- Yes, this is a rant, but please bear with me... it becomes less rant-like
;)
See also the recent thread "Dartmouth follies".
Votes for deletion have gone through the roof. At the start of August, the
average number of pages voted for deletion per day was two. Now it is
somewhere between 25 and 30, and I see no reason to expect this to stop
increasing.
Most of the articles are listed there for the wrong reasons. For instance,
someone sees a badly written article - they list it on vfd. This page is
useless without major expansion - vfd. A topic I've never heard of, and
think is obscure - vfd.
Articles are often voted for with little or no reason. Here's an example:
"Simply not notable enough, I'm afraid."
So what? As an example, one page being VfDed at the moment is about a club
established in 1888, with many thousands of members (don't look for it, this
is just an example). Why should the votes of 7 deletionists matter more than
the thousands of people who may potentially look up the article? For that
matter, why should the votes of even 100 Wikipedians matter, if the article
is likely to be looked up by many people?
The inherent bias of this page towards deletionism has been previously
discussed on this list.
It's pretty clear that VfD is going beyond it's original purpose, is wasting
a lot of time for no good reason, and in many cases conflicts with other
principles of Wikipedia. For instance, stubs are being deleted just because
they are stubs, even though they are very expandable.
I think it is clear that we need some tighter guidelines on reasons why
something should be voted for deletion. I've originated a policy,
Wikipedia:Importance (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Importance),
which attempts to establish some, and isn't doomed to failure like the
previous http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Fame_and_importance.
Feel free to disagree with me, comment (*not* vote) and propose changes etc.
at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia talk:Importance.
I'm not so much trying to push my personal viewpoint here, as trying to
establish consensus and stop people wasting their time. If the community
decides "no articles about obscure topics", that's fine, but let's make that
policy and not argue about it in a hundred different places over and over
again. Let's not waste people's time by encouraging them to start articles
on the one hand, and on the other deleting them because some other people
think they're not important. Let's establish some common ground, and stop
driving people away.
--
Chris Wood
I'm posting not to any particular thread, but separately, with a plea
to everyone on this list to remember that we are all on the same side,
that we should approach each other with love and respect and
understand that on many issues, there are multiple perspectives that
*even when we don't agree with them* are at least grounded in values
that we share to such a degree that we can respect our colleagues.
It pains me to see good people getting too heated, because such heat
tends to cause people to dig in their heels and get in the way of good
mutual consensus building.
Please, be kind to each other.
--Jimbo
--
"La nèfle est un fru.t" - first words of 50,000th article on fr.wikipedia.org
This is a mini-essay on a current problem in MediaWikiland, category policy.
It's also avaiable at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Gracefool/What_is_a_category, but I'd
rather have it discussed here first.
'''N.B.''' I'm aware of previous discussions at [[Wikipedia
talk:Categorization]]. This essay is a more thorough and defensible
treatment of the issue, and it highlights the fallacies of many previous
arguments.
==Introduction==
What ''is'' a category? No-one knows. There isn't consensus on what a
category is (see [[Wikipedia talk:Categorization]]). Is it a hierarchical
tree, with all categorizations representing "[[is a]]" relationships? Or is
it just a set, a group of related articles?
This is an important question - just look at [[Wikipedia:Categories for
deletion]]. Changes to categories have more widespread effects than changes
to articles, and have a greater possibly of annoying editors.
I believe that categories are, and should be, sets, not hierarchies:
==Categories are sets==
===Original purpose of categories===
What was the original purpose of the categorization system? Development of a
taxonomy of worldy knowledge? I don't think the developers are really that
stupid (I'll expand on this below). AFAIK it was as a kind of automatic
list-generator for related articles. Lists are sets, not hierarchies. Lists
of "related articles" are sets, not hierarchies.
===Current software===
The way that categories have been developed in software supports the idea
that categories are sets. There is implicit support for categories as sets
because there is nothing to stop anyone from using them that way. None of
the limits of a hierarchical system exist in the category software. Such
software is the best way to enforce the idea of hierarchical categories, and
would be easy to implement (eg. don't allow arbitrary parenting of
categories).
