RationalWiki talk:Nothing is going on at Citizendium/Archive7

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In fairness ...[edit]

… the FTL article has been slapped down. Well, patted on the head and told to go away please. Scream!! (talk) 10:21, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

Since this WIGO is current/updated...[edit]

Should we add this WIGO to the list template (the one on the upper right of the page)? [[User:K61824|]][[User_talk:K61824|]] 19:11, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

Definitely. 1.36.15.77 (talk) 23:17, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

No way! Scream!! (talk) 00:18, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

Limit[edit]

Might I suggest a limit, whether of characters, words or lines for WIGOs. Brevity is the soul of wit - long drawn out stuff is just unreadable. Points can be made on this (talk) page subsequent to writing the WIGO. Scream!! (talk) 16:44, 25 July 2013 (UTC)

Would you rather have 9 points for each referenda, or just group all the lesser ones into one batch for those interested in a quick summary?

The problem with CZ is that they've internalised bureaucracy enough to speak like bureaucrats, so you can't just link to them; you'd only force people to read a page just to get a sentence's worth of goings-on. 81.157.134.145 (talk) 21:05, 26 July 2013 (UTC) 81.157.134.145 (talk) 21:00, 26 July 2013 (UTC)

I think shorter WIGOs are better. It's easier to make them snarkier and more ironic. But I do agree with 81.'s comments. The best solution, I think, is to collaboratively edit long ones to make them shorter. I may try the one mentioned above later. DinoMight (talk) 23:52, 26 July 2013 (UTC)

That said, the one covering 7 referenda at least keeps the commentary on each one short and snappy; it's just that there's no point linking to any of them for clarification; The titles aren't descriptive, and the text takes ages to get to the point. I suppose I could've divided it off into four to seven separate WIGO items, but that seemed a bit excessive. 81.157.134.145 (talk) 00:24, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

It also wasn't helped by my modem crapping out last night (a full reset later it's working again), so that I had to stop editing once the text was finally up. 81.157.134.145 (talk) 00:37, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

Election time[edit]

Since I am a citizen in good standing (albeit one who has made about two edits in as many years), I can actually vote. I'm not entirely sure I can be bothered.

I'm slightly astounded by the nine referenda items. Are there now more referenda to vote on than there are editors? Enquiring minds want to know. —Tom Morris (talk) 18:25, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

Only eight referenda (the one most likely to revive Citizendium was rejected by the managing editor), and I count twelve people who've made at least one mainspace edit in the past fortnight. --65.101.119.25 (talk) 20:09, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

http://en.citizendium.org/wiki?title=Special:ActiveUsers gives 31 users in the last 30 days. I think that works out to about 1/3rd of their editors holding a position. 81.157.134.145 (talk) 06:17, 31 July 2013 (UTC)

Had someone other than Larry Sanger set up an encyclopedia similar in principle to Citizendium, it probably would have done much better. Sanger may have come up with some ideas but he ain't no leader. TorontoKid (talk) 23:26, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

$100 a month[edit]

They are finally getting serious about the finances... only about two years too late. —Tom Morris (talk) 16:15, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

There's nothing wrong with running CZ as a hobby server for a small number of people to play on, but the hard part will be to admit to themseves that it's a hobby server for a small number of people to play on - David Gerard (talk) 20:39, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

As an exercise in pointless bureaucracy, it is unparalleled. Occasionaluse (talk) 17:50, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

"Multiple accounts" August entry[edit]

The two accounts claim to be mother and daughter. I can't find independent evidence of the daughter outside of LinkedIn and a press release website; still, I think that entry should be removed unless there's really good reason to think it's the same person. How common is it to have a daughter named the same as the mother ("Jr.")? I haven't come across that yet, although I don't see why not. The Moose (talk) 11:53, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

Hmmm, they might in fact be different people (although it's interesting that people with such similar names could get approved without anyone batting an eye). I'm a bit busy to look into it in more detail today but feel free to remove it if you don't think it belongs (in that case, "12" should also be changed to "13" in the WIGO above it). DinoMight (talk) 03:17, 17 August 2013 (UTC)

Reporting on Citizendium[edit]

Is it just me, or is it almost impossible to report on some Citizendium things without being wordy (or making the commentary impossible to follow), because of all the complicated bureaucracy over there? The one on Citable versions vs. Approved Articles opening Homeopathy to editing... I tried to keep it short, but I also wanted to make it understandable. 86.161.13.165 (talk) 08:57, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

As a former CZ editor, personally banned by Larry no less, I enjyed RationalWiki's extensive coverage of our dearly beloved... but why oh why the foolish political agenda claimed? CZ has had problems with people pushing their own topics (notably 'Healing Arts') but in general, it is NOT a friendly place to try to put minroity views. For example, the homeopathy and Samuel Hahnemanna, articles, the Paracelus and alternative medicine pages were many times attacked by Sanger and his longest serving editors and constables - not because they knew or were even pretending to be interested in the topics but simply because they felt the views being put were outisde some supposed conventional range. What CZ has actually promoted is pages of engineering trivia, whcih presumably is uncontroversial.

Wikipedia, s heavy-handedly praised here, has by comparison many organised campaigns,such as that in favour of Global Warming 'action', which has replaced the 'collective editing' of important topics there for Stalinist showtrials and mass expulsions.

See: http://www.philosophical-investigations.org/Wikipedia_on_Climate_Change

for example, and feel free to contact us on the site for a more intelligent debate about these online encuylopedias. You are, after all, calling yourself 'rational wiki'.... ^{— Unsigned, by: 90.38.122.231 / talk / contribs 2013-09-22T16:27:09‎}

Time for a Citizendium boycott?[edit]

All that seems to be happening on this WIGO is one BoN's cataloguing of the day to day minutiae of activities at Cz. Quite frankly most of the last dozen or so entries have been trivial beyond belief. If it were down to me I'd lock the page. Scream!! (talk) 14:38, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

Scream, I think you're right. It might be time to consider another vote. If there is, I'm changing my previous vote from Keep to Delete. TorontoKid (talk) 23:26, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

Citizendium is solely of historical interest. In its present state it's just another obscure little website where a dozen or so people write about whatever is on their minds, and virtually no one else reads. (Alexa ranking has long been in the noise level, hovering around 300,000). No need to have a WIGO on such a site. If something noteworthy happens there we can bring it up on the article talk page or at the saloon. Doctor Dark (talk) 01:51, 22 November 2013 (UTC)

I don't see a point in deleting (I've always hated wiping years of work due to the fact nothing is happening now) however, moving CZ to the NIGO list seems like a practical thing to do. Perhaps we can have a a What is going on in Larry, to catalog his never ending fail-upward internet projects that go no where. --Revolverman (talk) 08:34, 22 November 2013 (UTC)

It's no longer of any importance. But don't delete it, fishbowl it.--Bob ^{"I think you'll find it's more complicated than that."} 10:44, 22 November 2013 (UTC)

Wouldn't want to delete it. Just forget about it. Unless anything major happens. It's just that these constant retellings of day to day events is becoming rather silly and doesn't reflect well on RW. Scream!! (talk) 13:11, 22 November 2013 (UTC)

