body:
Timwi wrote:
> What nobody has tried, although I would have thought it was obvious, was
> to ask him *in edit summaries* (he obviously looked at those) to discuss
> things on the article's talk page.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Ronald_Reagan&diff=4235469&oldid=4234848

14 edits before this all devolved into blocking, Texture said, in an edit
summary, "please discuss on talk page".

Cheers!
David...


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Stormie

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Violation of blocking policy by user "40277"

body:
James Marshall wrote:
> Stormie's post just came through-- Stormie, don't misrepresent it. Some of
> your post is answered above, but for what isn't: I did not ignore the
> comments on my talk page, though I didn't see the last one before I was
> banned.

Fair enough, the last warning from Oberiko was indeed the clearest statement
that what was needed was a discussion on the talk page. It's a shame that
that wasn't spelled out more clearly earlier in the piece.

> The first ones were insults toward me, and my response to Texture was
> firmly-worded, but hardly a "mischievous attack"-- it was modeled on what
> Texture said to me, to illustrate the symmetry of the situation.

I probably spoke too hastily there. It just seems that we get frequent
posts to this mailing list from people who claim to have just discovered
Wikipedia, made their very first contribution.. and been unfairly banned.
Yet they quote chapter and verse from various policy pages to try to
produce some technicality according to which they were unjustly treated.

Needless to say, this gets a bit wearing, and thus the first thought that
came to my mind when I read your post to Texture was "god, another banned
troll returning anonymously to stir up more trouble". Especially when you
start talking about the 3 Revert Rule and your reverts not really being
reverts because they were reverts of reversions, etc.

If you are genuinely a new user, I apologize for this suggestion
unreservedly. I jumped to conclusions concerning you due to the actions
of others.

> In any case, he avoided answering my points and merely repeated his
> usual "vandalism" mantra. As for my not discussing it, it was Texture,
> Oberiko, and Jiang who seemed to not want to discuss it.

I have to say, as the person trying to change the status quo on an
established article in what proved to be a controversial fashion, the onus
is on you to start the discussion and justify your change.

Texture and Oberiko both asked you to discuss the matter on the talk page.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Ronald_Reagan&diff=4235469&oldid=4234848
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=User_talk:24.4.202.208&diff=0&oldid=4247588

> Further still, what I added was less POV than what those others wanted.
> Why aren't you applying your complaints to the others? Double standards,
> maybe?

Not at all. I actually agree with your edits. But there is a right way to
go about things (which leads to a quality article that everyone can approve
of) and a wrong way (which leads to chaos and the same edits being endlessly
reverted and re-inserted).

Look, this has all been needlessly unpleasant, but I hope you can understand
WHY your edits met with hostility, even from people who DON'T disagree with
your content, just the way you went about inserting it.

As the rest of this message showed, you clearly have some good stuff to
contribute to this: I suggest you take that, stick it on [[Talk:Ronald
Reagan]], and have at it! I think you'll find quite a number of Wikipedia
editors who share your views and would be happy to try to thrash out a more
balanced section on Reagan's "period of prosperity".

What would be really helpful is some figures concerning wealth distribution
to put those "GDP grew, inflation dropped" claims into perspective.. reckon
you can rustle them up?

I trust that if you do so, everyone involved will treat your contributions
with good faith.

Any chance we can put this behind us and move forwards?

Cheers!
David...


body:
Timwi wrote:
> >
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Ronald_Reagan&diff=4235469&oldid=4234848
> >
> > 14 edits before this all devolved into blocking, Texture said, in an
> > edit summary, "please discuss on talk page".
>
> That was 18 hours before James added the bit that started it all. I
> don't think James was expected to notice it or feel addressed by it.

Oh, I'm not putting that forward as a claim that everyone has behaved in
an exemplary fashion, by any means. Just wanted you to know that one
person had tried to ask him in an edit summary to discuss things.

Also, it wasn't "18 hours before James added the bit that started it all".
It was is response to his third addition of controversial text. This
summary was attached to a reversion of his edit, which he must have
noticed since he re-inserted his text straight afterwards! :-)

Cheers!
David...


from_name: Poor, Edmund W

subject: [WikiEN-l] Rules vs. Anarchy

body:
A few contributors have taken me to task, for daring to suggest that
enforcing the rules of Wikipedia is a duty -- rather than something to
be apologized for.

I do not believe in "moral equivalence". When people agree to follow
rules, and one of them breaks the rule, another of them has the RIGHT to
point out the violation. At this point, the two parties are no longer on
the same standing. The violator takes the low road, and the
pointer-outer takes the moral high road.

Normally, the offender would then apologize, make amends, etc. Others,
including the pointer-outer would then forgive him.

Some people disagree with this norm. Or they think that social graces
should apply to all situations, regardless of import. "Sorry, that's my
seat." (apology given to offender!)

How about if someone wearing a tee-shirt with a large rooster on it
walks down your street breaking car windows with a baseball bat. Would
you feel a need to apologize to him, before calling the police? (Or
getting together with a couple of neighbors and tackling him?)

Problems with Wik dragged on because we don't have clear moral ideas,
that all subscribe to. The problem with 172 _was_ resolved (without
resorting to the Arbitration Committee), because we were all able to
discuss it on the mailing list. But Abe maintains the posture of having
taken offense, rather than realizing he offended, so the resolution
remains incomplete.

Imagine getting a phone call from the mother of the kid who was breaking
car windows, demanding an apology: "How dare you tackle (or call the
police on) him?" Would you say, "Sorry, I admit it was wrong for me to
try to stop him from destroying things. I promise not to do it again."?
That's ridiculous.

Ed Poor


from_name: James Marshall

subject:
Policy violations (was [WikiEN-l] Re: Violation of blocking
	policy by user "40277")

body:
Look, I only did this because Timwi specifically requested me to make a
list of violations and links to policy pages-- see his previous posts.  I
had NO desire to spend hours on this very dry task, and I would not have
if no one had asked for it.  I'm not obsessing on it.  Readers of this
list are free to ignore it if they wish, and I've tried to make that clear
in my posts.  I think it's better to ignore posts that don't interest you
than to criticize people for posting something uninteresting to you.

I was directed here after a friend of Jimbo's thought I should contribute
to the (currently pretty one-sided) Reagan article.  If my contribution
has now taken the form of Q/A on the Wikipedia social system, then so be
it, but that's definitely not what I came here for.  It can, however, be
constructive, if anyone chooses to follow up on it; that's not my choice
one way or the other.

James

On Fri, 25 Jun 2004, Ray Saintonge wrote:

RS> James Marshall wrote:
RS>
RS> >Okee dokee, here are some of the violations I found in the recent
RS> >unpleasantness.  Some are more important than others, and some are
RS> >stronger cases than others.  But in no particular order, and in an ad hoc
RS> >format, here's what I came up with in the last couple of hours:
RS> >
RS> >
RS> >First, not a violation, but Timwi specifically asked about policies
RS> >encouraging additions and discouraging deletions.  To clarify, I didn't
RS> >mean a hard-and-fast rule-- of course some deletions are good and some
RS> >additions are bad.  But it's a theme I picked up a few times on various
RS> >newbie and policy pages.  I'll see if I can find the references again.
RS> >
RS> >... OK, here are some:
RS> >
RS> (long snip)
RS>
RS> Please stop obsessing on this.  Notwithstanding the truth and validity
RS> of what you say people only go so far in reading this kind of stuff.
RS> Those who frequent the mailing lists have heard it all before, and can
RS> become impatient when it comes to reading these long diatribes of
RS> defence.  They are counterproductive to your cause.
RS>
RS> You would do better to simply devote your time to editing real
RS> articles.  Avoid hot-button items until after you have become better
RS> known, or have some track-record in less controversial areas.
RS>
RS> Ec
RS>


from_name: Robert

subject: [WikiEN-l] This isn't a theoretical issue; its real.

body:
Charle Podle is making things up. I did *not* make my name
public. EntmootsOfTrolls did, shortly before he theartened
to give my identity to Islamic extremists. (Groups that at
the time and now, were infamous for murdering those that
they disagreed with.)

Mr Natural Health didn't threaten to give me up to
Islamists; he coldly told me that he himself was a Nazi,
and that he lived near me. That's the same as sending an
e-mail to a black in the south that you are a member of the
KKK. Its called an implicit threat, and the local police
departments take such threats seriously, even if certain
Wiki-En members do not.

I am not about to sit back and wait for anyone else to do
the same. In the past, it was considered wrong for
Wikipedia users to "out" people and put such private
information out for others to read. But now that it has
happened to me twice, you'd think that people would stop
such behaviour? No, instead, Charles wrote falsehoods about
me, and ignores the point. I wonder how he would react if
someone was bothering one of his friends or loved ones? Oh
wait, that's different. As long as it is someone else who
is outed and who feels threatened, that's Ok?

No. Its morally wrong when it happens to anyone. It is also
a violation of every norm of Wikipedia etiquette, which
this list seems to have suddenly forgotten about. It is
also probably illegal.

The fact that not a single person here seems to care scares
the hell out of me. If it can be done to one person, it can
be done to any of us. (Just ask some of the many
well-documented victims of the Internet Scientology wars,
who have been threatened, stalked, and whose lives have
been damaged by maniancs from the Church of Scientology.)
This isn't a theoretical issue; its real.

Robert (RK)

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Address AutoComplete - You start. We finish.
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail


from_name: Stan Shebs

body:
Robert wrote:

>
>The fact that not a single person here seems to care scares
>the hell out of me. If it can be done to one person, it can
>be done to any of us. (Just ask some of the many
>well-documented victims of the Internet Scientology wars,
>who have been threatened, stalked, and whose lives have
>been damaged by maniancs from the Church of Scientology.)
>This isn't a theoretical issue; its real.
>
You kind of lost all your support and credibility when you called
all of us Nazis, and failed to apologize for it subsequently. Why
then would anybody pay attention to anything you have to say?

Stan


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] plone?

body:
martin f krafft wrote:
> Wikipedia has a decisive Plone (www.plone.org) feel to it. Yet,
> I cannot find Plone anywhere on the about pages. Is it
> a coincidence, or did Wikipedia base some of its logics and or
> design on Plone?

http://en.wikipedia.org/style/monobook/main.css

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 253 bytes
Desc: OpenPGP digital signature
URL: <http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/attachments/20040625/ed607f4c/attachment.pgp>


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Delirium

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Theora and video policy...

body:
Peter Gervai wrote:

>Dunno about any problems with GIF *decoding*, but you surely cannot *create*
>compressed GIFs without paying.
>
>
That's no longer true, as the GIF patent has expired everywhere except
Canada, where it will expire in 2 weeks.  According to the League for
Programming Freedom's page on the issue, expiration dates are:
* US: June 20, 2003
* UK, France, Germany, Italy: June 18, 2004
* Japan: June 20, 2004
* Canada: July 7, 2004

Once the Canadian one expires in 12 days, I see no reason to continue
prohibiting people from using GIFs.  Of course, whether there's any
advantage to GIFs over PNGs is another issue, but if we choose not to
use GIFs, it should be for a non-legal reason, and we should probably
not be anal about absolutely prohibiting them.

