Hi,
Some wikis are plagued with vandalism, spams and non sense. Moldavan
Wikipedia seems the worst at this time, but there have been others too.
These projects do not bring any free knowledge to anybody, just a lot of
works for volunteers (hopefully there are great volunteers like Pill)
and stewards.
Regarding the Moldavan Wikipedia (http://mo.wikipedia.org), the
administrators election was already cancelled twice because of massive
attacks. Sincere editors have been discouraged and have left. So the
wiki is just a battle field for vandals, trolls and sockpuppets. There
is no expected improvement in the near future because the language
itself is in the middle of a political controversy.
I forsee the same situation for the Montenegrin Wikipedia if it is
created. These wikis only give a bad image of Wikimedia. I think that
the Foundation should take its responsibilities and take some decisions.
Regards,
Yann
--
http://www.non-violence.org/ | Site collaboratif sur la non-violence
http://www.forget-me.net/ | Alternatives sur le Net
http://fr.wikipedia.org/ | Encyclopédie libre
http://fr.wikisource.org/ | Bibliothèque libre
http://wikilivres.info | Documents libres
Dear community,
The board of Wikimedia Foundation had a meeting last week in St
Petersburg, Florida, in WMF office.
This report is to give you information
* on the agenda of the 2 days board meeting
* provide partial or complete information on the outcome of each item on
the agenda
* inform you of what is planned next
* give you a more personnal view on my few days in St Petersburg
The big items (not necessarily in that order) on the agenda were
* board expansion
* advisory board
* bylaws
* audit
* budget
* executive director search
* projects
* legal update
* reorganisation (committees...)
To which I will add fundraising, as it was discussed quite a lot as well
---------
Board expansion
We had to 1) replace Tim Shell, 2) plan next elections, 3) make
decisions over how to expand the board
It was a set of issues I expected would be problematic, but we actually
rather easily and quickly settled down on an agreement.
A very detailed resolution will make that plain official, but the basic
ideas are these ones:
We will work toward a progressive expansion of board, up to a number of
probably 11, to be expected in july 2008.
2 new members will be added (by appointment) before the end of the year
on the board, until next elections in july 2007.
Tim Shell will be replaced before the end of the year, by appointement,
for a term of one year.
All appointements will be for one year from now on, which means Jimbo
and Michael Davis terms will expire in a year. Appointements may be
renewable.
Elections will take place every year for 3 positions (3 positions in
july 2007, 3 positions in july 2008). Elected seats is for 2 years term
and may be renewed. Elections will stay direct elections, but procedures
and rules (such as requirements for candidacy or voting system) may
evolve. The board is apparently opened to the concept of appointing in
the future, a member which would be warmly recommanded by chapters.
Last, the board pledged the majority of the board would be from the
community (through appointements or elections)
To be very specific
The board was also concerned by the risk of instability at next
elections, due to the important influx of new members (possibly very
knowledgable about the Foundation, or possibly not) and important
departure of current members (Erik, the two new temp members and
myself). The board consequently suggested that I, be appointed to the
board from july 07 till june 08, which I accepted (OMG).
The board came up with names for the three newly appointed members, but
we first need to check whether they agree :-) You'll be informed once
agreement is given. Stay tuned !
---------
Bylaws
It is my *immense* privilege to announce that ALL board members agreed
on new bylaws.
Working on bylaws is a tedious job, and a really serious job when one
considers the impact it may have on the Foundation for the years to
come. I wished changes in the bylaws before I ever thought of being on
the board... It only took 2 years and a half to secure board members in
a room together and get that done ! An amazing achievement.
What is next ?
There is a legal requirement, for a delay between modifications and
formal approval. We will all take the time to read the new bylaws again
quickly, before putting our "stamp of approval". Note as well that we
temporarily agreed on a default mission statement. The work and poll on
meta in the vision/mission statement is still ongoing, and the outcome
will be updated in the bylaws later on.
