Wikiversity:Colloquium

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Making Technical Wikiversity Topics Better Teaching Tools by Utilizing the Skills of a Hyper-Multidisciplinary Team

Moved to Improving Technical Topics At Wikiversity, with discussion on the discussion page.

Emesee's pagemoves

This user has apparently moved a variety of pages from the topic namespace to the template namespace. The template namespace should be reserved for transcluded wikicoding, and his moves seem to have disrupted a lot of topic pages. Should these actions be reverted? TeleComNasSprVen 02:19, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, page moves like {{New Testament Greek/Department news}} have created a mess. The question is the best way to clean it up. --mikeu ^talk 02:39, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

It looks like Topic:New_Testament_Greek uses text in the template pages for transclusion. This seems to me to be a rather ugly hack. --mikeu ^talk 02:39, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

TeleComNasSprVen 04:00, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Category:Novial

I'm not sure if this is appropriate, but I believe that most of the pages in this category ought to be moved under Topic:Novial as subpages of the topic. Otherwise it may appear confusing; for example, upon searching for The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, one might be looking for lessons on how to read the original book, rather than how to translate it into Novial. TeleComNasSprVen 06:16, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

TeleComNasSprVen 04:00, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Bureaucratship policy

We lack a Bureaucratship policy. I believe this is one of the causes in disruption by Bureaucrats over the past 3 years. Without a policy, technically we do not even have the right to have Bureaucrats as there is no community support for them. Since we have three active Crats involved in recent problems regarding giving ops without consensus, and the two previous ones and two current ones were involved in removing ops without consensus, it would seem that we would have to start over from scratch and then find new Bureaucrats that can be trusted to follow new community standards regarding what they can and can't do, including requiring consensus for all of their actions and not allowing Bureaucrats to just make up rules as they go along. Ottava Rima (talk) 00:10, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict with below.) There is a some disagreement about whether or not those actions enjoyed consensus! However, certainly, no harm in having a decent policy or guidelines. What Ottava refers to is mostly what, however, remains as a judgment call on all the wikis. "Giving ops without consensus" referred to following policy we do have, i.e., the procedure for mentored custodianship, which requires no discussion, only a mentor acceptance, and which instructs the 'crat to then assign the bit, with one thing not covered: return of ops after a request from a sysop who voluntarily resigned, and "removing ops without consensus" refers, obviously, to the desysopping of Ottava, as the recent example, which was, in fact, based on a discussion and a close, and "without consensus" is simply Ottava's opinion, not matched by the bulk of the ocmmunity, not matched by what the discussion and evidence actually showed. The only other example I know was in 2008, the emergency desysopping of JWSchmidt, which was done with the apparent concurrence of three 'crats. That could easily have been remedied at any time, if it was an error, by any 'crat, and the community could have held a discussion to undo it, if that's what the community had wanted.

(I wonder myself about that JWS desysopping, but JWS' response was so long so unbalanced about it, that I don't wonder that the tools were not returned. It's a shame, but it's a situation that JWS could fix in a flash, I'm sure. Or at least within a few months.)

Ottava has long experience with the wikis, and it's puzzling that he seems to not understand how WMF traditions operate, while he headlong attacks them and those who work with them. We may certainly create our own traditions here, and have, and it's best to do that through formal policy and guidelines, because otherwise people will expect what is standard. I'll look at the 'cratship policies of other wikis, but, I can say, the same things that Ottava is talking about happen on other wikis which have policies. Return of ops on request after return, having resigned "not under a cloud," which means immanent process, not just that someone said "Phooey on you, I don't like you!," is standard. And 'crats always exercise discretion in closes and thus their actions. --Abd 01:33, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

We have Wikiversity:Bureaucratship. The main problem is that after Jimbo came to Wikiversity in 2008 assorted Wikipedia polices and unwritten "wiki common law" was imposed on the Wikiversity community by a gang of abusive sysops and other misguided Wikimedia functionaries. Until that disruptive influence is removed from this community the policy pages have little or no importance. --JWSchmidt 00:38, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Well, it is important if people are declaring "Bureaucrats need to do ____" before things can be processed. Ottava Rima (talk) 00:43, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

"before things can be processed" <-- What sorts "things"? --JWSchmidt 00:57, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure he's unhappy with the responses here. (And don't blame me, I sure as heck didn't write that policy). --SB_Johnny ^talk 01:24, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

As JWS points out, we do have a [proposed] Wikiversity:Bureaucratship policy, and Ottava has been ignoring it. He's been ignoring Wikiversity:Custodianship. He's been ignoring ordinary Civility, it was my warning and blocking him for that originally (2 hour block) that set him off; before that, my extended probationary custodianship was just fine, no problems noted. Suddenly, he was a meta asking for desysop, clearly contrary to our own policy, which provided for a 48 hour period for me to find a new mentor. And, particularly for JWS, he's been soliciting, for months, Jimbo and Stewards to intervene again at Wikiversity. I see that Ottava did not accept the No he got from stewards. They've asked him again and again to stop that. Stewards don't take on local controversies, unless a situation has totally broken down.

I think what Ottava wants is for the policy to tell 'crats what to do, to deprive them of discretion. That doesn't fly on wikis. Clearer guidelines, yes, but if we didn't need discretion, we could use a 'bot. We'd need a manual that was truly a tome. And just how long would it take us to write this?

"Wiki common law" just means what people with experience with wikis and what works have developed and understand. Local policy always supersedes common law; common law simply applies where specific local policy has not been developed. JWS, you confuses this with what happened when we had an influx of "visitors" who were pursuing an external agenda, plus we were functioning as a safe harbor for personal criticism of uses at other wikis. We were not prepared for that, and, my opinion, we still aren't.

We need to develop structures that can readily handle such things as pile-in of !votes from "visitors." I've seen a number of processes here either damaged or possibly warped by that, including some present discussions. There was an obvious problem with the vote on Diego Grez, for example. The old Wikiversity simply didn't have the sophistication to address it. We need to build that, and it will take a community, I certainly cannot do it by myself, though I have lots of ideas. (Hint: the solution does not involve suppression of comment. It also doesn't involve bans.)

JWS, I invite you again to be a part of building the new Wikiversity, better than the old. How about it? How about realizing that you aren't locked in the hall closet any more, you have been free to speak for a long time. The only people inclined to block you have gone, and even if Adambro, say, comes back, I seriously doubt he would harass you. Why not? Because I confronted him on his recusal failure, repeatedly, that's why, and that may be why he resigned. (Adambro is not like Ottava!) Please take a fresh look at all this. You've been shooting yourself and your true friends in the foot.

By the way, I don't need sysop tools to work on improving our process, I was offered the tools and accepted only to do the boring work of dealing with, yes, vandalism and nonsense and obsolete redirects and unneeded pages. I've made one controversial action this time. It happens to be basically the same as my sole truly controversial action before. The previous action was confirmed as reasonable, and, indeed, had there been follow-up then, a great deal of later nonsense might have been avoided. I could, and can, only do so much, I can only press the block button once for a user, basically, under ordinary circumstances. There is no way to dominate Wikiversity with sysop tools except by violating Wikiversity:Recusal. Others may not be bound by that proposed policy, but I am, since -- I wrote it. How about helping formalize that policy. Fix it if it needs fixing! But, please, don't attack those who are trying to make this a safe place, to avoid the very situations that caused you such pain. --Abd 02:04, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

• Am I the only one confused as to how Abd can say "we do have a Wikiversity:Bureaucratship policy" when it is still "proposed" and was never passed through consensus? Is it another one of his imaginary fiat declarations? By the way, if we take the Bureaucrat policy as right, Bureaucrats are really easy to remove and if need be, that can happen - after all all 5 made serious errors of judgment and abused their status. Ottava Rima (talk) 02:30, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Slip of the keyboard. I added [proposed] to my comment. --Abd 09:21, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Bureaucrat confirmation hearings for Mu301 and Jtneill

See Wikiversity:Community Review/Jtneill 2 and Wikiversity:Community Review/Mikeu 2 for recall discussions related to long patterns of abuse and their participation in the abuse of SB Johnny and Abd. Ottava Rima (talk) 03:02, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

SBJ, having enough fun yet? --Abd 09:05, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Ottava's strategy is plain, he already used it with me, as he was using it with you, SBJ. I warned him for disruption, specifically for threatening users, including me and all three 'crats, with being blocked by "two custodians" who, as soon as they could "come on," block me for *commenting* in his "confirmation hearing" on you, and for threatening that stewards were going to intervene. He then filed his proposed topic ban, so, when I blocked him for continuing the disruption, he could scream, "See how out of control he is! Blocks people for disagreeing with him," and some users fall for it, even a WP arb fell for it.

So, now that he's filed process to remove the other two active 'crats, he will claim that all the 'crats are required to abstain from closing the processes, so that he can then, having canvassed his friends to !vote, go to meta and ask stewards unfamiliar with the situation to close. He might get lucky. Probably not, but .... there have been a few stewards who have been anti-Wikiversity and might take the opportunity.

