Speaking of the British tabloids, of course.
https://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/10/world/europe/10britain.html?nl=todayshead...
The lesson for us is to not take a leading position, be topical, but to report events which have occurred and on which there is some sort of considered opinion and a set of known facts, even if it takes a day or two for them to develop. In the case of these tabloids its going to take months.
The power of topical media is two-edged, seemingly exceedingly powerful, king-makers, but, as anyone familiar with our limited resources knows, quite weak if under serious attack, as is being shown in the case of the principals involved in this crisis. The British government is sick of kowtowing to them and seems to have just been waiting for an opportunity.
Fred
If only I could be so sanguine; I cannot disagree with Fred's first paragraph, but as regards his second I must take issue. For a start, current events should be covered by Wikinews, and subsequent *encyclopedic" treatment of those events be dealt with in analytic terms and in retrospect, by Wikipedia. That is why we have two projects, and not one. As regards the stance of the British government towards the media in this case, and in previous cases, it's clear to me that there is a dislocation between the two- and in my experience, the government has long since lost the support of the media, except in most general terms, and that is why we have the term "spin-doctor". It's a two-way process, and not a new one, and where I am, I cannot see any way in which the division of reponsibility to the citizen is to be resolved. TBH, the relationship between politicians and the media, and both of them have their suspect agendas, is always going to be problematic, and all we should do as documenters of what happens is to perhaps stand back for a while, and when the dust has settled,
WRITE A FUCKING ENCYCLOPEDIA!
Why is that a problem?
Fred Bauder wrote:
Speaking of the British tabloids, of course.
https://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/10/world/europe/10britain.html?nl=todayshead...
The lesson for us is to not take a leading position, be topical, but to report events which have occurred and on which there is some sort of considered opinion and a set of known facts, even if it takes a day or two for them to develop. In the case of these tabloids its going to take months.
The power of topical media is two-edged, seemingly exceedingly powerful, king-makers, but, as anyone familiar with our limited resources knows, quite weak if under serious attack, as is being shown in the case of the principals involved in this crisis. The British government is sick of kowtowing to them and seems to have just been waiting for an opportunity.
Fred
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If only I could be so sanguine; I cannot disagree with Fred's first paragraph, but as regards his second I must take issue. For a start, current events should be covered by Wikinews, and subsequent *encyclopedic" treatment of those events be dealt with in analytic terms and in retrospect, by Wikipedia. That is why we have two projects, and not one. As regards the stance of the British government towards the media in this case, and in previous cases, it's clear to me that there is a dislocation between the two- and in my experience, the government has long since lost the support of the media, except in most general terms, and that is why we have the term "spin-doctor". It's a two-way process, and not a new one, and where I am, I cannot see any way in which the division of reponsibility to the citizen is to be resolved. TBH, the relationship between politicians and the media, and both of them have their suspect agendas, is always going to be problematic, and all we should do as documenters of what happens is to perhaps stand back for a while, and when the dust has settled,
WRITE A FUCKING ENCYCLOPEDIA!
Why is that a problem?
Most of us have agendas, and this is the only major outlet most of us have access to.
Fred
Fred Bauder wrote:
Speaking of the British tabloids, of course.
https://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/10/world/europe/10britain.html?nl=todayshead...
The lesson for us is to not take a leading position, be topical, but to report events which have occurred and on which there is some sort of considered opinion and a set of known facts, even if it takes a day or two for them to develop. In the case of these tabloids its going to take months.
The power of topical media is two-edged, seemingly exceedingly powerful, king-makers, but, as anyone familiar with our limited resources knows, quite weak if under serious attack, as is being shown in the case of the principals involved in this crisis. The British government is sick of kowtowing to them and seems to have just been waiting for an opportunity.
