An anonymous coward asks for a Wikipedia to be closed

On Meta, an anonymous coward started a proposal for the deletion of a Wikipedia. I was asked for my opinion. I hate it when people think they start something controversial like the closure of a Wikipedia anonymously. In my opinion such a person deserves to be banned globally for at least a week or alternatively find a special place in hell.

There have been many such requests and I will not take them seriously. These cowards are not man enough to argue their case. Consequently I feel that we should close them on principle. I am really happy that Spacebirdy is a person who thinks like me in these terms. I am really happy with her closing this proposal.

Now if someone wants to close a project like the "Tarantino" Wikipedia, there may be all kinds of good reasons for it. I do not mind this discussion but these requests are highly political and it is extremely painful when such a request is made for your language. Anonimity is just not acceptable.
Thanks,
GerardM

The sound of a tit

I love tits, I love their sounds in spring, I love it when they fly endlessly to and from my house bringing grubs to their young. For me, spring starts when I hear my tits calling.

When you record their call, you can propose them as a featured sound candidate because it is "encyclopaedic". A lot of research has been done on the calling of tits, and tits sound differently in the city then in the country site. There are dialects, so just a call of a tit may be alluring but it is just that.

Jaap de Hoop Scheffer is the secretary general of the NATO. He is encyclopaedic and sure enough, he has his Wikipedia article in nineteen Wikipedias. His article is most often written in the Latin script, but there is also Яп де Хоп Схефер, იაპ დე ჰოოპ სხეფერი, ヤープ・デ・ホープ・スヘッフェル, Хооп Схеффер, Яап деХооп Схеффер, Яап де, Яап де Ҳуп Схефер, Хооп Схеффер Яап де and 亚普·德霍普·斯海费.

When I hear how people pronounce his name, it often does not sound like anything his mother would recognise him by. Mr de Hoop Scheffer was born and raised in the Netherlands and consequently his name should be pronounced in the Dutch way. This is relevant encyclopaedic information. There are services that help newscasters pronounce the news by making recordings like this available.

According to some, it is not encyclopaedic at all.  " It's just one person talking & then done." or "For the same reason that voiced articles are not featurable." I can say "It is just a tit sounding off" or "It is just another recording of the four seasons by Vivaldi by a minor artist", why would these be more encyclopaedic ? The case for a good recording of the pronunciation of the name of a famous person or place is easy to make; it is the difference between being understood or not.
Thanks,
      GerardM

Bias in stock photography

I learned that Getty Images and Flickr have joined in an exclusive partnership. Both organisations represent some of the biggest resources of images of the world. Getty Images sells them to people and organisations that need illustrations. Flickr is a website where you can share your images with the rest of the world. As photographers retain their copyright, this partnership is to allow Getty to sell images of Flickr on behalf of the Flickr participants.

What is most notable, is the reason for this collaboration. Getty's stock has a bias towards what is photographed by typically Western photographers. As a result there is a bias towards Western subjects and more importantly, a lack of material that illustrates far flung places and events.

This same bias both Wikipedia and Commons suffer from. Given that Commons' user interface is in English, many people who are not able to communicate in English find it a hostile environment and consequently many Wikipedias in languages other then en.wikipedia do not contribute to Commons as a result. This in term leads to a bias in Commons as the material that is represented in the languages and cultures of those projects is missing; it is at best uploaded locally.
Thanks,
      GerardM

Captcha with a twist

In the Wikimedia Foundation we use captchas. They are a tool against spam bots and vandals. They do their job and they can be annoying as hell when you do not get it right the first time. As they serve an important purpose I am happy that we use them anyway.

The BBC news webiste reported on a captcha scheme that is different. The idea is so compelling, that I want to seriously argue for the adoption of this scheme in the WMF
.

The idea is that people recognise words that have been scanned but cannot be recognised by optical character recognition software. As we have projects in so many languages, we can provide an even better service, our people can do this same work for other languages then English. I am sure when our Wikipedias become part of such an effort, it would help the digitisation effort for many languages..

The good news is that according to the Recaptcha website, there is already a "plugin" for MediaWiki. So for me it is clear why we should join this great endeavour. It makes filling out captchas useful in more ways then one :) .. PS why not have in the user preferences a place where you can recognise words.. just because you can ??
Thanks,
      GerardM

Numbers, statistics and appreciation

When Tim Starling announced the release of MediaWiki version 1.13.0, he mentioned for the first time our localisation efforts: "59,000 new localised text messages have been added, taking the total to 266,000, spread across 281 languages". This is important because it is indicative of the importance that internationalisation and localisation has for the Wikimedia Foundation.

Having 29% more messages localised relative to what was localised at the 1.12.0 release is an impressive number. However, when you look at the "group statistics", you will see that there is a lot more work that needs to be done. There were 172 new core messages since the previous release, Betawiki actually supports 317 languages so on average each language gained 14,2 messages or 0,73%. Obviously some languages did well and others did not.

Tim's announcement is about the MediaWiki core software. Most MediaWiki installations use several of the more then 800 extensions. With the release of MediaWiki the extensions, the 300 that reside in the WMF subversion have also had their code branched. Several of these extensions are under active development and consequently it is not a given that these will function as designed. It is for this reason that an initiative is formed to provide an environment where extensions can be tested in a "plain vanilla" environment.

The Wikimedia Foundation always uses the "bleeding edge" software and consequently the releases provide an environment that is stable for the core. The localisation is ongoing and we can and do release language packs after the release. The extensions are not guaranteed to work on the new release, so we are getting this environment where we can test this and publish the results.

The whole idea is that MediaWiki is easy to use. We want to remove nasty surprises and, we want to create an environment where extensions are supported for the stable releases.
Thanks,
      GerardM

Keeping up

Even keeping up the localisation of MediaWiki is hard work. This is illustrated best by the languages that have full localisation and maintain their status. In the past ten days some 250 edits were needed just to keep up... These are the changes of the French Wikipedia, the changes of the Norwegian, Dutch, German and Arabic show a similar story.

In a way these are the lucky languages; for many languages it is a dream to get to the stage where all the messages are visible. In the last month a lot has happened for the Spanish and the Romanian language; Spanish is now approaching 100% of the MediaWiki core messages and Romanian has reached this milestone :)

In order to get to the stage of full localisation, the amount of maintenance increases as well. It is considered too much work for a single person to do and more people working on the localisation and proof reading will improve the quality the most.
Thanks,
      GerardM

A project proposed for restoring images

A new project has been proposed for the restoration of images at the English Wikipedia. This is a great idea; the restoration of pictures helps to properly illustrate the many articles that deal with subjects that happened in the past. Many of these illustrations, pictures, maps and manuscripts are becoming available digitally. Many of the originals have crumbled or faded or are stained. It is the aim of this project to find the illustrations that will improve the articles and restore them to a modern glory.

Fulton original - Fulton restored

I love the proposal, but I would prefer to have such a project on Commons. Commons IS the best place to store restored images. Commons IS the place where people from many communities come together. Commons IS the place where we can best stimulate people from other languages, countries and communities to help restore pictures that they can get access to.

So what would it take to really make a multi lingual, multi cultural project on Commons ? Obviously people actively restoring images but also supporting texts in many languages.. This is why I am so interested in the deveopment of the "Translate" extension. This is an example of a long text on Betawiki.. and this is one part translated  into Dutch..

