WikiEN-l August 2004

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100 participants
251 discussions

When can an article be considered public domain?
by Robert 13 Aug '04

13 Aug '04

I am writing an article on the [[Kabbalah Center]], the for-profit religious group led by former insurance agent Feivel Gruberger, who now claims to be "Rabbi Philip Berg". There is a lengthy and carefully referenced article about him and his work called ''The Truth about the Kabbalah Centre'' which I got a photocopy of. It was published by the ''Task Force on Cults and Missionaries'', Los Angeles, CA in 1995. The references and facts stated therein match the claims in other articles, from newspapers. (Berg and hs group have been investiagted by journalists from the US and Israel; he is accused of running a cult and brainwashing some of his disciples, as well as scamming them out of large amounst of money, and endangering their health.) A few years ago I wrote an article for a local newspaper on this issue, and tried to get permission to print the article from the ''Task Force on Cults and Missionaries''. Despite letters and phone calls, I was unable to track down anyone who held copyright to it; the people who sent me the article from LA told me that I was free to publish the entire article, or parts therein, and that they could not provide me with copyright information or the name of the author. They allow others to post the entire article on their website, notably Rick Ross, an anti-cult educator. I suspect that the author or authors of this article want to avoid being sued, and wish that this material be distributed. I notice that our article on [[Public domain]] states that "A copyright holder can explicitly disclaim any proprietary interest in the work, effectively granting it to the public domain, by providing a licence to this effect. A suitable licence will grant permission for all of the acts which are restricted by copyright law." What about cases when we can no longer track down the copyright holder, or they wish not to be found, and encourage distribution of their work? At what point can we reasonably presume that such work enters the public domain? Robert (RK) __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - 100MB free storage! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail

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RE: Mintguy is an ad-hominem, British Upper Class POV revert war monger
by Kenneth Alan 13 Aug '04

13 Aug '04

There was no justification for such a fluke. It is merely my fault for announcing that I was who I was when I came back. People didn't notice otherwise, but proceeded to blacklist me for announcing myself as a former user who had an imperfect start with my first account. Just goes to show you that Frankenstein mobs inhabit Wikipedia. The village people have risen to slay the demon. Nice take you have of that Heph, when I didn't continue the things that got me into trouble. People began to justify every negative against me based upon my long ago past. What was that, Summer of 2003? Such obsession is only disgracious to Wikipedia. Wikipedia is no place for grudges, if you've got those type of soap opera disorders you ought to be watching As The World Turns or something on Lifetime. Sorry, that's not what I came to Wikipedia for, but that's so common it's hard not to notice or become involved somehow. Just ask user Jw, he used to stalk me and revert everything I posted. Then Decumanus set up a hate page for burning me at the stake. Mats Halldin flipped out in every circumstance of me being present for my editing, even if I just asked a question. I blatently flamed Fedor with a insult and so I must take responsibility for that. If he'd listen without demanding my banning, I would apologise. I just stopped giving a shit when people weren't opening their minds and attacked me so I just got caught in the drama people brought to me and went right at them back. I am glad that such people as Martijn Faassen, OlofE and Wiglaf have been so patient and polite, yet such an experience here at Wikipedia seems to be hard to come by. It's not my fault that you want to inflict your hatred of my contributions by banning me. That's an internal dispute that is being projected onto others. I find it hard to blame others for my discomfort in their opinions except when they attack me personally by auto-reverting everything or calling me a troll, especially without a formulated, rational reason when requested politely for one. > > From: John Robinson <john(a)freeq.com> > Date: 2004/08/13 Fri AM 10:46:10 EDT > To: coxcustomer3(a)cox.net, English Wikipedia <wikien-l(a)Wikipedia.org> > Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] RE: Mintguy is an ad-hominem, British Upper Class > POV revert war monger > > >I don't appreciate falsifications that justify social institutions > >which people like Mintguy adhere to. > > You have a lot of gall coming onto the list spouting about how > "abused" you think you are. You should have been banned months ago. > > -Hephaestos >

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Letting a group speak for itself
by Robert 13 Aug '04

