{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/4589", "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it. Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.", "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'" }, "archive": "urth", "thread": { "id": 4589, "subject": "Wiki draft proposal", "messages": 26, "voices": 11, "first": "2006-05-09T19:38:16+00:00", "last": "2006-05-20T01:47:21+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "maru dubshinki", "address": "marudubshinki at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-09T19:38:16+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I've been thinking about this for a while, and I think any wiki we\nstart on Wolfe's work should be categorized tripartitely:\n\nOne section should be for Urth ML emails. This would make it much\neasier to reference assertions and theories, especially since it seems\nthat a number of messages are primary sources, not merely secondary\nsources. And of course, if they are hosted on the wiki itself, one\ncould run a bot or some sort of bot to auto-link phrases to their\npages. (Now that I think of it, one could compile a list of words,\nphrases, and subjects from the mass of texts). I'm not too sure about\nthe copyright status, however: I'm pretty sure the list owner can\nallow them to be posted on a wiki (since he already has the right to\nso post them in a publicly accessible archive), but I don't know how\nthat factors into reditributions and licensing. So having a separate\nsection would allow us to segregate non-Free content from the Free\ncontent.\n\nThe second section would be articles. Straightforward factual articles\non Wolfe, relevant authors, his books and short stories, etc. Think\nlike what Wikipedia currently has. I guess we could import Wikipedia\npolicies wholesale for this section: verifiable, NPOV, no personal\nattacks, etc. This section we could grab straight from Wikipedia.\nAbout all we'd have to do is add a GFDL notice (assuming we decide to\ngo with a non-GFDL license, or cross-license) and perhaps swap out\ninternal Wikipedia links for interwiki links. Of course, these\narticles would link (perhaps in the relevant sections) to the third\nsection... which is the section of interest to us all:\n\nThe third section would be distilled discussions and theories. The\nidea is to condense all the verbiage and back and forth into a single\npage of pros and cons (ie. the evidence that, say, Thecla is the\nhermaphrodite lover of the Autarch would be presented on its own page,\nperhaps titled \"Theclas as hermaphrodite\"; the evidence for it would\nbe presented, linking to the relevant emails, with textual citations\nand such, and then the opposed side. Talk pages can be used to hammer\nout the list, or it can be done on-list.)\n\nCategories could be very useful for sections two and three. An\noff-the-cuff example: A top-level category could be Authors, with Gene\nWolfe in it, and then Books and Short Stories in the Wolfe cat, books\nbeing divided into Short Sun, New Sun, Peace, Soldier etc. categories.\nThen one has the articles on the individual novels. If a character\nappears in all the books, and so doesn't fit into a single book's\ncategory, they would go in the New Sun category, but minor characters\ncould go into only one book's category (ie. Triskele would go into the\nNew Sun cat, but the serving boy at the restaurant in SotT would be in\nthe Shadow of the Torturer cat (if that's the right book)).\n\nNow, no doubt someone will suggest that the wiki host the various\nWolfe interviews and miscellany available online. I won't address\nthese: technically those are copyright violations (at least, I haven't\nseen any under any sort of Free license), and so it would be\nunconscionable for me to advise Ranjit to set up a wiki and work to\npopulate it with stuff that exposes him, the hoster, to legal\nretribution. Now, perhaps he doesn't mind the risk, or perhaps Wolfe\nhas made known an intention not to prosecute any fans, but it's up to\nRanjit, not me, or us, for that matter.\n\nWe also need a name. Lupinepedia, Wolfepedia, the Wolfe Wiki, the urth\nWiki, just plain Urth.net... are all possible names. Now, the perfect\nname would be short, clever, clear, and be easily compressed (ie names\nbased on Urth or Wolfe are good, as they make it easy to refer to, and\nthey also make interwiki links from, say, Wikipedia, easy to do, so\nthey look like [[w:c:Wolfe:Article|Article]] or\n[[Urth:Article|Article]] instead of something much longer). Just some\nthoughts.\n\nWe also need to decide on licensing. Using the GFDL is a possibility\nbut there are severe drawbacks that may more than counterwiegh the\nease of using Wikipedia articles as a base: it's long, complex,\ncumbersome, unclear, and there are some bad features. I'll provide\nsome links for further reading, if you want to know more:\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Free_Documentation_License#Criticisms_of_the_GFDL\nhttp://wikitravel.org/en/Wikitravel:Why_Wikitravel_isn%27t_GFDL\nhttp://home.twcny.rr.com/nerode/neroden/fdl.html\nhttp://people.debian.org/~srivasta/Position_Statement.xhtml\n\nThere are quite a few possibilities w/r/t Free license. We could use \na modified BSD license (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BSD_license), a\nCreative Commons license (I like the Attribution-SA myself:\nhttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/1.0/), or a public domain\nlicense (no rights reserved, essentially). My personal preference\nwould be to go with PD; it's simple, it's definitely Free, and it's\nnot like we really need the protections of copyleft- who'll steal our\ncontent? And of course, if we decide to merge with Wikipedia some\nday, PD interoperates well with GFDL.\n\nOk. So those are my thoughts on the subject. Look forward to hearing\nyour comments and criticism.\n\n~maru\n\"A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the\nbalances are correct.\"" } ] }, { "message_id": "<44611517.60803@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "Jesper Svedberg", "address": "jsvedberg at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-09T22:17:59+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I have a few thoughts on how the Wiki should be structured.\n\n - There should be a bibliography on all stories and books with a \nsynopsis and publishing history. A standardized format of structure of \nthese articles should also be developed (for instance: 1. Title, 2. \nPublication data, 3. Synopsis, 4. Theories, 5. External links).\n\n - There should be separate articles on important persons, objects and \nconcepts that can be found in his works.\n\n - I don't think it's necessary to put these articles in different \ncategories based on which work they appear in, it should be enough to \ncreate structure by linking the articles in a careful fashion (you could \nhave an article called \"Characters in TBotNS\" filled with links the \nseparate articles) and by clearly stating in the articles where the \npersons/objects appear.\n\n - Theories and facts should be clearly separated. If there are \ntheories about a subject, there should be a \"Theories\" section in the \narticle with short descriptions of the theories and links to the \nseparate articles.\n\n - I don't think there really is a point in copying material that is \nalready online (such as interviews and the mailing list archives) into \nthe Wiki when one can easily link to the external locations. If there \nare entries in the mailing list archives that for instance discuss the \nidentity of Dorcas, then one could link to these entries in the article \non Dorcas.\n\n - Beyond this there are an endless amount of subjects that could be \nincluded in a wiki. One could have articles on different themes in \nWolfe's work (for instance Memory, Religion or Mythology), articles on \nauthors that have influenced him and in what way, articles on writers \nthat have been influenced by him, or anything else that might seem relevant.\n\n - One thing that must be discussed is the problem of the sender. In \nWikipedia, the articles are presented as facts and the sender is \nconsidered secondary, but if someone writes an article theorizing about \na subject in the WolfeWiki, then it might be wise to clearly mark out \nwho the writer/sender is.\n\n - I agree that it would probably be a good idea to give it a short and \nclear name. OTOH, i also think that it would be pretty cool to call it \n\"Tracking Song\", even it if could be somewhat confusing.