subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On 12/12/06, Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >
> > It is in my opinion notable and verifyable that there are conspiracy
> > theories about 9/11.  In my opinion, it's perfectly fine to document
> > that fact in Wikipedia, and explain what those theories are.
>
>
> So long as we also explain that these "theories" are thoroughly debunked
> and
> that nobody should take them even remotely seriously, sure.
>
> I have not been hanging around the 9/11 related Wikipedia pages
> > regularly for a while and I don't know the degree of shove we're
> > getting from those conspiracists of late.
>
>
> "Too Much."
>
>   I am sympathetic with "it
> > takes too much effort to fight these kooks", but suppressing Wikipedia
> > *coverage* of the issues is almost certainly the wrong approach to
> > dealing with it.
>
>
> No. If you say we can document that the theories exist, sure, but our
> coverage shouldn't give them any sort of credibility.
>
> In my currently ideal world, we'd do something like a policy which
> > says that conspiracy theories MUST be segregated to a separate page,
> > and simply apply normal warn-and-block to anyone who violates that and
> > puts it on the main pages. Let them have their playpen at the
> > conspiracy theory page, let the anti-conspiracy-theory people have a
> > "Criticisms of conspiracy theories about X" page to argue the point
> > on, and concentrate on squashing anyone who tries to pull that debate
> > onto the main page.
>
>
> Problem: this gives the kook nutjob theories credibility.

The real problem here is that overenthusiastic anti-conspiracists get into a
vicious cycle where they try and suppress conspiracists, which encourages
the conspiracists, which further angers the anti-conspiracists.

You are part of the problem.  You can either keep battering your head on it
until it stops hurting, or play Aikido with the problem.  Guess which way
minimizes long term stress by anti-conspiracists and public belief in
conspiracy theories?

--
-george william herbert
george.herbert at gmail.com


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Marc Riddell

subject: [WikiEN-l] Hello

body:
Sam,

Sounds very good to me!

Marc

> From: "Sam Korn" <smoddy at gmail.com>
> Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Tue, 12 Dec 2006 18:44:08 +0000
> To: "English Wikipedia" <wikien-l at wikipedia.org>
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Hello
>
> On 12/12/06, Marc Riddell <michaeldavid86 at comcast.net> wrote:
>> I don't understand how it would defeat the purpose of subcats. My goal is to
>> be able to retrieve lists of persons with like characteristics. Unless a
>> person is included in a subcategory, they will not be included in that list.
>> A person who dies from lung cancer, also belongs in the larger list of
>> persons who died from cancer.
>
> The suggestion is that some kind of tool -- as yet, I believe
> unwritten -- could generate a list of all members of a category and
> its subcategories.  I imagine this would suit your purpose.
>
> --
> Sam
> _______________________________________________
> 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: Michael Smith

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

body:
Whatever you say, dick.

I'm not Muslim. Point of fact is that I'm not anything. I don't think God
exists, and even if he does, I don't think he gives a flying fuck about the
world as it is now.

Itaqallah, on the other hand, is a member of the POV-pushing group called
the Muslim Guild, and I caught him blatantly lying in his edit summaries
while he was chain reverting people on that page. But you don't seem to care
about that at all.

So I get it: Lying on wikipedia is A-OK as long as you're a muslim, but
pointing out that a muslim is blatantly lying while also edit warring is
"incivil." Your policies are so much bullshit.

On 12/12/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
>
> On Tue, 12 Dec 2006 10:37:38 -0600, "Michael Smith"
> <runedchozo at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >Yadda yadda, you've got your fingers in your ears and you're screaming
> you
> >can't hear, you don't care as long as it's a muslim who's the one doing
> the
> >lying.
>
> Redux: "it's all about *me*".
>
> How am I supposed to know that Michael Smith is a Muslim?  And why
> should I care?  I am a Christian; both are Faiths of the Book.  I
> didn't even notice that JoshuaZ was Jewish (how obtuse does that make
> me?).
>
> Now try reading for comprehension: hysterical accusations of "rouge
> admin abuse" are pretty much bound to be discounted.  Next time try
> posting something much less strident.
>
> Guy (JzG)
> --
> http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG
>
> _______________________________________________
> 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: Ray Saintonge

subject: [WikiEN-l] The vexed issue of sources

body:
Daniel P. B. Smith wrote:

>>Libraries are wonderful things, but a scholar who believes that
>>"the sum
>>of all human knowledge" is to be found in the library alone is like a
>>medieval monk who believes that the same is to be found only in the
>>monastery.
>>
>>
>Wikipedia is an encyclopedia and an encyclopedia _is_ a distillation
>of things to be found in libraries.
>
>Things that are _not_ to be found in libraries are published in peer-
>reviewed journals, not encyclopedias. Wikipedia is not a peer-
>reviewed journal. And journals have their own requirements, which in
>fact are more stringent than those for an encyclopedia, one being
>reproducibility of results. That's the "new-knowledge" equivalent of
>what we call "verifiability" and it is _much_ harder to do.
>
We really need to accept that the nature of peer review is changing.
More and more I read about wikis being a medium for peer review.
Journals are notoriously inefficient.  If a researcher develops a truly
novel idea reviewers are often not in a position to empirically
establish the reproducibility of results; that could require the
consumption of more time and resources than they have available.  I'm
sure that most would prefer to put that expense into projects that are
closer to their hearts.

Ec


from_name: Puppy

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

body:
Mr. Smith: Well you just cost yourself any interest I had in possibly
following up on this. Accusing Guettarda, of all people, of being a POV
pusher and allowing personal attachments to influence his judgment is
nonsense. Your argumentative, accusatory approach speaks volumes.

Michael Smith wrote:
> Ha ha, very funny.
>
> Care to elaborate, or are you just blowing smoke?
>
> I know you're blowing smoke. He was caught red-handed lying, but you're
> probably one of his friends helping him POV push.
>
> On 12/12/06, Guettarda <guettarda at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On 12/12/06, Michael Smith <runedchozo at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Greetings,
>>>
>>> Yesterday, I reported Itaqallah for blatantly falsifying his edit
>>> summaries:
>>>
>>> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Muhammad_as_a_diplomat&diff=93627974&oldid=93625725
>>>
>>> Summary was "rv unsourced OR" despite the fact that I included the
>>>
>> source
>>
>>> very directly: See Also: [[Conquest of Mecca]] Source: Prophet's
>>>
>> biography
>>
>>> by Ibn Hisham, p 802ff; Al-Waqidi, p319ff; Ibn Sa'ad, p96ff
>>>
>>>
>>> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Muhammad_as_a_diplomat&diff=93628886&oldid=93628310
>>>
>>> Edit summary claims it has been "extensively discussed" on the talk
>>>
>> page,
>>
>>> no
>>> such discussion existed.
>>>
>>> Nobody has yet even bothered to deal with this. Instead, Itaqallah got
>>>
>> an
>>
>>> admin friend of his to lock the article page, got another member of his
>>> Muslim Guild to block me, and then I come in today and ANOTHER of his
>>> lying
>>> friends has falsely accused me of sockpuppeting while I was gone and
>>> they've
>>> jacked the illegal block all the way to five days now.
>>>
>>> Runedchozo
>>> _
>>>
>> Actually, your edit summaries amount to violation of NPA, which is
>> blockable.
>> _______________________________________________
>> WikiEN-l mailing list
>> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
>> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
>> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>>
>>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>
>


body:
Strongly second that. Grow up and learn to discuss things in a mature,
civil fashion or go away.

NSLE (Wikipedia) wrote:
> Seriously now, stop trolling and go back to your playroom.
>
> On 13/12/06, Michael Smith <runedchozo at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Yadda yadda, you've got your fingers in your ears and you're screaming you
>> can't hear, you don't care as long as it's a muslim who's the one doing
>> the
>> lying.
>>
>> On 12/12/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
>>
>>> On Tue, 12 Dec 2006 09:35:06 -0600, "Michael Smith"
>>> <runedchozo at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>> Nobody has yet even bothered to deal with this. Instead, Itaqallah got
>>>>
>> an
>>
>>>> admin friend of his to lock the article page, got another member of his
>>>> Muslim Guild to block me, and then I come in today and ANOTHER of his
>>>>
>>> lying
>>>
>>>> friends has falsely accused me of sockpuppeting while I was gone and
>>>>
>>> they've
>>>
>>>> jacked the illegal block all the way to five days now.
>>>>
>>> Ah, so they *have* dealt with this.  Good.
>>>
>>> Just for future reference, hysterical accusations of "rouge admin
>>> abuse" are pretty much bound to be discounted.  Next time try posting
>>> something much less strident.
>>>
>>> Guy (JzG)
>>> --
>>> http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
>>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> WikiEN-l mailing list
>>> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
>>> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
>>> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>>>
>>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> WikiEN-l mailing list
>> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
>> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
>> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>>
>>
> _______________________________________________
> 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: commons-l

from_name: Magnus Manske

subject: [Commons-l] Fwd: [Wikitech-l] ImportFreeImages Extension

body:
On 12/12/06, Cool Cat <wikipedia.kawaii.neko at gmail.com> wrote:
> I do not think this is good enough to celebrate. I'd welcome a tool that
> would allow us to move properly licensed free images from wikipedias to
> commons. Now I'd celebrate then.

*ahem*

http://tools.wikimedia.de/~magnus/pushforcommons.php

(currently down due to toolserver database desaster, though)

Magnus


subject: [Commons-l] New tool - User dupes

body:
On 12/12/06, Bryan Tong Minh <bryan.tongminh at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 12/4/06, Magnus Manske <magnusmanske at googlemail.com> wrote:
> > There was a discussion somewhere (maybe on this list? I don't
> > remember) to store MD5-hashes of image data in the table with the
> > other image information (size etc.). Nothing came of it, I'm afraid.
> > Too bad.
> What was the reason for this? Was it the technical difficulties, or
> just a lack of willingness?

I'd say 10% the former (MD5ing all existing images on all wikipedias
and commons would mean server stress), and 90% the latter.

Magnus


from_name: Brian Haws

subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On 12/13/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
> On Tue, 12 Dec 2006 14:21:02 +0000, <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com>
> wrote:
>
> >OK, not going to be 'popular'. Do you suggest we look at the evidence, or
the buzz?
>
>> I suggest that the context and history also needs to be considered as
>> a mitigating factor.

