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Re Wikiverse (There is an interim tally at or near the bottom of the page.)

We don't need articles about Wikipedia mirrors. Especially not about those who do spamming. The editing history of that article already switched between a rant against Wikiverse and a very praising version. andy 20:28, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)

  • [Not a vote (anon)] [Restatement of confusing attempt to vote:] Keep Don't delete: form your own opinion and edit the article if you think it's too praising to to reflect the facts.
  • Andy also seems to be confusing legitimate link notification emails with spamming. How is a non-profit Wikipedia mirror useful if nobody knows about it? I thought spammers were criminals who hijacked PCs, stole bandwidth and flooded our inboxes with a tidal wave of emails with fake headers trying to sell us herbal penis enlargement pills!
    • Per [1] and [2], User:81.218.221.77 closed essentially the above 2-'graph contrib with "[Katz]" before removing that and making minor formatting changes approximately 1 minute later. --Jerzy(t) 22:52, 2004 Aug 10 (UTC)
    • Unauthorized emails are spam, regardless of good will or not. But that is not the topic here, the topic is if Wikiverse is important enough to be worth an article in a encyclopedia, and that it is IMHO not. andy 20:40, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
      • No vote. I swear that I could set a clock to the number of times an anonymous poster arguing to keep an article accused someone here of elitism for wanting to delete it. Please stop calling people names, User:81.218.221.77; it's not bolstering your case, and neither are your rhetorical questions and sarcasm. --Ardonik 04:14, 2004 Aug 8 (UTC)
  • delete non-notable. maybe worth mentioning at Wikipedia:Forks and mirrors. Dunc_Harris|☺ 20:54, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • [not clear enough to be a vote - Duh, already voted [blush].] Yes. Dunc_Harris|☺ 10:29, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • Simple: Wikipedia is not a web directory. Current rule of: Top 1000 of Alexa is notable, everything else must have strong arguments to be notable. And how do you know none of the other mirrors is viable? andy 21:14, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Delete, not notable. Google search: exact phrase "www.wikiverse.org." Result: 8 hits, 5 listed, one from Wikipedia, two from Wikiverse, one from a link exchange site, one real one. "Find pages that link to the page www.wikiverse.org" Results: "Your search - link:www.wikiverse.org - did not match any documents." Apparently nobody links to it, despite invitations to do so. [[User:Dpbsmith|Dpbsmith (talk)]] 21:30, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Del It never ceases to amaze me how people think that, somehow, by offending other people it increases the likelihood that they will get their article kept. Delete. Oh, and you did know that votes by anonymous users are not counted, right? RickK 22:02, Aug 7, 2004 (UTC)
  • Delete, list it on Wikipedia:Mirrors and forks but it's far from significant enough for an encyclopedia article. —Stormie 01:06, Aug 8, 2004 (UTC)
    • [Comment?] Agreed. -Sean Curtin 01:33, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Delete as Wikipedia is not a web guide. A merge and redirect to Wikipedia:Mirrors and forks would be fine. Let controversies associated with this particular service be summarized, hopefully by a new, NPOV, and disinterested hand if it has to be there at all. Geogre 03:02, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Del. Not notable. --Jerzy(t) 04:06, 2004 Aug 8 (UTC)
  • Delete. Ambi 10:27, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Delete.. Twice if possible, once for not understanding Wikipedia principles. --Ianb 15:38, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Delete. Spammer resorts to personal insults - news at 11. Rhobite 21:34, Aug 8, 2004 (UTC)
  • [Not a vote: Anon] [Restatement of confusing attempt to vote:] Keep. Do not delete For people (like me), who receive spam mail from wikiverse, it is very valuable to look up the "wikiverse" entry in wikipedia to find out whether it is a respectable mirror, or just a spammer and hijacker.
    • a) Which category would you judge it to be in, based on the present content of the Wikiverse article?
    • b) Unsigned votes don't count, but in weighing your opinion it would be helpful to me if you'd identify yourself in some way. If you run a website with which Wikiverse has requested a link exchange, perhaps you'd care to identify that site. [[User:Dpbsmith|Dpbsmith (talk)]] 13:41, 9 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep [, as restatement of confusing vote] Do not delete I agree that it's useful to look up who they are, having just received their spam myself. Why is it spam? Because _they_ didn't create the link, they just inherited it, but they pretend they created it and imply that linking back is a requirement to maintain it. (If they had created the link it would be arguably a legitimate link exchange request.) They also have a spurious domain registration, claiming their city is Daganbanga (not found by Google anywhere), their state is Not Applicable, and their zip is 90210 (as in the TV show). Looks like they plan to first establish a presence, then sell advertising or whatever. They also are setting up subdomains for -- in this instance -- an artist in the form of "artistname.wikiverse.org" -- perhaps in a mild way a real service (but are they selling this?), plus they include a search for current press mention of the artist (small added value). So: is there a "scams" section this might be filed under appropriately? WytCld 15:12, 9 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • Hi everyone, in response to WytCld, I'm one of the programmers who helped create Wikiverse. We never expected Wikipedia to be so hostile to what we were doing, and I'm still not sure I understand why. I'd like to set a few things straight.