\n\n\n // Jesper\n\n\nmaru dubshinki skrev:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I've been thinking about this for a while, and I think any wiki we\nstart on Wolfe's work should be categorized tripartitely:\n\nOne section should be for Urth ML emails. This would make it much\neasier to reference assertions and theories, especially since it seems\nthat a number of messages are primary sources, not merely secondary\nsources. And of course, if they are hosted on the wiki itself, one\ncould run a bot or some sort of bot to auto-link phrases to their\npages. (Now that I think of it, one could compile a list of words,\nphrases, and subjects from the mass of texts). I'm not too sure about\nthe copyright status, however: I'm pretty sure the list owner can\nallow them to be posted on a wiki (since he already has the right to\nso post them in a publicly accessible archive), but I don't know how\nthat factors into reditributions and licensing. So having a separate\nsection would allow us to segregate non-Free content from the Free\ncontent.\n\nThe second section would be articles. Straightforward factual articles\non Wolfe, relevant authors, his books and short stories, etc. Think\nlike what Wikipedia currently has. I guess we could import Wikipedia\npolicies wholesale for this section: verifiable, NPOV, no personal\nattacks, etc. This section we could grab straight from Wikipedia.\nAbout all we'd have to do is add a GFDL notice (assuming we decide to\ngo with a non-GFDL license, or cross-license) and perhaps swap out\ninternal Wikipedia links for interwiki links. Of course, these\narticles would link (perhaps in the relevant sections) to the third\nsection... which is the section of interest to us all:\n\nThe third section would be distilled discussions and theories. The\nidea is to condense all the verbiage and back and forth into a single\npage of pros and cons (ie. the evidence that, say, Thecla is the\nhermaphrodite lover of the Autarch would be presented on its own page,\nperhaps titled \"Theclas as hermaphrodite\"; the evidence for it would\nbe presented, linking to the relevant emails, with textual citations\nand such, and then the opposed side. Talk pages can be used to hammer\nout the list, or it can be done on-list.)\n\nCategories could be very useful for sections two and three. An\noff-the-cuff example: A top-level category could be Authors, with Gene\nWolfe in it, and then Books and Short Stories in the Wolfe cat, books\nbeing divided into Short Sun, New Sun, Peace, Soldier etc. categories.\nThen one has the articles on the individual novels. If a character\nappears in all the books, and so doesn't fit into a single book's\ncategory, they would go in the New Sun category, but minor characters\ncould go into only one book's category (ie. Triskele would go into the\nNew Sun cat, but the serving boy at the restaurant in SotT would be in\nthe Shadow of the Torturer cat (if that's the right book)).\n\nNow, no doubt someone will suggest that the wiki host the various\nWolfe interviews and miscellany available online. I won't address\nthese: technically those are copyright violations (at least, I haven't\nseen any under any sort of Free license), and so it would be\nunconscionable for me to advise Ranjit to set up a wiki and work to\npopulate it with stuff that exposes him, the hoster, to legal\nretribution. Now, perhaps he doesn't mind the risk, or perhaps Wolfe\nhas made known an intention not to prosecute any fans, but it's up to\nRanjit, not me, or us, for that matter.\n\nWe also need a name. Lupinepedia, Wolfepedia, the Wolfe Wiki, the urth\nWiki, just plain Urth.net... are all possible names. Now, the perfect\nname would be short, clever, clear, and be easily compressed (ie names\nbased on Urth or Wolfe are good, as they make it easy to refer to, and\nthey also make interwiki links from, say, Wikipedia, easy to do, so\nthey look like [[w:c:Wolfe:Article|Article]] or\n[[Urth:Article|Article]] instead of something much longer). Just some\nthoughts.\n\nWe also need to decide on licensing. Using the GFDL is a possibility\nbut there are severe drawbacks that may more than counterwiegh the\nease of using Wikipedia articles as a base: it's long, complex,\ncumbersome, unclear, and there are some bad features. I'll provide\nsome links for further reading, if you want to know more:\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Free_Documentation_License#Criticisms_of_the_GFDL\nhttp://wikitravel.org/en/Wikitravel:Why_Wikitravel_isn%27t_GFDL\nhttp://home.twcny.rr.com/nerode/neroden/fdl.html\nhttp://people.debian.org/~srivasta/Position_Statement.xhtml\n\nThere are quite a few possibilities w/r/t Free license. We could use \na modified BSD license (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BSD_license), a\nCreative Commons license (I like the Attribution-SA myself:\nhttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/1.0/), or a public domain\nlicense (no rights reserved, essentially). My personal preference\nwould be to go with PD; it's simple, it's definitely Free, and it's\nnot like we really need the protections of copyleft- who'll steal our\ncontent? And of course, if we decide to merge with Wikipedia some\nday, PD interoperates well with GFDL.\n\nOk. So those are my thoughts on the subject. Look forward to hearing\nyour comments and criticism.\n\n~maru\n\"A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the\nbalances are correct.\"\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "maru dubshinki", "address": "marudubshinki at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-10T01:39:38+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "<44611517.60803@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 5/9/06, Jesper Svedberg wrote:\nI have a few thoughts on how the Wiki should be structured.\n\n - There should be a bibliography on all stories and books with a\nsynopsis and publishing history. A standardized format of structure of\nthese articles should also be developed (for instance: 1. Title, 2.\nPublication data, 3. Synopsis, 4. Theories, 5. External links)." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That's perfectly reasonable. I'd put the Reference/Publication data\nafter the synopsis and list of Dramatis Personae myself, snce that's\nboring stuff, but that's a good start." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " - There should be separate articles on important persons, objects and\nconcepts that can be found in his works." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Absolutely." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " - I don't think it's necessary to put these articles in different\ncategories based on which work they appear in, it should be enough to\ncreate structure by linking the articles in a careful fashion (you could\nhave an article called \"Characters in TBotNS\" filled with links the\nseparate articles) and by clearly stating in the articles where the\npersons/objects appear." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Well, why not? Links are great, but there are some things categories\nare just better at. See alsos can grow awfully long, you know." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " - Theories and facts should be clearly separated. If there are\ntheories about a subject, there should be a \"Theories\" section in the\narticle with short descriptions of the theories and links to the\nseparate articles.\n\n - I don't think there really is a point in copying material that is\nalready online (such as interviews and the mailing list archives) into\nthe Wiki when one can easily link to the external locations. If there\nare entries in the mailing list archives that for instance discuss the\nidentity of Dorcas, then one could link to these entries in the article\non Dorcas." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yes, we could use external links, but those have the problem of being\nboth more unreliable *and* harder to use than wikilinks. There are\nmore subtle reasons to prefer internal links to external links, but\nthey're hard to talk about." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " - Beyond this there are an endless amount of subjects that could be\nincluded in a wiki. One could have articles on different themes in\nWolfe's work (for instance Memory, Religion or Mythology), articles on\nauthors that have influenced him and in what way, articles on writers\nthat have been influenced by him, or anything else that might seem relevant.