subject: [Wikitech-l] Page collapsing/expanding

body:
Erik Moeller wrote:
>>With server-side collapsing, expansion will require a new request which
>>will include re-transferring everything that's already there. That's an
>>extra burden for the slow downloader, as well as requiring parsing and
>>rendering time on the server.
>
>
> Have you tried the feature? When you click an individual section in
> collapsed mode, *only that section* is loaded. Thus, no retransferring
> (except for the page layout).

...

Then I don't understand the point at all. Use separate pages!

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Mark Gerdes

subject: Severed head (wasRe: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy)

body:
I rarely comment anymore.  But in this case I would
just throw this out.

There is a very famous photo of a South Vietnamese
officer blowing off the head of a Viet Cong fighter on
a Saigon street.  This is quite offensive to view but
it is nonetheless one of the most important photos of
the last 35 years.  Would you want this famous picture
to be pushed out of an article on Vietnam due to its
terrible content?

Similarly, there is a ghastly photo of a naked young
child running down a road with severe burns from
napalm.  A horrible picture, but one that should not
be pushed aside.

The bodies of babies at My Lai are another example.

And finally, there are horrible photos of Dachau and
Auschwitz that make this photo look like nothing.

The fact is that Al-Qaeda cut off this young mans head
in a gruesome manner.  It is sometimes more necessary
to know a horrible truth for what it is than it is to
protect our sensibilities.

__________________________________
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Yahoo! Movies - Buy advance tickets for 'Shrek 2'
http://movies.yahoo.com/showtimes/movie?mid=1808405861


from_name: Delirium

body:
I actually just looked at this image now, and I must say it's not really
nearly as gruesome as I had expected.  It's a fairly small and grainy
photo, and a minimum of blood or gore is visible.  It's disturbing in a
conceptual sense primarily, in that the executioner is triumphantly
holding up the head as a trophy.  I'd say as far as potentially
offensive photos go, this is far less graphic than a lot of what we have
on Wikipedia.  I had assumed otherwise simply because I hadn't actually
looked at the image; as it stands now I'm not sure it shouldn't go
inline, unless we adopt a fairly low threshold for offensiveness.

-Mark


subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
Erik Moeller wrote:

>What I can agree on, on the basis of the Nick Berg poll, is this:
>If there is 95-100% agreement that an image is offensive, or that it is
>offensive enough to others that it should be linked, then it should be
>linked. Currently there is one vote "offensive, but show"; this is the
>kind of vote which I can agree we can ignore. Removing it, we have 2 in
>favor of showing inline with 27 in favor of linking. That's still below
>95%, but I believe with a large enough sample and a clear policy we would
>get there (if not, I would be willing to lower the threshold to 90%).
>
>
Well, it's now at 5 in favor of inline, and 28 in favor of linking, a
mere 84%.

-Mark


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] Page collapsing/expanding

body:
Erik Moeller wrote:
> Brion-
>>Then I don't understand the point at all. Use separate pages!
>
> The feature was inspired by the current situation on [[Wikipedia:Votes for
> deletion]] (en:). The page became so long that modem users complained that
> they could no longer effectively work with it.

Ahhh, deletion. You're solving the wrong problem, then. When all you've
got is a hammer...

A community deletion system with an automatically generated list linking
to all deletion-nominated pages would seem to be the appropriate thing;
this would eliminate the need to manually arrange a billion little
debates; they could sit on the talk pages where they belonged, and the
master list would manage itself.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


from_name: Hunter Peress

subject: [Wikitech-l] timelines on test

body:
After looking at the implemention on test.wp.org , I am not pleased with how technical the code
is, I strongly feel that its just a toy-idea.

I told gwicke on irc that I believe that sortable tables should come before timelines. Here is
why:

First, 1.3 introduces a parser (Tim, (i assume),  its a standard LALR algorithm that takes in a
BNF grammar?  (dont know where in the code it is exactly, both of these answers would help).

Assuming its a normal parser, then wiki tables will have to run through it no?

With this, just a little work is needed to make the tables into some type of data object that can
be manipulated.

A simple application of this object would be making tables sortable on columns.

A more advanced application would be to take this object representing the tables and feed it to
the timeline program (done in perl/plotticus). (I actually feel that it should be done in svg....
like the non-ganglia stats).

__________________________________
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http://movies.yahoo.com/showtimes/movie?mid=1808405861


from_name: Anthere

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: troubled.

body:
Ben, euhhhh, wellll, let's say, I *really* think this encyclopedia is
sometimes losing itself in pure speculation and forgetting real day life.

There are no articles on potty training, and that is more the reality of
life of many people than many articles on ... oh well...

And believe me, some commercial editors make big bucks selling books to
mothers, where pedetricians, psychopedetricians explain to them how to
raise a child. What is normal, and not normal, color, smell, texture,
depending on which food they ate, what to do when they have it runny,
when to call  a doctor, when not, how to drink unCO2 coca cola, what to
do when the kid plays with it, if it is healthy that he does so...and so on

Chapters and chapters and chapters

Anyway, never mind. I feel I am not in the right place. That is gross :-)

Let's go back to these prisoners pictures... I made a gallery. Feedback
welcome (even if I think I will be reverted, but well...)

Ant

Fennec Foxen a ?crit:
> And here I thought Wikipedia *itself* was educational. My, my... the
> things we learn... O_o
>
> On Wed, 12 May 2004 15:29:17 +0200, Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>>What I mean to say, is that kids are interested in their feces till a
>>much older age (3-4), than the moment the feces really start to smell.
>>While adults are frowning, kids are not yet. I have the personal
>>feeling, that the taboo is not spontaneous at all, but the result of
>>education. It is not a spontaneous taboo, triggered during natural
>>developement of the child, or if a natural taboo is triggered, I guess
>>the trigger time comes *after* an educational trigger.
>


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Thomas R. Koll

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Problems with displaying south Asian languages on
	my computer

body:
On Tue, May 11, 2004 at 09:59:40PM -0230, Shane Spencer wrote:
> I have Windows 98 SE and I have problems displaying text characters in Hindi, Bengali, Tamil and Malayalam...they're always bars and blocks.  I tried to find the text display supports in those languages on my Win98SE CD-ROM, but I'm out of luck.  Can you please help me?  Thank you very much.

They are all encoded in utf-8 and I am not sure if Win98 and it's IE can handle it.
I'd suggest you to install a modern browser like firefox which can be found at
http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/

ciao, tom
--
== Weblinks ==
* http://www.tomk32.de - just a geek trying to change the world
* http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benutzer:TomK32 - Free Knowledge
* http://tinyurl.com/27c88 - WikiReader Internet: bald im Druck
* http://tomk32.bookcrossing.com - Free Books


list: foundation-l

from_name: Tim Starling

subject: [Foundation-l] First Past the Post

body:
Danny wrote:

> Imran and I have discussed this. It seems that most people who have
> spoken out are opposed to First Past the Post as our voting system. We
> selected this because it seemed the easiest for everyone to understand
> and implement, and with the understanding that there will be
> opposition. In fact, I believe that no matter what voting system is
> chosen, there will be opposition to it.
>
> On the other hand, we are willing to consider other methods. Imran
> will be posting on this later. Without having a huge vote on how we
> should vote, I would like to invite people on this list to propose
> alternative methods. I will also pose this same question to the
> candidates themselves.
>
Simplicity was a much stronger argument when we were talking about doing
the vote on a meta page. Now I'm writing custom voting software. I don't
mind which voting method you choose, I'm sure I'll be able to code it
before the end of the month.

Condorcet's method has some nice mathematical properties, but does have
the significant criticism that it is prone to electing incompetent
candidates merely because they are in the middle of the political
spectrum. Critics of IRV point out that changes in preferences can have
unexpected results. Although I'm not an expert, I have to admit a
preference towards IRV.

For people who think there is no strategic voting in Condorcet's method,
have a look at:

http://condorcet.org/rp/strategy.shtml

I have to admit that the use of the FPTP method factored strongly in my
decision not to stand, since I didn't want to steal votes from those
candidates most similar to myself.

-- Tim Starling


list: wikimedia-l

subject: [Foundation-l] First Past the Post


subject: [Wikitech-l] Page collapsing/expanding

body:
Erik Moeller wrote:
> Brion-
>
> Maybe, but you wild still have to solve the problem of showing all linked
> debates on the page.

No, because that's not a problem that needs to be solved. Most of these
"debates" won't have changed at any given time, and showing them all
makes it very very difficult to work through what's going on.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


subject: [Wikitech-l] Page collapsing/expanding

references:
<98niCoZCpVB@erik_moeller> <40A2B593.3070205@pobox.com>
	<40A2C36C.2000301@tonal.clara.co.uk>

body:
Neil Harris wrote:
> A generalization of this problem is all the other request queues for
> human action that will soon scale beyond the ability of people to cope
> with by mere editing, like cleanup, RC patrol, etc.

I'll point out that "Votes for deletion" was originally a software
feature. From any page you could go to the 'Vote for this page' special
page, and add a comment which would be inserted in the lists on 'Votes
for deletion', 'Votes for rewrite', 'Votes for NPOVing', and a couple
others.

It was a little rough around the edges, but Lee didn't include the
feature at all for phase 3 and the vote pages became utterly
unmanageable manually. Votes for deletion survived into the present
monstrosity, while the others eventually died of neglect.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


from_name: Gabriel Wicke

subject: [Wikitech-l] Page collapsing/expanding

body:
On Wed, 2004-05-12 at 15:42 +0200, Erik Moeller wrote:

> On the plus side, rendering of collapsed pages is very fast as indeed only
> the intro has to be rendered (the headlines are also converted to HTML to
> make stripping of wikitags easier, but this is concatenated into a single
> step and thus quite unnoticeable).

I've investigated the caching issue a bit- there's nil purging for the
sections and the full page view, so the code would need to be changed to
send no-cache headers, otherwise anon users will get old versions of the
page. I've done some benchmarks of a long testpage
(http://wikidev.net/Long_testpage, 267.8Kb raw, 57.8kb gzipped for
normal browsers) with section folding/no caching vs. disabled section
folding/caching enabled. The (not surprising) result: Section folding
without caching is about 20 times slower.

