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Meetup in Cambridge

Wikipedia:Meetup/Cambridge 2 - we're scheduling this for 28 February, pm. Charles Matthews (talk) 11:52, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. Will look. Carcharoth (talk) 02:37, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

In case...

I very much respect and appreciate the thoughtful and insightful comments you have made on all pages, and wanted you to know my comments were not critical of you in anyway, just in case they sounded like that...(olive (talk) 02:36, 5 February 2009 (UTC))

Not at all. I'm always happy to talk at proposed decision talk pages. Doesn't always change anything, but talking is good. Carcharoth (talk) 02:37, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

WP:RINGS

The merging discussion has expanded a bit. Related: can we use this drawing of Sauron by Tolkien, found here, under fair use? One possible problem with the image is that it's a scan from a book. Uthanc (talk) Uthanc (talk) 19:41, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Will look. Hope I'm not too late... Carcharoth (talk) 15:01, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Request to copyedit Honolulu High-Capacity Transit Corridor Project

If you have the time, would you be willing to help copyedit this article? It has a request for peer review that has been open for a couple weeks now, and the only feedback received was that the article needs copyediting before it can become an FA candidate. Thanks, Musashi1600 (talk) 20:39, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, didn't find time to get to this one. Carcharoth (talk) 15:01, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

ArbCom Principles

Hello, I've recently been doing some work with the Mediation Cabal, and, as I was researching relevant material to the case, I came across several ArbCom findings of principle that applied. Can those be considered as Wikipedia policy, guidelines, interpretations of policy and guidelines, or simply as advice? Thanks, ErikTheBikeMan (talk) 16:53, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Sorry for letting this one slide. You would be better off asking this at WT:ARBCOM. Carcharoth (talk) 14:19, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Evolution Sunday

Yeah, I'd never heard of it before until I started exploring from the other articles in the "Darwin celebrations" cat you just created, and found it linked in the See also section of Darwin Day. Re:DYK, thanks!--ragesoss (talk) 23:59, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Cool. And congrats on the Signpost editor role! Carcharoth (talk) 14:19, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

My blog post

Thanks for the heads-up, and for the interesting discussion. For the record, I don't publish deleted pages on a regular basis but this case I thought it was useful to add some clarity to the situation, which not many other writers (and I suspect, no journalists) could provide. Incidentally, are article histories covered under GFDL or not? One worry I had was that of copyright but I figured as the copy was under GFDL so would the screenshots. Qwghlm (talk) 18:33, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Not a clue about GFDL and article histories. If you find out, let me know! Carcharoth (talk) 18:36, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

If you want to get technical about the GFDL, under "1. APPLICABILITY AND DEFINITIONS", paragraph 1: This License applies to any manual or other work...that contains a notice - everything on this site contains such a notice; The "Document", below, refers to any such manual or work... - so when we see "Document" we mean a GFDL-licensed work; A "Secondary Section" is a named appendix or a front-matter section of the Document that deals exclusively with the relationship of the publishers or authors of the Document to the Document's overall subject (or to related matters) and contains nothing that could fall directly within that overall subject. - so anything associated with the article/page that is not the article/page itself is a Secondary Section; A section "Entitled XYZ" means a named subunit of the Document whose title...[is] "History" - so when you click on the history tab, you are moving to a Secondary Section (sub-unit) of the Document; and under "4. MODIFICATIONS", section "I", Preserve the section Entitled "History"...and add to it an item.

Now the MediaWiki implementation of GFDL smears around some of these definitions but it does comply with all of them. So, short answer, yes, article history is licensed under the GFDL, it can be freely republished with the express provision that it is properly attributed as to the source. You can modify the document as you wish (including removing everything but the Secondary Section entitled History, so long as you indicate such in the History and indicate on the Title Page a distinct title) and redistribute it as you wish, so long as you always include the GFDL license, attribute the source and provide the History.

To clarify, the History you have to provide is on the lines of "History section of English Wikipedia document "<article>" (<article link>) obtained from <history link>" and you need to put that at the top of the history section; and your Title page will be "Article history of <article>"; and you have to make clear that you are re-licensing under GFDL.

