Re: [Foundation-l] Pedophilia and the Non discrimination policy

[Fred Bauder]

Jake,

It is not an accepted practice to ban users from editing Wikipedia unless
they are actively disrupting, endangering, or otherwise harming the
project. Such bannings usually require either broad community consensus,
an action from the Arbitration Committee, or an action from Jimbo Wales.
In addition, "The Wikimedia Foundation prohibits discrimination against
current or prospective users and employees on the basis of race, color,
gender, religion, national origin, age, disability, sexual orientation,
or any other legally protected characteristics.

Pedophile activism actively disrupts the project; is the subject of an
action by the Arbitration Committee; and is not a legally protected
characteristic.

I am not happy with Nihonjoe_4's RfB as I not sure he was given a chance
to arrive at a considered resolution regarding this matter, but I
certainly don't like his unbriefed arguments:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Ryan_Postlethwaite/archive22#Tyciol

Fred


> In the wake of this RfB on the English
> Wikipediawe
> really need some clarification from the foundation on this issue.
> It's
> my personal view that in general these kinds of situations fall pretty
> clearly under the Non discrimination policy of the
> Foundationas
> it is written now.  Because that policy or its interpretation isn't
> something subject to community consensus I feel we need to resolve this
> issue before soliciting community input on the wider matter.
>
> Best,
> ---
> Jake Wartenberg
> j...@jakewartenberg.com
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Re: [Foundation-l] Pedophilia and the Non discrimination policy

[Fred Bauder]

Actually, I think the better argument is that pedophilia activism on
Wikipedia harms the project.

Fred

> Jake,
>
> It is not an accepted practice to ban users from editing Wikipedia unless
> they are actively disrupting, endangering, or otherwise harming the
> project. Such bannings usually require either broad community consensus,
> an action from the Arbitration Committee, or an action from Jimbo Wales.
> In addition, "The Wikimedia Foundation prohibits discrimination against
> current or prospective users and employees on the basis of race, color,
> gender, religion, national origin, age, disability, sexual orientation,
> or any other legally protected characteristics.
>
> Pedophile activism actively disrupts the project; is the subject of an
> action by the Arbitration Committee; and is not a legally protected
> characteristic.
>
> I am not happy with Nihonjoe_4's RfB as I not sure he was given a chance
> to arrive at a considered resolution regarding this matter, but I
> certainly don't like his unbriefed arguments:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Ryan_Postlethwaite/archive22#Tyciol
>
> Fred
>
>
>> In the wake of this RfB on the English
>> Wikipediawe
>> really need some clarification from the foundation on this issue.
>> It's
>> my personal view that in general these kinds of situations fall pretty
>> clearly under the Non discrimination policy of the
>> Foundationas
>> it is written now.  Because that policy or its interpretation isn't
>> something subject to community consensus I feel we need to resolve this
>> issue before soliciting community input on the wider matter.
>>
>> Best,
>> ---
>> Jake Wartenberg
>> j...@jakewartenberg.com
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>
>
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Pedophilia and the Non discrimination policy

[Fred Bauder]

> If [it] brings the project in disrepute, then so be it.

> André Engels, andreeng...@gmail.com

It is our responsibility to avoid harm to the project.

Fred





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Re: [Foundation-l] Pedophilia and the Non discrimination policy

[Fred Bauder]

> "appeal" - someone said something that highly surprised me.
> Apparently, the AC of enwiki 'endorsed' the blockade, but still you
> consider an appeal realistic? I'm sorry, but I would find the chance
> of honest ruling very low, nearing zero, in case if that same group of
> judges first endorsed the fact they have to judge... Personally, I
> feel that AC should never "endorse" stuff without it being a case
> submitted to them. But that might be more a side discussion.

> Lodewijk

An appeal is not futile. For one thing the policy might be changed or it
might be decided the policy which exists does not apply in this case. If
a close examination of his editing record shows no activist activity, it
might be considered unfair to do external research which established his
identity. But then, if Ryan could do it, anyone, including an
investigative journalist could have done it.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] Pedophilia and the Non discrimination policy

[Fred Bauder]

> Fred Bauder wrote:
>
>> An appeal is not futile. For one thing the policy might be changed or
>> it
>> might be decided the policy which exists does not apply in this case.
>
> Again, I wish to read this policy.  Where is it published?  And how
> was it established?  Did the ArbCom itself author it?

It was authored by the Arbitration Committee and posted on the
Administrators' Noticeboard several years ago. Basically it says don't
discuss issues regarding pedophilia activists on-wiki; send everything to
the Arbitration Committee. This is coupled with a policy of hearing ban
appeals privately.

>
>> If a close examination of his editing record shows no activist
>> activity,
>> it might be considered unfair to do external research which established
>> his identity.
>
> There has been no _assertion_ of activist activity on the wiki.  Shall
> we go ahead and block everyone pending close examination of their
> editing records?

No, we assume good faith.

>
>> But then, if Ryan could do it, anyone, including an investigative
>> journalist could have done it.
>
> Yes, and the same applies to murderers, rapists and neo-Nazis in our
> midst.  This is not a "slippery slope" argument (a contention that
> we'll be banning those editors next).  I'm asking how it would be
> worse for an investigative journalist to discover that a pedophile is
> editing than to discover that a murderer, rapist or neo-Nazi is
> editing.

Well, if Charlie Manson has internet access and is editing, we don't know
it. Murders and rapists, and I'm sure we have a few editing, don't
usually advocate for the practice. Neo-Nazis are frequently banned for
disruptive editing as are many other aggressive POV pushers. Pedophilia
is different, but not different from Charlie Manson. What they have in
common is seductive power which may be combined with illegal activity.
This is reflected in the public opprobrium which results.

Anonymous editing offers ample opportunities for drama. As we don't know
who many people are, sketchy allegations "outing" one or another user can
easily gain traction, particularly on external sites.

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] Follow up: Fan History joining the WMF family

[Fred Bauder]

Laura,

It seems unlikely if only based on "We have no notability requirement."
Essentially, you've forked, chosen an incompatible core policy.

Fred Bauder

> This is a follow up to my proposal that Fan History Wiki join the wMF
> family, based on my experiences via e-mail, on the list and on strategy
> wiki.  This isn't as coherent as I would like.
>
> To give some back story that might not have been as obvious in our
> initial
> proposal, we were interested in joining the WMF for several primary
> reasons:
>
> 1) Wikimedia Foundation is a non-profit organization where we
> fundamentally
> believe in the objectives of the organization.
> 2) Wikimedia Foundation has credibility that could be extended to our
> project, helping us accomplish our mission.
> 3) Fan History and I feel like we have positive relationships with
> Wikimedia
> Foundation staff, based on our interactions at RecentChangesCamp and in
> various chat rooms like #wiki and #mediawiki on irc.freenode.net.
>
> We have certain things that we want to accomplish that have been detailed
> elsewhere.  We're in the process of looking for and determining if we
> should
> partner with some one to accomplish these goals, what we're looking for
> in
> partnering or being acquired by some one.  Our general criteria have
> been:
>
> 1) Non-profit, no-profit or for profit business where the emphasis would
> be
> on helping us to succeed with our mission.  Monetization of the project
> is
> fine so long as major content focus and creation is focused around
> monetizing.  We see our project as fundamentally for a greater good, to
> preserve and document the history of fan communities, and we don't want
> that
> made secondary to commercial interests.
> 2) Financial issues.  In an ideal world, we would want one or two or
> three
> of our staffers to get some form of compensation for helping to maintain
> the
> content, enforce policies and helping work towards the mission.  We also
> want to make sure that the project has the funding to continue
> indefinetely.
> 3) Fix and improve our back end.  Thankfully, it feels like a fair amount
> of
> this has been addressed in the past two weeks so we're much less stressed
> about this than we were.
> 4) Increase the visibility and credibility of our project.  Get more
> people
> involved.
>
> That out of the way, time to discuss the process of trying to get
> acquired
> by the Wikimedia Foundation.  Simply put, there were three basic steps
> that
> we took:
> 1) Contacted members of the Wikimedia Foundation to ask them if they
> would
> be interested in bringing Fan History into the Wikimedia Foundation
> family.
> Got directed to other people, told not sure who in the organization this
> would be best proposed to, got told that the Foundation itself probably
> wouldn't be interest, finally suggested I post this on the list because
> if
> community consensus is yes than we can go ahead.
> 2) Posted the proposal on the mailing list.  Good feedback.  Suggested I
> post it to the Strategy Wiki.
> 3) Posted to strategy wiki.
>
> Step one is fine.  The only problem I might have had with step one was
> not
> getting out right rejected.
>
> The problem is really when it comes to steps two and three.  To my
> knowledge, all of the projects that are currently part of the Wikimedia
> Foundation are home grown; they did not join as part of any aquisition
> process.  In this regards, our proposal was unique.   Steps two and three
> are kind of where we got hung up: What is the timeline?  What are the
> next
> steps to take after these?
>
> The timeline issue is a big one.  For us, this is not that big of a deal
> necessarily.  We're finacially in a place where we can probably chug
> along
> for a while in that regards.  We're not facing issues of possibly being
> shut
> down because of legal problems or scripting problems.  We do not have
> issues
> that say this is a last resort option for us to keep us open.  In the
> future, others may contact Wikipedia where this may be an issue or where
> the
> founders may see this as the only solution.
>
> I tried to ask various people to get a feel for the timeline that we were
> looking at to, well, know if WMF was interested in acquiring us or
> setting
> up some sort of official relationship.  What I got told by people in the
> know on  #wikimedia-strategy was that we were looking at three to
> eighteen
> months before we got some sort of official response back regarding
> whether
> this was something that the Wikimedia Foundation community was interested
> in.  I was left with the impression that unless I was basically 

Re: [Foundation-l] Pedophilia and the Non discrimination policy

[Fred Bauder]

>
> Just as a point of interest, do we block people currently
> incarcerated from editing?
>
> I have a vague recollection that one of the most voluminous
> contributors to the original edition of the Oxford English
> Dictionary, was actually a prisoner...
>
>
> Yours,
>
> Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
>

Certainly he was, an insane killer.

We don't block incarcerated prisoners. Prisons do that, to protect
themselves and the public. Prisoners know how to do online fraud, and are
good at it.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] Pedophilia and the Non discrimination policy

[Fred Bauder]

> In a message dated 11/29/2009 5:45:02 AM Pacific Standard Time,
> fredb...@fairpoint.net writes:
>
>
>> But then, if Ryan could do it, anyone, including an
>> investigative journalist could have done it.>>
>
> But you're assuming that they could then apply "guilt by association"
> which
> would throw egg on our face and I'm not sure that's a very fair slope to
> try to climb.

The media, in the United States at least, has a constitutionally
guaranteed right to not be fair.

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] Wikipedic OCD

[Fred Bauder]

Some books are very productive in that way, if you have time to add each
interesting fact to the encyclopedia. TV is a bit awkward to reference,
at least routinely.

Fred


> Does anyone else suffer from this problem, whereby you listen to or
> watch any kind of programme and think "I could add that to Wikipedia!"
>
> For me, there's so many facts I encounter every day that having that
> thought becomes overwhelming.
>
> I just wonder if I'm alone.
>
> User:Bodnotbod
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Is the consensus to the policy necessary?

[Fred Bauder]

> Does Wikipedia's principles need consensus of the community?
> There is not consensus of the community, but does somebody pass if
> filled out the page with "Policy"?

They do. A recently created policy page is only a proposal.

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] Is the consensus to the policy necessary?

[Fred Bauder]

> 2010/3/8 Marco Chiesa :
>> On Mon, Mar 8, 2010 at 2:42 AM, kigen2700...@gmail.com
>>  wrote:
>>> Does Wikipedia's principles need consensus of the community?
>>> There is not consensus of the community, but does somebody pass if
>>> filled out the page with "Policy"?
>>
>> There are values which are at the core of Wikipedia and cannot really
>> be changed (the 5 pillars). However, it is good practice to discuss
>> them and adapt them to the local community. For example, Wikipedia is
>> an encyclopedia, period, but the threshold for notability may be
>> different in the different languages. If you want to create a policy
>> in your project that en.wp already has, it is good practice to start
>> from the en.wp policy and adapt it to the local project. Maybe you
>> won't change a word, maybe you'll specify a few things, maybe you'll
>> realize that you need something very different.
>>
>> Cruccone
>>
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>
> As for a Japanese version, The Five Pillars is not adopted.
> Wikipedia:Consensus is not policy.
> The controversy is solved by the vote. Isn't there problem?

Yes, but within broad parameters, essentially NPOV and some democratic
method of making decisions, it is your problem.

Fred Bauder



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Re: [Foundation-l] Wikiversity

[Fred Bauder]

I gather there was posting of information which someone determined was
harmful to Wikipedia and the Wikimedia Foundation and the suggestion is
being made to take that stuff somewhere else, or else. From the
discussion I gather that the issue is whether Wikiversity is an open
educational resource or a platform for trolls banned from Wikipedia. A
troll platform needs to hosted on a different site and have other
financial support.

Essentially Jimmy is saying the the site needs to be adequately
administered or closed. He would rather it were cleaned up and that its
administrators take care of business.

Fred Bauder


> What's going on over at Wikiversity?  Jimmy Wales has now been threatened
> with a block by someone who seems to be an admin in good standing, and he
> responds that he has "the full support of the Wikimedia Foundation".  Is
> this true?  What does it mean?
>
> Wales also has said that he is "discussing closure of Wikiversity with
> the
> board".  Is there a public place where this is being debated, or is this
> all
> being done behind the scenes?  Is it even true that this discussion is
> taking place?
>
> I'm sorry if I'm repeating some discussion that's already been had, but I
> checked the archives and I couldn't find anything.
>
> http://en.wikiversity.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Jimbo_Wales&oldid=545523#Your_behaviour_in_Wikiversity
> http://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/Wikiversity:Community_Review/Wikimedia_Ethics:Ethical_Breaching_Experiments#Board_discussing_closure_of_Wikiversity
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Re: [Foundation-l] How to kill a mailing list

[Fred Bauder]

Yes, but no need to delete endless repetitive spam from "Anthony" without
bothering to read it.

Bottom line, serious discussions have moved elsewhere. Progress, I guess,
discussions here never seemed to lead anywhere. Just round and round.

Fred Bauder

> August 2009: 1030
> September 2009: 791
> October 2009: 326
> November 2009: 513
> December 2009: 234
> January 2010: 207
> February 2010: 213
> March 2010: ???
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Re: [Foundation-l] How to kill a mailing list

[Fred Bauder]

What I mean is that there are specialized forums both on and off wiki. We
used to discuss individual users and their behavior here. Now that would
be on a Noticeboard or a request for arbitration, and yes on a private
list. This list just doesn't handle everything anymore.