I have not communicated off-wiki on this, I'm openly and publicly advising you that you can, without violating recusal policy, undo any action of your own, restoring status quo ante. So you have an opportunity to end this immediately, as I tried to end it. Not to end community discussion, just threats and disruption. I know that there is at least one custodian watching this who has been perplexed about what to do. How much time should we spend, as a community, raking every one of our 'crats over the coals? Ottava is trying to wreck Wikiversity. If it can't be his, it can't be anyone's. It's obvious. --Abd 09:21, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

You are banned from all Wikiversity space. As such, your posting here, closing places, etc, is all done in violation of that ban. Ottava Rima (talk) 14:49, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Since Abd decided to violate his ban, a proposal to remove all current Crats for extreme abuse of community trust, sysopping and desysopping without consensus or policy being followed, and other disruption based problems, has been proposed. Ottava Rima (talk) 15:48, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

The ban discussion was never concluded above and includes several people whose only contributions here were to that discussion. Obviously canvassed supporters. Others whose opinions I personally would see as necessary to confirm such a ban have not participated, likely because they are ignoring all of the drama being perpetuated here. Adrignola 15:52, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

"several people whose only contributions here were to that discussion" I checked every single editor there and not one represents what you claim of them. Removing your "hot cat" and other tools of mass editing, many of them have more contributions than you do. In the past 2 months, you only have 14 real edits after all. Ottava Rima (talk) 15:58, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Guido den Broeder has far more than 14 edits in 2 months. JWSchmidt has far more than 14 edits in 2 months. Diego Grez only has 13 in the past month but he was a Custodian here and an active participant. IDangerMouse, a new user, has more than 14 edits in the past week with many additional IP edits (as shown by him having to re-sign over his IP signature). Bduke is someone I don't know much about but he seems to have been active going back many years. Ktr101 has also been a member here for a few months and has more edits than you in the past two months. Then Darklama, Moulton, and others participated in discussion and acknowledged what has been said so far. Everyone involved has a history here, which goes against your statements. Now, perhaps they all need to use hot cats or scripts to work up a flurry of mass edits to suit your ideas of activity? Ottava Rima (talk) 16:05, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

I found one user, Stanistani who has a Wikipedia Review account, very few edits and less recent edits than you, and also a supporter of SB Johnny. Did you mean him by chance? Ottava Rima (talk) 16:14, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm not throwing around names but there are three whose edits involve only user space or project space edits. Regarding the rest of it, I've done categorization without scripts as well at other projects. They're a tool. Deciding what to put where takes far more time than applying the category, even when doing it by hand. My contributions have been limited because I become demotivated when every time I come around people are bickering and bitching at each other. The fact that you don't consider them real edits is another demotivating factor. Well, maybe I won't bother. The "us" versus "them" mentality is very offputting. "We" all need to get along and trying to mobilize support, fictional, fabricated, canvassed, to fight on one side of a debate over issues imagined, assumed, or exacerbated defeats the purpose. You're going around and treating everyone like an enemy, including myself, and wikilawyering at every turn. There's no policy needed to justify basic human decency and measured communication with one another. Adrignola 20:25, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

"edits involve only user space or project space edits" And that is common. We've had admin who've never edited article space or added real content. My point was that you may see a "problem" now, but you didn't mention anything when Abd blatantly canvassed 6 people to vote against me, and the people who are involved now have more activity than you do for the most part. Consistency is important. Ottava Rima (talk) 21:57, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Ottava, I deleted all the political drivel off my page from all sides, and then stayed out of the discussions, to get back to what I want to do - create a learning resource about the relationship between a writer and their audience. So I go do my own thing for a few days, come back and you are dragging my name into this discussion. Stop it. Stop all of it, the witch hunts, tossing anyone who disagrees with you into made-up investigations and recalls, and provoking people. If you stop for one week, even, I'll come back and create some content. Yes, I'm a WR member. Yes, I disagree with you there. Here, on Wikiversity, the vast majority of my few dozen edits have been on my talk page, trying to figure out how to set up a learning resource. JWS has been helpful. You have not been helpful. Want me to create content? Post on my talk page a link to a simple tutorial on how to create a resource here. →StaniStani  08:41, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I mentioned all who voted because Adrignola had concerns about who voted. That isn't a "witch hunt". Ottava Rima (talk) 15:06, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

• That's just stupid; why would you plan to rid Wikiversity of all the bureaucrats it has? It has more than enough problems keeping up without the proper of numbers present and now you want to take out the ones that can actually make them? TeleComNasSprVen 09:13, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Liquid Threads

I propose that we enable Liquid Threads at English Wikiversity to make discussions more manageable. There has been a lot of lengthy discussions of late where liquid threads could of come in handy, and I believe the Colloquium and other discussion areas could benefit from it. -- darklama  19:47, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

• Is this basically a discussion forum model similar to those found on sites like W-R and NetKnowledge? —Moulton 20:46, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

  Yes and no. What I believe to be similar to some forum models is that discussions are split into threads, all discussions and responses are not necessarily shown at once, and discussions can be searched and sorted. Threads can be watched, moved, edited, and they still have a revision history which I believe to be unlike any forum models I know of. -- darklama  21:32, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

• Never Liquid Threads are atrocious. Ottava Rima (talk) 21:54, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose The problem is caused by a single user, Abd. I'm thinking of a more efficient solution. Guido den Broeder 22:01, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
• Never Liquid Threads are atrocious. One of the reasons I migrated from Wikieducator.Leutha 23:19, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
• Limited use only While I generally dislike the LiquidThreads system of talkpages, and I just think it adds a lot of bureaucracy and the potential for movethread vandalism, I find that others actually prefer having it and they think that it makes discussions go smoother. For example, there is already in effect a LiquidThreads system in action on Wiktionary, but it is not enabled by default, however the users there could simply flip a switch with the magic word {{#useliquidthreads:yes}} and it would be enabled on their usertalkpages. We could set up a similar system here, I find that it might help on smaller wikis like this one than maybe Wikipedia or Wiktionary. TeleComNasSprVen 09:09, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

add cite this page?

I think we should add "cite this page" functionality to our toolbox, like Wikipeida has. The Mediawiki extension is "Cite". As an academic resource I think it makes sense for it to be as easy as possible for people to cite our resources. --Charles Jeffrey Danoff 23:06, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

I couldn't find "cite this page" in my Wikipedia toolbar but I think it makes sense to have it. Ottava Rima (talk) 23:13, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

it's the last item in the toolbox, here's an example --Charles Jeffrey Danoff 06:35, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I see it now. It should be fine. I don't see what problems it would create. Ottava Rima (talk) 15:08, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I support enabling this feature, should make citing Wikiversity as a source easier for people. -- darklama  13:55, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Upload Pdfs

Can we upload pdfs? or other files. That's one of the things I liked about wikieducator. i.e. have handouts ready to print.Leutha 23:21, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

According to Special:Upload, you can upload png, gif, jpg, jpeg, xcf, pdf, mid, ogg, ogv, svg, djvu, tiff, tif, and oga files. -- darklama  23:27, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Please upload them at commons, so more people can access them. Also chose a (good/open?) licence if you are the creator of the material and have the rights. :-) ----Erkan Yilmaz uses the Wikiversity:Chat + Identi.ca 00:05, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Have you uploaded any handouts yet? Wikiversity makes PDFs look really slick, like , just go to "Upload file" in the toolbox. --Charles Jeffrey Danoff 06:40, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Should Wikiversity Evolve to a Social Contract Governance Model?

Two years ago, I proposed that Wikiversity upgrade its governance model to one based on the concept of a Community Agreement or Social Contract.

Is it timely now to reconsider that idea?

Moulton 00:21, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

• On IRC, Mike asked for other examples of a Social Contract besides the one that Geoff Plourde drafted as his model. Here is another one that was in actual use in a community in the 1990s. —Moulton 00:46, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

I suppose pretty much anything is worth a try at this point, and Moulton and I have talked about this more than a bit over the past couple years. Presumably we could at least add this to the editpage text, and perhaps have some sort of "formal" handshaking as a prerequisite to "enfranchisement". I say yes, let's try to move in that direction. --SB_Johnny ^talk 00:58, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

• Note that this also means moving in the direction of a higher level of ethics than we have seen here in the past few years. Basically, the Community Agreement is a reciprocal commitment among the signatories to strive for the highest possible level of scholarly ethics that we are individually and collectively able to muster. —Moulton 01:24, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

• This sounds like an excellent idea. Thanks, Moulton! Guido den Broeder 01:27, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

• I'll accept any contract where I am paid over 15 dollars per hour. Ottava Rima (talk) 02:10, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Unfortunately these Social Contracts and the current situation at Wikiversity have the same problem. Ideals are described and no practical guidance is provided for real collaboration when conflicts in the community arise which does occasionally happen. As can already be seen, without practical guidance conflicts can last a long time perhaps even indefinitely, which is far from ideal. -- darklama  02:26, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

• You will note that the second example I gave spells out a conflict resolution process. —Moulton 04:14, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

  Unfortunately the Conflict Resolution Processes section of the second example also only describes ideals with no practical guidance, and in fact does not actually describe any process. I believe that section can be summed up as be nice, be fair, and be consistent when conflicts arise. That section refers to external sources instead of providing practical guidance itself like what steps to take to ensure consistency and fairness, what to do when people believe they have been treated unfairly within a conflict resolution process, what steps if any are required to initiate conflict resolution, when and how can a conflict resolution end, what is the minimum and maximum lengths that a conflict resolution can run for, what steps happen next when conflict resolution fails to resolve a conflict or people want conflict to end immediately because they are sick of it, how many issues if any limit can be brought up at one time, can people repeatedly bring up the same issues indefinite and if not what are the limits and what happens when those limits are reached, what happens when people are not interested in a person's personal disputes, and I could keep on going with many unanswered questions, but that could feel a page and I think that is enough for you and anyone else to hopefully understand my perspective. -- darklama  12:51, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Why not give it a go - e.g., start drafting Wikiversity:Social contract? I would be interested to learn more. On the one hand perhaps a better governance model is possible (much of the example contract seems already similar to existing policy); on the other hand, I wonder, if such a social contract will work well for many people (as does existing policy and procedure) but still not work so well for a few. To date, it seems the approach has been to iteratively try to improve local policy. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 10:19, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the additional link, Moulton. I certainly think that this is worth giving a try, though I do share some of Darklama's concerns. I understand that the community at wikiversity would develop a unique social contract based on local needs and community values. But I'm not so sure that I understand how this would aide in conflict resolution. --mikeu ^talk 14:51, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

On one of the pioneering learning communities that I helped organize in the early 1990s, we had on hand a person who was a professional in conflict resolution. She taught us the principles of conflict resolution and applied them in her role as mediator and arbitrator when conflicts arose. She wrote a chapter in a book about her work on that project. Here is the reference:

• Anna Duval Smith : Problems of Conflict Management in Virtual Communities, 1997 (Chapter 6 in Communities in Cyberspace, edited by Marc A. Smith and Peter Kollock, Routledge Press, 1998.

Moulton 17:32, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Is it possible to have objective evidence that Wikiversity's governance model is or is not one based on the concept of a Community Agreement or Social Contract? If not, then how can we know if any specific proposed change would turn Wikiversity into such a thing or does the opposite? If Wikiversity is in fact now based on such a governance model, and the proposed change designates some one person as sole authority as to what behavior is or is not consistent with the concept of a Community Agreement; then Wikiversity will have moved from a Community Agreement to a dictatorship. - WAS 4.250 19:12, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

WAS, do you reckon that a dictatorship represents mutually agreeable terms of engagement? It doesn't seem to be the case in Egypt. —Moulton 00:52, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

I have two ways of saying the same thing: one too serious, one too joking; together perhaps they will successfully communicate.