And for another, much better opinion, User:Moonriddengirl is the GFDL master mariner that I know of. Hope this helps! Franamax (talk) 22:44, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Followup after looking beyond the straight question of whether history is GFDL-licensed: yes, I believe it is - however the position of admin carries with it specific responsibilities and obligations so especially in the case of republishing deleted information, you could well lose the position regardless of the precise licensing details. That's the difference between a right and a privilege. Franamax (talk) 22:55, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Very helpful, if a bit overwhelming. Thanks! Carcharoth (talk) 01:06, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Serious accusation from Robert Young

Hello Carcharoth, I would like to bring up a very serious issue that is quite important to me. In a recent edit, Mr. Young accused me of recruiting a meatpuppet on Wikipedia. I went to his talk page and insisted that he either retract the accusation or bring it to the proper forum. And I do mean insisted, not asked, because I take any statement that impugns my character or conduct, be it in real life or on Wikipedia very seriously. This is not a light accusation for me. He has thus far refused to do either, so I have no choice but to attempt to resolve this issue myself. I want to speak with you, as his mentor, first, however, to see if perhaps you could help dissolve this situation before it flares up anymore. If there is not a retraction, I have no choice but to pursue the accusation to prove my innocence. Cheers, CP 18:38, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Comment: I did not accuse CP of recruiting a meatpuppet...I suggested that a new editor appeared to be a single-issue meatpuppet. Nothing in Wikipolicy says that a meatpuppet must be recruited. Someone could be my friend and I tell them about Issue X on Wikipedia and then they jump on to make an edit without my explicit knowledge that they did so. Therefore, CP's accusations are incorrect. Since he made incorrect accusations against me, he should apologize. Further, the assertion that he "insist" shows a structural character flaw with CP. Wikipedia is not a democracy, but neither it is a dictatorship. I was within my rights, and acting appropriately, to point out potential violations of Wiki policy. To suggest that it is a violation to give an admonishing word is ridiculous. To try to use the either/or fallacy is, again, not appropriate. One does not bring the "accusation" to the next level if the problem from the perpetrator does not continue. Indeed, Meatpuppet X discontinued the behavior I admonished him/her about.Ryoung122 22:37, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the note. Hope things got sorted out. If there are still problems, let me know. Carcharoth (talk) 14:18, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

There are still problems but, really, what's the point? Since he's been back he's:

1. Unilaterally recreated Sebastian Bonnet immediately after it was deleted at an AfD.

Comment: the Sebastian Bonnett article, which had originally existed for 3+ years, was inappropriately deleted with minimal input and without informing affected individuals. While my re-creation was deleted, the article was re-created again by a third party and now exists. This is a strong indication that my re-creation was correct and that those who deleted it were not.Ryoung122 22:31, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

1. Engaged in multiple personal attacks against individuals (not just my own case, see recent [1], [2], [3])

None of these were personal attacks, they were responses to others.Ryoung122 22:39, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

1. Declared that he doesn't DO citations when asked to source material. See also my discussion with him on Beatrice Farve on his talk page and [4].

Wikipedia is NOT a job. We are not required to make any edits. I don't want to waste my time doing citations, since I have more important things to worry about and it's not my strong suit, either. On top of that, I usually provide clues as to where the citations are, or post them on the talk page. By the way, Bart Versieck loved to do citations, but despite 19,000+ edits was scared away from Wikipedia by Canadian Paul. Perhaps we'd like to ask Bart what he thinks about CP.Ryoung122 22:41, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Yet nothing more than a slap on the wrist since he's been back, even despite his previous one year ban.

Another false statement. I was NOT banned. I was NOT blocked for 1 year. I was blocked "indefinitely." I chose not to attempt a comeback while working on my Master's thesis. After graduation in August 2008, I requested to return after 10 1/2 months and was accepted. So, your above statement contains TWO misstatements.Ryoung122 22:50, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Yet people like me who work hard to improve the encyclopedia and respect its policies

Jesus said "the letter of the law kills, but the spirit gives life." It is not lawful to heal on the Sabbath. You have been overly concerned with policy (even when the policy is not set in stone and has been modified/changed radically over time). Your personal obsession with the Ruby Muhammad article is just one demonstration of where you have made Wikipedia a lesser, not greater, place. Wikipedia should be educational and encyclopedic. Significant evidence is available that Ruby Muhammad was born in 1907, not 1897. Her own family's website mentioned that as well as her own family's family tree on www.rootsweb.com, which listed her as born in 1906. I have simply held back from putting anything on the GRG website just to make a point. When the time is right, this case is going to be corrected.Ryoung122 22:48, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

get little in return except having their contributions insulted, their character attacked and now the above accusation (I'm not accusing Ryoung of all of the above, just generalizing my collective experience as of late). A couple of barnstars doesn't balance that out. It's very disheartening to do a lot of hard work, then see someone get away with comments like "I don't DO citations", but I don't think that much is going to come out of complaining about it. Cheers, CP 20:30, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Well, my view is that there is always room for improvement (and I include myself in that). The most difficult thing about Wikipedia is working with others. Getting the hang of that can be tricky. It took me a long time to realise how vital citations are, though when asked to provide them, it really is, as you say, important to try and do so. Recreation of an article can be an attempt to improve it. In the end, this article got deleted again and someone else re-recreated it, and it stuck this time. Carcharoth (talk) 22:22, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Speaking of getting along with others, the issues raised on February 21 died down, and no one continued to raise them except ONE person...CP. Whether or not I have issues, CP has his own issues which he refuses to consider. In fact, I was (UNFAIRLY) not even informed that this discussion was taking place here.Ryoung122 23:38, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

This is exactly what I mean; I just pointed out a large series of serious problems and, as his mentor, a condition of him coming back after a year of being blocked for everything under the sun, you didn't even bother to bring these concerns up with him. How many chances does he get? It doesn't look to me like he's learning at all: [5], [6], [7].

