Anthere wrote:
>The
>only major comments I heard from the english arbcom was that ***I*** was
>to slow to make that policy go live and that ***I*** was blocking the
>decision making, issue on which I already commented quite clearly.
That would be waiting on the board precisely because of your strong
concerns as expressed on the mailing lists. I would have thought it
rude simply to ignore them; surely you're not saying you would prefer
I had just ignored them.
- d.
[cc to wikitech-l]
Anthere wrote:
>David Gerard wrote:
>>Anthere wrote:
>>>But right now, we do NOT have this log. And people are ASKING for the
>>>check user status to go live !
>> I would really like to know who thought voting for checkuser was a
>> good idea and why.
>The polish wikipedia has Taw with checkuser status.
>The english wikipedia has David.
>How did that happen ? (correct me I am wrong on a detail)
>Initially, the developers were doing that job upon request (I myself
>asked twice for information in three years if I remember, to Tim or to
>Brion).
>When the requests started being too numerous, Tim made the checkUser
>tool, in order to hand out to the community the role of doing checks,
>rather than to let it to the developers.
>Two people were given access. David, probably per agreement with Tim and
>support from Jimbo. Taw, because he had developer access, but his only
>activity (if I understood well) was to check on users.
I don't know about Taw, but that's about right for me. Also
(presumably) because I'd been through some detailed investigations
with Tim so he had some idea of how well I understood what the process
involves. He also refers people to me, so he can get on with things
like the software and the servers.
>Then, requests went on pouring on the developers, who answered there was
>a tool now to do this. So, editors asked to have access or asked for
>other people to do the job for them.
>This is when the policy started to be discussed.
> [...]
>Second option : people get checkuser access through an approval system
>(with a community vote or an arbitrator vote)
> [...]
>That lets the second option... I think any large community can be fully
>trusted to give that status to good people who will not abuse it.
Voting for access to the user database access still seems a
fundamentally defective idea, precisely analogous to voting for root
or voting for CVS access. What do the devs with access think?
It also notably doesn't solve some of the bad examples you gave
before, e.g. the Wikipedia where they wanted to routinely use it on
all votes.
I am entirely unconvinced this is a less worse idea than no access at all.
- d.
Regarding Jimbo's (and other's) sentiments re new proposals and
new-language proposals, and the frustration of our Zlabitorian friends,
allow me to suggest a possible solution: start your own wiki. That's
what I did.
I proposed a project to gather memoirs of historical events. After some
discussion on foundation-l, I didn't get much support. Justifiably so,
because the project was half-baked and not proven. (Thanks to the
community for gently pointing this out!) So, with the help of a kind
Wikipedian (much appreciated, Erik!), I set up www.memorywiki.org myself
in order to refine the concept, work out the kinks, and see whether it
would do the world any good. I'm still doing all those things, and
invite you to judge for yourself. If you like what you see, I'd
appreciate your help.
The point is that wikimedia might benefit from a "minor league" policy.
If someone has an idea for wiki project, help them set it up, and tell
them to refine their project. There is no teacher like experience. If,
after an appropriate period of testing and development, the wiki looks
like it might be a good candidate for inclusion as an official Wikimedia
project, then the community can vote to bring it in. If the community
votes 'yes,' then the project moves to Wikimedia; if it votes no, then
the proponents *still* have a wiki and if they believe in it, they can
continue to develop it. Everybody wins.
Best, Marshall Poe
_______________________________________________
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foundation-l(a)wikimedia.org
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>PS : a comment about the checkuser policy. Afaik, it is done. I asked
>comments a week ago, and though Taw has not removed the fact he thought
>it "terribly dangerous", I read no real opposition to it and several
>supports.
The two opposers were Taw and myself, who have actually used the tool
and have experience of its social effects. And I did comment on the
policy at length. What are you counting as "real opposition"?
[cc to foundation-l]
- d.
Here are some conclusions according to recent events (questionable
reliability of Wikimedian projects) and to meeting of the part of
members of Initiative for Wikimedia Serbia and Montegro:
1. As the part of Wikimedian community supports hoaxes (i.e.
"Zlatiborian language") we are considered that such cases (not only
related to Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian languages area) can make
completely damage to relevancy of Wikimedia and her projects.
2. We completely understand that Wikimedian projects are not only WMF
Board's projects, but the projects of Wikimedian community. According
to that, we worry that recent events are not isolated cases, but the
important rule in Wikimedian community. Because of that we understand
that our involvement, as organization in the future, in Wikimedian
project assumes that we support such kinds of scientific and social
irresponsibilities. And we are not ready to do that.
3. Only because of the fact that our meeting was just the meeting of
the part of Initiative for WM SCG, we didn't make any decision. As we
would have Founding Assembly in two weeks, as our first meeting with
full number of members from now, we would make decision then.
