Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?
Hoi, I am glad that this is seen as obvious. The language committee has never involved itself in assessing new project proposals. It does not have the inclination to do so and I am glad that this is understood. Thanks, GerardM 2009/9/9 Michael Snow wikipe...@verizon.net John Vandenberg wrote: On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 10:33 AM, Brianbrian.min...@colorado.edu wrote: I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't need to be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more like the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way to prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over time will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to projects are likely to succeed and likely to fail. Brilliant idea. Currently new projects proposed on meta have buckley's chance of ever starting. Wikiversity wasn't a new project - it was split from wikibooks. We would need a bit of infrastructure around new concepts before they land on the incubator, such as a detailed description of the purpose, and an experienced admin willing to monitor that area of the incubator. This sounds like a good idea to me. One difference is immediately obvious from the way the incubator works presently, though. Rather than having these projects move out of the incubator based on the decision of the language committee, that issue would have to be considered by the board directly in consultation with the broader community. --Michael Snow ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Use of moderation
On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 8:37 PM, Tim Starlingtstarl...@wikimedia.org wrote: Erik Moeller wrote: 2009/9/8 Gregory Maxwell gmaxw...@gmail.com: As such, it's time to try something different. What do you suggest? Are there models from other mailing list communities that we should experiment with to create a healthier, more productive discussion culture? What, based on your own experience of this list, would you like to see change? I think we should stop using this outdated technology altogether and instead switch to a web-based forum, where comments can be postmoderated (i.e. removed after posting), and unproductive threads can be moved or locked. Mailing lists, by their nature, have a large potential for abuse by trolls and spammers. It's trivial to impersonate another user, or to continue posting indefinitely despite being blocked. We're lucky that the behaviour we've seen here has been merely inconsiderate, rather than malicious. Discussion on the English Wikipedia continues to function despite hateful users who try every dirty trick they can think of to disrupt the community. We're lucky that foundation-l has only seen the merest hint of a reflection of that turmoil, because the tools we have to deal with abusive behaviour on mailing lists are far less capable than those that have been developed for Wikipedia. Some modern forums have features that can interact very intelligently with email, which to my mind might be the best of both worlds. Such things would still allow the features you mention such as thread locking and removal of abuse from the archive, but would also allow people to continue to receive email copies of posts if that is what they prefer. For example, have a forum where people can subscribe to receive email copies of either all posts or just specific threads of interest. Most systems would require that you then visit the website to post replies (which could be facilitated by including a reply url in any emailed copy), though I do recall once seeing a forum email manager that created a unique reply-to address for each thread/user, hence allowing one to email replies directly onto the forum while still having those replies be subjected to any thread and/or user specific rules that had been put in place. In any event, I think we could probably set up a system that provided more flexible control over threads and users without necessarily sacrificing the convenience of email for people that prefer that approach. And of course, people who don't want email interaction could just use such a web forum as a web forum without enabling any email features. -Robert Rohde ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Use of moderation
On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 1:45 AM, Robert Rohde raro...@gmail.com wrote: On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 8:37 PM, Tim Starlingtstarl...@wikimedia.org wrote: Erik Moeller wrote: 2009/9/8 Gregory Maxwell gmaxw...@gmail.com: As such, it's time to try something different. What do you suggest? Are there models from other mailing list communities that we should experiment with to create a healthier, more productive discussion culture? What, based on your own experience of this list, would you like to see change? I think we should stop using this outdated technology altogether and instead switch to a web-based forum, where comments can be postmoderated (i.e. removed after posting), and unproductive threads can be moved or locked. Mailing lists, by their nature, have a large potential for abuse by trolls and spammers. It's trivial to impersonate another user, or to continue posting indefinitely despite being blocked. We're lucky that the behaviour we've seen here has been merely inconsiderate, rather than malicious. Discussion on the English Wikipedia continues to function despite hateful users who try every dirty trick they can think of to disrupt the community. We're lucky that foundation-l has only seen the merest hint of a reflection of that turmoil, because the tools we have to deal with abusive behaviour on mailing lists are far less capable than those that have been developed for Wikipedia. Some modern forums have features that can interact very intelligently with email, which to my mind might be the best of both worlds. Such things would still allow the features you mention such as thread locking and removal of abuse from the archive, but