WikiVoices

A media editor's quest for respect from text contributors

2009-12-11T21:26:00.000-08:00

1-10 featured media credits: no reaction.
11-25 featured media credits: "Yeah, but it's just media."
26-99 featured media credits: "Why aren't you writing featured articles?"
100-199 featured media credits: "Do you ever write anything?"
200-299 featured media credits: "It can't be that hard; look at how many she has."
300+ featured media credits: unknown territory; chasing the receding horizon of respect.

Wikipedia Forever: 2015 (Fictional Story)

2009-12-01T16:36:00.000-08:00

The year is 2015. The sum of human knowledge has been made clear. Sarah Palin is President of the United States. Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, is the brain for everyone's life. People, who used to rely on 10% of their brains to live their lives. The site has become the new Bing, posting all the information in people's lives. The human imagination, a far distant galaxy. The Einsteins no longer stand out, as all have become one. Arbitration Committee has collapsed, with trolls running the community. Who knows what could break?

Articles, expanded, Drama, high. What kind of civilization have we become? The technical people in Tokyo reply on the Japanese Wikipedia to build items that were so crucial for daily life. The Great Wall of China will become just like the Lighthouse at Alexandria, a part of old history. Religion, once a spectacle in our lives, is no more than knowledge than people could learn every day of our lives. The mesmerizing world of the Periodic Table or the ability to recite numbers up to a Googleplex are nothing amazing. Jimbo Wales has assumed the position of God, Sarah Palin means nothing.

What do we have to show in 2015? What did we do in 2009 that screwed us over? People who are eight have the knowledge of ten supercomputers. Teachers lose their jobs because there is nothing to teach. Everyone knows everything. The country is one. Nuclear bombs are nothing to construct anymore. We've found ways to bomb other worlds, make beer every five minutes, turn books into a foreign language. Each person in and of themselves know how to become the President of the United States and have the knowledge to lead a military coup de 'etat. Have we gone robotic?

The people of 2001 are gone. 2012 came and went. The people of 2015 are here now. We are Wikipedia, and we've become forever. We are the sum of human knowledge, it only took us 14 years to ever do it.
=====================================================================================

Yes, this story is fictional, and I hope this never occurs. Unfortunately if you're someone who sees the wrong end of technology, this could be a foreseeable future. I wrote this completely of fiction and only used names that would not insult the private public. I encourage you to comment, but again, none of this will probably ever occur.

Your history.
Your editor.
Mitchazenia/Roadgeek_Adam

Thanksgiving is upon us

2009-11-25T13:24:00.000-08:00

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

~IShadowed

WIKTIONARY FOREVER

2009-11-14T02:20:00.000-08:00

At the time when Firefox had "only" 6% market penetration, the marketing people of companies were asked the question: "Can you afford to ignore 6% of your target audience ? If not, tell your techies to conform to standards ! "

Wiktionary is in traffic bigger then the Dutch Wikipedia. It does not have the banners for the fund raiser. It should if only to achieve our goal and not see these banners for another year.

Seriously though, the fund raiser is not about Wikipedia, it is about achieving our goal to bring the sum of all knowledge to the people of this world and Wiktionary helps us achieve that.
Thanks,
GerardM

COMMONS FOREVER

2009-11-14T02:05:00.000-08:00

At the time when Firefox had "only" 6% market penetration, the marketing people of companies were asked the question: "Can you afford to ignore 6% of your target audience ? If not, tell your techies to conform to standards ! "

Commons is in traffic bigger then the Portuguese Wikipedia. It does not have the banners for the fund raiser. It should if only to achieve our goal and not see these banners for another year.

Seriously though, the fund raiser is not about Wikipedia, it is about achieving our goal to bring the sum of all knowledge to the people of this world and Commons helps us achieve that.
Thanks,
GerardM

Unlisted Skype Emoticons

2009-11-13T15:36:00.000-08:00

Here are some emoticon commands that do not appear in the Skype emoticon directory. Enjoy

(mooning)
(finger)
(rofl)
(headbang)
(smoking)
(poolparty)
(drunk)
(toivo)
(myspace)
(heidy)
(rock)
(bandit)
(flag:us)
(fubar)

~IShadowed

Best Wikivoice induced joke ever.

