subject:"\[Wikimedia\-l\] Profile of Magnus Manske"

Thanks Peter. It's not my work, I put it out to tender at Village Pump
(technical) and User:Makyen took it and did it. (It doesn't seem to be
working now, though.) I'm pretty confident it's technically possible to
make it accessible (readable by JAWS [1]) now. What's missing is the WMF's
decision to invest in reliability. Reliability, I'm discovering, is the
thing that must not be named. "We tried fixing reliability. Remember
Nupedia? Hahahahahahaha."

Magnus: I think we agree both ratios (Wikipedia's and Wikidata's) have a
long way to go. :o)

TTS: Yes. Why not? A simple button that smoothly reads an article to me,
like a podcast, with fast forward and rewind or skip, while I do the dishes
would be cool. I hope they're not going to try to re-invent JAWS, though.




Anthony Cole


On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 5:31 AM, Magnus Manske 
wrote:

> I like this for the interface, and as you said for the screen reading
> function. I hear WMF is working on some TTS thing now?
>
> Not sure it would significantly alter my ratios at the moment, especially
> given its rather low takeup (i presume). In your example, it would actually
> make the ratio worse for Wikipedia, providing evidence for more than one
> statement per sentence ;-)
>
>
> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 6:53 PM Anthony Cole  wrote:
>
> > Ugh. This: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Ref_supports2#Example
> >
> > Anthony Cole
> >
> >
> > On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 2:51 AM, Anthony Cole 
> wrote:
> >
> > > Ugh.I just edited the page and now it's not working. Try this:
> > > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Ref_supports2/Example
> > >
> > > Anthony Cole
> > >
> > >
> > > On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 2:42 AM, Anthony Cole 
> > wrote:
> > >
> > >> Regarding "Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically
> > >> discern what a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph."
> Check
> > >> out the first paragraph and its references here:
> > >> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_and_Albert_Museum_Spiral.
> > >>
> > >> Hovering your mouse over each footnote marker (or, depending on your
> > >> MediaWiki preferences, the dotted line under it) will tell you what
> each
> > >> reference is supporting. The ideal solution would be highlighting the
> > >> supported text on the page, rather than having it appear in a tool
> tip.
> > >>
> > >> I wish the WMF would organise that - and organise it in a way that
> > screen
> > >> readers can read it.
> > >>
> > >> Anthony Cole
> > >>
> > >>
> > >> On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 1:57 AM, Magnus Manske <
> > >> magnusman...@googlemail.com> wrote:
> > >>
> > >>> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 4:18 PM Anthony Cole 
> > >>> wrote:
> > >>>
> > >>> > Ah. You mean you're counting all footnote markers (including those
> at
> > >>> the
> > >>> > end of paragraphs). You're not just counting the number of
> references
> > >>> at
> > >>> > the bottom of the page. Yes I saw that. But you are missing my
> point.
> > >>> Many
> > >>> > editors use one footnote marker to support all the sentences in a
> > >>> > paragraph. Many use one footnote marker to support all sentences
> > after
> > >>> the
> > >>> > last footnote marker.
> > >>> >
> > >>> > There are many multi-sentence paragraphs in
> > >>> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer_pain with just one footnote
> > >>> marker
> > >>> > supporting all the sentences. Using your metric, the sentences at
> the
> > >>> > beginning and middle of those paragraphs would be counted as
> > unsourced
> > >>> > statements.
> > >>> >
> > >>>
> > >>> Yes. Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically
> discern
> > >>> what
> > >>> a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph. As described, my
> > >>> "one
> > >>> sentence, one statement" metric is a lower bound of statement
> numbers.
> > So
> > >>> is my  count, then. I am certain you can find an article where
> my
> > >>> statement-to-reference ratio is off against WIkipedia; but I believe
> I
> > >>> could find more instances where it is in favour of Wikipedia.
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>> >
> > >>> > But, really, who cares? The whole thing is a non-argument. It just
> > >>> doesn't
> > >>> > matter which project is more poorly referenced.
> > >>> >
> > >>>
> > >>> Well, considering the amount you write about it, apparently you care
> > :-)
> > >>>
> > >>> My argument, and I believe I made this reasonably solid, is that one
> > >>> can't
> > >>> "sit on Wikipedia", pointing finders at Wikidata for poor
> referencing.
> > >>> Which is what Andreas Kolbe implicitly did (amongst other things).
> That
> > >>> is
> > >>> all.
> > >>>
> > >>> Cheers,
> > >>> Magnus
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>> >
> > >>> > Anthony Cole
> > >>> >
> > >>> >
> > >>> > On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 11:59 PM, Anthony Cole <
> ahcole...@gmail.com>
> > >>> > wrote:
> > >>> >
> > >>> > > Magnus, I've just re-scanned your essay and don't see mention of
> > you
> > >>> only
> > >>> > > counting footnote markers within the paragraphs and not at the
> end
> > of
> > >>> > > paragraphs.
> >

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-03-12 Thread Magnus Manske

I like this for the interface, and as you said for the screen reading
function. I hear WMF is working on some TTS thing now?

Not sure it would significantly alter my ratios at the moment, especially
given its rather low takeup (i presume). In your example, it would actually
make the ratio worse for Wikipedia, providing evidence for more than one
statement per sentence ;-)


On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 6:53 PM Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Ugh. This: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Ref_supports2#Example
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 2:51 AM, Anthony Cole  wrote:
>
> > Ugh.I just edited the page and now it's not working. Try this:
> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Ref_supports2/Example
> >
> > Anthony Cole
> >
> >
> > On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 2:42 AM, Anthony Cole 
> wrote:
> >
> >> Regarding "Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically
> >> discern what a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph." Check
> >> out the first paragraph and its references here:
> >> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_and_Albert_Museum_Spiral.
> >>
> >> Hovering your mouse over each footnote marker (or, depending on your
> >> MediaWiki preferences, the dotted line under it) will tell you what each
> >> reference is supporting. The ideal solution would be highlighting the
> >> supported text on the page, rather than having it appear in a tool tip.
> >>
> >> I wish the WMF would organise that - and organise it in a way that
> screen
> >> readers can read it.
> >>
> >> Anthony Cole
> >>
> >>
> >> On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 1:57 AM, Magnus Manske <
> >> magnusman...@googlemail.com> wrote:
> >>
> >>> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 4:18 PM Anthony Cole 
> >>> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> > Ah. You mean you're counting all footnote markers (including those at
> >>> the
> >>> > end of paragraphs). You're not just counting the number of references
> >>> at
> >>> > the bottom of the page. Yes I saw that. But you are missing my point.
> >>> Many
> >>> > editors use one footnote marker to support all the sentences in a
> >>> > paragraph. Many use one footnote marker to support all sentences
> after
> >>> the
> >>> > last footnote marker.
> >>> >
> >>> > There are many multi-sentence paragraphs in
> >>> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer_pain with just one footnote
> >>> marker
> >>> > supporting all the sentences. Using your metric, the sentences at the
> >>> > beginning and middle of those paragraphs would be counted as
> unsourced
> >>> > statements.
> >>> >
> >>>
> >>> Yes. Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically discern
> >>> what
> >>> a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph. As described, my
> >>> "one
> >>> sentence, one statement" metric is a lower bound of statement numbers.
> So
> >>> is my  count, then. I am certain you can find an article where my
> >>> statement-to-reference ratio is off against WIkipedia; but I believe I
> >>> could find more instances where it is in favour of Wikipedia.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> >
> >>> > But, really, who cares? The whole thing is a non-argument. It just
> >>> doesn't
> >>> > matter which project is more poorly referenced.
> >>> >
> >>>
> >>> Well, considering the amount you write about it, apparently you care
> :-)
> >>>
> >>> My argument, and I believe I made this reasonably solid, is that one
> >>> can't
> >>> "sit on Wikipedia", pointing finders at Wikidata for poor referencing.
> >>> Which is what Andreas Kolbe implicitly did (amongst other things). That
> >>> is
> >>> all.
> >>>
> >>> Cheers,
> >>> Magnus
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> >
> >>> > Anthony Cole
> >>> >
> >>> >
> >>> > On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 11:59 PM, Anthony Cole 
> >>> > wrote:
> >>> >
> >>> > > Magnus, I've just re-scanned your essay and don't see mention of
> you
> >>> only
> >>> > > counting footnote markers within the paragraphs and not at the end
> of
> >>> > > paragraphs.
> >>> > >
> >>> > > And why wouldn't you count a footnote marker at the end of a
> >>> paragraph
> >>> > if,
> >>> > > as I've just explained, the sole citation at the end of a paragraph
> >>> often
> >>> > > supports all statements in the paragraph?
> >>> > >
> >>> > > Why would you assume one sentence only contains one fact?
> >>> > >
> >>> > > Choosing a lead sentence as your example - Denny did the same in
> his
> >>> > > response to Andreas's critique - is potentially misleading because,
> >>> > > provided statements are repeated and supported by a reliable source
> >>> in
> >>> > the
> >>> > > body of an article, citations are not expected or required in
> >>> > en.Wikipedia
> >>> > > article leads.
> >>> > >
> >>> > > Your methodology is flawed; fatally biased toward exaggerating
> >>> > Wikipedia's
> >>> > > lack of references. But. I really don't care because I think the
> >>> > > reliability of Wikipedia and level of referencing in Wikipedia is
> >>> > > appalling.
> >>> > >
> >>> > > Forgive me for mischaracterising your argument as, ""Wikipedia is
> >>> worse".
> >>> > > You appear to be saying, "Well, W

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-03-12 Thread Peter Southwood

Maybe it will become accessible with future technology, in which case your work 
would not be wasted.
Cheers,
Peter

-Original Message-
From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of 
Anthony Cole
Sent: Saturday, 12 March 2016 9:06 PM
To: Wikimedia Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

I'd use it for most of my citations if it also worked for users of screen 
readers. But I can't bring myself to add a feature to an article that isn't 
accessible by the sight impaired.

Anthony Cole


On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 2:59 AM, Peter Southwood < 
peter.southw...@telkomsa.net> wrote:

> That would be a useful feature in the long term Cheers,  Peter
>
> -Original Message-
> From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On 
> Behalf Of Anthony Cole
> Sent: Saturday, 12 March 2016 8:42 PM
> To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske
>
> Regarding "Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically 
> discern what a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph." 
> Check out the first paragraph and its references here:
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_and_Albert_Museum_Spiral.
>
> Hovering your mouse over each footnote marker (or, depending on your 
> MediaWiki preferences, the dotted line under it) will tell you what 
> each reference is supporting. The ideal solution would be highlighting 
> the supported text on the page, rather than having it appear in a tool tip.
>
> I wish the WMF would organise that - and organise it in a way that 
> screen readers can read it.
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 1:57 AM, Magnus Manske < 
> magnusman...@googlemail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 4:18 PM Anthony Cole 
> wrote:
> >
> > > Ah. You mean you're counting all footnote markers (including those 
> > > at the end of paragraphs). You're not just counting the number of 
> > > references at the bottom of the page. Yes I saw that. But you are
> missing my point.
> > Many
> > > editors use one footnote marker to support all the sentences in a 
> > > paragraph. Many use one footnote marker to support all sentences 
> > > after
> > the
> > > last footnote marker.
> > >
> > > There are many multi-sentence paragraphs in 
> > > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer_pain with just one footnote 
> > > marker supporting all the sentences. Using your metric, the 
> > > sentences at the beginning and middle of those paragraphs would be 
> > > counted as unsourced statements.
> > >
> >
> > Yes. Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically 
> > discern what a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph. As 
> > described, my "one sentence, one statement" metric is a lower bound 
> > of statement numbers. So is my  count, then. I am certain you 
> > can find an article where my statement-to-reference ratio is off 
> > against WIkipedia; but I believe I could find more instances where 
> > it is in
> favour of Wikipedia.
> >
> >
> > >
> > > But, really, who cares? The whole thing is a non-argument. It just
> > doesn't
> > > matter which project is more poorly referenced.
> > >
> >
> > Well, considering the amount you write about it, apparently you care
> > :-)
> >
> > My argument, and I believe I made this reasonably solid, is that one 
> > can't "sit on Wikipedia", pointing finders at Wikidata for poor
> referencing.
> > Which is what Andreas Kolbe implicitly did (amongst other things).
> > That is all.
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Magnus
> >
> >
> > >
> > > Anthony Cole
> > >
> > >
> > > On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 11:59 PM, Anthony Cole 
> > > 
> > > wrote:
> > >
> > > > Magnus, I've just re-scanned your essay and don't see mention of 
> > > > you
> > only
> > > > counting footnote markers within the paragraphs and not at the 
> > > > end of paragraphs.
> > > >
> > > > And why wouldn't you count a footnote marker at the end of a 
> > > > paragraph
> > > if,
> > > > as I've just explained, the sole citation at the end of a 
> > > > paragraph
> > often
> > > > supports all statements in the paragraph?
> > > >
> > > > Why would you assume one sentence only contains one fact?
> > > >
> > > > Choosing

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

I'd use it for most of my citations if it also worked for users of screen
readers. But I can't bring myself to add a feature to an article that isn't
accessible by the sight impaired.

Anthony Cole


On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 2:59 AM, Peter Southwood <
peter.southw...@telkomsa.net> wrote:

> That would be a useful feature in the long term
> Cheers,
>  Peter
>
> -Original Message-
> From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On
> Behalf Of Anthony Cole
> Sent: Saturday, 12 March 2016 8:42 PM
> To: Wikimedia Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske
>
> Regarding "Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically
> discern what a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph." Check
> out the first paragraph and its references here:
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_and_Albert_Museum_Spiral.
>
> Hovering your mouse over each footnote marker (or, depending on your
> MediaWiki preferences, the dotted line under it) will tell you what each
> reference is supporting. The ideal solution would be highlighting the
> supported text on the page, rather than having it appear in a tool tip.
>
> I wish the WMF would organise that - and organise it in a way that screen
> readers can read it.
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 1:57 AM, Magnus Manske <
> magnusman...@googlemail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 4:18 PM Anthony Cole 
> wrote:
> >
> > > Ah. You mean you're counting all footnote markers (including those
> > > at the end of paragraphs). You're not just counting the number of
> > > references at the bottom of the page. Yes I saw that. But you are
> missing my point.
> > Many
> > > editors use one footnote marker to support all the sentences in a
> > > paragraph. Many use one footnote marker to support all sentences
> > > after
> > the
> > > last footnote marker.
> > >
> > > There are many multi-sentence paragraphs in
> > > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer_pain with just one footnote
> > > marker supporting all the sentences. Using your metric, the
> > > sentences at the beginning and middle of those paragraphs would be
> > > counted as unsourced statements.
> > >
> >
> > Yes. Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically discern
> > what a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph. As
> > described, my "one sentence, one statement" metric is a lower bound of
> > statement numbers. So is my  count, then. I am certain you can
> > find an article where my statement-to-reference ratio is off against
> > WIkipedia; but I believe I could find more instances where it is in
> favour of Wikipedia.
> >
> >
> > >
> > > But, really, who cares? The whole thing is a non-argument. It just
> > doesn't
> > > matter which project is more poorly referenced.
> > >
> >
> > Well, considering the amount you write about it, apparently you care
> > :-)
> >
> > My argument, and I believe I made this reasonably solid, is that one
> > can't "sit on Wikipedia", pointing finders at Wikidata for poor
> referencing.
> > Which is what Andreas Kolbe implicitly did (amongst other things).
> > That is all.
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Magnus
> >
> >
> > >
> > > Anthony Cole
> > >
> > >
> > > On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 11:59 PM, Anthony Cole 
> > > wrote:
> > >
> > > > Magnus, I've just re-scanned your essay and don't see mention of
> > > > you
> > only
> > > > counting footnote markers within the paragraphs and not at the end
> > > > of paragraphs.
> > > >
> > > > And why wouldn't you count a footnote marker at the end of a
> > > > paragraph
> > > if,
> > > > as I've just explained, the sole citation at the end of a
> > > > paragraph
> > often
> > > > supports all statements in the paragraph?
> > > >
> > > > Why would you assume one sentence only contains one fact?
> > > >
> > > > Choosing a lead sentence as your example - Denny did the same in
> > > > his response to Andreas's critique - is potentially misleading
> > > > because, provided statements are repeated and supported by a
> > > > reliable source in
> > > the
> > > > body of an article, citations are not expected or required in
> > > en.Wikipedia
> >

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-03-12 Thread Peter Southwood

That would be a useful feature in the long term
Cheers,
 Peter

-Original Message-
From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of 
Anthony Cole
Sent: Saturday, 12 March 2016 8:42 PM
To: Wikimedia Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Regarding "Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically discern 
what a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph." Check out the first 
paragraph and its references here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_and_Albert_Museum_Spiral.

Hovering your mouse over each footnote marker (or, depending on your MediaWiki 
preferences, the dotted line under it) will tell you what each reference is 
supporting. The ideal solution would be highlighting the supported text on the 
page, rather than having it appear in a tool tip.

I wish the WMF would organise that - and organise it in a way that screen 
readers can read it.

Anthony Cole


On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 1:57 AM, Magnus Manske 
wrote:

> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 4:18 PM Anthony Cole  wrote:
>
> > Ah. You mean you're counting all footnote markers (including those 
> > at the end of paragraphs). You're not just counting the number of 
> > references at the bottom of the page. Yes I saw that. But you are missing 
> > my point.
> Many
> > editors use one footnote marker to support all the sentences in a 
> > paragraph. Many use one footnote marker to support all sentences 
> > after
> the
> > last footnote marker.
> >
> > There are many multi-sentence paragraphs in 
> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer_pain with just one footnote 
> > marker supporting all the sentences. Using your metric, the 
> > sentences at the beginning and middle of those paragraphs would be 
> > counted as unsourced statements.
> >
>
> Yes. Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically discern 
> what a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph. As 
> described, my "one sentence, one statement" metric is a lower bound of 
> statement numbers. So is my  count, then. I am certain you can 
> find an article where my statement-to-reference ratio is off against 
> WIkipedia; but I believe I could find more instances where it is in favour of 
> Wikipedia.
>
>
> >
> > But, really, who cares? The whole thing is a non-argument. It just
> doesn't
> > matter which project is more poorly referenced.
> >
>
> Well, considering the amount you write about it, apparently you care 
> :-)
>
> My argument, and I believe I made this reasonably solid, is that one 
> can't "sit on Wikipedia", pointing finders at Wikidata for poor referencing.
> Which is what Andreas Kolbe implicitly did (amongst other things). 
> That is all.
>
> Cheers,
> Magnus
>
>
> >
> > Anthony Cole
> >
> >
> > On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 11:59 PM, Anthony Cole 
> > wrote:
> >
> > > Magnus, I've just re-scanned your essay and don't see mention of 
> > > you
> only
> > > counting footnote markers within the paragraphs and not at the end 
> > > of paragraphs.
> > >
> > > And why wouldn't you count a footnote marker at the end of a 
> > > paragraph
> > if,
> > > as I've just explained, the sole citation at the end of a 
> > > paragraph
> often
> > > supports all statements in the paragraph?
> > >
> > > Why would you assume one sentence only contains one fact?
> > >
> > > Choosing a lead sentence as your example - Denny did the same in 
> > > his response to Andreas's critique - is potentially misleading 
> > > because, provided statements are repeated and supported by a 
> > > reliable source in
> > the
> > > body of an article, citations are not expected or required in
> > en.Wikipedia
> > > article leads.
> > >
> > > Your methodology is flawed; fatally biased toward exaggerating
> > Wikipedia's
> > > lack of references. But. I really don't care because I think the 
> > > reliability of Wikipedia and level of referencing in Wikipedia is 
> > > appalling.
> > >
> > > Forgive me for mischaracterising your argument as, ""Wikipedia is
> worse".
> > > You appear to be saying, "Well, Wikipedia is bad, too." That's 
> > > true but still an invalid argument.
> > >
> > > It was someone else who put the "It's a wiki" argument.
> > >
> > > Several of your colleagues above have complained that adding 
> > > references
> > i

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Ugh. This: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Ref_supports2#Example

Anthony Cole


On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 2:51 AM, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Ugh.I just edited the page and now it's not working. Try this:
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Ref_supports2/Example
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 2:42 AM, Anthony Cole  wrote:
>
>> Regarding "Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically
>> discern what a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph." Check
>> out the first paragraph and its references here:
>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_and_Albert_Museum_Spiral.
>>
>> Hovering your mouse over each footnote marker (or, depending on your
>> MediaWiki preferences, the dotted line under it) will tell you what each
>> reference is supporting. The ideal solution would be highlighting the
>> supported text on the page, rather than having it appear in a tool tip.
>>
>> I wish the WMF would organise that - and organise it in a way that screen
>> readers can read it.
>>
>> Anthony Cole
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 1:57 AM, Magnus Manske <
>> magnusman...@googlemail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 4:18 PM Anthony Cole 
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>> > Ah. You mean you're counting all footnote markers (including those at
>>> the
>>> > end of paragraphs). You're not just counting the number of references
>>> at
>>> > the bottom of the page. Yes I saw that. But you are missing my point.
>>> Many
>>> > editors use one footnote marker to support all the sentences in a
>>> > paragraph. Many use one footnote marker to support all sentences after
>>> the
>>> > last footnote marker.
>>> >
>>> > There are many multi-sentence paragraphs in
>>> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer_pain with just one footnote
>>> marker
>>> > supporting all the sentences. Using your metric, the sentences at the
>>> > beginning and middle of those paragraphs would be counted as unsourced
>>> > statements.
>>> >
>>>
>>> Yes. Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically discern
>>> what
>>> a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph. As described, my
>>> "one
>>> sentence, one statement" metric is a lower bound of statement numbers. So
>>> is my  count, then. I am certain you can find an article where my
>>> statement-to-reference ratio is off against WIkipedia; but I believe I
>>> could find more instances where it is in favour of Wikipedia.
>>>
>>>
>>> >
>>> > But, really, who cares? The whole thing is a non-argument. It just
>>> doesn't
>>> > matter which project is more poorly referenced.
>>> >
>>>
>>> Well, considering the amount you write about it, apparently you care :-)
>>>
>>> My argument, and I believe I made this reasonably solid, is that one
>>> can't
>>> "sit on Wikipedia", pointing finders at Wikidata for poor referencing.
>>> Which is what Andreas Kolbe implicitly did (amongst other things). That
>>> is
>>> all.
>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>> Magnus
>>>
>>>
>>> >
>>> > Anthony Cole
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 11:59 PM, Anthony Cole 
>>> > wrote:
>>> >
>>> > > Magnus, I've just re-scanned your essay and don't see mention of you
>>> only
>>> > > counting footnote markers within the paragraphs and not at the end of
>>> > > paragraphs.
>>> > >
>>> > > And why wouldn't you count a footnote marker at the end of a
>>> paragraph
>>> > if,
>>> > > as I've just explained, the sole citation at the end of a paragraph
>>> often
>>> > > supports all statements in the paragraph?
>>> > >
>>> > > Why would you assume one sentence only contains one fact?
>>> > >
>>> > > Choosing a lead sentence as your example - Denny did the same in his
>>> > > response to Andreas's critique - is potentially misleading because,
>>> > > provided statements are repeated and supported by a reliable source
>>> in
>>> > the
>>> > > body of an article, citations are not expected or required in
>>> > en.Wikipedia
>>> > > article leads.
>>> > >
>>> > > Your methodology is flawed; fatally biased toward exaggerating
>>> > Wikipedia's
>>> > > lack of references. But. I really don't care because I think the
>>> > > reliability of Wikipedia and level of referencing in Wikipedia is
>>> > > appalling.
>>> > >
>>> > > Forgive me for mischaracterising your argument as, ""Wikipedia is
>>> worse".
>>> > > You appear to be saying, "Well, Wikipedia is bad, too." That's true
>>> but
>>> > > still an invalid argument.
>>> > >
>>> > > It was someone else who put the "It's a wiki" argument.
>>> > >
>>> > > Several of your colleagues above have complained that adding
>>> references
>>> > is
>>> > > difficult in Wikidata. And your response is what? "Actually, it is
>>> easy
>>> > > to add references to Wikidata, certainly not more difficult than
>>> adding
>>> > > them to Wikipedia." Please listen to people, will you?
>>> > >
>>> > > You still seem to think the problem with the roll-out of the media
>>> viewer
>>> > > and visual editor was the stoopid power users.
>>> > >
>>> > > Anthony Cole
>>> > >
>>> > >
>>> > > On Sat, Ma

