[Wikimedia-l] [Wikimedia Announcements] The Signpost -- Volume 10, Issue 1 -- 08 January 2014

[Wikipedia Signpost]

News and notes: WMF sacks employee over paid editing
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2014-01-08/News_and_notes

Public Domain Day: Why the year 2019 is so significant
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2014-01-08/Public_Domain_Day

Op-ed: WikiCup competition beginning a new year
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2014-01-08/Op-ed

WikiProject report: The wonderful world of television
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2014-01-08/WikiProject_report

Traffic report: Tragedy and television
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2014-01-08/Traffic_report

Featured content: A portal to the wonderful world of technology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2014-01-08/Featured_content

Technology report: Gearing up for the Architecture Summit
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2014-01-08/Technology_report


Single page view
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Signpost/Single

PDF version
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book:Wikipedia_Signpost/2014-01-08


http://identi.ca/wikisignpost / https://twitter.com/wikisignpost
--
Wikipedia Signpost Staff
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Thanking anonymous users

[Gryllida]

On Sat, 11 Jan 2014, at 6:21, Ryan Kaldari wrote:
> These are two reason we don't have Thanks for anonymous editors:
> ...
> 2. Multiple editors often share the same IP address

They already share talk page and contribs. I don't see notifications being a 
problem: each of them *knows* that the IP is shared, and has registration 
instructions readily available if such situation is a problem.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[geni]

On 10 January 2014 21:06, Andreas Kolbe  wrote:

> Quite. Museums' self-interest in employing a Wikipedian-in-Residence is
> often quite evident from the way the position is described ("raise our
> profile" etc.)
>
> And what about, say, the Henry Ford Museum? Or the Volkswagen museum? Is
> that not knowledge? Is it "evil", because it's part of a business?
>

The term you are looking for is propaganda. Or PR if you like being invited
to a certain class of party.



> Which reminds me – I often think it odd that Wikimedia will fund a
> Wikipedian-in-Residence for some regional tourist attraction (think the
> Welsh Coastal Path project, or the York Museum),


You've never actually been to the York Museum have you? Its a typical
municipal museum. IE a place to dump all the historical stuff that you can
just leave sitting around in the street. Its collection is better than some
but only due to its age.

The tourist targeting museum in the area would be the Jorvik Viking Centre.

I'd assume the largest tourist draw is actually the National Railway Museum
(certainly it has the best class of cameras) but that is a national
collection rather than regional.




-- 
geni
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Thanking anonymous users

[Federico Leva (Nemo)]

David Gerard, 10/01/2014 22:02:

However, being able to thank IP contributors for their contribution
would be FANTASTIC. Saying "thank you" to casual drive-by contributors
would give them quite a buzz, I'd think.


You already can, even on the unwelcoming ;) en.wiki and de.wiki: talk 
pages have not (yet) been killed.
I think about 30-50k persons have been thanked with the simple 
{{grazie}} template on it.wiki across the years.

https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Cross-project_comparisons#Thanks


Perhaps a timeout? Say, you can thank an IP for their edit within 1
hour? We can experiment and see what time gives the best amount of
thanks versus mistakes.


On it.wiki, anonymous talk pages are purged monthly (with some conditions).

Nemo

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Thanking anonymous users

[David Gerard]

Yeah. It shouldn't be like welcome messages, it should be specifically
for thanking for good edits.

But this is a cultural issue, not a software issue.

On 10 January 2014 21:30, Kevin Rutherford  wrote:
> The downside of this is when we inevitably start thanking vandals by accident.
>
> Kevin Rutherford
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
>> On Jan 10, 2014, at 4:03 PM, "David Gerard"  wrote:
>>
>>> On 10 January 2014 20:28, Oliver Keyes  wrote:
>>>
>>> For 1: because it'd be impossible to accurately associate notifications
>>> with the person, I assume.
>>
>>
>>
>> Apparently that's the reason.
>>
>> However, being able to thank IP contributors for their contribution
>> would be FANTASTIC. Saying "thank you" to casual drive-by contributors
>> would give them quite a buzz, I'd think.
>>
>> Perhaps a timeout? Say, you can thank an IP for their edit within 1
>> hour? We can experiment and see what time gives the best amount of
>> thanks versus mistakes.
>>
>>
>> - d.
>>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Thanking anonymous users

[Kevin Rutherford]

The downside of this is when we inevitably start thanking vandals by accident.

Kevin Rutherford

Sent from my iPhone

> On Jan 10, 2014, at 4:03 PM, "David Gerard"  wrote:
> 
>> On 10 January 2014 20:28, Oliver Keyes  wrote:
>> 
>> For 1: because it'd be impossible to accurately associate notifications
>> with the person, I assume.
> 
> 
> 
> Apparently that's the reason.
> 
> However, being able to thank IP contributors for their contribution
> would be FANTASTIC. Saying "thank you" to casual drive-by contributors
> would give them quite a buzz, I'd think.
> 
> Perhaps a timeout? Say, you can thank an IP for their edit within 1
> hour? We can experiment and see what time gives the best amount of
> thanks versus mistakes.
> 
> 
> - d.
> 
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Andreas Kolbe]

On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 3:17 PM, Andrew Lih  wrote:

> Ting and Christophe,
>
> Glad to hear we are moving forward on finding more sophisticated ways of
> thinking about "paid" editing. At least for the English Wikipedians I've
> talked to, many are pleasantly surprised that the European editions are
> able to find a cooperative relationship with paid, corporate entities. The
> Signpost article out today details some of that, but it merits a
> comprehensive inventory and study to compare best practices. (Of course,
> the argument can always be made about English Wikipedia as a weird special
> case because of its profile and large community. I intentionally choose not
> to use the horrible word "exceptionalism"!)
>



I suspect the difference is that the English Wikipedia listened for so long
to Jimmy Wales, whose views on paid editing are well known, while the other
projects just did what they thought made sense.

No other Wikipedia I know has the same witch hunt mentality against
business as the English Wikipedia.

While the German Wikipedia verifies company accounts, to prevent
impersonation, the English Wikipedia bans them on sight and asks the
editors concerned to register alternative user names that bear no
resemblance to the company name. Tens of thousands of company accounts have
been banned that way, and asked to come back with an innocuous name.

This way, transparency is lost, and it *looks* as though it is all done by
volunteers, but the reality is the same as before. It is window dressing.

And in the English Wikipedia, as in any other, practically any company
article one looks into turns out on closer inspection to have been edited
by employees of that company.

http://wikipediocracy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=262

Other Wikipedias accept this, and are upfront about it. The English
Wikipedia is in a permanent hissy fit about it.



In last night's episode of Wikipedia Weekly podcast, we talked about this
> as well [1]. In general, there are multiple parameters regarding the issue
> of COI editing that goes beyond pay.
>
> 1. Pay
> 2. Neutrality
> 3. Advocacy
> 4. Transparency
>
> Even then, the term "advocacy" is an imprecise and nearly useless term. Are
> you advocating for a client? Are you advocating for the public good? Same
> word, completely different motivations. So "paid advocacy" as a phrase,
> uncontextualized, is not useful.
>
> That's why I really like the GLAM use of the phrase of choosing to work
> with "like minded institutions." A national museum with editorial
> independence is a good like-minded institution for the Wikimedia community.
> A think tank that works to convince the public that global warming is a
> myth… not so much.
>
> If an institution is not like-minded, then the process of educating and
> working with them with appropriate strict guidelines is a viable solution.
> We see that this can work with the examples of Swedish and German
> Wikipedias (and, it seems, others)
>
> Back to the four factors above: You can have paid, neutral, transparent
> editors that advocate for something good -- like better public access to
> public records. GLAM Wikipedians-in-residence are a good example of this,
> where they ensure that the interests of the public and Wikipedia's
> principles come first. So their advocacy is for the principles of better
> public knowledge, and a full time employee is working on it. This is a 4x
> positive outcome, even though the words "paid" and "advocacy" are used.
>
> On the other hand, in the case of Wiki-PR: it's editing for pay, without
> transparency, without neutrality and advocating for a paying customer's
> benefit. That's a quadruple no-no. This type of activity must be banned.
> But if there is a middle way on this, in working with corporations in a
> straightforward way, we would be silly not to investigate this, as certain
> Wikipedia editions already show that it is possible.
>
> I've highlighted in the past that we have systemic problems in Wikipedia
> with unpaid editors resulting in persistent non-neutral content. The
> university and college articles are the best (ie. worst) examples of this
> -- these always read like brochures that brag about the top accomplishments
> and rankings of a university because the number of alumni and students that
> put in positive statements far outnumber anyone who could pull them back
> into neutral territory. Unpaid, non-neutral, alma mater-advocacy is rampant
> and persistent.
>
> I hope we can start a longer dialogue about this at Wikimania. I'd be happy
> to propose not just a session, but an entire track at Wikimania to address
> this, including brainstorming/sharing sessions to get more views from other
> language editions.
>
> -Andrew
>
> [1] Wikipedia Weekly episode 108 -
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0698SX41VsE
> Discussion of paid editing at 33 minutes into the podcast
>
>
>
> On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 7:40 AM, Ting Chen  wrote:
>
> > Hello dear all,
> >
> > I would like to be more 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Andreas Kolbe]

On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 3:13 PM, Brad Jorsch (Anomie)  wrote:

> (Note these are my own personal views and in no way reflect any views of
> the WMF or anyone else)
>
> On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 7:34 AM, Christophe Henner <
> christophe.hen...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Now, the question about "paid advocacy". Again, one of our core
> > principle is NPOV. We don't want people to push their POV. Whether
> > they're paid or not, is not relevant.
> >
> > So, to me, the "paid foobar" question is not the one in debate here.
> > The one we're actually debating about is "do we want for profit
> > organization to edit Wikipedia".
> >
>
> I'd take this one step further: *paid* advocacy isn't necessarily the thing
> we should be that much concerned about, as unpaid advocacy is just as bad
> for the integrity of our content. There's no difference between someone who
> inserts POV content because they're being paid to do so and someone who
> inserts POV content because of their religious beliefs or personal
> relationships or the like.
>


That's the key point right here. The entire focus on preventing "paid
advocacy editing" is like fitting a 12-inch steel door at the front of the
house, while leaving open doors and windows for social entrepreneurs of all
sorts on all the other sides of the building.




