Jesse W wrote:

As much as I don't want to get into this, and as much as I respect and appreciate Danny's work answering the phones and handling complaints, this is not right.

Further explanation *is needed*.

From what I understand, Danny, wanting to keep things from being unnecessarily dramatic, did not invoke the WP:OFFICE policy with regards to [[Newsmax.com]] and [[Christopher Ruddy]], even though, in fact, that was what was intended - someone had called the office, and complained about the articles. This is OK - although it is troubling that Danny feels the WP:OFFICE policy can't be used whenever it is needed.

What is not acceptable is to retroactively claim that the WP:OFFICE policy *was* invoked, and to then desysop and ban Eloquence on that basis. That's plainly and simply wrong. If it is required in some case that an action by Danny not be reversed, we *have* a policy for that. If Danny does not use it, it's a justified assumption that the action in question *can* be reversed, like any other action on the 'pedia, and immediate banning is not an acceptable response.

I urge that Jimbo, someone else from the Board, and/or Danny further explain and/or apologize for this apparent mistake. We have WP:OFFICE for a reason.

Jesse Weinstein

While I agree...I sense a disturbance in the force. Sean Barrett (The Epopt) just unblocked Erik. *sits back and waits for shit to hit the fan*

John

On 4/19/06, Mathias Schindler mathias.schindler@gmail.com wrote:

And make [[NewsMax.com]] a featured article after extensive review and sourcing. :)

Mathias

Tricky. The subject would have POV issues the size of GWB and the subject itself is likely to take a serious interest.

-- geni

Sean Barrett wrote:

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1

Erik Moeller stated for the record:

<snip>

...

I have just been indefinitely blocked from the English Wikipedia, and desysopped, by user Danny, under the new nickname "Dannyisme", as an "Office Action" for alleged "reckless endangerment" which was not specified further. I have called Danny on the phone, but he said that he was not willing to discuss the issue, and that I should instead talk to the Foundation attorney instead. To my knowledge, this is the first time office authority has been used to indefinitely block and desysop a user.

<snip>

I have unblocked Eloquence on the English Wikipedia. Blocking him was clearly inappropriate. Blocking him indefinitely was astoundingly stupid. Desysopping is equally insane, but resysopping him can wait for the wheels to grind.

Danny reverted the block, but didn't use the OFFICE account (Dannyisme). This is getting interesting...

John

I agree, an WP:OFFICE-action must be marked as one for it to be an OFFICE-action

Katefan0 katefan0wiki@gmail.com:

I think that lately Danny has not been using the OFFICE tag because people tend to raise a fuss over things protected under this specific policy, and more publicity to/furor over an issue that's already very sensitive is a thorny thing to deal with. My guess, anyway.

Forgive me if I haven't understood this correctly, but: OFFICE actions are unreversible on pain of dire consequences (e.g. desysopping and indefinite banning), yet anything that Danny does could be an OFFICE action even though not identified as such? This seems very problematic; is there now a class of editor (Danny) whose actions noone can now dare risk undoing in case the action turns out to be an OFFICE action? Surely not.

-- Matt

Are we ment to be afraid of danny?

On 4/19/06, Katefan0 katefan0wiki@gmail.com wrote:

Why is it problematic? It's a simple enough thing to simply ask Danny first before undoing something he's done, whether or not he's acted on behalf of the foundation. I've done it before (and gotten a "yes but I'd rather this stay low profile" answer very quickly).

Everybody who's an administrator knows -- or ought to know -- that any of Danny's actions could be undertaken on behalf of the foundation. To me, this suggests -- in fact, demands -- a lot more caution with undoing his admin actions than otherwise, and at the very least warrants a discreet "what's this about?" before taking action.

k

On 4/19/06, Matt R matt_crypto@yahoo.co.uk wrote:

...

Katefan0 katefan0wiki@gmail.com:

...

I think that lately Danny has not been using the OFFICE tag because

people

...

tend to raise a fuss over things protected under this specific policy,

and

...

more publicity to/furor over an issue that's already very sensitive is

a

...

...

thorny thing to deal with. My guess, anyway.

Forgive me if I haven't understood this correctly, but: OFFICE actions

are

...

unreversible on pain of dire consequences (e.g. desysopping and

indefinite

...

banning), yet anything that Danny does could be an OFFICE action even

though

...

not identified as such? This seems very problematic; is there now a

class of

...

editor (Danny) whose actions noone can now dare risk undoing in case the action turns out to be an OFFICE action? Surely not.

-- Matt

---

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On 4/19/06, Katefan0 katefan0wiki@gmail.com wrote:

Everybody who's an administrator knows -- or ought to know -- that any of Danny's actions could be undertaken on behalf of the foundation. To me, this suggests -- in fact, demands -- a lot more caution with undoing his admin actions than otherwise, and at the very least warrants a discreet "what's this about?" before taking action.

First of all, I appreciate the support that has been expressed in this thread. I hope we can put this episode behind us quickly and move on.

In response to the above: Danny had _explicitly_ labeled this page as a regular protected page, and _explicitly_ removed the {{office}} template. This is why I believed it was his point that it was _not_ a WP:OFFICE action, but one of his many ongoing contributions to Wikipedia as an editor and admin (over 30,000 edits on en.wp, only a tiny, tiny fraction of which are office-related). Please note that I assumed good faith on Danny's part, which is why I did not revert the "stubbification" itself. I trusted him, as an editor, on the content issue, but I objected to the act of protecting the article, if taken as a regular administrative action. I would _never_ revert a WP:OFFICE action that is labeled as such, but again, here the opposite was the case; it was labeled as a non-office action.

Apparently (I'm still not sure), the protection was a _sensitive_ Office Action which is not meant to be publicized as such. That idea did not occur to me. I'm not sure if this approach is at all viable (if anything, this episode may show that it is not), and I am not very fond of the idea of mixing regular editorial/sysop tasks with Office Actions which cannot be clearly distinguished, and whose reversal is, effectively, treated with the Wikipedia equivalent of the [[Usenet Death Penalty]]. However, please understand that I will from now on remain largely silent on this issue, and will wait for the Board to clarify things.

Again, I apologize if my actions were rash, but I believed them to be justified based on the information available to me. As of this point in time, I am banned for 48 hours; this is a punishment I can accept. I am also still indefinitely blocked on Meta and desysopped. I would like to kindly request that the remaining indefinite block and the desysopping will be reversed. Again, I will do my best to follow policy, even if the policy is that "Anything Danny does is unusual and should be treated differently from what regular admins/editors do". However, I do believe it needs to be clear _exactly_ what the situation is.

Thanks,

Erik

Stephen Bain wrote:

On 4/20/06, Katefan0 katefan0wiki@gmail.com wrote:

...

Everybody who's an administrator knows -- or ought to know -- that any of Danny's actions could be undertaken on behalf of the foundation. To me, this suggests -- in fact, demands -- a lot more caution with undoing his admin actions than otherwise, and at the very least warrants a discreet "what's this about?" before taking action.

I agree, and I think this is really the point to take out of this. We should all operate on the presumption that when Danny does something, he's doing it for a Good Reason, and that one shouldn't undo it unless one has checked the reason behind it with Danny first (that's if it should even be undone at all). A little communication solves alot of problems.

But Danny has explicitly said (on this list) that he is also a normal editor, and only his actions that are accompanied with a statement that they are WP:OFFICE actions should be treated as such. So if he does something and does not tag it WP:OFFICE, we should all operate on the presumption that he is doing it in his capacity as a normal Wikipedian.

-Mark

Kelly Martin wrote:

On 4/20/06, Delirium delirium@hackish.org wrote:

...

But Danny has explicitly said (on this list) that he is also a normal editor, and only his actions that are accompanied with a statement that they are WP:OFFICE actions should be treated as such. So if he does something and does not tag it WP:OFFICE, we should all operate on the presumption that he is doing it in his capacity as a normal Wikipedian.

That does not excuse reversion without discussion. Even taking as an assumption that Danny had been acting on his own behalf, Erik's actions could easily have been the start of a wheel war, and were inappropriate by any reasonable standard. WP:OFFICE has nothing to do with that; wheel warring is still wheel warring.

He didn't revert Danny's edits or wheel war. Danny stubbed and protected the page; Erik noted that he was willing to give Danny the benefit of the doubt on stubbing, but that the protection was contrary to the protection policy (a correct observation), so unprotected the page but left it stubbed. It is quite acceptable and even encouraged to unprotect pages that have been inappropriately protected.

If Danny had reprotected and Erik had unprotected again, that would be a wheel war. A single correction of a presumably mistaken admin action is not wheel-warring, especially when it doesn't even involve completely reversal of the action, just the problematic part.

In addition, blocking another user yourself after you personally have had an altercation with him has always been regarded as inappropriate, so Danny's block was inappropriate by any reasonable standard.

-Mark

Since Danny didn't apply the WP:OFFICE tag, does that warrant an immediate desysoping and indefinite ban? I've seen such measures only after an arbitration case. Nowhere did Danny say he was applying WP:OFFICE. If Erik got into a wheel war, fine. I've seen wheel-warring admins get desysoped (or cautioned, or whatever), but only after an arbitration case was held against them. An indef ban should certainly only come after an arbitration case.

On 4/20/06, Kelly Martin kelly.lynn.martin@gmail.com wrote:

On 4/20/06, Delirium delirium@hackish.org wrote:

...

He didn't revert Danny's edits or wheel war.

Yes, he did. He reverted another admin's protection within a very short time of when it was imposed, without discussion. That, by definition, is the open salvo in a wheel war.

Kelly _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

On 4/20/06, Sean Barrett sean@epoptic.org wrote:

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1

Death Phoenix stated for the record:

...

Since Danny didn't apply the WP:OFFICE tag, does that warrant an immediate desysoping and indefinite ban? I've seen such measures only after an arbitration case. Nowhere did Danny say he was applying WP:OFFICE. If Erik got into a wheel war, fine. I've seen wheel-warring admins get desysoped (or cautioned, or whatever), but only after an arbitration case was held against them. An indef ban should certainly only come after an arbitration case.

Minor correction: even the ArbComm cannot impose an indefinite ban.

Don't let the issue here get buried under discussion of OFFICE. The issue is that Danny, while apparently acting as a common or garden variety admin, -- and not just without discussion, but rather while /actively refusing to discuss/ -- imposed a lifetime ban from Wikipedia.

Indefinite block.

While /actively refusing to discuss/.

Precisely. Trying to defend Danny's desysopping and ban by crying wheel-war is just wikilawyering in my opinion.

