from_name: MacGyverMagic/Mgm

subject: [WikiEN-l] What to do with $1.000.000

body:
Yeah, that would be a nice idea, but it would benefit just one or two
articles.
Any other ideas?

On 12/16/06, Daniel R. Tobias <dan at tobias.name> wrote:
>
> Fun thing to do with $1,000,000:
>
> Buy the rarest stamp in the world, the [[British Guiana 1c magenta]]
> (only one known to exist); last known value $935,000.  If you can't
> get the owner to sell, you might have to settle for another rare
> stamp such as an [[Inverted Jenny]].  Anyway, get a rare, priceless
> small paper object.  Then feed it to a goat.  Take the goat's feces
> and mold it into a modern-art sculpture, and exhibit it at the
> [[Brooklyn Museum]].
>
> And this will benefit Wikipedia... how?
>
> Well, um... I guess you can release the sculpture and pictures of it
> under a free license to allow illustration of Wikipedia coverage of
> this project and any controversy you manage to stir up about it
> without resorting to fair use or anything else unfree.
>
> --
> == Dan ==
> Dan's Mail Format Site: http://mailformat.dan.info/
> Dan's Web Tips: http://webtips.dan.info/
> Dan's Domain Site: http://domains.dan.info/
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Alphax (Wikipedia email)

subject: [WikiEN-l] Problems Connecting to Wiki

body:
Wiki-XMZL wrote:
<snip>


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Kelly Martin

subject: [Wikitech-l] A frightening chart

body:
Meh, Alexa data is largely meaningless anyway.

Kelly

On 12/16/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?site0=wikipedia.org&site1=google.com&site2=&site3=&site4=&y=p&z=0&h=400&w=700&range=3m&size=Large&url=wikipedia.org
>
> So ... how long at our present cancerous rates of growth till our
> traffic is 6x what it is now?
>
> (We hit #10 on Alexa twice in the last month, by the way. Our smoothed
> page rank is #12.)
>
>
> - d.
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Completely unreasonable block and behavior by admin
 friends of Itaqallah to win a content dispute

body:
Jim Schuler wrote:
> On 12/15/06, Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com> wrote:
>> I've asked Jimbo to step in and stop you and David Gerard from trying to
>> flame me.
>>
>> Parker
>
>
> Name dropping is so tacky.
>

No, he really did ask Jimbo, and Jimbo really did intervene.

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP

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subject:
[WikiEN-l] Admins who pretend to quit (was Re: MONGO and the
 ArbComm)

body:
jayjg wrote:
> On 12/15/06, Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com> wrote:
>> On 12/15/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
>>> On Fri, 15 Dec 2006 12:37:03 -0500, "James Hare"
>>> <messedrocker at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Please refrain from accusing people of trolling. It's really not that
>>>> pleasant.
>>> The trolling itself is worse, though :-)
>>>
>>> Guy (JzG)
>>
>> I've spent a lot of time discussing this with Jimbo, he's already emailed
>> two people who were vexatiously trolling me, and I'd prefer not to have
>> people trying to troll me. It does nothing for the discussion.
>>
>> In other words, stop trying to [[shoot the messenger]] please. I agree with
>> about half of what I've seen you write, and I wish you didn't have this chip
>> on your shoulder making you accuse anyone who disagrees with you of
>> trolling. It doesn't help the debate in any fashion.
>>
>> That goes for you too, Jay.
>
> There's no message, though, aside from "I'm a troll, please feed me".
>

Actually, there /is/ a message; it's just that we've become so used to
screams of "omg admin abuse" that we tend to dismiss them outright
before checking to see if they're valid, which this one appears to be.
My apologies to Parker.

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP

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subject: [WikiEN-l] Top posting poll; was Re: MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
Jim Schuler wrote:
> On 12/15/06, Mark Wagner <carnildo at gmail.com> wrote:
>> On 12/14/06, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>> M I i N d T- E p R o W s E t A i V n E g - i P s O t S h T e I o N n
>> G l F
>>>>> y O w R a M y E to go. :-)
>>> You just stole at least a minute, probably two, of my life trying to
>>> decipher your email, and I want them back.
>> !gnitsop evaewretni daer ot drah *taht* lla ton s'tI
>>
>
> !ton s'ti oN
>
>

Qm90dG9tLXBvc3RpbmcgeW91ciBtZXNzYWdlcyBhZnRlciBCYXNlNjQ=
ZW5jb2RpbmcgdGhlbSBiZWF0cyBldmVyeXRoaW5nLg==

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP

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from_name: Fred Bauder

subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On Dec 16, 2006, at 12:14 PM, bbatsell wrote:

> For all interested, this case is now 6-1 to close, which will be done
> soon.
>
> I have already expressed my extraordinary pleasure with the conduct
> and precedents established by this decision on the Talk page, as have
> many other well-respected administrators and Wikipedians.  There has
> been no substantive change in response to these concerns by the
> Arbitration Committee.
>
> Warmest regards,
> bbatsell

The drama needed to end. Thank you all for your comments and the
opportunity to re-examine the matter. Please support MONGO when and
if he decides to try to do some more hard work for us.

Fred


list: foundation-l

from_name: cohesion

subject: [Foundation-l] The Paypal donation notice is very distracting

body:
On 12/16/06, Erik Moeller <erik at wikimedia.org> wrote:
> We'll be tweaking the notice a lot over the next few days, but it may,
> at times, get more "ugly" than you would like or even stay that way,
> depending on whether statistics indicate that it is necessary. The
> tiniest of notices is clearly not sufficient to raise the money we
> need. If you want to work without the notice, click the little
> [dismiss] link at the bottom right corner.
> --
> Peace & Love,
> Erik

I haven't seen anyone else ask this question, so I will go ahead. Is
there a pressing need for funds right now? Because if not I'm not
really clear on why we would do a fundraiser weeks before Christmas is
celebrated by so many of our would-be donors. I'm sure this has been
brought up, but could someone clarify it again?

Judson
[[:en:User:Cohesion]]


list: wikimedia-l


list: commons-l

subject: [Commons-l] Recruit photographers with your blog

body:
David Gerard wrote:
> On 15/12/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> I couldn't get to sleep, so I posted to my blog asking for missing
>> pics. At least one direct success! Maybe more to come! Would anyone
>> else like to try?
>
>
> Oh, and note that I didn't even try to explain Commons vs English
> Wikipedia or creating a login on both. There's a limit to how much
> complexity I can reasonably expect people to take in the first time.
> And I eagerly await single login and some sort of auto-redirect to
> Commons when the uploaded image is free content.
>

If en: has some sort of tag "this needs moving to Commons", I'm sure it
could be arranged; I twiddled [[MediaWiki:Licenses]] (on Commons)
yesterday to try and "catch" more of the Flickr images that get uploaded...

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP

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from_name: Jeffrey V. Merkey

subject: [Foundation-l] WMG Community Report/Status

body:
The Wolf Mountain Group has been reincorporated as a C Corporation with
10,000,000 shares of common/preffered stock and the LLC has been
dissolved effective November 19, 2006.  The company is now Wolf Mountain
Group, Inc.

I also received a disturbing email from Mr. Wales to the affect some
people in the community and business community seem to have a mistaken
belief that the Foundation and Wolf Mountain Group have some sort of
partnership.   I will clarify and address these statements.

There is NO formal partnership between the Wikimedia Foundation and the
Wolf Mountain Group, Inc.  of any kind, nor is there likely to be in the
future.   The basis for this position is that the Foundation is a
non-profit entity and the Wolf Mountain Group is a for profit domestic
corporation which is 100% owned and controlled by Tribal Members or
Tribal Entities of Native American Tribes.   A formal partnership
between the two entites would preclude our participation in many of the
programs of the Federal Government since the Foundation is not eligible
for participation in any of these these programs for Native American
Tribal entites.  WMG, Inc. as currently structured is eligible for 8(a)
status with the Federal Government, which means we come before minority
businesses and even the open bidding process due to our status on
equipment purchases and business arangements with the Federal
Government, ANA, and BIA.  A partnership with the Foundation would
preclude us from our primary mission to serve the Native American Tribes
with our programs and place this status in jeopardy.

I have no idea where this mistaken belief has originated, so I am
correcting it.   WMG is simply a consumer of Wikipedia content like many
other groups who work with the Wikipedia community, the Wikimedia
Foundation, and various stakeholders in the effort as do a large number
of other groups who interact with the Wikipedia projects.    Mr. Wales
is under some impression there is some sort of "bad blood" with various
members of the community as well he cannot correct.   My response to
this is its irrelevant to our mission and business objectives.  The last
company I co-founded sold to the Canopy Group for 3.9 million dollars,
and the one before to Network General for 10.1 million dollars, so I
know how to create profitable ventures and we do contribute to the
Foundation in many ways that are complementary.

My message to those with "bad blood" is get over it.   WMG isn't going
away, and and we have 175 languages to preserve.   I want everyone to
understand that our mission overshadows any personal issues people may
have with me personally, or our company.    We don't care, and to be
honest, its not relevant.  We all have our roles and as a consumer of
Wikipedia content we are a "customer" of sorts of your efforts.

We look forward to promoting Wikipedia content and working with the
Foundation as a Wikipedia customer and content consumer.    For anyone
spreading these rumors there is some sort of "partnership" we ask you to
please stop immediately.   These statements are untrue and contrary to
the facts.

Sincerely,

Jeff


from_name: bbatsell

subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
For all interested, this case is now 6-1 to close, which will be done
soon.

I have already expressed my extraordinary pleasure with the conduct
and precedents established by this decision on the Talk page, as have
many other well-respected administrators and Wikipedians.  There has
been no substantive change in response to these concerns by the
Arbitration Committee.

Warmest regards,
bbatsell


from_name: Rob Smith

subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On 12/16/06, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at waterwiki.info> wrote:
>
>
>
>
> The drama needed to end. Thank you all for your comments and the
> opportunity to re-examine the matter. Please support MONGO when and
> if he decides to try to do some more hard work for us.
>
> Fred

the workers at Kaesong Industrial park

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaesong_Industrial_Region

make more and probably get treated better than the hard working volunteers.

nobs


from_name: Husky

subject: [Foundation-l] Project proposal: Wikicafes

body:
You could also add caf? and pub reviews to the 'nightlife and entertainment'
sections on World66, a wiki travel guide. For example, pubs and clubs in
Utrecht, the Netherlands (where i live) can be found at:
http://www.world66.com/europe/netherlands/utrecht/nightlife

They have Google Ads, but they do license all content under a CC-BY-SA
1.0license (only text, not the images), so it's possible to copy
content to any
Wikimedia Wiki, because CC-BY-SA is compatible with the GFDL.

