from_name: Matthew R. Howard, Sr.

body:
Brian wrote:

> There have been numerous reports recently of finding rampant vandalism
> on small Wikipedias/Wiktionaries. It might be useful to create an RC
> page and/or IRC channel which brings together the RC's of the ~50
> smallest Wikipedias.
>
> brian0918
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>
>
>
That does sound like a good idea. Do the smaller wikis have something
similar to the #en.wikipedia irc channel that streams RC data? if so, I
should be able to mod cool_cat's bot (possibly just run 1 bot per wiki)
and use a single channel for the smaller wikis. My only issue with doing
that would be, would the channel scroll so fast that no one would be
able to keep track...? Maybe something like a trouble-ticket like
system, fed by the irc bot, that users may 'take the case' of specic
vandalisms, and then 'close the case' when they're done. That too, would
entail a lot of extra work to get done on the part of the RC Patroler.
If you have any specific ideas of how you think this could be
implemented, let me know, I'm off work for the next 2 days, I should be
able to bash something out  ;]

Vilerage (on irc and en.wikipedia ;])


list: wikitech-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Mark Williamson

subject: [Wikitech-l] RC patrol for ~50 smallest wikipedias

body:
Speaking of which, I've recently gone on a drive to try to eliminate
active Wikis from the feed. I found a few actually, including os.wiki,
cv.wiki, ceb.wiki, and ar.books, IIRC

Cheers
Mark

On 27/11/05, Angela <beesley at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 27/11/05, Brian <brian0918 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > There have been numerous reports recently of finding rampant vandalism
> > > on small Wikipedias/Wiktionaries. It might be useful to create an RC
> > > page and/or IRC channel which brings together the RC's of the ~50
> > > smallest Wikipedias.
>
> See http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/SWMT
> The bloglines feed at
> http://www.bloglines.com/public/inactivewikipedias collects recent
> changes from small Wikipedias, Wiktionaries, Wikibooks and Wikiquotes.
>
> Angela
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>

--
"Take away their language, destroy their souls." -- Joseph Stalin


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Frieda Brioschi

subject: [Wikipedia-l] (no subject)

body:
> I am applying for the voluntary developer of Pashto language Wikipedia. Now
> if you please let me understand that why is it possible for other users of
> pashto Wikipedia that they can change the appearance of the first page
> according to their own wills.

You've to ways to avoid this:
1. start a dialogue with other users and try to decide together which
kind of home page you want
2. if your problems are not registered/usual users, you can use an
"escamotage" as on it.wiki home page

> I think you guys should limit the access of Wikipedia editors. I mean those
> who are registered users of Wikipedia should have access in editing the main
> page of Pashto Wikipedia.

that's not wiki

> There was one thing else that i wanted to make clear, and that is if it is
> possible to change the navagation tools, search bar and tool box options
> into main language. I mean it is easy to translate and replace it with the
> english language that has been used in the main page.

It's possible, but you need to be a sysop

Ciao,
Frieda

___________________________________________
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utente:Frieda


from_name: candy

subject: [Wikitech-l] database dump compatibility issue

body:
Hi all,

I imported the english database dump (pages_current.xml.bz2) in
mediawiki 1.5 and it worked fine. Does the same dump works well with
mediawiki 1.4.5 as well. I am a bit worried as the database schema of
the 2 mediawikis are different.

Another small problem. If you go to the following url:
http://download.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/

the full wikipedia page dump(pages_full.xml.bz2) seems to have a size of
14.1 GB but when I download it its size is only 2GB. Any clue what went
wrong?

A prompt reply will be highly appreciated !

Candy


from_name: Brion Vibber

body:
Matthew R. Howard, Sr. wrote:
> Brian wrote:
>> There have been numerous reports recently of finding rampant vandalism
>> on small Wikipedias/Wiktionaries. It might be useful to create an RC
>> page and/or IRC channel which brings together the RC's of the ~50
>> smallest Wikipedias.
>>
> That does sound like a good idea. Do the smaller wikis have something
> similar to the #en.wikipedia irc channel that streams RC data?

All of our wikis do.

> if so, I
> should be able to mod cool_cat's bot (possibly just run 1 bot per wiki)
> and use a single channel for the smaller wikis.

Could do. Alternatively it's probably possible to adjust our RC bots to have
some send a second stream (but I'm not sure offhand how to do this, Tim can you
comment?)

> My only issue with doing
> that would be, would the channel scroll so fast that no one would be
> able to keep track...?

In general it would hardly ever move. By definition they have low traffic. ;)

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

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list: wikien-l

from_name: David Gerard

subject: [WikiEN-l] For those wondering why Wikipedia is slow sometimes

body:
http://mail.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2005-November/032708.html

Requests have *doubled* since September. We're just about keeping up
with demand ...

And remember that this top-40 website is run by one paid admin/developer
and some volunteers on a shoestring by a nonprofit ...

- d.


subject: [WikiEN-l] How is validation supposed to work?

body:
stevertigo wrote:

> Point taken (and thats certainly my kind of sarcasm
> :]) but you also make My point:
> The use /discovery /application of the wiki software
> to the purpose of creating an encyclopedia was a
> relative fluke. You can't expect that kind of
> breakthrough to happen again in the same manner to the
> same general group of people in a newly developed
> application toward the same idea.

I think we can. I was talking to people at the UK meet today who
*already* are thinking of things to do with this data. The point is not
to make the data too special-purpose too early.

"Build it and the applications will come" is a pretty safe bet here IMO
because they're already slavering for it.

- d.


from_name: John Lee

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Fwd: Google Alert - Wikipedia

body:
Philip Sandifer wrote:

>
> On Nov 26, 2005, at 12:49 PM, Timwi wrote:
>
>>
>> I'm not much wikiolder than you are, but one observation I think
>> I've made is a relatively sudden decline in eventualist attitude in
>> 2005.
>
>
> I would agree with this wholeheartedly, except I would also note that
> the push to "get it right now" is all too often turning into a push
> to get it wrong - the move away from eventualism seems to me to be
> accompanied by a dramatic lowering in our standards for ourselves. As
> I commented on #wikipedia last night, if Larry Sanger submitted the
> Larry's Text articles now, they'd get AfDed in a heartbeat. That's...
> ummm... bad.
>
> -Phil

I would agree, despite my moderate immediatism. Wikipedia is still very
much a work in progress, and people seem to be devoting more effort to
deleting bad material than improving it. Unfortunately, as geni has
pointed out, when you're on RC patrol, things are taxing enough already.
Still, I suppose it's alright to delete plain useless CSDs. It's another
thing to spend so much effort (IMO) on AFDing something when you might
as well have Googled it and improved it to stub level.

John Lee
([[User:Johnleemk]])


from_name: Jürgen Herz

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Cluster report, September-November, 2005

body:
Anthere wrote:

> This does not show the daily work of maintenance, install and improvement
> though...

True, but if you wanna take a closer look at their daily work, visit
http://wikitech.leuksman.com/view/Server_admin_log

J?rgen


subject: [Wikitech-l] CVS mail changes

body:
I've made two tweaks to the CVS commit messages that get sent to the
mediawiki-cvs list:

* Unified diff (-u) should be easier to read in most cases
* Mail headers include a charset specifier, so UTF-8 text should display
correctly in your mail reader

To support the latter, we now have a slightly customized version of the syncmail
script in our local CVSROOT, rather than using SF's global copy.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

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subject: [Wikitech-l] Interwiki On Wheels?

body:
Brian wrote:
> Would it be possible to write a bot which simply goes through all the
> pages, following all the interwiki links that currently exist and
> placing them where they don't exist? This seems like it would be very
> easy for someone to write, easy to implement, and very effective.

Don't the pywikipediabot folks already do this?

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com

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from_name: Peter Mackay

subject: [WikiEN-l] extremely weak dispute resolution mechanisms

body:
> From: wikien-l-bounces at Wikipedia.org
> [mailto:wikien-l-bounces at Wikipedia.org] On Behalf Of David Gerard

> This can also be done by a single admin, e.g. this is mostly
> what Linuxbeak is applying to his dear little charges - beat
> them around the head with a cluebat until they realise he
> means it, then gently suggest they behave with suggestions of
> how to. It's sometimes more work than it seems like it should
> be, but can work if the idjit is cluifiable at all.

Don't be too hard on yourself, David.

Peter (Skyring)


subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Re: [WikiEN-l] For those wondering why Wikipedia
	is	slow sometimes

body:
Anthony DiPierro wrote:
> On 11/27/05, David Gerard <fun at thingy.apana.org.au> wrote:

>>http://mail.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2005-November/032708.html
>>Requests have *doubled* since September. We're just about keeping up
>>with demand ...
>>And remember that this top-40 website is run by one paid admin/developer
>>and some volunteers on a shoestring by a nonprofit ...

> Nothing like seeing the problem and the solution all in one handy email.

Devs/admins are actually possibly a useful thing for local chapters to
spend money on, by the way. (We were talking about this today.) Though
that is probably a way off.

I suspect throwing more boxes at the problem, carefully applied, is
probably the best immediate fix.

- d.


subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Fair use in non-English Wikipedias (moved from
	wikien)

body:
Anthony DiPierro wrote:

> Anyway, the English Wikipedia seems to be relying less on fair use
> than it has in the past.  I think it's good for us to look at the
> other languages to see that it really wouldn't be that horrible to
> drop reliance on it completely.

There are articles it would be a loss to, though quite obscure. I think
the current rate of attrition (and a slightly harder-arsed attitude to
blatant laziness and stretching "fair use") will do fine for now.

- d.


from_name: Edward Z. Yang

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: WikiStatus - OpenFact's replacement

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

Hmmm... I think I'll rename it CoLocus, short for Community Contingency
Locus. What do you think?