13 Aug '04

Christiaan writes: > Well no. Maybe they're right, who really knows? > It's a point of view. Maybe he does want to kill all > Muslims (Bush doesn't necessarily let on what he > actually thinks) and maybe he does "deserve" to die. > They're all point of views, and that you think such > people who think such things are "wrong" is another > point of view. > Jayjg may not be an angel to work with but to > productively collaborate on a Wikipedia article an > understanding of the above is crucial it seems to me. I'm glad that we agree with each other, but JayJg does not seem to agree with this (at least not in practice). You offer a crucial point: There is a difference between what a person says (e.g. George Bush) and what critics of that person claims they really believe (e.g. certain Muslim groups.) We must accurately describe what George W. Bush and the White House present as their policy. We must also accurately describe the POV of critics of the Bush White House. If someone wants, we even can present the POV of extremist groups that hate Bush and wish that he would be killed. (But to be fair, we would also have to note that such groups are not mainstream and are considered violent.) But we must never present the view of Muslim terrorist groups AS IF they were the views of George W. Bush! That is intellectually dishonest. The same is true for describing the beliefs and teachings of religious groups, like Conservative Judaism, Reform Judaism, the Catholic Church, etc. We must never present the view of their most angry critics AS IF they were the views of the group itself! That is intellectually dishonest Robert (RK) __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - Send 10MB messages! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail

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Re: [WikiEN-l] RE: Mintguy is an ad-hominem, British Upper Class POV revert war monger
by Kenneth Alan 13 Aug '04

13 Aug '04

I don't appreciate falsifications that justify social institutions which people like Mintguy adhere to. The nature of his interests and the form of his edits and attacks against me happen to reflect class basis. He has closeminded attitude to seeing anything which is not canon in his perceptions by the education he had in school. Mature contributers look beyond traditional, child-geared teachings to find more than the simple lullaby story. He has no understanding of how to expound upon articles to really bring their nature to light. All is dry and dreary, a lacklustre approach that signifies lack of creative inspiration for presentation. I believe that he is locked in his own willfull ignorance of more than the dogmatic simple take, always used and always believed. It is types like him that prevent needed changes in education from reflecting the real truth, instead of the one that justifies his quaint fantasy. Painting realities is what upper class snobs like him do to prevent others from seeing through them and their motives for trading truth for money for political advantage. I do not merely uphold the establishment's needs for preserving their perfect story on matters. I reveal the depth of things uncovered which are normally the stuff of what is taboo to speak of. My revelations found in the texts I read are never merely my opinion, they reflect often a side that has merit and is stomped by the bully. Voting for truth isn't realistic, but that is exactly how people like him resolve their insecurities with handling the flaws of power and propaganda. I am not satisfied with simply regurgitating the winning side of every debate, when that winning side had certain incentives to choose the main reality to focus on. I do not respond kindly to boxed-minded and living people who insist that others must comply. When the big picture is understood, this gives people a choice to decide for themselves just where their loyalties lie to the wording. I will not condone sheltering people from more knowledge than others want them to know when it affects us all who art involved. No matter the fact that he has a British style and I American, there is fault in his approach to dealing with me in his prejudices and abuse of power, that he used absolutely. I may be seen as living in my box and insisting that others comply, but that doesn't give Mintguy merit to break the rules he himself is supposed to uphold. He is given privileges in return for adhering the rules, not willfully breaking them. He confessed that he knows not what steps to take in regards to my banning that he did of me without counsel and approval. Follow our user contributions to see that Mintguy banned me for what is an unpopular opinion in his eye. He is irresponsible for doing so, when that breaks the rules of his station.

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Re: [WikiEN-l] Image use (was "the document vs. everything vs. the text")
by Jens Ropers 13 Aug '04

