Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
Someone (I believe David?) suggested actively encouraging some of your editors/admins to become more active on Commons. I think this is good advice for any project that finds itself using or depending on the services Commons provides. Just as the Commons community will become more aware of your needs, you will hopefully become more aware of their needs. Think of them as ambassadors of a sort, perhaps. I would likewise hope that Commons editors are active on other wikis, as well, for the same reason. Better participation and communication might help a lot of these problems. We can, I hope, meet the needs of all of our projects. -Luna ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
On Fri, Jun 19, 2009 at 7:43 AM, Ilario Valdelli valde...@gmail.com wrote: * Commons (like repository) with sysops elected by other projects which will use it like repository (and in this case the policies are decided by these projects) * another project (wikialbum???) which helps Commons to improve the quality of media files, to describe these files and to proceed to a production of articles where the aim is the collection of media files in some archives Would wikialbum use Commons as a repository? ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
OK, the question has popped up so many times, that I think it would only be fair to give it a separate topic on this list :) Now I'd like to have a discussion about this, and not just assumptions. Let's not be childish and say yes it is, no it's not (which some of the discussion comes down to) but lets play around a bit with arguments. This discussion is btw not new at all, I remember to have discussed over it several times, and I've had both opinions probably in time. Mostly this discussion comes up when a project (in the past at least several times this was the Dutch Wikipedia, as some might remember) felt that the commons community was damaging the content they uploaded there without them having a say over it. The even more important question is, however, when comes the moment when the two are in conflict? I doubt any project actually cares whether commons has out of scope images (well, a few might, but that is actually commons people then imho, not wikipedians/wikisourcians etc), not what the categorization is like. As long as it works, they can upload their stuff, it is safe, and they can use it. The problems often came when a few bad people (paraphrasing it as it was received by the Dutch Wikipedians at the time, no insult intended) were damaging their content (at the time, it was for example about Coat of Arms-png's being deleted) and they felt not heard or helped by others. I think that is currently a repeating pattern in some way. A smaller group, with all best intentions, decides to harm a collection of content, and people feel attacked by that, and react in a not-so-positive way. That is where the service project and the independent project clash. Were it merely service, the commons would abide the wish of the wikipedians (wikisourcians etc), were it independent, the Wikipedians would have bad luck and live with it. So now please share with me, in those conflict situations, which should it be, and, most importantly, why? I'll believe service project is great in ideal situations, as would be independent, as long as everything goes fine. But in these border cases? eia ___ 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] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
I thought a bit more about the issue, and I think there is a point we (possibly all of us) are missing. Actually, Commons must be not just a depository, it can also play an active role within WMF projects. Let me give an example. More than a year ago I uploaded this file: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Presentation_church_Borisoglebsky.jpg which I used to illustrate an article on ru.wp on the town where the church is located. (In the meanwhile, about 10 other pictures of the same town have been uploaded). I see now that articles about the town exist in four Wikipedias, en, fr, ru, and fi. fi.wp article uses this image since it has been apparently created after the file was uploaded. en and fr articles do not use any images at all for illustration: apparently, they have been created before I uploaded the image, and I was too lazy to insert images in these articles even though I speak both English and French. Now since I have noticed this I will of course do it myself, but generally this could be difficult: imagine an article with 10 interwikis, some of them in languages I have no idea of like Japanese. This is of course a meta issue and somebody (me for instance) could take an initiative and create a project alerting other wikipedias of new image arrivals (I vaguely remember we even had a script like this which was very helpful in adding images), but I guess it would be a natural task for Commons. Another example - actively searching for images and uploading them: for instance, approaching users living in certain areas, searching for PD images of works of art etc. May be I am just ignorant and all these things are already going on, but then it is strange that I have never heard of them being an active editor and being in principle interested in meta issues. To conclude there is definitely a room for an active role for Commons, not just as a passive file depository. Cheers Yaroslav ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
[Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
OK, the question has popped up so many times, that I think it would only be fair to give it a separate topic on this list :) Now I'd like to have a discussion about this, and not just assumptions. Let's not be childish and say yes it is, no it's not (which some of the discussion comes down to) but lets play around a bit with arguments. This discussion is btw not new at all, I remember to have discussed over it several times, and I've had both opinions probably in time. Mostly this discussion comes up when a project (in the past at least several times this was the Dutch Wikipedia, as some might remember) felt that the commons community was damaging the content they uploaded there without them having a say over it. The even more important question is, however, when comes the moment when the two are in conflict? I doubt any project actually cares whether commons has out of scope images (well, a few might, but that is actually commons people then imho, not wikipedians/wikisourcians etc), not what the categorization is like. As long as it works, they can upload their stuff, it is safe, and they can use it. The problems often came when a few bad people (paraphrasing it as it was received by the Dutch Wikipedians at the time, no insult intended) were damaging their content (at the time, it was for example about Coat of Arms-png's being deleted) and they felt not heard or helped by others. I think that is currently a repeating pattern in some way. A smaller group, with all best intentions, decides to harm a collection of content, and people feel attacked by that, and react in a not-so-positive way. That is where the service project and the independent project clash. Were it merely service, the commons would abide the wish of the wikipedians (wikisourcians etc), were it independent, the Wikipedians would have bad luck and live with it. So now please share with me, in those conflict situations, which should it be, and, most importantly, why? I'll believe service project is great in ideal situations, as would be independent, as long as everything goes fine. But in these border cases? eia ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
Hello, I want to start with thanking Effe iets anders, this is the most neutral email about Commons I have seen this week, and I like the fact that there is a new angle to work with. I think Commons is both a service projects and a independent project, Commons is a free file repository and can be used in all MediaWiki site from version 1.13 or higher (source:http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Instant_Commons ), so Commons is providing a service for more than 10.000 sites (http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Sites_using_MediaWiki). Commons is also a service project for Newspapers, magazines, other sites or things that needs images under a free license. I don't think somebody on Commons would mind if you call it a service project in this context. All Wikimedia project sites are build in MediaWiki so Commons provides them the same hosting service as the do for other MediaWiki sites, only the big difference is that the Foundation own the servers that host Commons and that the Wikimedia Foundation the only organization is that can use Commons for hosting non free images. When we look inside Wikimedia we have Wikipedia, Wikibooks,Wiktionary, Wikinews, Wikiquote, Wikisource, Wikiversety . Wikisource and Wikimedia Commons. Those nine projects all have there own scope and can work independent from the other projects, all the projects have there own community, policies, rules and content. When the Foundation will stop the could sell those projects to nine different people and all projects can keep working, the don't need a other project to keep existing. So all those project can be seen independently within the Foundation. The projects that stay over like Wikimania, Incubator or meta can be seen as projects with the soul purpose to support the nine big projects within the Foundation, Incubator can not work without other projects, Meta needs other projects to keep working also. Commons can go on with his own community, so does Wikipedia or Wikinews ect ect. So we should see Commons as a inpendend project created for giving MediaWiki sites a free file repository, but optimized for giving extra service for Wikimedia projects. Best regards, Huib * http://www.wikipedia.org* ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
