subject: [Foundation-l] Development in Africa

body:
Regarding to Focusing Linux fanatics idea, I have a living example on that.

Especially if you are dealing with a culture, which open source, free
knowledge type of philosophies are not widely spreaded, your best friends
are linux guys. S?nce they share smae type of idea, they understand our goal
fast and they like and support it easily. Although they may not help
directly, they might have mailinglist, different contacting ways, and can
reach people who respect the organization and respond resposibily. This
method worked very well on early days of Turkish WP.

Cheers,

?zg?r
(Dbl2010)

On 9/17/06, Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Anthere wrote:
> > Since I am on it
> > (
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/foundation-l/2006-September/010021.html
> ),
> > I'd like us to think along what we could more or less easily do to push
> > our visibility and participation in African countries (may be the the
> > same in other parts of the world as well).
> >
> > I have identified the following solutions. Are they others ?
> >
> > 1. Increase awareness in the project
> >
> OLPC could have been extremely relevant here, sadly they only use the
> Wikipedia content and provide it in a different format. There is a Yahoo
> group called "Afrophonewikis" where many of the issues to do with
> African languages are discussed. At Kasahorow work is done on a project
> proposal to support MediaWiki in the Ghanaian languages. WiktionaryZ is
> slowly but surely building portal pages for both countries and
> languages; this is to make people feel that every language is considered
> relevant.
>
> For the Wikimedia Foundation it is absolutely essential that every
> officer and employee supports the idea of our projects being
> multilingual. This being a core value of what we do means that there is
> no room to express the opinion that the English language is to be
> preferred over "native" languages.
> > 1.1 Identification of conferences where our participation might be
> > relevant (focused on ICT, Education, Sustainable development, Culture)
> > Contact with organisers and proposal to participate and make
> presentations
> >
> This would mean coordination of people who have something to contribute
> here and making sure that there is a budget for people to go there. I
> can effectively explain how many of the parts come together, I have
> effectively involved NGO's and we are working on projects to create
> content in (for Wikipedia) less developed languages.
> > 1.2. Identification of big media group (make a list).
> > Contact and proposition of articles. Language focus: english, french,
> > arab, portuguese.
> > Of course, include them in the list of press release.
> >
> I take it that you want to engage the media in the countries themselves,
> this is more effectively done by local people. They will be able to do
> so effectively when they know themselves empowered to do so. This means
> that local chapters may be really relevant here. They are because they
> can handle money and they provide a front to the people who do things on
> the ground. If you want to stimulate local languages, learn how it is
> done by others, what is done in Neapolitan is one good example but there
> are more like it.
> > 1.3. Identification of specialized press (make a list)
> > Focus: Linux fanatics :-) Contact and proposition of articles
> >
> I think the Linux fanatics are overrated, they have many of the concepts
> right, they have the fanatism wrong. We should reach out to everyone we
> do not want to be associated and identified with a fanatic fringe. I
> understand and appreciate the wink, but some of these people are fringe
> and are more of a burden than of a help.
> > 1.4. Identification of major NGO working on education and woman groups.
> > Contact. Provide them with a bit of "advertisment".
> >
> When you want to get NGO's to work on our projects, you do not only want
> to inform them, you also want to engage them. It means that a
> substantial amount of time will be involved. The time frame in which
> they operate is quite different, they work with budget cycles,
> deadlines. NGO's are often really enthusiastic but for them wikis and
> their methodology are new; they have to be initiated in the wiki way. It
> takes time and perseverance.
> > 1.5. Contact of all major universities.
> > propose them teleconference (if they are equipped) or irl presentation
> > (if that fit well with a formal conference or a trip)
> >
> I have not done that systematically yet, but it is extremely likely that
> I will get many more contacts in universities soon.
> >
> > 2. Favor production of content in languages already developped
> > Cases such as RAFT or Wiki voices. If necessary, find money and someone
> > to help coordinating this to ensure success.
> >
> It is helpful if there is a place where these things are coordinated. A
> language subcommittee of the SPC could do many of these things.. It is
> just for this subcommittee to be allowed to start. Finding money is not
> that hard. It just needs a plan that needs implementation. Approving
> plans for funding and incorporation in the WMF would be a step towards
> the notion of "donations, putting your money where your mouth is"
> (details on Meta).
> > 3. Favor production of content in local languages
> >
> > * Help Beta Wiki
> > * Contact local NGOs for help in translation interface
> > * Identification (now) of major languages (according to read/write
> > coverage)
> >
> >
> There is agreement between Brion and Nikerabbit that Beta Wiki will be
> hosted on a more convenient place. This is an extremely important thing
> and I am grateful to Brion to help out on this one.
>
> Translating the User Interface only for our projects is a missed
> opportunity. MediaWiki is extremely powerful software. When the
> localisation is also seen as an opportunity to have this great tool
> available, it becomes something that has relevance to an organisation
> for itself. This is an extremely powerful argument. It also underlines
> why the localisation in a wikipedia is not such a great idea; it's scope
> is only that project and there is no added benefit.
> > Here are some thougts. Are they others ?
> > Who feel like helping take care of some of those points ?
> >
> It is important to be enthusiastic about what we do and it is as
> important to have a good understanding what the WMF does and what it's
> projects are. It is however also really relevant to tell that the WMF is
> part of a growing ecosphere with many other projects like Wikitravel,
> Yellowiki, Wikia being part of it. This shows that the wikiway is not
> only the Wikipedia way.
>
> I have been taking care of some of these points because it helps
> WiktionaryZ. For WiktionaryZ it is relevant that we are part of this
> whole wiki thing. The strength of what we do is achieved in the many
> different things we do, try and achieve. We would be better served if we
> cooperated more and bickered less.
>
> Thanks,
>      GerardM
>
> http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/afrophonewikis/ - Yahoo group on
> supporting African language
> http://www.kasahorow.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page - Wiki for a
> project plan for supporting Ghanaian languages
> http://wiktionaryz.org - Pre alpha project to do lexicology, terminology
> and ontology has both language and country portals
> http://nike.users.idler.fi/dev/index.php?title=ISO-639-3/gil
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


list: wikimedia-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: A. Özgür Erdemli

subject: [Foundation-l] Development in Africa


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Brion Vibber

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Inline rendering of SVG images into PNG on
 MediaWiki 1.7.1

references:
<450E2BBB.2010709@wolfmountaingroup.com>	<450E4EA2.9060709@pobox.com>
	<450EBF3D.1060307@wolfmountaingroup.com>

body:
Jeffrey V. Merkey wrote:
> Here is a more complete question.
>
> I have attempted to setup SVG to PNG rendering and it does  not seem to
> work on 1.7.1.  I checked the Defaults file in includes and
> I have verified rsvg is properly installed.  I have also enabled the
> DebugLogFile option and attempted to run a trace
> the results indicate this section of code is not even activating as
> there are no messages being output to indicate
> that the RSVG section of code is even becoming active during rendering.
> The mine/type detection does appear to work
> in that SVG images are in fact detected.

Since you still do not provide any of your SVG-related configuration settings or
the details of your investigations, I can't guess whether you've simply
configured something wrong.  All I can tell you is that if configured correctly,
it is known to work.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

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list: foundation-l

from_name: Angela

subject: [Foundation-l] [WikiEN-l] Wikimedia Board Elections

body:
On 9/19/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 9/18/06, Arne Klempert <klempert at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > May I ask you in which languages these articles are? Probably not in
> > the same language I usually read.
>
> Dunno does google take news from things writen in not-english?

Yes, but only if you visit Google News in another language. I don't
believe there's a way to get news on a topic in all languages from
Google. For example, you need to visit
http://news.google.com/news?ned=de to see news in German (or perhaps
in Germany. They seem to mix up language and country.
http://news.google.com/news?ned=pt-BR_br
http://news.google.com/news?ned=pt-PT_pt generally give the same
alerts.)

Angela.


list: wikien-l

from_name: Akash Mehta

subject: [WikiEN-l] Fwd: Blocking issue

body:
Hi Chris,
>From time to time, IPs are blocked for serious vandalism, and
depending on the severity this can be for long periods of time.
However, dynamic IP addresses are constantly reassigned, and as a
result blocks can be misdirected.

If you visit your talk page
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:82.37.50.138), click the
'Edit' link at the top and add {{unblock}} followed by a brief
explanation of the situation, one of our admins will unblock you.

Regards,

Akash

On 9/18/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: DannyDyer.com <info at dannydyer.com>
> Date: 16-Sep-2006 18:05
> Subject: Blocking issue
> To: wp at davidgerard.co.uk
>
>
> Dear Sir,
>
> I am the editor of Danny Dyer's official website and he has advised me about
> some serious errors on his listing. I have tried creating an account so I
> can amend the listing but for some reason it states that my IP address
> (82.37.50.138)) has been blocked for misuse.
>
> Please can you explain how this can be blocked as the computer with this IP
> address has never been used to access Wikimedia and as Danny's editor I
> should be able to remove any offending material on his Wikimedia listing.
>
> I would appreciate it if you could please let me know how I can create an
> account using my current computer and IP address.
>
> Regards
>
> Chris Andrews
> Editor
> info at dannydyer.com
> www.dannydyer.com
> the official web site.
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Stephen Streater

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Would you like one of your videos posted
	on	Wikipedia?

body:
On 18 Sep 2006, at 23:19, [[User:Unforgettableid]] wrote:

> On 9/18/06, Stephen Streater <sbstreater at mac.com> wrote:
>> In English law, if you go into a Royal Park to film you
>> have to obey their terms and conditions - no commercial
>> use without permission.
>>
>> Similarly, it is illegal to film on British Rail property
>> without consent, which is often refused or charged
>> for. The Railways are covered by their own bylaws.
>>
>> Here's a link for more info:
>> http://www.sirimo.co.uk/ukpr.php/2004/11/19/
>> uk_photographers_rights_guide
>
> OK, point taken. However, it seems to me the UK has stricter copyright
> laws than other countries. For example, in the UK, modern
> skillfully-made photos of two-hundred-year-old paintings are
> automatically copyrighted to the author. On the other hand, I do not
> know of any other country with such strict laws regarding old
> paintings. Likewise, I assume France, where is not as strict regarding
> filming.

