Rocknerd sputtered to a standstill around mid-2007, and the domain stopped working in mid-2008 (though it seems to be working again, just occasionally points to the goddamn moon or something). I then started the third incarnation of the site, running on WordPress, which appears to be a slightly less shit piece of software. I’m looking around for extensions to make it more interesting and participatory.

I have the database dump from Rocknerd v2, and will attempt to restore it to v3 one day when I really hate myself. Articles should be easy, preserving comment threads will be a bastard and a half.

rocknerd.co.uk

In 2003, Rambot created placename articles for every census location in the United States. We were therefore able to claim complete coverage (per that “encyclo-” prefix) of one country. FritzpollBot aims to complete this coverage for the entire world.

I think this bot-assisted programme of article creation is a Good Thing for topics where we do in fact have the data. It’ll certainly help alleviate our systemic bias. The issues I can see are editorial — the Rambot articles are data in prose form that these days we’d do with a parameterised template, etc. — but Fritzpoll is quite aware of these and the planned programme includes considerable human review and the active involvement of country WikiProjects. Good.

(May I note that people whose objections are that this will artificially inflate the article count or make Special:Random annoying appear to have forgotten that we’re here to write an encyclopedia.)

The question that springs to mind is: what else can we get complete data on for bot-assisted article creation? Every state-level or higher politician in every country ever? What else?

Update: Fritzpoll is proceeding with all due caution, and the bot will be doing nothing but preparing lists as yet. See evolving FAQ.

In fairness, the FSF contact page says licensing@fsf.org will help with “questions about the GPL and free software licensing.” Even the FSF has given up trying to make sense of the GFDL. The new version can’t happen soon enough.

(Provoked by asking for help with the reuse FAQ and the likely utter unfeasibility of audio versions of GFDL text. The latter is one of the best arguments I can think of for running screaming to CC-by-sa as absolutely soon as possible and throwing the GFDL into a fire.)

So any grammar effort (and several What You See Is All You Get editors — others just forget wikitext and write HTML) requires reverse-engineering that, and lots of people have tried and gotten 90% of the way before stalling. It doesn’t help that wikitext is (I’m told) provably impossible to just put into a single lump of EBNF.

The goal is to replace the twisty series of regexps with something generated from a grammar. Tim Starling has said, more or less: “We can’t change wikitext. Go away and write something that (a) covers almost all of it (b) is comparably fast in PHP.” Harsh, but fair.

It occurred to me that there must exist tools to convert regexps into EBNF. And that if we can get it into even a few disparate lumps of hideous EBNF, there should be tools to take those and simplify them somewhat. (Presumably with steps to say what given bits mean.) Or possibly things other than EBNF, just as long as the result is parseable.

I am not (even slightly) a computer scientist, but many of you are. Does anyone have any ideas on this? Or pointers to anyone having done anything even remotely similar? Or knowledgeable friends they could point this query at?

The other approach is parserTests.php. Running maintenance scripts, the scripts (look for parserTests), the list of tests. A “parser” will be anything that passes the unit tests.

Arkady is selling her rather nice antique violin. Not in fact haunted, but sounds luvverly.

German, made in the 1860s. The original manufacturer is unknown, as there are no manufacturer’s marks anywhere either outside or inside the instrument. It is in excellent condition; one string has unfortunately snapped but otherwise it is quite playable and has a sweet mellow tone.

It has an “artificially distressed” finish that is deliberate - as you can see from close inspection, the markings are beneath the varnish, which is original and untouched. There is some wear to the finish around the bridge and on the back which is the result of over a century of use - this is no mere ornamental instrument, but a well-played one!

The violin will come complete with all you see here - violin, bow, Stentor case and block of rosin. It is sold “as is”; it is a full-sized instrument suitable for orchestral use. It needs only a new set of strings and tuning in to be fully playable. Whether you’re looking for the ideal instrument for a serious student, an orchestral violin or just something sweet-sounding for folk music, this could be the perfect instrument for you!

Wikipedia gained its present hideous popularity through convenience — an encyclopedia with a ridiculously wide topic range, with content good enough to be useful no matter how often we stress it’s not “reliable” (certified checked) as such.

Britannica and Brockhaus may be theoretically higher quality, but are not right there on everyone’s desktop — they fail on practical availability. Worse is better. Most of Wikipedia’s readers (the people who make it #9 site in the world) wouldn’t have opened a paper encyclopedia since high school. Wikipedia fills a niche that was previously ignored when not botched.