Fred
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Fred Bauder wrote:
If only I could be so sanguine; I cannot disagree with Fred's first paragraph, but as regards his second I must take issue. For a start, current events should be covered by Wikinews, and subsequent *encyclopedic" treatment of those events be dealt with in analytic terms and in retrospect, by Wikipedia. That is why we have two projects, and not one. As regards the stance of the British government towards the media in this case, and in previous cases, it's clear to me that there is a dislocation between the two- and in my experience, the government has long since lost the support of the media, except in most general terms, and that is why we have the term "spin-doctor". It's a two-way process, and not a new one, and where I am, I cannot see any way in which the division of reponsibility to the citizen is to be resolved. TBH, the relationship between politicians and the media, and both of them have their suspect agendas, is always going to be problematic, and all we should do as documenters of what happens is to perhaps stand back for a while, and when the dust has settled,
WRITE A FUCKING ENCYCLOPEDIA!
Why is that a problem?
Most of us have agendas, and this is the only major outlet most of us have access to.
Fred
And in what way is that an excuse to ignore the rules, or if you don't like them, seek to change them? Agenda-pushers will fall foul of OR, and other policies; those of us who merely wish Wikipedia to reflect the balance of current academic opinion, and are able to be objective about disputed points of view, should be empowered (and that is perhaps correct), to reject fringe theories, although it has to be said that such theories have traditionally been rejected out of hand on Wikpedia.
I need sleep; if it matters, I'll come back. If it doesn't, I won't.
Chuh!
Most of us have agendas, and this is the only major outlet most of us have access to.
As a sort of aside-- everyone comes with agendas, and sometimes people act neutrally, sometimes people act like advocates for their agenda.
I've always wondered if we couldn't "peel off' the people who advocate by inviting them to participate in "Something Else"-- some designated "advocate/argument/debate" project. Something by advocates for advocates of advocates. Some people genuinely like to argue, and unfortunately, one of the best venues for argument are WP article edit summaries and talk pages.
Right now, we only have neutral-style projects... this gives 'advocates' no one specific place to advocate their agendas, and this invites them to just 'advocate' in what should be neutral space.
If we had some roped off "Advocacy and Argument zone", that _might_ peel away the good faith people who want to make sure their point of view is heard, but are willing to honestly label their point of view as biased or non-neutral.
It won't stop edit wars, but it might reduce their frequency and intensity. Alec
Most of us have agendas, and this is the only major outlet most of us have access to.
As a sort of aside-- everyone comes with agendas, and sometimes people act neutrally, sometimes people act like advocates for their agenda.
I've always wondered if we couldn't "peel off' the people who advocate by inviting them to participate in "Something Else"-- some designated "advocate/argument/debate" project. Something by advocates for advocates of advocates. Some people genuinely like to argue, and unfortunately, one of the best venues for argument are WP article edit summaries and talk pages.
Right now, we only have neutral-style projects... this gives 'advocates' no one specific place to advocate their agendas, and this invites them to just 'advocate' in what should be neutral space.
If we had some roped off "Advocacy and Argument zone", that _might_ peel away the good faith people who want to make sure their point of view is heard, but are willing to honestly label their point of view as biased or non-neutral.
It won't stop edit wars, but it might reduce their frequency and intensity. Alec
You can always make Wikinfo a sister project.
Fred
You can always make Wikinfo a sister project.
Fred
That would be a rather elegant solution, wouldn't it. At a minimum, recognizing Wikinfo as "Part of the Wikimedia Movement" and incorporating links to it into our controversial articles. And then a next nice step would be if Wikinfo could seamlesly use WMF-hosted project's useraccounts, images, templates, and interwikilinks.
Or perhaps it would just make more sense technologically to just host it with WMF, with the understanding that WMF doesn't "endorse" Wikinfo in the same way that it might kinda 'endorse' Wikipedia but recognizes it for what it is-- yet another useful way for people to collaboratively produce educational content. -- I have actually been independently trying to think of other wikis that should be "sister projects". Some are really obvious and non-controversial-- SNPedia, for example, an encyclopedia of single nucleotide polymorphisms and related studies-- 'should' be a WMF-related project, unless either party doesn't want such an association for reasons I can't fathom.
We're at the point where the lack of diversity of our English language project 'styles' may be a major factor dissuading new users from participation. It may be time to begin exploring new content types, new policy sets, new cultures, and new tech. -- I would _love_ to see Wikinfo get closer ties to WMF, including direct hosting if all groups like it. Back when we could only afford to have one project, I understand why Wikipedia was that project. Times have changed, and the more ways we let people edit, the more people will feel comfortable editing.
