User talk:Jimbo Wales - Misplaced Pages

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Now over 20 million all-language articles

UPDATE: We have finally exceeded 20 million articles (counting all other-language Wikipedias). Current live count: 64,191,299 articles (all-languages). The total is equivalent to a full encyclopedia for every day of the year, as 366 encyclopedias of about 22-volume size. The growth was accelerated by an unexpected 37,000 more articles in recent weeks.

To speed-read 20 million articles, non-stop, at 1 article per minute, 24/7 and 365.25 days per year, would require 38 years, assuming 1-minute fluency in all the 282(?) Misplaced Pages languages. Separately, English WP growth is still on track to reach 4 million articles in June 2012 (+930 per day).

How many printed volumes? Using the size-data which concluded the average article size as 562 words (in January 2010), the count of printed volumes (all languages) would be 8,189:

{{#expr: 20033000*562 / (1375000) + .5 round 0}} = 8189

That equates to 366 sets of 22-volume encyclopedias (plus index), or 40.9 bookracks (each, 10 shelves of 20 volumes). So, year 2011 was the year Misplaced Pages size exceeded 1 traditional encyclopedia for every day of the year. -Wikid77 (talk) 13:45, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Would love to have some kind of images/illustrations around this.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 13:52, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

August 2010 version of wikipedia looked like this. (Scroll across to see full shelf) ♦ Dr. Blofeld 14:24, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps create a diagram of 37 bookcases: Show a library room with 6 bookracks, each as a row with 6 bookcases, where a bookcase contains 10 encyclopedias (1 per shelf). Then have a 37th bookcase with 6 shelves, as 36*10 + 6 = 366 shelves of traditional encyclopedias. Meanwhile, a visual approximation would be 3 repetitions of the diagram for the August-2010 enwiki. Those 3 show a total of 7,938 volumes (97% of the current 8,189 volumes), as shown below:

Misplaced Pages without illustrations: The above 3 rows of bookcases show the general size of a printed WP containing the 20 million all-language articles, in over 8,189 volumes (282 languages). Those volumes omit the illustrations, so a more accurate library size might be 30%(?) more volumes, or perhaps a 4th row of bookcases if the printed articles included illustrations as medium-sized images (rather than smaller thumbnail images).

Overall, I think the above picture conveys the idea of an overwhelming number of printed volumes, if the 20 million all-language articles were kept in library bookcases. Of course, the use of illustrations, animations, video files, and audio sound clips is not shown in the above picture. -Wikid77 (talk) 20:44, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Taking the average for size is a too optimistic. Try using mode. My guess is it will be lower. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 15:46, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Expect more volumes if showing infoboxes/navboxes: If a typical article is much smaller than 562 words, then that is great because the imagined volumes (shown above) are omitting infoboxes, navboxes and tables which appear in over a million articles (infoboxes on 997,000 pages). I think we are about right for the size of stubs in the 65,000+ footballer articles, where the footballer-infobox makes the article appear to be about ~50 lines of 12-words-per-line (600 words total); see "Doug Bergqvist" in Category:Swedish footballers. Remember the book volumes are showing the area of a printed article (as a block of text with 562 words), so stubs with infoboxes cover that amount of printed area. Plus, remember that every WP article displays 2 extra bottom lines: for Categories, and "This page was last modified on 9 October 2011 at 23:12." (as lines 49/50 of 48-line articles). That time-stamp is great for knowing if an article has not been updated, yet, for major recent events. I could only wish that printed encyclopedias time-stamped when each article was last edited in the year's volume set. However, all those size concerns are interesting: a real printed Misplaced Pages would be, at least, 20% larger (another row of bookcases) for article pages to have menus in the margins: imagine a "printed book" with side buttons for "Help" or "Recent changes" to see which 500 articles are being updated for current events, or a "Search" button to hunt articles containing a copy/paste word from the current printed page. I am concluding that a real "printed Misplaced Pages" would be at least 5 rows of bookcases for articles with illustrations and wider "button" margins to hold "click-notes" which state other topics to look-up or other-language pages to show. It really isn't a printed "Misplaced Pages" if the reader cannot see the other languages which article "Tokyo" has available. So, consider having 5 large rows of bookcases for that printed, illustrated WP which lists other-language versions at each article page. -Wikid77 (talk) 06:48, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Sorry to Bother You

