for a few days, but when
I last looked, I was concerned to see certain examples missing. The
current wording of that policy page has stood in the way of nonsense
many, many times, so I want to urge caution about throwing the baby
out with the bathwater. Succint is good, but it's not an end in
itself.

Sarah


body:
On 1/4/06, Stan Shebs <shebs at apple.com> wrote:
> Knowing more about other editors has always helped me working with
> them, so there's at least one counter-datapoint. For instance, I
> found trying to reason with Wik to be very difficult because nobody
> knew anything about him, and so we couldn't figure out whether he
> was stubborn on principle, extremely immature, mentally ill, or what.
>
I seem to recall something to the effect of "please create a user
account so we know who we're talking to" being written on a lot of IP
address talk pages, too.

Anthony


body:
On 1/4/06, Sam Spade <samspade.thomasjefferson at googlemail.com> wrote:
> Its overwhelmingly obvious. You already know I'm right.

So RFC and Medation and arbcom don't exist because it is all handled
by admins? We have nearly 800 admins so if they are doing disspute
resolution then we should not see many dissputes that are not already
being handled. This does not appear to be the case.

>"Reducing the heat"?
>
> Sam Spade

Protecting an article does not resolve the disspute. It mearly
increase the pressure on those involved to talk to each other.

--
geni


from_name: Delirium

subject: [WikiEN-l] SPOV threatens NPOV

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:

> Chris Jenkinson wrote:
>
>> David Gerard wrote:
>>
>>> I'm coming across as much more strident in this thread than I mean to
>>> be. But the point is that pseudoscience is in fact *bullshit*, not
>>> science, and there's going to be no label that doesn't puff up the
>>> subjects with false respectability that won't soon carry the same
>>> connotations. Because it is in fact bullshit.
>>
>>
>> I wholeheartedly agree with the above. Pseudoscience is nothing more
>> than dogmatic and irrational thinking trying to pretend it's exactly the
>> opposite to get public support. It should not be given a single bit of
>> credibility at all - and not giving it credibility would fit perfectly
>> with our policy of neutral point of view.
>
>
> The Neutral Point of View has nothing to do with what you say, which
> is clearly the ranting of someone who doesn't know WTF he's talking
> about.

Despite being somewhat of a scientist myself (well, as a PhD student in
the sciences, in some sense a scientist-in-training), I tend to agree
more with Ray than David or Chris here.  I can't say I have any interest
in pseudoscience, parascience, "alternative science", or whatever you
want to call it, and it certainly shouldn't be portrayed as accepted by
the mainstream, but on the other hand I see no reason or justification
for actively attacking it.  The point of Wikipedia is not to discern
fundamental truths (an impossible task, and original research in any
case), but to document who says what.  If someone has proposed what they
call a scientific theory, but most scientists think it's not one, then
we can report that matter-of-factly, preferably with citations to who
says what.

Using the label "pseudoscience" upsets this matter-of-fact reporting,
because we essentially take sides in the dispute.  It's NPOV to say that
it's rejected by most scientists; that it's not taught in science
classes; that so-and-so a scientific body or eminent scientist has
issued a statement saying it's crap; and so on.  Saying outright
"Wikipedia has concluded that it is fake science" is not neutral.  More
neutral is "Wikipedia has concluded that it is claimed by its proponents
to be science, but not accepted by most scientists as science."
"Pseudoscience" means literally "fake science", which is the former, and
therefore inappropriate; we need a term that means the latter.

-Mark


body:
jayjg wrote:
> Thank you Ray, that's exactly the spirit in which I intended it, and the
> reason I did not name the individual in question.

I know you didn't, but the details were so specific it was immediately
clear to me (and others) who you were talking about. I just didn't find
the not-quite-naming and shaming helpful.

Chris


subject: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad

body:
On 1/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> This is a serious push to
> reform Wikipedia as a network of users linked according to beliefs and
> preferences that can be accessed by a point-of-view pusher at the
> touch of a button.

This isn't a conspiracy, it's tinfoil hattery. I'll believe the conpsiracy
theories when I see a conspirator.

Ryan


body:
On 1/4/06, Sam Spade <samspade.thomasjefferson at googlemail.com> wrote:
> > It turns out that, in practice, it is difficult to de-admin an
> > administrator.
> >
> > Jay.
>
> So lets change that.
>
> Sam Spade

Is it really that hard at the moment? Two admins who have pulled my
blocks have ended up as non admins.

--
geni


body:
On 1/4/06, Ryan Delaney <ryan.delaney at gmail.com> wrote:
> Maybe we need to be thinking harder about how to improve Arbcom.
>
> Ryan

We came up with quite a list of proposals back in september. Did
really manage to build consensus for any of the them but expanding it
in various ways was proposed.

--
geni


body:
On 1/4/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/4/06, Sam Spade <samspade.thomasjefferson at googlemail.com> wrote:
> > The #1 admin job is dispute resolution, like it or not,
>
> Evidence? Policy does not support your claim. The way the softwear
> works does not support your claim (protection is hardly dispute
> resolution it is mearly reduceing the heat). The way admin powers are
> used does not support you claim (cheack the log).
>
>
> --
> geni

Its overwhelmingly obvious. You already know I'm right. "Reducing the heat"?

Sam Spade


body:
On 1/4/06, Sam Spade <samspade.thomasjefferson at googlemail.com> wrote:
> So RFC and Medation and arbcom don't exist because it is all handled
> by admins? We have nearly 800 admins so if they are doing disspute
> resolution then we should not see many dissputes that are not already
> being handled. This does not appear to be the case.
>
> >"Reducing the heat"?
> >
> > Sam Spade
>
> Protecting an article does not resolve the disspute. It mearly
> increase the pressure on those involved to talk to each other.
>
> We seem to be talking past each other. Admins should do a better job
> of of dispute resolution, certainly. Many of them are wildly
> inadaquate for the job. Thats part of why its so important to overhaul
> the RfA process. We need more dispute resolution, and less "wheel
> warring", controversial blocks, and other such pathetic displays of
> power.
>
> Sam Spade

Why should admins be doing disspute resultion? There are plently of
other mechanisms for that and they do not require people to have admin
powers. Frankly someone who is prepared to dig through [[WP:CP]] may
not be an ideal person for dealing with dissputes.

