There is a lot of great news this week from Germany, in addition to our usual local content; primarily new developments involving Directmedia Publishing, the digital publishing house that has helped distribute the first CD and DVD editions of Wikipedia content.
Many interesting ideas for new Signpost articles have been proposed recently. Lotsofissues suggested covering new ideas presented on the Village pump, a beat that could include edits to other common discussion areas. Another suggestion was to cover new template and WikiProject developments on a regular basis. Readers interested in writing for the Signpost, or in developing regular columns, should continue to use the Newsroom to discuss their ideas.
-- Samuel Klein (filling in for Michael Snow)
German publishing company Directmedia Publishing this week announced that they were donating digital images of some 10,000 works of art to the Wikimedia Commons, the Wikimedia Foundation's repository of freely licensed images and media [1]. The works of art are currently available on a DVD called 10000 Meisterwerke der Malerei DVD-ROM [2], but will be relicensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
This image database consists of high resolution scans of public domain works of art, together with brief biographical details of the artist, a caption (in German), the date of origin, size, painting technique, place of exhibition and a rough genre classification. The scans are in the JPEG format, and average about 1,800 pixels along the longest side. German Wikipedianer are currently coordinating the efficient transfer of the images and attendant information into the Commons database.
While the works of art depicted in these images are all themselves in the public domain, the images themselves may not be. There is no consensus regarding the legal status of such images even within the United States, and even less agreement around the world. By explicitly releasing these images under the GFDL, Directmedia has made the requirements for their reuse much clearer.
Following the announcement of the donation, notafish requested that Directmedia consider releasing the images under a Creative Commons license as well. She pointed out that the small print of the GFDL required the full text of the license to be included where documentation was reproduced under the license [3].
While this may be fine for online or CD/DVD reproductions, it may cause problems for printed reproductions, where a magazine wishing to use an image from the Commons would be obliged to print the lengthy full text of the license. Notafish suggested that Wikipedians bear this issue in mind when uploading images, and consider dual-licensing them under a license such as the Creative Commons attribution-sharealike (cc-by-sa) license in addition to the GFDL.
The donation follows the recent successful release of a DVD of German Wikipedia content, also published by Directmedia (see archived story). The original release of 10,000 copies sold out within three days of its release date [4], triggering another pressing of a further 10,000 copies. The German Wikipedia community has been developing a close relationship with the publishers over the past year. As well as the DVD, future editions of which are planned to be released every 6 months, Directmedia is currently developing plans to publish a series of print volumes (see related story).
The German Wikipedia continues to forge ahead in releasing offline editions. Building on the success of the CD version of the German Wikipedia released last October by publishers Directmedia Publishing, and an updated and expanded DVD version released at the start of April (see archived story) sold out its initial pressing of 10,000 copies within days of its release. Future releases are planned every six months.
Plans have now been announced for the production of a paper edition (Wikipedia:Wiki Press). Once again, Directmedia will be the publishers. The company, which recently donated images of 10,000 works of art to the Wikimedia Commons (see related story), has until now only been an electronic publisher; the Wikipedia paper edition will be its first foray into traditional publishing.
The details of the print edition are still being discussed between the publishers and the German Wikimedia chapter; final arrangements may wait until this fall. At the moment an initial release of 10 volumes is anticipated, each volume covering a particular subject area, with the idea of releasing an increasing number of new volumes each year.
Each volume will have between 128 and 256 pages, and will sell for between 6 and 10 euros. To keep production costs low, volumes will be paperback, with monochrome pages. As with the CD and DVD releases, complete digital versions of all volumes will be made concurrently available for free online.
One euro from each sale of the current DVD goes to the Wikimedia Foundation through Wikimedia Deutschland. It is not yet clear if the same arrangement will apply to the print edition; Directmedia has also proposed that those taking charge of the sifting and editing of articles (dubbed Wikipeditors) might deserve some recompense. Whether this would be in addition to or instead of support for the Foundation has not yet been decided.
The unique ability of readers to edit and improve articles is one of Wikipedia's main assets. The print edition hopes to retain some of this interactivity by including a postcard advising readers that they can visit the website to contribute to the encyclopaedia, or send back suggestions by post, which would then be added to the online entry (subject to being judged plausible).
News of the latest Directmedia endeavor was recently reported on the popular website of German newsportal Heise [5], and posts to Heise's discussion forum revealed a range of reactions to the possibility of a print edition. One poster felt that Wikipedia might not yet be at a high enough standard to justify offline editions, noting that virtually all articles see continuous incremental improvement on the website. Another mentioned environmental concerns in a post entitled To hell with the rainforests!
