Does anyone know why Wikipedia is often unavailable (timeouts)? I've
read that there are problems with the wiki software (table locking)
creating lag, but being unavailable even to read-only access seems a
little bit strange to me.
As of right now, I get timeouts connecting to www.wikipedia.org and
meta.wikipedia.org, while I experience no problems accessing other sites.
-matt (User:Ogmios)
Is there anybody who supports the ban against me besides Clutch and Zoe? Im sure Isis does, but I guess she was banned for some reason?? To be honest I don't think Clutch's opinion matters, he seems to support a ban against me because he thought my user page was too cluttered and I misspelled too many words or something. As for Zoe...I don't know what problem she has against me and she won't talk about it, is there anybody else? Maybe Larry Sanger or mav or Brion Vibber? I don't really know, being banned was good for me since I taught myself c++ but, uh, I sorta need to get back to working on the articles.
wikipedia-l-request(a)wikipedia.org wrote:Send Wikipedia-l mailing list submissions to
wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit
http://www.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to
wikipedia-l-request(a)wikipedia.org
You can reach the person managing the list at
wikipedia-l-admin(a)wikipedia.org
When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
than "Re: Contents of Wikipedia-l digest..."
Today's Topics:
1. Re: [WikiEN-l] User:MyPasswordIsHELLO (Oliver Pereira)
2. Re: ISBN links (Fred Bauder)
3. Re: ISBN links (Jimmy Wales)
4. Re: ISBN links (Jimmy Wales)
5. Re: ISBN links (Fred Bauder)
6. Re: [WikiEN-l] Please revoke Isis' sysop status (Jonathan Walther)
7. Re: [WikiEN-l] Isis -Tarquin dispute. (Jonathan Walther)
8. Re: Re: [WikiEN-l] Please revoke Isis' sysop status (Jimmy Wales)
9. Re: ISBN links (Axel Boldt)
10. Re: racialisme (Jimmy Wales)
11. banning is for goatse! not for lir! (Bridget [name omitted for privacy reasons])
--__--__--
Message: 1
Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 13:30:41 +0000 (GMT)
From: Oliver Pereira
To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
cc: wikien-l(a)wikipedia.org
Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: [WikiEN-l] User:MyPasswordIsHELLO
Reply-To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
On Mon, 3 Feb 2003, Jason Williams wrote:
> [[User:MyPasswordIsHELLO]] - I think this user account should
> be deleted, since it subverts the user account system.
Hmm. The existence of this account would seem to make banning people
impossible, since anyone could sign in under this name and make edits.
However, I suspect that the intention of whoever made the account was to
enable people to make truly anonymous edits. Simply not signing in at all
would probably allow one to do this for a while, but people might
eventually spot the pattern in one's edits and work out which IP address
corresonds to which user.
I'm not entirely comfortable with the idea of anonymous edits myself,
because of the difficulty in contacting contributors to check things with
them. However, if there is a consensus that anonymous edits are a good
idea, there could perhaps be a new check box on the "Edting" page, saying,
"Make this edit anonymous". I'm not necessarily recommending this, but I
suppose it might come in useful if someone wants to make a valid
contribution which they nevertheless would rather not be associated with.
Oliver
+-------------------------------------------+
| Oliver Pereira |
| Dept. of Electronics and Computer Science |
| University of Southampton |
| omp199(a)ecs.soton.ac.uk |
+-------------------------------------------+
--__--__--
Message: 2
Date: Mon, 03 Feb 2003 07:31:28 -0700
Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] ISBN links
From: Fred Bauder
To:
Reply-To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
Amazons prices are higher (and they are not politically correct), but the
listings on Amaazon often include reviews which are quite helpful. I
personally have never purchased a book from Amazon (always able to find a
cheaper book elsewhere) but frankly if you use the reviews, you might
consider buying there. At any rate I think it's a personal choice.
Anyway I hate polical correctness so much that I would dismiss that notion
out of hand just on that basis.
Fred (an ABE bookseller)
> From: Magnus Manske
> Reply-To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
> Date: Sun, 02 Feb 2003 23:18:34 +0100
> To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
> Subject: [Wikipedia-l] ISBN links
>
> Some people on the German wikipedia want to get rid of the amazon.de
> link on the ISBN page, because of the "one-click" patent thing. I told
> them it would be not-NPOV to do so. Now they want to make some two-level
> ISBN page, with some "all bookstores" and "good bookstores" groups. I'm
> not sure what exactly they imagine, but it would require a software change.