Also there are two tocs on that test page, not sure if that's
intentional.

Erik, can you move the section folding code to a separate branch for
now? The plan is to get 1.3 ready soon, but this feature needs more work
and discussion. It would certainly be a performance problem as it is.

Cheers

Gabriel Wicke

Detailed benchmark data:

Page: http://wikidev.net/Long_testpage
267.8Kb raw, 57.8kb for normal browsers (gzipped)

Section folding enabled, no caching, full page view:
ab -n 100 -H 'Accept-Encoding: gzip' -c 5
http://wikidev.net:8000/Long_testpage?action=view\&collapse=false

Requests per second:    0.13 [#/sec] (mean)

Connection Times (ms)
              min  mean[+/-sd] median   max
Connect:        0     9   48.9      0   357
Processing: 35941 37926 1048.5  37801 42632
Waiting:    35941 37922 1048.5  37772 42632
Total:      35941 37936 1051.8  37801 42632

No section folding, caching enabled (as on wp.org), full page view:
ab -n 100 -H 'Accept-Encoding: gzip' -c 5
http://wikidev.net/Long_testpage

Requests per second:    2.66 [#/sec] (mean)

Connnection Times (ms)
              min  mean[+/-sd] median   max
Connect:        0    10   50.6      0   373
Processing:     3  1872 8157.5      9 37526
Waiting:        3  1868 8138.5      8 37422
Total:          3  1882 8199.2      9 37573


from_name: Bod NotBod

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: troubled

body:
On the whole clitoris debate, the following might be of interest.

Recently a British broadsheet newspaper allowed guest editors to choose the
articles for their pull out supplement.

The band Franz Ferdinand wanted to publish an artist's photograph described
as "a woman sitting in a relaxed fashion, with her legs spread, as though
she is at breakfast. She is nude and the image shows her body from her belly
button to her knees. The facts of her body are just there - natural,
striking in their presence, and fascinating for it."

They censored this image and instead a picture was used of two artists - one
male, one female -, seated, wearing shirts but no clothing on their lower
halves.  The genitals could be seen but, in the case of the woman, you could
see her pubic hair and the - excuse my poor anatomical language - crease of
her vagina, but no internal detail as would have been seen in the proposed
image.

I'm not sure where that gets you, I'm not seeking to imply this represents
any kind of desirable rule, but it gives you an idea of the state of play at
one respected British publication.  A publication that is very left leaning
I should add, I suppose.

They print all swear words in full, including 'cunt' - most other British
papers use a******ks.

The tabloid "Sun" prints pictures of topless women each day.

An article about the Guardian's picture is here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/guesteditors/story/0,14481,1194719,00.html

Graeme

_________________________________________________________________
Express yourself with cool new emoticons http://www.msn.co.uk/specials/myemo


from_name: Tomos at Wikipedia

subject: [Wikipedia-l] japanese around

body:
Yes, I'm around. :-)

I am an ambassador from Japanese Wikipedia. And I have been active since the
time ja. wikipedia became active. If you have any question about ja., please
let me know.

It is true that I am virtually the only japanese wikipedian who posts on
mailinglists.

I was asked by some japanese wikipedian if I would run for the board. I
might... I am still thinking. But because I am virtually the only one on
meta's English page, sourceforge's bug report section, mailing lists, and
other places speaking on behalf of Japanese wikipedians, I hesitate a bit. I
am also virtually the only person who relays news, announcements, call for
comments/ votes, etc., from outside of ja. There are other things that I do,
and not many others do, including responding to press inquiries,  in-depth
discussion of GFDL related issues, talking to Brion and Jimbo when their
attention is needed, etc.

Well, enough of bragging.

I am interested in increasing ingerlingual sharing of wikipedia experiences.
Earlier this year, I indeed shared an overview of legal discussions (past &
present) on Japanese Wikipedia. (URL:
http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Tomos/Legal_discussions_on_Japanese_Wikipedia
)

Also, if you prefer communicating on Japanese Wikipedia in another language,
we have a page for you:
http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Contact_us_for_non-japanese-speakers

Regards,

Tomos

_________________________________________________________________
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Security. http://clinic.mcafee.com/clinic/ibuy/campaign.asp?cid=3963


from_name: Fennec Foxen

body:
On Wed, 12 May 2004 13:11:06 -0700 (PDT), Mark Richards
<marich712000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> I am unconvinced that a photo of this nature adds
> anything to the article, or will remain that
> newsworthy. The incident is tragic, and documenting it
> is important, but a graphic picture of a severed head?
> Why?
Mark is talking sense here. And on the issue of my-own-two-cents...
One of the nice things about Wikipedia, I have found, is that I can
view an article on, say, [[shock site]]s without being shown the
picture of the goatse man.