Hi Huib, yes, that seems to be an accurate description of the current situation. However, what would you /want/ it to be, and /why/ ? :) Thanks, eia 2009/6/16 Huib Laurens abi...@forgotten-beauty.com Hello, I want to start with thanking Effe iets anders, this is the most neutral email about Commons I have seen this week, and I like the fact that there is a new angle to work with. I think Commons is both a service projects and a independent project, Commons is a free file repository and can be used in all MediaWiki site from version 1.13 or higher (source:http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Instant_Commons ), so Commons is providing a service for more than 10.000 sites (http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Sites_using_MediaWiki). Commons is also a service project for Newspapers, magazines, other sites or things that needs images under a free license. I don't think somebody on Commons would mind if you call it a service project in this context. All Wikimedia project sites are build in MediaWiki so Commons provides them the same hosting service as the do for other MediaWiki sites, only the big difference is that the Foundation own the servers that host Commons and that the Wikimedia Foundation the only organization is that can use Commons for hosting non free images. When we look inside Wikimedia we have Wikipedia, Wikibooks,Wiktionary, Wikinews, Wikiquote, Wikisource, Wikiversety . Wikisource and Wikimedia Commons. Those nine projects all have there own scope and can work independent from the other projects, all the projects have there own community, policies, rules and content. When the Foundation will stop the could sell those projects to nine different people and all projects can keep working, the don't need a other project to keep existing. So all those project can be seen independently within the Foundation. The projects that stay over like Wikimania, Incubator or meta can be seen as projects with the soul purpose to support the nine big projects within the Foundation, Incubator can not work without other projects, Meta needs other projects to keep working also. Commons can go on with his own community, so does Wikipedia or Wikinews ect ect. So we should see Commons as a inpendend project created for giving MediaWiki sites a free file repository, but optimized for giving extra service for Wikimedia projects. Best regards, Huib * http://www.wikipedia.org* ___ 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] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
effe iets anders schreef: Hi Huib, yes, that seems to be an accurate description of the current situation. However, what would you /want/ it to be, and /why/ ? :) Thanks, eia 2009/6/16 Huib Laurens abi...@forgotten-beauty.com Hello, I would want it to be a independent project thats optimized for giving extra service to other projects. I have a few reasons for it, 1 I think when Commons would be only a service project we will get 700+ Wikimedia projects that wants to say a little bit about the policies on Commons, and that will not be good for Commons nor the other projects. When we say its a independent project it will mean Commons can make his own policies. 2 Commons is not ready to be a service project to replace local uploads, translations aren't good enough and there a not enough administrators to give enough service to all language projects. 3 If we make Commons a service project we will end up with users getting blocked because the are blocked on other wiki's. A independent Commons can be a safe harbour for users blocked from other projects to make a fresh start. (It happened it the past). I believe if Commons is a service project we need to change a lot of things in a short time with a lot of people involved, A independent Commons still have to deal with the same problems, but the community can work on it without the need of extra interference. Huib ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
Commons is an oddball project. Other projects produce work, but Commons stores it. Wikisource could be considered another oddball for the same reason. At this point in time, I would class Commons as a service project (and wikisource as well) because it provides a service to other projects and its only point is to provide a service to other projects. Unfortunately, I can not fathom any reason that Commons should be or is a independent project in its own right. It would be like making all the filing cabinets in an office their own division. From: Lodewijk lodew...@effeietsanders.org To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Sent: Tuesday, June 16, 2009 8:41:49 AM Subject: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not? OK, the question has popped up so many times, that I think it would only be fair to give it a separate topic on this list :) Now I'd like to have a discussion about this, and not just assumptions. Let's not be childish and say yes it is, no it's not (which some of the discussion comes down to) but lets play around a bit with arguments. This discussion is btw not new at all, I remember to have discussed over it several times, and I've had both opinions probably in time. Mostly this discussion comes up when a project (in the past at least several times this was the Dutch Wikipedia, as some might remember) felt that the commons community was damaging the content they uploaded there without them having a say over it. The even more important question is, however, when comes the moment when the two are in conflict? I doubt any project actually cares whether commons has out of scope images (well, a few might, but that is actually commons people then imho, not wikipedians/wikisourcians etc), not what the categorization is like. As long as it works, they can upload their stuff, it is safe, and they can use it. The problems often came when a few bad people (paraphrasing it as it was received by the Dutch