[Wikimedia-l] Hollywood planning to roll out SOPA-type laws again

[David Gerard]

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/studios-antipiracy-bill-legislation-1235871278/

we get a mention


- d.
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[Wikimedia-l] Re: Launch of Justapedia

[David Gerard]

what do you expect from an encyclopedia founded by world-famous
communist Jimmy Wales

 -d.

On Tue, 12 Sept 2023 at 08:52, Vi to  wrote:
>
> Indeed Venn diagrams are a left-wing-woke-cancel-culture propaganda.
>
> Vito
>
> Il giorno mar 12 set 2023 alle ore 08:15 Galder Gonzalez Larrañaga 
>  ha scritto:
>>
>> The logo is quite funny. According to that Information + Disinformation = 
>> Facts. It might be that they don't know what a Venn diagram is, or simply 
>> that they actually think that.
>>
>> Don't worry, this is just one more project that will fall into oblivion.
>>
>> Galder
>> 
>> From: Lauren Worden 
>> Sent: Tuesday, September 12, 2023 12:42 AM
>> To: Wikimedia Mailing List 
>> Subject: [Wikimedia-l] Re: Launch of Justapedia
>>
>> The only specific and non-contradictory complaints about Wikipedia
>> bias I can find on
>> https://justapedia.org/wiki/Justapedia:Justapedia_Foundation are
>> climate change and COVID-19, which are areas in which I think
>> Wikipedia excels. The complaints about politics go in both directions.
>>
>> Perhaps Atsme can clarify?
>>
>> -LW
>>
>> On Mon, Sep 11, 2023 at 3:18 PM Andy Mabbett  
>> wrote:
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > On Sun, 10 Sept 2023, 14:31 Rey Bueno via Wikimedia-l, 
>> >  wrote:
>> >
>> >> Justapedia
>> >
>> >
>> > It's laughable, as the logo [1] that (inadvertently,?) shows 
>> > "disinformation" and "lies" being given equal weight with "information" in 
>> > determining "truth" suggests.
>> >
>> > But this [2] hints at the darker underbelly:
>> >
>> > "The Editorial Review Board (ERB) [...] will make binding decisions 
>> > regarding the retention and rejection of article content, as well as serve 
>> > to resolve content disputes, and notability issues... ERB members are 
>> > required to have a high level, native understanding of written English"
>> >
>> >> Besides, there are alarming rumors I saw in Y Combinator [...]
>> >
>> >
>> > Oh, please. Do better than that.
>> >
>> >
>> > [1] https://justapedia.org/wiki/File:Hands-circ-sifts-sources-Sm.png
>> >
>> > [2] https://justapedia.org/wiki/Justapedia:Editorial_Review_Board
>> >
>> > ___
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[Wikimedia-l] Re: The last paper encyclopedia: World Book is still in print

[David Gerard]

I'm presuming they assume English, yes :-)

On Mon, 3 Jul 2023 at 11:52, Johan Jönsson  wrote:
>
> It was pointed out elsewhere that the Italian Enciclopedia Italiana 
> (Treccani) is available in print with the last appendix published in 2020, 
> and that the national encyclopedia of Azerbaijan (Azərbaycan Milli 
> Ensiklopediyası) is not only published in print but still in the middle of 
> being written, so the article's claim that this is the last paper 
> encyclopedia might not be entirely accurate.
>
> //Johan Jönsson
> --
>
> Den mån 3 juli 2023 kl 11:55 skrev David Gerard :
>>
>> It's sort of nice to know we didn't take out the entire sector:
>>
>> https://arstechnica.com/culture/2023/06/rejoice-its-2023-and-you-can-still-buy-a-22-volume-paper-encyclopedia/
>>
>> World Book still does a physical edition, selling a few thousand of
>> each edition of their paper encyclopedia set for $1,199. The market is
>> mostly schools and libraries.
>>
>>
>> - d.
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[Wikimedia-l] The last paper encyclopedia: World Book is still in print

[David Gerard]

It's sort of nice to know we didn't take out the entire sector:

https://arstechnica.com/culture/2023/06/rejoice-its-2023-and-you-can-still-buy-a-22-volume-paper-encyclopedia/

World Book still does a physical edition, selling a few thousand of
each edition of their paper encyclopedia set for $1,199. The market is
mostly schools and libraries.


- d.
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[Wikimedia-l] Re: ChatGPT as a reliable source

[David Gerard]

Note that quite often it just *makes up* a plausible-looking source.
Because AI text generators just make up plausible text, not accurate
text.

On Wed, 17 May 2023 at 09:40, Lane Chance  wrote:
>
> Keep in mind how fast these tools change. ChatGPT, Bard and
> competitors understand well the issues with lack of sources, and Bard
> does sometimes put a suitable source in a footnote, even if it
> (somewhat disappointingly) just links to wikipedia. There's likely to
> be a variation soon that does a decent job of providing references,
> and at that point the role of these tools moves beyond being an
> amusement to a far more credible research tool.
>
> So, these long discussions about impact on open knowledge are quite
> likely to have to run again in 2024...
>
> On Wed, 17 May 2023 at 09:24, Kiril Simeonovski
>  wrote:
> >
> > Thank you everyone for your input.
> >
> > Your considerations are very similar to mine, and they give a clear 
> > direction towards what the guidelines regarding the use of ChatGPT should 
> > point to.
> >
> > Best regards,
> > Kiril
> >
> > On Wed, 17 May 2023 at 10:11, Ilario valdelli  wrote:
> >>
> >> Define "reliable source".
> >>
> >> A source is reliable if can be consulted by other people than the editor
> >> to check the content.
> >>
> >> Is this possible with ChatGPT? No, becaue if you address the same
> >> question to CHatGPT, you will have a different answer.
> >>
> >> In this case how the people verificaying the information can check that
> >> the editor did not invent the result?
> >>
> >> Kind regards
> >>
> >> On 17/05/2023 09:08, Kiril Simeonovski wrote:
> >> > Dear Wikimedians,
> >> >
> >> > Two days ago, a participant in one of our edit-a-thons consulted
> >> > ChatGPT when writing an article on the Macedonian Wikipedia that did
> >> > not exist on any other language edition. ChatGPT provided some output,
> >> > but the problem was how to cite it.
> >> >
> >> > The community on the Macedonian Wikipedia has not yet had a discussion
> >> > on this matter and we do not have any guidelines. So, my main
> >> > questions are the following:
> >> >
> >> > * Can ChatGPT be used as a reliable source and, if yes, how would the
> >> > citation look like?
> >> >
> >> > * Are there any ongoing community discussions on introducing guidelines?
> >> >
> >> > My personal opinion is that ChatGPT should be avoided as a reliable
> >> > source, and only the original source where the algorithm gets the
> >> > information from should be used.
> >> >
> >> > Best regards,
> >> > Kiril
> >> >
> >> > ___
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> >>
> >> --
> >> Ilario Valdelli
> >> Wikimedia CH
> >> Verein zur Förderung Freien Wissens
> >> Association pour l’avancement des connaissances libre
> >> Associazione per il sostegno alla conoscenza libera
> >> Switzerland - 8008 Zürich
> >> Wikipedia: Ilario
> >> Skype: valdelli
> >> Tel: +41764821371
> >> http://www.wikimedia.ch
> >>
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[Wikimedia-l] Re: ChatGPT as a reliable source

[David Gerard]

I've mentioned AI text generators on English Wikipedia's Reliable
Sources Noticeboard a couple of times, and the consensus each time has
been that it's obvious that this rubbish absolutely doesn't belong in
en:wp in any manner. The discussions are how to deal with publishers
who indulge in this nonsense. So yes, I would suggest a text generator
could never be used as a source in this manner. The most unreliable of
sources.



- d.

On Wed, 17 May 2023 at 08:08, Kiril Simeonovski
 wrote:
>
> Dear Wikimedians,
>
> Two days ago, a participant in one of our edit-a-thons consulted ChatGPT when 
> writing an article on the Macedonian Wikipedia that did not exist on any 
> other language edition. ChatGPT provided some output, but the problem was how 
> to cite it.
>
> The community on the Macedonian Wikipedia has not yet had a discussion on 
> this matter and we do not have any guidelines. So, my main questions are the 
> following:
>
> * Can ChatGPT be used as a reliable source and, if yes, how would the 
> citation look like?
>
> * Are there any ongoing community discussions on introducing guidelines?
>
> My personal opinion is that ChatGPT should be avoided as a reliable source, 
> and only the original source where the algorithm gets the information from 
> should be used.
>
> Best regards,
> Kiril
> ___
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[Wikimedia-l] EU designates Wikipedia a Very Large Online Platform

[David Gerard]

https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_23_2413

In the same category as Facebook, Twitter, Amazon, TikTok ...

On the face of it, this seems a miscategorisation. However, the
recommendations aren't *bad*, and they're stuff we basically do anyway
- though through volunteer editors, not the Foundation.

The main nuisance will be a report as if we're Facebook.

How are we approaching this one?


- d.
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[Wikimedia-l] Re: Mozilla's social media pledge

[David Gerard]

I concur that the WMF should at the very least set up an account
mirroring what's sent to the Twitter account. Or perhaps some
well-known volunteer could set one up. (That's not me volunteering!)
Dip a toe in.


- d.

On Sat, 31 Dec 2022 at 01:15, Erik Moeller  wrote:
>
> On Fri, Dec 30, 2022 at 2:30 PM Erik Moeller  wrote:
> > These are just the nonprofits
> > that Wikidata knows about:
> >
> > https://w.wiki/6Am4
>
> Apologies, that was the wrong URL. Here is the correct one for that
> query: https://w.wiki/69V8
>
> And yeah, completely agree re: patience - hope everyone has a nice
> start into the new year! :)
>
> Warmly,
> Erik
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[Wikimedia-l] Re: Mozilla's social media pledge

[David Gerard]

Legoktm runs https://wikis.world which a small number of Wikimedians
and WIkimedia groups are already on.

But yes - recommended best practice for organisations is to run their
own instance. Putting an instance up on a domain you own is also a
clear stamp of authenticity.

Twitter has stayed up so far, but bits are visibly falling off. The
assorted official Wikimedia accounts should be posting in the main
federation too, from an official presence.




- d.

On Wed, 21 Dec 2022 at 00:01, Erik Moeller  wrote:
>
> Worth a read:
> https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/mozilla-launch-fediverse-instance-social-media-alternative/
>
> "Our intention is to contribute to the healthy and sustainable growth
> of a federated social space that doesn’t just operate but thrives on
> its own terms, independent of profit- and control-motivated tech
> firms.  An open, decentralized, and global social service that puts
> the needs of people first is not only possible, but it’s absolutely
> necessary."
>
> I don't think Wikimedia Foundation should get into the social media
> business, but it should IMO absolutely maintain an organizational
> presence on the fediverse (Mastodon & friends). It's a bit sad that
> the only social media profiles linked from
> https://wikimediafoundation.org/ are corporate ones -- especially as
> it's becoming quite clear that the fediverse is emerging as a
> singularly credible [1] alternative to Twitter, which is being run
> into the ground by its new owner.
>
> In other words, it would be wonderful to see a similar forward-looking
> statement & associated actions from Wikimedia Foundation soon :-).
>
> Erik
>
> [1] See, e.g., 
> https://www.deweysquare.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/DSG-Snapshot-of-the-Twitter-Migration-December-12-2022.pdf
> for some number-crunching on where folks are and aren't going.
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[Wikimedia-l] Re: Obnoxious fundraisers again: Undismissable notice

[David Gerard]

You put the dismissal button *two screens away* from where the user is.

You're choosing to make the banner hard to dismiss.

Look, we're trying to assume good faith here, but you're not making it
easy with the track record of observed behaviour.


On Sat, 17 Dec 2022 at 19:14, Samuel Patton  wrote:
>
> Hi all, I work in online fundraising and I'd like to provide some 
> clarification on this particular mobile fundraising banner. There are several 
> options to dismiss the banner. There is a "no thanks" option at the top of 
> the banner. A user can also scroll down to see the article without needing to 
> click on the banner at all.
>
> I appreciate the feedback on ways to make it simpler for readers to reach 
> their article and find what they're looking for. We'll line up some close 
> option tests to try over this weekend.
>
> Thanks,
> Sam
>
> On Sat, Dec 17, 2022 at 2:05 PM Rey Bueno via Wikimedia-l 
>  wrote:
>>
>> Here's a proposition for the WMF.
>>
>> You can keep the banners as big and as long as you want, but in return you 
>> must sponsor the next Arch Missions to back contents from top 10 Wikipedias 
>> (English, Japanese, Russian, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Chinese, 
>> Arabic, Portuguese) to Moon & beyond. Editors do not get paid from spending 
>> so much time on Wikipedia, but at least they'll all derive some reward from 
>> it.
>>
>> Context of Arch Mission:
>> https://www.space.com/40598-lunar-library-wikipedia-astrobotic-moon-mission.html
>> ___
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>
>
>
> --
>
> Sam Patton (he/him)
>
> Senior Manager, Online Fundraising
>
> Wikimedia Foundation
>
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[Wikimedia-l] Re: Obnoxious fundraisers again: Undismissable notice

[David Gerard]

I wonder if any of them check logged-out on mobile.

After that RFC, this just comes across as the fundraising team trying it on.

On Sat, 17 Dec 2022 at 16:44, Paulo Santos Perneta
 wrote:
>
> I thought it was decided by the community[1] they wouldn't be allowed in that 
> kind of format anymore 樂 at least on wiki.en.
>
> [1] - 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)#RfC_on_the_banners_for_the_December_2022_fundraising_campaign
>
> Benjamin Ikuta  escreveu no dia sábado, 17/12/2022 
> à(s) 14:32:
>>
>>
>>
>> We ought to have an RfC proposing to limit the size of such disruptive 
>> banners.
>>
>>
>>
>> > On Dec 17, 2022, at 6:16 AM, David Gerard  wrote:
>> >
>> > If you aren't logged in and you're on mobile, the fundraising notice
>> > now takes up 1.5 screens, and can't be dismissed - there's only "Maybe
>> > later", and that demands an email address and can't be dismissed.
>> >
>> > The fundraising department are making the site actually unusable again.
>> >
>> >
>> > - d.
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[Wikimedia-l] Obnoxious fundraisers again: Undismissable notice

[David Gerard]

If you aren't logged in and you're on mobile, the fundraising notice
now takes up 1.5 screens, and can't be dismissed - there's only "Maybe
later", and that demands an email address and can't be dismissed.

The fundraising department are making the site actually unusable again.


- d.
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[Wikimedia-l] Re: Is GoogleTV violating Wikipedia's license?

[David Gerard]

yep. Asking nicely is always the best first option, and WMF is good at
that. Reusing our stuff is excellent, but correct licensing is important,
and a link back would be very nice.

On Tue, 30 Aug 2022 at 13:50, Gnangarra  wrote:

> Agree with Andy here, the WMF cant sue as the copyright holder, but they
> do have leverage and direct connections to Google to remind them of
> their obligations as a reuser to follow the copyright licensing and at the
> very least acknowledge the work from a Wikipedia.  You'd think this would
> attribution requirment be built into the Wikimedia Enterprise agreements
> anyway with some form of assurance or penalty for failing to acknowledge a
> location where in the movement a fact came from.
>
> On Tue, 30 Aug 2022 at 20:40, Andy Mabbett 
> wrote:
>
>> On Tue, 30 Aug 2022 at 10:18, Peter Southwood
>>  wrote:
>>
>> > If I understand the CC-by-sa licence correctly, Wikipedia and WMF
>> themselves do not
>> > own the copyright, it is owned by the contributors who created the
>> text. They can take
>> > this up with Google,
>>
>> All of the above is true.
>>
>> > the WMF cannot
>>
>> That is not true. The WMF cannot sue Google as a copyright holder.
>> However, there is nothing stopping WM from raising the issue with
>> Google, and gently reminding them of their obligations. Indeed, that
>> would probably be more effective than individual editors doing so.
>>
>> --
>> Andy Mabbett
>> @pigsonthewing
>> https://pigsonthewing.org.uk
>> ___
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>
>
> --
> Boodarwun
> Gnangarra
> 'ngany dabakarn koorliny arn boodjera dardoon ngalang Nyungar
> koortaboodjar'
>
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[Wikimedia-l] Re: Luis Bitencourt-Emilio Joins Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees

[David Gerard]

On Thu, 13 Jan 2022 at 13:41, Dariusz Jemielniak
 wrote:

> even though I appreciate blockchain as a technology,

This is a common buzzword phrase. What *in particular* do you
appreciate about them, that someone who knows what they are and how
they work but isn't a fan would find a credible claim?
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Moderation notice

[David Gerard]

If we didn't want serious discussions to come to this mailing list, or
have discussions on it taken seriously, this thread would so far be a
great example for not doing so. Thankfully, it won't actually succeed
in derailing the discussions.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Paid API?

[David Gerard]

All cloud providers are approximately level in evil. The way we break
it down at my day job is:

* AWS: when you want it to work and want customer service
* Microsoft: when you hate yourself, you're running Windows or both
* Google: when you want zero customer service ever under any circumstances
* Ali: when you're serving in China
* Oracle: lol no, not under any circumstances are we signing up with
Oracle again for anything

My personal server is at Hetzner, which is cheaper than AWS with less
services - but that's a very bespoke box, not managed cattle in a
server farm.

tl;dr if we're going to use cloud at all rather than our own cloud,
AWS is as good as any and better technically.


- d.



On Thu, 9 Jul 2020 at 21:16, Dan Garry (Deskana)  wrote:
>
> On Thu, 9 Jul 2020 at 18:20, Amir Sarabadani  wrote:
>
> > * I find it ethically wrong to use AWS, even if you can't host it in WMF
> > for legal reasons, why not another cloud provider.
>
>
> Which cloud provider would you recommend? Popular alternatives to AWS
> include GCP (by Google, who unscrupulously harvest user data and sell it
> for profit) and Azure (by Microsoft who arguably owe their position in the
> market due to numerous anti-competitive practices for which they have
> fought, and lost, numerous lawsuits). In addition to that, there are
> numerous other factors to consider, such as cost (we should be responsible
> with donor money), and environmental impact of the hosting choice in
> question. My point is, there is no objectively correct ethical choice.
>
> There's also numerous other factors to take into account in addition to
> ethics. There are different feature sets that each cloud provider offers;
> as an example, I recently did a competitive analysis of different
> cloud-hosted container registry providers, and was surprised at the large
> number of feature differences in each provider, even for something as
> relatively straightforward as a container registry, even between ECR and
> GKE. Engineering productivity is an important factor too.
>
> From a project management perspective, it seems to me that the most prudent
> thing to do is to choose a solution for prototyping rather than spending an
> excessive amount of time analysing it. After all, time is money. I would be
> concerned by the choice of AWS if this were in any way a permanent choice,
> but the docs specifically mention that AWS is being used for ease of
> prototyping, and that the long-term solution is presently undetermined.
>
> Dan
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Citizendium shutting down

[David Gerard]

Not that occurs to me. I mentioned it here mostly as a historical note
- what happened to our most widely publicised fork.

Their current plans are:

* put good content into Wikipedia
* archive a final version with the Internet Archive
* maybe set up some sort of successor


- d.

On Sat, 4 Jul 2020 at 22:20, Joseph Seddon  wrote:
>
> Is there any merit in us helping them continue to exist?
>
> Seddon
>
> On Sat, Jul 4, 2020 at 10:13 PM David Gerard  wrote:
>
> > here's the discussion:
> >
> > https://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Forum_Talk:Technical_Issues#Any_further_thoughts.3F
> >
> > On Sat, 4 Jul 2020 at 22:11, David Gerard  wrote:
> > >
> > > Front page:
> > >
> > > > This wiki was unsuccessful in achieving its original goals (see
> > https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-difference-between-Wikipedia-and-Citizendium).
> > A dedicated few writers have continued working in the wiki, improving
> > articles that they believe are useful, and which for various reasons
> > probably could not be written in Wikipedia. On or about Sept. 30, 2020, we
> > plan to end Citizendium as a public "open" project, yet (possibly) keep the
> > wiki running and editable by a combination of donations and subscriptions.
> > How this might occur is still being examined.
> > >
> > > Original announcement
> > >
> > https://en.citizendium.org/wiki?title=Welcome_to_Citizendium=100864611=100857010
> > >
> > > basically - nobody's editing anything any more, and the money's running
> > out.
> > >
> > >
> > > - d.
> >
> > ___
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>
>
>
> --
> Seddon
>
> *Community and Audience Engagement Associate*
> *Advancement (Fundraising), Wikimedia Foundation*
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Citizendium shutting down

[David Gerard]

here's the discussion:
https://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Forum_Talk:Technical_Issues#Any_further_thoughts.3F

On Sat, 4 Jul 2020 at 22:11, David Gerard  wrote:
>
> Front page:
>
> > This wiki was unsuccessful in achieving its original goals (see 
> > https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-difference-between-Wikipedia-and-Citizendium).
> >  A dedicated few writers have continued working in the wiki, improving 
> > articles that they believe are useful, and which for various reasons 
> > probably could not be written in Wikipedia. On or about Sept. 30, 2020, we 
> > plan to end Citizendium as a public "open" project, yet (possibly) keep the 
> > wiki running and editable by a combination of donations and subscriptions. 
> > How this might occur is still being examined.
>
> Original announcement
> https://en.citizendium.org/wiki?title=Welcome_to_Citizendium=100864611=100857010
>
> basically - nobody's editing anything any more, and the money's running out.
>
>
> - d.

