User talk:DGG/Archive 52 May 2011

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Abdul Hameed

I reverted your redirection of the article to A Hameed. The full name is necessary, unless there is really good evidence that the form with the initial is the best known form, which I do not see. Please discuss on the talk p. and get consensus before moving back again. DGG ( talk ) 18:27, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

I like your quote at the top of this page. What I am trying to do is to get that redirect deleted, so I can move A Hameed into the Abdul Hameed space. The article supports the full spelling over the initial, and it makes more sense to have an actual article there rather than a redirect to a disambig page for which another spelling exists. If he's the famous person holding that exact name, his article should be there.--Kintetsubuffalo (talk) 01:12, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Looks like you did exactly what I was aiming for.--Kintetsubuffalo (talk) 01:14, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

It needed the admin buttons. That may be why you were having problems. DGG ( talk ) 04:50, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Wedding dress

Per this, I have decided not going to DRV would be the best course of action here ... while I will not be unconvinced that that was the weakest justification for a speedy keep ever, as you noted that would merely serve to intensify things. Instead, I think I'll bring up the general issue of the notability of garments worn once by a single person at WT:N, when I can. Maybe I've lost (for now) the battle over the wedding dress (I still think they would better treated by lists) but the potential for this to really go off the deep end is still there. Daniel Case (talk) 05:13, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

if free pictures were obtainable, what would you think of having them in commons, along with very full descriptive captions.? DGG ( talk ) 05:25, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ch interpreter (2nd nomination)

Hi DGG. You participated in Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2011 April 13#Ch interpreter. Originally closed as "[n]o consensus = no change to the status quo", the DRV close has amended by the closer to relist. If you would like to participate in the AfD, please comment at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ch interpreter (2nd nomination). Cunard (talk) 07:45, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

I find it disturbing

that you encourage WP:BATTLEGROUND behavior on the part of James Cantor. You should have researched his prior contributions more carefully, including his edits to Karen Franklin. He somehow develops an interest in editing the biographies of precisely those other professionals who disagree with his DSM-5 proposal. You came down like a ton of bricks on some right-wing guys who did similar dancing around COI. I assume you think Cantor's expert contributions to Wikipedia are so vital that we need to have some realpolitik horse trading and allow him to "improve" the biographies of those who disagreed with him (putting a notability tag on them) in exchange for his other contributions. I vaguely remember you were opposed to having that kind of tagged BLPs around in a discussion at WP:VP. Did you change your mind? Tijfo098 (talk) 19:41, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

if you re-read my comment, you will see that I said that the notability tag was unjustified. But it was not disruptive, as it led to the improvement of the article in apparent response to the challenge. DGG ( talk ) 20:16, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

I have already explained that I do not intend to get involved in the continued mediation of articles on this subject unless it appears nobody else is willing to step forward. I therefore ask that discussion not be continued here. DGG ( talk ) 20:16, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Since Cantor deletes my posts from his talk page [1], you leave me no choice but to continue the discussion at ANI. I have made a post there concerning your conduct/position. Tijfo098 (talk) 21:08, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

I've replied there. DGG ( talk ) 23:30, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

DSM

It seems we differ on the importance of the DSM. Medically, fiscally, and especially terminologically, its influence is substantial. In small community libraries in the US, it might be the only source of information on the paraphilias. Even on Wikipedia, it has been argued that homosexuality was never a paraphilia, because the word "paraphilia" was only adopted into the DSM after homosexuality was removed from what would later be the list of paraphilias. Sure, prizes such as the Nobel might be more prestigious, but they generally go to more mainstream efforts, not to those involved with the paraphilias. BitterGrey (talk) 20:45, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

I fail to see the relevance of this. I interpreted your comment as an attack, true of false; was I wrong? DGG ( talk ) 23:28, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Not just an attack, but a violation of BLP, coincidentally, the violation you were absolving Cantor of. (You glossed over his more frequent violation, COI.) This constructs the sort of illuminating asymmetry that we researchers love. My comment could be equally applied to any researcher in the paraphilias: To the best of my knowledge, none have received the Nobel, and none have lived to see their neologisms included in the DSM. I myself can't even realistically hope for either of these accolades. In contrast, Cantor's marking Moser as not notable was specifically denigrating: There are many researchers in the paraphilias who are notable enough for inclusion in Wikipedia. Cantor's comment had much greater scope. Furthermore, my comment was made in the body of a talk page, while Cantor's was topmost on the actual BLP. Cantor's comment had a much higher profile. Both Cantor and Moser appear to be equally alive. In effect, I stated that Cantor might not win the Nobel, and Cantor edited Wikipedia to reflect his position that his opponent, Moser, was not even worth mentioning. Yet Cantor is absolved, and I am accused.

AGF requires a clarification such as the one above, about the importance of the DSM. This could have been a misunderstanding. If you thought I was discussing something trivial, like a third-grade science fair, your accusation would make sense. That misunderstanding could be simply resolved by a clarification. Alternatively, this could have been a double standard implemented by an Admin to attract special castes of editors, for whom Wikipedia policies don't apply, sacrificing the integrity of Wikipedia for the superficial appearance of credibility. I've seen this before. As for whether you were wrong; was the clarification relevant? BitterGrey (talk) 06:05, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

so , was it intended as an attack, or as praise of him? that's the question about whether I was wrong. If it was intended as praise, I will re-examine.

As for a notability tag, adding a notability tag to an article is not a BLP violation. it makes no statement other that expressing a doubt about whether the person meets the specific Wikipedia guidelines for having an independent article. There are many people whom might well be highly notable in any ordinary sense of the word either to the general public or to a particular group, who do not. Personally, I think we ought to bridge this gap with much less concern over the current technical requirements for sourcing, but I don't think there's consensus for my view. I give my own opinions according to my view here, but my opinions have weight only to the extent other people agree with me. In what I actually do, either as an admin or an editor, I go according to the community consensus as best I understand it, whether or not I personally agree with it. In any case, I've not used any of the admin powers in this subject area. DGG ( talk ) 01:28, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

It was intended as a statement.

I think my evaluation of the DSM has been made reasonably clear, sufficient to resolve a misunderstanding. The necessary AGF was made and was considered irrelevant. You clearly hold that there is a caste of editors about whom only praise can be written, and so certainly would not wish to read my impression of editor Cantor, no matter how thoroughly diffed it might be. BitterGrey (talk) 06:13, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Avoiding a direct answer is not a very good sign of good faith. Were I convinced you meant it as praise, I would certainly modify what I said about it. Otherwise the matter is closed here. I've said before I hope never to get involved in this subject again, but I can't ignore cases where someone does something dangerous to the project generally, as the blocking admin in this case did. . DGG ( talk ) 15:48, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

AfD

Please see: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Norbert M. Samuelson. Thanks. Jaque Hammer (talk) 21:17, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

thanks for the notification. Perhaps you might want to read WP:PROF. All the material to meet it was in the article at the time of your nomination DGG ( talk ) 22:38, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

Sorry about that. I restored the reviews. Best, Yoninah (talk) 15:13, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Question re: Category:American Roman Catholics

The category was removed May 8 by the editor at this diff. I restored it and posted a note to his talk page, as I believe the category has been met by the references in the article which I copied to the user's talk page. Have just received this note regarding the references which were already on the page. I have added another reference re: his Papal knighthood but I think this is going a bit too far with regard to whether or not someone is or was a member of that faith. I do have references which state the family attended Mass every Sunday, but don't believe adding this is encyclopedic. Would appreciate your opinion on this. Thanks, We hope (talk) 23:34, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

I responded on the article talk p. In brief, I consider the Catholic funeral sufficient evidence. DGG ( talk ) 00:21, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your time and for sharing your opinion. We hope (talk) 00:26, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Talkback

Hello, DGG. You have new messages at RadioFan's talk page.
Message added 19:00, 10 May 2011 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Curt's Famous Meats Article

Hello, I responded to your post, but you seem extremely busy, so I will just comment here. First, thank-you for notifying me about the issues with the Curt's Famous Meats article. I wanted to tell you that I removed some improper references and have tried to make the article more neutral, but I think that the article's subject may make it seem more "biased" then it actually is. Such as, when it says "has worked with the community" or "has won many awards", it may seems biased, but perhaps I just introduced facts in a "positive light". I may be wrong, but I am still working on the article and would like to have assistance from such an expert Wikipedian. If you do not have the time to assist, then could you at-least specify major areas of bias? I have removed some of the adjextives you typed of, but I do not know what else I could remove. This may seem very sudden of a response, but I try to get things done as effeciantly as possible. If you could look over it again and edit it, or give me more details on fixing the article, I would be most pleased. I would also like to continue a discussion with you until the serious issues are mostly resolved. Thank-you for any consideration and thank-you for all the work you have obviously done for Wikipedia. Thank-you. Zach Winkler (talk) 04:31, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

I think I'd call it not biased, but promotional. I did some rewriting just now--the current owner does not appear to be appropriate for a section; but Independence is large enough that an article on each of the successive mayors of the city probably would be appropriate--I made a link for the current one, but didn't start the article. But for the store to be notable according to WP:LOCAL, it has to be known outside the city, and the most likely way of showing it is by the awards. So what is now needed is information about just what award it won at the American Royal --I have checked the AR web site for 2007 & 8 and cannot find them listed . As for the other awards, there needs to be something to show their importance. You might ask a local librarian for help, unless, as is likely, the store itself has clippings--ask them. It has to be published, but it does not have to be accessible on the web. DGG ( talk ) 05:33, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

I am currently working on this, I do not know why American Royal does not list their winners, but I have contacted some individuals that may be able to help. I will try my best to find this needed information. Thank-you for the assistance, I will notify you when I get more information and references. Zach Winkler (talk) 20:42, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Hedwig of Nordgau

I would argue that this article needs more than just proper sourcing; it needs more detail about Hedwig herself. Compare the articles about her daughters, which have more information than just family relationships.

