text:
Talk:RAF Hercules crashes north of Baghdad killing ten

Sorry, can't figure out how to add images from Wikipedia. Can someone point me at the right docs? VikOlliver 01:32, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * You can't use images off wikipedia with the Image tag. The picture has to be on wikicommons for it to work here.  I did the same thing a few days ago.  Download the image off wikipedia then upload it to wikicommons.  It's easy, but you need to make an account on the site. vlsimpson 02:35, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I have studied the video several times myself as captured from the television and it appears to show the launch of two missiles (the black smoke from the first can be seen as the second launches) and then a distinct cut to an obscured surface explosion followed by the footage of wreckage on the ground. At no point on the videos can I observe a 'large aircraft' in flight or being hit. Hence I removed the lines suggesting that the video showed an aircraft being hit in the air.

 * I agree, and was making a similar edit at the same time. Going by the reports last night, both the launch control and the appearance of the missiles show them to be anti-tank missiles. The explosion and fire occur on the ground - and it is a large fire, yet in the footage of the wreckage the grass is unburnt, suggesting that the plan exploded in mid-air and was not ablaze when it hit the ground.

I removed the reference to the Australian Servicemen and added the names of those released by the MOD. Also removed reference to the 'Special Forces' being on board as only the BBC's Mark Urban is making any reference to this has he he isn't giving any evidence for it.

 * I re-added the reference to the Australian man after discovering he was serving with British RAF 47 Sqdn Lyneham.

Dupe
Please replace Image:Usaf.c130.jpg with Image:Lockheed C-130 Hercules.jpg. -- Cecil (talk) 13:14, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
 * ✅ --Brian McNeil / talk 13:33, 23 July 2008 (UTC)


text:
Mother of first Australian soldier killed in Iraq expresses anger

Margaret Pardoel, mother of the first Australian soldier to be killed in Iraq since the commencement of hostilities, has expressed anger over the death of her only son, a father of three, who was about to return home to Australia and had been planning a career change. Mrs Pardoel and husband John were devastated by the loss of their only son.

Mrs Pardoel said she opposes the war. "I think it's just cold-blooded murder. Look at all those young American boys that have been slaughtered," she said. "I don't think this should have gone on ... He said to me one night he phoned, he said, 'Mum there's nowhere to hide here, it's just so dangerous, there's nowhere to hide'."

Thirty-five year old Flight Lieutenant Paul Pardoel had been on his last flight when the C-130 Hercules he was aboard crashed north of Baghdad yesterday, killing ten personnel. He was serving with the British Royal Air Force (RAF), to which he had transferred several years ago from the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), as Navigator in 47 Squadron Lyneham RAF.

Mr Pardoel had been expecting to return in July to his wife and three children in Australia, where they had recently bought a new house in Canberra.

Australian Foreign Affairs Minister, Alexander Downer, says he is saddened to hear of the man's death.

"I want his family to know, and his friends to know, that he certainly did not die in vain, that this tragic accident occurred - or this tragedy because it may not have been an accident - but this tragedy occurred on a day when 65 per cent of the people of Iraq went out and voted," he said.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text:
Nepal’s King Gyanendra dismisses the government, claims power for himself

The King of Nepal,, has dissolved the coalition government, accusing it of factional fighting and failing in its duty to protect democracy. Several key political figures in the old coalition have been put under house arrest, including the leader of the.

The king has said that he removed the government of Prime Minister because "it has failed to make necessary arrangements to hold elections by April and protect democracy, the sovereignty of the people and life and property". The king had repeatedly called on Deuba to set a date for elections despite threats by rebels to block any vote.

"I have exercised my rights given to the crown under the present constitution and I have, therefore, dissolved the government for the larger interests," the king said.

This announcement occurs with the backdrop of a which has claimed the lives of more than 11,000 people since 1996.


text:
Crosswords/2005/February/1

February 1, 2005

Feel free to use the Wikimedia sites to solve our Wikinews crossword (Please do not fill it out online as it would spoil it for other people, print it out and fill it in at you own leisure!)

If you like, you can follow the instructions on Crosswords/Across Lite to download and solve today's crossword on your computer.
 * Today's crossword in Across Lite TEXT format (warning - contains answers!).
 * < Yesterday's crossword.

Quick crossword
{| border=0 cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 style="margin: 0em 0em 1em 1em;"
 * colspan=2|

{|align="left"
 * valign=top style=width:50%|
 * valign=top style=width:50%|

Across
{|align="left"
 * 1. Absolute quiet (7)
 * 5. Banish (5)
 * 9. Long period of time (3)
 * 10. Break sharply (4)
 * 12. Precise (8)
 * 14. Greek letter (3)
 * 15. Science of manufacturing and design (11)
 * 19. Card game (5)
 * 21. Computer memory (3)
 * 22. North African country (7)
 * 23. Tidal retreat (3)
 * 24. Jar (3)
 * 26. Printed work (7)
 * 27. State of matter (3)
 * 29. Computer key (5)
 * 30. Peculiar sexual oddities (11)
 * 32. Hot drink (3)
 * 34. Member of clergy (8)
 * 36. Bigfoot (4)
 * 38. Tin (3)
 * 39. Choose democratically (5)
 * 40. Agree to (7)
 * }
 * valign=top style=width:50%|

Down
Answers tomorrow.
 * 2. Tavern (3)
 * 3. Paranoramal powers (3)
 * 4. Shipping box (5)
 * 5. Australian bird (3)
 * 6. Parks for children (11)
 * 7. Look at lustfully (4)
 * 8. Opposite word (7)
 * 10. To say taboo word(s) (5)
 * 11. 10 down may be said during one of these (8)
 * 13. Bad dog (3)
 * 16. Car identifier (11)
 * 17. Prior (7)
 * 18. Slope (7)
 * 20. Swamp plant (8)
 * 25. Salad vegetable (7)
 * 28. Food made with raw fish (5)
 * 31. By going through (3)
 * 33. Pimples (5)
 * 35. Section of land (3)
 * 36. Affirmative (3)
 * 37. Browning of skin (3)
 * }
 * }

title: Crosswords/2005/February/1


text:
Poll shows Romanians are optimistic about current government

A survey by the Romanian Institute for Marketing and Polling (IMAS) shows that 64% of the country's citizens consider that things are moving in the right direction and are optimistic about the future of Romania.

Additionally, 59% consider that the current centre-right liberal government, led by Călin Popescu Tăriceanu, will do a better job than the previous social-democrat government under Adrian Năstase.

The surveyed people were also asked who they would vote for if an election were held now. 66% said they would choose the governing Truth and Justice Alliance, while only 19% said they would back the Social Democrats. This is one of the lowest approval rates for the Social Democrats ever, especially considering that they achieved 37% of the vote in the November legislative elections, and the Social Democrats' Adrian Năstase only narrowly lost to current president Traian Băsescu in the December run-off election, getting 48.77% of the electorate's vote.

In terms of individual politicians, Presdient Traian Băsescu has the highest approval rating, with 73% trusting him. The next most trusted is the Prime Minister, Călin Popescu Tăriceanu, of the Truth and Justice Alliance. He has an approval rating of 64%.

Perhaps shockingly, the poll shows that the far-right nationalist Great Romania Party leader, Corneliu Vadim Tudor, has an approval rating of 21%, while the interim Social Democrat leader Victor Ponta has an approval rating of only 15%.

This dramatic fall in the Social Democrats' popularity is expected to change Romanian politics significantly, considering that, after the fall of Communism in Romania, they dominated politics for most of the years up until the present.

What matters most, though, is that in Romania at present, most people trust the people which elected as their leaders, something which is crucial at a time when Romania must implement important reforms to prepare for accession to the European Union in 2007.


text:
Blair says Iraq election was blow against global terrorism

According to the British Prime Minister Tony Blair, the Iraq election was a blow against global terrorism. He vowed to stand by Iraq as it moves to build a democracy and paid tribute to British military personnel who died in a plane crash on election day.

In a nationally broadcast statement, Blair said: "It was moving and humbling for those of us lucky enough to live in a democracy and take it for granted, to see the enthusiasm and the simple determination, the clear sight of courage of millions of Iraqis that came out to vote for the first time in their lives, despite the terrorism, despite the threats, despite the dangers...Democracy in Iraq is not just good for Iraq itself. It is also a blow right to the heart of the global terrorism that threatens destruction not just in Iraq but in Britain and virtually every major country around the world."

President Bush also spoke of the incident, saying he mourns the British and American military personnel who died on Sunday.


text:
Survey reveals US student apathy for freedom of speech

US students are apathetic about their First Amendment rights to free speech, according to the largest study of its kind, released today by The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. Most students surveyed said they believed flag burning is illegal, half that the government can censor the internet, and half that government approval should be required for stories published in the press.

“These results are not only disturbing; they are dangerous,” said Knight Foundation President and CEO Hodding Carter III. “Ignorance about the basics of this free society is a danger to our nation’s future.”

Researchers from the University of Connecticut questioned more than 100,000 high school students, nearly 8,000 teachers, and more than 500 administrators and principals, in a two-year study costing US$1 million. Entitled The Future of the First Amendment, the study was commissioned by the Florida-based John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

According to the study, teaching of First Amendment values is effective in redressing the types of misunderstandings revealed, but it concludes even the basics are not being taught effectively now.

Appreciation and understanding of the rights were much greater amongst teachers, principals and adults, studied in this, and other recent studies. In contrast, students were more likely than others to think that potentially offensive song lyrics should be allowed, and student publications should not require approval from the school authorities.

