See below.
My comments in reply summarised in square brackets.
http://yotophoto.com/
Play around, see what you like and don't like. I'll pass on any
comments given to me.
cheers,
Brianna
user:pfctdayelise
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: 10-Mar-2007 07:51
Subject: Re: [Provide feedback] Wikimedia Commons photos
Brianna,
First, sorry for the delayed response and thanks for your comments. I
especially appreciate feedback from people in your position as I want
Yotophoto to be embraced by those contributing to important projects
like Wikimedia Commons.
Right now, most of the links to go back to Wikipedia instead of the
Commons for the main reason that awareness of the Wikipedia project is
higher than that of Commons. It's just easier for people to get their
head around it if they are unfamiliar with Commons. (As an aside, I
find it pretty tough explaining how everything works with regards to
'free' licensing and how we index only third party sites and so on.
You wouldn't believe how often people write us to ask if they can use
one of "our" images or how they can upload their own images to us).
One thing I also like about linking to the Wikipedia page over the
Commons one is that the list of pages that link to the image seem to
be more accurate on Wikipedia than Commons. Is this your experience as
well? Any feedback on this would be helpful. See #3 below for a little
more on why this is relevant.
Having said that, I'm working a new version that will change a few
things. Here's an overview:
1) Every site we index will have it's own "about" page. Here we will
explain a bit about what each site is about, how to contribute, what
kind of licenses the site allows and so on. In the case of the
Wikipedia and Commons we intend to outline the relationship between
the two and how Wikipedia will often hold a 'fake' image for images
that come from Commons as you described.
[I told him about Check Usage.]
2) Most images will have an intermediate preview (probably in a pop-up
lightbox). From here we can provide a link to *both* the Commons and
Wikipedia pages for an image. What do you think?
3) Yotophoto will eventually index images using captions from the
various Wikipedia articles that include said image. So if an image
doesn't have a complete description on it's own page - we can still
index it based on all the captions used for that image throughout
Wikipedia. Commons tends to have decent image descriptions but for
images only on Wikipedia taken from third party sites (say a PD US-GOV
image), the descriptions are often lacking.
[I said:
On Commons we have enough trouble forcing people to annotate their
files with basic information like licensing and author, let alone a
decent content description. Many people when they submit files, are
submitting them with a specific purpose in mind and are focused on
that, not on the possibility that the file might be re-used in the
future for something else. Also when one is looking at an image, it is
often quite self-explanatory, so the user doesn't feel the need to
explain the purpose or background to the file beyond three words. Of
course that doesn't stack up well for searching since machines can't
"read" images well at all (or even, mostly, at all).
]
4) Yotophoto would like to enable one click republishing of images
found so people can repost to their own blogs etc. To do this we will
provide a copy and paste HTML code they can use. This code will link
back to the image source (ie. Commons) as well as to the image
license. Sites like Commons will get tons of back-links and exposure
in this way I think. I like to think of this as the "Flickerization of
Wikipedia" (and Commons).
[I forwarded this part to wikitech-l to see what they say.]
5) The depth of the index will increase massively. We intend to one
day have the entire Commons and Wikipeida image collections searchable
(right now it is only a fraction) including not only photos but other
types of images as well like maps, charts, flags and so on.
I'd love to know what you think, and if you have any further
suggestions. As well, feel free to invite anyone from the Commons to
submit their ideas to me as well. I hadn't seen the Mayflower tool
before but it looks quite nice - I want to look into it more.
Regards,
On 2/26/07, brianna.laugher(a)gmail.com <brianna.laugher(a)gmail.com> wrote:
> Brianna Laugher sent a message using the contact form at
> http://yotophoto.com/feedback.
>
> Hi, I'm a volunteer on the Wikimedia Commons website. I just wanted to say
> how impressed I am with Yotophoto at the moment. Displaying the license
> and the image dimensions in the results is particularly awesome. A couple
> of comments:
>
> Is it possible to do domain-specific searches? (like in Google,
> site:commons.wikimedia.org) - doesn't seem like it, so far
>
> As you may or may not know, when projects like Wikipedia use images from
> Wikimedia Commons, it creates 'fake' image pages like this one:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Common_frog.jpg (note the red tab and
> the tag 'This is a file from the Wikimedia Commons. The description on its
> description page there is shown below.'). To better promote Wikimedia
> Commons, it would be preferable if such images could be referred back to
> their Wikimedia Commons page, rather than the 'fake' page at Wikipedia.
> Would that be possible?