So the paper encyclopedias put their content online. Can they provide a better website than Wikipedia? Ignoring the process, just looking at the resulting body of text? Can they produce content on the range of topics people look for on Wikipedia fast enough at their advertised quality level and keep it up to date? To what extent can they compete with Wikipedia without becoming Wikipedia? What would that entail?

“Really, I’m not out to destroy Microsoft. That will just be a completely unintentional side effect.”

In addition to numerous e-mail messages sent to the Uncyclomedia Foundation, an online petition cites a prohibition in Sophistry on images of people. The petition has more than 80,000 “signatures,” though many who submitted them to ThePetitionSpammers.com remained anonymous.

“It’s totally unacceptable to print the Prophet’s picture,” Sodomy Bukkake from Uncyclostan wrote in a message. “It shows insensitivity towards Sophist feelings and should be removed immediately. We are a peaceable people, and will fucking kill you if you don’t.”

A Frequently Asked Questions page explains the site’s polite but firm refusal to remove the images: “Since Uncyclopedia has the goal of dealing with all topics from a satirical point of view, it is not censored for the benefit of any particular group. We’re quite happy to be complete dicks if it generates sufficient humorous energy. So watch it or we’ll put you in the Cancer porn article.”

• The Prophet Sophia “Don’t be a dick. Really“. Journal of Uncyclopedian Studies, February 5, 2008

It is with great sadness that I have to report the passing away of a long-time staunch critic of $cientology, Dave Bird.

Dave was often referred to by other members of a.r.s.c.c.uk (alt.religion.scientology.central commitee, UK division - see Brief history of ARSCC) as “Our Glorious Leader”, a title well-earned. He made me feel very welcome on my first demo against the cult in front of the TCR org in London, and I often looked forward to his emails, phone calls and letters. He was a cheerful, active, scarily-intelligent and amusingly-inventive campaigner against the cult of $cientology and had been an active member of the National Council for Civic Liberties/Liberty before taking on the cult.

Dave had suffered from some time from health issues arising from his diabetes and so it had been a couple of years since he was last able to join us on a demo, but he kept up a keen interest from afar via the phone and internet, including actively posting to a.r.s. He had an amusing array of sigs; one included the quote “Woof woof (glug glug) .. who drowned the judge’s dog ?” Another good sig was this one:
FUCK THE SKULL OF HUBBARD, AND BUGGER THE DWARF HE RODE IN ON!!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
8====3 (O 0) GROETEN — PRINTZ XEMU EXTRAWL no real OT has
|n| (COMMANDER, FIFTH INVADER FORCE) ever existed
………………………………….…………………….
A society without a religion is like a maniac without a chainsaw.

The following is the obituary posted today on alt.religion.scientology by Jens Tingleff, a fellow a.r.s.c.c.uk member:

“Dave Bird died the morning of Sunday Feb 10th from complications arising from diabetes. He had been in hospital for six days.

http://www.xemu.demon.co.uk/

Dave had been active in the NCCL and in the fight against miscarriages of justice before he came to activism against the criminal organisation known as the “church” <spit> of $cientology.

While Dave was a great debater - and a lot of fun - on a.r.s. he also had many effective moments in Real Life, notably initiating getting proper legal representation for Bonnie and Richard Woods (and the rest is history - I don’t think the clams have sued anyone in the UK since then).

http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/wood3.htm
http://www.solitarytrees.net/pickets/sp861.htm

Dave brought a welcome street theatre side to our pickets, including many props, some of which worked, some of which didn’t and the largest one of which was Carrie the Giant Clamshell.

http://www.tingleff.org/jensting/duke_tour/muslinger/poole980314_a.html#mar28th

Dave worked hard at his activism, organising, doing practical things, designing props (the balloons were always a favourite of mine) and writing songs. He was a firm believer in the will of good people to show up at a demo that someone else had to do the hard work organising and he was happy to put in the work. He did ask a lot, but he gave more.

The criminal organisation known as the “church” <spit>>of $cientology didn’t like him one little bit, as evinced by the multi-page entry on their hate site RFW

http://www.religiousfreedomwatch.org/anti-religious-extremists/david-bird/

Dave would have gotten a kick out of the day he passed away being the day of the largest worldwide protest against the criminal organisation known as the “church” <spit> of $cientology.