would also allow people to continue to receive email copies of posts if that is what they prefer. For example, have a forum where people can subscribe to receive email copies of either all posts or just specific threads of interest. Most systems would require that you then visit the website to post replies (which could be facilitated by including a reply url in any emailed copy), though I do recall once seeing a forum email manager that created a unique reply-to address for each thread/user, hence allowing one to email replies directly onto the forum while still having those replies be subjected to any thread and/or user specific rules that had been put in place. In any event, I think we could probably set up a system that provided more flexible control over threads and users without necessarily sacrificing the convenience of email for people that prefer that approach. And of course, people who don't want email interaction could just use such a web forum as a web forum without enabling any email features. -Robert Rohde If an enterprising hacker were to enable fully bidirectional e-mail - liquid threads functionality then I can see this being accepted, but otherwise it seems implausible. Despite all the benefits of forums they don't come close to the global usage habits and convenience of e-mail. ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Use of moderation
2009/9/9 Anthony wikim...@inbox.org: On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 11:37 PM, Tim Starling tstarl...@wikimedia.orgwrote: I think we should stop using this outdated technology altogether and instead switch to a web-based forum, where comments can be postmoderated (i.e. removed after posting), and unproductive threads can be moved or locked. I only find that acceptable if a web-based forum can be found which allows me to email myself every post/reply. Citizendium switched to a web-based forum and I absolutely hated it. I have all my mailing lists accessible in one location. I am not interested in logging in to multiple websites. I'm sure a web-based forum can be made to handle this request. But I haven't seen one that does it yet, only ones that do it partially and half-assedly. wine-users - http://forum.winehq.org/ It started as a mailing list, then the forum was set up with a two-way gateway. The forum is where most of the posters actually post from, but so far it works ... surprisingly well! Presumably we could ask Codeweavers for technical pointers. Mostly it's little details, e.g. spam control. The main thing Wine found is that the forum promptly had 10x the traffic! The point is: it has been done and can be done. And that way, those of us (e.g. me) who hate forums and don't want yet another web page to go to can have it all happen in in our email. So I heartily suggest we go to a forum with a fidelitous email gateway. Alternatively, put David Gerard in charge of foundation-l, or someone else who isn't going to complain that the list is a cesspool but not be willing to dictate to us what to do about it. Basically, you've got two choices. The second is to get off the pot. No and hell no ;-p - d. ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Use of moderation
Tim Starling wrote: I think we should stop using this outdated technology altogether and instead switch to a web-based forum, where comments can be postmoderated (i.e. removed after posting), and unproductive threads can be moved or locked. Web boards are crap, partly precisely for the reasons you claim as advantage here. Biggest flaw: They use pull protocols, you have to actively go there to look. Further: Access to web boards is proprietary. Each board has different address, format, GUI, options. Mailing lists are push media and they are one stop: the new posts come to my own mail folders automatically. Their look and feel is always the same: that of my mail program (or web mail operator). Browsing through your web boards in the morning takes much, much more time than with appropriately processes mailing lists. Moderation and s/n ration: If you read mailing lists as (pseudo) newsgroups, which is of course the recommended way of access, every reader has the most comfortable options for filtering and scoring. Web boards have central, mailing lists individual moderation. You, the reader, can filter authors, topics, threads or whatever you want or don't want to read. That gives you autonomy and responsibility. The only real advantage of web boards is that they run in a browser and everyone thinks they can use them. Processing and reading mailing lists is much more comfortable, but obviously not anyone knows how to do that anymore. Ciao Henning ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] open IRC meeting w/ Wikimedia Trustees: this Friday, 1800 UTC
On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 3:40 PM, Michael Snowwikipe...@verizon.net wrote: Thomas Dalton wrote: 2009/9/8 Gregory Maxwell gmaxw...@gmail.com: On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 2:58 PM, Michael Snowwikipe...@verizon.net wrote: The announcement makes it clear this is intended for the new board members introduce themselves to the community and have a chat with them, there is no real need for the rest of the board to have been involved in the planning. I don't see why you thought it was an actual board meeting. Perhaps the jargon of agendas and meetings and minutes added to the confusion. A different framework that might be more fitting is to think of it like the office hours that the strategic planning team is Yes, precisely. I always find 'office hours' a bit confusing in the same sense, when not used by a professor : whose office is it? and that feels less collaborative and more query-response than an open meeting. The reason for asking for community moderators and note-takers is to emphasize that this is an open meeting, with the agenda defined by the participants. Please feel welcome to change the language on the Wikimedia meetings page. SJ ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?