The lead in the bylaws topic will be Erik, who also volunteered to
explain some of the finer choices we made in the new bylaws. He will
give more feedback soon on this very list. Follow the flag.
---------
Audit
Next big achievement, an invisible but major effort from Michael Davis
(our treasurer), Brad Patrick (our exec dir), Jimbo, Danny, and of
course the auditors.
The audit of the first three years of existence of the Foundation is
over. Consider thanking these people.
Why is that important ?
Because the board as the duty to ensure the law is respected. Because
the board has the duty to ensure the activities of the Foundation follow
the mission stated in the bylaws. Because we need to be transparent
toward community and toward donors about what we are doing with the
revenue. Because with an audit and with good results (which we do have),
we will have the opportunity to go and seek grants and sponsorships,
with facts rather than expectations of "good faith" from donators.
We do the right thing with the money and an independant party is our
garantee of this.
I'll add the auditors gave us much input and recommandations, suitable
for our rapidly growing organisation. They recommanded rules and
procedures to create to ensure we keep on track.
What is next ?
A report is being prepared, with the audited financial statements. Due
soon (as in *very* soon). Follow Brad on this.
---------
Budget
Well, slightly less successful here. The item was left at the end of the
meeting, which was best since the two days decisions could (and did)
created new revenues and new expenses suggestions.
We however sort of run out of time (and of energy), so I can not say we
have a full budget. We do not.
However, the major areas (hardware etc...) are analysed. We also
considered a budget was easier to agree with, online, than, say, bylaws
revisions.
---------
Advisory board
Several months ago, the board agreed to create an advisory board, but it
had yet to be populated and members engaged.
This item on the agenda is also a satisfactory outcome. We came up with
a list of about 20 people, who need to be contacted (and to agree). We
also came up with ideas to engage them. Some are actually informally
helping on various matters already.
What's next ?
We first need to contact them all.
---------
ED Search
ED stands for Executive Director. I'll be quick on this one. We
currently have an interim director, we are seeking for a more permanent
one; We are currently working on the job description and exploring the
option of using a search firm. We met one in Florida.
---------
Legal stuff
Three differents issues were discussed.
Jimbo had some information to provide on the gfdl licence and where it
was going. It is yet too early to have a good announcement about this,
but I just wished to let you know this is ongoing and Jimbo is taking
care of that.
We approved a default agreement between chapters and Foundation,
regarding non commercial uses of brands by chapters. This agreement was
crafted in the past weeks in particular by Delphine (our chapter
coordinator), Alison (UK chapter chair), and Brad (legal counsel). This
agreement is to be used as template for future individual agreements
between Foundation and all chapters, to be done in the next weeks. A
resolution on this issue will be published on the foundation in the next
few days. The current agreement does not include agreement for
commercial uses (chapters still need to contact Foundation for this for
now)
Last, we had a thorough review of our trademarks and took decisions over
those. You should not expect information about that now, as any
publishing of information may be detrimental to our strategy.
---------
Projects
Several points, very specific with some projects or some languages, were
discussed during the meeting. I'll update each person or group of
persons who have made requests, in the next few days.
The tech summit already suggested during the board retreat was further
discussed, though nothing formal has been decided.
---------
Reorganisation
Last, we had a fruitful discussion over the reorganisation, in
particular of the committees. We'll deepen this discussion in the coming
weeks. Board members more involved in this discussion are Erik, Tim and
myself.
---------
Fundraising
Last, the Foundation is preparing the next fundraising, which is planned
to start on friday (though we may have a few days delay possibly).
Preparing the fundraising is currently using a lot of our time, so
please bear with us with the publishing of all feedback on things
mentionned above. More to come on fundraising topic very soon.
---------
Generally, I was very happy with that week in Florida. Though pretty
tiring, it was incredibly fruitful. So much fruitful than irc
discussions, or even phone discussions, that we'll plan more face to
face meetings in the future. Since three board members are likely to
join us very soon, we'll try to organise the next face to face board
meeting in january or february.
