Wikimedia-l December 2011

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134 participants
104 discussions

[Foundation-l] Wikimedia Incubator yearly report for 2011
by MF-Warburg 31 Dec '11

31 Dec '11

On Incubator we have in this year for the first time compiled an end-of-the-year review in order to inform people about what is going on on Incubator / new wikis. The version on-wiki can be found on http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Incubator:News/2011_report Incubator (http://incubator.wikimedia.org) is a wiki of the Wikimedia Foundation which serves as a platform where anyone can build up a a new language edition of a Wikimedia project (Wikipedia, Wiktionary, Wikibooks, Wikinews and Wikiquote) that does not yet have its own subdomain, provided that it is a recognized language. These so-called "test wikis" on Incubator can be used like (nearly) any other real wiki. When the community desires so and there is enough activity, they can request to move to an own subdomain through the requests for new languages process. Wikisource and Wikiversity are not mentioned above, as their tests belong to Old Wikisource (http://wikisource.org) and Beta Wikiversity ( http://beta.wikiversity.org). Regarding test wikis, this report will however focus on Incubator mainly. The Language committee reviews these requests, deciding about the eligibility of languages and determining whether test wikis are deemed active enough to sustain activity on an own subdomain. As it is widely known, the 10th anniversary of Wikipedia was celebrated on January 15th; but this year was also the fifth birthday of Incubator, which was created on 2 June 2006. ====Site creations==== 12 new language subdomains of Wikimedia projects were created in 2011. In January, Rusyn Wikipedia has been created, and in March Latgalian Wikipedia, Kabardian Wikipedia and Albanian Wikinews. Three Wikisources were also created, in Sanskrit, Yakut and Esperanto, after a successful testing phase on Old Wikisource. Greek Wikinews got its own subdomain in April. In July, the Mingrelian Wikipedia and from outside of Incubator Arabic Wikiversity have been created. In September, Oriya Wiktionary was re-opened; this was the first time that a closed wiki became so active again on Incubator, so that the subdomain could be opened again. The last wiki created in this year was the Northern Sotho Wikipedia in November, which was interestingly the largest indigenous South African language Wikipedia even though it was the only one still on Incubator. Upcoming projects are Veps Wikipedia and Western Punjabi Wiktionary, which were approved and are currently waiting for creation, while Tachelhit and Lezgian Wikipedia are still awaiting content verification. See http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Incubator:Site_creation_log for links to the projects. ====Policy issues==== '''Closing projects''' SPQRobin made a proposal for a Policy on closing projects in February. Proposals for closing projects ( http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Proposals_for_closing_projects) had no fixed rules before, but were more or less simply votes; sometimes users came by and made a "decision" by counting the votes and filing a bug accordingly. After the policy proposal had been elaborated further, it was adopted by Langcom and the Board of Trustees in May/June. The "Closing projects policy" now defines several reasons for closing as either valid or invalid. The decision on closing projects is now within the responsibility of the Langcom and Board. First Langcom actions about closing projects in happened in August; and currently the 2nd round is ongoing. See the proposal page on Meta for details. '''Kichwa language''': On Incubator, a group of users started building a test Wikipedia in Kichwa (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kichwa_language), an Ecuadorian standard of Quechua. This "Unified Kichwa", however, is not included in the ISO 639 standard which Wikimedia uses for determining whether a language is acceptable or not. A temporary code is used now; a solution is pending. '''Berber languages''': Several Berber languages have their test wiki, and there is also effort to start a Standard Berber test wiki, which also lacks a valid code. There are also technical issues because in addition to Latin, the Tifinagh script is used which lacks proper software support. Having two scripts also requires script conversion. ====Language Commitee==== In May, the Language Committee held its first real-life meeting in Berlin. We discussed a lot of topics, including linguistic issues, simple projects, ... We also made some decisions: the LangCom's activities are now more open by allowing observers. Robin volunteered to write monthly reports for the public. In November, several LangCom members who also work for WMF and/or are a developer (Amir, Robin, Gerard, Santhosh) went to the Hackathon in Mumbai, India (https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/India_Hackathon_2011). Software tools (Narayam input method and WebFonts) were improved for Indic languages, but can also be used for other languages; they make it possible to type non-Latin scripts without having an appropriate keyboard available. Wikimedia Australia and Wikimedia Indonesia are collaborating with the language committee to organise a 2012 Languages Conference in Indonesia. More info: http://www.wikimedia.org.au/wiki/Proposal:2012_Languages_conference ====Technical improvements==== A new MediaWiki extension has been developed for Incubator, aptly called "WikimediaIncubator" ( https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:WikimediaIncubator). It was enabled for the first time on 6 June, allowing users to set a test wiki preference (similar to the language preference), and to view a number of special pages, including Special:RecentChanges, on a per-test-wiki basis in order to make this more convenient and less confusing. The extension is continuously being improved. Some other features which should be mentioned are: Checks to help users create pages (correctly) according to the "sorting system" of Incubator and the introduction of automatic "Welcome pages" for every possible project of every valid language. These pages contain information for people how they can start a new Wikipedia language version there & are adapted to each language and project and are translatable. This last function is synergetic with a new feature added in December: Instead of showing a 404 error page, the red links on Special:SiteMatrix now redirect to the respective Welcome page on Incubator, e.g. http://ss.wikiquote.org. Interwiki links are also possible e.g. <nowiki>[[xyz:Page]] on en.wikipedia links to</nowiki> http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/xyz/Page" ====Plans for 2012==== For 2012, we hope to simplify the processes for requesting a new subdomain and to improve Incubator's usability. Therefore it will be easier for people to contribute here, resulting in an increased participation in new language versions. Unfortunately, our documentation is very poor at the moment, so that will be in our focus very much. It is also planned to gain more feedback from users about how the Incubator phase and wiki creation process could be made easier and more attractive.

