Re: [Wikimedia-l] Upcoming Survey, Feedback requested, and Office Hour

[charles andrès]

Dear Jan-Bart,
Unfortunately the exact wordings was "I'll point out also that there are zero 
real-world implications for the survey results".

Because we all agree that there is now such thing like a zero real-world impact 
survey, we really hope that the raw results of this survey will be made as 
public as possible (privacy issue), and that in the future , survey including 
question about WMF partners (chapters are not the only ones) will be done since 
the very beginning in collaboration with all the partners involved.

sincerely

Charles


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www.wikimedia.ch
Skype: charles.andres.wmch
IRC://irc.freenode.net/wikimedia-ch



Le 12 sept. 2012 à 16:14, Jan-Bart de Vreede  a écrit :

> Hey
> 
> So I might have missed some mails on this thread (perhaps because they were 
> not posted on this public list) but I highly doubt that Sue perform surveys 
> that do not have a real-world impact on our operations. I know that the 
> results of the previous surveys were used in several discussions (including 
> at a board level) in order to provide more insight….
> 
> On the other hand, using these surveys to gain more insight is not the same 
> as using them to "hold each other accountable" which is sometimes easy to do. 
> Every survey (and questions) has a lots of interpretation magic which can 
> easily lead you astray, but I don't have to tell you (the community) this :)
> 
> Jan-Bart
> 
> 
> On 10 Sep 2012, at 23:01, Delphine Ménard  wrote:
> 
>> Contrarily to Sue, I do
>> think that these surveys (should) have a real-world impact and
>> (should) keep us all on our toes, fine tuned to the critisicism, needs
>> and wishes of the editors of the WIkimedia projects. As such I expect
>> us to make sure that we do get as precise a picture as possible of
>> what those are.
> 
> ___
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> Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
> 

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[Wikimedia-l] Fwd: [WikiEducator] Scientists, Foundations, Libraries, Universities, and Advocates Unite and Issue New Recommendations to Make Research Freely Available to All Online

[Samuel Klein]

via CC

-- Forwarded message --
From: Cable Green 

[Forwarding from the Open Society Foundations and SPARC.]


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: September 12, 2012

CONTACT: Andrea Higginbotham, SPARC, and...@arl.org; 202-296-2296
Amy Weil, Open Society Foundations, aw...@sorosny.org; 212-548-0381

Scientists, Foundations, Libraries, Universities, and Advocates Unite and
Issue New Recommendations to Make Research Freely Available to All Online

WASHINGTON -- In response to the growing demand to make research free and
available to anyone with a computer and an internet connection, a diverse
coalition today issued new guidelines (
http://www.soros.org/openaccess/boai-10-recommendations) that could usher
in huge advances in the sciences, medicine, and health.

The recommendations were developed by leaders of the Open Access movement (
http://www.soros.org/openaccess/participants), which has worked for the
past decade to provide the public with unrestricted, free access
to scholarly research—much of which is publicly funded. Making the
research publicly available to everyone—free of charge and without most
copyright and licensing restrictions—will accelerate scientific research
efforts and allow authors to reach a larger number of readers.

“The reasons to remove restrictions as far as possible are to share
knowledge and accelerate research. Knowledge has always been a public good
in a theoretical sense. Open Access makes it a public good in practice,”
said professor Peter Suber, director of the Open Access Project at
Harvard University and a senior researcher at SPARC (The
Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition).

The Open Access recommendations include the development of Open Access
policies in institutions of higher education and in funding
agencies, the open licensing of scholarly works, the development of
infrastructure such as Open Access repositories and creating standards of
professional conduct for Open Access publishing. The recommendations also
establish a new goal of achieving Open Access as the default method for
distributing new peer-reviewed research in every field and in every country
within ten years’ time.

“Science and scholarship are activities funded from the public purse
because society believes they will lead to a better future in terms of our
health, environment, and culture,” said Heather Joseph, executive director
of SPARC. “Anything that maximises the efficacy and efficiency of
research benefits every one of us. Open Access is a major tool in that
quest. These new recommendations will underpin future developments in
communicating the results of research over the next decade.”