Go through policy. Admins have no role in disspute resolution. Wheel
warring is often a symptom of people failing to understnad this.

--
geni


body:
On 1/4/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
> On 1/4/06, Ryan Delaney <ryan.delaney at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I almost wish it were feasible to make a "Request for De-adminship" where
> > someone could be nominated for admin removal as a result of a user conduct
> > RFC, but then I realize what a trollpit that would become in a matter of
> > hours. Arbcom is really the only way to take away admin rights with any
> > measure of civillity and rationality. And they are swamped.
> >
> > Maybe we need to be thinking harder about how to improve Arbcom.
> >
> > Ryan
>
> Maybe the arb com needs to be thinking harder about how to improve
> arbcom.  Would it be out of the arbcom's jurisdiction to establish
> groups of people to help them out? Couldn't they say "X, Y, and Z are
> beurocrats who, if the three of them agree, can temporarily de-admin a
> user; the arbcom reserves the power to overrule any decision they
> make"?
>
> Anthony

General when we need to remove an admin fast we don't bother with
official channels.

--
geni


body:
On 1/4/06, jayjg <jayjg99 at gmail.com> wrote:
> It's difficult, but certainly not impossible.  Admins who have significantly
> abused their privileges have been de-adminned, but it's a lengthy process.
> And it may well be that it *should* be a lengthy process.  Incoming quality
> control is almost always less expensive than cleaning up messes after the
> fact; that's why I'm arguing we need to focus on the adminning process, not
> the de-adminning process.
>
> Jay.

The problem is that if we make the process too difficult we will be
getting people people makeing it to adminship about the time burnout
hits. I think giving people better information to self select on would
be a good idea.

--
geni


body:
jayjg wrote:
> I'm sure a small number of people who were aware of the specific incidents
> knew which individual I was referring to, but that's hardly the point.  Most
> of these discussions involve a lot of hand-waving arguments, people making
> claims with no concrete examples.  Rather than doing the same, I provided a
> live and relevant example of the issues I was raising.  And to remind
> everyone, the issue raised was not about whether or not one particular admin
> was behaving badly, but more broadly whether people are becoming involved in
> Wikipedia (and even becoming admins) without any familiarity with its norms
> or committment to its goals.  When one notices that an administrator is
> behaving quite badly, and then realizes that fewer than 1/4 of his edits are
> actually to articles, and that he has as many edits to his user page as he
> has to all encyclopedia articles combined, these issues are highlighted
> starkly.

Maybe he's a bad admin, he certainly gets involved right in the thick of
the latest and greatest controversy on Wikipedia, but he also received
53 support votes on his RFA, including a number of high-profile editors
who do not normally vote or typically vote oppose. And despite all the
controversy he's in recently, he still managed to become elected to one
of Esperanza's positions with 19 votes. I don't want to get into some
kind of psychological analysis of everyone's voting habits, but I
believe if someone is unsuitable then they would never get as many votes
as he has.

Yes, maybe he hasn't been editing the article space enough. I probably
don't edit the article namespace enough either. But if what he is doing
is building friendships and welcoming people to Wikipedia, then I don't
see what he is doing as a problem. People are more likely to contribute
if they feel happy here and I believe his actions are helping in this
area. He isn't directly building the encyclopaedia, but he's helping get
others to build it.

Chris


subject: [WikiEN-l] EXTREME Fix Crappy Prose CHALLENGE!

body:
I like those articles so much I have a link to them on my user page.
Thats the kind of stuff I like best about the wiki, the opportunity to
make a mountain out of a molehill ;)

Sam Spade

On 12/1/05, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
>     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Articles_that_need_to_be_wikified
>
> If you're feeling particularly strong and have a fresh pack of
> [[Kretek|Gudangs]] and a bottle of whisky to hand, there's a Metric
> Shitload of stuff in that category that can only be fixed by hard
> editorial slog. Call them the "unfeatured articles" ... the polar
> opposite of [[WP:FA]].
>
> (Worst is when it's an article about something clearly article-worthy,
> but just thinking about how to fix the crappy prose makes your brain
> seize up ...)
>
> [Note that I'm not saying "OMGWTFBBQ WESUCKANDWE'RED0000MED" ... I'm
> pointing out a practical thing that people can do if they're feeling
> inspired to hard unglamorous slog. I'm not sure I am right now; I'll
> let you know when I'm back on Sunday.]
>
>
> - d.
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Fastfission

body:
Mainly because a large deal of our feeling confident that our use of
unlicensed copyrighted material is "fair" is that it is purportedly for
"comment and criticism." This approach seems backed up by a number of
informed sources, i.e.
http://fairuse.stanford.edu/Copyright_and_Fair_Use_Overview/chapter9/9-a.html#1which
lists "Comment and Criticism" and "Parody" as the two primary
categories of things which receive legal blessing for "Fair use" claims. I
think most people have a pretty poor view of what counts legally as the
latter (most seem to think it just means "used in a funny way" which is not
at all how the courts interpret "parody"). As for the former, the Stanford
page says:

"If you are commenting upon or critiquing a copyrighted work--for instance,
writing a book review -- fair use principles allow you to reproduce some of
the work to achieve your purposes. Some examples of commentary and criticism
include:

   - quoting a few lines from a Bob Dylan song in a music review
   - summarizing and quoting from a medical article on prostate cancer in
   a news report
   - copying a few paragraphs from a news article for use by a teacher or
   student in a lesson, or
   - copying a portion of a Sports Illustrated magazine article for use
   in a related court case.

