I believe that the idea of "notability" is being
abused to remove controversial articles: it is
impossible to prove that a subject is notable to
you, and you can ignore whether it may be notable to someone else.
Jimmy is quoted as saying that the criteria for
inclusion is verifiability, which is why we have
the following, many of which are not notable in themselves:
* A thousand articles on each of the top 1000 asteroids
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_asteroids_%281-1000%29
* Every single episode of the Simpsons, and many other less notable TV shows.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_The_Simpsons_episodes
* Articles on different shades of blue
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Shades_of_blue
Examples of abuse?
* We have articles on hundreds of student newspapers
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_student_newspapers
But one in particular is singled out for
removal on grounds of notability, presumable
because of its controversial associations:
Pensée, a short-lived student newspaper from the 1970s.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pens%C3%A9e_%28Immanuel_Velikovsky_Reconsidere…
* We have articles on some of the most bizarre,
unproven, and pseudoscientific theories, eg. Time
Cube, Eloptic energy, and Welteislehre.
But the article on the "Electric universe
(concept)" was removed also on the grounds of notability (and other reasons)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Electric_unive…
Yet the concept is readily verifiable (my
comments were removed from the AfD, and placed n the discussion page).
*We have articles on all manner of people, from cranks to presidents.
But the article on "Ralph Juergens" was
removed on the grounds of his non-notability.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Ralph_Juergens
However, he is notable in the "Velikovsky
affair", has written articles, etc.
By point is not to specifically argue for the
inclusion of these articles, but that to suggest,
for example, that "Pensée" is less notable than
asteroid #812, shows that notability is a
subjective criteria influenced by popularity, and is being abused as such.
Wikipedia is supposed to be the "sum of all human
knowledge", described from a neutral point of
view, whose criteria for inclusion is
verifiability. Minority views can receive
(detailed) attention on pages specifically devoted to them.
The examples I gave are all well-noted
(verifiable). I agree that you might not
necessarily find them notable (popular), but is
that a reason to exclude them from readers who
are unable to judge for themselves?
Regards,
Ian Tresman
www.plasma-universe.com
Hi, again a crosspost :-)
Today I am here to ask you for your help with photos. We prepared two
example messages you can forward to friends and family below. Of course
we would like to see photos from all of you and you can see examples
here: http://www.flickr.com/groups/wikilove
What I myself experienced is that it is much easier to take the camera,
take some white paper and something to write when you meet people and
ask them if they love Wikipedia, Wikinews or whichever project - then
ask them to write it down and take a picture.
When it comes to uploading them to flickr and you don't want to do it
yourself, I suppose we will be able to organise it asking the community
for help.
Please use the various wiki-meetings around to take pictures and to ask
others to do the same. If you are at university or school things should
be quite easy, if you have a mobile phone that can take pictures or you
simply take your camera with you for one day and "do".
I hope we will be able to see your photo online soon then :-)
Cheers, Sabine
p.s. don't forget to ask others to do the same.
*****
Proposed texts (please adapt them according to your community and the
country where you live - we know that things can differ a lot from one
place to the other):
*Version 1*
Are you a Wikipedian fanatic? Do you ever wonder how you operated
without Wikipedia. Then show your wiki love! Post your picture depicting
why you love Wikipedia to the Wikilove Flickr group. Pictures can be
funny, creative, emotional, deep, or anything you want them to be!
Additionally, forward this email to your family and friends, and ask
them to do the same :) http://www.flickr.com/groups/wikilove/
*Version 2*
Are you a Wikipedian fanatic? Do you ever wonder how you operated
without Wikipedia? Then show your love by posting your pictures to the
official Wikipedia Flickr group! Pics can be funny, creative, or
anything you want them to be.
If you are camera shy, then simply check out the cool pics that have
already been posted.
http://www.flickr.com/groups/wikilove/
Hello.
As a few people may know, the Green Screen of Death multilingual error
message on Wikimedia is my baby. Since it's now 2 years old, and since
several people had dissed its javascript etc, I recently started
re-coding it and adding several languages.
I have spoken with so many kind, friendly Wikipedians who speak other
languages, and they have been incredibly helpful to me by providing
translations and putting up with my incessant popping into their IRC
questions to ask silly questions in English.