Hello, there, Mr. Wales, and I'm sorry to bother you, as I know you're a very busy man. One of the smaller articles in Misplaced Pages is one that I've hand-raised myself, much like the subject of the article, Kayavak, a beluga whale at Shedd Aquarium.. User:Qwyrxian suggests that 70% of the article needs to be rewritten, and that it may have to be significantly cut. I know you probably won't fret over such a small article. But please, look at it yourself, and tell me how it can be improved, if you may. Thank you, Mr. Wales, and good day. --Belugaboy 12:58, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I will leave space for Jimbo to answer, above, but recently he has been very busy. Meanwhile, some of us other editors have added notes and sources (from the Chicago Tribune) into article "Kayavak" as examples for updating the sourced text. It is an interesting article because the multi-year sources cover the whale's life from birth to age 12 now, and have described reactions to other whales at the Oceanarium. Similar articles (such as a page about "Horse communications") provide indepth information that is difficult to find, combined, on the Internet at large. -Wikid77 (talk) 05:34, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

BBC Culture Show

I have just watched your short, but illuminating interview. I wished my windows had been rattled by the thrust of Saturn V rockets when I was a boy :-) Graham Colm (talk) 18:31, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Donations.

Hello, these donation ads are getting tiring. Please out of respect to your members, consider removing these ads. These volunteers do enough work by writing these articles, then you ask them to write code for you like the coding event that was just held, you ask them for storytelling services. Please pay these people, rather than continuing to ask them of this. I know not all of the blame should be upon you as it should also respectively be upon the WMF, but you are the owner. Regardless, thank you for your service for the largest encyclopedia on the net. As it regards, 66.116.153.66 (talk) 21:06, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

We look forward to your pending membership :-) (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 21:07, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm not the owner. :) --Jimbo Wales (talk) 07:47, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Recent activity at Verifiability policy page and talk