Fred

> On Wed, Mar 17, 2010 at 9:14 AM, Fred Bauder 
> wrote:
>
>> Bottom line, serious discussions have moved elsewhere. Progress, I
>> guess,
>> discussions here never seemed to lead anywhere. Just round and round.
>>
>
> Where have the discussions moved?  I assume you're talking about a
> private
> list?  Any possibility of having such a list which is read-only to the
> general community?
>
> I don't think it's progress to take all the serious discussions out of
> the
> view of the community.  If the general quality of the discussions has
> increased, that's great, but you agree that it'd be even better if you
> could
> increase the quality while also maintaining the openness, right?
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Re: [Foundation-l] Wikiversity

[Fred Bauder]

I think the global principle of "don't take your fight
> to other projects" (x-project or x-language) is a good one, and we
> should adopt and enforce it, but I don't know if that includes global
> blocking.
>
> -- phoebe

That is an old MUD principle: You're welcome, but don't think this MUD is
a platform to continue a fight from another MUD. We have this on Wikinfo
regularly, ChildofMidnight being the latest.

http://www.wikinfo.org/index.php/Special:Contributions/ChildofMidnight

Fred Bauder



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Re: [Foundation-l] open letter by Wikiversity users to the WMF Board of Trustees

[Fred Bauder]

> please see at:
> http://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/Wikiversity_open_letter_project/WMF_Board_March_2010

Signed:

User:Jon Awbrey Jon Awbrey

Among others. Talk about a red flag!


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Re: [Foundation-l] Jimbo's Sexual Image Deletions

[Fred Bauder]

I found out about this from Larry Sanger's mailing list. Larry has
reported the "child pornography" images on Commons to the FBI, as is the
duty of any citizen, and has apparently appeared on Fox News with respect
to the subject.

I certainly have noticed occasional questionable images, the explicit
image that used to illustrate "Pearl necklace (sexuality)" comes to mind.
I have always objected to offensive images (such as of Muhammad) and know
that somewhere there is a sane dividing line between the informative and
the prurient.

Fred Bauder

> As some of you may know, Jimbo has recently used his standing in the
> community to dictate that Commons should not host porn. [1][2][3]  He
> has interpreted this to include a wide swath of images both
> photographic and illustrative, and both contemporary and historical.
>
> In principle, I agree that having a stricter policy on sexual images
> is a good thing, but fundamentally we need to have a clear policy on
> what should be allowed and what shouldn't.  Attempts to write one [4]
> have become a moving target that leaves us without a functional policy
> or community consensus.  Initially, this was based on the
> characteristics of the USC 2257 record keeping laws, but Jimbo has
> gone beyond this by deleting non-photographic and historical works
> that would not be covered by 2257.
>
> In essence, right now Jimbo is deleting things based on his singular
> judgment about what should be allowed. [5]
>
> These deletions have continued with little apparent concern for
> whether or not an image is currently in use by any of the projects.
>
> This is a large change and lack of a clear policy creates a very
> confusing and frustrating environment for editors.  (Multiple Commons
> admins have already stated their intention to resign and/or retire
> over this.)
>
> Again, I agree that tighter controls on sexual images are generally a
> good thing, but I believe the abruptness, lack of clear policy, and
> lack of a consensus based approach is creating an unnecessarily
> disruptive environment.  Much of the content has been hosted by
> Wikimedia for years, so do we really have to delete it all, right now?
>  Can we not take a week or two to articulate to boundaries of what
> should be deleted and what should be kept?
>
> In general, I would ask that things slow down until some sort of a
> clear policy can be created (either by the community or the WMF /
> Board).  This is especially true when it comes to deleting images that
> are in use on the various Wikipedias.  (Such deletions have already
> been widespread).
>
> I would also like to ask whether either the WMF or the Board plans to
> intervene?  Because of Jimbo's historical standing and technical
> access, the Commons community is largely impotent to stop him.
> Multiple requests by the community that things slow down or a clear
> policy be crafted prior to mass deletions have thus far been
> ineffective.
>
> At the very least it would be helpful if the WMF and/or Board would
> express a position on the appropriate use of sexual content?
>
> -Robert Rohde
>
> [1] http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Jimbo_Wales
> [2] http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Village_pump#Cleanup_policy
> (and following sections)
> [3] http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons_talk:Sexual_content
> [4] http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Sexual_content
> [5]
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ALog&type=delete&user=Jimbo+Wales
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Jimbo's Sexual Image Deletions

[Fred Bauder]

Yes, Category:Women facing left

A caricature of a Catholic saint using a dildo but used on Wikipedias in
3 languages to illustrate the article "dildo". I'm not a student of
Teresa of Ávila but it seems rather unlikely she did a lot of wanton
stuff with dildos. Not that there would be anything wrong if she had, but
we don't illustrate the articles of any number of women who might have
used a dildo at some point in their lives in this way.

In a word, the image is made up and quite offensive.

Fred Bauder

> The thing that has changed is the fact that this was decided by the
> community, by admins who have earned their rights in a community vote,
> and according to policies. Take e.g.
> <http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:F%C3%A9licien_Rops_-_Sainte-Th%C3%A9r%C3%A8se.png>.
> That image is a 19th century artwork, a drawing,  from an important
> artist. It was uploaded to Commons in 2006 and never questioned. But
> Jimbo didn't file a deletion request, he didn't even put a speedy
> delete. He just deleted it with a generic message given as reason. Two
> times the deletion was reverted by longstanding Commons admins who
> wanted to uphold Commons policy about deletions and two times Jimbo
> deleted it again, with the same generic reason. At the moment the file
> is again undeleted by a third Commons admin. (Jimbo is not online at the
> moment to overturn that decision.)
>
> I think this is a really obvious example how Jimbo breaks policies and
> why large parts of the Commons community are upset.
>
> Marcus Buck
> User:Slomox
>
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[Foundation-l] The Fox Article

[Fred Bauder]

Updated April 27, 2010
Wikipedia Distributing Child Porn, Co-Founder Tells FBI

"The parent company of Wikipedia is knowingly distributing child
pornography, the co-founder of the online encyclopedia says, and he's
imploring the FBI to investigate."

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/04/27/wikipedia-child-porn-larry-sanger-fbi/


Erik Möller is particularly unfair.

Fred Bauder


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Re: [Foundation-l] Jimbo Wales acting outside his remit

[Fred Bauder]

Well, do you need a picture to explain a dildo? File:Franz von Bayros
016.jpg is more or less art, but File:Félicien Rops - Sainte-Thérèse.png
which is used on three Wikipedias to illustrate the use of a dildo has
some real problems with being offensive to Catholics (Of course Japanese
or Chinese Catholics don't matter, but they do). Much better to use a
photo of the woman using a dildo or at least an eye-witness report
published in a reliable source. The image could, of course, be used
appropriately to illustrate an article on caricatures or something about
anti-catholicism.

Fred Bauder

> The foundation appears to be of the impression that Jimbo is merely
> attempting to encourage scrutiny, and removing clear cases.
>
> This is not true. Jimbo has speedy deleted, without discussion,
> historical
> artworks and diagrams, often edit warring with admins to keep them
> deleted,
> and has made a statement that he refuses to discuss his deletions until
> after he has finished deleting them all, which would only compound the
> problem.
>
> Examples:
>
> Artworks from the 19th century, by notable artists:
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Undelete&target=File%3AF%C3%A9licien_Rops_-_Sainte-Th%C3%A9r%C3%A8se.png<-
> Wheelwarred with three different admins to try and keep it deleted.
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Undelete&target=File%3AFranz_von_Bayros_016.jpg<-
> Wheelwarred with two admins this time.
>
> 
>
> Diagrams intended to illustrate articles on sexual subjects, in wide use
> on
> Wikipedia projects for that purpose:
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Undelete&target=File%3AWiki-fisting.png<-
> Edit warred with three admins
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Undelete&target=File%3AWiki-facial.svg
>
> 
>
> Further, when challeged on these, he said that he refused to engage in
> any
> discussion on the deletion of artwork *until he was done deleting all of
> them*
>
> From
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3AJimbo_Wales&action=historysubmit&diff=38891861&oldid=38891748
>
> "I have redeleted the image for the duration of the cleanup project. We
> will
> have a solid discussion about whether Commons should ever host
> pornography
> and under what circumstances at a later day - June 1st will be a fine
> time
> to start.--[[User:Jimbo Wales|Jimbo Wales]] ([[User talk:Jimbo
> Wales#top|talk]]) 17:31, 7 May 2010
> (UTC)"
>
>
> How are such images to be found, after's he's gone and deleted them all?
> Are
> we really to sift through every single deletion several months later, to
> find the things that shouldn't have been deleted in the first place, and
> which, thanks to the Commons Delinker bot, have been automatically
> removed
> from the articles they were used in?
>
> Out of Jimbo's deletions, at the very least a third of the deletions
> related
> to diagrams and historical artwork in wide use on Wikipedia projects.
> This
> despite his initial claim (
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3AJimbo_Wales&action=historysubmit&diff=38820363&oldid=38819608)
> that he'd only be dealing with things that violated the law that
> started
> the controversy.
>
> If the board are not aware, there was, about a year ago, a controversy
> related to images of Muhammed, in which Muslim readers - for whom such
> are
> horribly offensive, due to rules against depiction of the prophet - were
> politely informed that we could not delete material simply because it
> offended someone, as Wikipedia sought to show all of the world's
> knowledge.
> Jimbo's actions make that consensus deeply problematic.
>
> There is a petition for Wales' founder flag to be removed, which  has
> gained
> widespread support since his actions. (
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_comment/Remove_Founder_flag )
>
>
> -A. C.
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Re: [Foundation-l] Jimbo Wales acting outside his remit

[Fred Bauder]

How child friendly should we be?

Fred Bauder


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Re: [Foundation-l] Jimbo Wales acting outside his remit

[Fred Bauder]

Note however, "We were about to be smeared in all media as hosting
hardcore pornography with zero educational value and doing nothing about
it."

Fred Bauder

> Further, Mr. Wales:
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3AJimbo_Wales&action=historysubmit&diff=38935852&oldid=38935659
>
> Here, you remove about four pages of requests that you stop your
> behaviour without commenting on them, saying you know better than the
> community.
>
> You're a dsigrace.
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Statement on appropriate educational content

[Fred Bauder]

It comes down to the size of the tent. If you want students in Saudi
Arabia to be able to use Wikipedia it has to be structured one way. If
you want to please gay college students you structure it another way.

Really there is no right or wrong; it's a matter of who the resource is
going to be available to. We have no power to resolve the cultural
differences. We can only be aware and make decisions accordingly.

Fred Bauder

> H...
>
>> The vast majority of that material is entirely uncontroversial, but the
>> projects do contain material that may be inappropriate or offensive to
>> some audiences, such as children or people with religious or cultural
>> sensitivities.
>
> Time to delete
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_is_dead
>
> I guess...
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Statement on appropriate educational content

[Fred Bauder]

> On Sat, May 8, 2010 at 4:04 PM, Fred Bauder 
> wrote:
>> It comes down to the size of the tent. If you want students in Saudi
>> Arabia to be able to use Wikipedia it has to be structured one way. If
>> you want to please gay college students you structure it another way.
> [snip]
>
> The deletions performed would not have done even a bit of good making
> Wikipedia more useful to students in Saudi Arabia.  For that we must
> first start with
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jyllands-Posten_Muhammad_cartoons_controversy.
>
> In the access to wikipedia to the general public was inhibited due to
> a commercially available album cover. I expect that Chinia is still
> very unhappy with our coverage of human rights and other political and
> historical subjects.
>
> Even in US schools, I can't believe that ones who would inhibit
> schools over risqué drawings from the 1800s sourced from the US
> library of congress would suddenly permit access while we still
> detailed anatomical photographs.
>
> (As far as I can tell Jimmy's "almost complete cleanup" included only
> one of the almost 300 human penis pictures — is anyone actually
> proposing we remove all the anatomical images?)
>
> It's important to state a goal— it might be arguable to continue
> deleting educational images if it would cause Wikipedia to be usable
> in more places... but without a stated goal all we could hope to do is
> cause the harm without enjoying the benefit.
>

We can make choices and commit to those choices, if we chose. Probably
creation of a children's fork, a PRC fork, and a fundamentalist Muslim
fork would solve the main problems. I can't see it happening, but that
would be a solution. It's no different from a car company putting out
several different models.

Fred Bauder


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Re: [Foundation-l] Statement on appropriate educational content

[Fred Bauder]

>
> So which group is more important?  Which is the better answer, to tell
> families to go elsewhere, or to tell the specialists to go elsewhere?
>
> I dunno, when framed that way it seems the answer is to be
> family-friendly,
> and to let the specialists get their information in specialist resources.

Those will special interests should have no difficulty creating
specialized reference resources. Certainly those who are into pornography
have.

Fred Bauder


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Re: [Foundation-l] Statement on appropriate educational content

[Fred Bauder]

> 2010/5/8 Anthony :
>
>> I dunno, when framed that way it seems the answer is to be
>> family-friendly,
>> and to let the specialists get their information in specialist
>> resources.
>
> So... are we now going to start writting "USfamilyfriendlypedia(tm)" ?
> There is plenty of stuff to be delete then... not only penis and
> vagina pictures... For example delete all biographies of porn-stars,
> articles about addictive violent computer games, and there is tons of
> things to be deleted in order to make our projects more "family
> friendy".

All I'm talking about is a children's edition, not gutting En. It could
be even more free than it already is, if we chose it to be.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] "Filtering" ourselves is pointless

[Fred Bauder]

> Fox News (or at least this reporter and her editors) have dedicated
> themselves to damaging Wikipedia and the Wikimedia projects. This is a
> given, and it is evident from their behavior. *Any* followup story would
> have demonstrated what these days in the U.S. we are calling "epistemic
> closure" -- all results will be interpreted as validation of cherished
> theories.

> --Mike

Yeh, and there is not a thing we can do about it, because under our
editing policies our article on Foz News will be very unpleasant reading
for them.

I do think we need to sort out some of these issues:

One: are any of them actually illegal?

Two: Do we need legal documentation with respect to pictures of people?

Three: Is there legal material we should not host?

Four: Should we offer a sanitized version for children? Or anyone else?