>>See this section with respect to context:
>>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Seabhcan/P
roposed_decision#MONGO.27s_habitual_over-reaction

I would encourage anyone interested in this (and everyone else) to review a
couple very well thought out reactions to this decision:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_arbitration/Seabhca
n/Proposed_decision#Comments_on_proposed_decision

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_arbitration/Seabhca
n/Proposed_decision#Unprotection.3F
--
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition.
Version: 7.5.432 / Virus Database: 268.15.16/582 - Release Date: 12/11/2006
4:32 PM


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
Fred Bauder wrote:
> On Dec 12, 2006, at 9:12 AM, geni wrote:
>
>
>> On 12/12/06, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at waterwiki.info> wrote:
>>
>>> I think that is the most important thing any of us can do here,
>>> insist on verifiable information from reliable sources.
>>>
>>>
>> Have you had many dealings with the 9/11 CTers?
>>
>> --
>> geni
>>
>
> No, no active editing regarding the matter. However, I have seen no
> reliable evidence supporting the conspiracy theories.
>
> Fred
>
>
>
And yet you and the other Arbcom members found MONGO calling their
nonsense "nonsense" uncivil. Um, right. Complete bollocks being pushed
by a bunch of conspiracy theorists with no reliable sources cannot be
called "nonsense". Heaven forfend.

-kc-


subject: [WikiEN-l] Hello

body:
The Cunctator wrote:
> Articles should only belong to the most specific of categories in which they
> can belong. The goals of categorization are different from the goals of flat
> interlinking.
> __________________
>
Why? I'm not following your reasoning here. It seems to me a good point
has been made - if you want all suicides, then having to traverse all
subcats is tedious, to say the least.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Hello

body:
Sam Korn wrote:
> On 12/12/06, Marc Riddell <michaeldavid86 at comcast.net> wrote:
>
>> I don't understand how it would defeat the purpose of subcats. My goal is to
>> be able to retrieve lists of persons with like characteristics. Unless a
>> person is included in a subcategory, they will not be included in that list.
>> A person who dies from lung cancer, also belongs in the larger list of
>> persons who died from cancer.
>>
>
> The suggestion is that some kind of tool -- as yet, I believe
> unwritten -- could generate a list of all members of a category and
> its subcategories.  I imagine this would suit your purpose.
>
Perhaps an option on the category page which allows a choice of "expand"
upwards (category tree) and/or downwards (articles)?
-kc-


from_name: charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com

subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
Guy Chapman aka JzG wrote
> Of course MONGO should have held back, and we, his friends and fellow
> admins, should have helped him to do that, but I suspect that the
> decision is not going to be a popular one.

OK, not going to be 'popular'. Do you suggest we look at the evidence, or the buzz?

Charles

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


from_name: NSLE (Wikipedia)

subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
Hear, hear. Good decision. Seriously, the second I saw "Concerned
Wikipedian" as the person I knew that this would be something trollish like
this. Seriously now, make the plea openly instead of hiding behind
"Concerned Wikipedian".

On 12/12/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
>
> I would be much more inclined to intervene if you were willing to put
> your reputation on the line and make the defense publicly, rather than
> under a pseudonym and throwaway email address.
>
> Concerned Wikipedian wrote:
> > Mr Wales,
> >
> > I am hereby writing to you to express my displeasure and discontent at
> > "your" Arbitration Committee's decision to desysop MONGO, one of the
> most
> > dedicated and resilient users Wikipedia has ever seen.
> >
> > MONGO has had to put up with every kind of harassment you could think
> of; by
> > definition of [[WP:HA]], a number of users that have forced him into his
> > mental decline should have been blocked and/or banned ages ago.
> >
> > So, I officially protest this decision, and wish you to evaluate it.
> Given
> > your ability to veto any decision made by the AC, I hereby request that
> if
> > you agree with my sentiment, you use this to stop Wikipedia from losing
> yet
> > another prolific administrator and user to the abyss of trolls and
> vandals -
> > RickK springs to mind as another.
> >
> > Last time I checked, MONGO wasn't the only administrator who could, on
> > occasion, skirt the guidelines of civility. I could name 15 or so who do
> it
> > worse than he does, and yet it is him who takes the fall.
> >
> > MONGO stood up for NPOV, something you yourself should extremely proud
> of -
> > Wikipedia wouldn't be Wikipedia without servants like MONGO who try to
> keep
> > unverified rubbish out, in accordance with "What Wikipedia is not", as
> well
> > as "Neutral Point of View". Further, your relentless push of making
> > Wikipedia fully verified through "Verifiability" and "Reliable Sources",
> > which I commend you for emphasising, was one of MONGO's ideals, and
> > something he sought to try and create under your direction.
> >
> > There is no denying that MONGO may have overstepped his mark once or
> twice;
> > I would be a fool to say so. What I will say, however, is your ArbCom
> has
> > previously found that "occasional mistakes are entirely compatible with
> [the
> > role] ? administrators are not expected to be perfect". I believe that,
> > given the crap, for want of a better word, that MONGO has had to deal
> with
> > in his fight to uphold your, and Wikipedia's, values, he should be given
> > leeway in this precedent.
> >
> > You yourself said that "The Arbitration Committee [...] can impose a
> > solution that I'll consider to be binding, with of course the exception
> that
> > I reserve the right of executive clemency and indeed even to dissolve
> the
> > whole thing if it turns out to be a disaster. But I regard that as
> unlikely,
> > and I plan to do it about as often as the Queen of England dissolves
> > Parliament against their wishes, i.e., basically never, but it is one
> last
> > safety valve for our values". I feel that it is your turn to stand up
> and be
> > counted, Jimmy, to stand up for our values. Wikipedians are not perfect;
> > administrators are not perfect, by the same token; nor should
> administrators
> > be expected to be unflappable in the face of persistent, ridiculous
> trolling
> > and harassment that MONGO has had to.
> >
> > Cometh the hour, cometh the man; will you be the man, or will the hour
> slip
> > you by? I hope you can see the devastation that this would cause
> Wikipedia
> > should you decide that the Arbitration Committee, which is becoming more
> and
> > more dissented by members of the community as segregated, has somehow
> got
> > this one right.
> >
> > The question you must ask yourself, in the spirit of IAR: If this
> decision
> > will be detrimental to improving or maintaining Wikipedia more than the
> > opposite decision will be, ignore it. You made this official policy on
> > August 19, 2006 stating "IAR is policy, always has been". I feel that
> this
> > is as good a time as any to apply its' principle.
> >
> > -- Concerned Wikipedian
> > _______________________________________________
> > WikiEN-l mailing list
> > WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> > To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
> >
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Luna

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

body:
Hm. I've had some private email exchanges with the user, and I've finally
managed to calm him down, a bit. By preliminary looks through page
histories, it looks like he *was* being pretty disruptive and edit warring,
with a persistent failure to use talk pages -- but then, he wasn't the only
one doing so. The full protection of the page seems more or less
appropriate, as a means of forcing discussion.

RuinedChozo absolutely must back off or cool down on his personal attacks
and accusations -- if some of those complaints about lying and cabalism are
legitimate, let such be revealed through an RfC or brought before Arbcom for
consideration. On that count, I don't think I'm going to bend.

I am disappointed, however, that the admins involved didn't put more effort
into discussing things with this user. It's true that he's got a long block
log, but I notice that most of the blocks come from the same "group," -- in
situations where I have trouble getting through to someone, I'd say it's
better to try and find a neutral third party to talk things over, with the
person.

There really should have been more discussion from all sides. In heated
disputes, repeating the same superficial arguments ad nauseam usually
doesn't work -- why not explain in detail why you feel a particular edit was
or wasn't sourced, unsourced, original research, neutral in tone, or such?
Why wasn't more effort put into this, especially by experienced admins?

I'm still looking, but as of this moment, it's not yet clear to me where the
alleged block evasion took place. Anybody see something I'm missing?

-Luna

On 12/12/06, Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com>
> Date: Dec 12, 2006 4:11 PM
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Completely unreasonable block and behavior by
> admin
> friends of Itaqallah to win a content dispute
> To: Michael Bimmler <mbimmler at gmail.com>
>
>
>
> On 12/12/06, Michael Bimmler <mbimmler at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > 1. I'm not the list moderator. I'm merely reporting, so that we don't
> > have 10 people asking "please moderate him"
> > 2. He should maybe get a bit more calm... Words as "dick" and
> > "bullshit" simply don't help your cause.
> > michael
>
>
> No, they don't. But the utterly dismissive attack rhetoric that's been
> heaped on him, both here and on wikipedia? The fact that I'm the only
> person
> it seems who's even bothered to check the merits of his complaint?
>
> I can see where someone would start to get really angry, and throwing oil
> onto fire doesn't help.
>
> Parker
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


body:
Also, there's a pretty interesting read at AN/I. Forgot to link that, silly
me:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#Itaqallah_and_friends_lying

