Talk:Wikipedia

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Budget 2006/07

Trying as hard as I could, I see no pages for the wikipedia/media budget for 2006 or for 2007. Could someone point me in the right direction or include it in the article? Thanks so much ! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.240.20.149 (talk) 07:45, 3 January 2007 (UTC).[reply]

http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Budget/2005 this what your looking for? 71.220.22.34 01:23, 17 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Created By

I think it makes a lot more sense to say that Wikipedia was "created by" thousands of volunteers. Larry does deserve credit for his early work in Wikipedia, not as a founder, which he clearly was not, but stating it that way makes it sounds like Larry and I created the website... when the heavy lifting was done by other people, always. Particularly with respect to the core ideas that make up Wikipedia, they did not come from Larry (indeed, he stills argues against them!) but rather came mostly from people who argued with Larry... and won! ... in the early days. They should be acknowledged.--Jimbo Wales 15:23, 3 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It all depends on how exactly the section is written, I believe. Small summaries should cleanly state that you two made the website, since that's pretty must just the thing you did. When there's more room for explanation, it may indeed be good to mention that volunteers who were participating in discussions with you had a major influence on the foundation of Wikipedia, and continue to do so to this day. (The good thing here is that Jimmy can just write an article, have it published someplace, and thus provide a reliable source for this claim...) function msikma(const U, T : Float) : Float { to my page. } ; 18:06, 3 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As long as Jimmy continues to say patently untrue things about my role about Wikipedia, it appears I am going to have to point readers to some facts: http://www.larrysanger.org/roleinwp.html

As to the notion that I had little to do with "the core ideas that make up Wikipedia," Jimmy has said this enough times that I suppose I will have to correct him explicitly: Jimmy is either lying or misremembering. Through my daily work in taking people to task for violations of policy, and and in articulating policy statements, I was more responsible than any other single person for ensuring that Wikipedia follows certain essential policies, including the neutrality policy, the policy against original research, and the fact that the project is focused on an encyclopedia (and not the other things that "Wikipedia is not"). Neutrality and no original research were policies I articulated in Nupedia days before Wikipedia even existed. What Jimmy could mean in saying that I "argue against" Wikipedia's essential policies, I really don't know.

Jimmy, I remember the facts about how Wikipedia was founded far better than you do, because I was there--in the trenches--while you were busy as CEO of Bomis. Please stop making patently and provably false assertions about my role in and views about Wikipedia. You might notice that some such assertions are in fact actionable. You really should stop. --Larry Sanger 06:41, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I certainly am not going to jump inbetween you two. If these things are really untrue, then that raises some questions. I presumed Jimbo's assertions to be correct and simply in need of some kind of source; if Larry states that they are untrue and has sources that back up his claims, then for what reason was Jimbo suggesting them? It certainly would be really nice to read about how influential the visitors of the site once were and still are, as Jimbo suggested, but if this is not really true, we shouldn't think of including it. My question to Jimbo: for what reason do you state apparently original research material to be added to this article, and how do you respond to Larry? Benevolent dictator for life you may be, but I would like some explanation here. function msikma(const U, T : Float) : Float { to my page. } ; 07:15, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As a relatively new user, it distresses me that Jimbo's and Larry's statements contradict each other. I have no way of concluding who is exactly right without doing more research than I have time for. If Jimbo and Larry can't verify a Wikipedia article, then who can? I would suggest the following:

Human memories are very unreliable. I remember co-inventing a device together with a friend. He went on to market it and made it the center of his life; I just use it. For a while I used to tell people I was the coinventor, but I no longer do, because I have no conclusive written evidence and because I don't know if my brain isn't exagerating my accomplishment or not and because it no longer matters.
It doesn't matter whether Larry was a founder or not or how much Jimbo worked at the beginning, or indeed who founded Wikipedia at all. So many people work so very hard at it, it is irrelevant. What is more important is the work which Jimbo is doing now and the Citizendium project Larry is working on now. Think of Asimov's Foundation stories, where the Encyclopedia Galactica eventually became something like God...

Therefore it would be great if you great people could bury keyboards and offer a congruent joint statement. We love you all no matter who did what when. And I do thank you both, and everybody else involved, for something really really great! --Theosch 17:16, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Since it's taken quite a while now and neither has responded to this, I guess that neither really care about this anyhow. —msikma (user, talk) 07:18, 16 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Triva and First Article on Wikipedia

The page should have a trivia section, and one of the items in that section should be the name of the very first article on Wikipedia. If it's impossible to know what was the first, then that itself is an interesting bit of trivia. Who knows the answers? I don't. Interlingua ^{talk email} 15:31, 4 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

See Wikipedia:Avoid trivia sections in articles. Trivia sections are undesirable. Also see History of Wikipedia#Beginnings of a new project and Wikipedia:Wikipedia's oldest articles for some answers.--Pethr 16:36, 4 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia talk page index?