Today, Open Access is increasingly recognized as a right rather than an
abstract ideal. The case for rapid implementation of Open Access continues
to grow. Open Access benefits research and researchers; increases the
return to taxpayers on their investment in research; and amplifies the
social value of research, funding agencies, and research institutions.

The Open Access recommendations are the result of a meeting hosted earlier
this year by the Open Society Foundations, on the tenth anniversary of the
landmark Budapest Open Access Initiative (
http://www.soros.org/openaccess/read), which first defined Open Access.

“Foundations rarely have the good fortune to be actively present at the
birth of a world-wide movement that fundamentally changes the rules of
the game and provides immediate benefit to the world,” said István
Rév, director of the Open Society Archives and a member of the Open
Society Foundations Global Board. “This is what happened when the Open
Society Foundations initiated a meeting at the end of 2001 that gave birth
to the Open Access movement.”

###

SPARC (Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition), with SPARC
Europe and SPARC Japan, is an international alliance of more than
800 academic and research libraries working to create a more open system of
scholarly communication. SPARC’s advocacy, educational,
and publisher partnership programs encourage expanded dissemination of
research. SPARC is on the Web at http://www.arl.org/sparc.

The Open Society Foundations work to build vibrant and tolerant democracies
whose governments are accountable to their citizens. Working with local
communities in more than 100 countries, the Open Society Foundations
support justice and human rights, freedom of expression, and access to
public health and education. The Open Society Foundations is on the Web at
http://www.soros.org.



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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Upcoming Survey, Feedback requested, and Office Hour

[Samuel Klein]

On Fri, Sep 14, 2012 at 3:57 AM, charles andrès  wrote:


> Because we all agree that there is now such thing like a zero real-world
> impact survey, we really hope that the raw results of this survey will be
> made as public as possible (privacy issue), and that in the future , survey
> including question about WMF partners (chapters are not the only ones) will
> be done since the very beginning in collaboration with all the partners
> involved.
>

Yes.  What would be better ways to improve communication and collaboration?
 There were a couple of months of very gradual feedback before a recent
surge of interest close to the planned launch date.  The suggestions for
making these surveys regular, perhaps quarterly, would allow for continuous
participation.

And some parallel surveys prepared by different statisticians/analysts
might be useful as well.  There are economies of scale in consolidating
into a single survey, but there are also systemic biases that are hard to
avoid if there is *only* a single survey.  A few large surveys, judiciously
broadcast [not everyone has to see every survey announcement] might address
both issues.

SJ
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Upcoming Survey, Feedback requested, and Office Hour

[Florence Devouard]

On 9/12/12 4:14 PM, Jan-Bart de Vreede wrote:

Hey

So I might have missed some mails on this thread (perhaps because they were not 
posted on this public list) but I highly doubt that Sue perform surveys that do 
not have a real-world impact on our operations. I know that the results of the 
previous surveys were used in several discussions (including at a board level) 
in order to provide more insight….



Indeed. I agree. These surveys do have real-world impact, which is why 
we objected to a survey asking people from all over the world how they 
would rate Wikimedia Chapters activities when

1) there is likely no chapter in their country
2) they may have no idea that a "wikimedia chapter" is for example 
"Wikimedia Washington DC" or "Wikimedia Israel"
3) all chapters are collectively considered regardless of individual 
differences


And since you comment on that specific sentence

"I'll point out also that there are zero real-world implications for the 
survey results."


I'd like to clarify that these exact words come from Sue herself in an 
email sent on the 10th of September on internal-l.


I am glad to read that you disagree with that statement and recognize 
that there is real-world impact.



(did not want to comment any further on that problematic survey, but 
wanted to attribute statement properly)



Flo



On the other hand, using these surveys to gain more insight is not the same as using them 
to "hold each other accountable" which is sometimes easy to do. Every survey 
(and questions) has a lots of interpretation magic which can easily lead you astray, but 
I don't have to tell you (the community) this :)




Jan-Bart


On 10 Sep 2012, at 23:01, Delphine Ménard 
 wrote:


Contrarily to Sue, I do
think that these surveys (should) have a real-world impact and
(should) keep us all on our toes, fine tuned to the critisicism, needs
and wishes of the editors of the WIkimedia projects. As such I expect
us to make sure that we do get as precise a picture as possible of
what those are.