In the past there were several project proposals on incubator, but we deleted them because they were not active. Since then, tests for new WMF projects are not allowed. If they were still allowed, Incubator would be full of inactive projects. Even now, there are inactive test projects for new languages, because the procedure is difficult and takes a very long time. I assume requests for creating entirely new projects would require even more difficult and longer procedures, resulting in an Incubator full of inactive tests. 2009/9/9 Brian brian.min...@colorado.edu On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 6:28 PM, Erik Moeller e...@wikimedia.org wrote: 2009/9/8 Michael Peel em...@mikepeel.net: What could be the cause of this recent dearth of new projects? Certainly the process for getting a new project underway is so complex and exhausting that it's not something that many people will be likely to engage in - especially considering that project ideas are often proposed by people who aren't currently very active Wikimedians. Perhaps we need to set up a formal system for long-time Wikimedians to adopt ideas they're excited about, to help push them to approval? In any event, if you want to add to the Wikimedia family, my guess is that it's currently a commitment of 2-3 months of several hours per week to get to that point, provided it's achievable to begin with. I do think that project adoption is something that we should explore in the right circumstances; it's not something we've ever done but IMO we should be open to it. I don't think OpenStreetMap or OpenLibrary want or need to be adopted. ;-) But there may be other smaller semi-successful projects that would like to join our project family, and that would make sense as part of it. I would also make the point that adding capabilities to existing projects can be just as effective at cultivating new communities of participants as creating an entirely new wiki, and sometimes more so. For example, as of a few weeks ago, there's now a fledgling community of people on Wikimedia Commons who add annotations to images, because a volunteer developed a cool image annotation tool. The entire community of people adding categories to Wikipedia articles could only form after the categorization functionality was developed. Because the Wikipedia community is so vast, adding capabilities that engage more people on Wikipedia specifically, or improving access to the existing capabilities, can have dramatically greater impact than creating a blank-slate wiki. That is not to say that I think there should be no new blank-slate wikis, or wikis with custom software, for specific purposes. But I would also not see the fact that no new top-level Wikimedia project has been created in recent years as a sign of stagnation - wonderful capabilities have been created in the existing Wikimedia ecosystem in that same time period, some of them with dramatic positive impact. -- Erik Möller Deputy Director, Wikimedia Foundation Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't need to be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more like the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way to prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over time will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to projects are likely to succeed and likely to fail. ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?
Are inactive project in incubator really such a big problem? Could not be strict deadlines given to new projects in incubator the solution of this problem? Jiri On Wednesday, 09. September 2009 16:10:26 Robin P. wrote: In the past there were several project proposals on incubator, but we deleted them because they were not active. Since then, tests for new WMF projects are not allowed. If they were still allowed, Incubator would be full of inactive projects. Even now, there are inactive test projects for new languages, because the procedure is difficult and takes a very long time. I assume requests for creating entirely new projects would require even more difficult and longer procedures, resulting in an Incubator full of inactive tests. 2009/9/9 Brian brian.min...@colorado.edu On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 6:28 PM, Erik Moeller e...@wikimedia.org wrote: 2009/9/8 Michael Peel em...@mikepeel.net: What could be the cause of this recent dearth of new projects? Certainly the process for getting a new project underway is so complex and exhausting that it's not something that many people will be likely to engage in - especially considering that project ideas are often proposed by people who aren't currently very active Wikimedians. Perhaps we need to set up a formal system for long-time Wikimedians to adopt ideas they're excited about, to help push them to approval? In any event, if you want to add to the Wikimedia family, my guess is that it's currently a commitment of 2-3 months of several hours per week to get to that point, provided it's achievable to begin with. I do think that project adoption is something that we should explore in the right circumstances; it's not something we've ever done but IMO we should be open to it. I don't think OpenStreetMap or OpenLibrary want or need to be adopted. ;-) But there may be other smaller semi-successful projects that would like to join our project family, and that would make sense as part of it. I would also make the point that adding capabilities to existing projects can be just as effective at cultivating new communities of participants as creating an entirely new wiki, and sometimes more so. For example, as of a few weeks ago, there's now a fledgling community of people on Wikimedia Commons who add annotations to images, because a volunteer developed a cool image annotation tool. The entire community of people adding categories to Wikipedia articles could only form after the categorization functionality was developed. Because the Wikipedia community is so vast, adding capabilities that engage more people on Wikipedia specifically, or improving access to the existing capabilities, can have dramatically greater impact than creating a blank-slate wiki. That is not to say that I think there should be no new blank-slate wikis, or wikis with custom software, for specific purposes. But I would also not see the fact that no new top-level Wikimedia project has been created in recent years as a sign of stagnation - wonderful capabilities have been created in the existing Wikimedia ecosystem in that same time period, some of them with dramatic positive impact. -- Erik Möller Deputy Director, Wikimedia Foundation Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't need to be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more like the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way to prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over time will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to projects are likely to succeed and likely to fail. ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l -- * . . . ... . M45 .. M1 . # . * . . Jiri Hofman . . Opiskelijankatu 38 B28 . * Tampere . ** 33720 ¤. . Finland **. * . . . . * * . . . * . . .
