Geoff writes:
>I also think this system solves the POV problem
>by being APOV - the authorities' point of view -
>when the 'pedia _must_ take a point of view. The
>APOV is, after all, the only thing that matters
>when there are authorities with a POV, anyway.
Yes, but wikipedia does not strive for APOV; it
strives for NPOV. The more I hear about this, the
more I'm convinced that it is simply not a project for
wikipedia; that filtering content--or "sifting" it, if
you will--is a project for something else. Let's call
it "sifter," shall we?
You make some good points otherwise, especiallly about
wanting the 'pedia to be broadly available, but miss
the point that annotating articles with culturally
relative standards of e.g. "explicit" is POV. And,
just to get away from the sex examples (they're
becoming tedious), in a film I saw recently about
[[throat singing]], the people of a rural community
outside Mongolia killed a sheep by putting their hand
through a hole in the chest to stop its aorta. I
thought the footage graphic, if not nauseating, but
the people doing the ceremony were unbothered by it
and in fact considered it a great honor. I fail to
see how my opinion about the action is of any
consequence to wikipedia whatsoever; and I'd oppose
anyone's attempts to label the action according to
their moral or cultural standards--even if I share
them.
kq
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We're now up to the latest Wikipedia software version on the English
Wikipedia. Some changes I and others made in the last weeks:
1) There is a new feature called "oldest articles" (colloq. "ancient
pages"). Currently this inevitably lists first all the imported articles
from the phase I software that have not been edited yet ever since.
Hopefully, as these become updated, this feature will allow us to
systematically go through our old material and make sure it is in good
shape and up to date.
2) Sysops will note that the page deletion feature now auto-pastes the
content of pages that are smaller than 500 bytes into the deletion comment
(only the first 150 characters). It also does so if the current revision
is blanked and the previous revision contains text that can be pasted.
3) The deletion feature now indicates if you are about to delete a page
that has a history.
4) The "New pages" list now shows the bytesize of each page, making it
easier to pick nice, long articles for the Main Page.
5) Some minor layout stuff, some by me, some by others. Notably, the ugly
"It was last modified" sentence at the bottom of each page has been fixed.
Regards,
Erik
(long message - gist in paragraph below hyphens)
Christopher Mahan wrote:
>Perhaps not, in fact, because the majority of people in the world
>want an unbiased source, and almost everyone knows that education
>material is biased. Being banned from schools might actually be to
>the project's benefit.
Mff. I go to a school. I want Wikipedia there.
If educational material is biased, all the more reason for an NPOV
Wikipedia available from schools to independently verify the
story given to us from the textbooks. And [[There is no Cabal]]
of teachers intentionally giving us biased facts. I think I'm
missing your logic somehow - could you explain how it would
help the 'pedia if it were banned from schools?
Dante Alighieri wrote:
>Yes, if [[felching]] gets us banned from schools, that is a
>problem... for the schools. I don't really see it as a problem for
>us. The schools lose out on a source of information that, in my
>opinion, is unparalleled in its usefulness.
...
>I'm sorry, but if other people want to censor information from
>themselves and children in their charge, that's /their/ problem,
>not ours.
Thus I'd lose out on a source of information - and many other student
Wikipedians, I'm sure. Are we the students not considered part of
us the Wikipedians? (That sounds gramatically strange...is it right?)
If there's a sane way to help students - those whose present role
in society is to learn (note that Wikipedia's role is to teach) - we
should try to help the students rather than blame the bureaucrats.
--
Let me propose a content filtering system: a <filterable level=
"low","high">...</filterable> meta-tag. Unregistered users would
have level="high"-surrounded information removed - like an HTML
<!--comment-->. Registered users would see all information,
unless they set a User Prefs level of blocking (their choice).
