body:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA256

Jack Lynch wrote:
> You have flawed notion that admins don't vandalize or edit war, and
> that anons and layusers don't step in and correct such abuses.
>

I never said that they *don't* - that's what RfC and Arbcom are for.

> Sometimes they get popular by sharing the same socio-political
> paradigm. Sometimes they get that way by being boring, and not having
> been involved in conflict. MOST often they get that way the same way
> people get popular in school, by chatting alot, and making friends.
> Which of these shows their inherent abilities as adjudicators?
>

I would have said that they get popular based on the quality of their
skills in contributing to the encyclopedia.

> As to this last, I suppose your trolling? Suggestions like that
> underscore why an clique of net-friends should not have a monopoly on
> the reigns of power here.
>

I could ask you the same thing - your attitudes towards admins seem
remarkably similar to those of one particularly notorious troll who
claimed to be "experimenting" to prove their hypothesis that "admins are
evil".

"Power to the people" is a great idea, until you realise that "the
people" are idiots.

- --
Alphax                      |   /"\
Encrypted Email Preferred   |   \ /     ASCII Ribbon Campaign
OpenPGP key ID: 0xF874C613  |    X   Against HTML email & vCards
http://tinyurl.com/cc9up    |   / \
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iQEVAwUBQ0Tui7MAAH8MeUlWAQjv4Af9FFTDGe++j+DbpQNXUCeC2ZEgz4ThKcDE
O1fKdC8Lb0s6x2EPiNiJnpUbuYrQDGS7joofJPuy0HbJtscfqX7VurSX18qt9z++
VP75jp7wN20UXx7YdO6rWOnVl8chBgSFjN/on+ZbSdy2xMXNLhu3cZlxSBLBsSy6
1tYNtstFahkRjzkMHsf93oMThiBNT75sG8jaNKAMWmYE9ehkKpa2gc1egABjLSHs
znVCHtymrYK1EVOLiyp83o6IYDIW2d0ettIkLvDiFuUx7gz3wUafLhVn4RCpGJu+
mTZuz1Y0K5xnnzm9rXX8QNFmUblbX4dyl3OCSKMnWpyLiLk+lPRQcQ==
=0w7z
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Alphax

subject: [WikiEN-l] Old VFD-type discussions on talk sub-pages

body:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA256

MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:
> On 10/5/05, Phil Boswell <phil.boswell at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>I have just discovered that a bunch of these have been obliterated as an
>>unfortunate side-effect of an entirely right-minded drive to delete orphan
>>talk pages.
>>
>>The particular page which I stumbled across is
>>[[Talk:Constitutional_Charter_of_Serbia_and_Montenegro/Delete]] which can be
>>viewed here (if you have the right credentials :-):
>>*
>>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Undelete/Talk:Constitutional_Charter_of_Serbia_and_Montenegro/Delete
>>
>
> If I read this correctly the AFD/VFD discussion was put on the talk
> page when it belonged on a A or VFD subpage. Why was it there to begin
> with.
>
> I don't particularly like moving old VFD discussions to AFD either. It
> obscures their age.
>

Their age should be evident by the nicely timestamped closing comments.

- --
Alphax                      |   /"\
Encrypted Email Preferred   |   \ /     ASCII Ribbon Campaign
OpenPGP key ID: 0xF874C613  |    X   Against HTML email & vCards
http://tinyurl.com/cc9up    |   / \
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iQEVAwUBQ0TuxrMAAH8MeUlWAQjXVQf7BBdbKZWZzEjgOxtUkW7c/3+kO73uhrLp
6VdIYHcdTERoK4f6BP9NM53ImBEe4JN7u6u5fSjEtBIdDvtlt6cUTKvcGXQnt3gE
fnwfCXQVMFDc7Kh3IhXGFyfG6WaJ6vgGiZ5U3A70OnZ6ZFsPCz3BQLI0o5cujxtS
pC2cPi/iGV9uMZRjWUijB5+/dr6ylkZ5gwJT0j8bgXbuwWNadw/Rb0mtYirmoKJL
t0uNFHAyT9KdC8ciEM1JPrj/fN+Ml5BH6/InoiXkj5gMXlzQhTHfeoRBjkT9NlPj
SUZeiTGs43UxVz2rUfTR3IU4JvHReSSFxceec7+aZ5DahT8G8rvwAw==
=l0vk
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


from_name: Jack Lynch

subject: [WikiEN-l] RE: How many Arbitrators should we have?

body:
I ment that the mediation commitee has generally been a failure, and
its method of determining membgership has been a key factor in that
failure. Recently one or 2 members hjave taken an interest in things
and some improvement has occured, but they are '''FAR''' from an
example to be emulating.

Jack (Sam Spade)

> The current mediation process doesn't work very well, for exactly
> those reasons, and should not be used an an example of what to do w
> the ArbCom. They are making changes and improvements, but it is
> despite, rather than because of their selection process, that it is
> occuring.
>
> Jack (Sam Spade)
>
> Can you clarify what you mean, Sam Spade? Thanks.
>
> Flcelloguy


subject: [WikiEN-l] Autoblocking, reverts, and verifiability

body:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA256

MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:
> If the autoblocker causes so much problems for 3RR blocks, then we
> could ask the developers to make autoblocking optional. Have a nice
> clickable 3RR box in the block screen which switches off autoblocking
> for 3RR blocks.
>
> Of course, if one would follow a 1 or 2RR this wouldn't even be an issue.
>

A few days ago, I noticed a grammatical error in an article which I
figured must have been fixed at some point past.

Sure enough, looking through the history, I found the point at which the
change had occurred.

Dubious of the factual accuracy of the change, I reverted it and left a
note on the editor's talk page to let them know that I had done so,
since there was no source for the claim that was being made.

Within a few minutes I recieved a reply, giving a source and telling me
that they'd reverted my change.

No worries, I thought to myself, so I checked the article and sure
enough, the grammatical error was still there.

So I went and fixed it.

Only in my haste, I "fixed it" in the wrong spot.

Within another few minutes, the other party had corrected my change.

Four edits by two parties in the space of ten minutes. We discussed our
changes (on talk pages and in edit summaries), made one revert each, and
ended up fixing the article.

Who needs the 3RR when you have common sense?

- --
Alphax                      |   /"\
Encrypted Email Preferred   |   \ /     ASCII Ribbon Campaign
OpenPGP key ID: 0xF874C613  |    X   Against HTML email & vCards
http://tinyurl.com/cc9up    |   / \
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iQEVAwUBQ0Tyy7MAAH8MeUlWAQiHYwgAsloUcCYUGaU5uhZauOggtIDX7PnB658c
mlcIS6h+kSrT67RC+5G/b6UuobW0iNzvlIAYE67y4Buur7jrrqJr/S0hp8vCIIas
fNZ4sFwQXnVYOke91HelJMQGKHUlQh0nupNOKT2GF5l3N+8gS0ky04oqMJIlkMqi
f+NrApo57g+WnwnX2eoW8W4gZ00ZUY7YiXySiKRmYKRcsAwIwjNyDAFjarL2eCCO
bkxQzUxsxo6I1jhHHPJ68G48fBqtHDb3ToG9wI9GUJF1SGMVekQVxPr7AwlzH7x5
iIUQNIhO7lbZguY6rydEwDiuNQ9RHu3pEHVzaPvwyLUobgxTlFSQdw==
=4n+h
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


list: wikipedia-l

subject: [Wikipedia-l] 2 unrelated questions

body:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA256

Mark Williamson wrote:
> Why would we start a Tetum Wiktionary first? Wiktionaries generally
> don't hold new contributors as well.
>

To provide some examples of the language. Of course, you are free to go
ahead and request a Tetum Wikipedia if you can find some native or
near-native speakers who are able to contribute.

- --
Alphax                      |   /"\
Encrypted Email Preferred   |   \ /     ASCII Ribbon Campaign
OpenPGP key ID: 0xF874C613  |    X   Against HTML email & vCards
http://tinyurl.com/cc9up    |   / \
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iQEVAwUBQ0Tzd7MAAH8MeUlWAQitpQf/WvcqTP/QsQeeRmyg0xm/i58/xpSUmUG6
1iNGb/eIe480g4JU3dkRmEECMgZdFJpyixoNb5sp0/ZE9dCa7/O4SUJR1uinUW7o
s2cbp1tDbxNq/YL3yGsNH4rxZhP3DT+CRRZnxCqMvNVYdrOw6fjH/d3JNI4a3FdE
7k811LY5AFeD5h8HyS/ULOTvqs/ifK2MEDMGgZrUu415ky6kvO5b5SCqOwJg8TO9
iih396LOTwlBeP9YdVdy4bzSs274gWgELZ3w1TnYHGKVWEOH1FTmEvYtDoCNKi5b
TOqal1eyCNCc7dDkWGPJ2tk9353EioFaczN/Om6Ur2WvxL6MkVDVfw==
=e3fU
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


from_name: geni

body:
On 10/6/05, Kelly Martin <kelly.lynn.martin at gmail.com> wrote:
> Well, I started without a peer group.  It was a few months before I
> discovered the IRC channel

I don't use IRC. I get by.

--
geni


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: How many Arbitrators should we have?

body:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA256

Jack Lynch wrote:
> Without those ordinary "idiots" you wouldn't have an encyclopedia to
> play in.

No, it'd just be a lot less idiotic.

> Your resort to an ad hominem (and an absurd and unresearched
> one at that, how about you look into me and who I am before making
> attacks)

No, that would be making an ad hominem attack; I was addressing your
statment that:

Jack Lynch wrote:
> I'd been hoping for a long time that the position of adminship would
> be done away with, in favor of something more wikilike. This entire
> thread betrays the basics of why the wikipedia works (anti-elitism,
> ability of everyone to edit). These proposals perpetuate the idea that
> admins are somehow more competent for having won a popularity contest
> at RfA. That simply is not true, and eventually you'll discover the
> reason why the wikipedia works, and the nupedia didn't. Creating
> hegemony to the benefit of the few is no way to encourage
> volunteership. Skilled contributors don't donate their time in order
> to be made to feel like 2nd class citizens. Your damn lucky I enjoy
> reading the encyclopedia so much, or I wouldn't be wasting time w such
> an unrewarding process.
>

You want adminship done away with. You claim that admins have too much
power and not enough accountability. There is a troll who claimed
exactly the same thing, and conducted a series of "experiments" to try
and prove their point. I was just wondering if you knew each other.

You decided to call me a troll.

I was also addressing your statement that RfA was a popularity contest.
It's more like a sanity check.

> clarifies the quality of your argument.
>

As does your argument.

