subject: The v-word (was: [Wikipedia-l] User pages)

body:
On Mon, Nov 25, 2002 at 04:51:58PM +0100, Erik Moeller wrote:
>*sigh* Clutch is a vandal, there's no doubt about it. Even when Lir was
>still unbanned, he kept changing her page, linking to articles about "good taste"
>to help her develop "the good taste she lacks", kept reverting her attempts
>to restore the page and threatened to do so until Lir would "call him uncle"
>(and not in the uncle Ed sense, I presume). Now that Lir is banned, he is,

This is possibly a cultural difference.  Your address and name indicates
you are German.  In English, when you make someone "holler uncle!" it
means "do you give up now?"  It is specifically used when someone is
being an unbearable annoyance, so you sit on them, and you don't let
them up until they indicate they recognize they have been an annoyance
and are prepared to change, by hollering "uncle!"  It's a fine old
tradition, rarely used by people who are older than school age.  In Lirs
case I saw no other way to impress on him what he was doing to other
Wikipedians.

And remember, Lir IS a "he", not a "she".  He attends Iowa State
University.  He should know better.

>This is vandalism of a user page -- it's identical to me editing Ed's page
>and inserting some snide remarks about the Unification Church and "Moonies",
>making it look like Ed wrote them. That's why everyone kept reverting Clutch's
>changes, but he is patient enough to re-insert his version again and again.
>
>Now we have basically justified Clutch's vandalism by protecting the
>*vandalized* version of the page which links to the "how to develop good taste" etc.
>which Clutch deliberately inserted.

I asked you to please look at the edits more carefully.  Fact is, Lir
decided to add the link to the "Good Taste" article all by himself.  He
"incorporated" it into his own page after one of my edits.  I ask you
again: look carefully.  I have added nothing to Lirs page that he did
not add himself.  I just cleaned it up, made it look more dignified and
less careless, and removed the few things Lir had put in specifically to
antagonize people.

I am happy with the compromise page that was achieved this morning, and
hope Jimbo lets it stand.

>I've dealt with trolls a number of times, and I know one when I see one.
>Don't let Clutch pull your leg. He's an experienced troll. SoftSecurity won't
>work here.

I am experienced in dealing with trolls.  My troll days are long past;
that's why I understand what Lir is going through, and can empathize
with him.  Unfortunately, this makes it worse for him.  I know what it
means to role-play at the cost of the community one role-plays in.  Lir
doesn't yet appreciate the cost, he just sees it as a game.

Jonathan

--
                     Geek House Productions, Ltd.

  Providing Unix & Internet Contracting and Consulting,
  QA Testing, Technical Documentation, Systems Design & Implementation,
  General Programming, E-commerce, Web & Mail Services since 1998

Phone:   604-435-1205
Email:   djw at reactor-core.org
Webpage: http://reactor-core.org
Address: 2459 E 41st Ave, Vancouver, BC  V5R2W2
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 307 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/attachments/20021125/a2826977/attachment.pgp


list: wikipedia-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Jonathan Walther

body:
On Mon, Nov 25, 2002 at 10:59:16AM -0500, Poor, Edmund W wrote:
>Well, I've had words with Clutch -- both publicly and privately. I don't think the v-word applies. And name-calling, once it's gotten people's attention, is beest dropped quickly. (that's a hint, Erik :-)
>
>I think Jimbo protected the [[user:Lir]] page, and I'm happy to revert it to something nice and agreeable. (I seem to remember going through something like this Friday, too.)

Ed, please don't revert the Lir page on the say-so of Erik; his own
email shows he wasn't in possession of all the facts when he dubbed me a
"vandal".  Other people have also worked on the Lir page since then, and
we came to a compromise that everyone except Erik seems to have
accepted.

Jonathan

--
                     Geek House Productions, Ltd.

  Providing Unix & Internet Contracting and Consulting,
  QA Testing, Technical Documentation, Systems Design & Implementation,
  General Programming, E-commerce, Web & Mail Services since 1998

Phone:   604-435-1205
Email:   djw at reactor-core.org
Webpage: http://reactor-core.org
Address: 2459 E 41st Ave, Vancouver, BC  V5R2W2
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 307 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/attachments/20021125/ead23ba4/attachment.pgp


body:
On Mon, Nov 25, 2002 at 05:07:19PM +0100, Erik Moeller wrote:
>The "v-word" will be dropped as soon as the unvandalized version of the page
>is restored. Again, what would you call it if people used your user page to
>advocate their points of view under your name?

You are running hot under the collar based on false information.  Please
cool down.  What Clutch was doing isn't vandalism, but I doubt anyone
here has the time to look at every single edit that was done to Lirs
pages and see all the tiny changes that were made; the fact that Lirs
page is long makes the job much harder than it otherwise would be.

Jonathan

--
                     Geek House Productions, Ltd.

  Providing Unix & Internet Contracting and Consulting,
  QA Testing, Technical Documentation, Systems Design & Implementation,
  General Programming, E-commerce, Web & Mail Services since 1998

Phone:   604-435-1205
Email:   djw at reactor-core.org
Webpage: http://reactor-core.org
Address: 2459 E 41st Ave, Vancouver, BC  V5R2W2
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 307 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/attachments/20021125/dbe4f6eb/attachment.pgp


from_name: Jimmy Wales

body:
Erik Moeller wrote:
> *sigh* Clutch is a vandal, there's no doubt about it.

Clutch, knock it off.

(Similar words added to Clutch user talk page.)

I'm reverting Lir's user page to Lir's last version.

I don't think we should really care much about this stupid page anyway.


body:
I just posted a non-page to the page, a request that we all just drop
it.  Please let's drop it.

On Thanksgiving Day (Thursday) I will say a toast to everyone on the
entire planet who does not fuss over this page between now and then.
:-)

Erik Moeller wrote:

> > Well, I've had words with Clutch -- both publicly and privately. I don't
> > think the v-word applies. And name-calling, once it's gotten people's
> > attention, is best dropped quickly. (that's a hint, Erik :-)
>
> The "v-word" will be dropped as soon as the unvandalized version of the page
> is restored. Again, what would you call it if people used your user page to
> advocate their points of view under your name?
>
> Regards,
>
> Erik
>
> --
> +++ GMX - Mail, Messaging & more  http://www.gmx.net +++
> NEU: Mit GMX ins Internet. Rund um die Uhr f?r 1 ct/ Min. surfen!
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
> http://www.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l


body:
On Mon, Nov 25, 2002 at 05:15:26PM +0100, Erik Moeller wrote:
>"Lir, I'm going to sit on you till you cry uncle"
>"No. Bad Lir. No more senseless linking!"
>"Still sitting on Lir; she isn't showing that she's interesting in
>developing good taste in editing"
>"We want good taste, or we'll spit you out."
>"adding link to important article on Good Taste"
>"Don't try to wriggle out of it Lir; a contributor of your stature needs to
>develope some TASTE"
>"Wriggle, wriggle, wriggle. If you don't take other peoples feelings
>seriously Lir, why should we take your work seriously?"
>"Give me some evidence you know what good taste is Lir. C'mon, I challenge
>you"
>"not even close. try again, Lir baby"
>"(your fate is being decided; if you don't take your fate seriously, it will
>certainly take YOU very seriously"
>again: "putting in link to article on Good Taste"

You are quoting Clutches edit comments out of context; ignoring the edits that
Lir made that triggered them.  Lir was determined to show that he didn't
give a damn about community standards, or trying to build quality
articles.  That is why Lir is banned.

As for the comment about Lir's fate being decided, that comment was made
because just then Jimbos had sent out a mail to the mailing list saying
he was going to ban Lir.  Yet Lir's behavior that was causing Clutch to
edit his page didn't cease; he continued it.  He didn't believe anything
could happen to him because "this is anarchy, and that means anything
goes".

>This is when other Wikipedians started reverting your changes. Lir
>repeatedly *removed* your link to the good taste article and only left it in because
>you kept vandalizing her page and threatened to continue to do so. And yes,

That is your perception.  It is wrong.  He thought he saw a humorous way
to incorporate it into his webpage, and he did so.  Lirs humor is often
inappropriate and designed to enrage people, but it is pretty funny.  As
long as you persist in thinking of Lir as a poor, defenseless little
girl who didn't have any idea what she was doing, you aren't going to
understand Lir.

>You're falling back into your old trolling behavior, Jon. The sad thing is
>that you got away with it for too long, because nobody likes to stick up for
>Lir.

You never knew my old trolling behavior.  The Wikipedia is something I
care about.  Your defense of Lir's edits makes me wonder how much you
care about it.

Jonathan

--
                     Geek House Productions, Ltd.

  Providing Unix & Internet Contracting and Consulting,
  QA Testing, Technical Documentation, Systems Design & Implementation,
  General Programming, E-commerce, Web & Mail Services since 1998

Phone:   604-435-1205
Email:   djw at reactor-core.org
Webpage: http://reactor-core.org
Address: 2459 E 41st Ave, Vancouver, BC  V5R2W2
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 307 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/attachments/20021125/e4dc93a3/attachment.pgp


from_name: Pierre Abbat

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Attn: 217.5.141.103

body:
Please stop creating pages consisting only of interlanguage links (e.g.
Faraday cage, olfaction). [[Olfaction]] is blank except for a link to
[[Geruchssinn]], which in turn consists only of a link to [[olfaction]].

phma


from_name: Larry Sanger

body:
On Mon, 25 Nov 2002, Poor, Edmund W wrote:

> I would really like everyone to stop throwing around the word
> "vandalism" except in the narrowly-described cases of:
> * scribbling graffiti, like "Hi, I'm a newbie"
> * deleting a page without explanation
> * obvious obscenity

I totally agree with this.  But I also think it's important that we keep
this word, as it is indispensible precisely for those cases.  No one
should ever be accused of misusing the word "vandalism" when quite
properly labelling pictures of goatse, for example, and why they're
removed.

Larry
--
"We have now sunk to a depth at which the re-statement of the obvious is
the first duty of intelligent men." --George Orwell


subject: [Wikipedia-l] a way to contact IP users

body:
Ed,

I know you mean very well, and that you're trying to help solve an
important problem, but I'm generally opposed to giving admins any special
powers that they do not already have have.  Maybe give everyone this
power?

Isn't there another way to achieve what you are trying to achieve?