Is there one and where is it? I'm looking specifically for an index of editorial polls and the like. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Whoblitzell (talk • contribs)

Future directions for authoring content

is this correct ? afaik the idea was about flagging content, the article says it is about flagging people.

"Wales also talked about creating "stable" or "static" pages for entries that are considered complete, to help people who want to cite them in published works. The plan being tested in Germany appears designed to root out mischief, as opposed to inaccuracies that may be harder to detect."

--source: linuxworld, first google hit after 10min of searching on wikipedias pages...-- ExpImp^talkcon 01:43, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

wikipedia

i have just registered with wikipedia and i am surprised that people are given so much freedom to edit stuff. you can edit almost every page of this website.i could go and edit the text above into rubbish and no one would care. can someone tell me what this is all about??? Electron8 21:25, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia works because there are many more people who are good editors than bad editors. There is also a lot that goes on behind the scenes to combat vandalism. Wikipedia is constantly vandalized, but most vandalism is reverted within minutes (or within seconds for User:AntiVandalBot). --h2g2bob 21:38, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

An explanation of the behind the scenes stuff, if you're interested. There are many people using their watchlist to keep an eye on pages they have an interest in. Volunteers at recent changes patrol and bots keep an eye on the most recent edits to Wikipedia. In some cases, users can be blocked from editing for a while, or pages protected to prevent vandalism, but these are really a last resort. --h2g2bob 21:48, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, if you add rubbish to an article, some people will get annoyed and find it to be disruptive. However, it it easy for most editors to simply change it back without much difficulty. Users only get blocked if they repeatedly vandalize articles, and this is usually only temporary. The purpose of Wikipedia is to allow many editors to contribute to articles so that another piece of valid knowledge is added. I've heard that the goal of Wikipedia is to compile human knowledge and give free knowledge to the whole planet. Unfortunately, Wikipedia will never be actually completed, because to complete Wikipedia is to complete global human knowledge, which is impossible. Good editors are usually welcomed. BTW Antivandalbot doesn't read all articles, and sometimes makes errors. I've reverted people's edits many times without the help of Antivandalbot. It doesn't catch everything. AstroHurricane001^{(Talk+Contribs+Ubx)} 22:24, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia statistics

We now have two large lists of statistics. One shows the amount of articles, and the other shows the amount of words. I have two problems with this: firstly, this causes readers to have to draw conclusions of their own. We should find some news articles that also highlight these two lists and explain more about it rather than just indiscriminately giving information and hoping that the reader will "figure it out". Secondly, why have two lists when you can have one table? I bet that there are bots that are constantly updating these lists, so perhaps some of the bots' owners could change them to put these statistics in one table? It really is not necessary to have two lists at this point. function msikma(const U, T : Float) : Float { to my page. } ; 07:08, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Removed wiki listing by number of words

On second thought, I feel that we do not need yet another list of wikis, this time sorted by number of words. It seems like it's an inaccurate way of measuring wiki size, and it also seems a bit verbose to the reader. For example, Dutch is a slightly longer language than English, since we have more words and colloquialisms to say all kinds of things. I design websites, and when I need to make a multi-language site, I always seem to notice the Dutch texts being about 1.4x as long as the English ones, which can at least partially be attributed to a different amount of words. Anyway, if anyone really, really, really liked the listing of wikis by number of words, then just revert my change, but please discuss it here as well. msikma (user, talk) 22:00, 10 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

remove that begging donation request

remove or set aside that banner:

You can give the gift of knowledge by donating to the Wikimedia Foundation! Wikimedia ...

Tax-deductibility of donations | FAQ | Financial statements | Live list of donations

its really shame to beg donations in top of every page —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 202.41.72.100 (talk) 10:35, 9 January 2007 (UTC).[reply]

Have you tried the "dismiss" link? I did, and it worked like a charm to dismiss that banner. -- Jeff G. 11:35, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

He likely knows how to dismiss the banner, and is mentioning this because he feels it's not a good idea for all the visitors that stumble upon this site. Those visitors may not know how to click the dismiss link, or they simply don't want to see such an advertisement at all. And quite frankly, I agree. This fundraiser has gone on long enough, and Wikipedia isn't in any financial problems. msikma (user, talk) 13:18, 9 January 2007 (UTC) PS: this shouldn't be discussed on this page. See the WP:PUMP instead.[reply]

