[IMC-Tech] Re: [Wikipedia-l] Wikinews demo launches!

Tue Nov 16 10:51:57 UTC 2004

Scríobh Chuck0,

>I've been told that Wikipedia is run
>by right wing libertarians,

I've been told that Indymedia is run by a giant evil robot called "Hank".
His joints are oiled by the blood of capitalist babies.

Besides, I reject that implication.  I'm a left-leaning libertarian ;-)

>so hwo do we know that the volunteer work
>put into a joint project won't be exploited by venture capitalists when
>they try to turn Wikipedia into an IPO?

This sort of thing is why I feel it will be difficult to come to a
compromise.  I admire IndyMedia for at least having the initiative to do
something that they think is obviously important, but this sort of almost
fanatical anti-business anti-capitalism rhetoric that is common over there
does not sit well with the principle of NPOV at all.  IndyMedia are a
political advocacy site (they proudly say as much), and Wikimedia is
theoretically (at least) an unbiased, neutral source of information.

... unless I'm totally missing the fact that Chuck is having a little joke,
in which case I do apologise ;-)

Seriously though, I think we'd all love to have the IndyMedians aboard, but
our two different cultures are like oil and water, and I'm not sure that too
many of the ranters over there will be interested in putting aside their
political viewpoints to be of much use on Wikinews.

Now, go ahead and prove me wrong :-)

Regards,
- Craig Franklin

-------------------
Craig Franklin
PO Box 764
Ashgrove, Q, 4060
Australia
http://www.halo-17.net - Australia's Favourite Source of Indie Music, Art,
and Culture.

----- Original Message -----
From: <wikipedia-l-request at Wikimedia.org>
To: <wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org>
Sent: Tuesday, November 16, 2004 10:18 AM
Subject: [personal] Wikipedia-l Digest, Vol 16, Issue 31