The underlying rationale of this rule is that the public benefits from your
review, which is enhanced by including some of the copyrighted material.
Additional examples of commentary or criticism are provided in the examples
of fair use cases in Section C."

Now whether we achieve this in the article namespace is of course often
under discussion. In the User and Template namespaces media is primarily
used for decoration and personalization. This would not seem to fall under
the above descriptions even in a very optimistic approach.

Unfortunately the Stanford Fair Use case summaries page has almost nothing
relating to using images on webpages (only the "thumbnailing" case which is
not quite the same thing) so it is hard to know what sort of precedent one
would be fallnig back upon in either direction. I know a few cases offhand
but I'm not a lawyer and it is hard for me to sort through what is most
relevant and what would not be.

This is, anyway, my understanding of what the policy is based upon, for
better or worse. There is also a crude risk/benefit equation going on here.
There is simply no compelling reason to allow unlicensed, copyrighted images
in the user namespace, and a number of reasons to be suspicious of it.

FF

On 1/4/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
>
> On 1/3/06, SCZenz <sczenz at gmail.com> wrote:
> > "Fair use" images can't possibly be used on user pages or template
> > pages without violating copyright, as far as I can see.
>
> I'm sure this has been discussed before, so could you point us to a
> url where this assertion is explained?  Alternatively I suppose you
> could just write the explanation here, but that'd probably be
> redundant.
>
> Anthony
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Fl Celloguy

subject: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad

body:
I'm just going to play devil's advocate here, meaning that I don't
necessarily support the proposal below. I also know that this is radical and
may be going too far. But what if we entirely eliminated user pages? Sure,
having one can be good, but how much do user pages contribute to the
encyclopedia? Anything relevant on there can be placed on user talk
subpages. While user pages could essentially be moved to user talk subpages,
I'm sure that would take some of the focus away from user pages. Thoughts on
this? (Again, I'm just playing [[Devil's advocate]] here and would like to
see comments on this.)

Regarding the Esperanza vote - please don't take votes on Esperanza's
elections to mean that a user is either certified/uncertified/any other
position in Wikipedia. Esperanza is an organization dedicated to helping
promote Wiki-Love, and having a leadership position there means absolutely
nothing outside of the organization.

Finally, I know that this is a tangentally-related issue, but I'm wondering
if there's a policy against imitating genuine articles on user pages (i.e.
writing about a subject not deemed encyclopedic enough but placing it on
your user page, with the article's title as the user name, complete with
stub tags). If there is one, I haven't encountered such a policy. There was
recently some confusion with people misinterpreting such user pages as
Wikipedia articles (how they got directed to the user page, I don't
know...). Thoughts on this?

Thanks a lot!

Flcelloguy
>From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

_________________________________________________________________
Express yourself instantly with MSN Messenger! Download today - it's FREE!
http://messenger.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200471ave/direct/01/


from_name: charles matthews

body:
"jayjg" wrote

> I think the problem is
that we are creating administrators who are not part of the community, not
familiar with its policies and norms, and not particularly interested in
Wikipedia's goals.

The first point is how older generations always talk, of course.  I.e. it is
the postulation of a 'generation gap'.

Second point might be factually true.  How many of us would like to take an
exam on policy?  Is it any longer possible to be familiar with enough of the
key policy pages?  Why is there no 'Dummies' guide?  (Well, maybe there is
and I just don't come across it.)  Norms - well, yes, community norms are
what actually matter.

Not interested in WP's goals.  Possible, though I wonder just how many
people are interested in my current goals (this week, 1911 EB reference
wikification and blue-linking, sort out and develop William Blake mythology,
[[Category:Category theory]]).

There is a kind of progression: encourage people to have user accounts when
they were happy as IPs; user pages too tribal or full of 'This Wikipedian
drinks coffee' user boxes; RfA votes for people with too high a proportion
of edits on User Talk pages, or vandal chasing, and not enough good
name-space edits.

We have to live with all of this, by the way.  Admin status is the major
form of recognition open to everyone that means something (barnstars have
long been debased currency, Featured Articles I can no longer be bothered
with, as slanted to certain kinds of writing.)

Potential solutions:

- Stop talking about a gap in terms that can only accentuate it
- Do something about a policy guide for non-veterans
- New recognition mechanisms, raise the bar for admin creation for
newcomers, more active research of committed content-oriented RfA candidates
from those who quietly get on with it.

Charles


body:
> It turns out that, in practice, it is difficult to de-admin an
> administrator.
>
> Jay.

So lets change that.

Sam Spade


body:
So RFC and Medation and arbcom don't exist because it is all handled
by admins? We have nearly 800 admins so if they are doing disspute
resolution then we should not see many dissputes that are not already
being handled. This does not appear to be the case.

>"Reducing the heat"?
>
> Sam Spade

Protecting an article does not resolve the disspute. It mearly
increase the pressure on those involved to talk to each other.

We seem to be talking past each other. Admins should do a better job
of of dispute resolution, certainly. Many of them are wildly
inadaquate for the job. Thats part of why its so important to overhaul
the RfA process. We need more dispute resolution, and less "wheel
warring", controversial blocks, and other such pathetic displays of
power.

Sam Spade


from_name: Sam Korn

subject: [Wikitech-l] Special:Unwatchedpages

body:
On 1/4/06, Guillaume Paumier <guillom.pom at gmail.com> wrote:
> Unfortunately I'm afraid you still don't have your answer... :-)

It's not currently on there, though I expect it could be placed there
easily enough.  Probably just an oversight.

