Wikimedia-l May 2008

wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org

135 participants
189 discussions

[Foundation-l] New Wikimania security report posted
by Mike Godwin 01 Jun '08

01 Jun '08

Dear folks, The second of the security consulting firms we've been working with on developing a security profile for Wikimania in Alexandria has released its report for our publication. The second firm is Stratfor Protective Intelligence, and their report can be found here: <http://wikimania2008.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Alexandria%2C_Egypt_-_Securit… >. Stratfor has a "Welcome, Wikimedia Members" page at <https://www.stratfor.com/campaign/welcome_wikimedia_members > in case you want to consult with them on other matters. The first report, from Clayton Associates, continues to be available here: <http://wikimania2008.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Egypt_country_profile_04-22-0… >. The initial Wikimedia Foundation "Alexandria Security FAQ" can still be found here: <http://wikimania2008.wikimedia.org/wiki/Alexandria_Security_FAQ>. I hope the consensus here is that the Foundation has been responsive to security concerns raised on this list and elsewhere. We have tried to assemble a full range of resources for those who have raised these concerns. --Mike Godwin General Counsel Wikimedia Foundation

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[Foundation-l] Wikipedia logo uses non-free font
by Mark Williamson 31 May '08

31 May '08

Hi all, Somebody from the new Karakalpak Wikipedia wrote me today to ask what font is used for the Latin text in the labels on Wikipedia logos. The vast majority (that is, those created by Nohat or myself) use Hoefler. This is not a free font. I don't have the font on my current system, and the only ways for the Karakalpak logo designer to obtain the font would be to pay $200 to obtain it, or download it illegally. Just as an idea, I looked up average wages in Uzbekistan and found that for many workers, this is more than they earn in an entire month. The other common scripts on Wikipedia, Cyrillic and Arabic, also use non-free fonts: if I recall correctly, Minion is used for Cyrillic, and I can't remember what we use for Arabic. I would love to see the community select a suitable free font to replace the non-free fonts we use in almost all of our logos. (yi.wp uses a free font for its logo, but I know of no other Wikipedia that does) I understand that the current font has become associated with Wikipedia to a certain extent, but I feel that this is an important matter of principal and something that we should think about as a way to support free software and also to allow ALL people with the requisite expertise and computer access the ability to design a logo for their own language that uses the same font as any other language. Mark

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[Foundation-l] Testing
by Marc Riddell 31 May '08

31 May '08

Folks, Please bear with me while I run a test of my e-mail service. Comcast has been having problems for the past 24 hours & for some reason I haven't received any posts from any of the various WP-related Mailing Lists. Marc

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[Foundation-l] Allow new wikis in extinct languages?
by Jesse Martin (Pathoschild) 30 May '08

30 May '08

Hello, The language subcommittee only allows languages that have a living native community (except Wikisource, due to its archivist nature). This is based on an interpretation of the Wikimedia Foundation mission to "provide the sum of human knowledge to every human being". Thus, the overriding purpose of allowing a wiki in a new language is to make it accessible to more human beings. If a language has no native users, allowing a wiki in that language does not fit our mission because it does not make that project accessible to more human beings. Instead, a wiki in their native languages should be requested if it doesn't already exist. Typically, the users requesting a wiki in an extinct language don't want to provide educational material to more people at all, but only want to promote or revive the language. While these are noble goals, they are not those of the Wikimedia Foundation, so that a wiki should not be created simply to fulfill them. But that is my opinion. What do you think; should wikis be allowed in every extinct language? -- Yours cordially, Jesse Plamondon-Willard (Pathoschild)

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[Foundation-l] En.wikipedia's arbcom
by White Cat 30 May '08

30 May '08

Since this issue is about en.wikipedia's arbcom foundation-l is the place to discuss this. Right now we have an Arbitration Committee that has declared ownership over Arbitration related sub pages. Arbitrators will not allow community or members of the community to edit or restructure these pages. For example I was denied the right to create the redirect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Davenbellew… was promptly deleted by an admin who I believe is an arbitrator. Arbcom will not allow the restructure of RfAr page which has become very large or so I am told http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_arbitration#For_th… do not know what that assessment is based on but I suspect it may be yet another "private" discussion of arbcom. Us lowlifes hardly hear from arbcom anymore. It takes forever to load the RFAR page on GPRS connections. Arbcom was founded by Wikipedia's founder Jimmy Wales to help resolve disputes. Arbcom is beginning to be the source of a dispute over the most trivial disagreements. - White Cat

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[Foundation-l] Famous for our lack of ads
by David Gerard 30 May '08

30 May '08

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7428104.stm "Q: If Wikipedia can stay free of advertising why can't the BBC? The worst decision the Trust has made, in my view." (I must note that I personally don't object to ads on Wikipedia, but I do think it would be a public relations disaster externally as well as internally, and should be avoided as hard as we can. I'm posting the above for anecdotal interest.) - d.