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> Today's Topics:
>
>    1. Re: Fwd: Banned from editing except on en (Henry H. Tan-Tenn)
>    2. Re: no:/nb:/nn:/etc. - modified suggestion (Bjarte Sorensen)
>    3. Re: Wikinews demo launches! (Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales)
>    4. Re: Re: Fwd: Banned from editing except on en
>       (Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales)
>    5. Re: Wikinews demo launches! (Erik Moeller)
>    6. Re: Fwd: Banned from editing except on en (Henry H. Tan-Tenn)
>    7. Baseldytsch Wikipedia: Who can put it online? (cdamvvwgs at gmx.ch)
>    8. Re: [IMC-Tech] Re: [Wikipedia-l] Wikinews demo launches! (Chuck0)
>    9. Re: [IMC-Tech] Re: [Wikipedia-l] Wikinews demo launches! (jeff)
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 16:24:28 -0500
> From: "Henry H. Tan-Tenn" <share2002nov at lomaji.com>
> Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Fwd: Banned from editing except on en
> To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
> Message-ID: <cnb6qe$knb$1 at sea.gmane.org>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed
>
>  > You are banned from editing at any wikipedia site other than en.
>
> Personally (and with all due respect to Jimbo), I'd prefer that
> judgement be left to individual Wikipedias to decide, per their usual
> policy of banning users.
>
> Specifically, I personally wouldn't mind if Mark edit on zh-min-nan.
> Evidence suggests that he is not a fluent speaker or writer of Southern
> Min by any measure, but at the same time he has also shown some
> willingness to learn.  That willingness may well just be curiosity or
> dabbling, but those tendencies are not themselves evil.  Regardless of
> his ultimate attainment in proficiency (if any), a degree of "language
> exploration" might even be encouraged.  In practice this could mean
> devoting more community resources to correcting the learner's sentences,
> but so long as the errors are made in good faith and not meant to
> disrupt, they will be corrected in the usual wiki way.
>
> Of course, if Mark were to engage in spamming (on zh-min-nan) or other
> actions based on bad faith, he'd become a candidate for censure,
> including the possibility of banning.  Until and unless that occurs on
> zh-min-nan, I'd personally not mind participation from him (or anyone).
>
>
>
>
> > ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> > From: Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales <jwales at wikia.com>
> > Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 07:26:10 -0800
> > Subject: Banned from editing except on en
> > To: Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com>
> > Cc: Angela <beesley at gmail.com>,
anthere9-/E1597aS9LQAvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org
> >
> >
> > As a courtesy to you, Mark, I'm not going to make a big public
> > spectacle of this, but if you would like to take it public, please do
> > so.  I just see no reason at this juncture to put you through the
> > embarassment of a public ban.
> >
> > You are banned from editing at any wikipedia site other than en.  I
> > will make an adjustment to this if you can convince me that you are
> > fluent in any other language.  It is simply unacceptable for you to
> > continue making edits to minor language wikis in the way that you
> > have.
> >
> > We could enforce this ban at a technical level if we had to, but you
> > know how our system works enough to see that it would be quite a lot
> > of work for us.  I don't think I've seen enough evidence of bad faith
> > on your part to think that you'd do that.
> >
> > --Jimbo
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 2
> Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2004 08:27:19 +1100
> From: Bjarte Sorensen <bjarte at pingpingping.com>
> Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: no:/nb:/nn:/etc. - modified suggestion
> To: wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> Message-ID: <1100554039.41991f3724a01 at www.pingpingping.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
>
> I agree fully with Olve Utne's solution. I don't think it matters that
no:-links
> redirect to nb:-links. They are for the most part pointing to articles
that
> would stay on nb: anyway, and after a while most no:-interwiki links will
be
> changed to reflect the move to nb:. When it comes to static links on say
Google
> or other search engines these will sooner or later be replaced by
appropriate
> ones from nn: and nb: and the no: links will slowly die away. So in other
> words, it will be a temporary "problem", and both wikis will soon enough
have
> required fully equal status.
>
> Cheers,
> Bjarte Sorensen
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 3
> Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 12:25:05 -0800
> From: "Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales" <jwales at wikia.com>
> Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] Wikinews demo launches!
> To: wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> Message-ID: <20041115202505.GE21242 at wikia.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
>
> Jama Poulsen wrote:
> > Has anyone been thinking about how Wikinews could cooperate with the
> > Independent Media Center (IMC) project (http://www.indymedia.org)?
>
> I think that the culture clash would be substantial.  Virtually all of
> their text content is completely unusable due to strong POV.
>
> I do think that Indymedia should use wikis, because I think that much
> of their reporting could be strengthened by having an open editing
> process.  Most of their worst biases would not last 5 minutes in an
> open editing situation.  Even activists should learn that neutrality
> is a powerful means to persuade people, as compared to radical
> ranting.
>
> --Jimbo
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 4
> Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 13:44:04 -0800
> From: "Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales" <jwales at wikia.com>
> Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Fwd: Banned from editing except on en
> To: wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> Message-ID: <20041115214404.GC32013 at wikia.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
>
> Henry H. Tan-Tenn wrote:
> > > You are banned from editing at any wikipedia site other than en.
> >