2009-11-12T19:14:00.000-08:00

This is the best phrased "that's what she said" wikijoke ever. Yes that's right Wikivoices can now "induce" jokes. It can induce a lot of things... (that's what she said).

A real measure of popularity

2009-11-06T19:29:00.000-08:00

Today it was revealed that Wikipedia editor Durova is almost as famous as Barack Obama. According to Wikipedia:Database_reports/Pages_with_the_most_revisions, Barack Obama has 18,522 edits, making it the 104th most edited page on the English Wikipedia. User talk:Durova follows closely behind at 14,324 revisions, ranking it at number 163 on the aforementioned list. Durova's talk page is the fourth most edited user talk page on enwiki, behind only Jimbo, SandyGeorgia, Dr. Blofeld, and of course Raul654.

This means that Durova is roughly 77.33% as popular as Barack Obama. It's amazing what Wikipedia will do.

WikiVoices has big showing at not 1, but 2 Wikipedia meets!

2009-09-14T10:12:00.000-07:00

Hey all, Roadgeek Adam (aka Mitchazenia) here. This weekend was the 9th Philadelphia and 15th New York City Wikipedia meet. Unusually, Wikipedia had a major outing in both of the meets. In the Philly meet on September 12, Pharosofalexandria and I went to discuss about the Philly project and our Wikis Take Philadelphia. We were at Drexel University's *closed* student center. Then we went to Mikey's Sports Grille at Chesnut and 32nd Streets.

The next day we went to the NYC, where instead of just 2 of us, he had not 1, not 3, not 4, but 5 WikiVoices participants. Pharos and I from yesterday, along with Jake Wartenberg, Blurpeace and arbitrator Newyorkbrad. Except for Blurpeace, I knew everyone of them, as Pharos, Jake and Brad are friends of mine. WikiVoices had a really good turnout :) - 5 members at meets this weekend. Sometime we hope that we can Skype an episode at the meeting itself :D

Ira Brad Matetsky (User:Newyorkbrad) Keynote at Wiki-Conference New York

2009-09-03T08:39:00.000-07:00

For our second Keynote at Wiki-Conference New York, we were pleased to welcome Arbitration Committee member Ira Brad Matetsky (User:Newyorkbrad) speaking on the topic of "BLPs, Wikipedia, the Internet, and the Future of Privacy".

Ira takes us into how Wikipedia's handling of Biographies of Living Persons (BLP) concerns relating to privacy issues contrasts with how similar issues have been addressed by other media and by the legal system, with an interesting legal sidelight into the life of child prodigy William James Sidis.

The Keynote generated so much interest that an impromptu follow-up Q&A session was also held, and we will post the video of that later.

See the Opening Remarks (first 10 minutes) and Keynote here:

Video of Ira Brad Matetsky (User:Newyorkbrad) Keynote at Wiki-Conference New York

Previous post in the video series

Jimmy Wales Keynote

Reports of Wikipedia's demise greatly exaggerated

2009-08-19T11:00:00.000-07:00

As Wikipedia crosses the 3 million article threshold, numerous media outlets have picked up on the story of Wikipedia's declining rate of growth. (See last week's Signpost article). With sensationalist headlines like "Wikipedia's on the wane" and "After the boom, is Wikipedia heading for bust?" it seems everyone is convinced that Wikipedia's heyday is nearing its end. The sensationalist headlines aren't really that surprising, but what is surprising is what is being blamed for the decline in growth. Every article I've read this week blames it on a change in Wikipedia's power dynamics — that the "rusted-on Wikipedia elite" have bitten all the newbies, or that the draconian deletionists have finally secured an iron-fisted death-grip over Wikipedia. It's amazing that the most obvious explanation for the decline in Wikipedia's growth is not mentioned in a single article. Anyone who's been an active editor on Wikipedia for long enough can tell you why we aren't creating 3,000 new articles a day now: There simply aren't many topics left to create new articles for.