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] [Functionaries-en] Jerusalem Post article about concerted pro-palestinian editing

[Fred Bauder]

There has certainly been many brief, and not so brief blocks, passed out.
I see my old friend Zeq in there (He once provoked me into admitting I'm
a Zionist). I don't think there is a solution, really other than to keep
monitoring editors and dealing with the most egregious offenders. I have
always been suspicious of government involvement, as I am of the Chinese
government, but never have seen an obvious instance. There does seem to
be some advocacy recently for propaganda campaigns coordinated by the
Israeli government:

http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/features/israeli-propaganda-is-both-intelligent-and-necessary-1.265853

Fred Bauder

> There was the I/P ArbCom decision here <
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Palestine-Israel_articles#Remedies>
> that implemented a host of discretionary sanctions.
>
> My personal opinion is that there has been concerted and conspiratorial
> editing on both sides, with the Israeli side being more openly "accused"
> until recently.
>
> I do not have any good solutions; however, as someone who has edited in
> the
> field, I do feel that there are political blocks that position themselves
> to
> push points of view. I openly admit to having a particular point of view,
> although I do my best to edit neutrally. I feel that there are many
> editors
> who do not do there best to edit neutrally, from all perspectives, and I
> am
> certain others would say that about me.
>
> :(
>
> --Avi
> 
> User:Avraham
>
> pub 3072D/F80E29F9 1/30/2009 Avi (Wikimedia-related key)
> >
>   Primary key fingerprint: 167C 063F 7981 A1F6 71EC  ABAA 0D62 B019 F80E
> 29F9
>
>
> On Sun, May 16, 2010 at 10:11 PM, Fred Bauder
> wrote:
>
>> Avi,
>>
>> Could you point us to the proposed arbitration decision and comment on
>> that? My thought, made without spending the mandatory 10 or 20 hours
>> actually necessary to get up to speed on the current situation is that
>> while in the past the Zionist viewpoint has generally prevailed,
>> opposing
>> viewpoints are starting to be expressed more thoroughly, which is
>> exactly
>> what is contemplated under the NPOV policy.
>>
>> You're probably much more informed than many of us.
>>
>> Fred Bauder
>>
>> > http://bit.ly/cVBfag
>> >
>> > Thoughts?
>> >
>> > --Avi
>> >
>> > --
>> > Sent from my mobile device
>> >
>> > 
>> > User:Avraham
>> >
>> > pub 3072D/F80E29F9 1/30/2009 Avi (Wikimedia-related key)
>> > 
>> >Primary key fingerprint: 167C 063F 7981 A1F6 71EC  ABAA 0D62 B019
>> F80E
>> > 29F9
>> >
>> > ___
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>> > functionaries...@lists.wikimedia.org
>> > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/functionaries-en
>> >
>>
>>
>>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Participation of intellectual professions

[Fred Bauder]

> With wikipedia, any expert could reach and teach millions of persons. In
> ten or twenty years, every literate person with internet access could
> use an interdisciplinary, edge-cutting database of knowledge for their
> diary reasoning.
> The knowledge and understanding of mankind could make giant leaps.

Yes, this is what we are up to, with or without help from experts.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] Participation of intellectual professions

[Fred Bauder]

> I see a number of issues holding professionals back from contributing:
>
> 1) Some do not realize that it is possible to edit Wikipedia ( I hear
> this
> at work when people ask me how I became an editor ).  Maybe we should
> advertise the fact that yes you too can edit Wikipedia.

This, I think, probably accounts for most who might participate but
don't. Senior academics write books and journal articles. They don't fool
around on the internet for hours like we do.

>
> 2) Many are just not interested.  In medicine we have had issues with
> getting physicians to do continuing medical education.

A high percentage of practicing physicians, about 50%, regularly consult
Wikipedia and many do contribute. Which is not a surprising reaction to
discovery of minor or major errors and omissions. I suspect it is
precisely the ones who don't keep up adequately with their continuing
education who are most likely to consult Wikipedia. (It is a lazy way of
researching anything)

> Many just want to
> do
> their job and that is it.  Contributing to Wikipedia is work.  However
> students are required to do work and I think this is one of the
> populations
> which would be easiest to attract.  McGill University may have started a
> Wikipedia club.  Promoting these may be useful.

Students are our core constituency.

>
> 3) A great deal of competition to Wikipedia has sprung up such as
> Radiopeadia ( which does not allow commercial use of images ), Medpedia (
> which only allow professionals to contribute ), and Wikidocs ( which has
> more technical content ).  Each addressing some perceived drawback in
> Wikipedia.  None however has received the viewership of Wikipedia but of
> course cuts into the pool of available volunteers.

Nearly all of us who have created alternative sites continue to
participate on Wikipedia to some extent.

> Medpedia has
> partnered
> with a number of very respected Universities.  I think we could learn
> something for each of these formats such as clarification around image
> copyright and that CC does not mean you lose the rights to it, greater
> exposure of the professionals who already contribute, etc.
>
> 4) Wikipedia has received negative press in professional publications.
> We
> need to address these negativities most of which are false.  Currently a
> number of us at WikiProject Med are writing a paper for publication
> promoting Wikipedia as a health care information resource.  Other subject
> areas should do the same.

Yes, nearly always issues are raised which are off-point or ancient
history. Just as a political campaign has a "war room" to respond to such
press we should make a point of responding. David Gerard has done a great
deal of this, particularly in the U.K.

>
> --
> James Heilman
> MD, CCFP-EM, B.Sc.

Fred Bauder



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Re: [Foundation-l] Cultural awareness and sensitivity

[Fred Bauder]

Native Americans used to compare European Americans to spiders.

http://www.native-languages.org/cheyenne-legends.htm

That referred to our quick adaptive nature that was not rooted in
tradition. We seem to be very clever and good at things, but not
committed to anything. I think the problem has probably grown much worse
as the broad spectrum of our activities impacts traditional societies.
Not only is our music different, but there is a hundred kinds of it;
likewise our other cultural artifacts.

I suspect users from many cultures do better in an environment that is
sheltered from the full impact of Western culture.

Fred Bauder


> To avoid further disrupting discussion of interlanguage links and
> usability, I'll address the cultural problems separately now. I must
> admit, though, that in a discussion where we seemed to have agreed
> (rightfully so) that a 1% click rate was significant enough to warrant
> serious consideration, I was disappointed that someone could then be so
> callous about the need for cultural sensitivity because it most directly
> impacts "only 0.55% of the world population" in this case. There is no
> meaningful difference in order of magnitude there.
>
> We have significant distortions in the makeup of our community that
> affect our culture. There are quite a few groups that are seriously
> underrepresented, in part because our culture comes across as unfriendly
> to them at best. I talked about African-Americans because it's what was
> applicable in that particular situation and I happen to have some
> familiarity with the issues. It could just as well have been Australian
> Aborigines or another cultural group that has issues with our community.
> I'm not as prepared to explain those concerns, but I would welcome
> people who can educate us about such problems. It's legitimate to be
> wary of things that promote American cultural hegemony, which is another
> distortion, but that's not really warranted when the concern relates to
> a minority culture in the US.
>
> Some people seem to have gotten hung up on the issue of intent. I didn't
> say there was any intent, by the community or individuals, to exclude
> certain groups or to create a hostile environment for them. I actually
> tried to be as careful as possible not to say that. The point is that
> even in the absence of intent, it's possible for our culture to appear
> hostile to such groups. We didn't have any intent to be hostile toward
> living people, either, yet we've had a long struggle to cope with the
> consequences of that impression created by our culture.
>
> Consider the principle of not "biting" newcomers, which relates to a
> similar problem. It's not about the intent of the person doing the
> "biting", it's about the impact on those who encounter it. We need to be
> more welcoming to people, and striving for more cultural awareness is
> part of that.
>
> --Michael Snow
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Boycott in a...@wiki

[Fred Bauder]

http://ace.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Marit_Pola:Lhi_gamba_peukabeh_Nabi_Muhammad_saw&action=history

Fred Bauder


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Re: [Foundation-l] Boycott in a...@wiki

[Fred Bauder]

>
> So, to get back to the original question: Is it or is it not
> acceptable to you that the community of one Wikipedia decides that
> certain pictures will not be shown on their wiki? And is it or is it
> not acceptable that they use the morality of the nationality or other
> group that most of them belong to in doing so?
>
> --
> André Engels, andreeng...@gmail.com

First: There are no authentic images of Mohammad extant.

Second: You know millions of Muslims find images of Mohammad extremely
offensive.

So we are talking about whether it is OK to exclude offensive nonsenses,
not about excluding valid information. And yeh, God said not to display
false images. In what way does that commandment differ from
Wikipedia:Reliable sources? Is it wrong because God said it? You would be
all over them if they had articles that said New York City was in Finland
but you seem to have no problem with images of a man whose appearance is
unknown, and unknowable.

Fred Bauder


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Re: [Foundation-l] Boycott in a...@wiki

[Fred Bauder]

> On Fri, Jul 16, 2010 at 8:11 PM, Andre Engels 
> wrote:
>
>> So, to get back to the original question: Is it or is it not
>> acceptable to you that the community of one Wikipedia decides that
>> certain pictures will not be shown on their wiki? And is it or is it
>> not acceptable that they use the morality of the nationality or other
>> group that most of them belong to in doing so?
>
> I think I would accept that some language wikis decide, by consensus,
> that they will not show illustrations of Mohammed under any
> circumstances.
>
> They should not ask for a boycott of another language, though. They
> could have a protest page with a list of users who want to sign up to
> it. Sticking a banner on the main page - and worse; as the only
> content - I disagree with.
>
> Paedophilia is unlawful all around the world; but let's say it were
> legal in one culture and an associated language wiki hosted pictures
> of sex acts with minors; I think en:wp would correctly be in uproar. I
> don't think we would respond by having the issue on our front page in
> any form and especially not as the single item of content.
>
> en.User:Bodnotbod

That's the issue. Displaying offensive religious images is a big problem,
not a tiny little problem that can be brushed under the rug. You're doing
something that outrages millions of people and saying, "Hey, tough". And
you don't possess, and will never possess, an authentic image of
Muhammad.

You don't listen.

Fred Bauder



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Re: [Foundation-l] Boycott in a...@wiki

[Fred Bauder]

> Except the problem is that at no point do they mention law; it's entirely
> personal opinions. If they said "oh btw, the law in our nation creates
> problems with images of Muhammad" then cool, fine, it's justified.
> Arguing
> that images should be deleted not because of the law but because they
> find
> it personally offensive, and stating that all Muslim wikipedians should
> follow the same rules, is inappropriate.

Muslim Wikipedians who do not object to images of Muhammad are in the
same position as Western users. They know there are no authentic images;
they know it is extremely offensive to millions of people. They should
have common sense and not put images up in a reference work which are
both offensive and false.

There might be an exception for Persian art, but such images certainly
don't belong in an article on Muhammad or Islam in any language.

Fred Bauder


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Re: [Foundation-l] Boycott in a...@wiki

[Fred Bauder]

se of the word, with no influence from politics, religion
> or
> personal bias.

Wikipeia:Reliable sources IS policy. There are no authentic images of
Muhammad. Including one outside the realm of art is a violation of the
policy.

>
> *They should have common sense and not put images up in a reference work
> which are both offensive and false.*
> If you care to check the article title it says "Depictions" which are, i
> cite out article on "depiction": *Pictures may be factual or fictional,
> literal or metaphorical, realistic or idealised and in various
> combination.*
> * *There is a many topics which rely on artist impressions drawn in later
> ages - the images aren't false, they are just impressions with historical
> significance. I can repeat myself over and over, but the path of common
> sense is allowing people to choose whether or not they wish to view
> certain
> content.

Bottom line: Made up stuff is being included.

>
> But to get back to the ACE topic: I agree they may decide that they do
> not
> wish to include these depictions; Not including it isn't a NPOV problem
> in
> my eyes so they are free to decide what they wish on that regard. But
> that
> does not give them the right to demand the same for other Wiki's who had
> extensive talks on this subject. And equally placing "Boycot" notices on
> the
> mainpage with biased content is against everything Wikipedia stands for.
>
> ~Excirial

Wikipedia operates by consensus, not "We are the imperial powers which
control world culture"

Fred Bauder

>
> On Sat, Jul 17, 2010 at 2:39 AM, Fred Bauder 
> wrote:
>
>>
>> >
>> > So, to get back to the original question: Is it or is it not
>> > acceptable to you that the community of one Wikipedia decides that
>> > certain pictures will not be shown on their wiki? And is it or is it
>> > not acceptable that they use the morality of the nationality or other
>> > group that most of them belong to in doing so?
>> >
>> > --
>> > André Engels, andreeng...@gmail.com
>>
>>
>>
>> Fred Bauder
>>
>>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Boycott in a...@wiki

[Fred Bauder]

> On 07/17/2010 04:39 AM, Fred Bauder wrote:
>> First: There are no authentic images of Mohammad extant.
>
> There are no authentic images of most characters from the Bible. Yet I
> believe at least 1 % of works of art on Commons contain them.
>
> --vvv
>

There is a difference between using an image of Charlton Heston to
illustrate The Ten Commandments (1956 film)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ten_Commandments_%281956_film%29

and Moses

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moses

You say it all when you say "works of art"

Additionally, no one riots in the streets when you illustrate the article
on Moses with all sorts of made up images.

Fred Bauder



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Re: [Foundation-l] Boycott in a...@wiki

[Fred Bauder]

> On Sat, Jul 17, 2010 at 10:49 AM, Fred Bauder 
> wrote:
>>...
>>
>> That's the issue. Displaying offensive religious images is a big
>> problem,
>> not a tiny little problem that can be brushed under the rug. You're
>> doing
>> something that outrages millions of people and saying, "Hey, tough".
>> And
>> you don't possess, and will never possess, an authentic image of
>> Muhammad.
>
> Are our images of Muhammad any less authentic than our images of St.
> Paul, Jesus or Krishna?
>
> --
> John Vandenberg
>

No, they all had two eyes and a nose, but that's about all we know about
any of them. Well, no, we don't know if Krishna even had those, let alone
being colored blue.

Fred Bauder



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Re: [Foundation-l] Boycott in a...@wiki

[Fred Bauder]

> I think I would accept that some language wikis decide, by consensus,
>> that they will not show illustrations of Mohammed under any
>> circumstances.
>>
>> They should not ask for a boycott of another language, though. They
>> could have a protest page with a list of users who want to sign up to
>> it. Sticking a banner on the main page - and worse; as the only
>> content - I disagree with.
>>
>>
> I totally agree with the above. I don't know why the discussion evolved
> into
> the rights of individual wikis to not show the images. I thought that was
> never in question. On the Arabic wp for example, we do not display the
> images by consensus, we try to describe in detail what's in them in
> articles
> pertaining to the subject, this seems to be a compromise accepted by
> most.
>
> What irritated me originally was the call for boycott on the main page
> and
> the fact that the template is worded to be understood as the opinion of
> the
> Acehnese wikipedia not a group of editors/admins.
>
> What bothers me also is the mention by someone above that there was a
> note
> that Acehnese wikipedia follows islamic law and anything that contradicts
> with it is not allowed. If this is true, I think this is recipe for
> disaster. 'Islamic law' is not really a solid law but a large spectrum of
> interpretation of the holy books and precedence and differs by faction, I
> strongly doubt that everyone using that wikipedia will have the same
> views
> of what constitutes a violation even within the same ethnic group thus
> it's
> very hard to call that a 'consensus' that we should respect and not
> impose
> 'western values' on. There is an argument on the discussion going on that
> wiki that all Acehnese are muslim, I can't see how they can verify the
> validity of such claim,  religion is by choice. If someone is an
> Acehnese-born muslim but not a close practitioner or an atheist or
> convert
> to another religion, would his contributions be not welcome if they
> violate
> 'islamic law' (they can be as simple as writing articles about alcoholic
> drinks) ?
>
> --
> Best Regards,
> Muhammad Yahia

Yes, the notion that Sharia controls is troublesome, as is the request
for a fatwa. A fatwa that explicitly addresses images of Muhammad in
Wikipedia either way would be kind of ridiculous and would not meet with
general acceptance. My point is that we don't need to needlessly offend
by posting images we know are not authentic.