-- Hay Kranen / [[User:Husky]]

On 12/16/06, Sam <sam at co-operista.com> wrote:
>
> Thanks Angela,
>
> Or rather /wasn't/ active -- I see you've just added some content (at
> least I assume it was you?).  :-)  I'll post something there asking people
> for their feelings about another (hopefully better -- it's got google maps
> and no ads!) review wiki.
>
> Thanks,
> Sam Wilson.
>
> On Sat, December 16, 2006 6:54 pm, Angela wrote:
> >
> > One has existed at http://cafereview.wikia.com/ since May 2005 but it
> > hasn't been active yet.
> >
> > Angela.
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


from_name: David Gerard

body:
On 16/12/06, Alphax (Wikipedia email) <alphasigmax at gmail.com> wrote:

> If en: has some sort of tag "this needs moving to Commons", I'm sure it
> could be arranged; I twiddled [[MediaWiki:Licenses]] (on Commons)
> yesterday to try and "catch" more of the Flickr images that get uploaded...

The free licence tags themselves should generally be enough, shouldn't they?

- d.


from_name: Thomas Dalton

subject: [WikiEN-l] 1.9alpha redirecting loop after fresh install..

body:
Wrong list. This is a list for discussing Wikipedia, not MediaWiki.
There is another list for asking for help with MediaWiki installations
(I'm not sure what it's called).


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On Dec 16, 2006, at 1:14 PM, bbatsell wrote:

> I have already expressed my extraordinary pleasure with the conduct
> and precedents established by this decision on the Talk page <snip>

Er... displeasure.


from_name: Oldak Quill

subject: [WikiEN-l] Non-stupid WikiEN-l thread - Edition 4 I think

body:
On 15/12/06, James Hare <messedrocker at gmail.com> wrote:
> - If there was an article you'd love to see become FA, which one and why?

I'd like more articles on fundamental topics (especially scientific
articles like [[nature]], [[universe]], [[atom]], &c.) to be featured.
They just seem much harder to cover because there's so much content to
fit in and so many people know about them and want different aspects
introduced/emphasised.

--
Oldak Quill (oldakquill at gmail.com)


from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [WikiEN-l] Office actions

body:
Alphax (Wikipedia email) wrote:

>Earle Martin wrote:
>
>
>>In this case, it was an "office action", which appears to generally
>>equate to "putting stuff in the memory hole".
>>
>>Is it Foundation policy to hide official decisions of the Foundation?
>>Or is it Danny policy? Either way, it appears that the management of
>>this project is asymptotically approaching that of the Open[sic]
>>Directory Project.
>>
>>
>That's grounds for moderation, citizen.
>
While Earle's interpretation may be debatable, this kind of reaction
tends to put a chill on the conversation.  The suggestions are at least
possible, but easily rebuttable.  The kind of questions asked are
predictable in an environment where only limited real information is
made public.  If they are kept open without answers they are too easily
taken to logical conclusions of cabal and conspiracy.  A threat of
punishment only catalyses such a conclusion.

Ec


from_name: geni

body:
On 12/16/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 16/12/06, Alphax (Wikipedia email) <alphasigmax at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > If en: has some sort of tag "this needs moving to Commons", I'm sure it
> > could be arranged; I twiddled [[MediaWiki:Licenses]] (on Commons)
> > yesterday to try and "catch" more of the Flickr images that get uploaded...
>
>
> The free licence tags themselves should generally be enough, shouldn't they?
>

Generaly it is nice to know where something comes from.

--
geni


body:
On 16/12/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 12/16/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 16/12/06, Alphax (Wikipedia email) <alphasigmax at gmail.com> wrote:

> > > If en: has some sort of tag "this needs moving to Commons", I'm sure it
> > > could be arranged; I twiddled [[MediaWiki:Licenses]] (on Commons)
> > > yesterday to try and "catch" more of the Flickr images that get uploaded...

> > The free licence tags themselves should generally be enough, shouldn't they?

> Generaly it is nice to know where something comes from.

I mean for "this should be moved to Commons". Is there any reason I'm
not thinking of for not generally moving free content to Commons, as
the page on en:wp will continue to work just the same?

(I'm not thinking of exceptions like the en:wp main page pictures,
which are copied to en: and locked to allow local control of vandalism
etc. Are there other exceptions?)

- d.


from_name: Brad Patrick

body:
Cohesion - you bet.  We need to buy equipment and expand bandwidth as
soon as possible.  We have been barely keeping up.

cohesion wrote:
> On 12/16/06, Erik Moeller <erik at wikimedia.org> wrote:
>
>> We'll be tweaking the notice a lot over the next few days, but it may,
>> at times, get more "ugly" than you would like or even stay that way,
>> depending on whether statistics indicate that it is necessary. The
>> tiniest of notices is clearly not sufficient to raise the money we
>> need. If you want to work without the notice, click the little
>> [dismiss] link at the bottom right corner.
>> --
>> Peace & Love,
>> Erik
>>
>
> I haven't seen anyone else ask this question, so I will go ahead. Is
> there a pressing need for funds right now? Because if not I'm not
> really clear on why we would do a fundraiser weeks before Christmas is
> celebrated by so many of our would-be donors. I'm sure this has been
> brought up, but could someone clarify it again?
>
> Judson
> [[:en:User:Cohesion]]
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] Office actions

body:
James Hare wrote:

>Yes. We all know what happened to Erik Moeller.
>
>And now let's not speak of that incident ever again.
>
That would not be remedial.

It was an instructive incident about how quickly things can develop
badly.  To be instructive it needs to be depersonalized.  That Danny and
Erik were the persons involved is of no consequence.  It's evident from
the present thread that the incident did have a broader effect, because
some senior editors have become excessively cautious about being bold.

Ec


body:
On 16/12/06, Ryan Wetherell <renardius at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 12/15/06, Stan Shebs <stanshebs at earthlink.net> wrote:

> > Oy vey, that suggests the ultimate stage of Wikipediholism - altering
> > the real world so as influence articles!

> I wonder how often this has actually happened.

Wikipedia is a mirror with which to shape Jordanhill Railway Station.

(Jordanhill Railway Station has shown up in the Zork game on Uncyclopedia.)

- d.


body:
On 16/12/06, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 15/12/06, James Hare <messedrocker at gmail.com> wrote:

> > - If there was an article you'd love to see become FA, which one and why?

> I'd like more articles on fundamental topics (especially scientific
> articles like [[nature]], [[universe]], [[atom]], &c.) to be featured.
> They just seem much harder to cover because there's so much content to
> fit in and so many people know about them and want different aspects
> introduced/emphasised.

This is a vexed question - it's so much easier to make feature on a
specialist topic because everyone doesn't consider themselves an
instant expert. Though a few general topics have made FA.

- d.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Office actions

body:
Jimmy Wales wrote:

>But that's a problem that everyone wants to fix in an open, transparent,
>and loving way.  It is not very helpful to accuse Danny or the
>Foundation of any sort of "memory hole" policies or of becoming closed
>like the ODP.
>
>Please, let's all always move forward by assuming good faith.
>
"Memory holes" strike me more as a by-product of negligence than of any
assumption of faith, good or bad.  The person who lurks at the problem
article but does nothing to repair it may also operating on the
good-faith intent that he should not be meddling in a situation that he
knows nothing about.

Ec


from_name: Andre Engels

body:
2006/12/16, Husky <huskyr at gmail.com>:
>
> You could also add caf? and pub reviews to the 'nightlife and
> entertainment'
> sections on World66, a wiki travel guide. For example, pubs and clubs in
> Utrecht, the Netherlands (where i live) can be found at:
> http://www.world66.com/europe/netherlands/utrecht/nightlife
>
> They have Google Ads, but they do license all content under a CC-BY-SA
> 1.0license (only text, not the images), so it's possible to copy
> content to any
> Wikimedia Wiki, because CC-BY-SA is compatible with the GFDL.
>

Unfortunately, this is incorrect. Both CC-BY-SA and GFDL only allow
republication under the same license, not under a license that is somehow
'equivalent'.

--
Andre Engels, andreengels at gmail.com
ICQ: 6260644  --  Skype: a_engels


from_name: Michael Bimmler

body:
Guess what, it's called mediawiki-l
See http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-l for more information.
Michael

On 12/16/06, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:
> Wrong list. This is a list for discussing Wikipedia, not MediaWiki.
> There is another list for asking for help with MediaWiki installations
> (I'm not sure what it's called).
> _______________________________________________
> 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: [Foundation-l] Fundraising start

body:
> I have a memory of there being a page where one can read the donor
> comments. Was that on-wiki somewhere or just excerpts posted to
> mailing lists?
>

I remember that Daniel Mayer (or Danny Wool?) used to post his
favourite quotes on the mailinglist, together with a daily activity
report. The comments are also "unfiltered" on the web, see e.g.
http://fundraising.wikimedia.org/ongoing/index.php/2005-02-27/detail/

There is however a banner, stating "Data from October 27, 2006 on is
not shown here while we set up a new reporting system.", so I don't
know whether such a thing will also exist for the current fundraiser.
Michael


subject: [Foundation-l] Fundraising start


from_name: Steve Summit

subject:
[WikiEN-l] quick question: different policies for different
	namespaces?

body:
Steve Block wrote:
> Most people have already caught this.  I think the only ones that extend
> right across Wikipedia are the writing about living people policy,
> [[WP:BLP]], and the fair use policy, [[WP:FUC]].

I remembered BLP, but I forgot FUC (which is ironic, because
I was briefly embroiled in one of the recent debates on it).
Thanks to all who replied.


body:
On 12/16/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> I mean for "this should be moved to Commons". Is there any reason I'm
> not thinking of for not generally moving free content to Commons, as
> the page on en:wp will continue to work just the same?
>

Wating until we can move complete image histories to commons?