I’ll miss him

Best Regards

Jens

Over 500 people turned out for the demo against the Co$ on Sunday 10th, and I’m sure Dave was there in spirit. He would have been delighted and highly amused at the whole Anonymous situation.

Rest in peace, Dave. You will be sadly missed.

This was a triumph.
I’m making a note here:
HUGE SUCCESS.
It’s hard to overstate my satisfaction
Wikipedia Review
We do what we must
because we can
For the good of all of us
Except the ones who are banned
But there’s no sense crying
over every quick block
You just keep on saving
till the database’s locked
And the editing is stopped
A Squid failure notice up
For the people who are
still unbanned

I’m not even angry.
I’m being so sincere right now.
Even though you blocked my ass
And banned me
And blocked my whole college
And set the IT staff on my ass
As they kicked me out I cried,
I was so happy for you!
Now I’ve found your IP and your home phone on time
And I found your employer and I’ll drop them a line
So I’m glad I got blocked
And the database is locked
for the people who are
still unbanned

Go ahead and leave me
I’ll stay on the Wikback for a while
maybe I’ll find somewhere else
to edit
maybe Citizendium …
THAT WAS A JOKE, HA HA, FAT CHANCE.
Anyway, these edits grate
They’re so delicious and moist
look at me still talking when there’s editing to do
when I look out there
it makes me glad I’m not you
I’ve experiments to run
there is research to be done
on the people who are
still unbanned

and believe me I am still unbanned
I’m adding edits and I’m still unbanned
when AOL’s blocked and I’m still unbanned
when Qatar’s blocked I’ll be still unbanned
and when the world’s blocked I’ll be still unbanned
still unbanned
still unbanned

(anyone who wants to fix the scansion, feel free)

Update: Copy here.

There are many different processes in Hell. These include the various torture, speedy disembowelment, and barbed-penis sodomy review processes; the various dispute exacerbation processes; the Request for Unholy Host process; various processes for policy formation and alteration; and the Featured Sinner candidate process. There are processes more specific to particular areas of Hell, such as that for proposing imp types, and processes internal to various subareas of the inferno. There are also more informal processes such as those that happen in discussion on a particular sinner, when which hideous horror or style of taunting is most appropriate for a given sinner can be settled among the interested demons.

Most of these processes depend on demonic consensus in some form. Some of them ultimately rely on votes, or something like votes, to determine that consensus on a particular issue. But even during a “vote” most of them not only permit but encourage discussion in addition to simple “Yes” or “No” votes, in hopes that people of one view can persuade those of another, or that a compromise can emerge, and in either case a true consensus, not just a majority or super-majority, can emerge.

And of course, Satan himself will from time to time just tell you what’s fucking what.

It is no accident that the basic mechanism for demeaning civil rights is called “Due Process of Bureaucracy”. Indeed, in most bureaucratic systems the effective mechanisms for stifling rights and freedoms are essentially procedural ones.

Of course, Hell is not a government, nor is its primary purpose to be a social or communitarian experiment. But many of the same problems arise whenever lots of entities interact, some of them with strongly opposing views. The basically procedural methods that have been used to solve these problems when running governments often must apply, with suitable variations, in an inferno such as Hell — and this only becomes more true as such an inferno becomes larger and more influential.

Sometimes a process can be like unto a pitchfork in the buttocks. Some processes demand that demons go through several steps to achieve a result. Some can be cumbersome or time-consuming. Some do not deal with particular situations as rapidly as a demon might wish. Sometimes going through the process seems unlikely to give the result that a demon desires. In all these cases, there is a temptation, sometimes a strong temptation, to act unilaterally, to simply “fuck” the problem as one sees it. Often this is technically possible in Hell. Sometimes many demons will support it.

The problem with yielding to this temptation is that it affects the overall structure of the functionality of Hell. It throws sand in the gears of the inferno. When demons see others acting outside of process, they may be convinced that they ought to do the same; or they may be convinced that the dark whispering voices and views will get no respect or consideration. If all demons act outside of process, there is no process, no organization to our efforts. Then we do not have a functional collaborative inferno; we have some hippie bullshit. Which is no way to run an inferno.

The primary goal of Hell is the damnation of sinners, and any process is only a means to that end. Even the community of Hellions, important as it is to some, is only a means to that end.

Often following a process takes more time and effort in a particular case than acting unilaterally. Sometimes following a process will give a less distended sinner’s anus in a particular case. But frequently acting outside of process causes strong and widespread dissatisfaction, which consumes far more time and effort than any saved by avoiding the process in the first place.

