Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/2016-02-10/In focus

Data sources

If Fox News or TeleSUR have the slightest chance of appearing as data sources of this searching project, I will campaign to stop it. --NaBUru38 (talk) 14:04, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

Could we see the page that recommended pulling in Fox News? - Dank (push to talk) 14:14, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

File:Wikipedia Search April 2015.png --NaBUru38 (talk) 14:22, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

Okay, it's under "United Nations Security Council ... Source: Foxnews". I expect people will want some explanation. - Dank (push to talk) 14:33, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

Curation

Regarding "Establish curation process." When I see the WMF talk of "curation" I see them continuing to add more hamster wheels to a cage which already has in excess of a ten-to-one wheel-to-hamster ratio. Get a clue: we can only run on one wheel at a time. Tools which enable us to run more efficiently are what we need. How this "curation process" is likely to pan out: teams of low-paid "curators" in various third-world countries will work tirelessly to push the importance of their sponsors' favored articles and move them to the upper echelons of search results, overwhelming any efforts of independent curators. Either that, or it will only take 12 months to establish an 11-month "curation backlog". Wbm1058 (talk) 04:04, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

Asked and Answered

At User talk:Jimbo Wales#Basic question about the scope of the grant I asked the following question:

"Will whatever does the searching just search things that we control (Wikipedia, Wictionary, Wikidata, Wikibooks, etc.) or will it be searching things that other people control (other websites, for example)?" --Guy Macon

The reply I got was

"I recommend reading the actual grant agreement. There is nothing in the deliverables which includes searching things that other people control. Whether or not a fully realized future result would include, as an example, a tool for editors and readers to quickly find results in open access research, etc., is an interesting question (I think it sounds great) but not one which is at all proposed for this first stage. Media reports and trolling suggesting that this is some kind of broad google competitor remain completely and utterly false." --Jimbo Wales

I followed up with:

"Jimbo, if things ever change and they start talking about searching sites that the WMF doesn't control, please let me know..." --Guy Macon

And the response was

"Sure. We don't have, and won't have, the resources at our disposal to even contemplate a Google/Bing style search engine, and all the talk about that is just that - talk based on nothing. I can envision - but this is not current planned and isn't even in a serious brainstorm yet as far as I know..." . --Jimbo Wales

I trust Jimbo, based upon ten years of experience dealing with him. If any WMF or Knight foundation documents appear to contradict the above, then either those documents are lying, someone is doing something without Jimbo's knowledge, or someone is reading too much into what are essentially marketing documents and not paying enough attention to the deliverables. --Guy Macon (talk) 01:21, 17 February 2016 (UTC)