Wikinews:Water cooler/policy/archives/2017/August

Opt-in global sysops?

I've been thinking. We have combated vandalism and done some routine maintenance everyday. Right now, we have very few active admins, yet global sysops are opted-out. Is it okay to allow global admins to edit to just combat vandals and do some routine cleanups? --George Ho (talk) 06:59, 7 August 2017 (UTC)

My instinct is against; Wikinews has its own peculiar considerations, which an outsider could not reasonably be expected to be familiar with. --Pi zero (talk) 11:41, 7 August 2017 (UTC)

v:Everyone's favorite news site

At the risk of excess repetition, I've posted an edited version of my July proposal for "Everyone's favorite news site" to Wikiversity.

I think a next step would be to do a more in-depth comparison of the different language versions of Wikinews. I'd be pleased to hear a discussion of that, either here or on Wikiversity or at the wm2017:Wikimania conference in Montreal later this week. DavidMCEddy (talk) 07:37, 8 August 2017 (UTC)

@DavidMCEddy: I have always looked at your proposals with deep worry. Although you did once-upon-a-time publish an article on en.wn (with much help from several reviewers, iirc), I don't think you really have an understanding of what we are achieving here. This is why I have been desperately trying — for a dreadfully long time now — to scrape up time to try to explain how I see en.wn to you. I have decided, with Wikimania almost upon us, to change my strategy, and put that writing at the top of my agenda for today, despite all the articles clamoring for attention on the review queue; and instead of trying to write a huge semi-essay on the subject, I'm going to write the first part of such a thing, leaving other aspects of the subject for later. That will likely make it harder to do the later stuff, because I won't be able to adjust my approach to the earlier stuff as one would when writing a larger essay; but it's become more important to get at least some of it out the door. I intend to write those comments on my talk page, not here at the policy water cooler; I will, however, offer a few comments here about why I am deeply worried about your proposals, and why I mean to put those comments elsewhere.

• A key point, in all of this, is what one sees when one looks at en.wn. Factually, in recent times en.wn has been publishing roughly one article per day. That is neither bad nor good, in any degree: it is just a statistic. As someone-or-other said (as I recall there's been much discussion over its attribution), there are lies, damn lies, and statistics.
• There is an outspoken set of Wikipedians with blatantly sororocidal intent toward their sister Wikinews, who look at en.wn and apparently want to see it as failure. I know from long (and profoundly unpleasant) experience in dealing with those sorts of people that our output doesn't actually matter to their attitude; if we were producing a hundred articles a day, at the same high quality, they would just find some other excuse to claim we were failing (it is, I suggest, absolutely the same phenomenon as the Trump administration labeling anything they don't want to hear as "fake news").
• I look at the en.wn output and see us doing something roughly once a day that is truly extraordinary, bordering on miraculous — something that significant parts of both the journalistic and wiki worlds have claimed was impossible — an open wiki producing high-quality news. I see it as a stunning success, of truly profound potential for bettering the human condition, and absolutely precious, something that must be preserved, protected — and, of course, scaled up by orders of magnitude, but learning to do that requires keeping the spark alive in the first place.

Here can be seen the core of all my reactions to your remarks:

• why it deeply worries me when you talk about radically changing things when it's not clear that you see what I'm seeing in en.wn's current achievements.
• why it deeply worries me when you go on about low output (a particular line of BS favored by the sororicidal set).
• why it deeply worries me when you put this stuff on the policy water cooler (where one discusses major changes) rather than on the proposals water cooler (where one discusses changes within existing policy); and why I'm inclined to post my explanations of en.wn on my user talk page instead of here.
• why I put such high priority on trying to explain to you my understanding of en.wn.
• why I've put the past several years (how many? four or five by now, I think) into developing technology to transform our workflow.

There are lots of things I could say about your proposals beyond "deep worry", but I don't think any of them would even make sense until after I've explained these other deep considerations I see in the nature of en.wn. --Pi zero (talk) 13:09, 8 August 2017 (UTC)

Sorry: I do not understand how the "watch" system works: I did NOT receive an email from your post, even though I had clicked "Watch this page." I just adjusted my preferences so I will get more notices.

I appreciate your work, and I certainly do not want to disrupt something that is working.

My perception of what could be useful is still evolving based on comments from you, User:Pi zero, and others.

My proposal consists of multiple parts. The parts other than Wikinews should complement, not conflict, with what you've worked so hard to cultivate and build. If Wikinews changes at all as a result of my work in this area, it would be because you and the other Wikinewsians saw the benefits.

I think a next step would likely be to do some kind of data collection and analysis of the articles and the audience for different language versions of Wikinews. These numbers would be both in absolute numbers and relative to the available potential -- the number of people who regularly use each language -- or some similar metric that you all think makes sense.

I think this would be followed and accompanied by a more qualitative discussion / survey of people involved in creating the other language versions of Wikinews. This would lead to a report that would be shared among the different language versions of Wikinews that would at least identify areas of agreement and disagreement over what's important, what works, what doesn't, what should be cultivated, etc.

If anything comes of my proposal, part of trying to convert it into reality would be to do some kind of data collection and analysis of the different language versions of Wikinews. DavidMCEddy (talk) 02:53, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

Any chance we can attend Wikimania via a video calling facility? If yes, when and how? @DavidMCEddy:?
acagastya PING ME! 20:27, 8 August 2017 (UTC)

Sorry: I only now saw this. I've just been through two days of the "pre-conference". The conference consists of 11 different concurrent sessions except for the keynote talks and other plenaries. Some if it may be live streamed someplace. If I learn now, I will post instructions here while pinging you. However, at this point, it does not look promising for that. DavidMCEddy (talk) 02:53, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

Note wm2017:Videos, which strongly suggests events will not be live streamed except by volunteers willing to do so. - Amgine | t 03:34, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

Karachi

Any Political Party of Pakistan not to able for Successful Strike in Karachi.Peaceful Karachi need to all. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 45.116.233.8 (talk • contribs)

@45.116.233.8: Sorry, I'm not sure how we can help here. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 18:42, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Kashmir issue

Appeal to International Community to Boycott Indian Goods due to Violation Human Rights in Held Kashmir. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 45.116.232.29 (talk • contribs)

@45.116.232.29: If you have news about a boycott, that would be a great contribution here. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 20:11, 17 August 2017 (UTC)