On 12/12/06, Luna <lunasantin at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Hm. I've had some private email exchanges with the user, and I've finally
> managed to calm him down, a bit. By preliminary looks through page
> histories, it looks like he *was* being pretty disruptive and edit warring,
> with a persistent failure to use talk pages -- but then, he wasn't the only
> one doing so. The full protection of the page seems more or less
> appropriate, as a means of forcing discussion.
>
> RuinedChozo absolutely must back off or cool down on his personal attacks
> and accusations -- if some of those complaints about lying and cabalism are
> legitimate, let such be revealed through an RfC or brought before Arbcom for
> consideration. On that count, I don't think I'm going to bend.
>
> I am disappointed, however, that the admins involved didn't put more
> effort into discussing things with this user. It's true that he's got a long
> block log, but I notice that most of the blocks come from the same "group,"
> -- in situations where I have trouble getting through to someone, I'd say
> it's better to try and find a neutral third party to talk things over, with
> the person.
>
> There really should have been more discussion from all sides. In heated
> disputes, repeating the same superficial arguments ad nauseam usually
> doesn't work -- why not explain in detail why you feel a particular edit was
> or wasn't sourced, unsourced, original research, neutral in tone, or such?
> Why wasn't more effort put into this, especially by experienced admins?
>
> I'm still looking, but as of this moment, it's not yet clear to me where
> the alleged block evasion took place. Anybody see something I'm missing?
>
> -Luna
>
> On 12/12/06, Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> > From: Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com>
> > Date: Dec 12, 2006 4:11 PM
> > Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Completely unreasonable block and behavior by
> > admin
> > friends of Itaqallah to win a content dispute
> > To: Michael Bimmler <mbimmler at gmail.com>
> >
> >
> >
> > On 12/12/06, Michael Bimmler < mbimmler at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > 1. I'm not the list moderator. I'm merely reporting, so that we don't
> > > have 10 people asking "please moderate him"
> > > 2. He should maybe get a bit more calm... Words as "dick" and
> > > "bullshit" simply don't help your cause.
> > > michael
> >
> >
> > No, they don't. But the utterly dismissive attack rhetoric that's been
> > heaped on him, both here and on wikipedia? The fact that I'm the only
> > person
> > it seems who's even bothered to check the merits of his complaint?
> >
> > I can see where someone would start to get really angry, and throwing
> > oil
> > onto fire doesn't help.
> >
> > Parker
> > _______________________________________________
> > 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: wikitech-l

from_name: Brad Patrick

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Fwd: [Wmfcc-l] [Fwd: Re: Google Ads, Bubble,
	and Agreement]

body:
Per discussion about improving Google Earth/Wikipedia collaboration,
technical contacts are below.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Michael E. Jones <webtoe at google.com>
Date: Dec 12, 2006 1:47 PM
Subject: Re: [Wmfcc-l] [Fwd: Re: Google Ads, Bubble, and Agreement]
To: Brad Patrick <bradp.wmf at gmail.com>
Cc: Cris Castello <criscastello at google.com>, Jason Shields <
shields at google.com>

Hi Brad,

Please direct technical comments and questions to Cris Castello and
Jason Shields.

Thanks,
Michael

On 12/12/06, Brad Patrick <bradp.wmf at gmail.com> wrote:
> FYI.  Where do comments go to your tech team?
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Walter Vermeir <walter at wikizine.org >
> Date: Dec 12, 2006 10:49 AM
> Subject: Re: [Wmfcc-l] [Fwd: Re: Google Ads, Bubble, and Agreement]
> To: Communications Committee <wmfcc-l at mail.wikimedia.org >
>
> Brad Patrick schreef:
> > I am pleased to announce that Google Earth's new release, slated to
> > happen before Christmas, will contain a Google-developed layer for
> > Wikipedia.  We are happy to see this from Google, and are sure it will
> > drive our traffic even more for points of interest.  A mockup is below
> > in this thread which shows what an entry bubble will look like.  All of
> > the links are directly back to Wikipedia itself.  Alas, this release is
> > only in English.
> >
> > Press will need to be coordinated between the ComCom and Megan Quinn
> > from Google (her address is attached as well).
> >
> > -Brad
>
> This is now public and live;
>
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2006/12/opening-my-eyes-to-whole-new-world.html
>
> Google earth exists for Win, MaxOS X and linux
>
> Go to:
> layers -> Primary database -> geographic web -> wikipedia
>
> The result is that you will see the Wikipedia globe appear on certain
> places. When you click on them you get information about the location.
>
>
> It is nice but needs still a lot of work.
> - many places from who there exist articles are not listed
> - very small towns are displayed when you are at a very high altitude
> instead of the larger ones
>  - the location of the icon can be on a pace of the map the is not
> logical; like on the border of an other county the icon to give
> information about a country.
> - the zoomlevel needed to display information is not consistent and
> mostly badly  defined; often you need to zoom in highly before the icon
> with the information about the county is shown.
> - when watching the globe there are no icons for the earth itself, the
> continents and the oceans.
>
>
> --
> Contact: walter AT wikizine DOT org
> Wikizine.org - news for and about the Wikimedia community
> _______________________________________________
> Wmfcc-l mailing list
> Wmfcc-l at mail.wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wmfcc-l
>
>
>  --
> Brad Patrick
> General Counsel & Interim Executive Director
> Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
> bradp.wmf at gmail.com
> 727-231-0101

--
Michael E. Jones
Data Acquisition Representative

Google Inc.
Building 45 217E
1600 Amphitheatre Parkway
Mountain View, CA 94043

Email: webtoe at google.com
Phone: 650.253.2095
earth.google.com

--
Brad Patrick
General Counsel & Interim Executive Director
Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
bradp.wmf at gmail.com
727-231-0101


subject: [WikiEN-l] Hello

body:
I don't know that what I am asking for is as complex as your example. Cancer
> Lung cancer. Suicides > Suicides by firearm >> Deaths by firearm. I believe
limiting the number (and specificity) of the subcategories would help to
keep the process within manageable limits.

Marc

> From: Eugene van der Pijll <eugene at vanderpijll.nl>
> Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Tue, 12 Dec 2006 20:16:25 +0100
> To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Hello
>
> Sam Korn schreef:
>> On 12/12/06, Marc Riddell <michaeldavid86 at comcast.net> wrote:
>>> I don't understand how it would defeat the purpose of subcats. My goal is to
>>> be able to retrieve lists of persons with like characteristics. Unless a
>>> person is included in a subcategory, they will not be included in that list.
>>> A person who dies from lung cancer, also belongs in the larger list of
>>> persons who died from cancer.
>>
>> The suggestion is that some kind of tool -- as yet, I believe
>> unwritten -- could generate a list of all members of a category and
>> its subcategories.  I imagine this would suit your purpose.
>
> Unfortunately, it would not. At least, not completely. Categorization is
> not transitive: if article A is a member of category C, and C is a
> subcat of D, A need not be a member of D. For example: [[Seine]] is in
> [[Category:Paris]], which is in [[Category:Cities in France]], which is
> in [[Category:France]], which is in [[Category:Republics]], which
> ultimately is a subcat of [[Category:Thought]].
>
> But the Seine is not a thought, a republic, or a city in France.
>
> Categories as implemented now have mixed meanings: they can describe
> "is-a", "has-a" or "is-related-to" connections. See earlier
> discussions on this list in September 2004 and June 2006
> (http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/htdig/wikien-l/2006-June/048183.html).
>
> Eugene
> _______________________________________________
> 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: Steve Summit

subject: [WikiEN-l] Hello

body:
Puppy wrote:
> The Cunctator wrote:
>> Articles should only belong to the most specific of categories in
>> which they can belong.  The goals of categorization are different
>> from the goals of flat interlinking.
>
> Why? I'm not following your reasoning here. It seems to me a good point
> has been made - if you want all suicides, then having to traverse all
> subcats is tedious, to say the least.

Sure.  But if you're trying to do other things, then not having
them subcategorized can be tedious.

It's a blind-men-and-the-elephant problem, I think.  Categories
are many things to many people, and every time someone says
"categories should work *this* way and be used *this* way so I
can do *this* thing with them", someone else can always pop up
and say "No, they should work this other way so I can do this
other thing with them."

As Eugene van der Pijll pointed out in another branch of the
thread, we don't know whether category membership is supposed to
denote "is-a", "has-a" or "is-related-to" relationships.  (As he
also pointed out, and I'm not at all surprised to hear, this has
evidently been thrashed out several times before, too.)


from_name: Steve Bennett

subject: [Wikitech-l] Javascript to make references work better?

body:
Hi,
  Would it be possible to improve the "user clicks on footnote"
workflow by using JavaScript? Currently it goes something like this:

1) User clicks on a footnote in some text, like the [1] in "Wikipedia
is great.[1]"
2) The view suddenly jumps down to the bottom of the page.
3) User attempts to remember the number of the footnote they clicked
on, and locate the corresponding number in the list. In some cases,
this footnote will be at the very top of the current viewing window.
Text looks like "1. ^ http://www.someurl.com"
4) User clicks on a web link, if applicable.

How about:

1) User clicks on a footnote in some text, like [1]
2) The footnote expands in place to contain the full text of the
footnote: [1 - http://www.someurl.com]
3) User can click on the web link, if applicable
4) Clicking on the [1 -, or the trailing ] (hopefully in a different
colour from the contents of the footnote) collapses it again.

Is this desirable and possible?

Steve


from_name: Michael Noda

subject: [WikiEN-l] new Google Earth tie-in (!!)

body:
On 12/12/06, Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 12/12/06, Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 12/11/06, Michael Noda <michael.noda at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > Absolutely.  But how often are they checking for new data?  Every
> > > database dump?  How soon after one does the new data propogate?
> >
> > They are doing batch updates from dumps. .. I can find out exactly
> > what their update schedule looks like.
>
> Well, that answers an OTRS complaint I spotted last night about
> vandalism in one of the enGoogled articles! Any idea how often they're
> likely to update?
>
> (On the plus side, vandalism like this shouldn't be too much of a
> problem - our geotemplated articles are likely to have a smidgen more
> competent attention than the average)

Indeed, for those of us more used to an edit-save-test paradigm, it
becomes very confusing to not have corrections appear immediately.  I
still don't know if [[Iran]] is still 60 miles over the border in
Iraqi Kurdistan, or if [[Connecticut]] is just off the South Fork of
Long Island, or if other editors have fixed these (these are the two
most notable errors I've found so far.)  Maybe Google can be convinced
to devote resources to accelerating their update schedule, but I for
one am less hopeful.


from_name: Guy Chapman aka JzG

subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On Tue, 12 Dec 2006 06:15:08 -0700, Fred Bauder
<fredbaud at waterwiki.info> wrote:

>He may immediately apply to be an administrator again; however, I
>think he has lost broad community support. The Arbitration Committee
>proposals are harsh, but there are serious problems with the way he
>acts. He responds poorly to harassment, and he is quite dismissive of
>his opponents with respect to content. "Nonsense" is frequently used.

I don't disagree, but one must ask whether this is cause or effect.
After many months of pretty relentless chipping away, MONGO has
reached a point where he is isolated and beleaguered.  I do not think
that his behaviour under those circumstances is necessarily
representative of his behaviour in more normal circumstances.

I'll tell you one thing: I won't be the one going after the truthers,
because they are nasty - evil, underhand and quite definitely not
above taking real-world action against those who try to undermine
their abuse of Wikipedia to further their own ends.  MONGO was braver
(and had his real-world identity better hidden).

I am far from convinced that this is a good result for the project.