 

Now consider that this is an instructive text and it shows in your language when we have the translation... that is what "Translate" is supposed to do. The consequence is that as a language community becomes bigger, more of these texts are translated and it becomes in a way more autonomous as well.. 

So yes, let us have a Commons project as well and yes, PLEASE Nikerabbit make this a great little extension :)

Thanks,

     GerardM

Sick or not well

After my return from Alexandria i have not been well. Some call it the "curse of the Pharaoh" but it is a fact that my digestion was not performing in its usual way. I also had this nasty cough that did not go away. Now so many weeks later, I was told in no uncertain terms by my family that I should go and consult my doctor.

I went to the doctor, she send me to the hospital for x-rays. I returned and the verdict was that i have a bronchitis. The doctor subscribed me medicines, as my diarrhea had returned, it was to be a strong medicine that should deal with that too. I was told the return of the diarrhea is most likely due to the fact that the bacteria in the gut need time to recover and consequently I was for the moment a little intollerant for lactose and fructose.I am not to drink milk for a week...

With medicine you get a lengthy piece of paper explaining what it is that this medicine does. It is a lengthy list of things that I could be cured off, it includes things like venereal deseases, ear infections... I am now wondering how many things are cured as a result for a subscription for something completely different.
Thanks,
      GerardM

Philip Greenspun illustration project

I am really happy to echo that the Philip Greenspun illustration project is a go. Today Pfctdayelise send this message to the Foundation-l and the Commons-l. This first phase of the project is about creating new illustration for WMF projects. It consists of collecting requests for illustrations and the commissioning of selected requests.

I am really happy with this result, it means that the Free Content world is commissioning work that will help us illustrate those subjects where the proverbial picture paints a thousand words. As so many people are helped with good quality illustrations, it will help Wikipedia and other projects in their aim to bring information to the people of this world.
Thanks,
      GerardM

Trust

I read an article on the Time website. It reported about the consequence of the death of Abu Khabab al-Masr, a man who was the acknowledged expert on explosives and the use of poison gas of al-Qaeda. The article uses loaded phrases like "weapons of mass destruction" and is based on information provided by a former CIA officer.

I have a big problem with the information in the artice. I find that as a consequence of all the misinformation that has been provided by both US-American agencies and press agencies in the recent past, I no longer believe what is written. My first instinct is to suspect both sources as being too biased to be believable.

There has been ample proof that information as provided by the current American administration has been doctored to the point where it is a lie. The consequence is that I doubt almost all analysis that can be sourced to the US government and government agencies. I find it really sad because at some stage the US was the centre of the free world. I do not consider the world free when I find that we can no longer trust the information that is made available by our governments.
Thanks,
     GerardM

Jacob Zuma; mutually assured destruction

Jacob Zuma is a South African politician. To be politely about it, he is considered to be controversial. He has been accused of rape and corruption. He is to be the heir apparant of Thabo Mbeki, the current president of South Africa.

In news reported by the Volkskrant, it is said that Joseph Zuma is threatening to disclose corrupt practices of other politicians when he is charged with corruption in a process that is about to start. It is also reported that he will step down when he is found to be guilty as charged.

I do like to call Mr Zuma's bluff. I wish the judicial system in South Africa is strong enough to continue with the proceedings and I wish that Mr Zuma discloses the criminal and corrupt practices as he knows them. I am sure that this may be unsettling for the status quo. But I cannot envision that a corrupt status quo is one that is worth preserving.
Thanks,
       GerardM

Amsterdam for Wikimania 2010 ..

At this time several countries, cities are preparing their bid for Wikimania 2010. There are already 14 cities from four continents competing. Amsterdam is one of them.

As you can imagine, I have been talking with some people about this. It is easy to come up with reasons why Amsterdam will be able to host a great Wikimania experience;

• There is an active chapter
• Many WCN conferences have been organised over the years
• A dynamic wikimedia crowd
  
• The number of Wikipedia articles per head of the population is REALLY high
• The Dutch invariably speak English
• Five languages spoken in the Netherlands have their own Wikipedia

Typically I am in favour of having a Wikimania in a place where having a Wikimania will make a difference. When I look at the competion, Hong Kong is Chinese, Melbourne maybe if they do something for their Aboriginal languages, Seoul maybe but Korea has a well functioning project already, Rio de Janeiro we have just been to South America, North America, first get yourself a chapter, rest of Europe ... Stockholm seems to be the most serious competitor.. 
Thanks,
      GerardM

Sue Gardner interview on Wikipedia Weekly

The interview of Sue is all that episode 59 of the Wikipedia Weekly has to offer. I have listened to it, all of the 53 minutes and found it of real interest. You want to listen to it if you want to learn about the Wikimedia organisation, how the role of the board is being redefined, in what way the Wikimedia Foundation is truly a unique organisation..

Congratulations to Wikipedia Weekly and Liam Wyatt for a great episode of the Wikipedia Weekly.
Thanks,
     GerardM

Translate, a new extension is being developed

As part of his Summer of Code project, Nikerabbit is now developing the "Translate" extension. Translate is there to help with the translations of the many text that need ... translating. They are the press releases, the election statements and all the other texts.



This is an example of what it looks like; a legenda on top followed by the text in "your" language. When you want to translate, you click on the "Deze pagina vertalen" text in the top left corner.

At the moment the code is being developed, the documentation needs writing and I am sure that more testing will smooth the experience. In the mean time it is functionality that I think will prove to be really welcome.

Thanks,
GerardM

On the monthly Betawiki info

This month's Betawiki statistics need just like last months numbers some explanation. The numbers look good, there is growth in all groupings. What is different is that we have taken Flagged Revisions out of the statistics of the WMF used extensions and is now registered separately. The reason for this is that it is optional. A project may decide to use it and in order to make it work, it needs to be localised.

One of the projects that considers to use Flagged Revisions is the Hungarian Wikipedia. They have started to localise locally. This is actually a very bad idea for several reasons.

• Flagged revisions are used elsewhere and your localisation is not available as a consequence
• A local effort does not benefit from the management of changed messages Betawiki provides
• The messages explaining what a message is there for is not available

Betawiki does welcome any and all people working on localisation. We are particularly happy when the group for one language is big enough so that proof reading of the messages becomes feasible.
Thanks,
      GerardM

"a fight nobody should win"

Google has introduced it's Knol. It allows people to write an article about a given subject. This article is per standard licensed under the CC-by license but you can change this to either CC-by-nd  or "all rights reserved".

One way of getting information out is by publishing it, and publish it some more. Now, many Wikipedia articles have great content, so why not make all this wisdom of the crowds available on Knol as well ? Well actually you cannot from a legalistic point of view. The GFDL and the CC-by-sa are incompatible with the Knol licenses. So officially you cannot share Wikipedia content in Knol.

Some people created knols using Wikipedia articles. They have been told to desist. They are.. In this whole saga that developed on the Foundation list, there was one quote that caught my attention. "Knowledge should be free, right? This is a fight nobody should win". Meaning that we have to remember what we are about; getting information to people. Now in my opinion, if a knol is licensed as CC-by an uses Wikipedia content, I would not find it a problem. When people make the information LESS free, it would be arguably be a different thing. All the rest is politics.
Thanks,
      GerardM

My Wikimania presentation; the slides

These are the slides that I used at my presentation at Wikimania in Alexandria.. There is a rumour that my presentation will become available at the Kaltura website. Until this time, I think it is best that you can at least find what I have been talking about..
Thanks,
GerardM

NB the slides can also be found here.

