User talk:Jimbo Wales/Archive F

Admin Complaint

Sir, Beg to inform you that CesarB of your administration staff is deliberately deleting my requests to have the Ashida Kim page protected from vandals who insist on publishing the names of my friends so they can be attacked. He refuses to protect this page in spite of the fact that it has ALWAYS been nothing but a trash and bash site against me dedicated to personal attacks. To illustrate his prejudice. Today there is a request for page protection for Lu Sheng Yi, another involuntary entry, who is also being bashed in exactly the same manner as myself, and CesarB IMMEDIATELY protects HIS page without question or pause. This is hardly fair treatment. I have repeatedly asked to be removed from your site, also deleted. I had establish an account to monitor the page and stop the trolls myself. The account was closed without my permission or notification. This may not be the place to air such a complaint, but everywhere else I have gone has been utterly useless. And, I trust those who protect you are more honest and just than CesarB who, by his homepage is some teen-aged student in Brazil. I would much prefer to discuss such things privately, but none of your people will respond. You wouldn't like it if someone was posting your address so you could be harasssed. I am only asking for the same consideration.

Ashida Kim dojopress@aol.com

Flag

A light of hope

Yes I know it sound some silly but is what find the wikipedia site makes me feel. Why? Because recently I start to belive that the internet only good for see porn pages. (What it sound pathetic for me) this site change my mind and also make me belive there are people whit something else than hormones. What a relief¡

hate to spoil your fun but jimbo used to be a pornographer himself.--81.154.236.221 02:27, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

I hate to spoil it further, but you should see what the most popular pages accessed on Wikipedia are... It's enough to land the list in my favorite forum's Not Safe For Work section... :P ~ Syrae Faileas - «Talk» 21:29, 2 September 2005 (UTC)

About the Assyrian Human Rights page

I didnt know what to do when it suddenly came up that it had been locked etc..Well the article i copied and made a new article here is copyrighted by AINA.org..But Terms of use of AINA.org

AINA Terms Of Use

Copyrights, Permissions and Rules of Conduct To request permission to use AINA content, click here.

Abbreviations:

Assyrian International News Agency: AINA

1. Use of Content

1.1 Permission to link to Content is implicitly granted provided that you

1. Maintain all copyright and other notices contained in such Content. 2. Properly cite AINA as the source of said link 3. Do not frame the link. Links must open in a new window or a new browser instance

So i made all that and still the page on wikipedia Assyrian Human Rights is closed..why???

Laurent-Désiré Kabila

Just a courtesy note to say - I have edited your signed message at the top of Laurent-Désiré Kabila warning of advance fee fraud and so removed the attribution. I hope this is the right thing to do. — ciphergoth 16:51, July 26, 2005 (UTC)

World Community Grid

Hello, before you read on I would just like to say that I have so far only posted this to a limited amount of administrators for consultation. If you have any objections to its wider distribution or suitability for Wikipedia please let me know.'

Hi, I would just like to invite you to find out about the World Community Grid Human Proteome Folding Project. This is a purely philanthropic project and supported by a "blue chip" corporation in IBM. There is an ability to join a team once you have downloaded the software and another user has already established the Wikipedia team.

I would like to emphasise that I do not want to pressure anybody into feeling obligated and I understand the limited computer resources/access available to some. Feel free to pass this message on and thank you very much for your time, Mark83 21:50, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

Significant objections have been raised to this. Mark83 10:26, 27 July 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Text of the GNU Free Documentation License

Hello Mr. Wales. There is a discussion regarding the validity of Wikipedia's local copy of the GFDL here. Because it is in wiki formatting, it may be invalid. Please comment on this issue ASAP. --pile0nades^{talk | contribs} 22:30, 27 July 2005 (UTC)

I have addressed this. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 22:45, 27 July 2005 (UTC)

It is still not identical. Compare [1] to [2]. The original on gnu.org is plain text, while the one here is in wiki formatting. Or does that not matter? --pile0nades^{talk | contribs} 23:04, 27 July 2005 (UTC)

The license says a verbatim copy, meaning literally word-for-word. Differences in font selection, line length, spacing, and other formatting do not make a copy otherwise than verbatim, and the page as viewed by the user is now rendered with the same words as the GNU version (that is, the markup is removed). The Uninvited Co., Inc. 23:32, 27 July 2005 (UTC)

OK, the text is verbatim now, but if I turn on "Auto-number headings" in the preferences, the sections have 2 numbers before them, so section 0 looks like "1 0. PREAMBLE", section 1 is "2 1. APPLICABILITY AND DEFINITIONS", and so on for the whole page. What about people who have this setting on? --pile0nades^{talk | contribs} 03:48, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

Mailing list and Irate

Jimbo, I see that you've blocked User:Irate indefinitely based on some comments he made on IRC. But I only found out about this on the mailing list, and I think it should be discussed on Wikipedia, preferably on WP:AN or WP:AN/I, so that the rest of us can know about it and discuss it. For example, I myself strongly disagree with your block, but if you take this process, of doing it by fiat and only talking about it on the mailing list, those of us who disagree are effectively excluded from the decision. Everyking 03:02, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

You may start a discussion there if you like; I think it will be quite instructive. You could also discuss it here. I think such a discussion might be quite helpful to everyone to clarify the purpose of the website: is it to be a playground for belligerant, illiterate, and unapologetic users (like Irate), or a serious encyclopedia project? --Jimbo Wales 10:47, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

That isn't a fair characterization of the matter. Nobody wants Wikipedia to be a playground for anybody. The question I was raising was one of process, whether it was done correctly or whether it should have been done only on the basis of broader input. But of course it's settled now anyway. Everyking 10:56, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

I don't see what you think was done incorrectly. Everything was by the book. There was an arbcom case, a result, an appeal, a result. There was and continues to be broad community input and support for the process. --Jimbo Wales 11:07, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

Huh? You just banned him because he said something you didn't like in IRC. Everyking 23:01, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

Yes he did. Irate said that he intended to disrupt wikipedia. Everyone who has had any contact with irate knows that this was no idle threat as Irate had already disrupted wikipedia. Jimbo enjoys my support for this action, and I expect the support of everyone else with the exception of Irate and yourself. Theresa Knott (a tenth stroke) 23:11, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

You're trying to trap me in the box of supporting Irate, but it's not going to happen. All I'm saying is that we should follow process and a permanent ban should not be done purely on the basis of an IRC conversation. I'm not even saying the IRC conversation shouldn't be admissible as evidence! That alone is pretty radical, since there's precedent that IRC and the encyclopedia should be treated as completely separate. Everyking 23:23, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

I am not trying to trap you! you daft thing! Yes IRC and Wikipedia are seperate things, and yes something like "you are a wanker" said on irc shouldn't be grounds for a ban on wikipedia. But "I will disrupt wikipedia" is a different matter. Jimbo banned a disruptive editor who threatened to disrupt again as soon as his current block expired. This is entirely within process. Jimbo has every right to ban anyone he sees fit to. Theresa Knott (a tenth stroke) 23:33, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

I agree with Theresa, but I'll go further and say this wasn't just a ban because "he said something I didn't like in irc" nor was it a ban of "anyone I see fit". This is part of our standard operating procedure which sets no new precedent at all.

Everyking's point would be valid if I had randomly banned an otherwise good user for misbehaving in IRC. But Irate was not misbehaving in irc, and that was not at all the point. (And, let's be honest: Everyking surely knows this and is making a silly argument anyway.) The conversation could have taken place in email, on the phone, in the wiki, wherever. The point that a user was protesting his sentence before the ArbCom by making the argument that (a) "the rules are rubbish" and (b) other people's bad behavior justified his own and (c) a clear promise to continue behaving as he always has and (d) a clear rejection of my own suggestion that he hold himself to a higher standard than the rules.

I am quite certain now that this case is going to go down in the "troll version" of the history of Wikipedia as the case where Jimbo randomly banned a perfectly good user because he said something that Jimbo didn't like in irc. Fine. But good users will not be deceived by that sort of nonsense.

Irate was very very very lucky to have been allowed here as long as he was.--Jimbo Wales 10:51, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

Well, I think there are cases like this, or there could be, where a user makes a threat on IRC and that is followed by an encyclopedia block. I think C is the only one of your points that could warrant a block. The question is, did Irate make this promise? I mean in the sense that he said he would continue doing what got him banned before. Even in that case I think a block based on that is jumping the gun a bit, but it would be a bit more reasonable than I've previously thought it to be. Everyking 13:42, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

What did he do that was so terrible to get him banned permanently?. He always seemed to me to be fairly sensible, especially on the Liverpool page where he often edited. G-Man 19:59, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Irate and more. Basically, personal attacks over a long period of time. [[smoddy]] 20:05, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

Some of those who work forces...

Am I glad I just stumbled across you! What's the deal w/ al qaeda? It's been protected for like 9 days! Can anything be done? I know terrorism's touchy but truth seekers are getting the crappy end of this deal; I can taste it. I don't know what the exact controversy entails but I'm sure it has to do with the

goverment

and

truth.

If there's anything I can do, I got your back homey. Nice 'pedia. Salam.

Kzzl 04:42, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

Kate Walsh (singer)

I've just arrived at the article about Kate Walsh via a random link and noticed your comment on the talk page (from 16 July that you had a photo of her you were going to upload. Did you ever get around to doing this - I can't spot any images with her name in the title here or on commons? Thryduulf 11:31, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

I finally just now got around to uploading the photos to Commons. It was actually much easier than I thought it would be. Hmm, maybe I'm running out of excuses to be lazy, and I'll finally upload more. :-)--Jimbo Wales 10:52, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

Main Page (en) edit war

Hello Mr.Wales,

There seems to be an edit (maybe revert) war over the front page (Did You Know <> Picture of the Day). Maybe you should help resolve it. --Member 00:35, 30 July 2005 (UTC)

Arb Com appointments

Why did you appoint Jayjg rather than Mirv? Mirv was closer to being elected in the previous elections.

Jayjg was very strongly supported and recommended by the existing ArbCom members, whose judgment I trust very much. I'm sure Mirv would be a fine candidate too, but I don't know him so well. --Jimbo Wales 08:22, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

I am also curious why you re-appointed Jdforrester, when the electorate clearly de-elected him/her ?

James is, in my opinion, one of our finest arbitrators. I know of no complaints about him as an arbitrator, and his understanding of policy and the requirements of building an encyclopedia are excellent. He's thoughtful and patient, yet firm. I feel fairly strongly that the ArbCom election process was deeply flawed, due to the negative campaigning. The position is like that of a judge, not that of a legislator, and so a deep understsanding of the law and a judicial temperament are more important than popularity. --Jimbo Wales 08:22, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

I have some of the arb com pages in {{subst:Special:Watchlist}} but I don't remember ever noticing you giving an explanation of your appointments anywhere - could you point me to it? ~~~~ ( ! | ? | * ) 12:27, 30 July 2005 (UTC)

It was on the mailing list. But I'm happy to give further explanations here.

The fundamental job of the ArbCom is to defend the community so that we can get our work done. This is a touchy and difficult job requiring difficult judgments.--Jimbo Wales 08:22, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

I don't see much evidence that they are defending the community. Perhaps they imagine they are, but in practice? Their judgments are frequently unpopular, but cannot be overruled by the community. They seem to have a disconnect from the community and tend to apply punitive measures in cases where it is not necessary, often exacerbating problems. If the ArbCom is so in touch with the community, then we should allow for the possibility of a community veto, as well as petitions to oust unpopular arbs. Everyking 09:44, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps your view of the popularity of the ArbCom is influenced by the fact that you've been sanctioned by them for your behavior. I think if you step outside your own situation, you'll see that the main "popularity" problem the ArbCom has is that they have been, on the whole, much more patient than many people feel they should have been.

But this is really beside the point. The ArbCom really ought to feel comfortable making decisions regardless of popularity. It strikes me as particularly unwise for the decisions on user behavior to become a popularity contest. We're here to write an encyclopedia, not to be a mobocracy.--Jimbo Wales 09:55, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

I honestly cannot think of a case where the ArbCom was criticized for being soft, with the exception of Xed's case, where Snowspinner thought that he should've gotten a penalty even harsher than the already extremely harsh penalty he got. Maybe my memory is being selective. Everyking 10:01, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

You're still an admin. I think that says a lot, personally. --Jimbo Wales 10:28, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

It's like having half your money stolen: curse your luck for being robbed, or bless your luck for leaving you with something? My personality has always tended towards the former. Nice of you to come right out and say what you think of me, anyway, Jimbo. Everyking 10:36, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

I don't think this criticism is fair. The arbcom are a group of volunteers doing a difficult job in trying circumstances, where it's impossible to please everyone. Not only do they have to plough through all the claims and counter-claims (which are so boring sometimes, they make your head spin), they also take time to answer people's concerns about their decisions on talk pages, by e-mail, and on the mailing list, which makes them pretty accountable. Overall, they've laid down an important series of rulings, which are often referred to on article talk pages to guide decisions about content. If they can be faulted for anything, it's for erring on the side of caution and good faith, in my view. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 11:11, August 1, 2005 (UTC)

Obviously I concur with your remarks about volunteers and difficult job etc but that does not mean that any lapse, any screw up by the ArbCom is forgiveable. By analogy a volunteer fire force which kills someone by negligence (driving too quickly through a red light, say) is still liable, volunteer or not. But the rest of what you say seems like a joke to me. What you describe is not what took place in my case. Don't jump too quickly to the conclusion that I am biased. Have a look at "Tkorrovi and Paul Beardsell" - the ArbCom did not behave as you describe here, far from it. Paul Beardsell 14:00, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

your editings

Ser Jimbo Do you do som of you edits under an anonymous IP? .**My Cat inn @ (talk)** 23:48, 30 July 2005 (UTC)

Generally speaking, no. Usually if I accidentally make an edit anonymously, I log in immediately to claim the prior edit. I almost never edit the content of Wikipedia at all, other than tiny tidbits here and there.--Jimbo Wales 08:15, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

A lot of people have said that you use other accounts on wikipedia to do some of your edits. Is this true, false, or do you wish to respond "no comment."? DyslexicEditor 14:49, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

It's false. I haven't used another account in over a year. Before that I had another id for a short time, and made fewer than 100 edits with it. I sometimes toy with the idea of getting another account to do some minor editing here and there, because it tends to call a small ruckus when I do an edit as it is, and it would be nice to be able to sometimes do quiet editing without imply anything big and important. But by and large, I do almost no editing at all.--Jimbo Wales 14:54, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

Unabhängige Wikipedianer - Just a hello and a statement

Hi Jimbo

I am here to say that we are group of de:Wikipedia users who do not feel represented by "Wikimedia Deutschland e.V."