- --
Alphax                      |   /"\
Encrypted Email Preferred   |   \ /     ASCII Ribbon Campaign
OpenPGP key ID: 0xF874C613  |    X   Against HTML email & vCards
http://tinyurl.com/cc9up    |   / \
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iQEVAwUBQ0T2MrMAAH8MeUlWAQhhLAgAp/6/1QzBjo15QWvZC1II9pgvaQQv7e8B
MlGnUiGpCNIcuEx/PczXyiXTPCg9NPH2KWnvg51lR0OYVppt4kshqCc4sFJlhs+j
7XlofPzL0dfmGjS0MYEgfPJM8p/uIKcdUPdcKaVHeRE/fX3Uqpn5XCbO1ogWPIoY
fTdsL6f9XFPEztz+pIMOtvthFe6IY4kJ17AiuZiA5pp/oLf811+ZVyN7U9++po3i
GkNSZfRms+amyk7D0AYE8zvU1vvmok5geSc4hCOvbo01cocBViS+UjqEmjKrajxl
Iub02gQLijWAAQGGhSGARmG4yll7pVSfhsWj2Syhx51nvPWHVSaXzA==
=Cd6L
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


subject: [WikiEN-l] Will Wikipedia Swallow Google?

body:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA256

David Gerard wrote:
> Charles Matthews wrote:
>
>
>>Title of a column in today's London Independent, by technology correspondent
>>Charles Arthur.  Oh, BTW, it's favourable to WP.
>
> Analyst wank: the subgenre of business and technology reporting where
> a columnist comes up with a good headline then writes a flight of
> fancy making it sound like a plausible idea. Ones that don't happen
> are forgotten and ones that do happen make the columnist look
> amazingly prescient.
>

Yep, often they do it to cover up their own technical ineptitude and
general cluelessness.

> That said, it does raise the issue of what people want from a search engine.
>

Well, that's not what Wikipedia is. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia.

- --
Alphax                      |   /"\
Encrypted Email Preferred   |   \ /     ASCII Ribbon Campaign
OpenPGP key ID: 0xF874C613  |    X   Against HTML email & vCards
http://tinyurl.com/cc9up    |   / \
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iQEVAwUBQ0T2sbMAAH8MeUlWAQhzAwf/ZhM0apLoMQqTErFx4Ff8C1toKgaTi3UO
ZvyzQITGSCdaUs4YoaxV8p+Rujq/6SDgh8OqkduqKF25CgGKsa8gRRomiU7CRn3b
qA5vjzFcKOHhhTWqOLoqpaKBZzUocji1muw/R5N8n851V6kqORpkJ88qlhAX+KZe
tNSUan+bz2b+yqFedAOqjRo0kbToCbUbOqtSvAWgi3GW9A0DNDOECCjUILFAiUU6
lN6Asiw3laslhPwPNlqMOZKpq6y8c3d+aJOHg2mQc9x/9TVrv9Bf0Mnr0TvShqWg
Blb6opxFndDi1CPN8+jrF5sv3Nom14f5maMgckinBB745O6E5Vgfgw==
=G9yp
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


from_name: Ryan Delaney

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: a valid criticism

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

Michael Snow wrote:

>
> This is a common problem we have, especially with biographies of
> living people. They tend to develop by people adding various facts
> piecemeal, without any attempt to think about how to organize an
> encyclopedia article about the subject.

On the other hand, [[Robert Oppenheimer]] is one of the best articles
I've found on Wikipedia, let alone the best biography. I want to know
what the editors of that article did that the editors of [[Jane
Fonda]] didn't.

- - Ryan
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFDRd8i6MKb8lYmCtcRAr7OAJ95ywZvpJOeZNBZxURx2ag91DeuswCgj6Pj
DeB++2ePms3KbmjN1Xz6TYE=
=Q+8T
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


from_name: Arbeo M

subject: Ant:  Re: [Wikipedia-l] 2 unrelated questions

body:
--- Gerrit Holl <gerrit at nl.linux.org> schrieb:

> > On 10/6/05, Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > >
> > > Why would we start a Tetum Wiktionary first?
> Wiktionaries generally
> > > don't hold new contributors as well.
> GerardM wrote:
> > Well Mark,
> > I am sure you have figures on that. You have
> obviously done loads of
> > research on this. Or you prefer as usual to have
> Wikipedias. That is in
> > itself fine but please leave off with spreading
> FUD.
>
> I think it's obvious. Writing an encypclopedia
> provides more
> satisfaction, is better suitable for the wiki-style
> (more edits), and
> Wikipedia is far more famous.
>
> Gerrit.
>
Actually this is something we don't have to worry
about.

If some Tetum speakers show up and ask for an
encyclopedia and their request meets the requirements,
we'll create a Wikipedia. If they ask for a
dictionary, they'll be granted a Wiktionary. If they
ask for both, they'll get both.

But as long as they don't come and ask for anything in
Tetum, we won't start anything in Tetum.

Arbeo

___________________________________________________________
Gesendet von Yahoo! Mail - Jetzt mit 1GB Speicher kostenlos - Hier anmelden: http://mail.yahoo.de


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: MediaWiki OpenID patch

body:
Dan Libby wrote:
> 1) this patch piggy-backs on top of SpecialUserlogin.  So if a username
> contains "://" or '." then the OpenID code kicks in.  This does not
> provide any sort of possibility for other login types, eg LID.  Also it
> would break any pre-existing logins with those strings in them.

The . check would break... 12579 registered usernames on
en.wikipedia.org. :)

> 2) MediaWiki insists on upper-casing all titles, including usernames.  I
> worked around that for actually storing the username, but it still
> happens for display,which looks kinda nasty for eg:
> "Http://danda.videntity.org/".    I'm not sure how to get around that as
> the title normalization stuff is a bit, umm, inscrutable.

Using URLs for usernames is going to be inherently broken on the wiki,
as accounts are closely tied to their user pages on the wiki. To be
non-broken, the usernames need to be real, valid page titles. There are
many valid URLs which are not valid titles, and trying to use them like
that is I think going to be a tangle of ugliness, special cases, and
identifiers which won't be able to login despite having a valid OpenID
system.

There are basically two ways you can go I think:

1) OpenID identifiers are a special class of users and handled
distinctly, like anonymous IP addresses are.

Some mechanism for displaying properly formatted names and for picking a
not-too-illegible title for the user page / talk page would need to be
added to the core code.

Every place that takes a username in input, displays a username in
output, or tries to make a user page link would need to change. (That's
not that bad an idea, though; consolidation of duplicated code would be
good and other external authentication systems could use this same ability.)

-or-

2) OpenID identifiers can be used to authenticate a named account in
place of a password, but you have to pick a valid username name and
create an account. (This could be as simple as confirming an automatic
transformation of the OpenID identifier or choosing to change it during
your first login.)

Easy, but of course not as 'cool'. :)

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 253 bytes
Desc: OpenPGP digital signature
URL: <http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/attachments/20051006/5bac8d79/attachment.pgp>


from_name: steve v

subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
--- Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:

> ..it's really not joyful to see bad writing in two
> very prominent articles.

> Why?  What can we do about it?

Please forgive us who work countless hours for free
and dont quite get all the corners completely
spic-and-span. Some of us are too busy rewriting
crappy prominent articles like [[terrorism]] back to
readability.

SV
By the way, theres been much recent discussion about
reorganizing the Arbcom, Medcom, and perhaps providing
for the ability to form formal committees. Growth in
population means growth in governance.

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: a valid criticism

body:
--- Ryan Delaney <ryan.delaney at gmail.com> wrote:
> On the other hand, [[Robert Oppenheimer]] is one of
> the best articles
> I've found on Wikipedia, let alone the best
> biography. I want to know
> what the editors of that article did that the
> editors of [[Jane Fonda]] didn't.

Oppenheimer is a world-renowned scientist, whos life
is closed, and who's book can be written with both
bookends in place.

Gates and Fonda on the other hand are contemporary
personalities --each of whom have their feet in both
superficial (Gates' ego, Fonda's workouts, etc.) and
relevant worlds (Big business, principled protests,
etc.).

When I edited the JF article, I had a chuckle at how
crappy the bio section was. I did my part (should have
seen it before :P) with the parts I was interested in,
and left the trivial bits to someone interested in
those things. The bio section was so bad as to be *too
hard* to edit in my tired state when I happened to be
looking it. I did put in on my to-do list though
--somewhere after cleaning the bus stop toilet and
giving the cat a bath.

SV

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


from_name: Ashar Voultoiz

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: MediaWiki OpenID patch

body:
Dan Libby wrote:
> Hi all, I've created a patch for OpenID login to MediaWiki. ( 1.4.10 )
>
> Details here:
> http://wiki.www.videntity.org/wiki/MediaWiki_OpenID_Patch

Can you port it on 1.5.0 and eventually try to get a patch for HEAD ? It
would be interesting to get openid support for 1.6 (or later).

--
Ashar Voultoiz - WP++++
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Hashar
http://www.livejournal.com/community/wikitech/
IM: hashar at jabber.org  ICQ: 15325080


from_name: SAM

subject: [Wikitech-l] Special:Export enabled?

body:
Hi,

I asked about 2 months ago on this list if the Special:Export utility
was re-enabled, such that complete xml files, including all revisions,
could be generated and downloaded for all entries. I was told that it
will happen soon. I tried to use it the other day and it still wasn't
functional. Any idea when if this will be fixed/enable soon?

Thanks a lot.

Sorin Matei


from_name: Klaus-Eduard Runnel

subject: [Wikitech-l] makesysop, steward interface and a request

body:
2005/10/4, Peter Gervai <grin at grin.hu>:
> Hello,
>
> So as I learned stewards are now inactive due to the disabled
> steward interface, but I cannot really find info (apart from the
> brief "it may break replication", whatever "it" might be), so if someone
> would be so kind as to share what happened or the details would be great.
>
> More importantly I have to ask whether it's possible to set
> rights manually by a developer or it breaks replication (however
> may it happen) as well as the steward interface did? Shall I
> keep trying to find someone to set the flag or shall I wait
> for how long (a good guesstimation is okay).
>

Same questions here. We have elected a new sysop and a bureaucrat some
time ago already... What should I tell them?

Klaus


from_name: Michael Turley

subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
On 10/6/05, Ryan Delaney <ryan.delaney at gmail.com> wrote:
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> Stan Shebs wrote:
>
> >
> > 2. We need a way to discourage well-meaning but less-able editors
> > from crumbling good articles. On my watchlist I see a lot of editors
> > (some logins, some anons) adding nonsequiturs or redundancies,
> > randomly rearranging text, adding useless templates en masse, etc.
>
> I've actually had some luck with this. If someone makes an edit that
> doesn't hurt anything, but doesn't add anything either, I simply
> revert with the edit summary "rv: not an improvement". This seems to
> send a message to people that edits need to be constructive and have a
> plan behind them. Just moving stuff around isn't good for the Wiki,
> and a solitary edit like this could seem to have no effect, but in the
> aggregate they can make for a ridiculously disorganized article that
> is not at all a pleasure to read.

If you're going to be that brusque, you should accompany your
reversion with a comment on a talk page (article or editor) to tell
them where you see the problem with their edits.  "rv: not an
improvement, see [[article:talk]]" is much better.  This way, it's
constructive rather than just blunt.

