Wikimedia-l November 2008

wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org

121 participants
93 discussions

[Foundation-l] Response - Why new Mailing list (Mediawiki)
by Patrick Warren 04 Nov '08

04 Nov '08

Pat Chris Rock - "You don't pay taxes - they take taxes." On Tue, Nov 4, 2008 at 4:04 AM, Patrick Warren <ptw007(a)gmail.com> wrote: > I mean no harm. I respond to emails that I receive (countless) that seem > important. Via WikiMobile, i was asked to create a mailing list for > MediaWiki. All links that I clicked on, responded with "No information", > but there was a little blue link to click to start the information flow. > This led me to a whole new world. > Pat > Fulton J. Sheen - "Hearing nuns' confessions is like being stoned to death > with popcorn." > > On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 10:50 AM, < > foundation-l-request(a)lists.wikimedia.org> wrote: > >> Send foundation-l mailing list submissions to >> foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org >> >> To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit >> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l >> or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to >> foundation-l-request(a)lists.wikimedia.org >> >> You can reach the person managing the list at >> foundation-l-owner(a)lists.wikimedia.org >> >> When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific >> than "Re: Contents of foundation-l digest..." >> >> >> Today's Topics: >> >> 1. Re: What's appropriate attribution? (Milos Rancic) >> 2. Re: What's appropriate attribution? (Anthony) >> 3. Re: foundation-l Digest, Vol 55, Issue 62 (David Gerard) >> 4. Re: What's appropriate attribution? (Milos Rancic) >> 5. Re: What's appropriate attribution? (Andre Engels) >> 6. Re: What's appropriate attribution? (Milos Rancic) >> 7. Re: What's appropriate attribution? (Milos Rancic) >> 8. Re: What's appropriate attribution? (Milos Rancic) >> >> >> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- >> >> Message: 1 >> Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 14:57:26 +0200 >> From: "Milos Rancic" <millosh(a)gmail.com> >> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] What's appropriate attribution? >> To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" >> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> >> Message-ID: >> <846221520810230557t2fd4a68exb97f3094e06b9b77(a)mail.gmail.com> >> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 >> >> On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 1:58 PM, Anthony <wikimail(a)inbox.org> wrote: >> > has a right to attribution. But really, setting a limit to the number >> of >> > principal authors is meaningless anyway, because *anyone can modify the >> text >> > without permission*, so even if you work your ass off and produce a >> 10,000 >> > word text, all a reuser has to do is take 5 other 10,001 word texts, >> append >> > it to the end, and now you get no attribution at all. >> > ... >> > Only attributing "the five principal authors" is utterly unacceptable. >> Only >> > attributing "five of the principal authors" is utterly unacceptable. >> Any >> > attribution clause which doesn't ensure the attribution of *all* >> significant >> > contributors, is unacceptable. Within that framework I think there are >> a >> > lot of reasonable solutions. >> >> I was reading this thread (more or less) carefully and I was wondering >> how it is possible that the direction of the discussion was toward >> attribution only five persons for the whole Wikipedia (or to some part >> of it, no matter). So, thanks for mentioning this. >> >> I just may imagine an ironic smile of one my friend, a copyright >> lawyer from Serbia, with the question: Would it pass at the court? :) >> At least in Serbia, it would be treated as a typical example of trying >> to make a fraud based on a weird interpretation of a license (or >> whichever legal document) or "false contracts" (something in the >> sense: "See, I killed him because we signed a contract that I may kill >> him!"). >> >> However, I really think that we would come into a dead end if we >> insist that every ~300 pages book has to print 100 (or 1000) more >> pages of contributors. It is not a questionable issue, it is just a >> matter of time: it is, maybe, true even today, it could be no true for >> the next 5 years, but it will become our reality for sure. >> >> So, some way for solving this problem has to be find. I mentioned in >> my first post of this thread that some kind of "hard copy links", like >> web links to the history of the page on Wikipedia, may be used instead >> of writing all names inside of the book. Maybe it should be defined >> that if the list of authors is longer than 10% of the book size, for >> the rest of them, book has to refer to the (mentioned) bibliography. >> >> And this is something which license has to solve. After solving that >> issue inside of the license, we would have to convince continental >> legal systems that such kind of solution is reasonable. >> >> And, of course, I am sure that others have some other ideas how to >> address this problem. >> >> >> >> ------------------------------ >> >> Message: 2 >> Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 09:35:32 -0400 >> From: Anthony <wikimail(a)inbox.org> >> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] What's appropriate attribution? >> To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" >> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> >> Message-ID: >> <71cd4dd90810230635p7d56e8e9y681012f4963fc06e(a)mail.gmail.com> >> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 >> >> On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 8:57 AM, Milos Rancic <millosh(a)gmail.com> wrote: >> >> > However, I really think that we would come into a dead end if we >> > insist that every ~300 pages book has to print 100 (or 1000) more >> > pages of contributors. It is not a questionable issue, it is just a >> > matter of time: it is, maybe, true even today, it could be no true for >> > the next 5 years, but it will become our reality for sure. >> > >> >> No, it really isn't possible. For a 300 page book to require 100 pages of >> authors, each author could only have contributed 3 times as many >> characters >> as their user name. Unless you're going to count vandals or >> vandal-reverters as authors, it