Registered users at a school, or registered parents, could ask
an admin to block all <filterable>-marked content from their IP
address/range. Level="low", therefore, is only for additional
restrictions - user's own choice or IP range restriction - not
for anonymous users. The name "filterable" is chosen to be NPOV:
none doubt that [[genocide]] is filter/able/, that /some/ people
/might/ filter it. We can later decide to add a why= attribute,
with a few set categories and separate defaults/choices per why.
The reason we need a tag is for articles like [[Bill Clinton]]
and [[breast]] - parents/schools may want parts of those articles
blocked, but it's stupid to block the entire pages. Marking the
(in)appropriate sections with a tag would solve the problem.
If an entire article or significant portion of one is blocked,
we could print a message in place of the content, asking
users to log in/register to view restricted content or (if under
an IP restriction) log in/register and leave a message for
an admin, who will contact the person who originally requested
the block (to verify it should be removed). (Yes, even logged-in
users from a restricted IP address/range still wouldn't see
filterable content - parents won't want their kids creating
accounts to flout the ban.)
We can filter various amounts with this tag: single words
(maybe have an alt="replacement" attribute?), links to other
problematic articles/sites, sections, comments on talk pages,
or, of course, an entire article from top to bottom. Using
a separate database field would only allow the last situation.
I also think this system solves the POV problem by being APOV -
the authorities' point of view - when the 'pedia _must_ take a point
of view. The APOV is, after all, the only thing that matters when
there are authorities with a POV, anyway.
I know some will say there'll be edit wars over what might be
censorable, so we shouldn't implement this plan. By the same
argument one could much more easily say we shouldn't allow
capital letters for there _are_ edit wars on capitalization.
And content filtering seems to me a more important issue than
bird capitalization.
And sorry for the long message.
-Geoffrey Thomas [[User:Geoffrey]]
"The quickest bans in Wikipedia are reserved for those who do not maintain the neutral point of
view in times of great edit wars." ;-)
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Howdy all, I just wrote a new article, [[List of ethnic slurs]]. I've put a
redirect at [[List of racial epithets]]. Now, the list also includes terms
for people based on their religion, but I don't think that the article
title is that big a deal. Now, on to my request.
Because I've from the United States, the list is obviously heavily
populated with American English examples. I'm hoping that people from other
countries (especially non-English speaking ones) will stop by to add in
their own terms.
Just to clarify, I'm interested in this as a scholarly pursuit, although it
will probably be used for unsavory purposes by unsavory individuals. If you
could all take the time to go look and make whatever changes you think will
improve the article, I'd really appreciate it. Thanks in advance!
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ethnic_slurs
-----
Dante Alighieri
dalighieri(a)digitalgrapefruit.com
"The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their
neutrality in times of great moral crisis."
-Dante Alighieri, 1265-1321
KQ writes:
>> It's a lose/lose situation, as far as I can see:
>> re-establish a hierarchy of articles, or risk
>> "collateral damage" in filtering--and I expect that
>> collateral damage to include, for different
reasons,
>> [[breast]], [[Michael Jackson]], [[Kurt Cobain]],
>> [[Khmer Rouge]], and [[Robert Blake]].
Jimmy writes:
>What damage do you envision? Because I'm just not
> following you at all.
I'm going to need some time to think about ways to
express my points better, because I'm obviously not
doing so well with it right now.
kq
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In the last few minutes, 216.46.68.90 (no other history) has deleted several
pages (Leno, Letterman, etc.) "due to copyright violations". These articles
have been written, amended and re-written over long periods of time. Can
anyone make head or tail of the deletions?
KF
Stevertigo writes:
>I agree that there should be some standards here
>- but in a nutshell, I'd remind people not to
>trip too much. Once again, apologies for singling
>you out Kq for being unclear - my real point was
>that *everyone was being unclear.
I'm laughing but I wince--this proposed filtering is a
subject I care about a lot, and I've made an effort to
be both clear and concise. Apparently I need more
effort. :-) yet, I think the horse is dead and I
should cease to beat it. :-)
kq
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STV wrote: it does seem strange that you wrote two long-winded retorts
to her one short statement. (Sometimes, for reasons that escape me, the
posts come through out of order. Something to do with time zones or
individual system clock settings, I guess.)
