Responding to Odder (below)
I was quite surprised any controversy happened on this. My strict reading of the rules is that, in any case of confusion, the local contest organizers should decide, since this is a federal style organization. The only reason I know of that any controversy could exist is that people started uploading before the deadline (time marked on their upload) but it didn't finish uploading until after the deadline, so the bot didn't mark it WLM. We probably should have expected this (but I certainly didn't).
In the case of the US, I certainly didn't expect many uploaders in the very early morning (6:01 New York time) or the middle of the night (3 AM LA time) but it made sense to go until midnight Hawaii time. There were 2 photos which started uploading on time, but got cutoff - and I didn't see any real reason to exclude them. Perhaps we could re-jigger the bot for next year, but it hardly seems to matter for this rare case.
Probably more important is the case where somebody starts uploading hundreds of photos just before the deadline (Did this actually happen somewhere?) To me that suggests something wrong, but not with the bot or even the rules of the contest. I'm not sure I would know how to fix that behavior.
As a start, perhaps we can move toward a greater emphasis on quality over quantity for next year. This question won't be solved here and now, so can wait until the results come out before tackling it. But that's the best I can suggest about the general case.
All the best, Pete User:Smallbones
Message: 2 Date: Thu, 4 Oct 2012 22:46:41 +0200 From: Tomasz W. Koz?owski odder.wiki@gmail.com To: Wiki Loves Monuments Photograph Competition wikilovesmonuments@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: [Wiki Loves Monuments] Why deadlines exist Message-ID: CAHr62s=EyPNCfWzDU0Q3b-St0Ndaa-SXP4FtdYq-2JVDTtudXA@mail.gmail.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
Hello there, it came to my attention today that several users have been reverting Platonides' Wiki-Bot, contesting it's "decision" about disqualifying pictures uploaded to Wikimedia Commons after midnight local time.
I am aware of the fact that there have been probably hundreds of files uploaded in the night of September 30/October 1, and plenty of those did not make it before midnight. I am also aware that in the perspective of a month, 2, 5, or even 20 minutes do not make any difference, but we have all agreed to have this competition running for exactly a month -- from midnight local time on September 1 until 23:59:59 local time on September 30 (while taking into consideration the needs of countries with multiple timezones, too.)
There is an English saying that you shouldn't change the rules in the middle of the game; I think it would apply for changing the rules /after the end/ of the game, too. What is more, it isn't fair for people from other countries that put a lot of effort into making it before the deadline if you decide to accept photos uploaded in October in your country, for whatever reason.
Having said so, I would urge every local team to give this some consideration, and try to explain to your participants' why pictures uploaded after midnight do not participate in the competition.
Thanks in advance, -- Tomasz W. Koz?owski a.k.a. [[user:odder]]
------------------------------
2012/10/5 Peter Ekman pdekman@gmail.com:
Probably more important is the case where somebody starts uploading hundreds of photos just before the deadline (Did this actually happen somewhere?) To me that suggests something wrong, but not with the bot or even the rules of the contest. I'm not sure I would know how to fix that behavior.
We had such a user. He claimed that he had prepared 40 pictures using upload wizzard and then upoladed just a couple of them before midnight CEST and the rest was upoladed a bit too late. He claimed that he did that from UK (although for Polish contest) and had UTC time set in his preferences, so was sure that his upload will be accepted. However our regulation clearly stated that the end of contest is at midnight CEST. Dura lex, sed lex - but I would like to avoid such situations. This guy was really angry - his pictures were really good - so in fact - Wikimedia Commons lost a good photographer. He stayed anonymous - if we know his personal data at least we could send him some gadgets or small gift to please him :-) As the one of the main goals of the contest is to encourage people to stay with us after the contest - such a situations are counter effective. I see two solutions for next year:
To enable a kind of warning banner saying for example "please hurry up there is 15 min. left and 3 MB file takes several minutes to upload on slower connections..." + have some special "excuse" prize for unlucky uploaders who are late for several minutes...