I've never really followed CZ, but by the sounds of it, it's deader than CP, and possibly more disfunctional too. AFAIK most WIGOs aren't even added by RW editors. That said, we should leave it up to those that do still go there. If something noteworthy happens, I'm sure they'll WIGO it. But yeah, we don't need WIGOs on day-to-day stuff. PsyGremlin^Sprich! 13:44, 22 November 2013 (UTC)

And how would we ensure that IP editors only write about "notable" things?--Bob ^{"I think you'll find it's more complicated than that."} 14:53, 22 November 2013 (UTC)

Semi-protecting the page would get rid of the "IP" part, and since the only one keen to add new stuff is a BoN...--ZooGuard (talk) 15:43, 22 November 2013 (UTC)

Right. So, let me get this straight - the WIGO on CP - two entries in the last month - stays open, the one that's active is closed? http://xkcd.com/359/ 86.161.10.101 (talk) 17:59, 22 November 2013 (UTC)

I think the gun was jumped in protecting and shuting down so quickly. I personally think there is still a role for WIGO:CZ, its a niche interest but what "harm" is done keeping it really? Tmtoulouse (talk) 18:20, 22 November 2013 (UTC)

The problem is that the WIGO is getting bogged down in trivial crap. As a result I seldom look at it any more, figuring it's just going to be more of the same. (The talk page is another matter.) In short, signal-to-noise ratio is a real thing. If Mr./Ms. 86. would agree to throttle it back then it might be worth reopening. But not otherwise. Doctor Dark (talk) 01:16, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

It's a damn shame. This page brought me deeper into RationalWiki (after I saw the main article on Citizendium) and I like hearing about what's going on there, even if it is trivial. But, I understand your reasons. The Moose (talk) 08:18, 25 November 2013 (UTC)

If RationalWiki's just going to randomly shut it down without even giving a chance to respond, it's hard for me to care about RW anymore. Particularly as they don't even see this as a problem. 86.161.10.101 (talk) 09:16, 25 November 2013 (UTC)

(EC)Might have jumped the gun but the utter trivia being WIGOed by 86... was getting on my nerves. If (s)he wants to put in something worthy of note then fair enough: deprotect it but some of the crap that has been there lately … Scream!! (talk) 09:20, 25 November 2013 (UTC)

So ... create a login? - David Gerard (talk) 13:48, 25 November 2013 (UTC)

I'm disappointed the page was locked, I enjoyed following 86s updates. I consider Citizendium a great case study in how not to run a Wiki and have followed it's demise with interest. Most interesting to me is watching how they stick to certain practices even when said practices have proven misguided time and time again. Citizendium refuses to chance and now their ship is half sunk. Perhaps this page can remain unprotected until it's fully submerged? 189.61.31.87 (talk) 15:29, 26 November 2013 (UTC)

OK! Scream!! (talk) 16:19, 26 November 2013 (UTC)

Unprotecting is fine, but if the crapflood starts up again I reserve the right to protect unilaterally. Doctor Dark (talk) 01:28, 27 November 2013 (UTC)

As Doctor Dick still promises to screw this over without the need to even raise an issue on the talk page beforehand at any time, I'm not returning. Everyone agrees these actions were inappropriate, no apologies were made, instead we have promises that the behaviour will repeat. 86.161.10.101 (talk) 10:45, 27 November 2013 (UTC)

"No-one agrees with me that these actions were inappropriate but some people were willing to give me a chance to do better. I'm not interested unless I am given free rein to use this site to pursue my petty agenda anonymously" FTFY. Tialaramex (talk) 11:32, 29 November 2013 (UTC)

If someone does what everyone else agrees was a premature shutdown without any attempt to bring up the issues beforehand, and one is told that this will almost certainly happen again - failure to raise any issues until the point you suddenly burning everything down - and may I point out that if you don't like this, noone was ever forcing you to read it, the shutdown simply ruined the fun of others - then this site has clearly forgotten that A. it's a volunteer site, and B. It's meant to promote rationality while having fun about it. Systemic failures are a subject that rationality can shine a lot of light onto, particularly when, as in this case, many of them descend from ideological entrapment by ideas that have clearly failed. But I'd rather not deal with, if anything, even more irrational behaviour on RationalWiki while documenting irrational behaviour elsewhere. 86.180.35.237 (talk) 15:01, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

Coming shortly to Citizendium: What's going on at RationalWiki? Ro Thorpe (talk) 21:23, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

Scream!! (talk) 21:35, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

"noone was ever forcing you to read it" I think David's aspergers would disagree... Occasionaluse (talk) 17:19, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Am I the only one missing WIGO Citizendium? Editor at CP ^{mały książe} 11:00, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

No. A Real Libertarian (talk) 11:13, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Time to close down this WIGO. There has been nothing of note happening and that tumbleweed section is only getting larger. TorontoKid (talk) 22:43, 10 April 2014 (UTC)

Knowino gone?[edit]

Noticed over the last fortnight Knowino has disappeared and has been replaced by a "Down for scheduled maintenance" notice. Prior to this the only activity was from spammers and the removal of their spam. No major articles for months and now Google has stopped indexing the site. Is Knowino finished? TorontoKid (talk) 02:43, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

Good question, I like to know too. I contributed some major articles in the past and I don't have copies. I trusted that I be given a chance to make backups of my own work before Knowino would be unplugged, but alas.--P. Wormer (talk) 08:28, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

Knowino is up again, there was no need for me to worry. --P. Wormer (talk) 08:26, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

Surprised your webmaster didn't simply 503 notice his site. Getting your pages blocked via robots.txt will screw-up your search engine rankings when they go back online. TorontoKid (talk) 02:55, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

I don't quite understand what you mean, but doubtlessly Thomas Larssen knows and has his reasons. As you mentioned a few remarks earlier, I'm in the habit of spending a few minutes everyday on removing spam from Knowino. Very occasionally I update one of my own articles. To my surprise spammers discovered Knowino again already. I never bothered to figure out what they're after, but I guess that they want to attract readers to their own websites. Are these websites malicious, purely commercial, or both? I don't know. --P. Wormer (talk) 08:37, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

Anything in the last coupla months?[edit]

I see there's no entries for December or January. (I know the answer is "no", but I was curious as to a more detailed "no".) - David Gerard (talk) 13:00, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Here. A Real Libertarian (talk) 13:15, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Well, there's this hopeful new development, which will surely cement their reputation as a valuable resource if they can get what they call those "irrational skeptics" out of the way. Might be worth a WIGO. But at present CZ is just a scratchpad for a dozen or so people to write about whatever strikes their fancy, so my inclination is to let them carry on in their quiet corner of the interwebs. Doctor Dark (talk) 14:35, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

To be fair, don't tar everyone at Citizendium with the same brush. The presence of those two woo pedallers lie squarely with John Stephenson. He approved both their membership and only he has the power to delete their content, which he has not done. TorontoKid (talk) 21:21, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Hi. Replying to point out some inaccuracies here. The first person joined Citizendium several years ago; I had to create a new account for technical reasons and block the old one. In the second case, the application was approved for the same reasons everyone gets in: they promise to abide by the rules and present evidence of their real identity. There is currently no Citizendium rule which would allow us to deny applications because someone is insufficiently skeptical; nor is there any rule which would permit us to take activities on other projects into account, other than for cases of criminality. (This has been suggested before, but is yet to come about.) In other words, the application procedure broadly assumes good faith and allows people to make a fresh start on CZ. Now, if someone starts uploading mountains of nonsense, the Citizendium Council or expert Editors should in theory step in. As a 'Constable', I only have the powers to warn or ban people depending on behaviour, not content (e.g. for clear self-promotion or vandalism). So I have no "power to delete their content" unless Editors or the Council order me to do so: I just administer, and no account approval entails my personal endorsement of the applicant. Also, I am not the only Constable or sysop on the wiki, and everyone with such powers is subordinate to the Council. John Stephenson (talk) 16:41, 16 January 2014 (UTC)