just isn't going to happen. >> >> Anthony >> >> >> ------------------------------ >> >> Message: 3 >> Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 14:45:25 +0100 >> From: "David Gerard" <dgerard(a)gmail.com> >> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] foundation-l Digest, Vol 55, Issue 62 >> To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" >> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> >> Message-ID: >> <fbad4e140810230645k75e6b6f7w72e72b665f67cc2e(a)mail.gmail.com> >> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 >> >> 2008/10/22 Mike.lifeguard <mikelifeguard(a)fastmail.fm>: >> > Delphine wrote: >> >> >>1) The slogan "Wikipedia is a non-profit" sounds weird to me... >> >> > Well, Wikipedia itself isn't a nonprofit, the Foundation is. But "is >> > nonprofit" and "is a nonprofit" are both acceptable in English (1st is >> > an adjective, 2nd is a noun) so I don't see an issue with those words. >> >> >> "is nonprofit" would be more strictly accurate. >> >> >> - d. >> >> >> >> ------------------------------ >> >> Message: 4 >> Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 16:29:52 +0200 >> From: "Milos Rancic" <millosh(a)gmail.com> >> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] What's appropriate attribution? >> To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" >> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> >> Message-ID: >> <846221520810230729i4c4784c0ra3e7dcd75337226d(a)mail.gmail.com> >> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 >> >> On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 3:35 PM, Anthony <wikimail(a)inbox.org> wrote: >> > On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 8:57 AM, Milos Rancic <millosh(a)gmail.com> >> wrote: >> > >> >> However, I really think that we would come into a dead end if we >> >> insist that every ~300 pages book has to print 100 (or 1000) more >> >> pages of contributors. It is not a questionable issue, it is just a >> >> matter of time: it is, maybe, true even today, it could be no true for >> >> the next 5 years, but it will become our reality for sure. >> > >> > No, it really isn't possible. For a 300 page book to require 100 pages >> of >> > authors, each author could only have contributed 3 times as many >> characters >> > as their user name. Unless you're going to count vandals or >> > vandal-reverters as authors, it just isn't going to happen. >> >> Imagine that someone is making a 300 pages book about countries in the >> world, based on Wikipedia articles. All basic Wikipedia articles about >> countries have (~200) have, of course, much more than 300 pages. It >> may have even 2000 pages. But, someone wants to use Wikipedia articles >> to make a shorter book about the issue. Author of the book would use, >> probably, introductions, as well as some other parts of the articles. >> So, the author is not able even to try to count who contributed to the >> introduction, but he has to count on article as a whole. >> >> If I counted well, article about France has between 8.000 and 9.000 >> edits up to this moment. I think that it is reasonable to suppose that >> this article will have 100 distinctive and significant authors -- if >> not now -- then in 5 or 10 years. >> >> I am reading now a B5 format book with ~40x70=2800 characters per page. >> >> One name has, let's say, 15 characters (btw, I am sure that we will >> demand listing the names if they are available, not just user names; >> as I said before, some kind of user boxes may be used for that). 100 >> names would consume 1500 characters (let's say, 1400, a half of the >> page). 200 articles about countries with 100 distinctive names per >> article means that the list will be 100 pages long. Even 50 is a lot >> (if we assume that not all articles about countries would have such >> number of contributors, like article about France would have). >> >> And, numbers will just be raising. >> >> Of course, we may tell to such authors to make a research for every >> single page and to find which contributions are still inside of the >> article and which are not. So, instead of working on the matter, >> author would have to analyze contributions for more than year (I am >> not sure that I am able to make analysis of the article about France >> in one working day; even if I assume a number of [existing and >> non-existing] tools for that). >> >> It is, simply, not reasonable; as well as it is not toward our goal to >> spread free knowledge. >> >> However, I really agree with you that all significant contributors >> should be attributed. >> >> >> >> ------------------------------ >> >> Message: 5 >> Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 18:57:16 +0200 >> From: "Andre Engels" <andreengels(a)gmail.com> >> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] What's appropriate attribution? >> To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" >> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> >> Message-ID: >> <6faf39c90810230957h33d08868i2e0008380f0e7f7e(a)mail.gmail.com> >> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 >> >> On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 4:29 PM, Milos Rancic <millosh(a)gmail.com> wrote: >> >> > Of course, we may tell to such authors to make a research for every >> > single page and to find which contributions are still inside of the >> > article and which are not. So, instead of working on the matter, >> > author would have to analyze contributions for more than year (I am >> > not sure that I am able to make analysis of the article about France >> > in one working day; even if I assume a number of [existing and >> > non-existing] tools for that). >> > >> > It is, simply, not reasonable; as well as it is not toward our goal to >> > spread free knowledge. >> > >> > However, I really agree with you that all significant contributors >> > should be attributed. >> >> Although it would not solve the problem for your hypothetical writer, >> I think for the general case it would be good for us to _provide_ this >> information with the article - either on the article page, or on the >> history page, or maybe somewhere else (but I would prefer the first, >> or if that doesn't work, the second). The information could be created >> automatically from the history file, and a kind of bot could slowly go >> over the articles to update