The effect of the current situations is that there are many images for
which only a en.wikipedia admin can find out their true history.

--
geni


body:
[re: mass-shifting of free-licence images from en:wp to commons]

On 16/12/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 12/16/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:

> > I mean for "this should be moved to Commons". Is there any reason I'm
> > not thinking of for not generally moving free content to Commons, as
> > the page on en:wp will continue to work just the same?

> Wating until we can move complete image histories to commons?
> The effect of the current situations is that there are many images for
> which only a en.wikipedia admin can find out their true history.

Ooh yes. Do we need to wait on single login for that to be a
reasonable thing to do? I understand a dev also has to explicitly
allow transwiki to move histories, though I'm not at all clear on the
details.

[cc'd to wikitech-l for my cluification]

- d.


subject: [Wikitech-l] [Commons-l] Recruit photographers with your blog


from_name: Tim Starling

subject: [WikiEN-l] Problems Connecting to Wiki

body:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
> If you can't load that error page, and it's only wikipedia that's a problem,
> then something very odd seems to be going on...

Not that odd, there are about 150 IP addresses that are blocked from any
kind of Wikipedia access, mostly remote loading websites. There should be
an "access denied" error message in this case. If there is no error
message, then the most common diagnosis is a routing problem in the user's
ISP.

In any case, it's a problem for a system administrator to track down, so
the best forum is the #wikimedia-tech channel on irc.freenode.net.

-- Tim Starling


from_name: Rob Church

body:
On 16/12/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> Ooh yes. Do we need to wait on single login for that to be a
> reasonable thing to do? I understand a dev also has to explicitly
> allow transwiki to move histories, though I'm not at all clear on the
> details.

As far as I know, Special:Import won't handle moving images in the
correct manner. Mind you, I've not been keeping 100% up to date with
what's developed lately, so I may well be wrong.

Rob Church


subject: [Commons-l] Fwd: [Wikitech-l] Recruit photographers with your blog

body:
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Rob Church <robchur at gmail.com>
Date: 16-Dec-2006 17:19
Subject: Re: [Wikitech-l] [Commons-l] Recruit photographers with your blog
To: Wikimedia developers <wikitech-l at wikimedia.org>

On 16/12/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> Ooh yes. Do we need to wait on single login for that to be a
> reasonable thing to do? I understand a dev also has to explicitly
> allow transwiki to move histories, though I'm not at all clear on the
> details.

As far as I know, Special:Import won't handle moving images in the
correct manner. Mind you, I've not been keeping 100% up to date with
what's developed lately, so I may well be wrong.

Rob Church
_______________________________________________
Wikitech-l mailing list
Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On Dec 16, 2006, at 5:20 PM, Jeff Raymond wrote:

> bbatsell wrote:
>
>>  There has
>> been no substantive change in response to these concerns by the
>> Arbitration Committee.
>
> Actually, the fact that all the arbitrators were voting unanimously
> until the shitstorm at the talk page, and then proceeded to not
> closefor
> a number of days, shows a remarkable change in typical response to the
> concerns of the community who stopped by the page.  If they could have
> been clearer regarding what specific evidence they used to come to the
> conclusion, perhaps that's something they should address in the
> future.
>
> We're not privy to a lot of the discussion they have on their mailing
> list, but I have no doubts in my mind that they discussed this quite a
> bit.  Thus the extra motions, thus the extra time for deliberation.
> Even if the result did not come in a way I favored, I wouldn't be able
> to criticize them for lack of consideration, and I don't think
> that's fair.
>
> If anything, I hope the 5 new folks who'll come on board show the
> same care.

I certainly didn't intend to intimate that there wasn't substantive
discussion amongst ArbCom members (as I have noted on the talk
page).  My problem is with the lack of communication with and
explanation to the general public.  The findings of fact do not
support the proposed remedies, and no communication or substantive
changes have been made in response to that.
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from_name: Erik Moeller

body:
On 12/16/06, Oleg Alexandrov <aoleg at math.ucla.edu> wrote:
> Can we make it one line only, just a pointer to a page where
> people can donate? The way it is now it is no better than an
> ugly advertisement to start with.

We'll be tweaking the notice a lot over the next few days, but it may,
at times, get more "ugly" than you would like or even stay that way,
depending on whether statistics indicate that it is necessary. The
tiniest of notices is clearly not sufficient to raise the money we
need. If you want to work without the notice, click the little
[dismiss] link at the bottom right corner.
--
Peace & Love,
Erik

DISCLAIMER: This message does not represent an official position of
the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.


from_name: Walter Vermeir

subject: [Wikitech-l] Giften

body:
There is layout problem with the Dutch donation page version. Does
anybody knows how to fix this?

The problem seems to be for IE 6.0 and SeaMonky

Walter

(forward email Aphaia approved)

Aphaia schreef:
> Hello Walter,
> thank you for your attention.
> Here is a capture.

http://wikizine.org/tmp/giften_seamonkey.png

> Setting is
> View 100% (fyi in 50% it is okay - four parallel columns)
> Window size is widen from the default but I have no idea how I count its
> size.
> Resolution, too (sorry).
> If the windows is maximized, it is okay. Quite it depends on settings
> possibly.
>
> ... we need to give it up?

http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Giften

I have done a browser test. My resolution 1024X768.

IE 6.0 (Wine)

Default XXXX

With larger font it become

XX
 X
X

FF 2.0 for linux

XXX
X

With smaller font it become XXXX

Epiphany - gnome desktop browser

XXX
 X

With smaller font it become XXXX

Mozilla 1.7.13 for linux

XXX
X

With smaller font it become XXXX

Opera 9.0 for linux

Default XXXX

With larger font it become
XXX
X

--
Contact: walter AT wikizine DOT org
Wikizine.org - news for and about the Wikimedia community


subject: [Wikitech-l] A frightening chart

body:
http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?site0=wikipedia.org&site1=google.com&site2=&site3=&site4=&y=p&z=0&h=400&w=700&range=3m&size=Large&url=wikipedia.org

So ... how long at our present cancerous rates of growth till our
traffic is 6x what it is now?

(We hit #10 on Alexa twice in the last month, by the way. Our smoothed
page rank is #12.)

- d.


from_name: Anthere

subject: [Foundation-l] Paypal in site notice

body:
daniwo59 at aol.com wrote:
> There are many ways to donate to the Foundation, not just Paypal. In fact,
> Paypal, while the most common, is also the most expensive for us and the most
> difficult for people in certain countries.
>
> We have redesigned the fundraising page to highlight the different ways
> people can donate. Based on the current site notice, the drive-by donor will
> never see that. The link to the donor page is completely counter-intuitive.
>
> Please remove the Paypal link from the site notice.
>
> Danny

Agreed.
I also removed the paypal donation box from the appeal, I thought having
three different places to call for donations through paypal was a bit
overkill.

I like very much the links above the faq page. Very handy.

Ant


subject: [Foundation-l] Paypal in site notice


from_name: Jeff Raymond

subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
bbatsell wrote:

>  There has
> been no substantive change in response to these concerns by the
> Arbitration Committee.

Actually, the fact that all the arbitrators were voting unanimously
until the shitstorm at the talk page, and then proceeded to not closefor
a number of days, shows a remarkable change in typical response to the
concerns of the community who stopped by the page.  If they could have
been clearer regarding what specific evidence they used to come to the
conclusion, perhaps that's something they should address in the future.

We're not privy to a lot of the discussion they have on their mailing
list, but I have no doubts in my mind that they discussed this quite a
bit.  Thus the extra motions, thus the extra time for deliberation.
Even if the result did not come in a way I favored, I wouldn't be able
to criticize them for lack of consideration, and I don't think that's fair.

If anything, I hope the 5 new folks who'll come on board show the same care.

-Jeff

--
Name: Jeff Raymond
E-mail: jeff.raymond at internationalhouseofbacon.com
WWW: http://www.internationalhouseofbacon.com
IM: badlydrawnjeff
Quote: "As the hobbits are going up Mount Doom, the
	Eye of Mordor is being drawn somewhere else."
	- Sen. Rick Santorum on the war in Iraq.


from_name: Sam

body:
Hi,

Has anyone here checked out Wikipubs.org, the pub guide wiki?  It's a
proposed wikimedia project.  Anyway, I propose a similar guidebook for
caf?s and coffeehouses: Wikicaf?s.  A place for information, reviews,
photos and so forth.

  Proposal information: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikicafes
  Demonstration site:   http://www.wikicafes.co-operista.com

I've searched and searched but can't find any other site out there that
lets users submit their own reviews of caf?s, let alone gives them the
democratic power of a wiki.

Regards,
Sam Wilson


from_name: Angela

body:
On 12/16/06, Sam <sam at co-operista.com> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> Has anyone here checked out Wikipubs.org, the pub guide wiki?  It's a
> proposed wikimedia project.  Anyway, I propose a similar guidebook for
> caf?s and coffeehouses: Wikicaf?s.  A place for information, reviews,
> photos and so forth.
>
>   Proposal information: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikicafes
>   Demonstration site:   http://www.wikicafes.co-operista.com

One has existed at http://cafereview.wikia.com/ since May 2005 but it
hasn't been active yet.

Angela.


subject: [Foundation-l] Steward elections

body:
Hello

I am aware the elections are over. Please allow us a few days to settle
down on that. We are currently working pretty hard over the fundraising
stuff (when we do not lose our times waiting in airports forever for the
ultimate flight to Belgrade...)

Thanks for the patience

Anthere


subject: [Foundation-l] Steward elections


from_name: GerardM

subject: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Foundation's help to the projects

body:
On 12/13/06, Michael Bimmler <mbimmler at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 12/13/06, Yann Forget <yann at forget-me.net> wrote:
>
> > 2. Helping small projects. It seems that some projects have a difficult
> > start. Indian languages projects are my first examples. I will go to
> > India in January, and I would like to use this opportunity to recruit
> > new contributors. The Foundation could help coordinate this kind of
> > recruitement.
> >
> Isn't this in the domain of Special Projects Committee resp. its
> 'language' subcommitee?
> >From
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special_projects_subcommittees/New_languages
>
> The Wikipedia Foundation Special projects language subcommittee is in
> charge of (...) supporting and coordinating new projects to optimize
> their success.

