<rambling>
100.000 articles
Will we have 100.000 articles in a few days? This depends on wether we
do have *any* articles (like a magazine or newspaper) or entries (like
an encyclopedia). I think the number itself is not the point. Stubs?
Yes, we do have stubs. So what? Any encyclopedia has them. Opened one
lately? I just went to my bookshelf and opened one of the "Brockhaus"
(big German quality encyclopedia) volumes at a random page, and guess
what I found?
We're not saying "we have 100.000 complete, detailed, perfect,
bullet-proof articles", we say "we have 100.000 articles". We even link
directly to our definition of "article".
Vera Cruz
Well, I never had any quarrel with him/her/it. I noticed some strange
activity on Recent Chages, but that was it.
On the other hand, I *am* tempted to ban "Vera Cruz" just to reduce the
amount of incoming mails.
If it's Lir (prove!), or harming the 'pedia (subtle or not), I say get
rid of it.
Images
After DW told me some weeks ago in a rather commanding tone that some
images I uploaded were too large and to dark (images that I had already
downsized, filtered and dust-removed), and started to replace them with
tiny thumbs, I found myself rather displeased with the current image
handling, both by software and by people. Did anyone notice that lots of
our images have no source or PD explanation given? That we have
double/triple images of the same thing/person? That there are "x.jpg",
"x (small).jpg", "x (large).jpg", etc. and no handling of the different
sizes?
Consensus
Great thing. We talk about the different options, argue a little, and
finally agree on the way to go.
Except we don't.
Anyone know a country or big company that is successfully run by
consensus? I don't.
Dictatorship or voting. Pick one.
</rambling>
That's it for today ;-)
Magnus
I don't think we should use voting. Individuals should take
responsibility and simply carry out the proper action. If the
wishes or ideas of others should be taken into account, the
responsible person should find an ad hoc way of considering
them.
But no formal system of voting is immune to subversion by
determined anti-social forces, so I think we should stick with
"benevolent dictatorship" with Jimbo as wiki-Messiah and all of us
"heavenly citizens" as his loyal subjects.
If Mav, Eric, KQ, et al., make a decision, I trust it!
"Uncle Ed" Poor
P.S. I didn't list all the names, but the people whom I trust
know who they are ^_^)
My Wikipedia time is a little slim lately, and too much of it is getting
spent twiddling with pages on the English Wikipedia. I'm going to take a
break from it for a few days to work more on getting other languages set
up on the new software, and maybe getting some more articles written in
Esperanto and French.
I'll check in at least once a day to check for things that need fixing,
though...
-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
Jimbo wrote:
>4. And finally, there is a class of decisions that weighs heavily on
>me, namely decisions about banning. My pleasant demeanor may not
>reveal how much I agonize over these, in *both* directions. Some
>mornings I wake up in a mood to ban everyone. Other mornings I wake
>up in a mood that says that everyone can be saved. So I have to think
>and worry a lot about these. Despite the difficulty, though, I like
>doing it well enough for now. But someday I might be exhausted by it,
>and might prefer a more broad-based procedure.
This part of it is, to me, really a pain in the ass. Some people come
to wikipedia with the wrong idea; others come with the right idea but
the wrong delivery, and can be converted, others can't; a few get it
immediately and set about doing excellent work. An equally few get it
immediately and latch on like a tick. The trolls and the wackos are
tiresome; banning is imperfect; unending tolerance seems damaging both
to the content and the community; showing too little tolerance
preserves the content but changes both the project and the community.
I don't want wikipedia to become a tux-and-tails place, but I'd also
respect the decision to toss out the occasional layabout. In any
case, I don't see any solution. This is a problem for people smarter
& more experienced than I.
kq
wikikarma: [[san Marino]] pages
I have decided not to deal with Vera Cruz, ceding to he she or it any
article he she or it wants to work on, on the grounds that life is too
short to waste fighting him her or it and then literally losing sleep
over afterwards. He she or it is a pure troll, as anyone with eyes
can see.
Look at what he she or it has contributed to [[Talk:Isaac Asimov]],
dragging people into debates over pointless subjects, subtly shifting
ground from one tiny truism to another while everyone else fumes,
engaging in look-at-me-I'm-horrible ploys, and generally poisoning the
well. So I don't want to drink from it.
Her his its latest triumph is to drive the earnest but hapless 172
from the [[New Imperialism]] article, which I had quit in frustration
several weeks back. I only got into the article because I asked a
naive question as to why this imperialism was "new". After much back
and forth with 172, tiresome but ultimately productive, I managed to
get a paragraph into the article that clarified what was new, which
172 promoted to the lead for the whole article.
Now I find a note in my talk page (and Tannin's) from 172 begging me
to get back and save the [[New Imperialism]] article from Vera
Cruz. 172 and Slrubenstein and Tannin have spent a great deal of
effort turning political guff about imperialism (much of it from 172)
into an NPOV article on the topic while Vera has slouched on the
sidelines, periodically reverting the whole article, including totally
neutral typographical fixes, and generally doing what he she or it
does best, roiling, confusing, annoying, enraging.
As much as I wish the article was better I will *not* step back in to
it because I have no facility, other than logic and committment, for
dealing with trolls, and that has been proven not to work.
I'm not one for banning, but if Vera Cruz is Lir and Lir is banned,
then . . .
Tom Parmenter
Ortolan88
We used a voting scheme for KQ's project of country article
formats (porting from CIA fact book).
My tweak to Magnus's suggestion is to have one page per
issue:
[[Wikipedia:Decision for metric vs. Imperial units]]
[[Wikipedia:Decision for fan fiction policy]]
[[Wikipedia:Decision for banning that annoying Uncle Ed fellow]]
Recent Changes junkies will appreciate having each issue
on a separate page.
"Uncle Ed" Poor