it, giving each user's contribution to a >> page a number, stored in the database. When a page (or history page) >> is then shown, all users with either more than X contribution, or more >> than Y% of the total contribution, or among the Z (5) largest >> contributors would be shown (with a quick-and-dirty version of the >> algorithm to get a 'maximum' contribution for those who contributed to >> the page after the last time the information was updated). It might >> not be that much use to your writer, who still would have 200 lists of >> 10 or 20 names to deal with (still, 4000 names, many of them >> duplicates is much more manageable than 20.000 of them), but for more >> reasonable cases where whole pages or large portions of pages are >> used, it could give a good indication of which names to include and >> not to include. >> >> >> -- >> Andr? Engels, andreengels(a)gmail.com >> >> ------------------------------ >> >> Message: 6 >> Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 20:15:04 +0200 >> From: "Milos Rancic" <millosh(a)gmail.com> >> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] What's appropriate attribution? >> To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" >> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> >> Message-ID: >> <846221520810231115n2b2f2e96tb9a05fe30befd1f4(a)mail.gmail.com> >> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 >> >> On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 6:57 PM, Andre Engels <andreengels(a)gmail.com> >> wrote: >> > Although it would not solve the problem for your hypothetical writer, >> > I think for the general case it would be good for us to _provide_ this >> > information with the article - either on the article page, or on the >> > history page, or maybe somewhere else (but I would prefer the first, >> > or if that doesn't work, the second). The information could be created >> > automatically from the history file, and a kind of bot could slowly go >> > over the articles to update it, giving each user's contribution to a >> > page a number, stored in the database. When a page (or history page) >> > is then shown, all users with either more than X contribution, or more >> > than Y% of the total contribution, or among the Z (5) largest >> > contributors would be shown (with a quick-and-dirty version of the >> > algorithm to get a 'maximum' contribution for those who contributed to >> > the page after the last time the information was updated). It might >> > not be that much use to your writer, who still would have 200 lists of >> > 10 or 20 names to deal with (still, 4000 names, many of them >> > duplicates is much more manageable than 20.000 of them), but for more >> > reasonable cases where whole pages or large portions of pages are >> > used, it could give a good indication of which names to include and >> > not to include. >> >> Yes, it would be good to have such tool as the first step. It would be >> useful to have it even during this discussion to get a figure about >> what do we demand from authors who would write books based on >> Wikipedia. >> >> So, as I hope that you are interested in making that 0:-) may you give >> numbers for, let's say, countries [1] of the world and species Felidae >> [2]. >> >> And, of course, we need lists of contributors: >> 1. Every contributor [let's say, without bots, while it may be >> disputable, too] with an account and with immediately not reverted >> edits. -- as the largest group of authors. >> 2-n. Other ideas which you mentioned. >> >> It would be, also, good to have an approximation of the sizes of the >> books based on full article size (without templates and images). >> >> [1] - Let's say, this list lists them inside fo the table: >> >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_outlying_territories_by_… >> [2] - This template is good enough: >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Felidae_nav >> >> >> >> ------------------------------ >> >> Message: 7 >> Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 20:45:10 +0200 >> From: "Milos Rancic" <millosh(a)gmail.com> >> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] What's appropriate attribution? >> To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" >> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> >> Message-ID: >> <846221520810231145nf3ad828o47360d20c66fb319(a)mail.gmail.com> >> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 >> >> On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 8:15 PM, Milos Rancic <millosh(a)gmail.com> wrote: >> > And, of course, we need lists of contributors: >> > 1. Every contributor [let's say, without bots, while it may be >> > disputable, too] with an account and with immediately not reverted >> > edits. -- as the largest group of authors. >> >> "with immediately not reverted edits" -> with more than immediately >> not reverted edits >> >> >> >> ------------------------------ >> >> Message: 8 >> Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 20:50:04 +0200 >> From: "Milos Rancic" <millosh(a)gmail.com> >> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] What's appropriate attribution? >> To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" >> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> >> Message-ID: >> <846221520810231150o5811f701p155b66d16d0bee86(a)mail.gmail.com> >> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 >> >> On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 8:45 PM, Milos Rancic <millosh(a)gmail.com> wrote: >> > On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 8:15 PM, Milos Rancic <millosh(a)gmail.com> >> wrote: >> >> And, of course, we need lists of contributors: >> >> 1. Every contributor [let's say, without bots, while it may be >> >> disputable, too] with an account and with immediately not reverted >> >> edits. -- as the largest group of authors. >> > >> > "with immediately not reverted edits" -> with more than immediately >> > not reverted edits >> >> Ah, I realized now that the first construction was good :) >> >> >> >> ------------------------------ >> >> _______________________________________________ >> foundation-l mailing list >> foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org >> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l >> >> >> End of foundation-l Digest, Vol 55, Issue 69 >> ******************************************** >> > >