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[Foundation-l] Proposals for the first global roles
by Milos Rancic 30 May '08

30 May '08

Let's try to resume previous discussions. Proposals for the first set of global roles are: * Global bot flag for interwiki bots. This flag may be used only for non-controversial actions, like interwikis and user space pages are. * Anti-vandal fighters. They should have the next possibilities: ** Rollback ** Delete ** Undelete. I submitted a bug at Bugzilla with ask for making permission "undelete if I deleted"; when/if such permission would be implemented, undelte privilege should be substituted with this privilege; it is obvious that undelete is needed only in the case when page is deleted by accident. ** Block user (global) permission is not necessary, but it would be better that anti-vandal fighter are taking care about vandals, not stewards (while stewards are able to do so, too). ** Anti-vandal fighters would be elected in the similar manner like Meta administrators: they would nominate themselves whenever and voting will last something like 7 days. * Meta bureaucrats ** Meta bureaucrats exist and I realized that there is no need for one more role for "global bureaucrats". ** Meta bureaucrats would be able to give global bot flag as well as to give anti-vandal group to the elected contributor. ** Meta bureaucrats should be able to take care about SUL accounts, too. ** Their election process wouldn't be changed. However, note that we will need more meta bureaucrats. If there are not serious objections about those proposals, I'll formulate more precise draft of rights and responsibilities for new and new-old roles and send it here for further discussion.

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Re: [Foundation-l] SUL homewiki selection question
by Anon Sricharoenchai 30 May '08

30 May '08

5. In another situation, 1. Mr.A own user123@frwikipedia: 50000 edits count 2. Mr.A has ever been approved to be sysop on frwikipedia, but at that time, he refuse to be sysop 3. Mr.B own user123@lowikipedia: 10000 edits count 4. After SUL, user123 has not been merged by anyone 5. In someday later (after SUL), Mr.B has been elected to be sysop on lowikipedia 6. At that time (after Mr.B got sysop), who will get the homewiki? 6. The next situation, 1. Mr.A own user123@frwikipedia: 50000 edits count 2. Mr.A has ever been approved to be sysop on frwikipedia, but at that time, he refuse to be sysop 3. Mr.B own user123@lowikipedia: 10000 edits count 4. When SUL is enabled for sysop only, 4.1 Mr.A try to merge his account, but he can't, since he is not sysop 4.2 Mr.B is sysop on lowikipedia, and Mr.B successfully merge his user123 account (after Mr.A fail to merge) 5. When SUL is enabled for everyone, Mr.A try to merge his account again, but he got the message "user123 has already been merged by user123@lowikipedia"!!! 6. Can Mr.A request steward to delete global account of Mr.B?

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[Foundation-l] New wikis
by A.M.D.F. 29 May '08

29 May '08

Day #70. Still no activity around creating new wikis. -- [FreeBSD 6.1-STABLE][2:5020/845.86@fidonet]

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[Foundation-l] Fwd: [Internal-l] Latest Tax Form 990 Available on Foundation Wiki
by Erik Moeller 29 May '08

29 May '08

FYI: ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Veronique Kessler Date: 2008/5/16 Subject: [Internal-l] Latest Tax Form 990 Available on Foundation Wiki I just wanted to let you know that our 2006 IRS Form 990 (covering the fiscal year of July 1, 2006 to June 30, 2007)was filed electronically with the IRS on May 12. This is a required annual filing related to our status as a U.S. non-profit, charitable foundation. This form, in a slightly amended version, must be available publicly at our office site. As a service to the community and the public, we are pleased to be sharing a PDF version of the filing on the Foundation wiki at: This is the link to the updated, 2006 Form 990: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Image:WMF_2007_Form_990.pdf In anticipation of any questions, we have also prepared a Question and Answer sheet also posted on the Foundation wiki at: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Form_2006_Questions_and_AnswersURL Of course we'd be happy to field any other questions you might have. Regards, -- Veronique Kessler Chief Financial and Operating Officer, Wikimedia Foundation

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Wikimedia-l May 2008