Larry

On Mon, 25 Nov 2002, Poor, Edmund W wrote:

> How about giving admins the ability to throw up a "Please read this" message.
>
> Something like this:
> * User submits an edit
> * Wikipedia accepts the edit, and...
> * Sends user to a "You have an urgent administrative message" page.
>
> User can then:
> * Click on the "Read message" button, or
> * Just ignore it
>
> We can think of variations, like, send the user directly to the message page, rather than the "you have a message waiting". Another, for egregious cases, would send the user to the "message waiting" or 'please acknowledge this' page after EVERY edit, until the click an OKAY button.
>
> Ed poor
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: tarquin [mailto:tarquin at planetunreal.com]
> Sent: Monday, November 25, 2002 6:43 AM
> To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
> Subject: [Wikipedia-l] a way to contact IP users
>
>
> (this is a general feature suggestion, BTW, though it's a case on En
> that's reminded me of it)
>
> Someone on En: is adding pages on actors with just dates of birth. it's
> not vandalism, but admins have deleted many of these, because they're
> such tiny stubs they're basically worthless.
> it's not the first time that we get users who make many well-meaning
> edits, but make mistakes that leave us a lot to clean up.
>
> This reminds me of something I suggested ages ago -- we need a way to
> contact unregistered users to politely point of where they're putting a
> foot wrong.
> My suggestion was this:
> * on the IP contributions page, add a "alert this user" dialog box, or a
> link to one
> * that user will then see the message text above above every edit box
>
>
> This could save us a lot of cleaning up work. I also worry that these
> people may get discouraged and leave when they find we've deleted their
> additions -- we may be losing potentially valuable contributors.
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
> http://www.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
> http://www.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>

--
SeeATown webmaster
lsanger at seeatown.com
"We have now sunk to a depth at which the re-statement of the obvious is
the first duty of intelligent men." --George Orwell


list: wikien-l

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Clean up our mess! (was: A concept from Buckminster
 Fuller)

body:
On Mon, 25 Nov 2002, Jimmy Wales wrote:

> Larry Sanger wrote:
> > http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:The_Cunctator/How_to_destroy_Wikipedia
>
> This is a User page.  We've never come to definitive policies on what
> should be "allowed" on User pages, but we've taken a mostly
> laissez-faire attitude so far.

Please understand, I'm not saying that that policy should be changed
(while neither do I think that all users have an inalienable right to put
*whatever* they want into their user space--but I don't think anyone is
denying that right now).

The request for refactoring or moving such pages is not an attempt to
infringe anyone's rights (for example, Cunc can continue to ignore the
request without comment if he chooses).  It's instead a matter of simple
politeness and civility, of trying to make Wikipedia a place where people
are *more* apt to treat each other respectfully than they are now.

> > http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_commentary/Responses_to_How_to_Destroy_Wikipedia%2C_Screw_with_the_GFDL
>
> This should probably be moved to meta, right?  It's not an
> encyclopedia article, per se, so it shouldn't be in the main article
> namespace in the first place.

That would be a slight improvement but it wouldn't achieve what tarquin
was trying to achieve, viz., demonstrating to new visitors that constant
verbal warfare and nursing festering resentments isn't what we are about.
(Of course, it's a matter of debate whether we should use this means of
achieving it!)

This is why moving the "anti-American Wikipedians" page to m.w.o (linked
directly from the main Wikipedia user space) misses the point as well.

We shouldn't be trying to balkanize ourselves for the simple reason that
what we're doing requires cooperation, and a lot of it!

> > If we were *really* serious about making Wikipedia more civil, we would
> > demonstrate that we have the maturity and courage to talk about such
> > problems openly and seriously--and then finally committing ourselves to
> > burying the hatchet.
>
> I'm all for this.  Perhaps Cunc will exercise some of the "ten noble
> virtues" from his "WikipediAhimsa" page and remove whatever pages in
> his user space are causing anyone discomfort.  Such a gesture might be
> greatly appreciated and help forge a better path forward.

Yes, I agree totally, while acknowledging that he can continue to
voluntarily host all that stuff in his user space.

Larry
--
"We have now sunk to a depth at which the re-statement of the obvious is
the first duty of intelligent men." --George Orwell


from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [WikiEN-l] DoB alert

body:
Pierre Abbat wrote:

>On Sunday 24 November 2002 19:14, Brion Vibber wrote:
>
>>Pierre Abbat wrote:
>>
>>>Someone with IP addresses in the vicinity of 195.93.32.8 is creating
>>>articles consisting only of someone's date of birth. I can't block it
>>>(it's cluelessness, not vandalism, anyway) because it's an AOL proxy and
>>>he gets a different address each time.
>>>
>>Are they *correct* birth dates?
>>
>
>I have no idea. I've never heard of them.
>

Certainly it would not be productive to start allowing extra-calendrical
dates.  :-)
Eclecticology


from_name: Toby Bartels

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: The v-word

body:
Jonathan Walther (Clutch?) wrote:

>In English, when you make someone "holler uncle!" it
>means "do you give up now?"  It is specifically used when someone is
>being an unbearable annoyance, so you sit on them, and you don't let
>them up until they indicate they recognize they have been an annoyance
>and are prepared to change, by hollering "uncle!"

No, that's not how it's used.
It's used to *bully* somebody, pure and simple.
I've dealt with many a bully in my day, so I should know.
(And I am an American.)

-- Toby


from_name: Tom Parmenter

subject: [WikiEN-l] lir collateral damage: Stop!  In the name of love

body:
|From: koyaanisqatsi at nupedia.com
|Cc:
|Sender: wikien-l-admin at wikipedia.org
|Reply-To: wikien-l at wikipedia.org
|Date: Mon, 25 Nov 2002 04:13:09 -0800
|
|Ortolan88 Wrote:
|>Dear Friends,
|>
|>Damn, this whole Lir thing is nasty.  Rlee0001 just trashed KQ's user
|>page while KQ and Clutch were apparently off trashing Lir's user page.
|
|I wasn't trashing Lir's page; I was reverting it from what I
|considered rather disrespectful writing that Clutch had made on it.
|Check the revision history.  Also, I was in process of discussing the
|page with Clutch on [[user talk:Clutch]].
|
|cheers,
|
|kq
|
|
|
|
|_______________________________________________
|WikiEN-l mailing list
|WikiEN-l at wikipedia.org
|http://www.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
|

Sorry, KQ.  I tried to be careful with that "apparently" and some
other weasel locutions in the excised part, but as I also said the
edit history and comments across many user pages were just too hard to
follow.

They shouldn't have done it to you.

They shouldn't have done it to Lir.

Nonspecific "they" meaning no one should be doing this.

Tom P.
O88


from_name: Poor, Edmund W

subject: [Wikipedia-l] a way to contact IP users

body:
How about giving admins the ability to throw up a "Please read this" message.

Something like this:
* User submits an edit
* Wikipedia accepts the edit, and...
* Sends user to a "You have an urgent administrative message" page.

User can then:
* Click on the "Read message" button, or
* Just ignore it

We can think of variations, like, send the user directly to the message page, rather than the "you have a message waiting". Another, for egregious cases, would send the user to the "message waiting" or 'please acknowledge this' page after EVERY edit, until the click an OKAY button.

Ed poor

-----Original Message-----
From: tarquin [mailto:tarquin at planetunreal.com]
Sent: Monday, November 25, 2002 6:43 AM
To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
Subject: [Wikipedia-l] a way to contact IP users

(this is a general feature suggestion, BTW, though it's a case on En
that's reminded me of it)

Someone on En: is adding pages on actors with just dates of birth. it's
not vandalism, but admins have deleted many of these, because they're
such tiny stubs they're basically worthless.
it's not the first time that we get users who make many well-meaning
edits, but make mistakes that leave us a lot to clean up.

This reminds me of something I suggested ages ago -- we need a way to
contact unregistered users to politely point of where they're putting a
foot wrong.
My suggestion was this:
* on the IP contributions page, add a "alert this user" dialog box, or a
link to one
* that user will then see the message text above above every edit box

This could save us a lot of cleaning up work. I also worry that these
people may get discouraged and leave when they find we've deleted their
additions -- we may be losing potentially valuable contributors.

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


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: The v-word

body:
Jonathan Walther (Clutch?) wrote:

>You are running hot under the collar based on false information.  Please
>cool down.  What Clutch was doing isn't vandalism, but I doubt anyone
>here has the time to look at every single edit that was done to Lirs
>pages and see all the tiny changes that were made; the fact that Lirs
>page is long makes the job much harder than it otherwise would be.

It's easy to look at every single edit.  I did it.
(Yes, Erik, Lir put in the link to good taste first,
after Clutch had put it on her user talk page.)
There's no doubt in my mind that vandalism was at work.
This is not name-calling; I do not say this gratuitously.
These sorts of changes to a user page are unprecedented,
and they were done repeatedly, despite admonition
from several other Wikipedians.  Normally bannable.
However, we made an exception, because we hate Lir.

-- Toby

PS:  Who are you on Wikipedia?


subject: [Wikipedia-l] User pages

body:
Oliver Pereira wrote:

>Hello again,
>
>I gather that it the general agreement is that the User pages are for the
>users' own use, and that it is bad manners for other Wikipedians to edit
>them. Would it be sensible to formalise this as a definitive rule - in
>fact, to make the page protected from edits by anyone but the user and the
>sysops? Anyone who wishes to address the user would still be able to on
>the associated Talk page, of course.
>
>I don't know how difficult it would be to implement technically, but I
>think it would be a good move to prevent people from vandalising other
>people's User pages, as some are doing.
>
I essentially agree with this view.  A user page is about the persona
that an individual wants to present to the rest of the Wikipedia world.
 If that persona includes detailed evidence to establish that the user
is an idiot, we have no right to contradict those facts.  I would
usually never even venture so far as to change spelling or typographical
errors on someone's page unless there was expressed permission on the
page.  This mostly comes from people who are not natve English speakers,
and who appreciate corrections.

There is only one instance that comes to mind where I would make minor
changes to somebody's user page, and that is to fix broken links or
multiple redirects incidental to  a change somwhere else on Wikipedia.
 Even there a piping to the correct title while retaining the appearance
of the user page is often to be preferred.

Eclecticology


subject: Jon & 'cluctch' (was: [WikiEN-l] 129.186.80.133 aka Lir)

body:
Erik,

Jonathan told me privately that he is Clutch. I'm not sure whether he has acknowldged this on the list or whether I should "out" him.

Why not e-mail him directly?

Ed Poor

-----Original Message-----
From: Erik Moeller [mailto:erik_moeller at gmx.de]
Sent: Monday, November 25, 2002 5:08 AM
To: wikien-l at wikipedia.org
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] 129.186.80.133 (aka Lir)

Jon,

I do not know if you are Clutch, and frankly, I do not care, although I note
that you write these messages while simultaneously Clutch keeps vandalizing
the page. That you defend such an obvious violation is also strange.

Please don't use Wikipedia or the mailing lists for personal flamewars.
Wikipedia is not a playground.

Regards,

Erik


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: [Wikipedia-l] My vacation, dealing with Lir

body:
Jimmy Wales wrote:

>I just protected Lir's user page, to give a
>break from people feeling a need to fight about it.

Thank you for leaving it in a form that is not an insult to Lir.
An eye for an eye, and all that ^_^.