Apparently, Enland does not respect character rights,
which the US does. So I could upload a video of a famous
person shot in England without breaking English law,
but it could be illegal for Wikimedia to redistribute it in the US.


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Would you like one of your videos
	posted	on	Wikipedia?

body:
On 18 Sep 2006, at 23:22, Delirium wrote:

> Andrew Gray wrote:
>
>> To the best of my knowledge, the United States does not possess any
>> "royal parks". Given Stephen appears to live in the UK, a country
>> which does have royal parks, it seems reasonable to assume he shot
>> the
>> videos there. In which case, the question of what  American laws
>> apply
>> to the filming seems a bit less relevant.
>>
>>
> While the person filming has to worry about the law regarding filming,
> anyone redistributing the films in the United States does not---it is
> not necessarily illegal to redistribute illegally filmed video.  This
> came up a while ago on Commons with World Cup photographs: The
> stadiums
> prohibited photography, but given that photographs were taken and
> uploaded under the GFDL, Wikimedia is violating no law by
> continuing to
> host them.  The original photographer likely violated the prohibition,
> but that's a separate matter, not enforceable through copyright,
> and so
> not really our problem.

Would the original poster be liable in the UK
for each copy made though? I don't have a
clear answer on this yet. By releasing something
under a free licence, am I saying:
"you have the right to copy this"
or am I saying
"you have the right to copy this subject to applicable laws"?
The second seems to make sense, but then why delete
copyvio images if the images are subject to the law anyway?

Kim Bruning was saying he would like all content
on Wikipedia to be free ie decisions on ownership
to be resolved when images were uploaded.


from_name: Kim van der Linde

subject: [WikiEN-l] Citizendium

body:
charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com wrote:
> Yes, why should another site not get the grunt work done? I guess
> because they start with a 'more chiefs than Indians' model of
> intellectual work?

Is it not amazing how often I get to articles that I improve at
Wikipedia, just to discover how may redirects are missing, and me, as an
expert adding them. Just because I know which to add?

But I think you miss a more important aspect. Suppose I am doing a Ph.D.
study, and want to become a expert in a field. What is nicer than to
work with some experts in that field to create good quality articles. To
many people seem under the impression that Citizendium is written solely
by experts, my impression is that the bulk of the work is still done by
many authors together, with a major difference that only a 'finalised'
version is approved and visible for the larger public. Just imagine that
a group of people works together adding a new page that do not have to
fight with POV-pushers of fringe or bullshit ideas (expert guidance) and
vandals (not approved, no reward for vandalism), while at the same time
can benefit from the expertise of those same experts to get towards a
much better article as those experts do know the literature much better,
  know which [[WP:V]] [[WP:RS]] to use (no blanket criteria needed
anymore). Furthermore, an added incentive would be that quality
contributors are being recognized by those experts, which results in
better working relationships, but also more praise and feedback....

> Just who gets excited enough to add all those variants of [[John of
> Jandun]], for a random example, on a site based on a star system (as
> if that was a panacea)?

Who gets excited at that at Wikipedia? We have our gnomes doing those
things, why can Citizendium not have them as well? There is no objection
to grant recognized valuable contributors some extra privileges just to
do that kind of jobs.... Let alone, that if I as an expert would know
some of the regulars and would know the quality of their work, I would
unseen approve series of redirects made by those people.

Kim
--
http://www.kimvdlinde.com


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Would you like one of your
	videos	posted	on	Wikipedia?

body:
On 19 Sep 2006, at 05:51, Sean Barrett wrote:

> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> Ben McIlwain stated for the record:
>> [[User:Unforgettableid]] wrote:
>>
>>>> On 9/18/06, Forbidden Places <postmaster at forbidden-places.be>
>>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Hi Jason,
>>>>> No problem, as long as the videos are not edited.
>>>>
>>>> We will not edit the video. Other people will be able to edit the
>>>> video in the future once it is posted on Wikipedia, but we at
>>>> Wikipedia have no plans to. It would be nice if you remove the
>>>> ad for
>>>> your website in the corner of your video though... :-)
>>
>>
>> Who are you to say that we won't edit the video?  Maybe you won't,
>> but
>> maybe someone else will, in a way that makes it more useful, and then
>> link that on Wikipedia.  That's the point of viral licensing and
>> ShareAlikes.  I'm afraid "you're not allowed to edit it" is a deal-
>> breaker.
>>
>> --
>> Ben McIlwain ("Cyde Weys")
>>
>> ~ Ubi olim vita, nunc vita ~
>
> Emphatic agreement with Ben. The video ''will'' be edited -- I
> personally guarantee it.  Please ensure that Forbidden Places
> <postmaster at forbidden-places.be> knows that I have said so, and
> that you
> have no authority to revoke parts of the GFDL.

Also, remember that in Belgium, the architect can have
some rights over a photograph containing his work.
This may apply here - I'm not an expert on Belgian law.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Sanger's first post to Citizendium-l

body:
On 19 Sep 2006, at 06:05, Nathaniel Krause wrote:
> The main downside of this process, seems to me, would be that one
> wouldn't be able to freely lift text from one article to another
> within the same wiki; you'd always have to check if the licenses
> match. Note that lifting text like this technically causes
> copyright problems already on Wikipedia, unless one is careful to
> provide authorship information.

I've had text moved from one article to another.
The edit summary said where it came from, and
the date made everything traceable. I think this
is sufficient.


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Berto

body:
Hi!

the right place is betawiki @ http://nike.users.idler.fi/betawiki/Etusivu

The site opens in finnish, just make yourself a user and choose your own
language. From here you can develop both the text localization for your wiki
AND namespace localization. To get realtime help use the IRC channel
#mediawiki-i18n @ freenode.

Be always aware that changing a namespace on the run may result in a number
of broken links, if you had used your "fallback language" during development
and this language happens to be "not english".

B?rto

----- ???????? ????????? -----
??: "Ragib Hasan" <ragibhasan at gmail.com>
????: <wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org>
??????????: 18 ???????? 2006 ?. 21:17
????: [Wikipedia-l] Change of namespace: who to contact?

> I am a bureaucrat in Bengali wikipedia. We need to change the spelling
> of our Wikipedia namespace, from ?????????? to ??????????. I am a bit
> confused as to who should be able to do this. I've posted this message
> at meta wiki, a week ago, but haven't got a reply yet. Messages to
> several developers were also not replied (I might have posted to wrong
> contact pages).
>
> Anyway, I'd appreciate if someone can explain the proper procedure to me.
>
> Thanks
>
> Ragib
>
>
> --
> Ragib Hasan
> PhD Student
> Dept of Computer Science
> University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
> 201 N Goodwin Avenue
> Urbana IL 61801
>
> Website:
> http://www.ragibhasan.com
> http://netfiles.uiuc.edu/rhasan/www
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


from_name: Matt Brown

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Would you like one of your videos posted on
	Wikipedia?

body:
On 9/19/06, Alphax (Wikipedia email) <alphasigmax at gmail.com> wrote:
> If you claim that on Commons, you'll be laughed off the project.

The general assumption on Commons is that the work not be encumbered
by the copyright of others in the originating country as well as the
United States.

There is general but not complete consensus (among those who could be
bothered to argue about it, at least) that images of copyrighted
two-dimensional trademarks where that trademark is the major element
in the picture are not permitted.

A large number, but possibly not a consensus, wish that all pictures
where an identifiable person is the major element in the picture were
taken with the permission of that person, preferably with model
releases.

Others believe that Commons should not concern itself overly with
non-copyright restrictions on image use freedom.  That discussion is
not complete and may not ever be.

There is a vocal minority that insists that if an image is permissable
under their own nation's copyright laws, it should be able to be put
on Commons, even if that law does not agree with either (a) the laws
of the originating country (these users are mostly in the US) or (b)
US law (these users are mostly in Germany).

-Matt


body:
On 9/19/06, Alphax (Wikipedia email) <alphasigmax at gmail.com> wrote:
> . Unforgettableid wrote:
> > To: info at forbidden-places.be
> >
> <snip>
>
> Please do NOT post such things here in the future. The correct place is
> the permissions # wikimedia ! org (you can figure it out) OTRS queue,
> where such things can be discussed IN PRIVATE and CLUEFULLY.
>
Thank you for the tip. I am starting to regret CC'ing the main wikien
list. I wanted to get permissions from the video's author, not to
start a legal debate. :-)

Oh well, I guess there's nothing I can do to close the thread now that
it's on wikien-l now...


subject: [WikiEN-l] Citizendium

body:
David Gerard wrote:

> It's a useful idea, yes. I'm wondering, though, if their model
> includes non-experts as important contributors (which is what you
> seem to be saying), whether their initial publicity will prove
> problematic. It's not so much pro-expert as anti-non-expert. I don't
> see why a non-expert would bother with volunteering for it, what's in
> it for them.

Ok, suppose I end up being an expert there (which I do not know yet as I
am not knowing enough about their model). Say, a non-expert, high school
student passes by. He just inserts junk. No issue, such a person will be
out of it quickly, as there is nothing to gain for either side. But the
next does know where he talks about, adds good content, and with some
instruction, produces good content. As an expert, I know that person
from then on, and keep working with him. It can result in a productive
two-way interaction, beneficial for both. Just expand that to a group...

And just to add on the often used comparison of Wikipedia with open
source software. It fails, software additions are required to work
properly together with the existing code, additions at Wikipedia do not,
in fact, a total rewrite is nothing less than deleting the source code
and start anew. I have added to open source software and expert control
is firmly in place in those projects.

> Expert review of Wikipedia content is already possible.

Possible yes, is it done?

> It doesn't even have to be done on Wikipedia - links to good versions
> of articles would suffice, as the URL of a given revision is
> unchanging.

