from_name: Roberto Frangi

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:

> Speaking as a Wikisource admin and as the person who wrote most of
> that policy page I think that I can safely say that such a thesis can
> be accomodated.  That rule is primarily there to forestall those
> individuals who are out to promote their own pet theories or bad
> poetry that has never been published anywhere.  Perhaps they could be
> accomodated at Wikibooks, but since I have very little involvement
> with that project I cannot speak for them.
>
> In this case I would tend to interpret the submission of the thesis to
> the appropriate university authorities as a form of prior publication.
>
> Including the thesis will leave it subject to the FDL rules for
> copyright purposes.  The submission should include enough information
> to legally identify you as the owner of the copyright so that we know
> that you have the authority to release the text under a free
> distribution licence.
>
> Ec

That's wat I wanted to hear!
Now my idea is: since thesis are  a valuable resource  for students,  I
think that maybe we shuold incentivate the use of wikisource as a thesis
repository,  so that  students have a place  where they can find works
related to their studies. Also we will give a chance to have
translations of the thesis in different languages (the one we are going
to insert will be (slowly) translated from italian to english),
which.would be interesting in particular for works on humanistic
subjects, that are more likely to be treated with different perspectives
in different cultures.

Snowdog (A colege drop-out, working hard for a "honoris causa").


list: wikimedia-l

source: pipermail-mbox

subject: [Foundation-l] Wikisource as a repository for thesis


list: wikien-l

from_name: Cyril Thomas

subject: [WikiEN-l] Article Categorization

body:
Thank you Charles, I wanted to categorize National Center for the
Analysis of Violent Crime (NCAVC) and Critical Incident Response Group
(CIRG) into FBI category. (The India thing is I am from India). Thanks
again for your advice. I really appreciate it.

-----Original Message-----
From: wikien-l-bounces at Wikipedia.org
[mailto:wikien-l-bounces at Wikipedia.org] On Behalf Of Charles Matthews
Sent: Wednesday, October 13, 2004 12:32 PM
To: English Wikipedia
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Article Categorization

Cyril Thomas wrote

>How do I categorize an article?

If you simply edit in [[Category:India]] to an article (conventionally
at
the bottom), the India category will be added. You can add any category;
if
the added category doesn't yet exist it will appear in red.

Charles

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

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list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Articles that might draw fire.

body:
Omri Schwarz wrote:

>I and some friends have been discussing the issue of whether 10 years
>from now it will become important for your average corporate manager
>not to do anything that might wind up being documented in his company's
>Wikipedia entry. A brief look through Wikipedia does show articles
>detailing the controversial actions of some corporations, but not enough
>to indicate a concerted effort by any corporate history geeks or labor
>history geeks.
>
>Said friends reached the conclusion that the addition of many articles
>on corporate history and ongoing activities would be a good thing indeed,
>but a concerted effort to do so would be obnoxious, since it increases the
>chance of Wikipedia facing disruptive efforts (in the form of legal threats
>or revert-wars conducted by paid minions). It would be a good thing since
>a wiki is not time indexed, like any press article, and cannot just be
>"ridden out." But before any effort is made to write articles on
>corporate activities, it would be good to come here and ask whether
>possibly controversial articles are wellcome in Wikipedia, or whether a
>fork of the project would be a better thing to do.
>
>
Articles about particular corporations are a valid part of Wikipedia.
Corporate edit warriors should be resisted just as much as individual
ones.  As long as we strive to be truthful in what we report we have
nothing to be ashamed of.  If we are to bow to and be censored by
corporate intimidation we might as well all pack it in.

Ec


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] MediaWiki 1.3.6 released

body:
MediaWiki 1.3.6 is a security update, which contains fixes for several
cross-site scripting and SQL injection vulnerabilities discovered
during a code review. All MediaWiki users are strongly urged to upgrade
to this latest release.

Changes from 1.3.5:
* (bug 296) Variables in user interface messages are no longer
substituted
   at install time, so changes to the site name etc should be easier to
make
* (bug 149) Special:Recentchanges "changes from" link preserves limit
* (bug 433) tooltip for "Undelete" tab now labeled correctly
* (bug 439) unclickable "Move" tab no longer displays on protected pages
* (bug 484) graceful deletion of images where the actual file is missing
* (bug 686) fixed [[plural]]s in Catalan localization
* Fixed potential HTML/JavaScript injection attack in the
UnicodeConverter
   extension. (This extension is not enabled by default.)
* Fixed potential HTML/JavaScript injection attack via raw page views to
   a maliciously crafted wiki page.
* (bug 187, bug 669) Fixed centered thumbnails, using <div> instead of
   <span>.
* catch MySQL error 2000 during installation.
* (bug 704) Removed misleading LocalSettings.sample
* Fix cross site scripting bugs in SpecialIpblocklist, SpecialEmailuser
* Fix SQL injection and cross site scripting bugs in SpecialMaintenance
* Fix cross site scripting bugs and possible filename validation
vulnerability
   in ImagePage.
* and more of that sort

Release notes:
http://sourceforge.net/project/shownotes.php?release_id=275099

Download:
http://prdownloads.sf.net/wikipedia/mediawiki-1.3.6.tar.gz?download

Wiki admin help mailing list:
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-l

Bug report system:
http://bugzilla.wikipedia.org/

Play "stump the developers" live on IRC:
#mediawiki on irc.freenode.net

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

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from_name: Jens Ropers

body:
Hi Omri,

NPOV (the Neutral Point Of View) is sacrosanct here.

As was just discussed a few emails back, it's not even enough to allow
for one's point of view to get balanced by other people's point of
view. At the Wikipedia it's actually expected to make an express effort
to write in an NPOV fashion yourself.

Thus, if you're interested in making any sort of concerted effort to
''specifically emphasize and focus on'' corporate wrongdoing, you will
probably find your own efforts more criticized than welcomed here.
While I haven't properly read but a single of their articles (not to
mention contributing), I am--based on hearsay--under the impression
that disinfopedia.org may be a better place to go ''if'' I understood
you correctly and the above is what you have in mind.

(And yes, granted, in theory it's probably possible to write about
corporate wrongdoing in an NPOV way -- I just think that it's very,
very hard and unlikely to accomplish, especially given a stated
ambition to specifically write about such issues.)

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

On 14 Oct 2004, at 03:07, Omri Schwarz wrote:

> Hi, folks.
>
> I and some friends have been discussing the issue of whether 10 years
> from now it will become important for your average corporate manager
> not to do anything that might wind up being documented in his company's
> Wikipedia entry. A brief look through Wikipedia does show articles
> detailing the controversial actions of some corporations, but not
> enough
> to indicate a concerted effort by any corporate history geeks or labor
> history geeks.
>
> Said friends reached the conclusion that the addition of many articles
> on corporate history and ongoing activities would be a good thing
> indeed,
> but a concerted effort to do so would be obnoxious, since it increases
> the
> chance of Wikipedia facing disruptive efforts (in the form of legal
> threats
> or revert-wars conducted by paid minions). It would be a good thing
> since
> a wiki is not time indexed, like any press article, and cannot just be
> "ridden out." But before any effort is made to write articles on
> corporate activities, it would be good to come here and ask whether
> possibly controversial articles are wellcome in Wikipedia, or whether a
> fork of the project would be a better thing to do.
>
> So, what do y'all think?
>
> Thanks for your attention,
>
> Omri Schwarz
>
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


from_name: Fred Bauder

body:
Generally speaking what goes into Wikipedia articles of this nature is just
material that has been reported in the press. As original research is not
included much that might be known cannot be included as it is not part of
the corpus of knowledge.

Fred

> From: "Omri Schwarz" <ocschwar at MIT.EDU>
> Reply-To: wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> Date: Wed, 13 Oct 2004 21:07:20 -0400
> To: wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Articles that might draw fire.
>
> Hi, folks.
>
> I and some friends have been discussing the issue of whether 10 years
> from now it will become important for your average corporate manager
> not to do anything that might wind up being documented in his company's
> Wikipedia entry. A brief look through Wikipedia does show articles
> detailing the controversial actions of some corporations, but not enough
> to indicate a concerted effort by any corporate history geeks or labor
> history geeks.
>
> Said friends reached the conclusion that the addition of many articles
> on corporate history and ongoing activities would be a good thing indeed,
> but a concerted effort to do so would be obnoxious, since it increases the
> chance of Wikipedia facing disruptive efforts (in the form of legal threats
> or revert-wars conducted by paid minions). It would be a good thing since
> a wiki is not time indexed, like any press article, and cannot just be
> "ridden out." But before any effort is made to write articles on
> corporate activities, it would be good to come here and ask whether
> possibly controversial articles are wellcome in Wikipedia, or whether a
> fork of the project would be a better thing to do.
>
> So, what do y'all think?
>
> Thanks for your attention,
>
> Omri Schwarz
>
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l


from_name: Gerard Meijssen

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Simplified Chinese and Traditional Chinese

body:
Hoi,
In the past there have been heated debates about this subject, if you
are interested in this subject, here is something uncontroversial for
you; I am looking for the translations of these two terms in ANY
language. Currently I know it in only three languages; Dutch, English
and French. I would like to know it in all languages.

This term is used to indicate in wiktionary that a translation of a word
is in one of these two methods of writing. As such it is really usefull
when I have this information. You can reply to me, but you can also be
really bold and edit the pages on the nl:wiktionary.

[[wikt:nl:eenvoudig Chinees]]
[[wikt:nl:traditioneel Chinees]]

Thanks,
    GerardM


body:
It is apparantly still too early in the moring for me, it should have been

[[wikt:nl:vereenvoudigd_Chinees]]
[[wikt:nl:traditioneel_Chinees]]

Sorry,
    GerardM


from_name: Phil Sandifer

subject: [WikiEN-l] Administrator Abuse

body:
I think the latter is more assholery than anything else. He didn't
blank pages. I've seen admins occasionally use the {{test}} template in
pure and dripping sarcasm to point out utterly stupid additions. This
could conceivably have been a case of that.