Until policy is decided on (and, preferably, software upgraded to support
it), categories will continue to be used as sets. Since sets include
hierarchies, while hierarchies don't include sets, the current
categorization system is one of sets.
==Categories should be sets==
===Categories are inherently POV===
A categorization system is a worldview. Therefore it is very hard for
categories to be [[WP:NPOV|NPOV]]. The following quote from
[http://www.shirky.com/writings/semantic_syllogism.html#worldviews_differ_fo
r_good_reasons Clay Shirky] expands:
<quote>:Many networked projects, including things like business-to-business
markets and Web Services, have started with the unobjectionable hypothesis
that communication would be easier if everyone described things the same
way. From there, it is a short but fatal leap to conclude that a particular
brand of unifying description will therefore be broadly and swiftly adopted
(the "this will work because it would be good if it did" fallacy.)
:Any attempt at a global ontology is doomed to fail, because meta-data
describes a worldview. The designers of the Soviet library's cataloging
system were making an assertion about the world when they made the first
category of books "Works of the classical authors of Marxism-Leninism."
Melvyl Dewey was making an assertion about the world when he lumped all
books about non-Christian religions into a single category, listed last
among books about religion. It is not possible to neatly map these two
systems onto one another, or onto other classification schemes -- they
describe different kinds of worlds.
:Because meta-data describes a worldview, incompatibility is an inevitable
by-product of vigorous argument. It would be relatively easy, for example,
to encode a description of genes in XML, but it would be impossible to get a
universal standard for such a description, because biologists are still
arguing about what a gene actually is. There are several competing standards
for describing genetic information, and the semantic divergence is an
artifact of a real conversation among biologists. You can't get a standard
til you have an agreement, and you can't force an agreement to exist where
none actually does.
:Furthermore, when we see attempts to enforce semantics on human situations,
it ends up debasing the semantics, rather then making the connection more
informative. Social networking services like Friendster and LinkedIn assume
that people will treat links to one another as external signals of deep
association, so that the social mesh as represented by the software will be
an accurate model of the real world. In fact, the concept of friend, or even
the type and depth of connection required to say you know someone, is quite
slippery, and as a result, links between people on Friendster have been
drained of much of their intended meaning. Trying to express implicit and
fuzzy relationships in ways that are explicit and sharp doesn't clarify the
meaning, it destroys it.</quote>
The whole concept of an all-encompassing hierarchical category system is
against the spirit of Wikipedia. It is an all-encompassing worldview, or
attribution of value, to the marked-up (categorized) articles.
The "categories are hierarchies" idea presumes that it is even possible for
a large group of people to agree on an all-encompassing belief-system, a
ridiculous notion totally bereft of realism, a notion that has been shown
wrong experientially in many IT metadata projects.
Categories, especially hierarchical categories, are about the followers of
one particular worldview implicitly saying "our way is right, everyone
should follow it". Note that the proportion of people who follow one
particular worldview in every aspect is very small.
===Sets are much less POV===
Categorization by set is obviously less POV. An article can belong to as
many sets as the community thinks it should belong to, whether directly or
via multiple parenthood of the article's category (or ancestors).
==Conclusion==
The benefits of hierarchical categorization
#decreased redundancy
#easier navigation (for a minority who have the "right" worldview)
are outweighed by its costs
#the community will never be in agreement over the system
#harder navigation (for the majority who don't find articles where they
expect them to be)
#decreased accuracy (the real world is not in a big hierarchy, it merely has
sets of metadata applied to it by different people)
--
Chris Wood
The problem with articles like "Violence against Israelis" is not so
much that the material they contain is false, but that the topic of
the articles is unfixably POV. People like Lance6Wins and
MathKnight who devote many hours to maintaining these lists
do not do it out of a desire to make Wikipedia a fine encyclopedia.
They are on a political mission, and do not consider that the NPOV
rule is relevant to them.