4. Decisions can be: (1) We would a "full" local chapter (i.e., like
German Chapter is) with the name "Wikimedia Serbia and Montenegro" or
(2) we would not be a "full" local chapter, but only a friendly
organization which can behave like an Wikimedian local chapter (with
different name then "Wikimedia Serbia and Montenegro").
In response to Sabine,
I think that saying that people can make their own
wiki somewhere else is not a good thing. Wikipedia is
already established, and the more regional languages
we offer, the richer the encyclopedia becomes. Just
transferring languages to Wikicities won't work,
because over there, those certain Wikipedias stop
becoming a free encyclopedias and disintegrate into
something a bit more than community forums, often not
respecting NPOV. It's sort of what happened with the
Enciclopedia Libre episode...
In fact, I think the isolation of Toki Pona and
Klingon from the Wikipedia community are both negative
precedents that shouldn't be repeated again. It is
exactly this attitude that I am worried about, which
consists of two points:
1. That languages which aren't used predominantly be a
certain population aren't important and can be treated
as "second-class", just because they don't help in the
narrow goal of making an encyclopedia accessible to
all.
2. That users of these languages must "prove
themselves" somehow that their Wikipedia is "worthy"
By the way, how do you get cascading replies? I'm
using Yahoo Mail... is it possible?
---
Sabine said:
"Well what stops a person to set up an own wiki and
just start writing if
it is not possible to do this within wikipedia? Who
knows me, excactly
knows that if I really want something I get it - well
if someone really
wants something he/she can get it - but: he/she must
make facts and not
only words."
__________________________________
Yahoo! FareChase: Search multiple travel sites in one click.
http://farechase.yahoo.com
I just found this site:
http://www.semapedia.org
It is supposed to tag "physical objects" with the barcode of a wikipedia
URL. Basically, you enter the URL of a wikipedia article, and it prints
a chessboard-like box with black and white squares. You then glue this
sheet of paper onto the object (after asking permission!), for example,
a famous building.
The site also offers a Java software for cell phones with a camera.
Anyone with that software can now take a picture of the sheet of paper
with the cell phone, and the software will convert it back into a URL,
which you can then open on the cell phone to see the article about that
building.
I, for one, welcome our new tagging overlords! I am currently printing
the URL of my user page to glue it to my forehead, so people can find
out who I am without having to talk to me ;-)
Magnus
Jimmy Wales wrote:
> I do think we need some serious reform of our
> language policy to end what I see as an ongoing
drive
> to reclassify every dialect in the world into a
> standalone language.
In my opinion the most important point would be having
an official policy on this issue at all. Currently,
there is a big vacuum only partly filled by some
nonofficial guidelines. This naturally causes
expectations that can't really be fulfilled as well as
a disproportionate amount of discussion. Both of which
is not constructive with regard to our primary aims.
As pointed out already, various users have put quite a
bit of effort into developing a proposal for a
workable policy regarding new languages for Wikimedia
projects. However, at the same time most people have
been aware that turning this proposal into "something
official" would be the harder part (or, in other
words, more or less impossible). As far as I recall,
even a board member was asked in September I think if
the Board could decide some general guidelines here
(only general guidelines, no decisions on individual
cases) because it looks like this issue is not really
solvable within the community. However, as far as I
remember, the notion back then was that this is up to
the community.
However, my impression is that we don't have any real
mechanisms here for implementing such fundamental
decisions within any reasonable span of time. Thus, a
board decision based upon the community's input
concerning the issue would probably mean a real step
forward.
Arbeo
___________________________________________________________
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Timwi wrote:
> Your [[IP address]] will be recorded when you click 'Save'. If
> you are not [[Special:Userlogin|logged in]], it will be shown
> publicly. See [[Wikipedia:Privacy policy|privacy policy]].
To make it even less scary, how about:
:Unless you are [[Special:Userlogin|logged in]] your edit will be signed
with your [[IP address]] when you click 'Save'. See our
[[Wikipedia:Privacy policy|privacy policy]].
Having an edit be signed with your IP number is IMO less threatening
than saying we'll show your IP number publically, more of a way of
granting attribution for the contributor's fine work than a warning that
"we're watching you!". This version does unfortunately omit the point
that Wikipedia records the IP address of logged-in users too, but it's
not like we can compress every detail of the privacy policy down into
just two lines and it should be pretty obvious to anyone who's thinking
about this sort of thing so hopefully not a major omission.
Now, Mark supports creation of Zlatiborian Wikipedia.
And people on Meta thinks that the situation with Zlatiborian and
Montenegrin is similar.
And people talk about Zlatiborian seriously.
I was thinking and I can say that I am not oppose to creation of
Zlatiborian Wikipedia no articles about "Zlatiborian language" on
English Wikipedia. And this is my last email/edit about this issue.
If people from community want to support hoaxes, I completely agree.
If the relevancy of Wikipedia is not important for them, what should I
do? Just to keep relevancy on Serbian and/or to work on some more
relevant project.