Fred Bauder


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Re: [Foundation-l] Boycott in a...@wiki

[Fred Bauder]

> Excirial wrote:
>> *First: There are no authentic images of Mohammad extant.*
>> As already mentioned in a previous response: are there any authentic
>> images
>> which display any god or prophet?
>>
>
> Do they not have traditional images that go back millennia? If you
> depicted images of Shiva as Yoda you'd get a whole load of grief from
> Hindus, and the Christians were none too pleased about the image of
> christ being fucked by a Roman Centurian (see Whitehouse v Lemon).
>
> Oh and I'll just mention in passing that wikimedia doesn't have nearly
> enough photos of 'Baby Jesus Butt Plugs', nor are there anywhere near
> enough drawings of Western politicians engaging in bestiality. I'm sure
> that there are oodles of those out there, I know an artist friend of
> mine draw a number of Ronald Reagun sucking a horses dick and shitting
> nuclear missiles. Perhaps I'll take some scans and add them to:
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Reagan

Yes, indeed.

What is wrong with using photographs of Baby Jesus Butt Plugs to
illustrate the article on Jesus? Answer that question and you'll know why
offensive images of Muhammad are not a good idea. The thing is, we're
saying, "Hey, come off of it, no real harm is done is there are images of
Muhammad" Why doesn't the same reasoning apply to the butt plugs? No real
harm would be done. Or would there?

Fred Bauder



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Re: [Foundation-l] Boycott in a...@wiki

[Fred Bauder]

> Have you seen [[Piss Christ]]? How is that different?

There is no general Christian prohibition on depicting Christ. In fact it
is a generally accepted practice. Generally Muslims don't, and consider
it a mark of disrespect to do so. Why offend?

Piss Christ was an artistic-political controversy.

Fred Bauder


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Re: [Foundation-l] Boycott in a...@wiki

[Fred Bauder]

> This turns out not to be the case. In practice, anything that is even
> *purported* to be an image of Mohammed is condemned.
>
> (And, as the article on the history of such images notes - this is a
> modern POV of one particularly noisy and violent group rather than a
> constant over the history of Islam.)
>
>
> - d.
>

Well, we should not bow before noise and violence. However, there is a
substantial body of Muslim public opinion that holds this view today.

Fred Bauder



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Re: [Foundation-l] Boycott in a...@wiki

[Fred Bauder]

>
> You are arguing in the wrong place. A very large debate has already
> taken place on this issue and consensus has been reached. Nothing you
> can say on this mailing list will impact that. If you really think you
> have something new to bring to the debate the correct place to raise
> the matter is:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Muhammad/images
>
>
> --
> geni

If something is wrong there is never consensus about it.

Fred



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[Foundation-l] Journal Boycott

[Fred Bauder]

"Elsevier is emblematic of an abusive publishing industry. "The
government pays me and other scientists to produce work, and we give it
away to private entities," says Brett S. Abrahams, an assistant professor
of genetics at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. "Then they charge
us to read it." Mr. Abrahams signed the pledge on Tuesday after reading
about it on Facebook."

http://chronicle.com/article/As-Journal-Boycott-Grows/130600/

http://thecostofknowledge.com/

"Elsevier has supported a proposed federal law, the Research Works Act
(HR 3699), that could prevent agencies like the National Institutes of
Health from making all articles written by grant recipients freely
available."

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d112:h.r.03699:

"Research Works Act - Prohibits a federal agency from adopting,
maintaining, continuing, or otherwise engaging in any policy, program, or
other activity that: (1) causes, permits, or authorizes network
dissemination of any private-sector research work without the prior
consent of the publisher; or (2) requires that any actual or prospective
author, or the author's employer, assent to such network dissemination.

Defines "private-sector research work" as an article intended to be
published in a scholarly or scientific publication, or any version of
such an article, that is not a work of the U.S. government, describing or
interpreting research funded in whole or in part by a federal agency and
to which a commercial or nonprofit publisher has made or has entered into
an arrangement to make a value-added contribution, including peer review
or editing, but does not include progress reports or raw data outputs
routinely required to be created for and submitted directly to a funding
agency in the course of research."

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] Journal Boycott

[Fred Bauder]

Another article:

http://chronicle.com/article/Who-Gets-to-See-Published/130403/

> "Elsevier has supported a proposed federal law, the Research Works Act
> (HR 3699), that could prevent agencies like the National Institutes of
> Health from making all articles written by grant recipients freely
> available."
>
> http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d112:h.r.03699:
>
> "Research Works Act - Prohibits a federal agency from adopting,
> maintaining, continuing, or otherwise engaging in any policy, program, or
> other activity that: (1) causes, permits, or authorizes network
> dissemination of any private-sector research work without the prior
> consent of the publisher; or (2) requires that any actual or prospective
> author, or the author's employer, assent to such network dissemination.
>
> Defines "private-sector research work" as an article intended to be
> published in a scholarly or scientific publication, or any version of
> such an article, that is not a work of the U.S. government, describing or
> interpreting research funded in whole or in part by a federal agency and
> to which a commercial or nonprofit publisher has made or has entered into
> an arrangement to make a value-added contribution, including peer review
> or editing, but does not include progress reports or raw data outputs
> routinely required to be created for and submitted directly to a funding
> agency in the course of research."
>
> Fred
>
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Strike against the collection of personal data through edit links

[Fred Bauder]

> Strike against the collection of personal data through edit links

See http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10448060-38.html


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Re: [Foundation-l] Strike against the collection of personal data through edit links

[Fred Bauder]

> FWIW, I know our devs are not at all keen to keep personal data even
> sitting around - even checkuser data is cleared after six months, I
> think. What is the current policy?
>
>
> - d.

About right. Keeping personal data creates disclosure problems with
children under 13.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] Strike against the collection of personal data through edit links

[Fred Bauder]

A US law would affect only US providers; however the National Security
Agency is already authorized to monitor all other internet traffic, and
other communications traffic, in the world. They have complex search
algorithms that single out individual messages based on their security
priorities.

Fred

> Correct if I'm wrong (And i'm probably wrong) but that would work for
every
> single site if approved, so why strike only Wikipedia? I would stop use
internet altogether. :P
> _
> *Béria Lima*
> <http://wikimedia.pt/>(351) 925 171 484
>
> *Imagine um mundo onde é dada a qualquer pessoa a possibilidade de ter
livre acesso ao somatório de todo o conhecimento humano. Ajude-nos a
construir esse sonho. <http://wikimedia.pt/Donativos>*
>
>
> On 4 February 2012 13:46, Fred Bauder  wrote:
>
>> > Strike against the collection of personal data through edit links
>>
>> See http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10448060-38.html
>>
>>
>> ___
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>>
>





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Re: [Foundation-l] Fw: Strike against the collection of personal data through edit links

[Fred Bauder]

> To list!
> Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device
>
> -Original Message-
> From: dger...@gmail.com
> Date: Sat, 4 Feb 2012 16:46:58
> To: Béria Lima
> Reply-To: dger...@gmail.com
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Strike against the collection of personal
> data through edit links
>
> 3 months I can live with :-) Can someone from WMF just confirm what data
> is kept for how long?
>
>
> - d.

The exact time is confidential.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] "Cartman Gets an Anal Probe" English Wikipedia's featured article today

[Fred Bauder]

> Some FAs should never be shown on the main page.
>
> Nothing in the FA criteria says anything about the subject of the
> article: such as whether the subject is of broad interest or has
> educational merit. Such criteria should be considered for choosing
> articles to show on the main page. The main page should show the best
> of Wikipedia, not the ugliest loopholes in its inclusion criteria.
>
> I was involved in some deletion debates in 2002 and 2003. Nobody knew
> at the time that if we said "OK, let's allow this" then some day the
> fancruft we were allowing would be featured on the main page, with the
> only criteria being that a fan puts enough effort into their style and
> citations.
>
> -- Tim Starling

My attention was drawn to this issue only after I had just watched,

Miss Teacher Bangs a Boy

It was so funny and good. And very informative. All cops, parents,
teachers, and especially young boys, should watch it.

Colorado, for some reason, has been the scene of several of these
incidents. Not that South Park has anything to do with Colorado, of
course.

Casting aside the infantile slogan, "Wikipedia is not censored", I think
having the pilot of South Park on the Main Page is quite appropriate; the
subject is significant.

Fred





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Re: [Foundation-l] "Cartman Gets an Anal Probe" English Wikipedia's featured article today

[Fred Bauder]

> On 7 February 2012 17:03, Thomas Dalton  wrote:
>
>> He's been doing it for years and has never screwed up badly enough for
>> the
>> community to take the job away from him. It's as simple as that. The
>> Wikipedia community can be uncharacteristically pragmatic at times!
>
>
> I note that even the front-page featuring of
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gropecunt_Lane made almost no impact in
> the outside world.
>
>
> - d.

Yet one cannot see in the dark...

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] Fwd: Right to be Forgotten

[Fred Bauder]

I think the biggest problems might involve users who have been trashed
for one reason or another, justified or not.

Fred

> Is the worry primarily around article-space, or around Wikipedia users?
> There's already
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Courtesy_vanishing, though it
> would have to be made somewhat more rigorous (and no longer a mere
> courtesy) if it were an actual legal obligation.
>
> As a non-lawyer, I would consider our uses in article-space to all fall
> under the exceptions, though I wouldn't want to speculate on whether a
> court would agree. At least in principle, Wikipedia articles only cover
> material of historical, cultural, scientific, artistic, sociological,
> etc. interest. If anything, we're more often criticized for upholding
> that viewpoint too strongly; vociferous complaints about Wikipedia's
> "deletionism" seem to pop up in nearly every external discussion of
> Wikipedia. Though this may lower the bar for people wanting information
> removed from Wikipedia, by providing an alternate route from the usual
> libel-law approach that doesn't require them to prove libel, so might be
> bad pragmatically.
>
> -Mark
>
>
> On 2/11/12 7:42 AM, Samuel Klein wrote:
>> Forwarding from internal.
>> The right to vanish... or a part of it... proposed as law.
>>
>> -- Forwarded message --
>> From: Richard Symonds
>> Date: Thu, Feb 9, 2012 at 11:46 AM
>> Subject: [Internal-l] Right to be Forgotten
>> To: interna...@lists.wikimedia.org
>>
>> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-16677370
>>
>> A new law promising internet users the "right to be forgotten" will be
>> proposed by the European Commission on Wednesday.
>>
>> It says people will be able to ask for data about them to be deleted
>> and firms will have to comply unless there are "legitimate" grounds to
>> retain it.
>>
>> The move is part of a wide-ranging overhaul of the commission's 1995
>> Data Protection Directive.
>>
>> Richard Symonds
>> Office&Development Manager
>> Wikimedia UK
>> 
>>
>> As Bence noted:
>>
>>> You can find the December 2011 draft at
>>> http://epic.org/privacy/intl/EU-Privacy-Regulation-29-11-2011.pdf
>>> (Article 15 is the relevant part).
>>> The stated exceptions do not include expense or technical difficulty,
>>> but include
>>> " except to the extent that the retention of the personal data is
>>> necessary:
>>> (a) for exercising the right of freedom of expression in accordance
>>> with Article 79;
>>>   or
>>> (b) for historical, statistical and scientific research purposes in
>>> accordance with
>>>   Article 83; or
>>> (c) for compliance with a legal obligation to retain the data by Union
>>> or Member
>>>   State law to which the controller is subject; this law shall meet an
>>> objective of
>>>   public interest, respect the essence of the right to the protection
>>> of personal
>>>   data and be proportionate to the legitimate aim pursued; or
>>> (d) in the cases referred to in paragraph 4."
>>>
>>> I'll leave it to the lawyers to decide how this affects Wikimedia
>>> (which is hosted
>>> outside the EEA) and whether any of the exceptions can be applied to
>>> it.
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>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Fwd: Right to be Forgotten

[Fred Bauder]

> On Sat, 11 Feb 2012 11:25:56 -0700 (MST), "Fred Bauder"
>  wrote:
>> I think the biggest problems might involve users who have been trashed
>> for one reason or another, justified or not.
>>
>> Fred
>>
>
> My understanding is that the legislation is not so much about users
> (which
> we can handle anyway), but about notable persons which have some
> information about them leaked into media and they want toi remove this
> information. I remember when I was still an admin in Russian Wikipedia, I
> had a long conversation with an admin of a website of a rock star, who
> wanted to change the birth year in the article on the person (basically,
> making her five years younger) even though we had sources claiming the
> opposite. This did not happen, since I accidentally knew I was younger
> than
> the star, and the proposed year would make her younger than me, but I
> think
> the legislation in this case would require to have the information on the
> birth year deleted from all sources (and, obciously, also from our
> articles). I would like to hear a legal opinion though.
>
> Cheers
> Yaroslav
>

Anything that produces a substantial expansion of a court's docket, and
requires close examination of a mass of material, will prove very
unpopular.

Fred



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[Foundation-l] Wikipedia Articles In Uzbek Blocked

[Fred Bauder]

http://www.rferl.org/content/uzbek_wikipedia_blocked/24486460.html


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Re: [Foundation-l] The 'Undue Weight' of Truth on Wikipedia (from the Chronicle) + some citation discussions

[Fred Bauder]

> The key problem here is that WP:UNDUE was expressly written to address
> the problem of genuine ongoing controversies, and fringe views. In
> this case there is no ongoing controversy, but the use of the policy
> has for long been used to remove new research no-one has even refuted,
> much less there being an intractable controversy over the issue.
>
> It is equally clear that some portions of the policy have been
> wilfully wordsmithed so  it could be used outside the original intent.
> There is plenty of meticulously sourced new information that has been
> challenged and removed from wikipedia because of this. It is only now
> that this subverted use of the policy runs headlong into this kind of
> glaringly obvious example of it's misuse that people are taking
> notice. And taking notice of it in the wrong way.
>
> Correcting the act, but not the root cause. In fact, if I wanted to
> retain the ability to use the policy in precisely this manner, I would
> be very quick about making sure the issue were quickly settled, so
> there never arose a genuine review of the policy and its uses. The
> fact that the policy is used in this fashion daily if not hourly.
> Those (ab)uses just haven't been as glaringly obvious. I suspect we
> all know that deep within our hearts, but loathe to go through the
> tedium of overhauling a policy page with such deep devotees.
>
>
> --
> --
> Jussi-Ville Heiskanen, ~ [[User:Cimon Avaro]]

Actually, there is an ongoing controversy, the whitewashing of radical
history which is what the language, paraphrasing, "no evidence was
presented but the defendants were found guilty", is all about.