Anyway, after almost a couple of months, I finally have all the
translations together. I would now like people who are fluent in these
languages to proof-read the messages, and mark them in the table on
this page as checked:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Multilingual_error_messages/Draft
Additionally, some of the languages there need some links to be inserted.
Thanks for your time. Any help that people can give me in this by
doing this proof-reading will be rewarded with warm thank-yous and
WikiLove.
~Mark Ryan
There is a Wikipedia in the Sardinian
language<http://sc.wikipedia.org/wiki/P%C3%A0gina_printzipale>.
It uses the sc ISO-639-1 code. What was known as Sardinian became srd in the
ISO-639-2. In the ISO-639-3 it was recognised as a
macrolanguage<http://www.sil.org/iso639-3/scope.asp#M>;
practically what was called Sardinian was split into four
languages<http://www.sil.org/iso639-3/documentation.asp?id=srd>
.
The Italian government has officially recognised the Sardinian language or
the "Limba Sarda Comune". This is in essence a constructed language as it
tries to make one language out of the four "dialects". One of the effects
has been that some people prevent others from writing in one of the four
languages on the sc.wikpedia.
The language committee of the Wikimedia Foundation has a request to approve
a new language; one of the Sardinian languages, Sassarese with ISO code sdc.
There are two problems to deal with:
- The "Limba Sarda Comune" is not recognised as a language
- The proponents of the "Limba Sarda Comune" reserve the
sc.wikipediafor their language
This issue is political. The first thing that I understand when you go to
the official website <http://www.sardegnacultura.it/linguasarda/> is the
notion of identity and indeed, to create one Sardinian identity it would be
instrumental to have a unifying language. However, the map of the Sardinian
languages <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Lingue_di_Sardegna_mod.gif> is
clear, the island is divided in four.
Given that the language committee has as one of its rules that political
arguments are not accepted, there are a few conclusions that we should make.
1. Sassarese can have a conditional approval
2. We urge the proponents of the Limba Sarda Comune to ask for the
recognition of this newly constructed language from ISO.
I have had a chat with Debbie
Garside<http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Advisory_board#Debbie_Garside>about
all this, and I understand that it is necessary to apply for an
ISO-639-3 code before an IANA language code is likely to be approved. At
least fifty published works in the Limba Sarda Comune will be required.
Thanks,
GerardM
Hi, again we need your help :-)
Now we have a group on Flickr where people can express why they love the
wikimedia projects - more about this here:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_2007/WikiLove_campaign
We need the translation of a short text (see link above) in the
following languages:
* English (well that is of course already done - it is just for
completion)
* French
* German
* Italian
* Korean
* Portuguese
* Spanish
* Traditional Chinese
It would be great if some of you could help :-) and maybe pass the
information on to the relevant Village Pumps and discussion lists.
Thank you!!!
Sabine
*****
Sabine Cretella
PM Fundraiser 2007
scretella(a)wikimedia.org
skype:sabinecretella
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:SabineCretella
Hello,
I was under the impression that the Real Name field would be
displayed instead of the Username.
"* Real name (optional): if you choose to provide it this will be
used for giving you attribution for your work."
When I look at the Recent changes page, everything is attributed to
Username, not Real Name. In fact, I have not been able to find any
place where Real Name is used instead of Username.
Any insight would be appreciated.
Thank you,
E
--
Eric Powell
WildPackets
Illuminate Your Network
OmniAnalysis 5 Now Available!
Featuring 802.11n capture and analysis, virtualization, Video over IP
Media and Signaling analysis, and much more!
http://www.wildpackets.com/products/overview
For those who don't read my blog - just forwarding to various lists in
English and if needed, please forward it to the various project lists.
Thank you!!!
Sabine
-------- Original-Nachricht --------
Well, dealing with the Fundraiser 2007 I am trying to involve the whole
of the communities. But that seems easier that it really is ... one
things: oh well, there are the village pumps and you just go around them
... or you go through the mailing lists (but not all projects have one)
... or in the worst case you use the various chat rooms ... well no, it
does not really work ... a really well structured communication in this
specific moment is not possible - and in some way we should think about
a solution.