Alec
I would love to see the new project process on Meta come back online. (much of this email is posted to [[m:talk:new project proposals]])
I could use some help in making this happen - we need to start an incubator process for ideas with support, and a separate process for proposing existing projects that have been incubated elsewhere for support or hosting. The meta page for each proposed project should track its progress, whether offsite or on the incubator... a project infobox should be designed... an interested group (if less formal than langcom) should go through and review the backlog of proposals and suggest the necessary next step for each.
On Sun, Jul 10, 2011 at 11:48 PM, Alec Conroy alecmconroy@gmail.com wrote:
You can always make Wikinfo a sister project.
A space to hold POV debates would be an interesting intermediate ground between no-restraint edit wars and topic bans, for those in heated argument. Is Wikinfo designed for this? I was thinking of something more like 'Wikireason'. There have been various proposals for an 'argument wiki' over the years, but I've never seen a working implementation.
I have actually been independently trying to think of other wikis that should be "sister projects". Some are really obvious and non-controversial--
SNPedia, for example, an encyclopedia of single nucleotide polymorphisms and related studies
Yes. Link: http://www.snpedia.com/index.php/SNPedia
Genealogy: WeRelate and Rodovid. Both remarkable and lovely projects. Combinable, if all parties could be brought together. Both could use support; I've touched on the possibility of becoming WMF projects with each, and they are willing to discuss it. The result would be by far the largest free collection of genealogy information, with support from one of the major libraries studyig and archiving related data in the US
Children's encyclopedia: WikiKids, Vikidia, Grundschulwiki, Wikimini. These projects could be coordinated better to share ideas and lessons, and could use more visibility. Some people active in these projects are already Wikimedians.
Dictionaries: OmegaWiki. This multilingual dictionary could help revamp our toolchain for Wiktionary, which remains a bit broken.
Interface translation: TranslateWiki. iirc it does not want to be a WMF project per se, but could use more explicit support than we have given so far.
Citations and bibliography: AcaWiki (and the budding WikiScholar).
Wikified maps: Wikimapia. currently profitable and popular; probably fine on their own. However they use a non-free map stack and use an NC license; finding a way to help that project migrate to a free stack and license [now that there is a free orthorectified aerial map available http://blog.stevecoast.com/im-working-at-microsoft-and-were-donating-ima] would be of benefit to the whole world.
Other projects for which there is a supply of raw materials available from content donors (which we cannot currently accept): * Annotated source materials and their translations: Part of Wikisource++ ? * Translation memory: Part of Translatewiki++ ? * Public datasets: Wikidata * Music scores: Wikimusic
We're at the point where the lack of diversity of our English language project 'styles' may be a major factor dissuading new users from participation.
It is certainly one of the factors.
Sam.
On Sun, Jul 10, 2011 at 11:01 PM, Samuel Klein sj@wikimedia.org wrote:
Amazing list of potential allies, partners and new projects. You guys all seem very on top of things, all in the mentioned list looked great and sounded like exciting good fits for us-- from a Wikimedian perspective at least.
There have been various proposals for an 'argument wiki' over the years, but I've never seen a working implementation.
See, that's the thing about new projects. Right now, we treat them like a shuttle launch-- everything has to be absolutely perfect for us to grant launch clearance. This, of course, was how we had to do things in the old days, when wikis were expensive and we were poor.
But now, I feel like we may be able to move back into an era of rapid experimentation, where new projects are more like unmanned 1940s test rockets-- they should be blowing up left and right, as we try to learn from the failed attempts.
I'll go further-- provided we can do so cheaply, I want new projects that are like the ridiculous early failures of flight. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7OJvv4LG9M]. I want to hear about a new WMF project and it's policy, think "That's crazy-- that's never gonna get off the ground", and indeed, learn something from whether it crashes or whether it actually takes off.
Having an "early flight era" attitude is how we can find something even better than Wikipedia. I agree a lot of ideas are unlikely to work-- but provided the resource usage is sufficiently negligible, let people start making insane flying machine projects, and eventually the wright brothers will show up.