A) History shows that theory and justification are often used to achieve the exact opposite of what is claimed to be the goal.

B)

1) Declare mutually agreeable terms of engagement.

2) ?

3) Wikiversity now has better governance.

Are you related to Underpants Gnomes ? - WAS 4.250 19:41, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

You can't just up and declare "mutually agreeable terms of engagement." You actually have to negotiate them. Not that I expect the motley crew here ever to arrive at a mutually agreeable consensus, but some people might learn something useful while failing. —Moulton 20:27, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

That's a distinction that doesn't make a difference. You still wind up with:

1) Negotiate mutually agreeable terms of engagement.

2) ?

3) Wikiversity now has better governance.

- WAS 4.250 20:57, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

WAS, it works either way. Either you end up with an authentic learning community operating with a functional Community Agreement under the Social Contract Model, or you end up with something even better. —Moulton 12:53, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Is it possible to have objective evidence that "negotiation of mutually agreeable terms of engagement" is or is not taking place? (Your digging deep is very Socratic while mine is strongly influenced by logical positivism. We are making progress. Don't confuse my style with obstructionism; because from my point of view, the objective test defines the meaning of what is being said.) - WAS 4.250 09:28, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

• It's possible to have a mix of subjective and objective evidence that incremental progress in a negotiation process is gaining net ground. Two and a half years ago, you and I didn't get very far in our ill-fated project to craft a course on the fundamentals of managerial ethics. Two years ago, Jimbo unilaterally dictated that a course on managerial ethics was "beyond the scope" of WMF-sponsored projects, thereby illustrating the power of prevailing corrupt managerial practices to stem the tide of education in ethical best practices. Today the outlook is a tad brighter, and there is some evidence (both subjective and objective) that Wikiversity is intellectually ready, emotionally willing, and politically able to give it another go. So, how can we measure this progress objectively? For starters, SBJ recently smashed Jimbo's Global Site Lock against the likes of me, and the world didn't come to an end. Laura has added her voice to the call for recrafting the Charter, Mission Statement, Community Agreement, and Code of Ethics of Wikiversity in the direction suggested by the Social Contract Model of Self-Governance. Do you agree that the tide is turning since last we visited this issue back in 2008? —Moulton 12:58, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

No governance

All parties ranging from the neo-libertarians to the social anarchists and everybody in between are calling for less governance, usually through less government. I find it ironic from my experience at WP that the Wv would be moving towards more governance, even so far as to call it a model, as it clearly does not work.

The far right on the WP is attempting to annex the freedom fringe (if not Left itself) to achieve no-governance (and eliminate its critics). So, to differentiate the Wv from the WP, we need distance ourselves from annexation by stressing freedom of speech, where the only way to go wrong is censorship: the non-consensual deletion of material. This is not to say that material cannot be reorganized; this is what we do as knowledge constructors; in fact, if there is going to be friction, as there will be, it should with where and not what. If there is a fundamental difference of opinion in a lesson plan or research model, then do what the rest of the Information Society does: fork. It is that simple.

I got into it with a nutty professor because of my contemporary humanism, so I strategically segued to the imaging technology behind genetic psycho-neurology, and he gave me an A+ for the paper. Technology is neutral, so, despite the friction, I got an A- for the class. I think that we need to focus on information technology anyway, as it is what we do, creating a safe haven from conflict.

(The Democratic Technic (from Mumford) innovates only to have it's work absorbed by the Authoritarian Technic (Mumford's fascism) to make our mixed-synergy society (from Maslow), which has recently swung so far to the right that humanity may not survive!)

I ultimately resolved friction with the nutty professor by assisting his transition from Dawkins to Christ (God help me!) though Heine from Jung. While on the topic of Jung--and I know your interests in classicism--I think you will all enjoy my writing on Jung's approach as it tackles Jung's approach to the object. Now that I know that the object/subject relationship is about "attachment to the object," I am seeing the object everywhere, especially in writing about natural science; from Jung's perspective, we are mostly objectivist. Subjectiveness to Jung means introversion, which he supported, I believe, only because of Freud's mindwash. I also tackle Jung's racism, which, if repaired, triggers a recalculation of his psychological approach resulting in an " openness to new experience," what we would expect from Jung: Maslow's 60s revolution.--JohnBessa^talk 20:48, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

"Less governance," taken mindlessly, is not viable, because it leads to the State of Nature, which leads to the establishment of ad hoc, defacto governance, which can easily become, and often becomes, more abusive than more sophisticated models. Rather, forms of governance -- which, in this context, simply means collective decision-making -- are needed which seek consensus, and which enable this by setting up process that protects minority opinion without allowing Endless Debate to overwhelm the majority. There are techniques that work. They do not ordinarily arise spontaneously, they are the product of centuries of experience, and this isn't necessarily taught in school! Wikis have generally imagined that they were immune to the Iron Law of Oligarchy. They are not. It takes conscious effort to set up true consensus process, and respect for what it takes, which is frequently deep discussion. That's why, in fact, many groups are intolerant of deep discussion, because it can take a lot of time to participate; and that is why classical organizations set up committee process, to prefilter what goes before the community as a whole. All of this can be done on-wiki, but it's not necessarily "natural," and it's not necessarily easy in practice. People resist it, each for their own reasons. --Abd 21:05, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Arguing against something even you call "State of Nature" is not the best strategy to convince me, because if you know anything about me I live for evolution, and, as such, believe that we evolved form Nature! Anyone who finds fault with Nature is obviously de-evolving and subject to Nature's harsher realities that keep that pack strong. Anyway, look at the classical writing as I think you will like it.--JohnBessa^talk 21:18, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

John, you've misread what I wrote. The State of Nature is simply that. I'm not "arguing against" it, that would be silly, it would be like arguing against children, or against tribes. Wake up, John, the world is much larger than you think. --Abd 21:43, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

The oligarchic picture is a picture within a picture. I got this impression when I was dealing with the neo-libertarians but I didn't relate it to oligarchy until I started tracing back the meanings of reason and sense. Then I met Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, and learned that they implemented Western Civilization by creating an information system called the Academy, or Lyceum, that survived intact to become our education system. Plato's Republic is the obvious corporate template, though he is more credited for the government template. I wondered "is this just a problem or a phenomena?" One look at the Asian Confucian structure answered that question very quickly, and added knowledge about the examination system that is used to stratify society (Mandarins, the masses). The Socratics worked to benefit a rebel military structure, that, despite being particularly, well, Spartan, was militarily inferior to the birth place of democracy that they kept attacking, Athens, where the Lyceum was--infiltrators. This learning answered a lot of questions, like where is the manual for this thing, its the Education system. But it presented another unexpected question. Just as I had reinforced my position against oligarchy last summer, I added a new friend to my social alliance--a philosophy professor who professes love for the Stoics and Cynics. He rationalizes that the Socratics were rebels within the structure of Athens, which had actually been collecting tribute under false pretenses to build the building picture in the upper left corner of this page. The only way I could reconcile this anomaly is that this intellectual rebellion is a picture within a picture, with the socialist Russian Revolution giving rise to the oligarchic Soviet Union as perfect example.

This learning presents a number of troubling realizations; there is no way to know were someone is at as they may be the picture within the picture--the rebels all now appear to be budding oligarchs, and that civilization is not society but the exploitation of society as a resource. Athens had a democratic society that was disrupted by the oligarchy of the Lyceum to create an exceedingly violent Western Civilization. Let me attempt to close this by going back to my original intent, to say that I was initially looking at the evolution of human thought through the evolution of the words "sense" and "reason." I have figured out that the best strategy is to ignore reason, as reason comes from Roman ratio-, or rationalization, a purely oligarchic synthesis (modernism). "Sense" is ancient (pre-modern), making sensible suggestions naturally preferable, and delicious too!

Think about it this way: the WP is in fact the peak of Civilization if you consider contemporary humanity to be the Information Society--since ancient Egypt (as Mumford taught). And we are considered, I think, to be the rebel and hence Socratic camp within that information system. It seems counter-intuitive that we should host an obsessive law-making group, but it should surprise no one! What seems like an experimental microcosm is not experimental because there nothing microcosmic about the WP. The only thing different about the WP, and hence Wv, is that we are online.--JohnBessa^talk 02:26, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

• I love it. The Towering Wall of Text meets the Towering Extension Ladder of Reason. Moulton 11:25, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

I am glad you "love it." But I am wondering if you actually read it! I am rejecting reason, not yours or abd's, all reason. And I am avoiding the post-modern argument by being pre-modern, but not Luddite. Just restore the "State of Nature" by eliminating the environmental tragedies (famine) and the spiritual paradoxes (killing to survive). Proof of the pre-modern technology is ten thousand year highly-empathic development of a plant, the soy, that substitutes for meat, and reinforces the soil. Proof of post-modern failure is that that plant now enforces tribal suffering in, for instance, of South American rainforests by implementing soy production as colonial exploitation necessitating the destruction of the State of Nature, and in so doing, proving Abd's point.--JohnBessa^talk 16:25, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

• OK, maybe I don't love it as much as I did at first. It feels like my brain is turning to tofu. —Moulton 16:33, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

• OK, thanks for your honesty. The problem with reason is that (from recent observation and experiementation) rationalists have no sense of proportion (despite being named for it, Latin -ratio. In fact, rationalism is best defined in Freud's defenses, which to me are defenses implemented after endless failed offense because, basically, rationalists don't work well with others to create life's necessities. They steal, get busted, and then reconstitute the whole affair as an internal struggle--totally senseless, but completely in control at the WP.--JohnBessa^talk 16:50, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

In summary: This is why I am proposing a technical fork for the Wp; technology, being neutral ground, is far less prone to conflict, and hence needs less governance. The WP does need a MW (mediawiki) school, and a development area for all the different levels of tech: Microkernel OS, Free communication via 802.11 (or other), modifying the MW for the sticky needs of student evaluation (replace Moodle), and other things such as the restoration of beneficial legacies: valves.--JohnBessa^talk 16:57, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

• John, the technical fork already exists. Go to NetKnowledge and register there. It's a Social Contract fork of WV that stands ready to host projects that are likely to be disrupted here by unrelenting political drama. —Moulton 07:49, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

No governance?