> > Personally (and with all due respect to Jimbo), I'd prefer that
> > judgement be left to individual Wikipedias to decide, per their usual
> > policy of banning users.
>
> The problem is: he has been making annoying edits on wikipedias that
> do not have any current users.  He removed all the interlanguage links
> from one, and replaced the standard boilerplate text with his own
> message and email address.  When Angela fixed this, he reverted her.
>
> This is just one example of an ongoing pattern of difficult behavior.
>
> He is one of the main factors forcing us to pursue a policy locking or
> closing small wikis, which is of course ironic, since he is an
> activist for small language wikis.
>
> He and I had a partly constructive dialogue about these issues earlier
> today in IRC, and I am hopeful that some compromise can be worked out.
>
> I admire his energy and enthusiasm, and I find him to be very bright.
> But there have been several incidents that are just problematic to say
> the least (look up the unresolved issue of sockpuppets for example),
> and his hostility and personal attacks against people who are highly
> respected in the community don't help at all.
>
> I took this action at a global level rather than at an individual
> project level, because that's where the problem has arisen.
>
> If you want him to be able to edit at zh-min-nan, then that is enough
> for me.  He can do that.  If anyone wants to vouch for him anywhere
> else (in an active project), email me and it will be done.
>
> --Jimbo
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 5
> Date: 15 Nov 2004 23:30:00 +0100
> From: erik_moeller at gmx.de (Erik Moeller)
> Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] Wikinews demo launches!
> To: wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> Message-ID: <9Kt$0Y8CpVB at erik_moeller>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
>
> Jimmy-
> > Jama Poulsen wrote:
> >> Has anyone been thinking about how Wikinews could cooperate with the
> >> Independent Media Center (IMC) project (http://www.indymedia.org)?
>
> > I think that the culture clash would be substantial.  Virtually all of
> > their text content is completely unusable due to strong POV.
>
> I certainly would like us to cooperate wherever reasonably possible.
> Indymedia explicitly does not want to follow a neutral point of view, and
> that is good -- otherwise they'd be competing with us and we'd have to
> destroy them ;-). They can take Wikinews content and develop it from a
> lefty POV, if they want. I for one would be interested in some of their
> video and picture material. It's perfectly legitimate for Wikinews to
> cover the same protests Indymedia does, for example, but from an NPOV.
>
> I'll be talking to some of the Indymedia folks in the coming weeks WRT
> license compatibility. They have already expressed some interest.
>
> Regards,
>
> Erik
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 6
> Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 18:41:42 -0500
> From: "Henry H. Tan-Tenn" <share2002nov at lomaji.com>
> Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Fwd: Banned from editing except on en
> To: wikipedia-l at wikipedia.org
> Message-ID: <cnbern$90t$1 at sea.gmane.org>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
>
> Hi, Jimbo,
>
> You are quite right that the inactive Wikipedias are not being cared
> for, except by some dedicated Wikipedian admins from the outside.  So if
> indeed someone has been a troublemaker (i.e. editing in bad faith) on
> those inactive WPs, he or she should be judged accordingly, and I think
> you and others have the trust of the larger community to make such a
> decision.  But again, I am not comfortable with the idea of a global ban
> (except en:).  I think each of the active WPs should consider the record
> in the context of actual edits performed in each edition.  That is,
> assume he or she is on a "white list" for all WPs, and only ban him/her
> _locally_ for violating specific community policies (which could well
> differ).  It could mean that a persistent editor would need to be banned
> by and from all WPs, one by one, but so be it.  (It maybe enough, IMO,
> that all the WPs be notified that so-and-so is believed to have edited
> in bad faith on one or more WP, and leave it at that.)
>
> It was along this line that I proposed to remove Mark from a wide "black
> list" as regards zh-min-nan (to be confirmed or rejected by other
> editors there, of course).  In that sense I was "vouching" for Mark, and
> only in that sense (given my limited attempt to follow the discussion).
>
> Anyway, I hope things work out for all.
>
> ~~~~
>
>
> Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales ti 2004/11/15 EP 04:44 sia-kong:
> > Henry H. Tan-Tenn wrote:
> >
> >>>You are banned from editing at any wikipedia site other than en.
> >>
> >>Personally (and with all due respect to Jimbo), I'd prefer that
> >>judgement be left to individual Wikipedias to decide, per their usual
> >>policy of banning users.
> >
> >
> > The problem is: he has been making annoying edits on wikipedias that
> > do not have any current users.  He removed all the interlanguage links
> > from one, and replaced the standard boilerplate text with his own
> > message and email address.  When Angela fixed this, he reverted her.
> >
> > This is just one example of an ongoing pattern of difficult behavior.
> >
> > He is one of the main factors forcing us to pursue a policy locking or
> > closing small wikis, which is of course ironic, since he is an
> > activist for small language wikis.
> >
> > He and I had a partly constructive dialogue about these issues earlier
> > today in IRC, and I am hopeful that some compromise can be worked out.
> >
> > I admire his energy and enthusiasm, and I find him to be very bright.
> > But there have been several incidents that are just problematic to say
> > the least (look up the unresolved issue of sockpuppets for example),
> > and his hostility and personal attacks against people who are highly
> > respected in the community don't help at all.
> >
> > I took this action at a global level rather than at an individual
> > project level, because that's where the problem has arisen.
> >
> > If you want him to be able to edit at zh-min-nan, then that is enough
> > for me.  He can do that.  If anyone wants to vouch for him anywhere
> > else (in an active project), email me and it will be done.
