Wikimedia-l November 2013

wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org

137 participants
91 discussions

Textbooks Which Borrow Heavily from Wikipedia
by James Heilman 26 Nov '13

26 Nov '13

Yes agree with David that this is an very positive development and am glad a company is turning Wikipedia into textbooks. I am myself in the process of writing one as a compilation of 80 articles but do not mind someone beating me to it. They seem open to a discussion around attribution. At the least Wikipedia should be listed within the kindle edition. It is faltering that when they say there books are based on "highest-quality open-access content" they more or less mean they are based on Wikipedia. I will continue a discussion with them. -- James Heilman MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian The Wikipedia Open Textbook of Medicine www.opentextbookofmedicine.com

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Wikimedia Conference in Karlsruhe, Germany
by Romaine Wiki 26 Nov '13

26 Nov '13

The past three days (22-24 Nov) there was in the south German city of Karlsruhe near the French border a conference organised by Wikimedia Germany and a whole group of volunteers. The conference, WikiCon, was held for the fourth time as German language conference, with many users from Germany, Switzerland, and Austria, but also users from Poland, Czech Republic, Italy, and the Netherlands. I was there too and was asked to give a presentation and tell about about bots and about Wiki Loves Monuments. The conference was held in the buildings of the complex of the Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT), with there the rooms for presentations and talks, a university cafeteria and a hall. The conference took three days to enable the users to travel here from longer distances to come here. Friday was the day of arrival. In the afternoon almost everyone arrived. Those who were early could join the excursion to the Bundesverfassungsgericht [1], an important court in Germany. At the beginning of the evening everyone was welcomed and a buffet was arranged. After that a Entzücklopädischer Abend (entzücken = delight), in what humor and music where used to have a look at the going ons in Wikipedia. After a long night everyone went to their hotel. On the second day there were seven tracks - seven simultaneous series of presentations - about a wide range of subjects with attention to all kinds of aspects of Wikipedia and the things that accompany it. See for the program in German on https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiCon_2013/Programm At noon a lunch was arranged for the attendees in the cafeteria. At the beginning of the evening followed the ceremony of Wiki Loves Monuments in Germany. Then there was a buffet arranged for the attendees, after which people lingered long and talked until midnight. On the third day, there was a barcamp [2], the visitors had indicated the day before what topics they wanted to talk about and/or give a presentation and who was interested. There was also room for discussion on some issues. Around noon we moved to the main hall for closure. There the motivation awards were handed out: which projects over the past year contributed most to the development of (mainly) the German Wikipedia. Also everyone was thanked who helped to make this conference a success. I personally I liked the most talking to users to exchange our experiences on Wikipedia and learn from each other, what subjects people are working on and what they encounter working on the various projects. There is a huge overlapping with what users encounter on the German Wikipedia compared to other wikis, but we actually know so little about each other. Other ingredients were big Wikipediabeanbags, Wikipedia seating cubes, wikichocolate, wikipuzzles, free internet, nice users on an interesting conference. Also I should mention that the KIT is active with open access as publication model. See for images: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:WikiCon_2013 Greetings, Romaine >From a poster there: Many Wikipedia article on meals have no photo yet. What could be more natural than the court to prepare myself to photograph, and involve them in the Wikipedia? -- http://wikifeedme.openthesaurus.de/ [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Constitutional_Court_of_Germany [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BarCamp

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XOWA has released a complete copy of 2013-11-04 English Wikipedia with images -- Help wanted!
by gnosygnu 26 Nov '13