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] Hello

body:
On 12/12/06, Marc Riddell <michaeldavid86 at comcast.net> wrote:
> When I came upon Wikipedia early this year I was thrilled. Here were
> countless biographies (case histories if you will) of persons who, among
> other things, were categorized according to similar traits and life
> experiences. I could, for instance, click on the Category ?Writers who
> committed suicide? and have hours of work done for me. Now, as the
> categories become more and more diluted, this is becoming more and more
> unavailable.

What do you mean by "diluted"? If you can give examples, and maybe
even some tentative solutions, we would be more than happy to listen
to your bitching and moaning.[1]

Steve
[1] Well, I would anyway. I think our categories fall well short of
what they can and should do.


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On Tue, 12 Dec 2006 14:21:02 +0000, <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com>
wrote:

>> Of course MONGO should have held back, and we, his friends and fellow
>> admins, should have helped him to do that, but I suspect that the
>> decision is not going to be a popular one.

>OK, not going to be 'popular'. Do you suggest we look at the evidence, or the buzz?

I suggest that the context and history also needs to be considered as
a mitigating factor.

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] Hello

body:
Steve,

But thrashed out to what conclusion?

Marc

> From: Steve Summit <scs at eskimo.com>
> Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Tue, 12 Dec 2006 14:41:23 -0500
> To: wikien-l at Wikipedia.org
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Hello
>
> Puppy wrote:
>> The Cunctator wrote:
>>> Articles should only belong to the most specific of categories in
>>> which they can belong.  The goals of categorization are different
>>> from the goals of flat interlinking.
>>
>> Why? I'm not following your reasoning here. It seems to me a good point
>> has been made - if you want all suicides, then having to traverse all
>> subcats is tedious, to say the least.
>
> Sure.  But if you're trying to do other things, then not having
> them subcategorized can be tedious.
>
> It's a blind-men-and-the-elephant problem, I think.  Categories
> are many things to many people, and every time someone says
> "categories should work *this* way and be used *this* way so I
> can do *this* thing with them", someone else can always pop up
> and say "No, they should work this other way so I can do this
> other thing with them."
>
> As Eugene van der Pijll pointed out in another branch of the
> thread, we don't know whether category membership is supposed to
> denote "is-a", "has-a" or "is-related-to" relationships.  (As he
> also pointed out, and I'm not at all surprised to hear, this has
> evidently been thrashed out several times before, too.)
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


body:
On 12/12/06, Erik Moeller <erik at wikimedia.org> wrote:
> On 12/12/06, Steve Bennett <stevagewp at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Is this desirable and possible?
>
> It's certainly possible, and I think it would work well. The old style
> listing could be preserved for printing, screen readers, and
> JavaScript-disabled browsers. There's really no particular reason to
> literally transport the traditional footnote metaphor to the web.

Ah, yes, I had presumed that the footnotes would also be available at
the base of the page - there would just no longer be a page-internal
link sending you down there. I guess the link coming back from the
footnote's definition to its reference should still remain.

Should I enter this into mediazilla?

Steve


subject: [WikiEN-l] new Google Earth tie-in (!!)

body:
Michael Noda wrote:
> Indeed, for those of us more used to an edit-save-test paradigm, it
> becomes very confusing to not have corrections appear immediately.
> I still don't know if [[Iran]] is still 60 miles over the border in
> Iraqi Kurdistan, or if [[Connecticut]] is just off the South Fork of
> Long Island,

No to the latter, I dunno about the former.  I was checking a
bunch of these yesterday, and fixing them as necessary, and it
was pretty easy, until Magnus's GeoHack broke (which may not have
been coincidental!).

> Maybe Google can be convinced to devote resources to accelerating
> their update schedule, but I for one am less hopeful.

We (and they) are in a rock-and-a-hard-place situation.  It's
good that they're working from their own stashed copy instead of
hitting us live, because I doubt our servers could handle their
users' load.  But of course on the other hand it's supremely
annoying that they're working from their own stashed copy,
because (as you note and I emphatically agree) our lovely
instantaneous wiki-quick edit-save-test loop is broken.

As to updating their stashed copy more often, there's not much
way we can ask them to do that when our own dumps only come out
on a 2-4 week cycle. :-(


from_name: Gregory Maxwell

subject: [WikiEN-l] new Google Earth tie-in (!!)

body:
On 12/12/06, Steve Summit <scs at eskimo.com> wrote:
> We (and they) are in a rock-and-a-hard-place situation.  It's
> good that they're working from their own stashed copy instead of
> hitting us live, because I doubt our servers could handle their
> users' load.  But of course on the other hand it's supremely
> annoying that they're working from their own stashed copy,
> because (as you note and I emphatically agree) our lovely
> instantaneous wiki-quick edit-save-test loop is broken.

Since our coordinates are just crammed in the article text, no live
access would be possible in any case. The best approximation would be
to read every change looking for updates.

We've survived for years having other mirrors not update quickly. ;)


subject: [WikiEN-l] "Fair use" images of living people

body:
On 12/12/06, theProject <wp.theproject at gmail.com> wrote:
> If I understood Jimmy correctly, this is the kind of template that would in
> *after* the fair use image was removed, trying to get a replacement, not a
> template that goes under a fair use image saying we need a replacement.

Oh!

I'm all in favor of that.  Maybe I got it when I first read it. ;)


from_name: Rob Smith

subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On 12/12/06, George Herbert <george.herbert at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 12/12/06, Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> The real problem here is that overenthusiastic anti-conspiracists get into
> a
> vicious cycle where they try and suppress conspiracists, which encourages
> the conspiracists, which further angers the anti-conspiracists.

Yah what do you do when a long term conspiracy theory is later debunked with
reputable, verifiable information, and the then anti-conspiracists invent
conspiracy theories to debunk the WP:RS, WP:V, WP:ATT former conspiracy
theory.  I can point to a real life situation.

nobs


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On Tue, 12 Dec 2006 08:47:42 -0600 (CST), "Jeff Raymond"
<jeff.raymond at internationalhouseofbacon.com> wrote:

>And why, pray tell, would anyone who supports the decision dare go to his
>userpage and tell him, especially given his record of threatening blocks?

Depends how you tell him, I'd say.  And also on context - for example,
you would be very unwise to bring up Encyclopaedia Dramatica on his
user pages for obvious and perfectly good reasons.

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


body:
On 12/12/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
>
> On Tue, 12 Dec 2006 14:30:14 -0800, Luna <lunasantin at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >By preliminary looks through page
> >histories, it looks like he *was* being pretty disruptive and edit
> warring,
> >with a persistent failure to use talk pages -- but then, he wasn't the
> only
> >one doing so. The full protection of the page seems more or less
> >appropriate, as a means of forcing discussion.
>
> I got the same result, but I don't see the block log as evidence of a
> cabal, I regard William pretty highly, for example.

Fair enough. I have no questions on the older blocks. Have been looking into
things a bit more. Tariqabjotu has been kind enough to link me to evidence
supporting the allegation of block evasion:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/RunedChozo
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/70.114.237.14

If we compare the two, they look pretty similar, to me.
70.114.237.14appears to have been used to evade the block on
RunedChozo, as it references
the same dispute, uses some of the same language, and shares the same sorts
of behavior. It's also worth noting that the vitriol, attacks, and insults
coming from 70.114 are far more severe than those from RunedChozo. Looks
like block evasion and serious attacks, to me?

JoshuaZ expressed some concern that 70.114 might have been another anon user
who caused problems, in the past. Sounded like he was considering a
checkuser request to try and sort out for sure whether they're the same
person, but I shouldn't speak for him in that regard.

Also, just as I finished typing this, Tariqabjotu let me know that he's
submitting a checkuser request.

-Luna


subject: [WikiEN-l] Caregories (was: Hello)

body:
Marc Riddell wrote:
> But thrashed out to what conclusion?

That I do not know, and I'm sorry if I gave the impression it had
been.  (I wrote "thrashed out" instead of "hashed out" in an
attempt to suggest that there had probably been more thrashing
than concluding -- though I wasn't part of the earlier
discussions, so I don't even know.)

My own take on the question is that Categories in their current
form are an imprecise mechanism, and that people should not try
to use them for precise tasks, or waste too much time arguing
about particular attempted more-precise usages.

We could speculate about nice, more-precise technical solutions
to the problem, which would support those more-precise usages.
But (like [[m:Wikidata]]), it's not clear when or if mainstream
mediawiki might ever get such improvements, nor is it clear that
it even should.  The relative simplicity of mediawiki -- the
absence of complicated features with technophiles (like me!) are
always wishing it had in support of more-precise usages -- this
simplicity is of course a huge strength, and I suspect that it's
more responsible for Wikipedia's success than I'd like to admit.
(Which is to say, technical advances like more-precise categories
and taggable data, which I would dearly love to see, are even
more out of the question than I already fear they are.)


subject: [WikiEN-l] new Google Earth tie-in (!!)

body:
On 12/12/06, Steve Summit <scs at eskimo.com> wrote:
>  until Magnus's GeoHack broke (which may not have
> been coincidental!).

I don't believe in that kind of coincidence.  :-)

> We (and they) are in a rock-and-a-hard-place situation.  It's
> good that they're working from their own stashed copy instead of
> hitting us live, because I doubt our servers could handle their
> users' load.  But of course on the other hand it's supremely
> annoying that they're working from their own stashed copy,
> because (as you note and I emphatically agree) our lovely
> instantaneous wiki-quick edit-save-test loop is broken.
>
> As to updating their stashed copy more often, there's not much
> way we can ask them to do that when our own dumps only come out
> on a 2-4 week cycle. :-(

I agree that having live updating would be well outside the realm of
what we or Google want or are willing to pay for.  Maybe we can do
something to get back to a weekly dump schedule?  Preferably on
Google's dime?  ;-)


from_name: The Cunctator

subject: [WikiEN-l] Hello

references:
<b8ceeef70612111944j7cfd4e18ub15f4741b5382e8c@mail.gmail.com>
	<C1A4525E.3F9%michaeldavid86@comcast.net>
	<46d9b7490612121000l28966ca8m6c0ffcd7e00abcfc@mail.gmail.com>
	<dfd0b40612121023s55e34a95v3f33a05c562b8736@mail.gmail.com>
	<457EFEB1.8050608@KillerChihuahua.com>

body:
Tedious for a human; not for a computer.

