WikiEN-l August 2007

wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org

147 participants
183 discussions

Foundation and History
by InkSplotch 04 Aug '07

04 Aug '07

Good evening, folks. I need some help in sorting out an issue. It has to do with a sticky subject that's been discuss here in the past: the founding of Wikipedia. I feel like I ought to open with a bit of Marc Antony, though...I'm not here to argue the issue of how many founders Wikipedia has. As I say, it's been roundly discuss here in the past. Many articles have been written about it. And it's disputed by about the only two primary sources available: Wales and Sanger. Why I am bringing it up has to do with NPOV. My view is: it is disputed, the secondary sources we have (external articles) mostly relate to the dispute itself, and I'm not sure it's something one can reliably establish outside Wikipedia itself, and in this matter I don't think we can count Wikipedians as reliable sources. I've been discussing it over on [[Talk:Wikimedia_Foundation]] tonight, and I feel like I'm going around in circles. It's the second time I've had the discussion there, and I've seen similar discussions on articles for Wales, Sanger, Wikipedia, and just about anything related. Terms like "founder" or "co-founder" have to be sourced, to absurd degrees in some cases. And every few weeks or months, someone comes along and decides to change things up. I think it's hurting our neutrality. As undisputed as "co-founder" apparently was for awhile, now it seems to have quite a few editors polarized and I just don't think we can tuck the term into articles with just a source or two. Personally, I feel needing any sources for the term 'founder' renders it POV. I don't have an easy solution, that's why I'm here. I felt this would be a good place to discuss it neutrally, and I've considered an RFC (but to be honest, I'm not sure how I'd set one up). I think some articles, like [[Wikimedia Foundation]] can stand alone without touching the issue, and on others we can probably still find suitable alternatives. I think the dispute itself could be explained neutrally on the [[Wikipedia]] article...but that, itself, might be POV. Is it something we can distance ourselves from and find a neutral stance, or am I out in left-field even bringing it up again. Please go easy on me. InkSplotch -- "Stercus, stercus, stercus, moritus sum!"

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Re: [WikiEN-l] Please stop this Re: The Second Rape: Victim-Blaming (was Re: Self-sensorship, how far should it go?)
by Daniel R. Tobias 04 Aug '07

04 Aug '07

On 3 Aug 2007 at 08:16:48 +0100, ElinorD <elinordf(a)gmail.com> wrote: > It's not possible to hush up this rumour, but it should be possible to > create an environment where contributors who have given a lot to Wikipedia > and have been harassed as a result can feel that they have the support of > the community. Creating such an environment is good for Wikipedia, but I > sometimes feel that's overlooked. As one of the MONGO rulings said, > "Wikipedia users, especially administrators, will not permit a user under > attack to be isolated, but will support them. This may include reverting > harassing edits, protecting or deleting pages, blocking users, or taking > other appropriate action." But what happens when Slim and her friends, acting in "solidarity" as encouraged by that ruling, become persecutors themselves, ganging up on people who are critical of or opposed to them, or otherwise are perceived as "enemies"? In the "real world", the categories of "victim" and "persecutor" are far from being completely disjoint, as seen repeatedly in history. The Christians were persecuted and martyred by the Romans, but later gained political power and perpetrated the Crusades and the Inquisition. The Serbs and Croats, the Irish Catholics and Protestants, the Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds, and lots of other sets of groups, have alternated between being the victims of persecution and being the perpetrators of it. Why should things be any different with the personalities and groups on Wikipedia? -- == 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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The encyclopedia
by Kamryn Matika 04 Aug '07

04 Aug '07

Remember it? http://en.wikipedia.org 1,927,797articles at the time of writing. 1,529 featured articles. That leaves 1,926,268 articles that you could be working on improving. Does it really matter if [administrator of your choice] is a [secret agent/evil overlord/janitor/popular TV talk show host]? Even if s/he is, there's not much you can do about it.