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Ugh.I just edited the page and now it's not working. Try this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Ref_supports2/Example

Anthony Cole


On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 2:42 AM, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Regarding "Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically
> discern what a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph." Check
> out the first paragraph and its references here:
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_and_Albert_Museum_Spiral.
>
> Hovering your mouse over each footnote marker (or, depending on your
> MediaWiki preferences, the dotted line under it) will tell you what each
> reference is supporting. The ideal solution would be highlighting the
> supported text on the page, rather than having it appear in a tool tip.
>
> I wish the WMF would organise that - and organise it in a way that screen
> readers can read it.
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 1:57 AM, Magnus Manske <
> magnusman...@googlemail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 4:18 PM Anthony Cole  wrote:
>>
>> > Ah. You mean you're counting all footnote markers (including those at
>> the
>> > end of paragraphs). You're not just counting the number of references at
>> > the bottom of the page. Yes I saw that. But you are missing my point.
>> Many
>> > editors use one footnote marker to support all the sentences in a
>> > paragraph. Many use one footnote marker to support all sentences after
>> the
>> > last footnote marker.
>> >
>> > There are many multi-sentence paragraphs in
>> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer_pain with just one footnote marker
>> > supporting all the sentences. Using your metric, the sentences at the
>> > beginning and middle of those paragraphs would be counted as unsourced
>> > statements.
>> >
>>
>> Yes. Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically discern
>> what
>> a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph. As described, my "one
>> sentence, one statement" metric is a lower bound of statement numbers. So
>> is my  count, then. I am certain you can find an article where my
>> statement-to-reference ratio is off against WIkipedia; but I believe I
>> could find more instances where it is in favour of Wikipedia.
>>
>>
>> >
>> > But, really, who cares? The whole thing is a non-argument. It just
>> doesn't
>> > matter which project is more poorly referenced.
>> >
>>
>> Well, considering the amount you write about it, apparently you care :-)
>>
>> My argument, and I believe I made this reasonably solid, is that one can't
>> "sit on Wikipedia", pointing finders at Wikidata for poor referencing.
>> Which is what Andreas Kolbe implicitly did (amongst other things). That is
>> all.
>>
>> Cheers,
>> Magnus
>>
>>
>> >
>> > Anthony Cole
>> >
>> >
>> > On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 11:59 PM, Anthony Cole 
>> > wrote:
>> >
>> > > Magnus, I've just re-scanned your essay and don't see mention of you
>> only
>> > > counting footnote markers within the paragraphs and not at the end of
>> > > paragraphs.
>> > >
>> > > And why wouldn't you count a footnote marker at the end of a paragraph
>> > if,
>> > > as I've just explained, the sole citation at the end of a paragraph
>> often
>> > > supports all statements in the paragraph?
>> > >
>> > > Why would you assume one sentence only contains one fact?
>> > >
>> > > Choosing a lead sentence as your example - Denny did the same in his
>> > > response to Andreas's critique - is potentially misleading because,
>> > > provided statements are repeated and supported by a reliable source in
>> > the
>> > > body of an article, citations are not expected or required in
>> > en.Wikipedia
>> > > article leads.
>> > >
>> > > Your methodology is flawed; fatally biased toward exaggerating
>> > Wikipedia's
>> > > lack of references. But. I really don't care because I think the
>> > > reliability of Wikipedia and level of referencing in Wikipedia is
>> > > appalling.
>> > >
>> > > Forgive me for mischaracterising your argument as, ""Wikipedia is
>> worse".
>> > > You appear to be saying, "Well, Wikipedia is bad, too." That's true
>> but
>> > > still an invalid argument.
>> > >
>> > > It was someone else who put the "It's a wiki" argument.
>> > >
>> > > Several of your colleagues above have complained that adding
>> references
>> > is
>> > > difficult in Wikidata. And your response is what? "Actually, it is
>> easy
>> > > to add references to Wikidata, certainly not more difficult than
>> adding
>> > > them to Wikipedia." Please listen to people, will you?
>> > >
>> > > You still seem to think the problem with the roll-out of the media
>> viewer
>> > > and visual editor was the stoopid power users.
>> > >
>> > > Anthony Cole
>> > >
>> > >
>> > > On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 10:11 PM, Magnus Manske <
>> > > magnusman...@googlemail.com> wrote:
>> > >
>> > >> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 12:27 PM Anthony Cole 
>> > >> wrote:
>> > >>
>> > >> > Hi Magnus.
>> > >> >
>> > >> > I'm re-reading this thread and just noticed you linked me to an
>> essay
>> > >> [1]
>> > >> > earlie

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Regarding "Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically
discern what a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph." Check
out the first paragraph and its references here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_and_Albert_Museum_Spiral.

Hovering your mouse over each footnote marker (or, depending on your
MediaWiki preferences, the dotted line under it) will tell you what each
reference is supporting. The ideal solution would be highlighting the
supported text on the page, rather than having it appear in a tool tip.

I wish the WMF would organise that - and organise it in a way that screen
readers can read it.

Anthony Cole


On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 1:57 AM, Magnus Manske 
wrote:

> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 4:18 PM Anthony Cole  wrote:
>
> > Ah. You mean you're counting all footnote markers (including those at the
> > end of paragraphs). You're not just counting the number of references at
> > the bottom of the page. Yes I saw that. But you are missing my point.
> Many
> > editors use one footnote marker to support all the sentences in a
> > paragraph. Many use one footnote marker to support all sentences after
> the
> > last footnote marker.
> >
> > There are many multi-sentence paragraphs in
> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer_pain with just one footnote marker
> > supporting all the sentences. Using your metric, the sentences at the
> > beginning and middle of those paragraphs would be counted as unsourced
> > statements.
> >
>
> Yes. Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically discern what
> a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph. As described, my "one
> sentence, one statement" metric is a lower bound of statement numbers. So
> is my  count, then. I am certain you can find an article where my
> statement-to-reference ratio is off against WIkipedia; but I believe I
> could find more instances where it is in favour of Wikipedia.
>
>
> >
> > But, really, who cares? The whole thing is a non-argument. It just
> doesn't
> > matter which project is more poorly referenced.
> >
>
> Well, considering the amount you write about it, apparently you care :-)
>
> My argument, and I believe I made this reasonably solid, is that one can't
> "sit on Wikipedia", pointing finders at Wikidata for poor referencing.
> Which is what Andreas Kolbe implicitly did (amongst other things). That is
> all.
>
> Cheers,
> Magnus
>
>
> >
> > Anthony Cole
> >
> >
> > On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 11:59 PM, Anthony Cole 
> > wrote:
> >
> > > Magnus, I've just re-scanned your essay and don't see mention of you
> only
> > > counting footnote markers within the paragraphs and not at the end of
> > > paragraphs.
> > >
> > > And why wouldn't you count a footnote marker at the end of a paragraph
> > if,
> > > as I've just explained, the sole citation at the end of a paragraph
> often
> > > supports all statements in the paragraph?
> > >
> > > Why would you assume one sentence only contains one fact?
> > >
> > > Choosing a lead sentence as your example - Denny did the same in his
> > > response to Andreas's critique - is potentially misleading because,
> > > provided statements are repeated and supported by a reliable source in
> > the
> > > body of an article, citations are not expected or required in
> > en.Wikipedia
> > > article leads.
> > >
> > > Your methodology is flawed; fatally biased toward exaggerating
> > Wikipedia's
> > > lack of references. But. I really don't care because I think the
> > > reliability of Wikipedia and level of referencing in Wikipedia is
> > > appalling.
> > >
> > > Forgive me for mischaracterising your argument as, ""Wikipedia is
> worse".
> > > You appear to be saying, "Well, Wikipedia is bad, too." That's true but
> > > still an invalid argument.
> > >
> > > It was someone else who put the "It's a wiki" argument.
> > >
> > > Several of your colleagues above have complained that adding references
> > is
> > > difficult in Wikidata. And your response is what? "Actually, it is easy
> > > to add references to Wikidata, certainly not more difficult than adding
> > > them to Wikipedia." Please listen to people, will you?
> > >
> > > You still seem to think the problem with the roll-out of the media
> viewer
> > > and visual editor was the stoopid power users.
> > >
> > > Anthony Cole
> > >
> > >
> > > On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 10:11 PM, Magnus Manske <
> > > magnusman...@googlemail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > >> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 12:27 PM Anthony Cole 
> > >> wrote:
> > >>
> > >> > Hi Magnus.
> > >> >
> > >> > I'm re-reading this thread and just noticed you linked me to an
> essay
> > >> [1]
> > >> > earlier. I'm sorry, I didn't realise at the time that you were
> > >> addressing
> > >> > me.
> > >> >
> > >> > Comments have closed there, so I'll post my thoughts here. You
> > describe
> > >> a
> > >> > formula for measuring how well Wikipedia is supported by reliable
> > >> sources.
> > >> > Basically, correct me if this is wrong, you presume that each
> sentence
> > >> > contains on

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-03-12 Thread Magnus Manske

On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 4:18 PM Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Ah. You mean you're counting all footnote markers (including those at the
> end of paragraphs). You're not just counting the number of references at
> the bottom of the page. Yes I saw that. But you are missing my point. Many
> editors use one footnote marker to support all the sentences in a
> paragraph. Many use one footnote marker to support all sentences after the
> last footnote marker.
>
> There are many multi-sentence paragraphs in
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer_pain with just one footnote marker
> supporting all the sentences. Using your metric, the sentences at the
> beginning and middle of those paragraphs would be counted as unsourced
> statements.
>

Yes. Unless I missed it, there is no good way to automatically discern what
a  refers to - a word, a sentence, a paragraph. As described, my "one
sentence, one statement" metric is a lower bound of statement numbers. So
is my  count, then. I am certain you can find an article where my
statement-to-reference ratio is off against WIkipedia; but I believe I
could find more instances where it is in favour of Wikipedia.


>
> But, really, who cares? The whole thing is a non-argument. It just doesn't
> matter which project is more poorly referenced.
>

Well, considering the amount you write about it, apparently you care :-)

My argument, and I believe I made this reasonably solid, is that one can't
"sit on Wikipedia", pointing finders at Wikidata for poor referencing.
Which is what Andreas Kolbe implicitly did (amongst other things). That is
all.

Cheers,
Magnus


>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 11:59 PM, Anthony Cole 
> wrote:
>
> > Magnus, I've just re-scanned your essay and don't see mention of you only
> > counting footnote markers within the paragraphs and not at the end of
> > paragraphs.
> >
> > And why wouldn't you count a footnote marker at the end of a paragraph
> if,
> > as I've just explained, the sole citation at the end of a paragraph often
> > supports all statements in the paragraph?
> >
> > Why would you assume one sentence only contains one fact?
> >
> > Choosing a lead sentence as your example - Denny did the same in his
> > response to Andreas's critique - is potentially misleading because,
> > provided statements are repeated and supported by a reliable source in
> the
> > body of an article, citations are not expected or required in
> en.Wikipedia
> > article leads.
> >
> > Your methodology is flawed; fatally biased toward exaggerating
> Wikipedia's
> > lack of references. But. I really don't care because I think the
> > reliability of Wikipedia and level of referencing in Wikipedia is
> > appalling.
> >
> > Forgive me for mischaracterising your argument as, ""Wikipedia is worse".
> > You appear to be saying, "Well, Wikipedia is bad, too." That's true but
> > still an invalid argument.
> >
> > It was someone else who put the "It's a wiki" argument.
> >
> > Several of your colleagues above have complained that adding references
> is
> > difficult in Wikidata. And your response is what? "Actually, it is easy
> > to add references to Wikidata, certainly not more difficult than adding
> > them to Wikipedia." Please listen to people, will you?
> >
> > You still seem to think the problem with the roll-out of the media viewer
> > and visual editor was the stoopid power users.
> >
> > Anthony Cole
> >
> >
> > On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 10:11 PM, Magnus Manske <
> > magnusman...@googlemail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 12:27 PM Anthony Cole 
> >> wrote:
> >>
> >> > Hi Magnus.
> >> >
> >> > I'm re-reading this thread and just noticed you linked me to an essay
> >> [1]
> >> > earlier. I'm sorry, I didn't realise at the time that you were
> >> addressing
> >> > me.
> >> >
> >> > Comments have closed there, so I'll post my thoughts here. You
> describe
> >> a
> >> > formula for measuring how well Wikipedia is supported by reliable
> >> sources.
> >> > Basically, correct me if this is wrong, you presume that each sentence
> >> > contains one statement of fact and compare the number of sentences
> with
> >> the
> >> > number of footnote markers. That ratio is what you call the references
> >> per
> >> > statement (RPS) ratio. You have another formula for arriving at the
> RPS
> >> > ratio for Wikidata statements. You then compare the RPS ratios of
> >> > en.Wikipedia featured articles with the RPS ratios of their associated
> >> > Wikidata items. And drew conclusions from that latter comparison.
> >> >
> >>
> >> Correct.
> >>
> >> >
> >> > Many of the Wikipedia articles I write have a low RPS ratio because
> >> whole
> >> > paragraphs are supported by one reference, whose footnote marker
> appears
> >> > only once at the end of the paragraph.
> >> >
> >>
> >> Which is why I am counting reference markers within the paragraphs, not
> >> references at the end. Every  is sacred ;-)
> >>
> >> Actually, I think my statement count for entire Wikipedia articles is
>

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Ah. You mean you're counting all footnote markers (including those at the
end of paragraphs). You're not just counting the number of references at
the bottom of the page. Yes I saw that. But you are missing my point. Many
editors use one footnote marker to support all the sentences in a
paragraph. Many use one footnote marker to support all sentences after the
last footnote marker.

There are many multi-sentence paragraphs in
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer_pain with just one footnote marker
supporting all the sentences. Using your metric, the sentences at the
beginning and middle of those paragraphs would be counted as unsourced
statements.

But, really, who cares? The whole thing is a non-argument. It just doesn't
matter which project is more poorly referenced.

Anthony Cole


On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 11:59 PM, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Magnus, I've just re-scanned your essay and don't see mention of you only
> counting footnote markers within the paragraphs and not at the end of
> paragraphs.
>
> And why wouldn't you count a footnote marker at the end of a paragraph if,
> as I've just explained, the sole citation at the end of a paragraph often
> supports all statements in the paragraph?
>
> Why would you assume one sentence only contains one fact?
>
> Choosing a lead sentence as your example - Denny did the same in his
> response to Andreas's critique - is potentially misleading because,
> provided statements are repeated and supported by a reliable source in the
> body of an article, citations are not expected or required in en.Wikipedia
> article leads.
>
> Your methodology is flawed; fatally biased toward exaggerating Wikipedia's
> lack of references. But. I really don't care because I think the
> reliability of Wikipedia and level of referencing in Wikipedia is
> appalling.
>
> Forgive me for mischaracterising your argument as, ""Wikipedia is worse".
> You appear to be saying, "Well, Wikipedia is bad, too." That's true but
> still an invalid argument.
>
> It was someone else who put the "It's a wiki" argument.
>
> Several of your colleagues above have complained that adding references is
> difficult in Wikidata. And your response is what? "Actually, it is easy
> to add references to Wikidata, certainly not more difficult than adding
> them to Wikipedia." Please listen to people, will you?
>
> You still seem to think the problem with the roll-out of the media viewer
> and visual editor was the stoopid power users.
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 10:11 PM, Magnus Manske <
> magnusman...@googlemail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 12:27 PM Anthony Cole 
>> wrote:
>>
>> > Hi Magnus.
>> >
>> > I'm re-reading this thread and just noticed you linked me to an essay
>> [1]
>> > earlier. I'm sorry, I didn't realise at the time that you were
>> addressing
>> > me.
>> >
>> > Comments have closed there, so I'll post my thoughts here. You describe
>> a
>> > formula for measuring how well Wikipedia is supported by reliable
>> sources.
>> > Basically, correct me if this is wrong, you presume that each sentence
>> > contains one statement of fact and compare the number of sentences with
>> the
>> > number of footnote markers. That ratio is what you call the references
>> per
>> > statement (RPS) ratio. You have another formula for arriving at the RPS
>> > ratio for Wikidata statements. You then compare the RPS ratios of
>> > en.Wikipedia featured articles with the RPS ratios of their associated
>> > Wikidata items. And drew conclusions from that latter comparison.
>> >
>>
>> Correct.
>>
>> >
>> > Many of the Wikipedia articles I write have a low RPS ratio because
>> whole
>> > paragraphs are supported by one reference, whose footnote marker appears
>> > only once at the end of the paragraph.
>> >
>>
>> Which is why I am counting reference markers within the paragraphs, not
>> references at the end. Every  is sacred ;-)
>>
>> Actually, I think my statement count for entire Wikipedia articles is low
>> (and thus, favourable to Wikipedia). Take jsut the first sentence at
>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Adams
>> This sentence alone contains nine statements (first names, last name,
>> birth
>> date, death date, nationality, the fact he's human, and three
>> occupations).
>> But I would only count that as one statement, as it is one sentence. This
>> reduces the number of statements I count in the article, but the number of
>> references (btw, only one in the entire lead section) remains constant,
>> thus pushing the RPS ratio in favour of Wikipedia.
>>
>> >
>> > But, really, it doesn't matter. The arguments that "it's a wiki it
>> should
>> > be unreliable", or "Wikipedia is worse" are not really very valid
>> > arguments.
>> >
>>
>> I agree. Which is why I never made such arguments. Please don't put them
>> in
>> my mouth; I don't know you well enough for that.
>>
>>
>> >
>> > The sound argument coming from above is the cry from Gerrard and others
>> > that it is hideously difficult to

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Magnus, I've just re-scanned your essay and don't see mention of you only
counting footnote markers within the paragraphs and not at the end of
paragraphs.

And why wouldn't you count a footnote marker at the end of a paragraph if,
as I've just explained, the sole citation at the end of a paragraph often
supports all statements in the paragraph?

Why would you assume one sentence only contains one fact?

Choosing a lead sentence as your example - Denny did the same in his
response to Andreas's critique - is potentially misleading because,
provided statements are repeated and supported by a reliable source in the
body of an article, citations are not expected or required in en.Wikipedia
article leads.

Your methodology is flawed; fatally biased toward exaggerating Wikipedia's
lack of references. But. I really don't care because I think the
reliability of Wikipedia and level of referencing in Wikipedia is
appalling.

Forgive me for mischaracterising your argument as, ""Wikipedia is worse".
You appear to be saying, "Well, Wikipedia is bad, too." That's true but
still an invalid argument.

It was someone else who put the "It's a wiki" argument.

Several of your colleagues above have complained that adding references is
difficult in Wikidata. And your response is what? "Actually, it is easy to
add references to Wikidata, certainly not more difficult than adding them
to Wikipedia." Please listen to people, will you?

You still seem to think the problem with the roll-out of the media viewer
and visual editor was the stoopid power users.

Anthony Cole

On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 10:11 PM, Magnus Manske  wrote:

> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 12:27 PM Anthony Cole  wrote:
>
> > Hi Magnus.
> >
> > I'm re-reading this thread and just noticed you linked me to an essay [1]
> > earlier. I'm sorry, I didn't realise at the time that you were addressing
> > me.
> >
> > Comments have closed there, so I'll post my thoughts here. You describe a
> > formula for measuring how well Wikipedia is supported by reliable
> sources.
> > Basically, correct me if this is wrong, you presume that each sentence
> > contains one statement of fact and compare the number of sentences with
> the
> > number of footnote markers. That ratio is what you call the references
> per
> > statement (RPS) ratio. You have another formula for arriving at the RPS
> > ratio for Wikidata statements. You then compare the RPS ratios of
> > en.Wikipedia featured articles with the RPS ratios of their associated
> > Wikidata items. And drew conclusions from that latter comparison.
> >
>
> Correct.
>
> >
> > Many of the Wikipedia articles I write have a low RPS ratio because whole
> > paragraphs are supported by one reference, whose footnote marker appears
> > only once at the end of the paragraph.
> >
>
> Which is why I am counting reference markers within the paragraphs, not
> references at the end. Every  is sacred ;-)
>
> Actually, I think my statement count for entire Wikipedia articles is low
> (and thus, favourable to Wikipedia). Take jsut the first sentence at
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Adams
> This sentence alone contains nine statements (first names, last name, birth
> date, death date, nationality, the fact he's human, and three occupations).
> But I would only count that as one statement, as it is one sentence. This
> reduces the number of statements I count in the article, but the number of
> references (btw, only one in the entire lead section) remains constant,
> thus pushing the RPS ratio in favour of Wikipedia.
>
> >
> > But, really, it doesn't matter. The arguments that "it's a wiki it should
> > be unreliable", or "Wikipedia is worse" are not really very valid
> > arguments.
> >
>
> I agree. Which is why I never made such arguments. Please don't put them in
> my mouth; I don't know you well enough for that.
>
>
> >
> > The sound argument coming from above is the cry from Gerrard and others
> > that it is hideously difficult to add citations to Wikidata sources. If
> > that is so, you should fix that.
> >
>
> Actually, it is easy to add references to Wikidata, certainly not more
> difficult than adding them to Wikipedia. I have written bots and
> drag'n'drop scripts to make it even easier. It is a little fiiddly to add
> book references, but still reasoably possible.
> What /is/ difficult is to do this automatically, by bot. But pick a random
> Wikidata entry, and with a little googling, many statements can be
> referenced to URLs. But this takes time.
> Which brings me back to my blog post: Even after ~3 years, Wikidata is
> referenced not too badly, compared to Wikipedia. And if we have learned one
> thing from Wikipedia, it is that the state in general, and references in
> particular, will improve over time.
> So to everyone who disses Wikidata because of "missing references", I say:
> 1. You're wrong (it's already OK)
> 2. Patience (it will get even better)
>
> Cheers,
> Magnus
>
>
> >
> >
> >
> > 1. http://magnusmanske.de/wordpress/?p=3

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-03-12 Thread Magnus Manske

On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 12:27 PM Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Hi Magnus.
>
> I'm re-reading this thread and just noticed you linked me to an essay [1]
> earlier. I'm sorry, I didn't realise at the time that you were addressing
> me.
>
> Comments have closed there, so I'll post my thoughts here. You describe a
> formula for measuring how well Wikipedia is supported by reliable sources.
> Basically, correct me if this is wrong, you presume that each sentence
> contains one statement of fact and compare the number of sentences with the
> number of footnote markers. That ratio is what you call the references per
> statement (RPS) ratio. You have another formula for arriving at the RPS
> ratio for Wikidata statements. You then compare the RPS ratios of
> en.Wikipedia featured articles with the RPS ratios of their associated
> Wikidata items. And drew conclusions from that latter comparison.
>

Correct.