Village pumps:
I am getting step by step to them - there is no all comprehensive page -
but even if there was there is one huge problem: they are structured
very different from one project to the other. Often I posted "somewhere"
without even understanding if it was the right place ... some have extra
pages for messages written in a different language from theirs (but then
again: there you don't reach a maximum number of people who maybe would
help). Some have different sectors for different themes ... but again:
there you don't reach all potential people, just the part of them that
goes to the "general" village pump page. Uhmmmmmm ...... not sure how to
sort this out ... and no: I would be agains a page for special
"foundation information" since again it would be read by only a part of
the users/editors and these would probably be more or less the same ones
who read foundation list ....
Now I asked for a bot that can help us to add new sections to specific
pages within the pywikipediabot framework - this would at least make one
part of it easier, not having to go around all projects, but still the
"how to communicate effectively" problem remains ....
For now, until we maybe get a better solution, I would like to ask
people from the various projects to check the page where I list the
village pumps
<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_2007/Village_Pumps> and
change the links I have there to the page where they want to have the
messages added - for all projects please - this will help all of us to
live an easier wiki-life. During the next days I will then make another
round around the various Village Pumps asking people to correct the link
on the page above if necessary.
I am sorry, but for now I don't see a different way to get this on the way.
And please: all links to all projects are needed - also the smallest
ones ... they all have the same relevance.
Thanks!!!
--
Posted By Sabine Cretella to words & more
<http://sabinecretella.blogspot.com/2007/09/fundraiser-2007-communication-wi…>
at 9/08/2007 02:35:00 PM
This is the official announcement for WikiSym 2007, a conference about wikis
that is now in its third year. WikiSym is different from both Wikimania and
Recent Changes Camp in that it is primarily focussed on research into wikis,
though there is also a track for open discussion and practitioner reports;
Wikimedians and Wikip/media researchers are very welcome to attend. See the
site below for more info, and please distribute to anyone who may be
interested.
-- phoebe
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
WikiSym 2007
2007 International Symposium on Wikis
Wikis at Work in the World:
Open, Organic, Participatory Media for the 21st Century
October 21-23, 2007
Palais des Congrès de Montréal
Montreal, Quebec, Canada
http://www.wikisym.org/ws2007/
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Registration is now open for WikiSym 2007, convening October 21
through 23 in chic, sophisticated, metropolitan Montreal, Quebec.
**Deadline for early registration is September 13th**
NO ORDINARY CONFERENCE
WikiSym is the only international scientific conference dedicated to
wikis. It brings together wiki researchers, practitioners, and users.
The goal of the symposium is to explore and extend our growing
community. It has a rigorously reviewed research paper track as well
as plenty of space for practitioner reports, demonstrations, and open
discussions. Anyone who is involved in using, researching, or
developing wikis is invited to WikiSym 2007!
We recognize that the online world is always evolving, and therefore
welcome people interested in other online media consistent with the
wiki philosophy of being open, organic and participatory.
PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS
Our headline speakers this year include many of the thought leaders on
wiki. Our keynote speaker will be Jonathan Grudin (Microsoft
Research), one of the world's leading researchers on Computer
Supported Collaborative Work. Ward Cunningham (AboutUs), inventor of
wiki and founding father of our field, will give the closing talk.
Peter Thoeny (StructuredWikis), creator of TWiki, will give a half day
tutorial on wikis in the workplace.
Our program also includes two headline speakers from ooPSLA, our host
conference. Jim Purbrick and Mark Lentczner, creators of Second Life,
will talk about this collaboratively built 3D virtual world. Peter
Turchi, award-winning author of "Maps of the Imagination", will talk
about the relationships between creative writing, making maps, and
creativity.
That's just a sampling of what makes WikiSym the conference of choice
for wiki researchers.
We are proud to offer you WikiSym and look forward to sharing the
experience with you in Montréal this fall.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-located events:
ooPSLA 2007 (http://oopsla.org/)
DLS 2007 (http://www.swa.hpi.uni-potsdam.de/dls07/)
ISMM 2007 (http://www.eecs.harvard.edu/~greg/ismm07/)
LCSD 2007 (http://lcsd.cs.tamu.edu/2007/) APL 2007
(http://www.sigapl.org/apl2007.html)
Mini PloP (http://refactory.com/OOPSLA_Workshop.html)
CompFrame 2007 (http://www.compframe.org/compframe2007/)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
For more information and to register, go to http://www.wikisym.org/ws2007/.
Alain Désilets (National Research Council of Canada) WikiSym 2007
Conference Chair
Robert Biddle (Carleton University)
WikiSym 2007 Program Chair