-Snowspinner

On Oct 14, 2004, at 1:25 AM, Rebecca wrote:

> The latter certainly sounds like vandalism in my book, even if the
> former narrowly escapes that definition.
>
> -- ambi
>
>
> On Wed, 13 Oct 2004 22:57:34 -0500, Phil Sandifer
> <sandifer at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
>> Indeed, Oronto was not a vandal.
>>
>> He was a troll, a POV pusher, and a moron. His countless good faith
>> edits amount to less than 50, all of which either involved adding a
>> sentence accusing Nietzsche of "absurd and childish hatred of women"
>> (Which he insisted was a NPOV characterization) or adding the {{test}}
>> message to the userpage of anyone who reverted him.
>>
>> This is not vandalism.
>>
>> Now, having established that, good riddance.
>>
>> -Snowspinner
>>
>>
>>
>> On Oct 13, 2004, at 10:38 PM, Polytarp! wrote:
>>
>>> To whom it may concern (and it should concern everyone!):
>>>
>>> I have reason(s) to believe that one or more of the administrator(s)
>>> of the Wikipaedia Online Encyclopaedia, owned and/or operated by
>>> (the)
>>> Wikemaedia Foundation, Inc./Org./Co., has violated one (1) or more
>>> (>1) of Wikipaedia's or/and (the) Wikimaedia Foundation,
>>> Inc./Co./Org.'s rules &/| regulations.  I was prompted to believe
>>> this
>>> by the following message, which appeared when I attempted to make a
>>> delightful, beneficial, truthful, and good (though not necessarily in
>>> that order) addition to an article about that most lovable and
>>> eminent
>>> among preemnient German philosophers, Friedrick Nietzsche the First
>>> (1st):
>>>
>>> ...
>>>
>>> Your user name or IP address has been blocked by RickK.
>>>
>>> The reason given is this:
>>> all of user\'s edits are vandalism -- was blocked, came back, and
>>> immediately began vandalizing again
>>>
>>> ...
>>>
>>> Everyone who reads this message is someone who cares about Wikipedia.
>>> We all enjoy contributing to it, and do so in the best of faith, and
>>> are determined to make it grow and succeed.  Imagine the shock-horror
>>> any one (1) of us would feel upon being excluded from doing so by an
>>> apparently malicious stranger.
>>>
>>> I knew that none of my\ edits were vandalism.  All were made in good
>>> faith and with the foremost intention of improving the Wikipaedia.  I
>>> therefore figured that it was a mistake; perhaps, as another part of
>>> the message suggested, "...[a user] with a [dynamic IP had been]
>>> blocked accidentally, due to that fact that [his] present IP [had
>>> been] previously used by a blocked user."  To verify whether or not
>>> this was the case, I went to the block list to check.  It was then I
>>> learned the ban wasn't an accident.  Someone going by the name of
>>> Erl,
>>> RickK had banned me indefinitely and purposely:
>>>
>>> 22:06, 9 Oct 2004, RickK blocked Ute Oronto (expires indefinite)
>>> (contribs) (all of user\'s edits are vandalism -- was blocked, came
>>> back, and immediately began vandalizing again)
>>>
>>> Who was this RickK?  Who would ban a user who had made countless
>>> useful good faith edits, and call these malicious acts of vandalism?
>>> Who could be so kerlish?
>>>
>>> It was then I remembered:  The day or so previous, I had reverted
>>> some
>>> vandalism inflicted upon the Neva article.  Someone had removed the
>>> Geo-stub template.  I replaced it, and checked to see who the errant
>>> user could be.  Noting that it was a long time user, who should know
>>> better, I added him to the vandalism and progress list and went on
>>> with my day.
>>>
>>> Could this have been the same person as the one who banned me?  I
>>> checked.  It was him, apparently seeking to quiet me and to enact
>>> vengence upon me.
>>>
>>> However, I (capital i, not number one) refuse to be quiet about this
>>> issue.  I'm E-mailing all of you this so that we'll no longer have
>>> administrators who feel free to vandalize Wikipaedia and then silence
>>> users who object by banning them indefinitely for supposedly
>>> commiting
>>> the very same Wikicraeme.
>>>
>>> Lovingly yours,
>>>
>>> Ute Oronto.
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> WikiEN-l mailing list
>>> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
>>> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> WikiEN-l mailing list
>> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
>> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Rick

subject: [WikiEN-l] Administrator Abuse

body:
He also insists on editing the [[Neva]] article by saying that the water from the river tastes like Rasputin.

RickK

Phil Sandifer <sandifer at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
Indeed, Oronto was not a vandal.

He was a troll, a POV pusher, and a moron. His countless good faith
edits amount to less than 50, all of which either involved adding a
sentence accusing Nietzsche of "absurd and childish hatred of women"
(Which he insisted was a NPOV characterization) or adding the {{test}}
message to the userpage of anyone who reverted him.

This is not vandalism.

Now, having established that, good riddance.

-Snowspinner

On Oct 13, 2004, at 10:38 PM, Polytarp! wrote:

> To whom it may concern (and it should concern everyone!):
>
> I have reason(s) to believe that one or more of the administrator(s)
> of the Wikipaedia Online Encyclopaedia, owned and/or operated by (the)
> Wikemaedia Foundation, Inc./Org./Co., has violated one (1) or more
> (>1) of Wikipaedia's or/and (the) Wikimaedia Foundation,
> Inc./Co./Org.'s rules &/| regulations. I was prompted to believe this
> by the following message, which appeared when I attempted to make a
> delightful, beneficial, truthful, and good (though not necessarily in
> that order) addition to an article about that most lovable and eminent
> among preemnient German philosophers, Friedrick Nietzsche the First
> (1st):
>
> ...
>
> Your user name or IP address has been blocked by RickK.
>
> The reason given is this:
> all of user\'s edits are vandalism -- was blocked, came back, and
> immediately began vandalizing again
>
> ...
>
> Everyone who reads this message is someone who cares about Wikipedia.
> We all enjoy contributing to it, and do so in the best of faith, and
> are determined to make it grow and succeed. Imagine the shock-horror
> any one (1) of us would feel upon being excluded from doing so by an
> apparently malicious stranger.
>
> I knew that none of my\ edits were vandalism. All were made in good
> faith and with the foremost intention of improving the Wikipaedia. I
> therefore figured that it was a mistake; perhaps, as another part of
> the message suggested, "...[a user] with a [dynamic IP had been]
> blocked accidentally, due to that fact that [his] present IP [had
> been] previously used by a blocked user." To verify whether or not
> this was the case, I went to the block list to check. It was then I
> learned the ban wasn't an accident. Someone going by the name of Erl,
> RickK had banned me indefinitely and purposely:
>
> 22:06, 9 Oct 2004, RickK blocked Ute Oronto (expires indefinite)
> (contribs) (all of user\'s edits are vandalism -- was blocked, came
> back, and immediately began vandalizing again)
>
> Who was this RickK? Who would ban a user who had made countless
> useful good faith edits, and call these malicious acts of vandalism?
> Who could be so kerlish?
>
> It was then I remembered: The day or so previous, I had reverted some
> vandalism inflicted upon the Neva article. Someone had removed the
> Geo-stub template. I replaced it, and checked to see who the errant
> user could be. Noting that it was a long time user, who should know
> better, I added him to the vandalism and progress list and went on
> with my day.
>
> Could this have been the same person as the one who banned me? I
> checked. It was him, apparently seeking to quiet me and to enact
> vengence upon me.
>
> However, I (capital i, not number one) refuse to be quiet about this
> issue. I'm E-mailing all of you this so that we'll no longer have
> administrators who feel free to vandalize Wikipaedia and then silence
> users who object by banning them indefinitely for supposedly commiting
> the very same Wikicraeme.
>
> Lovingly yours,
>
> Ute Oronto.
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

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

---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
vote.yahoo.com - Register online to vote today!


from_name: Mike Halterman

subject: [WikiEN-l] Administrator Abuse

body:
Okay, now that's just daft.

Rick <giantsrick13 at yahoo.com> wrote:He also insists on editing the [[Neva]] article by saying that the water from the river tastes like Rasputin.

RickK

---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Express yourself with Y! Messenger! Free. Download now.


from_name: Tim Starling

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Re: AW: influence the cache of a local WikiMedia
	installation

body:
Jens Frank wrote:
> On Tue, Oct 12, 2004 at 09:14:53PM +0100, Rowan Collins wrote:
>
>>On Tue, 12 Oct 2004 17:04:47 +0200, Arvalux <arvalux at yahoo.de> wrote:
>>
>>>>$dbw->query("delete from cur"); would show better how useful your plugin
>>>
>>>is.
>>>I cannot accress $dbw. A "global $dbw;" doesn't help.
>>>How to access variables like $dbw?
>>
>>I guess you should count yourself lucky: your hack is less insecure
>>than it looks, and can't access global variables. I'm not too sure
>>what it *might* be able to do though.
>
>
> $dbw is no global. Use
> 	$dbw =& wfGetDB( DB_MASTER );
> to initialize $dbw.
>

Why are you all explaining to him how to delete his entire wiki? He
asked how to clear the cache, not destroy the site.

-- Tim Starling


list: foundation-l

from_name: Delirium

subject: [Foundation-l] Wiki translations of Greek and Roman texts

body:
Viktor Horvath wrote:

>Could it be possible to set up a Wiki containing some
>Latin/Greek/Arabian/whatever philosophy (or other content) whose copyright
>has expired for a long time - be it by typing in old editions or by taking
>over some Gutenberg content - and displaying it one paragraph per page,
>giving the viewer the possibility to translate it into his native language?
>I guess some specific features would be helpful, such as allowing two
>translations in the same language to coexist (call them "English version,
>showing John's translations where possible" and the same thing for Jim), as
>there will never be "the one correct version". In addition, it would be nice
>to create a bilingual PDF for printing.
>
>
This sounds great to me.  Would this be acceptable at wikisource without
starting a fully new project?  I know the original source texts would
be, but are original translations okay, or is that project strictly for
verbatim source texts?

A related project that's been mentioned on this list is support for
annotations (a footnote-like system), which I think any translation
project would need---there are often nuances and controversies in
translation that can't be fully resolved in the text, but should be
noted for those who are interested (and there are likely to be so many
that they need to be noted as attachments to the text like footnotes,
not scattered on the talk page).

-Mark


subject: [Wikitech-l] a editing problem

body:
On Oct 14, 2004, at 3:12 PM, Sheepdog wrote:
> Everything looks fine  (no error messages) but if i search for
> something in the new wiki,
> the "search results" page i get does not contain the "edit" link - so
> i can not edit any artikles
> or create the new ones. Even logged in as sysop. Does anybody had the
> same problem ?

http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/mediawiki-l/2004-October/001671.html

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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from_name: Robert

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Hateful ban shows that Wikipedia is flawed almost beyond
	hope

body:
The banned users "Mr. Natural Health", Simonides, and
Raul654, along with Zero, have succeeded in banning me from
Wikipedia for four months. They had absolutely no reason to
do so, but they did it out of sheer hatred and malice.