--
Michael Turley
User:Unfocused


from_name: actionforum at comcast.net

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: The 3RR is an electric fence, not an entitlement.

body:
-------------- Original message --------------
> I agree whole-heartedly. Reverts should really only be seen from trolls and
> POV-pushers, who find the edit summary or talk page irrelevant.

Don't edit pages with POV pushers on them, if you aren't
willing to revert, it will put you at a disadvantage.  Some of
those pages are among my favorites.  The real problem
is not POV pushers, but POV suppressors, who won't
let any other POV on a page.

I seldom have trouble with POV pushers, because I am tolerant
of other POVs.  If the other POV has any legitimacy and
at all, I usually am tolerant of it as long as it is fairly characterized,
will will usually assist in fairly characterizing it.

Some pages are guarded by POV suppressors, and some busy
pages have whole cliques of POV suppressors.

                         -- Silverback


body:
Thats all true, but there are measurable affects, and I think I'm far
from alone in wishing that more benefits were reaped. I donno about
arbiters, but we could use acouple hundred more mediators. The
mediation commitee selection process is an error which should not be
perpetuated.

Jack (Sam Spade)

On 10/6/05, steve v <vertigosteve at yahoo.com> wrote:
> The Mediation Committee cant be called "a failure"
> because it wasnt built to work in a manner that can be
> verified in terms of its overall success. "Success" in
> mediation often means getting over one hump, only to
> find another two weeks later. Successful mediations
> are often comparable to watching a "molasses ko",
> while unsuccessful mediations at least progress from
> chaos to
> arbcom. MC views werent meant to be binding, hence RFM
> wasnt actually designed to "work."
>
> SV


subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
-------------- Original message --------------
> http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2005/10/the_amorality_o.php
>
> I don't agree with much of this critique, and I certainly do not share
> the attitude that Wikipedia is better than Britannica merely because it
> is free. It is my intention that we aim at Britannica-or-better
> quality, period, free or non-free. We should strive to be the best.
>
> But the two examples he puts forward are, quite frankly, a horrific
> embarassment. [[Bill Gates]] and [[Jane Fonda]] are nearly unreadable crap.
>
> Why? What can we do about it?
>
> --Jimbo

I haven't looked at the criticism or the articles, but your comment about
readability, reminds me of several other articles.  However, I think you
may be emphasizing the wrong standard of quality.  Instead of the type
of quality you can only get with a uniform editoral staff, I think instead
you should emphasize value and information.  Even an poorly written
article can be more valuable than an encyclopedia Brittanica article.
The article may have useful links to other information, it may
be a crystalization of a controversy or conflict, i.e., in some kind
of compromise state.  There is information there.  Also, don't
underestimate the value of the talk page, there are arguments,
POVs and other information there that increase the total value.

I would not hesitate to send students to wikipedia for this
reason, I would have them also take advantage of the talk
page, etc.  They are more likely to get all POVs on wikipedia.
They should also learn to view information with a healthy
dose of skepticism, and to verify information themselves.
Wikipedia's state of flux, conflict and poor readability,
will all be heathy reminders of this, while Britannica may
lull the student into an uncritical trust.
             -- Silverback


subject: [WikiEN-l] Simple code for formatting lists in two colums

body:
This code has worked quite well so far, so I'd like to
promote its further use on any page with excessive
verticality.

{| width="100%"
|- valign=top
|width="50%"|

COLUMN 1

|width="50%"|

COLUMN 2

|}

SinReg,
SV

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] How many Arbitrators should we have?

body:
I doubt they often bother.

Jack (Sam Spade)

On 10/6/05, Phroziac <phroziac at gmail.com> wrote:
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> DF wrote:
> > On 10/6/05, Ryan Delaney <ryan.delaney at gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> >>Michael Turley wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>>There are a lot of current administrators that
> >
> > I've either voted to
> >
> >>>support, or simply refused to vote oppose in their
> >
> > RfA that I
> >
> >>>would never consider supporting in the position of
> >
> > an arbitrator.
> >
> >>>If I'd thought that one future day they'd get
> >
> > handed the authority
> >
> >>>to arbitrate in any way stronger than they now can
> >
> > (by blocking,
> >
> >>>page locking, etc) it would certainly have been
> >
> > less "no big deal"
> >
> >>>and a lot more "let's screen these people very
> >
> > carefully".
> >
> >
> >>All right, then. How would you suggest we choose
> >
> > them?
> >
> > I also agree with what has been said by Turley and
> > others.  Arbitration is not something I would trust to
> > every admin, and there are at least a couple admins
> > that I would shudder to see given binding judicial
> > powers.
> >
> > How about a mixed system?  First, have a Supreme Court
> > (or whatever we want to call it) whose membership is
> > fixed in number and determined through an election
> > process such as governs Arbcom now.  And then have
> > lesser courts/magistrates/whatever confirmed through a
> > process of community consensus such as occurs in RFA
> > now?
> Sounds good to me. Maybe we should make the current Requests for
> arbitration into a supreme court, rename it. Then make the lesser courts
> be called Requests for arbitration. These would be seperated like page
> RFCs are. "Excessive reverters", "complete trolls", "POV pushers", etc.
> Then the supreme court (whatever it's called) could be appealed to like
> me do to Jimbo, and they could accept the case and look into it. There'd
> still be Jimbo above them, but hopefully less people would appeal to
> him. He's very busy, as we all know. Doesn't everyone in arbitration
> appeal to him currently?
>
> - --
> Phroziac                    |   /"\


from_name: charles matthews

subject: [WikiEN-l] [[David Hilbert]] under attack

body:
We have some apparent anti-Semitic activity on [[David Hilbert]] (cuts of
sourced quotes from the Constance Reid biography concerning the state of the
Gottingen faculty after 1933).

Charles


subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

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

BJ?rn Lindqvist wrote:

>>I've actually had some luck with this. If someone makes an edit that
>>doesn't hurt anything, but doesn't add anything either, I simply
>>revert with the edit summary "rv: not an improvement". This seems to
>>send a message to people that edits need to be constructive and have a
>
>
>That's an incredibly hostile way of editing. What happens when someone
>thinks that your "rv. not an improvement" is "not an improvement"?

To be honest, I don't view this as a big deal, so I don't think it's
worth taking up much time on the mailing list for. But the point is
that I don't think many people view edits that don't actually improve
the article as a bad thing. Frivolous editing- the kind of editing
that looks good on the micro scale, but pays no real attention to
what's going on in the article overall- can be very damaging when
there has been enough of it. From listening to what other people on
the list are saying, it seems to be the problem with [[Bill Gates]]
and [[Jane Fonda]].

Maybe my way of responding to that is viewed as hostile because this
isn't part of the common understanding, but I think it probably should
be. Of course I don't want to step on anyone's toes, but if the
article has to suffer because someone takes reverts personally, there
isn't much I can do.

Ryan
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFDRgCF6MKb8lYmCtcRApoDAJ0Ze26Nq5CV+El7WnVRlQcGZnV1YQCfVc2Z
WYv/owZyy8mnf3Qbqk9Vezw=
=n4It
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
-------------- Original message --------------

> Do we really need to discuss in detail incidents in 2005 where someone
> spat at her at a book signing? That one guy in Kentucky won't show her
> films in his cinemas?

It depends on the level of detail, on a recent news item,
I think we should consider what level of detail would
still be notable 1 or 5 years from now.  The persistence of
resentment against Jane Fonda is a notable part of her life,
and that she got spat on, and her movies get boycotted
probably will still notable after her death.

Contrast that with the Iraq War, a particular incident like
the recent British conflict with some local Iraqi police,
although probably more important in the scheme of things,
probably won't be encyclopedic unless it becomes some
kind of persistent international incident.  If it doesn't
it surely wouldn't be in some encyclopedia article 1 or
5 years from now.

Notability depends on the subject.

            -- Silverback


subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
On 10/6/05, Ryan Delaney <ryan.delaney at gmail.com> wrote:
> Michael Turley wrote:
> >> I've actually had some luck with this. If someone makes an edit
> >> that doesn't hurt anything, but doesn't add anything either, I
> >> simply revert with the edit summary "rv: not an improvement".
> >> This seems to send a message to people that edits need to be
> >> constructive and have a plan behind them. Just moving stuff
> >> around isn't good for the Wiki, and a solitary edit like this
> >> could seem to have no effect, but in the aggregate they can make
> >> for a ridiculously disorganized article that is not at all a
> >> pleasure to read.
> >
> >
> > If you're going to be that brusque, you should accompany your
> > reversion with a comment on a talk page (article or editor) to tell
> > them where you see the problem with their edits. "rv: not an
> > improvement, see [[article:talk]]" is much better. This way, it's
> > constructive rather than just blunt.
> >
> If you want to do that, you are welcome to. My intention was to give
> him an idea on how to deal with this problem, not to lecture him on
> manners.

Actually, my instruction was directed to you.  You mentioned that "rv:
not an improvement" was a practice of yours, and I was suggesting how
you can improve it.  -

--
Michael Turley
User:Unfocused


from_name: MacGyverMagic/Mgm

body:
On 10/6/05, Kat Walsh <mindspillage at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 10/6/05, Kelly Martin <kelly.lynn.martin at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 10/6/05, Michael Turley <michael.turley at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > Well, the amount of policy a person has to absorb to become socialized
> > > at Wikipedia IS stupefying.  There's a lot to think about and remember
> > > when you just get started.
> >
> > I never really noticed that.  I was here for months before I read all
> > that much of policy.  There are quite a few I still haven't read and
> > I've been an admin since June.
> >
> > If you have some basic common sense, and access to a trusted peer
> > group (i.e. Kat, who *has* read all of the policy and is easy to talk
> > to on IRC...) who also has common sense, you barely need to read the
> > published policy.
> >
> > Kelly
>
> By this she means that I've spent too much time burying my head in the
> Wikipedia namespace and hanging around chattering instead of doing
> anything useful. ;-)
>
> I do think that the Simplified Ruleset should be enough policy for
> anyone to jump in with, and that newbies should get a lot of leeway
> for a while if they're genuinely trying to contribute well.
>
> The peer group is useful. For all the criticism the IRC channel gets,
> I've seen quite a few people talked out of poor decisions and helped
> with procedures and understanding of them;  the immediacy of responses
> and the large numbers of people around does help, when there are
> people around who will offer good advice. (When there aren't, well...
> not so much.)
>
> -Kat
> [[User:Mindspillage]]
>
> --
> "There was a point to this story, but it has temporarily
> escaped the chronicler's mind."  --Douglas Adams
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>
Sure, newbies should get a fair bit of leeway. But once someone is
warned against the 3RR they should have the common sense not to revert
until they fully understand. Yes, I like the electric fence analogy
lots better than the baseball one. Baseball suggests you have the
right at 3 shots.

--Mgm


subject: [WikiEN-l] How to control a if a section appears or not in TOC

body:
Only headings made with = signs appear in the TOC.