--Oskar

On 4/20/06, Oskar Sigvardsson oskarsigvardsson@gmail.com wrote:

On 4/20/06, Sean Barrett sean@epoptic.org wrote:

...

Death Phoenix stated for the record:

...

Since Danny didn't apply the WP:OFFICE tag, does that warrant an immediate desysoping and indefinite ban? I've seen such measures only after an

<

...

Minor correction: even the ArbComm cannot impose an indefinite ban.

Both the ban and the desysopping were indefensible. Editors should not be punished for violating nonexistent policies.

Desysopping on more than one project was unprecedented and outrageous.

It is perfectly legitimate to have legal reasons for actions to remain secret. It is not legitimate to pretend that such reasons don't exist -- and then punish editors because they really do.

...

Don't let the issue here get buried under discussion of OFFICE. The issue is that Danny, while apparently acting as a common or garden variety admin, -- and not just without discussion, but rather while /actively refusing to discuss/ -- imposed a lifetime ban from Wikipedia.

Right. This is not an OFFICE issue, except insofar as that was the source of a misunderstanding. This is an issue of misuse of authority and refusal to communicate, once the misunderstanding had taken place.

-- ++SJ

...

Indefinite block.

While /actively refusing to discuss/.

Precisely. Trying to defend Danny's desysopping and ban by crying wheel-war is just wikilawyering in my opinion.

--Oskar

"Delerium",

In regards to:

[Erik] didn't revert Danny's edits or wheel war. Danny stubbed and protected the page; Erik noted that he was willing to give Danny the benefit of the doubt on stubbing, but that the protection was contrary to the protection policy (a correct observation), so unprotected the page but left it stubbed. It is quite acceptable and even encouraged to unprotect pages that have been inappropriately protected.

While we're engaging in this critique of Danny's response, it might make sense to ask whether or not Danny, and the other office people, are aware that there exists some large segment of the admin population who regard it as routine to undo other admin actions without discussion because they were "out of process", or "obviously wrong", or whatever. Can we imagine the possibility that some people might interpret that as inexplicable, or even hostile, interference, if they aren't used to this?

Jkelly

Geni,

You are suggesting that there are admins on wikipedia who are not aware that stuff done on wikipedia may be undone?

I'm not clear on whether or not you're just goofing around here. There are a lot of things that "may" potentially be done on a wiki that would surprise or alarm experienced users if they were actually put into practice. If you were just goofing, I didn't get the joke.

Jkelly

On 4/20/06, jkelly@fas.harvard.edu jkelly@fas.harvard.edu wrote:

While we're engaging in this critique of Danny's response, it might make sense to ask whether or not Danny, and the other office people, are aware that there exists some large segment of the admin population who regard it as routine to undo other admin actions without discussion because they were "out of process", or "obviously wrong", or whatever. Can we imagine the possibility that some people might interpret that as inexplicable, or even hostile, interference, if they aren't used to this?

Perhaps the real problem is that a large segment of our admin population needs not to be admins anymore.

Kelly

On 4/20/06, Oskar Sigvardsson oskarsigvardsson@gmail.com wrote:

We have, what, 4000 new articles a day, something like that. Something like half gets speedied, and a chunk goes to Afd or gets {{prod}}ed. We need every single admin we can get.

No, we don't. 50% of admin actions in March 2006 were performed by 29 of our nearly 900 admins; 90% by 170. We could probably lose 500 admins without any real impact on our ability to get administrative work done. Note also that sending articles to AfD or prod doesn't require an admin.

Simply disagreeing with someone, or thinking that they break some policies are not enough for desysopping. Such an action is never punitive, which means that an admin can (and should) only lose their status for misuse of their priviliges. Can you name anyone lately?

Karmafist. Ed Poor. Guanaco. Stevertigo. There's others; do you pay any attention to the Arbitration Committee's docket lately?

Kelly

On 4/20/06, Steve Bennett stevage@gmail.com wrote:

Would it be worth asking less active admins to consider handing in their mops, on the understanding that they can ask for them back without having to go through RfA again? Just to keep the number of mops out there down a bit?

I really don't see any need for that. Most of the low-activity admins aren't the ones causing trouble, just a few of them. My point is that we should not be that concerned about lopping off problematic admins; we're not running short on them by any means.

Kelly

On 4/20/06, Kirill Lokshin kirill.lokshin@gmail.com wrote:

The practical question here is how we go about determining which admins are "problematic".

Indeed.

Kelly

On 4/20/06, Andrew Gray shimgray@gmail.com wrote:

On 21/04/06, Kelly Martin kelly.lynn.martin@gmail.com wrote:

...

On 4/20/06, Kirill Lokshin kirill.lokshin@gmail.com wrote:

...

The practical question here is how we go about determining which admins are "problematic".

Indeed.

It is probably worth remembering that this whole sorry argument began with one of the few dozen people least likely to get desysopped by any such test...

If you mean the unprotect/desysop/block mess, certainly.

If we make some (possibly quite incorrect) assumptions about why Danny moved in the way he did -- to wit, that at least a partial reason for keeping office actions less visible is the leaking of deleted information -- it becomes less clear. Would desysopping the (assumed) admin(s) passing this information to wikitruth -- ignoring for the moment the question of whether we can catch them -- help in avoiding the need for this sort of secrecy in the future? Or will office actions need to be kept under wraps even if there's no danger of admins interfering?

Kirill Lokshin

...

I really don't see any need for that. Most of the low-activity admins aren't the ones causing trouble, just a few of them. My point is that we should not be that concerned about lopping off problematic admins; we're not running short on them by any means.

The practical question here is how we go about determining which admins are "problematic".

You are approaching the problem the wrong way. You only need to determine which _actions_ are problematic. Wikipedia has a number of policies for doing that. Then you only need to act on it.

-- mvh Björn

On Apr 20, 2006, at 3:49 PM, Steve Bennett wrote:

Would it be worth asking less active admins to consider handing in their mops, on the understanding that they can ask for them back without having to go through RfA again? Just to keep the number of mops out there down a bit?

What's the point? Are we running out of mops?

On 4/22/06, Philip Welch wikipedia@philwelch.net wrote:

On Apr 20, 2006, at 3:49 PM, Steve Bennett wrote:

...

Would it be worth asking less active admins to consider handing in their mops, on the understanding that they can ask for them back without having to go through RfA again? Just to keep the number of mops out there down a bit?

What's the point? Are we running out of mops?

It might reduce the risk of abuse of administrator powers such as that which is apparently taking place on wikitruth. I'm not convinced that it's feasible, though.

On Apr 20, 2006, at 2:53 PM, Kelly Martin wrote:

No, we don't. 50% of admin actions in March 2006 were performed by 29 of our nearly 900 admins; 90% by 170. We could probably lose 500 admins without any real impact on our ability to get administrative work done. Note also that sending articles to AfD or prod doesn't require an admin.

Here's an interesting question: assuming those statistics are the same each month, is it the same 29 admins each month, or does it turn over? Some months/days I really dig into CSD and PROD backlog, other months/days I'm too busy with real life to devote that much time.

geni geniice@gmail.com wrote: On 4/22/06, Philip Welch wrote:

On Apr 20, 2006, at 2:53 PM, Kelly Martin wrote:

...

No, we don't. 50% of admin actions in March 2006 were performed by 29 of our nearly 900 admins; 90% by 170. We could probably lose 500 admins without any real impact on our ability to get administrative work done. Note also that sending articles to AfD or prod doesn't require an admin.

Here's an interesting question: assuming those statistics are the same each month, is it the same 29 admins each month, or does it turn over? Some months/days I really dig into CSD and PROD backlog, other months/days I'm too busy with real life to devote that much time.

The top group are probably those killing pictures.

-- geni

What do you mean, "Killing pictures"....? Massive image deletions...?- Zero _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

--------------------------------- New Yahoo! Messenger with Voice. Call regular phones from your PC and save big.

I had a bash at creating a proposal which would define notability on wikipedia as meaning that an article or topic is mentioned in a third party reliable source. I figure it should be impossible to write an article without a third party reference, as per [[WP:V]], [[WP:NOR}] and [[WP:NPOV]], and so I hope that people will consider using that as the level for notability in areas where no other guidance exists.

Thoughts welcomed at [[Wikipedia:Notability/Proposals]].

----- Original Message ---- From: Philip Welch

...

I had a bash at creating a proposal which would define notability on wikipedia as meaning that an article or topic is mentioned in a third party reliable source.

I can provide multiple third party reliable sources as evidence that there is a four way stop on the intersection between Merman Drive and Terre View Drive in Pullman, Washington. Does that mean that aforementioned four way stop is worthy of mention in Wikipedia?

Recalling Jimbo's "Ten Things That Should Be Free" (http://many.corante.com/archives/2005/08/05/jimbos_problems_a_free_culture_m...)

in particular number 7: Free the Maps!

I would say absolute yes that information should be in a Wikimedia project that seamlessly integrates into Wikipedia.

Pete

MGM wrote:

On 4/25/06, Pete Bartlett pcb21@yahoo.com wrote: ----- Original Message ----

...

From: Philip Welch

...

...

I had a bash at creating a proposal which would define notability on wikipedia as meaning that an article or topic is mentioned in a third party reliable source.

I can provide multiple third party reliable sources as evidence that there is a four way stop on the intersection between Merman Drive and Terre View Drive in Pullman, Washington. Does that mean that aforementioned four way stop is worthy of mention in Wikipedia?

Recalling Jimbo's "Ten Things That Should Be Free" (http://many.corante.com/archives/2005/08/05/jimbos_problems_a_free_culture_m...)

in particular number 7: Free the Maps!

I would say absolute yes that information should be in a Wikimedia project that seamlessly integrates into Wikipedia.

Pete

Perhaps, but a map is not an encyclopedia. It should all be free, but not everything should necesserilly be put in this particular project. Mgm

The free encyclopedia, the free dictionary, the free news reports, the free media repositry, the free documents and quotes repositries, the free textbooks, the free species directory, <redlink>the free thesaurus</redlink> and <redlink>the free atlas</redlink>

are all different sides of the same coin. With the technology provided by the Web we should be mixing and integrating these much much more than we are. It is a great shame that there is very little cross-project co-operation. A further frustrating aspect of a large community directing a project is that it is very conservative and keen to maintain the status quo.

Why is that as a community we haven't been badgering the board to do anything dramatic since Wikinews was set up /18/ months ago.

Pete

On 4/25/06, Pete Bartlett pcb21@yahoo.com wrote:

MGM wrote:

...