>
> Many of the Wikipedia articles I write have a low RPS ratio because whole
> paragraphs are supported by one reference, whose footnote marker appears
> only once at the end of the paragraph.
>

Which is why I am counting reference markers within the paragraphs, not
references at the end. Every  is sacred ;-)

Actually, I think my statement count for entire Wikipedia articles is low
(and thus, favourable to Wikipedia). Take jsut the first sentence at
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Adams
This sentence alone contains nine statements (first names, last name, birth
date, death date, nationality, the fact he's human, and three occupations).
But I would only count that as one statement, as it is one sentence. This
reduces the number of statements I count in the article, but the number of
references (btw, only one in the entire lead section) remains constant,
thus pushing the RPS ratio in favour of Wikipedia.

>
> But, really, it doesn't matter. The arguments that "it's a wiki it should
> be unreliable", or "Wikipedia is worse" are not really very valid
> arguments.
>

I agree. Which is why I never made such arguments. Please don't put them in
my mouth; I don't know you well enough for that.

>
> The sound argument coming from above is the cry from Gerrard and others
> that it is hideously difficult to add citations to Wikidata sources. If
> that is so, you should fix that.
>

Actually, it is easy to add references to Wikidata, certainly not more
difficult than adding them to Wikipedia. I have written bots and
drag'n'drop scripts to make it even easier. It is a little fiiddly to add
book references, but still reasoably possible.
What /is/ difficult is to do this automatically, by bot. But pick a random
Wikidata entry, and with a little googling, many statements can be
referenced to URLs. But this takes time.
Which brings me back to my blog post: Even after ~3 years, Wikidata is
referenced not too badly, compared to Wikipedia. And if we have learned one
thing from Wikipedia, it is that the state in general, and references in
particular, will improve over time.
So to everyone who disses Wikidata because of "missing references", I say:
1. You're wrong (it's already OK)
2. Patience (it will get even better)

Cheers,
Magnus

>
>
>
> 1. http://magnusmanske.de/wordpress/?p=378
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 4:37 PM, Andre Engels 
> wrote:
>
> > The issue is that you are framing all objections to be of the "it's
> > new, so it's bad" crowd. I'm not even convinced that such a crowd
> > exists, let alone that it is the mainstream of community is behind it,
> > as you seem to imply. To be honest, as a member of the community who
> > had a negative opinion about the first released version of visual
> > editor, I feel personally insulted by your statements. Which I had to
> > be, because I know you have done many good things.
> >
> > And how would you want to "come together and fix it"? Your average
> > Wikipedia/other project editor does not have the software engineering
> > skills to just go and repair the Mediawiki code, and even if they did,
> > they would not have the power to make their repairs go life in short
> > term (and before I'm misunderstood, I am not complaining about that,
> > it is entirely logical and doing it differently would probably cause
> > disasters). They can of course complain, and file bug reports
> > etcetera, but they have no idea what will happen with them.
> >
> > I think a big part of the blame lies with Wikimedia's way of working
> > in this, at least that's what I see in the Imageviewer case. People
> > see issues, and want them resolved. But some of those issues are so
> > large that they do not want the product at all *until they are
> > resolved*. By not only using the user as a beta tester, but also
> > forcing the product on them in the period between the discovery of the
> > issues/bugs and the time they are resolved, Wikimedia in my opinion is
> > instrumental in turning the objections against specific issues into
> > resistance against the product as a whole.
> >
> >

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Gnangarra,

I was away when Andy was here, and am really regretting missing his
presentation. Can you explain to me why the Wikidata people have to make a
wikidata item of every source before they can cite it?

Anthony Cole


On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 8:29 PM, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Sorry, there's a typo in that last paragraph. It should read:
>
> The sound argument coming from above is the cry from Gerrard and others
> that it is hideously difficult to add citations to Wikidata *statements*.
> If that is so, you should fix that.
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 8:27 PM, Anthony Cole  wrote:
>
>> Hi Magnus.
>>
>> I'm re-reading this thread and just noticed you linked me to an essay [1]
>> earlier. I'm sorry, I didn't realise at the time that you were addressing
>> me.
>>
>> Comments have closed there, so I'll post my thoughts here. You describe a
>> formula for measuring how well Wikipedia is supported by reliable sources.
>> Basically, correct me if this is wrong, you presume that each sentence
>> contains one statement of fact and compare the number of sentences with the
>> number of footnote markers. That ratio is what you call the references per
>> statement (RPS) ratio. You have another formula for arriving at the RPS
>> ratio for Wikidata statements. You then compare the RPS ratios of
>> en.Wikipedia featured articles with the RPS ratios of their associated
>> Wikidata items. And drew conclusions from that latter comparison.
>>
>> Many of the Wikipedia articles I write have a low RPS ratio because whole
>> paragraphs are supported by one reference, whose footnote marker appears
>> only once at the end of the paragraph.
>>
>> But, really, it doesn't matter. The arguments that "it's a wiki it should
>> be unreliable", or "Wikipedia is worse" are not really very valid
>> arguments.
>>
>> The sound argument coming from above is the cry from Gerrard and others
>> that it is hideously difficult to add citations to Wikidata sources. If
>> that is so, you should fix that.
>>
>>
>>
>> 1. http://magnusmanske.de/wordpress/?p=378
>>
>> Anthony Cole
>>
>>
>> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 4:37 PM, Andre Engels 
>> wrote:
>>
>>> The issue is that you are framing all objections to be of the "it's
>>> new, so it's bad" crowd. I'm not even convinced that such a crowd
>>> exists, let alone that it is the mainstream of community is behind it,
>>> as you seem to imply. To be honest, as a member of the community who
>>> had a negative opinion about the first released version of visual
>>> editor, I feel personally insulted by your statements. Which I had to
>>> be, because I know you have done many good things.
>>>
>>> And how would you want to "come together and fix it"? Your average
>>> Wikipedia/other project editor does not have the software engineering
>>> skills to just go and repair the Mediawiki code, and even if they did,
>>> they would not have the power to make their repairs go life in short
>>> term (and before I'm misunderstood, I am not complaining about that,
>>> it is entirely logical and doing it differently would probably cause
>>> disasters). They can of course complain, and file bug reports
>>> etcetera, but they have no idea what will happen with them.
>>>
>>> I think a big part of the blame lies with Wikimedia's way of working
>>> in this, at least that's what I see in the Imageviewer case. People
>>> see issues, and want them resolved. But some of those issues are so
>>> large that they do not want the product at all *until they are
>>> resolved*. By not only using the user as a beta tester, but also
>>> forcing the product on them in the period between the discovery of the
>>> issues/bugs and the time they are resolved, Wikimedia in my opinion is
>>> instrumental in turning the objections against specific issues into
>>> resistance against the product as a whole.
>>>
>>>
>>> On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 3:56 PM, Magnus Manske
>>>  wrote:
>>> > Anthony, it does seem you've missed some of which I wrote in this
>>> thread. I
>>> > have no problem with specific criticism where it is deserved, and I do
>>> well
>>> > remember that the Visual Editor, in its early incarnation, was not
>>> quite up
>>> > to the job.
>>> >
>>> > What I do have a problem with is people fixating on some technical or
>>> > early-lifecycle issues, declaring the entire thing worthless, even
>>> > dangerous, and spreading that view around. This behaviour, I have seen
>>> time
>>> > and again, with the Media Viewer, with Wikidata.
>>> >
>>> > It's bad because it's broken - let's come together and fix it.
>>> >
>>> > It's bad because ... well, everyone says it's bad. And new. And Not
>>> Made
>>> > Here. THAT is a problem, and not a technological one.
>>> >
>>> > On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 2:39 PM Anthony Cole 
>>> wrote:
>>> >
>>> >> Magnus, you've missed the point of the visual editor revolt. A couple
>>> of
>>> >> people here have tried to explain that to you, politely. And you're
>>> >> persisting with your idée fixe.
>>> >>
>>>

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Sorry, there's a typo in that last paragraph. It should read:

The sound argument coming from above is the cry from Gerrard and others
that it is hideously difficult to add citations to Wikidata *statements*.
If that is so, you should fix that.

Anthony Cole


On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 8:27 PM, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Hi Magnus.
>
> I'm re-reading this thread and just noticed you linked me to an essay [1]
> earlier. I'm sorry, I didn't realise at the time that you were addressing
> me.
>
> Comments have closed there, so I'll post my thoughts here. You describe a
> formula for measuring how well Wikipedia is supported by reliable sources.
> Basically, correct me if this is wrong, you presume that each sentence
> contains one statement of fact and compare the number of sentences with the
> number of footnote markers. That ratio is what you call the references per
> statement (RPS) ratio. You have another formula for arriving at the RPS
> ratio for Wikidata statements. You then compare the RPS ratios of
> en.Wikipedia featured articles with the RPS ratios of their associated
> Wikidata items. And drew conclusions from that latter comparison.
>
> Many of the Wikipedia articles I write have a low RPS ratio because whole
> paragraphs are supported by one reference, whose footnote marker appears
> only once at the end of the paragraph.
>
> But, really, it doesn't matter. The arguments that "it's a wiki it should
> be unreliable", or "Wikipedia is worse" are not really very valid
> arguments.
>
> The sound argument coming from above is the cry from Gerrard and others
> that it is hideously difficult to add citations to Wikidata sources. If
> that is so, you should fix that.
>
>
>
> 1. http://magnusmanske.de/wordpress/?p=378
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 4:37 PM, Andre Engels 
> wrote:
>
>> The issue is that you are framing all objections to be of the "it's
>> new, so it's bad" crowd. I'm not even convinced that such a crowd
>> exists, let alone that it is the mainstream of community is behind it,
>> as you seem to imply. To be honest, as a member of the community who
>> had a negative opinion about the first released version of visual
>> editor, I feel personally insulted by your statements. Which I had to
>> be, because I know you have done many good things.
>>
>> And how would you want to "come together and fix it"? Your average
>> Wikipedia/other project editor does not have the software engineering
>> skills to just go and repair the Mediawiki code, and even if they did,
>> they would not have the power to make their repairs go life in short
>> term (and before I'm misunderstood, I am not complaining about that,
>> it is entirely logical and doing it differently would probably cause
>> disasters). They can of course complain, and file bug reports
>> etcetera, but they have no idea what will happen with them.
>>
>> I think a big part of the blame lies with Wikimedia's way of working
>> in this, at least that's what I see in the Imageviewer case. People
>> see issues, and want them resolved. But some of those issues are so
>> large that they do not want the product at all *until they are
>> resolved*. By not only using the user as a beta tester, but also
>> forcing the product on them in the period between the discovery of the
>> issues/bugs and the time they are resolved, Wikimedia in my opinion is
>> instrumental in turning the objections against specific issues into
>> resistance against the product as a whole.
>>
>>
>> On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 3:56 PM, Magnus Manske
>>  wrote:
>> > Anthony, it does seem you've missed some of which I wrote in this
>> thread. I
>> > have no problem with specific criticism where it is deserved, and I do
>> well
>> > remember that the Visual Editor, in its early incarnation, was not
>> quite up
>> > to the job.
>> >
>> > What I do have a problem with is people fixating on some technical or
>> > early-lifecycle issues, declaring the entire thing worthless, even
>> > dangerous, and spreading that view around. This behaviour, I have seen
>> time
>> > and again, with the Media Viewer, with Wikidata.
>> >
>> > It's bad because it's broken - let's come together and fix it.
>> >
>> > It's bad because ... well, everyone says it's bad. And new. And Not Made
>> > Here. THAT is a problem, and not a technological one.
>> >
>> > On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 2:39 PM Anthony Cole 
>> wrote:
>> >
>> >> Magnus, you've missed the point of the visual editor revolt. A couple
>> of
>> >> people here have tried to explain that to you, politely. And you're
>> >> persisting with your idée fixe.
>> >>
>> >> There were two parts to the visual editor catastrophe, actually. The
>> >> product wasn't ready for anyone to use. Not veteran editors. Not
>> newbies.
>> >> Newbies who used it were less likely to successfully complete an edit.
>> It
>> >> was broken, and the WMF insisted we had to use it.
>> >>
>> >> The second part of the problem was arrogance. Yes, a few editors were
>> >> unnecessarily

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Hi Magnus.

I'm re-reading this thread and just noticed you linked me to an essay [1]
earlier. I'm sorry, I didn't realise at the time that you were addressing
me.

Comments have closed there, so I'll post my thoughts here. You describe a
formula for measuring how well Wikipedia is supported by reliable sources.
Basically, correct me if this is wrong, you presume that each sentence
contains one statement of fact and compare the number of sentences with the
number of footnote markers. That ratio is what you call the references per
statement (RPS) ratio. You have another formula for arriving at the RPS
ratio for Wikidata statements. You then compare the RPS ratios of
en.Wikipedia featured articles with the RPS ratios of their associated
Wikidata items. And drew conclusions from that latter comparison.

Many of the Wikipedia articles I write have a low RPS ratio because whole
paragraphs are supported by one reference, whose footnote marker appears
only once at the end of the paragraph.

But, really, it doesn't matter. The arguments that "it's a wiki it should
be unreliable", or "Wikipedia is worse" are not really very valid
arguments.

The sound argument coming from above is the cry from Gerrard and others
that it is hideously difficult to add citations to Wikidata sources. If
that is so, you should fix that.



1. http://magnusmanske.de/wordpress/?p=378

Anthony Cole


On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 4:37 PM, Andre Engels  wrote:

> The issue is that you are framing all objections to be of the "it's
> new, so it's bad" crowd. I'm not even convinced that such a crowd
> exists, let alone that it is the mainstream of community is behind it,
> as you seem to imply. To be honest, as a member of the community who
> had a negative opinion about the first released version of visual
> editor, I feel personally insulted by your statements. Which I had to
> be, because I know you have done many good things.
>
> And how would you want to "come together and fix it"? Your average
> Wikipedia/other project editor does not have the software engineering
> skills to just go and repair the Mediawiki code, and even if they did,
> they would not have the power to make their repairs go life in short
> term (and before I'm misunderstood, I am not complaining about that,
> it is entirely logical and doing it differently would probably cause
> disasters). They can of course complain, and file bug reports
> etcetera, but they have no idea what will happen with them.
>
> I think a big part of the blame lies with Wikimedia's way of working
> in this, at least that's what I see in the Imageviewer case. People
> see issues, and want them resolved. But some of those issues are so
> large that they do not want the product at all *until they are
> resolved*. By not only using the user as a beta tester, but also
> forcing the product on them in the period between the discovery of the
> issues/bugs and the time they are resolved, Wikimedia in my opinion is
> instrumental in turning the objections against specific issues into
> resistance against the product as a whole.
>
>
> On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 3:56 PM, Magnus Manske
>  wrote:
> > Anthony, it does seem you've missed some of which I wrote in this
> thread. I
> > have no problem with specific criticism where it is deserved, and I do
> well
> > remember that the Visual Editor, in its early incarnation, was not quite
> up
> > to the job.
> >
> > What I do have a problem with is people fixating on some technical or
> > early-lifecycle issues, declaring the entire thing worthless, even
> > dangerous, and spreading that view around. This behaviour, I have seen
> time
> > and again, with the Media Viewer, with Wikidata.
> >
> > It's bad because it's broken - let's come together and fix it.
> >
> > It's bad because ... well, everyone says it's bad. And new. And Not Made
> > Here. THAT is a problem, and not a technological one.
> >
> > On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 2:39 PM Anthony Cole 
> wrote:
> >
> >> Magnus, you've missed the point of the visual editor revolt. A couple of
> >> people here have tried to explain that to you, politely. And you're
> >> persisting with your idée fixe.
> >>
> >> There were two parts to the visual editor catastrophe, actually. The
> >> product wasn't ready for anyone to use. Not veteran editors. Not
> newbies.
> >> Newbies who used it were less likely to successfully complete an edit.
> It
> >> was broken, and the WMF insisted we had to use it.
> >>
> >> The second part of the problem was arrogance. Yes, a few editors were
> >> unnecessarily rude about the product and the developers. But then most
> of
> >> the developers and tech staff who dealt with the community arrogantly
> >> characterised *anyone* who complained about the product as an ignorant,
> >> selfish Ludite - and you're persisting with that characterisation now.
> >>
> >> The WMF under Lila has learned the lessons from that, and they have
> >> fostered a much healthier relationship between the developers and the
> >>

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-03-12 Thread Andre Engels

The issue is that you are framing all objections to be of the "it's
new, so it's bad" crowd. I'm not even convinced that such a crowd
exists, let alone that it is the mainstream of community is behind it,
as you seem to imply. To be honest, as a member of the community who
had a negative opinion about the first released version of visual
editor, I feel personally insulted by your statements. Which I had to
be, because I know you have done many good things.

And how would you want to "come together and fix it"? Your average
Wikipedia/other project editor does not have the software engineering
skills to just go and repair the Mediawiki code, and even if they did,
they would not have the power to make their repairs go life in short
term (and before I'm misunderstood, I am not complaining about that,
it is entirely logical and doing it differently would probably cause
disasters). They can of course complain, and file bug reports
etcetera, but they have no idea what will happen with them.

I think a big part of the blame lies with Wikimedia's way of working
in this, at least that's what I see in the Imageviewer case. People
see issues, and want them resolved. But some of those issues are so
large that they do not want the product at all *until they are
resolved*. By not only using the user as a beta tester, but also
forcing the product on them in the period between the discovery of the
issues/bugs and the time they are resolved, Wikimedia in my opinion is
instrumental in turning the objections against specific issues into
resistance against the product as a whole.

On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 3:56 PM, Magnus Manske
 wrote:
> Anthony, it does seem you've missed some of which I wrote in this thread. I
> have no problem with specific criticism where it is deserved, and I do well
> remember that the Visual Editor, in its early incarnation, was not quite up
> to the job.
>
> What I do have a problem with is people fixating on some technical or
> early-lifecycle issues, declaring the entire thing worthless, even
> dangerous, and spreading that view around. This behaviour, I have seen time
> and again, with the Media Viewer, with Wikidata.
>
> It's bad because it's broken - let's come together and fix it.
>
> It's bad because ... well, everyone says it's bad. And new. And Not Made
> Here. THAT is a problem, and not a technological one.
>
> On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 2:39 PM Anthony Cole  wrote:
>
>> Magnus, you've missed the point of the visual editor revolt. A couple of
>> people here have tried to explain that to you, politely. And you're
>> persisting with your idée fixe.
>>
>> There were two parts to the visual editor catastrophe, actually. The
>> product wasn't ready for anyone to use. Not veteran editors. Not newbies.
>> Newbies who used it were less likely to successfully complete an edit. It
>> was broken, and the WMF insisted we had to use it.
>>
>> The second part of the problem was arrogance. Yes, a few editors were
>> unnecessarily rude about the product and the developers. But then most of
>> the developers and tech staff who dealt with the community arrogantly
>> characterised *anyone* who complained about the product as an ignorant,
>> selfish Ludite - and you're persisting with that characterisation now.
>>
>> The WMF under Lila has learned the lessons from that, and they have
>> fostered a much healthier relationship between the developers and the
>> community. You clearly haven't learned all you might have.
>>
>> In fact, reading the arrogant responses from you here and in the concurrent
>> thread titled "How to disseminate free knowledge," and from Denny in
>> earlier threads addressing criticism of WikiData, it seems to me there is
>> still a significant arrogance problem that needs addressing, at least over
>> at WikiData.
>>
>> Some people may approach you arrogantly, maybe even insultingly, about an
>> innovation, and I suppose you might be justified in talking down to them or
>> ridiculing them (though I advise against it.). But if you can't distinguish
>> them from those who approach you with genuine concerns and well-founded
>> criticisms, then no matter how clever you think your technical solutions
>> are, you will soon find you're no more welcome here than those WMF staffers
>> who thought insulting well-meaning critics was a good career move.
>>
>> Denny's contemptuous dismissal of valid criticisms of his project, and your
>> contemptuous dismissal of the valid criticisms of the early visual editor
>> and its launch are both very disappointing.
>>
>> Anthony Cole
>>
>>
>> On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 7:24 AM, Magnus Manske <
>> magnusman...@googlemail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>> > The iPhone was a commercial success because it let you do the basic
>> > functions easily and intuitively, and looked shiny at the same time. We
>> do
>> > not charge a price; our "win" comes by people using our product. If we
>> can
>> > present the product in such a way that more people use it, it is a
>> success
>> > for us.
>>

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-03-11 Thread David Cuenca Tudela

Andreas,

Of course it is a Wikipedia-centric analysis, because citing the article
you provide (bold in the original):
*Wikidata presents Wikipedia as structured data*
Wikidata does not exist in isolation. In symbiosis with existing projects
it acts as a catalyst, or at least that is one of the goals.

I am aware of the risks of the CC0 license reuse, and of the possible
"garbage dump" effect, but so far the process of data import/correlation
has been highly human supervised, with initiatives like the Wikidata game:
https://tools.wmflabs.org/wikidata-game/#
or Mix'n'match: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mix'n'match
There is also a process for approving data imports, it is not such a wild
place...

So far it is unclear how the relationship with external consumers will
evolve, maybe it is a new opportunity for them to participate in the data
curation process, either directly or through entirely new feedback loops
that are not possible in the traditional Wikipedia setting. For instance:
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Wikibase_Quality_Extensions

All in all, I find very positive that you bring this issues into public
awareness, it gives a broader perspective of the limits of the platform,
both technical and social. I think there is still a lot to discuss about
it, and it is good to have the conversation rolling.

Cheers,
Micru

On Fri, Mar 11, 2016 at 5:25 PM, Andreas Kolbe  wrote:

> Micru,
>
> That seems a very Wikipedia-centric analysis, as though Wikidata were only
> there to feed Wikipedia. I think most re-users of Wikidata will be
> elsewhere, and indeed be passive consumers and commercial rebranders whose
> audience is unlikely to feed back into Wikidata.
>
> The following article in The Register, which resulted from a conversation
> with Andy Mabbett, explains this quite well:
>
>
> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/02/25/wikidata_turns_the_world_into_a_database/
>
>
> There was also another media story last week, about a project by Dutch firm
> Lab1100 (complete with some sceptical comments about data quality). It's a
> Wikidata-based map of historical military battles fought across the world:
>
>
> http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/12180516/Geography-of-violence-Map-records-every-battle-ever-fought.html
> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-35685889
>
> So the commercial potential is huge.
>
> I'm not blind to the argument that use will lead to correction, but it has
> to be balanced against the risks of "garbage in, garbage out", given the
> huge amount of data that will eventually accumulate and need to be curated
> by volunteers, and bearing in mind that the CC-0 licence has the potential
> of obscuring the origin of the data, cutting the very feedback loop your
> argument relies on for a substantial subset of end users.
>
> Andreas
>
> On Fri, Mar 11, 2016 at 1:57 PM, David Cuenca Tudela 
> wrote:
>
> > On Fri, Mar 11, 2016 at 12:41 PM, Andreas Kolbe 
> > wrote:
> >
> > > Wikidata and Wikipedia have very different purposes: Wikipedia is an
> > > encyclopedia to be read; Wikidata is a database. No one reads a
> database.
> > > The whole purpose of a database is to have its content multiplied and
> > > surfaced elsewhere. Therefore it is even more essential that its
> content
> > > stand on solid ground.
> > >
> >
> > I disagree with that. In my opinion Wikipedia and Wikidata do not have
> > different purposes, they complement each other.
> > In an ideal world all the data present in Wikidata should surface in
> > Wikipedia, and be referenced from there.
> > However it is expected that the data comes already referenced at
> > *statement* level from Wikidata, when Wikipedia doesn't comply with those
> > standards either. This assumes that the Wikidata community is a generator
> > of perfectly referenced facts and that the Wikipedia communities are mere
> > consumers of data. This is a toxic view because it goes against the core
> > principle of wikis as a tool for taking ownership of the means of
> knowledge
> > aggregation and distribution.
> >
> > It has to be noted too, that in Wikidata many items have external
> > identifiers, references, and sources, and they apply to the whole
> > information contained, not just one single statement, that is something
> > that should be taken into account when speaking about reliability.
> >
> > Besides this discussion is trite. Quality comes from use, research and
> > oversight, and without tools for working with wikidata from wikipedia,
> like
> > connected infoboxes, there is no point in discussing about data quality,
> > because as you said "no one reads a database"... except for a few people
> > like me I guess :)
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Micru
> >
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-03-11 Thread Andreas Kolbe

Micru,

That seems a very Wikipedia-centric analysis, as though Wikidata were only
there to feed Wikipedia. I think most re-users of Wikidata will be
elsewhere, and indeed be passive consumers and commercial rebranders whose
audience is unlikely to feed back into Wikidata.