>
> On the other hand, a paid advocate may perhaps be more concerning from a
> community standpoint because it's likely that the paid advocate is going to
> have more time and resources to devote to inserting POV content (and to
> doing so in ways less likely to be "caught") than most unpaid advocates.
>
> Even more generally, even paid editing without advocacy may give a stigma
> to the project even if the content really is fully NPOV. And, as mentioned
> elsewhere, even paid editing without advocacy might discourage non-paid
> contributions for various reasons. These reasons might be behind some of
> the opposition to all paid editing.
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Andreas Kolbe]

Quite. Museums' self-interest in employing a Wikipedian-in-Residence is
often quite evident from the way the position is described ("raise our
profile" etc.)

And what about, say, the Henry Ford Museum? Or the Volkswagen museum? Is
that not knowledge? Is it "evil", because it's part of a business?

Which reminds me – I often think it odd that Wikimedia will fund a
Wikipedian-in-Residence for some regional tourist attraction (think the
Welsh Coastal Path project, or the York Museum), resulting in the creation
of truly niche content that seems designed to benefit local tourism more
than mass education, while baulking at the idea of paying legal, scientific
or medical experts to look over the most viewed, most critical legal,
scientific or medical articles, i.e. articles that are accessed by
thousands of people each day. I'd rather see the money go to a trained
expert working on those articles, much along the lines Ting (somewhat
reluctantly) considered above, even it this were to result – shock! horror!
– in a stable, authoritative Wikipedia article.

At any rate, I am sure donors would rather see their money go towards
improving the quality of key encyclopedic topics than see them spent on
funding microcoverage of some tourist region.




On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 3:01 PM, Erlend Bjørtvedt wrote:

> A museum is a commercial entity. They live from ticket incomes from
> customers. Universities live from tuition fees from students who freely
> choose which university is most attractive to them.
>
> The difference between these institutions editing, and a private railway
> company when it comes to coi issues, is in my view  non-existent.
>
> Erlend
> Den 10. jan. 2014 14:14 skrev "Anders Wennersten" <
> m...@anderswennersten.se>
> følgende:
>
> > Thanks Christophe for your long ,but very good thoughts and experiences
> > from paid editing from pro-profit organization.
> >
> > I fully  support your approach and hope we can put energy, instead of
> just
> > being "against", to elaborate on how to best handle the reality that
> > pro-profit organization do paid editing. Should we ask them to be be open
> > with their userids  relation to their companies/organizations for
> example,
> > which I think is the (only) wish we should have (and paid editors from
> GLAM
> > already do this) .
> >
> >
> > Anders
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > Christophe Henner skrev 2014-01-10 13:34:
> >
> >> Hi everyone,
> >>
> >> I'll try to elaborate on this topic :)
> >>
> >> First of all, in 2011 in Haifa I did a first talk about companies and
> >> Wikipedia. I did that because I was making a "study" (emphasis on the
> >> " as I'm not keen to say it's a study and more of a detailed
> >> observation) of the state of the articles of the top 40 french
> >> companies.
> >>
> >> During that talk I explained how I believe companies could help us
> >> improve our projects. I won't get too much into that as, since then,
> >> the debate evolved from "companies editing Wikipedia" to "Paid editing
> >> is evil".
> >>
> >> This year at Wikimania I gave two talks about this very topic, one
> >> about how third party organizations can help us and the second on a
> >> framework to have editing.
> >>
> >> Of course, as usual, some people were "against it".
> >>
> >> But how can we, as a community, be against "paid editing" on one hand
> >> when on the other hand we seek "paid editing" from GLAMs, researchers
> >> from state organizations, etc.
> >>
> >> The question whether we allow, or not, paid editing is non-existent.
> >> Paid editing is allowed, we already allowed it, we even support it;
> >>
> >> Now, the question about "paid advocacy". Again, one of our core
> >> principle is NPOV. We don't want people to push their POV. Whether
> >> they're paid or not, is not relevant.
> >>
> >> So, to me, the "paid foobar" question is not the one in debate here.
> >> The one we're actually debating about is "do we want for profit
> >> organization to edit Wikipedia".
> >>
> >> So yes, paid organizations have an interest in editing Wikipedia, but
> >> just as much as GLAMs have an interest in editing our projects. In
> >> fact, when Wikimedian meets GLAMs one of the key arguments is "look at
> >> (pick past project that got great coverage such as the bundesarchives,
> >> British Museum, etc)". We show them they have an interest in
> >> committing resources, both financial and human, to improve Wikimedia
> >> projects.
> >>
> >> So the "they have an interest in editing" isn't an argument in the
> >> end, as, of course a lot of editors have an interest in editing. And
> >> we're using it. When we think or work on how researchers valorize
> >> their edits in their cursus, those researchers have an interest in
> >> editing Wikipedia.
> >>
> >> So, really what is that people working for a company have that makes
> >> it so we have to ban them to edit? If we already have people paid to
> >> edit, if we have people with interests (henceforth some sort of COI),
> >> what do they

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Thanking anonymous users

[David Gerard]

On 10 January 2014 20:28, Oliver Keyes  wrote:

> For 1: because it'd be impossible to accurately associate notifications
> with the person, I assume.



Apparently that's the reason.

However, being able to thank IP contributors for their contribution
would be FANTASTIC. Saying "thank you" to casual drive-by contributors
would give them quite a buzz, I'd think.

Perhaps a timeout? Say, you can thank an IP for their edit within 1
hour? We can experiment and see what time gives the best amount of
thanks versus mistakes.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Thanking anonymous users

[Nathan]

I think we should just thank everyone, on at least a yearly basis, with a
"thank you" drive similar to what we do for fundraising. It doesn't need to
be for a specific edit or tied to any one IP. After the fundraiser hits the
goal we usually run it a little with a thank you banner, and if we did that
separately and used it to encourage participation by our readers, all the
projects should benefit.
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Thanking anonymous users

[Sam Klein]

I would very much enjoy notifications as an IP & for IPs.

We can make a few carve-outs:
 - major hubs (schools, businesses, wifi providers with thousands of users)
can be excluded.

The message/framing to IPs would be slightly different than that for
logged-in users: since we can't be sure it's the same person.  Nevertheless
we could make it fun for them to see the wall of comments left for the last
user of that IP, and any global notifications for it.

The same message could highlight that they are logged out, in case they
didn't realize (right now it's not easy to notice when you get logged out
in the middle of a session, unless you've set a custom skin / color in your
prefs).

SJ


On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 2:21 PM, Ryan Kaldari wrote:

> These are two reason we don't have Thanks for anonymous editors:
> 1. Anonymous editors don't get notifications
> 2. Multiple editors often share the same IP address
> Problem #2 isn't as prominent as it use to be, but there are still many
> large companies and schools that connect to the internet through a single
> IP. I imagine that once IPv6 is widely in use, this problem will go away
> and we'll be able to turn on all notifications (including Thanks) for
> anonymous editors.
>
> Ryan Kaldari
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-- 
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Andreas Kolbe]

Christophe's comment about Wikipedia's company articles not being very
complete reminded me of a fun infographic:

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5474/11871822903_714f36a83e_h.jpg

There is a strange, systemic hostility towards business at work in the
English Wikipedia. Combined with a love for pop trivia ...