I suppose this fact isn't immediately obvious since never before in history have we tried to compile a truly comprehensive list of all the encyclopedic topics in the universe. Perhaps it's a bit easier to understand if we limit our view to a particular area. Let's take movies for example. How many movies have ever been created? I suppose no one knows for sure, but it certainly isn't infinite. IMDB has 1.13 million entries total (including TV episodes, direct to video, etc.). I'm sure when IMDB was getting started it experienced exponential growth as hundreds of thousands of entries were added to it's database. At some point that growth trickled off once the back catalog was filled out, and now there is just a steady stream of new movies being added to the database. Strange that no one has sounded the alarm about IMDB going bust.

What's happening on Wikipedia is basically just a macro version of that same phenomenon. Obviously there are always going to be new articles to create on Wikipedia, but the low-hanging fruit is gone. A few years ago WikiProject Missing encyclopedic articles was a hotbed of activity. Today it is a ghosttown. Why? Not because the Wikipedia "elite" chased everyone away. It's because all the easy lists are finished. Notable albums? Done. Notable films? Done. Towns and cities with 100,000 or more inhabitants? Done. If you want to do some serious research, there are still about 200 culinary terms from the nineteenth century that don't have Wikipedia articles. Other articles still missing: about 40 Canadian politicians, 2 municipalities of Armenia, and of course premature chromosome condensation.

Rather than wringing our collective hands about the imminent collapse of Wikipedia, we should be having a global party to celebrate the fact that Wikipedia has 3 million (!!!) articles, and even more significantly, we have basically completed the task of cataloging all the important topics in the known universe. Now it's time to concentrate on the really important work: expanding our 2,900,000 stubs into full articles.

Cary Bass Video at Wiki-Conference New York

2009-08-07T16:08:00.000-07:00

For the second video out of Wiki-Conference New York, we're pleased to have Wikimedia Foundation Volunteer Coordinator Cary Bass and his talk and workshop on "OTRS: Wikimedia's Customer Service System".

Cary takes us beyond the OTRS acronym to explain the workings of the customer service system, the satisfaction of a job well done, and how outside parties use it to report errors and BLP issues, as well as to donate images or occasionally even to attempt an edit-by-email. And how we still have the job of communicating the message about our nonprofit status.

See Cary's OTRS talk and workshop here:

Video of Cary Bass OTRS talk and workshop at Wiki-Conference New York

Previous post in the video series

Featured Pictures on English Wikipedia

2009-07-31T14:41:00.000-07:00

Featured Pictures currently allows a single person - who can volunteer him or herself to the task - to overrule all other votes, and keep a nomination from being promoted

How? By closing the nomination. Anyone closing the nomination can, for the most trivial of reasons - declare that a nomination with widespread support isn't going to be promoted after all.

Now, were these major issues - copyright problems, undeclared and misleading modification, incorrect identification - then he closer might be right to object. But they aren't.

For instance (all these are real closures, but I shall not link, to try and limit drama):

The majority of people say that the image is a good illustration of the mood of a novel. One or two don't like that you can't see one character's face (even though it's unseen at that point in the novel). Closer overrules, saying that accurate depiction of that scene of the novel lacks encyclopedic value.
The image is of an uncompleted watercolour, and is used in various articles. Some people question its usefulness in some of the articles, but none address its usage in Watercolour, where it's used to illustrate how a notable watercolour artist planned out his work. Many supporters point out its excellent value in watercolour and, to a lesser extent, in the other articles. Closer overrules votes, saying it lacks encyclopedic value.

What is this "Encyclopedic Value" (EV) ? In theory, it's a term used to describe how useful the image is to illustrate the articles it's in.

In reality, this definition pretty much only applies when used in a positive sense. "Good EV" means that it helps illustrate an article. "No EV" usually means "I don't like it", or "I don't like the subject it illustrates". It's a nonsense, utterly subjective term that can be use to overrule any nomination that the closer - who can nominate his or herself to the task, and does not require any Wikipedia experience whatsoever - can use to declare that they're going to screw the nominator over.

Wikipedia requires a fair, transparent process. As it is, if 1 person puts forth an argument, and 8 people see the argument, think it's nonsense, and vote in support, well, you'd better hope they said exactly why they disagree with that argument, or the closer, likely as not, will overrule the 8 other people, saying that the oppose side has the better argument.