I find their behaviour dishonest, shocking and unjustified.
A few weeks ago Jimbo wrote and said that I am not going to
be banned, and that I was just being hysterical.  Yet
Raul654 told me that Jimbo had authoried this ban.  Someone
was clearly lying, and I am sure that it was Raul who was
not being honest.

Ironically, this uncalled for ban occurs on the heels of a
long discussion, in which most of us recognized that
several troublemakers were pushing away long-time Wikipedia
contributors, and allowing trolls to run wild. Apparently,
the clique who banned me is trying to make certain that the
trolls run the asylum.  Now Mr. Natural Health, Simonides
and their sock-puppets can do huge amounts of damage yet
again.

Consider the following seven facts. Has anyone EVER been
banned from Wikipedia for such a huge amount of time in
such cases?  NEVER.  Not once.  There is clearly a lynch
mob that hates me, lead by Mr. Natural Health and
Simonides, two anti-Semites, one of whom even publicly
admitted to being a Nazi.  (Yet he wasn't banned for that,
but I have been banned for complaining about their
harassment.)

Facts about this case.

1* I am not involved in any flame wars.  So why the ban?

2* I am not involved in any revert wars or edit wars. So
why the ban?

3* The supposed problems are in articles in which the
articles HAVE ALREADY BEEN RESOLVED, long ago!  So why the
ban?

4* I repeatedly take week-long (or longer) Wiki-breaks
(like the last 10 days) to let things cool down and allow
other people to have their say without any problem.  So why
the ban?

5* I have taken many contentious articles OFF of my
Watchlist, and simply let others do what they want, rather
then engage in multiple arguments.  So why the ban?

6* I have asked for and successfully used mediation when
necessary.  So why the ban?

7* I have been successfully working with a large group of
others on potentially acrimonious articles, without revert
wars, and with great progress being made on many articles.
So why the ban?

Folks, this is a clear abuse of the system by a small group
of people who hate me.  And it won't go unnoticed by the
trolls, or Wikipedia haters.

Ed Poor, you mentioned recently that you would be able to
un-ban me if this small group blocked me. Your help would
be of great assistance now!

Robert (RK)

*********

You have attempted to edit a page, either by clicking the
"edit this page" tab or by following a red link.

Your user name or IP address has been blocked by
Jwrosenzweig.

The reason given is this:
Banned for 4 months from Wikipedia in compliance with
Remedy 1 in Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/RK, as the
case is now officially closed

You can email Jwrosenzweig or one of the other
administrators to discuss the block.

_______________________________
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subject:
[WikiEN-l] Objecting to hatespeech is grounds for being banned?
	Huh?!

body:
A small group of hateful people banned me for no reason.
In response, Fred Bauder made this incoherent personal
attack:

> But just today on [[Talk:Holocaust denial examined]]
> you made the following edit:
> ":::HistoryBuffEr, you are clearly makin anti-Semitic
>  and ad homenim attacks towards Jay, and you are pushing
> a Nazi agenda. Your edits will be reverted.
> [[User:RK|RK]] 17:58, Oct 14, 2004 (UTC)"

> Now, you may be right. I don't follow the edits in this
> area, but still a personal attack. I would have banned
> you long ago, but played no role in the arbitration
> case. May I suggest you take what happened as a lesson
> and learn from it and when you come back take a lighter
> attitude and have some fun instead of the constant
> uproar.

I am shocked by Fred's lies and condoning of anti-Semitic
personal attacks.  HistoryBuffEr has repeatedly been
filling Wikipedia with multiple ad homenim anti-Semitic
attacks, all of which use anti-Semitic terminology straight
from Jew-Watch, a Nazi website.  In response, MANY
Wikipedia users have condemned this person for his
outrageous behaviour, and it now looks like he may be
banned.

Yet out of all the people who have been condemning his
anti-Semitic attacks, Fred Bauder picks on me alone, and
dishonestly pretends that I am somehow attacking people?
Huh?

As far as I can tell, Fred Bauder thinks that it is Ok to
come onto Wikipedia, harasss people, revert pages, create
flame wars, and use racist hatespeech.  And no ban.  But
when multiple people object to such behaviour, Fred uses
this as a reason to ban me?  And then says that I should
have "fun" with this kind of Jew-baiting?

This is precisely the kind of anti-Jewish rhetoric that I
was complaining about last year.  No one on this list ever
bans people for racist hatespeech, even when they admit to
being a Nazi (like Mr. Natural Health), or even when they
use Neo-Nazi JewWatch tactics, like HistoryBuffEr.  Yet
objecting to this gross abuse someone is grounds for a ban?

Is obecting to wife-beating worse than beating one's wife?

It is no wonder that Wikipedia is getting a bad rep, and
this latest incident will only convince the world at large
that Wikipedia doesn't work, and is controlled by hateful
extremists.  Fred's outrageous blame-the-Jew-victim
mentality is an example of Wikipedia at its utter worst.

Robert (RK)

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subject: [WikiEN-l] 4 out of 9 is grounds for a ban?

body:
I note with some astonishment that out of the nine Sysops
originally set up to "judge" me, only four ever made it to
the point of voting to ban me.

Four out of nine is enough for a ban?  Despite the
following seven facts?  I guess it is enough for a ban, in
a dictatorship.

1* I am not involved in any flame wars.  So why the ban?

2* I am not involved in any revert wars or edit wars. So
why the ban?

3* The supposed problems are in articles in which the
articles HAVE ALREADY BEEN RESOLVED, long ago!  So why the
ban?

4* I repeatedly take week-long (or longer) Wiki-breaks
(like the last 10 days) to let things cool down and allow
other people to have their say without any problem.  So why
the ban?

5* I have taken many contentious articles OFF of my
Watchlist, and simply let others do what they want, rather
then engage in multiple arguments.  So why the ban?

6* I have asked for and successfully used mediation when
necessary.  So why the ban?

7* I have been successfully working with a large group of
others on potentially acrimonious articles, without revert
wars, and with great progress being made on many articles.
So why the ban?

To be fair, Fred Bauder claims that objecting to
anti-Semitic hatespeech is grounds for a ban, and counts as
being in a flame war.  That's not rational or fair, but
Fred says it is Wikipedia policy and that he would vote for
a ban.  So I fully expect all the people who similarly
condemned HistoryBuffEr to be banned by tommorow, right?

If not, it is just more evidence that four people hate me,
out of over ten thousand Wikipedia contributors.

Robert (RK)

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from_name: Rebecca

subject: [WikiEN-l] Administrator Abuse

body:
The latter certainly sounds like vandalism in my book, even if the
former narrowly escapes that definition.

-- ambi

On Wed, 13 Oct 2004 22:57:34 -0500, Phil Sandifer
<sandifer at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
> Indeed, Oronto was not a vandal.
>
> He was a troll, a POV pusher, and a moron. His countless good faith
> edits amount to less than 50, all of which either involved adding a
> sentence accusing Nietzsche of "absurd and childish hatred of women"
> (Which he insisted was a NPOV characterization) or adding the {{test}}
> message to the userpage of anyone who reverted him.
>
> This is not vandalism.
>
> Now, having established that, good riddance.
>
> -Snowspinner
>
>
>
> On Oct 13, 2004, at 10:38 PM, Polytarp! wrote:
>
> > To whom it may concern (and it should concern everyone!):
> >
> > I have reason(s) to believe that one or more of the administrator(s)
> > of the Wikipaedia Online Encyclopaedia, owned and/or operated by (the)
> > Wikemaedia Foundation, Inc./Org./Co., has violated one (1) or more
> > (>1) of Wikipaedia's or/and (the) Wikimaedia Foundation,
> > Inc./Co./Org.'s rules &/| regulations.  I was prompted to believe this
> > by the following message, which appeared when I attempted to make a
> > delightful, beneficial, truthful, and good (though not necessarily in
> > that order) addition to an article about that most lovable and eminent
> > among preemnient German philosophers, Friedrick Nietzsche the First
> > (1st):
> >
> > ...
> >
> > Your user name or IP address has been blocked by RickK.
> >
> > The reason given is this:
> > all of user\'s edits are vandalism -- was blocked, came back, and
> > immediately began vandalizing again
> >
> > ...
> >
> > Everyone who reads this message is someone who cares about Wikipedia.
> > We all enjoy contributing to it, and do so in the best of faith, and
> > are determined to make it grow and succeed.  Imagine the shock-horror
> > any one (1) of us would feel upon being excluded from doing so by an
> > apparently malicious stranger.
> >
> > I knew that none of my\ edits were vandalism.  All were made in good
> > faith and with the foremost intention of improving the Wikipaedia.  I
> > therefore figured that it was a mistake; perhaps, as another part of
> > the message suggested, "...[a user] with a [dynamic IP had been]
> > blocked accidentally, due to that fact that [his] present IP [had
> > been] previously used by a blocked user."  To verify whether or not
> > this was the case, I went to the block list to check.  It was then I
> > learned the ban wasn't an accident.  Someone going by the name of Erl,
> > RickK had banned me indefinitely and purposely:
> >
> > 22:06, 9 Oct 2004, RickK blocked Ute Oronto (expires indefinite)
> > (contribs) (all of user\'s edits are vandalism -- was blocked, came
> > back, and immediately began vandalizing again)
> >
> > Who was this RickK?  Who would ban a user who had made countless
> > useful good faith edits, and call these malicious acts of vandalism?
> > Who could be so kerlish?
> >
> > It was then I remembered:  The day or so previous, I had reverted some
> > vandalism inflicted upon the Neva article.  Someone had removed the
> > Geo-stub template.  I replaced it, and checked to see who the errant
> > user could be.  Noting that it was a long time user, who should know
> > better, I added him to the vandalism and progress list and went on
> > with my day.
> >
> > Could this have been the same person as the one who banned me?  I
> > checked.  It was him, apparently seeking to quiet me and to enact
> > vengence upon me.
> >
> > However, I (capital i, not number one) refuse to be quiet about this
> > issue.  I'm E-mailing all of you this so that we'll no longer have
> > administrators who feel free to vandalize Wikipaedia and then silence
> > users who object by banning them indefinitely for supposedly commiting
> > the very same Wikicraeme.
> >
> > Lovingly yours,
> >
> > Ute Oronto.
> > _______________________________________________
> > WikiEN-l mailing list
> > WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
> >
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Hateful ban shows that Wikipedia is flawed almost
	beyond hope

body:
Robert,

You claim "I am not involved in any flame wars."