Is there any objection to having this and similar images linked
besides the fact that it may (or may not) possibly be construed as POV
or judgemental? I'll take a good dose of "being nice to the reader"
over a theoretical and/or philisophical objection any day of the week.

~~~~
(that does not work inna email, darnit)


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nick Berg

body:
Now... this is just...

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Nick_Berg&oldid=3551741

Okay, it shows a human face, on which we can put a name, a story. This
is not an anonymous blurred penis. I also wonder how the family of this
man will appreciate that we display this picture. I think we reach the
limit of dignity here. I also think (for those who might not be sensible
to the dignity argument) that such a display might be more hurtful than
beneficial on Wikipedia image.

Now, I understand that some people want this picture on Wikipedia very
much. I did not censor it by deleting it. So, it is no use screaming
censorship.

I did an online link to this picture, so it is available, but only to
those who wish to see it. Not to everyone.

I know not how much votes would be in favor of visibly displaying that
picture on Wikipedia. I consider it really is a candidate for an image
hidden behind a link.


from_name: David Friedland

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Re: Historian: origin of apparent "policy" re recipes
	and how-tos?

body:
I would like to note that we discussed this matter in February, and
although perhaps no consensus was formed on policy, I continue to stand
by my statements on the topic, particularly that how-tos, recipes, and
similar didactic texts are inherently POV and don't belong on Wikipedia
proper.

<http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2004-February/010873.html>
<http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2004-February/010883.html>

Note, however, that information about this kind of content is decidedly
NPOV.

For examples of articles about culturally-important dishes that are not
ridiculous strawmen, see:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guacamole>
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paella>

There was a small edit war/debate about what ingredients are permitted
in Paella (see <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Paella>). One can only
imagine what kind of chaos that debate would have engendered if there
had been a recipe. And who knows if the resulting recipe would have even
been edible! :-)

In any case, the point is that there is no such thing as a neutral
recipe, only a neutral "meta-recipe".

- David

Daniel P.B.Smith wrote:
> NOT a rhetorical question.
>
> I've been very puzzled by an apparent consensus or policy--one with
> which I obviously do not agree--that recipes in particular, and didactic
> or "how-to" articles in general, do not belong in Wikipedia. I can give
> cogent-to-me reasons for not agreeing with this. But I don't want to
> discuss that now.
>
> Here's what I want to know. Is this an example of a difficult,
> carefully-threshed-out consensus that newer Wikipedians, having not
> participated in that consensus, may be unaware of?
>
> (And if so why isn't it documented on any of the policy pages I've been
> able to find?)
>
>
> --
> Daniel P. B. Smith, dpbsmith at verizon.net
> alternate: dpbsmith at alum.mit.edu
> "Elinor Goulding Smith's Great Big Messy Book" is now back in print!
> Sample chapter at http://world.std.com/~dpbsmith/messy.html
> Buy it at http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1403314063/
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


from_name: Peter Jaros

subject: [WikiEN-l] Someone in New York, June 23

body:
On May 12, 2004, at 4:38 PM, Jimmy Wales wrote:

> Who is
> (a) located in or near New York City
> (b) willing to speak publicly
> (c) close to the project
> (d) willing to attend on our behalf the ceremony there.

When *is* this ceremony?  Is it going to be webcast?  Broadcast?
The website only mentions today's independent celebrations.

Peter

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
On May 12, 2004, at 5:33 PM, Erik Moeller wrote:

> You have not offered a single plausible counter-argument on why, for
> example, this would be any different from moving criticisms of Mother
> Teresa to a separate page if the majority does not like to read about
> them.

Fair enough.  I would say that the primary difference between text
and image in this case is that text can be skimmed and skipped.  It
is *much* harder to avoid an image, especially an image one finds
disturbing or offensive.

Peter

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
On May 12, 2004, at 7:01 PM, Jimmy Wales wrote:

> Erik Moeller wrote:
>> Exactly. If you take a look at Talk:Clitoris/Image discussion, you
>> will
>> see that all options were offered, and the option of *showing the
>> photo
>> inline* (instead of just a link) got the most votes of all.
>
> This shows me that you are right that majority vote is not the right
> way to determine the correct result.  Majority vote is very frequently
> not helpful in finding or determining NPOV.

Indeed, this is MPOV: Majority Point of View.  The two are only the
same if there is a truly *overwhelming* majority.  Otherwise, NPOV
is a meta-wise compromise, so to speak.

Peter

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


from_name: Brian Corr

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Re: troubled.

body:
Rich is exactly right in his response to Erik and explains the situation
very clearly, IMHO. So let's accept that collectively we *will* be making a
choice among POV's, and let's follow Jimbo's excellent advice about how to
do so and how to apply the decision that we make.

Thanks,
Brian (Bcorr)

--- Rich Holton <rich_holton at yahoo.com> wrote:

>This is not a choice between POV and NPOV. It is a
>choice between different POV's. You want all images
>left on the article page unless the group that wants a
>particular image left there is so small as to be
>almost noise level. I would have all images left on
>the article page unless the group that wants a
>particular image left there falls below 70%.
>
>Either way the image is placed -- on the article page
>or masked -- is still POV. In your case it reflects
>the POV of as little as 10% of those who vote. Would
>we really want the image of the militants holding Nick
>Berg's severed head to be plainly on the article if
>only 10% want it to be there?


from_name: Viajero

subject: [WikiEN-l] Nick Berg: unclear why this page was protected

body:
I just went to take a look at this page and discovered that it was protected by Svertigo a couple hours ago. There was no mention of why on the Talk page nor on [[Wikipedia:Protected_page#Pages_protected_due_to_edit_wars_or_vandalism]] and a quick look at the Page history didn't reveal an edit war so I unprotected it, but Svertigo reprotected it. What the hell is going on?

V.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
On May 12, 2004, at 8:34 PM, Erik Moeller wrote:

> Aside from any NPOV issues with the image itself (is it manipulative?
> singled out? fake? etc.), an image is a *fact*. Nobody disputes that
> Lynndie England held a prisoner in Abu Ghraib on a leash. What some
> people
> claim is that this particular image in this particular article should
> not
> be shown inline because it is offensive to them. If we do this, then we
> *selectively* endorse this point of view. If we selectively show it, we
> endorse the opposite view. If we show all images where there is no
> consensus that they are offensive, we endorse *no* point of view.
>
> Now you appear to argue that by doing that we make some people unhappy,
> hence we violate NPOV. I'm sure the Mother Teresa article will also
> make
> some people unhappy, but I'm hardly willing to make them happier by
> removing or hiding some inconvenient facts.

As they say, a picture is worth a thousand words.  Images can be
more than facts.  They can evoke, as Delirium put it, a "visceral"
response.  That is beyond the academic and the factual.  If a
significant number of people would like to know the *facts* about a
topic, but feel uncomfortable with seeing certain images, they
should have that opportunity.  It's not a right, it's an expression
of WikiLove.

If people simply don't want to know certain *facts*, in text or in
image, I agree that reworking articles to this end is a breakdown of
NPOV.  Allowing users to learn all the facts without an unwanted
visceral reaction is just playing nice and making the Wikipedia more
accessible.

Peter

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


subject: [Wikitech-l] timelines on test

body:
Hello. I tried the timeline feature on test wiki using Japanese text.

It seems it does not work properly. Would someone take a look?

http://test.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=EasyTimeline&oldid=1765

I tried to do the same on a desktop terminal (Win98SE, English version), but
I could not do that, either. :-(

Thanks,

Tomos

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from_name: Fred Bauder

subject: [WikiEN-l] Paul Vogel banned for a year

body:
7-0-0 7 voted for, no one voted against, no one proposed a third
alternative, 3 didn't vote at all.

Fred

> From: Peter Jaros <rjaros at shaysnet.com>
> Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Wed, 12 May 2004 21:27:17 -0400
> To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Paul Vogel banned for a year
>
> On May 7, 2004, at 6:40 AM, Delirium wrote:
>
>> Passed (7-0-0):
>> Passed (6-0-0):
>> Almost but not yet passed (5-0-1):
>> Nothing decided (2-2-1):
>> Remedies (both passed 7-0-0)
>
> Point of procedural inquiry:
>
> What does it mean if the three numbers don't add up to 10?  Are the
> extras implicit abstentions (non-responses), and the third number
> only the explicit?
>
> Peter
>
> -- ---<>--- --
> A house without walls cannot fall.
> Help build the world's largest encyclopedia at Wikipedia.org
> -- ---<>--- --
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Offensive photos policy

body:
Erik:

How would you feel if the linked images had a disclaimer saying
something to this effect:

The following images have been placed on a separate page because they
MAY be consiered disturbing and/or offensive. It is Wikipedia policy not
to take a position on whether the following images are in fact
disturbing or offensive or not (See [[Wikipedia:Neutral Point of
View]]). However, to avoid disturbing or offending those users to whom
the images are disturbing or offensive, they have been placed on a
separate page.

Would that be an satisfactorily explicit endorsement of NPOV while at
the same time preventing unnecessary offense?

- David


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Historian: origin of apparent "policy" re recipes and
	how-tos?

body:
On May 11, 2004, at 6:52 AM, Daniel P.B.Smith wrote:

> Here's what I want to know. Is this an example of a difficult,
> carefully-threshed-out consensus that newer Wikipedians, having not
> participated in that consensus, may be unaware of?

Difficult, yes.   Carefully-threshed-out, sort of.  Consensus, no.
At least I never heard a definitive one.  However, I was left with
the impression that prescriptive material doesn't belong in the
Wikipedia, but can often be reworded to be descriptive.  The
conversion process seems to weed out the POV.  But, no, that's not
really a consensus, and that's why it's not in the policy.

Peter

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Nick Berg: unclear why this page was protected

body:
Easy. Reddi put the severed head on the current event page
Someone removed it
Then he put it on the Nick page.
I removed it
He put it back
I removed the picture, but put a link to the picture in the article
he removed it and put back the picture
I reverted
he reverted
I reverted
.......

Viajero a ?crit:
> I just went to take a look at this page and discovered that it was protected by Svertigo a couple hours ago. There was no mention of why on the Talk page nor on [[Wikipedia:Protected_page#Pages_protected_due_to_edit_wars_or_vandalism]] and a quick look at the Page history didn't reveal an edit war so I unprotected it, but Svertigo reprotected it. What the hell is going on?
>
>
> V.


from_name: steven l. rubenstein

subject: [WikiEN-l] offensive photos policy

body:
I tried sending this message before and it bounced back.  I don't think it
went through and I am resending -- if it did get through, sorry for the repeat.

admit that I haven't been following this discussion in its entirety (in
part because we've been through this before), and I apologize if I am
making a point others have already made.

In some of the examples people have given, I think it is a mistake to
construe it as a POV/NPOV issue in strict terms.  As Erik points out, we
end up playing a simple numbers game, concerning how many people including
or excluding a photo offends.  Surely there are more substantive criteria
we can use here, ones that move us away from asking whether the photo is
offensive (begging the question, for we must then ask, "according to
