User talk:Jimbo Wales

Wales:Oliver::Lincoln:Kennedy

In the vein of the long-running urban legend about Lincoln and Kennedy's lives being similar to each other, [1] I have decided to compile some similarities between Mr. Wales' life, and that of John Oliver (comedian).

• They were both the oldest of four children, and they both had at least one educator parent. [2] (Oliver had two, but Wales had one, his mother). [3]
• Oliver, who is British, is married to Kate Norley, an American woman, while Wales, who is American, is married to Kate Garvey, a British woman. Note also that their wives both have the same first name.
• Oliver was born in the UK but now lives in America. Wales was born in America but now lives in the UK.
• Of course these are all coincidences, but it's still interesting, at least to me. I hope the other readers of this page, particularly Wales himself, will agree. Everymorning (talk) 00:42, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

Most striking is the hidden fact that both Oliver and Wales have secret secretaries named John Hay and John Nicolay. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 07:45, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

You left out the most obvious parallel involving art centers; the Lincoln Center:the Kennedy Center::the Oliver Center:the Wales Centre. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 15:02, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

OMG I love this so much.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 15:14, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

Some 2 millennia ago someone made a business out of such comparisons, see Parallel Lives. --Francis Schonken (talk) 15:23, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

The Kennedy-Lincoln thing is not exactly an urban legend. Snopes chops the list down into the component parts and shows why each one by itself is not so remarkable, and also shows that a few of them are either probably incorrect or at least questionable. But if you take the main items that are unquestionably true, together, the odds that all these things would be true is not great. Two men, first elected President exactly 100 years apart, were assassinated on the same day of the week and both replaced by men named Johnson - the only Johnsons ever to become president. I think there is a "wow" factor right there, even forgetting about everything else. (And I personally would add the theater-warehouse warehouse-theater thing to the list, though as Snopes points out, that is somewhat a matter of interpretation.) I am not suggesting that this is any more than a series of coincidences, but it is a highly unlikely series of coincidences. As for John Oliver and Jimbo Wales, I'll leave that for other historians to deal with. I'd be more impressed if their wives had a name a little less common than "Kate". Neutron (talk) 19:45, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

There is a problem with the concept "highly unlikely series of coincidences". Consider a golfer who hits a ball which lands in the middle of a fairway. When the golf ball lands it touches one individual blade of grass before any other -- maybe just a nanosecond sooner, but one blade gets touched first. What are the odds that the ball would first touch that one blade of grass instead of any other? Millions to one. But does that mean that the ball landing involves any highly unlikely coincidences? No, because it was certain to hit a blade of grass. Likewise with Kennedy-Lincoln. Same day of the week could have been same day of the month, same hour of the day, same minute, same weather, undertaker with the same last name -- the list of possible coincidences that didn't happen goes on and on. --Guy Macon (talk) 20:27, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

I agree completely, which is why I think of this as a harmless bit of enjoyable fun. I suspect if you try, it's pretty easy to find remarkable coincidences in a fair number of cases.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 08:49, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

Kind of disturbing that you would compare two people that were assassinated to two living people. Kind of fatalistic. Future Prince of Wales married a Kate as well. At least they are still alive. Now if both had stalkers named "John Wilkes Harvey Oswald," I think you;d have something. --DHeyward (talk) 00:16, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

When I met the Duke of Cambridge at a meeting about his charity (I suggested that he back a Wiki Loves Monuments global photo competition on conservation, but nothing came of it unfortunately), I mentioned that he uses "Wales" as his surname in his military career, and so in a way his wife is Kate Wales, like mine. It's not actually correct, of course, not least of which because my wife doesn't go by "Kate Wales" but it was fun to say. But... John Oliver is alive, so I'm not bothered by the parallel drawing.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 08:49, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

...so I says to Wills, I says... Neutron (talk) 22:27, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

• Both Jimbo Wales and John Oliver have ten letters in their names.
• Both Jimbo Wales and John Oliver wear glasses
• Both have a connection to two other people with a strong connection; Wales helped found an encyclopedia which has Kennedy as an entry, Oliver played a character named Booth Wilkes John.
• Oliver helped support the constitutional rights of the residents of Guam, but has never visited Guam, Wales has never visited Guam.--S Philbrick(Talk) 02:00, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

Fun as such comparisons always are, you could probably pick two people assassinated and find any number of coincedences. For example, I looked to see if there are any things which John Lennon and JFK have in common. Nothing obvious came up in terms of dates but, apart from sharing the same name

• JFK was elected president in 1960. The Beatles formed in 1960.
• Both had fathers of Irish origin who had maritime connections. JFK's dad was first chair of the maritime commission, Lennon's was a merchant seaman.
• Lennon was murdered by a guy from Texas, JFK was killed in Texas.
• Both assassins were southerners known by their 3 names.
• Both were concerned with civil rights and opposed politically by Richard Nixon (Tricky Dicky tried to have Lennon deported.)
• JFK's dad worked for Roosevelt, Lennon died in Roosevelt hospital.
• etc etc. That's just some I found in the space of a few minutes, I'm sure you could find more if you looked. Valenciano (talk) 16:38, 21 November 2015 (UTC)