>
> Is there a policy on that? Should we exclude bookstores (the largest
> one, actually) from the list because some (many?) wikipedians don't like
> them? Or should we leave the choice where to order to the user? Jimbo?
>
> Magnus
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
> http://www.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
--__--__--
Message: 3
Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 06:35:07 -0800
From: Jimmy Wales
To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] ISBN links
Reply-To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
Magnus Manske wrote:
> Is there a policy on that? Should we exclude bookstores (the largest
> one, actually) from the list because some (many?) wikipedians don't like
> them? Or should we leave the choice where to order to the user? Jimbo?
Wow, I don't know. My first inclination is to list several sources,
and if people don't like some of them, then they shouldn't shop there.
It's really not a good idea for us to get involved in the particulars
of endorsing/not-endorsing particular shops.
--Jimbo
--__--__--
Message: 4
Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 06:36:22 -0800
From: Jimmy Wales
To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] ISBN links
Reply-To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
Axel Boldt wrote:
> I know that I have fought and lost this fight before. ISBN numbers are
> evil and should not be used to identify books. They identify *editions*
> of books, and in a couple of years all these editions will be out of
> print and all ISBN links in Wikipedia will be completely useless. Right
> now they are already useless if you are interested in buying used
> books.
I'm listening. This sounds like a valid objection to this particular
technical detail.
--__--__--
Message: 5
Date: Mon, 03 Feb 2003 07:37:24 -0700
Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] ISBN links
From: Fred Bauder
To:
Reply-To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
Marvellously wrongheaded, most books published after 1970 have ISBN numbers
and are most easily found an purchased if you start with that number
(although it can get complicated as books are reprinted under diffent
numbers). The general practice in the bookselling business currently relies
on the ISBN number and will for the forseeable future.
Fred an ABE bookseller
> From: Axel Boldt
> Reply-To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
> Date: Sun, 2 Feb 2003 17:22:46 -0800 (PST)
> To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
> Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] ISBN links
>
> I know that I have fought and lost this fight before. ISBN numbers are
> evil and should not be used to identify books. They identify *editions*
> of books, and in a couple of years all these editions will be out of
> print and all ISBN links in Wikipedia will be completely useless. Right
> now they are already useless if you are interested in buying used
> books.
>
> If versions of a book are being published by different parties, as is
> true for many important books that are in the public domain, then
> ISBN's are furthermore inherently POV, since they pick out a single
> publisher.
>
> No reference work, encyclopedia, library catalog, bibliography, article
> or book ever refers to books by ISBN number. Because they are not book
> identifiers. Given properly formatted author and title, our software
> could and should query bookstores and libary catalogs.
>
> I think I said it before: meaningless numbers are worse than no
> numbers.
>
> Axel
>
> WikiKarma: http://wikipedia.org/wiki/UN_number
>
>
> __________________________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now.
> http://mailplus.yahoo.com
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
> http://www.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
--__--__--
Message: 6
Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 05:52:52 -0800
From: Jonathan Walther
To: wikien-l(a)wikipedia.org
Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: [WikiEN-l] Please revoke Isis' sysop status
Reply-To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
--UugvWAfsgieZRqgk
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed
Content-Disposition: inline
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
On Mon, Feb 03, 2003 at 12:37:18PM +0100, Erik Moeller wrote:
>Given Isis'/Kay's continued legal threats against a valued member of the
>Wikipedia community (Tarquin) for a misunderstanding (largely on her part)=
, I
>must insist that her sysop status be revoked. I cannot trust her to be fai=
r in
>the use of the sysop privileges any longer.
>
>Jimbo, please take action in this matter ASAP.
I object to this request, and request that Isis sysop status be left
alone.
Isis has repeatedly asked for clarification, in very polite terms. I
have not seen attempts to answer him.
Isis is acting out of concern for his own legal liability. I think it
would be the right thing to do for you, Jimbo, or for Tarquin to give
Isis a brief note of assurance that he is not liable.
As you may or may not have noticed, Isis works as a paralegal. He has
experience of how things work in the law, so has a better idea than the
rest of us if he actually is in legal danger or not. Far better to have
him onside and working for us, than to snub him and lose his valuable
services.
Jonathan
--=20
Geek House Productions, Ltd.