In all these cases, I chose to take on an issue that was controversial. "Religion" and faith/mythology, as well as LGBT issues, are ones that are, by nature, controversial. In the above examples, a single-issue editor who admitted to "MESSING WITH MY MIND" had created an identity ("localchurch") that was identical to the religious group he has been in dispute with for 20+ years. He then proceeds to interject controversial material into the article. If I am not the best person for getting along with others, I can CLEARLY identify a problem when something is wrong. As noted earlier, the Sebastian Bonnett article had existed for 3 years and was nominated for deletion by someone who had made anti-gay comments. It was clear that the push for deletion was a bad-faith edit. In the case of the local church article, the single-issue editor clearly admitted to making bad-faith edits and to have had a personal dispute/issue with the group for 20+ years, and EVEN was requesting that editors such as HopeChrist (clearly a local church member) drop out. WIKIPEDIA IS NOT THE PLACE FOR APOLOGISM, PROSELYTYZING, RECRUITING, OR BASHING RELIGIOUS FAITHS. If CP had bothered to get beyond his personal dislike of me and looked at the actual situation (or, better yet, referred it to a third-party editor), then it would be clear that I was in the right, not the wrong. Do the ends justify the means? That is the question.Ryoung122 23:02, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

At what point are the chances he's given outweighed by the departure of an editor who has actually worked hard to improve the project and treat people with civility (and improve himself and apologize when he does not)?

Can you clarify? Are you threatening to leave again? You already did that before, and it was an issue that had nothing to do with me. In fact, you "retired" once. True or not?Ryoung122 23:04, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

What I've learned today 

What I've learned today is that you continue to be disruptive. I thought, after almost a month, you would cool off and realize that you were reading into the situation accusations that simply were not there. I must admit you do a great job presenting one side of the story.

Speaking of improving, I have made multiple, multiple attempts to improve my editing and to get along with you, and was rebuffed consistently. What you should have done is, if you thought my editing was out of line, is to refer this to a third (or fourth) party who has no history (an untainted jury) and then let them judge the relative merits, or lack therefof, of my editing. For, while you would make a great prosecutor in court, many of your arguments would fall at the hands of a great defense attorney, who would be able to point out your stacked-deck presentations. I have made more than 2,000 edits since returning, and one would expect a certain number of disagreements. Also, persons that agree rarely are going to bother with a "good job" but if you look at how many of my edits were eventually backed up as consensus, then...by the way, CP agreed with me on the Charles Lewis, Jr. article (just one example).Ryoung122 23:09, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

is that an editor who routinely ignores WP:CIVIL,

Not true, I am polite and CIVIL to those who are such. But even when my words acquire a harsher tone, I stay away from the typical profanity that has been seen by many, many other longtime, established editors, for which little was done to "rein them in."Ryoung122 23:11, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

accuses long-standing editors of reigning in meatpuppets without any evidence and declares that he won't cite the material he adds, all serious violations of Wikipedia policy, will be treated the same as an editor such as myself who has spent 4 years working hard, improving his behavior, and creating many quality articles, while also taking up the mantle of administrator to help protect policy. Actually, they're probably even being treated better, since if I did any of the stuff that I just mentioned, I'd meet harsh consequences (and rightly so). And all this despite the fact that the main condition of his return was supposed to be an improvement in his behavior. I wasn't asking for him to be reblocked; but even a note left on his talk page discussing these issues would have been a nice gesture. Cheers, CP 16:21, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

This does need dealing with. Sorry I didn't make things clearer before. Will follow up on this later tonight. Carcharoth (talk) 00:28, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

OK, I'm going to e-mail Robert (and point him here) and leave a note on his talk page. I will also point him to WP:ADOPT, as even if I was never formally his mentor, I clearly don't have time to do that role. I hope this will help address your concerns. Apologies for not dealing with it sooner. Carcharoth (talk) 03:01, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Please take this somewhere else

Robert, the above is a mess now that you have inserted your comments. Please, don't feel you have to respond to everything in great detail (that was a problem before) and please don't do so here. My talk page is not a place for you and CP to argue (CP, that applies to you too). I wish I did have time to sort things out here, but I don't. I'm going to have to politely ask you both to take this somewhere else. Carcharoth (talk) 01:56, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Your question on the mailing list