Re: [Foundation-l] Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009
Once again, thank you for this. One question: 2009/9/9 Sue Gardner sgard...@wikimedia.org: Jennifer worked with Sue, Erik Moeller and Veronique to review and evaluate proposals submitted through the Chapters Funding Request process. Twenty-six of thirty proposals received were approved. Recipients will be posting descriptions of their events and lessons learned on Meta, linked from http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_chapters/WMF_grants I emailed Jennifer shortly after the requests were approved asking if the details of what was and wasn't approved would be made public and was told it would once the chapters had all been contacted and had had a chance to accept the grants. As far as I can see, that information has yet to be made public. Has that plan changed or is there just a delay? ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Head of Communications position open? (copy editing fix)
My error: The sentence should read ... yet must *comply* with all relevant US employment laws This is one of those instances in which the author knew a word was missing from the draft and intended to add it, but somehow managed to post the unedited version anyway. Sorry. --Mike On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 1:15 PM, Mike Godwin mgod...@wikimedia.org wrote: sfmammamia writes: A bit of a mystery -- in Sunday's San Francisco Chronicle, page E-8, there's an ad for the Wikimedia Foundation Head of Communications position. This ad does not appear online, at least I could not find a companion posting, either on the foundation site or on Yahoo (the Chronicle's online ad partner). Perhaps once the staff is back from the Labor Day holiday there will be clarification? Or did I just miss something? Hi, sfmammamia. Here's the nutshell answer to your question: because the Wikimedia Foundation is an international organization that hires staff from around the world and yet must with all relevant US employment law, we sometimes need to adhere to specific legal and administrative requirements. In other words, sometimes we must run employment ads, such as the posting of this position, in a newspaper like the SF Chronicle or elsewhere. This shouldn't be interpreted as a sign of any shakeup. Jay, for example, is not leaving the Wikimedia Foundation -- he's doing a great job, and we expect and hope he will stay with us, doing the same great work, for a long time. --Mike Godwin General Counsel Wikimedia Foundation ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?
Yes. Btw, if we had a deadline, what should we do when a project reaches the deadline? The most logical is deleting it. The problem with that, however, is that nobody would contribute to a test project knowing that it will be deleted when it reaches the deadline. If there is interest again, it would then have to be undeleted. That would be also too much work for nothing. So not really a solution. 2009/9/9 Jiri Hofman hofm...@aldebaran.cz Are inactive project in incubator really such a big problem? Could not be strict deadlines given to new projects in incubator the solution of this problem? Jiri On Wednesday, 09. September 2009 16:10:26 Robin P. wrote: In the past there were several project proposals on incubator, but we deleted them because they were not active. Since then, tests for new WMF projects are not allowed. If they were still allowed, Incubator would be full of inactive projects. Even now, there are inactive test projects for new languages, because the procedure is difficult and takes a very long time. I assume requests for creating entirely new projects would require even more difficult and longer procedures, resulting in an Incubator full of inactive tests. 2009/9/9 Brian brian.min...@colorado.edu On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 6:28 PM, Erik Moeller e...@wikimedia.org wrote: 2009/9/8 Michael Peel em...@mikepeel.net: What could be the cause of this recent dearth of new projects? Certainly the process for getting a new project underway is so complex and exhausting that it's not something that many people will be likely to engage in - especially considering that project ideas are often proposed by people who aren't currently very active Wikimedians. Perhaps we need to set up a formal system for long-time Wikimedians to adopt ideas they're excited about, to help push them to approval? In any event, if you want to add to the Wikimedia family, my guess is that it's currently a commitment of 2-3 months of several hours per week to get to that point, provided it's achievable to begin with. I do think that project adoption is something that we should explore in the right circumstances; it's not something we've ever done but IMO we should be open to it. I don't think OpenStreetMap or OpenLibrary want or need to be adopted. ;-) But there may be other smaller semi-successful projects that would like to join our project family, and that would make sense as part of it. I would also make the point that adding capabilities to existing projects can be just as effective at cultivating new communities of participants as creating an entirely new wiki, and sometimes more so. For example, as of a few weeks ago, there's now a fledgling community of people on Wikimedia Commons who add annotations to images, because a volunteer developed a cool image annotation tool. The entire community of people adding categories to Wikipedia articles could only form after the categorization functionality was developed. Because the Wikipedia community is so vast, adding capabilities that engage more people on Wikipedia specifically, or improving access to the existing capabilities, can have dramatically greater impact than creating a blank-slate wiki. That is not to say that I think there should be no new blank-slate wikis, or wikis with custom software, for specific purposes. But I would also not see the fact that no new top-level Wikimedia project has been created in recent years as a sign of stagnation - wonderful capabilities have been created in the existing Wikimedia ecosystem in that same time period, some of them with dramatic positive impact. -- Erik Möller Deputy Director, Wikimedia Foundation Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't need to be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more like the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way to prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over time will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to projects are likely to succeed and likely to fail. ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l -- * . . . ...
Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?
On 9/9/09, Michael Peel em...@mikepeel.net wrote:
On 2 Sep 2009, at 12:35, David Goodman wrote:
There is sufficient missing material in every Wikipedia, sufficient
lack of coverage of areas outside the primary language zone and in
earlier periods, sufficient unsourced material; sufficient need for
updating articles, sufficient potentially free media to add,
sufficient needed imagery to get; that we have more than enough work
for all the volunteers we are likely to get.