Providing Unix & Internet Contracting and Consulting,
QA Testing, Technical Documentation, Systems Design & Implementation,
General Programming, E-commerce, Web & Mail Services since 1998
Phone: 604-435-1205
Email: djw(a)reactor-core.org
Webpage: http://reactor-core.org
Address: 2459 E 41st Ave, Vancouver, BC V5R2W2
--UugvWAfsgieZRqgk
Content-Type: application/pgp-signature
Content-Disposition: inline
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.1 (GNU/Linux)
iQCVAwUBPj50NMK9HT/YfGeBAQFPcAQAnnp5sOVtpysacicbdpnltdCSevLOZKoJ
9sYNraj59gSjPxXq4usLqvbL1K4LVQ243scuR/9jET5KP4SbLSG+XdwzXCjO8PGl
yZber2crO4EaFDmB01DCgcaykL94X9P2HUNFi5G3vUIqrl4Ao3CmtvQcmGZhQmOX
W+sPbMSACg8=
=C1Zh
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
--UugvWAfsgieZRqgk--
--__--__--
Message: 7
Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 07:28:07 -0800
From: Jonathan Walther
To: wikien-l(a)wikipedia.org
Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: [WikiEN-l] Isis -Tarquin dispute.
Reply-To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
--5vNYLRcllDrimb99
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed
Content-Disposition: inline
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
On Mon, Feb 03, 2003 at 03:20:25PM -0000, Eugene Gill wrote:
> I'm quite disgusted at Isis' behaviour to the extent that I've joined t=
his
> mail list so that I can voice my wish (seconding Eloquence's) that Isis=
be
> removed from sysop status. Furthermore I think she should be banned for
> making ridiculous threats of legal action to a fellow Wikipedian (Tarqu=
in)
> over a comment that as far as I can gather was merely a difference of
> opinion.
You seem ignorant of how the law works. Isis has brought up some valid
issues that the Wikipedia needs to deal with for it's own future safety
and continuance.
I really hope the Wikipedia will not be the type of project that shoots the
messenger when problems are pointed out. Isis is a valuable sysop, and
I would be sad to see his privileges taken away.
Wikipedia, not Ostrichpedia!
Jonathan
--=20
Geek House Productions, Ltd.
Providing Unix & Internet Contracting and Consulting,
QA Testing, Technical Documentation, Systems Design & Implementation,
General Programming, E-commerce, Web & Mail Services since 1998
Phone: 604-435-1205
Email: djw(a)reactor-core.org
Webpage: http://reactor-core.org
Address: 2459 E 41st Ave, Vancouver, BC V5R2W2
--5vNYLRcllDrimb99
Content-Type: application/pgp-signature
Content-Disposition: inline
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.1 (GNU/Linux)
iQCVAwUBPj6Kh8K9HT/YfGeBAQHjRgP/YQRvrvPTr9aX5WDeITyAQoaa2TMrSzBL
cpsIN522pQ0K5+3uqwhiT8hQ/z1ZzCnqFmqD63hG1X0bUUjCGSr29Gw3FGliQsH5
PO5XlneJ4U+SC3UIXYDlYQP6YmXfoJLUbNq33lV+hcLA/4+A1KGDs+hwT0XneJHE
/MzFUlMlG6I=
=8KaO
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
--5vNYLRcllDrimb99--
--__--__--
Message: 8
Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 08:29:46 -0800
From: Jimmy Wales
To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] Re: [WikiEN-l] Please revoke Isis' sysop status
Reply-To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
I'm responding to this one privately. Jonathan, I don't think
you've got the basic facts of the dispute straight at all.
I don't want us to discuss this one on the list too much right now,
and never unless it becomes absolutely necessary, but I did want to
say that Jonathan's factual summary is not even remotely correct.
Jonathan Walther wrote:
> Isis has repeatedly asked for clarification, in very polite terms. I
> have not seen attempts to answer him.
>
> Isis is acting out of concern for his own legal liability. I think it
> would be the right thing to do for you, Jimbo, or for Tarquin to give
> Isis a brief note of assurance that he is not liable.
>
> As you may or may not have noticed, Isis works as a paralegal. He has
> experience of how things work in the law, so has a better idea than the
> rest of us if he actually is in legal danger or not. Far better to have
> him onside and working for us, than to snub him and lose his valuable
> services.
>
> Jonathan
>
> --
> Geek House Productions, Ltd.