On 4/25/06, Pete Bartlett pcb21@yahoo.com wrote: ----- Original Message ----

...

From: Philip Welch

...

...

I had a bash at creating a proposal which would define notability on wikipedia as meaning that an article or topic is mentioned in a third party reliable source.

I can provide multiple third party reliable sources as evidence that there is a four way stop on the intersection between Merman Drive and Terre View Drive in Pullman, Washington. Does that mean that aforementioned four way stop is worthy of mention in Wikipedia?

Recalling Jimbo's "Ten Things That Should Be Free" (http://many.corante.com/archives/2005/08/05/jimbos_problems_a_free_culture_m...)

in particular number 7: Free the Maps!

I would say absolute yes that information should be in a Wikimedia project that seamlessly integrates into Wikipedia.

Pete

Perhaps, but a map is not an encyclopedia. It should all be free, but not everything should necesserilly be put in this particular project. Mgm

The free encyclopedia, the free dictionary, the free news reports, the free media repositry, the free documents and quotes repositries, the free textbooks, the free species directory, <redlink>the free thesaurus</redlink> and <redlink>the free atlas</redlink>

are all different sides of the same coin. With the technology provided by the Web we should be mixing and integrating these much much more than we are. It is a great shame that there is very little cross-project co-operation. A further frustrating aspect of a large community directing a project is that it is very conservative and keen to maintain the status quo.

Wikimaps sadly isn't really practicle. A lot of work goes into makeing a map and a lot of that has to be done on the ground. If you want free maps you may just have to wait for the copyright on OS maps and the like to expire and then work from those.

Why is that as a community we haven't been badgering the board to do anything dramatic since Wikinews was set up /18/ months ago.

Pete

Because wikiversity din't really get the support some people were expecting. -- geni

On 25/04/06, S.M.Sabri S.M.Ismail sms@sabre23t.com wrote:

With the spread of consumer GPS devices, from Garmin/Magellan and others, "free map" is getting more practical. A wiki method of creating the maps would split "trackers" who uploads the tracks of roads and other features, and "mappers" who trace over the tracks and storing/compiling in useable formats format.

See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mashup_%28web_application_hybrid%29#Mapping_mas...

Steve

MGM, Geni and Erik wrote about:

WikiAtlas

As it was the specific example of mapping data that spurred my mini-rant, I wanted to quickly reply on that aspect. The more general stuff I hope to say something more coherent on later.

To Geni: Yes copyright isn't on our side here. But the situation in the US is better than many other places, so we could push ahead there.

To MGM: I want to encourage more general thinking than a binary "this is in" /"this is out". Of course if we are writing about Pullman, Washington, to write in prose about every junction would be tedious beyond belief. But on the hand, why shouldn't (in an ideal Free world) the user have the possibility to open a sidebar with a map of the area to the standard of Google Maps, with other places with a Wikipedia article marked on. etc etc. We should have useful integration, not standalone barely-speaking-to-one-another projects.

If that's a bit blue sky here's another example, if you go to the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London article you will see some co-ordinates in the top-right corner (at least in Monobook skin - not sure about the rest). Click those co-ordinates and you get a list of map resources - it is an extension modelled on clicking on an ISBN. That is a simple idea, but is really effective. I'd like to see that spread across all geographical articles just as a simple start. Also, is there a show-stopping reason why the extension is not turned on MediaWiki? (I'll try the other list for that)

Pete

...

Why is that as a community we haven't been badgering the board to do anything dramatic since Wikinews was set up /18/ months ago.

Cuz Wikinews isn't good yet, Wikipedia is only good in one language (German) and usable in a couple more (English, etc.), Wiktionary is just there, Wikibooks is a mess, and Wikiversity doesn't even know what it is yet.

It would be best if we didn't subdivide our efforts even more than they are now, or we won't get anything done!

Well "dramatic" didn't have to mean a new project!

Why is de: better than en: is a great question. They appear to have covered classic encyclopedic topics much better than en: and their proportion of Exzellente Artikeler is double that of our FAs, despite standards. How to learn from de would be a great thing to discuss.

You also note that other projects are stumbling along and that they are cause a sub-division of effort. We should change things so that projects collaborate routinely. You can click on any word in Britannica Online and get a dictionary definition for example. Why not have this in Wikipedia?

Why not have extensions that auto-detect the existence of quotations or source material by or about a person and even drag a snippet of it into the sidebar?

Yep there is lots to do, but recently the unimaginative debates about notability seem to be dominating.

Pete

Because our Devs are already hopelessly overloaded with feature requests.

Yes I am aware how easily this could become "Request A Feature" thread. I think the devs we have do a fabulous job and do not want to pound on them.

One wonderful thing Brion has done recently is get the Foundation signed up for the Google Summer of Code. Let's make sure the community tells the devs what is important to us. There are a list of possible projects at

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Summer_of_Code_2006

Pete

Stan Shebs schrieb:

Pete Bartlett wrote:

...

Why is de: better than en: is a great question. They appear to have covered classic encyclopedic topics much better than en: and their proportion of Exzellente Artikeler is double that of our FAs, despite standards. How to learn from de would be a great thing to discuss.

In a word: "Ordnung".

The full range of connotation is not easily translated into English, but the disambig for de:'s [[Ordnung]] connects to lots of telling things, such as en:'s [[social structure]] and the like. At the risk of playing amateur sociologist and offending everybody, I'll opine that while the German cultural liking for "Ordnung" sounds to USians and Brits an awful lot like a compulsion to "follow orders", in the WP context I think it translates to a greater sense of duty to help achieve communal goals.

As a german Wikipedian, I would dispute this. It is definitely not Ordnung and a sense of duty which makes the difference between English and German Wikipedia. And even if this claim comes up again and again, I'm not even sure that German Wikipedia is really better than English Wikipedia. They are different and have different strengthes.

Now...let me collect some differences, I leave it to the reader to draw his own conclusions.

On 2nd April 2006 the category:Living people on en contained 81.930 entries while the number of _all_ german articles tagged with Personendaten (=almost all wikified biographies) was 86.830. I was surprised.

When I compare RfA on en and de, I count support votes on en: 31, 53, 45, 48, 61, 81, 28, 76, 50 on de: 72 (loosing candidate), 6 (loosing candidate), 93, 143 (loosing candidate!), 92, 55 It seems rather strange to me that the bigger community has less participation on such an important topic as is "who should become admin". I didn't look at the criteria voters use on en, but they might be also a bit different. On de candidates who really do a lot of useful cleanup work are regularly turned down if they are not able to show that they are also good authors. Other no-nos are bad behaviour, ignorance and especially ignorance and wrong actions in image right questions.

Social structure. The german wikipedia has a geographical advantage here because it covers a smaller area than the english. I may be a bit exceptional but my estimate is that I've met at least 150 wikipedians in person. Those 150 wikipedians know others who know others... there is a rather close network of personal relationships among german wikipedians (including of course the wikipedians from Austria and Switzerland). This becomes especially important in case of conflicts: a good editor in wikistress, deleting his userpage and quitting? He'll be flooded with emails and maybe a calm discussion with one of his friends on the phone will sort the problem out.

Let's look at the structure of the IRC channels now. English wikipedia has the general channel #wikipedia with an extremely low signal to noise ratio, the a bit more quiet #wikipedia-en and - I may be mistaken on the following: a closed admin channel, a bootcamp, mediation, probation and esperanza (whatever this is).

German wikipedia has: the general channel #wikipedia-de for socializing, coordinating general work on the wiki, discussing events on wp, calling an admin for quick vandal bans etc. Rarely people who chat too much off topic (=not wikipedia related) receive a friendly kick. Other channels: #hist.wikipedia where most historians hang out. #phil.wikipedia - meeting channel for the philosophers. #bio.wikipedia - home of the biologists. Some people frequent only the topic channels and not the general one. The biology channel was the first topic channel set up and reflects the strength of the german wikipedia in biology. The Projekt:Lebewesen (living beings) is the most active project on de and they fill one whole column on featured articles alone (the historians are catching up).

General atmosphere. It's difficult to get hard data on this, but the thing I hear most often is: atmosphere on the English Wikipedia is much more relaxed and people are friendlier and politer. There are even a few users who left the German Wikipedia with this reason and work only on en. So it might be true. This feeling is often connected to the behaviour on AfD. Hurtful comments are frequent there, combined with a much lower threshold for AfD: articles which are tagged as stub on en are usually proposed for deletion on de (and either expanded or deleted).

One group of prominent editors sticks to the maxims on the page "Be cruel" (http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Sei_grausam ). This is not meant literally, but in the sense of Larry Sanger: To attract and retain the participation of experts, there would have to be little patience for those who do not understand or agree with Wikipedia's mission, or even for those pretentious mediocrities who are not able to work with others constructively and recognize when there are holes in their knowledge (collectively, probably the most disruptive group of all). A less tolerant attitude toward disruption would make the project more polite, welcoming, and indeed open to the vast majority of intelligent, well-meaning people on the Internet. --Larry Sanger

Refering to this "meme" (it's not a guideline), users have - undisputed by the community - been blocked for "disturbing good authors from writing articles". Leads to blocking and banning customs. The german wikipedia has no arbitration committee. A poll to establish one has not reached a necessary majority, the community divided about the question. Long term bans are decided by a community vote, short term bans are pronounced at the individual admin's own discretion. If another admins thinks a ban too harsh, he may shorten or lift it. Wheel wars about such issues are rare, though.

Wikipedia namespace. This topic probably comes closest to Stan's assumption of "Ordnung". Personally, I love the Wikipedia namespace in the English Wikipedia. There is so much to discover, so many obscure, interesting or funny pages. However, without counting, I have the impression that en has many many more pages in this namespace than de. When I look in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Wikipedia_style_guidelines I find a huge number of good advices, guides for almost everything (hey, even a whole page for how to set dashes). The number of german pages is much lower. Pages in the Wikipedia namespace are routinely scrutinized if they are really necessary and often merged into existing ones or deleted. http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProjekt_Usability/%C3%9Cbersicht is a rather complete overview of all important documentation pages.