Sure, the difference, Citizendium provides that good version to its
readers, Wikipedia provides the latest vandalized version. Another
difference, at Citizendium, this would be an expert approved version, at
Wikipedia an admin approved? Or is the idea to get experts to do that
job? If so, in what way is that different from what Citizendium wants to
do?

Kim
--
http://www.kimvdlinde.com


subject: [WikiEN-l] Expert AfD close (Re: Citizendium)

body:
On 9/19/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> IIRC this was something put in by Aaron Brenneman with the aim of
> keeping Phil Sandifer from saying anything about webcomics.

Understanding that things like this happen is key to realising why not
everything written in Wikipedia pages that claim to be policy really
is, and why IAR exists.

-Matt


from_name: Delphine Ménard

body:
On 9/19/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:

> OK lets look at some international figures:
>
> en dominates the alexa results:
>
> http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?q=wikipedia.org&url=wikipedia.org
>
> other than a brief appearance by de en dominates the search results:
>
> http://www.google.com/trends?q=en.wikipedia.org%2C+es.wikipedia.org%2C+de.wikipedia.org%2C+fr.wikipedia.org%2C+Ja.wikipedia.org&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all

This search is about as biased as the Alexa numbers. Who in the world
would *ever* look for a search with en.wikipedia or fr.wikipedia ?

Try that one:
http://www.google.com/trends?q=wikipedia&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all

Very different results aren't they?

Delphine
--
~notafish


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Elephants and giraffes (was: [[WP:V]] and [[WP:RS]] are
	destroying Wikipedia)

body:
> Which, when you're invested in NPOV, is truth, since our goal, at
> least on subjects where there's dispute, is not to say "It's an
> elephant" but rather "This is what seven people say about it."
>
But there are more than seven people who say elephants are three times
as tall as a giraffe thanks to [[Stephen Colbert]]'s TV show. :-(

Though they say any publicity is good publicity...


body:
On 9/19/06, Sean Barrett <sean at epoptic.com> wrote:
> Ben McIlwain stated for the record:
> > [[User:Unforgettableid]] wrote:
> >>>On 9/18/06, Forbidden Places <postmaster at forbidden-places.be> wrote:
> >>>
> >>>>Hi Jason,
> >>>>No problem, as long as the videos are not edited.
> >>>
> >>>We will not edit the video. Other people will be able to edit the
> >>>video in the future once it is posted on Wikipedia, but we at
> >>>Wikipedia have no plans to. It would be nice if you remove the ad for
> >>>your website in the corner of your video though... :-)
> >
> > Who are you to say that we won't edit the video?  Maybe you won't, but
> > maybe someone else will, in a way that makes it more useful, and then
> > link that on Wikipedia.  That's the point of viral licensing and
> > ShareAlikes.  I'm afraid "you're not allowed to edit it" is a deal-breaker.
>
> Emphatic agreement with Ben. The video ''will'' be edited -- I
> personally guarantee it.  Please ensure that Forbidden Places
> <postmaster at forbidden-places.be> knows that I have said so, and that you
> have no authority to revoke parts of the GFDL.

Hi Sylvain,

I was incorrect about editing. The video will be edited.

I believe that if the video is edited, the person doing the editing
must label it as a "derivative work" of your video and provide full
credit when they publish the edited work. I do not know the full set
of rules for the licenses; those are available at
www.creativecommons.org for the Creative Commons
Attribution-ShareAlike License and www.gnu.org for the GNU Free
Documentation License.

Is this a problem?

Cheers,
Jason


from_name: Jeffrey V. Merkey

references:
<450E2BBB.2010709@wolfmountaingroup.com>
	<450F9C08.3000107@wolfmountaingroup.com>
	<450F9CBA.8030007@wolfmountaingroup.com>
	<200609191030.30425@bloodgate.com>

body:
Tels wrote:

>Stupid questions you might be able to answer:
>
>* Have you tried running the commands manually?
>* If they succeed, check that the automated process isnt by accident running
>a different version (having f.i. a different path, like /usr/bin
>vs /usr/local/bin first)
>
>
I've run the command manually and it works.   I am getting the debug
logs for Brion he asked for now and
moving the wgLegalChars changes back to LocalSettings.php and running
the traces.

>* Check that the automated process can actually find the command
>* Check the permissions and directories very carefully. Check them again. :D
>
>
This is a VERY good idea.

Jeff

>Sorry for being so handwaiving, but without a login on that machine it's
>nothing more I can do from my armchair :)
>
>Best wishes,
>
>Tels
>
>
>


from_name: Fastfission

body:
On 9/19/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 18/09/06, Fastfission <fastfission at gmail.com> wrote:
> In particular, the GFDL for images is pretty much a pretend
> free-content licence and not effectively one at all. "Yes, you can
> freely reuse our images in print if you print the entire text of the
> licence next to it." Uh, yeah.

This is why I recommend to people who are anxious about releasing
their images under free licenses to use GFDL. Yes, they are
technically free, and can be used easily be web pages. But you'll
probably never see any print sources bother.

Our GFDL non-compliance goes beyond images, though. If you read over
the GFDL very carefully there are all sorts of things that are
impractical for a communal encyclopedia to do (i.e. modified versions
of works are supposed to have different titles with every modification
? not exactly practical when you are all editing the same
draft-in-progress).

FF


body:
Hi,

On 9/19/06, Forbidden-Places <postmaster at forbidden-places.be> wrote:
> Hi again,
> Yeah I know Creative Commons pretty well, my brother is in the music field.
>
> It is not possible for the moment, but I would agree on the principle.
>
> Why not? Well the videos use commercial music currently. I am in the process
> of re-doing them with a friend of mine doing electronic music. Anyway, I
> find these videos crappy now, needed to re-edit them again.

Great! (I like the old music: I personally think it's worth it for us
to request GFDL and/or CC-licensing for it, but if you plan to redo
the music, that's fine too. Just have him post a note on his webpage
or to permissions at wikipedia.org saying that the music in the video is
dual-licensed under the current GNU Free Documentation License and
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Deed or any later version.)

> Do you have an urgent needs for these videos?

No, the process of adding videos to Wikipedia is a gradual one. :-) I
wish we had more but it's very hard to find free-licensed videos.

When the video is done editing, though, we would appreciate it if you
export to Ogg Theora format (maximum filesize 20 MB) for us to upload
to Wikipedia. Let us know, we will help you.

Best regards,
Jason


from_name: charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com

subject: [WikiEN-l] Citizendium

body:
Kim van der Linde wrote

> There is no need for a project of equal quality,
> there is a need for a project of higher quality.

Right. So we can link to it and learn from it.

Charles

-----------------------------------------
Email sent from www.ntlworld.com
Virus-checked using McAfee(R) Software
Visit www.ntlworld.com/security for more information


subject: [WikiEN-l] Citizendium

body:
David Gerard wrote:
> On 19/09/06, Kim van der Linde <kim at kimvdlinde.com> wrote:
>
>> Sure, the difference, Citizendium provides that good version to its
>> readers, Wikipedia provides the latest vandalized version. Another
>> difference, at Citizendium, this would be an expert approved version, at
>> Wikipedia an admin approved? Or is the idea to get experts to do that
>> job? If so, in what way is that different from what Citizendium wants to
>> do?
>
> That last one is something de: is presently trying to address. See
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/foundation-l/2006-September/010045.html
> for current status.

Interesting. Lets see:

1. Unvandalized versions. Default at Citizendium, requires already
considerable work at Wikipedia. Special flag, criteria when something is
vandalized etc. But it would be a major step forward.

2. Reviewed versions. Ok, several options as by whom:

a) Regular editors: how are they going to check for quality and accuracy?
b) In house experts: credential discussion seems to be going in already.
If the credential requirements would be roughly equivalent to
Citizendium, what is the difference? And I see already the same
arguments as against Citizendium: "Argh, experts are going to determine
what gets approved... No way..." "This leads to two classes of editors...."

c) Outside reviewers: LOTS of work!!!!

So, what I see here proposed is either doing the same as Citizendium but
with more effort, as it is either more work (Citizendium will have the
expertise in house by design), or of lower standard (just not
vandalized, but with development of specific criteria etc.).

But the main question, in what way would the preferred option (2b)
differ from Citizendium, except that the current community structure at
Wikipedia is way less inviting for those needed experts to join and the
massive community resistance that can be expected against such a change?

Kim
--
http://www.kimvdlinde.com


from_name: Nick Jenkins

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Inline rendering of SVG images into PNG on
	MediaWiki 1.7.1

body:
> This is the most unprofessional and community hostile notice I have ever
> seen - if I read this right is says:
>
> "...eat our stuff, bugs and all, and you are on your own if you need
> help, we don't care..."
>
> :-)
>
> > Many project websites link to this document in their sections on how
> > to get help. That's fine, it's the use we intended ? but if you are a
> > webmaster creating such a link for your project page, please display
> > prominently near the link notice that /we are not a help desk for your
> > project!/
> >
> > We have learned the hard way that without such a notice, we will
> > repeatedly be pestered by idiots who think having published this
> > document makes it our job to solve all the world's technical problems.
> >
> > If you're reading this document because you need help, and you walk
> > away with the impression you can get it directly from the authors,
> > /you/ are one of the idiots in question. Don't ask /us/ questions.
> > We'll just ignore you. We are here to show you how to get help from
> > people who actually know about the software or hardware you're dealing
> > with, but 99% of the time that will not be us. Unless you know for
> > /certain/ that one of the authors is an expert on what you're dealing
> > with, leave us alone and everybody will be happier.

That's from the http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html#disclaimer page; In other words, the people who wrote how to ask better technical questions are simply saying "don't then proceed to ask us (the how-to-ask-questions-people) those technical questions; rather, ask it of the appropriate mailing list (or whatever) for the software in question". Which is what you've done ;-)  I.e. It's not the MediaWiki people refusing to help you.