• Lutgardis of Luxemburg: acted as regent and was involved in peace-making
• Cunigunde of Luxembourg: even aside from her being a saint, she was politically active and took part in imperial councils

Do you know of anywhere to find this kind of info about Hedwig? --Auntof6 (talk) 09:24, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

• • We have the standing practice that spouses of heads of state are always notable for Wikipedia purposes, which makes perfectly good sense. It probably makes especially good sense in the medieval period, because they (& often mothers) and abbesses were essentially the only women who could play a political role in Northern Europe in at least the earlier part of that historical period. (& btw, Luxenbourg was a much more considerable state in the Middle Ages than it is presently. The sources for expansion of this article --and all articles on this period-- will be found in MGH. Much of the work is now online as open access. There is an index to the online part at [2]. There will undoubtedly be secondary references also, and the various indexes to German historical literature will find them. Most of our articles on traditional academic subjects are unfortunately written very carelessly without proper attention to the amount of information available in libraries DGG ( talk ) 00:14, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Re: Your de-PRODs of cricket seasons articles

I agree that sports team's seasons are often notable, but non-notable sports team's seasons are not I would say, which is more or less the case in each of these situations. However, given you've removed the PRODs, I'll have to move onto AfD anyway. Harrias ^talk 19:37, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

sure. that's the way to settle it. This is not a subject where I have particularly strong feelings. DGG ( talk ) 21:09, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Question re: Institute for Integrative Nutrition

Could you please remove this page. It does not have proper content and will be updated appropriately when I have more reliable sources to provide. Thank you :) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Evildeadxsp (talk • contribs) 20:06, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

help request

I'm trying to use of those templates that make a not appear at the top of a page saying something like "this page is about blah, if you're looking for blah blah, go here". I'm used to editing in WP when it comes to correcting grammar or orthography or adding actual text, but I don't know how to use templates and I think it's high time I learn. Can you help me out with a simple step by step. I already tried the pages on templates and I didn't understand them. Asinthior (talk) 22:24, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

the templates for this are at WP:Template messages/General, more specifically the WP:DISTINGUISH section, and for more detailed information about how they are used, see Template:About and WP:HAT There's one for almost every conceivable possibility, and often several different ones, all equally suitable, Do not be too concerned if you use the wrong one. There is also an way of producing the same effect for a custom message using Template:Dablink. (The central help pages for how to make new ones are Wikipedia:Template namespace and Help:Template, but most people avoid this unless they want to specialize in it.) DGG ( talk ) 19:27, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the help. I had already done something about it: I found a page that had a similar start and copied the code. I will look into the info you're giving me here though, as my approach was a bit... let's say unsophisticated. Thanks for the help again!Asinthior (talk) 03:14, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Geonames

I see Fram has proposed to ban people from creating articles using geonames, which is absurd I think. The idea as I'm sure you know is that they are added to like Qurchi. If you view on a google map it is actually a fair sized town more than a village.. I found an update to date UN source at least which states the district places are in. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 17:44, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

I've been commenting at AN/I. If they take this anywhere else, let me know. I've made a further comment about the absurdity of Fram's statement that we should require that material added should be "proved beyond a doubt", and "actually identify the potential matching reality", There is very little in most subjects that could be added meeting such qualifications. Just in this field, every population figure we report is false in actual reality--they are true only as updated by a census. Every location is correct only to the extent of current accuracy in measurement. In other fields, every species description here is true only to the most reliable current knowledge; every biography, every historical article, is true only to the extent the sources are correct. DGG ( talk ) 19:51, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, And the thing is 99% of geonames entries I've come across are visible on a google map on populated places seem to be correct, even if the exact coordinates are not always right. If I can get somebody to download to UN list in the workspace I can use that as a guide to add district too.♦ Dr. Blofeld 11:45, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

DGG, it would be nice if you would contradict my argument with anything reasonable. I have not resuired that all contents of an article are proved beyond a doubt, as you suggest with your census example, but only that if we create an article on a location, we have actual proof that it exists and is actually located in that province, and in reverse that the location that is visible on Google Earth on or around those coordinates actually has the same name as the one suggested by geographic.org. As can be seen from the examples given for Afghan (and in the AfD American) places, neither of these can be trusted from geographic.org, so it shouldn't be used as the sole source to base articles on. It is ridiculous to accept the rapid mass creation of thousands of articles from a clearly unreliable source, only to ask others to clean up that mess. I have no idea why you prefer completely incorrect articles over no article at all, but you are not helping Wikipedia by this. Fram (talk) 12:11, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Fram, my quotes are from your own statements. If you do not recognize them, perhaps you did not mean them literally. SImilarly ,, I have seen some things doubtful or ambiguous in these articles, but nothing "completely incorrect". DGG ( talk ) 22:27, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia's standards are already set out by policy at V and RS. Fram believes that geographic.org is not sufficiently reliable to provide the sole verification for facts it adverts to. It seems obvious that the community—in the form of people who think and opine about V and RS (and not those who think and opine about who should be blocked or sanctioned)—should be enlisted to come to a consensus. ^Bongo_matic 12:22, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Indeed. Would the Village pump be the best location, or the reliable sources noticeboard? Fram (talk) 12:24, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

I have no informed view as I spend time at neither. My intuition is RSN with a notice at VPP. ^Bongo_matic 12:31, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

I do have one other suggestion, though, which is that the three of you agree on the formulation of the question here or somewhere else before posting, so that the discussion can remain as focussed as possible. ^Bongo_matic 12:37, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Ah, I saw your first post, started a discussion at WP:RSN#Geographic.org, and then came back to post the link here, only to see your suggestion... Anyway, people are free to suggest a different question at the RSN if they think another one is needed. Fram (talk) 12:57, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

there are, even in very well mapped countries, many geographic names which may or may not represent a distinct place, as compared to an isolated house (frequent on UK Ordnance Survey Maps) or an indistinct district, as I've encountered several times in the US. There are additionally many example all over the world of settlements, some of very considerable size up into hundreds of thousands population each, which have exactly the same name, and are located in different provinces or districts, or US states. As an additional difficulty, there are many instances where the same name is used for a settlement, and also the district containing it--New York and New Jersey have particularly confusing systems, so I assume that parts of the world I know less well, such as Afghanistan and Nepal, may be similarly complex. The solution is to give what information there is, and attribute it to what sources there are. DGG ( talk ) 22:27, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

...or not to provide the info until you are reasonably sure that it is correct. We shouldn't create articles in the hope that they are correct, we should create articles where we can be confident that the source is correct, which we can't be here. (talk) 07:29, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

When worded this way, nobody is likely to object to the wording. The argument then shifts to what degree of correctness is necessary, will probably continue to differ on what degree of correctness is necessary in different situation. I say again there are no mechanical formulas for general judgements. Skill is needed in editing, which is not a mechanical process. A distinction needs to be made between harmful and less harmless errors. Among factors to consider is that errors in early versions of articles where we know good people will be working on subsequently are not usually harmful, & experience shows it is the rare topic that will never be worked on after the initial editing.Additionally , most topics are not isolated. A list of places or events is to some extent self correcting because incompatible facts will be manifest. But most important, is the degree to which we are limited by available sources--in some fields it must be understood that if we are to have information at all, we much accept that it will not be of FA quality. Remember, I came here because of my display at the very superficial and outdated sourcing at Wikipedia and my hopes of improving it. The first step isn apply proper academic standards is triage--working first on the worst and most importance. Treating everything os being equally important is not scholarship, but pedantry--the sort of mechanical work a bot could do as well.

Well that's just it. You say that "editing ... is not a mechanical process". But in this case, there is bulk creation of articles without editorial discretion you suggest (in the form of a manual attempt to verify from other sources), hence it is for practical purposes a mechanical process (even if not automated). ^Bongo_matic 07:58, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

And the end result of such mechanical processes is articles like Bona see Buna, which have existed now for over three months. Our own Dord... Fram (talk) 13:11, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

the creation of articles of routine subjects by a mechanical process is sometimes correct if it is done properly from a suitable source. It's been done right sometimes, and done wrongly in others--I remember some algae articles done ignorantly, but most taxonomic articles done this way have been done correctly , and so have most geographic ones. I believe that some on Eastern Europe were challenged, but nobody found any significant number of errors. See below for my suggestion of a better source, but I still await some information about the % of errors in the present one--I think neither you or I have done more than spot-checking. The continued existence of improvable but unimproved articles is the fault of those who could have improved them as well as those who wrote them less well than they could have. to be frank, I really should be fixing them instead of disputing with you, and my only excuse it that I might encourage others to fix them also. DGG ( talk ) 23:36, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

DGG, I'm surprised to hear your views on this, us both having had the chance to see the results of spot-checks. Most people—even, probably, a majority of editors—come here to get, not contribute, information. There is no reason to trust the source in question (it's a dump of a database—possibly not even the most scrubbed version of that database used internally by the database publisher), and the most likely items to be wrong are those for which no other sources is readily available (specifically, because the name is wrong). Taxonomy is one thing—the result of a highly transparent process with scads of overlapping sources for both the source data and the aggregate data. Obscure populated places in countries where roman script is not standard, and people with first-hand knowledge are not likely to be participating in Wikipedia (primary sources aren't encouraged, but most edits come from people with first-hand knowledge of the topic) is another one totally.