-Mark


from_name: Charles Podles

subject: [WikiEN-l] RK's groundless complaint

body:
--- Robert <rkscience100 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Charle Podle is making things up.

Charle*s* Podle*s*. Please. And now that you've outed
me by using my real name, you must be banned
immediately!!!eleven!!! :)

> I did *not* make my name public. EntmootsOfTrolls
did <snip>

So what about these messages, sent to a public mailing
list by "Robert K*****" and signed as "RK"?

http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2002-December/008259.html
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2002-December/008294.html
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2002-December/008319.html
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2002-December/008329.html

I suppose EntmootsOfTrolls hijacked your account and
sent those e-mails. He's a tricksy one, he is.

<snip>
Robert wrote:
> Charles wrote
> falsehoods about
> me, and ignores the point. I wonder how he would
> react if
> someone was bothering one of his friends or loved
> ones? Oh
> wait, that's different. As long as it is someone
> else who
> is outed and who feels threatened, that's Ok?

I still don't see how using a name you revealed in a
public forum is in any way a "threat" or "outing".
Perhaps you can explain?

> No. Its morally wrong when it happens to anyone. It
> is also
> a violation of every norm of Wikipedia etiquette,
> which
> this list seems to have suddenly forgotten about. It
> is
> also probably illegal.

Using names which people themselves revealed is a
violation of every norm of Wikipedia etiquette?

So I suppose I should stop addressing every Wikipedian
who uses their real name by that selfsame real name,
lest I be banned, eh.

As to the legality of using a name someone revealed of
his own free will---I'm not a lawyer, so I won't
comment on that.

--Charles Podles ([[en:user:Mirv]])

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - 100MB free storage!
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail


list: foundation-l

subject: [Foundation-l] Re: Finances

body:
Anthere wrote:

>> I believe it is important to get a set accounts drawn
>> including a balance sheet and statement of income and
>> expenditure.  Then have them audited by a chartered
>> accountant.  Because often when applying for grants
>> they will request an audited set of accounts.
>>
>> Richard (aka Popsracer)
>
>
> Might you explain what you are thinking of, when you mention "a
> chartered accountant" ?

I think this means simply an accountant who is legally qualified to act
as an accountant.  Usually this is a "certified public accountant (CPA)"
in the US, although there may be some special license for non-profits.
Since we're chartered in Florida, someone with credentials to operate
under Florida law is probably best.  Basically, it's someone who has
taken a set of tests and gotten a license that allows them to legally
say "I have audited these accounts, and they are correct".  Due
especially to some relatively recent scandals, both in non-profits and
in corporations, a lot of grant agencies in the US require officially
audited account books these days, and that usually has to be done by an
outside auditor (i.e. someone not affiliated with the organization, so a
Wikipedian who is also an accountant wouldn't qualify) to make sure the
money is being spent where the organization says it's being spent.

I think even if we did this, we'd still keep the books ourselves, and
just submit them once per year to an outside auditor for a stamp of
approval.  I have no idea how much paying such a person would cost.

-Mark


list: wikimedia-l

subject: [Foundation-l] Re: Finances


subject:
Policy violations (was [WikiEN-l] Re: Violation ofblockingpolicyby
	user "40277")

body:
But I have to respectfully disagree with both of you here-- do you really
want to forbid newbies from contributing to anything controversial?

I still think things would have gone much better if the other users had
not abused their power and had otherwise done what they were supposed to,
_especially being more experienced users_.  I think it would have been OK
EVEN IF the subject is controversial.  There are ways of dealing with
controversy that don't involve censorship or inappropriate banning.  And
I'm sorry, I STILL don't see that I did anything wrong, at least nothing
that wasn't done MORE wrong by the others (e.g. I could have started a
discussion, but so could the others, and they had more reason to start
one).

Just because I contribute something controversial does not give license to
the others to behave the way they did.  Does it?

???

James

On Fri, 25 Jun 2004, sannse wrote:

s> Charles worte:
s>
s> > > I think this case has said a lot about our community reaction to
s> newbies,
s> > > I'm seriously considering starting a Save the Newbie campaign here.
s> > >
s> > > --sannse
s>
s> > To be fair (though matters may have gone wrong here) newbies also need
s> > saving from well-intentioned advice to start their time on WP, not logged
s> > in, adding comments on American political topics that are divisive and
s> > concerning divisiveness.  The deep end.
s>
s> Yes, such advice to take things easy at first would be part of the
s> policies of the RSPCN (with it's US branch of SPCN of course).  Those
s> who slide easily into the Wikipedia culture tend to be those who start
s> by writing NPOV articles about fluffy kittens rather than those jumping
s> in to the more... ummm... /active/ areas of the 'pedia.
s>
s> --sannse
s>
s> do we /have/ an article on [[Fluffy kitten]]s?
s>


from_name: Andrew Lih

subject: [Foundation-l] Finances

body:
On Fri, 25 Jun 2004 15:46:10 +1200 (NZST), Richard Gallagher
<richie_a76 at yahoo.co.nz> wrote:
>
> After rereading the bylaws I now see that the don't
> preclude the treasurer from being someone outside the
> Board of Trustees.  Although I still think it would be
> good if the treasurer was also on the board.

Is that quite true?  It reads:

Section 1. COMPOSITION OF BOARD. The Board of Trustees shall elect
from among its members a Chair, Vice Chair, Executive Secretary and
Treasurer. These officers shall be elected for one year terms of
office by majority vote of the Board and may be re-elected at the
expiration of their term. Any officer may be removed at any time for
cause or without cause by an affirmative vote of a majority of the
whole Board of Trustees.

"Elect from its members" seems to imply members of the Board of Trustees.

In either case, Mav has been enthusiastic, knowledgable and
responsible in the role, and something that he has given his time to.
We would all do well to have him oversee financial matters however the
community or the Board decide that role should be defined.

-Andrew Lih (User:Fuzheado)


subject: [Foundation-l] Finances


from_name: Daniel Mayer

subject: [Foundation-l] Re: Finances

body:
--- Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:
> ...
> I think even if we did this, we'd still keep the books ourselves, and
> just submit them once per year to an outside auditor for a stamp of
> approval.  I have no idea how much paying such a person would cost.

Jimbo has indicated to me that this is the plan. I'm not sure how much the
yearly audit would cost though.

--mav

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
http://mail.yahoo.com


subject: [Foundation-l] Re: Finances


body:
--- Robert <rkscience100 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Charle Podle is making things up. I did *not* make my name
> public. EntmootsOfTrolls did, shortly before he theartened
> to give my identity to Islamic extremists. (Groups that at
> the time and now, were infamous for murdering those that
> they disagreed with.)

RK, on several occasions I've seen your real name in the from field in messages
sent to this list. You 'outed' yourself. But EoT and his sockpuppets are
already banned.

> Mr Natural Health didn't threaten to give me up to
> Islamists; he coldly told me that he himself was a Nazi,
> and that he lived near me. That's the same as sending an
> e-mail to a black in the south that you are a member of the
> KKK. Its called an implicit threat, and the local police
> departments take such threats seriously, even if certain
> Wiki-En members do not.

Arbitration of Mr Natural Health is proceeding. It looks like he is going to
get another long ban again for doing the type of thing you are complaining
about. In the future we will be using initial rulings to stop people from
continuing to harm the community while arbitration is on-going. What we really
need are more people to volunteer for the committee and to actually let admins
enforce our policies.

-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail is new and improved - Check it out!
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail


body:
Adon Metcalfe wrote:
> I think outruling gif's is harsh, unless we provide them with tools to
> convert what they have into something more usable, i.e. on the image
> page have a pointer to tools that conver gif's to mng or a series of
> png's.

Just a note: we haven't completely *banned* GIFs from Wikipedia, though
we've recommended against them because of the not-quite-gone-yet patent
issue. Once the patent expires in Canada, I'll be happy to take them off
of the "warning! X is not a recommended file type" list.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 253 bytes
Desc: OpenPGP digital signature
Url : http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/attachments/20040625/bcb58ea6/attachment.pgp


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Stop the abuse (was: This isn't a theoretical issue;
	its real.)

body:
Robert,

I care. And I wish the committees would take a stronger stand against
people who threaten or otherwise attempt to intimidate Wikipedians. Time
was when Daniel (mav) would refer these matters to the police. But now
there are endless wrangles, which wind up being more a debate on what
rules are proper or investigations into the character of the
rule-enforcers -- than putting a stop to abuse.

Fred, Mav, are you going to help Robert, or do I have to call Jimbo?

Ed Poor


from_name: Charles Matthews

subject: [WikiEN-l] Rules vs. Anarchy

body:
Ed Poor wrote

>A few contributors have taken me to task, for daring to suggest that
enforcing the rules of Wikipedia is a duty -- rather than something to
be apologized for.

That may well be true.  I, for my part, would take Ed to task for
consistently asserting that the end justifies the means, in WP matters.

<snip>

>Problems with Wik dragged on because we don't have clear moral ideas,
that all subscribe to.

That the end does not justify the means is a clear moral idea.  It is true
that not all here subscribe to it.  In the case, the end (that the
atmosphere on WP would be cleared with his departure) would have happily
been used to justify the means by a number of prominent sysops - whether or
not the means had the sanction of agreed policy or process.  That seems to
be the limited basis, such as it is, of the 'cabal' claim.

>The problem with 172 _was_ resolved (without
resorting to the Arbitration Committee), because we were all able to
discuss it on the mailing list. But Abe maintains the posture of having
taken offense, rather than realizing he offended, so the resolution
remains incomplete.

I think anyone in future (and let's hope this kind of scenario is something
from which WP moves on) who sees Ed in provocative action on the mailing
list should take good note of the history on this.  Ed is happy with
resolution/closure on matters seen as dragging on ('log-jams', as he put it
in another self-justifying mail to this list); Ed doesn't mind going outside
norms to get movement; if the end has sufficient support, then Ed will see
no reason to apologise, though he will issue various statements that he is
backing down, willing to compromise, is contrite for any infringements, and
so on.  Beware of the dog/chien mechant.