Regarding the outcomes of the board retreat in Frankfurt last october,
we are pretty much in track. The only issue on which we are "late" is
the tech summit, but we need to organise that carefully. Haste would do
us no good.
It was also the first time all board members were visiting the office,
and I'd say it was extremely positive to do so.
I met with Barbara and Carolyn. Barbara is a black woman of maybe 25-30.
Until now, she was only introduced to me as "the one answering the
phone". She does much more than that, dealing a lot with documents,
acting in tandem with Danny, fixing coffee and generally spreading
happiness all around. Carolyn is a woman in her 40ies, very smily and
quiet. She is our bookkeeper, and I hope she stays with us for a long time.
My first sight of the office was an open door with a big (Wikipedia)
poster on it. All other offices in that building have closed doors.
After one walks past the poster, one gets in a corridor with the signed
Wikimania banner. And it is open...
Who else than us could have office doors open this way ?
I hope you have found this report useful. More details (resolutions,
charters, agreements etc...) will be posted on Foundation wiki shortly.
Please ask questions as needed.
Florence Devouard
Chair of Wikimedia Foundation
Brianna wrote
>
> Good grief. Is it the end of the world if women have an ADDITIONAL
> list to share their views on? I don't see anyone advocating that women
> STOP contributing to the existing lists or channels in favour of a
> women-only one instead.
>
Well honestly, it sounded more like an ALTERNATIVE list, not an ADDITIONAL list, but probably it's just my male bias.
Anyway, no, it's not the end of the world. So let's go with WikiBoyz and WikiLGBT (or WikiL, WikiG, WikiB & WikiT)
WikiLeft and WikiRight are ok for the basic kind of political bias you find on Wikipedia.
WikiHeaven and WikiHell will do for the religious bias in the form, believers vs. atheists (Yes, I know WikiHell is so POV)
Roberto (Snowdog)
------------------------------------------------------
Mutuo da 200.000? Tassi ridotti:euribor +0.69%. Solo per richieste online. www.mutuionline.ithttp://click.libero.it/mutuionline04dic0
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Reusing_content_outside_Wikimedia
I've tweaked this and filled it out a bit. It's hard writing about
legal issues in very simple grammar; I'd like juriwiki-l in particular
to look over this and check that I haven't oversimplified,
particularly in the "how to comply with this licence" sections.
The only section that hasn't been written yet is content under
GPL/LGPL - anyone think they can write two simple sentences on how to
comply with this licence?
It should probably also be merged with the similar page on meta.
- d.
Hi!
I am an outsider in this dispute, but I would like to give my opinion on the
state of these four languages as I see them, after learning for some time
Croatian, and having spoken with a friend who is more knowledgable than me.
What I see is that Montenegrin uses the ijekavica dialect of the so-called
Serbo-Croatian language (which I think is THE artificial one from the 5
mentioned), while the Serbians use the ekavica dialect. This makes every
second word different. Even though either is acceptable, you wouldn't wanna
mix them in an article (as mixing British or American spelling: no one would
really notice), it would stop your "train of thought" to decode each woord
and decide which dialect it was written in. Requiring the use of either one
would be unfair, and would violate the free speech rights of either of them,
also it would lead to some more unnecessary tension.
Croatian uses latin script, and ijekavica (at least the official dialect),
so Montenegrins could integrate there? Wrong. Montenegrin has many words
borrowed from Turkish that Croatians might not understand, or would
constantly replace with their Croatian counterparts, or just remove from
articles.
The difference of words and dialect is a main difference between Serbian in
Croatian. Apart from the dialet problem mentioned with the Montenegrins,
Serbian language tends to use Western words by transliterating it
phonetically into Serbian language, while Croatian tends to invent their own
words. Compromise on this ground would either ignite tension, or be a factor
in "deteriorating" Croatian language by introducing foreign words, for which
there is already a Croatian version in use.
