Wikipedia-l October 2005

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80 participants
90 discussions

The issue of existance of the Moldovan language Wikipedia
by Oleg Alexandrov 24 Oct '05

24 Oct '05

I know that this issue has come up one or two times this list before, but from what I saw in the archives the discussion attracted only a small audience, while the issue itself does not show any signs of going way. I post this now hoping that there will be a bigger discussion, hopefully followed by a resolution of the matter. The background of the issue and some comments on it are available at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Village_pump_%28policy%29#Moldovan_W… and more information is at http://mo.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Ronline/Propunere In short, http://mo.wikipedia.org/ is a version of Wikipedia written in Romanian with Cyrillic characters. This combination is used nowhere in the world except in Transnistria which is a breakaway region of Republic of Moldova without international recognition and with a rather dubious regime. It is a relic from Soviet times, when in Republic of Moldova people used Cyrillic. There are two views on this matter. Some people think that nothing is wrong with having Wikipedia in all languages/character sets possible. The number of potential readers and editors of this particular version of Wikipedia is very small, but it still could be useful. And deleting a language version of Wikipedia would be against the Wiki spirit, would make Wikipedia politicized, etc. The other view is mostly reflected by people in Republic of Moldova itself and neighboring Romania (again, we are talking about the Romanian language here, the issue is the set of characters - in Romania proper they use the Latin alphabet). To us (I am from Republic of Moldova) writing our language in Cyrillic is a symbol of what was wrong with the Soviet Union, a totalitarian regime which did not give us even the choice of how to write our own language, and of all the tragedies which happened after Republic of Moldova was annexed to the Soviet Union in 1940 and then again in 1945. The discussion of this issue has been going on since June; see again http://mo.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Ronline/Propunere Neither side of course has any power to do anything about it (an administrator is not enough to close it down, for example). I would like to again express my hope that this discussion will attract a wide audience, and that the issue of existence of this Wikipedia will eventually be settled. Thank you, Oleg Alexandrov CAM assistant professor, UCLA aoleg(a)math.ucla.edu

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Mark Williamson's fonts
by Phil Boswell 23 Oct '05

23 Oct '05

I keep seeing references to fonts provided by our very own node_ue, and they seem to have been well received all over the place. However the site provided seems to be down: http://fixedsys.org/~node_ue/fonts/ I'm asking here because it seems to be a fairly easy place to get hold of Mark, and I thought it would be of general interest. Is there any other place to get these fonts? I would like to see if they would be useful for further special font designations like {{polytonic}} and {{IPA}}: {{gothic}} maybe? -- Phil [[en:User:Phil Boswell]]

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Wikimania 2006 will take place in Boston, USA.
by Delphine Ménard 23 Oct '05

23 Oct '05

Dear all, after a very tight vote within the jury, Boston has been chosen to host Wikimania 2006, the second International Wikimedia Conference. All information about the location can be found at: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2006/Boston We wish to thank all participants for the work they have put into their bids, and especially the supporters of Toronto whose city made it to the shortlist. Results of the vote were 5 for Boston to 4 for Toronto, and one abstention. Definite dates and agenda to be confirmed shortly. Best, Delphine PS. Sorry for the post in English to other lists, thank you for translating it if needed. PS. Désolée pour l'annonce en anglais. Bitte die Nachricht auf Englisch vergeben. Disculpe per la notizia en inglese. ;-) -- ~notafish

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Wikimedia in the media [Sept. 25 -- October 15 2005]
by SJ 22 Oct '05