Simply, I live to govern or steer my way,

adapting to ever-changing contexts or situations.

Collectively, in analogy or in corollary,
we also live to govern or steer our way that way.

That is the very way
Egyptians go right away.

Never forget, however, that to govern your way is not to help govern other ways. American and Egyptian ways of governance should vary. Then, (even bilateral) free trade agreements may be too harmful for your self-governance of utmost vitality. -- KYPark [T] 08:14, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

This goes to the myth of global economy. Economies are local or regional, much past that is colonialism or an extension of it. Adam Smith helped ruin Scotland, causing mass migrations (50,000+ / year) from that rich and parsimonious land. So the issue is not just pan-regional, but pan-personal, which goes to the free speech that we need to support original research.--156.34.217.180 16:28, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Probationary custodians, call for a pause

I think it would be a good idea if we spent a couple weeks talking about the current mentorship system before promoting any new contributors to probationary custodian. A few questions worth considering:

1. Is our system really any better (or worse) than the RfA system practiced on most projects?
2. Should we have an actual separate usergroup for probationary custodians (that could be both added and removed locally)? It might spare a lot of concern if we could even temporarily remove access when there is a concern.
3. Should there be some sort of process of approving a mentorship before it begins?

The last few weeks don't bear repeating, so at least some method of better regulating this would be a very good thing. --SB_Johnny ^talk 15:22, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

• Is it a coincidence that Wikiversity:Probationary custodians's talk page is blank? Ottava Rima (talk) 15:28, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

I think a discussion on mentorship would be a good idea. Is #2 technically possible? --mikeu ^talk 18:42, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Yep, just takes a minor edit to the LocalSettings.php file to add the usergroup and set who can add or remove people to and from the usergroup. For example, you could set it so only 'crats can add people to it, but any custodian could remove it if he/she thinks there's a problem. --SB_Johnny ^talk 19:06, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

If we go that path, we might as well remove the block button but given them deletion, protection, and import rights. Such a group would be good for professors who would need such for clean up related work for classes but wont need to block. Ottava Rima (talk) 19:23, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Delinking the tools has some advantages, but on the other hand seeing how someone uses the block button might be good to know before proceeding on to the confirmation (I trust you might have reason to agree about that). The class instructor's toolkit makes sense for other reasons though. --SB_Johnny ^talk 20:47, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

The ideal would be to give only a crat-like user voted in via a super majority who makes blocks only after community discussion while letting global sysops and stewards to make blocks of IPs which are normally based on cross-wiki vandalism. JWS and Moulton have been asking for that for years. Ottava Rima (talk) 20:54, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

I'm thinking a short pause to clarify the mentorship procedures might be a good idea. --mikeu ^talk 19:28, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

• Opposed. When Ottava proposed changing the mentorship system at the beginning of last month, based on my approval as a probationary custodian, I requested examples of where the system had broken down. None were provided. Allegedly, it broke down with me, I recognize that people could believe that. But my actions as a custodian were not reviewed, the community has not examined the situation and made a real determination, and Wikiversity:Community Review/Abd was hopelessly defective. The real issue here is a difference of option between 'crat Jtneill and 'crat SB_Johnny, and that difference of opinion existed before my probationary custodianship. The existing process provides for 'crat approval. It is incorrect to assume, as SB_Johnny did, that a 'crat, under present policy, must approve if a mentor offers. I'm now thinking that SB_Johnny approved, and allowed the whole Ottava business to escalate, precisely to create an appearance of Jtneill error. If, instead, he'd done what was proper for a 'crat (not approve if not personally satisfied that the arrangement was safe), the decision on me would have been made by another 'crat, not him. SBJ was also given the right to yank the bit, and if the community wants it, we could allow any 'crat to do that, on individual discretion. We could allow, as SBJ demanded with Salmon of Doubt, the right of a mentor to immediately withdraw the bit. It's simply not that difficult. Such a withdrawal by a mentor, under existing policy, does not immediately terminate the candidacy, but a mentor, withdrawing, could decide that there was a risk, yank the bit, which is a separate issue. If another mentor appears, then a 'crat could decide whether or not to accept it. --Abd 20:58, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

• Comment Wikiversity:Recusal covers the problems involved in rash custodian action. I followed that, even more strongly than that proposed policy requires. Probationary custodians have not, historically, been a problem at Wikiversity, rather permanent ones have. On Wikipedia, the RfA process is so onerous that only users who have avoided controversy can pass. Then, once they have passed, they are very difficult to remove. What was unusual about me was that I did not avoid controversy, but my actions, themselves, were not outside the normal discretion of custodians. Until my actions are truly reviewed, assuming that my actions were improper is making judgments without evidence. And a single case makes bad policy. There is a current Community Review attempting to rake Jtneill over the coals for mentoring me and allegedly failing to supervise. This was all, really, moot, because I allowed the entire WV custodian community to supervise; the problem was that no custodian had the guts to take a stand, except, of course, SBJ, who apparently thought that a block of a user whom he had previously blocked for lesser offenses was so horrible that it required immediate reversal, without any consideration of the reasons for the block, which were plain and obvious and necessary for the protection of the wiki. SBJ does not understand Wikiversity:Recusal, himself, and has violated the proposal.

• My view is that the community failed to monitor the emerging situation, the community failed to intervene, so a few disgrunted users, long disruptive, were able to muster an appearance of consensus, being successfully manipulated by Ottava. It will take time to disentangle this, and changing the policy immediately will, sure, prevent a sysop from mentoring new candidates, but ... the basic problem is that we are desperately short of custodians. I was begging for a neutral custodian to intervene -- even to tell me to stop! or even to short-block me -- and none appeared. Note that the apparent consensus in my CR is quite the same as SBJ's. Will they close consistently? No, there is a prejudice against probationary custodians, but not one based on policy. There is no policy against probationary custodians using tools, including the block tool, and there has been plenty of tool use in the past, not a problem.

• I used the tools more extensively this period, but there has been no review of my actual tool use, which was extensive. And the CR that removed me did not actually focus on what I'd done as to supposed egregious violations. The whole thing stank. Policy developed out of this, to toss mentorship, will be tossing out one of the best features of the Wikiversity tradition, and I think that's exactly been Ottava's intention. He wants Wikiversity to fail, it's pretty clear, he's angry. SBJ is enabling him. Bad Sign. --Abd 20:58, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

• Neutral. I will never want to be a custodian, so it doesn't matter to me.--JohnBessa^talk 21:06, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

That's exactly why you should care. Should custodian policy be made by those who "want to be custodians"? That's a setup for attracting those more likely to abuse the tools! No sensible user would "want" to be a custodian, for any personal benefit, it's a pain in the rear, speaking from experience. You get to do a lot of boring work for no thanks, and make one controversial action, you are called on the carpet. Maybe. Even if the action is trivially reversible, as are all custodian actions. Someone who actually wants this, instead of, with some reluctance, merely accepting it, as one might accept being handed a broom and asked if you can help when visiting a friend, is basically crazy. Wikiversity is notable because, with the existing process, you don't have to "pass muster" with some supermajority, all it has taken is a mentor custodian. Which is truly a super idea, as long as the responsibilities of mentorship are better specified. Someone trusted to clean up the university space can recruit a friend to help! On his or her own responsibility, of course. --Abd 21:12, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Proposed policy

I started to address the lack of a policy with a rough proposal. Ottava Rima (talk) 16:37, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Looks like a good start, this is what I understood you were suggesting all along and I agree. I also think that SB_Johnny's idea of creating a separate user group for probationary custodians is wise. It doesn't make a good impression if we need to run to Meta to ask for something simple like the removal of bits of a probie. Regards, Guido den Broeder 01:17, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for starting it up Ottava, but I was hoping we could brainstorm a bit (perhaps getting "out of the box") rather than moving to a concrete proposal right away. I also agree that going to meta can be a problem, but (IMO) the issue is more that it runs counter to a "no big deal" approach. --SB_Johnny ^talk 11:29, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

It takes moments for a 'crat to go to meta to request desysopping. I've done it, when we had trouble finding a 'crat, I went to meta to request a steward set a bit. Normally, it's very simple and quick; it takes a minute for a 'crat to set a bit, and if the 'crat has desysop permission, removing it is almost just as quick. Mentors have often required the right to immediate desysop, and, if that's documented with a diff, a steward will honor it. Ottava first desysopped me directly, even contrary to policy, by misrepresenting the situation with me as routine. It was far from routine, that was noticed, but still it didn't change. As long as the desysopping is either supported by permission or is following a discussion that a 'crat closes, it's easy.

Several requests there were very messy, recently, but not because of anything we could fix here, it was because Ottava Rima vigorously protested steward decisions, arguing tendentiously, threatening the stewards, while trying to bypass our process here. That is far from the norm.

It ain't broke. Don't fix it. As to Guido's "good impression" at meta, he's currently blocked there.

While there might be a separate user group, I don't suggest it for probationary custodian. The probationary period is intended as a trial to show how the custodian will be, presumably, when made permanent. If the tools are restricted, there is less of a trial. What's important is to supervise all custodians, probationary custodians are actually the lesser problem.

We might consider a privilege set, or more than one of them, that would allow users, for example, the right to review deleted contributions and revision deletions. Call these "investigators," who can review custodial actions. Further, it's trivial to instruct, say, a probationary custodian to follow certain specific restrictions. If the custodian violates that, it's easy to yank the bit, but, I hope, we'd provide the probationer a proper opportunity to defend the actions. Ahem. --Abd 03:12, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Since we're brainstorming, how about allowing any email confirmed user to remove this probationary custodian group? I also like the idea of creating more groups than a probationary custodian group. I think the more group options available for Wikiversity, the less need there may be to have as many custodians. Another brainstorm, how about splitting the Custodian group up? Could have a group for importers, a group for blocking/unblocking, a group for deleting/undeleting, and a group that can edit the MediaWiki: namespace. That could allow people to decided what they are willing to help out with and provide a way for the community to decide to what extent they trust people with certain tools without a need for the all or nothing approach that exists now. -- darklama  07:34, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I think emailconfirmed is a bit too low for the bar (the probability of some sort of odd wheel warring would be around 1:1), but a very-much-no-big-deal "trusted" usergroup might actually be much better than just custodians.