Rania Al Abdullah

Google reader provided me with this lead to a story on the BBC News website. In it, the first lady of Jordan takes on many of the stereotypes about Arabs and Islam in the west and she promotes modern Islam.

I have watched many of the videos and I recommend this presentation at Zeitgeist. Queen Rania is asking YouTubers to send her stereotypes about the Arab world so that she can address them. When you look at what is already on line, I hope that you will be impressed... yes men are hairy. :)

Being back from Alexandria Egypt, I can tell you that I had no idea what to expect. Now I have two Egyptian facebook friends and I learned a lot from them. I have seen the traffic of Egypt, the library of Alexandria I saw people pray. I have been thinking about what more can be done. Queen Rania indicates that information is key, particularly information for the younger generation. I think our Wikipedias should be part of this. Wikipedia is the most popular source of encyclopaedic information and consequently it should have great information about the Arab cultures, histories and peoples.

All our Wikipedias in all of our languages do not provide good, understandable information about the other cultures that are part of our world. Often the words used are not understood... What is "supplication" or "ablution" for instance ? When the articles are written in a way that expects our readers to know these things to start with, we fail our readers. It helps when the mechanics of the daily Muslin prayers are explained, including the washing, the carpet, finding the direction to Mecca... Most people do not have the full picture, and I still include myself here.

Someone, a people can be made an enemy only when they are not known, I think that Wikipedia can help in having information available for everyone who wants to know. Given that queen Rania's project is time limited, I think that it should be complemented by good information in Wikipedia. I hope she agrees with me.
Thanks,
GerardM

Wikimania Alexandria

Wikimania has come and gone. For me it was as good as I could expect. There were many really nice people, I stayed at the dorms, they were cheap and cheerful, I met really nice people there and we had a great impromptu party on the balcony with music blaring from the internal speakers of a laptop allowing for great conversation. 

This Wikimania was different in several ways.

• The Bibliotheca Alexandrina co-hosted with the Wikimedia Foundation.
• There were no hacker days; I missed them and the folks that come for them
  
• Egypt is in Africa, but there were no black Africans at all this time.
• The organisation of the WMF is more mature, it showed
• The keynote speeches were streamed there and then and are now available for your enjoyment.

Bibliotheca Alexandrina was a revelation to me. Its building is beautiful. Its director Dr Ismail Serageldin gave two inspiring speeches. It is developing Open Source software. It is digitising Arabic documents in two shifts and it has the only copy of the Internet Archive. All in all it provides inspriation what we can do when we have the money to realise our dreams.

This was the first Wikimania without what used to be the traditional "hacker days". I do not know why they were not there, probably because nobody organised them. I missed them. It is not only that the "hackers" did not come, with them many of the people managing wiki organisations did not come as well.

I was asked what did this Wikimania bring for Africa. I had to answer nothing. There were no people from countries like Nigeria, Ghana, Ivory Coast or Uganda. This was the first Wikimania without any people from black Africa. For the Arabic world however, this Wikimania was really important a lot of publicity has been given to our projects and ideals. The early indications are that we can anticipate an increased interest resulting in many new editors.

Most if not all of the WMF staff was at Wikimania. Much of the work of the WMF is reaching out to people and other organisations, where better to do this then at our own conference. Last year the emphasis was very much only on the board, I can imagine that next year Sue will be part of what is currently the board panel Q&A.

The Bibilotheca Alexandrina proved itself as well by streaming some of the key speeches on the Internet and making them available online. This is awesome. Many more presentations have been recorded, among them the one that I gave (these are my slides). I would really appreciate to be able to see the presentations I missed.

All in all this Wikimania was for me a great success, I am ever so happy that I went, I loved what I saw. The Egyptian people I met were genuinely nice people .. It is again a tough act to follow :)

PS I promissed myself to write about Wikimania once I got home. I did get home but I fell sick. This is my first opportunity to write.

Egyptian Arabic

It is a great moment when things come together.. Today, in what was probably her last official acts as chair of the board of the Wikimedia Foundation, Anthere confirmed that Egyptian Arabic is the next language to get a Wikipedia... It is fitting that it was in Alexandria, at Wikimania and in the opening speech that the approval for the newest Wikipedia was announced.

So congratulations to the people of the Egyptian Arabic Wikipedia !!
Thanks,
    GerardM

الإسكندرية

OmegaWiki's word of the day for tomorrow.... الإسكندرية here I come :)
Thanks,
     Gerard

The srn.wikipedia

The Wikipedia in the Sranang language was created in the last batch of new projects. It does feature more then the minimum localisation, it does have a sufficiently large number of articles and people who know the language attested that the language is indeed Sranang.

To my amazement I received the request to close the srn.wikipedia down. The language is not according to how Sranang should be written, it is called insulting to the people of Suriname. A good reason to close the Wiki ? Maybe a website but a wiki can only be improved when it is online. I have asked the gentleman who complained, to fix the localisation at Betawiki and collaborate on the srn.wikipedia.org

When I looked a bit further I found to my amazement on the Wikipedia in the Dutch language problematic Babel templates for the Sranang language.. They are all wrong as they used the wrong code. The person who decided that a template was in order used the wrong codes, used text in the Dutch language and was not willing to fix it.. so I did fix the codes I do not know the language ...

In a way, I am pleased that there are people who take offence when their language is not well presented. When they take the consequence and fix things, when they lead by example it means that a project gets a life. Wikipedia is not only a place where you can express your language it is also the place where you have to express your language well. When I look at it from another perspective, with more people involved in a Wikipedia there will be more content. It will make the language more visible and in the end this is exactly what the Sranang Wikipedia needs.. I think that this is a positive development..
Thanks,
GerardM

Wikipedia in Afrikaans

The Wikipedia in Afrikaans, is the first Wikipedia in an African language that has passed the 10.000 number of articles. I am really happy that finally there is an African language that reached this level, I hope that many more Afican languages will be able to follow where Afrikaans is leading..

Thanks,

      GerardM

More statistics

Statistics are great to explain things, to show trends. When the numbers are understood, the statistics based on those numbers provide excellent value.

Nikerabbit is working on the Betawiki statistics at the moment. I do not know all the goodies he is planning, but the first batch is really interesting. Niklas has added statistics to the portals for the languages. When you look at the Dutch portal for instance, you will find under the Babel values a graph with the edits pers day over a period of a month. I think Niklas put it in a reasonable place, it gives a clue as to the recent activity for a language, and I can imagine that it helps to keep people interested.

I have also been given a static graph of the number of edits. This shows how the activity on Betawiki develops. When you compare these numbers with the well known group statistics and the group statistics in time, you get the feeling that when a language is more or less finished, the involvement in Betawiki wanes.. What you can observe is that the support for a language often happens in spurts.

