User talk:Motmit

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Hi Motmit! welcome to Wikipedia!

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Rayment refs

Well done making the ref more specific, but there was no need for the uncivil edit summary. I have seen numerous similar edit summaries by you for similar ref improvements, and they are not WP:CIVIL. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 21:17, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

Sorry sweetheart - but some of yours are pretty tetchy too! :) Motmit (talk) 21:27, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

Most of those rayment refs were added ages ago, by a variety of editors, before more specific templates were available. It is of course better to improve them, which also I regularly do, but calling them "stupid" or "useless" as you routinely do is quite unnecessary. I do not describe such improvements of old references in uncivil terms. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs)

With respect, I don't think you quite realised what was happening here.

The reference that is appearing, as of the time of writing, on several House of Commons constituency articles through the {{Rayment}} template is as follows [1]. This returns a page that is titled "The Peerages of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom" and it contains an index of all the UK etc peerages. It does not contain any information at all that is relevant to House of Commons constituencies; nor does it provide easy access to such information. It is no more than stating the facts to say that a table of peerages provided as a reference for a constituency is useless and that it is being replaced by a more useful or more sensible one. It is extremely annoying when trying to create lots of decent articles on MP's to be hampered by an unhelpful look-up and to be forced to spend time putting things right. It is not really unduly unreasonable to highlight the situation as being stupid or a silly nonsense. Now for the record, here is the full list of the "numerous similar edit summaries" which are referred to disparagingly above. These began on August 17.

[More sensible link to LR]

[more useful link]

[more useful ref]

[Better ref link]

[More helpful ref link]

[More intelligent link]

[More intelligent link]

[proper reference]

[sensible link]

[sensible link]

[replace useless]

[more useful ref]

[sensible ref]

[More useful LR link]

[Replace silly ref]

[sensible ref]

[replace nonsense]

[sensible ref]

[replace uselessness]

[Replace useless ref yet again]

[grumble grumble grumble]

[moan moan moan]

[Dambig and change the stupid Rayment ref]

Perhaps they suggest an increasing level of irritation, light hearted sometimes, but hardly unreasonable given the situation. They were half intended to alert to a situation and it is interesting that it took the until last one to provoke a response, albeit unsympathetic. (NB Dambig is my silly abbreviation for disambiguate which relates to another change made at the same time)

Now it is actually unfair to blame any of those good souls who took the trouble to add the template to the constituency articles in the first place, because when they added the template, it linked to a completely different page as here [2]. This is the high level Leigh Rayment menu which includes the "House of Commons" and which was a satisfactory reference though not as specific as it could have been.

What has happened is that sombody came along and decided to change the template. It really is not a good idea to tinker with a template without thinking through the consequences properly, but this is precisely what happened on 11 August 2010. I am sure this was done in good faith and with the best intentions, but it has had the unfortunate effect of providing a large number of articles with an inappropriate reference. It has caused great annoyance and slowed down the work of one editor at least. And it could have resulted in an editor posting critical comments to those who had innocently added the template.

Now that it has come to light, one can only hope that the person responsible will finish the job by putting right as quickly as possible not just the constituency articles but also numerous other articles that have become incorrectly referenced as a result. I know that this could be done by checking the "What links here" on the Rayment template page - but a smart user may find a simpler way. And if you are wondering who was responsible for changing the template, creating this confusion and raising my blood pressure - well I am sorry to have to point out [3] Regards Motmit (talk) 09:20, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

If someone can tell me what our medium term objective is here and how to use the new Rayment template (I know I could search), I'll back fix the constituencies pointing at the "The Peerages of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom" page. Thanks. Crooked cottage (talk) 10:47, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

CC - It is extremely generous of you to offer to help clear up the unsatisfactory situation has arisen since BrownHairedGirl changed the Rayment template without full regard to the consequences. Particularly so as you yourself have been treated to unfriendly edit summaries from BrownHairedGirl such as "rm pointless extra word which restricts scope of the section" which was repeated successively over twenty times directly in reponse to your own edits as a relatively new editor. You will appreciate that I was particularly narked when BrownHairedGirl added insult to injury by making accusations of incivility about my edit summaries in a characteristic back handed compliment. These were simple statements of fact rather than personally directed opinions. I was not after all aware that BrownHairedGirl had changed the template.

Anyway it does not yet seem that that editor responsible has made any effort to sort out the situation, so your help would be most welcome. It would be useful if all the constituency articles linked to the relevant Rayment page as Rayment provides vital dates for MPs. The Rayment website divides constituencies into pages alphabetically which are then subdivided further. The top level House of Commons table is [4] which lists the sub pages. So for the first page of constituencies beginning with B we use the template parameterised as {{rayment-hc|b|1}} You change the letter or number as necessary, and you will see examples in my "condemned" edit summaries above. If there is only one page for a letter as for F I and J then you drop the number and the preceding | mark. As well as those that incorrectly link to the peerage, there are a few constituencies that do not have a link to rayment at all and it would be useful to add those. Quite a number only have the top level House of Commons page - I can live with that but it would be a good little tidy up job if anyone wants to do it.

And for the record, these examples from just the last couple of days are what in my opinion is not acceptable in a edit summary

Obscenity

Which part of "get lost" do you not understand??????)

Regards and best wishes - Motmit (talk) 22:27, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

I've formed the same opinion of what needs to be done here having looked at a few dozen articles over the last couple of days, but it is good to know we concur. I'll be going through all the articles over the next few months, and adding this information.

I've no wish to upset anyone, as it's not the way I work. In particular BrownHairedGirl has been very helpful to me with an article I'm in the process of writing. I'm looking forward to working with all the experienced editors in the UK elections area. Crooked cottage (talk) 23:39, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Thank you BrownHairedGirl for correcting the constituencies, and well done for going the extra mile - or two - or three .....Motmit (talk) 12:29, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

You're welcome. We're getting there. Crooked cottage (talk) 13:02, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

And to you for walking an extra crooked mile to earn a crooked sixpence.:) Motmit (talk) 19:33, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

Motmit, it's all part of the process of improvement. Sometimes one change requires others, but eventually we get there.

I don't see how all your trawling for diffs assisted that process; when you had spotted that a change of mine has an unintended side-effect we could have discussed how to fix it, but since you seemed to prefer being annoyed to finding a solution, I left you to it.

I was a little bemused by your note on my talk about being "a little bit more careful in future", since I encounter several times a week articles where you have inferred facts from sources which don't state them, and got them wrong. The latest was one I encountered today: Sir Edmund Buckley, 1st Baronet, which you created and left with the wrong dates for his parliamentary career, the wrong link to the Hansard site, and missing a bundle of categories.

The solution, of course, is to WP:SOFIXIT. Trawling through your contribs for unrelated diffs wouldn't have improved anything for readers. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:22, 15 January 2011 (UTC)

BrownHairedGirl wrote -

"I don't see how all your trawling for diffs assisted that process; when you had spotted that a change of mine has an unintended side-effect we could have discussed how to fix it, but since you seemed to prefer being annoyed to finding a solution, I left you to it."

Answers from motmit

Wikipedia is about Verifiability - you "inferred facts" and made a sweeping statement and an unsubstantiated generalisation about my behaviour. I responded by listing the diffs. It was no big deal for me to check back through my edits and I am sorry for you if you dont like it that the evidence shows your criticism was unjustified..

I had no idea that you had caused the problem before you came onto my talk page to deliver gratuitous criticism. When you saw that my edit summary highlighted a problem, instead of investigating and attacking the problem, you chose to attack the person. As they say "Don't shoot the messenger!" When I spotted what had caused the problem I stopped dealing with Rayment refs, told you about it and counted on your undeniable conscientiousness to fix it. However you did not acknowledge that I had a point, and a well meaning intervention by kind and sensible Crooked Cottage threatened to distract from the point at issue.

For one who makes a big deal of "tongue in cheek", surely you recognise a bit of "stage indignation" :)

BrownHairedGirl wrote -

"I was a little bemused by your note on my talk about being "a little bit more careful in future", since I encounter several times a week articles where you have inferred facts from sources which don't state them, and got them wrong. The latest was one I encountered today: Sir Edmund Buckley, 1st Baronet, which you created and left with the wrong dates for his parliamentary career, the wrong link to the Hansard site, and missing a bundle of categories."

Answers by motmit

Be not bemused. If you think a minor slip in the article editing process is the equivalent to making a change to template that adversely affects hundreds if not thousands of articles, then you fully justify my advice that you should be a little bit more careful in future.

I can assure you - as would any good IT consultant - that if you make what is in effect a program change that may have wide reaching and unintended effects, then you do need to be careful. Did you conduct thorough testing of all the options? Did you get other people inolved to check it out? That is what I mean by "being more careful". It actually gets worse - because almost immediately after you made the change, you disappeared off the system for several weeks. That is certainly not being careful. A good idea at least would have to have been to mention it to those most likely to be affected so they could check out for problems. You made the change on 11 August, you disappeared on 15 August, and on 17 August I found an incorrect reference for the first time. Apart from a brief reappearance you gave us all a Wikibreak until November. Be not bemused. I have no hesitation in repeating my request to you to "Be a little bit more careful in future".

And now you come here again and you denigrate my contributions to Wikipedia - again with "inferred facts" to make another sweeping statement and invalid generalisation. Sure you found a couple of slips, but "it's all part of the process of improvement". As all my creations are on my watchlist, I know when you improve them, and I know your "several times a week" is another atrocious exaggeration (but I won't trawl for diffs this time). I shall be happy to leave the Hansard links for you to deal with in future.

BrownHairedGirl wrote -

"The solution, of course, is to WP:SOFIXIT. Trawling through your contribs for unrelated diffs wouldn't have improved anything for readers."

Answer from motmit

Are you seriously suggesting that it would have been a good idea for me to have tried to fix a template I knew nothing about when I am no expert on Template grammar? I am more careful than that. I have no idea what on earth you are trying to say with the second sentence.