As far as completely breaking up the user-rights, is the idea that people would go through a separate mentor period for each right? --SB_Johnny ^talk 11:14, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I didn't have any ideas in mind for how mentoring would work with the tools split up. I guess each group could have separate mentors, mentors could be willing to mentor for multiple groups, and a person could have one or a few mentors depending on who is willing to mentor for each group. I guess parallel mentoring could happen when multiple tools are given at the same time. I guess separate mentoring periods could happen when tools are given at different times. -- darklama  13:56, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Splitting the tools up a bit sounds like an interesting suggestion, but I'm converned that splitting things up to the degree you described will overly complicate things. --mikeu ^talk 19:28, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I agree. There are much more pressing issues. For example, what about Wikiversity:Recusal? What about Wikiversity:Blocking policy? What about Wikiversity:Deletion policy? Wikiversity:Civility is policy, but is, in fact, silent about what is to be done if it isn't respected, beyond measures that may work. And if they don't?

There is no harm, however, in working on a suggested division of the tool set, which could provide flexibility.

But what is really needed is much better guidance for custodians. We have no clear community consensus on what policies a custodian is expected to enforce, and which violations are to be left to discussions, and discussion itself is often disruptive, so there is a tradeoff there. All discussions are to be pursued until everyone gets tired and stops? What? Most of us agree that beating a dead horse isn't a great idea, but how do we know that a horse is dead? Silence? For how long? And on and on.

I was desysopped for what? The discussion actually didn't make it clear. For writing tomes? What policy did that violate? For a block while involved? Again, what policy? I wrote Wikiversity:Recusal and I followed that process, more than adequately. Whatever I did had been done before by other custodians without any serious process being filed. Even two weeks before!

How should desysop discussions be filed, precisely? The Custodianship policy is actually silent. There is a required finding, but that's been ignored, and probably more than once. And I could go on and on. --Abd 20:07, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

And you will, no doubt... Guido den Broeder 20:12, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Maybe not. --Abd 20:47, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

What "things" are you concerned will be complicated by splitting the tools up? How do you think those "things" will be complicated? -- darklama  21:24, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Custodians, in general, become more aware of the flow of edits, and the tools work together, generally. It is not necessary to have separate tool sets to have separate user functions. It can be enough that a custodian is restricted voluntarily, to avoid certain kinds of actions, and that can be crafted between mentor and probationary custodian. (and a mentorship agreement can cover multiple mentors and the rights of other community members.) My own view is that, for a possibly controversial custodian, probationary custodianship could be extended indefinitely, the key would be whether or not the mentor is willing (as well as the probationer). If a mentor approves of the actions of the probationer as within reasonable discretion, then we have a way for a mentor to expand their personal capacity. They key to doing this, while remaining safe ,is to provide safeguards, such as, for example, allowing any regular custodian to undo the actions of a probationer, pending review. This would still allow any probationer to take emergency action as seen necessary. A probationer who can't be trusted to at least confine this to reasonable actions, shouldn't be trusted, and neither should the mentor, then, if the mentor has allowed it to continue. If the community looks at how I acted in the recent flap, they will see that very ample safeguards were built in, and, as I see it, the problem was not that I acted outside of proper norms -- I did not -- but that the actions were not specifically reviewed and corrected properly, but were knee-jerk rejected without review of the causes for my actions. The review and correction was continually invited, both before and after acting, and most of my actions were, in fact, supported, all except one. Which was about the most solidly justified action I took! --Abd 22:05, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

One-sided enforcement, prevent selective blocking

Mikeu Mu301 and the entire active Wikiversity administrative community, with maybe one exception, stood by by while Ottava Rima engaged in a massive attack on Wikiversity, lying about policy here and on meta, repeating old discredited allegations, over and over, wikilawyering, quite effectively, by setting up an appearance of recusal failure by filing a topic ban here after being warned for disruption, and I know that some were, indeed aware, and, to boot, bringing in obviously canvassed inactive or new users. At that point I'd been begging, for days, for neutral custodian action. Instead, custodians watched. Were they enjoying the show?

Hence I now join with JWS, Ottava, and probably Moulton, two boot, in concluding (as Ottava has claimed on meta and with a series of Community Reviews here) that the whole structure is corrupt. I therefore propose that:

• Existing custodians are prohibited from blocking established users, other than short blocks for blatant vandalism, and from closing discussions if they are involved in conflict with a user, until Wikiversity has developed clear policy, and the guts to enforce it, so that individual custodians cannot abuse users they dislike and selectively enforce policies against some users while they tolerate the same behavior or worse from others.

Support

• Support as proposer. --Abd 21:03, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Other comment

Conceiving governance structures as hierarchical rather than separate and balanced guarantees decisions that will create corruption. The assumptions behind this entire discussion are flawed. WAS 4.250 10:24, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Well, I started this for complex reasons, so I'm not sure that my "assumptions" are visible. It's really an expression of a point of view, and I have at least two eyes. Care to explain more, WAS? What do you get when you see things from more than one point of view? --Abd 21:52, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

• What is the name of the complex which compelled you to start this vexatious process? —Albatross 10:45, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

• The Moulton/Schmidt/Ottovan complex. I credit you all for pioneering the process. I'm only standing on the shoulders of giants. --Abd 13:41, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

• If you can't beat 'em, purloin 'em. —Montana Mouse 14:31, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

• As to nobody answering my question about seeing from two points of view (which enormously complicates polemic, eh?), color me "bemused." --Abd 13:45, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

• You need to crank up your polyonic reverb unit. —Barsoom Tork 14:31, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

• The antidote to a slew of corrupt managerial practices is to require all supervising personnel to take and pass a rigorous course in managerial ethics. —Moulton 12:34, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Aw, bosh. Such a course would help, but do you imagine that any amount of "course work" would prevent corruption? Do you think that the corrupt are, what, less educated? Less educated than whom? There are classic solutions that we have ignored. It's time we start to bring in what's known about consensus and deliberative process. We neglect the relevant sciences to our great loss. --Abd 21:52, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

• Ethical reasoning relies on the faculty of model-based reasoning. —Moulton 21:55, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Process note. Isn't it rather silly to oppose and discuss a proposition when it has no second? What interesting here is that there are users who have been promoting what I proposed here, but ... so far, no second. If that condition remains, I'm quite interested as to what it would mean. As I wrote about the events of 2000, perhaps it depends on whose Gore is being axed. --Abd 21:55, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

About communications

Hello to everyone!

Being a new Wikiversity user, I'd like to ask you whether the only way for different Wikiversities to communicate with each other is via IRC.
Also, I think that the Wikiversity communities and this OpenStudy (external link) community have overlapping goals, therefore that they could benefit from one another.

Thanks! --SpaniardGR 20:58, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

• There is a Wikiversity nexus channel, #wikiversity, which is used for all languages. There is also beta.wikiversity.org for on-wiki discussion for all languages. —Moulton 22:01, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Politics

--124.228.165.177 09:39, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

• I agree. The less said on the subject of politics, the better. —Barsoom Tork 10:48, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Current courses

Wondering how we might collate and share about current courses - I'll start a list below. Maybe we can then add the list to Courses and a link from News on the front page? -- Jtneill - Talk - c 14:46, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

---

• Conservation and Development Entrepreneurship, University of Florida
• Political Simulations and Gaming, University of Westminster
• Survey Research and Design in Psychology, University of Canberra

---

Would it be useful to develop a shared evaluation survey so that we can understand better how students view their experience of wikiversity?Leutha 21:36, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

SB Johnny's removal

From Policy:

Custodians can lose their status for egregious violations of policies. Loss of custodianship involves a process that establishes community consensus. If a specific complaint is not resolved at Wikiversity:Custodian feedback then a new seven day community discussion can be initiated to establish if there is community consensus in support for the custodianship of the custodian who is the subject of the unresolved complaint.

1. Policy states that there will only be seven days. So the matter was officially closed at the beginning of February 2 UTC.

2. Policy says there must be consensus in support, not oppose.

3. A Bureaucrat must close an admin discussion but not a Bureaucrat discussion. That, however according to the proposed policy, is anyone.

As such, SB Johnny's Bureaucrat discussion is closed as a major failure for him to retain the privilege because this discussion has resulted in 6 opposes, 2 supports, 1 "label him as a drama queen for disruption" (an oppose, so 7 opposes), and 1 oppose to the process, so a support. That is 70% oppose to remove of a Bureaucrat. There is not enough support to show a majority let alone a consensus for him to retain these privileges. Ottava Rima (talk) 15:11, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

• Ottava, I couldn't fail to disagree with you less. —Albatross 15:24, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

But you have succeeded in agreeing with me more. :P Ottava Rima (talk) 15:45, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Ottava, do you remember our conversation over on Wikiversity talk:Community Review where we talked about how the best interest of the community involves not attacking good faith contributors? Because it negatively impacts on the academic community and discourages them from contributing because the politics of Wikiversity are just too toxic? Do you realize your actions once again highlight how you are acting in bad faith towards the greater Wikiversity community and its goals of getting academics involved, working towards establishing say a peer reviewed journal with the review happening on Wikiverity? Or how your actions undermine our efforts as we're working towards establishing methodology and ethics guidelines to help make the work on Wikiversity more in compliant accepted academic practices? You really need to sit down, shut up and let the big girls and boys do their work. Stop hurting the cause. I know you've said several times in IRC that no one's feelings matter but your own... but that's emphatically not true. You're acting in bad faith in a situation like this and you should frankly be banned. --LauraHale 08:08, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

• I could, perhaps, discover how to succeed if I tried, but I'm too lazy to make the effort. —Albatross 18:12, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Ottava made a move typical for him, selective quotation of policy. After what he quotes above, Wikiversity:Custodianship continues:

At the end of that seven day period of community discussion, Wikiversity bureaucrats will review the discussion. If a bureaucrat decides that there is good reason for removal of a custodianship, that bureaucrat will go to the meta-wiki and request that stewards review the community discussion. If a steward agrees that the Wikiversity community has reached consensus about a problem custodian, then that steward can terminate the custodianship of the custodian.

