Wikipedia talk:User categorisation: Difference between revisions

Hello all, created the preliminary page. I have a few questions of the community and those who would be contributing... First of all, should this be made an actual WikiProject (as in, should we put in the standard WikiProject template, add it to the WikiProject category, and all of the other work that goes into doing that sort of thing), or is it simply not large enough to warrant its own project? Thoughts? Ideas? Questions? Answers? Please post them all here, also please feel free to post to my talk page and contact me on AIM, my s/n is the same as here (thereverendeg). --thereverendeg 01:20, 30 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Reasons

From the article:

This change makes sense for inumerable reasons!

You know, I agree that this makes more sense, but it would clearly be better if you listed some of the reasons that this change would be for the better. (Also, innumerable has two ns.) Brighterorange 15:07, 30 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Doesn't this fall under that category of things you should fix instead of complaining about? How long would it take you to fix this? Maybe a minute, but probably not even that long. --thereverendeg 16:11, 30 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Template for <div> tag

I was thinking of creating a template CSS for the <div> tag called Template:Cat-class. This sort of thing has been done before with the Template:Prettytable.

The initial template would include the style="margin:1em; text-align:center; padding:.25em; border:1.0px gray dashed;" information, and the tag would look like this in each category page:

<div {{Cat-class}}>
...
...
</div>

This means that if you want to change the properties of the classification, you only need to do it once and it will have a global effect on all the categories. Thoughts anyone? – AxSkov (T) 10:48, 31 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Question on clasification.

How would Category:Scandinavian wikipedians be clasified in this scheme? It's mainly a sub-category for Norwegian, Danish and Swedish users, but I see a few users are also directly in the category. None of those categories where created as part of this project as far as I can tell, I was planning to start on the Norwegian users list and redirect the old Category:Norwegian users (only 3 users listed anyway) category to Categoy:Wikipedians in Norway for the sake of completenes, but I'm a bit unsure how to treat the Category:Scandinavian wikipedians category (Category:Norwegian users is a subcat of it currently.). In many ways it would be redundant because ALL Norwegians, Danes and Swedes are Scandinavians but some people might object if I take unilateral action without discussing it first.
P.S. It can't be compared with Category:Wikipedians in Basque Country, that is a small area of two countries, but Scandinavia is on a "higher level" than the nations it encompas, wich cause a problem because no other nations are subclassed unter they continent or region. --Sherool 12:46, 31 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Well, Scandinavian wikipedians could be compared to that of the Caribbean Wikipedians. As I see it, Danish, Norwegian and Swedish users are sub-categories of the Scandinavian wikipedians category. Regarding the redirection of Norwegian users, another option would be to redirect to Norwegian wikipedians to conform with Scandinavian wikipedians, or just leave it as it is, so there isn't a dead page. – AxSkov (T) 13:38, 31 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Argentina

Does it make sense for Argentina to be the only category with "of" instead of "in"? (Category:Wikipedians of Argentina) PeepP 14:06, July 31, 2005 (UTC)

It's an old one and needs to be changed immediately. – AxSkov (T) 15:30, 31 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I was about to list it on speedy renaming, but noticed there is already a Category:Wikipedians in Argentina. Seems thereverendeg has created that, and it says "of" should be used instead. I presume that is an error, and we should just move the content from the "of" page to the "in" page, then list "of" on category deletions? PeepP 17:44, July 31, 2005 (UTC)

I added a section "categories to rename". A nice side effect of the automatic script output was to show misspelled categories. PeepP 18:37, July 31, 2005 (UTC)

This is like many of the suggested renames, the Category name being questioned (inconsistent with most) was the ORIGINAL category - it already existed and there were many people listed through it, so I considered it wiser to keep the old category. For the sake of consistency I understand your discussion and I am going to count myself NEUTRAL as I personally don't think either name is superior to the other. In fact, 'of' is probably more appropriate but by the time I had figured that I had created dozens of categories and, because I am not an admin and cannot delete or rename pages, did not want to leave tons of dead pages lying around.

Some comments

Firstly, why are some categories named "Wikipedians in Country", while others are "Countryan Wikipedians""? I understand that the categories not only mark present location, but also nationality (i.e. belonging to an ethnic group) and association. If it is so, then all of these categories should be called "Countryan Wikipedians".

Then, why do the subpages in Wikipedia:Wikipedians have notices saying the page moved, not a redirect? This is not very important though, as they will be deleted soon anyway.