On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 12:34 PM, Christophe Henner <
christophe.hen...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi everyone,
>
> I'll try to elaborate on this topic :)
>
> First of all, in 2011 in Haifa I did a first talk about companies and
> Wikipedia. I did that because I was making a "study" (emphasis on the
> " as I'm not keen to say it's a study and more of a detailed
> observation) of the state of the articles of the top 40 french
> companies.
>
> During that talk I explained how I believe companies could help us
> improve our projects. I won't get too much into that as, since then,
> the debate evolved from "companies editing Wikipedia" to "Paid editing
> is evil".
>
> This year at Wikimania I gave two talks about this very topic, one
> about how third party organizations can help us and the second on a
> framework to have editing.
>
> Of course, as usual, some people were "against it".
>
> But how can we, as a community, be against "paid editing" on one hand
> when on the other hand we seek "paid editing" from GLAMs, researchers
> from state organizations, etc.
>
> The question whether we allow, or not, paid editing is non-existent.
> Paid editing is allowed, we already allowed it, we even support it;
>
> Now, the question about "paid advocacy". Again, one of our core
> principle is NPOV. We don't want people to push their POV. Whether
> they're paid or not, is not relevant.
>
> So, to me, the "paid foobar" question is not the one in debate here.
> The one we're actually debating about is "do we want for profit
> organization to edit Wikipedia".
>
> So yes, paid organizations have an interest in editing Wikipedia, but
> just as much as GLAMs have an interest in editing our projects. In
> fact, when Wikimedian meets GLAMs one of the key arguments is "look at
> (pick past project that got great coverage such as the bundesarchives,
> British Museum, etc)". We show them they have an interest in
> committing resources, both financial and human, to improve Wikimedia
> projects.
>
> So the "they have an interest in editing" isn't an argument in the
> end, as, of course a lot of editors have an interest in editing. And
> we're using it. When we think or work on how researchers valorize
> their edits in their cursus, those researchers have an interest in
> editing Wikipedia.
>
> So, really what is that people working for a company have that makes
> it so we have to ban them to edit? If we already have people paid to
> edit, if we have people with interests (henceforth some sort of COI),
> what do they have the others don't?
>
> Now, why do I strongly believe we should encourage companies to edit
> Wikipedia.
>
> First of all, as I said some years ago I evaluated the quality of
> company articles on the French Wikipedia. Most of them were crap.
> Either outdated, incomplete or with wrong information, all those
> articles were poor; And we're talking about the top 40 french
> companies, such as Orange, L'Oréal, Renault, BNP, etc.
>
> The volunteer community isn't keen to improve and maintain those
> articles. Companies are willing to do it. So we prefer to have poor
> articles instead of good ones because there's a risk companies will
> act wrongfully (I hope I'm not the only one to see the irony in this
> situation where we prefer to ban editors because there's a risk
> they'll do wrong. We should do that for all the projects, Close them
> to editing because there's a risk people will do wrong.).
>
> Adapting our projects to provide a framework where companies can
> easily fit in and edit as a direct consequence, improve the quality of
> their articles.
>
> Companies that have the resources to commit to such things are,
> usually, big and sometimes old company. Imagine that in a few year,
> being involved with the Wikimedia projects is so natural for those
> companies that they release their archives on the Wikimedia Projects.
> What archives do you ask?
>
> Orange, for example, is the former organization in charge of the
> french telecom. They managed telephone for a very long time and have a
> long history in R&D. Their archives must be astounding. Containing
> documents, pictures and videos about telecomunication that should be
> awesome. That are part of our history.
> Right now, those archives are dusting in some building. And in few
> years they might disappear.
> Our stance, being so opposed to companies making the first step
> (editing) prevent companies to go the next step, release. And in fact,
> indirectly, we're preventing knowledge to be freed. Awesome.
>
> Lastly, those companies have huge R&D budgets and employ thousands of
> researchers and engineers. Imagine a company that employs 1 000
> researchers. A

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Ting Chen]

Hello Peter,

I see the following two possibilities:

Either the paid editing brings a higher quality and thus by that quality 
imposes itself as an authority and thus discourage further "unqualified" 
editing


Or the paid editing does not bring a higher quality, then an unpaid 
volunteer editor will with right feel fooled and ask: Why does that 
person get paid and I not, it is obvious that my work is less valued and 
thus I will quit.


In both cases I come back to my conclusion, and that is paid editing 
changes the collaboratory nature of our projects.


Greetings
Ting

Am 10.01.2014 16:23, schrieb Peter Gervai:

On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 1:40 PM, Ting Chen  wrote:

Wikipedia articles. So they pay 10.000 Dollar to Bryce DeWitt (I know, he is
dead, I just don't want to name any living people) to write about field
theory, or John Wheeler to write about general relativity, and so on and so
on. I wonder if this happens, would there still be anyone who dares to
change or write articles on topics about theoretical physics? If this

I understand your intentions but the example was faulty, as you mix up
paid editing with authority or celebrity status.

If Albert Einstein wrote an article about relativity (not paid by
anyone but because he really likes to share his knowledge) nobody
really would dare to chime in.

However John Doe, Jr., however he's paid isn't special and people will
trim his advocacy way more than a normal one.

In fact authority is not equal to article protection and humble
silence: we had pleny of cases where notable academics went away in
flaming anger because a "nobody" questioned their authority and
requested, for example, external sources or proofs.

I believe "paid advocacy" vs. "paid article writing" destinction is
valid and important; as well as the general "article writing" vs.
"advocacy" distinction, which may not be black and white but it's
definitely a separate hue or brightness. :-)

Peter

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Ting Chen]

Hello Peter,

I see the following two possibilities:

Either the paid editing brings a higher quality and thus by that quality 
imposes itself as an authority and thus discourage further "unqualified" 
editing


Or the paid editing does not bring a higher quality, then an unpaid 
volunteer editor will with right feel fooled and ask: Why does that 
person get paid and I not, it is obvious that my work is less valued and 
thus I will quit.


In both cases I come back to my conclusion, and that is paid editing 
changes the collaboratory nature of our projects.


Greetings
Ting


Am 10.01.2014 16:23, schrieb Peter Gervai:

On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 1:40 PM, Ting Chen  wrote:

Wikipedia articles. So they pay 10.000 Dollar to Bryce DeWitt (I know, he is
dead, I just don't want to name any living people) to write about field
theory, or John Wheeler to write about general relativity, and so on and so
on. I wonder if this happens, would there still be anyone who dares to
change or write articles on topics about theoretical physics? If this

I understand your intentions but the example was faulty, as you mix up
paid editing with authority or celebrity status.

If Albert Einstein wrote an article about relativity (not paid by
anyone but because he really likes to share his knowledge) nobody
really would dare to chime in.

However John Doe, Jr., however he's paid isn't special and people will
trim his advocacy way more than a normal one.

In fact authority is not equal to article protection and humble
silence: we had pleny of cases where notable academics went away in
flaming anger because a "nobody" questioned their authority and
requested, for example, external sources or proofs.

I believe "paid advocacy" vs. "paid article writing" destinction is
valid and important; as well as the general "article writing" vs.
"advocacy" distinction, which may not be black and white but it's
definitely a separate hue or brightness. :-)

Peter

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Thanking anonymous users

[MF-Warburg]

On that occasion, do IPs still receive information about messages on their
talk page? (Since the orange bar was abolished and they now go through echo
notifications all well)
Am 10.01.2014 21:29 schrieb "Oliver Keyes" :

> For 1: because it'd be impossible to accurately associate notifications
> with the person, I assume.
>
>
> On 10 January 2014 12:11, Isarra Yos  wrote:
>
> > On 10/01/14 19:21, Ryan Kaldari wrote:
> >
> >> These are two reason we don't have Thanks for anonymous editors:
> >> 1. Anonymous editors don't get notifications
> >> 2. Multiple editors often share the same IP address
> >> Problem #2 isn't as prominent as it use to be, but there are still many
> >> large companies and schools that connect to the internet through a
> single
> >> IP. I imagine that once IPv6 is widely in use, this problem will go away
> >> and we'll be able to turn on all notifications (including Thanks) for
> >> anonymous editors.
> >>
> >> Ryan Kaldari
> >> ___
> >> Wikimedia-l mailing list
> >> Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> >> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> >> 
> >>
> >
> > 1. Why not?
> > 2. A time limit might help resolve that with ipv4 addresses. Alternately,
> > thanks could potentially be nice even if they didn't make the edit
> > themselves, since it's the general feeling and such, so just letting that
> > through for ipv4 addresses might be an option.
> >
> > Mind I'm mostly just echoing something someone else said on IRC just now,
> > but they seem like interesting points to me.
> >
> >
> > ___
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> >
>
>
>
> --
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> Product Analyst
> Wikimedia Foundation
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Thanking anonymous users

[Jasper Deng]

"I imagine that once IPv6 is widely in use, this problem will go away
and we'll be able to turn on all notifications (including Thanks) for
anonymous editors."

Not completely correct when it comes to public computers and mobile IPs.


On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 12:28 PM, Oliver Keyes  wrote:

> For 1: because it'd be impossible to accurately associate notifications
> with the person, I assume.
>
>
> On 10 January 2014 12:11, Isarra Yos  wrote:
>
> > On 10/01/14 19:21, Ryan Kaldari wrote:
> >
> >> These are two reason we don't have Thanks for anonymous editors:
> >> 1. Anonymous editors don't get notifications
> >> 2. Multiple editors often share the same IP address
> >> Problem #2 isn't as prominent as it use to be, but there are still many
> >> large companies and schools that connect to the internet through a
> single
> >> IP. I imagine that once IPv6 is widely in use, this problem will go away
> >> and we'll be able to turn on all notifications (including Thanks) for
> >> anonymous editors.
> >>
> >> Ryan Kaldari
> >> ___
> >> Wikimedia-l mailing list
> >> Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> >> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> >> 
> >>
> >
> > 1. Why not?
> > 2. A time limit might help resolve that with ipv4 addresses. Alternately,
> > thanks could potentially be nice even if they didn't make the edit
> > themselves, since it's the general feeling and such, so just letting that
> > through for ipv4 addresses might be an option.
> >
> > Mind I'm mostly just echoing something someone else said on IRC just now,
> > but they seem like interesting points to me.
> >
> >
> > ___
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> > Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > 
> >
>
>
>
> --
> Oliver Keyes
> Product Analyst
> Wikimedia Foundation
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> 
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Thanking anonymous users

[Oliver Keyes]

For 1: because it'd be impossible to accurately associate notifications
with the person, I assume.