Points:

• the close is by a 'crat. While, if no 'crat is available to act for an extended period, and a discussion shows consensus for an action, a steward might act on review, this is not a reasonable possibility under the present conditions.
• the policy requires a finding by a crat as to the fact of "good reason for removal." The context implies "egregious misconduct," but the community discussion part implies something different ("consensus in support"). That's not enough conflict of text to reverse the plain and express intention of a 'crat determination and close, and, further, of a steward finding of "consensus about a problem custodian."
• Ottava's review of the comments is highly selective, and attempts to exclude comments made after 7 days. That is entirely contrary to precedent and custom. Comments may be made in any process until it is closed.

I will review the !votes on the Talk page, Wikiversity talk:Community_Review/SB_Johnny --Abd 16:59, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

The Bureaucrat removal section is not closed by a Crat. "That is entirely contrary to precedent and custom" No it isn't. Clearly says 7 days. Ottava Rima (talk) 17:18, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

• I have reviewed the !votes at [1]. My conclusion is that there was either consensus for keeping SBJ, if SPA and probably canvassed !votes are deprecated, or no consensus. In order to conclude the opposite, above, Ottava has to exclude all comments made after his proposed automatic closing. There is not a snowball's chance in hell that a steward would look at this and conclude a consensus for removal. So Ottava's argument here is purely disruptive. Contrary to Ottava's claim, there is no "Bureaucrat removal section" provided in policy, and 'crat bits are assigned by the action of a 'crat. The proposal was to remove both the 'crat bit and the 'custodian' bit, so, even if Ottava's fantastic interpretations were true, the removal, then, would apply only to the 'crat bit, and filing a single process for both was simply one more complication in a pile of complications that Ottava entirely created. The process was fatally flawed, from the beginning. --Abd 17:45, 8 February 2011 (UTC)
• Ottava continued to revert war on the close of the review, see page history, I'd have blocked if I were a (non-recused) custodian, he knows better, way better. Mikeu protected the page, which was proper. --Abd 18:02, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

1. CRs aren't randomly "closed" like that. 2. The "vote" process ended 2 February but that does not mean discussion ends. 3. The community's response was very clear and SB Johnny does not have community support for keeping Bureaucrat status. Ottava Rima (talk) 18:18, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Community Review process discussion

Please participate at Wikiversity:Community Review/CR process discussion. --mikeu ^talk 20:36, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Navigation on the Wikiversity is non-intuitive

Note: I felt bad editing Img-o-reality's original text in the title, so I will fix it--JohnBessa^talk 16:01, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

I find navigating wikiversity non-intuitive. The menu on the left is not very helpful. Wikiversity would be easier to use if the menu system could be modified in some way. The article I had in mind was as elusive as something in the Yellow Pages ( in the UK Yellow Pages one often has to be redirected through several classifications to find the goal of ones search ) and I only found it again because I had added to its talk page.Imageofreality 15:54, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps it's a matter of personal taste - I found wikipedia quite intuitive from when I first started. You can add any page to your watch list which means that not only are you informed when it is changed but if you go to "my watchlist" you can find "View and edit watchlist" in small writing at the top, which lets you view everything you have tagged to watch. I have also found that adding categories means I can find pages through "my contributions" as well as linking the page into the relevant category. Perhaps it's also a matter of getting used to handling things in a different way.Leutha 22:59, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I think it is unrealistic to expect to find Wikiversity (Wv) intuitive. Most projects are solo efforts and as such contained in their own meanings. My guess is that most learners come in to Wv via external search engines, because Wv projects have high SEO. Intuition might come from within collaborative groups whose work connects socially as well as informationally, but the bulk of Wv functions happily and paradoxically at cross purposes despite having an superstructure that is seemingly constantly in a highly-forgiving power struggle. The cross purposes are

• to create a educational institution extension, or copy, of the Wikipedia (WP) and
• create a workspace for a truly free wiki, that is, a WP that has no original research (OR) restrictions.

I personally fit into the latter category, and see a future for the Wv as a WMF research branch that can independently help WP editors determine valid sources from those that are simply preserved misconception (such as psychology) or recently-created misconceptions (such as global economy) using OR. In one of my projects, this means proving why tube HiFi is better than solid-state, I am driven to this partly because tube sound is both my cats' preference.--JohnBessa^talk 04:22, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

• Because electrons in a vacuum tube drift more slowly than electrons moving in solid-state devices, you get more reverb, much like playing music in a "live room" or singing in a shower. Reverb makes the music sound richer. —Moulton 11:31, 13 February 2011 (UTC)
  

1. that is what we are trying to prove
2. nothing to do w/ needless power struggles!

Maybe it is a personal taste what intuition is and its effects.(Intuition: knowledge gained by insight). When the help system (navigation through Wv) gets you in a tailspin, or leads you always to the same answer than this could be called non-intuitive. When this happens to me than I prefer to ask living people. And not surprising most of the time I cannot find the answer there either because if known it would be in the help-system. I was even blamed that I do not accept the help-system.

Why is it unrealistic to expect that Wv is intuitive? Is Wv created and run by non-intuitive people? I don’t think so. To remove all restrictions to enable somebody to perform an original research is quite intuitive but to get the effect that every one with a new knowledge, which needs an original research, has to perform the project solo is not. I don’t think, that the projects end up as solo efforts, are the intention of Wv but that most projects are done by only their inventors are a prove that the system does not lead to collaborative groups. The reason for this is, as I have learned, that there are no places provided for intuitive discussions which would focus on original researches (ideas). Which has the same effect as saying: OK we let you do what you want, but we will not support you until you have proven that somebody agrees (collaborates) with you. Which is in effect the same stand which Wikipedia is taking. New knowledge (ideas) can not inspire or lead to more new knowledge because it is not intuitively seen as a possible source of new knowledge. Which would be the educational institution extension which Wikipedia (and many other ‘scientific’ places) needs.--Martin Lenoar 13:02, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

MediaWiki:Gadget-searchbox.js

Hello, I've installed wikt:fr:MediaWiki:Gadget-searchbox.js from wikt:pl:MediaWiki:Gadget-searchbox.js. It adds the text treatment functions: "go to line n°", "change the capitalization", "search and replace" (eventually "replace all") and sort alphabetically. JackPotte 20:40, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

London Calling

Wikimedia Meet-Up

42

London Meetup:

Venue:Penderel's Oak

Welcome

Informal chitchat with no set agenda. We usually have some experienced users and some laptops around so if you want a ten minute lesson in creating tables, doing history merges, etc this is a good venue

Wikiversity Image credit: Geni

This coming Sunday, 13th February the next WIkimedia London Meetup will be taking place in Holborn, Central London. If there are any wikiversitans available in London it would be great to see you there.Leutha 08:59, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Is this Bond? RU shak'n but not stirred?--156.34.217.103 15:59, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

IRC

I've spent about an hour trying to figure out how to connect to #wikiversity.en. Once upon a time, I did figure out how to connect to the main Wikipedia IRC, but that was some years ago.... I registered with Mbbit, as suggested by Firefox, but it dumped me each time I tried to connect. Probably I need an account on chat.freenode.net. No clue how to register such, etc. The help pages are ridiculous.

IRC is *very* user-unfriendly. Is there a page here that gives simple instructions so that any user can readily, and without having prior knowledge, connect to IRC? --Abd 18:19, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Are you using a Mac by any chance? --SB_Johnny ^talk 18:30, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

iPhone at the moment, but usually a PC. W2000 Server, or XP Pro, and Firefox on the PCs. Safari, of course, on the iPhone. --Abd 01:17, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

• I've spent about an hour trying to figure out how to connect to #wikiversity.en.

For starters, the name of the channel is #wikiversity-en (with a hyphen, not a dot). You don't need to register an account. You can use an IRC client or you can use Chatzilla in a browser. —Moulton 01:33, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

Sorry. Typo. I was using the link on Wikiversity:Notices for custodians and it was correct. --Abd 01:54, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

1. Get ChatZilla for Firefox and restart Firefox.
2. Clicking #wikiversity should now take you there. -- darklama  01:27, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

Link to addons did not work, ". [2] worked. Then the original link worked... Go figure. I'll let you know what happened after I restart Firefox. --Abd 02:01, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

• Addons do not work until after they are successfully download, installed, and launched. Only in dreamy flights of fancy do things appear to work before they have been constructed and reified. —Moulton 11:00, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

Notice that the above was added after my comment below. There was no add-in to not work, no expectation of an add-on working without process. I knew that an add-on might be one way to go, but I saved myself a lot of time by asking here. Moulton's comment above about the misspelled link was useless, of course, but Darklama's information was totally helpful, with a minor glitch at first with addons.mozilla.org not responding. Moulton wants to establish and rub in that I'm supposedly given to "flights of fancy." It's part of his agenda which could be labelled "Moulton is Right, Others are Stupid" .... which he pursues with diligence and persistence. When he runs this with highly connected editors from Wikipedia, it pisses them off to no end, thus attracting ... flies, let's say. Garbage. Bad smell. Disruption. Blocks and global locks. All for?

I know the problem of having a very high IQ and being misunderstood, all too well. It gives those with this problem no right to demean and attack and ridicule. Confronting problems, yes, but people are not puppies, and rubbing their noses with shit gets it all over the place. Those with "higher intelligence" -- I'm not sure what this means -- have more responsibility to be careful, not less. --Abd 16:33, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

It worked. I'd have liked to know that it uses my computer login name as a nickname.... but no harm done. I'd also have liked to know that my IP address is broadcast to the world, but no big deal on that either. Might matter to somebody.

