The following is an automatically-generated compilation of all talk pages for the Signpost issue dated 2014-07-09. For general Signpost discussion, see Wikipedia talk:Signpost.
Thanks for mentioning the fact that Anachronox was my first Featured Article (and hopefully not the last). It should be noted that the nomination was co-nom'd by User:Zeality, who helped set the ground work for getting the article to where it is now. GamerPro64 18:20, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
The original closing statement was "There is a clear consensus that the Media Viewer should be disabled for both logged-in and logged-out users." This was not reflective of the actual discussion, which was about disabling default, not disabling Media Viewer entirely; I note that Armbrust has subsequently revised his closing comment, but in the interim, this is at least in part related to the next steps, which resulted in the application of a script that did exactly what Armbrust's initial close said it should do. Risker (talk) 07:30, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
Thanks, Risker. I've added text to clarify this. Ed[talk][majestic titan] 14:23, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
Comment
I was surprised The Signpost was brave enough to post this, well done for an excellent piece. Thanks, Matty.007 10:17, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
I'm not surprised, which is even better news. :) --NaBUru38 (talk) 12:36, 17 July 2014 (UTC)
I don't argue for or against this bit of software, but the attitude attributed to WMF is reminds me of words I've heard before. Vibber said "Perhaps it's time to stop calling self-selected surveys of a tiny subset of our user base 'community consensus'. The vast majority of our user base never logs in, never edits, and never even hears about these RfC pages. Those are the people we're making an encyclopedia for." Richard Nixon's Vice President Spiro T. Agnew in 1969 said "America's silent majority is bewildered by irrational protest." Richard Nixon said those who vocally protested his policies were vastly outnumbered by the silent majority who supported him. Perhaps surveys of the Vast Silent Majority should be taken before someone asserts what they think. Edison (talk) 13:38, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
I am quite offended, as I'm sure many others are, at the capricious attitude displayed by WMF staff. If we, the editors, are to be disallowed from decision-making the least WMF could do is re-write "Office Actions" to demarcate the limits of their authority. Threatening a punitive block to an admin acting on consensus is beyond the pale. Chris Troutman (talk) 15:57, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
If the decision making capacity of RfCs isn't questioned for other matters, why is it questioned for this one? Are all RfCs now suspect? It seems to me that the people most interested in what happens to the English Wikipedia would take part in these discussions, so even if that turns out to be a small number, its decisions should be given a lot of weight. If there's a problem, it's with the English Wikipedia's diminished overall participation and possibly a lack of way of getting Wikipedians to take part in the most site-critical discussions. What happened since the heady days when we got virtually everyone to comment about SOPA? Stevie is the man!Talk • Work 19:54, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
Stevietheman, please see above. The code that was added to the mediawiki.common.js didn't just disable the software as the default, it disabled it entirely. That wasn't even the intention of the person who added the code, and it wasn't the correct interpretation of the RFC - the initial close of the RFC didn't match the actual discussion that occurred. It's entirely right that the script was removed; it wasn't even the consensus on the RFC. Risker (talk) 20:03, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
Thanks for the technical points, but I'm referring to the WMF's attitude about RfCs, which stands no matter what the particulars are. Stevie is the man!Talk • Work 20:06, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
If a project develops an internal consensus that its users must have accounts separate from their SUL account, the WMF isn't going to agree to implement it - and they shouldn't. Thisi s exactly what the WP:CONEXCEPT purpose is. Core features remain enabled in some form on all projects. In this case, the user inserting the code disabled a core feature - and not even with community consensus at that. To be honest, I don't think the WMF's attitude to RFCs is all that different from the community's. Risker (talk) 20:13, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
I wouldn't call the Media Viewer a "core" feature. We can edit and keep working with or without it, and the fact that the Foundation is trying to shove it down to us is concerning. I understand that the code inserted by Pete was not the best solution, but the response from Vibber and Moeller left us with little to no room to explore alternate paths. → Call meHahc21 23:13, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
Core features are those that are attached to MediaWiki, as opposed to local features or gadgets or scripts. Risker (talk) 00:56, 16 July 2014 (UTC)