All the best,
Nick.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Citizendium

body:
charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com wrote:

> I do prefer WP, vexing though it may be. I bring this all up because
> if good manners were all there was to it, Sensei's Library would be a
> shining example.

What you describe is a pretty static example. Citizendium could turn out
that way (its a risk with Larry's top-down preference that I think to
see in his other projects), but in that case, I am out of there. For the
rest, the basic structure is not even set up, Larry has some rough
ideas, that's all. But I have been actively thinking about how to set up
a wiki that would do the right job, and I am definitely going to
participate there as I see more options there to get something better
going than at Wikipedia with its inherent anti-expert attitude. If
wikipedia would be willing to make some fundamental changes towards a
more quality oriented goal than to the current process based goals, I
would stay.

In that context, we not even have a content ArbCom filled with open
minded academics and related experts who actually know how to deal with
content disputes, it is conduct based one; maybe we should start a
separate thread about that, because I have some ideas about that.

Kim
--
http://www.kimvdlinde.com


from_name: Andrew Lih

subject: [WikiEN-l] Template cruft

body:
On 9/19/06, Kirill Lokshin <kirill.lokshin at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 9/18/06, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
> > I speak as a long-time Wikipedian who is more interested in content than
> > pretty presentation.  I had a hand in helping develop the early versions
> > of taxoboxes, and descriptive boxes for battles.  To some extent the use
> > of charts and tables is essential for organizing data.  But when we
> > reach a point that changing the content of these charts and boxes is a
> > mysterious process for the average user, or when it is only with great
> > difficulty that one even finds what page to edit, then we have to
> > consider the possibility that we have gotten away from the essential
> > principal that this is an encyclopedia that anyone can edit.
> >
> > When we speak of Wikipedia as a site that anyone can edit that means
> > more to me than permission.  That permission is hollow if a person lacks
> > the techniques to do it.  In the earliest time we took pride in the fact
> > that wiki-markup was so simple that anyone could understand it; the
> > essentials could be put on a single page that did not even need to be
> > scrolled.  Someone could edit without having to learn html.  Can we
> > still honestly say that a retired professor in the arts and humanities
> > is still able to contribute from his vast experience?  His familiarity
> > with his subject may be unquestionable, but his expertise preceeded the
> > cyber-age and did not depend on familiarity with computer languages.
>
> I strongly disagree.  Our goal here must fundamentally be to produce
> an encyclopedia for the reader rather than merely to engage in the
> perpetual process of editing it.

There's no reason this has to be mutually exclusive since #2 helps #1.
I'll explain in a bit. But you must admit editing has become quite complex.

1. We used to use CamelCase syntax for linking to BobNey
2. Then it became [[Bob Ney]] with free links
3. Add a template like {{current}}
4. Then add an infobox like {{Infobox Congressman
| name=Robert William Ney
| image name=Bob Ney.jpg
5. Then add inline references like
<ref>[http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/001532.php DOJ press
release on Ney's plea]</ref>
6. Add some tables, images, categories, etc.

I used to be a programmer/coder, so I'm not scared of funky code and
symbols. But even my eyes glaze over when I need to decipher a
taxobox, an inline
reference or a table. Unless I'm really determined, I avoid editing it.

Even for doing images, it's way too hard. That's not good.

For those not at Wikimania hacking days, there were two presentations
relevant to this issue of "user experience" while editing.

1) One was a presentation from OpenUsability which provided a good
evaluation of user testing on editing Wikipedia pages.
http://www.openusability.org/forum/forum.php?forum_id=950

We needed a good friend to tell us - images and commons are
way too hard for the average person to decipher. Licenses confusing,
too many steps, what the hell is Commons, is my login the same?
The presentation was received warmly - the developers in the room
all know this is a big problem with putting in images.

2) WIKIWYG and parsing. Certainly a next logical step for WP is
WYSIWYG editing, or at least the option of it. Some people like the
power of markup, but for newbies graphical (ie. MS Word)  editing
would be more inclusive. For that you need markup->WYSIWYG->markup
conversion. Well one of the [[Google Summer of Code]] participants spent
his summer trying to create a "parser" to do just that. He failed. And not
for lack of smarts, but because everyone recognizes what a rats
nest Wikimarkup syntax is, having morphed over the years haphazardly.
Every developer in the room had compassion for the young chap who
tried it, and everyone recognized how incredibly hard a problem this is.

So the prospect of that conversion is grim, at least right now, without a
major breakthrough, or altering Wikimarkup syntax to be more "normal"
and running a script to change all "n" million articles. Yikes.

> Producing a high-quality
> encyclopedia necessarily means allowing a somewhat more sophisticated
> set of layout and content presentation tools than the retired
> professor may be willing to learn -- but this is only a problem
> insofar as the professor *needs* to learn those tools.  Just as we do
> not expect all users to be equally capable of taking high-quality
> photographs, writing FAs, or any of a variety of other tasks, we
> should not expect that all users will be equally capable of working on
> complex issues of templatized design and layout.

Understandable attitude but disconcerting. Some view Wikimarkup the same
way as a "tech literacy test" to act as a bozo filter. (See [[Literacy test]])
I'm not a fan of, "Keeping it hard keeps it elite."

> The retired professor, in your example, is most likely here to
> contribute content rather than to play around with the aesthetics of
> little colored boxes; the overwhelming majority of his exposure to
> templates will be either simply including them -- but usually there's
> no shortage of volunteers to do this anyways -- or using them as black
> boxes for data, like so

I would contend that this "retired" professor even seeing the arcane
boxes and such would be intimdated enough not to even dive into it.
And I have first-hand knowledge of such a case.

When I visited the Wikimedia Foundation in Florida last month,
the dean of a prominent US college contacted the office, and she
said she was an enthusiastic fan of Wikipedia, and thought it was
great. But she also said that it was darn intimidating to edit, when
she saw all that Wikimarkup. She wanted to contribute to areas
for which she is a published author! But Wikimarkup is too hard
and intimidating.

So this was not a "retired" professor but a professor and dean,
at the top of her game, with enthusiastic interest, who was
intimidated.

> There is absolutely no reason, in most cases, for said professor to
> concern himself with how {{Infobox Clown}} transforms the values he
> enters into a pretty table; if he's particularly interested in layout
> issues, he can always ask someone for help if he can't figure things
> out.

You should observe some user testing sometime to see exactly
how people react to these situations. The frustration threshold
for users is typically very low.

> Forcing everyone else to abandon all the sophisticated presentation
> tools we've developed, meanwhile, will drastically decrease the
> quality of page layout in the encyclopedia, and won't help the
> professor in the least, as the nice "black box" template will either
> be replaced with a fragile table, or nothing at all -- neither of
> which is something he'll be particularly pleased to work with, I
> suspect.

It does not have to be mutualy exclusive. It's a hard problem,
but they are not inherently at odds.

-Andrew (User:Fuzheado)


from_name: Delirium

body:
Peter Ansell wrote:
> Im curious as to whether that goes against the typical ethic portrayed
> by [[Wikipedia:Notability]] where things seem to be never notable
> unless people _outside_ of a field say they are, which would trump
> everyone interested in a topic, __especially__ experts.
>

This is mainly directed at experts in sociological phenomena I think,
because there's some contingent of Wikipedians who are irrationally
afraid of "fancruft", as if more articles on webcomics equals a worse
encyclopedia.

In less contentious areas, this "policy" is ignored---we don't delete
obscure mathematics articles, even if nobody outside professional
mathematics has ever heard of the topic.

-Mark


body:
Stephen Streater wrote:
> On 18 Sep 2006, at 23:22, Delirium wrote:
>
>> While the person filming has to worry about the law regarding filming,
>> anyone redistributing the films in the United States does not---it is
>> not necessarily illegal to redistribute illegally filmed video.  This
>> came up a while ago on Commons with World Cup photographs: The
>> stadiums
>> prohibited photography, but given that photographs were taken and
>> uploaded under the GFDL, Wikimedia is violating no law by
>> continuing to
>> host them.  The original photographer likely violated the prohibition,
>> but that's a separate matter, not enforceable through copyright,
>> and so
>> not really our problem.
>>
>
> Would the original poster be liable in the UK
> for each copy made though? I don't have a
> clear answer on this yet. By releasing something
> under a free licence, am I saying:
> "you have the right to copy this"
> or am I saying
> "you have the right to copy this subject to applicable laws"?
> The second seems to make sense, but then why delete
> copyvio images if the images are subject to the law anyway?
>

It probably depends specifically on what law was violated in taking the
original picture.  In the World Cup case, the photographer violated
FIFA's "no photographs" policy, but while that may subject him to having
his ticket revoked and possibly other FIFA sanctions if they feel like
it, there's no legal mechanism for FIFA to revoke his copyright on the
photograph---so he may still perfectly well license it under the GFDL.

-Mark


from_name: Phil Sandifer

subject: [WikiEN-l] I've Kicked the Process Habit

body:
On Sep 19, 2006, at 10:12 AM, David Gerard wrote:

>
> What is the imminent danger to the encyclopedia or its core policies
> of Phil keeping his ops?
>

You ask too many questions, citizen.

/me bans David Gerard

-Phil


subject: [WikiEN-l] [[WP:V]] and [[WP:RS]] are destroying Wikipedia

body:
Phil Sandifer wrote:
> On Sep 18, 2006, at 8:52 PM, Daniel P. B. Smith wrote:
>
>> Verifiable sources do not ensure truth. (It's not clear to me that
>> there's any way to ensure truth... you know, observer A says it's a
>> wave, observer B says it's a particle... blind men... elephant...
>> etc.)
>>
>
> Which, when you're invested in NPOV, is truth, since our goal, at
> least on subjects where there's dispute, is not to say "It's an
> elephant" but rather "This is what seven people say about it."
>

Indeed... it's often missed that Wikipedia aims "only" to be an accurate
*documentation* of the current state of human knowledge, not a community
of researchers that *advances* the state of knowledge.  If the world as
a whole is confused and divided about some issue, we just write that
down---it's not our job to clear up the confusion or arbitrate the dispute.

