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Whoot!

The da Vinci Barnstar
Congratulations on the successful completion of User:VWBot. Moonriddengirl (talk) 17:10, 16 August 2010 (UTC)


I cannot tell you on how many levels we got lucky when you decided to pitch in with copyright cleanup on Wikipedia. :D --Moonriddengirl (talk) 17:10, 16 August 2010 (UTC)
Second the barnstar :) - Kingpin13 (talk) 17:12, 16 August 2010 (UTC)
Thanks both! Now I just need to sit on my urge to continue tweaking the code every day or two. VernoWhitney (talk) 17:20, 16 August 2010 (UTC)
I second what Moonriddengirl said. Now there's only one thing left: Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/VernoWhitney. :) Theleftorium (talk) 17:21, 16 August 2010 (UTC)
Thanks. While adminship would be nice, I think I'll still hold off on the whole RFA hoopla for a while yet and stick with what I've been doing (and of course thinking of devious things my brand new assistant could do). VernoWhitney (talk) 18:26, 17 August 2010 (UTC)
Just wanted to echo the users above about what a great job you're doing with copyright cleanup. I also would like to see you with a mop in hand ;) so whenever you're ready I'll be happy to be your nominator. -- œ 07:56, 29 August 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for your support, I really appreciate it. ^_^ VernoWhitney (talk) 18:27, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

Sanford J. Ungar new content

Thanks for verifying the OTRS. I'm concerned about your reversion to that form however. Even though it's wiki-legal now (I trusted author's claim), I had still later reverted the wholesale replacement on strictly editorial grounds. Reverting a WP:BOLD complete rewrite. Are you saying that the rewrite, "which is now usable" on OTRS grounds but needs work to fit article standard guidelines, is a better content now than what was there (which was already better MOS/etc)? DMacks (talk) 14:06, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

Well, for future reference you shouldn't trust the author's claim, you should direct them to Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials. Anyways, I think your version including some of the material from their contributions would probably be the best. You are certainly correct that their contributed material is not very encyclopedic. I try not to get involved in content/MOS issues when I'm doing OTRS work, but in order to be able to honestly tell them that their contribution has been accepted, I feel obligated to at least have it up at the time that I reply to them unless the material is completely hopeless (i.e., speedily deletable). I hope that explains why I did it, and I have no problems if you just want to revert to the version you had previously up. I'm sorry for any inconvenience I caused you. VernoWhitney (talk) 14:15, 28 August 2010 (UTC)
No worries! I have reasons that I can't state on-wiki why I trusted this particular user's copyright/permission claim (I'm usually appropriately more wary of them:) DMacks (talk) 18:49, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

Take a look...

Take a look at this version of the page in question. I've gone over the page, and sections which I identified as copyright violations were rewritten or removed. You can see the changes through the history of that page, or in a different format at User:Jeff3000/Sandbox6. When I looked through the page looking for copyright violations, I noticed that the vast majority of the page is not referenced by the link in question, and given my changes in the version linked I do believe I have addressed most of the issues. Any remaining issues should be removed as line-items rather than a wholesale blanking of the page. Please let me know your thoughts. Regards, -- Jeff3000 (talk) 01:57, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

I appreciate your efforts to rewrite the article. I do believe, however, that there are still issues which need to be resolved before the article is restored. As I said before, I believe we have to operate under the presumption that everything in the foundation of the article is a copyright violation, regardless of source. At a first run through I notice that the last paragraph in the "Russian ties" section of your rewrite is still essentially material contributed by AdibMasumian. I haven't looked through it all yet, so I'll try to look over more of it tomorrow. I've also notified an admin copyright expert of the situation with this article, so she may weigh in with additional insight if she has time. VernoWhitney (talk) 02:34, 29 August 2010 (UTC)
I disagree with your logic. I've gone through the article and compared the contents to the link in question, and changed those portions that are similar to the link and all you can say is that that's not good enough. You need to provide specific examples. Also you didn't ask Moonriddengril for their opinion, but rather to "watch" over is so that you can push your view rather than actually providing for specific examples. I'm going to fix the last paragraph, and you should at that time remove line items, as the rest of the article is just fine. Regards, -- Jeff3000 (talk) 04:10, 29 August 2010 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but have I not been clear that it's not just that one link that is in question but everything that AdibMasumian contributed? VernoWhitney (talk) 04:12, 29 August 2010 (UTC)
So where does it come from? Also the last paragraph of the Russian ties section you note comes from the link in question, doesn't. You need to be more careful with your assertions. Regards, -- Jeff3000 (talk)

Look at this diff [1]. It's the last version edited by AdibMasumian, and the version just before the blanking. If you have a diff tool that is better than Wikipedia's, such as the one that comes with the popups tool, you'll notice that most of the diff is either read (meaning text is gone) or green (meaning new text is added). There is very little text that is grey meaning the text is the same. Some of those I've already removed in my edits in my sandbox, and I can remove the rest as well, but regardless my assertion is that his original text that is remaining is more original research, than anything, and has since been refereced. Regads, --- Jeff3000 (talk) 04:27, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