Motmit (talk) 08:48, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

Update - four weeks since BrownHairedGirl alleged "I encounter several times a week articles where you have inferred facts from sources which don't state them, and got them wrong...etc" and in that time she has made just one correction - a date of 1852 instead of 1853. I wonder if she will withdraw this "bad faith" statement. Motmit (talk) 17:54, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

List of MPs not excluded from the English parliament in 1648 (2)

I am trying to improve the article on Edmund Dunch (Roundhead). There is a sentence in it that states "After the capture of Charles I, Dunch survived Pride’s Purge of MPs who did not want Charles tried and was part of the Rump Parliament ..." but the current sources in the biography do not support the statement. I can see from the article List of MPs not excluded from the English parliament in 1648 supports the fact he was not excluded, but it is unclear to me from the list of general references which source supports this. Please could you point me to the correct volume and chapter in the external sources? -- PBS (talk) 12:34, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the note. I spotted his article when dealing with his son but decided to give it a miss for the time being given the number of splats. I am finding it very difficult to establish who were Rumpers and I have tended to rely on the Constituency articles which seem fairly confident in most cases. The Wallingford article gives a date range for Dunch ending in 1653. For others I have assumed they remained unless there is evidence to the contrary. As I create the MPs articles I often find such evidence - death is fairly convincing. I am currently working on the Shorters, and it will take me a while to get onto the Rumpers. Important though because they came up again like a bad curry. By the way, I still haven't forgiven you for sending me that wretched Meercat, and I am tempted to send you in reply Mother Dunch's Buttocks. Regards and HNY. Motmit (talk) 13:55, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

Nicholas Weston

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Thank you for brightening up a dull January day with this hilarious joke. Motmit (talk) 19:19, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Charles Worsley

With this edit, you have inadvertently caused a problem with the sourcing. When you split the paragraph in half the Lee citation has remained in the second paragraph and no longer covers the information in what is now the first paragraph. In future if you split such a paragraph please make sure that the reference is duplicated if it covers information in both paragraphs. -- PBS (talk) 18:00, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Thomas Gewen

Momit wrote:

Hi Vernon I am not sure why you siezed on the Thomas Gewen article, but it is always satisfying, after one has created an article, to see it taken up and developed so thoughtfully. Makes work on obscure 17th century politicians seem all the more worthwhile.

I am interested in 17th C Quakers in Cornwall and their persecutors. I also found Gewen interesting as one of the coalition that brought Charles Stuart in. Coalitions are rather relevant at the moment in the UK. If you like obscurities, what about Horace Pym or Samuel Middleton Fox. More restful than editing anything to do with Israel! BTW, what's you reference for "He was also a sturdy Presbyterian and was considered one of the main persecutors of Quakers."Vernon White ^{. . . Talk} 23:42, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Regarding the ref, I am afraid that as a result of all your editing, you inadvertently disconnected the sentence in quotes from the reference (Robbins). I have no issue with that and have restored it without complaint. Whereas the previous visitor to this page has taken all the trouble to come on to my talk page specfically to complain and take a high-handed attitude because for once I put in a paragraph break which split a reference. Shall I leave a snottogram on PBS's page to tell him/her to be more carefl about splling Cromwell in future? :) Funny old world! Motmit (talk) 10:19, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

I am sorry that you seem to have quarrels with several other editors, including Brown haired girl, who is someone who has improved many of my articles significantly. Your discourse seems to be deliberately offensive. Are you not aware of this? Vernon White ^{. . . Talk} 15:11, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

When I visit other people's talk pages, it is to offer support and encouragement. I have given you nothing but appreciation on your talk page and I have given PBS nothing but appreciation on his talk page. I think this helps to oil the wheels and I am sorry that you think I am being deliberately offensive. PBS sent me a Meercat video in reply to my note of appreciation and we also had an amusing discussion about the Rump parliament and that was the background to my comment about Mother Dunch's buttocks. So I don't know why he complained about the paragraph break as it only occurred as I began work improving the article he refered to. As for the other person, I was accused of incivility and I explained that I was simply expressing annoyance at finding an inappropriate reference. Do you think the edit summaries I listed were deliberately offensive given the circumstances? Do you? You can go back through all my edit summaries and I don't think you will find any evidence of personal incivility - a few bad puns perhaps - but no obscenities, no personal attacks, no screaming with exclamation marks. Now it was only when I investigated that I found out that my accuser was the person who had created the problem by changing a template. Now not taking care with a template is an order of magnitude greater than mistyping the date in an article because its effects are not obvious and it can affect literally thousands of articles. I am sure you will agree with that. My reaction, if I was told that I had done something like that, would be to acknowledge the mistake, apologise profusely and set about putting it right. But I received no response apart from an offer from another kind person to work on it. Eventually I discovered that the person concerned had tackled the business and so I drew a line under the matter with a gracious note of appreciation - or do you read that as being deliberately offensive? There was no need for the person concerned to come back on the attack. There is no doubt that this editor puts in a tremendous amount of work - even spending hours over the festive season. I always appreciate those who add value to my articles (as I did with you) and when this editor even used one of my creations for a DYK again I visited the user's talk page to give appreciation for this. (By the way I hope you don't consider my avoidance of gender specific language as deliberately offensive). Anyway, I invite you to compare my edit history and my use of talk pages with the other person's and see where the instigation of disputes comes from. I am baffled as to why people seem to have got grumpy with me in the last few days - perhaps it is the time of year since as you will see apart from some silly bots no one else has anything but praise and appreciation. I am not aware that anything I have said in this response can be classed as deliberately offensive but I invite you to tell me if you think so. Meanwhile I would prefer to get on with the positive and constructive business of creating articles on members of parliament of around the time of the civil war. Regards Motmit (talk)

Talkback

Hello, Motmit. You have new messages at Wdchk's talk page.
Message added 06:04, 12 January 2011 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

DYK nomination of Thomas Witherings

Hello! Your submission of Thomas Witherings at the Did You Know nominations page has been reviewed, and there still are some issues that may need to be clarified. Please review the comment(s) underneath your nomination's entry and respond there as soon as possible. Thank you for contributing to Did You Know! Wasted Time R (talk) 14:10, 15 January 2011 (UTC)

Thomas Danby (MP)

As his son (the mayor) was also an MP, this doesn't seem an ideal disambiguation, though I'm not sure what would be better here! Perhaps we need to resort to using dates? PamD (talk) 21:33, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Hi Pam - neither mayor nor MP is ideal here. My main issue was that as I understand it "Sir" should not be used except for Barts and I felt uncomfortable including it in a new article. I also found he was being linked into another article in the persona of an 18th century Sir T D so there was already a dambig problem. I think this may be an iterative process. I am throwing up so many replicated MPs names that it is the devils own job to sort them out. One option is that as MPs in the Long parliament break down into Royalists and Parliamentarians, we could make him a Royalist. Dates are a bit of a last resort, but I am coming round to a preference for (died ....) only rather that the full range. It is only 4 digits and avoids a dash character that doesnt exist on my keyboard. If you can bear with a few placeholders, I am sure we can work it out in the end. Regards Motmit (talk) 23:11, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Thank you

Somehow the cut and paste on my nice new boxes for C17 parliaments got all screwed up (probably user error - late - tired from looking after preggers wife) so thanks for sorting out the errors. Tattooed Librarian (talk) 00:36, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

No probs - all fixed now. Keep an eye on my library as I will update it from time to time, but there is a more copious reference source developed by PBS - Regards Motmit (talk) 21:47, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Barnstar

		The Disambiguator's Barnstar
		Thanks for all your hard work on disambiguation pages and your support for my ediing, it's appreciated. Best wishes, Boleyn (talk) 20:31, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Many thanks - Motmit (talk) 21:47, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

		The Original Barnstar
		I have just expanded Edmund Prideaux (by using DNB text) I linked that text to Thomas Witherings I think you did a first class job in assembling the information and writing the article, well done. -- PBS (talk) 06:08, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Many thanks for the appreciation and for improving the article.Motmit (talk) 21:54, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Samuel Browne (judge)

If you could wait a few days I am in the process of developing an article on him (That is why I've put a stub in place). But if you want to do some further development you will find all the details you need at User:Philip Baird Shearer/sandbox#Samuel Browne (judge). -- PBS (talk) 02:42, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

I was not fully awake yesterday I was in a transit lounge after a very long flight. OK the man I am writing a biography on was MP for Clifton-Dartmouth-Hardness

The two biographies I have been using do not include him as an MP in 1660, but I have found conformation in the ODNB on the biography of this man:

He was eventually elected MP for Bedford in 1659, and for Bedfordshire in 1660. He was knighted by Charles II and rewarded for his loyalty during the interregnum with reinstatement as serjeant-at-law in Trinity term 1660 and with elevation to the bench of common pleas in the Michaelmas term following. He served as justice in common pleas until his death in London on 11 April 1668. He was buried at Arlesey in Bedfordshire, where he lived.

I'll include it in my biography article on him. Presumably the 1659 election was for a vacant seat in the reconstituted Long Parliament while the 1660 was to the Convention Parliament (1660). -- PBS (talk) 08:28, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

The extended article is now in place. Improvements appreciated. -- PBS (talk) 13:17, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

Samuel Browne (MP for Rutland) another Convention Parliament MP and nephew of Samuel Browne (judge) -- PBS (talk) 17:49, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

Sir Francis Drake, 2nd Baronet

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Ridiculous Bot! Have a good laugh anyone who checks this message. Motmit (talk) 14:01, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

1604 list

That's a fine list to have around - thanks. I see in the ODNB that Edward Forsett is reckoned to have come in c.1606 for Wells, replacing Sir Robert Stapleton. Charles Matthews (talk) 12:59, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Charles - I was glad to see you taking advantage of the list. I have added your comment in the notes. The constituency article doesnt include Forsett, but once the Stapleton article is done we might get confirmation. The list is very much WIP for the present, so any extra info is always useful. Regards Motmit (talk) 13:14, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Nickalls

If you are correct on parentage of Patteson Womersley Nickalls, then the article on Emily Quihampton is incorrect. I will see if I can find an obituary to confirm one or the other. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 23:24, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Yup, you are correct and the other editor is wrong. I will make the change and start and entry for Sir Patteson Nickalls. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 23:48, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks -Added a bit more from the love of the chase rather than any real interest in the subjects. Wonder if Pat is Tom's brother. Motmit (talk) 13:51, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Richard Cave

