Hoi,
This is of sufficient merit that I do it this way.
Thanks,
GerardM
Aan u verzonden door GerardM via Google Reader: Court: Congress can't
put public domain back into copyright via Ars Technica door
nate(a)arstechnica.com (Nate Anderson) op 6-4-09
In 1994, Congress jammed a batch of foreign books and movies back into
the copyright closet. They had previously fallen into the public domain
for a variety of technical reasons (the author hadn't renewed the
rights with the US Copyright Office, the authors of older works hadn't
included a copyright notice, etc.) and companies and individuals had
already started reusing the newly public works. Did Congress have the
right to put a stop to this activity by shoving the works back into
copyright? On Friday, a federal court said no.
"Traditional contours of copyright"
1994's Uruguay Round Agreements Act (URAA) brought US intellectual
property law in line with that of other countries. Section 514 of URAA
better aligned US copyright law with the international Berne
Convention, one of the earliest international intellectual property
treaties. Though Berne had first been signed back in 1886, the US
hadn't joined up until a century later, in 1988.
Click here to read the rest of this article
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te houden
Dear foundation-l,
1) summaries for March are posted:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/LSS#Foundation-l
2) please, if you have some sort of community news (a big chapter or
meetup group event? goings-on on your wiki? some proposal on meta we
should all know about?) don't forget to post it to the mailing list,
or at least to the appropriate project list. The people who write for
Wikizine, the Signpost, and the other community newsletters would all
appreciate it :) and personally, I love seeing what is going on with
the various projects.
-- phoebe
--
* I use this address for lists; send personal messages to phoebe.ayers
<at> gmail.com *
Thomas Dalton wrote:
>>>> I've just looked at a BLP and nowhere can I see an guidance on how to
>>>> complain. I suggest a "Report a problem with this article" link to
>>>> added to the sidebar of all articles as a mailto link to the
>>>> appropriate OTRS address.
>> I agree with this - I think "report a problem" would be a very helpful
>> starting point.
> I've started work on an extension to provide such a link. Hopefully
> I'll have something to show in a few days.
The Dutch Wikipedia uses an extension to contact "Wikipedia"
anonymously directly from the browser. See
https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=15624 and
http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:ContactPage.
IRC tells me that the response group is happy with the message flow so
far, and people using the form seem happy to use it as well, even
though it's also three clicks away from any article.
--Para
For a couple of years I am talking to different people inside of WMF
about the need for solving conversion engines issue systematically.
However, all of the responses which I am getting are non-understanding
(in better cases) or silence.
== Why do we need conversion engines? ==
Unlike, for example, French, English, German and Russian, there are
languages which have more than trivial internal differences. It may
vary between:
* slightly different orthographies, so, person who knows one
orthography is not able to write in another;
* slightly different language varieties (or "dialects"), so, person
who knows one variety is not able to write in another;
* different scripts, so, person who knows one script doesn't know
[well] another;
* some combination of the previous possibilities.
Options which we have are:
* Not to care about differences. The most known situation is related
to the English language projects, which allows writing in both major
varieties. However, difference between "kilometer" and "kilometre" is
small and it belongs to the common knowledge of every educated English
speaker. The other situations known to me are Persian language
projects (Farsi and Dari are allowed) and Serbian language projects
(Ekavian and Iyekavian allowed).
Problems with such approach is that at least one group, usually a
bigger one, doesn't know to write in the other variety. Speakers of
Farsi don't know to write Dari, as well as speakers of Ekavian don't
know to write Iyekavian. There are significant problems in keeping and
expanding articles written in a variety of minority group: Even with a
lot of good will, speaker of majority group has to ask a speaker of
minority group to check consistency of an article, *if* there are
active speakers of minority group at the project.
* To make different projects. This is the case with Belarus projects.
(Parts of Belarus diaspora don't want to write in the "communist"
orthography, while the educational system (including the educational
system for Belarus minority in Poland) is using that orthography.)
I see that as the worst possible solution: Instead of having one
project for one language system, there are two projects; which means
that efforts needed to make a good source of knowledge are doubled.