13 Aug '04

CB low > Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2004 07:08:12 -0700 > From: "Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales" <jwales(a)wikia.com> > > Jens Ropers wrote: >> IMHO we would severely hamstring ourselves if we didn't allow this. > > I don't think so. There might be some extreme cases in which we might > desperately need something that is unavailable under a free license > and also unavailable under a conservative interpretation of 'fair > use/fair dealing', but it is very hard to think of examples. > > One very big issue is that if we permit ourselves to use content > under a proprietary license, we do two very bad things: > > 1. We dilute our standing as a shining example of what freedom can > bring. We lose the ability to speak publicly and say: "Look, the > claim that proprietary copyright is necessary for the production of > quality content is not true; we have proven it." Instead, we have to > point to our work and say "Well, some of it is free, but some of it is > proprietary, and we really needed the proprietary stuff to make it > work." > > 2. We remove the incentive for free alternatives to develop. Imagine > if I went to a major stock photo house and obtained, as a charitable > contribution, licenses for wikipedia-only use of photos of major > landmarks around the world. Then why should anyone bother to go out > and take a photo of the Leaning Tower of Pisa with Wikipedia in mind? > >> There are some very important images out there that /should/ be >> included in the Wikipedia -- and we may just (given our "limited" >> legal >> resources) be unable to ever get them under "free" licenses. > > I concede that there may well be *a few* rare cases where this is > absolutely necessary for scholarly integrity. We should make careful > judgments about those exceptions, on a case-by-case basis. > > What we should *not* do is get lax about using non-free content as a > crutch because it is easier or more convenient. > > --Jimbo I can actually see where you're coming from and I would even largely agree. However, with respect to the [[Image:TrangBang.jpg]] I emailed AP about -- are you ok/is there agreement that this would be one of the "few rare cases"? I would strongly plead that it is. My email was this: > From: ropers(a)ropersonline.com > Subject: electronic reproduction permission request -- Nick Ut's > "naked girl running from napalm attack" photograph of Kim Phuc Phan > Thi > Date: 8 August 2004 16:25:15 GMT+02:00 > To: apdigital(a)ap.org (content omitted here) I previously cc'd this mailing list on that email. Thanks and regards, - Jens [[User:Ropers|Ropers]]

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Re: domain donation, cybersquatter, our copyright
by Jens Ropers 13 Aug '04

13 Aug '04

CB low > Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2004 06:55:36 -0700 > From: "Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales" <jwales(a)wikia.com> > Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Re: domain donation, cybersquatter, our > copyright > To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l(a)Wikipedia.org> > > The nice thing about "particularly bad serial cybersquatters" is that > they tend to offer reasonable prices. Once upon I time, I foolishly > allowed bomis.net and bomis.org to expire and they were promptly > squatted. I was horrified at what it might cost to get them back, but > it turned out to be quite reasonable, given the fact that it was > completely tragic in the first place, of course. > > If this person is a professional, he's going to be smart and know that > this isn't worth *that much* money to us. He'll charge us a small > nuisance amount, like double what he paid, and that'll be that. Okay, that's possible. Couple of points: (a) I made a strong case on http://www.ropersonline.com/Area_51/wikipaedia.html (user: guest, passwd: 1ns4nI+y) that we should own and control /all/ the major wikipAEdia domains (in addition to the wikipEdia ones). Do you agree? Is there consensus on that? (b) Are we /willing/ to pay for the wikipaedia.com, .org and .de domains, considering that we are pretty much guaranteed to get the .com .org ones by the ICANN UDRP and also rather likely to get the .de domain through the German legal system? POVs on this may include considerations of principle vs. convenience -- as well as, in the .de case, legal costs. (c) Once we have a clear decision established on (a) and (b), can we get down to business? I happen to know German and might be able to help, if suitably "authorized and ordained" ;-) (d) Speaking of getting down to business -- and keeping (a) in mind -- are people willing to accept my donation of the wikipaedia.net domain? The domain name registrar I used is http://www.ev1servers.net/english/index.asp and I could create a profile of, say, jimmywales (or whoever holds the keys to the kingdom), move the domain to that profile and email you (Jimmy) the password. No cost would incur (until and unless you renewed the domain or moved it to Register.com, who AFAICT are your registrar for wikipedia.org). I would be happy to do that now if you're ready. I'd prefer though, if you gave me a public key of yours (PGP or whatever). Safer is safer. (e) Also, again assuming you're happy to accept wikipAEdia.net, I suggested doing the applicable DNS changes in my last email, and to point wikipaedia.net at the respective applicable DNS boxen, to actually get it to work. Any word on that? Who actually looks after the Wikipedia associated DNS servers? (Of course, once (d) is done, you no longer need me for this and can DIY ;-) Thanks, and looking forward to your replies :-) - Jens [[User:Ropers|Ropers]] > Angela_ wrote: > >> (moving thread from wikien-l to foundation-l. Please reply there) >> >> Jens Ropers wrote: >> >>> 1. I am seeking to donate the wikipaedia.net domain name (which I >>> have >>> registered) to the Wikipedia Foundation. >> >> Thank you for offering us this. My only concern is that confusion >> could arise if we own wikipaedia.net but not the other wikipaedia >> domains. If we don't own any of them, it's more obvious that >> wikipaedia is nothing to do with us. >> >>> 2. A particularly bad serial cybersquatter is controlling >>> wikipaedia.org, wikipaedia.com and wikipaedia.de. We really should >>> get >>> these domains off him (and would be able to do so). >> >> I asked in the German IRC channel about this. Maybe I'm assuming too >> much good faith, but I think we ought to approach that site owner in a >> friendly way at first before we get too heavy handed. Sansculotte is >> going to take this to the VereinDE-l mailing list and discuss it >> there. Hopefully someone who speaks German can contact the site about >> this. We might well get no reply, but at least we can say we tried >> before taking this any further. It is worth noting that Akl was >> successful in getting the wikipedia.ch and wikipedia.at domains back, >> so perhaps this can be successful too. >> >> Angela. >> _______________________________________________ >> WikiEN-l mailing list >> WikiEN-l(a)Wikipedia.org >> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l >>