>
> Providing Unix & Internet Contracting and Consulting,
> QA Testing, Technical Documentation, Systems Design & Implementation,
> General Programming, E-commerce, Web & Mail Services since 1998
>
> Phone: 604-435-1205
> Email: djw(a)reactor-core.org
> Webpage: http://reactor-core.org
> Address: 2459 E 41st Ave, Vancouver, BC V5R2W2
--__--__--
Message: 9
Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 09:30:35 -0800 (PST)
From: Axel Boldt
Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] ISBN links
To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
Reply-To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
--- Fred Bauder wrote:
>Marvellously wrongheaded, most books published after 1970 have ISBN
>numbers
I don't dispute that. Most books published after 500 BC have an author
and a title.
>and are most easily found an purchased if you start with that number
>(although it can get complicated as books are reprinted under diffent
>numbers).
Since many books are eventually reprinted under different numbers
(softcover, second edition), your second half sentence seems to
contradict the first. How is searching for a book by author and title
any more complicated than searching for it by ISBN? You will find all
editions by all publishers that way, hardcover and softcover, printed,
Braille or on tape, whatever.
>The general practice in the bookselling business currently relies
>on the ISBN number and will for the forseeable future.
Sure. ISBN's were invented by and for booksellers and serve a useful
purpose there, namely to identify a specific edition of a book so that
it can be ordered from a wholesaler and delivered to the customer. But
they don't serve a useful purpose for someone who wants to locate a
book in a (used) bookstore or library. These people are Wikipedia's
clientele.
Axel
__________________________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now.
http://mailplus.yahoo.com
--__--__--
Message: 10
Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 09:24:28 -0800
From: Jimmy Wales
To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] racialisme
Reply-To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
julien tayon wrote:
> Yes but shoud we present the fact that it is legitimate to think Shoah
> never existed, or shoud we state (arbitrary) that revisionism is a far
> rightist theory that Shoah never existed. Can you tell me which can be
> written in wikipedia, and why ?
I think we can (and should) say that the theory that "Shoah never
existed" is held only by a very tiny minority of people, and that no
notable historian takes such claims seriously.
We absolutely should _not_ act as if holocaust revisionism and
standard history are equally valid. To do so would itself be a
perversion of NPOV.
--Jimbo
--__--__--
Message: 11
Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 10:28:20 -0800 (PST)
From: Bridget [name omitted for privacy reasons]
To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
Subject: [Wikipedia-l] banning is for goatse! not for lir!
Reply-To: wikipedia-l(a)wikipedia.org
--0-1943413075-1044296900=:27526
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
I object strongly to DW being called an idiot. I resent the fact that it is considered ok to call him an idiot. He brought up some very legitimate complaints, not the least of which is that Zoe openly reverts changes based not on their merit, but merely because she doesn't like the user who made them. She is open about this, she has admitted it, she has argued, "But User:XX made the change, why should we listen to that idiot?"
It is true that wikipedia is full of argument and that this is a problem, but the problem is not merely those, like DW, TMC, or even myself the mongrel troll Vera Cruz, which engage in inappropriate behavior not because we are incorrigible, but because we honestly don't always know better. For example, DW does not know that informing JW that he has a system of approved ignorance is not going to come across well, nor did I know that arguing that it is racist to refuse to use forign spellings would be bad.
Certainly I have learned to be increasingly non-argumentative, and I am sure DW, TMC, 172, Danny, etc can definitely become even better contributors than they are. So no, I don't think we are the real problem, even if we can from time to time be offensive because we don't have a high enough level of class or protocol.
I think there is a serious problem with people such as Isis, who insults people (me others), refuses to discuss the problem with the people she hates, and then winds up threatening to sue somebody for libel, a crime she regularly commits herself!
There is an amazing difference between the two groups, the most notably difference being that Im no advocating banning anybody. Isis can call me names all day, I don't care. User:172 can go insane with insisting that his dry rambling articles are the ultimate nobel prize explanation of every subject every written. But I don't want to ban them.
Banning is for people that load goatse or change the dates of WWII to 1836-2321. Banning is not for somebody who writes, "Columbus was a slavetrader" or "The Israelis are actively conducting genocide in Palestine". Yes, anyone with brains know those statements are absolute truth, but it takes time to learn NPOV.
