[Foundation-l] Priorities

[Dan Rosenthal]

I'm not sure why Howard Taylor is a problem here, his comic Schlock  
Mercenary is one of the larger and more famous ones on the internet.  
He is however, something of a whack job and would likely be prone to  
believing things like "Wikipedia discriminates against webcomics."

-Dan Rosenthal
On Oct 22, 2007, at 1:50 PM, Birgitte SB wrote:

>
> --- Florence Devouard <Anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> Brian McNeil wrote:
>>> Florence Devouard wrote:
>>>
>>>> ... I felt I could not say publicly that
>> Wikipedia was one
>>>> of the tools to bring peace on Earth because I
>> also know working on our
>>>> projects (not only Wikipedia) is somehow becoming
>> increasingly
>>>> difficult. We are more numerous, more protective
>> to our
>>>> featured-content, less welcoming to our newbies
>> (for technical or social
>>>> reasons).
>>>> How many experts have been driven away by the
>> agressivity of some of our
>>>> members ? How many new editors just were
>> discouraged by the difficulty
>>>> of editing a table or a template ? How many
>> newbies were blocked because
>>>> they just did not understood quickly enough how
>> to use a talk page ?
>>>> Also, during the year, several cases of online or
>> offline harassment of
>>>> contributors were reported. Harassement which
>> came as a result of their
>>>> contributions to our projects.
>>>
>>> In trying to do my bit for fundraising I emailed
>> Howard Tayler, a webcomic
>>> artist asking could he help with my nonexistent
>> drawing skills and make up
>>> an ad for his site that I'd pay for during part of
>> the WMF fundraiser.
>>>
>>> As an indication that there is indisputably a
>> problem that needs addressed,
>>> here is the response I got.
>>>
>>>
>>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>>> I use Wikipedia from time to time, and appreciate
>> its value to the growing
>>> internet community, and to the world at large.
>>>
>>> I will not, however, help them raise money. I am
>> strongly opposed to the
>>> "anti-webcomics" agenda that has been espoused by
>> a number of prominent
>>> editors. If the foundation really cared about what
>> these editors write, and
>>> how they treat other people, it would take steps
>> to curb their behavior.
>>>
>>> This, unfortunately, is a very non-negotiable
>> position on my part, and I'd
>>> prefer to not argue about it. We'd just be wasting
>> each others' time.
>>>
>>> I appreciate your attempt to raise money for a
>> cause you believe in, and am
>>> flattered that you'd think of me in connection to
>> it.
>>>
>>> --Howard
>>>
>>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>
>>> This issue isn't just costing us contributors;
>> we're losing goodwill and
>>> fundraising opportunities.
>>>
>>>
>>> Brian.
>>
>> Right....
>>
>> What is that anti-webcomics" agenda he is talking
>> about ?
>>
>> Ant
>>
>
> This is an en.WP issue (again). Articles on web-comics
> have been deleted as not notable on en.WP. [1]  It
> might be useful to share with Howard what the actual
> mission of Wiki*media* is and how it works, just for
> the sake of clarity.  But I can't imagine anyone would
> really support WMF writing and enforcing new deletion
> guidelines for en.WP or anything else that would truly
> appease him.
>
> Birgitte SB
>
>
> [1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ 
> Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Webcomics/Archive_5#Non- 
> noteworthy_webcomics
>
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