26 Nov '13

Hi. I am the developer for XOWA -- a free, open-source offline Wikipedia app. XOWA allows a user to have their own copy of a wiki on their hard-drive -- without any internet connection. It works with the latest versions of over 660 database dumps [1], including wikis like English Wikipedia, French Wiktionary, German Wikisource, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons, etc.. If you have a moment, you can download the app and set up Simple Wikipedia in less than 5 minutes. I just finished generating a full set of thumbnail images for English Wikipedia. This now makes it possible to have one's own complete offline copy of English Wikipedia as of 2013-11-04. The total size of these image databases are quite large (75 GB), but archive.org was kind enough to host them[2]. I've emailed offline-l, but I am emailing this group because I'd like to reach as wide an audience as possible. In particular, these files will also be distributed by torrent[3], and I'd like to attract as many seeders as possible, especially as torrents should relieve any burden on archive.org's download servers. In addition, future wikis will be distributed by torrent, so more seeders now will facilitate distribution then. I'd greatly appreciate it if you could assist with seeding these files, or forward this news to others who may help seed them. Thank you in advance for your time and support. [1]: See http://dumps.wikimedia.org/backup-index.html for a full list. [2]: The download links are: http://archive.org/details/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_00 http://archive.org/details/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_01 http://archive.org/details/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_02 http://archive.org/details/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_03 http://archive.org/details/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_04 http://archive.org/details/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_05 http://archive.org/details/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_06 http://archive.org/details/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_07 http://archive.org/details/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_08 [3]: The torrent links are: https://archive.org/download/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_00/Xowa… https://archive.org/download/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_02/Xowa… https://archive.org/download/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_03/Xowa… https://archive.org/download/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_04/Xowa… https://archive.org/download/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_05/Xowa… https://archive.org/download/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_06/Xowa… https://archive.org/download/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_07/Xowa… https://archive.org/download/Xowa_enwiki_2013-11-04_images_complete_08/Xowa…

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Wikisource Community User Group recognized
by Bence Damokos 25 Nov '13

25 Nov '13

Hi, It is with great pleasure that I can announce that the Wikisource Community User Group has been recognized as the 7th user group of our movement. The group aims *"to support the Wikisource community in international communication tasks, outreach to external groups, coordination of software tools development, and facilitate fundraising according to its member needs."* You can learn more about the group and how to join at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikisource_User_Group The Affiliations Committee resolution is at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Affiliations_Committee/Resolutions/Wikisour…. The group has already signed the user group agreement, their first round of recognition runs until 31 November 2014. Please join me in welcoming them and wishing them luck. Best regards, Bence Damokos Chair, Affiliations Committee P.S. The Affiliations Committee is still accepting membership applications at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Affiliations_Committee/Call_for_Candidates_…

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Office hours reminder
by Maggie Dennis 25 Nov '13

25 Nov '13

Hi. I just wanted to remind everyone that in a week we are again having office hours for VisualEditor. The first will be held on Monday, 2 December, at 1900 UTC and the second on 3 December at 0100. (See https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Office_hours for time conversion links.) Logs will be posted on meta after each office hour completes. You'll find them and logs for older office hours on the topic at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:VisualEditor_office_hours_logs Thanks! Maggie -- Maggie Dennis Senior Community Advocate Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.

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FDC R1 funding recommendations are posted
by Dariusz Jemielniak 25 Nov '13