--
Sam


from_name: Frieda Brioschi

subject: [Wikitech-l] Special:Unwatchedpages

body:
Hi,
I cannot understand why Special:Unwatchedpages is not listed in
Special:Specialpages.

is there any special reason?

Thanks,
Frieda

___________________________________________
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utente:Frieda


from_name: Guillaume Paumier

subject: [Wikitech-l] Special:Unwatchedpages

body:
Hello

Access to Special:Unwatchedpages is restricted to sysops, and it seems to me
all special pages listed in Special:Specialpages are accessible to all
users, but I may be wrong.

Guillom

2006/1/4, Frieda Brioschi <ubifrieda at gmail.com>:
>
> Hi,
> I cannot understand why Special:Unwatchedpages is not listed in
> Special:Specialpages.
>
> is there any special reason?
>
> Thanks,
> Frieda
>
> ___________________________________________
> http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utente:Frieda
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>

--
Guillom
"Je sers la science et c'est ma joie" - Basile le Disciple
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guillom


from_name: Alphax (Wikipedia email)

subject: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad

body:
Tony Sidaway wrote:
> On 1/4/06, Kelly Martin <kelly.lynn.martin at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>On 1/3/06, Ryan Delaney <ryan.delaney at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> If you're deleting userboxes because they are copyright violations, then
>>>fine. But what I've been hearing is that you're deleting them because
>>>they're a waste of time and cause Wikipedia editors to factionalize by POV.
>>>Not fine.
>>
>>Then you are listening to people who are not telling the truth.
>
>
> To clarify, *I* am the one deleting userboxes because they enable
> serious disruption of Wikipedia.
>

Maybe we should just disable anonymous edits and require face-to-face
meetings with Board members to enable account creation. Surely they are
also enabling serious disruption of Wikipedia? I mean, we've disabled
anon article creation, we're deleting userboxes and crucifying the users
who support that, why not take the next logical steps?

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP
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subject: [Wikitech-l] Special:Unwatchedpages

body:
Hi Guillom :-)

> Access to Special:Unwatchedpages is restricted to sysops,

Yes, I know :-)

> and it seems to me
> all special pages listed in Special:Specialpages are accessible to all
> users, but I may be wrong.

Ehm.. yes, you're wrong.
If you're sysop you can see a section "Restricted special pages" with
few pages for sysops and bureocrats only.

Ciao,
Frieda

> 2006/1/4, Frieda Brioschi <ubifrieda at gmail.com>:
> >
> > Hi,
> > I cannot understand why Special:Unwatchedpages is not listed in
> > Special:Specialpages.
> >
> > is there any special reason?
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Frieda
> >
> > ___________________________________________
> > http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utente:Frieda
> > _______________________________________________
> > Wikitech-l mailing list
> > Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
> >
>
>
>
> --
> Guillom
> "Je sers la science et c'est ma joie" - Basile le Disciple
> http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guillom
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>

--
___________________________________________
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utente:Frieda


from_name: Rob Church

subject: [Wikitech-l] Special:Unwatchedpages

body:
It's now a known bug, which I'll likely get to looking at later, if
someone doesn't beat me too it.

Rob Church

On 04/01/06, Sam Korn <smoddy at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/4/06, Guillaume Paumier <guillom.pom at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Unfortunately I'm afraid you still don't have your answer... :-)
>
> It's not currently on there, though I expect it could be placed there
> easily enough.  Probably just an oversight.
>
> --
> Sam
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>


from_name: Phil Boswell

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Page age notice hack: comments?

body:
"Brion Vibber" <brion at pobox.com> wrote in
message news:43BBF8B0.5040604 at pobox.com...
> As a quick hack on http://test.leuksman.com/ I've added a little notice
> that
> displays at the top of the page if it's been recently modified, reminding
> the
> user to check the edit history to see what's changed.
> The color of the box and the approximate age gradually gets duller after
> about
> 10 minutes, 30 minutes, and 60 minutes, then finally disappears.

I'm getting the notice, but no coloured box.

Am I doing something wrong?
--
Phil
[[en:User:Phil Boswell]]


subject: Imitating articles on user pages (Re: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad)

body:
I don't know if there is a policy, but I suggest just putting it up for
deletion. I did the same with a user page/pov article fork recently and it
was deleted with no dissenting votes.

On 1/4/06, Fl Celloguy <flcelloguy at hotmail.com> wrote:

> Finally, I know that this is a tangentally-related issue, but I'm
> wondering
> if there's a policy against imitating genuine articles on user pages (i.e.
> writing about a subject not deemed encyclopedic enough but placing it on
> your user page, with the article's title as the user name, complete with
> stub tags). If there is one, I haven't encountered such a policy. There
> was
> recently some confusion with people misinterpreting such user pages as
> Wikipedia articles (how they got directed to the user page, I don't
> know...). Thoughts on this?
>
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad

body:
Brian wrote:
<snip>
> And relationships are being formed right now in the group of new-ish users
> that have been brought together over user boxes that will indeed result in
> attempts to shout policies through. Not to be melodramatic but I really
> think we're at a crossroads here.
>
> The increase in usage has brought a lot of new users in, some of whom have
> been active in forum-like sites where participation and acceptable ways of
> communicating are much different.....
>

I had been active on internet forums for several years before joining
Wikipedia, so I had some idea of netiquette and such before I starting
trying to influence things. I suspect many users have been active in
online communities far longer than I have, back to the Usenet days. But
what we are getting now are internet n00bs (and they are well deserving
of that term) turning up and acting like it.

But because we are the nice people that we are, we assume good faith and
don't bite the newbies, and these people, the truly clueless who have
just discovered the internet and think that Wikipedia is just another
online community, we *aren't* deploying the clue-by-fours, we are
letting these people integrate and suddenly there are so many that you
can't tell who is and isn't a n00b until they do something stupid (like
passing RfA and unblocking the vilest trolls).

