https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Metrics_and_activities_meetings/2013-02-07
Yesterday I gave a 3-minute presentation about the Outreach Program for Women at the monthly Wikimedia Foundation all-hands meeting. My slides are up on Commons:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Opw-presentation-feb7-2013.pdf
More about our participation in OPW:
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Outreach_Program_for_Women
The parent organization's page about OPW:
https://live.gnome.org/OutreachProgramForWomen
The blog aggregator where you can read interns' and mentors' posts:
The YouTube video will be at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17rTFSUy3Xk once Google finishes processing the livestream.
Hi Sumana,
[CCing the English Wikipedia mailing list].
sorry for the late response.
On Fri, 08 Feb 2013 08:03:11 -0500 Sumana Harihareswara sumanah@wikimedia.org wrote:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Metrics_and_activities_meetings/2013-02-07
Yesterday I gave a 3-minute presentation about the Outreach Program for Women at the monthly Wikimedia Foundation all-hands meeting. My slides are up on Commons:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Opw-presentation-feb7-2013.pdf
More about our participation in OPW:
Thanks for making the slides available, but I was annoyed by the fact that I had to switch to every page individually, and could not figure out a way to download the .pdf itself (but there should be). Your talk seems like a good initiative, and I will encourage it.
Like I said earlier, I think part of the problem is that many people (predominantly women, but naturally not only those) have very thin skin and lack persistence and will give up after every social obstacle they encounter. So what I suggest is:
1. Make sure to phrase the issues you have using constructive criticism, telling what should be done instead of what is wrong. Leave comments on the page, etc.
2. Make sure to contact the person who did the change and instruct them that there is a problem, even using E-mail if necessary.
3. Tell people that have not followed this to have to know better and come to the defence of people who are trying to contribute.
4. Thanks contributors of worthy changes (even small ones) for their changes on their talk pages.
5. Enlighten people whose changes have been labelled as bad as to the correct way.
6. Avoid mentioning too many acronyms and weird jargon in your comments, and instead explain in plain English.
-----
All of this seems like much more work, but it will eventually pay in spades in much less resentment and less hard feelings, more contributors, better happiness and joy from all parties, and eventually much more useful edits.
I think we should change the templates on wikipedia to read something more like “Please find citations from reliable sources for this article.” instead of the much less constructive and more frightening “This article lacks citations from reliable sources. It may be challenged and removed.”.
Does anyone agree?
Regards,
Shlomi Fish
On Mon, Feb 11, 2013 at 08:29:22AM +0200, Shlomi Fish wrote:
On Fri, 08 Feb 2013 08:03:11 -0500 Sumana Harihareswara sumanah@wikimedia.org wrote:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Metrics_and_activities_meetings/2013-02-07
Yesterday I gave a 3-minute presentation about the Outreach Program for Women at the monthly Wikimedia Foundation all-hands meeting. My slides are up on Commons:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Opw-presentation-feb7-2013.pdf
More about our participation in OPW:
Thanks for making the slides available, but I was annoyed by the fact that I had to switch to every page individually, and could not figure out a way to download the .pdf itself (but there should be). Your talk seems like a good initiative, and I will encourage it.
Just click "Full resolution," it took me a minute to find, as well. I expect there will be digitized video of the event, or one can hope.
As for your guidelines to persistent engagement, is there a web page where you explain in more detail? I feel like those would make very good advice in the proper circumstances -- however, I cannot imagine how they could be applied to as bold an initiative as the Outreach Program, and especially and above all, you cannot sensibly say they apply to "predominantly women".
I think many of the ideas you expressed would be well received by the wiki*edia "welcoming committee", and that might be a good place to try them out [1] in the field, possibly achieving a reduction to a smaller number of axioms in the process.
....
I think we should change the templates on wikipedia to read something more like “Please find citations from reliable sources for this article.” instead of the much less constructive and more frightening “This article lacks citations from reliable sources. It may be challenged and removed.”.
This is a great improvement, in my opinion, but there might be problems with using the imperative voice, even if it begins with "please". It is an interesting idea though, and it makes me laugh to think that Wikipedia's public pleas have already bordered on such lines, we might as well have had a big Uncle Sam pointing at our organ of sense of duty: "I want YOU to edit this broken-ass website."
Agreed that the "challenged and removed" sentence sounds like an insurance-company cop-out, something like a "we told u so". What about an attempt at sympathy, "Unfortunately, articles may be swiftly removed if content falls short of basic criteria..."
