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GA Sweeps June update

Thanks to everyone's dedicated efforts to the GA Sweeps process, a total of 396 articles were swept in May! That more than doubles our most successful month of 163 swept articles in September 2007 (and the 2 articles swept in April)! I plan to be sending out updates at the beginning of each month detailing any changes, updates, or other news until Sweeps are completed. So if you get sick of me, keep reviewing articles so we can be done (and then maybe you'll just occasionally bump into me). We are currently over 60% done with Sweeps, with just over a 1,000 articles left to review. With over 40 members, that averages out to about 24 articles per person. If each member reviews an article a day this month (or several!), we'll be completely finished. I know that may be asking for a lot, but it would allow us to complete Sweeps and allow you to spend more time writing GAs, reviewing GANs, or focusing on other GARs (or whatever else it is you do to improve Wikipedia) as well as finish ahead of the two-year mark coming up in August. I recognize that this can be a difficult process at times and appreciate your tenacity in spending time in ensuring the quality of the older GAs. Feel free to recruit other editors who have reviewed GANs in the past and might be interested in the process. The more editors, the less the workload, and hopefully the faster this will be completed. If you have any questions about reviews or the process let me know and I'll be happy to get back to you. Again, thank you for taking the time to help with the process, I appreciate your efforts! --Happy editing! Nehrams2020 (talk • contrib) 18:17, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

WP:CENT

I think you have to manually add remove entries to the archives (that's what I did anyway). I could be wrong. - Jarry1250 ^{(t, c)} 08:59, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Oh, that's interesting. I have added and removed various items from CENT and not done that. I wasn't even aware of it. It's a good resource. Thanks for the heads up. SilkTork *^YES! 14:13, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

sorry

• Hi SilkTork. Sorry about that "Dammit, I want a lid on that woman's mouth!" bit. You omitted a crucial piece of info that caused mt to completely misread your intent. Ling.Nut (talk) 09:22, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

No problems at all. We can only respond to what we see. SilkTork *^YES! 14:06, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Still, I suppose i could learn the value of "counting to ten" and "asking for clarification" :-P Ling.Nut (talk) 14:15, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Van Morrison

Hey SK - The assessment is done. Check it out. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Van_Morrison/GA2 Cheers,

--Scott Free (talk) 18:42, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. Your efforts have been much appreciated. SilkTork *^YES! 18:45, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

quadrupel

Hi. Thanks for your message. Unfortunately the problem is more the editor than the specific issue. He has defaced many of the Belgian beer articles and then edit-warred to prevent undoing, etc., etc. He claims to know Belgian beer, but he doesn't. He needs to be banned from the beer articles. Mikebe (talk) 13:05, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

A topic ban is something that the ArbCom considers. See Wikipedia:Editing restrictions. And the ArbCom would require evidence of an attempt to resolve the issue. The first steps in resolving the issue are negotiations with the other editor(s) to agree the best way forward. Negotiations are not edit wars and reverts and personal attacks, but an attempt to understand the viewpoint of the other editor. If negotiations break down, or don't make progress, then the next step is Mediation. There has been some discussion already, and it appears that no progress is being made, so Mediation is the next step. On the whole we don't block or ban editors because another editor disagrees with them. Disagreements are the backbone of Wikipedia. I feel that articles which have been through debate and negotiation by editors with differing viewpoints tend to be more balanced. And what we wish to produce is balanced articles well supported by reliable sources.

My own view on the issue is that Quadrupel is a brand name used by several breweries. The first use of the term appears to be by Koningshoeven. The brand name is being used to loosely describe a strong ale in the Belgian style, along with the term Abt. This is much the same as ESB was a brand name used for a Premium Ale in the UK by various breweries, and when Fullers ESB was exported to the USA, the term ESB was used in place of Premium Ale. The whole nature of "beer styles" is difficult as there is nothing officially prescribed. Articles which discuss beer styles need to be flexible and accept that with a few exceptions, there is nothing definitive. What needs to be done is to collect the available material on the subject and use that in the articles. It is not helpful to anyone for people to be making unsourced statements on this subject. Sources such as this and this are helpful. SilkTork *^YES! 14:51, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for your response and helpful suggestions. I think that balanced articles work better in opinion articles. For example, film or restaurant reviews. I don't think an encyclopedia is a place, for example, to have an article about evolution and then have a religious fanatic say that this is nonsense. Or, in an article about abortion another religious view that it is a sin. Likewise, beer is more or less science - that it, whether it tastes good may be a matter of opinion but facts about its history or composition are surely facts. Your view of quadrupel is quite correct. The only thing I would add is that the foreign breweries that use it as a brand name do so for commercial purposes. I don't know if you read Ron P.'s blog, but one thing about it that I find quite important is that he uses primarily local sources. Ron and I both read Dutch and German. Surely documents about beer written in those languages are more likely to be accurate. The books you cited above are both filled with errors. (i.e., there are six Belgian Trappist monasteries, not five). A much better source is this: http://shrinkify.com/j74 (I have the Dutch version, there is none in English). This book is quite scholarly and, needless to say, extremely accurate. Peter Jones "proved" his quadrupel claim with a personal blog (American) which, as you know, is not at all acceptable in Wikipedia. There is a wealth of misinformation about beer (and other things) on the Internet. The Wikipedia beer articles are largely ignored or ridiculed by knowledgeable people (I'm speaking from personal experience). I'd like to try to change that. Mikebe (talk) 16:51, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