The policy, misused in the course of POV struggle, is a way of excluding
information with interferes with presentation of a desired point of view.

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] The 'Undue Weight' of Truth on Wikipedia (from the Chronicle) + some citation discussions

[Fred Bauder]

> On Sun, Feb 19, 2012 at 4:44 AM, Mike Godwin  wrote:
>
>> I think the article in The Chronicle of Higher Education is a
>> must-read. Here you have a researcher who actually took pains to learn
>> what the rules to editing Wikipedia are (including No Original
>> Research), and who, instead of trying to end-run WP:NOR, waited years
>> until the article was actually published before trying to modify the
>> Haymarket article. To me, this is a particularly fascinating case
>> because the author's article, unlike the great majority of sources for
>> Wikipedia articles, was peer-reviewed -- this means it underwent
>> academic scrutiny that the newspapers, magazines, and other popular
>> sources we rely on never undergo.
>>
>> I think the problem really is grounded in the UNDUE WEIGHT policy
>> itself, as written, and not in mere misuse of the policy.
>>
>
> Perhaps the policies can be improved, but they are written to stop bad
> editing rather than to encourage good editing.  I don't think that can be
> changed.  It's impossible to legislate good judgement, and it's judgement
> that was called for with the Haymarket article.
>
> Mike

The policy had its roots in the effort to deal with physics cranks, see

http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2003-September/006715.html

It it is misapplied when rigorous new research is excluded. What is
needed is capacity make judgements based on familiarity with the
literature in the field. You can have that, as a academic in the field
might, or you can learn about it by reading literature in the field and
finding how how new research was received, reviewed and commented on.

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] The 'Undue Weight' of Truth on Wikipedia (from the Chronicle) + some citation discussions

[Fred Bauder]

> On Sun, Feb 19, 2012 at 3:57 AM, Mike Christie 
> wrote:
>
>> Perhaps the policies can be improved, but they are written to stop bad
>> editing rather than to encourage good editing.  I don't think that can
>> be
>> changed.  It's impossible to legislate good judgement, and it's
>> judgement
>> that was called for with the Haymarket article.
>
> If policies don't encourage good judgment, or discourage bad judgment,
> then what are policies for?
>
> It seems worth discussing whether it would be good to revise the
> existing policy to restore its original (presumed) functionality.
>
> More generally, I've believed for a long time that WP policies have
> been increased, modified, and subverted in ways that both create a
> higher barrier to entry for new editors and that discourage both new
> editors and existing ones.
>
>
> --Mike

I think it probably seems to climate change deniers that excluding
political opinions from science-based articles on global warming is a
violation of neutral point of view, and of basic fairness. That is just
one example, but there are other similar situations.

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] Fwd: Right to be Forgotten

[Fred Bauder]

> On 19 February 2012 18:06, Jussi-Ville Heiskanen 
> wrote:
>> On Sun, Feb 19, 2012 at 7:08 PM, Federico Leva (Nemo)
>>  wrote:
>>> Jussi-Ville Heiskanen, 19/02/2012 08:12:
>>>
 Do the people at MeatballWiki know?
>>>
>>>
>>> Why should they care?
>>>
>>
>> This is where it all started,
>>
>> http://meatballwiki.org/wiki/RightToLeave
>
> The Right to Leave is very different from the Right to Vanish. Nobody
> can stop you leaving, so the Right to Leave is just a statement of
> fact. The Right to Vanish is something that we (and possibly this new
> law) explicitly grant to people.

How can we remove ten thousand comments and signatures using the users
real name or well-known handle?

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] The 'Undue Weight' of Truth on Wikipedia (from the Chronicle) + some citation discussions

[Fred Bauder]

> Fred Bauder writes:
>
>> I think it probably seems to climate change deniers that excluding
>> political opinions from science-based articles on global warming is a
>> violation of neutral point of view, and of basic fairness. That is just
>> one example, but there are other similar situations.
>
> This analogy is breathtakingly unpersuasive. Apart from the fact that
> consensus about scientific theory is not analogous to consensus about
> the historical records of particular events, climate-change-denial
> theory is actually discussed quite thoroughly on Wikipedia. Plus, the
> author of the op-ed in The Chronicle of Higher Education doesn't seem
> at all like climate-change deniers.
>
> If there is something specific you want to suggest about the author --
> that he's agenda-driven, that his work is unreliable, or that the
> journal in which he published the article is not a reliable source --
> then I think equity requires that you declare why you doubt or dismiss
> his article.
>
> I read the article in the Chronicle pretty carefully. The author's
> experience struck me as an example of a pattern that may account for
> the flattening of the growth curve in new editors as well as for some
> other phenomena. As you may rememember, Andrew Lih conducted a
> presentation on "the policy thicket" at Wikimania almost five years
> ago. The wielding of policy by long-term editors, plus the rewriting
> of the policy so that it is used to undercut NPOV rather than preserve
> it, strikes me as worth talking about. Dismissing it out of hand, or
> analogizing it to climate-change denial, undercuts my trust in the
> Wikipedian process rather than reinforces it.
>
>
> --Mike

We're talking past one another. It is obvious to me that the author of
the Chronicle article should have been able to add his research without
difficulty, at least after it was published.

We have material about climate change denial, but do not give political
viewpoints the status we give scientific opinion in articles on the
science, nor should we. What we would be looking for, and will not be
able to find, is substantial work showing that climate warming does not
result from an increase in greenhouse gases and other products of human
activity. We can't simply say, "According to Rick Santorum, there is no
scientific basis"

Yes, please, lets discuss.

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] The 'Undue Weight' of Truth on Wikipedia (from the Chronicle) + some citation discussions

[Fred Bauder]

I have initiated a discussion at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Neutral_point_of_view#The_.27Undue_Weight.27_of_Truth_on_Wikipedia

It is there that any refinement of the policy and how it is properly
applied can possibly be resolved. I note that the article in question
still does not contain information regarding the evidence presented at
the trial.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] The 'Undue Weight' of Truth on Wikipedia (from the Chronicle) + some citation discussions

[Fred Bauder]

> On Tue, Feb 21, 2012 at 9:48 PM, Mike Godwin  wrote:
>
>> Apart from the question of whether this particular article -- on the
>> Haymarket bombing -- has been hurt by editors' ill-considered
>> application of UNDUE, there's the larger question of what it means for
>> our credibility when a very respected journal, The Chronicle of Higher
>> Education, features an op-ed that outlines, in very convincing detail,
>> what happens when a subject-matter expert attempts to play the rules
>> and is still slapped down. If I thought this author's experience is
>> rare, I wouldn't be troubled by it. But as someone who frequently
>> fielded complaints from folks who were not tendentious kooks, my
>> impression is that it is not rare, and that the language of UNDUE --
>> as it exists today -- ends up being leveraged in a way that hurts
>> Wikipedia both informationally and reputationally.
>>
>
> Do you have specific ideas either as to what is wrong with the current
> language, or what it should be changed to say?
>
> Mike

Would any of you consider joining the discussion at

Wikipedia_talk:Neutral_point_of_view#The_.27Undue_Weight.27_of_Truth_on_Wikipedia

I've probably gotten it off to a bad start, and perhaps that is not the
place to discuss the policy, but I suspect it is.

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] The 'Undue Weight' of Truth on Wikipedia (from the Chronicle) + some citation discussions

[Fred Bauder]

>>
>> "What *was* at issue here is how we treat new users; the discussion was
>> approached (on the part of our editors) either as a battleground/fight,
>> or
>> in a quite patronising way. The issue here was that someone was put off
>> from raising the issues."
>>
>> The "expertise" that is most valued at Wikipedia is expertise in
>> Wikipedia
>> itself  - its policies, procedures, technology, etc - rather than
>> expertise
>> in the content. That's a fundamental cultural flaw if the project is to
>> succeed.
>>
>
> In a sense; though, as one academic pointed out to me, writing
> an encyclopaedia is a skill in itself. And just because one is a topic
> area
> expert does not immediately make them the most capable of writing the
> article (in some respects it makes them less capable than an interested
> layman).
>
Of course, but that is not a reason to heap abuse on them rather than
assisting them.
>
>> In reference to other comments here about the treatment of new editors,
>> there has been a noticeable (to me at least) shift away from the role
>> of
>> administrators and "senior editors" from helping newcomers overcome the
>> challenges to finding them a nuisance.
>
>
> I don't think this is an issue of sysops or "senior editors" - it is
> ingrained in the vast majority of the community.
>
> For example we know it is common in newer/younger editors to "bite" or
> otherwise apply policy too strongly - because with regularity we have to
> deal with the fall out (i.e. mentor them).
>
> I see the same issues with content editors as well; with resistance to
> anyone trying to add content to articles they've invested in (I don't
> just
> mean subject matter experts).

That is what is going on at the Haymarket article. Editing that article
successfully is harder than the D-Day Landing.

>
> Realistically *we are all part of the problem*. You, me, etc. because the
> problem is the entire ecosystem. Even stuff we think is polite and
> sensible
> might be incomprehensible to a newbie. Simple things like linking to, or
> quoting, parts of policy instead of taking time to write a simple
> explanation. The use of templates. The resistance to listen to arguments.
> It all adds up into a confusing user experience.
>
> This is not a new problem; many online communities suffer, and have
> suffered, from it.
>
> All of the things I mentioned are useful once your dealing with editors
> aware of the workings - it's not "new and scary" at that point and acts
> as
> a useful shortcut to streamline our interaction. The key thing to work
> on,
> I think, is easing newbies into that process without bombarding them with
> too much of it at once.
>
> Tom

And we do have a problem with academics such as this one who are not
patient enough or too busy to get up to speed. Note, however, that he is
not too busy to write an article on the Academic Chronicle or appear on
NPR.

Now, in effect we have moved a Wikipedia policy discussion off our policy
pages onto The Academic Chronicle and NPR which most of us have no access
too. Our policy process is broken, and, in fact, effectively jammed.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] The 'Undue Weight' of Truth on Wikipedia (from the Chronicle) + some citation discussions

[Fred Bauder]

> This idea of "published" can (and is) relaxed though. Indeed it is my
> perception that in many topic areas we rely far too heavily on online
> sources - there can be a distinct prejudice against offline source
> material.

> Tom

Journals pose a particular problem as they are often, as in the case of
the three journal articles in this case, behind pay walls. Those are peer
reviewed, while his book by a commercial publisher has not received
academic reviews.

Someone did send me a copy of one of the academic journal articles. But I
have yet to see the other two which cost quite a bit.

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] The 'Undue Weight' of Truth on Wikipedia (from the Chronicle) + some citation discussions

[Fred Bauder]

>
> And this is what I meant about misunderstanding policies. Because nothing
> in our policies precludes the use of primary sources. What you can't do
> is
> use them for interpretation or analysis. So to make up an example; if you
> have an oral citation from someone who was arrested under an oppressive
> regime - and questioned at length on his choice of blonde hair color and
> whether he dyed it. You could relate that experience, but you
> couldn't necessarily say something like "The regime persecuted people
> with
> blond hair, or those who dyed it".
>
> So if there are oral recordings of at the Smithsonian & Yale (surely that
> means they are published?? It certainly fits our explicit criteria for
> published) then we can and should be using them.
>
> One example of published primary sources we do use is court proceedings.
>
> Tom

Interesting because in the Haymarket case there is a 3,000 page
transcript of the trial on line. I thought we could not use it directly.
What can we use it for? Can it be used as a reference for itself, in the
sense that the fact that there was a lengthy hearing with a great number
of prosecution witnesses being heard, as well as many defense witness?

>From Identifying reliable sources:

Primary sources are often difficult to use appropriately. While they can
be both reliable and useful in certain situations, they must be used with
caution in order to avoid original research. Material based purely on
primary sources should be avoided. All interpretive claims, analyses, or
synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary
source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by
Wikipedia editors.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] Subject: Re: The 'Undue Weight' of Truth on Wikipedia, (from the Chronicle) + some citation discussions

[Fred Bauder]

> On 24 February 2012 09:34, Ray Saintonge  wrote:
>
>> On 02/22/12 6:04 PM, David Goodman wrote:
>>
>>> There are many subjects in which there would be multiple schools of
>>> thought with little agreement; anyone following book reviews in the
>>> humanities or social sciences or even some of the sciences would know
>>> the intensity with which the highest level scholars attack the work of
>>> those they disagree with. Appoint one as expert, and that field will
>>> have a substantial bias. Appoint several, and they will endlessly
>>> dispute with each other.
>>>
>>
>> We shouldn't expect ourselves to be exempt from this kind of academic
>> discourse. We owe it to our readers to provide a clear and fair-minded
>> presentation of these differences.
>>
>>
> Isn't that what David is saying? That if we allowed partisans to hold
> sway
> by virtue of their expertise in the subject we are not going to get a
> fair
> minded presentation (either a one-sided one, or a major argument if two
> or
> more experts clash).
>
> By introduction lay editors with no specific interest or investment,
> except
> in writing a good article, we moderate this issue (not entirely, but
> there
> you go).
>
> Tom

Still original research. And even worse, not interesting. A cleaned up
version that omits the research of those who are passionate about the
subject would pretty much be a bucket of warm spit.

Although I don't think we need to consider Howard Zinn an expert on
anything but his own birthday. Footnote 49 from Haymarket affair:

"Some anarchists privately indicated they had later learned the bomber's
identity but kept quiet to avoid further prosecutions. Howard Zinn, in A
People's History of the United States suggests Rudolph Schnaubelt was an
agent of the police posing as an anarchist and threw the bomb (thus
giving police a pretext to arrest the leaders of Chicago's anarchist
movement.) This theory does not have wide support among historians."

Hardly surprising; as far as I can see, he just made it up.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] Why is Arbcom is actively promoting Wikipedia Review?

[Fred Bauder]

> Can anyone explain why Arbcom members are not required to refrain from
> posting and responding to requests on Wikipedia Review while they are on
> Arbcom? It seems a basic conflict of interest to be actively promoting
> the
> opinions and drawing unnecessary attention to attack posts against
> Wikipedia contributers by banned users.
>
> I see at least two current Arbcom members posting there quite recently
> and
> even responding to requests of banned users to do things on their behalf
> on
> Wikipedia (such as John Vandenberg working for Edward Buckner).
>
> One might argue that Arbcom members have a right to free speech, however
> this seems to cross the boundaries into undermining the fundamental
> principles and the values of the Wikimedia Foundation.
>
> Bob

I haven't been there for a few years, but when I was an active arbitrator
I read some of WR and posted a little bit. Occasionally, besides the
slime, there are people posting there who have legitimate complaints, or
are, at least, owed an explanation. Also, occasionally, news about a
crisis of some sort that affects Wikipedia breaks there. Bottom line,
this a long standing practice.

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] Does google favour WIkipedia?

[Fred Bauder]

> The answer, evidently, is "not as much as Bing" -
> http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2161910/Bing-Not-Google-Favors-Wikipedia-More-Often-in-Search-Results-Study
>
> Thought people might find it interesting :)

No question that we are a center of attention for Google. I've noticed
that when I create a new article, it often comes up as the first hit on
Google for the subject within 5 minutes. There is no way such positioning
is based on external links to the article.

