In regards to the "wikiunderground" site, I have a couple questions.
Is it directly tied-in to the Wikimedia software? Or is it just a fast-refreshing crawler? If the latter, is it sufficiently equipped to handle all article deletions?
Secondly, this concept raises a lot of possibilities. First of all, the question of deletion itself. Is there a need to permanently delete pages so that only administrators can view them? Or could we have another userlevel (somewhere between autoconfirmed and admin) called "Pageview" where you could view deleted pages? I mean, this might be a bad idea because it would remove the importance of deletion (why bother deleting a page if some users will be able to view it) but this level might require 6 months and 500 edits.
Thirdly, a developer might even want to automate this process, wherein all deleted pages are transfered to a subdomain, perhaps deleted.wikipedia.org or something to that effect.
Just some thoughts.
Just a thought.
Whoa... I'd never heard of the JIDF before, but their site and articles on
them sent a shiver down my spine. Mind you, if I'm reading this release
correctly (and it does seem to be incredibly incoherent and cryptic), this
alleged "hacking" was simply the usage of names listed on a Facebook group
as "officers" in the JIDF article. How that jumps to "snooping email,
invading privacy, making threats, etc.", I'm not too sure.
"We have upset Hezbollah by taking out one of their top recruitment and
promotion areas on the web."
I presume they're referring to the fact that they manage to take
administrative rights on a Facebook group named "Israel is not a country!
Delist it from Facebook as a country" and close it down. Wow... that's
something to put on the old CV.
Facebook is a social networking website. The existence of a group
requesting that Israel be removed as a formal location for user profiles
(itself in response to creation of a group suggesting that Palestine be
itself removed, which attracted 8,300 members but did not allow comment or
debate of any sort), does not mean that Zuckerberg or Facebook "aid and
abet terrorist organizations". It's not even a grey area. You hit the nail
on the head, David: they're absolute nutters.
However, since they're probably monitoring the list, I'd like to take this
opportunity to point out that the Arab-Israeli conflict has in no way been
exacerbated by Israeli foreign policy. None whatsoever.
- H
David Gerard [dgerard(a)gmail.com] wrote:
> http://www.thejidf.org/2008/09/wikipedia-editors-snooping-email.html
>
> 9.07.2008
> Wikipedia editors snooping email, invading privacy, making threats, etc.
Personally, I'm against this in favour of the system that currently exists.
It is not difficult to request deleted material, and administrators are
(for the most part...) a helpful bunch. Administrators know when not to
grant requests for libellous or copyvio content, whereas with some kind of
tier system, all it would take is one slip by the deleting admin to allow
that content to be viewed by a vast number of users - given the number of
deletions that occur every day, this hardly seems statistically unlikely to
ever occur.
This proposal seems like a lot of extra legwork for the sake of unnecessary
change, and I can't see how that change would bring about any real benefit.
If every web user can view deleted articles about non-notable subjects,
then why delete them at all? The procedure's currently pretty simple, it
works, and hey... if it ain't broke...
- H
Flameviper Velifang [theflameysnake(a)yahoo.com] wrote:
> Perhaps some kind of "deletion tier" system is in order.
>
> There would be different forms of deletion, each with its own access
levels..
>
> Normal deletion: Non-notable material, prod etc. No requirement.
>
> CSD: Advertisements, "zomg Todd is ghey", etc. Requirements:
Autoconfirmed and above.
>
> BAD deletions: Unsourced BLP, etc. Requirements: Admin and above.
>
> REALLY BAD deletions: People's phone numbers, etc. Requirements:
Oversight and above.
>
> Just a thought, again, I'm open to suggestions, but this seems like a
pretty good way to separate the arguably good stuff from the bad stuff, and
the bad stuff from the evil stuff.
Perhaps some kind of "deletion tier" system is in order.
There would be different forms of deletion, each with its own access levels..
Normal deletion: Non-notable material, prod etc. No requirement.
CSD: Advertisements, "zomg Todd is ghey", etc. Requirements: Autoconfirmed and above.
BAD deletions: Unsourced BLP, etc. Requirements: Admin and above.
REALLY BAD deletions: People's phone numbers, etc. Requirements: Oversight and above.
Just a thought, again, I'm open to suggestions, but this seems like a pretty good way to separate the arguably good stuff from the bad stuff, and the bad stuff from the evil stuff.
I've been working on a proposal for implementing a sub-article like
functionality in the mainspace using templates. My reasoning here is
simple - we often have multiple articles on very closely related
topics. From an editorial perspective, these are generally treated as
wholly discrete and separate items. Discussions of one article do not
apply to or happen on another, etc. From a reader's perspective, the
divisions are less rigid - if I am learning about Descartes on
Wikipedia, every article on the topic is, for me, part of a related
whole.
By finding a way to think about linked articles as a whole, we improve
our ability to deal with coverage systematically.