Hoi,
The language sub committee involves itself in particularly technical things
that are related to languages. In the past there have been projects adopted
that are fundamentally wrong because the scope of that project is not in
line with what it advertises. Also we have had projects started where the
name of the language is squatted by something that may be close but is not
that language.

When new projects have technical issues, we will try to find a technical
solution. It is for instance only recently that I learned that one of our
existing language projects is missing glyphs in UNICODE so it cannot even be
properly shown ...

Thanks,
   GerardM


body:
Thanks Angela,

Or rather /wasn't/ active -- I see you've just added some content (at
least I assume it was you?).  :-)  I'll post something there asking people
for their feelings about another (hopefully better -- it's got google maps
and no ads!) review wiki.

Thanks,
Sam Wilson.

On Sat, December 16, 2006 6:54 pm, Angela wrote:
>
> One has existed at http://cafereview.wikia.com/ since May 2005 but it
> hasn't been active yet.
>
> Angela.


from_name: Steve Block

subject:
[WikiEN-l] quick question: different policies for
	different	namespaces?

body:
Steve Summit wrote:
> Can someone remind me where it's stated how our policies are
> applied differently for different namespaces, and how many of
> those differences there are?  I'm pretty sure the rules for talk
> pages are different, but are there also significant differences
> between "project" pages and the main namespace (i.e. ns:0)?

Most people have already caught this.  I think the only ones that extend
right across Wikipedia are the writing about living people policy,
[[WP:BLP]], and the fair use policy, [[WP:FUC]].

--
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition.
Version: 7.1.409 / Virus Database: 268.15.19/587 - Release Date: 14/12/06


from_name: Thomas Dalton

body:
> I mean, we don't go
> around tagging {{wikibreak}} with {{fact}} :D

Although, in some cases...


from_name: Gregory Maxwell

subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On 12/15/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> No, because that makes work for the moderators. We should instead
> declare open season on such offenders!
>
> ("But my email program makes me top-post!" "Then get a keyboard with
> arrow keys. *BLAM*")

The mobile gmail client makes it impossible to do anything except top post.
You can't trim either.

The mail client built into the RIM blackberry isn't much better.

(and yes, sometimes I use gmail mobile client, .. you can tell.. it's
the posts where I top post and dont trim)


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On 12/16/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 17/12/06, Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > The mobile gmail client makes it impossible to do anything except top post.
> > You can't trim either.
> > (and yes, sometimes I use gmail mobile client, .. you can tell.. it's
> > the posts where I top post and dont trim)
>
> Ah, that's the Gmail lo-fi interface? You can still open a full edit
> box, just *don't* hit "quick reply".

No I'm referring to the native java client for mobile phones. It only
offers the lofi interface.


from_name: zero 0000

subject: [WikiEN-l] The boundaries of OR

body:
Here is a scenario that explores the boundaries of
what counts as Original Reseach.  Suppose there is
a legal issue about which there are two popular
opinions, say A and B.

Now I log into a well-known depository of legal
journals and search for this issue.  I get about 20 hits.
Then I look at each of these hits (articles published
in peer-reviewed law journals) and in all cases the
writer gives opinion A.

Ok, so now I am itching to write in Wikipedia
something like: "The consensus amongst legal
scholars is that opinion A is correct"  (or similar),
with a footnote stating the evidence.

Can I do that?  My sources were the best that exist,
and everything I did can be verified easily by anyone
with a good library.  On the other hand, I have drawn
my own conclusions from these observations so
maybe I'm afoul of the No Original Research policy.

I tend to think it's ok because the conclusions I drew
were the same as any reasonable person would draw,
and these conclusions don't require any private
information.  I admit it is a boundary case though.
What do you think?

--Zero.

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


from_name: Aphaia

subject: [Foundation-l] Fundraising start

body:
On 12/16/06, Brianna Laugher <brianna.laugher at gmail.com> wrote:
> BTW "Our projects" on the Foundation website appears not to mention Wikiversity.

We've encouraged Wikiversity folks to submit a description since this
October and thanksfully got a draft recently.

Is the current version on meta is okay for you? > 'versities
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Translation_requests/WMF/Our_projects/En:#Wikiversity

If you all like it, let us move it on [[m:TR/quick]] for updating the
wmf website "Our projects".

Btw, there is another Wikiversity related request on [[m:TR/quick]],
waiting for Chinese, Portuguese and Polish editors for featuring it on
the project list on top page. Your help to revise the list will be
appreciated.

Cheers,
--
KIZU Naoko
  Wikiquote: http://wikiquote.org
  * Nessuna poesia prima di noi *


subject: [Foundation-l] Fundraising start


from_name: Matthew Brown

subject: [WikiEN-l] The boundaries of OR

body:
Hmm.  It IS original research of a sort, BUT can be sourced.  It would
be best to find some kind of meta-article out there that reviews the
current state of opinion and says the words you want.

If you can't find one, I feel it would be appropriate to state it
carefully.  Rather than blanket stating "A consensus of legal
scholars", you might want to say something more specific.

-Matt


from_name: David Gerard

subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On 16/12/06, Jeff Raymond <jeff.raymond at internationalhouseofbacon.com> wrote:

> We're not privy to a lot of the discussion they have on their mailing
> list, but I have no doubts in my mind that they discussed this quite a
> bit.  Thus the extra motions, thus the extra time for deliberation.
> Even if the result did not come in a way I favored, I wouldn't be able
> to criticize them for lack of consideration, and I don't think that's fair.

I'm not on the AC but I am on the list (and am a listadmin), and I
don't think I'm giving anything away by confirming that the matter has
been discussed afresh at great length. Not everyone agrees by a long
shot, but this is a really hard one and there's no way everyone would
be happy with any result. But then, that's why being on the AC is hard
work.

> If anything, I hope the 5 new folks who'll come on board show the same care.

What tends to happen is a month or two of enthusiasm then burnout,
from dealing with wholesale quantities of the most corrosive
industrial-strength stupid to be found in wikidom. This is a tricky
one to try to work past ...

- d.


from_name: A

subject: [WikiEN-l] Office actions

body:
The major issue with WP:OFFICE as I see it is an admin/non-admin problem.
When [[Paul Barresi]] was stubbed per WP:OFFICE in April, the article was
still editable, so an interested editor simply had to adopt the article and
add carefully sourced statements one by one. No problemo.

In the case of [[Pacific Western University]], the article is only editable
by admins. Several good non-admin editors have developed serviceable scratch
articles in the last four months. I suppose there's a question whether these
scratch articles should even be on Wikipedia if the actual article is in
lockdown.

There's really no clear system to discuss those proposed versions, come to a
consensus, and incorporate those changes. What we end up with is multiple
people saying on the article's talk page, "Hey, check out this version I
wrote," or "Let's add this well-sourced statement," but then there's no one
coordinating or incorporating the consensus-based additions.

Instead, and I have found this extremely frustrating in the case of the PWU
article, we get unilateral decisions made by admins regarding changes. For
instance, an editor who created a well-sourced scratch article also created
a [[List of Pacific Western University people]] containing a rather crufty
but well-sourced list of people claiming degrees from PWU, some of whom are
notable. The article was put up for AfD, but was instead quickly deleted in
its entirety, edit history and all, with the sourced statements about
notable alumni removed as well. I understand the need for caution, but this
kind of unilateral decision to completely delete articles containing useful
material that could be merged into other articles is what drives good people
from the project. The information can't even be retrieved by non-admins and
adds to the growing sense that non-admins are less important/less valued
contributors. Because they were redlinked in the PWU scratch article, I
gathered a lot of information and started articles on three officers of PWU,
including the founder, president, and owner, all of which were similarly
deleted on sight by JzG. The simultaneous lack of process with WP:OFFICE and
the unilateral deletion of all ancillary PWU articles made today my least
favorite Wikipedia user experience to date.

My from-the-trenches suggestions:

- Impartial admin(s) assigned to each OFFICEd article at the moment it is
protected (preferably someone with no edits to the article prior to
WP:OFFICE). Perhaps randomly chosen from an existing pool of volunteers and
an a WP:COI clearance for the article in question. That person would be
listed on the talk page as the coordinator and would check back in each day
and respond to proposed changes.
- A registration system for articles locked down by WP:OFFICE for impartial
non-admins to make edits, perhaps with a high threshold (edit number, WP:COI
clearance, etc.).
- Barring that, a centralized location where a scratch article can be
prepared and discussed by admins and non-admins alike, possibly
registration-only or off-site.

I recommend adopting the first suggestion immediately, and then discussing
the other options somewhere before implementing them. All the Office has to
do is lock and stub the disputed article, then the WP:OFFICE admin pool
would take it from there. I believe articles would slowly but surely move
toward unprotection from there, rather than languishing for many months
under the current system.

Jokestress


from_name: bbatsell

subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On Dec 16, 2006, at 11:24 PM, Jimmy Wales wrote:
>> My problem is with the lack of communication with and explanation
>> to the
>> general public.  The findings of fact do not support the proposed
>> remedies, and no communication or substantive changes have been
>> made in
>> response to that.
>
> Wow.  The findings of fact very very strongly support the proposed
> remedies.  AND the Arbcom has very carefully and extensively discussed
> the concerns about this that some members of the community have
> raised.

Jimbo, you just so happened to trim the part of my e-mail where I
fully acknowledged your third sentence.  Not sure why you felt it was
necessary to trim and then tell me something I already knew and
stated, other than to try to make me look even sillier than I already
do by being called out by [[WP:JIMBO]].

I'd like to point you to the analysis of the findings of fact
provided for MONGO's desysopping done by Radiant [1] (also, see
Renesis [2], Durin [3], and Newyorkbrad [4]).  If you feel that the
findings of fact match up with the proposed remedy of desysopping,
then I think we need to have some policy clarification for several of
the points raised by Radiant in particular.  If ArbCom really feels
that the findings of fact are rock solid, then I think they need to
explain why and respond publicly to the numerous complaints raised.
As I've said numerous times, I'm aware of and fully appreciate the
amount of private discussion that must have gone into this decision.