22 Oct '05

There were many and hilarious media mentions this fortnight. Here's a sampling from across the English mediaverse. ================== ~ ~ ~ ==================== Andrew Leifer of the Stanford U's paper (the ''Daily''): "Your first stop for any kind of research should always be Wikipedia, the Internet's free, ever-evolving encyclopedia of everything... [s]imilar in philosophy to the clothing brand Fubu" -- one has to admire his spirit. http://daily.stanford.edu/tempo?page=content&id=18157&repository=0001_artic… "Orlowski Tackles Problems at the Wikipedia" ...puts encyclopedia's inaccuracies in perspective through own example. Orlowski's flair for balance and neutrality is propagated through English and German media. http://blog.searchenginewatch.com/blog/051018-152053 Wikipedia's reach quadruples in the past twelve months; leads growth spurt in reference-sites that includes eHow/wikiHow: http://www.linuxelectrons.com/article.php/2005101609035361 Worth a revisit: Nick Carr publishes David Gerard's eloquent response to his last Wikipedia posting, in full; and concurs. http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2005/10/more_on_wikiped.php Wikipedia makes Foolish watchlist: http://www.fool.com/news/commentary/2005/commentary05100505.htm Jimbo wales on the competition : On Wikibooks and 'slaughtering' textbook publishers -- http://www.dailyorange.com/media/paper522/news/2005/09/30/News/Wikibooks.Of… http://www.crankyconsumer.org/archives/000354wikimedia_foundation_vows_to_a… Jimbo, world traveller: "that's like opening a steakhouse and saying, 'Wait. What if people want to stab each other with their steak knives?' ... What does that do to your community?" Benkler's beard makes an appearance, along with goggling Googlers and an air guitar. http://www.technewsworld.com/story/46275.html (nyc, sept) And finally... Ward Cunningham leaves Microsoft for the open-source Eclipse Foundation, causes media stir. Reporters trying to reach Ward for comment yesterday (Tuesday) were told "I'm sorry, call back tomorrow. I'm at the Wikisym conference[1]; this is more important." [overheard --sj.] http://www.redherring.com/Article.aspx?a=14044&hed=Wiki+Inventor+Leaves+Mic… [1] a wiki conference he helped organize, in coordination with ACM and OOPSLA -- ++SJ

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Re: [Wikipedia-l] Wikipedia blocked in China?
by Ting Chen 22 Oct '05

22 Oct '05

No, we have no official representative in China. We have people in China, who works voluntarily as sysops as well as elsewhere in the world and as well as the other language versions. Regards. Ting Chen > --- Ursprüngliche Nachricht --- > Von: Jiaming Xu <john.xu.1982(a)gmail.com> > An: Wing.Philopp(a)gmx.de > Betreff: Re: [Wikipedia-l] Wikipedia blocked in China? > Datum: Fri, 21 Oct 2005 22:16:27 +0800 > > Thanks pal. Is this sysops in Beijing an official representative of > wikimedia in China? > > On 10/21/05, Ting Chen <Wing.Philopp(a)gmx.de> wrote: > > > > The block is officially confirmed. One of the sysops in Beijing would > > submit > > a pittition in the next days. > > > > >What is really happening? There's > > > rumor > > > on the net that it's been blocked by the government here, but I don't > > know > > > exactly what is happening. > > > Plus, is it a malfunction of the colocation servers in Seoul, Korea > > where > > > the Asian access might be directed to? > > > And I can view wikipedia articles from A9's syndication, but sure no > > > editing. > > > I see from the Berlios site that it seems fine in the US and Europe, > so > > > friends from Taiwan and Hongkong could be esp helpful. > > > Thank ou. > > > _______________________________________________ > > > Wikipedia-l mailing list > > > Wikipedia-l(a)Wikimedia.org > > > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l > > > > > > > -- > > Highspeed-Freiheit. Bei GMX supergünstig, z.B. GMX DSL_Cityflat, > > DSL-Flatrate für nur 4,99 Euro/Monat* http://www.gmx.net/de/go/dsl > > _______________________________________________ > > Wikipedia-l mailing list > > Wikipedia-l(a)Wikimedia.org > > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l > > > -- 10 GB Mailbox, 100 FreeSMS/Monat http://www.gmx.net/de/go/topmail +++ GMX - die erste Adresse für Mail, Message, More +++

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Wikipedia blocked in China?
by Jiaming Xu 21 Oct '05

21 Oct '05

Hi folks. I noticed several days ago that wikipedia is no longer accessible from mainland China (en,de,zh.....). What is really happening? There's rumor on the net that it's been blocked by the government here, but I don't know exactly what is happening. Plus, is it a malfunction of the colocation servers in Seoul, Korea where the Asian access might be directed to? And I can view wikipedia articles from A9's syndication, but sure no editing. I see from the Berlios site that it seems fine in the US and Europe, so friends from Taiwan and Hongkong could be esp helpful. Thank ou.

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Old translations of the week - pages for conference in Cracow
by Sabine Cretella 20 Oct '05