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Politician relinks

Hi Motmit. I've just seen that you relinked a few politicians within Callington (UK Parliament constituency). I know that you were trying to follow the guideline that states that we should avoid dashes etc where appropriate, but most of the new links directed to titles that no other page linked to, whereas the old ones had several incoming links. An example of Samuel Rolle, where the original link had 8 incoming links but your new link had only 1 incoming link. So it might be worth checking the "What links here" for the original link to see if it actually needs changing - I'm just concerned that we'll end up with multiple title locations for a single person, which editors might try to create multiple times (and then need merging later on). I've restored all but one of the links because of this. Hope you don't mind, cheers, Zangar (talk) 12:43, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

John Arundell

Hi Motmit - do you think John Arundell (Royalist) is the same John Arundell that needs disambiguating in Truro (UK Parliament constituency), for the 1666 and 1685 parliaments? Cheers, Zangar (talk) 12:31, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Ah, good spot - why I didn't go to Rayment I don't know! I think I'll keep to minor edits today if my brain isn't engaging! Cheers, Zangar (talk) 13:17, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Well done for sorting that out! There's another spurious John Arundell now - John Arundell (1474-1545), father of Mary Arundell (courtier) (originally her father was listed as the 14 century John), not too sure if he's notable enough for his own article though (I haven't found anything on him). The Arundell family are very confusing! Zangar (talk) 11:26, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

Eastbourne GAR

Wonder whether you've seen the note on the Eastbourne page about the GAR. It would be a pity to lose the GA ... I see there are only 116 GAs in the 'Places' category. I'm trying to make a few changes. Mikeo1938 (talk) 21:25, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

I noticed what was going on. I though it was a bit of a kick in the teeth for someone to come in from left-field and tear up a good article like that. Motmit (talk) 15:40, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

Category:English landowners

Please help populate this category, one also exists for Scottish landowners.♦ Dr. Blofeld 10:57, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Use the new category English landowners please. Why haven't you added it to John Southby?♦ Dr. Blofeld 06:58, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

I have little time for categories. If you want to set them up, feel free. If you want to populate them feel free. But please don't address me like that. Motmit (talk) 07:05, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

For the record one of the reasons I have little time for categories is because of the antics of these people! Motmit (talk) 07:49, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

John Suckling (poet)

Hello, Motmit. Please check your email; you've got mail!
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Peaceray (talk) 06:41, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Former pupils of Foo

FYI. This CfD and this one have re-opened the topic. Ephebi (talk) 17:14, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

Disambiguation needed

Please don't [do this] - you may know it needs sorting, but the tags are their to alert other editors that it needs sorting, as well as warning readers that the link does not go to the intended target. DuncanHill (talk) 17:13, 24 July 2011 (UTC)

These huge new tags are appalling and clutter up articles unneccessarily. The old (dn) was sufficient. If I saw any evidence whatsoever that anyone was dealing with commonwealth MPs - or if many readers were looking at the articles - you may have a point. But nobody is. Instead of cluttering up articles like this stating the bleeding obvious, why don't you try sorting one or two out. Motmit (talk) 17:22, 24 July 2011 (UTC)

I disambiguate thousands of links thank you very much, take a look at my contributions if you don't believe me. If you can't be bothered to make the correct link, don't deliberately hamper those of us who do try to either fix them or bring them to the attention of others who may be able to. DuncanHill (talk) 17:25, 24 July 2011 (UTC)

Fine - I will leave that one and any similar for you to do. You sure know how to garner support. Motmit (talk) 18:25, 24 July 2011 (UTC)

Well as you're doing your damned best to stop anyone knowing which links need fixing I didn't honestly expect you to be of much help. Don't bother replying, I won't be reading it if you do. DuncanHill (talk) 18:39, 24 July 2011 (UTC)

Good, and good riddance. Motmit (talk) 18:45, 24 July 2011 (UTC)

By sorting it out, I mean doing the hard work of digging into sources to find the facts and creating a good well referenced article. Since May 2010 DuncanHill has created just 10 new articles of which seven are simply DAB pages and two are small stubs. Since this tirade, I have resolved one dambig issue in the the normal course of editing. None of the splats have been dealt with by anyone else. Here is an example of what I object to.

Does anyone think this looks good? The splat is considerably larger than the article name it refers to and I got no answer to the objection I raised. And what is the point of entering the splat twice to make things even more cluttered? And instead of worrying that someone might be directed to a page which usefully indicates that we are not quite sure who this yet, I would be more concerned about the link that directs to a Victorian cricketer. Motmit (talk) 18:14, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Yet again

I think you may wish to contribute here. Moonraker (talk) 08:21, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

(MP)

Thanks for your note, Motmit, which was about my moving the Christopher Sykes page. I am afraid we may need to agree to disagree on this, but I hope you will at least find my answer interesting!

You asked "What is this naming convention and what is its rationale?" I can't find a policy to support me, but I do remember a strong preference some time ago for using "politician" rather than "MP", where a disambiguating term is needed for members of parliament. I have just looked through some of the English and British categories, and for what it's worth "politician" is used more than "MP", so perhaps the only convention is the greater use of "politician". Given that, I am sorry if you feel the word "convention" was the wrong one to use and will avoid it in future.

On your question about the rationale for avoiding "MP", the strongest point is probably that the acronym is only clear to readers in countries where the term is used, and Wikipedia aims to be universal.

You say "MP is the most familiar term used for these people in the UK and has a long history of use." If you will forgive a quite subjective further reply to your question about rationale, I was brought up in a political household in which the term "MP" was looked on as a cringe-making solecism invented by left-wing journalists. To say "MP" then (the 1950s and 1960s) was as vulgar as saying "serviette" or "lounge". All educated people then said "member of parliament" in full, or "member" for short. You will certainly not find "MP" in the works of Benjamin Disraeli, Winston Churchill, Harold Macmillan, or Leo Amery. So the "long history of use" you mention, at least in reliable sources, is probably not more than about forty or fifty years. Perhaps the world has moved on, but I am afraid I still frown when I hear David Cameron say "MP" or "MPs", which he often does. There is nothing surprising in hearing it from (say) Peter Tatchell, but an Old Etonian should know better...

I couldn't agree with you more that neither "MP" nor "politician" should be used as part of the page title for more than a handful of men before about the late 19th century, as for most members in those days their life's work was something quite different.

In category names, I confess that I should rather see "members of parliament" in full, rather than "MP", but that is not a debate I wish to impose on anyone at the moment. Moonraker (talk) 01:04, 29 July 2011 (UTC)

John Clark (Parliamentarian)

Nice addition/rewrite of the John Clark (Parliamentarian) stub. I have altered the last seat of the 1659 parliament as the source you provided said Melcombe Regis rather than Weymouth and although the Wikipedia article says "Act of Parliament in 1570 which amalgamated the existing boroughs of Weymouth and Melcombe Regis" the source given states that the election of 1659 returned 2 MPs for Weymouth and 3 for Melcombe Regis of which Clark was one.[5]

This is really just a heads up because I know you put these men into other list so you are aware of a possible anomaly. If you have another source that contradicts the first one you have provided then I'll leave it to you to change it back. -- PBS (talk) 14:38, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Isaac Pennington

If you want the redirect deleted, you may nominate it for deletion through our WP:RFD process. It is not acceptable or appropriate, however, to simply blank the redirect or to replace it with a personal commentary that criticizes it for existing — you need to either follow the proper procedure for getting it deleted or leave it alone. Thanks. Bearcat (talk) 16:34, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Ok lets leave the rubbish there to confuse Canadians who dont know the difference between the Mayor of London and the Lord Mayor. Motmit (talk) 17:05, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Some useful sources

I have just written an article Sir Baynham Throckmorton, 2nd Baronet (because I wrote another one called Bristol in the English Civil War and his name came up). Anyway I digress. If you look at Sir Baynham Throckmorton, 2nd Baronet you will see that there are two sources. The Cokayne one is useful if you are writing a biography about a baronet, you will find all of his volumes listed in my library. But the really interesting one from the point of view of MP in parliament is the first one. If you have not seen it I think you will find it very useful. For example I noticed that you wrote Sir Baynham Throckmorton, 3rd Baronet take a look at:

http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1660-1690/member/throckmorton-sir-baynham-1629-81

-- PBS (talk) 10:46, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

List of Sheriffs of London

I have done some further research on List of Sheriffs of London please have a look at Talk:List of Sheriffs of London. Any additional comments would be most welcome. -- PBS (talk) 01:38, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

James Gould

Hey, referring to the James Gould (died 1707) page, two things I'd just like to put out there. Could you change the name of the page to just "James Gould" (I don't know why you included his year of death the article title) also I understand you just started the page but if you could dig up more references that'd be nice! Happy editing! Purplesky91 (talk) 20:07, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

For goodness sake, what is wrong with these people! No I cannot change the page to James Gould as that is a disambiguation page with several entries. If you bothered to look at my last few edits you would see exactly why the article title is qualified. In particular I have just created an article for his eponymous father which unbelievably some other clown immediately decided to rename ambiguously giving me unnecessary work to put right. I dont know why the pair of you are interfering in an area in which I suspect you have little expertise or why you are checking an autopatrolled user. Having created thousands of articles I do not need gratuitous instruction from someone who does not seem to understand the basics.Motmit (talk) 20:26, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

I do not intend to belittle your experience here, I know it's a disambiguation page, I can see why you may find my above post slightly annoying in that aspect. I made no changes, merely contacted you on your talk page. Wouldn't it be more appropriate to title their pages by their positions rather than their year of death? Yes, they both held the same position, but surely something. It's a question. Apologies for any offence caused. Just trying to be friendly. Purplesky91 (talk) 20:37, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

A reference I found with minimal use of search engines that might be useful for you to use as multiple references. I don't appreciate the condescension but anyway. Have a nice day. Purplesky91 (talk) 20:48, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Richard_More_(Parliamentarian)

Hi, Please see the discussion page for this article, where I have proposed a major edit. As you are the creator of this page I would appreciate your view. --Shropshire Lad (talk) 09:34, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

Robert Hunt (MP)

Hello Motmit, I just thought I'd let you know that I say your article Robert Hunt (MP) in the New Articles list-- And have a beautiful day! Cheers, Amy Z (talk) 20:33, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

Bypass redirect

With regard to this edit it is generally not a good idea to alter redirect just to bypass them see WP:NOTBROKEN. -- PBS (talk) 10:29, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

May be, but for the time being I am creating lots of similarly named articles, and cutting out redirects cuts out actual and potential confusion. It also frees up names that could be reappropriated for a more suitable subject. (eg Sandys,Jephson and Bethall) Regards Motmit (talk) 15:43, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Locks on the River Thames

Hello Motmit,

I have noticed that the River Thames authority appears to give all information about the locks in metres. For Wikipedia the information would, of course, have to be provided in both metres and feet and inches. As the source of information is in metres, I think it would be better to put this first, especially in this case, where the government authority is, apparently, quite consistent in just using metres. I know it is possible to argue that the locks were built to Imperial measures, so these should take precedence. However, as our source is metric, rounding errors could result in slight inaccuracies if we put the information round the other way. Therefore I think the source units should go first. (You can, if you want, check this out by following the links from http://www.visitthames.co.uk/poi/184/locks.html.