Bosnian: I'm no expert here, why this is a separate language :), if not for
political reasons. I guess they have many Turkish words too. Anyway, if
there is a Bosnian wiki, a Montenegrin one could also be.
Also, if I'm correct Montenegro had its state television in the Serbia and
Montenegro era, that was broadcast it Montenegrin (language/dialect).
In conclusion, Serbo-Croatian was an invented language, without machine
translation between the ijekavica/ekavica/ikavica dialects choosing either
that is not the official in any a part of the region would lead to tensions,
and the difference in words might also lead to misunderstandings, or at
least heart national feelings if a "dialect version of a word" is changed to
an other "for better understanding".
Anyway, I hope I didn't upset any one, and that I wasn't factually wrong, or
misleading.
Regards, Bence Damokos
ps. OFF. why are there so many wikis in Italy?
On Montenegrin request for new wikipedia I found this resolution:
**This request has been rejected following discussion with the Special
projects language subcommittee
<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special_projects_subcommittees/Languages>.
Wikis should not be split along political lines, and we encourage
Montenegrin editors to collaborate with Serbian editors in a single wiki
or, at the very least, to have Montenegrin pages alongside Serbian
pages. If political divisions make this difficult, please note that the
Wikimedia Foundation's goal is giving every single person free,
/unbiased/ access to the sum of all human knowledge, and not information
from individual political communities.**
I am asking members of Special projects language subcommittee to give
evidence that this request was driven by political lines. I am asking
for reference in past that committee has made same decision on same
situation. I am asking members of committee to give deeper guidelines to
us what should we do next in this situation.
Also wider explanation of this decision could be helpful.
Thank you,
Darko Bulatovic
President of IT Association of Montenegro
p.s. Sorry for wrong mail posting.
FYI. An article by NYT senior writer Mr. Howard French on the
difference between Chinese and English Wikipedias was published on the
International Herald Tribune yesterday at
http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/11/29/news/wiki.php and
http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/11/29/business/wiki.php. Many Chinese
Wikipedians were extremely disappointed by the profound bias, shallow
research, and jammed untrue descriptions. You can read the forwarded
message from Lawrence Lo (Lorenzarius), and a blog entry from Joseph
Wang (Roadrunner) at http://twofish.wordpress.com/. There were also
private communications from other Chinese Wikipedians on their similar
opinions .
The take-home messages are:
1) Chinese Wikipedia has and conforms to a high standard of NPOV, and
Chinese Wikipedians take this policy seriously.
2) There is no such thing called "self-censorship" at Chinese
Wikipedia; indeed any intention for such practice at Chinese Wikipedia
will be denounced by most Chinese Wikipedians.
3) Chinese Wikipedia is written by people from various places of the
world, including Mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Asia, America,
Europe, etc. Indeed, editors from Mainland China are disproportionally
scarce because of the current block obviously imposed by the PRC
government (though it never admitted that).
I am not going to list all the false/misleading statements in the
report, as it is super easy to identify chunks of them by any one who
is able to read the following Wikipedia articles in both English and
Chinese. There Wikipedia articles were used as examples in the report.
If you like, check both the current and past versions when the report
was prepared/published.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_Zedonghttp://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/毛泽东
(http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%AF%9B%E6%B3%BD%E4%B8%9C)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Taiwanhttp://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/台灣歷史
(http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%8F%B0%E7%81%A3%E6%AD%B7%E5%8F%B2)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwanese_aborigineshttp://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/臺灣原住民
(http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E8%87%BA%E7%81%A3%E5%8E%9F%E4%BD%8F%E6%B0%91)
By the way, the part of Taiwan's history cited in this IHT report from
English Wikipedia and deemed correct was actually wrong. Luckily, that
part in the actual English Wikipedia article has been corrected in
last August.