Again, all I am asking for is communication.  After this thread in
enwiki, plus the talk page at RfAr, I have no idea what half of this
decision means for me as an administrator.  I don't know when I can
protect or even unprotect an article anymore.  I really don't think
communication is too much to ask for, and I don't understand why I'm
being publicly derided by Jimmy Wales for asking for it.

Warmest regards,
bbatsell

P.S. I hope the links come through, but if they do not, they are below:
[1] http://tinyurl.com/wrkrq
[2] http://tinyurl.com/yy5d5b
[3] http://tinyurl.com/y94x2k
[4] http://tinyurl.com/yxyuzz


from_name: Jimmy Wales

subject: [WikiEN-l] Office actions

body:
Parker Peters wrote:
>> The point is, mistakes are made, errors are reversible, assuming good
>> faith and trying to listen to each other is always better than the
>> alternatives.
>>
>
> Precisely, Jimbo.
>
> And assuming good faith, and asking what the boundaries are before doing
> something when OFFICE is potentially involved, would seem to be a good
> course of action, would it not?

Yes.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Office actions

body:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
>>> I would recommend protection or semi-protection at this point, but with
>>> the idea that even if protected admins are (as compared to normal
>>> protection) actually encouraged to come help with the article.
>>>
>> Admins have rather a lot of other things to do. Admin only editing of
>> articles does not strike me as a good idea. In theory at least when it
>> comes to editing we are all equal.
>
> Jimbo said protection *or semi-protection*. Perhaps more OFFICE
> articles should be semi-protected, rather than protected.

Probably, although the cases vary widely and assuming good faith of
Danny and Brad seems to be in our best interest overall.

> Especially not when [[WP:OFFICE]] says:
>
> "The following pages are currently under full Office protection and
> full page protection and must not be edited by anyone not explicitly
> authorised to do so."
>
>>From following this thread, I think what that means is the article
> should be edited on a temporary subpage and then get explicit
> authorisation to move the subpage to the main page. If that's what's
> intended, it should be made clearer.

Given that we have seen that things tend to end up under office
protection for rather longer than we would like, I think we should try
to come up with gradations, at a minimum.

--Jimbo


from_name: brion at pobox.com

subject: [Wikitech-l] MediaWiki automated test run failure 2006-12-17

body:
An automated run of parserTests.php showed the following failures:

Reading tests from "/home/brion/src/wiki/phase3/maintenance/parserTests.txt"...
Running test TODO: Table security: embedded pipes (http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2006-April/034637.html)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Link containing double-single-quotes '' (bug 4598)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: message transform: <noinclude> in transcluded template (bug 4926)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: message transform: <onlyinclude> in transcluded template (bug 4926)... FAILED!
Running test BUG 1887, part 2: A <math> with a thumbnail- math enabled... FAILED!
Running test TODO: HTML bullet list, unclosed tags (bug 5497)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: HTML ordered list, unclosed tags (bug 5497)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: HTML nested bullet list, open tags (bug 5497)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: HTML nested ordered list, open tags (bug 5497)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Parsing optional HTML elements (Bug 6171)... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Inline HTML vs wiki block nesting... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Mixing markup for italics and bold... FAILED!
Running test TODO: 5 quotes, code coverage +1 line... FAILED!
Running test TODO: dt/dd/dl test... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Images with the "|" character in the comment... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Parents of subpages, two levels up, without trailing slash or name.... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Parents of subpages, two levels up, with lots of extra trailing slashes.... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Don't fall for the self-closing div... FAILED!
Running test TODO: Always escape literal '>' in output, not just after '<'... FAILED!

Reading tests from "/home/brion/src/wiki/phase3/extensions/Cite/citeParserTests.txt"...

Reading tests from "/home/brion/src/wiki/phase3/extensions/Poem/poemParserTests.txt"...

Passed 458 of 477 tests (96.02%)... FAILED!


subject: [WikiEN-l] Office actions

body:
Delirium wrote:
> That's what I am unclear on (and I imagine some others are too).  My
> original understanding of WP:OFFICE was that it was a quick-fix
> lockdown: while the Foundation is trying to sort out an imminent
> problem, the page gets stubbed or blanked and has a WP:OFFICE banner on
> it, giving the Foundation a bit of temporary breathing room to do the
> sorting out.
>
> But it seems that's not what it's *actually* being used for, since the
> banner sometimes stays for months and there doesn't seem to be any of
> that "sorting out" activity going on in the meantime.

Right, but this is not intended.  We who do not work in the office (and
I do not work in the office, remember) need to remember that those who
do are overwhelmed.  They have good reasons for flagging things, but
they can't always follow up on everything themselves... it's too much.

We, good experience editors who have a sensitivity to both legal
situations and human dignity, should stand ready to carefully try to
help make NPOV articles when there is a problem, without a lot of
ludicrous accusations of bias and whatnot.

> So what is
> actually intended?  That the article be rewritten cautiously from
> scratch?  How long does the WP:OFFICE banner (and protection) stay on in
> that case?  Basically I'm unsure what, as a normal editor, I should do
> with regards to such pages.  My original understanding was that I should
> just leave the page alone for a few days, pending someone figuring out
> the situation and re-opening editing from a new starting point.  But
> maybe that's not the process?

I think right now we don't know.  This needs to be fixed, so that we
have a better system.

--Jimbo


subject: [WikiEN-l] Office actions

body:
Erik Moeller wrote:
> I don't think it's likely that an editor will be indef-blocked for
> good faith edits anytime soon -- and if it does happen, we'll try to
> straighten it out ASAP.

Precisely.

> Most of the articles under office protection
> end up there because they were written by people not familiar with our
> policies of verifiability and neutrality, or those deliberately
> violating them. In general, the process is: stub it down and start
> from scratch, with more trusted editors taking the lead.
>
> I think the office process is still one we need to eventually reform
> (make more transparent, scalable, etc.). But right now we're in the
> middle of a major fundraiser and other organizational reforms, so it's
> not the highest priority for Board+ED+Legal Counsel.

:)

--Jimbo


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
> My problem is with the lack of communication with and explanation to the
> general public.  The findings of fact do not support the proposed
> remedies, and no communication or substantive changes have been made in
> response to that.

Wow.  The findings of fact very very strongly support the proposed
remedies.  AND the Arbcom has very carefully and extensively discussed
the concerns about this that some members of the community have raised.

--Jimbo


from_name: Erik Moeller

subject: [WikiEN-l] Office actions

body:
On 12/15/06, Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com> wrote:
> ... to get the answers he needs so that he doesn't step on the toes of
> OFFICE.
>
> If those answers aren't provided, if OFFICE isn't willing to tell an ..

As an aside, could we stop writing "office" in ALL CAPITAL LETTERS?
It's starting to kind of creep me out. ;-) The office is not _that_
impressive; believe me, I've been there. :-)

I don't think it's likely that an editor will be indef-blocked for
good faith edits anytime soon -- and if it does happen, we'll try to
straighten it out ASAP. Most of the articles under office protection
end up there because they were written by people not familiar with our
policies of verifiability and neutrality, or those deliberately
violating them. In general, the process is: stub it down and start
from scratch, with more trusted editors taking the lead.

I think the office process is still one we need to eventually reform
(make more transparent, scalable, etc.). But right now we're in the
middle of a major fundraiser and other organizational reforms, so it's
not the highest priority for Board+ED+Legal Counsel.
--
Peace & Love,
Erik

DISCLAIMER: This message does not represent an official position of
the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.


from_name: Brianna Laugher

subject: [Foundation-l] Fundraising start

body:
I really like Anthere's appeal (
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Give_the_gift_of_knowledge ). It
is straightforward and clear about how the funds connect to the goals.

I have a memory of there being a page where one can read the donor
comments. Was that on-wiki somewhere or just excerpts posted to
mailing lists?

BTW "Our projects" on the Foundation website appears not to mention Wikiversity.

cheers
Brianna
user:pfctdayelise


subject: [Foundation-l] Fundraising start


from_name: Stephen Bain

subject: [Foundation-l] [Wmfcc-l] Fundraising start

body:
On 12/16/06, Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:
>
> Yeah, that seems perfectly fine to me.  Actually I'm surprised it was
> the *anonymous* donor people would be worried about.  Personally I'm a
> bit wary of the non-anonymous donors being listened in
> sitenotices---someone paying money to get their name on the top of all
> Wikipedia pages for a time (as "thanks", naturally) sounds awfully like
> the functional equivalent of them buying ad space, only with the quid
> pro quo more implicit...

If my memory serves me correctly, the issue with the sponsor for
Wikimania being anonymous during the bidding process was that some
people were worried about whether they would be able to verify that
the bid did actually have the backing of the sponsor. That isn't
really applicable here.

--
Stephen Bain
stephen.bain at gmail.com


from_name: Earle Martin

body:
On 15/12/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> [[Image:Autofellatio 2.jpg]], shirley!

Which led me to the fascinating [[MediaWiki:Bad image list]], which I
probably wouldn't count as a favourite, but interesting nonetheless.

--
Earle Martin
            http://downlode.org/
http://purl.org/net/earlemartin/


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On 17/12/06, Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell at gmail.com> wrote:

> The mobile gmail client makes it impossible to do anything except top post.
> You can't trim either.
> (and yes, sometimes I use gmail mobile client, .. you can tell.. it's
> the posts where I top post and dont trim)

Ah, that's the Gmail lo-fi interface? You can still open a full edit
box, just *don't* hit "quick reply".

- d.


from_name: Andrew Lih

body:
On 12/17/06, cohesion <cohesion at sleepyhead.org> wrote:
> On 12/16/06, Erik Moeller <erik at wikimedia.org> wrote:
> > We'll be tweaking the notice a lot over the next few days, but it may,
> > at times, get more "ugly" than you would like or even stay that way,
> > depending on whether statistics indicate that it is necessary. The
> > tiniest of notices is clearly not sufficient to raise the money we
> > need. If you want to work without the notice, click the little
> > [dismiss] link at the bottom right corner.
> > --
> > Peace & Love,
> > Erik
>
> I haven't seen anyone else ask this question, so I will go ahead. Is
> there a pressing need for funds right now? Because if not I'm not
> really clear on why we would do a fundraiser weeks before Christmas is
> celebrated by so many of our would-be donors. I'm sure this has been
> brought up, but could someone clarify it again?

Money is needed for funds/staffing, and another factor is that for
Americans, there is an incentive to donate at the end of the year for
tax deduction purposes.