As you say in your user page (admirably, and so admired that a recent visitor asked your permission to copy), different editors contribute in different ways. But creating what may be hundreds of articles that are WRONG is bad for the project, and shouldn't create an onus of sourcing for those editors who opine that it's bad.

Dr Blofeld is one of the project's very most valuable editors, and his catholic interests are an energizer for the project and an inspiration. But let's call this what it was—a bad idea executed with the very best of intentions that should be voluntarily undone—either by deletion or sourcing—by him and anyone who happens to be interested in helping. ^Bongo_matic 01:24, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

It is impossible to prepare any reference work without error. There is an inevitable need to compromise between the factors of comprehensiveness and precision, and the methods of Wikipedia are not adapted to a goal of accomplishing more than a moderate standard of accuracy; if aim too high, we will accomplish very little. (The degree of accuracy asked for above by Fram amounts to OR in this field--we have no way of proving within our parameters of working that a location on a map has in truth the name that is specified, & I do not regard divergent spellings or transcription in this particular field as avoidable error.) There are 2 practical questions with this material: are there many significant errors, or only a few, and to where they are to be attributed. It's unreasonable to judge without quantitation, and I have not seen any numbers and have not myself checked anything other than the presented examples. Dr. B says it has 99% accuracy, which I regard as so unlikely as to need actual analysis. You assert so many errors as to be unusable; ditto. In any case, are they errors in transcription by geographic.org, which is easy to both determine and to remedy, or are you saying there are errors in the underlying National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency data? If that is true, it's beyond what we can fix, and we can only report the sources, as follows from our rule of Verifiability, not Truth. DGG ( talk ) 04:52, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Novel sources are presumed unreliable unless demonstrated otherwise—that's part and parcel of the verifiability policy. There is a requirement to establish a consensus for the reliability of a source, not the other way around. Anecdotal evidence of unreliability is enough to invalidate a source as reliable until and unless a consensus of (preferably informed) editors come to the opposite conclusion. ^Bongo_matic 06:06, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

More Afghanistan

I see Fram has plastered tags all over the entire lot it seems. DO you think the tags in Qasem Khel are warranted? He's added tags on all of them like Pitigal♦ Dr. Blofeld 20:48, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

I do not usually like to object to tags asking for additional references, & for most geo stubs, we do after all want more refs. If Fram's just doing this instead of trying to delete the articles, I'd let it be. But about the wording of the tag on the Pitgal, "which may not be a reliable source" -- I would suggest changing to something like "which is some cases is not the most reliable source " However, again just in order to keep the peace I wouldn't change it, at least not this month. Cf. the similar discussion of {{BLP-IMDB only refimprove}}, a tag I use pretty heavily. [3] DGG ( talk ) 21:14, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Its completely pointless, a nobody is going to listen to the tags. And the articles end up looking worse in the time being. If he really cares about sources and stubs he should expand them himself. Such a waste of time.♦ Dr. Blofeld 21:43, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

The tag on Qasem Khel at the time of your post was added by User:LeadSongDog, not by me. We have worked together (Leadsongdog and me) to decide which of the sources you added to the article are actually about Qasem Khek, with one that is about it, one that is uncertian, and one that certainly isn't. This was done because, yes, I really care about sources, and I really care about the correctness of our articles and the sources used in them. I thought that after your problems at Dara-I-Pech, you would think twice about talking about caring about sources, but apparently not...

As for Pitigal: according to your article, it is in Kunar Province. According to the Kunar provincial map though, it is outside the province[4] and is actually in Nuristan Province, in Kamdesh District (which was part of Kuran province until 2001). So your information in this case was clearly outdated (User:The Anome/Villages in Kamdesh District, Nuristan Province, Afghanistan had the correct location though). Considering how many of the articles that were checked have been partly or completely incorrect or outdated, tagging them as being unverified or having a high risk of containing incorrect data seems the least we can do. Fram (talk) 07:01, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

The word "you" on a 3rd person's talk p. can be confusing--I thought it meant me, but actually it meant the previous commentator. But Fram, you have been using the tag "Its only attribution is to geographic.org, which may not be a reliable source for geographical information" for a great many articles where the link may be to geographic.org, but the actual data source as specified both in the article & the geographic.org page is the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, which I would think is an excellent reliable US government source. I do not consider this correct tagging. It would only be correct if geographic.org gave no source at all. A simplething to do would be to change the wording on the tag, to be something like " Its only attribution is to the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency as reported by geographic.org, which may not be a reliable source for reporting geographical information from reliable sources". I admit I had not realized this when I supported your use of the tag.

But, more important, the actual National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency data is easily available, at least in the US, from the excellent text interface at [5] and the graphical one at [6]. The best thing to do is to replace the link, and upgrade the information with the material there, which gives variant names and the name in the local script, which should be at least given in the articles and probably used as redirects also (I think it has been decided that names in other languages are appropriate redirects for places & people etc. from the relevant region region). I'm not sure whether we could get a bot to do this, but if not, surely it would be more helpful to do it manually than to just tag. And Dr.B, would it be possible to make the articles directly from that database in the first place? DGG ( talk ) 19:57, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

...and this is yet more evidence that geographic org should not be used at all. Darrah-ye Pich is only found as a stream in the geonames server, not as a populated place. So "surely it would be more helpful" if Dr. Blofeld actually cleaned up his mess instead of discussing this at ANI, here, at the AfD, and so on? He continued to create articles from that database after it was shown to him that it is not reliable: I don't feel compelled to do more than point out his errors, and have no plans to spend more of my time correcting his errors when he can just as easily do this himself (correcting would be more helpful, but much more time-consuming as well). Kariz Dashak is actually Karez-e Dashak, and is located in Herat Province, not in Farah province. What is actually the use of keeping this article, which has the wrong name, information, and source? Starting again from scratch, and from a reliable source, would be a lot quicker than checking those 1000plus articles and manually correcting them... Fram (talk) 21:19, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

so perhaps we should concentrate on finding a way to go forward. Have you an estimate on the % of errors? that might help deciding how to do it. I see constantly at AfD proposals to throw out a list or a group of articles because a few of them are in error, and I think that close to vandalism--destroying good content because other people do things wrong. for the examples you have been giving, I see you do not correct them, but just use them as an arguing points. Though I can understand just tagging, I can not understand determining something is wrong, finding out what is right, and letting the error stand. As a parallel example, you've lately been categorizing articles on painters. I looked at a few, and about 1/3 of them have major deficiencies ranging from improve-sources to no indication of notability. I didn't check many, for instead I did some of what I say should be done, and have sent the worst for deletion--after searching.

But none of this is really directed at you specifically--with most of these, sometimes dozens of people have looked at them at one time or another over several years, correcting minor errors, but ignoring the major ones--and I see this is all types of articles also. I came here in the first place to improve the quality of articles by using my experience to source them, but I soon discovered that we needed just as much to improve the quantity in most fields also. I then intended to start that, but have been diverted from both into the last-ditch effort to keep existing improvable articles from getting deleted before people had a chance to work on them. I do not consider that either an optimal use of my time or particularly enjoyable, but almost nobody else was doing it. All along, I've been trying to persuade people to join me in saving and fixing. Perhaps you will. I would not write this if I did not think we had the same goal, and could work together. DGG ( talk ) 22:06, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Considering what lengths it took to get Dr. Blofled convinced that one article (Dara-I-Pech) was incorrect and to agree with this (reverts, ANI discussion, and an AfD), I have no real urge to repeat that experience over 1,000plus articles. Furthermore, if I were to delete e.g. Bona see Buna, Dr. Blofeld would no longer be able to view the article, making it harder for him to dispute my findings (and I'm by now an involved editor, so deleting that one would have been branded admin tool abuse probably). I'll do some more checks of the general quality of these articles, but may well start a mass AfD, comparabale to the one on algae you mention, since the articles often have the wrong name and information and a poor source, leaving very little reason to keep them, and indicating that it would be less work to start from scratch than to correct these. As for the painter articles: I have sent a number at Prod as well, like Ioana Crewenski. Finally "I've been trying to persuade people to join me in saving and fixing. Perhaps you will." I am constantly creating, saving, and fixing things here, and have done so for more than five years. Fixing things doesn't always mean keeping things though, in some cases (like here) deleting them and starting from scratch is the best fix. Please don't imply that if people don't follow your strategy, they aren't saving or fixing things... Fram (talk) 07:00, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

I'll take the ten first articles tagged so far: Ab Kalak to Ajghan, to get an idea of how widespread the problems are.