>
> Also, another Wikimedia editor has developed an image search engine
> specifically for Wikimedia Commons called 'Mayflower', which you might be
> interested in checking out:
> http://tools.wikimedia.de/~tangotango/mayflower/
>
> As the default wiki search engine for media performs very poorly, we tend
> to be very happy whenever we find out about nice products like these :)
>
> thanks!
>
Well my biggest comment (although this is not really related to the
subject at hand) is that yotophoto doesn't actually index things. If
I'm trying to find a free image, I generally search yotophoto and
mayflower. Mayflower finds stuff 10 times more often then yotophoto.
yotophoto theoretically should be a superset of mayflower, how come
they don't find anything one you search them (I've maybe found images
with them twice).
</rant>
-bawolff
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> Date: 10-Mar-2007 07:51
> Subject: Re: [Provide feedback] Wikimedia Commons photos
>
> Brianna,
>
> First, sorry for the delayed response and thanks for your comments. I
> especially appreciate feedback from people in your position as I want
> Yotophoto to be embraced by those contributing to important projects
> like Wikimedia Commons.
>
> Right now, most of the links to go back to Wikipedia instead of the
> Commons for the main reason that awareness of the Wikipedia project is
> higher than that of Commons. It's just easier for people to get their
> head around it if they are unfamiliar with Commons. (As an aside, I
> find it pretty tough explaining how everything works with regards to
> 'free' licensing and how we index only third party sites and so on.
> You wouldn't believe how often people write us to ask if they can use
> one of "our" images or how they can upload their own images to us).
>
> One thing I also like about linking to the Wikipedia page over the
> Commons one is that the list of pages that link to the image seem to
> be more accurate on Wikipedia than Commons. Is this your experience as
> well? Any feedback on this would be helpful. See #3 below for a little
> more on why this is relevant.
>
> Having said that, I'm working a new version that will change a few
> things. Here's an overview:
>
> 1) Every site we index will have it's own "about" page. Here we will
> explain a bit about what each site is about, how to contribute, what
> kind of licenses the site allows and so on. In the case of the
> Wikipedia and Commons we intend to outline the relationship between
> the two and how Wikipedia will often hold a 'fake' image for images
> that come from Commons as you described.
>
> [I told him about Check Usage.]
>
> 2) Most images will have an intermediate preview (probably in a pop-up
> lightbox). From here we can provide a link to *both* the Commons and
> Wikipedia pages for an image. What do you think?
>
> 3) Yotophoto will eventually index images using captions from the
> various Wikipedia articles that include said image. So if an image
> doesn't have a complete description on it's own page - we can still
> index it based on all the captions used for that image throughout
> Wikipedia. Commons tends to have decent image descriptions but for
> images only on Wikipedia taken from third party sites (say a PD US-GOV
> image), the descriptions are often lacking.
>
> [I said:
> On Commons we have enough trouble forcing people to annotate their
> files with basic information like licensing and author, let alone a
> decent content description. Many people when they submit files, are
> submitting them with a specific purpose in mind and are focused on
> that, not on the possibility that the file might be re-used in the
> future for something else. Also when one is looking at an image, it is
> often quite self-explanatory, so the user doesn't feel the need to
> explain the purpose or background to the file beyond three words. Of
> course that doesn't stack up well for searching since machines can't
> "read" images well at all (or even, mostly, at all).
> ]
>
> 4) Yotophoto would like to enable one click republishing of images
> found so people can repost to their own blogs etc. To do this we will
> provide a copy and paste HTML code they can use. This code will link
> back to the image source (ie. Commons) as well as to the image
> license. Sites like Commons will get tons of back-links and exposure
> in this way I think. I like to think of this as the "Flickerization of
> Wikipedia" (and Commons).
>
> [I forwarded this part to wikitech-l to see what they say.]
>
> 5) The depth of the index will increase massively. We intend to one
> day have the entire Commons and Wikipeida image collections searchable
> (right now it is only a fraction) including not only photos but other
> types of images as well like maps, charts, flags and so on.
>
>
> I'd love to know what you think, and if you have any further
> suggestions. As well, feel free to invite anyone from the Commons to
> submit their ideas to me as well. I hadn't seen the Mayflower tool
> before but it looks quite nice - I want to look into it more.
>
> Regards,
>
>
>
>
>
> On 2/26/07, brianna.laugher(a)gmail.com <brianna.laugher(a)gmail.com> wrote:
> > Brianna Laugher sent a message using the contact form at
> > http://yotophoto.com/feedback.