Now, I am confident that there *are* people who have a clue out there,
and that they *are* getting this grand encyclopedia of ours written, but
maybe we need to go back to basics: remember what Wikipedia is Not (in
all namespaces, not just main) and get on with why we are all supposed
to be here.

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP
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subject: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad

body:
Stan Shebs wrote:
> Ryan Delaney wrote:
>
>> On 1/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> The scope for abuse  of these userboxes has been amply demostrated.
>>> They fulfil no function useful to the encyclopedia that isn't done
>>> equally well by simply stating one's affiliations on one's user page.
>>> They must die.
>>>
>>>
>>
>> You really ought to learn to pick your battles. Yes, some people do
>> things
>> on Wikipedia that are less than entirely productive. But some of these
>> things boost community morale and connect people with each other in fun
>> ways. Yes, in an ideal world, we would spend all our time working on the
>> encyclopedia and doing nothing else. But tha door swings both ways. In
>> that
>> world, you would spend all your time working on the encyclopedia, not
>> launching a crusade over trivial crap like this.
>>
> Taking a longer perspective, we do have fads that sweep over from time
> to time. About the time I started, three years ago, lists were a big
> issue - lots of lists being created and expanded, lots of argument
> about the value of lists. Now they're just part of the scene, don't
> get much attention.
>
> Somebody compared userboxes to bumper stickers, and I think it's very
> apt. While we may dislike seeing cars covered with bumper stickers,
> we don't (usually :-) ) try to pass laws regulating the number or
> type of bumper stickers on a car, nor do we try to outlaw the
> printing of bumper stickers.
>

Most people try to avoid cars with lots of bumper stickers because they
are likely to be rednecks/lefties/greenies and you wouldn't trust them
to give you the time.

> Similarly, if there are somebody who admire WP so much that they want
> to be associated with it, even if they don't have anything to
> contribute to the encyclopedia, that seems like a good thing. In fact,
> if their language skills are abysmal and their library skills
> nonexistent, I would rather have them tinkering with user pages and
> talking about WP with their friends rather than editing on articles
> proper. For some, I imagine that the user page is a good way to learn
> about editing without disrupting article development. (It does suggest
> that we should fine-tune our metrics so that user-space edits are never
> counted.)
>

Similarly, "user has too many useless userboxes/user has < 500 article
edits" could become a regular "oppose" reason at RfA... after all, if
it's bad userboxes and stupid admins who are being targeted here, why
not draw the conclusion that "stupid userboxes -> bad admins"?

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP
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body:
geni wrote:
> On 1/3/06, Steve Bennett <stevage at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>What's strange to me is that it seems that WP is one of the few places
>>where you could really provide a comprehensive CV of all the good you've
>>done and why you should be admin.  Why not ask candidates to provide X
>>diffs demonstrating their dispute resolution skills, and invite
>>nay-sayers to provide diffs of bad judgement? Simple statistics should
>>mandatorily be collected which would show roughly what sort of Wikipedia
>>member they are: How many different talk pages have they left comments
>>on? How many user talk pages have they left 2 or more comments on? How
>>long have they been active? What is their activity pattern? How many
>>edits have all the people voting for them made?
>>
>>I like stats!
>>
>>Steve
>>
>
>
>
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
> Dispute resolution is not an admin task
>
> People keep seem to be forgeting this.
>

Same applies to helpdesk-l (and possibly wikien-l and wikipedia-l, too)...

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP
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subject: [Wikitech-l] Special:Unwatchedpages

body:
Thanks for making me learn these things ; as for the simple user I am, I
don't see these "Restricted special pages".

Unfortunately I'm afraid you still don't have your answer... :-)

2006/1/4, Frieda Brioschi <ubifrieda at gmail.com>:
>
> Hi Guillom :-)
>
> > Access to Special:Unwatchedpages is restricted to sysops,
>
> Yes, I know :-)
>
> > and it seems to me
> > all special pages listed in Special:Specialpages are accessible to all
> > users, but I may be wrong.
>
> Ehm.. yes, you're wrong.
> If you're sysop you can see a section "Restricted special pages" with
> few pages for sysops and bureocrats only.
>
> Ciao,
> Frieda
>
> > 2006/1/4, Frieda Brioschi <ubifrieda at gmail.com>:
> > >
> > > Hi,
> > > I cannot understand why Special:Unwatchedpages is not listed in
> > > Special:Specialpages.
> > >
> > > is there any special reason?
> > >
> > > Thanks,
> > > Frieda
> > >
> > > ___________________________________________
> > > http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utente:Frieda
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > Wikitech-l mailing list
> > > Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> > > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
> > >
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Guillom
> > "Je sers la science et c'est ma joie" - Basile le Disciple
> > http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guillom
> > _______________________________________________
> > Wikitech-l mailing list
> > Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
> >
>
>
> --
> ___________________________________________
> http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utente:Frieda
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>

--
Guillom
"Je sers la science et c'est ma joie" - Basile le Disciple
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guillom


from_name: Rowan Collins

body:
On 04/01/06, Phil Boswell <phil.boswell at gmail.com> wrote:
> I'm getting the notice, but no coloured box.
>
> Am I doing something wrong?

CSS problem, perhaps? What browser are you using?

Works for me (using http://test.leuksman.com/view/C as test page) on
Mozilla, Firefox, Konqueror, and Opera, but I'm running Linux right
now, so can't test IE.

Meanwhile, I think this is a rather good idea. The only danger is that
the absence of such a notice might be interpretted as meaning a page
is stable when in fact it's just being ignored, but I'm not sure
people would become accustomed enough to the notice to make that
assumption.