• Ab Kalak gives no results in the Geonames database...
• Abchakan is correct
• Abdan, Jowzjan is in Sar-e Pul, not in Jowzjan...
• Abu Kala is correct
• Achek is correct, but should be at Achik
• Afsay is not in Kunar, but in Nuristan
• Afshar-e Bala is correct
• Afshar-e Nanehchi is correct
• Agej is not in Farah, but in Ghor (as Agij)
• Ajghan is correct, but should be at Ajighan

So this gives 6 correct articles (minor transliteration differences sometimes), three articles where a village with that name exists, but in a different province, and one that doesn't seem to exist at all.

For the last ten articles starting with a Z, this gives:

• Ziarat-e Shah Maqsud is correct
• Ziarat-e Molla Navvab-e Nikeh is correct, but should be at the quite different Mulla Nawab Nikeh, which is now a redlink in List of places in Afghanistan
• Zeydabad is correct, but should be at Zahidabad
• Zeybayan (or Zaybayan) is not in Jowzjan, but in Sar-e Pul
• Zerat, Afghanistan is not in Bamyan, but in either Wardak or Daykundi
• Zenyah (or Zinyah) is in Pansjhir, not in Kapisa
• Zelergak is not in Farah but in Ghor
• Zayeman (or Zayaman) is correct
• Zay Soltan (or Zay Sultan) is correct
• Zaw is the variation of the name of a place in Sar-e Pul and Herat, but not in Jowzjan

So again, we have 5 basically correct articles, and 5 which are located in the wrong province (which is the only info given about these villages in the article, so quite an important aspect...). In total, this check gives 11 correct articles, 8 where the only info in the article is wrong, and one that doesn't seem to exist. Fram (talk) 08:11, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

But then again in 2008 Dr. Blofeld supposedly used the real geonames database for his article creation, but e.g. Bidak is according to that database not in Badghis, but in Herat (and slightly to the North of the coordinates given by the article). Perhaps the Geonames database gave different coordinates and a different province in 2008? I checked this article when I encountered the funnily named Bidak (33°N). Fram (talk) 08:32, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Another effect of such mechanical article creation is the lack of checks whether another article for the same subject already exists, e.g. Titan, Afghanistan already existed as Titan, Saghar District. Fram (talk) 11:55, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

I thank you for the analysis--I apologize for the delay in responding to it. Yes, I agree with you that this is an unduly high error rate. Are these his transcription errors, or transcriptions errors of the derived non-authoritative database he used? It makes a difference with respect to other users of that derived db. Numbers do clarify things, and I cannot help thinking it would have helpful to start off with this analysis. I agree with you also that in correcting this many articles, its a problem how to go about it & multiple approaches are necessary. My comment about helping was only technically addressed at you--it applies to everybody. Duplicates are a problem, because there can easily be places (or people) of identical or apparently identical names. I think one of the copyvio detectors can also be used for the detection of possible duplicate articles, but of course it would have to be used very carefully. My response to all this is that we do not need to stop auto-creation, but that we need better tools to do it--I think the direction to go is in making infoboxes , which could collect data from various sources, and then should be transformable into prose as well. In other words, a semantic wiki. And I continue to wish we could find ways to work together or at least in parallel. DGG ( talk ) 17:57, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Geographic.org

Please note that the above-captioned AfD discussion has been initiated (I saw notices posted on Dr Blofeld's talk page and RSN). ^Bongo_matic 08:41, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

You seen Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Geographic.org?♦ Dr. Blofeld 11:53, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Fram's pursuit of this is beginning to really bother me: a archetypal example of trying every possible venue until one gets satisfaction. On the other hand, the proportion of errors is higher than I had at first realized. Dr. B, you really could have cut this short by going back over them and fixing them. DGG ( talk ) 02:25, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

DGG, what fora came to the opposite conclusion? The consensus at RSN was pretty clear that these don't constitute a reliable source suitable for sole sourcing an article. The ANI thread was ill-conceived, but didn't come to any (certainly not any contradictory) consensus. Did Fram lodge any other complaints? As I stated in the AfD, the mass creation of these articles appears to be a clear policy violation, so it could be dealt with in a fashion relating to that. Reading the comments at ANI, RSN, and AfD together, a strong consensus—quite different from your view—emerges. This isn't forum shopping, it's result shopping. The outcomes prescribed by the various venues haven't resulted in Fram's objective, but Fram is not trying to reverse any consensus already stated elsewhere. ^Bongo_matic 03:27, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Bongo, I didn't say Fram was trying to reverse consensus. Please read my whole comment. DGG ( talk ) 04:44, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

It's true, you didn't. But forum shopping is only inappropriate in such a context. Otherwise, it's simply learning the hard way that the previous venues were not the ones that give the desired satisfaction. On the other hand, if the consensus at the other places was, "there's no problem with this", then looking elsewhere becomes inappropriate. Fram's actions, in this light (and according to me and this logic, not to all views) may be tiresome, but not bothersome in the sense of "problematic", which is how I read "beginning to bother me". ^Bongo_matic 04:57, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

DGG, your attitude is really bothering me as well, but I try to keep such opinions to myself. The ANI discussion didn't prodce a good result, because I didn't present my case very well, with people misunderstanding the problem, tacked as it was to a different objection against the articles (one which I didn't share). However, the RSN discussion, and my further research in how correct these articles were (or, as it turned out, weren't), convinced me that something needed to be done. So I brought it to a neutral location, and tried my best to get as much input from uninvolved editors as possible (including a note on AN, VP, and the Geography project). That things there are not going the way you should like them to go is not my problem, but yours: but trying to present this as some kind of forumshopping or asking the other parent is incorrect and just poisoning the well, since it was the logical conclusion of the RSN discussion. Fram (talk) 06:59, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Fram's nomination is extremely exaggerated and he has almost seemingly convinced you here that the errors are pronounced. I've just spent several hours going through some 350 articles to date and you know what? Aside from moving lower casing to capitals which was very easily done, I spotted 2 errors only. And the vast majority of the transliterations match the geonames entry and have the correct coordinates. Geogrpahic.org was not even used to generate the missing Afghan village list it was a 2008 downloaded version of geonames which Fram acknowledges to be reliable! only since 2008 some of the villages have changed province.♦ Dr. Blofeld 19:59, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

View Category:Populated places in Aktobe Province for instance. He has done his very best to only identify the flaws, the VAST majority are fine. He's found any errors which have existed and blown it into something way beyond the truth just because he didn't get his own way at the AFD. The one flaw of Akbobe? We had duplicates for Komsomloskye. View it on a google earth here ♦ Dr. Blofeld 21:24, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

I apologize to Fram, because attitudes are not the point here; dealing with the articles is the point. Obviously, the need is to verify the articles. Dr B., you say you are doing it, and that should meet the objections. I am deliberately posting only very concisely here, and not at all at the AfD, which I have not looked at in 2 days, because what I hope is that the matter can be settled it should be, if you are able to verify the material. I think it would be entirely justified to remove the additional sources tag from the ones you verify and add some other source, just as is the routine in the very similar practice at BLP prod. I presume Fram will then remove them from the afd list also, and any that may still be of questionable notability (such as something that turns out to be a neighborhood) would be nominated separately. Fram? DGG ( talk ) 23:47, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

as an aside, since I mentioned BLP prod: Much of my time since the last few months has been spent at BLP prod, where I have consistently found that over 80% of the articles listed there can be sourced, including over 95% of those that might possibly be notable & encyclopedic. Unlike verified inhabited places, every one of which is unquestionably notable, about half of the initially unsourced BLPs are probably not notable, a similar proportion to the initially sourced BLPs. At the start, I simply removed the BLP prod tag after sourcing, but now what I do is see if some other deletion tag will apply, and, for the many that meet a speedy criterion, I speedy-delete without further ado. As far as I can tell, the BLP prod process was and remains totally unnecessary: the ones that must be removed and might not be removed otherwise--the unverifiable articles that would probably be notable if verified--is extremely low. DGG ( talk ) 23:47, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Removing articles from the AfD is extremely simple, and happens constantly. Part of this is done by redirecting articles to another one, part of this is done by deleting articles, and part of this is done by solving the problems and/or identifying the correct ones. I have no ambitions to delete articles which have been corrected, even though I still believe (and am clearly not alone in that view) that having them deleted and starting again from scratch would have been easier and more productive.

And Dr. Blofeld, that I only give one example of an error doesn't mean that there aren't more. "He's found any errors which have existed and blown it into something way beyond the truth just because he didn't get his own way at the AFD. The one flaw of Akbobe? We had duplicates for Komsomloskye." It took my five seconds to find another error at Category:Populated places in Aktobe Province: Kyrykkuduk and Qyryqqudyq are the same place. And there are clearly more duplicates in that category to be found. Fram (talk) 07:08, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Duplicates are hardly a cause to delete the entire lot.♦ Dr. Blofeld 08:33, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Duplicates not, misspellings not, wrong provinces not, villages that don't exist not, villages that aren't villages not ... Anyway, that was not what you were arguing: you claimed that there was only one flaw in Aktobe, which was obviously incorrect. Fram (talk) 08:49, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

I estimate there are a few hundred duplicate articles in Wikipedia generally. We could solve that by removing the entire database and reconstructing it. DGG ( talk ) 16:17, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

I've deleted the remainder.♦ Dr. Blofeld 10:34, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Dario Piombino-Mascali

I'm not sure if this scholar passes WP:ACADEMIC. What do you think? Bearian (talk) 16:23, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

not quite yet; I commented there.` DGG ( talk ) 03:56, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

It is happening again...