On 10/5/05, David <achepati67 at yahoo.es> wrote:
> Dear members,
>
> I would like to know if there is possible to control if a given section should not appear in the Table of Contents, generated automatically by Wiki (__TOC__), like in LaTeX, you have \section{} and \section*{}, the second one is not going to be included on the TOC.
>
> Is there any way to control the deep level of the TOC, for example just first level will show:
> 1
> 2
> 3
>
> but you have:
> 1
> 1.1
> 2
> 3
> 3.1
> 3.1.1
> 3.2
>
> Thanks in advance,
>
> David
>
>
> ---------------------------------
> Yahoo! for Good
>  Click here to donate to the Hurricane Katrina relief effort.
> _______________________________________________
> 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:
Agreed. If the edit is really the right thing to do, you should have
no problem finding scores of others willing to do the edit for you.
And working with someone is a lot easier than repeated revert warring.
Warring is just not productive.

--Mgm


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Tag-teaming, 3RR, logging,
	all admins are intrinsically evil

body:
Then why did no one ask for it being unprotected?

On 10/6/05, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 10/6/05, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > Ed Poor wrote:
> >
> > >This can be addressed by encouraging (requiring?) Admins to log all
> > >their 3RR blocks in one place. It could be a section of:
> > >* [[Wikipedia:Account suspensions]]
> >
> >
> > Sounds like [[m:instruction creep]]. Admins don't even bother logging
> > their page protections in practice.
>
>
>
> Oh they do, for the most part. That *is* important simply because page
> protection doesn't automatically expire. Until recently we had some logged
> protections that went back weeks. Khmer Rouge was protected for 90 days out
> of 100, probably as part of a deliberate strategic move by some of the
> editors.
>
> And when I checked further I found some unlogged protections that went out
> to the middle of August. It isn't good for the wiki to have temporary
> protection drag on for months.
> _______________________________________________
> 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] a valid criticism

body:
I was talking to a non-Wikipedian friend (yes, I do have one) on Monday; and
he said ''WP is really good now, used to be full of obvious errors but no
longer, and less bias than the BBC''.  Not sure I agree on the last, but,
accepting that not all is well, much seems to be better.

Charles


from_name: Urs Richle

subject:
[Wikitech-l]
	Re: 5. Map of Wikipedia (Urs Richle)/Wikitech-l Digest, Vol 27,
	Issue 6

body:
Dear Deborah,
thanks for your respons.
You can find my e-mail on http://www.sheherazade.ch
As I wrote in my last mail, my first step will be to extract the different
kinds of links from the Wiki-content. Then I will propose a list of
different links for a given topic by a Web Service. (this is devlopped as
MediaWiki-extensions)

Second: I would like to descripe the hole linked Wiki-conten with Topic
Maps(XTM). Afterwards it would be possible to create interactif
visualizations of the Wiki-conten.
What do you mean with "a picture in layers" - would the layers be static or
dynamic? How would you create them? With which technology?

Best regards
Urs

deborah.macpherson <deborah.macpherson at ...> writes:
> Dear Urs Richle,
>
> What I want to do is make a picture of the linkages in layers you
> could turn off or on to see how they go together in XTM, RDF or OWL.
> Somewhere between these will be the best fit/clearest picture.
>
> I could not get through to your email or find you on
> http://tecfa.unige.ch/. Please let me know how to reach you to
> continue this discussion so we can create one or two concrete examples
> to post.
>
> Sincerely,
> Deborah MacPherson
>
> On 10/5/05, wikitech-l-request at wikimedia.org
> <wikitech-l-request at wikimedia.org> wrote:
>> Send Wikitech-l mailing list submissions to
>>         wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
>>

>> >
>> > *************************************************
>> >
>> Message: 5
>> Date: Wed, 5 Oct 2005 20:24:29 +0000 (UTC)
>> From: Urs Richle <mail at sheherazade.ch>
>> Subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Map of Wikipedia
>> To: wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
>> Message-ID: <loom.20051005T215425-113 at post.gmane.org>
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
>>
>> Hello,
>> I'm working on a project to visualize the semantic network of
>> MediaWiki-content. I tested the SpecialPage implementation of the
>> Touchgraph-applet on
>> http://wiki.sheherazade.ch/index.php/Spezial:Touchgraph (thanks to
>> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fxparlant/Touchgraph).
>> My idea is to use the Topic Maps (XTM)-standard to describe the
>> semantic network. XTM allows a more complex description of all
>> different kinds of links then the XML-file used by Touchgraph.
>> Applications like Omnigator from Ontopia (http://www.ontopia.net)
>> are able to read and visualize XTM-files.
>>
>> The seconde idea is to propose a list of different links for an
>> article and the XTM-file by a webservice (compare RPC-interface of
>> JSPWiki --> http://www.jspwiki.org/wiki/WikiRPCInterface).
>> I will use the NuSOAP-library for this.
>>
>> Does someone work on a similar project to describe the semantic
>> network of MediaWiki-content with XTM, RDF or OWL?
>>
>> Does someone work on a webservice-extension for MediaWiki?
>>
>> Please contact me.
>>
>> Urs Richle
>> www.sheherazade.ch
>> TECFA, University of Geneva, Switzerland
>> http://tecfa.unige.ch/
>>
>> > *************************************************
>>
>> deborah.macpherson <deborah.macpherson at ...> writes:
>> >
>> > I am interested in making a map of Wikipedia in order to
>> streamline the content,
>> > provide an overview of different areas, and connect
>> Wikipedia to digital archives
>> > maintained by museums and laboratories all around
>> the world. For more information
>> > please see http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/CDT_proposal .
>> >
>> > If you would like to collaborate, or if you
>> already have similar efforts underway,
>> > please contact me.
>> >
>> > Thank you,
>> >
>> > Deborah MacPherson
>> >

>> > Deborah MacPherson, Projects Director
>> > Accuracy&Aesthetics, A Nonprofit Organization for the
>> > Advancement of Education, Cultural Heritage, and Science
>> > www.accuracyandaesthetics.com
>> > www.deborahmacpherson.com
>> >
>> > mailing address: PO Box 52, Vienna VA 22183 USA
>> > phones: 703 585 8924 and 703 242 9411
>> > mailto:debmacp at ...
>> >
>> > The content of this email may contain private and confidential
>> > information. Do not forward, copy, share, or otherwise distribute
>> > without explicit written permission from all correspondents.
>> >
>> > **************************************************

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

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

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

Michael Turley wrote:

> I sincerely
>
>hope your current method NEVER becomes part of the common
>understanding.

I didn't say that my method should be part of the common understanding.

Egh, nevermind. It's not even what we were talking about.

- - Ryan
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFDRgto6MKb8lYmCtcRAs3XAKCnUWSJpQ7If+dBTpPI050lczkzJACfaRri
A3rGcblBK2b4ANns/eiIavU=
=R6nk
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


from_name: David Gerard

subject: [WikiEN-l] Response to Nick Carr on Wikipedia and Web 2.0

body:
There's a long rant on Wikipedia (and the so-called Web 2.0) by Nick Carr at:

  http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2005/10/the_amorality_o.php

I've posted a comment, which is currently waiting in his comment
moderation queue. Read the above, and below is my reply. I left this
on another blog commenting on the Nick Carr post, at:

    http://asay.blogspot.com/2005/10/commentary-nick-carr-on-amorality-of.html

I'll probably put it on my LiveJournal
(http://reddragdiva.livejournal.com/ - combining utter tedium with bad
taste!) tomorrow or something as well.

- d.

David Gerard said...

    Everything Nick wrote is a valid opinion, and commercial
encyclopedias are doomed anyway because (as Microsoft is finding out
with Linux) it's hard to compete with free. (I eagerly await EB
putting out TCO studies on Wikipedia.)

    Speaking as someone who's highly involved in it (I write stuff,
I'm an administrator, I'm on the Arbitration Committee, I'm a mailing
list moderator, I do media interviews), Wikipedia is of mediocre
quality with some really good bits. If you hit the "Random page" link
twenty times, you'll end up mostly with sketchy three-paragraph stub
articles.

    That said, the good bits are fantastic. Although articles good
enough to make "Featured Article" status (which are indeed excellent)
tend to be hideously esoteric; somehow getting more general articles
up to that sort of quality is not facilitated at present.

    Encyclopedia Britannica is an amazing work. It's of consistent
high quality, it's one of the great books in the English language and
it's doomed. Brilliant but pricey has difficulty competing
economically with free and apparently adequate (see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worse_is_better - this story plays out
over and over again in the computing field and is the essence of
"disruptive technology"). They could release the entire EB under an
open content license, but they have shareholders who might want a word
about that.

    So if we want a good encyclopedia in ten years, it's going to have
to be a good Wikipedia. So those who care about getting a good
encyclopedia are going to have to work out how to make Wikipedia
better, or there won't be anything.

    I've made some efforts in this direction - pushing toward a
page-rating feature, a "Rate this page" tab at the top, which, unlike
an editorial committee, will actually scale with the contributor base
and will highlight areas in need of attention. (See
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Article_validation_feature and
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/En_validation_topics - the feature is
currently waiting on an implementation the lead developer thinks won't
kill the database.) Recent discussion on the WikiEN-L mailing list has
also included proposals for a scaleable article rating system.

    Wikipedia is likely to be it by first-mover advantage and network
effect. Think about what you can do to ensure there is a good
encyclopedia in ten years.


from_name: Andrew Gray

subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
On 06/10/05, Chip Berlet <c.berlet at publiceye.org> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> Just out of curiosity, what specifically about the Jane Fonda entry is "crap?"

At a guess: Slightly under a screenful of "biography", one of "acting
career", four and a half of "Political activism" (including links
which suggest [[Opposition to the Vietnam War]] and [[Opposition to
the Iraq War]] are pages about her!) then another half on "Later
career".

That's not an encylopedia article; it's a chunk of debate. I look at
that TOC and I certainly don't want to read most of the article...

Do we really need to discuss in detail incidents in 2005 where someone
spat at her at a book signing? That one guy in Kentucky won't show her
films in his cinemas?

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
>Just out of curiosity, what specifically about the Jane Fonda entry is
>"crap?"

 Chip Berlet

Early in her career she had grown both distant and critical of her father,
but in 1980 she bought the play "On Golden Pond" for the purpose of acting
alongside her father-hoping he might win the Oscar that had eluded him
throughout his career. He won, and when she accepted the Oscar on his
behalf, she said it was "the happiest night of my life." Director and first
husband Roger Vadim once said about her: "Living with Jane was difficult in
the beginning...she had so many, how do you say, 'bachelor habits.' Too much
organization. Time is her enemy. She cannot relax. Always there is something
to do." Vadim also said, "There is also in Jane a basic wish to carry things
to the limit."

That's a quote, and it's bad writing.

(1) Early in her career she had grown both distant and critical of her
father, but in 1980 she bought the play "On Golden Pond" for the purpose of
acting alongside her father-hoping he might win the Oscar that had eluded
him throughout his career.