Nothing in the Featured Picture process mentions this might be the case. There is no requirement to state reasons, and, at the top of the page, it's said that "consensus [to promote] is usually defined as a two-third majority in support".

If we want a featured picture process that's transparently fair, and one that does not result in the nominator, excited about his forthcoming featured picture, getting backhanded in the face by a closer, then we need to throw out all this nonsense about the closer ruling over all, and go with votecounting, strictly applied.

Episode 43: Wiki Takes Philadelphia!

2009-06-30T12:23:00.000-07:00

This is our second on-location episode of Wikivoices, recorded "live" at Drexel University in Philadelphia.

At the recent meetup, a couple Wikipedians talked with a Swarthmore University Free Culture activist and a Philadelphia teacher about ideas for a Wiki Takes Philadelphia outreach project.

Listen to Episode 43

Hopefully in future, we can organize more Wikivoices episodes to be recorded live at meetups around the globe.

If folks have thoughts on the discussion and outreach ideas raised in this episode, or just the format of this type of episode, please add them to the comments.

And thanks to Marc for the much improved the audio quality and editing, much better than mine last time!

The associaton of friendly geezers

2009-06-18T15:57:00.000-07:00

The association of friendly geezers is a group of Wikipedians over the age of 30 who oppose ageism. One of the joys of Wikipedia is that it allows talented people to demonstrate their true abilities. When young people perform valuable volunteer work for this website that's something to celebrate. Friendly geezers think it's wonderful when young people contribute quality content and perform useful support functions. We're glad to support individuals who demonstrate proficiencies suitable for administratorship or bureaucratship, regardless of age.

Maturity is a factor of inner growth; some people have it at fifteen and others lack it at fifty. Friendly geezers rate fellow editors by how much they help the site. We wish a place like Wikipedia had existed while we were younger, and we pledge to extend merit-based respect.

----
Participants welcome. Geezers (over thirty) sign up as full members. Future geezers (under thirty) sign up as associates. And if you don't think your age is anybody's business, your signature is welcome at 'Friendly independents'.

Good news about Commons

2009-06-16T04:47:00.000-07:00

One of the things I hated about Commons, an irritation that has been with me for a long time is its inability to support trademarked material. I had uploaded a lot of this material in the past and many of these have been deleted.

Today in an exchange of e-mail I was told "There is no point in discussing that, it is (and has been) allowed on Commons. See http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:With_trademark". Ok, I do agree that I have stopped arguing, I have walked away from Commons for this a LONG time ago.

This is completely new to me. If anything it leads me to one conclusion: if it is new to me about something that I have been bitching about for years, there is a communication problem.

The obvious solution to me is: I blog about it, I talk about it, I will consider the implications about this. One implication is that it is incorrect to say that something cannot be freely licensed when a logo is visible on a picture.. It is obvious that there are restriction to the logo because of trademark, but that is it.
Thanks,
GerardM

Slashdot and Wikipedia

2009-06-13T20:23:00.000-07:00

"Eventually we're gonna put Slashdot on our front page and Slashdot is going to go down." - NuclearWarfare

Fail

2009-06-06T20:19:00.000-07:00

An edit war at Wikipedia talk:Edit war.

Sign of the Times?

2009-05-25T12:15:00.000-07:00

Recently, I happened across the Outline of poetry article. "Oh!" I said to myself, as I seem to talk out loud when no one is about, "this should be interesting." Oh, indeed it was. So interesting, in fact, that the article, until I got a hold of it, mentioned quite a few obscure and minor poets, and people like Oscar Wilde or Emily Bronte that have almost no critical interest in regards to their poetry.

Sure, that could be excusable, except that Chaucer was not on the list. Really, no Chaucer? Oh, but John Milton was also not there. You mean the greatest poet of the English language is not in the poetry section? What about Wordsworth and Coleridge, whose poems are taught whenever a class deals with general English poetry? John Donne is worthless now? We all know Dryden and Pope have been pushed aside for ages, but William Blake's thousands of lines of poetry mean nothing? Tennyson is worthless? And poor Keats, just because he died of TB means that he doesn't get a mention? T.S. Eliot, Yeats, and Pound obviously couldn't be important, because no one cares about Modernism! And Walt Whitman was just some dirty old man, so we can ignore his works. But obviously, no one cares about the revolutionary poetic diction of Housman, Hopkins, or Longfellow.