On 10 January 2014 12:11, Isarra Yos  wrote:

> On 10/01/14 19:21, Ryan Kaldari wrote:
>
>> These are two reason we don't have Thanks for anonymous editors:
>> 1. Anonymous editors don't get notifications
>> 2. Multiple editors often share the same IP address
>> Problem #2 isn't as prominent as it use to be, but there are still many
>> large companies and schools that connect to the internet through a single
>> IP. I imagine that once IPv6 is widely in use, this problem will go away
>> and we'll be able to turn on all notifications (including Thanks) for
>> anonymous editors.
>>
>> Ryan Kaldari
>> ___
>> Wikimedia-l mailing list
>> Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
>> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
>> 
>>
>
> 1. Why not?
> 2. A time limit might help resolve that with ipv4 addresses. Alternately,
> thanks could potentially be nice even if they didn't make the edit
> themselves, since it's the general feeling and such, so just letting that
> through for ipv4 addresses might be an option.
>
> Mind I'm mostly just echoing something someone else said on IRC just now,
> but they seem like interesting points to me.
>
>
> ___
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> 
>



-- 
Oliver Keyes
Product Analyst
Wikimedia Foundation
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Thanking anonymous users

[Isarra Yos]

On 10/01/14 19:21, Ryan Kaldari wrote:

These are two reason we don't have Thanks for anonymous editors:
1. Anonymous editors don't get notifications
2. Multiple editors often share the same IP address
Problem #2 isn't as prominent as it use to be, but there are still many
large companies and schools that connect to the internet through a single
IP. I imagine that once IPv6 is widely in use, this problem will go away
and we'll be able to turn on all notifications (including Thanks) for
anonymous editors.

Ryan Kaldari
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1. Why not?
2. A time limit might help resolve that with ipv4 addresses. 
Alternately, thanks could potentially be nice even if they didn't make 
the edit themselves, since it's the general feeling and such, so just 
letting that through for ipv4 addresses might be an option.


Mind I'm mostly just echoing something someone else said on IRC just 
now, but they seem like interesting points to me.


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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Michel Vuijlsteke]

On 10 January 2014 20:12, Martijn Hoekstra wrote:

> I very much agree with this. Currently we just don't have the manpower to
> explain to 'the corporate world' in an understanding and clear fashion that
> what they are trying to do is *all wrong*, and what it is they *can*
> actually do. As long as corporate spam outnumbers well-meaning Wikipedians
> who are willing to invest time and effort in explaining by roughly a factor
> 1 : 10, there is little we can do.


Or, as is the case on the Dutch-language Wikipedia; as long as hardcore
anti-anything-to-do-with-corporate-whatever Wikipedians can "outgun"
well-meaning Wikipedians who are willing to invest time and effort in
creating and maintaining content about corporate entities in the equivalent
of AfD, there is little we can do.

Michel
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Thanking anonymous users

[Ryan Kaldari]

These are two reason we don't have Thanks for anonymous editors:
1. Anonymous editors don't get notifications
2. Multiple editors often share the same IP address
Problem #2 isn't as prominent as it use to be, but there are still many
large companies and schools that connect to the internet through a single
IP. I imagine that once IPv6 is widely in use, this problem will go away
and we'll be able to turn on all notifications (including Thanks) for
anonymous editors.

Ryan Kaldari
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Anders Wennersten]

Martijn Hoekstra skrev 2014-01-10 20:12:


I very much agree with this. Currently we just don't have the manpower to
explain to 'the corporate world'


Who do you refer to when you talk of "we". I it a group of people or a 
language community. You are certainly not laking for all communities, as 
the community I work recognize the issues you take up, but we feel we 
can handle it OK (but still have severe problem with the "hard" POVer re 
racism etc)


Anders




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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Martijn Hoekstra]

On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 7:17 PM, Federico Leva (Nemo) wrote:

> Arne Klempert, 10/01/2014 17:51:
>
>> I've heard that before from Wikipedians. However, it does not match
>> with what communication professionals keep telling me. Even larger
>> companies with solid communication departments are usually not in a
>> place to spend enough ressources to correct their articles beyond
>> basic facts. [...]
>>
>
> That only means that their return on investment is too little for them,
> not that they wouldn't have enough resources. Usually, that's because what
> they're trying to do is impossible, so they keep hitting a wall. Wiki-PR's
> very reasonable prices show that the job can be very cost-effective and not
> so heavy, if one knows what can survive in the system.
> In my experience, every time you talk with a company's communication
> person you have to spend hours convincing them that every single thing they
> thought or wanted to do on Wikipedia is totally impossible, then after a
> complete mind-reset you can teach them the simple things they can do
> successfully. Things could be much smoother, but our approaches are too
> inefficient (or our resources insufficient by several orders of magnitudes
> with current approaches) for the necessary mass-education of communication
> professionals to happen and enable them to productive interaction.
>
> Nemo
>
>
I very much agree with this. Currently we just don't have the manpower to
explain to 'the corporate world' in an understanding and clear fashion that
what they are trying to do is *all wrong*, and what it is they *can*
actually do. As long as corporate spam outnumbers well-meaning Wikipedians
who are willing to invest time and effort in explaining by roughly a factor
1 : 10, there is little we can do. But at the same time, it's the work
environment of those tons of spam that make our editors treat every new
contribution and contributer like spam and spammers - even the ones that
aren't, which fosters an aggressive uninviting environment that inhibits
the influx of people who can become seasoned Wikipedians who can help deal
with the issue.

I'm pretty sure that's the problem. I wish I had a solution to it too, but
unfortunately I don't.




>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Federico Leva (Nemo)]

Arne Klempert, 10/01/2014 17:51:

I've heard that before from Wikipedians. However, it does not match
with what communication professionals keep telling me. Even larger
companies with solid communication departments are usually not in a
place to spend enough ressources to correct their articles beyond
basic facts. [...]


That only means that their return on investment is too little for them, 
not that they wouldn't have enough resources. Usually, that's because 
what they're trying to do is impossible, so they keep hitting a wall. 
Wiki-PR's very reasonable prices show that the job can be very 
cost-effective and not so heavy, if one knows what can survive in the 
system.
In my experience, every time you talk with a company's communication 
person you have to spend hours convincing them that every single thing 
they thought or wanted to do on Wikipedia is totally impossible, then 
after a complete mind-reset you can teach them the simple things they 
can do successfully. Things could be much smoother, but our approaches 
are too inefficient (or our resources insufficient by several orders of 
magnitudes with current approaches) for the necessary mass-education of 
communication professionals to happen and enable them to productive 
interaction.


Nemo

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [Wikitech-l] A Multimedia Vision for 2016

[Keegan Peterzell]

On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 2:33 AM, Gerard Meijssen
wrote:

> Hoi,
> Fabrice, I very much love the two stories described in the vision. It
> describes not only a functionality that is technical, it also describes how
> our community may interact. That is great.
>
> What I missed are the consequences of the planned integration of Commons
> with Wikidata. I blogged about it [1] and I suggest three more stories that
> could be told because they are enabled by this integration. What I do not
> fully understand is how the community aspects will integrate in an
> environment that will be more multi lingual and multi cultural as a
> consequence.


Thanks for reading over the material, watching the video, and blogging,
Gerard. Your ideas and visions are interesting, by all means put them down
on the talk page on the wiki <
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons_talk:Multimedia_Features/Vision_2016
 >

Thanks!

-- 
Keegan Peterzell
Community Liaison, Product
Wikimedia Foundation
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Arne Klempert]

On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 4:13 PM, Brad Jorsch (Anomie)
 wrote:
> On the other hand, a paid advocate may perhaps be more concerning from a
> community standpoint because it's likely that the paid advocate is going to
> have more time and resources to devote to inserting POV content (and to
> doing so in ways less likely to be "caught") than most unpaid advocates.

I've heard that before from Wikipedians. However, it does not match
with what communication professionals keep telling me. Even larger
companies with solid communication departments are usually not in a
place to spend enough ressources to correct their articles beyond
basic facts. Many of them tried (directly and/or through talk pages)
but gave up at some point. For companies engaging with Wikipedia can
be terribly time-consuming - especially if they want to do it right.

Cheers,
Arne
-- 
Arne Klempert, http://www.klempert.de/
This gmail address is for mailing lists only. Please
use @gmail.com for personal emails.

