And this is more or less exactly what I see on top of the front page of Commons: "Welcome to Wikimedia Commons, a database of 4,584,458 media files to which anyone can contribute and be sued about 10% of the time".
The "service project angle" worries me too. I have noticed that many articles of Wikipedia, the service project that makes it easier to find media in Commons by providing encyclopedic context to our content, utterly lack the proper links to our galleries and categories. Furthermore, I sometimes have the feeling that contributors of Wikipedia expect us to host all sorts of unacceptable media in return of the service that they provide; while we of course appreciate the service projects, this is a problem, particularly when these files are copyright violations.
In the particular case of Pikiwiki, it would of course be very caricatural to say that all their images are copyvios. There are lots of out-of-scope party snapshots, too. -- Rama
On 15/06/2009, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
[foundation-l added back to cc: as well as commons-l]
2009/6/15 Gnangarra gnangarra@gmail.com:
Sysops on Commons arent just handed the tools they first must seek a level of trust from the community that trust is because there are times when a person must act in the interest of Commons. As a long term sysop on Commons and one the higher end contributors sysops do have a level of authority and need to exercise their judgement more frequently without discussion then other larger projects (like de,en) one the problems is that at times there arent the experienced people around to enable a thorough discussion before acting. This is a particluar problem with local copyright issues as an Australian I got a good understand of OZ law and know where to get more info, I also gained a fair understanding of US over time and out of necessity but I have a very limited smattering of it for elsewhere when there is the necessity to make a move if I cant get independent opinions/help then I would defer to safest solution for Commons
Yeah. The problem is that to be an admin on Commons requires you to be a copyright law edge-cases nerd way beyond the point where any reasonable person would just say "bugger it, just sue me." And the persistence to deal with, what is it, 10%? of uploads being unacceptable for one reason or another.
So you'll get people - and it's fewer and fewer - who tend to be interested in Commons as a standalone project and are indifferent-to-hostile to the service project angle.
The bureaucratic obstructionism - not active hindering (well, maybe just a bit), just passive not-caring - accorded the recent Pikiwiki problems is a perfect recent example.
Possible solution: active recruitment drive on client wikis of underrepresented languages. Get interested sysops on those wikis to go through suitable training to become Commons.
This requires setting out precisely what a Commons admin needs to know. Establish clear and somewhat objective criteria for Commons admins.
- d.
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