This page contains discussions that have been archived from Village pump (miscellaneous). Please do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to revive any of these discussions, either start a new thread or use the talk page associated with that topic.
< Older discussions · Archives: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, T, U, V, W, X · 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79
User:Phaedriel has been one of our most valued editors. But she's not edited since taking a wiki-break in September. Does anyone know if she's formally left the project or is just busy with real life? Mbisanz ( talk) 20:34, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
At this late date I have become interested in wikipedia. Are there places or projects where new editors can be of particular assistance, while still having limited experience with policies and best practices? Pastepotpete ( talk) 17:57, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
I just thought I'd share this. I hit "Random article" 100(+) times in a row today and made a tally of the kinds of pages that appeared. I have been copyediting random articles lately, and I thought I was seeing a disproportionate number of certain types, so I made up categories and sampled, throwing out disambigs until I reached 100:
Pop Culture 24, Sports 11, Corporate 3, Computer software 2, Political 2, Towns nobody ever heard of before 11, and Other 47.
"Other" was all regular encyclopedia stuff. I think the "Sports" count is low. Who knew there were so many cricketers? -- Milkbreath ( talk) 06:06, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
Or is everything edited and reedited by anyone? Why I ask is because it seems everytime you turn around, some jerk reverts an edit they may not agree with when the edit or addition is a factual entry that any moron would or should know. They seem God-like and have their own little community and it makes me wonder if a bunch of nerds are sitting around the world behind their fancy little computers changing things and discussing the newest episode of 'Heroes'.
It really needs to stop and needs to be a limit to their antics or most protential contributors will simply leave and go elsewhere. This site is suppose to be open to everyone and NOT controlled by a select few.
Agreed? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.96.75.40 ( talk) 00:42, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
Well, nobody answered this, so .... Yes, everything can be edited and re-edited by anyone. Yes, any "jerk" can revert, etc., etc. However, significant articles do attract a group of editors who watch it for changes, and vandalism and nonsense edits, in that case, disappear quickly; further, when there is serious contention about how an article is to stand, there are processes for dispute resolution. I don't know if the anonymous editor who wrote the above will ever see this, because watchlists, which would normally be the way that I'd learn that a comment of mine attracted a response, aren't very useful for anonymous editors unless they have fixed IP. (Not sure if they work even then.) If you really want to get serious about Wikipedia, register an account and use it, and watch any article you edit. The default setting, I think, is that when you edit an article, it's added to your watchlist.
So you could just put back what that "jerk" deleted. But watch out. If you are thinking of the other editor as a "jerk," you just might run afoul of the community disfavor. By itself, fine, but if you get into an edit war over a content dispute, and you have acted rudely as a result of the way you are thinking, it can bounce back to you. I'd suggest reading over the information accessible about Wikipedia, the guidelines about how to edit. I'd start with Wikipedia:About, which is accessible as a link from any page, plus from this very sentence, and read it all, plus follow the links.
Let me take the image presented above of this "little community," and let the writer consider if someone else might look at his or her community in the same way, as having some deficient way of being, thinking, or whatever. Definitely, there are problems with the way Wikipedia is organized, or not organized, but it is a community building itself and the process takes time. There are no moderators, period. There is no a priori censorship. There are administrators who have the power to do things like block users for vandalism, and a few other tasks that aren't given to everyone. But administrators, themselves, aren't supposed to use their administrative powers beyond necessity, and not on behalf of their own point of view or personal opinions.
It's an experiment, a very interesting one, even an historic one, if you look around. -- Abd ( talk) 19:50, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
Hi, my name is Thor Polukoshko. I am an English Masters student at Simon Fraser University (in British Columbia, Canada), and I am currently writing a research paper on reliability, truth, consensus, and Wikipedia. The main objective of my paper is to find a definition of "truth" as it applies to an online, collaborative project. I will be working mostly from what Jurgen Habermas defines as the "consensus theory of truth," focusing on Wikipedia’s hope that consensus will eventually lead to a higher level of reliability.