Some admins of us (and with > 10.000 edits) were therefore nominated by Achim Raschka and others for re-election (and being bashed) but are still in a quite good standing.

Please be informed that we appreciate yours and Wikimedia Foundation's work to provide us an ultimate collection of knowledge and exchange of views from all cultures.

Unabhängiger Wikipedianer (de) 22:00, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

Flag

Vandalism

Hello Jimbo... I've been apologizing to the users hit by my imposter Redwolf24. Of course Im sure your page is edited more than any other user page so you probably havent noticed it. However rest assured that wasn't me... Redwolf24 02:56, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

vfd I think you should see...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Votes_for_deletion/Cyrus_Farivar

The admin Snowspinner is completely ignoring the community consensus.

I will admit my first comment was probably unnecessarily harsh, but here's the basic situation as I see it. A journalist who has written for notable publications, and who is probably unaware of our vanity policy, writes an article on himself. The article is nominated for deletion, and our badly broken deletion system generates a lot of votes that want to delete an article on a notable subject because of the circumstances of its creation, despite the fact that plenty has happened since the article's creation.

And, well, it needs to not work that way. If VfD is generating a consensus like that, VfD is broken, and it should be ignored. We don't delete articles on notable subjects because we're pissy about how they got created, and we don't bite the newcomers like that - especially not prominant newcomers who are giving Wikipedia what is basically good press. It's a shitty thing to do, and it needs to not happen. So I'm going to keep the article. Snowspinner 01:41, August 2, 2005 (UTC)

I have no opinion on this particular issue, but I do want to stress Snowspinner's attitude here—this is what I've been dealing with for a long time (and gotten a lot of grief for), his belief that policy is optional and can be ignored. This is not a belief that an admin should hold, and certainly, not in a million years act on it. But he does this on a daily basis. And currently I'm in front of the ArbCom for reminding him of policy during each of these daily controversies he stirs up. Everyking 05:14, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

That does not look like consensus to delete to me. Far from it. — David Remahl 02:49, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

David is right. Snowspinner is right. I'm not sure what else I can say about it. --Jimbo Wales 08:09, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

Actually I decided that there is more that I can say about it. I just did a count myself, and found 17 Keep and 35 Delete votes. That's 67.32%. According to the deletion policy, a 2/3 majority is considered by many to be sufficient, but some feel it should be higher. It is also well within the remit of an administrator to weigh votes according to their own judgment of the reputation or credibility of the voters, and also to make a judgment on the circumstances. Therefore, quite clearly, Snowspinner is perfectly within his rights to make a judgment call that the page should be kept.

Furthermore he is _clearly right_ on the issue of notability. This is a legitimate journalist who is writing in Slate, the New York Times, etc.! Even if VfD _did_ produce a consensus that this article should be deleted, then VfD is broken and should be ignored in a case like this. Remember, our fundamental goal here is to write a comprehensive high quality encyclopedia, and our social rules are in service to this mission.--Jimbo Wales 08:29, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

Coincidentally, I also made the decision a few weeks ago to reject the specific VfD decisions if they contradict wider deletion policy (I over-dramatically wrote User:Pcb21#Notice to any readers: I do not accept the results of VfD any more but should've written "I occasionally do not accept results of VfD..."). It is interesting to see that as VfD has grown, and attracted editors who devote their Wikipedia time solely to VfD, that (set of) pages has become a project of its own, detached from the wider purpose of Wikipedia. Pcb21| Pete 11:32, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

• Jimbo this guy is on the borderline at best of current Vfd demands for "notability", if you think he should be a clear "keep" you might need to get your hands dirty and help write some new guidelines and persuade people. I don't even think "comprehensive" has consensus, it seems like wikipedia is headed towards being a selective resource including only topics that will impress general users, not those specifically searching for information. Kappa 15:35, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

Can you give me some examples of people equally notable who were deleted? Or anyhow examples of deletions that you feel went too far? Just for my own study... --Jimbo Wales 16:19, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

Here's an example of an odd decision to delete, in my view. Brandenn Bremmer was a child progidy in the U.S., very high IQ, allegedly started reading at 18 months, playing the piano at three, started university at 11; had been written up a few times in his local newspaper. Out of the blue, he shot and killed himself at the age of 14, apparently with no warning signs and no suicide note. The death sparked a debate about the pressures very talented children face, and it received international press coverage, including from the AP, British newspapers, [3] and (from memory) Indian newspapers, as well as major newspapers in the U.S. Yet the article has been deleted twice from Wikipedia, and was once nominated within two hours of being created, with the result that no decent article has ever gotten off the ground. Here's a link to the best version it, which is very short. [4] Here's the VfD page: Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/Brandenn Bremmer There seems to have been voting by suspected sock puppets and anon IPs. Their argument was that they didn't believe he was talented, and this was all propaganda put out by the parents, which misses the point that we're not here to judge the truth of news stories in the mainstream press, but simply to compile what they report. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 18:04, August 2, 2005 (UTC)

The problem with Snowspinner substituting his judgement for the result of consensus isn't that the consensus is always right or preferred or desired - the last US election pretty much proves that the majority is always wrong. The problem is what happens when some other admin decides that Snowspinner's judgement was flawed and substitutes his or her judgement for Snowspinner's, nuking the article anyway. And then some other admin... I see Snowspinner's point, but I think the proper thing to do would have been to attempt to convince people instead of just declaring a consensus of one. Kappa's the sky is falling scenario of worthy topics getting deleted left and right simply is not true. Anything of the slightest bit of worth almost always makes it through VFD unscathed. I've written dozens of small articles on obscure artists, poets, and comic strips that are probably of no interest to a "general user", and I've never had a single one deleted. Let's be honest, stuff like Cyrus Farivar is borderline at best, and it really does the project no harm either way if stuff like that stays or goes. I'd prefer have an orderly vfd that respects the community consensus and the price of losing the occassional borderline vanity article isn't really that much of a price when you can just create a better non-vanity article later. Gamaliel 18:30, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

"Community consensus" is bullshit. In the first place, the "community" is not the Wikipedia community; it is the community of people who regularly read and vote in VFD/CFD/etc. It only takes ONE person to nominate an article for VFD, for whatever reason (including malice), and then the VFD "regulars" give their snap judgement based on a cursory look and their general voting prejudices. Then an administrator counts up the votes and if 60% or so voted 'delete', it may be deleted (with no other justification). If the delete was improper, other admins generally ignore it rather than entering into a revert war which may get them kicked out of the admin club.

The ills of the VFD system - censorship, politicking, bullying, etc. - are a high price to pay for not having to tolerate a few harmless "non-notable" articles. Mirror Vax 20:14, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

I should also mention that VFD is a big waste of time. The same people argue over and over about "Is X 'notable'?", which contributes about as much to Wikipedia as arguing whether vanilla ice cream or chocolate ice cream tastes better. Mirror Vax 20:31, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

CFD also causes problems. Let me give a concrete example. Category:Causes célèbres was an interesting, well-filled, and (as far as I know) uncontroversial category. One person didn't care for it and nominated it for deletion. This is the record:

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the discussion was: delete --Kbdank71 13:43, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• Delete. Unencyclopedic, POV, absence of context. zen master T 07:55, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete - inherently arbitrary. - SimonP 00:46, Jun 12, 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, vague. Neutrality^talk 04:59, Jun 12, 2005 (UTC)
• Comment. Its French for "Famous Causes", I'm guessing they want the people/celebs cat'd if they have participated in noteworthy causes. Not really sure how this would work, unless each "cause" was a sub cat. <>Who?¿? 18:06, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, vague Gorrister 11:23, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. I don't like this one either. Postdlf 08:01, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, has no purpose --U.U. 18:28, Jun 15, 2005 (UTC)
• Strong Keep. It isn't vague; it's a well known French term in common English usage which means "Famous case" (not "Famous cause"). A cause célèbre is defined in its own article. It's not arbitrary: for something to be a cause célèbre, it must be a long-running case in which the public is involved on one side or the other, preferably both, and which is an exemplar of a particular phenomenon of human society. That is what distinguishes it from merely a well-known law case. David 25px | Talk 23:45, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

---

The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

It's not clear if the people who voted 'delete' even knew what a "cause celebre" was (see Landmark_case#Comparison_with_cause_c.C3.A9l.C3.A8bre and Cause célèbre). There was no dialogue. There were no suggestions for improvement. Just "don't like, nuke it". None of the deleters took responsibility for re-categorizing the articles. They never were re-categorized; they were ultimately de-categorized (I forget how many articles were in the category, but it was more than 100). This sort of wanton destruction is demoralizing. Mirror Vax 01:30, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

Cases I have noticed

Jimbo you asked above for some examples of where deletion mistakes are made. Awkwardly the cases I remember are the cases I took an active interest and hence often the material is saved! But anyway from the last few days

• Romeo and Juliet in Sarajevo - 6-6 VfD, admin deleted the article. VfU said the admin decision was wrong given no consensus. Undeleted. Immediately VfDed again, where I am currently (I hope!) convincing readers of the importance of this historical event. Given how important it was at the time, this is surprisingly tough!

• Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - Full Plot Summary VfD was to move the content to Wikibooks - all good so far. However the deletion decision was to expunge all mention of the article from WP. I've put a "soft" redirect to Wikibooks at the old site of the article, to save breaking links etc.

• Bottom of the pyramid - Article on a valid topic in economics. Unfortunately it was created by a newbie to Wikipedia. Nominated for deletion, the newbie unfortunately created sockpuppets in order to try to get his article kept. This got the backs up of residents of VfD who voted for deletion seemingly to aggravate the sockpuppet-creator more than on the merits of the topic. VfU upheld the VfD decision - VfU culture is to only examine the procedure of the VfD debate rather the the debate itself, so only looked at the number of voters (which did indeed, once socks were discounted, have a significant majority for deletion).

Now I guess none of these are hugely important by themselves, but I chose this selection because a) they show a variety of defiencies in the VfD process, b) on a mixture of topics and c) are all recent. 07:40, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

Heh I wrote the above oblivious to the current flurry of activity regarding deletion on the mailing list and various pages around the Wikipedia: namespace. It looks right now as if we have an opportunity for change, which is difficult given the literally hundreds of interested parties, and dozens of proposals. Such is the size of this issue, there may some value in organizing a group of two or three people (I am thinking of the model of the election overseers) who help manage the process of getting all proposals considered and discussed, picking the elements people like, and managing a preference vote between viable options. Of course these people should hold no sway over what is finally chosen, they just ensure all ideas are given a fair hearing. Pcb21| Pete 10:27, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Votes for Deletion, the next generation

A bold idea you may want to comment on. VfD in my opinion is failing to operate properly due to overwhelming and increasing number of new cases. --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 23:14, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

I agree with Cool Cat. There are at least two RfCs against admins basically reflecting problems with the RfD procedure. Robert McClenon 23:49, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

Counter Vandalism Unit

I don't know how much RC patroling you do, I noticed you reverting a few vandals, so here it goes... You may find my bot on irc.freenode.net #en.wikipedia.vandalism intriguing. Feel free to use/try it. --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 23:14, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

I do very little, but I like to be aware of things, so I'll check it out. Thanks! --Jimbo Wales 11:04, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

Your white list ide (irc) is nice and not hard to implement. Who could provide me such a whitelist? Also can do a blacklist. :) --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 17:18, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia:List of administrators might not be a bad place to start. [[smoddy]] 17:25, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

Thats already implemented. --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 03:30, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

This is sounding a lot like CDVF. What's the diff? -- Essjay · Talk 00:17, August 4, 2005 (UTC)

It's a central service on IRC. CryptoDerk's prog isn't bad but the alternative isn't bad either. I can list a number of pros if you really like. This bot will work on all wiki languages when I am done getting it translated. (working on de and fr looking for translators) --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 03:30, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

No need for me; I like my CDVF. However, might not be a bad idea for the benefit of others. -- Essjay · Talk 05:11, August 5, 2005 (UTC)

Well a short list of advantages compared to CryptoDerk's vandal fighter. I am not going to mock CryptoDerk's hard work/art as that would not be right. --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