-Andrew (User:Fuzheado)


from_name: Rob Church

subject:
[Wikitech-l] fixing lines automatically which run through the
	border

body:
On 17/12/06, Jax <cybercorecentre at gmail.com> wrote:
> So I made a test post in wikipedia which demonstrate my problem (I hope
> they don't delete it): http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Thisisatest

Someone deleted it.

> As you see if you copy text files to the mediawiki then some line will
> overruns the border and after you got thousands of pages in your wiki it
> can't be fix by hand. This wiki is not public, I need to maintain it for
> my company so I can't just ask someone to setup a bot to fix it even if
> that's a solution.

The problem seems to be that some lines prefixed with spaces are
creeping in from the source text. MediaWiki treats this as a cue to
enter <pre> mode, which means that formatting and line breaks are up
to the user. To correct this, delete the preceding spaces at the start
of each line.

To fix this in bulk, you could write a quickie maintenance script
which whizzes through all pages in the database (or just those you
specify) and performs this edit for you, saving the page if changes
were made.

Rob Church


from_name: jayjg

subject: [WikiEN-l] The boundaries of OR

body:
On 12/17/06, zero 0000 <nought_0000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Here is a scenario that explores the boundaries of
> what counts as Original Reseach.  Suppose there is
> a legal issue about which there are two popular
> opinions, say A and B.
>
> Now I log into a well-known depository of legal
> journals and search for this issue.  I get about 20 hits.
> Then I look at each of these hits (articles published
> in peer-reviewed law journals) and in all cases the
> writer gives opinion A.
>
> Ok, so now I am itching to write in Wikipedia
> something like: "The consensus amongst legal
> scholars is that opinion A is correct"  (or similar),
> with a footnote stating the evidence.
>
> Can I do that?  My sources were the best that exist,
> and everything I did can be verified easily by anyone
> with a good library.  On the other hand, I have drawn
> my own conclusions from these observations so
> maybe I'm afoul of the No Original Research policy.
>
> I tend to think it's ok because the conclusions I drew
> were the same as any reasonable person would draw,
> and these conclusions don't require any private
> information.  I admit it is a boundary case though.
> What do you think?

It's obviously original research. You could certainly state that "A
number of legal scholars have stated that...", with your reference,
but it's not up to you to decide that "legal consensus" is, it's up to
experts in the area.

Jay.


subject: [WikiEN-l] The boundaries of OR

body:
On 12/17/06, Stephen Bain <stephen.bain at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 12/17/06, zero 0000 <nought_0000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> >
> > Ok, so now I am itching to write in Wikipedia
> > something like: "The consensus amongst legal
> > scholars is that opinion A is correct"  (or similar),
> > with a footnote stating the evidence.
> >
> > Can I do that?  My sources were the best that exist,
> > and everything I did can be verified easily by anyone
> > with a good library.  On the other hand, I have drawn
> > my own conclusions from these observations so
> > maybe I'm afoul of the No Original Research policy.
>
> Of course that's ok. Original research in that scenario would be to
> say "the consensus among legal scholars is A, but they haven't
> considered C, and therefore D is the correct position."
>
> Original research is about posing new theories, or making new
> inferences, or drawing new conclusions that are your own opinions and
> involve some element of analysis or synthesis. Fundamentally, original
> research is introducing your own original thought into articles.

And, of course, drawing your own conclusions and stating that there is
a "legal consensus" on this matter, based on your own research into
what various legal scholars have said, is a prime example of original
research. Quote the scholars, list their names, state that there are a
number of them, but don't introduce your own original thought that
these selected sources have created a "legal consensus".

Jay.

>
> Here you're simply stating an obvious fact: all sources support A.
> Drawing conclusions from this in a way that amounts to original
> thought would be something like "all sources support A and as a result
> E, F and G".
>
> --
> Stephen Bain
> stephen.bain at gmail.com
> _______________________________________________
> 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: Jax

subject: [Wikitech-l] fixing lines automatically which run through the border

body:
Hey guys!

I can't solve this problem and asked many people about it on the
#mediawiki channel. My last shot was to try
pywikipediabot.sourceforge.net but I can't figure it out how could I run
this on my own wiki.

So I made a test post in wikipedia which demonstrate my problem (I hope
they don't delete it): http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Thisisatest

As you see if you copy text files to the mediawiki then some line will
overruns the border and after you got thousands of pages in your wiki it
can't be fix by hand. This wiki is not public, I need to maintain it for
my company so I can't just ask someone to setup a bot to fix it even if
that's a solution.

The thing is it can be fixed by hand if I go to the start of the
overrunning lines and hit enter \n then it will only fix this invisible
character or what should I call this.  If it's not must then I don't
want to use any bot to fix it.

If you have any idea how can be fixed in the whole wiki than please tell me.

Thanks

Jax


from_name: Daniel P. B. Smith

subject: [WikiEN-l] The boundaries of OR

body:
> From: zero 0000 <nought_0000 at yahoo.com>

> Now I log into a well-known depository of legal
> journals and search for this issue.  I get about 20 hits.
> Then I look at each of these hits (articles published
> in peer-reviewed law journals) and in all cases the
> writer gives opinion A.
>
> Ok, so now I am itching to write in Wikipedia
> something like: "The consensus amongst legal
> scholars is that opinion A is correct"  (or similar),
> with a footnote stating the evidence.
>
> Can I do that?

The point is, _you probably don't need to_. If your opinion is firmly
founded on facts, there's no need to state it at all. You don't need
to spell it out for the reader. You can just say "All men are mortal.
Socrates is a man," and leave it at that.

Sidestep the issue by stating the facts _without_ explicitly stating
my interpretation. Pick a couple of the best or most-respected
journals, or the articles that state opinion A in the flattest and
most succinct way. In the article, put "According to [bigshot author]
in [leading journal] says 'A is absolutely correct because blah
blah,' while [distinguished writer] in [respected journal] says
'Because of compelling reasons yada yada, A is correct.'"

In the footnote, after citing the sources actually quoted, if you
think it is important you could add "other sources with similar
opinions are" and cite and quote a couple more of the best.

I think you can document my borderline-original-research on the Talk
page, saying I found these twenty references or whatever, because I
believe it's perfectly OK to present original research on Talk pages
in hopes of influencing other editors' behavior.

Don't try to keep opinion B out of the article if it's sourced. If
the legal community thinks opinion B is bizarre, though, by all means
find someone who says so and cite and quote them.

For a recent concrete example... so recent that my success or failure
isn't clear yet... although looking at my interactions with another
editor I think it's going to stick...

in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_bombing I had written "The term
was popularized by the controversial psychiatrist Margaret Singer."
An editor objected to the word "controversial."

So, I changed the sentence to "The term was popularized by the
clinical psychologist Margaret Singer, who has become closely
identified with the love-bombing-as-brainwashing point of view."

And I added a source citation, and a quotation, in a footnote,
reading, ""One particular California psychologist, Margaret Singer,
has been involved in offering testimony supporting cult brainwashing
theories in over 40 such cases.... Such testimony, even though
apparently effective, has drawn the ire of some scholar studying
newer religions. These scholars claimed that such testimony should be
disallowed because itdoes not represent a consensus position of
scholars in the relevant fields of study, and it disregards
considerable evidence that participation is virtually always a
volitional act."

You see the point? Is Singer "controversial?" Instead of drawing that
conclusion for the reader, I briefly state a fact which explains why
she _might_ be controversial, and back it up with a source citation
and a quote so that anyone can judge whether my brief statement is a
fair statement of the gist of the source.


from_name: geni

subject: [WikiEN-l] The boundaries of OR

body:
On 12/17/06, zero 0000 <nought_0000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Here is a scenario that explores the boundaries of
> what counts as Original Reseach.  Suppose there is
> a legal issue about which there are two popular
> opinions, say A and B.
>
> Now I log into a well-known depository of legal
> journals and search for this issue.  I get about 20 hits.
> Then I look at each of these hits (articles published
> in peer-reviewed law journals) and in all cases the
> writer gives opinion A.
>
> Ok, so now I am itching to write in Wikipedia
> something like: "The consensus amongst legal
> scholars is that opinion A is correct"  (or similar),
> with a footnote stating the evidence.
>
> Can I do that?

No because you don't appear to have considered the role of publication
bias (obviously doing a funnel plot in this case is going to be trick
though).

> My sources were the best that exist,
> and everything I did can be verified easily by anyone
> with a good library.  On the other hand, I have drawn
> my own conclusions from these observations so
> maybe I'm afoul of the No Original Research policy.
>
> I tend to think it's ok because the conclusions I drew
> were the same as any reasonable person would draw,
> and these conclusions don't require any private
> information.

There problem is that they are not. Some might talk about publication
bias others might disspute elements of your search.
--
geni


from_name: theProject

subject: [WikiEN-l] Office actions

body:
On 12/17/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
>
> We still have the odd cases like Gregory Lauder-Frost where the office
> action was the result of his legal advisors stating that we could not
> mention his conviction for fraud because of the UK's Rehabilitation of
> Offenders Act.  That demands actual legal advice.  As it happens, the
> Act only prevents "spent" convictions being mentioned in a defamatory
> way, there is no apparent restriction on coverage in a neutral,
> independent biography, and his friends did not help his case by
> initially including the case but claiming that he had been cleared on
> appeal - it was possible (though certainly not trivial) to verify that
> this was simply not true, and it was only when we included the
> citations to back up the conviction and failed appeal that they pulled
> the office stunt.

Whoa, whoa, whoa. How would Wiki[m/p]edia, in the United States, be subject
to a law in the United Kingdom? Just because some country has a law that
would prevent Wikipedia from stating something about some particular topic
doesn't mean Wikipedia has to follow it. If we followed North Korean or
Chinese or Iranian laws on free speech, I have the feeling some of our
articles would be pretty blank. :-)

Or should we even try discussing that, because most of us aren't lawyers?

--
theProject


from_name: xaosflux

body:
Many of the policies have grown to the point of being able to tell if they
are article or site policies.  Look for the key term "article" or "page" in
the policy.  Most policies are either article policies or user-conduct
policies.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Steve Block" <steve.block at myrealbox.com>
To: "English Wikipedia" <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
Sent: Saturday, December 16, 2006 3:17 PM
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] quick question: different policies fordifferent
namespaces?