whom?").  I'd like to propose two, related criteria.

First, is the photo necessary in order to convey important information.  In
the case of a vagina, for example, a drawing can convey just as much if not
more information.  On these grounds alone, why not go for the drawing (I
think this specific matter came up some time ago)?

Second, is the image of a prurient nature?  I do not mean that if might
offend some (our NPOV policy ensures that we will always offend some), but
rather that some people cruising the web might fixate on the image for
purposes external to those of an encyclopedia.  I am sure we can come close
to a consensus as to whether this is likely or not.

I believe that even if an image is prurient in nature, if it is necessary
to convey important information we should keep it.  If it is not necessary
to convey important information, we should find an alternative.  In short,
I am appealing not to "NPOV" but to "wikipedia is an encyclopedia."

I understand that we might still argue over whether something is prurient
or not, or whether something is essential for communicating important
information.  I just think it will be easier to reach a consensus on these
questions than on the question of whether or not it is offensive.

Steve

Steven L. Rubenstein
Associate Professor
Department of Sociology and Anthropology
Bentley Annex
Ohio University
Athens, Ohio 45701
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subject: [WikiEN-l] What is a troll?

body:
On May 7, 2004, at 3:43 PM, Theresa Robinson wrote:

> It would be much more productive to be very
> specific about what the person is doing, and say "I disagree with the
> tenacity with which you exclude all but one POV from this article" or
> "it
> would really help if you told us why you were reverting all our edits"
> etc.  This is much more likely to result in a resolution.

The WikiCommandments:

1. AssumeGoodFaith.
2. WikiLove thy neighbor.
...

Peter

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] Paul Vogel banned for a year

body:
On May 7, 2004, at 6:40 AM, Delirium wrote:

> Passed (7-0-0):
> Passed (6-0-0):
> Almost but not yet passed (5-0-1):
> Nothing decided (2-2-1):
> Remedies (both passed 7-0-0)

Point of procedural inquiry:

What does it mean if the three numbers don't add up to 10?  Are the
extras implicit abstentions (non-responses), and the third number
only the explicit?

Peter

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


from_name: Pedro Fortuny

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Nick Berg

body:
Even though I find it disgusting, it is not about being or not horrific.
Showing someone's severed head is -for the purposes of the terrorists-
the greatest humiliation and profanation of a person.

What we are not allowed to do is to humiliate that person even more by
making that picture public. Information is WAY BELOW dignity as a right.
And anyone (even the prisoners, and Erik did a good job blurring their
faces) has a right for his dignity.

Pedro.

* Brian Corr <BCorr at NEAction.org> [2004-05-12]:
> I can't believe this article has the picture of his severed head -- this is
> rather horrific. I'm respecting the article protection, but I think this is
> way over the line. People who want to see the picture can certainly find it
> other places, and lots of people looking for info on Nick Berg may stumble
> across this page. The note at the top of the page is needed, but certainly
> didn't prepare ''me'' for a picture of someone holding his severed head.
> Years of grisly horror films didn't prepare me either.
>
> Brian (Bcorr)
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

--
Pedro Fortuny Ayuso: http://pfortuny.sdf-eu.org
Colegio Mayor Pe?afiel, Universidad de Valladolid
C/ Estudios 6, 47005 Valladolid, Spain -->        www.cmpenafiel.org
pfortuny at sdf-eu.org                         Tfn. Nr. 34  983  298277


subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
I know I am repeating myself, but in this special case it is not the
readers who are at stake, but the photographed person, who in this case
has no means to defend his rights to

	-privacy
	-dignity
	-honour

So in this case the policy ought to be: personal human rights are above
collective rights.

Pedro.

* Jimmy Wales <jwales at bomis.com> [2004-05-12]:
> There is no issue of censorship involved in having the good sense and
> good taste to not automatically display graphic photos that are likely
> to be offensive or upsetting to large numbers of people.
>
> There will always be difficult questions of where to draw the line, I
> suppose, but we solve that issue in other cases by "going meta",
> i.e. avoiding the controversy.
>
> With most issues, the wiki process works perfectly fine.  It is almost
> never "either/or" with the text of an article -- creative people can
> almost always find a way to compromise on a text that is different
> from either of two extreme positions.
>
> With photos, the "show" versus "don't show" really is an "either/or",
> though.  The only possible compromise, and one which I think will
> almost always work just fine, is to *link* to the picture, with
> suitable warnings, and leave it at that.
>
> That is the proposal that Anthere has proposed in this case, and that
> is what I support.
>
> I do think that there are cases of photos that we ought to not even
> have on our site at all.  Were it not for the extreme newsworthiness
> of this particular photo, and it's likely longterm political
> importance, I would argue for deleting it.  This is not rotten.com.
>
> I think that there is great validity to the concern for the family and
> for human dignity in general, with respect to photos of this nature.
>
> --Jimbo
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

--
Pedro Fortuny Ayuso: http://pfortuny.sdf-eu.org
Colegio Mayor Pe?afiel, Universidad de Valladolid
C/ Estudios 6, 47005 Valladolid, Spain -->        www.cmpenafiel.org
pfortuny at sdf-eu.org                         Tfn. Nr. 34  983  298277


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Nick Berg

body:
Mind you... I did not respect the three revert rule here...

And I do not regret it :-)

FirmFluffyThing (solidly in the "this picture should not be displayed
directly in the article")

fabiform a ?crit:
>>I can't believe this article has the picture of his severed head
>>-- this is  rather horrific. I'm respecting the article
>>protection, but I think this is  way over the line.
>
>
> The protected version doesn't have the picture, you were looking at an oldid.
> But there's been a revert war over having the picture inline or linking to it.
>
> Fabi (solidly in the "link to it, don't show it" camp).


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Offensive photos policy

body:
I thank you Jimbo and Pedro and many others.
I would prefer it deleted. But I understand that it may be important in
some people opinions. So, I won't argue for it to be deleted at all of
course.

ant

Jimmy Wales a ?crit:
> There is no issue of censorship involved in having the good sense and
> good taste to not automatically display graphic photos that are likely
> to be offensive or upsetting to large numbers of people.
>
> There will always be difficult questions of where to draw the line, I
> suppose, but we solve that issue in other cases by "going meta",
> i.e. avoiding the controversy.
>
> With most issues, the wiki process works perfectly fine.  It is almost
> never "either/or" with the text of an article -- creative people can
> almost always find a way to compromise on a text that is different
> from either of two extreme positions.
>
> With photos, the "show" versus "don't show" really is an "either/or",
> though.  The only possible compromise, and one which I think will
> almost always work just fine, is to *link* to the picture, with
> suitable warnings, and leave it at that.
>
> That is the proposal that Anthere has proposed in this case, and that
> is what I support.
>
> I do think that there are cases of photos that we ought to not even
> have on our site at all.  Were it not for the extreme newsworthiness
> of this particular photo, and it's likely longterm political
> importance, I would argue for deleting it.  This is not rotten.com.
>
> I think that there is great validity to the concern for the family and
> for human dignity in general, with respect to photos of this nature.
>
> --Jimbo


from_name: Erik Moeller

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: troubled.

body:
Rich-
> One might suggest that there is near universal
> agreement that those images should be masked (or would
> you say censored?). But if the goal is to achieve
> "near universal offensiveness", what better way to
> achieve it than to display such images? Why have *any*
> images masked?

By masking those images which are nearly universally considered offensive,
we are providing a service to our community in hiding images that they
will not want to see unless they explicitly request them. If we set this
threshold low - at 70%, for example - then we are trampling on the POV of
30% of our readers. But if we set it very high - 95-100% - then we are in
NPOV territory.

In the NPOV policy we can only treat something as a fact if it is
universally considered as one by informed persons. Similarly, if a photo
is accepted as offensive by all, then we can treat its offensiveness as
*fact*, and act on the basis of this fact. If it is considered offensive
by some, when we act on this *opinion*, we are endorsing a specific POV.

The argument that when we set a threshold at, for example, 50%, and
enforce this threshold *consistently* we are acting in an NPOV manner is
fallacious. Instead we would be abandoning NPOV - neutral point of view -
in favor of MPOV - majority point of view.

Here's a test for any idea of dealing with offensive pictures: Apply the
same methodology to text. Would the result be desirable and acceptable per
NPOV?

Let's take the Mother Teresa article as an example. It accords a
significant amount of space to criticisms of Mother Teresa, even though
there is a strong majority who believes that MT was, if not a living
saint, a courageous helper of the poor and who may consider these
criticisms offensive. Would it be NPOV to say "If 50% (or 70%) of people
find a certain text in an article offensive, it should be moved somewhere
else and a link should be provided to it"? In that case, we would have to
move the criticisms away to make the article more amenable to Christians
and MT-admirers.

Now you can come up with lots of reasons to justify this. You're acting in
the interest of *accessibility*, you say. You want to make sure that
Wikipedia can be read without problems in Catholic schools. You cite an
example of a kid on the Philippines who lost his Internet access after
viewing the Mother Teresa article on a school computer. "This young child,
only 12 years old, could still be reading Wikipedia if we would only move
certain segments of pages away. It's not censorship, you see? The pages
are still there for those who want to read them. And we do this
consistently across all pages -- any minority point of view that is
offensive to the majority will be treated in the same way. So it's
perfectly neutral treatment. It could be done by a computer!"

And you may find these arguments persuasive. I'm sure that over time,
people will make these arguments for text as they are making them for
images now. But the simple fact is that this is *not* our neutral point of
view policy which does not implicitly or explicitly endorse any single
point of view, be it the majority point of view or one which is defined by
some committee.

This doesn't mean that we have to tolerate all images everywhere, of
course. It merely answers the first question, offensiveness. Other key
questions are usefulness and redundancy. And we may even make the
compromise of saying that if a photo's offensiveness to a large number of
readers clearly outweighs its usefulness, the photo should be removed or
linked to. Again, such a determination can only be made in consensus.

Regards,

Erik


subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
Jimmy-
> With photos, the "show" versus "don't show" really is an "either/or",
> though.  The only possible compromise, and one which I think will
> almost always work just fine, is to *link* to the picture, with
> suitable warnings, and leave it at that.

If we make this official policy, we abandon NPOV for photos, for the
reasons I have cited. Please refute my arguments or state clearly that you
do want to abandon NPOV for photos.

Regards,

Erik


subject: [WikiEN-l] Nick Berg photo poll

body:
In order to verify my thesis that the most extreme examples in this
discussion are offensive to 95-100% of people, please vote in this
poll I have started:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Nick_Berg#Inline_image_poll

Regards,

Erik


from_name: Delirium

subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
Erik Moeller wrote:

>>I think I see where we disagree now.  Your position is that we should
>>show the image in all cases unless 95% of the people think it should
>>not be shown, and that this should be a policy which overrides
>>consensus and compromise.
>>
>>
>