Other findings included that one in five schools offer no student media whatsoever, and that finances limit the ability of administrators to offer such opportunities for student expression, particularly for low income, inner city and regional schools; and that student participation in student media increased appreciation for First Amendment rights.


text:
Colombia releases detailed report about the FARC

The Colombian Caracol Radio reported on January 31, 2005 that the government of Colombia released a detailed document which describes how the FARC operates in Colombia and around the world. The report was prepared by the Unidad Administrativa Especial de Información y Análisis Financiero del Ministerio de Hacienda(Special Administrative Unit of the Information and Financial Analysis of the Ministry of the Finance) and describes how the FARC operates and manage their finances. The study was delivered to the Colombian government at the end of the last year.

The FARC expenses
According to Caracol Radio the most important facts from the report are the following:

Guerrilla
The report identifies three types of guerrilla:
 * High rank: these members can participate in the high level operations, including the drug trafficking. They have access to beer, seafood, gatorade (a soft drink), prawns, shampoo, gel for the hair, brandy, and whiskey. Daily cost: $6 798 pesos ($US1 equals 2359 Colombian pesos).
 * Average rank: these member can participate in illicit activities such as kidnapping, extorsion and theft . Daily cost: $4,917 pesos.
 * Low rank: they are supported by the secretaryship or other structures because they operate in difficult conditions. Daily cost: $2.800 pesos.

28 percent belongs to the high ranking members of FARC, 64 percent belongs to the middle ranks and 8 percent to the lower ranks.

Kidnapping
The costs of feeding people who are kidnapped is 2,382 million pesos

Logistic Intendance

 * 20 billion pesos are the expenses of 690 thousand units of armament, that include as much ammunition expenses as weapon expenses during a year.
 * 14 billion pesos are the expenses of quartermaster equipment (uniforms, machetes, boots) during a year.
 * up to 4 thousand 256 million pesos are the expenses on explosives.

Health

 * There is evidence that FARC members are under specialized treatments in recognized clinical of Ecuador and Venezuela. Expenses of up to 1450 million pesos a year.

Transportation

 * Vehicles and gasoline. Each FARC structure does between 14 and 18 short trips per month, and between 8 and 11 long trips, spending up to 1500 million pesos.

Communications

 * Purchase of radios and cellular telephones and batteries costs up to 8311 millions pesos.

Chemical

 * Chemical products used during the narcotic processing. 722.000 gallons of gasoline are used. Expenses with gasoline are up to 12515 million per year. Other chemical reagents: up to 305 billion pesos per year.

Education
FARC recruit people of between 16 and 30 years of age. The new recruits first get a minimum information on internal, objective statutes of the organization and commitments. After been incorporated, the members are sent to training basic schools by a period between 3-5 months. When they leaves the scholl they are considered flat guerrilla. After two years depending on profits and behavior the guellicas can get promotion to squadron commander, delegate of guerrilla, commander, etc.
 * Each student spends about 10,000 pesos per day in feeding and uniforms.
 * The FARC annual expenses for personnel and education are 5110 million  pesos.
 * In a optimistic hypothesis the FARC train 200 men per year in each one of their 7 schools.

Propaganda

 * 327 million pesos are expenses with social programs supporting indigenous groups, associations of farmers, students and labour unions workers and leaders.
 * internet: 20 million pesos
 * Radio: Intelligence detected between 5 and 7 clandestine radios of low range but with the possibility of moving them through all the territory: up to 431 million pesos.

Solidarity founds
Support to the captured members and their families.
 * Prisoner support: 7 billion pesos by year.
 * Family support: 1773 million pesos by year.

International front

 * Support to the FARC activities in foreign countries: 476 million pesos by year.

Drugs

 * Protecting plantations: $541 million pesos.
 * Storage of the leaf of the coca: 953 million pesos.
 * Production of base cocaine: 886 million pesos.
 * Production in sophisticated laboratories: 2621 million pesos.

Clandestine airports
There are 57 clandestine airports that the narco-traffickers use(this is a big number since in Colombia there are only 73 official airports). The FARC rent the use of these airport to drug-dealers and receive income of up to 7154 million pesos from doing so.

Commercialization
The report says that the Farc directly commercializes 30 percent of the drug that is produced, and the remaining 70 percent is left to international networks of drug trafficking.
 * Cocaine commercialization: incomes up to 7 billion pesos

Other activities

 * Kidnapping: up to 88560 million pesos is gained per year through kidnapping.
 * Extorsion: 1 billion 569 million, 315 thousand pesos per year.
 * Assaults on banks: 2,780 million pesos per year.
 * Cattle robbery: 52 thousand 668 million pesos per year.
 * Fuel robbery: 42 billion pesos.

According to the Vice-Minister of Defense Andrés Peñate the majority of the FARC incomes comes from the commercialization of the drugs, followed by extorsion and kidnapping.


text:
Talk:Iraqis vote in massive numbers

Perhaps the title 'Mass of Iraqs appeared to vote' needs to be changed? - 'Iraqs' needs to be 'Iraqis' but is still a little non-sensical. How about "Many Iraqis go to the polls" or "Many Iraqis cast their vote"?

 * Also: no mention of the fact that very, very few Sunni's could or wanted to vote. Many polling stations plain didn't open in the triangle and surrounding areas... Snooo 01:05, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Propaganda piece
Jesus christ, what a propanda piece. I can't believe the heading of this article, all based on a guesstimate from Farid Ayar, the spokesman for the Independent Electoral Commission for Iraq (IECI), before the polls had even closed. Ayar said, “Percentages and numbers come only after counting and will be announced when it's over ... It's too soon to say that those were the official numbers.” yet here they are been parroted on Wikinews. What a joke. —Christiaan 14:01, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)

 * Some relevant links for those looking for a bit of balance:

 * What They’re Not Telling You About the “Election” by Dahr Jamail, 1 Feb, 2005

 * The Vietnam turnout was good as well Sami Ramadani, an Iraqi exile and senior lecturer at London Metropolitan University, points to the uncanny similarities between reports of these elections and a report in the New York Times published on 4 September, 1967.

 * U.S. Encouraged by Vietnam Vote Officials Cite 83% Turnout Despite Vietcong Terror, by Peter Grose of the New York Times, 9 Sep, 1967

title: Talk:Iraqis vote in massive numbers


text:
Venezuela-Colombia crisis:Castro intervenes, Chavez and Uribe scheduled to meet

The President of Colombia Alvaro Uribe is scheduled to meet the President of Venezuela Hugo Chávez Thursday. Apparently the crisis between Venezuela and Colombia is almost solved. The crisis began with the imprisonment of the alleged FARC member Rodrigo Granda by Colombian forces on December 13, 2004. Venezuela accused Colombian of invading Venezuelan territory. Colombia accused Venezuela of harboring FARC terrorists. The President of Cuba, Fidel Castro, intervened in the crisis and talked to Chavez and Uribe.

According to Bogota's newspaper El Tiempo, Uribe asked for Castro's help on January 21. Castro responded with surprising speed and effectiveness. On January 21 Castro sent the chancellor Felipe Perez Roque to Caracas where he met with Chávez and then returned to Havana, informing Castro on the results of the encounter. After midnight Castro communicated by telephone with Uribe for two hours. They decided that Castro would send his Vice-chancellor with a letter detailing what they had talked about to Chávez.

During the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre Chavez appeared to be optimistic about the end of the crisis. He recognized the importance of Castro's role in the resolution of the problems between Colombia and Venezuela. Also he was thankful for the help of the other leaders in South America.

The crisis between Venezuela and Colombia lasted more than a month without a solution and it was entering a dangerous stage, with severe accusations from both sides. During recent days the US government became more interested in the conflict and was pressuring Chávez for a clear declaration about his relationship with the FARC. The US is an ally of Colombia in the fight against FARC. FARC is a member of, and supported by, the Foro de São Paulo, an alleged anti-imperialism and anti-liberalism organization of South America. Other Forum de São Paulo member states include Brazil, Cuba and Venezuela.

Chronology
There is some uncertainty about the date of some events. 2004 - December
 * 13: FARC-EP member Rodrigo Granda is arrested by Colombian authorities.
 * 15: The Colombian National Police director Jorge Daniel Castro says Granda was arrested in Cúcuta, Colombia.
 * 16: Sources of the Cúcuta police say Granda was arrested in a city hotel.
 * 17: Another source of the Cúcuta police says Granda was arrested in a street of the Norte de Santander capital, Colombia.
 * 30: The FARC say Granda was kidnapped.