Charles


from_name: Richard Gallagher

subject: [Foundation-l] Finances

body:
--- Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote: > Hello dear
all,
>
> Regardless of the way we decide to spent money, we
> have some in bank. It comes in. It comes out.
> So, we need some people to take care of financial
> issues.
>
> Mav has renewed his interest in taking care of this
> after the elections. Angela and I are favorable to
> this. I will not speak up for Jimbo... as he is on
> holidays :-)
> Mav has been taking care of Wikimedia accounting for
> several months as far as I can remember. I did not
> hear there were any problems. He also is interested
> in working on the budget.

What exactly are you suggesting?  That Maveric149
should be the treasurer or he should be some sort of
financial clerk?

If the former, then I believe the treasurer should be
a member on the Board of Trustees.  This fits in with
the foundation bylaws as they currently stand (
http://www.wikimediafoundation.org/bylaws.pdf ).
Having a treasurer that was not on the board would be
unusual.  If none of the current five board of
trustees want to be the treasurer then I suggest that
steps should be taken to get someone on to the board
who does.

If the later, then I believe the the foundation is not
big enough to warrant a clerk as well as a treasurer.
And the treasurer should handle the bulk of financial
dealings.

> Other people might be interested as well to
> participate in financial issues. In particular, the
> perspective of a professionnal on legal issues or on
> accounting would be most welcome. I think we should
> thrive to have teams as much as possible, and people
> with various perspectives, as it is more productive
> and usually more successful. A group of 3-5 people
> would be neat :-)
>
> So, if someone is interested in being part of the
> financial committee, please speak up :-)
>
> Criticism and/or nomination may be public or
> private.

I will put my hand up for such a committee.

I believe it is important to get a set accounts drawn
including a balance sheet and statement of income and
expenditure.  Then have them audited by a chartered
accountant.  Because often when applying for grants
they will request an audited set of accounts.

Richard (aka Popsracer)

Find local movie times and trailers on Yahoo! Movies.
http://au.movies.yahoo.com


subject: [Foundation-l] Finances


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: This isn't a theoretical issue; its real.

body:
Anthere wrote:

> Stan Shebs wrote:
>
>> Robert wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> The fact that not a single person here seems to care scares
>>> the hell out of me. If it can be done to one person, it can
>>> be done to any of us. (Just ask some of the many
>>> well-documented victims of the Internet Scientology wars,
>>> who have been threatened, stalked, and whose lives have
>>> been damaged by maniancs from the Church of Scientology.)
>>> This isn't a theoretical issue; its real.
>>>
>> You kind of lost all your support and credibility when you called
>> all of us Nazis, and failed to apologize for it subsequently. Why
>> then would anybody pay attention to anything you have to say?
>>
>> Stan
>
>
>
> Well... I *do* care.
> Yes, Robert said wrong things and should have apogized later.
> Yes, Robert gave his name himself, so it is not outing.
> But, I do care that someone feels he is threatened in his real life
> because of his wikipedia activity.

He *says* he feels threatened, but given his track record of abuse,
bullying, and misrepresentation, I'll bet a dollar he doesn't
really feel threatened at all - I think he's just using this as a
technique to fish for sympathy from the gullible.

If I genuinely felt threatened, I would go to the police, not
post lengthy complaining emails to a public mailing list, where
there is not one single person who has any power or capability
to protect me from an actual would-be criminal. It's not like
WPers are going to fly over from Australia or wherever, arm
themselves, and stand guard at my front door.

Stan


from_name: Fennec Foxen

body:
On Fri, 25 Jun 2004 11:51:05 -0500, Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:
> Once the Canadian one expires in 12 days, I see no reason to continue
> prohibiting people from using GIFs.  Of course, whether there's any
> advantage to GIFs over PNGs is another issue, but if we choose not to
> use GIFs, it should be for a non-legal reason, and we should probably
> not be anal about absolutely prohibiting them.

List of Advantages of GIF over PNG:
1) Animation.
2) ???
3) Profit!!!

Erm. Make that just 1, Animation. :)

Advantages of PNG over GIF:
1) better compression ratios available
2) variety of compression levels available
3) better interlacing algorithm available
4) 24-bit color depth available
5) 8-bit alpha transparency possibly available (in some contexts)


subject: [Foundation-l] Finances

body:
--- Richard Gallagher <richie_a76 at yahoo.co.nz> wrote:
>
> If the former, then I believe the treasurer should
> be
> a member on the Board of Trustees.  This fits in
> with
> the foundation bylaws as they currently stand (
> http://www.wikimediafoundation.org/bylaws.pdf ).
> Having a treasurer that was not on the board would
> be
> unusual.

After rereading the bylaws I now see that the don't
preclude the treasurer from being someone outside the
Board of Trustees.  Although I still think it would be
good if the treasurer was also on the board.

Richard (aka popsracer)

Find local movie times and trailers on Yahoo! Movies.
http://au.movies.yahoo.com


subject: [Foundation-l] Finances


body:
On Sat, 26 Jun 2004 04:00:03 +0800, Adon Metcalfe <flonejek at gmail.com> wrote:
> why don't we have a conversion tool that converts all the uploaded
> gif's to mng?

Because, realistically, nobody uses- or even likes- MNG. I hear that
there used to be Mozilla support for it, but they cut it out because
it was really bloating the image libraries.


subject:
Policy violations (was [WikiEN-l] Re: Violation
	ofblockingpolicybyuser "40277")

body:
On Fri, 25 Jun 2004, Charles Matthews wrote:

CM> James Marshall wrote
CM>
CM>
CM> > But I have to respectfully disagree with both of you here-- do you really
CM> > want to forbid newbies from contributing to anything controversial?
CM>
CM> No.  Where you went wrong - i.e. put yourself in a false position -
CM> was to persist in editing.  You may not have known what rule you were
CM> infringing, but there is a rule.  You were then blocked, I assume for
CM> 24 hours, which except for Wikiholics is hardly the end of the world.
CM> You don't have to like it.

You don't have to take an abrasive tone, Charles.  I've asked you before.

No, I don't have to like it, but if newbies don't like their experience,
they won't come back.  Which may be just fine with some people here, but
would be a great loss for a project like Wikipedia.

I don't know what you mean by "put [myself] in a false position".  ???

If I was wrong to persist in editing, why weren't the others wrong to
persist in their DESTRUCTIVE editing?  If I was blocked, why weren't they
blocked?  I tried to discuss it, and they didn't.  I did no worse than
them at any point, and they are supposed to be the experienced users,
people who are supposed to know what they're doing.

If I did do something "wrong", then I sure as hell don't know how I could
have known, especially given the examples set by the others.  And I think
your logic that puts blame on me and not the others is pretty circuitous
reasoning.

Of course the block isn't the end of the world.  It can be very annoying,
if I came to make a contribution, FOLLOWED the rules, and then I have to
remember to come back a day or more later.  Worse, I'm given no clue why I
was banned, and what to do to prevent an immediate ban the next time.
Why should I spend my good time making contributions when they're just
going to be erased for no apparent reason?

I'm not trying to dwell on this one block I got.  My point is not to
whine.  I'm trying to point out how part of the system has a problem that
could be improved (i.e. that some sysops abuse their power, and some
sysops don't even act like good users, much less sysops; also, that
newbies are sometimes treated harshly for no good reason).

CM> What I'm pointing out here is that there is a learning curve.  The
CM> point about going straight for the most contentious topics is that the
CM> learning curve is going to be very steep.  One can figure out why this
CM> must be. _Every_ non-wiki technical person I have explained wiki to,
CM> has explained back 'can't possibly work'.  They are confident that a
CM> free-for-all in editing must be a disaster.  Wikipedia shows they are
CM> missing something. They are missing the community self-policing
CM> effect.  If a wiki works - not all do - the policing of graffiti on
CM> [[Ronald Reagan]] is going to be effective.

Well, it obviously wasn't effective here-- what was removed wasn't
graffiti.  The approach taken by Texture and Oberiko-- authority-oriented,
use of force over discussion, removing rather than adding, insults, lack
of explanation-- seems quite in contrast to the stated values of
Wikipedia; I don't see how it can lead to good articles.  (The Reagan
article, for example, is very one-sided and omits important facts and
viewpoints.)  And I still maintain the sentence they wanted is more POV
than my modification, obvious by simple boolean logic (though I'm willing
to discuss it, of course).

In case you don't know, Wikipedia is not the first collaborative
collection of knowledge where people have to negotiate
mutually-satisfactory content.  I've worked on RFC's, for example.  I also
set up a similar (much simpler) Web-based system back around 1997.
Usenet FAQs used to be done through discussion of diverse viewpoints to a
negotiated product, and I assume they still are.  I agree that some
Wikipedia-specific learning will be involved, but some of the hardest
parts have been dealt with elsewhere.

CM> Now your version of the learning curve may seem to be 'your rights and
CM> how to get them'.  The system is set up so this is secondary to
CM> 'freedom to edit'.  Has to be that way.  You'd do better to learn
CM> something about editing, in the shallower waters.

Please don't put words in my mouth, Charles.  My purpose here is not to
establish my "rights" or whatever you mean by that.  I was only trying to
contribute, and then when the editing social system obviously screwed up
(by banning me in the way it happened), I was led to a page that mentioned
this email list.  I thought I'd give this avenue a chance instead of just
blowing it off altogether.

Funny that you say the primary value is "freedom to edit".  That's what
I'm saying, too.  Why don't you think that includes my "freedom to edit"?

What do you think I need to learn about editing?  (I've edited books, and
written content used by millions of people and many schools.  I assume you
mean Wikipedia-specific editing.)

Sorry, people, if I'm sounding harsh; this is just getting frustrating.
I'm not one to peacefully suffer unjustified shit sent in my direction.
I've been continuing this thread because other people said that it would
be constructive to Wikipedia to do so, and I've tried to keep it
constructive.  Then, when I did what was asked (took many hours), people
have criticized me for it.  I thought Wikipedia was a neat idea, so I
thought I'd contribute as my friend suggested.  Then, after I was banned
in the manner I was, I thought it was worthwhile to try to help fix the
infrastructure.  But I'm really starting to wonder why I should spend my
time doing so, and if any good can come of it (I know some of you would
want me to stay, and others want me to leave).

Or should I just learn to ignore the postings of some individuals?  I can
do that easily enough and not get upset.

I was trying to make this thread focused on the issues and not on me;
sorry if it's been too much about me.