• Right after bot posts something a number of users see this in a channel. They can (and have) discussed on how to deal with vandals. Sometimes vandals use dynamic ips as you all may know. Discussion there can actualy create suggetsions to improve vandal detection. --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
• If I improve detection rules this affects everyone (instant patch)
• Additional optional code can be coded/is coded to assist spesific users. Forexample vandal fighters would not care about copy vio warnings.--Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
• No one needs to install anyhing aside from an irc client, web chat works (but I wouldnt recomend it as web chat sucks). --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
• If I see a character like the wheeler I can black list him, when I am sleaping the bot will notify people who have taken my RC shift more aproporately. Bot also auto blacklists users blocked and have the word "vanda" in their block summary --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
• The bot detects a good portion of vandalism and coun ter vandalism that have been detected ad reverted without this bot being used. Such work would be easier. --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
• The bot works on multiple languages. Bot is servicing French, German, Japaneese, and Bulgarian wikis. I could do more but am investigating if the bot is accepted in other larger wikis. Aperantly they arent vandalised remotely as much as english wiki. --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
• It also creates a level of competition, "who will revert that vandal first"? Copetition creates better "service". --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
• Shows blocks/reverts so you know if you need to bother the vandal or not. --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
• Also since multiple people are working, one person warns the vandal and the other reverts the page. --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
• Making any request a reality is rather easy as it is very easy to code in mirc. A lot of data processing is already coded. Mirc for me is basicaly a very nice c++ class. Even a monkey can understand it given enough time (ok maybe an exagaration, make it a very smart monkey :P ). --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
• Raw mirc uses about 3 megs of ram, my bot uses about 3-5 megs of ram (depends on the volume of edits). By the time data is recieved it is already processed. It can be processed more if user wants. Granted this means little as people have Ghz of cpus these days, but I like efficency. --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

In the future:

(These are just possibilitises I am considering)

• A list of frequently vandalised articles beeing automaticaly reverted (such as George W. Bush). Very significant changes on articles such as GWB are traditionaly vandalism. --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
  • I am debating the pro's and con's of this though. This technicaly is imposible as I cant revert as I am no admin. --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
• Adding an invisible/visible template to vandalised articles. Blankers will remove this template first thing and the bot could detect this rempval and react to it. (auto revert mentioned above may apply assuming automated admin duty is worth it). All I need to do is load the first 5,6 lines of every page which would not use too much bandwith and would allow me to identify vandalism more accurately. --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
• If <rc> on irc.wikimedia.org also posts total article size aside from the change this would allow the bot to detect vandalism more acurately, such as stub vandalisms. --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
• Mirc supports text to speach. So a little chunk of code per user will alert RCing people who are only concerned with a spesific type of vandalism (lets say blanking) or all alerts. This is also geeky. :) --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Just for the record, I strongly support CDVF users idling in #en.wikipedia.vandalism anyway. Even if you have the bot ignored (as I do), having everyone in a channel could be a very useful resource for coordinating and communicating between active RC Patrollers. --malathion ^talk 07:35, 15 August 2005 (UTC)

The vatican's Media Conference and the Wikipedia

Can I repeat my un-answered question? (New Media /Old Media -cleared out)

It was reported on Euronews this Spring , just prior to the death of Pope John Paul II , that a special conference was being held in the Vatican over the issue of new Media (ie the internet and presumably things like the Wikipedia . Film appeared from within the modern conference hall , there seemed to be about 150 people maximum in a hall capacity of about 600 . There were Cardinals , not many , in the front rows , noteable for their cummerbund colours around their waists . There were people in civvy clothes as well . This was their new modern confernce hall , showing their arrival into networked communication .

Euronews said that the conference was called by the Roman Catholic Church to study the new phenomenon of internet information dissemination . That the church was aware of negative information on the internet which could cause harm to the church and faith. That the church should being aware of these new tools, also see it as a positive opportunity for the faith . - Euronews quoted the conclusion reached at this conference-three days I think it lasted . It concluded that indeed there was an urgent need for Catholics of all places to enter into these new media channels to counterract all such malign influences , and for them to recognise and take active part themselves in this new media as catholics . This to the faithful , was by way of being an order for a concerted entry into cyberspace , and was presumably reported through catholic media organs at greater length than the 5 minute Euronews report . This was broadcast repeatedly several times daily for a week(they repeat info that way) .

I ask you again, in the fear that you may not have understood what I referred to , as the chief of a large media organ , if you are aware of this catholic conference's concluding instruction to the faithful ? Famekeeper 10:57, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

I was not aware, and I can't imagine why I should care. I will gladly join with the Catholic Church and invite Catholics and people of every belief to get engaged with the Internet and New Media generally. I think that positive dialogue and discussion is a net value for everyone, and I am very pleased to hear that the Catholic Church is encouraging it.--Jimbo Wales 11:02, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

The instruction however was to each of the faithful to personally involve themselves to the fullest to combat all encroachment on the teaching of the church . If it were positive we'd be delirious but rigidity and prevention are not at the cutting edge of positive dialogue . If Condoleeza Rice can have a Foreign Policy u-turn re :the Middle East (more democracy , less kings ), that's a positive . U-turns and recognition of the reality is positive , obedience to dogma ain't . Sino-japanese relations as of now require positive dialogue , but maybe you will be able to help (just an example ) . I can see your point . Anyway , you opened the door , and I say thanks .Famekeeper 21:14, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

One big problem is that when they say ‘consensus’, the members of Obscurantists United mean control of the content of, for example, true, knowledge, epistemology and related articles by force of numbers instead of the true meaning of consensus decision-making, to meet everyone's needs, to deemphasize the role of factions or parties and promote the expression of individual voices.

These obscurantists like to ignore the fact that the first item on the list (see chart at right) of means of resolving content disputes is not control of content through force of numbers, it is PRINCIPLED NEGOTIATION, a cooperative process whereby participants join together to find a solution which meets the legitimate interests of both parties, which in the context of Wikipedia usually involves appropriate mention of all points of view in an article thus improving the quality of the article.

Right now it looks like freethinkers challenging them are very few and far between. --67.182.157.6 22:42, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

Source

Hi Jimbo. I noticed this page was updated with The Devil's Reject having used the word the most times so I updated Nil by Mouth accordingly. So I guess my source was this page but whoever updated it, I don't know where they got the source from. Thanks Craigy File:Uk flag large.png (talk) 20:09, August 3, 2005 (UTC)

I have a feeling that the information is not valid at all.--Jimbo Wales 22:51, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

blackbook of wikipedians

This page which is blacklisting fellow wikipedians doesn't really belong on the pedia .... does it? User:Witkacy/Black_Book Waerth 23:15, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

free tv listings (de)

Hi, I will test your german now... :-) Ich war positiv überrascht zu lesen, das Du auch freie TV-Listings als etwas wichtiges empfindest. Leider ist mein Vorschlag in den deutschen Wikinews auf wenig Gegenliebe gestoßen (s.a. http://de.wikinews.org/wiki/Wikinews_Diskussion:Pl%C3%A4ne#Tv-Listings ). Ich würde da ggf. gerne bei dem Start von so einem Projekt mithelfen. Ich befasse mich ebenfalls seit Jahren mit Dingen wie Hypertext und Wikis. Mit den anderen 10 Punkten, die wichtig sind stimme ich auch überein, besonders was freie Datenformate und freie Bildung angeht.

Where in Africa will you be?

You say you'll be in 5 countries on the continent, which ones?

Happy birthday! :D

Happy birthday Jimbo! I know i'm two days early, but, my memory sucks and I would probably forget by Sunday. :D --Phroziac (talk) 19:20, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

Mediation, and who should be allowed to do it

As an important force in the creation of the ArbCom, I think you should take a look at this decision: Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Coolcat, Davenbelle and Stereotek/Proposed decision#Coolcat prohibited from mediating. While the intent of the ArbCom seems to prevent someone who has no support from holding himself out as a credible mediator, there are serious worries that this is actually precedent to bar anyone who's seen as not effective at resolving disputes from doing it at all! As Kim Bruning rightly points out on the talk page, informal mediation is not something we should be discouraging. The ArbCom ought to be our last resort, and any decision the ArbCom makes that seems to reinforce the illusion of them being the "only" source of Mediation needs at least a strong clarification. If you could keep an eye out? TIA. JRM · Talk 21:43, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

If you think about it from a psychological point of view, sometimes just getting anyone else to listen (i.e. post a few affirmations while to two parties try to work it out) can help to diffuse a situation. Sometimes the two sides just need to get it out of their systems (and reiterated it in front of that third party) before they will settle down and prepare to find a compromise. No special skills needs there: just the willingness to try and help. Anyone who has ever been to marriage counseling knows that. 69.181.82.221 15:09, 3 September 2005 (UTC)

Please just tell me...

Please just tell me you didn't say the things attributed to you in the Yahoo article. Freezing "stable" pages in perpetuity?! Even freezing them for a few days is incredibly staling, even for articles generally considered good. I can only assume you were grossly misquoted. Else I'd be worried. — David Remahl 21:53, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

While few long-time editors are freaking out over this, we'd still like an official "my statements were misrepresented" (or similar) statement that we can point people at. -- Cyrius|✎ 22:18, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

I don't think it's a bad thing, as long as there are a few assumptions about how it'd work: 1) there would be an alternate, editable version of the article available, and 2) new changes could be incorporated in the "stable" version after some deliberation, so it wouldn't really be "in perpetuity". This has been on the table for a long time, I think, and I think it would be a step forward that we need to take at some point. Everyking 22:29, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

Forgive me if I've missed something (recent evidence would suggest I have), but isn't this called m:Wikipedia 1.0? [[smoddy]] 22:32, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

All I can say is "Finally." Anything that reduces some of the idiocy in a lot of these articles' history is most welcome. RADICALBENDER★ 00:11, August 6, 2005 (UTC)

I just posted this to Slashdot:

Wikipedia hereby formally announces tighter :editorial controls on Reuters and Slashdot... ;-)

I spoke in English to many journalists yesterday and :the day before (90 journalists registered to cover :Wikimania). I spoke to one journalist about our :longstanding discussions of how to create a "stable :version" or "Wikipedia 1.0". This would not involve :substantial changes to how we do our usual work, but :rather a new process for identifying our best work.

I spoke in English, and this was translated to :German. Then the German was translated back to :English, and then translated again into the Slashdot :story.

There was no "announcement". We are constantly :reviewing our policies and looking for ways to :improve, but we have not "announced" anything. We :don't even really work that way... if you know how :Wikipedia works, it's through a long process of :community discussion and consensus building, not :through a process of top-down announcements.

--Jimbo Wales 08:05, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia Rap

Jimbo,

I think that Wikipedia ought to have its own song. I wrote a "Wikipedia Rap" a while back, but nobody seemed to like it. I suggest that we have a contest to see who can write the best song for Wikipedia.

Sincerely, NapSpit2

• There are some songs. Please check my user page; I didn't write them but I collect links. A rap would be a nice addition, though. Radiant_>|< 10:34, August 10, 2005 (UTC)

"Disambiguous" sentence

On your user page, it says "Please use that number only for press inquiries!"

Does this mean that the number may not be used for anything but press inquiries, or that all press inquiries should be to that number and no other number? Jon Harald Søby \ ^{no na} 15:35, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

Proposed update of MediaWiki:Tagline

A change to the current Wikipedia tagline has been proposed for discussion and adoption at Wikipedia:Proposed update of MediaWiki:Tagline. Interested contributers please visit this page. WOULD APPRECIATE YOUR COMMENT -- Sitearm | Talk 18:47, 2005 August 6 (UTC)

The proposal has been updated:

• Leave current top-left text as is ("From WikiPedia the free encyclopedia.")
• Add new top-right text ("All articles are user-contributed in a collaborative effort.")

Interested contributors please comment here. Thank you for your help! -- Sitearm | Talk 02:03, 2005 August 12 (UTC)

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday Jimbo! You also have some birthday greetings. — Stevey7788 (talk) 20:45, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

Hello Jimbo,

I will just say "Happy Birthday" to you at this way, because I was not long enough at the wikimania-party yesterday. I hope, you have enoy your birthday present :-). --DaB. 20:21, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

I just got blocked

I rolled back Vietnam War because User:Stevertigo reverted while it was locked. I sent him a quick note that it was poor form to do this. Then he blocked me!

This does appear to be an abuse of Admin priviledges. I am formally asking for you to desysop him... however if this is not the correct way of going about it just let me know. Please also note he has been edit warring on Vietnam War.

Here is the entry in the block log: 12:59, 8 August 2005, Stevertigo blocked Ta bu shi da yu (expires 14:59, 8 August 2005) (contribs) (unblock) ( 1. Do not edit a temporarily protected page except to add a protected page notice.)