Even in the more numerous cases where no great uproar results, actions outside of process still tend to damage the trust of individual imps and demons in the institution of Hell, and to damage the community. And the community is the essential tool in the damnation of the sinners. Without the community, there is no one to brutally sodomise them, and there is no way to organize the brutal sodomy. Without the community, there is no reason for anyone to undertake any of the many needed but unglamorous tasks on which the damnation of the sinners depends.

Process need not be inflexible — most Hell processes and policies can be changed if the community, or the relevant section of it, wants to change them. Many processes allow for exceptions or alternate routes in particular cases or circumstances; such exceptions can be added to processes that do not have them.

In a small group there is little need for structure or process. When five people work on a sinner, little structure and no formal process may be required. When five thousand work together on a substantial group of sinners, there must be some structure or the inferno will collapse. While Hell intentionally has relatively little structure, it must have some to continue in a productive way. Processes, formal and informal, are some of the key elements in that structure.

During the early days of Hell, few processes were needed to maintain its essential structure. Many — at first most — demons knew each other or rapidly came to know each other. Issues could be resolved by informal discussion or casual fights to the death with tooth and claw, with little need for any other process.

As Hell has grown, more process has developed. While many demons still know or know of each other, there are many overlapping sub-communities, and no one knows all or even most of the most accomplished torturers. Demons have strong and differing views about policy and damnation issues. Process, often formal process, is needed to allow issues to be resolved in ways that all can accept as reasonable, even when individuals strongly disagree with particular results. Unilateral action tends to subvert that acceptance, and lead to a “me-first” or a “my way or the highway” attitude to the inferno — even or especially when demons sincerely believe that they are acting for the enhancement of the inferno.

Action outside of process is particularly dangerous when it involves powers restricted to the Unholy Host, or knowledge available only to long-established demons. This tends to create at least the impression of a caste system. No one wants to be on the bottom of a caste system, and such perceptions reduce the motivation for demons to contribute.

For all these reasons, demons and particularly the Unholy Host ought to adhere to and use existing processes, and resist the temptation to act outside of process, other than in truly emergency situations. If a process is not good, think enough of fellow Hellions to engage the problem and propose a change to it; don’t just ignore the process.

（偽基百科檳城周一訊）偽基百科基金會的內政安全部證實馬來西亞提供不屬實的訊息，並刊載含有侮辱、輕蔑偽基百科的內容和意識，該部於今日發出文告促請民眾關注不要使用該國家。

In the warning notice it mentioned that Malaysia was founded on August 31, 1957 and again on September 16, 1963 and is run by Barisan Nasional, Inc. The famous Tolololpedia website also belongs to this language group. But the country is spreading wrong information on Uncyclopedia and is been used widely in the world, especially by the press from the south-east Asian nations.

文告中指出，馬來西亞成立於1957年8月31日，並再次成立於1963年9月16日，為國民陣線公司所經營，國際著名的網站Tolololpedia也是屬於這個語言團體，但是，上述國家卻對偽基百科散播不正確的訊息，而這些錯誤的消息卻廣為被採納，尤其來自東南亞國家的媒體。

It also mentioned that the country speaks of many aspects of Uncyclopedia including history, culture, the political leaders, the government, the national song and the name and symptoms of the national flag. However, this information actually are in fact contrary to the information of its validity.

文告中透露，該國刊載的許多內容涵蓋了偽基百科的歷史、文化、政治、領袖、管理陣容、國歌甚至是國旗的名稱、特徵，然而有關資訊均實際上有違其正確性。

The Internal Security Department warning says this is insulting Uncyclopedia and the country is spreading unresponsible news to twist the fact that Uncyclopedia now is a peaceful website and Malaysia tends to make a political separation in Uncyclopedia and cause a bad image of Uncyclopedia in the world. In the statement, said that Uncyclopedia would have been serious violations of the dignity of the network, more irresponsible dissemination of the news of Chinese Wikipedia's intention to distort the facts, now enjoy peace, and attempts to split the website's political situation, to create a negative Uncyclopedia image in the domain.