I apologise for taking this slightly out of context, but it touches
upon something I've been wondering about recently, which is: do we
have a complete set of WMF projects?
great topic :-D
in my personal vision, it is rather obvious we should consider the
work of the wmf as perpetually unfinished just as wikipedia or any
of its other projects: an ongoing process, never ever {{done}}
completely.
to just do a little brainstorm, let me share some ideas as well:
* a compendium to wikipedia, collecting each and every complete older
encyclopedia (which is no longer copyrighted), thus also giving a peek
into the history of knowledge and of encyclopedias (does this really
belong in wikisource? maybe)
* a wikimusic including a musical dictionary, where one can e.g. look
up themes and melodies, find sheet music and recordings, searching by
notes etc
* i also thought of wikimaps, somebody mentioned this already, imnsho
including all maps in detailed resolutions also historical maps,
thus also giving a peek into the history of geography and of
cartography as well as leaving room for original creations under a
free license (new maps)
just my 2 cts ;-)
all the best,
oscar
--
*edito ergo sum*
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?
On 9 Sep 2009, at 00:42, Yann Forget wrote: Michael Peel wrote: ** A few of my favourite examples: WikiJournal, publishing scholarly works; These works are welcomed on Wikisource, if they are under a free license, of course. WikiReview, providing in-depth reviews of subjects; I think this can be hosted on Wikibooks or Wikiversity for the most part. There's a big difference between starting a new section of something, and starting something completely new and fresh. With the former, you get all of the baggage of that project so far - e.g. if you want to start something slightly different on the English Wikipedia, then you have to modify huge numbers of policies, argue with many thousands of people, etc. Sometimes it's easier to split something off and do it seperately - as WikiSpecies has been doing, for example. There's also a big difference between testing a project and launching a project. Tests are normally small-scale, aimed at just trying something out, rather than actually doing a project. It's very difficult to establish critical mass with that approach. Launching a project involves announcing it loudly to the world, and getting the attention of lots of people. As long as the basic idea is sound, you then get a large influx of people who want to try it out. Perhaps they don't all stick around - but some of them will. Of course, you can't do either very often, otherwise people will stop paying any attention. But for some projects, it could work very well. Especially if there's the backing of e.g. a funding body, which could easily be attracted now that Wikimedia is so large and popular. Mike ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Use of moderation
Brian wrote: This is unfortunate - why are so many people more interested in backwards-looking criticism than forward-looking progress? They are not many, they are very few. But they are allowed to speak freely, beyond all reasonable proportions. The majority is silent. Count how many members (lurkers) this list has, and how few people post the majority of messages. The problem is that you don't see the silent majority in an electronic forum. The intelligent and responsible members only post when they have something useful to say, and never just for showing their presence. Posting more than 30 messages per month is not an achievement, but a lack of self-moderation and consideration. More active moderation could improve this list significantly. Serious criticism and whistle-blowing will never be published here anyway, but in other media channels that don't belong to the Wikimedia Foundation. There is no real risk for censorship. -- Lars Aronsson (l...@aronsson.se) Aronsson Datateknik - http://aronsson.se ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?
On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 11:45 AM, Michael Peel em...@mikepeel.net wrote: There's a big difference between starting a new section of something, and starting something completely new and fresh. With the former, you get all of the baggage of that project so far - e.g. if you want to start something slightly different on the English Wikipedia, then you have to modify huge numbers of policies, argue with many thousands of people, etc. Sometimes it's easier to split something off and do it seperately - as WikiSpecies has been doing, for example. There's also a big difference between testing a project and launching a project. Tests are normally small-scale, aimed at just trying something out, rather than actually doing a project. It's very difficult to establish critical mass with that approach. Launching a project involves announcing it loudly to the world, and getting the attention of lots of people. As long as the basic idea is sound, you then get a large influx of people who want to try it out. Perhaps they don't all stick around - but some of them will. Of course, you can't do either very often, otherwise people will stop paying any attention. But for some projects, it could work very well. Especially if there's the backing of e.g. a funding body, which could easily be attracted now that Wikimedia is so large and popular. Mike I think you can test a project in the incubator, get an idea of how it will work, set up the initial structure and *then* launch it publicly. The publicity part is the simplest. We've got a built-in megaphone; any launch that is incorporated with the fundraising drive, or given a similar level of extended publicity on Wikimedia pages, would reach many millions of people who already appreciate free collaborative projects. That would require a somewhat different philosophy from the current approach to advertising (not in the commercial sense) the fundraising drive, which emphasizes minimal intrusion and a once-a-year limit. Perhaps the community would be more amenable to Wikimedia-wide publicity if it promoted projects? I'd like to see a role like that in launches for future projects; the foundation hasn't been involved in promoting or fostering new projects in a deep way in the past, from my understanding, and real support from the moment of establishment would go a long way towards protecting promising ideas from abandonment in the incubator. Erik's point is well made, that developing many promising projects beyond the idea point requires the commitment of resources that remain scarce. But there are lots of avenues the Foundation can take in this direction that don't require the direct allocation of foundation money; a lesson plan / course material wiki, or a student wiki designed for collaborative use by students could be developed jointly with innovative school systems or teacher groups, or even partnerships between schools in different countries aimed at allowing international cooperative learning. We may not be able to organically generate the Wikimedia community interest and expertise necessary for building the content these projects would need, but with the Foundation as technological facilitator and enthusiastic booster... Nathan ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?