I believe that the medium of communication is an integral part in the reception of any work that criticizes or discusses a specific medium—this is in part simply because of the fact that the work draws attention to the notion of “medium” as a possible subject for discourse. Thus, my project will take the form of a Wikipedia article, not only in the form of the finished product, but also in the process of its conception. By using only articles and other information found on public-access websites, I will be working within the realm of the “unreliable” media which I discuss. I believe that citing non-academic and other “unreliable” sources as my primary and secondary texts enables me to better develop my own guidelines for truth and reliability, and allows me to, in the process of compiling my notes, come to my own definitions of the two terms. Not only does this process help me, as a writer, to develop my own notions of reliability, but it also allows my readers to do the same. Because I will display the project online, and because it uses only internet sources, the employment of hypertext and hyperlinks will grant, to anyone who reads the essay, the same access to the sources I use. This means that my readers may easily check and evaluate the sources for themselves.
The reason I am posting this here is because I would like to post my essay on my Wikipedia user page when it is completed in the next week or two. This way, it will be open to improvement (or vandalism), and will introduce a collaborative element, and a degree of consensus, to the project.
Is posting an entire 15-20 page essay on my user page an acceptable Wikipedia practice? Or is there a better place for me to do this? If it is acceptable, is there any possible way for me to enlist a few volunteer Wikipedians to make changes/deletions/additions to my project? Since the essay is about consensus I want the methodology to involve some degree of consensus, and I’m afraid that if I just post the essay on my user page nobody will even touch it.
If anyone has any suggestions or comments about my proposal, I would be very grateful. Thorblood ( talk) 23:16, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
The essay is now up on my user page. If you're interested in the topic, take a look. A few people have suggested that I shouldn't promote the editing of a non-Wikipedia project (so only edit it if you feel the urge to...), but as I do discuss Wikipedia policies, please feel free comment on the discussion page of the essay. Thorblood ( talk) 01:18, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
This is a rather ignorant thing to say, considering that Wikipedia itself does not even meet WP:RS. Jtrainor ( talk) 19:38, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
With regards to commenting on his talk page, he stated it publically, to a news organization, therefore, I feel it reasonable to respond to it publically. Jtrainor ( talk) 22:54, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
I don't allow my students to use Wikipedia as a source. Yes, some articles are great, but many are bloody awful, and even the good ones get assaulted by vandals and POV pushers. A student who has not already mastered the relevant field may not be able to tell the wheat from the chaff. Grad students and professionals -- who have more finely-tuned BS detectors -- may be able to make effective use of Wikipedia. Raymond Arritt ( talk) 00:33, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
For those interested in further discussion, Jimbo already addressed this concern (before this thread was posted here on the Pump) on his talk page: User talk:Jimbo Wales#Disgusting. He has stated that some, shall we say, overzealous editing on the part of the BBC has left some of the important context from his comments. His full position is stated on his talk page; he has also asked the BBC to run a correction. Further discussion and comment belongs on Jimbo's talk page. TenOfAllTrades( talk) 14:31, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
somebody anybody needs to contact spartan-james (a user) and tell him to check his talk page i really really need his help. really -- ANOMALY-117 ( talk) 04:51, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
ok..Just a little spooked thats all. —Preceding unsigned comment added by ANOMALY-117 ( talk • contribs) 05:06, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
problem soloved ANOMALY-117 ( talk) 21:07, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
(undent) Unfamiliarity??? :-) No, I'm not referring to the GA system preventing editing the article; I'm suggesting that it should explicitly allow nay encourage nay beg for multiple reviewers to examine and review an article. The current system discourages the practice. Ling.Nut ( talk) 11:59, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
(undent). Good granny, obfuscation runs rampant. The cases are unrelated; this is sophistry. The prior was regarding citations. Come up with a substantive reply, please. Ling.Nut ( talk) 13:23, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
(undent) At no point did I say a reviewer owns an article. It's you that doesn't understand. I was talking about limiting reviews to one (and crucially, only one reviewer). But having said that, I abandon this useless non-conversation. Cheers. Ling.Nut ( talk) 07:55, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
can someone provide me with a map for the game scarface:the workd is yours. maybe a web site, or something —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.130.201.83 ( talk) 03:33, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
http://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Mo%C3%AFse_Katumbi_Chapwe&diff=prev&oldid=176924437
Interesting but not appropriate for the article mainspace page. If this person knows of reliable sources, this would be good. I am trying to improve the article of the province of which this man (the article) is governor.