Best regards,
roc
--
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Lawrence Lo <lorenzarius(a)gmail.com>
Date: 2006/11/29 上午 11:21
Subject: Re: [Wikizh-l] Chinese-language Wikipedia presents different
view of history
To: Andrew Lih <andrew.lih(a)gmail.com>
Cc: wikizh-l(a)wikimedia.org
I call this report biased BS. A wiki as we all know is continuously
evolving, singling one edition of one article does not prove anything.
For instance the last sentences in the opening paragraph of the
current edition
(http://zh.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=%E6%AF%9B%E6%B3%BD%E4%B8%9C&oldid…)
of the article in question now reads:
He [Mao] was also the initiator of a series of political movements
such as the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, resulting
in the abnormal deaths of many Mainland people and great destructions
to many Chinese cultural and historical monuments. He had a great
influence on the 20th century's China and the world.
And obviously omission does not equal self-censorship. Self-censorship
is when a person knows something but intentionally avoids to mention
it. But IMO the more realistic situation with most Mainland
contributors is that they don't know that "something" to begin with.
When a man is taught since birth that "A is right", how can you
criticize him for not knowing that somebody in the other part of the
world thinks that "B is right"? In fact, the Chinese Wikipedia is a
great place for people from different parts of the Chinese-speaking
world to get to know things that we didn't know, to understands things
from the other perspectives.
On 11/29/06, Andrew Lih <andrew.lih(a)gmail.com> wrote:
> FYI, some of our own famous ZH Wikipedians mentioned...
>
>
> http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/11/29/news/wiki.php
>
> Chinese-language Wikipedia presents different view of history
> By Howard W. French
> The New York Times
>
> Just who was Mao Zedong?
>
> According to the English-language version of Wikipedia, the popular
> online encyclopedia, he was a victorious military and political leader
> who founded China's modern Communist state. He was also a man many saw
> as "a mass murderer, holding his leadership accountable for the deaths
> of tens of millions of innocent Chinese."
>
> Switch to Wikipedia in Chinese, and one discovers a very different
> man. There, Mao Zedong's reputation is unsullied by any mention of a
> death toll in the great purges of the 1950s and 1960s, or for what
> many historians call the greatest famine in human history.
>
> In recent weeks, the Chinese government has demonstrated its hostility
> toward the emergence of a credible source of reference material that
> escapes its control by frequently blocking access to Wikipedia, whose
> Chinese version, though still far smaller than its English-language
> counterpart, is growing by leaps and bounds.
>
> But on sensitive questions of China's modern history or on hot-button
> issues, the Chinese version diverges so dramatically from its English
> counterpart that it sometimes reads as if it were approved by the
> censors themselves.
>
> This gulf in information and perspective comes across powerfully in
> the entry on Mao, which is consistently one of the most frequently
> searched and edited topics in the Chinese version, and in the entry on
> historical watersheds, like the Tiananmen Square massacre, the Great
> Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution.
>
> Chinese Wikipedia users and critics say that the differences highlight
> the resilience here of a system of information control whose reach
> goes well beyond simple censorship.
>
> In each of its language versions, Wikipedia is collaboratively written
> and edited by online enthusiasts, and contributors to the
> Chinese-language site explain the differences in content by citing the
> powerful influence of Chinese education, which often provides a neatly
> sanitized national perspective on sensitive aspects of the country's
> past.
>
> This parochialism is reinforced by the blocking of foreign Web sites,
> and by the conformism of the carefully censored mass media.
> Alternative viewpoints are sometimes available, but usually only to a
> restricted circle of people who have the means and determination to
> seek them out.
>
> For some, the Chinese version of Wikipedia was intended as just such a
> resource, but its tame approach to sensitive topics has sparked a
> fierce debate in the world of online mavens over its objectivity and
> thoroughness.