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[Foundation-l] WMF compensation practices
by Federico Leva (Nemo) 31 Dec '11

31 Dec '11

Erik Moeller, 30/11/2011 07:03: > On Tue, Nov 29, 2011 at 3:42 PM, Nathan wrote: [...] >> * The budget includes a whopping $14 million on staffing costs (at the >> planned 117 number of staff, that is nearly $120k per staff member) > > The 2010-11 staffing budget is $13.3M. [5] Staffing costs include > payroll taxes, recruiting costs, and benefits, and of course pay bands > for different roles vary significantly, but are consistent with > similar non-profit organizations, i.e. below the market rate paid at > for-profit companies. > > More background about the guiding principles of Wikimedia's > compensation practices can be found in [7]. [...] > [7] <http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/2/2a/Wikimedia_Foundation_…> Thank you for mentioning this (and thanks to people who worked on it too), I found it very interesting. What I don't understand, especially given the nature of the WMF staff (at large), is that there is no mention at all of international differences; I heard that they're somehow taken care of, but it would be very nice to have them briefly documented. As it is, this document would seem to be only about San-Francisco indefinite employees. For instance: «benefits package for all staff, which includes medical, dental, vision and life insurance» doesn't apply to non-USA based staffers, I guess (they might not even need one), but it's not said what happens to them; «Staff receive an annual vacation allotment, which ranges from 5-20 working days», but no mention of whether this is adjusted to local vacation/public holidays laws; there's nothing about notice periods for termination or non-renewal of contracts (another thing which varies a lot across countries). Nemo P.s.: I hope you'll be forgiving of my English terminology mistakes.

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[Foundation-l] Smurfs Movie is infringing on wikipedia copyright
by Mike Dupont 31 Dec '11

31 Dec '11

The smurfs move disturbed me when I watched it, Not only does the actor in the movie lift an image off the wikipedia and use it in his advertising campaign, but the movie itself gives no credits to wikipedia on the webpage etc. http://rdfintrospector2.blogspot.com/2011/12/smurfs-movie-wikipedia-copylef… mike -- James Michael DuPont Member of Free Libre Open Source Software Kosova http://flossk.org

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[Foundation-l] WIKEXPERIENCE, project of University for experience knowledge, call for contributions
by Marie-Antoine Rieu 31 Dec '11

31 Dec '11

*WIKEXPERIENCE, project of University for experience knowledge, call for collaborative writting,* * WIKEXPERIENCE, projet d'université des savoirs d'expérience, appel à collaboration pour l'écriture* Dear all, Wikexperience University is a project to be sent in January 2012 to Wikimedia Foundation. Its goals : - exploring and objectivizing the knowledge drawn from experience, by the means of a frame to be created in a collaborative and multicultural manner ; - developing interactions between academic knowledge, Wikimedia's knowledge and knowledge drawn from experience; - researching ways to create a degree (or a certificate) or to graduate groups (or individuals) regarding their production of experience knowledge or their use of this knowledge in situation of life or work. I invite you to discuss this project together and to take part to the final writing of this project You can find the project following this link : *http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikexperience* You can also send personal mails to me for questions or critical points of vue. Best regards. Marie-Antoine Rieu, Toulouse, France *Wikexperience, projet d'université des savoirs d'expérience, appel à collaboration pour la rédaction* **Wikexpérience est le projet d'une université expérimentale dédiée aux savoirs d'expérience. La rédaction definitive du projet doit être envoyée au 10 janvier 2012 à Wikimédia Foundation. Ses buts : - explorer les savoirs d'expérience et les objectiver au moyen d'une grille à élaborer de façon collaborative et multiculturelle ; -développer les interactions entre les savoirs académiques, les savoirs disponibles sur les projets Wikimedia et les savoirs d'expérience ; - chercher des moyens de créer une validation ou une certification ou de diplômer des groupes ou des individus pour leur production de nouveaux savoirs ou l'usage de ces savoirs en situation réelle. Je vous invite à discuter ensemble ce projet et à prendre part à sa rédaction qui est à finaliser pour le 10 janvier 2012. Vous pouvez trouver le projet en suivant ce lien :* **http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikexperience* Vous pouvez aussi m'envoyer des courriels personnels pour vos questions ou points de vue critiques. Marie-Antoine Rieu, Toulouse, France