The following article in The Register, which resulted from a conversation
with Andy Mabbett, explains this quite well:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/02/25/wikidata_turns_the_world_into_a_database/

There was also another media story last week, about a project by Dutch firm
Lab1100 (complete with some sceptical comments about data quality). It's a
Wikidata-based map of historical military battles fought across the world:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/12180516/Geography-of-violence-Map-records-every-battle-ever-fought.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-35685889

So the commercial potential is huge.

I'm not blind to the argument that use will lead to correction, but it has
to be balanced against the risks of "garbage in, garbage out", given the
huge amount of data that will eventually accumulate and need to be curated
by volunteers, and bearing in mind that the CC-0 licence has the potential
of obscuring the origin of the data, cutting the very feedback loop your
argument relies on for a substantial subset of end users.

Andreas

On Fri, Mar 11, 2016 at 1:57 PM, David Cuenca Tudela 
wrote:

> On Fri, Mar 11, 2016 at 12:41 PM, Andreas Kolbe 
> wrote:
>
> > Wikidata and Wikipedia have very different purposes: Wikipedia is an
> > encyclopedia to be read; Wikidata is a database. No one reads a database.
> > The whole purpose of a database is to have its content multiplied and
> > surfaced elsewhere. Therefore it is even more essential that its content
> > stand on solid ground.
> >
>
> I disagree with that. In my opinion Wikipedia and Wikidata do not have
> different purposes, they complement each other.
> In an ideal world all the data present in Wikidata should surface in
> Wikipedia, and be referenced from there.
> However it is expected that the data comes already referenced at
> *statement* level from Wikidata, when Wikipedia doesn't comply with those
> standards either. This assumes that the Wikidata community is a generator
> of perfectly referenced facts and that the Wikipedia communities are mere
> consumers of data. This is a toxic view because it goes against the core
> principle of wikis as a tool for taking ownership of the means of knowledge
> aggregation and distribution.
>
> It has to be noted too, that in Wikidata many items have external
> identifiers, references, and sources, and they apply to the whole
> information contained, not just one single statement, that is something
> that should be taken into account when speaking about reliability.
>
> Besides this discussion is trite. Quality comes from use, research and
> oversight, and without tools for working with wikidata from wikipedia, like
> connected infoboxes, there is no point in discussing about data quality,
> because as you said "no one reads a database"... except for a few people
> like me I guess :)
>
> Cheers,
> Micru
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-03-11 Thread David Cuenca Tudela

On Fri, Mar 11, 2016 at 12:41 PM, Andreas Kolbe  wrote:

> Wikidata and Wikipedia have very different purposes: Wikipedia is an
> encyclopedia to be read; Wikidata is a database. No one reads a database.
> The whole purpose of a database is to have its content multiplied and
> surfaced elsewhere. Therefore it is even more essential that its content
> stand on solid ground.
>

I disagree with that. In my opinion Wikipedia and Wikidata do not have
different purposes, they complement each other.
In an ideal world all the data present in Wikidata should surface in
Wikipedia, and be referenced from there.
However it is expected that the data comes already referenced at
*statement* level from Wikidata, when Wikipedia doesn't comply with those
standards either. This assumes that the Wikidata community is a generator
of perfectly referenced facts and that the Wikipedia communities are mere
consumers of data. This is a toxic view because it goes against the core
principle of wikis as a tool for taking ownership of the means of knowledge
aggregation and distribution.

It has to be noted too, that in Wikidata many items have external
identifiers, references, and sources, and they apply to the whole
information contained, not just one single statement, that is something
that should be taken into account when speaking about reliability.

Besides this discussion is trite. Quality comes from use, research and
oversight, and without tools for working with wikidata from wikipedia, like
connected infoboxes, there is no point in discussing about data quality,
because as you said "no one reads a database"... except for a few people
like me I guess :)

Cheers,
Micru
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-03-11 Thread Gnangarra

Why Anthony
On 26 January 2016 at 20:46, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Yes, Aubrey.  It would be way too onerous to expect us to make each
> citation a Wikidata item.


If you use the currently available templates to format your citation then
its possible to extract this information with a bot, the next step is how
to use that to create a wikidata item... nothing onerous in using citation
templates on WP.

as for book older books dont have ISBNs, and some books are individually
notable yet assuming they have an ISBN they share that with the 1,000's of
of identical books that arent notable.

So many of my concerns and issues over WikiData were cleared up by Andy
Mabbett when he toured Australia last month, maybe WikiData/WMF could get
Andy on the road and talking to more communities it'd resolved many of the
underlying issues that are clogging up the system through misunderstanding
or false expectations




On 26 January 2016 at 20:46, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Yes, Aubrey.  It would be way too onerous to expect us to make each
> citation a Wikidata item.
>
> On Tuesday, 26 January 2016, Andrea Zanni 
> wrote:
>
> > On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 11:58 AM, Anthony Cole  > > wrote:
> >
> > > Most editions of most books published in the last 40 years (certainly
> > books
> > > from reliable publishers) have an ISBN that identifies one edition.
> Most
> > > reliable journal articles these days have a doi. For simple citing of
> web
> > > pages, you could automatically convert bare urls to archived versions
> of
> > > the cited web page.
> > >
> >
> >
> > I do agree with you.
> > But the problem emerges if you want to cite the reference (the book, the
> > article) as an item.
> > There you have to take into account a "book model" in Wikidata, and it's
> > easier said than done. (scientific articles are a bit easier, and Magnus
> is
> > working on them).
> > https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:WikiProject_Source_MetaData
> >
> > Aubrey
> > ___
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>
>
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-03-11 Thread Gerard Meijssen

Hoi,
It is becoming boring. Andreas, quality is not in sources. They are often
horrible. Your notion that only sources are good is off.

It has been argued too often that quality is in much more than only
sources. The argument that Wikidata is immature has been made all
frequently and the point is very much that we need to concentrate our
effort on where effort has the biggest impact.

To improve quality in a meaningful way, sources will not make much of a
difference when adding them is not targeted. The most impact is achieved
when differences between sources are identified and when they are curated.

Andreas, it is irrelevant what others say, I do not care at all. I care
however very much about quality, I blog frequently about it and I am happy
that my understanding evolves. I sincerely hope that you take the time to
consider what is important; dogma or making a qualitative difference in our
projects.
Thanks,
   GerardM

On 11 March 2016 at 12:41, Andreas Kolbe  wrote:

> On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 9:36 AM, Magnus Manske <
> magnusman...@googlemail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > Be careful with that "obvious" word...
> >
> > http://magnusmanske.de/wordpress/?p=378
>
>
>
> Hi Magnus,
>
> Things have been busy of late, and I never had time to properly respond to
> this blog post of yours. (For anyone else who has forgotten, this was the
> discussion about vast swathes of Wikidata lacking reliable references, as
> discussed in [1].)
>
> You say, "the impression I get from Andreas’ text is that, while Wikipedia
> has some issues, references are basically OK, whereas they are essentially
> non-existent in Wikidata." In your piece, you then go on to compare the
> referencing density of Wikidata content to that of Wikipedia content,
> finding that Wikidata, even now, doesn't do at all badly compared to
> Wikipedia.
>
> You present it as a sort of sibling rivalry: if Wikipedia doesn't do any
> better herself, why does she complain about her sister Wikidata? I recall
> Denny and Gerard making similar arguments.
>
> In doing so, you miss the core point of the criticism. My point is that
> Wikipedia's *referencing standards are okay*, and that *those* are what
> Wikidata should be assessed against.
>
> Wikidata and Wikipedia have very different purposes: Wikipedia is an
> encyclopedia to be read; Wikidata is a database. No one reads a database.
> The whole purpose of a database is to have its content multiplied and
> surfaced elsewhere. Therefore it is even more essential that its content
> stand on solid ground.
>
> If you want to measure Wikidata against something else, you should measure
> it against the sources that open knowledge currently relies on, i.e. the
> quality standards underlying WP:V, WP:RS and so on, especially if Wikidata
> will also be used as a source in Wikipedias.
>
> My argument has never been that Wikipedia content is good, and Wikidata
> content is rubbish. The quality of Wikipedia's content is extremely
> variable. Sometimes it's alarmingly unstable, and you see Wikipedia "truth"
> shifting from one extreme to the other (example: [2]). Sometimes it's
> manipulated (example: [3]). Wikipedia contains *a lot* of rubbish,
> alongside some undeniably good content.
>
> It's for that reason that I view it with dismay when Wikidata makes
> wholesale imports "from Wikipedia", without so much as traceability to a
> specific article and article revision, and a check whether the information
> taken from Wikipedia was accurately sourced there.
>
> At the Wikipedia Weekly Facebook group, we recently discussed the use of
> Wikipedia as a source for legal decisions.[4] On a human level, it's
> perfectly normal and understandable for Wikimedians to feel validated, to
> feel pride whenever a court makes such use of Wikipedia. But in my view,
> one of the core tasks of the Wikimedia community should be to *discourage*
> such use, and teach the legal profession Wikipedia literacy. This includes
> at its most basic level not putting any faith into any statement in
> Wikipedia *per se*, but instead checking and assessing its sourcing on each
> and every occasion, and referencing the source instead. We all know that
> complete nonsense can survive for a long time in Wikipedia, even in highly
> trafficked articles.
>
> Andreas
>
> [1]
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2015-12-02/Op-ed
> [2] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Klee-Irwin.gif
> [3]
>
> http://www.newsweek.com/2015/04/03/manipulating-wikipedia-promote-bogus-business-school-316133.html
> [4]
> https://www.facebook.com/groups/wikipediaweekly/permalink/969531789761319/
>
>
> > On Mon, Jan 25, 2016 at 1:56 PM Andreas Kolbe 
> wrote:
> >
> > > On Fri, Jan 22, 2016 at 9:34 AM, Magnus Manske <
> > > magnusman...@googlemail.com>
> > > wrote:
> > >
> > > > What you hear is "Wikidata is unreliable" (compared to the respective
> > > > Wikipedia; proof, anyone? Please, show me proof; silence or anecdotes
> > > don't
> > > > count)
> > >
> >

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-03-11 Thread Andreas Kolbe

On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 9:36 AM, Magnus Manske 
wrote:

> Be careful with that "obvious" word...
>
> http://magnusmanske.de/wordpress/?p=378

Hi Magnus,

Things have been busy of late, and I never had time to properly respond to
this blog post of yours. (For anyone else who has forgotten, this was the
discussion about vast swathes of Wikidata lacking reliable references, as
discussed in [1].)

You say, "the impression I get from Andreas’ text is that, while Wikipedia
has some issues, references are basically OK, whereas they are essentially
non-existent in Wikidata." In your piece, you then go on to compare the
referencing density of Wikidata content to that of Wikipedia content,
finding that Wikidata, even now, doesn't do at all badly compared to
Wikipedia.

You present it as a sort of sibling rivalry: if Wikipedia doesn't do any
better herself, why does she complain about her sister Wikidata? I recall
Denny and Gerard making similar arguments.

In doing so, you miss the core point of the criticism. My point is that
Wikipedia's *referencing standards are okay*, and that *those* are what
Wikidata should be assessed against.

Wikidata and Wikipedia have very different purposes: Wikipedia is an
encyclopedia to be read; Wikidata is a database. No one reads a database.
The whole purpose of a database is to have its content multiplied and
surfaced elsewhere. Therefore it is even more essential that its content
stand on solid ground.

If you want to measure Wikidata against something else, you should measure
it against the sources that open knowledge currently relies on, i.e. the
quality standards underlying WP:V, WP:RS and so on, especially if Wikidata
will also be used as a source in Wikipedias.

My argument has never been that Wikipedia content is good, and Wikidata
content is rubbish. The quality of Wikipedia's content is extremely
variable. Sometimes it's alarmingly unstable, and you see Wikipedia "truth"
shifting from one extreme to the other (example: [2]). Sometimes it's
manipulated (example: [3]). Wikipedia contains *a lot* of rubbish,
alongside some undeniably good content.

It's for that reason that I view it with dismay when Wikidata makes
wholesale imports "from Wikipedia", without so much as traceability to a
specific article and article revision, and a check whether the information
taken from Wikipedia was accurately sourced there.

At the Wikipedia Weekly Facebook group, we recently discussed the use of
Wikipedia as a source for legal decisions.[4] On a human level, it's
perfectly normal and understandable for Wikimedians to feel validated, to
feel pride whenever a court makes such use of Wikipedia. But in my view,
one of the core tasks of the Wikimedia community should be to *discourage*
such use, and teach the legal profession Wikipedia literacy. This includes
at its most basic level not putting any faith into any statement in
Wikipedia *per se*, but instead checking and assessing its sourcing on each
and every occasion, and referencing the source instead. We all know that
complete nonsense can survive for a long time in Wikipedia, even in highly
trafficked articles.

Andreas

[1]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2015-12-02/Op-ed
[2] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Klee-Irwin.gif
[3]
http://www.newsweek.com/2015/04/03/manipulating-wikipedia-promote-bogus-business-school-316133.html
[4]
https://www.facebook.com/groups/wikipediaweekly/permalink/969531789761319/

> On Mon, Jan 25, 2016 at 1:56 PM Andreas Kolbe  wrote:
>
> > On Fri, Jan 22, 2016 at 9:34 AM, Magnus Manske <
> > magnusman...@googlemail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> > > What you hear is "Wikidata is unreliable" (compared to the respective
> > > Wikipedia; proof, anyone? Please, show me proof; silence or anecdotes
> > don't
> > > count)
> >
> >
> >
> > Any non-trivial content you want to add to Wikipedia today has to fulfil
> > one basic criterion: that the content be traceable to a professionally
> > published source.
> >
> > Most Wikidata content fails that criterion.[1] It's blooming obvious that
> > Wikidata is "unreliable" according to Wikipedia's definition of a
> "reliable
> > source", isn't it?[2]
> >
> > [1] https://tools.wmflabs.org/wikidata-todo/stats.php
> > [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:SPS
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-26 Thread Andreas Kolbe

On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 11:32 AM, Gerard Meijssen  wrote:

> Hoi,
> You want to compare it to the Reasonator item. It has all the right links
> for 43 award winners. That is 100% I did not have problems telling
> Wikipedians that there link was wrong. The information is there and there
> are more 'blue' links than in Wikipedia.
>

Well, not 100% either, because the 1982 winner, Andrew W. Ellis, is missing
in Reasonator.[1]

> The proof is in the pudding. For simple lists and links Wikidata is hands
> down superior.

That depends entirely on the volunteers involved, and the quality of their
work. I don't think Wikidata has a systemic advantage. At any rate, given
its lack of referencing standards, what's being added to Wikidata today is
less likely to be verifiable than what is being added to Wikipedia today.

Andreas

[1] https://tools.wmflabs.org/reasonator/?&q=15995494
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-26 Thread Anthony Cole

Yes, Aubrey.  It would be way too onerous to expect us to make each
citation a Wikidata item.

On Tuesday, 26 January 2016, Andrea Zanni  wrote:

> On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 11:58 AM, Anthony Cole  > wrote:
>
> > Most editions of most books published in the last 40 years (certainly
> books
> > from reliable publishers) have an ISBN that identifies one edition. Most
> > reliable journal articles these days have a doi. For simple citing of web
> > pages, you could automatically convert bare urls to archived versions of
> > the cited web page.
> >
>
>
> I do agree with you.
> But the problem emerges if you want to cite the reference (the book, the
> article) as an item.
> There you have to take into account a "book model" in Wikidata, and it's
> easier said than done. (scientific articles are a bit easier, and Magnus is
> working on them).
> https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:WikiProject_Source_MetaData
>
> Aubrey
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-26 Thread Andrea Zanni

On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 11:58 AM, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Most editions of most books published in the last 40 years (certainly books
> from reliable publishers) have an ISBN that identifies one edition. Most
> reliable journal articles these days have a doi. For simple citing of web
> pages, you could automatically convert bare urls to archived versions of
> the cited web page.
>

I do agree with you.
But the problem emerges if you want to cite the reference (the book, the
article) as an item.
There you have to take into account a "book model" in Wikidata, and it's
easier said than done. (scientific articles are a bit easier, and Magnus is
working on them).
https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:WikiProject_Source_MetaData

Aubrey
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-26 Thread Gerard Meijssen

Hoi,
Anthony, having sources is desired. The point is not that we do not want
them. We clearly do. My point is that it is not the only yardstick of
success and quality.

As I argued, Wikidata may be a tool to link links and red links properly.
It will improve quality in both Wikipedia and Wikidata. It has nothing to
do with sources at the Wikipedia end because links are already based on
existing sources. It improves quality because it is assured that the link
go  where they are supposed to go given the source :) .

When we ensure quality for all our Wikipedias, the implicit quality rises
in Wikidata because we clearly want statements that describe the relation.
As relations are linked to Wikipedia, the source of that Wikipedia applies.
It does not mean that by other means the quality of the statements will not
be checked and improved.

In this way everybody wins. It is about our quality, it is measurable, it
is achievable, it is SMART. Requiring statements for every Wikidata
statement at this time of its life cycle is not.
Thanks,
  GerardM

On 26 January 2016 at 11:58, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Most editions of most books published in the last 40 years (certainly books
> from reliable publishers) have an ISBN that identifies one edition. Most
> reliable journal articles these days have a doi. For simple citing of web
> pages, you could automatically convert bare urls to archived versions of
> the cited web page.
>
> There is a difference between unreliable assertions and knowledge.
> Wikimedia should be distributing knowledge. That's what the mission
> statement says. Wikidata could take citation a bit more seriously.
> On 26 Jan 2016 5:59 pm, "Jane Darnell"  wrote:
>
> > That is so true! Making book items is hard and then using them in
> > reference statements is harder
> >
> > -Original Message-
> > From: "Andrea Zanni" 
> > Sent: ‎26-‎1-‎2016 09:20
> > To: "Wikimedia Mailing List" 
> > Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske
> >
> > On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 8:03 AM, Gerard Meijssen <
> > gerard.meijs...@gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> > >- It is really laborious to add references. Many references are a
> > book a
> > >publication and I give you one example of a book [1]. It takes MUCH
> > more
> > >time to add a source than it is to add a statement. The book, the
> > > authors
> > >they need sources in their own right..
> > >
> >
> >
> > Also, Wikidata has not found a way yet to work with books.
> > Yes, it's relatively easy to create an item for a recent book and
> populate
> > it with a few statements relatively to the main metadata (author, year of
> > publishing, publisher).
> >
> > What we don't have is a way to *consistently* work with books (which have
> > often many translations and editions). We cannot import (yet) library
> > catalogs in wikidata[1]. We don't even have a consistent way to link
> > Wikidata to Wikisource (index pages, ns0 pages).
> >
> > I think this is quite relevant for the reference issue.
> >
> > Aubrey
> >
> >
> > [1] there is an ongoing project with the National Library of Florence, in
> > Italy. We now have a script to import records in WIkibase, and will do
> on a
> > local one. Then we will approach Wikidata.
> > ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-26 Thread Gerard Meijssen

Hoi,
You want to compare it to the Reasonator item. It has all the right links
for 43 award winners. That is 100% I did not have problems telling
Wikipedians that there link was wrong. The information is there and there
are more 'blue' links than in Wikipedia.

The proof is in the pudding. For simple lists and links Wikidata is hands
down superior.
Thanks,
  GerardM

On 26 January 2016 at 12:21, Andreas Kolbe  wrote:

> On Mon, Jan 25, 2016 at 4:32 PM, Gerard Meijssen <
> gerard.meijs...@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > Hoi,
> > Eh, wrong link ...
> > http://ultimategerardm.blogspot.nl/2016/01/wikipedia-20-error-rate.html
> >
> > On 25 January 2016 at 17:29, Gerard Meijssen 
> > wrote:
> >
> > > Hoi,
> > > I regularly blog. It was mentioned in one of my blogposts [1].. By the
> > way
> > > the obvious would be to do some research yourself. Paper tigers [2] are
> > > those tigers that rely on what others have to say,
> > > Thanks.,
> > >   GerardM
> > >
> > >
> > > [1]
> > >
> >
> http://ultimategerardm.blogspot.nl/2016/01/wikipedia-recovery-and-mental-health.html
> > > [2] http://www.letusdiy.org/uploads/userup/0911/341GC2.jpg
> >
>
>
> Gerard,
>
> You say in your January 2016 blog post,
>
> 
>
> The article on the Spearman Medal is a case in point. This medal is
> conferred by the British Psychological Society to psychologists. There were
> 19 links and two were wrong. One link was to a soccer and one to a football
> player. The award is conferred since 1965 so there ought to be quite a
> number of red links
>
> With two sportsmen attributed to winning the Spearman Medal there was an
> error rate of 20%.
>
> 
>
> Looking at the current version of the [[Spearman Medal]] article,[1] last
> touched in August 2014 (i.e. well before your blog post), I find it
> contains 20 (not 19) blue links in its List of medal winners (along with a
> bunch of red links).
>
> Looking at the blue links, I find only one soccer/football player (Richard
> Crisp), not two. However, there is also a research climatologist
> specialising in viticulture (Gregory V. Jones).
>
> These two would seem quite obviously to be wrong, given that the Spearman
> Medal is given to psychologists. So I agree with you that at least two blue
> links lead to the wrong person.
>
> I don't agree with your percentage calculation: if 2 out of 20 blue links
> lead to the wrong person, that makes an error rate of 10% (not 20%).
>
> I note that only two of the names in the list have references. That's just
> as bad as Wikidata. :)
>
> The saving grace is that at least the article cites a British Psychological
> Society webpage in its lead where an official list of medal winners[2] is
> linked. Frankly, I would consider that page a better reference than the
> Wikipedia page. It's good to see that it outranks the Wikipedia page in
> search engines.
>
> Speaking more broadly, I don't think you'll find me disagreeing with you
> that Wikipedia quality leaves much to be desired. I have written plenty
> about Wikipedia's reliability problems.
>
> However, I consider the requirement for reliable sources to be a key factor
> in whatever quality improvement there has been in Wikipedia. Moreover, the
> presence of sources very often gives readers access to more reliable
> material than Wikipedia itself (as indeed is the case in the Spearman Medal
> article). That is useful.
>
> In my view, much of Wikipedia has been and continues to be substandard. But
> without references, Wikidata's reliability problems are likely to be even
> greater than those of Wikipedia.
>
> Andreas
>
> [1]
> https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Spearman_Medal&oldid=620735680
> [2]
>
> http://www.bps.org.uk/what-we-do/bps/history-psychology-centre/history-society/society-award-winners/spearman-medal/spearman-medal
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-26 Thread Andreas Kolbe

On Mon, Jan 25, 2016 at 4:32 PM, Gerard Meijssen 
wrote:

> Hoi,
> Eh, wrong link ...
> http://ultimategerardm.blogspot.nl/2016/01/wikipedia-20-error-rate.html
>
> On 25 January 2016 at 17:29, Gerard Meijssen 
> wrote:
>
> > Hoi,
> > I regularly blog. It was mentioned in one of my blogposts [1].. By the
> way
> > the obvious would be to do some research yourself. Paper tigers [2] are
> > those tigers that rely on what others have to say,
> > Thanks.,
> >   GerardM
> >
> >
> > [1]
> >
> http://ultimategerardm.blogspot.nl/2016/01/wikipedia-recovery-and-mental-health.html
> > [2] http://www.letusdiy.org/uploads/userup/0911/341GC2.jpg
>

Gerard,

You say in your January 2016 blog post,

The article on the Spearman Medal is a case in point. This medal is
conferred by the British Psychological Society to psychologists. There were
19 links and two were wrong. One link was to a soccer and one to a football
player. The award is conferred since 1965 so there ought to be quite a
number of red links

With two sportsmen attributed to winning the Spearman Medal there was an
error rate of 20%.