How do you feel about this? After all, if it's good enough for the River Thames authority, it should be good enough for Wikipedia. Best wishes, Michael Glass (talk) 04:44, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for passing this by me. I know you have a one-person compulsive obsession with pushing metric measures over Imperial measures. Government bodies in the UK come under EU pressure to provide metric measures but like much EU interference it is in conflict with English usage and preference. That is why the general consensus among editors is to present Imperial measures first in English articles except where metric usage prevails as in certain sports. Please will you respect this. Any rounding errors are likely to be in metric measures as the locks were built to the Imperial standards which are given. I doubt if you have ever used a lock on the River Thames, and it seems you do not live in England. So it would be helpful if you stopped worrying about our articles as no one else does in this respect. Regards Motmit (talk) 08:36, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Motmit, your reply and your lack of manners are both noted. Michael Glass (talk) 09:43, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for taking note again - I think we did cover this previously - manners? - see [6] Motmit (talk) 10:38, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

My apologies for the comment you pointed out. Not my nicest, I admit. However, please note that the only time I suggest a change is where a source of information already uses metric measures, as does the Thames authority. The Times Style Guide says, "The overwhelming preference is sporting, foreign, engineering and scientific stories to be metric". http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/tools_and_services/specials/style_guide/article986731.ece Also the royal website uses metres in its description of Buckingham Palace http://www.royal.gov.uk/TheRoyalResidences/BuckinghamPalace/BuckinghamPalace.aspx so I don't think the use of metric measures is quite as foreign as your comment might imply. Michael Glass (talk) 13:19, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

River Thames

Hi Motmit - you may not notice my comment at talk Thames, as someone added another comment lower down a couple of minutes later, so I will repeat it here: If the intention is for the tidal Thames to be covered by Tideway rather than River Thames this should be made clear in the lead paragraph. The 94-odd miles of tidal river below Teddington are after all by far the more economically significant. Regards Pterre (talk) 17:07, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi Pterre - good to hear from you. The Tideway article is a way of providing the sort of detail for the tidal reach that is given for the non-tidal reach in the 45 individual lock articles. That does not mean exluding any important details of the tidal reach from the main article any more than it means excluding important details from the non-tidal reaches. However much of the trivial flotsom that gets chucked in the river by people in London ends up on the Tideway both in real life and in Wikiworld! Motmit (talk) 17:22, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

New Page Patrol survey

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A barnstar for you!

	The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
	For your excellent work on behalf of English and British MPs, especially of the Civil War era. Wear it with pride. --Ser Amantio di NicolaoChe dicono a Signa?Lo dicono a Signa. 18:29, 2 November 2011 (UTC)|}

Not at all - I quite enjoy it, actually. :-) Keep up the good work, and happy editing! --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 19:21, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Oliver Cromwell (died 1655)

Nice article. Please see talk:Oliver Cromwell (died 1655) -- PBS (talk) 21:56, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks PBS - I understand your concerns and have responded. Regards Motmit (talk) 22:12, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Simon Thelwall (of Cefn Coch)

The article Simon Thelwall (of Cefn Coch) has been proposed for deletion because of the following concern:

Well, he's not really notable. There are a thousand members of the House of Commons every 10 years! What has he done? What makes him special?

While all contributions to Wikipedia are appreciated, content or articles may be deleted for any of several reasons.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{proposed deletion/dated}} notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Removing {{proposed deletion/dated}} will stop the proposed deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. In particular, the speedy deletion process can result in deletion without discussion, and articles for deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion. Ratibgreat (talk) 16:36, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Edward Wilde

Hi Motmit, would you mind telling where you found this man and his name? Thanks, Eddaido (talk) 06:25, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

There is a reference provided in the article which provides the information you want. Spellings of the name Wild/Wilde/Wylde vary according to source as was typical in the 17th century and there is not necessary a definitive name. I note that your changes to George Wild have completely convoluted his parentage and lost the sourced reference to his father being a clothier.Motmit (talk) 07:59, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Names of the period are a problem, how it sounded was what mattered but they knew their own orthodox spellings. There is a definitive name. Curiously enough your quoted source indexes them all correctly as Wylde (printed in Hereford, close by). But the truly fun part is that father and son are both Edmund - everywhere else. Williams employed someone with bad handwriting? Poor Proofreader? The only reason to write to you was in case you had troubled to find another source. Here's father's name on his monument obviously erected by his widow or son (about 2 when Dad died aged 32) as reported by Nikolaus Pevsner - good enough for you? St Mary the Virgin, Kempsey and this looks like Dad and his baby boy though I don't know for sure family foto. And then there's the VCH. Should I go on?

By the way, search for Wilde and you will find Wilde, search for Wylde and you will find Wylde - do you see what I mean?

I have corrected incorrect statements in other related articles and am in the process of reviewing all the articles on these closely related people. My sources are not those previously quoted in those articles but those quoted agree with my sources so I leave those references be. Check out George and the clothier etc. Eddaido (talk) 10:26, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

oops, getting as rough as PBS! Eddaido (talk) 10:27, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Here are the MP lists that include Edward Wild/Wylde etc under Droitwich (should have included one or other in the article)

• Browne Willis Notitia parliamentaria, or, An history of the counties, cities, and boroughs in England and Wales: ... The whole extracted from mss. and printed evidences 1750 pp252
• The parliamentary or constitutional history of England;: being a faithful account of all the most remarkable transactions in Parliament, from the earliest times. Collected from the journals of both Houses, the records, ..., Volume 9

The former gived Edw., the latter gives Edmund. Often names are abbreviated in original sources as Edw. or Edm. and I have come across several instances where these have been expanded wrongly.

I expected Edward/mund to be related to the other Wild ones, but apparently not. I don't trust Williams 100% but often he is all there is to go on - at least until HOP becomes available for the period next year. HOP does suffer from the occasional "Under construction" error. HOP seems to go for the simplest spelling (see Bampfylde/Bampfield which I have been struggling with). Williams manages to get George as Wild, Wylde, Wielde and Welde. Obviously memorials tend to be written by someone other than the person concerned, who may have their own agenda. So it is a bit of a dog's breakfast and often a variation is simply a convenient form of disamiguation. Motmit (talk) 11:23, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

I'll come back later with a proper response to your interesting notes above. My background is that just over a decade ago I put a lot of effort (over some years) into tracking this particular Commandery family and have (what feels like) a computer bursting with data which is why it is so easy for me to refer to it. Thomas the first of The Commandery was a younger son of a gentry family and so had some capital. He set up as a clothier in Worcester then made a large fortune when exports to the low Countries were blocked by war (though I don't know exactly how he did it - a woollen goods mountain?). He had a lot of children and left them all plenty and was generous to the poor etc etc you can read part of his will here: Old Tom. I'm annoyed and surprised by your mention of Browne Willis who is a descendant through Margaret remarkable wife of Dr Fell and mother of John as in "I do not like thee Dr Fell . . .". Margaret single-handed faced down a small army! Back later, Eddaido (talk) 12:27, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Well one of the main inspirations in kicking off these articles is the hope that someone with lots more information will build on them. I expect with a computer stuffed with old data you are grappling, as I often have to, with the problems of OR and sourcing. Why does BW annoy you? Motmit (talk) 13:01, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

BW would annoy me if he got it wrong but I think he has not, see below. I can find no mention of Edwards or Edmunds in the references above but perhaps you can point me to a specific page?

What BW seems to have done is made the index right, presumably leaving the individual entries to fit with source documents? Do you have access or are parliament's own records missing? In BW's index those not Wylde are:

• • (the important one) Wild John sometime baron of the exchequer. I do remember finding a facsimile signature as Wild. I like to think this was to fit with his name as in the document he was signing (to avoid squabbles). You may see he is Wylde (only) in your second reference.
  • Wild Tho. This was for the parliament of 1625. There was no Commandery Wylde I know of alive around that time who would fit which I guess is why BW indexed him that way.

BW records The Commandery original paterfamilias as Wylde Tho and Thomas in both places (MP for Worcester City 1557). You can find confirmation of that here in Parl. Hist. Worcs which fits exactly with what I know (Williams is new to me) except his first wife's surname was Ledington. Shall I make a new article for Old Tom? You have suggested Williams may not be reliable but what do you think about my using it as the ref for this new article?

