WikiEN-l September 2006

wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org

137 participants
216 discussions

Best Register article ever
by David Gerard 24 Sep '06

24 Sep '06

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/09/23/wikitruth_on_sanger/ The press subcommittee might as well pack up and go home. - d.

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FYI: Infiltrating politics. Definitions will greet us as liberators (today: iterative)
by Mathias Schindler 24 Sep '06

24 Sep '06

(The chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, Jim Connaughton, and Undersecretary of State for Democracy and Global Affairs Dr. Paula Dobriansky will discuss the policy and implementation committee meeting of the Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate.) KARSNER: Yes, I'm Andy Karsner. I'm the assistant secretary for energy efficiency and renewable energy at the Department of Energy. And I just overheard the last bit of your question. And I wanted to comment because I'm rather new inside the government, but I have extensive experience in the private sector as an international project developer. [...] So you have to bear in mind, if we want to adapt our role to catalyzing market forces to steer the capital to the desired result, government has to have a proper perspective, which is to be iterative and catalytic with the private sector... QUESTION: I'm sorry, what did you say? KARSNER: I said government must hold the... QUESTION: But be iterative? Is that what you said? KARSNER: Iterative, correct. QUESTION: What's that? KARSNER: What is iterative? QUESTION: Iterative, in this sense. KARSNER: Happy to give you my definition on that. You might have to check Wikipedia in case I go awry. Iterative means having a relationship where one reacts off of the other as opposed to, sort of, maintaining the delusion that government can do this all by itself. $52 million, even in Washington, is a whole lot of money and a very, very serious commitment to being catalytic.

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Hallmark of bad process: guideline vs didacticism
by David Gerard 23 Sep '06

23 Sep '06

I've added this to my process essay (which I should declare "done" some time soon really). It's too long and too bitter. Your help is most welcomed. * Prescriptive when it should be a guideline ** A lot of people think making things hard policy means people will actually follow them. This means editorial guidelines get phrased as didactic policy. This results in stupidity such as WP:RS (a guideline) being used by apparently insane robots as a reason to gut articles of content. ** Policy is harsh stuff, and there's a limit to how much people will hold in their heads. Everything that can be a guideline should be, because clueless editors won't understand it and bad faith editors won't care. to expand: There is no point being didactic on editorial guidance pages even if you REALLY REALLY think people REALLY REALLY need to do this. Because it doesn't work. It doesn't stop clueless editors, because they won't understand it. It doesn't stop malicious editors, because they don't care. It provides a new way for apparently insane robots to inappropriately misapply process without understanding why it's there. And it pisses off the good clueful editors who go "what, MORE policy?" Now. The above bullet points are from the perspective of me, who hates this stuff. What's a phrasing that would get through to someone who thinks being didactic on editorial guideline pages is a necessary idea? This is the school of thought that removes all blog or Usenet references because they don't like them, then the apparently insane robots move in. - d.

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Current events and breaking news
by Daniel R. Tobias 23 Sep '06

23 Sep '06

Regarding all the discussion lately about whether Wikipedia ought to have coverage of breaking events right as they happen, this sort of thing is what brings out both the best and the worst of Wikipedia. At its best, Wikipedia has up-to-date information on things of current interest, placed in historical context, something that no other medium can do in quite the same way: news media have info on what just happened now without much context, while printed encyclopedias have out-of-date information on what happened a long time ago without recent updates. The easy updatability of Wikipedia, combined with its ability to hyperlink things together, give it the ability to have simultaneous depth, breadth, currency, and history. You also see it at its worst during times of rapidly-changing events, though; there's a dizzying succession of edits to any related articles which include the posting of rumors, hearsay, and speculation as if it were fact; lots of jumping to conclusions about what has happened, what effect it will have, and what it all means; and plenty of cases of outright vandalism. The high edit volume makes it an exercise in frustration to make any sort of update, due to edit conflicts. Thus, one can see why some would desire that current events be left out until they have a chance to settle down a bit. On the other hand, such breaking events *also* show the best and the worst of the mainstream media. Look at tapes of the live TV or radio coverage of a major past event (the Kennedy assassination, the Reagan attempted assassination, the 2000 U.S. presidential election, the 9/11 attacks, Hurricane Katrina) and you'll see the same sorts of missteps and pratfalls you see on Wikipedia (though generally minus the outright vandalism). Announcers report rumors and then retract them. Things are reported as fact that turn out to be false. James Brady is dead... no he isn't! Bush is projected as the winner... no, Gore is projected as the winner... no, Bush... no, it's too close to call. The Pope is dead... no he isn't... OK, *now* he is. Announcers sometimes interrupt one another to bring in new bulletins. So, everybody has some problems dealing with events that flood in too rapidly to keep track of. But at least Wikipedia's coverage eventually settles down to a reasonable article. -- == Dan == Dan's Mail Format Site: http://mailformat.dan.info/ Dan's Web Tips: http://webtips.dan.info/ Dan's Domain Site: http://domains.dan.info/

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Citizendium
by Kim van der Linde 23 Sep '06