  1. The first link exchange emails Katz sent were inaccurate in their wording (saying that we added a link), but that was fixed as soon as we noticed people were confused.
  2. The domain registration was not fully accurate to for privacy reasons. The registrar has a privacy option, but the gal who registered the domain figured it would easier to just put in some bogus details. That has been fixed since.
  3. We don't understand why the Wikipedia community is so hostile to Wikiverse. It's the nicest Wikipedia mirror out there. It's non-profit, it has a clean interface, it has an integrated newsfeed.
  4. At this point I don't think there's anything I can say which will convince you we are not the sinister evil spammers you make us out to be. However, for those of you who are not yet biased by baseless accusations I'd like to say: there is no conspiracy, clever scamming or otherwise going on, just a humble little mirror of Wikipedia made some people who love it enough to donate resources to make sure it's always available in one form or another. (Wikipedia is under such a huge load it has been down on numerous occasions)
  5. Why do you hate Wikiverse so much? --Tomco 15:13, 10 Aug 2004 (UTC)
      • Speaking for myself and nobody else... I' don't hate Wikiverse. But based on my own observations, I don't think it's notable enough to be worth an article of its own. A brief mention in an article on Wikipedia mirrors is sufficient. The spam controversy should be mentioned briefly, because there is controversy about it. My own vote remains delete. If and when Wikiverse becomes important, I'd have no objection to an article.
      • By the way, Tomco, as a registered user, you are allowed to vote, which I don't think you've actually done yet. On a new line at the bottom, at the start of the line type an asterisk, then your vote (keep or delete, presumably the former), then sign with four tildes. Perfect formatting is not important, just make it easy for a sysop to spot your vote and determine your intention. VfD is an exercise in forming and determining rough consensus, not parliamentary procedure, so don't worry to much about the exact count and please don't create "sockpuppets" (registering as multiple users to inflate a vote), as Wikipedians really do hate that. Votes can be changed for as long as the discussion proceeds, by the way). [[User:Dpbsmith|Dpbsmith (talk)]] 16:29, 10 Aug 2004 (UTC)
      • I can't judge the site as, at least for the last 15 minutes, it's been down. Niteowlneils 19:03, 10 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Delete. Keep. (I change my vote. See my note below about "shame on me".) Apparently there is sufficient controversy about this new mirror to justify a Wikipedian dialog. It appears to be something more than just a mirror and may bear watching, or perhaps I should say, policing; and the Wikipedia entry is an excellent place for that. I will say that the message I received from Wikiverse, and which ultimately led me here, could in no way be considered spam. It concerned the Glosa language, and proposed an exchange between one of my Glosa pages and the Glosa entry in Wikiverse. Very precise, very relevant. Of the many link exchange requests I've received, I've only accepted one; this may make two. (Unless somebody else here, with no Glosa pages, and not even an interest in auxiliary languages, received the same proposal? Yeah, that could be spam.) The only questionable aspect of the proposal: Linking back to us will also help maintain your link with us in the future.. If Wikiverse is truly a mirror, then I see no way that an exchange could help maintain the link. (WytCld makes some interesting points above. And I too was intrigued by Wikiverse's use of subdomains for every Wikipedian page; an odd technique. Maybe I will wait a bit before linking. See what I mean? Even this VFD dialog about Wikiverse has been useful for me, already!) Ailanto 15:50, 2004 Aug 9 (UTC)
    • I don't want to say this in a way that is unfair to Ailanto, especially since i'll be surprised if they turn out to be a sockpuppet. But, at the cost of singling them out for attention, i'm pointing out that their 3 or 4 editing sessions, with 6 edits, concern
  1. the cryptic user page,
  2. favoring retention in the successful VfD and unsuccessful undelete discussions on Ceqli language, and
  3. this one.
It may be that they just need to request attribution of their anon edits. But they certainly are an unusual and contrarian editor here, and since i noticed the above, i'm drawing attention to that: FWIW, even tho i expect it's worth nothing. --Jerzy(t) 22:52, 2004 Aug 10 (UTC)
      • Thank you, Jerzy! I appreciate the gentle manner in which you raised your concerns. True, I haven't done much work in this Wiki yet. (And may not for some time; I've gotten myself involved in too many things lately! And Wikipediawise, I'd like to focus on the Esperanto and Ido sister sites.) As for my user page, I was influenced by the Ceqli discussion, in which self-promotion was oft cited as a major no-no. I assume that user pages are a special case since they would seem to be inherently self-promotional; mine is about me, after all... unless of course I am simply misunderstanding the purpose of user pages. I proudly accept the label unusual... and contrarian too, though in these cases I think that it would only mean that I'm in the minority, hehe. Ailanto 14:21, 2004 Aug 11 (UTC)
        • Y're welcome, Ail': the comment was specifically meant to be consistent w/ yr taking pride in it; i like to think such attitudes abt such qualities are characteristic of WP, as when my reservation abt being odd elicited "Odd is good" during voting on my adminship. --Jerzy(t) 18:24, 2004 Aug 13 (UTC)
      • ... Hehe! Suddenly it became clear to me! Linking back to us will also help maintain your link with us in the future. "Your link with us" doesn't refer to the link from them to me; it refers to a "link" between us. If I create a link to them, there will still be a link between us even if their link to me disappears. Hehehe. Ailanto 20:13, 2004 Aug 11 (UTC)
