Wikipedia To Add Video

viyh writes "Wikipedia will be adding a video option within two or three months, according to the MIT Technology Review. '... a person editing a Wikipedia article will find a new button labeled "Add Media." Clicking it will bring up an interface allowing her to search for video — initially from three repositories containing copyright-free material — and drag chosen portions into the article, without having to install any video-editing software or do any conversions herself. The results will appear as a clickable video clip embedded within the article.' They will be requiring all video to use open-source formats. This is in hopes of getting content providers to open up their material to gain wider exposure on the Wikipedia website. There is also an in-browser editor that removes a lot of the headache often associated with any kind of video editing. With the new Wikipedia system, 'people will be able to easily inject media into pages, in a way that wasn't possible before,' says Michael Dale, a software engineer from Kaltura, the company assisting with development of the tools."

Comments

No Male

[Anonymous Coward]

"Clicking it will bring up an interface allowing her to search for video"

So they only allow females to add videos!?!

Re:No Male

[Xeth]

It's far worse than images. At least with an image, you can tell immediately that something's wrong. One wonders how long a video modified in the style of Tyler Durden might persist.

Re:No Male

[Raul654]

If only that was a joke...

Rather not.

[Nylathotep]

I like wiki because it's such a clean, fast, text layout with nothing special. I don't see how this is going to improve things.

Re:Rather not.

[XPeter]

Agreed. This will also make Wikipedia's bandwidth cost skyrocket, and if I remember correctly they're on a lean budget.

Title is misleading

[geniice]

Title is somewhat misleading. Wikipedia has had video for years. For example scroll down at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morris_C8 or for direct to video http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Morris_C8_towing.ogv

Another Tool

[travisb828]

It's always nice to see new tools in the toolbox. I just wonder what kind of edit wars we can look forward to seeing. Could they be like this?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Human_anus

Re:Another Tool

[EdIII]

I'm sorry, but not everybody is going to actually look at that link, and it is far too fucking priceless to be just referenced. So let's post the juicy parts:

WRT that female image - how would the contributors here feel if I was to crop it down to the anus alone and use it to replace the current pic? Porn-sourced or not, it is a good, clear picture of the human anus, moreso than the existing image IMO. --Kurt Shaped Box 22:28, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

That would bring it around full circle to where it's been a couple of years. We had a cropped, shaved, bleached porn-anus in this article for a while, it was determined unsuitable (and a copyvio) and replaced with the current hairy man-hole. All we need is a neutral-looking and not-overly-hairy, suitable for an anatomy text. The Crow 22:43, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

I have actually considered taking a photo of my own anus for the article (as far as I am aware, mine is pretty typical) just to put an end to this. Unfortunately, I don't think I'll be able to hold the camera at the right angle to get a decent shot. :( If you take a close look at the 'porn' anus in hi-res, it doesn't actually appear to have been shaved or bleached. --Kurt Shaped Box 22:52, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't think the old female anus was unsuitable; it was removed because it was unsourced. I'm not a fan of females, but cropped, that anus looks more useful than the male one we have now. I'd support adding it if you're willing to crop it. The only real problem is that it looks like a copyright violation too. --Kinst 21:59, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

I'd certainly be willing to do it - but I'll leave it until the image's status is sorted out. As a matter of interest, why was it tagged as a copyvio (there doesn't appear to be any explanation)? --Kurt Shaped Box 01:24, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't think my anus is any less hairy than Ano.jpg and I wouldn't say that my anus is an atypical human anus. In any case, who would you be to state that my anus, or the anus on the picture is atypical. In fact most male anuses that I have come across have a similar amount of hair, although the color of the hair on the picture makes it quite prominent. If we were discussing the anus of any other species than human, hair would surely not be a concern. Furthermore if was the Italian gentleman, who was so generous and kind to contribute the picture, I would be downright offended, if the picture was replaced only because the amount of hair was considered, by other wikipedians, to be unnatural and/or objectionable. BrunOperator 13:36, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

As for my part, I don't find the present anus photo objectional or abnormal. My issues are (1) it's so hairy that the actual anus isn't very visible, (2) It's a decidedly male-looking anus, so people are going to be tempted to put a shaved anus on there and call it "female" because this is what porn has conditioned them to think. The anus is neither male nor female... the anatomy is exactly the same, and some females have even hairier anuses than men. So I think if we had a slightly hairy anus, it would be both medically illustrative and gender-neutral. The Crow 14:17, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Re:Hipocrisy or something near that.

[icebike]

Its also proprietary, requiring a license to use their tools.

Its an abusive technology, allowing no view controls other than blocking or de-installing flash all together.

With the advent of HTML5, flash is NOT the way to go.

Donations?

[Itninja]

I have donated to Wikipedia a few times over the years. But I think I will stop if this video 'enhancement' takes off. I can think of no article I have ever read that would have been served better by video on the same page. Just reference a video from a source site. I thought Wikipedia was a non-profit organization running an lean crew of committed semi-volunteers, not a business looking to 'drive traffic' to their site.

Re:I can see a problem

[merreborn]

The "Porn" entry bring down the whole Wikipedia site in the first hour.

It's already begun... (sauce [nsfw])

Re:Weird story gender...

[mdwh2]

So you acknowledge that all three possibilities offered by the English language are flawed, but you still criticise the author for picking one you evidently have a problem with?

For heaven's sake - get over it.

Re:There's just one problem...

[Jurily]

Apparently the feminists won and we're so fucking PC now that there are no males on the internet.

Let's face it: in English, if you talk about someone, you either have to specify his/her gender, or pretend they're more than one person.

Re:There's just one problem...

[gigabites2]

Technically, that's grammatically incorrect. A singular object referred to as a plural object, as was mentioned above. The correct way to do so would be to say he or she or his or her. I suppose we could be like the French and assume the male gender. Then again, why assume? This is Slashdot!