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[Wikimedia-l] Citizendium shutting down

[David Gerard]

Front page:

> This wiki was unsuccessful in achieving its original goals (see 
> https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-difference-between-Wikipedia-and-Citizendium).
>  A dedicated few writers have continued working in the wiki, improving 
> articles that they believe are useful, and which for various reasons probably 
> could not be written in Wikipedia. On or about Sept. 30, 2020, we plan to end 
> Citizendium as a public "open" project, yet (possibly) keep the wiki running 
> and editable by a combination of donations and subscriptions. How this might 
> occur is still being examined.

Original announcement
https://en.citizendium.org/wiki?title=Welcome_to_Citizendium=100864611=100857010

basically - nobody's editing anything any more, and the money's running out.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Summary of the Brand Project presentation

[David Gerard]

I'd like to stress - I can see a case for renaming it all as
"Wikipedia". I could even make that case!

I'm not inclined to advocate such a change myself - and I'm not
convinced that branding is a problem we have - but it's not an
unreasonable *position*.

But pre-deciding the outcome, then feeding the community nonsense in
this manner, is bad business, and can't possibly go well.


- d.


On Wed, 22 Apr 2020 at 16:56, Steven Walling  wrote:
>
> I can't believe I'm saying this but I agree with Fæ as well.
>
> Having been on the inside at some companies that underwent controversial
> rebrands, I can see how this might be a very early stage thing to help
> guide and shape thinking about how to approach a rebrand by unifying around
> a high level concept. I can see how in the name of transparency the team
> might be sharing very early stage work like that with the community, but if
> that's truly what it is (early exploratory thinking, not finished work) it
> would probably help to explain that this is not anywhere close to finalized
> work. People who don't do brand design tend to have little patience or
> interest in hand-wavy concepts without a concrete expression, Wikipedians
> maybe least of all.
>
> On Wed, Apr 22, 2020 at 2:30 AM Chris Gates via Wikimedia-l <
> wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org> wrote:
>
> > As it appears my earlier email was not approved by the moderators:
> >
> > I'm in agreement with Fæ on this.
> >
> > The text and videos given on the subject of the new "interconnection" focus
> > is all extremely vague. I don't see how this is a change from previous
> > branding, or how the idea of "interconnection" will change anything.
> > Specifically in regard to the video, I was surprised by the vagueness.
> > Obviously, everything is connected. We are all humans with a majority of
> > similar characteristics and a high potential for similar experiences.
> > Putting together a few videos of people from different cultures
> > collaborating and some videos of nature doesn't make a branding strategy.
> >
> > I am very happy that, in the presentation, a timeline was addressed and
> > that there will be ample time for feedback on the proposed naming
> > conventions. I am looking forward to that; this project has been quite
> > vague for a while, and I hope there's some great ideas we can, as a
> > community, discuss.
> >
> > Best regards,
> > Chris Gates
> > (User:Vermont)
> >
> > On Sat, Apr 18, 2020 at 1:44 PM Anders Wennersten <
> > m...@anderswennersten.se>
> > wrote:
> >
> > > I have a background in a telecom supplier, and we were proud to talk of
> > > us "connecting people" and with 5G (where things also gets connected)
> > > "interconenctivity" would be a great brand concept for that company.
> > >
> > > But for Wikimedia I have never felt this as a relevant brandconcept. To
> > > "share and spread knowledge"is the core word as far as I see it and have
> > > been all the time.
> > >
> > > Anders
> > >
> > >
> > > Den 2020-04-18 kl. 18:44, skrev Peter Southwood:
> > > > I agree. It did not seem to say anything much.
> > > > Cheers,
> > > > Peter
> > > >
> > > > -Original Message-
> > > > From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On
> > > Behalf Of Fæ
> > > > Sent: Saturday, April 18, 2020 3:06 PM
> > > > To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> > > > Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Summary of the Brand Project presentation
> > > >
> > > > Have now watched "interconnection". It did not seem to say anything
> > > > tangible apart from stuff like you find 'interconnection in nature' in
> > > > the 2 minutes. It was produced to a good standard.
> > > >
> > > > Sorry, it was not encouraging. The question remains of how much this
> > > > is costing the movement in WMF funding and valuable Wikimedia
> > > > community time without any clear outcomes being defined that the
> > > > Wikimedia community wants or could use to benefit the core value of
> > > > adding to the sum of human knowledge. Why the "rebranding" project
> > > > continues at this time remains an enigma.
> > > >
> > > > We have gone ahead and added the video to Commons. If superseded it
> > > > will remain useful as a snapshot as of 16 April.
> > > >
> > >
> > https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Our_unified_concept_interconnection.webm
> > > >
> > > > Thanks,
> > > > Fae
> > > >
> > > > On Fri, 17 Apr 2020 at 09:57, Samir Elsharbaty
> > > >  wrote:
> > > >> Hi everyone,
> > > >>
> > > >>
> > > >> Yesterday, the 2030 Brand Movement Project presented the unified
> > concept
> > > >> that will guide the upcoming branding proposals. Thanks to the 224
> > > >> attendees who watched the presentation live! Participants brought a
> > > great
> > > >> stream of comments and questions (averaging 8 per minute!) that helped
> > > >> clarify important points.
> > > >>
> > > >> The unified concept, “interconnection”, was arrived at after many
> > > community
> > > >> workshops, exercises, and conversations. “Interconnection” 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Brand Project: Who are we as a movement?

[David Gerard]

https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Minutes/2018-11-9,10,11#Branding

So this has been dictated from above - the "community consultation" is
window dressing for a decision that's long been made.

Hence the nonsensical claims of massive community support by fiddling
the numbers, employing literal wiki spammers to do the consulting,
etc.

Samir's posts here are an attempt at managing messaging. Nothing a
community member does to "engage" with this process will change the
path that's been set.

Image Filter 2.0 anyone?


- d.

On Sun, 12 Apr 2020 at 21:38, Tito Dutta  wrote:
>
> It would be good to reflect the new changes/progress in the FAQ. 1.1–1.6,
> maybe revisited perhaps.
>
> An email above notifies about "slowing down the process", the /Timeline
> page also mentions a possible delay because of the crisis. FAQ 1.5 timeline
> has not been edited or contains such details (a link to the main timeline
> page might be a good idea).
>
> "Exploring new options" seem to be an important point in the last update.
> In the FAQ it is mentioned once at FAQ 2.4 while answering "Why is this
> project moving forward after the RfC?" However, this might be a separate
> FAQ point.
>
> FAQ 2.6: "... findings of the 2030 research and planning community review
> [link to email],"
> -- Perhaps a "link to email" is missing? If it so, it's a minor thing of
> course and can be fixed.
>
> Regards, in a personal capacity
>
> Thanks
> Tito Dutta
> Note: If I don't reply to your email in 2 days, please feel free to remind
> me over email or phone call.
>
>
> On Sun, 12 Apr 2020 at 23:22, David Gerard  wrote:
>
> > I think at this point, someone needs to answer: who has predetermined
> > this outcome?
> >
> > It's clear nobody at (say) Samir's level can or will answer this
> > question - just repeat the same things again, as if nobody ever
> > objected.
> >
> > So precisely who is so gung-ho for this idea?
> >
> >
> > - d.
> >
> > On Sat, 11 Apr 2020 at 13:58, Tito Dutta  wrote:
> > >
> > > Hello,
> > > My comments are in a personal capacity, and kindly note my posts are not
> > > directed towards anyone specifically/at all. Sincere thanks for
> > > understanding these two points.
> > >
> > > " We recommend you to have a look at these updates before making further
> > > conclusions here.
> > > -- Thanks for the recommendation. Kindly do not assume that we are not
> > > reading the updates "before making further conclusions here".
> > >
> > > " the Brand team has been watching the RfC and has written a summary
> > about
> > > it"
> > > --Yes, RfC needs a closure/summary, from which we get action points. Now,
> > > there is something called WP:INVOLVED. Someone who is
> > > supporting/opposing/promoting/demoting an idea or in other words someone
> > > who is "involved" often may not close or summarise a debate/discussion
> > with
> > > due weight to all the arguments. As a result, conclusions may be faulty,
> > > and action points may not reflect the actual opinion of the RfC. Example
> > > below.
> > >
> > > FAQ: Why is this project moving forward after the RfC resulted in clear
> > > majority opposition?
> > > (
> > >
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Communications/Wikimedia_brands/2030_movement_brand_project/FAQ#Why_is_this_project_moving_forward_after_the_RfC_resulted_in_clear_majority_opposition
> > > ?)
> > > -- Even after reading the answer I also don't understand "why?" A point I
> > > get there is "exploring further options". On the report page, "What is
> > > happening with the feedback?" (intended action points section perhaps) is
> > > taking me to FAQ page. From the FAQ page the last paragraph sends me back
> > > to the report page, making it a loop.
> > >
> > > " The team has integrated the feedback of the RfC in the development
> > > process, just as we did with the activities organized by the project
> > > itself. "
> > > -- unlike other statements here any footnote or reference is not given.
> > > Would love to learn what are those activities and how was the RfC
> > feedback
> > > integrated into the agenda/activity. (Please note that I have read the
> > > brand workshop report.)
> > >
> > > That's all for now, with regards, and good wishes during the global
> > > pandemic time,
> > > User:Titodutta
&

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Brand Project: Who are we as a movement?

[David Gerard]

about_this_RfC_by_the_Brand_Project_team
> >
> > [3]
> >
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Communications/Wikimedia_brands/2030_movement_brand_project
> >
> > [4]
> >
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Communications/Wikimedia_brands/2030_movement_brand_project/FAQ
> >
> > [5]
> >
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Communications/Wikimedia_brands/2030_movement_brand_project
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > Samir Elsharbaty (he/him)
> >
> > Community Brand and Marketing coordinator
> >
> > Wikimedia Foundation <https://wikimediafoundation.org/>
> >
> >
> >
> > On Sat, Apr 11, 2020 at 1:12 AM David Gerard  wrote:
> >
> > > Yes. Who's the person telling Samir to post this stuff, which comes
> > > across as aggressively ignoring all feedback to date? Could we have a
> > > word with them here?
> > >
> > >
> > > - d.
> > >
> > > On Fri, 10 Apr 2020 at 14:12, Peter Southwood
> > >  wrote:
> > > >
> > > > When you speak for someone who is hard of listening, it is an
> > > occupational hazard that you will be shouted at occasionally by those
> > whose
> > > voices are being ignored. It is not necessarily anything personal, just
> > > part of the heat in the kitchen.
> > > > Cheers,
> > > > Peter
> > > >
> > > > -Original Message-
> > > > From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On
> > > Behalf Of Yaroslav Blanter
> > > > Sent: Friday, April 10, 2020 11:28 AM
> > > > To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> > > > Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Brand Project: Who are we as a movement?
> > > >
> > > > In all honesty, this should not have been directed at Samir. I do not
> > > think
> > > > he has the authority to stop the process. And whoever has probably
> > spends
> > > > more time in Twitter that in Wikimedia projects.
> > > >
> > > > Best
> > > > Yaroslav
> > > >
> > > > On Fri, Apr 10, 2020 at 11:12 AM Tito Dutta 
> > wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > There is something called [[WP:IDHT,]] i.e. I didn't hear that.
> > > > > No matter how many times, how many people (90% in the RFC) speak, I
> > > just
> > > > > didn't hear that.
> > > > > Kind regards,
> > > > > (Comment in personal capacity)
> > > > >
> > > > > Thanks
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > On Fri, 10 Apr 2020 at 00:15, Samir Elsharbaty <
> > > selsharb...@wikimedia.org>
> > > > > wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > > > Hi All,
> > > > > >
> > > > > > We wanted to follow up with a brief update on the project timeline
> > > and
> > > > > > share an invitation to join an event this month.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > We know there continues to be so much uncertainty in the world, so
> > > we are
> > > > > > slowing down the process of the project. Big changes are happening
> > > to all
> > > > > > of us these days. We want to make sure that we respect the time and
> > > > > > priorities of the project collaborators. This means updating the
> > > project
> > > > > > timeline approach to have more flexibility for participants and
> > > smaller
> > > > > > time commitments [1], revising the project schedule month by month
> > > and
> > > > > > keeping the Brand Network [2] and other participants informed on a
> > > more
> > > > > > regular basis with any updates and changes. The naming discussions
> > > > > planned
> > > > > > for April are now pushed to May, at the earliest. Design proposals
> > > are
> > > > > > likewise shifted +4 weeks.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > But we do have things to share:
> > > > > >
> > > > > > *This month: live brand concept presentation!*
> > > > > >
> > > > > > To honor, celebrate, and conclude the work around the concepts
> > > referred
> > > > > to
> > > > > > in Essie’s email above [3], Snohetta and the Brand Project team
> > will
> > > > > > present the Unified Concept LIVE on 16 April, 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Brand Project: Who are we as a movement?

[David Gerard]

On Sat, 11 Apr 2020 at 09:49, Samir Elsharbaty
 wrote:

> While having Wikipedia as a central concept
> is a project requirement,

... and here we have the source of all the problems here: the answer
has been predetermined.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Brand Project: Who are we as a movement?

[David Gerard]

Yes. Who's the person telling Samir to post this stuff, which comes
across as aggressively ignoring all feedback to date? Could we have a
word with them here?


- d.

On Fri, 10 Apr 2020 at 14:12, Peter Southwood
 wrote:
>
> When you speak for someone who is hard of listening, it is an occupational 
> hazard that you will be shouted at occasionally by those whose voices are 
> being ignored. It is not necessarily anything personal, just part of the heat 
> in the kitchen.
> Cheers,
> Peter
>
> -Original Message-
> From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf 
> Of Yaroslav Blanter
> Sent: Friday, April 10, 2020 11:28 AM
> To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Brand Project: Who are we as a movement?
>
> In all honesty, this should not have been directed at Samir. I do not think
> he has the authority to stop the process. And whoever has probably spends
> more time in Twitter that in Wikimedia projects.
>
> Best
> Yaroslav
>
> On Fri, Apr 10, 2020 at 11:12 AM Tito Dutta  wrote:
>
> > There is something called [[WP:IDHT,]] i.e. I didn't hear that.
> > No matter how many times, how many people (90% in the RFC) speak, I just
> > didn't hear that.
> > Kind regards,
> > (Comment in personal capacity)
> >
> > Thanks
> >
> >
> > On Fri, 10 Apr 2020 at 00:15, Samir Elsharbaty 
> > wrote:
> >
> > > Hi All,
> > >
> > > We wanted to follow up with a brief update on the project timeline and
> > > share an invitation to join an event this month.
> > >
> > > We know there continues to be so much uncertainty in the world, so we are
> > > slowing down the process of the project. Big changes are happening to all
> > > of us these days. We want to make sure that we respect the time and
> > > priorities of the project collaborators. This means updating the project
> > > timeline approach to have more flexibility for participants and smaller
> > > time commitments [1], revising the project schedule month by month and
> > > keeping the Brand Network [2] and other participants informed on a more
> > > regular basis with any updates and changes. The naming discussions
> > planned
> > > for April are now pushed to May, at the earliest. Design proposals are
> > > likewise shifted +4 weeks.
> > >
> > > But we do have things to share:
> > >
> > > *This month: live brand concept presentation!*
> > >
> > > To honor, celebrate, and conclude the work around the concepts referred
> > to
> > > in Essie’s email above [3], Snohetta and the Brand Project team will
> > > present the Unified Concept LIVE on 16 April, 15:00 - 16:00 GMT. Snøhetta
> > > will explain how they used the ideas, feedback and conceptual models from
> > > the workshops and online exercises to arrive at a final, unified concept.
> > > This unified concept  will be the foundation for the upcoming work around
> > > the naming conventions, visual decisions, and the overall design system.
> > > The session will also be recorded and made available for viewing after.
> > You
> > > can join us using these links. [4] Note: this is not a presentation of a
> > > proposal for a naming convention or design.
> > >
> > > Thank you!
> > >
> > > Samir and the brand project team
> > >
> > > [1]
> > >
> > >
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Communications/Wikimedia_brands/2030_movement_brand_project/Timeline
> > >
> > > [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Brand_Network
> > >
> > > [3] https://brandingwikipedia.org/concepts/
> > >
> > > [4] Join via Zoom:
> > >
> > > https://wikimedia.zoom.us/j/769565325
> > >
> > > Steam via Youtube Live:
> > > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xS72O6Si94Q
> > >
> > > Samir Elsharbaty (he/him)
> > >
> > > Community Brand and Marketing coordinator
> > >
> > > Wikimedia Foundation <https://wikimediafoundation.org/>
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > On Thu, Mar 26, 2020 at 10:32 AM David Gerard  wrote:
> > >
> > > > The article itself is spammy brochure-style nonsense, and this is even
> > > > after some cleanup. Editorial eyes welcomed.
> > > >
> > > > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sn%C3%B8hetta_(company)
> > <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sn%C3%B8hetta_%28company%29>
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Brand Project: Who are we as a movement?

[David Gerard]

The article itself is spammy brochure-style nonsense, and this is even
after some cleanup. Editorial eyes welcomed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sn%C3%B8hetta_(company)


- d.

On Wed, 25 Mar 2020 at 23:16, Samir Elsharbaty
 wrote:
>
> Hi everyone,
>
> The Brand Project Team felt it was important to address the concerns and
> questions around Snøhetta and the English Wikipedia, and have now added an
> FAQ about it. [1] Please refer there for the full details about the block
> and what is being done. The project team is in the process of updating the
> project materials, including the FAQ, so feel free to add those pages to
> your watchlist to stay up to date on the latest information.
>
>
> Best,
>
> Samir
>
> [1] https://w.wiki/LEF
>
> Samir Elsharbaty (he/him)
>
> Community Brand and Marketing coordinator
>
> Wikimedia Foundation <https://wikimediafoundation.org/>
>
>
>
> On Tue, Mar 24, 2020 at 4:43 AM Gnangarra  wrote:
>
> > This does have feeling of a company creating a financial relationship with
> > the Foundation as way to bypass or backdoor a community ban thats been
> > reviewed already.   Over the years I've worked with many users who been
> > blocked and help them become productive contributors but before they start
> > making recommendation or decisions about who we are there needs to be
> > something done to get them back to good standing with the community first
> > untiil thats taken place.It's like asking the fox to rebuild the hen
> > house,  I just dont see how I could support anything they recommend.
> >
> > After the dollars, and t=volunteer time that has been pumped into the 2030
> > strategy shouldnt we already know who we are, as it is that should have
> > been the key starting point for a strategy process. Its comprehensible not
> > to have known or explored that before deciding where, how, why we will be
> > doing anything for the next 10 years.
> >
> > On Tue, 24 Mar 2020 at 03:20, David Gerard  wrote:
> >
> > > Particularly as they've demonstrated by their actions an unwillingness
> > > to work with Wikipedia properly:
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Archive318#Review_of_User:Sn%C3%B8hettaAS_block_please
> > >
> > >
> > > - d.
> > >
> > > On Sat, 14 Mar 2020 at 04:34, Peter Southwood
> > >  wrote:
> > > >
> > > > I would agree with this in principle. From what I have seen so far, it
> > > looks like either Snøhetta have not done their homework on how we
> > operate,
> > > or they have the arrogance of PR agencies, don't care, and plan to spin
> > > their way through with smoke and mirrors, flashy pages with lots of buzz,
> > > little content and all the dialogue they can't avoid. Maybe I am wrong,
> > and
> > > they have just been badly briefed. Who can tell from the outside? Block
> > > evasion does not bode well for their understanding of the community.
> > > > Cheers,
> > > > Peter
> > > >
> > > > -Original Message-
> > > > From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On
> > > Behalf Of Pine W
> > > > Sent: Friday, March 13, 2020 8:13 PM
> > > > To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> > > > Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Brand Project: Who are we as a movement?
> > > >
> > > > Hello,
> > > >
> > > > First, a disclaimer that these comments aren't directed personally at
> > > > you, Essie.
> > > >
> > > > Even if money was unlimited, I thought that Snøhetta deserved the
> > > > community's trust, and I felt that WMF was a good steward of resources
> > > > (all of which are questionable), I don't think that this project is a
> > > > good idea. Wikidata is an increasingly important component of the
> > > > Wikiverse, and there are a some problems with WMF rebranding itself as
> > > > the Wikipedia Foundation including the risk to the communities and
> > > > affiliates from WMF's political adventures, governance problems, and
> > > > occasional high profile clashes with the community. I don't think that
> > > > the costs or the risks here make sense, I wouldn't involve Snøhetta
> > > > given its apparent block evasion on English Wikipedia, and I've been
> > > > unimpressed with WMF's handling of this process during the past few
> > > > months.
> > > >
> > > > I am fine w

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Brand Project: Who are we as a movement?

[David Gerard]

Particularly as they've demonstrated by their actions an unwillingness
to work with Wikipedia properly:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Archive318#Review_of_User:Sn%C3%B8hettaAS_block_please


- d.