- --
 Edward Z. Yang      Personal: edwardzyang at thewritingpot.com
 SN:Ambush Commander Website: http://www.thewritingpot.com/
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from_name: Anthere

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Nightmare getting on WP

body:
A bit more here http://wikitech.leuksman.com/view/Server_admin_log

Ant

  See Domas report here :
> http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Hardware_and_hosting_report
>
> Ant
>
> Tom Cadden wrote:
>
>> What is going on with the server? It has been a nightmare tonight? One
>> minute it is down. The next up. The next down again. I finally got an
>> article I had to write off WP onto WP but 10 seconds later when I
>> tried to add in a second I couldn't - it would take so long my browser
>> would time out.
>>  Sometimes I'm told that my article has not been saved, but then when
>> I look on my watchlist there it is. Other times I save something but
>> it isn't on anything.
>>  At this stage one can forget about using the preview button (oh look
>> another timed out message on my other screen!) to make sure everything
>> is OK. It is a matter of saving in case in a few seconds the damn
>> thing goes down yet again. (Oh lookie, its back again.) *sigh*
>>  Better go and use it before it goes for the 28th time.
>>  Thom
>>
>>
>>
>> ---------------------------------
>>   Win a Yahoo! Vespa NEW - Yahoo! Cars has 3 Vespa LX125s to be won
>> Enter Now! _______________________________________________
>> WikiEN-l mailing list
>> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
>> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
>> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Re: [WikiEN-l] For those wondering why Wikipedia is
	slow sometimes

body:
Anthony DiPierro wrote:
> On 11/27/05, David Gerard <fun at thingy.apana.org.au> wrote:
>
>>http://mail.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2005-November/032708.html
>>
>>Requests have *doubled* since September. We're just about keeping up
>>with demand ...
>>
>>And remember that this top-40 website is run by one paid admin/developer
>>and some volunteers on a shoestring by a nonprofit ...
>>
>>
>>- d.
>
>
> Nothing like seeing the problem and the solution all in one handy email.

complete Domas report and handy links here :
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Hardware_and_hosting_report

ant


from_name: Jeremy Dunck

body:
On 11/27/05, Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell at gmail.com> wrote:
> Sounds like the software you used to download only supports files as
> large as two gigs.
> In Linux I use wget, if you run windows I'm not sure what to suggest.

wget under cygwin works for me.

http://www.cygwin.com/


from_name: Gregory Maxwell

body:
On 11/27/05, candy <ccanddyy at yahoo.com> wrote:
> I imported the english database dump (pages_current.xml.bz2) in
> mediawiki 1.5 and it worked fine. Does the same dump works well with
> mediawiki 1.4.5 as well. I am a bit worried as the database schema of
> the 2 mediawikis are different.

The import process converts the XML to whatever format your version
needs on the back end. This (among other reasons) is why we only
provide the XML dump for this data now.

> Another small problem. If you go to the following url:
> http://download.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/
>
> the full wikipedia page dump(pages_full.xml.bz2) seems to have a size of
> 14.1 GB but when I download it its size is only 2GB. Any clue what went
> wrong?

Sounds like the software you used to download only supports files as
large as two gigs.
In Linux I use wget, if you run windows I'm not sure what to suggest.


from_name: Pawe³ Dembowski

body:
> It's somewhat odd that the different languages have different policies
> on fair use.  From a legal standpoint, it really shouldn't matter what
> language the article is written in.  I suppose it's enough to stay
> under the radar this way, though.

If about 99% editors and readers of Polish Wikipedia live in Poland,
do you think that they couldn't be sued for infringing copyright only
because they do it on an American server?

--
Ausir
Wikipedia, wolna encyklopedia
http://pl.wikipedia.org


from_name: Brian

subject: [Wikitech-l] Interwiki On Wheels?

body:
Would it be possible to write a bot which simply goes through all the
pages, following all the interwiki links that currently exist and
placing them where they don't exist? This seems like it would be very
easy for someone to write, easy to implement, and very effective.

For example, if an article on EN links to an article on ES, but that one
links to an article on DE, then the bot will go back through and add
es/de to en, en/de to es, and es/en to de, etc.

This would eliminate a lot of the problems encountered by the Interwiki
Link Checker, for example, which can't deal with comparing English and
Chinese (provided that at least one page somewhere in the chain links to
the Chinese version).

Of course, it isn't a complete solution, but it seems like it would be a
very effective one. For any chains where there are discrepancies (en ->
de -> a different en), it can just not bother with that chain.

brian0918


list: foundation-l

from_name: Walter van Kalken

subject: [Foundation-l] Cluster report, September-November, 2005

body:
I would like to say thanks to all developers and techies out there that
do a wonderfull job of keeping the site growing. We owe a lot to all of you.

THANKS!

Waerth/Walter van Kalken


list: wikimedia-l


from_name: MacGyverMagic/Mgm

body:
On 11/27/05, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> Grease Monkee wrote:
> > First, a simple example;
> > 1) Newbi is a disruptive moron, HardAss(admin) gives him simple clear
> > instructions on how not to be disruptive moron, once.
> > 2) Newbi replies to HardAss(admin); "Fuck You", and continues to disrupt.
> > 3) HardAss blocks Newbi and gives another short, clear lecture on how to
> > behave
> > 4) Newbi replies by spitting venom and calling for justice over his violated
> > civil rights.
> > 5) Cycle repeats, escalating each time in the tone of rhetoric and length of
> > blocks.
> > 6) Along comes NiceGuy(admin) who sticks up for Newbi, telling him
> > "..listen, I will unblock you, but you gotta do x,y and z..." Thereby
> > supplying a face saving mechanism for Newbi.
> > 7) Newbi either starts to behave, or gets blocked for longer and longer
> > periods
> >
> > The most common mistake made implementing this strategy is that NiceGuy is
> > overly critical of HardAss, not realising that his mentorship of Newbi won't
> > work without the threat of HardAss looming. Likewise, HardAss often takes it
> > personally when NiceGuy unblocks someone, not realising it as a face saving
> > feature that allows Newbi to behave.
>
> Good faith communication among admins is critical to this sort of thing.
>  In such a case, NiceGuy should try to contact HardAss beforehand to get
> agreement on the strategy.  Or _even better_, HardAss admins should seek
> out NiceGuy admins and say to them "Look here, I've been bonking this
> guy on the head for a bit, to minimal effect, but if you want to come in
> and befriend him and try and turn him about, I'm happy to lay off."
>
> --Jimbo
>
True. How is it you always make such good points, Jimbo?
Anyway, we should take caution that we don't keep the cycle going
forever. If people "Newbie" is still spouting personal attacks after
three warnings, they should be blocked with clear note in the reason
field so fellow admins know what's going on. If someone is willing to
unblock them, they should also make the effort to guide whoever they
are unblocking on their way to being a good user.

Mgm


body:
I'm not sure it's nessecary. As both Angela and I have already noted
in this thread, there is already a group dedicated to monitoring small
Wikis for spam and vandalism.

Mark

On 27/11/05, Brion Vibber <brion at pobox.com> wrote:
> Matthew R. Howard, Sr. wrote:
> > Brian wrote:
> >> There have been numerous reports recently of finding rampant vandalism
> >> on small Wikipedias/Wiktionaries. It might be useful to create an RC
> >> page and/or IRC channel which brings together the RC's of the ~50
> >> smallest Wikipedias.
> >>
> > That does sound like a good idea. Do the smaller wikis have something
> > similar to the #en.wikipedia irc channel that streams RC data?
>
> All of our wikis do.
>
> > if so, I
> > should be able to mod cool_cat's bot (possibly just run 1 bot per wiki)
> > and use a single channel for the smaller wikis.
>
> Could do. Alternatively it's probably possible to adjust our RC bots to have
> some send a second stream (but I'm not sure offhand how to do this, Tim can you
> comment?)
>
> > My only issue with doing
> > that would be, would the channel scroll so fast that no one would be
> > able to keep track...?
>
> In general it would hardly ever move. By definition they have low traffic. ;)
>
> -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>
>
>

--
"Take away their language, destroy their souls." -- Joseph Stalin


subject: [Wikitech-l] Interwiki On Wheels?

body:
On 11/27/05, Brion Vibber <brion at pobox.com> wrote:
> Brian wrote:
> > Would it be possible to write a bot which simply goes through all the
> > pages, following all the interwiki links that currently exist and
> > placing them where they don't exist? This seems like it would be very
> > easy for someone to write, easy to implement, and very effective.
>
> Don't the pywikipediabot folks already do this?

Yes, and you can supervise it .. which is somewhat important because
the mappings are not 1:1 because of different styles of breaking ideas
into articles, so you can end up through multiple layers of interwiki
on a page which isn't quite what you thought it was...


from_name: Puddl Duk

subject: [WikiEN-l] Non-commercial only and By Permission Only Images to be

body:
On 11/26/05, Mike Finucane <mike_finucane at yahoo.com> wrote:
> I was going to enrich Wikipedia with a whole bunch of my images, but
> quite frankly, i dont want someone getting rich off my work.
> As such, I was intending to add creative commons no commercial use tags.
>
> Then I come across this note from you:
>
> "All images which are for non-commercial only use and by permission only
> > are not acceptable for Wikipedia and _will be deleted_.  We have
> > tolerated them for some time..."
>
> Well fear not; you wont have to tolerate any of my images.
>
> I'm going to have to re-evaluate contributing to wikipedia if its based
> on providing source material for commercial companies.
>
> Feel free to explain WHY you have this policy; but I have to say your
> explanation above wasnt very tactful or conducive to goodwill on my
> part.

Allowing commercial use is a big part of the engine that makes open
source work.  Wikipedia couldn't reach as many people without our
commercial mirrors (who operate for profit). And our commercial
mirrors bring in new business, make donations and have helped pay
wages for Wikipedia employees. The GFDL explicitly makes room for
commercial uses, while limiting them somewhat.

Also, Mike, when you license your images per the GFDL you still own
them, and you can still use them for your own commercial purposes.

Finally, commercial re-use of Wikipedia isn't limited to certain
people, you can take part too.


from_name: Tony Sidaway

body:
This is the kind of situation where review is very important.

Hardass is doing part of a good job.  His job will be easier and more
effective if he takes blocks to the administrators' noticeboard,
explains why he did what he did, and looks to see what others say.
Sometimes this may result in a modification of the original block,
though usually he ends up walking away with an agreement that he did
the right thing in the circumstances.  Whatever happens is better for
the wiki than just one lone guy facing up to someone whose behavior
seems to him to be unreasonable.