23 Sep '06

Jussi-Ville Heiskanen wrote: > Assuming that good content (if any) in sangers project will be added > to wikipedia, why would potential editors prefer to edit these > articles that are copied back to wikipedia too on sangers project, > rather than on wikipedia? There has to be some added value to editing > on sangers project, rather than on wikipedia, for his project to > flourish. What is it? I genuinely want to know. As an expert who has left Wikipedia more or less, I can give you an answer: 1. I would write there for Citizendium, not for Wikipedia. 2. Content from there included in Wikipedia will deteriorate at Wikipedia over time, there is will remain sound. 3. Content there, if the right editing paradigm is chosen, will continue to improve, which would either require Wikipedia to repeatedly insert the newest version, of basically fall behind. Your response is based on the premise that Wikipedia will keep the lead, and that forks are just to feed stuff to Wikipedia. Maybe, but my prediction will be that some smarter hybrid between general community involvement and experts guarding quality will in the end replace Wikipedia. It is just a matter of time. Whether Citizendium will be that alternative, I do not yet know. What I do know is that experts have in general a short life span at Wikipedia (if they join at all), and that is not going to change. Kim

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Re: [WikiEN-l] No derivatives (was: Would you like one of your videos posted on Wikipedia?)
by Michael Snow 22 Sep '06

22 Sep '06

dmehkeri(a)swi.com wrote: >>>digging, it does seem to be disallowed. For rationale, I get pointed >>>back to either Jimbo's posts on disallowing non-commercial-use media >>>licenses, fair use, or discussion of downstream use. >>> >>>None of these reasons seem to apply here. For the free encyclopedia, >>>a CC-BY-ND media license, for example, is perfectly redistributable, >>>allows for possible commercial use, and poses no issues for forks or >>>other downstream use, right? >>> >>> >>When we talk about Wikipedia being free, we refer to the 4 freedoms of >>free software, as defined by Richard Stallman many years ago: >> >>0. The freedom to copy >>1. The freedom to redistribute >>2. The freedom to modify >>3. The freedom to redistribute modified versions >> >>CC-BY-NC violates at least the last of these. >> >> >This is just an unfortunate typo, and you mean CC-BY-ND. Right? > > Probably he did, although for use in a commercial context (and that can mean many things), it's also true for CC-BY-NC. --Michael Snow

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Re: [WikiEN-l] Encyclopedia of Earth appears to be now online...
by Michael Snow 22 Sep '06

22 Sep '06

David Alexander Russell wrote: >Oskar Sigvardsson wrote: > > >>Yeah, reading from CCs webpage, I guess not, it says "identical >>license". A shame, really. >> >>Why couldn't Lessig have invented his damn licenses before we came along?!?!? >> >> >Creative Commons was launched in 2001, as was Wikipedia. > > The Creative Commons licenses, however, were not released until 2002. December 2002 at that, so effectively two years after Wikipedia started. --Michael Snow

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[[Portal:Current events]] (regarding is WP a news portal?)
by NSLE (Wikipedia) 22 Sep '06

22 Sep '06

As an aside to all the discussion that's been going on about articles regarding news events, why do we have [[Portal:Current events]] then? Fair enough, some might argue it serves a purpose to consolidate all major info in major current events. But I think it's ridiculous when things like [[Richard Hammond]]'s progress in hospital is being reported at Portal:CE daily. --NSLE/Chacor

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Policy Creation Procedure
by Sean Barrett 22 Sep '06

22 Sep '06

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Start with a cage containing five apes. In the cage, hang a banana on a string and put stairs under it. Before long, an ape will go to the stairs and start to climb towards the banana. As soon as he touches the stairs, spray all of the apes with cold water. After a while, another ape makes an attempt with the same result, all the apes are sprayed with cold water. This continues through several more attempts. Pretty soon, when another ape tries to climb the stairs, the other apes all try to prevent it. Now, turn off the cold water. Remove one ape from the cage and replace it with a new one. The new ape sees the banana and wants to climb the stairs. To his horror, all of the other apes attack him. After another attempt and attack, he knows that if he tries to climb the stairs, he will be assaulted. Next, remove another of the original five apes and replace it with a new one. The newcomer goes to the stairs and is attacked. The previous newcomer takes part in the punishment with enthusiasm. Again, replace a third original ape with a new one. The new one makes it to the stairs and is attacked as well. Two of the four apes that beat him have no idea why they were not permitted to climb the stairs, or why they are participating in the beating of the newest ape. After replacing the fourth and fifth original apes, all the apes that were sprayed with cold water have been replaced. Nevertheless, no ape ever again approaches the stairs. Why not? Because that's the way they've always done it and that's the way it's always been around here. - -- Sean Barrett | Q: Magic 8-Ball, which e-mail sean(a)epoptic.com | client should I use? | A: Outlook not so good. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iD8DBQFFEH6vMAt1wyd9d+URAu8DAJ4+TDtNkU64zXFzTLRghYnzwy1kswCcDWC3 QwkasuV7RX7d/w38uCN0HAM= =U7k3 -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Re: [WikiEN-l] [[Portal:Current events]] (regarding is WP a news portal?)
by charles.r.matthews＠ntlworld.com 22 Sep '06

22 Sep '06

"NSLE (Wikipedia)" wrote > But I think it's ridiculous when things like > [[Richard Hammond]]'s progress in hospital is being reported at Portal:CE > daily. Media stories about media people are typically incestuous, and, yes, can be ridiculous. And non-events in terms of their real consequences, though not always. Charles ----------------------------------------- Email sent from www.ntlworld.com Virus-checked using McAfee(R) Software Visit www.ntlworld.com/security for more information

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WikiEN-l September 2006