On Sat, 14 Mar 2020 at 04:34, Peter Southwood
 wrote:
>
> I would agree with this in principle. From what I have seen so far, it looks 
> like either Snøhetta have not done their homework on how we operate, or they 
> have the arrogance of PR agencies, don't care, and plan to spin their way 
> through with smoke and mirrors, flashy pages with lots of buzz, little 
> content and all the dialogue they can't avoid. Maybe I am wrong, and they 
> have just been badly briefed. Who can tell from the outside? Block evasion 
> does not bode well for their understanding of the community.
> Cheers,
> Peter
>
> -Original Message-
> From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf 
> Of Pine W
> Sent: Friday, March 13, 2020 8:13 PM
> To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Brand Project: Who are we as a movement?
>
> Hello,
>
> First, a disclaimer that these comments aren't directed personally at
> you, Essie.
>
> Even if money was unlimited, I thought that Snøhetta deserved the
> community's trust, and I felt that WMF was a good steward of resources
> (all of which are questionable), I don't think that this project is a
> good idea. Wikidata is an increasingly important component of the
> Wikiverse, and there are a some problems with WMF rebranding itself as
> the Wikipedia Foundation including the risk to the communities and
> affiliates from WMF's political adventures, governance problems, and
> occasional high profile clashes with the community. I don't think that
> the costs or the risks here make sense, I wouldn't involve Snøhetta
> given its apparent block evasion on English Wikipedia, and I've been
> unimpressed with WMF's handling of this process during the past few
> months.
>
> I am fine with discussions about branding, but not with this program
> in its current form.
>
> Given the choice, I would freeze this project and spending associated
> with it pending a Meta RfC regarding the community's view on whether
> this project should continue. If the community wants a branding
> project to continue, I would let the community decide on the project's
> parameters and budget, and what if any consultant should be involved.
>
> Pine
> ( https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Pine )
>
> ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Wikipedia is going to be available in turkey again

[David Gerard]

here's the AP writeup https://apnews.com/3dc4b3da93ba67f728b27608badb7d93


- d.

On Thu, 26 Dec 2019 at 13:16, Rajeeb Dutta  wrote:
>
> A wonderful news to end 2019, thanks for the update.
>
> Best Regards,
> Rajeeb Dutta.
> (U: Marajozkee)
> (Sent from my iPhone pardon the brevity)
>
> > On 26-Dec-2019, at 6:40 PM, Abhinav srivastava  wrote:
> >
> > This is a wonderful news! Thanks for sharing.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >> On Thu, Dec 26, 2019, 6:22 PM Shlomi Fish  wrote:
> >>
> >> On Thu, 26 Dec 2019 16:10:09 +0330
> >> Mardetanha  wrote:
> >>
> >>> Dear friends and colleagues
> >>> before new year I would like to share the wonderful news that we received
> >>> today. Turkey's Constitutional Court finds that the Wikipedia ban
> >>> constitutes a violation of the right to freedom of expression. The high
> >>> court also requests Ankara 1st Criminal Judgeship of Peace to remove the
> >>> ban immediately. Wikipedia has been banned since Apr 2017.
> >>>
> >>
> >> Great news! Thanks for sharing.
> >>
> >>>
> >>> Mardetanha
> >>> ___
> >>> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> >>> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
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> >>> Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe:
> >>> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> >>> 
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >>
> >> Shlomi Fish   https://www.shlomifish.org/
> >> My Favourite FOSS - https://www.shlomifish.org/open-source/favourite/
> >>
> >> You can never truly appreciate The Gilmore Girls until you’ve watched it in
> >> the original Klingon.
> >>— http://www.shlomifish.org/humour.html
> >>
> >> Please reply to list if it's a mailing list post - http://shlom.in/reply .
> >>
> >> ___
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> >> 
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> > 
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[Wikimedia-l] How does Wikimedia handle non-US requests for user information?

[David Gerard]

https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_user_information_procedures_%26_guidelines

What do you tell non-US authorities who ask if their local courts can
submit orders allowing Wikimedia to release information?

Are there relevant international treaties in place that would mean
that a foreign request from certain countries would be sufficient?


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Community feedback and next steps on movement brand proposal

[David Gerard]

I concur, it sounds sensible.

(I'll note, I'm not actually against the name change proposal - but
it's got to be presented to the community properly.)

On Sat, 7 Sep 2019 at 20:50, Kiril Simeonovski
 wrote:
>
> HI David,
>
> Yes, it stands to reason to announce on all wikis in a similar way as the
> announcements about board or steward elections.
>
> Best,
> Kiril
>
> On Sat, Sep 7, 2019 at 9:46 PM David Gerard  wrote:
>
> > On all wikis?
> >
> > On Sat, 7 Sep 2019 at 19:19, Yaroslav Blanter  wrote:
> > >
> > > Right.
> > >
> > > I guess a central notice about an RfC would be appropriate.
> > >
> > > Cheers
> > > Yaroslav
> > >
> > > On Sat, Sep 7, 2019 at 8:16 PM Kiril Simeonovski <
> > > kiril.simeonov...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > > Hi all,
> > > >
> > > > It seems like there is a clear consensus to open an RfC on Meta about
> > this,
> > > > so we can safely move forward with it and close this thread.
> > Otherwise, we
> > > > will most likely keep up boggling our minds with the 20-per-cent
> > metric and
> > > > endlessly discuss how unfortunate is this for the global community
> > when the
> > > > only rational thing we can do is take action and save everyone's time.
> > > >
> > > > Do you have any concluding remarks or comments regarding the RfC?
> > > >
> > > > Best regards,
> > > > Kiril
> > > >
> > > > On Sat, Sep 7, 2019 at 7:57 PM Ferdinando Traversa <
> > > > ferdi.trave...@gmail.com>
> > > > wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > I’m against and sincerly I don’t trust this datas (80% agrees? Are
> > you
> > > > > kidding me? I’ve seen the meta discussion). I think a Meta CLEAR
> > VOTE as
> > > > > suggested here is the best way. Imposing a change like this is a
> > wrong
> > > > > decision.
> > > > >
> > > > > Regards.
> > > > >
> > > > > > Il giorno 6 set 2019, alle ore 05:49, Zack McCune <
> > > > zmcc...@wikimedia.org>
> > > > > ha scritto:
> > > > > >
> > > > > > *Summary* - We want your help with a voluntary, OPT-IN design
> > process
> > > > for
> > > > > > movement branding.  Please join the in-depth discussion group, or
> > watch
> > > > > for
> > > > > > updates on Meta-Wiki.
> > > > > >
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Hello all,
> > > > > >
> > > > > > After 4 months of community consultation, spanning dozens of
> > > > affiliates,
> > > > > > several mailing lists, community conferences, and Meta-Wiki, I am
> > > > pleased
> > > > > > to share a summary of feedback on the proposed 2030 movement brand
> > > > > strategy
> > > > > > [1].
> > > > > >
> > > > > > From more than 319 comments, representing 150 individual
> > contributors
> > > > and
> > > > > > 63 affiliates, we assessed 6 major themes in feedback:
> > > > > >
> > > > > >   1.
> > > > > >
> > > > > >   Reducing confusion
> > > > > >   2.
> > > > > >
> > > > > >   Protecting reputation
> > > > > >   3.
> > > > > >
> > > > > >   Supporting sister projects
> > > > > >   4.
> > > > > >
> > > > > >   Addressing (legal, governmental) risks
> > > > > >   5.
> > > > > >
> > > > > >   Supporting movement growth
> > > > > >   6.
> > > > > >
> > > > > >   The process of change
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Please visit our feedback summary page to learn more [2]. You will
> > see
> > > > > > examples of comments within each section, along with a rough
> > indication
> > > > > of
> > > > > > how many of the comments that we received were related to each
> > theme.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > The comments sometimes contradict one another, showing that across
> > our
> > > > > wide
> > > > > > movement’s experience, different points of

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Community feedback and next steps on movement brand proposal

[David Gerard]

On all wikis?

On Sat, 7 Sep 2019 at 19:19, Yaroslav Blanter  wrote:
>
> Right.
>
> I guess a central notice about an RfC would be appropriate.
>
> Cheers
> Yaroslav
>
> On Sat, Sep 7, 2019 at 8:16 PM Kiril Simeonovski <
> kiril.simeonov...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Hi all,
> >
> > It seems like there is a clear consensus to open an RfC on Meta about this,
> > so we can safely move forward with it and close this thread. Otherwise, we
> > will most likely keep up boggling our minds with the 20-per-cent metric and
> > endlessly discuss how unfortunate is this for the global community when the
> > only rational thing we can do is take action and save everyone's time.
> >
> > Do you have any concluding remarks or comments regarding the RfC?
> >
> > Best regards,
> > Kiril
> >
> > On Sat, Sep 7, 2019 at 7:57 PM Ferdinando Traversa <
> > ferdi.trave...@gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> > > I’m against and sincerly I don’t trust this datas (80% agrees? Are you
> > > kidding me? I’ve seen the meta discussion). I think a Meta CLEAR VOTE as
> > > suggested here is the best way. Imposing a change like this is a wrong
> > > decision.
> > >
> > > Regards.
> > >
> > > > Il giorno 6 set 2019, alle ore 05:49, Zack McCune <
> > zmcc...@wikimedia.org>
> > > ha scritto:
> > > >
> > > > *Summary* - We want your help with a voluntary, OPT-IN design process
> > for
> > > > movement branding.  Please join the in-depth discussion group, or watch
> > > for
> > > > updates on Meta-Wiki.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > Hello all,
> > > >
> > > > After 4 months of community consultation, spanning dozens of
> > affiliates,
> > > > several mailing lists, community conferences, and Meta-Wiki, I am
> > pleased
> > > > to share a summary of feedback on the proposed 2030 movement brand
> > > strategy
> > > > [1].
> > > >
> > > > From more than 319 comments, representing 150 individual contributors
> > and
> > > > 63 affiliates, we assessed 6 major themes in feedback:
> > > >
> > > >   1.
> > > >
> > > >   Reducing confusion
> > > >   2.
> > > >
> > > >   Protecting reputation
> > > >   3.
> > > >
> > > >   Supporting sister projects
> > > >   4.
> > > >
> > > >   Addressing (legal, governmental) risks
> > > >   5.
> > > >
> > > >   Supporting movement growth
> > > >   6.
> > > >
> > > >   The process of change
> > > >
> > > > Please visit our feedback summary page to learn more [2]. You will see
> > > > examples of comments within each section, along with a rough indication
> > > of
> > > > how many of the comments that we received were related to each theme.
> > > >
> > > > The comments sometimes contradict one another, showing that across our
> > > wide
> > > > movement’s experience, different points of view are common (and a sign
> > of
> > > > health!). To visualize these tensions, we have created “polarity maps”
> > > > which are used to help visualize how different arguments coexist in
> > > tension
> > > > with each other.
> > > >
> > > > Ultimately, the comments provided from you all are very thoughtful and
> > > > useful guidance on what is needed to make our movement’s branding
> > > > successful. One can read the 6 themes above as “criteria” for assessing
> > > > branding systems.
> > > >
> > > > == Thanks ==
> > > >
> > > > I would like to thank the organizers of Iberoconf, Wikipedia Education
> > > > Summit, and the Wikimedia Summit for inviting us to hold discussions
> > > during
> > > > their sessions. I would also like to thank my colleagues Elena Lappen,
> > > > Samir Elsharbaty, and Blanca Flores who conducted extensive parts of
> > this
> > > > consultation. To the hundreds of people, and dozens of affiliates
> > > > commenting, thank you for reviewing the proposal and offering your
> > > > perspectives and insights.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > == Next steps and staying involved ==
> > > >
> > > > There is considerable support for the brand proposal and general
> > appetite
> > > > to improve our movement’s branding system. Further, we believe that
> > > > critical feedback on the proposal offers direct guidance for precisely
> > > what
> > > > branding must do to be successful for our movement. We have shared
> > these
> > > > insights and our proposed continuance with the Board of Trustees, who
> > > > approved continuing these efforts.
> > > >
> > > > Acting on community insights, we will be collaborating on formal brand
> > > > naming, visual identity, and brand system design that will use
> > > “Wikipedia”
> > > > as the central reference point. The resulting system will be OPT-IN for
> > > > affiliates.
> > > >
> > > > This design process will be guided by a “brand network” – a group of
> > > > volunteers who would like to continue advising on brand during this
> > > > consultation. Dozens of people have already volunteered, and we invite
> > > you
> > > > to join the group. We will use a group on Wikimedia Space to host this
> > > > discussion and the group will be closed to allow candid discussions and
> > > > room for iterations. 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Fram en.wp office yearlock block

[David Gerard]

If you really think Fram's framing of events here is even plausible,
let alone the story, then you're less competent than I have previously
considered you to be.

On Fri, 14 Jun 2019 at 18:47, Todd Allen  wrote:
>
> According to Fram, the WMF told him his "interaction ban" was for
> maintenance tagging two articles, yes (and when I looked at the diffs, the
> maintenance tags were accurate and necessary). So, either Fram is lying or
> omitting something (and the WMF, for whatever reason, is not challenging
> him on it), the WMF lied to Fram, or they did indeed sanction him for what
> they told him they sanctioned him for.
>
> Todd
>
> On Fri, Jun 14, 2019 at 4:37 AM David Gerard  wrote:
>
> > and you're *seriously* positing that the WMF would ban an admin for
> > doing only what you describe?
> >
> > On Fri, 14 Jun 2019 at 11:32, Todd Allen  wrote:
> > >
> > > The only case of "harassment" apparently cited here was "I kept writing
> > > garbage articles, and someone kept flagging them as garbage! Harassment!
> > > Bad!"
> > >
> > > If you don't want your articles to be flagged as garbage, FIND YOUR
> > SOURCES
> > > PRIOR TO WRITING THEM, AND CITE THEM. That's rather a requirement anyway.
> > > The editor in question repeatedly failed to do that, repeatedly had her
> > > articles flagged for failure to do that, and regarded that as
> > "harassment"
> > > rather than her own failure to follow the English Wikipedia's policies.
> > > Next time, she needs to find the sources first, and write the article
> > only
> > > after she has them in hand.
> > >
> > > Todd
> > >
> > > On Thu, Jun 13, 2019 at 10:14 AM Robert Fernandez <
> > wikigamal...@gmail.com>
> > > wrote:
> > >
> > > > If someone is able to harass someone for years and nothing is done then
> > > > clearly community procedures are not “perfectly adequate”
> > > >
> > > > On Thu, Jun 13, 2019 at 11:36 AM Fæ  wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > This misses the point, as others have highlighted already.
> > > > >
> > > > > The WMF can and /should/ globally and permanently ban paedophiles,
> > > > > terrorists, system hackers and people making multiple cross-wiki
> > death
> > > > > threats or threats of suicide. There are perfectly good and
> > > > > understandable reasons as to why the evidence behind these attacks
> > and
> > > > > threats would be kept unpublished, it's seriously personal or
> > criminal
> > > > > stuff.
> > > > >
> > > > > The WMF making topic bans, interaction bans and limited project
> > > > > specific bans against Wikipedians is a brand new invention, which
> > goes
> > > > > against the pre-existing understanding that the WMF do not replace
> > > > > existing and perfectly adequate community agreed procedures for
> > > > > banning bad behaviour on our projects. Once full time WMF employees
> > > > > start doing in parallel what volunteer administrators already do,
> > then
> > > > > we should question why we do not *pay* volunteers administrators the
> > > > > same hourly rate and we are likely to see a mass exodus of
> > > > > administrators. After all, would you, say, deliver the post for free
> > > > > in your area for fun, but thereby take away decent full time
> > > > > employment with a guaranteed pension for your local postie?
> > > > >
> > > > > If the reason for the WMF stepping in to ban Fram for a year is
> > > > > because the WMF do not trust Wikipedia administrators or Wikipedia's
> > > > > Arbcom to take sensible action in harassment cases, then they should
> > > > > be raising that honestly and openly with Arbcom. If the English
> > > > > Wikipedia's policies are not fit for purpose, or implementation of
> > > > > policy is incompetent, we need a much bigger discussion than whether
> > > > > Fram did something so terrible it cannot be named, but oddly was not
> > > > > worth a global ban but only the equivalent of a 12 month block on
> > > > > Wikipedia while they are free to do whatever they feel like on other
> > > > > Wikimedia projects.
> > > > >
> > > > > Fae
> > > > > --
> > > > > fae...@gmail.com https://commons

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Fram en.wp office yearlock block

[David Gerard]

and you're *seriously* positing that the WMF would ban an admin for
doing only what you describe?

On Fri, 14 Jun 2019 at 11:32, Todd Allen  wrote:
>
> The only case of "harassment" apparently cited here was "I kept writing
> garbage articles, and someone kept flagging them as garbage! Harassment!
> Bad!"
>
> If you don't want your articles to be flagged as garbage, FIND YOUR SOURCES
> PRIOR TO WRITING THEM, AND CITE THEM. That's rather a requirement anyway.
> The editor in question repeatedly failed to do that, repeatedly had her
> articles flagged for failure to do that, and regarded that as "harassment"
> rather than her own failure to follow the English Wikipedia's policies.
> Next time, she needs to find the sources first, and write the article only
> after she has them in hand.
>
> Todd
>
> On Thu, Jun 13, 2019 at 10:14 AM Robert Fernandez 
> wrote:
>
> > If someone is able to harass someone for years and nothing is done then
> > clearly community procedures are not “perfectly adequate”
> >
> > On Thu, Jun 13, 2019 at 11:36 AM Fæ  wrote:
> >
> > > This misses the point, as others have highlighted already.
> > >
> > > The WMF can and /should/ globally and permanently ban paedophiles,
> > > terrorists, system hackers and people making multiple cross-wiki death
> > > threats or threats of suicide. There are perfectly good and
> > > understandable reasons as to why the evidence behind these attacks and
> > > threats would be kept unpublished, it's seriously personal or criminal
> > > stuff.
> > >
> > > The WMF making topic bans, interaction bans and limited project
> > > specific bans against Wikipedians is a brand new invention, which goes
> > > against the pre-existing understanding that the WMF do not replace
> > > existing and perfectly adequate community agreed procedures for
> > > banning bad behaviour on our projects. Once full time WMF employees
> > > start doing in parallel what volunteer administrators already do, then
> > > we should question why we do not *pay* volunteers administrators the
> > > same hourly rate and we are likely to see a mass exodus of
> > > administrators. After all, would you, say, deliver the post for free
> > > in your area for fun, but thereby take away decent full time
> > > employment with a guaranteed pension for your local postie?
> > >
> > > If the reason for the WMF stepping in to ban Fram for a year is
> > > because the WMF do not trust Wikipedia administrators or Wikipedia's
> > > Arbcom to take sensible action in harassment cases, then they should
> > > be raising that honestly and openly with Arbcom. If the English
> > > Wikipedia's policies are not fit for purpose, or implementation of
> > > policy is incompetent, we need a much bigger discussion than whether
> > > Fram did something so terrible it cannot be named, but oddly was not
> > > worth a global ban but only the equivalent of a 12 month block on
> > > Wikipedia while they are free to do whatever they feel like on other
> > > Wikimedia projects.
> > >
> > > Fae
> > > --
> > > fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
> > >
> > > On Thu, 13 Jun 2019 at 15:35, John Erling Blad  wrote:
> > > >
> > > > When you bad mouth other users there should be, and will be,
> > > consequences.
> > > > An admin got desysoped and banned after repeated warnings? So what? The
> > > > only ting to be learned is that some people believe they can do
> > whatever
> > > > they want and it has no consequences, and other people goes ballistic
> > > when
> > > > consequences happen.
> > > >
> > > > I would have given desysoped fram and 14 days to cool off, and if that
> > > did
> > > > not work out repeated with one month. Banning someone for one year is
> > > like
> > > > telling them to leave and don't come back. Someone at WMF is clearly
> > > overly
> > > > sensitive, but not reacting would also be wrong.
> > > > ___
> > > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
> > > > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > > 
> > >
> > > ___
> > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
> > > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > > 
> > ___
> > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
> > New messages to: 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Fram en.wp office yearlock block

[David Gerard]

I think the problem is that the pathological people, having been
called out on being pathological, decided to double down on the
original complainant. See also: Gamergate, a clearly apt and apposite
comparison.

On Thu, 13 Jun 2019 at 19:48, Pine W  wrote:
>
> I'm sad to hear that. I would not want a victim to go with a request for
> help to WMF, local functionaries, an arbitration committee, or anyone else,
> and have the situation end up worse rather than better. I don't know what
> to recommend. Perhaps you could ask the stewards what they think.
>
> I am also sad to hear about the difficulties regarding the situation in
> which you think that someone was at risk of self-harm. I think that the
> situation you described is probably appropriate for review by the
> management of WMF Trust and Safety so that they can take a second look. I
> encourage you to contact them.
>
> I am finding this conversation to be rather depressing, but I am glad that
> we are having it, because this is one way of developing solutions.
>
> Pine
> ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Fram en.wp office yearlock block

[David Gerard]

On Thu, 13 Jun 2019 at 00:19, Nathan  wrote:

>  The
> T team made a very token effort to intervene, and then imposed a high
> profile ban with the flimsy excuse of a diff that says "fuck arbcom". They
> then used that diff to excuse not including ArbCom, as if ArbCom had never
> been subjected to any abuse before.

Did they actually do that, or was that Fram claiming it was the cause?