I'm sharing this link because it is the most unusual edit that I have ever seen. This person probably means well. He's a newbie. And he knows about the man from first hand experience. If only WP would allow this! Congolese ( talk) 04:02, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
Secret mailing list rocks Wikipedia The Guardian has published an article about the recent Durova mess, it's an interesting outside perspective on internal drama. -- arkalochori |talk| 02:00, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
After talking with Durova, Slimvirgin, and also briefly with Jimbo Wales:
-- Kim Bruning ( talk) 10:36, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
Lady and gentlemen, there was a time for the community to protect !!, he is a great contributor and got an absolutely undeserved blow by a stupid block, there was a time to protect Giano, he is a great contributor and was threaten with undeserved sanctions for his whistleblowing. I believe it is now time for the community to protect Durova. She also is a great contributor as an editor, mediator and former admin. I do not know if she has learned her lesson (I would if I were in here shoes) but whatever her misunderstandings of WP:SOCK are they are not dangerous since she retired from her admin buttons. I think it is time to stop kicking her while she is down and protect her against unfair criticism in the media (or maybe do something useful like e.g. writing encyclopedia). IMHO she deserves some community protection for all her work she put in this project.
Regarding the "secret mailing lists" there was and is all sorts of closed and semi-closed communication between 5 millions of registered members. The difference with this list that it was hosted on wikia and so is somehow semi-affilated with the foundation. I am not a member of the list (and in fact is surprised that nobody invited me there). Still I can reasonably guess that was there and do not think it was sinister enough to warrant investigation. Anyway the list is obviously have private info on their recipients who are exactly the same people who are targets of stalkers and are very conscious about their privacy. Thus, obviously only people with checkuser access can have an access to the uncensored version of the list. I do not think it is unreasonable to request somebody with a checkuser access who the whistleblowers trust to review the maillist content of the mail lists. It is the only real thing I could think of Alex Bakharev ( talk) 09:31, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
(per request, am providing links to appropriate references. Please feel free to reposition or reformat for maximum clarity).
Other off-wiki fair and helpful links in understanding Durova's personality and style:
-- Laughitup2 ( talk) 09:12, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
Since there is a consensus that questions about this issue should NOT be directed to Durova's talk page, there needs to be a proper place for them. Some people seem to think this is the right place (and who am I to disagree?); but it's not properly structured. I'm adding this heading to provide a clear place for people to ask their questions under.— Random832 16:41, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
The whole point of a wiki is lots of people coming together to figure out what the right thing to do is in a particular circumstance. "Policy", then, is not prescriptive but rather descriptive--descriptive of what generally happens in certain types of situations. This means that an argument for a particular action should be justified on its own merits; simply saying "because policy says we must/must not" is not a valid argument, since it rests on a complete reversal of the concept of policy on Wikipedia. Actions should not follow policy; rather, policy follows actions. The right thing to do in a particular situation, whatever it may be, is totally independent of policy. Simply citing policy--even if such a citation is indeed correct and relevant--is not enough; what policy says is irrelevant since its purpose is not to dictate our actions, but rather to describe them after the fact.
Many people fail to grasp this basic distinction, and instead go around insisting that policy on Wikipedia is the exact opposite of what it actually is. They justify actions because "policy says to do it" (I, too, have been guilty of this at times) rather than justifying their actions on their own merits. There is now an entire generation of editors who can recite "policy" forwards and backwards, but don't get what it actually means, or how it applies to actually doing things on Wikipedia--or any other wiki, for that matter. This bureaucratic wonkery needs to stop.