Actually, to trip out on something I'm passionate about, it's nonsense that vandalism is so sensitive an issue that we have to self-police the encyclopedia in this way. In the case of an incomplete article, let's just flag it as such, and move on. Then, sections with this flag ("non-authoritative"???) would not appear unless you are looking for them.
-Adam
Hi Adam,
thanks for your kind words. Please see below for my response.
On Mon, 11 Feb 2013 09:12:32 -0800 spam@ludd.net wrote:
On Mon, Feb 11, 2013 at 08:29:22AM +0200, Shlomi Fish wrote:
On Fri, 08 Feb 2013 08:03:11 -0500 Sumana Harihareswara sumanah@wikimedia.org wrote:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Metrics_and_activities_meetings/2013-02-07
Yesterday I gave a 3-minute presentation about the Outreach Program for Women at the monthly Wikimedia Foundation all-hands meeting. My slides are up on Commons:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Opw-presentation-feb7-2013.pdf
More about our participation in OPW:
Thanks for making the slides available, but I was annoyed by the fact that I had to switch to every page individually, and could not figure out a way to download the .pdf itself (but there should be). Your talk seems like a good initiative, and I will encourage it.
Just click "Full resolution," it took me a minute to find, as well. I expect there will be digitized video of the event, or one can hope.
Ah, OK, I'll try it next time.
As for your guidelines to persistent engagement, is there a web page where you explain in more detail? I feel like those would make very good advice in the proper circumstances -- however, I cannot imagine how they could be applied to as bold an initiative as the Outreach Program, and especially and above all, you cannot sensibly say they apply to "predominantly women".
They don't apply only to women (naturally), but I'm pretty sure they certainly affect women.
I don't have a web page yet, but I guess I can write one in English (possibly on the Meta-Wiki - https://meta.wikimedia.org/ ) and so we'll allow other people to contribute.
I think many of the ideas you expressed would be well received by the wiki*edia "welcoming committee", and that might be a good place to try them out [1] in the field, possibly achieving a reduction to a smaller number of axioms in the process.
Thanks. :-).
....
I think we should change the templates on wikipedia to read something more like “Please find citations from reliable sources for this article.” instead of the much less constructive and more frightening “This article lacks citations from reliable sources. It may be challenged and removed.”.
This is a great improvement, in my opinion, but there might be problems with using the imperative voice, even if it begins with "please". It is an interesting idea though, and it makes me laugh to think that Wikipedia's public pleas have already bordered on such lines, we might as well have had a big Uncle Sam pointing at our organ of sense of duty: "I want YOU to edit this broken-ass website."
Heh. :-).
Agreed that the "challenged and removed" sentence sounds like an insurance-company cop-out, something like a "we told u so". What about an attempt at sympathy, "Unfortunately, articles may be swiftly removed if content falls short of basic criteria..."
OK.
Actually, to trip out on something I'm passionate about, it's nonsense that vandalism is so sensitive an issue that we have to self-police the encyclopedia in this way. In the case of an incomplete article, let's just flag it as such, and move on. Then, sections with this flag ("non-authoritative"???) would not appear unless you are looking for them.
Yes, I think you are right.
Well, I actually had to revert a change on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erin_Hoffman (back when it was still EA_spouse) because it was done anonymously and contained baseless, opinionated, and defamatory rumours:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Erin_Hoffman&diff=423068674&am...
However, I guess you need to draw the line somewhere.
Anyway, I will work on that page now.
Regards,
Shlomi Fish
Hi all,
On Tue, 12 Feb 2013 07:28:18 +0200 Shlomi Fish shlomif@shlomifish.org wrote:
Hi Adam,
thanks for your kind words. Please see below for my response.
As for your guidelines to persistent engagement, is there a web page where you explain in more detail? I feel like those would make very good advice in the proper circumstances -- however, I cannot imagine how they could be applied to as bold an initiative as the Outreach Program, and especially and above all, you cannot sensibly say they apply to "predominantly women".
They don't apply only to women (naturally), but I'm pretty sure they certainly affect women.
I don't have a web page yet, but I guess I can write one in English (possibly on the Meta-Wiki - https://meta.wikimedia.org/ ) and so we'll allow other people to contribute.
I started it here for the time being:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Shlomif/Guidelines_Encouraging_Particip...
There's not a lot there aside from what I have written in the E-mail, but I'm planning to continue working on it and as usual - feel free to contribute as long as you do no harm.
Regards,
Shlomi Fish