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[Wikimedia-l] [Wikimedia Announcements] Wikimedia UK report, August 2012

[Stevie Benton]

Hello everyone,

I'm writing to let you know that our report for August 2012 is now
published. You can see the report
here
.

This month's report includes updates on education and expert outreach,
communications, GLAM, fundraising, membership and other activities. There's
also a special report from the National Eisteddfod, Wales's primary
cultural event, where we had a presence for the first time. You can view
that report 
here
.

Thanks and regards,

Stevie

-- 

Stevie Benton
Communications Organiser
Wikimedia UK
+44 (0) 20 7065 0993 / +44 (0) 7803 505 173
@StevieBenton

Wikimedia UK is the operating name of Wiki UK Limited, a Company
Limited by Guarantee registered in England and Wales, Registered No.
6741827. Registered Charity No.1144513. Registered Office 4th Floor,
Development House, 56-64 Leonard Street, London EC2A 4LT. United
Kingdom. Wikimedia UK is the UK chapter of a global Wikimedia
movement. The Wikimedia projects are run by the Wikimedia Foundation
(who operate Wikipedia, amongst other projects).
Wikimedia UK is an independent non-profit charity with no legal
control over Wikipedia nor responsibility for its contents.
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Upcoming Survey, Feedback requested, and Office Hour

[Jan-bart de Vreede]

Hey

So someone sent me the internal-l mail and I do think that the "zero 
real-world" thing is taken out of context here. But a few points

1) Lets not have these discussions on internal-l, there is no reason to not 
have those in public
2) See 1)
3) I am sure that the data set allows us to see chapter's individual responses, 
depending on whether or not we know the country (I would figure we do?)
4) Doesn't every survey contain questions that don't apply to the whole 
responding audience?

Jan-Bart




On 14 sep. 2012, at 17:05, Florence Devouard  wrote:

> 
> 
> On 9/12/12 4:14 PM, Jan-Bart de Vreede wrote:
>> Hey
>> 
>> So I might have missed some mails on this thread (perhaps because they were 
>> not posted on this public list) but I highly doubt that Sue perform surveys 
>> that do not have a real-world impact on our operations. I know that the 
>> results of the previous surveys were used in several discussions (including 
>> at a board level) in order to provide more insight….
> 
> 
> Indeed. I agree. These surveys do have real-world impact, which is why we 
> objected to a survey asking people from all over the world how they would 
> rate Wikimedia Chapters activities when
> 1) there is likely no chapter in their country
> 2) they may have no idea that a "wikimedia chapter" is for example "Wikimedia 
> Washington DC" or "Wikimedia Israel"
> 3) all chapters are collectively considered regardless of individual 
> differences
> 
> And since you comment on that specific sentence
> 
> "I'll point out also that there are zero real-world implications for the 
> survey results."
> 
> I'd like to clarify that these exact words come from Sue herself in an email 
> sent on the 10th of September on internal-l.
> 
> I am glad to read that you disagree with that statement and recognize that 
> there is real-world impact.
> 
> 
> (did not want to comment any further on that problematic survey, but wanted 
> to attribute statement properly)
> 
> 
> Flo
> 
> 
>> On the other hand, using these surveys to gain more insight is not the same 
>> as using them to "hold each other accountable" which is sometimes easy to 
>> do. Every survey (and questions) has a lots of interpretation magic which 
>> can easily lead you astray, but I don't have to tell you (the community) 
>> this :)
> 
> 
>> Jan-Bart
>> 
>> 
>> On 10 Sep 2012, at 23:01, Delphine Ménard 
>>  wrote:
>> 
>>> Contrarily to Sue, I do
>>> think that these surveys (should) have a real-world impact and
>>> (should) keep us all on our toes, fine tuned to the critisicism, needs
>>> and wishes of the editors of the WIkimedia projects. As such I expect
>>> us to make sure that we do get as precise a picture as possible of
>>> what those are.
>> 
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>> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
>> 
> 
> 
> 
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[Wikimedia-l] IPv4 close to end of road for RIPE,

[FT2]

General info for anyone who wants.