But just today on [[Talk:Holocaust denial examined]] you made the following
edit: ":::HistoryBuffEr, you are clearly makin anti-Semitic and ad homenim
attacks towards Jay, and you are pushing a Nazi agenda. Your edits will be
reverted. [[User:RK|RK]] 17:58, Oct 14, 2004 (UTC)"

Now, you may be right. I don't follow the edits in this area, but still a
personal attack. I would have banned you long ago, but played no role in the
arbitration case. May I suggest you take what happened as a lesson and learn
from it and when you come back take a lighter attitude and have some fun
instead of the constant uproar.

Fred

> From: Robert <rkscience100 at yahoo.com>
> Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Thu, 14 Oct 2004 15:28:51 -0700 (PDT)
> To: Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com>, wikien-l at wikipedia.org
> Subject: [WikiEN-l] Hateful ban shows that Wikipedia is flawed almost beyond
> hope
>
> The banned users "Mr. Natural Health", Simonides, and
> Raul654, along with Zero, have succeeded in banning me from
> Wikipedia for four months. They had absolutely no reason to
> do so, but they did it out of sheer hatred and malice.
>
> I find their behaviour dishonest, shocking and unjustified.
> A few weeks ago Jimbo wrote and said that I am not going to
> be banned, and that I was just being hysterical.  Yet
> Raul654 told me that Jimbo had authoried this ban.  Someone
> was clearly lying, and I am sure that it was Raul who was
> not being honest.
>
> Ironically, this uncalled for ban occurs on the heels of a
> long discussion, in which most of us recognized that
> several troublemakers were pushing away long-time Wikipedia
> contributors, and allowing trolls to run wild. Apparently,
> the clique who banned me is trying to make certain that the
> trolls run the asylum.  Now Mr. Natural Health, Simonides
> and their sock-puppets can do huge amounts of damage yet
> again.
>
> Consider the following seven facts. Has anyone EVER been
> banned from Wikipedia for such a huge amount of time in
> such cases?  NEVER.  Not once.  There is clearly a lynch
> mob that hates me, lead by Mr. Natural Health and
> Simonides, two anti-Semites, one of whom even publicly
> admitted to being a Nazi.  (Yet he wasn't banned for that,
> but I have been banned for complaining about their
> harassment.)
>
> Facts about this case.
>
> 1* I am not involved in any flame wars.  So why the ban?
>
> 2* I am not involved in any revert wars or edit wars. So
> why the ban?
>
> 3* The supposed problems are in articles in which the
> articles HAVE ALREADY BEEN RESOLVED, long ago!  So why the
> ban?
>
> 4* I repeatedly take week-long (or longer) Wiki-breaks
> (like the last 10 days) to let things cool down and allow
> other people to have their say without any problem.  So why
> the ban?
>
> 5* I have taken many contentious articles OFF of my
> Watchlist, and simply let others do what they want, rather
> then engage in multiple arguments.  So why the ban?
>
> 6* I have asked for and successfully used mediation when
> necessary.  So why the ban?
>
> 7* I have been successfully working with a large group of
> others on potentially acrimonious articles, without revert
> wars, and with great progress being made on many articles.
> So why the ban?
>
> Folks, this is a clear abuse of the system by a small group
> of people who hate me.  And it won't go unnoticed by the
> trolls, or Wikipedia haters.
>
> Ed Poor, you mentioned recently that you would be able to
> un-ban me if this small group blocked me. Your help would
> be of great assistance now!
>
>
> Robert (RK)
>
> *********
>
> You have attempted to edit a page, either by clicking the
> "edit this page" tab or by following a red link.
>
> Your user name or IP address has been blocked by
> Jwrosenzweig.
>
> The reason given is this:
> Banned for 4 months from Wikipedia in compliance with
> Remedy 1 in Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/RK, as the
> case is now officially closed
>
> You can email Jwrosenzweig or one of the other
> administrators to discuss the block.
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Declare Yourself - Register online to vote today!
> http://vote.yahoo.com
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


from_name: Emmanuel Engelhart

subject: [Wikitech-l] New feature to win the win the vandalism battle

body:
Hi

I propose to add a new feature, to improve our fight again vandalism.
I mean a diff, for watchlist articles, between the current version and the last
read one.

I need opinion about the feature ?
and about an elegant technical solution too ?

Emmanuel Engelhart [Kelson]


from_name: Viktor Horvath

body:
Hello everybody,

I'm a German student living in Paris for one year. I've learned Latin and
Ancient Greek at school, so occasionally, I like to glance into a bilingual
book. But sometimes it's impossible to find a bilingual version of a
particular work, say, some books of Seneca; or they are extremely expensive
or just badly translated. While I'm not good enough to translate an entire
Latin book, it'd be great fun to translate some parts, and I'd think that
many people who once learned ancient languages share this feeling. After
all, this way you could actually USE what you've learned. Fans and Texts of
ancient literature are hopelessly scattered through the Web, one text here
and part of a translation there.

Could it be possible to set up a Wiki containing some
Latin/Greek/Arabian/whatever philosophy (or other content) whose copyright
has expired for a long time - be it by typing in old editions or by taking
over some Gutenberg content - and displaying it one paragraph per page,
giving the viewer the possibility to translate it into his native language?
I guess some specific features would be helpful, such as allowing two
translations in the same language to coexist (call them "English version,
showing John's translations where possible" and the same thing for Jim), as
there will never be "the one correct version". In addition, it would be nice
to create a bilingual PDF for printing.

As I'm a student living in a small chamber with only two hours of Internet
access from Monday till Friday, it is impossible for me to create such a
thing. There will be lots of other ideas and feature requests; for me it
doesn't matter if this will be a new project or integrated into Wikibooks or
something completely different. I just wanted to present this idea; maybe
someone "mightier than me" likes it, too: using your knowledge of humanism
to actually exert humanism, translating some of the oldest and greatest
works of mankind to be accessible free of charge by nowadays' mankind.

Have a nice day,
Viktor.

--
GMX ProMail mit bestem Virenschutz http://www.gmx.net/de/go/mail
+++ Empfehlung der Redaktion +++ Internet Professionell 10/04 +++


body:
Tim Starling wrote:
> Why are you all explaining to him how to delete his entire wiki? He
> asked how to clear the cache, not destroy the site.

Domas has explained to me via IRC that he was joking, although I think
$dbw->query("delete from cur") is a joke likely to be lost on the
average user.

Instead try:

wfQuery("delete from cur", DB_WRITE);

;)

-- Tim Starling


from_name: Bryan Derksen

subject: [WikiEN-l] Administrator Abuse

body:
At 12:12 PM 10/14/2004 -0700, Mike Halterman wrote:

>Okay, now that's just daft.
>
>Rick <giantsrick13 at yahoo.com> wrote:He also insists on editing the
>[[Neva]] article by saying that the water from the river tastes like Rasputin.
>
>RickK

Yeah. Rasputin tastes _nothing_ like Neva river water.


body:
2 of the 9 arbitrators had recused themselves, so only 7 heard the case.

Fred

> From: Robert <rkscience100 at yahoo.com>
> Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Thu, 14 Oct 2004 16:23:23 -0700 (PDT)
> To: wikien-l at Wikipedia.org
> Subject: [WikiEN-l] 4 out of 9 is grounds for a ban?
>
> I note with some astonishment that out of the nine Sysops
> originally set up to "judge" me, only four ever made it to
> the point of voting to ban me.
>
> Four out of nine is enough for a ban?  Despite the
> following seven facts?  I guess it is enough for a ban, in
> a dictatorship.
>
>
> 1* I am not involved in any flame wars.  So why the ban?
>
> 2* I am not involved in any revert wars or edit wars. So
> why the ban?
>
> 3* The supposed problems are in articles in which the
> articles HAVE ALREADY BEEN RESOLVED, long ago!  So why the
> ban?
>
> 4* I repeatedly take week-long (or longer) Wiki-breaks
> (like the last 10 days) to let things cool down and allow
> other people to have their say without any problem.  So why
> the ban?
>
> 5* I have taken many contentious articles OFF of my
> Watchlist, and simply let others do what they want, rather
> then engage in multiple arguments.  So why the ban?
>
> 6* I have asked for and successfully used mediation when
> necessary.  So why the ban?
>
> 7* I have been successfully working with a large group of
> others on potentially acrimonious articles, without revert
> wars, and with great progress being made on many articles.
> So why the ban?
>
>
> To be fair, Fred Bauder claims that objecting to
> anti-Semitic hatespeech is grounds for a ban, and counts as
> being in a flame war.  That's not rational or fair, but
> Fred says it is Wikipedia policy and that he would vote for
> a ban.  So I fully expect all the people who similarly
> condemned HistoryBuffEr to be banned by tommorow, right?
>
> If not, it is just more evidence that four people hate me,
> out of over ten thousand Wikipedia contributors.
>
>
> Robert (RK)
>
>
>
>
> __________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Yahoo! Mail Address AutoComplete - You start. We finish.
> http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail
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> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


from_name: Christopher Mahan

body:
--- Robert <rkscience100 at yahoo.com> wrote:

> If not, it is just more evidence that four people hate me,
> out of over ten thousand Wikipedia contributors.

boo hoo.

Don't you have some work to do to pay the rent/mortgage?

=====
Chris Mahan
818.943.1850 cell
chris_mahan at yahoo.com
chris.mahan at gmail.com
http://www.christophermahan.com/

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from_name: Yann Forget

body:
Le Thursday 14 October 2004 19:46, Delirium a ?crit :
> Viktor Horvath wrote:
> >Could it be possible to set up a Wiki containing some
> >Latin/Greek/Arabian/whatever philosophy (or other content) whose copyright
> >has expired for a long time - be it by typing in old editions or by taking
> >over some Gutenberg content - and displaying it one paragraph per page,
> >giving the viewer the possibility to translate it into his native
> > language? I guess some specific features would be helpful, such as
> > allowing two translations in the same language to coexist (call them
> > "English version, showing John's translations where possible" and the
> > same thing for Jim), as there will never be "the one correct version". In
> > addition, it would be nice to create a bilingual PDF for printing.

Yes, that's a great idea.

> This sounds great to me.  Would this be acceptable at wikisource without
> starting a fully new project?  I know the original source texts would
> be, but are original translations okay, or is that project strictly for
> verbatim source texts?

Of course translations are accepted.

> A related project that's been mentioned on this list is support for
> annotations (a footnote-like system), which I think any translation
> project would need---there are often nuances and controversies in
> translation that can't be fully resolved in the text, but should be
> noted for those who are interested (and there are likely to be so many
> that they need to be noted as attachments to the text like footnotes,
> not scattered on the talk page).