I believe that the single biggest culprit for this is, quite simply, the unfortunate choice of the word "policy" as an appellation for what are in fact nothing more than observations made after the fact. The word "policy" should be reserved for the few "policies" we have that are indeed imperative in nature: copyright policy, maybe BLP, and whatever else is necessary to keep the Foundation and individual editors out of legal trouble; documents that describe a general process used for going about a task (adminship/bureaucratship, article deletion/undeletion, blocking, etc.) should be referred to as, simply, "processes" (the process for accomplishing something being separate from the reasons why it is done). The vast majority of what we now call "policies", including deletion and undeletion policy, blocking policy, notability, most user conduct policy, etc. should be explicitly renamed to "Observations", and make it clear that that their purpose is not to tell editors what they must or must not do but rather let them know what they can likely expect others to do in certain situations.
It may be tempting for some to respond that this is what IAR is for. Don't fall into that trap. The basic assumption of IAR is still that policy as it currently stands is primarily prescriptive in nature; it merely serves to emphasize this basic misunderstanding. When it becomes clear that most of what is now termed "policy" is in fact not, IAR will become useless--because actions, orthodox or not, will be justified on their own merits. Kurt Weber (Go Colts!) 21:30, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
Kurt: What you are stating is basically how policies, guidelines and essays still (de-facto) operate. You'll find that many or most of the older wikipedians adhere to this view. People who don't understand this are sometimes confounded at how older wikipedians seem to get away with all kinds of things, and suspect the existence of a cabal where none exists. -- Kim Bruning ( talk) 22:07, 8 December 2007 (UTC) ps, where is the Real Kurt Weber, and what have you done to him? :-D -- Kim Bruning ( talk) 22:33, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
It's not a bad idea, but the word "observation" isn't helpful as there are many, many pages that are observations in some fashion, and nearly none of them are as accurate or helpful as those we presently call "policy". The good thing about the term "policy" is that people unaware of how the wiki-structure functions will still be compelled to act in a productive fashion as suggested by past consensual decisions - in other words, the term isn't perfect because most people that read it aren't either. >Radiant< 22:19, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
I'm not going to get into this debate beyond saying that the worshipping of undefinedness and undefinability of policy, as well as other kinds of wikimysticism, are childish and boring. Most stuff on Wikipedia gets done despite them, not because of them. Zocky | picture popups 22:50, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
This page contains discussions that have been archived from Village pump (miscellaneous). Please do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to revive any of these discussions, either start a new thread or use the talk page associated with that topic.
< Older discussions · Archives: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, T, U, V, W, X · 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79
User:Phaedriel has been one of our most valued editors. But she's not edited since taking a wiki-break in September. Does anyone know if she's formally left the project or is just busy with real life? Mbisanz ( talk) 20:34, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
At this late date I have become interested in wikipedia. Are there places or projects where new editors can be of particular assistance, while still having limited experience with policies and best practices? Pastepotpete ( talk) 17:57, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
I just thought I'd share this. I hit "Random article" 100(+) times in a row today and made a tally of the kinds of pages that appeared. I have been copyediting random articles lately, and I thought I was seeing a disproportionate number of certain types, so I made up categories and sampled, throwing out disambigs until I reached 100:
Pop Culture 24, Sports 11, Corporate 3, Computer software 2, Political 2, Towns nobody ever heard of before 11, and Other 47.
"Other" was all regular encyclopedia stuff. I think the "Sports" count is low. Who knew there were so many cricketers? -- Milkbreath ( talk) 06:06, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
Or is everything edited and reedited by anyone? Why I ask is because it seems everytime you turn around, some jerk reverts an edit they may not agree with when the edit or addition is a factual entry that any moron would or should know. They seem God-like and have their own little community and it makes me wonder if a bunch of nerds are sitting around the world behind their fancy little computers changing things and discussing the newest episode of 'Heroes'.
It really needs to stop and needs to be a limit to their antics or most protential contributors will simply leave and go elsewhere. This site is suppose to be open to everyone and NOT controlled by a select few.
Agreed? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.96.75.40 ( talk) 00:42, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
Well, nobody answered this, so .... Yes, everything can be edited and re-edited by anyone. Yes, any "jerk" can revert, etc., etc. However, significant articles do attract a group of editors who watch it for changes, and vandalism and nonsense edits, in that case, disappear quickly; further, when there is serious contention about how an article is to stand, there are processes for dispute resolution. I don't know if the anonymous editor who wrote the above will ever see this, because watchlists, which would normally be the way that I'd learn that a comment of mine attracted a response, aren't very useful for anonymous editors unless they have fixed IP. (Not sure if they work even then.) If you really want to get serious about Wikipedia, register an account and use it, and watch any article you edit. The default setting, I think, is that when you edit an article, it's added to your watchlist.