...please see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Superbradyon (2nd nomination). Drmies (talk) 02:19, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

we will deal with it definitively this time. DGG ( talk ) 16:52, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Tamas Horvath, expanded

Dear DGG, Thanks for the valid request and saving the page from deletion. Sorry for the brief startup page on Tamas Horvath (mathematical informatics); it is my fault. Now, it is enriched with references and links. Note, the list of papers in the website are 'selected papers; it is a strongly incomplete list. These are the recent papers of high impact. Also note: in the computer science field conference papers are often more important than journal papers. Observe his activities as conference organizer, editor, committee member, too. Any of these guarantees notability because only a very small fraction of active scientists gets to be an editor or chair of a conference. We are talking about a high-profile scientist here. Many wiki entries features less notable people. Can you remove the tags?

Thanks in advance, and sorry for the brief initial page; my fault. Repep (talk) 18:39, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

there is considerable objection to making the Wikipedia page look like a CV, which is one of the reasons we normally list only a relatively small number of articles and other published items. Usually, I like to include all published books, & the 4 or 5 most highly cited per-reviewed articles. I think everyone here working on these sort of articles understands that some fields of EE and CS are different, so this can include conference proceedings, especially if republished in one of the IEEE series or the like (there are also some fields of humanities where these can be significant). But we would normally want to make the distinction between peer-reviewed conferences and others, just as between peer-reviewed journals and others, and as you know, it can sometimes be rather hard to determine if a conference talk is indeed peer reviewed (even setting aside the problem of the rather nominal standards of peer review for many conferences--as I know from my own experience as a reviewer & organizer). The importance of being a conference chair and the like depends on the conference. Normally, for someone highly notable, it is not necessary to include peripheral material, as there is quite enough without it, so there's a tendency to regard bios that rely on such for sufficient content to be impressive as possibly marginal. Additionally, in our criteria for notability via WP:PROF, the only such position that proves notability is that of being editor or editor in chief of a major journal, not being on the editorial board.

The article needs some considerable further formatting; we do not list internal pages of the person's website, and we do not repeat see-also references from the text, but link them there. WP articles do not make judgments--we therefore can not include a phrase like "a number" of papers without giving the number, (& we'd use the no. of peer-reviewed papers, not papers total); we also do not include unprovable adjectives of praise, such as "importance." I've made the adjustments also. I have just done all this. What you could help me with is to actually list the most cited papers in the section I provided. I use the citation counts from Scopus in this field, since WoS does not include proceedings. I'll do it later if you do not get to it. The way we in practice work here, is that people will judge the notability primarily by such counts. (and could you add the years of your degrees, please; we also like to have a birth place and birthdate --or at least birthyear, in order to have consistent metadata.) DGG ( talk ) 19:16, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

• Thanks for the edit. Note: I am not him but I can try to look citation numbers and birth and graduation dates up. Note, citation numbers are also heavily depending on the fields. Those guys in computer science and mathematics have usually relatively low numbers. In math, this number is low due to the lower number of publications as publication times are longer. In computer science/engineering, the low number comes from the fact that they publish a lot at high-profile conferences and those citations are not seen by SCI. Note, in CS, IEEE conferences are usually not considered strong, just like not in physics. No Nobel prize winning paper has ever been published in any of the IEEE journals and conferences. As citation numbers are concerned, it is very beneficial to check out citation numbers in physics, where the typical numbers are higher. If you check SCI for a few famous physicists during their lifetime, you will see that their citation numbers were low. Some of them is low even now, such as the Nobel prize winner Dennis Gabor, the inventor of hologram, etc, had some 800 citations a few years ago when I checked. And some mainstream guys of today, who did not discover anything but have been producing papers as a machinery, have numbers beyond 7000.

Thanks for the useful formatting comments; I will try to get the dates, etc. and improve the format. Final remark: The conference which he chaired earlier and where he is in the steering committee now, is a high-profile one. Repep (talk) 00:24, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

you will find that people involved in notability discussions here generally understand bibliometrics fairly well, and make comparisons in a reasonable sophisticated manner. DGG ( talk ) 02:31, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Timeshift9

Hi DGG. Would you sign your comment at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Timeshift9? Cunard (talk) 07:47, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

Norbert M. Samuelson

Hi, just to let you know that I nominated this BLP expansion at DYK and gave you co-credit. I'm surprised the AFD hasn't closed by now. Best, Yoninah (talk) 19:14, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

Question about a user name

Not sure if this violates Wikipedia policy or not, but I have concerns over the user name AFD hero, which at the very least, sounds like an agenda. I wanted your opinion before stirring the pot. Dennis Brown (talk) 19:33, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

He's been here since 2008. He's done nothing that merits censure. Going just by the name, there's no way of telling whether he's trying to delete or keep articles (it seem he mainly wants to keep them). DGG ( talk ) 21:06, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the input, nice to know I can always get a direct answer from you, particularly on things that are more fringe concerns than obvious issues. Dennis Brown (talk) 22:44, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Norbert M. Samuelson

Materialscientist (talk) 01:18, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia Ambassador sweatshirt

Hi! This is the last call for signing on for a Wikipedia Ambassador hooded sweatshirt (in case you missed the earlier message in one of the program newsletters about it). If you would like one, please email me with your name, mailing address, and (US) sweatshirt size. We have a limited number left, so it will be first-come, first-served. (If more than one size would work for you, note that as well.)

Cheers, Sage Ross - Online Facilitator, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 19:40, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

Sandusky (automobile company)

While I normally appreciate your CSD work, I have to bring up a few points with Sandusky (automobile company), specifically the edit summary you used.

• "probably notable" - notability != significance. You know this. If you meant "probably significant", that's not the same as "actually significant". If you meant "probably notable" you should have some, y'know, sources, which it might be helpful to provide to Fluffernutter.
• "First look for sources, & if not found, only then nominate for deletion" - Fluffernutter is an experienced contributor - she doesn't necessarily need stuff like this thrown at her.
• "See WP:BEFORE" - again, she doesn't need this thrown at her, but more importantly, it's optional. If you're trying to give advice, fair enough; if you're using it as part of your rationale, you should probably take a look at the guideline/policy pages on the subject.

As said, I appreciate the good work you do. But if you were basing it on "I think", notability is not the test. If you were basing it on "I have found some evidence that it is", you should have provided the sources. A failure to follow optional due dilligence guidelines does not exempt somebody seeking for others to follow them from doing so himself Ironholds (talk) 00:58, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

One this was proposed as a speedy deletion. Speedy is for unquestionably necessary deletions. Any doubt anyone (except of course the contributor) may have about the appropriateness of a speedy deletion is cause to remove the speedy, though it should be explained, if only to guide further action. (But the removal is valid even if not explained properly or at all). I remove speedy tags based on thinking, guessing, or whatever. What I do not do on the basis of mere guessing, is delete (or undelete, or any other admin action). Removing a tag is not an admin action: anyone may do it. I would not have closed "keep" at an AfD on a reason such as I gave here. Of my declined speedies, probably one-third end up deleted. That's perfectly reasonable--speedy is not the only deletion process. DGG ( talk ) 02:52, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

Two any of the pioneer automobile manufacturers are possibly notable, and that's enough reason to look further. Not necessarily to keep, but certainly to look further. If it needs looking further, it's not a speedy.

Three WP:BEFORE is just a restatement and amplification of WP:Deletion Policy, which says unambiguously that deletion is the last resort. It's a suggestion of things to try, not all of which will be appropriate in every case.

Four It is relatively difficult to find wordings to separate advice from requirement in the space of an edit summary. I shall try to reword this one a little, since it's a message I frequently use. You're correct that I probably could be clearer.

Five I explain what I'm doing, even to experienced contributors. Wikipedia:Don't template the regulars is an essay that, by and large, I disagree with. I treat all editors equally, as I want to be treated. (And the edit summary is furthermore intended as information for whoever might look.) If I think someone has placed a tag in a way that is demonstrably very wrong, I leave them a personal message, adapted to the person. This was not that sort of a blunder, & there was no need for instruction or remonstrance. DGG ( talk ) 02:52, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

DGG, the problem I see here now is that you removed the speedy tag but left the article in a state where it still very clearly doesn't assert any importance. I mean, I find A7 extremely vague, and very rarely dare use it for that reason. And it's clear even to me that this article doesn't assert any importance. If there is importance to be asserted, which there well may be, was the correct action on your part not to assert it, rather than remove a valid tag and leave the article in a state where, unless someone is inside your head to see what importance you know of, it has no validity as an article according to our inclusion guidelines? I mean, a NPPer could come across it tomorrow, see that it asserts no importance, and tag it again. Would you then re-remove the tag, again asserting that it's "probably" important? How long would the article need to stay in a doesn't-meet-inclusion-criteria state before you would allow it to be deleted? A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 15:55, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

A Deleting a speedy is optional, except for things like copyvio and BLP violation. . ANYONE can stop the process. Speedy and Prod are processes deliberately designed so that any one person can object. Otherwise, they're too dangerous. That's why I don't do single handed deletions unless its something really harmful and completely obvious (or, I must admit, if I get really impatient.)