Closing this discussion in the interests of harmony. Sarek's close was a good close, but I see no harm emerging from allowing the RfC to run a few more days. I think SV should take a break from this issue.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
FYI. There was an RFC on a proposal that began on Oct 5 re WP:V. The RFC had the participation of about a hundred editors. About 8 hours ago it was closed as successful by an administrator and the changes were implemented in WP:V. Since then, the changes have been reverted. A couple of hours ago there began intense activity opposing the proposal, after this edit. --Bob K31416 (talk) 00:42, 29 October 2011 (UTC) Hi, Jimbo. I was just coming over myself, because I'm very distressed at what's going on. (I was the admin who did the close.)--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 01:40, 29 October 2011 (UTC) Reminder: Well, I am not convinced that moving "verifiability, not truth" to be lower in the policy page was really a helpful, significant change. What people should understand is that the word "verifiability" requires "truth in representing sources", plus some sources are not correct, so "truth" is an aspect required to judge accurate sources (articles should not cite known false, out-dated sources). Hence, the broader reality is "verifiability and truth" (while the word "not" has been misleading for years). Meanwhile, the phrase "verifiability-not-truth" sounds like convoluted "Yoda-speak" (Yoda: "Do, or do not; there is no "try"), so even when people do not gag about verifiability requiring truth ("verity"), some viewers will read the "verifiability-not-truth" phrase and think, "WTF??" (trendy term for "sounds like utter patent nonsense"). I can appreciate a compromise, to lower the "not-truth" phrase further down into the policy, but "Can't we all just get along" with reality, and accept the fact that Misplaced Pages is in the truth business? -Wikid77 (talk) 17:30, 29 October 2011 (UTC) You make some good points, but you also miss a few (possibly though due to how obvious they are). Articles should be permitted to cite known false/outdated sources. It's how they are used that's important. I can point out thousands of articles where it is required to cite such sources. One example is Flat_Earth. Besides reasons such as applicable to that article, often, to show historical changes in perceptions and understandings, it is also required to cite incorrect/outdated sources (grossly paraphrased made up example: "In the 1500's scientists believed (some item we believe to be nonsense now){incorrect/outdated cite}, which was later proved to be false{newer cite with current beliefs/theories}"). And of course, truth is often largely irrelevant when beliefs, belief systems and such come into play. In those instances, since for each belief system there are dozens or thousands of conflicting ones, we cannot determine truth, but can simply only posit what each believes without giving weight to which is "true". These are some of the key reasons why verifiability is more important than our own individual "truths". It's one of the reasons that "v... not t..." is so important. Numerous (many many many) Misplaced Pages articles are comprised of way too many beliefs that have counter-beliefs and no universally held "truths". Even the same goes for BLPs, where all we have is what's reported, which is at best just a shadow of the truth. Of course, in those situations, it again boils down to properly using all sources; correct or incorrect, outdated or new. If BillyBob made (notable) claims about MarySue, which were later proved to be false, they still (sources and all) should be included - but with the new information and cites presented as well. Of course, that gets back to weighing the notability and relevance of each. Simple point is, it's far more complex than "old vs new" or "incorrect vs correct". It's a balancing act that needs to be encompassed by numerous other policies and guidelines to determine how such is applied in each article. And with a lot of NPOV and BALANCE (not bias) applied to ensure due weight to each individually and conflicting views as a whole. At least, those are my thoughts. One last thought. Too many people seem to pick apart one single policy or guideline in an effort to improve it without looking at the bigger picture to realize that one cannot do that without determining how it affects the interaction of that policy/guideline with the numerous others we are required to adhere to. Best, ROBERTMFROMLI \| /_CN 17:54, 29 October 2011 (UTC) Overcomplicating issues can obscure the role of truth: I agree there is a balance, but when dwelling on "it's far more complex" then there is the danger to overlook the simple factors. It reminds me of the student talking to his parents, "We had a long discussion in philosophy class today, and I no longer know what really exists, perhaps it is all an illusion, and is anything real?" The parents, of course, reply like, "Well, we always thought your car and your allowance were real, but perhaps they no longer exist." Articles should be true to the sources for a specific topic, and the sources should be checked for known factual errors. The key issue is that truth is determined by the collection of sources; when there is a mixed difference of opinions, then that is the limit to the truth of those sources. When people have tried to justify the "verifiability-not-truth" phrase, they use terms such as "no absolute truth" or Misplaced Pages does not seek "The Truth" because that seems to be the heart of the problem (versus truth relative to sources). Instead, when articles are written and copy-edited for corrections, the editors are working with so-called "journalistic truth" where a reporter focuses on what the sources have said or written. That is why "Flat earth" addresses the concept as an out-dated mode of thinking (compared to "The earth is round"), and the old sources are used to show that some people formerly believed in that concept, but secondary sources judge the earlier primary sources as having mistaken notions. WP uses secondary sources to give true opinions about the concepts, where possible. For example, a controversy in that topic concerns quoting Greek philosopher Aristotle out-of-context, where he wrote a comparison of the flat-earth and round-earth concepts, but some people used only part of his text to "prove" he believed the earth was flat (not actually), by quoting selected phrases, out-of-context, and omitting the parts where he noted the earth as round. Step 1: Focus on truth, then the next steps involve weighing the sources and avoiding a partial out-of-context quote about a topic. The focus on truth is how slanted text is judged. When a new WP:RS source is published which reports, "The conviction has been overturned", then WP should change the article to reflect the truth, not pretend the conviction stands as verified by an out-dated source. That is how current up-to-date sources are detected as being omitted, and the focus on truth is why an article which omits the acquittal would no longer be viewed as correct. Misplaced Pages is in the truth business, where truth is determined by all the sources, to the extent possible. Beyond that point, the truth is uncertain, but WP articles do not depend on "verifiability-not-truth" in practice, just in policy wording which confuses many people. The focus on truth is how an editor can determine a word is misspelled, versus a variant spelling, and when to append "" to emphasize a misspelled word is truly a direct quote from a source. -Wikid77 (talk) 00:09, 30 October 2011 (UTC) IMHO, a splendid example of how things work all too often on Misplaced Pages -- for a rather different sort of take try reading WP:Ab initio showing an attempt to explain the reasoning behind policies, rather than counting angels on the heads of pins within policies <g>. Cheers. Collect (talk) 00:38, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Closing this discussion in the interests of harmony. Sarek's close was a good close, but I see no harm emerging from allowing the RfC to run a few more days. I think SV should take a break from this issue.