        • Hmm, which would ensure you had a way to find them to say "Wha'happened??" when they cut off your traffic. Or they may just mean "when we decide whether to continue linking to you, we'll factor in whether you're sending us traffic." (Which difficulty communicating may be a sign of their being not odd, contrarian or unusual, but just fly-by-night, incompetant, confused, likely to fold, and -- dare i say? -- non-notable.) --Jerzy(t) 19:02, 2004 Aug 13 (UTC)
  • Hi again. Thanks for sticking up for us (in a sense). Your view reflects the crushing non-wikipedia majority. Your point regarding that line in the email is valid, and I've sent an email to Katz regarding that. I'd like you and everyone else to keep watch over wikiverse for as long you it takes you to become convinced there is no cloak and dagger conspiracy going on. --Tomco 15:13, 10 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • The email Wikiverse sent me was to "Webmaster@<one of my domain names>" (with a CC to another username at that domain). There is no LAN associated with that domain name, and no email accounts. Email to made-up user names is clearly an unsolicited electronic message, which, in my mind (and according to m-w.com), is spam. Yes, it is better targetted than most spam--it linked to an article I editted some time ago (even tho' it's a topic I don't really care about)--but it's still spam. Ailanto, et al, using separate domain names for every article just gives them more google presence. Note that the vast majority of the hits for wikiverse are <some topic>.wikiverse.org. Niteowlneils 18:58, 10 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Delete. After reading numerous (many good) arguments on both sides of the aisle, I put it to my own test of keeping Wikipedia reputable: Is it encyclopedic content? No. As valid as some arguments are, this is meant to be an encyclopedia, not a list of warnings, subliminal advertisements, or whatever else this could be used for. It's not encyclopedic, borders on breaking several rules and, in my opinion, is not notable. So I say delete. Skyler 21:40, Aug 9, 2004 (UTC)
  • Delete from the main article space. Spam is an encyclopedic topic. Individual spammers generally are not. If this is spam (obviously still a disputed point), this doesn't make the cut. Might deserve a mention in a more general article about scams involving Wikipedia or in a Meta article. Rossami 16:36, 10 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Delete (see my vote in the comment of 16 Aug 2004 below) (I change my vote after reading Ailanto opinion below and re-reading Geogre post of 03:02, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC). A redirect to Wikipedia:Mirrors and forks should be enough) Keep. [, clarifying confusing vote] Do not delete. Yesterday I was searching for something in Google and Google pointed me a page in Wikiverse. I was curious: "What is this Wikiverse and what is its relationship with Wikipedia?". The best place to find out is in Wikipedia. It would be frustating if Wikipedia did not at least mention what Wikiverse is. Akira - Cleber Akira Nakandakare 15:18, 10 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • [Too vague to be a vote] That's a reasonable argument. And its why we have Wikipedia:Mirrors and forks - so that these (non-)relationships can be explained. There is no need for an encyclopedia article on it yet though - too far from the big time. Pcb21| Pete 19:06, 10 Aug 2004 (UTC)
      • Okay, shame on me. Your comment that "(non-)relationships can be explained prompted me to finally visit Wikipedia:Mirrors and forks and see that it contains lively discussions about those mirrors and forks, not just a list of mirrors and forks which I guess is what I was assuming. That satisfies my concern except for one thing: If I Search for Wikiverse, only the Wikiverse page shows up, not the mirrors/forks page. So, if the Wikiverse page is deleted, and I come here to find out if there's a relationship between Wikipedia and Wikiverse (which is exactly how I ended up here!) and I search for Wikiverse, will I be led to mirrors/forks? Redirect, search results, something? If yes, then I'll definitely change my vote, for deletion. (I probably will anyway. Just hope I don't lose my contrarian status, hehe.) Ailanto
  • Delete This has all been blown way out of proportion. I'd like to point out the only reason the wikiverse article exists is because someone who had felt deceived by the link exchange request created an article that was little more than a rant against wikiverse explaining that we were spamming scumbags who deserved "to die frightened and alone", trying to explain Wikiverse's point of view in the article (biasing it the other way), and the subsequent Vfd flamewar created much more heat then light and the impression something significant was going on in contrary to the facts
  1. We decided to create a non-profit mirror of Wikipedia that was decent, clean and useful.
  2. We made a few mistakes in the way we promoted the mirror that caused a member of the Wikipedia community to become upset and feel they had been deceived and cheated. He wrote the first article.
  3. My response to this article, combined with a mis-understanding of Wikipedia culture eventually created a huge backlash that magnified Wikiverse into something significant and sinister that outraged the Wikipedia community.
  4. For Wikipedians, the closest thing to deleting Wikiverse is to delete the article about Wikiverse.
  5. It would be convenient for Wikiverse to have an article in Wikipedia about itself, where we can have a dialog with Wikipedia and introduce the site.
  6. But I agree logically that if every minor website created an encyclopedia article about itself in Wikipedia, Wikipedia wouldn't really by an encyclopedia anymore.