This means that "As a young woman, she had a troubled relationship with her
father".  That's Henry Fonda.  "In the film 'On Golden Pond', they acted
together. Henry won an Oscar for his performance, his first Academy Award,
at age 107 (whatever).  Jane ina acceptance speech when she took the award
for him called it "the happiest night of my life." .

And (2) Vadim can keep out of the happy moment - he was surely relevant to
the 1960s.

Really, the writing is wretchedly bad, as Jimbo said.

Charles


list: foundation-l

from_name: Delphine Ménard

subject:
[Foundation-l] Re: [Wikimania] Wikimania 2006 - host city contest,
	latest update

body:
On 10/4/05, SJ <2.718281828 at gmail.com> wrote:

> * So I was told.  The original jury was set up before Boston was a
> candidate city.  Now that I am the contact for Boston, I am not on the
> jury, nor involved with its private discussions.

We have agreed to let Andrew Lih ([[User:Fuzheado]])  join the jury,
since he was also very much involved in the last wikimania, especially
in the area where Sj had remarks to make, namely speakers and
programme.

Cheers,

Delphine
--
~notafish


list: wikimedia-l


from_name: Ray Saintonge

body:
Kelly Martin wrote:

>On 10/6/05, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
>
>
>>Appelate courts also do not permit new evidence to be brought forth.
>>They judge on points of law rather than facts.  It would be up to the
>>lower ranking tribunal to sort through the mass of irrelevant material
>>that is often raised.
>>
>>
>I don't guarantee that the ArbCom would elect to refuse to consider
>new evidence on appeal.  However, just having the case marshalled for
>review through the process of the preceding magisterial process will
>immensely help the ArbCom in its determinations.
>
>The other appeal to a tiered system is that it will scale far better
>than most of the other proposals I've seen.  Any system which has
>ArbCom as a court of original jurisdiction is going to have scaling
>problems in the long term, IMO.
>
>
Absolutely.  Having a single arbitrator rule on a new appeal would
probably lead to a quicker result.  This could be appealed to a panel,
but the panel members should not accept to hear every case that comes
before them.  If they make a habit of accepting everything, then
everything will be appealed..  By taking a stricter approach to this and
what they will accept as evidence their task can be much easier.

Ec


from_name: Fastfission

subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
If [[Bill Gates]] and [[Jane Fonda]] were wonderful, featured articles
then he could have picked any of the dozens upon dozens of other
biographies of major figures who haven't had a full editing treatment
from many knowledgeable editors. The "find crappy articles on
Wikipedia" game is not one we can ever win -- the person looking for
crap will find it.

The *real* criticism would be to look at featured articles and find
the crap in them. To say that "even in the self-described best of the
best, they can't get it together."

When people do that -- okay, there might be a real cause for concern.
But if they're looking at articles which just haven't had the benefit
of a swirl of interested and informed attention -- well, that's always
going to be the majority of the encyclopedia in the way things are
done here. There's no point in which the numbers on that will ever
really change. Wikipedia is not going to ever be valued for its
"completeness" or its "coherency" -- it will be valued for its
intellectual property model, its breadth, its concept, its speed, and,
in the end, some aspect of its "usefulness", which is a moving target.

But if we are truly worried about some articles being "bad
representatives", it might be nice to really explicitly prioritize
some of them. We do have that list of "100 articles which should be in
every encyclopedia" or something like that for all of the new-language
Wikis to consider as a starting point -- maybe we need to re-apply
that to EN and really get out there to encourage people to find things
on that list (or another list of some sort) which are important to get
into a "featured" state *not* because the article is necessarily
horribly flawed in some way, but because the *topic* of the article is
of a high-enough priority to the world-at-large that if we goof on it,
it'll look like a bad thing. It would also be a good way to march
towards 1.0 if people are still interested in that.

(If this is somewhat incoherent, I apologize -- it has been a long day.)

FF

On 10/6/05, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2005/10/the_amorality_o.php
>
> I don't agree with much of this critique, and I certainly do not share
> the attitude that Wikipedia is better than Britannica merely because it
> is free.  It is my intention that we aim at Britannica-or-better
> quality, period, free or non-free.  We should strive to be the best.
>
> But the two examples he puts forward are, quite frankly, a horrific
> embarassment.  [[Bill Gates]] and [[Jane Fonda]] are nearly unreadable crap.
>
> Why?  What can we do about it?
>
> --Jimbo
> _______________________________________________
> 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: Jack Lynch

body:
I generally agree w your points.

My suggestion would be to create a long list of willing mediators for
clients to choose from, and create some sort of rating system to
reward those who are successful mediators. Maybe (this is just one
flippant example) put a star by their name for every success, and
remove on for every failure. Some process whereby good mediators are
rewarded, and bad mediators either learn from their mistakes, or move
on.

My primary complaint w the wikipedia is synonymous w my complaint with
the mediation commitee selection process.Too much emphasis on voting
and the opinions of the insiders, not enough emphasis on results,
efficiency, and the bottom line.

Jack (Sam Spade)

On 10/6/05, Fl Celloguy <flcelloguy at hotmail.com> wrote:
> >Thats all true, but there are measurable affects, and I think I'm far
> >from alone in wishing that more benefits were reaped. I donno about
> >arbiters, but we could use acouple hundred more mediators. The
> >mediation commitee selection process is an error which should not be
> >perpetuated.
>
> >Jack (Sam Spade)
>
> Sam Spade, what do you think is wrong with the mediation selection process?
> We can't exactly hold elections, because there's a variable amount of us. Do
> you have any reforms/opinions?
>
> Regarding the effectiveness of mediation: it is true that Requests for
> mediation (RfM) was backlogged a few weeks ago. However, there's been a wave
> of new mediators/ applicants, and the MedCom is up and running again. The
> reason, in my opinion, why there's no immediate effect by the functioning of
> the MedCom is the nature of the work itself - unlike the ArbCom, we don't
> determine who's "right" and who's "wrong", we can't dole out punishments,
> and our word isn't binding. On the contrary, we strive to resolve the
> disputes before they reach the ArbCom. This is often difficult to
> accomplish, because disputes that have reached the stage of mediation are
> already very demanding, and even with the best mediator, it is doubtful that
> the dispute can be resolved completely. It is human nature that once you
> have a bad experience with another user, even after mediation, your views
> will not be altered significantly. Mediation is also a extremely long and
> time-consuming process; unlike the ArbCom, there is no definitive "end" to
> mediation. While the job is tough, I consider it worthwhile if the two
> disputees gain even an inch more respect and understanding for each other.
> Thus, I beleive in that sense, mediation has been working.
>
> In another sense, though, the MedCom has failed. If I am correct, the
> original intentions of the WikiQuette Committee (the predecessor to the
> MedCom) was to lighten the load from the ArbCom. This has not happened; a
> cursorary glance at the current cases facing the ArbCom show that almost
> none attempted mediation. In fact, the vast majority of ArbCom cases over
> the past year have not gone through the MedCom.
>
> Thus, I am going to make a suggestion: re-introduce and emphasize the role
> of the MedCom in the dispute resolution process. While the MedCom should by
> no means be doling out punishment or determining findings of facts, if even
> one-fourth of the current cases went through MedCom first, I believe the
> mutual respect between the involved parties would often increase - if only
> somewhat. Though it is doubtful that the MedCom would prevent any of these
> cases from going to the ArbCom, by having attempted mediation, not only
> would the mutual respect increase (hopefully), but also show the ArbCom that
> both sides have made good-faith efforts at resolving the conflict.
>
> A second suggestion: hand the MedCom more power. In other words, make the
> MedCom serve as the "lower court" that has been proposed, except that
> instead of deciding cases, the MedCom could attempt to mediate, reject the
> case, or refer to the ArbCom. Thus, the MedCom would serve as a "filter"
> before the ArbCom, only referring to the ArbCom cases which they believe
> warrant arbitration, thus filtering out cases where mediation could possibly
> work and cases that are too ridiculous to reach the ArbCom. Of course, if
> mediation does not resolve the dispute, the MedCom can always refer the
> dispute to the ArbCom.
>
> It is my opinion, as demonstrated above, that the MedCom should be more
> involved in the dispute resolution process than it currently is. While it
> may not be the solution that we are searching for regarding the ArbCom
> reforms, I certainly think that placing a greater emphasis on attempting
> mediation first is worthwhile.
>
> Also, let me take this opportunity, in the spirit of Esperanza, to thank
> each and every one of you for your wonderful work on Wikipedia. Without you,
> this great project would not be possible. I know that it is easy to feel
> underappreciated, but know that many of us all admire and appreciate your
> work. Also, let me wish all the ArbCom candidates best of luck at this time,
> and to prepare - and warn- you of the long road ahead of you.
>
> As always, I am seeking input on my views and value your opinions.
>
> Regards,
>
> Flcelloguy
> >From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia.
>
> _________________________________________________________________
> Express yourself instantly with MSN Messenger! Download today - it's FREE!
> http://messenger.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200471ave/direct/01/
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


subject:
[Foundation-l] Re: [Wikimania-planning-l] Re: [Wikimania] Wikimania
	2006 - host city contest, latest update

body:
On 10/6/05, Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:

> But who is "WE" ?

The Wikimania organising team.

and where and when was it agreed
> upon ?

Yesterday, or the day before, by email.

Delphine
--
~notafish


from_name: Johannes Ernst

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: MediaWiki OpenID patch

body:
On Oct 6, 2005, at 19:50, Brion Vibber wrote:

> Using URLs for usernames is going to be inherently broken on the wiki,
> as accounts are closely tied to their user pages on the wiki.
>

We've been doing some work integrating LID (the "other" URL-based
digital identity system) with WikiPedia, and while ugly, even user
talk pages work surprisingly well with very few changes, for the LID
URLs we tried so far. I guess that will be the same for Dan and
OpenID. The MediaWiki code is more robust than we thought ;-)

<snip />

> There are basically two ways you can go I think:
>
> 1) OpenID identifiers are a special class of users and handled
> distinctly, like anonymous IP addresses are.
>

That's probably the most appealing route. This would apply to all
REST-ful identifiers for authors, and potentially for non-URL-based
"outside" identifiers as well, like URNs or XRIs (see the Identity
Commons project, which is another personal digital identity effort).

> Some mechanism for displaying properly formatted names and for
> picking a
> not-too-illegible title for the user page / talk page would need to be
> added to the core code.
>

The issue here is privacy and what follows from there. Within LID,
for example, we have extensive facilities for voluntary "profile data
exchange" (see the LID MediaWiki ;-) at http://lid.netmesh.org/
wiki ), so it's very straightforward to determine what VCard calls
the "Formatted Name" for a user, but experience shows that people
don't necessarily want others to see their real name in public places
such as Wikipedia.