Email from Jimmy Wales with tracking link

According to Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous)#Yearly appeal (posted by PRL42), some users are receiving an email asking for a donation. The problem is that (apparently) the email has a donation link which appears to go to wikimedia.com, but which actually links to links.wikimedia.mkt4477.com. Some email clients flag such an email as a possible scam, and phab:T114010 indicates that some recipients of the email are concerned, so various fixes are being considered. Are emails with tracking links really necessary? Johnuniq (talk) 22:14, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

Note that https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T114010 never considers the option of not tracking -- it just assumes that tracking is desirable and discusses the best way to do it. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:47, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that it is not the inclusion of tracking links per se that is the problem. It is the fact that the text for one of the links is a URL ("https://donate.wikimedia.org"). This is, of course, a signature for phishing scams - although there are obviously legitimate reasons for doing this. The problem could be rectified in moments by simply changing the text that shows as a URL to say something like 'Click here to donate'. PRL42 (talk) 07:57, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with the details of the decision making on this, but there are a lot of really obvious reasons to use tracking links for A/B testing. One of the core goals of the fundraiser is to raise funds with a minimum of intrusion - so emails that work better are obviously desirable. Emails with usability problems, or messages that don't appeal to donors, are not good as they force us to run more banners, or make do with less money.

Obviously, if they are being done in a way that causes people to fear a scam, that is bad. I've never heard of 'mktr4477.com' but if I see a link with text that says 'donate.wikimedia.org' and I hover over it and see 'mktr4477.com' I'm going to worry - and I'm hoping that my email client will worry too, and warn me.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 08:44, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

This looks worthy of a discussion

This story looks worthy of a discussion. I have long advocated that we should deal much more quickly and much more severely with COI editors. The usual objections (from some quarters - I think most people agree with me) have to do with it being hard to detect them, but in this case, the COI was called out, warnings were issued, and nothing was done. Now the editor has been called out by the media embarrassing him (he deserves it), his employer (who may not), and Wikipedia.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 17:08, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

In case anyone interested in discussing this isn't aware, there is also a thread at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#User:Edwardpatrickalva and blatant COI.. -- Ed (Edgar181) 18:49, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

As the individual who initiated the ANI discussion, I feel that this user has also been fairly disingenuous about his actions. This extends beyond just simple COI, which is bad enough in its own right. I furthermore believe that what Mr. Alva is doing is a violation of WP:GAME, and is a flagrant disregard for all things factual and encyclopedic in nature. I looked through his contributions (that term can only be applied in the most literal sense), and the violations range from NPOV and WEIGHT, to IRS, GAME, and disruptive editing, with a healthy dose of shamelessly plugging the movie and the "stars" thereof. All this to make Wikipedia conform to the movie's narrative. Perhaps it's time for a consensus on a course of action? KirkCliff2 (talk) 15:05, 21 November 2015 (UTC)

@Edgar181: @KirkCliff2: Re J's in this case, the COI was called out, warnings were issued, and nothing was done. What are your views on that? Why was nothing done? Why does it take so long to stop abuse? What could be done to deal "much more quickly and much more severely" with egregious offenders? How would you improve WP:COI, esp the inconsequential "How to handle" section? I'll ask these questions and suggest some answers on COI Talk, but since Jimmy started the conversation here, I'm responding here first. - Thanks; LeoRomero (talk) 01:41, 22 November 2015 (UTC)

Bassel Khartabil sentenced to death

Syria secretly sentenced free software developer Bassel Khartabil to death. Remembered reading about him in an issue of the Signpost and seeing this shocked me. GamerPro64 19:25, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

It should be now clear that this news requires immediate and high-scale action from our community. I would urge everyone to please do everything they can as citizens of their respective countries -- particularly the US and European Union countries -- to raise awareness of Bassel's urgent situation. Write and call your Congressmen, Members of Parliament, Members of European Parliament, and ask them to intervene and speak up. A press release from the Wikimedia Foundation would also be helpful, at the very least. odder (talk) 20:26, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

As a pointer, we have Bassel Khartabil. Looie496 (talk) 22:10, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

Hmmm, what kind of satellite or other pictures of Adra Prison can you get? What other information about the place? Can you add them to the article? If it would be an improvement, could Wikipedia commission some private satellite images of the facility and surrounds, or get some donated to CC-licensing? Note that I, of course, am not suggesting that we take any intentional step to help Jaysh al-Islam succeed in liberating the facility with a third try, as that would probably be illegal ... I just think that human rights advocates reading our articles would like to get a really good view of that awful place. :) Wnt (talk) 23:17, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