偽基百科內政安全部在文告上表示，此舉已經嚴重侮辱偽基百科，該國更散播不負責任的新聞，有意扭曲偽基百科目前享有和平的事實，並企圖製造偽基百科分裂的局勢，讓偽基百科在世界上有一個負面的形象。該新聞說偽基百科破壞了網路的尊嚴，更不負責任的以中文維基百科的新聞意圖扭曲偽基百科享有和平的事實，企圖製造該網站的分裂，以在網路世界建立偽基百科的負面形象。

Through the warning notice the Internal Security Department of Foundation of Uncyclomedia wishes to ask the public not to download or spread the contents of this country, in order to avoid falling into the trap of heart.

偽基百科內政安全部冀望透過文告，促請公眾人士不要隨意下載、散播與該國相關的內容，以避免落入有心人的圈套中。

• Sann Se “What’s Malay for ‘crimethink’?“. Forum:Urgent Public Safety Warning, January 14, 2007

PECKHAM POLYTECHNIC, Saturday (UNN) — A lecturer has criticised students for relying on “books” and “journals” to do their thinking for them.

Tara Raboomtiyay, Professor of Reflexive Perspectives on Post-Modern Verbosity at the University of Bumsonseats, said too many young people around the world were taking the easy option when asked to do research and simply repeating the first things they found in library searches.

She has dubbed the phenomenon “The University of Dead Words On Paper.”

“The education world has pursued new technology with an almost evangelical zeal,” she said. “Too many students don’t use their own brains enough and just cite something they see in a ‘book’ or a ‘journal.’ We need to bring back the important values of critical reading and net forum discussion. Young people are finishing education with shallow ideas and need to learn interpretative skills before starting to use technology.

“Thousands of students across Britain are churning out banal and mediocre work by stringing together references to what ‘libraries’ provide them. I don’t think students come to university to learn how to use ‘books,’ they can all do that before they get here. It is an easy way out for tutors to let them work to their own devices using ‘literature searches,’ rather than active participatory discussion on phpBB. People have to pay to come to university now and what they are paying for is the knowledge, experience and guidance of forum moderators like myself.”

She will be giving a lecture on the issue, called Britannica Is White Bread For The Mind, at the Alan Dubious Lecture Theatre on Wednesday at 6.30pm.

• Cassandra Doomvoice “I warn you, if you keep doing this ‘writing’, you’ll lose your memory!“. Journal of Publication Credits, January 12, 2008

I won’t be there this time, as I have a prior booking (getting drunk with perverts. Other perverts). But it should be good!

I know of no examples whatsoever that anyone beyond Semantic Web geeks themselves care about. Zero.

I am not asking for responses of “I’m doing research in this area, let me show you it” or “SemanticFooWiki will be the coolest thing ever, you heathen, as soon as we get the code written” — I’m asking for examples of sites presently existing, that people are interested by the semantic web functionality of, without having to know or care what “the Semantic Web” is. Anyone?

— Chandon Seldon on Slashdot.

Did you know there is an MOS in the air force for internet help desk? That means there are people who’s entire job in the airforce is getting sent to kuwait and answering phone calls from junior officers about why flash videos of a dog humping a cat are loading slowly.

— Dan Rosenthal on foundation-l.

I have also been finding and playing every possible version of the Portal theme “Still Alive” after playing the Weebl and Bob version for Freda. (Spoileriffic ending fight.) Lyrics and chords, piano 1, piano 2 (mp3), cello, indie rock, EBM (mp3), NES, 8-bit, Japanese, Swedish, Engrish, YouTubeSports (hear his voicebox disintegrating), YouTube stereotype, by the songwriter (in concert), transcription (PDF).

Liz is playing the baby awful ’80s charity videos. Hear’n'Aid, oh dear God.

Free content, like free software, is about freedom — the freedom for anyone to use, study and apply, change and redistribute the work, for any purpose. “Non-commercial” isn’t free enough to be called free. “No derivatives” isn’t free enough to be called free. As Brianna Laugher notes, “The right to fork that is created by free content licensing keeps the parent organisations honest.”

The big news here is that the choice of a free licence furthers the public expectation that educational content (Wikipedia, Citizendium, Encyclopedia of Earth, Open Site) will be under a proper free content license. Scholarpedia and about.com need not apply. Google needs to think carefully.

(I also get a thank you at the end of the Citizendium license essay. Any help I provided in making this choice happen, I’m extremely pleased to have provided.)

Citizendium and Wikipedia, or at least the more foolish members thereof, have their periodic pissy bitchfights. But we’re on the same side in deep and important ways.

(Is Citizendium good for anything? Well, their history of the BSD Daemon is the best article I’ve seen on the subject. There’s excellent stuff there worth linking people to.)