Last point of this long mail: the impressive german projects like the printed wikireaders, the DVD, the writing contest with big media echo etc. In my opinion, these are due to several factors: 1) the independence of the german community from Jimbo and the Wikimedia Foundation. The English Wikipedia is very much a monarchy, with people looking to Jimbo for advice and guidance. The german wikipedia had and has nobody with Jimbo's authority. People had to deal with the fact that there is no ultimate appeal. This has consequences for the social structure (which evolved to what I'd characterize as a meritocracy with a few prominent and influential editors) but also for the possibility to realize such projects. People had to act on their own, so they did it. 2) Personal dedication and leadership of individual Wikipedians. Most projects were team work, but there was usually one person who invested much more work than the others. The driving force behind Wikipedia academy in June is one editor, Frank. The driving force behind many successful initiatives like the writing contest is Achim Raschka. The driving force behind the Wikipedia exhibition were Frank for the organisation and me for the realization. The WikiReaders were produced by individuals. etc. 3) For the DVD and WikiPress: the luck to find a good partner company which is crazy enough to take up the accompanying risks and whose bosses and employees "grok" the Wiki way. The first thing Vlado, one of the Directmedians, did after the first CD was finally ready for production was to expand the article Reggae to double its size - at 3 o'clock at night. Just to relax...

So much for a comparison between English and German Wikipedia. I noticed that I wrote much more about de, as I know the project much better. Maybe someone else could add more facts about en. I'm placing this text also on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Elian/comparison - feel free to edit and add comments there (and of course fix my bad english ;-).

greetings, elian

On en: vs de:

From my experience, two (rather unrelated) differences

are most striking:

(A) On de: the argument "no real (convential) encyclopedia would write this" is by and large honored (or at least considered). On en: this argument is ignored, or even considered trollish.

(B) On de: all articles are expected to be accessable to a general audience (the horrible and horribly named "Oma-Test" -- "grandmother test"). On en: there are a lot of articles in mathematics and physics addressed to users definitively having some education in the area. I assume most experts are flocking to en: anyway, as it seems pointless to have advanced articles in other languages than English.

Regars, Peter [[User:Pjacobi]]

Pete Bartlett wrote:

----- Original Message ---- From: Philip Welch

...

...

I had a bash at creating a proposal which would define notability on wikipedia as meaning that an article or topic is mentioned in a third party reliable source.

I can provide multiple third party reliable sources as evidence that there is a four way stop on the intersection between Merman Drive and Terre View Drive in Pullman, Washington. Does that mean that aforementioned four way stop is worthy of mention in Wikipedia?

Recalling Jimbo's "Ten Things That Should Be Free" (http://many.corante.com/archives/2005/08/05/jimbos_problems_a_free_culture_m...)

in particular number 7: Free the Maps!

I would say absolute yes that information should be in a Wikimedia project that seamlessly integrates into Wikipedia.

Perhaps when we are faced with information about such an obscure intersection the question should be, "Where does it belong?" and not "Wat's the quickest way to get rid of it?"

Ec

On 4/24/06, Philip Welch wikipedia@philwelch.net wrote:

On Apr 23, 2006, at 4:21 PM, Steve Block wrote:

...

I had a bash at creating a proposal which would define notability on wikipedia as meaning that an article or topic is mentioned in a third party reliable source.

I can provide multiple third party reliable sources as evidence that there is a four way stop on the intersection between Merman Drive and Terre View Drive in Pullman, Washington. Does that mean that aforementioned four way stop is worthy of mention in Wikipedia?

According to his proposal, yes, it does.

Of course, to be realistic you'd have to add in [[Wikipedia:Article size]]. An article just about a four-way stop would probably be better off merged with another article and redirected, unless it was a particularly interesting four-way stop.

Anthony

On 4/25/06, Philip Welch wikipedia@philwelch.net wrote:

On Apr 25, 2006, at 2:39 PM, Anthony DiPierro wrote:

...

...

I can provide multiple third party reliable sources as evidence that there is a four way stop on the intersection between Merman Drive and Terre View Drive in Pullman, Washington. Does that mean that aforementioned four way stop is worthy of mention in Wikipedia?

According to his proposal, yes, it does.

Of course, to be realistic you'd have to add in [[Wikipedia:Article size]]. An article just about a four-way stop would probably be better off merged with another article and redirected, unless it was a particularly interesting four-way stop.

So [[Pullman, Washington]] would have detailed prose about each and every single intersection? That's absurd.

Strawman. I never said anything about [[Pullman, Washington]] *or* every intersection.

Anthony

On May 2, 2006, at 3:18 AM, Zoney wrote:

...

...

According to his proposal, yes, it does.

Of course, to be realistic you'd have to add in [[Wikipedia:Article size]]. An article just about a four-way stop would probably be better off merged with another article and redirected, unless it was a particularly interesting four-way stop.

So [[Pullman, Washington]] would have detailed prose about each and every single intersection? That's absurd.

There's little need to deliberately present such absurd options, that obviously aren't being suggested by others.

The logical place to merge a sentence or two about an intersection is into the article for that route.

Great. Now every city street has its own article. Imagine:

---

From [[Merman Drive, Pullman, Washington]]:

The drive goes past several apartment complexes, a coffee shop, and a bar. The vast majority of the street's population consists of [[Washington State University]] students.

Merman Drive intersects [[Terre View Drive, Pullman, Washington]] at a [[four-way stop]]. This stop is at the same intersection as Zoe's Cafe, the aforementioned coffee shop.

---

Shoot me now.

On 5/2/06, Steve Bennett stevage@gmail.com wrote:

On 03/05/06, Philip Welch wikipedia@philwelch.net wrote:

...

Shoot me now.

If it was done well, and linked to Google Maps or something, it would actually be kind of cool.

Steve

Personally, I think this sort of thing would lead to a Wiktionary-like thing, in which valid but extremely numerous data is moved to its own project. Philip, would a Wikimap make you want to shoot yourself as well?

~maru

Philip Welch wrote:

Great. Now every city street has its own article. [...] Shoot me now.

No one would hunt you down and force you to read such articles. :)

On 5/2/06, Philip Welch wikipedia@philwelch.net wrote:

On May 2, 2006, at 3:18 AM, Zoney wrote:

...

...

...

According to his proposal, yes, it does.

Of course, to be realistic you'd have to add in [[Wikipedia:Article size]]. An article just about a four-way stop would probably be better off merged with another article and redirected, unless it was a particularly interesting four-way stop.

So [[Pullman, Washington]] would have detailed prose about each and every single intersection? That's absurd.

There's little need to deliberately present such absurd options, that obviously aren't being suggested by others.

The logical place to merge a sentence or two about an intersection is into the article for that route.

Great. Now every city street has its own article. Imagine:

That would be incredible, but somehow I doubt there are that many dedicated Wikipedians that it's going to happen.

Anyway, I look forward to the day when I can use Wikipedia to find out about the local coffee shops and Linux User Groups and radio stations and indie artists. If that means I have to stop myself from clicking on a link to [[Harrisburg Street, St. Petersburg]] and reading about the width of the sidewalks, it's well worth it.

Otherwise, if you can think of some way that Wikipedia can allow what's interesting to me but not allow what I personally find to be "cruft", without boring me with the nearly impossible task of going through every VFD discussion myself, I'd love to hear it.

Anthony

On 5/3/06, Justin Cormack justin@specialbusservice.com wrote:

On 3 May 2006, at 12:38, Anthony DiPierro wrote:

...

...

That would be incredible, but somehow I doubt there are that many dedicated Wikipedians that it's going to happen.

Anyway, I look forward to the day when I can use Wikipedia to find out about the local coffee shops and Linux User Groups and radio stations and indie artists. If that means I have to stop myself from clicking on a link to [[Harrisburg Street, St. Petersburg]] and reading about the width of the sidewalks, it's well worth it.

The problem I have with all this stuff is the people who dont understand that an encyclopaedia is a historic record, and that just try to write this stuff about what things are now. Unless people are prepared to write from a historical perspective it is a guidebook not an encyclopaedia.

Well, I intentionally included a list of things which *can* be written about historically, and not just as a guidebook. I agree with you that it's important that the articles we have focus on presenting timeless depictions. Sure, some instances of these things will be short lived, but there are usually natural parent articles to put them in when that's the case.

So a history of the Linux User Groups on your street, referenced with the CVS checkin histories from the street's IP addresses, yes; "There is a Linux User group in my street" or "this street is mostly inhabited by students and my friends and has a coffee shop on the crossroadds" is just cruft in the most derogatory sense, and should be deleted, or transwikied to a guidebook.

Justinc

In the extreme case of "There is a Linux User group in my street", yes. But that sentence doesn't even allow one to identify what the person is talking about, so that's an extreme example.

Better than deleting less extreme examples, in my opinion, would be to drop a note on the talk page of the person who created the article and tell them that information added to the encyclopedia needs to be verifiable and timeless ([[Wikipedia:Avoid statements that will date quickly]] is the best link I could come up with right now, if that's the best there is then it should probably be improved, though). Then sprinkle it with {{fact}}, cut out any dubious statements, and put it on some list along the lines of ([[Wikipedia:horrible articles which will be removed if they don't shape up really soon]]) for a couple weeks and delete it if it doesn't get improved to where it's verifiable and from a perspective of history (or have a chance of quickly getting there).

By the way, [[LUG]]s generally aren't attached to streets, they're usually attached to entire metropolitan areas. In fact, I suspect a well-written article on the [[Suncoast Linux Users Group]], for example, would survive a VFD vote today.

Anthony

On 03/05/06, Steve Bennett stevage@gmail.com wrote:

...

By the way, [[LUG]]s generally aren't attached to streets, they're usually attached to entire metropolitan areas. In fact, I suspect a well-written article on the [[Suncoast Linux Users Group]], for example, would survive a VFD vote today.

I'm sad to hear that well-writtenness is a criteria in AfDs. If it's not well-written someone should just fix it.

Agreed. On the other side of the coin, though...sometimes it takes a mite of brilliant prose to make people realise that it's worth replicating the effort throughout a page.

Rob Church

On 03/05/06, geni geniice@gmail.com wrote:

Someone?

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Cleanup_by_month

15000 articles.

Looks like anyone who might be that someone has enough work on their hands already.

Yep. But the vast majority of those articles are good enough that they're better than a conspicuous hole where they used to be. I don't object to us aiming for higher standards, but I do object to us nuking anything that's trying to get there - if slowly.

Steve

Steve Bennett wrote:

On 03/05/06, geni geniice@gmail.com wrote:

...

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Cleanup_by_month 15000 articles. Looks like anyone who might be that someone has enough work on their hands already.

Yep. But the vast majority of those articles are good enough that they're better than a conspicuous hole where they used to be.

That's true almost by definition; if they were worse than a conspicuous hole, most of them would already have been replaced by one.