As to where it's from, I'd have to do more searching and probably track down some library books, but it's almost certainly from somewhere. See here if you doubt that they tend heavily towards copying material. Even without a definite source, per Wikipedia:Copyright violations, "If contributors have been shown to have a history of extensive copyright violation, it may be assumed without further evidence that all of their major contributions are copyright violations, and they may be removed indiscriminately". Even if their material has since been referenced, how it is said should not remain the same, because that is where the copyright resides, not in the facts themselves. VernoWhitney (talk) 04:33, 29 August 2010 (UTC)
But look at the diff, I mentioned above. Virtually none of the material in his last edit remains. Regards, -- Jeff3000 (talk) 04:34, 29 August 2010 (UTC)
I did. I'm afraid I'm just relying on Wikipedia's diff, but I still see plenty of sentences and phrases which remain mixed in with added and changed material...which is why I blanked the whole article. VernoWhitney (talk) 04:38, 29 August 2010 (UTC)
Go to User:Preferences, and enable WikiEd. Then when you look at the diff of an article, at the bottom of the diff, there is a button that looks like a triangle that gives you a better diff, and you'll see not much remains from the AdibMasumian's page, and I'm going to remove the last vestiges tonight. Regards, -- Jeff3000 (talk) 04:52, 29 August 2010 (UTC)
Look at this diff between the last version that AdibMasumian touched and the latest version in my Sandbox. If you can enabled the WikiEd gadget as I explained above by going to User:Preferences and selecting gadgets, and use the better diff. You will notice that other that references, and proper nouns, there is virtually nothing left from the original version. Regards, -- Jeff3000 (talk) 06:27, 29 August 2010 (UTC)
Well, everything looks clean now, including your new additions. And as you may have noticed, the reason I asked Moonriddengirl to watch the article, was not to push my view, but because she is simply better than I am at separating the usable from the unusable content. Cheers! VernoWhitney (talk) 18:25, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

Numbered parameters

Hi, just to remind you that if a template parameter contains an equals sign, numbered parameters must be explicitly stated, i.e. 1=something-containing-an-equals-sign=. I've therefore fixed your template here. Given your contribution history I assume you simply forgot or overlooked it, but I thought I'd let you know anyway. GiftigerWunsch [TALK] 22:28, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

Yup, just overlooked it. I don't normally expect '=' in article titles, so I didn't even think about it. Thanks for fixing it. VernoWhitney (talk) 22:30, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

hi..

thank you for the info....im a new user..still learning —Preceding unsigned comment added by Smartspy (talkcontribs) 22:46, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

No worries, and it's all fixed now. Thanks for helping out! VernoWhitney (talk) 23:35, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

Conk 9

As far as I can tell, all of the images from Conk 9 that have been moved to commons are at commons:Commons:Deletion requests/Files by Conk 9. I compiled that list by searching for "Conk 9" in all of commons. I don't know if there's a more technical way to getting that list. Thanks! --GrapedApe (talk) 03:51, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

Okay, I was just hoping it was some nifty trick I could set up which wouldn't get false positives with more common usernames. And yeah, I probably will comment but I want to take time to look at the images first. VernoWhitney (talk) 03:55, 27 August 2010 (UTC)
I set out a preliminary list of images at this CCI that ought to be deleted--those without EXIF data. What should be my next step in this? (This is my first CCI, so I'm not sure what else to do.)--GrapedApe (talk) 19:14, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
Well, one of the copyright admins who works CCI will come along eventually and delete those you've identified or we can make one giant PUF listing for them. As to the rest, I'm afraid I've just been swamped with real life recently so I still haven't looked at any of it. Most likely they simply get looked at one by one and marked as good (such as non-free and tagged as such, or with a verifiable source), or certainly bad if we can find duplicates online via some variety of image search. The ones left in the middle, well - it probably depends how many others are confirmed to be copyvios. <shrug> VernoWhitney (talk) 01:25, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

Marketing process outsourcing

An interesting case of Marketing process outsourcing first I declined the delete because of OTRS pending, then it was labelled spam and I deleted it without the reason being filled in. The reason would alsost certainly be because it was highly promotional of the topic. I have no prejudice against recreating the article, but as it stood there was very little worth keeping. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:40, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

Okay, can you put that in the deletion log so I have that to point to instead of just this conversation? Say by restoring it and deleting it under G11? Alternatively, if you'll just restore it I can add the OTRS tag and see if another admin feels it should be deleted. VernoWhitney (talk) 22:59, 28 August 2010 (UTC)
OK I have restored it for another admin to decide. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 10:15, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
Thanks, I guess we have our answer now. Cheers! VernoWhitney (talk) 11:37, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