If these people were well-motivated, they would also be including
violence against Palestinians as well. Try to find the following in
Wikipedia, for example (I went to the web site of the Israeli
human-rights organization B'Tselem and entered a random month):
8 February 2003
Mustafa Ibrahim Abu 'Adwan, age 10, died of wounds inflicted by IDF
gunfire in Khan Younis, in the south of The Gaza Strip, on 7 February,
2003. Did not participate in fighting
11 February 2003
Hassan al-Ghoul, age 8, from Qalqiliya, killed by IDF gunfire shot in
response to stones and molotov cocktails thrown at soldiers, in
Qalqiliya,
The West Bank. Did not participate in fighting
And so on for a total of 11 children killed by Israeli forces in April
2003.
The list of adults killed, including both combatants and
non-combatants,
is much longer. April 2003 was not an unusual month.
The reason these are not listed in Wikipedia is that there is nobody
with
the dedication and time to match the efforts of Lance6Wins and
MathKnight.
(Actually, such a person or persons would need several times as much
dedication because several times as many Palestinians are killed as
Israelis.)
Would we want such a competition between lists anyway? From experience
we know that articles like this cannot be deleted. My preferred
solution
would be to kick out the political fanatics, and good riddance, but it
won't
happen. The problem in fact will not be solved and this open sore will
remain. Sorry to bring bad news.
Zero.
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
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On 3 Sep 2004, at 19:08, wikien-l-request(a)Wikipedia.org wrote:
> Message: 6
> Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 23:11:37 -0700 (PDT)
> From: Geoff Burling <llywrch(a)agora.rdrop.com>
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] So write an article about it (was: Anent
> Dartmouth, Again)
>
> On Thu, 2 Sep 2004, Christiaan Briggs wrote:
>
>> Well, its good advice, but my point wasn't to tell you all why I think
>> the West falls short of its rhetoric. My point was simply to make
>> people aware that at least some of us find comments such as Geoff's
>> ethnocentric and offensive. People can take from that what they like;
>> that an intense discussion ensued is not surprising but it wasn't my
>> aim.
Geoff Burling wrote:
> If that was your intent, then you failed miserably, Christiaan. All
> that
> your emails communicated to me was that you have a poor opinion about
> Western Civilization, & have expressed it so vehemently &
> uncompromisingly
> that I don't see any point in responding to what you have to say. Or
> even
> reading it.
Hi Geoff,
First of all, it's good to hear from you! After the email dispute that
developed following your closing remarks to this email
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2004-August/030035.html
I was unsure whether you had left the list, because you fell silent at
a certain point. It's good to still have you around and despite our
differences, I would like to say that I value your input and I believe
it's a good idea to have discussions about our differences. So lemme
discuss, shall I?
As I've already hinted at in this email
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2004-August/030167.html
I don't necessarily endorse Christiaan's way to communicate his
convictions and feelings. However--and without trying to be a back
seat-driver--I think not reading Christiaan's email is a Very Bad
Thing. The moment we stop listening to what our opponents have to say
is the moment we start heading down the slippery slope of ignorance and
negligence. If I was Karl Rove, I'd make darn sure to watch Fahrenheit
9/11 the first day it comes out. If I was Michael Moore, I'd make darn
sure to go to the Republican convention (I think both did do just that,
though I don't have proof positive in Rove's case).
> If you go back & read what I wrote, you will see that I showed an
> awareness
> that not everyone might agree with me. And I attempted to express
> myself
> in a way that any reasonable person would not find offensive
Well, I consider myself a reasonable person and, ok, I do not
personally find your remarks acutely offensive, but I do find them very
worthy of criticism and I find them ''potentially'' offensive--I am
absolutely convinced that there are people out there who (IMHO not
without reason) will find such remarks acutely offensive.
> -- or at least
> not say things like "Who the hell do you think you are?"
Seeing his reaction, I think Christiaan might be one of them.