Not that new, announced imminent a week ago or so. (Also apparently not the
first, APNIC hit this point last year)


http://www.ripe.net/internet-coordination/ipv4-exhaustion/last-8-phases

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/internet/9543870/Internet-IPv4-address-system-hits-its-limit.html

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2012/09/ripe-warn-eu-and-uk-supply-of-ipv4-internet-addresses-to-run-out-next-month.html


Availability graph:
http://www.ripe.net/internet-coordination/ipv4-exhaustion/ipv4-available-pool-graph


FT2
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Upcoming Survey, Feedback requested, and Office Hour

[Bence Damokos]

Hi,

On Fri, Sep 14, 2012 at 6:08 PM, Jan-bart de Vreede  wrote:

> Hey
>
> So someone sent me the internal-l mail and I do think that the "zero
> real-world" thing is taken out of context here. But a few points
>
> 1) Lets not have these discussions on internal-l, there is no reason to
> not have those in public
> 2) See 1)
> 3) I am sure that the data set allows us to see chapter's individual
> responses, depending on whether or not we know the country (I would figure
> we do?)
>
I believe the biggest issue from a methodological point of view, once you
filter out responses from non-chapter countries, is that the question asks
for a composite average rating on chapterS performance. There is doubt that
the results obtained in this way would be valid or reliable measures of
chapters ratings.
(On the face of it, if one has to rate together a well-performing known
organization and 38 unknown ones, it is unlikely that he would adjust his
rating of the known organization upwards to get to an average, it seems
more likely that he would do a downwards adjustment and perhaps vice-versa
in case of a low-performing local organization; different people would
apply different adjustments and it becomes doubtful whether we can ever get
an accurate average from a simple question asking for opinion about 39
organizations.
Asking individuals to rate one chapter if relevant and than taking the
[weighed] average of the ratings from the 39 relevant countries would be
more accurate perhaps. And as a control group, people from outside chapter
countries could be asked to rate all chapters in one question to see if
there is anything to learn there from the answers.)
 In general, when a concept is complex, surveys tend to ask more questions
to get a better picture, just as the WESI-score on Wikipedia satisfaction
is a composite from a number of questions on this survey.

> 4) Doesn't every survey contain questions that don't apply to the whole
> responding audience?
>
Probably not - depends on the survey design and goals.

Best regards,
Bence

>
> Jan-Bart
>
>
>
>
> On 14 sep. 2012, at 17:05, Florence Devouard  wrote:
>
> >
> >
> > On 9/12/12 4:14 PM, Jan-Bart de Vreede wrote:
> >> Hey
> >>
> >> So I might have missed some mails on this thread (perhaps because they
> were not posted on this public list) but I highly doubt that Sue perform
> surveys that do not have a real-world impact on our operations. I know that
> the results of the previous surveys were used in several discussions
> (including at a board level) in order to provide more insight….
> >
> >
> > Indeed. I agree. These surveys do have real-world impact, which is why
> we objected to a survey asking people from all over the world how they
> would rate Wikimedia Chapters activities when
> > 1) there is likely no chapter in their country
> > 2) they may have no idea that a "wikimedia chapter" is for example
> "Wikimedia Washington DC" or "Wikimedia Israel"
> > 3) all chapters are collectively considered regardless of individual
> differences
> >
> > And since you comment on that specific sentence
> >
> > "I'll point out also that there are zero real-world implications for the
> survey results."
> >
> > I'd like to clarify that these exact words come from Sue herself in an
> email sent on the 10th of September on internal-l.
> >
> > I am glad to read that you disagree with that statement and recognize
> that there is real-world impact.
> >
> >
> > (did not want to comment any further on that problematic survey, but
> wanted to attribute statement properly)
> >
> >
> > Flo
> >
> >
> >> On the other hand, using these surveys to gain more insight is not the
> same as using them to "hold each other accountable" which is sometimes easy
> to do. Every survey (and questions) has a lots of interpretation magic
> which can easily lead you astray, but I don't have to tell you (the
> community) this :)
> >
> >
> >> Jan-Bart
> >>
> >>
> >> On 10 Sep 2012, at 23:01, Delphine Ménard <
> notafishz-re5jqeeqqe8avxtiumw...@public.gmane.org> wrote:
> >>
> >>> Contrarily to Sue, I do
> >>> think that these surveys (should) have a real-world impact and
> >>> (should) keep us all on our toes, fine tuned to the critisicism, needs
> >>> and wishes of the editors of the WIkimedia projects. As such I expect
> >>> us to make sure that we do get as precise a picture as possible of
> >>> what those are.
> >>
> >> ___
> >> Wikimedia-l mailing list
> >> wikimedia-l-rusutvdil2icgmh+5r0dm0b+6bgkl...@public.gmane.org
> >> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
> >>
> >
> >
> >
> > ___
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>
>
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[Wikimedia-l] Fwd: Mobile site banner to promote the WLM App