25 Nov '13

Hello friends, The Funds Dissemination Committee meets twice annually to help make decisions about how to effectively allocate movement funds to achieve the Wikimedia movement's mission, vision, and strategy. [1] On behalf of the committee, I am pleased to announce that Round 1 2013-2014 recommendations to the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees have now been posted on Meta. [2] The WMF Board will make their decision on these recommendations by 1 January 2014. For the first round of this fiscal year, the committee received 11 proposals. [3] These eleven proposals came from ten chapters and one thematic organization, totaling requests of $5.9 million USD. Prior to our face-to-face deliberations in San Francisco from 17-21 November, the FDC reviewed the proposals in careful detail, aided by staff assessments and analysis on programs, finances, grant compliance and history, as well as community comments on the proposals. Staff presented an overview of these findings to the FDC during the deliberations. The FDC and FDC staff also asked clarifying questions to the entities on the proposal form discussion pages during the four-week community review period (and prior to the publishing of staff assessments), and observed the discussions about the proposals. The committee thanks all entities that submitted proposals, as it required significant effort to both create the proposal and to respond to the questions and feedback from the community, FDC, and FDC staff. We sincerely appreciate them all for this work. For formal complaints or appeals about the recommendations, there is a separate process that entities should follow. Note that at the request of many stakeholders, we are clarifying the complaints and appeals terminology so that complaints are made about the process to the ombudsperson and appeals on the recommendations are made to the WMF Board representatives. These are further explained below: Any entity that would like to submit an appeal on the FDC’s Round 1 recommendation should submit it to the Board representatives to the FDC by 23:59 UTC on 8 December 2013 in accordance with the appeal process outlined in the FDC Framework. The process is as follows: Appeals to the WMF Board on the recommendations of the FDC (formerly called complaints, terminology changed to avoid further confusion): * A formal appeal to challenge the FDC’s recommendation should be in the form of a 500-or-fewer word summary directed to the two non-voting WMF Board representatives to the FDC (Patricio Lorente and Bishakha Datta). * The appeal should be submitted on-wiki through the FDC portal page designated for this purpose. [4] * Formal appeals can be submitted only by the Board Chair of a funding-seeking entity. * Formal appeals must be filed within seven days of the deadline for submission of the FDC slate of recommendations to the WMF Board, even if the recommendations are published before the deadline for the recommendations i.e. end-of-day 1 December 2013. The deadline for appeals is the end-of-day UTC on 8 December. * These board representatives will present the appeal to the WMF Board at the same time as the Board considers the FDC recommendation. However, all responses to an appeal will be made seven days after the deadline for the appeal, i.e. by end-of-day UTC 15 December 2013. * Any planned or approved disbursements to the organization filing an appeal will be put on hold until the appeal is resolved. * If the WMF Board's consideration of the appeal results in an amendment of the FDC's recommendations (which is expected only in extraordinary circumstances), the WMF Board may choose to release extra funds from the WMF reserves to provide additional funds not allocated by the FDC's initial recommendation. * The Ombudsperson, as well as members of the WMF Board other than the Board representatives, may participate in the investigation if approved by the Chair of the WMF Board. Complaints to the ombudsperson about the FDC process (formerly called appeals): * A complaint about the FDC process can be filed by anyone with the Ombudsperson and can be made any time during a particular round of the FDC process (e.g. in this instance, from start July 2013 to end December 2013). * The complaint should be submitted on wiki, through the FDC portal page designated for this purpose [5] * The ombudsperson will receive and publicly document the complaint, and investigate the complaint, as needed. On behalf of the FDC, "pundit" Dariusz Jemielniak (FDC Chair) [1] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Funds_Dissemination_Committee/Framework_for_… [2] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal/FDC_recommendations/2013-2014_rou… [3] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal/Proposals [4] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal/Appeals_to_the_Board_on_the_reco… [5] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal/Complaints_about_the_FDC_process

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Monobook was optimised for editors, Vector is more balanced between readers and edtors
by WereSpielChequers 24 Nov '13