Those are who people should know in our modern education system. I can understand people having no sense of great literature in general, so of course Homer, Virgil, Horace, Ovid, Petrarch, and even Dante would be ignored. And if people wont bother with the classics, how would they even know the wonders of Ariosto or Tasso? Does anyone still pay attention to the delicate emphasis of wine, women and song from Kayyam? Of course not since their understanding of poetry is a handful of ditties read to them from collections by Shel Silverstein while they were 4 because their mother thought it would be nice to make their children a little more literary!

Edit - excuse me... even I was able to forget poor Edmund Spenser and poor Sidney too!

Juvenal and Today's ArbCom

2009-05-25T10:26:00.000-07:00

Like a good Federalist, Tony1 recently put forth the concept of "Separation of Powers" on the ArbCom noticeboard. A noble spirit, and, indeed, a system that has proven its superiority over the years. However, a good Federalist would remember that these separations were imposed to distinguish Republicanism from Democracy. The Federalists intended to rely on a Smithian understanding of human desire for power in order to establish a system of checks that should temper the problematic aspects of human nature when it comes to holding power: power begets desire for more power, jealousy begets the willingness to seek out problems with one's opposition, and the corrupt are eventually weeded out during the power struggles.

However, Wikipedia is not a Democracy, let alone a Republic. We have no Cato, let alone a Solon. We have Caesar, and we must give to Caesar what is his. So, I pointed out why Tony1's idea is flawed, as our system does not follow that which he wants. But the spirit, the intent, behind his words do have a parallel: Juvenal. So yes, Juvenal has made the ArbCom noticeboard.

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? That is the question - who will watch the watchmen. It is an interesting phrase and brings forth to the mind the need to protect not only the people from the people, but the people from the protectors. We could leave it at just that, but the context is telling:

I hear always the admonishment of my friends:
"Bolt her in, constrain her!" But who will guard
the guardians? The wife plans ahead and begins with them! (SatireVI: 346–348)

In this situation, a woman is to be restrained, but (as well all know, women are quite crafty and men are easily manipulated) she has already gone to those in power and seduced them in whatever way. Thus, she is to be put under control, but those controlling her let her go and continue on her way. Our biggest danger is not from evil protectors of the people, but against those who are able to turn even our faithful protectors. As Tony1's claim shows, an Arbitrator was possibly persuaded by friendship towards helping one of their friends. If that is the case, they have already been seduced. Who is there to protect that Arbitrator from the seducer? Who is there to protect that Arbitrator from their own self?

There is much that can be learned from Juvenal, and, at least, he can be used to spice up a point.

Episode 42: Live From New York

2009-05-24T18:30:00.000-07:00

This is a first for Wikivoices, a "live" episode.

At the recent NYC meetup, User:Becksguy led a wide-ranging discussion exploring the various ways processes that worked well when Wikipedia was small are having difficulty scaling up to work well for the humongous size it is now.

Listen to Episode 42

Hopefully in future, we can organize more Wikivoices episodes to be recorded live at meetups around the globe.

If folks have thoughts on the discussion and ideas raised in this episode, or just the format of this type of episode, please add them to the comments.

The Pennsylvania Turnpike Tunnel Expansion Episode

2009-04-10T08:32:00.001-07:00

Hello all do-ocratists.

I have an episode, today on April 10, 2009.

It is an article expansion episode for the tunnels along the Pennsylvania Turnpike. There are 9 tunnels along the turnpike. Sure, you may think, "Its Roads, Why Should We Care?" - Well, these tunnels have been more than just roads. They originated in the 1880s as railway tunnels constructed for the abandoned and never completed South Pennsylvania Railroad.