--Tomco 00:06, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)

  • Delete. The site may be useful, the article isn't. A couple of clarifications. 1. Ailanto: The reason your search for Wikiverse fails is that Wikipedia:Mirrors and forks isn't in the main namespace; if you click the "Wikipedia" check-box on the search results page and re-search, it'll come up. That certainly is a bit confusing, but that's a general issue about our interface, not a reason to keep the article. 2. Tomco: Thank you for finally acknowledging in a less sarcastic manner some of the specific issues others have raised, though it's really not productive to raise straw men like "cloak-and-dagger conspiracy" that obscure those specific issues. I'm still not convinced that you get the particular ways in which you "misunderstood Wikipedia culture" (which are clearly spelled out in the help pages - basically, don't engage in edit wars on subjects you're affiliated with [you could easily have voted to delete the original anti-Wikiverse article yourself], and don't delete others' comments; it's not rocket science). Your assertion that "the closest thing to deleting Wikiverse is to delete the article about Wikiverse", though, is just ridiculous. I might as well say that if someone posts a pointless article about me, deleting it is "the closest thing to murdering me". I think it's safe to say that Wikipedia users do not mistake non-listing for nonexistence, and know that articles are not written in order to "introduce" a site or to "have a dialogue". —Hob←Talk 15:54, 2004 Aug 14 (UTC)

(Vote above this 'graph if you change the tally accordingly, or below if you don't.) Votes above: DEL 14, KEEP 1 (unless someone changed their vote but didn't strike thru the old one). No one has yet double checked me. --Jerzy(t) 19:02, 2004 Aug 13 (UTC)

  • Redirect so that visitors to Wikipedia who seek information about Wikiverse can be sure of reaching the appropriate passage on Wikipedia:Mirrors and forks. Jerzy, you seem to be counting "delete and redirect" as a simple "delete", so I'm not sure how you want my vote to be reflected in your tally. Do any of the "delete" voters actively object to a redirect? JamesMLane 01:59, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Hangon

can i point out that the wikiverse google co-op is NOT AFFILIATED with wikiverse.org. I dont understand the comments about abusive messages.

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