On 12/12/06, Puppy <puppy at killerchihuahua.com> wrote:
>
> The Cunctator wrote:
> > Articles should only belong to the most specific of categories in which
> they
> > can belong. The goals of categorization are different from the goals of
> flat
> > interlinking.
> > __________________
> >
> Why? I'm not following your reasoning here. It seems to me a good point
> has been made - if you want all suicides, then having to traverse all
> subcats is tedious, to say the least.
> _______________________________________________
> 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: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On 12/12/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
>
> On Tue, 12 Dec 2006 15:03:54 -0700, "Rob Smith" <nobs03 at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> >Yah what do you do when a long term conspiracy theory is later debunked
> with
> >reputable, verifiable information, and the then anti-conspiracists invent
> >conspiracy theories to debunk the WP:RS, WP:V, WP:ATT former conspiracy
> >theory.  I can point to a real life situation.
>
> I am all ears :-)
>
> Guy (JzG)

"What if the American Government had disclosed the...conspiracy when it
first learned of it? ...this did not happen.* *Ignorant armies clashed by
night."  Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan.

"defenders have loudly demanded the release of government documents on the
case, only to deny the documents' significance once they are made public."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moynihan_Commission_on_Government_Secrecy#Cold_War_Secrecy

Expresses much the content of my dispute.

nobs


from_name: Parker Peters

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

body:
On 12/12/06, M Roget <mroget at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Can we have a rule that states that any admin who "quits" Wikipedia to
> protest this or that is automatically desysopped? It's one thing to take a
> wikibreak or to leave because of real life time commitments but any admin
> who quits in order to make a point has abdicated their responsibilities.
> There seems to be a trend of admins announcing their departure only to
> come
> back in a few days after dozens of people have posted supportive
> statements
> on their talk page. Call me cynical but this looks like manipulative
> trolling to me and automatic desysopping would create a disincentive. If
> someone really intends to leave they won't care about being desysopped -
> they'll even request that it be done but if somone is just pretending to
> leave an automatic desysopping will make them think twice.
>
> Michel
>

I see this as a very valid option. It'd certainly be a disincentive to a
large amount of drama.

And no, I don't see my circumstances as different. Unlike them, I haven't
come back to wikipedia itself. And if this were to be adopted, I'd
cheerfully smile as my account was desysopped.

Parker


body:
On 12/12/06, Luna <lunasantin at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Ehh. If someone's *constantly* leaving and coming back and making all
> sorts
> of drama over this sort of thing, I might be more inclined to exlore that
> option. But in terms of an indefinite fits-all-situations policy, I'm not
> too fond of the idea. I figure good contributors are entitled to a certain
> amount of drama and temper tantrum, now and then.
>
> Well, maybe "entitled" is a poor word choice. But if somebody solves more
> problems than they cause, in the long run, I'm personally willing to
> tolerate breakdowns and depressions.
>
> Just my ramblings on the matter. Dissect at will,
> -Luna
>

MONGO: I lost count.
Slimvirgin: at least 3 instances, one of which was "if you don't ban this
user I'm leaving."
FloNight: at least 2 instances.

I'm sure I could hunt down others, those are just off the top of my head.

Parker


subject: [WikiEN-l] new Google Earth tie-in (!!)

body:
On 12/12/06, Michael Noda <michael.noda at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 12/12/06, Steve Summit <scs at eskimo.com> wrote:
> >  until Magnus's GeoHack broke (which may not have
> > been coincidental!).
>
> I don't believe in that kind of coincidence.  :-)

Geohack is on toolserver which has had problems recently, but it seems
to be forking fine right now. Whats broken about it?


subject: [WikiEN-l] Categories (was: Hello)

body:
I wrote:
> My own take on the question is that Categories in their current
> form are an imprecise mechanism, and that people should not try
> to use them for precise tasks, or waste too much time arguing
> about particular attempted more-precise usages.

By which I mean, the argument usually boils down to trying to
decide precisely whether category membership is supposed to
denote an "is-a", "has-a" or "is-related-to" relationship.
But that can't be answered, so the arguments can never really be
resolved, and people have to fall back to using categories not
to implement rigid OO-like inheritable hierarchies, but rather,
looser collections where the only semantic attached to category
membership is "is-kinda-related-to".  Some categories and the
editors who maintain them will reach some kind of loose,
relatively informal consensus that they're categories which
embody a web of loose relationships (e.g. "Topics relating to
Paris"), and some will similarly reach some kind of loose,
relatively informal consensus that they're categories which
embody a tighter taxonomy (e.g. "Counties in California").

Now, despite what I said about the problem not being solveable
without additional and potentially more-complicated technical
mechanisms which aren't likely to happen soon, it seems to me
that one loose, relatively informal, "soft" solution to the part
of the problem would be to try to reflect a category's semantic
in its name, e.g. "Category:Counties in California" and
"Category:Arrondissements in Paris" and "Category:Topics relating
to Paris", rather than just "Category:California" and
"Category:Paris".  And we're probably doing a lot of that today.
But there are still (and will always be) lots of problems when
categories contain other categories, and we'll always be
wondering whether category membership is or isn't or should or
shouldn't be transitive, and it's these larger-scale questions
which we can't (under the current architecture) ever fully
satisfactorily resolve.


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On Tue, 12 Dec 2006 07:10:04 -0800 (PST), Mongo Montana
<mongomontana at yahoo.com> wrote:

>>Hell, I'm villified by a large portion of the community simply because I
>>had an association with the group that's been trolling him.  I've written
>>an FA, created over 250 articles, and I have 10k edits to my name, but
>>that doesn't change anything in a number of people's minds.

>  You can run for admin anytime you want and I will abstain from voting.

Jeff did run for admin (I nominated him).  It was derailed by people
who disliked his inclusionism. I didn't see that as relevant, myself,
since an inclusionist is, if anything, less likely to be a problem as
an admin than a deletionist.  But what do I know?

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


from_name: Jimmy Wales

subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
Concerned Wikipedian wrote:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Seabhcan/Proposed_decision#MONGO_is_desysopped
>
> Jimmy, that offer I sent to you via private email is open.

The offer was to meet in irc, but unfortunately I went to bed before I
saw it.  Well, I am in irc often, so anytime. :)

As to public critique of ArbCom decisions, I fail to grasp why you think
it would be a big deal.  It seems quite easy to phrase your dissent in a
respectful and thoughtful manner that everyone will admire, even if they
are not convinced.

"I believe that a ArbCom decision to desysop Mongo would be unwise because:"

No one is going to troll you about that.

--Jimbo


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
Matt R wrote:
> --- Puppy <puppy at KillerChihuahua.com> wrote:
>> MONGO has been the target of
>> massive trolling and harassment. It shows good sense to try to insulate
>> oneself from becoming a target of the same people
>
> Since "Concerned Wikipedian" was appealing to Jimbo, he might wish to
> communicate with Jimbo via private e-mail using his Wikipedia identity.
>
> In a noisy environment, it's not a bad heuristic to use reputation in order to
> evaluate how seriously we should take someone's comments.

Exactly.  Several good people have said that they do not agree with the
desysopping of MONGO, using their own good names to do it, and I don't
see any problem with that.  We are a diverse community, and we are not
required to agree on everything.  In particular, we must have a culture
of open tolerance for dissent and debate as a form of proper check on
our actions.

A culture in which people anonymously take potshots at other people's
decisions is not a healthy one.

--Jimbo


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
>> The ArbCom are technically independent from Jimbo, and I
>> don't see why he should intervene.
>
> They're not that independent. They are appointed by Jimbo and Jimbo
> maintains a veto over all their decisions. If he wants to intervene he
> can and should. I see no reason to in this case, though.

In point of fact, I have never overruled any ArbCom decision nor am I
likely to do so and I appoint only after approval by the community.

I am very active on the ArbCom mailing list, but only in an advisory
capacity, and the function I play there is very similar to the function
I try to play everywhere... which is to build consensus and try to find
common ground.  It's pretty easy to build common ground on the arbcom
because by the very nature of our election process, the people who make
it to the arbcom tend to be quite sane and open to reasonable compromise.

In a case like this, the MONGO case, I am quite sure that all the ArbCom
are reading with great interest to learn what various trustworthy
community members think of things.  It seems likely to me that we will
soon be discussing it on the ArbCom and try to find a solution that will
work broadly for everyone.

This is the wikipedia way.  (When it is working well, at least. :) )

--Jimbo


subject: [WikiEN-l] First fair use criterium

body:
On 12/12/06, George Herbert <george.herbert at gmail.com> wrote:
[snip]
>On 12/10/06, Stan Shebs <stanshebs at earthlink.net> wrote:
> A number of people on the fair use policy pages have explicitly declared
> > that they consider the free content goal to be secondary at most. I
> > suppose it's fortunate that they haven't started lifting text from other
> > websites en masse...
> >

Some of them have.

> Wikipedia stripped of all the fair use images at the moment would suck
> rather badly.

I believe that some areas would, Yes.  But look at the articles on
dewiki. Do those suck?

I think we have a need for some unfree images for critical commentary.
There are articles where dewiki is kinda poor in part due to a lack of
free images.

For example, their articles which best cover the famous photograph of
[[Phan Th? Kim Ph?c]] are  [[de:Phan Th? Kim Ph?c]] and [[de:Tr?ng
B?ng]].  Both have  external links and encourage readers to follow
them to read the pictures.

What good does external linking do for free content?   Most of
whatever incentive to somehow free that image which could be created
by excluding it is lost when we include a highly visible external link
to it.

The primary advantage I see in completely excluding unfree works (even
ones which can't be freed or replaced) is that we avoid confusing new
contributors with an apparently inconsistent policy. On the other hand
on dewiki it seems to be instutionalizing the process of external
linking to content which would be inside wikipedia in an ideal world.
Already enwiki is challenged by people adding externals rather than
contributing content.

So nothing is simple. :)

> Making Wikipedia worse, in order to try and convince people to put more time
> in and eventually make it better, seems like a bad tradeoff to me.

Whatever the extent that removing unfree content will make Wikipedia
lower quality, making it more free is a move towards our goals. So
removing unfree isn't pure loss. We have to consider the balance.


subject: [WikiEN-l] new Google Earth tie-in (!!)

body:
Greg Maxwell wrote:
>On 12/12/06, Michael Noda <michael.noda at gmail.com> wrote:
>>On 12/12/06, Steve Summit <scs at eskimo.com> wrote:
>>>  until Magnus's GeoHack broke (which may not have
>>> been coincidental!).
>>
>> I don't believe in that kind of coincidence.  :-)
>
> Geohack is on toolserver which has had problems recently, but it seems
> to be forking fine right now. Whats broken about it?