You're being disingenuous here. Example: You deleted Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting without there being any "orders" from Editors or the Council. TorontoKid (talk) 22:23, 16 January 2014 (UTC)

Thank you for acknowledging the inaccuracies in your previous statement. Both your comments lead me to think that you are willing to criticise without really understanding the rules or the circumstances. In the case you refer to, that was an article imported from Wikipedia with no substantive improvements at all - and, in fact, the introductory paragraph had been deleted and the templates were producing error messages. Under CZ rules going back some years, all such 'external articles' are automatic candidates for deletion until significant work is done on them, and may be removed at the request of any member. The revisions served purely to make the article unreadable and involved no new content at all, plus the material had gone out-of-date and was imported by someone who had left, so there was little reason to keep it. John Stephenson (talk) 12:38, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

No such request to delete the article had been made on the article talk page or forum. You simply deleted it without forewarning and did so when the author was in no position to make any remedial changes to it. You abused your position as constable. You should do the right thing Stephenson and resign. TorontoKid (talk) 22:49, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

Sure thing. I'll hand in my resignation immediately. John Stephenson (talk) 01:44, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

Not believing in any paranormal stuff (including God, Allah, etc.), I was pleasantly surprised by this overview of the history of paranormal research. It is factual and the author does not try to conceal the criticism that has been brought forward against paranormal research. I had expected something much more quacky. --P. Wormer (talk) 08:25, 16 January 2014 (UTC)

The psyker[edit]

In one of the discussions about Wikipedia, RationalWiki and wikis in general on the Skeptiko and/or the Mind-Energy forums, someone mentioned editing Citizendium, but now I can't find it.--ZooGuard (talk) 10:29, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Well, time to dispatch Ravenor, it takes a thief and all. A Real Libertarian (talk) 10:38, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Nice guy Darren Duncan[edit]

During the six month move to cheaper hosting, this Darren Duncan guy has been donating $319.90 a month "as a special extra donation to cover the cost of the old servers while he works to migrate us to a cheaper service" [1] He's donated nearly 2K at this stage instead of setting up the cheaper hosting. Has he like, forgotten about it or something? Must be nice to have so much money that you don't notice a few missing K's here and there. 46.7.249.24 (talk) 11:02, 11 April 2014 (UTC)

Well, it's a recurring deadline. People are bad at recurring deadlines. Each time you think "Oh, I'll get to that before the deadline" and then something urgent comes up and you miss it. Scale it down and you'll probably recognise it. Maybe you kept up a subscription to something you weren't reading/ playing/ using any more for a few days, or weeks or months because you didn't get around to cancelling for example? Tialaramex (talk) 11:29, 20 April 2014 (UTC)

Sure, but most magazine subscriptions don't cost $320/month (-: DinoMight (talk) 01:10, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

I have had fleeting thoughts about gathering a posse, outvoting the people on the site and setting up a wiki about good government/government accountability (something that would make the name make sense.) Problem is, we would need to get the keys from them and maintain the site well. Plus I would feel sorry for Good Guy Darren Duncan. The Moose (talk) 06:38, 7 July 2014 (UTC)

Who is an expert?[edit]

We have a bizarre spectacle now where an author can now approve an editor, even though that author may not be qualified to be an editor, and where the standing procedure page specifically refers to editors only approving other editors. Policy on the run. Just gotta love it. TorontoKid (talk) 02:20, 10 July 2014 (UTC)

Citizendium Elections[edit]

The good news: Citizendium has more people active in the mainspace (13 in the past month) than open elective positions (5). Bets on if the number of candidates will exceed the number of positions? --65.101.119.25 (talk) 21:04, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Anyone else find it amusing that there seems to be a huge increase in wiki and forum participation around this time of elections and referenda? 46.7.249.24 (talk) 04:56, 13 June 2014 (UTC)

It would be amusing if it wasn't so sad. Two words: election chasers. Make promises that will be forgotten about after the election, pretend to look busy while doing nothing for the next twelve months. TorontoKid (talk) 07:19, 13 June 2014 (UTC)

And of course make sure you tell everyone you donated money, ie always helpful to get people to vote for you when you don't really contribute anything else of value. TorontoKid (talk) 16:47, 13 August 2014 (UTC)

Infobitt[edit]

So, the site still says "Launching early 2014." I wonder what's taking so long. Maybe I'm missing something, but it doesn't seem to be a particularly complex idea. I would think that creating an interface for adding links to news sites, ranking them, writing summaries, and voting on the summaries would all be functionality that would mostly be pretty standard and/or not too time-consuming to code. Unless, of course, it's been difficult to find a programmer that is willing to work for (a) Larry and (b) equity in Larry's company. DinoMight (talk) 21:41, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

They were inviting people for private testing a while ago - I got an e-mail about it, but they only give you a week or so to respond before they recind the offer, so I couldn't say more. 86.150.152.117 (talk) 14:07, 12 June 2014 (UTC)

That lack of publicity and recruitment for the project is endemic with everything Sanger does. TorontoKid (talk) 16:54, 13 August 2014 (UTC)

Heavy load[edit]

They had 1,760,000 views between Oct 29, 2013 and Aug 13, 2014, or fewer than 6,400 views a day - 193,000 a month... --larron (talk) 13:37, 13 August 2014 (UTC)

The honeymoon is over[edit]

I don't get it. :( 46.7.249.24 (talk) 10:21, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

They're arguing over how to get editors back, and if they should lower the user grade required for approving articles. The Council decided that lowering the grade would risk turning it into an inaccurate Wikipedia clone, and prefer that it remain a website edited largely by Homoeopathy salesmen, since they are considered 'experts'.-- Forerunner (talk) 13:47, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

I don't think they will ever get any editors back. They have noting to offer as far as I can see. They have no community, no brand recognition, very few who remain seem to be interested in contributing actual content and there's noting there for me as a reader to go for. I mean, look at Christine Bush. All she has done all week is edit her user page 40 times and post on the forums.