There is no possibility to have footnotes now in MediaWiki like it exists in
LaTeX. That would be a must for this kind of texts.

> -Mark

Regards,
Yann
--
http://www.non-violence.org/ | Site collaboratif sur la non-violence
http://www.forget-me.net/ | Alternatives sur le Net
http://fr.wikipedia.org/ | Encyclop?die libre
http://www.forget-me.net/pro/ | Formations et services Linux


body:
On 14 Oct 2004, at 21:32, Yann Forget wrote:

> Le Thursday 14 October 2004 19:46, Delirium a ?crit :
>> A related project that's been mentioned on this list is support for
>> annotations (a footnote-like system), which I think any translation
>> project would need---there are often nuances and controversies in
>> translation that can't be fully resolved in the text, but should be
>> noted for those who are interested (and there are likely to be so many
>> that they need to be noted as attachments to the text like footnotes,
>> not scattered on the talk page).
>
> There is no possibility to have footnotes now in MediaWiki like it
> exists in
> LaTeX. That would be a must for this kind of texts.
>
>> -Mark
>
> Regards,
> Yann

While it's not on par with LaTeX footnotes, (and while few people are
aware of this) the possibility to use footnotes in Wikipedia/MediaWiki
does exist:
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Footnotes
It works quite well, actually.

Here
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tse_Hsi#Names
is an example of heavy use of such annotation (admittedly, they're not
proper ''foot''notes here).

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


from_name: Michael Snow

subject: [WikiEN-l] How the Arbitration Committee can reduce revert wars

body:
In the past few weeks we have seen a glut of page protections triggered
by revert wars. Very often these involve the same group of users
pursuing their tactics on different pages. I have seen people say, as an
explanation for protecting a page, "the usual suspects". The problem is
that a small core of people have decided to blatantly disregard the
three revert rule.

I think the Arbitration Committee can deal with this problem, and I am
calling on it to do so. Responding to a similar situation several months
ago, it imposed a revert parole on Wik, and later Cantus, that allowed
these users to be blocked for 24 hours whenever they violated the three
revert rule. Since then, Cantus has continued to contribute but not
caused nearly as many problems, while Wik unfortunately chose to depart.
I have presented a case to the Arbitration Committee involving three of
our most frequent revert warriors. I am asking for only one thing: that
these users be placed on the same kind of revert parole.

Very nearly all Wikipedians follow the three revert rule voluntarily.
When users prove that they are not willing to respect our rules, the
community should be given the ability to enforce them. I welcome anyone
who would like to express their support for this request on the
arbitration page.

--Michael Snow


from_name: Anthere

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Re: Hateful ban shows that Wikipedia is flawed almost
	beyond hope

body:
One comment :

1.1) RK is banned from editing Wikipedia for four months. In the time he
is banned, he will be required to do 'community service' work on
Wikibooks on topics exclusively related to biology.

Fortunately, this did not pass.

I do not think "required to do community service" is a good idea in a
project which is only happening thanks to volunteer work.

"Suggested to bring his expertise on biological topics" is a much more
positive approach.


subject: [Foundation-l] Wikinews

body:
I thank you Erik for this clearer proposal.
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikinews

I have two comments to make with regards to it.

"A Wikinews project in a language will be started under two conditions: a) that the language is accepted as one of the Wikimedia project languages, b) that there is at least one person who expresses an interest in working on that language edition."

I wish that this requirement is modified.
One person interested is not enough if only for one single reason : if only one person is editor, he will also have to be the one person making all policies, and the one doing the validation and publication. There will be no feedback and no control. No discussion either.
This is not a wiki, but a blog.
This mean that any pov pusher can ask for a wikinews, announced himself big chief, and go wild.

So, I would like that this requirement is a bit changed, so as to increase the number of minimal interested people. Note that if 5 people are found, and only 1 contribute, we find ourselves in the same situation.

And this is doubly dangerous, as the articles will be protected after a while.

--------------

The second point has to do with liability. If an article contains an error, but may not be corrected after a week, we will be liable.
And this time, we wont be able to say "there is a incorrect statement ? Please, do correct it".
Putting a correction in an attached page wont do it either. Because other sites will use our content, and they are not likely to bother go check error corrections mentionned in another page. This type of "correction" work well in paper journal. It just is not okay online.

Anthere

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subject: [Foundation-l] Wikinews


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Re: Objecting to hatespeech is grounds for being banned?
	Huh?!

body:
I would like that no flame war starts on this list.
Robert is currently very shocked. Just let him voice his opinion once
for all, and let us be done with it. Please refrain from blowing on the
flame. It is not pleasant for anyone.

-------

Also, I just looked at Robert user page and talk page, and there is no
notification of the ban. I am quite surprised of that.  Why not ?

Incidently, Robert, since you will not be able to edit your user page
and your user talk page, you may wish that they are left in a certain
state. I am not entirely sure you were given the time to fix your space.
If you wish to change them in any way, I just wanted to tell you I would
be willing to do it for you.


from_name: Sheepdog

subject: [Wikitech-l] a editing problem

body:
hello again

I have following problem - i installed my wiki more or less successfull but there is still a problem there
Everything looks fine  (no error messages) but if i search for something in the new wiki,
the "search results" page i get does not contain the "edit" link - so i can not edit any artikles
or create the new ones. Even logged in as sysop. Does anybody had the same problem ?


from_name: Ray Saintonge

body:
Delirium wrote:

> Viktor Horvath wrote:
>
>> Could it be possible to set up a Wiki containing some
>> Latin/Greek/Arabian/whatever philosophy (or other content) whose
>> copyright
>> has expired for a long time - be it by typing in old editions or by
>> taking
>> over some Gutenberg content - and displaying it one paragraph per page,
>> giving the viewer the possibility to translate it into his native
>> language?
>
I would hope that one could have pages that are longer than one
paragraph.  My own preference would be to have the ability to have two
or more versions that could be scrolled in synchrony beside each other.

>> I guess some specific features would be helpful, such as allowing two
>> translations in the same language to coexist (call them "English
>> version,
>> showing John's translations where possible" and the same thing for
>> Jim), as
>> there will never be "the one correct version". In addition, it would
>> be nice
>> to create a bilingual PDF for printing.
>
> This sounds great to me.  Would this be acceptable at wikisource
> without starting a fully new project?  I know the original source
> texts would be, but are original translations okay, or is that project
> strictly for verbatim source texts?

It fits in perfectly with my vision of Wikisource.  In theory this is
one way in which Wikisource could be superior to other e-text
suppliers.  There is bound to be some blurring of the line between
Wikisource and Wikibooks.

> A related project that's been mentioned on this list is support for
> annotations (a footnote-like system), which I think any translation
> project would need---there are often nuances and controversies in
> translation that can't be fully resolved in the text, but should be
> noted for those who are interested (and there are likely to be so many
> that they need to be noted as attachments to the text like footnotes,
> not scattered on the talk page).

Wikimedia does not do a good job with footnotes.  Having to srcoll way
down to the bottom of the page to see a footnote can be very
inconvenient with a long text.  It's often a good thing to be able to
see both the referring text and the footnote at the same time.  Again,
this is something where having synchronized boxes would be very helpful.

Ec


subject: [WikiEN-l] Administrator Abuse

body:
Mike Halterman wrote:

>Okay, now that's just daft.
>
>Rick <giantsrick13 at yahoo.com> wrote:He also insists on editing the [[Neva]] article by saying that the water from the river tastes like Rasputin.
>
>
It sounds like a Russian version of the "Big Rock Candy Mountain",
except that it's vodka instead of whisky that's flowing. :-)

Ec


from_name: Erik Moeller

subject: [Foundation-l] Wikinews translation request

body:
This page:

        http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikinews

now contains five basic requirements for the launch of Wikinews, as
outlined in my previous message:
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/foundation-l/2004-October/001228.html

Most specific policy ideas have been moved to

        http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikinews/Thinktank

and are considered non-binding, should the project be approved. This
allows us to evaluate whether the community wants Wikinews to start, and
to let us then concentrate on how to do it, using the ideas we have
collected as inspiration. The vote will take place on:

        http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikinews/Vote

starting October 22, 2004, 20:00 UTC. Until then, I ask people to
translate these pages into other languages. I have also put this call for
translations on [[m:Translation requests]]. Is there any other page I
should use?

On October 22, I will announce the vote in many places to get as much
interest as possible.

Regards,

Erik


from_name: Angela

body:
On 15 Oct 2004 03:31:00 +0200, Erik Moeller <erik_moeller at gmx.de> wrote:

Is there any other page I should use? [to announce translations]

Yes, there's also at translators-l at wikimedia.org. See
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/translators-l for details
or to subscribe.

I've forwarded your email there.

Angela.


from_name: Sj

subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews and other stuff

body:
Just a few examples :

Video. Course materials such as problem sets, exams, etc.  There would
be an extra layer of interactivity for some of these things; login to
take an exam, receive questions randomized from a large list, take a
timed test, and see your score afterwards.  Public reviews of
submitted work.

There's a lot that can be learned from a public review -- be it a
review of code, a problem set, a translation or proofreading effort,
aa research paper or a page of creative writing.  And even more can be
learned from masterclasses -- experts coming to review the work of
talented contributors.  Most of this can be captured on-wiki.

Much of this is temporal, unlike the content in most books.   And
while all content (even an encyclopedia or dictionary) could be
captured between the covers of a book, this does not make wikibooks
the right place for all other wikimedia projects.

+sj+

On Fri, 15 Oct 2004 11:40:21 +0200, Andre Engels <andreengels at gmail.com> wrote:
> But if it can't offer those, then I would like to repeat Robin's
> question: What would wikiversity offer that wikibooks doesn't? That's
> no negativity, that's a legitimate question. Apparently it is NOT
> dems, pracs and class discussions. So what is it?
>
> Andre Engels


subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews and other stuff


body:
On Fri, 15 Oct 2004 00:55:47 +0200, Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> One comment :
>
> 1.1) RK is banned from editing Wikipedia for four months. In the time he
> is banned, he will be required to do 'community service' work on
> Wikibooks on topics exclusively related to biology.
>
> Fortunately, this did not pass.

Yes, this was a bizarre suggestion.  Perhaps the next suggested remedy
will require financial donations in reparation, before restoring a
long-time user's editing privileges.  In combination with proposed
measure 4, and the repeated lack of thoughtfulness towards the subject
(not informing him of either the start of the arbitration case or its
conclusion), this left an awfully sour taste in my mouth.  Could one
of the arbiters respond to sannse's question at the bottom of the talk
page for the proposed decision?

 http://en.wikipedia.org/Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_arbitration/RK/Proposed_decision

+sj+


subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews and other stuff

body:
CC would be wonderful.  Anything wrong with CC-by?
Any other particulars people would like in a 'special' CC license?