A new post just came through-- thank you, Denni, for your comments and
support.

Best wishes,
James
............................................................................
  James Marshall      james at jmarshall.com       Berkeley, CA      @}-'-,--
                        "Teach people what you know."
............................................................................


from_name: Denni

subject:
Policy violations (was [WikiEN-l] Re:
	Violationofblockingpolicybyuser "40277")

body:
I'd just like to thank James for his persistence and patience in dealing
with this situation. James, you've been unfailingly courteous
throughout, and have backed your concerns up with solid research. I feel
that, whatever may have happened to precipitate the incident, you have
convinced me that your actions were reasonable and that if there were
any errors on your part, you've done the besr thing which can be done
with errors - learned from them. Continue the good work. And oh, yes, I
also think Reagan's "trickle down" economics had an unmistakable odor
and a distinctly yellow hue.

Denni

--
? "Computers are stupid They only know the answers." -- Pablo Picasso
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Visit my Wikipedia user page at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User%3ADwindrim
Do you ICQ? I do - 276534369 Magpie


from_name: Peter Jaros

subject: [Foundation-l] Using D'ni in images

body:
I'd like to put images of D'ni script on a bunch of the Myst-related
pages.  For example, on [[Gehn]] I'd add an image of "gen" in D'ni
script.  Is this legal, copyright-wise?  Should I credit Cyan Worlds,
Inc. (creators of Myst) and/or the person who made the font?  If so,
how?

Peter

                            -- ---<>--- --
                  A house without walls cannot fall.
     Help build the world's largest encyclopedia at Wikipedia.org
                            -- ---<>--- --


subject: [Foundation-l] Using D'ni in images


from_name: sannse

subject:
Policy violations (was [WikiEN-l] Re: Violation of blocking
	policyby user "40277")

body:
Ec wrote:

> James Marshall wrote:
>
> >Okee dokee, here are some of the violations I found in the recent
> >unpleasantness.  Some are more important than others, and some are
> >stronger cases than others.  But in no particular order, and in an ad hoc
> >format, here's what I came up with in the last couple of hours:
> >
> >
> >First, not a violation, but Timwi specifically asked about policies
> >encouraging additions and discouraging deletions.  To clarify, I didn't
> >mean a hard-and-fast rule-- of course some deletions are good and some
> >additions are bad.  But it's a theme I picked up a few times on various
> >newbie and policy pages.  I'll see if I can find the references again.
> >
> >... OK, here are some:
> >
> (long snip)
>
> Please stop obsessing on this.  Notwithstanding the truth and validity
> of what you say people only go so far in reading this kind of stuff.
> Those who frequent the mailing lists have heard it all before, and can
> become impatient when it comes to reading these long diatribes of
> defence.  They are counterproductive to your cause.
>
> You would do better to simply devote your time to editing real
> articles.  Avoid hot-button items until after you have become better
> known, or have some track-record in less controversial areas.
>
> Ec
>

It's rather unfair - he's told that no one will look at this or will believe
that there is a problem unless he provides specific policies and describes
how they are being broken - and when he does he is told to shut up.

I think this case has said a lot about our community reaction to newbies,
I'm seriously considering starting a Save the Newbie campaign here.

--sannse


from_name: martin f krafft

subject: [Wikitech-l] plone?

body:
Wikipedia has a decisive Plone (www.plone.org) feel to it. Yet,
I cannot find Plone anywhere on the about pages. Is it
a coincidence, or did Wikipedia base some of its logics and or
design on Plone?

Thanks,

--
martin;              (greetings from the heart of the sun.)
  \____ echo mailto: !#^."<*>"|tr "<*> mailto:" net at madduck

invalid/expired pgp subkeys? use subkeys.pgp.net as keyserver!
spamtraps: krafft.bogus at ailab.ch madduck.bogus at madduck.net

opment of a culture.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 189 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/attachments/20040625/cdc23dd2/attachment.pgp>


from_name: Peter Gervai

body:
On Fri, Jun 25, 2004 at 11:51:05AM -0500, Delirium wrote:
> Peter Gervai wrote:
>
> >Dunno about any problems with GIF *decoding*, but you surely cannot
> >*create*
> >compressed GIFs without paying.
> >
> >
> That's no longer true, as the GIF patent has expired everywhere except
> Canada, where it will expire in 2 weeks.  According to the League for
> Programming Freedom's page on the issue, expiration dates are:
> * US: June 20, 2003
> * UK, France, Germany, Italy: June 18, 2004
> * Japan: June 20, 2004
> * Canada: July 7, 2004
>
> Once the Canadian one expires in 12 days, I see no reason to continue
> prohibiting people from using GIFs.  Of course, whether there's any
> advantage to GIFs over PNGs is another issue, but if we choose not to
> use GIFs, it should be for a non-legal reason, and we should probably
> not be anal about absolutely prohibiting them.

Thank you for this correction! I haven't followed the dates thoroughly, and
it seems that GIFs indeed have no further patent problems.

Still I'd prefer PNG and JPEG instead of GIF, but that's completely a matter
of taste from now on.

The rest of the topic probably still valid though as most video codecs have
not expired patents (unless they expired in the meantime and me being
ignorant again).

Thanks,
Peter


subject:
Policy violations (was [WikiEN-l] Re: Violation of
	blockingpolicyby user "40277")

body:
> I think this case has said a lot about our community reaction to newbies,
> I'm seriously considering starting a Save the Newbie campaign here.
>
> --sannse

To be fair (though matters may have gone wrong here) newbies also need
saving from well-intentioned advice to start their time on WP, not logged
in, adding comments on American political topics that are divisive and
concerning divisiveness.  The deep end.

Charles


subject:
Policy violations (was [WikiEN-l] Re: Violation
	ofblockingpolicyby user "40277")

body:
Charles worte:

> > I think this case has said a lot about our community reaction to
newbies,
> > I'm seriously considering starting a Save the Newbie campaign here.
> >
> > --sannse

> To be fair (though matters may have gone wrong here) newbies also need
> saving from well-intentioned advice to start their time on WP, not logged
> in, adding comments on American political topics that are divisive and
> concerning divisiveness.  The deep end.

Yes, such advice to take things easy at first would be part of the policies
of the RSPCN (with it's US branch of SPCN of course).  Those who slide
easily into the Wikipedia culture tend to be those who start by writing NPOV
articles about fluffy kittens rather than those jumping in to the more...
ummm... /active/ areas of the 'pedia.

--sannse

do we /have/ an article on [[Fluffy kitten]]s?


from_name: Ivo van der Wijk

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: [Plone-users] plone?

body:
On Fri, 25 Jun 2004 19:04:25 +0200, martin f krafft <madduck at madduck.net> wrote:
>
> Wikipedia has a decisive Plone (www.plone.org) feel to it. Yet,
> I cannot find Plone anywhere on the about pages. Is it
> a coincidence, or did Wikipedia base some of its logics and or
> design on Plone?
>

Browsing source and css reveals:

http://en.wikipedia.org/style/commonPrint.css
** Derived from the plone (http://plone.org/) styles
** Copyright Alexander Limi

http://en.wikipedia.org/style/monobook/main.css
** Based on http://www.positioniseverything.net/ordered-floats.html by Big John
** and the Plone 2.0 styles, see http://plone.org/.
** Alexander Limi - http://www.plonesolutions.com
** additional plone work:
** Joe Geldart & Tom Croucher - http://www.netalleynetworks.com,
Michael Zeltner - http://niij.org,
** Geir B?kholt - http://www.plonesolutions.com
** All you guys rock :)

Plone is not just cool for it's great technology :)

Cheers

  Ivo


from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [WikiEN-l] Rules vs. Anarchy

body:
Poor, Edmund W wrote:

>I do not believe in "moral equivalence". When people agree to follow
>rules, and one of them breaks the rule, another of them has the RIGHT to
>point out the violation. At this point, the two parties are no longer on
>the same standing. The violator takes the low road, and the
>pointer-outer takes the moral high road.
>
Whatever happened to the idea of innocent until proven guilty.  You are
presuming that the prosecutor is correct.  There is more to guilt than
the obvious violation of a rule.

Americans are essentially a law-abiding peoples, and would sacrifice
common sense to ensure that the law is enforced.

>Some people disagree with this norm. Or they think that social graces
>should apply to all situations, regardless of import.
>
Violating a law or a rule does not mean that damage is being done.
Civil disobedience is an important part of democracy.  It breaks laws,
but does not cause damage.

>How about if someone wearing a tee-shirt with a large rooster on it
>walks down your street breaking car windows with a baseball bat. Would
>you feel a need to apologize to him, before calling the police? (Or
>getting together with a couple of neighbors and tackling him?)
>
Given the complete irrelevance of the rooster, this suggest that if he
had worn a business suit and necktie he might be treated differently. :-)

>Problems with Wik dragged on because we don't have clear moral ideas,
>that all subscribe to.
>
Perhaps so.

>The problem with 172 _was_ resolved (without
>resorting to the Arbitration Committee), because we were all able to
>discuss it on the mailing list. But Abe maintains the posture of having
>taken offense, rather than realizing he offended, so the resolution
>remains incomplete.
>
If the issue was resolved on the mailing list that should be the end of
it...Why should his taking offense be treated as posturing?  When major
companies settle a law suit out of court, they will readily pay out
large sums, but often insist that the settlement agreement include a
clause saying that the payment does not imply accepting responsibility
for whatever was alleged in the suit.  If he honestly believes that he
has not offended, why insist that he realize that he has?

Ec


subject: [Foundation-l] Re: Finances

body:
--- Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote: >
> > What exactly are you suggesting?  That Maveric149
> > should be the treasurer or he should be some sort
> of
> > financial clerk?
>
> No. The treasurer is a board position. But the board
> is empowered to
> delegate activity to identified persons or to
> committees.
> Mav would be financial officer, and report to the
> Board.

That clears it up a bit.  Your original message did
not go into much detail as to what exactly the role
was.  Personally I didn't see that there would be much
financial work to do.  So it did seem to me to be a
bit redunant have both a treasurer and a financial
officer.

But then again I am not familiar with intimate details
of the foundations financial dealings. Would you be
able to further describe this financial officer role
and how it differs treasurer?

> > I believe it is important to get a set accounts
> drawn
> > including a balance sheet and statement of income
> and
> > expenditure.  Then have them audited by a
> chartered
> > accountant.  Because often when applying for
> grants
> > they will request an audited set of accounts.
>
> Might you explain what you are thinking of, when you
> mention "a
> chartered accountant" ?