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[Wikimedia-l] [Wikimedia Announcements] Wikimedia Argentina report: December 2013

[Osmar Valdebenito]

Dear Wikimedians,

Here is the monthly report of Wikimedia Argentina for December 2013.
You can read the full report (in Spanish and English) here:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Argentina/Reportes/2013-12
Also, the full reports of past months are available at
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Argentina/Reportes

1. New publication: «¿Cómo educar con Wikipedia?»
2. Virtual training for teachers
3. Content digitization

=== New publication: «¿Cómo educar con Wikipedia?» ===

With a clear objective of widening the resources aimed at teachers, to use
Wikipedia in the classroom, Wikimedia Argentina has translated the document
«Case studies: How professors are teaching with Wikipedia», originally
produced by Wikimedia Foundation. The document goes through successful
cases and different exercises that have given good results to teachers of
different levels, especially in tertiary education. These cases are proof
of how versatile Wikipedia is as an education tool.

With this brochure, we hope to increase the references available for
teachers interested to work with Wikipedia. «¿Cómo educar con Wikipedia?»
joins our collection of documents, formed by «Wikipedia en el aula»,
«Manual de bolsillo del Wikipedista» and the compliation of articles
«Bicentenario de la Revolución de Mayo».

The document is available at
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Programa_de_Educaci%C3%B3n_Wikipedia_-_Casos_de_estudio.pdf

=== Virtual training for teachers ===

The Centre of Innovation in Technology and Pedagogics, in the department of
Innovation and Academic Quality of Universidad de Buenos Aires, organized a
massive virtual course focused on training teachers in new technologies,
and learning new teachers' practices related with those. The course
«Escenarios con tecnología: entre lo real y lo posible» began at the end of
November and lasted till mid-December. Close to 2.500 Spanish-speaking
teachers all over the world (counting amongst these, professionals from
Albania and China), of which 200 took part of all the practical exercises
suggested during the course.

The last week of November the course was dedicated to collaborative
learning contexts, with an important emphasis on Wikipedia. We presented a
video with Patricio Lorente and held a videoconference amongst Wikipedians
and participants of the course. We opened a special forum so the people
involved could revise articles on Wikipedia, suggest changes and talk with
Wikipedia collaborators. The Wikipedia volunteers acted as tutors, teaching
diverse aspects of Wikipedia, guiding through different editing stages and
motivating the participants of the course to join the community. Through
this real-editing experience, many people who had never edited the free
encyclopedia before were able to do it for the first time, and other
participants who did not edit actively were able anyway to know more about
the encyclopedia.

After two weeks experience, 49 topics were created in the forum, which
received 325 messages. New articles were created, like «Resignificar» and
«Vito Campanella», while other articles were substantially improved, like
«Wikinomía» or «Facultad de Ciencias Biológicas (UNMSM)», aside from a
dozen other articles with minor changes.

=== Content digitization ===

All throughout the year, several institutions received a do-it-yourself
scanner to digitize books. This has allowed different organizations to
share their books on Wikimedia Commons. The library and documentary center
«Feminaria», part of the Tierra Violeta Cultural Center, uploaded 43 books
of its collection to Wikimedia repositories. This works greatly cover the
feminist ideology books published in our country during the XX century.
This collection has works by María Saez de Vernet, Rafael Barreda, Paulette
Pax, Alfonsina Storni, and many others, and also has documents like «Civil
rights of women», by Eduardo Padró and the International Feminine Congress
transcripts, amongst others.

Some months ago, the Library of the School of Humanities and Educational
Sciences of the National University of La Plata shared part of its archive
on Wikimedia Commons. Thanks to the home-made scanner they received as a
loan, they were able to upload 42 books to Wikimedia Commons. These cover
very varied topics, such as agricultural sciences, rural history studies,
books about Julio Cortázar, Borges and many other publications.

With this program, we not only promote the aperture of publications for
their free spreading, but we also promote wiki culture within local
institutions. The aim of bringing together these successful cases is, as
well, to make an open call for volunteers that wish to collaborate in any
of these projects. In some cases, the process of translating these scans to
text has been started on Wikisource, but there are still many documents to
transcribe. During 2014, these scanners will be moved to new institutions,
thus we can bring the process of digitization further, and continue to
pro

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Lionel Allorge]

Hi,

> I agree it's an important distinction. I personally think it could be
> worthwhile to think about a separate non-profit organization which
> receives payments and manages contracts to systematically expand
> Wikipedia coverage, with payment entirely or largely decoupled from
> specific articles (at most coupled to specific domains) and the
> organization's policies being developed transparently in partnership
> with the community. I suspect such an org could receive significant
> grants and public support in its own right.
...
> I'd love to see more experiments that are conducted in full awareness
> of the ethical issues involved, both with funding models for free
> content, and with other incentive structures. WikiMoney was actually
> quite popular for a short while, considering how much of a pain it was
> to actually administer!

I agree with you that the Wikimedia Foundation is not in the best position to 
pay people to produce Free content. But there are many fields where it would 
useful to pay people to produce Free (as in freedom) content.

For exemple, we could have a Free news website with paid journalists that 
could get to places forbiden to amateurs like in press conferences or get 
interviews with celebrities.

We could have a Free photography agency that could send professionals to take 
pictures and videos all over the world, especially where amateurs won't be 
allowed like in war zones.

We could have a publishing company that would pay specialists to write Free 
books about subjects where we lack tertiary sources. It would be a great way 
not to antagonize renowned scientists who might get bitten if they edit 
Wikipedia directly.

Those Free texts, pictures, videos, etc. could then be used by the Wikimedia 
projects by amateurs.

Best regards.

-- 
Lionel Allorge
April : http://www.april.org
Lune Rouge : http://www.lunerouge.org
Wikimedia France : http://wikimedia.fr


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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Christophe Henner]

A track about that \o/

It took me years to have 2 sessions and they were the only 2 tackling
that issue last year :)
--
Christophe


On 10 January 2014 16:17, Andrew Lih  wrote:
> Ting and Christophe,
>
> Glad to hear we are moving forward on finding more sophisticated ways of
> thinking about "paid" editing. At least for the English Wikipedians I've
> talked to, many are pleasantly surprised that the European editions are
> able to find a cooperative relationship with paid, corporate entities. The
> Signpost article out today details some of that, but it merits a
> comprehensive inventory and study to compare best practices. (Of course,
> the argument can always be made about English Wikipedia as a weird special
> case because of its profile and large community. I intentionally choose not
> to use the horrible word "exceptionalism"!)
>
> In last night's episode of Wikipedia Weekly podcast, we talked about this
> as well [1]. In general, there are multiple parameters regarding the issue
> of COI editing that goes beyond pay.
>
> 1. Pay
> 2. Neutrality
> 3. Advocacy
> 4. Transparency
>
> Even then, the term "advocacy" is an imprecise and nearly useless term. Are
> you advocating for a client? Are you advocating for the public good? Same
> word, completely different motivations. So "paid advocacy" as a phrase,
> uncontextualized, is not useful.
>
> That's why I really like the GLAM use of the phrase of choosing to work
> with "like minded institutions." A national museum with editorial
> independence is a good like-minded institution for the Wikimedia community.
> A think tank that works to convince the public that global warming is a
> myth… not so much.
>
> If an institution is not like-minded, then the process of educating and
> working with them with appropriate strict guidelines is a viable solution.
> We see that this can work with the examples of Swedish and German
> Wikipedias (and, it seems, others)
>
> Back to the four factors above: You can have paid, neutral, transparent
> editors that advocate for something good -- like better public access to
> public records. GLAM Wikipedians-in-residence are a good example of this,
> where they ensure that the interests of the public and Wikipedia's
> principles come first. So their advocacy is for the principles of better
> public knowledge, and a full time employee is working on it. This is a 4x
> positive outcome, even though the words "paid" and "advocacy" are used.
>
> On the other hand, in the case of Wiki-PR: it's editing for pay, without
> transparency, without neutrality and advocating for a paying customer's
> benefit. That's a quadruple no-no. This type of activity must be banned.
> But if there is a middle way on this, in working with corporations in a
> straightforward way, we would be silly not to investigate this, as certain
> Wikipedia editions already show that it is possible.
>
> I've highlighted in the past that we have systemic problems in Wikipedia
> with unpaid editors resulting in persistent non-neutral content. The
> university and college articles are the best (ie. worst) examples of this
> -- these always read like brochures that brag about the top accomplishments
> and rankings of a university because the number of alumni and students that
> put in positive statements far outnumber anyone who could pull them back
> into neutral territory. Unpaid, non-neutral, alma mater-advocacy is rampant
> and persistent.
>
> I hope we can start a longer dialogue about this at Wikimania. I'd be happy
> to propose not just a session, but an entire track at Wikimania to address
> this, including brainstorming/sharing sessions to get more views from other
> language editions.
>
> -Andrew
>
> [1] Wikipedia Weekly episode 108 -
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0698SX41VsE
> Discussion of paid editing at 33 minutes into the podcast
>
>
>
> On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 7:40 AM, Ting Chen  wrote:
>
>> Hello dear all,
>>
>> I would like to be more cautious about the difference between the "good"
>> paid editing and the "bad" paid advocacy.
>>
>> There are two reasons why I don't want to separate in this way.
>>
>> First of there is no clear boundary between the "good" and "bad" like
>> black and white. There is a gradient of grey between the two. And that
>> gradient is not a narrow one but a very broad one. And it depends from the
>> perspective of the people who look upon the matter. For one maybe a
>> behavior is the dark white but for the other one it may be a bright black.
>>
>> Second I want to especially respond to the idea that Erik brought up: an
>> organization that hire people to write qualified articles. I wrote in the
>> other mail that I believe paid editing changes the collaboratory nature of
>> our projects but did not really elaborate on why I think so. I want to do
>> this now. Let me construct an example to emphasize why I think so. I will
>> now take an example which leaves almost no room for interpretation about
>> black and white: the the

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Peter Gervai]

On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 1:40 PM, Ting Chen  wrote:
> Wikipedia articles. So they pay 10.000 Dollar to Bryce DeWitt (I know, he is
> dead, I just don't want to name any living people) to write about field
> theory, or John Wheeler to write about general relativity, and so on and so
> on. I wonder if this happens, would there still be anyone who dares to
> change or write articles on topics about theoretical physics? If this

I understand your intentions but the example was faulty, as you mix up
paid editing with authority or celebrity status.

