Wikimedia-l June 2011

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147 participants
123 discussions

[Foundation-l] Language committee observers
by Milos Rancic 02 Jun '11

02 Jun '11

Language committee got the first observers today: Samuel Klein and Mark Williamson. If you want to be LangCom observer, please send email to any of LangCom members and after 7 day discussion you will get the answer. As I said before, it is likely that any highly involved Wikimedian would pass without problems.

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[Foundation-l] [OT: OSM] State of the Map, Sep 9-11 - discount for early birds, scholarships
by Samuel Klein 02 Jun '11

02 Jun '11

Somewhat off-topic, from one of our awesome cousin projects: The annual OSM meeting will be in Denver this September 9-11. Early bird registration ends in two weeks. Outside of Wikimedia, OSM may be the most successful focused free knowledge project around, and has revolutionized the culture of mapping worldwide. I had the pleasure of seeing their LinuxTag booth the other week, and some of the print maps they are making with their data are among the best I have seen. I encourage anyone who is close to Denver to consider going. They are offering scholarships for mappers from countries with smaller mapping communities who could not afford to come. They list a few countries as examples: Eastern and Southern Europe: Belarus, Kosovo, Bulgaria Arab States: Tunisia, Bahrain, Jordan Asia: Nepal, Afghanistan, Cambodia, Indonesia Latin America: Argentina, Bolivia, Guatemala Africa: Liberia, Ivory Coast, Swaziland If you know OSM contributors in these regions who might benefit from being at this meeting, you can nominate them via email until June 25: http://stateofthemap.org/scholarships-to-state-of-the-map-2011/ SJ ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Subject: State of the Map discounts Hello, As you may have heard, this years main OpenStreetMap event, "State of the Map", will take place in Denver, Colorado, USA during September 9th-11th. Read more about our event on our website http://stateofthemap.org/ If you are a member of the OpenStreetMap Foundation, we can offer you a $15 discount on the community tickets. This discount is also available for the early-bird tickets which can still be acquired until June 15th. You may want to extend your stay in Denver by also attending FOSS4G http://2011.foss4g.org/ Let's meet in Denver! Henk Hoff -- Organising Committee State Of The Map 2011 http://www.stateofthemap.org/ http://www.openstreetmap.org/ henk(a)stateofthemap.org phone +31 6 4808 8925 -- Samuel Klein identi.ca:sj w:user:sj +1 617 529 4266

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[Foundation-l] 'This Month in GLAM' - May 2011
by Liam Wyatt 02 Jun '11

02 Jun '11

Forwarding to foundation-l as announce-l didn't seem to send it automatically. -Liam wittylama.com/blog Peace, love & metadata ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Rock drum <wikirockdrum(a)gmail.com> Date: 1 June 2011 18:04 Subject: [cultural-partners] 'This Month in GLAM' - May 2011 To: cultural-partners(a)wikimedia.ch, museum-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org, wikimediaannounce-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org *This Month in GLAM* is a monthly newsletter documenting recent happenings within the GLAM project, such as content donations, residencies, events and more. GLAM is an acronym of *G*alleries, *L*ibraries, *A*rchvies and *M*useums. You can find more information on the project at glamwiki.org<http://outreach.wikimedia.org/wiki/GLAM> . *This Month in GLAM - April 2011* ------------------------------ Front page: http://outreach.wikimedia.org/wiki/GLAM/Newsletter/May_2011 >From the editors: Global approach http://outreach.wikimedia.org/wiki/GLAM/Newsletter/May_2011/Contents/From_t… News in brief: Inception of the UK GLAM task force; GLAM in Mexico; Ansel Adams arrives and more http://outreach.wikimedia.org/wiki/GLAM/Newsletter/May_2011/Contents/News_i… Full GLAMcamp NYC report http://outreach.wikimedia.org/wiki/GLAM/Newsletter/May_2011/Contents/GLAMca… Event calendar: GLAM events this month http://outreach.wikimedia.org/wiki/GLAM/Newsletter/May_2011/Contents/Events Newsroom <http://outreach.wikimedia.org/wiki/GLAM/Newsletter/Newsroom> · Archives <http://outreach.wikimedia.org/wiki/GLAM/Newsletter/Archives> · Subscribe<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Global_message_delivery/Targets/GLAM> _______________________________________________ cultural-partners mailing list cultural-partners(a)wikimedia.ch http://lists.wikimedia.ch/listinfo/cultural-partners