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[Foundation-l] WIKEXPERIENCE UNIVERSITY, please Help
by Marie-Antoine Rieu 31 Dec '11

31 Dec '11

Hello, I am a french woman who want your help about my final draft for a project - Wikexperience University -to be deposed in January 2012. . Its goals : - exploring and objectivizing the knowledge drawn from experience, by the means of a frame to be created in a collaborative and multicultural manner ; - developing interactions between academic knowledge, Wikimedia's knowledge and knowledge drawn from experience; - researching ways to create a degree (or a certificate) or to graduate groups (or individuals) regarding their production of experience knowledge or their use of this knowledge in situation of life or work. I invite you to discuss this project and to collaborate at the final writing of this project You can find the project following this link : http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikexperience *http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikexperience* You can also send personal mails to me for questions or critical points of vue. Best regards. -- Marie-antoine RIEU 50 rue Offenbach 31500 Toulouse France 00(33) 5 61 48 90 55 00(33) 6 61 98 86 42 Mail : marie.rieu(a)gmail.com Merci de me confirmer bonne réception des fichiers attachés le cas échéant

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[Foundation-l] Wikimedia's secret wikis
by Jan Kučera 31 Dec '11

31 Dec '11

I see following wikis hold secred information: http://internal.wikimedia.org http://office.wikimedia.org http://board.wikimedia.org Imagine a world in which every single human being can NOT freely share in the sum of all knowledge. That's our commitment.

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Re: [Foundation-l] [Wikimedia Announcements] Legal strategy background doc
by Itzik Edri 29 Dec '11

29 Dec '11

Great overview Geoff! - Sent from my mobile device On Dec 29, 2011 11:58 PM, "Philippe Beaudette" <philippe(a)wikimedia.org> wrote: > Hi everyone, > > Prior to office hours, Geoff prepared a nice legal strategy overview. > Based on the interest there, I thought it might make sense to distribute > this more widely so that everyone knows what the Foundation's legal team is > up to and what their priorities are. > > You can read the document at: > http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Geoffbrigham/Strategy. > > pb > ___________________ > Philippe Beaudette > Head of Reader Relations > Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. > > philippe(a)wikimedia.org > > > _______________________________________________ > Please note: all replies sent to this mailing list will be immediately > directed to Foundation-L, the public mailing list about the Wikimedia > Foundation and its projects. For more information about Foundation-L: > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l > _______________________________________________ > WikimediaAnnounce-l mailing list > WikimediaAnnounce-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaannounce-l > >

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Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Summer of Research 2011
by En Pine 28 Dec '11

28 Dec '11

> Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2011 19:00:02 -0800 > From: Steven Walling <steven.walling(a)gmail.com> > Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Summer of Research 2011 > questions > To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List > <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> > Message-ID: > <CABxVVqukt-CQ6b8jJrbZgwQozFKEUyTV7jYMdPXydgX5LJVdqQ(a)mail.gmail.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 > > On Thu, Dec 22, 2011 at 1:47 PM, Steven Walling <steven.walling(a)gmail.com>wrote: > > > Pine, > > > > I can take a whack at these, since I was one of the co-leaders of the > > Wikimedia Summer of Research. I'm going to answer on the talk page of the > > findings though, since these questions are things that will be of more > > use if not buried in a mailing list archive. > > > > Best regards, > > > > Just to follow up, I've answered these now that we're post-holiday in the > States. > > http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research_talk:Wikimedia_Summer_of_Research_2… > > Thanks for your patience Pine. > Steven, Thank you. I've responded to you on that page on Meta. Pine

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[Foundation-l] Board resolution on controversial content -- request for clarification
by Andreas K. 28 Dec '11

28 Dec '11

This is a question for Phoebe and/or another board member: The board resolution on controversial content http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Resolution:Controversial_content includes the following paragraph – *We urge the Commons community to continue to practice rigorous active curation of content, including applying appropriate categorization, removing media that does not meet existing policies and guidelines for inclusion, and actively commissioning media that is deemed needed but missing. We urge the community to pay particular attention to curating all kinds of potentially controversial content, including determining whether it has a realistic educational use and applying the principle of least astonishment in categorization and placement. * A question that has come up repeatedly on Wikipedia is whether the last sentence (starting with the words "We urge the community ...") applies exclusively to the Commons community, or whether it applies in equal measure to other projects. Could Phoebe or another board member briefly clarify? Thank you, and season's greetings. Andreas

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[Foundation-l] Wikimedia Summer of Research 2011 questions
by En Pine 28 Dec '11

28 Dec '11

I’ve read http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Wikimedia_Summer_of_Research_2011/S… and have some questions. 1. What was the projected total cost for this research? 2. What was the final cost? 3. What was the projected ROI, and what metrics were chosen to quantify ROI? 4. What is the ROI to date? 5. What actions have been taken based on the research results? Pine

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Wikimedia-l December 2011