Rubénerd!

Wikipedia has just gone dark, though initially I didn't notice because I use NoScript. Turns out they're using JavaScript to block it for various reasons and more.

Perosnally, I reckon they should have taken the angle that they're making a statement on the technological infeasiblity of blocking material, given the internet treats censorship as damage and routes around it. Blocking data will only render people more creative in finding ways to get to it. And they will, every time.

I feel like I'm talking about The Great Firewall of Australia again!

Anyone else notice Wikimedia Common's Picture of the day today?

No Ruben, do tell!

File:On the edge - free world version.jpg

English: Drawing of a fictional landscape with a figure in manga/anime style. The title of this image is: On the Edge. Programs used: GIMP, Inkscape, Blender. ~ Niabot

Okay then, so what?

Aside from being a really colourful and creative image in its own right (love the light coming in through the trees onto the Shinto gate), I applaud the editors at Wikimedia for not only allowing material like this, but gracing their homepage with it for a day and tagging it as "a featured picture on Wikimedia Commons" and "This image has been assessed using the Quality image guidelines and is considered a Quality image". Seriously!

I think it speaks volumes about our culture that images like this warrent a NSFW warning, but gory violence where people are graphically maimed or killed is perfectly acceptable, or at the very least is more leniently censored. I have my suspicions as to why that is, but at the risk of getting into further trouble, I won't discuss it here!

This was the first -- and will be the last -- NSFW image on Rubénerd.com. I hope I didn't offend, or at the very least scar you for life!

UPDATE: It seems the image isn't the picture of the day anymore, in the time I wrote this it changed to something completely different. There's a Monty Python reference in there somewhere. Anyway, dang timezones, I keep forgetting their servers are in the US! There's probably an archive of previous pictures of the day somewhere on their site.

Big shout out to everyone at Wikipedia and the Wikimedia Foundation for reaching 10 million articles! The record breaking entry was an article on English artist Nicholas Hilliard written in Hungarian. Hungarian of course being the language native to a country called Hungary. Sometimes I surprise even myself.

I wonder what ol' Nick who died in 1619 would think about being the 10 millionth article in a collaborative online encyclopaedia powered by electronic computers connected through a globally spanning network... makes you think.