If an expert were interested, what's to stop that person simply installing their own version of MediaWiki and getting to work? 46.7.249.24 (talk) 17:16, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

It was dead in 2011: Ars Technica article, not one CZ defender present in the comments in two weeks. In 2014, it's tumbleweeds to the horizon. When the only people talking about you are RationalWiki, you're way past fucked - David Gerard (talk) 19:21, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

Citizendium needs to close[edit]

The treatment of Claus Bruentrup on Citizendium highlights just how unprofessional that site has devolved into. It's one thing disagreeing with a person's point of view, it's another thing abusing your power to delete an authors work, leaving comments that imply some criminal impropriety, then banning that user on the absurd pretext of "account issue". Citizendium was a great idea on paper, but the problem has always been its administration - there are people there who place their own personal interests above the project. As the saying goes "a fish rots from the head down". TorontoKid (talk) 02:48, 24 October 2014 (UTC)

I've never followed CZ closely, save to follow some of the threads in the WIGO. Suffice to say, most of the leadership there come across as insufferable arseholes. PsyGremlin^講話 02:55, 24 October 2014 (UTC)

Does anybody know what was wrong with Claus Bruentrup or with his "India Wikipedia project" article (which has been deleted)? As far as I can see he supported Christine Bush in a polite manner. Surely that's not a bannable offense. He must have committed another crime, but what? False identity perhaps?--P. Wormer (talk) 07:56, 24 October 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, Claus's talk page and his article were deleted, so I don't really know what happened. Are there any mirrors of Citizendium? The Moose (talk) 09:19, 24 October 2014 (UTC)

As best I can tell, Claus was importing Wikipedia drama (the article "Wikipedia India Education Program" refers to Wikipedia's "India Education Program", which is generally considered to have been a disastrous failure). Claus's userpage also lists affiliation with one of the many India Against Corruption groups, and may have been importing IAC drama from Wikipedia (in short, there are approximately three groups claiming to be the "real" IAC, and they're using Wikipedia as a battleground to advance their competing claims; see also http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/WeAreStrugglingTogether). --65.101.119.25 (talk) 22:30, 24 October 2014 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘Claus is a man of principles specializing in Cyber Law and Intellectual Property, ie. patents, copyright, trademark, domain name protection, WIPO, DMCA etc.<User:Claus Bruentrup. He had sent this DMCA India Against Corruption logo and WMF conceded IAC logo takedown on legal advice. Claus then discovered that WMF's Indian Trustee was inducting young Indian schoolchildren onto Wikipedia where they figgered out Wikiporn (hi-res photos of the identifiable minors are still on Commons); the instructor was teaching "Ubuntu" but Google was throwing up "UbuntuXXX" which led on to Wikia and Commons. After Claus complained to the school he was blocked on Wikipedia (for his IAC related edits).

Archivo:UbuntuXXX.jpg --> Preferencias_sexuales and from there to some hotties on commons.

Claus blew the whistle by publishing a detailed article - on CZ, Wikimedia and Wikipedia. This was picked up in India by IAC's former allies and they also sent legal notices here Wikipedia child pornography scandal. India Education Program 2013 which went to many MPs in India. CZ took down everything BRAVO, WMF did so partially. Here is Claus's mirror Wikipedia India Education Program

On the Indian end, the IAC boys got WMF's expensive 0.3 million USD$ Indian search engine Wiki Indic Search, PR puff taken down on 28 Oct 2014. And Jimbo's Empire strikes back. HRA1924 (talk) 17:04, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

Infobitt versus Grasswire[edit]

In 12 months, who will still be active? Given Sanger's track record, my money is on Grasswire. TorontoKid (talk) 05:25, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

I get much of my news through Twitter, by following news sites that I like and reading what they post if the headline catches my eye. It's not clear to me what problem Grasswire and especially InfoBitt are trying to solve. The Moose (talk) 07:47, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

Updates![edit]

Just a note about the latest WIGO, things are actually worse over at CZ then mentioned. Just some other problems I'm aware of of the top of my head:

The blog is not working, but still linked to on the CZ main page. The last update to it was over 2 years ago in January 2013 so I guess it's not missed. Ironically the last entry was 2013: A Make-or-Break Year for Citizendium?
Larry Sanger's Accelerated early childhood education article is missing its YouTube video.
As well as Special:ActiveUsers not working, Special:PopularPages doesn't work either and this one's linked to from the main page. It actually shows up as a red link on the main page. Parts of other special pages are also broken. Special:ListFiles dosen't list any Thumbnails for some reason.
Many of their Citable articles for example Complex number are unreadable because the math tags no longer work. This has to be the best one ever. Officially the entire point of CZ is to provide more reliable articles then Wikipedia or something, and yet any CZ article that deals with math is unusable. Of course we all know the real reason of CZ's existence is to provide it's players with a Bureaucracy simulation. I guess as long as that is at least technically working anything else is just a minor detail.

Also of note is that the old CZ forums no longer work and look like they will never be coming back. There was some talk about having them as an archive but given the above, hahahaha :) There are a lot of links to the forum in the RationalWiki article. We probably will need to change them over to the Internet archive at some point. 37.228.253.220 (talk) 17:11, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

Feel free to add the above as an entry - David Gerard (talk) 18:01, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

OMG It just keeps getting better!

Today John Stephenson has been having trouble updating the Article Specific Template. Apparently the original attribution line was part of the Pinkwich skin and that was also lost in the upgrade. That was a damn ugly skin anyway so I think this is a rare case of some actual improvement.
Despite the mighty Charter, Article 8 stating about CZ user pages that "they are not released to be indexed by search engines" John Stephenson has discovered that some CZ user pages are being indexed by Google.

Yes John, those are the major issues of the day. Not no blog, no users, no articles and no future but Google indexing user pages. 37.228.253.220 (talk) 20:52, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

Old, but well-hidden[edit]

This is old, but it wasn't hidden at all.

if it wasn't being worked on before, what the hell was happening?

Well, the same thing that's happening right now to finish the job. NOTHING. Nothing at all.. We've laughed at the lack of movement on this issue before. 37.228.253.121 (talk) 22:41, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

Crowdsourcing the news actually works[edit]

An email I received from Larry today:

Crowdsourcing the news actually works

Our experiment to commit to create news bitts appears to improve news quantity and quality

I had an idea for an experiment to build Infobitt:

Invite people to commit to write some number of bitts (their choice) per day or per week.
Collect the commitments on a spreadsheet.
Report to the group (humorously called the "Commit-tee") what the totals are.

The results of the first week are in. Fourteen people collectively committed to write 33 bitts per day, or 231 for the week. After a week, those 14 collectively did in fact write exactly 231 per day (odd coincidence). The entire community wrote more than that, because quite a few other writers, who didn't commit, wrote a bunch as well.

So: Infobitt is working! We're discovering and showing the world how to crowdsource the news.

Please join in!

I want to invite you to join this same effort! Please reply to this email (larry@infobitt.com) stating how many bitts you can commit to writing, either per day or per week. Even one per week would be great. Two per day is not that hard.

Why it works:

Infobitt is more fun when there are lots of people contributing.
When you can be sure that others are contributing, you're more motivated.
The more people who have committed, the more sure you can be that others will contribute!

And sure enough: in the first week of our experiment, Infobitt has been significantly more active...and more fun. So far, so good!

So, again, please check out the site and send me your commitments!

Best,
Larry

The site is already almost five months old, but Larry already has to get people to commit themselves to using the site. And even then only 14 people did so. It reminds me of the "Write-a-Thons" failing wiki's (like CZ) sometimes try to organize. Sites that people are actually interested in using don't need "commitments", "Write-a-Thons" or any other type of fluff, people will just use the site.

There also seems to be very little information about infobitt on the net. The Wikipedia article is just a short stub, and Google search results show only a few articles from late last year. I guess the internets aren't interested in Larry's so called "movement" to fix the news or whatever.

It looks to me that infobitt is going to be another Larry failure, which is no surprize. But I was surprized that it doesn't seem to have even taken off at the beginning. People have learned their lesson from CZ :) 37.228.229.180 (talk) 11:57, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

So what is the relationship between Citizendium and Infobitt? Are they part of the same organization or just kind of overlap? 192.241.143.118 (talk) 20:15, 11 April 2015 (UTC)

Just Larry - David Gerard (talk) 09:33, 12 April 2015 (UTC)

Both were founded by Larry Sanger, both were going to change the world, and both have fallen into obscurity. 37.228.229.180 (talk) 18:18, 12 April 2015 (UTC)

CZ Election 2015[edit]

So, the CZ Bureaucracy is starting up again this year for election time.