B In any case, I consider any historic company at the development of an industry notable. I consider saying so and having evidence for it not just an assertion of notability , but a proof of it.

C If a NPPatroller or anyone replaced or retagged any removed speedy for the same reason, I'd remove that tag and warn them, because it isn't permitted, according to WP:CSD. If an admin were to deliberately do it, it's close to wheel-warning. The recourse is AfD .

D One of the good things here is how looking at any one article can lead to a long bypass. I've spent some amusing hours finding the various sources for old automobile advertisements & resolving some inconsistencies. I haven't finished, but a good magazine chose one of their cars to be in the 50 they listed in 1904. I have been working on the article. I just didn't do it immediately, DGG ( talk ) 02:27, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

• "In any case, I consider any historic company at the development of an industry notable. I consider saying so and having evidence for it not just an assertion of notability , but a proof of it." - three points:

1. What is this evidence of notability in the article as it was when tagged?
2. What allows what you "consider" to constitute notability, without reference to any policy or guideline, to be the rule?
3. Can you explain how a company which existed for two years, the article on which was referenced to a single source of dubious reliability, can be considered to have evidence of notability with relation to our actual guidelines? Ironholds (talk) 13:34, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

Don't you get it? You don't need any reason to remove a CSD or PROD nomination. Any editor's own idiosyncratic notions are enough. If you think the topic is not notable, there is a way to test that where each editor's view is counted—it's called AfD. It so happens that DGG's views here are probably within the mainstream, but who cares? If you don't like the article, use the process and make the editors who feel it should be kept justify their views—something they are not obliged to do when removing PROD or CSD templates . ^Bongo_matic 15:06, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

I can't speak for Ironholds (and I'm quite sure I don't in this case, because he knows what he's doing far more than I do), but I guess I (as someone who is not a regular NPPer or CSD tagger - I kind of stumbled onto this article in the course of my normal non-deletion-related editing) figured that because CSD had strict criteria, an article that met the criteria persistently (as opposed to while under construction, etc) would be deleted. I don't think I was aware that CSD tags function like PRODs and can be removed for any reason or no reason. So, to make sure that I understand this now, someone could equally well remove a CSD tag on a gibberish article, or any other CSD-criterion-meeting article, even if they made no improvements, and that article would then have to go through AfD to be deleted? That's how the process works? A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 17:03, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

All Wikipedia actions are only valid if they are performed in good faith. A removal of a CSD tag to be disruptive could be reverted, but sometimes even these are taken to AfD for the sake of getting a definitive judgment, as the community judgment is always stronger than that of any individual administrator, and serves better to prevent further disruption. However, if the tag was regard to unsourced negative BLP or libel or vandalism or undoubted copyvio, it will almost certainly be directly reverted, but such material is deleted immediately even if not tagged. I've seen AfD tags as nonsense incorrectly placed on articles, that are not nonsense, but if it were true gibberish and there were no prior version, it might well simply be deleted also. I am not aware that anyone in good faith has ever truly removed a CSD tag placed for undoubted nonsense. (Some tagging for hoaxes has been disputed from time to time.) A person doing disruptive tagging or de-tagging for deletion processes (or anything else) on a continuing basis would probably find their actions being discussed at WP:AN/I, and if continued after a warning would probably lead to a block. Several such instances of possibly disruptive nature have been discussed there in recent months, and resolved in various ways, but there has often been no clear consensus on what is disruptive, with mass inappropriate tagging or de-tagging more likely to be considered a problem.

CSD has strict criteria, yes, but any criterion needs judgement and interpretation, and the CSD criteria being strict means that they are interpreted narrowly.

If you consider my detagging disruptive, discuss it there, but I think the evidence that I was able to improve the article, as people there know that I rather frequently do, will demonstrate my good faith. If you want to change the rules, discuss it at WT:CSD, but I think my improvement, and the frequent improvements many editors have been able to make on similarly weak articles, will show why it and similar articles should not be deleted, and why any good faith objection is sufficient. If you question just this article, use AfD. AfD is unpredictable, but I estimate there's only a 30% chance it will be deleted there even if not further improved. Or perhaps you will think it now strong enough. DGG ( talk ) 18:56, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

DGG, I don't intend to say that your detagging was disruptive in the slightest; I'm sorry if it comes across that way. I'm just trying to understand why the way I thought the process worked is not actually the way the process works. Yeah, it seems kind of counterintuitive to me, but if that's the way things work, that's the way things work. I'm still a little skeptical that the company will turn out to pass notability requirements, but I'm perfectly willing to wait and see what you turn up in your expansion before I make that call. My main issue was with the removal of the tag with no concurrent work on the article, which objection is now moot, since you are working on it. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 19:49, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

i'm seeing an increased use of the speedy, when references "are not good enough". while the intent may not be to circumvent consensus AfD process, this is the effect. badgering users who take down speedy's is bitey. there seems to be a lot of restatement of positions, and motivation through deletion, rather than working with good faith editors. we have a list here of hundreds of defunct auto manufacturers, not much better than this one: will we now speedy or mass delete them all? Slowking4 (talk) 18:12, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I object to my questions here being characterized as "badgering" or "bitey," Slowking. DGG took an action that I didn't understand, I asked him to explain it, his explanation raised another question in my mind, and I asked that. Is it now considered rude to try to ask for explanation when something happens that I don't understand? I've made no attacks on anyone, I've not claimed that DGG's actions were unconstructive, and I've not implied that anyone was operating in bad faith. I'd appreciate it if you'd do the same. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 19:49, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

I certainly do not regard any of the questions asked me as improper, and I appreciate Fluffernutter's comments. I like having an opportunity to explain how I see things, and if people doesn't agree, it's good to try to narrow down the area of disagreement. DGG ( talk ) 19:56, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

i apologize if my comments were taken as bitey, i'm less interested in the present case than the trend: article improvement via speedy. Slowking4 (talk) 21:24, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

A7 Speedies for referencing problems can & should be brought to Deletion Review, but there is not all that much point in doing so unless there is some chance of making an article. The only times a speedy for referencing problems might be valid is negative BLP and re-creation of an afd'd article if referencing problems were the reason for deletion at AfD. Mass AfD nominations are strongly deprecated. The way to go is to test the waters with one or two of the weakest articles. But the real thing that needs doing is finding good sources for this material, There must be books, and the advertisement and articles in magazines of the period are increasingly available at Hathi Trust and Google Books. For everything in the US before 1920, these PD sources are really a wonderful way of increasing both the breadth and depth of content here. If people spent as much time on improvement they spend on deletion, we'd get somewhere. For one thing, we'd be able to concentrate of quickly getting rid of the real junk.We must have a few thousand articles , some in here quite a while, that could qualify for speedy. The other thing that needs doing is more people monitoring speedy and prod--it is not necessary to be an admin to remove a tag, and, in fact, it's excellent preparation for adminship. DGG ( talk ) 19:41, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

Display of age in bios

Dear DGG, A friend told me that you're a WP expert who can clarify even question from dummies. Here's a dummy puzzlement. In the bio box for living people, they always display birth date and age. With BD any 3rd grader and above can calculate the age. Why the fuss which needs to be updated every year. Worse yet, in some cultures they calculate age differently. Some follow math'l rule, i.e., 21.5 or more becomes 22. Some, I was told, have no zero age, thus becomes 2 on their 1st BD. Pls enlighten. You can reply on this page so others can also benefit. --Daikang59 (talk) 21:50, 19 May 2011 (UTC) Daikang59

Generally, the {{Birth date and age}} template is used, so no manual updating is required. ^Bongo_matic 22:32, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

I know it's really not your typical academic journal AfD

But could you poke your head in at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Maledicta? --Orange Mike | Talk 14:32, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/dispute resolution

Had you noticed this has reopened? I only did today. I stopped looking in after discussion faded away. Now I've put it on my watchlist. I've just checked and find the preceding one was opened just over two years ago and has still not been closed and archived. Peter jackson (talk) 14:51, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

GLAMcamp

Glad to meet you today at GLAMcamp! I look forward to receiving the material you mentioned.Trouver (talk) 18:03, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

Dominique Strauss-Kahn AfD

"I'm reluctant to mention this AfD to my non-Wikipedian friends, as I don't want them to make fun of me for engaging a project where people argue for deleting articles like this."