Wikipedians at the time, no insult intended) were damaging their content (at the time, it was for example about Coat of Arms-png's being deleted) and they felt not heard or helped by others. I think that is currently a repeating pattern in some way. A smaller group, with all best intentions, decides to harm a collection of content, and people feel attacked by that, and react in a not-so-positive way. That is where the service project and the independent project clash. Were it merely service, the commons would abide the wish of the wikipedians (wikisourcians etc), were it independent, the Wikipedians would have bad luck and live with it. So now please share with me, in those conflict situations, which should it be, and, most importantly, why? I'll believe service project is great in ideal situations, as would be independent, as long as everything goes fine. But in these border cases? eia ___ 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] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
On Tue, Jun 16, 2009 at 1:56 PM, Geoffrey Plourde geo.p...@yahoo.comwrote: Commons is an oddball project. Other projects produce work, but Commons stores it. Wikisource could be considered another oddball for the same reason. At this point in time, I would class Commons as a service project (and wikisource as well) because it provides a service to other projects and its only point is to provide a service to other projects. By other projects, do you mean other Wikimedia projects? And how are you determining what its only point is? All Wikimedia projects are service projects in a sense. Unfortunately, I can not fathom any reason that Commons should be or is a independent project in its own right. It would be like making all the filing cabinets in an office their own division. Most cabinet makers are independent from the office where those cabinets are used. I really don't see the dichotomy between independence and service. ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
On Tue, Jun 16, 2009 at 10:56 AM, Geoffrey Plourde geo.p...@yahoo.comwrote: Commons is an oddball project. Other projects produce work, but Commons stores it. Wikisource could be considered another oddball for the same reason. At this point in time, I would class Commons as a service project (and wikisource as well) because it provides a service to other projects and its only point is to provide a service to other projects. You are ignoring the efforts of the photographers, graphic artists, restorationists and free image sleuths that consider building the archive at Commons as their primary goal. There is a great deal of content added and maintained in Commons that is uploaded with no particular WMF use in mind. An organizaed and well-documented free content repository -- for use by the wider world -- is valuable regardless of whether the works it contains happen to be used by the WMF. -Robert Rohde ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
Its only point=what is does=store images for other projects I was not referring to the cabinet makers, just the filing cabinets. It was the closest metaphor for Commons my caffeine deprived brain could think of. Following along it, a cabinet maker is one who makes cabinets. The cabinets themselves are repositories. On Tue, Jun 16, 2009 at 1:56 PM, Geoffrey Plourde geo.p...@yahoo.comwrote: Commons is an oddball project. Other projects produce work, but Commons stores it. Wikisource could be considered another oddball for the same reason. At this point in time, I would class Commons as a service project (and wikisource as well) because it provides a service to other projects and its only point is to provide a service to other projects. By other projects, do you mean other Wikimedia projects? And how are you determining what its only point is? All Wikimedia projects are service projects in a sense. Unfortunately, I can not fathom any reason that Commons should be or is a independent project in its own right. It would be like making all the filing cabinets in an office their own division. Most cabinet makers are independent from the office where those cabinets are used. I really don't see the dichotomy between independence and service. ___ 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] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
Geoffrey Plourde schreef: Its only point=what is does=store images for other projects I was not referring to the cabinet makers, just the filing cabinets. It was the closest metaphor for Commons my caffeine deprived brain could think of. Following along it, a cabinet maker is one who makes cabinets. The cabinets themselves are repositories. Commons does a lot more than only store images for other projects.. Please note that there are a lot of people busy with maintaining images, or making images better. The goal of Commons is to make a archive full of free media files, not only for the WMF. Huib ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
On Tue, Jun 16, 2009 at 2:13 PM, Geoffrey Plourde geo.p...@yahoo.comwrote: Its only point=what is does=store images for other projects Then your earlier statement is incorrect because that's not the only thing Commons does. People do view Commons images directly. Moreover, many of those other projects are outside of Wikimedia. ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