20 Oct '05

Hi, I was invited to speak about "Wiki-projects" on a translator's conference in Cracow. Well, really my translator colleagues know me for the one that works on the Wikimedia projects and of course also on Ultimate Wiktionary. This means that I will tell about how things on a wiki work, about GFDL, about Wikipedia, Wiktionary, Ultimate Wiktionary and if time permits also about Wikibooks, Wikisource, Wikiquote, Wikinews and whatever - I would at least like to add all these informations on a CD to give to the participants (there should be descriptions in many languages around, right?). Now I don't have problems to burn approx. 120 CDs - I could also ask for help to a friend of mine here, where I live, but I need contents - enough to show the potentials but not too much in order to have people then go to the projects itself for further reference. I just talked with Frieda from the Italian chapter - she will help me to create the entrance pages that have to be done manually. Now what I would like to have are the downloaded pages of the translations of the week from the last year because I suppose these are articles that are very complete. I suppose, being these translations they will also create a very particular mood for translators and maybe some of them will decide to dedicate some time to their local projects. People going to this conference come from anywhere and it is very likely that they will give copies of the CD to friends and others if we have some useful stuff on it. I'll also try to add some glossaries that I have myself and that are under GFDL. So please help us to create this CD by downloading these pages and sending them to me. Maybe it would also be a good idea to tell us briefly on the list what/on which wikipedia you are going to do the downloads of the pages. Or would it make sense to use HTTrack (well I should learn how to use it properly) in order to have the links working? Martin gave me this idea for another project some days ago and there I saw that all the links access directly the website where the page was downloaded from on the Internet. Well, thank you for any help! Ciao, Sabine ___________________________________ Yahoo! Mail: gratis 1GB per i messaggi e allegati da 10MB http://mail.yahoo.it

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The New Student's Reference Work, 1914
by Lars Aronsson 20 Oct '05

20 Oct '05

Some of you know that I (LA2) am the founder of Project Runeberg, a website (runeberg.org) where we scan old books from Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Iceland, including several works that are recycled for Wikipedia. In promoting the way we work, my biggest obstacle is that the world at large is so unwilling to learn Swedish. You don't know what you're missing! So I found and bought "The New Student's Reference Work", a little encyclopedia in five volumes, published in Chicago in 1914. As it was published before 1923, it is now in the public domain. Since this non-Scandinavian work doesn't fit in Project Runeberg, I put it in Wikisource. First I scanned images (300 dpi JPEG) of all 2791 pages and uploaded them to Wikimedia Commons, where you will find them in the category http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:LA2-NSRW Then, for each book page, I created a wiki page on Wikisource displaying the scanned image and containing the raw OCR text. If you want to help in proofreading, use two separate browser windows to open the enlarged image and edit the wiki text. Finally, I made a front page with a short preface and a rough table of contents, which is your starting point: http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_New_Student%27s_Reference_Work Some trivia: It turns out that this work has a historic relationship to Encyclopædia Britannica. The main editor, Chandler B. Beach, started out as a salesman for Britannica, but in 1892 set out to create his own, smaller and more easily sold "Youth's Cyclopedia". His companion F.E. Compton took over the firm in 1907 and later produced "Compton's Encyclopedia". In 1941 this competitor was acquired by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. Someone already noticed that the illustration plate for Peanuts, http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:LA2-NSRW-3-0473.jpg is identical to the one found in Koehler's Medicinal-Plants 1887, http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Koeh-163.jpg So reuse of encyclopedic materials is nothing new indeed. -- Lars Aronsson (lars(a)aronsson.se) Project Runeberg - free Nordic literature - http://runeberg.org/

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Placeopedia
by Angela 20 Oct '05

20 Oct '05

Placeopedia is an online application which integrates Google Maps images and Wikipedia encyclopedia articles.See <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Placeopedia> and<http://www.placeopedia.com/>. The Board are currently working on a logo licensing contract which would permit such sites to use the Wikipedia logo. A new mailing list for Placeopedia has recently been created at <http://www.mysociety.org/mailman/listinfo/mysociety-maps> and they would welcome input from Wikipedians on various aspects of the site. For example, some issues already raised are whether links to Placeopedia should be added automatically to all Wikipedia articles that have a corresponding entry in Placeopedia. There is already a template for this on the English Wikipedia (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Placeopedia>) but so far any links have only been added manually. Another issue is whether users of Placepedia should be able to add categories to Wikipedia directly from Placeopedia. If you have an interest in maps, please join the mailing list to help answer these Wikipedia-related questions. <http://www.mysociety.org/mailman/listinfo/mysociety-maps> Angela.

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Wikimania 2006 - Boston/Toronto, why and why not?
by Delphine Ménard 20 Oct '05

20 Oct '05

Since the jury has been speculating on why or why not people would go to one or the other of the two shortlisted cities for Wikimania, a page was started on meta to actually stop speculating and finding reasons why *you* (not your neighbour, not your dog, not your grand-mother) would go (or not go) to Boston or to Toronto. This is not a vote, this is not even really a poll. Please help us by stating your reasons on this page: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2006/Why_and_why_not%3F [[m:Wikimania 2006/Why_and_why_not?]] Thank you :-) Delphine -- ~notafish

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Wikipedia-l October 2005