Firstly, a quick recap of last years election. Written partly for myself as it's hard to follow all the red tape.

Gareth Leng was elected to an editor seat. Ran unopposed and needed only an approval vote. Since election he has made 10 (ten) edits to the Citizendium.
Peter Schmitt was elected to an editor seat. Also ran unopposed and needed only an approval vote. Since election he has made 1 (one) edit to the Citizendium.
Christine Bush was elected to the only author seat. She stuck around for a few months. Her last edits were back in October 2014 to archive her Pseudonym Policy page and cut her user page down to a stub. I don't think she's coming back.
Meg Ireland was also up for the author seat. She is the only person not to get elected and blanked her talk page afterward. She returned on 5 March 2015 to NOINDEX her user and talk page.
Anthony Sebastian was elected as Managing Editor. Ran unopposed and needed only an approval vote. He's still around, but has only made 7 (seven) edits since 1 January 2015.

So with all the success of last years election let's talk about this years election.

Only Christine Bush's seat is actually ending this year, all the other terms end in June 2016 and whoever gets elected to this position will be given a two year term (until June 2017). Also, there are no longer different seats for authors and editors, at the last election all Council seats were opened up to all Citizens. The CZ:Governance mentions something about holding special elections to fill council seats that become vacant within (roughly) 90 days after a regularly scheduled election. Well, Peter Schmitt's seat looks pretty vacant to me so I'm wondering if they will try to fill that seat as well.

This was hard to write. I couldn't stop laughing at parts of it. 37.228.229.180 (talk) 03:21, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

18 edits from CZ's elected leaders. It's hard to have inept leadership when there isn't any... Jeez. Herr FuzzyKatzenPotato (talk/stalk) 03:47, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

I was afraid someone would misinterpret what I wrote. There have been a lot more then 18 edits from CZ's elected leaders, it just that they haven't been sustained. Here are the raw numbers to look over. I was going to upload a graph but even with an account I don't have the necessary permissions.

	Gareth Leng	Peter Schmitt	Christine Bush	Anthony Sebastian
July	3	1	84	28
August	1	0	131	8
September	1	0	83	17
October	2	0	79	18
November	0	0	0	0
December	0	0	0	4
January	2	0	0	3
February	0	0	0	3
March	1	0	0	1
April	0	0	0	1
Total	10	1	377	83

ElectionJune2015 (talk) 04:26, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

Ah, I see now. Either way, not promising. Cømrade FυzzчCαтPøтαтø (talk/stalk) 04:30, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

ElectionJune2015 (talk) 04:35, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

That Christine Bush edit count is misleading. Around 270 of those edits appear to be comments left on Talk pages and gardening her own User page, not mainspace editing. Also Peter Schmitt hasn't edited any mainspace articles for nearly 3 years. 37.235.54.87 (talk) 09:43, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

I knew there was a reason I never went through all the hoops to join over there. PacWalker 11:14, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

The edit counts are just to show how active these people have been on the site. CZ edit counts are always inflated anyway because of the bureaucracy. For example, a new page on any normal wiki is one edit, but on CZ it's four because they have to create the talk page, a metadata page and a definition page. ElectionJune2015 (talk) 18:02, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

I've added April. 86.179.234.107 (talk) 15:37, 1 May 2015 (UTC)

Potential nominees[edit]

I've been wondering who might possibly be nominated for the job. I went through the list of their active users, there's only 13 of them, to see what I could find. Now, an "active user" is any user who preformed an action in the last 30 days. For those user's I looked at how many edits they have made so far this year. I also had a quick look at how they responded to nominations in the last two elections. Note that I put this table together manually so there may be mistakes, fell free to correct any you find.

Active users For 23 March 2015 — 22 April 2015	Total edits this year 1 January 2015 — 22 April 2015	Notes
John Stephenson‎	320	Declined 2013
Ro Thorpe	289	Declined 2013
Martin Wyatt	158	Accepted 2013
Robert A. Estremo	134	Declined 2013 and 2014
Hayford Peirce	129	Declined 2014
Peter Jackson	93	Declined 2014
Pradyumna Singh	77
Robert Badgett	40	Declined 2014
‎Anthony.Sebastian	7	Current Managing Editor
Pat Palmer	5	Accepted 2013
Darren Duncan	2	Tech Staff
David Yamakuchi	1
Ramanand Jhingade	1

My guess is the top six get nominated and whoever accepts will run unopposed, especially if Peter Schmitt's seat goes up for election as well. Or maybe someone I missed will crawl out of the woodwork and take the job. Or better yet, ten people will suddenly realize that they do not need a "council" of four to manage them. ElectionJune2015 (talk) 01:46, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

Christine Bush made only two edits prior to being nominated, so contributions don't seem to be factored in with nominations. 37.235.54.87 (talk) 03:18, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

First, to correct some factual inaccuracies: Christine Bush was nominated on 8 June 2014 after she had made 14 (fourteen) edits. Your point however (that contributions don't seem to be factored in with nominations) is well taken. To be honest, this just raises more questions than it answers. How the feck did she beet Meg Ireland 5 votes to 3!? I always thought I never heard of her before because she was someone from the beginning of the site who lapsed for a while and then came back. I remember we even ran a quick poll on the WIGO page and Meg convincingly beet Christine. What did Christine Bush do to get people to vote for her over someone who was actually active at the time? Did she run some sort of off wiki email campaign or something? I honestly don't get it! CZ is like quantum theory, the more you look into it, the less you understand it. ElectionJune2015 (talk) 04:09, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

I stand corrected, but I should point out her third edit (1st June) was three days after the election, for that year, was announced (29th May), and seven months after her last edit. Coincidence? I think not. I'm not privy to what discussions occurred between admins and Christine Bush but the fact she made public mention of donating money to Citizendium, a number of times, may have something to do with it. There of course, could be a lot more to this behind closed doors, but we can't be 100% sure. 37.235.54.87 (talk) 08:35, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

It's always possible elections are rigged, particularly when only two people, who also vote in the elections, are the only ones who are privy to the ballots. There is no "neutral" party to oversee the process. 37.235.54.87 (talk) 23:16, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

Impressively, with a week left before the election closes, there's really noone around to be nominated or to nominate. God knows what they'll do if the election simply fails. Probably run another; they DO love their bureaucracy. 86.179.232.100 (talk) 23:53, 29 May 2015 (UTC)

Nominations and referenda close on the 6th but voting doesn't start until the 14th. It's like waiting for the NBA Finals to start this year. The Moose (talk) 16:26, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

There are 13 active users listed on the table above and it just so happens 13 people voted in the election, with all 13 people voting "Yes" for the same candidate. I'm sceptical. I have serious doubts on this election and the legitimacy of past results. 37.235.54.87 (talk) 06:04, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I think there are less than 13 people in the world who care - David Gerard (talk) 09:26, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

in memoriam[edit]