There are other reasons why this review process helps; sometimes
inexperienced or ill-informed administrators make mistakes, such as
using their sysop powers to pursue editing disputes, or engaging in
edit warring in parallel with dispute resolution.  If blocks and the
like are reviewed (as page protections already are) then this kind of
problem gets picked up quicker and solved.


from_name: Sean Barrett

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

Mike Finucane stated for the record:

> Well fear not; you wont have to tolerate any of my images.
>
> I'm going to have to re-evaluate contributing to wikipedia if its based
> on providing source material for commercial companies.
>
> Feel free to explain WHY you have this policy; but I have to say your
> explanation above wasnt very tactful or conducive to goodwill on my part.

Because Wikipedia is free as in freedom.  Your pictures are not free
(though apparently they are gratis); you are limiting who can distribute
them.  Please re-evaluate contributing to Wikipedia if you are unwilling
to support freedom.

- --
 Sean Barrett     | The Penguin Credo is not "never
 sean at epoptic.org | bathe in hot oil and Bisquick."
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body:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Mark Gallagher stated for the record:

>> Because Wikipedia is free as in freedom.  Your pictures are not free
>> (though apparently they are gratis); you are limiting who can distribute
>> them.  Please re-evaluate contributing to Wikipedia if you are unwilling
>> to support freedom.
>
>
> Let's not get narky, eh?  I didn't like his tone, either, but I don't
> think it's good policy to invite people willy-nilly to leave.

Rebuke accepted.  I apologize.

- --
 Sean Barrett     | When I sign up, do I need to be home so
 sean at epoptic.org | you can come out and install the Internet?
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from_name: Mike Finucane

subject: [WikiEN-l] Non-Commercial Usage

body:
The reasons put forward on why images must be allowed to be profited
from can be summarized thus:

(1) "Maybe you should explain WHY you have the policy of not allowing
people to "get rich" off your work first. There's nothing wrong with
commerce.  In fact, in today's society commerce is pretty much required
for survival."

In answer to that; I can only say that this seems to be the very
antithesis of what I thought Wikipedia to be; people providing free
material, for a free resource.  How does Wikipedia justify its policy
on not getting rich quick?  I am not proposing a shutdown of western
society (although given how the planet is going as a result, dredging
sandworms for fuel, clearcutting the amazon for profit, one could go
that way); I'm arguing that there should be a space for those who wish
to contribute out of the good of their hearts, for a better, freer,
society.
I thought Wikipedia stood for this; apparently I was wrong, as also
evidenced by reason (2):

(2) "On the other hand, have you considered getting rich off ours?... I
hear that running Google ads on well-formatted copies of Wikipedia can
be quite lucrative." and "commercial re-use of Wikipedia isn't limited
to certain people, you can take part too."

My purchase price, I'm afraid, is a little higher than that.
----------------------

Having dismissed the most objectionable objections, we come to more
reasonable ones.

(3) "The goal of Wikipedia is "to create and provide a freely licensed
and high quality encyclopedia to every single person on the planet in
his or her own language....In order to achieve that goal...This
necessarily includes... for-profit ... uses"

I realize this has other implications, in terms of funding, but I'll
deal with that later.  First, I wish to disabuse the notion that
"freedom" cant be gained unless and until everyone has made a buck from
something freely given.  Is love only truly free when someone pays for
it?  There is a perfectly acceptable, CC-nc designation, which means
that everyone - including Bill Gates - can use the material as they
wish.  They are just prevented, for now, for all time, from buying out
Wikipedia and copyrighting it.  I'll come back to that.

(4) "However, allowing for-profit uses can make the information even
more widely available; for example, it encourages people to make
derivative works that build on it, or to make and sell hard copies to
other people."

This becomes even more reasonable.  However, at what price does
accessibility come?  A quick look around the web shows whats happening;
commercial sites like About.com are encouraged to derivatize Wikipedia
by loading the page with ads, as suggested by one of our
commercially-minded contributers above.  Does it REALLY help people to
have a copy available on Ebay for $5?  How about someone selling links
to the site to gullible buyers at $1 a pop?  I'm not convinced that any
for-profit body has materially benefitted Wikipedia by having been
derivatized, or sold as hard copies.

(5) "if there are parts that have more restrictive licences (for
example, no commercial use), a commercial redistributor would have to
go through the entire encyclopedia checking the licence of every single
illustration. "

Looking at the wonderful system that is Wikipedia, and all the coding
that went into it; it strikes me as strange that no filter can be
written, such that a user cannot simply tick a checkbox, yielding a
version of Wikipedia for his/her perusal consistent with any of the
copyright classifications available.  If a user ticks "not nc", for
example, he would be able to see/download/pilfer everything which is
"not nc" in wikipedia.  It doesnt seem insurmountable.

Which brings us to our last, most reasonable proposition

(6) "And our commercial mirrors bring in new business, make donations
and have helped pay wages for Wikipedia employees."
"put on DVD, and sold for  ten euros(?). A large swathe of this went
back to the Foundation"

I have no objection to any use of the images, for non-profit use.  That
is, if Wikipedia makes money from selling disks to people, I'm fine by
that, provided that the money is used to fund wikipedia.  I *do* have a
problem if someone -say a newspaper - lifts one of my images from
Wikipedia, and uses it instead of paying for their own photography, and
makes a profit therefrom.  Now I'm not the legal expert here that most
are, and I suppose "non-profit" use may not cover the generation of
money by non-profit organizations.  In which case, I dare say, the same
people could find a way to write this and include it in the Wiki
License.  The sole remaining objection to me appears to be that people
like me arent ponying up to donate cash to provide whats required to
run Wikipedia.  And that is, I guess, true.  So we need to turn to
Satan, and prostitute ourselves, so that some people will have access
to free material.
And in response to those who ask me to consider the profit enterprises
as only american-as-apple-pie patriots, Let me just respond that there
are already many for-profit encyclopedias in existence.  If Wikipedia
becomes just another way for a corporation to make money, it will not
improve over the already excellent content provided by these worthy
capitalists.

Let's be clear about the danger of consorting with the enemy (because
like it or hate it, those who would fence in the commons are always at
odds with those who would free resources to all); that Danger is seen
in how Bill Gates has bought the rights to the digitial reproduction of
huge amounts of Art that is (or should be) public domain.  Bill Gates
has seen to it that Java has become a little part of Windows.  Private
enterprises now own the right to use turmeric as a medicine; and are
patenting life forms.  Yes, it is unfortunately true that anywhere one
CAN make a buck, someone WILL be trying to capture it. "I hear that
running Google ads on well-formatted copies of Wikipedia can be quite
lucrative."   What happens when Bill Gates, or Larry Ellison, or
someone else builds a new and better gizmo, which makes the Internet
obsolete?  Or whatever; just say that the experience of Wikipedia
becomes a thousand times better on it, than as it is at present.  But
the new format is proprietary.  Sure the CONTENT is free - but the
licensing of the new technology is not.  And say that this fictitious
company adds new material, such that wikipedia-old becomes obsolete?
Who will use the free version anymore?  What if Google generates a
superpedia; in which it uses Wikipedia as a base, but adds on vast new
access to its own-sourced info?  Who will use Wikipedia then?  Embrace
and Extend has killed off more than one open-source before.  One of the
most significant protections against this is the prohibition against
for-profit use.

I would encourage people to consider other possibilities, other than
engaging in or with the for-profiteers.  One suggestion would be to
sell and widely distribute DVDs, by some of the wikipedia wage-earners,
all profits going back to pay for the system.  Make it $20 for all I
care.  I dont even mind policies whereby other non-profits can use the
free material.

But embracing embrace and extend, is a dangerous gamble.

postscript.  I may contribute some images, I'll have to consider the
matter more deeply now.  Perhaps some images that no commercial company
would want to use; or perhaps a resolution unsuited to commercial
useage.  I'll continue to contribute information; but the idea that
someday some Mogul might squeeze Wikipedia out of existence, and
incorporate its assets, just as surely as Netscape was lost to
AOL-Time-Warner, will probably have an affect on my desire to help
create something new.  A world asset which was never saleable to the
highest bidder.


from_name: Poor, Edmund W

body:
> > This can also be done by a single admin, e.g. this is mostly
> > what Linuxbeak is applying to his dear little charges - beat
> > them around the head with a cluebat until they realise he
> > means it, then gently suggest they behave with suggestions of
> > how to. It's sometimes more work than it seems like it should
> > be, but can work if the idjit is cluifiable at all.
>
> Don't be too hard on yourself, David.
>
> Peter (Skyring)

Our whole process of "dispute resolution" needs an overhaul. It's
slipped down to relativism:

We are viewing each dispute in a moral vacuum, with both parties
considered to have equal standing. This can never work.

IF one party is strongly upholding our civility or accuracy standards
(or making a plea for Neutrality on a Controversial Topic), while the
other insists on being uncivil, adding inaccurate information, or using
the article to push their point of view (POV)

THEN

* it's not a matter of two people "disputing"
* it's a matter of one party being "right" and the other party being
"wrong"

Let's change our procedures so that there's a way to enforce civility
and accuracy as key values of our community - and stamp out bias too!

Ed Poor


from_name: Phil Boswell

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Please leave Rex Lynch for now

body:
"David Gerard" <fun at thingy.apana.org.au> wrote
in message news:438857F3.4090505 at thingy.apana.org.au...
[snip]
> Rex replied to this with another rant, this time including you amongst
> the forces of evil suppressing the truth. I replied telling him to go
> away until he has something new to say. I ask all to abandon the subject
> for now.

I'll be glad to once he stops filling my email inbox with copies of his
rants...do I look particularly sympathetic to anyone here? :-)
--
Phil
[[en:User:Phil Boswell]]


from_name: Norvy

subject: [WikiEN-l] yet another image lost for posterity

body:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Upload&wpDestFile=SablePlante.JPG
>
>
> yet another image deleted
> *without any personal warning to the uploader
> *even though it was uploaded before the tags ever existed...
>
> I find that pityful. Really pityful. Really really pityful.