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Fram en.wp office yearlock block

[David Gerard]

Seconded. These pages appear to have a substantial population of
raving obsessives I have no intention of bothering to deal with.


- d.

On Wed, 12 Jun 2019 at 22:10, Rebecca O'Neill  wrote:
>
> Just you reply to your point on how many people are speaking out against
> this decision, I'm a relatively active and interested editor and I have no
> interest in voicing my opinion there as the atmosphere is so toxic. There
> is always a danger of the tyranny of a vocal and motivated minority
> appearing to be the dominant opinion of the community as a whole. I would
> proffer that that is a deeply flawed premise, if we were to take into
> account the number of people engaged in this discussion and compare it to
> the number of regular contributors.
>
> On Wed 12 Jun 2019, 22:01 Yaroslav Blanter,  wrote:
>
> > Just to summarize the difference between WMF and ArbCom, in view of the
> > majority of the en.wiki community:
> >
> > We elect ArbCom, and if they do not do what they should be doing, they do
> > not get re-elected in two years, which happens on a regular basis
> >
> > We do not elect WMF and in fact we have no means of influencing WMF (apart
> > of the three Trustees we elect every three years who are themselves
> > typically alienated from the community). Short of taking down the
> > fundraiser banner or of organizing a Wikipedia blackout.
> >
> > This is the difference, and this is why virtually everybody who had to say
> > smth about this episode was unhappy with the process. Without looking at
> > the diffs, I only remember three users who were perfectly happy with what
> > happened, out of hundreds who said smth.
> >
> > One unfortunate consequence of the whole episode was, whoever is right and
> > whoever is wrong, the general opinion about WMF in the community is
> > all-time low, with people generally not prepared to believe to anything
> > communicated to them. If WMF is not interested in getting very unpleasant
> > surprises, they should start working towards building the community trust.
> >
> > Cheers
> > Yaroslav
> >
> > On Wed, Jun 12, 2019 at 10:48 PM GorillaWarfare <
> > gorillawarfarewikipe...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > On Wed, Jun 12, 2019 at 8:36 AM Fæ  wrote:
> > >
> > > > Any Arbcom approved sanction against Fram based on the evidence would
> > not
> > > > be controversial for anyone.
> > >
> > >
> > > Sorry for coming in late to this conversation; I've mostly been following
> > > the sicussion happening on-wiki. But I wanted to pipe up to say that I
> > > absolutely do not believe this is true (see also my comment here
> > > <
> > >
> > https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:Arbitration_Committee/Noticeboard=revision=901559520=901559137=source
> > > >).
> > > To repeat my comment somewhat, the English Wikipedia ArbCom has in the
> > past
> > > had to place similar bans: that is, ones against long-term contributors
> > > with many supporters, and ones in which the full details behind what led
> > to
> > > the ban cannot be revealed publicly. The reaction has been quite similar
> > to
> > > the one the WMF is currently experiencing—"star chamber" accusations,
> > > claims that we've abused our power or the process, and assumptions that
> > the
> > > ban is unwarranted unless everyone is allowed to scrutinize the private
> > > evidence. The ArbCom is empowered to take action based off of
> > > privately-submitted evidence and private discussion, but in practice it
> > is
> > > extremely poorly-received when we do, basically across-the-board.
> > >
> > > – Molly (GorillaWarfare)
> > > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:GorillaWarfare
> > > ___
> > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
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> > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > > 
> > ___
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> > 
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Dispute between Common and Outreach

[David Gerard]

Yann, you SERIOUSLY need to back up this claim of "dishonesty" on the
part of a Wikmedian of long experience.  Your assumption of bad faith
here is stupendous.

You can't simultaneously complain of the workload, then work this hard
to drive people away.


- d.


On Mon, 13 May 2019 at 05:10, Yann Forget  wrote:
>
> This was reverted. It is a dishonest edit with a misleading summary.
>
> Regards,
> Yann
> Jai Jagat 2020 Grand March Coordinator
> https://www.jaijagat2020.org/
> +91-74 34 93 33 58 (also WhatsApp)
>
>
>
> Le dim. 12 mai 2019 à 19:59, Andrew Lih  a écrit :
>
> > This episode exposes a policy of Commons that may be unknown to many folks
> > - the precautionary principle.
> >
> > It is an explicit exception to assuming good faith, so I noted this on the
> > AGF page on Commons.
> >
> >
> > https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commons:Assume_good_faith=prev=349650525
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > On Sun, May 12, 2019 at 10:23 AM Galder Gonzalez Larrañaga <
> > galder...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > As I am the author of the post, some remarks:
> > >
> > >   *   Commons is, indeed, the only [cloud] storage for file in most of
> > the
> > > Wikipedias. Making an accusation of using Commons as a storage place is
> > > unfair and nonsense.
> > >   *   Communication could be better, of course, but we don't have to
> > think
> > > on experienced editors and wikimedians, but on people we are trying to
> > > convince to upload to the Commons and find this burden. They don't know
> > how
> > > to communicate and why they must do it.
> > >   *   The upload system allow you to upload something if you are the
> > > author. Period.
> > >   *   Claiming that something is a derivative work without saying which
> > is
> > > the original work is not a good practice.
> > >   *   Of course, commons volunteers are few, and they have a great
> > > job-queue. But outreach volunteers are less, and a project like this can
> > > take a whole year of volunteer work.
> > >   *   After all the victim-blaming seen on this discussion no one was
> > able
> > > to point to a page where the procedure was clear for everyone.
> > >
> > > Let's hope we can follow with this project next year and we will have
> > less
> > > problems.
> > >
> > > Cheers
> > >
> > > Galder
> > > 
> > > From: Wikimedia-l  on behalf of
> > > Vi to 
> > > Sent: Sunday, May 12, 2019 3:35 PM
> > > To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> > > Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Dispute between Common and Outreach
> > >
> > > I wonder wheter local sysops could be allowed to delete/undelete images
> > on
> > > commons in order to reduce workload. Most risky commons' uploads come
> > from
> > > cw-upload, allow local sysops to handle them could work.
> > >
> > > Vito
> > >
> > > Il giorno dom 12 mag 2019 alle ore 15:31 James Heilman  > >
> > > ha scritto:
> > >
> > > > It is hard to get the admin bit there aswell. Is Commons interested in
> > > > having more admins?
> > > >
> > > > James
> > > >
> > > > On Sun, May 12, 2019 at 5:41 AM Fæ  wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > A couple of years ago a proposed project was for the WMF to pay for
> > > > > access to the Google image matching API access so we could run a
> > > > > copyvio bot on the live new uploads list. Such a bot would not be
> > > > > terribly hard to get working, and would be a great experiment to see
> > > > > if this aspect of the more boring side of sysop tools could be
> > > > > reduced.[1]
> > > > >
> > > > > Not specifically advocating auto-deletion, but daily housekeeping
> > > > > image matches to highly likely copyrighted categories would make mass
> > > > > housekeeping very easy.
> > > > >
> > > > > A separate old chestnut was my proposal to introduce systemic image
> > > > > hashes, which neatly show "close" image matches.[2] With a Commons
> > hat
> > > > > on, such a project would be of far more immediate pragmatic use than
> > > > > mobile-related and structured data-related projects that seem to suck
> > > > > up all the oxygen and volunteer time available.
> > > > >
> > > > > Note that the history of these project/funding ideas is so long, that
> > > > > several of the most experienced long term volunteers that were
> > > > > originally interested have since retired. Without some positive short
> > > > > term encouragement, not only do these ideas never reach the useful
> > > > > experiment stage, but the volunteers involved simply fade away.
> > > > >
> > > > > Links
> > > > > 1.
> > > > >
> > > >
> > >
> > https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Village_pump/Archive/2016/02#Google_has_opened_an_API_for_image_recognition
> > > > > 2. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae/Imagehash
> > > > >
> > > > > Fae
> > > > >
> > > > > On Sun, 12 May 2019 at 12:21, Amir Sarabadani 
> > > > wrote:
> > > > > >
> > > > > > IMO commons need either a Clue Bot NG for new uploads or ores
> > support
> > > > for
> > > > > > images that might be copyright violation, or both.
> > > > > >
> 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Supporting Wikinews [was: Reviewing our brand system for our 2030 goals]

[David Gerard]

I seem to recall seeing a thread on this list every few years about
how to revive Wikinews and make it do something useful and
interesting.

In practice, it had a burst of enthusiasm for about six months after
it started and then went pretty much dormant, and has been there ever
since.



- d.

On Sat, 27 Apr 2019 at 23:17, Philippe Beaudette  wrote:
>
> But it won’t be. Wikipedia does a fine job of documenting a great deal of
> news: in an encyclopedic fashion.
>
> On Sat, Apr 27, 2019 at 11:48 AM Jennifer Pryor-Summers <
> jennifer.pryorsumm...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Strainu,
> >
> > Simply leaving the world of news to others is not really an option for the
> > Foundation.  Recall that its vision is that
> >
> > > By 2030, Wikimedia will become the essential infrastructure of the
> > ecosystem of free knowledge, and anyone who shares our vision will be able
> > to join us.
> >
> > It can't achieve that by abandoning news.
> >
> > JPS
> >
> > On Sat, Apr 27, 2019 at 6:29 PM Strainu  wrote:
> >
> > > În mar., 16 apr. 2019 la 12:38, Dan Garry (Deskana) 
> > a
> > > scris:
> > > >
> > > > Splitting off the Wikinews discussion from the branding discussion...
> > > >
> > > > On Tue, 16 Apr 2019 at 07:52, Jennifer Pryor-Summers <
> > > > jennifer.pryorsumm...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > Compared to Wikitribune it is!  But more importantly, if Wikinews is
> > > not
> > > > > thriving, then why not?  Does it lack resources?  What could or
> > should
> > > the
> > > > > WMF do to revive it?
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > In my opinion, nothing. Wikinews was a nice idea, but it didn't work
> > out,
> > > > and I don't think the Wikimedia Foundation investing resources into
> > > trying
> > > > to bring it back to life is really worth it. In fact, I think the
> > > Wikimedia
> > > > Foundation isn't the right group to try to breathe new life into the
> > > > project anyway—we, as a volunteer community, could invest our time in
> > > > bringing new content into it. That doesn't happen though. Why is that?
> > > For
> > > > me, I'm voting with my actions rather than my words—it's because it
> > just
> > > > isn't important enough compared to other things. It's okay to think
> > that.
> > >
> > > I personally believe the law of the hammer [1] had a very significant
> > > contribution to the launch of Wikinews (as well as Wikiversity,
> > > Wikispecies and Wiktionary): "we have a wiki, what else can we use it
> > > for?" Stated differently ("we have a mission and an idea aligned with
> > > that mission, what kind of wiki would we need for that?") the outcome
> > > might have been radically different. Some projects might have never
> > > happened, others might have been years ago where they are now and
> > > again others might have happened later (e.g. a wiki does not seem a
> > > great fit for University courses, but Wikiversity might have happened
> > > anyway as part of the OpenAccess movement. Or not).
> > >
> > > It's a bit late to change history, but it's not too late to admit some
> > > of the projects are a failure in the current form and start again - or
> > > just drop them. As somebody else in the conversion put it "we must
> > > have ways to try and fail fast".
> > >
> > > Strainu
> > >
> > > [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_the_instrument
> > >
> > > >
> > > > Also, I'd prefer to see the Wikimedia Foundation trying to do fewer
> > > things
> > > > but do them better rather than taking more on; I think the annual plan
> > > > reflects that it is trying to do so.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > > Perhaps some of the money spent on rebranding would
> > > > > be better spent on the  projects that are not doing so well as the
> > big
> > > > > Wikipedias -- or perhaps the WMF should cut its losses and close them
> > > down,
> > > > > on the principle of reinforcing success instead.
> > > > >
> > > >
> > > > I suspect that significantly less money is being spent on this
> > rebranding
> > > > effort than people might think. A short engagement with an external
> > > > consultant, and some staff time to think about it and publish some
> > pages
> > > to
> > > > solicit comment, is a relatively small investment compared to what it
> > > might
> > > > take to bootstrap improvements to breathe life into a mostly dead
> > > project.
> > > > I don't think it's really helpful to guess about the cost of things...
> > > yes,
> > > > I broke my own rule right at the start of this paragraph. ;-)
> > > >
> > > > Dan
> > > > ___
> > > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
> > > > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > > 
> > >
> > > ___
> > > Wikimedia-l 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] America may go bizarro, but Wikipedia has a choice to make

[David Gerard]

So ... when did someone last test putting up a copy of the sites from
the backups?

(just a complete copy with history, not even at publicly-accessible scale)



On Tue, 8 Jan 2019 at 19:31, Steven Walling  wrote:
>
> Great question to think about for our long term sustainability. I think we
> already have a universal "plan B" however? It's providing all content under
> free licenses and regularly distributing complete dumps of our content.
>
> Many larger and more well-funded technology organizations (Google,
> Facebook, etc.) regularly do disaster recovery scenarios that account for
> not just governmental disruption or civil unrest but events such as a major
> earthquake in the San Francisco Bay Area. The movement doesn't really have
> the resources to do this effectively in the same manner.
>
> It seems like decentralizing our ability to recover from a disruption is
> the most effective defense we have, *especially *in the scenario involving
> government intervention because the Foundation's infrastructural and legal
> presence in the United States is actually one of the more brittle pieces
> within our movement.
>
> On Tue, Jan 8, 2019 at 9:18 AM Fæ  wrote:
>
> > Dear fellow Wikimedians, please sit back for a moment and ponder the
> > following,
> >
> > For those of us not resident in the US, it has been genuinely alarming
> > to see highly respected US government archives vanish overnight,
> > reference websites go down, and US legislation appear to drift to
> > whatever commercial interests have the loudest current political
> > voices. Sadly "populism" is happening now, and dominates American
> > politics, driving changes of all sorts in response to politically
> > inflated and vague rhetoric about "security" and "fakenews". It is not
> > inconceivable that a popularist current or future US Government could
> > decide to introduce emergency controls over websites like Wikipedia,
> > virtually overnight.[1][2][3][4]
> >
> > The question of whether the Wikimedia Foundation should have a hot
> > switch option, so that if a "disaster" strikes in America, we could
> > continue running Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons from other countries
> > has been raised on this list several times over many years. The WMF
> > and its employees are heavily invested in staying in Silicon Valley,
> > and that will stay true unless external risks become extreme.
> >
> > However, there has never been a rationale to avoid investing in a Plan
> > B. A robust plan, where the WMF can switch operations over to a
> > hosting country with a sufficiently welcoming with stable national
> > government and legislation, that our projects could continue to meet
> > our open knowledge goals virtually uninterrupted and without risk of
> > political control. A Plan B would ensure that if the US Government
> > started to discuss controlling Wikipedia, then at least that published
> > plan would be a realistic response. If they tried doing it, we could
> > simply power off our servers in the USA, rather than compromise our
> > content.
> >
> > If anyone knows of committed investment in a practical WMF Plan B, it
> > would be reassuring to share it more widely at this time. If not, more
> > of us should be asking about it, politely, persistently but perhaps
> > less patiently than indefinitely. :-)
> >
> > Links:
> > 1. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-46739180
> > 2. http://www.lse.ac.uk/ideas/research/updates/populism
> > 3.
> > https://www.cnet.com/news/obama-signs-order-outlining-emergency-internet-control
> > "... this order was designed to empower certain governmental agencies
> > with control over telecommunications and the Web during natural
> > disasters and security emergencies."
> > 4.
> > https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/01/presidential-emergency-powers/576418
> > "The president could seize control of U.S. internet traffic, impeding
> > access to certain websites and ensuring that internet searches return
> > pro-Trump content as the top results."
> > 5. Bizarro, as used in the title of this email:
> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bizarro_World
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Fae
> > --
> > fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
> >
> > ___
> > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
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> > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > 
> ___
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> 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Is the death of Wikipedia imminent?

[David Gerard]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Lead_section
says pretty much the same:

> The lead should stand on its own as a concise overview of the article's 
> topic. It should identify the topic, establish context, explain why the topic 
> is notable, and summarize the most important points, including any prominent 
> controversies. The notability of the article's subject is usually established 
> in the first few sentences.

that is, the intro section should be a short standalone article:

> As a general rule of thumb, a lead section should contain no more than four 
> well-composed paragraphs and be carefully sourced as appropriate.

For an extreme case, [[World War II]] gets *five* long paragraphs for
its intro section.


- d.



On Sun, 30 Dec 2018 at 10:57, Anders Wennersten
 wrote:
>
> In my little duckpond (svwp) we have guidleines for the introduction
> part of the article.
>
> It should use (simple) language to enable 14-16 years old to understand
> it (while the rest can use more complicated vocabulary)
>
> It should hopefully only be 1-3 sentences, and to state what is all
> about and not a summary.
>
> We do not live up to this recommendation all the time, but I have
> noticed that he introducion part on enwp generally are very long, in
> comparison
>
> Anders
>
>
>
> Den 2018-12-30 kl. 11:39, skrev Zubin JAIN:
> >> I am 51, and I do not know much about the 18- generation, but I know two
> > important things about them. They have a very short attention span and
> > difficulties to concentrate. And they get a graphical and visualized
> > information much more easier than texts. For example, my son is capable of
> > watching three or four movies per day, but he has difficulties to read 20
> > pages from a book.
> >
> >> Well, the first question is whether an encyclopedia is an appropriate / the
> > best format for them to get knowledge (as it is for us). I do not know the
> > answer. What I write below assumes that the answer is positive, otherwise
> > the rest of the text does not make sense.
> >
> >> The next question is what should be done. How Wikipedia should look like to
> > be accessible to this generation? The answer seems to be obvious. Articles
> > must be short and contain a lot of graphic information. May be they need to
> > be videoclips. Short clips. Or, at lest, they must contain clips, with more
> > voice and less letters. If one needs more detailed information or just
> > further information - one hops to the next article or watches the next clip.
> >
> > These are gross generalizations and the ideas are similarly flawed.
> > Anecdotes do not prove anything and while there is some evidence to suspect
> > that attention span is reducing ( Though there has yet to be consensus and
> > one should naturally be sceptical of any psychological finding given the
> > fields replication crisis). Under 18 people such as myself probably use the
> > site the most compared to any other demographic and most of us are capable
> > of using it as well as anybody else.
> >
> > The idea that Wikipedia needs to be dumbed down has abousltley no basis on
> > fact and data, is only supported by anecdotes and stereotypes. This is not
> > to say that simplifying some Wikipedia articles and creating more video
> > content is wrong, Wikipedia should be inclusive to all including those with
> > disabilities or conditions that make the traditional encyclopedia
> > unsuitable but making those changes out of ageist assumptions of
> > generational decline is insulting.
> >
> > On Sun, 30 Dec 2018 at 17:21, Jane Darnell  wrote:
> >
> >> I still believe we need to "explode Wikipedia", by which I mean split
> >> curation templates, categories, lists and all other articles into more
> >> easily editable and curatable parts. This enables better linking to
> >> discrete Wikidata items while reducing the tedious task of curation for
> >> extremely long articles. Your comments, Peter, are still based on the
> >> 18-year-old idea of "it's the info that matters". It's no longer just the
> >> content that matters. Content curation, once advertised as being super
> >> simple (and still in the byline as "everybody can edit"), has become a
> >> tedious and complicated task, and efforts to make it easier have resulted
> >> with the visual editor for mobile, which still doesn't work for uploading
> >> to Commons. We need better upload interfaces for fixing spelling mistakes,
> >> adding blue links, categories, media, and all other common tasks. We should
> >> not let Google decide which sentences to index first, but we should be
> >> enabling those decisions to be made by human editors. Findability should
> >> reflect editability and it doesn't.
> >>
> >> On Sun, Dec 30, 2018 at 9:18 AM Peter Southwood <
> >> peter.southw...@telkomsa.net> wrote:
> >>
> >>> Hi Yaroslav,
> >>> Several recent developments relate to this situation which I think you
> >>> have described reasonably well.
> >>> Short descriptions help a 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Mobile fundraising ads

[David Gerard]

I've had people complaining to me personally about the multiple-page
fundraising banners on mobile, like I can do anything about them ...
this is really deeply pissing people off.