No, not really. As noted at the top of mw:core features, the term "core" is used in a variety of contexts, but I don't know of any in which a MediaWiki extension (i.e., mw:Extension:MediaViewer), which adds an entirely supplementary feature, is considered a core feature. Extensions are inherently not part of MediaWiki core, of course. There's also currently a wmf:Template:Staff and contractors#Core Features team, but they were not involved in MediaViewer. I don't see how it's appropriate for you or Edokter to suggest that this feature is somehow vital without first clearly establishing why you believe this to be the case. --MZMcBride (talk) 03:15, 16 July 2014 (UTC)
MZMcBride, MediaViewer may not be in the core of MediaWiki, but it part of the Wikipedia installation, so it is regarded as a core feature of the website. Consider Extension:Cite (which was moved from core some time ago). Do you not consider that to be a core feature? -- [[User:Edokter]] {{talk}} 09:35, 16 July 2014 (UTC)
Cite is vastly more important than MediaViewer as it's actively used by articles and editors, but neither feature represents core functionality. Both extensions are not part of MediaWiki core and it's trivial to do without either of them. MediaViewer is not considered a core feature of Wikipedia the Web site. It's insane to suggest that MediaViewer is. MediaViewer is a bit of JavaScript that hijacks clicks on files. Editing is a core feature of Wikipedia. Logging in is a core feature of Wikipedia. Serving content to readers is a core feature of Wikipedia. File upload support is a core feature of Wikipedia. MediaViewer is not a core feature. --MZMcBride (talk) 13:11, 16 July 2014 (UTC)
I find Brion Vibber's comment highly offending to the Wikipedia community as a whole, as well as clearly disingenuous. → Call meHahc21 19:57, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
The leading vote recipient in the Wikimedia Foundation 2013 elections got 787 votes, from our "active editing community of over 124,000". Any decisions based on the authority given to persons appointed by this board which was elected by a "tiny subset of our user base" would seem to be based on a pile of sand. I didn't bother to vote in this RfC, per WP:SNOW, because I didn't want to unduly pile on to what was looking to be a lopsided result. At best, this was looking like an uphill battle. I've watched the videos of our new executive director's first two monthly talks to employees, which are posted online. In each, she emphasized that the employees work for "the users". It's time to specify how "what the users want" is determined. If it's not a WP:RFC, then the whole set consensus-based guidelines on which this project operates needs to be reconsidered. Maybe we need to hold a constitutional convention. Wbm1058 (talk) 20:33, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
There will always be some questions on who represents the community better, the WMF Board or 60 people on an RfC. Personally, I think the self-selected RfC participants would have to show why they consider themselves the representative of the whole movement. The WMF was started by the founder, does hold some election, and has gone out of its way to get feedback.
There really shouldn't be much doubt about where the community stands on many of the controversial issues that seem to be debated forever on pages like this on on RfCs. Just take a random sample of about 400 editors, say 4 times a year, ask them about, say, 6 current issues. Delve deeper on the next survey if opinion on an issue is closely divided. You'll get a series of "where the community stands" over time and on many issues, with a margin of error of about 5%. What more info? Do same thing with readers (non-logged in accounts). Cost? Maybe $100k/yr if the WMF wants to farm it out, maybe cheaper if done in-house. This could solve those seemingly unsolvable questions - do editors want better media capabilities? Do editors want paid editors regulated? (The ultimate RfC puts this at about 80% yes - why did it take us this long to figure this out?) Should the system of admins (or Arbcom, or ...) be overhauled? It would be pretty easy to actually find out rather than argue about it forever. Smallbones(smalltalk) 00:49, 15 July 2014 (UTC)
I actually prefer MediaViewer to the previous mechanism for viewing image thumbnails. I am, however, very unhappy with the bullying engaged in by Erik Moeller and hope that ArbCom weighs in on this matter with action and a statement of community expectations of appropriate behavior by WMF employees. Carrite (talk) 15:14, 15 July 2014 (UTC) Last edit: Carrite (talk) 15:16, 15 July 2014 (UTC)
Out of curiosity, has anyone pointed out to Brion Vibber & others who agree with him that their argument that RfCs don't represent the majority of users is little more than a paraphrase of the old Usenet claim, "The lurkers support us in email?" -- llywrch (talk) 16:11, 15 July 2014 (UTC)
That's an intereseting point. Which users are you talking about, though? Because the majority of people who click on images do not edit, they are readers. We can't actually say what they think, except for some results from a WMF-based survey whose legitimacy was questioned. It would be interesting to set two laptops side by side on the same page, get someone who only reads WP and never edits to click on the same image on the same page, and ask them which of the "standard" view or Media Viewer they prefer when looking at images. I have no idea what the result would be. But disabling MV as default for "unregistered" users (i.e., all the millions of readers) would remove the option entirely for them. A reader survey that allowed readers to compare the two "side by side" so to speak would be much preferable to everyone insisting they know what would be best. Risker (talk) 00:50, 16 July 2014 (UTC)