24 Nov '13

When Vector was introduced the rationale was that "The monobook design is very "utilitarian" and optimized for editor usage. It can however also be cluttered, "busy", and confusing to readers. The Usability initiative is trying to strike a balance between both groups<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Vector#Did_I_ask_for_this.3F>" . Judging by subsequent trends I think they succeeded. Monobook is cluttered because it puts lots of editor options on the screen, Vector is "cleaner" because it puts most of those in sub menus. Of course there will be some experienced editors who quickly worked out where the various options were and for whom the occasional extra click is minimal overhead. But the theory and I suspect the reality is that a skin which set out to be more balanced between the needs of editors and readers has done precisely that, if you make editing options an extra click away then fewer editors will discover them. Now in an ideal world we would have a new editor experience that steadily introduced editors to additional options. Hiding some away means that fewer new editors will find them, and in general the more editors discover additional features and make use of them the more they are likely to contribute. Since Vector became the default our readership has grown faster than the internet whilst editorship has broadly stabilised. More tellingly the most dramatic drops have not been in the number of editors who start editing, or who do 5 edits, we can probably account for that drop just by looking at the impact of the edit filters. The big drops have been in the proportion of new editors who do their 100th or 1000th edit. So it looks to me that the people who introduced Vector did exactly what they intended, though of course there are many other factors that affect both readership and editorship. That isn't necessarily a bad thing, the better an encyclopaedia Wikipedia is the more we should be thinking about how to get more people to use it. But it would be interesting to see some stats on the relative retention and upgrading of editors who use monobook and Vector. Ideally we should get one language version of Wikipedia to test the two for a year, set half of new accounts to Vector and half to Monobook and then after a year compare the two groups of editors. Regards Jonathan Message: 1 > Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2013 22:45:11 +0000 > From: David Gerard <dgerard(a)gmail.com> > To: Wikimedia Mailing List <wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> > Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Copyright infringement - The real elephant > in the room > Message-ID: > <CAJ0tu1FT0fk4OyRx=MdCnER= > dcLhPqEF_axubTG9Cwy9Q-BcFg(a)mail.gmail.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 > > On 21 November 2013 21:26, Matthew Flaschen <matthew.flaschen(a)gatech.edu> > wrote: > > On 11/21/2013 03:37 AM, WereSpielChequers wrote: > > >> To some extent this can be considered a success for Vector > >> and the shift of our default from a skin optimised for editing to one > >> optimised for reading. Of course if we want to increase editing levels > we > >> always have the option of defaulting new accounts to Monobook instead of > >> Vector. > > > I don't really agree that Vector is less encouraging of edits. I've been > > using it for years, and don't feel it slows down my editing. > > > Can't say I've noticed a problem either, and I switched to Vector when > it was still in testing. > > > - d. >

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Info: Boards training workshop programme announced
by Chris Keating 24 Nov '13

24 Nov '13

Dear all, I am pleased to announce that the programme is now available for the Wikimedia Boards Training Workshop that will take place in London in March 2014. This is a small event focused on giving Chapter/Thematic Org boards the skills and confidence to do a great job. We are using a wide range of expertise from within and outside the movement to help do this. Registration will open next week. Places are limited so I wanted to give people the heads up and a chance to think about which Board members would most benefit from this. More on Meta, here: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Boards_training_workshop_March_2014 Many thanks, Chris (on behalf of Wikimedia UK and the organisers)

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[Wikimedia Announcements] The Signpost -- Volume 9, Issue 46 -- 20 November 2013
by Wikipedia Signpost 24 Nov '13

24 Nov '13

>From the editor: The ''Signpost'' needs your help http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2013-11-20/From_t… News and notes: Foundation to Wiki-PR: cease and desist; Arbitration Committee elections starting http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2013-11-20/News_a… Book review: Peter Burke's ''Social History of Knowledge''—ambitious, fascinating, and exhaustive http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2013-11-20/Book_r… Traffic report: Ill Winds http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2013-11-20/Traffi… WikiProject report: Score! American football on Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2013-11-20/WikiPr… Featured content: Rockin' the featured pictures http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2013-11-20/Featur… Single page view http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Signpost/Single PDF version http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book:Wikipedia_Signpost/2013-11-20 http://identi.ca/wikisignpost / https://twitter.com/wikisignpost -- Wikipedia Signpost Staff http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost _______________________________________________ Please note: all replies sent to this mailing list will be immediately directed to Wikimedia-l, the public mailing list of the Wikimedia community. For more information about Wikimedia-l: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l _______________________________________________ WikimediaAnnounce-l mailing list WikimediaAnnounce-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaannounce-l

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Fwd: Wikimedia Australia 2013 AGM results
by Steve Zhang 23 Nov '13

23 Nov '13

Dear Wikimedians, Wikimedia Australia today held their annual general meeting today and has elected a new management committee. President - Steven Zhang Vice President - Gideon Digby Secretary - Andrew Owens Ordinary members - Robert Myers, Pru Mitchell, Charles Gregory and Michael Billington On behalf of the new committee, I would like thank the outgoing members of the committee for their hard work over the years. They have shaped our organisation in a dramatic way and we would not be the same without their efforts. Regards, Steven Zhang President - Wikimedia Australia steven.zhang(a)wikimedia.org.au

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Wikimedia-l November 2013