To be fair, you were asked to tag them on December 16th, 2004.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Anthere/box#Image_tagging
Seems like plenty of warning to me.
--
Norvy


subject: [WikiEN-l] (no subject)

body:
In reply to:
"Let's not get narky, eh?  I didn't like his tone, either,"

I'm sorry if my tone offends some; the record, it was generated by the
following, which *I* didnt much like, either:

 > "All images which are for non-commercial only use and by permission
only
 > > are not acceptable for Wikipedia and _will be deleted_.  We have
 > > tolerated them for some time..."

  I'm not writing here for the purposes of offending anyone; the purpose
is to provoke some thought, if not discussion (I'm sure this has
already been done, dont worry) on a policy which I find antithetical to
the notion of a commons.  A secondary purpose is to provide feedback on
why I personally, have been dissuaded from contributing material to
Wikipedia.  I was in the process of going through my photo archive and
linking them up to articles in Wikipedia, when I came across the
requirement that they be open to profit-making; which pulled me up very
quickly.  The above statement stopped me in my tracks.  If that
information is useful to you, then well and good.  If not, it really
doesnt make much difference to me.

In reply to:
 > Because Wikipedia is free as in freedom.  Your pictures are not free
 > (though apparently they are gratis); you are limiting who can
distribute
 > them.  Please re-evaluate contributing to Wikipedia if you are
unwilling
 > to support freedom.

My answer is that I do not see how enriching private corporations
furthers freedom.  My pictures are indeed gratis.
The only objection I have is to allowing others to make profits from my
work.  That definition of freedom isnt in my dictionary.
Ask the Java community how they feel about Gates embracing and
extending their freedoms.

When freedom is defined by the ability of corporate persons to enrich
themselves at the expense of the community, whether thats by patenting
life forms, folk medicine, or whatever, then we have truly lost the
idea of freedom.  It is of interest that the images allowable are still
restricted - by for example the "by" atrribution.  Its only the "nc"
that seems to draw howls of protest.

I cannot understand why people freely contributing material to be used
by anyone else for whatever purposes they wish - EXCEPT to make a fast
buck - is considered "if you are unwilling to support freedom."

I suppose we each have our definitions of what freedom truly is.
Mike


from_name: Kelly Martin

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: yet another image lost for posterity

body:
On 11/28/05, Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Anthere wrote:
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Upload&wpDestFile=SablePlante.JPG
> >
> >
> > yet another image deleted
> > *without any personal warning to the uploader
> > *even though it was uploaded before the tags ever existed...
> >
> > I find that pityful. Really pityful. Really really pityful.
> >
> >
> > Ant
>
> I would like a clarification, because I must have missed some step possibly.
>
> I thought fair use images were still authorized on the english
> wikipedia. Is that still the case or not ?
>
> Ant

Unlicensed media are allowed on the English Wikipedia only when they
are being used under the fair use doctrine in at least one article.
There can be no fair use justification for keeping unlicensed media on
the server which are not actually being used in any article (fair use
requires that there actually be some use).  We allow a seven day
window so that someone who uploads unlicensed media with the intent to
attach them to an appropriate article has some time to actually do so.

This particular image appears to have been unused, and was therefore
deleted as orphaned unlicensed media.

Kelly


subject: [WikiEN-l] NC use

body:
In reply to Mark Gallagher:
"That's *not* what it's based on.  Please take more care before jumping
to conclusions in the future...I don't know why the GFDL always allows
commercial use.  Presumably it's part of the whole ideological
"copyleft is beautiful" bizzo.  I've taken
great pains to avoid understanding how the Free Software Movement people
think, and I cherish my ignorance in this regard.

Given that the entire issue centers on just why commercial use is
allowed, with all respect, I'm not sure how youre helping me on this
one.
Regards, Mike


references:
<dmf1h3$k8t$1@sea.gmane.org> <dmf5at$1e5$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<bd4c411e0511280701m66ac19abt4b4c63ef8e9936be@mail.gmail.com>
	<dmf6nm$79u$1@sea.gmane.org>

body:
On 11/28/05, Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> This, I presume, does not apply to all the funny logos derivated from
> various copyrighted logos, which are commonly used in most editors
> pages, but are not used within main space, such as the mop or counter
> vandalism ?

We are deleting these when we find them.  The CVU logo, which you
mention, and which uses a Wikimedia logo, was authorized by Angela on
behalf of the Board for use on Wikipedia and is therefore not
unlicensed.

> Another question : does that mean that an image previously used in the
> main space but removed for whatever reason by anyone, does not qualify
> any more to be kept ?

We delete orphaned unlicensed images.  Orphaned freely licensed images
are not deleted as a matter of course, although they may be deleted if
the community elects to do so.  Another option is to move them to
Commons.

> Yet another question : on many user pages, editors upload a personal
> shot of their face. Given that GFDL authorize any one to transform their
> face in a monster or to use the personal face picture to make an
> advertisement for a cream to fight spots or other red blotches, is that
> authorized to put a picture of self under another licence than fair use
> ? In which case, which licenses are authorized ?

A community discussion is underway to establish a "community use only"
licensing class for such images.  I support the availability of such
licensing options for media not intended for use in articles, but
there does not seem to be consensus on this point yet.  The image on
my personal user page is currently licensed under such a license, and
nobody has deleted it yet.

> I ask the question, because many pictures of many editors are taken
> during wikimeetups. If the pictures are labelled with a non-restricted
> use, that should mean that anyone can use a picture of the face of a
> wikipedian to do anything that he would like to. If the pictures are
> labelled with a restricted use and used only in non-article space, do
> they qualify as "speedy deletion" as my pictures did ?

Note that I said "unlicensed media".  Media uploaded under a
"community use license" would not be unlicensed and therefore not
subject to deletion under our orphaning policy.  However, we have not
yet approved the use of a "community use license".

> I am not sure I am clear here, but depending on the answers, I think I
> will delete many of my images on the english wikipedia. Somehow, I do
> not think we can forbid editors to delete their images, if the rules
> change upon time; Before, fair use images were authorized. If rules
> change, I suppose editors can change their license choice to protect
> themselves as well ?

Please note that our change in policy about fair use images has been
heavily motivated by this odd fellow known as Jimmy Wales.  Jimbo's
been pushing us for months to cut back on copyright infringement and
unnecessarily reliance on fair use.  You may wish to discuss this
issue with him.

Kelly


body:
On 11/28/05, Poor, Edmund W <Edmund.W.Poor at abc.com> wrote:
> * it's not a matter of two people "disputing"
> * it's a matter of one party being "right" and the other party being
> "wrong"

I disagree.  It's a matter of two people disputing.  One of them may
be disputing in a manner we approve of and the other disputing in a
manner we do not.  The purpose of dispute resolution is not to Find
What Is Right, but rather to enable the disputants to come to an
agreement without tearing each other's heads off.

Kelly


from_name: Matt Brown

body:
On 11/28/05, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On the other hand eventualism resulted in the current mess we have
> with image lisences.

I would disagree. It is not eventualism, but right-now-ism, that leads
people to use an unfree image instead of waiting for a free-licensed
one to appear.  It's not eventualism that leads people to decry free,
amateur-produced images as 'not professional enough'.

It's not eventualism that caused people to, for a very long time,
utterly ignore the warning on the image upload page stating quite
clearly that uploading meant placing under the GFDL and not to upload
material you didn't have the rights to.  For a very long time, the
image upload page implicitly disallowed fair use images, yet people
chose to ignore that.

-Matt


from_name: Anthony DiPierro

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Re: [WikiEN-l] Non-commercial only and By Permission
	Only Images to be

body:
On 11/28/05, Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 27/11/05, Mike Finucane <mike_finucane at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > I'm going to have to re-evaluate contributing to wikipedia if its based
> > on providing source material for commercial companies.
> >
> > Feel free to explain WHY you have this policy; but I have to say your
> > explanation above wasnt very tactful or conducive to goodwill on my
> > part.
>
> Basic problem: Wikipedia has a goal of producing an encylopedia. Not
> an encyclopedia limited only to people with Internet access - though
> internet access is certainly booming - but an encyclopedia accessible
> through other means. The long-term goal of this is, of course, the
> mythical Printed Version - it's still in the air as to whether this
> will ever be successful, but we do try and keep it in mind.
>
> But there's other options. In Germany, for example, there was a very
> successful DVD distribution of the German-language wikipedia; it was
> reformatted, put on DVD, and sold for  ten euros(?). A large swathe of
> this went back to the Foundation, a small quantity went to production
> costs, and the residue went to the company that produced and
> distributed them. Given the remarkable sales, I assume they made a
> profit - asking on wikipedia-l would probably get some nice German to
> explain this in better detail.
>
If the restriction is that the use be "non-commercial", then it
doesn't matter whether or not they made a profit anyway.  Selling DVDs
qualifies as commercial regardless of whether or not you make a
profit, and under my and probably most interpretations, it qualifies
as commercial even if done by a non-profit organization.

> This was very popular, and no doubt a good thing for the project - but
> it was a commercial venture, and had it contained non-commercial
> material it wouldn't have been able to go ahead, because the company
> was distributing it at more than cost. Any form of large-scale
> distribution is likely to fall afoul of non-commercial clauses, at
> some point, or at least to clash with them to such an extent that it
> becomes impractical to do the distribution at anything but a loss.
>
I wonder how much of the success of the German DVD compared to the
lack (AFAIK) of one for the English Wikipedia has to do with the lack
of fair use images in the German Wikipedia.  I'm sure it's not the
only problem, the English Wikipedia is a lot larger and wouldn't even
fit on a DVD without some serious trimming anyway.

> Picking a random role, we'd love to provide, oh, a ten-dollar
> encyclopedia to Indian schools. But if the choice is providing a
> fifteen-dollar one with someone making a profit, or not being able to
> afford to provide a ten-dollar one at cost, then fifteen starts to
> sound pretty good.
>
> Yes, this can be avoided by cleaning out with-permission and
> limited-use images, but this itself provides another burden - the
> labour to filter images. If we only accept images which are known to
> be redistributable, then this presages that problem. We already do
> this with text, and the reason for the strong wording is because we
> recently tightened the standards on images.
>
> (Personally, I feel we are more insistent on only-free-images than we
> absolutely need to be, but...)
>
Probably more importantly than the trouble of cleaning out certain
images is the fact that we're much less likely to find or create free
images if we already have semi-free ones.