--
Rowan Collins BSc
[IMSoP]


from_name: Angela

subject: [WikiEN-l] Check all deleted edits?

body:
On 1/4/06, Michelle Kinney <jareth at crimsonblade.net> wrote:
> I recall seeing a post in the past couple of months where someone had a
> solution to check all the boxes when restoring a deleted item.
> Unfortunately, I can't for the life of me figure out what I did with
> that message.  Would anyone happen to have it laying around?

The following bookmarklet, created by Brian0918, will do this:

javascript:for (i=0; i<document.forms.length; i++) { for (j=0;
j<document.forms[i].elements.length; j++) { f=
document.forms[i].elements[j]; if (f.type == 'checkbox') f.checked=
true; } } void 0

Source: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Archive19#Quick_selective_undeleting_and_watchlist_cleaning>

Angela.


from_name: Chris Jenkinson

body:
jayjg wrote:
> You seem to know him well.  Since you've decided to defend him, tell me,
> when he insists that "fair use" images can be used on Userboxes, and that
> attempts to delete them are attempts by "the mob" to enforce "copyright
> paranoia" and "wiki-law" that have "no basis in reality", and then edit wars
> both the policy pages which forbid it, and those who delete the images from
> the userboxes, is he helping others build the encyclopedia?

No, I think he's wrong on this issue, and I've promised elsewhere to
talk to him about it.

Chris


subject: [Wikitech-l] Special:Unwatchedpages

body:
thanks :-)

2006/1/4, Rob Church <robchur at gmail.com>:
> It's now a known bug, which I'll likely get to looking at later, if
> someone doesn't beat me too it.
>
>
> Rob Church
>
> On 04/01/06, Sam Korn <smoddy at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 1/4/06, Guillaume Paumier <guillom.pom at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > Unfortunately I'm afraid you still don't have your answer... :-)
> >
> > It's not currently on there, though I expect it could be placed there
> > easily enough.  Probably just an oversight.
> >
> > --
> > Sam
> > _______________________________________________
> > Wikitech-l mailing list
> > Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
> >
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>

--
___________________________________________
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utente:Frieda


body:
jayjg wrote:
> Well, that's great, but again, the issue isn't this particular individual.
> Rather, this is a symptom:  Why do we have administrators who are unfamiliar
> with policy? Why do we have administators who are unwilling to accept
> community consensus, and, indeed, seem almost unfamiliar with the concept?
> Why do we have administrators who think that it is so important to have
> "fair use" images on userboxes that it is reasonable to completely ignore
> any risks of copyright lawsuits against Wikipedia?
>
> Those are the issues here, and your having a chat with your friend isn't
> going to fix the root cause.

I really don't know why people think that, but this problem isn't just
related to userboxes. There are a number of admins who have fair use
images on their user pages, and they aren't all in "the userbox crew". A
cursory look at the arbitration committee candidates shows a number with
fair use images on their user page also.

Chris


from_name: Nick Boalch

body:
Conrad Dunkerson wrote:
[Userbox WikiProject]
> Basically... they're a pretty organized crowd over there so I expect
> these meta-template and copyright issues will be sorted out in fairly
> short order.

The thing is... I can't help but wish they'd use their time to do
something that actually benefits the encyclopaedia. :/

Cheers,

N.

--
Nicholas Boalch
School of Modern Languages & Cultures       Tel: +44 (0) 191 334 3456
University of Durham                        Fax: +44 (0) 191 334 3421
New Elvet, Durham DH1 3JT, UK               WWW: http://nick.frejol.org/


from_name: geni

body:
On 1/4/06, charles matthews <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com> wrote:
> Second point might be factually true.  How many of us would like to take an
> exam on policy?  Is it any longer possible to be familiar with enough of the
> key policy pages?

No just take a look at WP:CSD.

>  Why is there no 'Dummies' guide?  (Well, maybe there is
> and I just don't come across it.)  Norms - well, yes, community norms are
> what actually matter.
>

Becuase you can't really simplify it. The way around the problem is
that most admins specalise. I don't need to know the speedy delete
stuff aplying to rediects becuase I never deal with it.
 > Potential solutions:
>
> - Stop talking about a gap in terms that can only accentuate it
> - Do something about a policy guide for non-veterans

Have you seen the size of the MOS lately?
--
geni


from_name: Tony Sidaway

body:
I think it does us all a disservice to say that dispute resolution
isn't part of Wikipedia administration.  It's part of the editing
skills expected of an editor on Wikipedia.  Skill in resolving
disputes is unevenly distributed but a good editor is one who can
handle himself--and other people--well in a dispute, and a bad editor
is one whose skills of persuasion are inadequate to support his
actions.  An administrator has to make tough decisions, for which he
must possess the mental agility to prepare himself, the consequences
of which will test his resilience and responsiveness daily.

An administrator who can't hack dispute resolution is about as much
use as a chocolate teapot


body:
On 1/4/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> I think it does us all a disservice to say that dispute resolution
> isn't part of Wikipedia administration.  It's part of the editing
> skills expected of an editor on Wikipedia.  Skill in resolving
> disputes is unevenly distributed but a good editor is one who can
> handle himself--and other people--well in a dispute, and a bad editor
> is one whose skills of persuasion are inadequate to support his
> actions.  An administrator has to make tough decisions, for which he
> must possess the mental agility to prepare himself, the consequences
> of which will test his resilience and responsiveness daily.
>
> An administrator who can't hack dispute resolution is about as much
> use as a chocolate teapot

See the backlog at WP:CP? I don't care if the admins fixing it are any
good at disspute resolution.

--
geni


body:
On 1/4/06, Chris Jenkinson <chris at starglade.org> wrote:
> who do not normally vote or typically vote oppose. And despite all the
> controversy he's in recently, he still managed to become elected to one
> of Esperanza's positions with 19 votes.