Success is not the only reason to start a project. Constructive failure is a valid goal too.
Alec
I'll go further-- provided we can do so cheaply, I want new projects that are like the ridiculous early failures of flight. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7OJvv4LG9M]. I want to hear about a new WMF project and it's policy, think "That's crazy-- that's never gonna get off the ground", and indeed, learn something from whether it crashes or whether it actually takes off.
The thing is (and I am somewhat of an enthusiast on the early attempts at flight :) so you picked a good metaphor) that tose early attempts were dangerous, mostly impractical and basically barking up the wrong trees.
What did it take ot make successful flight?
It took a couple of quiet brothers who realised that mad and dedicated vision had to be metered with scientific observation, personal sacrifice and critical thinking to succeed.
So, yeh, I agree largely with your theory of "lets throw resources at all those mad but clever people out there". But I think we need to learn the lesson of Chanute [1] and keep a careful watch for the many hacks, egotistical and mad individuals that such an enterprise would encourage.
(of course, another school of thought might suggest we need to encourage all the mad schemes, and let someone smart and clever take the failures and turn them into reality).
On Tue, Jul 12, 2011 at 1:08 PM, Thomas Morton morton.thomas@googlemail.com wrote:
I'll go further-- provided we can do so cheaply, I want new projects that are like the ridiculous early failures of flight. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7OJvv4LG9M]. I want to hear about a new WMF project and it's policy, think "That's crazy-- that's never gonna get off the ground", and indeed, learn something from whether it crashes or whether it actually takes off.
So, yeh, I agree largely with your theory of "lets throw resources at all those mad but clever people out there".
The thing is-- I'm not even sure we need to "throw resources" as much as we just need to "allow experimentation". Unless I'm missing something, actual resources like hosting costs aren't really an issue for us anymore when it comes to 'small, new projects'.
Technology is growing exponentially-- Processor power and Storage double every 18 months, Bandwidth behaves similarly. A file that cost us $1 to host in 2001 may now cost us less than a penny-- and this trend is expected to continue for the foreseeable future.
I _think_ that means we can have nearly limitless sandboxes, of every shape and size, but unless they become successful, they should use hardly any resources at. This may not be true for projects that want to work with large binaries, but for mere human generated wikitext, I think we passed "infinite" capacity a long time ago.
But I think we need to learn the lesson of Chanute [1] and keep a careful watch for the many hacks, egotistical and mad individuals that such an enterprise would encourage.
I don't necessarily expect that the best thing to come out of new projects would be the new projects. I expect the best thing to come out of new projects would be the insights gained from them, and how our best minds can incorporate new projects' lessons into our existing ones. ( Of course, if a new project itself ended up itself being the best thing, that would be fine also. )
When I say, for example, we'd find something "better than wikipedia"-- well of course, if WIkipedia agrees it's better in some way, then Wikipedia will just 'become' the new better thing, making a new a better Wikipedia.
Alec
On 11 July 2011 04:26, Fred Bauder fredbaud@fairpoint.net wrote:
Most of us have agendas, and this is the only major outlet most of us have access to.
As a sort of aside-- everyone comes with agendas, and sometimes people act neutrally, sometimes people act like advocates for their agenda.
I've always wondered if we couldn't "peel off' the people who advocate by inviting them to participate in "Something Else"-- some designated "advocate/argument/debate" project. Something by advocates for advocates of advocates. Some people genuinely like to argue, and unfortunately, one of the best venues for argument are WP article edit summaries and talk pages.
Right now, we only have neutral-style projects... this gives 'advocates' no one specific place to advocate their agendas, and this invites them to just 'advocate' in what should be neutral space.
If we had some roped off "Advocacy and Argument zone", that _might_ peel away the good faith people who want to make sure their point of view is heard, but are willing to honestly label their point of view as biased or non-neutral.
It won't stop edit wars, but it might reduce their frequency and intensity. Alec
You can always make Wikinfo a sister project.
Fred
See also http://opinion.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page. Not sure if there are other projects in a similar vein.
Pete / the wub
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