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Re: [Foundation-l] foundation-l Digest, Vol 55, Issue 69
by Patrick Warren 04 Nov '08

04 Nov '08

I mean no harm. I respond to emails that I receive (countless) that seem important. Via WikiMobile, i was asked to create a mailing list for MediaWiki. All links that I clicked on, responded with "No information", but there was a little blue link to click to start the information flow. This led me to a whole new world. Pat Fulton J. Sheen - "Hearing nuns' confessions is like being stoned to death with popcorn." On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 10:50 AM, <foundation-l-request(a)lists.wikimedia.org>wrote: > Send foundation-l mailing list submissions to > foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org > > To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l > or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to > foundation-l-request(a)lists.wikimedia.org > > You can reach the person managing the list at > foundation-l-owner(a)lists.wikimedia.org > > When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific > than "Re: Contents of foundation-l digest..." > > > Today's Topics: > > 1. Re: What's appropriate attribution? (Milos Rancic) > 2. Re: What's appropriate attribution? (Anthony) > 3. Re: foundation-l Digest, Vol 55, Issue 62 (David Gerard) > 4. Re: What's appropriate attribution? (Milos Rancic) > 5. Re: What's appropriate attribution? (Andre Engels) > 6. Re: What's appropriate attribution? (Milos Rancic) > 7. Re: What's appropriate attribution? (Milos Rancic) > 8. Re: What's appropriate attribution? (Milos Rancic) > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > > Message: 1 > Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 14:57:26 +0200 > From: "Milos Rancic" <millosh(a)gmail.com> > Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] What's appropriate attribution? > To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" > <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> > Message-ID: > <846221520810230557t2fd4a68exb97f3094e06b9b77(a)mail.gmail.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 > > On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 1:58 PM, Anthony <wikimail(a)inbox.org> wrote: > > has a right to attribution. But really, setting a limit to the number of > > principal authors is meaningless anyway, because *anyone can modify the > text > > without permission*, so even if you work your ass off and produce a > 10,000 > > word text, all a reuser has to do is take 5 other 10,001 word texts, > append > > it to the end, and now you get no attribution at all. > > ... > > Only attributing "the five principal authors" is utterly unacceptable. > Only > > attributing "five of the principal authors" is utterly unacceptable. Any > > attribution clause which doesn't ensure the attribution of *all* > significant > > contributors, is unacceptable. Within that framework I think there are a > > lot of reasonable solutions. > > I was reading this thread (more or less) carefully and I was wondering > how it is possible that the direction of the discussion was toward > attribution only five persons for the whole Wikipedia (or to some part > of it, no matter). So, thanks for mentioning this. > > I just may imagine an ironic smile of one my friend, a copyright > lawyer from Serbia, with the question: Would it pass at the court? :) > At least in Serbia, it would be treated as a typical example of trying > to make a fraud based on a weird interpretation of a license (or > whichever legal document) or "false contracts" (something in the > sense: "See, I killed him because we signed a contract that I may kill > him!"). > > However, I really think that we would come into a dead end if we > insist that every ~300 pages book has to print 100 (or 1000) more > pages of contributors. It is not a questionable issue, it is just a > matter of time: it is, maybe, true even today, it could be no true for > the next 5 years, but it will become our reality for sure. > > So, some way for solving this problem has to be find. I mentioned in > my first post of this thread that some kind of "hard copy links", like > web links to the history of the page on Wikipedia, may be used instead > of writing all names inside of the book. Maybe it should be defined > that if the list of authors is longer than 10% of the book size, for > the rest of them, book has to refer to the (mentioned) bibliography. > > And this is something which license has to solve. After solving that > issue inside of the license, we would have to convince continental > legal systems that such kind of solution is reasonable. > > And, of course, I am sure that others have some other ideas how to > address this problem. > > > > ------------------------------ > > Message: 2 > Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 09:35:32 -0400 > From: Anthony <wikimail(a)inbox.org> > Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] What's appropriate attribution? > To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" > <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> > Message-ID: > <71cd4dd90810230635p7d56e8e9y681012f4963fc06e(a)mail.gmail.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 > > On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 8:57 AM, Milos Rancic <millosh(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > However, I really think that we would come into a dead end if we > > insist that every ~300 pages book has to print 100 (or 1000) more > > pages of contributors. It is not a questionable issue, it is just a > > matter of time: it is, maybe, true even today, it could be no true for > > the next 5 years, but it will become our reality for sure. > > > > No, it really isn't possible. For a 300 page book to require 100 pages of > authors, each author could only have contributed 3 times as many characters > as their user name. Unless you're going to count vandals or > vandal-reverters as authors, it just isn't going to happen. > > Anthony > > > ------------------------------ > > Message: 3 > Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 14:45:25 +0100 > From: "David Gerard" <dgerard(a)gmail.com> > Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] foundation-l Digest, Vol 55, Issue 62 > To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" > <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> > Message-ID: > <fbad4e140810230645k75e6b6f7w72e72b665f67cc2e(a)mail.gmail.