Check out Creation–evolution controversy and related articles! The notion of a balanced view is central to Wikipedia - it is one of our core policies. See Wikipedia:Neutral point of view and Wikipedia:Five pillars. I agree that many of our articles could be improved, including beer related ones. And including ones I wrote when I first starting writing articles on Wikipedia when there was not so much concern about using reliable sources. I am very aware that there are a number of rather contentious beer style articles on Wikipedia, and that this has not been appropriately dealt with. It may be that what is needed is to go through the beer style articles and remove anything contentious that does not have a reliable source. This would likely mean that most of the content would be removed - but so be it. We can't continue having edit wars over personal opinions. Wikipedia intends to be a reliable and informed summary of existing knowledge - not a repository of personal opinions and theories! We accept foreign language sources - though we prefer English sources. See WP:NONENG. As for the errors - well, the books were both originally written before 1998, so they were correct at the time. Regards SilkTork *^YES! 18:15, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

This is turning into a very interesting discussion. Would you mind continuing by email? If so, shall I get your address from Ron? Mikebe (talk) 20:23, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

You've already emailed me successfully. That's why I got involved in this dispute. SilkTork *^YES! 22:00, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

Two Brothers Brewing

Hi Pontificalibus. I semi-protected the Two Brothers Brewing due to disruptive edits by an IP. You then requested the article was unprotected, so it was. The IP has again deleted large sections of the article, so I have again protected it. I do feel that giving the article semi-protection for a week is appropriate in the circumstances as the IP is not responding to negotiations and warnings. Without protection of the article the likely outcome is that the IP will get blocked. Semi-protection at least allows the IP to continue discussion on the article talkpage and on the talkpage of WikiProject Beer. If you feel my action is inappropriate let me know, and we can perhaps decide on an alternative approach. Regards SilkTork *^YES! 10:42, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I'm sorry but your semi-protection of this page does not conform to policy. As only 1 IP is involved, they can be blocked and discussion about their contributions can continue on their talk page, which they would still be able to edit. Preventing every IP from editing the page is not a proportional or necessary outcome. --Pontificalibus (talk) 11:04, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I don't follow your interpretation of the Semi-protection policy, though I do understand that the alternative to semi-protecting the article for seven days is to wait until the disruption has reached a point where the IP is blocked. Given that all the IP edits of the article since it was created have been vandalism, it appears more reasonable and appropriate and causes less drama and conflict to protect the article against IP edits for a short while, and allow the person who feels that the article is inappropriate to make comments where they will be viewed. The IP's own talkpage is out of sight and out of mind, and so is not, to my mind, a reasonable and appropriate forum to discuss the article. My thinking here is to be as reasonable as possible, and not create a situation where a person is blocked, nor where an article is continually disrupted. SilkTork *^YES! 16:19, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

On the article it's appears there is you and the 2 others own [WP:OWN]] the article and my even have economic interest in it. The article is in violation of numerous Wikipeida policy WP:OWN WP:NOT WP:NOTADVERTISING

My contention is this place is not that special, there are hundreds of local micro brewerys in the Chicago area, and in fact, It's not unusual to get good press if you advertise heavily in the food section of the Trib and the Daily Harald. I this this article is a shameful example of wiki for economic gain.Greenbreww (talk) 18:49, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Dakota Malting and Brewing Company

The article Dakota Malting and Brewing Company now has some references. You may want to revisit Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Dakota Malting and Brewing Company -- Eastmain (talk) 02:40, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. I have left some comments there. SilkTork *^YES! 09:39, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Blood of Angels infobox for Michelle Belanger