Hi all,
a few remarks from this discussion: * The suggestions by Polimerek sound really good - although I'm not sure if it is viable to set up such an extra banner system (it's quite a lot of work). * There will '''always''' be people just too late... So lets not get discouraged by that. * Pete: yes, the local jury should decide on the interpretation and admission. However, a) this doesn't mean we agree with it/like it, and b) reverting a bot is not the way to implement it. If you have valid exceptions (might very well be good reasons for), you should contact Platonides directly. But please be careful with this. * Finally: to get the contest recognized by externals (such as Guinness Book of World Records) changing the rules half way might actually be detrimental. While we may consider this 'not important', for outsiders changing the rules is a sign of not being serious and in fact bending the rules is almost asking for conflicts of interest.
Best, Lodewijk
2012/10/5 Tomasz Ganicz polimerek@gmail.com
2012/10/5 Peter Ekman pdekman@gmail.com:
Probably more important is the case where somebody starts uploading hundreds of photos just before the deadline (Did this actually happen somewhere?) To me that suggests something wrong, but not with the bot or even the rules of the contest. I'm not sure I would know how to fix that behavior.
We had such a user. He claimed that he had prepared 40 pictures using upload wizzard and then upoladed just a couple of them before midnight CEST and the rest was upoladed a bit too late. He claimed that he did that from UK (although for Polish contest) and had UTC time set in his preferences, so was sure that his upload will be accepted. However our regulation clearly stated that the end of contest is at midnight CEST. Dura lex, sed lex - but I would like to avoid such situations. This guy was really angry - his pictures were really good - so in fact - Wikimedia Commons lost a good photographer. He stayed anonymous - if we know his personal data at least we could send him some gadgets or small gift to please him :-) As the one of the main goals of the contest is to encourage people to stay with us after the contest - such a situations are counter effective. I see two solutions for next year:
To enable a kind of warning banner saying for example "please hurry up there is 15 min. left and 3 MB file takes several minutes to upload on slower connections..." + have some special "excuse" prize for unlucky uploaders who are late for several minutes...
-- Tomek "Polimerek" Ganicz http://pl.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Polimerek http://www.ganicz.pl/poli/ http://www.cbmm.lodz.pl/work.php?id=29&title=tomasz-ganicz
Wiki Loves Monuments mailing list WikiLovesMonuments@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikilovesmonuments http://www.wikilovesmonuments.org
On 05/10/12 09:27, Lodewijk wrote:
Hi all,
a few remarks from this discussion:
- The suggestions by Polimerek sound really good - although I'm not sure
if it is viable to set up such an extra banner system (it's quite a lot of work).
If we can use "magic banners" next year, it would be simple.
- There will '''always''' be people just too late... So lets not get
discouraged by that.
- Pete: yes, the local jury should decide on the interpretation and
admission. However, a) this doesn't mean we agree with it/like it, and b) reverting a bot is not the way to implement it. If you have valid exceptions (might very well be good reasons for), you should contact Platonides directly. But please be careful with this.
To be fair, it was me who contacted Peter after being asked by one of his participants. Other people have been reverting the bot loudly, crying it should be a "democratically 'human' decision" (sic) and that the bot should ignore uploads two-three hours after the deadline (!!).
Timezones are a novel concept for some people, when they see an upload time [in UTC] before midnight, they assume the bot was wrong. It is also confusing how the Upload Wizard places the current date in local time and without timezone in the date field. I have opened a bug.
We should clarify the "deadline rules" next year, and make clear that there will be a bot with an axe for any image whose upload wasn't finished before midnight.
And for people considering that deadlines are not needed, I have seen uploads marked for WLM2011 in March. :)
and in fact bending the rules is almost asking for conflicts of interest.
One of the reasons for using a bot, since it will be completely neutral in its ruling. You may decide next year if you prefer to state that you will accept submissions finished until 00:05, but beware that there will be someone with a file at 00:05:48 begging for an exception...
