Re: [WikiEN-l] Regarding Berkman/Sciences Po study
On 10 December 2011 11:38, James Farrar james.far...@gmail.com wrote: Here's the thing. Banner adverts are bad. Sometimes they're necessary (the fundraiser being the most obvious example, but other get involved with Wikipedia/WMF/chapters stuff qualifies) - but when they're not, they shouldn't be tolerated. Recruiting for a third party's research project is advertising. [[WP:PROMOTION]] (point 1) is very clear on the matter: it is not appropriate. On Dec 10, 2011 3:50 AM, Dario Taraborelli dtarabore...@wikimedia.org wrote: [deleted because apparently my little text added at the top when I posted from my phone pushed the message over the list's pathetically small limit. That was 24 hours ago; apologies for the delay, I couldn't get to a computer until now.] ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] A reader's experience with The Closed, Unfriendly World Of Wikipedia
Our own internal discussions have long reflected on the unfriendliness and undue bureaucracy of Wikipedia. Generally we're good at the trade-off but if we start claiming with a straight face that it's benign rather than a necessary evil we'll have lost something important. While the complainant here might not have prevailed on the merits, his complaints about the spikiness of the interface were legitimate and should not have been met with defensive comments that sought to reflect the criticism back onto him. ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Linkage bloat
If an article is bloated with links or templates just remove the clutter.
On Nov 11, 2011 7:33 PM, Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonav...@gmail.com
wrote:
On Fri, Nov 11, 2011 at 12:36 AM, Tim Starling tstarl...@wikimedia.org
wrote:
On 09/11/11 22:29, Peter Jacobi wrote:
Perhaps the usefulness of portals and categories can be combined.
For example, but unrealistic in the short term, clicking to a
standard category link should open the portal page of the same name
if it exists.
You could just put {{Portal:{{PAGENAME}} }} at the top of the category
page, although I appreciate how difficult it is to change the relevant
policy.
I came to the conclusion many years ago that the easiest way to make a
policy change on Wikipedia is to spend 6 months writing and deploying
software that requires or implements the change. It's a lot easier to
get a majority in a software deployment vote than it is to build
consensus behind an editorial policy.
Not really. Two sofwareside attempts on Finnish Wikipedia crashed and
burned,
despite me trying to nurse them along.
--
--
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen, ~ [[User:Cimon Avaro]]
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Re: [WikiEN-l] A reader's experience with The Closed, Unfriendly World Of Wikipedia
On 11 December 2011 14:13, Tony Sidaway tonysida...@gmail.com wrote: Our own internal discussions have long reflected on the unfriendliness and undue bureaucracy of Wikipedia. Generally we're good at the trade-off but if we start claiming with a straight face that it's benign rather than a necessary evil we'll have lost something important. While the complainant here might not have prevailed on the merits, his complaints about the spikiness of the interface were legitimate and should not have been met with defensive comments that sought to reflect the criticism back onto him. I would agree that it is well worth pondering the nature of the interface between the administrative pages (in the Wikipedia: namespace) and the general public who may wish to access them. I don't know any single onsite explanation of processes and noticeboards which would be a good starting point. Then I haven't looked for such a thing. A main page explaining the whole namespace looks like an inherently good idea (whether or not those who need it would find it). That said, I deprecate getting design issues mixed up with others. The use of emotive terms such as cold and unfriendly implies things about intention and fault that aren't exactly helpful. I don't know whether arguing that WP is sui generis is defensive or not. I can think of several issues where it allows a reply like you'd have more of a case if WP were ..., to fill in to taste with staffed by paid workers/for profit/offering a different service/run on a billion dollar budget/Facebook, etc. These answers seem to me to offer analytical insight. Charles ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
[WikiEN-l] Creative Commons wants your input on the 4.0 license process
Creative Commons is beginning the process of revising their suite of licenses, with the goal of having a 4.0 version by the end of 2012: https://creativecommons.org/weblog/entry/30676 They have a set of goals, including better internationalization, better interoperability with other licenses, and addressing the needs of new communities like governments and other public institutions in addition to the communities already using the licenses. But this is the requirements gathering period--there is no draft yet. If you want your input considered, this is the best time to start thinking about what is and isn't working with the current version of the licenses. There is a public wiki explaining more about the goals, timeline, considerations, and ways to participate: http://wiki.creativecommons.org/4.0 Wikimedia wants the 4.0 licenses to be better for us and for the commons than the 3.0 versions, which most Wikimedia projects are currently using; CC has already reached out to us, wanting to come out with a version that the Wikimedia community will adopt, and we'll be trying to make sure everything is coordinated and communicated well throughout the revision process. But if you are interested, you should be participating directly. This is doubly true if you are in a jurisdiction with unusual requirements, or part of a group of users with particular wants that are not handled well by the current version. Please pass this message on to other places where interested people will see it! Cheers, Kat -- Your donations keep Wikipedia free: https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate Web: http://www.mindspillage.org Email: k...@wikimedia.org, k...@mindspillage.org (G)AIM, Freenode, gchat, identi.ca, twitter, various social sites: mindspillage ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] A reader's experience with The Closed, Unfriendly World Of Wikipedia
On Sun, 11 Dec 2011 15:01:33 +, Charles Matthews wrote: That said, I deprecate getting design issues mixed up with others. The use of emotive terms such as cold and unfriendly implies things about intention and fault that aren't exactly helpful. I don't know whether arguing that WP is sui generis is defensive or not. I can think of several issues where it allows a reply like you'd have more of a case if WP were ..., to fill in to taste with staffed by paid workers/for profit/offering a different service/run on a billion dollar budget/Facebook, etc. These answers seem to me to offer analytical insight. While the design and user interface of Wikipedia certainly has things that could stand improvement, I generally like the fact that it's not run by a billion dollar budget commercial outfit brimming with meddlesome marketing and management types and artsy graphical designers, aimed at producing a site design that looks cool when demoed in PowerPoint presentations, shoves lots of annoying, intrusive ads at the user and is explicitly designed and structured to maximize this even at the expense of actual content, and works well (if at all) only in the particular browsers and platforms targeted by the developer. Those sites are hard to navigate, hard to read, slow to load, prone to crashing your browser, go out of their way to interfere with normal browser operations like caching and back/forward buttons by having crazy contraptions of scripts to reinvent those wheels in an inferior way, and are generally a headache to use in comparison with Wikipedia. -- == Dan == Dan's Mail Format Site: http://mailformat.dan.info/ Dan's Web Tips: http://webtips.dan.info/ Dan's Domain Site: http://domains.dan.info/ ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