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

FYI. There was an RFC on a proposal that began on Oct 5 re WP:V. The RFC had the participation of about a hundred editors. About 8 hours ago it was closed as successful by an administrator and the changes were implemented in WP:V. Since then, the changes have been reverted. A couple of hours ago there began intense activity opposing the proposal, after this edit. --Bob K31416 (talk) 00:42, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi, Jimbo. I was just coming over myself, because I'm very distressed at what's going on. (I was the admin who did the close.)--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 01:40, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Reminder: Well, I am not convinced that moving "verifiability, not truth" to be lower in the policy page was really a helpful, significant change. What people should understand is that the word "verifiability" requires "truth in representing sources", plus some sources are not correct, so "truth" is an aspect required to judge accurate sources (articles should not cite known false, out-dated sources). Hence, the broader reality is "verifiability and truth" (while the word "not" has been misleading for years). Meanwhile, the phrase "verifiability-not-truth" sounds like convoluted "Yoda-speak" (Yoda: "Do, or do not; there is no "try"), so even when people do not gag about verifiability requiring truth ("verity"), some viewers will read the "verifiability-not-truth" phrase and think, "WTF??" (trendy term for "sounds like utter patent nonsense"). I can appreciate a compromise, to lower the "not-truth" phrase further down into the policy, but "Can't we all just get along" with reality, and accept the fact that Misplaced Pages is in the truth business? -Wikid77 (talk) 17:30, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

You make some good points, but you also miss a few (possibly though due to how obvious they are). Articles should be permitted to cite known false/outdated sources. It's how they are used that's important. I can point out thousands of articles where it is required to cite such sources. One example is Flat_Earth. Besides reasons such as applicable to that article, often, to show historical changes in perceptions and understandings, it is also required to cite incorrect/outdated sources (grossly paraphrased made up example: "In the 1500's scientists believed (some item we believe to be nonsense now){incorrect/outdated cite}, which was later proved to be false{newer cite with current beliefs/theories}").

And of course, truth is often largely irrelevant when beliefs, belief systems and such come into play. In those instances, since for each belief system there are dozens or thousands of conflicting ones, we cannot determine truth, but can simply only posit what each believes without giving weight to which is "true". These are some of the key reasons why verifiability is more important than our own individual "truths". It's one of the reasons that "v... not t..." is so important. Numerous (many many many) Misplaced Pages articles are comprised of way too many beliefs that have counter-beliefs and no universally held "truths". Even the same goes for BLPs, where all we have is what's reported, which is at best just a shadow of the truth. Of course, in those situations, it again boils down to properly using all sources; correct or incorrect, outdated or new. If BillyBob made (notable) claims about MarySue, which were later proved to be false, they still (sources and all) should be included - but with the new information and cites presented as well. Of course, that gets back to weighing the notability and relevance of each.

Simple point is, it's far more complex than "old vs new" or "incorrect vs correct". It's a balancing act that needs to be encompassed by numerous other policies and guidelines to determine how such is applied in each article. And with a lot of NPOV and BALANCE (not bias) applied to ensure due weight to each individually and conflicting views as a whole. At least, those are my thoughts.