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[Foundation-l] Getting involved in a Wikimedia Foundation research project
by Steven Walling 01 Jun '11

01 Jun '11

Hi everyone, You might have heard some about it previously, but today we officially announced a new summer initiative in the Community Department,[1] where we've brought in a team of eight researchers to sprint with us for three months on some Wikipedia-focused questions, with a special focus on new editor retention as per the Board's resolution on openness. The part from our announcement that I wanted to point to in particular is: "If you’re a Wikipedian who would like to get involved, we’d love to have you participate. We especially seek community members who can pragmatically align our research with the everyday realities of working on the encyclopedia, as well as think about how trends uncovered may be constructively addressed." Beyond commenting on the public documentation we're still building on Meta (see Category:Summer of Research), this means that in the next few weeks I'll be relaying an open invitation to an IRC meeting where we can discuss the project. In particular we'll be looking for feedback from people who've read our draft research questions, seen our initial results, and who (as active editors on the projects) can help us push our research forward. -- Steven Walling Fellow at Wikimedia Foundation wikimediafoundation.org 1. http://blog.wikimedia.org/2011/06/01/summerofresearchannouncement/

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[Foundation-l] LangCom meeting report
by Milos Rancic 01 Jun '11

01 Jun '11

As you should know, thanks to Wikimedia Germany, Language committee had its first real-life meeting from May 13th to May 15th during the Hackathon in Berlin [1]. The meeting was very successful. We've made numerous conclusions. They need to be verified by LangCom members who didn't participate, but I don't expect substantial changes. LangCom members who participated are: Amir E. Aharoni, Antony D. Green, Gerard Meijssen, Michael Everson, Miloš Rančić, Oliver Stegen (via Skype), Robin Pepermans, Santhosh Thottingal. Below is the short report from the meeting. Many of the items inside of the list below require longer description or even creation of documents. You will be informed after the creation of every document. A number of the conclusions below assumes that Language proposal policy [2] will be changed. (I'll make the proposal to LangCom, then LangCom will discuss and decide, then it will be sent to the Board for approval.) The report is by order of importance for the community. (Or at least as I see what is the most important.) All of the issues below are general. We've discussed about some particular issues and you can see them at the page [1]. == Incubator extension and redirects == We will soon have implemented Incubator extension on Incubator. The extensions is written by Robin Pepermans (a LangCom member and Incubator admin) and it will make Incubator more useful for those who create new projects. In relation to this issue, Incubator projects will get their own virtual codes. For example, http://xyz.wikisource.org/ will be a redirect to http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Ws/Xyz. If technically possible (I'll send the list of the codes to Mark and he will discuss with other admins is it possible to implement without problems), all ISO 639-3 codes will get such redirect to the Incubator page which would have the text similar to "Wikipedia in this language doesn't exist. If you speak this language, feel free to start it!" This will be implemented in a couple of steps. I'll write the proposal at Meta, inform you here and after fixing issues if any, that will be implemented step by step. The final product will be Incubator with all small projects, but with virtually all infrastructure needed to see that project as normal Wikimedia project. The main goal of that is to allow many languages to have their own projects, although they don't have enough manpower to keep the whole project in function (many of their technical needs would be covered by Incubator admins). I've got a number of the same questions in relation to this issue: If they have virtually everything, why would they create new articles to become independent project? I answered with the question: Why you create new articles on your own projects? The point is that it is not likely to expect that a language with less than 100,000 speakers will every have sufficient number of people interested in Wikipedia projects to become a separate one. At the other side, of course, we still have many possible projects which could be separate at some point of time. == Observers == Language committee has introduced observers. Anyone who wants to see what Language committee members are discussing on their list are able to be ask LangCom for that. It is not likely that any member of this list wouldn't get such access. Sj is our first observer. == Monthly reports == Robin Pepermans said that he will write monthly reports of LangCom's work to inform Wikimedia community. == Macrolanguages == There are a couple of cases in which macrolanguages need to get their own project. It could be about very small population which wants to have common Wikisource, let's say; or it could be about a kind of unified orthography used by a couple of closely related languages. In all cases communities have to want that. All cases will be handled on case by case basis. In other words: While it changes Language proposal policy, this is not a general rule, but making a field to cover some specific cases in which macrolanguage