As Erik points out, at a certain point we have to actually write new code to support new ideas. Else projects we could do at Wikimedia becomes projects we can do with a wiki engine. e.g. OpenStreetMap would have been a natural for WMF, but it would have required a whole new software infrastructure. And we have no shortage of content editors, but developers appear rather rarer. Proposals I recall seeing for new projects either fit into a current project (e.g. Wikibooks - really, Wikipedia is a book, too) or haven't been neutral (e.g. the victims of Soviet repression proposal, which I think is a great idea but also think just would have been way too intrinsically non-neutral for WMF; the reviews wiki). Any proposal that's hey, let's start a wiki will, I suspect, fall into one of those two. We're either not thinking outside the box enough or need to build new boxes. Or both. What interesting new engines are there out there for gathering content from masses of Internet users that aren't wikis as we know them? What could we use them for besides their original purpose? [cc'd to wikitech-l for comment as well] - d. ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?
On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 7:10 AM, Robin P. robinp.1...@gmail.com wrote: In the past there were several project proposals on incubator, but we deleted them because they were not active. Since then, tests for new WMF projects are not allowed. If they were still allowed, Incubator would be full of inactive projects. Even now, there are inactive test projects for new languages, because the procedure is difficult and takes a very long time. I assume requests for creating entirely new projects would require even more difficult and longer procedures, resulting in an Incubator full of inactive tests. I don't think that deleting them is a good idea,. Perhaps you can archive them after a certain period of inactivity, but the incubator should allow project ideas to be revived and should give projects plenty of time to become active. There must be a carrot of course - the WMF should make some sort of statement about how successful a project should become, and what sorts of vision it might have, for them to commit more resources to it. ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Use of moderation
David Gerard wrote: wine-users - http://forum.winehq.org/ It started as a mailing list, then the forum was set up with a two-way gateway. The forum is where most of the posters actually post from, but so far it works ... surprisingly well! If you allow posting via email, then you lose the ability to properly authenticate those posts. If you allow receiving of the full content via email, then you lose the ability to postmoderate. Maybe it would be useful as a temporary migration measure, but it wouldn't solve any abuse problem until you removed those features. The main thing Wine found is that the forum promptly had 10x the traffic! There's a chance we would see that aspect of it. The mailing lists have a different readership to the on-wiki discussion pages, and that's because of the technical barrier, which works in both directions. Some people prefer the interoperable nature of mail and don't bother reading the wikis, and some people like web pages and find the mailing lists strange, and the subscription process onerous. Because I know that this mailing list is mainly populated with the former kind of person, I know that my desire for a web-only interface is wishful thinking. A properly advertised bidirectional gateway might go some distance towards healing the split in the community that we currently have. But then we would run the risk of losing the people who contribute via mail, on small screens or non-threading clients, who already complain that foundation-l traffic is getting too high. A lower barrier to entry, with a continuing lack of postmoderation, would only make the traffic higher. I'm not opposed to bidirectional gateways, but I do think we should move carefully. If the software is not up to scratch, we could lose what productive public discussion we have, and increase our reliance on private mailing lists. -- Tim Starling ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Use of moderation
On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 5:21 PM, Tim Starling tstarl...@wikimedia.org wrote: David Gerard wrote: wine-users - http://forum.winehq.org/ It started as a mailing list, then the forum was set up with a two-way gateway. The forum is where most of the posters actually post from, but so far it works ... surprisingly well! If you allow posting via email, then you lose the ability to properly authenticate those posts. If you allow receiving of the full content via email, then you lose the ability to postmoderate. Maybe it would be useful as a temporary migration measure, but it wouldn't solve any abuse problem until you removed those features. The main thing Wine found is that the forum promptly had 10x the traffic! There's a chance we would see that aspect of it. The mailing lists have a different readership to the on-wiki discussion pages, and that's because of the technical barrier, which works in both directions. Some people prefer the interoperable nature of mail and don't bother reading the wikis, and some people like web pages and find the mailing lists strange, and the subscription process onerous. Because I know that this mailing list is mainly populated with the former kind of person, I know that my desire for a web-only interface is wishful thinking. A properly advertised bidirectional gateway might go some distance towards healing the split in the community that we currently have. But then we would run the risk of losing the people who contribute via mail, on small screens or non-threading clients, who already complain that foundation-l traffic is getting too high. A lower barrier to entry, with a continuing lack of postmoderation, would only make the traffic higher. I'm not opposed to bidirectional gateways, but I do think we should move carefully. If the software is not up to scratch, we could lose what productive public discussion we have, and increase our reliance on private mailing lists. I agree with every one of Tim's points. There is definitely a disconnect between mailing list participants and wiki participants, and there would definitely be yet another disconnect if we tried to split foundation-l between a mailing list and a web forum. This is not a tightly knit group of 20 people who will migrate to whatever methodology we choose--a hybrid solution may work as a transition, but it's not going to be the same kind of community on the other side. (But then, that's really not what we want anyway.) My ideal, personally, is something more like nntp--and while I'm perfectly happy to turn over the list to some other technology, I don't know that this is the magic solution, and I agree with Tim that it risks killing what good we do have with the existing methods. Austin ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Use of moderation