-- Toby


subject: [Wikipedia-l] a way to contact IP users

body:
On Monday 25 November 2002 09:43, Poor, Edmund W wrote:
> How about giving admins the ability to throw up a "Please read this"
> message.
>
> Something like this:
> * User submits an edit
> * Wikipedia accepts the edit, and...
> * Sends user to a "You have an urgent administrative message" page.
>
> User can then:
> * Click on the "Read message" button, or
> * Just ignore it
>
> We can think of variations, like, send the user directly to the message
> page, rather than the "you have a message waiting". Another, for egregious
> cases, would send the user to the "message waiting" or 'please acknowledge
> this' page after EVERY edit, until the click an OKAY button.

Sounds good, but we'd still have trouble contacting the AOLer who's been
writing pages consisting only of someone's birthdate.

phma


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: The v-word

body:
Jonathan Walther wrote:

>I doubt anyone
>here has the time to look at every single edit that was done to Lirs
>pages and see all the tiny changes that were made; the fact that Lirs
>page is long makes the job much harder than it otherwise would be.

And I said that it was easy to do.

But Jon's right -- it can be very tricky.

In fact, *Clutch* was the first to link the article on good taste, not Lir:

http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=User:Lir&diff=437516&oldid=437514

If Lir linked it anytime before then, then she'd taken it out.

However, Lir *did* choose to let it stay in,
although she changed the format of the link.

I think that it's necessary that ordinary administrators
be given the power to block signed in users for vandalism.
I'm not arguing for further *authority*,
such as to ban people like Helga and Lir
that weren't engaged in vandalism as such
but eventually proved impossible to work with --
only Jimbo has the authority to ban such people.
I mean that logged in users should be bannable for
the *same* acts of vandalism that anonymous users can be banned for.
All that this requires on the technical end
is that administrators be able to see the IP numbers
of signed in users.

And, yes, we need to clarify what rights users have to their user page.
Until the episode with Lir, users were given quite a free rein,
up to the point that advertising was explicitly allowed.
While I've said that Clutch's edits to [[User:Lir]] were vandalism,
I do think that this needs to be clarified.

-- Toby


list: wikitech-l

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: The v-word


subject: [Wikipedia-l] RE: [Wikipedia-l] Orthographe québécoise

body:
Matt (Montr?alais) a ecriv?:

- Je me demande s'il existe une politique sur le Wiki fran?ais par rapport
- aux orthographes r?gionales de m?me qu'existe sur le Wiki anglais.

If this means that French and English wikipedias should have a similar naming convention for geographic terms, then I strongly agree.

I didn't understand the "Village gai" stuff. It sounds like a discussion about the [[gay village]] article, which in turn sounds like the idea of calling parts of various cities "Chinatown". As in, "I went to Chinatown last night and ate eggrolls at a Chinese restaurant."

I understand the slang use of "gay" as:
* referring to homosexuals & homosexuality
* becoming increasingly a mainstream term (as in "gay rights")

I apologize for my inability to read French accurately. Il y a 25 ans que je l'ai etudi?.

Ed Poor, aka [[Edmond Le Pauvre]]


from_name: Erik Moeller

subject: [Wikitech-l] Table types and locking

body:
On Sam, 2002-11-23 at 00:15, Brion Vibber wrote:

> However... with MySQL not all tables in a database have to be of the
> same type. There are already separate columns for the fulltext index
> thanks to the need to strip out markup; why not move them out to a
> separate table, keyed to the cur_id, and make it MyISAM while the other
> tables move to InnoDB?

I see no reason why this shouldn't work. Let's give it a try!

Regards,

Erik
--
FOKUS - Fraunhofer Insitute for Open Communication Systems
Project BerliOS - http://www.berlios.de


subject: [Wikipedia-l] linking

in_reply_to:
<20021125064539.16023.qmail@web40701.mail.yahoo.com> (message
	from Bridget [name omitted for privacy reasons] on Sun, 24 Nov 2002 22:45:39 -0800 (PST))

body:
|From: Bridget [name omitted for privacy reasons] <lapollutionestsimauvaise at yahoo.com>
|Sender: wikipedia-l-admin at wikipedia.org
|Reply-To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
|Date: Sun, 24 Nov 2002 22:45:39 -0800 (PST)
|
|--0-569529178-1038206739=:14419
|Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
|
|What should or should not be linked?
|

A start.

Should be linked:

-- birth and death dates
-- major connections with the subject of the article, that is, if it's
   an article about, say, B. B. King, there should be links on
-- [[blues]], [[guitar]], and [[singer]]
-- significant names mentioned in the article, defining significant to
   mean people who deserve an article.  Opening for the [[Rolling
   Stones]] had a big effect on B.B. King's career, but that doesn't
   mean B.B.'s bass player should get a link.
-- Anything you think there *should* be an article about.  Linking
   gets it on the Most Wanted list.

Should not be linked:

-- dates of marriage, book publication, and other dates between the
   big two unless they bear some kind of significant connection with
   the date.  That Charles Reich's "Greening of America" was published
   in [[1970]] is significant because it was a zeitgeist book.
-- Every song on a record album.  "[[Helter Skelter]]" deserves an
   article, "Back in the U.S.S.R." doesn't.
-- Likewise, every book and short story by an author, unless you're
   prepared to back it up by writing all the articles, as some Robert
   Heinlein enthusiast did.  Otherwise, leave the various works
   unlinked until you get around to writing an article.

Tom Parmenter
Ortolan88


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: The v-word

body:
Jimmy Wales wrote:

>On Thanksgiving Day (Thursday) I will say a toast to everyone on the
>entire planet who does not fuss over this page between now and then.
>:-)

OK, but remember, some of us get this in digest ^_^.

-- Toby

And now I think that I have some time to edit encyclopaedia articles!


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Blocked: 217.5.141.103

body:
I just blocked 217.5.141.103. Some sysop on the German Wiki please do the
same. The block should be removed in a few hours, or sooner if he gets the
message.

phma


subject: [Wikipedia-l] RE: Oliver is Lir II

body:
"Let him who is without sin cast the first stone." (Jesus)
"An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind." (Gandhi)
"No teasing." (Uncle Ed)

Ed Poor
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/attachments/20021125/30c3cadf/attachment.htm


subject: [Wikipedia-l] User pages

body:
Jonathan Walther wrote:

> On Mon, Nov 25, 2002 at 02:22:36AM +0000, Oliver Pereira wrote:
>
>> I gather that it the general agreement is that the User pages are for
>> the
>> users' own use, and that it is bad manners for other Wikipedians to edit
>> them. Would it be sensible to formalise this as a definitive rule - in
>> fact, to make the page protected from edits by anyone but the user
>> and the
>> sysops? Anyone who wishes to address the user would still be able to on
>> the associated Talk page, of course.
>
> Lir is a special case, in that he used his User page to antagonize and
> piss off a lot of Wikipedians.  None of the recent edits in any way
> attacked Lir personally; they just massaged the material to show how one
> does things when one DOESN'T think the Wikipedia is just an information
> dump, when one actually cares about what one is writing, and not just
> the raw amount of information one dumps.

Why not just put your reactions to Lir on his User Talk page rather than
his User page.

> I have a feeling Lir was trying to get on that list of the top 250 most
> prolific Wikipedians... Too bad for him it isn't dynamically generated.

This is yet more unsupported speculation.

>> I don't know how difficult it would be to implement technically, but I
>> think it would be a good move to prevent people from vandalising other
>> people's User pages, as some are doing.
>
> To call those edits "vandalism" is to use far too strong a word,
> especially from an admitted newbie who isn't familiar with the full
> history of Lir's actions here.

I don't think that a newbie should be prevented from expressing things
as he sees them.  I know of no single page that clearly outlines the
case against Lir, and allows a newbie or any fair-minded Wikipedian to
separate fact from speculation.

Hmmm!  It sounds like I'm suggesting policy relating to disciplinary
procedures.  It could begin with an indictment page on which the
complainant states what individual A did wrong, and what should be done
about it.  I'm afraid that further ideas on this will have to come
elsewhere.

>> And I repeat, if anyone has any problems with my behaviour, please
>> tell me
>> on my Talk page, or in a private e-mail.
>
> The only problem so far is your poorly informed defense of Lir.  Apart
> from that, it's good to have you on the Wikipedia.

Some of Lir's accusers were just as poorly informed as his defenders.

Eclecticology


subject: [bryce@neptune.net: Re: [zoecomnena@yahoo.com: [Wikipedia-l] Oregon City, Oregon]]

body:
Bryce is apparently "extremely pissed".  I'm not yet sure why.  No
policies have changed.  But we can't have people sticking invariant
sections with copyright notices willy-nilly throughout the site.

----- Forwarded message from Bryce Harrington <bryce at neptune.net> -----

From: Bryce Harrington <bryce at neptune.net>
Date: Mon, 25 Nov 2002 10:15:26 -0800 (PST)
To: Jimmy Wales <jwales at bomis.com>
Subject: Re: [zoecomnena at yahoo.com: [Wikipedia-l] Oregon City, Oregon]

I am extremely pissed that the copyright statement was deleted.
If the policy of Wikipedia has changed such that authors are not longer
allowed to retain copyright of their work, then I want no part of this.
Go ahead and delete my contributions.  This is just wrong.

Bryce

On Mon, 25 Nov 2002, Jimmy Wales wrote:
> Bryce,
>
> I'm curious about this notice.  Do you mind if we remove it?  If not, I'm afraid
> the best choice for us is to simply remove your contribution completely from this
> page.  But I know you're one of the good guys, so maybe there's something here that
> I haven't thought of?
>
> Generally, I would say that posting separate copyright notices like
> this in the articles is something we can't have, simply for the sake
> of usability and simplicity.
>
> ----- Forwarded message from Zoe <zoecomnena at yahoo.com> -----
>
> From: Zoe <zoecomnena at yahoo.com>
> Date: Fri, 22 Nov 2002 14:28:03 -0800 (PST)
> To: wikipedia-l at nupedia.com
> Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Oregon City, Oregon
>
>
> Bryce Harrington has attached a copyright notice to the [[Oregon City, Oregon]] page.  Since the time of the copyright notice, Ram-Man's bot went in and added several paragraphs, making the vast majority of the article not part of Bryce's copyrighted material.  There is nothing on the page which indicates which parts are copyrighted by Bryce and which are not.
>
> Zoe
>
>
>
>
>
> ---------------------------------
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now
> ----- End forwarded message -----
>

----- End forwarded message -----


body:
Jonathan wrote:

> To call those edits "vandalism" is to use far too strong a word,
> especially from an admitted newbie who isn't familiar with the full
> history of Lir's actions here.

