>
>
>
> Message: 6
> Date: Fri, 5 May 2006 12:51:07 +0100
> From: "Tony Sidaway" <f.crdfa(a)gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] We need to recognize that advocating is a
> basic right
> To: "English Wikipedia" <wikien-l(a)wikipedia.org>
> Message-ID:
> <605709b90605050451u54ffec61i46939c96b8f8a6e1(a)mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
>
> On 5/4/06, Fred Bauder <fredbaud(a)ctelco.net> wrote:
> >
> > On May 4, 2006, at 10:10 AM, Tony Sidaway wrote:
> >
> > > On 5/4/06, John Tex <johntexster(a)gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > >
> > >> This is "advocacy". Contacting people to recruit them to support
> > >> you or to
> > >> act according to beliefs you think they may already have should
> > >> rightly be
> > >> called "campaigning". This is a Good Thing.
> > >>
> > >
> > > You're on the wrong project, mate.
> >
> > He's thinking about policy issues and expressing himself in the
> > proper forum. He's being courteous. He may be wrong, but input on
> > policy questions is welcome.
>
> All of the above may be true, but he's still on the wrong project.
> This is a project for the production of an encyclopedia, not for
> political campaigning.
Hi Tony,
I thought it was a bit rude of you to essentially invite me to leave the
project with your "You're on the wrong project, mate." However, since
you're known for your somewhat surly statements and lack of civility, I let
it slide. Now that you've repeated your transgression, however, I feel
compelled to respond.
I'm here to build an encyclopedia. I hope that my contributions log shows
that I have helped to do that. If people disagree, then there are proper
channels to go through if anyone thinks I shouldn't be here. I'd thank you
to use one of them rather than to make your snide, off-wiki comments saying
I'm in the wrong place.
In the meantime, building the encyclopedia requires decisions on policy, as
well as daily decisions about how to apply policy to individual situations.
This requires discussion and sometimes debate. That is inherently a
political process. Person A will inevitably be trying to convince person B
and C that Person A is proposing the correct solution. Sometimes Person A
will be successful in bringing B and C around. Sometimes the opposite will
happen and A will change positions. Sometimes people will agree to
disagree. Etc.
Fortunately, Wikipedia is not ruled by Tony Sidaway, so you don't get to
make all the decisions yourself. As long as multiple people are
contributing to decision-making, politics is a fact-of-life.
I welcome your continued presense on Wikipedia and I thank you for the
myriad contributions you have made to date. I would thank you as well to
extend me the same courtesy, even if you disagree with my position.
Sincerely,
Johntex
WP:NVS
(Wikipedia:No vote stacking)
That was one of the factors in Jason Gastrich's downfall??
Is he still sock/meatpuppeteering on Wikipedia???
Craig
--- stevage(a)gmail.com wrote:
From: "Steve Bennett" <stevage(a)gmail.com>
To: "English Wikipedia" <wikien-l(a)wikipedia.org>
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] We need a policy against vote-stacking
Date: Fri, 5 May 2006 15:00:52 +0200
On 5/5/06, geni <geniice(a)gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > For all the standard reasons like Wikipedia is not paper, inclusion of
> > > > any single article does almost infinitesimal direct harm.
> > > >
> > >
> > > I can think of quite a few that could do considerable harm.
> >
> > Sorry, "inclusion of any single article which might otherwise be
> > deleted for lack of notability"...
> >
>
> So say a "John doe is a pedophile" article (nn 3 google hits) would do no harm?
Yawn. You know exactly what I'm saying.
> The "ize" risks starting spelling wars. The first four letters of
> dearticlify risk breaking [[WP:TOE]]. Vaporize has a nice 1984 ring to
> it.
Terminate :)
Steve
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From: "Anthony DiPierro"
> I still have no idea what it means to "assert
> notability" or what "an
> article with no claim to notability" is.
Neither do our vandals. I'd go as far as saying that
the majority of CSD-A7 deletions that are immediately
recreated go from "Joe Bloggs is a bicyclist from
Melbourne" to "Joe Bloggs is a notable bicyclist in
Melbourne".