A chartered accountant is an accountant who is a
member of institute of accountants for their country.
Seeing as Wikimedia is US based I probably should have
used the US equivalent term which is certified
accountant.  The thing is anyone can call themselves
an accountant, while to call yourself a
chartered/certified accountant you have to have passed
some exams and have a certain amount of work
experience.

> In all cases, I invite you to consult my user page
> on meta.
> http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/user:Anthere.
> It hosts a collection of links which might be of
> interest to you.
> In particular, do not forget to check out
> http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grants.

Will do.

Richard (aka popsracer)

Find local movie times and trailers on Yahoo! Movies.
http://au.movies.yahoo.com


subject: [Foundation-l] Re: Finances


body:
James Marshall wrote

> But I have to respectfully disagree with both of you here-- do you really
> want to forbid newbies from contributing to anything controversial?

No.  Where you went wrong - i.e. put yourself in a false position - was to
persist in editing.  You may not have known what rule you were infringing,
but there is a rule.  You were then blocked, I assume for 24 hours, which
except for Wikiholics is hardly the end of the world.  You don't have to
like it.

What I'm pointing out here is that there is a learning curve.  The point
about going straight for the most contentious topics is that the learning
curve is going to be very steep.  One can figure out why this must be.
_Every_ non-wiki technical person I have explained wiki to, has explained
back 'can't possibly work'.  They are confident that a free-for-all in
editing must be a disaster.  Wikipedia shows they are missing something.
They are missing the community self-policing effect.  If a wiki works - not
all do - the policing of graffiti on [[Ronald Reagan]] is going to be
effective.

Now your version of the learning curve may seem to be 'your rights and how
to get them'.  The system is set up so this is secondary to 'freedom to
edit'.  Has to be that way.  You'd do better to learn something about
editing, in the shallower waters.

Charles


from_name: Rowan Collins [IMSoP]

body:
Adon Metcalfe wrote:
> why don't we have a conversion tool that converts all the uploaded
> gif's to mng?. mng is the animated version of png, and it should be
> supported in browsers soon, the mozilla/firefox extension is here:
> http://extensionroom.mozdev.org/more-info/mngsupport.

Simple answer: why bother?
GIF: supported by all graphical browsers made within the last 15 years; no patent issues after 7
July this year; wide variety of creation tools available
MNG: native support in Konqueror, plugins available for other browsers, removed from Mozilla due to
size & politics; advantages include different compression levels, colour depths, forms of animation
(last time I looked MNG even included interaction, like a cross between an imagemap and a Flash
movie!) - NONE of which could be spontaneously created by a conversion tool.

> I think outruling gif's is harsh, unless we provide them with tools to
> convert what they have into something more usable, i.e. on the image
> page have a pointer to tools that conver gif's to mng or a series of
> png's.

I think outruling GIFs is probably unnecessary if there are genuinely no patent issues.

However, a further point to consider is whether we *want* animated images anyway (as Fennec says,
the only advantage of GIFs). As soon as you print out the article, for instance, such an image is
likely to become less than useless. That's not to say that there are no cases where animation is
useful, but I personally "de-animated" an image, because the movement was more annoying than it was
useful - I just replaced growing lines with arrows; it's now
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Fresnel.png if you're curious.

So, in the majority of cases, it's best to encourage people to save straight to PNG (I don't think
conversion will very often be an issue, since the majority of tools that can create GIFs can
probably create PNGs by now). If people really can't, we should let them just upload GIFs, I guess.

--
Rowan Collins
[IMSoP]


body:
Anthere wrote

> But, I do care that someone feels he is threatened in his real life
> because of his wikipedia activity.

I care too.  I care less for the following reasons (a) crying wolf (b) I
knew the name, without specially wanting to (c) past UseNet prominence, and
the one that is also in need of a mention: bullies - and I have a deep
hatred of that type - would obviously use a certain type of threat with a
certain type of person.  What can be done, should be.

Charles


subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: [Plone-users] plone?

body:
also sprach Ivo van der Wijk <vladdrac at gmail.com> [2004.06.25.2024 +0200]:
> Browsing source and css reveals:

Aha, I didn't actually think about scanning the source. Silly me.

Maybe the Wikipedia could attribute their layout and design more
prominently to Plone?

--
martin;              (greetings from the heart of the sun.)
  \____ echo mailto: !#^."<*>"|tr "<*> mailto:" net at madduck

invalid/expired pgp subkeys? use subkeys.pgp.net as keyserver!
spamtraps: krafft.bogus at ailab.ch madduck.bogus at madduck.net

                -- la rouchefoucauld
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 189 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/attachments/20040625/3acbf804/attachment.pgp>


from_name: Ralesk Ne'vennoyx

body:
Fennec Foxen wrote:

> On Sat, 26 Jun 2004 04:00:03 +0800, Adon Metcalfe <flonejek at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>why don't we have a conversion tool that converts all the uploaded
>>gif's to mng?
>
>
> Because, realistically, nobody uses- or even likes- MNG. I hear that
> there used to be Mozilla support for it, but they cut it out because
> it was really bloating the image libraries.

I posted relevant Bugs and quoted relevant attitudes just up in the
thread somewhere.  If you want to, go read.

Nobody even likes is not true, there was quite an amount of noise from
Mozilla theme developers and other people who use MNG already and were
negatively affected through -- as far as I can remember -- two major
versions until one or some of the 3G managed to make an actually WORKING
add-on for MNG support.

The reasons were, to say the least, weak.  Except perhaps the lack of
maintainer -- but at that part, they didn't look too hard, just acted.


from_name: Anthere

body:
Stan Shebs wrote:
> Robert wrote:
>
>>
>> The fact that not a single person here seems to care scares
>> the hell out of me. If it can be done to one person, it can
>> be done to any of us. (Just ask some of the many
>> well-documented victims of the Internet Scientology wars,
>> who have been threatened, stalked, and whose lives have
>> been damaged by maniancs from the Church of Scientology.)
>> This isn't a theoretical issue; its real.
>>
> You kind of lost all your support and credibility when you called
> all of us Nazis, and failed to apologize for it subsequently. Why
> then would anybody pay attention to anything you have to say?
>
> Stan

Well... I *do* care.
Yes, Robert said wrong things and should have apogized later.
Yes, Robert gave his name himself, so it is not outing.
But, I do care that someone feels he is threatened in his real life
because of his wikipedia activity.


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Re: Policy violations (was Re: Violation
 ofblockingpolicyby user "40277")

body:
sannse wrote:
> Charles worte:
>
>
>>>I think this case has said a lot about our community reaction to
>>
> newbies,
>
>>>I'm seriously considering starting a Save the Newbie campaign here.
>>>
>>>--sannse
>>
>
>>To be fair (though matters may have gone wrong here) newbies also need
>>saving from well-intentioned advice to start their time on WP, not logged
>>in, adding comments on American political topics that are divisive and
>>concerning divisiveness.  The deep end.
>
>
> Yes, such advice to take things easy at first would be part of the policies
> of the RSPCN (with it's US branch of SPCN of course).  Those who slide
> easily into the Wikipedia culture tend to be those who start by writing NPOV
> articles about fluffy kittens rather than those jumping in to the more...
> ummm... /active/ areas of the 'pedia.
>
> --sannse
>
> do we /have/ an article on [[Fluffy kitten]]s?

We have one on hairless cats !


from_name: Gabriel Wicke

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: [Plone-users] plone?

body:
On Fri, 2004-06-25 at 22:16 +0200, martin f krafft wrote:
> also sprach Ivo van der Wijk <vladdrac at gmail.com> [2004.06.25.2024 +0200]:
> > Browsing source and css reveals:
>
> Aha, I didn't actually think about scanning the source. Silly me.
>
> Maybe the Wikipedia could attribute their layout and design more
> prominently to Plone?

There's actually little left of the fundamental plone css setup- if you
compare the xhtml source of the page you'll see that we sport a real
content-first order while plone follows the easier route with ui
elements in the source where they appear on the page.

The main similarities are tab formatting (which is also very different
css-wise), the boxes in the left column, the header underline, the blue
li bullet and some icons.

 --
Gabriel Wicke


body:
James Marshall wrote:

> But I have to respectfully disagree with both of you here-- do you really
> want to forbid newbies from contributing to anything controversial?

Please see the word "advice" in my post.

Of course newbies should be permitted to contribute where every they wish
to, and of course we should be more welcoming and more willing to assume
good faith when they do so.  But I don't think there is anywhere on-line or
off where that is not a risky thing to do, and would always *advise* newbies
to start off slow and feel their way into the more controversial areas of
the 'pedia.

--sannse


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Re: Policy violations (was Re: Violation
	ofblockingpolicyby user "40277")

body:
Anthere wrote:

> >
> > do we /have/ an article on [[Fluffy kitten]]s?
>
> We have one on hairless cats !
>

heh! Close enough for me

--san


from_name: Michael Snow

body:
James Marshall wrote:

>Or should I just learn to ignore the postings of some individuals?  I can
>do that easily enough and not get upset.
>
Yes, that might be a good idea. Also remember to assume good faith on
everyone's part (and try to hold that assumption for as long as you
can). Hopefully more people will remember to assume good faith on your
part as well.

--Michael Snow


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: RK's groundless complaint

body:
Charles Podles wrote:

>--- Robert <rkscience100 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
>>Charle Podle is making things up.
>>
>>
>Charle*s* Podle*s*. Please. And now that you've outed
>me by using my real name, you must be banned
>immediately!!!eleven!!! :)
>
There's always the possibility that RK was deliberately misspelling your
name so as not to out you.

--Michae Sno
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/attachments/20040625/5e34be27/attachment.htm


subject: [WikiEN-l] Mr-Natural-Health banned until 2 Oct

body:
FYI:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Mr-Natural-Health#Final_decision

--mav

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail - 50x more storage than other providers!
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail


from_name: David Gerard

subject:
Policy violations (was [WikiEN-l] Re: Violation	ofblockingpolicyby
	user "40277")

body:
On 06/25/04 18:53, sannse wrote:

> Yes, such advice to take things easy at first would be part of the policies
> of the RSPCN (with it's US branch of SPCN of course).  Those who slide
> easily into the Wikipedia culture tend to be those who start by writing NPOV
> articles about fluffy kittens rather than those jumping in to the more...
> ummm... /active/ areas of the 'pedia.

Yes. My very first edit was a rewrite of [[Racial Holy War]], followed by
[[Ben Klassen]]. Um ...