2005 - January
 * 3: The FARC demand Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to begin a investigation.
 * 5: Venezuelan Minister Jesse Chacón says that Venezuela didn't take part in the capture of Granda.
 * 5: The Colombian Minister of Defense Jorge Alberto Uribe says that Colombian forces captured Granda inside Colombian territory.
 * 6: The Colombian President Álvaro Uribe also says that Colombian forces captured Granda inside Colombian territory.
 * 9: The Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez says that the Colombian police lies about the Granda capture.
 * 12: The Colombian Minister of Defense Jorge Alberto Uribe says that a reward was paid for Granda. He reiterates that Colombian forces captured Granda inside Colombian territory.
 * 13: The National Police director Jorge Daniel Castro says that Colombian authorities didn't take part of the arrestment of Granda in Caracas, Venezuela.
 * 13: Chavez says that Venezuelan ambassador should leave Bogotá in Colombia.
 * 20: Lula da Silva talks to Colombian president Álvaro Uribe.
 * 21: Fidel Castro intervened. A meeting between Uribe and Chaves is scheduled. The crisis seems to be solved.


text:
Wikinews:Water cooler/proposals/Archive/2

Proposal: remove Copy-edit stage
I think new articles should go straight onto Latest news without being listed for copyedit first. Due to the nature of the beast, any mistakes will probably be picked up on and fixed by the first few readers. This would also remove the delay on good stories reaching the LN and also prevent stories languishing on Copyedit for days! Dan100 09:16, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * I strongly support. I think that was always the idea — the copyedit section was mainly for articles that the author (or someone else) felt weren't strong enough to be "published" to latest news yet. -- IlyaHaykinson 09:52, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * I agree! Honestly I think that the 'stage' idea should be further gotten rid of. I think that articles should go right from 'requested' to the main page, with the stub note if they're not complete. I think putting them out like that and not hiding them away makes it look more professional and will make them complete faster. Requested articles, I think, don't have a place on the main page (it could be confusing for non-wiki-ers). Xcjm 01:26, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Further agreement. But also agree there should still be a copyedit section of Article workspace; for Wikinewsies who wish support, such as those for whom english is a second language, that has been a very valuable resource. - Amgine 05:21, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Disagree. Copyedit section is needed. But, the process you are asking for is already the process we have in place. Copyedit is either optional (for writers unsure they are completely done and seek input) or is used by other editors to tag an article that may have style issues or could use some polish by some volunteer. Every day this week at least one story has been listed under both Latest Stories and Copyedit. There is NO reason to remove a story from Latest Stories unless it is a woefully incomplete sub-stub. I will change the description of Copyedit to make this clear. -- Davodd | Talk 10:21, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * By the way, thanks for always keeping the reader and the timeliness of news in mind. -- Davodd | Talk 10:55, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Fair enough. Amgine hits the nail on the heard. We'd better adjust the instructions to reflect that. Dan100 1238 at work!

 * Strongly disagree. The copy edit queue is the first place I go when I hit the site.  It's a great place to see articles that are coming up and giving them the once over before releasing from edit embargo.  Yes, people can edit articles later.  But it really simplifies the process of getting things cleaned up.  Otherwise, I would have to hunt down every single article in the Latest News looking for mistakes.  Copy editing is kind of my thing, so that's the point of view I'm bringing here, but it really does make a HUGE difference having this little "task list" for me to jump into.  Otherwise, it's like trying to drink from a firehose.

Remember Wikinews is a wiki, so pages get fixed naturally. There's also no 'edit embargo'.
 * OK, that's cool with me. As long as we keep the copy edit section as an option for people seeking help, that's fine.  I was objecting to getting rid of it entirely.  But the current state of the section, as an option, is fine with me. MikeEdwards 01:50, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Editorial Section
I think that Wikinews should shart a non-radical editorial and opinion section. It would be a good chance to attract good writers and readers. Until yesterday, I only was just looked upon Wikipedia and Wikinews, now I am active and have found it quite fun. Please consider my idea.

In addition, I think that when Wikinews gets more developed, it should have a newsletter and news alerts for catagories of the news. I also agree with a previous post in this section saying we should integrate Wikinews with Wikipedia's Current Events, or else it would just be double work.

 * There was a poll on this subject very recently (see higher up on the Water cooler). There was no clear consensus, although 'no' votes were in the majority. Many people felt blogs are already an ideal outlet for editorial/opinion pieces. Wikinews is something that isn't done elsewhere - factual news-reporting, by citizen journalists. Dan100 (Talk) 18:09, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * In addition to Dan100's comments, it is currently possible to write your own editorials in your user space. This allows contributors to show editorials are a possible element of Wikinews. - Amgine 21:35, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Yes, but what if there was another part of Wikinews that was an appropiate editorial section. Wikinews has a better layout then any other citizen news site and it would be nice to be able to contribute to one site only. In responce to the saying that I can put the editorials on my user page, I will try that, but how do you make those table of contents and how should I go about orginizing my articles. Cafzal 23 Jan 2005

New 'daily pages' system
I'm not too keen on this idea. I can see the reasoning behind it - we get a good system of archiving stories - but it's quite complex and very newbie-unfriendly - already people are putting links in wrong places. There's also the problem that, unless someone re-saves all these pages at the stroke of midnight UTC, all the "edit today's articles" links will point to the wrong place.Dan100 (Talk) 16:26, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Actually I think I'm wrong above. The "today's articles page" links should actually update automatically every new day, shouldn't they? If so the new system should work rather well :). I think it will take new-comers a while to get used to the nested-template system to list new articles, but hopefully it should improve the archiving of old articles no-end. Dan100 (Talk) 17:27, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * I should also say I think it's a good piece of design and must have taken a lot of work to get up and running :). Dan100 (Talk) 18:10, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Thanks for the kind words. It actually took longer than it was supposed to, which is why I didn't get the explanation up here right away. (building the calendar wasn't in the initial plan). Sorry about the confusion.
 * Related to this is going to be changes to the editor tasks box, including similar templates to build the sections for Developing stories, etc., in both the workspace and the main page. - Amgine 20:51, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)

To stop using Wiki Commons as our image source
I officially propose that we institute an Image: upload capability into the Wikinews area and drop the use of Wiki Commons as our default image upload site and article image server since it will harm the depth of our news coverage. The use of Wiki Commons as our image source will hamper us since fair use images are not allowed there. It is my belief that news sometimes needs fair use graphics -- case in point: the Wells Fargo and Barclay's rumoured to be in merger talks article in which I inserted a Wells fargo and Barclays logo - which visually helps the story. But since we use Wiki Commons for our image source, this graphic will most likely be deleted, leaving the story text-only. -- Davodd | Talk 10:13, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Fair use (or equivalent) provisions vary widely between countries though. Could we find that images which are allowed to be used in one country are not allowed to be used in another?  202.154.105.254 08:55, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Since Wikinews servers (and the foundation) is based in Florida, wouldn't U.S. law apply? -- Davodd | Talk 09:15, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * What laws apply to whom and why certainly needs to be clarified. I think we need to get some funds and pay a real lawyer if none can be found who will gratis offer an actual legal opinion that they will stand behind. Legal differences with other wiki projects are significant, as this issue points out. News reporting often gains extra protections regarding copyright, and news reporting is more likely to encounter issues of defamation.

 * We need at the very minimum to clarify this question of jurisdiction regarding what might threaten the physical server operation, and what potential benefits we may have above what wikipedia has, to decide answers to questions like this one.

 * I doubt that we can conclusively find an answer for what legal problems/protections might apply to every last contributor in every country, although perhaps we should be starting a set of pages responding to these topics on a place-by-place basis for contributors to reference. Would anyone like to propose a namespace for starting this? or a page or section to discuss the issues.

 * Also keep in mind that decisions such as this, because of geographical variations in laws, may restrict options of who may mirror the site. Do we take maximum advantage, or opt for maximum flexibility? I suppose some compromise, since we don't want to be bound by laws which apply in China or Iran, but I think should aim to be able to operate equally well in a range of countries with advanced IT infrastructure. -- Simeon 12:32, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Two things; firstly the foundation is trying as hard as it can to internationalise itself, which means that servers right now exist in france as well as florida, and germany is only a month or two away of setting up thier own servers. If memory serves, there has also been talk of setting up branches of the foundation in the UK, Canada, Australia, and Japan. So this trend is going to change the rules. Also an australian court ruled last year that people who are aiming content at australians must follow Australian law (this court decision has ramifications for all common law countries, ie canada, UK, NZ, and even to a small extent US). Basicly, perhaps we are on solid ground with fair use, perhaps we are not. No one knows till there are a whole bunch of court decisions in a whole bunch of countries. I think it would generaly be better to err on the safer side of caution and not use fair use. The bellman 04:46, 21 Jan 2005 (UTC)

One of the nice things about using Wiki Commons is that we don't have to worry about licensing or anything--it's known to be good. Otherwise, we have to vet every single image, and that gets to be a real drag. Plus, the more we push using the commons, the more media it will have for us to use. Recently, I needed PD images for an article. I went out, found some, posted them in the Commons, and now we're all the better for it. Just my $0.02. MikeEdwards 21:50, 19 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * 1. Mike, some of the Huygens photos you uploaded (including Image:Huygens channels.jpg) are not public domain. Although they were posted on the NASA website, they are co-owned by the European Space Agency and the University of Arizona, both of which hold current copyrights on the images. Scroll to the bottom of the page of the ESA website for copyright claims: http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Cassini-Huygens/SEMHB881Y3E_0.html
 * 2. Using Wikicommons means since there is no way to quickly verify the source of original photography, then we must resign ourselves to the notion that Wikinews will for all intents and purposes, be a text-only service unless stock public domain art exists on Wikicommons or was created by the U.S. federal government. This also means that we will probably never have any up-to-datep photos of any people who are not upper-level U.S. government officials (famous actors, businessmen, International diplomts). We also will NEVER be able to use any popular culture photo as a reference, nor will we be able to use a corporate logo for a business story. -- Davodd | Talk 08:25, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Why do most other language Wikinews sites have Upload?
I just noticed that the French, Nederlands, Spanish, and Svenska Wikinews sites all have Upload enabled on their sites.

Only Dutch and English have Upload disabled.

Are there country-specific copyright or licensing issues that allows some sites to allow Upload while others cannot?

I thought all the servers for Wikinews were in Florida?

Is this an oversight or an intentional difference? — DV 10:33, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * It was intentional, to allow a replacement logo to be uploaded. The upload is about to be shut off. - Amgine 21:32, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Wire Service
As a wannabe webmaster I think it would be nice if somebody could develope a wire service for Wikinews. So people could live feed of headlines on certain topics. Lemme' know what you think. --Tlarson 17:58, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC) | Talk

This idea is good, and I think it was brought up before. It is still not realized, and I am still thinking that it has certain potential.