'E's passed on! This wiki is no more! He has ceased to be! 'E's expired and gone to meet 'is maker! 'E's a stiff! Bereft of life, 'e rests in peace! If you hadn't nailed 'im to the perch 'e'd be pushing up the daisies! 'Is metabolic processes are now 'istory! 'E's off the twig! 'E's kicked the bucket, 'e's shuffled off 'is mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin' choir invisible!! THIS IS AN EX-WIKI!! Scream!! (talk) 11:29, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

"I'm not dead yet!" - David Gerard (talk) 14:52, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I don't think anyone believes that this is anything but the documentation of a dying project. But, at the same time, I think there's some value in that, as we can learn from the mistakes. The many, many mistakes, like constantly working to block new members from coming in even as they're losing members rapidly. They had a broken sign-up for months, and, after that, proposals to make sign-up easy by lessening the amount of identity checking were rejected outright from even being voted on - but a number of extra bureaucratic procedures were added in every voting period. The mismanagement is farcically bad, and that makes for an interesting study. 86.161.12.169 (talk) 09:49, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

The Infobitt email[edit]

Here's a copy of Larry's email explaining that they have run out of money:

Larry's E-mail

Friends,

I have some unfortunate news. While I don’t wish to give up on Infobitt, we have run out of money. I’ve let the programmers go, and I’m looking for a job myself. But I'll still be contributing, and I hope you will too.

Before I say anything else, let me say thank you to the investors, my advisers (especially Terrence Yang), and especially the contributors. Thanks also to Vivy Chao, who has written the daily updates very well; Tim Chambers, who provided the awesome audio editions; and Ben Rogers, our technical adviser. And, of course, the readers!

Infobitt deserves to be rescued. It’s got an active, committed community, it’s an awesome idea, it works quite well at a small scale, and I'm confident it can be made to work at a large scale. So we’re very much open to new opportunities for Infobitt. Maybe you can help? I’ll explain how below.

Contents of this mail:

If you keep at it, so will I
What’s the core problem?
Why I'm still excited about Infobitt
What does Infobitt need?
Potential partners
How it can happen
If not Infobitt: gigs I’d like to consider
Idea 1: write Philosophy for Children and create a complete set of free philosophy videos for kids to go with it
Idea 2: making educational videos for little kids—a free online preschool

Please do continue contributing to Infobitt!

If you keep at it, so will I.

If you continue to support Infobitt by writing bitts, adding facts, and so on, then I will too. I do hope that in the next few weeks or months, we’ll re-emerge, re-invigorated, with a new configuration of people who can really make things happen fast.

What’s the core problem?

Why don’t we do a proper launch? Because the software works OK only at a small scale. It desperately needs certain features if we are to benefit from the massive traffic we’d get after a proper launch. If we launched now, we simply wouldn’t be able to absorb the new arrivals. (That’s what happened after my Reddit AMA.)
So why don’t we just code up the features we need? Because our outsourced software is buggy, complicated, and lacks automated tests, all of which means it’s hard to maintain, and would become more so as we add more (badly needed—see below) features.
So why don’t we just raise the money? Because we’re out of money, which makes fundraising very hard. Besides, we need an active, productive team to raise money, and at this point it’s just me, a sole founder.
So why don’t I get some co-founders? Yes, just my thinking...read on.

Why I'm still excited about Infobitt:

Unlike every other news startup I know of, we are actively, daily creating a purely volunteer, Wikipedia-like front page news site. Infobitt works as no other crowdsourced news startup does. It's been working, in its current version, for about a year now—really working, even if our traffic numbers are still small. That can change (see below).
People are still working on it, and not just a few, but over 25 every week, and that's on an obscure project that still hasn't been properly launched and is rarely discussed in the media. Regularly, I see old hands getting excited again and new people getting into it. We are onto something.
I absolutely love your loyalty and I don't forget the people who have helped my projects. You are the lifeblood of Infobitt.
I've seen evidence of deeper support for Infobitt from outside our active community. There are people waiting in the wings, waiting for the software to get better, waiting to be able to share their work, waiting for it to get easier (e.g., a browser plugin to add facts by selecting text on a page and pressing a button to add to Infobitt), etc.
When I work more on it, you do. If I were enabled to work full time just on growing the community—if I had the time to write 10 bitts per day, comment and add facts, do more tweeting and blogging, and especially if we were launched and I could do interviews about it, then the community would grow like gangbusters.

What does Infobitt need? So...why aren't we there yet?

We need a better API. (Our automatically-created Python/Django API lacks many features, although it works.)
Then we need apps (which use the API). (But a high school kid has actually made one based on our existing API, but it’s not released yet.)
We need to add some insanely obvious features:
- Fact editing!
- View counts!
- Choose a bitt's rank from within the bitt!
- Social sharing!
- FB/Twitter login.
- Email notices.
- Automatic newsletters.
- Tags/categories.
- Browser plugin to start/expand bitts quickly.
- We've also got serious bugs to fix.
- Any one of these would inject new life into the project. All of them would make this a popular and growing website, I think.
Then, we need to be properly launched.
We've got to make the software faster and more resilient for when high traffic arrives.
I’ve got to start doing interviews. But first we need to be positioned to benefit.

To be brutally honest, I never should have tried to start a startup as a sole founder. I need others on board as partners, who are passionately committed to our mission and to making it a success. I'm doing too many jobs at once, when my forte, what I need to be focused on, is community and project development.

Potential partners. I assume that many of Infobitt’s best potential partners will be reading this, or will know people who are reading this—and you can forward this mail to them. Here is what we need:

Awesome engineers: Python/Django, Javascript/Angular, PostgreSQL. Solid sysadmin type skills, including experience on AWS, would be most welcome. Somebody who can improve our API so people can make full-featured apps around our (open content) data. Maybe more exciting would be somebody who is inspired (and, of course, positioned) to write Infobitt from scratch, in a more reliable form.
Designers. (But we need engineers on board first, to be able to use design work.)
Maybe eventually one or two community people to help me.

How it can happen. Here are some categories of people or organizations who might be interested in joining me and helping to turn Infobitt around:

Remarkable individuals, especially those are free to work for equity or who might want to buy into the company. Especially awesome engineers who are on top of Python/Django, Javascript/Angular, PostgreSQL, sysadmin, AWS.
Existing startups, or idle startup teams, that want to pivot to Infobitt, who are interested in working with me. Again, free to work for equity or who want to buy into the company.
Big nonprofits or fast-moving universities (ha ha). Theoretically, we could become nonprofit, open source, and open content. This would probably make it easier for Infobitt to succeed, assuming the project funding were adequate, but Infobitt's investors obviously would like to make money.
An investor that wants to buy Infobitt, build a team, and will hire me (with significant equity) and assign me to work on it.

Such people (or entities) would have to buy a major stake in the company and, presumably, hire me as an employee. I’m cool with that.

As far as I'm concerned, everything is on the table. I’ll be interested in anything that has a reasonable chance of making Infobitt a success.

Other gigs I’d like to consider

If nobody bites on Infobitt, here are some opportunities that would intrigue me:

Full-time worker on somebody else’s startup. Community leader, project manager, or you tell me. I’d prefer to work from home most of the time.
Adviser. For the right sort of project, I can help a lot. I’m an endless fount of ideas and very useful critical feedback.
Writer/analyst/advocate. About education, homeschooling, very early reading, the Internet, rescuing the Enlightenment, philosophy, etc. (from a libertarian, rationalist perspective, if relevant). I’m also a practiced public speaker. I’m interested in working for a nonprofit advocacy group.