> >
> > Hi, I'm a volunteer on the Wikimedia Commons website. I just wanted to say
> > how impressed I am with Yotophoto at the moment. Displaying the license
> > and the image dimensions in the results is particularly awesome. A couple
> > of comments:
> >
> > Is it possible to do domain-specific searches? (like in Google,
> > site:commons.wikimedia.org) - doesn't seem like it, so far
> >
> > As you may or may not know, when projects like Wikipedia use images from
> > Wikimedia Commons, it creates 'fake' image pages like this one:
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Common_frog.jpg (note the red tab and
> > the tag 'This is a file from the Wikimedia Commons. The description on its
> > description page there is shown below.'). To better promote Wikimedia
> > Commons, it would be preferable if such images could be referred back to
> > their Wikimedia Commons page, rather than the 'fake' page at Wikipedia.
> > Would that be possible?
> >
> > Also, another Wikimedia editor has developed an image search engine
> > specifically for Wikimedia Commons called 'Mayflower', which you might be
> > interested in checking out:
> > http://tools.wikimedia.de/~tangotango/mayflower/
> >
> > As the default wiki search engine for media performs very poorly, we tend
> > to be very happy whenever we find out about nice products like these :)
> >
> > thanks!
> >
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> _______________________________________________
> Commons-l mailing list
> Commons-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/commons-l
>
>
> End of Commons-l Digest, Vol 22, Issue 12
> *****************************************
>
We have just launched http://planet.wikimedia.org/ , which is an
aggregator for all on-topic wiki-related weblog (blog) posts by
participants in Wikimedia projects. The planet can be found at:
http://planet.wikimedia.org/
To get added, please follow the instructions at:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Planet_Wikimedia
This is a kind of beta test, and right now, the planet is in the
English language; however, I have prepared a process for requesting
new languages to be set up here:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Planet_Wikimedia/New_language
So please add your support if you wish to aggregate blog posts in
another language.
Again, this is for on-topic posts, not for diary entries. All feeds
must either point to a blog which is almost exclusively about wikis,
or filtered (WordPress, Blogger and other common blog engines all
support filtered feeds by categorizing your posts, e.g., adding the
"wiki" category to all posts which you want to be included in the
planet). If this makes you feel uncomfortable, you can (in addition or
in substitution) add your blog to http://wikiblogplanet.com/ , which
does not filter posts for on-topicness. WikiBlogPlanet is run
independently by Nick Jenkins.
I hope that this new tool will allow us to share useful and
interesting information, as well as opinions, more effectively across
project boundaries.
--
Peace & Love,
Erik
DISCLAIMER: This message does not represent an official position of
the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.
"An old, rigid civilization is reluctantly dying. Something new, open,
free and exciting is waking up." -- Ming the Mechanic
I'd like to officially announce Andre Engels as the reigning KING OF
THE FLICKRLICKRS. Andre was one of the first FlickrLickr reviewers,
and has reviewed a total of 30,000 CC-BY-licensed Flickr images so
far.
http://epov.org/cgi-bin/flickrlickr.pl?stats=1
Thanks to Andre for his continuing dedication. Though, KenWalker is
catching up quickly with 24,000 reviewed pictures. ;-) There are
currently 65 registered reviewers.
For those who do not know, FlickrLickr is a collaborative review
process for picking freely licensed pictures on Flickr that should be
uploaded to Commons:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:FlickrLickr
You see 50 random photos per page, edit their descriptions, and tick
the ones you want to upload. The vast majority of photos on Flickr is
of no relevance to us, or of unacceptable quality. So far, more than
150,000 pictures have been reviewed, and about 8,000 of these have
been uploaded to Commons.
New pics are being uploaded to Flickr at a much faster rate than we
can review them -- there are more than 5 million pictures under
acceptable licenses on Flickr. So we always need more volunteers. Just
e-mail me off-list if you want an account (include your Commons
username).
You can review some of the favorites chosen by FlickrLickr users here:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:FlickrLickr/Highlights
(That page could use some reorganization - feel free to be bold. :-)
Some FlickrLickr pictures have become featured, and we do our best to
ensure that useful pictures get included in Wikimedia articles.
Volunteer today, and one day you might be the next .. KING OF THE
FLICKRLICKRS. ;-)
--
Peace & Love,
Erik
DISCLAIMER: This message does not represent an official position of
the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.
"An old, rigid civilization is reluctantly dying. Something new, open,
free and exciting is waking up." -- Ming the Mechanic
Greetings. Tonight I setup a test version of a new Java based
install-free player for our Ogg files.
Unlike the prior version it also supports Ogg/Theora Video. It also
should improve compatibility with some Java implementations such as
the old Microsoft JVM, and it should have working buffering which
should make it useful for people with slow or intermittent links where
the prior player was not.
I was planning on testing it out for a few days before taking it live,
but the database feel over on toolserver which broke the old player
anyways. The new player setup is a little more robust against database
failures.