Looking at the current version of the [[Spearman Medal]] article,[1] last
touched in August 2014 (i.e. well before your blog post), I find it
contains 20 (not 19) blue links in its List of medal winners (along with a
bunch of red links).

Looking at the blue links, I find only one soccer/football player (Richard
Crisp), not two. However, there is also a research climatologist
specialising in viticulture (Gregory V. Jones).

These two would seem quite obviously to be wrong, given that the Spearman
Medal is given to psychologists. So I agree with you that at least two blue
links lead to the wrong person.

I don't agree with your percentage calculation: if 2 out of 20 blue links
lead to the wrong person, that makes an error rate of 10% (not 20%).

I note that only two of the names in the list have references. That's just
as bad as Wikidata. :)

The saving grace is that at least the article cites a British Psychological
Society webpage in its lead where an official list of medal winners[2] is
linked. Frankly, I would consider that page a better reference than the
Wikipedia page. It's good to see that it outranks the Wikipedia page in
search engines.

Speaking more broadly, I don't think you'll find me disagreeing with you
that Wikipedia quality leaves much to be desired. I have written plenty
about Wikipedia's reliability problems.

However, I consider the requirement for reliable sources to be a key factor
in whatever quality improvement there has been in Wikipedia. Moreover, the
presence of sources very often gives readers access to more reliable
material than Wikipedia itself (as indeed is the case in the Spearman Medal
article). That is useful.

In my view, much of Wikipedia has been and continues to be substandard. But
without references, Wikidata's reliability problems are likely to be even
greater than those of Wikipedia.

Andreas

[1]
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Spearman_Medal&oldid=620735680
[2]
http://www.bps.org.uk/what-we-do/bps/history-psychology-centre/history-society/society-award-winners/spearman-medal/spearman-medal
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-26 Thread Anthony Cole

Most editions of most books published in the last 40 years (certainly books
from reliable publishers) have an ISBN that identifies one edition. Most
reliable journal articles these days have a doi. For simple citing of web
pages, you could automatically convert bare urls to archived versions of
the cited web page.

There is a difference between unreliable assertions and knowledge.
Wikimedia should be distributing knowledge. That's what the mission
statement says. Wikidata could take citation a bit more seriously.
On 26 Jan 2016 5:59 pm, "Jane Darnell"  wrote:

> That is so true! Making book items is hard and then using them in
> reference statements is harder
>
> -Original Message-
> From: "Andrea Zanni" 
> Sent: ‎26-‎1-‎2016 09:20
> To: "Wikimedia Mailing List" 
> Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske
>
> On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 8:03 AM, Gerard Meijssen <
> gerard.meijs...@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> >- It is really laborious to add references. Many references are a
> book a
> >publication and I give you one example of a book [1]. It takes MUCH
> more
> >time to add a source than it is to add a statement. The book, the
> > authors
> >they need sources in their own right..
> >
>
>
> Also, Wikidata has not found a way yet to work with books.
> Yes, it's relatively easy to create an item for a recent book and populate
> it with a few statements relatively to the main metadata (author, year of
> publishing, publisher).
>
> What we don't have is a way to *consistently* work with books (which have
> often many translations and editions). We cannot import (yet) library
> catalogs in wikidata[1]. We don't even have a consistent way to link
> Wikidata to Wikisource (index pages, ns0 pages).
>
> I think this is quite relevant for the reference issue.
>
> Aubrey
>
>
> [1] there is an ongoing project with the National Library of Florence, in
> Italy. We now have a script to import records in WIkibase, and will do on a
> local one. Then we will approach Wikidata.
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-26 Thread Jane Darnell

That is so true! Making book items is hard and then using them in reference 
statements is harder

-Original Message-
From: "Andrea Zanni" 
Sent: ‎26-‎1-‎2016 09:20
To: "Wikimedia Mailing List" 
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 8:03 AM, Gerard Meijssen 
wrote:

>- It is really laborious to add references. Many references are a book a
>publication and I give you one example of a book [1]. It takes MUCH more
>time to add a source than it is to add a statement. The book, the
> authors
>they need sources in their own right..
>

Also, Wikidata has not found a way yet to work with books.
Yes, it's relatively easy to create an item for a recent book and populate
it with a few statements relatively to the main metadata (author, year of
publishing, publisher).

What we don't have is a way to *consistently* work with books (which have
often many translations and editions). We cannot import (yet) library
catalogs in wikidata[1]. We don't even have a consistent way to link
Wikidata to Wikisource (index pages, ns0 pages).

I think this is quite relevant for the reference issue.

Aubrey

[1] there is an ongoing project with the National Library of Florence, in
Italy. We now have a script to import records in WIkibase, and will do on a
local one. Then we will approach Wikidata.
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-26 Thread Andrea Zanni

On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 10:45 AM, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> To cite a book just add the ISBN and page number. Leave it at that; or
> perhaps you could devise a bot that follows up, converting ISBN + page
> number into a full-blown reference.
>

Most of the time, I think your approach is good enough.
But please don't assume that there is a bijection between books ("works")
and ISBNs.
* not all books have ISBNs (ISBN has been widely used from 1970s)
* that ISBNs are *always* unique (publishers reuse them to save
money)(yeah, I know)
* you often have a different ISBN for the ebook, for the paperback, for the
hardcover, of the same book etc.
* right now, we don't really know how to consistenly works to their
different editions and translations.

I'm simply stating that the reason we don't have Wikidata full of book
records is a deep one.

Aubrey
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-26 Thread Anthony Cole

To cite a book just add the ISBN and page number. Leave it at that; or
perhaps you could devise a bot that follows up, converting ISBN + page
number into a full-blown reference.
On 26 Jan 2016 4:20 pm, "Andrea Zanni"  wrote:

> On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 8:03 AM, Gerard Meijssen <
> gerard.meijs...@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> >- It is really laborious to add references. Many references are a
> book a
> >publication and I give you one example of a book [1]. It takes MUCH
> more
> >time to add a source than it is to add a statement. The book, the
> > authors
> >they need sources in their own right..
> >
>
>
> Also, Wikidata has not found a way yet to work with books.
> Yes, it's relatively easy to create an item for a recent book and populate
> it with a few statements relatively to the main metadata (author, year of
> publishing, publisher).
>
> What we don't have is a way to *consistently* work with books (which have
> often many translations and editions). We cannot import (yet) library
> catalogs in wikidata[1]. We don't even have a consistent way to link
> Wikidata to Wikisource (index pages, ns0 pages).
>
> I think this is quite relevant for the reference issue.
>
> Aubrey
>
>
> [1] there is an ongoing project with the National Library of Florence, in
> Italy. We now have a script to import records in WIkibase, and will do on a
> local one. Then we will approach Wikidata.
> ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-26 Thread Magnus Manske

Be careful with that "obvious" word...

http://magnusmanske.de/wordpress/?p=378


On Mon, Jan 25, 2016 at 1:56 PM Andreas Kolbe  wrote:

> On Fri, Jan 22, 2016 at 9:34 AM, Magnus Manske <
> magnusman...@googlemail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > What you hear is "Wikidata is unreliable" (compared to the respective
> > Wikipedia; proof, anyone? Please, show me proof; silence or anecdotes
> don't
> > count)
>
>
>
> Any non-trivial content you want to add to Wikipedia today has to fulfil
> one basic criterion: that the content be traceable to a professionally
> published source.
>
> Most Wikidata content fails that criterion.[1] It's blooming obvious that
> Wikidata is "unreliable" according to Wikipedia's definition of a "reliable
> source", isn't it?[2]
>
> [1] https://tools.wmflabs.org/wikidata-todo/stats.php
> [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:SPS
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-26 Thread Andrea Zanni

On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 8:03 AM, Gerard Meijssen 
wrote:

>- It is really laborious to add references. Many references are a book a
>publication and I give you one example of a book [1]. It takes MUCH more
>time to add a source than it is to add a statement. The book, the
> authors
>they need sources in their own right..
>

Also, Wikidata has not found a way yet to work with books.
Yes, it's relatively easy to create an item for a recent book and populate
it with a few statements relatively to the main metadata (author, year of
publishing, publisher).

What we don't have is a way to *consistently* work with books (which have
often many translations and editions). We cannot import (yet) library
catalogs in wikidata[1]. We don't even have a consistent way to link
Wikidata to Wikisource (index pages, ns0 pages).

I think this is quite relevant for the reference issue.

Aubrey

[1] there is an ongoing project with the National Library of Florence, in
Italy. We now have a script to import records in WIkibase, and will do on a
local one. Then we will approach Wikidata.
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Hoi,
The question why add sources to every statement has nothing to do with
Wikipedia. If Wikipedia is mentioned, it is because Wikipedians say that
Wikidata is inferior "because we have sources".

When the question is to be asked seriously, the answer becomes quite
different.

   - It is really laborious to add references. Many references are a book a
   publication and I give you one example of a book [1]. It takes MUCH more
   time to add a source than it is to add a statement. The book, the authors
   they need sources in their own right..
   - At this stage of Wikidata, it is very incomplete and very immature.
   Our biggest concern is coverage more than anything else. Ask yourself on
   that book is it more relevant to have links to the authors or to the ISBN
   number if any? We actually need both.
   - Perceived quality is very much in the completeness of the data, the
   ease of going from item to item. This is true in Wikipedia and even more so
   in Wikidata. People read the article and some take an interest in sources.
   - When I add award winners, there may be a few there may fifty. All the
   statements are on the award winners. I can automate the insertion of the
   statement. I cannot automate the insertion of a source.

Thanks,
 GerardM


[1] https://tools.wmflabs.org/reasonator/?&q=22019124

On 26 January 2016 at 06:39, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Why not insist that every piece of data added to wikidata is supported by a
> reliable source?
>
> That's a genuine question. I don't know the answer.
>
> Saying, "Well, Wikipedia is unreliable, too" doesn't answer the question.
>
> You're all bright people, and I assume there is a good reason not to insist
> on reliable sourcing for all of Wikidata's claims. What is it, please?
>
>
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 1:28 AM, Jane Darnell  wrote:
>
> > Actually I think Wikidata is sourced more thoroughly than any single
> > Wikipedia. Looking at the last chart in those stats, less than 10% of all
> > items have zero sitelinks, and we can't see in the stats whether 100% of
> > those have zero referenced statements, but I would assume that is not the
> > case, especially since items with zero sitelinks and zero internal
> Wikidata
> > links tend to be "cleaned up and deleted". At least one sitelink means
> the
> > item is coming from a Wikipedia, and therefore the Wikipedia article will
> > have references that could be used in the Wikidata item and just haven't
> > been added yet. Of all the items with zero or just one statement, I
> expect
> > a great deal of these to be linked to categories, disambiguation pages,
> or
> > lists, as these types of items generally only contain one statement.
> >
> > Also, we currently have no way to count unreferenced statements in
> > Wikipedia articles, but there are very few Wikipedia articles that have
> at
> > least one reference per sentence. So concluding that any single
> > unreferenced statement no matter how many other referenced statements
> there
> > are in the item brings an entire Wikidata item into the "untrustworthy
> > zone" is just silly.
> >
> > On Mon, Jan 25, 2016 at 3:32 PM, Gerard Meijssen <
> > gerard.meijs...@gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> > > Hoi,
> > > Maybe.. but not all Wikipedias are the same. It is verifiable that
> > > Wikipedia would easily benefit from Wikidata from Wikidata by replacing
> > the
> > > existing links and red links with functionality that uses Wikidata.
> > >
> > > It happens often that I work on content in Wikipedia and find an error
> > rate
> > > of 20%. When you check Wikidata for its quality I expect it to be much
> > > better than 90%.
> > >
> > > It is blooming obvious that Wikipedians only see fault elsewhere and
> are
> > > forgiving for the error in their own way.
> > > Thanks,
> > >   GerardM
> > >
> > > On 25 January 2016 at 14:55, Andreas Kolbe  wrote:
> > >
> > > > On Fri, Jan 22, 2016 at 9:34 AM, Magnus Manske <
> > > > magnusman...@googlemail.com>
> > > > wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > What you hear is "Wikidata is unreliable" (compared to the
> respective
> > > > > Wikipedia; proof, anyone? Please, show me proof; silence or
> anecdotes
> > > > don't
> > > > > count)
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > Any non-trivial content you want to add to Wikipedia today has to
> > fulfil
> > > > one basic criterion: that the content be traceable to a
> professionally
> > > > published source.
> > > >
> > > > Most Wikidata content fails that criterion.[1] It's blooming obvious
> > that
> > > > Wikidata is "unreliable" according to Wikipedia's definition of a
> > > "reliable
> > > > source", isn't it?[2]
> > > >
> > > > [1] https://tools.wmflabs.org/wikidata-todo/stats.php
> > > > [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:SPS
> > > > ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-25 Thread Jane Darnell

Then you are willing to concede that we don't need references on
disambiguation pages? What about categories? What about templates? Those
all have items in Wikidata as well.

On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 6:47 AM, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> I understand there are some data (say, the sky is blue) that are so obvious
> and well-known that no one would expect a source to be provided. I'm
> referring to data that everyone on earth doesn't know the answer to, like
> dry
> air contains 78.09*% *nitrogen.
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 1:39 PM, Anthony Cole  wrote:
>
> > Why not insist that every piece of data added to wikidata is supported by
> > a reliable source?
> >
> > That's a genuine question. I don't know the answer.
> >
> > Saying, "Well, Wikipedia is unreliable, too" doesn't answer the question.
> >
> > You're all bright people, and I assume there is a good reason not to
> > insist on reliable sourcing for all of Wikidata's claims. What is it,
> > please?
> >
> >
> >
> > Anthony Cole
> >
> >
> > On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 1:28 AM, Jane Darnell  wrote:
> >
> >> Actually I think Wikidata is sourced more thoroughly than any single
> >> Wikipedia. Looking at the last chart in those stats, less than 10% of
> all
> >> items have zero sitelinks, and we can't see in the stats whether 100% of
> >> those have zero referenced statements, but I would assume that is not
> the
> >> case, especially since items with zero sitelinks and zero internal
> >> Wikidata
> >> links tend to be "cleaned up and deleted". At least one sitelink means
> the
> >> item is coming from a Wikipedia, and therefore the Wikipedia article
> will
> >> have references that could be used in the Wikidata item and just haven't
> >> been added yet. Of all the items with zero or just one statement, I
> expect
> >> a great deal of these to be linked to categories, disambiguation pages,
> or
> >> lists, as these types of items generally only contain one statement.
> >>
> >> Also, we currently have no way to count unreferenced statements in
> >> Wikipedia articles, but there are very few Wikipedia articles that have
> at
> >> least one reference per sentence. So concluding that any single
> >> unreferenced statement no matter how many other referenced statements
> >> there
> >> are in the item brings an entire Wikidata item into the "untrustworthy
> >> zone" is just silly.
> >>
> >> On Mon, Jan 25, 2016 at 3:32 PM, Gerard Meijssen <
> >> gerard.meijs...@gmail.com>
> >> wrote:
> >>
> >> > Hoi,
> >> > Maybe.. but not all Wikipedias are the same. It is verifiable that
> >> > Wikipedia would easily benefit from Wikidata from Wikidata by
> replacing
> >> the
> >> > existing links and red links with functionality that uses Wikidata.
> >> >
> >> > It happens often that I work on content in Wikipedia and find an error
> >> rate
> >> > of 20%. When you check Wikidata for its quality I expect it to be much
> >> > better than 90%.
> >> >
> >> > It is blooming obvious that Wikipedians only see fault elsewhere and
> are
> >> > forgiving for the error in their own way.
> >> > Thanks,
> >> >   GerardM
> >> >
> >> > On 25 January 2016 at 14:55, Andreas Kolbe 
> wrote:
> >> >
> >> > > On Fri, Jan 22, 2016 at 9:34 AM, Magnus Manske <
> >> > > magnusman...@googlemail.com>
> >> > > wrote:
> >> > >
> >> > > > What you hear is "Wikidata is unreliable" (compared to the
> >> respective
> >> > > > Wikipedia; proof, anyone? Please, show me proof; silence or
> >> anecdotes
> >> > > don't
> >> > > > count)
> >> > >
> >> > >
> >> > >
> >> > > Any non-trivial content you want to add to Wikipedia today has to
> >> fulfil
> >> > > one basic criterion: that the content be traceable to a
> professionally
> >> > > published source.
> >> > >
> >> > > Most Wikidata content fails that criterion.[1] It's blooming obvious
> >> that
> >> > > Wikidata is "unreliable" according to Wikipedia's definition of a
> >> > "reliable
> >> > > source", isn't it?[2]
> >> > >
> >> > > [1] https://tools.wmflabs.org/wikidata-todo/stats.php
> >> > > [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:SPS
> >> > > ___
> >> > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> >> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
> >> > > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> >> > > Unsubscribe:
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
> >> ,
> >> > >  ?subject=unsubscribe>
> >> > >
> >> > ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-25 Thread Jane Darnell

The answer is quite simple and is exactly the same as it is for Wikipedia:
it's a wiki, and not everyone who contributes knows how to add references.

On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 6:39 AM, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Why not insist that every piece of data added to wikidata is supported by a
> reliable source?
>
> That's a genuine question. I don't know the answer.
>
> Saying, "Well, Wikipedia is unreliable, too" doesn't answer the question.
>
> You're all bright people, and I assume there is a good reason not to insist
> on reliable sourcing for all of Wikidata's claims. What is it, please?
>
>
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 1:28 AM, Jane Darnell  wrote:
>
> > Actually I think Wikidata is sourced more thoroughly than any single
> > Wikipedia. Looking at the last chart in those stats, less than 10% of all
> > items have zero sitelinks, and we can't see in the stats whether 100% of
> > those have zero referenced statements, but I would assume that is not the
> > case, especially since items with zero sitelinks and zero internal
> Wikidata
> > links tend to be "cleaned up and deleted". At least one sitelink means
> the
> > item is coming from a Wikipedia, and therefore the Wikipedia article will
> > have references that could be used in the Wikidata item and just haven't
> > been added yet. Of all the items with zero or just one statement, I
> expect
> > a great deal of these to be linked to categories, disambiguation pages,
> or
> > lists, as these types of items generally only contain one statement.
> >
> > Also, we currently have no way to count unreferenced statements in
> > Wikipedia articles, but there are very few Wikipedia articles that have
> at
> > least one reference per sentence. So concluding that any single
> > unreferenced statement no matter how many other referenced statements
> there
> > are in the item brings an entire Wikidata item into the "untrustworthy
> > zone" is just silly.
> >
> > On Mon, Jan 25, 2016 at 3:32 PM, Gerard Meijssen <
> > gerard.meijs...@gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> > > Hoi,
> > > Maybe.. but not all Wikipedias are the same. It is verifiable that
> > > Wikipedia would easily benefit from Wikidata from Wikidata by replacing
> > the
> > > existing links and red links with functionality that uses Wikidata.
> > >
> > > It happens often that I work on content in Wikipedia and find an error
> > rate
> > > of 20%. When you check Wikidata for its quality I expect it to be much
> > > better than 90%.
> > >
> > > It is blooming obvious that Wikipedians only see fault elsewhere and
> are
> > > forgiving for the error in their own way.
> > > Thanks,
> > >   GerardM
> > >
> > > On 25 January 2016 at 14:55, Andreas Kolbe  wrote:
> > >
> > > > On Fri, Jan 22, 2016 at 9:34 AM, Magnus Manske <
> > > > magnusman...@googlemail.com>
> > > > wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > What you hear is "Wikidata is unreliable" (compared to the
> respective
> > > > > Wikipedia; proof, anyone? Please, show me proof; silence or
> anecdotes
> > > > don't
> > > > > count)
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > Any non-trivial content you want to add to Wikipedia today has to
> > fulfil
> > > > one basic criterion: that the content be traceable to a
> professionally
> > > > published source.
> > > >
> > > > Most Wikidata content fails that criterion.[1] It's blooming obvious
> > that
> > > > Wikidata is "unreliable" according to Wikipedia's definition of a
> > > "reliable
> > > > source", isn't it?[2]
> > > >
> > > > [1] https://tools.wmflabs.org/wikidata-todo/stats.php
> > > > [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:SPS
> > > > ___
> > > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
> > > > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > > > Unsubscribe:
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > > > 
> > > >
> > > ___
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> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
> > > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
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> > > 
> > ___
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> > 
> >
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-25 Thread Anthony Cole

I understand there are some data (say, the sky is blue) that are so obvious
and well-known that no one would expect a source to be provided. I'm
referring to data that everyone on earth doesn't know the answer to, like dry
air contains 78.09*% *nitrogen.

Anthony Cole


On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 1:39 PM, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Why not insist that every piece of data added to wikidata is supported by
> a reliable source?
>
> That's a genuine question. I don't know the answer.
>
> Saying, "Well, Wikipedia is unreliable, too" doesn't answer the question.
>
> You're all bright people, and I assume there is a good reason not to
> insist on reliable sourcing for all of Wikidata's claims. What is it,
> please?
>
>
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 1:28 AM, Jane Darnell  wrote:
>
>> Actually I think Wikidata is sourced more thoroughly than any single
>> Wikipedia. Looking at the last chart in those stats, less than 10% of all
>> items have zero sitelinks, and we can't see in the stats whether 100% of
>> those have zero referenced statements, but I would assume that is not the
>> case, especially since items with zero sitelinks and zero internal
>> Wikidata
>> links tend to be "cleaned up and deleted". At least one sitelink means the
>> item is coming from a Wikipedia, and therefore the Wikipedia article will
>> have references that could be used in the Wikidata item and just haven't
>> been added yet. Of all the items with zero or just one statement, I expect
>> a great deal of these to be linked to categories, disambiguation pages, or
>> lists, as these types of items generally only contain one statement.
>>
>> Also, we currently have no way to count unreferenced statements in
>> Wikipedia articles, but there are very few Wikipedia articles that have at
>> least one reference per sentence. So concluding that any single
>> unreferenced statement no matter how many other referenced statements
>> there
>> are in the item brings an entire Wikidata item into the "untrustworthy
>> zone" is just silly.
>>
>> On Mon, Jan 25, 2016 at 3:32 PM, Gerard Meijssen <
>> gerard.meijs...@gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>> > Hoi,
>> > Maybe.. but not all Wikipedias are the same. It is verifiable that
>> > Wikipedia would easily benefit from Wikidata from Wikidata by replacing
>> the
>> > existing links and red links with functionality that uses Wikidata.
>> >
>> > It happens often that I work on content in Wikipedia and find an error
>> rate
>> > of 20%. When you check Wikidata for its quality I expect it to be much
>> > better than 90%.
>> >
>> > It is blooming obvious that Wikipedians only see fault elsewhere and are
>> > forgiving for the error in their own way.
>> > Thanks,
>> >   GerardM
>> >
>> > On 25 January 2016 at 14:55, Andreas Kolbe  wrote:
>> >
>> > > On Fri, Jan 22, 2016 at 9:34 AM, Magnus Manske <
>> > > magnusman...@googlemail.com>
>> > > wrote:
>> > >
>> > > > What you hear is "Wikidata is unreliable" (compared to the
>> respective
>> > > > Wikipedia; proof, anyone? Please, show me proof; silence or
>> anecdotes
>> > > don't
>> > > > count)
>> > >
>> > >
>> > >
>> > > Any non-trivial content you want to add to Wikipedia today has to
>> fulfil
>> > > one basic criterion: that the content be traceable to a professionally
>> > > published source.
>> > >
>> > > Most Wikidata content fails that criterion.[1] It's blooming obvious
>> that
>> > > Wikidata is "unreliable" according to Wikipedia's definition of a
>> > "reliable
>> > > source", isn't it?[2]
>> > >
>> > > [1] https://tools.wmflabs.org/wikidata-todo/stats.php
>> > > [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:SPS
>> > > ___
>> > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
>> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
>> > > 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
>> > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
>> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
>> > 
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>> 
>>
>
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-25 Thread Anthony Cole

Why not insist that every piece of data added to wikidata is supported by a
reliable source?