The two additions you took down on Aug 31, 2010 will be re-submitted after editing. The appearance of copyright violation may be because I copy/pasted portions of articles I or colleagues in the field have written (with permission). —Preceding unsigned comment added by FernandoTorres (talkcontribs) 17:59, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

If you wish to restore the content I removed, you need to follow the steps listed at Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials. If you or your colleagues do not wish to donate your copyrighted works as outlined there, please be sure to rewrite the text sufficiently so that it would no longer infringe upon the original material. Thank you. VernoWhitney (talk) 19:07, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

Restored, although I think any admin will re-delete as spam, as soon as requisite OTRS approval is added. Kimchi.sg (talk) 04:41, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks! I see what you mean about spam, but copyvio was the listed reason for deletion and that's been resolved, so they at least get another go at it. Cheers. VernoWhitney (talk) 04:56, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

Re Eclectikan

Hello, VernoWhitney. You have new messages at Sandahl's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.
Cool editnotice btw.—Sandahl (talk) 01:38, 2 September 2010 (UTC)

Hi VernoWhitney. Hope all is well. If it's not too much trouble and when you have time, could you please look into the OTRS permission for a "File:RayLawrenceAndHisOrchestra.jpg"? The uploader claims to have sent an email containing permission details. Thanks in advance, FASTILY (TALK) 19:18, 2 September 2010 (UTC)

Actually, nevermind. Fæ already took care of it. Best, FASTILY (TALK) 19:19, 2 September 2010 (UTC)

1967 Kayseri Atatürk Stadium disaster

I need the article to get off and stay off the Untagged Uncats list. I'm trying to whittle down a backlog of almost 20,000 articles, so I simply can't leave articles on it that I have to repeatedly detour around every time I try to tag a batch. Regardless of the article's content status, there's no way to keep it off that list unless it's either categorized or tagged. It's possible that there may be another solution, but I really do need to get it off the list (which is autogenerated and not editable except by actually categorizing or tagging the articles.) Bearcat (talk) 20:56, 2 September 2010 (UTC)

Fair enough, I just figured it was extra edits that didn't have to be made if you were going through and looking at each of the articles before editing them. If you're just running them in batches I can see how it would be easier to just tag them all and let someone else sort them out later. Cheers! VernoWhitney (talk) 21:02, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
Oh, it's not about not wanting to look at the articles — obviously I have to, because there are a wide variety of different problems that might be causing an article to be "uncategorized": categories that are present but formatted incorrectly, unclosed ref tags, etc. It's just about not wanting to have to leave titles stuck on the list permanently or semi-permanently, that's all :-) Bearcat (talk) 21:33, 2 September 2010 (UTC)

Re:Foundation Telecommunications Inc

Hello, VernoWhitney. You have new messages at Fastily's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

-FASTILY (TALK) 23:06, 2 September 2010 (UTC)

File permission problem with File:Bratmobile at The Roxy - Hollywood, California - Feb 22, 2001.jpg

I have referred your request to User talk:Chavando who may know more about this. Regards, JohnI (talk) 03:38, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Way of the Warrior

Greetings,

Who claimed copyright to the information I posted on WIKIPEDIA regarding Way of the Warrior? The bios and information were translated from the game, and I added cast info directly as well, just like is done from movies and tv shows that are posted on wikipedia. Is this incorrect, or did someone just want to revert to the low level & bogus information on the game that has again been restored?

Drax —Preceding unsigned comment added by GirDraxa (talkcontribs) 17:48, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

The copyright to bios and information in the game would generally be held by whichever company produced the game. Translating them without permission creates unauthorized derivative works which are still subject to the restrictions of the original material, and as such constituted a copyright violation. VernoWhitney (talk) 17:55, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

But isn't the same thing done with movies and TV shows that appear here? I simply transcribed the information, same as is done with other entries. Odd that it would be so specific. But ok. I figured they'd be more likely to bash on all the cover art scans than the actual information on the game, at least the cast information wasn't 100% removed.

If articles regarding movies and TV shows copy their plot description, for example, from official press releases they are copyright violations and should be removed, and they are when they are discovered. The cover art scans are explicitly allowed under the non-free content guideline. That guideline would also allow short, clearly marked quotes (or translations of those quotes), but only when they couldn't be replaced by free content. Facts by themselves are generally not copyrightable, and thus there is no problem with the cast listing. Copyright becomes an issue when they are presented in a creative manner, which is a very low standard and so applies to almost every sentence and/or paragraph of prose. Feel free to restore the facts from the content that has been removed, but the structure and language must be entirely your own and not derived from someone else's work. VernoWhitney (talk) 18:11, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Ironically, it was my own work, taking quite a bit of time to compile and make it more intelligent than what was conveyed by the game. Same information conveyed just like you mention about tv shows & such, plot descriptions, biographical info each character, etc, but better written, and more detailed based on facts that come up in the game. But I understand. Only so many ways you can say the same thing, and people get edgy when it comes close to their work. —Preceding unsigned comment added by GirDraxa (talkcontribs) 18:29, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry that your hard work was removed. As the versions have been deleted by an administrator I can't see them to give any details, but judging from the note that I left on the article's talk page, at least some of the material was too close to the actual guidebook (reproduced here) to be usable. And yeah, it's sometimes really hard to reword things; I'm pretty bad at it myself. VernoWhitney (talk) 18:59, 3 September 2010 (UTC)
Hi. I can see them. Let me provide an example that may clarify. Among the content added in October 2009 was the following:

A classic modern American biker chick, Crimson Glory rides her iron horse across the paved planes of the Middle and Western United States. The only daughter in a family of 12 children, Crimson was a "tom-boy" as a child. Se showed no interest at all in dolls or other typical "girl toys" but instead took up wrestling and boxing to fill her time. It wasn't until her early teens when she started becoming a woman that the men she had hung out with started to treat her as anything but one of the boys.

Deciding that she was not going to change her ways for anyone, Crimson surmised that the best way to gain the guys respect was to beat the living hell out of them. By 22, she had done just that, one, two and often dozens at a time, in just about every sleazy bar west of the Mississippi River.

Crimson sees the competition as just another bar filled with men, and although seeing her in action has often been called "the show of a lifetime", the truly wise have always fled the bars that Crimson Glory enters.

Posted at this website, where it is evidently copied without permission from the official book way back in 2001, we see this:

A classic modern American biker chick, Crimson Glory rides her iron horse across the paved planes of the Middle and Western United States. The only daughter in a family of 12 children, Crimson was a "tom-boy" as a child. Se showed no interest at all in dolls or other typical "girl toys" but instead took up wrestling and boxing to fill her time. It wasn't until her early teens when she started becoming a woman that the men she had hung out with started to treat her as anything but one of the boys.

Deciding that she was not going to change her ways for anyone, Crimson surmised that the best way to gain the guys respect was to beat the living hell out of them. By 22, she had done just that, one, two and often dozens at a time, in just about every sleazy bar west of the Mississippi River.

Crimson sees the competition as just another bar filled with men, and although seeing her in action has often been called "the show of a lifetime", the truly wise have always fled the bars that Crimson Glory enters.

--Moonriddengirl (talk) 16:33, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Oh wow, how ironic. Gamewinners.com breaks the copyright law. They have word for word copied the info pamphlet on Way of the Warrior that Naughtydog sent out back in 1996. You could get it at the time by calling their phone # for gameplay help. GirDraxa (talk) 16:16, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

The fact that they apparently violated copyright doesn't let us violate copyright. Cheers. VernoWhitney (talk) 17:27, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Favor, if you have time

Can you take a look at this editorial I've written for Milhist to see if I've made any boneheaded errors or omissions? If you don't have time or shrink away from the length, I completely understand. :) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 23:36, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Sure, will review it now. VernoWhitney (talk)
Okay, onto the nitpicking (sadly one of my favorite pasttimes). In the "How to handle it" section, your examples of {{copyvio|url=name your source}} should be {{subst:copyvio|url=name your source}}. In the "When to seek admin assistance" section, just judging from my own experiences I wouldn't even mention AIV, and just direct them to ANI or a copyright admin. Finally, in "A word about CCIs" you could probably say "tens-of-thousands of articles", but that may just be discouraging... VernoWhitney (talk) 00:20, 4 September 2010 (UTC)
LOL! Yes, maybe. :D Thank you very much. The editors at the MilHist project may be too polite to tell me: does it seem deadly dull? Or just too long in spite of its inherent fascination? --Moonriddengirl (talk) 00:27, 4 September 2010 (UTC)
I don't think it's dull - but then if I did I wouldn't be working copyvios. As far as too long goes, I really can't tell there either. I don't remember what they asked you for (nor can I find it in your talk page archives), so I don't know if there's an implied limit. I don't know that it could be much shorter without skimping on either the reasoning behind the actions or the array of actions themselves. <shrug> VernoWhitney (talk) 00:37, 4 September 2010 (UTC)
Thanks. They were a bit vague. I their project, by the way. They've been perhaps the most responsive group dealing with copyright issues next to maybe the Gastropod group. As you know, we usually get ignored. :) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 00:46, 4 September 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for the link. They did say length wasn't an issue, so it should be good. It's a nice surprise when anyone else helps out, so I'm glad they're nice since they seem to be about the most active wikiproject as far as I can tell. VernoWhitney (talk) 01:11, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Break

I'm already on a bit of a break writing about something else! Flicking through hundreds of articles for infringements is not the way I'd planned to spend the weekend! Go ahead with the changes when you're ready. Sillyfolkboy (talk) (edits)Join WikiProject Athletics! 12:59, 5 September 2010 (UTC)