Ta bu shi da yu 03:22, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

P.S. I am also noting this on WP:AN, WP:AN/I and User:Angela. - Ta bu shi da yu 03:22, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

Desysoping for what could be a simple mistake or misunderstanding is a bit over the top, isn't it? — David Remahl 03:25, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

Chmod007, you may not be aware that this isn't the first time: Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Stevertigo. A desysoping not only seems appropriate, it seems absolutely nessesary in this case. The misunderstanding here in on the part of Stevertigo; he seems to have lost all sense of what purpose the admin tools are for, and when it is appropriate to use them. Func( t, c ) 03:30, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

Interesting. Yes, it really does look damning. :-( — David Remahl 03:32, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

Doesn't seem like much of a misunderstanding, considering that Stevertigo blocked Ta bu shi da yu for doing exactly the same thing he did on the same page. If you ever need a clear example of hypocrisy in action, keep this one handy. --Calton | Talk 03:53, August 8, 2005 (UTC)

I just wanted to say I also support immediate removal of administrator privileges for User:Stevertigo, or at least a promise to refrain from using them until this is sorted out. His behavior has gone from bad to worse in the last couple days. Please see Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Stevertigo for more background. — Knowledge Seeker দ 03:55, August 8, 2005 (UTC)

For the record, he apologised. If we can make sure that he doesn't do this again, I'd like to take back my request for desysoping this editor. We all make mistakes. - Ta bu shi da yu 07:06, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

Irate again

I looked at your block of User:Irate again, and the message you used to give your reason for it, and I noticed that as part of your reason you say that Irate promises to "continue "following" [our rules] as he always has". The obvious implication is that Irate is planning to circumvent the rules, or something to that effect, but I think another interpretation is possible, whereby Irate's comment (as I infer it based on your words) is simply a statement claiming that he has been following the rules, and that he means to follow the rules in the future as well. So by that interpretation, he did nothing more than claim he had done nothing wrong. Well, if we come at it from this direction, we have to wonder: since when do we block someone—indefinitely!—just for defending themselves? Of course this could be wrong, since I don't have much information to base it on. Everyking 04:00, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

Unified wiki namespace?

Hello Jimbo, I have been wondering why the different wiki sites are rather separate: wikipedia, wikibooks, wikisource, wikiquote etc? It seems to me it would be easier on multiple levels if there was one unified namespace for everything under one site with one login, call it the wikiuniverse perhaps. Doesn't the concept of "wiki" trump even the seemingly arbitrarily imposed distinctions of "encyclopedia" and "books" and "quotations" etc? zen master T 14:21, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

I think the current division is completely sensible. An encyclopedia is a specific kind of reference work, not a massive random compilation of everything.--Jimbo Wales 14:02, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

More rogue admin activity on CFD

User:Kbdank71 is trying to delete terrorism-related categories on the grounds that, "We've gotten rid of many other "terrorist" cats as POV, so this should probably go too." See for example: Categories_for_deletion#Category:Terrorism_in_India

This nomination was a typical "drive by shooting" with absolutely no discussion before the nomination or after.

It makes no sense to delete a subcategory of Category:Terrorism as long as the main category exists - as it should, because it's very useful.

Of course, if User:Kbdank71 can get a few friends to vote 'delete', he could probably get the whole Category:Terrorism deleted. It only takes a few people to form a phony "consensus" on Wikipedia which justifies any action, no matter how destructive. Mirror Vax 01:35, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

Question about IP blocks

What would it take to disallow anoymous editing for a particular subnet? See User:Ta bu shi da yu/Ozemail for info on why I would like this. - Ta bu shi da yu 07:40, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

See also Blocks on Anonymous users only at Bugzilla. Thryduulf 19:52, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

Historical persecution by Jews

Hello Jimbo. Can I ask you what the rules are about closing, reopening and overriding closed VFD debates. Some weeks back I closed Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/Religious persecution by Jews as a "no consensus" keep. A number of users complained about this, IZAK, Ambi, Jfdwolff for example (see my talkpage under "You make no sense"). I therefore decided to ask for the advice of two other regualar VFD closers, Rossami and SimonP and both of them agreed with me. The issue died down until Neutrality suddenly decided to delete the article (which had now moved to a new title)

• 19:47, 7 August 2005 Neutrality deleted "Historical persecution by Jews" (VfD debate had an overwhelming vote to delete (at least 2:1).)

When I discovered this, I brought it to WP:VFU [5] and informed Tony Sidaway, who had been involved in the debate. He almost immediatly restored the article as an obvious out of process deletion.

• 10:03, 8 August 2005 Tony Sidaway restored "Historical persecution by Jews"

I promised to undelete this next time I saw the article get deleted without a VFD debate to back it up. Neutrality then decided to delete it again, and was reversed by User:Kim Bruning.

• 14:59, 8 August 2005 Neutrality deleted "Historical persecution by Jews" (Re-deleting. There was an obvious two-thirds consensus on VfD to delete. This is "broad consensus." A small minority of users will no be allowed to override the broad consensus. Take it to VfU if you must.)

and

• 18:33, 8 August 2005 Kim Bruning restored "Historical persecution by Jews"

There is now a question on Wikipedia:Votes for undeletion on whether or not it is okay to "override" or "review" VFD debates which have been closed by an administrator. I would really appreciate your views on the matter, because my role as an administrator since I was promoted in June has mostly been closing VFD debates.

To finish off I will add some links to pages where this case has been discussed:

• Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/Religious persecution by Jews original VFD debate
• Wikipedia talk:Votes for deletion/Religious persecution by Jews discussion of the original VFD debate
• WP:ANI#User:Sjakkalle,_User:IZAK_and_the_VFD_debate_on_Religious_persecution_by_Jews Discussion at Administrator's Noticeboard
• User talk:Sjakkalle My talkpage
• Talk:Historical persecution by Jews
• Wikipedia:Votes for undeletion#Historical persecution by Jews

Sorry about bothering you, but I have almost had it with the discussion of this article. Yours, Sjakkalle (Check!) 10:45, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

JWales Final Responsibility re:Auschwitz Testimony Against Pope Pius XII etc

I'm sorry Jimbo , but I see the responsibility to settle intractable disputes rests with you . I seem to run into intractable dispute on your WP , so I ask you to take responsibility . No one else can take this your place . I refer you to the articles Pope Pius XII and Hitler's Pope as the centre of this endless dispute and ask you to put yourself into the position of final arbiter now, OK ? I particularly think that the surviving Roman Jewess's words be taken as an issue : I wish you therefore to show or not show , that an Auschwitz survivor be called POV ( ,Pius in WWar 2) and removed on one page and insulted with neutrality on the other . . You will see that the difference between the two articles at this minute is simple : one (PPII) is the 'censored' or whatever version of the other (H's P).

Having been battling to and beyond the brink for 8 months on the one article , I say that only you can survey this with any authority to do anything about it . Let you be the judge of all the WP ( or whatever )requisites, knowing that your judgements are real , and that ultimately you yourself will equally be judged . Auschwitz survivors are definitely in a minority and this responsibility for arbitration I lay at you because you are the organ . I will consider myself in-active until you please let me know that I am required . As various users may find this disappearance odd , I post this letter to you , for them to see elsewhere . Famekeeper 09:36, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Category madness: "broad" is now a reason to delete

As Sherool points out below, Category:People is pretty broad. I guess that will have to be deleted under the new thinking? Mirror Vax 12:47, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Category:Christian_people

• should be Category:Christians
• focus "This category comprises articles pertaining to people espousing or belonging to the Christian faith." this is completely inappropriate! Every European 400 AD - 1770 AD would need to be included. Focus should be restricted to people actively involved in theology, church, or proselytization, i.e. people whose adherence to Christianity is part of their notability. dab (ᛏ) 09:10, 5 August 2005 (UTC)
• What about Category:Jews and Category:Muslims? Also very broad. --DR31 _(talk) 13:42, 9 August 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, too broad. Radiant_>|< 12:02, August 5, 2005 (UTC)
• Delete as per Radiant. --Kbdank71 13:56, 5 August 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Only a couple million WP articles fit this category. --Lord Voldemort ^{(Dark Mark)} 16:22, 5 August 2005 (UTC)
• Delete way too broad. -Splash 17:39, 5 August 2005 (UTC)
• Delete No argument. siafu 19:51, 5 August 2005 (UTC)
• Delete Too broad. RedWolf 22:36, August 5, 2005 (UTC)
• Delete as per Radiant. Hall Monitor 22:53, 5 August 2005 (UTC)
• Delete Broad. --DR31 _(talk) 13:42, 9 August 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Too broad to be useful. Hall Monitor 23:47, 9 August 2005 (UTC)
• Depopulate only and rename possebly tweak it's text a little. It's part of a "hierarchy" structure, and the instructions also clearly says that biographies should not go into the category itself, but one of the subcats (and the quoted bit abowe was changed by the nominator too). IMHO deleting this as "too broad" would be simmilar to deleting Category:People (now that's broad!) or, sometimes a "too broad" category is needed to house more spesific subcats, IMHO this is one such case. --Sherool 08:04, 10 August 2005 (UTC)
• Christian leaders would make more sense as a category. Then we would have a place to put Pat Robertson. Certainly, someone needs to put him in his place. >:) Wahkeenah 20:30, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

More stuff...

We are going to talk about real some more. Earlier this year, I went for a checkup for the first time in 10 years. There were two suspicious moles on my back that needed to get removed. My mindset at the time was to try to make an appointment with Elizabeth Morgan and have her do them. She declined (we never talked in person). That is the level at which I play. With my whole being.

Now, we gonna start talking about the genuine stalkers in your organzation. We already covered Xaa and Nunh-huh. Now we deal with Antaeus Feldspar. Look at this: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Buddy_Ebsen&oldid=20592765 Now: How do I know about "At the Codfish Ball?". It is only the end of a videotape of "The Little Princess". I have sat through it several times with my daughter (in the times I do get to be with her). That is where I got the lines about her memorizing scripts at age 5 and doing all those dance steps on her page. I did not recognize Buddy Ebsen. He was young and wiry, black hair, suave and graceful. He was not Jeb Clempet. But they only show Jeb Clempet on TV anymore. That is all these kids in your organization know.

Of course, since I added the lines, Antaeus Feldspar me down and undid my work.

Sir, I ask you: How bad is the problem that you cannot get Wikipeida into grade school. I can tell already that it is really bad. You have people like Antaeus Feldspar.

And check up on Tregoweth also. He did come after me, removed some stuff I made, and then conceeded the point after a discussion.

And just tell Michael L. Kaufman to keep off the sexual stuff completely. That boy has no sense. How does it feel to be "banned" by all grade schools, or at least teachers with any sense? I tried to explain in the Linda Lovelace thing that I do not value my "Amorrow" handle. You should give these people pause by making them consider renaming their handles. Do not do it, but get them to think and shape up. They are a wolf pack. You need to address this problem, sir, if you are going to become relevant. You may still get there, but those guys are going to slow you down, but good.

The Gates of Hell

So I been sending Geni (or should I say Geni-username?) a LOT of email. Like I said, I am in Silicon Valley. I went to view, again, the Rodin Gates of Hell at the Cantor Art Museam at Stanford. Right now, I am at the Clocktower Cafe in Mountain View. Hell is simple: you made mistakes and you lost to someone smarter, better, more mature and maybe richer.

I have had a rich and deep experience with Wikipedia. I continue to process the information about psychology that I have gather. I continue to make analogies, because they help me in my analysis. Maybe a few times, I have applied the wrong template. But basically, conflict is conflict. Whether it is a pissing contest on a discussion tab, or Microsoft (or whoever) eating Wikipeida's lunch or the blood and gore of the Civil War or whatever.

I already know what is on my userpage. I WROTE it. Do not unblock my username. But make one concession. Unblock my user page, so that the World can see for itself it if I am a bad man or a good man. On the other hand, there is so much stuff there, maybe it will not help, but do it anyway. Oh sure, dummies will say "Gotcha!" on this or that. Let them look. I looked into the Gates of Hell yesterday. It ain't so bad. It simply defeat. But I will tell you: Victory is better. Now let the World look at my silly page and judge for themselves. You arleday know I can put a copy of it anywhere I want to. I can create a sock-puppet that you DO NOT recogonize, if I have no already done so. Mabye I got a freind in Japan to make one for me and just tell me the new username and password and hand it off to me. See how that works? Stop trying to squash me: you are wasting your time.

Let's work together on this. Huh? Microsoft (or somebody else) is coming after you even as you read this. When they finish you off, they will do it painlessly. You will never feel it coming. You will just go to sleep. Forever.

Better movie and media star review

Look at this site: http://www.sensesofcinema.com/ You want them on your side. If Microsfot buys thems, they have snatched away from you something valuable. Look at the list of great directors. I am doing this to you on the open channel on purpose, to give you a sense of urgency. Look at that http://www.sensesofcinema.com/contents/directors/03/gilliam.html Beautiful. You want that. How you gonna get it? What if one day you have to use your MS Passport to read that? That would suck. Or even just a Paypal thingy.

Think about it.

I oppose this [tagline] change

I oppose this change on the grounds that all of the proposed alternatives are aesthetically awful. The tagline is short and sweet and should stay that way. We should not lack self-confidence and feel we have to put a disclaimer on everything.--Jimbo Wales 12:47, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

I replied on Tagline proposal, but rephrasing and reposting here:

We can't just stick our heads in the sand and pretend that our articles will be free from vandalism and inaccuracy when a first-timer visits from a google link. They see "free encyclopedia" at the top and trust everything they read as much as they would a traditional encyclopedia.

We don't trust everything we read on the Wikipedia. We're constantly looking out for bits that need updating or vandalism that needs to be removed. We shouldn't encourage an atmosphere in which newcomers trust the content more than we do.

I absolutely disagree with smacking a giant disclaimer or apology on every page, but I do think it's very important that we make the source of our content (ourselves) and basic principles of operation the first thing a google link follower sees.

My proposal was a condensed version of the main page greeting (which newcomers don't see):

"Welcome to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit."

