Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/2014-01-15/News and notes

Discuss this story

CBC Radio player

The link mentioned in your article required Flash to play... isn't wikipedia supporting free audio playback?! 81.173.136.211 (talk) 21:45, 21 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Alas we don't control the world. Bawolff (talk) 22:55, 21 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

TK's

Ahem. — PinkAmpers &^{(Je vous invite à me parler)} 22:21, 19 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Ack, right in the lead too—I've fixed them now. Thanks for the comment. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 23:13, 19 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

mp4 rfc

I'm not sure if I would consider the RFC a pass/fail type of things (Although I will admit that taken literally, it is "failing"). My impression was it was more meant as a finding of fact - The Multimedia team needed to know how the Community stood on this complex issue in order to figure out where to go from here. I would characterize it not as a barrier they are trying to overcome, but instead as a fork in the road. This is of course just my personal opinion based on the discussion taking place. I have no idea if this is how the multimedia team actually views the RFC or not. Bawolff (talk) 03:12, 20 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

1st I'd like to ask "How many people can actually easily view the videos that are in this article?" My guess is that it is very low.
2nd, we should realize that Wikipedia still looks very much like a printed encyclopedia. It's probably the least video-friendly major site on the web, and that this hurts our overall educational mission.
3rd, the opponents of allowing MP4 state their opposition in terms of freedom, but rejecting MP4 on Commons reduces our freedom. Ultimately freedom is defined as enabling individual choices. Having the WMF ban MP4 does not enable individual choice. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 17:13, 20 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Smallbones: Using non-free file formats will make the situation for re-users of our content unnecessarily burdensome. You view freedom through the lens of giving the "individual" (I am unclear as to whether you are referring to the contributor of the work, the writer of the content, or the viewer) choice. I view freedom instead as being able to easily re-use Wikimedia projects' content, without worrying about royalties or the madness that is the copyright system. They are both noble goals, but I feel that my take is more in line with Wikipedia's mission. Sven Manguard Wha? 21:51, 20 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

As an entirely practical matter, I don't see that having an mp4 file in Commons will cause anybody any burden for reuse. But not allowing mp4 does cause them harm, since a lot of material is simply not there in so-called "free formats". Does anybody charge individuals for using mp4 now? Does anybody sue anybody else for reusing CC-BY licensed mp4 files? I think the answer is no, and they are not expected to in the future, but theoretically they might. Please allow people the free-est use possible, and if something comes along to make it un-free then we can adjust. Not having video on Wikipedia does not seem to be a viable option. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 22:43, 20 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

To answer your first question (Since its an objective, factual questions, the others are probably best debated on the RFC page) - based on [1], 59.3% should be able to view videos (and if they encounter problems, it would be a generic bug in mediawiki, the type that would affect both MP4 and the free formats equally). Additionally once java fallback (ie cortado) is un-broken, this number will increase by an unknown amount (A very rough estimate would be 14.3 percentage point increase based on 17.14% of users using browsers that would benefit from the java fallback, and about 84% of all people having java enabled [2] (Using other people's stats since we have no info about java enabled rates on Wikimedia). On the other hand, those java enabled stats could be unreliable or perhaps reflect a different demographic. Additionally java enabled-ness is probably not evenly distributed across browsers, however I would expect that the distribution be biased towards Safari and MSIE on desktop, since pretty much all mobile browsers do not have java, and java is less popular with technical-savy users, who also tend towards using firefox and chrome. Last of all, some may argue that java playback isn't really that good an experience (relative to native html playback like in firefox and chrome. Some may take this further and even claim native free format playback in android is not a good experience as its battery heavy), and thus discount these people as being people who can easily view video content. Anyhow, lots of not very well supported assumptions here when it comes to level of java support. Really all we can say is somewhere between 60-77% of viewers in total can view videos. If we enabled MP4, about 88% of viewers would be able to view video (The browser stats also include bots, as well as obscure browsers which aren't going to be playing video of any type) Bawolff (talk) 01:42, 21 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

FDC critique

hello, I want to make clear that I do not fault WMDE! :) In fact, I agree with many of the comments (although many have been already recognized by the FDC and either addressed or left for discussion). I think that the overall net result of WMDE feedback will be positive. I basically commented on its shortcomings. The main problem for now, I think, is a lack of concrete suggestions. The only thing I do not particularly like in WMDE critique is the proposal to redesign the FDC process during the forthcoming chapters' conference, organized by WMDE, in a way planned, scheduled, and guided by WMDE. The exercise itself is not a bad idea, but its timing is very unfortunate. Most of the FDC members will not be present at the conference and they will be deeply involved in Round 2 of the current funding process. Also, the FDC review process scheduled 2 years ago is to happen in May - possibly offering a better starting point for improvement than the chapter conference itself (and Pavel from WMDE is a member of this review committee). Finally, as discussed on the mailing list, while imagining a total redesign of the process is a good approach (it allows to think outside of current constraints), perhaps involving Wikimedia activists outside of the chapters community would be beneficial, too. Pundit|utter 12:17, 20 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]