project is the most sensible solution. == Simple projects == While some Simple English projects have no reason to exist (Wikiquote, for example), LPP will be changed to allow other simple language projects to exist if necessary requirements exist. We haven't finished this discussion, but at least the rules are: * Language should be the world language. * There is a reliable published specification of "simple" (or equivalent) language. Under present rules, counting that both languages have reliable published specification, French would get simple project, while German wouldn't because French is used as world language. However, we haven't finished this discussion yet and I think that we should cover regional lingua francas (or cultural, technical etc. languages used not just by native speakers) as well (if so, German and Swahili would qualify). However, the second rule won't be discussed. Proposers of simple projects have to present reliable and published specification of "simple" or equivalent language, as English has. == Proposals for closing projects == Robin has made Proposal for closing projects [3]. We discussed briefly and in general we agreed about the next: * Anyone can propose project closure. * A member of Language committee who wants to deal with it (we'll mark it inside of the "Task" column of the members table at Language committee page on Meta [4]) brings that on discussion to Language committee. * Language committee won't vote about it. Recommendation to the Board will be sent by the LangCom member which is interested in that issue. * Board will make final decision; likely the same as recommendation would be. Before implementing the full Incubator extension and redirects it is not likely that we would react in the cases of inactive projects. After that, it is likely that we would send back all of inactive projects to Incubator. == Change of Board decisions == Board approval will move from the "approval" point to the "eligibility" point. That has two important consequences: * If Board really doesn't want some language on Wikimedia servers because of political reasons, it could block it at the right time, not after contributors made significant efforts to create the project. * All projects with previously approved project[s] will be [almost] automatically approved. ("Almost" in the sense that, for example, Old Church Slavonic won't get Wikinews, as well as Belorussian will get just one Wikisource, after communities of two existing Wikipedias agree to work together.) == Asking LangCom for opinion == Board will be able to get formal *private* answer from LangCom if necessary. As LangCom's opinion is likely to have significant influence on Board, LangCom doesn't want to be publicly responsible for random decisions. Community is able to ask members of LangCom for anything relevant on "Talk:Language committee" page [5], as it always was. == Membership in LangCom == Some kind of yearly confirmations should be introduced; actually, yearly verification that members are willing to continue to stay for another year on board. However, we didn't discuss it enough, as we didn't have time for that. It will continue on list. The other issue is that we (or at least I) will ask two to four times per year for new members. However, you should note that we don't need any new member, but new members which are able to have substantial contribution to LangCom. == Renaming wikis == There are a number of wikis to be renamed, as they don't have proper codes. They should be renamed with some exceptions. For example: * Alemannisch Wikipedia, with the code "als" should be renamed to "gsw" (or split into single languages, as Alemannic German is a macrolanguage). If moved, it will keep "als" for a couple of years and then the code will be virtually transferred to Albanian Wikipedia, as "als" is ISO 639-3 code for Tosk Albanian, which is the standard Albanian, also. * Min Nan Chinese presently has code "zh-min-nan". Its ISO 639-3 code is "nan". As "zh-min-nan" is not used by any Wikimedia project, Min Nan Wikimedia projects will be able to keep virtual code "zh-min-nan" forever. == Languages support issues == * Thanks to Santhosh, Gerard and others, we have webfonts in MediaWiki. That basically means that if someone wants to read some page, usually in a language which doesn't have proper support on contemporary operating systems, MediaWiki would be able to give needed font to the browser. Thanks to Siebrand, this will be implemented on Translatewiki [6] soon as a step to prepare it for WMF servers deployment. * Amir should make report on two issues: ** problems in RTL/LTR support; and ** problems with sorting in Hebrew, Arabic and Myanmar. == Other issues == There are a couple of other issues discussed during the meeting about which I would like not to talk before they happen. All of them are about improving language related issues on Wikimedia projects. == Your input == Feel free to suggest anything relevant here or at our talk page [5]. While some things need time to be changed, good ideas are always welcome. Other members of LangCom and others who participated in our discussions can add here what they think that is relevant and I forgot to say. [1] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Language_committee/May_2011_meeting [2] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Language_proposal_policy [3] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Proposals_for_closing_projects [4] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Language_committee [5] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Language_committee [6] http://translatewiki.net/