@Risker:, the preference of readers is certainly an important consideration, but it doesn't trump other legitimate considerations. We have the legal rights, and the fair treatment, of copyright holders and the subjects of photos to consider; and we have the strategic priorities of the Wikimedia movement to consider. The image to the right comes from the strategic planning process; the red arrow on the right-hand side indicates the important link between readers and contributors. Very few readers become contributors, but it is of vital importance to the movement that some do. When a software change makes the very concept that it's possible to improve the page virtually invisible to readers, that damages that red arrow. How much damage? We don't know, because the WMF didn't test that. -Pete (talk) 01:29, 16 July 2014 (UTC)
Umm, no, I don't buy that, Peteforsyth. I'll lay odds most readers don't even realise that they can click on an image and wind up somewhere else (and that's pretty shocking all by itself); heck, I didn't figure it out myself for months after I started editing. You remember, back in the day, when we used to have those little image placeholders and encouraged people to upload their images? Do you also remember that 90% of the images uploaded in response were deleted because they were copyvios, and that the "new editors" thought that since they'd personally scanned the image or done the screengrab, they owned the rights? We don't have that problem anymore - we got rid of the placeholders, people stopped contributing copyvios, and the net effect was...well, we weren't gaining new accounts as quickly but we also weren't overloading admins or having people leave in a huff because their one contribution had been declined. And we had fewer copyvios. A lot of editors never upload images. IP editors can't upload images - it requires an account. (This is probably a net positive, because we've already got enough, um, self-portraits to fill an encyclopedia. Okay, bad example.) The "Edit" tab is the entry point for almost everyone, not images, at least not from Wikipedia. Ask the question, you'll get an answer; if you want, I'll ask the question: what percentage of new editors to English Wikipdia made their first edit a media upload? Data from May 2013 and May 2014 for comparison, both dates from before MediaViewer was accessible to new users. How does this sound? While we're at it: percentage of active editors from both months who have never uploaded an image, just to answer that niggling question. Thoughts? Risker (talk) 02:32, 16 July 2014 (UTC)
@Risker:, I'm touched that you remember the placeholder thing -- starting the centralized discussion to get them removed was my first substantial effort to push for a broad change on Wikipedia. Your points are all good ones, and it seems like you are saying basically the same thing as me: there are significant questions around the reader-to-contributor transition that should be carefully and transparently considered. -Pete (talk) 15:41, 16 July 2014 (UTC)
And now we have mobile frontend doing something very similar to the placeholder image thing, but pushing everyone to commons. Life's a circle I suppose. Bawolff (talk) 02:16, 17 July 2014 (UTC)
Annual plan
I found the risks section of the annual plan to be quite interesting. In particular, "A competitor could provide an interface (reading, editing, or both) that is significantly better than ours" [1]. Well I could certainly understand how that could be a potential risk to the foundation, I do wonder if such an event could actually be a good thing for the Wikimedia movement as a whole (competition breeds innovation and all). Bawolff (talk) 22:29, 14 July 2014 (UTC)
Certainly competition could be good for the foundation and for the movement as well. One possibility could be for the WMF to fund some type of internal competition, e.g. a "Wikipedia" for academics, or perhaps a version, call it "Edgepedia" that is willing to experiment with new media applications, moving closer to the cutting edge of technology (or maybe call it Mediapedia!) Smallbones(smalltalk) 00:49, 15 July 2014 (UTC)
Wikimedia's mediapedia for a more media-immersive experiance by using a non-Mediawiki interface! Bawolff (talk) 01:30, 15 July 2014 (UTC)
We are attending 2014 Wikimania, our first Wikimania ever. We took the decision because it is in London, to where we can go for a reasonable budget. So when we learned that it would take place in the Barbican -my wife is the only person I know that loves that place, and that's one of the pluses of WM14- we started preparations. First of all I needed to secure that I could take holidays in August, what means negotiations with my work colleagues (that was last December). That secured, I tried to find the official hotel, but none was listed (as of February/March). We wouldn't take risks so we made our own reservations (which proved to be a wise step, as things have gone). Then we tried to register and pay. We tried to guess how, and as no information about 2014's procedure was available, we took Hong Kong as a proxy: so we would probably need to pay by Paypal and guessed that the price would be twice Hong Kong's (just in case). We put money on Paypal (remmember that it can take up to a month for Paypal to collect money from our accounts). Then we found that payment would be by credit card (that's much more convinient for us!). We ended up with some hundreds of euros on a paypal account we didn't need (the money was well spent later, that's another story). At this point I calculated that WM14 was some six weeks late compared with WM13. I was almost right, as the article says it's two months. I still have my oldest son asking me if the programme has been completed.
