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Date: Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 11:57 PM
Subject: [Foundation-l] Year: 2009 Week: 31 Number: 113
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.org
Year: 2009 Week: 31 Number: 113
******************************************
An independent internal news bulletin
for the members of the Wikimedia community
//////////////////////////////////////////
=== Technical news ===
[arwp: New namespace] - the Arabic Wikipedia Community has agreed to
create a new namespace called "Supplement". It will contain most of
date pages (days, months, years, decades, etc.), disambiguation pages
and lists to give the exactly number of encyclopedic articles. There
are about 6000 pages that will be moved to the new namespace. It may
be possible that your community would like to apply the same idea.
https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=19357 -- bug report
http://ar.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project:Supplement -- guideline of namespace
[Commons: Off-site archive] - A off site archive for Commons and the
XML snapshots will be added. Thanks are due to eBart consulting and
User:Milosh for proving a backup server and storage array at their
colocation facility in Europe. This server will store archives of our
publicly available data of Wikimedia Commons and the XML snapshots.
http://techblog.wikimedia.org/2009/07/were-adding-an-off-site-archive-for-commons-and-the-xml-snapshots/ -- techblog
post
[Passwords plz] - Watchlistr.com was an outside site that asked for
Wikimedia passwords in order aggregate user watchlists across all
projects for them. Although in this case it did not have a malicious
intent, use of external sites asking for passwords place in risk the
accounts used. Users are asked not to share their user password with
any external site. Not even toolserver tools are allowed to request
your password for any service. The site has now been shut down, and
further analysis revealed that it had important vulnerabilities.
Magnus Manske has created an alternative tool for people to use if
they liked this feature.
http://www.watchlistr.com/
http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2009-July/044238.html
-- initial thread
http://magnusmanske.de/MetaWatchlist/ -- alternative proposed by Magnus
[TS: Multi-maintainer tools] - the toolserver is pushing
multi-maintainer tools and will be actively discouraging single
maintainer ones. They want to encourage collaboration amongst
toolserver users and make tools last even when one of the users
disappears.
http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.org.wikimedia.toolserver/1515
[SVN account requests] - there's a new process for requesting SVN
accounts to the MediaWiki source code. Brion announced that he'll be
going through the queue every week, so if you have request throw them
up on MediaWiki wiki. ;-)
http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.science.linguistics.wikipedia.technical/44683 --
mailing list post
http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Commit_access_requests -- requests
=== Proposals ===
[Geonotice + Wikinews/Commons?] - Sage Ross recently proposed
something interesting: using an opt-in geonotice (notice that displays
based on the location of your IP) to show local reporting or
photographing opportunities. Hopefully this will help with one of the
great frustrations that inhibit original reporting.
http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2009-July/044367.html
=== Foundation ===
[Board elections: Voting] - the Foundation's Board elections has
finally entered into the voting phase (voting is open until August 10)
and translation is continuing. Visit the Meta pages for election
information (including a "Questions" page), the Wikipedia Signpost
also has interviews with the candidates.
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_elections/2009#voters -- voter
requirements
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_elections/2009/Translation --
translation page
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2009-07-27/Board_elections#Candidate_interviews -- signpost
interviews
[More donation buttons] - the second round of donation button designs
has been posted, feedback is appreciated to determine which designs
we'll end up using!
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_2009/Donation_buttons_upgrade
[Audit Committee] - the new members of the 2009-2010 Audit Committee
have been announced.
http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/foundation-l/2009-July/053280.html --
foundation-l post
[wm2009: Registration] - Media Registration for Wikimania 2009 has
opened. For regular registration, there is a new update: it is also
possible to extend your stay past the Wikimania dates, but you need to
contact the hotel directly.
http://wikimania2009.wikimedia.org/wiki/Registration#Accommodations --
extending stay options
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Wikimania_2009_Media_Registration -- media
registration
[Strategy: "Office Hours" & Wiki] - the Strategic Planning team has
announced their "office hours" which are teams that they will be on
the channel to answer questions and participate in discussions,
everyone's invited! The team has also "soft-launched" their wiki
(most of its content is also available for translation).
http://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/IRC_Office_Hours
http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.org.wikimedia.foundation/40527 --
soft-launch post
[TS donation] - the Wikimedia Foundation has awarded a US$40,000 grant
to the Toolserver toward improving the toolserver's reliability. With
that money they will buy three database servers, so they can keep two
copies of each wiki database instead of just one. This should greatly
improve the availability of up to date data in the wiki databases.
http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/toolserver-l/2009-July/002278.html --
announcement
http://journal.toolserver.org/entry/2009/07/29/wikimedia-foundation-grants-40000-to-the-toolserver/ -- blog
post
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_chapters/WMF_grants/WM_DE/Improve_toolserver_reliability -- original grant
application
[Active ombudsmen?] - there was a discussion on the DE Wikipedia (and
then foundation-l) about whether or not the Ombudsmen commission (the
group that hears privacy violations) is actually fulfilling its
mission actively.
http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.org.wikimedia.foundation/40241
=== Community ===
[NY Wiki-Conference] - the first New York City Wiki-Conference was a
success with more than 100 people attending. The Signpost has a
write-up about the event and there was also a twitter "report" with
the tag #nywikiconference.