But I also noticed that some or our contributions seem to have came from people who want to promote certain view, or want to spread particular piece of information to change people's mind. That is, to a various degree, against our policy emphasizing neutral point of view. So not only technologies to offer live feed, but also an institutional mechanism is needed to make sure that we deliver quality news articles along with our values. That is somewhat hard because we often take a day to several days (when the issue is really contentious) to be able to neutralize an article.

Well, if you have further ideas how we could successfully launch the live feed, I am at least interested in listing to it. Tomos 10:46, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * This would be great!! WikiRadio!! or even WikiTV, no kidding!! I'm willing to contribute if someone started the projects King Ho Cheung 00:55, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * This was brought up recently, and is actively under consideration. However, we do need to develop a stable base of completed articles first, since this is what any broadcast system would be using for source. - Amgine 21:35, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Amen Rome wasnt built in a day. The bellman 07:11, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Tlarson, as far as I can tell, Wikinews is public domain (the foundation hasn't chosen a license yet), so you can use the stories posted on Wikinews directly on your site. If you need a feed, the digests are a serialized view of Wikinews' output. Of course, this would only work if someone were to keep the digests synchronized with each day's latest stories instead of waiting until the end of the week. This wouldn't be fully automated like a RSS feed, but it's a start.
 * Amgine, how does a stable base of completed articles allow us to do anything more than we can now? Having a large backlog of stories is something to be proud of, but unless we plan on rehashing old news, the main thing holding us back from having any sort of feed, radio, or video broadcast is that we need to increase the volume of new stories that are created during each news cycle.
 * King Ho Cheun, the Ogg Vorbis audio codec is ready to use today! If you want to create an audio stream, I believe this open source format is acceptable for use on Wikinews. And Theora (the video codec) may go beta this year, which will permit video presentations.
 * To make this happen, we don't need to build a backlog of old news stories. However, there is a practical concern - the bandwidth constraint all of the Wiki projects are dealing with due to lack of servers, and in the case of video, the lack of an open source format with which to encode the video.
 * I'm not particularly interested in doing an audio-only stream, but if Wikimedia ever obtains enough funding to handle the bandwidth, I'm not aware of a stated policy which would prevent some wannabe radio show announcer from recording a reading of the latest news into an Ogg audio file and uploading it to Wikimedia Commons.
 * Once the bandwidth problems are solved, a lot of things become possible. Hopefully the Wikimedia foundation will obtain their 501 IRS exemption soon, which will make it easier to raise funds. — DV 11:34, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * I was unclear. Once we have a large base of article production... Which in my opinion we do not yet have. If I remember correctly, 3,000-6,000 words = 90 seconds of broadcast. (It's been a long time, and I may be way off.) The point is, you need a lot of stories just to do the hourly updates which are so popular. And just having new stories is not always useful; you need enough production of finished/polished stories which are unique yet cover broad categories consistently.
 * I am personally strongly in favour of producing two short hourly updates daily, each a solid 150 seconds of dense news. I know of several webcasters who are searching for exactly such a product. - Amgine 19:53, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * I was way off... about 150 wpm is normal speaking pace, more than double possible by professionals. So 1000 words or so for a 5-minute news update.. Do-able. - Amgine 04:00, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Non-homepage "Latest News" rework
Please read User:IlyaHaykinson/On Categories and Topics — I have put the beginnings of this system into test production in South America and Central America. The general idea is that there is one template for a region and topic until we get more editors involved. A single story would (for now) need to get listed three times: once in the main Template:Latest news, once in the region's latest news, and once in the topic's latest news. Any sub-topic or sub-region will just inherit the parent region's latest news via an include until there's a dedicated editing team that is willing to maintain a separate Latest News section for a country.

To see how this works, take a look at South America to see a page, Category:South America to see the category page including the same latest news, Category:Argentina including the same news as well for now, and Template:LocationLatestNews for the basis of the template. I think this system is reasonably good until we get technical features developed in MediaWiki just for us that would let us have auto-generated Latest News listings. -- IlyaHaykinson 10:39, 17 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * very intersting The bellman 07:16, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Wikinewsies by region/nationality
Wikipedia and Meta have Lots of Useless Lists for people to categorize themselves in, but one list could actually be of use here: a listing by country. Why does Wikipedia:Wikipedians have this but Wikinewsies does not? It's arguably of more use here. (Also, if you don't get user categorization schemes started rightaway, you'll never get them up to date later... :-) JRM 00:52, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Great idea, JRM! - Amgine 03:05, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Ha! There's no Template:Sofixit on Wikinews. ! :-) OK, OK, I should have expected this response. *grumble* Since I won't ever be much of a reporter, I'll do gruntwork for you lot. I'm strapped for time on a lot of things, but I'll get this started. I'll port the lists from Meta and the 'pedia as much as possible, since there's quite a bit of overlap between there and here. Of course, I expect you all to come by and register when it's done, or else I'll use Rambot to spam your talk pages. :-) JRM 10:59, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 *  Thank you JRM!!one one...  The Wikinewsies page is great, and you included the related listings as well! A lot of find/replace on that. Great work! (where's my barnstar collection? Is there an orange one?) - Amgine 03:53, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Simple find/replace, costs only a few keystrokes. No need to haul out barnstars for that. Wait till I get around to fully updating Template messages. :-) There are only a 160 or so uncategorized ones; we should be able to get this done. I'll do 10 today. JRM 13:12, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Newsletter and RSS
We should have individual (Top News, World, US, Science, Entertainment, Politics, Business, ect) RSS and newsletter feeds available to people. I think Wikinews really needs to be recognised more, and while I am bringing up that topic, why don't they use Wikinews instead of Current Events in Wikipedia now that Wikinews is really devoloping, and I must say, with alot more news than the Wikipedia Current Event seciton. Cafzal 23 Jan 2005
 * I agree, an RSS feed for additions to certain templates (I believe there is one for Special:Recent changes) would be excellent. A lot of people view the 'net through a feed aggregator these days. Dan100 (Talk) 19:19, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * There is an RSS/Atom functionality to wikinews; I do not know how to use it yet. If someone could figure this out and write a tutorial, perhaps we won't have to re-invent the wheel? On the other hand, this is a great idea; but I want to concentrate on re-building the main page at the moment. - Amgine 19:44, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * I agree, I think an RSS feed would be very useful Saxsux

Categories
We need to add catagories people can access from the front page, I have just realized that not haveing this is not user friendly. I really want to post some science articles, but where can I go to get to the science catagory? I have to spend a good amount of time searching through the arichives and whatnot. Does anyone else share my experiance and how can I access various specific sections easier?
 * Just search. Dan100 (Talk) 20:07, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Search is nice, but it doesn't give you a list of the possible categoires. I definately agree that we should have a category list on the homepage.  teeks99 19:32 (UTC), 29 Jan 2005

Hopefully we will shortly, but right now the category system is broken. I agree browsing by category would be nice if you don't want to read only stories mentioning 'Huygens', for example. Dan100 (Talk) 20:08, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Publication date
I would like to suggest adding the publication date of the article, so the reader knows how long the article is at the Main Page. This date could be put at the article's body. Why do I suggest this? I suggest this because anyone can put an unreviwed article at the Main Page. Older articles are more reliable, since maybe a lot of people read them. But what do you say about an article which was published right now? A three hours old article is likely to be more reliable than an ten seconds old article. Other ideas are welcome. It seems the articles at the Main Page are not so reliable because the way we are working now. -- Carlosar 01:46, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Since anyone can put any date they want next to an article, we wouldn't really solve the problem. Besides, we would need to put the time there, and that'd get really confusing due to the time zone not being clear (not everyone knows their UTC offset). Instead I think we need to continue being quick about removing articles from the homepage if they are obviously not ready to be listed there. We have enough people on the site now that this generally happens. -- IlyaHaykinson 03:20, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, I'm with Ilya on this one. However I'd rather legitimate artices (ie potentially news-worthy, just very short) remain on Latest news, in the hope of someone reading it just expanding it. The beauty of Wiki. I think so long as there's a vaild reference on the article, it should stay. Anyone agree or disagree? Dan100 (Talk) 17:59, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * I really liked the News Briefs model for short news mentions. It's an easy way to highlight news that's important yet not something that the writer wants to or can expand upon. Some of the news briefs mentions did go on to become full articles. -- IlyaHaykinson 20:46, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * I liked that a lot too. I'm thinking about a new layout for main - sections links + weather link at top, section blocks down the middle (60%?), and a right block with a very-latest-news (say, newest 3-5 links), plus news briefs. At the bottom full-width weather, section links again, and the editor tasks. (hmm... I shoulda posted this at Main Page)
 * Anyway, the News Briefs are a great idea. We need to revive/keep doing. - Amgine 20:59, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Personally I didn't like News Briefs. It often contained one or two lines on each of the biggest stories of the day. I'd rather have seen that effort go into seperate articles - it seems odd for more minor stories to get articles, while bigger news ended up in 'briefs'! I think this was quite possibly happening because people were seeing big news in 'briefs' and thinking the story had been 'covered', so then not starting an individual article on the subject. Dan100 (Talk) 21:38, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * An Alternate way of doing it is to write the big story, then a 'teaser' brief with a link to the larger article? - Amgine 19:41, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Number of days on Latest news
Someone changed it from seven to four, presumably to make the main page a bit shorter. Seems fair enough to me, I doubt many people are that interested in news more than four days old. However I put it up to five as it looks a little more impressive and five just seems a nicer number than four. Dan100 (Talk) 23:37, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * When I was taking publication design courses, we learned theories ranging from Japanese aesthetics to Gestalt theory. Basically we were told when placing elements in a composition to use odd numbers such as one, three, and five. This will better result in a sense of relaxed, natural asymmetry. Upon seeing an even-numbered grouping, the human mind works harder and for some reason feels the need to either count the individual elements, divide the group in half looking for symmetry or search for pattern clusters. With even-numbered elements, the impact of the layout tends to overpower the content. -- Davodd | Talk 08:03, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * That was me... and I was trying to keep the columns at least similar in length. I like the comments about asymmetry; we should definitely think about this with the new page layout. - Amgine 19:37, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

"Categories" vs. "Search"
Which should we use?