That's a genuine question. I don't know the answer.

Saying, "Well, Wikipedia is unreliable, too" doesn't answer the question.

You're all bright people, and I assume there is a good reason not to insist
on reliable sourcing for all of Wikidata's claims. What is it, please?



Anthony Cole


On Tue, Jan 26, 2016 at 1:28 AM, Jane Darnell  wrote:

> Actually I think Wikidata is sourced more thoroughly than any single
> Wikipedia. Looking at the last chart in those stats, less than 10% of all
> items have zero sitelinks, and we can't see in the stats whether 100% of
> those have zero referenced statements, but I would assume that is not the
> case, especially since items with zero sitelinks and zero internal Wikidata
> links tend to be "cleaned up and deleted". At least one sitelink means the
> item is coming from a Wikipedia, and therefore the Wikipedia article will
> have references that could be used in the Wikidata item and just haven't
> been added yet. Of all the items with zero or just one statement, I expect
> a great deal of these to be linked to categories, disambiguation pages, or
> lists, as these types of items generally only contain one statement.
>
> Also, we currently have no way to count unreferenced statements in
> Wikipedia articles, but there are very few Wikipedia articles that have at
> least one reference per sentence. So concluding that any single
> unreferenced statement no matter how many other referenced statements there
> are in the item brings an entire Wikidata item into the "untrustworthy
> zone" is just silly.
>
> On Mon, Jan 25, 2016 at 3:32 PM, Gerard Meijssen <
> gerard.meijs...@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > Hoi,
> > Maybe.. but not all Wikipedias are the same. It is verifiable that
> > Wikipedia would easily benefit from Wikidata from Wikidata by replacing
> the
> > existing links and red links with functionality that uses Wikidata.
> >
> > It happens often that I work on content in Wikipedia and find an error
> rate
> > of 20%. When you check Wikidata for its quality I expect it to be much
> > better than 90%.
> >
> > It is blooming obvious that Wikipedians only see fault elsewhere and are
> > forgiving for the error in their own way.
> > Thanks,
> >   GerardM
> >
> > On 25 January 2016 at 14:55, Andreas Kolbe  wrote:
> >
> > > On Fri, Jan 22, 2016 at 9:34 AM, Magnus Manske <
> > > magnusman...@googlemail.com>
> > > wrote:
> > >
> > > > What you hear is "Wikidata is unreliable" (compared to the respective
> > > > Wikipedia; proof, anyone? Please, show me proof; silence or anecdotes
> > > don't
> > > > count)
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > Any non-trivial content you want to add to Wikipedia today has to
> fulfil
> > > one basic criterion: that the content be traceable to a professionally
> > > published source.
> > >
> > > Most Wikidata content fails that criterion.[1] It's blooming obvious
> that
> > > Wikidata is "unreliable" according to Wikipedia's definition of a
> > "reliable
> > > source", isn't it?[2]
> > >
> > > [1] https://tools.wmflabs.org/wikidata-todo/stats.php
> > > [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:SPS
> > > ___
> > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
> > > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > > 
> > >
> > ___
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> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
> > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > 
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-25 Thread Jane Darnell

Actually I think Wikidata is sourced more thoroughly than any single
Wikipedia. Looking at the last chart in those stats, less than 10% of all
items have zero sitelinks, and we can't see in the stats whether 100% of
those have zero referenced statements, but I would assume that is not the
case, especially since items with zero sitelinks and zero internal Wikidata
links tend to be "cleaned up and deleted". At least one sitelink means the
item is coming from a Wikipedia, and therefore the Wikipedia article will
have references that could be used in the Wikidata item and just haven't
been added yet. Of all the items with zero or just one statement, I expect
a great deal of these to be linked to categories, disambiguation pages, or
lists, as these types of items generally only contain one statement.

Also, we currently have no way to count unreferenced statements in
Wikipedia articles, but there are very few Wikipedia articles that have at
least one reference per sentence. So concluding that any single
unreferenced statement no matter how many other referenced statements there
are in the item brings an entire Wikidata item into the "untrustworthy
zone" is just silly.

On Mon, Jan 25, 2016 at 3:32 PM, Gerard Meijssen 
wrote:

> Hoi,
> Maybe.. but not all Wikipedias are the same. It is verifiable that
> Wikipedia would easily benefit from Wikidata from Wikidata by replacing the
> existing links and red links with functionality that uses Wikidata.
>
> It happens often that I work on content in Wikipedia and find an error rate
> of 20%. When you check Wikidata for its quality I expect it to be much
> better than 90%.
>
> It is blooming obvious that Wikipedians only see fault elsewhere and are
> forgiving for the error in their own way.
> Thanks,
>   GerardM
>
> On 25 January 2016 at 14:55, Andreas Kolbe  wrote:
>
> > On Fri, Jan 22, 2016 at 9:34 AM, Magnus Manske <
> > magnusman...@googlemail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> > > What you hear is "Wikidata is unreliable" (compared to the respective
> > > Wikipedia; proof, anyone? Please, show me proof; silence or anecdotes
> > don't
> > > count)
> >
> >
> >
> > Any non-trivial content you want to add to Wikipedia today has to fulfil
> > one basic criterion: that the content be traceable to a professionally
> > published source.
> >
> > Most Wikidata content fails that criterion.[1] It's blooming obvious that
> > Wikidata is "unreliable" according to Wikipedia's definition of a
> "reliable
> > source", isn't it?[2]
> >
> > [1] https://tools.wmflabs.org/wikidata-todo/stats.php
> > [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:SPS
> > ___
> > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
> > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > 
> >
> ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Hoi,
Eh, wrong link ...
http://ultimategerardm.blogspot.nl/2016/01/wikipedia-20-error-rate.html

On 25 January 2016 at 17:29, Gerard Meijssen 
wrote:

> Hoi,
> I regularly blog. It was mentioned in one of my blogposts [1].. By the way
> the obvious would be to do some research yourself. Paper tigers [2] are
> those tigers that rely on what others have to say,
> Thanks.,
>   GerardM
>
>
> [1]
> http://ultimategerardm.blogspot.nl/2016/01/wikipedia-recovery-and-mental-health.html
> [2] http://www.letusdiy.org/uploads/userup/0911/341GC2.jpg
>
> On 25 January 2016 at 16:11, Andreas Kolbe  wrote:
>
>> On Mon, Jan 25, 2016 at 2:32 PM, Gerard Meijssen <
>> gerard.meijs...@gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>> >
>> > It happens often that I work on content in Wikipedia and find an error
>> rate
>> > of 20%.
>>
>>
>>
>> Could you give some specific examples of such cases, with links to the
>> relevant article versions?
>>
>> Andreas
>> ___
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>>
>
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Hoi,
I regularly blog. It was mentioned in one of my blogposts [1].. By the way
the obvious would be to do some research yourself. Paper tigers [2] are
those tigers that rely on what others have to say,
Thanks.,
  GerardM


[1]
http://ultimategerardm.blogspot.nl/2016/01/wikipedia-recovery-and-mental-health.html
[2] http://www.letusdiy.org/uploads/userup/0911/341GC2.jpg

On 25 January 2016 at 16:11, Andreas Kolbe  wrote:

> On Mon, Jan 25, 2016 at 2:32 PM, Gerard Meijssen <
> gerard.meijs...@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> >
> > It happens often that I work on content in Wikipedia and find an error
> rate
> > of 20%.
>
>
>
> Could you give some specific examples of such cases, with links to the
> relevant article versions?
>
> Andreas
> ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-25 Thread Andreas Kolbe

On Mon, Jan 25, 2016 at 2:32 PM, Gerard Meijssen 
wrote:

>
> It happens often that I work on content in Wikipedia and find an error rate
> of 20%.

Could you give some specific examples of such cases, with links to the
relevant article versions?

Andreas
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Hoi,
Maybe.. but not all Wikipedias are the same. It is verifiable that
Wikipedia would easily benefit from Wikidata from Wikidata by replacing the
existing links and red links with functionality that uses Wikidata.

It happens often that I work on content in Wikipedia and find an error rate
of 20%. When you check Wikidata for its quality I expect it to be much
better than 90%.

It is blooming obvious that Wikipedians only see fault elsewhere and are
forgiving for the error in their own way.
Thanks,
  GerardM

On 25 January 2016 at 14:55, Andreas Kolbe  wrote:

> On Fri, Jan 22, 2016 at 9:34 AM, Magnus Manske <
> magnusman...@googlemail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > What you hear is "Wikidata is unreliable" (compared to the respective
> > Wikipedia; proof, anyone? Please, show me proof; silence or anecdotes
> don't
> > count)
>
>
>
> Any non-trivial content you want to add to Wikipedia today has to fulfil
> one basic criterion: that the content be traceable to a professionally
> published source.
>
> Most Wikidata content fails that criterion.[1] It's blooming obvious that
> Wikidata is "unreliable" according to Wikipedia's definition of a "reliable
> source", isn't it?[2]
>
> [1] https://tools.wmflabs.org/wikidata-todo/stats.php
> [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:SPS
> ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-25 Thread Andreas Kolbe

On Fri, Jan 22, 2016 at 9:34 AM, Magnus Manske 
wrote:

> What you hear is "Wikidata is unreliable" (compared to the respective
> Wikipedia; proof, anyone? Please, show me proof; silence or anecdotes don't
> count)



Any non-trivial content you want to add to Wikipedia today has to fulfil
one basic criterion: that the content be traceable to a professionally
published source.

Most Wikidata content fails that criterion.[1] It's blooming obvious that
Wikidata is "unreliable" according to Wikipedia's definition of a "reliable
source", isn't it?[2]

[1] https://tools.wmflabs.org/wikidata-todo/stats.php
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:SPS
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-22 Thread Lydia Pintscher

On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 4:58 PM, Jens Best  wrote:
> I'm not sure where you get your impressions, Magnus. But when I discuss
> ideas for a better implementation of Wikidata into Wikipedia to improve
> automatisation of repetitive editing procedures, including the
> implementation of the possible use of structured data, I rarely hear "It Is
> Not Made Here" or "It's Bad Because Its New".
>
> When it comes to analyse the problems with Wikidata it isn't only about
> possible early-lifecycle issues(which can be fix), but about the blind spot
> when it comes to develope working social processes which keep everybody
> (especially the editors) in the picture.
>
> Community involvement (especially consultations) are often seem to be
> organized only out of necessity. They not in the middle of the
> decision-making process. Nobody said that doing things the way they are
> done in a crowdsourced, community-driven process are easy, but this is no
> excuse for any Foundation or other similiar entity to set up an
> intransparent, precendents creating process where community becomes
> accessories.

I have spent a huge part of my waking hours over the past 4 years
making sure that community always comes first in Wikidata. And I will
continue to do so. But that doesn't mean that everyone always gets
their way because that is simply impossible with the demands people
have for Wikidata. What I have been doing and will continue to do is
to engage with people on a rational and non-agitated level and hear
them out so we can find ways to make it happen or get a better
understanding of why something can't be done (yet). What we have
created through this is an amazingly friendly, hard working and
reasonable community on Wikidata that I am proud of every single day.

Cheers
Lydia

-- 
Lydia Pintscher - http://about.me/lydia.pintscher
Product Manager for Wikidata

Wikimedia Deutschland e.V.
Tempelhofer Ufer 23-24
10963 Berlin
www.wikimedia.de

Wikimedia Deutschland - Gesellschaft zur Förderung Freien Wissens e. V.

Eingetragen im Vereinsregister des Amtsgerichts Berlin-Charlottenburg
unter der Nummer 23855 Nz. Als gemeinnützig anerkannt durch das
Finanzamt für Körperschaften I Berlin, Steuernummer 27/029/42207.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-22 Thread Magnus Manske

Ah, I see. I am the problem. Glad we cleared that up.

On Fri, Jan 22, 2016 at 6:56 AM Isarra Yos  wrote:

> You just don't get it, do you? Even from the start this was all about
> social issues with rollouts, and still you are contributing to the very
> same social problems you so blindly condemned.
>
> -I
>
> On 20/01/16 14:16, Magnus Manske wrote:
> > On Wed, Jan 20, 2016 at 12:58 AM Todd Allen 
> wrote:
> >
> >> Once the VisualEditor was fit for purpose and a good deployment strategy
> >> had been developed, the English Wikipedia community overwhelmingly
> >> supported rolling it out. (
> >>
> >>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)/Archive_125#Gradually_enabling_VisualEditor_for_new_accounts
> >> )
> >>
> > That is for new accounts only. Without an account, still no VE for you,
> > even if you are probably the one needing it most.
> >
> >> It's not Luddism, it's not "resistance to change", it's not "power
> users"
> >> grumpy about newbies having an easier time, it's not anything like that.
> >> It's that in the state it was initially released in, the thing did not
> >> work.
> >>
> > No one said "Luddism", except to defend against its use. Odd.
> >
> >
> >> So yes, by all means, let's try new things. But try:
> >>
> >> 1: Asking us what we actually want, before coding something up and
> feeling
> >> obligated to push it out. People are a lot more receptive to something
> they
> >> asked for than something being forced upon them. That's been an issue
> with
> >> Flow. It's not that it doesn't work well (though it doesn't), it's that
> it
> >> wasn't wanted to start with. So instead of "Here's the new discussion
> >> system", ask "What can we do to make our system of discussion better?"
> >>
> > Listening to what editors want is important. ONLY listening to wad
> editors
> > want is bad. People often don't know what they want or need, until they
> see
> > it. Compare the famous (possibly misattributed) Henry Ford quote:
> > “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster
> > horses.”
> >
> > Also, veteran editors do not represent the readers or casual/newbie
> > editors; their needs are often quite different.
> >
> >
> >> 2: Make sure it works. Have an opt-in beta phase. Doesn't have to be
> >> perfect, but certainly make sure it's not breaking page formatting all
> over
> >> the place. You'll notice, for example, that there wasn't really any
> >> resistance to HHVM. It worked well, it was desirable, it was clearly fit
> >> for purpose. So no, there isn't just a reflexive change aversion. Though
> >> the previous missteps and hamfisted followups have, rather ironically,
> >> created a lot of the reflexive change aversion that people said was
> there.
> >>
> > Wrong example. The HHMV switch was a back-end change that should have had
> > no visible effect. As long as the servers are fast, people don't really
> > care what's going on there. Did e.g. English Wikipedia actually vote on
> > HHMV?
> >
> >> 3: Be nice (but NOT condescending or patronizing) if an issue comes up.
> >> "Superprotect" alienated people right quickly, and turned what could
> have
> >> been a productive (if tense) conversation into a war. Same with refusal
> to
> >> budge on VE and the arrogant tone several people took. Yes, some people
> >> might be rude about objecting to the change. Don't sink to their level.
> If
> >> they call the new software a steaming pile, ask "Could you offer more
> >> concrete feedback?"
> >>
> > Superprotect was used to revert an admin action on de.wikipedia, an
> action
> > that might actually fall under U.S. or German computer sabotage laws.
> This
> > was hailed as some heroic action by that vocal group I keep mentioning,
> > when it can easily be seen as someone abusing the privileges given by the
> > Foundation (as owners of the servers) to deactivate functionality put in
> > place by the Foundation.
> > The creation and subsequent use of superprotect was not exactly the most
> > wise decision ever undertaken, but neither was the original sabotage
> > (literally so; using access to a machine to stop it from working, just
> not
> > using a wooden shoe).
> > And while it is always good to ask for more concrete feedback, it is even
> > better to offer it to begin with.
> >
> >
> >> 4: Don't surprise people. Not everyone follows the Village Pumps or what
> >> have you. If a major new feature is set to roll out, do banners, do
> >> watchlist notices, do whatever it takes, but make sure people know. When
> >> Mediaviewer was rolled out, all of a sudden, I was just having images
> act
> >> completely different. I had no idea what was going on. People are more
> >> amenable to change if you brace them for it. Even better, do that to
> >> develop a rollout strategy in advance with the community. (You already
> know
> >> they want it; they asked for it. Right?)
> >>
> > The Foundation appears to be doing this already. I even saw a mail about
> it
> > today.
>

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-22 Thread Magnus Manske

On Thu, Jan 21, 2016 at 11:54 PM Jens Best  wrote:

> I'm not sure where you get your impressions, Magnus. But when I discuss
> ideas for a better implementation of Wikidata into Wikipedia to improve
> automatisation of repetitive editing procedures, including the
> implementation of the possible use of structured data, I rarely hear "It Is
> Not Made Here" or "It's Bad Because Its New".
>

No, of course you don't hear that, because no one wants to sound like that.
What you hear is "Wikidata is unreliable" (compared to the respective
Wikipedia; proof, anyone? Please, show me proof; silence or anecdotes don't
count), which is the "Wikipedia is unreliable" Spiel we heard from
Britannica or Brockhaus. I have a bot that can add and update lists on
Wikis, and it is accused by some of "vandalism", even though it doesn't
edit in the article namespace, and requires a user-made template to do
edits in the first place. Those are the kind of strawman "arguments" made
instead.

> When it comes to analyse the problems with Wikidata it isn't only about
> possible early-lifecycle issues(which can be fix), but about the blind spot
> when it comes to develope working social processes which keep everybody
> (especially the editors) in the picture.
>

People can edit Wikipedia. People can edit Wikidata. With the same account.
Erveryone can have as clear a picture as they want. Few do.

It strikes me that a similar thing was happening to Commons, in the same
"communities". There is still a "don't move your pictures to Commons, they
will be deleted!" meme floating around on German Wikipedia.

>
> Community involvement (especially consultations) are often seem to be
> organized only out of necessity. They not in the middle of the
> decision-making process. Nobody said that doing things the way they are
> done in a crowdsourced, community-driven process are easy, but this is no
> excuse for any Foundation or other similiar entity to set up an
> intransparent, precendents creating process where community becomes
> accessories.
>
> The whole way the Knowledge Engine process was implemented, the whole still
> intransparent incident of kicking a highly valued community-selected person
> out of the WMF board are clear signals that some people already decided
> about the future of Wikimedia and now staging a folksy broad consultation
> circus to create the impression of transparent community involvement. -
> Deciding about the color of the car if you would instead prefer to talk
> about the vehicle is the illusion of community-based decisionmaking.
>

Not sure what's with that "Knowledge Engine" phrase -  looks to me it was
used by the donating party, and made its way into a blog. Anyone know more
details?

And communities don't start new things. Individuals, or small groups of
them, do. I was on the GNU mailing list when, after the Nupedia launch,
they were discussing the creation of a "free encyclopedia". Lots of
high-flying plans, lots of talk. And if WIkipedia hadn't started, they
would still be talking. IIRC they shut up pretty quickly after that.
Sometimes, you just need to throw things at the wall and see what sticks.
And if you wait around for permission of communities, the wall will crumble
to dust before anything happens.

And we are NOT sidetracking to some WMF personell issues in a thread that
has my name on it, please! ;-)

> We need a lot of change in the social procedures at the level of really
> needed ground work which is important for changing the Wikiprojects to make
> them work for the future. To reflect and to work on the development of
> these social procedures would be the most precious work to be done by the
> Foundation. Instead the Foundation dreams of techbubble-driven, humanless
> wonderland full of free floading informations which magically forms into
> knowledge when it somehow hits a human being.
>

Still with the babbling about a "techbubble"? I thought we had moved past
that nonsense.

>
> I like the idea of Wikidata.
> I like the idea of combining Encylopedia with structured data to enable
> understanding and easy re-use at the reader-side of Wikiprojects. So many
> things are imaginable there when the culture of conveying the needed
> individual and social skills are done well. Tech is only tool to these
> processes. Tools are important, but not the purpose when it comes to
> disseminate knowledge.
>

I agree with this entire paragraph 100%. I would like to add, though, that
sometimes, technology opens an unexpected door, even, and especially, when
no one asked for it. Like Jimbo and Larry adding a wiki to the Nupedia
site, just to see what would happen.

Cheers,
Magnus

>
> regards,
> Jens
>
>
>
>
> 2016-01-19 15:56 GMT+01:00 Magnus Manske :
>
> > Anthony, it does seem you've missed some of which I wrote in this
> thread. I
> > have no problem with specific criticism where it is deserved, and I do
> well
> > remember that the Visual Editor, in its early incarnation, was not quite
> up
> > to th

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-21 Thread Yaroslav M. Blanter


On 2016-01-19 16:58, Jens Best wrote:



I like the idea of Wikidata.
I like the idea of combining Encylopedia with structured data to enable
understanding and easy re-use at the reader-side of Wikiprojects. So 
many

things are imaginable there when the culture of conveying the needed
individual and social skills are done well. Tech is only tool to these
processes. Tools are important, but not the purpose when it comes to
disseminate knowledge.

regards,
Jens



Actually, Wikidata itself is an excellent positive example of community 
involvement. All things, including technical innovations, are discussed 
at the village pump (there, it is called Project Chat); for those who 
are less active in some areas there are weekly digests covering all the 
activities; if there is a technical problem help comes within minutes. 
It is of course much easier for a smaller scale project, but the 
problems in Wikipedia from Wikidata come, I believe, not from negligence 
or from insufficient attention to the community, but from bad 
communication.


Cheers
Yaroslav

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-21 Thread Isarra Yos

You just don't get it, do you? Even from the start this was all about
social issues with rollouts, and still you are contributing to the very
same social problems you so blindly condemned.

-I

On 20/01/16 14:16, Magnus Manske wrote:

On Wed, Jan 20, 2016 at 12:58 AM Todd Allen wrote:

Once the VisualEditor was fit for purpose and a good deployment strategy
had been developed, the English Wikipedia community overwhelmingly
supported rolling it out. (

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)/Archive_125#Gradually_enabling_VisualEditor_for_new_accounts
)

That is for new accounts only. Without an account, still no VE for you,
even if you are probably the one needing it most.

It's not Luddism, it's not "resistance to change", it's not "power users"
grumpy about newbies having an easier time, it's not anything like that.
It's that in the state it was initially released in, the thing did not
work.

No one said "Luddism", except to defend against its use. Odd.

So yes, by all means, let's try new things. But try:

1: Asking us what we actually want, before coding something up and feeling
obligated to push it out. People are a lot more receptive to something they
asked for than something being forced upon them. That's been an issue with
Flow. It's not that it doesn't work well (though it doesn't), it's that it
wasn't wanted to start with. So instead of "Here's the new discussion
system", ask "What can we do to make our system of discussion better?"

Listening to what editors want is important. ONLY listening to wad editors
want is bad. People often don't know what they want or need, until they see
it. Compare the famous (possibly misattributed) Henry Ford quote:
“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster
horses.”

Also, veteran editors do not represent the readers or casual/newbie
editors; their needs are often quite different.