On 03/05/06, Anthony DiPierro wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:

By a horrible article I mean one with no verifiable content whatsoever. Depending whether or not the person creating the article seems to be acting in good faith I'd say it should stay around between no time at all and two weeks or so.

Ah, so you mean an article with no claim to notability, or a suspected hoax? Both candidates for speedy deletion :) If all the content is unverifiable, it could always be trimmed down without going through AfD at all.

And IMO yes, an article which is not verifiable is worse than nothing at all. It should be corrected as soon as possible, and keeping it around in the main namespace for very long is not acceptable (still IMO, of course).

How about stubbing it and moving the content to the talk page, gently redirecting the newbie there? I'm just speculating a bit here...

I agree with that point to some extent (at some point you've gotta just stop feeding the trolls though). In any case, how well written an article is *does* tend to affect the outcome of votes on deletion.

Pity.

Steve

On 03/05/06, Anthony DiPierro wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:

As for "an article with no claim to notability", I actually have no idea what that phrase means.

An article has to establish the notability of its subject. If it doesn't do that, it's subject to speedy deletion.

...I recite.

Stubbing only works if there's something there you can verify in the first place. Stubbing an article without verifying that your stub is accurate first is a very bad idea IMO, because it gives false credibility to the possibly inaccurate statement.

Heh: '''John Smith''' was a rap singer [citation needed].

Steve

On May 3, 2006, at 4:48 AM, Justin Cormack wrote:

The problem I have with all this stuff is the people who dont understand that an encyclopaedia is a historic record, and that just try to write this stuff about what things are now. Unless people are prepared to write from a historical perspective it is a guidebook not an encyclopaedia.

In this case, the coffee shop used to be a Hi-Co, and the bar was only built in the last couple of months.

On May 3, 2006, at 4:38 AM, Anthony DiPierro wrote:

That would be incredible, but somehow I doubt there are that many dedicated Wikipedians that it's going to happen.

Anyway, I look forward to the day when I can use Wikipedia to find out about the local coffee shops and Linux User Groups and radio stations and indie artists. If that means I have to stop myself from clicking on a link to [[Harrisburg Street, St. Petersburg]] and reading about the width of the sidewalks, it's well worth it.

Otherwise, if you can think of some way that Wikipedia can allow what's interesting to me but not allow what I personally find to be "cruft", without boring me with the nearly impossible task of going through every VFD discussion myself, I'd love to hear it.

Actually, it would be not too bad to put together city guides and such, either within Wikipedia or within a separate project. But there is so much more content of such wider interest waiting to be developed that we shouldn't divide our efforts.

On May 3, 2006, at 10:12 AM, Anthony DiPierro wrote:

...

Actually, it would be not too bad to put together city guides and such, either within Wikipedia or within a separate project. But there is so much more content of such wider interest waiting to be developed that we shouldn't divide our efforts.

The same could be said of *any* category of articles. Why write about presidents, or hurricanes, or rock stars, or fortune 500 companies, when there is so much else to do? I'd personally rather read about coffee shops and indie artists than fortune 500 companies and rock stars anyway.

I'm going to take a wild guess and say that [[Zoe's Cafe, Pullman, Washington]] will be of interest to fewer readers than [[Hurricane Katrina]].

There are probably some fascinating and unique coffee shops that we can have articles on, but the one down the street from me probably isn't one of them.

Philip Welch wrote:

Great. Now every city street has its own article. Imagine:

From [[Merman Drive, Pullman, Washington]]:

The drive goes past several apartment complexes, a coffee shop, and a bar. The vast majority of the street's population consists of [[Washington State University]] students.

Merman Drive intersects [[Terre View Drive, Pullman, Washington]] at a [[four-way stop]]. This stop is at the same intersection as Zoe's Cafe, the aforementioned coffee shop.

At least you could say who it's named after. Two US streets that I've been on and have wondered about are Chef Menteur Highway in New Orleans and Last Chance Gulch in Helena. MT

Ec

On Apr 25, 2006, at 2:54 PM, Anthony DiPierro wrote:

...

I can provide multiple third party reliable sources as evidence that there is a four way stop on the intersection between Merman Drive and Terre View Drive in Pullman, Washington. Does that mean that aforementioned four way stop is worthy of mention in Wikipedia?

-- Philip L. Welch http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Philwelch

By the way, just out of curiousity, what would those sources be? Remember not to violate [[WP:NOR]].

I found one arguably "reliable source" at http://www.wmel.wsu.edu/directions/directions.html. It's a website, but it's a .edu website. Google Book Search finds nothing for the names of the two roads in quotes. Maybe if it's a particularly busy road there would be some mention in newspapers...

Maps, Pullman Transit schedules, driving directions.

Here's some more information that is verifiable from third party reliable sources: there is a "Turney Hitler" living in Lakeside California, and his phone number is 619-390-9009. The third party reliable source in question is anywho.com, an online telephone directory. I don't think poor Mr. Hitler deserves mention in Wikipedia, however.

On 4/25/06, Philip Welch wikipedia@philwelch.net wrote:

. I don't think poor Mr. Hitler deserves mention in Wikipedia, however.

Does he know Brian Peppers?

I don't know if streets were your best example. Streets rarely survive an AfD (on grounds of notability).

Joe

On 4/30/06, Steve Block steve.block@myrealbox.com wrote:

Philip Welch wrote:

...

On Apr 23, 2006, at 4:21 PM, Steve Block wrote:

...

I had a bash at creating a proposal which would define notability on wikipedia as meaning that an article or topic is mentioned in a third party reliable source.

I can provide multiple third party reliable sources as evidence that there is a four way stop on the intersection between Merman Drive and Terre View Drive in Pullman, Washington. Does that mean that aforementioned four way stop is worthy of mention in Wikipedia?

What this guideline is trying to do is define notability within the verifiability chain.

It attempts to close the door on the possibility of allowing wikipedians to decide what is and isn't notable, something I believe is against both the original research and POV policies. We should seek to summarise claims of importance, where those claims are verifiable.

If there are no outside sources, how do we write an encyclopedic article on the topic, how do we quantify the value of the topic, without breaking the original research policy? Yes, I could write an article on my street, for which verifiability exists in many sources, as do the businesses and houses upon it. I could detail, through land registry searches, phone books and electoral rolls, the history of the street. But this violates original research; I have compiled a new narrative. I have summarised something which does not actually exist, and for someone to verify it they would have to repeat the research. Jimbo prescribed against this way back, stating that something is encyclopedic if "it is information which is verifiable and which can be easily presented in an NPOV fashion."

Verifiability, NOR and NPOV do not mean we can write articles on topics we happen to feel should have them, they mean we should write articles on topics for which we have good sources, the summation of which do not amount to the original research through creating a novel narrative, and which does not impart greater weight to the topic than exists in the wider world, represented by the reliable sources we seek.

If we source only from the primary source, the topic itself, we cannot do anything but present information from a biased point of view. Yes, it is disappointing that there exists categories of information for which Wikipedia would be a wonderful repository, but for which no other sources exist for us to summate. However, that cannot be something we should seek to remedy. Wikipedia is not a place for original research. To me, that means Wikipedia cannot be a place to make claims of importance for any topic. Such claims should already be established within reliable sources, before we can attempt to document them. It is unfortunate that closers in afd discussions are not mindful of this, but it is the case that Wikipedia is a tertiary source. Wikipedia is not a repository for primary research.

So is your four way stop worthy of an article? On the strength of your description, I would say no, because you are imparting undue weight to it by creating such an article, you are presenting information for your own point of view rather than summarising someone else's, and if the article states only that four way stop on the intersection between Merman Drive and Terre View Drive in Pullman, Washington then I'd consider speedying it per A1.

Steve Block

-- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.1.385 / Virus Database: 268.5.1/327 - Release Date: 28/04/06

---

WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

It's dangerous to apply the notion of "original research" too literally outside of its original context (dealing with crackpot theories, or simply novel ones, student essays, and so on). Beyond that context, I'm not literalistic, and I don't need a lot of guidlines. I think I know it when I see it, and I think I know what is not intended to be covered by the expression when I see it, even if it could be brought under the literal description that is used. Common sense has to prevail, I think, which is why we have all these processes involving shared community perceptions.

An example of something that is probably NOT "original research": "Bloggs has approvingly cited the work of Derrida to attack the philosophy of bohemian snarkism. According to Bloggs, it is all 'words, words, words.' <reference, Joe Bloggs, Anti-Snark, p. 300>"

An example of something that certainly IS original research: "Bloggs, who has attacked the philosophy of bohemian snarkism, could have found further support for his view by applying certain claims famously made by Derrida. <reference, Jacques Derrida, Words/ Words/ Words, p. 300>"

We all make these kinds of distinctions reasonably confidently, don't we? When in doubt, at the margins, we do indeed want to call on our collective wisdom. The process seems straightforward enough to me, though I suppose I might change my mind if I got caught in an edit war over it.

As for notability, I'm not sure I properly understand the argument. It seems to me that we have a (loose and largely unofficial) body of criteria to apply to decide whether or not something is notable. We don't apply novel theories, we just find the facts and apply the criteria. The facts should be publicly available ones. The criteria themselves get clarified and developed from case to case, with commonsense input from the community to resolve doubts in individual hard cases. That seems like the right way to go about it to me. I'm not sure whether I'm in disagreement with anyone here or not, but it just doesn't seem all that complicated at my end.

Russell Blackford (a.k.a. Metamagician3000)

----- Original Message ----- From: "charles matthews" charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com To: "English Wikipedia" wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Sent: Monday, May 01, 2006 7:35 PM Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Verifiability equating to notability

"Steve Block" wrote

...

It attempts to close the door on the possibility of allowing wikipedians to decide what is and isn't notable, something I believe is against both the original research and POV policies. We should seek to summarise claims of importance, where those claims are verifiable.

Err ... why? This may be what we resort to in some cases (garage bands). But it is a bad idea in other cases (e.g. academics). And I think we all should be allowed to express opinions on notability. In some areas, for example the arts, poetry, if you go by tallying up awards and honours and suchlike 'objective' credits, you will only reproduce the contours of the 'academic art' of the time. Thus missing what is coming up, for example.

Further, there could hardly be a better example of how 'original research', launched by Jimbo as a way to deal with crank theories, has been spandexed as an argument.