At this wiki, we have a group of people who are snide and elitist. They do not have perfect NPOV, they do not have perfect decisions, but they believe they do. They reinforce their belief because they are just about the only people who read or talk on the mailing list and they are arguing all over the wiki, thus making them feel that they are the wiki, and everybody else is a noobie or non-contributor.
Those people should not be banned, they should not lose their sysop privileges. But, at the same time, the bullshit has got to fucking stop. You don't sue somebody from England because they tell u that as a paralegal you don't know jack about law. You don't call people an idiot simply because they don't agree with anything u think.
Id like to talk about how I shouldn't be banned, its pretty obvious that Im somebody who is going to contribute valuable material. I don't think even my biggest opponents can deny the fact that just about every time I click submit I am adding something of value and just about everytime there is a problem, I back down or its eventually decided that I was correct.
I know Im not a problem, but I can't convince anybody of it. There is a reason that legal courts do not require a defendant to prove their innocence, its IMPOSSIBLE to prove one's innocence. It cannot be done no matter what the crime or no matter how innocent you are. Not a single one of you can prove that you were not Adolf Hitler who committed a genocide and then, via parapscyhological phenomena, teleported himself into the future.
=== message truncated ===
---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now
Hello.
Thanks Anthere. I do not deserve such a praise.
Well, I will try to dedicate some time,
to improve communication. Please feel free to let
messages on my user pages or by email. You can do it
in English, French, Spanish and Dutch.
Regards,
Youssef
On May 20-24, the 12th international World Wide Web Conference is held
in Budapest, Hungary. The deadline for posters is tomorrow, Feb 7,
and for "developers day" on Feb 14. Among the developers day topics
(http://www.www2003.org/dd/) there is one titled "[D7] Authoring
Techniques and Tools for Accessibility and Device Independence".
This sounds very interesting, like it could turn into a wiki workshop.
I don't know if I can go there, but perhaps someone else can.
Read all about it at the conference website, http://www.www2003.org/
or at W3C's http://www.w3.org/Conferences/Overview-WWW.html
--
Lars Aronsson (lars(a)aronsson.se)
Aronsson Datateknik - http://aronsson.se/
I just discovered wikipedia the other day and I'm just thrilled that
this thing exists. I authored the drug testing faq, and it's probably
about 5 years old now because I don't have time to maintain this
monster of a document. I've been planning to write software that does
almost exactly what Wikipedia does so that others could maintain it.
Now I don't have to!
To get to my question, would it be appropriate for me to post the drug
testing faq? I have the feeling that too much controversy might not
be appreciated here, but then the faq is pretty objective and factual.
It discusses methods that work and don't work for beating the test,
and it covers details on how tests are administered.
There may be some points where my anti-drug testing bias comes out,
but I'm thinking I could comb through the text and edit that out
before posting it. I pretty much isolated my opinions in the 'Ethics'
section of the faq.
I know I read somewhere that dramatic changes to wikipedia are
discouraged, so I only plan to post small pieces at a time as I edit
them.
Also, I just caught the end of a discussion on vikipedia (whatever
that is) and other languages. Some people have already translated the
drug testing faq into other languages. I could track those down and
post them as well, but I can't read them, so any edits that I make on
the english version will be disjoint from the other languages.
Is wikipedia the right place for me to post the faq, or is there
another *pedia that would be better suited?
On Wednesday 05 February 2003 04:00 am, brion wrote:
> On lun, 2003-02-03 at 11:47, Jimmy Wales wrote:
> > Here's my WikiKarma: I spent the whole damn day trying to put out
> > WikiFires and spread WikiLove, and managed to make virtually no
> > headway with any of it.
> >=20
> > I'm *this damn close* to going on a banning spree. But, I'll
> > relax first.
> There, there. We've all been having a tough WikiWeek (and it's only
> Tuesday!) We'll pull through though...
>
> Jimbo, I'd just like to thank you for continuing to support and host
> this project, despite the enormous amount of crap you have to put up
> with.
Mega dittos, err... yeah, me likes Jimbo too. :-)
No seriously. Without Jimbo's foresight, crazy ideas and unusual selflessness
this project would not exist at all. IMO the Internet without Wikipedia is
either a very boring and static place to do research or it is a cacophony of
yelling, flames and other buzz (sic there is no real focus to any of it). But
Wikipedia, I think combines a worthwhile goal to create a research resource
with just enough of the buzz aspect of the Internet to allow us to
collaborate to further our goal.