--sj--

On Fri, 15 Oct 2004 18:05:45 +0800, Andrew Lih <andrew.lih at gmail.com> wrote:
> We've recenly found GFDL to be a headache, and most wished that CC
> existed at the start of WP so we could use it. Now that we're starting
> Wikinews from scratch, is there any reason to stick with GFDL, other
> than familiarity? I like the CC or special Wikimedia route. Perhaps we
> could get Lessig to help craft one appropriate to our needs.
>
> -Andrew (User:Fuzheado)
>

--
 _ _ :-------.-.--------.--.--------.-.--------.--.--------[...]


subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews and other stuff


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Re: Objecting to hatespeech is grounds for being
	banned? Huh?!

body:
On Fri, 15 Oct 2004 20:20:09 +1000, Rebecca <misfitgirl at gmail.com> wrote:
> While I have no problem with his ban, it is inclined to look
> ridiculous when compared against the treatment of some of those RK has
> clashed with, who have been far worse, and that now gives him
> something to complain about. Consistency should be king.

Agreed on both counts.  It is frustrating when the outcome of a series of
decisions is that people who obviously care about the project, and have
contributed greatly to it -- but have a hard time expressing it civilly or
manipulating rules -- are treated the same way, or worse, than people
who obviously don't care about the project, have only recently arrived or
contributed little of note, but are skilful at manipulating rules to their
advantage.

--
+sj+


body:
On Fri, 15 Oct 2004 12:25:30 +0200, Jens Ropers <ropers at ropersonline.com> wrote:
> On 15 Oct 2004, at 12:04, Ray Saintonge wrote:
>
> > Wikimedia does not do a good job with footnotes.  Having to srcoll way
> > down to the bottom of the page to see a footnote can be very
> > inconvenient with a long text.
>
> You don't have to scroll down, at least not manually.
> You just click on the superscript number. And hit backspace when
> finished reading the footnote.

Or better yet, link the number at the start of the footnote to its
position in the text.
But MediaWiki doesn't support autonumbered or auto-positioned
footnotes yet, at all...
It would in general be useful to edit the footnote along with the relevant text.

< Cf.:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Footnotes

--
+sj+


from_name: Poor, Edmund W

subject: [WikiEN-l] Why didn't you ask for help? (was: Hateful ban)

body:
RK,

Perhaps I was less than clear. My offer to un-ban you was CONDITIONAL on
your seeking out my advice and following it. My promise was (and still
is):

* No one who seeks out my help and follows my advice ever comes to harm.

I have had no messages from you, either in private e-mail, the Wikipedia
mailing list, or the Wikipedia website. I can't help someone who refuses
to communicate.

Now I must ask you the same question I asked Lir:

* What advice of mine did you ever follow?

Sadly,

Ed Poor


from_name: Fred Bauder

body:
RK, despite his long record of transgression, getting away with it with
seeming impunity, WAS one of our failures to be consistant.

Fred

> From: John Lee <johnleemk at gawab.com>
> Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Fri, 15 Oct 2004 21:54:23 +0800
> To: Sj <2.718281828 at gmail.com>, English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Re: Objecting to hatespeech is grounds for
> being banned? Huh?!
>
> I am in complete agreement with the sentiments expressed in both emails
> below.
>
> John Lee
> ([[User:Johnleemk]])
>
> Sj wrote:
>
>> On Fri, 15 Oct 2004 20:20:09 +1000, Rebecca <misfitgirl at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>> While I have no problem with his ban, it is inclined to look
>>> ridiculous when compared against the treatment of some of those RK has
>>> clashed with, who have been far worse, and that now gives him
>>> something to complain about. Consistency should be king.
>>>
>>>
>>
>> Agreed on both counts.  It is frustrating when the outcome of a series of
>> decisions is that people who obviously care about the project, and have
>> contributed greatly to it -- but have a hard time expressing it civilly or
>> manipulating rules -- are treated the same way, or worse, than people
>> who obviously don't care about the project, have only recently arrived or
>> contributed little of note, but are skilful at manipulating rules to their
>> advantage.
>>
>>
>>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


body:
Angela-
> Yes, there's also at translators-l at wikimedia.org. See
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/translators-l for details
> or to subscribe.

I vaguely remember reading about this, but it was not listed at
mail.wikimedia.org, so I added it there. Perhaps mail.wikimedia.org should
really redirect to a page on the foundation wiki? Currently it's only
editable by developers.

Regards,

Erik


from_name: Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales

body:
Robert wrote:
> A few weeks ago Jimbo wrote and said that I am not going to
> be banned, and that I was just being hysterical.  Yet
> Raul654 told me that Jimbo had authoried this ban.  Someone
> was clearly lying, and I am sure that it was Raul who was
> not being honest.

Robert, I'm astounded to see you twist the facts in this way.

1.  First, I never said that you would not be banned.  Please refer
to my actual words:

http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2004-September/030743.html

You expressed a concern *nearly a month ago* that you might be banned
"any moment now, for absolutely no reason at all".  This was not true
then, and it is not what happened.  You were banned after the rather
excruciatingly long due process that we give to such things around
here.

2.  It is true in some sense that I "authorized this ban", since I
have delegated decision making to the ArbCom in cases of this sort.
They are instructed to follow the rules of Wikipedia in deciding such
things, and I'm confident in this case that they have done so.

--Jimbo


subject: [Wikipedia-l] de:Wikipedia edges out Britannica (among others)

body:
The de: Wikipedia recently underwent its second professional content
test, this time overseen by Die Zeit, Germany's leading weekly
newspaper.  And friends, this "popular dispenser of knowledge on the
Internet", this "desert of text", is HOT.  While it is "completely
without [multi]media" and "does not support complex search queries",
it "stands in first place when it comes to text content," receiving
top aggregate marks in three broad content categories -- Natural
Science and Technology, Humanities and Social Science, and Culture --
matched only by Encarta Professional.  Moreover, its "lead in current
events is a mile wide".

This review was longer than the c't review -- seven terms in each of
21 fields -- but the article was shorter and less detailed.  Die ZEIT
was kind enough to extend the comparison to include both smaller
German encyclopedias (Data Becker, aimed at a younger audience, and
Universallexikon) and the English-language Britannica 2005 DVD.
Britannica, she of the "legendary 32-volume set,"  took top marks in
the sciences, but fell down when it came to sports and, most notably,
current events.  All the same, "the 165,000 well-sorted Web links
alone are worth the price".

As to that perennial bugbear, editorial responsibility, the reviewers
tackle it with bold eloquence:

    "Those concerned with the quality of [Wikipedia] articles,
   because no established editorship takes responsibility for
   them, can rest at ease: we had most of the Wikipedia articles
   we examined judged separately by specialists in their
   respective fields, and they were thoroughly done. The texts
   still have gaps here and there, but they make up for it
   elsewhere with precise and detailed descriptions. And
   everyone can engage himself as a gap-filler: clicking on the
   link "edit this article" makes the reader an author."

It's enough to make me want to be a first-time author all over again.

Original article : http://www.zeit.de/2004/43/C-Enzyklop_8adien-Test
(English translation available onli^B^B^B^B on request.)

--
+sj+


body:
Just to inject a bit of legal formalism here, if RK had sought and
followed Ed's advice, and the arbcom banned him anyway, and Ed
unblocked him anyway, Ed would be in the wrong.  We have worked very
hard to put into place the "rule of law" as opposed to arbitrary
individual bans/unbans, and I intend to vigorously defend that.

--Jimbo

Poor, Edmund W wrote:

> RK,
>
> Perhaps I was less than clear. My offer to un-ban you was CONDITIONAL on
> your seeking out my advice and following it. My promise was (and still
> is):
>
> * No one who seeks out my help and follows my advice ever comes to harm.
>
> I have had no messages from you, either in private e-mail, the Wikipedia
> mailing list, or the Wikipedia website. I can't help someone who refuses
> to communicate.
>
> Now I must ask you the same question I asked Lir:
>
> * What advice of mine did you ever follow?
>
> Sadly,
>
> Ed Poor
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

--
"La n??fle est un fruit." - first words of 50,000th article on fr.wikipedia.org


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Image tarball

body:
> I ignore anything in the tarballs that doesn't match [0-9a-f]/../
> Cuts out a lot of dross.
> We are moving into DVD space.
< How are we going to carry the bandwidth around?

Another reason to have rough estimations of content quality, and also
for content depth -- so people who need 100M of the most important
content can get it.  We could also offer thumbnail-only images for a
reduced image tarball...

--
+sj+


subject: [WikiEN-l] Red Herring article on wiki wars

body:
http://www.redherring.com/Article.aspx?a=10909&hed=Wiki+wars

Makes it sound as though we will have professional editors next year, hmmm.
When will someone write an article on Gdanzig?  Aside from a few minor
errors - the # of times arts were protected and the "Wikipedia
Foundation" - it's pretty positive.

--
+sj+


from_name: Magnus Manske

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Open Mapping

body:
Daniel Mayer wrote:

>Translating is one thing, literally tracing is very different. Tracing does not
>require any creativity at all. But as I said, the particulars in regard to GIS
>data have not been tested yet (AFAIK). The Court may find there is a compelling
>interest in giving that type of GIS data copyright protection. Thus we must
>play it safe and create our own whenever PD data is not available.
>
>
>
Well, I don't know much about GIS data, or mapping, and I'll prove that
through my following proposal :-)

Looking at a map, I see three possible structures:
* Points (coordinates and altitde), like in mountain tops, cities (their
center, at least), etc.
* Open polygons ("polyline", made from points as described above), like
rivers
* Closed polygons, for regions, states, counties, lakes, continents, etc.

A world map can be described by everything belonging to another object.
"Lake Superior" would thus belong to the next larger units, namely
Ontario,  Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan. Ontario belongs to Canada,
whereas the others belong to the US. Both Canada and the US belong to
the continent America, which belongs to the world.

The outer shape of, say, Wisconsin, can now be calculated by merging all
objects that belong to Wisconsin. Likewise, the outer shape of the NATO
can be calculated by merging all countries that belong to the NATO.
Drawing a map of a region with given coordinates can thus easily exclude
irrelevant parts by going down from world view; if Europe is not visible
on the given part of the map, it can be excluded from drawing as a
whole, speeding up map drawing.
Likewise, one could just require to show a bunch of objects ("Lake
Superior", "New York", "Ottawa"), and a rectangular view of the world
map is selected that includes all these objects; that map section is
then piped into the process above.