Many posters expressed their delight at the news, with one saying the print edition would dispense with the need to consult Microsoft Encarta or the Brockhaus encyclopedia, and adding that "Wiki means knowledge for all, not just for the exploitative corporations". Another said "Big praise to Wikipedia... free content will triumph!"
Earlier efforts by German Wikipedians Hartwin Rohde and TomK32 to self-publish WikiReaders, resulting in the first two printed volumes of Wikipedia content (on Sweden and [the] Internet), have not been abandoned. Interested readers will soon be able to purchase two new print editions, about whales and the island nation of Nauru, for 15€ and 9.60€, respectively. Portions of these revenues go either directly to the main authors (the Nauru articles were mostly written by a Swiss student) or to Wikimedia Deutschland. Many people have contributed to further polished WikiReader efforts, resulting in nine total WikiReaders (including one for each of the first two German writing contests). TomK32 also maintains the "WikiReader Digest", a biweekly collection of Wikipedia articles, currently released as a 64-page PDF. Some 1800 interested readers receive email notifications about new issues.
Work has also begun on dictionaries under the same process, newly dubbed WikiDikis. The first dictionary, German <--> Portuguese, was finished two weeks ago under the oversight of Igelball. It is intended as an appendix to WikiReaders on Germany, Portugal, and Brazil.
First of all, we would like to atone for any confusion caused by the last edition of T.R.O.L.L. The article was written late Wednesday, with the result that certain statements — notably the number of cases closed — were no longer correct at press time. The current report covers the ArbCom's work since then.
This week as a whole was a busy one for the committee, with a dramatic reduction in its caseload coming from the conclusion of several previously-stubborn issues. The Committee's docket looks clearer now than it has been for some time.
Three outstanding petitions failed to make it to the contest phase. One of these, involving STP and potential sockpuppetry, failed after the expiration of a one week period with four outstanding rejection votes, according to policy. The other two were sent back with an admonition to pursue earlier steps in the dispute resolution process first. One of these was between Fadix and Coolcat over personal attacks violations; the other between SummerFR (petitioning) and BaronLarf (responding) regarding NPOV. Due to the unusually impassioned nature of the latter case, this advocate wouldn't be surprised if it returns to arbitration in a few weeks' time.
A pair of disputes, ostensibly between Xiong and Netoholic on one side and Snowspinner on the other, has been brought before the committee this week; a number of rather confused postings on the subject left some doubt as to the content of the dispute. What was clear was that a page created by Netoholic, Wikipedia:Avoid using meta-templates, was involved. Arbitrators were divided on how to proceed, due to the case's convoluted nature, and decided not to hear the disputes. Another dispute, between SPUI (responding) and Neutrality (petitioning) regarding incivility and violation of VfD guidelines, has come before the committee. At press time, this has prompted a pair of recusals (one from Neutrality, who is an arbitrator) and a reject vote from arbitrator Grunt in favor of other dispute resolution steps.
A dispute between Curps (petitioning) and AndyL (responding) regarding possible abuse of administrative powers was brought forth late on 1 May (or early on 2 May), especially regarding the page The Matrix. Multiple RfCs have been filed by both parties. Arbitrators have yet to render a decision whether to hear the case.
Another case regarding LevelCheck was brought forward this week; this is discussed in more detail below.
A new case was both brought and accepted for arbitration this week regarding the user LevelCheck. Meelar alleged that LevelCheck has violated Wikipedian policy regarding disruption and civil disobedience. After Meelar's evidence was presented, LevelCheck refused to comment, and the case was unanimously taken. The ArbCom continues to accept evidence from all interested parties.
Cases regarding User:Instantnood, et al. remained in the evidentiary phase from last week. The case, seen by some as an exemplar of the wider dispute over Wikipedia's Chinese naming conventions, has seen evidence offered by a wide variety of users in different capacities, including User:Susvolans, an active editor of the German language Wikipedia. Evidence has yet to be gotten from several further participants. Interested parties may still leave further evidence related to these cases; no injunctions are in effect.
The dispute between tkorrovi (petitioning) and Paul Beardsell (responding) also remains in the evidentiary phase, with an injunction effective against edits by either user. Interested parties may still contribute evidence as the case proceeds.
The dispute between William M. Connolley (petitioning) and Cortonin (responding), despite indications to the contrary, remained in the voting phase for a second week. Evidence continued to be added by several parties as recently as 28 April, including new evidence from Sheldon Rampton on behalf of the petitioner. As no new discussion has occurred regarding the evidence for several days, and consensus seems to have been reached on most points, a settlement should be forthcoming.
The second Netoholic case also remained mired in voting for another week, despite a lack of new evidence. Consensus, however, seems to be developing on a regimen of revert restrictions for the respondant as well as mentorship under Grunt, Raul654 and Kim Bruning. This case is likely to be settled within the coming week.