If Albert Einstein wrote an article about relativity (not paid by
anyone but because he really likes to share his knowledge) nobody
really would dare to chime in.

However John Doe, Jr., however he's paid isn't special and people will
trim his advocacy way more than a normal one.

In fact authority is not equal to article protection and humble
silence: we had pleny of cases where notable academics went away in
flaming anger because a "nobody" questioned their authority and
requested, for example, external sources or proofs.

I believe "paid advocacy" vs. "paid article writing" destinction is
valid and important; as well as the general "article writing" vs.
"advocacy" distinction, which may not be black and white but it's
definitely a separate hue or brightness. :-)

Peter

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Andrew Lih]

Ting and Christophe,

Glad to hear we are moving forward on finding more sophisticated ways of
thinking about "paid" editing. At least for the English Wikipedians I've
talked to, many are pleasantly surprised that the European editions are
able to find a cooperative relationship with paid, corporate entities. The
Signpost article out today details some of that, but it merits a
comprehensive inventory and study to compare best practices. (Of course,
the argument can always be made about English Wikipedia as a weird special
case because of its profile and large community. I intentionally choose not
to use the horrible word "exceptionalism"!)

In last night's episode of Wikipedia Weekly podcast, we talked about this
as well [1]. In general, there are multiple parameters regarding the issue
of COI editing that goes beyond pay.

1. Pay
2. Neutrality
3. Advocacy
4. Transparency

Even then, the term "advocacy" is an imprecise and nearly useless term. Are
you advocating for a client? Are you advocating for the public good? Same
word, completely different motivations. So "paid advocacy" as a phrase,
uncontextualized, is not useful.

That's why I really like the GLAM use of the phrase of choosing to work
with "like minded institutions." A national museum with editorial
independence is a good like-minded institution for the Wikimedia community.
A think tank that works to convince the public that global warming is a
myth… not so much.

If an institution is not like-minded, then the process of educating and
working with them with appropriate strict guidelines is a viable solution.
We see that this can work with the examples of Swedish and German
Wikipedias (and, it seems, others)

Back to the four factors above: You can have paid, neutral, transparent
editors that advocate for something good -- like better public access to
public records. GLAM Wikipedians-in-residence are a good example of this,
where they ensure that the interests of the public and Wikipedia's
principles come first. So their advocacy is for the principles of better
public knowledge, and a full time employee is working on it. This is a 4x
positive outcome, even though the words "paid" and "advocacy" are used.

On the other hand, in the case of Wiki-PR: it's editing for pay, without
transparency, without neutrality and advocating for a paying customer's
benefit. That's a quadruple no-no. This type of activity must be banned.
But if there is a middle way on this, in working with corporations in a
straightforward way, we would be silly not to investigate this, as certain
Wikipedia editions already show that it is possible.

I've highlighted in the past that we have systemic problems in Wikipedia
with unpaid editors resulting in persistent non-neutral content. The
university and college articles are the best (ie. worst) examples of this
-- these always read like brochures that brag about the top accomplishments
and rankings of a university because the number of alumni and students that
put in positive statements far outnumber anyone who could pull them back
into neutral territory. Unpaid, non-neutral, alma mater-advocacy is rampant
and persistent.

I hope we can start a longer dialogue about this at Wikimania. I'd be happy
to propose not just a session, but an entire track at Wikimania to address
this, including brainstorming/sharing sessions to get more views from other
language editions.

-Andrew

[1] Wikipedia Weekly episode 108 -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0698SX41VsE
Discussion of paid editing at 33 minutes into the podcast



On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 7:40 AM, Ting Chen  wrote:

> Hello dear all,
>
> I would like to be more cautious about the difference between the "good"
> paid editing and the "bad" paid advocacy.
>
> There are two reasons why I don't want to separate in this way.
>
> First of there is no clear boundary between the "good" and "bad" like
> black and white. There is a gradient of grey between the two. And that
> gradient is not a narrow one but a very broad one. And it depends from the
> perspective of the people who look upon the matter. For one maybe a
> behavior is the dark white but for the other one it may be a bright black.
>
> Second I want to especially respond to the idea that Erik brought up: an
> organization that hire people to write qualified articles. I wrote in the
> other mail that I believe paid editing changes the collaboratory nature of
> our projects but did not really elaborate on why I think so. I want to do
> this now. Let me construct an example to emphasize why I think so. I will
> now take an example which leaves almost no room for interpretation about
> black and white: the theoretical physics. Let's say there is a charitable
> non-profit organization that hires reknowned theoretical physicists to
> write Wikipedia articles. So they pay 10.000 Dollar to Bryce DeWitt (I
> know, he is dead, I just don't want to name any living people) to write
> about field theory, or John Wheeler to write about general rela

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Brad Jorsch (Anomie)]

(Note these are my own personal views and in no way reflect any views of
the WMF or anyone else)

On Fri, Jan 10, 2014 at 7:34 AM, Christophe Henner <
christophe.hen...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Now, the question about "paid advocacy". Again, one of our core
> principle is NPOV. We don't want people to push their POV. Whether
> they're paid or not, is not relevant.
>
> So, to me, the "paid foobar" question is not the one in debate here.
> The one we're actually debating about is "do we want for profit
> organization to edit Wikipedia".
>

I'd take this one step further: *paid* advocacy isn't necessarily the thing
we should be that much concerned about, as unpaid advocacy is just as bad
for the integrity of our content. There's no difference between someone who
inserts POV content because they're being paid to do so and someone who
inserts POV content because of their religious beliefs or personal
relationships or the like.

On the other hand, a paid advocate may perhaps be more concerning from a
community standpoint because it's likely that the paid advocate is going to
have more time and resources to devote to inserting POV content (and to
doing so in ways less likely to be "caught") than most unpaid advocates.

Even more generally, even paid editing without advocacy may give a stigma
to the project even if the content really is fully NPOV. And, as mentioned
elsewhere, even paid editing without advocacy might discourage non-paid
contributions for various reasons. These reasons might be behind some of
the opposition to all paid editing.
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Erlend Bjørtvedt]

But even they sell souvenires and books..
Den 10. jan. 2014 16:05 skrev "Katie Chan"  følgende:

> On 10/01/2014 15:01, Erlend Bjørtvedt wrote:
>
>> A museum is a commercial entity. They live from ticket incomes from
>> customers.
>>
>
> Not all museum charges people entry... ;)
>
> --
> Katie Chan
> Any views or opinions presented in this e-mail are solely those of the
> author and do not necessarily represent the view of any organisation the
> author is associated with or employed by.
>
>
> Experience is a good school but the fees are high.
>  - Heinrich Heine
>
>
> ___
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> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> 
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Katie Chan]

On 10/01/2014 15:01, Erlend Bjørtvedt wrote:

A museum is a commercial entity. They live from ticket incomes from
customers.


Not all museum charges people entry... ;)

--
Katie Chan
Any views or opinions presented in this e-mail are solely those of the author 
and do not necessarily represent the view of any organisation the author is 
associated with or employed by.


Experience is a good school but the fees are high.
 - Heinrich Heine


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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Erlend Bjørtvedt]

A museum is a commercial entity. They live from ticket incomes from
customers. Universities live from tuition fees from students who freely
choose which university is most attractive to them.

The difference between these institutions editing, and a private railway
company when it comes to coi issues, is in my view  non-existent.