For a while yesterday it was displaying the latitude (only) at the
top of an otherwise blank page.  But yes, it's working again now.


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
>
> It is in my opinion notable and verifyable that there are conspiracy
> theories about 9/11.  In my opinion, it's perfectly fine to document
> that fact in Wikipedia, and explain what those theories are.

So long as we also explain that these "theories" are thoroughly debunked and
that nobody should take them even remotely seriously, sure.

I have not been hanging around the 9/11 related Wikipedia pages
> regularly for a while and I don't know the degree of shove we're
> getting from those conspiracists of late.

"Too Much."

  I am sympathetic with "it
> takes too much effort to fight these kooks", but suppressing Wikipedia
> *coverage* of the issues is almost certainly the wrong approach to
> dealing with it.

No. If you say we can document that the theories exist, sure, but our
coverage shouldn't give them any sort of credibility.

In my currently ideal world, we'd do something like a policy which
> says that conspiracy theories MUST be segregated to a separate page,
> and simply apply normal warn-and-block to anyone who violates that and
> puts it on the main pages. Let them have their playpen at the
> conspiracy theory page, let the anti-conspiracy-theory people have a
> "Criticisms of conspiracy theories about X" page to argue the point
> on, and concentrate on squashing anyone who tries to pull that debate
> onto the main page.

Problem: this gives the kook nutjob theories credibility.

Parker


body:
On 12/12/06, Luna <lunasantin at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 12/12/06, Michael Smith <runedchozo at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > Yadda yadda, you've got your fingers in your ears and you're screaming
> you
> > can't hear, you don't care as long as it's a muslim who's the one doing
> > the
> > lying.
>
>
> And that's where you lost my attention, I'm afraid. Please try to calm
> down,
> or you very probably will lose any chance of getting a fair hearing.  If
> you
> have a legitimate complaint, I'd love to try and investigate it -- as is,
> however, you look too much like a troll for me to eagerly invest the time
> to
> find out.

Luna,

I've taken a look at this complaint. Suffice it to say, there's more than
enough for me to be "very uneasy" about what went on.

The diffs given from Itaqallah do have what appear to be falsified edit
summaries, especially the first - calling something "OR" when the text
includes a section saying "SOURCE:" is about as blatant as you get short of
claiming 2+2=5.

As for the rest, the discussion is a pile-on, and Runedchozo definitely
reacted badly. I would probably have supported a 24-hour block as a cooling
down period, if it had been explained as such and applied to all involved
parties.

The accusation of "block evasion" from Inshaneee appears to be wholly
without merit, not to mention that Inshaneee actually removed the comment
that I'm assuming he is referring to from the page anyways.

Looks clearly to be bad-faith persecution to me.

Parker


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com wrote:
> Guy Chapman aka JzG wrote
>> Of course MONGO should have held back, and we, his friends and fellow
>> admins, should have helped him to do that, but I suspect that the
>> decision is not going to be a popular one.
>
> OK, not going to be 'popular'. Do you suggest we look at the evidence, or the buzz?

The evidence! :)  At the same time, and I am sure Charles will agree
because we have talked about it... it can be fine for the ArbCom to
always be open to new evidence or arguments from trusted community
members as a sanity check.

But this is one of the reasons we try to keep the arbcom elections
apolitical and why we have the appointment buffer.  I think that the
last thing any of us want is judges making decisions not based on facts
but based on opinion polls.  It can be joyful in some cases, but on the
whole, it is quite a bad idea.


from_name: Marc Riddell

subject: [WikiEN-l] Categories (was: Hello)

body:
Thank you, Steve, for making (painful) sense out of this issue for me. I
started school with a typewriter and finished post-grad with pretty much the
same. The only computer on campus was the size of my dorm.

I'll continue to campaign for changes; although as technochallenged as I am,
my arguments will need to remain philosophical.

Marc

> From: Steve Summit <scs at eskimo.com>
> Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Date: Tue, 12 Dec 2006 15:26:57 -0500
> To: wikien-l at Wikipedia.org
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Categories (was: Hello)
>
> I wrote:
>> My own take on the question is that Categories in their current
>> form are an imprecise mechanism, and that people should not try
>> to use them for precise tasks, or waste too much time arguing
>> about particular attempted more-precise usages.
>
> By which I mean, the argument usually boils down to trying to
> decide precisely whether category membership is supposed to
> denote an "is-a", "has-a" or "is-related-to" relationship.
> But that can't be answered, so the arguments can never really be
> resolved, and people have to fall back to using categories not
> to implement rigid OO-like inheritable hierarchies, but rather,
> looser collections where the only semantic attached to category
> membership is "is-kinda-related-to".  Some categories and the
> editors who maintain them will reach some kind of loose,
> relatively informal consensus that they're categories which
> embody a web of loose relationships (e.g. "Topics relating to
> Paris"), and some will similarly reach some kind of loose,
> relatively informal consensus that they're categories which
> embody a tighter taxonomy (e.g. "Counties in California").
>
> Now, despite what I said about the problem not being solveable
> without additional and potentially more-complicated technical
> mechanisms which aren't likely to happen soon, it seems to me
> that one loose, relatively informal, "soft" solution to the part
> of the problem would be to try to reflect a category's semantic
> in its name, e.g. "Category:Counties in California" and
> "Category:Arrondissements in Paris" and "Category:Topics relating
> to Paris", rather than just "Category:California" and
> "Category:Paris".  And we're probably doing a lot of that today.
> But there are still (and will always be) lots of problems when
> categories contain other categories, and we'll always be
> wondering whether category membership is or isn't or should or
> shouldn't be transitive, and it's these larger-scale questions
> which we can't (under the current architecture) ever fully
> satisfactorily resolve.
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l


body:
On 12/12/06, George Herbert <george.herbert at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 12/12/06, Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > On 12/12/06, Luna <lunasantin at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > Ehh. If someone's *constantly* leaving and coming back and making all
> > > sorts
> > > of drama over this sort of thing, I might be more inclined to exlore
> > that
> > > option. But in terms of an indefinite fits-all-situations policy, I'm
> > not
> > > too fond of the idea. I figure good contributors are entitled to a
> > certain
> > > amount of drama and temper tantrum, now and then.
> > >
> > > Well, maybe "entitled" is a poor word choice. But if somebody solves
> > more
> > > problems than they cause, in the long run, I'm personally willing to
> > > tolerate breakdowns and depressions.
> > >
> > > Just my ramblings on the matter. Dissect at will,
> > > -Luna
> > >
> >
> > MONGO: I lost count.
> > Slimvirgin: at least 3 instances, one of which was "if you don't ban
> this
> > user I'm leaving."
> > FloNight: at least 2 instances.
> >
> > I'm sure I could hunt down others, those are just off the top of my
> head.
> >
>
> Having WP policy be that we punish people for what they say in
> discussions,
> other than threats and personal attacks and the like, is a bad thing.  No,
> let me restate that more emphatically - it's a horrible, terrible idea.

We've already stretched the definition of "personal attack" so far that I'm
opposed to that being a valid reason to "punish" someone.

I agree with Luna; while not always necessarily desirable, it's a common and
> fairly normal human response to extreme frustration to let off
> steam.  It's
> not hurting us to let people do it.  It may be irritating you, but that's
> not by itself a reason to take official action over it.
>

They should be desysopped for violating [[WP:POINT]] after the second or
third occasion anyways, because it IS highly disruptive.

Parker


body:
You do realize that that's not going to help the situation at all...

sigh.

Parker

On 12/12/06, Michael Bimmler <mbimmler at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Dear everybody,
> Michael Smith has already been placed on moderation by David Gerard
> shortly after this post.
> Thanks
> Michael (Bimmler, not Smith...)
>
> On 12/12/06, Sean Barrett <sean at epoptic.com> wrote:
> > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> > Hash: SHA1
> >
> > Michael Smith stated for the record:
> > > Whatever you say, dick.
> > > ... Your policies are so much bullshit.
> >
> > Moderators, please put Michael Smith on moderation.
> >
> > - --
> >  Sean Barrett     | Is smoke supposed to come out of it like that?
> >  sean at epoptic.com |
> > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
> > Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32)
> > Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org
> >
> > iD8DBQFFfyK0/SVOiq2uhHMRAmR7AJ9Qz9JbQVSX7K1pPlCGahzrlyOFcACePZ1q
> > +Pz3bFLET+MaYlq1WFMCHn0=
> > =YU0h
> > -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
> > _______________________________________________
> > WikiEN-l mailing list
> > WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> > To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
> >
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
<snip>
>
>
>
> The real problem here is that overenthusiastic anti-conspiracists get into
> a
> vicious cycle where they try and suppress conspiracists, which encourages
> the conspiracists, which further angers the anti-conspiracists.
>
> You are part of the problem.  You can either keep battering your head on
> it
> until it stops hurting, or play Aikido with the problem.  Guess which way
> minimizes long term stress by anti-conspiracists and public belief in
> conspiracy theories?
>

No, you give them a page where the theory is listed, followed by "This is
debunked/wrong BECAUSE:" and include the thorough debunking.

Parker


from_name: Brianna Laugher

subject:
[Commons-l] Cookie based blocking and bug #3233. A quick hack
	implimented on commons.

body:
On 12/12/06, Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell at gmail.com> wrote:
<snip info about cookie-based blocking>
> The current behavior blocks all uploads and edits by the impacted
> browser, but it would be fairly trivial to make the function more like
> regular blocking... or even more fine grained with per-namespace or
> per article blocks. The current behavior also renews the block for 24
> hours every time the user *views* a page while logged in as the
> blocked user. This too could be trivially changed.

This is interesting.

A comment in the code says "If the user logs on while this is in their
js, their browser gets a 24hour cookie block." which seems rather
different to "The current behavior also renews the block for 24 hours
every time the user *views* a page while logged in as the blocked
user." The latter comment I don't entirely understand. Is it that the
block is only activated once they log in? If so, I think that could be
a very useful feature for Commons, where users don't always regularly
log in. Short blocks are good to get a user's attention (generally re:
uploading copyivos), but if they don't even try to log in while
they're blocked then they go basically unnoticed.