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 > > 2008/10/22 Mike.lifeguard <mikelifeguard(a)fastmail.fm>: > > Delphine wrote: > > >>1) The slogan "Wikipedia is a non-profit" sounds weird to me... > > > Well, Wikipedia itself isn't a nonprofit, the Foundation is. But "is > > nonprofit" and "is a nonprofit" are both acceptable in English (1st is > > an adjective, 2nd is a noun) so I don't see an issue with those words. > > > "is nonprofit" would be more strictly accurate. > > > - d. > > > > ------------------------------ > > Message: 4 > Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 16:29:52 +0200 > From: "Milos Rancic" <millosh(a)gmail.com> > Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] What's appropriate attribution? > To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" > <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> > Message-ID: > <846221520810230729i4c4784c0ra3e7dcd75337226d(a)mail.gmail.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 > > On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 3:35 PM, Anthony <wikimail(a)inbox.org> wrote: > > On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 8:57 AM, Milos Rancic <millosh(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > >> However, I really think that we would come into a dead end if we > >> insist that every ~300 pages book has to print 100 (or 1000) more > >> pages of contributors. It is not a questionable issue, it is just a > >> matter of time: it is, maybe, true even today, it could be no true for > >> the next 5 years, but it will become our reality for sure. > > > > No, it really isn't possible. For a 300 page book to require 100 pages > of > > authors, each author could only have contributed 3 times as many > characters > > as their user name. Unless you're going to count vandals or > > vandal-reverters as authors, it just isn't going to happen. > > Imagine that someone is making a 300 pages book about countries in the > world, based on Wikipedia articles. All basic Wikipedia articles about > countries have (~200) have, of course, much more than 300 pages. It > may have even 2000 pages. But, someone wants to use Wikipedia articles > to make a shorter book about the issue. Author of the book would use, > probably, introductions, as well as some other parts of the articles. > So, the author is not able even to try to count who contributed to the > introduction, but he has to count on article as a whole. > > If I counted well, article about France has between 8.000 and 9.000 > edits up to this moment. I think that it is reasonable to suppose that > this article will have 100 distinctive and significant authors -- if > not now -- then in 5 or 10 years. > > I am reading now a B5 format book with ~40x70=2800 characters per page. > > One name has, let's say, 15 characters (btw, I am sure that we will > demand listing the names if they are available, not just user names; > as I said before, some kind of user boxes may be used for that). 100 > names would consume 1500 characters (let's say, 1400, a half of the > page). 200 articles about countries with 100 distinctive names per > article means that the list will be 100 pages long. Even 50 is a lot > (if we assume that not all articles about countries would have such > number of contributors, like article about France would have). > > And, numbers will just be raising. > > Of course, we may tell to such authors to make a research for every > single page and to find which contributions are still inside of the > article and which are not. So, instead of working on the matter, > author would have to analyze contributions for more than year (I am > not sure that I am able to make analysis of the article about France > in one working day; even if I assume a number of [existing and > non-existing] tools for that). > > It is, simply, not reasonable; as well as it is not toward our goal to > spread free knowledge. > > However, I really agree with you that all significant contributors > should be attributed. > > > > ------------------------------ > > Message: 5 > Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 18:57:16 +0200 > From: "Andre Engels" <andreengels(a)gmail.com> > Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] What's appropriate attribution? > To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" > <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> > Message-ID: > <6faf39c90810230957h33d08868i2e0008380f0e7f7e(a)mail.gmail.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 > > On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 4:29 PM, Milos Rancic <millosh(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > Of course, we may tell to such authors to make a research for every > > single page and to find which contributions are still inside of the > > article and which are not. So, instead of working on the matter, > > author would have to analyze contributions for more than year (I am > > not sure that I am able to make analysis of the article about France > > in one working day; even if I assume a number of [existing and > > non-existing] tools for that). > > > > It is, simply, not reasonable; as well as it is not toward our goal to > > spread free knowledge. > > > > However, I really agree with you that all significant contributors > > should be attributed. > > Although it would not solve the problem for your hypothetical writer, > I think for the general case it would be good for us to _provide_ this > information with the article - either on the article page, or on the > history page, or maybe somewhere else (but I would prefer the first, > or if that doesn't work, the second). The information could be created > automatically from the history file, and a kind of bot could slowly go > over the articles to update it, giving each user's contribution