Due to the current limitations of the categories system, and the lack of man-power to keep 'aggregator' pages bang-up-to-date, I propose that we fully embrace a "flat directory" (FD) search-based style.

The FD concept (there's probably a proper name but I don't know it) revolves around using search. The likes Google Desktop, iTunes, Furl, and of course Google itself, are built around the idea that it doesn't matter where information is stored, as long as you can find it when you need it. It's a fairly new concept but I believe it's the future of much of information management

On WN, you can view all the latest news for the last few days on Latest news. If a visitor wants to find something specific, I suggest we should highlight the methods available to search the site (eg google site search, or our own when it's working), rather than directing to them to category or 'aggregator' page, then having to dig through sub-pages etc. Dan100 (Talk) 12:34, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Amgine and I have been working on an extension to create automatic dynamic lists of articles based on a union of categories (i.e. "all articles for 'Spain' in 'Politics and conflicts'", or "last ten articles from January 12, 2005"). You can see this extension in action at http://www.ilya.us/wiki/ — we are trying to find developers to put this extension in production at wikinews and will know soon if that'd be possible. See 1411. -- IlyaHaykinson 22:55, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Go for it! The way to use extension is to use a custom tag, , with various settings to decide which categories the articles must belong to. Go ahead and copy some articles and play with it. - sig lost due to an un-closed tag earlier :o

That's pretty cool, though you could do with some actual content on your test site (copy and paste WN stuff? It's public domain) to illustrate how it works a little more clearly. Dan100 (Talk) 19:22, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I liked the feature very much, so I voted for it. In case some of you are not aware, you can register with the site, and vote for 1411 or anything else you want to express your desire to the developers (although I am not sure how much the votes weigh in developers' prioritizing of their tasks.)

Thank you for Ilya and Amgine for developing the feature. Tomos 00:05, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Category region pages
I have just started/had a go at merging old static region pages with (fantastic! thanks Ilya) new automated category-based region pages. The advantage of this is a) right now we have both, and it's confusing, b) the automated ones are the ones people will reach when they click on the category links at the bottom of an article. Therefore, that is the one I have merged 'to'.

So far I have done Oceania and had a start on Africa, South America really already seemed to have moved themselves, so I just put in a redirect.

Europe, North America, Asia, Middle East .. others .. all still need to be done. Does anyone not understand what I mean? Please have a look, and if possible, have a go at moving your page if you work on one of these pages, or have a go at tidying up the ones that are already done .. I left some inconsistencies, wasn't sure what is best .. put explanation into Oceania but left out of South America, I think without is cleaner, but perhaps not intuitive enough to users?

Please provide suggestions if you think something is awry.

Some region categories could perhaps be broken up or made into two levels, eg Africa hints at a possible two-tiered structure, but I didn't actually implement it. South America I may have removed useful content by removing the wikipedia links, but otoh these would be better in the category page of each country .. but I didn't get to there yet. Simeon 20:15, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Wikinews and Wikipedia Current Events
Cafzal and I are trying to promote Wikinews on WP, read our efforts, and please join in! Dan100 (Talk) 22:22, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Wikinewsie listings
I've copied the structure of the regional and alphabetical listings of w:Wikipedia:Wikipedians to Wikinewsies. Please consider adding yourself to these lists.

I have toyed with the idea of transferring information from Meta and Wikipedia, but considered against it for two reasons: So, updating these listings is up to the community.
 * 1) These lists are supposed to be voluntary. While I can't imagine much harm coming from copying an existing listing, it is still a bit dubious.
 * 2) There's no way to be sure an account on Meta or Wikipedia will match one on Wikinews, even though this will apply in 99% of all cases.

Incidentally, I'd like a statement on the welcome message asking people to consider adding themselves to these lists. Unfortunately, I can neither find this welcome message nor a page listing the templates in use on Wikinews. Template messages is a careless and fairly useless copy of the Wikipedia page. If anyone can give me pointers on this, I'd be grateful. JRM 20:58, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Update: I've cleaned up Template messages and found  . The plea to add yourself to the list is not appropriate there, however. Hmm. JRM 01:01, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)

New days
How do new days get added to the latest news thingo. Is it automagic, or does an admin do it. If its automagic, can i request that it uses the international date line, cause its frequently a day behind for me (being an aussie), which also makes adding new articles difficult, cause it adds them to a date which is not yet on the main page. If its done by admin, ill just have to wait till there is an aussie (or NZ) admin. The bellman 10:44, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Days are added manually, and anyone can do it: just edit Template:Latest news. -- IlyaHaykinson 18:04, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Oh well, thats easier than i thought it would be. Good-o. The bellman 04:51, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Titles
Hey everyone. I had a problem with one of the articles today: PEI to become GMO free zone?. The problem is, WN is sort of an international newssite and you cant expect people all over the world to know local acronyms. When you read something like that on the main page you actually get no usefull information on what the article could be about at all. Bolivia rejects Chile's OAS candidate is a little better because at least I get to know what part of the world it is all about.

So, can we have some sort of policy agreement to caution people from using double acronyms in the title?

Floflei6 00:25, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)

 * I agree entirely. Article titles, at least until the category system is implemented, need to define the geographical area the story originates from (if there is one, ie not science or astronomy). Beyond that, article titles need to be as specific as possible as we can only use each one once.

 * Flo, if you come across a title you don't like in the future again, don't be afraid to change it by using the 'move' tab. However, you must also change the listing on the day page the article is listed on. Dan100 (Talk) 20:12, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Look under the Style book under headlines. I suggest you move and rename the article to be more clear. -- Davodd | Talk 20:45, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Another option is to use the piped link, for example Prince Edward Island to become Genetically Modified Organism free zone? looks like "Prince Edward Island to become Genetically Modified Organism free zone?". This is an easy way to display better headlines (or very different ones) without possibly breaking links, etc. - Amgine 19:55, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)


text:
Wikinews:Water cooler/assistance/Archive/2

SqueakFox
Ineed the assistance of an administrator over copyright misuse--Squeakfox 15:03, 8 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Hey Admins, this one is for you
Could an admin go through the Category:Speedy deletion page and clean it out by deleting some of those garbage files? I've had a self-nom in there for a few days now. Not very speedy. ;-) -- Davodd | Talk 07:51, 7 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I tried some, and looked again the proposed speedy deletion policy (which is not accepted by the community yet). I am not sure how inclusionist/deletionist we should be, and some speedy deletion tags were attached for reasons not even in that proposal. So I figured it wouldn't hurt to go a bit slower in case anyone has a say about curently tagged pages or general policy. Perhaps we should talk at: Wikinews talk:Policies and guidelines/Deletion guidelines/Speedy deletion. Tomos 10:56, 7 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * I've brought Category:Speedy deletion mostly up to date, with one duplicated article to go. For people interested in the Speedy deletion issue, please see Lankiveil's Wikinews:Speedy Deletion Proposal. If you think an article is in need of attention as a speedy deletion, list it on the page and add to the top of the article. Speedy deletion is not the same as Deletion requests, but only for articles which are vandalism, patent nonsense, or which otherwise meet the criteria for speedy deletion. - Amgine 04:07, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)

News getting put on main page...
I don't think news is being put anywhere on the front page fast enough. People write news and it takes forever for it to be shown, stunting the growth and promptness of Wikinews and making the writers (atleast myself) not too happy. Cafzal Revised: 20:55, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Really it's up both the author and the community to get stuff on the main page. The instructions on the Workspace explain the process. If you feel an article you've written yourself is ready for publication, post it to the day's template yourself. Otherwise other uses will hopefully develop your story and then post it themselves. Dan100 (Talk) 19:25, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Creating Own Editorial and Research Sections on User Page
Are we allowed to create our own sections on our user page? For example: http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/User:Cafzal/SECTION_NAME/ I want to create my own editorial and research sections on my user Page, am I allowed to? Cafzal 20:55, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Yes, you can make a subpage under your user account. Simply create a linke on your page to User:Cafzal/SECTION NAME, save it, and click on it. This will start the page, and you'll be at an edit screen. - Amgine

Pictures, Graphics, and Table of Contents
How do you add pictures to an article and, on another note, how do you make that table of contents box on the top of a page in and article. Also, how do you make the "References" section box and, lastly, how do you format the date, those bullets for lists, and the place when writing an article. I am kind of confused in all of the mentioned areas. Cafzal
 * A picture is added by first making it available on Wikimedia Commons. You will need to create an account there, and upload the file according to the requirements (it must be in the Public Domain, or released under the Gnu Free Document License, for example.)
 * The graphic can then be linked to on Wikinews (and any of the other Wikimedia foundation project sites) by adding the link [[Image:filename.ext]] . You should probably take a moment to learn more about using images on the Wikimedia sites, since there are many options to position and size the graphic. Try the Help:Contents or Metawiki- Amgine 21:56, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Adding article to latest news
Um, okay, so I've created my article (Mother of first Australian soldier killed in Iraq expresses anger), added it to todays latest news using the "Add it" button, then hit the "Refresh" button in the latest news box, and the article doesn't show up. It is definitely on the page for today's news. Any tips? - Borofkin 03:12, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Okay, I've figured this out. The "Add it" button links to 2005/February/1, whereas Template:Latest news links to 2005/February/01 (note "1" vs "01"). I've added my article to the "01" page, but I'm not quite sure how to fix this problem permentently. - Borofkin 03:33, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Thanks for pointing this out. That funtion was supposed to return the correct format... I think I'll be moving the single-digit files; should be easier than trying to get the software changed. - Amgine 03:40, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)


text:
Wikinews:Water cooler/miscellaneous/Archive/2

Templates and 'edit' links
Please wherever practical, provide the option for a user to edit content without them having to hunt through a chain of templates containing templates containing ...

