Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2011-12-26/From the editors Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2011-12-26/Traffic report Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2011-12-26/In the media
Wikimedia's domain names (including wikipedia.org) will no longer be managed by U.S.-based registrar Go Daddy, it was decided this week following concerns over the registrar's political activities.
The process that led to the decision to ditch the company that has managed Wikimedia's domains since at least 2007 seems to have begun with a December 23 post on the social news website reddit. The post, which has since received 35,000 votes and hundreds of responses, was a simple request directed at Jimmy Wales to "transfer Wikimedia domains away from Go Daddy to show you're serious about opposing SOPA". It refers to the registrar's then open support of the Stop Online Piracy Act, to which many Wikimedians and redditors are emphatically opposed. Many reddit commenters pledged donations if Wales committed to moving Wikimedia domains away from Go Daddy, part of a wider reddit campaign to get organisations to leave Go Daddy.
The response to the post was swift. The same day as the post, Wales committed to a move away from Go Daddy on his Twitter page, although an orderly transition is likely to take some time. (Wales also announced the transfer of Wikia domains as part of the same process.) A twist came shortly after the announcement, when Go Daddy issued a press release stating that it was withdrawing its support for SOPA. The statement, a world away from their earlier description of their opposition to SOPA as "myopic", does not seem to have yet prompted any change of action by Wales or the Foundation.
Not all fixes may have gone live to WMF sites at the time of writing; some may not be scheduled to go live for many weeks.
Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2011-12-26/Essay Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2011-12-26/Opinion
The Wikimedia Foundation has posted an update on the Wikimedia Foundation's 2011 annual fundraiser. The update featured images and short biographies of twelve faces that were selected for use during this year's fundraiser. As fundraising chief Megan Hernandez explained, "these past few weeks, we’ve rotated through a couple dozen appeals with people from different parts of the world with unique Wikipedia experiences and personal stories to tell. ... Right now and for the next few days, we have all the appeals up live together." As of time of writing, all twelve appeals that made it through the selection process are still in active rotation, along with Jimmy Wales' own personal appeal.
The annual fundraiser is the Wikimedia Foundation's biggest single source of income, and has been growing with the project since early efforts from 2004. As with last year's drive, this year's event kicked off with Jimbo Wales' "personal appeal", which consistently received the highest feedback in previous drives and has again this year (see previous Signpost coverage), with a change to a green banner curiously gathering increased contributions. The appeals featured then shifted their focus to the community, turning the spotlight on appeals from individual Wikimedians. As of 26 December, according to the fundraiser statistics, a total of $16.9 million has been raised, just surpassing last year's goal of $16 million.
Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2011-12-26/Serendipity Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2011-12-26/Op-ed Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2011-12-26/In focus
This week saw the opening of the Muhammad images case to address which depictions of the prophet Muhammad, if any, were appropriate to display in the respective articles, as community discussion had not rendered a consensus on this. Evidence by multiple users has been submitted, and some workshop proposals have been tabled.
The case regarding TimidGuy's ban appeal proceeded into its second week. The case was opened by TimidGuy to appeal the site ban imposed off-wiki by Jimmy Wales. Part of the case is being conducted off-wiki due to privacy matters. It is one of the most active arbitration cases at present, with substantial activity in both the evidence and workshop pages.
Betacommand 3 proceeded to its ninth week. There has been no activity on the evidence pages this week, though several proposals were made at the workshop, including by drafting arbitrator SirFozzie.
Two new cases were requested this week. The first related to actress Demi Moore and conflicting information in reliable sources and tweets by the actress regarding her birth-name. It was declined due to a lack of prior dispute resolution, with an RFC or mediation suggested as alternatives by the committee.
The other request this week concerned the perceived uncivil conduct by Malleus Fatuorum, and his blocking, unblocking and reblocking by administrators Thumperward, John, and Hawkeye7, respectively. The request aimed to address whether Malleus's conduct was uncivil and warranted blocking, and whether the subsequent unblock and re-block constituted a wheel-war. At the time of writing, more than 100 users had commented on the request, and the case trended towards acceptance by the committee.
The two open requests for clarification regarding the Eastern European mailing list case and the Abortion motion had no activity this week.
Jimmy Wales ceremonially appointed the recently elected eight arbitrators to the committee this week. In his statement, Courcelles, Risker, Kirill Lokshin, Roger Davies, Hersfold, SilkTork, and AGK were appointed to two-year terms, and Jclemens to a one-year term, as determined by both a community RfC last month and a more recent decision by the election coordinators on the matter of the one-year term. Jimmy encouraged the committee to review its history, and strive to find the right balance between being too lenient or too strict in their judgments, to be neither too quick or too slow, and neither inconsistent nor arbitrary in its decisions.
He announced his intention to give up some of his traditional powers, and that to do this in an organised fashion he would form a council of editors to discuss various aspects of the history and state of the wiki, including its governance processes, to come up with ways to delegate these powers to the community. Details as to how such a council will be selected or how it will operate are yet to be announced. Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2011-12-26/Humour