* To use a conversion engine. There are few of implemented conversion
engines: Chinese, Serbian and Kazakh (I think that this is the full
list, but I am not sure). This is the best possible solution *if* it
is working.
The smallest issue is in the Serbian case. All literate people in
Serbia know to write in both scripts: Cyrillic and Latin. Usage of
scripts is at the level of preference and rarely at the level of
functional styles (usually, materials for children will be written in
Cyrillic, while emails will be written usually in Latin; formal acts
have to be written in Cyrillic).
Chinese is a little bit more complex because there are a number of
characters. However, AFAIK, Simplified and Traditional scripts share a
number of characters and some of others may be guessed form context.
But, again, current implementation may solve just cases which fulfill
the next two conditions: (1) they are more or less straight-forward
(more or less one character for one character) and (2) speakers are
able to read and write (at least partially) the other script.
== Problems with the current conversion engine ==
* Current conversion engine is able to convert the text just for
reading. When you switch to edit mode, you'll are able to see just
text in one script (in which article is written). This is not a
problem for Serbian case and this is a small scale problem in Chinese
case.
However, this would be a significant problem for cases like
Azerbaijani is: one Azerbaijani from Azerbaijan doesn't know
Perso-Arabic script, while just educated Azerbaijanis from Iran know
not so well Latin script (note that literacy in Iran is ~80%, which is
quite low for Western standards; it means that one in five persons
doesn't know to read and write). In other words, make a simple
conversion engine, one on one, from Latin to Arabic script for English
and try to read converted text. If you don't want to bother yourself
with right-to-left text, try with Devanagari.
* Current conversion engine converts *everything* into the output
script. This means that text with mixed scripts will be converted in
one. This is useful for Chinese case because contributors may write
text in any script, while readers would be able to read in one of
them. This is a redundant (and sometimes irritating) feature for
Serbian case because no one is writing Serbian texts by mixing
Cyrillic and Latin (except, of course, for scientific purposes).
But, it makes the engine useless in the cases where just orthographies
or language varieties need to be converted. For example, if Dari has
word which form is X and meaning A (and written in Farsi as Y) and
Farsi has word which form is X (and written in Dari as Z) and meaning
is B, the only option which conversion engine gives is escape syntax
like -{ Dari: X; Farsi: Y }-. Imagine now how the wiki code would look
like if, for example, genitive case is written Dari like accusative
case in Farsi: All syntactic objects will have to be escaped; which
means that almost every sentence will have one escape from regular
rules.
== What do we need? ==
Actually, we don't need a lot to solve this problem. I have the
solution for the most important part of the problem, the linguistic
one. Even if I don't have enough of time to deal with all cases, I am
able to find students or professors of linguists who are willing to
work on those issues for free (they would have scientific papers after
the work is done). We need "just" a PHP programmer who is willing to
work on this problem. And for a couple of years I didn't find any
(even I know a lot of PHP programmers).
P.S. I am writing this because I've got an email with an ask to help
in solving an orthography problem. The only option which I am able to
give them is to make a Python script which would make four articles
from one at their project.
Hello,
A couple of days ago I have contacted our project manager in San Francisco
who is dealing with the improvement of the usability of Wikipedia. I have
done this interview for [[de:Wikipedia:Kurier]] and translated it to German,
but originally it is in English and so I thought that I can also send it to
this list.
Kind regards
Ziko
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Kurier
*Kimura: Wikipedia Usability by Better „Ranking“*
*Wikipedia is difficult to edit, many people say, and Wikimedia Foundation
encountered the problem by installing Naoki Kimura as a project manager. Her
team will make proposals to improve Wikipedia Usability. In an interview
with Ziko van Dijk she unravels test results and the next step.*
ZvD: Dear Naoki Kimura, previously you told us that you would run some tests
about the problems of our new users.
NK: Yes, first results confirmed that new Wikipedia users find it very
difficult to link to the already existing community, to fit in and to learn
the rules. Most difficult this is because the rules change and there is no
clear authority. You don't know whom to direct to.
ZvD: That is exactly the Wiki principle which made Wikipedia big.