Now that the Wikimedia Foundation has hired Erik Zachte to work more of his statistical magic, it will be interested to learn if he can find a relation between the localisation of MediaWiki and the number of editors, the number of readers of a project. It seems obvious, there is a lot of circumstantial evidence, but it will be really important when numbers support what is to me a conviction, a conviction that is shared by all of us here at Betawiki.
Thanks,
GerardM

Lingála

Lingala is a language spoken in both the Democratic Republic of the Congo and in the Republic of Congo by some 2.1 million people. This language uses the Latin script for its writing and has some additional characters. Two examples are found in "nyɔ́nsɔ" and "Kɛndɛ"́. Sadly not all fonts show these characters correctly.

In order to fix this problem, in the CSS of the Lingala Wikipedia some changes have been added indicating what fonts show these characters correctly. Given that the purpose of pro
jects like Commons, Meta and Betawiki is to support all languages properly, I would suggest that it makes sense to adopt these changes on a wider scale.
Thanks,
     GerardM

¿Hablas español?

According to Alexa, Spanish is the second language for Wikipedia considering the amount of traffic it generates. There must be MANY people who use the Spanish Wikipedia. When you look at Betawiki, there are 20 people who indicated there wish to help with the localisation of Spanish.

¿Hablas español?

We are looking for people who speak Spanish, who are willing and able to help us with the localisation of MediaWiki into Spanish. Not only the WMF extensions (41.29% ) but also the MediaWiki core messages (91.84%) are in need of attention..

When Spanish is not your "language", you may want to check out how your language is doing..
Thanks,
     GerardM

On the monthly Betawiki info

This month's Betawiki statistics need some explanations. The numbers are down for the "most often used 98%" category from 112 to 110. This is odd because these messages have been stable for quite some time now. It turns out that the friendly Betawiki developers have changed how they assess what goes into the numbers; the FUZZIED messages, messages that for whatever reason need attention, are no longer included and consequently the numbers are down for now.

The numbers of the MediaWiki core localisation has gone up and so did the messages for the WMF used extensions. This shows that even though there are FUZZIED messages in there as well, there is continued work done on many languages. It also shows that there is a need for more work to be done for many languages.

The Single User Logon is active, and it needs localisation on all projects in order to work really well. Localising on a local wiki is a waste of time because who can do this on the 700+ wikis of the Wikimedia Foundation ??
Thanks,
      GerardM

The aging of watching television

According to an article on Slashdot, the median age of people watching television is rising. Currently the median age for several US-American networks is 50. From a marketing point of view, the 18 to 49 is considered the most valuable one. A funny situation arises; the customers are ageing and given that the networks have a choice; do they acknowledge this trend in their programming or will they continue to program for a teeny public.

I would like to understand these numbers better;

• Are less people watching people 
• Are the young watching less television
• Are the old watching more television
• What are the people doing that do not watch television

When people move away from the television and move on to the Internet, you can still find the same way of working; I do not use Microsoft's MSN network because of its ridiculous amount of advertising. As I can typically  find interesting info elsewhere as well, I am sure that a fight will be fought about control of information on the Internet . The advertisers have no control of the web and find it hard to influence how people access information and as long as they don't, the Internet will be useful as well as informative.
Thanks,
     GerardM

Norwegian Sign Language

Today I learned from a mailing list that Norwegian Sign Language is recognised as an official language of Norway. This is good news. I understand it to mean that there is now a legal recognition for the fact that sign language is a legal method of communication between a state and its citizens.

In the e-mail thread, the question was raised if there is a list of sign languages that have an official status. I found this list on the English Wikipedia, it already included the Norwegian Sign Language as it was already recognised in the Norwegian education.

Reading the article, I found that as I personally do not have a link to the official Norwegian announcement or to a press release in English I will not change the list of sign languages nor the article on the Norwegian Sign Language. It is funny to find myself not changing a Wikipedia article; I feel restricted by the English language Wikipedia policies...

I am sure that someone else, someone who is also happy with this development will either provide me with a source or better, will update the article for all of us :)
Thanks,
      GerardM

Too darn hot

I am in Maiori Italy. It is hot. It is 38 °C. In the Netherlands where I live the weather is a more comfortable 21 °C. When I get home it is not unlikely that I will find it cold.

When summer temperatures are constantly above 30 °C, many things are different. This shapes the culture, the people, yesterday we had a pizza in the lemon garden of the "Bar Pineta". Today we went swimming in the sea; school children were there with their teachers, Dominican nuns, because as it is too warm in summer, the curriculum is condensed in the more moderate months of the year; kids do go to school on Saturday...

When you hang your clothes out to dry, you have to take into account the power of the sun; it bleaches your clothes so you hang them inside out. It is quite nice to have a siesta .. so you work some more hours in the evening or at night, but in this way you do not suffer the heat that much.

Kids like their chocolate, you do not buy it in summer as it melts. Oh, and Sabine paints her hair in winter; this is when it gets its original colour; everybody has a "coup de soleil" in summer :)

There are many small things like this, but all in all it is too darn hot ... for me :)
Thanks,
GerardM

Why SignWriting

Adam Frost created a wonderful video, this video was originally created for the Cherasco conference and has now found a home on the SignWriting website as well.

Adam's presents a compelling case for being able to write in your native language. Adam's mother tongue is American Sign Language. SignWriting allows him to do this. Have a look and I am sure that you will agree with me that the point is well made.

The ability to write in a mother tongue has been proven to be of benefit for the whole of the academic career of a person. Even when the career perspectives are better in another language, this is however another issue :)
Thanks,
GerardM

Privacy

Internet privacy is something to get over with; it does not exist we have been repeatedly told. This means that whatever you do on the Internet should be considered as if it is done in the full view of the world. Today I was surprised when my mother told me that she had googled me; she told me that she had enjoyed my blog entry about swimming in Maiori.

When you write on the Internet, it is your mother that may read you. When whatever you write is sane / safe enough for your mother to read it, you have a proper idea of your Internet privacy and Internet dealings.

This lack of privacy does not give any excuse to those people that want to snoop beyond what is available. I am staying with Sabine at the moment and am staying in the privacy of her home, her family. When I comment publicly, I have to ensure that I show proper respect, I have to be aware of Sabine's privacy and I want to find myself as friendly a welcome a next time.
Thanks,
GerardM

WOTD: spiaggia

"Spiaggia" is the word of the day. I have been to the beach in Maiori, and as you may have learned from a blog entry from Sabine I am in Naples. As I was a day "early", I have been privy to one of the delights of Sabine's hometown, the beach. Sabine loves to excercise by swimming. As it was a really nice sunny day, I went with her, I had a nice swim and afterwards enjoyed the sun a little bit too much, making my upper right leg turn a nice shade of red. The lower right leg is fine because that is used to the sun because my running clothes gave it the exposure that prevented a sunburn.

When you read Sabine's blog entry, you can imagine that I spend considerable time waiting for her to arrive at the Naples airport. The worry if she was ok, was the worst bit. Eventually I decided to send her an e-mail that I would come to her by bus. The cost of Internet at the Naples airport is a rip off.

Travelling can be nice, I met nice people underway, a really helpful American lady who helped a stranded guy find the right bus at the Naples central station; it was going by train to Sorento, on the train I met a guy who was happy to excercise his English on me and once in Sorento I met two ladies who were with the Irish office in Spain.. The bus took me along some of the most beautiful stretches of the Italian coast and I was really happy to find Sabine waiting for me at the bus stop :)

When you work as intensively with someone like Sabine, it is really helpful when you occasionaly meet. We had to meet in Bamberg anyway and as Sabine was driving, she invited me to come and prepare the meeting together. Given that a train ticket to Germany is almost as expensive as the cost of plane ticket it makes great sense.