[Philip Chang]

FYI

-- Forwarded message --
From: Philip Chang 
Date: Fri, Sep 14, 2012 at 11:00 AM
Subject: Mobile site banner to promote the WLM App
To: Wiki Loves Monuments Photograph Competition <
wikilovesmonume...@lists.wikimedia.org>


Dear WLM Members,

As of yesterday, a banner promoting the WLM Android App has appeared on all
pages of the WIkipedia mobile site and the sister projects, on Android
devices only. This banner can be closed easily by the user, and won't
appear again until the user clears the data of his/her browser.

To summarize, the banner:

- appears on the mobile site only
- appears on Android devices only
- appears on all pages in all languages
- can be closed easily and persistently
- is being localized
- links to the app on Google Play

We are tracking downloads of the app to see what impact this makes.

To all of you who considered putting the banner on your WIkipedia main
page, this removes the need for making the manual change. I believe there
were no cases where this was actually done, but if it was, the banner would
appear twice on the main page, so the manual version can be removed.

Thank you for your support.

Phil

-- 
Phil Inje Chang
Product Manager, Mobile
Wikimedia Foundation
415-812-0854 m
415-882-7982 x 6810




-- 
Phil Inje Chang
Product Manager, Mobile
Wikimedia Foundation
415-812-0854 m
415-882-7982 x 6810
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Wikimedia Travel Guide: Board statement

[Kim Bruning]

On Thu, Sep 06, 2012 at 03:21:55PM +0200, Alice Wiegand wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> on behalf of the Board of Trustees I'm glad to announce the following
> statement about the travel guide RfC
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_comment/Travel_Guide :


What are the next steps? Will the foundation first wait for all
lawsuits to resolve, or will they start with working on providing the
servers? What's the current time-frame?

sincerely,
Kim Bruning

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Fwd: Mobile site banner to promote the WLM App

[Andrew Gray]

I was surprised to see this appear earlier today! It'll be interesting to
see the results...

Are there any plans to put a banner in the Android app as well as the
mobile site? A large number of users have switched, so the mobile site will
only get a portion of the Android traffic.

Andrew.
On 14 Sep 2012 19:02, "Philip Chang"  wrote:

> FYI
>
> -- Forwarded message --
> From: Philip Chang 
> Date: Fri, Sep 14, 2012 at 11:00 AM
> Subject: Mobile site banner to promote the WLM App
> To: Wiki Loves Monuments Photograph Competition <
> wikilovesmonume...@lists.wikimedia.org>
>
>
> Dear WLM Members,
>
> As of yesterday, a banner promoting the WLM Android App has appeared on all
> pages of the WIkipedia mobile site and the sister projects, on Android
> devices only. This banner can be closed easily by the user, and won't
> appear again until the user clears the data of his/her browser.
>
> To summarize, the banner:
>
> - appears on the mobile site only
> - appears on Android devices only
> - appears on all pages in all languages
> - can be closed easily and persistently
> - is being localized
> - links to the app on Google Play
>
> We are tracking downloads of the app to see what impact this makes.
>
> To all of you who considered putting the banner on your WIkipedia main
> page, this removes the need for making the manual change. I believe there
> were no cases where this was actually done, but if it was, the banner would
> appear twice on the main page, so the manual version can be removed.
>
> Thank you for your support.
>
> Phil
>
> --
> Phil Inje Chang
> Product Manager, Mobile
> Wikimedia Foundation
> 415-812-0854 m
> 415-882-7982 x 6810
>
>
>
>
> --
> Phil Inje Chang
> Product Manager, Mobile
> Wikimedia Foundation
> 415-812-0854 m
> 415-882-7982 x 6810
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Upcoming Survey, Feedback requested, and Office Hour

[Frédéric Schütz]

On 14/09/12 18:08, Jan-bart de Vreede wrote:


4) Doesn't every survey contain questions that don't apply to the whole 
responding audience?