But how to create such a complex structure? After all, an object *might*
consist of a bunch of multiple polygons (can't think of an example right
now); it probably belongs to several objects; it might be of different
"types" (for example, "Hamburg, Germany" is both a county and a city).

I believe the best way to do this is (surprise!) through a wiki. *But*,
one that will, upon saving, analyze (parse) a page and put the contents
into a separate database, which is then used to draw the maps and do
other things (like click on a map, and it takes you to the object you
clicked on, thus a reverse-lookup).
This has the advantage to be open to practical structures. For example,
it might be a good idea to list most of the cities on the same page as
the county they're in, instead of creating thousands of one-line
"darticles" (from "data-article"). Exceptions can, of course, be made,
like "Kansas City", which belongs to both Kansas and Missouri. The
database would remember where that data came from, so one can always
find the source "darticle". [Note that this is a little different from
the wikidata concept, as there is no from to enter your data, rather a
markup which then gets parsed.]

As there are various types of data to enter, I propose a HTML/XML-like
structure (which would make parsing a breeze once the XML-parser is up
and running :-):
<mapdata>
<name>Lake Superior</name>
<type magnitude=5>lake</type>
<polygon>x,y,a;x,y,a;x,y,a;x,y,a;x,y,a</polygon>
<belongsto>Ontario</belongsto>
<belongsto>Minnesota</belongsto>
<belongsto>Wisconsin</belongsto>
<belongsto>Canada</belongsto>
</mapdata>
with x,y=coordinates, a=altitude, magnitude between 1-5, where 1 is
smallest and 5 is largest object category of that type

This schema could also work for multiple languages:
<name language="de">...</name>
For keeping data consistent, I propose that we require one <name>
without language attribute (or language="en"), which is both the English
name and the identifier in the database. Alternate names could then be
used in map drawing in different wikipedias.

For those of you concerned about Even More HTML, and that being to
complicated for newbies: I strongly believe that anyone who can take
down GPS coordinates or calculate them from a map, and go to wikipedia
to enter them, should be able to make at least the basic entry in that
manner when shown a good example first.

The final piece missing, the actual "drawing syntax" in the actual
wikipedia article, is another thing entirely, and should be discussed
separately IMHO. However, as the above schema uses labels for objects,
it would easily be possible to implement something like "show the US and
Canada; 300x300 pixel; outline the Greate Lakes in red, 3px pen; show
the US in brown; show Canada in green; show all other countries in pink;
show country borders; show rivers of magnitude 4 and 5; show mountains
of magnitude 4 and 5".

But I'm sure the mapping pros would do something entirely different.

Magnus


from_name: Daniel Mayer

subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews and other stuff

body:
--- Erik Moeller <erik_moeller at gmx.de> wrote:
> Currently I'm leaning towards it for reasons of compatibility. But I'd
> really like to ask Jimmy to give us a quick update on where the talks with
> the FSF and the Creative Commons folk stand on making the FDL 2.0 CC-SA-
> compatible.

This is very important; I just had somebody contact me about using one of my
dual-licensed (FDL / cc-by-sa) images in a book he is writing and I had to warm
him against using the image under the GNU-FDL since its mass print requirements
are relatively onerous (printing all 7 pages of the FDL being the worst part).

A GNU FDL / cc-by-sa dual licensing scheme could be used for Wikinews... But
this would eliminate the option of re-incorporating third party improvements
back into Wikinews and would also make it impractical to incorporate Wikipedia
content into Wikinews for background content (since in both cases the third
party/Wikipedia users would have to agree to dual-license their work). So what
we really need is GNU FDL and cc-by-sa compatibility ASAP.

> Yes, which is why I initially proposed Wikimedia Commons to include
> what is currently on Wikisource. I still think the two should be merged.

As do I.

> A migration to single sign-on is being worked on.

This is also very important.

</aol>

-- mav

_______________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Declare Yourself - Register online to vote today!
http://vote.yahoo.com


subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews and other stuff


from_name: Erdal Ronahi

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: One Wikipedia - two scripts

body:
Mark Williamson schrieb:

>Still wondering, is there any sort of unified standard?
>
>
Not for all dialects. For Sorani, there is a de-facto standard. It is
the dialect of Sulaymaniya, the main written language since tens of
years. There is a lot of publiations in that dialect, also education. It
is user in parts of Iraq and Iran. Educated Sorani speakers have less
difficulty with Kurmanji, because they know roman letters.

The situation is worse for Kurmanji, which is the dialect most of the
Kurdish speakers speak. Because most of them are in Turkey they are
afflicted by the Turkish state politics which has persecuted the use of
the language since the 1930's. Only in the last years there are some
publications. The situation is even worse for Zazaki, because there are
less speakers. In the south of Iran there are some more dialects
(Gorani, Hewremani) which I cannot say a lot about.

For Kurmanji there are some standards, like a roman-based alphabet and a
lot of grammar rules, which are commonly accepted. But details are still
being discussed. These dicussions have often taken place in exile in
Europe, which made them even more difficult. Standardization is a main
goal and will proceed as the political situation in Turkey improves.

But the differences between Kurmanji and Sorani are severe, and a
further standardization of Kurmanji, even if there is a tendecy towards
closing in, is likely to make these differences permanent. Kurmanji
speakers also generally do not know the arabic script so they cannot
make use of Sorani effectively.

So in short:

1. Kurmanji is most widely used, but not effectively standardized. Latin
script, moste speakers.
2. Sorani is second most widely used, has just become official language
in Iraq, well standardized, arabic script.
3. Zazaki used by less speakers, poorly standardized.
4. Little convergence of  the main dialects.

This is how I see it, others may see it differently.

For Wikipedia, we take everything as it comes and try to support
everything technically. I have switched the Monobook.css to Tahoma,
which is ok for all dialects.

>So advisory committees were formed, and they formulated proposals for
>unified versions of these languages. Currently, the Limba Sarda
>Unificata (Unified Sardinian) standard is official in the Sardinian
>province of Nugoro, and it is being promoted everywhere. Its intention
>is to be a bridge between the different dialects, a sort of linguistic
>"least common denominator" which works for everybody.
>
>
That is an interesting example how things can be done.

>even if this problem is not dealt with now, it will need to be dealt
>with by any future kurdish nation-state
>
>
If there is one. A real nation-state is not likely to develop. Even if
the Iraqi part breaks away from Iraq, that is just a small fraction of
Kurdistan (1/6). There will be no language problem, Sorani is standard
there. But the Kurmanji problem can only be solved in the north, in
Turkish Kurdistan. Kurdish politics are very very difficult.

Erdal


subject: [Foundation-l] Re: Formal request: Wikinews project

body:
Delirium wrote:
> I certainly hope it can be done in a reasonable way, but I'm wondering
> if there's been any thought as to how to differentiate this from
> Indymedia?  From what I can tell, Indymedia does use bylined reporters
> for many of its articles, but they still end up generally being, well,
> not very neutral.  Hopefully Wikinews would end up rather more credible
> than Indymedia, but how to ensure that?

I think these are reasonable questions, and I also think that there
are reasonable answers to them.

The core answer is: wiki.  By removing an ethos of "individual
ownership" over particular articles, and replacing it with an ethos of
"consensus", the sharpest edges of bias get worn down very quickly.

> But somehow it seems like it'll naturally attract more of the other sort
> of people---activists who are reporting with a particular agenda in
> mind.  That tends to lead to the facts being arranged to fit the
> pre-held agenda, rather than the other way around...

This is entirely possible, but of course, the same can be said of
wikipedia, and it is in fact a problem for us (though not terribly
much so, most of the time).  We have cases where activists camp out on
articles and make it quite difficult for alternative perspectives to
balance the presentation -- but even so, we still manage to be better
in these cases than virtually all other sources.

We live in an era when citizens have to decide which part of the media
is more dishonest: organizations like Fox News, which have dropped all
pretense of neutrality, or organizations like the New York Times or
CBS News, which have dropped the neutrality but kept the pretense.

It would be hard to be much worse than what routinely passes for
journalism these days.  And I think if we try, we can be a lot better.

--Jimbo


from_name: Mark Williamson

body:
What about Pok?mon? Did we beat all the other encyclopedias at Pok?mon? ;p

--node

On Fri, 15 Oct 2004 09:52:06 -0400, Sj <2.718281828 at gmail.com> wrote:
> The de: Wikipedia recently underwent its second professional content
> test, this time overseen by Die Zeit, Germany's leading weekly
> newspaper.  And friends, this "popular dispenser of knowledge on the
> Internet", this "desert of text", is HOT.  While it is "completely
> without [multi]media" and "does not support complex search queries",
> it "stands in first place when it comes to text content," receiving
> top aggregate marks in three broad content categories -- Natural
> Science and Technology, Humanities and Social Science, and Culture --
> matched only by Encarta Professional.  Moreover, its "lead in current
> events is a mile wide".
>
> This review was longer than the c't review -- seven terms in each of
> 21 fields -- but the article was shorter and less detailed.  Die ZEIT
> was kind enough to extend the comparison to include both smaller
> German encyclopedias (Data Becker, aimed at a younger audience, and
> Universallexikon) and the English-language Britannica 2005 DVD.
> Britannica, she of the "legendary 32-volume set,"  took top marks in
> the sciences, but fell down when it came to sports and, most notably,
> current events.  All the same, "the 165,000 well-sorted Web links
> alone are worth the price".
>
> As to that perennial bugbear, editorial responsibility, the reviewers
> tackle it with bold eloquence:
>
>     "Those concerned with the quality of [Wikipedia] articles,
>    because no established editorship takes responsibility for
>    them, can rest at ease: we had most of the Wikipedia articles
>    we examined judged separately by specialists in their
>    respective fields, and they were thoroughly done. The texts
>    still have gaps here and there, but they make up for it
>    elsewhere with precise and detailed descriptions. And
>    everyone can engage himself as a gap-filler: clicking on the
>    link "edit this article" makes the reader an author."
>
> It's enough to make me want to be a first-time author all over again.
>
> Original article : http://www.zeit.de/2004/43/C-Enzyklop_8adien-Test
> (English translation available onli^B^B^B^B on request.)
>
> --
> +sj+
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


from_name: Andre Engels

subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews and other stuff

body:
> firstly, re: wikinews, it will be released under GFDL yes? which means
> that if CNN or BBC or ABC or NZBC or the guardian or even slashdot or
> a blog wanted to reproduce our wikinews article, then they would have
> to also reproduce the entire GFDL license (or did i read the GDFL
> incorrectly), which may well be twice as long as the news article. Has
> anyone else thought of this problem and come up with any solutions.
> Other than this my position on wikinews is not active support, but
> certainly close interest.