Well to be fair, nobody actually thinks an Esperanza position means
anything.  Isn't it just some sort of social club?


body:
Tony Sidaway wrote:
> Well to be fair, nobody actually thinks an Esperanza position means
> anything.  Isn't it just some sort of social club?

I don't know what Esperanza actually is, but that's not really the
point. The point is that if he was eminently unsuitable, he wouldn't be
voted for.

Chris


body:
On 1/4/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
>
> Well, I took a brief look at the RfC for Kelly, and apparently one of
> the deleted userboxes was "User_Christian".

I'd say that's a no-brainer delete.  Just the other week I had to
block some wacko who insisted on using Wikipedia to spout exhortations
to kill muslims.  The harder it is for people like that to play
hunt-the-thimble when searching for people who might agree with their
nonsense, the better.

>Maybe that was done for
> copyright reasons though, I can't really tell.
>

Sadly that may be true.


subject: [WikiEN-l] The userbox fad

body:
On 1/4/06, Stan Shebs <shebs at apple.com> wrote:
> >
> We have a settled policy that users can do pretty much anything
> they like on their user pages and subpages, within the bounds of
> civility.

Absolutely not.  Wikipedia isn't a web hosting service.


from_name: Kirill Lokshin

body:
On 1/4/06, Carbonite <carbonite.wp at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> You're certainly correct on those points, but this proposal would go a
> long way towards addressing the current problems with userboxes. I
> think this issue needs to be solved by a combination of technical
> solutions (making the userboxes simply a statement than a membership
> in a faction) and social solutions (any suggestions?).

There is, incidentally, a halfway decent technical solution;
unfortunately, it runs afoul of [[Wikipedia:Avoid using
meta-templates]]:

1. Eliminate the categories linked from userboxes (this is a basic
starting step for any scheme of this sort).
2. Re-implement the templates in question using {{switch}} (see, for
example, {{User religion}}).  Since the meaning of the template
depends on the parameter given, Whatlinkshere is no longer useful;
someone looking through it will see anyone who has a religion userbox,
rather than those of a particular religion, for instance.

Kirill Lokshin


from_name: taib

subject: [Wikitech-l] Special:Unwatchedpages

body:
DEAR SIR, DEAR MADAM

I DO N AT SPEAK NOR UNDERSTAND ENGLISH. I  AM SUBSCRIBED AT WIKITECH BY
IGNORANCE;
EVERYDAY IRECEIVE MANY MANY SPAMS!!

PLEASE EXPLAIN TO ME HOW CAN I BE UNSBSCRIBED. IN FRENCH IF POSSIBLE

 THANK YOU

  taib.tilouine at wanadoo.fr

----- Original Message -----
From: "Frieda Brioschi" <ubifrieda at gmail.com>
To: "Wikimedia developers" <wikitech-l at wikimedia.org>
Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 6:19 PM
Subject: Re: [Wikitech-l] Special:Unwatchedpages

thanks :-)

2006/1/4, Rob Church <robchur at gmail.com>:
> It's now a known bug, which I'll likely get to looking at later, if
> someone doesn't beat me too it.
>
>
> Rob Church
>
> On 04/01/06, Sam Korn <smoddy at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 1/4/06, Guillaume Paumier <guillom.pom at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > Unfortunately I'm afraid you still don't have your answer... :-)
> >
> > It's not currently on there, though I expect it could be placed there
> > easily enough.  Probably just an oversight.
> >
> > --
> > Sam
> > _______________________________________________
> > Wikitech-l mailing list
> > Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
> >
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>

--
___________________________________________
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utente:Frieda
_______________________________________________
Wikitech-l mailing list
Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l


subject: [Wikitech-l] Special:Unwatchedpages

body:
DEAR SIR, DEAR MADAM

I DO N AT SPEAK NOR UNDERSTAND ENGLISH. I  AM SUBSCRIBED AT WIKITECH BY
IGNORANCE;
EVERYDAY IRECEIVE MANY MANY SPAMS!!

PLEASE EXPLAIN TO ME HOW CAN I BE UNSBSCRIBED. IN FRENCH IF POSSIBLE

 THANK YOU

taib.tilouine at wanadoo.fr

----- Original Message -----
From: "Guillaume Paumier" <guillom.pom at gmail.com>
To: "Wikimedia developers" <wikitech-l at wikimedia.org>
Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 5:40 PM
Subject: Re: [Wikitech-l] Special:Unwatchedpages

Thanks for making me learn these things ; as for the simple user I am, I
don't see these "Restricted special pages".

Unfortunately I'm afraid you still don't have your answer... :-)

2006/1/4, Frieda Brioschi <ubifrieda at gmail.com>:
>
> Hi Guillom :-)
>
> > Access to Special:Unwatchedpages is restricted to sysops,
>
> Yes, I know :-)
>
> > and it seems to me
> > all special pages listed in Special:Specialpages are accessible to all
> > users, but I may be wrong.
>
> Ehm.. yes, you're wrong.
> If you're sysop you can see a section "Restricted special pages" with
> few pages for sysops and bureocrats only.
>
> Ciao,
> Frieda
>
> > 2006/1/4, Frieda Brioschi <ubifrieda at gmail.com>:
> > >
> > > Hi,
> > > I cannot understand why Special:Unwatchedpages is not listed in
> > > Special:Specialpages.
> > >
> > > is there any special reason?
> > >
> > > Thanks,
> > > Frieda
> > >
> > > ___________________________________________
> > > http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utente:Frieda
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > Wikitech-l mailing list
> > > Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> > > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
> > >
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Guillom
> > "Je sers la science et c'est ma joie" - Basile le Disciple
> > http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guillom
> > _______________________________________________
> > Wikitech-l mailing list
> > Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
> >
>
>
> --
> ___________________________________________
> http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utente:Frieda
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>

--
Guillom
"Je sers la science et c'est ma joie" - Basile le Disciple
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guillom
_______________________________________________
Wikitech-l mailing list
Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l


subject: [Wikitech-l] Special:Unwatchedpages

body:
DEAR SIR, DEAR MADAM

I DO N AT SPEAK NOR UNDERSTAND ENGLISH. I  AM SUBSCRIBED AT WIKITECH BY
IGNORANCE;
EVERYDAY IRECEIVE MANY MANY SPAMS!!