I now see little Walter has been slipped behind the flower stand in family foto. Please tell me whenever I am wrong. Sorry I'm so slow, Eddaido (talk) 06:46, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Here is the HOPO entry for Old Tom. [7]. Regards Motmit (talk) 23:31, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Many thanks, will get to it soon, thinking of your comment re Williams, I have found ODNB not impeccably reliable though very good and receptive to (appropriately verifiable) corrections (for one of which I get credit there in print) but have noticed that recent HoP not quite so very good. Regards, Eddaido (talk) 00:19, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes - DNB especially the old one has quite a few errors, also Venn and Oxford Alumni. It is a matter of picking among the sources and providing some discussion in the notes where they differ. Re the Willis and other ref I gave, you need to scroll to the approp section. However you will notice an empty box centrally placed on the google page - if you type page number there and enter it will jump you there or near. For Willis enter 252; for the other try 35 and then scroll. Regards Motmit (talk) 09:51, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

this is pasted from talk Philip Baird Shearer following his reversion of accurate information from ODNB: "There is, in just the same way, good reason for material differences between editions of the DNB. To repeat the untruths of the original misleads Wikipedia readers in just the same way as I have described in the previous paragraph. It is so easy to check with the updated version while copying/pasting from the old one it is surely, as I have pointed out, irresponsible not to do so. Eddaido (talk) 21:46, 13 March 2011 (UTC)"

re your new reversion, I can show it but I need your response to my questions on the discussion page. Looking forward etc., Thanks and regards, Eddaido (talk) 20:22, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

John Manley (MP)

What a bummer. WE both wrote the bio of John Manley at the same time. Yours a classic, as ever. I will delete my offering forthwith. Plucas58 (talk) 20:15, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

Don't throw your work away - there are bits in there that should be incorporated as my post 1660 material is very sketchy. He was actually next to do on my list of Welsh MPs when your edits to Witherings directed me to PMG and I made the connection. May have to move him to 1699 as his homonymous son was also an MP. I really appreciate the great work you have been doing. Regards Motmit (talk) 20:40, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

George Orwell

Regarding your post, "He was reverting vandalism!!": If that's what he was doing, he should have said so in the edit summary. Uncommented changes are frowned upon for this very reason. — UncleBubba ^{( T @ C )} 21:51, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Why on earth are you telling me? Motmit (talk) 22:34, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Because of your edit summary, "He was reverting vandalism!!" in reply to my attempt to revert apparent vandalism.

What I, in my haste, neglected to do was to say "thanks" for correcting my error, so, Thank you! — UncleBubba ^{( T @ C )} 23:13, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

He probably forgot the ES (we all do sometimes) as he was restoring after a multi-edit IP rather than undoing. Glad you appreciate the irony. Motmit (talk) 08:03, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

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Yet again

Thanks for tangentially drawing my attention to the latest cfds by your comment at Talk:Old Boys. No doubt you will take part yourself before long. Moonraker (talk) 07:21, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

Reversion

FYI

 – User:JCScaliger has been indef blocked as a sockpuppet of User:Pmanderson (blocked for another year for abusive sockpuppetry).

This revert is both uncivil and unwise. To call Sir Oliver's removal a purge without explaining the purpose is misleading. It also borders on plagarism; our purpose is to express the content of our sources, not to copy their metaphors.

As for chronological order; listing each re-election wastes the reader's time and attention futilely; what should be said is that he was (as might be expected in that age) re-elected as long as he cared to run. I am copying this to Talk:Sir Oliver Cromwell; please discuss there. JCScaliger (talk) 00:52, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Not for nothing is my Wikimotto "Before you accuse me, take a look at yourself". Thanks PBS for banging to rights the contributor of this hysterical outburst. Motmit (talk) 17:26, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Photo of Hampton Reach

Hi Motmit,

This is the first time that I've used a talk page, so I hope that I'm doing so correctly!

I came across your excellent photo of Hampton Reach (Hamptonreach.jpg), which is the top photo on the Wikipedia page for "Hampton, London": showing the church, Shakespeare's temple and Garrick's Villa. This is a great shot. I live in Hampton and would like to obtain/buy from you a higher resolution version of this image, please.

My plan is to print an enlargement, approximately 3 feet wide (but with sky and water cropped to create a panoramic proportion).

Would you be able to supply either a high resolution digital file (.tif or .jpg or similar), or otherwise a print?

Kind regards,

Trilectric. Trilectric (talk) 20:50, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the appreciation. This was one of the earliest pictures I loaded and I was under the mistaken impression at the time that we should economise on space and so cut the resolution. Perhaps I should replace it with the 1MB+ original and that would make it available to you. You can check out my gallery on Commons where there are other pics of Hampton and the river. Regards Motmit (talk) 21:13, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Hello again Motmit,

Your gallery is wonderful, but my favourite photo remains the Hampton Reach shot. Uploading the 1Mb+ original would be a good solution. Alternatively, I am happy to remunerate you for the hi-res photo (cheque or PayPal) ...although I don't know how to go about that without either of us posting personal details on this public talk page.

Kind regards,

Trilectric.Trilectric (talk) 20:16, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

I have loaded the full res image and replaced it on Hampton. Enjoy. You can buy me a pint at the Cardinal Wolsey or Bell sometime and I will sign it for you. Alternatively you could make a donation to Wikipedia in response to the Jimmy mug-shots that appear on the top of pages. Regards Motmit (talk) 20:25, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Many thanks Motmit! I will experiment with a test-print and if suitable I'll try to get some extra long "panoramic" photo paper for my printer, or go to a print-shop, for the best effect. Jimmy's mug-shots had the desired result with me a few weeks ago, so I've already donated. However, if the photo works out, then a signature from you and a drink on me would be nice. They revamped the Bell a few months ago, so it's particularly good in there now!

Happy snapping, Trilectric. Trilectric (talk) 21:48, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Old boys again

• Please see Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2012 February 10. Moonraker (talk) 16:02, 10 February 2012 (UTC)

This is a quote from an discussion in the cricket project regarding the ridiculous antics of the inhabitants of category cloud cuckoo land.

I think there's been long term concerns about CfD and how it appears to operate like a clique of like-minded people from the UK and North America - my experience in 2008 was that a common sense outcome could only be obtained by engaging in open warfare with the clique and notifying as many people as possible of discussions. It would take days to win a discussion (often either found purely accidentally, or after the fact necessitating a DRV) in the name of common sense against the mythical beast of "standardization" (note the US spelling), and it was a rare win with much blood on the walls. Basically, any time one got regular Wikipedians in there, they were automatically accused of bad faith and subjected to sneering sarcasm and patronising comments in the hope they'd leave - most of them did after whichever particular CfD was in question, so it was conduct which probably met its purpose.

Repeat submission of repeatedly rejected proposals is just one of the dirty little tricks of members this cabal. BlueArsedFly (talk)

CfD process

I have made a suggestion at the CfD talk page which you might be interested in. Ephebi (talk) 15:17, 11 February 2012 (UTC)

Here is another quote from the cricket project on the pompous ol' pontificators, the pack of mental masturbators and other misguided individuals who waste their life arguing about the number of angels that can fit on the head of a category.

CfD is broken beyond repair and nothing except a total overhaul of the category policies and procedures will fix it. The CfD process has been captured by a group of like-minded editors who have written the policy and run the enforcement program and who take little note of those editors who actually have to work with the categories they mangle. They give no consideration to the idea that category names that may appear ambiguous in theory are actually quite intelligible in practice, given some context such as the wider category tree that they sit for example.

I think that the CfD clique genuinely think they can do the impossible - i.e. remove all ambiguity from category names - but even if this was possible, they give no consideration to other concepts important in a good naming policy, including conciseness and simplicity, and seemingly have no concept of "common sense". The basic idea driving their program is that if a category name can possibly be confused by some editor, somewhere - then no matter how small that risk of confusion is, the category must be renamed regardless of the ridiculousness of the category name that results. One of my favourites in Category:Football (soccer) in Victoria (Australia)!!

This will not change, ever. My advice is not to get hung up on categories and just accept that they are broken and next to useless.

Frankly this outfit has nothing to do with an encyclopedia. I imagine most readers can't be bothered with those tedious lists at the foot of the article. They could be useful tools for editors if they didnt get bent out of shape in the good ol' joke factory. The perpetrators seem to be bent on a fools mission which simply can never achieve thier aims. They remind me of librarians who were devoted to their absurd catalogues in which no one could find anything. (Thank heavens for google and free text search.) Anyway thanks to the behaviour of this lot I have completely eschewed categories. When I create an article I will only provide bare minimum identification and occasionally an extra marker if there is something unusual or where I my knowlege is useful. Otherwise I will not populate categories more than two words long, and I will never populate a category name that begins "People". So perhaps they are defeating their own ends. BlueArsedFly (talk)

Edmund Weaver (MP)

Motmit, the Oxford Alumni Oxonienses also lists Edmund as an MP in 1653. That's two independant sources. McParlin's information was very detailed and specific. Let's at least agree to keep the reference to Barebone's with a "possibly" until we sort it out. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bmwtx (talk • contribs) 16:47, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

Remember to sign your posts.

No. All reliable sources are quite clear that he was not in the Barebones parliament. This is reflected in all the related articles for the constituency and the lists of members. A PhD thesis is not a reliable source and I have explained why the author got confused - but it is quite reasonable, and in this case sufficent, to refer to a conflicting piece of material in the footnote. The date 1653 in Alumni Ox refers to the end of the Long/Rump parliament and not to the separate Barebones. Alumni Ox also states he was a Rumper which conflicts with the PhD thesis, but unlike the certainty with which Barebones members are recorded there is considerable confusion about who actually sat in the Rump. Well done, anyway, for starting this article off. Regards Motmit (talk) 17:07, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

I don't know how reliable these other sources on the Barebones are so I'll leave it to you to judge that. The fact that the other related articles don't list Edmund is all the more reason to determine if this lead really is true or false and set the record straight. McParlin seemed to have confident details but I haven't been able to trace his source yet. So I agree this is too little to go on to overturn the Status Quo at this time. I would concede the Oxford dates range as being inconclusive, but their Rumper statement was only in reference to 1659 ("Restored" Rump?). Anyway, yes - leaving the mention in the reference is fine for now. Thanks! Bmwtx (talk) 18:04, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

Motmit, I don't have any portraits of the Weaver MPs (I have one possible but not sure who it is!) but I was thinking of adding their coat-of-arms as an image. I have clear references on these from the Visitation documents, where the person and MP title is explicitly listed. Would be for Richard, Edmund and John. What are your thoughts on that? I have noticed this done on other pages when no portrait is available, and the coat-of-arms is valuable additional information that helps sort out the family relationships. Could add it in text but the image is more interesting. Bmwtx (talk) 19:03, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

I like the coats of arms, and it seems user:Lobsterthermidor has been very busy adding them. Sometimes they do seem over dominant - probably because of their simple shapes and colours - so my feeling is they shouldn't be too big. Motmit (talk) 19:16, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

Alban Stepney

The article you created appears to confuse the guy with his grandson. The source you cited gives a 1611 date of death, which I've used. You might want to check I've got it right. Cheers, Bazj (talk) 16:39, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for picking that up and correcting it. Dunno how it happened. Regards Motmit (talk) 18:41, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