-Mark


list: commons-l

from_name: Fredrik Josefsson

subject: [Commons-l] [[Commons:Administrator permission for statistics]]

body:
There was a bot who was supposed to send a bulletin to
all admins. It went to all admins alphabetical, but
halted at [[user:Howcheng]]. I don't think it was
restarted again.

The bulletin said two things. First it adverticed the
Administrators' noticeboard (
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Administrators'_noticeboard
). Second, it said this:

" If you consent for statistics to be published about
your actions as an administrator, please sign here:
[[Commons:Administrator permission for statistics]]. "
( see
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Administrator_permission_for_statistics
)

Since most people didn't get the bulletin, I'm posting
this message again here on the mailinglist.

You can see the original bulletin on
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Orgullobot/commands/message-adminstats

/ Fred-Chess


body:
Mark Gallagher wrote:
> G'day geni,
>
>
>> On 9/18/06, User:Unforgettableid <unforgettableid at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>> Why would that be? Can a tree, a river, or a building be copyrighted?
>>> You claim that there "may" be rights issues but you have not cited any
>>> American law which back up your claim.
>>>
>> If you are the creator and you are not in the US or made the item
>> outside the US you need to consider more than the US legal system.
>>
>
> But if you're in the USA, as we see again and again, you can blithely
> pretend that the US's POV is all that matters and shamelessly flaunt
> your ignorance of the rest of the world.
>

But this is precisely the goal---Wikipedia is sunk if it must use the
*intersection* of all copyright laws in the world, under which nearly
nothing is permissible to distribute.  Instead, it's carefully set up so
that all the core servers and legal mechanism are in the United States,
so we can use only one set of copyright laws.

Of course individual contributors must deal with their local
governments, but the point is that Wikipedia itself should not subject
itself to dozens of competing restrictions.

-Mark


from_name: Steve Summit

body:
I haven't followed this whole thread, so this point may have been
amply made already, but:

	*Phil did not say he was going to violate policy.*

He said he was going to ignore process, and there's a crucial
difference.  The speculation is that simply doing the right
thing, even in ignorance of process, will be in substantial
accordance with it (or at least, with core policy) 90% of the
time anyway.  And for the other 10%, the possibility that the
process is misguided or incomplete, and the existence of IAR,
ought to about cover it.

(Phil didn't claim those 90/10 numbers; I just made them up.)

> Or, for that matter, that offensive that you had to launch into
> such a bizarre attempt to smear me, including trying to re-air
> year old dirty laundry...

Is Phil getting smeared now?  I can't say I'm surprised.  To the
process wonk, process is the most important thing there is, way
more important than the goals of the project it's supposed to
support.  Denying or disavowing the sacred process is the most
cardinal of sins.

I don't deny that Phil's declaration was provocative.  It calls
to mind Colonel Cathcart's objection to Yossarian's attitude:
"What if everyone felt that way?"  But Yossarian's retort is
equally apt: "Then I'd certainly be a fool not to."


from_name: Tels

references:
<450E2BBB.2010709@wolfmountaingroup.com>
	<450F9C08.3000107@wolfmountaingroup.com>
	<450F9CBA.8030007@wolfmountaingroup.com>

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

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

Moin,

On Tuesday 19 September 2006 09:31, Jeffrey V. Merkey wrote:
> Jeffrey V. Merkey wrote:
> >Jeffrey V. Merkey wrote:
> >>Brion Vibber wrote:

Stupid questions you might be able to answer:

* Have you tried running the commands manually?
* If they succeed, check that the automated process isnt by accident running
a different version (having f.i. a different path, like /usr/bin
vs /usr/local/bin first)
* Check that the automated process can actually find the command
* Check the permissions and directories very carefully. Check them again. :D

Sorry for being so handwaiving, but without a login on that machine it's
nothing more I can do from my armchair :)

Best wishes,

Tels

- - --
 Signed on Tue Sep 19 10:27:30 2006 with key 0x93B84C15.
 Visit my photo gallery at http://bloodgate.com/photos/
 PGP key on http://bloodgate.com/tels.asc or per email.

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from_name: David Gerard

body:
On 18/09/06, dmehkeri at swi.com <dmehkeri at swi.com> wrote:

> > Or instead, we could try to keep up with growth by implementing some more
> > advanced soft controls of our own.

> I know I've seen some people stating on their userpages something to the effect
> that if you can produce verification that you are an expert in a field, they
> will kill an AfD on an article in that field on your word that it is notable.
> I'm curious if anyone takes them up on this?

I've had no takers so far.

I've occasionally commented on Australian music AFDs saying "hello,
expert here, this stuff is not in Google but it is in printed books.
Mine are in Australia, I'm in London. But yes, this is notable and
shouldn't be deleted. I'll see if I can fix it up." So far they've
been kept.

- d.


body:
On 19/09/06, Peter Ansell <ansell.peter at gmail.com> wrote:

> Im curious as to whether that goes against the typical ethic portrayed
> by [[Wikipedia:Notability]] where things seem to be never notable
> unless people _outside_ of a field say they are, which would trump
> everyone interested in a topic, __especially__ experts.

IIRC this was something put in by Aaron Brenneman with the aim of
keeping Phil Sandifer from saying anything about webcomics.

- d.


from_name: Brion Vibber

references:
<450E2BBB.2010709@wolfmountaingroup.com>	<450E4EA2.9060709@pobox.com>	<450EBF3D.1060307@wolfmountaingroup.com>	<450F3984.7030702@pobox.com>	<450F9B29.7010309@wolfmountaingroup.com>
	<450F9C08.3000107@wolfmountaingroup.com>

body:
Jeffrey V. Merkey wrote:
> Splicing in the text for LocalSettings.php.  The mailer rejects the
> attachments.  The only change I made to DefaultSettings.php is the
> addition of
> a "+" symbol to $wgLegalChars.

Never ever change DefaultSettings.php

Don't do it. There's comments all over the file telling you not to do it. Please
read the comments. Please read the documentation. Please follow the directions.

Change settings ONLY in LocalSettings.php.

Do not change settings in DefaultSettings.php

Your LocalSettings.php contains no SVG-related configuration; thus by default
ImageMagick would be set as the SVG renderer, which will work poorly if at all.

You haven't included any of the debugging information you claim to have done.

You're also still posting to the development list instead of the support list
(mediawiki-l). Slightly better than foundation-l, but it would be nice if you
could pick the appropriate forum occasionally as well as including enough
information for people to have a clue how to help you.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

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from_name: dmehkeri at swi.com

subject:
[WikiEN-l] No derivatives (was: Would you like one of your videos
	posted on Wikipedia?)

body:
> Who are you to say that we won't edit the video?  Maybe you won't, but
> maybe someone else will, in a way that makes it more useful, and then
> link that on Wikipedia.  That's the point of viral licensing and
> ShareAlikes.  I'm afraid "you're not allowed to edit it" is a deal-breaker.

Eh, why is that anyway? I understand why we would dislike it, of course, but I'm
not sure why, exactly, we would want to make it a deal-breaker. (We, english
Wikipedia, rather than say, Wikimedia Commons which has slightly different goals.)

For starters it isn't mentioned in the copyright FAQ at all. With a bit more
digging, it does seem to be disallowed. For rationale, I get pointed back to
either Jimbo's posts on disallowing non-commercial-use media licenses, fair use,
or discussion of downstream use.

None of these reasons seem to apply here. For the free encyclopedia, a CC-BY-ND
media license, for example, is perfectly redistributable, allows for possible
commercial use, and poses no issues for forks or other downstream use, right?

We would, obviously, rather have everything under one license. But we allow
incompatible media copylefts, like CC-BY-SA and GFDL, even though it means we
can't, say, make a derivative image based on two images with incompatible
copylefts. We even allow "fair use" under some restricted circumstances. This
does not allow for derivative works either, and in fact poses downstream
problems. (Again, we, english Wikipedia. The Commons does not allow fair use.)

So it's obvious why we would rather not have no-derivative media licenses, but
it's not obvious to me why we would absolutely insist upon it, the way we
absolutely insist upon allowing commercial use or what have you.

At least, we could use some better documentation on this point.

Regards,
Dan Mehkeri


from_name: Domas Mituzas

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Inline rendering of SVG images into
	PNG	on	MediaWiki 1.7.1

references:
<NABBJGECPILFNLFEAPIKKEHIIOAA.nickpj@gmail.com>	<450F34AA.3020209@wolfmountaingroup.com>
	<eene3a$f3e$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<450F9A03.4010506@wolfmountaingroup.com>

body:
Hi!!!!

> I am cool. I seriously doubt that someone who invests large sums of
> money in MediaWiki sponsored companies likes
> being pointed to text that refers to them as an "idiot".

If you're investing money into companies already sponsored by
MediaWiki team, would you call ourselves partners? :)

Domas


body:
On 18/09/06, Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen at gmail.com> wrote:

> *  Wikimedia Foundation is not about the English Wikipedia. If it was,
> the other projects should get out of the Wikimedia Foundation asap
> because it would make it the wrong place to grow their project.
> * It would be good to discriminate against the English Wikipedia because
> it gets too much attention. The alternative is that it cannot look after
> itself. If this is the case the project should organise itself and not
> be dependant on outside control.
> * Even the Neapolitan wikipedia has had articles in the Italian National
> Press. This is certainly true for all the bigger projects. If you think
> that the domination of the English wikipedia is so self evident, think
> again most of what happens around the other projects you do not know
> about. Also the growth of the other projects is faster than the English
> project. It will not take long and the other projects will be
> substantially bigger.
> If you choose a board member only because you think he or she is
> "nice".. you might consider if he of she will also be effective and do
> good for ALL the projects.

Would this sort of thinking be why it's almost impossible for someone
from en: to become a steward these days?