Okay, working on it. Anything that makes your life easier and more willing to help out is the least I can do. Cheers! VernoWhitney (talk) 13:05, 5 September 2010 (UTC)

File:Yuvan@fitnessone.jpg

Hi boss can I ask u why this image was rejected for OTRS ticket confirmation. The email was sent regarding this image then what is the problem with this image. Please tell me. User:Anand_023 Sep 6, 5:18pm —Preceding unsigned comment added by 114.79.135.29 (talk) 11:47, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

I can reply to this. We need specific licensing information to be given to us by the copyright holder. We recommend the form here. We need to be able to prove that the person writing us is the copyright holder. If the e-mail address used to contact us doesn't prove that, the website that publishes it first has to. Full instructions were provided in e-mail to our correspondent. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 12:02, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Yuvan Shankar Raja

Hi, you had found that the OTRS for File:Yuvan@fitnessone.jpg had insufficient permission - the uploader uploaded a new image at File:Yuvan@fitness1.jpg and I wonder whether the OTRS fits for that image instead or if another one was sent or if it's not permitted. Best Hekerui (talk) 14:46, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I'm not finding anything in OTRS for that image, and permission for the earlier image is still unusable. VernoWhitney (talk) 14:52, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Darius Dhlomo CCI

Is there any way a copyvio bot (like Coren's or The Earwig's) can run through all the articles he created and mark likely copyvios so those can be processed first? I didn't want to leave this at the AN/I thread because it was getting too long and I wanted to see if this was reasonable for a bot to process. I know User:CorenSearchBot/manual and http://toolserver.org/~earwig/cgi-bin/copyvio.py work, but it's quite slow to do one-by-one. fetch·comms 21:23, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Can't you run multiple files at User:CorenSearchBot/manual at the same time? I don't know that I've tried. VernoWhitney (talk) 21:26, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
To answer my own question, yes you can, so I can run a whole bunch through (use a bot to list them) and see if there are any hits.VernoWhitney (talk) 21:29, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
Ah, I was wondering why you tested pig and elephant :P Could start on that list with page Wikipedia:Contributor_copyright_investigations/Darius_Dhlomo_8, which I've asked Darius to look over (see his talk), just to check the ones he went through? fetch·comms 21:31, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
Okay, I'll see if I can set that up before I run off to dinner. I'll be running it at User:VWBot/manual so as to not violate bot policy. VernoWhitney (talk) 21:35, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
Hrmm...clearly there's a bug somewhere, and I have to run away now, so I won't be able to look into this until later tonight. Sorry. VernoWhitney (talk) 21:56, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
No worries. CSBot has a bug too, the exact same one it seems (the links are [not working] and the confidence is over 100%). fetch·comms 22:02, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
Well, that part of VWBot's code is the same as CSBot (unless he's recently updated the code), it apparently only handles [[Foo]] and not [[:Foo]], which is what my generator spits out automatically so I don't have to fix it for files when I list them. VernoWhitney (talk) 00:31, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
Okay, it's now running. It may take a while since it only does the manual checks while waiting for its regular work, but it should spit out a thousand results tonight. ^_^ VernoWhitney (talk) 00:39, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
Bah, I forgot that it doesn't have a robust system for dealing with lags, so it just timed out and lost everything... this may take some finagling. VernoWhitney (talk) 01:04, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
Is it difficult to have the bot ignore the Wikipedia mirrors that keep popping up? I am loathe to believe that none of them are real copyvios, but I still wonder if there are any easily-detected ones lingering about. fetch·comms 03:07, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
It ignores some of them, but I didn't write the code initially (that'd be Coren, of course), so I don't remember the details off the top of my head. I'm sure it can be set to ignore more of them, but I'm not going to mess with that until this batch is done. As far as other easily-detected ones...not with what we have coded and working at the moment, at least that I know of, or CSBot would've tagged them the first time around. VernoWhitney (talk) 03:14, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
Grr, he was sly in adding vios. Either he added them at the beginning with mixed-order, or he added them two years later. More manual work, then :P. I just wish everyone at the AN/I subpage would help, too, not just a few users. fetch·comms 03:31, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
Okay, everything should now be listed at User:VWBot/results except for three which hit on blacklisted sites that I forgot to write down and take to work with me today so I'll have to list those when I get home. There are a whole bunch of "unable to check" results which I imagine means that it just timed out, so I can run them again but I doubt it will make a difference, since at a glance every hit appears to be to a mirror site. VernoWhitney (talk) 13:29, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
The three blacklisted sites follow, appropriately modified to not trigger the blacklist:
Hiroshi Nagashima, as of 23:40, 7 September 2010 (UTC), appears to be a copyright violation of [www.babynology.com/chinese-mcelebrityhiroshi.html www.babynology.com/chinese-mcelebrityhiroshi.html] with 87% confidence.
Sukhbir Singh Gill, as of 23:40, 7 September 2010 (UTC), appears to be a copyright violation of [www.indianetzone.com/9/sukhbir_singh_gill.htm www.indianetzone.com/9/sukhbir_singh_gill.htm] with 89% confidence.
Jude Menezes, as of 23:40, 7 September 2010 (UTC), appears to be a copyright violation of [www.indianetzone.com/9/jude_menezes.htm www.indianetzone.com/9/jude_menezes.htm] with 84% confidence.
VernoWhitney (talk) 23:40, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Mark Weber (historian)