Calling edits one doesn't agree with "vandalism" is analogous to calling
racial/ethnic discrimanation "genocide". Yes, some UN-sponsored treaties
have re-defined genocide so it means more (and less) than mass murder --
but that doesn't make killing 10 million civilians equivalent to not
welcoming refugees. Inhospitality is not murder.

I would really like everyone to stop throwing around the word
"vandalism" except in the narrowly-described cases of:
* scribbling graffiti, like "Hi, I'm a newbie"
* deleting a page without explanation
* obvious obscenity

We don't have a firm rule on name-calling, but if we ever do then I'm
going to make sure calling a fellow contributor a vandal is at the top
of the list.

Making an edit that isn't neutral is not an offense so terrible that it
justifies revenge. Besides, "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth
leaves us all blind and wearing dentures".

Ed Poor


subject: [WikiEN-l] My vacation, dealing with Lir

body:
Have a good trip, Jimbo, and thanks for the advice. I will do my best to follow it.

Ed Poor


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: The v-word

body:
Toby Bartels wrote:
>  Normally bannable.
> However, we made an exception, because we hate Lir.

As cute as this is, I should point out that it's not literally true.
There's no "o.k. to be mean to people, if we hate them" exception.

--Jimbo


from_name: tarquin

subject: [WikiEN-l] *sigh* it's sunday and the nuts are here

body:
Daniel Mayer wrote:

>This isn't anything new. "Wikipedia is an encyclopedia" is our third most
>important policy. That means that we don't include the entire gene sequences
>of organisms, source code for entire free-software programs and yes pi to one
>billion places (or anything above 40 places for that matter).
>
agreed. you and I and many others here understand what is meant by that.
Seems some people don't.

>
>These things have and should continue to be deleted right away and without any
>apology. I am surprised that the pi to x places entries weren't deleted right
>away.
>
I would gladly delete those pages right now.
But I fear that Fonzy and Lir will resurrect them, and we'll have
another edit war on our hands.
Then again, we've explained over and over and OVER again why they are
not material for an encyclopedia, and Fonzy & Olivier just don't seem to
get it, and Lir (IMO) is just trolling.
What's the correct course of action? an interminable debate on deletion,
or an interminable delete/create war?

>Focus people! We are building an encyclopedia. Granted a huge one, but an
>encyclopedia nonetheless.
>
>
>
Yup.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] RE: Oliver is Lir II

body:
Khendon wrote:

Wed 11/20:
> I've been here a few months now; can I be a sysop, please?

Mon 11/25:
> about me being "promoted" to SysOp - I don't want to hassle
> you all, but I don't want you to forget either ;-)
> Jason Williams [jason at jasonandali.org.uk]

There being no objections...

Khendon, you are now a sysop. Congratualations, and remember always to use your power for good not for evil :-)

Ed Poor


body:
On Monday 25 November 2002 10:36, Poor, Edmund W wrote:
> I would really like everyone to stop throwing around the word
> "vandalism" except in the narrowly-described cases of:
> * scribbling graffiti, like "Hi, I'm a newbie"
> * deleting a page without explanation
> * obvious obscenity

"Hi, I'm a newbie" is not vandalism. It's a newbie experiment. OTOH IMHO,
repeatedly changing Athens to Istanbul in [[Greece]] is vandalism, though it
is none of the above.

phma


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Copyright notice

body:
Should we have a link and terse copyright notice on every article in
Wikipedia?

I don't personally see this as being required by the license (read
carefully the parts about compilations and copyright notices, and
think of the website as a compilation).  But even if it is not, we
might still think this is a good idea, to emphasize to newcomers that
this is a free (in the GNU sense) project.

See, for example:
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States

Very nice looking, approaching a commercial quality level.  Yet,
nowhere is it made clear that this text is available under the GNU
FDL.

I would recommend a notice somewhere on the page near this:
>This page has been accessed 17682 times. The page was last modified
>08:57 Nov 24, 2002.

This email was inspired by Bryce's actions and complaints.

--Jimbo


subject: [WikiEN-l] 129.186.80.133 (aka Lir)

body:
> IP 129.186.80.133 popped onto Recent Changes. This IP is almost identical
> to
> the one Lir was using when he was banned (just swap-out the last digit for
> a
> 0 and there you have it). Clutch also removed some excessive linking from
> an
> article that this IP was working on and then Lir posted a message to
> Wikipedia-L asking for some linking criteria. This IP then asked Clutch
> about
> linking.

Don't trust Clutch. He keeps vandalizing the User:Lir page. Take a look at
its history.

The User:Lir page should be protected (in the last revision edited by Lir)
until Lir, if ever, is unbanned.

And no, vandalism is not too strong a word for what Clutch has been doing.

Regards,

Erik

--
+++ GMX - Mail, Messaging & more  http://www.gmx.net +++
NEU: Mit GMX ins Internet. Rund um die Uhr f?r 1 ct/ Min. surfen!


body:
Well, I've had words with Clutch -- both publicly and privately. I don't think the v-word applies. And name-calling, once it's gotten people's attention, is best dropped quickly. (that's a hint, Erik :-)

I think Jimbo protected the [[user:Lir]] page, and I'm happy to revert it to something nice and agreeable. (I seem to remember going through something like this Friday, too.)

Ed Poor

-----Original Message-----
From: Erik Moeller [mailto:erik_moeller at gmx.de]
Sent: Monday, November 25, 2002 10:52 AM
To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
Cc: jwales at bomis.com
Subject: Re: The v-word (was: [Wikipedia-l] User pages)

Ed and Jimbo,

*sigh* Clutch is a vandal, there's no doubt about it. Even when Lir was
still unbanned, he kept changing her page, linking to articles about "good taste"
to help her develop "the good taste she lacks", kept reverting her attempts
to restore the page and threatened to do so until Lir would "call him uncle"
(and not in the uncle Ed sense, I presume). Now that Lir is banned, he is,
against the explicit will of others, changing Lir's page to contain the links
he used to offend her, I presume as a last demonstration of his power.

This is vandalism of a user page -- it's identical to me editing Ed's page
and inserting some snide remarks about the Unification Church and "Moonies",
making it look like Ed wrote them. That's why everyone kept reverting Clutch's
changes, but he is patient enough to re-insert his version again and again.

Now we have basically justified Clutch's vandalism by protecting the
*vandalized* version of the page which links to the "how to develop good taste" etc.
which Clutch deliberately inserted.

I don't care much about Lir's page, but I care about antisocial behavior.
Rules should be enforced consistently, as Larry said. Please restore Lir's last
version of the page and protect that one, instead of Clutch's vandalized
one.

I've dealt with trolls a number of times, and I know one when I see one.
Don't let Clutch pull your leg. He's an experienced troll. SoftSecurity won't
work here.

Regards,

Erik

--
+++ GMX - Mail, Messaging & more  http://www.gmx.net +++
NEU: Mit GMX ins Internet. Rund um die Uhr f?r 1 ct/ Min. surfen!

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


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Blocked: 217.5.141.103

body:
On Monday 25 November 2002 10:16, Pierre Abbat wrote:
> I just blocked 217.5.141.103. Some sysop on the German Wiki please do the
> same. The block should be removed in a few hours, or sooner if he gets the
> message.

Unblocked. He got the message.

phma


subject: [WikiEN-l] 129.186.80.133 (aka Lir)

body:
Jon,

I do not know if you are Clutch, and frankly, I do not care, although I note
that you write these messages while simultaneously Clutch keeps vandalizing
the page. That you defend such an obvious violation is also strange.

Please don't use Wikipedia or the mailing lists for personal flamewars.
Wikipedia is not a playground.

Regards,

Erik

--
+++ GMX - Mail, Messaging & more  http://www.gmx.net +++
NEU: Mit GMX ins Internet. Rund um die Uhr f?r 1 ct/ Min. surfen!


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Newbies (was: The v-word)

body:
Pierre replied to Ed:

> > I would really like everyone to stop throwing around the word
> > "vandalism" except in the narrowly-described cases of:
> > * scribbling graffiti, like "Hi, I'm a newbie"
> > * deleting a page without explanation
> > * obvious obscenity
>
> "Hi, I'm a newbie" is not vandalism. It's a newbie experiment. OTOH IMHO,
> repeatedly changing Athens to Istanbul in [[Greece]] is vandalism, though it
> is none of the above.
>
> phma

You're right. I stand corrected.

Let's not even brand newbies who experiment with little bits of graffiti as "vandals". They're just pushing the buttons to see if they work.

We ought to make a concerted effort to encourage newbies to stick around and learn our ways. Any ideas?

Ed Poor


subject: [WikiEN-l] 129.186.80.133 (aka Lir)

body:
Daniel Mayer wrote:

>IP 129.186.80.133 popped onto Recent Changes. This IP is almost identical to
>the one Lir was using when he was banned (just swap-out the last digit for a
>0 and there you have it). Clutch also removed some excessive linking from an
>article that this IP was working on and then Lir posted a message to
>Wikipedia-L asking for some linking criteria. This IP then asked Clutch about
>linking.
>
>IMO this is an obvious attempt by Lir to subvert Jimbo's banning so I warned
>this IP on user:Clutch's page but then the person continued to edit. I
>therefore blocked the IP. If another sysop thinks this is in error then
>please unblock the IP and state your reasoning here.
>
>-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
>
>
>
There's also the registered user "Return of the Killer Lir
<http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Return_of_the_Killer_Lir>", causing
fuss about the Pi digits. I despair, I really do.


from_name: Matt M.

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Village gai

body:
> I didn't understand the "Village gai" stuff. It sounds
>like a discussion about the [[gay village]] article, which
>in turn sounds like the idea of calling parts of various
>cities "Chinatown". As in, "I went to Chinatown last night
>and ate eggrolls at a Chinese restaurant."

Let me explain: In Montreal, the [[gay village]] ([[fr:Quartier gay]]) is called Le [[Village gai]] ([[fr:Village gai de Montr?al]] - no fr:articles yet). The reason I was insisting that this be spelled "gai" and not "gay" in the [[fr:Montr?al]] article is because that is how it is spelt by the city government of Montreal, who more or less officially recognize it, put it on tourist maps, promote it as an attraction, etc., etc. Le Village gai is its official name, so that's how I think it should be spelt, regardless of other arguments about gai/gay.