Well said. In this situation and in one or two others I am seeing right now, I am seeing the BLP policy or policies such as "not news" being used to try to delete articles that common sense would dictate people desperately want to read and there are myriad reliable sources for. I've always been pretty deletionist, but I feel like the project's tendency to delete content merely because it is merely incomplete or not quite perfect yet is making us lose our grasp on not just our roots, but on reality. I even find myself doing it. It's yet another sneaking feeling that I've had which suggests that we need a maintenance phase not just in mainspace content, but in trimming, condensing, and applying common sense to the huge number of policies and guidelines which allow people to rules lawyer their way into whatever result they desire. Steven Walling 06:43, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

one of the exceptions to my general inclusionism is that I strongly support the principle of NOT TABLOID--most of the times when I have said delete and the decision went otherwise have been such cases. But this instance shows an inability to know what is important in the world, and , ironically, I ascribe such ignorance to the pervasive effect of tabloid journalism, in inducing people to believe that trivialities are important, so they then misjudge anything scandalous but important, as trivial. DGG ( talk ) 07:10, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

It's not a bad point. If the infidelity of Schwarzenegger and the arrest of the IMF head receive the same media play, how are we best to decide which is more notable?, et cetera. Steven Walling 07:14, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Your comment

Hi DGG, would you mind revising your comment based on this? Thanks and regards, Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 04:45, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

done; my apologies. DGG ( talk ) 05:09, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks and no worries, we all make mistakes! Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 07:20, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Deletion of Tamas Horvath (information science)

Hi DGG, you deleted the page however I do not see consensus. Only the subject of the page (Tamas Horvath) but neither the creator or the subsequent authors of the page nominated deletion. Can a Subject request deletion of a page about himself written by others? I thought the subject could only request improvements if the info is incorrect. Can you point out a relevant rule? I guess, wiki is like a newspaper article. The subject cannot stop or delete it only if it contains false information. However, the subject here had no such argument just that he does not want a wiki page about him. Can you clarify? Thanks, Repep (talk) 19:25, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

I seem to have interpreted your comment somewhere as willingness to have it deleted--I gather from what you said above this was incorrect. If you insist on retaining it, I will have to reinstate it and I shall then send it for an AfD discussions.

This sort of situation occurs fairly often-  We have a policy against withdrawing articles at the request of the subject unless there are special considerations: if we did, some people especially in fields involving some degree of controversy or public attention would insist on withdrawing  any article which showed them in a light other than the one they wished to be shown--the effect of this would be to let the subject censor their article.  We get many   requests with such motivations, and of course we turn them down. 

One of the special cases is with people of really borderline notability who request removal as they think them non-notable.   This can be done quietly by various means if unchallenged, but if challenged, it does requires a public discussion--unless the article can be shown to actually be harmful. In that discussion the views of the subject can optionally be considered, but do not have to be.  

I think the subject rather clearly fall into the class of unclear "notability" ("notability" as we use it is a term of art not necessarily correlated to actual importance). It's sufficiently unclear that I could make a plausible argument at such a discussion either for keeping the article, or deleting it, I am not sure what I would say in this case: In any event, what would happen depends on what other people say, and  although I cannot predict the results, I think it highly likely that if I were to argue against this article, the article would be deleted, & if I argued for keeping, it's 50-50.   In general, our accepted level according to WP:PROF usually in practice corresponds to full professor at a major research university, and I doubt he'd be considered at that level. My own personal view is that Wikipedia should expand the definition of academic notability to a considerably broader scope, but as we have not done so and do not seem likely to do so, it is unfair and unreasonable to single out a few individuals because either they or their friends want to make a case for them.

I understand the person is your friend , though in a different subject. I urge you to seriously consider whether you really wish to have the article reinstated, as it will in that case be followed by a discussion which is likely to be embarrassing to all concerned. If that is what you want, I shall have to do it. I would really appreciate it if you would activate your email from your user preferences page. DGG ( talk ) 19:47, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

OK, thanks, I see and understand; it is fine as it is. The situation is that he is indeed a friend and, surprisingly, he got extremely agitated, when he saw the page. He became wild and started to act as a wiki-vandal, as it was noted. My note was dubious because, on one hand, I wanted to please him, on the other hand, I did not want to violate any wiki rule or practice. But your explanation makes it clear that this is a kind of common practice with living persons, thus everything looks fine. Note: he is notable; his permanent position at Fraunhofer corresponds to a young full prof level at a good university. He could have done his habilitation (German acadmic title) already 10 year ago but he is lazy to do such things. But now he is forced to do it and will have it this year. Thanks, Repep (talk) 20:10, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

New resolution proposal

Hi. Just wanted to let you know that a new proposal has been made in a thread you contributed to at AN/I concerning the possibility of prohibiting a user from initiating actions at AN, AN/I, or WQA. Thanks,  – OhioStandard (talk) 06:46, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

J.C. Maçek III

Hi DGG! You recently declined my speedy deletion regarding J.C. Maçek III and replaced it with a prod based on the content of the article. When I first reviewed the article, I thought that as well. However, the website that the article claims the subject is the "editor-in chief and head writer of" is, in fact, the subject's own website with no other contributers. Basically, the subject has his own website, posts his own reviewes, and there are no third-party sources supporting any importance. It seems to me that there is no credible claim of importance or significance, and hence a speedy deletion under A7. Singularity42 (talk) 02:30, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

a claim to importance does not have to be supported to pass A7. Nor does it have to be expressed in so many words. And in doubt, we do not speedy. I considered the article a claim that the individual was running a significant film review site. The site however did not seem very significant, and at first it seemed that the article was added by someone using it to support spamming, and I was about to delete it accordingly, revert the spam, and block the editor. But then I noticed that in this particular case, the site had been used as a reference by several different editors in a number of articles, and the person who added the article was not a spam-only account, I therefore have some doubts, and I wish to consult. So I changed the speedy to prod, warned instead of blocked the editor, held off on reverting the apparent spam, and have asked about it at the Reliable sources Noticeboard. Unless the site can be shown important, which I doubt very much, the article will surely get deleted one way or another. In the meantime the editor who introduced it has complained elsewhere about the hostile actions against him. He is not necessarily a SPA, and may quite possibly be a good faith editor who does think the man important for running the site. As you see, whether one takes or does not take action, there are complaints. It has happened to me before, as is happening now, that there are simultaneously complaints against what I did in a particular case from both directions. DGG ( talk ) 15:59, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. To be clear, I didn't intend my above comments to be a complaint. I do a lot of new page patrolling, and I'm usually on the mark with speedy deletion tagging - so when it is denied I sometimes like to ask why so I know what to look out for and/or avoid doing in the future - which the above reply does. Thanks again. Singularity42 (talk) 19:21, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Please take the Wikipedia Ambassador Program survey

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Amy Roth (Research Analyst, Public Policy Initiative) (talk) 20:37, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Relieved and a note of appreciation

I was a bit troubled by the comments you made on the Rfarb page, but I am relieved by your striking (I was not missing something significant when I reviewed the matter after all!) I do think it was nice of you to offer your apologies with it. Ncmvocalist (talk) 04:19, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Notability

Any ideas DGG if Marjan Bojadziev is notable? I'm convinced he easily meets requirements but as you can see, others diagree.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:25, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

yes he is, as both you and I have now argued at the AfD DGG ( talk ) 03:28, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Cuisine of Montevideo was nominated for deletion at the same time.♦ Dr. Blofeld 10:39, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

AfD invitation

Hi DGG--would you mind having a look at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Luis González-Mestres? It's a delicate situation, I think, and the deletion discussion could do with a couple more opinions. Thanks, Drmies (talk) 04:04, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

A notable book?

If you have time, could you check your usual sources for The Tower (crime novel)? Worldcat shows 67 holdings in Australia (author is Australian), 1 in US, 0 in UK. Google News as usual shows almost nothing; apparently, though, the book was condensed and serialized in the Sydney Morning Herald. Regular Google shows a smattering of reviews, although they all seem to be on unreliable sites (i.e., just random customer reviews). I can no longer access Amazon at work, so I can't check reviews there. I appreciate the help if you have time. Qwyrxian (talk) 04:12, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

I wonder what normal holdings are for Australian fiction in WorldCat--I'm not sure how to interpret the numbers. Book Review Digest & Book Review Index show no reviews, and only one utterly trivial nonprofessional one for The Simple Death (crime novel); his historical works do have reviews. WorldCat however shows it was included in a Readers Digest Australia compilation [7], which might I think be some possible evidence for notability along with the Herald republication, but I need to check other authors they include, & I don't think that's necessarily enough as I do not know their standards. Amazon shows only one customer review, which is worthless. DGG ( talk ) 04:45, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

For comparison, I tried looking up Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, obviously a notable book and one we can assume will be held by a very large number of libraries in any English speaking country. There's a few different editions, but of the two main ones I see, there are 59 for one version and 147 for another version. Looking up something a little more academic, The Color Purple has about 105 holdings in Australia. So, at 67, it seems like this may indicate some level of notability in Australia; however, I actually don't know how libraries go about choosing and acquiring books; for example, can an author/publisher donate books to libraries to increase exposure (would they?)? The Reader's Digest Australia is an interesting point, but also still borderline. Perhaps as a borderline case it's better to err on the side of keeping, although keeping an article with no citeable indication of notability does always bother me. Qwyrxian (talk) 05:20, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

These may not be the best comparisons. They are internationally famous books. What we need for comparison is novels by Australian writers, who are not famous, but notable in Australia with significant reviews there, and I would need to do some checking to select good examples. Public libraries in general buy books on the basis of reviews, known interest in previous books by the author, local authors, patron requests, and , sometimes in some genres, everything likely to be read by fans of these genres who will read everything in sight. The three principal genres this way in US libraries are mysteries, SF, and romance. As there have been no reviews yet, and the two books are his first novels (there are two previous historical books with modest reviews enough to establish him as a mildly notable author, but they aren't relevant here) I assume the libraries that have bought it have bought it on the genre consideration. We also need to take account the time from publication: as the book is '10, there is time for reviews by now. His other book is '11; the article for the first books was added soon after the publication of the second, which has one review. "Duffy is indisputably a writer to watch. He will soon be ranked alongside the likes of international behemoths Michael Connelly, George Pelecanos and Don Winslow. There is no higher praise.' Winsor Dobbin, Sun-Herald"-- I do NOT consider this as much of a positive review,as it might appear; reading carefully, it amounts to "not yet notable". The editor has worked on almost nothing else. The two indexes I used are not all that comprehensive for Australian fiction, but they do cover some of the possible sources.