The reason Robert Stuart, Duke of Kintyre has an article and his sister Mary doesn't is almost certainly that he was created a peer and, for a month or so, enjoyed the privilege of peerage, as distinct from his sister, who was only a royal princess. Choess (talk) 02:17, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. That makes some kind of sense, though I'm still not convinced. Carcharoth (talk) 14:16, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Peer review

Please help me here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Peer_review/Syriac_Orthodox_Church/archive1 ܠܝܓܘ Liju ലിജു לג"ו (talk) 07:05, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Apologies for not finding the time to review this. Hope others managed to get to it. Carcharoth (talk) 14:20, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Fringe science

Please make sure the Committee checks my comment on the proposed decision talk page before closing the case. Sanctions against SA are just barely passing. It would be a shame for them not to take my view into account. Jehochman ^Talk 09:17, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the note. This did get addressed I think, though I'm not totally satisified with the results. Carcharoth (talk) 14:17, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I found them a mixed bag. There are some systemic issues that the community hasn't faced yet. In any case, I'm here because you wrote this in the current RfAr/Clarification re ScienceApologist's topic ban: Administrators should still use their judgment though - correction of typos, for example, can be ignored, and administrators should be able to judge when the line is crossed between helpful edits and engaging in disruption.

I agree that typo correction can be ignored, but that it also can be sanctioned. The problem with allowing such apparently harmless and helpful edits is that, if more than rare, they can complicate enforcement of a topic ban. When we block an editor, we do not allow any edits, and "violating edits" (i.e., sock edits) can be reverted on sight, without regard to content, with few exceptions.

If topic ban enforcement necessarily depends on judgment of the individual edits, there is no clear boundary. If an editor crosses into engaging in disruption, the editor could be blocked without a topic ban, so what does the ban accomplish? Ban enforcement must be simple, or bans can be disruptive. --Abd (talk) 13:14, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

extended discussion, proposal for how to allow helpful edits to content covered by topic ban

In the evidence I presented in the current RfAr/Clarification (in the collapse box there), it can be seen that SA intends to disrupt the topic ban and its enforcement. I've concluded that a topic ban should be strictly enforced when an editor shows intention to defy it; an occasional spelling correction or other harmless edit would not normally create disruption and the truly harmless edits involved in the present clarification would not have resulted in disruption if not for Hipocrite cooperating with SA by reverting them and demanding enforcement. (Some of the edits aren't clearly harmless but are provocative.) I've also pointed out that if an editor who is topic banned sees a non-controversial correction to make, the editor can do what a blocked editor may also do; if a blocked editor came in as IP and made a spelling correction, then reverted himself with "(username) blocked", which would take seconds, it would also only take seconds for any other editor to confirm and implement the correction, and I would strongly argue that such edits, if indeed harmless, would not constitute block evasion. They are really "proposed edits" that require no fuss but allow legitimate edits to be implemented quickly and easily. Indeed, when the editor comes off the block, and if there were any such lingering about that weren't fixed, the editor could quickly revert them back in. A topic banned editor, if truly interested in cooperation, which requires respect for community process, can do the same. My attention was called to the situation when SA removed an edit of mine from Talk:Cold fusion that had mentioned him, though not in a way that could reasonably be construed as an attack. He then made a spelling correction to the article. Hipocrite reverted him and reported the edit to AE. I reverted SA's Talk page removal, Hipocrite reverted me -- in part -- and I decided that if my comment was going to do any good, it had already been done, and I'd let it be. However, I then undid Hipocrite's reversion of the spelling correction, and if I noticed any other reverted spelling corrections by SA, self-reverted or not, I'd fix them, too. Cooperation with even banned editors in improving the project is to be encouraged; I've undone reversions of banned editors when I was willing to take responsibility for the edit, and attempts were made to slap me down for that, which properly failed. SA would likely push the limits with even this suggested process, I suspect, from his declared intentions; however, he should be allowed every opportunity to reform his behavior; the tragedy is that his "friends" aren't warning him. Hipocrite might be seen as having done so, except that in discussion, Hipocrite showed that his intentions were aligned with SA's. No, SA has friends among the administrative community, and these are the ones who should primarily be reigning him in, he's more likely to listen to them. If they don't, they will lose him, he will end up completely banned. The limits would be pushed by using the self-reversion process, more than occasionally, to propose a disruptive edit; a friend would then revert it back in. However, the remedy in this case would be to ignore SA's involvement, as such, except possibly when considering the life of the ban (just as if the edit had been proposed in Talk), and treat the reverting editor as fully responsible for the edit to the article. WP:MEAT is actually moot when the possible meat puppet is an established editor, not an SPA dedicated to backing up another editor.--Abd (talk) 13:14, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, but really? Typos? If they are being corrected to gain attention, they really are best ignored. Carcharoth (talk) 16:34, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