Short, sweet, optimistic, and clues in newcomers as to the source of our information. - Omegatron 14:41, August 7, 2005 (UTC)

(Report Vandalism by ----Mel Etitis) and --Ragib

Dear Admin,

User --Ragib and --Mel Etitis are contionusly vandal the article rohingya. please see it in http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rohingya&action=history. Such Violaton shall be stop .please keep wiki standard updated .violations would not be accepted by any reader of wikipedia . go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Vandalism. please advice. Thanks,--Bobjack 14:43, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

The dispute is mainly about two dashes (?!?). I responded to the user on his talk page, no need for you to respond. Happy editing -- Chris 73 Talk 15:45, August 12, 2005 (UTC)

The hitherto anonymous editor in question should seriously consider focusing his or her energy on imporving Rohingya villages, me thinks. El_C 12:49, 13 August 2005 (UTC)

Second tagline poll - please follow this link

(This is already announced on Pump and Rfc but I'm adding it here because you contributed to the proposal talk page discussion.) Thanks! -- Sitearm | Talk 05:38, 2005 August 16 (UTC)

Request for clarification

I realize you're a busy man, so I understand if time prevents you from answering this in a prompt manner, or at all for that matter. A number of Wikipedians, myself included, have been trying to put together a draft for a standard on obscenity in images. Before we are ready to request comments we first would like to search the "case law" as it were of Wikipedia to find standards which may be suggested by history. In particular we have been looking at the following example of a comment by you:

Link to the diff where you commented in the summary

This image is completely unacceptable for wikipedia -- I don't even consider this borderline

We would like you to clarify why you felt the image was unacceptable so we can understand the case law here, and try to incorporate it into our suggestion. Do you remember the incident? Would you be able to share your insight into what you believe/believed make such images unacceptable? Thanks for your time. Agriculture 07:54, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

User:Attackoftheshow

This was reported as a policy violation, which, technically, it is. It was reported at least once, to WP:AN/I. It is not uncommon for people to create discussion pages wholly unrelated to Wikipedia, and I had deleted and protected it before I figured out you were actually behind it. We routinely send such people to other, more general wikis.

It would be helpful if you would let the community know about these sorts of things in advance so that we can excercise the appropriate forebearance.

The Uninvited Co., Inc. 22:37, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

I see Tony had done so earlier as well. I will put up notices to try to prevent it from happening again. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 22:39, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia reading level

Hi

I was wondering if you or anyone has said anything about what reading level Wikipedia articles should be written? 3rd grade, 8th, 12th, college? Just wondering. I see a lot of articles written well above and/or well below what most people come across in newspapers and paper encyclopedias. Thanks! --JPotter 23:55, August 16, 2005 (UTC)

Well, to chime in here, I don't think there's any kind of standard; I think a lot of it depends on the subject matter (some things are so complex that dealing with it in simple language is too difficult and long-winded) and personal style. I don't know if you know it, but we have a Simple English wiki, which I think meets the needs of people who aren't so proficient, so we don't need to go too far out of our way to simplify the kind of language we use. Everyking 10:03, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

The reading level of some WP articles is pitched way too high - often at undergraduate or graduate level, which isn't generally appropriate. Why shouldn't a non-graduate be able to read the article on chromosomes, for example, and come away with an idea as to what they are and why they are important? Yet at the moment, I'd advise against anyone below undergraduate level reading it, as it'd just be a waste of time to do so, jguk 12:20, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Wikipedians for Decency

Your opinion on Wikipedia:WikiProject Wikipedians for Decency and the VfD debate on it would be welcome. Zoe 06:29, August 17, 2005 (UTC)

I heartily agree. Agriculture 06:29, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

I have changed my position on the VfD in question. It's obvious that discussion of certain kinds of topics are no longer welcome on Wikipedia. It's not your fault Jimbo, you had a great idea and I salute you. You are one of the few visionaries left in the world, and on Wikipedia. You may ignore my previous request for your comments as it will no longer be relevant. Agriculture 09:03, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

Oopsla in October

Hello Jimbo - I would like to schedule a San Diego meet-up to coincide with your trip to San Diego in October. Please let me know what would work best with your schedule and I will arrange accordingly. Thanks! Johntex 00:11, 18 August 2005 (UTC)

Hi Jimbo, I know you are terribly busy, but I wonder if you will have time while in San Diego this October to attend an event if I put one together? Please let me know. Thanks! (PS - best of luck with the funding presentations) Johntex 02:05, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I would be very interested in that. Please email me?--Jimbo Wales 14:07, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

Ten things that will be free

On Wikimania you announced ten things that will be free, and blogged about two on Larry Lessig's blog. Then you wrote that the next will be announced on your blog, but there is no mention of it. I wonder, is this "project" dead or something? I am just curious. Samohyl Jan 17:50, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

No, it is an ongoing project of mine. I'll be presenting the current list at the Fellow's Hour at Harvard's Berkman Center Tuesday a week from now.--Jimbo Wales 14:02, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

The Balkans

Something got me thinking. While millosh has been planning your whole stay in the Balkans (presumably somewhere between October 19 and 31), I've checked if you are really busy. And the thing that worried me was this - TENTATIVE Lithuania visit. The whole Sebian and other neighbouring wiki communities are really glad you're coming, since they've been told that you'll probably come and Millosh has planned the whole thing. Now, I know you've e-mailing each other over the time and I just want to know if this thing is for sure, i.e. will you really visit us again? Thanks in advance. :) --Dungo (talk) 18:05, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

Oh dear, I do plan to try to come to the Balkans but I really most likely can not come at that time. :-( --Jimbo Wales 06:33, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

Vandalism on Greenlandic language Wikipedia

a vulgar article has been created on the Greenlandic Wikipedia page. I attempted to delete it with the 'move' option but it didn't work. Could you have someone take care of it.

Admin?

(from WP:PE)

I blocked Boothy443 for having a very offensive link on one of his user pages. This caused me a fair amount of embarassment as I clicked on it in a work environment. I have no idea what the policy is, so I only blocked him for 17 seconds. But I think admins should hold themselves to a high standard of professionalism.--Jimbo Wales 19:59, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

This is strange. You are the second person I can see who talked as if Boothy443 were an admin. He's not, I checked on WP:LA and on the logs. Why did you come to that conclusion? --cesarb 23:27, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

I got an email asserting that admins should behave better, and showing me the link. I took it at face value on the bit about him being an admin, obviously a mistake. Boothy443 is lucky, then, becuase if he wasn't an admin, I would have blocked him for longer than 17 seconds. I did that on the assumption that he'd passed the community test and just had a little lapse of judgment there. Now I find that he's been blocked more than once, etc. Ah, well. He's still lucky I'm in a dandy mood today.  :-) --Jimbo Wales 04:58, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

So I assume that meeting with the suits to try to get server equipment went well. Jtkiefer ^{T | @ | C} ----- 06:09, August 25, 2005 (UTC)

I don't understand why you didn't just remove the link. Symbolic blocks are worse than no block at all; at least a block of some length serves a functional purpose. A 17 second block is just an annoyance which is only likely to make him even more hostile. Everyking 06:19, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

He's lucky I only blocked him for the 17 seconds. It was my attempt to reach out to him in a friendly way. His response suggests that this was a little bit pointless on my part. --Jimbo Wales 16:20, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

And your thoughts on this?

just a note that there is a discussion here about the issues with Boothy. 06:43, August 25, 2005 (UTC)

There is a good deal of difference between goatse (clearly labeled no less) and Last Measure. The former is akin to having a link to our circumcision article. --SPUI (talk) 07:23, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

There is a difference between the two links, but I would not call it a 'good deal' of difference. Both are juvenile, annoying, and unprofessional. Neither has the character of wickedly clever wit, they are just blunt tools. I encourage you, and Boothy443 of course, to do better.--Jimbo Wales 16:20, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

Can we change his name too?

While everyone's discussing changing his beard, and even glasses, why not change his name from Jimbo Wales to Jumbo Whales? His actual name is as offensive as his beard is. Can I have a poll of keeping his name, or changing it? Adamwankenobi 14:31, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

• Keep. You shouldn't be changing his name without his mom's permission. *Dan* 15:29, August 25, 2005 (UTC)
• Weak Keep. Moral concepts like "should" and "shouldn't" have no place here, but the name is okay as it is. ZacharyS 22:18, 25 August 2005 (UTC)
• Comment. Both Jumbo Whales and Jumbo Wales are already taken (and blocked). As is, probably, just about every other variation of the name "Jimmy Donal Wales" imaginable. JRM · Talk 00:40, 26 August 2005 (UTC)
  • Should we block User:Jimbo Wales as well, just to be on the safe side? jguk 19:58, 27 August 2005 (UTC)
• Delete Ryan Norton ^{T | @ | C} 03:03, 26 August 2005 (UTC)
• Transwiki to WikiWales. Fernando Rizo T/C 16:33, 26 August 2005 (UTC)
• Merge with God 195.92.40.49 17:16, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

trouble

hi jim ive been editing as an anon user for a few months now and i believe that has hurt me.if you look into my history you will see most of my edits are to the special forces page on wiki for the U.S. and there are some registered users whi i will not name that are consistent on deleting my edits.i have even cited sources but they delete the source saying you need more than one,but, how can you have more than one if you delete the first?i was wondering if you would just please watch out for them,making sure they're not abusing their power. thank you.

Re:Your message at my talk page

I was actually astounded to see there wasn't a wave of supports after you voted at that VfD ;) The link is now fixed but for laziness sakes here it is again. Wikipedia:Votes_for_deletion/Jane_mcgonigal. Enjoy Redwolf24 (talk) 02:56, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

The problem was at first the page was Jane mcgonigal with the lowercase M and thats how it was nominated for VfD. When I went to write {{Oldvfd}} on the page I saw the page was moved and I'd have to type {{subst:oldvfd}} and fix the link myself. But I made a typo "mcgonical" You then capitalized it I see and then JRM fixed it. Redwolf24 (talk) 02:58, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

How about a new tribunal committee for trial of misdemeanor cases?

Could you get behind the creation some sort of court, or tribunal comittee of some sort to relieve the arbitration committee of the burden of trying all these misdemeanor cases?

In the real world arbitration and tribunal are two entirely different things.

Arbitration is the process by which two parties to an unresolved dispute JOINTLY submit their differences to the judgment of an impartial person. [6]

A tribunal is a court of justice before which an accused is brought for justice after being provided with a summons citing precisely what sections of the code he is charged with violating, and specifically what particular actions of his are alleged to be violations of the code. [7]

There is a big difference, and I am sure that in the long run, Wikipedia will want to establish a separate tribunal where such misdemeanor (bad behavior) charges are brought. The capital of the arbitration committee should be spent arbitrating CONTENT DISPUTES submitted for arbitration, don't you think? --172.194.231.160 21:47, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure this is DotSix, as per WP:VPR#Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration_is_being_used_as_a_tribunal_-_that_ain.27t_right. ~~ N (t/c) 22:58, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

Aren't you interested in following policy and comment on the content of what was written, not on the contributor? You would prefer to go along with the obscurantist crowd and post argument _ad hominem_ instead of discussing the issues?--172.197.155.60 01:55, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

I didn't intend that as an ad hominem, I was just making an observation. I have no strong position on your proposal, except to note as I did on the VP that, although Wikipedia's arbitration process is actually closer to the dictionary definition of "tribunal", this does not in any way make it less valid. And I am not an obscurantist, unless the definition is "anyone who disagrees with DotSix", as it appears to be. Besides, aren't you prohibited from editing here? ~~ N (t/c) 02:01, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

1. An OBSERVATION?? I think you misspelled CONJECTURE, old boy, and an argument _ad hominem_ style conjecture at that, don't you think? 8^)

2. Are you going to assume from now on that every anonymous contributor is User:DotSix?

3. Are you in the habit of making a lot of assumptions with no basis in fact, sir?

4. Why are you still trying to make this a discussion about the contributor? Has there been a change in policy I haven't heard about? Have you forgotten already, comment on the content of what was written, not on the contributor? --172.192.16.159 06:20, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

Please could you move this to User_talk:Jimbo Wales. Pcb21| Pete 09:25, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

Crisis

Wikipedia is approaching a crisis. My thoughts on this situation are set forth at: User:Robert McClenon/Crisis. Robert McClenon 19:43, 27 August 2005 (UTC)

When I first started to read the immediately above post, I thought that it might also be discussing the need for dispute resolution reform. It is not. It is only a silly dictionary argument about whether the existing Arbitration Committee is misnamed. I think that if he thinks that the Arbitration Committee exists to resolve content issues, then he misunderstands how Wikipedia is supposed to work. Robert McClenon 19:43, 27 August 2005 (UTC)

A joint request by the two parties for arbitration of their content dispute is not the last resort for handling content disputes, sir? Doesn't the chart at right show the route content disputes are suposed to take?? If not, then will you please post the correct chart right below here, sir?

Human Rights Servey on Wikipedia (The final post of I_sterbinski)

Dear all,

Wikipedia was recently a subject of intensive research of an huge international human right organization. A team of people from different nationalities and ages were acting on Wikipedia for 20 days, investigating previously noted anomalities of Wikipedia free editing and forming a final report, which (between the others similar reports) will later be a guide to all future moves of the organization concerning Wikipedia. Acting under an account of a real person, their privacy is to be held private. Therefore, very few private information will be revealed.

Also, this is a result of the lack of final possition of the organization concerning Wikipedia and human rights, which was still not formed.

The team's final post on Wikipedia, where they explain their actions can be found on the following addresses:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:I_sterbinski

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Macedonia#Human_Rights_Servey_on_Wikipedia_.28The_final_post_of_I_sterbinski.29

The team would like to thank to all the persons who took part in the correspondence with us.

We also want to appologise for keeping our identity secret for a longer period.