>Um, no, I think that when 95% of the people think it should not be shown,
>that *is* a consensus.
>
>
By your standards then, we will show all images, no matter how
offensive, with possibly goatse and little else being "censored".

Note that the Nick Berg decapitation image now only has 81% support for
not putting it inline, so by not having it inline we are, by your
argument, catering to the non-neutral majority POV that images of
decapitated heads should not be displayed.

-Mark


subject: [Wikitech-l] Page collapsing/expanding

body:
Gabriel-

> Hm, how does this integrate with caching? I would also vote for
> switching this feature off by default, especially for anon users (no
> caching for the biggest pages otherwise).

I don't see how this affects caching on the Squid level. If you set the
size threshold to 30K, then a page will be compressed if it has more than
this number of characters, but the URL will not show the &collapse=false
parameter. Surely this should be treated like any other page?

> Instead of re-rendering pages for everyone i think it would make more
> sense to render the page only once and do the customizations in js/css
> as far as possible. Hiding sections via js or css for the browsers that
> support it similar to what we do with the toc currently shouldn't be too
> hard and would save many round-trips to the server and repeated
> rendering.

The whole point of collapsing pages is not to have to send 90K to a dialup
user whenever they view VfD. I fail to see how this can be achieved using
JavaScript.

Regards,

Erik


subject: [Wikitech-l] Page collapsing/expanding

body:
Gabriel-
> I've investigated the caching issue a bit- there's nil purging for the
> sections and the full page view, so the code would need to be changed to
> send no-cache headers, otherwise anon users will get old versions of the
> page.

?? When would anons get old versions of the page? I just edited a couple
of sections on wikidev.net anonymously and all changes show instantly.

> I've done some benchmarks of a long testpage
> (http://wikidev.net/Long_testpage, 267.8Kb raw, 57.8kb gzipped for
> normal browsers) with section folding/no caching vs. disabled section
> folding/caching enabled. The (not surprising) result: Section folding
> without caching is about 20 times slower.

Actually, section *expanding* without caching is slower. You have
benchmarked with collapse=false. That will only happen if an expansion is
explicitly requested, which is a dynamic operation which may well be slow.
How about benchmarking with the auto-collapsing (no URL parameters) versus
the old behavior (set threshold to 0)? Surely the massively smaller pages
far outweigh any benefits of caching?

Re: the duplicate TOC, investigating.

Regards,

Erik


from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] SATA vs DMA

body:
So we've been trawling around on the net looking for info on this
problem. The SATA controller on the non-suda boxes seems to be an Intel
ICH5 of some sort. In theory this should be supported in newer kernels
either out of the box or after some tweaking. Maybe.

We tried a tweaked 2.6.6 kernel on Curly, with ata_piix compiled in
instead of as a module. It booted, but still no DMA, and still with
stuff on hda rather than sda as, perhaps, it ought to be using the SATA
driver.

Curly crashed a few minutes later. :P It doesn't seem to be on our power
manager; Jimmy or Jason, if you guys can either give it a reboot
remotely or Jimmy if you can just reset it when you're next that way,
that'd be great.

Googlings turned up that the BIOS generally has some sort of
'compatibility' mode setting for Parallel ATA. It either *should not* be
on, or *should* be on, I can't tell which. I can't really get at the
BIOS screen from California, so this'll have to be tried out in person.

The 3ware SATA RAID card of course will be a separate kettle of fish. :)
It has its own driver, which we'll have to figure out someday.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


from_name: Matthew Trump

subject: [WikiEN-l] Someone in New York, June 23

body:
I am willing. I live in Staten Island.

Matthew Trump
User:Decumanus

Jimmy Wales said:
> Who is
> (a) located in or near New York City
> (b) willing to speak publicly
> (c) close to the project
> (d) willing to attend on our behalf the ceremony there.
>
> I don't think there's any major requirement for a big speech, just a
> "thank you" type of thing at the ceremony, I think.
>
> If there are multiple volunteers, I will pick someone.  But by
> volunteering, you *promise* not to have your feelings hurt if I pick
> someone else, o.k.?  I have to pick someone.
>
> --Jimbo
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
Delirium-
>> If we make this official policy, we abandon NPOV for photos, for the
>> reasons I have cited. Please refute my arguments or state clearly that you
>> do want to abandon NPOV for photos.

> You wish to adopt the principle that we should err on the side of
> showing photos, based on your personal point of view that people should
> not find things offensive that you do not find offensive.

Not at all. I find many photos of violence offensive but would still
tolerate them if I was one out of 50 or 100 people who feels that way. Of
course I am anti-censorship and my arguments and rationalizations will
lean towards this (just like yours will lean towards a more mainstream
view), but to imply that they are therefore wrong would be an ad hominem
logical fallacy.

You have not offered a single plausible counter-argument on why, for
example, this would be any different from moving criticisms of Mother
Teresa to a separate page if the majority does not like to read about
them.

> For what it's worth, I think the majority of articles you have worked on
> on Wikipedia are similarly flawed, as your idea of NPOV, couched in
> rather pretentious language, is to promote your political ideology.
<snip>

I'll let your personal attack speak for itself.

Regards,

Erik


from_name: Anthere

subject: [WikiEN-l] offensive pict policy suggestions

body:
Image is offensive to me, should be shown inline : 3

Image is not offensive to me, should be shown inline :
4
	(with one person who probably did not understand the
question well)

That makes : 7/44 (perhaps 6/44)

-------
Image is offensive to me, should be linked to or
removed : 14

Image is not offensive to me, should be linked to or
removed : 16

Haven't looked at image, should be linked to or
removed : 7

That makes : 37/44 (perhaps 38/44), hence 84 %

-------

It is interesting to note that 7 people voluntarily
did NOT want to look
at it. We can suppose that these people would *really*
prefer to have the choice to click on the picture,
than being forced to see it.

I would like to note as well, that afaik, currently,
when an image is listed on votes for deletion, I think
the % required for removal is 80% (or something like
this ?)

If some people find a picture offensive, and want it
not to be displayed online, they will have two
possibilities
* campaigning for plain deletion (80%)
* campaigning for inline linking (???)

Obviously, ??? can not be a % over 80%. If a number of
95% is required to label a picture "offensive", that
means

*first that people will rather try to have it plain
deleted (not exactly the best way to achieve a
consensus, and truely potential censorship) *second
that the decision will be taken in truth by 6% of
people (the tyranny of the minority)

This seems a very strange way to manage decisions than
to have 6% of people impose their opinion, and second
to favor extrem solutions over a more consensual one.

I would think that as soon as there is a question over
a picture, we roughly decide that more than 80% for
removal lead the picture to be removed.
If less than 80% but more than 50% have a problem with
the picture being displayed online, then the image is
* kept in the db
* not directly visible in the article
* visible through a link, either in a gallery or the
image page itself
* that a warning message is displayed in the article
(general mediawiki message for example)
* that the link to the image is made "proeminent", so
as not to be missed by those interested (bold for
example)

--------

Future :

Additionnaly, I think we could go forward setting a
couple of categories of potentially offensive
pictures, such as
* sex
* violence
* nudity
* ...

When the category system is on, a picture labelled
offensive (so, between 50% and 80% of opinion) could
belong to one of these categories. People might choose
to display one or several of these categories or not
in their prefs.

If the filter is OFF for a category : the image is
displayed online
If the filter is ON for a category : the image is
available through a link

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Movies - Buy advance tickets for 'Shrek 2'
http://movies.yahoo.com/showtimes/movie?mid=1808405861


subject: [Wikitech-l] Page collapsing/expanding

body:
On Wed, 2004-05-12 at 22:36 +0200, Erik Moeller wrote:

> ?? When would anons get old versions of the page? I just edited a couple
> of sections on wikidev.net anonymously and all changes show instantly.

Try with another browser that has no cookies set. After editing you have
a session cookie which means no squid caching so far.
None of the 'content' url's are purged, so all that would remain
cacheable is the toc. However, at the moment it's sending "i'm
cacheable" headers for the content urls that are never purged, hence
out-of-date content.

Benchmark for toc-only page (uncached, but this is purged so could be
cached):
Requests per second:    1.06 [#/sec] (mean)

Connnection Times (ms)
              min  mean[+/-sd] median   max
Connect:        0    11   60.2      0   444
Processing:  3919  4612  316.1   4629  5247
Waiting:     3855  4606  317.7   4626  5247
Total:       3919  4623  311.8   4630  5247

A short section:
ab -n 100 -H 'Accept-Encoding: gzip' -c 5
http://wikidev.net:8000/Long_testpage?action=view\&section=24\&sectiontitle=Page_move_to_new_destination_without_deleting_existing_page_at_destination%3Fdele

Requests per second:    0.62 [#/sec] (mean)

Connnection Times (ms)
              min  mean[+/-sd] median   max
Connect:        0    10   56.5      0   423
Processing:  3999  7930 2362.7   8804 12732
Waiting:     3999  7924 2371.0   8804 12731
Total:       3999  7940 2348.1   8804 12732

Just rendering a small section is more than four times slower than
getting the full page from squid (!). I don't see how this is a
performance advantage if caching is available.

Was there any discussion on this feature before? The only thing i found
via Google was
http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_feature_requests#Collapsable_tree_in_See_also_section which doesn't seem to be related to this implementation.

All the skin stuff i've done so far (heavy use of css instead of
rendering another page for every user/skin etc) is aiming at a higher
cache hit ratio. Just increasing the cache hit ratio by 15% means
halving the load on the apaches and the DB. This way to fold sections
defeats it.

Cheers

Gabriel Wicke


subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
Delirium-

> I think the primary difference is that photos can be shocking, while
> text generally isn't.

That very much depends on your definition of shocking. Blasphemy laws are
still on the books even in liberal European countries, including Germany.
I have a copy here of an anti-clerical book called the "Pfaffenspiegel" by
Otto von Corvin. My edition was published in 1996. It is in fact a
censored edition according to Article 166 of the German criminal code,
based on a verdict from 1927 which apparently remains in effect. I have
through a friend acquired an uncensored (19th century) copy of the same
book and the censored passages in question are fairly harmless in
comparison with the rest of the book.

The point is that offense is in the eye of the beholder. Of course an
openly held anti-blasphemy point of view would be quickly ridiculed and
rejected. However, the hypothetical question of whether to split away the
criticisms of Mother Teresa is not so hypothetical at all; there was even
an edit war and a poll about it. Some made arguments, others just split
away the criticisms without discussion or removed it entirely (and edit
warred about it).

If a simple majority (for example) would be sufficient to get "offensive"
material moved away, it would be fairly easy for a group of people -- even
within Wikipedia -- to organize and win a vote on the matter (well, at
least when I'm not watching). Supported by policy, these people would
argue that even if the text is not offensive to non-believers, those non-
believers will have to admit that it is clearly offensive to any devout
Catholic or admirer of Mother Teresa, and surely linking to it is no big
loss. Given that this almost happened even *without* an offensive content
policy, it is not hard to imagine that it would have quickly happened with
such a policy in place.

While it is true that text is generally considered less offensive than
images, I can think of many other articles where such a policy would have
an effect, specifically those dealing with violence and religion. Now you