2 Commons is not ready to be a service project to replace local uploads, translations aren't good enough and there a not enough administrators to give enough service to all language projects. I am not sure what you mean. es.wp and (almost) de.wp only use Commons, they do not have any local uploads. And I wish all PD images which are stored on en.wp locally now would be ever transferred to Commons by bots. It could save a lot of my time. And I do not see why translators are a problem, translating a description to an existing Commons image is way easier than to store another one locally. Cheers Yaroslav ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
On Tue, Jun 16, 2009 at 12:35 PM, Huib Laurens abi...@forgotten-beauty.comwrote: effe iets anders schreef: Hi Huib, yes, that seems to be an accurate description of the current situation. However, what would you /want/ it to be, and /why/ ? :) Thanks, eia 2009/6/16 Huib Laurens abi...@forgotten-beauty.com 2 Commons is not ready to be a service project to replace local uploads, translations aren't good enough and there a not enough administrators to give enough service to all language projects. Several of the largest wikipedias have already disabled local uploads and rely completely on commons to provide freely-licensed only images. And we're not talking small wikis, but big wikipedias. So there's factual evidence that commons is ready to replace local uploads. 3 If we make Commons a service project we will end up with users getting blocked because the are blocked on other wiki's. A independent Commons can be a safe harbour for users blocked from other projects to make a fresh start. (It happened it the past). I believe if Commons is a service project we need to change a lot of things in a short time with a lot of people involved, A independent Commons still have to deal with the same problems, but the community can work on it without the need of extra interference. Huib ___ 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] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
Just because people put things into a filing cabinet does not endow the filing cabinet with any special powers. I also am not disputing the relative importance of free content repositories. From: Robert Rohde raro...@gmail.com To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Sent: Tuesday, June 16, 2009 11:13:55 AM Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not? On Tue, Jun 16, 2009 at 10:56 AM, Geoffrey Plourde geo.p...@yahoo.comwrote: Commons is an oddball project. Other projects produce work, but Commons stores it. Wikisource could be considered another oddball for the same reason. At this point in time, I would class Commons as a service project (and wikisource as well) because it provides a service to other projects and its only point is to provide a service to other projects. You are ignoring the efforts of the photographers, graphic artists, restorationists and free image sleuths that consider building the archive at Commons as their primary goal. There is a great deal of content added and maintained in Commons that is uploaded with no particular WMF use in mind. An organizaed and well-documented free content repository -- for use by the wider world -- is valuable regardless of whether the works it contains happen to be used by the WMF. -Robert Rohde ___ 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] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
Just because several projects have decided to disable local uploads does not mean that Commons is ready to accept them. From: Pedro Sanchez pdsanc...@gmail.com To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Sent: Tuesday, June 16, 2009 11:41:51 AM Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not? On Tue, Jun 16, 2009 at 12:35 PM, Huib Laurens abi...@forgotten-beauty.comwrote: effe iets anders schreef: Hi Huib, yes, that seems to be an accurate description of the current situation. However, what would you /want/ it to be, and /why/ ? :) Thanks, eia 2009/6/16 Huib Laurens abi...@forgotten-beauty.com 2 Commons is not ready to be a service project to replace local uploads, translations aren't good enough and there a not enough administrators to give enough service to all language projects. Several of the largest wikipedias have already disabled local uploads and rely completely on commons to provide freely-licensed only images. And we're not talking small wikis, but big wikipedias. So there's factual evidence that commons is ready to replace local uploads. 3 If we make Commons a service project we will end up with users getting blocked because the are blocked on other wiki's. A independent Commons can be a safe harbour for users blocked from other projects to make a fresh start. (It happened it the past). I believe if Commons is a service project we need to change a lot of things in a short time with a lot of people involved, A independent Commons still have to deal with the same problems, but the community can work on it without the need of extra interference. Huib ___ 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 ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