Since last writing, several cases were brought to closure, although only one of these occurred this week. The second 172 case, was dismissed due to 172's departure from Wikipedia, as expected, with a proviso that he be consulted whether he would like to be struck from the rolls to settle the administrative question. The other two outstanding resolutions were equally-unsurprising—the third Rex case saw an endorsement of Rex071404's self-imposed six-month ban, while the RJII matter was dismissed due to behavioral and consensual improvements by all parties involved.
The final matter closed was that of the John Gohde case, after extensive and sometimes-heated discussion and an unusual published opinion, prepared by arbitrator sannse. sannse stated that it was "a complex case, and one that doesn't fall into the usual pattern of principle, findings, and remedies." The decision reached was in favor of a long-term ban, in this case a year in duration, followed by a personal attack parole and the unusual requirement that, upon his return, John Gohde read the articles on 'ownership of articles' and 'no personal attacks' and write two-hundred words' worth of reflections on each. Users Matt Crypto and TenOfAllTrades commented that this was an unusual remedy, with Matt adding that "essay-writing seems a farcical thing for grown-ups to be faffing around with."
For the second week in a row, eight new articles gained featured status. The long-standing candidate Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, first nominated by its author Rad Racer on April 4th, was finally promoted. The article had languished on the nomination page with a few positive comments and no standing objections for much of April.
Prolific writers Lord Emsworth and Worldtraveller both nurtured articles through the featured article process, with Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9, Canadian Senate, and Canadian House of Commons. The first two of these received practically unanimous support, as did Oakland Cemetery, a self-nomination by uberpenguin that had previously passed through peer review and the International Writing Contest.
The number of pictures featured has also experienced a recent lull; however, Wikipedia:Featured pictures produced eight features this past week, more than doubling last week's tally.
Two of the pictures featured, Aerospike engine and Wright Flyer, received unanimous support.
The eight articles that gained featured status last week are Canadian House of Commons, Warren County Canal, and Dorset, Oakland Cemetery, Canadian Senate, Polish Constitution of May 3, 1791, Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, Moe Berg, and Warren County Canal.
The eight new featured pictures are:
Last week also saw the promotion of seven new administrators. They were Smoddy, furrykef, Khaosworks, Trilobite, Lommer, Shanes, and Cburnett. Although all seven nominees saw relatively widespread support, only Smoddy received unanimous support, with 36 users giving Smoddy their blessing.
At press time, Wikipedia:Requests for adminship is unusually busy, with twelve ongoing nominations, including those of many well-known and long-standing users.
}}</noinclude>
Wikipedia's coverage of the death of Pope John Paul II and the election of Pope Benedict XVI has been much praised by the media (see archived story). This week, however, a darker side to the articles on the papacy was uncovered by Reuters [6].
In the 12th Century, Saint Malachy allegedly predicted the subsequent 112 popes, after which time Judgement Day would arrive. Believers in the prophecies of the saint have claimed that the election of the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger fulfils the prophecy for the 111th pope, which mentioned the 'glory of the olive'. Ratzinger's choice of the name Benedict could be seen as an allusion to a branch of the Order of Saint Benedict known as the Olivetans.
This might sound far fetched to a cynical reader, but the Wikipedia article on the Prophecy of the Popes was quoted in a Reuters article about the prophecy, with the news provider saying "'When (he) chose the name Benedict XVI, this was seen as fulfilling the prophecy for this pope,' wrote one entry on www.wikipedia.org".
However, this strongly-worded sentence, which is not terribly neutral as quoted, was toned down considerably just after (although apparently unrelated to) the publication of the Reuters article [7]. The article, created on 12 October 2004, received only 12 edits before the death of John Paul II on 2 April; it has since been in a state of active flux, receiving over 500 edits last month.
Search engine industry magazine SearchViews this week looked at the problems inherent in online review systems [8]. The article considered the power of a negative or inaccurate review to influence decisions and cost companies millions, and said that Wikipedia, Amazon.com and others have "lately gotten more active about building in functionality that allows for community-style policing of reviews", although the very essence of Wikipedia, of course, is that anyone can edit almost any article at any time.
The example the article cited of community policing on Wikipedia was the debate on the deletion of the entry for blogger Robert Scoble, which ultimately concluded that the article should be kept. Scoble himself noticed the debate about his entry [9], but seemed somewhat underwhelmed by the situation, saying "They kept me. Interesting."