Also, there is a namespace issue. The reason DNS is hierarchical is
that there are simply too many things that need to be named to be in
one, flat namespace. As Wikipedia grows to, say, include every
graduate student ever (kindergartener?), how realistic is it to stay
with a single-level name space? And the whole point of OpenID, LID,
and all the internet-scale identity efforts is to get away from local
pseudonyms that need to be invented because somebody else took
john.doe already at that site.

I'm afraid that I don't have a full-fledged answer here (not sure
anybody does), except for the maybe-not-so-trivial one: what if users
with REST-ful outside identifiers don't get a talk page?!? Chances
are that their REST-ful identifier actually refers to their blog, or
some place where people can leave comments ... Other than User:xxx,
where else would something break? It's easy to format, say,
SpecialListusers differently if it is a URL ...

> 2) OpenID identifiers can be used to authenticate a named account in
> place of a password, but you have to pick a valid username name and
> create an account.
>

Account federation with local pseudonyms... let's not do that, it's a
kludge and not worth the effort ...

So much for now ...

Johannes Ernst
-------------- next part --------------
  http://netmesh.info/jernst

Johannes Ernst

-------------- next part --------------
  http://netmesh.info/jernst


subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
3 quick answers:

#1. you can do what you just did, and we can all get editing.

#2. You can sanction some reasonable form of article rating system, so
that people know if the article they are reading is crap.

#3. Find a way to <u>reward</u> good users, and to encourage bad users
to become good, that doesn't involve adminship. Punishments like the
ArbCom deals out are just fine, but all successful organisations put
the emphasis on rewards.

I'm off to edit Bill Gates, and the Jane Fonda XD

Cheers,
Jack (Sam Spade)

On 10/6/05, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2005/10/the_amorality_o.php
>
> I don't agree with much of this critique, and I certainly do not share
> the attitude that Wikipedia is better than Britannica merely because it
> is free.  It is my intention that we aim at Britannica-or-better
> quality, period, free or non-free.  We should strive to be the best.
>
> But the two examples he puts forward are, quite frankly, a horrific
> embarassment.  [[Bill Gates]] and [[Jane Fonda]] are nearly unreadable crap.
>
> Why?  What can we do about it?
>
> --Jimbo
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Anthere

subject:
[Foundation-l] Re: [Wikimania-planning-l] Re: [Wikimania] Wikimania
 2006 - host city contest, latest update

body:
Delphine M?nard wrote:
> On 10/6/05, Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
>>But who is "WE" ?
>
>
> The Wikimania organising team.
>
> and where and when was it agreed
>
>>upon ?
>
>
> Yesterday, or the day before, by email.
>
>
> Delphine
> --
> ~notafish

Maybe you could put the name of the new team on wiki and inform people
here. It is best to be transparent about who is going to take decisions
about the event. Ihmo.

Ant (not part of the organising team, so just letting the wave gently
carress her toes rather than getting over her head)


list: textbook-l

subject: [Textbook-l] Re: Wikibooks

body:
Karl Wick wrote:

> Ryan, (and Laurent),
>
> On 10/5/05, rpenner at mail.utexas.edu <rpenner at mail.utexas.edu> wrote:
>
>>Karl,
>>I'm not sure if my last message went through, so I'll try again. If you got my
>>other questions, disregard them and respond to this email instead. I'd like to
>>start the interview through email, and I'll call you if I have any follow up
>>questions. If you could answer any or all of these questions, I would really
>>appreciate it!
>>
>>First, how did you get started with Wikibooks, and why? Was the site mostly your
>>idea, or was it a collaboration?
>>
>
>
> The one who opened his mouth was me, but the idea seems pretty obvious
> and I am sure that someone else would have said something soon if I
> hadn't. It has been a collaboration from the very beginning, with the
> faceless tech guys at Wikipedia who set up the software to Maveric149
> who bought the domain name space to each person who has dedicated time
> to writing and editing textbook modules, and especially Jimmy Wales
> who got Wikipedia started and was the one who gave the go-ahead for
> the Wikibooks project.
>
>
>>To get some sort of time frame, when did the idea for Wikibooks come about, and
>>when did the site actually go up?
>>
>
>
> I started writing my OChem book on Wikipedia at the beginning of the
> summer 03 quarter at Cleveland State University, and on July 10, 2003
> the new site went up. The delay was probably a month.
>
>
>>How big was the site when it was started, and how big is it now? What do you
>>hope to accomplish with Wikibooks in the future?
>>
>
>
> When the site started it had no content, and now it has 11,600+
> modules in English and several thousand more in other languages,
> although like Wikipedia, English has the most developed content.
>
> The vision that I had when I started Wikibooks was that we would
> eventually have free versions of textbooks in all subjects at all
> levels from preschool to the most advanced postgraduate, any and every
> subject that traditional textbooks currently serve. My idea is that
> when there is a good base of information for a book, that is, a decent
> book all developed and online at the site, teachers and students can
> use that information online, people can print out hard copies to
> distribute and sell, but that individuals can also take the content
> and modify it for their very private uses. A teacher can decide which
> modules to use, what order to use them in, pick between different
> modules that serve more or less the same purpose, etc. And of course,
> for the person who is already well served by a traditional textbook,
> he or she can use the wikitext just as it is, without those laborious
> changes.
>
> My dream is that when any  book is finished and online, new
> developments can be included as they happen, and the texts can avoid
> the problem of traditional texts that get outdated fast. Also the fact
> that it is all online means that you can use multimedia right there in
> your computer and otherwise interact more than with a printed book.
>
> Another great thing about it all is that errors are corrected in real
> time so, unlike traditional books, when errors are there they can be
> pointed out and corrected. Also, students can take an active part in
> their own education by writing about the things that they are learning
> about, especially while the project is relatively new and there are
> huge holes in content still. Teachers can work together and decide as
> a team what material to include and how to present it, and even have
> different options for students with different learning styles. We now
> know that different learners have quite different preferences for
> their own learning, and having alternative modules customized for a
> couple of different styles of learners, with localized examples,
> cultural sensitivity according to the end user, the list goes on and
> on.
>
>
>>This is the most important question for me: is there a possible application of
>>Wikibooks at the university level? If so, to what extent can Wikibooks be used
>>in a college classroom?
>>
>
>
> Part of the answer is above. The answer is absolutely YES. In fact, it
> was a university level book that was the first to be started. I think
> that study guides are a natural first step, and a study guide fleshed
> out could become the outline of a whole textbook.
>
>
>>Is there a problem with the open-source nature of the site? Specifically, it
>>seems like since anybody can write whatever they want on any subject, there may
>>be credibility or authenticity issues. Also, might authors with good intentions
>>mistakenly take information from bad sources and use it for their
>>contributions? Do any of these issues limit in any way the usability of
>>Wikibooks in colleges?
>>
>
> The material will depend on the quality of the contributions made. The
> more teachers, professors, involved students, and other experts we can
> have involved, the better the quality of the books and other teaching
> materials. Jimmy Wales has focused in on the benefits for the
> developing world and I agree, but I also think these texts can make
> learning better for users in the developed world, too. My original,
> immediate goal was to work with and help out other pre-med students in
> the US developing college-level science texts. I think that the more
> the students are involved in the process, and the teachers, the better
> the final product can be.
>
>
>>That's it for now. Thanks a lot for all of your help.
>>
>
>
> No problem, I hope that these answers help you out! Have a great day,
> Karl
>
>
>>-Ryan Penner
>>Daily Texan

hiya

By the way, did you get the message from the french journalist
interested by Wikibooks ?

ant


subject: [WikiEN-l] RE: How many Arbitrators should we have?

body:
The failure of most mediations is the lack of any mediation at all.

Jack (Sam Spade)

On 10/6/05, Kelly Martin <kelly.lynn.martin at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 10/6/05, Jack Lynch <jack.i.lynch at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Maybe (this is just one
> > flippant example) put a star by their name for every success, and
> > remove on for every failure. Some process whereby good mediators are
> > rewarded, and bad mediators either learn from their mistakes, or move
> > on.
>
> The failure of a mediation is usually not the fault of the mediator.
>
> Kelly
>


from_name: Alphax

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Unblock my account or mark pages so I can extract the
	content

body:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA256

jmerkey wrote:
>
>
> I have written several articles on wikipedia.
<snip>
> I have setup my own wiki
<snip>
> I would, however, like to be able to retrieve the source from the
> articles I have written.  The new site isn't GNU based, and the
> content is copyrighted and will remain so.
>

Any material you wrote and placed on Wikipedia is licensed under the
GFDL. If you use anyone else's work edits in placing your own edits on
your own site, those documents must also be licensed under the GFDL.

> at which point I wish my account (gadugi) to be deleted from this
> site.
>

The GFDL prevents us from doing that.

- --
Alphax                      |   /"\
Encrypted Email Preferred   |   \ /     ASCII Ribbon Campaign
OpenPGP key ID: 0xF874C613  |    X   Against HTML email & vCards
http://tinyurl.com/cc9up    |   / \
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iQEVAwUBQ0UrJLMAAH8MeUlWAQhSDQf/ULByXRghGhp6kjBRuj06jmIeewMBcZfJ
FD0c0nJl6hKdkNDmG5hh3G4Qdf/gfoREOO2cC4FM8+grSwBE89Ixtssdhu8FDXBB
rVtC3Ry7qhV8N8RZzEhP5eOy/4rA/8DIQTQS1atYTsAdFZ+UuRny6cq8Bq3MVfZV
3q/u2L5EKUyjVeSUejBYGgU+OJNsNUlvFvdONLqTQAgzjhNR85/3aHva+T716TGV
M+dByhwoq9esk7XHrf1Vjib/17lu3KGhZlKNjHm8DUMgtBGmWA4zPsyF6Ga+1P1c
EFl3Bz+0gg4gjB14Bsk+vZG4IZDofMrUllvQToEm7k5LnS88YQ3tBA==
=vPWs
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


body:
Ryan Delaney wrote:

>-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>Hash: SHA1
>
>Ray Saintonge wrote:
>
>
>>points of law rather than facts. It would be up to the lower
>>ranking tribunal to sort through the mass of irrelevant material
>>that is often raised.
>>
>>Ec
>>
>>
>I'm sorry, but I don't think I understand what you are trying to say.
>
Points of law relate to the interpretation of laws.  Points of fact
relate to establishing what happened.

In a murder trial establishing that the accused really pulled the fatal
trigger would establish a point of fact.  Whether that established act
was murder would be a point of law.

There should be no need for everybody to wade through a lot of claims
that have nothing to do with the issues being appealed.