One solution would be what Tim Starling proposed on WikiCommons: We
get our own Wikimedia license, which specifies that material under the
Wikimedia license may also be distributed under the GNU/FDL license
(as well as CC-BY-SA and perhaps others). The Wikimedia license then
could specify that mentioning "This material may be published in
changed or unchanged state under the Wikimedia license" would be
enough.

Andre Engels


subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews and other stuff


subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews and other stuff

body:
But if it can't offer those, then I would like to repeat Robin's
question: What would wikiversity offer that wikibooks doesn't? That's
no negativity, that's a legitimate question. Apparently it is NOT
dems, pracs and class discussions. So what is it?

Andre Engels

On Fri, 15 Oct 2004 18:08:42 +1000, Tim Starling
<t.starling at physics.unimelb.edu.au> wrote:
> Robin Shannon wrote:
> >fifthly, what would wikiverstiy offer that wikibooks doesnt? i fail to
> >see how a wiki is capable of producing anything that a university
> >offers other than text books (and class notes ect.). How is it going
> >to be able to do dems and pracs, and class discussions?
> >I really want to like the idea of wikiversity, but I'm gonna need some
> >clarifying before ill do that.
> >
> >
> >
> It can't offer pracs and class discussions, the proponents were very
> clear on this. There's no need to be so negative about it.


subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews and other stuff


body:
Anthere wrote:
> Today, when I got to my work place, my collegues joked me, as several of
> them had seen me on TV... Apparently, I was *such a bug* while trying to
> take pictures... that there was more of me during the TV spot than the
> minister himself. I am a bit embarassed... jeeee.

Anthere is a WikiHero.  No one can ever question this.  :-)

--Jimbo


body:
Erik Moeller wrote:
> If, within the first 7 days of voting, there is a 90% level of agreement
> or higher, the project can launch immediately. Seeing as this procedure
> may well become the standard for future Wikimedia project proposals, I
> find it important to minimize bureaucratic overhead for proposals which
> have an exceptionally high level of agreement, even if that may not be the
> case for Wikinews.
>
> Is this agreeable?

I haven't read the rest of the thread yet, but since I'm trying to
catch up today and might not get to thre rest until later this
weekend, I didn't want to hold anything up by not letting people know
how enthusiastic I am about this whole concept.

I especially strongly support Erik's proposal for a voting period and
so on, because we really must avoid the fiasco that happened after the
approval of wikispecies.

--Jimbo


body:
Michael Snow wrote:
> What I'm trying to illustrate is that in a civil action for damages, by
> the time a substantial judgment is issued, Wikimedia as a legal entity
> would be effectively dead anyway. Thanks to the copyleft licensing, the
> content would already have moved to the fork that would undoubtedly
> start, and many of the contributors would follow.

And I would be more than happy to lead the way on this.

Legal conservatism is a very good thing.  But it's important to
remember that the community is us, and the community is invincible and
unstoppable in the face of a mere lawsuit.  If some kind of bizarre
worst case scenario did occur, we can just shed the legal clothes we
were wearing, and move into another set and keep on about our
business.  So while legal conservatism is a good thing, we need not
let it stretch into legal paranoia.

All I'm saying is that in such a situation, we need not be concerned
about the death of the community itself -- this is impossible.  The
community *could* under great stress split into two in some kind of
great schism.  But I would work very hard to avoid that, and I'm
pretty confident that the vast majority of the community would very
much prefer to avoid that as well.

--Jimbo


subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews and other stuff

body:
Andrew Lih wrote:
> We've recenly found GFDL to be a headache, and most wished that CC
> existed at the start of WP so we could use it. Now that we're starting
> Wikinews from scratch, is there any reason to stick with GFDL, other
> than familiarity? I like the CC or special Wikimedia route. Perhaps we
> could get Lessig to help craft one appropriate to our needs.

Discussions with Lessig, Stallman, Moglen, and others have been going
quite well.  I'm sending off a document to them all with our specific
concerns, and there seems to be broad support from all of them to make
changes to simplify and clarify the license to make it better suit our
needs.

This just takes time, that's all.

--Jimbo


subject: [Foundation-l] wikinews and other stuff


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Articles that might draw fire.

body:
Omri Schwarz wrote:
> But before any effort is made to write articles on
> corporate activities, it would be good to come here and ask whether
> possibly controversial articles are wellcome in Wikipedia, or whether a
> fork of the project would be a better thing to do.

Of course NPOV articles on possibly controversial topics are more than
welcome.  If you're looking to write "corporate expose" type of stuff,
though, it might be more comfortable for you at disinfopedia?  Or
better yet, focus attention on both...

--Jimbo


from_name: Jens Ropers

subject: [Foundation-l] Wiki translations of Greek and Roman texts

body:
On 15 Oct 2004, at 12:04, Ray Saintonge wrote:

> Wikimedia does not do a good job with footnotes.  Having to srcoll way
> down to the bottom of the page to see a footnote can be very
> inconvenient with a long text.

You don't have to scroll down, at least not manually.
You just click on the superscript number. And hit backspace when
finished reading the footnote.
Cf.:
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Footnotes


from_name: Delirium

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:

> Wikimedia does not do a good job with footnotes.  Having to srcoll way
> down to the bottom of the page to see a footnote can be very
> inconvenient with a long text.  It's often a good thing to be able to
> see both the referring text and the footnote at the same time.  Again,
> this is something where having synchronized boxes would be very helpful.

I think we may also want to extend the concept of footnoes, given that
we have the technology to do so.  In print, a footnote follows the
section it's footnoting, and what exactly preceding portion to refers to
is not actually specified.  This makes it difficult for
densely-footnoted texts to figure out what is going on.  Since this is
the intarweb, we can annotate *regions* of text, even overlapping
regions.  This would be useful in Wikipedia proper as well, as you could
annotate a particular section as "this is phrased this way because of
the following issue" and be exactly clear what you're referring to.

I *seem* to recall someone already proposed something like this, and
even had a page at meta about it, but I can't find it (I suppose I could
be imagining things).

-Mark


subject: [Foundation-l] Wikisource as a repository for thesis

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:
> In this case I would tend to interpret the submission of the thesis to
> the appropriate university authorities as a form of prior publication.

Agreed.  This is a nice "bright line" rule that won't get us into
endless debates with physics cranks.  We can still omit, for example,
self-published books.

--Jimbo


from_name: Bernd Mueller

subject: [Wikitech-l] ERD

body:
Hello,

Does there exist any database scheme like an entity relationship model for
Media Wiki?

Thx,

Bernd


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Re: Objecting to hatespeech is grounds for
	being	banned? Huh?!

body:
Rebecca wrote:

>While I have no problem with his ban, it is inclined to look
>ridiculous when compared against the treatment of some of those RK has
>clashed with, who have been far worse, and that now gives him
>something to complain about. Consistency should be king.
>
>
I didn't participate in this particular Arbitration decision, so this is
just my personal view, but I don't think it was inconsistent or
unjustifiable.  Any particular action by RK doesn't warrant banning IMO,
but this is not one particular action.  There is a *lengthy* series of
actions, and he's been at the center of numerous disputes over the past
year or so.  Some are not his fault, and some are.  Generally, he
appears to go ballistic during most of them, which causes problems.  If
you look through this mailing list's archives, you'll find quite a few
tirades from him, including his belief that Wikipedia ought to be called
"Nazipedia" due to its antisemitism (a statement I don't think he ever
actually retracted).  On the whole, he's accounted for a
disproportionate share of problem-resolution time, and I don't think
it's entirely due to the people he contends with.  It's a tough call
because he also has been a good faith contributor, but I think if you
look at other decisions, it's consistent.  IMO this case is clearer than
Wik's case, for example.

-Mark


from_name: James Rosenzweig

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: the block on RK

body:
The following is essentially (with minor adjustments
and additions) what I just posted to the talk page on
the proposed decision in RK's arbitration case:

This situation is entirely my fault, based in large
part on my inexperience as an arbitrator. I asked on
the proposed decision page what should be done about
the ban. An admin (not an arbitrator) left me a note
saying I could impose the block myself -- I should
have taken the advice I have often given others, and
waited for the input of an experienced arbitrator. I
had been editing a bit too long, and I think I was
trying to tie up too many loose ends as an arbitrator
all in one night.

As a result, I did not give RK the notification or the
time to put affairs in order that now seem like such
an obvious thing to me. I apologize deeply and
sincerely to RK for this -- I am more than willing to
unblock RK and allow him the time to set his user and
user talk pages in the state he prefers. This was not
intended by me as a slight to RK in any way: as I
said, it's purely a combination of my inexperience as
an arbitrator and my appalling failure to consider the
matter with more care and prudence. I will copy this
to the mailing list so that RK sees my response: if he
wishes, he is more than welcome to let me know he
would like to be unblocked for a day to set things in
order.

I apologize once again to him, and to the Wikipedia
community, for not displaying more fully the kind of
careful and well-thought-out action that I believe led
the community to entrust me with this position, and I
promise to remedy that in the future.

James Rosenzweig

__________________________________________________
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from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] problem resizing photo's

body:
On Oct 15, 2004, at 1:05 PM, VideoMontageForum wrote:
> As a newbie in Wiki I have this question:
> Installing wikepedia 1.3.5 everything works fine.

Please upgrade to 1.3.6 immediately, there are security vulnerabilities
in earlier versions that have been found and fixed.

> Only resizing images does'nt work.
> Uploaded images shows up in the original size.
> When I for example use this line   [[image:picture.jpg|100px]] I get an
> error that something is wrong in image.php

You need to cut and paste the actual error message if you want anyone
to be able to help you.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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from_name: Nefercheprure Waenre

subject: [Wikitech-l] case sense on links for czech wiktionary

body:
Could please anybody sufficiently privileged make the Czech Wiktionary
fully case sensitive? I.e. to add:
$wgCapitalLinks = false;
to LocalSettings.php ?

It was discussed on the wiktionary itself and gained a wide acceptance.
(23% of registered users were in favor, the rest is inactive (ca 40-60%) or
unopposing (the rest))

Furthermore there was no opposition to the switch on wiktionary-l where I have
been advised to ask.

Therefore I reckon the claim be well supported.

--TMA (sysop on wikt:cs:) http://cs.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wikipedista:TMA