It drives home the fact how much my "office" is in being able to connect to the Internet and have my data available to me. It is only the personal and private stuff that I miss here ... like teaching someone to cycle and a dear friend.
Thanks,
GerardM

A book to read

In the definition of stalking: "The crime of following or harassing another person, causing him or her to fear death or injury" it seems clear that we are talking about dangers in the physical world. Injury comes however in many forms; damage to a reputation is a form of injury that can have a lasting impact to a person.

In a mail thread, there was talk about being "streetwise", this may be good advise but what is streetwise, how do we still maintain our NPOV, how do we still prevent pov pushing, how do we deal with cranks? If streetwise means that we leave the rougher areas of our project, would our Wikipedia still be NPOV ?

A book by Daniel J Solove was recommended to me. This book, the future of reputation is recent, 2007, it's subtitle is: "gossip, rumor and privacy on the Internet" and is available under a CC-by-nc license.

With the recommendation came the comment: "The solution is going to have to involve auto-criticism, from all sides and accepting that hostility will always exist, so the problem becomes drawing proper boundries." The person who gave the recommendation wished me good luck, he indicated that he does not want to become a victim of cyber stalking.
Thanks,
GerardM

PS So now I need to find time to read a book :)

Why not join "Durova and friends"

Yesterday I started a Facebook group called "Durova and friends". This group is to get more attention to the stalking phenomena and the victims of stalking. Stalking as a phenomena is quite something... Just look at the Wikipedia article; its neutrality is disputed, it is in need of an expert sociologist, an expert psychologist, it needs additional citations and it even may not represent a worldwide view of the subject.

I am happy to find currently 36 members of this group. Two people have written on the group wall about Wiki related stalking. I informed a person on another project about the group, I was pointed to this website and was told in the strongest terms that he would stay away from Wikipedia and its phenomena after past experiences. Names of other victims and stalkers were given... There is a self help group of Wikistalking victims... People are still rubishing the idea, people are suggesting that you should be street wise ...

I have not been stalked. The closest I come is by being asked to reconsider friendship because of me being outed as a friend of Durova. I am angry and I use my anger to get attention for this phenomena. Anger however is not how to help, it needs cool expertise, it needs a protocol that expresses how to deal with stalking incidents, it needs compassionate people that help victims with the stress of being stalked and it needs an overall understanding of how it affects the Wikimedia Foundation and its projects.

As I am not an expert in this field and as stalking is belittled and ignored, I feel that we indeed need, like the Wikipedia article suggests, experts with a sociologist and psychologist background to help us understand stalking in all its gradations. Once stalking has been identified as happening in real time, we need a protocol that allows us to help victims in their dealings with the authorities. When we KNOW that stalking is happening, the protocol should allow us to invoke the name of the Wikimedia Foundation, name its multi million budget and its multi billion worth. It should be a protocol because we cannot be seen to be the boy who cries wolf.

To answer the question, you should not join "Durova and friends" when you are afraid of the stalkers. You may be outed as a friend of Durova. Then again, I think she is a wonderful person so you could do worse. When you are a victim of stalkers, there are other places where you can get some comfort and support. When you feel like me, you may choose to defy the stalkers and become a "friend".

For Durova and myself the action of Mr Brandt has been good; we have many more Facebook friends now.
Thanks,
GerardM

Durova is my friend

Today it gets personal. I have been informed that Mr Daniel Brandt, a person with a dubious reputation when it comes to on-line privacy decided to "out" all Facebook friends of Durova.

Durova informed me about this and suggested that given the new circumstances, I might like to reconsider my Facebook connection. I have reconsidered and as a consequence I am writing this post. I am happy to acknowledge my friendship of Durova. I find that she is a spirited lady who has an enviable stack of ackomplishments. The work that she does for restoring pictures is such that I have commented about this in the past. This example is just to prove my appreciation for her.

Mr Daniel Brandt, has the kind of reputation that is hard to shake. By acting like this, by telling the world the real name of Durova, someone who Mr Brandt knows to be stalked by the type of people that go to jail as a result, he demonstrates how irresponsible he is.

Until now I have had no interest in Mr Brandt, I have since learned that he runs a website, that a visit to his website will have him harvest cookies. That as a result it is better to stay away from such a creepy site.

Mr Brandt, for the record, my name is Gerard Meijssen and I am happy to be a friend of Durova.
Thanks,
GerardM

OpenSpell

"Researchers at the Meraka Institute have released a spelling game in all 11 official South African languages. The game, OpenSpell, can also be localised for additional languages."

This is interesting news; the software is GPL, the game can be localised and it is the kind of software that would be usefull in addition to the vocabulary trainer at OmegaWiki. It would be an ideal tool to localise it in as many languages as possible.

I learned about it from Friedel from translate.org.za; he is another who would love to see a tool like this available in as many languages as possible...

I will send them an e-mail; it will be interesting to learn what the possibilities are :)
Thanks,
GerardM

We lost the fuzzy ones

In the Betawiki statistics, a message was localised when it was localised. However, once a message changes, it gets fuzzied, indicating that the message needs some more work.

So far the statistics included these fuzzied messages. Today I noticed that Siebrand changed the way the statistics are compiled; no more fuzzies, we now only count the localised messages that completely serve their purpose..

This puts downward pressure on Siebrand's goals for the MediaWiki localisation for 2008. Luckily there is another half a year to go :)
Thanks,
GerardM

Orthography

When you write a language like Dutch, the orthography is prescribed. Its orthography changes over time but it is easily understood how to spell. When you write English, there are several ways of writing your words, English and American spelling for instance differ but it is quite clear what spelling is acceptable and what is not.

The question of what orthography to use is not a trivial one. Politics plays an important role; we learned to the consternation of many, that people on the Belarus Wikipedia were enforcing an orthography that precluded the changes that happened while the communists were in power. This even led to a rename and this is what is now the be-x-old.wikipedia.org. Sadly the Belarussians could not find it in themselves to work together..

In less and least resourced languages it is not always clear how to spell. Some languages have a written tradition that has fallen in disuse, some languages have multiple dialects that sound distinct. When there is no orthography taught, when not many people write a language, it is hard to get agreement on how to spell.

There are several possible competing arguments for a specific choice and when they are considered together, it is hard to decide what to do. When you maintain an old orthography, you keep the connection with the existing literature. When you create a unifying orthography and prescribe its use, there will be resistance from the people that do not spell in this way. When you write what you hear, the different dialects of a language sound different and consequently it fragments the language.

I do not know what the right way to approach this problem is. I would approach it by keeping people together; leading by example, discussing the issues and keeping the conversation going. One thing is for sure; languages change so the spelling of a language will change in time with it.

When languages are to survive, it all depends on having as many people as possible communicate in a language by talking, listening, signing, watching, reading and writing.
Thanks,
GerardM

Not invented here ...

Most of the best ideas around are the ideas of other people. Some of the best ideas you learn of your parents, your family, the people around you. Adopting these shared ideas ensure that you are part of a culture, that you share a language.