Matt


from_name: Bridget

from_email: Bridget

subject: [Wikipedia-l] what people I know have to say about anglicization

body:
MarderIII: should people pronounce the names of foreign places in the foreign manner?
Bakunin 18: Er, as they are pronounced by their populations?
MarderIII: yes
Bakunin 18: I think so
MarderIII: wikipedia banned me over that question
MarderIII: i really fucking hate people right now
Bakunin 18: You can't switch IPs?
MarderIII: i can
MarderIII: i already did it once
MarderIII: i found some good info on the Taino
MarderIII: and so i added it
MarderIII: and then some troll went and deleted it because I was banned and not allowed to contribute
Bakunin 18: That's... incredibly stupid.
MarderIII: they are also threatning to ban other people who don't think I was so uncontrollab
MarderIII: e
Bakunin 18: Is there not some head admin you can talk to?
MarderIII: he is very mad at me
Bakunin 18: Oh

MarderIII: should people pronounce the names of foreign places in the foreign manner?
opium4themasses: hrm
opium4themasses: well, it would be best if they did
opium4themasses: well no...
MarderIII: wikipedia banned me over the question
opium4themasses: erg?
MarderIII: I came to the conclusion that it boiled down to a latent racism from not considering the other culture's name to have any real tangible value in excess of the outsiders name
opium4themasses: hrm, maybe not racism
opium4themasses: more just egocentric
MarderIII: I believe names are very important
MarderIII: egocentrism is racism I believe
opium4themasses: it's more than just racism

MarderIII: should people pronounce the names of foreign places in the foreign manner?
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: no
MarderIII: why not?
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: because you are not in the foreign place
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: i have someone at work mad at me
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: someone in brazil
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: the program puts Brazil at the top of their report
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: however in Brazil they spell Brazil like this Brasil
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: they don't like that i spell brazil the correct way in the us
MarderIII: So shouldnt we start saying Brasil?
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: but if i spell it brasil then people in the us will think i spelled it wrong
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: no
MarderIII: they are just uneducated though
MarderIII: its Brasil
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: does germany call germany germany
MarderIII: Brazil is just a mistake that a foreigner made
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: or deustchland
MarderIII: Deutschland
MarderIII: I want to go to Deutschland
MarderIII: not Germany
MarderIII: Germany is an american tourist spot
MarderIII: Deutschland is a real place
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: i am sure the germans do not call the united states the united states
MarderIII: who are we to say what germans should do
MarderIII: we need to focus on us
MarderIII: and set a good example
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: yet it is proper to pronounce people's names as they pronounce them in their home country
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: so perhaps proper names should be pronounced as the local people wish them to be pronounced
MarderIII: I agree
MarderIII: and of course there are difficult questions
MarderIII: like what should Asia be called?
MarderIII: I for one, am not particular, as to whether we refer to it in Chinese or Vietnamese
MarderIII: but surely we should use an Asian language
MarderIII: and as Chinese are the most populous
MarderIII: I would much rather use the Chinese name for Asia
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: now i disagree
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: you should call everything whatever your local language calls it
MarderIII: why?
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: it is a different language
MarderIII: why should that matter?
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: your language can call it whatever it deems proper
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: it is language
MarderIII: thats a good point
MarderIII: languages are code
MarderIII: but what about names?
MarderIII: personal names?
Franz[name omitted for privacy reasons]: they should be as the person call themselves
MarderIII: what about Christopher Columbus
MarderIII: he never called himself such

---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/attachments/20021125/6f8b1345/attachment.htm


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Blocked: 217.5.141.103

body:
On Monday 25 November 2002 11:05, elian wrote:
> Pierre Abbat <phma at webjockey.net> writes:
> > I just blocked 217.5.141.103. Some sysop on the German Wiki please do the
> > same. The block should be removed in a few hours, or sooner if he gets
> > the message.
>
> Stop, this user makes in the German wikipedia absolutely valuable
> contributions (see f.e. http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gew%FCrzvanille)
>
> I suppose he is just not aware of how to place interlanguage links
> correctly, but he seems to be goodwilled and no vandal.

I didn't say he was a vandal, and I unblocked him as soon as he acknowledged
the message. We need a better way to contact IPs, but blocking is all we have
now.

phma


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Pronunciation guides (Was Re: Oliver is Lir II [...])

body:
Lars Aronsson wrote:

>I think the problem is that Lir is young and has more energy to
>question authority, than patience to listen before he speaks.  This
>makes it hard for him to engage in a dialogue.  He questions his
>peers, with whom he should cooperate, instead of knowing his enemies
>and where he should direct his energy.  Been there, done that, got the
>T-shirt.  I think his homepage indicated he was 21.  I'm 36.  I have
>no idea how old or young or energetic or lazy everybody else is.  I'm
>lazy enough, not to bother very much in all the detail.
>
The issue of using diacritical marks is not about Lir.  Lir may have
been the one to raise the matter, but that does not alter the objective
question of diacriticals.  At 59 I'm much lazier than a 36-year old kid.
 I know that people with a poor credibility occasionally make worth
while contributions, and that highly respected people are not immune
from stupidity.

If anything, the debate so far has shown that we are far from unanimous
in our opinions about how non-English names should be treated.  A rule
that "the English Wikipedia is in English" seems trivial at first
glance.  It works well as long as we stick to common nouns and concepts
of English language origin.  There's a whole non-English speaking world
out there with many interesting ideas that are worth incorporating into
Wikipedia.  A dictionary is about words; an encyclopedia is about ideas,
and, in the absence of direct neural interfaces, an encyclopedia needs
the words to communicate its ideas.  The diacritics of another language
enhance communication, and often are the distinguishing feature between
dissimilar words.  The poetics of another language can suffer badly in
translation, yet such a small concession as allowing foreign words to be
fully accented is worth doing if it enhances the understanding of the
other culture.  Yes, I know that Spanish considers "n" and "?" to be
separate letters which follow each other in alphabetical order, and that
Swedish considers "a" and "?" to be separate letters with the latter put
in a group of special letters at the end of the alphabet.  I would never
propose that we adopt the hodge-podge of aphabetical orders from other
languages.  Algorithms can be established to link these letters to their
unaccented counterparts.  The French certainly have no trouble treating
"e", "?", "?" and "?" as the same letter for alphabetical purposes, and
that's just fine for English.  It also allows for users who just don't
know what the correct accent is in a given circumstance including native
speakers.  What I really oppose is having English as the foundation for
a modern Tower of Babel.

>But I know
>that after Lir we will still have the same problem with the next of
>the same kind. So what is our conclusion, and what tools will we have
>prepared for the next time this happens?
>
Indeed we will!  I very strongly agree that we should have objective
procedures for dealing with these.  Those procedures should help us not
only to deal with "guilty" parties, but also safeguard users from being
overwhelmed by the mob instinct..

Eclecticology


body:
Tom Parmenter wrote:

>Damn, this whole Lir thing is nasty.  Rlee0001 just trashed KQ's user
>page while KQ and Clutch were apparently off trashing Lir's user page.
>
>I thoroughly approve of the banning of Lir, a troll's troll, but
>dropping "examples of the kind of awful thing Lir would do if Lir were
>still here" on Lir's own user pages is piling on.  And so is jumping
>all over KQ's user page to do the same back (if, indeed, that is what
>KQ and Clutch have been doing, the edit audit and Recent Changes are
>such a mess that Solomon couln't sort it out).
>
>As regards Lir and all his/hers/its friends and enemies, in the wise
>words of the grand old (copyright) song:
>
>Please Don't Talk About Me When I'm Gone
>
My sentiments exactly!

Eclecticology


subject: [Wikipedia-l] a way to contact IP users

body:
(this is a general feature suggestion, BTW, though it's a case on En
that's reminded me of it)

Someone on En: is adding pages on actors with just dates of birth. it's
not vandalism, but admins have deleted many of these, because they're
such tiny stubs they're basically worthless.
it's not the first time that we get users who make many well-meaning
edits, but make mistakes that leave us a lot to clean up.

This reminds me of something I suggested ages ago -- we need a way to
contact unregistered users to politely point of where they're putting a
foot wrong.
My suggestion was this:
* on the IP contributions page, add a "alert this user" dialog box, or a
link to one
* that user will then see the message text above above every edit box

This could save us a lot of cleaning up work. I also worry that these
people may get discouraged and leave when they find we've deleted their
additions -- we may be losing potentially valuable contributors.


from_name: The Cunctator

body:
On Mon, 2002-11-25 at 11:18, Jonathan Walther wrote:
> On Mon, Nov 25, 2002 at 05:15:26PM +0100, Erik Moeller wrote:
> >"Lir, I'm going to sit on you till you cry uncle"
> >"No. Bad Lir. No more senseless linking!"
> >"Still sitting on Lir; she isn't showing that she's interesting in
> >developing good taste in editing"
> >"We want good taste, or we'll spit you out."
> >"adding link to important article on Good Taste"
> >"Don't try to wriggle out of it Lir; a contributor of your stature needs to
> >develope some TASTE"
> >"Wriggle, wriggle, wriggle. If you don't take other peoples feelings
> >seriously Lir, why should we take your work seriously?"
> >"Give me some evidence you know what good taste is Lir. C'mon, I challenge
> >you"
> >"not even close. try again, Lir baby"
> >"(your fate is being decided; if you don't take your fate seriously, it will
> >certainly take YOU very seriously"
> >again: "putting in link to article on Good Taste"
>
> You are quoting Clutches edit comments out of context; ignoring the edits that
> Lir made that triggered them.  Lir was determined to show that he didn't
> give a damn about community standards, or trying to build quality
> articles.  That is why Lir is banned.

The context doesn't matter. The above comments are rude, juvenile, and
indefensible.

Lir certainly gave plenty of evidence of trying to build quality
articles. To claim otherwise is not accurate.

> You never knew my old trolling behavior.  The Wikipedia is something I
> care about.  Your defense of Lir's edits makes me wonder how much you
> care about it.

Lir cares about Wikipedia too. Caring about Wikipedia doesn't make you
right.


in_reply_to: <20021125192450.97869.qmail@web40707.mail.yahoo.com>; from lapollutionestsimauvaise@yahoo.com on Mon, Nov 25, 2002 at 11:24:50AM -0800

body:
Bridget [name omitted for privacy reasons] wrote:
> MarderIII: should people pronounce the names of foreign places in the foreign manner?
> Bakunin 18: Er, as they are pronounced by their populations?
> MarderIII: yes
> Bakunin 18: I think so
> MarderIII: wikipedia banned me over that question

This is simply untrue.

> MarderIII: i really fucking hate people right now

This may be true, but isn't helpful.  When you let go of your anger, you will be
better able to think clearly about how to achieve the things that you want to
achieve.

> Bakunin 18: You can't switch IPs?
> MarderIII: i can
> MarderIII: i already did it once
> MarderIII: i found some good info on the Taino
> MarderIII: and so i added it
> MarderIII: and then some troll went and deleted it because I was banned and not allowed to contribute
> Bakunin 18: That's... incredibly stupid.
> MarderIII: they are also threatning to ban other people who don't think I was so uncontrollab
> MarderIII: e
> Bakunin 18: Is there not some head admin you can talk to?
> MarderIII: he is very mad at me

I am not mad at anyone.  I am disappointed that Lir has not recognized
that the problem is not even remotely related to legitimate
disagreements about how to pronounce foreign words.  The problem is
*directly* related to misrepresenting why he/she was banned.