can say that this effect is in fact desirable and necessary, on text as
well as on images. But it is the effective end of the NPOV idea.

> If the [[Mother Theresa]] article *did* include
> truly shocking text, like referring to her with epithets of some sort,

Christopher Hitchens called his movie about her "Hell's Angel" and
originally wanted to call it "Sacred Cow". Would mentioning this, in
attributed form, be offensive to some? You bet.

> Photos, however, are pretty easy to make shocking.  I might wish to read
> an article about [[clitoris]], for example, but find it rather difficult
> to do so when there is a photograph of a woman spreading open her
> genitalia with her fingers in the sidebar.

I still fail to see a plausible situation where you want to read an
article about genitalia but are unprepared to see a small thumbnail image.
Nevertheless, I would support a "hide images" button which would make all
images on a page invisible. That would be fairly easy to implement.

Regards,

Erik


subject: [Wikitech-l] Page collapsing/expanding

body:
Brion-
> With server-side collapsing, expansion will require a new request which
> will include re-transferring everything that's already there. That's an
> extra burden for the slow downloader, as well as requiring parsing and
> rendering time on the server.

Have you tried the feature? When you click an individual section in
collapsed mode, *only that section* is loaded. Thus, no retransferring
(except for the page layout). Expanding the full page should only be done
when you have to edit or print it as a whole. Right now the Edit link in
collapsed mode goes to the top section; I thought that was a clever
feature but it's probably rather annoying. If we change this you don't
even need to expand to edit in full.

Regards,

Erik


subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
Jimmy-
> "The neutral point of view attempts to present ideas and facts in such
> a fashion that both supporters and opponents can agree.

Exactly. If you take a look at Talk:Clitoris/Image discussion, you will
see that all options were offered, and the option of *showing the photo
inline* (instead of just a link) got the most votes of all. So your belief
that people will readily accept hiding "offensive" images behind links is
clearly wrong; many people (including myself) perceive this as an
endorsement of a pro-censorship POV and are therefore against it. Even if
these people were in the minority, there would hardly be any consensus on
the matter.

What I can agree on, on the basis of the Nick Berg poll, is this:
If there is 95-100% agreement that an image is offensive, or that it is
offensive enough to others that it should be linked, then it should be
linked. Currently there is one vote "offensive, but show"; this is the
kind of vote which I can agree we can ignore. Removing it, we have 2 in
favor of showing inline with 27 in favor of linking. That's still below
95%, but I believe with a large enough sample and a clear policy we would
get there (if not, I would be willing to lower the threshold to 90%).

So it appears that you believe that there will be consensus in cases where
there clearly won't; that's fine, as long as we agree that consensus is a
requirement for hiding an image behind a link.

Regards,

Erik


subject: [Wikitech-l] Page collapsing/expanding

body:
Gabriel-
>> ?? When would anons get old versions of the page? I just edited a couple
>> of sections on wikidev.net anonymously and all changes show instantly.

> Try with another browser that has no cookies set. After editing you have
> a session cookie which means no squid caching so far.
> None of the 'content' url's are purged, so all that would remain
> cacheable is the toc. However, at the moment it's sending "i'm
> cacheable" headers for the content urls that are never purged, hence
> out-of-date content.

I presume calling SquidUpdate::purge after the save (in EditPage) with the
section viewing URL as parameter (multiple ones if the whole page is
edited) would solve this problem? That doesn't sound very hard.

> I don't see how this is a
> performance advantage if caching is available.

>From the view of the end user, rendering speed will be negligible if load
is low, transferring speed will always matter. So under good hardware
conditions, this will make a big difference in user experience.

However, I agree that the caching should be optimized. Since you are the
expert in that department, I would of course appreciate any assistance. Is
my described approach above correct? Can I test this without setting up
squid?

Regards,

Erik


subject: [Wikitech-l] Page collapsing/expanding

body:
Brion-

>> Have you tried the feature? When you click an individual section in
>> collapsed mode, *only that section* is loaded. Thus, no retransferring
>> (except for the page layout).

> Then I don't understand the point at all. Use separate pages!

The feature was inspired by the current situation on [[Wikipedia:Votes for
deletion]] (en:). The page became so long that modem users complained that
they could no longer effectively work with it. (Even though parts had
already been split away to other pages.) So some people got clever and
started using templates for each section. Now if you want to nominate an
article for deletion, you have to create a template page and add an edit
link to it. After the debate is over all these templates keep floating
around and cannot be easily refactored because they are spread across
hundreds of pages. While the problem of slow editing has been solved, the
problem of slow loading still exists, and people continue to complain
about it.

What are the alternatives? It has been suggested to link to the deletion
debates on Talk:-subpages, but the problem with that approach is that it's
no longer possible for those who *want to* to quickly view all ongoing
debates on a single page.

Similar problems exist on other very long pages. The dialup users complain
that they can't work with the pages properly, and the high bandwidth users
complain that splitting everything up makes it hard to find and refactor.

By having a threshold defined in the user preferences, we can satisfy both
parties without sacrificing usability as the template approach does. Now
of course I agree that in many if not most cases, long pages should simply
be split up, but as the examples of VfD (and the Village pump, and FAC,
and - occasionally - RFA, and ...) show, this is not always an option. And
where it is, it often takes weeks or months until someone goes to the
effort.

I therefore predict that this feature will be much loved by all. The only
possible negative side effect I can see is that people might be
discouraged from refactoring long pages which will lead to larger
revisions, but of course we should solve this problem by reorganizing
revision storage, which is not urgent but should be done for 1.4 or 1.5 in
any case, together with the schema redesign.

Regards,

Erik


from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
Jimmy Wales wrote:

>One more thing that I wanted to add is that I do not in any way agree
>with the view that "majority vote" is a proper means for making
>decisions about this sort of thing.  On that point, Erik and I agree
>completely -- I'm actually not sure where he thinks we disagree.
>
I'm glad to hear this.  Majorities can sometimes use the result of a
vote as an excuse to stop seeking compromise.

>I think that in almost all cases, the compromise that's possible
>between the "show" and "don't show" parties to a dispute is to put the
>image behind a link with suitable warnings.  That doesn't censor it,
>it's available, but it's also not "in your face" for people who choose
>not to click.
>
>I don't think this rule leads to any strange consequences for ordinary
>images.
>
An option to hide all images is still useful, but that has nothing to do
with offensiveness.  It would be welcome by people with slow internet
connections as we keep getting away from plain vanilla text articles.

Ec


from_name: Neil Harris

subject: [Wikitech-l] Page collapsing/expanding

body:
Brion Vibber wrote:

> Erik Moeller wrote:
>
>> Brion-
>>
>>> Then I don't understand the point at all. Use separate pages!
>>
>>
>> The feature was inspired by the current situation on
>> [[Wikipedia:Votes for  deletion]] (en:). The page became so long that
>> modem users complained that  they could no longer effectively work
>> with it.
>
>
> Ahhh, deletion. You're solving the wrong problem, then. When all
> you've got is a hammer...
>
> A community deletion system with an automatically generated list
> linking to all deletion-nominated pages would seem to be the
> appropriate thing; this would eliminate the need to manually arrange a
> billion little debates; they could sit on the talk pages where they
> belonged, and the master list would manage itself.
>
> -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>
>
>
I agree with Brion. The problem is that VfD in its current form is
completely broken.  The current system won't scale, and the plethora of
transclusion pages is a worse cure than the original problem: at least
when VfD got huge before, someone worked on it.

Brion's solution also sounds reasonable: a specialized solution for a
(so far) specialized problem.

A generalization of this problem is all the other request queues for
human action that will soon scale beyond the ability of people to cope
with by mere editing, like cleanup, RC patrol, etc.

-- Neil


from_name: Erik Zachte

subject: [Wikitech-l] timelines on test

body:
Tomos wrote;

> I tried the timeline feature on test wiki using Japanese text.
> It seems it does not work properly. Would someone take a look?

Hi Tomos,

EasyTimeline uses Ploticus for the actual rendering. Ploticus has never
heard of html characters.

Ploticus can be extended (by recompiling with freetype support, I don't know
if the current version on test has this capability) to handle unicode, but
EasyTimeline has no support for that yet, I already planned to look into it
in the near future (after wikistats for wiktionaries are live).

Of course Ploticus requires a unicode font on the server for generation of
static images (png).

There are only a few fonts available that contain a good portion of the
unicode character set in one font.
One is 'Arial Unicode MS', 25 Mb!, which comes with MS Office, hardly an
inviting proposition for WikiMedia :)
Another one is a shareware font, called Code2000, which is a work of love of
one person, James Kass (http://home.att.net/~jameskass/) and has gained
quite a reputation over the years. I'll happily pay the $5 license for
Wikipedia (really a bargain for what it contains).

Later, when wikimedia has svg support, timelines can also be viewed in this
scalable vector format, and rendering occurs then on the client machine,
like with html, and depends on availability of the specified font on that
client machine.

I will extend the syntax so that any font name can be specified for png (as
said it should be available on the server) and svg generation.

Cheers, Erik Zachte


subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
Peter Jaros wrote:

> On May 12, 2004, at 5:33 PM, Erik Moeller wrote:
>
>> You have not offered a single plausible counter-argument on why, for
>> example, this would be any different from moving criticisms of Mother
>> Teresa to a separate page if the majority does not like to read about
>> them.
>
> Fair enough.  I would say that the primary difference between text
> and image in this case is that text can be skimmed and skipped.  It
> is *much* harder to avoid an image, especially an image one finds
> disturbing or offensive.

Text can also be edited to change nuances.  Where in a longer text some
would call a national leader a "dictator" it is easy to change that term
to "president".  We can't make that sort of change in a photograph.

Ec


subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
Jimmy-
> Erik Moeller wrote:
>> Exactly. If you take a look at Talk:Clitoris/Image discussion, you will
>> see that all options were offered, and the option of *showing the photo
>> inline* (instead of just a link) got the most votes of all.

> This shows me that you are right that majority vote is not the right
> way to determine the correct result.

:-) Interesting. What would you say if the voters had voted differently?

> I doubt very much that in most cases, the people who would like to
> show the photo inline are so unreasonable as to absolutely insist that
> only their own viewpoint is the correct one,

It's not about whose viewpoint is correct. It's about not implicitly and
selectively endorsing the view that the image is offensive. If all people
agree that the image is sufficiently offensive to hide it, then hiding it
is not the expression of an opinion but the expression of a fact. If,
however, only some people feel that way and others do not, then the image
should not be hidden.

Aside from any NPOV issues with the image itself (is it manipulative?
singled out? fake? etc.), an image is a *fact*. Nobody disputes that
Lynndie England held a prisoner in Abu Ghraib on a leash. What some people
claim is that this particular image in this particular article should not