to a > page a number, stored in the database. When a page (or history page) > is then shown, all users with either more than X contribution, or more > than Y% of the total contribution, or among the Z (5) largest > contributors would be shown (with a quick-and-dirty version of the > algorithm to get a 'maximum' contribution for those who contributed to > the page after the last time the information was updated). It might > not be that much use to your writer, who still would have 200 lists of > 10 or 20 names to deal with (still, 4000 names, many of them > duplicates is much more manageable than 20.000 of them), but for more > reasonable cases where whole pages or large portions of pages are > used, it could give a good indication of which names to include and > not to include. > > > -- > Andr? Engels, andreengels(a)gmail.com > > ------------------------------ > > Message: 6 > Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 20:15:04 +0200 > From: "Milos Rancic" <millosh(a)gmail.com> > Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] What's appropriate attribution? > To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" > <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> > Message-ID: > <846221520810231115n2b2f2e96tb9a05fe30befd1f4(a)mail.gmail.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 > > On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 6:57 PM, Andre Engels <andreengels(a)gmail.com> > wrote: > > Although it would not solve the problem for your hypothetical writer, > > I think for the general case it would be good for us to _provide_ this > > information with the article - either on the article page, or on the > > history page, or maybe somewhere else (but I would prefer the first, > > or if that doesn't work, the second). The information could be created > > automatically from the history file, and a kind of bot could slowly go > > over the articles to update it, giving each user's contribution to a > > page a number, stored in the database. When a page (or history page) > > is then shown, all users with either more than X contribution, or more > > than Y% of the total contribution, or among the Z (5) largest > > contributors would be shown (with a quick-and-dirty version of the > > algorithm to get a 'maximum' contribution for those who contributed to > > the page after the last time the information was updated). It might > > not be that much use to your writer, who still would have 200 lists of > > 10 or 20 names to deal with (still, 4000 names, many of them > > duplicates is much more manageable than 20.000 of them), but for more > > reasonable cases where whole pages or large portions of pages are > > used, it could give a good indication of which names to include and > > not to include. > > Yes, it would be good to have such tool as the first step. It would be > useful to have it even during this discussion to get a figure about > what do we demand from authors who would write books based on > Wikipedia. > > So, as I hope that you are interested in making that 0:-) may you give > numbers for, let's say, countries [1] of the world and species Felidae > [2]. > > And, of course, we need lists of contributors: > 1. Every contributor [let's say, without bots, while it may be > disputable, too] with an account and with immediately not reverted > edits. -- as the largest group of authors. > 2-n. Other ideas which you mentioned. > > It would be, also, good to have an approximation of the sizes of the > books based on full article size (without templates and images). > > [1] - Let's say, this list lists them inside fo the table: > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_outlying_territories_by_… > [2] - This template is good enough: > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Felidae_nav > > > > ------------------------------ > > Message: 7 > Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 20:45:10 +0200 > From: "Milos Rancic" <millosh(a)gmail.com> > Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] What's appropriate attribution? > To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" > <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> > Message-ID: > <846221520810231145nf3ad828o47360d20c66fb319(a)mail.gmail.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 > > On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 8:15 PM, Milos Rancic <millosh(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > And, of course, we need lists of contributors: > > 1. Every contributor [let's say, without bots, while it may be > > disputable, too] with an account and with immediately not reverted > > edits. -- as the largest group of authors. > > "with immediately not reverted edits" -> with more than immediately > not reverted edits > > > > ------------------------------ > > Message: 8 > Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2008 20:50:04 +0200 > From: "Milos Rancic" <millosh(a)gmail.com> > Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] What's appropriate attribution? > To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" > <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> > Message-ID: > <846221520810231150o5811f701p155b66d16d0bee86(a)mail.gmail.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 > > On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 8:45 PM, Milos Rancic <millosh(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 8:15 PM, Milos Rancic <millosh(a)gmail.com> wrote: > >> And, of course, we need lists of contributors: > >> 1. Every contributor [let's say, without bots, while it may be > >> disputable, too] with an account and with immediately not reverted > >> edits. -- as the largest group of authors. > > > > "with immediately not reverted edits" -> with more than immediately > > not reverted edits > > Ah, I realized now that the first construction was good :) > > > > ------------------------------ > > _______________________________________________ > foundation-l mailing list > foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l > > > End of foundation-l Digest, Vol 55, Issue 69 > ******************************************** >