Forgive me, but I'm missing something — how do you know that it's a repost? This article appears to have started as a copy from the GFDL-only http://wikibin.org/articles/mark-weber-3.html before being significantly rewritten. I'll be happy to try to help once I understand better what's going on. Nyttend (talk) 12:01, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Wikibin is a host for articles deleted from Wikipedia (It comes up fairly regularly as a hit for CorenSearchBot). The fact that it's GFDL doesn't matter because it a) doesn't correctly attribute Wikipedia in general, let alone the actual editors and b) we've needed CC-BY-SA to import anything after November 1st, 2008. Judging from the diff, there are still some core elements which would make this a derivative work and thus a copyright violation unless there is appropriate attribution provided. VernoWhitney (talk) 12:09, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
Okay, I've never before heard of Wikibin. I know of no way to find the original article — if the Wikibin page had attributed its own source properly, we could use that, but it neither provided the name of the original article nor provides a list of contributors. I'll ask at the Help Desk. Nyttend (talk) 12:17, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
The original article appears to have been at Mark Weber, but which version I don't know. VernoWhitney (talk) 12:19, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
Ah, I just found the solution — it is a version of the original Mark Weber article, not some other title. When a page is accused of being a repost, I'll just compare it to the deleted version of the alleged source. Yes, this article is taken from the deleted version, but it's greatly enough modified that it doesn't qualify for G4 deletion: it would have when it was first discovered, but it doesn't anymore. I'll move around the histories, asking for help from more-experienced admins if necessary. Nyttend (talk) 12:21, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
Great, thank you! VernoWhitney (talk) 12:22, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
You're welcome. For some reason, the newer edits didn't appear when I finished the history merge; I've asked for help at WP:AN. Nyttend (talk) 12:31, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Does this seem good enough?

Hi. I'm not sure if I'm comfortable with my own cleanup on Peter Shalvoy, by comparison to [2]. Can you take a look and tell me if you think I've left too much? --Moonriddengirl (talk) 16:55, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

On the assumption you're actually talking about this source, the lists of clubs bothers me since it doesn't sound like it's comprehensive so there's presumably some creativity involved in picking them for the list and it's fairly extensive. The list of celebrities bothers me a little for the same reasons, but it's short enough and reorganized from the source so I think I'd let that part go. VernoWhitney (talk) 17:20, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
Oops, yes, I was. Sorry. :) I started to remove the list of clubs, but there are actually more of them in our article than in that source, so I left them (uneasily). Other than that, you feel okay about it? --Moonriddengirl (talk) 17:38, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
Yeah, other than that I didn't see any issues comparing it to either source. ^_^ VernoWhitney (talk) 17:40, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Back to the races!

Hi, Verno. You'll no doubt recall 1976 Lady Wigram Trophy. We're back with 1951 Lady Wigram Trophy. You removed the DNS listing from the prior table. Would you believe that doing so here would eliminate creativity? I have no idea what a DNS is or what would ordinarily be included in such a table. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 17:28, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, I think that would do it. DNS (from what I gathered during the previous discussion, I have no personal knowledge) stands for "did not show" which could mean either a) entered but didn't race, probably not creative or b) were favorites or somesuch but didn't actually enter the race, which could be creative in determining who to mention. At least that was my logic for the last case. VernoWhitney (talk) 17:39, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Bollards

thank you immensely. ViniTheHat (talk) 19:32, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

You're welcome. I'm just sorry that it took 3 months since you tagged it for us to get around to figuring out exactly what all was added improperly and get it taken out. Thank you for tagging it and bringing the problem to light in the first place. VernoWhitney (talk) 19:37, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Sure thing, I'll do it right away. Blood Red Sandman (Talk) (Contribs) 14:10, 12 September 2010 (UTC)

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Lol! That must have taken a lot of time.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 19:58, 12 September 2010 (UTC)