> Steve Summit wrote:
>> Can someone remind me where it's stated how our policies are
>> applied differently for different namespaces, and how many of
>> those differences there are?  I'm pretty sure the rules for talk
>> pages are different, but are there also significant differences
>> between "project" pages and the main namespace (i.e. ns:0)?
>
> Most people have already caught this.  I think the only ones that extend
> right across Wikipedia are the writing about living people policy,
> [[WP:BLP]], and the fair use policy, [[WP:FUC]].
>
>
>
> --
> No virus found in this outgoing message.
> Checked by AVG Free Edition.
> Version: 7.1.409 / Virus Database: 268.15.19/587 - Release Date: 14/12/06
>
> _______________________________________________
> 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: Anthere

subject: [Foundation-l] WMF mission

body:
There is no "that's our commitment" in the vision statement which was
discussed during the board retreat. It should be removed.

Ant

(vision Aphaia, not mission, vision :-))

Aphaia wrote:
> Now the home page of its website says,
> "Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in
> the sum of all knowledge. That's our commitment."
>
> Is it a final version we can call for translators (at least for website)?
>
> Besides that, one day I found a question about that on feedback page.
> An anonymous inquirer was worried if married people had no seat in the
> world we've envisioned ;) It is always difficult to talk without
> misunderstanding .....
>


subject: [Foundation-l] WMF mission


from_name: Mafius

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Accents links and images appear in red when migrate
	hosting

body:
Hi,
i change my hosting server and i try to import with utf8 and latin1 the
mysql db but the problem is still happening, the images that have accents
like Introduci?n or the links to another articles inside the wiki dissapear,
all appear in red link and dont go to the article, the name is correct in
the title but isnt inside.
Sincerally, Mafius.


from_name: Brion Vibber

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

Rob Church wrote:
> On 16/12/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Ooh yes. Do we need to wait on single login for that to be a
>> reasonable thing to do? I understand a dev also has to explicitly
>> allow transwiki to move histories, though I'm not at all clear on the
>> details.
>
> As far as I know, Special:Import won't handle moving images in the
> correct manner. Mind you, I've not been keeping 100% up to date with
> what's developed lately, so I may well be wrong.

Special:Export and Special:Import do not handle images at this time.
There's some specs for it in the XML format but currently it's only used
by the OAI feed system.

- -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2.2 (Darwin)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFFhZu/wRnhpk1wk44RAj+ZAKC4Iyf0T59xy7+vWyqJCBGURN7rdQCgx0aa
K1LKE6rt4wCfsGdtKRAFODo=
=BZPE
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


from_name: Aphaia

subject: [Foundation-l] [Foundation wiki] "Our projects" - invite to edit

body:
Hello there,
I would invite you to update [[Wikimedia:Our projects]] - introduction
of our nine projects (and some related). As for Wikiquote I modifed
its part, but I will be happy to coordinate with more active editors'
hands. For other projects, much more such collaborations will be
welcome.

There is a draft version on meta.
http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Translation_requests/WMF/Our_projects/En:&action=history

I believe all parts are outdated to some extent, except Wikiversity
and Wiktionary (thank you, Cormaggio and Kipmaster). And hopefully
Wikiquote ... Regretfully this draft is not regularly updated - if we
can periodically update this draft and regularly replace with the
existing version on the Foundation website, we'll be able to provide
visitors latest information. I confess even I myself forget to update
the parts I am very familiar, but still I believe it is a worthy task
to keep in mind always.

We expect your description about your favorite project(s)!

Cheers,
--
KIZU Naoko
  Wikiquote: http://wikiquote.org
  * Nessuna poesia prima di noi *


from_name: Thomas Dalton

subject: [WikiEN-l] Office actions

body:
> I think right now we don't know.  This needs to be fixed, so that we
> have a better system.

So, we're all agreed that it's broken and needs fixing. That's an
excellent first step! :-) How do we want to do the second step?


from_name: phoebe ayers

subject: [WikiEN-l] What to do with $1.000.000

body:
On 12/15/06, MacGyverMagic/Mgm <macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I remember a post way back about what the Wikimedia Foundation should do
> in
> case it receives a large grant or donation.
> For the past few days I've been collecting data for a number of new
> articles, and I realized how lucky I am.
> A lot of people don't have access to things like Pubmed and LexisNexis and
> those are particularly useful in citing articles.
> Buying a set of books and making their contents available is nice, but
> still
> growing databases of information are more useful, especially now we should
> focus more on sources instead of new content as Jimbo said at the
> Wikimania
> conference. As soon as I finish my study, my access to those databases
> will
> cease to exist. I don't know the numbers, but perhaps a number of
> Wikipedians, say those in a referencing taskforce, should get access to
> such
> services with the help of the foundation...
>
> Mgm

One note -- for those who don't know, PubMed (in a slightly less fancy
version) is free!
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi
it's pretty much *the* database to go to for medical research information,
at least for English speakers. Agricola and Eric, for agriculture and
education respectively, are also large U.S. government-produced databases
and are also free:
http://agricola.nal.usda.gov/
and http://www.eric.ed.gov/

Sadly, Lexis-Nexis and most other commercially-produced research databases
are very very very unfree (and take up the bulk of your library's purchasing
budget, generally).

I think trying to provide source access is a great side project for the
foundation. However, there's a bit of a problem. Most databases like this
are priced based on the size of the potential user base -- e.g., a school
with 50,000 students will pay more than a school with 3000 students; a large
law firm pays more than a small one. Now someone just has to figure out a
good formula for the size of the potential user base for WMF-sponsored
databases... (or a way to restrict the user base to a reasonable number)
:)  In the meantime, I and others with access will help when we can:
[[Wikipedia:Newspapers and magazines request service]]

-- phoebe


subject: [WikiEN-l] The boundaries of OR

body:
> It's obviously original research. You could certainly state that "A
> number of legal scholars have stated that...", with your reference,
> but it's not up to you to decide that "legal consensus" is, it's up to
> experts in the area.

Exactly. Stating what various sources say on the matter is just
regular research. Drawing conclusions as to consensus is original
research. You don't have a source to verify the consensus, you just
have a collection of sources agreeing with eachother. For example,
where is the source saying there aren't any articles on the subject
other than the ones you've cited?


subject: [WikiEN-l] What to do with $1.000.000

body:
On 12/17/06, phoebe ayers <phoebe.wiki at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 12/15/06, MacGyverMagic/Mgm <macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > I remember a post way back about what the Wikimedia Foundation should do
> > in
> > case it receives a large grant or donation.
> > For the past few days I've been collecting data for a number of new
> > articles, and I realized how lucky I am.
> > A lot of people don't have access to things like Pubmed and LexisNexis
> > and
> > those are particularly useful in citing articles.
> > Buying a set of books and making their contents available is nice, but
> > still
> > growing databases of information are more useful, especially now we
> > should
> > focus more on sources instead of new content as Jimbo said at the
> > Wikimania
> > conference. As soon as I finish my study, my access to those databases
> > will
> > cease to exist. I don't know the numbers, but perhaps a number of
> > Wikipedians, say those in a referencing taskforce, should get access to
> > such
> > services with the help of the foundation...
> >
> > Mgm
>
>
> One note -- for those who don't know, PubMed (in a slightly less fancy
> version) is free!
> http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi
> it's pretty much *the* database to go to for medical research information,
> at least for English speakers. Agricola and Eric, for agriculture and
> education respectively, are also large U.S. government-produced databases
> and are also free:
> http://agricola.nal.usda.gov/
> and http://www.eric.ed.gov/
>
> Sadly, Lexis-Nexis and most other commercially-produced research databases
> are very very very unfree (and take up the bulk of your library's purchasing
> budget, generally).
>
> I think trying to provide source access is a great side project for the
> foundation. However, there's a bit of a problem. Most databases like this
> are priced based on the size of the potential user base -- e.g., a school
> with 50,000 students will pay more than a school with 3000 students; a large
> law firm pays more than a small one. Now someone just has to figure out a
> good formula for the size of the potential user base for WMF-sponsored
> databases... (or a way to restrict the user base to a reasonable number)
> :)  In the meantime, I and others with access will help when we can:
> [[Wikipedia:Newspapers and magazines request service]]
>
> -- phoebe
>

And, of course, having access to a database doesn't necessarily provide
access to the actual full-text of the article or paper itself, just the
citation. Only a handful of databases are full-text, and they tend to not be
the most specialized ones.
Throwing our collective support behind open-access publications and
initiatives is one way to go, but it doesn't solve the problem of getting
contributors good sources *now.* I urge people again to take advantage of
their libraries, and to make sure your library knows what you need as a
researcher.
-- phoebe


from_name: MacGyverMagic/Mgm

subject: [WikiEN-l] The boundaries of OR

body:
OR is when you go out and test the evidence yourself. Finding sources to
corroborate a point is called research, not original research.

Mgm

On 12/17/06, zero 0000 <nought_0000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> Here is a scenario that explores the boundaries of
> what counts as Original Reseach.  Suppose there is
> a legal issue about which there are two popular
> opinions, say A and B.
>
> Now I log into a well-known depository of legal
> journals and search for this issue.  I get about 20 hits.
> Then I look at each of these hits (articles published
> in peer-reviewed law journals) and in all cases the
> writer gives opinion A.
>
> Ok, so now I am itching to write in Wikipedia
> something like: "The consensus amongst legal
> scholars is that opinion A is correct"  (or similar),
> with a footnote stating the evidence.
>
> Can I do that?  My sources were the best that exist,
> and everything I did can be verified easily by anyone
> with a good library.  On the other hand, I have drawn
> my own conclusions from these observations so
> maybe I'm afoul of the No Original Research policy.
>
> I tend to think it's ok because the conclusions I drew
> were the same as any reasonable person would draw,
> and these conclusions don't require any private
> information.  I admit it is a boundary case though.
> What do you think?
>
> --Zero.
>
> __________________________________________________
> Do You Yahoo!?
> Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
> http://mail.yahoo.com
> _______________________________________________
> 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: Guy Chapman aka JzG

subject: [WikiEN-l] Office actions

body:
On Sun, 17 Dec 2006 12:05:33 +0000, "Thomas Dalton"
<thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:

>So, we're all agreed that it's broken and needs fixing. That's an
>excellent first step! :-) How do we want to do the second step?

