Wikinews:Water cooler/miscellaneous/archives/2011/June

Announcing our new community liaison

I’m delighted to announce that the Wikimedia Foundation has engaged Maggie Dennis (User:Moonriddengirl) to serve as our first Community Liaison. The Community Liaison role is envisioned to be a rotating assignment, filled by a new Wikimedian each year, half year or quarter. One of Maggie’s responsibilities is to begin to lay out a process for how this rotating posting would work.

Maggie has been a contributor to the projects since 2007 and is an administrator on the English Wikipedia and an OTRS volunteer. She has over 100,000 edits, including edits to 40 of the language versions of our projects. Her broad experience and knowledge made her a natural fit for this role.

This role is a response to requests from community members who have sometimes felt they didn’t know who to ask about something or weren’t sure the right person to go through to bring up a suggestion or issue. Her initial thrust will be to create systems so that every contributor to the projects has a way to reach the Foundation if they wish and to make sure that the Foundation effectively connects the right resources with people who contact us. If you aren’t sure who to call, Maggie will help you. Obviously, most community members will never need this communications channel - they’re happy editing, doing the things that make the projects great - but we want to make it as easy as possible for people to communicate with the Foundation.

The job of the liaison will have two major parts. First are standard duties that every liaison will perform which may include maintaining a FAQ about what each department does, making sure that inquiries from email or mailing lists are brought to the attention of appropriate staff members, etc. However, we also want liaisons to be free to pursue unique projects suited to their particular skill sets. Maggie will develop such projects in the coming weeks.

Maggie will be on the projects as User:Mdennis (WMF) and can be reached at mdennis (at) wikimedia.org. Her initial appointment runs for six months. I look forward to working with Maggie in this new role!

Philippe (WMF) (talk) 22:11, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Philippe, whilst I welcome the creation of a community liaison post, having a new community liaison ever 3, 6 or 12 months is not gonna be much of a help for those who don't know who to go to with stuff. Once you get used to a community liaison, they should be the person you contact. Keep changing the holder of the post up to 4 times a year is only gonna serve to confuse stuff. BarkingFish (talk) 22:21, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Hi, BarkingFish. You raise a very good point. Because of it, I'm getting a new e-mail address: liaison (at) wikimedia.org. :) That way, when the job does shift, the communications will still go to the same address. (Address is not yet live, but I hope it soon will be.) I don't think that the role is really envisioned as lasting for only three months; as I understand it, this is more of a possibility to accommodate future liaisons who may be available for a limited time. I hope, though, that passing the baton will be relatively painless. One of my tasks is making sure that I leave behind clear enough systems (once they're created) that my successor won't have to start over, but can easily pick up where I left off, while also implementing new projects that suit his or her individual skills. --Mdennis (WMF) (talk) 19:01, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

That wasn't quite what I had in mind, Mdennis (WMF) - my idea was more along the lines of getting used to a name, and you're it :) You have the job, and it shouldn't be one that rotates, unless you decide for whatever reason, to leave the post. It's always good to have a known, named person at the other end, and having to get used to another new person every few months, who may operate differently to you, is gonna be tricky for some. Maybe it should be a permanent-unless-you-decide-otherwise kinda post. Still, welcome to the team! BarkingFish (talk) 19:07, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Well, naturally, I can see some advantages to your suggestion. ;D But at least a consistent e-mail address will mean that people are reaching out to the same place. I'm working on systems that would make me pretty much invisible in the process, but it's early days yet. Because it is a rotating position, I'm not meant to make myself personally central just so that we avoid unsettling people when the position rotates. By the way, please call me Maggie. "Mdennis (WMF)" is just so formal. --Mdennis (WMF) (talk) 19:20, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

/me waves @ Maggie. Don't think we've seen you on "The wiki for grumpy would-be journos" ;-) Despite what you may have heard elsewhere, we only bite if you ask! :P --Brian McNeil / ^talk 07:27, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

copyright violation

The following article seems to have some paragraphs copied out of Gay couple elected prom king and queen in Maine's Sanford High School without attribution, in violation of the Creative Commons license:

http://www.examiner.com/celebrity-headlines-in-portland-me/gay-male-couple-crowned-prom-king-and-queen-at-sanford-high-c-nelsen-and-c-jett

Does Wikinews have any sort of recourse for these kinds of violations? Ragettho (talk) 19:22, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

You could try to contact Jay Walsh about that. -- Cirt (talk) 19:51, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

• Ragettho, I've examined the two articles, check publication timestamps, and I concur. Thus, I've emailed notice to the Examiner of their contributor's plagiarism, with a courtesy copy to Jay. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 07:04, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Brian! ;) -- Cirt (talk) 07:04, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

• Got to do something for entertainment since I'm signed off from work for two weeks post-stroke. Dropping a "Polly Filler" in the crapper was too good an opportunity to miss. ;-) --Brian McNeil / ^talk 07:10, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Oh no, I hope you rest and get better soon! -- Cirt (talk) 07:25, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

No rest for the wicked. I very quickly regained full motor control, I just get tired pretty easily. My mind is still the same – "Like a steel trap"; rusted, and illegal in 27 states. :-D --Brian McNeil / ^talk 07:43, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Thank you so much! Ragettho (talk) 14:15, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

And I do hope that you get better. Ragettho (talk) 14:16, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Google anti-competitive behaviour

Mostly for those who recall the issue being brought up in relation to YouTube...

Has any further work been done regarding Google apparently favouring Chrome over other browsers with their websites? I appear to have run into this problem with Google Docs; a link emailed to me simply refuses to work in Firefox, and I get a "connection interrupted" error. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 07:31, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

• Try Error loading web sites -> Interrupted or reset connection and safe mode, will any of them work? Gryllida 08:04, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

main page

• Just tried to add a welcome message to User talk:111.93.40.130, the title was saying "editing user talk:111.93.40.130", hit save, the change went to main page, but wasn't sighted, I rejected it. Did same thing two times (100% sure was editing the right page the second time, but it still happened).
• Not sure if related, I also installed Firefox 7 (trunk) today. Is someone else notices odd thins happening, post here, I'm just using another browser for a while.

-Gryllida 12:36, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Happened again (in Chrome). I rejected the change so it probably didn't go "live", but it may be a site issue. -175.38.228.205 (talk) 12:56, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

(Its disgusting that firefox is on version 7...). That's really odd. You should perhaps consider filing a bug. Whats really odd is it only seems to be affecting you (but that could be because you're doing something different to trigger the bug that other's aren't). I have no idea what could cause this. Bawolff ☺☻ 00:18, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

My Firefox updated itself to 5 this morning, and has crashed about 10 times in the last several hours. I don't know what's going on. Mattisse (talk) 00:32, 27 June 2011 (UTC)