SA and his friends are already using these edits to create disruption. I would have ignored it; in fact, I reverted back in the one I saw, after Hipocrite reverted it. The RfAr/Clarification was clearly filed as a form of cooperation between SA and Hipocrite, this is covered in the evidence I cited at the RfAr. But I'm not sure you understand my approach. Topic bans should be simple to enforce. Indeed, 'twere possible, we'd make them automatic, like blocks. If they aren't simple to enforce, they can create disruption and waste of time, exactly as we are seeing. I'm not suggesting that we should necessarily or routinely block for typo corrections, but I am saying that it should be within the discretion of any admin to do it as arbitration enforcement, and the committee can request that such blocks not be overturned without committee consultation. And then I've pointed out how it's possible that SA, if he really does want to make helpful edits, can do it in a way that wouldn't risk a block, if the interpretation I've proposed is made clear: self-reverted edits, not disruptive (i.e., not uncivil, for example, not clearly made to irritate rather than help), don't violate a topic ban, they are like Talk page edits proposing an edit, except both less distracting and more helpful (i.e, it takes much less time to undo the self-reversion than it does to read a suggestion on Talk and then go to the article and make the edit). So whenever there is a concern that an editor might be pushing the edge, the editor can be warned to self-revert if the editor truly wants to be helpful and not disruptive to arbitration enforcement. And then it would be clear. --Abd (talk) 04:30, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree. The self-reversion is a good idea. I will be interested to see if SA takes up that idea or not. Carcharoth (talk) 04:37, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks and a request

Thanks for signing up at Wikipedia:Peer review/volunteers and for your work doing reviews. It is now just over a year since the last peer review was archived with no repsonse after 14 (or more) days, something we all can be proud of. There is a new Peer review user box to track the backlog (peer reviews at least 4 days old with no substantial response), which can be found here. To include it on your user or talk page, please add {{Wikipedia:Peer review/PRbox}} . Thanks again, and keep up the good work, Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 03:20, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Er, not sure how many peer reviews I actually did, so this form letter might not apply to me! But thanks anyway, and I'll add the template to my user page. Carcharoth (talk) 14:15, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Cambridge meetup

The second Cambridge meetup is confirmed for this Saturday, 3pm, at CB2 on Norfolk Street: Wikipedia:Meetup/Cambridge 2. We could, for example, explore the topic of succession boxes at more adequate length. Hope to see you there. Charles Matthews (talk) 19:23, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Hi Charles. I'm afraid I can't make this after all. Sorry about that. I was planning to be in Cambridge, but other things have come up and I need to deal with those. I will be there in the summer at some point, so I'll see if I can co-ordinate that with the next meetup. Carcharoth (talk) 11:46, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

My deletion log

Hey Carc. In case you're interested, I set up a deletion log for myself yesterday that excludes the non-old IP talk page deletions. It updates daily here. Cheers. --MZMcBride (talk) 00:37, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks! Carcharoth (talk) 00:54, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Ralph Bakshi

The filmography section had a summary, but it was deleted by a copyeditor. (Ibaranoff24 (talk) 15:53, 1 March 2009 (UTC))

Thanks for pointing this out. Am asking about whether this is the normal approach to take. Carcharoth (talk) 16:14, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for working on this peer review. Per your post on the peer review talk page, I am not sure I understand what about the PR acrhives needs to be fixed / cleaned up. Would you mind clarifying what it is that needs to be done and I will try and fix it if possible? Thanks, Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 04:42, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

I didn't realise peer reviews took place on archive pages, and I didn't realise project reviews were dealt with separately. :-) The redirect is confusing - maybe that could be sorted out, as you said elsewhere, I think. Carcharoth (talk) 04:03, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

J. R. R. Tolkien FAR

I have nominated J. R. R. Tolkien for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:52, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. Replied over there. Carcharoth (talk) 04:38, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikitext simplicity start date -> start-date

I came across one of these edits and made the following change: [8] (note the change to use the template that calculates the age of death). I found the use of two similarly named templates rather confusing. Birth date and death date versus birth-date and death-date: the hyphen is difficult to notice and not all editors will realise what change has been made. Carcharoth (talk) 05:54, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Numeric encoding of dates is trivial for a single date but becomes needlessly intimidating as it scales to more complex tasks. This was discussed last month in depth at MOSNUM, with all editors in agreement that the new template is preferable (with one holdout who was one of the authors of the numeric oriented template). The general feeling is that templates that introduce needless complexity to wikitext defeats the primary goal of wikitext, and are not preferable to those templates that use simple syntax. Compare the two- which can a grandmother figure out[9]? Which requires no reference to the /doc page? Which allows utter freedom with formatting (note start-date/birth-date allows a right hand parameter that is the display form that can include templates eg for julian, or links). Your thoughts? My belief is that we are on the road to deprecating the numeric format in favor of the free text version that does more than the old template in a way that conforms to the goals of wikitext- that it is easy enough for anyone to become an editor. The complexity of syntax does not end with the death dates. Which of the following syntaxes are preferable?