2: Make sure it works. Have an opt-in beta phase. Doesn't have to be
perfect, but certainly make sure it's not breaking page formatting all over
the place. You'll notice, for example, that there wasn't really any
resistance to HHVM. It worked well, it was desirable, it was clearly fit
for purpose. So no, there isn't just a reflexive change aversion. Though
the previous missteps and hamfisted followups have, rather ironically,
created a lot of the reflexive change aversion that people said was there.

Wrong example. The HHMV switch was a back-end change that should have had
no visible effect. As long as the servers are fast, people don't really
care what's going on there. Did e.g. English Wikipedia actually vote on
HHMV?

3: Be nice (but NOT condescending or patronizing) if an issue comes up.
"Superprotect" alienated people right quickly, and turned what could have
been a productive (if tense) conversation into a war. Same with refusal to
budge on VE and the arrogant tone several people took. Yes, some people
might be rude about objecting to the change. Don't sink to their level. If
they call the new software a steaming pile, ask "Could you offer more
concrete feedback?"

Superprotect was used to revert an admin action on de.wikipedia, an action
that might actually fall under U.S. or German computer sabotage laws. This
was hailed as some heroic action by that vocal group I keep mentioning,
when it can easily be seen as someone abusing the privileges given by the
Foundation (as owners of the servers) to deactivate functionality put in
place by the Foundation.
The creation and subsequent use of superprotect was not exactly the most
wise decision ever undertaken, but neither was the original sabotage
(literally so; using access to a machine to stop it from working, just not
using a wooden shoe).
And while it is always good to ask for more concrete feedback, it is even
better to offer it to begin with.

4: Don't surprise people. Not everyone follows the Village Pumps or what
have you. If a major new feature is set to roll out, do banners, do
watchlist notices, do whatever it takes, but make sure people know. When
Mediaviewer was rolled out, all of a sudden, I was just having images act
completely different. I had no idea what was going on. People are more
amenable to change if you brace them for it. Even better, do that to
develop a rollout strategy in advance with the community. (You already know
they want it; they asked for it. Right?)

The Foundation appears to be doing this already. I even saw a mail about it
today.

5: If at all feasible, offer an easy opt-out. People are actually more
likely to give something a decent try if they know they can switch back if
they don't like it.

IIRC, both VE and MediaViewer offered opt-out from the beginning; the MV
opt-out just was "below the fold" or something.

6: Show willingness to budge. "No, we won't do ACTRIAL, period." "You get
VE, like it or not." "You're getting Mediaviewer even if we have to develop
a new protection level to cram it down your throats!" That type of
h

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-21 Thread Gerard Meijssen

Hoi,
Jens, so you talk about improving Wikipedia. What I hear is basic
negativity. What is it in what you say that will actually make a positive
difference. Have you considered how Wikidata already made a big quality
improvement and do you agree that by taking the next step from interwiki
links and move to links and red links Wikidata would easily improve any
Wikipedia actually any Wikimedia project. It does not need sources, it does
not need anything but the realisation that it will remove a whole class of
errors that can be as much as 20% in some articles.

Really Jens, let us forget about adding stumbling blocks and focus on
quality. Improving quality in Wikipedia because we can.
Thanks,
  GerardM

On 19 January 2016 at 16:58, Jens Best  wrote:

> I'm not sure where you get your impressions, Magnus. But when I discuss
> ideas for a better implementation of Wikidata into Wikipedia to improve
> automatisation of repetitive editing procedures, including the
> implementation of the possible use of structured data, I rarely hear "It Is
> Not Made Here" or "It's Bad Because Its New".
>
> When it comes to analyse the problems with Wikidata it isn't only about
> possible early-lifecycle issues(which can be fix), but about the blind spot
> when it comes to develope working social processes which keep everybody
> (especially the editors) in the picture.
>
> Community involvement (especially consultations) are often seem to be
> organized only out of necessity. They not in the middle of the
> decision-making process. Nobody said that doing things the way they are
> done in a crowdsourced, community-driven process are easy, but this is no
> excuse for any Foundation or other similiar entity to set up an
> intransparent, precendents creating process where community becomes
> accessories.
>
> The whole way the Knowledge Engine process was implemented, the whole still
> intransparent incident of kicking a highly valued community-selected person
> out of the WMF board are clear signals that some people already decided
> about the future of Wikimedia and now staging a folksy broad consultation
> circus to create the impression of transparent community involvement. -
> Deciding about the color of the car if you would instead prefer to talk
> about the vehicle is the illusion of community-based decisionmaking.
>
> We need a lot of change in the social procedures at the level of really
> needed ground work which is important for changing the Wikiprojects to make
> them work for the future. To reflect and to work on the development of
> these social procedures would be the most precious work to be done by the
> Foundation. Instead the Foundation dreams of techbubble-driven, humanless
> wonderland full of free floading informations which magically forms into
> knowledge when it somehow hits a human being.
>
> I like the idea of Wikidata.
> I like the idea of combining Encylopedia with structured data to enable
> understanding and easy re-use at the reader-side of Wikiprojects. So many
> things are imaginable there when the culture of conveying the needed
> individual and social skills are done well. Tech is only tool to these
> processes. Tools are important, but not the purpose when it comes to
> disseminate knowledge.
>
> regards,
> Jens
>
>
>
>
> 2016-01-19 15:56 GMT+01:00 Magnus Manske :
>
> > Anthony, it does seem you've missed some of which I wrote in this
> thread. I
> > have no problem with specific criticism where it is deserved, and I do
> well
> > remember that the Visual Editor, in its early incarnation, was not quite
> up
> > to the job.
> >
> > What I do have a problem with is people fixating on some technical or
> > early-lifecycle issues, declaring the entire thing worthless, even
> > dangerous, and spreading that view around. This behaviour, I have seen
> time
> > and again, with the Media Viewer, with Wikidata.
> >
> > It's bad because it's broken - let's come together and fix it.
> >
> > It's bad because ... well, everyone says it's bad. And new. And Not Made
> > Here. THAT is a problem, and not a technological one.
> >
> > On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 2:39 PM Anthony Cole 
> wrote:
> >
> > > Magnus, you've missed the point of the visual editor revolt. A couple
> of
> > > people here have tried to explain that to you, politely. And you're
> > > persisting with your idée fixe.
> > >
> > > There were two parts to the visual editor catastrophe, actually. The
> > > product wasn't ready for anyone to use. Not veteran editors. Not
> newbies.
> > > Newbies who used it were less likely to successfully complete an edit.
> It
> > > was broken, and the WMF insisted we had to use it.
> > >
> > > The second part of the problem was arrogance. Yes, a few editors were
> > > unnecessarily rude about the product and the developers. But then most
> of
> > > the developers and tech staff who dealt with the community arrogantly
> > > characterised *anyone* who complained about the product as an ignorant,
> > > selfish Ludite -

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-21 Thread Jens Best

I'm not sure where you get your impressions, Magnus. But when I discuss
ideas for a better implementation of Wikidata into Wikipedia to improve
automatisation of repetitive editing procedures, including the
implementation of the possible use of structured data, I rarely hear "It Is
Not Made Here" or "It's Bad Because Its New".

When it comes to analyse the problems with Wikidata it isn't only about
possible early-lifecycle issues(which can be fix), but about the blind spot
when it comes to develope working social processes which keep everybody
(especially the editors) in the picture.

Community involvement (especially consultations) are often seem to be
organized only out of necessity. They not in the middle of the
decision-making process. Nobody said that doing things the way they are
done in a crowdsourced, community-driven process are easy, but this is no
excuse for any Foundation or other similiar entity to set up an
intransparent, precendents creating process where community becomes
accessories.

The whole way the Knowledge Engine process was implemented, the whole still
intransparent incident of kicking a highly valued community-selected person
out of the WMF board are clear signals that some people already decided
about the future of Wikimedia and now staging a folksy broad consultation
circus to create the impression of transparent community involvement. -
Deciding about the color of the car if you would instead prefer to talk
about the vehicle is the illusion of community-based decisionmaking.

We need a lot of change in the social procedures at the level of really
needed ground work which is important for changing the Wikiprojects to make
them work for the future. To reflect and to work on the development of
these social procedures would be the most precious work to be done by the
Foundation. Instead the Foundation dreams of techbubble-driven, humanless
wonderland full of free floading informations which magically forms into
knowledge when it somehow hits a human being.

I like the idea of Wikidata.
I like the idea of combining Encylopedia with structured data to enable
understanding and easy re-use at the reader-side of Wikiprojects. So many
things are imaginable there when the culture of conveying the needed
individual and social skills are done well. Tech is only tool to these
processes. Tools are important, but not the purpose when it comes to
disseminate knowledge.

regards,
Jens

2016-01-19 15:56 GMT+01:00 Magnus Manske :

> Anthony, it does seem you've missed some of which I wrote in this thread. I
> have no problem with specific criticism where it is deserved, and I do well
> remember that the Visual Editor, in its early incarnation, was not quite up
> to the job.
>
> What I do have a problem with is people fixating on some technical or
> early-lifecycle issues, declaring the entire thing worthless, even
> dangerous, and spreading that view around. This behaviour, I have seen time
> and again, with the Media Viewer, with Wikidata.
>
> It's bad because it's broken - let's come together and fix it.
>
> It's bad because ... well, everyone says it's bad. And new. And Not Made
> Here. THAT is a problem, and not a technological one.
>
> On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 2:39 PM Anthony Cole  wrote:
>
> > Magnus, you've missed the point of the visual editor revolt. A couple of
> > people here have tried to explain that to you, politely. And you're
> > persisting with your idée fixe.
> >
> > There were two parts to the visual editor catastrophe, actually. The
> > product wasn't ready for anyone to use. Not veteran editors. Not newbies.
> > Newbies who used it were less likely to successfully complete an edit. It
> > was broken, and the WMF insisted we had to use it.
> >
> > The second part of the problem was arrogance. Yes, a few editors were
> > unnecessarily rude about the product and the developers. But then most of
> > the developers and tech staff who dealt with the community arrogantly
> > characterised *anyone* who complained about the product as an ignorant,
> > selfish Ludite - and you're persisting with that characterisation now.
> >
> > The WMF under Lila has learned the lessons from that, and they have
> > fostered a much healthier relationship between the developers and the
> > community. You clearly haven't learned all you might have.
> >
> > In fact, reading the arrogant responses from you here and in the
> concurrent
> > thread titled "How to disseminate free knowledge," and from Denny in
> > earlier threads addressing criticism of WikiData, it seems to me there is
> > still a significant arrogance problem that needs addressing, at least
> over
> > at WikiData.
> >
> > Some people may approach you arrogantly, maybe even insultingly, about an
> > innovation, and I suppose you might be justified in talking down to them
> or
> > ridiculing them (though I advise against it.). But if you can't
> distinguish
> > them from those who approach you with genuine concerns and well-founded
> > critic

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-20 Thread Marc A. Pelletier


On 2016-01-20 10:09 PM, Risker wrote:

Marc is not a member of the WMF staff.


[anymore].

But yeah, that was my personal opinion only and not any sort of 
staff-like thing - I was never involved in superprotect or its deployment.


I was hacking happily at Wikimania in London when I saw (a) parts of 
dewiki go insane over the media viewer followed by (b) parts of WMF go 
insane over the parts of dewiki going insane.  Hilarity ensued. My own 
reaction at the time, if I recall correctly, was "what an idiot" 
followed by "is [Erik] insane?  That is the single worst way of handling 
this".  Both were accompanied with copious facepalms.


-- Marc


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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-20 Thread Risker

On 20 January 2016 at 22:08, John Mark Vandenberg  wrote:

> On Wed, Jan 20, 2016 at 12:51 PM, Marc A. Pelletier 
> wrote:
> > On 2016-01-19 12:53 PM, Pine W wrote:
> >>
> >> The constitutional crisis that WMF created by using Superprotect to
> force
> >> Image VIewer on the communities [...]
> >
> >
> > ... except that this is not what happened.  While that narrative might be
> > satisfying for someone who looks for a sense of being the stalwart
> defender
> > of an oppressed community, the reality is that superprotect was created
> to
> > block the deployment of a technically inapt and entirely broken "fix"
> that
> > was - itself - a kneejerk reaction.
> >
> > Which is not to say that its creation or use was wise in any way - it
> > wasn't.  But trying to reframe things in "oh, evil WMF did all wrong
> against
> > the poor, innocent community" terms serves no purpose other than create a
> > windmill to tilt at.
>
> It is comments like this from WMF staff which make me think that WMF
> has not yet really internalised the reason why VE, MV, etc. were such
> a problem.
>
>
Marc is not a member of the WMF staff.

Risker/Anne
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-20 Thread John Mark Vandenberg

On Wed, Jan 20, 2016 at 12:51 PM, Marc A. Pelletier  wrote:
> On 2016-01-19 12:53 PM, Pine W wrote:
>>
>> The constitutional crisis that WMF created by using Superprotect to force
>> Image VIewer on the communities [...]
>
>
> ... except that this is not what happened.  While that narrative might be
> satisfying for someone who looks for a sense of being the stalwart defender
> of an oppressed community, the reality is that superprotect was created to
> block the deployment of a technically inapt and entirely broken "fix" that
> was - itself - a kneejerk reaction.
>
> Which is not to say that its creation or use was wise in any way - it
> wasn't.  But trying to reframe things in "oh, evil WMF did all wrong against
> the poor, innocent community" terms serves no purpose other than create a
> windmill to tilt at.

It is comments like this from WMF staff which make me think that WMF
has not yet really internalised the reason why VE, MV, etc. were such
a problem.

-- 
John Vandenberg

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-20 Thread Pete Forsyth

On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 5:51 PM, Marc A. Pelletier  wrote:

> On 2016-01-19 12:53 PM, Pine W wrote:
>
>> The constitutional crisis that WMF created by using Superprotect to force
>> Image VIewer on the communities [...]
>>
>
> ... except that this is not what happened.  While that narrative might be
> satisfying for someone who looks for a sense of being the stalwart defender
> of an oppressed community, the reality is that superprotect was created to
> block the deployment of a technically inapt and entirely broken "fix" that
> was - itself - a kneejerk reaction.
>

No, Marc. Your version is quite a stretch. According to Lila Tretikov --
the person responsible for rolling out Superprotect -- its legacy is that
it established a "precedent of mistrust
."

It was deployed to block something, but the thing that was technically
inept was the initial deployment of Media Viewer. Even if you (or WMF)
disagreed, there was no real cost to the alternative of disabling it by
default, with the possibility of fixing it and redeploying it.

Even now, more than a year later, independent news organizations and web
sites frequently cite the wrong person when reusing Commons photos -- they
cite the uploader, rather than the photographer. That bug (one of many) was
caught, has now been fixed (in the last couple of weeks). It was caught by
a photographer looking after his own attribution -- a photographer who did
not sign the Superprotect letter, if that matters -- not by Wikimedia staff.

Media Viewer was deployed before it was ready. There was no benefit to
doing so. Superprotect was deployed to reinforce that bad decision.

Which is not to say that its creation or use was wise in any way - it
> wasn't.  But trying to reframe things in "oh, evil WMF did all wrong
> against the poor, innocent community" terms serves no purpose other than
> create a windmill to tilt at.

The Wikimedia Foundation needs, first and foremost, to look after the
principle and unique asset that gives the Wikimedia and Wikipedia brands
value: its volunteer community. When the Wikimedia Foundation conducts
itself in a way that leads to division, it's damaging our shared vision,
and it needs to be held accountable. None of that is to say that the
Wikimedia Foundation should give way before a mob of pitchfork-wielding
anarchists; but to the repeated suggestion that that's what the community
(or those opposed to any specific software deployment) is, I say:

Citation needed.

-Pete
[[User:Peteforsyth]]
Author of letter objecting to Superprotect:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Letter_to_Wikimedia_Foundation:_Superprotect_and_Media_Viewer
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-20 Thread Marc A. Pelletier


On 2016-01-19 12:53 PM, Pine W wrote:

The constitutional crisis that WMF created by using Superprotect to force
Image VIewer on the communities [...]


... except that this is not what happened.  While that narrative might 
be satisfying for someone who looks for a sense of being the stalwart 
defender of an oppressed community, the reality is that superprotect was 
created to block the deployment of a technically inapt and entirely 
broken "fix" that was - itself - a kneejerk reaction.


Which is not to say that its creation or use was wise in any way - it 
wasn't.  But trying to reframe things in "oh, evil WMF did all wrong 
against the poor, innocent community" terms serves no purpose other than 
create a windmill to tilt at.


-- Marc


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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-20 Thread Magnus Manske

On Wed, Jan 20, 2016 at 12:58 AM Todd Allen  wrote:

> Once the VisualEditor was fit for purpose and a good deployment strategy
> had been developed, the English Wikipedia community overwhelmingly
> supported rolling it out. (
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)/Archive_125#Gradually_enabling_VisualEditor_for_new_accounts
> )
>
That is for new accounts only. Without an account, still no VE for you,
even if you are probably the one needing it most.

>
> It's not Luddism, it's not "resistance to change", it's not "power users"
> grumpy about newbies having an easier time, it's not anything like that.
> It's that in the state it was initially released in, the thing did not
> work.
>

No one said "Luddism", except to defend against its use. Odd.

> So yes, by all means, let's try new things. But try:
>
> 1: Asking us what we actually want, before coding something up and feeling
> obligated to push it out. People are a lot more receptive to something they
> asked for than something being forced upon them. That's been an issue with
> Flow. It's not that it doesn't work well (though it doesn't), it's that it
> wasn't wanted to start with. So instead of "Here's the new discussion
> system", ask "What can we do to make our system of discussion better?"
>

Listening to what editors want is important. ONLY listening to wad editors
want is bad. People often don't know what they want or need, until they see
it. Compare the famous (possibly misattributed) Henry Ford quote:
“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster
horses.”

Also, veteran editors do not represent the readers or casual/newbie
editors; their needs are often quite different.

>
> 2: Make sure it works. Have an opt-in beta phase. Doesn't have to be
> perfect, but certainly make sure it's not breaking page formatting all over
> the place. You'll notice, for example, that there wasn't really any
> resistance to HHVM. It worked well, it was desirable, it was clearly fit
> for purpose. So no, there isn't just a reflexive change aversion. Though
> the previous missteps and hamfisted followups have, rather ironically,
> created a lot of the reflexive change aversion that people said was there.
>

Wrong example. The HHMV switch was a back-end change that should have had
no visible effect. As long as the servers are fast, people don't really
care what's going on there. Did e.g. English Wikipedia actually vote on
HHMV?

>
> 3: Be nice (but NOT condescending or patronizing) if an issue comes up.
> "Superprotect" alienated people right quickly, and turned what could have
> been a productive (if tense) conversation into a war. Same with refusal to
> budge on VE and the arrogant tone several people took. Yes, some people
> might be rude about objecting to the change. Don't sink to their level. If
> they call the new software a steaming pile, ask "Could you offer more
> concrete feedback?"
>

Superprotect was used to revert an admin action on de.wikipedia, an action
that might actually fall under U.S. or German computer sabotage laws. This
was hailed as some heroic action by that vocal group I keep mentioning,
when it can easily be seen as someone abusing the privileges given by the
Foundation (as owners of the servers) to deactivate functionality put in
place by the Foundation.
The creation and subsequent use of superprotect was not exactly the most
wise decision ever undertaken, but neither was the original sabotage
(literally so; using access to a machine to stop it from working, just not
using a wooden shoe).
And while it is always good to ask for more concrete feedback, it is even
better to offer it to begin with.

>
> 4: Don't surprise people. Not everyone follows the Village Pumps or what
> have you. If a major new feature is set to roll out, do banners, do
> watchlist notices, do whatever it takes, but make sure people know. When
> Mediaviewer was rolled out, all of a sudden, I was just having images act
> completely different. I had no idea what was going on. People are more
> amenable to change if you brace them for it. Even better, do that to
> develop a rollout strategy in advance with the community. (You already know
> they want it; they asked for it. Right?)
>

The Foundation appears to be doing this already. I even saw a mail about it
today.

>
> 5: If at all feasible, offer an easy opt-out. People are actually more
> likely to give something a decent try if they know they can switch back if
> they don't like it.
>

IIRC, both VE and MediaViewer offered opt-out from the beginning; the MV
opt-out just was "below the fold" or something.

>
> 6: Show willingness to budge. "No, we won't do ACTRIAL, period." "You get
> VE, like it or not." "You're getting Mediaviewer even if we have to develop
> a new protection level to cram it down your throats!" That type of
> hamfisted, I'm-right-you're-wrong approach will gear people right up for a
> fight. Fights are bad. Discussions are good. But people don'

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-19 Thread Todd Allen

Once the VisualEditor was fit for purpose and a good deployment strategy
had been developed, the English Wikipedia community overwhelmingly
supported rolling it out. (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)/Archive_125#Gradually_enabling_VisualEditor_for_new_accounts
)

It's not Luddism, it's not "resistance to change", it's not "power users"
grumpy about newbies having an easier time, it's not anything like that.
It's that in the state it was initially released in, the thing did not work.

So yes, by all means, let's try new things. But try:

1: Asking us what we actually want, before coding something up and feeling
obligated to push it out. People are a lot more receptive to something they
asked for than something being forced upon them. That's been an issue with
Flow. It's not that it doesn't work well (though it doesn't), it's that it
wasn't wanted to start with. So instead of "Here's the new discussion
system", ask "What can we do to make our system of discussion better?"

2: Make sure it works. Have an opt-in beta phase. Doesn't have to be
perfect, but certainly make sure it's not breaking page formatting all over
the place. You'll notice, for example, that there wasn't really any
resistance to HHVM. It worked well, it was desirable, it was clearly fit
for purpose. So no, there isn't just a reflexive change aversion. Though
the previous missteps and hamfisted followups have, rather ironically,
created a lot of the reflexive change aversion that people said was there.

3: Be nice (but NOT condescending or patronizing) if an issue comes up.
"Superprotect" alienated people right quickly, and turned what could have
been a productive (if tense) conversation into a war. Same with refusal to
budge on VE and the arrogant tone several people took. Yes, some people
might be rude about objecting to the change. Don't sink to their level. If
they call the new software a steaming pile, ask "Could you offer more
concrete feedback?"

4: Don't surprise people. Not everyone follows the Village Pumps or what
have you. If a major new feature is set to roll out, do banners, do
watchlist notices, do whatever it takes, but make sure people know. When
Mediaviewer was rolled out, all of a sudden, I was just having images act
completely different. I had no idea what was going on. People are more
amenable to change if you brace them for it. Even better, do that to
develop a rollout strategy in advance with the community. (You already know
they want it; they asked for it. Right?)

5: If at all feasible, offer an easy opt-out. People are actually more
likely to give something a decent try if they know they can switch back if
they don't like it.

6: Show willingness to budge. "No, we won't do ACTRIAL, period." "You get
VE, like it or not." "You're getting Mediaviewer even if we have to develop
a new protection level to cram it down your throats!" That type of
hamfisted, I'm-right-you're-wrong approach will gear people right up for a
fight. Fights are bad. Discussions are good. But people don't like to talk
to a brick wall.

Many of us were asking for a WYSIWYG editor for some time, because we very
much need a way to reach out to prospective editors who are intimidated by
wikimarkup or just don't care to learn it. So it wasn't that we were
opposed to VE in principle. Good idea, bad execution.