> And then when I read your stated belief that:
>
>> I never argued that these people died and suffered
>> _because_ of these ideals. My argument is that our culture has
>> extensively used and abused such ideals simply to make its membership
>> feel good about itself when collectively implementing the opposite
>> (imperialism, intolerance of other economic models, war, etc.)
>
> I'm left with an unclear sense how you want us to react. If these
> ideals
> are nothing more than opiates to distract us from the fact we members
> of
> Western Civilization are wreaking evil upon the rest of the world, then
> should we dispense with our collective denial & destroy every trace of
> our culture & kill ourselves in hope that will cleanse the earth of our
> crimes? Or should we simply all accept that we are little better than
> thugs & Storm Troopers, & instead take pride in how we oppress &
> exploit
> other peoples & nations?
Moot point (of ridicule) -- it's obvious that neither of your
rhetorical options are sensible. Neither collective civilizatory
suicide nor voluntary perpetuation of civilizatory terrorism are gonna
be helpful -- not even to ourselves. Modesty however would be a good
start. [[Aldous Huxley]] once wrote:
>> Chronic remorse, as all the moralists are agreed, is a most
>> undesirable sentiment. If you have behaved badly, repent, make what
>> amends you can and address yourself to the task of behaving better
>> next time. On no account brood over your wrong-doing. Rolling in the
>> muck is not the best way of getting clean.
If I read Huxley right, then that's a plain indictment of the not
infrequent notion of wallowing in guilt. It also is a roadmap: 1st --
Repent (honestly). 2nd -- Make what amends you can (no more, no less).
3rd -- After (1) and (2) are completed, try to mend.
Let me openly admit at this point that I used to be one of the
guilt-wallowers. Speaking only for myself: It felt good wallowing in
guilt. Because in doing so I implicitly exhibited: "Look, '''I''' am
ashamed of my group." In being that I could internally and externally
distance myself from the group and consider myself kind of ''exempt''
from the evil I loudly denounced.
In hindsight, I can say that as a "guilt-wallower" I was just as daft
as a "cultural imperialist by default and ignorance":
The ''ignorant imperialist'' doesn't want to know about things that may
be wrong about his group, so he doesn't have to feel bad about himself.
The ''guilt-wallower'' relentlessly exhibits the wrongdoings of his
group at every possible time, opportunity or no, in order to exempt
himself, the "enlightened critic", from any- and everything that has
gone wrong in connection with his group, so he doesn't have to feel bad
about himself.
The only sensible way of course is to do as Huxley proposed, and in the
order Huxley proposed and not to address any step halfheartedly. Yes,
the road is painful, but it leads to a better place.
> I am not being ironic here: your view of Western Civilization is so
> condemning & so extreme that I find nothing I can discuss about it
> with you.
> And frankly, from what I've read that you have written, I don't feel
> that
> you will be happy on Wikipedia because there are many people
> contributing
> to Wikipedia who will be praising the ideals, products, & other results
> of Western Civilization far more fulsomely -- & most likely more
> fluently --
> than I will ever do.
This section actually reminded me of SCO -- because what you say there
is wrong in so many ways:
1.) To call somebody's POV "extreme" is a hollow attack. It's a
non-argument, lacking merit, logic and--worst of all--content. It's
"full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." I could call your POV
"extreme", you could call mine "extreme" or Christiaan's (as you have
done). But what's the point? The label "extreme" only makes sense
against a reference frame -- and especially when it comes to not
infrequently held political POVs, the "extreme" label, while frequently
abused in seeking to ostracize the opposing speaker, ultimately rings
hollow.
2.) I put it to you that your refusal to discuss Christiaan's POV has
far greater potential to alienate yourself from the Wikipedia community
(and it from you) than any supposed "extremeness" of his stance.