	wikitext	display	microformat
old	{{Start date|1963|11|22|19|00||-07:00}}	19:00, November 22, 1963 (-07:00) (1963-11-22T19:00-07:00)	(1963-11-22T19:00-07:00)
new	{{start-date|November 22, 1963 1pm CST}}	November 22, 1963 1pm CST (1963-11-22UTC19)	(1963-11-22 T19Z)

-J JMesserly (talk) 17:06, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for explaining. It does look good, but as I've just said to someone else, there is nearly always room for improvement. Even if it involves incorporating suggestions from the authors of the numeric-oriented template. There are also a ton of questions I have about user preferences and handling dates in quotes, but as I still don't fully understand microformats, I'll stop there. It's something I've been following on and off. Would you be interested in looking at Wikipedia:Metadata and Wikipedia:Biographical metadata sometime and giving your thoughts on the talk pages? It's the biographical stuff I'm really interested in, namely consolidating it and integrating it into other systems (you mentioned some Google biography thing somewhere, similar to Google Maps is it?). Carcharoth (talk) 22:27, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Oh? Integration of Wikipedia biographical information with which systems? It's hard to give input on these rather broad subjects without a concrete goal. If you install Operator on Firefox (quick notes here), you can quickly become conversant on microformats. This toolbar will allow you to preview the promised microformats aware features of future internet browsers. For example you can export information from a biography article to Yahoo Calendar. You can also export events to the various web calendar applications. Not particularly useful at this point, but you can do it. The low hanging fruit is the mapping applications. Wikipedia is destined to expose more of its information in a structured form, and the usual cost of structure is complexity of representation. {{Start date}} is a classic example of this. Another cost is restriction on how the structured data appears (eg- the disputes about how dates, coord's and cites are formatted). Oftentimes one need not come at the price of the other, but to get both involves exceptionally complex templates to make the representation as simple as possible for contributors. -J JMesserly (talk) 01:38, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

My thoughts re fringe science etcetera

See this? [10]. This is a direct result of ArbCom fiddling while rome burns. I understand where you are coming from, that no administrator should "rewrite" an ArbCom restriction, but are you going to tell me that saying that a "topic ban" means that "you can't edit articles about it, unless you're making "minor changes", or a majority of the article isn't under your topic ban." At least you spoke up, which is more then I can say for some of your colleagues (I'm not speaking of the ones who recused, or the ones already aware of this. Instead of a five minute "clarification" that says "yes, if you're topic banned, you can't edit anything about it".. we are going 3+ DAYS. No updates in about a day. Really guys, you were elected to jar ArbCom out of its slumber. Instead, it seems the new ArbCom has entered the same torpor that claimed the last one. SirFozzie (talk) 02:11, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

From my perspective, ArbCom is giving the maximum allowance to the community to decide first. Prohibiting minor edits seems rather silly to me personally, but then of course the question arises as to what are truly "minor" edits. ArbCom is perhaps wise to wait until this little tempest becomes an intractable dispute. Franamax (talk) 02:28, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Except there's an active clarification going on right now, and it seems pretty upfront, everyone who's spoken up has said "No, what SA is trying to pull is Wikilawyering". I'm just going off on the number of people who aren't speaking up. It's not as difficult as people try to make it. SirFozzie (talk) 02:33, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Well yeah, he's pulling a fast one, on purpose. Me myself, I'd say no problem, he's fixing typos (though I thought I saw a diff where he went much further). But ArbCom has to consider broad principles as well as the individual. What wording would you propose for the clarification? Franamax (talk) 02:42, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

(after e/c, reply elsewhere) Or to put it another way, while the loss to the wiki of SA's efforts would be a crushing blow, at the same time no editor is irreplaceable and that must be the overriding principle for ArbCom to consider. Efforts would be better directed to persuading SA to modify their approach, rather than persuading the wiki to accept the way SA goes about his editing. Franamax (talk) 02:42, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