\n\n - One thing that must be discussed is the problem of the sender. In\nWikipedia, the articles are presented as facts and the sender is\nconsidered secondary, but if someone writes an article theorizing about\na subject in the WolfeWiki, then it might be wise to clearly mark out\nwho the writer/sender is." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I disagree. We can source it to emails, which should be enough, and\nbesides, theories should stand or fall on their own merit." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " - I agree that it would probably be a good idea to give it a short and\nclear name. OTOH, i also think that it would be pretty cool to call it\n\"Tracking Song\", even it if could be somewhat confusing." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Hmm. Don't get it. Where's that from?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " // Jesper" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "~maru" } ] }, { "message_id": "<000a01c673ff$251dc300$433ec6d8@rclackey.stic.net>", "from": { "name": "Roy C. Lackey", "address": "rclackey at stic.net" }, "date": "2006-05-10T06:58:24+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Jesper wrote:\n - Theories and facts should be clearly separated. If there are\ntheories about a subject, there should be a \"Theories\" section in the\narticle with short descriptions of the theories and links to the\nseparate articles." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "What is fictive fact and what is theory -- and who decides? Is it a fact\nthat Weer is dead, or that Dorcas is Severian's grandmother? These two cases\nare not that controversial; consensus is that they are facts, but that is\nonly a consensus. Did Weer really have constructed such an edifice as his\nMemory House, or did it exist only in his head? It's been argued both ways.\nFact or theory?\n\n[snip]" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " - One thing that must be discussed is the problem of the sender. In\nWikipedia, the articles are presented as facts and the sender is\nconsidered secondary, but if someone writes an article theorizing about\na subject in the WolfeWiki, then it might be wise to clearly mark out\nwho the writer/sender is." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "At the very least. I've seen some theories on this List better aired in an\nouthouse. I've made posts I wish I could take back -- but I can't. It's one\nthing to think out loud in public in a relatively small forum such as this,\nbut it's a very different thing to have such thoughts presented with a\npresumption of authority or even credibility to a larger audience. I don't\nknow that much about Wikipedia, but if Whomever's opinions are presented\nthere as facts, then it is useless as an authority, and I could never in\ngood conscience cite it as such. Democracy is a wonderful ideal, but not all\nopinions are equal.\n\n-Roy" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4461955D.7010300@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "Jesper Svedberg", "address": "jsvedberg at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-10T07:25:17+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal (repost)", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "[I tried to send this mail last night, but I'm sending it again since it \ndoesn't seem to have arrived yet.]\n\nI have a few thoughts on how the Wiki should be structured.\n\n - There should be a bibliography on all stories and books with a\nsynopsis and publishing history. A standardized format of structure of\nthese articles should also be developed (for instance: 1. Title, 2.\nPublication data, 3. Synopsis, 4. Theories, 5. External links).\n\n - There should be separate articles on important persons, objects and\nconcepts that can be found in his works.\n\n - I don't think it's necessary to put these articles in different\ncategories based on which work they appear in, it should be enough to\ncreate structure by linking the articles in a careful fashion (you could\nhave an article called \"Characters in TBotNS\" filled with links the\nseparate articles) and by clearly stating in the articles where the\npersons/objects appear.\n\n - Theories and facts should be clearly separated. If there are\ntheories about a subject, there should be a \"Theories\" section in the\narticle with short descriptions of the theories and links to the\nseparate articles.\n\n - I don't think there really is a point in copying material that is\nalready online (such as interviews and the mailing list archives) into\nthe Wiki when one can easily link to the external locations. If there\nare entries in the mailing list archives that for instance discuss the\nidentity of Dorcas, then one could link to these entries in the article\non Dorcas.\n\n - Beyond this there are an endless amount of subjects that could be\nincluded in a wiki. One could have articles on different themes in\nWolfe's work (for instance Memory, Religion or Mythology), articles on\nauthors that have influenced him and in what way, articles on writers\nthat have been influenced by him, or anything else that might seem relevant.\n\n - One thing that must be discussed is the problem of the sender. In\nWikipedia, the articles are presented as facts and the sender is\nconsidered secondary, but if someone writes an article theorizing about\na subject in the WolfeWiki, then it might be wise to clearly mark out\nwho the writer/sender is.\n\n - I agree that it would probably be a good idea to give it a short and\nclear name. OTOH, i also think that it would be pretty cool to call it\n\"Tracking Song\", even it if could be somewhat confusing.\n\n\n // Jesper\n\n\nmaru dubshinki skrev:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I've been thinking about this for a while, and I think any wiki we\nstart on Wolfe's work should be categorized tripartitely:\n\nOne section should be for Urth ML emails. This would make it much\neasier to reference assertions and theories, especially since it seems\nthat a number of messages are primary sources, not merely secondary\nsources. And of course, if they are hosted on the wiki itself, one\ncould run a bot or some sort of bot to auto-link phrases to their\npages. (Now that I think of it, one could compile a list of words,\nphrases, and subjects from the mass of texts). I'm not too sure about\nthe copyright status, however: I'm pretty sure the list owner can\nallow them to be posted on a wiki (since he already has the right to\nso post them in a publicly accessible archive), but I don't know how\nthat factors into reditributions and licensing. So having a separate\nsection would allow us to segregate non-Free content from the Free\ncontent.\n\nThe second section would be articles. Straightforward factual articles\non Wolfe, relevant authors, his books and short stories, etc. Think\nlike what Wikipedia currently has. I guess we could import Wikipedia\npolicies wholesale for this section: verifiable, NPOV, no personal\nattacks, etc. This section we could grab straight from Wikipedia.\nAbout all we'd have to do is add a GFDL notice (assuming we decide to\ngo with a non-GFDL license, or cross-license) and perhaps swap out\ninternal Wikipedia links for interwiki links. Of course, these\narticles would link (perhaps in the relevant sections) to the third\nsection... which is the section of interest to us all:\n\nThe third section would be distilled discussions and theories. The\nidea is to condense all the verbiage and back and forth into a single\npage of pros and cons (ie. the evidence that, say, Thecla is the\nhermaphrodite lover of the Autarch would be presented on its own page,\nperhaps titled \"Theclas as hermaphrodite\"; the evidence for it would\nbe presented, linking to the relevant emails, with textual citations\nand such, and then the opposed side. Talk pages can be used to hammer\nout the list, or it can be done on-list.)\n\nCategories could be very useful for sections two and three. An\noff-the-cuff example: A top-level category could be Authors, with Gene\nWolfe in it, and then Books and Short Stories in the Wolfe cat, books\nbeing divided into Short Sun, New Sun, Peace, Soldier etc. categories.\nThen one has the articles on the individual novels. If a character\nappears in all the books, and so doesn't fit into a single book's\ncategory, they would go in the New Sun category, but minor characters\ncould go into only one book's category (ie. Triskele would go into the\nNew Sun cat, but the serving boy at the restaurant in SotT would be in\nthe Shadow of the Torturer cat (if that's the right book)).