Would you be adverse to sharing views on if the album info box for the Blood of Angels album should be included in the main article? Ebonyskye has been adding it, under the impression that you recommend including it in the main article. DragonflySixtyseven has been removing it off the article without participating in the discussion that was started: Talk:Michelle_Belanger#Merging_album_page.--SiIIyLiIIyPiIIy (talk) 20:18, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Actually, DragonflySixtyseven removed both the author and the album info boxes and several refs associated with them. I replaced them until we can discuss the matter. I knew this would be an issue and that's why I voted to keep the album page as it was. When somethings not broke, don't fix it.. that's my belief. Ebonyskye (talk) 05:22, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

RfC on reliable sources for Eurovision articles

A second RfC has been started on sourcing for Eurovision articles, you can view it at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Eurovision#RfC on reliable sources for Eurovision articles. You are being notified as you are specifically mentioned on the list of events relating to the dispute at least once. The list is intended to be factual to help focus discussion, please point out any errors or omissions. You are free to participate in the debate if you wish. Camaron · Christopher · talk 16:29, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Belanger

The article is not being vandalized. However, it is getting a lot of spam inserted in it by anons who are, one suspects, closely affiliated with the subject of the article.

Lots of self-promotional stuff. Lots of stuff about the article subject's self-published/vanity-press material. Stuff that has to be repeatedly excised from the article.

Thus it's semi-protected. DS (talk) 21:22, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Two IP accounts have edited the article. 173.88.195.71 made this edit, which remains in the article. The other IP is 208.125.152.228, who appears to have been making good faith edits. If there is an issue with the sourcing that should be taken up directly with that IP account. If that IP account is found to be violating policy and won't respond to discussion, then warnings should be issued, and if those are ignored, then the IP account should be blocked. There is no general vandalism taking place, and IP edits like this appear to be in good faith, and are not potentially contentious or defamatory. Concerns about spam are addressed with warnings first - see Wikipedia:Spam#Warning_spammers - though I'm not convinced that there is a spamming issue here. I agree that some of the sources are questionable, though that's a matter for discussion, not blocking the editor, nor preventing all other IP accounts editing the article for the rest of the year.

You made one edit to undo the work of 208.125.152.228, and you undid the work of two registered accounts at the same time, restoring poor quality material. I don't see you or anyone else "repeatedly" removing the work of IP accounts, and I don't see the sense in removing page references from cites, nor in replacing Winter's Knight with Winter's_Knight, which had been corrected by User:BD2412, another admin - hardly a vandal. That edit of yours is of questionable quality. I would ask you to re-examine your recent actions in this article. SilkTork *^YES! 23:43, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

The vanity press items that were included were included in the bibliography of Belanger’s works. Since the author wrote those items, and the references are not being used to support claims about the author or another topic, it is possible that IP 208.125.152.228 did not see why there is so much concern about including all published items in a section listing an author's works. Particularly since there is no policy on what can and cannot be included a bibliography section for authors.

As for the suspicion of IP 208.125.152.228 being affiliated with the author, I believe this is the first mention of such a concern. If there is some other undocumented discussions over concerns about that IP occurring, than that has the potential of that bringing up greater concerns over the transparency of admin actions. If specific edits by IP 208.125.152.228 have been promotional, than they are best discussed on the talk page. Otherwise, other editors don't know what concerns there are, why they are concerns and might start doubting the neutrality of the process and the administration.--SiIIyLiIIyPiIIy (talk) 16:44, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

Infoboxes

Hi SilkTork, Lovely-looking baby! Going through the history of Wikipedia:Manual of Style (infoboxes) I found this diff of an edit by All Hallow's Wraith who claims "reverted to older description - change was evidently done without consensus". Conversely, I find no consensus for boxes being placed at top and right-aligned. In the original proposal on 10 March 2006 by Kirill Lokshin he writes "Infobox templates are a broad group of templates commonly used at the top of an article", this observation later becomes a rigid foundation stone of the infobox ethos and is seemingly not supported by consensus. I'd like to hear your views on the matter. Rotational (talk) 08:37, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

There was some discussion about the placing of infoboxes in the top right of articles. It was thought by those involved in the discussions that infoboxes could be intrusive in the lead section, but that long term usage implied a wide consensus. I will see if I can dig up those discussions. SilkTork *^YES! 18:55, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Discussions: [1] and [2]. There may be others. SilkTork *^YES! 19:13, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks!

Hi SilkTork,

Thanks for confirming you willingness to be on my panel of mentors/advisers. And thanks most of all for your well-reasoned support during the arbitration. I have learned a great deal from you and from observing how you handle situations. Your involvement in my problem has been immensely uplifting to me and showed me a road to an improved future for me on Wikipedia.

I have confidence in the judgment of my mentors/advisers, and I hope I am not being overly optimistic in thinking that my days of unfortunate behavior are over for good.

Regards, —Mattisse (Talk) 17:08, 28 June 2009 (UTC)