If this could be changed to create permanent (or timed) uploading-only
blocks, Commons would start using this straight away, I feel certain.
:) ( http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=4995 )

BTW: I think something like this would be good in its own MediaWiki
page, it is easier to track changes to it and refer to it instead of
jumbled in Monobook.js.

cheers,
Brianna
user:pfctdayelise


from_name: Bence Damokos

body:
> I do not think this is good enough to celebrate. I'd welcome a tool that
> would allow us to move properly licensed free images from wikipedias to
> commons. Now I'd celebrate then.

>
>
> *ahem*
>
> http://tools.wikimedia.de/~magnus/pushforcommons.php

Is there a way, to have the one-click upload feature in the ImportFreeImages
extension made available in the pushforcommons as well?

-Bence
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/commons-l/attachments/20061212/41366e1d/attachment.htm


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On 12/12/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 12/12/06, George Herbert <george.herbert at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 12/12/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > [[Scholars for 9/11 Truth]] is a significant indication of the
> problem.
> >
> > What is wrong with that page?
> >
>
> No idea I haven't read it isn't relvivant to my point. My point out
> there is that there are CTs produceing a large amount of citable
> material. Most the the active oponents (such as the author of "screw
> loose change") who are the ones who acutaly write down the point by
> point debunkings tend not to produce the same amount of citable
> material.

For any reasonable individual, it only takes one good thorough debunking to
show what kooks these nuts are.

The fact that 5 tinfoil hats, even 5 tinfoil hats with cheap university
degrees and too little psychological evaluation, spend all day writing about
this still doesn't mean we should give them any credence.

"Eat dung. 10 million flies can't be wrong."

Parker


from_name: George Herbert

body:
On 12/12/06, Luna <lunasantin at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hm. I've had some private email exchanges with the user, and I've finally
> managed to calm him down, a bit. By preliminary looks through page
> histories, it looks like he *was* being pretty disruptive and edit warring,
> with a persistent failure to use talk pages -- but then, he wasn't the only
> one doing so. The full protection of the page seems more or less
> appropriate, as a means of forcing discussion.
>
> RuinedChozo absolutely must back off or cool down on his personal attacks
> and accusations -- if some of those complaints about lying and cabalism are
> legitimate, let such be revealed through an RfC or brought before Arbcom for
> consideration. On that count, I don't think I'm going to bend.
>
> I am disappointed, however, that the admins involved didn't put more effort
> into discussing things with this user. It's true that he's got a long block
> log, but I notice that most of the blocks come from the same "group," -- in
> situations where I have trouble getting through to someone, I'd say it's
> better to try and find a neutral third party to talk things over, with the
> person.
>
> There really should have been more discussion from all sides. In heated
> disputes, repeating the same superficial arguments ad nauseam usually
> doesn't work -- why not explain in detail why you feel a particular edit was
> or wasn't sourced, unsourced, original research, neutral in tone, or such?
> Why wasn't more effort put into this, especially by experienced admins?
>
> I'm still looking, but as of this moment, it's not yet clear to me where the
> alleged block evasion took place. Anybody see something I'm missing?
>
> -Luna
>
> On 12/12/06, Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> > From: Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com>
> > Date: Dec 12, 2006 4:11 PM
> > Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Completely unreasonable block and behavior by
> > admin
> > friends of Itaqallah to win a content dispute
> > To: Michael Bimmler <mbimmler at gmail.com>
> >
> >
> >
> > On 12/12/06, Michael Bimmler <mbimmler at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > 1. I'm not the list moderator. I'm merely reporting, so that we don't
> > > have 10 people asking "please moderate him"
> > > 2. He should maybe get a bit more calm... Words as "dick" and
> > > "bullshit" simply don't help your cause.
> > > michael
> >
> >
> > No, they don't. But the utterly dismissive attack rhetoric that's been
> > heaped on him, both here and on wikipedia? The fact that I'm the only
> > person
> > it seems who's even bothered to check the merits of his complaint?
> >
> > I can see where someone would start to get really angry, and throwing oil
> > onto fire doesn't help.
> >
> > Parker
> > _______________________________________________
> > WikiEN-l mailing list
> > WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> > To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
> >
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

As far as I can see, it's entirely over his editing of his talk page,
removing unblock request refusals and re-unblock-requesting, plus
arguing with people there.

As a personal opinion - lengthening blocks due to ongoing argument
ONLY on a blockee's talk page is among the worst abuses that a pack of
administrators can commit, ganging up on someone.

RunedChozo came into the argument with a bunch of abuses he'd
committed counting against him, and certainly was being disruptive on
several levels.  He did have one point that I see - Itaquallah did use
inappropriate edit summaries and remove material with source info
claiming it's unsourced.  There was a two-sided abusive edit war going
on; Itaquallah was not an innocent party there, and should have been
warned against that.

It's hard to see this and not wonder if RunedChozo is too disruptive
to be a Wikipedia participant, but a bunch of admins have gone and
collectively beaten up on someone in a way which is not called for or
appropriate.  If someone can't stop being a dick on their talk page
while they're blocked, admins need to just walk away and let them cool
down.

Bad day.

--
-george william herbert
george.herbert at gmail.com


from_name: Guettarda

body:
On 12/12/06, Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 12/12/06, George Herbert <george.herbert at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > On 12/12/06, Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > On 12/12/06, Luna <lunasantin at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > Ehh. If someone's *constantly* leaving and coming back and making
> all
> > > > sorts
> > > > of drama over this sort of thing, I might be more inclined to exlore
> > > that
> > > > option. But in terms of an indefinite fits-all-situations policy,
> I'm
> > > not
> > > > too fond of the idea. I figure good contributors are entitled to a
> > > certain
> > > > amount of drama and temper tantrum, now and then.
> > > >
> > > > Well, maybe "entitled" is a poor word choice. But if somebody solves
> > > more
> > > > problems than they cause, in the long run, I'm personally willing to
> > > > tolerate breakdowns and depressions.
> > > >
> > > > Just my ramblings on the matter. Dissect at will,
> > > > -Luna
> > > >
> > >
> > > MONGO: I lost count.
> > > Slimvirgin: at least 3 instances, one of which was "if you don't ban
> > this
> > > user I'm leaving."
> > > FloNight: at least 2 instances.
> > >
> > > I'm sure I could hunt down others, those are just off the top of my
> > head.
> > >
> >
> > Having WP policy be that we punish people for what they say in
> > discussions,
> > other than threats and personal attacks and the like, is a bad
> thing.  No,
> > let me restate that more emphatically - it's a horrible, terrible idea.
>
>
> We've already stretched the definition of "personal attack" so far that
> I'm
> opposed to that being a valid reason to "punish" someone.
>
> I agree with Luna; while not always necessarily desirable, it's a common
> and
> > fairly normal human response to extreme frustration to let off
> > steam.  It's
> > not hurting us to let people do it.  It may be irritating you, but
> that's
> > not by itself a reason to take official action over it.
> >
>
> They should be desysopped for violating [[WP:POINT]] after the second or
> third occasion anyways, because it IS highly disruptive.
>
> Parker

Don't be ridiculous.  Saying "I will not stay here if PersonX is allowed to
return to editing" isn't "disrupting Wikipedia to make a point".  Why should
anyone tolerate the unblocking of a particularly vicious troll who has been
harrassing them?  Trolls should not be tolerated.  If someone unblocks a
troll who has stalked and harrassed a valuable editor, the victim of the
harrassment shouldn't be punished.

Trolls and stalkers are disruptive.  People pointing out that the community
is not doing enough to protect them against trolls and stalkers are
notdisruptive.


from_name: M Roget

body:
Can we have a rule that states that any admin who "quits" Wikipedia to
protest this or that is automatically desysopped? It's one thing to take a
wikibreak or to leave because of real life time commitments but any admin
who quits in order to make a point has abdicated their responsibilities.
There seems to be a trend of admins announcing their departure only to come
back in a few days after dozens of people have posted supportive statements
on their talk page. Call me cynical but this looks like manipulative
trolling to me and automatic desysopping would create a disincentive. If
someone really intends to leave they won't care about being desysopped -
they'll even request that it be done but if somone is just pretending to
leave an automatic desysopping will make them think twice.

Michel


body:
On 12/12/06, Guettarda <guettarda at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 12/12/06, Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > On 12/12/06, George Herbert <george.herbert at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > On 12/12/06, Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > On 12/12/06, Luna <lunasantin at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > > Ehh. If someone's *constantly* leaving and coming back and making
> > all
> > > > > sorts
> > > > > of drama over this sort of thing, I might be more inclined to
> exlore
> > > > that
> > > > > option. But in terms of an indefinite fits-all-situations policy,
> > I'm
> > > > not
> > > > > too fond of the idea. I figure good contributors are entitled to a
> > > > certain
> > > > > amount of drama and temper tantrum, now and then.
> > > > >
> > > > > Well, maybe "entitled" is a poor word choice. But if somebody
> solves
> > > > more
> > > > > problems than they cause, in the long run, I'm personally willing
> to
> > > > > tolerate breakdowns and depressions.
> > > > >
> > > > > Just my ramblings on the matter. Dissect at will,
> > > > > -Luna
> > > > >
> > > >
> > > > MONGO: I lost count.
> > > > Slimvirgin: at least 3 instances, one of which was "if you don't ban
> > > this
> > > > user I'm leaving."
> > > > FloNight: at least 2 instances.
> > > >
> > > > I'm sure I could hunt down others, those are just off the top of my
> > > head.
> > > >
> > >
> > > Having WP policy be that we punish people for what they say in
> > > discussions,
> > > other than threats and personal attacks and the like, is a bad
> > thing.  No,
> > > let me restate that more emphatically - it's a horrible, terrible
> idea.
> >
> >
> > We've already stretched the definition of "personal attack" so far that
> > I'm
> > opposed to that being a valid reason to "punish" someone.
> >
> > I agree with Luna; while not always necessarily desirable, it's a common
> > and
> > > fairly normal human response to extreme frustration to let off
> > > steam.  It's
> > > not hurting us to let people do it.  It may be irritating you, but
> > that's
> > > not by itself a reason to take official action over it.
> > >
> >
> > They should be desysopped for violating [[WP:POINT]] after the second or
> > third occasion anyways, because it IS highly disruptive.
> >
> > Parker
>
>
> Don't be ridiculous.  Saying "I will not stay here if PersonX is allowed
> to
> return to editing" isn't "disrupting Wikipedia to make a point".  Why
> should
> anyone tolerate the unblocking of a particularly vicious troll who has
> been
> harrassing them?  Trolls should not be tolerated.  If someone unblocks a
> troll who has stalked and harrassed a valuable editor, the victim of the
> harrassment shouldn't be punished.
>
> Trolls and stalkers are disruptive.  People pointing out that the
> community
> is not doing enough to protect them against trolls and stalkers are
> notdisruptive.