MP articles' names

First of all, let me tell you what a great job you've done on documenting all these MPs. Given, however, that quite a few of them share the same name, I think it would be best if the titles of their articles mentioned their constituencies rather than their year of death, since that is, after all, their main reason of notability (and, thankfully, there are, I think, no two MPs with the same name and same constituency). I already moved your most recent article John Ferrers (died 1622), and I'm going to go ahead and repeat the process on some of the rest. Do tell me what you think. -Anagogist (talk) 18:14, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

See my reversion of your inappropriate move. Please leave these article alone. If I think there is a better way of differentiating MPs then I do it. Please note that the purpose of qualifiers is to discriminate,, and not to describe. In the majority of cases there the date of death is perfectly adequate. Motmit (talk) 18:18, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

You should have awaited my response before proceeding. To prove my point further you have made a mess of it when you discovered an MP can have more than one constituency. Motmit (talk) 18:30, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

First of all, I object to being called an interferer. I was merely trying to resolve an issue which I could not see a standard solution for in WP:NAME. Second, the articles are indeed well differentiated, but in a very inelegant way. All similar cases in which two individual names have the same name are resolved by addition of the individuals' points of notability e.g. Mr. X (politician), Mr. X (scientist), not by year of birth or death. Even if death discriminates, that doesn't mean it's the only available way to do so. Furthermore, the fact that an MP can have more than one constituency does not affect my moves: simply adding (Member of Parliament) to the person who had multiple ones and (Tamworth) to the other is sufficient. I have no desire to initiate a move-war, so I'll ask on the relevant policy about the issue. -Anagogist (talk) 18:32, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

You do not appear to have had any prior involvement in Englist 17th century MPs so I am entitled to wonder why you have made yourself involved. Those of us concerned with disambguating are moving away from the qualifier MP (or its long form) as it often fails to discriminate. This is one hell of a job which takes a lot of sorting out and it doenst help if people change article names willy-nilly. Please find something else to worry about. Regards Motmit (talk) 18:42, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

Pls forgive me for butting in here, but although Motmit and I do not usually see eye-to-eye, I wanted to say that he is definitely on the right track with this form of disambiguation. My only disagreement with him on this would be that I tend to go for even greater precision, using dates of both and death, after getting caught too many times by identically named MPs who died in the same year.

The early 17th century MPs are not my field, but I have created a lot of articles on 18th- and 19th-century MPs and I developed the restoration-onwards lists of MPs for a large proportion of constituencies. From all that, I can say with great certainty that actually there are many many cases of people with the same name being MPs for the same constituency. Before the 19th century reforms, many seats were in the pocket of local gentry, and often these families maintained a tradition of keeping the same first name for their sons through many generations. Some of them were baronets, which provides a ready form of disambiguation (tho even that is not always unique), but many were not.

Off the top of my head, here a few examples:

• 2 X Abel Smith were MP for Hertfordshire
• If you look at the MP list for Lyme Regis, you will see that in the 70 years after 1757, for different people called Henry Fane were MPs for the borough. From 1772 to 1777, both of Lyme Regis's MPs were called Henry Fane

Motmit is quite right that the MP qualifier often fails to discriminate, but that isn't the end of the matter. Many MPs represented more than one constituency, and because powerful families often controlled several parliamentary boroughs and shuffled members around to suit their tastes, so so there is frequently a pattern of a family with a dozen or MPs sharing a much smaller pool of first names, each representing several seats at various times.

The job of trying to tie all this together is best done with a unique disambiguator. When I was doing this stuff with 17th century MPs, I was often astonished to find just how many permutations were involved. Anagogist, you can verify the scale of the problem yourself by spending a day or two looking through the hundreds of lists of MPs-by-constituency. So far you appear not to have done that, which is your privilege, so please can you accept the assurance of the editors who have most experience this area that is a quite extraordinary minefield of ambiguity. Sorting it out is painstaking work, and I sympathise with Motmit's complaint about well-intentioned but simplistic solutions proposed who have not taken the time to study the field in death.

As Motmit said, please find something else to worry about. Motmit is handling these article titles very effectively, and is massively expanding Wikipedia's coverage of the Parliament of England. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:03, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

New cfds regarding "Old Fooians"

Two new cfds propose the renaming of some twenty categories. Most of those who took part in last year's cfd "Former pupils by school in the United Kingdom" seem unaware of them, so I am notifying all those who took part in that discussion, to improve the quality of the discussion by broadening participation to more fully achieve consensus. Please consider contributing here and here. Moonraker (talk) 13:29, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

"Improve the quality of discussion"- you jest!. I have mentioned elsewhere that I have little interest in categories. The serious inherent flaws in the nature of categories (which are well stated in the description) make them unreliable; the continuous chopping and changing of names, apart from clogging up watchlists, renders useless any attempt to keep a template set; the increasingly lengthy category names make their use tedious; the category hierarchies that are being piled up actually seem to make it harder to find things. Duplication of a living active encyclopaedia by a catch-up abstact replication strikes me as a massive waste of effort and a complete fool's mission. However given the vindictiveness, absurdity and blatant ignorance of discussions in the good ol' category joke factory it is probably a good thing that some people are kept off the streets. By not getting sucked into this charybdis one can enjoy the sheer entertainment value of discussions like this.Motmit (talk) 11:46, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

Edward Hungerford

I have moved "Edward Hungerford (Parliamentarian)" back to "Edward Hungerford (roundhead)" because both men described as Edward Hungerford can also be described as Parliamentarians (meaning member of parliament). As the man described in this article was a parliamentary military officer, roundhead is a more precise disambiguation. -- PBS (talk) 11:37, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

Clearly every MP could be called a parliamentarian. We are using "Parliamentarian" (capitalised) as opposed to "Royalist" to described the two opposing sides in the civil war. This is the way they are properly designated. "roundhead" is a nasty slang term and has disgusting connotations.Motmit (talk) 17:58, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

Also see your earlier comment on by-pass redirect - why have you foisted this horrible term on the adequately described and differentiated names in the lists of MPs. Motmit (talk) 18:06, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

I do not keep you talk page on my watch list (so you need to post to my talk page if you wish to have a timely reply. Why is Roundhead a nasty slang term with disgusting connotations? Any more than Cavalier Whig or Tory? -- PBS (talk) 00:49, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

From the Oxford English Dictionary: Roundhead 1a "Brit. Hist. Usu. with capital initial. A member or adherent of the Parliamentary party during the English Civil War; = parliamentarian n. 2. Freq. contrasted with cavalier n. 3." -- PBS (talk) 01:04, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

See Talk:Edward Hungerford (roundhead) -- PBS (talk) 08:23, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
	You've been a huge asset to articles on British politicians on wikipedia. Keep up the great work! ♦ Dr. Blofeld 12:55, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Thank you very much for that note of appreciation. Motmit (talk) 18:24, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Template:Cite Notitia Parliamentaria

I have written a new template {{Cite Notitia Parliamentaria}} because I found it very difficult to find pages in the book Notitia Parliamentaria because it is divided up into two parts. In the documentation for the template I have included a section which lists the chapters in Part II of Notitia Parliamentaria they are under: Template:Cite Notitia Parliamentaria#List of parliaments with page numbers

You added some text to the Edward Hungerford (Roundhead) which says:

In 1614 he was elected Member of Parliament for Wootton Bassett in the Addled Parliament. He was elected M.P. for Chippenham in 1621 and for Wiltshire in 1624.

and the citation given is [Browne Willis Notitia parliamentaria, or, An history of the counties, cities, and boroughs in England and Wales: ... The whole extracted from mss. and printed evidences 1750 pp166-239] which unfortunately for me returns the first page of the book.

In the Addled Parliament which was the James I Second Parliament 1614, I think Edward was returned for Chippenham not Wootton Bassett ({{Cite Notitia Parliamentaria|part=2|page=174}}Willis, Browne (1750). Notitia Parliamentaria, Part II: A Series or Lists of the Representatives in the several Parliaments held from the Reformation 1541, to the Restoration 1660 ... London. p. 174.)

In James I Third Parliament (1621 NS -- Willis writing in 1750 places it in 1620 OS) Edward was returned for Chippenham ({{Cite Notitia Parliamentaria|part=2|page=184}}Willis, Browne (1750). Notitia Parliamentaria, Part II: A Series or Lists of the Representatives in the several Parliaments held from the Reformation 1541, to the Restoration 1660 ... London. p. 184.)

In James I Fourth Parliament (1624 NS 1623 OS) Edward was returned (as a Knight of the shire?) for Wiltshire ({{Cite Notitia Parliamentaria|part=2|page=195}}Willis, Browne (1750). Notitia Parliamentaria, Part II: A Series or Lists of the Representatives in the several Parliaments held from the Reformation 1541, to the Restoration 1660 ... London. p. 195.)

So I find this template useful I hope you will as well. --PBS (talk) 19:00, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for that - I am sure it will be very helpful as it is quite difficult to point to the right section. It used to be possible to type in a page number and get to the right page, but that doesnt work any more. Brown Willis on the Addled parliament is all to cock as is explained on the List of MPs elected in 1614 and some of his errors may not have been corrected. I am not using BW so much now that HOPO is available and am re-reffing when possible. The 1603-1659 section is due this year and that may consign BW to history. Regards Motmit (talk) 19:10, 5 April 2012 (UTC).

I have anticipated that. I included in the template a hidden category "Category:Wikipedia articles citing Notitia Parliamentaria" which will list those articles that use the template. This will allow such articles to be found easily so that Brown Willis can be replace with a more modern source like HOPO when one is available. -- PBS (talk) 08:06, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

I though you might have some of the approximately 700 pages on your watch list and notice that I have been busy!

My major reason for creating this template was because nearly all the references link by defaulted to the start of the book, and were given with a page range of either "pp229-239" or "pp166-239", which often did not correspond to the correct pages for the particular parliament and constituency that was being referenced. I have been through a few of articles and amended the page numbers eg List of MPs elected to the English parliament in 1640 (April), but in only one case have I altered the information contained in the article and that was Edward Hungerford (Roundhead) where I changed the constituency for the 1614 from Wootton Bassett to Chippenham, not because I think that Willis is right, but Willis was given as the source and Willis says Chippenham, if another source had been provided I would not have altered it.