Yes, sometimes the buzz does get a little loud, but the goal is still being
worked on. Jimbo is also in the unenviable position of mostly seeing the bad
elements of Wikipedia. However I am either editing Wikipedia or at least
monitoring Recent Changes for 12 hours a day now and what I see is greater
than 99% valid edits that improve articles (3+ edits a minute now just in
en.wik!).
IMO vandalism and dross as a percentage of edits has in fact gone down, way
down, since I joined over a year ago (at least in en.wiki). This is the
opposite of what I expected. But with so many edits every day even a very low
level of vandalism, dross and unfriendlyness tends to be a lot in an absolute
sense. And these problems are distilled from all the good things that happen
in Wikipedia and brought to the mailing list.
Our once little town is now a bustling city that never sleeps complete with
thriving and distinct "ethnic quarters". Before, a volunteer fire department
and a combined town Mayor/Sheriff was perfectly fine to run the town. IMO now
what we need is a "city council" headed by a mayor who appoints a "Sheriff"
(who in turn appoints "deputies").
But to form such a structure IMO we need to become a non-profit first (thus
"council members"/"Sheriffs" and "deputies" would have legal roles and would
be that much more accountable for their actions - or inactions).
Thank you Jimbo for making Wikipedia possible. :-) Please understand that we
are just going through some major growing pains right now.
Wikipedia: Order from Chaos.
--Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
WikiKarma:
I added a lot of events to [[February 1]] and updated all the year pages and
many of the other articles linked from there.
I object strongly to DW being called an idiot. I resent the fact that it is considered ok to call him an idiot. He brought up some very legitimate complaints, not the least of which is that Zoe openly reverts changes based not on their merit, but merely because she doesn't like the user who made them. She is open about this, she has admitted it, she has argued, "But User:XX made the change, why should we listen to that idiot?"
It is true that wikipedia is full of argument and that this is a problem, but the problem is not merely those, like DW, TMC, or even myself the mongrel troll Vera Cruz, which engage in inappropriate behavior not because we are incorrigible, but because we honestly don't always know better. For example, DW does not know that informing JW that he has a system of approved ignorance is not going to come across well, nor did I know that arguing that it is racist to refuse to use forign spellings would be bad.
Certainly I have learned to be increasingly non-argumentative, and I am sure DW, TMC, 172, Danny, etc can definitely become even better contributors than they are. So no, I don't think we are the real problem, even if we can from time to time be offensive because we don't have a high enough level of class or protocol.
I think there is a serious problem with people such as Isis, who insults people (me others), refuses to discuss the problem with the people she hates, and then winds up threatening to sue somebody for libel, a crime she regularly commits herself!
There is an amazing difference between the two groups, the most notably difference being that Im no advocating banning anybody. Isis can call me names all day, I don't care. User:172 can go insane with insisting that his dry rambling articles are the ultimate nobel prize explanation of every subject every written. But I don't want to ban them.
Banning is for people that load goatse or change the dates of WWII to 1836-2321. Banning is not for somebody who writes, "Columbus was a slavetrader" or "The Israelis are actively conducting genocide in Palestine". Yes, anyone with brains know those statements are absolute truth, but it takes time to learn NPOV.
At this wiki, we have a group of people who are snide and elitist. They do not have perfect NPOV, they do not have perfect decisions, but they believe they do. They reinforce their belief because they are just about the only people who read or talk on the mailing list and they are arguing all over the wiki, thus making them feel that they are the wiki, and everybody else is a noobie or non-contributor.
Those people should not be banned, they should not lose their sysop privileges. But, at the same time, the bullshit has got to fucking stop. You don't sue somebody from England because they tell u that as a paralegal you don't know jack about law. You don't call people an idiot simply because they don't agree with anything u think.
Id like to talk about how I shouldn't be banned, its pretty obvious that Im somebody who is going to contribute valuable material. I don't think even my biggest opponents can deny the fact that just about every time I click submit I am adding something of value and just about everytime there is a problem, I back down or its eventually decided that I was correct.
I know Im not a problem, but I can't convince anybody of it. There is a reason that legal courts do not require a defendant to prove their innocence, its IMPOSSIBLE to prove one's innocence. It cannot be done no matter what the crime or no matter how innocent you are. Not a single one of you can prove that you were not Adolf Hitler who committed a genocide and then, via parapscyhological phenomena, teleported himself into the future.