\n\nNow, no doubt someone will suggest that the wiki host the various\nWolfe interviews and miscellany available online. I won't address\nthese: technically those are copyright violations (at least, I haven't\nseen any under any sort of Free license), and so it would be\nunconscionable for me to advise Ranjit to set up a wiki and work to\npopulate it with stuff that exposes him, the hoster, to legal\nretribution. Now, perhaps he doesn't mind the risk, or perhaps Wolfe\nhas made known an intention not to prosecute any fans, but it's up to\nRanjit, not me, or us, for that matter.\n\nWe also need a name. Lupinepedia, Wolfepedia, the Wolfe Wiki, the urth\nWiki, just plain Urth.net... are all possible names. Now, the perfect\nname would be short, clever, clear, and be easily compressed (ie names\nbased on Urth or Wolfe are good, as they make it easy to refer to, and\nthey also make interwiki links from, say, Wikipedia, easy to do, so\nthey look like [[w:c:Wolfe:Article|Article]] or\n[[Urth:Article|Article]] instead of something much longer). Just some\nthoughts.\n\nWe also need to decide on licensing. Using the GFDL is a possibility\nbut there are severe drawbacks that may more than counterwiegh the\nease of using Wikipedia articles as a base: it's long, complex,\ncumbersome, unclear, and there are some bad features. I'll provide\nsome links for further reading, if you want to know more:\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Free_Documentation_License#Criticisms_of_the_GFDL\nhttp://wikitravel.org/en/Wikitravel:Why_Wikitravel_isn%27t_GFDL\nhttp://home.twcny.rr.com/nerode/neroden/fdl.html\nhttp://people.debian.org/~srivasta/Position_Statement.xhtml\n\nThere are quite a few possibilities w/r/t Free license. We could use \na modified BSD license (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BSD_license), a\nCreative Commons license (I like the Attribution-SA myself:\nhttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/1.0/), or a public domain\nlicense (no rights reserved, essentially). My personal preference\nwould be to go with PD; it's simple, it's definitely Free, and it's\nnot like we really need the protections of copyleft- who'll steal our\ncontent? And of course, if we decide to merge with Wikipedia some\nday, PD interoperates well with GFDL.\n\nOk. So those are my thoughts on the subject. Look forward to hearing\nyour comments and criticism.\n\n~maru\n\"A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the\nbalances are correct.\"\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4461B003.9080901@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "Jesper Svedberg", "address": "jsvedberg at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-10T09:18:59+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Hm, you seem to have recieved my original mail, but I didn't get a copy. \nStrange. Anyway, I apologize for the double posting.\n\nmaru dubshinki skrev:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 5/9/06, Jesper Svedberg wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "- I don't think it's necessary to put these articles in different\ncategories based on which work they appear in, it should be enough to\ncreate structure by linking the articles in a careful fashion (you could\nhave an article called \"Characters in TBotNS\" filled with links the\nseparate articles) and by clearly stating in the articles where the\npersons/objects appear." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Well, why not? Links are great, but there are some things categories\nare just better at. See alsos can grow awfully long, you know." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "OK, after looking around Wikipedia I see that they have a pretty nice \nsystem for categories. Putting a [[Category:The Soldier Series]] in the \nthe article on Hypereides is good way of doing it, but when you \ninitially mentioned categories I thought you wanted to separate the \narticles in different directories (such as \nhttp://www.wolfewiki.org/wiki/soldier/Hypereides), and that I think \nwould be a bad idea." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Yes, we could use external links, but those have the problem of being\nboth more unreliable *and* harder to use than wikilinks. There are\nmore subtle reasons to prefer internal links to external links, but\nthey're hard to talk about." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Well, the Wikipedia seems to manage. When it comes to the mailing list \narchives, you could copy it to the wiki (or preferably to a parallell \nwiki (I think the mailing list should be clearly separated from the \ngeneral wiki in a way that allows for no confusion as to what belongs \nwhere), but it seems a lot of work for very little gain. To link to a \nmail you still have to search for it and either copy the wiki name for \nit (I suppose one would have to give the mailing list postings \nindividual ID numbers) or the URL and then paste it in one's article. \nMaybe it is much easier to search in another wiki to find the posting \nand the copy the ID number, but it doesn't seem like that great a \ndifference to me." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "- One thing that must be discussed is the problem of the sender. In\nWikipedia, the articles are presented as facts and the sender is\nconsidered secondary, but if someone writes an article theorizing about\na subject in the WolfeWiki, then it might be wise to clearly mark out\nwho the writer/sender is." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I disagree. We can source it to emails, which should be enough, and\nbesides, theories should stand or fall on their own merit." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "If all theorizing intially takes place here on the list then this isn't \na problem, but what if people start writing directly for the wiki? I'm \njust saying that at least I would be interested in knowing who's behind \nthe theories." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "- I agree that it would probably be a good idea to give it a short and\nclear name. OTOH, i also think that it would be pretty cool to call it\n\"Tracking Song\", even it if could be somewhat confusing." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Hmm. Don't get it. Where's that from?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "It's the name of a novella in _The Island of Doctor Death and Other \nStories and Other Stories_.\n\n\n // Jesper" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4461B301.5000303@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "Jesper Svedberg", "address": "jsvedberg at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-10T09:31:45+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "<000a01c673ff$251dc300$433ec6d8@rclackey.stic.net>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Roy C. Lackey skrev:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Jesper wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "- One thing that must be discussed is the problem of the sender. In\nWikipedia, the articles are presented as facts and the sender is\nconsidered secondary, but if someone writes an article theorizing about\na subject in the WolfeWiki, then it might be wise to clearly mark out\nwho the writer/sender is." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "At the very least. I've seen some theories on this List better aired in an\nouthouse. I've made posts I wish I could take back -- but I can't. It's one\nthing to think out loud in public in a relatively small forum such as this,\nbut it's a very different thing to have such thoughts presented with a\npresumption of authority or even credibility to a larger audience. I don't\nknow that much about Wikipedia, but if Whomever's opinions are presented\nthere as facts, then it is useless as an authority, and I could never in\ngood conscience cite it as such. Democracy is a wonderful ideal, but not all\nopinions are equal." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "This is what I'm talking about when I want to separate theory from fact. \nYou are right that in some (perhaps many) cases, it isn't clear where \nthe line goes between speculation and what can be agreed upon as being a \nfact, but considering how wild some of the theories here are it's at \nleast worth trying to keep these two things apart. Maybe it isn't \ninteresting who created a theory, but it's at least interesting to make \nclear that this is one person's idea of how to interpret the text.