Ec


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Need help with ACLE vandalism

body:
ilooy wrote:

> Hi,
> I pushed hard to get the
> subdomain lad.wikipedia.org
> established. And now that
> it is up and running it has
> become a target of vandals.
>
> Earlier I'd asked how to get
> admin/sysop access to be
> able to administer the wiki
> but I haven't heard.
>
> Could someone help?
>
> I'm willing to administer the
> wiki and help promote and
> aid its progress, but we need
> someone who can grant admin
> rights. If it is not done soon there's
> going to be a lot of vangalism and
> this is just not right.
>
> Could someone please help?
>
> Thanks,
> Jay B.
> [[User:ILVI]]
>
>
> --
> ilooy.gaon at gmail.com

Hi,

If steward interface is fixed soon, you can make the request on request
for permission on meta.
If not... you should ask on wikitech-l at wikimedia.org

Anth


from_name: geni

subject: [WikiEN-l] Tag-teaming

body:
On 10/6/05, Ben E. <bratsche1 at gmail.com> wrote:
> And couldn't tag-teaming be counted as meatpuppetry?
>
> -[[en:User:Bratsche|Ben]]
>

Technicaly no.

--
geni


from_name: Jean-Baptiste Soufron

subject:
[Foundation-l] Authoring on wikijunior : providing
	private	information.

body:
I really don't understand your point.

When you write something, you own your copyright and you only allow
people (including the wmf) to use it under the conditions of the gfdl or
any other license of your choice.

Nicholas Moreau wrote:
> On 10/6/05, foundation-l-request at wikimedia.org <
> foundation-l-request at wikimedia.org> wrote:What I am asking for is that if
> you want to claim copyright on your contribution, you need to give this
> minimum amount of information for legal protection and to give a realistic
> copyright claim on your contributions. As it stands right now, there is no
> way that you can realisticly claim copyright on any of your contributions
> right now, and certainly there is no way that you canresolve potential
> copyright claims on material if it goes to court in a dispute.
>
>
> Okay, suppose I didn't include my information, and I wanted to claim
> copyright on content in Wikijunior.
>
> I take the Foundation to court, saying "I CLAIM MY COPYRIGHT ON THIS!"
>
> The defendant's lawyer says "But, you can't. On the website, when you
> contribute anything to any Wikimedia project, it says that you're
> contributing this info to the Wikimedia Foundation."
>
> Like, seeing that I have my information on the "contributors" page, does
> that mean I own part of the Wikijunior project, and thus can profit from my
> "share" of the contribution? Every time one issue of the books is published,our
> $0.02 come rolling into my PayPal account? What? If that's the case, I'm
> doing fifty edits under fifty different usernames.
>
> I honestly am dumb-founded on what you consider "claiming [my] copyright",
> on something solely copyrighten by the foundation.
>
> Nick/Zanimum
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
On 10/7/05, Ryan Delaney <ryan.delaney at gmail.com> wrote:
> Maybe my way of responding to that is viewed as hostile because this
> isn't part of the common understanding, but I think it probably should
> be. Of course I don't want to step on anyone's toes, but if the
> article has to suffer because someone takes reverts personally, there
> isn't much I can do.

Actually, there IS much you can do.  Start by leaving a talk page post
explaining just what you think is wrong with the other person's edits
each time you use your "rv: not an improvement" message.  That's all
it takes. You can do a lot with very little effort.

Your way is hostile not because it isn't part of the common
understanding, it's hostile because it criticizes other editors and
makes no attempt to be non-hostile.  It also gives no impression of
what you find wrong with someone else's good faith edit. I sincerely
hope your current method NEVER becomes part of the common
understanding.

--
Michael Turley
User:Unfocused


from_name: Ryan Norton

subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
On Friday, October 7, 2005, at 12:35  AM, Magnus Manske wrote:

> Jimmy Wales wrote:
>
>>
>> But it's really not joyful to see bad writing in two very prominent
>> articles.
>>
>>
> Just as a reminder, there *is* a validation/rating/whatever-you-call-it
> system sitting in MediaWiki for month, waiting to be tested.
>
> Emphasis on /waiting/.

Would be better to actually clean it up, eh?

Anyway, I cleaned up the Bill Gates article a bit - let me know you
think :).

Thanks,
Ryan

[[User:RN]] at wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:RN
Ryan Norton at wxforum: http://wxforum.org


from_name: Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: MediaWiki OpenID patch

body:
Regarding your comments in the patch regarding on the usernames we
restrict: We require usernames to be upper case for future
compatability with single login.

Anyway, have you considered making this an extension? (see
docs/hooks.txt), I looked it over and found that it would be trivial
to do all this through $wgHooks by sprinkling a few wfRunHooks();


from_name: Mark Williamson

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Request for immediate creation of Illocano Wikipedia,
	a language with millions of speakers,
	17 support votes and no opposition

body:
Hi all,

I am writing to request the immediate creation of an Illocano
Wikipedia due to the overwhelming support shown on Meta and the
complete lack of opposition.

Please see http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Approved_requests_for_new_languages#Illokano_.2817.29

The ISO code is ilo; it should thus be located at http://ilo.wikipedia.org/

Thanks
Node ue
--
SI HOC LEGERE SCIS NIMIVM ERVDITIONIS HABES
QVANTVM MATERIAE MATERIETVR MARMOTA MONAX SI MARMOTA MONAX MATERIAM
POSSIT MATERIARI
ESTNE VOLVMEN IN TOGA AN SOLVM TIBI LIBET ME VIDERE


from_name: V. Ivanov

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: No more new Wikipedias !

body:
2005/9/24, Tim Starling <t.starling at physics.unimelb.edu.au>:
> If those potential new contributors only want to write articles in some
> little-known conlang, I won't shed any tears if they stay away.

It'd be OK, if only WPs for smaller or non-existent languages are
ignored. But I have an example of Udmurt WP, which has at least two
native supporters (and more to come, if it started and shown good).
Udmurt is a large language of more than 500 thousand speakers, it's
not a "dialect-language", but a "fully featured" language with its own
literature, newspapers, schools (though most in rural areas), etc.

I really do hope that the Udmurt WP will appear at least during this autumn. :)
I've added Udmurt to
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Approved_requests_for_new_languages
if it is the newer shortest way.

Sincerely,
Slavik IVANOV,
[[:os:User:Amikeco]]/[[eo:Vikipediisto:Slavik IVANOV]]

--
Esperu cxiam!


subject: [WikiEN-l] Dispute resolution attempt in the Ashida Kim case

body:
>>
>
> Hence I started my RFC against such people (and I'm still waiting for
> some more support on it):
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:RFC/AfD
>
> I invite everyone who feels that people who simply say "nn, d." or
> "keep, notable" or "keep, we are winning" or "delete, let's get rid of
> all of these" are Pains in the Arse and Should Be Shot.
>
>

"not notable" and "notable" are both quite valid because they are part
of a discussion. Things like "KEEP ALL SCHOOLS" and "DELETE ALL PUBLIC
SCHOOLS" are much less so.

> Thanks,
Ryan

[[User:RN]] at wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:RN
Ryan Norton at wxforum: http://wxforum.org


from_name: BJörn Lindqvist

subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
> I've actually had some luck with this. If someone makes an edit that
> doesn't hurt anything, but doesn't add anything either, I simply
> revert with the edit summary "rv: not an improvement". This seems to
> send a message to people that edits need to be constructive and have a

That's an incredibly hostile way of editing. What happens when someone
thinks that your "rv. not an improvement" is "not an improvement"?

--
mvh Bj?rn


from_name: Tony Sidaway

subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
On 10/6/05, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
>
> http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2005/10/the_amorality_o.php
>
> But the two examples he puts forward are, quite frankly, a horrific
> embarassment. [[Bill Gates]] and [[Jane Fonda]] are nearly unreadable
> crap.
>

Uh oh. Moral panic time. Again.

Go and read Eventualism. Relax.

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Eventualism

I think you're likely to get this style of waffle when most people who edit
an article think they know about the subject, but have no real knowledge.
Subjects from popular culture, such as Fonda and Gates, haven't had a chance
yet. Wait until they've been dead for a decade or so, and the wave of
amateurism will give way to more professional writing.

There are good Wikipedia articles. I like this one because it's shaped like
an onion. You can go for the outside ring of the onion, or you can peel it
right down to the core.

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

It isn't perfect, but it's okay.

Articles like Bill Gates and Jane Fonda are the hopeless cases. You might as
well run a featured article drive on both of them, it couldn't do any harm.

By the way, I found Nicholas Garr's writing almost impenetrable. As far as I
can tell, peeking through the thickets of his prose, he seems to be using a
worldwide communication network to write an article intended to deny that
anything at all extraordinary has happened to the world in the past two
decades. "The Internet had transformed many things, but it had not
transformed us. We were the same as ever." Well, only if you posit some "us"
that is in some way different from everything that has changed about us in
the past twenty years. Does he mean that we still need to eat and drink?
Well thank you, Captain Obvious!


subject: [WikiEN-l] Tag-teaming

body:
On 10/6/05, Ben E. <bratsche1 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> And couldn't tag-teaming be counted as meatpuppetry?
>
>
Terms like "tag teaming" and "meat puppetry" obscure what is happening here.
If an edit by a single person is reverted more than once by different
people, that means that more than one person thinks that his edit is wrong.
When this happens, he should discuss the issue with the other two or more
people, not get into a pointless edit war in which the consensus is clearly
against him.


from_name: Puddl Duk

subject: [WikiEN-l] Simple code for formatting lists in two colums

body:
On 10/6/05, steve v <vertigosteve at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> This code has worked quite well so far, so I'd like to
> promote its further use on any page with excessive
> verticality.
>
> {| width="100%"
> |- valign=top
> |width="50%"|
>
> COLUMN 1
>
> |width="50%"|
>
> COLUMN 2
>
> |}
>
> SinReg,
> SV

Great tip! The same concept can be use for additional image layout
possibilities (see [[Floodgate]] ).


subject: [Foundation-l] Quarto est mort ! Vive Quarto !

body:
Hello everyone

During the past few weeks, I have reflected on what should be the future of Quarto and how  the Wikimedia Foundation main page could be refactored. Both Quarto and the main page have been launched a year ago now, so it was high time to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of both and to see what could be done to keep the best of both systems.

So, what I propose is that Quarto disappear and will be somehow merged in the Foundation website. I?ll try to create the main page as I perceive it in the next few days (from a structural perspective). It will be easier to "show" than to try to explain with words. But please comment !

When I am roughly done, I would like some feedback from anyone on it, we can changed it together, and it will naturally have to be approved by Angela, Jimbo, Tim and Michael. If no one likes it, well.... we'll go back to the old one or will do something else :-)

During a third phase, I would be glad of some help to improve it from a ergonomic point of view, add some colors, icons
 because I am really not very good at that ;-)

We could then translate it if some people are willing to help. Please do not until things are a bit more fixed.

Hopefully, we could do something which would keep the good sides of Quarto, while removing or lessening the defaults.

Anthere

---------------------------------
Yahoo! for Good
 Click here to donate to the Hurricane Katrina relief effort.


from_name: Kelly Martin

body:
On 10/7/05, Ryan Norton <wxprojects at comcast.net> wrote:
> "not notable" and "notable" are both quite valid because they are part
> of a discussion.

Not if they're just offered without justification.  You have to
explain WHY you think they're notable or not notable, or you're just
offering an unsupported conclusion.  "Because I say so" only works for
Jimbo, and even then not that well.