On Tue, 11 Dec 2018 at 15:03, Joseph Seddon  wrote:
>
> Hi James,
>
> As I mentioned in my original reply to Molly, Desktop page views have been
> in decline for the past 2-3 years from 4.36 billion (Oct 2016) to 3.64
> billion (Oct 2018). Likewise, the relative effectiveness as of mobile as a
> fundraising platform has historically been substantially lower compared
> with desktop. So with future budget growth in mind and a desktop
> fundraising environment that will become increasingly difficult, we’ve been
> working hard to ensure that as user behaviors shift we are well prepared
> and that the future of the movement is safeguarded.
>
> Regards
> Seddon
>
>
>
> On Mon, Dec 10, 2018 at 5:14 AM James Salsman  wrote:
>
> > For those of you who have not seen the mobile fundraising banner this
> > year, and thus are uncertain of what all the fuss is about, here is an
> > example:
> >
> > https://i.imgur.com/wL4Y5dl.png
> >
> > The fundraising message literally takes 4.5 screens that have to be
> > scrolled through to get to the article. I don't think its accurately
> > reflected with how desktop browsers render the example given by the
> > Fundraising team at
> >
> > https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA?banner=B1819_0701_mlWW_mob_p1_lg_template=1=US
> > which is only a little over one screenful before the article text on
> > typical landscape-shaped desktop browser rendering.
> >
> > In years past, it seemed like the fundraising team was more
> > forthcoming about their choices and the reasons for making them. Has
> > anyone inside or outside of the Foundation seen any explanation of why
> > so much text, with such odd formatting, is necessary on mobile this
> > year?
> >
> > On Thu, Dec 6, 2018 at 8:44 AM Samuel Klein  wrote:
> > >
> > > I love the focus on mobile and smaller format interfaces, quite
> > generally;
> > > it's increasingly how I use the projects too!
> > >
> > > A)  This banner-text-series is clearly impactful, gave me a bit of a jump
> > > scare, and got me to read it to find out why. I'm still not sure how I
> > feel
> > > about it.
> > > ~ Visual effect: Messages that flow smoothly in and out of the reading
> > > experience are even nicer.
> > > ~ Message: Is there an estimate of the total impact on all readers, as
> > well
> > > as total effective fundraising?  If there is a very effective
> > > compact/delightful banner, and an even more effective large/ambivalent
> > > one, is there some internal calculus about the overal impact of running
> > the
> > > former for longer vs. the latter for a short period?
> > > I'd like to think the best possible messages inspire and delight and
> > > draw on positive emotions while raising funds, including for those who
> > > don't donate, even if they do not yield the most donations per view.
> > >
> > > B)  The tracking of whether I've donated, when choosing to show or not
> > show
> > > me banners, is definitely lacking.  Part of this is that we have taken an
> > > overly-paranoid approach to gathering and anonymizing user data.  It is
> > > entirely possible to cluster users for the purposes of
> > > not-continuing-to-show-banners (maintain a dictionary of
> > > user-fingerprint-hashes-already-seen, check to see if the current user is
> > > in there, don't show banners if they are) without being able to see what
> > > pages a given user is viewing.
> > >
> > > I wrote more about this here:
> > >
> > https://blogs.harvard.edu/sj/2018/07/25/anonymizing-data-on-the-users-of-wikipedia/
> > >  Please consider doing this; it is really hurting the user-experience of
> > > the wiki projects (not only in this instance -- in so many other basic
> > > instances of usage stats + testing over time!), for no benefit to anyone.
> > > ___
> > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
> > > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > 
> >
> > ___
> > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
> > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > 
>
>
>
> --
> Seddon
>
> *Community and Audience Engagement Associate*
> *Advancement (Fundraising), Wikimedia Foundation*
> ___
> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: 
> 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Croatian Wikipedia: persisting far-right bias?

[David Gerard]

Forgive me, but this is coming across as hopping from excuse to excuse.
On Tue, 27 Nov 2018 at 18:03, Dennis During  wrote:
>
> It is important that any wiki process be applied fairly.  In this case I
> think the Croatian wiki cannot be the first to have a new process applied.
> I hope that the process that Gerard recommends has been validated in some
> way that meets with broad, nearly universal approval.
>
> On Tue, Nov 27, 2018 at 12:37 PM Gerard Meijssen 
> wrote:
>
> > Hoi,
> > We have a database with all the citations of all Wikipedias. That database
> > is integrated in wikidata as we speak. What we should do is eat our own
> > medicine and compare sources on the same subject when the subject is
> > controversial. Our overriding policy is for Wikipedia to have a neutral
> > point of view. So while Croation sources are fine, they need to be balanced
> > for a NPOV. When sources with a different viewpoint are available, ignoring
> > them is not an option.
> >
> > At the same time, there are sources that have been found to be
> > untrustworthy. At some stage, sources, any and all sources can be assessed
> > and even rejected.
> >
> > Admins and bureaucrats have their authority because they promise to  adhere
> > to the universal Wikipedia policies, the other reason is the trust their
> > community gave them at one time. In the end, we have the mechanisms and the
> > methods to assess the NPOV and the quality of articles. We have the
> > mechanisms and methods to assess the functioning of people who are trusted
> > to adhere to our policies.
> > Thanks,
> > GerardM
> >
> > On Mon, 26 Nov 2018 at 19:15, Ilario Valdelli  wrote:
> >
> > > History does not require a judge. It's the storiography to be judge.
> > >
> > > Here the problem is to give relevance to some sources and to neglect
> > > (completely) others.
> > >
> > > If a single not neutral source is considered as the Holy Bible, the same
> > > pillars of Wikipedia are infringed.
> > >
> > > Kind regards
> > >
> > > On Mon, 26 Nov 2018, 14:06 Dennis During  > >
> > > > Who is the judge? Are we going to join Facebook, Google, Twitter, et al
> > > as
> > > > the new press barons?
> > > > ___
> > > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
> > > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
> > > > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > > > 
> > > ___
> > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
> > > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > > 
> > ___
> > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
> > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > 
>
>
>
> --
> Dennis C. During
> ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] convert from BitCoin to FoldingCoin and other proofs of useful work

[David Gerard]

I think any involvement in it is nonsensical and nobody should
entertain any of these ideas for a moment.


- d.


On Fri, 2 Nov 2018 at 16:42, James Salsman  wrote:
>
> David, what if the Foundation converted their next largest bitcoin
> donation over some set amount to foldingcoin, and then cash in a press
> event designed to educate cryptocurrency enthusiasts that they don't
> have to be as destructive, strictly as a principled stance against
> bitcoin's waste of electricity? I'd love to get a sense of your idea
> of the potential drawbacks.
>
> Best regards,
> Jim
>
>
> On Fri, Nov 2, 2018 at 1:49 AM David Gerard  wrote:
> >
> > worth noting again that in my (I am paid to have these opinions now)
> > professional opinion, nothing about cryptocurrencies is good or
> > useful, and WMF's involvement should proceed precisely as far as
> > taking donations at arm's length (never touching an actual
> > cryptocurrency). And documenting the phenomenon accurately on the
> > wikis.
> >
> > yet again, anyone reading this list is welcome to read my book for
> > free! (Got good reviews in NYRB and BBC News)
> >
> > http://libgen.io/book/index.php?md5=41A766EE9752E757169A46C936C2EC17
> >
> > there you go, an *official* bootleg copy.
> >
> >
> > - d.
> >
> >
> > On Fri, 2 Nov 2018 at 05:54, Father Of Lies  wrote:
> > >
> > > That is a complete useless responds. Bitcoin, Litecoin and all are no 
> > > piramide games.
> > >
> > > Sent from my iPhone
> > >
> > > > On 1 Nov 2018, at 11:57, Gerard Meijssen  
> > > > wrote:
> > > >
> > > > Hoi,
> > > > Bitcoin and its ilk rely on an overabundance of energy. In this day and 
> > > > age
> > > > the speculation of these "currencies" is irresponsible. The best attack 
> > > > on
> > > > this pyramide game is to stay away from it.
> > > > Thanks,
> > > > GerardM
> > > >
> > > > On Thu, 1 Nov 2018 at 10:38, Robert Rohde  wrote:
> > > >
> > > >>> What is a 51% attack?
> > > >>
> > > >> A 51% attack is when a single malicious entity controls >51% of the
> > > >> computing power being used to validate the blockchain of a particular
> > > >> digital currency.  Blockchain-based digital currencies rely on a 
> > > >> consensus
> > > >> of computing participants acting in good faith to verify transactions 
> > > >> and
> > > >> coin ownership.  However, if a single entity controls a majority of the
> > > >> compute power, then it is possible for them to maliciously validate bad
> > > >> transactions to steal, double spend, and otherwise commit fraud using 
> > > >> the
> > > >> currency.
> > > >>
> > > >> Smaller digital currencies, with fewer participants acting to maintain
> > > >> their blockchain, are generally more vulnerable to this kind of 
> > > >> attack.  A
> > > >> bad actor can rent a large block of computing power and then use it to
> > > >> attack a small blockchain.   Such attacks have been becoming more 
> > > >> common,
> > > >> though the largest coins (e.g. BTC) are still resistant due to the 
> > > >> size of
> > > >> their community.
> > > >> https://www.coindesk.com/blockchains-feared-51-attack-now-becoming-regular/
> > > >>
> > > >> I don't know anything about FoldingCoin and whether it is more or less
> > > >> vulnerable to this kind of fraud than other cryptocurrencies.
> > > >>
> > > >> However, the 51% attack may just be the death of many smaller 
> > > >> alt-coins,
> > > >> unless an effective countermeasure can be developed.
> > > >>
> > > >> -Robert Rohde
> > > >>
> > > >>> On Thu, Nov 1, 2018 at 8:23 AM James Salsman  
> > > >>> wrote:
> > > >>>
> > > >>> Geni, it's the "Day of the Dead" now so I want to attempt to resurrect
> > > >>> this thread.
> > > >>>
> > > >>> Is FoldingCoin still vulnerable to a 51% attack? What is a 51% attack?
> > > >>>
> > > >>> Do you think it is reasonable for the Foundation to convert bitcoin to
> > > >>> FoldingCoin as part of its progr

Re: [Wikimedia-l] convert from BitCoin to FoldingCoin and other proofs of useful work

[David Gerard]

worth noting again that in my (I am paid to have these opinions now)
professional opinion, nothing about cryptocurrencies is good or
useful, and WMF's involvement should proceed precisely as far as
taking donations at arm's length (never touching an actual
cryptocurrency). And documenting the phenomenon accurately on the
wikis.

yet again, anyone reading this list is welcome to read my book for
free! (Got good reviews in NYRB and BBC News)

http://libgen.io/book/index.php?md5=41A766EE9752E757169A46C936C2EC17

there you go, an *official* bootleg copy.


- d.


On Fri, 2 Nov 2018 at 05:54, Father Of Lies  wrote:
>
> That is a complete useless responds. Bitcoin, Litecoin and all are no 
> piramide games.
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
> > On 1 Nov 2018, at 11:57, Gerard Meijssen  wrote:
> >
> > Hoi,
> > Bitcoin and its ilk rely on an overabundance of energy. In this day and age
> > the speculation of these "currencies" is irresponsible. The best attack on
> > this pyramide game is to stay away from it.
> > Thanks,
> > GerardM
> >
> > On Thu, 1 Nov 2018 at 10:38, Robert Rohde  wrote:
> >
> >>> What is a 51% attack?
> >>
> >> A 51% attack is when a single malicious entity controls >51% of the
> >> computing power being used to validate the blockchain of a particular
> >> digital currency.  Blockchain-based digital currencies rely on a consensus
> >> of computing participants acting in good faith to verify transactions and
> >> coin ownership.  However, if a single entity controls a majority of the
> >> compute power, then it is possible for them to maliciously validate bad
> >> transactions to steal, double spend, and otherwise commit fraud using the
> >> currency.
> >>
> >> Smaller digital currencies, with fewer participants acting to maintain
> >> their blockchain, are generally more vulnerable to this kind of attack.  A
> >> bad actor can rent a large block of computing power and then use it to
> >> attack a small blockchain.   Such attacks have been becoming more common,
> >> though the largest coins (e.g. BTC) are still resistant due to the size of
> >> their community.
> >> https://www.coindesk.com/blockchains-feared-51-attack-now-becoming-regular/
> >>
> >> I don't know anything about FoldingCoin and whether it is more or less
> >> vulnerable to this kind of fraud than other cryptocurrencies.
> >>
> >> However, the 51% attack may just be the death of many smaller alt-coins,
> >> unless an effective countermeasure can be developed.
> >>
> >> -Robert Rohde
> >>
> >>> On Thu, Nov 1, 2018 at 8:23 AM James Salsman  wrote:
> >>>
> >>> Geni, it's the "Day of the Dead" now so I want to attempt to resurrect
> >>> this thread.
> >>>
> >>> Is FoldingCoin still vulnerable to a 51% attack? What is a 51% attack?
> >>>
> >>> Do you think it is reasonable for the Foundation to convert bitcoin to
> >>> FoldingCoin as part of its program to source clean electricity?
> >>>
> >>> Best regards,
> >>> Jim
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> On Fri, Apr 13, 2018 at 7:21 AM James Salsman 
> >> wrote:
> 
> > Cryptocurrency. If your first thought isn't "how could a scammer
> > exploit this" you are doing it wrong.
> 
>  I've thought about that for several hours now, and I'm sure scammers
>  far prefer bitcoin. Folding@Home's lab director is a partner
>  Andreessen Horowitz, so he has certainly had no lack of resources to
>  defend against the possibility, and I am persuaded that the Indiana
>  nonprofit behind FLDC is sincere and acting in good faith at present.
>  If the Foundation is hesitant, they might sponsor an audit of either
>  or both, but the Folding@Home project is so established that its
>  article is featured on enwiki.
> 
>  I have no financial interest in any cryptocurrency, and I never have,
>  and I don't have a familial interest with anyone who I am aware has
>  any either.
> 
>  Best regards,
>  Jim
> >>>
> >>> ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Category: French Jews on en.wp / GPDR

[David Gerard]

I'm not 100% comfortable with the approach of doing it because we legally
can - we do a lot of stuff because it's the right thing, not just because
we're legally obliged to. The concern is a real one and worth giving
serious consideration.

(As I noted in my email about the GDPR, we do a lot of stuff because it's
the right thing to do, not just because we're forced to - hence our
ridiculously low DMCA rate.)

It occurs to me: Has anyone gone through the cat and made sure every
instance is cited to best BLP standards?


- d.



On 28 May 2018 at 00:33, Todd Allen  wrote:

> "Privacy" is often censorship by another name. Seems so here too.
>
> Of course, if the information is not sourced, or is not well sourced, it
> can and should be removed as a potential BLP issue. But if it is sourced,
> we're not making anything available to the public that wasn't already
> publicly known--after all, our source already published the information!
>
> It has nothing to do with "humble" or not. We don't, and shouldn't, worry
> about the laws of countries with no jurisdiction. Be that France or Vatican
> City, doesn't matter. We of course have to follow US law, because the US
> actually does have jurisdiction.
>
> Todd
>
> On Sat, May 26, 2018 at 8:41 AM, sashi  wrote:
>
> > Hello again,
> >
> > Thanks for your input on this question!  I'll add a few clarifications
> > here to respond to points raised in the discussion so far.  (As I'm
> > subscribed in digest mode, I'll have to cut & paste.)
> >
> > ---
> > Nathan commented:  "I'm not seeing an argument here for why Wikimedia
> > should adhere to this law, if it is correctly stated by the OP. If France
> > passed a law banning Internet-published photos of living people, how
> would
> > we approach that law? If Germany barred publishing the place of birth,
> date
> > of birth or religious preference of public figures? If the United States
> > banned publishing the name of individuals accused of mass murder?"
> > ---
> >
> > Since I quoted it the law of 6 January 1978 in French, I'm pretty sure I
> > got it right. ^^ On the other hand, I didn't translate or interpret the
> law
> > in the context of current jurisprudence, so yes, maybe some more should
> be
> > said...
> >
> > It is  legal in France to write an article about a notable person and
> > mention their religious affiliation if they volunteer that information.
> > What is *not* legal is to extract that information about them and add it
> to
> > a database which lists Catholics -- as was done during the Vichy regime
> > with punchcards.  How exactly were Jewish people rounded up and sent off
> to
> > concentration camps? (How did prefects go about locating Freemasons
> during
> > the war?). While there was certainly some collaboration with the National
> > Statistics Service (SNS) established during the Occupation, the most
> recent
> > research suggests that this collaboration was not as significant as was
> > once commonly assumed.  The 1978 law was written before this research.
> >
> > The fact that -- today on en.wp -- these religious categories are being
> > overwhelmingly applied to Jews (and to a lesser degree to Freemasons) is
> > certainly striking.  (cf.  the 862 members of Category:French Jews & the
> 21
> > members of the Category:French Christians).
> >
> > Regarding the hypothetical situations you evoke (the first of which, of
> > course, being particularly relevant since people in France do have a
> right
> > to refuse the publication of their image (*unless* they are for some
> reason
> > newsworthy))...  I imagine that they will have to be dealt with on a case
> > by case basis until national laws have been superseded by the
> > new-wikiwiki-order of supranational arbitration.
> >
> > ---
> > Todd commented: "We should no more follow French censorship laws than we
> > should follow Turkish ones. All editors are responsible for compliance
> with
> > the laws in their jurisdiction."
> > ---
> >
> > First, the issue is privacy, not censorship.  Nobody has prosecuted or
> > will prosecute a newspaper for mentioning, for example, that Vincent
> > Bolloré is Catholic (since he is open about that fact and does not object
> > to having it reported).  However, when the CRIF (a Jewish foundation)
> > petitioned the CNIL for the right to compile a list of folks whose
> surnames
> > were the same as the 150 most common donors to the foundation for the
> > purposes of a survey they were told this would be a clear violation of
> the
> > law. (https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichCnil.do?oldAction=rech
> > ExpCnil=CNILTEXT17651919)
> >
> > What exists on en.wp is an ad-hoc categorization that does not guarantee
> > the quality of sourcing.  Anyone can add the category "French Jews" to
> 100s
> > of living people's biographies with hotcat in a matter of minutes (with
> or
> > without a source).  Only the vigilance of the community is a safeguard
> > 

[Wikimedia-l] GDPR and Wikimedia content?

[David Gerard]

I'm a big fan of the GDPR and why it had to be created. (I'm doing a lot of
the bureaucratic work on the tech side at the day job and am getting very
used to thinking of ways something could constitute Personally Identifying
Information.)

But I'm wondering how we'll approach it for the Wikimedia sites. Not just
the log data - but the content.

We already have problems with Right To Be Forgotten, and well-cited content
being removed from the search engines.

What do we have in place to deal with this when - not if - we get GDPR
requests to remove information about a person from the site?

I don't mean just the letter of the law, in the EU or the US - I mean also,
how we can handle this *right*. Because there are multiple competing
legitimate interests here, and the editing communities tend to take a lot
more care than they're strictly required to by law, because we are here to
get things right. (This is why our DMCA numbers are ridiculously low for a
top 10 site, for example.)

Is anyone keeping track of what the communities are doing, as well as WMF
itself?


- d.
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Does anyone know what wikimedia france are up to with the Request Network ?

[David Gerard]

Logo still at the bottom of https://request.network


- d.

On 28 April 2018 at 16:12, Nadine Le Lirzin  wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> First of all, thanks for reporting the issue. Impressive reactivity :)
>
> Then, sorry for the intempestive and unwelcome communication about this
> local partnership. The agreement is quite clear, it has been established by
> Wikimédia France (of course *not* in name of Wikimedia Foundation) and our
> partners are obviously *not allowed* to use any of Wikimedia projects
> marks.
>
> Today, Request Network updated their posts to clarify things and suppressed
> Wikipedia logo from their communication messages :
> — https://www.reddit.com/r/RequestNetwork/comments/8firkq/
> update_to_clarify_wikimedia_france_partnership/
> — https://blog.request.network/request-network-project-update-april-27th-
> 2018-partnership-with-wikimedia-woocommerce-plugin-c598372e9b58
>
> We updated our blog post as well, with an introductive warning :
> — https://www.wikimedia.fr/2018/04/27/wikimedia-france-
> annonce-partenariat-fondation-request-network-accepter-
> donations-crypto-monnaies/
>
> After the week-end and labor day (1 May), we are expecting that all
> occurrences of this misunderstanding have disappeared.
>
>
> Nadine Le Lirzin
>
> *Secretary of the Board*
> *Wikimédia France *
>
>
>
> 2018-04-27 16:23 GMT+02:00 Devouard (gmail) :
>
> > Definitly confusing.
> >
> > See also this : https://blog.request.network/r
> > equest-network-project-update-april-27th-2018-partnership-
> > with-wikimedia-woocommerce-plugin-c598372e9b58
> >
> >
> > Florence
> >
> > Le 27/04/2018 à 15:49, geni a écrit :
> >
> >> According to their twitter feed they have announced a partnership with
> >> something called the "Request Network‏" for cryptocurrency donations.
> >> Also this article here
> >>
> >> https://www.wikimedia.fr/2018/04/27/wikimedia-france-annonce
> >> -partenariat-fondation-request-network-accepter-donations-
> >> crypto-monnaies/
> >>
> >> Ok. I don't approve but I'm not french so not its not an area where I
> >> can reasonably expect anyone to pay any attention to my opinions.
> >>
> >> What concerns me is that they have retweeted something claiming the
> >> partnership is with the wikimedia foundation rather than just
> >> wikimedia france:
> >>
> >> https://twitter.com/wikimedia_fr?lang=en
> >>
> >> Is some form of clarification possible?
> >>
> >>
> >
> > ___
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> > i/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Does anyone know what wikimedia france are up to with the Request Network ?

[David Gerard]

Wrote up the story so far:

https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/2018/04/27/no-wikipedia-is-not-partnering-with-the-request-network-dont-believe-the-hype/

Any new stuff, corrections, clarifications etc most welcomed!


- d.