>
> In a recent discussion on the encyclopedia's Web site about the Mao
> legacy, a user with the online name Manchurian Tiger wrote, "If anyone
> can prove that Mao's political movements didn't kill so many people,
> I'm willing to delete the wording that 'millions of people were
> killed.'" Rather than contribute to encyclopedias, those who wish to
> pay tribute to Mao, he added, should "go to his mausoleum."
>
> Another user replied angrily: "If you want to release your emotions,
> use a bulletin board. Wikipedia is not your toilet." In the end, the
> entry on Mao included no death toll from either famine or political
> purges.
>
> Indeed, in its present form, the Chinese Wikipedia introduction to Mao
> Zedong could hardly be more anodyne: "One of the main founders and
> leaders of the Communist Party of China, the People's Liberation Army
> and the People's Republic of China," it reads. "He introduced a series
> of political movements such as the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural
> Revolution. He had a great influence over 20th-century China and the
> world."
>
> On the evidence of entries like this, for the moment, the fight over
> editorial direction of Wikipedia in Chinese is being won by
> enthusiasts who practice self-censorship.
>
> "Most of the people who contribute to Wikipedia rarely touch upon
> political topics," said Yuan Mingli, a frequent contributor from
> Shanghai. "They prefer to write about things like technology. There
> are other things in life."
>
> Others denounce compromises on content as a deviation from the
> original mission of Wikipedia, which they say is to spread reliable
> information and to seek truth. In any case, they add, self- censorship
> has already proved naïve because the government still frequently
> blocks access for most Chinese Internet users.
>
> "There is a lot of confusion about whether they should obey the
> neutral point of view or offer some compromises to the government,"
> said Isaac Mao, a well-known Chinese blogger and user of the
> encyclopedia. "To the local Wikipedians, the first objective is to
> make it well-known among Chinese, to get people to understand the
> principles of Wikipedia step by step, and not to get the thing blocked
> by the government. The government doesn't buy into their attitude."
>
> After Mao Zedong, few questions are treated as more sacrosanct in
> China than the status of Taiwan, which every pupil is taught is
> irrevocably part of China. To publicly suggest that Taiwanese have any
> historical basis for asserting their independence from China would be
> a career-ending offense for anyone in academia or in the media.
>
> The English-language version of the encyclopedia speaks of a Japanese
> shipwreck off Taiwan in 1871, in which 54 crew members were beheaded
> by Taiwanese aborigines. Japan demanded compensation from China, only
> to be told that Taiwan was not within China's jurisdiction. The
> Chinese-language entry on Taiwan, meanwhile, is silent on the
> jurisdiction question.
>
> Similarly, the English-language Wikipedia mentions the settlement of
> Taiwan by aborigines who are genetically related to Malaysians, about
> 4,000 years ago. It also places the first meaningful settlement of the
> island by Chinese in the 16th century.
>
> The Chinese version of Wikipedia, though, merely speaks of cultural
> affinities with Malaysians and speculates about the possible
> exploration of the island by Chinese as far back as the third century.
>
> A parallel, and purely homegrown, effort at creating an online
> encyclopedia in China, Baidu Baike, skirts controversies like these
> altogether. Baidu Baike, which is owned by the biggest Internet search
> engine company in China, asserts that Taiwan's original inhabitants
> "came from mainland China directly or indirectly," and not from
> Malaysia.
>
> Similarly, a user who searches for the Tiananmen Square massacre will
> find no entry.
>
> As online reference sites grow in popularity here, Baidu Baike
> benefits from government efforts to block Wikipedia, just as the same
> company's search engine once benefited from similar blockage of
> Google.
>
> Baidu Baike, much of whose content appears to be copied directly from
> Wikipedia, would not release detailed user statistics, saying only
> that it has "several million" users each day. A spokeswoman for the
> company, Zhang Yan, said it is guided by the editorial policy of not
> "judging the existing national system with malice."
>
> Asked to explain what this meant, Zhang said, "Anyone who is Chinese knows."
> _______________________________________________
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>
--
http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Lorenzarius
Tel: +852 95825791
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