So you could just put back what that "jerk" deleted. But watch out. If you are thinking of the other editor as a "jerk," you just might run afoul of the community disfavor. By itself, fine, but if you get into an edit war over a content dispute, and you have acted rudely as a result of the way you are thinking, it can bounce back to you. I'd suggest reading over the information accessible about Wikipedia, the guidelines about how to edit. I'd start with Wikipedia:About, which is accessible as a link from any page, plus from this very sentence, and read it all, plus follow the links.
Let me take the image presented above of this "little community," and let the writer consider if someone else might look at his or her community in the same way, as having some deficient way of being, thinking, or whatever. Definitely, there are problems with the way Wikipedia is organized, or not organized, but it is a community building itself and the process takes time. There are no moderators, period. There is no a priori censorship. There are administrators who have the power to do things like block users for vandalism, and a few other tasks that aren't given to everyone. But administrators, themselves, aren't supposed to use their administrative powers beyond necessity, and not on behalf of their own point of view or personal opinions.
It's an experiment, a very interesting one, even an historic one, if you look around. -- Abd ( talk) 19:50, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
Hi, my name is Thor Polukoshko. I am an English Masters student at Simon Fraser University (in British Columbia, Canada), and I am currently writing a research paper on reliability, truth, consensus, and Wikipedia. The main objective of my paper is to find a definition of "truth" as it applies to an online, collaborative project. I will be working mostly from what Jurgen Habermas defines as the "consensus theory of truth," focusing on Wikipedia’s hope that consensus will eventually lead to a higher level of reliability.
I believe that the medium of communication is an integral part in the reception of any work that criticizes or discusses a specific medium—this is in part simply because of the fact that the work draws attention to the notion of “medium” as a possible subject for discourse. Thus, my project will take the form of a Wikipedia article, not only in the form of the finished product, but also in the process of its conception. By using only articles and other information found on public-access websites, I will be working within the realm of the “unreliable” media which I discuss. I believe that citing non-academic and other “unreliable” sources as my primary and secondary texts enables me to better develop my own guidelines for truth and reliability, and allows me to, in the process of compiling my notes, come to my own definitions of the two terms. Not only does this process help me, as a writer, to develop my own notions of reliability, but it also allows my readers to do the same. Because I will display the project online, and because it uses only internet sources, the employment of hypertext and hyperlinks will grant, to anyone who reads the essay, the same access to the sources I use. This means that my readers may easily check and evaluate the sources for themselves.
The reason I am posting this here is because I would like to post my essay on my Wikipedia user page when it is completed in the next week or two. This way, it will be open to improvement (or vandalism), and will introduce a collaborative element, and a degree of consensus, to the project.
Is posting an entire 15-20 page essay on my user page an acceptable Wikipedia practice? Or is there a better place for me to do this? If it is acceptable, is there any possible way for me to enlist a few volunteer Wikipedians to make changes/deletions/additions to my project? Since the essay is about consensus I want the methodology to involve some degree of consensus, and I’m afraid that if I just post the essay on my user page nobody will even touch it.