Now I have a new way to waste gobs of time. Just what I needed. --Abd 02:54, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

• There is a reliable way to know in advance what will happen. It's called doing research to find or construct a reliable system model, then exercising the model to discover what the model predicts. NASA used to rely on it in the early days of the Space Program, before they stopped caring if they were about to do something foolish that they were unprepared for. —Moulton 11:06, 14 February 2011 (UTC)
• What, pray tell, do you seek to learn by wasting time on IRC bantering with Moulton? —Caprice 11:09, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

Learn? I didn't join IRC to banter with Moulton. I already spent about two months exploring Moulton's criticisms of cold fusion research, and his cockamamie theories that boil down to "Even an idiot would have known this was all phony, immediately, so ... you are worse than an idiot and so are all the researchers and ...." This is not the place to examine cold fusion, for sure, but Moulton became a broken record and simply repeated phrases, from the past, on IRC. Value to this? None, as far as I can see. The earlier exploration produced some new information and certain oversights in published material may not be repeated, in future work, as a result. But it was all, in the end, dotting i's and crossing t's, nothing of substance. Done, finished. Unless, of course, Moulton could get his theories published. My position is that they are so obviously bogus, there isn't a snowball's chance in hell of them passing peer review, but ... hey, I'm Not God. --Abd 16:33, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

• My theories? They're the theories of Faraday, Maxwell, Ohm, Thevenin, Norton, et al, as applied and demonstrated by Elisha Gray, Alexander Graham Bell, Thomas Edison, and a host other pioneers from the late 19th and early 20th centuries. —Moulton 16:44, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

No. Moulton has confused his own work with that of the pioneers. The theories I referred to are two: that anomalous heat in electrolytic cell cold fusion research is produced by (1) misting, i.e., the unobserved loss of electrolyte, instead of assumed water vapor, and that (2) anomalous heat is produced by incorrectly estimating input power through missing the effect of current noise caused by bubbles changing the cell resistance. Given the body of experimental evidence, as well as sound theory, both of these theories, while sounding plausible on the face, are preposterous. They predict phenomena that would be easily observed but which are not, they do not consider the actual experimental conditions and results, and they require hosts of electrochemists to make newbie mistakes in their field of expertise. There is no significant misting, as confirmed by the lack of deposits of electrolyte salts that would be produced, and by the similarity of results in closed cells where nothing escapes, and power supply input power has been accurately measured, as confirmed by multiple methods that would not be affected by the noise problem Moulton asserts.

Moulton applies the scientific method to the theories of others, not to his own theories. It's classic.I understand his theories, and have pointed out the problems, including his imagination of evidence from a CBS video that simply was not what he thought it was. He's unmovable, he never admits any errors, he just tries another tack for a while and then comes back to the same bankrupt assertions. It gets him in trouble, all over the place.

In any case, nobody has contradicted the work of those pioneers. Moulton tries to cloak his cockamamie theories with their reputations, and to dominate conversation on IRC with this nonsense. I could explain in detail why Moulton thinks that I and others are neglecting his brilliant insights. But not here. I've spent way too much time on it elsewhere, already, including his blog. --Abd 18:18, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

• It's not "anomalous heat." It's the expected ohmic dissipation of the AC noise signal. Signal losses in telephony have been measured and modeled since the dawn of telegraphy and telephony. Those signal losses are measured in decibels, named after Alexander Graham Bell. You can measure the AC noise signal with a VU meter. —Moulton 19:12, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

"Anomalous heat" is the term used to refer to apparent heat observed for about 25 years in experiments with highly loaded PdD. It means heat of unidentified origin. Moulton claims to have discovered the origin. His claim has zero experimental support, in spite of the fact that thousands of researchers around the world tried to find the "artifact." His explanations are so simple and obvious that they would have been identified within months. They are armchair hypotheses, based in ignorance of the range of controls that have been used. His understanding of power and noise issues is divorced from practical reality. He imagines that AC power (VU meter) is in addition to "average DC power," when, in fact, if current is constant, and the AC noise is random, as is the case with bubble noise, the AC noise, which is now only voltage noise, does not add to the power, it averages out. Moulton then uses various arguments to pretend that there is no such thing as a constant current power supply, an example of how true theory can be applied, by avoiding realistic quantitative analysis, to come to preposterous conclusions. See the Knol on cold fusion, the comments, for his argumentum ad nauseum, and responses by some with actual experience. And me, of course. Researchers have, in fact, done as he suggested, and have used wattmeters and high speed DSOs to measure the power input, coming up with the sane results as the simpler method he thinks defective, plus these are calorimetric experiments with cold fusion, famous as a chimera. A researcher in the early days might run the same exact experiment three times, with what seemed to be the same conditions and the same materials. The same bubbling, the same bubble noise. So, first two times, the calorimetry shows no excess heat. Which confirms that the power input is being correctly measured. Then, third time, when the current was ramped up, there was substantial excess heat. That is anomalous heat. What caused it? Not error in input power measurement, and not misting: this was closed cell work.

Later it was found that helium is produced in amounts correlated at the "right value" with the excess heat. If it hadn't taken about three years to find that, cold fusion would have been accepted in 1989. But the cat is out of the bag now. It's all over with the mainstream scientific publishers; Moulton's general position is not uncommon, that CF must be impossible, but as far as the experts are concerned, he's lunatic fringe. And if you think I'm blowing smoke, come on over to Cold fusion and we can look at the evidence. Maybe even brew some cups of tea. The ordinary way. I'm not expecting practical CF "reactors." Given that we don't know the mechanism and hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent trying to make CF reliable and scalable. --Abd 23:13, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

• Bloody Hells Bells — Yes it's uncommon for people to rigorously adhere to the protocols of the scientific method. That's why it's so commonplace for people to embrace a persistent delusional belief that eludes diagnosis for decades, if not centuries. There simply aren't that many competent scientists to go around diagnosing every silly myth and misconception that takes up residence in someone's head. —Moulton 12:59, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

This particular one seems to have deluded the peer reviewers and editors at Springer-Verlag, Elsevier, World Scientific, and Oxford University Press. Moulton, however, has his patent pending BullDog Shield that makes him immune to any "silly myths" and "misconceptions." This is a communication problem that IRC isn't going to fix. Period. I can document every statement I made above. Moulton, however, doesn't need documentation and sources. He just repeats the mantras that his BullDog Shield feeds to him.

Moulton is making, and insisting on, all over the internet, some elementary errors in circuit analysis and application of the scientific method. There must be many here who could diagnose the problem. Determining the reality of Cold fusion is not required. Anyone care to mediate this, so that it doesn't keep filling up the Colloquium with my Favorite Topic? --Abd 15:17, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

(<---) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_fusion says "In 1989, the majority of a review panel organized by the US Department of Energy (DOE) found that the evidence for the discovery of a new nuclear process was not persuasive. A second DOE review, convened in 2004 to look at new research, reached conclusions similar to the first." Why should anyone - even you - believe that their evaluation of the evidence is inferior to yours"? - WAS 4.250 00:02, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Cold fusion

Lots of people have opinions about cold fusion, for two decades it was shorthand for Bad Science, but few actually know the history and the science involved. I'm taking the occasion to invite anyone interested to come on over to the resource. Ask questions, correct errors, help make general pages neutral, maybe even do some original thinking or research. I have access to the world's foremost experts in the field, the ones being published under peer review, covered in media, etc.

There is a lot of misinformation that's been published. Above, WAS points to a piece of business from the WP article, some fair-seeming synthesis from the 2004 US DoE review. It's been cherry-picked, there was revert warring over the section for years. There is a little deeper coverage in our top level resource, with links to the review itself, and accessory material. "Conclusions similar to the first" was summary language referring to the recommendations of the reviews. By quoting that together with language from the very negative 1989 review, it is made to seem that the 2004 Review was similarly negative. Not. There is a lot more to explore about this, but this makes a nice vignette about just how bad the Wikipedia article is. --Abd 01:20, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Wikiversity:Community Review/Ottava_Rima 2

Wikiversity:Community Review/Ottava_Rima 2 has been started, regarding alleged disruptive behavior by Ottava Rima. Per present proposed process, being voted upon, I'm willing to certify this as covering a valid set of issues. --Abd 18:49, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

The page is mostly filled with rants, stuff already covered, and policy violating IRC conversations. There is no "certification" nor are there any actual violations. Abd, you have been criticized for spreading trouble everywhere, including Meta. Why not back off and leave people alone? Ottava Rima (talk) 18:59, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

I did not file this CR, and certainly would not have filed it in that shape. But the filer has the same right to file problematic process as did you, Ottava. I wrote a brief comment, requesting that response not be threaded, and you disregarded that request. I've been "criticized" in many places, but not, generally, by the majority, rather by individuals, often egged on by you, Ottava. I'm not blocked on meta and, I'd say, not even close to being so. You are. Guido den Broeder was unblocked there because of your harassment of the admin who blocked him, but he promptly got himself blocked again. That I'm "criticized" in places is completely irrelevant to your CR, and I had no idea Laura Hale was planning to do this, no part in it, but, Ottava, this is what you do: attack whatever you perceive as might possibly strike some chord with someone. It's highly disruptive. Above, I simply notified the community of the CR. You actually started what became my CR on the Colloquium. Laura seems unaware of much of what you actually have done.

As to "policy violating" IRC conversations, I've long been troubled by the use of privacy policy, with a logged IRC channel, open to the public, with all participants knowing that what they write is visible, being used to cover up and allow bullying and canvassing by IRC. I'd say we should gut that policy for any "official" IRC channel. If it's official, it's public, and logs are public. Laura may be right. In any case, ArbComm on Wikipedia obtained and used an archive from a clearly private mailing list, and published in their proceedings "juicy excerpts" from that list. This was actually illegal, my opinion. But they did it. Far worse than IRC logs from open IRC chat, presented on Wikiversity as to be used, officially, to contact sysops. --20:07, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

I have requested deletion of the page. Ottava is right, this is not a proper CR. Guido den Broeder 19:42, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

And yours were? I think this was an accidental edit, I ran into a bunch of edit conflicts, note lack of sig --Abd 20:17, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

And Ottava's were? --Abd 20:17, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Oh come on. Stop crying out loud. That's just childish: And yours were?, Now go kick his ass just like a four-years-old kid would do. No. Diego Grez 20:11, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