All those may seem just little problems, but I when I go to an event like Wikimania, I have to organize carefully. I need to know things in advance. I need to coordinate my work, my family, my transportation, my payments, my accomodation. We are four people travelling. We need to know times, amounts, places, etc. I have no doubts that WM14 will be very successfull.
£38.5 spent by WMUK from their reserves for "printed materials, merchandising, and to pay for three temporary members of staff to help with the conference"? That's value for money ;) Surely a typo. - Sitush (talk) 07:46, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
Caught the same - I guess a K is missing? effeietsanders 09:09, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
Yes, I do think that the three staff members would object to that amount of pay. ;-) Corrected to £38,500. Ed[talk][majestic titan] 14:10, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
B25es, much the same here. I was also under the mistaken assumption that the Wikimania would offer a good bit of scientific papers about Wiki-projects. Instead there are all sorts of How-To sessions for beginners, it seems to me. Seeing the program now, I probably would not have gone, but I had to book the hotel and my flight before the program was available. If I would have wanted to have my university pay for my attendance, I would have needed all this information much, much earlier. I understand many people had trouble with getting visas in time, as there was no clear information. I personally do not agree that it is a good idea to combine an internal conference and an outreach action. Separation of concerns is an important precept, not only in computing. WiseWoman (talk) 20:48, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
I won't comment on the article iself, but I'll just say to anyone thinking of coming to Wikimania: don't let concerns over budgets or politics get in the way—we are assembling an excellent team of volunteers, who will make sure everything goes as smoothly as possible. You won't notice anything amiss. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 21:03, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
Interesting piece; I also won't comment beyond agreeing with Harry above, but "...how have this year's monetary costs come to be?" is jarringly unidiomatic. Don't make us miss Tony1 too much. Wiki CRUK John (talk) 10:52, 14 July 2014 (UTC)
While Haifa's headline figure (2011) may have been about 650, by the end of WikiMania I believe that the total registration was almost exactly 1000. All the best: RichFarmbrough, 18:18, 14 July 2014 (UTC).
Why focus just on the budget, yet not on the organising team? I'm sure this group of former City financial workers with zero editing experience are well placed to cater for the interests of the volunteer community. SFB 21:03, 14 July 2014 (UTC)
I will be going. Meeting those you work with on Wikipedia in real life is a great experience. London is a great location as it is 1) easy to get to 2) doesn't require visa's for much of the world. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 07:28, 15 July 2014 (UTC)
From my recent experiences in organising international conferences, $500,000 is really cheap for a three day event for 3,000 people ($166 each!), and especially one being held in the middle of a major city. Great work to the organisers! Even modest conferences can be really expensive, and I don't think that it's at all fair to describe a budget of of £804,500 as being "extremely large": it's less than what a similar-sized and not lavish academic or government conference would cost - I expect to pay much more than $US 166 to register for an academic conference, and have actually paid more to attend lunches! Obviously costs should be kept down to the sensible minimum, but conferences are intrinsically costly and if the figures quoted here are correct the organisers have done a great job. Nick-D (talk) 08:34, 15 July 2014 (UTC)
Jimbo looks weird with an arrow in place of his mouth.— Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 20:31, 15 July 2014 (UTC)
Nowadays invalid is seen a quite hurtful. Could disability be used instead? Simplysouth ......time, department skies for just 8 years 10:55, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
Really? Huh. OK. Probably just people getting the word "invalid" (n) confused with "invalid" (adj); they both mean "powerless", for the record. Serendipodous 12:12, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
Netherlands
Calling them "giant-killers" is kind of silly, as they have a very strong record since their first final appearance in 1974. Although they have never won the cup they are definitely one of the stronger teams. --John (talk) 10:51, 14 July 2014 (UTC)
Ah, an explanation. Try making a habit of those; they're really useful. And actually, I kinda see your point, even if I don't 100% agree with it. I mean yes they're a good team but no one expected them to take out the previous winners 5-1. Serendipodous 11:15, 14 July 2014 (UTC)
Hmm, they are only placed 15th in the world, not as high as I thought. Even so, if anyone was a giant killer it would be Costa Rica who were 28th before the tournament. The Netherlands (not "Holland" btw) were finalists in 1974, 1978 and 2010. --John (talk) 11:18, 14 July 2014 (UTC)
Lombardi quote
More to the point is that that's a misquotation of what Lombardi said—it was actually "Winning isn't a sometime thing; it's an all-the-time thing", a more realistic thing for the coach of a pro sports team to have said. Indeed, the very next sentence in that speech is "I have finished second twice in my time at Green Bay, and I do not ever want to finish second again."