On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 3:21 PM, Tim Starling tstarl...@wikimedia.org wrote: David Gerard wrote: wine-users - http://forum.winehq.org/ It started as a mailing list, then the forum was set up with a two-way gateway. The forum is where most of the posters actually post from, but so far it works ... surprisingly well! If you allow posting via email, then you lose the ability to properly authenticate those posts. If you allow receiving of the full content via email, then you lose the ability to postmoderate. Maybe it would be useful as a temporary migration measure, but it wouldn't solve any abuse problem until you removed those features. The main thing Wine found is that the forum promptly had 10x the traffic! There's a chance we would see that aspect of it. The mailing lists have a different readership to the on-wiki discussion pages, and that's because of the technical barrier, which works in both directions. Some people prefer the interoperable nature of mail and don't bother reading the wikis, and some people like web pages and find the mailing lists strange, and the subscription process onerous. Because I know that this mailing list is mainly populated with the former kind of person, I know that my desire for a web-only interface is wishful thinking. A properly advertised bidirectional gateway might go some distance towards healing the split in the community that we currently have. But then we would run the risk of losing the people who contribute via mail, on small screens or non-threading clients, who already complain that foundation-l traffic is getting too high. A lower barrier to entry, with a continuing lack of postmoderation, would only make the traffic higher. I'm not opposed to bidirectional gateways, but I do think we should move carefully. If the software is not up to scratch, we could lose what productive public discussion we have, and increase our reliance on private mailing lists. I would assume that any email delivery of posts from a web forum would be an opt-in feature for those that want it. People who want to use the forum merely as a forum without email would have that option, and I'd suggest that doing so is a more natural default behavior. Such an approach would grow the potential participant base by adding forum users who are put off by email, but hopefully reduce the losses from people who require push-based email delivery in order to stay involved. Accepting posts into the forum via email would never be 100% secure, but one could take steps (such as a per user / thread reply-to addresses) to reduce the opportunities for impersonation. I would suggest that the optimal solution is probably a system that is mostly a forum but has a few email features as well rather than thinking of it as a gateway primarily designed to be used around email. -Robert Rohde ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] [Wikitech-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?
-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA1 David Gerard wrote: Proposals I recall seeing for new projects either fit into a current project (e.g. Wikibooks - really, Wikipedia is a book, too) Sorry, Wikibooks is for *textbooks* and Wikipedia is not a textbook. (We also have a cookbook, wikijunior (kids' books) and how-tos.) Nevertheless, a lot of proposed projects do fit at Wikibooks - on strategywiki I found 2 or 3 just today. Perhaps we're not doing a good enough job of advertising ourselves, or perhaps people are not thinking their ideas through. Whatever the reason, it seems like these proposals that already fit inside a box are not actually being nipped in the bud with That belongs at X project, go do it there and instead these people simply wallow in a netherworld between wanting to start a project and the community having no real capacity to evaluate proposals (including letting people know where their project might fit into the wikis we already have). - -Mike -BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE- Version: GnuPG v1.4.9 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAkqoPfEACgkQst0AR/DaKHswZACgtIcFUKF6jkRvEdIBIe1OpZnu yG4AnROKXaatKTROfqvHUUPomV0+2xWo =6VgS -END PGP SIGNATURE- ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Use of moderation
Austin Hair wrote: My ideal, personally, is something more like nntp--and while I'm perfectly happy to turn over the list to some other technology, I don't know that this is the magic solution, and I agree with Tim that it risks killing what good we do have with the existing methods. I like NNTP too. It has postmoderation, so while you might not be able to authenticate posts, you can at least cancel any that fall outside the rules. It's an open standard which predates the web, and lots of tools and clients have been developed over the years to make use of its many features. It has built-in support for distribution and mirroring. It integrates well with email and lots of organisations run bidirectional gateways. However, it has largely been forgotten. Most internet users have never heard of it and they don't know how to read it, except when they're shown a web gateway. Mobile developers have apparently never heard of it either, despite the fact that its lightweight nature and time-worn support for low-memory systems should make it a perfect fit. For postmoderation to work, most people would have to be using NNTP directly, or a web gateway, instead of an email gateway. We'd have to evangelise the clients, say in a footer in outgoing emails. A quick google search turns up the following NNTP clients for mobile platforms: Java: http://mobilenews.sourceforge.net/ iPhone: http://inewsgroup.googlecode.com/ Windows: http://www.qusnetsoft.ru/ -- Tim Starling ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Use of moderation