I consider the default to be merge. There is nothing in the articles but plot summary--and, what is worse, plot summary of the teaser kind, characteristic exactly of the typical press release. I intend to merge them. If they become popular/much reviewed, or if he does become famous, they can be unmerged. I want to add that I myself think the GNG as applied to fiction is very weak indeed--two reviews in two newspapers is a very minimal requirement. It has led to is our practice of including individual works of fiction not on the grounds of anything resemble real-world importance, but on the basis of "I'm a fan" which is an open invitation to promotionalism, while completely ignoring most of what is actually important in the field. I personally consider avoiding promotionalism the critical justification for notability standards in general. A encyclopedia can talk about the relatively unimportant and be an encyclopedia , but once it starts including advertising, it becomes unreliable. DGG ( talk ) 15:01, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Very well put. The author himself may be notable (not sure yet) based on his other work on Australian TV and as an Australian journalist, but I am happy with merging the books. I'd be happy to go through the formal Requested Merge process if you like, or you can do it, or one of us can just do the merge without discussing. I'm personally hesitant to do the latter. I've always felt odd that WP:BEFORE allows an editor to effectively blank a page without a deletion discussion or even the input of an uninvolved admin (like CSD and PROD), especially in a case like this where the merge isn't actually going to bring over most of the text in the book article. It feels awkward to me, like a way of bypassing at least the veneer of consensus. I mean, I know it's a legitimate move, but it just feels "off" to me. Qwyrxian (talk) 01:51, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

I too am concerned about the quirk in our procedures that allows destructive editing without any attempt at looking for consensus or asking for an opinion. the rationale for that, is that any edit can revert it, which is certainly true, but nonetheless can easily lead to conflict as disruption. The key rule is this respect is WP:BRD, which is treated as policy, though it is only an essay. I think it wrong except when used for something trivial or obvious. I do not do it. I think it should at the least be deprecated. Better, it should be treated like WP:IAR: it's available when really needed, but anyone who uses it is answerable if what they did lacks consensus. The proper rule for anything non-trivial should be PCE, propose, get explicit or at least implicit consensus, then edit. We sometimes say as a caution, BE BOLD, NOT RECKLESS—but anything Bold a person dislikes, they are likely to consider reckless. When I came here are saw we actually promoted BRD, I realized that this is a place which encouraged uncooperative behavior.

More specifically, having asked advice, since we both feel the same way, there's no real reason to ask further. If you haven't done it by tomorrow, I shall. I generally ignore Requested Merges, as anything controversial ends up at AfD anyway, and I cannot watch everything. DGG ( talk ) 03:06, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

I did the redirects; since both articles were just plot summaries, and the only cites were links to the publisher (which didn't even clarify publication dates) I didn't actually merge anything. In the process of cleaning up, though, I did find a good review of one of his non-fiction books; if there's more out there, that book may actually even qualify for its own article. I do think the author/journalist himself appears notable enough to not worry about. Qwyrxian (talk) 00:41, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

A quick note

In the Clifford Kubiak ANI thread you had mentioned you were concerned with protecting an article you had written yourself. Once you do have the new article up, feel free to drop me a note and I will add the protection for you if you'd like. Cheers, --Jezebel'sPonyo^{bons mots} 13:38, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Rewrite for Games, Learning, Society

Hi DGG -- I was wondering what steps I could take to restoring the page, Games Learning Society that was marked for speedy deletion. In the talk page I offered 3rd party references (The AV club, The journal of media literacy, and the Isthmus). I also included links to academics of note (that have existing, and valid, wikipedia pages). Were these references insufficient to mark the Games Learning Society as notable? If so, could you please give me some guidance as to what other references would be notable? Thank you very much for your help! --Cheetahxing (talk) 23:30, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

I am very eager to increase both our coverage of academic faculty in general, and of academic and other serious studies of games in particular, but I can only tell you what I think the community here will accept--I do not make the decisions. In general essentially all institutes that appear to be parts or closely affiliated with academic departments have not been considered separately notable. Our standard in general is that references providing substantial coverage from 3rd party independent published reliable sources, print or online, but not blogs or press releases, or material derived from press releases have been written about the institute as such--not about the individual researchers, but the institute. With respect to such institutes, this tends to be interpreted very narrowly; I would personally interpret it less narrowly, but I doubt that I would get consensus for that. You have the right of course to a community discussion, and in any specific case the result of a community discussion is unpredictable--however in my judgment based on long experience here on such topics, I see very little possibility that the community will accept this one, & I therefore do not propose to defend it. I have explained why in my comment on User talk:VideoGameScholar, to which I refer you. Briefly, this institute is composed of 4 faculty in the Curriculum & Instruction department at UW-Madison, two associate professors and 2 asistant professors. Famous people giving talks at the institute do not make it notable, nor does being sponsored by Microsoft, nor sponsoring talks at local student groups. All this is routine for academic institutes, & not notability. Better to work on articles for individual scholars, for which there are clear standards. Even better, add a very few carefully selected references to works of these people published in peer-reviewed journals, or books by respected academic publishers, to the articles about the subjects they study--this is what will be of the most benefit to everybody. Please don't add conference papers unless they are unquestionably recognized major conferences. Do not include unpublished work.

I must also point out this is not why I deleted the article--nobody here has authority to delete without opportunity for discussion in such cases. I deleted it , as is required of me, because it was a copy of the institute's web page. This is never acceptable. As for copyright, you must have authority & be willing to explicitly license the rights to the material according to our licensing, using the CC-BY-SA and the GNU licenses, as explained in WP:COPYRIGHT and WP:Donating copyrighted materials ; be aware that these licenses give everyone in the world an irrevocable license to reuse and alter the material, even for commercial purposes. I do not advise it, for it would need to be rewritten in any event to be less promotional, as I also explained there.

I can further say that the work of the people at the institute is in my opinion very important, and also of great personal interest to me, but Wikipedia does not operate based on my own personal interests or values. DGG ( talk ) 00:30, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

List of most popular missing articles

Can you comment here. I've proposed a list of say 1000 of the most popular searched for articles in the search engine but which are without articles.Tibetan Prayer ^᧾ 16:27, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jeremy Taylor (writer)

Hey there. I've run into your contributions more than a few times in the AfD circuit and have probably been in disagreement with you at least as often as I've been in agreement on what constitutes notability, but I do know you to be very sincere in your efforts to simply improve the project. Anyway. I know you to be one who makes a very good-faith effort to find sourcing for articles under AfD review. I also know you to be a librarian who recently compelled a rapid shift towards inclusion by finding copious offline sourcing in an AfD that was having a hard time finding consensus. I'm curious to see what you think of the above-referenced AfD. If you have the time, please take a look at it. Somewhere between tantalizing GNews results behind paywalls, the opinions of well-respected editors in the AfD, and wonderfully sincere efforts by the article's author, I suspect there's notability-conferring sourcing to be found. Any advice or assistance that you can offer would be greatly appreciated -- even if it's "lay off, he's not notable." Best regards. ɠǀɳ̩ςεΝɡbomb 02:59, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

I saw this earlier, & I'm checking for book reviews; otherwise, it'll likely be one of those cases where there might well be sources for notability , but they are not in any practical way accessible to us because of regional bias. It's not just getting access to print: Some regions and languages have neither print nor online adequate periodical or newspaper indexes, or even book union catalogs. And in the US there are inadequate collections for some areas in even the major libraries. And some aspects of life of great human cultural and economic significance do not publish anything that resembles what we think of as reliable sources; some still rely entirely upon oral or manuscript traditions. The only approach to this that is productive for us in the short run is to relax our standards for what we do accept, in consideration of what can be expected to be found. In the long one, we can hope that the spreat of the multilingual Wikipedia projects will encourage the development of the necessary resources. I have sometime criticized some WMDF initiatives, but their efforts to increase participation for the global south, and for development in these regions of the necessary basic information resources, do information from the things and people important to them can get the recognition they deserve in the general world community. DGG ( talk ) 12:50, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply and the willingness to look for reviews -- that would obviously help a bit. I'm going to hold off on putting in my own vote until I hear either way from you. I suspect my vote's going to be something like a sympathy !keep even if you can't find anything, because I'm relatively confident that sourcing or something like sourcing's equivalent likely exists...but I hardly expect my "gut" feeling to sway what is currently trending towards a deletion outcome. We'll see. Either way, thanks for looking into this; truly appreciate it. ɠǀɳ̩ςεΝɡbomb 14:11, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Lois Ruby

Hi David. Looks as if some refs you added were deleted by a possible vandal but I'm unable to unravel it. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 12:14, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

thanks, checking,. DGG ( talk ) 12:50, 31 May 2011 (UTC)