Im supposed to apoligize to people or something so I can be unbanned. Ive apoligized, Ive apoligized ten-fold. Am I changed? I change every morning when I wake up, its a gradual sorta thing. Nobody has apoligized to me, and nobody can honestly deny that I haven't been the victim of rude abuse. I don't want your goddamn apologies, I want you to grow up and realize that from time to time somebody is gonna show up at the wiki and not only have info to contribute, but they are gonna start revising stuff that everyone of u thought was perfect. Its gonna happen next year, and ten years down the road, and its already happaned. Because Im not just a spell-checker or information-dumper, Im a reviser.
Look at that ridiculous New Imperialism, its got to be just about the most boring piece of crusty lecture Ive ever looked at, you can't honestly expect some 4th grader, or working class stiff, or even an academic, to want to read that. Thats why none of you have actually read it! Don't tell me you've read that, I know you haven't read it. If you'd read it you'd be able to discuss it with me. Yes, I know, thats argumentative, maybe u even have read it and Im sorry if you have and I just libeled you. But the point is, that article needs revision and I need to revise it and nobody will let me simply because we don't get along.
Why? Why can't we all just get along? I don't see any reason we can't get along. I've obviously taken numerous steps to try and reconcile things, Ive written a great deal of material which NOBODY has read. I admit that Im not the greatest writer ever, but Id like somebody else to take a step. Id like somebody else to consider the fact that I might be right, maybe a student of New Imperialism shouldn't be required to read a massive paragraph about the word imperialism, maybe he should just be able to click on imperialism when he decides he wants to read all that.
In any case, thats what I was doing when I was last banned and I apoligize for not apoligizing enough and instead using this opportunity to make demands and concessions, but Im pretty stuck on this territorial dispute regarding New Imperialism, and I know, if you give in at all the floodgates will come crashing open and pretty soon Ill be over on Isaac Asimov or Charles Dickens insisting that he wasn't the greatest writer ever whose greatest book ever was such and such, but yah know, I did have a point about the Asimov article being POV.
So let's like talk about articles sometime, cuz honestly, I don't know what to say about anything else. At least DW was trying to talk about whatever changes he was going on about on Jimbo Wale's talk page, I know for a fact that Zoe doesn't discuss things, she argues "This is the wiki way!", but the wiki way is to make a good encyclopedia. And I don't see how that can be done without a little more conversation and a little less resorting to law by commandment and imperial decree. Not to state that Jimbo is a King or some totalitarian, just to note that no matter how benevolent things may be, there hasn't been enough friendliness.
Oh, I almost forgot, for about the hundreth time, plz add some simple chatrooms like even the most moronic of websites have. You can't honestly expect to go another year without even one chatroom, can you?
---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now
I sent this yesterday, but it doesn't appear to have made it to the list.
We seem to have lost the capability to Edit in the Diff page. You have to click Cancel and then edit.
Zoe
---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now
Some people on the German wikipedia want to get rid of the amazon.de
link on the ISBN page, because of the "one-click" patent thing. I told
them it would be not-NPOV to do so. Now they want to make some two-level
ISBN page, with some "all bookstores" and "good bookstores" groups. I'm
not sure what exactly they imagine, but it would require a software change.
Is there a policy on that? Should we exclude bookstores (the largest
one, actually) from the list because some (many?) wikipedians don't like
them? Or should we leave the choice where to order to the user? Jimbo?
Magnus
1. "Legal issues"...perhaps taking edit wars too far?
2. Might there be a way to eventually implement some kind of mapping interface? I mean, a way to tag, within pages, a relative heirarchy and relationship between them. Sorta like "what links here" only done like a site map. Nothing big. :)
3. Bridget - simmer down. I happen to agree with you. But a lot of it is attitude. The overbearing, do nothing, go by the book usually wins out over the attitude of jumping right on it, and fighting it out. A lot depends on how clearly you can think through the real issue, underneath, which is often very general, and usually a question of style. Yes, people are arrogant, insulting, and hypocritical. "Columbus being a slave trader" is an topical example of how people have a hard time reconciling their engrained and iconoclastic views of things with the dirty details - throw morality in there, and anyone who remains too attached to that idol, will skew even moral issues till their completely backwards. see; moral relativism. But in any event, it would be hypocritical to kill even the hypocrites, and time may permit them change. Think before speak, and obey the Murphy's Law that deals with arguing with fools, or the like...
-Ztevertigo