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Soft-pedal the personal remarks
by Poor, Edmund W 13 Aug '04

13 Aug '04

Two recent posts to this list have complained about other contributors, including even some name-calling. Surely we are all mature adults here, and can discuss issues of how to write good articles -- without such comments as: * stuffy, toffee-nosed, Upper Class, British * responded with ad homenin comments to me on this list * made an unfortunate comment on my user page Please allow me suggest that we all confine our remarks to discussion of the articles themselves, and to specific additions or deletions to them. And leave personalities out of it. The reason for this is that when you depart from the articles and veer into discussing the writers, a lot of them "take it personally" and feel "attacked". Then they start defending themeselves or even counter-attacking, and we lose the focus of the thread: which should be on how we can improve this encyclopedia. Ed Poor Not the Moderator, but... The English Mailing List Administrator

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RE: Mintguy is an ad-hominem, British Upper Class POV revert war monger
by Kenneth Alan 13 Aug '04

13 Aug '04

Just because I've had some editing flaws in the past, doesn't permit somebody to abuse their privileges and ban somebody for their opinions. That is expressly forbidden at Wikipedia. Not that I have a problem with British people, it's that I have a problem with POV spins in favour of merely the Upper Class propaganda. Wikipedia is not for such things as Wikipedia is not a place for establishing social heirarchy as a reason for what edits to favour.

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Mintguy is an ad-hominem, British Upper Class POV revert war monger
by coxcustomer3＠cox.net 13 Aug '04

13 Aug '04

I can't ever get a word in without him getting on my case. Mintguy has this stuffy, toffee-nosed, Upper Class, British POV, Canonical Fascism about every article and doesn't allow for American contributions on British and British related topics by me, although it was beginning to spill into other articles including American that I contributed to in his quest to stamp me out and erase my efforts to Wikipedia. He vandalised my User Talk Page and banned my IP address in the midst of a revert war in which he facilitated a prejudicial and ad hominem, mass revert spree towards my contributions without excuse by any discussion, despite my message to him on his talk page for a reason of his and a warning against such behaviours. - Kenneth Alan

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Re: Mintguy is an ad-hominem, British Upper Class POV revert war monger
by Kenneth Alan 13 Aug '04

13 Aug '04

Sorry about the long line of writing. I thought the wrap-around features work at the mailing list. I hope this one comes out right. > > From: <coxcustomer3(a)cox.net> > Date: 2004/08/13 Fri AM 05:37:51 EDT > To: <wikien-l(a)Wikipedia.org> > Subject: Mintguy is an ad-hominem, British Upper Class POV revert war monger > > I can't ever get a word in without him getting on my case. Mintguy has this stuffy, toffee-nosed, Upper Class, British POV, Canonical Fascism about every article and doesn't allow for American contributions on British and British related topics by me, although it was beginning to spill into other articles including American that I contributed to in his quest to stamp me out and erase my efforts to Wikipedia. He vandalised my User Talk Page and banned my IP address in the midst of a revert war in which he facilitated a prejudicial and ad hominem, mass revert spree towards my contributions without excuse by any discussion, despite my message to him on his talk page for a reason of his and a warning against such behaviours. - Kenneth Alan >

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WikiEN-l August 2004