Anyway, that's not so, STV. Read the posts over: you will see that I
wrote a single post of medium length this moning, which Zoe then
replied to saying that she had been " attacked so fiercely" - which is
odd, as I don't recall attacking Zoe at all. I suspect that an
examination of the record will bear this out. She then went on to claim
that I was engaging in "continuing personal attacks". Nonsense. I have
been forced to make a series of personal DEFENCES, which is a very
different thing. So I posted a brief reply to that, setting the record
straight.
Moving on to the subject of EC's unilaterial edit war and cut & paste
page move, having already called me a liar, EC then wrote: "I can
affirm that I did not use it [cut & paste] in the course of this edit
war".
I invite readers to visit
http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Giant_panda&diff=988572&oldi
d=988552 and see the evidence for themselves.
-------
Now, with that out of the way, I'll move on to add yet more citations
to those which I have given previously, let's start with this one:
The Society for the Study of Amphibians and Reptiles
The American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists
and The Herpetologists� League
have a joint commitee on English and scientific names, which is working
to "achieve the goal of making a list of Standard English Names for
North America and the world", adds some comments about the practical
worth of common names in a broader sense that are worthy of further
consideration. The para is lengthy, so I'll edit down a bit. As their
examples, they take ''Cynocephalus mormon'' and ''Cynocephalus
sphinx'' (the Mandril and the Guinea Baboon).
Since 1904, these names have undergone the following
vagaries:''Cynocephalus mormon'' became ''Papio mormon'', otherwise
''Papio maimon'', which turned to ''Papio sphinx''. This might well
have been confused with ''Cynocephalus'', now become ''Papio sphinx''
,had not the latter meanwhile been turned into ''Papio papio'' .This
danger averted, ''Papio sphinx'' now became ''Mandrillus sphinx'',
while ''Papio papio'' became ''Papio comatus''
Their point, in short, is that if you want to refer to one of these two
species and be sure that the reader knows which one you actually mean,
you really *have* to use the common name!
Oh, and they capitalise species names as a matter of policy.
The Ohio Odonata Society says: "English names have been determined for
Odonata, (Paulson and Dunkle 1996), and accepted by the Dragonfly
Society of the Americas (DSA) in an effort to bring some control to
common names, thus addressing the demand for common names that has
grown with interest in the order. Common names should be capitalized
when referring to a species, but lower case when speaking in general.
For example, we refer to dragonflies in general but to a King Skimmer
(genus Libellula) or the Common Green Darner, (Anax junius).
Capitalizing species names is desirable because many of them begin with
adjectives or adverbs. It is difficult to determine the name of the
common green darner (where �common� might be editorial comment) as
opposed to the Common Green Darner."
The Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales (Australia) says:
"Generic and specific scientific names are to be in italics.
Standardized vernacular (common) names for species should be
capitalised and first used in conjunction with the full scientific name
and the scientific name should be used for all subsequent references to
the species.When using the common name in conjunction with the
scientific name, do not put the scientific name in brackets. Both
common names and scientific names may be used in captions to tables,
figures and photos. Common names used in a �generic� sense (eg: cats,
dogs, foxes, eucalypts) should not be capitalised or italicised."
In the course of looking that stuff up (wasting yet more perfectly good
editing time) I also stumbled across a number of other references,
which serve to confirm the two broad trends that I and others have
remarked on previously:
(a) That decaptialisation is largely an American practice and is much
less common in other English-speaking parts of the world.
(b) More interestingly, that there seems to be an almost 1:1
relationship between the degree to which species names are capitalised
in different taxa, and the extent to which species names are formalised
and standardised.
This makes excellent sense, when you think about it. In the case of
birds, a common name is an exact 1:1 equivalent to the binomial name.