PLEASE EXPLAIN TO ME HOW CAN I BE UNSBSCRIBED. IN FRENCH IF POSSIBLE

 THANK YOU

PROF. MOHAND TAIB TILOUINE

----- Original Message -----
From: "Sam Korn" <smoddy at gmail.com>
To: "Wikimedia developers" <wikitech-l at wikimedia.org>
Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 5:53 PM
Subject: Re: [Wikitech-l] Special:Unwatchedpages

On 1/4/06, Guillaume Paumier <guillom.pom at gmail.com> wrote:
> Unfortunately I'm afraid you still don't have your answer... :-)

It's not currently on there, though I expect it could be placed there
easily enough.  Probably just an oversight.

--
Sam
_______________________________________________
Wikitech-l mailing list
Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l


subject: [Wikitech-l] Special:Unwatchedpages

body:
DEAR SIR, DEAR MADAM

I DO N AT SPEAK NOR UNDERSTAND ENGLISH. I  AM SUBSCRIBED AT WIKITECH BY
IGNORANCE;
EVERYDAY IRECEIVE MANY MANY SPAMS!!

PLEASE EXPLAIN TO ME HOW CAN I BE UNSBSCRIBED. IN FRENCH IF POSSIBLE

 THANK YOU

PROF. MOHAND TAIB TILOUINE

----- Original Message -----
From: "Frieda Brioschi" <ubifrieda at gmail.com>
To: "Wikimedia developers" <wikitech-l at wikimedia.org>
Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 6:19 PM
Subject: Re: [Wikitech-l] Special:Unwatchedpages

thanks :-)

2006/1/4, Rob Church <robchur at gmail.com>:
> It's now a known bug, which I'll likely get to looking at later, if
> someone doesn't beat me too it.
>
>
> Rob Church
>
> On 04/01/06, Sam Korn <smoddy at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 1/4/06, Guillaume Paumier <guillom.pom at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > Unfortunately I'm afraid you still don't have your answer... :-)
> >
> > It's not currently on there, though I expect it could be placed there
> > easily enough.  Probably just an oversight.
> >
> > --
> > Sam
> > _______________________________________________
> > Wikitech-l mailing list
> > Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
> >
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>

--
___________________________________________
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utente:Frieda
_______________________________________________
Wikitech-l mailing list
Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l


body:
On 1/4/06, Chris Jenkinson <chris at starglade.org> wrote:
> Tony Sidaway wrote:
> > Well to be fair, nobody actually thinks an Esperanza position means
> > anything.  Isn't it just some sort of social club?
>
> I don't know what Esperanza actually is, but that's not really the
> point. The point is that if he was eminently unsuitable, he wouldn't be
> voted for.

I don't think Michael Foot made much of a party leader, but I'd vote
for him as a constituency MP and, if I were still a party member, I'd
vote for him on the NEC.  I'd say the same of those two former
conservative leaders that I've forgotten the name of, the bald
Yorkshireman and the Essex MP with the Japanese ancestry.  These three
chaps all have bags of skill and talent, but not all skills are shared
out equally.  They all lacked the skill to unite their respective
parties.  Conversely, someone may have such skills but be lacking in
other areas (Neil Kinnock, a magnificant unifier and great orator
whose downfall was lack of charisma in front of the TV camera).
"Eminently unsuitable" presupposes a job description, and a vote for
an Esperanza position probably only requires willingness to
do...whatever it is Esperanza people do.


body:
On 1/4/06, Carbonite <carbonite.wp at gmail.com> wrote:
[..]
>
> With this setup, a userbox stating "This user is a Democrat" would be
> no different that a sentence on their user page stating that they're a
> Democrat. The user wouldn't be included in a category and couldn't be
> identified through Whatlinkshere. There also wouldn't be any concerns
> about censorship or stifling of free speech.
>
> I'm sure this proposal could use some development, but it's a start. Thoughts?

Looks good.  Perhaps a bot to chase around doing the necessary
substing of unapproved templates, or at least to identify candidates
that someone can fix manually--the code to do this is trivial.


from_name: Stan Shebs

subject: [WikiEN-l] Userboxes and fair-use images in userspace

body:
Chris Jenkinson wrote:

> Jtkiefer wrote:
>
>> Remove the images and put it on your watchlist and also tell the user
>> why they can't have the images up there and if they put them back
>> then lock the user page and/or temporarily block the user for
>> violating copyrights and Wikipedia's guidelines on using fair use
>> images.  Jimbo himself has stated that we now should have zero
>> tolerance for people who knowingly violate copyrights.
>
>
> Wow, that's incredibly heavy handed. A better first step would be to
> ask that they remove them, then if they don't remove them yourself,
> explaining yourself all the way, and then do protection/blocking if
> it's really necessary. We're not trying to get rid of people here.

But as we've discovered, lots of people get unduly attached to
images that they can't legitimately use. I've applied a very
light touch on image tagging myself, still get carping and reverts.

At some point (soon I hope) we'll get to where all fair use image
descriptions include links to the exact set of articles where their
use is justified, then it will be sufficient to run a variant of
Orphanbot to quietly comment out all other attempts to use. Bots
are relentless and are hard to accuse of bias or favoritism, so
even the intransigent will learn to give up.

Stan