Who decides which political or humanitarian causes the Wikimedia Foundation supports and which is does not? If the Wikimedia Foundation supports one side of a political struggle, will it be seen as a neutral source of information on that issue? Protopone primigena (talk) 23:36, 21 November 2015 (UTC)

That's two very separate matters. Unlike the Foundation, article content is governed by our policies and guidelines. Articles take no side in conflicts, but they do document the sides. If the due weight in reliable sources leans towards one side, then the article will do the same. That's how NPOV works. -- BullRangifer (talk) 03:16, 22 November 2015 (UTC)

Do you think that the editors of Wikipedia can make that distinction if the Foundation endorses a position? And do you think that the reading public will make that distinction? Protopone primigena (talk) 04:01, 22 November 2015 (UTC)

Of course. Besides that, the public and 99.9% of editors haven't a clue about the positions of the Foundation. Editors just focus on polices and guidelines and write content. Any editor who tries to make improperly biased edits will get called on it by other editors, and if they persist, they may get blocked. Your fears are unfounded. -- BullRangifer (talk) 04:33, 22 November 2015 (UTC)

Vision accomplished. Now what? Imagine a new vision statement.

Heya Jimmy - I posted this on Meta, and would like to know what you think. - Thanks; LeoRomero (talk) 21:00, 21 November 2015 (UTC)

Now that Wikimedians have changed the world, such that every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge, we should probably start describing bigger dreams, hopes and ambitions. What's our most radical conception of our organization and community — 20, 50, 100 years from today?

Some first thoughts, based on the current vision:

1. Our work benefits the entire planet - maybe the whole multiverse - not just humans.
2. We don't just share knowledge.
3. We practice what others only preach - freedom, responsibility, duty, service, compassion - better than any other country-size organization, anywhere, ever.
4. We are building a new transnational, transracial, transpolitial, transreligical, transeverything world, and we don't even know it.
5. Let's not use cliches like "imagine a world"

The Signpost: 18 November 2015

• Special report: ArbCom election—candidates’ opinions analysed

• In the media: Icelandic milestone; apolitical editing

• Discussion report: BASC disbanded; other developments in the discussion world

• Arbitration report: Ban Appeals Subcommittee goes up in smoke; 21 candidates running

• Featured content: Fantasia on a Theme by Jimbo Wales

• Traffic report: Darkness and light

• Read this Signpost in full
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• MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 22:28, 21 November 2015 (UTC)

Publishing a rumor about a living person

I wanted to start this discussion with a comparison. Wikipedia would not publish rumors about Charlie Sheen being HIV positive, so why would it publish rumors about Bassel Khartabil being sentenced to death, I was going to ask. But then I looked at the history of Charlie Sheen's entry and saw that editors had indeed added rumors that Sheen was going to announce that he was HIV positive. It was added and removed several times before the television appearance confirming his HIV status. I know that it is a very imperfect comparison, but why is it not ok to include widely reported rumors about Sheen, but it is ok to include weakly sourced rumors about Khartabil? Protopone primigena (talk) 23:32, 21 November 2015 (UTC)

By the way, Charlie Sheen's article currently says "A source indicates that Sheen had over 200 sexual partners after he learned he had HIV". Sourced to "Bang Showbiz" which is, in turn, quoting TMZ. Protopone primigena (talk) 23:57, 21 November 2015 (UTC)

The collective "Wikipedia" does not make and is not capable of making editorial decisions about what is included in individual articles. Instead, the group of editors interested in each individual article decide that through consensus, which should be based on our policies and guidelines. Your question makes it clear that you are an editor interested in the Sheen and Khartabil articles. Boldly edit to remove content that you believe violates BLP policy. If reverted, discuss on the article's talk pages. I see no discussion of your concerns at Talk:Bassel Khartabil. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 05:01, 22 November 2015 (UTC)

Inmates have started running the asylum (part 2)

Last night ******** removed a post from this board claiming the OP was sitebanned. A few days ago Smallbones recounted here how he did the same thing in respect of an editor who actually was sitebanned and found himself in front of Arbcom for doing it. There are things you should know about ********. If you mention his name your post will be rejected by the edit filter (hence the asterisks). So who does ******** think he is to censor mention of his name on Wikipedia? Has the edit filter been registered? Is it authorised? Here's the post that ******** is so anxious you don't see:

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

Previous discussion at Special:Diff/691607300#God bless you, Katie!. Elockid confirmed it would be misconduct for him to protect the incident noticeboard for an extended period because there is consensus not to then went ahead and did it. I propose a discussion here on how to handle this situation. 109.156.115.40 (talk) 19:11, 21 November 2015 (UTC)

Transferred from AN, also protected. 90.196.214.198 (talk) 22:21, 21 November 2015 (UTC)