PeepP 17:38, July 31, 2005 (UTC)

The reason for the different names are simply that a handfull of categories existed prior to this project. As for why not "countryan Wikipedians" see Wikipedia talk:Category titles for a in-depth debate over that very issue. For the record I support the "Foo in/of/from Country/Province/City" naming scheme (because it allows for maximum consiustency, not all nations have a well known adjective form, and some don't have one at all) for categories, as do I would guess the founder of this project. --Sherool 23:25, 31 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I feel there needs to be consistenty throughout this project and "Category:Wikipedian in Country/Province/City" seems to be the best form. As such these need to be changed to be brought into line.

-- Ianblair23 09:11, 1 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I have essentially responded to this above in the discussion titled 'Argentina' - I have thought about the issues of consistency and meaning, and basically I didn't want to leave dead pages lying around. Maybe create seperate categories for ethnicity/location/relation? Like I said above, I think that 'of' would pretty much cover all of them. However, this would mean I could theoretically list myslef as a 'Wikipedian of The Netherlands' because of my heritage, but I've never even been to The Netherlands. I am counting myself nutral on this issue and will go with what you more experianced Wikipedians go for, as I am pretty much unable to decide what to do. --thereverendeg 03:21, 5 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

"Dead pages" are not an issue IMHO. Especialy categories, if a category is empty (for more than 24 hours) it qualifies for speedy deletion, just add
{{deletebecause|Empty, replased by <new category name>}}
or some such, and it will be deleted in due course the next time an admin check the list of candidates (asuming he/she agrees that it fits the criterea). If the category already have more pages in it that you can comfortably move on your own you can send it to CfD instead and request a rename to fit the project "standard", if people agree a boot will be tasked with recategorising pages. However at the moment CfD tend to put anyting related to countries on hold pending the outcome of Wikipedia:Category titles, so going though them is currently likely to take longer than doing it manualy. --Sherool 08:25, 11 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Main Objections

What about the main reason why these lists has been established ? From the Wikipedia:Wikipedians Page: "*Special:Listusers is an automatic listing; however, due to technical limitations, it does not list all users."

The Mediawiki software cannot display all items of so big categories and even if it could, there is a second pracital reason why these lists were established:
Google and other search engines see only the first 200 entries of a category due to the database character of the URLs. Therefore i humbly ask who decided about this radical change and was the public asked ? Maybe a poll should be started before moving so much information. Thanks, --Leopard 22:27, 31 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Although I see some reasons why categories might be preferred over lists, I agree that this is a radical change that deserves at least more publicity before execution. Also:

If you're going to change people's user pages, they should at least be warned.
I prefer not to have such a template on my user page.
The general category titles are still under discussion. Please keep in mind that the following aren't always synonymous:
1. "Adjective foo"
2. "Foo of bar"
3. "Foo in bar"
4. "Foo from bar"
5. "Foo interested in or involved with, etc. bar"

Maurreen (talk) 00:55, 1 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

There is another problem that arises if you change from lists to categories:

Many users have written explanations, refinements and comments that would be lost if you change to categories. Since these lists have community building as a purpose that would cut its usefullness quite a lot. --Leopard 01:54, 3 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry about the lateness of my response, I was out of town on business and without the internet for the last few days. First of all, I want to say that I am no longer going to be editing user's pages ever, and I urge other participants not to either. Instead, please visit their talk pages and let them know about changes, so they can choose to add or not to add themselves. Also, about the Google deal... From what I've read on Wikipedia, it is not supposed to be an issue of one users' rank on Google over another. Wikipedia isn't Google. I will try to find where I read this and post it hear soon. Also, I don't think that any of the individual lists on the Wikipedia:Wikipedians pages have more than 200 entries. I could be wrong about this, but most areas can be broken up into smaller areas to cure this problem anyhow (example - Category:Wikipedians in New York vs Category:Wikipedians in Upstate NY). --thereverendeg 03:29, 5 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed, regarding the editing of other user's pages, but sometimes it is necessary when they have added themselves to a catagory but not sorted themselves within that catagory (ie, piping). This is all that I've been doing, sorting users that already exist within categories not adding users. – AxSkov (T) 06:48, 6 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I created the Usercat_msg template and added instructions on the page on how to use it, so that editing user pages won't be necessary. PeepP 12:51, August 7, 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for your response. Maurreen (talk) 05:06, 5 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Does this mean that the lists will be kept and the categories are a supplement ? Regarding Google: I'm not concerned about the rank on Google over another but about the content. Google has found the userpages through these lists. Do you know if the bugs mentioned on Wikipedia:Wikipedians are still causing trouble ? “due to technical limitations, it does not list all users.” --Leopard 06:27, 5 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

The Listuser page has absolutely nothing to do with this project or the Wikipedians pages. It doesn't categorize users. So far the lists haven't been kept as changes are made, because it would be redundant.... I mean, reverts back to the way they were could always happen, but it seems like the lists are very unmanageable, unsorted, not systematic or dynamic, and probably take up a lot of space.