Best regards,

Aleksandar, Biljana, Asparuh, Christos, Valjon, Michael and Ana Luiza

I sterbinski 00:32, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

Could the User Page on which the summary statements are made please be protected and that protection monitored by at least one admin? Regardless of the veracity of the claims, the text is no doubt going to be a vandalism target. Please protect its content. Courtland 03:14, 30 August 2005 (UTC)

Further issues on what Wikibooks is or should be

Hi Jimbo, I wanted to point you to Votes for deletion/The Manual of Crime. The book in question is similar to The Anarchist Cookbook in nature. Reading over the Wikicities policy, it seems like this book would not be allowed. So, it would seem to me that Wikibooks should at least have standards no lower than Wikicities. (In fact, the standards should be higher in the sense that no original research should be allowed.)

The discussion itself has turned somewhat into a discussion of where Wikibooks should draw the line. I think we all agree that textbooks, how-tos, and the cookbook have a place on Wikibooks; though there is no agrement whether video game walk-throughs should be included, or, indeed, the more significant point if there should be single books devoted to breaking laws. I don't think any of us have problems with chemistry books, in the proper context, describing explosives; but I think this has gone too far. If you could shed any wisdom on this discussion it would be greatly appreciated. MShonle 07:32, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

The purpose of Wikibooks is to host works which constitute a curriculum of textbooks from Kindergarten through the university level. The cookbook, for example, qualifies, since such courses are taught. The manual of crime does not fit the definition of any course that I know of, and should be deleted. This is not a decree, since I haven't even looked at it, just a recommendation for now.--Jimbo Wales 14:19, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

Thanks! I appreciate the reply. MShonle 23:31, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

Encarta/2004

I notice the Encarta/2004 lists have been deleted with great urgency, having been humming along happily for 6 months or so. I saw your mail on WikiEN-l, but there was little reasoning given there. Would you mind furnishing me with a little more detail behind the decision, privately if you prefer? I just have a feeling you wouldn't have written that mail from a plane apropos of nothing! Pcb21| Pete 15:48, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

I had no idea these lists were around, or they would have been deleted immediately. While opinions seem to differ among the lawyers on juriwiki-l, it seems that this would likely be determined to be a copyright violation. As such, I feel an obligation to delete these pages and any like them immediately.--Jimbo Wales 16:10, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

It seems to be non-trivial to subscribe to juriwiki-l. It would be useful for someone with access to those posts to post a precis of the discussions so that those who used the lists understand the reasons for their deletion.

On the other note, I guess I am quite sad that you had never heard of the lists, as it indicates my advertising campaign to get people involved failed! Pcb21| Pete 16:23, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

Jimbo, could you clarify the meaning of "any like them"? There are a range of things that might fall under this edict. Should it be extended to cover lists compiled from the indices of books, dictionaries and other reference works, not just other encyclopedias? Does it make a difference if the list is single source or not (there are a couple lists that people have created by combining the contents of multiple works)? And lastly, does it matter if the sources are known (there is one list page which states that it was compiled by combining multiple reference works, but has never disclosed which ones)? Thank you for clarifying this matter. Dragons flight 17:43, August 28, 2005 (UTC)

I believe it is important to indicate what changes could have been made, or what other-formatted-list could have been used, that would not be in potential violation of copyright. An underlying sentiment among respondants is likely "what will next disappear?" In order to reassure editors as to the legality of their actions, or inform them of their illegality, some clarification is needed. Further, its important to clarify whether the deletions (and implied like ones coming in the future) were done as pre-emptions against potential legal issues or as clearcut purging of Wikipedia of surely illegal content. If we are now in a position where pre-emption by purging boundary-skirting content will be the rule, that will necessarily change the editing climate across all Wikimedia Projects, in my opinion, and necessitates a reduction in the openness of the editing environment. Thanks for the further comment. Courtland 20:53, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

As a matter of procedure, I was under the belief that if a page qualified as copyright violation, then someone should put a copyvio tag on the page, to give people the opportunity to discuss the issue. Only last week, Bluemoose suggested that copyvios should be added to the criteria for speedy deletion, only to have the idea discounted (see [8] for details). Bluap 21:57, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

The distinction is that this particular sort of list had been discussed many times over the years and thought to be a copyvio each time. This sort of list is an extraordinary risk to us, a special case, since it is a copyvio *of an organization with whom we directly compete in the market*. That's what makes it intolerable for me, because the specific legal risk is so high. As to the exact parameters of lists of this sort, I think this warrants a serious community discussion.--Jimbo Wales 03:29, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

Was this an action as benevolent dictator, or do you consider an action like this appropriate for any administrator should the situation arise? Jarvik 03:45, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

Considering the potential for this type of conflict between Wikipedia and other information resources, it might be prudent to establish something along the lines of Wikipedia:WikiProject CopyVio Monitor that has as its specific goal detection, consideration, and resolution of potential copyright (and related) violations with particular emphasis on other players in the Wikipedia activity space; similar activities could be established for each of the Sister Projects and coordinated at the Wikimedia level. Courtland 04:12, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

Makes sense. Would it be possible for someone to put together a clear set of guidelines of what is permitted in Wikipedia, to prevent this from happening again... Bluap 09:49, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

Re: "many times over the years..." It is true that your opinion has changed over time... see e.g. http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2004-March/011449.html. Pcb21| Pete 19:14, 30 August 2005 (UTC)

Apparently so! Goodness.--Jimbo Wales 21:40, 30 August 2005 (UTC)

:). That wasn't meant as a criticism by the way, just that I felt it might help explain some of the confusion over these lists. Pcb21| Pete 07:41, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

In accordance with your statement that we should not use topic lists from "an organization with whom we directly compete in the market", I have now deleted 4 additional topic lists generated from copyrighted works that market themselves as "encyclopedias". This still leaves open certain other questions such as whether the list of topics in the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology is acceptable? As it is specialized and does not describe itself as an "encyclopedia", I was not sure whether to include it under a direct competition standard. Dragons flight 19:30, August 31, 2005 (UTC)

I believe that lists of names of individuals generated from telephone books have been found by the courts to be copyright violations. So just about any list culled from a copyrighted source is probably copyrighted; this includes top-ten lists (!). I am not a lawyer. linas 05:28, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

Curiously, you have this exactly wrong. Phone books are the famous example of lists which are not copyrighted as neither the selection nor arrangement of items in a phone book is a creative act. This is in contrast to encyclopedias/indices/cookbooks and most other lists where the selection of topics is clearly a creative act. Top ten lists are copyrighted if and only if editorial judgment was involved in their creation. For example, a list of the 10 largest cities in the world is a collection of facts, not subject to copyright. A list of the best resteraunts in Bombay or any late night talk show list is a matter of opinion, hence creative and protected. Dragons flight 07:12, September 1, 2005 (UTC)

Ony when those lists were generated by extracting them directly from the phone book, with no creative act in between. Going "The first name in the telephone book is…" etc wouldn't be a problem. I don't think there have been suits about having a computer do that step, but I doubt that would be allowed given current precedent (layman's opinion). --fvw* 05:53, September 1, 2005 (UTC)

Anti-Elitism page

[When I first posted this I stupidly omitted the heading, so it got buried in someone else's post. You may have overlooked it or just didn't consider that it needed a comment. For what it's worth, and for form's sake, here it is, properly headed. — J M Rice 21:28, 28 August 2005 (UTC)]

Hi, Jimbo. I just wrote a piece on Wikipedia:Anti-elitism called, "The problem is not anti-elitism!". Since the page begins with

Anti-elitism at Wikipedia is at the root of both of its biggest problems.

1. lack of public perception of credibility, particularly in areas of detail

2. the dominance of difficult people, trolls, and their enablers

It must be jettisoned.

and since you were referred to a couple of times on the page, I was wondering if you'd like to comment on my comments. (Guess I'm asking for it.) — J M Rice 04:03, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

Question about banned user policies

Just wondering, Jimbo, if a user is banned for a certain timeframe, is there a set number of sockpuppet attacks beyond which the issue of a lengthening of a ban (as opposed to its rebegining on each occasion) arises? You no doubt remember the wonderful (sic) User:Skyring. Since his ban early in August at least 22 sockpuppets strongly suspected of being him have appeared and been blocked (same edits on the same pages, same abusive comments, same language used, one picking up as soon as another was blocked, etc.) Others are being found. There probably are many everyone missed. It may be an area where some form of policy might be worth adopting; namely that while everytime a sockpuppet appears the ban is restarted, if the number of sockpuppets hits a certain threshhold an extra ban (say 1 month, or 3 months, or one quarter of a ban for bans of less than 1 year, etc) is added on as punishment. And don't worry I'm not planning to round up a posse on Skyring (though the guy has now begun writing to Irish newspapers to seek evidence that supports one edit some of his sockpuppets wanted to add in to an article — he is that nutty!). But his conduct raises an interesting set of issues of the sort we faced with Michael and DW before. Slán FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 03:48, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

Mediation

Hello, Jimbo! I recently expressed my interest in becoming a mediator with Uncle Ed, and he encouraged me to apply. Thus, I've done so at WP:MC. Also, he asked me to propose a new mediation format that would make the process go smoother; I have created such a page at Wikipedia:Requests for mediation/Proposed, and thought I'd share it with you. Here are my ideas for mediation:

1. Every mediator will have an office (similar to the desks used at the cleanup taskforce), at User:MEDIATOR/Office. This is where s/he will place all the current mediation.
2. Every mediation case will be on a subpage, at Wikipedia:Requests for mediation/PARTY 1 and PARTY 2. Thus, we can just put {{Wikipedia:Requests for mediation/...}} on the WP:RfM page and in the mediator's office.
3. Each case must first be approved by a mediator. Both parties MUST have agreed to mediation, as I beleive it's fruitless to mediate if one party is unwilling to settle their differences. Only a brief summary, without diffs or links to pages, will be accepted before the case is approved. The case may also be rejected or referred to the arbcom. In addition, both parties MUST agree to the goals of the mediation. (Again, I feel it's fruitless to mediate if both parties don't know what they are negotiating for)
4. Once approved, the next mediator without a case will take the assignment. In other words, the task will automatically move to an open office. If there are several open offices, it will go to the one which has been open the longest. If there are no open offices, it will go to one with the least cases/longest time on a case (if this wording isn't clear, see the "Open Tasks" thing at the right of the proposed page). Thus, there will be no "picking and choosing" of cases, streamlining the process. (An exception will be made if a mediator is an involved party).
5. Then the mediator will work with the parties... this is the actual mediation part.
6. The case can then be closed by the mediator- if both parties have met the goals, then the case is successful. Otherwise, the mediator can dismiss the case or recommend it to the arbcom.

I hope that makes sense; let me know what you think (after all, you are the "benevolent dictator" of Wikipedia). Thanks a lot for your help. Flcelloguy | A note? | Desk 23:58, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

maybe you like this one

We had a very pleasant informal meeting at the Dutch/Belgian wikipedia last sunday. Maybe you like this picture. Ellywa 07:34, 30 August 2005 (UTC)

Hey...

Hey Jimbo...if you're ever in the Chicagoland area can you tell me? I live in a suburb and I would like to come out and meet the greak godking himself . Cheers. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 22:32, 30 August 2005 (UTC)

Ilyanep and Jimbo - a few Chicagoans (and temporary ones like myself) have expressed interest in a meetup (see User talk:Kelly Martin#Chicago meetup). I could probably secure a conference room or somesuch at the U of Chicago if the need arose. — Dan | Talk 23:16, 30 August 2005 (UTC)

I'd be interested! — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 00:17, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

Fair Use Images

Jimbo, I saw this in the deletion log: (Deletion log); 20:16 . . Jimbo Wales (Talk | block) (deleted "Image:Katrina Flood Overview.jpg": abuse of "fair use" -- it's about time we got really really strict about this). How do you wish to go about the issue of Fair Use images? Zscout370 (Sound Off) 03:18, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

Well, mostly, they have to actually fit the definition of fair use. There is a 4 factor test for fair use, and this image used in this context violates 3 of of them.

1. What is the character of the use?

This one we get right: nonprofit, eductional, news reporting, non-commercial. We are not, however, criticizing or commenting on the photo itself (which would strengthen the fair use claim, because we would need to show the user what we are critiquing).

2. What is the nature of the work to be used?

This particular photo is imaginative and artistic, clearly a work of art.

3. How much of the work will you use?

We used all of it. We aren't quoting from the work, we are reproducing it wholesale.

4. What effect would this use have on the market for the original or for permissions if the use were widespread?

It would destroy it. Indeed, it could be argued (perhaps wrongly, but still...) that Wikipedia is in *direct competition* with the news service (we assume) from which it came. If Wikipedia started lifting wholesale commercially produced images from news services, there would be no images left.

Finally, it is worth noting that any legitimate claim of fair use is going to have to include a proper attribution and presumably a demonstration of thoughtfulness as to the use. Cavalierly saying "I found this picture, I don't know where it is from, so I'll wave my hands about fair use" is not consistent with our adamant attention to copyright laws.--Jimbo Wales 03:29, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

I also think you should talk to User:Carnildo, since he seems to know a lot about Fair Use by his work at WP:FAC. He should be the one to tell you about fair use more than I can. While I will take your suggestion and look at case law, I think we should pull in more folks for this. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 03:35, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

Requiring citation meta-data for images of all kinds is a good idea. I'll mention this at Wikipedia:WikiProject Fact and Reference Check. Courtland 04:05, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

I think the main problem is that there is not really any reminder to users that if they are to add images under fair use, they also have to provide the rationale. Special:Upload is always only one click away, and there are lots of nice templates (like Template:Promotional and many many others) that give users the impression that adding such a template will be sufficient. We just had a discussion about this on our Wikiproject, and I got the impression that most users are simply not aware of this. After all, fair use is a rather complicated issue, and I don't think that having a law degree should be a requirement for contributing images. I propose that there should be clear reminders when users upload images under fair use that simply slapping a tag on is not enough. The ten point system from Wikipedia:Fair use is a good place to start. Jacoplane 12:18, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

Just noticed the Wikipedia:WikiProject Fair use. While this is a good project that aims to solve a lot of the issues with fair use, I can't help but feel that they're always going to be trying to contain the problem, not solve it. The sheer volume of Category:Fair use images is quite intimidating. Jacoplane 12:21, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

I've just added this to Category:WikiProjects and it appears on List of WikiProjects. Courtland 13:53, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

Fair use... or not?