Yaroslav M. Blanter schreef: 2 Commons is not ready to be a service project to replace local uploads, translations aren't good enough and there a not enough administrators to give enough service to all language projects. I am not sure what you mean. es.wp and (almost) de.wp only use Commons, they do not have any local uploads. And I wish all PD images which are stored on en.wp locally now would be ever transferred to Commons by bots. It could save a lot of my time. And I do not see why translators are a problem, translating a description to an existing Commons image is way easier than to store another one locally. Cheers Yaroslav Yaroslav, I don't think the problem will be with the big projects, there are a lot of people who can speak the language.. The small wiki's are the most difficult and Commons isn't ready to handle them in a good way. It would be best if Commons had two admins for every language instead of none for some languages. Huib ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
I don't think the problem will be with the big projects, there are a lot of people who can speak the language.. The small wiki's are the most difficult and Commons isn't ready to handle them in a good way. It would be best if Commons had two admins for every language instead of none for some languages. Huib Huib, but is it really a problem? I thought that actually on bigger wikis there are users who only speak their own language and are not keen to go through the interface of Commons and explain their problems to the Commons admins in the case of misunderstanding. But communities on small wikis always speak some of the bigger languages, like in Chavash wiki everybody speaks Russian, on Gaelic and Marathi - English, on Kechua - Spanish and so on. It would be nice of course to have all translations like Testwiki, but I think at this point five to ten bigger languages would suffice. Cheers Yaroslav ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
Actually, what Commons does is store media files. Whether it does that for other projects or not is the open question we're considering at present. You shouldn't define your premises to meet your conclusions if you want to participate in a constructive dialogue. Thanks, -Mike On Tue, 2009-06-16 at 11:13 -0700, Geoffrey Plourde wrote: Its only point=what is does=store images for other projects ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
Yaroslav M. Blanter schreef: I don't think the problem will be with the big projects, there are a lot of people who can speak the language.. The small wiki's are the most difficult and Commons isn't ready to handle them in a good way. It would be best if Commons had two admins for every language instead of none for some languages. Huib Huib, but is it really a problem? I thought that actually on bigger wikis there are users who only speak their own language and are not keen to go through the interface of Commons and explain their problems to the Commons admins in the case of misunderstanding. But communities on small wikis always speak some of the bigger languages, like in Chavash wiki everybody speaks Russian, on Gaelic and Marathi - English, on Kechua - Spanish and so on. It would be nice of course to have all translations like Testwiki, but I think at this point five to ten bigger languages would suffice. Cheers Yaroslav I think that we can not expect from users to speak a non native language, it would be best if everybody can be helped in there native language when it is needed. I'm sure lot of people can give advice in English or French but I know for sure that a explanetion can go wrong with misunderstandings if it isn't held in your native language. And a lot of people can be scared for coming to Commons as a big wiki where only other language are present and your native language isn't there or is only there at some places. Huib ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Commons: Service project or not?
On 16 Jun 2009, at 18:56, Geoffrey Plourde wrote: Commons is an oddball project. Other projects produce work, but Commons stores it. Wikisource could be considered another oddball for the same reason. At this point in time, I would class Commons as a service project (and wikisource as well) because it provides a service to other projects and its only point is to provide a service to other projects. Unfortunately, I can not fathom any reason that Commons should be or is a independent project in its own right. It would be like making all the filing cabinets in an office their own division. I produce images for Commons in an analogous way to producing text for Wikipedia. I don't expect all of the images that I upload to Commons will be used in Wikimedia projects. I do hope that they will be useful for projects/education/life in general, though, both within Wikimedia and without. Wikipedia itself can be regarded as a service project - it is providing content/a service for other projects. Fundamentally, we are about making content/information available freely to everyone. I think that Commons (and wikisource) does this as well as any other project (although of course they do this more effectively in combination than separately). Commons does however provide multimedia for Wikipedia. Hence I view it both as a project in its own right and a service project, but primarily the former. Mike ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