- d.


from_name: Andre Engels

subject: [Wikitech-l] plone?

body:
On Fri, 25 Jun 2004 19:04:25 +0200 martin f krafft <madduck at madduck.net>
wrote:
>Wikipedia has a decisive Plone (www.plone.org) feel to it. Yet,
>I cannot find Plone anywhere on the about pages. Is it
>a coincidence, or did Wikipedia base some of its logics and or
>design on Plone?

No. Both Plone and Wikipedia base their design on a common source, namely
WikiWiki.

Andre Engels


from_name: Matthew Brown

body:
David Gerard writes:
> One question (and I don't mean to sound churlish): if MNH comes back
on
> 2nd October and starts doing the same stuff again, will it take
another
> few months for this to be acted upon?

I think this is an important issue.  While I would like the arbitration
committee to be somewhat faster, taking our time over 'first-time
offenders' at least makes sure that a considered decision is reached.
However, I do think that subsequent violations after one banning should
be rather more fast-track than that.  If a user is 'violating their
probation' by doing the exact same thing they did last time -- I don't
see the complexity.  I do see an appearance of toothlessness.

-Morven


from_name: Adon Metcalfe

body:
why don't we have a conversion tool that converts all the uploaded
gif's to mng?. mng is the animated version of png, and it should be
supported in browsers soon, the mozilla/firefox extension is here:
http://extensionroom.mozdev.org/more-info/mngsupport.

I think outruling gif's is harsh, unless we provide them with tools to
convert what they have into something more usable, i.e. on the image
page have a pointer to tools that conver gif's to mng or a series of
png's.

On Fri, 25 Jun 2004 15:36:44 -0400, Fennec Foxen <fennec at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On Fri, 25 Jun 2004 11:51:05 -0500, Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:
> > Once the Canadian one expires in 12 days, I see no reason to continue
> > prohibiting people from using GIFs.  Of course, whether there's any
> > advantage to GIFs over PNGs is another issue, but if we choose not to
> > use GIFs, it should be for a non-legal reason, and we should probably
> > not be anal about absolutely prohibiting them.
>
> List of Advantages of GIF over PNG:
> 1) Animation.
> 2) ???
> 3) Profit!!!
>
> Erm. Make that just 1, Animation. :)
>
> Advantages of PNG over GIF:
> 1) better compression ratios available
> 2) variety of compression levels available
> 3) better interlacing algorithm available
> 4) 24-bit color depth available
> 5) 8-bit alpha transparency possibly available (in some contexts)
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>

--
Adon Metcalfe
<flonejek at gmail.com>
HTML Mail
Perth
Australia
Additional Information:
Last Name: Metcalfe
First Name: Adon
Blog: adonmetcalfe.blogspot.com


body:
I see, oops :)

On Fri, 25 Jun 2004 16:09:24 -0400, Fennec Foxen <fennec at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On Sat, 26 Jun 2004 04:00:03 +0800, Adon Metcalfe <flonejek at gmail.com> wrote:
> > why don't we have a conversion tool that converts all the uploaded
> > gif's to mng?
>
> Because, realistically, nobody uses- or even likes- MNG. I hear that
> there used to be Mozilla support for it, but they cut it out because
> it was really bloating the image libraries.
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>

--
Adon Metcalfe
mailto:flonejek at gmail.com
HTML Mail
Perth
Australia
Additional Information:
Last Name: Metcalfe
First Name: Adon
Blog: adonmetcalfe.blogspot.com


from_name: Fred Bauder

subject: [WikiEN-l] When MNH comes back

body:
When the person who edits Wikipedia under the user name Mr. Natural Health
returns to Wikipedia after his ban he gets a fair chance to start over. That
he may be unable or unwilling to take advantage of this opportunity can be
anticipated but it is not outside the range of human possibility that he
will simply return and get down to the basically enjoyable business of
editing rather than engaging in the past pattern of argument and insult. It
would probably help him out if he would choose a new user name. If he does
that and things go well there is no way a Wikipedia user could even tell he
was back.

Should the prior destructive pattern resume the response of the arbitration
committee can be expected to be swift and decisive. It can be anticipated
that Mr. Natural Health/3, should it be necessary, would probably result in
a permanent ban from editing health related articles.

Fred

> From: David Gerard <fun at thingy.apana.org.au>
> Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Sat, 26 Jun 2004 10:04:19 +0000
> To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Mr-Natural-Health banned until 2 Oct
>
> On 06/26/04 08:09, Daniel Mayer wrote:
>
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Mr-Natural-He
>> alth#Final_decision
>
>
> One question (and I don't mean to sound churlish): if MNH comes back on
> 2nd October and starts doing the same stuff again, will it take another
> few months for this to be acted upon?
>
>
> - d.
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


from_name: Timwi

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Re: Policy violations (was Re: Violation of blocking
 policy by user "40277")

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:

> Please stop obsessing on this.

He didn't. He did that because I asked for it, and I'm very grateful he
did. It is very helpful for improving the introductory texts and stuff.
I would have hoped that others would see it the same way, but apparently
I'll have to do the improving by myself...


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Re: Policy violations (was Re: Violation
 ofblockingpolicybyuser "40277")

body:
Charles Matthews wrote:

> What I'm pointing out here is that there is a learning curve.

I'm sure there are ways of flattening that curve.

A steep learning curve for newbies is usually an indication that the
introductory material on a system is insufficient or misleading.

It is only natural for newbies to have no idea how steep the learning
curve really is (all they know is "you can edit this page, right now").

Timwi


from_name: Nikola Smolenski

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: What's the issue?

references:
<40DA89AC.D73BBAAC@shaw.ca> <200406242244.29072.smolensk@eunet.yu>
	<cbfus4$fdg$1@sea.gmane.org>

body:
On Friday 25 June 2004 03:24, Timwi wrote:
> Nikola Smolenski wrote:
> > On Thursday 24 June 2004 21:30, Timwi wrote:
> >>>As an easy example, try this: SETI Online offers online certificates for
> >>>work units completed. I am coming up on certificate four - 1000 work
> >>>units - and I'm excited.
> >>
> >>This is significantly different from what I was referring to. It is
> >>already technically possible for us to count the number of contributions
> >>(I even keep an approximate value on my user page updated). However, it
> >>is clear to everyone, troll or not, that these numbers don't mean
> >>anything. Anyone can make tens of thousands of edits; the system does
> >>not judge how meaningful each edit is.
> >
> > This could be solved by awarding users with, for example, most articles
> > that made it to the main page. They are already pre-selected by humans as
> > good articles.
>
> If you award *users* for what an *article* achieves, then minor
> contributors to the article in question are going to feel left out.

I was thinking about "Did you know" section, it's for new articles written
only by one user. Then, perhaps making it to the main page is enough a reward
itself.

> Incidentally, I'm a little annoyed that an article I wrote has been
> rejected from being Featured solely because it is an obscure topic. But
> that's fine; I can still be proud that I've written this article, and
> others can judge for themselves whether they think it's good or not. If
> there had been a reward in it for me, personally, I'm sure it's clear I
> would be quite a lot more annoyed for having been denied it, especially
> if others got it just because their favourite topics are less obscure.

Don't need to tell that to me - I think that articles I make are edited
perhaps once per month on average (except for grammar fixes ;) I take that as
a sign of their quality :]


subject: [Wikitech-l] Query two or more categories

body:
On Friday 25 June 2004 00:37, Forest Gregg wrote:
> Is there a way to query two or more categories. Something like
> /Category:Philosophers:Dwarves that would return all dwarvish philosophers.
> I think I saw a notice that a feature like this was implemented.

I made a patch which does it but it didn't made it to the CVS. I guess because
I submitted it when everyone was busy with installing new version mediawiki
to the Wikipedia.


from_name: Koltwills at aol.com

subject: [WikiEN-l] "Blocked"?

body:
In a message dated 6/25/2004 3:17:06 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
travelingmirv at yahoo.com writes:
Without knowing the username or the anonymous IP
address under which you were editing at the time of
the block, it's hard for anyone to say with certainty.

My wild guess is this: [[User:Hephaestos vs.
Dallabnikufesin]] is probably the latest incarnation
of the peristent vandal [[user:Michael]], who has a
strange fixation with Hephaestos's user page. Michael
sometimes uses AOL; from your e-mail address, I guess
that you also use AOL. If Michael was editing from an
AOL IP address when he was blocked, and you happened
to get the same IP address when you logged in, you
would also be blocked.

. . . but that's just a wild guess. Perhaps you have
some more information that might help? The username or
IP address you were using at the time of the block
would be most helpful.

--Charles Podles ([[en:User:Mirv]])
Thanks, Charles, for the response.

It seems the block was temporary, so I'm not too concerned.  It's all pretty
silly, if you ask me.

I don't recall who suggested to another new user that he stay away from
"controversial" subject matter -- that's just plain ... *searching for a polite
word here* ... silly.  Some people's noses got outta joint because I dared
comment on someone's ridiculous NPOV musings on "motherfucker."  If that's what
passes for controversy on wikipedia, then we're all in trouble.

Since coming to the site a week or so ago, I've come across some pretty
hair-brained stuff -- people posting misinformation about subjects they don't seem
to know much about.  And to think I once thought wikipedia was actually a good
research tool!  (Kinda scary.)  But I can hope it'll get better with each
successive edit.

Now, if we could just lose the melodrama...

Peace.

deeceevoice
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/attachments/20040626/47e76b9f/attachment.htm


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Controversial new religious movements, failure of
	the Wikipedia system?

body:
The obvious solution is a "believers" article and a "sceptics" or
"debunkers" article. However Wikipedia contemplates including fair
representations of both viewpoints in the same article. Therefore don't try
to get the other viewpoint out but rather try to get your own viewpoint in,
in fact, insist on it.

Fred

> From: "Andries Krugers Dagneaux" <andrieskd at chello.nl>
> Reply-To: andrieskd at chello.nl, English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Sat, 26 Jun 2004 14:59:42 +0200
> To: <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Subject: [WikiEN-l] Controversial new religious movements, failure of the
> Wikipedia system?
>
> I have been working on various controversial new religious movements
> including [[Sathya Sai Baba]] of which I am an ex-member, and
> [[Maharaji]]. Unfortunately, it seems very difficult to maintain
> objective, balanced articles about these gurus and their corresponding
> new religious movements.
>
> People who are followers try to insert positive material and ex-members
> go to the other extreme of abusing their former gurus. It is an almost
> full time job for me which cannot continue because I will have others
> things to do.
>
> It seems that the Wikipedia system does not work well for these kinds of
> cases. I would appreciate help in maintaining the articles. Does
> somebody have another suggestion?
>
> Thanks in advance, Andries Krugers Dagneaux [[user:Andries]]
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


subject:
[WikiEN-l] NPOV contemplates fair statement of all significant
	points of view regarding a matter.

body:
Not really considering that the edit in question contained the information
that economic conditions in the United States did not markedly improve for
the poor in the United States during Ronald Reagan's administration. This is
a true statement which looks at a matter from a legitimate point of view.
Removing such a valid statement to make things look better than they were is
a violation of NPOV. NPOV contemplates fair statement of all significant
points of view regarding a matter. Removing a legitimate point of view which
interferes with the point of view which you wish to present is a violation
of Wikipedia policy.