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] Does google favour WIkipedia?

[Fred Bauder]

>
> Perhaps they honestly believe that their keyword-primed advertorial
> page is actually more useful than a Wikipedia page and are astounded
> that Google might have the temerity to disagree. ;-)
>
> --
> Tom Morris
> 

We can't create a new page based on a press release or an advertisement.
Usually a new page results from news, journal articles, or news about
journal articles. There will be links to the sources. This is not a
difficult pattern to program into an algorithm.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] Does google favour WIkipedia?

[Fred Bauder]

> Fred Bauder wrote:
>>> Perhaps they honestly believe that their keyword-primed advertorial
>>> page is actually more useful than a Wikipedia page and are astounded
>>> that Google might have the temerity to disagree. ;-)
>>
>> We can't create a new page based on a press release or an
>> advertisement.
>> Usually a new page results from news, journal articles, or news about
>> journal articles. There will be links to the sources. This is not a
>> difficult pattern to program into an algorithm.
>
> We can't? It happens every single day on Wikimedia wikis and the articles
> generally sit around for weeks, if not months or years. I'm not sure what
> you're talking about.
>
> MZMcBride

I speak of the enforceable requirement that information in Wikipedia come
from a reliable published source.

Fred



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[Foundation-l] The People’s Encyclopedia Under the Gaze of the Sages: A Sys tematic Review of Scholarly Research on Wikipedia

[Fred Bauder]

Abstract:
Wikipedia has become one of the ten most visited sites on the Web, and
the world’s leading source of Web reference information. Its rapid
success has inspired hundreds of scholars from various disciplines to
study its content, communication and community dynamics from various
perspectives. This article presents a protocol for conducting a
systematic mapping (a broad-based literature review) of scholarly
research on Wikipedia. The purpose of this review is to analyze
particular trends in research and offer the basic groundwork for future
studies. We identify what research has been conducted; what research
questions have been asked, and which have been answered and which remain
unanswered; and what theories and methodologies have been employed to
study Wikipedia. This protocol follows the systematic literature review
methodology to conduct a systematic mapping study. The review process is
work in progress, and has thus far identified over 2,000 studies.

This working paper is a rough first draft combining three different
working papers by the authors. In its current form, it mainly serves as a
placeholder to provide a source for attribution for the website, which
presents the papers analyzed in the systematic part of this review.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 71

Keywords: Wikipedia, systematic literature review, open content, open
knowledge, free cultural works, open source
Working Paper Series

Free download

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2021326

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] The People’s Encyclopedia Under the Gaze of the Sages: A Sys tematic Review of Scholarly Research on Wikipedia

[Fred Bauder]

They have a wiki:

http://wikilit.referata.com/wiki/Main_Page

Fred

> Abstract:
> Wikipedia has become one of the ten most visited sites on the Web, and
> the world’s leading source of Web reference information. Its rapid
> success has inspired hundreds of scholars from various disciplines to
> study its content, communication and community dynamics from various
> perspectives. This article presents a protocol for conducting a
> systematic mapping (a broad-based literature review) of scholarly
> research on Wikipedia. The purpose of this review is to analyze
> particular trends in research and offer the basic groundwork for future
> studies. We identify what research has been conducted; what research
> questions have been asked, and which have been answered and which remain
> unanswered; and what theories and methodologies have been employed to
> study Wikipedia. This protocol follows the systematic literature review
> methodology to conduct a systematic mapping study. The review process is
> work in progress, and has thus far identified over 2,000 studies.
>
> This working paper is a rough first draft combining three different
> working papers by the authors. In its current form, it mainly serves as a
> placeholder to provide a source for attribution for the website, which
> presents the papers analyzed in the systematic part of this review.
>
> Number of Pages in PDF File: 71
>
> Keywords: Wikipedia, systematic literature review, open content, open
> knowledge, free cultural works, open source
> Working Paper Series
>
> Free download
>
> http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2021326
>
> Fred
>
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Plethora of overlapping Categories

[Fred Bauder]

> Hi
>
> I know I am in the wrong place for this. Normally this kind of thing
> would/
> should go on the "discuss" pages, but category discuss pages don't
> attract
> much attention.
>
> If you consult Categories: Sailors/ Navigators/ Explorers, you will see
> that
> quite a number of people are listed in these arguably (or not)
> overlapping
> categories for the same activity/ feat/ achievement.
>
> To put it into perspective, it makes sense to list a person in the
> categories of [[poet]], [[playwright]], etc, but in each of these
> categories
> such people would be different 'personae', with different works that make
> them merit being classified a poet or a playwright.
>
> On the other hand, to list - for example - Henry the Navigator/ Captain
> Cook
> as [[sailor]], [[navigator]], [[explorer]] looks odd as the activity
> undertaken to merit being given that title is only one. This is like
> calling
> a farmer a tiller/ sower/ weeder/ harvester/ etc.
>
> Generally, there is a problem with Categories, as many were created
> without
> any regard to hierarchy - we have examples of names that appear under
> "British explorers" or "15th century explorers", but then they are not
> listed under "explorers".
>
> Any ideas?
>
> Best regards,
>
> Rui
>

The current situation is helpful to the searcher as they need not figure
out, or guess, which Wikipedia has chosen to designate the category.

Fred


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[Foundation-l] It Is not Us

[Fred Bauder]

The web itself is passé

http://www.businessinsider.com/chart-of-the-day-facebook-vs-the-rest-of-the-web-2011-6

Actually, we missed the boat, but that ship sailed long ago.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] It Is not Us

[Fred Bauder]

Facebook, and Twitter, big with Black folk, gives people something they
can relate to. Wikipedia is as dry as reading, or writing, an
encyclopedia.

In a sense they ate our lunch, but millions of Facebook-like user pages
can hardly be justified as a basis for charitable donations.

Fred

> What lovely abuse of statistics!
>
> By showing them indexed to the same scale, it makes it impossible to
> draw the conclusion they try and draw. You need to know the *absolute*
> increase in facebook usage and the *absolute* increase or decline in
> total internet usage. If their numbers are correct, then facebook is
> growing at the expense of the rest of the internet, but without the
> absolute numbers you can't tell if it's doing so to a significant
> extent.
>
> You really need to look at the growth in total internet usage pre- and
> post-facebook as well. I expect the existence of facebook has caused a
> noticeable increase in total internet usage (compared to pre-existing
> trend). It is creating new internet minutes, not stealing them from
> other sites.
>
> You should probably also look at Facebook's direct competitors. For
> example, usage of MySpace has declined enormously - a lot of
> Facebook's growth may have come from that decline. The article
> suggests Facebook is hurting the rest of the internet, but if it's
> really only hurting other social networking sites, then there is
> nothing to worry about.
>
> The most important data for us to look at is here:
> http://stats.wikimedia.org/EN/TablesPageViewsMonthlyAllProjects.htm.
> While that does show a year-on-year decline, that actually because of
> a spike a year ago (I don't know why). If you smooth things out a bit,
> we are seeing growth (albeit fairly low growth). What the rest of the
> internet is doing isn't really important.
>
>
>
> On 25 June 2011 15:03, Fred Bauder  wrote:
>> The web itself is passé
>>
>> http://www.businessinsider.com/chart-of-the-day-facebook-vs-the-rest-of-the-web-2011-6
>>
>> Actually, we missed the boat, but that ship sailed long ago.
>>
>> Fred
>>
>>
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Re: [Foundation-l] It Is not Us

[Fred Bauder]

> Hoi,
> I have read the replies that are against social networking functionality.
> In
> my opinion you are all missing the point. Our projects are crowd sourced
> projects and we do not support collaboration, we do not support special
> projects. We need to.
>
> Social networking in our context will not be a Facebook, a Twitter or an
> IRC. It will have the parts that we need and it will support our
> activities.
> Thanks,
>  GerardM

I always go back to the userbox controversy when I think about this. What
would we look like if we had not only embraced userboxes but created a
complex system of user categories based on them?

Fred


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[Foundation-l] Façonnable USA Corp. v. John Does 1-10

[Fred Bauder]

The progress of Façonnable USA Corp. v. John Does 1-10 a U.S. District
Court for the District of Colorado case which concerns editing of the
article Façonnable can be followed at

http://www.citmedialaw.org/threats/fa%C3%A7onnable-usa-corp-v-john-does-1-10#description

The edits complained of, made by similar ip addresses in the spring of
2011, have been suppressed as potentially libelous and the page
semi-protected, but a screenshot of a version of the article during this
period is included as Exhibit A in the pleadings.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] Call for referendum

[Fred Bauder]

> On 30 June 2011 12:31, Alec Conroy  wrote:
>
>> The further we can get away from the model of elementary schools and
>> towards the model of the global universities, the better.
>
>
> +1
>
> (This entire post is gold.)
>
> One *big* problem we have now is: Wikipedia has won. Wikipedia is the
> encyclopedia anyone actually consults, ever. Wikipedia now defines
> what an "encyclopedia" is in popular conception.

We are actually affecting the English language at this point through the
choices we make for our article titles.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] It Is not Us

[Fred Bauder]

>> Of course, that could either help or hinder, with no way to
>> know for sure in advance; perhaps encouraging more social interaction
>> would exacerbate and personalize the disputes and conflicts that drive
>> people away.
>>
>
>>From my perspective, this is exactly what is happening. Too many people
> want to be in the focus of attraction, and too many are doing politics
> instead of writing an encyclopaedia.
>
> Cheers
> Yaroslav

Yes, that was the thinking behind suppression of full development of
userboxes. Probably wise. But it still leaves us with underground
movements, some with governments behind them--Turkey China Israel and
doubtless more. And there are the professional, and amateur, public
relations people promoting commercial and religious products.

Actually, it is a miracle we do as well as we do.

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] It Is not Us

[Fred Bauder]

I think people should be more flexible in their postings. It is OK to
write a message in Japanese and also in not quite perfect, or even rather
poor English. Send both. And if there is no English just use Japanese,
even on this list. We can all go to Google translate and see more or less
what it says. The world is moving simultaneously in two directions:
English as lingua franca and towards mulilingualism.

I have no real hope of learning Japanese, but if someone is young and
spending a lot of time on a multilingual site they are going to learn
other languages naturally. People can be very fluent in their native
language. There is no reason they should not use it and say exactly what
they mean.

Fred

> Well, respectfully I disagree, Gerard, on your view, or analysis of
> the stats. Edit is used vague on our community: from writing a FA
> almost alone to doing a WiiGnome task. We need both, but those two
> activities require not a same amount of communication skills as well
> involvement to wiki editing commuity lives.
>
> We have a certain number of people who edit several languages. I edit
> English Wikiquote and Japanese (even most of those edits are on talks
> or project name spaces). I know some translators who edit several
> languages - but I'm not sure we assure every those "multilingual"
> editors edit main namespace of each projects mainly. I was honored to
> be called Aphaia on all wikis once by a certain editor who visited
> #wikipedia.ja, but it didn't mean I was then active as writer of
> articles - rather it may have meant I created interlang links
> aggressively.
>
> So I'd like to ask in which way we keep and assure our community as
> multilingual? Honestly I have been thinking this for years seriously.
> Even on meta, it was not once I was accused just because I left a note
> in Japanese - when I had a hardship to express my opinion enough in
> English. I remember still how I was accused then - I was accused
> because I didn't write in English "the language everyone can read".
>
> How then can such a community multilingual? Or in other words, what
> have we been doing for making our community multilingual? We have
> devout translators - and always I thank them and feel honored to
> collaborate with them,  but, or because I have been working with them,
> I feel we need more other ways to assure and empower multilingual
> aspects of our Wikimedia community.
>
> Cheers,
>
> On Wed, Jun 29, 2011 at 3:37 PM, Gerard Meijssen
>  wrote:
>> Hoi,
>> Recently research showed that the majority of our editors is multi
>> lingual
>> and edits on multiple projects. This is without considering Commons ...
>> I
>> have a user on 491 projects and I am certainly not the only one who has
>> many
>> many profiles.
>>
>> As we did not know the extend to which we generally edit in many
>> languages,
>> we have not considered the needs of this majority. Our view has always
>> been
>> on single projects. We can do better and we should do better for our
>> majority.
>> Thanks,
>>  GerardM
>>
>> http://ultimategerardm.blogspot.com/2011/06/in-defence-of-social-networks-ii.html
>>
>> On 28 June 2011 13:27, Peter Coombe  wrote:
>>
>>> On 28 June 2011 08:35, Gerard Meijssen 
>>> wrote:
>>> > Hoi,
>>> > I have read the replies that are against social networking
>>> functionality.
>>> In
>>> > my opinion you are all missing the point. Our projects are crowd
>>> sourced
>>> > projects and we do not support collaboration, we do not support
>>> special
>>> > projects. We need to.
>>>
>>> Yeah! Special projects with a narrower focus would be great, how about
>>> giving them a catchy name like "WikiProjects". Maybe we could give
>>> every article a "talk page" for users to collaborate on. Heck, let's
>>> go mad and give users their own talk pages too! Now if only there was
>>> some protocol for real time chats we could use...
>>>
>>> > Social networking in our context will not be a Facebook, a Twitter
>>> or an
>>> > IRC. It will have the parts that we need and it will support our
>>> activities.
>>> > Thanks,
>>>
>>> I'm all for improving the interface around these things, but exactly
>>> what functionality are you asking for that we don't already have?
>>>
>>> Pete / the wub
>>>
>>>
>>> > On 27 June 2011 18:24, Nathan  wrote:
>>> >
>>> >> On Mon, Jun 27, 2011 at 11:43 AM, Gerard Meijssen
>>> >>  wrote:
>>> >> > Hoi.
>>> >> > Wikipedia should be more like a social network. It provides us
>>> with
>>> the
>>> >> > opportunity to reach out to people when we want to crowd source
>>> some
>>> >> > activity. We have a problem in retaining people particular
>>> newbies.
>>> When
>>> >> we
>>> >> > show a social side to our work on open content (not only
>>> encyclopaedic
>>> >> > content) we stand a better chance we are likely to do better.
>>> >> > Thanks,
>>> >> > GerardM
>>> >>
>>> >> That's an interesting theory. Wikipedia is sort of the epitome of a
>>> >> social enterprise, and all of the good and the bad in the proje

Re: [Foundation-l] Merge wikis

[Fred Bauder]

> One thing I find irritating and complex about our structure is the
> proliferation of small wikis. Now I've no objection to the idea that
> we have a wiki for every language on Earth, though where languages are
> mutually intelligible such as the major dialects of English  it seems
> sensible to me that we combine them in one wiki - if necessary with
> spelling and alphabet being subject to user preference.
>
> But I see no reason why ten wiki, Strategy and the various wikimanias
> each need their own wiki as opposed to being projects within meta.
>
> On a broader and more radical note, why do we need separate wikis for
> wikiquote, wikiversity, wikipedia wikinews and wiktionary? Surely each
> of those could be separate namespaces within a language wiki?
>
> This would make it much easier when people create an article on
> wikipedia that is really a wiktionary or wikinews article as one could
> just move it. It would immediately reduce the number of userpages,
> watchlists and usertalk pages that one needed to maintain to one per
> language (plus meta and commons). It would also foster cooperation
> between editors across what are currently different projects if you
> had one wiki for each language, as individual wikiprojects would now
> work across what are currently quite separate  news, quote and pedia
> projects.
>
> WereSpielChequers

Sometimes templates used on different wikis can be incompatible.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] Fwd: wikiEducation: The Classroom Wikipedia

[Fred Bauder]

We should do this before some aggressive outfit like Wikinfo jumps in...
It wouldn't be an anyone can edit wiki. Only authorized student accounts
could edit. It would be a teaching tool.