If anyone has any suggestions or comments about my proposal, I would be very grateful. Thorblood ( talk) 23:16, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
The essay is now up on my user page. If you're interested in the topic, take a look. A few people have suggested that I shouldn't promote the editing of a non-Wikipedia project (so only edit it if you feel the urge to...), but as I do discuss Wikipedia policies, please feel free comment on the discussion page of the essay. Thorblood ( talk) 01:18, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
This is a rather ignorant thing to say, considering that Wikipedia itself does not even meet WP:RS. Jtrainor ( talk) 19:38, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
With regards to commenting on his talk page, he stated it publically, to a news organization, therefore, I feel it reasonable to respond to it publically. Jtrainor ( talk) 22:54, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
I don't allow my students to use Wikipedia as a source. Yes, some articles are great, but many are bloody awful, and even the good ones get assaulted by vandals and POV pushers. A student who has not already mastered the relevant field may not be able to tell the wheat from the chaff. Grad students and professionals -- who have more finely-tuned BS detectors -- may be able to make effective use of Wikipedia. Raymond Arritt ( talk) 00:33, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
For those interested in further discussion, Jimbo already addressed this concern (before this thread was posted here on the Pump) on his talk page: User talk:Jimbo Wales#Disgusting. He has stated that some, shall we say, overzealous editing on the part of the BBC has left some of the important context from his comments. His full position is stated on his talk page; he has also asked the BBC to run a correction. Further discussion and comment belongs on Jimbo's talk page. TenOfAllTrades( talk) 14:31, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
somebody anybody needs to contact spartan-james (a user) and tell him to check his talk page i really really need his help. really -- ANOMALY-117 ( talk) 04:51, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
ok..Just a little spooked thats all. —Preceding unsigned comment added by ANOMALY-117 ( talk • contribs) 05:06, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
problem soloved ANOMALY-117 ( talk) 21:07, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
(undent) Unfamiliarity??? :-) No, I'm not referring to the GA system preventing editing the article; I'm suggesting that it should explicitly allow nay encourage nay beg for multiple reviewers to examine and review an article. The current system discourages the practice. Ling.Nut ( talk) 11:59, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
(undent). Good granny, obfuscation runs rampant. The cases are unrelated; this is sophistry. The prior was regarding citations. Come up with a substantive reply, please. Ling.Nut ( talk) 13:23, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
(undent) At no point did I say a reviewer owns an article. It's you that doesn't understand. I was talking about limiting reviews to one (and crucially, only one reviewer). But having said that, I abandon this useless non-conversation. Cheers. Ling.Nut ( talk) 07:55, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
can someone provide me with a map for the game scarface:the workd is yours. maybe a web site, or something —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.130.201.83 ( talk) 03:33, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
http://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Mo%C3%AFse_Katumbi_Chapwe&diff=prev&oldid=176924437
Interesting but not appropriate for the article mainspace page. If this person knows of reliable sources, this would be good. I am trying to improve the article of the province of which this man (the article) is governor.
I'm sharing this link because it is the most unusual edit that I have ever seen. This person probably means well. He's a newbie. And he knows about the man from first hand experience. If only WP would allow this! Congolese ( talk) 04:02, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
Secret mailing list rocks Wikipedia The Guardian has published an article about the recent Durova mess, it's an interesting outside perspective on internal drama. -- arkalochori |talk| 02:00, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
After talking with Durova, Slimvirgin, and also briefly with Jimbo Wales:
-- Kim Bruning ( talk) 10:36, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
Lady and gentlemen, there was a time for the community to protect !!, he is a great contributor and got an absolutely undeserved blow by a stupid block, there was a time to protect Giano, he is a great contributor and was threaten with undeserved sanctions for his whistleblowing. I believe it is now time for the community to protect Durova. She also is a great contributor as an editor, mediator and former admin. I do not know if she has learned her lesson (I would if I were in here shoes) but whatever her misunderstandings of WP:SOCK are they are not dangerous since she retired from her admin buttons. I think it is time to stop kicking her while she is down and protect her against unfair criticism in the media (or maybe do something useful like e.g. writing encyclopedia). IMHO she deserves some community protection for all her work she put in this project.
Regarding the "secret mailing lists" there was and is all sorts of closed and semi-closed communication between 5 millions of registered members. The difference with this list that it was hosted on wikia and so is somehow semi-affilated with the foundation. I am not a member of the list (and in fact is surprised that nobody invited me there). Still I can reasonably guess that was there and do not think it was sinister enough to warrant investigation. Anyway the list is obviously have private info on their recipients who are exactly the same people who are targets of stalkers and are very conscious about their privacy. Thus, obviously only people with checkuser access can have an access to the uncensored version of the list. I do not think it is unreasonable to request somebody with a checkuser access who the whistleblowers trust to review the maillist content of the mail lists. It is the only real thing I could think of Alex Bakharev ( talk) 09:31, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
(per request, am providing links to appropriate references. Please feel free to reposition or reformat for maximum clarity).