In fact, his next sentence "There is a game for third place, but it is a game for losers played by losers" is more or less what one of the Dutch players said about the equivalent match against Brazil Saturday: "Nobody plays for third place." Daniel Case (talk) 18:41, 15 July 2014 (UTC)
Hey guys, thanks for the mention. Angelou *only* wrote 7 autobiographies, not 9. I'm not sure how to edit it, so I bring it to your attention. Great edition of the Signpost! Christine (Figureskatingfan) (talk) 20:29, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
Fixed. Impressive work BTW! --99of9 (talk) 02:22, 14 July 2014 (UTC)
Sorry, there's nine articles in the topic, of course, and I forgot for a moment that two of them are overviews. I've only read the first three of her autobiographies, so... (memo to self: fix this: I loved the ones I read.) Adam Cuerden(talk) 08:41, 14 July 2014 (UTC)
As an academic, I used to be highly supportive of Wikipedia Educational projects, but the misfires and backfires over the past three years or so have left me still smarting today from the huge work I did to bring some serious issues to light (which in the first instances were vehemently refuted by the responsible staff), motivate a volunteer clean up team, and spend hundreds of hours on the actual clean-ups myself - all without thanks, and simply resulting in more junkets for the paid staff. It's possible that things have improved since - especially in the USA - and possibly due to some changes in executive management of the GEP, but I am still not wholly convinced that the management team is entirely on the right track and hence I withdrew my support from education projects some time ago. I may possibly return to Wkipedia educational work some day, but certainly not in any geographical regions where the Wiki Education Foundation in its current structure is active. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 04:40, 17 July 2014 (UTC)
Kudpung, This article is about the US/Canada education program. The education program that had the serious issues you refer to was the Pune Pilot in India. The Pune Pilot in India was cancelled and not restarted. It's wrong to imply that education projects in countries a hemisphere away run very differently than one failed pilot should be viewed with suspicion. It’s not fair to the volunteers who have put countless hours into making the US/Canada program successful — or to the volunteers successfully running education programs in 20+ other countries. And for the record, here's one discussion in which two of the senior staff working on the Pune Pilot acknowledged the burden on the community as a whole and you personally, and specifically thanked you for your work. We are thankful for all the volunteer time that goes into supporting educational efforts globally, which is why it’s so disheartening to see a comment like this about a failed pilot from three years ago in a different country casting doubt on the excellent work volunteers are doing today in the US and Canada. --LiAnna (Wiki Ed) (talk) 21:56, 17 July 2014 (UTC)
LiAnna. Thank you for reminding me of that thread - indeed it was so long ago and such a disheartening issue that I had banished most of it from my memory. I do recall however that I worked literally day and night for over a month on that clean up and during that time the actual physical support from the Foundation appeared to be minimal or at best very slow. The Pune issue left many regular en.Wiki regulars embittered, but not being here in Asia they may have been quicker to overcome their disappointment in the GEP than I have been. There have obviously been some serious changes in both the Foundation's overall education policy and its involved staffs since that time, and I'm sure that projects in North America are working well. I no longer follow GEP discussions and developments, but there was one instance where I was contacted around a year ago by a staffer who was touring around Asia, including Thailand, where I was asked if I could help out on an obscure education related project, unfortunately it was at very short notice, and would also have incurred personal expense that in addition to my volunteer time I was not prepared to make. One cannot ignore the fact that the Wikipedia volunteer community may at times be skeptical about the deployment of donors' funds, especially where staff travel is concerned. Thanks is fine, and where I don't doubt its sincerity for a moment, it is very easily expressed; nevertheless, I and many others still feel that in its enthusiasm, the Foundation might not always act in the best interests of the volunteers who in spite of working very hard at times, receive no other recompense for their work. This is something that Foundation employees may tend to forget. I know many of the most senior Foundation staff personally and have excellent relations with them and my comment above does not address any individual in particular. I do hope that if there are, or are to be, any Wikimedia educational projects in countries where cultural dichotomies exist, that responsible volunteers in those areas may be invited, rather than expected, to join in with the planning and execution, and perhaps with some initiative to help them do so. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 01:52, 18 July 2014 (UTC)
Kudpung, we're in agreement about that! As a former Wikimedia employee who was working on global education efforts, I can confirm that all education programs since Pune have been started by or in direct collaboration with local editors from the beginning of the planning stage, and I can say with confidence that was one of many lessons taken to heart from the Pune Pilot's failure. (I'm now with the Wiki Education Foundation, the independent nonprofit that supports the U.S. and Canada education program, so I can only speak for Wikimedia's global education efforts until March, when I left, but I think that lesson was well impressed upon the new education team, too!). --LiAnna (Wiki Ed) (talk) 02:03, 18 July 2014 (UTC)
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