http://twitter.com/#search?q=%23nywikiconference -- twitter feed
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2009-07-27/Wiki-Conference -- signpost
update
[Institutions editing] - the Tropenmuseum, a Dutch museum, was
preparing to upload images to the Dutch Wikipedia until it's account
was blocked due to its name. Erik Möller (User:Eloquence, Deputy
Director WMF) suggested on Commons-l that this is something we want to
avoid -- "these institutions are helping expand our content, we should
Assume Good Faith and let our first impressions be friendly and
professional".
http://ultimategerardm.blogspot.com/2009/07/tropenmuseum-is-blocked.html --
Gerard's blog post on the museum
http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.org.wikimedia.commons/5006 -- Erik's
commons-l post
[WMUK: Schools project ML] - Wikimedia UK has started a new mailing
list for its schools project, dedicated to creating a Wikipedia
version with selected articles for schools. Interested parties are
welcome to subscribe.
http://wikimedia.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/schools-project-l_wikimedia.org.uk
=== Media ===
[Wikipedia flawed, but that's okay] - Wikipedia is a flawed and
incomplete testament to the essential fallibility of human nature. An
interesting blog post from the BBC about Wikipedia being okay. ;-)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/digitalrevolution/2009/07/wikipedia.shtml
[Mobile Wikipedia tips] - Wikipedia Expert Tips: How to Keep the Facts
at Your Fingertips. The article talks about different ways to serve
Wikipedia content, from tweaking the skin to a random article
screensaver to mobile phone versions.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/168655/wikipedia_expert_tips_how_to_keep_the_facts_at_your_fingertips.html
[NIH] - a few more media outlets have covered the National Institutes
of Health Academy with article titles ranging from "Should you trust
health advice from the web?" to "NIH Gets Schooled on Wikipedia".
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327185.500-should-you-trust-health-advice-from-the-web.html?full=true
http://techinsider.nextgov.com/2009/07/nih_gets_schooled_on_wikipedia.php
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/27/AR2009072701912.html
[CK-12 Foundation] - Jimmy Wales joined the Advisory Board of the
CK-12 Foundation, a Silicon Valley non-profit organization with a
mission to provide online up-to-date and standards-aligned textbook
content to K-12 students around the world.
http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/jimmy-wales-joins-advisory-board-of-ck-12-foundation,897842.shtml
[NPG] - the British Association of Picture Libraries and Agencies has
sided with the National Portrait Gallery *against* Wikipedia, as the
NPG incident continues.
http://www.bjp-online.com/public/showPage.html?page=866109
http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.org.wikimedia.foundation/40549
[Jimmy on CNN Money] - Jimbo did a piece on "CNN Money" where he
talked about Wikipedia's non-profit status and it's usability and
stategic planning projects.
http://money.cnn.com/video/news/2009/07/28/n_co_wikipedia_wales.cnnmoney/
[Rorschach censors] - the New York Times covers the Rorschach
controversy: whether or not we should include the ink blot tests in
our articles (for "ethical reasons").
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/29/technology/internet/29inkblot.html
[WP has poor photos?] - the NY Times ran an article a few weeks ago
called: "Wikipedia May Be a Font of Facts, but It?s a Desert for
Photos" which pointed out that Wikipedia has some trouble with good
quality pictures in its articles (especially ones of celebrities).
This caused a bit of controversy on the mailing lists, with image
contributors complaining that the Foundation didn't steer the article
in the right direction -- highlighting good works instead of bad ones.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/20/arts/20funny.html -- article
http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/foundation-l/2009-July/053282.html --
mailing list thread
=== Stats ===
[50k] - the Galician and Nynorsk (Norwegian) Wikipedias have both
reached 50,000 articles.
http://gl.wikipedia.org/
http://nn.wikipedia.org/
[mhr.wp] - the Meadow Mari Wikipedia is less than a month old and
already has over 500 articles (almost 600)!
http://mhr.wikipedia.org/
=== Other news ===
[Facebook] - the Wikipedia fan page on Facebook, managed by Cary Bass
(Bastique) Volunteer Coordinator WMF, now has a URL. If you use
Facebook, make sure to add yourself as a fan.
http://www.facebook.com/wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facebook#Privacy
[Wikipedia Art] - some awesome posters/t-shirts from last year have
resurfaced, they display people with a common theme: "I [edit]
Wikipedia". They show ordinary people surrounded by words that
display their editing interest depending upon their personality.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikeeperez/sets/72157604803121347/
[Attracting newbies?] - David Gerard pointed out an interesting
article with tips about attracting newbies and making them effective.
Although the author is talking about software development, it
definitely could relate to our projects.
http://denise.dreamwidth.org/23600.html
=== Did you know ... ===
... parody is the highest form of flattery?
[Bigipedia] - BBC Radio launched a "broadwebcasting" show parodying
the internet by mocking pop-ups, search boxes and other aspects of
online activity. Produced and directed by Pozzitive, the four-part
series is called 'Bigipedia' and has taken its inspiration from
Wikipedia. If you can appreciate British humor, check it out.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00lpr29/Bigipedia_Episode_1/ --
first episode (30 min)
//////////////////////////////////////////
Editor(s): Casey, Alex, Platonides
Thanks to: OsamaK, Rand, Stu, Sage, Daniel Kinzler, Skenmy, Frederic,
Brion, Jay, Philippe, David, River, Roan, Galio, Cary, Signpost, Gerard
Contact: reply or
http://report.wikizine.org
Website:
http://www.wikizine.org
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