On Tue, May 13, 2014 at 11:10 AM, Kevin Gorman kgorman@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Yann -
Commons is unique in that AFAIK it's our only project that, by it's very nature, effects other projects, as well as outside collaborations.
Well, no, it isnt.
Wikidata also has a direct effect on the other projects.
A very large part of the reason those outside collaborations with Commons exist is that Commons is a project and community which can be compared to Flickr Commons. The other large part is that Commons is attached to Wikipedia, but dont discount the value that the Commons community provides to these collaborations.
The inclusion policies and practises of the other wikis all influence and reflect on each other. e.g. English Wikipedia used to contain lots of articles consisting of public domain poems with very little prose, and sometimes translations; now the full text is on Wikisource if the full text is not encyclopedic, and sometimes the articles are deleted from en.wp for not being notable.
Perhaps you recall the German Wikipedia put a vulva on their front page. This offended many, caused a large debate here on wikimedia-l, and there was international news about it also IIRC. http://achimraschka.blogspot.com/2011/09/story-about-vulva-picture-open-lett...
All projects are occasionally going to press the boundaries. This is a good thing, despite this meaning sometimes they will make a decision that other project communities feel reflects badly on them.
-- John Vandenberg