So now his eminent worthiness Mark a.k.a. Raul has decreed that
[[Nintendo Entertainment System]] will be the Featured Article tomorrow,
despite the overwhelming support for UTPH at
[[Wikipedia_talk:Featured_article_candidates#European_toilet_paper_holder]].
It seems to me a spectacularly lame and unimaginative choice. If
running a genuinely ersatz text was too daring, at least we could have
run an oddball article that looked like a hoax, but I guess even that
was too much for the timid souls at the steering wheel.
I am disappointed by the process by which this decision was reached and
I especially disappointed by the outcome, but I guess it reflects the
fact that Wikipedia EN is overpopulated by geeky teenagers who probably
prefer Red Bull to red wine and Game Boys to sex.
Signed,
Just Another Dinosaur
For immediate release:
Jimbo Wales, founder of Wikipedia, was de-sysopped today by a coalition
of rogue admins (the Troll League) and his account blocked indefinitely.
The new GodKing, Rickk, immediately reinstated
RK weds Helga! The long-awaited wedding will feature mav147 wearing the
traditional Muslim headscraf (click here for picture).
Kim Jong-Il brings peace to Palestine. The leader of the world's
remaining Hermit Kingdom outlawed both Judaism and Islam throughout the
Middle East, replacing all forms of religious worship with the playing
of old Beatles records.
(I was saving these, but ... )
Uncle Ed
--- Ray Saintonge <saintonge(a)telus.net> wrote:
> Sounds like some kind of reverse April Fools. Something perfectly true
> that nobody in his right mind would believe. I like that idea.
I also very much like this idea. But finding such oddball topics to write about
is hard enough. Finding enough to make them feature worthy is even harder. Then
there is the time and effort it takes to put the article through FAC.
So having an alternate Main Page at [[Wikipedia:April 1, 2005]] seems to be a
good thing to do as well. All the real hoaxes would go there and the stuff that
just looks like a hoax but is real content goes on the real Main Page.
-- mav
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Web April Fools are very rarely funny, and now everyone does them.
With all respect to those who worked on ours, I'm not sure it is
either (it seems more like an "in joke" for us).
If we post a fake story, we'll be just the same as Slashdot and the
rest. But we can do better. We have a limitless supply of *real
crap* to draw upon. We can be lighthearted and play with the reader's
credulity just as well by using stuff from [[Wikipedia:Unusual
articles]]. I think all the featured articles in there have all been
on the main page fairly recently, so instead I propose a special
variant of Did You Know to take the place of the featured article on
the main page. For example:
==Things you'll wish you never knew==
''From wikipedia's [[Wikipedia:Unusual articles|stupidest articles]]:''
* A 1919 '''[[Boston molasses disaster|molasses explosion]]''' killed 21 people.
* [[Afrikaans language|Afrikaans]] pigs say '''''[[Oink|snork]]'''''
and [[Korean language|Korean]] pigs say '''''[[Oink|kkool]]'''''. And
we can prove it.
* [[John F. Kennedy]] was almost certainly not a '''[[Ich bin ein
Berliner|a jelly donut]]'''.
* '''[[Belly button fluff]]''' is usually blue. Check yours.
* '''[[History of perpetual motion machines|Perpetual motion]]''' is
impossible. Probably.
* [[El Salvador]] and [[Honduras]] fought a '''[[Football War|war]]'''
over the result of a [[Football (soccer)|Football]] match. Don't ask
who won the war.
* The happy [[Ewok]]s won't be happy '''[[Endorian Holocaust|for
long]]'''. Serves 'em right.
* '''[[Le Pétomane|French culture]]''' blows the competition away.
And use [[Image:Shark big.jpg]] as the image.
--
John Fader
--- Bishonen <bishlist(a)ungoodthinkful.com> wrote:
> So, again: anybody? Can/will my userpage be from my userspace untimely
> ripp'd and used in a way I protest against? Or not? What do you think?
> Should I hurry up and try to get it speedied?
Legally you don�t have a leg to stand on since the text on that page in under
the GNU FDL. But morally it would be very rude for somebody to use the text in
a way you didn�t want since it is clearly marked as being in your userspace.