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[Foundation-l] Fwd: [Wikimedia Announcements] Language committee report - May 2011
by Milos Rancic 01 Jun '11

01 Jun '11

It seems that this wasn't forwarded from announcements list. -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [Wikimedia Announcements] Language committee report - May 2011 Date: Wed, 1 Jun 2011 21:30:18 +0200 From: Robin Pepermans <robinp.1273(a)gmail.com> Reply-To: foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org To: incubator(a)lists.wikimedia.org, wikimediaannounce-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org /See the wiki version here: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Language_committee/Reports/2011-05/ This is the Language Committee report for May 2011. This is the first edition of the monthly report. I proposed this at the first real-life meeting in Berlin and volunteered to write such reports to increase transparency of the committee. === Committee === Most of these items can also be found in the LangCom meeting report sent to foundation-l. * The committee held its first real-life meeting during the Hackathon in Berlin. * Several members volunteer to take care of [[meta:Proposals for closing projects]]. The [[meta:Closing projects policy]] is pending Board approval. * If technically possible, wikis that do not exist (yet) will be redirected to the Wikimedia Incubator instead of showing a "Wiki does not exist" or "Server not found" error. * To increase transparency, an observer position has been created on the LangCom mailing list. Anyone can request to become an observer and receive mails sent to langcom-l. * We have discussed a lot of other things, such as macrolanguages and renaming projects. === Approvals === * The Mingrelian Wikipedia has been approved after some time searching for an expert who could and wanted to verify its content. It is now passing Board approval and will be created within some time. === Rejections === * A request for a Montenegrin Wikipedia has been rejected for the fourth time. -- User:SPQRobin Language Committee member

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[Foundation-l] The Wikipedia-Ready Essay
by Fred Bauder 01 Jun '11

01 Jun '11

An interesting technique: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/May2011/30/c8623.html Fred

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Re: [Foundation-l] The Wikipedia-Ready Essay
by M. Williamson 01 Jun '11

01 Jun '11

Professor Machado: This is an interesting allegation, I would be quite interested to see some examples of this taking place. -m. 2011/5/31 Virgilio A. P. Machado <vam(a)fct.unl.pt>: > Now that my attention has been drawn to that section, I wonder if > that explains why the academic projects were not welcome and their > contributions are being vandalized, almost systematically, at the > Brazilian Wikipedia. > > Sincerely, > > Virgilio A. P. Machado > > > At 09:43 31-05-2011, you wrote: >>On Mon, May 30, 2011 at 10:42, Fred Bauder <fredbaud(a)fairpoint.net> wrote: >> > An interesting technique: >> > >> > http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/May2011/30/c8623.html >> > >> > Fred >> >>Thanks for the link. I actually felt a surge of pride when I read it: >> >>"A student writing an essay for their teacher may be tempted to >>plagiarize or leave facts unchecked. A new study shows that if you ask >>that same student to write something that will be posted on Wikipedia, >>he or she suddenly becomes determined to make the work as accurate as >>possible, and may actually do better research. ... >> >>"[Brenna Gray] says despite its faults, [Wikipedia] does promote solid >>values for its writers, including precise citations, accurate >>research, editing and revision." >> >>Sarah > > > _______________________________________________ > 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] About Wikiepdia.org
by HW 01 Jun '11

01 Jun '11

Dear all, Now, some user report that the website wikiepdia.org is copying the Wikipedia logo without Wikimedia Foundation permission. And, it will make user misunderstand it is the real Wikipedia. Same case happen in wikiedia.org , and the website all is redirect to http://www.inforewardsurvey.com/ . Should the Wikimedia Foundation take action? See http://zhwp.org/WP:COMPLAINT HW from zh wiki

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[Foundation-l] Opinion of the Grinch
by Fred Bauder 01 Jun '11

01 Jun '11

"Today we hear of a new way to exploit the unpaid Wikipedian: lazy college professors can use the crowdsourced encyclo-custodians to mark their students' work, again without any guarantee that they will do so properly or accurately. ®" http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/06/01/wikipedia_makes_students_do_better_… Fred

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Wikimedia-l June 2011