At the Go Piedmonte conference on Wikipedia, some of the best people around discussed less and least languages. Also some great presentations were made available for the conference including a workshop by Erik Moeller on licenses, a presentation by Adam Frost why SignWriting is such a wonderful thing to him..

Raoul Weiler presented both at the conference and provided a video. We discussed the continuation of Raoul's quest to have ethnonological artefacts photographed and documented. The cultural heritage of Africa is mostly available in Western musea and most of the artefacts exist in depots away from the public eye. Much of Africa's history is unknown to Africa.

Much of the background, the culture, the language that is associated with these artifacts is lost or about to be lost. This is what gives Raoul the drive to persue his quest. Much of the material in these musea has some annotation, sometimes even pictures. Raoul's quest is to make all of this available digitally and in this way make non western history available to the whole of the world.

Of all the imagery on Commons, the pictures that have been restored are really special. Many of these pictures are testimony to a time, to events that have passed. The pictures taken in Africa are so important because they provide a rare glance in a past that is often more distant then the ancient past of the Romans, the Greek, the Hittite.

I would love to see pictures restored in Commons about Africa, I echo the need for high resolution scans. I would love to see the photos of the artifacts in Commons, the annotation in Wikisource, articles about these cultures, the histories in all Wikipedias because the history of Africa is our history and the languages of Africa are our languages. There is no NPOV without them.
Thanks,
GerardM

Lies, damned lies and statistics

Statistics are one of the more important tools to inform about how things develop. The Wikipedia statistics are wonderful they are informative, they show trends. Sadly the numbers for the English Wikipedia are out of date because the number crunching requires bigger hardware..

The problem with statistics is in their interpretation. When numbers are given an implication that is not warranted, the consequences are proverbially based on lies even damned lies. The number of articles is often seen as all important; even the Wikipedia portal is based on these numbers.

What the Wikimedia Foundation is about is providing people with information; encyclopaedic information for Wikipedia. So when you want to rate the relevance of the wikipedias, it is much more relevant to know how many people actually use a Wikipedia and rate the projects accordingly.

Once it is decided that the relevance of a Wikipedia is in the number of people actually reading a Wikipedia, the fight for a high ranking becomes the kind of fight that we welcome. In this way the number of articles becomes only a factor in attracting more people. When the current emphasis on raw numbers of articles changes in the numbers of visitors, the current energy in improving the statistics will take a change for the better. People will want to understand what factors help gain more visitors, things like relevance of articles, quality of localisation. These two factors can be quantified as well. They are respectively the number of articles read and the articles that are not available and the localisation statistics.

We have had some bad fights as a consequence of the way the current statistics are understood. When we can agree that the current numbers are not really relevant for achieving our goals, we should turn to the numbers that do matter.
Thanks,
GerardM

What happened to the "Extensions WMF 90%" ??

The Betawiki "group statistics in time" show how the localisation of MediaWiki is doing. The statistics show the number of "Languages" in a given month, the number of languages with the "Most often used 98%", the "Core 90%", the "Extensions WMF 90%" and the "Extensions 65%".

The numbers have been growing every month. We are really proud by the achievement of our localisers.. but how can it be that the "Extensions WMF 90%" have halved ?

It has everything to do with Single User Logon and Stable Versions. Both are big new extensions that are now used by the Wikimedia Foundation's projects. Both bring with them a large number of messages that need translating. The number of languages that reach 90% messages localised has now dropped considerably.

When you compare the statistics of the MediaWiki core messages and the extensions, you will notice that with 66 languages, MediaWiki is well covered. The extensions are providing an increasingly important function. Given that the number of languages covering the WMF extensions was only half the number of the MediaWiki core, it becomes clear how important it is to cover the extensions well.

Given the importance of Single User Logon and Stable Versions, I hope that many people will help us localise them and that within a month or two we will be at the same number of languages that support the extensions used by the Wikimedia Foundation as we had them at the end of April.

Thanks,
GerardM

Jimmy Wales as an author of a scientific paper

You may have read in Ars Technica about Jimmy Wales named in the author list of a scientific paper. The paper has now been published on Genome Biology. The paper is of interest and I recommend you reading Community annotations with WikiProteins.

The author of Ars Technica expressed his amazement of Jimmy being part of this paper. Jimmy has played an important role in the conception of Wikiprofessionals. Jimmy and Barend Mons met in Brazil at a conference and they discussed all kinds of everything but of particular relevance was that they discusssed what makes the difference in projects when you need the collaboration of many people.

Jimmy did a great convincing job selling the notion of Wikis. He told Barend to get into contact with me and as a consequence a fruitful collaboration started with several people heavily into wikis got involved. I want to mention Erik Moeller and Sabine Cretella here as well. The collaboration was a big boost to OmegaWiki and it resulted in the first Wikiprofessional.

It is a great practice to honour people who have been important in the developement of a new concept. Jimmy deserves to be mentioned in this way and I am glad that he is. In a way, all of us who are involved in wikis can be proud.
Thanks,
GerardM

New projects are ready for new business

I am really happy and grateful that the projects that have been approved have been created. These new projects with the exception of the Wikinews projects are now available under a combined CC-by-sa and GFDL license. As Erik indicated in the past, this will prove necessary at the time when the latest version of the GFDL will finally be published.

I wish the new projects well in their quest to provide the type of information that they are creating for to the people they are there for.

A special word of thanks to Tim Starling for making a difference :)
Thanks,
GerardM

Not the 18th edition of "Not the Wikipedia Weekly"

Given my involvement and interest in the 17th edition of Not the Wikipedia weekly, I do want to point out this edition of the NWW.. I hope you like it and I am keen to make things work out well.
Thanks,
GerardM

Wiki meeting on TV

I just learned that a Wiki meet for the people of the Piedmontese language is going to happen and be recorded on web television. I understand that it starts in two hours (currently 12:00 Amsterdam time) and that they are checking out technology.

So if you like to know more .. try pms-1-la-festa-television.
Thanks,
GerardM

Missed opportunity

At the conference in Arhus there was a presentation planned about "online dictionaries in a web 2.0 environment". This presentation was to be given by Joseph Dung.

Joseph is from Nigeria and in order to be there, his trip to the conference started two day before the start of the conference. His presentation was the last presentation of the conference and sadly he did not make it. For all kinds of reason, he was delayed, there were problems and finally he missed a flight from Frankfurt airport.

Joseph made it finally to Arhus, he came in 15 minutes after the start of the final dinner. We were kept informed about the progress of Joseph towards Arhus during the conference.. We all felt bad for him and cheered his arrival.

I would love to have learned more about how Web 2.0 makes an impact in Nigeria.. It must be a challenge.
Thanks,
GerardM

A better mouse trap

I have had the privilege to participate at a conference on lexicography at the Aarhus School of Business. It was a truly enjoyable conference; I learned a lot, I talked a lot and I even had the pleasure of presenting about Wikis, Wiktionary, OmegaWiki, the need for standards and SignWriting. As each of these subjects are broad enough to present for half a day, it is not strange when people find that one aspect that is of special interest to them, only becomes clear when talking in the coffee break.

There were several presentations that really made me sit up and listen. Presentations about the preservation of knowledge about Tamil crafts, Bavarian dialects, Brazilian learners dictionaries, specialised tools for the teaching of English, electronic pocket dictionaries in Japan .. the list goes on. Really special for me was a talk on Wiktionary.