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[Foundation-l] Brief update on board meeting
by Michael Snow 04 Nov '08

04 Nov '08

I'm almost scared to post this because it's liable to get lost in all the other traffic (what was that about a decline in activity on this list again? Not that this makes the concerns invalid, of course). But the board did have its scheduled meeting on IRC, and I wanted to quickly report some of the business we covered. First of all, we voted to approve new Wikimedia chapters for Hungary and Norway. Congratulations and welcome to the new chapters! (Maybe that will clear up a question or two that came up in one of the other threads.) Secondly, we approved the completed financial statements for the 2007-08 fiscal year, as audited by KPMG. We're happy to have finished the audit in a successful and timely fashion and look forward to the upcoming fundraising drive. As a housekeeping matter, we also passed a resolution needed by our bank in connection with having a brokerage account (used to process donations of stocks). Everyone attended and all of the resolutions passed unanimously. That's all I have time for right now, there's a lot going on - not just for me, it looks like. --Michael Snow

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[Foundation-l] survey does not work for konqueror browser?
by THURNER rupert 04 Nov '08

04 Nov '08

hi, there are rumors that the survey does not work on konqueror browser? anybody tested it with this browser? rupert.

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Re: [Foundation-l] GFDL 1.3 Release
by Mike Godwin 04 Nov '08

04 Nov '08

Erik writes: >> >> Will Wikimedia Foundation take the role of a publisher when >> relicensing >> content? > > Mike can answer much better to any section 230 issues, but no, I don't > see how it would. This change seems to me to be very similar in nature > to our licensing policy. Section 230 analysis focuses on the origin or development of the content, and not on licensing (or relicensing). So it follows from this that relicensing could not by itself trigger a change in the Foundation's legal status (from "interactive computer service" to "publisher or speaker" according to the language of Title 47, Sec. 230 of the United States Code). Note that this analysis focuses on a U.S. statutory provision -- it shouldn't be applied to other legal frameworks. --Mike

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[Foundation-l] Open Video Alliance
by Erik Moeller 03 Nov '08

03 Nov '08

Michael Dale & I traveled to New Haven this weekend to attend the first meeting of the "Open Video Alliance" at Yale University: http://openvideoalliance.org/ The meeting was sponsored and facilitated by the Open Society Institute, Kaltura, the Participatory Culture Foundation and the Yale ISP project. It was attended by video practitioners and technologists who want to support open licensing & open standards for web video. Attendees included representatives from Mozilla, Xiph.org, Kennisland, DotSub, PCF, EFF, Creative Commons, Al Jazeera, the Berkman Center, and many others. Separately, Michael & I met with Kaltura to discuss the future of the Wikimedia/Kaltura relationship. There are four primary outcomes of the meetings: * The OVA will work on a statement of principles regarding open video. This is of less relevance to us since we already have a strong commitment in this regard, but may help to convince others to use free licenses & open standards. * I've followed up with Anna Helme of the Engage Media project. Together with some collaborators, Anna has compiled a great survey of free codecs and players here: http://wiki.transmission.cc/index.php/FOSS_Codecs_For_Online_Video:_Usabili… We may want to commission her to do a similar in-depth comparison of 100% open source video editing solutions, with the ultimate goal of helping to bootstrap one of them to be useful. If anyone is aware of an existing survey in this regard, please let me know. * We've followed up with Monty from Xiph and the Mozilla folks to see if there are ways in which we can support the further development of Theora, and the specific implementation used in Firefox 3.1. * Regarding Kaltura, we're unlikely to further investigate any Flash-based solutions, or any depending on proprietary codecs, but we're discussing now whether/how Kaltura could function as a technology partner for a 100% open video editing solution targeting the Firefox platform. We'll be having follow-up meetings on this topic in the near future. Meanwhile, Kaltura is continuing to sponsor Michael Dale's initial work on exactly such a solution, and has built a first prototype that can do basic video sequence editing in Firefox 3.1 on the basis of Ogg Theora. I'll post further updates as things develop. -- Erik Möller Deputy Director, Wikimedia Foundation Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate

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[Foundation-l] GNU FDL 1.3 released!
by Petr Kadlec 03 Nov '08

03 Nov '08

I'm finishing a "licenses on Wikipedia" speech I'm going to have tomorrow. I want to check something in the GFDL text. I get 404… and after a while, refresh shows "GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.3, 3 November 2008"… :-) Going to check the changes… and possibly rewrite some parts of my presentation :-/ -- [[cs:User:Mormegil | Petr Kadlec]]

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[Foundation-l] Fwd: ISO 639 JAC decision re mo/mol
by Gerard Meijssen 03 Nov '08

03 Nov '08

Hoi, Today I received the following e-mail. It demonstrates clearly that issues in the ISO-639 standard are dealt with eventually. Thanks, GerardM ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Håvard Hjulstad <HHj(a)standard.no> Date: Mon, Nov 3, 2008 at 11:43 AM Subject: ISO 639 JAC decision re mo/mol The ISO 639 Registration Authorities' Joint Advisory Committee has decided: The identifiers *mo* and *mol* are deprecated leaving *ro* and *ron/rum* the current language identifiers to be used for the variant of the Romanian language also known as *Moldavian* and *Moldovan * in English and *moldave* in French. (The identifier *ron* is used in the ISO 639-2 T table; the identifier *rum* in the ISO 639-2 B table.) The identifiers *mo* and *mol* will not be assigned to different items, and recordings using these identifiers will not be invalid. Best regards, Håvard Hjulstad *--------------------* *Håvard Hjulstad* * Standard Norge / Standards Norway** ** Postboks 242, NO-1326 Lysaker** ** besøksadresse / visiting address: Strandveien 18* * tel: (+47) 67838600 | faks / fax: (+47) 67838601* * direkte tel / direct tel: (+47) 67838645* *hhj(a)standard.no* * **http://www.standard.no/* *--------------------* _______________________________________________ Ietf-languages mailing list Ietf-languages(a)alvestrand.no http://www.alvestrand.no/mailman/listinfo/ietf-languages

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Re: [Foundation-l] GNU FDL 1.3 released!
by Geoffrey Plourde 03 Nov '08

03 Nov '08

Images are handled under different licenses? It doesn't seem very wise to license them under a documentation license ________________________________ From: Michael Bimmler <mbimmler(a)gmail.com> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> Sent: Monday, November 3, 2008 8:36:23 AM Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] GNU FDL 1.3 released! On Mon, Nov 3, 2008 at 5:31 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com> wrote: > 2008/11/3 Erik Moeller <erik(a)wikimedia.org>: >> 2008/11/3 Nathan <nawrich(a)gmail.com>: >>> Referring to: >>> >>> "An MMC is "eligible for relicensing" if it is licensed under this License, >>> and if all works that were first published under this License somewhere >>> other than this MMC, and subsequently incorporated in whole or in part into >>> the MMC, (1) had no cover texts or invariant sections, and (2) were thus >>> incorporated prior to November 1, 2008." >>> >>> I get the feeling that your reading of this section is not completely >>> accurate. >> >> That's correct. Changes originating in the wiki to be relicensed can >> still be relicensed past November 1, in fact until the 2009 deadline >> for relicensing. I haven't checked the FAQ (we didn't receive an >> advance copy of it), but it is possible that it doesn't correctly >> reflect this point. > > Ok, that's marginally better. We don't need to delete everything > posted in the past 2 days (and the subsequent time until we decide > whether or not to switch) we just have to scour through it all and > delete those parts that weren't originally posted to whatever project > you're on - that includes anything transwikied and anything > translated. I stand by my original assessment, it's a useless license. > I'm following up on what Bence mentioned first here: What about e.g. images that we receive through permissions(a)wikimedia.org between November 1 and (hopefully) Novermber X? These were obviously published first somewhere else than a Wiki...what's the position on this? I'm not intending to spread panic (*especially* because I'm really not a copyright law expert and at the moment somewhat too tired for analytical reading of the license), but still, if the permissions team should stop handle permissions for the moment, it had better be told... Best regards, Michael -- Michael Bimmler mbimmler(a)gmail.com _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

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[Foundation-l] First-ever Wikimedia Foundation Annual Report
by Jay Walsh 03 Nov '08

03 Nov '08

Hey all, Very pleased to announce the official release of our first-ever Annual Report today. Hosted on-wiki: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Annual_Report And blogged up here: http://blog.wikimedia.org/2008/10/31/wikimedias-first-ever-annual-report/ We'll have lots of time to prep for the next annual report, so please share any feedback or thoughts on how we can make improvements. Thanks, -- Jay Walsh Head of Communications WikimediaFoundation.org +1 (415) 839 6885 x 609

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