Pretending that you were banned over pronunciation, after our long
conversations, is not really fair.

If you ask your friends for input into this situation, and you tell
them things that are not true, then you will get advice that is
inaccurate.  If you tell them that you were banned for your views on
anglicization, when you were actually banned for being an obnoxious
pest who calls people racist for no reason, they will be unable to
tell you "Stop being an obnoxious pest... present your views with
reason and good will, and others will agree or disagree with some
details, but you can likely achieve your significant goals to a
significant extent."

--Jimbo


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Copyright query

body:
Oliver Pereira wrote:
> I have a query about copyright, although not directly related to the Bryce
> Harrington thing. If an article is in breach of copyright, and someone
> else replaces the text with original material, the copyrighted material is
> still publically available on the Wikipedia to anyone who knows about the
> revision history page. Doesn't this mean that there is still a breach of
> copyright here? And if so, doesn't the entire article (along with its
> history) have to be deleted, and not just rewritten?

Ideally, we should drop the specific revisions that are problematic, leaving
the rest of the history intact.

--Jimbo


subject: [Wikipedia-l] a way to contact IP users

body:
I was thinking of applying this "special power" only for the case of:
* an anonymous user, i.e., IP address
* when a sysop would really rather talk than ban

I see this as being LESS powerful a move than simply clicking the "ban this IP" link.

Ed Poor

-----Original Message-----
From: Larry Sanger [mailto:lsanger at nupedia.com]
Sent: Monday, November 25, 2002 12:00 PM
To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
Subject: RE: [Wikipedia-l] a way to contact IP users

Ed,

I know you mean very well, and that you're trying to help solve an
important problem, but I'm generally opposed to giving admins any special
powers that they do not already have have.  Maybe give everyone this
power?

Isn't there another way to achieve what you are trying to achieve?

Larry


body:
Hi Tarquin!

1) The Pi to .. pages should be deleted immediately. Fonzy disagrees, but he
seems to be reasonable enough to tolerate the decision. We are already
linking to Pi as a Gutenberg text.

2) The new Lir account(s) should be banned/deleted without further notice
("Return of the Killer Lir" being the current one). They are obviously in
violation of our current policy to ban Lir. I'm CCing this to Brion because he
seems to be the person to do bans on signed on users.

I also suggest that Bridget [name omitted for privacy reasons] (Lir) be removed from this mailing
list. I'm currently using a webmail account that doesn't seem to have any
filtering, so I'd appreciate that. If this becomes a long-term issue, we need
volunteer moderators for the mailing lists who approve new members (this is an
option in the software we are using).

The vandalism of Lir's page by Clutch is a separate issue that also needs to
be dealt with.

Let's clean this Lir mess up so we can work on building an encyclopedia
again.

Regards,

Erik

--
+++ GMX - Mail, Messaging & more  http://www.gmx.net +++
NEU: Mit GMX ins Internet. Rund um die Uhr f?r 1 ct/ Min. surfen!


from_name: Zoe

subject: Oliver is Lir II (Re: [Wikipedia-l] This whole Lir and Americanization thing)

body:
Criminal?
Zoe
 Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
It seems that Jonathan's obsession about Lir has now turned into a
criminal slander of Oliver.

---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/attachments/20021125/714d7ac6/attachment.htm


subject: [Wikipedia-l] vandalism spree

body:
Anthere to Toby:

> >however, wouldn't it be a good idea to have sysops be
> >sysops for all languages?
> >If this were the case I would pop into several
> >different languages periodically to check for obvious
> >vandalism.
> >En.wiki has sysops watching it 20-24 hours a day so
> >if en.wiki sysops popped in to check various other
> >languages periodically (esp. during the no, or slow
> >edit times you talk about) then that should provide
> >better coverage against the most blatant >goat sex
> >type vandalism and vandal bots.
>
> That's a tough point really.
> Theoretically, it sounds natural that somebody trusted
> for one wiki should be trusted on another (though, to
> be honest...I am not convinced myself).
> Practically, that's could be a problem unfortunately.
> The english wiki process while deciding who should be
> a sysop or not is done through peer review (general
> behavior, respect to the community standards...). But,
> communities don't have the same standards, and what is
> ok on one could be hardly tolerable on another. And
> the tobe-sysop being not known, how would it be ok to
> accept somebody you don't know (say would you blindly
> accept Shaihulud as a sysop ?), while you reject
> somebody you know, just on the behalf he is refusing
> to change his name ?
>
> I know you Mav, so I would say "yes, please, come and
> help us", and I thank you very much for your
> proposition. But why would other french agree for
> somebody they don't know to have more admin "power"
> than they have ?
>
> Btw, didnot tmc changed his name as the community was
> 'kindly' asking him ?

I don't think I should be a sysop on a wiki whose language I can't read and write well (e.g., Fran?ais). I have caused enough trouble on Wiki-EN speaking my native language (English) with French speakers. Imagine how many people I could offend if I went global: O? est la plume de ma tante? Quelle dommage! Vive La France! Cherchez la femme! L'?tat, c'est moi!

About le coq... TMC refused to change his name. He said he would leave Wiki-EN if we changed it. Jimbo insisted that TMC's old name was "vandalism" and asked the developers to change it. A few days later, Brion changed it. Since then, I haven't heard anything from TMC.

Ed Poor, aka [[user:Edmond Le Pauvre]]


subject: [WikiEN-l] Clean up our mess!

body:
> That page really doesn't seem conducive to civility either, though,
> really?  Cunctator gets knocked around quite a bit.  Decide for
> yourself if you think he deserves it--and Larry, you don't have to
> tell me what you think; but really he does.  Which hatchet needs
> burying?  Oh, there are two?
>
> kq

1. Just because a person is wearing a sign on his back that says "Kick me!", that's no excuse for people to kick him.

2. The Cunctator is right often enough that I continue to read all his posts. Occasionally, I have even taken his advice.

Ed Poor


subject: [Wikipedia-l] The h-word (was: The v-word)

body:
Toby said, "...we hate Lir."

I think you're speaking for yourself, there, pal.

I've been amused, angry, annoyed, astonished, bewildered, confused, downtrodden, enlightened, etc., all through the alphabet.

But I don't hate anyone on Wikipedia.

Ed Poor


body:
Erik, could you please take this off the list?  It's boring.
Zoe
 Erik Moeller <erik_moeller at gmx.de> wrote:> My troll days are long past;

That's not what I get from your changelog to Lir's page:

"Lir, I'm going to sit on you till you cry uncle"
"No. Bad Lir. No more senseless linking!"
"Still sitting on Lir; she isn't showing that she's interesting in
developing good taste in editing"
"We want good taste, or we'll spit you out."
"adding link to important article on Good Taste"
"Don't try to wriggle out of it Lir; a contributor of your stature needs to
develope some TASTE"
"Wriggle, wriggle, wriggle. If you don't take other peoples feelings
seriously Lir, why should we take your work seriously?"
"Give me some evidence you know what good taste is Lir. C'mon, I challenge
you"
"not even close. try again, Lir baby"
"(your fate is being decided; if you don't take your fate seriously, it will
certainly take YOU very seriously"
again: "putting in link to article on Good Taste"

This is when other Wikipedians started reverting your changes. Lir
repeatedly *removed* your link to the good taste article and only left it in because
you kept vandalizing her page and threatened to continue to do so. And yes,
I'm going to continue to say "her", nobody seems to be female on the Internet
anyway, so I can use it as a neutral gender [*].

You're falling back into your old trolling behavior, Jon. The sad thing is
that you got away with it for too long, because nobody likes to stick up for
Lir.

Regards,

Erik

[*] Yes, that was a joke.

--
+++ GMX - Mail, Messaging & more http://www.gmx.net +++
NEU: Mit GMX ins Internet. Rund um die Uhr f?r 1 ct/ Min. surfen!

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

---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/attachments/20021125/4abbe4c5/attachment.htm


from_name: elian

subject: [Wikitech-l] database connections

body:
Hello,

While learning PHP I came across the following warning in the php manual
and remembered one frequent error message in wikipedia (maximum number of
database connections exceeded...):

 There are a couple of additional caveats to keep in mind when using
 persistent connections. One is that when using table locking on a
 persistent connection, if the script for whatever reason cannot release
 the lock, then subsequent scripts using the same connection will block
 indefinitely and may require that you either restart the httpd server or
 the database server. Another is that when using transactions, a
 transaction block will also carry over to the next script which uses that
 connection if script execution ends before the transaction block does. In
 either case, you can use register_shutdown_function() to register a
 simple cleanup function to unlock your tables or roll back your
 transactions. Better yet, avoid the problem entirely by not using
 persistent connections in scripts which use table locks or transactions
 (you can still use them elsewhere).

Do we actually use persistent connections and is this problem affecting
wikipedia?

greetings,
elian
--
Sex is hereditary. If your parents never had it,
chances are you won't either.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] User pages

body:
What about the case where Lir attributed a quote to me on her User page that I never made?
Zoe
 Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:There is only one instance that comes to mind where I would make minor
changes to somebody's user page, and that is to fix broken links or
multiple redirects incidental to a change somwhere else on Wikipedia.
Even there a piping to the correct title while retaining the appearance
of the user page is often to be preferred.

Eclecticology

---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/attachments/20021125/14542866/attachment.htm


body:
Poor, Edmund W wrote:

>Matt (Montr?alais) a ecriv?:
>
>- Je me demande s'il existe une politique sur le Wiki fran?ais par rapport
>- aux orthographes r?gionales de m?me qu'existe sur le Wiki anglais.
>
>If this means that French and English wikipedias should have a similar naming convention for geographic terms, then I strongly agree.
>
>I didn't understand the "Village gai" stuff. It sounds like a discussion about the [[gay village]] article, which in turn sounds like the idea of calling parts of various cities "Chinatown". As in, "I went to Chinatown last night and ate eggrolls at a Chinese restaurant."
>
The French debate is not about gay rights.  It is instead a parallel to
the American/British or labor/labour issue.  In France "gay" is the
preferred usage; in Qu?bec "gai" is the preferred usage.  "Village gai"
is a Montreal usage that is an accepted geographical name for the area.
 That should override the spelling of "gai/gay" as applied to more
generic gay villages anywhere in the world.  The person from France was
wanting to insist that the anglicised spelling "gay" should apply in all
circumstances.

I hope that that clarifies what the argument was about.

Eclecticology


from_name: Anthere

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Blocked: 217.5.141.103

body:
--- Lars Aronsson <lars at aronsson.se> wrote:
> Pierre Abbat wrote:
> > I just blocked 217.5.141.103. Some sysop on the
> German Wiki please do the
> > same. The block should be removed in a few hours,
> or sooner if he gets the
> > message.
>
> I'm curious, is this how we want Wikipedia to work?
> No trial?  No
> reasons stated?  Just "block him now!", really?  I
> find this
> problematic.  Am I the only one?