Plans for the development of a print edition of Wikipedia (see Wikipedia 1.0 and this week's related story) have been inspired in part to assist the spread of free knowledge to parts of the world where computers are uncommon. Wikipedians have recently had a little outside help in reaching that goal in Namibia from SchoolNet, a non-profit organization focusing on education, whose slogan is "youth empowerment through internet." According to a story in KDE News [10], the organisation aims to provide computers to all schools in Namibia, and has already installed machines in 340 schools, mostly in remote areas. The computers run a distribution of Linux, and are also provided with snapshots of Project Gutenberg and Wikipedia, among other educational content.
Many news outlets mentioned Wikipedia in comparison with the fictional reference work The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, a central galactic reference work in the film by the same name which opened last weekend. The film was based on a seminal book by British author Douglas Adams, who also inspired the creation of the site h2g2.com, an explicit attempt to create the Guide from his books; it is now maintained by the BBC.
A live CNN broadcast recommended looking to Wikipedia to find The Answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything, the Financial Post described the Hitchhiker's Guide reference work as "Wikipedia.org but with more advice on pubs" (for a similar work with more on pubs, see the current-era version of the Guide), and the Alberta Calgary Sun mentioned that Adams' idea predated Wikipedia.
Other citations of Wikipedia content varied widely this week. The Economist suggested Wikipedia's article on the Chinese Civil War for background reading on the tension between China and Taiwan [11]. Local Tech Wire pointed readers to Core competency [12], and Geospatial information systems magazine Directions made use of this collaborative project's definition of collaboration in an article on the subject [13].
The Wikimedia Foundation recently announced preparations for this year's election of Member Representatives to its Board of Trustees. Under the current Foundation bylaws (official PDF), the Board is composed of three initial Trustees and two Member Representatives, who are elected from the community each year. The bylaws section on Member Representatives states that "[t]he Board of Trustees shall determine the dates, rules and regulation of the voting procedures," and that "[t]he deadline for the issuance of ballots to eligible members shall be no more than thirty days prior to any election date." Rules and dates have not yet been set for this year's election.
Current Trustee Florence Devouard asked the foundation mailing list on April 26 for volunteers for election administration. Four days later, five volunteers were named the "organisation team" for the upcoming election: users Tim Starling, Danny, BjarteSorensen, Datrio, and Aphaia. A late-night discussion on IRC on Friday, April 29, involving Anthere, Danny, Aphaia, Bjarte, and a brief appearance by Foundation President Jimmy Wales, helped to finalize the selection. The two "Inspectors of the Election" required by the bylaws have yet to be appointed, but will likely come from this team.
Devouard noted in her announcement of the team that it represented "4 continents, several languages and several projects." She added that the organisation team are active both on Meta and on IRC, enabling immediate discussions. Moreover a separate #wikimedia-conclave channel was created on freenode.net to focus discussions about election preparations. It was not initially made an invite-only channel, and anyone is welcome to join; however for certain sensitive discussions, it may be made private.
Discussions ensued on the mailing list, regarding how to promote and translate news of the elections across the projects, and how to improve on last year's election. The need for broad and active translations, and for translating all candidate statements or none into any given language, was mentioned. Aphaia quickly set up a translator's page for translators interested in overseeing translations into each language.
Official candidate statements are expected to be limited to a certain length, although this was not strictly enforced last year. Candidates will likely be welcome to write as much as they like in their user space.
The Wikimedia Foundation was announced by Wales on June 20, 2003. Its goals, as later clarified in its bylaws, are "to encourage the further growth and development of open content, social sofware WikiWiki-based projects [and] to provide the full contents of those projects to the public free of charge."
In January 2004, Wales appointed Tim Shell and Michael Davis, whom he had known for many years, to the initial Board of Trustees. The Foundation bylaws were finalized in early 2004, and provided for election of two Trustees from the community, named User Representatives.
The inaugural 2004 election for the Board of Trustees was announced in early May, 2005, and overseen by two Election Officials, Danny and Imran, with technical help from Tim Starling.
Voting was initially scheduled to take place for a full week beginning on Saturday, May 30, but was later extended to two weeks. Starling developed a new voting tool integrated with MediaWiki for use in the election; it has since been used for many other Wikimedia-related elections, including two separate votes for the English Wikipedia's Arbitration Committee. The voting system was initially set to be First Past the Post, but after some controversy this was finally changed to a system of Approval Voting. In this system, voters vote to "approve" as many candidates as they like, in no particular order, and the candidate with the most votes wins.
The two seats on the Board to be filled by the 2004 election were titled Volunteer User Representative and Contributing Active Member Representative, in anticipation of having a system for paying membership; they were to represent the needs of non-members and members, respectively, in addition to the general duties of all Trustees. The bylaws differentiate between Contributing Active Members and Volunteer Active Members; however, there is currently no formal system for contributing membership and no practical difference between these groups. This year's election is not expected to distinguish between the two seats.