I have a tender spot for Wiktionary, I know how much it has improved over the years. I know the people, their dedication and the amount of effort that goes into constantly improving what is essentially unstructured data. Given that I am a bureaucrat and admin on several projects, given that I am still running a bot on most Wiktionaries, I have a clue what is going on.

In the presentation the terminology of business terminology was considered. Business, was looked at and the information was found wanting. There are many translations but several were considered to be wrong, archaic... OmegaWiki is a better mouse trap, it does allow for annotations. But in order to be better mouse trap, it has to catch more mice.

The traffic numbers demonstrate the relevance of Wiktionary; it is the biggest resource of its kind on the Internet. This is in my opinion why it is an important resource. When lexicographers want to make an impact, they have to do better. If they want to cooperate, they will find people knowledgeable, interested and enthusiastic. They will have to tread carefully because their scientific reputation is not what will make this work, it will be their ability to listen, to be judicious in their effort and in their ability to share on an equal footing.
Thanks,
GerardM

Betawiki localises for *all* MediaWiki projects

There have been some altercations on Betawiki about what localisation is acceptable. What is at stake is the difference between language and project localisation. Betawiki is firmly committed to only allow for language localisation. This means that all references to specific projects like Wikipedia, Wikibooks etcetera are not accepted.

In the projects of one of the languages supported within the Wikimedia Foundation, templates are used to add functionality to the recent changes functionality. These templates are not supported by MediaWiki or by its localisation and are unavailable to MediaWiki installations outside of the WMF. Betawiki does not accept these templates and it is not for a "community" of the WMF to dictate that exceptions are to be made for their language.

The underlying problem is that the Wiktionary and the Wikibooks in that language do not have admins. Admins are the people that can do project localisation. This is what needs fixing. When a new project is created, there should be at least one admin. In this way the community will be able to do the project localisation but also vandal fighting.

The idea that people external to a project are needed to do the maintenance of the project is problematic. When people maintain their own project, when trust is given from the start I am convinced that it will enhance the chances for a project to do well. This is yet another thing that a council should deal with.
Thanks,
GerardM

The localisation of MediaWiki extensions

Betawiki is doing a great job on the localisation of extensions. This can be deduced from the improvement shown by the group statistics and from the increasing list of extensions that are supported.

Today Siebrand provided another interesting statistic; a list with the extensions that have some localisation in more then fifty languages. This list is already quite long and it is interesting to note that the BoardVote has already some support from 111 languages.

There is one little teaser in this mix, Siebrand only included the extensions that use "$messages". This excluded the one extension that is my favourite, the Wikidata extension.. Then I again I was told that it is somewhere int the eighties :)
Thanks,
GerardM

Moving forward

Some good things that have been happening lately. Aaron, the developer of Flagged revisions, or Stable Version indicated that this extension is now stable in its messaging. This has now been picked up on Betawiki where it can now be can localised again.

The 179 messages of Flagged revisions adds to the load of an ever increasing number of messages that need localising. Currently there are 6511 messages up from 5744 messages a month ago, an incease of 767 messages. This shows clearly how much work goes into the MediaWiki development and the Betawiki localisation.

We are grateful for all the good work and to maintain the momentum, we have to continue to reach out to more people to help us to make their language a MediaWiki success too. Particularly for the African languages we wish to do well. At the last two Wikimanias Jimmy and Anthere talked about this. There have been workshops, there are special mailing lists and if we can do more to make Africans buy into the wiki way and own their Wikipedias many will.

Today I was asked to write for the Kabissa website.. Have a read, tell me what you think, tell me what more we can do for African languages..
Thanks,
GerardM

(ps we includes you :) )

Chamorra Wikipedia

The Chamorra Wikipedia is saved for now. This project that was proposed for closure will not be closed in recognition to the fact that there is some noticeable activity. Chamorra is a language spoken on Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands, and is spoken by some 76.700 people. As such it qualifies as a Wikipedia with few native speakers.

The Chamorra language is currently well supported on Betawiki; 95.72% of the most relevant messages are currently localised and 33.94% of all the MediaWiki messages. Consequently, this language is almost at the stage where we will honestly say that it has the minimum support required for this language.

I am really pleased with these efforts and I hope that this work done will be emulated by the other languages that are on life support.
Thanks,
GerardM

Saucy stories ?

I use Google reader to follow what is published on several websites. Sometimes I get to read a story that is saucy. Today I read about a named 13 year old boy who abused his fathers credit card and after having played in a "World of Warcraft" tournament ordered a supply of Dr Pepper, Fritos and Oreos as well as two escort girls. To quote the article, the boy said he thought it was the thing to do when you win a "World of Warcraft" tournament. To quote the two ladies of the night, they knew that something was up when they ended up playing Halo in stead of providing sexual services.

It is an amusing story but once I realised that this 13 year old kid was named in the article, it became a disgusting story to me. This kid is likely to be stigmatised for the rest of his life. I do not have any respect for a justice system that allows kids to be abused in this way. I do not have any respect for news organisations that name kids in this way. If this defines me and my values, I am proud to have them in this way.

There has been a lot to do about an article that my friend Erik Möller wrote several years ago in kuro5hin. This was written on websites and blogs that I do not care for because of their barrage of negative stories targetted against the Wikimedia Foundation and the people involved in it. I had been asked to take part in an edition of the Wikipedia Weekly, and this subject was discussed. After the program I was urged by Andrew Lih to read the kuro5hin article and make up my own mind.

I have read it and I find again how morals differ. This article is about children and sex; but the notion of what is acceptable and what is not, what is healthy and what is not is apparently very much a cultural thing. The article is about children and sex and provides a decidedly European view. In the Netherlands for instance a girl mature enough to ask a doctor for the pill, is likely to get it. This is much to be preferred over her going to the doctor two months later for an abortus provocatus or becoming a teen mother.

Erik writes: "It is a scandal in itself that the subject of child sexuality cannot be discussed without people raising the spectre of paedophilia", he writes: "If the child doesn't want it, is neutral or ambigious, it's inappropriate. This excludes most adult/child sexual contact, but only little child /child contact". I do not find suggestions in the article that provide an apology for peadophilia. Having read the article, I do not understand what the fuss is about.

What I do know is that both the 13 year old boy and Erik are damaged by a complete lack of what I consider appropriate. The 13 year old boy emulated adult behaviour and the escort girls went their way after having played Halo. Erik is being damaged because of what is to me a narrow minded POV on acceptable sexual morals, a fundamentalist parochial view that is sadly damaging many children. It has everything of a thought police ready to lynch all those who provide strong arguments that their dearly beloved moral beliefs are bankrupt.
Thanks,
GerardM

Getting the message, right ?

Flagged revisions is what is also known in "user land' as stable version. It has gone life in the German Wikipedia and as such it qualifies as a "WMF used extension". This means that it should be a compulsory part of what is to be translated when a subsequent project is requested in a language.

In the past, the developers of Flagged revisions did not get their messaging right, there were so many changes, that we at Betawiki decided not to ask our localisers to work on it. This move has been communicated and at present we are not convinced / aware that flagged revisions has reached a sufficiently stable version (pun intended).