I never before tangled with SA, to my recollection, though I've become involved with Cold fusion and saw damage there. "The way he goes about his editing" can be very, very disruptive, with rank incivility, which frequently triggers uncivil response. When one couples this with new editors arriving and encountering this, and new editors often react to serious incivility with serious incivility, and are then, as "SPAs," easily blocked and banned, and there are administrators aligned with SA, there is a steady attrition of editors who might hold POVs contrary to that of SA and his supporters. While it would be wrong to "turn the article over" to fringe-POV pushers, this steady loss is also ultimately damaging to the project, and very deeply so, because of reservoirs of ill-will generated. To protect an article against serious POV-pushing, it only takes one or a few knowledgeable editors (best if it is at least two!) to make sure that the article remains within guidelines, but it is very important that consensus process is respected, and that requires that "fringe POVs," and, even more importantly, alleged "fringe POV editors" be respected and included in consensus process. My experience has long been that people with extreme views know that they are extreme, i.e., minority positions, with some rough concept of how minority they are, and they don't mind truly neutral text about this. What they do mind, and what they will sometimes become long-term vandals over, is total exclusion, as if they did not exist. To the extent that Wikipedia has clear notability and verifiability standards, to the extent that these editors are welcomed and assistance is demonstrated toward finding whatever is allowed by clear guidelines that would recognize the POV of these editors without imbalancing the article, these editors can become supporters of the article and will actually protect it against overenthusiastic assertion of their POV, because it will destabilize the consensus, which can lead to *less* recognition rather than more, it attracts editors with strong POV in the other direction, and, by the conditions asserted, they are in the majority. Organizations like Wikipedia learned long ago that group unity was fundamental, which is why such organizations, the ones that have survived long-term, will bend over backwards to try to find absolute consensus. It's not always attainable, but the goal is worthwhile, and seeking it will minimize disruption in the long run. --Abd (talk) 15:41, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

I would like your opinion on what to do regarding Golden plates article.

Hello there,

I am just asking your advice as an arbitrator but not an arbitration and I do so only because I fear we are far past the point of mediation. The Golden plates article has serious issues. It was FA but as the review here[[11]] will show you. Now I know I've been hardly civil in discourse with the regular editors of the article but these guys just simply drive me mad with how they ignore dozens of other editors requests for changes and how they simply either reject or (seemingly) make up reasons to reject policy driven agruments. Its gotten to the point where I am the only person left trying to show an ounce of un-bias and I have to give up. The problem is mediation won't work because they just simply refuse to believe the article is POV. They just don't budge. External concensus rules against them but they just argue everyone away. The last straw to me was when it became apparent that they are just not interested in putting forward "featured article" quality, going so far as to say if they had to make the changes proposed to get FA status they would not do it because it is their belief their article is as near prefect as is. So what do I do? Any edit I make would be reverted and all discussion would be (and has been) for nought. I would think arbitration is the only route remaining. I don't want to jump a step "needlessly" but I am at my wits end with dealing with them. -Kirkoconnell (talk) 06:40, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

If some parties to a dispute refuse mediation, that step can quite legitimately be skipped. I would, first, try raising your concerns at various noticeboards to see if you can get new opinions. For this article, may I suggest the reliable sources noticeboard, the 'no original research' noticeboard (if there is overuse and synthesis of primary sources) and possibly the religious conflicts noticeboard? I will also raise your message with my fellow arbitrators, as some are more experienced with this sort of dispute than I am. Carcharoth (talk) 11:10, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Peer review

Could you pl review this.[12].yousaf465'

Admin Abuse

I've been blocked from editing, and the Admins who blocked me, user:tenofalltrades user:rockpocket and user:friday clever as they are, blocked me from my talkpage, leaving me no avenue of appeal.

This is Admin abuse.

Basically I've been blocked from appealing the block because I've been blocked from my talkpage.

I've even been blocked from posting here, explaining why I've actually had to log out in order to make this very post.

I am user:loomis51 and I would like to appeal my block.

Unfortunately I've been forced to come in with this "sockpuppet" of an anonymous account in order to be unblocked from appealing the block.

Would you be so kind as to unblock user:loomis51 from my own talkpage so that I can proceed to appeal my block?

This is beyond absurd.

Wherever he is, at least Kafka must be having a good laugh. 70.51.20.70 (talk) 07:43, 20 March 2009 (UTC) aka user:loomis51

Appeals of blocks in this case are done via email, either by Special:EmailUser/Carcharoth or unblock-en-llists.wikimedia.org/arbcom-llists.wikimedia.org. I've blocked the IP for block evasion. MBisanz ^talk 07:53, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

E-mail received from Loomis51 through the Wikipedia e-mailer system (so it is him or someone with access to the account). I've replied to the e-mail and forwarded it to the Arbitration Committee mailing list. I've also noted that this is about a block from June 2007 (nearly two years ago) - block log here. My first question would be why this block is being appealed now and not earlier, and were there any earlier appeals? My second question would be what has changed in the intervening time? Carcharoth (talk) 00:00, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Your suggestion for a working group

Hi. Part of your response to the ArbCom case involving the use of myth in religion articles was to suggest setting up a working group to study the issues. I would be more than willing to engage in this idea, but haven't got a clue as to how to go about it. I was wondering if you could let me know what the procedure for doing this should be. Thanks--FimusTauri (talk) 14:36, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

I'll make a suggestion: find some editor who is willing to host the group in their user space, and moderate it. It should ideally be someone trusted by most parties to a dispute, to be neutral and to keep discussion on track toward the goal of finding consensus, while maintaining civility. A user may ask specific editors not to edit in their user space. If a "moderator" abuses the position, the editors participating in this working group can walk to another user's space, copying or referencing whatever they might need from the original discussion. There is no absolute need for there to be only one working group, so there could be, for example, the "anti-myth" working group (I have no familiarity with the dispute here); obviously, though, consensus there wouldn't form a good basis, by itself, for proceeding to actually do something with an assumption of consensus, but it might focus that faction's participation in an overall, neutrally-moderated working group.