It is, like the name of a type of aircraft or a model of car, a
quasi-proper noun. Bird common names are not duplicated, even between
different continents, and capitalisation of bird common names is
practically universal. With mammals, the story is much the same. From
my reading today, I gather that reptile names are not far behind
either.
However, with fish this process is not as well developed. here are far
more conflicting or ambiguous names, and capitalisation is less broadly
supported - although nevertheless vigorously debated and something of a
50/50 call.
With arthropods (insects and spiders and so on), common names are not
terribly useful as yet (and may never be). According to the American
Arthropod society, more than 50% of the *families* do not have a common
name yet, never mind individual species. Here, clearly, we have a
situation where common names are little if any better than nicknames,
and a strong case for decapitalisation can be mounted.(They themselves
do not capitalise.)
Finally, there is flora. The common names of plants are a horrible
mess. Within any one geographic area they seem to be consistent enough,
certainly for the larger species (trees, shrubs, wildflowers), but
*between* areas they often conflict with one another. Australian plant
common names, for example, do not conflict with one another, but *do*
conflict with the names of other, completely different, plants in
Europe and America. Eventually, one supposes, the botanical authorities
will get their act together as the bird, mammal and reptile people
have, and as the fish people are trying to do. In the meantime, though,
plant common names are not terribly helpful a lot of the time. It is no
doubt this very reason that stands behind the much greater usage of
botanical names by laypeople interested in plants as opposed to very
little usage of binomial names by laypeople interested in animals.
Indeed, I am wondering if, as time goes by and the flora sections start
to fill up, it might be sensible to consider using botanical names for
plants more. (I'm not convinced that that is the best way to go, but
it's certainly something that ought to be considered.)
Tony
KQ writes:
>> I'm not being a wag; I'm being serious when I say
that
>> if Bill Clinton (and other articles) fit into one
>> category only, then we're recreating subpages.
Stevertigo writes:
>I think this is all off the point. We all in good
>faith understand what reasonable people could be
>objecting to - namely articles like teabagging,
>buttplugs, creampies, the list goes on...
Is it really so unclear what I'm saying? The idea of
what is "sexually explicit" has at various times
included piano legs, women's ankles, and Elvis
Presley's hips. In quite a few places on the planet,
it still includes women's ankles, and I'm sure it
would include Elvis Presley's hips as well. For an
example in the opposite direction, Robert Mapplethorpe
considered his work "erotic," yet many (many) people
consider it "pornographic." Should I point you to the
obscenity trials for James Joyce's _Ulysses_? Anyway,
tagging articles with commentary of that
sort--"sexually explicit," etc.--is the same as
imposing your cultural POV onto them; in other words,
it is the same as declaring the wikipedia a developed
nation's middle-class anglocentric-pedia. Exactly how
is that of benefit to us?
kq
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Has anyone talked to him about the inaccuracies? This may just be a
misunderstanding. At the least, someone should tell him that he has
added inaccuracies to his article, and then put the boiler from
[[Wikipedia:Accuracy dispute]] on his contributions. Tell him why we
are doing it, and give him a chance to correct his errors and become a
contributor. This is the process we should go through.
--
Michael Becker
-----Original Message-----
From: wikien-l-admin(a)wikipedia.org [mailto:wikien-l-admin@wikipedia.org]
On Behalf Of Stan Shebs
Sent: Tuesday, June 03, 2003 12.43
To: wikien-l(a)wikipedia.org
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] User:Harry Potter
I agree. It sows an atmosphere of distrust, which, going by the
pataphysics manifesto, is the goal. It's a waste of my time to research
things and add them to an article if the rest of the article is fiction
masquerading as fact; no reader is going to believe any of it.
[[Templars in England]] looks plausible for instance, but given Harry
Potter's other activities, how am I supposed to know if any of it is
true? Better to vaporize it and start over.
Stan