> I hope that explains matters.
>
It explains why en.Wikipedia doesn't allow non-commercial use images.
And it does so a lot better than some of the other explanations
(images *don't* have to be GFDL or even GFDL-compatible as some others
stated).  But it doesn't explain why en.Wikipedia doesn't allow images
which are free for educational use (such as in an encyclopedia).
Personally I think this restriction should be relaxed and the one on
non-commercial images tightened.  The goal of Wikipedia is to create
an encyclopedia, not provide images for people to use in commercials
or other non-encyclopedia productions.

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

Anthony


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: [WikiEN-l] GFDL compatibility of image licenses

body:
On 11/28/05, Steve Block <steve.block at myrealbox.com> wrote:
> Nyenyec N wrote:
> > What is the definitive source to read about which image licenses are
> > compatible with the GFDL?
> >
> > Or perhaps a GFDL text with non-GFDL images added doesn't count as
> > derivative work?
>
> There is a slightly related discussion on meta,
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Do_fair_use_images_violate_the_GFDL%3F Do
> fair use images violate the GFDL?
>
> In it Jimbo seems to argue that the addition of fair use images does not
> mean that the images become GFDL, but rather that the usage of the
> specific images in such a way become compliant with the GFDL.  At least
> that is my reading of the comments.  The position I base that upon is
> his argument:
>
> "The experts I have consulted on this (including Richard Stallman and
> Larry Lessig) find no merit in this argument. Remember that the GNU FDL
> works inside the framework of copyright law. The GNU FDL is a way for
> authors to conditionally give up some of the rights they have under
> copyright. It is not a claim to be able to impose additional
> restrictions above and beyond what copyright grants. Since fair use is
> legitimate in copyrighted works, an author may use fair use. But this
> doesn't preclude that author from releasing the work under the GNU FDL,
> because the GNU FDL does not pretend to impose ad"

Actually, it's pretty clear that Jimbo didn't properly explain the
argument to those experts.  Of course fair use is legal.  But if
sizeable portions of GFDL text are being taken and distributed without
permission then it is unlikely that that would be considered fair use.

There are two potential copyright infringements going on when GFDLed
text is mixed with copyrighted images.  There is the copyright on the
image, which might be excused by fair use, and there is the copyright
on the text, which might be excused by either fair use or the GFDL.
Just because the image is being used under fair use doesn't mean the
text is as well.

I think relying on the aggregation clause of the GFDL is much more
appropriate here.  The fair use argument doesn't really make any
sense, and I doubt that Stallman or Lessig were presented with an
accurate description of the argument if they said they found no merit
in it.  Since AFAIK there are no direct quotes from them available
it's really hard to say, though.

Anthony


body:
On 11/28/05, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> Becuase eventaulism ment that we didn't have to fix the problem of
> people uploading such images right now. So the problem was allowed to
> build up.

I'm not sure that's eventualism, though - it's 'laziness' as in having
too much else to do to get round to everything.  And a lack of
appreciation as to the scale of the problem. And a process for dealing
with them having not been established.

All of this was, in retrospect, a mistake.  But I'm not sure it can be
chalked up to 'eventualism', rather than other causes.

-Matt


body:
On 11/28/05, Steve Block <steve.block at myrealbox.com> wrote:
> In it Jimbo seems to argue that the addition of fair use images does not
> mean that the images become GFDL, but rather that the usage of the
> specific images in such a way become compliant with the GFDL.  At least
> that is my reading of the comments.

By the way, this sentence contains at least one common misconception
about copyleft.  Images only "become GFDL" if they are released by
their copyright holder under the GFDL.  They don't automatically
become released under the GFDL.

Anthony


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: fonts for foreign language wikibooks

body:
"L S Lesser" <lsl45x at netzero.com> wrote in
message news:000401c5f24a$f27e6ac0$d10fec04 at oemcomputer...
> I have installed Latin-2 encoding, Arial Unicode MS, and Aruniupd.exe,
> and yet I cannot read many of the Croatian, Slovenian, Slovak, and
> Romanian characters on the wiki pages describing their languages and
> grammars.  [?, ?, ?, etc.].  I run Windows ME and Internet Explorer
>  5.5.  I'd greatly appreciate some advice.  Thanks.

It would help a great deal if you could link to the precise pages which are
giving you trouble, so that we could check that the encoding is actually
correct.

In the meantime, you could do a lot worse than to seek out the "CODE2000"
font, which is free, download and install it, and tell your browser to use
it.

HTH HAND
--
Phil
[[en:User:Phil Boswell]]


subject: [WikiEN-l] Prototype {{ARTICLESPACE}} and {{TALKSPACE}} templates

body:
There are many places where it is necessary to include code within a
template which will construct a link from a talk-page to the associated
non-talk-page and vice versa, and the code to make this work in any given
situation until recently required a whole slew of tightly-bound templates.
It also seems to have been done in several different ways, and this
duplication of effort is not necessarily helpful.

I have created prototype templates to perform these useful functions which
use the {{switch}} template, newly developed to take advantage of recent
upgrades in the template syntax. The resulting code is much simpler.

The prototypes are at [[User:Phil Boswell/ARTICLESPACE]] and [[User:Phil
Boswell/TALKSPACE]]. The latter should always give the {{NAMESPACE}} for the
talk page for where it is placed; the former works in the opposite
direction.

Please could as many people as possible insert them into various places in
as many namespaces as possible (temporarily using the Preview function
obviously :-) and let me know if I've mucked anything up.

Please also take a look at my code and place any helpful criticisms you
might have on the appropriate talk-page.

HTH HAND
--
Phil
[[en:User:Phil Boswell]]


from_name: Angela

subject: [Wikitech-l] RC patrol for ~50 smallest wikipedias

body:
> On 27/11/05, Brian <brian0918 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > There have been numerous reports recently of finding rampant vandalism
> > on small Wikipedias/Wiktionaries. It might be useful to create an RC
> > page and/or IRC channel which brings together the RC's of the ~50
> > smallest Wikipedias.

See http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/SWMT
The bloglines feed at
http://www.bloglines.com/public/inactivewikipedias collects recent
changes from small Wikipedias, Wiktionaries, Wikibooks and Wikiquotes.

Angela


from_name: stevertigo

body:
Anthere wrote: >
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Upload&wpDestFile=SablePlante.JPG

>
> yet another image deleted
> *without any personal warning to the uploader
> *even though it was uploaded before the tags
ever existed...
>
> I find that pityful. Really pityful. Really  really
pityful.

The image (whatver it was -- we will never know) was a
danger to Wikipedia and to Wikimedia itself. The
erasure of one single insignificant image (whatever it
was -- we may never know) is insignificant compared to
the increased security that Wikipedia and Wikimedia
now has, as a result of not hosting that image.

Stevertigo
Le calembour a pr?vu

__________________________________
Yahoo! Mail - PC Magazine Editors' Choice 2005
http://mail.yahoo.com


body:
--- Anthere <Anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > I see no reason to share your pessimism.
> >
> > Kelly
>
> it is a deal :-)
> I keep this in memory to see what the future will
> offer us :-)
>
> See you next december ...
>
> ant

OOh! Ladies, lets not be catty now. Remember wisdom is
no substitute for inexperience.

Stevertigo

__________________________________
Yahoo! Music Unlimited
Access over 1 million songs. Try it free.
http://music.yahoo.com/unlimited/


body:
On 11/28/05, Anthere <Anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Upload&wpDestFile=SablePlante.JPG
>
> yet another image deleted
> *without any personal warning to the uploader
> *even though it was uploaded before the tags ever existed...
>
> I find that pityful. Really pityful. Really really pityful.
>
>
> Ant

I think the worst part is that the uploader wasn't warned first.  I've
had at least two images deleted this way (one was GFDL, the other was
public domain, who knows what else was deleted without my knowledge),
and I think it's incredibly rude.  Unless there is some sort of
ongoing problem with a user I think admins should at least warn the
uploader before deleting the image.

Anthony


subject: [WikiEN-l] Support freedum of infromashuon

body:
Since Wikipedia is supposed to be, like, into this
'freedom of information thing,' (and stuff) and, like,
that includes our friends even in the UK, who arent
used to like, living under freedom (and stuff)...

I thought it might not be out of our mandate to put
this little image (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Illpublish.png ) on
the front page. Maybe even at Wikisource! (Im sure
somebody here is an admin there. Ive only got my meta
priveleges left now - snif!). The image is a little
white box that says "Ill publish the Al Jazeera memo."
It may or may not be linked to the Blairwatch.org
site.

Anyway, though it might, like, be cheezy to stand up
for freedom of information (and stuff) though. Plus,
that might violate Wikisource's NOR policy.

Stevertigo
 Confused: Is it still called 'Valspeak'
 when a guy uses it?

__________________________________
Yahoo! Mail - PC Magazine Editors' Choice 2005
http://mail.yahoo.com


from_name: Mark Wagner

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Arbitration Committee elections,
	2005 - still no information!

body:
On 11/28/05, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> Other than the need for a friendly developer is there a reason why we
> could not in theory ignore jimbo and elect arbcom whatever?

The ArbCom's power comes entirely from the willingness of the admins
and the community in general to implement the decisions it comes up
with.  If we're willing to forgo the use of the formal voting
software, there's nothing stopping the community from running its own
ArbCom election.

--
[[User:Carnildo]]


from_name: Uwe Brauer

subject: [Wikitech-l] arbitrary Anchors and links within the same page

body:
Hello

I am just reading the handbook and would like to have a link to an
arbitrary anchors within a page. It is not clear to me how to set that
anchor.

The handbook say use
so I understood

[[#test]] would be the trick.

But now it seems not to work. Can anybody please give me a full
example.

Thanks

Uwe Brauer


body:
Kelly Martin ecrit:
>We are deleting these when we find them.  >The CVU
logo, which you mention, and which >uses a Wikimedia
logo, was authorized by >Angela on behalf of the Board
for use on >Wikipedia and is therefore not unlicensed.

You can start with
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:2kip.png

As the artist I can say for a fact that it is not
copyright by the Wikimedia Foundation.