- d.


from_name: Gregory Maxwell

body:
On 9/19/06, Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:
>Wikipedia is sunk if it must use the
> *intersection* of all copyright laws in the world, under which nearly
> nothing is permissible to distribute.

Cite up or shut up.

Your claim that the intersection of permitted works is the empty set
is ridiculous and disruptive. If you're going to make claims like
that, please substantiate them.

Although your statement is a ridiculous overstatement, it's not that
relevant any case: The long term practice of Wikipedia is to follow
the laws that we must follow and adopt additional practices that
further our goal of creating a encyclopedia which is free for all
forms of use, redistribution, and modification anywhere, for any
reason, and in any medium for all time.

There is no movement to limit wikipedia to least common denominator of
all jurisdictions.

However, we do choose to respect the copyrights of Iran... which have
copyright terms quite similar to the rest of the industrialized world,
but which lack enforcement in the US because Iran is not currently a
party to the Berne Convention.  This is a sound policy: Not only does
it preserve the legality of our work in Iran (which is part of
anywhere), but it preserves the legality of our work in the US and
Europe when a some point in the future Iran's copyrights become more
generally enforceable.


subject:
[Wikitech-l] Inline rendering of SVG images
	into	PNG	on	MediaWiki 1.7.1

references:
<NABBJGECPILFNLFEAPIKKEHIIOAA.nickpj@gmail.com>	<450F34AA.3020209@wolfmountaingroup.com>	<eene3a$f3e$1@sea.gmane.org>	<450F9A03.4010506@wolfmountaingroup.com>
	<51A4AE15-1C15-452A-BAA9-C623D27AE18F@gmail.com>
	<450FA286.3010509@wolfmountaingroup.com>

body:
Hi! Cool! Digs!

> Howdy partner. I am investing in a company that promotes the use of
> MediaWiki in Native American Language Preservation
> programs for Wikimedia content. Close enough.

Good initiative. I'm working on use of mediawiki in Native European
Language Preservation too!

> When my ban is lifted on the English Wikipedia, then I will start
> the money
> flow into the Foundation -- which is what I think you meant. In the

Bans are set by communities. Foundation oversees operational issues,
that supports many communities, including Native European Languages.

> meantime, I work on the Cherokee Wikipedia and Machine Translation
> Support for the Foundations projects -- I like the folks at Wikimedia.

Great! I like them (Wikimedia people) too! I don't like machine
translation though, because due to difficult ancient grammar
constructs Native European Languages resist automatic conversions.

I actually even thought it would be great idea to have a special
mailing list for native language preservation issues - your emails to
foundation about new dumps etc don't get that much attention and does
appear as a spam there. With a new mailing list you could send all
your information about language preservation to interested folks like
me!

Best regards,
Domas

--
Domas Mituzas -- http://dammit.lt/ -- [[user:midom]]


from_name: David Alexander Russell

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

Sean Barrett wrote:
 > Emphatic agreement with Ben. The video ''will'' be edited -- I
> personally guarantee it.  Please ensure that Forbidden Places
> <postmaster at forbidden-places.be> knows that I have said so, and that you
> have no authority to revoke parts of the GFDL.

Well we've explicitly stated that the video will be GFDL or CC-Att-SA
licenced, both of these allow modification. If he doesn't bother to read
a legal document before agreeing to it then that's his problem - if he
has then he should be more than adequately aware of the fact that
modification is allowed.

Cynical

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

Stephen Streater wrote:
> Would the original poster be liable in the UK
> for each copy made though? I don't have a
> clear answer on this yet. By releasing something
> under a free licence, am I saying:
> "you have the right to copy this"
> or am I saying
> "you have the right to copy this subject to applicable laws"?
> The second seems to make sense, but then why delete
> copyvio images if the images are subject to the law anyway?

I'm not entirely sure (IANAL etc.) but surely there is a chance that, if
the person taking the photo/film was legally restrained from offering it
under a particular licence (in this case, one that allowed commercial
use), then any such licencing would be invalid.

Cynical
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subject: [WikiEN-l] Simplified blocking policy by InkSplotch

body:
I may or may not get a moment to look at it, but others may care to
look it over:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:David_Gerard&diff=next&oldid=75891209

- d.


subject:
[WikiEN-l] No derivatives (was: Would you like one of your
	videos posted on Wikipedia?)

body:
On 9/19/06, dmehkeri at swi.com <dmehkeri at swi.com> wrote:
> Eh, why is that anyway? I understand why we would dislike it, of course, but I'm
> not sure why, exactly, we would want to make it a deal-breaker. (We, english
> Wikipedia, rather than say, Wikimedia Commons which has slightly different goals.)
[sni]

Is not *Free Content*, it is incompatible (in both spirit and
intention) with the GFDL, and it would inhibit intended applications
of Wikipedia.

Even if you forget that Wikipedia has creating Free Content as one of
its two primary goals (the other of which is creating an
Encyclopedia), and only consider making a no-cost encyclopedia:

Consider what happens if we make a print version of Wikipedia with
color images in black and white? Is that a derived work?   What if we
need to adjust some of the colors in the image to preserve contrast in
the black and white conversion?

What about cropping?  It is common on english wikipedia to crop images
to preserve their informative content in the small amount of screen
real estate we have available... (As an aside I think we often take
cropping too far)...

Translations, rearrangements, .. etc there is no shortage of examples
of places where we've altered images to further our goal of creating
an encyclopedia. This is all possible because we require illustrations
people create for our project to be Free Content.

[snip]
> For starters it isn't mentioned in the copyright FAQ at all.
[snip]

The copyright FAQ is mostly written for users of content in Wikipedia.
Not creators of Wikipedia content. See [[Wikipedia:Image use policy]]
which states "You can prove that the copyright holder has licensed the
image under a free license."

[snip]
> We would, obviously, rather have everything under one license. But we allow
> incompatible media copylefts, like CC-BY-SA and GFDL, even though it means we
> can't, say, make a derivative image based on two images with incompatible
> copylefts.

Although GFDL and CC-By-SA are technically incompatible, they are
largely compatible in principle.  If your use of an article conforms
to the GFDL, then it will easily conform to the CC-By-SA terms of
included images.

[snip]
>We even allow "fair use" under some restricted circumstances. This
> does not allow for derivative works either, and in fact poses downstream
> problems.

Our intention of allowing fair use images is to fulfil our
encyclopedic goals for material which can not be made available under
another license.

The downstream implication is that if we have a valid fair use claim
and they are doing something similar to us, then they should have a
fair use claim as well.

[snip]
> So it's obvious why we would rather not have no-derivative media licenses, but
> it's not obvious to me why we would absolutely insist upon it, the way we
> absolutely insist upon allowing commercial use or what have you.

Because our absolute insistence increases the amount of Free Content.

"Rather not" is meaningless if we do not put teeth behind it.


body:
On 18/09/06, Fastfission <fastfission at gmail.com> wrote:

> (I think the intent and basic mechanisms of the GFDL are great. I
> think the implementation is poor. I suspect that anything which
> implemented the GFDL as poorly as Wikipedia does would not hold up
> strongly in court.)

In particular, the GFDL for images is pretty much a pretend
free-content licence and not effectively one at all. "Yes, you can
freely reuse our images in print if you print the entire text of the
licence next to it." Uh, yeah.

- d.


subject: [Wikitech-l] Category intersection

body:
Timwi,

> I'm not sure where you get this idea that each intersection would be a
> separate table. Obviously it wouldn't, it would still be one single
> database table, containing everything. And this single table can be
> queried for a single category, which (assuming proper indexes are in
> place) would not be any less efficient than it already is currently.

Sure, now there's another issue - what happens (well, it already
happens with Living People), when people use categories like tags.
Simply, amount of big categories increases.

When you do an intersection of a small and big categories, you end up
with nested loop starting on a small one, checking for entry
existence in big one. Then you sort the small resultset.
When you do an intersection of two big categories, you end up with
nested loop going over two big tables, and a big resultset finally,
with big resultset to sort.

Right now we try to avoid sorting for categories at all - we use
index-based sorts.

B+Trees are not that good for intersections, now maybe fulltext
indexing in general is more suitable for such task, that would mean
us using external facility for lookups like that (well, that was
discussed in frankfurt 2005 ;-), but it is far more complex than to
throw few more queries at our core databases and expecting a miracle.

BR,
--
Domas Mituzas -- http://dammit.lt/ -- [[user:midom]]


from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [Wikipedia-l]Change language name... interwiki for roa-rup.wikipedia.org: Armãneashce not Armâneashti! HELP

body:
ro.wiki wrote:

>"ro.wiki" <wikipediaromana at yahoo.it> ha scritto:   Can please somebody change the name of the Aromanian language ( http://roa-rup.wikipedia.org ) as it appears in Wikipedia's interlanguage links from "Arm?neashti" to the correct spelling form "Arm?neshce" ?
>
>Also I wanna ask, how can this Wikipedia be transferred to rup.wikipedia.org , the correct Wikipedia adress as per ISO 639-2 Alpha 3?( http://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/englangn.html ) When it was created there was no ISO code for this language, but one was created. It is anyway a small Wikipedia so there should be no problem in movin articles.
>
Wouldn't ISO 639-3 be more appropriate since it is expected that in due
time it will replace 639-2?

Ec


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Would you like one of your videos posted
	on	Wikipedia?

body:
Gregory Maxwell wrote:
> On 9/19/06, Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:
>
>> Wikipedia is sunk if it must use the
>> *intersection* of all copyright laws in the world, under which nearly
>> nothing is permissible to distribute.
>>
>
> Cite up or shut up.
>
> Your claim that the intersection of permitted works is the empty set
> is ridiculous and disruptive. If you're going to make claims like
> that, please substantiate them.
>

Although your comment is in a rather impolite tone, I suppose I'll reply
anyway.