Um, was there ever any effort to gain consensus on this? I'm just asking. Personally, I like lists much better than categories. But if the community says these changes must be made, that's OK with me.-- Visviva 11:10, 6 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Privacy

I've just discovered this project owing to a couple of categories being added to my user page. I want to preach caution. While I have no objection to the categories that have been added so far (I certainly don't want them removed) and IANAL, I do see a few problems.

IMO there's every chance that Wikipedia is already breaching Australian privacy legislation here. We have crossed a very significant line from allowing people to voluntarily display information about themselves, to maintaining a database containing this and other information about them.
Even if we aren't already in breach of any law (and how to cover the Internet is problematic in all such issues), privacy is an up-and-coming hot topic, and we should be very careful of it. This is not something that's essential to Wikipedia's mission.
And even if these categories and others currently proposed are all harmless, where do we draw the line? If the categorisation project decides to list people by interest, for example, I guess I'd get flagged as interested in sexology because of the work I've done on the Kinsey reports. Combined with other flags or even on its own, this might attract attention I would not welcome. While I've already asked for this by allowing my userid to appear in the article history, I think Wikipedia should be very wary of increasing my exposure. I already get quite enough spam emails promising me cheap Viagra, willing ladies (photographically and otherwise), and anatomical miracles guaranteed to help keep them happy.

Food for thought? Andrewa 20:53, 10 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Your (and others') user page was only edited because you had already listed yourself on the Wikipedia user listings, and it was just converting the existing public information from one form to another.

This is not done anymore, as we now send a message to users to notify them that they have the option of choosing to use the category system or not.

Users won't be automatically added to the "by field of interest" categories outside of converting the old list. PeepP 21:16, August 10, 2005 (UTC)

This sounds like progress. A few more questions.

1. Has the project considered privacy issues? Where?

2. What Wikipedia procedures and policies are relevant? Do we need some new ones to ensure that the (commendable) measures and decisions you mention above are in fact implemented, and any changes to them are discussed?

I'm also a bit concerned about the phrase just converting the existing public information from one form to another. As I tried to point out above, that's not necessarily a sound defence on privacy matters. As soon as you start to manipulate personally identifiable data, especially data stored on a computer, you start to have some responsibilities and duties of care which I think Wikipedia might do well to avoid.

But thanks for the reply. As I said, progress. Andrewa 01:44, 11 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Windows XP users

I've suggested that Category:Windows XP users be renamed to Category:Windows users (or Category:Microsoft Windows users) to be more broad. (see Wikipedia:Categories for deletion#Category:Windows XP users) ^…Mar kaci 2005-08-4 T 18:18:55 Z

Regarding the "Populating existing categories" instructions.

I removed the instruction for replacing the old list pages with a redirect to the category. The reason is that there are technical difficulties with redirecting to a category from a "normal" page.

If you redirect to a category from a Wikipedia or main namespace page then the current wikisoftware doesn't "realise" that it's showing a category, and so only the category text is shown, the list of pages in the article does not show, giving the false impression that it's an empty category. IMHO it's better to just use the "old" method and provide a link to the category. At least untill such a time as the redirect problem has been fixed. --Sherool 15:41, 17 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, I thought the "redirect notice" was only used because of convention. I'll change back some of the Wikipedians/ subpages I redirected. PeepP 15:45, August 17, 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, it did seem like a good idea, up untill I tried the redirect I had created. To illustrate the problem see the difference between this link and this one. I better go and check if this bug is known. --Sherool 15:52, 17 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I stated in the instructions that redirects won't work, so that someone like me won't come around again, being too bold. ;) PeepP 16:04, August 17, 2005 (UTC)

This "project" and CfD

I think we should try to hammer out some kind of policy regarding user categories. Right now a bunch of "Wikipedian" categories are up for deletion on CFD with reasons like "silly" or "vanity" and so on. While I won't loose any sleep over loosing stuff like "left handed wikipedians" I don't think categories exclusively used on user pages should be held to the same standards as "regular" categories. As things stand however there are no special "rules" for this kind of categories so deletionists can pretty much wipe out most of it citing existing policy for notability, patent nonsense and things like that.