Stevertigo

__________________________________
Yahoo! Mail - PC Magazine Editors' Choice 2005
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subject: [Wikipedia-l] Wikisource Main english page deleted?

body:
Google IFL redirects to this page, which is curiously
deviant from normal Main Page formatting...

http://wikisource.org/wiki/Main_Page:English

Everybody please game google to redirect to either
en.wikisource or www.wikisource

Thanks
Stevertigo

__________________________________
Yahoo! Mail - PC Magazine Editors' Choice 2005
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from_name: Anthere

subject: [Foundation-l] Wikimania organiser

body:
As mentionned in the minutes of last board meeting,
the Wikimedia Foundation is considering hiring a part
time conference organizer to arrange Wikimania 2006,
the second international Wikimedia Conference.

The conference will be held in Boston in late July or
early August 2006. The organiser will not be an
employee, but a contractant. The applicant should be
experienced in organizing internaltional conferences,
be able to work online for most of the year, and have
an understanding of the goals of Wikimedia and the aim
of this conference. Fluency in English is required,
and a good level of fluency in at least one other
language is beneficial. The position implies full time
availability immediately before and during the
conference.
Please make applications, with quotations and
estimates of costs to board-private at wikimedia.org
before sunday the 4th of december, midnight UTC.

Signature : after much hesitation... us.

__________________________________
Yahoo! Mail - PC Magazine Editors' Choice 2005
http://mail.yahoo.com


subject: [Foundation-l] Wikimania organiser


from_name: Fred Bauder

body:
Jimbo recently asked those on the arbitration mailing list (current
and former arbitrators) to give him feedback regarding the listed
candidates. This was done. If someone wants to be considered they
should probably list themselves and also contact an arbitrator and
ask that their availability be forwarded to the list.

Jimbo will probably appoint a list which will have to be confirmed by
the community, probably with a vote of more than 50% approval for
each candidate.

Fred

On Nov 28, 2005, at 11:45 AM, Chris Jenkinson wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> It's been one month since Jimbo Wales edited the Arbitration
> Committee elections page for this December (now just a few days
> away) to change the procedure, adding some brainstormed thoughts.
> Those thoughts are still all the information we have on the
> procedure, and we're almost in December.
>
> A number of potential candidates have said they don't wish to put
> their name forwards if they don't know the election procedure, yet
> recently a member of the current Arbitration Committee said that
> all Wikipedians wishing to become arbitrators should put their name
> forwards immediately.
>
> This is really a terrible state of affairs for a number of reasons:
>
> Firstly, we have no idea how the new Arbitration Committee is going
> to become the new Arbitration Committee at all. Not even the
> current arbitrators say they know how it's going to be done.
>
> Secondly, it has been almost a year since the last elections, and
> there has been plenty of community discussion about what was good
> and bad about the procedure, and action has been taken on this by
> the community (for example, the deletion of the endorsements/
> disendorsements page).
>
> Thirdly, Jimbo has been deathly quiet. These are probably the most
> important positions in the Wikipedia community and the process
> deserves to be discussed openly. Yet all we've seen are some brief
> thoughts from Jimbo. He hasn't responded to other suggestions or to
> criticism of his thinking.
>
> Come on Jimbo, sort it out! It's been almost a year since the last
> elections, there has been plenty of discussion from the community
> (including the current arbitrators) on reform of the system, but
> all we've heard from you is a "current line of thinking". Yes, we
> know you have other things to do, such as the incredibly important
> role of getting funding. However, the encyclopaedia project relies
> on its community to exist and we have to get this right. Please
> join in the discussion and make your thoughts clear.
>
> Chris
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Chip Berlet

subject: [WikiEN-l] Non-Commercial Usage

body:
Hey Mike Finucane,

I agree with you, but there is a way on the English-language Wiki to accomplish most of what you are trying to do. The two templates together of  "Fair Use" and "Permission Granted" offer a more limited usage.  Check out these two images, and read the notice text.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Chip.jpg <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Chip.jpg>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Genealogy_of_Antisemitic_White_Supremacy%2C_Theocracy%2C_and_Fascism.png <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Genealogy_of_Antisemitic_White_Supremacy%2C_Theocracy%2C_and_Fascism.png>

Not ideal, but the second tag states " In addition to being usable under fair use, the copyright holder has granted permission for this image to be used in Wikipedia. This permission does not extend to third parties."

So start by putting up relatively low resolution (96 dpi) images for computer display, and then add the two tags.

In theory, this allows use by folks who reproduce Wikipedia as a package  (non-profit or  for-profit), but would not allow people to lift your images alone for commercial purposes. At least that's how I interpret it.

Others can chime in and say how they think it works. There is still much disagreement over this.

-Cberlet (aka Chip Berlet)


from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] PHP compilation

body:
Neil Harris wrote:
> The Roadsend compiler (a non-Free commercial product) appears to be a
> PHP-in-Scheme implementation that then uses the Bigloo Scheme compiler
> to generate binary executables. Its authors' benchmarks appear to show a
> 10% to 150% improvement compared to standard PHP bytecode execution.
>
> Since I'm just about to set to work on a largish Scheme-driven project,
> and once wrote a (horrible) compiler using Lisp as a target language
> some time ago, I find this quite interesting. This kind of improvement
> in PHP execution performance across the Wikipedia cluster, if available
> using Free software, would be rather useful.
>
> Does anyone know of any free-as-in-freedom work on anything similar?

There's an in-progress PHP compiler for the CLI (.NET/Mono) floating about
somewhere, but it's not ready for prime time last I looked.

http://php4mono.sourceforge.net/

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

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body:
Oh no -- it's the 'One Crown or Several?' debate all
over again -- this time in the context of Wikipedia.

Stevertigo

--- geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 11/28/05, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal at inbox.org>
> wrote:
> > On 11/28/05, Mark Wagner <carnildo at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > > On 11/28/05, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > Other than the need for a friendly developer
> is there a reason why we
> > > > could not in theory ignore jimbo and elect
> arbcom whatever?
> > >
> > > The ArbCom's power comes entirely from the
> willingness of the admins
> > > and the community in general to implement the
> decisions it comes up
> > > with.  If we're willing to forgo the use of the
> formal voting
> > > software, there's nothing stopping the community
> from running its own
> > > ArbCom election.
> > >
> > > --
> > > [[User:Carnildo]]
> >
> > Umm, the ArbCom's power comes from Jimbo as
> President of the Wikimedia
> > Foundation.  The "community" can run its own
> election if it wants, but
> > Jimbo and the board choose how to spend the funds
> of the foundation
> > and how to administer the property of the
> foundation (such as the
> > servers).
>
> However servers and fundraiseing are not the concern
> of arbcom.
>
> --
> geni
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

__________________________________
Yahoo! Mail - PC Magazine Editors' Choice 2005
http://mail.yahoo.com


subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Ampersand symbol in URLs

body:
Netocrat wrote:
> On Tue, 29 Nov 2005 00:09:04 +1100, Netocrat wrote:
>> I noticed while validating the HTML output of an extension that some
>> urls are being generated with a plain & instead of encoded as & and
>> the W3C validator complains about this as an error.  This patch fixes
>> the line of code that was the source of the uncoded ampersand (and
>> another line I noticed) if anyone with CVS access chooses to apply it.
>
> Looks like the attachment's been stripped on gmane.  Here it is inline.
[snip]
> -					$url = "{$wgScript}?title={$dbkey}&{$query}";
> +					$url = "{$wgScript}?title={$dbkey}&{$query}";

This patch is incorrect, and will cause broken URLs to be output throughout the
wiki.

Instead, you should locate the individual *output* of the bad URL that you found
and patch *that* to properly HTML-encode its output.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

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subject: [Wikitech-l] importDump.php runs and runs and does not do anythin

body:
Martina Greiner wrote:
> I am trying to upload the english Wikipedia xml dump from 20051105 xml. I have
> Mysql 5, Wikimedia 1.6 phase 3, and a mac with osx 10.3.
>
> I started the loading process six days ago using importDump.php and the process
> list shows me that php, bz, and mysql are still working. However, when I go into
> Mysql the row counts of the tables do not go up.

1) Checked open transaction?
2) Are you using read-only mode on the wiki? This will cause all changes to the
database to silently fail to run.
3) For large imports like this use mwdumper if you want decent speed. Please see
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/

> For example, the user table has
> one row, and the text table has approx. 3500 rows. If I call show processes in
> Mysql, then I can see that queries are running (admin tells me that approx 200
> queries/second are executed) but they seem not to be executed.

They may all be in a transaction then, in which case the modifications won't be
visible to your other process until committed.

> My questions: is it normal to take six days to upload the Wikipedia dump? is it
> normal that the row count does not go up?

importDump.php is relatively inefficient, and is generally expected to be used
with smallish data sets being copied in from another wiki. For bulk imports
you'll get much much better performance with mwdumper.

> If not, I would highly appreciated any help. Unfortunately I cannot use
> mwdumper, because OSX 10.3 only allows java 1.4 and with java 1.4 I get
> exception errors.

Java 1.5 for Mac OS X can be downloaded from www.apple.com.

1.4 will still be the default JVM, but you can run 1.5 specifically with:
/System/Library/Frameworks/JavaVM.framework/Versions/1.5/Commands/java

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

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references:
<dmf1h3$k8t$1@sea.gmane.org> <dmf5at$1e5$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<bd4c411e0511280701m66ac19abt4b4c63ef8e9936be@mail.gmail.com>
	<dmf6nm$79u$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<bd4c411e0511280735q22e20bd1vfd4acd96bfa7066@mail.gmail.com>
	<dmfh0f$eho$1@sea.gmane.org>

body:
On 11/28/05, Anthere <Anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> I do not understand well how you make the difference between
> "unlicensed" and "licensed".
> Afaik, fair use is licensed. No tag is unlicensed. No ?

Fair use is NOT licensed.  Fair use is a doctrine under which
copyrighted content may be used without obtaining a license.  There's
a big difference.

Let me repeat that again for the bystanders: Fair use is not a license.

Media used on Wikipedia pursuant to a license allowing the use (e.g.
the GFDL or CC-BY-SA, or some other free or nonfree license) is
licensed.  Media that is used on Wikipedia not pursuant to a license
but instead either a claim of fair use, or invalidly as a copyright
infringement, is unlicensed.  We are strict on the use of unlicensed
media because the distribution of unlicensed media content is a
copyright infringement unless privileged under fair use.