When there is a serious ongoing discussion and people have a serious
difference of opinion with you, and other respected editors are saying that
the person should not be banned, then YES this IS serious disruption.

Parker.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Categories (was: Hello)

body:
The important thing is to campaign for what you want --
an easy way to list all of the people who have committed suicide, say

rather than for a particular implementation.

On 12/12/06, Marc Riddell <michaeldavid86 at comcast.net> wrote:
>
> Thank you, Steve, for making (painful) sense out of this issue for me. I
> started school with a typewriter and finished post-grad with pretty much
> the
> same. The only computer on campus was the size of my dorm.
>
> I'll continue to campaign for changes; although as technochallenged as I
> am,
> my arguments will need to remain philosophical.
>
> Marc
>
> > From: Steve Summit <scs at eskimo.com>
> > Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> > Date: Tue, 12 Dec 2006 15:26:57 -0500
> > To: wikien-l at Wikipedia.org
> > Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Categories (was: Hello)
> >
> > I wrote:
> >> My own take on the question is that Categories in their current
> >> form are an imprecise mechanism, and that people should not try
> >> to use them for precise tasks, or waste too much time arguing
> >> about particular attempted more-precise usages.
> >
> > By which I mean, the argument usually boils down to trying to
> > decide precisely whether category membership is supposed to
> > denote an "is-a", "has-a" or "is-related-to" relationship.
> > But that can't be answered, so the arguments can never really be
> > resolved, and people have to fall back to using categories not
> > to implement rigid OO-like inheritable hierarchies, but rather,
> > looser collections where the only semantic attached to category
> > membership is "is-kinda-related-to".  Some categories and the
> > editors who maintain them will reach some kind of loose,
> > relatively informal consensus that they're categories which
> > embody a web of loose relationships (e.g. "Topics relating to
> > Paris"), and some will similarly reach some kind of loose,
> > relatively informal consensus that they're categories which
> > embody a tighter taxonomy (e.g. "Counties in California").
> >
> > Now, despite what I said about the problem not being solveable
> > without additional and potentially more-complicated technical
> > mechanisms which aren't likely to happen soon, it seems to me
> > that one loose, relatively informal, "soft" solution to the part
> > of the problem would be to try to reflect a category's semantic
> > in its name, e.g. "Category:Counties in California" and
> > "Category:Arrondissements in Paris" and "Category:Topics relating
> > to Paris", rather than just "Category:California" and
> > "Category:Paris".  And we're probably doing a lot of that today.
> > But there are still (and will always be) lots of problems when
> > categories contain other categories, and we'll always be
> > wondering whether category membership is or isn't or should or
> > shouldn't be transitive, and it's these larger-scale questions
> > which we can't (under the current architecture) ever fully
> > satisfactorily resolve.
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > WikiEN-l mailing list
> > WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> > To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


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

body:
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Parker Peters <onmywayoutster at gmail.com>
Date: Dec 12, 2006 4:11 PM
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Completely unreasonable block and behavior by admin
friends of Itaqallah to win a content dispute
To: Michael Bimmler <mbimmler at gmail.com>

On 12/12/06, Michael Bimmler <mbimmler at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> 1. I'm not the list moderator. I'm merely reporting, so that we don't
> have 10 people asking "please moderate him"
> 2. He should maybe get a bit more calm... Words as "dick" and
> "bullshit" simply don't help your cause.
> michael

No, they don't. But the utterly dismissive attack rhetoric that's been
heaped on him, both here and on wikipedia? The fact that I'm the only person
it seems who's even bothered to check the merits of his complaint?

I can see where someone would start to get really angry, and throwing oil
onto fire doesn't help.

Parker


from_name: geni

subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

references:
<114a29870612112213m4301a16dia56f79cfc34209d6@mail.gmail.com>
	<457E4A5C.1060904@wikia.com>
	<5cosn2he24nt57ntjdorgog081p8pjsbph@4ax.com>
	<A3D73CA7-306E-4C3A-B200-0DB3E3A10DA2@waterwiki.info>
	<mqftn2lcfma5bm1dg7tjjnkg2gmbocjo8h@4ax.com>
	<35C63923-9D4B-45B7-86E2-6D8B609F939D@waterwiki.info>

body:
On 12/12/06, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at waterwiki.info> wrote:
>
> I think that is the most important thing any of us can do here,
> insist on verifiable information from reliable sources.
>

Have you had many dealings with the 9/11 CTers?

--
geni


from_name: James Hare

body:
I think the intent is if they claim to be perma-leaving, and they mean it,
they wouldn't mind giving up their wares. If it's simply a Wikibreak, then
that means they recognize that they're coming back.

On 12/12/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
>
> On Tue, 12 Dec 2006 15:57:40 -0500, "M Roget" <mroget at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> >Can we have a rule that states that any admin who "quits" Wikipedia to
> >protest this or that is automatically desysopped?
>
> Why?  "Bah! Sod this, I'm off!" can mean it (in which case there is no
> urgency) or it can be a precursor to a Wikibreak to restore sanity.
> Let each case be judged on its merits, in accordance with the
> Clue-based principles on which the whole edifice is after all founded.
>
> Mind you, if we auto-moderated all "I'm leaving" posts from this list,
> life would probably be more pleasant :-)
>
> Guy (JzG)
> --
> http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


references:
<2ea0be9d0612121257l4efe6fd9o957f85020a285a73@mail.gmail.com>
	<9g6un21p4k91qcup9fsrrs5qtaju9chto4@4ax.com>
	<353e9f360612121314n59b67d8fk76d2b6a04cc684f3@mail.gmail.com>
	<1adf38660612121322u6ce13dcev33d52cc17cf35246@mail.gmail.com>
	<l0aun25i0fnu7domhsdhjvdnfcdsord8ju@4ax.com>

body:
On 12/12/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
>
> On Tue, 12 Dec 2006 13:22:16 -0800, Luna <lunasantin at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >Well, maybe "entitled" is a poor word choice. But if somebody solves more
> >problems than they cause, in the long run, I'm personally willing to
> >tolerate breakdowns and depressions.
>
> Exactly that.  You serve your dues, you earn a bit of slack.
>
> Guy (JzG)
>

"A bit of slack" is one thing, the utter disregard for even the remote
possibility that admins are in the wrong that I've seen? Sorry, your logic
is flawed. Please retake Logic 101.

Parker


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On 12/12/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
>
> On Tue, 12 Dec 2006 13:28:29 -0800, "George Herbert"
> <george.herbert at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >What is wrong with that page?
>
> It gives far to much credence to their absurd theories.
>
> Look at it this way: if I said to you that 300 people in the world
> believed that the moon was made of green cheese, and that the "moon
> made of rock" theory was a hoax perpetrated by the evil American
> government, and then created articles on Scholars for Green Cheese
> Truth, List of researchers supporting Moon Cheese Hypothesis,
> Alternate Explanations of Moon Construction, Evidence for Green Cheese
> Moon and so on and so on, then the whole walled garden would be gone
> by morning, and rightly so.
>
> We have a *massive* collection of articles on these nutters and their
> absurd views, and most of them are "notable" solely for propounding
> absurd theories which violate Occam's Razor.
>
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Researchers_questioning_the_official_account_of_9/11
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9/11_conspiracy_theories
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9/11_Truth_Movement
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controlled_demolition_hypothesis_for_the_collapse_of_the_World_Trade_Center
>
> and so on and so on.  All classic conspiracy theory shit: We "know"
> that their explanation is bogus, they refuse to tell us the truth,
> what are they hiding, and variations on that theme.  If we can't rebut
> something which is obviously bogus from credible sources, that
> indicates to me that maybe it should not be there at all. Aetherometry
> and pseudoscience all over again.
>
> Meanwhile the rest of the world - to a fairly good approximation 100%
> of it - accepts that it was an act of terrorism, and that the
> buildings collapsed because nobody had thought to design against being
> hit square-on by a suicide bomber in an airliner fully loaded with
> fuel - a remarkable oversight given how often this had happened
> before.
>
> We might disagree on the reasons behind the reasons, but as far as I
> can tell nobody with a full deck seriously believes that the WTC and
> Pentagon attacks were anything other than terrorism.
>

There was a poll a couple of years ago which found that 40% of the
population of New York City thought that there was something that had been
covered up about the official 9/11 story, though support for the individual
specific conspiracy theories was lower.

The links should be in the WTC disaster page talk page history.

That many people thinking there's something conspiratorial going on
terrifies me, for one, but it is a real issue...

--
-george william herbert
george.herbert at gmail.com


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Berto 'd Sera

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Abuse on mo.wiki

body:
Hoi!

> I expect however that it is not far off from where
> the other languages sub committee members will be.

Put my signature under it as well :)

Berto


from_name: Matthew Brown

subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On 12/12/06, George Herbert <george.herbert at gmail.com> wrote:
> There was a poll a couple of years ago which found that 40% of the
> population of New York City thought that there was something that had been
> covered up about the official 9/11 story, though support for the individual
> specific conspiracy theories was lower.
>
> The links should be in the WTC disaster page talk page history.
>
> That many people thinking there's something conspiratorial going on
> terrifies me, for one, but it is a real issue...

It's not necessarily crazy to think that there may have been things
covered up about 9/11; at the very least, evidence of screwups on the
part of those whose job it was to try and catch people like this.
Such a broadly worded question is different than specific conspiracy
theories.

-Matt


subject: [WikiEN-l] MONGO and the ArbCom

body:
On Tue, 12 Dec 2006 09:36:12 -0600 (CST), "Jeff Raymond"
<jeff.raymond at internationalhouseofbacon.com> wrote:

>the large amount good you do isn't going to make a lick of difference if
>people perceive the very small amount of bad a certain way, fair or not.

Right about now, you do not need to tell me this :-)

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