This is a Good Thing, as claiming notability is not
the same as asserting it, and Mr Bloggs and his bike
can be deleted again. I'm always surprised that the
vandals haven't worked out that they should *assert*
notability. But they don't and I think the reason is:
they can't.
A good encyclopedia article, especially one about a
person or group, sums up the entire article in the
first sentence. You learn everying that is notable and
important about the subject in a couple of dozen words
(less in the better written articles). Anything,
anything at all, that is notable can be summed up in
the opening sentence. Wikipedia is the free
encyclopedia anyone can edit. Jimbo Wales is an
internet entrepreneur who founded Wikipedia. ABC is a
national television and radio network in the United
States. If it's not notable, you can't sum it up. So
you get CSD-A7 articles that wander all over the shop
- sometimes for thousands of carefully crafted words -
but don't assert the notability of the subject because
they can't.
Of course, there is a large grey area on either side.
It is, after all, perfectly possible to write an
article about Albert Einstein without once summing him
up and asserting notability for him. Difficult, but
not impossible. Albert Einstein was a Swiss patent
clerk who later became a professor. Articles like that
by right shouldn't be deleted since the person in
question was and is notable. But it's not up to
another editor to discover why someone or something is
notable and insert it. It's *certainly* not up to our
customers - millions and millions of readers - to try
to guess why the person is included if they don't know
already. If that article stayed up, it becomes the
equivilant of the old empty articles that I seem to
remember as a feature of Wikipedia 5 or 6 years ago.
And it's less likely to grow into a full article than
a redlink would, as it acts as a barrier to growth.
On the other side, it is possible to assert notability
where no exists, but when people do that they tend to
assert improbable or just downright bollocks
notability. Joe Bloggs is a bicyclist from Melbourne
who owns all the money in the world and your sister.
Joe Bloggs is a bicyclist from Melbourne who has
ridden around the world 18 times since he first
learned to ride a bike when he was 3 months old. If
true, these things would be a sign of notability. But
they then fall foul of CSD-G1 - patent nonsense - and
bite the dust on that score.
I think it's a small thing to ask of an article and
its creator - assert some reason why this subject
should be in our encyclopedia. If they don't, CSD-A7.
If they do but don't do it very well, AfD. If they do
but it's a lie, CSD-G1.
But it's very difficult to *define* what is and isn't
an assertion of notability. Notability is largely a
/quality/, a property something has or doesn't have.
Producing an exact definition of what an assertion of
it looks like is probably beyond the English language.
Like modern art, you can't produce a definition of it,
but know it when you see it!
I think we can trust our admins to rule on it, if
nothing else because admin actions are undoable. And
if something or someone *is* notable after all, an
article will spring up in its place later and
hopefully better.
For AfD decisions its harder to know if we can trust
the consensus, but that's because the cut-and-dried
non-notables have been deleted by admins already. Its
the grey-area ones that go to AfD and are subject to
people's prejudices, deletion/inclusion leanings and
the author's potential for disrupting of the process.
If AfD worked, it would be the ideal place to discuss
all of these things. Ho hum.
=REDVERS=
___________________________________________________________
Switch an email account to Yahoo! Mail, you could win FIFA World Cup tickets. http://uk.mail.yahoo.com
Perhaps we should run a CheckUser on AFD votes to see if they are all the same user??
I'm willing to offer my services for CheckUser
Craig
--- geniice(a)gmail.com wrote:
From: geni <geniice(a)gmail.com>
To: "English Wikipedia" <wikien-l(a)wikipedia.org>
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] We need a policy against vote-stacking
Date: Fri, 5 May 2006 12:57:02 +0100
On 5/5/06, Steve Bennett <stevage(a)gmail.com> wrote:
> It just doesn't seem fair to delete an article on one school of a
> given type while keeping others. And I suspect "notability" there is
> very much dependent on the social milieu of the voters...
>
So you are saying there is no difference between Eton and Sacred Heart
school, Nowheresville
> For all the standard reasons like Wikipedia is not paper, inclusion of
> any single article does almost infinitesimal direct harm.
>
I can think of quite a few that could do considerable harm.
> Got another?
>
Vaporize. Transition to unarticle.