> >
> > --Jimbo
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 7
> Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 15:58:10 +0100 (MET)
> From: cdamvvwgs at gmx.ch
> Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Baseldytsch Wikipedia: Who can put it online?
> To: wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> Message-ID: <31797.1100530690 at www26.gmx.net>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>
> Hello dear Wikipedians,
> I listed a proposal for a Wikipedia in Baseldytsch (a swiss-german dialect
> in Switzerland with its own dictionary and orthography, about one million
> speakers; see also http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/
> Request_for_new_language). I'm currently translating the interface (http:/
> /meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Locales_for_the_Wikipedia_Software), but is there
> anyone who can put the Baseldytsch Wikipedia online under the domain http:
> //bsd.wikipedia.org/ ??? If yes, please do so! Or send me an e-mail how to
> do so. Thank you very much,
> CdaMVvWgS
>
> --
> Geschenkt: 3 Monate GMX ProMail + 3 Top-Spielfilme auf DVD
> ++ Jetzt kostenlos testen http://www.gmx.net/de/go/mail ++
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 8
> Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 10:55:29 -0600
> From: Chuck0 <chuck at mutualaid.org>
> Subject: Re: [IMC-Tech] Re: [Wikipedia-l] Wikinews demo launches!
> To: wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org
> Cc: imc-tech at lists.indymedia.org
> Message-ID: <4198DF81.6020201 at mutualaid.org>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed
>
> Jama Poulsen wrote:
>
> > On Sun, Nov 14, 2004 at 07:05:46PM -0800, Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales wrote:
> >
> >>http://demo.wikinews.org/
> >>
> >>After the successful wikinews vote
> >>http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikinews/Vote
> >>
> >>the board has discussed and decided to move forward with this project!
> >>This will also give people more of a chance to discuss the proposed
> >>policies before the site goes live.
> >
> >
> > Has anyone been thinking about how Wikinews could cooperate with the
> > Independent Media Center (IMC) project (http://www.indymedia.org)?
>
> > In short, it seems to me that if these two projects could join forces,
> > the end result would be more than just Wikinews and IMC separately.
>
> I'm skeptical about this idea. What is the political orientation of
> Wikinews? Indymedia exists as an alternative media space for the
> political left (broadly defined). Is Wikinews apolitical, left-leaning,
> or friendly towards neo-fascists? I've been told that Wikipedia is run
> by right wing libertarians, so hwo do we know that the volunteer work
> put into a joint project won't be exploited by venture capitalists when
> they try to turn Wikipedia into an IPO?
>
> I'm opposed to this partnership until it can be determined how Indymedia
> would benefit from any partnership with a newly launched project.
>
> Chuck Munson
> Infoshop News
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 9
> Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 16:30:06 -0700
> From: jeff <jeff at indymedia.org>
> Subject: Re: [IMC-Tech] Re: [Wikipedia-l] Wikinews demo launches!
> To: imc-tech at lists.indymedia.org
> Cc: wikipedia-l at Wikimedia.org, Chuck0 <chuck at mutualaid.org>
> Message-ID: <200411151630.06184.jeff at indymedia.org>
> Content-Type: text/plain;  charset="iso-8859-1"
>
> Chuck0 wrote:
> > Jama Poulsen wrote:
> > > On Sun, Nov 14, 2004 at 07:05:46PM -0800, Jimmy (Jimbo)
> Wales wrote:
> > >>http://demo.wikinews.org/
> > > Has anyone been thinking about how Wikinews could cooperate
> > > with the Independent Media Center (IMC) project
> > > (http://www.indymedia.org)?
> >
> > I'm skeptical about this idea. What is the political
> > orientation of Wikinews?
>
> My guess is that it would have the "Neutral Point of View". I've
> been impressed at how well wikipedia has been able to maintain
> this goal on controversial subjects.
>
> > Indymedia exists as an alternative
> > media space for the political left (broadly defined). Is
> > Wikinews apolitical, left-leaning, or friendly towards
> > neo-fascists?
>
> That's a bit harsh. Can you point to a single wikipedia article
> that has been friendly to neo-fascists?
>
> Indymedia is "left-leaning" but could certainly be an
> automated/semi-automated contributor to wikinews even if there
> are viewpoints on there that are generally not on Indymedia.
> Wikinews could have both, like news.google. Wikinews is
> probably more sympathetic to Indymedia than google as well.
> See the wikipedia entry on Indymedia--it's current & good:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indymedia
>
> Or take a look at their entry on Anarchism (which nicely links
> to Chuck's infoshop.org):
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchism
>
> > I've been told that Wikipedia is run by right
> > wing libertarians, so hwo do we know that the volunteer work
> > put into a joint project won't be exploited by venture
> > capitalists when they try to turn Wikipedia into an IPO?
>
> wikipedia is a non-profit and the articles are under the GFDL. I
> doubt it will ever go IPO... For more info, see:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Overview_FAQ#Who_owns_Wikipedia.3F
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation
> http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Home
>
> If it ever does turn commercial, you can download the /entire/
> database and set up your own wikipedia and do whatever you want
> with the articles as long as you comply with the GFDL. See:
> http://download.wikimedia.org/
>
> I wish Indymedia database dumps were publicly available!
>
> > I'm opposed to this partnership until it can be determined
> > how Indymedia would benefit from any partnership with a newly
> > launched project.
>
> It could benefit by wider distribution of Indymedia content.
> Wikipedia has a huge audience, and deservedly so. In general,
> I'm in favor of collaboration between wikinews & indymedia.
>
> Chuck, stop dissing one of my favorite Internet projects. ;)
>
> Thanks,
>
> -Jeff
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
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> End of Wikipedia-l Digest, Vol 16, Issue 31
> *******************************************
>
>