Erlend
Den 10. jan. 2014 14:14 skrev "Anders Wennersten" 
følgende:

> Thanks Christophe for your long ,but very good thoughts and experiences
> from paid editing from pro-profit organization.
>
> I fully  support your approach and hope we can put energy, instead of just
> being "against", to elaborate on how to best handle the reality that
> pro-profit organization do paid editing. Should we ask them to be be open
> with their userids  relation to their companies/organizations for example,
> which I think is the (only) wish we should have (and paid editors from GLAM
> already do this) .
>
>
> Anders
>
>
>
>
> Christophe Henner skrev 2014-01-10 13:34:
>
>> Hi everyone,
>>
>> I'll try to elaborate on this topic :)
>>
>> First of all, in 2011 in Haifa I did a first talk about companies and
>> Wikipedia. I did that because I was making a "study" (emphasis on the
>> " as I'm not keen to say it's a study and more of a detailed
>> observation) of the state of the articles of the top 40 french
>> companies.
>>
>> During that talk I explained how I believe companies could help us
>> improve our projects. I won't get too much into that as, since then,
>> the debate evolved from "companies editing Wikipedia" to "Paid editing
>> is evil".
>>
>> This year at Wikimania I gave two talks about this very topic, one
>> about how third party organizations can help us and the second on a
>> framework to have editing.
>>
>> Of course, as usual, some people were "against it".
>>
>> But how can we, as a community, be against "paid editing" on one hand
>> when on the other hand we seek "paid editing" from GLAMs, researchers
>> from state organizations, etc.
>>
>> The question whether we allow, or not, paid editing is non-existent.
>> Paid editing is allowed, we already allowed it, we even support it;
>>
>> Now, the question about "paid advocacy". Again, one of our core
>> principle is NPOV. We don't want people to push their POV. Whether
>> they're paid or not, is not relevant.
>>
>> So, to me, the "paid foobar" question is not the one in debate here.
>> The one we're actually debating about is "do we want for profit
>> organization to edit Wikipedia".
>>
>> So yes, paid organizations have an interest in editing Wikipedia, but
>> just as much as GLAMs have an interest in editing our projects. In
>> fact, when Wikimedian meets GLAMs one of the key arguments is "look at
>> (pick past project that got great coverage such as the bundesarchives,
>> British Museum, etc)". We show them they have an interest in
>> committing resources, both financial and human, to improve Wikimedia
>> projects.
>>
>> So the "they have an interest in editing" isn't an argument in the
>> end, as, of course a lot of editors have an interest in editing. And
>> we're using it. When we think or work on how researchers valorize
>> their edits in their cursus, those researchers have an interest in
>> editing Wikipedia.
>>
>> So, really what is that people working for a company have that makes
>> it so we have to ban them to edit? If we already have people paid to
>> edit, if we have people with interests (henceforth some sort of COI),
>> what do they have the others don't?
>>
>> Now, why do I strongly believe we should encourage companies to edit
>> Wikipedia.
>>
>> First of all, as I said some years ago I evaluated the quality of
>> company articles on the French Wikipedia. Most of them were crap.
>> Either outdated, incomplete or with wrong information, all those
>> articles were poor; And we're talking about the top 40 french
>> companies, such as Orange, L'Oréal, Renault, BNP, etc.
>>
>> The volunteer community isn't keen to improve and maintain those
>> articles. Companies are willing to do it. So we prefer to have poor
>> articles instead of good ones because there's a risk companies will
>> act wrongfully (I hope I'm not the only one to see the irony in this
>> situation where we prefer to ban editors because there's a risk
>> they'll do wrong. We should do that for all the projects, Close them
>> to editing because there's a risk people will do wrong.).
>>
>> Adapting our projects to provide a framework where companies can
>> easily fit in and edit as a direct consequence, improve the quality of
>> their articles.
>>
>> Companies that have the resources to commit to such things are,
>> usually, big and sometimes old company. Imagine that in a few year,
>> being involved with the Wikimedia projects is so natural for those
>> companies that they release their archives on the Wikimedia Projects.
>> What archives do you ask?
>>
>> Orange, for example, is the former organization in charge of the
>> french telecom. They managed tele

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Anders Wennersten]

Thanks Christophe for your long ,but very good thoughts and experiences 
from paid editing from pro-profit organization.


I fully  support your approach and hope we can put energy, instead of 
just being "against", to elaborate on how to best handle the reality 
that pro-profit organization do paid editing. Should we ask them to be 
be open with their userids  relation to their companies/organizations 
for example, which I think is the (only) wish we should have (and paid 
editors from GLAM already do this) .



Anders




Christophe Henner skrev 2014-01-10 13:34:

Hi everyone,

I'll try to elaborate on this topic :)

First of all, in 2011 in Haifa I did a first talk about companies and
Wikipedia. I did that because I was making a "study" (emphasis on the
" as I'm not keen to say it's a study and more of a detailed
observation) of the state of the articles of the top 40 french
companies.

During that talk I explained how I believe companies could help us
improve our projects. I won't get too much into that as, since then,
the debate evolved from "companies editing Wikipedia" to "Paid editing
is evil".

This year at Wikimania I gave two talks about this very topic, one
about how third party organizations can help us and the second on a
framework to have editing.

Of course, as usual, some people were "against it".

But how can we, as a community, be against "paid editing" on one hand
when on the other hand we seek "paid editing" from GLAMs, researchers
from state organizations, etc.

The question whether we allow, or not, paid editing is non-existent.
Paid editing is allowed, we already allowed it, we even support it;

Now, the question about "paid advocacy". Again, one of our core
principle is NPOV. We don't want people to push their POV. Whether
they're paid or not, is not relevant.

So, to me, the "paid foobar" question is not the one in debate here.
The one we're actually debating about is "do we want for profit
organization to edit Wikipedia".

So yes, paid organizations have an interest in editing Wikipedia, but
just as much as GLAMs have an interest in editing our projects. In
fact, when Wikimedian meets GLAMs one of the key arguments is "look at
(pick past project that got great coverage such as the bundesarchives,
British Museum, etc)". We show them they have an interest in
committing resources, both financial and human, to improve Wikimedia
projects.

So the "they have an interest in editing" isn't an argument in the
end, as, of course a lot of editors have an interest in editing. And
we're using it. When we think or work on how researchers valorize
their edits in their cursus, those researchers have an interest in
editing Wikipedia.

So, really what is that people working for a company have that makes
it so we have to ban them to edit? If we already have people paid to
edit, if we have people with interests (henceforth some sort of COI),
what do they have the others don't?

Now, why do I strongly believe we should encourage companies to edit Wikipedia.

First of all, as I said some years ago I evaluated the quality of
company articles on the French Wikipedia. Most of them were crap.
Either outdated, incomplete or with wrong information, all those
articles were poor; And we're talking about the top 40 french
companies, such as Orange, L'Oréal, Renault, BNP, etc.

The volunteer community isn't keen to improve and maintain those
articles. Companies are willing to do it. So we prefer to have poor
articles instead of good ones because there's a risk companies will
act wrongfully (I hope I'm not the only one to see the irony in this
situation where we prefer to ban editors because there's a risk
they'll do wrong. We should do that for all the projects, Close them
to editing because there's a risk people will do wrong.).

Adapting our projects to provide a framework where companies can
easily fit in and edit as a direct consequence, improve the quality of
their articles.

Companies that have the resources to commit to such things are,
usually, big and sometimes old company. Imagine that in a few year,
being involved with the Wikimedia projects is so natural for those
companies that they release their archives on the Wikimedia Projects.
What archives do you ask?

Orange, for example, is the former organization in charge of the
french telecom. They managed telephone for a very long time and have a
long history in R&D. Their archives must be astounding. Containing
documents, pictures and videos about telecomunication that should be
awesome. That are part of our history.
Right now, those archives are dusting in some building. And in few
years they might disappear.
Our stance, being so opposed to companies making the first step
(editing) prevent companies to go the next step, release. And in fact,
indirectly, we're preventing knowledge to be freed. Awesome.

Lastly, those companies have huge R&D budgets and employ thousands of
researchers and engineers. Imagine a company that employs 1 000
researchers. And 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Ting Chen]

Hello dear all,

I would like to be more cautious about the difference between the "good" 
paid editing and the "bad" paid advocacy.


There are two reasons why I don't want to separate in this way.

First of there is no clear boundary between the "good" and "bad" like 
black and white. There is a gradient of grey between the two. And that 
gradient is not a narrow one but a very broad one. And it depends from 
the perspective of the people who look upon the matter. For one maybe a 
behavior is the dark white but for the other one it may be a bright black.


Second I want to especially respond to the idea that Erik brought up: an 
organization that hire people to write qualified articles. I wrote in 
the other mail that I believe paid editing changes the collaboratory 
nature of our projects but did not really elaborate on why I think so. I 
want to do this now. Let me construct an example to emphasize why I 
think so. I will now take an example which leaves almost no room for 
interpretation about black and white: the theoretical physics. Let's say 
there is a charitable non-profit organization that hires reknowned 
theoretical physicists to write Wikipedia articles. So they pay 10.000 
Dollar to Bryce DeWitt (I know, he is dead, I just don't want to name 
any living people) to write about field theory, or John Wheeler to write 
about general relativity, and so on and so on. I wonder if this happens, 
would there still be anyone who dares to change or write articles on 
topics about theoretical physics? If this becomes a model that many 
follow, I feel it will largely change the composition of our volunteers 
community and how the project will look like. This is basically an 
approach that the Nupedia tried at the beginning. It didn't work that 
time. Meanwhile Wikipedia gains such a reputation that the model may 
work. But I personally don't find the idea sexy.


Greetings
Ting

Am 09.01.2014 03:22, schrieb MZMcBride:

Frank Schulenburg wrote:

[...] it is widely known that paid editing is frowned upon by many in the
editing community and by the Wikimedia Foundation.

No.

Paid editing is not the same as paid advocacy (editing). This is a very
important point.

Suggested reading:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Dominic/FAQ
https://blog.wikimedia.org/?p=25830

N.B. an example of paid editing that few would likely have an issue with
in the first link and Sue's careful and correct wording in the second link.

If we're going to have such a fine distinction, we should probably better
document it to avoid misunderstandings.