On 27 April 2018 at 21:04, David Gerard <dger...@gmail.com> wrote:

> TrustNodes tested out Request's donation offering:
>
> https://www.trustnodes.com/2018/04/27/request-network-
> partners-wikimedia-launching-beta-plus-test-run-review-
> digital-codable-invoices
>
> tl;dr it's incredibly clunky, painful and disappointing and largely
> doesn't work. Also, it only offers Ethereum.
>
> On a related note, I notice the WMF Bitcoin gateway currently uses
> Coinbase's merchant option to accept cryptos and then pay the charity
> on dollars (so WMF never touches a crypto). Coinbase are deprecating
> this shortly, going to a model where the merchant has an account on
> Coinbase and cashing out is their own problem. What will happen to the
> WMF bitcoin option?
> https://medium.com/@coinbasecommerce/upgrading-the-merchant-experience-
> d97679274c71
>
> (I'm just writing up this terrible story for my blockchain blog.)
>
>
> - d.
>
>
>
> On 27 April 2018 at 19:05, David Gerard <dger...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 27 April 2018 at 17:21, geni <geni...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> Not really. At best you end up with a less efficient version of a
> >> downloadable database. People claiming that "blockchain technology" is
> >> useful for things are either cyptocurrency advocates (with the usual
> >> conflicts of interest) or third parties trying to be nice to them.
> >
> >
> > seconded. Actual blockchain expert here! As in, I wrote a book about
> > it that's sold well and the BBC calls me an expert now.
> >
> > Just for readers of this list, as copyright holder I hereby grant you
> > permission to download this copy:
> >
> > http://libgen.io/book/index.php?md5=41A766EE9752E757169A46C936C2EC17
> >
> > (like I could stop anyone anyway)
> >
> > tl;dr "blockchain" anything is a boondoggle at best and horribly
> > damaging at worst, and you really don't want to go near this actively
> > terrible rubbish.
> >
> >
> > - d.
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Does anyone know what wikimedia france are up to with the Request Network ?

[David Gerard]

TrustNodes tested out Request's donation offering:

https://www.trustnodes.com/2018/04/27/request-network-partners-wikimedia-launching-beta-plus-test-run-review-digital-codable-invoices

tl;dr it's incredibly clunky, painful and disappointing and largely
doesn't work. Also, it only offers Ethereum.

On a related note, I notice the WMF Bitcoin gateway currently uses
Coinbase's merchant option to accept cryptos and then pay the charity
on dollars (so WMF never touches a crypto). Coinbase are deprecating
this shortly, going to a model where the merchant has an account on
Coinbase and cashing out is their own problem. What will happen to the
WMF bitcoin option?
https://medium.com/@coinbasecommerce/upgrading-the-merchant-experience-d97679274c71

(I'm just writing up this terrible story for my blockchain blog.)


- d.



On 27 April 2018 at 19:05, David Gerard <dger...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 27 April 2018 at 17:21, geni <geni...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Not really. At best you end up with a less efficient version of a
>> downloadable database. People claiming that "blockchain technology" is
>> useful for things are either cyptocurrency advocates (with the usual
>> conflicts of interest) or third parties trying to be nice to them.
>
>
> seconded. Actual blockchain expert here! As in, I wrote a book about
> it that's sold well and the BBC calls me an expert now.
>
> Just for readers of this list, as copyright holder I hereby grant you
> permission to download this copy:
>
> http://libgen.io/book/index.php?md5=41A766EE9752E757169A46C936C2EC17
>
> (like I could stop anyone anyway)
>
> tl;dr "blockchain" anything is a boondoggle at best and horribly
> damaging at worst, and you really don't want to go near this actively
> terrible rubbish.
>
>
> - d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Does anyone know what wikimedia france are up to with the Request Network ?

[David Gerard]

On 27 April 2018 at 17:21, geni  wrote:

> Not really. At best you end up with a less efficient version of a
> downloadable database. People claiming that "blockchain technology" is
> useful for things are either cyptocurrency advocates (with the usual
> conflicts of interest) or third parties trying to be nice to them.


seconded. Actual blockchain expert here! As in, I wrote a book about
it that's sold well and the BBC calls me an expert now.

Just for readers of this list, as copyright holder I hereby grant you
permission to download this copy:

http://libgen.io/book/index.php?md5=41A766EE9752E757169A46C936C2EC17

(like I could stop anyone anyway)

tl;dr "blockchain" anything is a boondoggle at best and horribly
damaging at worst, and you really don't want to go near this actively
terrible rubbish.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] convert from BitCoin to FoldingCoin and other proofs of useful work

[David Gerard]

On 11 April 2018 at 22:56, geni  wrote:

> But the foundation wants actual money (US$ mostly). Why convert
> bitcoin into anything other than cash (which is what it does at the
> moment)?


in fact, I believe the WMF never touches a bitcoin - BitPay takes in
the bitcoins, changes them to actual money and gives that to WMF.

So you'd need to get Bitpay to accept FoldingCoin in this arrangement.

(I predict this will never happen.)


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] What's making you happy this week? (Week of 4 March 2018)

[David Gerard]

On 4 March 2018 at 02:41, Pine W  wrote:

> What's making you happy this week?


Trimmed my en:wp watchlist to pages I was actually interested in and
cared about. Made a few more meaningful edits I was more interested in
this way :-)

really, if you edit with "add page to my watchlist" ticked, you'll
accumulate all sorts of pages you don't care about and that will make
your watchlist feel like work. So trim it down to take away that "oh
no" feeling!


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Anyone else want the job of wikimediaau-l list admin?

[David Gerard]

Not in the least, I'm in the UK :-) I've added you.

Are there any volunteers who don't use GMail? (Just for added redundancy.)


- d.


On 16 January 2018 at 16:11, Frederick Noronha <fredericknoro...@gmail.com>
wrote:

> I could volunteer.
> Does location matter?
>
> Frederick
>
>
> --
>
> _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
> _/
> _/  FN * फ्रेड्रिक नोरोन्या * فريدريك نورونيا‎ +91-9822122436
> _/  RADIO GOANA: https://archive.org/details/@fredericknoronha
> _/
> _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
>
>
>
> On 16 Jan 2018 7:40 pm, "David Gerard" <dger...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > At present it's literally only me as wikimediaau-l list admin. This is
> less
> > than ideal, i.e. I can't guarantee any sort of consistent service.
> >
> > It fell to me when everyone actually in Australia quit after some
> spurious
> > legal threats. So that's the threat model ...
> >
> > Anyone want to volunteer as backup?
> >
> > The workload is absolutely minimal, i.e. I just let through a large
> message
> > and that's the first thing I had to do in months if not years. But it'd
> be
> > a good idea to have more than one person.
> >
> > [cc'ing wikimedia-l to cast a wider net]
> >
> >
> > - d.
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[Wikimedia-l] Anyone else want the job of wikimediaau-l list admin?

[David Gerard]

At present it's literally only me as wikimediaau-l list admin. This is less
than ideal, i.e. I can't guarantee any sort of consistent service.

It fell to me when everyone actually in Australia quit after some spurious
legal threats. So that's the threat model ...

Anyone want to volunteer as backup?

The workload is absolutely minimal, i.e. I just let through a large message
and that's the first thing I had to do in months if not years. But it'd be
a good idea to have more than one person.

[cc'ing wikimedia-l to cast a wider net]


- d.
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[Wikimedia-l] looks like SOPA is still dead because of our work five years ago

[David Gerard]

It's scared them off SOPA-like activities.

https://torrentfreak.com/sopa-ghosts-hinder-u-s-pirate-site-blocking-efforts-171008/

The main reason why pirate site blocking requests have not yet been
made in the United States is down to SOPA. When the proposed SOPA
legislation made headlines five years ago there was a massive backlash
against website blocking, which isn’t something copyright groups want
to reignite.

“The legacy of SOPA is that copyright industries want to avoid
resurrecting the ghosts of SOPA past, and principally focus on ways to
creatively encourage cooperation with platforms, and to use existing
remedies,” Turkewitz tells us.




- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] How can we fix the two-stage page loading problem?

[David Gerard]

On 2 September 2017 at 02:09, Michael Peel  wrote:

> This is possibly the most annoying feature of the Wikimedia projects at the 
> moment. You access a page. Then you start reading or editing it. And then 
> suddenly the page jumps when a fundraising banner / central notice / gadget / 
> beta feature loads. So you have to start reading the page again, or you have 
> to find where you were editing again, or you have to undo the change you just 
> made since you made it in the wrong part of the page.


Or you click "edit" and it hits the banner that suddenly popped up
under your click. 


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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Sharing sad news about Bassel

[David Gerard]

On 2 August 2017 at 00:00, Katherine Maher  wrote:

> at his article [2], and at https://freebassel.org.


This is giving an SSL error ...


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Copyfraud by the British Museum

[David Gerard]

On 28 July 2017 at 21:59, Fæ  wrote:

> Rogol, it's worth repeating that the only one here talking about
> fraudulent conduct is yourself.


If you write a post containing the word "fraud" over and over, people
are going to assume you are accusing someone of fraud.

Particularly when you use a word like "copyfraud" which was
specifically coined to carry the emotional freight of the concept of
fraud.

If you don't realise this, you may not be the best person to be
conducting public relations on this matter.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Let's set up a Tor onion service for Wikipedia

[David Gerard]

Apposite, but defective in a number of respects; also, explicitly advocacy
for Tor editing without really addressing the objections to it (that it's
99+% a firehose of garbage).

Rather than me reading through several pages to pick out what you might
mean, could you please quote the bits you consider particularly make a
relevant point?


- d.



On 10 June 2017 at 15:30, Cristian Consonni  wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I have found now this paper that seems relevant to this conversation:
>
> Forte, Andrea, Nazanin Andalibi, and Rachel Greenstadt
> "Privacy, anonymity, and perceived risk in open collaboration: a study
> of Tor users and Wikipedians."
> Proceedings of Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing
> (CSCW). Portland, OR. CSCW 17 (2017): 12.
> http://andreaforte.net/ForteCSCW17-Anonymity.pdf
>
> Cristian
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Let's set up a Tor onion service for Wikipedia

[David Gerard]

Editing may be a tricky one, particularly on en:wp, which has found
Tor exit points to overwhelmingly be fountains of garbage, and
automatically blocks them.


- d.


On 5 June 2017 at 18:30, David Cuenca Tudela  wrote:
> I think that's an excellent idea and very much aligned with our commitment
> to provide free information also for those who are living under unfavorable
> conditions.
>
> I personally endorse it.
>
> Thanks Cristian for suggesting it.
>
> Regards,
> Micru
>
> On Jun 5, 2017 19:11, "Cristian Consonni"  wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> I have written a proposal about setting up an onion (hidden) service to
>> serve Wikipedia over Tor:
>>
>> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/A_Tor_
>> Onion_Service_for_Wikipedia
>>
>> I was thinking about this and I also discovered that the Internet
>> Archive is experimenting with a very similar idea:
>> www.hackerfactor.com/blog/index.php?/archives/750-
>> Freedom-of-Information.html
>>
>> I would like to have some feedback on this, I am also in contact with
>> the author of the aforementioned proxy which could be able to give some
>> help in setting it up.
>>
>> Thank you.
>>
>> Cristian
>>
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[Wikimedia-l] EU mandatory filter/safe harbour proposals - what's the status?

[David Gerard]

Wikimedia has put in a submission against this - but the entertainment
industry is still lobbying as absolutely hard as possible. (Their goal
is to remove safe harbour protection from YouTube so they can demand
money that presently doesn't exist, and that they know doesn't exist.)
Do we have any status updates on what's going on with this?


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Update on Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

[David Gerard]

For those who missed it in the 10th footnote, this is the link to spread:

https://blog.wikimedia.org/2017/05/23/wikimedia-nsa-appeal-standing/


- d.

On 23 May 2017 at 23:00, James Buatti  wrote:

> Hello everybody,
>
>
>
> The Foundation is pleased to announce an update in Wikimedia Foundation v.
> National Security Agency,[1] our challenge to the U.S. National Security
> Agency’s “Upstream”[2] mass surveillance practices. We filed[3] the suit
> back in March 2015 to protect the privacy and free expression rights of
> Wikimedia readers, editors, and contributors. The U.S. government moved to
> dismiss the case, and in October 2015, the District Court granted that
> motion.[4] Soon after, we appealed.[5]
>
>
>
> This morning, the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals[6] ruled that the
> Wikimedia Foundation can proceed with the suit. The opinion[7] partially
> vacated and remanded the District Court ruling, which found that the
> Wikimedia Foundation and our eight co-plaintiffs lacked legal standing[8]
> to bring the case. The Fourth Circuit panel vacated this ruling as to the
> Wikimedia Foundation; two of the judges held that we have established
> standing, although the other plaintiffs have not. The final judge would
> have found standing for all the plaintiffs. This means our case can
> proceed, but not with the other plaintiffs.
>
>
>
> This is an important step in the fight against government mass
> surveillance, and a victory for the privacy and free expression rights of
> Wikimedia users. We are carefully reviewing the decision, along with our
> counsel at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)[9] to identify next
> steps for our case. For the immediate time being, the case has been
> remanded back to the District Court of Maryland for further proceedings. We
> will keep you posted on the next steps.
>
>
>
> For more information, please see today’s blog about the case,[10] as well
> as our Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA resource page.[11]
>
>
>
> Best,
>
> Jim Buatti
> Legal Counsel
>
> [1] https://policy.wikimedia.org/stopsurveillance/
>
>
> [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upstream_collection
>
>
> [3] https://blog.wikimedia.org/2015/03/10/wikimedia-v-nsa/
>
>
> [ 4]
> https://blog.wikimedia.org/2015/10/23/wikimedia-v-nsa-lawsuit-dismissal/
>
>
> [ 5]
> 
> https://blog.wikimedia.org/2016/02/17/wikimedia-nsa-appeal-filed/
>
>
> [6]
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Court_of_
> Appeals_for_the_Fourth_Circuit
>
>
> [
>  Appeals_for_the_Fourth_Circuit>
> 7]
>  Appeals_for_the_Fourth_Circuit>
> https://www.aclu.org/sites/default/files/field_document/
> 73._4th_cir_opinion_5.23.2017.pdf
>
>
> [8] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standing_(law)
>
>
> [9] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Civil_Liberties_Union
>
>
> [10] https://blog.wikimedia.org/2017/05/23/wikimedia-nsa-appeal-standing/
>
>
> [11] https://policy.wikimedia.org/stopsurveillance/
>
> --
> James Buatti
> Legal Counsel
> Wikimedia Foundation
> 149 New Montgomery Street, 3rd Floor
> San Francisco, CA 94105
> jbua...@wikimedia.org
>
> NOTICE: This message might have confidential or legally privileged
> information in it. If you have received this message by accident, please
> delete it and let us know about the mistake. For legal reasons, I may only
> serve as an attorney for the Wikimedia Foundation. This means I may not
> give legal advice to or serve as a lawyer for community members,
> volunteers, or staff members in their personal capacity.
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Wikitribune!

[David Gerard]

On 26 April 2017 at 09:23, Andrea Zanni  wrote:

> Last time I remember we had a discussion¹ was September 2011 (!):
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/foundation-l/2011-September/thread.html


Everyone interested in Wikified news should read the Wikinews threads
in that page.

That's where the complaint that Wikinews is process-heavy comes from.
But it really isn't process-heavy at all, if you look at the actual
process. The blocker appears to have been insufficient or careless
reviewers. (Japan getting a new Prime Minister apparently not being
relevant to Wikinews because the sources weren't in English.)

You'll also see numbers as to why it looks like a dead project from
any reasonable outside perspective.


- d.

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[Wikimedia-l] Wikipedia, right, but on the blockchain

[David Gerard]

Advertising-funded Wikipedia that micropays participants from
advertising revenue, on the Ethereum blockchain! The important bit is
to give them startup money.

"Lunyr: Decentralized Wikipedia on the blockchain"
https://medium.com/@cryptojudgement/lunyr-decentralized-wikipedia-on-the-blockchain-4072606d5fc5

I have a number of thoughts on this, all negative:
https://davidgerard.co.uk/notes/2017/04/25/wikipedia-right-but-on-the-blockchain/

Jimbo wasn't impressed either:
https://twitter.com/jimmy_wales/status/856060215577464833


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Wikitribune!

[David Gerard]

On 25 April 2017 at 22:59, Jimmy Wales  wrote:

> Today I announced a new initiative, outside of my Wikimedia activities,
> to combat fake news. It is important to me that I share directly with
> all of you information about this new initiative early on.


I was one of the Wikipedians at the hackathon days for this, a few
weeks ago. (And now it's gone live and I can speak of it in good
conscience!)

The obvious comparison is Wikinews. Now, Wikinews contributors are
determined that WikiNews is a good project that deserves to live, and
they also resent Wikipedia for doing news more effectively as a
sideline than they do as their main thing and the WMF is unfair and so
forth. But from the outside view, it's important to note that
approximately nobody cares about Wikinews and it's a failure in
impact. Or: if WikiTribune turns out to have the content,
participation and readership of Wikinews, it will have failed.

The question is why Wikinews didn't take off. There's a sort of myth
that it's too process-heavy - but the rough WikiTribune rules on the
day (which may or may not be the ones they go live with) were *pretty
much the Wikinews process*. (I looked them up on the day.) So that
isn't the missing magic ingredient.

I suspect one big problem is that journalism anyone's interested in
reading involves gathering dubious information and assessing how true
it is likely to be. It's pretty much a process of turning bad sources
into good ones. Actual reporting tends to work like "I talked to these
three separate sources, none of whose names I can print, but I'll tell
you my editor." "Yep, looks likely enough to run." Bam, scoop. It's
hard to do that in a fully transparent manner (put up the recordings,
etc) without outing your sources. I spoke to one journalist on the day
and they concurred.

And that's before you get into there being no such thing as neutral
news, just news that pretends to be. It's not clear that NPOV is even
a good idea - selection of stories to cover is a huge bias.

There's also the danger of the other failure mode of citizen
journalism. The example I brought up on the day was BeforeItsNews.com
- I won't spoil it for you, go there and see what sort of stories it
covers and what sort of advertising it runs. It turns out you need
sane editorial control at some level.

It's possible the missing magical ingredient that will let it take off
will be paid professional journalists - that this will produce a news
site that's exciting enough, and not just "me too" stories everyone is
already running, to get subscribers. But again, it'll need some way
for them to say "This is the story, I'm not revealing my sources, but
me and x editor concur it's a news story we'd stand by running."

WordPress is probably the least-worst option for a CMS. MediaWiki is a
horrible CMS for anything that isn't a reference work. You can do
almost anything with WordPress if you throw enough money at extension
development. (Which may or may not be a good idea.)

Anyway, I'll be watching closely and probably diving in at least slightly.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[David Gerard]

On 14 April 2017 at 17:39, Gabriel Thullen  wrote:

> The damage has been done. Theverge.com claims to have done such a
> modification on Wikipedia, to quote them "as did we, in a test yesterday".
> We will probably see more of this.


Yes. This is why we need to respond in such a way as to deter
companies from trying this ever again.

Cosying up to them is precisely the wrong response.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [arbcom-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[David Gerard]

On 14 April 2017 at 11:38, Andy Mabbett  wrote:

> A far better (and less WP:BITEy) outcome would be to get then to


Pretty sure WP:BITE doesn't apply in the case of deliberate abuse for
clear purposes of spamming.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Arbital, another Wikipedia competitor/complement

[David Gerard]

aand it's dead Jim:

http://lesswrong.com/r/discussion/lw/otq/whats_up_with_arbital/

The front page is now a "coming soon" for the proposed blogging
platform. Oh well.


- d.



On 11 October 2016 at 22:52, David Gerard <dger...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Followup on this: Arbital is still going (recent changes shows
> consistent activity, mostly from MIRI people) and now has the tag line
> "Arbital is the place for crowdsourced, intuitive math explanations."
> This is an area it might actually get somewhere with - en:wp's
> mathematics articles are notoriously opaque and not good for
> explaining a concept to people who don't already understand it. And
> CC-by-sa educational articles on math are a win for everyone.
>
> On 14 March 2016 at 01:03, David Gerard <dger...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Being put together by Eliezer Yudkowsky of LessWrong. Content is
>> cc-by-sa 3.0, don't know about the software.
>>
>> https://arbital.com/p/arbital_ambitions/
>>
>> Rather than the "encyclopedia" approach, it tries to be more
>> pedagogical, teaching the reader at their level.
>>
>> Analysis from a sometime Yudkowsky critic on Tumblr:
>> http://nostalgebraist.tumblr.com/post/140995096534/a-year-ago-i-remember-being-baffled-by-eliezer
>>
>> (there's a pile more comments linked from the notes on that post,
>> mostly from quasi-fans; I have an acerbic comment in there, but you
>> should look at the site yourself first.)
>>
>> No idea if this will go anywhere, but might be of interest; new
>> approaches generally are. They started in December, first publicised
>> it a week ago and have been scaling up. First day it collapsed due to
>> load from a Facebook post announcement ... so maybe hold off before
>> announcing it everywhere :-)
>>
>>
>> - d.

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[Wikimedia-l] heads up: latest wacky jape from the music industry to whittle away DMCA safe harbours

[David Gerard]

A study claiming that YouTube costs them ONE BLION DOLLARS a year,
by having DMCA safe harbours!

writeup: 
https://torrentfreak.com/dmca-helps-youtube-avoid-up-to-1bn-in-royalties-per-year-study-claims-170330/
study: http://www.phoenix-center.org/PolicyBulletin/PCPB41Final.pdf

The conceit here is the music industry claiming that YouTube should
pay them money that they literally know YouTube isn't taking in, on an
assured basis as they do with Spotify.