Charles

I find it difficult to set rules in the abstract - all the more so from being a lawyer by training, with a good knowledge of how slippery language can get once you try to apply it to an unforeseen situation. Thankfully we only have policies and guidelines to worry about, not things that are supposed to be binding laws. I'd agree with you about the Foo case, though. I would vote to delete such an article unless I saw evidence that other people with some profile were already commenting on the "Foo" meme (e.g. op.ed. pieces, editorials, or well-known blogs (but what is "well-known"?). Without that, I'd consider the article original research. (Put aside whether there's a dicdef issue; I'm assuming the article could be expanded beyond a mere definition of "Foo").

In other cases I'm not so sure. What about all those articles on fictional characters who may not have been discussed much in critical sources? I wouldn't necessarily want to say that these characters are non-notable, even though I sometimes think we give too much importance to them and not enough to real people who are important in the adult world. I think they are notable because they often just do have a cultural impact that we can all sort of take judicial notice of without dreaming up novel theories. If we accept that much, I'm then happy for someone to say: "Sammy Snark gets killed at the end of the first-series story arc of Blogsville" with a citation to the actual episode rather than to a secondary source. In this sort of context, some easily replicable putting together of a narrative doesn't worry me, and I don't interpret the original research proscription as covering this kind of thing in spirit. What's your take on this kind of example?

Russell (a.k.a Metamagician3000)

----- Original Message ----- From: "Steve Block" steve.block@myrealbox.com To: "English Wikipedia" wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Sent: Monday, May 01, 2006 11:41 PM Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Verifiability equating to notability

Russell Blackford wrote:

...

It's dangerous to apply the notion of "original research" too literally outside of its original context (dealing with crackpot theories, or simply novel ones, student essays, and so on). Beyond that context, I'm not literalistic, and I don't need a lot of guidlines. I think I know it when I see it, and I think I know what is not intended to be covered by the expression when I see it, even if it could be brought under the literal description that is used. Common sense has to prevail, I think, which is why we have all these processes involving shared community perceptions.

An example of something that is probably NOT "original research": "Bloggs has approvingly cited the work of Derrida to attack the philosophy of bohemian snarkism. According to Bloggs, it is all 'words, words, words.' <reference, Joe Bloggs, Anti-Snark, p. 300>"

An example of something that certainly IS original research: "Bloggs, who has attacked the philosophy of bohemian snarkism, could have found further support for his view by applying certain claims famously made by Derrida. <reference, Jacques Derrida, Words/ Words/ Words, p. 300>"

We all make these kinds of distinctions reasonably confidently, don't we? When in doubt, at the margins, we do indeed want to call on our collective wisdom. The process seems straightforward enough to me, though I suppose I might change my mind if I got caught in an edit war over it.

I think we're in broad agreement. The trouble is, at the thin edge, you get people arguing that because everyone says "Foo", we can have an article on "Foo", and note all the blogs and people who have said "Foo", especially on "XYZ message boards", because Bloggs has set up a website documenting the history of XYZ message board, and also the posts are all archived and you can clearly see where Bleggs said "Foo" to Blaggs and Bliggs banned him.

Apparently, because this can all be sourced it isn't original research, because there are no sources disputing it it isn't a point of view, and it's all sourced so it's verifiable. The issue is that it is original research because the particular documentation of these things create a novel narrative which exists nowhere but on Wikipedia. But that doesn't seem to hold sway over people. To me, no original research means we can't personally see it, we need someone to see it for us and then we can summarise them. So if nobody else has commented on Bleggs saying "Foo" to Blaggs in a reliable source, it's original research for us to document it. The problem is that there is an issue as to whether things recorded on the internet as they happen exist in the same sense as a tree, a cat and that four stop Phil mentioned. Is the internet a reliable source in and of itself?

Notability is an issue in the sense that everyone mentions it an no-one agrees on what it means. I was attempting to cut through various discussions which were attempting to allow, for example, memes which have existed for a year to be recordable. Given there's not much of a definition of a meme to start with, a meme pretty much being an idea which catches on, it seems like allowing any idea which catches on to be documentable after having caught on for a year a little mad. To me. For starters, how would we define whether a meme has caught on or not?

And then, why can't we allow website X to be added, it's been online for a year, why isn't that allowed, and so on and so forth. The idea was to base notability within the three policies we have already, which as they stand, would also allow Phil's Four Stop article. I was kind of seeing a lower tier triumvirate of notability, deletion policy and Wikipedia is not.

Steve block

I find [[WP:V]] and [[WP:NOR]] all to be very linked together.

[[Streets and intersections in Pullman, Washington]] would be seen as listcruft.

Joe

On 5/1/06, Anthony DiPierro wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:

On 4/30/06, Steve Block steve.block@myrealbox.com wrote:

...

Philip Welch wrote:

...

On Apr 23, 2006, at 4:21 PM, Steve Block wrote:

...

I had a bash at creating a proposal which would define notability on wikipedia as meaning that an article or topic is mentioned in a third party reliable source.

I can provide multiple third party reliable sources as evidence that there is a four way stop on the intersection between Merman Drive and Terre View Drive in Pullman, Washington. Does that mean that aforementioned four way stop is worthy of mention in Wikipedia?

What this guideline is trying to do is define notability within the verifiability chain.

It attempts to close the door on the possibility of allowing wikipedians to decide what is and isn't notable, something I believe is against both the original research and POV policies. We should seek to summarise claims of importance, where those claims are verifiable.

I've always considered NOR to be *part of* the verifiability rules. It is a description of what sources count toward verifiability. For that matter, both rules are really an explanation of what NPOV means - "assert facts, including facts about opinions — but don't assert opinions themselves". NOR and V go on to describe what is meant by "facts".

I guess what I'm saying is you can't really eliminate any of those three rules without significantly affecting the interpretation of the other one, or to quote NPOV: "Because the three policies are complementary, they should not be interpreted in isolation from one other, and editors should therefore try to familiarize themselves with all three."

...

Verifiability, NOR and NPOV do not mean we can write articles on topics we happen to feel should have them, they mean we should write articles on topics for which we have good sources, the summation of which do not amount to the original research through creating a novel narrative, and which does not impart greater weight to the topic than exists in the wider world, represented by the reliable sources we seek.

I don't see how V, NOR, and NPOV imply that we should not impart greater weight to a topic than exists in the wider world. For that matter I don't even understand what that means.

...

If we source only from the primary source, the topic itself, we cannot do anything but present information from a biased point of view. Yes, it is disappointing that there exists categories of information for which Wikipedia would be a wonderful repository, but for which no other sources exist for us to summate. However, that cannot be something we should seek to remedy. Wikipedia is not a place for original research. To me, that means Wikipedia cannot be a place to make claims of importance for any topic. Such claims should already be established within reliable sources, before we can attempt to document them. It is unfortunate that closers in afd discussions are not mindful of this, but it is the case that Wikipedia is a tertiary source. Wikipedia is not a repository for primary research.

To this point I still can't really figure out what you're trying to say. That paragraph above is pretty much indisputable.

...

So is your four way stop worthy of an article? On the strength of your description, I would say no, because you are imparting undue weight to it by creating such an article, you are presenting information for your own point of view rather than summarising someone else's, and if the article states only that four way stop on the intersection between Merman Drive and Terre View Drive in Pullman, Washington then I'd consider speedying it per A1.

I'd say it needs to be expanded if that's all it says. Using those secondary sources provided by the person adding the information I'm sure you could come up with a nice little article on the subsection of Pullman where the street is located, or maybe on [[Streets and intersections in Pullman, Washington]], or something like that. Right now it's far too hypothetical, so I don't know exactly what the best solution would be, though.

But as I pointed out when the comment was first made, it's not clear whether or not the four-way stop on that intersection is verifiable without resorting to original research. It might be, and it might not be. It would, of course, be the job of the person adding the information to show that it is.

Speedy deletion of such true information doesn't make any sense to me though. At the least move the information into the talk page of the Pullman, Washington article, please.

Anthony _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

Listcruft is a term on AfD used for the deletion of lists. Generally, it is used for pointless lists.

On 5/1/06, Anthony DiPierro wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:

On 5/1/06, Joe Anderson computerjoe.mailinglist@googlemail.com wrote:

...

I find [[WP:V]] and [[WP:NOR]] all to be very linked together.

[[Streets and intersections in Pullman, Washington]] would be seen as listcruft.

Joe

What's listcruft?

Anthony _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

-- Joe Anderson

[[User:Computerjoe]] on en, fr, de, simple, Meta and Commons.

BTW, you could look at [[cruft]] :D

On 5/1/06, Anthony DiPierro wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:

Based on just the title [[Streets and intersections in Pullman, Washington]], I don't see how such an article would necessarily be pointless or a list.

I suppose that wouldn't necessarily stop it from being deleted as "listcruft", though...

Anthony

On 5/1/06, Joe Anderson computerjoe.mailinglist@googlemail.com wrote:

...

Listcruft is a term on AfD used for the deletion of lists. Generally, it

is

...

used for pointless lists.

On 5/1/06, Anthony DiPierro wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:

...

On 5/1/06, Joe Anderson computerjoe.mailinglist@googlemail.com

wrote:

...

...

...

I find [[WP:V]] and [[WP:NOR]] all to be very linked together.

[[Streets and intersections in Pullman, Washington]] would be seen

as

...

...

...

listcruft.

Joe

What's listcruft?

Anthony _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

-- Joe Anderson

[[User:Computerjoe]] on en, fr, de, simple, Meta and Commons. _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

---

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-- Joe Anderson

[[User:Computerjoe]] on en, fr, de, simple, Meta and Commons.

On 03/05/06, Phil Boswell phil.boswell@gmail.com wrote:

AfD is becoming a cesspit which can only be recovered by draining, dynamiting and redigging.

RfA too please. Everytime I read either the talk page or the project page I sigh with sadness...

Oppose. Doesn't meet my admin standards. Also, I'm biased against disruptively formatted signatures. Also, some concerns about civility. Also, the number of comments on people's oppose votes seems to be bordering on harassment of opposition voters.

Oppose. As Mackensen points out, MoP doesn't have a lot of main article contributions. The work you do is important for Wikipedia as a community, but I'm not convinced you need admin tools. I would also recommend that you use edit summaries more often.

Oppose. I can't possibly support a user who averages 10+ edits per page, no matter how good those edits are. Furthermore, this list gives me a heart attack. 5,615 article-space edits per Interiot's tool looks good on the surface, but 4,273 of them (76.1%) are to his ten favorite articles,

Oppose: too hung up on user boxes. See his user page.

Militantly Oppose - JoshuaZ seems to be a bright guy and very level-headed - I'm sure he'll be a great admin here. But with all sincerity, I cannot do anything but oppose someone who has lowered themselves to the reprehensible depths of posting "Questions" on WP:RfA pages. The Q/A grandstanding has nothing to do with anything.