If we had to follow the intersection of copyright laws, we could not
distribute a number of things we currently distribute on various of our
projects:

1. Modern mechanical reproductions of out-of-copyright artworks, since
these are only unprotected by copyright in the subset of countries that
have _Bridgeman_-like case law
2. Simple collections of facts compiled by someone else, since these are
copyrightable under the 1996 [[en:European Union Database Directive]]
3. Anything, such as the King James version of the Bible, held under
perpetual copyright in the United Kingdom
4. Anything created and first published in the United States before
1923, but by an author who did not die more than 70 years ago, since
some countries that don't use a "principle of the shortest term" apply
70 years PMA *even* to works that are out of copyright in their country
of origin
5. Similarly, anything out of copyright due to its country of origin
having a 50-years PMA rule, since some countries apply 70 years PMA to
these works anyway
6. Anything out of copyright due to having been first published in the
U.S. during the period when copyright registration and renewal was
mandatory, that did not have its copyright registered or renewed, since
some countries apply 70 years PMA to thsee works anyway

The list goes on extensively.  To get an idea of what would need to be
deleted if we respected the intersection of copyright laws, find every
Commons copyright tag with a proviso such as "This may not apply in
countries such as [x, y, z]".

-Mark


body:
On 9/19/06, Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:
> Although your comment is in a rather impolite tone, I suppose I'll reply
> anyway.

It's rather impolite of you to make sweeping and inaccurate
generalizations. There are people  here who may not know that you were
full of crap.

> If we had to follow the intersection of copyright laws, we could not
> distribute a number of things we currently distribute on various of our
> projects:

Yes. No argument that we currently distribute works that we could not
distribute if we attempted to follow all laws, but your claim was that
the project would fail because "nearly nothing is permissible to
distribute" under a policy of expansive conformance.

> 1. Modern mechanical reproductions of out-of-copyright artworks, since
> these are only unprotected by copyright in the subset of countries that
> have _Bridgeman_-like case law

A nit: only in cases where the mechanical reproducer tries to claim a
non-free copyright.

[snip]
> The list goes on extensively.  To get an idea of what would need to be
> deleted if we respected the intersection of copyright laws, find every
> Commons copyright tag with a proviso such as "This may not apply in
> countries such as [x, y, z]".

Yes, its a lot of material but it's far less than all.

In particual content *we* create is not copyright encoumbered. Since
our text is mostly submitter authored there is no reason to believe
that our project would fail if our images had to be submitter authored
as well.


from_name: Ragib Hasan

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Change of namespace: who to contact?

body:
On 9/19/06, habj <sweetadelaide at gmail.com> wrote:
> Most of the language files can be fiddled with at betawiki, as well as
> locally on the wikis.(Betawikis is nice, since the changes there will
> eventually be integrated into the MediaWiki software and used in every wiki
> in your language that uses the MediaWiki software. Changing the actual name
> of the namespace, however, can only be done by developers.

Thanks for the advice.

>
> The recommended way, as I understand it, is to first have a discussion on
> your wiki to reach a decision and then file a request to have the namespace
> renamed at Mediazilla
> http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/
> You can also join one of the IRC-channels with tech folks in it and ask to
> have it done, but you should be able to show a concensus on your wiki first.
>
> /habj

This part is a bit interesting, we do have consensus, but how would
someone not able to understand another language or to see Indic fonts
be able to understand the consensus page?

--
Ragib Hasan
PhD Student
Dept of Computer Science
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
201 N Goodwin Avenue
Urbana IL 61801

Website:
http://www.ragibhasan.com
http://netfiles.uiuc.edu/rhasan/www


body:
Ray Saintonge wrote
> Claims about whether Wikipedia is reliable or unreliable are most often
> speculative.

Wikipedia is unreliable. You can't settle a bet with Wikipedia. If you actually needed to buy Britannica in the past, you still do. The wriggle-room between 'unreliable' and 'useless' turns out to be so large we have shoehorned a multimillion-article reference site in there.

Charles

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from_name: Gerard Meijssen

subject: [Foundation-l] [WikiEN-l] Wikimedia Board Elections

body:
David Gerard wrote:
> On 18/09/06, Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>> *  Wikimedia Foundation is not about the English Wikipedia. If it was,
>> the other projects should get out of the Wikimedia Foundation asap
>> because it would make it the wrong place to grow their project.
>> * It would be good to discriminate against the English Wikipedia because
>> it gets too much attention. The alternative is that it cannot look after
>> itself. If this is the case the project should organise itself and not
>> be dependant on outside control.
>> * Even the Neapolitan wikipedia has had articles in the Italian National
>> Press. This is certainly true for all the bigger projects. If you think
>> that the domination of the English wikipedia is so self evident, think
>> again most of what happens around the other projects you do not know
>> about. Also the growth of the other projects is faster than the English
>> project. It will not take long and the other projects will be
>> substantially bigger.
>> If you choose a board member only because you think he or she is
>> "nice".. you might consider if he of she will also be effective and do
>> good for ALL the projects.
>>
>
>
> Would this sort of thinking be why it's almost impossible for someone
> from en: to become a steward these days?
>
>
> - d.
>
Hoi,
For someone to become a steward, there has to be something that he / she
brings to the table that makes him / her do a good job. Considering what
a steward does, it makes sense for a steward to speak multiple
languages. The question that I would ask you is: is being a steward of
political or is it of functional importance? Most people want someone to
be a steward so that he can do things effectively and consequently it is
hard for English only people to become a steward.
Thanks,
    GerardM


body:
On 9/19/06, Delphine M?nard <notafishz at gmail.com> wrote:
[snip]
> "All Google searches". "Most searches". So unless you need exact
> numbers, I think the trends are obvious. Wikipedia is not looked up
> primarily in English speaking countries, but rather in non-English
> speaking countries. Of course, one could argue that they're all
> looking up the English Wikipedia. My little finger tells me they are
> not, localized browsers tend to show results in their own language.
[snip]

" When the Cities tab is selected, Google Trends first looks at a
sample of all Google searches to determine the cities from which we
received the most searches for your first term. Then, for those top
cities, Google Trends calculates the ratio of searches for your term
coming from each city divided by total Google searches coming from the
same city."

Also, keep in mind that these is for people actually searching for the
word "Wikipedia".  The AOL data shows that most of the people who
click through to Wikipedia searched for things which were not
Wikipedia (although wikipedia was the single most common search term
which brought people to wikipedia).


from_name: charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com

subject: [WikiEN-l] Citizendium

body:
Kim van der Linde wrote

> charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com wrote:
> > It is going to be a lot easier for WP to improve
> > article content, in areas where it actually has some welcome
> > competition, than it is going to be for those rivals to import into
> > their site the necessary redirects and so on, to give the
> > navigational smooth ride.

> Why should only Wikipedia be able to do that?

Yes, why should another site not get the grunt work done? I guess because they start with a 'more chiefs than Indians' model of intellectual work? Delegation to the nearest graduate student actually works in academia, sort of. People get doctorates for doing what someone memorably called the more boring parts broken off the professor's research program.

Just who gets excited enough to add all those variants of [[John of Jandun]], for a random example, on a site based on a star system (as if that was a panacea)?

Charles

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from_name: Jeff V. Merkey

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Inline rendering of SVG images
 into	PNG	on	MediaWiki 1.7.1

body:
Jay R. Ashworth wrote:

>On Tue, Sep 19, 2006 at 01:19:31AM -0600, Jeffrey V. Merkey wrote:
>
>
>>[ regarding ESR's Smart Questions paper ]
>>It may be construed to be rather tacky to use that listing for third
>>parties as a statement that reflects on
>>the MediaWiki project.
>>
>>
>>
>>>(b) If you'd read to the end, you'd have seen this:
>>>http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html#keepcool
>>>
>>>
>>I am cool. I seriously doubt that someone who invests large sums of
>>money in MediaWiki sponsored companies likes
>>being pointed to text that refers to them as an "idiot". I am not upset
>>at all -- just making an observation.
>>
>>
>
>I'm sure they don't.
>
>This doesn't, however, mean that they *aren't* idiots.  ESR is
>certainly a polarizing individual, and that as much as anything because
>he's blunt, and calls them like he sees them.
>
>Whether how he sees them is reasonable is a-whole-nother argument, of
>course, but I personally am one of those people who answers lots of
>dumb questions from idiots -- idiots who *pay me* for the privilege,
>and that's why I don't lay ASQ on them.  If they're asking me for
>*free*?  You bet.  If they think it's calling them an idiot, then maybe
>it is, and I might be so lucky as to have them ask someone else.
>
>:-)
>
>Cheers,
>-- jra
>
>
My first encounter with Eric Raymond was at a public conference several
years ago. He got up and
announced he was a "warlock" and other strange and bizzare nonsense. I
note he was an author of
that document. I guess that all speaks for itself.

:-)

Jeff


from_name: geni

body:
On 9/19/06, Delphine M?nard <notafishz at gmail.com> wrote:
> This search is about as biased as the Alexa numbers. Who in the world
> would *ever* look for a search with en.wikipedia or fr.wikipedia ?
>

It appears to happen.

> Try that one:
> http://www.google.com/trends?q=wikipedia&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all
>
> Very different results aren't they?
>
> Delphine

Different but largely useless unless you can find out how many search
requests come from various areas. You also have the problem that you
have no way of knowing which language people are looking at.
--
geni


subject: [Foundation-l] Verifiability: Constitution? Question for Jimbo!

body:
Gerard Meijssen wrote:

>Hoi,
>When some people have highlighted that in their opinion veriability and
>no original research are two sides to the same coin, it does not equate
>that everyone agrees with that. Not everyone does. When people make the
>effort to write an article for Wikipedia, it does not make them POV
>warriors; constantly on the lookout what is happening to their article.
>This invalidates your argument that they will "defend" their article in
>the first place. There are many people who have been disgusted by the
>policies about (in their opinion) nitwits who claim that an article is
>not "good" but do not argue WHY it is not good. The notion that
>something is not good because there are no sources provided is in and of
>itself not a conceptual argument, it is a formalistic argument.
>
Defending an article is not inherently wrong.  How and to what extent
one defends the article is far more important.  The same thing can be
said about how and to what extent one opposes an article.  The problem
arises when the author's personal investment in an article is more
important than the article itself.