No, because the answer would not be terribly useful. In all surveys I 
have seen in my work life [statistics work -- I don't design much 
surveys myself, but reply to a lot of them from different horizons :-], 
this does never happen.


Typically, the filtering for a question about chapters would be 
something like this (simplified and written quickly):


1) Do you know any organization active within the Wikimedia movement ?
(free text fields allow people to enter names)

2) This page contain a list of organizations active within the Wikimedia 
movement; please tick all the ones you know (even if you have only heard 
the name)


(a list follows, with maybe "WMF", "Local chapters in general", and a 
list of individual chapters)


3) People are then asked to rate and/or comment each entity that was 
mentioned under (1) or (2).


This way, not only do we avoid having people give their opinion on a 
topic they've never heard about, but we also get two different levels of 
knowledge on the topic (either the user knew it well enough to list the 
name, or he had to be reminded).


Frédéric

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[Wikimedia-l] : Copyright of deep space objects (DSOs) outside of the solar system

[とある白い猫]

  Hi,

  I am not seeking legal advice. I am asking the pursuit of the issue. I am
not a US citizen so I do not have a congress person to contact. The laws
governing copyright can be amended to address the issue of deep space
objects (DSO). I do not expect a result next week, I merely want the issue
to enter into an agenda of some sort. If the Foundation is going to take
the lead, this probably would only be possible through a board decision. In
such a case I want to work with people to come up with such a draft
proposal to the board.

  I realize this is an unusual request but there seems to be a lack of
clarity on this issue[1]. Argument is that copyright can be an issue since
not every organization observing or assisting NASA's observations are
PD-USgov compatible. We may be forced to permanently delete all deep space
objects as a result.

  I'd like to provide a short technical explanation why copyright of deep
space objects or DSOs (objects outside of the solar system) are
meaningless. For ordinary photographs copyright is determined by factors
such as lighting, perspective, exposure and other such settings that
creates a different image of the same object. You can distinguish the
difference between a daylight photo and an evening photo.

  With deep space objects however, even the stellar parallax[2] has a very
small value. The closest object outside of the solar system is 4.24 light
years (268,136 AU's) away. The semi-major axis of earth is about 1AUs. The
difference in perspective is like looking at a 2cm (width of a nickel) wide
object 5.3km (3.29 miles) away and the perspective difference is switching
left eye to the right eye. We lack scientific instruments to even detect a
stellar parallax for objects much further. In other words our perspective
of the nearest star and beyond is more or less constant and the objects
themselves look the same for hundreds of years.

  So any photo of a deep space object I or someone else takes from the
solar system will look identical regardless of when and where on earth I
take it within multiple lifetimes. I think this can bring legal precedent
for us to either disregard any copyright claim or at least pursue lawmakers
in congress to amend the copyright law to make an exception in the law.
People who worked with congress such as Neil Degrasse Tyson could be
consulted to this end. Also international treaties[3] can be consulted to
this end as copyrighting photos of deep space objects could be interpreted
as an unfair exploitation of resources.

  I realize this reads like something out of Star Trek but this is growing
to be quite a problem as we see more and more weird copyright claims even
when dealing with NASA which traditionally had a PD-USgov mentality. NASA
regularly contracts its more recent projects and to be fair we do not know
how NASA contracts these projects which could potentially lead
to legitimate copyright claims in the future.


[1]:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Village_pump#Potential_deletion_of_all_deep_space_objects

[2]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stellar_parallax

[3]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_law#International_treaties

  -- とある白い猫  (To Aru Shiroi Neko)
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