Weak Oppose. Three odd months is too soon to become an admin, in my view at least six are required. I am also concerned that this user sometimes fails to understand that proper sourcing actually requires a footnote or other direct reference

Oppose (for now) - no valid email address on file, thus no way to contact privately, which is essential for admins. [this one is especially unfathomable - opposing adminship on the grounds that they haven't yet validated their email address?]

sigh...grr...sigh...

Why can't people just raise their concerns directly with the candidates, rather than using these petty concerns as a cudgel to bludgeon them over the head with when they're at their most vulnerable - asking for acceptance from the community?

Steve

On 03/05/06, Philip Welch wikipedia@philwelch.net wrote:

Trial by fire. If someone can't take the "abuse" of a standard RfA, they can't take the ongoing abuse that admins take all the time from vandals, trolls, and other trouble-makers.

Personally, I went through RfA just like a lot of people here. You don't see me whining about how I was bludgeoned over the head. RfA is supposed to be a tough process to get through.

Oh, I'm not objecting to it being rough. I'm objecting to someone actually being opposed for RfA for petty reasons

Steve

Philip Welch wrote:

On May 3, 2006, at 10:39 AM, Steve Bennett wrote:

...

...

Trial by fire. If someone can't take the "abuse" of a standard RfA, they can't take the ongoing abuse that admins take all the time from vandals, trolls, and other trouble-makers.

Personally, I went through RfA just like a lot of people here. You don't see me whining about how I was bludgeoned over the head. RfA is supposed to be a tough process to get through.

Oh, I'm not objecting to it being rough. I'm objecting to someone actually being opposed for RfA for petty reasons

That seems fair, but RfA is a community based process, not a policy based process. With a community based process, you have to allow people to use criteria you disagree with in exchange for allowing consensus. With a policy based process, criteria might be more rational, but you might lose consensus.

The community is full of trolls - to the point where they claim that they've been made admins. Of course, they could just be trolling, but if that doesn't say that RFA needs a sanity check, I don't know /what/ does.

On 03/05/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:

On Wed, 3 May 2006 10:42:12 +0200, you wrote:

...

Militantly Oppose - JoshuaZ seems to be a bright guy and very level-headed - I'm sure he'll be a great admin here. But with all sincerity, I cannot do anything but oppose someone who has lowered themselves to the reprehensible depths of posting "Questions" on WP:RfA pages. The Q/A grandstanding has nothing to do with anything.

They said that about Joshua? Where's that wet trout? Joshua is a very calm and levelheaded person, ideal admin material IMO.

Your opinion is that; and neither wrong nor right. I'd fight for your right to have it, but I would fight you before it was thrust upon another.

Rob Church

On Thu, 4 May 2006 00:17:58 +0200, you wrote:

Except that in the case of RfA, we don't even have agreed principles that decisions should be based on, so all reasoning is good reasoning.

For some values of good, obviously.

My problem here is with the assertion that asking questions of candidates for adminship is in some way bad. I really can't see how that could be a valid viewpoint. One of the most pertinent questions I've seen asked of an admin candidate recently was whether they saw the role of admin more as that of policeman or janitor. Asking that question is entirely consistent with adminship being no big deal, also entirely consistent with knowing in advance to whom we are giving the tools, and what they will do with them. For my money we don't need policemen, but this is of course also just one person's view.

Guy (JzG)

On 03/05/06, Philip Welch wikipedia@philwelch.net wrote:

Not that it's unprecedented for people on this list to be civility hypocrites.

Eep, let's chill, everyone, please?

Steve

On 01/05/06, Matt Brown morven@gmail.com wrote:

On 5/1/06, Anthony DiPierro wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:

...

What's listcruft?

On *fD, <foo>cruft is shorthand for 'articles about <foo> that are below my personal notability threshold'. Thus its application is generally tautological and only serves to denigrate the subject matter.

And/or discredit the person using the term. It really is a pretty offensive term, but I don't know if most people using it realise that.

Steve

On 01/05/06, Steve Bennett stevage@gmail.com wrote:

On 01/05/06, Matt Brown morven@gmail.com wrote:

...

On *fD, <foo>cruft is shorthand for 'articles about <foo> that are below my personal notability threshold'. Thus its application is generally tautological and only serves to denigrate the subject matter.

And/or discredit the person using the term. It really is a pretty offensive term, but I don't know if most people using it realise that.

Some people use 'cruft' (me, for example) in the original sense - it's the word for that dust and fluff you pull out from under furniture. It is, outside of Wikipedia, most commonly applied to badly written and messy programming. Back in Wiki context, the term (when used in this sense, at least) makes no assertion of notability, but rather suggests that the article is in need of a major rewrite and/or cleanup.

So 'listcruft' implies a poorly-written list, probably in need of a loving Wikipedian to take it in and foster it back to full health. However, some 'cruft' is beyond redemption, and the best remedy for that is a brand new stub to take its place.

Can you tell I don't regularly take part in AfDs?

--Sam

[[Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of PS2 DVD9

Games]]

How sad. Lots of votes to delete. And none of them presenting a cogent argument. Uses of the word "-cruft" as some sort of excuse to avoid having to do so.

The one user who presents an argument is the one who created the list, and you play the man not the ball by arguing about the few edits he has in the Wikipedia: namespace. He has few edits there because he spends his time trying to create content!

Pete

p.s. The information should be merged into the broader list of games.

----- Original Message ---- From: Joe Anderson computerjoe.mailinglist@googlemail.com To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@wikipedia.org Sent: Tuesday, 2 May, 2006 8:04:36 AM Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Verifiability equating to notability

When I'm using the term listcruft it is not intended to offend the author. Look at [[Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of PS2 DVD9 Games]].

On 5/1/06, Sam Pointon free.condiments@gmail.com wrote:

On 01/05/06, Steve Bennett stevage@gmail.com wrote:

...

On 01/05/06, Matt Brown morven@gmail.com wrote:

...

On *fD, <foo>cruft is shorthand for 'articles about <foo> that are below my personal notability threshold'. Thus its application is generally tautological and only serves to denigrate the subject matter.

And/or discredit the person using the term. It really is a pretty offensive term, but I don't know if most people using it realise that.

Some people use 'cruft' (me, for example) in the original sense - it's the word for that dust and fluff you pull out from under furniture. It is, outside of Wikipedia, most commonly applied to badly written and messy programming. Back in Wiki context, the term (when used in this sense, at least) makes no assertion of notability, but rather suggests that the article is in need of a major rewrite and/or cleanup.

So 'listcruft' implies a poorly-written list, probably in need of a loving Wikipedian to take it in and foster it back to full health. However, some 'cruft' is beyond redemption, and the best remedy for that is a brand new stub to take its place.

Can you tell I don't regularly take part in AfDs?

--Sam _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

-- Joe Anderson

[[User:Computerjoe]] on en, fr, de, simple, Meta and Commons. _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

On 02/05/06, Sam Pointon free.condiments@gmail.com wrote:

Some people use 'cruft' (me, for example) in the original sense - it's the word for that dust and fluff you pull out from under furniture. It is, outside of Wikipedia, most commonly applied to badly written and messy programming. Back in Wiki context, the term (when used in this sense, at least) makes no assertion of notability, but rather suggests that the article is in need of a major rewrite and/or cleanup.

You probably wouldn't use the term to describe a bunch of articles recently written by an enthusiastic young contributor to Wikipedia, who simply needs to be guided towards areas of Wikipedia more in need of his energy, then.

It's really hard to avoid causing offense when you're nominating an article for deletion, or even supporting a nomination. Pity that some people don't even try :/

Steve

Anthony DiPierro wrote:

On 4/30/06, Steve Block steve.block@myrealbox.com wrote:

...

Verifiability, NOR and NPOV do not mean we can write articles on topics we happen to feel should have them, they mean we should write articles on topics for which we have good sources, the summation of which do not amount to the original research through creating a novel narrative, and which does not impart greater weight to the topic than exists in the wider world, represented by the reliable sources we seek.

I don't see how V, NOR, and NPOV imply that we should not impart greater weight to a topic than exists in the wider world. For that matter I don't even understand what that means.

What I mean is I'm trying to figure out the answer to the following question, is an article written about foo, using only foo as a source, written from a npov? My main line of thinking has been that to use foo as the only source in an article on foo imparts undue weight to foo; there are no other sources to use in writing an article, so by writing the article I am asserting a point of view that the article should exist. Is that the reason articles should exist, or should articles exist because there are external sources we can use to write from a neutral point of view?

Can we write an article which basically says:

Foo is a website which allows you to create a blog. You do that by visiting this link, filling out this form and then you have a blog. Foo also hosts forums, which are broken down into sub-forums focussing on such topics as films, music and eggs. Foo doesn't have a chat room, but a lot of people who use foo use the same chat room at this link. Recently users of foo had a contest on foo's message boards and voted this film the best ever film.

Because I don't seem to be able to work out, through the various policies, why we can't. Because primary sources are allowed to be used as sources for information on themselves, and this is the argument I don't understand, because it seems to mean I can create an article on my self using my blog as a source. If I can't do that, why can people game Wikipedia by creating articles on forums and websites which have no external sourcing simply through sheer weight of numbers?

But as I pointed out when the comment was first made, it's not clear whether or not the four-way stop on that intersection is verifiable without resorting to original research. It might be, and it might not be. It would, of course, be the job of the person adding the information to show that it is.

But what, in this instance, is original research? Is sourcing from public archives original research? Is reading a book original research? Is looking at a map original research?

Steve block

The first half of your post answered my questions. I haven't decided if I agree yet :), but it does make sense.

On 5/2/06, Steve Block steve.block@myrealbox.com wrote:

...

But as I pointed out when the comment was first made, it's not clear whether or not the four-way stop on that intersection is verifiable without resorting to original research. It might be, and it might not be. It would, of course, be the job of the person adding the information to show that it is.

But what, in this instance, is original research? Is sourcing from public archives original research? Is reading a book original research? Is looking at a map original research?

Steve block

The way I see original research is basically any text which can't be derived trivially from a published source. That's my understanding, without looking at any Wikipedia pages.

Now I suppose "derived trivially" is subject to some dispute there. I like the way Steve Bennett explained this, though I think we have to allow interpretation (including context) to the extent that no one would reasonably dispute the interpretation.