On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 7:39 AM, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Magnus, you've missed the point of the visual editor revolt. A couple of
> people here have tried to explain that to you, politely. And you're
> persisting with your idée fixe.
>
> There were two parts to the visual editor catastrophe, actually. The
> product wasn't ready for anyone to use. Not veteran editors. Not newbies.
> Newbies who used it were less likely to successfully complete an edit. It
> was broken, and the WMF insisted we had to use it.
>
> The second part of the problem was arrogance. Yes, a few editors were
> unnecessarily rude about the product and the developers. But then most of
> the developers and tech staff who dealt with the community arrogantly
> characterised *anyone* who complained about the product as an ignorant,
> selfish Ludite - and you're persisting with that characterisation now.
>
> The WMF under Lila has learned the lessons from that, and they have
> fostered a much healthier relationship between the developers and the
> community. You clearly haven't learned all you might have.
>
> In fact, reading the arrogant responses from you here and in the concurrent
> thread titled "How to disseminate free knowledge," and from Denny in
> earlier threads addressing criticism of WikiData, it seems to me there is
> still a significant arrogance problem that needs addressing, at least over
> at WikiData.
>
> Some people may approach you arrogantly, maybe even insultingly, about an
> innovation, and I suppose you might be justified in talking down to them or
> ridiculing them (though I advise against it.). But if you can't distinguish
> th

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-19 Thread Philippe Beaudette

On Mon, Jan 18, 2016 at 1:45 PM, David Gerard  wrote:

>
>
> 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.
>

This.  David and Risker say it well.  From my position, as the guy
responsible for the team that was worried about the non-technical aspects
of the rollout,  I think I'm safe

in saying that the root cause was a lack of a clearly articulated minimum
viable product. From the WMF developers' POV, "Hey!  it does half of what
you need!" was a pretty substantial win at the time.  From the POV of a
random editor, "Hey!  it only does //half// of what I need" was pretty
damning criticism.

I own part of the blame for that rollout. I wish I'd pushed back harder.
In my own defense, the team that had to articulate these changes and manage
the social roll out (which formed the corpus of the Community Engagement
(Product) team today) was hired about 11 minutes before the roll-out.  We
didn't have much of a chance to have direct influence.  And I don't think
we really knew how many editing errors would be introduced - I don't think
that anyone expected that, and until we got it up to scale, we wouldn't
have seen that, necessarily.

The real flaw was the failure to agree with the editing community on what
the minimum viable product was.  I'm pleased to say that the WMF learned a
lot from that experience, and by the time I left, we had moved on to making
a whole new set of mistakes

But yeah, what David and Risker said.

pb

>
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415-275-1424
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-19 Thread Ziko van Dijk

Hello,

I can second more or less everything what Magnus said, and hope that
the discussion about how to implement software improvements will go on
in a productive way. I totally agree with Magnus and many others that
these improvements are very much necessary - just think of Wikimedia
Commons.

On one point I would like to mention what could be a serious cause for
disagreement between "the Foundation" and "the community" (both aren't
monolithic). Sometimes I experience that paid collaborators of the WMF
or chapters perceive "the community" as a huge workforce, a steerable
resource without limits, that can be made use of.

When the VE was introduced in 2013, some people from the WMF might
have thought: "the community" has unlimited time to clean up the mess
that is temporarily created by the VE. Using that resource is better
than to wait with the introduction, as software development is costly.

But "the community" was unhappy to serve as beta testers and cleaning
personnel, certainly without having been asked.

Adding insult to injury, during the VE introduction of 2013, one WMF
collaborator said on a talk page: Don't forget your resistance is
burning a lot of money. - It is a little strange to tell this to the
people who are creating the income by their volunteer work.

With regard to the Media Viewer, in 2014, my opinion was different:
the MV worked fairly well, serving to readers and to newbies. As long
as I can turn it off (because it is rather slowing down my workflow
than support it) I am happy with it.

Neither "the Foundation", neither "the community" is always right (or
always wrong). It's that simple.

Kind regards
Ziko

2016-01-19 18:53 GMT+01:00 Pine W :
> As it happens, I now like both VE and Image Viewer as optional features. I
> didn't appreciate how they were deployed.
>
> The constitutional crisis that WMF created by using Superprotect to force
> Image VIewer on the communities was arrogant, disproportionate, politically
> unwise, and wasteful. Although WMF has backed off from this position a bit,
> it has never apologized for it AFAIK, and this is one in a number of
> experiences that is informing the community thinking about strategic
> alternatives to WMF.
>
> Let me contrast this with Echo, which had some initial pains but was
> accepted by the community with relative ease. It's still one of my favorite
> features, and I look forward to its continued development.
>
> Piine
>
> On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 9:00 AM, Anthony Cole  wrote:
>
>> Magnus, regarding, "...at some point, you have to leave the test
>> environment, and test your product against reality."
>>
>> Of course. But VE was far, far too bad for real time when it was released.
>> Really. It was driving newbies away. The sensible embracers-of-change threw
>> it out, in the end. The squealing Ludites don't have the numbers for that.
>> When the sensible majority starts squealing, the developers really need to
>> pay attention.
>>
>> I didn't follow it carefully but it seemed to me the release of the Image
>> Viewer was much better timed and handled. Ludites squealed but genuine
>> concerns were addressed promptly and respectfully.
>>
>> Anthony Cole
>>
>>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-19 Thread Pine W

As it happens, I now like both VE and Image Viewer as optional features. I
didn't appreciate how they were deployed.

The constitutional crisis that WMF created by using Superprotect to force
Image VIewer on the communities was arrogant, disproportionate, politically
unwise, and wasteful. Although WMF has backed off from this position a bit,
it has never apologized for it AFAIK, and this is one in a number of
experiences that is informing the community thinking about strategic
alternatives to WMF.

Let me contrast this with Echo, which had some initial pains but was
accepted by the community with relative ease. It's still one of my favorite
features, and I look forward to its continued development.

Piine

On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 9:00 AM, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Magnus, regarding, "...at some point, you have to leave the test
> environment, and test your product against reality."
>
> Of course. But VE was far, far too bad for real time when it was released.
> Really. It was driving newbies away. The sensible embracers-of-change threw
> it out, in the end. The squealing Ludites don't have the numbers for that.
> When the sensible majority starts squealing, the developers really need to
> pay attention.
>
> I didn't follow it carefully but it seemed to me the release of the Image
> Viewer was much better timed and handled. Ludites squealed but genuine
> concerns were addressed promptly and respectfully.
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-19 Thread Anna Stillwell

Informative discussion. Thank you all. I knew the history here, but seeing
it come alive from these various perspectives further clarified that
history for me.

Thank you.
/a

On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 9:00 AM, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Magnus, regarding, "...at some point, you have to leave the test
> environment, and test your product against reality."
>
> Of course. But VE was far, far too bad for real time when it was released.
> Really. It was driving newbies away. The sensible embracers-of-change threw
> it out, in the end. The squealing Ludites don't have the numbers for that.
> When the sensible majority starts squealing, the developers really need to
> pay attention.
>
> I didn't follow it carefully but it seemed to me the release of the Image
> Viewer was much better timed and handled. Ludites squealed but genuine
> concerns were addressed promptly and respectfully.
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 11:58 PM, Magnus Manske <
> magnusman...@googlemail.com
> > wrote:
>
> > On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 3:40 PM Anthony Cole 
> wrote:
> >
> > > Magnus, in the interview you said "From the Media Viewer, the Visual
> > > Editor, to Wikidata transclusion, all have been resisted by vocal
> groups
> > of
> > > editors, not because they are a problem, but because they represent
> > change.
> > > For these editors, the site has worked fine for years; why change
> > > anything?"
> > >
> > > Well, yes. No one here, I'm sure, will argue there aren't such groups.
> > >
> > > But the problem with the blog post is you only mention them.
> >
> >
> > Because they are the problem, and they (by being vocal) often get more
> > attention than a more silent, sensible majority. But by getting
> attention,
> > they shape the general consensus, in a negative way.
> >
> >
> > > You don't take
> > > into account the very much larger crowd, including myself, who were
> > hanging
> > > out for the visual editor and were contemptuously flicked off by the
> > > developers when we brought up fatal flaws, as just some more
> > > superconservative no-vision Ludites - haters of change.
> > >
> >
> > I am not going to get into a who-said-what-to-whom-in-what-tone
> discussion
> > here. I wouldn't be surprised if some developers didn't bother to
> > differentiate between sensible feedback and nay-sayers. As I have said in
> > this mail thread, I hope the Foundation has learned how to deal with
> > feedback more sensibly.
> >
> >
> > >
> > > The first version of VE was so bad it was harming our mission. It was
> far
> > > worse than "didn't do everything 100% right." It would have been
> bounced
> > > back from the community to the developers even if that first group of
> > > bitter, change-hating autistic ranters hadn't said a word.
> > >
> >
> > Consider this perspective: I doubt the developers would have pushed out
> > that first version if it had massively failed their own tests. But at
> some
> > point, you have to leave the test environment, and test your product
> > against reality. Remember, WMF is not Microsoft, with an army of
> thousands
> > of paid beta-testers.
> >
> > So then it turns out there are more (and more really bad) bugs than
> > anticipated. Then you go and fix those bugs. Which is what they did. But
> > turning a major endeavour on and off repeatedly is just a bad thing to
> do.
> > AFICT the window where wrong edits were made by VE was not /that/ large.
> > Apparently, the decision was made to "power through it", rather than flip
> > the switch repeatedly. That may or may not have been the right strategy.
> >
> >
> > >
> > > I notice VE isn't even an option when I log out and edit en.Wikipedia,
> > yet
> > > above others are saying it is much improved and ready for release. What
> > are
> > > we waiting for?
> > >
> >
> > This is the thing. The atmosphere has been poisoned against VE, which now
> > makes it much harder to get a good product deployed.
> >
> > But I agree with the sentiment. What ARE we waiting for?
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Magnus
> >
> >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > Anthony Cole
> > >
> > >
> > > On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 10:56 PM, Andrew Lih 
> > wrote:
> > >
> > > > On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 9:39 AM, Anthony Cole 
> > > wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > Magnus, you've missed the point of the visual editor revolt. A
> couple
> > > of
> > > > > people here have tried to explain that to you, politely. And you're
> > > > > persisting with your idée fixe.
> > > > >
> > > >
> > > > To be fair, Magnus was addressing more than just the initial
> complaints
> > > > from 2013. He said, “condemning an entire product forever because the
> > > first
> > > > version didn’t do everything 100% right is just plain stupid.”
> > > > ___
> > > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
> > > > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > > > Unsubscribe:
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> >

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Magnus, regarding, "...at some point, you have to leave the test
environment, and test your product against reality."

Of course. But VE was far, far too bad for real time when it was released.
Really. It was driving newbies away. The sensible embracers-of-change threw
it out, in the end. The squealing Ludites don't have the numbers for that.
When the sensible majority starts squealing, the developers really need to
pay attention.

I didn't follow it carefully but it seemed to me the release of the Image
Viewer was much better timed and handled. Ludites squealed but genuine
concerns were addressed promptly and respectfully.

Anthony Cole


On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 11:58 PM, Magnus Manske  wrote:

> On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 3:40 PM Anthony Cole  wrote:
>
> > Magnus, in the interview you said "From the Media Viewer, the Visual
> > Editor, to Wikidata transclusion, all have been resisted by vocal groups
> of
> > editors, not because they are a problem, but because they represent
> change.
> > For these editors, the site has worked fine for years; why change
> > anything?"
> >
> > Well, yes. No one here, I'm sure, will argue there aren't such groups.
> >
> > But the problem with the blog post is you only mention them.
>
>
> Because they are the problem, and they (by being vocal) often get more
> attention than a more silent, sensible majority. But by getting attention,
> they shape the general consensus, in a negative way.
>
>
> > You don't take
> > into account the very much larger crowd, including myself, who were
> hanging
> > out for the visual editor and were contemptuously flicked off by the
> > developers when we brought up fatal flaws, as just some more
> > superconservative no-vision Ludites - haters of change.
> >
>
> I am not going to get into a who-said-what-to-whom-in-what-tone discussion
> here. I wouldn't be surprised if some developers didn't bother to
> differentiate between sensible feedback and nay-sayers. As I have said in
> this mail thread, I hope the Foundation has learned how to deal with
> feedback more sensibly.
>
>
> >
> > The first version of VE was so bad it was harming our mission. It was far
> > worse than "didn't do everything 100% right." It would have been bounced
> > back from the community to the developers even if that first group of
> > bitter, change-hating autistic ranters hadn't said a word.
> >
>
> Consider this perspective: I doubt the developers would have pushed out
> that first version if it had massively failed their own tests. But at some
> point, you have to leave the test environment, and test your product
> against reality. Remember, WMF is not Microsoft, with an army of thousands
> of paid beta-testers.
>
> So then it turns out there are more (and more really bad) bugs than
> anticipated. Then you go and fix those bugs. Which is what they did. But
> turning a major endeavour on and off repeatedly is just a bad thing to do.
> AFICT the window where wrong edits were made by VE was not /that/ large.
> Apparently, the decision was made to "power through it", rather than flip
> the switch repeatedly. That may or may not have been the right strategy.
>
>
> >
> > I notice VE isn't even an option when I log out and edit en.Wikipedia,
> yet
> > above others are saying it is much improved and ready for release. What
> are
> > we waiting for?
> >
>
> This is the thing. The atmosphere has been poisoned against VE, which now
> makes it much harder to get a good product deployed.
>
> But I agree with the sentiment. What ARE we waiting for?
>
> Cheers,
> Magnus
>
>
> >
> >
> >
> > Anthony Cole
> >
> >
> > On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 10:56 PM, Andrew Lih 
> wrote:
> >
> > > On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 9:39 AM, Anthony Cole 
> > wrote:
> > >
> > > > Magnus, you've missed the point of the visual editor revolt. A couple
> > of
> > > > people here have tried to explain that to you, politely. And you're
> > > > persisting with your idée fixe.
> > > >
> > >
> > > To be fair, Magnus was addressing more than just the initial complaints
> > > from 2013. He said, “condemning an entire product forever because the
> > first
> > > version didn’t do everything 100% right is just plain stupid.”
> > > ___
> > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
> > > 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
> > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > 
> ___
> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidel

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Excellent. Seems funny it's not the default for IPs.



Anthony Cole


On Wed, Jan 20, 2016 at 12:21 AM, Andrew Lih  wrote:

> On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 10:58 AM, Magnus Manske <
> magnusman...@googlemail.com
> > wrote:
>
> > On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 3:40 PM Anthony Cole 
> wrote:
> >
> > > I notice VE isn't even an option when I log out and edit en.Wikipedia,
> > yet
> > > above others are saying it is much improved and ready for release. What
> > are
> > > we waiting for?
> > >
> >
> > This is the thing. The atmosphere has been poisoned against VE, which now
> > makes it much harder to get a good product deployed.
> >
> > But I agree with the sentiment. What ARE we waiting for?
> >
>
> Folks, it is ON by default in English Wikipedia for new users who are
> logged in. But not for anons.
>
> At the top of the articles now: "Read - Edit source - Edit - View History”
>
> This was turned on late last year as a default for new users, to the
> delight of those who do GLAM training and edit-a-thons.
>
> -Andrew
> ___
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> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
> New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> 
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-19 Thread Andrew Lih

On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 10:58 AM, Magnus Manske  wrote:

> On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 3:40 PM Anthony Cole  wrote:
>
> > I notice VE isn't even an option when I log out and edit en.Wikipedia,
> yet
> > above others are saying it is much improved and ready for release. What
> are
> > we waiting for?
> >
>
> This is the thing. The atmosphere has been poisoned against VE, which now
> makes it much harder to get a good product deployed.
>
> But I agree with the sentiment. What ARE we waiting for?
>

Folks, it is ON by default in English Wikipedia for new users who are
logged in. But not for anons.

At the top of the articles now: "Read - Edit source - Edit - View History”

This was turned on late last year as a default for new users, to the
delight of those who do GLAM training and edit-a-thons.

-Andrew
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-19 Thread Magnus Manske

On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 3:40 PM Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Magnus, in the interview you said "From the Media Viewer, the Visual
> Editor, to Wikidata transclusion, all have been resisted by vocal groups of
> editors, not because they are a problem, but because they represent change.
> For these editors, the site has worked fine for years; why change
> anything?"
>
> Well, yes. No one here, I'm sure, will argue there aren't such groups.
>
> But the problem with the blog post is you only mention them.

Because they are the problem, and they (by being vocal) often get more
attention than a more silent, sensible majority. But by getting attention,
they shape the general consensus, in a negative way.

> You don't take
> into account the very much larger crowd, including myself, who were hanging
> out for the visual editor and were contemptuously flicked off by the
> developers when we brought up fatal flaws, as just some more
> superconservative no-vision Ludites - haters of change.
>

I am not going to get into a who-said-what-to-whom-in-what-tone discussion
here. I wouldn't be surprised if some developers didn't bother to
differentiate between sensible feedback and nay-sayers. As I have said in
this mail thread, I hope the Foundation has learned how to deal with
feedback more sensibly.

>
> The first version of VE was so bad it was harming our mission. It was far
> worse than "didn't do everything 100% right." It would have been bounced
> back from the community to the developers even if that first group of
> bitter, change-hating autistic ranters hadn't said a word.
>

Consider this perspective: I doubt the developers would have pushed out
that first version if it had massively failed their own tests. But at some
point, you have to leave the test environment, and test your product
against reality. Remember, WMF is not Microsoft, with an army of thousands
of paid beta-testers.

So then it turns out there are more (and more really bad) bugs than
anticipated. Then you go and fix those bugs. Which is what they did. But
turning a major endeavour on and off repeatedly is just a bad thing to do.
AFICT the window where wrong edits were made by VE was not /that/ large.
Apparently, the decision was made to "power through it", rather than flip
the switch repeatedly. That may or may not have been the right strategy.

>
> I notice VE isn't even an option when I log out and edit en.Wikipedia, yet
> above others are saying it is much improved and ready for release. What are
> we waiting for?
>

This is the thing. The atmosphere has been poisoned against VE, which now
makes it much harder to get a good product deployed.

But I agree with the sentiment. What ARE we waiting for?

Cheers,
Magnus

>
>
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 10:56 PM, Andrew Lih  wrote:
>
> > On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 9:39 AM, Anthony Cole 
> wrote:
> >
> > > Magnus, you've missed the point of the visual editor revolt. A couple
> of
> > > people here have tried to explain that to you, politely. And you're
> > > persisting with your idée fixe.
> > >
> >
> > To be fair, Magnus was addressing more than just the initial complaints
> > from 2013. He said, “condemning an entire product forever because the
> first
> > version didn’t do everything 100% right is just plain stupid.”
> > ___
> > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
> > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > 
> >
> ___
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> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
> New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> 
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

Magnus, in the interview you said "From the Media Viewer, the Visual
Editor, to Wikidata transclusion, all have been resisted by vocal groups of
editors, not because they are a problem, but because they represent change.
For these editors, the site has worked fine for years; why change anything?"

Well, yes. No one here, I'm sure, will argue there aren't such groups.

But the problem with the blog post is you only mention them. You don't take
into account the very much larger crowd, including myself, who were hanging
out for the visual editor and were contemptuously flicked off by the
developers when we brought up fatal flaws, as just some more
superconservative no-vision Ludites - haters of change.

The first version of VE was so bad it was harming our mission. It was far
worse than "didn't do everything 100% right." It would have been bounced
back from the community to the developers even if that first group of
bitter, change-hating autistic ranters hadn't said a word.

I notice VE isn't even an option when I log out and edit en.Wikipedia, yet
above others are saying it is much improved and ready for release. What are
we waiting for?

Anthony Cole

On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 10:56 PM, Andrew Lih  wrote:

> On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 9:39 AM, Anthony Cole  wrote:
>
> > Magnus, you've missed the point of the visual editor revolt. A couple of
> > people here have tried to explain that to you, politely. And you're
> > persisting with your idée fixe.
> >
>
> To be fair, Magnus was addressing more than just the initial complaints
> from 2013. He said, “condemning an entire product forever because the first
> version didn’t do everything 100% right is just plain stupid.”
> ___
> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
> New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> 
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-19 Thread Andrew Lih

On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 9:39 AM, Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Magnus, you've missed the point of the visual editor revolt. A couple of
> people here have tried to explain that to you, politely. And you're
> persisting with your idée fixe.
>

To be fair, Magnus was addressing more than just the initial complaints
from 2013. He said, “condemning an entire product forever because the first
version didn’t do everything 100% right is just plain stupid.”
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske

2016-01-19 Thread Magnus Manske

Anthony, it does seem you've missed some of which I wrote in this thread. I
have no problem with specific criticism where it is deserved, and I do well
remember that the Visual Editor, in its early incarnation, was not quite up
to the job.

What I do have a problem with is people fixating on some technical or
early-lifecycle issues, declaring the entire thing worthless, even
dangerous, and spreading that view around. This behaviour, I have seen time
and again, with the Media Viewer, with Wikidata.

It's bad because it's broken - let's come together and fix it.

It's bad because ... well, everyone says it's bad. And new. And Not Made
Here. THAT is a problem, and not a technological one.

On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 2:39 PM Anthony Cole  wrote:

> Magnus, you've missed the point of the visual editor revolt. A couple of
> people here have tried to explain that to you, politely. And you're
> persisting with your idée fixe.
>
> There were two parts to the visual editor catastrophe, actually. The
> product wasn't ready for anyone to use. Not veteran editors. Not newbies.
> Newbies who used it were less likely to successfully complete an edit. It
> was broken, and the WMF insisted we had to use it.
>
> The second part of the problem was arrogance. Yes, a few editors were
> unnecessarily rude about the product and the developers. But then most of
> the developers and tech staff who dealt with the community arrogantly
> characterised *anyone* who complained about the product as an ignorant,
> selfish Ludite - and you're persisting with that characterisation now.
>
> The WMF under Lila has learned the lessons from that, and they have
> fostered a much healthier relationship between the developers and the
> community. You clearly haven't learned all you might have.
>
> In fact, reading the arrogant responses from you here and in the concurrent
> thread titled "How to disseminate free knowledge," and from Denny in
> earlier threads addressing criticism of WikiData, it seems to me there is
> still a significant arrogance problem that needs addressing, at least over
> at WikiData.
>
> Some people may approach you arrogantly, maybe even insultingly, about an
> innovation, and I suppose you might be justified in talking down to them or
> ridiculing them (though I advise against it.). But if you can't distinguish
> them from those who approach you with genuine concerns and well-founded
> criticisms, then no matter how clever you think your technical solutions
> are, you will soon find you're no more welcome here than those WMF staffers
> who thought insulting well-meaning critics was a good career move.
>
> Denny's contemptuous dismissal of valid criticisms of his project, and your
> contemptuous dismissal of the valid criticisms of the early visual editor
> and its launch are both very disappointing.
>
> Anthony Cole
>
>
> On Tue, Jan 19, 2016 at 7:24 AM, Magnus Manske <
> magnusman...@googlemail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > The iPhone was a commercial success because it let you do the basic
> > functions easily and intuitively, and looked shiny at the same time. We
> do
> > not charge a price; our "win" comes by people using our product. If we
> can
> > present the product in such a way that more people use it, it is a
> success
> > for us.
> >
> > I do stand by my example :-)
> >
> > On Mon, Jan 18, 2016 at 10:37 PM Michael Peel 
> wrote:
> >
> > >
> > > > On 18 Jan 2016, at 22:35, Magnus Manske  >
> > > wrote:
> > > >
> > > > As one can be overly conservative, one can also be overly
> > enthusiastic. I
> > > > would hope the Foundation by now understands better how to handle new
> > > > software releases. Apple here shows the way: Basic functionality, but
> > > > working smoothly first.
> > >
> > > But at a huge cost premium? I'm not sure that's a good example to make
> > > here. :-/
> > >
> > > Thanks,
> > > Mike
> > > ___
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> > > 
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> > 
> >
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Profile of Magnus Manske