be shown inline because it is offensive to them. If we do this, then we
*selectively* endorse this point of view. If we selectively show it, we
endorse the opposite view. If we show all images where there is no
consensus that they are offensive, we endorse *no* point of view.

Now you appear to argue that by doing that we make some people unhappy,
hence we violate NPOV. I'm sure the Mother Teresa article will also make
some people unhappy, but I'm hardly willing to make them happier by
removing or hiding some inconvenient facts. Now who is responsible for the
unhappiness on that article -- me, for not being willing to censor an
article, or those who seek to hide or remove information without just
cause? Am I obligated to seek compromise even when that implies removing
or hiding facts which nobody disputes? I do not believe this to be the
spirit of NPOV, and if it was your original idea, then your original idea
was wrong.

NPOV is about *neutrality*, not about transforming Wikipedia into a real
world version of Fahrenheit 451. NPOV is about expressing facts as facts
and opinions as opinions. We should always strive to find solutions that
are acceptable to all, but not at the expense of truth or neutrality. To
me, it appears you are mixing different concepts - neutrality, WikiLove,
consensus, compromise - into one big messy substance that you are
spreading all over the place. That is legitimate, but that substance is
not the essence of NPOV, it is the essence of Wikipedia.

Now how do we express WikiLove and the quest for compromise on this issue?
I'll accept that by showing the images, one could claim that we are making
an implicit claim that such images are acceptable. That is a false claim,
but it is an easy misunderstanding of NPOV. That's why I'm perfectly
willing to tolerate things like disclaimers, and to add a "Hide images"
feature to the software. I'm also willing to accept that images which are
offensive to a substantial majority should not be shown in the intro, so
that the disclaimer can be viewed and the user can make an informed
decision about viewing the images. It seems to me that I am willing to
make a lot of concessions to a point of view that is not my own.

I am not willing to accept that we should hide certain images because a
substantial majority believes they may be offensive, as I view this as
completely against NPOV, an implicit endorsement of the majority point of
view.

> I think I see where we disagree now.  Your position is that we should
> show the image in all cases unless 95% of the people think it should
> not be shown, and that this should be a policy which overrides
> consensus and compromise.

Um, no, I think that when 95% of the people think it should not be shown,
that *is* a consensus.

> That's a perfectly acceptable position to
> hold, but will you agree that it would amount to abandoning NPOV

Absolutely not. It is the essence of NPOV. N stands for Neutrality.

> With text, I feel that any form of voting is almost always inferior to
> creatively solving the problem with repeated revision of the text.

"Creative solving" often means edit wars. I'd prefer discussing the matter
instead. But I can agree that votes should only be used if no consensus
can be found. If other people are more willing to abandon neutrality than
I am, I cannot stop them. However, in any discussion in which I am
involved I will forcefully argue for respecting our policy.

> Instead, the exact meaning of consensus in a voting situation has to
> be something like Condorcet, Approval voting, Instant Runoff or the
> like.

The consensus building should happen through the discussion, not through
the voting system. Letting a vote automatically decide the most acceptable
option is not a good way to work towards a *neutral* solution. It would,
however, be a good way to work towards a general policy on the matter.

Regards,

Erik


body:
David Friedland wrote:

> I would like to note that we discussed this matter in February, and
> although perhaps no consensus was formed on policy, I continue to
> stand by my statements on the topic, particularly that how-tos,
> recipes, and similar didactic texts are inherently POV and don't
> belong on Wikipedia proper.
>
> <http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2004-February/010873.html>
> <http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2004-February/010883.html>
>
> Note, however, that information about this kind of content is
> decidedly NPOV.

It is completely ridiculous to say that because the verbs in a recipe
are in the imperative mood, they are inherently POV.  The imperative
mood can be instructive by nature, and does not imply an order to do
things that will be enforced by anybody.  If you don't follow the recipe
the meal may be a flop, but the cook proceeds at his own risk.  We have
a general disclaimer which should apply when the recipe doesn't work.

But if a recipe is POV, then so too is its deletion.

This intent to delete articles of practical instruction communicates a
view that the content of an encyclopedia should be restricted to a
narrow and snobbishly academic range of subjects.

> In any case, the point is that there is no such thing as a neutral
> recipe, only a neutral "meta-recipe".

If your solution were really to turn a recipe into a "meta-recipe" then
go ahead and do that.  It would be better than deleting, though the
downside for you would be the requirement to do constructive work.

Ec


subject: [Wikitech-l] Page collapsing/expanding

body:
Brion-

> A community deletion system with an automatically generated list linking
> to all deletion-nominated pages would seem to be the appropriate thing;
> this would eliminate the need to manually arrange a billion little
> debates; they could sit on the talk pages where they belonged, and the
> master list would manage itself.

Maybe, but you wild still have to solve the problem of showing all linked
debates on the page. You can hardcode such a solution, but it will not be
applicable to other cases, where things like refactoring are needed and
you don't want a multitude of subpages (e.g. Village pump). I think the
collapse feature is a good general solution that may well be complemented
by other, more specific, functions later on.

Regards,

Erik


body:
Mark Gerdes wrote:

>There is a very famous photo of a South Vietnamese
>officer blowing off the head of a Viet Cong fighter on
>a Saigon street.  This is quite offensive to view but
>it is nonetheless one of the most important photos of
>the last 35 years.  Would you want this famous picture
>to be pushed out of an article on Vietnam due to its
>terrible content?
>
>Similarly, there is a ghastly photo of a naked young
>child running down a road with severe burns from
>napalm.  A horrible picture, but one that should not
>be pushed aside.
>
Both of those pictures had already crossed my mind as I was considering
this subject.

Ec


subject: [WikiEN-l] Image hiding mock-up

body:
I've created a mock-up of an image hiding feature which should solve the
problem of pictures which are offensive to some, but not to others:

http://scireview.de/wikipedia/ihide/

It's the Nick Berg page (for the purposes of this demo, the normal image
rather than the gory one is shown here).

There could be a special tag like

<imagecontent>
This page includes an explicit photograph of a clitoris.
</imagecontent>

The software would automatically add the "hide images" link. Obviously the
threshold for adding such a warning would be much lower than the threshold
for not showing an image for reasons of offensiveness, e.g. 50%-60%
instead of 95-100%.

I've deliberately avoided words like "warning" for reasons of NPOV. Now,
before you suggest that we switch to a full-fledged rating system, this
proposal can be implemented fairly quickly, while a rating system cannot.

Regards,

Erik


subject: [Wikitech-l] Page collapsing/expanding

body:
Brion-
>> Maybe, but you wild still have to solve the problem of showing all linked
>> debates on the page.

> No, because that's not a problem that needs to be solved. Most of these
> "debates" won't have changed at any given time, and showing them all
> makes it very very difficult to work through what's going on.

When I go to VfD, I check for debates that are unusually long, or vere
heterogenous (many deletes, many keeps). So I systematically search for
controversial pages to see if any issue needs to be clarified. Others will
likely search for pages where they can add "Me too" votes to seal the
deal, etc. This kind of systematic browsing of VfD, as a matter of
housekeeping, is only possible if all debates are visible on one page.

Regards,

Erik


from_name: Tomasz Wegrzanowski

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: timelines on test

body:
On Thu, May 13, 2004 at 11:16:47AM +1000, Tim Starling wrote:
> Presumably we could rewrite the entire parser properly in one go, but
> no-one has volunteered as of yet, and it's not clear what would happen
> to performance.

There's one in Ocaml I posted to wikitech-l some time ago.
It wasn't complete, but nothing conceptualy difficult was left (HTML attributes
validation and a few tweaks here and there). The problem is of course integrating
such thing with PHP codebase.

Performance was excellent.


from_name: Poor, Edmund W

subject: [WikiEN-l] Human rights abuses in Iraq

body:
Why can't we just create a separate page called (something like) "Images
of Iraqi prisoner abuse" or even "Images of Iraqi torture"?

Or if you want to be less partisan about it, how about "Human rights
abuses in Iraq" with a warning near the top of the page like "Graphic
images below"? Then design the page so that most readers would have to
scroll down at least once before seeing any really shocking photos.

The issue is not just that people may be "offended" by seeing nudity or
torture. There's also the political aspect: publicizing the images fans
the flames. That is, we are not just reporting news; we're making it.

People who don't have a firm handle on mathematics (specifically,
probability and statistics) tend to generalize from what they see.
Hardly anyone has read about, let alone seen pictures of, the victims of
Saddam and his sons. If they see 10 pictures of Iraqi prisoners in
Coalition custody, being roughed up, hazed, or possibly even tortured --
they assume:

(a) that the Coalition is doing this on purpose;
(b) that the people at the top know about it, maybe even ordered it;
(c) that this is just as bad (if not worse) as anything Saddam ever did;

Then it's easy for them to conclude that the Coalition is no improvement
over Saddam, which removes the last possible justification for the
war/occupation. Therefore, get out now and let al-Sadr and his ilk take
over (it's none of our business anyway).

I have tried (but been reverted by user:Rei) to balance the hundreds of
thousands of murders under Saddam, and the countless mutilations,
tortures and rapes (all kept secret by Iraqi officials) -- with the
dozens (at most, hundreds) of similar but usually less serious incidents
under Coalition auspices (all being investigated and publicized by
American officials and journalists).

Everyone is entitled to draw their own conclusions, and I'm not trying
to change any minds here. But Wikipedia should be NEUTRAL rather than
taking either:

1. the side of America-boosters, who want to shrug this whole thing off
and say we're still better than those bastards; or,

2. the side that says America is as bad as (or worse than) Saddam's
regime, because US forces did things which are just as bad (or worse).

Let's do our best to report how many Iraqis were murdered, tortured,
etc. on SADDAM'S watch as well as on Bush's watch. Obviously it's going
to be hard to find any pictures of Saddam's victims - one may imagine
that possession of a digital camera or CD burner would be difficult for
an ordinary Iraqi in the 1990s through March 2003 - and woe to him who
says, "Oh, look, I found a CD with a bunch of incriminating pictures".

There hasn't been a single question raised, either by US officials or US
journalists, about punishing the people who gave that first disk of
photos to CBS. That's a free society in action: find the problems, and
fix them.

Ed Poor, aka Uncle Ed


from_name: Ashar Voultoiz

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: extension .mp4 not served with proper mime type

references:
<c7roph$2ou$1@sea.gmane.org> <c7sk3d$gm5$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<c7st7m$718$1@sea.gmane.org>

body:
Nathan Hamblen wrote:
> Ashar Voultoiz wrote:
>
>> Nathan Hamblen wrote:
>>
>>> I tried uploading a movie in MPEG 4 format with the extension .mp4,
>>> but when I linked to it with [[media:movie_name.mp4]] it just came up
>>> as gibberish, which usually would mean that the mime time was wrong.
>>> I'm pretty sure that giving it a .mov extension would work fine so
>>> long as the user has Quicktime 6, but that's not really as correct as
>>> mp4. (And  there are probably players out there that can handle MPEG
>>> 4 but not quicktime movies in general.)
>>
>>
>> Why not using the mpg or mpeg extensions ? ;)
>
>
> I'm a little leary of that too, as MPEG 4 is a fairly new format
> encapsulated by something resembling Quicktime. Since there are