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Re: [WikiEN-l] Conflict of Interest and lobbyists for foreign governments
by Daniel R. Tobias 04 Aug '07

04 Aug '07

On 3 Aug 2007 20:03:37 -0400, jayjg <jayjg99(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/FuelWagon_v… > > Wow, you found a workshop section created two years ago by an editor > who ended up getting banned. > > You're proving the opposite of the point you are trying to prove. One possible hypothesis is that some of the admins engineer the banning of certain critical users for the express purpose of being able to dismiss any viewpoints they might have. Incidentally, in accordance with the proposed penance, I've added categories to these articles in need of them: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Machin_stamps http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haskell_Public_Schools http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mucklewain http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacred_Fools_Theater http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicephorus_Basilakes http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fran%C3%A7ois_Baby_House http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nigel_Bradham http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gleaves_Whitney http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dayton_Ballpark_Village http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_Formula_Renault_2000 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernest_A._Watkinson So I'm not a useless troll, after all. -- == 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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Re: [WikiEN-l] Conflict of Interest and lobbyists for foreign governments
by Fred Bauder 04 Aug '07

04 Aug '07

Utter contempt for the integrity of Wikipedia. Fred >-----Original Message----- >From: Hello all [mailto:wikipedian51@gmail.com] >Sent: Sunday, July 29, 2007 03:39 PM >To: wikien-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org >Subject: [WikiEN-l] Conflict of Interest and lobbyists for foreign governments > >The Hasbara Fellowship program is a project of the Israeli Foreign Ministry >which "educates and trains university students to be effective pro-Israel >activists". The program essentially pays people to engage in promoting >Israel's point of view online. > >Hasbara has said the following about wikipedia: > ><http://www.israelactivism.com/index.php?mode=newsletter#article11> >http://www.israelactivism.com/index.php?mode=newsletter#article11 > >Everyone knows about Wikipedia, a place to go to get the 'real' scoop. How >often do you use Wikipedia to look up subjects you know little about? Now >imagine how often other people use Wikipedia to look up subjects related to >Israel. > > Wikipedia is not an objective resource but rather an online encyclopedia >that any one can edit. The result is a website that is in large part is >controlled by 'intellectuals' who seek re-write the history of the >Arab-Israeli conflict. These authors have systematically yet subtly >rewritten key passages of thousands of Wikipedia entries to portray Israel >in a negative light. > > You have the opportunity to stop this dangerous trend! If you are >interested in joining a team of Wikipedians to make sure Israel is presented >fairly and accurately, please contact director(a)israelactivism.com for >details! >------- > >This looks like a concerted and funded effort to push a particular political >POV on wikipedia. If there is a "team" of people paid to edit Israel related >articles in a POV fashion shouldn't they be required to declare their >Conflict of Interest? Should employees or other individuals paid by Aish >HaTorah, which runs the Hasbara Fellowships program on behalf of and with >funding by Israel's Foreign Ministry, have to declare their COI if they edit >Israel related articles? >_______________________________________________ >WikiEN-l mailing list >WikiEN-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org >To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: >http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l >

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Re: [WikiEN-l] Penance
by K P 03 Aug '07

03 Aug '07

On 8/3/07, Armed Blowfish <diodontida.armata(a)googlemail.com> wrote: > On 03/08/07, David Gerard <dgerard(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > On 03/08/07, Bryan Derksen <bryan.derksen(a)shaw.ca> wrote: > > > > > If anything, getting involved in arguments like this actually increases > > > my editing output. I find that doing large amounts of repetitive and > > > uncontroversial work, such as categorization, format tidying, reference > > > markup, etc., is a great way to work off the frustration and annoyance. > > > I don't _like_ it, though, so I wouldn't exactly recommend it as a > > > motivator. > > > > > > A proposal: everyone who posted to this discussion must fix up ten > > articles from each of [[Category:Cleanup]] and [[Category:Category > > needed]]. Including me. > > > > > > - d. > > > > Erm, hi, banned user here. > > Armed Blowfish > Pick one or two goodies (perferably in the sciences) and send me them plus a single good source for each that would help clean them up, and I will do two clean-ups in penance for you. I'm going to write a really good article from scratch as my own penance, because that would be more fun and confer more glory upon me. KP

