Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/Single/2012-01-23

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The following is an automatically-generated compilation of all talk pages for the Signpost issue dated 2012-01-23. For general Signpost discussion, see Wikipedia talk:Signpost.

Arbitration report: Four open cases, proposed decision in Muhammad images, AUSC call for applications (591 bytes · 💬)

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Trying to micromanage Betacommand is stupid and pointless. He's an adult. Either ban him or just let him edit. - Burpelson AFB ✈ 18:47, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

Burpleson, Perhaps you should contribute your opinions to the discussion at Wikipedia talk:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Betacommand 3/Proposed decision Buffs (talk) 21:14, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

Featured content: Interview with Muhammad Mahdi Karim and the best of the week (3,030 bytes · 💬)

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A request for comment has been initiated to discuss the structure of the leadership for the Featured Articles department at en:wiki. Wikipedia:Featured articles/2012 RfC on FA leadership. If you could please insert a notice drawing attention to the event, it might help draw wider participation. Thank you. --Dianna (talk) 19:38, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

• Added to N&N Crisco 1492 (talk) 08:11, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

US-centric?

I don't agree with the anon's repeat performance this week in adding explicit references to the US all over the page. We're supposed to be intelligent editors (this is aimed at the en.WP community, not 10-year-old grade-school kids in the UK). By now, we're supposed to know where New England is and that Obama is the president of the US, not of Ireland. One might be more explicit in article space, by contrast. Tony (talk) 13:02, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes but see what I mean - Albert Hoffman's nationality was given but Timothy Leary's wasn't. Why would that be? The usual biased assumption of editors that everyone who reads it will know who Leary is but not who Hoffman is. How ironic on a page where Muhammad Mahdi Karim talks about systemic bias - you go right ahead and dump a whole load of it on the very same page.

You just don't get it, do you? How alienating it is for readers from countries other than the US. How arrogant it is of US editors to assume they don't need to provide the most basic information because, hey, everyone somehow will know it anyhow, right? This is the third time I have raised this here and I have been, to use an Americanism, kissed off both times before, and my complaint treated as some sort of irritating nonsense. But can't you see if in this, a PR exercise for Wikipedia which is focussing on the best of the project, you promote the US-centric 'don't give a fuck for the rest of the world, we're the default here so suck it' attitude, what signals does that send out? 86.138.46.69 (talk) 13:14, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

Muhammad Mahdi Karim

I've long been a fan of his photographic work, and it's nice to see a little bit about the man behind the pictures as well. Thanks for an interesting read! Lankiveil ^{(speak to me)} 13:30, 28 January 2012 (UTC).

• Thanks for the feedback! He indeed has several really nice pictures; the picture of the Kaaba in Masjid Al-Haram is impressive. Crisco 1492 (talk) 01:55, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

In the news: World watched as Wikipedia shut down for SOPA blackout (2,317 bytes · 💬)

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Tell you what struck me - the comcom's phones started ringing on Tuesday morning, soon as the UK journalists got into work and saw the warning countdown banner up. Then the UK bunch had to do press for the US media (hence me on NPR) 'cos San Francisco wouldn't be awake at the time. (Though, of course, they were.) Journalists joked about students missing Wikipedia ... but if anyone's utterly dependent on Wikipedia, it's the journalists.

(Post-mortem here. Including "how to get roped in as a media volunteer", for those wondering. It can be six months between calls, but when we need you we need you.) - David Gerard (talk) 22:41, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

David, was it you who made the automobile analogy? If so, that's one of the most powerful sound bites I've heard in years. Viriditas (talk) 04:17, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Bank robbers and cars? Yep :-) Nicked directly from Cory Doctorow. That soundbite played spectacularly well and defused a common objection out the gate. I expect Hollywood rhetoric to adapt quickly, though. Most brilliant soundbite of the blackout, "Imagine a world without free knowledge", was coined by SarahStierch just a few hours before blackout - David Gerard (talk) 08:13, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

I missed the NPR feed. I heard you as part of the lead story on the BBC Global News podcast, and it was perfect. Very impressive. Viriditas (talk) 10:01, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Ah, the 18 Jan one here. That was Jimbo using the analogy, not me (though I did a few BBC radio slots). It seemed to work in other languages too - David Gerard (talk) 00:11, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

He did a great job. Viriditas (talk) 03:35, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

News and notes: SOPA blackout, Orange partnership (2,231 bytes · 💬)

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A bit of an aside, but how should one read the ebb and flow of the edits per minute chart? I assume the peaks are during evening in America? Lampman (talk) 10:57, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

It seems to peak around 19:00 UTC, when most of the western world is awake (1pm - 4pm for the US). Jujutacular ^talk 13:19, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

Interesting that the usual ebb and flow cycle was disrupted the next day after the blackout. The normal peak around 19:00 was late. Powers ^T 14:35, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

• Q: "Mobile service provider Orange had made a three-year commitment" Had made? Until what? Or is that a typo for "has"/"have" (depending on ENGVAR) --Dweller (talk) 17:49, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
• "There is no financial exchange with the partnership between Orange and the Wikimedia Foundation." I have literally no idea what this means. --Dweller (talk) 17:50, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
  • I assume that simply means that no money changed hands. - Jarry1250 ^{[Deliberation needed]} 18:31, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
    • Ah. A "financial exchange" sounds like a Wall Street rival. --Dweller (talk) 21:54, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
• Actually, in the Orange deal, data charges will not be incurred for images. Orange has agreed to make access to the full version of Wikipedia, including images, free of data charges. Ijon (talk) 18:42, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

• What is the relationship between the versions served up by the Orange Project, Wikipedia Zero and WikiReader? Guy Macon (talk) 22:42, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

Technology report: Looking ahead to MediaWiki 1.19 and related issues (2,603 bytes · 💬)

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• I think you've described the matter of dependencies very well. Thanks for this!
  Just a small clarification I wanted to make though
  

  particularly on smaller wikis that could have lain untouched for years

  
  The above quote is not entirely correct. Gadgets that were written before the introduction of ResourceLoader will not be affected since modules didn't exist back then, therefor they won't be affected by anything related to "dependencies" since they do not use any modules.
  
  This matter only concerns modules created by MediaWiki extensions (including Gadgets that are using "[ResourceLoader]" in their definition). And from those only the ones that are referring to a module in their code (such as mw.util or $.ui.dialog) without adding the name of this module as a "required" for their module (which is done by the "dependencies=" option (more info)).
  
  Imagine a module A and B both use "jquery.ui", but only module A has this requirement declared in it's meta-data. Before MediaWiki 1.19 modules used to load a bit slower, so loading A and B (in that order) would probably not fail because B happens to be loaded after module A which already provided the "jquery.ui" functionality. In MediaWiki 1.19, however, modules are loading faster and thus make it less likely for these "lucky" hits to occur.
  
  We acknowledge that these "lucky" hits were more common than they should be and some users have come to expect that certain modules would simply be available by default, to aid the transition we've loaded some the most popular modules by default (such as mw.util), however other than that there isn't a whole lot we can do since there is no way of knowing which modules are needed, this is exactly where "dependencies" is for. From looking around however I see that most gadgets that use modules do have their dependency meta-data in order, it's mostly the simple few-line gadgets that emerged from copy/pasting code without including the dependency information for mw.util.
  
  If anyone runs into ResourceLoader dependency-related issues on wikis in beta@wmflabs or here live post-deployment, I'd recommend you report it to mw:Talk:ResourceLoader/Migration guide (users). Krinkle (talk) 16:04, 12 February 2012 (UTC)