Hu, no. You are not.
Actually, what I did was to delete these pages...
He didnot put many of these, I had no way to know who
he was, nor to communicate with him. I did not want
him to create endless empty pages, unlikely to be
filled before long (architecture stuff, we have no
architect around !)
I thought maybe he would notice...maybe is that a
wrong move, dunno...

There's one thing I know though.

It is now more than a week that the french wikipedia
is basically not usuable in the evening. All the usual
evening participants don't participate any more.
*This* is a *problem* to me.

__________________________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus ? Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now.
http://mailplus.yahoo.com


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Help accessing Wikipedia?

body:
The Wikipedia seems to be inaccessible right now.  Anybody know what's wrong and if it's something that's going to be fixed any time soon?

Zoe

---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/attachments/20021125/bb6833bf/attachment.htm


subject: [Wikipedia-l] linking

body:
Tom Parmenter wrote:

>A start.
>
>Should be linked:
>
>-- birth and death dates
>-- major connections with the subject of the article, that is, if it's
>   an article about, say, B. B. King, there should be links on
>-- [[blues]], [[guitar]], and [[singer]]
>-- significant names mentioned in the article, defining significant to
>   mean people who deserve an article.  Opening for the [[Rolling
>   Stones]] had a big effect on B.B. King's career, but that doesn't
>   mean B.B.'s bass player should get a link.
>-- Anything you think there *should* be an article about.  Linking
>   gets it on the Most Wanted list.
>
>Should not be linked:
>
>-- dates of marriage, book publication, and other dates between the
>   big two unless they bear some kind of significant connection with
>   the date.  That Charles Reich's "Greening of America" was published
>   in [[1970]] is significant because it was a zeitgeist book.
>-- Every song on a record album.  "[[Helter Skelter]]" deserves an
>   article, "Back in the U.S.S.R." doesn't.
>-- Likewise, every book and short story by an author, unless you're
>   prepared to back it up by writing all the articles, as some Robert
>   Heinlein enthusiast did.  Otherwise, leave the various works
>   unlinked until you get around to writing an article.
>
Although I would disagree in a few of the details, I think this list is
a good starting rule of thumb.  I would add to the should not be linked
list:

  -- up-links that are not germane to the article.  Thus, a link in
saying that B. B. King was born in the [[United States]] is not helpful
because the reader is not likely to be interested at this time in a
general discussion about the United States.  Another way of saying this
might be "Avoid uplinking to an article where you would not reasonably
expect a down link back.

Eclecticology


from_name: Vicki Rosenzweig

subject:
[bryce@neptune.net: Re: [zoecomnena@yahoo.com:
  [Wikipedia-l] Oregon City, Oregon]]

body:
At 10:35 AM 11/25/02 -0800, Jimbo wrote:
>Bryce is apparently "extremely pissed".  I'm not yet sure why.  No
>policies have changed.  But we can't have people sticking invariant
>sections with copyright notices willy-nilly throughout the site.
>

No policy has changed. He probably put the copyright notice in and
assumed it was acceptable-by-Wikipedia-policy because people hadn't
removed it right away.

>----- Forwarded message from Bryce Harrington <bryce at neptune.net> -----
>
>From: Bryce Harrington <bryce at neptune.net>
>Date: Mon, 25 Nov 2002 10:15:26 -0800 (PST)
>To: Jimmy Wales <jwales at bomis.com>
>Subject: Re: [zoecomnena at yahoo.com: [Wikipedia-l] Oregon City, Oregon]
>
>I am extremely pissed that the copyright statement was deleted.
>If the policy of Wikipedia has changed such that authors are not longer
>allowed to retain copyright of their work, then I want no part of this.
>Go ahead and delete my contributions.  This is just wrong.

So, do we delete, or do we point to our license and the consent he gave
by contributing? More to the point, can we be sure which are his contributions?

--
Vicki Rosenzweig
vr at redbird.org
http://www.redbird.org


from_name: koyaanisqatsi at nupedia.com

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: The v-word

body:
>It's easy to look at every single edit.  I did it.
>(Yes, Erik, Lir put in the link to good taste first,
>after Clutch had put it on her user talk page.)
>There's no doubt in my mind that vandalism was at work.
>This is not name-calling; I do not say this gratuitously.
>These sorts of changes to a user page are unprecedented,
>and they were done repeatedly, despite admonition
>from several other Wikipedians.  Normally bannable.
>However, we made an exception, because we hate Lir.
>
>
>-- Toby

I don't hate Lir, and I was very tempted to ban Clutch.  My previous oath to
avoid banning as much as possible would have stopped me, even if my lack
of developer access didn't.

kq


subject: [WikiEN-l] Clean up our mess!

body:
Ed wrote:
>1. Just because a person is wearing a sign on his back that says "Kick me!",
that's no excuse for people to kick him.
>
>2. The Cunctator is right often enough that I continue to read all his posts.
Occasionally, I have even taken his advice.

1. I was being a lawyer, Ed: 'never ask a question you don't know the answer
to.'  Thank you for making the point explicit.  :-)

2.  Of course he's often right.  And I read all his posts except the ones on a
thread I've disconnected from.

kq

P.S. I'd post a diff to redeem this email, but wikipedia isn't responding.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Clean up our mess!

body:
You Wrote:
>> That page really doesn't seem conducive to civility either, though,
>> really?  Cunctator gets knocked around quite a bit.  Decide for
>> yourself if you think he deserves it--and Larry, you don't have to
>> tell me what you think; but really he does.  Which hatchet needs
>> burying?  Oh, there are two?
>>
>> kq

I just posted in response to Ed, & also just realized why he wrote in defense of
Cunc: sloppy writing in my original post.  I wrote:

>>Cunctator gets knocked around quite a bit.  Decide for
>> yourself if you think he deserves it--and Larry, you don't have to
>> tell me what you think; but really he does.

What I meant was 'really he does get kicked around quite a bit," not "really he
does deserve it.

kq


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Blocked: 217.5.141.103

body:
If participation in Wikipedia ever gets so problematic that we have to appoint a court and hold trials, I really will leave -- permanently.

I neither wish to be a judge and hear cases, nor be hauled in front of one and put on trial.

But there has to be away to stop "vandalism" -- even if that way is imperfect.

Could we possibly stop re-visiting every issue, on this mailing list?

Ed Poor


from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Help accessing Wikipedia?

body:
On Mon, 25 Nov 2002, Zoe wrote:
> The Wikipedia seems to be inaccessible right now.  Anybody know what's
> wrong and if it's something that's going to be fixed any time soon?

Up again.

I tried upping the priority on the simple queries used for loading up and
displaying pages to see if it would improve interactive performance, but I
don't think it helped much.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


body:
Jonathan Walther wrote:

> On Mon, Nov 25, 2002 at 04:51:58PM +0100, Erik Moeller wrote:
>
>> *sigh* Clutch is a vandal, there's no doubt about it. Even when Lir was
>> still unbanned, he kept changing her page, linking to articles about
>> "good taste"
>> to help her develop "the good taste she lacks", kept reverting her
>> attempts
>> to restore the page and threatened to do so until Lir would "call him
>> uncle"
>> (and not in the uncle Ed sense, I presume). Now that Lir is banned,
>> he is,
>
> This is possibly a cultural difference.  Your address and name indicates
> you are German.  In English, when you make someone "holler uncle!" it
> means "do you give up now?"  It is specifically used when someone is
> being an unbearable annoyance, so you sit on them, and you don't let
> them up until they indicate they recognize they have been an annoyance
> and are prepared to change, by hollering "uncle!"  It's a fine old
> tradition, rarely used by people who are older than school age.

Rarely used by them because it's the tactic of a schoolyard bully.  A
lot of effort has been put by British Columbia schools in recent years
to prevent this kind of bullying that amounts to lynch mob justice.

Eclecticology


from_name: Julie Kemp

subject: [Wikipedia-l] what people I know have to say about

body:
Pax to your Thanksgiving, Jimbo.  Please accept that
this is not about Lir, but rather just about
nomenclature and an attempt to support the way we've
been doing things.

I just read with interest what Lir's friends have to
say about the anglicisation (for you, Steve) of
foreign words.  I also looked at what Lir had to say.
Based on that, I am even more convinced that the
article titles should remain in English.  They are
completely valid words in English.  Moreover, I was
just thinking about what we do with  foreign names in
English.  Often it's true that the names were changed
or misspelt or otherwise mutilated at Ellis Island.
Sometimes, though, the bearers of those names changed
them -- or their pronunciation -- to make them sound
more "American" (I think the same is true in England).
 When one correctly pronounces those names (as I did
after living in Germany for several years), one is
often the immediate giver of offense.

Furthermore, when I think back to the old days of
"it's Prussia," "No, it's Poland," (the argument was
over what name to use for cites which spent much of
their history as part of Prussia, but are presently
located in Poland) the only way to come to a
reasonable agreement was to rely on what English
speakers most normally (and currently) use.

As for leading through good example -- I have to ask
about this.  As I understand Lir's argument, he says:
It's correct to use the local name for a place,
because we should be more sensitive to others,

But speakers of other languages may in fact not do
this(I personally know people who speak French,
German, and Spanish as their native languages -- they
all use that language's version of US when speaking
the respective language)

If these other-language-speakers don't practice the
"local-name-use" rule, then they aren't behaving as
they should, BUT, we should be better than they are
and lead by example -- then they may catch on.

Can we please leave it alone, and accept that
languages reflect a good many things, but that, unless
terms are not translatable, it's best to try and speak
one language at a time in the Pedia?

Jules

__________________________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus ? Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now.
http://mailplus.yahoo.com


subject: Periodic restarts (was: [Wikitech-l] database connections)

body:
On Mon, 25 Nov 2002, Poor, Edmund W wrote:
> Would restarting any of the servers periodically help?
>
> Suppose it takes X minutes to restart a server, and that the "lag" problem puts Wikipedia out of operation for Y minutes -- where X << Y. Maybe then this would be a good "band-aid" for the problem.

It takes all of a couple seconds to restart apache; I've set it to do a
"graceful" restart every half hour during US daytime, which more or less
coincides with our peak hours.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


subject: [Wikitech-l] Hungarian Wikipedia Software

body:
Hi,

can we upgrade the hu.wikipedia.org to the new software? Zoltan Simon,
who has contacted wiki-en a few days ago and with whom I have been
corresponding since, has expressed interest in starting the Hungarian
Wikipedia (which is currently empty). I think it would make more sense
to upgrade the software before telling him how to work on it.