These tunnel have a really cool history. Recently, I finished the article on Sideling Hill Tunnel, and there are 8 still left to expand. Two of those 8 were NEVER used for the Pennsylvania Turnpike, and just sit off the highway. These are the Quemahoming, which is visible at Milepost 106.3, and the Negro Mountain, which is about 200 ft off the roadway.

I wish to say that these are not just road articles, but a mix of railway and roadway and they have really interesting histories. As a bonus, I have images for us to use as well.

See you there!

April 10, 2009
3:40 EST, 12:40 PST - 19:40 GMT

Adam/Mitchazenia

The significance of God?

2009-03-13T09:44:00.000-07:00

After a short discussion with some users about the God article, it struck me that, for such a core topic, the length was very short. I wondered how it was possible to summarise the content of many, many daughter pages into an article of only 34 kilobytes. After looking at the talk page, I was met with another surprise when I saw WikiProject Judaism's importance rating: only "high importance". WikiProject Philosophy had also denied God access to the top levels, assigning a "high importance" rating as well. This was, nevertheless, better than WikiProject Spirituality, which has yet to assign any importance rating at all.

The article's progress is also interesting. In November 2005, it was nominated for featured article status, but the nomination failed. Less than a month later, it was nominated for GA status and passed. This status lasted until February of this year, when it was delisted after a rather uninteresting Good Article Reassessment. It has since remained at B-Class with very little real activity since.

Now, this is not the fault of the editors, who do fine work in maintaining it, and keeping the POV pushers at bay. It does strike me as interesting, however, that certain core articles fail to attract the attention they sometimes deserve. Looking at Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Core topics, I expected to find most articles to be rated B-Class or higher. To my surprise, I found that a great many are still at the basic levels, including Personal life, which is classed as a stub.

To put this into perspective, we must look at the attention popular culture gets in comparison to these articles. The Stolen Earth, a climactic Doctor Who television episode, began its life on June 12, 2008. It was featured on Wikipedia's Did You know? template on July 8, 2008, and nominated as a featured article candidate a featured article candidate just five days later. Although it failed its first attempt, it was renominated on August 16, and promoted. From placeholder redirect to FA in just over two months. The Doctor Who editors have put an amazing amount of work into their project's articles, but is this evident in other core areas? No. I'm not going to speculate on reasons - it could simply boil down to lack of interest among editors. After all, Wikipedia is maintained by only a few thousand regular contributors, so certain topics will be left out of the article improvement drive. Maybe God just isn't cool anymore. Who can really tell?

Looking at our list of featured articles, there are some familiar and some peculiar names. 4chan, a notorious site used by members to attack Wikipedia and Wikipedians, is featured, while God (male deity) is a stub. We have a fine featured article on that ever-important topic, Toilets in Japan, while our article on Blessing is still a stub. It is remarkable that some of the most obscure articles make their way to featured article status, while other very significant topics remain unattended. Welcome to Wikipedia. ;)

The master manipulator of do-ocracies strikes again

2009-03-10T17:10:00.000-07:00

When a person like Durova calls you names, you either live up to it and wear the badge with pride, or you sulk. So what to do when you are considered to be a "master manipulator"?

I have asked Adam Cuerden one of our more prolific restorationists to start the "Commons:Meet our restorationists". Adam does wonderful work with graphics, many of his restorations became featured pictures.

I am really happy that Adam helped me out because now it is for Durova to add her details to this page. I am sure that she understands that a page like this is important to show that the group of people who restore is growing. The good news is that at the Wikivoices skype group, restorations is a persistent topic. Regularly new people show up to learn about how to do this so I am sure that the group of restorationists will grow..

So if being a master manipulator means having a knack for making people understand that work has to be done. I am sure that Durova knows David Gerard's law.
Thanks,
GerardM

First post

2009-03-06T12:08:00.001-08:00

Hi, this is the start of the WikiVoices blog. Pharosofalexandria first suggested it and Gerard Meijssen proposed it, so this being a do-ocracy I told them to go ahead.

And Gerard, being a master manipulator of do-ocracies, convinced me to start it.

So: our forty-first episode is scheduled for tomorrow at 6pm UTC (that's 10am in sane and rational California time if you're in the land of the setting sun like me).

Head over and sign up right here.