> undoubtedly many players that can play older MPEG by not newer MPEG, I
> think the version-specific suffix is appropriate.
>
> thanks,
> Nathan

I wasn't aware of the new MPEG4 format, I was thinking about Mpeg Layer4


from_name: daniwo59 at aol.com

subject: [WikiEN-l] Someone in New York, June 23

body:
I am willing. I live in Brooklyn
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from_name: Jimmy Wales

subject: [WikiEN-l] [.@.: Nicholas Berg]

body:
I forward this opinion that I got in the mail, not from anyone I know,
just a reader, in hopes that this perspective will be carefully taken
into account in our deliberations on these matters.

----- Forwarded message from . <. at .net> -----

From: <omitted for privacy>
Date: Thu, 13 May 2004 03:41:48 -0700
To: jwales at bomis.com
Subject: Nicholas Berg

Please for the family of the Berg's remove the links that show the
beheading,I know it generates great traffic. This is someone's son and
brother. Imagine the pain and grief they are going through,is that not
enough. Report on the greatness this 26 yr old sent out to  do in this
world. Your site is wonderful but, think of it as if this were your own
family and this was all over the web. I am not even a family member but,
cannot endure the fathom their pain at this time. Please re-think the links
to the actual beheading.

Thanks
<name omitted for privacy>


subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
Erik Moeller wrote:
> Jimmy-
> > Erik Moeller wrote:
> >> Exactly. If you take a look at Talk:Clitoris/Image discussion, you will
> >> see that all options were offered, and the option of *showing the photo
> >> inline* (instead of just a link) got the most votes of all.
>
> > This shows me that you are right that majority vote is not the right
> > way to determine the correct result.
>
> :-) Interesting. What would you say if the voters had voted differently?

Well, to be clear.  The way that I would vote is something like this,
ranking my own preferences for the articles [[clitoris]] and [[penis]]q:

1. "medical" photo/diagram on the page
2. link to "medical" photo/diagram
3. no photo at all
4. any variant of a 'porno' style photo

That's the way I would vote, and quite possibly is the way you would
vote as well.  But I do not think that our #1 choice would win,
because I think that #2 would win.  And I would be fine with that, I
think it's a perfectly acceptable compromise.

> It's not about whose viewpoint is correct. It's about not implicitly and
> selectively endorsing the view that the image is offensive.

It's also about not implicitly and selectively endorsing the view that
the image is *not* offensive.  We can't as a matter of NPOV policy
automatically privilege either position.

> If we do this, then we *selectively* endorse this point of view. If
> we selectively show it, we endorse the opposite view. If we show all
> images where there is no consensus that they are offensive, we
> endorse *no* point of view.

I don't agree with this.  This is not "no point of view" -- it is a
specific and highly undesirable (for most people) point of view that
says that we're going to shove images down the readers throat unless
they are so bad that 95% of the editors don't like them.

The articles are supposed to reflect consensus and compromise among
editors with many different perspectives.  If there's a case where,
say, 70% of the people think that an image should not be shown, then
how can we argue with a straight face that the article is neutral and
satisfactory to both opponents and advocates?  We can't.

That's just a complete abandonment of the principles of wiki editing
in favor of a decree that Wikipedia ought to publish pictures even
when consensus does not support it, even when there is significant
dispute.

> > I think I see where we disagree now.  Your position is that we should
> > show the image in all cases unless 95% of the people think it should
> > not be shown, and that this should be a policy which overrides
> > consensus and compromise.
>
> Um, no, I think that when 95% of the people think it should not be shown,
> that *is* a consensus.

But what of the case where 70% think it should not be shown, 30% think
that it should be shown?  What of the case where if we did a Condorcet
vote, "show it behind a link" would be the clear winner?  What of the
case where almost everyone indicates a preference one way or the other
(split 70%/30%) but also notes that putting it behind a link would be
an acceptable compromise?

In such a case, there would be a consensus for putting it behind a
link, and you'd still say that we should override consensus to push
your own so-called "anti-censorship" point of view.

--Jimbo


subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:
> Text can also be edited to change nuances.  Where in a longer text some
> would call a national leader a "dictator" it is easy to change that term
> to "president".  We can't make that sort of change in a photograph.

In hopes of reaching towards common ground here, I think that all
sides to this discussion can agree that this is really the essence of
the problem with images, as opposed to text.  With text, we generally
have a wide range of options.  It's almost never really "either/or".

Take for example the [[Mother Theresa]] article.  That's one which was
hard fought for a long time, but which has since stabilized in a form
acceptable to all sides, as evidenced by the fact that it has seen
only minor changes for a couple of months.

With photos, our range of creative options to resolve conflict is more
limited.  In some cases, we can change the photograph itself.  This
will be true mostly for photos of generic concepts, and a lot less
true for newsworthy photos, and virtually impossible for photos that
are themselves of historical importance.

And so, this is what poses the problem.  As our range of options is
limited, it is harder to find one which is acceptable to almost
everyone.

I do think, though, that in most cases, the option that is going to be
most widely acceptable to all sides is to show the potentially
offensive image, but behind a link with appropriate warnings.

I am trying hard to understand why Erik thinks it is neutral to have a
policy that we always force people to show potentially offensive
images within the article, except in the extraordinary case where 95%
are opposed.  I do not understand how he thinks that showing an image
is neutral to both sides of the dispute, when for example 70% are
opposed to it.

--Jimbo


subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:
> An option to hide all images is still useful, but that has nothing to do
> with offensiveness.  It would be welcome by people with slow internet
> connections as we keep getting away from plain vanilla text articles.

I agree with this, it does sound like a useful option.  And I, too,
don't think that it does anything at all for us in the discussion of
disputed images.

If someone says "Gee, I'd like to be able to read an article about the
Nick Berg situation without having to look at the actual picture
unless I choose to do so" then responding with: "Fine, you may turn
off every single image in Wikipedia" doesn't sound helpful to me.  I
doubt if many of the people who have a preference against looking at
severed heads are going to be satisfied with that answer.

--Jimbo


subject: [WikiEN-l] Someone in New York, June 23

body:
It will be June 23.  I am not sure of the time.

Peter Jaros wrote:

> On May 12, 2004, at 4:38 PM, Jimmy Wales wrote:
>
> >Who is
> >(a) located in or near New York City
> >(b) willing to speak publicly
> >(c) close to the project
> >(d) willing to attend on our behalf the ceremony there.
>
> When *is* this ceremony?  Is it going to be webcast?  Broadcast?
> The website only mentions today's independent celebrations.
>
> Peter
>
>                            -- ---<>--- --
>                  A house without walls cannot fall.
>     Help build the world's largest encyclopedia at Wikipedia.org
>                            -- ---<>--- --
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Rick

subject: [WikiEN-l] [.@.: Nicholas Berg]

body:
I can't imagine much of a move on the mailing list or on Wikipedia itself for actually deleting the LINKS to the images.  That is probably not a viable option.

RickK

Jimmy Wales <jwales at bomis.com> wrote:
I forward this opinion that I got in the mail, not from anyone I know,
just a reader, in hopes that this perspective will be carefully taken
into account in our deliberations on these matters.

----- Forwarded message from . <. at .net> -----

From:
Date: Thu, 13 May 2004 03:41:48 -0700
To: jwales at bomis.com
Subject: Nicholas Berg

Please for the family of the Berg's remove the links that show the
beheading,I know it generates great traffic. This is someone's son and
brother. Imagine the pain and grief they are going through,is that not
enough. Report on the greatness this 26 yr old sent out to do in this
world. Your site is wonderful but, think of it as if this were your own
family and this was all over the web. I am not even a family member but,
cannot endure the fathom their pain at this time. Please re-think the links
to the actual beheading.

Thanks

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

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subject: [WikiEN-l] [.@.: Nicholas Berg]

body:
Rick wrote:
> I can't imagine much of a move on the mailing list or on Wikipedia
>itself for actually deleting the LINKS to the images.  That is
>probably not a viable option.

I agree that it is probably not a viable option.  I just want us to
keep in mind the perspective of the author in our deliberations.

What I think is important about that perspective is that people who do
not like the photo are not just frightened of ugly images, as in a
horror movie, nor are they necessarily motivated by censorious
impluses or political motives.  There are real human values at stake
(on both sides), and a sensitive and thoughtful resolution of how to
handle this will have to take that into account.

What I mean is: I have real respect for those who think that it would
be best to not even link to the images, even though I don't share
their conclusions in the final analysis.

--Jimbo


subject: [Wikitech-l] SATA vs DMA

body:
Brion Vibber wrote:
> The 3ware SATA RAID card of course will be a separate kettle of fish. :)
> It has its own driver, which we'll have to figure out someday.

I tested it here in the office on an old machine, by installing Fedora
Core 1.  I did not test it regarding DMA or anything fancy, all I can
say is that it functions under Fedora Core 1.

When the new servers arrive, my plan is to install it with 2x250Gb and
probably Fedora Core 1 (with your permission) and then stick it in the
colo for ya'll to test more thoroughly.  With 1 new big powerful db
server and 4 new 1U boxes (to be customized according to our needs),
we should have spare boxes enough to be able to run tests and such.

--Jimbo


from_name: Sean Barrett

subject: [WikiEN-l] [.@.: Nicholas Berg]

body:
> Please for the family of the Berg's remove the links that show the
> beheading,I know it generates great traffic. This is someone's son and
> brother. Imagine the pain and grief they are going through,is that not
> enough. Report on the greatness this 26 yr old sent out to  do in this
> world. Your site is wonderful but, think of it as if this were your own
> family and this was all over the web. I am not even a family member but,
> cannot endure the fathom their pain at this time. Please re-think the links
> to the actual beheading.

I note that while the concerned writer is willing to speak for the Berg
family, he is "not even a family member." He strikes me as one of those
hyper-sensitive souls who is concerned about what he thinks that someone
he doesn't know should feel.

--
  Sean Barrett     | There are many who dare not kill themselves
  sean at epoptic.com | for fear of what the neighbors will say.
                   | --Cyril Connolly


subject: [WikiEN-l] Offensive photos policy

body:
Fennec Foxen wrote:
> Wisdom in a private IRC conversation:
> <CimonAvaro> I think the only thing to do is to cool things down, and
> later, when the dust has settled, get serious about what our
> _fundamental_ policy with images should be, beyond copyright concerns.
> We (including you), can't see this clearly while staring at Bergs
> head.

I think that's exactly right.

As far as the Nick Berg article goes, I think the article is
reasonable stable for now (though of course under heavy development).
As of yesterday, the most Eloquent (;-)) proponent of showing most
images inline agreed to have it behind a link, and even though the
percentage has dropped since then, I think that decision is likely to
hold for now.

So our discussion can and should continue, but in classic Wikipedia
style, we need not rush to any final conclusions.  We've knocked along
reasonably well for a long time now, and probably can continue just
fine.  I don't think anyone's about to go on a rampage of inlining or
image hiding, so we can mull this over and chat about it amicably for
a while and then have some kind of vote later on.

--Jimbo