> I have the feeling that in one year or so, freely licensed orphan images
> will indeed be deleted on the english wikipedia. That would be well
> within what I currently observe.

I see no reason to share your pessimism.

Kelly


from_name: Neil Harris

body:
Mike Finucane wrote:
> I was going to enrich Wikipedia with a whole bunch of my images, but
> quite frankly, i dont want someone getting rich off my work.
> As such, I was intending to add creative commons no commercial use tags.
>
> Then I come across this note from you:
>
> "All images which are for non-commercial only use and by permission only
>> are not acceptable for Wikipedia and _will be deleted_.  We have
>> tolerated them for some time..."
>
>
>
> Well fear not; you wont have to tolerate any of my images.
>
> I'm going to have to re-evaluate contributing to wikipedia if its
> based on providing source material for commercial companies.
>
> Feel free to explain WHY you have this policy; but I have to say your
> explanation above wasnt very tactful or conducive to goodwill on my part.
>
I agree, the comment above was perhaps not as tactfully phrased as it
could be. However, here's the reasoning behind the policy:

The goal of Wikipedia is "to create and provide a freely licensed and
high quality encyclopedia to every single person on the planet in his or
her own language".

In order to achieve that goal, Wikipedia is released under the GNU Free
Documentation License: "free" in this case, means "free as in freedom".
Summarized, it grants the right to redistribute and use material
licensed under it in any way whatsoever, provided that the user
preserves those rights for any other person. This is to ensure the
widest possible use and distribution of the encyclopedia and the
information within it.

This necessarily includes both for-profit and nonprofit uses. However,
it does not mean that Wikipedia is a for-profit enterprise: indeed, the
Wikimedia Foundation which supports it is an explicitly non-profit
organization.

One of the things that you have the freedom to do with Wikipedia is to
distribute it at no cost. However, allowing for-profit uses can make the
information even more widely available; for example, it encourages
people to make derivative works that build on it, or to make and sell
hard copies to other people. However, none of these commercial uses
prevent people from using the information for free; indeed, because the
GFDL requires derivative works also to be licensed under the GFDL, it
means that Wikipedia material, so long as it remains properly licensed
under the GFDL, cannot have its freedom stripped away, even if it is
included in a commercial derivative product.

For example, I would be quite within my rights to make copies of the
articles from a commercially-purchased version of Wikipedia, and to give
them, or indeed the whole encyclopedia, away for free. Any publisher
asserting proprietary rights over Wikipedia material would be in breach
of the GFDL, and would no longer have the right to use the material in
the first place.

However, for this freedom to be useful, all the material in Wikipedia
needs to be released under the GFDL; if there are parts that have more
restrictive licences (for example, no commercial use), a commercial
redistributor would have to go through the entire encyclopedia checking
the licence of every single illustration. For this reason, Wikipedia's
copyright rules state that every piece of material in Wikipedia must
either be licenced under the GFDL, or fall under a legitimate exemption
under copyright law (fair use, public domain, and so on).

This is the reason why we (regretfully) cannot accept images or other
material under noncommercial-use-only licences. I understand your desire
not to have other people get rich off your hard work. That is your
right, and what you do with your own copyrighted material is your own
business.

On the other hand, have you considered getting rich off ours?

Under the terms of the GFDL, you are quite welcome to do so; indeed,
every contributor who has licensed their copyrighted material under the
GFDL as part of Wikipedia has explicitly consented to this. Feel free to
publish Wikipedia content as-is, or make commercial derivative works.
The more widely you do this, the happier we will be. I hear that running
Google ads on well-formatted copies of Wikipedia can be quite lucrative.

The only constraints are:

* that Wikipedia's collective copyright owners (its authors) insist that
you do so under the terms of the GFDL, a copy of which you can find
online here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Text_of_the_GNU_Free_Documentation_License

* that you do not copy Wikipedia pages from the Wikimedia servers in
real-time, but instead work off an offline dump of the encyclopedia (as
the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation does not have the resources for
performing real-time page rendering for commercial enterprises)

-- Neil


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: [WikiEN-l] Non-Commercial Usage

body:
On 11/28/05, Mike Finucane <mike_finucane at yahoo.com> wrote:
> The reasons put forward on why images must be allowed to be profited
> from can be summarized thus:
>
> (1) "Maybe you should explain WHY you have the policy of not allowing
> people to "get rich" off your work first. There's nothing wrong with
> commerce.  In fact, in today's society commerce is pretty much required
> for survival."
>
> In answer to that; I can only say that this seems to be the very
> antithesis of what I thought Wikipedia to be; people providing free
> material, for a free resource.  How does Wikipedia justify its policy
> on not getting rich quick?  I am not proposing a shutdown of western
> society (although given how the planet is going as a result, dredging
> sandworms for fuel, clearcutting the amazon for profit, one could go
> that way); I'm arguing that there should be a space for those who wish
> to contribute out of the good of their hearts, for a better, freer,
> society.
> I thought Wikipedia stood for this; apparently I was wrong, as also
> evidenced by reason (2):
>

"I'm arguing that there should be a space for those who wish to
contribute out of the good of their hearts, for a better, freer,
society."  Huh?  Of course there is a space.  You're free to
contribute to Wikipedia out of the good of your heart.  But you can't
restrict that contribution to only people who aren't making a profit.

I personally believe that we have a better, freer society *with* money
than without it.  Distribution of information is not free, and by
being able to provide the distributors with a potential for profit you
allow greater distribution.  But what can I say, I'm a huge believer
in the principles of capitalism and believe that capitalism is what
allows a society to be both free and successful.

Sure, you can try to restrict the cost solely to the distribution, but
this is splitting hairs.  What about the cost of borrowing the money?
What about the cost of the labor in setting up the distributor?  If
people are earning interest on this borrowed money, and employees are
getting paid for their contributions of labor, what does it matter if
these people are paid through loans and salaries or stock?  Well, I'll
tell you one place it matters - stock is often much more efficient
tax-wise.

> (2) "On the other hand, have you considered getting rich off ours?... I
> hear that running Google ads on well-formatted copies of Wikipedia can
> be quite lucrative." and "commercial re-use of Wikipedia isn't limited
> to certain people, you can take part too."
>
> My purchase price, I'm afraid, is a little higher than that.

Yeah, I didn't really understand this point.
> ----------------------
>
> Having dismissed the most objectionable objections, we come to more
> reasonable ones.
>
> (3) "The goal of Wikipedia is "to create and provide a freely licensed
> and high quality encyclopedia to every single person on the planet in
> his or her own language....In order to achieve that goal...This
> necessarily includes... for-profit ... uses"
>
> I realize this has other implications, in terms of funding, but I'll
> deal with that later.  First, I wish to disabuse the notion that
> "freedom" cant be gained unless and until everyone has made a buck from
> something freely given.  Is love only truly free when someone pays for
> it?  There is a perfectly acceptable, CC-nc designation, which means
> that everyone - including Bill Gates - can use the material as they
> wish.  They are just prevented, for now, for all time, from buying out
> Wikipedia and copyrighting it.  I'll come back to that.
>
I hope you do, because it doesn't make much sense.

Bill Gates can use the material as he wishes?  What about using it on
his corporation's website?  How about distributing it with every copy
of Windows?

> (4) "However, allowing for-profit uses can make the information even
> more widely available; for example, it encourages people to make
> derivative works that build on it, or to make and sell hard copies to
> other people."
>
> This becomes even more reasonable.  However, at what price does
> accessibility come?  A quick look around the web shows whats happening;
> commercial sites like About.com are encouraged to derivatize Wikipedia
> by loading the page with ads, as suggested by one of our
> commercially-minded contributers above.  Does it REALLY help people to
> have a copy available on Ebay for $5?  How about someone selling links
> to the site to gullible buyers at $1 a pop?  I'm not convinced that any
> for-profit body has materially benefitted Wikipedia by having been
> derivatized, or sold as hard copies.
>
Thousands if not millions of people have first seen Wikipedia content
when they clicked on the "definition" link at the top of their Google
search, and came to Answers.com.  Wikipedia has been distributed to
many, many more people because of this.  More people are given free
access to human knowledge.

> (5) "if there are parts that have more restrictive licences (for
> example, no commercial use), a commercial redistributor would have to
> go through the entire encyclopedia checking the licence of every single
> illustration. "
>
> Looking at the wonderful system that is Wikipedia, and all the coding
> that went into it; it strikes me as strange that no filter can be
> written, such that a user cannot simply tick a checkbox, yielding a
> version of Wikipedia for his/her perusal consistent with any of the
> copyright classifications available.  If a user ticks "not nc", for
> example, he would be able to see/download/pilfer everything which is
> "not nc" in wikipedia.  It doesnt seem insurmountable.
>
Well, this is true to some extent, though "nc" and "not nc" would be
very hard to define.  There are lots of different definitions as to
what is considered commercial and what isn't.

> Which brings us to our last, most reasonable proposition
>
> (6) "And our commercial mirrors bring in new business, make donations
> and have helped pay wages for Wikipedia employees."
> "put on DVD, and sold for  ten euros(?). A large swathe of this went
> back to the Foundation"
>
> I have no objection to any use of the images, for non-profit use.  That
> is, if Wikipedia makes money from selling disks to people, I'm fine by
> that, provided that the money is used to fund wikipedia.  I *do* have a
> problem if someone -say a newspaper - lifts one of my images from
> Wikipedia, and uses it instead of paying for their own photography, and
> makes a profit therefrom.  Now I'm not the legal expert here that most
> are, and I suppose "non-profit" use may not cover the generation of
> money by non-profit organizations.  In which case, I dare say, the same
> people could find a way to write this and include it in the Wiki
> License.  The sole remaining objection to me appears to be that people
> like me arent ponying up to donate cash to provide whats required to
> run Wikipedia.  And that is, I guess, true.  So we need to turn to
> Satan, and prostitute ourselves, so that some people will have access
> to free material.