They have been smart enough to explicitly name Wikipedia as the sort
of organisation they don't want to hurt. Wikimedians, of course, know
better than to trust the IP industry with anything. This "study" is
getting hyped in the industry press today; if it comes to anything, it
*may* be worth Wikimedia commenting.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Status of the Code of Conduct for technical spaces

[David Gerard]

You mean, "how to deal with people who complain they weren't consulted
then turn around and complain they were excessively consulted"? At
this point, the appropriate thing would be to put forward a plausible
solution rather than complain they did the thing you claimed they
hadn't sufficiently done.


- d.




On 18 March 2017 at 20:39, Pine W  wrote:
> Chris,
>
> That last paragraph assumes that people (1) know where to look and (2) have
> hours to spend watching countless channels for announcements. On the other
> hand, there's also a problem of burying people in so many announcements,
> surveys, and consultations that people start to tune it all out. This is
> part of a larger set of communications and "information overload" problems
> that I'm hoping that WMF will address, particularly during its next Annual
> Plan.
>
> Pine
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] a second commons, prevent cease and desist business

[David Gerard]

This thread is notably long on hypothetical and meta-level discussions
and very short on concrete examples of the supposedly problematic
uploads under discussion. What are the generally accepted examples of
what we're actually talking about here?


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] More politics: "WMF Annual Report"

[David Gerard]

+1

On 4 March 2017 at 10:17, Ido ivri  wrote:
> A little late into the discussion I just want to note that aside from the
> factual reservations, which seem to make sense, the overall tone, context
> and setting of the WMF Annual report is something I wholeheartedly agree
> with, and I feel that it conveys a sense of urgency on a few fronts that
> could benefit from more truthfulness.
>
> The world looks quite different when you're contributing to Wiki projects
> just kilometers away from the bloody civil war in Syria, in a country where
> freedom of speech is continuously threatened. I for one am happy to be a
> part of a Movement that will not stay silent in the face of "post-truths"
> and the growing impediments to basic civic (and other) freedoms.
>
> If this is considered a political statement, so be it.
>
> Ido
>
> On Sat, Mar 4, 2017 at 11:12 AM, Peter Southwood <
> peter.southw...@telkomsa.net> wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> -Original Message-
>> From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On
>> Behalf Of George William Herbert
>> Sent: Saturday, 04 March 2017 10:47 AM
>> To: Wikimedia Mailing List
>> Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] More politics: "WMF Annual Report"
>>
>> I think that the idea of taking the weekend off from the topic is
>> excellent.  We may not have reached universal consensus yet but everything
>> we needed to have said was, and it's been acknowledged as received and
>> under consideration.
>>
>> Have a good weekend everyone.
>>
>> -george
>>
>> Sent from my iPhone
>>
>> > On Mar 4, 2017, at 12:38 AM, Pine W  wrote:
>> >
>> > Rogol,
>> >
>> > I don't get the impression that Anna's position is that "everything is
>> > all right and that (WMF doesn't) need our help after all". That
>> > comment comes across to me as inflammatory and unhelpful.
>> >
>> > It seems to me that Anna is interested in improving the situation
>> > rather than having a battle with the community. I'd like to let the
>> > improvement process happen. Please have some patience, and let's be
>> > grateful that WMF is trying to make the situation better. I would
>> > rather see a thoughtfully re-designed report in 2 weeks than pour
>> > gasoline on the fire and have another report come out on Monday that
>> also has problems.
>> >
>> > Pine
>> > ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Is the Code of Conduct in force?

[David Gerard]

This assumes the relevant Community is here now on this very list,
which is an extremely questionable assumption. As has been noted ad
nauseam already. At this point this thread appears hard to distinguish
from forum shopping.

On 2 March 2017 at 17:16, Rogol Domedonfors  wrote:
> I'm not asking Matt.  I'm asking the Community – here, now, on this very
> list.
>
> "Rogol"
>
> On Thu, Mar 2, 2017 at 7:44 AM, Pine W  wrote:
>
>> Rogol,
>>
>> Please don't assume that Matt thinks that the TCoC is now in effect. Try
>> asking him, preferably on the relevant talk page.
>>
>> I'm well aware of the challenges with the TCoC, but let's not make it more
>> difficult than it is already, OK?
>>
>> Pine
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Mar 1, 2017 at 11:31 PM, Rogol Domedonfors 
>> wrote:
>>
>> > Matt Flaschen has declared the final amendment to the code of conduct for
>> > Wikimedia technical spaces approved and although he has not said so
>> > explicitly, I assume that his current position is that it is now in
>> force.
>> > Even asuming that is correct, and previous consensus was against that,
>> andI
>> > there is still signficiant disagreement on this list, it can hardly have
>> > any practical effect until it is published.  But first --
>> >
>> > Does the Community accept that this Code of Conduct is now in force?
>> >
>> > "Rogol"
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] More politics: "WMF Annual Report"

[David Gerard]

On 2 March 2017 at 12:07, Steinsplitter Wiki
 wrote:

> This WMF Annual Report has imho a obvious political connotation. Wikimedia 
> should remain politically neutral in any regard. WP:POV;


In 2017, literally the concept of factual information is an active
matter of political dispute.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_facts

I note this discussion is leaning "I totally am not offended myself,
but unspecified others might be." I think some posters need to own
their own discomfort more.

The trouble with liberality is a tendency to shy away from wishing to
assert oneself even when actually it's quite important.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] More politics: "WMF Annual Report"

[David Gerard]

On 2 March 2017 at 13:30, Peter Southwood  wrote:
> It is not possible to get away from politics while remaining in contact with 
> civilisation. Politics follows you around. It is possible to ignore politics 
> only until they affect you directly.


Well, yes. Who are these people with lives of such privilege that they
don't have to think about politics?

Literally everything Wikimedia has ever done is heavily political.
Here in 2017, the following are political:

* scientific fact
* acknowledging scientific fact
* spreading knowledge without permission
* the fact of education
* availability of education

That's just going off what's come out of the White House in the last
month, off the top of my head.

There is no such thing as "no politics", there is only "I am not
personally reminded of the discomfort of others".


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Draft Code of Conduct for Technical Spaces

[David Gerard]

On 26 February 2017 at 17:49, Tim Landscheidt  wrote:

> Eh, they do and that is one of the reasons to oppose the
> Code of Conduct.  Its draft implicitly alleges that the
> technical spaces currently are a cesspit that is in urgent
> need of someone with a rake while protecting actual offend-
> ers by granting immunity to "neuroatypical" behaviour.



This is a pretty reasonable presumption regarding technical spaces: if
you *don't* have a code of conduct, it's a reasonable conclusion from
outside that there will be serious unacknowledged problems.

e.g. "You literally cannot pay me to speak without a Code of Conduct"
http://rachelnabors.com/2015/09/01/code-of-conduct/

This is literally all well-worn discourse territory, but I'm sure if
you both persist you can wear everyone down.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Foundation official response re Daily Mail issue

[David Gerard]

On 9 February 2017 at 15:13, Stephen Philbrick <
stephen.w.philbr...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Does anyone have a link to the recent Foundation Statement about the Daily
> Mail? We are receiving inquires at OTRS, and it would be nice if I see see
> our official position.


Here's the current version that's going out as of a few minutes ago, may be
useful for adaptation. You probably can't put HTML links in, so maybe paste
some URLs :-)

(Currently trying to find an editor in the UK who can make Newsnight
*tonight*, I can't.)


- d.


Hi X,

Thanks for reaching out. We’d be happy to share a comment from the
Wikimedia Foundation on the recent outcome of a discussion among volunteer
editors around the use of the Daily Mail as a reliable source on English
Wikipedia.

One point of clarity -- A number of outlets have called this move a “ban.”
This is not a blanket ban, but a general statement from volunteer editors
on the reliability of the source for use on English Wikipedia.

Also, I should mention that as the nonprofit that supports Wikipedia and
the other Wikimedia projects, the Wikimedia Foundation generally does not
set editorial policy on Wikipedia. That is up to volunteer editors around
the world who contribute to the site.

Editors have discussed the reliability of the Daily Mail since at least
early 2015
.
In January 2017, an RfC

(Request for Comment) discussion was proposed to evaluate the use of the Daily
Mail as a reliable source on English Wikipedia. This is one of many
community discussions that take place every day about a broad range of
issues, including reliable sources.

In this case, volunteer editors seem to have come to a consensus that the Daily
Mail is “generally unreliable and its use as a reference is to be generally
prohibited, especially when other more reliable sources exist.” This means
that there is a general recommendation according to this discussion that
the Daily Mail not be referenced as a "reliable source" on English
Wikipedia or used to demonstrate an article subject’s notability.

That said, I encourage you to read the comments in the RfC

itself. You will find considerable discussion on the topic, including views
both for and against the proposal. Wikipedia is a living, breathing
ecosystem where volunteers regularly discuss and evolve the norms that
guide the encyclopedia. Among Wikipedia’s many policies and guidelines,
there is even a policy to ignore all rules
. It captures the
open spirit of the community: “If a rule
 prevents
you from improving or maintaining Wikipedia, ignore it.”

As a general guide to reliable sources, articles on Wikipedia should be
based on reliable, third-party
, published
sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. Editors assess
the reliability of a source at these levels:

   -

   The piece of work itself (the article, book)
   -

   The creator of the work (the writer, journalist)
   -

   The publisher of the work (for example, Random House
    or Cambridge University
   Press )


They also use a variety of criteria to evaluate reliability within each of
these levels. For example, one signal that a news organization engages in
fact-checking and has a reputation for accuracy is the publication of
corrections .
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Concerns in general

[David Gerard]

On 27 January 2017 at 03:33, Romaine Wiki  wrote:

> But I think it is possible to make sure risks are spread over the world.
> Certainly as we are an international movement that intends to cover the
> knowledge of the whole humanoid civilisation.
> To come to a conclusion, I think WMF and the Wikimedia movement should
> think about a back-up plan if it actually goes wrong.



A working live backup copy of everything would be a good and important thing.

How easy is it to bring up, say, a fully working copy of en:wp,
starting from just backups? Has anyone in WMF tested this? A backup
not being a backup until it's been restored and verified.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[David Gerard]

`What we actually need is clarity from the en:wp arbcom. They could
easily say "yes Legal has advised X but we are stricter", and note
that they have already banned users for outing blatant bad faith
spammers. GorillaWarfare's commentary on this, both personal and
speaking for the arbcom, are probably required at this point.


- d.


On 19 January 2017 at 14:23, James Heilman  wrote:
> Okay I have been bold and started a list of the known banned socks of
> companies involved in undisclosed paid editing
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Doc_James/Paid_Editing_Companies
>
> I have also started the discussion of the policy implications of such a
> list here and will not work further on the list further until the policy
> discussions are complete
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Harassment#Socks_of_undisclosed_paid_WP_editing_companies
>
> Best
> James
>
> On Thu, Jan 19, 2017 at 6:52 AM, James Heilman  wrote:
>
>> If we had such a list of known bad actors created by the WMF we could than
>> more easily apply the G5 speedy deletion criteria.
>>
>> It is easier to associate an undisclosed paid editor with the company they
>> are from than with their previous sock accounts.
>>
>> James
>>
>> On Wed, Jan 18, 2017 at 9:40 PM, Jytdog at Wikipedia <
>> jytdogte...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Thanks for this Jacob.
>>>
>>> Would you please address Legal's approach to the following scenario:  a
>>> company advertises Wikipedia editing services for clients, and there is no
>>> disclosure of paid editing by an editor employed by or affiliated with the
>>> company on Wikipedia.   (In other words, a company is obviously not
>>> following the Terms of Use).
>>>
>>> In my view, this is a situation where I would think that Legal should
>>> start
>>> a discussion with that company, and if those discussions fail to yield a
>>> change in behavior, Legal should then make a public statement indicating
>>> this, perhaps on the page you recently posted under a section entitled
>>> something like: "Companies that advertise Wikipedia editing services that
>>> have no disclosures on Wikipedia".  If a company starts to disclose then
>>> of
>>> course the listing could be modified.
>>>
>>> This is something that editors ~could~ do, but as the ToU are issued by
>>> the
>>> WMF, it would seem more appropriate for WMF to do.
>>>
>>> But I am interested to hear Legal's perspective.
>>>
>>> Thanks
>>>
>>> On Wed, Jan 18, 2017 at 9:17 PM, Jacob Rogers 
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>> > Hi all,
>>> >
>>> > As I mentioned in my email earlier this month, we've put together a
>>> longer
>>> > statement regarding paid editing and how we see the balance of the
>>> > communities' role and the role that WMF legal can play in these cases.
>>> We
>>> > tried to address the concerns that people have raised to us, and explain
>>> > when it's helpful to contact us to assist on a case. Of note, it does
>>> > explain what actions we can take even in cases that don't involve the
>>> WMF
>>> > trademarks.
>>> >
>>> > You can find it here: Wikimedia Foundation statement on paid editing and
>>> > outing
>>> > >> > Foundation_statement_on_paid_editing_and_outing>
>>> >
>>> > Best,
>>> > Jacob
>>> > --
>>> >
>>> > Jacob Rogers
>>> > Legal Counsel
>>> > Wikimedia Foundation
>>> >
>>> > NOTICE: This message might have confidential or legally privileged
>>> > information in it. If you have received this message by accident, please
>>> > delete it and let us know about the mistake. As an attorney for the
>>> > Wikimedia Foundation, for legal/ethical reasons I cannot give legal
>>> advice
>>> > to, or serve as a lawyer for, community members, volunteers, or staff
>>> > members in their personal capacity. For more on what this means, please
>>> see
>>> > our legal disclaimer
>>> > .
>>> > ___
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>>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> James Heilman
>> MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian
>>
>> The Wikipedia Open Textbook of Medicine
>> www.opentextbookofmedicine.com
>>
>
>
>
> --
> James Heilman
> MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian
>
> The Wikipedia Open Textbook of Medicine
> www.opentextbookofmedicine.com
> 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[David Gerard]

On 7 January 2017 at 20:31, Jytdog at Wikipedia  wrote:

> With those companies freely (and often mockingly) advertising their
> services, the spigot is opened wide - they constantly get more customers
> and send people here to edit.I would like to know if legal is
> authorized to take action to cut that flow off from the top.  To close the
> spigot.


Jytdog is not exaggerating here, by the way - this is literally what
happens. I see cases of people editing using a certain username, you
Google that username and you will literally see their webpage
advertising their services as a Wikipedia article writer for your
business. You ask them if they have a COI and they say "no". Posting
the smoking gun evidence is a violation of the outing policy. I
realise the extremely good reasons for our outing policies, but that
doesn't make the flood of spam go away. We have an actual problem.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer paid editing services

[David Gerard]

I should add: I spent a few months following the various AFD queues on
WP lately, and MY GOODNESS THERE ARE SO MANY BLATANT SPAMMERS. What
Jytdog raises is an actual problem. The short reason for a lot of the
Problems with Wikipedia is actually "spammers mean we can't have nice
things".


- d.


On 2 January 2017 at 22:08, Jytdog  wrote:
> Christophe
>
> Thanks for replying!
>
> This is something the board should be paying  attention to, as undisclosed
> paid editing that causes scandal that reaches mainstream media on a regular
> basis, damages the reputation of Wikipedia, and is something that both Jimmy
> Wales and Sue Gardner (when she was ED) made strong public statements about.
>
> See:
> * https://www.ft.com/content/3f726eba-bb6f-11e4-b95c-00144feab7de
> *
> http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/01/wikimedia-foundation-employee-ousted-over-paid-editing/
> *
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2012-10-01/Paid_editing
> *
> http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2012/09/19/new-wikipedia-scandal-uk-head-was-paid-to-promote-topics.html
>
> And there are many more references to this issue in mainstream media.
>
> Doing nothing, especially when WMF representatives make strong statements
> and there are legal remedies available (WMF legal sent a cease-and-desist
> order to Wiki-PR with regard to use of the Wikipedia name even before the
> ToU were strengthened) opens the WMF to criticism and makes those strong
> statements appear to be just empty rhetoric.  Action is possible.  Where is
> it?
>
>
>
> -- Original Message --
> From: "Christophe Henner" 
> To: "Wikimedia Mailing List" 
> Sent: 1/2/2017 3:51:49 AM
> Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Where is WMF with pursuing companies that offer
> paid editing services
>
>> Heu
>>
>> To be fair it's a topic that isn't currently in our plate.
>>
>> So to be honest, from a board level, I can't really give you an answer
>> right now. As said before, there might be legal constraints we can't
>> foresee.
>>
>> I made a not to work on that topic, but it might take some time as the
>> current focus is on the strategy process.
>>
>> Have a very good day,
>>
>>
>>
>> Le 2 janv. 2017 9:46 AM, "Gnangarra"  a écrit :
>>
>> Like most in western countries you'll find most of the WMF staff are
>> currently out of office so I wouldnt expect much back especially not
>> officially from them until after the 9th January.
>>
>> On 2 January 2017 at 16:42, Jytdog at Wikipedia 
>> wrote:
>>
>>>  This is something that people can natter over endlessly.
>>>
>>>  The question is to the WMF board and management.  These are the people
>>> who
>>>  can authorize action or not.  Anything else is just talk.
>>>
>>>  Again - what discussions has the WMF had, at the corporate
>>> decision-making
>>>  level, about taking legal action against companies that advertise WP
>>>  editing services and that have no evidence of disclosure as required
>>> under
>>>  the ToU?
>>>
>>>  Thanks.
>>>
>>>  On Sun, Jan 1, 2017 at 11:04 PM, Pine W  wrote:
>>>
>>>  > Good points, Gnangarra. I started to write out a reply before
>>> realizing
>>>  > that maybe I would give ideas to our adversaries, so I'll wait here
>>> for
>>>  > Legal to talk. Perhaps some of us can continue this conversation
>>> behind
>>>  > closed doors.
>>>  >
>>>  > Pine
>>>  >
>>>  >
>>>  > On Sun, Jan 1, 2017 at 7:59 PM, Gnangarra  wrote:
>>>  >
>>>  > > I think it would be nice for a more direct input from the WMF over
>>>  those
>>>  > > not following the Terms of use.
>>>  > >
>>>  > > I see some potential pitfalls, even in chasing companies that charge
>>>  for
>>>  > > content;
>>>  > >
>>>  > >- would this draw WMF into a legal editorial position
>>>  > >- would it drive them to further hide their activities
>>>  > >- what would damage would be done if a court says its ok for a
>>>  > >company/individual to control its image even on Wikipedia. we
>>>  already
>>>  > > deal
>>>  > >with the EUs right to vanish
>>>  > >
>>>  > > sometimes its better to not open the can.  I think a lot more
>>>  discussion
>>>  > > over the implications and impact is needed unfortunately some of
>>> that
>>>  can
>>>  > > only be behind closed doors it going to need community
>>> trust(something
>>>  I
>>>  > > think isnt all there at the moment),  before asking the WMF legal to
>>>  > pick a
>>>  > > fight with anyone.
>>>  > >
>>>  > > On 2 January 2017 at 08:52, Pine W  wrote:
>>>  > >
>>>  > > > (: I think that Legal could at least describe in general terms
>>> what
>>>  > they
>>>  > > > are currently doing and have plans to do in the near future.
>>>  > > >
>>>  > > > If it turns out that the answers are "we aren't doing much and we
>>>  > aren't
>>>  > > > planning to do more", then yes, asking the higher-ups to do
>>
>> 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Music industry threats to safe harbor?

[David Gerard]

On 21 December 2016 at 02:53, Newyorkbrad  wrote:

> I think it might be useful to focus on how any of the proposed changes
> to the law would affect Wikipedia/Wikimedia specifically, apart from
> the broader philosophical discussion.  Is there a good link for
> exactly what changes to the safe harbor laws are being considered, as
> opposed to the more general statement that there's a discussion of
> scaling them back?



To further answer your question, this morning I saw these (access
while you can):

http://www.completemusicupdate.com/trendpdfs/gh890/cmutrends-1116-streamingmarket.pdf

"The real problem with YouTube, from a music industry perspective, is
that it won't pay the aforementioned minimum guarantees. Therefore
from a revenue perspective, the continued boom in people streaming
music on YouTube is irrelevant, what matters is the site’s ad sales,
which have been pretty flat of late. If the music industry gets
copyright law re-written, YouTube could possibly be forced into paying
minimum guarantees, which would force it to sell more ads, or limit
the amount of music users both upload and play."

- that is, they literally want guaranteed free money.

http://www.completemusicupdate.com/trendpdfs/kjh5r/cmutrends-0916-copyrightdirective.pdf

"The music industry doesn’t have a problem with the basic principle of
the safe harbour, just with the kinds of companies which now claim
protection. In particular, it argues that user-upload websites should
not be covered by the safe harbour. And while there are lots of sites
of that kind, the real concern is YouTube."

- and one of those sites is Wikimedia; their aim directly targets us.

http://www.completemusicupdate.com/trendpdfs/hbnms/cmutrends-0616-youtube.pdf

"This would be frustrating in itself but there’s a bigger problem, the
music rights sector argues. The existence of YouTube is stopping
people from signing up to the subscription music services."