This is stupid

Why have a Wikipedia page about Wikipedia??? It's stupid, "Hey, whats Wikipedia?" "I dunno, lets look up Wikipedia on Wikipedia." "There, thats what wikipedia is." Its stupid and a waste of space. SerpentsTail

You brought up a valid question. The main answer is that the Wikipedia article in Wikipedia is one of the four currently permitted exceptions to Wikipedia:Avoid self-references in finished articles per Writing about Wikipedia itself. I have some additional justifications, and think of the Wikipedia article in Wikipedia as each of the following:

A "Help About" page for itself. Lots of software has such a feature to answer the question "What is this?".
A reference for all the mirrored or forked versions.
A link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia to give to newbies on other sites or in email who ask "Wikipedia, what's that?". Think WP:BITE in a global sense. The new acronym RTFWA (for "Read The Fine Wikipedia Article") is gaining currency (13 hits so far on Google).
Wikipedia is certainly a free online encyclopedia worthy of note in any new encyclopedia. See Wikipedia:Notability.

-- Jeff G. 01:46, 10 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

WOW! I was real surprised to see that Wikipedia had a page about itself. I just thought now of checking to see. How can it possibly be NPOV when the subject is itself? Weird stuff! lol

YourPTR! 03:14, 15 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Sure, much of the article is somewhat biased in favor of Wikipedia. Only edits by Wikipedians have survived in it (the quantity of material that hasn't survived in it is mind-boggling - see the article's edit history). And only in American English (from what I've read). But it does include a whole section on criticism and controversy to balance the POVs. -- Jeff G. 03:35, 15 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It's no more stupid than the word "dictionary" being in the dictionary. Kidcorona 09:00, 16 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Technical Help?

I'm looking for precise technical informations and ressource pages about Wikipedia. I know that the content is free, but is there some sort of way to get the articles in a computer processible form? Like a giant file that has all the article contents in plain UTF-8 in it or something like that? How large would such a file be? 130.83.73.251 15:02, 11 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You can find all the informations you need on Wikipedia:Database download. Have fun! (I am copying this message on your user talk since I move it at the bottom of the page) -- lucasbfr ^talk 15:59, 11 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Equipment WikiMedia Plans To Buy ?

Have they come up with the list of stuff/ servers they plan to buy with the donation(s) ? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Kumarrrr (talk • contribs) 13:15, 12 January 2007 (UTC).[reply]

Please see Fundraising - Wikimedia Foundation. -- Jeff G. 18:03, 12 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia "studies"

The Nature investigation wasn't a study, so I changed that. I did a cursory check of other "studies" and it seems one was done by a defunct website and the other wasn't published in a peer-reviewed journal. This should most definitely be noted and repeatedly calling them "scientific studies" when they aren't peer reviewed is biased, since it's leaving it up to the Wikipedia editors as to whether or not it's scientific.

And of course, as stated in the todo/priority list (which hasn't seem to have been addressed yet), there's an obvious pro-Wikipedia bias in the Criticisms section. It basically attempts to debunk the minimal formal criticism listed.

Also, there is this: "However, it was also found that Wikipedia articles were generally of greater length (2.6 times as long as the Britannica equivalents, on average), and that thus its error per word ratio is lower."

This seems to have been quoted from the Wikinews article that was linked to. Who found this? If it was found by the person who wrote the Wikinews article, that's essentially original research. Wikimedia should never self-reference as a source for research. Nathan J. Yoder 07:03, 15 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

more study and statistics

Do we know the average age of wikipedia users in en.wikipedia? Likewise for editors? Likewise for countries of provenance? Thanks. Politis 17:18, 16 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In a related point - I would love to see more statistics on how many average users contribute regularly. How are the number of edits split geographically and questions around that. Literature on Wikipedia is sorely lacking and Wikipedia administrators need to step up to provide more information about the "server side" of Wikipedia. varuag doos

Popularity

Given that this site has been rated in the top 15 in terms of web traffic of all the websites in the world, the advertisement revenue potential for wikipedia is immense, and yet they choose not to post any ads.If the revenue would be by far enough that they would never need donations, why does the site choose not to sell ad space?is it just integrity?Rodrigue 17:43, 17 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Its adspace appears to be reserved for donations to the Wikimedia Foundation. -- Jeff G. 18:09, 17 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Im glad theres no ad's! Would you like stupid pop-ups like on every other website? --ISeeDeadPixels 20:41, 17 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

But seriously,it would generate alot of money,because wikipedia is one of the most popular website in the world[2],and that translates into very high advertissement rates, and besides never needing donations from people to keep the site running, the founders would really be very rich by now,but if it is about integrity, then I guess I understand why they wouldn't want all that money.Rodrigue 01:03, 18 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It would be really nice if they can use all the donated money to come up with some new features etc for the site.