>On the topic of politics, the Hungarians know all too well that
>politicians lie.
>
Hungarian politicians do not have a monopoly on this skill.

>What proof is in the fact that something was said
>publicly.
>
It proves that whoever said it said it publicly

>It is public knowledge that the voting machines are not
>reliable and politicians are still elected this way.
>
Many would say that "public knowledge" is a weasel phrase, although in
this instance I am sure that enough people have made that assertion that
it should be easy to track down a quotation from somebody who should know.

>The same is true
>with religion, every religion believes in their truth and consequently
>what an other religion says is an affront. The points that prove any
>point of view in this have sources, it is just what you want to
>believe.
>
Religious belief is a problem by itself because it does not adapt very
well to compromise solutions.

>in a similar vain, research has indicated that commercial
>healthcare result in a higher death rate but as this is not a fact that
>is acceptable this fact is ignored.
>
The death rate everywhere is neither more nor less than 100%. :-)

>When the talk page is long, the facts and probably the sources are biased.
>
When the talk page is too long people stop reading it.  It will
naturally contain multiple biases.  At one time it was considered a
positive contribution to condense the contents of a talk page, but I
have heard very little about that recently.  Preparing a fair summary is
a tough job.

>Constructive criticism.. I would love a definition for that.. is that
>not the criticism that says "you are on the right track but see the way
>of your errors" .. basically replacing one POV with another ..
>
Not really.  It presents alternative points of view.  It recognizes what
is right in the article, and suggests alternatives that might improve
the article.  Insisting that the original writer has erred is not
constructive.

Ec


subject: [Wikitech-l] Category intersection

body:
Domas Mituzas wrote:

>Hey Greg,
>
>
>
>>Or another database engine which supports an index type which is an
>>inverted index with fast intersections.
>>
>>
>
>MyISAM? \o/
>
>
>
I am in process of mapping MediaWiki to a file system I wrote that
provides Wiki-like database behaviors. I am a ways out
on getting this finished and it will be end of the year until all of it
is completed, but it will solve a lot of these issues of
scaling and make MediaWiki a lot thinner and a ton faster.

Keep everyone updated.

Jeff


body:
On 9/19/06, Aphaia <aphaia at gmail.com> wrote:
> And most of Wikipedia languages have no information about Election
> even in the form of sitenotice. That is our reality.

Due to the use og global notice the only way that can happen is if
there is already something in sitenotice.

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] Citizendium

body:
On 19/09/06, charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com
<charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com> wrote:

> Yes, why should another site not get the grunt work done? I guess because they start with a 'more chiefs than Indians' model of intellectual work? Delegation to the nearest graduate student actually works in academia, sort of. People get doctorates for doing what someone memorably called the more boring parts broken off the professor's research program.
> Just who gets excited enough to add all those variants of [[John of Jandun]], for a random example, on a site based on a star system (as if that was a panacea)?

Wikipedia gets people willing to do the ridiculously boring jobs
because they believe in the project and this is a way they can help
it.

An example that I find striking: The [[Puffing Billy Railway,
Melbourne]] is a tourist steam railway. They have volunteers out
warming up the engine every morning at 3am! Reliably! People volunteer
to do jobs that when paid workers did them brought socialist
revolution to mind.

Citizendium will, I suspect, need to attract people who belileve in
the project and want to help it however they can and do the *really
boring bits*.

- d.


body:
> Consider what happens if we make a print version of Wikipedia with
> color images in black and white? Is that a derived work?

Meh. Possibly a derivative work under some laws, I don't know.

Though CC-BY-ND, for instance, explicitly allows transfer to different media,
and modifications necessary for such.

> > For starters it isn't mentioned in the copyright FAQ at all.
> [snip]
>
> The copyright FAQ is mostly written for users of content in Wikipedia.
> Not creators of Wikipedia content.

Sorry, isn't that the case under discussion? By "user of content" we mean people
including someone else's content in Wikipedia, rather than people using
Wikipedia's content, right? Because the first question in the FAQ is, in fact,
"Can I add to Wikipedia something that I got from somewhere else?"

The FAQ has a whole section on licenses. It even has a specific sub-section on
Creative Commons licenses. There is a general prohibition on that page against
non-commercial licenses, but nothing about non-derivative, not even in the
specific sub-section.

> See [[Wikipedia:Image use policy]] which states "You can prove that the
> copyright holder has licensed the image under a free license."

I did in fact look at that page as well, and that is not the relevant section.
That section is about whether you can upload the media. For example it also has
the option "you own the rights to the image" and one for "fair use".

You then go down just a bit further to find what "free license" is acceptable.
Again, it explicitly forbids non-commercial use licenses, but is silent on
non-derivative licenses. You then go to another page for "acceptable image tags"
(WP:TAG). Again, a general prohibition on non-commercial license is stated
(sort-of... e.g. if you go all the way down under generic free licenses), but no
general prohibition on non-deriv. Of course, under the specific creative commons
section, you would not find no-deriv licenses.

So I found it less than clear, even for "creators of content" rather than "users
for content", and rationale is not given in any case.

> >We even allow "fair use" under some restricted circumstances. This
> > does not allow for derivative works either, and in fact poses downstream
> > problems.
>
> Our intention of allowing fair use images is to fulfil our
> encyclopedic goals for material which can not be made available under
> another license.
>
> The downstream implication is that if we have a valid fair use claim
> and they are doing something similar to us, then they should have a
> fair use claim as well.
>

But if the downstream users are doing something different, then they might not,
and in any case a fair use claim is not a let to make derivative works
(notwithstanding media transfers, which as I say is allowed anyway).

It seems to me that CC-BY-ND, therefore, is intermediate between a copyleft and
fair-use. And we do, as you say, allow fair use, under some circumstances. We
should therefore allow CC-BY-ND under at least the same circumstances, and
probably more. No?

Regards,
Daniel


body:
On 9/19/06, Jon Harald S?by <jhsoby at gmail.com> wrote:
> Indirect elections is a terrible idea. Indirect elections are used in
> a certain North-American country. It is an election type that allows a
> war-mongering cowboy who stands for less gun control, less social
> welfare programs, and who doesn't give a rat's ass about the
> enviroment ("there is no such thing as a human-created enviroment
> changes" my ass) to become the President even though he gets fewer
> votes than the other candidate. This should have taught people a
> lesson about indirect elections.
[snip]

You'll see no love of Bush from me, but your complaint is factually
inaccurate: Bush won the popular vote in the second election and even
had more then 50% of the votes.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election%2C_2004#Election_results]

Even in the case of the first election, to me it seems a bit foolish
to complain about the electoral system when the popular vote was well
within the margin of error of the voting system overall.  ... and can
you really look at a results by state map
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election%2C_2000#Results]
and say that it is entirely unfair that Gore did not win?

It's simply not a black and white issue... and it's not fair to fault
an election process because it didn't go the way you prefer.

In the future it would make sense not to disrupt discussion about
Wikimedia operations with offtopic politically loaded interjections.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Citizendium

body:
"David Gerard" write

> Citizendium will, I suspect, need to attract people who belileve in
> the project and want to help it however they can and do the *really
> boring bits*.

Correct. First-mover advantage can run out.

WP, however, started in a low key way and grown very largely by word-of-mouth up to Siegenthaler. It has not only a 'community', in the sort of nomadic sense you get on the Net, but a bunch of very many people who have an understanding of Community. As in what the job requires in the way of division of labour, and what being a single household also requires. That group is not so easily cherry-picked away by another site, just by offering improvements in working conditions.

We'll see. [[Digital Universe]] says it has 100 articles by now - is that reliable information?

Charles

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from_name: Kelly Martin

body:
On 9/19/06, Jon Harald S?by <jhsoby at gmail.com> wrote:
> Anyways, my point was that indirect elections _might_ turn out to have
> inaccurate results (though that is a rather rare situation), and that
> it would be especially hard to arrange this on Wikimedia projects.

Indirect election of officials in voluntary organizations with large,
geographically diverse membership is common and may actually be the
norm.  Comparisons with election of geopolitical leaders ("involuntary
organizations") are simply inapposite; there are so many functional
differences between electing a head of government and electing the
officers of a voluntary organization.

Rejecting the idea simply because it superficially resembles the
American college of electors (which, by the way, is a very strange
form of indirect election) is, frankly, silly.  Rejecting it because
it seems too difficult to implement today is shortsighted.

Let's also not forget that direct democracy elected Hitler, and yet we
still use it as well.

Kelly


from_name: Andrew Gray

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Would you like one of your videos posted on
	Wikipedia?

body:
On 19/09/06, Stephen Streater <sbstreater at mac.com> wrote:
> Would the original poster be liable in the UK
> for each copy made though? I don't have a
> clear answer on this yet. By releasing something
> under a free licence, am I saying:
> "you have the right to copy this"
> or am I saying
> "you have the right to copy this subject to applicable laws"?

My interpretation is that you're saying "I have the right to copy
this, and I'm giving you these rights subject to the following
conditions..."

If you don't have the right to make commercial copies (or whatever),
you can't license the rights to do so. If you've attempted to license
it under something like the GFDL without first possessing all the
rights you're licensing, at the very least the license is invalid -
and there's a nontrivial possibility you're liable for breach of
contract. Even though you yourself haven't made commercial use of it,
you've knowingly permitted people to do so...

(It becomes more complex if you distribute it legally and then  *I*
steal it and redistribute it under a free license - the license is
still invalid, but you're probably no longer liable)

--
- Andrew Gray
  andrew.gray at dunelm.org.uk


from_name: mr wiggl3s

subject: [WikiEN-l] Infobox help needed

body:
How do i make it so all the infoboxs are with their headers? Right now some
of the info boxs are on the wrong info section.
Heres what i got:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Mr_wiggl3s
--
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