Because I have done a mass conversion of the entries, I have created another category called Category:Wikipedia articles citing Notitia Parliamentaria that were auto-converted and need a page number check‎ so that on those days when we have nothing more interesting to do, we can go through them checking if the given page number is correct. If you do look at any, when the check is completed then please remove the parameter |converted=1 from the template and it will be moved into Category:Wikipedia articles citing Notitia Parliamentaria.

-- PBS (talk) 14:54, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

thx from Monmouthpedia

Sir Trevor Williams is one of ours .... thanks Victuallers (talk) 22:22, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

GTHFY - Hope you haven't deserted Derbs. Motmit (talk) 07:37, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Dead link in article 'Henry Fell Pease'

Hi. The article 'Henry Fell Pease' has a dead link that could not be repaired automatically. Can you help fix it?

Dead: http://www.durham.gov.uk/durhamcc/dre.nsf/DREDetail?readform&NAME=Darlington,+portrait+of+Henry+Fell+Pease&IMGID=M5740&PERSON=Pease,+Henry+Fell

• You added this in January 2009.
• The bot checked The Wayback Machine and WebCite but couldn't find a suitable replacement.

This link is marked with {{Dead link}} in the article. Please take a look at that article and fix what you can. Thank you!

PS- you can opt-out of these notifications by adding {{Bots|deny=BlevintronBot}} to your user page or user talk page. BlevintronBot (talk) 06:01, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

Parliament of England category

Just a reminder that for members of the Parliament of England prior to 1707, the category is named Category:Members of the Parliament of England (pre-1707), not "Members of the pre-1707 Parliament of England". — Paul A (talk) 03:29, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, but if the category clowns keep on changing category names that is their problem. Motmit (talk) 08:23, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

It's not their problem, that's the thing. It's the problem of the people who are having to spend time cleaning up after you, who are not the people responsible for the category name change. Injuring innocent third parties is a peculiarly ineffective and petty form of revenge. — Paul A (talk) 02:17, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

There is a bot which converts it automatically within 24 hours, so no one actually has to do anything they don't want to.

I concentrate entirely on adding articles or "clearing up" existing articles - which calls for considerable research skills and consumes a great deal of effort. I therefore don't have much time for categories, but I have no objection to others adding categories to my articles if they want to - in fact I have a regular follower who enjoys doing that. As a concession the category fans I do include some categories in my creation template, which happens to include this one. Rather than removing it, I am happy to let it stay, because before the bot kicks in it gives others a chance to pick up on my article and add categories if they choose to.

For the record, this is the second time within two years that this category name has been changed. The category discussion on this occasion was absurd but typical - Person A referred it to CFD suggesting another name. Person B dismissed Person A's suggestion and then suggested another name. An inconclusive discussion followed with several participants, of whom two agreed with Person B. Person C closed the discussion accepting Person B's suggestion. On this occasion, the change effectively shut down my watchlist and impacted on my article creation (and I am just about the only person populating it at the moment). This category contains about 3000 entries which probably shows it is pretty pointless anyway. Regards Motmit (talk) 12:36, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

When I thought you were having to remember the new category name each time you created an article, I had some sympathy. Now you say it's in a template, and I'm just bemused that you're apparently prepared to write a multiple-paragraph argument to avoid having to re-type the category name once. — Paul A (talk) 03:08, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

To be clear, I respect the effort you put into creating the articles, and I have sympathy for your annoyance at the category name flip-flopping. I don't see how deliberately using a broken category tag helps anybody. — Paul A (talk) 04:15, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Another turn of the charybdis

Within this thread Ephebi (talk) 00:54, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

Reaches

Motmit - you've moved the old weirs in Locks_and_weirs_on_the_River_Thames. I accept your point that reaches are normally above a lock - but the previous heading clearly identifies a reach below a lock. So there's an ambiguity. I used that because of the source I was using. So if you move the weirs you should also move the distances. Do you want to do it or shall I? Chris55 (talk) 14:41, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the extra links to ferries. I only linked what I thought were the 2 surviving ferries - do any of the others still work? I'll spell it out. (I've added Hammerton's Ferry.) The Raven's Ait ferry still goes over to the island but does it cross the river? Incidentally, I used Thacker's spellings throughout but it's probably better to use the recognized names. Some of them I don't have a clue about. e.g. the one between Abingdon and Nuneham I called Thrupp because that was the only identifiable house in the locality. Chris55 (talk) 11:11, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Original Barnstar
	Motmit - I noticed your new English politician articles and want to give you a barnstar of appreciation. Good job! Rosiestep (talk) 17:43, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

Thank you very much for that note of appreciation.

John Bingham (MP)

Perhaps your sources can sort this out, is the Governor of Guernsey listed as Colonel John Bingham (1651-1660), the same person as John Bingham (MP). The dates are about right, plus he is noted as a colonel. Googling find bios of the governor which don't mention him being an MP. Thanks. Tassedethe (talk) 22:35, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

And the sources referring to him as MP dont mention Guernsey - but there can only have been one Col John Bingham.

Wikipedia:Wikiproject Surrey

Hi,

I've refounded Wikipedia:Wikiproject Surrey and I saw you were a member of Wikipedia:Wikiproject Surrey. I was wondering, as you are a on the Participants List weather on not you would like to help improve more Surrey articles and make Wikipedia:Wikiproject Surrey and active Wikiproject again.

I hope you will come and help make Wikipedia: Wikiproject Surrey an active Wikiproject again.

Thanks, pbl1998--Pbl1998 (talk) 14:16, 7 June 2012 (UTC)

P.S. Either reply or Wikipedia:Wikiproject Surrey on my talk page.

File:Turpinscave.jpg

Hi. This photo does not have a clear source. It looks rather old. Are you the photographer? Perhaps you could mention the source/author on the file page. --MGA73 (talk) 20:03, 10 June 2012 (UTC)

And File:Inky.jpg :-) --MGA73 (talk) 20:04, 10 June 2012 (UTC)

Permission to ask a question

I see that you have more than 60K edits on Wikipedia, and I'm relatively new editor. I was wondering if I can ask you a question about your understanding of Wikipedia? (What and do and not to do a stuff??) I would really appreciate you willingness to guide me. The Determinator p t c 01:54, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

Thames Islands

I'd suggest using [os.openstreetmap.org OSOpenDataStreetView] over Wikimapia, The OS OpenData Streetview is supposed to be definitive. Sfan00 IMG (talk) 23:20, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

William Waller Member of Parliament for Westminster in 1679 and 1681

From the lead of Sir William Waller (informer) (informer is the one word descriptor in the DNB) "He was elected a Member of Parliament for Westminster in 1679 and 1681". The article on Middlesex (UK Parliament constituency) does not seem to include him. As our now resident expert on 17th century members of Parliament, please could you check your sources and fix which ever article is not correct. -- PBS (talk) 13:35, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. -- PBS (talk) 23:35, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

Succession boxes for baronetcies

Hi. Why are you adding succession boxes for baronetcies in peerage articles? I can't see the point in it. Tryde (talk) 16:32, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

Because the baronetcies annoyingly redirect to these peerages, and then baronets are listed under the peerages (and I can't see the point in that).Motmit (talk) 18:01, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

I can't see the problem in that. In the case of Saunderson Baronets this redirects to Earl Castleton as the holders were eventually elevated to that title. This gives a good overview of the family and their titles. If there were two Saunderson baronetcies created we would have a separate article with a link to Earl Castleton. This is the system that has been in place here for years. I can't see anything annoying about this. Also, what purpose do the succession boxes fill? Who is interested in the next baronetcy created after the Saunderson baronetcy for instance? I have never seen succession boxes in peerage or baronetcy articles before so please stop adding them. Tryde (talk) 19:08, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

Look I am trying to improve coverage of baronets in this encyclopedia and it is really useful to be able to step through them page by page as one can in the sources I am using. I have already added two missing baronetcies in the first year's creations. "This is the system that has been in place for years" is a classically poor argument and sorry to disillusion you, but frankly these articles are in considerable need of improvement. Thanks to my efforts they are also starting to have a decent online reference. As for "I have never seen succession boxes in baronetcy articles so please stop adding them" - well time to open your eyes and mind and move on I think. Are you with me in this, as you seem to be the only other person I have come across with a positive attitude to baronets? Motmit (talk) 21:42, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

I think it's great that you're improving sources and adding missing baronetcies - I have never said these articles are not in need of improvement. However, I don't think the succession boxes are a good idea. I can't see how anyone would be interested in what order baronetcies were created and they will fill very little purpose. What happens when you get to for instance Williams Baronets - will you have twenty succession boxes in that article? And will you add succession boxes for peerages as well? Please think again about adding them. Tryde (talk) 17:33, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

Hugh Courtenay (MP)

Do you still have the sources you used to create the article Hugh Courtenay (MP) because the last two paragraphs do not have citations and they contain quotation. -- PBS (talk) 17:32, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

George Wild

Hi Motmit. I'm a little concerned to see its a while since there's been much on this page, does this mean you are resting on your laurels? Today I found that a new part of the History of Parliament is online and have started checking. I began with George Wylde but Wikipedia would only turn up his son. It seems this is because he is still listed as George Wild.

So I'm writing to tell you about it rather than going myself to change the name Wild to Wylde. The man's memorial, will and now HoP all agree his name (or if you wish primary name) is Wylde and a WP search does not turn him up though Wylde is within his article so I think his article name has to be changed. Can you do that (if you agree) otherwise would you mind letting me know what your thoughts are? Best regards, Eddaido (talk) 06:33, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

Hi Ed. I have been taking it a bit easier, and that is partly because the impending arrival of the next section of HOPO meant my research skills for many obscure MPs were no longer called for. Anyone can now pick up and create an article from HOPO. Also my watchlist was becoming so cluttered with the activity of BOTs, dambiggers, deck chair movers and obsessive compulsives that I couldn't really keep up any more. Anyway I have a fairly fulfilling time in the real world at the moment. Probably a few months down the line I will start tidying up one of the parliaments again. Best regards Motmit (talk) 20:41, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

WP:SURREY and Award of Recognition

We would like to recognise your recent work with regards to the above project and as a Wikignome.