Though even they note: "Yes, there may be support, but what does
reform actually look like? What words can legislators use to force
YouTube’s hand, without causing collateral damage? Which is to say,
could you achieve the music industry’s objectives without making every
social network liable for every ‘borrowed’ photo that is shared on the
net?"

The problem comes down to the music industry trying for free money:
"Though in Content-ID, YouTube already operates an industry-leading
takedown system. And it already pays the majority of its ad income to
the rights owners. The problem isn’t so much how the value is shared,
as it is the lack of value to start with."

So basically, Wikimedia needs to make sure it's representing itself to
the EU as well. In whatever form.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Music industry threats to safe harbor?

[David Gerard]

On 21 December 2016 at 02:53, Newyorkbrad  wrote:

> I think it might be useful to focus on how any of the proposed changes
> to the law would affect Wikipedia/Wikimedia specifically, apart from
> the broader philosophical discussion.  Is there a good link for
> exactly what changes to the safe harbor laws are being considered, as
> opposed to the more general statement that there's a discussion of
> scaling them back?


The Guardian article I linked outlines the problem as the record
industry sees it.

The actual problem is that the record industry makes much less money
from streaming than it did in the 1990s from CDs, and they consider
this everyone else's fault and responsibility to fix, as if boom-times
income is right and natural.

I've yet to see a coherent clearly-stated proposal on the safe harbor.
But per the Guardian article: they fundamentally dislike the fact that
YouTube doesn't have to license content first, and that people can
just upload it and *then* they need to send a notice. They would
really really like a permissioned Internet.

They previously considered Spotify streaming inherently evil as well,
until they bullied Spotify into revenue guarantees to the major labels
(but not the minor ones). YouTube has consistently refused any similar
revenue guarantee arrangement - although it's gone well out of its way
to work with them, e.g. content ID on audio.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Music industry threats to safe harbor?

[David Gerard]

Good to know :-) I was mostly just wondering if the music industry
initiative was making any headway, from an outside perspective. Because if
they chip a bit off, they won't stop there.

On 19 December 2016 at 20:22, Charles M. Roslof 
wrote:

> Throughout 2016, the US Copyright Office has been collecting input on the
> DMCA safe harbors. WMF has submitted written comments to the Copyright
> Office  >[1]
> and participated in in-person discussions
> [2] on this issue.
> We're currently in the process of preparing a submission as part of a
> second
> round of Copyright Office comments
>  26904/section-512-study-request-for-additional-comments>,
> due in February.[3]
>
> If you have questions about what's going on with the safe harbors or have
> suggestions about what we should say in the second round of comments, I
> encourage you to start a discussion on the public policy mailing list
> [4] or email me
> directly.
>
>  - Charles
>
> [1] https://blog.wikimedia.org/2016/04/06/save-safe-harbors-open-web/
> [2] https://blog.wikimedia.org/2016/06/16/copyright-law/
> [3]
> https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2016/11/08/2016-
> 26904/section-512-study-request-for-additional-comments
> [4] https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/publicpolicy
>
> ==
> Charles M. Roslof
> Legal Counsel
> Wikimedia Foundation
> cros...@wikimedia.org
> (415) 839-6885
>
> NOTICE: This message might have confidential or legally privileged
> information in it. If you have received this message by accident, please
> delete it and let us know about the mistake. As an attorney for the
> Wikimedia Foundation, for legal/ethical reasons I cannot give legal advice
> to, or serve as a lawyer for, community members, volunteers, or staff
> members in their personal capacity. For more on what this means, please see
> our legal disclaimer
> .
>
> On Mon, Dec 19, 2016 at 11:04 AM, Vi to  wrote:
>
> > I see, thank you for your explanation, coming from a civil law system it
> > sounds pretty weird. Anyway I concur, it's pure madness and some action
> > must be taken.
> >
> > Vito
> >
> > 2016-12-19 19:46 GMT+01:00 geni :
> >
> > > On 19 December 2016 at 18:38, Vi to  wrote:
> > > > I wouldn't call DMCA safe harbor(s) "how Wikipedia is allowed to
> > exist".
> > > At
> > > > a glance I'd say it would (at worst) impact on some (most) wikis way
> to
> > > > handle copyvios/the thin red line around fair-use, but most of our
> > > > ecosystem shouldn't be affected. So, what am I missing?
> > > >
> > >
> > > Without some form of safe harbor the likes of AP and getty would have
> > > a fairly solid case for statutory damages for every single one of
> > > their images uploaded even if we deleted them fairly quickly. We could
> > > probably argue it down to $200 per image but it would still add up.
> > >
> > > --
> > > geni
> > >
> > > ___
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[Wikimedia-l] Music industry threats to safe harbor?

[David Gerard]

For various reasons * I follow music industry news. One drum the record
industry has been beating *hard* in the past year is attempts to reduce the
DMCA "safe harbor" provisions in order to squeeze more money from YouTube.
It's been a running theme through 2016.

e.g.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/may/20/music-industry-battling-google-youtube-what-happens-next
http://www.billboard.com/articles/business/7624389/music-industry-congratulates-trump-open-letter

The DMCA "safe harbor" is otherwise known as "how Wikipedia is allowed to
exist".

so! Is this on our threat radar? Do they have any hope? How close are we to
another "call your Congressman" banner?

(I figure this is not a good time to say things like "well that could never
happen politically")


- d.


* well, to write schadenfreude-dripping posts on rocknerd.co.uk
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[Wikimedia-l] Infobitt.com (crowdsourced news) has gone offline

[David Gerard]

Larry Sanger's attempted crowdsourced Wikinews, Infobitt, is dead -
the name infobitt.net no longer resolves (though the domain is still
registered).

It died sometime after June 23, the date of the last screenshot on the
Wayback Machine; tweets concerning it suggest it was up until August
or September. The last top news story was "New York Post interviews
Frank Fiorina, a husband of soon to be First Women President - Carly
Fiorina". http://web.archive.org/web/20160623233441/http://infobitt.com/


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] We appear have been partially blocked in France (probably accidentally)

[David Gerard]

This is the more detailed writeup that Le Monde cribbed from:

http://www.nextinpact.com/news/101786-google-fr-bloque-pour-apologie-terrorisme-orange-invoque-erreur-humaine.htm

and it's hilarious, even in translation.

Orange blames "human error". Indeed.


- d.


On 17 October 2016 at 21:54, geni  wrote:

> Apparently on the orders of the french government orange added us to
> their blocked terrorist sites list. This did apparently have the fun
> effect of  DOS the government page people were redirected to, Source
> (among others):
>
> http://www.lemonde.fr/pixels/article/2016/10/17/une-erreur-
> bloque-l-acces-a-google-pour-les-clients-d-orange_5014900_4408996.html
>
>
>
> --
> geni
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Arbital, another Wikipedia competitor/complement

[David Gerard]

Followup on this: Arbital is still going (recent changes shows
consistent activity, mostly from MIRI people) and now has the tag line
"Arbital is the place for crowdsourced, intuitive math explanations."
This is an area it might actually get somewhere with - en:wp's
mathematics articles are notoriously opaque and not good for
explaining a concept to people who don't already understand it. And
CC-by-sa educational articles on math are a win for everyone.

On 14 March 2016 at 01:03, David Gerard <dger...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Being put together by Eliezer Yudkowsky of LessWrong. Content is
> cc-by-sa 3.0, don't know about the software.
>
> https://arbital.com/p/arbital_ambitions/
>
> Rather than the "encyclopedia" approach, it tries to be more
> pedagogical, teaching the reader at their level.
>
> Analysis from a sometime Yudkowsky critic on Tumblr:
> http://nostalgebraist.tumblr.com/post/140995096534/a-year-ago-i-remember-being-baffled-by-eliezer
>
> (there's a pile more comments linked from the notes on that post,
> mostly from quasi-fans; I have an acerbic comment in there, but you
> should look at the site yourself first.)
>
> No idea if this will go anywhere, but might be of interest; new
> approaches generally are. They started in December, first publicised
> it a week ago and have been scaling up. First day it collapsed due to
> load from a Facebook post announcement ... so maybe hold off before
> announcing it everywhere :-)
>
>
> - d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] A new Wikipedia fork: InfoGalactic

[David Gerard]

On 10 October 2016 at 20:50, John Mark Vandenberg  wrote:

> Ads on the horizon according to
> http://infogalactic.com/info/Infogalactic:Roadmap and
> https://infogalactic.com/info/Infogalactic:Advertising


Well past that:

http://infogalactic.com/info/Infogalactic:Corelords


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] A new Wikipedia fork: InfoGalactic

[David Gerard]

"No, it's not. My designs always work. See: multibutton mice."

http://voxday.blogspot.co.uk/2016/10/project-big-fork-infogalactic.html#c2393769086409813649

On 10 October 2016 at 20:18, Asaf Bartov <abar...@wikimedia.org> wrote:
> "Starlords".
>
> okay.
>
> A.
>
> On Mon, Oct 10, 2016 at 9:35 PM geni <geni...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> S
>>
>> On 10 October 2016 at 19:13, David Gerard <dger...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> > "INFOGALACTIC: an online encyclopedia without bias or thought police"
>> >
>> > Home page: http://infogalactic.com/info/Main_Page
>> > Announcement:
>> http://voxday.blogspot.com/2016/10/project-big-fork-infogalactic.html
>> > Roadmap: http://infogalactic.com/info/Infogalactic:Roadmap
>> >
>> >
>> > - d.
>>
>> So the neoreactionaries have their wiki just like the more traditional
>> far right have Metapedia.
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> geni
>>
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[Wikimedia-l] A new Wikipedia fork: InfoGalactic

[David Gerard]

"INFOGALACTIC: an online encyclopedia without bias or thought police"

Home page: http://infogalactic.com/info/Main_Page
Announcement: 
http://voxday.blogspot.com/2016/10/project-big-fork-infogalactic.html
Roadmap: http://infogalactic.com/info/Infogalactic:Roadmap


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Ray Saintonge has died

[David Gerard]

On 13 September 2016 at 17:19, Lane Rasberry  wrote:

> https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ray_Saintonge,_Heathrow_Terminal_5,_20110801_P1020446.jpg



Yes, that shot was after I went across London to catch him between
planes and have a few pints at Heathrow :-D


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Status update about editing software, June 2016

[David Gerard]

On 23 June 2016 at 10:17, James Forrester  wrote:

> TL;DR: The Editing Department is working to make the content editing
> software better. The big work areas are improving the visual editor and
> editing wikitext. We will bring in a wikitext mode inside the visual editor
> for simpler, faster switching. We will experiment with prompts to give
> users ideas for what they might want to make as they edit. We will do other
> things as well. Your feedback is welcome.



I see this isn't a blog post yet, and it should be!


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] The end

[David Gerard]

On 17 May 2016 at 13:44, Chris Sherlock  wrote:

> I've just been blocked forever. I've been bullied, and I'm having suicidal 
> thoughts.


Followup: Chris is fine :-)  All is well. He's quite touched at how
many people rallied around to help him. Mostly he's a bit embarrassed
about just how many people this email went out to, but he's pretty
public about his depressive illness in order that others will be less
shy.

He wants you to know: "Please tell anyone else who has similar
suicidal feelings that life is wonderful and it's worth every painful
and wonderful moment."

Also I told him to put 127.0.0.1 en.wikipedia.org in /etc/hosts ;-)


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] wikinews has a NPOV policy derived from wikipedia, mamamia ...

[David Gerard]

For comparison: http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Special:Statistics

the twitter version: "Wikinews is half as active as Citizendium."


- d.



On 1 May 2016 at 17:45, rupert THURNER  wrote:
> On Fri, Apr 22, 2016 at 10:38 PM, Tilman Bayer  wrote:
>> On Fri, Apr 22, 2016 at 12:42 PM, rupert THURNER 
>> wrote:
>>
>>> hi jimmy,
>>>
>>> i asked on the facebook group wikipeda weekly if joe/ed could publish
>>> an upcoming blog post on wikinews. joe sutherland mentioned ".. I
>>> simply cannot get my head around its attitude to news coverage". which
>>> i find frightening. an editor for 10 years, tens of thousands
>>> contributions, thousands of pages created, degree in journalism,
>>> dissertation about news on wikipedia, administrator.[1]
>>>
>>> jimmy, as wikinews refers an old mail of you from 2003 as the holy
>>> grail of NPOV, could you please clarify once and for all that your
>>> NPOV statemant you sent to wikien-l was valid for wikipedia. and not
>>> for wikisource, wikiquote, wikinews. best on the wikinews talk page
>>> concerning NPOV [2][4]. i understand of course that certain publishing
>>> standards might apply - but NPOV, and "sourced" in the sense of
>>> published somewhere else cannot be amongst them [3].
>>>
>>> just as a note, i hate that the blog [5] opens 20 times slower than
>>> wikinews on my mobile phone,
>>
>> The blog is hosted by Automattic (known for Wordpress.com) in the same
>> environment as high traffic sites like time.com or fivethirtyeight.com.
>> You can file technical issues on Phabricator:
>> https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/project/view/328/ or contact the blog
>> team (https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Blog/Guidelines ).
>>
>> that it is not in different languages,
>>>
>> It does support multilingual posts, e.g.
>> https://blog.wikimedia.org/2016/04/18/wikimedia-server-switch/ is available
>> in 23 languages.
>
> asaf and others were so kind to point me to the statistics of
> wikinews, only SIX persons contributing. this a nice private wiki now
> - nobody would notice if it is set read only :)
> https://stats.wikimedia.org/wikinews/EN/SummaryEN.htm
>
> still i think it benefits the movements software if you as WMF
> communications team eat our own dogfood and publish on mediawiki.
> wikinews might fit nicely as its target of publishing original texts
> is closest - but anyway wiknews would need a policy change and the
> bureaucrat(s) changed to allow such kinds of texts. if this policy
> change revives its contributor base good. if not i'd agree with asaf
> and others to just let it formally die, as it is already de facto
> dead.
>
>>> that i do not have the "usual mediawiki features". i hate that
>>> signpost [7] cannot be read on mobiles because of formatting. i hate
>>> the glam newsletter [6] for the same reason, despite beeig again on a
>>> different wiki, no "read in different languages". which is the main
>>> reason i write this mail ... and asked joe why not using wikinews. and
>>> i hate that wikinews does not use mediawiki features to properly
>>> classify what quality an article has, e.g. "blog", "npov", etc.
>>>
>>> [1]
>>> https://tools.wmflabs.org/xtools-ec/?user=Foxj=en.wikipedia.org
>>> [2]
>>> https://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Wikinews_talk:Neutral_point_of_view#raphael_honigstein_and_outreach_blog_on_wikinews.3F
>>> [3] https://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Wikinews:Pillars_of_Wikinews_writing
>>> [4]
>>> https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2003-November/008096.html
>>> [5] blog:
>>> http://blog.wikimedia.org/2016/04/22/ted-wikimedia-collaboration/
>>> [6] glam newletter: https://outreach.wikimedia.org/wiki/GLAM/Newsletter
>>> [7] signpost: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost
>
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[Wikimedia-l] Arbital, another Wikipedia competitor/complement

[David Gerard]

Being put together by Eliezer Yudkowsky of LessWrong. Content is
cc-by-sa 3.0, don't know about the software.

https://arbital.com/p/arbital_ambitions/

Rather than the "encyclopedia" approach, it tries to be more
pedagogical, teaching the reader at their level.

Analysis from a sometime Yudkowsky critic on Tumblr:
http://nostalgebraist.tumblr.com/post/140995096534/a-year-ago-i-remember-being-baffled-by-eliezer

(there's a pile more comments linked from the notes on that post,
mostly from quasi-fans; I have an acerbic comment in there, but you
should look at the site yourself first.)

No idea if this will go anywhere, but might be of interest; new
approaches generally are. They started in December, first publicised
it a week ago and have been scaling up. First day it collapsed due to
load from a Facebook post announcement ... so maybe hold off before
announcing it everywhere :-)


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Anybody alive?

[David Gerard]

I've just been standing back at a safe distance and watching the
current disaster with an "ooh, ouch" expression on my face. Still,
editing Wikipedia is less triggering than editing RationalWiki.

I was only actually shocked at Oliver's resignation.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Post mortems (second attempt)

[David Gerard]

On 22 February 2016 at 03:49, Risker  wrote:

> I can think of Echo/Notifications which, despite some rather minor
> grumblings and need for a few tweaks at the beginning, has been fully
> embraced by the community.  It's not entirely perfect for all use cases,
> but it is so much better than anything we had before.  It's become so
> natural to ping someone with {{u|username here}} that I can barely remember
> a time when it wasn't the norm.



And users of other MediaWikis now expect it. (Coming soon to
RationalWiki! Probably.)


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

[David Gerard]

On 18 January 2016 at 20:33, Magnus Manske  wrote:

> * New things are not necessarily good just because they are new. What seems
> to be an improvement, especially for a technical mind, can be a huge step
> backwards for the "general population". On the other hand, projects like
> the Visual Editor can make work easier for many people, but few of them
> will realize what a daunting undertaking such a project is. The complexity


As a huge VE advocate, I was quite disconcerted how hard the WMF was
trying to force through what was clearly an early beta in need of
real-world testing as if it were a production-ready product; I think
this was the problem and the reason for the backlash. VE *now* has had
a couple of years' development in a real-world environment and is
really quite excellent (and the only sensible way to edit tables). But
the problem here was not fear of change or fear of technology, but
rejecting technology that was being forced on editors when it was
really obviously not up to the job as yet.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF trustee Arnnon Geshuri and part in anticompetitive agreements in Google

[David Gerard]

... and the court papers, and the smoking gun documents, and ...

This is the sort of thing that needs some serious explaining. Assume
good faith, but we're starting from some pretty *startling*
circumstances and evidence here.


- d.

On 9 January 2016 at 09:19, Craig Franklin  wrote:
> Chris,
>
> Thanks for saying that.  I'd also add that while the situation with Arrnon
> looks damning on the face of it, I'm a little disappointed that people are
> breaking out the pitchforks based purely on media reports, before he has a
> chance to present his own side of the story and before Dariusz and the
> others can properly look into the matter.  I also think that some of the
> more 'excitable' commentary on this list in the past couple of weeks is
> more likely to push the trustees away than get us the explanations we
> want.  Yes, what is happening is deeply concerning, but lets not all lose
> our heads.
>
> Cheers,
> Craig
>
> On 9 January 2016 at 19:06, Chris Keating 
> wrote:
>
>> > I suspect they need a few days, based on past experiences. To dig into
>> the
>> > matter, and prepare an answer
>>
>> Quite, and thanks for saying that Lodewijk.
>>
>> In my view, the WMF board's top priority has to be the issues about
>> strategy, leadership and staff morale that are being made public now. It is
>> in everyone's interests that these issues get sorted out and some key parts
>> of the solution have to happen in private.
>>
>> I am sure that the Board have invested a huge amount of time and energy in
>> these issues already. Unless you have been on the board of an organisation
>> that's gone through a serious problem it's difficult to appreciate the
>> pressure this creates. I have, and I would urge everyone to take a deep
>> breath and  think before emailing. It's worth repeating that Board members
>> are all volunteers with jobs and families and what's more are trying to
>> coordinate between three different continents.
>>
>> In particular hundred-email threads on this list where everyone speculates
>> and demands answers to their particular questions  (and some people
>> downright stir the shit) are less than helpful - a board member who spends
>> 5 hours a week on WMF business could easily spend that just reading all the
>> emails
>>
>> Dariusz has said the Board is looking into the situation with Arnnon, which
>> they were clearly not aware of - that is what needs to happen and yet more
>> emails on this list won't mean that happens any more quickly.
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>> Chris Keating
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] AWB & Ubuntu: Can really someone help?

[David Gerard]

I got it to work on Ubuntu 14.04 by approximately this method. It's
INCREDIBLY long winded, you have to download about a gigabyte of stuff
from Microsoft, one file didn't exist at the listed download site any
more and I had to get a questionable copy off someone's "saved stuff"
web directory, and after all that a pile of stuff doesn't work
properly. *However*, it is usable for real work without getting a
Windows box to run it on.

On 28 December 2015 at 11:52, Asaf Bartov  wrote:
> I have recently been able to make it work under WINE, and have updated the
> documentation page accordingly[1].  It did take a series of winetricks(1)
> incantations to get it to work.  It's quite brittle.  In particular, make
> sure you're specifying WINARCH=32.
>
>A.
>
> [1]
> https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Mono_and_Wine=681340924=681113160
>
>
> On Mon, Dec 28, 2015 at 2:39 AM, Fæ  wrote:
>
>> It's been several years since I used AWB for anything serious, precisely
>> because it only runs under Windows.
>>
>> The conventional advice is to run it in a windows emulator, such as Wine,
>> Parallels or Virtualbox. Folks talk about porting it, but I suspect this
>> will never happen.
>>
>> Fae
>> On 28 Dec 2015 10:36, "Tito Dutta"  wrote:
>>
>> > In last 2 years I have contacted every help section from AWB talk page,
>> > Ubuntu help forum etc.
>> > Trying this medium as well:
>> > Can someone tell me how to use AWB on Ubuntu?
>> > ___
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>
>
>
> --
> Asaf Bartov
> Wikimedia Foundation 
>
> Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the
> sum of all knowledge. Help us make it a reality!
> https://donate.wikimedia.org
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