Fred

> From: zen19725 at zen.co.uk (phil hunt)
> Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Sat, 26 Jun 2004 11:27:02 +0100
> To: wikien-l at wikipedia.org
> Subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Re: Violation of blocking policy by user "40277"
>
> On Thu, 24 Jun 2004 16:23:41 -0700, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
>>
>> If including it was a NPOV violation, then so was deleting it.
>
> It's an NPOV violation to remove an NPOV violation? That's a novel
> argument.
>
> --
> "It's easier to find people online who openly support the KKK than
> people who openly support the RIAA" -- comment on Wikipedia
> (Email: zen19725 at zen dot co dot uk)
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


body:
On 06/26/04 08:09, Daniel Mayer wrote:

> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Mr-Natural-Health#Final_decision

One question (and I don't mean to sound churlish): if MNH comes back on
2nd October and starts doing the same stuff again, will it take another
few months for this to be acted upon?

- d.


from_name: Meir Mendelovich

subject: [Wikitech-l] Broken links table in HE Wikipedia

body:
Hi,
 I the last days there is a recurring problem in Hebrew Wikipedia. Links to existing articles are colored in red. Sometimes it could be fixed by edit the source article. I suspect that this hints that our links table is not updated with all the changes.

Ideas? Is this related to the problem with Greek Wikipedia?

    Meir :->
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/attachments/20040626/8d2a40d8/attachment.html>


subject: [Wikipedia-l] meta vandalism

body:
In the past week, I think meta has been vandalised every day, around 4
or 5 in the morning GMT+2. When no one is around, the vandal bot is
really giving a lot of clean up work afterwards.
Please, drop on meta from time to time to check situation.

Note : how to recognise there is a problem : usually, what you will see
is this :

#  (diff) (hist) . . Linguistic democracy in a multilingual project
moved to Iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiihhhhhhhhh; 05:15 . . Lavoii (Talk)
# (diff) (hist) . . Talk:Wikipedia drop-outs moved to
Talk:Ddddddddddddddvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv; 05:15 . . Qoqucof (Talk)
# (diff) (hist) . . Wikipedia drop-outs moved to
Ddddddddddddddvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv; 05:15 . . Qoqucof (Talk)
# (diff) (hist) . . Running MediaWiki moved to Ppzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz;
05:15 . . Yepolod (Talk)
# (diff) (hist) . . Talk:Wikisource moved to Talk:Ddddddddddddddxxxxxxx;
05:15 . . Iire (Talk)
# (diff) (hist) . . Wikisource moved to Ddddddddddddddxxxxxxx; 05:15 . .
Iire (Talk)
# (diff) (hist) . . Talk:Wikipedia sociology moved to Talk:F; 05:15 . .
Iovutowo (Talk)
# (diff) (hist) . . Wikipedia sociology moved to F; 05:15 . . Iovutowo
(Talk)
# (diff) (hist) . . Documentation:Administration moved to
Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrffffffffffff; 05:15 . . Oekisa (Talk)
# (diff) (hist) . . Liste des wikim?diens francophones moved to
Ccccuuuuuuuuuuuuu; 05:15 . . Vuuo (Talk)
# (diff) (hist) . . Articles on fr with no interwiki link to en/Q moved
to Nnnnnnnnnnnnssssssss; 05:15 . . Miju


from_name: Charles Matthews

body:
David Gerard wrote

> One question (and I don't mean to sound churlish): if MNH comes back on
> 2nd October and starts doing the same stuff again, will it take another
> few months for this to be acted upon?

You don't, to me, sound churlish.  But you can't _really_ expect an answer,
prejudging this ... ?

Charles


from_name: phil hunt

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Re: Violation of blocking policy by user "40277"

body:
On Thu, 24 Jun 2004 16:23:41 -0700, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
>
>If including it was a NPOV violation, then so was deleting it.

It's an NPOV violation to remove an NPOV violation? That's a novel
argument.

--
"It's easier to find people online who openly support the KKK than
people who openly support the RIAA" -- comment on Wikipedia
(Email: zen19725 at zen dot co dot uk)


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: This isn't a theoretical issue; its real.

body:
Stan Shebs wrote:
> Anthere wrote:
>
>> Stan Shebs wrote:
>>
>>> Robert wrote:
>>>
>>>>
>>>> The fact that not a single person here seems to care scares
>>>> the hell out of me. If it can be done to one person, it can
>>>> be done to any of us. (Just ask some of the many
>>>> well-documented victims of the Internet Scientology wars,
>>>> who have been threatened, stalked, and whose lives have
>>>> been damaged by maniancs from the Church of Scientology.)
>>>> This isn't a theoretical issue; its real.
>>>>
>>> You kind of lost all your support and credibility when you called
>>> all of us Nazis, and failed to apologize for it subsequently. Why
>>> then would anybody pay attention to anything you have to say?
>>>
>>> Stan
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Well... I *do* care.
>> Yes, Robert said wrong things and should have apogized later.
>> Yes, Robert gave his name himself, so it is not outing.
>> But, I do care that someone feels he is threatened in his real life
>> because of his wikipedia activity.
>
>
> He *says* he feels threatened, but given his track record of abuse,
> bullying, and misrepresentation, I'll bet a dollar he doesn't
> really feel threatened at all - I think he's just using this as a
> technique to fish for sympathy from the gullible.
>
> If I genuinely felt threatened, I would go to the police, not
> post lengthy complaining emails to a public mailing list, where
> there is not one single person who has any power or capability
> to protect me from an actual would-be criminal. It's not like
> WPers are going to fly over from Australia or wherever, arm
> themselves, and stand guard at my front door.
>
> Stan

I think that whether an editor is a good standing one in the community
or not, as soon as we accept them as editors, we should held similar
standards. If we just stick to facts, I'd say a threat stays a threat
whoever receive it. In front of two users threatened, I do not think it
is correct to help one and to be rude to the other.

So, I am glad of the AC decision.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: meta vandalism

body:
It is clearly not.

One night, I blocked first a half dozen of ips, then a dozen of names
created one after the other.
No autoblocking occured.

Adon Metcalfe wrote:
> On Sat, 26 Jun 2004 10:27:44 +0200, Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>>In the past week, I think meta has been vandalised every day, around 4
>>or 5 in the morning GMT+2. When no one is around, the vandal bot is
>>really giving a lot of clean up work afterwards.
>
>
> If its a single ip, can't it just be banned?
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: No more outing. No more threats. This is not a joke.

body:
On Thu, 24 Jun 2004 17:24:44 -0700 (PDT), Robert <rkscience100 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>User ZW must be banned immediately.

The way you talk, anyone would think that you are under the
impression you own Wikipedia. You don't; get over it.

>I do not want to have
>to threaten legal action, but ZW has no right to post
>personal information about any Wikipedia users, whether it
>is correct or incorrect, especially in the context of a
>flame war.
>
>In the recent past I already have received a death threat
>from EntmootsOfTrolls (verified by other members of the
>Wiki-En discussion list); I also received what some
>interpreted as a threat from John Goode, aka Mr. Natural
>Health, who explicitly stated that he knew I was Jewish,
>lived in NY, and that he was a Nazi who also lived in NY.
>The threat was clear.

Unless you are accusing User:ZW of being a sockpuppet for these
people, their behsaviour isn't ZW's responsiblity.

>I am not willing to allow more such threats to be made.
>Wikipedia must not allow death threats, nor must it ever
>allow private personal information to be put online.

Does Wikipedia have the power to forbid this. For example, if
someone put your real name on their website, together with your
Wikipedia user name, then anyone could use Google to link the two,
and I doubt if you or Wikipedia could do anything about it.

>Wikipedia Sysops must purge this article's records so that
>such personal information is permanently removed. ZW must
>be banned immediately.

Why? All he's done (AFAICT) is call you by your name.

>I take my personal safety, and the safety of my family,
>very seriously. I do not want to have to initiate legal
>action against anyone here in order to protect myself.

You know perfectly well that if Wikipedia was attacked by lawsuits
it would be to the detriment of the Wikipedia project. (For this
reason I favour making editing Wikipedia conditional on an
I-won't-sue guarantee). Because you threaten to do something that
you know would harm Wikipedia, unless you get your own way, I regard
you as being someone who doesn't have Wikipedia's interests at
heart.

I think a good case could be made for banning you from Wikipedia,
Robert.

> But
>it is now a common pattern for those people who hate me to
>try and expose me, and then threaten me. If Wikipedia
>doesn't take action to stop such outing and threats, then
>Wikipedia effectively becomes to party to them, as it
>enables them to occur without disability.

Death threats are unacceptable and it's reasonable for Wikipedia to
remove them. Anonymity is another thing entirely; if someone
uses Wikipedia to accuse others of being racist[1] I don't see
that that person has a right to remain anonymous.

[1] from [[Talk:Zionism]] """You have a wordy way of saying "I
hate the Jews". Why not
just say it outright? Its not like we don't understand what you are
really saying. RK 22:34, Jun 13, 2004 (UTC)"""
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Talk%3AZionism&diff=4076025&oldid=4075908

>You don't want Wikipedia to work on
>the level of threats, do you? I merely feel the same way as
>most of you.

Then don't threaten legal action against Wikipedia, hypocrite.

--
"It's easier to find people online who openly support the KKK than
people who openly support the RIAA" -- comment on Wikipedia
(Email: zen19725 at zen dot co dot uk)


from_name: Pablo Saratxaga

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Re: Something strange with categories on French
	Wiktionary

body:
Kaixo!
Li Wed, 23 Jun 2004 15:50:25 +0200,
 Thomas Jost <tom.jost at laposte.net> scrijheut:

 TJ> [[Cat?gorie:Pronom fran?ais]] and [[Cat?gorie:Pr?positions fran?aises]].
 TJ> ~ "Pr?positions" was listed after "Pronom", which is incorrect. So I

Sorting is not localized.
And yes, that's a real problem.