Other off-wiki fair and helpful links in understanding Durova's personality and style:
-- Laughitup2 ( talk) 09:12, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
Since there is a consensus that questions about this issue should NOT be directed to Durova's talk page, there needs to be a proper place for them. Some people seem to think this is the right place (and who am I to disagree?); but it's not properly structured. I'm adding this heading to provide a clear place for people to ask their questions under.— Random832 16:41, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
The whole point of a wiki is lots of people coming together to figure out what the right thing to do is in a particular circumstance. "Policy", then, is not prescriptive but rather descriptive--descriptive of what generally happens in certain types of situations. This means that an argument for a particular action should be justified on its own merits; simply saying "because policy says we must/must not" is not a valid argument, since it rests on a complete reversal of the concept of policy on Wikipedia. Actions should not follow policy; rather, policy follows actions. The right thing to do in a particular situation, whatever it may be, is totally independent of policy. Simply citing policy--even if such a citation is indeed correct and relevant--is not enough; what policy says is irrelevant since its purpose is not to dictate our actions, but rather to describe them after the fact.
Many people fail to grasp this basic distinction, and instead go around insisting that policy on Wikipedia is the exact opposite of what it actually is. They justify actions because "policy says to do it" (I, too, have been guilty of this at times) rather than justifying their actions on their own merits. There is now an entire generation of editors who can recite "policy" forwards and backwards, but don't get what it actually means, or how it applies to actually doing things on Wikipedia--or any other wiki, for that matter. This bureaucratic wonkery needs to stop.
I believe that the single biggest culprit for this is, quite simply, the unfortunate choice of the word "policy" as an appellation for what are in fact nothing more than observations made after the fact. The word "policy" should be reserved for the few "policies" we have that are indeed imperative in nature: copyright policy, maybe BLP, and whatever else is necessary to keep the Foundation and individual editors out of legal trouble; documents that describe a general process used for going about a task (adminship/bureaucratship, article deletion/undeletion, blocking, etc.) should be referred to as, simply, "processes" (the process for accomplishing something being separate from the reasons why it is done). The vast majority of what we now call "policies", including deletion and undeletion policy, blocking policy, notability, most user conduct policy, etc. should be explicitly renamed to "Observations", and make it clear that that their purpose is not to tell editors what they must or must not do but rather let them know what they can likely expect others to do in certain situations.
It may be tempting for some to respond that this is what IAR is for. Don't fall into that trap. The basic assumption of IAR is still that policy as it currently stands is primarily prescriptive in nature; it merely serves to emphasize this basic misunderstanding. When it becomes clear that most of what is now termed "policy" is in fact not, IAR will become useless--because actions, orthodox or not, will be justified on their own merits. Kurt Weber (Go Colts!) 21:30, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
Kurt: What you are stating is basically how policies, guidelines and essays still (de-facto) operate. You'll find that many or most of the older wikipedians adhere to this view. People who don't understand this are sometimes confounded at how older wikipedians seem to get away with all kinds of things, and suspect the existence of a cabal where none exists. -- Kim Bruning ( talk) 22:07, 8 December 2007 (UTC) ps, where is the Real Kurt Weber, and what have you done to him? :-D -- Kim Bruning ( talk) 22:33, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
It's not a bad idea, but the word "observation" isn't helpful as there are many, many pages that are observations in some fashion, and nearly none of them are as accurate or helpful as those we presently call "policy". The good thing about the term "policy" is that people unaware of how the wiki-structure functions will still be compelled to act in a productive fashion as suggested by past consensual decisions - in other words, the term isn't perfect because most people that read it aren't either. >Radiant< 22:19, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
I'm not going to get into this debate beyond saying that the worshipping of undefinedness and undefinability of policy, as well as other kinds of wikimysticism, are childish and boring. Most stuff on Wikipedia gets done despite them, not because of them. Zocky | picture popups 22:50, 8 December 2007 (UTC)