Ergo my proposal: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Phil_Sandifer/Branching
The biggest hurdle I see is the question of control. Like categories,
branching provides a great opportunity to screw up a lot of things
quickly. It violates the basic wiki principle of having things that
are easy to do be equally easy to undo. Which means we probably need
to develop some sort of way of controlling when articles branch. I
would imagine that a white list of accepted reasons (Books by an
author can always branch off of that author, episodes of a TV series
can always branch off of the TV series, etc) and a Branching Proposals
page where other proposals can be considered by the community would be
a good idea, along with policies that make merging branched articles
and deleting ill-advised branches easy.
What do people think? I'd love comments and thoughts about how to
proceed implementing this.
Best,
Phil Sandifer
Dear Wikipedians,
We're very short on disk space on one of our image servers and have to
move the image directory of the English wikipedia to another host.
During this migration, the image upload on en.wikipedia.org will be
disabled.
The maintenance will start on Saturday, September 6, 03:00 UTC.
We apologize for the trouble caused.
Best regards,
JeLuF
--
GMX startet ShortView.de. Hier findest Du Leute mit Deinen Interessen!
Jetzt dabei sein: http://www.shortview.de/wasistshortview.php?mc=sv_ext_mf@gmx
I doubt that deleted stuff is libelous.
Libelous material is oversighted, not AfD'd which is what the mentioned site
is archiving.
The mentioned site is not archiving oversighted material.
In a message dated 9/5/2008 3:23:54 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time,
nawrich(a)gmail.com writes:
Your suggestion might make sense if there were some greater value to having
broad access to deleted content from Wikipedia. Other sites might find
something worth seeing among the morass of deleted articles, but a lot of
that "content" is poisonous, libelous, or simply and sometimes harmfully
wrong. Why would we need to make it easier for people to see that stuff? For
the instances where content of relative value is deleted? Those pages would
be sort of a needle in a gigantic pile of manure, wouldn't they, and so
wouldn't the negatives clearly outweigh the positives on this one?
Nathan
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It's not a question of whether the content is good, it's a question of
whether it's libelous.
AfD is, in part for, the deletion of content which doesn't meet our criteria.
The issue raised here was that some of that content is libelous.
That is the issue I was addressing.
I wasn't addressing whether it's good.
In a message dated 9/5/2008 5:12:33 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time,
shimgray(a)gmail.com writes:
As such, taking the low level of oversight as an indication that the
rest of the content is reasonably good is... not very useful, I fear.
**************Psssst...Have you heard the news? There's a new fashion blog,
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And anyone who has a specific issue with a specific article can certainly
bring it forward. But in a general manner I think capturing the AfD's articles
(which is all this particular site does) is quite commendable.
If you visit the site, and review what they have listed and find something
libelous, then you can certainly bring that up. And by the way, people are
not shy to scream libel within AfD and if they do that portion of the article
can still be, and is, oversighted even while AfD is ongoing.
This actually occurs. It's not always done, because 95% of the time, it's
not libel at all.
In a message dated 9/5/2008 4:45:38 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time,
nawrich(a)gmail.com writes:
This is your oft-repeated version of how things *should be done* - not how
they are always done.
**************Psssst...Have you heard the news? There's a new fashion blog,
plus the latest fall trends and hair styles at StyleList.com.
(http://www.stylelist.com/trends?ncid=aolsty00050000000014)
I don't fully see the distinction you are trying to draw.
If I want information on my specific cancer, I will look at the specific
articles about it and the various specific procedures and drugs available.
That information applies to me, as well as it does to other cases. If the
information is in just a widely general presentation that no one can apply it,
then why have it at all? It serves no purpose to write in such a vague way
that no one can apply that knowledge.
"Can I eat with this medicine?" is a specific question that can be
specifically answered in our article, without the need to consult another doctor.
In a message dated 9/5/2008 4:24:11 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time,
thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com writes:
2008/9/5 <WJhonson(a)aol.com>:
> I'm not sure I fully agree with this. It would depend on the question.
> The internet allows people to check and re-check what they've been told.
> In that sense, our article on digitalis should strive to represent the
> average knowledge of the medical community, not just be a source of
entertainment
> for example.
>
> If our article on breast cancer could be improved in some way, that is a
> good thing.
I'll clarify a key point about what I said: Questions about *your
wife's* breast cancer should be directed to a doctor. Questions about
breast cancer *in general* could well be answered on Wikipedia and if
they're not already in the article the reference desk would be happy
to help (be careful how you phrase the question though or it might be
interpreted as a request for medical advice and deleted). If you want
to re-check what a doctor has told you about your specific case, you
go to a different doctor.
More generally, the issue of how encyclopaedic facts apply to a given
case is not, itself, encyclopaedic. The application of facts is a
matter for professionals, we just concern ourselves with the facts
themselves (the reference desks will sometimes help out with the
application, but generally the desks exist to help people find out
encyclopaedic facts, although sometimes facts too obscure to be
included in the encyclopaedia proper [yet, at least]).
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