3.) I further am slightly shocked that--after all these emails--you
still write as if you hadn't noted what some people--myself
included--found so objectionable about your aforementioned email
closing remarks. Maybe I'm misreading you, but to me you seem to
implicitly again identify "willing[ness] to engage in a conversation
about [one's] contributions" and similar ideals to be "Western"
achievements. They're not. I thought at least with this email:
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2004-August/030140.html
I had made clear my point that we as "Westerners" hold no monopoly on
any of such ideals. I wrote that "we're HARDLY the sole inventors or
champions of these ideals". I mean it. It is simply unwise to
unconcernedly and unqualifiedly repeat a point that some people
strongly object to -- especially after you have already made it and
after you already have found yourself challenged over it. I somehow
don't think you intent was malicious, but I must say: Usually, if a
person does such, it's to ram their view down the opposition's throats
or to pick a fight. Surely you cannot be hellbent on either of the two?
4.) Telling someone of an opposing POV that you "don't feel [he] will
be happy" participating in a project which neither he nor you own is,
again, a non-argument: What are you trying to tell that person? "Go
away, for people won't like your ilk over here"? Or "I represent a
majority and you don't, so please leave"? Especially in case you are
right (which you quite possibly are) and the Wikipedia /is/ slated and
biased into your direction, then isn't that all the more reason for
seeking to actively include and retain contributors who differ?
> And as a last point, find another word than "ethnocentric" to apply to
> what I have asserted. The word "ethnocentric" means to "hold one's race
> as superior to all others" -- & I feel your use of this word accuses me
> of being racist. That I am clearly not, & except for throwing this word
> about, you have failed to show that I am so -- unless somehow by my
> definition of "Western Civilization" you believe that I have excluded
> non-Caucasian members of this culture such as Asian Americans, Black
> British, French of North African origin, & countless more groups I
> could
> recount. And one could only believe that by abusively misinterpreting
> what I have written.
>
> Geoff
If you really mean what you said in your said email closing remark,
then IMHO you unfortunately will have to live with some people accusing
you of racism: If you really persist in claiming that "tolerance,
pluralism, & unfettered speech" was an /exclusively/ "Western"
invention (warranting us to be missionaristic, of all things!), then
you simply will face such accusations, sooner or later. While you have
a valid point saying that many ethnically diverse groups are now
integral parts of "Western" society, the balance of power with regards
to "Caucasian" and other "races" is a point of an ongoing argument and
historically in particular there have been huge racial injustices
perpetrated and perpetuated within and by various wider "Western"
communities. It is thus not without base to closely identify "Western
civilization" with the "Caucasian race". Thus, unduly proclaiming
"Western civilization" to have a historical and ongoing monopoly on the
said ideals can very well be seen, by some, to smack of racism. Let me
be clear: neither I nor, I believe, others on this list did call you
racist, and I am not calling you thus now either. However: If it's
hurtful to see yourself getting uncomfortably close to such labels,
then maybe it's time to reexamine your position.
Let me add:
You wrote in this email
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2004-August/030105.html
that you were "unaware of any serious argument that this tradition of
thought was introduced from Africa, India, or China". That's a huge
fallacy. Our ignorance of other cultures does not entitle us to
monopolize nobler human achievements as exclusively our own. This is
not patent law where you can stake a claim, however frivolous, and have
it granted purely on the basis that proof of prior art/competing claims
are not produced by persons of limited knowledge within a limited
jurisdiction and timeframe.
As your own choice of words in your initial email shows, you are well
aware that portraying these noble ideals as the sole invention of the
West, is sub-par: You wrote "soapbox". You wrote "chauvinist". After
having given the reader of your email such clear indication that you
are well aware of the rather widespread reservations about the opinions
you then proceeded to express, you honestly cannot subsequently be
surprised and say: "Wow. All of this verbage just because (...)". You
knew what you were getting into and your own words prove it.
On a related note, you may (or may not) know the closing scene to
Fahrenheit 9/11 (which I just saw today): It fits my argument
perfectly. For from what I gathered on the web, Americans were laughing
about the fact that Bush misspoke (which is very human to do), that he
failed to correctly deliver the "Fool me once, shame on you; fool me
twice, shame on me" saying. You see, some Europeans who were laughing
during that scene were NOT laughing about Bush's verbal stumbling. They
were laughing about the fact that Bush attributed the adage to both
Texas and, tentatively, Tennesse -- when in fact these words are an old
Chinese proverb.