One last thought. Too many people seem to pick apart one single policy or guideline in an effort to improve it without looking at the bigger picture to realize that one cannot do that without determining how it affects the interaction of that policy/guideline with the numerous others we are required to adhere to. Best, ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 17:54, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Overcomplicating issues can obscure the role of truth: I agree there is a balance, but when dwelling on "it's far more complex" then there is the danger to overlook the simple factors. It reminds me of the student talking to his parents, "We had a long discussion in philosophy class today, and I no longer know what really exists, perhaps it is all an illusion, and is anything real?" The parents, of course, reply like, "Well, we always thought your car and your allowance were real, but perhaps they no longer exist." Articles should be true to the sources for a specific topic, and the sources should be checked for known factual errors. The key issue is that truth is determined by the collection of sources; when there is a mixed difference of opinions, then that is the limit to the truth of those sources. When people have tried to justify the "verifiability-not-truth" phrase, they use terms such as "no absolute truth" or Misplaced Pages does not seek "The Truth" because that seems to be the heart of the problem (versus truth relative to sources). Instead, when articles are written and copy-edited for corrections, the editors are working with so-called "journalistic truth" where a reporter focuses on what the sources have said or written. That is why "Flat earth" addresses the concept as an out-dated mode of thinking (compared to "The earth is round"), and the old sources are used to show that some people formerly believed in that concept, but secondary sources judge the earlier primary sources as having mistaken notions. WP uses secondary sources to give true opinions about the concepts, where possible. For example, a controversy in that topic concerns quoting Greek philosopher Aristotle out-of-context, where he wrote a comparison of the flat-earth and round-earth concepts, but some people used only part of his text to "prove" he believed the earth was flat (not actually), by quoting selected phrases, out-of-context, and omitting the parts where he noted the earth as round. Step 1: Focus on truth, then the next steps involve weighing the sources and avoiding a partial out-of-context quote about a topic. The focus on truth is how slanted text is judged. When a new WP:RS source is published which reports, "The conviction has been overturned", then WP should change the article to reflect the truth, not pretend the conviction stands as verified by an out-dated source. That is how current up-to-date sources are detected as being omitted, and the focus on truth is why an article which omits the acquittal would no longer be viewed as correct. Misplaced Pages is in the truth business, where truth is determined by all the sources, to the extent possible. Beyond that point, the truth is uncertain, but WP articles do not depend on "verifiability-not-truth" in practice, just in policy wording which confuses many people. The focus on truth is how an editor can determine a word is misspelled, versus a variant spelling, and when to append "" to emphasize a misspelled word is truly a direct quote from a source. -Wikid77 (talk) 00:09, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

IMHO, a splendid example of how things work all too often on Misplaced Pages -- for a rather different sort of take try reading WP:Ab initio showing an attempt to explain the reasoning behind policies, rather than counting angels on the heads of pins within policies <g>. Cheers. Collect (talk) 00:38, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

FUD tactics or admins know best?

After this notice got posted on WP:AN there was a flood of opposes in that WP:V RfC. That's quite interesting sociologically because a notice had been up for nearly month at WP:CENT, which is transcluded on WP:AN. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 17:40, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Oh, and you only have 15 minutes to comment on the issue above before the offer expires!

ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 17:44, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Many editors do not pay attention to WP:CENT on a regular basis. Thus, there is nothing whatsoever unusual about the "flood" of opposes and essentially equal flood of approves. Cheers. Collect (talk) 17:49, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

For policy change proposals, perhaps something similar to what we use for "Gee, we're all getting together in NYC next weekend. Yay!!!" should be used, that way all editors are made aware of such. I understand the importance (and fun) of interacting with the community at such events, but I'd posit that community involvement in potential policy changes is probably a lot more important. And oddly, though rarely used for such, the mechanisms are already in place to ensure such involvement. Best, ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 17:58, 29 October 2011 (UTC)