We still have a server problem which causes large media files to get
stuck in the cache as zero byte files. If a particular file doesn't
play for you, it's very likely that the file has been hit with this
caching bug. This is a long standing bug, but we know the general
cause now. It just is not fixed yet.
Here is a video example:
http://tools.wikimedia.de/~gmaxwell/jorbis/commonsJOrbisPlayer2.php?path=Vi…
See, http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Video for more.
Unfortunately most do not yet have a template which provides a direct
link to the player.
Here is an audio only example:
http://tools.wikimedia.de/~gmaxwell/jorbis/commonsJOrbisPlayer.php?path=Sca…
Feedback is appreciated.
First some background, why do we use compressed audio:
1) Uncompressed audio is huge and uses a lot of disk space for us.
2) Uncompressed audio would be an amazing waste of our bandwidth.
3) Uncompressed audio would be a huge burden on our readers, and would
make clips longer than a few seconds inaccessible to users on dialup.
Brion may stab me for saying it, but (1) is fairly unimportant.
The way we are using compressed audio today is not very good from the
perspective of (2), and (3).
I haven't gone and exhaustively checked our files, but most of the
Ogg/Vorbis files I'm seeing people upload are in the 160kbit/sec
range. I believe there are four reasons for this:
1) An incorrect impression created by old data about MP3 performance.
Old MP3 wisdom is that you have to be 160kbit/sec to be good. This was
true five years ago.
All cutting edge perceptual coders have results which are very good at
128kbit/sec, Vorbis better than the others, with results which are
nearly statistically the same as the original on a test using trained
listners.(http://www.listening-tests.info/mf-128-1/results.htm)
2) My recording is a unique and precious snowflake. I want it to be
the highest quality.
3) You can go down but you can't go up, and I have broadband so it's
fast enough for me.
4) Lossless files are bad for editing, less loss is better.
Of these, *none* of them should be a factor is deciding what we send
to our readers. Yet here we are sending these 160kbit/sec oggs to
joe-average-reader, sucking up his bandwidth and ours.
In terms of what we need uploaded for our own purposes, (4) matters.
It matters a lot, because being able to edit the content is an
important part of what we enable. However, even the 160kbit/sec lossy
files fail here: Take a file decoded from a 160kbit/ogg and pass it
through a 1500Hz high pass filter ('sox input.wav output.wav highp
1500' for those with real computers (tm)). The result will have
obvious yucky artifacts. This isn't a bug, it's the behavior of a
perceptual codec by design. The high pass trick is a pathological
worst case, but it is true that even at 160kbit/sec perceptual codecs
do not survive all forms of manipulation well.
What I'd like to see us do instead, is to ask uploaders to send us
losslessly compressed Ogg/Flac files instead. Lossless compression
because disk space isn't totally irrelevant and to avoid people
downloading insanely huge wavs just because they don't want to use the
java player or install a codec. We already permit uploading these
lossless audio files they can be easily transcoded to Ogg/Vorbis while
preserving all metadata.
Then we would, either via an automatic transcoding bot or via an
upload enhancement to mediawiki automatically generate 40kbit/sec
(dialup) and 96kbit/sec (broadband) versions from the lossless. These
versions are what we'd link from our other projects.
Considering the quality of most audio/video sharing sites on the
internet, these would still leave us head and shoulders better
quality. (Most youtube videos seem to be using 8 or 16kbit/sec mp3 for
their audio, it's miserable but you don't notice if you're watching
the video)
Thoughts on this? On using a bot vs some native support? The biggest
limit I see on this is that we don't have any support for subfiles, or
bundled files... which means that this gunks up commons with two extra
files for our audio.
[Crossposted on many lists]
Hello,
The press team of the Foundation is currently building a press list file and
gathering contact information of journalists and editors of all the major
media (newspapers, magazines, radio, tv) around the world. The aim is to
improve our communication and be able to reach people from all over the
world (not only people from the US and not only people from English-speaking
countries).
We are requesting help from the whole community to gather this information.
We have the chance to have a global community of users and volunteers and we
need to take advantage of this chance. Please help us by sending contact
information of journalists and editors you know or from your country.
The basic information are :
Name of the journalist:
First name:
Email:
Name and type of the media: (for instance "CNN, worldwide news TV channel")
Any other information about each contact is welcome (area of concentration,
coverage, schedule...).
Please send the information you have got to: press at wikimedia dot org and
*do not answer this email*, I will probably not get the emails since I am
not subscribed to all lists I have posted to.
Thanks for your help!
--
Guillaume Paumier
[[m:User:guillom]]
http://www.wikimedia.org