• Abd, care to stop disrupting the project and making people feel uncomfortable? You are wrong. Understand, please! For God's sake. I had never seen such a crappy website in my life, this is getting worse than Dramatica. Do you know the reason? THE UNNECESSARY DRAMA you are creating. Diego Grez 20:05, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Diego, you have a history of jumping in when there is something related to Ottava or filed by him, and knee-jerk agreeing with him. You said you were going to stop that, on meta, but you obviously have not. I didn't file this CR, what I did was to reply in it, briefly, still near the bottom, and then I filed a note that it was open here. A fairly neutral note, far more neutral than the preposterous Topic ban proposal - Abd that Ottava created here in the Colloquium, it's still above, that you immediately voted in. You are transparent, Diego. Just understand that. You can be seen. --Abd 20:14, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Should I laugh at you? You are being so arrogant. Oh wait, I'm contributing to teh dramah! I'll shut up. Good luck disrupting the project et all, you stupid failing idiots! Diego Grez 20:17, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Let me translate that into English: Diego made a comment that very incorrectly assumed, on the face, that I was "disrupting the project" and "making people feel uncomfortable" by filing this complex CR on Ottava. When I point out his error, which is the kind of error he's made in many places (shallow, quick comment supporting some goal of his), I'm "arrogant." Yeah! I believe my eyes and I report what they see. A lot of people don't like that. Including, obviously, Diego. Now I know why others were so eager to torpedo his custodianship here. Perhaps they knew him. He was almost approved! --Abd 20:23, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Let me translate that further: Diego Grez is correct. You are disrupting the project, and by now it is well clear to everyone that you choose to. I expect that we won't need a CR to solve that. Guido den Broeder 20:30, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Hey, Guido! That was dense! Diego posted as if I'd filed the CR. I had no role in it at all, didn't know it was coming, etc. Now, you repeat this as if you think the same, too! How, exactly, am I "disrupting the project."? Here, Guido, all I did was point to the CR. Read my original comment. Was that disruptive? --Abd 20:10, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Suffering Succotash

Far be it from me to construct a haphazard theory of mind regarding the principal characters here. But it occurs to me that if there is, in fact, any empathy here, it would be that parties on both sides are in a state of suffering. —Moulton 20:10, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Best Practices for Educational Dialogues

Over the past few days on IRC, Mike and I have been talking about best practices for educational dialogues. Mike points out that different people have different learning styles or learning orientations. Some people are very flexible and can accommodate a wide variety of dialogue modes. Others are more resistant to conventional didactic methods and require customized modes of interaction. Mike has pointed some recent examples where none of the traditional dialectic modes have been fruitful. Indeed he notes some modes of interaction may even be counter-productive, arousing angst, anxiety, or anger that impedes the learning process.

Neither Mike nor I have yet discovered an effective practice for dialoguing in a productive or constructive way with selected dialogue partners who are not receptive to normative methods of interaction. My own experience is that I consistently fail to engage dialogue partners who are resistant learners of personality type F60.2-8. Indeed my preferred dialogue mode seems to be a litmus test for attracting Cluster/B/Fucks.

So I am open to ideas on how best to devise alternate methods of interaction that don't generate quite so much unproductive drama.

Moulton 14:52, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

I suggest ideas of best practices for educational dialogs be explored in a learning/research project. -- darklama  15:45, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

• I am more than amenable to that, if there are enough people interested to form a collaborative learning project on the topic. Who else would be interested? —Moulton 15:55, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Best practices for Autobiographical Monologues

There are situations in which collegial dialogues are not a viable option because one or more of the proposed dialogue partners declines to participate. In these cases, it may be necessary to write autobiographical monologues or personal memoirs in which other individuals who have had a substantial impact on the course of one's life must be referred to in the third person, rather than being present as a collaborating co-author. When writing a personal memoir, what are the best practices for identifying and characterizing absentee individuals who have made a singular impact on the course of one's life? —Moulton 08:13, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

Editorial judgment is required. Algorithms for that purpose are to be made available "real soon now." WAS 4.250 20:59, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

• I take that to mean that when writing a personal memoir, an author is entitled to write in his or her own natural voice. —Moulton 22:55, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

That is not relevant to the question asked. An author may write in whatever voice the author chooses, as long as it's not libelous. If the author is restrained by ethics, there may be additional considerations. But the question was about identifying and "characterizing" others. And that is a question that is normally addressed and answered by the publisher. And the publisher's legal counsel! If you self-publish, well, you seek your own counsel. You can write any way you like, for your own pleasure, and for private sharing. It's when you publish stuff that it can get dicey. --Abd 00:07, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

• Thank you for using your own natural voice for dismissing as irrelevant my comment to WAS in the context of his most helpful answer to the question at hand. —Moulton 12:00, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

You're welcome, Barry. Editorial judgment is required. By the publisher. --Abd 17:03, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

• Do Jeff and Tracy concur that we are each responsible for our own judgment in deciding what to publish and sign our names to? —Moulton 19:51, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Best practices for addressing fellow scholars

A related issue is how best to address one's fellow scholars, including authors who have published outside of Wikiversity. Please visit the discussion page of the local Privacy Policy to weigh in on the question. —Moulton 15:49, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

The question gets abstracted by Moulton. "Address" implies that one is speaking to the individual (which is ordinarily avoided in academic writing). "Scholar" implies that the individual is participating in some scholastic activity. Speaking to individuals is subject to the customs of the environment and the preferences of individuals. It is not normal in academic circles for participants to use pseudonyms (Such as Moulton, Caprice, Albatross, etc.), but when writing in a field, and referring to the work of others, one will use the name that allows another searching for the work to readily find it. Suppose a woman was born Smith but marries Jones. She published as Smith, a paper. In citing the paper one would cite it as published, Smith. In discussing the paper, one might mention that later work was done as Jones, if the later work was later published that way. But the citation is as-published, and that's how publications are indexed.

"Best practices" implies some standard of determining "best," and, in fact, this depends on context and purpose. If your purpose is to berate, humiliate, and enrage a person, then the "best practice" is to pick whatever name will have the greatest impact for that purpose. What's the purpose? The set of questions is silent on that. The difficulties we have had on Wikiversity over "outing" have to do, not with best academic practice, for which the wiki pseudonym serves best for that, since one can immediately look up all contributions under that pseudonym, but rather with what appear to be attempts to provoke, outrage, berate, and humiliate. --Abd 14:50, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

• Mr. Lomax, what is your hypothesis with respect to my objectives? —Moulton 15:21, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Public Domain Resources on Wikiversity

I am wondering what the policy is on developing public domain resources here. That is, if I created a resource (e.g. lesson plan) and as the creator dedicated it to the public domain, then brought it into Wikiversity. Afterwards, could it still be a public domain resource? Given images that are edited by the community can remain public domain, I don't see why not. I did a rough draft of a license for this, built off one from another Wikimedia project where this goes on. --Charles Jeffrey Danoff 21:16, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Good question, Charles - I'm not sure of the answer, but have wondered about the same thing. There is {{Userpd}} which can be added to a user page. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 21:35, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Any modification on Wikiversity or any WMF site is licensed as GFDL/CC.BY.SA.3.0 and not Public Domain. To reuse would require attribution of the authors of the modifications. Ottava Rima (talk) 21:48, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps surprisingly, it seems that you hit some curious problems when you try to release collaborative works as PD. The main one is that not all legal systems recognize that people can give up their copyright - in many regions copyright can only be removed by specific processes, such as time since first publication. So with a collaborative work such as this, where each contribution needs to be released under a common license, I'd be concerned that you may hit some problems. Indeed, it isn't clear whether or not works created in the US can necessarily be released as PD - some have argued that they can (Lessig says yes, but only with difficulty), but others have said that they can't.

Thus the use of CC/GFDL - you may not be able to release works as PD, but you can license them for free use, which isn't identical but overcomes most of the problems while still allowing open, PD-like use of the work. An alternative has been to release the work as PD, but to also specifically outline the free use side of things, so that where PD isn't possible the free use terms come into play instead. From memory I think that this is what is going on with images, especially with Commons and the CC0 1.0 license.

I would also have some concern about tagging articles as PD, as when you make your edit you agree to release your work as CC/ GFDL, not PD. So while the article may state that additions are PD, the agreement when you save won't. I'm not sure where that would leave us, but it seems like a potential concern.

On the plus side, copying PD works here doesn't change the PD status of the original text. :) Any comments above only relate to derived or new works. - Bilby 22:51, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Jtneill, Ottava Rima & Bilby thx for your thoughtful responses raising new dimensions to this idea I had not yet considered. I will say this discussion thread from the multi license PD template seems to give support against my ideas. In response though, I would first give these three pieces of evidence in regards to developing IDENTIFIED pub dom resources here on Wikiversity:

1) wikipedia template for user public domain contributions

2) Mediawiki PD help project

3) Wikipedia's "Granting work into the public domain".

All are instances from our sister sites where (1) users are allowed to make public domain contributions and (2) an entire collaborative project made public domain. Furthermore (3) says

"All text on Wikipedia is submitted under the GNU Free Documentation License. Contributors can choose to multi-license their works under other licenses, and users can then choose which license to accept. Many people have also put public domain deeds on their uploaded content or their user pages. Given the above, it is up to any user of the content to decide whether they consider a public domain deed to be sufficiently legally safe."

Also, in the links it has:

A private e-mail from the U.S. Copyright Office sent to User:Dcoetzee that says, among other things, "Please be advised that one may not grant their work into the public domain. However, a copyright owner may release all of their rights to their work by stating the work may be freely reproduced, distributed, etc."

Possible Implementation: For a PD resource, add a notice akin to the top of the Mediawiki PD help pages, including the advice from the US Copyright office. If a user contributes whose already released all their contributions PD its fine. For other users, assuming the notice is clear enough, they should play aware of their release or stay away if they're not comfortable. --Charles Jeffrey Danoff 07:08, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

I think when a person releases all rights to their work, they also allow other people the right to choose any conditions they want for derived works. I think if there are conditions for derived works, than people are not really releasing all their rights. I think releasing all rights works for individuals because other people can continue to contribute and have their contributions be CC-BY-SA licensed.

I think PD help more or less works at MediaWiki because the conditions are guaranteed to be there for any page in the namespace. However I am uncertain whether the situation is clear enough to guarantee there won't be problems down the road. I think there is a risk that the Help must fall back to being CC-BY-SA licensed if the situation is unclear, which I am comfortable with.

I think you can't guarantee a person won't create a new page without the notice with the intention for it to be part of the overall work. I think you can't guarantee a person won't remove the notice from a page, and other people won't have contributed in the mean time. I think if there is no notice whether from the start or due to being removed by someone, changes would fall back to being CC-BY-SA licensed as that is the only clear conditions set forth on the project.

I have seen debate on this topic play out time and again at other projects without any conclusive results. What do you hope to gain by requiring everyone release all their rights? What conditions of CC-BY-SA do you not like? -- darklama  13:56, 22 February 2011 (UTC)