I'd be excited to execute either of a couple ideas I've had:

Idea 1: write Philosophy for Children and create a complete set of free philosophy videos for kids to go with it I started writing an intro to philosophy for elementary students, a chapter book, back in 2012. Here’s the first chapter. I’d love to finish it quickly, and use the text to make the world’s first complete set of videos about philosophy for kids approximately 5-10 years old. Here’s the first video. It would take about three months for me to finish if I work on it full time.

Thing is, to support this project, I need at least $17,500. I’d love to do this and make the next generation a bit more hip to the liberal arts and the Enlightenment. I started designing a Kickstarter about this, but I haven't finished it.

Idea 2: making educational videos for little kids—a free online preschool Are you a philanthropist? Want a high-impact way to support online education for kids everywhere? Pay me me to make 2-3 videos per day like these. Most of those 24 videos got over 10,000 views after a few years, and my top ten have over 50,000 views apiece (with one at 750K). They’re easy for me to make, I’m good at it, and I love to do it. Also, my 4-year-old will beta-test for free! I envision a library of thousands of videos like these...think of it as an awesome free online preschool. By the way, if you want to pay me per video, to make sure I don’t waste your money, let’s do it!

Please continue contributing to Infobitt!

All the best,

Larry

37.228.229.211 (talk) 12:00, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

Oops, I didn't realize Larry put the message up on the web and someone has linked to it. Should have checked the current version of the WIGO before posting this here. My bad. 37.228.229.211 (talk) 12:03, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

no prob :-) tl;dr Larry: "I'm an ideas guy" - David Gerard (talk) 19:51, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

Is it really necessary to pad out this WIGO:CZ page with stuff about Infobitt? They are nothing to do with each other. --31.55.96.127 (talk) 19:19, 14 July 2015 (UTC)
- Larry's Performing Ego is highly relevant here IMO - David Gerard (talk) 20:28, 14 July 2015 (UTC)

The catalogs of words that only Citizendium cares to keep[edit]

Since it has been brought up on the WIGO page I have a few questions/comments about these so called "English spellings".

These lists are listed under "English spellings", but I’ve never seen earth spelled with a diaeresis on the e before, as in ëarth. So it would seem these would be more accurately described as English pronunciations. But they only give pronunciation marks on the vowel sounds, so a word with silent letters like kneŵ, is given an "= neŵ" to show that the k is silent, so what’s the point of giving pronunciation guides on a word, if right afterword you have to list a more accurate guide to the word?

My next question would be, where did this system come from? It seems to be the sole work of Ro Thorpe, used only on CZ and nowhere else. Wouldn’t the International Phonetic Alphabet be a better and more accurate choice. Or perhaps a respelling system like at Wikipedia, for example: ree-SPEL-ing for respelling. It looks to me like Ro is putting a lot of work into this, but the end product is only useful to himself and doesn’t really belong on a collaborative project. Is there actually someone out there who would want this list and find it useful? And if so, who would that person be?

Then there's these "Retroalphabetical" lists. Lists of pronunciations of English words that end in a letter. I have never once wanted a list ordered in "reverse" alphabetical order. To me, reverse alphabetical order is listing items Z ➡ A, and is something better handled by an automated sort function, not by manually maintaining two separate lists. Why should such a list ever be useful? Again, is this actually for someone other than Ro Thrope? And I’ve never heard of the word "Retroalphabetical" before. The best Google gives me is retro styled fonts.

If these things are useful, maybe give them to some other wiki (Wiktionary perhaps), and then let CZ rest in peace and save the $100 per month hosting cost. There’s really nothing else happening on CZ except these lists.

</rant>

37.228.231.253 (talk) 18:07, 7 November 2015 (UTC)

I'm sorry that English spellings is not for you. If you like the International Phonetic Alphabet, fine, but many learners find it an extra load to bear, which is why I elaborated my own system, using the actual spelling where possible, which is most of the time; accent marks don’t work on consonants. And "knew = new" is a neat way to make an important point. The core article explains. "English spellings", not "pronunciations", because that usually means local variants.

Wiktionary would classify these articles as original research, so no go. As for CZ, still not dead. Contrary to reports, I am not alone. Ro Thorpe (talk) 20:47, 7 November 2015 (UTC)

So what you're saying is that CZ is basically you're private ArXiv which is masquerading as an encyclopedia? Actually no, not even ArXiv would host this. Your own private XivAr or blog? You're even lying by omission by not presenting it as something you just made up. Also, most people if presented with Ëarth would assume it was pronounced "Eh-arth", as the dieresis denote that they're two separate vowel sounds and not a diphthong. Your system is actually incompatible with systems already in use. --Sugarfrosted (talk) 08:06, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

So what? Different languages use different systems, and you can write English correctly without any accents, that's what got me started, "how would they work?" A diaeresis doesn't make sense on an initial letter, as it separates a vowel from the preceding one, so not so. And you need to learn the difference between 'you're' and 'your'; see [2]. Ro Thorpe (talk) 13:17, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

Are you claiming that British English is a separate language? Also, I don't see the mistake with you're and your that you're referring to. Edit: We all make mistakes. Explains why copy editors exist. Even the copy editors, like me, do occasionally make mistakes like that. Especially when they're drunk posting at idiots. --Sugarfrosted (talk) 01:11, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

Now where do I even mention British English? Do sober up and make an effort. Ro Thorpe (talk) 04:02, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

Earlier[edit]

Ah, I see your response has been to remove my comment from the WIGO page. Quite right too. That'll teach me to copy Hayford Peirce! Ro Thorpe (talk) 13:47, 8 November 2015 (UTC)

You're making the mistake that Citizendium is a collaborative project. With five users and tens of thousands of pages, there's no way that people could be collaborating on anything. So, these pages of words are just as collaborative as anything else on the site. DinoMight (talk) 01:45, 14 November 2015 (UTC)

It hasn't been a collaborative project for some years now. Thorpe is symptomatic of the problems there. Tending his own little walled garden of useless information, contributing little else. 37.220.10.54 (talk) 23:55, 30 May 2016 (UTC)

Adding a second server[edit]

This isn't the dumbest idea ever, but boy is it ever close. First, they aren't even earning enough month-by-month to pay for one server. Second, they don't have four or five authors who aren't already contributors. Third, their registration process is broken, so there isn't any way they could get additional authors. Fourth, would adding an extra server help any perceived performance issues? Personally, I doubt it. DinoMight (talk) 01:58, 14 November 2015 (UTC)

Less notable content on Citizendium[edit]

I was wondering if someone would try to take advantage of the fact that Citizendium has no inclusion standards like Wikipedia does. I thought it could revitalize Citizendium somewhat by providing a place for lesser-known artists and such. Then again, you'd end up with a lot of junk. In any event, I'm confident the old people hanging around Citizendium will shut down the new guy soon enough. The Moose (talk) 04:46, 28 January 2016 (UTC)

OK, I realize this thread is 6 months old but there's little point in checking this page more often than that (-: I did a bit of that on CZ about 6 years ago without anyone shutting me down. Personally, I would encourage this sort of strategy, and I agree it might help CZ. Even if CZ wanted to shut this sort of thing down, they don't have the resources to do that. DinoMight (talk) 22:51, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

Is Citizendium[edit]

still not dead?--Kugelschreiber (talk) (mail) (block) 12:28, 5 May 2016 (UTC) 12:28, 5 May 2016 (UTC)

Hanging by a thread. The Moose (talk) 11:03, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

Bill Cosby[edit]

A perfect illustration on how moribund Citizendium is: the flattering article on Bill Cosby.