-- mav
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--- Viajero <viajero(a)quilombo.nl> wrote:
> So now his eminent worthiness Mark a.k.a. Raul has decreed that
> [[Nintendo Entertainment System]] will be the Featured Article tomorrow,
> despite the overwhelming support for UTPH at
> [[Wikipedia_talk:Featured_article_candidates#European_toilet_paper_holder]].
ETPH is not an article - let alone featured. That "article" can and should be
on the alternate Main Page at [[Wikipedia:April 1, 2005]]. A huge banner on the
real Main Page could point to the alternate Main Page.
> It seems to me a spectacularly lame and unimaginative choice. If
> running a genuinely ersatz text was too daring, at least we could have
> run an oddball article that looked like a hoax, but I guess even that
> was too much for the timid souls at the steering wheel.
Sadly [[exploding whale]] was already on the Main Page. As was Emperor Norton
of the United States. Either Main Page summary could have been written with a
bit more wit to work. I wouldn't mind if we recycled one or the other for just
this day though.
> I am disappointed by the process by which this decision was reached and
> I especially disappointed by the outcome, but I guess it reflects the
> fact that Wikipedia EN is overpopulated by geeky teenagers who probably
> prefer Red Bull to red wine and Game Boys to sex.
I for one prefer sex above all those other things you mentioned. :)
-- mav
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--- Sj <2.718281828(a)gmail.com> wrote:
> Those of you who have not delved into the Britannica may not know this
> (check out our Category of 1911 Britannica content for examples), but
> it is peppered with subtle wit. An April Fools' hoax is by its nature
> something different -- a hoax! an attempt to pull a fast one on the
> very people we set out to inform! -- and this too has a long and
> noble tradition within the academic and scientific community. The BBC
> (both radio and TV), Nature, Discover, and Scientific American have
> all run regular April Fool's hoaxes (with, I might add, a straight
> face -- never acknowledging it was a hoax until the following
> day/issue).
EB 1911 is also famous for being very POV. Those publications you cited also do
not have to be extra careful about their perception - we do. Any hoax that I
find in the main namespace will either be moved or deleted as all vandalism
should.
I like the idea of having a separate hoax Main Page at [[Wikipedia:April 1,
2005]] and having any hoax "article" at [[Wikipedia:April 1, 2005/Foo]] with
'Foo' being the 'article' name. A large banner could be on the regular Main
Page pointing this the 'new and improved Main Page.'
-- mav
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Once again I can't do a thing. I've been trying to do some of the
work at WP:RM for the last hour and am sick of seeing the "Sorry- we
have a problem..." message - not been able to do a single one yet.
It's not too slow looking at pages, even editing them isn't too bad,
but trying to delete or move is simply impossible at the moment. So
damn frustrating.
~~~~ Violet/Riga
--- Matt R <matt_crypto(a)yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
> Grrr. Please stop declaring "how things will be" unilaterally, it's not very
> Wikipedia-like.
It would be very un-wikipedia-like to intentionally mislead readers given our
goal of informing them. The fact that Wikipedia is an encyclopedia is
non-negotiable (although in truth we are redefining what an encyclopedia can
be) no matter how popular notions to the contrary are.
> Moreover, I don't really think an April Fool's hoax on the main page is quite
> "subverting the goal of creating an encyclopedia". It's certainly tangential,
> but what harm are you seeing here? It's a minor diversion, not a major
> subversion.
Given the traffic we get on the Main Page, this is anything but minor. It
serves as a very bad example. The suggestion by Stan of creating hoax articles
in a contest that people would need to spot on the new page list really went
over the line. Many of these articles would not be cleaned up afterwards and
would persist in the article namespace.
> Don't be so patronising! I'm sure everyone is quite as aware of the goals of
> this project as you are.
Old hands yes, new hands have to be often reminded that we are first an
encyclopedia project and the community aspect is aimed at supporting that.
> I just think it's quite unfortunate if Wikipedia
> takes itself so seriously that it fears to do what institutions like, say,
the BBC
> are quite happy to do.
Again, I have not seen a single example of a respected encyclopedia doing this.
Give me one example and I�ll stop complaining. Wikipedia in particular needs to
be sensitive to this type of thing due to our high profile and given the many
misgivings about our reliability.
-- mav
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