2012/10/5 Platonides platonides@gmail.com:
We should clarify the "deadline rules" next year, and make clear that there will be a bot with an axe for any image whose upload wasn't finished before midnight.
(LoL, bots with axes)
I like: * the idea of clarifying rules * the idea of having a "hurry up" template * very much like the idea of adding a template instead of removing one. We did that for the monuments which where not in our list.
About people which started uploading an image before the end of the contest but finishing after midnight, if there is a simple (and only if it simple enough!) way to understand if this is the case for a given picture I think we should allow them. I say this because AFAIK the standard, at least in Italy, in contests where some transfer of documents is involved (through postal service) the deadline is placed on the sending date (and precisely, the postmark "certifies" the date of sending).
Cristian
On 05/10/12 20:46, Cristian Consonni wrote:
2012/10/5 Platonides platonides@gmail.com:
We should clarify the "deadline rules" next year, and make clear that there will be a bot with an axe for any image whose upload wasn't finished before midnight.
(LoL, bots with axes)
I like:
- the idea of clarifying rules
- the idea of having a "hurry up" template
- very much like the idea of adding a template instead of removing
one. We did that for the monuments which where not in our list.
No problem in changing the template instead of removing it.
I say this because AFAIK the standard, at least in Italy, in contests where some transfer of documents is involved (through postal service) the deadline is placed on the sending date (and precisely, the postmark "certifies" the date of sending).
That's sometimes done, but in other cases, the contest state that «entries must be received by $DAY», and it is up to the participant to ensure how to make it arrive (check the delay of the different postal services, if he's late and should pay an extra fee to have it arrive the next day, etc.).
About people which started uploading an image before the end of the contest but finishing after midnight, if there is a simple (and only if it simple enough!) way to understand if this is the case for a given picture I think we should allow them.
You can in some cases have an idea on when it began being uploaded, but it's not completely reliable.
Another problem is what we consider "started uploading". The file which was in transfer at that time? The full image set? What happens when a user was uploading with commonist a group of 4.500 images? We can't accept thousands of images which arrived to commons later than the deadline just because a few hundreds were uploaded some days before!
Most concerns are for removing the WLM template, for any reason, by bot or not. It can be seen as an unfriendly behaviour to exclude a file for the contest. In fact, the submission was intented for WLM, successfully or not, as the template reads. A solution is to keep the template with a note, i.e. "uploaded after deadline", "not a registered monument", "not a participant country", etc. The template with any note can categorize instead in "Images from WLM in XX not validated" keeping track of them and allowing any revision. But this is an option to discuss for next year.
Vicenç
Date: Fri, 5 Oct 2012 03:19:32 +0200 From: polimerek@gmail.com To: wikilovesmonuments@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wiki Loves Monuments] Why deadlines exist
Dura lex, sed lex - but I would like to avoid such situations. This guy was really angry - his pictures were really good - so in fact - Wikimedia Commons lost a good photographer.
hmm, good point! The unfriendlyness could perhaps be tackled by a message on the talkpage of the uploader? (or did that already happen?). Also replacing it with an alternative template "it was uploaded for WLM, but unfortunately outside the allowed timeslot" in friendly wordings would be a good way.
Lodewijk
2012/10/5 Vicenç Riullop vriullop@hotmail.com
Most concerns are for removing the WLM template, for any reason, by bot or not. It can be seen as an unfriendly behaviour to exclude a file for the contest. In fact, the submission was intented for WLM, successfully or not, as the template reads. A solution is to keep the template with a note, i.e. "uploaded after deadline", "not a registered monument", "not a participant country", etc. The template with any note can categorize instead in "Images from WLM in XX not validated" keeping track of them and allowing any revision. But this is an option to discuss for next year.
Vicenç
Date: Fri, 5 Oct 2012 03:19:32 +0200 From: polimerek@gmail.com To: wikilovesmonuments@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wiki Loves Monuments] Why deadlines exist
Dura lex, sed lex - but I would like to avoid such situations. This guy was really angry - his pictures were really good - so in fact - Wikimedia Commons lost a good photographer.
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