Fred

> Forwarded to the list on behalf of a non-member.
>
> -- Forwarded message --
> From: Jacob Franklin 
> Date: Thu, Jun 30, 2011 at 7:39 PM
> Subject: wikiEducation: The Classroom Wikipedia
> To: foundation-l-ow...@lists.wikimedia.org
>
>
> Dear WikiMedia,
> In recent weeks I have been reading about the work of your
> foundation and all of the wikipages you have created. The scope of
> your organization is vast, along with the amount of people who use its
> tools. I believe that this incredible reach gives you a wonderful
> opportunity to positively affect the lives of many people.
>
> My name is Jake Franklin and I am an educator. I graduated from
> Colby College with a degree in Philosophy in 2008. Since then I have
> been teaching English in Shenyang, China and studying Chinese. Next
> year I am planning to return to the US to go to graduate school for a
> Masters in Educational Policy or International Education. I am
> extremely passionate about improving the educational opportunities,
> tools, and resources for all students. I believe that giving all
> students access to quality education both enriches their educational
> experience and provides them with a strong foundation to build towards
> a better future.
>
>It is because of this dedication to the enrichment of education
> that I wish to develop a relationship with your foundation. I have an
> idea that I am passionate about and dedicated to and am writing this
> email to introduce it to you.
>
>  The basic idea is to create a version of wikipedia that is
> exclusively written and edited by students. It is called
> wikiEducation. There is one site for each grade level, and teachers
> can sign up their classes to be writers and editors. The site grows
> through students submitting their work as wikiEducation articles,
> which are then edited by other students. By pairing collective
> responsibility and a published presence, wikiEducation gives both
> writers and editors a sense of achievement, a feeling of
> responsibility and a relationship with each other that would be absent
> without this tool. Moreover giving students ownership of the
> information on the site motivates them to develop more intimate and
> long-lasting relationships with the material.
>
>  I think the idea would work best if implemented through the
> Wikimedia Foundation and therefore have come to you first. I think
> that you have the people and experience to build the site in the best
> possible way. I would like to work with you to bring this idea to
> fruition. I don’t have the technical know-how to build a website but I
> do have the desire, drive and experience to bridge the gap between the
> technical aspects of website building and the creation of an effective
> teaching tool. WikiEducation’s success depends on teacher use. I can
> work with the teachers and the builders to create a highly functional
> website that teachers will enjoy using.
>
>The detailed business plan includes; a more detailed description
> of
> the site, information about the site’s special features, market
> analysis, and potential problems along with suggested solutions.
> Please let me know whom I should send the plan to, and how I can
> continue to play a role in its creation.
>
>Sincerely,
>Jake Franklin
>Email: jake.frankl...@gmail.com
>Skype: jakefranklin2
>
>
>
>
> --
> [[User:Ral315]]
> ___
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Re: [Foundation-l] Fwd: wikiEducation: The Classroom Wikipedia

[Fred Bauder]

> On Sat, 2 Jul 2011 13:49:58 -0600 (MDT), "Fred Bauder"
>  wrote:
>> We should do this before some aggressive outfit like Wikinfo jumps
>> in...
>> It wouldn't be an anyone can edit wiki. Only authorized student
>> accounts
>> could edit. It would be a teaching tool.
>>
>> Fred
>
> To do this is not a big deal, but it would only have an added value for
> us
> if the result could be somehow merged into Wikipedia once the assessment
> has been completed. It is not difficult to organize, but it requires some
> preliminary planning (only articles absent in Wikipedia would be
> assigned?
> What if they did not exist at the time of the assignment but were created
> before the assessment? Who will merge? etc).
>
> Cheers
> Yaroslav

I'm not quite sure what Jacob Franklin has in mind, but I remember once
an elementary school class edited the article "Bear". It was a really
good exercise. This was in the early days, and they were pretty much
starting from scratch. I'm sure none of it remains, it was done in the
way elementary school children do. The added value is educational. We are
a non-profit charity. I can sell this to the University of North
Carolina, ibiblio, in a heartbeat.

It would not be merged. It would be the collaborative product of say 6th
graders. It could get better and better, but would always be limited by
that horizon. And you could always start over, although that will
eventually become a sterile exercise for common topics.

One of the advantages is that you can pick whatever topic the students
are exercised over. I know when I was a kid Peanuts, the comic strip, or
George Gobel, the comedian, would have generated major enthusiasm. Today
that might be Lady Gaga.

A package might be developed that could be installed at each
participating school and become a regular part of learning to write
collaboratively.

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] Fwd: wikiEducation: The Classroom Wikipedia

[Fred Bauder]

> Hi,
>
> On Sun, Jul 03, 2011 at 12:14:39AM +0400, Yaroslav M. Blanter wrote:
>> On Sat, 2 Jul 2011 13:49:58 -0600 (MDT), "Fred Bauder"
>>  wrote:
>> > We should do this before some aggressive outfit like Wikinfo jumps
>> in...
>> > It wouldn't be an anyone can edit wiki. Only authorized student
>> accounts
>> > could edit. It would be a teaching tool.
>>
>> To do this is not a big deal, but it would only have an added value for
>> us
>> if the result could be somehow merged into Wikipedia once the
>> assessment
>> has been completed. It is not difficult to organize, but it requires
>> some
>> preliminary planning (only articles absent in Wikipedia would be
>> assigned?
>> What if they did not exist at the time of the assignment but were
>> created
>> before the assessment? Who will merge? etc).
>
> Sorry to dampen things, but as we're proposing "what if"s, what if some
> of Wikipedia's material was copied to it and it just became a kind of
> duplicate of Wikipedia run, as proposed, by the WMF?  There would be
> admins etc, but
> run by students for students: that's not always a good thing.  With
> regard to what you said about maybe only articles absent in Wikipedia
> would be
> assigned, that's a good idea (it avoids the direct "what if" mentioned
> above),
> but an assignment you can't straight to a Wikipedia article for
> information but actually have to go browsing the web for?  That would
> horrify many students I know.  ;-)
>
> It's definitely a good idea though, I'm not disputing that.  I'd
> certainly get involved!
>
> Disclaimer: I am a student.  :-)
>
> Isabell.
>

3rd grade, or post-graduate? Well, the existence of a Wikipedia article
on almost any subject is always going to be there, no matter what kind of
writing exercise students participate in. Great assignments will be about
subjects our regular editors don't have much interest in but students do,
ephemeral, topical subjects.

Copying from or using Wikipedia, or any other encyclopedia, as a source
would diminish rather than increase evaluation of work; that is pretty
much standard practice anyway.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] Fwd: wikiEducation: The Classroom Wikipedia

[Fred Bauder]

> Hi,
>
> On 2 July 2011 23:28, Fred Bauder  wrote:
>> On 2 July 2011 23:16, Isabell Long  wrote:
>>>
>>> Sorry to dampen things, but as we're proposing "what if"s, what if
>>> some
>>> of Wikipedia's material was copied to it and it just became a kind of
>>> duplicate of Wikipedia run, as proposed, by the WMF?  There would be
>>> admins etc, but
>>> run by students for students: that's not always a good thing.  With
>>> regard to what you said about maybe only articles absent in Wikipedia
>>> would be
>>> assigned, that's a good idea (it avoids the direct "what if" mentioned
>>> above),
>>> but an assignment you can't straight to a Wikipedia article for
>>> information but actually have to go browsing the web for?  That would
>>> horrify many students I know.  ;-)
>
> Let's try part of the second-to-last sentence again: "... an
> assignment on a subject you can't go straight to a Wikipedia article
> for information on...".

That gets hard, probably beyond what a school teacher can do, or get away
with. We have areas in Wikipedia that are not covered, sometimes not even
minimally, because they are not part of the canon of knowledge. Any
school teacher, indeed any Wikipedia editor, who ventures into such
territory aggressively can expect serious trouble.

For example, the Great Recession, an article deleted on Wikipedia. The
article is about the current economic malaise and the fact that there
seems to be no way out. Essentially the collapse of capitalism, and for
the exact reasons Marx predicted, concentration of capital and falling
rate of profit.

A decent assignment for a post-graduate seminar, as would be a creative
exercise about how and why the Chinese dictatorship will collapse. Might
be nice for a Harvard class with a few little princes enrolled.

>
>> 3rd grade, or post-graduate?
>
> That's another question I meant to ask: what are we defining "students"
> as here?
>

Jake Franklin was breaking it down by grade level. And that makes some
sense, although it would probably work best for kids of any level who are
really into it. Wikipedia would be a grim business if you were forced to
do it. Perhaps from 3rd grade or so to post-graduate level with layers.
So maybe 6 English language wikis, closed to all but enrolled students,
although it is ideal for home schooling.

>> Well, the existence of a Wikipedia article
>> on almost any subject is always going to be there, no matter what kind
>> of
>> writing exercise students participate in. Great assignments will be
>> about
>> subjects our regular editors don't have much interest in but students
>> do,
>> ephemeral, topical subjects.
>
> Ah, right.  Like the example you used earlier: an article on Lady Gaga.
> :-)

Except that we have pretty much exhausted that subject. There are things
children are interested in are under Wikipedia's radar.

>
>> Copying from or using Wikipedia, or any other encyclopedia, as a source
>> would diminish rather than increase evaluation of work; that is pretty
>> much standard practice anyway.
>
> That's very true.  This question delves a bit into the specifics and
> "rules" of running such a project, but would that then get put onto
> the Wiki (going back to my "what if" in my previous email...), would
> the student be asked to re-do it, or would all of this be at the
> discretion of the supervising teacher?  I assume the latter, but we
> don't have to delve into the specifics at this time of night.  :-)
>
> Isabell.
>

Re-do by command would be grim. I think learning and creativity would be
maximized by evaluation of the best work done of the student's choosing.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] Merge wikis

[Fred Bauder]

> On Fri, Jul 1, 2011 at 3:34 PM, . Courcelles
> wrote:
>
>> I couldn't agree more, now that the date has passed, so should
>> ten.wikipedia.  Outreach and Strategy have a mission, but nothing so
>> distinct that it would be out of scope on Meta, and combining those
>> three
>> projects would reduce the overhead in time and process required to
>> maintain
>> all three/four wikis.
>>
>
> Just to speak about tenwiki...
>
> There has been an open discussion since March (no rush to close) about
> what
> to do with the site.[1] You're all welcome to participate in that if you
> have an opinion about what to do.
>
> That discussion was interesting for this one, because it brings up issues
> such as that merging even a relatively small wiki like ten (565 content
> pages, 3,204 total pages) into Meta would probably take some considerable
> work.
>
> Best regards,
>
> Steven

How about making it read only and just leave it as an archive?

Fred


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[Foundation-l] Lessons from Wikipedia

[Fred Bauder]

http://therexpedition.com/?p=59


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[Foundation-l] They do make or break reputations

[Fred Bauder]

Speaking of the British tabloids, of course.

https://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/10/world/europe/10britain.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=globasasa2

The lesson for us is to not take a leading position, be topical, but to
report events which have occurred and on which there is some sort of
considered opinion and a set of known facts, even if it takes a day or
two for them to develop. In the case of these tabloids its going to take
months.

The power of topical media is two-edged, seemingly exceedingly powerful,
king-makers, but, as anyone familiar with our limited resources knows,
quite weak if under serious attack, as is being shown in the case of the
principals involved in this crisis. The British government is sick of
kowtowing to them and seems to have just been waiting for an opportunity.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] They do make or break reputations

[Fred Bauder]

> If only I could be so sanguine; I cannot disagree with Fred's first
> paragraph, but as regards his second I must take issue. For a start,
> current
> events should be covered by Wikinews, and subsequent *encyclopedic"
> treatment of those events be dealt with in analytic terms and in
> retrospect,
> by Wikipedia. That is why we have two projects, and not one. As regards
> the
> stance of the British government towards the media in this case, and in
> previous cases, it's clear to me that there is a dislocation between the
> two- and in my experience, the government has long since lost the support
> of
> the media, except in most general terms, and that is why we have the term
> "spin-doctor". It's a two-way process, and not a new one, and where I am,
> I
> cannot see any way in which the division of reponsibility to the citizen
> is
> to be resolved. TBH, the relationship between politicians and the media,
> and
> both of them have their suspect agendas, is always going to be
> problematic,
> and all we should do as documenters of what happens is to perhaps stand
> back
> for a while, and when the dust has settled,
>
> WRITE A FUCKING ENCYCLOPEDIA!
>
> Why is that a problem?

Most of us have agendas, and this is the only major outlet most of us
have access to.

Fred

>
> Fred Bauder wrote:
>> Speaking of the British tabloids, of course.
>>
>> https://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/10/world/europe/10britain.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=globasasa2
>>
>> The lesson for us is to not take a leading position, be topical, but
>> to report events which have occurred and on which there is some sort
>> of considered opinion and a set of known facts, even if it takes a
>> day or two for them to develop. In the case of these tabloids its
>> going to take months.
>>
>> The power of topical media is two-edged, seemingly exceedingly
>> powerful, king-makers, but, as anyone familiar with our limited
>> resources knows, quite weak if under serious attack, as is being
>> shown in the case of the principals involved in this crisis. The
>> British government is sick of kowtowing to them and seems to have
>> just been waiting for an opportunity.
>>
>> Fred
>>
>>
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Re: [Foundation-l] They do make or break reputations

[Fred Bauder]

>>> Most of us have agendas, and this is the only major outlet most of us
>>> have access to.
>
> As a sort of aside--  everyone comes with agendas, and sometimes
> people act neutrally, sometimes people act like advocates for their
> agenda.
>
> I've always wondered if we couldn't "peel off' the people who advocate
> by inviting them to participate in "Something Else"-- some designated
> "advocate/argument/debate" project.   Something by advocates for
> advocates of advocates. Some people genuinely like to argue, and
> unfortunately, one of the best venues for argument are WP article edit
> summaries and talk pages.
>
> Right now, we only have neutral-style projects... this gives
> 'advocates' no one specific place to advocate their agendas, and this
> invites them to just 'advocate' in what should be neutral space.
>
> If we had some roped off "Advocacy and Argument zone", that _might_
> peel away the good faith people who want to make sure their point of
> view is heard, but are willing to honestly label their point of view
> as biased or non-neutral.
>
> It won't stop edit wars, but it might reduce their frequency and
> intensity.
> Alec

You can always make Wikinfo a sister project.