Claiming that all the acceptedly good things were invented by one's own
community (note: rhetorical exaggeration) -- that's what REALLY
attracts sneers, ridicule and resentment. Why go there when we know
better?
-- Jens [[User:Ropers|Ropers]]
www.ropersonline.com
>What do I need to apologize to Hephaestos about?
>
>RickK
Well, I meant it is pretty hollow of you to request that someone apologise
when you yourself has never apologised to any of the many users you have
harassed.
_________________________________________________________________
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One of our frequently banned users is making a variety of legal and
financial accusations that I wanted to respond to early and firmly
lest any of these things take root in any way shape or form as
reflective of reality in any way.
1. First, the Wikimedia Foundation is currently in full compliance
and more with all legal requirements for filings, etc. It is my
intention that we remain so, and that indeed, we are proactive about
doing whatever is necessary to go above and beyond what is required of
us in terms of organizational transparency, etc.
I am always eager to hear suggestions for improvement in this regard.
2. Second, there are no plans of any kind to release a 'for-profit'
version of the Wikipedia, for the separate benefit of me or Bomis or
any other company that I own, control, work for, etc. We *will* be
working to release Wikipedia on CD-ROM, in paper format, etc., but
these will be projects *of the foundation*, carried out with perfect
consistency with our nonprofit mission.
Such efforts will necessarily and properly involve the work of
for-profit publishers, but of course any contracts entered into will
be to the benefit of the Wikimedia Foundation.
3. There are no current plans for salaries for anyone. In the
future, I do intend that as we grow, we will become a large
organization patterned after the National Geographic Society, the
International Red Cross, and so on. This will eventually necessitate
employees, etc. But for now, any suggestion that I am personally
trying to get money from Wikipedia is beyond ludicrous.
It is commonly thought that I'm a wealthy person, but I'm not really.
I'm a very committed person who drives a 4 year old Hyundai and lives
in an ordinary middle-class American home in an ordinary neighborhood,
while spending far more in the last 5 years on my dream of a free
encyclopedia than I have on my own salary, none of which, of course,
is derived from Wikipedia in any way.
I do this because it matters to me. There are lots of ways to spend
money in life, some frivolous, some meaningful. To me, doing
something meaningful is the best reward.
4. As of June 1, 2004, I am resigning as CEO of Bomis, and my partner
Tim Shell will take over that role. This is primarily to reflect the
reality of the situation, which is that I spend virtually all my time
on Wikipedia and non-Bomis work. But it is also in part to further
emphasize and underscore the fact that the two are unrelated. Bomis's
ongoing provision of free hosting for the Wikimedia Foundation as a
gesture of appreciation of "giving back" to the free software
community whose software has helped us to do so much is not going to
change. But that ongoing gift is the only relationship between Bomis
and Wikipedia, period.
5. One troll has suggested that the Wikimedia Foundation needs to
disclose something about it's relationship to Bomis. This is a
classic propaganda technique: to demand the disclosure of some shadowy
secrets, with ominous overtones, when there is actually nothing to
disclose. I am happy to answer any questions that anyone has about
it, but there's not much to say.
While I was a futures and options trader, I founded Bomis partly as a
sideline hobby. It was eventually successful enough for me to retire
from trading and do it full time. The company rode through the
dot-com boom with good times and bad, and has always prospered enough
to provide me with a decent living.
I eventually became consumed with the passion to create a free and
freely licensed encyclopedia, and started to spend money on it. In
the early days, I thought of it as a possible business venture like
RedHat. Nupedia was an expensive failure, Wikipedia was a big
success.
But through that process, it became apparent that in order for
Wikipedia to achieve it's full potential it needed to be owned by a
non-profit organization. I promised then to give it all away to the
non-profit organization, and I did. I did so fully and completely and
with no regrets. My reward will be a Nobel Peace Prize, ha ha.