The way to do this, is to provide an embedded 'edit' link within a template, which links straight to that template edit page. Use brief but descriptive text, eg 'edit section' 'edit list' so that the user can easily find the right way to edit a particular set of information.

Obviously this should not be done when a template contains only a template, but should be done when there is any content displayed that might need editing, for example the long list of articles presented on the main page. Simeon 05:51, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Perhaps a solution: if pages are meant not to be editable, and are not marked visually as Special pages automatically, that they should have a link to a note explaining how their content is managed, how to get it changed, or that it is automatic. This link would be in place of an actual 'edit' link. - Simeon 08:05, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * This is a good idea. I'll try to implement this tomorrow... hopefully I won't have quite so much going on. Would you suggest a generic template, or a specific message for each page which is not to be edited? - Amgine 08:10, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Eheh. Well, the two are not mutually exclusive. :) I won't make a suggestion, if people do either or both, it will be helpful. Even if we only gradually adopt the idea each time a template is edited. :) - Simeon 08:16, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

A message of thanks
I want to congratulate all your people who are doing great job by providing all kind of help.I want to share my feelings in this manner

MIGHTY OCEAN Oh mighty ocean! what happened to your mood?

Why you have become so much rude?

We know your powers,and so we pray,

You need not to show that in such a horrible way!

Just in a moment you wiped away lives,

There were children,husbands and wives!

There were cows,dogs and cats,

The master lost all,his possessions and pets!

You cheated the fishermen who depended on you,

Now where they will go? they do'nt have a clue!

You can do that again,that is a fact,

But please try to give us little time to react!

Mrs.Rachana Bajaj

Nasik

Moved from by Amgine

Media news entrepreneur's thoughts on Wikinews
Some comments on WIkinews from a former employer of mine, who has launched many news media startups: http://www.ratcliffeblog.com/archives/000241.html ... all in all I found it to raise many, many fair questions as well as some issues I'll be keeping in the back of my mind. -- Davodd | Talk 05:26, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * When I first started on Wikinews back in November, I shared Ratcliffe's concern about collaborative editing hindering how quickly we could post stories, as I thought the extensive peer-review process would make the site too slow.

 * As it turns out, more and more stories are being pushed from initial development, to copyediting, to posting in the Latest news section very quickly, when multiple editors collaborate on different aspects one after another. I believe this informal process can do just as good a job of reviewing articles as the originally proposed review process would have done, but at a much faster pace.

 * Ratcliffe makes an obvious point about having more than one viewpoint to be fully informed. This isn't much of an issue for our readers. (If you've stumbled onto Wikinews, you're obviously already seeking out alternative sources of news.) However, multiple stories about the same thing, on the same site, simply hasn't caught on when it's been tried before. Fred Bauder (of Wikipedia fame) has his own site where he is trying "multiple articles about the same thing" - he calls it "sympathetic point of view". But Wikipedia is the 800-pound gorilla because few contributors want to work on obscure subpages indexed from a master table of contents. They want to work on "the article". I suspect this is what caused most of us to pile onto a single Indian Ocean Earthquake page when that event was unfolding, rather than branch out into dozens of separate reports. (Despite your early advice to create many stories, which was only belatedly followed, but which in hindsight would have been much more effective.)

 * In any case, SPOV (sympathetic point of view) won't get anywhere on Wikinews, because NPOV is king. And NPOV is a non-negotiable foundation issue. If enough of us decided that NPOV is fatal to Wikinews ability to host firsthand reporting, or original analysis that goes beyond sterile rehashing ("echo chamber" is the fashionable term), we would have to fork. Which is a shame, as it would be a colossal waste of time and effort to have to start again just to work around these problems. But I've seen enough folks shown the door on Wikipedia that I won't debate any of the foundation issues.

 * Ratcliffe's remarks are right on the money on firsthand reporting versus NPOV. I raised this point several times here on Wikinews, but most folks didn't appear to understand this conflict as well as Ratcliffe does. I was recently a firsthand witness to an accident that shut down Interstate 280 here in San Jose, and I was fascinated that everyone on the scene had a slightly different story to tell the highway patrol about what had caused the accident. Wikinews will never be immune to that no matter how many pages of policy anyone may write up and vote upon. However, Jimbo's comments that Wikinews isn't really about original reporting have made me wonder if we're just going to politely dance around this whole issue for now, and continue our run as a glorified news aggregator/blog, rewriting wire stories and posting entertainment listings and homebrew weather reports for good measure (when our datafeed isn't down).

 * Once we get some firsthand reports to provide a concrete example, the rubber is going to hit the road. :)

 * On a more positive note, Ratcliffe's blog makes the first mention I've ever read about a low-budget "ON24" video news service. I plan to get involved in video news reporting for Wikinews, once its possible. Once the Theora video codec is ready, I plan to produce a few video news reports, which I hope we can post here on Wikinews, as it is my understanding that the primary non-negotiable foundation issue that is preventing video from being hosted on Wikinews (or Wikipedia for that matter) is that all Wikimedia projects must use open source media formats for anything that is posted on the Commons.

 * By the way, is Ratcliffe running a news site of his own? He mentions a consulting business, but I'm wondering what his motivation was to write such a lengthy piece on this subject? I looked at his disclosure page and it wasn't obvious what specific type of business he is running.

 * Regards,

 * — DV 11:58, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * The blog piece consists of a series of strawman arguments, false assumptions he makes, then defeats, imagining that this process is somehow informative? It presents a very singular opinion and point of view, which he is welcome to.

 * "I sincerely wonder whether wiki news will be any more informative than any other source..." .. fallacy number 1 in first paragraph: that for Wikinews to be successful it must be more informative.

 * Wikinews may be successful in prompting and assisting a general improvement in news quality offered, by the principle of competition, just as it may be argued that while some open source software is not successful in replacing existing commercial software, open source software provides competition in a market dearly lacking.

 * Wikinews may be considered successful if it is useful to its readers and users. Many 'mainstream' publications appeal to the narrowest of interests, and yet are 'successful'.

 * "ultimately the final judgment lies with the reader". Exactly. Fallacy number two: that news should appear as an authoritative source of undisputable fact.

 * "This is not to argue that the blog format is better for relating the news, only to explain that the WikiNews approach may not be appropriate to sheering fact from fiction." This should have been the lead par. The story could have been written well with NPOV and balance, since not even Ratcliffe knows the outcome of the experiment we are engaged in, and so should not have been so presumptuous, imho.

 * He seems not to allow for cultural development in the pool of regular wikinews users (and people in general), and assumes they are all 'readers' in the sense of 'people who cannot write effectively but who have been put at the controls'. Wiki thrives on the diversity of talent levels of its users, 'poor edits' often prompting the 'expert' authors to review their own set of preconceptions, and to reword in ways that are more easily understood.

 * He certainly has imagined some limit to the number of users working, since as I think the success of wikipedia shows, very large number of users create content very quickly. -- Simeon 06:26, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Wikinews:Welcommittee
I created a Welcommittee page for those of use willing to publicly announce that we are willing to help the newbies. I thought we could use its talk page (or subpages) to share techniques and develop strategies. Feel free to modify the page to make it more functional for newcomers. -- Davodd | Talk 05:30, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Time to choose a logo for Wikinews
Well, hopefully the proposal stage for a logo for this site ends on January 15. Then, unless people keep extending the proposal stage, we will finally lurch a little closer to getting a decent logo. See Wikinews/Logo. Dan100 19:11, 14 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * For discussion of voting and (hopefully) the voting page itself, see m:Talk:Wikinews/Logo. Dan100 19:23, 14 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * For a summary gallery of submissions: Wikinews logo summary -- Davodd | Talk 20:04, 14 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Chose our new logo!
Please vote here: Wikinews logo contest voting. Dan100 (Talk) 18:32, 15 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * I edited the page to make it easier to cast votes. Then I voted. -- Davodd | Talk 19:37, 15 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Ta for the improvements Davodd, better rules and easier to vote. Dan100 (Talk) 20:13, 15 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Original research
Okay, ive lauched our first experiment in original research - Conference discusses the credibility of blogs. I'm not trying to push this on anyone, just having a go at it while we are still in beta to see what happens. user:sj will be at the conference (with jimbo) and will hopefully feed us quotes and what not. So lets see how this goes. The bellman 12:35, 21 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Oh, I just took it out of 'development' and put it in 21 January 2005 on the front page. Not sure how we are supposed to add stories into date category pages, so it may well disappear. This seems to be part of an ongoing problem with people hiding content in templates, without providing efficient access to edit the template. Simeon 06:39, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * You did it exactly correctly. I will try to build better tools for editing what is on the templates, but one of the issues is the main page itself. - Amgine 06:56, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * OK, I think if pages are meant not to be editable, and are not marked visually as Special pages automatically, that they should have a link to a note explaining how their content is managed, how to get it changed, or that it is automatic. - Simeon 08:04, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * As far as the experiment in original research... I think there is general agreement on meta and here that original journalism is acceptible if:
 * It is verifiable (Talk:Article for most notes)
 * Confidentiality is maintained (Talk:Article/Notes for transcripts if the source agrees)
 * Opinions/beliefs/quotes are ascribed.
 * - Amgine 06:56, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

First Column--Science and Technology News
I have created the first column we have on Wikinews, as a test. It's not an opinion piece, to be safe, but instead it just has the latest science/technology news summarized so everybody understands it.

