Make the following experience:
Go to Gmail and create a new account on Gmail. Does Google tell you after you have created your new account : We are ready to have a conflict relationship with YOU ? We have an Abuse Log ready for YOU ?
Now go to meta.wikimedia.org (1), create a new account there and click on your "My contributions" link. And see what you see on the top line of Special:Contributions : "Abuse Log". My preference on meta is French, and it reads ("Journal des abus"). In French "Journal" means both "Log" and "Newspaper". It sort of says "you are already making headlines in newspapers for abuse".
It means Wikimedia users are considered as suspects from the first time they set foot into the wiki. It means that the climate there is a climate where everyone suspects everybody else, where you are guilty until proven innocent, and where bad faith is assumed (3).
Jimmy Wales and Michael Snow want to attract new volunteers (2) in these conditions ?
Can anybody show me the page on meta.wikimedia.org, which shows that a consensus was reached prior to implementing this Special:AbuseLog software ?
It is almost the same problem on Commons (my user preference there is English) where the AbuseLog has been pudically renamed "filter log" (but the wording with Abuse is still used in the URL).
The French Language Wikipédia is still unaffected by this Abuse thing. I hope the virus of suspicion will not infect her.
(1) http://meta.wikimedia.org (2) http://volunteer.wikimedia.org (3) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Assume_good_faith
On Wed, Sep 30, 2009 at 16:00, Teofilo teofilowiki@gmail.com wrote:
Now go to meta.wikimedia.org (1), create a new account there and click on your "My contributions" link. And see what you see on the top line of Special:Contributions : "Abuse Log".
Thanks for bringing this up.
On the English Wikipedia it is called "filter log", which is indeed much better.
-- אמיר אלישע אהרוני Amir Elisha Aharoni
"We're living in pieces, I want to live in peace." - T. Moore
Of course Google has this kind of logs. However, Google is just not transparant about it.
eia
2009/9/30 Amir E. Aharoni amir.aharoni@mail.huji.ac.il
On Wed, Sep 30, 2009 at 16:00, Teofilo teofilowiki@gmail.com wrote:
Now go to meta.wikimedia.org (1), create a new account there and click on your "My contributions" link. And see what you see on the top line of Special:Contributions : "Abuse Log".
Thanks for bringing this up.
On the English Wikipedia it is called "filter log", which is indeed much better.
-- אמיר אלישע אהרוני Amir Elisha Aharoni
"We're living in pieces, I want to live in peace." - T. Moore
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On Wed, Sep 30, 2009 at 17:22, effe iets anders effeietsanders@gmail.com wrote:
Of course Google has this kind of logs. However, Google is just not transparant about it.
Being transparent is nice and important, but being it is just as important to be nice. "Filter log" is just as correct and transparent as "abuse log", but doesn't make a newbie feel that he's accused of abuse.
sure it would, and maybe it would be an improvement. But the mere fact that the log is there, I don't see as a problem. Also, realize that the average newbee will not even look at the contributions page...
2009/9/30 Amir E. Aharoni amir.aharoni@mail.huji.ac.il
On Wed, Sep 30, 2009 at 17:22, effe iets anders effeietsanders@gmail.com wrote:
Of course Google has this kind of logs. However, Google is just not transparant about it.
Being transparent is nice and important, but being it is just as important to be nice. "Filter log" is just as correct and transparent as "abuse log", but doesn't make a newbie feel that he's accused of abuse.
-- אמיר אלישע אהרוני Amir Elisha Aharoni
"We're living in pieces, I want to live in peace." - T. Moore
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"Amir E. Aharoni" amir.aharoni@mail.huji.ac.il wrote:
Of course Google has this kind of logs. However, Google is just not transparant about it.
Being transparent is nice and important, but being it is just as important to be nice. "Filter log" is just as correct and transparent as "abuse log", but doesn't make a newbie feel that he's accused of abuse.
"Filter" in current German discussions /can/ allude to the semi-governmental content filters deployed by most major German ISPs to deny users access to child pornography web- sites.
So, should we find a term that is suitable for all six billion people on this planet, or should we covertly prefer users who are curious enough to just click on that link to find out what's behind it?
Tim
On Wed, Sep 30, 2009 at 20:49, Tim Landscheidt tim@tim-landscheidt.de wrote:
"Amir E. Aharoni" amir.aharoni@mail.huji.ac.il wrote:
Of course Google has this kind of logs. However, Google is just not transparant about it.