On Thu, Sep 10, 2009 at 10:09 AM, Tim Starlingtstarl...@wikimedia.org wrote: Austin Hair wrote: My ideal, personally, is something more like nntp--and while I'm perfectly happy to turn over the list to some other technology, I don't know that this is the magic solution, and I agree with Tim that it risks killing what good we do have with the existing methods. I like NNTP too. It has postmoderation, so while you might not be able to authenticate posts, you can at least cancel any that fall outside the rules. It's an open standard which predates the web, and lots of tools and clients have been developed over the years to make use of its many features. It has built-in support for distribution and mirroring. It integrates well with email and lots of organisations run bidirectional gateways. I agree. The mozilla newsgroups are a good example. http://groups.google.com/groups/dir?sel=usenet%3Dmozilla Another benefit is that the mailing list archives can be easily moved to the news server, keeping the history intact. However, it has largely been forgotten. Most internet users have never heard of it and they don't know how to read it, except when they're shown a web gateway. Mobile developers have apparently never heard of it either, despite the fact that its lightweight nature and time-worn support for low-memory systems should make it a perfect fit. For postmoderation to work, most people would have to be using NNTP directly, or a web gateway, instead of an email gateway. We'd have to evangelise the clients, say in a footer in outgoing emails. A quick google search turns up the following NNTP clients for mobile platforms: Java: http://mobilenews.sourceforge.net/ iPhone: http://inewsgroup.googlecode.com/ Windows: http://www.qusnetsoft.ru/ Google groups is a web gateway to NNTP. I've not tried it from a mobile, but I expect it would be usable. -- John Vandenberg ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Use of moderation
Erik Moeller wrote: Part of traditional professionalization is also to only make a commitment when you feel you can uphold it. So where a casual, informal organization is more likely to say Yeah, sure and then never do anything (FlaggedRevisions and SUL being two examples of this happening in the past, with no execution over multiple years), a more formal, professional organization will only make the commitment if it can allocate resources to keep it. So, as an organization matures, it will by definition say no more frequently, because saying yes too often is one of the most common signs of immaturity. We've certainly not reached the end point of that process yet. But for a _volunteer_ driven organization, it's important to make a further transition, not from yes to no in 9 out of 10 cases, but from yes (and nothing will happen) to yes, and here's how _you_ can make it happen, except for the truly bad ideas. :-) I think this is where we're failing right now -- engaging more people to help us solve problems. The strategic planning process is the first attempt to scale up the small-room conversations of the past into the largest possible meaningful consultation. How do we transform those plans and proposals into volunteer workgroups and actions? I think the two are inherently in conflict, though. As organizations become professionalized, it becomes less appealing to work for them for free, when some people are getting paid to do the same job--- and the volunteers migrate to less-professionalized organizations. It's not absolute, but there's at least some tension. I'll stuff that I wouldn't really want to do, if I had the choice, for an organization that has absolutely no budget and no paid staff, if I believe in their goals and agree it needs to get done. But if an organization has full-time staff who are paid to do the unpleasant things, I'm much more likely to only work-for-free in doing the things I find enjoyable. -Mark ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Use of moderation
Austin Hair wrote: In Buenos Aires I had multiple people ask (even practically beg) me to do something about foundation-l. One person said fucking moderate foundation-l, already!—to which I explained why I didn't think that moderating individuals was a solution, but had to admit that I didn't really have a better one. Maybe I'm unusual in treating large mailing lists as if they were FidoNet or Usenet discussion forums, but the idea of people being bothered by long threads they don't care about, individuals whose posts they don't like, etc., is strange to me. Isn't that easily handled on the client side? Killfile individual posters, delete/filter entire threads, etc. Do most people use clients where that's unreasonably difficult? It does require *some* community standards to enable it. For example, it really helps the client-side filtering if people choose meaningful subject lines, and change subject lines when threads have drifted to new topics. But it's a fairly minimal set of things that have to be centrally enforced. It certainly seems easier than trying to come up with a centrally enforced set of standards that will simultaneously make everyone happy! -Mark ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Use of moderation
On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 7:07 PM, Robert Rohde raro...@gmail.com wrote: I would suggest that the optimal solution is probably a system that is mostly a forum but has a few email features as well rather than thinking of it as a gateway primarily designed to be used around email. Google Wave promises pretty much all the features I'd like to see in a perfect discussion forum. Only real problem is that it also promises 1000 other features that I'd rather not see. Oh, that and the fact that it hasn't been released publicly yet! ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Use of moderation
Austin Hair wrote: My ideal, personally, is something more like nntp--and while I'm perfectly happy to turn over the list to some other technology, I don't know that this is the magic solution, and I agree with Tim that it risks killing what good we do have with the existing methods. I'm reading and posting to the list using nntp. foundation-l is distributed by gmane.org as the (pseudo) newsgroup news:gemane.org.wikimedia.foundation on the server news.gmane.org along with all the other Wikimedia mailing lists and it is by far the most comfortable way to read the list. It is open to read worldwide without registration, first time posters have to authenticate their mail address in the from with gmane. Ciao Henning ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