Um, sorry, Jimbo, I couldn't find a way to express why I saw that the Katrina picture (Katrina Flood Overview.jpg) I tagged as {{fuus}} was fair use. As far as I know, Wikipedia is using it in a news report, which makes it fair use. If I'm mistaken, then I apologize. But thanks for bringing that up to my attention. --Titoxd 03:20, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

No, using it in a news report absolutely does not make it fair use. I appreciate that you were mistaken; you are not in trouble. What we really need is a very firm change in the way the policy is written, to make inappropriate fair use be candidates for speedy deletion.--Jimbo Wales 03:22, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

While I do agree that many people use (and abuse) fair use, but I do not know under what guidelines could fair use apply. IANAL, but we need to see the Fair Use law and see what does the law say. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 03:25, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

Indeed, please do review the case law. It's quite important.--Jimbo Wales 03:30, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

What confused me was the article on fair use itself. I quote:

The fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright.

I known of several Wikipedians who use that article as an authoritative source on whether something is fair use or not. I agree, a change in policy is needed (I supported it to begin with, but now that I goofed and got yelled by the Big guy :), I advocate it even more). Tell me whenever there's discussions about this. --Titoxd 03:32, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

I also wish to jump in on the discussion. I also know of a few people who could enjoy the discussion. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 03:41, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

Hmmm. I see. The problem was that we had no idea where the picture came from. I tried to locate the source of the image. See these diffs: [9], [10], [11], [12]. --Titoxd 03:42, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

It could have been renamed when it was uploaded (some people do not rename images, so that makes finding copyvios/sources easy). Zscout370 (Sound Off) 03:49, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

This is meaningless a posteriori thinking, but rename it how? --Titoxd 05:03, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

When you upload the file to Wikipedia, you are given three boxes. Thr first is the file you want to upload, the second one gives you the option to rename it and the third online allows you to state what it is and any copyright infomation. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 05:04, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

Oh, I get it now. Since I wasn't the one who uploaded the pic (and haven't gotten around to do that) I wouldn't have known. I stand corrected. By the way, I was saying that 'my a posteriori thinking was meaningless, not anyone else's. Rereading my previous comment, that looks a little bit unclear. --Titoxd 05:14, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

Critics say Terri Schiavo is too long for a Fac ...eh?

Mr. Jimbo,

You remember me: I'm the Lakeland wiki contributer who went to court for Terri and almost won -actually doing better than Jeb Bush: (we both lost, as you well know, and this should be an interestimg topic, as you, like I, live nearby to where the Schiavo ordeal unfolded)

Raw Links here:

Links regarding my recent court battles, in which I lost a "next friend" petition to save Terri's life by a 4-3 margin. I did better then the governor, who lost 7-0 both times he was permitted before the court: (Jeb's case) http://www.floridasupremecourt.org/clerk/disposition/2004/10/04-925reh.pdf Google'ing my court case: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%224-3%22+watts+schiavo Yahoo speaks about me: http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=%224-3%22+watts+schiavo&fr=FP-tab-web-t&toggle=1&cop=&ei=UTF-8 The Fla. Supreme Court's decision for my case: http://www.floridasupremecourt.org/clerk/disposition/2005/2/03-2420reh.pdf My Press Release: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2005/2/prweb212613.htm News Coverage about my case: http://www.rense.com/general63/shc.htm

Anyhow, I hate to bother the top brass, but the Schiavo article is a Featured Article Candidate, and, while some of the critics have good points about image copyright concerns, most of the other criticisms are unfounded (e.g., length of article must be long to "do justice," etc.), I think the article is stable and very well-written.

Slightly over half of the "votes" are against it being a "Featured Article," but I've whipped the article in shape -with help from many other editors, including Mark (aka →Raul654), the Fac editor. Please honor our combined hard work & team-effort, and use your "god-like" powers, just once more, before you give them up. Thank you.--GordonWattsDotCom 10:13, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

Robert McHenry, Potty Mouth

Jimmy,

I've really enjoyed digging more deeply into editing at Wikipedia, and learning its peculiar culture. It's a lot of fun.

This morning I came across McHenry's critique of WP, and wrote a reponse to it. That potty mouth. I think his bathroom analogy is all wrong, and came up with a better one. It's at the bottom of this page:

"Who Farted?" A Response to Robert McHenry

Thanks for putting this place together.

Regards,

-- Paul Klenk

Well said. --Titoxd 03:55, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

Mediation #2

Hello, Jimbo. Would you mind giving us your opinion on the mediation proposal above (see User talk:Jimbo Wales#Mediation and the page, Wikipedia:Requests for mediation/Proposed)? Thanks very much! Flcelloguy | A note? | Desk 19:52, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

More images

Jimbo, more about fair use images. If we are going to use the four-point test you've given, then what purpose does {{fuus}} serve? Should all the images tagged with it be deleted? --Titoxd 03:07, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

This group is between 100 and 250 members large, a pretty small number overall, just to clarify the scale of this proposal/question. Courtland 03:47, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I think all of those should be deleted. Don't consider this a policy pronouncement just yet. I want to carefully study this.--Jimbo Wales 12:47, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

It seems to me that {{fuus}} serves the same purpose as {{noncommercial}} and {{permission}}: it provides an easy way to spot images that should be deleted. --Carnildo 03:20, 3 September 2005 (UTC)

Maybe qualify that by replacing "should" with "should be considered for"? Courtland 13:23, 3 September 2005 (UTC)

Lists of articles from other encyclopedias

Hi Jimbo. Sorry to stick this down here rather than neatly with the other 2004/Encarta stuff, but I wanted to make sure that it didn't get missed. There's some discussion going on at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Missing encyclopedic articles that you should have a look over. We could do with your view as to whether you consider a new list that is currently being generated to be such a risk that you would want to "shoot it on sight" as with the Encarta list earlier. Most of us think it's safe, but I think you should have the final word. --OpenToppedBus - Talk to the driver 16:28, September 1, 2005 (UTC)

Q. Is there a distinction between publishing the lists on (say) 'Pedia pages and using them "internally" to ensure full coverage? I'm sure dictionary makers use other dictionaries, and I suspect encyclopedists us other encyclopedias. Further if we remove the entries in the list which we already have articles for, the case being considerd copyvio/unfair use worsens. Rich Farmbrough 17:42, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

Stalking?

Dear Jimbo:

I believe you should be aware of ICalledJimbo (talk · contribs) and two of his socks, Kaiser Wilheim II (talk · contribs) and User:I know what boys like....I know what guys want (talk · contribs) It started in IRC when a user named Ralph said 'I called Jimbo' a few times and other stuff. He was kicked, changed his screen name, came back, Rinse wash and repeat 4 times. So then he adds stuff to Jimmy Wales which we reverted, not based on content, but partly for his IRC behavior, as we often revert edits by trolls regardless of what they may say. If you believe it belongs in the article, feel free to add it. But also I think the user may keep coming back, and perhaps face a ban? A comment back would be appreciated. Redwolf24 (talk) 01:03, 3 September 2005 (UTC)

Also note whether or not that whole thing is true, it counts as Original Research. Redwolf24 (talk) 01:09, 3 September 2005 (UTC)

The user was, in my opinion, Lir, who has phoned me before. He did call me last night, in an apparently drunken or drugged state. I wrote more about this on my encyclopedia article talk page.--Jimbo Wales 12:38, 3 September 2005 (UTC)

Thanks Jimmy :) Redwolf24 (talk) 22:18, 3 September 2005 (UTC)

Vote to keep jimbo's beard debate

Due to recent disputes once again over Jimbo's beard, we'll vote whether or not to keep the section on his beard. Adamwankenobi 01:45, 3 September 2005 (UTC)

• Keep I agree with rdsmith4, it is funny, and the section should stay on the user page! Adamwankenobi 01:45, 3 September 2005 (UTC)
• Keep on wheels. ~~ N (t/c) 01:50, 3 September 2005 (UTC)
• Ignore. It's Jimbo's user page. If he doesn't want it there, he'll remove it (and then we should resist any attempt to add it again). There's an explicit invitation on his page for users to edit it, so the community should only revert edits there which are clear vandalism.-gadfium 01:55, 3 September 2005 (UTC)
• Keep. It is an important matter, and community consensus should be reached before deciding. --Titoxd 01:56, 3 September 2005 (UTC)
• Keep Ryan Norton ^{T | @ | C} 22:21, 3 September 2005 (UTC)
• Keep or Move to User:Jimbo Wales/bearddebate etc. --Cool Cat ^{My Talk} 20:26, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

Fair Use

Do you believe the extensive fair use images in Wikipedia is wrong? In portuguese version of Wikipedia has polemic discussion about this, the adoption and the coexistence with GPL. Thanks. --200.167.78.3 12:33, 3 September 2005 (UTC)

There is no conflict between the GFDL and fair use images. I don't really know what relation is contemplated between fair use and the GPL, but perhaps you simply mistyped? Anyway, I think that we should begin to strongly restrict fair use in English Wikipedia, in the interest of broader re-use worldwide. It's a complex issue that I think causes more trouble than benefit overall. In terms of Portuguese Wikipedia, I would say that what should additionally be considered is Brazilian and Portuguese law. Even though we have no servers or assets of any kind in those two countries, we should follow the laws of those countries (as much as possible without censorship, but I don't know if those countries have such problems). The reason is that we want to make it easy for people to re-use our work. --Jimbo Wales 12:41, 3 September 2005 (UTC)

You do want to avoid gravitating to the lowest common denominator among laws of individual nations globally with respect to copyright matters, yes? Would it be appropriate to target the level of legal compliance to a) the countries in which servers reside and b) international legal precedents as set down in international agreements? Courtland 13:22, 3 September 2005 (UTC)

The solution is save the images under fair use license only in the servers of United States, then all Wikipedias will can adopt this resource. -- 201.3.251.137 15:54, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

• The problem with that is not every country has fair use laws. Though, to steer this in the other direction, I got a legal opinion today. Jimbo, with your permission, I wish to email it to you. Zach (Sound Off) 01:45, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

You will not be able to find a universal copyright and fair use law without deleting all the images. Even more to the point, you will not be able to find a universal copyright enforcement policy, which is actually what counts. Remember, most of fair use in the US was as a result of court decisions, some of which were later codified in law. I see no need to keep restricting copyright interpretation on Wiki for no valid reason. --Noitall 06:38, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

And, that is why I was told by my law professor to seek out an attorney who is very knowledgeable with these kinds of laws. Not only we have to keep Federal Law in mind, but also Florida law, since that is where our servers are at. While few of us are actually lawyers, but we all need to understand what kind of things that can happen if we do not take action to this problem. As someone said on IRC, it will be the copyright infringement problems that will kill us, not vandalism. Zach (Sound Off) 06:48, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

It will not. This is the conundrum you have here: the easiest and most prevelant pictures are pornography box covers on many persons. These are the only people likely to sue and the only ones who might actually have a chance. The other aspect of copyright lawsuits is that the prevailing party pays, and so nuisance suits, which a suit against Wiki would obviously be, would result in their being possibly liable. If only the rest of the World cared 1% of what Wikipeople do about copyrights (Hollywood and Bill Gates would get even richer).--Noitall 07:07, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

I would tend to disagree here. While the pictures I have been dealing with are lumped in Category:Fair use images, most images are not really that dealing with pornstars or porn at all. Most of the photos I deleted were either related to various cartoons, anime, historical events or sports. While I am just going through and deleted mostly unused photos that are "claimed" to be fair use, I went through about 6-7 pages and I am still in just the A's. This not only shows how many fair use images we have, but also shows what kind of things that are "fair use." I even seen things that we could easily replace with a free image, like a can of 7up and Amp. While this is going to be a very long and a very hard process to go through, but in the end of it all, it will be worth it to all of us. Zach (Sound Off) 07:17, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

You are missing the point. I am not alleging that you are deleting porn star images, only that those are the most prevelant images here, and all based on a fair use boxcover and publicity photo theory. I am also not alleging you should delete them, only that the effort in deleting images used in articles has already gone too far. Also, the deletion process has been handed over to people who know nothing about fair use considerations or law (we won't even get into the deletions for revenge). --Noitall 07:35, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

While I also disagree that porn images are the most present here (there are a lot of flag images, car images, Pokemon, etc), but none of us really understand the law, especially those who upload the images. The burden of uploading the image and telling us about the source of the image and the copyright of the image is not on the burden on the administrator who comes across the image: it should be sqaurely be on the uploader themselves. Zach (Sound Off) 07:59, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

Famekeeper Shortest Possible History Summary ,to bring Jimbo up to date

Hi, I was sucked back in for a month , but now my disgust is relieving me ,Jimbo ,of strength to confront more strange behaviour in the usual articles, to do with the papal collaboration with Hitlerism during Weimar Germany . So I have by now potted the facts down to a few lines by way of truth-full micro-explanation:

Illegal the assembly that passed the Enabling Act for Adolf Hitler (constitutional protection of deputies transgressed) , Illegal the Government of Adolf Hitler's Nazi Party contravention of section 2 of Enabling Act .Illegal the Government of Nazi Germany from 28 Febuary 1933 deputy detentions ( as found by the Nuremburg Trials, Illegal the Roman Catholic reichskonkordat per the versailles treaty , by internal catholic law Illegal the popes Pius XI and XII subjects excommunicated at offence Illegal present continuance by present German Government of vatican treaty .Guilty Contumacy charge against Holy See of 1933 proved by the existence of Secret Annexe : RESULT : WWII , HOLOCAUST Ends

Use it all, as it is digimmortal  ! Famekeeper 01:50, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

WikiJunior

Hey Jimbo!