Regards,

Erik
--
FOKUS - Fraunhofer Insitute for Open Communication Systems
Project BerliOS - http://www.berlios.de


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Blocked: 217.5.141.103

body:
Lars Aronsson wrote:

>Pierre Abbat wrote:
>
>>I just blocked 217.5.141.103. Some sysop on the German Wiki please do the
>>same. The block should be removed in a few hours, or sooner if he gets the
>>message.
>>
>
>I'm curious, is this how we want Wikipedia to work?  No trial?  No
>reasons stated?  Just "block him now!", really?  I find this
>problematic.  Am I the only one?
>

You're not the only one.  Some of this stuff is starting to look like
cowboy justice.

Eclecticology


from_name: Jason Williams

subject: [Wikipedia-l] RE: Oliver is Lir II

body:
On Mon, Nov 25, 2002 at 10:21:07AM -0500, Poor, Edmund W wrote:
> "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone." (Jesus)
> "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind." (Gandhi)
> "No teasing." (Uncle Ed)

"The loveliest fairy in the world, and her name is do as you
would be done by" (Alisha's Attic)

PS; about me being "promoted" to SysOp - I don't want to hassle
you all, but I don't want you to forget either ;-)

--
jason at jasonandali.org.uk    http://www.jasonandali.org.uk/jason/


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Copyright query

body:
On Mon, 2002-11-25 at 14:59, Jimmy Wales wrote:
> Oliver Pereira wrote:
> > I have a query about copyright, although not directly related to the Bryce
> > Harrington thing. If an article is in breach of copyright, and someone
> > else replaces the text with original material, the copyrighted material is
> > still publically available on the Wikipedia to anyone who knows about the
> > revision history page. Doesn't this mean that there is still a breach of
> > copyright here? And if so, doesn't the entire article (along with its
> > history) have to be deleted, and not just rewritten?
>
> Ideally, we should drop the specific revisions that are problematic, leaving
> the rest of the history intact.

Actually, I think it's reasonable to state that we're only publishing
the latest version of the article. It's similar to the way that Google
etc. has archives of the pages they index, which are even publicly
viewable to a degree, but a clearly not intended to replace the original
document and are not presented as such.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] a way to contact IP users

body:
> How about giving admins the ability to throw up a "Please read this"
> message.
>
> Something like this:
> * User submits an edit
> * Wikipedia accepts the edit, and...
> * Sends user to a "You have an urgent administrative message" page.
>
> User can then:
> * Click on the "Read message" button, or
> * Just ignore it

A good idea, but it would need to have at least a message queue to handle
multiple messages, so you arrive at an internal messaging system.
Unfortunately, this would have to be a bit of a hack, as IPs expire rather quickly. With
cookies it could be done more reliably but not in all cases. Anyway, I think
there's little opposition to more advanced messaging/ban/revert features, they
just haven't been coded so far.

Regards,

Erik

--
+++ GMX - Mail, Messaging & more  http://www.gmx.net +++
NEU: Mit GMX ins Internet. Rund um die Uhr f?r 1 ct/ Min. surfen!


subject: [Wikipedia-l] RE:_[Wikipedia-l]_Orthographe_qu�b�coise

body:
--- "Poor, Edmund W" <Edmund.W.Poor at abc.com> wrote:
> Matt (Montr?alais) a ecriv?:
> - Je me demande s'il existe une politique sur le
> Wiki fran?ais par rapport
> - aux orthographes r?gionales de m?me qu'existe sur
> le Wiki anglais.
>
> If this means that French and English wikipedias
> should have a similar naming convention for
> geographic terms, then I strongly agree.

No, it is not what was meant in fact.

It is quite likely we won't have exactly the same
naming conventions for geographic terms than the
english. What makes you believe we name things and
cities the same way as you do ;-) and what makes you
believe we would use your conventions ;-)))

What Matt referred to is the way all french speaking
don't use the same orthographic rules, and sometimes
not the same words at all for a concept. Just like
your fertilisation/fertilization stuff (sorry Mav, I
again forgot which from the s and the z was the
english or american, my memory is a sieve) or
Lorry/truck or corn/maize.

For example Matt wanted to use the word gai. For
French, it means happy. For Canadians homosexual. We
rather know gay to say homosexual. So, one french said
the proper orthographic rule (gai) was not respected,
and the canadian word had to be replaced by the french
one (gay). (academic weight)

Pretty simple no ?

Just need a reminder that francophone is different
from french, and that the fr in front of the web
adress is for francophone.

> I didn't understand the "Village gai" stuff. It
> sounds like a discussion about the [[gay village]]
> article, which in turn sounds like the idea of
> calling parts of various cities "Chinatown". As in,
> "I went to Chinatown last night and ate eggrolls at
> a Chinese restaurant."
>
> I understand the slang use of "gay" as:
> * referring to homosexuals & homosexuality
> * becoming increasingly a mainstream term (as in
> "gay rights")
>
> I apologize for my inability to read French
> accurately. Il y a 25 ans que je l'ai etudi?.

Ed, voici pour vous l'occasion r?v?e de faire des
progr?s. Si ce n'est pour lire, sinon pour ?crire.

> Ed Poor, aka [[Edmond Le Pauvre]]

Certaines formations priv?es vous feraient payer une
fortune pour une telle exp?rience.

__________________________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus ? Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now.
http://mailplus.yahoo.com


body:
> Erik,
>
> Jonathan told me privately that he is Clutch. I'm not sure whether he has
> acknowldged this on the list or whether I should "out" him.

Actually, he has implied that he isn't ("I and others agree that it is far
too strong a word to describe Clutches efforts to work in good faith on the
Wikipedia.") If he indeed is Clutch, this further confirms my assumption that
he is deliberately trying to troll Wikipedia for his own amusement. We
shouldn't take the bait. Please restore and protect the last valid version of Lir's
user page.

Regards,

Erik

--
+++ GMX - Mail, Messaging & more  http://www.gmx.net +++
NEU: Mit GMX ins Internet. Rund um die Uhr f?r 1 ct/ Min. surfen!


body:
--- Julie Kemp <juleskemp at yahoo.com> wrote:
> But speakers of other languages may in fact not do
> this(I personally know people who speak French,
> German, and Spanish as their native languages --
> they all use that language's version of US when
speaking
> the respective language)
>
> If these other-language-speakers don't practice the
> "local-name-use" rule, then they aren't behaving as
> they should, BUT, we should be better than they are
> and lead by example -- then they may catch on.

*sigh*

__________________________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus ? Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now.
http://mailplus.yahoo.com


body: The English Wikipedia slowed down again today.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] User pages

body:
Yes, of course, you can take that off.

Ed Poor

-----Original Message-----
From: Zoe [mailto:zoecomnena at yahoo.com]
Sent: Monday, November 25, 2002 4:29 PM
To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] User pages

What about the case where Lir attributed a quote to me on her User page that I never made?

Zoe

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/attachments/20021125/7f9a0a18/attachment.htm


from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Copyright query

body:
Oliver Pereira wrote:

>I have a query about copyright, although not directly related to the Bryce
>Harrington thing. If an article is in breach of copyright, and someone
>else replaces the text with original material, the copyrighted material is
>still publically available on the Wikipedia to anyone who knows about the
>revision history page. Doesn't this mean that there is still a breach of
>copyright here? And if so, doesn't the entire article (along with its
>history) have to be deleted, and not just rewritten?
>
>I think I may have edited some articles that *previously* contained
>copyrighted material, and now I'm wondering if these edits actually need
>to be deleted, which would be annoying...
>
I think we should be all right as long as the article history pages are
not available to search engines.  Not even Wikipedia's own search
feature can  illustrate these old versions.  That technique is also
worthwhile in that if a search engine continued to produce a randomly
selected version from the history page, the value of material on
Wikipedia would be considerably less reliable than it is now.  As things
stand, nothing in the current version of an article suggests that a
copyright violation was removed.  If we apply the fair use rules to the
material we may find that even if something is not fair use on the
article, it could become fair use on the history back pages.  The first
and the fourth factors will notably be different.

     1. Putting it on the history page will be transformative in that
    the intent is no longer a matter of making it easily available to
    the general public, and it will have acquired a kind of
    meta-existence of interest only to those who are looking for
    possible sources of future copyright violations.  Having a data base
    of these incidents will help to identify others in the future.

     4. The likelyhood of the copyright holder being damaged by having
    this material in our archives is very low.  At least in theory, the
    purpose of editing is to create versions that are progressively more
    reliable than the previous ones.  If the user even cares to go
    through old versions with the aim of inappropriately using material
    that is copyrighted, he is still faced with the question of whether
    what he has found is an accurate and reliable quote.  That's a
    daunting task for someone who is looking for a quick fix for his
    college essay - thus it is highly unlikely that what is found on our
    history pages will have any kind of impact on the market for the
    original work.

My comments are written with textual material in mind.  We have no need
to keep violating pictures.

Eclecticology


subject: The v-word (was: [Wikipedia-l] User pages)

body:
Ed and Jimbo,

*sigh* Clutch is a vandal, there's no doubt about it. Even when Lir was
still unbanned, he kept changing her page, linking to articles about "good taste"
to help her develop "the good taste she lacks", kept reverting her attempts
to restore the page and threatened to do so until Lir would "call him uncle"
(and not in the uncle Ed sense, I presume). Now that Lir is banned, he is,
against the explicit will of others, changing Lir's page to contain the links
he used to offend her, I presume as a last demonstration of his power.

This is vandalism of a user page -- it's identical to me editing Ed's page
and inserting some snide remarks about the Unification Church and "Moonies",
making it look like Ed wrote them. That's why everyone kept reverting Clutch's
changes, but he is patient enough to re-insert his version again and again.

Now we have basically justified Clutch's vandalism by protecting the
*vandalized* version of the page which links to the "how to develop good taste" etc.
which Clutch deliberately inserted.

I don't care much about Lir's page, but I care about antisocial behavior.
Rules should be enforced consistently, as Larry said. Please restore Lir's last
version of the page and protect that one, instead of Clutch's vandalized
one.

I've dealt with trolls a number of times, and I know one when I see one.
Don't let Clutch pull your leg. He's an experienced troll. SoftSecurity won't
work here.

Regards,

Erik

--
+++ GMX - Mail, Messaging & more  http://www.gmx.net +++
NEU: Mit GMX ins Internet. Rund um die Uhr f?r 1 ct/ Min. surfen!


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Help accessing Wikipedia?

body:
We'll have to ask Brion or someone who has access to the server.

Although Jimbo gave me "developer" rights last week, I still haven't figured out how to do things like RESTART THE MACHINE.

Ed Poor

-----Original Message-----
From: Zoe [mailto:zoecomnena at yahoo.com]
Sent: Monday, November 25, 2002 4:51 PM
To: wikipedia-l at nupedia.com
Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Help accessing Wikipedia?

The Wikipedia seems to be inaccessible right now.  Anybody know what's wrong and if it's something that's going to be fixed any time soon?

Zoe

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/attachments/20021125/5dc8bdec/attachment.htm