Just lots of right click -> "copy link location" once I saw that everything was copied and pasted. I like being thorough ^_^ VernoWhitney (talk) 20:00, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
Okay I just deleted Geography of Arunachal Pradesh. For your own sanity (and efficiency, and time management that could be spent finding more copyvios or tagging other articles appropriately), I suggest you simplify and just list one or two and maybe say "and many other sites." Thoroughness is a virtue but the effort is really not needed!--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 20:04, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
Yeah, I'm starting a new CCI on them since I just uncovered a bunch of other copyvios they created, so I won't be quite so verbose with the rest. VernoWhitney (talk) 20:07, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
Since you seem to be involved in CCI investigations on a regular basis can you tell me what is typically done about the infringer? I have looked at various pages but have not found any stock response to such an incident. Barring an outright block, I would think they should get a very serious warning such as: "As the investigation at Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations/Anikingos revealed numerous instances of copyright violations by you, you are now on notice that any future copyright infringements (or plagiarism) will result in a block." Our whole scheme with warnings and blocks is set up around normally giving a final warning before a block for non vandalism-only accounts, so I think we need some type of final warning to be given when we find a user like this.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 22:32, 13 September 2010 (UTC)
Off the top of my head I think the only cases where a CCI hasn't been accompanied by at least a temporary block are where they've never been warned before the scale of the problem was discovered or where it's clearly good faith mistakes (e.g., they thought they had permission or were paraphrasing sufficiently or the like). By the time we start most CCIs they've usually already gotten plenty of warnings which include the lovely phrase "persistent violators will be blocked from editing". Judging from an old version of their talk page, the got a casual comment about copying text on 5 July and then a formal warning on 4 August, so they've known about it for a while. VernoWhitney (talk) 22:43, 13 September 2010 (UTC)
So I guess there is no "standard" warning since most have already received something like {{Uw-copyright}}. I will simply go ahead since a warning seems necessary and certainly appropriate.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 01:06, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
Yeah, there's no standard warning since every copyright warning is supposed to be final (or close to it). VernoWhitney (talk) 01:27, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

Hi, I've updated the information on the CycleBeads page, but there is still a warning at the top that says that this article has multiple issues. It had been changed, but perhaps we needed to notify after the changes were made so that it could be reviewed? I think the issues are all fixed, but would like feedback. Thanks, 98.233.39.135 (talk) 17:22, 13 September 2010 (UTC)Leslie

Thanks for bringing this to my attention. I'll take a look at it later today and either remove the tags or make some recommendations for further improvement on the article's talk page. VernoWhitney (talk) 17:33, 13 September 2010 (UTC)
It took me longer to get around to it than I expected, but I've no looked at it and left some comments on the talk page. Cheers. VernoWhitney (talk) 15:06, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

tb

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Heads up

Can you take a look at this thread? You are name checked. :) Not sure if your wizardry is up to it. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 20:21, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads-up. I had unwatchlisted their page, but I've commented there and will be watching again. VernoWhitney (talk) 20:31, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

Thank you thank you

Thank you ever so much for your vigilant monitoring of the RFC request board. Especially given how much real-life things are engaging me, it is assuring to know that I have assistance. Another page you may be interested in is Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Unsorted, where RFCs either aren't categorized or are in a non-existent/misspelled category. harej 22:20, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

You're welcome. I don't always keep on top of it, but I've been trying. I'll try to remember the Unsorted category too. Cheers! VernoWhitney (talk) 22:25, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

Page number?

Hi, Verno. Can you give me a page number for the pdf from which William B. Langford paraphrases, por favor? As I write at the CP listing, the search function doesn't seem to be working for me. :/ --Moonriddengirl (talk) 17:40, 15 September 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, I meant to put that on the listing. Page 15 of the pdf, the "Judson tower" sentence is a problem at least, I don't remember if anything else struck me when I blanked it. VernoWhitney (talk) 17:53, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
Thanks! Armed with that information, I'll take a deeper look. :) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 17:57, 15 September 2010 (UTC)

I've re-added some of the basic information that you deleted, re-written to avoid the original editor's close paraphrasing. Take a look and see if it's OK. There are only so many ways that one can say they commission operas, are the resident ensemble at the Boston Conservatory and perform in the Zack Box Theater. Best, Voceditenore (talk) 14:42, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

That looks fine. Thank you! VernoWhitney (talk) 14:45, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

Oh,man

Ah, Verno, it breaks my heart. Never mind the endless hours involved, the damage to the project is so discouraging. :( What are we going to do? </end rhetorical despairing question>. Some days it makes me want to go curl up somewhere with a pint of ice cream and cry. :/ --Moonriddengirl (talk) 13:05, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

I opt for milk'n'cookies myself. With that CCI at least there's a decent chance of doing double-duty with the Banglapedia sources. VernoWhitney (talk) 13:31, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Tahadi Games

Hi there, about the Tahadi Games page, I might be wrong with the way I created it.. But would it be okay if i rewrite the information? Thanks in advance, Regards. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Violadelesseps (talkcontribs) 10:56, 19 September 2010 (UTC)

Yes, the material can be rewriteen, but it should be rewritten from scratch. If you take the same words and just reorganize them some you can create a close paraphrase which is still a problem, so please be aware of that. Cheers! VernoWhitney (talk) 11:32, 19 September 2010 (UTC)

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JohnCD (talk) 09:40, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