Kelly


from_name: charles matthews

subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
Tony Sidaway wrote

>Wait until they've been dead for a decade or so, and the wave of
amateurism will give way to more professional writing.

OTOH ...

Reading this list,. anyway, you'd think driving out 'amateurism' was defined
by NPOV, NOR and sources.  Not by Fowler, Gowers, Strunk-White.  We hardly
hear about 'style crimes'; and it has been argued that lame, academic style
is kind of OK.

More subediting needed.

Charles


from_name: Jason Holt

subject: [Wikitech-l] Proposal: pseudonymous accounts for tor users

body:
There has been a lot of discussion lately on the or-talk list about
how to let tor and other anonymizing proxy users edit wikipedia without
allowing vandals free rein. Several straightforward approaches have been
proposed, such as holding edits in escrow pending approval by a trusted
user, and requiring anonymizing network users to login before posting.
The latter idea in particular could easily be abused, since abusers can
create a new account for each edit.

Roger Dingledine, tor's author, suggested creating a pseudonym service
using a cryptographic construction called blind signatures:

http://www.rsasecurity.com/rsalabs/node.asp?id=2339

Basically, Alice can generate a token, mathematically blind it
(obscuring its value), have it signed, then unblind the signature.
Anyone can verify that the signature on the token is valid, but nobody,
including the signer, can link the blinded value Alice had signed with
her unblinded token.

I implemented such a scheme which works as follows:

* Alice creates and blinds a token, then submits it to a token server
for signing.  Optionally, the token server may have a list of IPs banned
from wikipedia, and refuse to sign Alice's token if her IP is on the list.

* The token server signs the blinded token, then records what IP address
Alice used so that she can't obtain multiple tokens per IP address.
Later, this will allow us to block Alice's IP address if she misbehaves,
just as Wikipedia admins currently do, except that now it'll work even
when she connects via tor.  Token rationing could also be done based
on other (more or less) scarce resources, including email addresses,
captchas, CPU-intensive tasks or even money, just as I'm sure has been
proposed for the vanilla wikipedia.  The advantage of blind signatures is
that tokens can be recorded and blocked without revealing the potentially
sensitive underlying resource (such as a personal email address or
IP address).

* Alice can now turn on tor and present her token to wp, without revealing
her actual IP address.  This token takes the place of the IP address
record currently stored along with article edits, and can be blacklisted
just the same way that IPs are banned.

* However, I implemented an intermediary step which has several
advantages.  Instead of presenting her token to wp, Alice generates an
essentially empty client certificate and presents it via the tor network
to a certificate authority (CA) for signing, along with the signed token.
The CA records that the token has been "spent" (preventing her from
receiving multiple certs per token), then signs her cert just as Verisign
would sign a server SSL certificate. Since she connects via tor, the CA
doesn't learn her real IP address.

* Alice installs the client certificate in her browser, then connects
to a special wp server running an SSL server that demands valid client
certificates from our CA.  That configuration takes only 4 lines in my
apache-ssl server's httpd.conf.  Apache automatically sets environment
variables which identify the client certificate, and which can be used
in place of the REMOTE_ADDR variable currently used to record users'
incoming IP addresses when marking page edits.  Blocking a client cert
would then be just as easy as blocking an IP address.

All of Alice's edits will be marked with that identifier unless she
obtains a new IP address (or other scarce resource) and repeats the
process to obtain another certificate.  Later, features can optionally
be added which will allow her to have separate identifiers for each edit
(protecting her in case, say, her repressive government confiscates her
computer in order to find out if she wrote a particular article they
disagree with).

I have already released code to implement this system, with the exception
of the wp-specific code. I sent the proposal to both the or-talk lists
and the cryptography list at metzdowd.com on Monday. Next I'd like your
comments, before I dive into the mediawiki code (or find someone willing
to help with this part).  Once the feature is complete, we can set up a
live test wiki for people to bang on, before we consider implementation
on the live wp servers.

                                              -J


subject: [Textbook-l] Re: Wikibooks

body:
http://www.ilsole24ore.com/fc?cmd=art&artId=581516&chId=30&artType=News&back=0

I do not understand italian either :-)

Ant

Karl Wick wrote:

> Yeah, and I wrote back to him and to Ryan. Thanks for the connection,
> maybe we will be written up in a nice piece somewhere. I don't speak
> any French though so I don't know if I will understand any of
> Laurent's article.
>
> Karl
>
> On 10/6/05, Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>


body:
On 10/6/05, steve v <vertigosteve at yahoo.com> wrote:
> This code has worked quite well so far, so I'd like to
> promote its further use on any page with excessive
> verticality.
>
> {| width="100%"
> |- valign=top
> |width="50%"|
>
> COLUMN 1
>
> |width="50%"|
>
> COLUMN 2
>
> |}
>
> SinReg,
> SV

Be careful using this.  Some people still browse Wikipedia on 800x600
monitors, and I frequently use my Blackberry to access Wikipedia.
Formatting like this may not transfer well to small-screen devices.

Kelly


from_name: steve v

body:
Well, I passed it on (i forgot where i first saw it)
because I think its a good solution compared to others
Ive seen. Its really simple, so its not as
code-obstructive as others, and can be removed for
special purposes.

The formatting solution vs function solution issue is
something youre going to need to take to the W3C -
HTML is all style and no function. Im sure Wikipedia
isnt the only site you have problems reading on your
Blackberry. Still, that does address perhaps a
technical need to show wikipedia articles in extremely
plaintext form - like printing mode, only with links
still in place. You should take this up with the
devos. There's probably already an FR on
bugzilla.wikimedia.org for it.

SV

--- Justin Cormack <justin at specialbusservice.com>
wrote:

> On Fri, 2005-10-07 at 14:50 +0100, Tony Sidaway
> wrote:
> > On 10/7/05, Kelly Martin
> <kelly.lynn.martin at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > >
> > > Be careful using this. Some people still browse
> Wikipedia on 800x600
> > > monitors, and I frequently use my Blackberry to
> access Wikipedia.
> > > Formatting like this may not transfer well to
> small-screen devices.
> > >
> > >
> > Actually it seems to be designed to scale
> according to browser page width (I
> > wish more pages did this!) A table may look
> slightly odd if the available
> > screen width isn't enough to contain all the text
> and it has to wrap the
> > columns, but at least you get to see the text
> without annoying horizontal
> > scroll. Wikipedia is actually quite good at this;
> some sites such as gmail
> > are utterly hopeless, apparently written by
> complete amateurs.
>
> But it is markup by layout not function, and
> therefore bad. There should
> be a generic use as many columns as fit on the
> screen - this forces 2.
>
> I try to use wikipedia on my phone too quite often.
> The main problem is
> the amount of clutter around the information, which
> lays out very badly
> on a small screen. AT some point I migth play around
> with how best to
> fix this.
>
> Justinc
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] Vacation for Uncle Ed

body:
Have a good one Tio Eduardo.

SV

--- "Poor, Edmund W" <Edmund.W.Poor at abc.com> wrote:

> I need a break. I'm going to take a week off from
> Wikipedia. Try not to
> break anything while I'm gone.
>
> Thanks.
>
> Ed Poor
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

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


body:
> Alternate viewing for mobiles..

Oh I forgot, the the "basic" or "original" CSS already
does this.

SV

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


from_name: Tucci

subject: [Wikitech-l] approved requests for new wikipedias

body:
Hi, there are currently four requests on
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Approved_requests_for_new_languages
that meet all requirements for a new wiki.  They are:

Udmurt - .udm
Samogitian - .bat-smg
Banyumasan - .map.bjk
Ripuarian - .gem-rip

All but one of these languages have a test wiki, they
all have a number of native speakers willing to work
on them and consensus for their creation.

The persons behind the Udmurt request asked that it
use the Russian interface.  If this is possible,
please do so.  The others didn't specifically request
it, but if it's easy to do so, it seems eminently
reasonable for Samogitian to use Lithuanian,
Banyumasan to use Javanese and Ripuarian to use
German.

Thank you, Tuf-Kat

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
Further specialization in process may help, but thats
only part of it. Some would say its just more "process
creep", and I tend to think the truth somewhere in the
middle between process upgrades and guidance upgrades.

IAC I think I need to apologise for my earlier
comment, "please forgive us..." which was indeed a bit
snippy (though quite edited down from what I had in
the draft :|).  Our traditional proper response to
anyone has traditionally been "{{sofixit}}" and it
should remain so, regardless of who makes the
criticism. There are in fact only two--exactly
two--kinds of people in this world: Those who edit
Wikipedia and those who dont.

And furthermore, I think ATP focusing on particular
articles ("the pick on a crappy article game" -
Flcello) at this point is rather useless, when there
are indeed bigger fish to fry --considering my opening
point, namely that stuff needs' be done.

Sincerely,
SV

--- Fastfission <fastfission at gmail.com> wrote:
> That's the list I was thinking of. The cleanup
> process is currently so
> bogged down that it's hard to know what needs to be
> done, though. In
> the meantime, I've created a template --
> {{cleanup-priority}}, which
> currently is a cleanup tag for any articles which
> are of sub-par
> quality on that list (and should only be limited to
> that list, I
> think), hopefully it will help focus things a bit.
> (If people disagree
> with the "prioritization", well, they can argue that
> on the list
> itself -- if we have such a list, and take it at
> least partially
> seriously, then I think using it as a base for a
> prioritization scheme
> is a good idea).

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


from_name: Sean Barrett

subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

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

Justin Cormack stated for the record:
>
> On 7 Oct 2005, at 12:25, Jack Lynch wrote:
>
>> There seems to be less motivation to get the *really
>> general* articles up to featured status. God help the person who tries
>> to get [[Earth]] past the present FAC process and keep it under 200KB.
>
>
> But who looks up "Earth" in an encyclopaedia?

My seven-year-old daughter.  Wikipedia is an encyclopedia for everyone,
not just geeks who are looking for hyper-specialized trivia.

> I would expect more people to read [[Brutalist architecture]] than
[[Architecture]]....

You have surprising expectations.

- --
 Sean Barrett     | Never stand next to anyone throwing
 sean at epoptic.com | shit at an armed man. --Larry Niven
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFDRqFJMAt1wyd9d+URArquAJ4oo/ZlAqJOHj7dq3F/pWXbqEqdtQCfdQ+m
QYOqaGiPYIkdepZNur3DPLM=
=WABe
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


from_name: Magnus Manske

subject: [WikiEN-l] a valid criticism

body:
Jimmy Wales wrote:

>
>But it's really not joyful to see bad writing in two very prominent
>articles.
>
>
Just as a reminder, there *is* a validation/rating/whatever-you-call-it
system sitting in MediaWiki for month, waiting to be tested.

Emphasis on /waiting/.

Magnus


from_name: Poor, Edmund W

subject: [WikiEN-l] Vacation for Uncle Ed

body:
I need a break. I'm going to take a week off from Wikipedia. Try not to
break anything while I'm gone.

Thanks.

Ed Poor