	Chelsea Buns for informed research on the River Thames
	Your research of reliable sources related to the River Thames and Middlesex show a high level of scholarly diligence. Adam 37 (talk) 12:38, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

Thank you very much for the appreciation. I am glad to see that thanks to your efforts, the Surrey Project has become active again. Motmit (talk) 08:03, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

Alan Clark

... continues to be a bit of a graffiti wall on the talk page. Any ideas apart from keeping an eye on? If there was substance to this suggestion it would have been front and centre of the media storm at the time so I can't see how it is valid to throw around now --Zymurgy (talk) 10:57, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

Happy Parliament / Coke quotation

Hello Motmit, you attributed the term "Happy Parliament" to Sir Edward Coke and provided a source too... well not a complete one since you unfortunately did not give a page number. Could you please add that information? I have been unable to find it in the book. Thank you very much! --Eistreter (talk) 08:51, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

That was a long time ago and I have no idea now. Motmit (talk) 18:41, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

I found another edition and have included the details in the article. I have also left an list of his other names at Talk:List of Parliaments of England#Sir Edward Cokes names -- PBS (talk) 11:22, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

List for 1659 Rump Parliament

While looking for something else I came across a list of MPs recalled to the restored Rump and thought you might be interested:

• The Parliamentary Or Constitutional History of England: Being a Faithful Account of All the Most Remarkable Transactions in Parliament, from the Earliest Times; Collected from the Journals of Both Houses, the Records, Original Manuscripts, Scarce Speeches, and Tracts; All Compared with the Several Contemporary Writers, and Connected, Throughout, with the History of the Times, vol. 21, T. Osborne and W. Sandby, 1760, pp. 372–376

Page 376 concludes "total Number 91" and then adds details of the numbers who took their seats. -- PBS (talk) 11:22, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Original Barnstar
	For making so many articles on MPs. (I've added sections to many) 75* 01:01, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Possibly unfree File:Turpinscave.jpg

A file that you uploaded or altered, File:Turpinscave.jpg, has been listed at Wikipedia:Possibly unfree files because its copyright status is unclear or disputed. If the file's copyright status cannot be verified, it may be deleted. You may find more information on the file description page. You are welcome to add comments to its entry at the discussion if you object to the listing for any reason. Thank you. Sfan00 IMG (talk) 23:04, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

Possibly unfree File:Inky.jpg

A file that you uploaded or altered, File:Inky.jpg, has been listed at Wikipedia:Possibly unfree files because its copyright status is unclear or disputed. If the file's copyright status cannot be verified, it may be deleted. You may find more information on the file description page. You are welcome to add comments to its entry at the discussion if you object to the listing for any reason. Thank you. Sfan00 IMG (talk) 00:36, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Wargrave Boating Club

The article Wargrave Boating Club has been proposed for deletion because of the following concern:

Not notable per WP:CORP. The onpy sources are the subject's own website and a local history society website.

While all constructive contributions to Wikipedia are appreciated, content or articles may be deleted for any of several reasons.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{proposed deletion/dated}} notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Removing {{proposed deletion/dated}} will stop the proposed deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. In particular, the speedy deletion process can result in deletion without discussion, and articles for deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 17:56, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

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Nomination of Skiff (sailing) for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether the article Skiff (sailing) is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Skiff (sailing) until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article. Malcolmxl5 (talk) 17:39, 29 February 2016 (UTC)

Europe 10,000 Challenge invite

Hi. The Wikipedia:WikiProject Europe/The 10,000 Challenge has recently started, based on the UK/Ireland Wikipedia:The 10,000 Challenge. The idea is not to record every minor edit, but to create a momentum to motivate editors to produce good content improvements and creations and inspire people to work on more countries than they might otherwise work on. There's also the possibility of establishing smaller country or regional challenges for places like Germany, Italy, the Benelux countries, Iberian Peninsula, Romania, Slovenia etc, much like Wikipedia:The 1000 Challenge (Nordic). For this to really work we need diversity and exciting content and editors from a broad range of countries regularly contributing. If you would like to see masses of articles being improved for Europe and your specialist country like Wikipedia:WikiProject Africa/The Africa Destubathon, sign up today and once the challenge starts a contest can be organized. This is a way we can target every country of Europe, and steadily vastly improve the encyclopedia. We need numbers to make this work so consider signing up as a participant and also sign under any country sub challenge on the page that you might contribute to! Thank you. --MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:09, 7 November 2016 (UTC)

Welcome back!

Good that you are editing here again. Charles Matthews (talk) 10:31, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

MPs from the 18th century - good work! You may find it useful to know that, thanks to the efforts of User:Andrew Gray with the History of Parliament, they all have existing Wikidata entries, starting from 1689. Charles Matthews (talk) 07:06, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Copyright problem on Humphrey Minchin

Material you included in the above article appears to have been copied from the copyright web page http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1790-1820/member/minchin-humphrey-1727-96. Copying text directly from a source is a copyright violation. Unfortunately, for copyright reasons, the content had to be removed. Please leave a message on my talk page if you have any questions or if you think I made a mistake. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 14:24, 15 October 2017 (UTC)

October 2017

Your addition to Anthony Eyre (Nottinghamshire MP) has been removed, as it appears to have added copyrighted material to Wikipedia without evidence of permission from the copyright holder. If you are the copyright holder, please read Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials for more information on uploading your material to Wikipedia. For legal reasons, Wikipedia cannot accept copyrighted material, including text or images from print publications or from other websites, without an appropriate and verifiable license. All such contributions will be deleted. You may use external websites or publications as a source of information, but not as a source of content, such as sentences or images—you must write using your own words. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously and persistent violators will be blocked from editing. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 21:01, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

The material was all public domain information and there are not that many variations in the presentation of basic facts that can be made.Motmit (talk) 22:49, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

The prose was copied from here, which is not released under a compatible license. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 14:30, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

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Shipley Hall

Hi, I note you created the Shipley Hall article, I tend to create country parks so I was thinking about moving this article to Shipley Country Park and having the hall as a section of history. I'm not wholly sure this would be the best thing to do though but it seems sensible enough as the country park exists and the hall is a historical part of its history. I probably couldn't have a subsection in this historical article about a current living thing - the country park - because it would be too confusing to readers so if you don't want it moved I could just create a new article, What do you think?

Yes that's fine, I'll create a separate article in a day or two. Szzuk (talk) 18:55, 15 August 2018 (UTC)

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Henry Finch

Your new submission for Henry Finch says he was a Groom of the Bedchamber from 1742. Surely that honour belonged to his brother Edward? Plucas58 (talk) 00:27, 16 December 2018 (UTC)

• That is based on the 1754-1790 HoP. Perhaps they made a mistake.Motmit (talk) 07:22, 16 December 2018 (UTC)
  • I see what you mean. Confusingly they also attribute the post to his brother at https://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1754-1790/member/finch-%28afterwards-finch-hatton%29-hon-edward-1697-1771 Plucas58 (talk) 12:48, 16 December 2018 (UTC)

Copying within Wikipedia requires attribution

Thank you for your contributions to Wikipedia. It appears that you copied or moved text from one or more pages into Bridewell and Bethlehem Hospitals. While you are welcome to re-use Wikipedia's content, here or elsewhere, Wikipedia's licensing does require that you provide attribution to the original contributor(s). When copying within Wikipedia, this is supplied at minimum in an edit summary at the page into which you've copied content, disclosing the copying and linking to the copied page, e.g., copied content from [[page name]]; see that page's history for attribution. It is good practice, especially if copying is extensive, to also place a properly formatted {{copied}} template on the talk pages of the source and destination. The attribution has been provided for this situation, but if you have copied material between pages before, even if it was a long time ago, please provide attribution for that duplication. You can read more about the procedure and the reasons at Wikipedia:Copying within Wikipedia. Thank you. If you are the sole author of the prose that was copied, attribution is not required. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 15:40, 27 December 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia and copyright

Hello Motmit, and welcome to Wikipedia. Your additions to James Vernon have been removed in whole or in part, as they appear to have added copyrighted content without evidence that the source material is in the public domain or has been released by its owner or legal agent under a suitably-free and compatible copyright license. (To request such a release, see Wikipedia:Requesting copyright permission.) While we appreciate your contributions to Wikipedia, there are certain things you must keep in mind about using information from sources to avoid copyright and plagiarism issues.

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• Aside from limited quotation, you must put all information in your own words and structure, in proper paraphrase. Following the source's words too closely can create copyright problems, so it is not permitted here; see Wikipedia:Close paraphrasing. (There is a college-level introduction to paraphrase, with examples, hosted by the Online Writing Lab of Purdue.) Even when using your own words, you are still, however, asked to cite your sources to verify the information and to demonstrate that the content is not original research.
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• Also note that Wikipedia articles may not be copied or translated without attribution. If you want to copy or translate from another Wikipedia project or article, you must follow the copyright attribution steps in Wikipedia:Translation#How to translate. See also Wikipedia:Copying within Wikipedia.

It's very important that contributors understand and follow these practices, as policy requires that people who persistently do not must be blocked from editing. If you have any questions about this, you are welcome to leave me a message on my talk page. Thank you. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 14:31, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

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email sent

I hve sent you an email requesting help re Edward Clarke LowePennychestnut (talk) 14:03, 29 April 2020 (UTC)

Swift Ditch pound lock pictures

Hi Momit.

Abingdon Swift Ditch - remains of old 17C pound lock

I visited the head of the Swift Ditch yesterday to look for the remains of the old pound lock. I took this photo:

Of the two outflows from the Thames, this structure is on the upstream one. Your pictures with their captions in the article Swift Ditch say the pound lock was on the outflow that is downstream of this. A mistake perhaps? I know there is one map that claims that the lock was where the weir is now, but I am sure it is wrong. One would expect the lock entrance to be narrower than the weir, as is the case with the upstraem outflow. I plan to replace your picture with this one. --TedColes (talk) 10:28, 18 March 2021 (UTC)

Nomination of Slopseller for deletion

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Roxy . wooF 19:15, 19 May 2021 (UTC)

Nomination of Michael Allen (cricketer) for deletion

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Nomination of Eysey Footbridge for deletion

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JMWt (talk) 08:17, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

Nomination of Water Eaton House Bridge for deletion

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JMWt (talk) 08:20, 12 October 2023 (UTC)