And that's another factor that has to be kept in mind. NOR is, more than anything, a fallback for when there is a disagreement. If no one (who isn't banned, anyway) has a problem with the text as its written, then NOR can safely be ignored. NOR comes into place when someone, (anyone acting in good faith), reads a statement in a Wikipedia article, then reads the source or sources, and isn't *convinced* that the statement is true.

To answer your questions... The main source of original research in the four-way-stop case would be direct observation. Interviews would also qualify as original research, to give another example. Sourcing from public archives wouldn't be original research as far as I'm concerned. Reading a book, assuming a published book, would be fine. Looking at a map, assuming a published map, would be fine too.

What counts as published? I'm sure there's grey area, but the main distinction is that copies are available to the public, for free or for a fee.

Anthony

My beef is this ... What counts as a reliable source? Does a mention of a POV-pushing political phrase in heresy-hunting leftist rag count as a reliable source, such that said phrase could be used to label people and parties that may go 10 or 20% in the general direction claimed, but not the 100% claimed by the label applied to them? Lately I've had such run-ins. POV-pushing publications (even if respected by otherwise respectable people) do not count as verifiability. <probably a rabbit trail for your conversation> -- Chris (aka Gudsthegn)

On 4/23/06, Steve Block steve.block@myrealbox.com wrote:

I had a bash at creating a proposal which would define notability on wikipedia as meaning that an article or topic is mentioned in a third party reliable source. I figure it should be impossible to write an article without a third party reference, as per [[WP:V]], [[WP:NOR}] and [[WP:NPOV]], and so I hope that people will consider using that as the level for notability in areas where no other guidance exists.

Thoughts welcomed at [[Wikipedia:Notability/Proposals]].

-- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.1.385 / Virus Database: 268.4.5/322 - Release Date: 22/04/06

---

WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

My point regards ANY POV-pushing source. Rightest rags don't work either.

-- Chris (Gudsthegn)

On 4/25/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:

On Mon, 24 Apr 2006 22:05:11 -0500, you wrote:

...

My beef is this ... What counts as a reliable source? Does a mention of

a

...

POV-pushing political phrase in heresy-hunting leftist rag count as a reliable source

Not that your POV is showing or anything...

Guy (JzG)

http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG

---

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On Tue, 25 Apr 2006 16:28:01 -0500, you wrote:

My point regards ANY POV-pushing source. Rightest rags don't work either. -- Chris (Gudsthegn)

Sure. But if you're making strong statements about the kinds of sources which should be excluded per NPOV, it's best not to do it in pejorative partisan terms. As far as I'm concerned anything on Faux News is considered false until proven correct :-) Guy (JzG)

On 4/22/06, Philip Welch wikipedia@philwelch.net wrote:

Here's an interesting question: assuming those statistics are the same each month, is it the same 29 admins each month, or does it turn over?

It obviously does vary from month to month, but there are some people who are consistently in the top 25. I'm supposedly working on some stuff to report this more nicely, but as my toolserver account expires on May 1 and has not been reviewed, I probably won't actually do it.

Kelly

Ray Saintonge wrote:

As a rule of thumb suspensions of privileges that exceed 24-hours should be considered punitive. When there are dangerous uncertainties about things that are happening 24 hours will be enough time to investigate. If after a best effort this still isn't enough one extend the time 24 hours at a time.

I'd say that depends. An indefinite block of a vandalism-only account, made on the basis that "nothing good has ever come from this user, and most likely nothing ever will", is not punitive but preventative.

On 4/20/06, jkelly@fas.harvard.edu jkelly@fas.harvard.edu wrote:

While we're engaging in this critique of Danny's response, it might make sense to ask whether or not Danny, and the other office people, are aware that there exists some large segment of the admin population who regard it as routine to undo other admin actions without discussion because they were "out of process", or "obviously wrong", or whatever. Can we imagine the possibility that some people might interpret that as inexplicable, or even hostile, interference, if they aren't used to this?

I just posted this to another thread, but it's more appropriate here. Some admins have adopted a definition of "wheel warring" that excludes the first revert of an admin action -- so that if X blocks, and Y unblocks, Y is not wheel warring. But if X restores the block, X has started the wheel war, meaning the admin who's only trying to return to the status quo ante gets the blame.

This is nonsense and it lies at the heart of all this trouble. The first person to undo the original admin action has started the wheel war, and it's that first undoing that shouldn't be happening (except where the original admin can't be contacted and it has to be done quickly). But as a rule, we shouldn't be undoing each other's admin actions at all.

Sarah

The first person to undo the original admin action has started the wheel war, and it's that first undoing that shouldn't be happening (except where the original admin can't be contacted and it has to be done quickly). But as a rule, we shouldn't be undoing each other's admin actions at all.

I think "wheel war" is a great term that overly bold admins can throw at people who disagree with them, making it seem like it is the fault of the reverter, that the one returning things to the status quo is the rouge, when in fact it could simply be that the original admin's edits were unwarranted. Or stupid. I still haven't heard a reason why admins shouldn't revert admin actions "at all" except that it's wheel-warring, which is a rather circular answer (fitting, I suppose for a wheel). So I suppose my response to "We shouldn't be undoing each other's admin actions at all" is that we also shouldn't be making any mistakes at all. But it happens, and so should be able to unhappen.

Ben

Matt Brown wrote:

On 4/20/06, Ben Lowe ben.lowe@gmail.com wrote:

...

I still haven't heard a reason why admins shouldn't revert admin actions "at all" except that it's wheel-warring, which is a rather circular answer (fitting, I suppose for a wheel). So I suppose my response to "We shouldn't be undoing each other's admin actions at all" is that we also shouldn't be making any mistakes at all. But it happens, and so should be able to unhappen.

My preferred policy change would not be 'we shouldn't ever undo admin actions' but rather 'we shouldn't undo admin actions instantly and without discussion'.

Very few things are so, so critical that there isn't time to discuss.

A correlary ought to be: We shouldn't *do* admin actions instantly and without discussion, for the same reason.

-Mark

On 4/20/06, Ben Lowe ben.lowe@gmail.com wrote:

I still haven't heard a reason why admins shouldn't revert admin actions "at all" except that it's wheel-warring, which is a rather circular answer (fitting, I suppose for a wheel).

Because we elect admins we feel we can trust to use good judgment and be responsible. When someone's been an active admin for a while, they develop instincts about how to act in certain situations, and they tend to be very familar with policy and how it works de jure and de facto, and the admin community should trust and respect that experience. That doesn't mean don't question it. It means don't undo it, unless an unambiguous error has been made.

Sarah

On 4/20/06, slimvirgin@gmail.com slimvirgin@gmail.com wrote:

This is nonsense and it lies at the heart of all this trouble. The first person to undo the original admin action has started the wheel war, and it's that first undoing that shouldn't be happening (except where the original admin can't be contacted and it has to be done quickly). But as a rule, we shouldn't be undoing each other's admin actions at all.

This sounds like a fine and productive suggestion.

It is not *completely* obvious that this is the right way to behave, however -- one of the arguments for IAR as applied to admins, for instance, has long been that other admins can rv your actions right back -- and it is not currently understood as policy. So it is not surprising that many admins don't operate under this understanding.

++SJ

Matt Brown wrote:

I feel that the immediatist attitude of the vandal-fighter has infected many of the decision-making processes of en-wikipedia way too much. Everything must be fixed NOW. We must act as if we have the attention span of a mayfly, because later is as good as never.

With the absolute deepest respect for the vandal fighters, whose immediatist attitude saves us from untold volumes of unspeakable horrors, I will say that I agree totally with Matt here.

Some things require immediate action. Even some things having to do with WP:OFFICE, although my view is that if it comes to that, what we really really should do is look at what failure of process led us to that impasse in the first place.

But mostly, no. Mostly, if we (any of us! for any reason!) stub a controversial article and demand careful sourcing for rebuilding it, that's fine, EVEN IF THE ARTICLE SUCKS FOR A FEW DAYS.

Whereas in my belief most administrator actions do NOT need to be fixed *right now*, even if they are wrong. Bans and blocks - in most cases, the world will not end if an individual can't edit Wikipedia for a day. Frustrating though it might be. Page protection: everyone can live with not editing an article for a little bit. Deletion: undeletion can be done at any time, and unless an article is a very high-traffic one, our readers are unlikely to even notice.

Totally. Some of the silliest fights we have gotten into about alleged 'censorship by admins' was over the most trivial of topics.

The culture of feeling entitled to instantly revert, though, is quite damaging. It escalates arguments, builds up pressure, makes everyone tense, encourages revert wars. Nothing on Wikipedia should be settled by a fight. I feel that instant, no-discussion reverts of anything other than *obvious vandalism* - whether edits or administrative actions - encourages a quite unpleasant pattern of behaviour.

If we feel we have to do things instantly because it's too hard to keep track of things otherwise, then we need tools - procedure or software - to help with that.

Absolutely!

On 4/20/06, slimvirgin@gmail.com slimvirgin@gmail.com wrote:

On 4/20/06, Matt Brown morven@gmail.com wrote:

...

Is it the right of every administrator to second-guess the administrative actions of any other administrator, and instantly revert them if they feel justified?

The culture of feeling entitled to instantly revert, though, is quite damaging.

Exactly right. Some admins have adopted a definition of "wheel warring" that excludes the first revert of an admin action -- so that if X blocks, and Y unblocks, Y is not wheel warring. But if X restores the block, X has started the wheel war. This is nonsense. The first person to undo the original admin action has started the wheel war, and it's that first undoing that shouldn't be happening as a rule.

Sarah

So if I say delete [[Template:NPOV]] (T1) you wouldn't revert that action?

-- geni

On 4/20/06, Matt Brown morven@gmail.com wrote:

On 4/20/06, geni geniice@gmail.com wrote:

...

So if I say delete [[Template:NPOV]] (T1) you wouldn't revert that action?

Sometimes it will be annoying following a culture of 'no instant admin reverts', but I think the overall effect will be positive.

In such a case, I'd leave a message on YOUR talk page to the effect of 'Are you crazy?', and post to a few noticeboard pages to the effect of 'Geni has deleted [[Template:NPOV]], anyone agree with me that he shouldn't have?' and wait for either your response or a few other opinions before acting. Wikipedia will not end for want of [[Template:NPOV]].

No but it would probably have some rather negative effects. The fallout from restoring it would probably be less serious than the fallout from waiting around

To chose a more extream example. How long would you hang around discusing this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ALog&type=move&us...

However, deleting a commonly-accessed page upon which policies and guidelines depend could be construed as vandalism, too.

-Matt

The template is "divisive and inflammatory" a clear T1 candidate.

-- geni