MZMcBride



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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid editing v. paid advocacy (editing)

[Christophe Henner]

Hi everyone,

I'll try to elaborate on this topic :)

First of all, in 2011 in Haifa I did a first talk about companies and
Wikipedia. I did that because I was making a "study" (emphasis on the
" as I'm not keen to say it's a study and more of a detailed
observation) of the state of the articles of the top 40 french
companies.

During that talk I explained how I believe companies could help us
improve our projects. I won't get too much into that as, since then,
the debate evolved from "companies editing Wikipedia" to "Paid editing
is evil".

This year at Wikimania I gave two talks about this very topic, one
about how third party organizations can help us and the second on a
framework to have editing.

Of course, as usual, some people were "against it".

But how can we, as a community, be against "paid editing" on one hand
when on the other hand we seek "paid editing" from GLAMs, researchers
from state organizations, etc.

The question whether we allow, or not, paid editing is non-existent.
Paid editing is allowed, we already allowed it, we even support it;

Now, the question about "paid advocacy". Again, one of our core
principle is NPOV. We don't want people to push their POV. Whether
they're paid or not, is not relevant.

So, to me, the "paid foobar" question is not the one in debate here.
The one we're actually debating about is "do we want for profit
organization to edit Wikipedia".

So yes, paid organizations have an interest in editing Wikipedia, but
just as much as GLAMs have an interest in editing our projects. In
fact, when Wikimedian meets GLAMs one of the key arguments is "look at
(pick past project that got great coverage such as the bundesarchives,
British Museum, etc)". We show them they have an interest in
committing resources, both financial and human, to improve Wikimedia
projects.

So the "they have an interest in editing" isn't an argument in the
end, as, of course a lot of editors have an interest in editing. And
we're using it. When we think or work on how researchers valorize
their edits in their cursus, those researchers have an interest in
editing Wikipedia.

So, really what is that people working for a company have that makes
it so we have to ban them to edit? If we already have people paid to
edit, if we have people with interests (henceforth some sort of COI),
what do they have the others don't?

Now, why do I strongly believe we should encourage companies to edit Wikipedia.

First of all, as I said some years ago I evaluated the quality of
company articles on the French Wikipedia. Most of them were crap.
Either outdated, incomplete or with wrong information, all those
articles were poor; And we're talking about the top 40 french
companies, such as Orange, L'Oréal, Renault, BNP, etc.

The volunteer community isn't keen to improve and maintain those
articles. Companies are willing to do it. So we prefer to have poor
articles instead of good ones because there's a risk companies will
act wrongfully (I hope I'm not the only one to see the irony in this
situation where we prefer to ban editors because there's a risk
they'll do wrong. We should do that for all the projects, Close them
to editing because there's a risk people will do wrong.).

Adapting our projects to provide a framework where companies can
easily fit in and edit as a direct consequence, improve the quality of
their articles.

Companies that have the resources to commit to such things are,
usually, big and sometimes old company. Imagine that in a few year,
being involved with the Wikimedia projects is so natural for those
companies that they release their archives on the Wikimedia Projects.
What archives do you ask?

Orange, for example, is the former organization in charge of the
french telecom. They managed telephone for a very long time and have a
long history in R&D. Their archives must be astounding. Containing
documents, pictures and videos about telecomunication that should be
awesome. That are part of our history.
Right now, those archives are dusting in some building. And in few
years they might disappear.
Our stance, being so opposed to companies making the first step
(editing) prevent companies to go the next step, release. And in fact,
indirectly, we're preventing knowledge to be freed. Awesome.

Lastly, those companies have huge R&D budgets and employ thousands of
researchers and engineers. Imagine a company that employs 1 000
researchers. And imagine that company to do 2 things:
1/ that a company, as part of its CSR politic, says they commit 1 day
per year per researcher to improve one article. And to provide to
those researchers a one day training session about Wikipedia. This
means 1 000 days of editing from specialized researchers and 1 000
researchers evangelized and trained to edit.
2/ that this company would commit 0.0001% of it's R&D global budget to
open a Q&A desk so wikimedians could ask their researchers for
bibliography or proof reading articles

Those things are not wild dreams, they could de

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Announcement Sarah Stierch

[Delphine Ménard]

Oh wow, this is so... well, random.

Cheers,

Delphine

On Thu, Jan 9, 2014 at 1:07 AM, Frank Schulenburg
 wrote:
> Dear all,
>
> I'm writing to let you know that Sarah Stierch is no longer an employee of 
> the Wikimedia Foundation.
>
> The Wikimedia Foundation has recently learned that Sarah has been editing 
> Wikipedia on behalf of paying clients, as recently as a few weeks ago. She 
> did that even though it is widely known that paid editing is frowned upon by 
> many in the editing community and by the Wikimedia Foundation.
>
> The Wikimedia Foundation values Sarah a great deal. She has been an active 
> Wikipedian since 2006. She is committed to increasing dialogue between 
> cultural institutions and our projects. She has worked hard to increase the 
> presence and voices of women and other minorities in our projects, and she is 
> a warm welcomer of new Wikipedians. Her work in Program Evaluation has been 
> important and necessary. She is a good friend of many of us.
>
> Everybody makes mistakes, and I would like to believe that the Wikimedia 
> movement is a place of forgiveness and compassion. And so I ask you to 
> respect Sarah's privacy at what is surely a difficult time for her, and to 
> join me in wishing her every future success.
>
> I sincerely hope that Sarah will continue her important work as a Wikipedian 
> and member of the GLAM community, and I thank her for the commitment and 
> energy and thoughtfulness she has brought to her work at the Foundation.
>
> Frank Schulenburg
>
>
> --
>
>
> Frank Schulenburg
> Senior Director of Programs
> Wikimedia Foundation
>
> Cell: +1 (415) 517-0453
> Email: fr...@wikimedia.org
>
> Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum 
> of all knowledge. Help us make it a reality!
>
> http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate
>
> ___
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> Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, 
> 



-- 
@notafish

NB. This gmail address is used for mailing lists. Personal emails will get lost.
Intercultural musings: Ceci n'est pas une endive - http://blog.notanendive.org
Photos with simple eyes: notaphoto - http://photo.notafish.org

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [Wikitech-l] A Multimedia Vision for 2016

[Gerard Meijssen]

Hoi,
Fabrice, I very much love the two stories described in the vision. It
describes not only a functionality that is technical, it also describes how
our community may interact. That is great.

What I missed are the consequences of the planned integration of Commons
with Wikidata. I blogged about it [1] and I suggest three more stories that
could be told because they are enabled by this integration. What I do not
fully understand is how the community aspects will integrate in an
environment that will be more multi lingual and multi cultural as a
consequence.

I have confidence that the three stories that I suggest will be realised by
2016. Not only that, I am pretty sure that as a consequence the amount of
traffic that our servers will have to handle will grow enormously to the
extend that I am convinced that our current capacity will not be able to
cope. Then again, they are the luxury problems that make us appreciate how
much room we still have for growth.
Thanks,
 GerardM


[1]
http://ultimategerardm.blogspot.nl/2014/01/wikimedia-multimedia-featuresvision-2016.html


On 10 January 2014 01:39, Fabrice Florin  wrote:

> Happy new year, everyone!
>
> Many thanks to all of you who contributed to our multimedia programs last
> year! Now that we have a new multimedia team at WMF, we look forward to
> making some good progress together this year.
>
> To kick off the new year, here is a proposed multimedia vision for 2016,
> which was prepared by our multimedia and design teams, with guidance from
> community members:
>
> http://blog.wikimedia.org/2014/01/09/multimedia-vision-2016/
>
> This possible scenario is intended for discussion purposes, to help us
> visualize how we could improve our user experience over the next three
> years. We hope that it will spark useful community feedback on some of the
> goals we are considering.
>
> After you’ve viewed the video, we would be grateful if you could let us
> know what you think in this discussion:
>
>
> https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons_talk:Multimedia_Features/Vision_2016
>
> We are looking for feedback from all users who benefit from Commons, even
> if their work takes place on other sites. This vision explores ways to
> integrate Wikimedia Commons more closely with Wikipedia and other MediaWiki
> projects, to help users contribute more easily to our free media repository
> -- wherever they are.
>
> In coming weeks, we will start more focused discussions on some key
> features outlined in this presentation. If you would like to join those
> conversations and keep up with our work, we invite you to subscribe to our
> multimedia mailing list:
>
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/multimedia
>
> We look forward to more great collaborations in the new year!
>
> All the best,
>
>
> Fabrice
> on behalf of the Multimedia team
>
> ___
>
> Fabrice Florin
> Product Manager, Multimedia
> Wikimedia Foundation
>
> Wikipedia Profile:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Fabrice_Florin_(WMF)
>
> Multimedia Project Hub:
> https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Multimedia
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> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] "Wikipedia-Mania" in the New York Times

[Federico Leva (Nemo)]

MZMcBride, 10/01/2014 08:26:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/09/fashion/Wikipedia-Judith-Newman.html

This piece by Judith Newman has some amusing snippets. :-)


Very funny and looks like her "sockpuppet public call to arms" has 
worked. :) At its root however it's just pokémon test all over the 
place. 


Nemo

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