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Re: [WikiEN-l] Self-sensorship, how far should it go?
by Fred Bauder 03 Aug '07

03 Aug '07

>-----Original Message----- >From: Oleg Alexandrov [mailto:mathbot@hemlock.knams.wikimedia.org] >Sent: Sunday, July 29, 2007 09:04 AM >To: 'English Wikipedia' >Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Self-sensorship, how far should it go? > > >On Sun, Jul 29, 2007 at 01:15:26PM +0000, Fred Bauder wrote: > >> Generally speaking we don't include stuff that is made up; unless it crosses the notability threshold. This might, but does not seem to yet. > >I am not talking about including this in articles. I am talking >about people removing any mention of this from talk pages, >not just the link to the attack site, nothing, nothing at all >containing the words "SlimVirgin" and "news" is allowed to stand. > >I understand that such discussion may be off-topic on Wikipedia, >but how far should people go to purge any mention on this from >the site? This is not about notability anymore, not about >protecting the feelings of an editor, it is about some >Wikipedians using the policy of attack sites to censor and delete >any discussions on the topic. But is there anything to it? Or is it just nasty gossip? If you want to gossip, join the Navy. Fred

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Supernova
by Magnus Manske 03 Aug '07

03 Aug '07

en.wp article of the day : Supernova http://slashdot.org/articles/07/08/03/0313252.shtml Coincidence? You be the judge... (just kidding) Magnus

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The Second Rape: Victim-Blaming (was Re: Self-sensorship, how far should it go?)
by jayjg 03 Aug '07