Why has Bomis funded Wikipedia? Because my partners in Bomis shared
my vision and let me do it. Bomis had servers, technical employees,
etc., and was the original owner of Nupedia/Wikipedia. The transition
was natural and spontaneous, and that's where things are today.
6. I have said before that although there are no plans for it at the
current time, and no need for it, it would please me greatly to have
the Wikimedia Foundation grow into a large enough organization that it
would be sensible for me to accept a salary for running it. If and
when that time comes, of course my compensation will be decided
according to the standard practices for charitable organizations, i.e.
through a vote of the other members of the Board of Directors, and in
accordance with the advice of an independent outside compensation
agency.
----
In short, if anyone has *any* questions or concerns about legal or
financial matters, I ask you to please write to me privately and
express those concerns openly and honestly, so that I can resolve
anything of this sort to everyone's satisfaction. If, after you've
talked with me privately, you find that you have any remaining issues
that you don't feel I've addressed, then by all means I encourage you
to go public with your complaints.
That's my biggest problem, really, with what this troll is doing.
He's issuing a lot of lies (anonymously of course) and insinuations,
attempting to make a public stink, rather than honestly and simply
raising the issues with me in an appropriate manner. I don't actually
fear any actual legal action, because in order to file a legal action,
he or she would have to reveal his or her true identity, which would
then enable us to finally take legal action to permanently ban them
from the website, as well as providing an opportunity for me to file a
libel claim against him.
Anyhow, really, I wanted to say all this because I want you you all to
know my keen interest in openness, transparency, fairness, etc. I
want to do whatever I need to do to make sure that the Wikimedia
Foundation is looked to as a shining example of how a nonprofit should
be run, with tight attention paid to expenses, good stewardship of
donor money, etc.
--Jimbo
I want to say a word about this demand for an apology.
I have advised Mike that he should apologize. He agreed. He also told me that
he sent an email to Heph expressing his regret for what he did. I do not know
if he did or not, but in this instance, I choose to act in good faith and
believe Mike. In his own unique way, he wrote to me today: "To my knowledge, I do
apologize." In an earlier email he wrote: "I do apologize to him for calling
him a bastard and thinking he is bad for something. I will try to get Zoe,
Hephaestos to come back and let them know that I apologize to them and not let
them be angry." (I corrected three typos for clarity)
What seems to be happening here is that Rick is demanding a public apology.
Personally, I do not think this is necessary. One thing I would hope we can all
do is act in good faith. We all stand to benefit from encouraging Mike to
keep to his part of the agreement, make accurate edits, and act respectfully
toward others. Our best bet to achieve this is to act respectfully toward him, be
welcoming of him, and point out any mistakes he makes in a friendly,
supportive manner.
I encourage Rick and all others who are skeptical to be vigilant. As Jimbo
pointed out, this new agreement is an experiment. At the same time, I encourage
them to participate in the experiment and to help it succeed. We all stand to
benefit from it.
Danny
>From Wikipedia:Quick index
'''Note''': since this list is relatively new other wikipedias with a
none-latin alphabet might wish to translate it which would be a time
consuming task to do manually. For this reason [[User:Ævar Arnfjörð
Bjarmason|Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason]] has made a stupid little script in
[[Perl]] which shouldnt be that hard to tweak for any other language (
just modify the array and add some regxp's which work around how lame
perl is ). The code is located
[http://pig.berlios.de/cgi-bin/is.txt.pl here] and a sample output is
[http://pig.berlios.de/cgi-bin/is.pl here] (that script being
executed).
Yeah i know i know, put it on the talk page, but just think of all the
people that might miss this and start editing that huge list by hand.
Couldnt be bothered to rewrite this into mail form, but anyway if
someone here has yet to translate that list to a none-english,
none-italian and none-icelandic wikipedia they might find that tool
useful.
Cheers
>Has he apologized to Hephaestos?
>
>RickK
Have you?
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