When we get some assurance about the stability of its messages, we at Betawiki will be really happily start to localise this extension again.

some nice infobits

• Niuean, a language with some 5.000 fluent speakers is the latest language at Betawiki that has started localisation. I wish Sioneholof well with this brave attempt.
• More and more messages for the Babel extension are being added. The functionality is actively being developed but its messages are stable ..
• the project that provides funding for the localisation of languages in Africa, Asia and Latin America is in its last months.. We REALLY want to pay out more money :)

Thanks,
GerardM

Taking responisibility of actions

The Wikimedia Foundation has for its own reasons stopped the creation of new projects for a considerable amount of time. This has everything to do with the imminent release of a new version of the GFDL. As projects like the Hungarian Wikinews are now waiting foralmost 100 days after receiving final approval from the board.

Erik had indicated that when there was no resolution by the end of April, the projects awaiting creation would be finally created. It must be said that I am disillusioned with what happened. In stead of finally creating these projects, new stumbling blocks were created in that these new projects had to be dual licensed.

There may be "good" reasons for all this nonsense, but I think it is not fair to all the people that want to see an end to this endless procrastination. It is not reasonable either because the new projects are effectively nothing but a split of content previously created on the Incubator. In effect a new project is nothing but a continuation of what went before. A new Wikipedia is just that but in a different language, finally were it is intended to be for a long time.

I would urge Erik, the WMF organisation to accept that their action is not fair and not reasonable to the people involved.

Please create the missing projects with all possible speed.
Thanks,
GerardM

Beer, free wifi and standards

Today is a day to reflect on the days that went before. I am in Milan and yesterday there was this wonderful meeting where ISO contemplated how it will continue to evolve in the 21th century. I was asked to present about Wikis, and I am very happy with the opportunity that was given to me.

I must admit that I was exceedingly nervous, I hardly slept the day before I flew, and when I arrived at Bergamo airport I found that I had left my itinerary at home. Luckily there was an Internet cafe, and I had no problem reconstructing this all important list. There was one other person there, we got to talk and it turned out that Mz Otto had to wait until 15:00 for her travel partner to fly in. This allowed us to have a pleasant day in Bergamo, we drank coffee had some gelatto and visited the botanic garden after a nice walk in the old city. A great way to ease the nerves.

That evening I had a nice meal with the other people presenting; it was great because it eased my nerves. The meeting was held in a state of the art conference room, there was a nice opening speech by Mr Bob Sutor, he presented well what technologies are maturing and how they could be used by an international organisation that ISO is.

My presentation was a mix of the technical but most importantly also the social aspects that are necessary to make a Wiki approach a success. Wikis are considered as a viable way forward by ISO. It is definetly recognition for the relevance and the vitality as perceived outside of our wiki world :)

The one glitch was the Internet availability; at the meeting it just did not work. When I got near the hotel, I found this bar, and happily drank two bears not even starting to make an inroad of all the mail and other things. Today, I am back at this bar, I have had my coffees, a beer and something to eat. It is truly a busman's holiday and I could not be more content :)
Thanks,
GerardM

World famous in the Netherlands

The Dutch Wikimedia chapter issued today a press release seeking quality pictures of famous people. In the press release it is explained that for the Wikimedia projects we need pictures available to us under a free license.

To make things easy, a special website, wikiportret.nl provides a helping hand when making a picture available to the WMF projects. There is a press kit available on the website.. I expect that the famous people in the Netherlands and Belgium will appreciate that a quality picture in Wikipedia is great publicity.
Thanks,
GerardM

RobotGMwikt

Several years I have run as a service the interwiki.py function of the pywikipedia bot software on all the Wiktionaries. I had up to six instances of the bot running concurrently on different projects. The principle behind it was simple; when a word in one project is exactly the same, a link is to be created. This function was created by Andre Engels and he helped me out a considerable number of times.

I stopped running the bot when people started to question the algorithm used by the bot. As I run it as a service, I was interested in changing it only when good arguments were provided why it should be changed. These arguments were never forthcoming, the reason why I stopped the running of the bot was because I was told that it is now ran from the tool server.

Yesterday, I learned that the tool server functionality although maybe really clever and efficient is only used to update the English language Wiktionary. Yesterday I was asked by Spacebirdy to run the bot again because there is a need for it. So I asked on IRC if there was a problem and I was told there was not.

Today I was told to change the algorithm because the English Wiktionary wants to create interwiki links to redirect pages and as it is a "community policy" I was told to abide by it. I asked for arguments why this made sense and no good arguments were forthcomming. It was even conceded that it would be best to discuss this in the village pump.

There are good reasons why a redirect should not be referred to by interwiki links:

• Wiktionary aims to include all words in all languages. A word spelled incorrectly in one language can be correct in another
• The specific word does not exist yet in the other project
  
• The notion of homonymy is ignored
• There are a substantial number of redirects that exist as a result of a conversion

Interwiki links are one of the few things that connect the different Wiktionary projects. It is essential to consider its use in the scope of the whole of Wiktionary and not within the narrow understanding of single projects. As more Wiktionaries became isolationist in their point of view it became increasingly time consuming and frustrating for me to run the bot. Given that I have in OmegaWiki the perfect solution for the need for interwiki links, I have no need for this functionality in the first place.

What I find disappointing is that the quality of service that I provided is no longer there. It is another fine problem that a community / project council could deal with.
Thanks,
GerardM

Xhosa Wikipedia

Xhosa is a language spoken in South Africa and Lesotho by over seven million people. It is an official language of South Africa. I went to the Xhosa Wikipedia to urge people to contribute to Betawiki and found to my astonishment that a request has been made to close that project.

The proposal for closure is by one of its moderators, he is living in Europe and not a fluent speaker of the language. Nobody from Africa is currently involved in this project but considerable effort is put into finding people willing to contribute to this project.

A project without a community is dead. It may be possible to keep a project on life support when people volunteer their services. The problem is that all this well intentioned effort may be what prevents a project from taking off. What I wonder is that all the non African involvement prevents people from Africa getting a sense of ownership. If this is true, the best thing we can do is close down all the projects that are on life support. When people have to fight for their right to have and keep a project in their language, it may gain value as a consequence.
Thanks,
GerardM

Violence

A 15 year boy was walking with two girls on a street during Koninginnedag. A car wanted to pass, honked ... was annoyed got out of the car and started to have a go at the boy. It started with some pushing, some kicking and only then the boy reacted. As a brown belt karateka, the boy could do serious damage. He did not, in the end his glasses were damaged but he had defended himself without resorting to his skills.

A thirty year old man was in a bar. Recently he had been professionally trained in aggression management and self defense. There was a guy who was intoxicated, really aggressive destructive even. The man thought, I can practice what I have learned... will I first give him an upper cut or a jab... He involved himself, talked to the man, using the psychological tricks... and found that they worked. I met this man at a dinner party, he told us that he would have liked to use his new fighting skills.

At the party, we talked about aggression, that it is good to have the skill to be able to manage unpleasant situations. The consensus was that it is best not to get into a situation and that the best you can do is to prevent a situation from getting even more nasty. We tried some holds on each other... I feel uncomfortable about having a perceived need for these skills. If anything the aggression management skills are the ones I prefer to master. Running I do for fun.
Thanks,
GerardM