03 Aug '07

Armed Blowfish apparently get e-mails through to the list, and has asked me to forward this. ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Armed Blowfish <diodontida.armata(a)googlemail.com> Date: Aug 1, 2007 10:03 PM Subject: The Second Rape: Victim-Blaming (was Re: [WikiEN-l] Self-sensorship, how far should it go?) To: jayjg99(a)gmail.com I am truly depressed by the lack of support SlimVirgin is receiving from certain individuals on this list, but at the same time, not surprised. Victim-blaming has a long and horrific history. When it happens to rape victims, it is called 'the second rape'... to victims of assault, 'the second assault'... or, to cover all situations, victim-blaming or secondary victimisation. The far-too-frequent society response to victims of rape, violence and harassment - to abandon her, to blame her, to insult her - is severely psychologically damaging to the victim, and helps keep perpetrators safe to continue these abuses. The experience of Serena, who was ultimately banned from her classrooms and friends after being raped: http://www.justicewomen.com/cj_second_rape.html An introduction to the phenomena of 'The Second Rape', geared towards helping victims deal with it, and explaining why it happens, along with a few typical examples: http://www.justicewomen.com/help_special_rape.html#two Some survey results on the topic of secondary victimisation: http://www.musc.edu/vawprevention/research/victimrape.shtml On 01/08/07, Andrew Gray <shimgray(a)gmail.com> wrote: > On 01/08/07, jayjg <jayjg99(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > I don't see any good coming from giving into trolls and stalkers. The > > fact that a bunch of disgruntled, mostly banned ex-Wikipedians like to > > spin conspiracy theories, and occasionally disrupt Wikipedia, should > > simply be ignored. Not discussed on Wikipedia, not discussed here, > > just ignored. > > "Ignored" is one thing. "Silenced" just feeds the fire. > > I note this thread began because a debate about Slim's identity, and > the massive efforts gone to to conceal edits associated with her, *was > on the front page of slashdot*. (Slashdot. Not Wikipedia Review, or > Encyclopedia Dramatica, or anyone else; Slashdot, perhaps a classic > example of our "natural supporters".) This led to a large amount of > curiosity amongst our community. But a small group of people cracked > down heavily on anyone trying to say "what the fuck is going on here?" > on the wiki... which just further encouraged speculation about those > efforts to conceal something. An excerpt from the song 'The Second Rape' by Aus-Rotten: Defense attorney: Do you know the man who "allegedly" attacked you? Victim: Yes I know the man who raped me. Defense attorney: And isn't this man a friend of yours? Victim: Well I thought he was a friend of mine. Defense attorney: And were you drinking that night he 'allegedly" attacked you? Victim: I had a drink or two but is that a crime? Defense attorney: I'll ask the questions if you don't mind! -What were you wearing: How did you act? Victim: My wardrobe isn't an invitation for a man to attack. -I didn't act in any way to bring this on. Why am I on trail? What did I do wrong? Defense attorney: Could you tell the jury why you let this happen? Victim: I was in shock. I couldn't stop him. Defense attorney: You claim that you were raped but how do we know? Victim: I said no, I said no, no, no! Defense attorney: Isn't it true you're just a woman scorned? Victim: I'm a woman who's been raped and torn. Defense attorney: Your honor, I demand that this case be dismissed, -it all comes down to her word against his! In the above, the attorney's questions are fairly typical - the victim's strength, not so typical. If you don't mind a long read, this paper is enlightening: http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/1981/3/81.03.06.x.html#c > If you honestly don't see that this sort of behaviour is wasteful, > counterproductive, inflammatory and - in the long run - just poisoning > our reputation, then I am afraid my complaints are hopeless. But, by > god, they were worth making. > > At some point in the past, people fucked up, made enemies or handled > something badly or just been unlucky in who they dealt with. Things > have moved on, and developed, and we're now in a situation where they > have no choice but to look foolish, or keep harming the project. The > only reasonable solution here is for them to stop and walk away. > Sooner or later, they have to realise this. Just as the officials at Serena's school drove her out - putting her in independent study, banning her from her classrooms and friends - after she was raped by a classmate. > I will say it again - the people we are looking bad to now aren't the > people who already thought the worst of us. We're now beginning to > look like incompetent spiteful twerps to neutral third parties, and I > see no indication it's ever going to improve. Essjay got us faintly > amused newspaper coverage - what will "Wikipedia Covers Up Unknown > Misdemeanours" look like? > > The project is bigger than them, it is more important than a username, > and I will not stand by to see it dragged down to protect their pride. > > -- > - Andrew Gray > andrew.gray(a)dunelm.org.uk On the contrary, secondary victimisation is far more damaging not only to Wikipaedia, but to all of society. It teaches the perpetrators that they can get away with it, and the victims that they can't expect help. It helps abuse continue - both by participating in victimisation of current victims and by making it easier for future victimisation to occur to new victims. And yet, far too often, victims are abandoned and blamed in the name of society... it's her fault the football team is calling her a ho... it's her fault a crime occurred against her in her own apartment... it's her fault she got raped. Thanks for listening, Armed Blowfish P.S. While I don't believe Andrew means to hurt anyone, people often hurt others without meaning to. Hence my attempt to explain why it hurts, in the hopes that this will stop.

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Re: [WikiEN-l] Moving forward
by Daniel R. Tobias 03 Aug '07

03 Aug '07

On 2 Aug 2007 at 15:30:33 -0500, "Armed Blowfish" <diodontida.armata(a)googlemail.com> wrote: > You hear the sound of someone entering > downstairs... door opening and closing... footsteps... and then the > voice of the man you fear. You don't believe you could run out past > him. There are no ladders to escape out the window. You could > scream, but there's no one around to hear you... and even if there > was, he's a friend of the neighbours. Is this a forum to discuss Wikipedia, or a psychological-thriller movie (rated R for intense violence)? -- == 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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WikiEN-l August 2007