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] They do make or break reputations

[Fred Bauder]

Regarding external links to videos:

> Perhaps an on-wiki discussion is the way to progress this.
> Tom

Where is that policy and discussion?

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] roadmap for WM affiliation ; a name for self-identified affiliation

[Fred Bauder]

I'm open to negotiations, on behalf of Wikinfo, for the friendliest
possible cooperative relationship. However, the more relaxed editing
atmosphere, the exclusion of nasty editing behavior, and exploration of
alternate points of view are not negotiable.

Fred Bauder

> I had the same interpretation as Ziko.  Affiliate sites, in Alec's
> language, want to indicate they share Wikimedian ideals.
> Few such sites would want to become a Wikimedia-hosted project.
>
> SJ
>
>
> On Wed, Jul 13, 2011 at 7:03 AM, Ziko van Dijk 
> wrote:
>> Hello,
>>
>> If I understand Alec right he wants a model wherein a project like
>> WikiSomething can declare itself affiliated with Wikimedia:
>> "We need a name for self-identified project affiliation. External
>> projects needs to be able to claim, on their own initiative, that they
>> are "part of" something."
>> Of course, WikiSomething can say on its website "We like Wikimedia and
>> share its goals", but the wording must not give the impression that
>> there is an official link between both.
>> The problem is that we don't want that anybody can decorate himself
>> with the Wikimedia trademark and maybe abuse it. There must be an
>> official recognition anyway from Wikimedia Foundation.
>>
>> Kind regards
>> Ziko van Dijk
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> 2011/7/13 Lodewijk :
>>> I am not sure if this is about the same thing. I read Alec's questions
>>> as
>>> being about content projects that want to affiliate themselves with
>>> Wikimedia - want to become the new Wikimedia project. I know that in
>>> the
>>> past this question has lived for example with OmegaWiki/WiktionaryZ .
>>> SJ,
>>> would you consider this to be similar to Wikimedian groups who want to
>>> have
>>> a slightly more formal relationship with the Movement?
>>>
>>> Lodewijk
>>>
>>> 2011/7/13 Samuel Klein 
>>>
>>>> We're discussing setting up an "Affiliation committee" to oversee
>>>> simple, low-overhead wikimedia affiliates and associations.  These
>>>> could be organizations 'under the umbrella' of free knowledge --
>>>> requiring just basic review of their work and standards to confirm
>>>> they are in line with our basic principles.  [1]
>>>>
>>>> Wikimedia Associations could be individual wikiprojects, clubs, or
>>>> meetups run by one or more people that want to establish a lasting
>>>> identity as part of the movement.
>>>>
>>>> Third-party wikis and larger groups could be Wikimedia Affiliates.
>>>>
>>>> Both could use web-badges and icons to identify them with the
>>>> movement
>>>> (derived from the WM community logo?).
>>>>
>>>> SJ
>>>>
>>>> [1]
>>>> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Movement_roles_project/New_group_models
>>>>
>>>> On Tue, Jul 12, 2011 at 8:32 PM, Alec Conroy 
>>>> wrote:
>>>> > Prompted by discussions in another thread, I ask a related
>>>> question--
>>>> >
>>>> > ;1--  A roadmap towards affiliation
>>>> >
>>>> > How should a currently-unaffiliated project go about becoming 'part
>>>> > of' Wikimedia?
>>>> >
>>>> > One easy step they could take would be to simply  say, on their
>>>> > website, "This site considers itself to be part of the Wikimedia
>>>> > Movement".   (alternate text welcome )
>>>> >
>>>> > Later, a self-identified affiliate could be formally designated as
>>>> > "part of the Wikimedia Movement" by the global community or the
>>>> > foundation or both.
>>>> >
>>>> > Such recognition would have lots of benefits for the new projects
>>>> that
>>>> > share our values-- other WM projects would know to visibly link to
>>>> > them whenever they have relevant content (as we currently do across
>>>> > WMF projects).  We could permit access to the unified login, we
>>>> could
>>>> > allow template-sharing or image-sharing.  We could set up
>>>> > interwiki-linking, and other interoperability functions.
>>>> >
>>>> > Such recognition would have even bigger benefits for us.   We could
>>>> > get an affiliation w

Re: [Foundation-l] They do make or break reputations

[Fred Bauder]

There are practices which are beyond the pale, for example, linking to a
pirated copy of the latest Harry Potter movie. Linking to the typical
YouTube video of unknown provenance is quite another matter; although it
is quite true that in both cases there may be a technical copyright
violation. In the second case, there is usually no one complaining. When
there are complaints YouTube takes the material down. The copyright
police demand proof of ownership and either expiration or release in
instances where such information is unavailable. That may be what is
required if we are to host the material, but might be unreasonable for
mere linking.

Fred

> I agree 100% with this.
> Some people on Wikimedia want to enforce copyright much beyond what is
> reasonable.
> This is hurt us, and is outside of our mission.
>
> Yann
>
> 2011/7/13 Wjhonson :
>>
>> Links by themselves are not copyrightable, and are not unfree.
>> So your argument, which you keep repeating is not germane to this
>> point.
>> The point is, the copyright police have taken a fear (of something
>> which has never occurred in actual law), and made it a point of battle.
>>
>> We are arbiters of information content, should not be acting as the
>> police and judge over what is on YouTube.
>> We cannot know is something loaded is under copyright or not and should
>> not be attempting to know.
>> It's none of our business.
>> Our business should be merely to decide what is useful for our project.
>>
>> The links themselves, I repeat, are free.  The point of contention is
>> whether a link by itself IS a copyright violation.
>> And on the presumption that it MIGHT be (which is itself ridiculous)
>> our project suffers immense harm by a handful of u persons.
>>
>> All that is beside the point, my point, which is that a link cannot be
>> a copyright violation, and cannot be licensed.
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Re Greg Kohs

[Fred Bauder]

As they say, He is dead to me.

Fred

> If anyone thinks The Kohser is just a maverick who asks awkward
> questions, and rather more relevantly did some sockpuppetry and ran a
> breaching experiment doing "unhelpful" edits to unwatched articles,
> please read the thread at
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Stewards/elections_2010/Questions#Thekohser
>
> I have no problem with former vandals returning, one of the attendees
> at our last London meetup started their wiki career winning a contest
> amongst their schoolmates by doing 47 vandalisms before being blocked.
>
> But before considering the return of thekohser I would like a better
> answer to the question I posed to him last year:
>
>>There's a lot of discussion on EN wiki about the compromised admin
>> account that recently came into your possession. >Would you be willing
>> to tell a check user whether you acquired it by purchasing it or by
>> compromising it, and if you >purchased it who you purchased it from, and
>> if you compromised it how you did so?
>
> Tolerance of dissent and forgiveness for former miscreants are both
> important feature of our community, but just occasionally it makes
> sense to ban people. I'd be opposed to Greg Kohs returning unless I
> had assurance that he'd fully explained to our checkusers how he
> obtained that compromised admin account, and some assurance that he
> was unlikely to doing anything similar again.
>
> Regards
>
> WereSpielChequerss
>
> On 23 July 2011 19:01,   wrote:
>> Send foundation-l mailing list submissions to
>>        foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org
>>
>> To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit
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>>
>> When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
>> than "Re: Contents of foundation-l digest..."
>>
>>
>> Today's Topics:
>>
>>   1. Re: Greg Kohs and Peter Damian (Mike Dupont)
>>   2. Re: Greg Kohs and Peter Damian (Huib Laurens)
>>   3. Re: Greg Kohs and Peter Damian (Andre Engels)
>>   4. Re: Greg Kohs and Peter Damian (Mike Dupont)
>>
>>
>> --
>>
>> Message: 1
>> Date: Sat, 23 Jul 2011 19:17:50 +0200
>> From: Mike  Dupont 
>> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Greg Kohs and Peter Damian
>> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
>>        
>> Message-ID:
>>      
>>  
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
>>
>> It looks like my message here was truncated from the mailing list
>> archive,
>> so I am reposting it.
>> http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/foundation-l/2010-October/061709.html
>>
>> Mr Kohs pointed this out here :
>> http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=34460
>> thanks,
>> mike
>> --- Original Text --
>>
>> Hello,
>>
>> >From what I have seen about Greg Kohs is that he does have some
>> interesting points to make, but I do see that he is jumping to
>> conclusions and does seem to have a biased viewpoint.
>>
>> People want to make their own decisions and have enough information to
>> do that. We don't want to have important information deleted away
>> because it is uncomfortable.
>>
>> Banning him makes it less likely for him to be heard, and these
>> interesting points which are worth considering are not heard my many
>> people : this is depriving people of critical information, that is not
>> fair to the people involved.
>>
>> Just look at this article for example, it is quite interesting and
>> well written, and why should it not be visible to everyone on the
>> list.
>>
>> http://www.examiner.com/wiki-edits-in-national/wikimedia-foundation-director-admits-to-sweetheart-contracts
>>
>> Deleting and banning people who say things that are not comfortable,
>> that does make you look balanced and trustworthy.
>>
>> The Wikimedia foundation should be able to stand up to such
>> accusations without resorting to gagging people, it just gives more
>> credit to the people being gagged and makes people wonder if there is
>> any merit in what they say.
>>
>> This brings up my favorite subject of unneeded deletions versions
>> needed
>> ones.
>>
>> Of course there is material that should be deleted that is hateful,
>> Spam etc, lets call that evil content.
>>
>> But the articles that i wrote and my friends wrote that were deleted
>> did not fall into that category, they might have been just bad or not
>> notable.
>>
>> We have had a constant struggle to keep our articles from being
>> deleted in a manner that we consider unfair. Additionally, the bad
>> content is lost and falls into the same category as evil content.
>>
>> Also there should be more transparency on deleted material on the
>> Wikipedia itself, there is a lot of information that is being dele

Re: [Foundation-l] Greg Kohs and Peter Damian

[Fred Bauder]

> As someone said previously, the mailing software truncates stuff after
> the
> word "From", if it begins a sentence, probably because it thinks that's
> part
> of the mail header.  No conspiracy or cloak and dagger stuff, just a bug
> that probably ought to be looked at.
>
> I'd take this opportunity to ask if there's any other background to what
> Kohs is talking about there.  I know that he twists stuff and he's an
> expert
> at making himself look the victim, but I've seen that particular story a
> couple of times and the way he was quickly kicked from IRC does look
> pretty
> bad.  What, if anything, is he omitting from the story?
>
> Cheers,
> Craig Franklin

He wanted to make a business of writing ads (articles with a favorable
point of view) on Wikipedia for commercial clients, and to a certain
extent, has.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] Greg Kohs and Peter Damian

[Fred Bauder]

>
>
>
> Although he reneged on his offer to buy
>
> http://knol.google.com/k/bose-201-series-ii-direct-reflecting-bookshelf-speakers#
> The Speakers Which Almost Destroyed Knol
>
> I as well as others support welcoming Kohs back to this list by unbanning
> him.
>
> I agree with the sentiment that the ban was over reaching and
> inappropriate.
>
> Will Johnson

He has a long track record of trashing any limit of constructiveness or
civility set. Kind of like inviting an alligator to a birthday party.

Fred



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Re: [Foundation-l] Greg Kohs and Peter Damian

[Fred Bauder]

>
>  Well maybe you can point out what exactly he did to get himself banned
> from this list?
> When it occurred I also had the same reaction that I still have.  It
> didn't make sense to me.
> It still doesn't.  His presence here was not disruptive to me.

It disrupted discussions about the Wikimedia Foundation, the purpose of
the list.

Fred

>
> -Original Message-
> From: Fred Bauder 
> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List 
> Sent: Sun, Jul 24, 2011 2:00 pm
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Greg Kohs and Peter Damian
>
>
>>
>>
>>
>> Although he reneged on his offer to buy
>>
>> http://knol.google.com/k/bose-201-series-ii-direct-reflecting-bookshelf-speakers#
>> The Speakers Which Almost Destroyed Knol
>>
>> I as well as others support welcoming Kohs back to this list by
>> unbanning
>> him.
>>
>> I agree with the sentiment that the ban was over reaching and
>> inappropriate.
>>
>> Will Johnson
>
> He has a long track record of trashing any limit of constructiveness or
> civility set. Kind of like inviting an alligator to a birthday party.
>
> Fred
>
>
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] We need to make it easy to fork and leave

[Fred Bauder]

> On 15/08/11 16:30, David Gerard wrote:
>> 2011/8/15 David Richfield :
>>> It's not just financial collapse.  When Sun was acquired by Oracle and
>>> they started messing about with OpenOffice, it was not hard to fork
>>> the project - take the codebase and run with it.  It's not that easy
>>> for Wikipedia, and we want to make sure that it remains doable, or
>>> else the Foundation has too much power over the content community.
>>> Let me make it clear that I currently am happy with the Foundation,
>>> and don't see a fork as necessary.  If the community has a problem
>>> with the board at any point, we can elect a new one.  If things
>>> change, however, and it becomes clear that the project is being
>>> jeopardised by the management, we need a plan C.
>>
>>
>> Pretty much. It's not urgent - I do understand we're chronically
>> underresourced - but I think it's fairly obvious it's a Right Thing,
>> and at the very least something to keep in the back of one's mind.
>
> So you're worried about a policy change? What sort of policy change
> specifically would necessitate forking the project? Is there any such
> policy change which could plausibly be implemented by the Foundation
> while it remains a charity?
>
> I'm just trying to evaluate the scale of the risk here. The amount of
> resources that we need to spend on this should be proportional to the
> risk.
>
> -- Tim Starling

That technical staff have effective power to decide whether a fork is
justified is reason enough.

Fred Bauder



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Re: [Foundation-l] We need to make it easy to fork and leave

[Fred Bauder]

treating Group POV as Neutral POV.

> Ray

Bingo

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] We need to make it easy to fork and leave

[Fred Bauder]

> I'm sure I
> could easily fork enwp with just one machine, and handle a few hundred
> visitors a day, or even in an hour. I believe Fred Bauder have made a
> fork of a kind (yes I know it used a different method) and I guess he
> do see the traffic stats and resource requirements to do that. ;-)


>  byte-byte,
>     grin

Some of Wikinfo's technical problems at ibiblio result from being on a
shared server, less than one server. I'm pretty sure one small server
would handle a full fledged setup. If there is high traffic there is high
potential for donations.

Fred


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Re: [Foundation-l] To make it easy to fork and leave

[Fred Bauder]

> Yes, leave and forking is our main problem. Sure. I think that to make
> easy
> to fork will be something like to show the exit way to some people
> well,
> let me think one minuteYes! excelent!
>
> 2011/8/15 Tom Morris 

Oh, but we leave, and stay.

Fred


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