It has nothing to do with Satan or prostitution as far as I can see.
And yes, you could say that any non-profit organization can use
Wikipedia for profit use.  But you'd be surprised what that would
mean.  The RIAA is a non-profit organization, for instance.

I also just don't see the purpose of the distinction.  People are
going to "get rich" off your work either way, whether it's the hosting
companies and the hard drive companies and the Wikipedia employees or
whether it's the people who started up the company and brought the
idea to the rest of the world.

> And in response to those who ask me to consider the profit enterprises
> as only american-as-apple-pie patriots, Let me just respond that there
> are already many for-profit encyclopedias in existence.  If Wikipedia
> becomes just another way for a corporation to make money, it will not
> improve over the already excellent content provided by these worthy
> capitalists.
>
Yes it will, because Wikipedia is and always will be *free*.  That is
what will always separate Wikipedia from the traditional
encyclopedias.

> Let's be clear about the danger of consorting with the enemy (because
> like it or hate it, those who would fence in the commons are always at
> odds with those who would free resources to all); that Danger is seen
> in how Bill Gates has bought the rights to the digitial reproduction of
> huge amounts of Art that is (or should be) public domain.  Bill Gates
> has seen to it that Java has become a little part of Windows.

Wikipedia can't be bought.  The copyright is still held by the
individual contributors.  And actually, by making Wikipedia
non-commercial only *that* would enable Wikipedia to be bought.  If no
one could distribute Wikipedia commercially without permission of the
copyright holders, then Bill Gates could buy the rights to be the only
person allowed to distribute it commercially.

> Private
> enterprises now own the right to use turmeric as a medicine; and are
> patenting life forms.  Yes, it is unfortunately true that anywhere one
> CAN make a buck, someone WILL be trying to capture it. "I hear that
> running Google ads on well-formatted copies of Wikipedia can be quite
> lucrative."   What happens when Bill Gates, or Larry Ellison, or
> someone else builds a new and better gizmo, which makes the Internet
> obsolete?

We wind up with a new and better Internet!  Sounds like a good thing.

> Or whatever; just say that the experience of Wikipedia
> becomes a thousand times better on it, than as it is at present.  But
> the new format is proprietary.  Sure the CONTENT is free - but the
> licensing of the new technology is not.  And say that this fictitious
> company adds new material, such that wikipedia-old becomes obsolete?
> Who will use the free version anymore?

I really don't understand what you're getting at.  If the free version
is still available, and no one uses it, then the other version must be
so much better that we'd have been incredibly stupid not to allow it
to exist.

> What if Google generates a
> superpedia; in which it uses Wikipedia as a base, but adds on vast new
> access to its own-sourced info?

Then the world is enriched incredibly, and Wikipedia is a tremendous success.

> Who will use Wikipedia then?

Probably most of the people who use it now, as well as many additional ones.

> Embrace and Extend has killed off more than one open-source before.

I can't think of an example of this.  Has Red Hat killed Linux?

I guess you could say that Apple killed FreeBSD, but this wouldn't
really be accurate, and the BSD license is much different from the
GFDL.

> One of the most significant protections against this is the prohibition against
> for-profit use.
>
No, the biggest protection against this is copyleft (*).  No one is
saying you can't copyleft your works you contribute to Wikipedia.
Just that you can't restrict commercial use.

(*)Actually, the biggest protection is probably the free market, but
that's really a different argument entirely.

> I would encourage people to consider other possibilities, other than
> engaging in or with the for-profiteers.  One suggestion would be to
> sell and widely distribute DVDs, by some of the wikipedia wage-earners,
> all profits going back to pay for the system.  Make it $20 for all I
> care.  I dont even mind policies whereby other non-profits can use the
> free material.
>
> But embracing embrace and extend, is a dangerous gamble.
>
> postscript.  I may contribute some images, I'll have to consider the
> matter more deeply now.  Perhaps some images that no commercial company
> would want to use; or perhaps a resolution unsuited to commercial
> useage.  I'll continue to contribute information; but the idea that
> someday some Mogul might squeeze Wikipedia out of existence, and
> incorporate its assets, just as surely as Netscape was lost to
> AOL-Time-Warner, will probably have an affect on my desire to help
> create something new.  A world asset which was never saleable to the
> highest bidder.

Umm, Netscape was a for-profit company.  And, in fact, Netscape was
*shareware* before AOL came along.  That meant that businesses had to
pay for the product after using it for 30 days.  AOL changed Netscape
to freeware, and then eventually open sourced the whole thing.  Then
they spun it off into its own non-profit organization (Mozilla
Foundation).

Anyway, I don't see how "assets" come into play at all here.  You
still own the copyright on images you submit.  Wikipedia can't sell
that asset to anyone.  In fact, Wikipedia has no control over who
follows or doesn't follow the license agreement at all.  You still
have control over that.  You just can't sue someone just because they
happen to be making a profit using your work.

Anthony


from_name: Stan Shebs

body:
Anthere wrote:

>
> I have the feeling that in one year or so, freely licensed orphan
> images will indeed be deleted on the english wikipedia. That would be
> well within what I currently observe.

It wouldn't surprise me, I seem to recall some people muttering about
that a while back. Just imagine all the AfDers migrating over to IfD!

> I do not think people will bother moving them to commons, it is too
> heavy to do.

As a board member, isn't it within your power to pay a developer to
come up with an automated way to transfer images from language WPs
to commons? It's been wanted for some time, and would solve a lot of
our image management problems. Commons has evolved much better ways
to deal with large masses of images.

>
> Overall, our license issues strike me as being more confusing and
> messy every day that goes by.

Organizations that deal professionally with as many images as are
now in WMF's collection often have persons paid to do nothing but
deal with license issues, calling and writing copyright holders for
permissions, negotiating prices for licenses, etc. Pinching down on
non-free images is basically our strategy to simplify things so
that the Foundation doesn't have to start interviewing job candidates...

Stan


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Fwd: Google Alert - Wikipedia

body:
On 11/28/05, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> The problem with eventualism is that in most cases I can show
> it supports both sides of the debate.

& thus is not the problem.

-Matt


body:
On 11/28/05, Steve Block <steve.block at myrealbox.com> wrote:
> Sadly, though, in some instances, i.e. for illustrating articles
> regarding comics, you will never get a free-licensed image.

True.  Although a position one could describe as 'extreme eventualism'
would state that the comics will eventually fall into the public
domain and then be usable ...

-Matt


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: copyright and arbcom issues

references:
<dmf1h3$k8t$1@sea.gmane.org> <dmf5at$1e5$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<bd4c411e0511280701m66ac19abt4b4c63ef8e9936be@mail.gmail.com>
	<dmf6nm$79u$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<bd4c411e0511280735q22e20bd1vfd4acd96bfa7066@mail.gmail.com>
	<dmfh0f$eho$1@sea.gmane.org> <438B79C3.4080308@apple.com>
	<dmfuc0$vsq$1@sea.gmane.org>

body:
On 11/28/05, Anthere <Anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> correct. This said... did you hear about the major uproar on the german
> wikipedia due to massive copyright infringment ? It is now in the press.
> And the german wikipedia, I believe, choose to entirely forbid all fair
> use images at least a year ago.

Is there an english-language place to read about this?  First I'd heard of it.

Thanks,

-Matt


from_name: Gerard Meijssen

subject: [Foundation-l] Single login

body:
Hoi,
We have discussed the subject of single login many times. There are many
scenario's that we can take to get to a solution. There is also the
potential to do some "future proofing". At this moment in time all our
security for users is pretty minimal; it relies on knowing a password or
having a cookie on your system. For gaining read only access we do not
require any authentication. There are several scenario's where
(technically available) additional authentication possibilities will
help us.

* When a range of IP numbers is blocked because of frequent vandalism,
we want to allow access for authenticated editors. These can be schools
or proxies.
* When we host educational content, we want to ensure that it is only
the student who accesses his material
* When we host educational content, we want to give access to a subset
of data to a teacher of a student
* When we collaborate with another web services like Kennisnet, we allow
users authenticated by such an organisation to use our resources as an
authenticated editor

The point that I am trying to make is that future proofing makes sense.
When we have the potential to do this and make use of proven open source
technology, we should consider this as an option in stead of "rolling
our own". A-Select http://a-select.surfnet.nl/ is a project run by
"Surfnet", it is available under a BSD license. Scalability has been
very much part of their existing projects. It is used as the engine for
many big projects; DigiD http://www.digid.nl/ is a project to give
people living in the Netherlands access to their personal information.
Strong authentication like used by banks for on-line transactions are
provided for. The Dutch library system, Dutch education .. they use it.

I will make sure that material about all this will become available on
Meta. I start by posting here because there is a need for discussing the
issues that come up when you introduce the potential for more
authentication to our growing list of services.

Thanks,
     GerardM


subject: [Foundation-l] Single login


subject: [Wikitech-l] Single login


from_name: Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason

subject: [Wikitech-l] <link> elements for interlanguage link information

body:
Could this thread please be kept on topic? It's about adding link
elements for interwiki links not about changing the behaviour of
redirects.


body:
Anthere wrote:

> Stan Shebs wrote:
>
>>
>> As a board member, isn't it within your power to pay a developer to
>> come up with an automated way to transfer images from language WPs
>> to commons? It's been wanted for some time, and would solve a lot of
>> our image management problems. Commons has evolved much better ways
>> to deal with large masses of images.
>
>
> Nod. But frankly, it would not be considered as the most urgent thing
> a developer would have to take care of. Issues such as single login,
> or very simply, having the site run smoothly and with a decent
> efficiency (images loading time...) would be the priority.
>
> Beyond this, we always fall back on the same issue, paying developers
> means more money. More money means having more fundraiser or
> fundraiser lasting longer, or people willing to take the time to ask
> for more grants (not so many people interested in doing that...) or
> simply looking for more sponsors, or putting ads ;-)

At one point, I was keen to do some wikimedia development, so as to help
with this sort of thing, and set up a test wiki, but it's more fun to upload
images than to hack on PHP...

>
> correct. This said... did you hear about the major uproar on the
> german wikipedia due to massive copyright infringment ? It is now in
> the press. And the german wikipedia, I believe, choose to entirely
> forbid all fair use images at least a year ago.

I've not heard a thing about this. Do you have a link?

Stan