Because this is only an experiment, I would definitely like your input. What should I do? What shouldn't I do? And to the administrators: if I am breaking any policies or you would like me to get rid of this, please tell me and tell me why. I really think this idea should be done.

Hope you enjoy the column! Cap'n Refsmmat 00:37, 8 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Just to be helpful, Cap'n Refsmmat's science column is at User:Cap'n Refsmmat/ScienceNews, and may soon be templated so users may include it on their user pages. - Amgine 04:01, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Now it is. Cap'n Refsmmat 01:46, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

We have a new logo ...maybe!
'''A final logo still needs to be chosen with a run-off. See Wikinews logo contest voting for more info.''' Christiaan 23:00, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

This logo won by quite a large margin (results), and there seems to be consensus among voters for this version:

However I don't know who can actually change the logo... does anyone else? Dan100 (Talk) 00:30, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * The winning entry appears to contain six variations, by more than one artist. Which variation won? I suggest a runoff vote to select the specific logo variation that will be used on Wikinews. — DV 08:33, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Dan, you are not being at all honest rushing around announcing that we have a new logo when there is clearly no consensus on the voting page. I would direct people to voting page to see what is currently being discussed. And Dan, can you please refrain from making such announcements until there is a community consensus about where to go to from here? Christiaan 16:33, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Do we need a run-off? I don't think the majority would find an animated logo acceptable, and any arrangement of continents is POV. That leaves the no-continents version. Would anyone object to that being our new logo? Personally, I don't like it, but it won the vote. Dan100 (Talk) 11:15, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Are you claiming that everyone who voted for the "Globe with waves" was voting for the version without continents? How is that possible if many votes were entered before the no-continents version was even posted?

 * It was a mistake to post so many significantly different variations under the same entry, as it is now unclear whether any one variation had more votes than any of the other logo submissions.

 * The bottom line is this: are there more votes under the "globe with waves" entry which specifically call out the blank globe version as the version they support, then are presented underneath any of the other logo submissions?

 * Unless someone is going to have a heart attack if we fail to update the logo right this minute, I suggest we at least allow some of the voters to clarify if the blank globe version was really what they were voting for, otherwise the vote tally is rather suspect.

 * I'd like to update the logo right this minute, but at the same time, it doesn't seem right to disenfranchise so many of the folks who bothered to vote just because we're in a hurry. — DV 14:02, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Yes, please, let's not rush. There really is no need to. Christiaan 16:38, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Are you suggesting we re-run the contest but keeping all versions seperate? That would probably clear everything up. Do you think it's time we further said 'no more submissions'? I suggest this as, if we don't, we could end up delaying the desicion process for-ever while new submissions are continually put forward... Dan100 (Talk) 14:54, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * If there was a runoff, keeping all versions separate would make it crystal clear what was being voted upon.

 * A significant number of voters for "globe with waves" added comments qualifying their vote in one way or another.

 * Rather than try and interpret these votes, a runoff seems the simplest way to resolve this.

 * Another alternative is to contact each of the voters who voted for the "globe with waves" entry and ask them which variation they specifically voted for. However, sending out such a large number of messages would be difficult to do without offending those editors who feel they are being spammed when a posting is made to more than one user talk page by the same poster.

 * If there is to be a runoff vote, as long as each variation receive its own entry, there is no problem with late submission of additional variations, as the later variation submissions would simply be placed under a new entry. — DV 15:29, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I just want to clarify one thing - do you think we should only hold a run-off between the six 'with waves' logos, or re-run the vote with all the original submissions, this time taking care to keep them seperate? I can see pros and cons for both. Dan100 (Talk) 17:40, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * That would be called a re-vote, for which there is no need. A concept has already be chosen. Now we need to decide which version of this concept we use. Christiaan 17:47, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I like the new logo alot, but have one objection. Is there any reason to have or keep the slight outer blur around the text? Why can't the text just be crisp? It just looks too faded/blurry right now. --Comics 22:05, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * The actual logo hasn't been chosen yet Comics. This is the winning concept, of which there are a few options. I suggest you head over to Wikinews logo contest voting and add your comments there before the runoff. Christiaan 22:54, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Thanks for the pointer. I had seen the notice on the top of that page which said discussion ought to be moved here so naturally I posted here first.  I realize that the design isn't finalized yet, but am only offering a suggestion to whatever design does get chosen.  --Comics 02:32, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Rant
I'm really disappointed by the way this has turned out. Instead of a clear winner we're still left with many different versions. Personally I hate this design, it is incredibly weak visually. Compare it with any other logo to see what I mean.

I don't even see why meta should be involved in this anyway. I bet many of those who voted there never visit Wikinews and even fewer contribute.

Why don't we, Wikinewsies, settle down and resolve this one ourselves? Rant over!! :) Dan100 (Talk) 22:41, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * It's a Wikimedia project, like all of them. I like personally the logo, and so do a majority of voters. Managing the process does not make you an arbitrator or somehow make your opinion more valid. Christiaan 23:32, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

 * Au contrare, mon aime, this is one of the few true logos we had submitted. So stop your whining. --  user:zanimum
 * Actually Dan, selection of a logo is one time when you should want opinions from people outside Wikinews. After all, the whole point of a logo is to appeal to the general public, so the more people you consult, the better. Isomorphic 01:53, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Discussion
So is there going to be a run-off and where isthe discussion taking place if so? 216.90.114.66 22:29, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * This is it. Yes, there will be a run-off. The question now is when, how, and what. Jump in anywhere... - Amgine 22:41, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Logo Discussion (refactor of current threads)
- Amgine 21:17, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Logo Vote Runoff
It is generally agreed a run-off vote amongst designs which are based on the "Globe with waves" designs, originals by Jasonp55.

 * Disagreement over whether to allow post-initial-vote designs

Separate comments:
 * There is no discussion of a deadline. When should this logo be chosen? - Amgine 21:18, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * I think a good way forward is to notify Jasonp55 that his concept won the vote. Once he's been in contact then we can then setup a new run-off page for deciding exactly which logo we want. During this time maybe Jason or others would be so kind as to finalise (professionalise) some of the options based on all the comments and the alternative sketches that have been submitted. If he (or no one else) cares to then we can get on with a run-off between the 6 as they stood at the end of the last vote. Christiaan 23:36, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * That is a noble thought. However, if Jasonp55 doesn't check back in until, say, June? It is probably a good idea to determine an end to the process (where we want to get to) and when we should be there (a deadline), because that will help us determine what the steps to get there are, and when they should be finished. - Amgine 23:43, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Fair enough. I think a week should be enough to get hold of Jason. If he hasn't been in touch by then we should get on with a run-off between the 6 as they stood at the end of the last vote. If we get hold of him before a week is up we can ask him if he'd like to tidy some of the concepts up for a final vote. If he doesn't, again, we get on with a run-off between the 6 as they stood at the end of the last vote. If he does we ask him how much time it'll take and go from there. Christiaan 23:54, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Well it's been over a week and I haven't been able to get hold of Jasonp55. I presume bnobody else has. Shall we get this runoff under way? —Christiaan 19:59, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I've drafted a page for a runoff at Wikinews logo contest voting/Runoff. Any comments before/if we get it underway? —Christiaan 20:14, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)

 * Good work. Who will create a transparent version, though? That is absolutely needed on the Monobook skin.--Eloquence 02:57, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)

 * Jasonp55 last contribution was on January 21st (over on meta). I hope he will continue to participate in the logo process. If one of his logos is chosen and he has disappeared, it may require redrawing it from scratch to create a transparent version. It would look a bit shoddy to try and mask off the white background from the small versions that are posted, plus we need a full-sized, high resolution version for print purposes. — DV 04:00, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Well I've kicked it off. I've posted it to the Wikinews site news section and the WIkimedia Foundation email list. Can someone post it to Wikinews mailing lists? —Christiaan 16:43, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Content of sphere
There is disagreement over the use or non-use of:

 * Continents in general - too busy
 * Single hemisphere - North American-centric/Euro-centric/Regionalist
 * Animated globe - file size/distracting/.gif
 * Blank sphere - dull, does not say anything

 * How about using the wikipedia globe? --Regebro 10:48, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * I don't know if this has been suggested yet, but it may be a not-to-bad idea... - Amgine 18:48, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)

 * Wouldn't it be odd for us to have the same logo as a sister project?

 * All Wiki projects have their own logo.

 * It seems kind of lazy to just reuse Wikipedia's logo.

 * From the many logo ideas that have been submitted, we arrived at a concept of a globe with waves.

 * The second round of voting will narrow it down to a specific variation.