I think our first order of business should be to get this thing aproved as an official Wikiproject (not sure how that works though), then we can claim "ownership" over Wikipedian categories and work out a consensus on things like naming conventions, deletion criterea and so on for that kind of categories. Without that I fear that lists on Wikipedians by hobby and interests and what not will get shot right back down if we convert them to categories. --Sherool 16:28, 18 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

There's no need to be "official". A wikiproject is a wikiproject, which means nothing but a group of users with a common goal. See the discussion mentioned below; what I believe you should do is consider what kinds of categorization are appropriate, and what are not (e.g. users by country is useful, users by handedness is silly). R adiant _>|< 09:51, August 19, 2005 (UTC)

Delteing Wikipedians categories

There is (hopefully it gets off the ground) a conversation on Wikipedia talk:Categories for deletion about when it is appropriate to delete Wikipedians categories. Check it out if you're interested. -Seth Mahoney 01:21, August 19, 2005 (UTC)

Supplementary not Replacement of Lists

As I have said above there are many problems that this Project creates and it does not seem to have been a poll whther this alternative System is wished or positive. I have found a nice example for my objection concerning information loss: The page [1] for Wikipedians from Alabama USA has been replaced by categories. It has the following info: " Jimbo Wales is originally from Huntsville, Alabama and is a graduate of both Auburn University and the University of Alabama

User:Kayellen is a Huntsville, Alabama native and graduated from the University of Alabama in Huntsville with a Master of Science in Management." As you can see on Jimmy Wales page there is no category besides Babylon english and german, and it does not mention that he is a graduate of Auburn University and the University of Alabama. From User:Kayellen you cannot get the university she graduated either. And you cannot expect to have so many popular Wikipedians that they have their own Encyclopedia entry like Jimbo Wales. Therefore by deleting the lists you loose a lot of information that was useful and necessary. The main purpose of these lists was that people with common interests or common geography can meet and build communites. By making big categories you degrade it to some kind of datamining and nobody can add someting personal like in these lists. That was just 1 simple example. These lists are full of interesting bits.

I have nothing against an additional system of categories but let the people communicate and conserve these lists. The most objections on this discussion page have not been resolved positively. People with strange characters do not appear in the categories. The categories themselves get deleted because they sound silly. That is not what should happen with valuable information. --Leopard 13:21, 28 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

the spanish poject

In the spanish wikipedia the list to categories is near to be finished. this will been possible tanks to

The use of messages inviting to the user to categorize your user page, this a example of the message used in the spanish wikipedia:

== [[:Category:Wikipedians in ]] ==

Hello '''{{subst:PAGENAME}}''' this message is a invitation to categorize [[User:{{PAGENAME}}|your userpage]] in the category:
[[:Category:Wikipedians in ]] or in the adecuate sub-category and erasing your name from the
[[Wikipedia:Wikipedians/ |equivalent list]] since the lists of users are in process of being transformed into categories.
Remember: You can categorize your user page in more than one category. example: your actual location and your origin country.

for more info see: [[Wikipedia:User categorisation]] and [[:Category:Wikipedians by location]]

Saludos. 
 ~~~~

example:

== [[:Category:Wikipedians of Mexico]] ==

Hello '''{{subst:PAGENAME}}''' this message is a invitation to categorize [[User:{{PAGENAME}}|your userpage]] in the category:
[[:Category:Wikipedians of Mexico]] or in the adecuate sub-category and erasing your name from the
[[Wikipedia:Wikipedians/Mexico|equivalent list]] since the lists of users are in process of being transformed into categories.
Remember: You can categorize your user page in more than one category. example: your actual location and your origin country.

for more info see: [[Wikipedia:User categorisation]] and [[:Category:Wikipedians by location]]

Saludos. 
 ~~~~

Also location templates are in developement this template inform the location place and origin country of the wikipedian and categorize by country your userpage

you can see this location templates in the Wipedia location article in spanish:es:Wikipedia:Ubicación

another diference between the spanish and english categories is: in the english category exist continents, countries and minor areas like territories, zones, regions, etc at the same category level. in the spanish version the minor areas are categorized in to the relative contry or countries.

The spanish version use "Wikipedistas de.." (Wikipedians of) to include both wikipedians in... and wikipedians from...

See:

es:Categoría:Wikipedia:Wikipedistas por países (wikipedians by country category)
esWikipedia:Ubicación (Wikipedia location article)

--Mnts 08:21, 1 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Eisspeedway