\n\n\n // Jesper" } ] }, { "message_id": "<200605100731.20698.ddjones@riddlemaster.org>", "from": { "name": "Daniel D Jones", "address": "ddjones at riddlemaster.org" }, "date": "2006-05-10T11:31:20+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "<4461B301.5000303@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Wednesday 10 May 2006 05:31, Jesper Svedberg wrote:\nRoy C. Lackey skrev:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Jesper wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "- One thing that must be discussed is the problem of the sender. In\nWikipedia, the articles are presented as facts and the sender is\nconsidered secondary, but if someone writes an article theorizing about\na subject in the WolfeWiki, then it might be wise to clearly mark out\nwho the writer/sender is." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "At the very least. I've seen some theories on this List better aired in\nan outhouse. I've made posts I wish I could take back -- but I can't.\nIt's one thing to think out loud in public in a relatively small forum\nsuch as this, but it's a very different thing to have such thoughts\npresented with a presumption of authority or even credibility to a larger\naudience. I don't know that much about Wikipedia, but if Whomever's\nopinions are presented there as facts, then it is useless as an\nauthority, and I could never in good conscience cite it as such.\nDemocracy is a wonderful ideal, but not all opinions are equal." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "This is what I'm talking about when I want to separate theory from fact.\nYou are right that in some (perhaps many) cases, it isn't clear where\nthe line goes between speculation and what can be agreed upon as being a\nfact, but considering how wild some of the theories here are it's at\nleast worth trying to keep these two things apart. Maybe it isn't\ninteresting who created a theory, but it's at least interesting to make\nclear that this is one person's idea of how to interpret the text." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "This is one of the advantages of a Wiki. If you read something presented as \nfact that you feel isn't proven, just do a quick edit to insert a few \"Some \npeople think...\" and \"It can be argued that...\" type statements." } ] }, { "message_id": "<1f7617370605121642n63ca796bi4157958940c43082@mail.gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-12T23:42:25+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Onomastipedia?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 5/12/06, Matthew King wrote:\n\nOn May 9, 2006, at 12:38 PM, maru dubshinki wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "We also need a name. Lupinepedia, Wolfepedia, the Wolfe Wiki, the urth\nWiki, just plain Urth.net... are all possible names." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "A punny name based on a two-bit word Wolfe uses in Shadow of the\nTorturer:\n\nUrticate\n\nSometimes, after reading a contentious thread in this list, I feel\nlike I've been urticated.\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Matthew King", "address": "automatthew at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-13T01:25:43+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On May 9, 2006, at 12:38 PM, maru dubshinki wrote:\nWe also need a name. Lupinepedia, Wolfepedia, the Wolfe Wiki, the urth\nWiki, just plain Urth.net... are all possible names." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "A punny name based on a two-bit word Wolfe uses in Shadow of the \nTorturer:\n\nUrticate\n\nSometimes, after reading a contentious thread in this list, I feel \nlike I've been urticated." } ] }, { "message_id": "<39A5C414-1455-44E1-B3D1-4B7818710AB6@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "Matthew King", "address": "automatthew at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-13T01:51:41+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "<1f7617370605121642n63ca796bi4157958940c43082@mail.gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On May 12, 2006, at 4:42 PM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:\n\nOn 5/12/06, Matthew King wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "On May 9, 2006, at 12:38 PM, maru dubshinki wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "We also need a name. Lupinepedia, Wolfepedia, the Wolfe Wiki, the \nurth\nWiki, just plain Urth.net... are all possible names." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "A punny name based on a two-bit word Wolfe uses in Shadow of the\nTorturer:\n\nUrticate\n\nSometimes, after reading a contentious thread in this list, I feel\nlike I've been urticated." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Onomastipedia?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I retract my suggestion in favor of Dan'l's" } ] }, { "message_id": "<1f7617370605131636t36d5532ck4dd2ec7290737b63@mail.gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-13T23:36:56+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "<39A5C414-1455-44E1-B3D1-4B7818710AB6@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Why, thank you!" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 5/12/06, Matthew King wrote:\n\nOn May 12, 2006, at 4:42 PM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "On 5/12/06, Matthew King wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "On May 9, 2006, at 12:38 PM, maru dubshinki wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 4, "text": "We also need a name. Lupinepedia, Wolfepedia, the Wolfe Wiki, the\nurth\nWiki, just plain Urth.net... are all possible names." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "A punny name based on a two-bit word Wolfe uses in Shadow of the\nTorturer:\n\nUrticate\n\nSometimes, after reading a contentious thread in this list, I feel\nlike I've been urticated." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Onomastipedia?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I retract my suggestion in favor of Dan'l's\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4466F089.5080306@charter.net>", "from": { "name": "JWillard", "address": "aldenweer at charter.net" }, "date": "2006-05-14T08:55:37+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "maru dubshinki wrote:\nI've been thinking about this for a while, and I think any wiki we\nstart on Wolfe's work should be categorized tripartitely:\n\nOne section should be for Urth ML emails. This would make it much\neasier to reference assertions and theories, especially since it seems\nthat a number of messages are primary sources, not merely secondary\nsources. And of course, if they are hosted on the wiki itself, one\ncould run a bot or some sort of bot to auto-link phrases to their\npages. (Now that I think of it, one could compile a list of words,\nphrases, and subjects from the mass of texts). I'm not too sure about\nthe copyright status, however: I'm pretty sure the list owner can\nallow them to be posted on a wiki (since he already has the right to\nso post them in a publicly accessible archive), but I don't know how\nthat factors into reditributions and licensing. So having a separate\nsection would allow us to segregate non-Free content from the Free\ncontent.\n\nThe second section would be articles. Straightforward factual articles\non Wolfe, relevant authors, his books and short stories, etc. Think\nlike what Wikipedia currently has. I guess we could import Wikipedia\npolicies wholesale for this section: verifiable, NPOV, no personal\nattacks, etc. This section we could grab straight from Wikipedia.\nAbout all we'd have to do is add a GFDL notice (assuming we decide to\ngo with a non-GFDL license, or cross-license) and perhaps swap out\ninternal Wikipedia links for interwiki links. Of course, these\narticles would link (perhaps in the relevant sections) to the third\nsection... which is the section of interest to us all:\n\nThe third section would be distilled discussions and theories. The\nidea is to condense all the verbiage and back and forth into a single\npage of pros and cons (ie. the evidence that, say, Thecla is the\nhermaphrodite lover of the Autarch would be presented on its own page,\nperhaps titled \"Theclas as hermaphrodite\"; the evidence for it would\nbe presented, linking to the relevant emails, with textual citations\nand such, and then the opposed side. Talk pages can be used to hammer\nout the list, or it can be done on-list.)