I'm wondering if we should create a Junior Wiki (maybe junior.wikipedia.org) for children, not just a set of Wikibooks. What do you think? (Oh, and by the way, I'm not new. I used to be WikiFan04.) --WikiFanatic^{Talk 4:08, 4 Sep 2005 (CDT)}

There will be a website set up to go with the books, but if you mean a wiki for kids I think it's a non starter. The trouble with wikis is that anyone can edit. Theresa Knott (a tenth stroke) 09:24, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

I'm not an idiot, and I'm fully aware that anyone can edit a wiki. However, we could not feature WikiJunior prominently. We could put it under "other wikis" on the wikipedia.org main page. --WikiFanatic^{Talk 13:38, 4 Sep 2005 (CDT)}

I never called you an idiot!I don't know what you mean by not featuring it promenantly, in what way would that make it kid safe? Theresa Knott (a tenth stroke) 20:43, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

It could be policy to keep it kid-friendly. Wikiness doesn't have to interfere with that. ~~ N (t/c) 18:41, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

The idea of a WikiJunior is an interesting one, but there are a lot of questions that need to be answered. Just a few: What would a junior wiki look like? In what ways would it be different from Wikipedia? What would be the target age range? Who would edit it? --Canderson7 19:17, September 4, 2005 (UTC)

The "who would edit it" is the difficult question. How do we convince schools and parents that a wiki is a safe place for their kids to edit? How do we stop paedophilles talking to children? How do we stop sick bastards vandalising it with pornographic images? Theresa Knott (a tenth stroke) 20:43, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

Make it a little less wiki, perhaps. All the same questions could be asked of WP, although WP doesn't have the issue of being designed expressly for kids. ~~ N (t/c) 20:55, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

Well exactly, Wikipedia is an adult encylopedia. Perhaps a wiki where all changes had to be vetted by an admin first would work, assuming you could find enough people willing to be admins. There would probably be issues of censorhip that would need to be addressed. If a "what do we censure for kids" policy isn't stated in the beginning there will a huge potential for argument as different people and different cultures have widely different opinions as to what is suitable for children to see. Theresa Knott (a tenth stroke) 21:06, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

How do we make it "a little less wiki" and have it still function at all? And, although the same issues do apply to Wikipedia to some extent we're not trying to create a kid friendly environment here, nor are we advertising it as such. --Canderson7 21:05, September 4, 2005 (UTC)

Well, a junior Wikipedia could have more eye candy, and maybe Kiki or whatever that mascot is named as the logo instead of Wikipedia. We COULD have edits be moderated, and then possibly added after looked over. We would need a big staff of admins from different time zones so an eye could be kept on edits at all times. I'd say a target range of 7-11, maybe. (Maybe less articles, like Food, Africa, the Roman Alphabet and others?) And what I mean about "prominently" is this: The English, French, Swedish, Polish, Portuguese, Dutch, Japanese, German, Italian, and Spanish wikis are all featured in bold on the wikipedia.org page. However, at the bottom with less edit counts are smaller ones- like the Afrikaans or Catalan ones. --WikiFanatic^{Talk 21:35, 4 Sep 2005 (CDT)}

The Beck Foundation awarded us a $10,000 grant for the meta:Wikijunior project. --Alterego 23:35, September 5, 2005 (UTC)

I already knew that. How does that stop us from having a Junior Wikipedia? --WikiFanatic^{Talk 18:53, 5 Sep 2005 (CDT)}

Katrina and userspace

Jimbo would you mind if I temporarily donated some of my user space to some of the Katirna refugees in Marshall, Texas. Some of them are still looking for people and others just need an outlet for their stories, the former could be deleted eventually and the latter moved to wikisource latter. I would transcribe everything, because most victims don't have internet access. This could be a low cost way wikipedia could help Katrina victims, without distracting ourselves from our primary goal. Please get back to me as soon as possible. Thanks. -JCarriker 11:36, September 4, 2005 (UTC)

Wikisource isn't appropriate for this but we have always been fairly open ended about what can go in your user space. Go ahead with this if you like, I don't think anyone will complain. You might talk to Angela about an ad-free wikicities site for this; I would totally support doing that.--Jimbo Wales 13:18, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

As I wrote at User talk:JCarriker, there is already a wiki for this at katrinahelp.info/wiki, and I think it is best to consolidate efforts there rather than forking part of the content off into a Wikicity. Angela. 16:48, September 4, 2005 (UTC)

Today 05 September 2005

Without closing the above section (Explosive Secret Annexe to Reichskonkordat )I open this to explain , under wikipedia procedure quoted by me at my talk page .

I relate two separate items which were reported today , back to the subject of papal destabilisation . The first involves Ludwig Kaas himself, who as I wrote , Str1977 accepted and then subsequently cut , as involved personally in 1939-40 negotiations with the Brits , the bad brits [[13]] or appeasers under Lord Halifax , Foreign Secretary . Kaas was in the papal mediation between these guys and the german "widerstand" , at this time an unlikely and confused internal german axis of interests between the disaffected within the Army, who were few, and individuals still persuaded as to the necessity of German territorial expansion, and conquest of Sovietism , but against Hitler. The pope , again secretly , is discussed in a chapter by [[14]] Klemens von Klemperer, with Kaas floating in a new quid pro quo /stroke/ peace alignment not revealed to the Gestapo until 1943 .

Tonight apparently the BBC will divulge the true reason for the home -guard of that era as being designed for the secret attack upon these British appeasers, with their expulsion and liquidation by that home guard should such further appeasement arise . Halifax was to be killed . This was what was planned by those who did not trust the pope, nor the widerstand .

The other matter is that of the nomination by President Bush today of the newbie John Roberts to Chief-Justicse of the USA . The man , almost needless to say, would come with well known Ratzinger/BXVI attitude to abortion, and represents prsumably the fruits of the Bush/Ratzinger meeting prior to the G8 Summit . By their fruits ye shall know them . It is the same anti-Islamic posture pushed last night by the German CDU christian right leader last evening on TV there , all good old Ratzinger stuff.

I explain that these forces today are the same sort of forces that operated so murkily in the Reichskonkordat(secret annexe) in 1933, and it is revolting to behold a world so firmly in the grip of such political interference from supposedly divine agency . I repeat that they should be controlled, and Str1977 assumed I meant he should too . That's his choice . That's your world Robert McClenon, the war is plainly there for you to see and is the first fruit of this particular pope's interference in the American democratic process .As in the thirties we can see an axis of evil , a choice to wage war upon beliefs, Communism then , Islam now .The ancient Chinese knew that natural disaster comes from bad government . Well, elect a violent reformed coke-head who xxx-xx his president father, and that's what you get . Just watch out Ratzinger doesn't intervene in the US ,again ,at the next election , or you'll all end up a different people . Famekeeper 17:10, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

Note: I've repaired a link to the disambiguation page for "British" above, to reduce crowding on the "What links here" page for that article. Cheers! -- BDAbramson ^talk 03:20, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

I'm sorry, you're doing what here exactly? Warning me about papal influence over US supreme court nominations? I am not sure that Wikipedia is the right community for you. I wish you all the best, but please understand that I have zero interest in what you are saying. --Jimbo Wales 20:02, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

I think that the above user is warning you that there is a Catholic Church conspiracy to take over the United States, and is saying that Wikipedia is the last bastion of reason and truth, but that it too is under threat from the Catholic conspiracy. That may not be what he is saying, but I do not understand what he is saying. At your convenience, it might be worth following up on his claims, although not for the obvious reason. Robert McClenon 23:14, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

He's calling you to arrest me Jimbo! Keep disinterested and the WP and the history will take care of it . But the time will come when the Chicago futures markets enter the equations , both back in the 30's and in the present politics .Nothing to do with you-just co-incidence , that . Do you know then, or are you disinterested to know that this John Roger's nominee says that nowhere does the Constitution of the USA prohibit discrimination ? Never mind & Thanks for the words before, Famekeeper 23:42, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

Famekeeper, may I please recommend to you that you leave the Wikipedia community with your head held high, dignity intact. You tried to warn us, we didn't listen. So be it. I really do not find your words to be particularly interesting nor persuasive and you seem to me to be quite destined to be banned from Wikipedia. A better thing to do is to quit before they can fire you, do you see what I mean? There are a great many other places on the Internet which will welcome you, and I encourage you to take advantage of those opportunities. There's little merit in trying to explain things to people (like me) who simply will not listen. Ok? --Jimbo Wales 02:44, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

Just wondering if I'm the only one who didn't understand a single word of what he said. Titoxd 03:39, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

You're not alone. He reminds me of... hell, I don't know, every clinically paranoid person I've ever heard. It almost sounds like he's using Babelfish. ~~ N (t/c) 14:24, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

And it gets better. Keep reading below. Titoxd 20:50, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

Legal action needed?

Jimbo, as the founder of Wikipedia you must certainly be familiar with the Willy on Wheels vandal. Recently, he has gone on another page-move spree, irritating enough Wikipedians to incite discussion about potential legal action. Over there, the consensus is to look past No legal threats and contact his ISP directly. What is the Board's opinion on this? Personally, I think he's refined his methods and has now gotten to the point where something more has to be done, besides indefinite userblocks. Titoxd 20:35, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

Do we actually know his ISP? I am happy to take drastic action if it seems helpful.--Jimbo Wales 21:43, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure we have enough minds to figure it out. We just needed the authorization to do so. Titoxd 21:57, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

Go for it. The only good Vandals go to the University of Idaho --fpo 21:45, September 5, 2005 (UTC)

I'll Accept your dis-invitation to edit the WP, Jimbo , but answer me this Please, Famekeeper

I am well aware ,Jimbo, that you pay for the digital soup (more noodles, please) and I thank you for allowing that there might be some dignity in with-drawal from your ability to influence the planet . I shall do so and leave the influence in your hands . I think it only fair that you should also recognise that the influence , whether it is of interest to you or not , is nevertheless influence . I came only to correct info that was largely entering from the more faith-positioned Deutsch WP and German users (lacks context). I would be very happy to join one of these wiki-others , and might agree with every one of their policies except that which requires loss of anonymity , for the obvious reason (obvious to you, you mean). I should be grateful I suppose that you recognise that some people do not want to hear some things , as the reason for your invitation is because of this . A question to you though for which I should be pleased to have explanation : is it that a majority of users over-rule a majority of sources ? (see Ayn Rand's May 1954 piece in the New Yorker and the Private Correspondence of Lucille Ball and Groucho Marx for insight on this point) I note that what could even be a typo extolls the absolute rule that majority rather than truth counts here on WP , which is the same question. My removal I claim proves the former, that users rule over sources . So,I will have to reserve the right to lift out of here whatever I have contributed , and reserve the right, if I see fit , to re-enter simply to call for the user(s) arbitration my enemies so desire . This I shall do if I, again, do not see the WP as a beneficial influence upon the world . If I see a continuation of the faith-based pollution actually sundering the WP back to where it was before I arrived , I shall call all the Rfc's and ArbCom's I see fit . I shall also hold you responsible , as I have earlier called for you to be, for everything that you hold the tiller to . I shall never open another userpage and adhere to my accedance for your request . You are responsible for this, in so far as you clearly rule , and clearly decide that certain people are not prepared to listen . You may all have to listen if I choose to return and call for that responsibility to accord with truth . I am proud to say that the true history of our world is better represented for my editing of the Wikipedia , as I have undone much mistruth and deflection of truth, and whitewash of historical wrong.The articles I repaired are now accepted as repaired by users , and I am , quite simply , un-justly shot as the messenger. I shall (ZOT!) have to thank you in advance for answering my remaining public question, Jimbo.. Byebye Str1977 , and thanks for your brain-power , what was murky is now crystal clear . And published . ("Have I told you about my fishnet stockings, Are we having fun yet?, fishnet, fishnet, fishnet, fishet) (Famekeeper (Some comments added by paul klenk 01:43, 7 September 2005 (UTC))

OMGWTFBBQGRASS. I have a vibe that this guy won't be much trouble - he's too insane (I mean that literally) to maintain severe disruption. Can I have some digital soup? ~~ N (t/c) 21:45, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

Now now, be nice. :-) He's walking away with dignity. Let's let him have that, eh?--Jimbo Wales 21:48, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

Sorry. :-) ~~ N (t/c) 21:50, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

"Kidswiki"

Dear Jimbo!
I am User Abzt, mainly working at the German Wikipedia and a Ripuarian Test-Wiki.
But this is not the thing! Last night I mailed to you About "Kidswiki" and I would like an Answer! Do you think it's a good Idea or a bad one? Special greetings, Abzt 09 Sept 05 16:42 (CEST)