--
geni
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On 5/4/06, julieharding1(a)charter.net <julieharding1(a)charter.net> wrote:
> To assert notability: To rise above the rest. To cause immediate attention and/or attraction due to action and/or content. To be assertive. To assert notability is to rise above the rest with respect and wisdom for what you are representing. Notability if given sufficiently enough, can make your name known forever. It will make your strong voice heard. Choose your topic wisely. For, to assert notability, you must choose something that will express your strongest points of character. Yet be careful, because we must always remember to respect new knowledge with care and pride. With this, your notability can be asserted: Respect.
> -JTMH
>
I think you might have something there. But what is it that must rise
above the rest? You're talking about the article, right?
Anthony
I do not know what top-posting is, so I can hardly stop it. I do not fall into either of your divisions. I edit Wikipedia first and foremost all right, but I do make negative comments about admins I dislike, though obviously I wouldn't call my comments acerebic and utterly ignorant. I also believe that posting my pesonal beliefs and convictions on my personal userpage does not harm the encyclopedia and if anyone else is offended by them they can bloody well go see a different page, I didn't invite them to look at mine. How would you or Jimbo categorise me in that case?
Molu
On Fri, 05 May 2006 04:55:22 +1000, Mark Gallagher wrote:
"G'day Molu,
[stop bloody top-posting, please]
> So wikipedians like me who have (unsucessfully) supported the
> userboxes are all bad people just clogging up the system?
Well, that depends. I've never seen you on Wikipedia, TMK, so you're
going to have to answer this one yourself. Let your conscience be your
guide ...
Do you:
a) Edit Wikipedia first and foremost, and very occasionally decorate
your userpage as a fun diversion, or
b) Edit userboxen first and foremost, turning your attentions to
Wikipedia only to "vote" on TfD or DRV and make acerbic and utterly
ignorant comments about hard-working admins? Do you resent the fact
that people consider Wikipedia an encyclopaedia, even though the
"anyone can edit" tag implies that if you want to treat it like
MySpace no-one should be allowed to stop you?
If you answered 'a' to that one, then you're one of the unfortunate
victims of the way the userbox situation was handled. If you answered
'b', seriously, fuck off and don't come back until you've re-adjusted
your way of thinking about this project. Wikipedia is not a hosting
service.
--
Mark Gallagher
"What? I can't hear you, I've got a banana on my head!"
- Danger Mouse"
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Hi,
I tried again to create a username and predictably the self described
angry Wikipedia admin username, Freakofnurture, immediately blocked me from
editing. The name I choose was "Even Small Children Can Edit Wikipedia" and
his explanation is "yep, and i'm keeping it safe for them". It's curious
how this person became an admin, being so angry, his consistent not assuming
good faith and not being genuine in his communications. It seems in the
wikipedia user-space there is plenty of room for anger and nastiness and not
much for humor.
Bacchante
I think I'll go with the second option. What on earth is inflammatory about Even Small Children Can Edit Wikipedia?!? It's bloody true all right!!! This username paranoia is attaining ridiculous heights.
On Fri, 5 May 2006 00:14:32 +0100 "Rob Church" wrote:
"For those who like their drama, select from the following responses:
"Won't somebody please think of the children!?"
"Oh my god, it's admin abuse! I am shocked to my very core."
and
"Where are we going, and what's with the handbasket?"
Rob Church"
---------------------------------
Yahoo! Mail goes everywhere you do. Get it on your phone.
Hell, no! That's an extremely bad idea in a long history of bad ideas. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia *written by a community*. You can't ignore the community component, or there would be no Wikipedia. It's because the community take the decisions around here that Nupedia is long dead and gone while Wikipedia is the largest encyclopedia in the world. Transferring the power of making deletion decisions to a small committee that's not even elected will be another bad blow to "the free encyclopedia anyone can edit". AfDCom probably won't be a good idea even if they were elected.
Molu
On Thu, 04 May 2006 18:14:27 -0400, Ben McIlwain wrote:
"The AfdCom members would be
appointed, NOT elected. I don't even want to think of how messy a
voting situation would be ... many, many votes would be based on
members' past decisions on specific subject area Afds rather than an
actual objective analysis of the merit of that person."
---------------------------------
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