I've been recommending and implementing, to some extent, this kind of response to conflict, to generate focused discussions where it's possible to interdict disruption from editors who are not interested in finding consensus. Turns out, though, that usually editors will voluntarily restrain themselves, once they have the presence of a neutral moderator and they are confident that they will be heard and their views considered, which is what a good meeting chair has always had a duty of facilitating, under conditions which simultaneously protect the group as a whole.

When sufficient consensus is found in such a small-scale "committee," then a WikiProject can be started, or an existing one used, as a permanent open forum with a set of participants who have shown that they can work together. --Abd (talk) 16:43, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Abd's suggestions sound good. I would also suggest having a look at how other disputes of a similar nature have been handled. But my main point is that both sides in the dispute should build on what they already have, and aim to find someone willing to mediate. Carcharoth (talk) 22:21, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

I fully appreciate the suggestions and honestly believe they would work in many instances - but not this one. We have a situation here where one side adamantly refuses to acknowledge a problem exists; the other side is equally adamant that there is a problem. If editors cannot see that there is a problem, how can we talk about the problem?--FimusTauri (talk) 11:27, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

If it helps to clarify what I mean, see here, where I have outlined what I consider to be the problem (including a list of policies/guidelines affected) - those on the opposing side of the argument simply disagree with all of that and refuse to discuss it. I have suggested this as a possible mechanism, where each sides presents its case then sits back and lets others evaluate the evidence.

arctic expeditions

Hi Carcharoth, I see you did some work on List of Arctic expeditions, if so you might be interested in Mietinen Young. If I have traduced it then the history of early Arctic exploration needs serious adjustment. ϢereSpielChequers 19:00, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

You think it is a hoax? I agree, but I don't see what it has to do with List of Arctic expeditions. As far as I can see, it was never on there. Carcharoth (talk) 22:22, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Sorry I didn't mean to imply it was on the list, but I thought since you were a major editor of List of Arctic expeditions you'd have an idea as to whether Mietinen Young was a new hoax, notable hoax or fringe theory (I'm assuming that sailing to the Hudson Bay would qualify as Arctic exploration). ϢereSpielChequers 23:19, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

NB I agree with WSC, now listed at AFD. No redeeming qualities. (talkpage lurker speaks :) Franamax (talk) 11:04, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Eucatastrophe

In doing something else, I came upon an article on Eucatastrophe and was very impressed by it. Upon looking at its backstory I found that an editor named "Carcharoth" had something to do with it. The article has not changed much since 2007, perhaps because it is very good right now and need not get much better. I see that we award early and mid-level Wikipedia users vaarious kinds of "stars" for their work, but I wld. assume "Carcharoth" is well beyond needing or valuing such baubles, so I'll write this brief tribute.Bigturtle (talk) 18:29, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Upon looking back, I see that the article is in fact the product of lots of people, but "Carcharoth" has done great work looking after it and many other articles. Bigturtle (talk) 18:32, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

I think "lots of people" is about right. :-) I merely added a category and a talk page tag, so you really should be thanking someone else for the article. If you do read this, may I ask how you arrived at the article? From a link from another article? From a Google search? From a category? Carcharoth (talk) 09:01, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

RTVing

Just a comment that in the past Jimbo altered the RTV guidelines [13] to permit user talk page deletion in RTV cases. It has been re-worded since then, but is still substantially in Wikipedia:Right_to_vanish#Vanishing_from_Wikipedia. MBisanz ^talk 04:17, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. Carcharoth (talk) 08:54, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Deletion stats

I would like to call your attention to this post. Dragons flight (talk) 01:20, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. That's exactly what I was after. Much appreciated. Carcharoth (talk) 01:32, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I've posted this in answer to your question. Approximately 80% of the now existing pages were recreated without undeletion. Of the 20% that were undeleted, approximately half were restored by a different adminbot operator acting in bulk. Dragons flight (talk) 03:21, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. That is very helpful. That is almost certainly a result of this incident and the restores listed at User:ST47/restores. If this is correct, you might want to note this in your evidence. I was aware of this incident (as you can see from the ANI thread), and part of the reason for requesting evidence about undeletions was to see if that was a one-off incident. From a first glance at your evidence, it seems it was. Carcharoth (talk) 11:09, 29 March 2009 (UTC)