\n\nCategories could be very useful for sections two and three. An\noff-the-cuff example: A top-level category could be Authors, with Gene\nWolfe in it, and then Books and Short Stories in the Wolfe cat, books\nbeing divided into Short Sun, New Sun, Peace, Soldier etc. categories.\nThen one has the articles on the individual novels. If a character\nappears in all the books, and so doesn't fit into a single book's\ncategory, they would go in the New Sun category, but minor characters\ncould go into only one book's category (ie. Triskele would go into the\nNew Sun cat, but the serving boy at the restaurant in SotT would be in\nthe Shadow of the Torturer cat (if that's the right book)).\n\nNow, no doubt someone will suggest that the wiki host the various\nWolfe interviews and miscellany available online. I won't address\nthese: technically those are copyright violations (at least, I haven't\nseen any under any sort of Free license), and so it would be\nunconscionable for me to advise Ranjit to set up a wiki and work to\npopulate it with stuff that exposes him, the hoster, to legal\nretribution. Now, perhaps he doesn't mind the risk, or perhaps Wolfe\nhas made known an intention not to prosecute any fans, but it's up to\nRanjit, not me, or us, for that matter.\n\nWe also need a name. Lupinepedia, Wolfepedia, the Wolfe Wiki, the urth\nWiki, just plain Urth.net... are all possible names. Now, the perfect\nname would be short, clever, clear, and be easily compressed (ie names\nbased on Urth or Wolfe are good, as they make it easy to refer to, and\nthey also make interwiki links from, say, Wikipedia, easy to do, so\nthey look like [[w:c:Wolfe:Article|Article]] or\n[[Urth:Article|Article]] instead of something much longer). Just some\nthoughts.\n\nWe also need to decide on licensing. Using the GFDL is a possibility\nbut there are severe drawbacks that may more than counterwiegh the\nease of using Wikipedia articles as a base: it's long, complex,\ncumbersome, unclear, and there are some bad features. I'll provide\nsome links for further reading, if you want to know more:\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Free_Documentation_License#Criticisms_of_the_GFDL\nhttp://wikitravel.org/en/Wikitravel:Why_Wikitravel_isn%27t_GFDL\nhttp://home.twcny.rr.com/nerode/neroden/fdl.html\nhttp://people.debian.org/~srivasta/Position_Statement.xhtml\n\nThere are quite a few possibilities w/r/t Free license. We could use \na modified BSD license (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BSD_license), a\nCreative Commons license (I like the Attribution-SA myself:\nhttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/1.0/), or a public domain\nlicense (no rights reserved, essentially). My personal preference\nwould be to go with PD; it's simple, it's definitely Free, and it's\nnot like we really need the protections of copyleft- who'll steal our\ncontent? And of course, if we decide to merge with Wikipedia some\nday, PD interoperates well with GFDL.\n\nOk. So those are my thoughts on the subject. Look forward to hearing\nyour comments and criticism.\n\n~maru\n\"A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the\nbalances are correct.\"\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<415.1a86d9e.3198825b@aol.com>", "from": { "name": "Anjruu at aol.com", "address": "anjruu at aol.com" }, "date": "2006-05-14T12:53:47+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "<4466F089.5080306@charter.net>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Hi. I was wondering if it might be possible to compile a dictionary-esque of \nall the esoteric words used by Wolfe in his various books on the wiki. \nActually, a compilation of interesting and esoteric words would be fun, regardless \nof their connection to Wolfe's works. I am not sure if this would be \nfeasible, even desirable, because dictionary.com would have many of them, but I \nthink even just putting together the choices would be an adventure. People could \nsubmit in proposals via the mailing list. \n \n-Anjruu" } ] }, { "message_id": "<44678FFA.3070805@bitterman.net>", "from": { "name": "Thomas Bitterman", "address": "tom at bitterman.net" }, "date": "2006-05-14T20:15:54+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Matthew King wrote:\nOn May 9, 2006, at 12:38 PM, maru dubshinki wrote:\n\n " }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "We also need a name. Lupinepedia, Wolfepedia, the Wolfe Wiki, the urth\nWiki, just plain Urth.net... are all possible names.\n " }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "A punny name based on a two-bit word Wolfe uses in Shadow of the \nTorturer:\n\nUrticate\n\nSometimes, after reading a contentious thread in this list, I feel \nlike I've been urticated.\n_______________________________________________\n\n " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Lectern of the Anagnosts?\n\nenamel" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "mournings glory", "address": "mourningsglory at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-14T20:34:19+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "<44678FFA.3070805@bitterman.net>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "On May 9, 2006, at 12:38 PM, maru dubshinki wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "We also need a name. Lupinepedia, Wolfepedia, the Wolfe Wiki, the urth\nWiki, just plain Urth.net... are all possible names." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Man bytes Wolfe?\n\n\nemily" } ] }, { "message_id": "<000801c677be$ba855670$b5f15a18@VALUED664B84C7>", "from": { "name": "Joe Smulkstis", "address": "jismulkstis at nyc.rr.com" }, "date": "2006-05-15T01:27:27+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "\"And who else would get it?\"\n\nPossibly the BTK killer and others like him.\n\nI suggest avoiding obscurity and going for \"WolfeWiki\" or \n\"GeneWolfeWiki\". It might be more easily located by people \ninterested in Gene Wolfe, and that would be a good thing." } ] }, { "message_id": "<1f7617370605141918h16ddd580y240e756adba16a9d@mail.gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-15T02:18:10+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "<000801c677be$ba855670$b5f15a18@VALUED664B84C7>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The man has a point." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 5/14/06, Joe Smulkstis wrote:\n\n\n\"And who else would get it?\"\n\nPossibly the BTK killer and others like him.\n\nI suggest avoiding obscurity and going for \"WolfeWiki\" or\n\"GeneWolfeWiki\". It might be more easily located by people\ninterested in Gene Wolfe, and that would be a good thing.\n\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "maru dubshinki", "address": "marudubshinki at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-15T06:14:14+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "<415.1a86d9e.3198825b@aol.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 5/14/06, Anjruu at aol.com wrote:\n\n Hi. I was wondering if it might be possible to compile a dictionary-esque\nof all the esoteric words used by Wolfe in his various books on the wiki.\nActually, a compilation of interesting and esoteric words would be fun,\nregardless of their connection to Wolfe's works. I am not sure if this would\nbe feasible, even desirable, because dictionary.com would have many of\nthem, but I think even just putting together the choices would be an\nadventure. People could submit in proposals via the mailing list.\n -Anjruu" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "You'll definitely want to look into Castle of the Otter, then, if you\nhaven't already. A lot of those words generalize to other books.\n\n~maru" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "maru dubshinki", "address": "marudubshinki at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-15T07:20:31+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "<000a01c673ff$251dc300$433ec6d8@rclackey.stic.net>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "\\On 5/10/06, Roy C. Lackey wrote:\n\nJesper wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "- Theories and facts should be clearly separated. If there are\ntheories about a subject, there should be a \"Theories\" section in the\narticle with short descriptions of the theories and links to the\nseparate articles." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "What is fictive fact and what is theory -- and who decides? Is it a fact\nthat Weer is dead, or that Dorcas is Severian's grandmother? These two\ncases\nare not that controversial; consensus is that they are facts, but that is\nonly a consensus. Did Weer really have constructed such an edifice as his\nMemory House, or did it exist only in his head? It's been argued both\nways.\nFact or theory?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "There are always going to be boundary problems, Roy. I don't think they're\nserious enough to really be an impediment.\n\n[snip]" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "- One thing that must be discussed is the problem of the sender. In\nWikipedia, the articles are presented as facts and the sender is\nconsidered secondary, but if someone writes an article theorizing about\na subject in the WolfeWiki, then it might be wise to clearly mark out\nwho the writer/sender is." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "At the very least. I've seen some theories on this List better aired in an\nouthouse. I've made posts I wish I could take back -- but I can't. It's\none\nthing to think out loud in public in a relatively small forum such as\nthis,\nbut it's a very different thing to have such thoughts presented with a\npresumption of authority or even credibility to a larger audience. I don't\nknow that much about Wikipedia, but if Whomever's opinions are presented\nthere as facts, then it is useless as an authority, and I could never in\ngood conscience cite it as such. Democracy is a wonderful ideal, but not\nall\nopinions are equal." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Well, why would we bother summarizing such posts into a wiki article if they\nwere so truly excreable?\n\n-Roy" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "~maru" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "maru dubshinki", "address": "marudubshinki at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-15T07:26:20+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "<4461B003.9080901@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 5/10/06, Jesper Svedberg wrote:\n\nHm, you seem to have recieved my original mail, but I didn't get a copy.\nStrange. Anyway, I apologize for the double posting." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Perhaps you sent it straight to me?\n\nmaru dubshinki skrev:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "On 5/9/06, Jesper Svedberg wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "- I don't think it's necessary to put these articles in different\ncategories based on which work they appear in, it should be enough to\ncreate structure by linking the articles in a careful fashion (you could\nhave an article called \"Characters in TBotNS\" filled with links the\nseparate articles) and by clearly stating in the articles where the\npersons/objects appear." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Well, why not? Links are great, but there are some things categories\nare just better at. See alsos can grow awfully long, you know." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "OK, after looking around Wikipedia I see that they have a pretty nice\nsystem for categories. Putting a [[Category:The Soldier Series]] in the\nthe article on Hypereides is good way of doing it, but when you\ninitially mentioned categories I thought you wanted to separate the\narticles in different directories (such as\nhttp://www.wolfewiki.org/wiki/soldier/Hypereides), and that I think\nwould be a bad idea." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Oh, no, no. That's a rather restrictive hierarchy- categories on Wikipedia\nand as I was thinking of them resemble more directed graphs (\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directed_graph) than strict single inheritance\nhierarchies." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Yes, we could use external links, but those have the problem of being\nboth more unreliable *and* harder to use than wikilinks. There are\nmore subtle reasons to prefer internal links to external links, but\nthey're hard to talk about.\n\nWell, the Wikipedia seems to manage. When it comes to the mailing list\narchives, you could copy it to the wiki (or preferably to a parallell\nwiki (I think the mailing list should be clearly separated from the\ngeneral wiki in a way that allows for no confusion as to what belongs\nwhere), but it seems a lot of work for very little gain. To link to a\nmail you still have to search for it and either copy the wiki name for\nit (I suppose one would have to give the mailing list postings\nindividual ID numbers) or the URL and then paste it in one's article.\nMaybe it is much easier to search in another wiki to find the posting\nand the copy the ID number, but it doesn't seem like that great a\ndifference to me." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "You could well be right. I've never seen a similar scheme proposed or\ncarried out, so empirical data is a wee bit lacking. No way but to try?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "- One thing that must be discussed is the problem of the sender. In\nWikipedia, the articles are presented as facts and the sender is\nconsidered secondary, but if someone writes an article theorizing about\na subject in the WolfeWiki, then it might be wise to clearly mark out\nwho the writer/sender is.\n\nI disagree. We can source it to emails, which should be enough, and\nbesides, theories should stand or fall on their own merit." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "If all theorizing intially takes place here on the list then this isn't\na problem, but what if people start writing directly for the wiki? I'm\njust saying that at least I would be interested in knowing who's behind\nthe theories." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Well, that's an interesting problem. All wikis should be blessed by such\nproblems. But most discussion would ideally take place on the Talk pages, so\nI guess one would then start citing talk pages? (Which would be a bad thing\non Wikipedia, where one is supposed to eschew self-references, but I don't\nthat is such a good guidelines for us.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "- I agree that it would probably be a good idea to give it a short and\nclear name. OTOH, i also think that it would be pretty cool to call it\n\"Tracking Song\", even it if could be somewhat confusing.\n\n\nHmm. Don't get it. Where's that from?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "It's the name of a novella in _The Island of Doctor Death and Other\nStories and Other Stories_." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "D'oh. I should've gotten that.\n\n// Jesper" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "~maru" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "maru dubshinki", "address": "marudubshinki at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-15T07:28:02+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 5/12/06, Matthew King wrote:\n\n\nOn May 9, 2006, at 12:38 PM, maru dubshinki wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "We also need a name. Lupinepedia, Wolfepedia, the Wolfe Wiki, the urth\nWiki, just plain Urth.net... are all possible names." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "A punny name based on a two-bit word Wolfe uses in Shadow of the\nTorturer:\n\nUrticate\n\nSometimes, after reading a contentious thread in this list, I feel\nlike I've been urticated." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Unfortunately, that's already taken. See the rather nice urticator.net\n\n~maru" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "maru dubshinki", "address": "marudubshinki at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-15T07:30:53+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "<4466F089.5080306@charter.net>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 5/14/06, JWillard wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "How about theoubliette-wiki? (OED says: \"A secret dungeon, access to\nwhich was gained only through a trapdoor above...\") It seems we've all\nfallen into this particular oubliette. And Wolfe mentions its\netymological significance as \"a place of forgetting\" - which seems\nappropriately ironic for a venture trying to do the opposite. And who\nelse would get it?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I don't really like that one. The meanings certainly are nice, but the word\nis too damn long.