Being transparent is nice and important, but being it is just as important to be nice. "Filter log" is just as correct and transparent as "abuse log", but doesn't make a newbie feel that he's accused of abuse.
"Filter" in current German discussions /can/ allude to the semi-governmental content filters deployed by most major German ISPs to deny users access to child pornography web- sites.
So, should we find a term that is suitable for all six billion people on this planet, or should we covertly prefer users who are curious enough to just click on that link to find out what's behind it?
With crowdsourcing, finding the right word for six billion people is not so hard. The admins of every language edition can find a suitable word for their edition.
Most importantly, don't forget that you know what the abuse log is and you know that it's harmless, but newbies don't know it. Many newbies got really scared when they saw Windows 95's error messages about applications that performed "illegal" actions. (I actually saw it myself.)
I gave several classes of basic Wikipedia editing to groups of newbies. The misunderstandings of the technical terms - and they do encounter these technical terms - are most unexpected.
"Amir E. Aharoni" amir.aharoni@mail.huji.ac.il wrote:
[...] Most importantly, don't forget that you know what the abuse log is and you know that it's harmless, but newbies don't know it. Many newbies got really scared when they saw Windows 95's error messages about applications that performed "illegal" actions. (I actually saw it myself.)
I gave several classes of basic Wikipedia editing to groups of newbies. The misunderstandings of the technical terms - and they do encounter these technical terms - are most unexpected.
Actually, until today I did not even know what the abuse log was. But I would have treated it the same way as the block log: "Oh, it's empty, can't be that bad then!"
Your experience with Windows users seems to differ vastly from mine though. I do not know of even a single one who was scared to play "Minesweeper". On the other hand, they grasp in microseconds what a "friend" in a social network is, how a politician "tweets" without opening his mouth and that not all "blackberries" are edible.
So if, as you say, newbies could be frightened off by /seeing/ an "abuse log" (or a "block log") link, we should not try to find a short term that could explain to someone with no insights whatsoever in Wikipedia's inner workings what the link contains, but we should hide the link (if the log is empty).
But personally, I would ask new users to endure that sight because if they want to participate in the community, there will be lots of other terms, rules and habits that they did not know beforehand.
Tim
On Wed, Sep 30, 2009 at 2:49 PM, Tim Landscheidt tim@tim-landscheidt.de wrote:
So, should we find a term that is suitable for all six billion people on this planet, or should we covertly prefer users who are curious enough to just click on that link to find out what's behind it?
Obviously we should replace the text messages with the ulitmate wiktionary "Defined Meaning" numeric identifier!
or… you know… just submit a new translation.
(but… I for one welcome the ultimate conlang lexicon overloards!)
Gregory Maxwell gmaxwell@gmail.com wrote:
So, should we find a term that is suitable for all six billion people on this planet, or should we covertly prefer users who are curious enough to just click on that link to find out what's behind it?
Obviously we should replace the text messages with the ulitmate wiktionary "Defined Meaning" numeric identifier! [...]
In many cultures there are numbers with negative connota- tions (cf. [[Number of the Beast]], [[88 (number)]] and *many* more). So maybe the board should appoint a "Numbers Committee" that determines which sequences of digits (bina- ry? decimal? hexadecimal?) are acceptable for use. Obviously there is a need - just look at URI:http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=666: Vandalism! :-)
Tim
Hello,
On Wed, Sep 30, 2009 at 4:00 PM, Teofilo teofilowiki@gmail.com wrote:
Now go to meta.wikimedia.org (1), create a new account there and click on your "My contributions" link. And see what you see on the top line of Special:Contributions : "Abuse Log". My preference on meta is French, and it reads ("Journal des abus"). In French "Journal" means both "Log" and "Newspaper". It sort of says "you are already making headlines in newspapers for abuse".
It means Wikimedia users are considered as suspects from the first time they set foot into the wiki. It means that the climate there is a climate where everyone suspects everybody else, where you are guilty until proven innocent, and where bad faith is assumed (3).
So, in a word, you're not complaining about the tool itself, you're complaining about how a tool is named. I invite you to raise your concerns with the developers and to propose a better French translation at translatewiki.net.
Any other wikilawyering or claim of assuming bad faith is completely unnecessary and unhelpful.
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