If the servers are running on Linux systems a possibility would be
to install locale definitions for all involved languages (I can help
provide the needed info for missing ones) and use the locale's
LC_COLLATE definition for sorting purposes.

Reimplementing it on php would be harder, as it is a complex thing.

--
? bient?t,
Pablo Saratxaga           PGP Key available, key ID: 0xD9B85466

http://chanae.walon.org/pablo/


from_name: Rowan Collins

body:
> I the last days there is a recurring problem
> in Hebrew Wikipedia. Links to existing articles are colored in red. Sometimes it
> could be fixed by edit the source article. I suspect that this hints that
> our links table is not updated with all the changes.

> Ideas? Is this related to the problem with Greek
> Wikipedia?

Actually, this seems to some kind of endemic bug - it's been happening
a lot on en: recently, too - the relevant bug tracker is (I would
presume) https://sourceforge.net/tracker/index.php?func=detail&aid=802814&group_id=34373&atid=411192

Clearly something's going wrong somwhere in the database - my guess
would be that queries are timing out or somesuch, but I don't really
know how that code works yet.

--
Rowan Collins Bsc
[IMSoP]


from_name: egbunu david

subject: [Wikipedia-l] help me answer this question

body:
 How are you doing over there with your job? i hope fine
I am a regular visitor to your website and i have been enjoing it.
I would want you to help me answer this question
   "A man who has reflected upon the principle of reasoning is much less likely to be decieved than one who is guided unconsciously by assumption which he has never examined. Discuss these assertion in detail"

 It is a question gotten from Philosophy and logic.Please i would be glad if you can e-mail me the answer to my e-mail address (inventorfuture at yahoo.co.uk) as soon as possible

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

---------------------------------
 ALL-NEW Yahoo! Messenger - sooooo many all-new ways to express yourself
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/attachments/20040626/7c164af6/attachment.htm


body:
On 06/26/04 10:26, Charles Matthews wrote:
> David Gerard wrote

>>One question (and I don't mean to sound churlish): if MNH comes back on
>>2nd October and starts doing the same stuff again, will it take another
>>few months for this to be acted upon?

> You don't, to me, sound churlish.  But you can't _really_ expect an answer,
> prejudging this ... ?

I think it's a reasonable hypothetical question, considering this is
what's already happened once.

- d.


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Controversial new religious movements,	failure of
	the Wikipedia system?

body:
On 06/26/04 12:59, Andries Krugers Dagneaux wrote:

> People who are followers try to insert positive material and ex-members
> go to the other extreme of abusing their former gurus. It is an almost
> full time job for me which cannot continue because I will have others
> things to do.
> It seems that the Wikipedia system does not work well for these kinds of
> cases. I would appreciate help in maintaining the articles. Does
> somebody have another suggestion?

Look to [[Category:Scientology]] for examples. What I try for is:

1. write in an understated and matter-of-fact manner.
2. references, references, references. By sentence if need be.

- d.


list: wiktionary-l

from_name: Muke Tever

subject: [Wiktionary-l] Categories on la: broken?

body:
[One more time, posted from the correct address this time]
(Bug report posted on en:Wiktionary:bug reports also, though it probably
doesnt belong there)

Categories don't appear to work on la.wiktionary. Tried to create
[[Category:????]] ("category of words derived from the Greek root ????"),
and it draws the category box all right but the link for ???? appears as a
link to [[:????]] (with an initial colon; clicking the link takes one to
the entry for ????). One can't go to Category:???? either without being
sent to ????. How do I fix this?

(Furthermore:)
???? is listed in Specialis:Categories, but the link is again to the entry
for ????, not to a category.  The same thing seems to happen on the Latin
Vicip?dia.

	*Muke!
--
http://frath.net/  (my website)
http://kohath.livejournal.com/
http://kohath.deviantart.com/

http://wiki.frath.net/ (conlangs and concultures)

--
http://frath.net/  (my website)
http://kohath.livejournal.com/
http://kohath.deviantart.com/

http://wiki.frath.net/ (conlangs and concultures)


from_name: Andries Krugers Dagneaux

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Controversial new religious movements,
	failure of the Wikipedia system?

body:
I have been working on various controversial new religious movements
including [[Sathya Sai Baba]] of which I am an ex-member, and
[[Maharaji]]. Unfortunately, it seems very difficult to maintain
objective, balanced articles about these gurus and their corresponding
new religious movements.

People who are followers try to insert positive material and ex-members
go to the other extreme of abusing their former gurus. It is an almost
full time job for me which cannot continue because I will have others
things to do.

It seems that the Wikipedia system does not work well for these kinds of
cases. I would appreciate help in maintaining the articles. Does
somebody have another suggestion?

Thanks in advance, Andries Krugers Dagneaux [[user:Andries]]


from_name: Brion Vibber

body:
Muke Tever wrote:
> [One more time, posted from the correct address this time]
> (Bug report posted on en:Wiktionary:bug reports also, though it
> probably  doesnt belong there)
>
> Categories don't appear to work on la.wiktionary.

The Category and Help namespaces are not defined for Latin. Someone
needs to provide translations, please.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 253 bytes
Desc: OpenPGP digital signature
Url : http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wiktionary-l/attachments/20040626/c237f97b/attachment.pgp


from_name: cookfire

subject: [Wiktionary-l] Re: De-capitalisation-isation

references:
<cb7je6$5jm$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<cbcea4$aac$1@sea.gmane.org>	<40DA7F1B.70002@softhome.net>
	<cbfd60$8p6$1@sea.gmane.org>

body:
Timwi wrote:

> cookfire wrote:
>
>> The voting page has been moved over to the English Wiktionary by
>> Eclecticology.
>
>
> It seems that he *copied* it over. That's a bad idea. :-P I've
> replaced the page on meta with a "this has been moved" page now.
>
>> Now we have a lot of no votes from people I don't see contributing
>> all that much on Wiktionary.
>
>
> Yeah. I'm stupid. I should have started the vote on Wiktionary itself.
>
> Timwi

I wouldn't call it that. In fact I'm glad you would want to help us with
this issue. It's something we have been asking for since the beginning
of the English Wiktionary. It wasn't possible back then because of other
priorities for the developers. It's a pity there is such vocal
opposition to it now and I feel bad because I started by objecting. It
is true that there might be even better ways of dealing with the issues,
but I'm sure that flipping a switch is going to be a lot easier to
accomplish than having to add functionality to the software to do it in
those better ways.

Polyglot


from_name: Tim Starling

subject: [Wikitech-l] Search index updates

body:
We had some problems enabling search because inserts into a table with a
full-text index is quite slow. Switching PACK_KEYS off seemed to help a
bit, although that may have been illusory. Despite having PACK_KEYS off,
during last peak period the edit rate on the wiki again exceeded the
maximum insert rate on suda, just as it had done in the previous two
days. This causes editing on the wiki in question to apparently cease, a
runaway increase in open mysql connections, and eventually complete loss
of service if search updates are not switched off.

A more efficient alternative was obviously necessary, so I wrote a
script to perform the day's search updates during the off-peak periods.
It scans the recentchanges table for pages to update, starting from a
timestamp saved to disk by the previous run. It obtains a write lock on
searchindex and a read lock on cur, and then updates the table for some
specified period of time (currently 20 seconds). It then releases its
locks and allows any queued edits from the wiki to complete, before
locking again and continuing.

Locking tables like this improves the performance of bulk inserts,
according to the MySQL manual. The read lock on cur is required because
an unlocked table cannot be accessed while another table is locked.

The script is in CVS at maintenance/updateSearchIndex.php, and should
work on non-Wikimedia installations without modification.

-- Tim Starling


subject: [Wikitech-l] MediaWiki 1.3.0beta4 released

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

Some compatibility fixes for PHP 4.1.2 and 4.2.x; installer checks for
missing MySQL support; and many various things fixed. Anyone running a
public server on 1.3.0beta is strongly recommended to upgrade to this
release, as a potential JavaScript injection attack in earlier betas has
been fixed. (1.2.x is not vulnerable.)

Release notes:
https://sourceforge.net/project/shownotes.php?release_id=248913

Download:
http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/wikipedia/mediawiki-1.3.0beta4.tar.gz?download

Report bugs at:
https://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=34373&atid=411192

Play "Stump the Developers" live on IRC:
#mediawiki on irc.freenode.net

Help mailing list:
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-l

(CVS note: this is tagged as REL1_3_0beta4a. We tagged a REL1_3_0beta4
last week but didn't release quite it.)

Changes from beta3 include but are not limited to:

* Install checks for missing PHP MySQL support
* Fixed broken PHP 4.1.2 compatibility functions
* PHP 4.2 vs MonoBook skin title encoding
* Offsets
* Mysterious install fixes
* Fix for   with html-tidy
* (optional) experimental load balancer
* Fixes for some broken queries from last beta
* Improved error reporting in command line scripts and elsewhere
* Account creation per IP throttle (requires memcached)
* Copyright info on uploads (optional)
* Hook for custom spam check filter function
* Improved HTML escaping of user names in some places
* Removed < and > from legal title chars (shouldn't have been added)
* Recentchanges reports move-over-redirect more clearly
* Search index updates no longer use REPLACE DELAYED, as it causes more
problems than it solves
* Copyright notice was missing on old revisions, fixed
* More bad title checks in skin
* Unused skins no longer loaded (reduces memory usage)
* "newbies" mode on Special:Contributions
* Bureaucrat flag put back into Special:Makesysop
* Special:Undelete fix for titles with apostrophes
* Upload warning on existing filename
* $wgWhitelistRead fix
* Titles with "./" are allowed again as long as it's not at the
beginning or following a "/"
* Language file upades for Hungarian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese
* Spelling corrections in languge names
* rebuildtextindex.php updated
* SQL fix to blobs table
* TeX suppress dvips output from logs
* Style fixes

- -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.2 (Darwin)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFA3hSCwRnhpk1wk44RAozfAKC+DUHqNn6fHib/z4x5KERA/iU0+gCghKs5
MH0NL5ooqwYMbd6pw8C6/JA=
=peLW
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


subject: [Wikipedia-l] meta vandalism

body:
On Sat, 26 Jun 2004 10:27:44 +0200, Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> In the past week, I think meta has been vandalised every day, around 4
> or 5 in the morning GMT+2. When no one is around, the vandal bot is
> really giving a lot of clean up work afterwards.

If its a single ip, can't it just be banned?

--
Adon Metcalfe
mailto:flonejek at gmail.com
HTML Mail
Perth
Australia
Additional Information:
Last Name: Metcalfe
First Name: Adon
Blog: adonmetcalfe.blogspot.com