 * Has the desire to maintain a neutral point of view watered us down to the point where we can't even choose an original logo for fear of offending someone? — DV 04:08, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I like the UN globe - over the north pole, shows all the major land-masses (not a true projection). Dan100 (Talk) 13:20, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Of the approved design concept, I feel this is the best choice though I'm not sure how the southern hemisphere feels about it. Glad this discussion is moving again. - Amgine 02:05, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

 * All of the southern hemisphere, except for Antartica, is in the variation I posted (it's the last entry). — DV 05:16, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

 * Why not adapt the content of the sphere to the language of the wiki news viewed? In this case, the map would be centered on Asia for any Asian-language wikinews, on Europe for European language wikinews etc.Stefantastic 15:42, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

 * I like this idea, but I'm afraid you would give the contributors who are so eager to have a final vote a bit of a fit if any more late submissions are added. :) — DV 19:10, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

 * Very disappointed, actually, by the late entries. It was clearly stated that late entries would not be allowed, to avoid clouding the issue. Although the late entries are improvements on their themes, they has seriously injured the credibility of the poll, the process, and may ultimately force a complete new selection poll. To prevent this, I would encourage the contributors to voluntarily withdraw the late entries. I don't find any humor in it. - User:Amgine

 * "The late entries are improvements". So you rather throw away improvements for the sake of what? Now that you've made this remark, I don't find any humor in it either. Dan100 and others are insisting that this is the final vote and that there will be no modifications or variations allowed later on, which is why I thought it was important to contribute a few more variations based upon some feedback that was offered.

 * Although I previously felt otherwise, I now find that polls are evil. They seem to bring out all the worst traits in some of the participants, and they defeat collaboration.

 * It's understandable to have votes for committees that hold power, or for policies which can result in people being banned if they are violated. But this is a logo we're talking about. Nothing more. It's the pretty picture that goes in the corner.

 * Why was the starting time of the vote so precious given that it wasn't going to close for many days? The "late submissions" were submitted a day after the vote started, leaving plenty of time for voters to mull over the choices and help us to choose the most pleasing logo.

 * If anyone is interested in collaborating, I'm here, volunteering my time to help. Despite the fact that it only reduces the chance to react to constructive criticism and offer improvements, I'll refrain from adding any other variations for the duration of the current vote.

 * However, I will not disenfranchise the voters who have made their selections by withdrawing anything.

 * Sheesh. — DV 05:58, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

 * DV - a decision of some form, which can and most likely will be revisited again, needs to be made. The only reason, as far as I can determine, for having a second run-off - further delaying the decision - was the late additions of improvements/variations on the theme. Every design can be improved, so you have to put a limit and say "at this point we stop improving and decide which one" or you will never make a decision.
 * But polls are evil. I would far rather have the logo being an on-going thing, being modified and improved as we go along. Perhaps a planned change every 3-6 months... - User:Amgine
 * A planned change every 3-6 months is an excellent suggestion. Providing a regular opportunity to participate would encourage more talented artists to submit their ideas. — DV

WN:WBDU
G'day everyone, i just set up a WikiBureau (ie. noticeboard) for australia at WN:WBDU. Any interested aussies, come join, everyone else, go grab a bunch of friends and start one for your own country (there is already one for the US at WikiBureau_United_States. The bellman 04:37, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)


text:
Brazil forbids previous release of statistical data

The Brazilian government announced on January 28 that the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) will have to provide the Ministry of Planning and Budget with all research data 48 hours before it is released to the press. The ministry will be responsible for checking the data before it becomes public. All government employees with previous access to IBGE data will be required to keep it private or face prosecution.

According to the announcement, the objective is to organize the flow of information according to practices adopted in several other countries. Both the government and the IBGE deny claims of censorship and data manipulation.

IBGE is an independent public agency responsible for research in Brazil.


text:
Microsoft releases new MSN Search

Microsoft released today the final version of its new service, MSN Search. The new features that are available include tabs that allow consumers to target searches to the Web, news, images, music, desktop or Microsoft Encarta.

title: Microsoft releases new MSN Search


text:
Australian Prime Minister to visit Aceh

February 1, 2005 Australian Prime Minister John Howard will visit Banda Aceh this afternoon.

He will visit the hospital which reopened recently with the help of Australian and German military doctors, and also take a helicopter tour of tsunami-ravaged coastal areas. He will also hold talks with senior Indonesian ministers who are overseeing relief efforts.

Australia has committed AUD$1 Billion in aid over five years to the tsunami recovery, it's largest ever foreign aid program.

title: Australian Prime Minister to visit Aceh


text:
User:Jill St. Crux~enwikinews

Please see my Wikipedia userpage.

title: User:Jill St. Crux~enwikinews


text:
Human rights group critical of US opposition to ICC in Darfur

February 1, 2005

US based  has criticised the United States attempts to block the UN  from referring atrocities in the  region to the  (ICC). The US favours setting up an ad hoc tribunal instead. HRW claims that the resulting delay will lead to the loss of more innocent lives.

The US has long opposed the ICC, because of concerns over politically motivated prosecutions of it's citizens.

A report prepared by a five member UN commission noted "killing of civilians, enforced disappearances, destruction of villages, rape and other forms of sexual violence, pillaging and forced displacement, throughout Darfur", and secretly named alleged war criminals that should go before the ICC.

, the U.S. ambassador-at-large for war crimes, said "We don't want to be party to legitimizing the ICC."

In the last two years in the region more than 70,000 people have been killed, and over 2 million displaced.

US opposition to ICC
The United States, which signed but did not ratify the statute during the administration, withdrew its support soon after  assumed the presidency. It signed the ICC Statute at the last minute, primarily so that it could continue to take part in negotiations on the rules of procedure for the new court, in an attempt to obtain an exemption for U.S. nationals taking part in UN-sponsored peacekeeping missions--as several other countries were able to do. The U.S. fears that American soldiers and political leaders may be subject to frivolous or politically motivated prosecutions.

U.S. opponents of the ICC maintain that in cases where the U.S. failed to act quickly enough to prevent disaster the U.S. has been criticized for allowing genocide to occur (e.g. :"Rwanda: U.S., France blamed for genocide","Rwanda-US: Intelligence Warned Early of Genocide, New Papers Show"); in cases where the U.S. has acted quickly they have been criticized and even accused of war crimes (e.g. Yugoslavia, :"Yugoslavia: US Terrorism", "American Slaughter of People in Somalia").

Furthermore, opponents contend that the neither the ICC nor the United Nations has any real power to enforce the extradition of war criminals from signatory states. Therefore, any kind of military action to force compliance would have to be undertaken (in large part) by the U.S., action which would expose U.S. officials to spurious charges of war crimes.


text:
Talk:Microsoft releases new MSN Search

hmmm... a built in encarta search, if that catches on, maybe google will provide a special wikipedia search... or maybe im dreaming. The bellman 23:32, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)

editprotected
Could someone with edit privileges please remove the big brown box above the archive template? ♪ Tempo Di  Valse ♪ 17:00, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

 * ✅ Blood Red Sandman  (Talk)   (Contribs) 21:11, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

title: Talk:Microsoft releases new MSN Search


text:
Pope John Paul II has flu, taken to hospital

February 1, 2005

Pope John Paul II has been taken to hospital and is suffering from a "breathing crisis", the Vatican has confirmed.

The Vatican said in a statement that the Pope, 84, is suffering from an acute respiratory infection. He was admitted to the Gemelli Polyclinic Hospital at 2300 local time (2200 UTC).

According to the Vatican the Pontiff is suffering from an acute inflammation of the larynx as well as laryngo-spasms that constrict the lung's intake of air. He was diagnosed with a severe flu three days ago and taken to Gamelli as a precaution.

The Pope is no stranger to Gemelli Polyclinic Hospital. In 1981 he was taken there after being shot in the abdomen by Mehmet Ali Agca and he has been re-admitted at least three times since.

Although the Vatican usually does not comment on the pontiff's state of health, it is widely known that the Pope suffers from Parkinson's disease, and chronic joint problems.


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Category:February 1, 2005

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title: Category:February 1, 2005


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Australian churches begin campaign against late-term abortion

February 2, 2005 Australian churches have begun a public campaign opposing late-term abortion. Anglican, Catholic, Baptist, Presbyterian, Buddhist, Hindu, Lutheran, Sikh, Salvation Army, Wesleyan and Seventh-Day Adventist religious groups issued a signed statement yesterday calling for laws limiting abortions after a pregnancy has reached its 20th week.

The statement also calls for information to be provided to women considering abortion. They should receive detailed information about the health risks, the stage of the actual foetal development and the exact nature of the medical procedure. Additionally, a seven day "cooling down period" should follow initial counseling to give women more time to consider their decision.

But according to the document, the concerned church leaders are also aware that public opinion in Australia is predominantly pro-choice.

And New South Wales Premier Bob Carr has revealed that of 31,600 abortions in NSW last year, only 200 were in fact late term.

Prime Minister John Howard has welcomed the renewed debate about abortion without committing himself yet.


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Category:February 2, 2005

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Category:February 5, 2005

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Category:February 6, 2005

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Talk:Human rights group critical of US opposition to ICC in Darfur

Comments
Human rights group critical of US opposition to ICC in Darfur ->Human rights group critical of US opposition to ICC  I have made that change because the US opposition to ICC is not related to Darfur conflict. -- Carlosar 01:12, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * The original article name wasn't very good, I admit, however HRW's recent criticisms relate specifically to the US's opposition to the Security Council referring Darfur atrocities to the ICC. That is the recent development that makes it newsworthy. - Borofkin 01:41, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Ok. No objections to the criticals. -- Carlosar 02:04, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Editprotected
Could someone fix the spacing at the top of the article so that the date stamp is on a separate line from the text? Thanks, ♪ Tempo Di  Valse ♪ 03:43, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

 * Fixed. Thanks for the heads-up! Chris Mann (Say hi!|Stalk me!) 03:51, 2 December 2008 (UTC)