NK: But is it suitable to keep Wikipedia running? We lose a lot of people or
scare them away even before they join, the statistics show us. Wikipedia can
only go on by making the collaboration better.
ZvD: So if I am a new user, what will change?
NK: In fact, as a new user you already have only limited rights compared to
more experienced users. You cannot vote, you cannot sight versions in
Wikipedias with flagged revisions, and so on. This must become more
systematic. So as a new user you will start as a „rookie user“, and after
six months, after trainings and tests, you might become an „advanced user“
and later a „user major“. A bigger step will be to become an „editor
adjunct“ etc. In the end, you can become a „senior editor general“.
ZvD: I see. And what about non editors?
NK: You mean developers and admins? It will be the same or similar.
ZvD: And the "commander-in-chief" of the three service branches will be
Jimmy Wales?
NK: Yes of course, that will not change at all.
ZvD: So the word "edit war“ will get a totally new meaning?
NK: No, there will be no edit wars at all! There will be no quarrels, no
uncertainties, no cybermobbing. We will even be able abolish the talk pages.
ZvD: Because everyone knows who is senior and has what rights.
NK: Exactly.
ZvD: But will Wikipedians accept such a system?
NK: That is funny, you know. I worried about that until I presented the idea
to the staff members in San Francisco. They told me that they are all Star
Trek fans and when they were children at play, they called each other
"captain“ or "midshipman“ or "commander“.
ZvD: Naoki, I wish you all the best for implementation (it will certainly
not be easy) and thank you for this interview.
NK: Dismissed.
---------------------------------------------------
Ziko van Dijk
NL-Silvolde
Hi all
I just came across this[1] policy on Commons, which states that from today,
non-free content is going to be allowed to be uploaded on Commons. I'm
rather shocked that this was pushed through without any notice here, or
anywhere, and it has become policy, going against Wikimedia's "free content"
philosophy. Can people please input on the talk page as soon as possible
please, so we can get this reversed.
Thanks,
--
Alex
(User:Majorly)
[1] http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Non-free_content
--- On Wed, 4/1/09, Marcus Buck <me(a)marcusbuck.org> wrote:
> From: Marcus Buck <me(a)marcusbuck.org>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Non-free content on Commons
> To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Date: Wednesday, April 1, 2009, 10:16 AM
> Birgitte SB hett schreven:
> > Right, it obviously "the pompous English majority"
> conspiring here because you received a prank from every
> English speaker on the list.
> >
> > If the list were in Spanish so every immature youth in
> Latin America with too much time on their hands could access
> it without scholarship, you would be unable to spare the
> rest of us on Dec 28. Follow David's example and
> ignore those who actually choose to waste your time and
> spare the rest of us your stereotyped rant.
> >
> > Birgitte SB
> >
> Cultural imperialism is not confined to societies. It can
> be done by
> individuals too. And Pedro's critical remarks are aimed at
> individuals.
> No need to feel offended as a member of the English
> majority (except you
> support imposing your own cultural sillynesses on other
> people, in that
> case, feel offended).
>
> The main problem with "just ignore them" is: If you don't
> know the
> custom of April's Fool day, you won't know that it's a
> joke. And even if
> you know the custom you can still fall for the jokes.
>
> I am fully aware, that there will always be idiots, who
> don't know how
> to behave in an intercultural environment, but only if we
> tell them that
> they are idiots, awareness can arise for the idioticy of
> this behaviour.
>
If you hadn't snipped it would be clear the rant was not directed at any individuals. The foundation list and it's English majority were all that was given not idiotic pranksters. While one need not feel offended about it, neither does one need to feel annoyed with April Fools pranks. But such an attitude is offensive to me and I don't think it belongs here any more than the annoying pranks do.
I am afraid you misunderstood my suggestion as well as misquoted me.. I have no issue with singling out people, and didn't mean to suggest they must be ignored without comment. More like placed on the "ignore emails from X" function of your Inbox. So that they won't bother him in the future.. I suggested following David's example, which was singling a prankster out and publicly announcing that he was ignoring him. So I never intended to suggest that he "just ignore [the pranks]".
Birgitte SB