\n\nMaru, you've asked about what kind of licensing we want. If you think" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "public domain is all right (I agree, I don't think lots of people will\nbe interested in what we're doing) then, fine. It sounds like Wikia\nwants a large audience to establish a wiki, and I don't know that we can\nprovide that." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Alright, so that's two people for public domain.\n\nI was wondering if we could do something like the portals at wikipedia:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "instead of Ancient Greece Portal, we could have an Urth Portal, Whorl\nPortal, Latro Portal, etc. It seems to me that, optimally, any one of\nthese areas is begging for a tremendous amount of information, because I\nthink, ultimately, we're talking about having a page for every Wolfe\ncharacter, every Wolfe creature, flower, building, etc., every key\nconcept (White Fountain, fuligin, etc.), and every theory (Severian's\nlineage; Thecla as Secret Protagonist; Severian Clones, etc.) - and\nthat's just Urth. I'm sure people will want the same for The Wizard\nKnight, Peace, Fifth Head of Cerberus, etc. (I do.) If I'm just\nreiterating something you've already proposed, I apologize. But it\nseems to me we're talking about a potentially massive amount of stuff\nand will need to be laid out to accomodate that. It seems to me the\nmain page of the entire wiki should focus on Wolfe: links to categories\nlike biography, influences (I'd like to see more on connections between\nhis work and Nabokov's, for example), bibliography, etc. and to the\nportals for the different books/series? I don't know: I'm tired and\nI'm probably just babbling a bunch of obvious things.\n\nJason" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Of course we can do Portals- I believe they are a general Mediawiki\nfeature. But they require a lot of content to be really useful, and so it's\na bit premature IMO to discuss'em.\n\n~maru" } ] }, { "message_id": "<000a01c6784b$d9620d80$ac3ec6d8@rclackey.stic.net>", "from": { "name": "Roy C. Lackey", "address": "rclackey at stic.net" }, "date": "2006-05-15T18:17:31+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "maru wrote:\nWell, why would we bother summarizing such posts into a wiki article if\nthey were so truly excreable?<<" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Different people have differing thresholds of credulity. \n\nIs that how it's going to be done -- summarizing posts? Let me spell out my\nconcerns, which are primarily related to this list's archives.\n\nMost posts have a narrow focus. Some people try harder than others; some\npeople have done their homework and some have not. The wheel is constantly\nbeing reinvented. The sheer volume of the list archives is daunting to\nconsume, and few of us have eidetic memories. I read the archives before I\never posted, but they were much smaller seven years ago. Trying to separate\nthe wheat from the chaff is very difficult, and it's not all the fault of\nthe search engine; it's the nature of the posts. Even trying to follow the\nthread of a single subject line is often fruitless, because what started off\nas topic A often devolves to topics D and E, which have little or nothing to\ndo with A.\n\nThere have been many thousands of posts made which contain a lot of\nredundant verbiage. I don't see any practical way to sift out what may be\nworth repeating (in regards to the Urth List) in another forum, but if it\nisn't filtered some way then all you have is what already exists -- the\nchaos that is the archives.\n\nWho's going to do the summarizing? It seems to me that it would require a\nhell of a lot of time and work. Are summarized theories harvested from the\narchives going to do justice to the originals, and will the respective\nauthors be consulted beforehand?\n\n-Roy" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "maru dubshinki", "address": "marudubshinki at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-17T07:16:03+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "<000a01c6784b$d9620d80$ac3ec6d8@rclackey.stic.net>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "n 5/15/06, Roy C. Lackey wrote:\nmaru wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "Well, why would we bother summarizing such posts into a wiki article if\nthey were so truly excreable?<<" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Different people have differing thresholds of credulity. " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Heh. Well, one lamentable process we could always import from\nWikipedia is deletion." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Is that how it's going to be done -- summarizing posts? Let me spell out my\nconcerns, which are primarily related to this list's archives." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I'd say so, yeah. The posts/archives are the most comprehensive source\nI can imagine, short of a complete electronic copy of Wolfe's corpus,\nor possibly all the critical literature on Wolfe combined, and they\ncertainly are more acessible." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Most posts have a narrow focus. Some people try harder than others; some\npeople have done their homework and some have not. The wheel is constantly\nbeing reinvented. The sheer volume of the list archives is daunting to\nconsume, and few of us have eidetic memories. I read the archives before I\never posted, but they were much smaller seven years ago. Trying to separate\nthe wheat from the chaff is very difficult, and it's not all the fault of\nthe search engine; it's the nature of the posts. Even trying to follow the\nthread of a single subject line is often fruitless, because what started off\nas topic A often devolves to topics D and E, which have little or nothing to\ndo with A." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "All good arguments for a wiki. Articles and pages can remain focussed,\nand can summarize, as threads and posting just cannot." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "There have been many thousands of posts made which contain a lot of\nredundant verbiage. I don't see any practical way to sift out what may be\nworth repeating (in regards to the Urth List) in another forum, but if it\nisn't filtered some way then all you have is what already exists -- the\nchaos that is the archives." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Any practical way? Mm. It won't be easy, but what's the alternative?\nThe longer we wait, the worse the problem gets. And waiting for an AI\nto be developed to sort everything out for us is a wee bit\nimpraticable." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Who's going to do the summarizing? It seems to me that it would require a\nhell of a lot of time and work. Are summarized theories harvested from the\narchives going to do justice to the originals, and will the respective\nauthors be consulted beforehand?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I suppose I'll have to do the summarizing... :( Along with the others\nwho have expressed support. But I don't think it's as bad as you\nthink. There's a lot of repetition, one can steer clear of off-topic\nthreads (which cuts down on bulk considerably) the Internet is fast\n(and the archives can be downloaded), and if you're scanning for\nevidence for and against one particular theory, one can move fast.\nBesides, it only takes a little work each day. No hurry. Not like once\nWolfe is dead, we can't continue to discuss or work on the wiki. I\nhave yet to see a finished wiki...\nAs for authors- it'd be nice to consult them. They know what they\nmeant best, usually. But that seems problematic in some cases (does\nanyone know where Mantis got off to, for example?), and so probably\nshouldn't be a requirement." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "-Roy" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "~maru" } ] }, { "message_id": "<1138AEE9-C3E2-4090-ACD2-EBDDD5CEF73A@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "Matthew King", "address": "automatthew at gmail.com" }, "date": "2006-05-20T01:47:21+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wiki draft proposal", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The domain names lupiverse.com and lupiverse.net do not appear to be \nregistered at this time. Does the community have an interest in \ngrabbing one or both?" } ] } ] }