A lot can happen in three years. 37.220.10.54 (talk) 06:36, 19 October 2016 (UTC)

Infobitt's dead.[edit]

Just an occassional RationalWiki lurker here, but I notice Infobitt's down, and seems to be dead. How long has it been dead? I have no idea (although last I checked, it was still up as of early 2016), but it's interesting to note that the Google Groups discussion page hasn't been updated in over a year. Could this be added to WIGO:CZ? 49.147.81.156 (talk) 08:05, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

Update: checking the Wayback Machine, it appears the last snapshot the site was taken on June 23, 2016, which means the site went down sometime between then and now. Interestingly, there's no word from Sanger about the downtime, not even on his blog or social media. Also, note that the most recent "bitt" on the website was posted on January 18, 2016 (which, interestingly, thought that Carly Fiorina would become president), meaning that the site had already been moribund for months before the site died. 49.147.81.156 (talk) 08:19, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

Manual of Style[edit]

To the anonymous, probably ex-CZ person: I do know about the capital letter, so I don't know what your point is. And nowhere do I use the word 'official', that's your invention. Ro Thorpe (talk) 05:16, 19 November 2016 (UTC)

What is the point of CZ now?[edit]

OK, so they have had yet another referendum and election (or at least tried to have an election — looks like no one wanted the job).

Let me see if I have this right; there is no longer an "Editorial Council". The merged Editorial and Management(?) council is also gone. The charter is basically gone, it's just a guideline now. Do they even have an "Editor" class anymore? The Managing Editor position is definitely gone, right? No one seemed to want the job even when the position was still there. Do "constables" still exist?

The charter still exists as "guidance" or something. So will they still keep running the sim-bureaucracy, with yearly elections and all that faff or has that finally stopped now?

What about new accounts; will you still need to provide your life story or will that finally change to something more sensible?

I mean, what is the point of CZ now? Is it just a crappy Wikipedia with real names or what? 80.111.53.193 (talk) 13:37, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

18 days, no action[edit]

12 days into July, and there's nothing new. Just when I only recently discovered Citizendium... Guess it's pretty dead? The recent changes aren't looking too good. —Kazitor, ^pending 09:32, 12 July 2017 (UTC)

The site is dead. RationalWiki used to track the active users at Citizendium. When it stopped tracking edits back in 2013 there were something like 30 editors per month. These days there are basically only six regulars left on the site. I had a quick look to see what they normally do. Feel free to edit this if I got something wrong, or left something out.

Ro Thorpe 28 edits in the last 30 days. Most active user by far. Mostly spends time on his English spellings pages, which list lots of English words with spellings I have never seen before. He is often the only editor for an entire day.

Peter Jackson 11 edits in the last 30 days. Mostly works on Pali Canon and Brexit.

John Stephenson 8 edits in the last 30 days. Creates new user accounts and welcomes people who then rarely bother to make a single edit. Keeps updating the TopicalArticles template every so often for some reason. Used to handle the elections and referenda when Citizendium still had them.

Hayford Peirce 1 edit in the last 30 days. Manages Citizendium’s finances and updates the Financial report every month.

Anthony.Sebastian 1 edit in the last 30 days. The guy who’s got a major hard on for having verified real names. Now he only edits one or two days a month.

Martin Wyatt 1 edit in the last 30 days. First edit was in 2012. Edits maybe once or twice a month.

For years, CZ was only a bureaucracy sim, with elections, referendums, councils, voting, a “charter” and so on. But then last year they voted to get rid of all that stuff. The people never seemed too interested in the compendium part of the project, so I guess there is nothing for them to do on the site anymore.

Even if you think the ideas behind CZ are good ones, there's no future in CZ itself. Don't waste your time with it.

And to think, they waste a $100 per month for this nonsense. 87.192.220.205 (talk) 13:01, 13 July 2017 (UTC)

I fear this WIGO mainly exists now to document their death, as an analysis of how a site like this dies. 86.134.224.154 (talk) 17:30, 27 July 2017 (UTC)

Don't you nerds have anything better to do?[edit]

Yeah we get it, CZ is moribund. How much longer are you gonna masturbate thinking about its downfall? Don't you nerds have anything better to do?^{— Unsigned, by: 141.70.119.109 / talk}

It only takes 2 minutes to check if there's been an edit, and you only need one person to do that. And you only need to do it every few days. You make it seem like there's whole dissertations of work done per day.-- Forerunner (talk) 18:18, 3 September 2017 (UTC)

Yes, but what's the point of it? What are you trying to prove? ^{— Unsigned, by: 141.70.119.109 / talk / contribs}

I can't believe the WIGO page is still active.—Hamburguesa con queso con un cara

(talk • stalk) 03:17, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

Humor, mostly. Watching CZ collapse under the bloated weight of its pointless and inept bureaucracy is quite amusing. RoninMacbeth (talk) 03:45, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

I jest, but I think we do this to demonstrate that building a top-heavy website with bureaucrats and hierarchy and subcommittees before having a very large user base is a bad idea. RoninMacbeth (talk) 03:47, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

If this is amusing to you, my friend , then you gotta get a life.^{— Unsigned, by: 2.247.245.113 / talk / contribs}

On talk pages, please sign your comments using four tildes (~~~~) or by clicking on the sign button:

on the toolbar above the edit panel. (You can indent successive talk page comments using one more colon (:) for each line.) Thank you. Christopher (talk) 17:35, 5 September 2017 (UTC)

Why should I? I enjoy spending time on this site. I don't enjoy most people's idea of "getting a life," nor do I intend to do so beyond what is absolutely necessary. If it doesn't harm me, then why should I not have a life here? RoninMacbeth (talk) 18:12, 5 September 2017 (UTC)

Since people and their desires are generally the same, most people's idea of getting a life is correct. You would enjoy it if you gave it more than a half-hearted try. The life you have here is not real, and yes, it harms you by depriving you of necessary social skills. CZ is not going to be around forever to provide you the meagre entertainment that it does provide. 141.70.119.109 (talk) 14:18, 6 September 2017 (UTC)

And when CZ is gone, there will be something else. CP, or 4chan, or someone. I am aware that this is not real (well, we are communicating, but our personae are fake. But I can function in society. I've had to learn how to do so, to be sure, but I know how to do it. Although you do raise an interesting point. One can't really opt out of society, even if it's hard for them to function in it. RoninMacbeth (talk) 15:21, 6 September 2017 (UTC)

Lots of down voting[edit]

Seems like pretty much every entry gets to about half up, half down. That's probably a fair indicator that nothing interesting is happening. It's pretty much just "Oh hey, something happened last week!" —Kazitor, ^pending 10:20, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

Actually, someone has been going through all the entries and downvoting them to zero. This has been going on for years now. I’ve never brought it up before because, to be honest, what difference does it make? 87.192.220.205 (talk) 08:48, 27 October 2017 (UTC)

Huh. Wonder if there's any way to stop that. But yeah, in the long run it makes little difference. —Kazitor, ^pending 10:26, 27 October 2017 (UTC)