Jimbo already answered that.  We discuss every change really
thoroughly and ensure that all changes have broad consensus and are
impeccably sourced and neutral.  As long as we do that, there should
be no pressing problem.

But...

We still have the odd cases like Gregory Lauder-Frost where the office
action was the result of his legal advisors stating that we could not
mention his conviction for fraud because of the UK's Rehabilitation of
Offenders Act.  That demands actual legal advice.  As it happens, the
Act only prevents "spent" convictions being mentioned in a defamatory
way, there is no apparent restriction on coverage in a neutral,
independent biography, and his friends did not help his case by
initially including the case but claiming that he had been cleared on
appeal - it was possible (though certainly not trivial) to verify that
this was simply not true, and it was only when we included the
citations to back up the conviction and failed appeal that they pulled
the office stunt.

In these cases it is good to have feedback, even if the feedback is a
weekly "sorry, no progress yet".  And it would be good to know if
there is a particular issue which needs to be addressed.

In other cases, the one which prompted this thread being Pacific
Western university, there is no question of verifiable facts for which
there might be a legal basis for forbidding inclusion.  It's all about
tone, sourcing and above all scrupulous fairness.  So we can verify
that PWU cooperated in an investigation into diploma mills, we can
verify that it was discussed in the same breath, but we cannot say
that the GAO director actually called it a diploma mill, because he
did not, not in so many words.  So as long as we set the bar high for
sourcing, and ensure that we attribute every statement which might be
perceived as questionable, I think we can proceed with improving the
article.

Guy (JzG)
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG


subject: [WikiEN-l] Office actions

body:
On Sun, 17 Dec 2006 00:01:17 -0800, A <jokestress at gmail.com> wrote:

>In the case of [[Pacific Western University]], the article is only editable
>by admins. Several good non-admin editors have developed serviceable scratch
>articles in the last four months. I suppose there's a question whether these
>scratch articles should even be on Wikipedia if the actual article is in
>lockdown.

Having seen at least one of the serviceable scratch articles, I
disagree that they were necessarily serviceable :-)  That said, I
don't see a problem with having them as long as they are flagged as
not being part of the encyclopaedia, and can be edited by anyone (so
if the complaining party dislikes a particular statement they can cut
it out).  Take it in small pieces, I'd say.

Guy (JzG)
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG


from_name: Heimermann, Asher

subject: [Foundation-l] Fundraising Support

body:
The Resources of Sheboygan Club has a donation link on it's website at http://www.roscfriends.tripod.com.

  The Resources of Sheboygan Club will also put a donation link on other websites like:

  * http://www.goportal.tripod.com
  * http://www.roscfriends.tripod.com/connection
  * http://www.roscfriends.tripod.com/ideasforchange

  ---

  I (Asher Heimermann) will make a blog post about donating to The Wikimedia Foundation on my blog at http://sheboyganpolitics.blogspot.com.

  I will also post make a forum post on http://www.whbl.com/forum

  ---

  If there is anything at all I can do, please let me know at resourcesofsheboygan at yahoo.com.

  Yours Truly,
      Asher Heimermann
      Club Director
      The Resources of Sheboygan Club
      920-547-4934

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


subject: [Foundation-l] Fundraising Support


subject: [WikiEN-l] The boundaries of OR

body:
On Sat, 16 Dec 2006 23:04:34 -0800 (PST), zero 0000
<nought_0000 at yahoo.com> wrote:

>Now I log into a well-known depository of legal
>journals and search for this issue.  I get about 20 hits.
>Then I look at each of these hits (articles published
>in peer-reviewed law journals) and in all cases the
>writer gives opinion A.

>Ok, so now I am itching to write in Wikipedia
>something like: "The consensus amongst legal
>scholars is that opinion A is correct"  (or similar),
>with a footnote stating the evidence.

In  which case, surely there will be a legal text you can cite which
says just that?

Guy (JzG)
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG


from_name: Guettarda

subject: [WikiEN-l] The boundaries of OR

body:
On 12/17/06, charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com <
charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com> wrote:
>
> "Stephen Bain" wrote
>
> > On 12/17/06, zero 0000 <nought_0000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > Ok, so now I am itching to write in Wikipedia
> > > something like: "The consensus amongst legal
> > > scholars is that opinion A is correct"  (or similar),
> > > with a footnote stating the evidence.
> > >
> > > Can I do that?  My sources were the best that exist,
> > > and everything I did can be verified easily by anyone
> > > with a good library.  On the other hand, I have drawn
> > > my own conclusions from these observations so
> > > maybe I'm afoul of the No Original Research policy.
> >
> > Of course that's ok.
>
> I think it's OK, too. We are suppoed to summarise existing knowledge: so
> NOR shouldn't take away the tool of giving an accurate precis. One can tweak
> the wording, so that 'most opinions follow that of X in [cite]' is perhaps
> better than 'consensus'. But I think many practical cases are like this,
> with a slight change of words helping out the look.

This might be ok if you were looking at an exhaustive list.  If the
collection was (supposed to be) exhaustive, and you looked at them all and
summarised the information then you would still be doing OK, but since you
would only be summarising existing knowledge it would be ok (IMO).
Similarly, with your database, you could say that all the opinions in that
database said A, but calling that "consensus" wouldn't be ok.

Ian


from_name: Anthony

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Legacy non-free images (non-commercial,
	non-third-party use, etc)

body:
On 12/17/06, Bogdan Giusca <liste at dapyx.com> wrote:
> There are some old images (pre-2005) which were uploaded before we had
> some clear rules on free images and do not allow commercial use,
> third-party use, cannot be modified or have other restrictions.
>
> Some are replaceable, some are not. I propose that we should put a
> bot to replace those tags with "fairuse" and the images which
> are replaceable should be deleted, while the rest should be kept as
> fairuse.
>
> What do you think?

I think bots are not very good at determining whether or not the use
of an image in an article is "fair use".  Some other tag would be more
appropriate.

Anthony


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

Rob Church wrote:
> On 17/12/06, Brion Vibber <brion at pobox.com> wrote:
>> Special:Export and Special:Import do not handle images at this time.
>> There's some specs for it in the XML format but currently it's only used
>> by the OAI feed system.
>
> What might be the best approach to making this work, then? Chucking
> the filename in the XML somewhere and having Special:Import do a local
> copy, if possible?

That's pretty much how it would work if you implemented the spec. I
stashed an example in docs/export-demo.xml:

<page>
  <title>Image:Some image.jpg</title>
[snip]
  <upload>
    <timestamp>2001-01-15T20:34:12Z</timestamp>
    <contributor><username>Foobar</username><id>42</id></contributor>
    <comment>My awesomeest image!</comment>
    <filename>Some_image.jpg</filename>
    <src>http://upload.wikimedia.org/commons/2/22/Some_image.jpg</src>
    <size>12345</size>
  </upload>
</page>

Probably not too hard to hack up, actually, if someone wants to give it
a try.

- -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com / brion @ wikimedia.org)
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Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFFhck2wRnhpk1wk44RAq15AKDc8sxEraohqms5RXdp2TP3RF9qJQCfWiDI
XJEOA4tQnGw08AIrsMeyKAk=
=t34V
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from_name: Brad Patrick

subject: [Foundation-l] Fundraising update

body:
Hello:

Well, after some bumps we have the fundraiser off and running!  There
was a bug in currency conversion reporting when we got started, but
everything has been tested and verified, and now the thermometer is
exactly right.  The good news is that the currency issue caused the
thermometer to *underreport* what was donated in the first day of the
fundraiser.  Our donation history is available on
http://fundraising.wikimedia.org.

We also have our default site notice revised and in need of
translation.  Please see
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Translation_request/WMF/Fundraising_Sitenotice%28default%29/2006.
We will go live with the new and improved sitenotice after we get some
translations put together.

Stay tuned!

-Brad


subject: [Foundation-l] Fundraising update


from_name: James Hare

subject: [Foundation-l] Fundraising update

body:
Does the fundraising thermometer account offline donations as well as
online? Also, the thermometer seems to follow some sort of scale; what is
its "maximum capacity"?

On 12/17/06, Brad Patrick <bpatrick at wikimedia.org> wrote:
>
> Hello:
>
> Well, after some bumps we have the fundraiser off and running!  There
> was a bug in currency conversion reporting when we got started, but
> everything has been tested and verified, and now the thermometer is
> exactly right.  The good news is that the currency issue caused the
> thermometer to *underreport* what was donated in the first day of the
> fundraiser.  Our donation history is available on
> http://fundraising.wikimedia.org.
>
> We also have our default site notice revised and in need of
> translation.  Please see
>
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Translation_request/WMF/Fundraising_Sitenotice%28default%29/2006
> .
> We will go live with the new and improved sitenotice after we get some
> translations put together.
>
> Stay tuned!
>
> -Brad
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


subject: [Foundation-l] Fundraising update


from_name: Ilmari Karonen

subject: [Wikitech-l] A frightening chart

body:
David Gerard wrote:
> http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?site0=wikipedia.org&site1=google.com&site2=&site3=&site4=&y=p&z=0&h=400&w=700&range=3m&size=Large&url=wikipedia.org
>
> So ... how long at our present cancerous rates of growth till our
> traffic is 6x what it is now?
>
> (We hit #10 on Alexa twice in the last month, by the way. Our smoothed
> page rank is #12.)

While Google's pageviews fluctuate a lot more than ours, squinting at
the charts suggests that their average growth rate over the last 5 years
has been a bit under twice what ours has been this year.  So, according
to a linear extrapolation, we may be able to narrow down the relative
margin but won't catch up with them in absolute terms.

Then again, while our growth this year seems fairly linear, the three
year graph could also be quite well fitted to an exponential model, if
you ignore the odd spike last January and the corresponding slowdown
over the first half of this year.  If our growth is in fact still
exponential, I'd roughly estimate our yearly growth rate to be about
3.5-fold, which would have us catching up with Google in about a year
and a half, assuming their growth remains mostly linear.

And if you believe any of that crap, I've got some stocks to sell you.

--
Ilmari Karonen