Letters to Father Jacob

While I appreciate your efforts and contributions to wikipedia, it's certainly becoming harder and more burdensome to edit wikipedia articles. I'm not surprised wikipedians r leaving. The two sections you removed are the plot and the director's statement. I had done some rewording on the plot. I can improve this. Removing it altogether is a step in the wrong direction. The director's statement is a quote. The NFC policy isn't explicit about the length of allowable quotes ('brief' is by no means definitive). If you take a pragmatic approach and consider the essence and meaning of having a policy around quoting NFC, the idea is that people don't quote entire published articles and books that would have a significant market value, and thereby forfeit revenue for the owner of this material. For all pragmatic purposes, 6 sentences (particularly a comment about a movie rather than a piece of poetry), is unlikely to have anything other than an immaterial market value. In addition, the quote comes from "http://www.efp-online.com" which is the European Film Promotion site funded by the EU - their material is aimed to promote films, not to be sold. Having it quoted and viewed would be to their benefit.

The image I added I just copied from the original Finnish article: http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiedosto:PPJ_juliste.jpg I usually screw up adding images to commons so I was expecting this. i was hoping someone would fix it up for meUtopial (talk) 10:11, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

We cannot be explicit with the meaning of "brief' because brief is relative to the size of the article and the source and to the centrality of the quote to either. In Harper & Row v. Nation Enterprises, a book publisher was found to have infringed a 500 page book with the use of 300 or 400 words. 250 words is a fair approximation of a single printed page, though some books have considerably more. We're talking less than .4% of the book here, and it was found to be extensive. The quote in question is 185 words long. The page from which it is taken is about 328 words long. That's over 50% of the source page, which is not brief. The page in which you used it had 365 words of creative text, so it was almost 50% of that page as well. While Wikipedia's non-commercial nature may help shelter us in the event of a legal challenge, there's no compelling need for us to test our luck, and our reusers will not necessarily enjoy that shelter. Wikipedia was created specifically to permit reuse and wide publication elsewhere (including commercially), which is one reason why our WP:NFCC policy is deliberately more narrow than U.S. law. When selecting quotes, you should consider the proportion of the quote to each document and the necessity for a quote at all. Frequently, content can be properly paraphrased with shorter, limited quotations chosen to express highlights.
As far as the plot section is concerned, I'm afraid that we are mandated to remove content that violates copyright. We can't leave it published in the article while waiting for people to rewrite it. Minimal rewording may still constitute a derivative work, particularly when you are also incorporating literal phrases from the original, such as:

Every day the mail man brings letters from people asking for help from pastor Jacob. Answering the letters is Jacob´s life mission, while Leila thinks it´s useless. Leila has already decided to leave the parsonage when the letters suddenly stop coming. Jacob´s life is shaken to its foundation.

Please make sure that the content you wish to add to Wikipedia meets our copyright policy and Terms of Use before placing it. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 10:57, 20 September 2010 (UTC)
Moonriddengirl seems to have covered the text aspect fairly comprehensively, so let me just add that as far as the image goes you should know that commons only accepts freely licensed images, and even run through Google Translate it's clear that the Finnish one is marked as copyrighted, so "fixing" it involves deleting it. It can be uploaded to Wikipedia under our NFCC policy and fair use, but not Wikimedia Commons. VernoWhitney (talk) 11:40, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

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Sick computer

Hi, Verno. I foolishly followed a link in an OTRS e-mail this morning, and my computer is loaded with viruses. In the event that I fall off the face of the planet, can you let others know? I'm meant to be compiling a list of checked articles for Uncle G's bot (I'm on page 2). I'm also creating an edit notice for pages that I've finished (see Template:Editnotices/Page/Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations/Darius Dhlomo 1, for example). Hopefully Webroot will be able to clean this up without downtime! :/ (Don't follow links.) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 17:27, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

I'll keep an eye out in case you fall off in case anyone asks - although I don't know how much good I'd be at filling in for you should you completely disappear. Good luck with your computer woes. VernoWhitney (talk) 17:58, 20 September 2010 (UTC)
Thanks. :) Webroot declares confidently that it has quarantined everything. On User:Avraham's recommendation, I am now running it through Malwarebytes. At this point, I'm beginning to think it may be faster for me to just go through the list and unblank articles that have been checked. It took me over an hour to do the first 1,000, and the second 1,000 isn't going any faster! --Moonriddengirl (talk) 18:02, 20 September 2010 (UTC)
Glad to hear things are looking up. I saw your conversation with Uncle G, and I think I agree - reverting the blanking would probably be quicker. VernoWhitney (talk) 18:04, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

Seeing as you brought it up... Could you please fix the licensing on this image? J Milburn (talk) 15:15, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

Fix it how? I'm not sure what you mean. VernoWhitney (talk) 15:20, 21 September 2010 (UTC)
Ah, I just saw your comment at the BRFA. Until I go find it in the original source I'm not going to change the license. VernoWhitney (talk) 15:21, 21 September 2010 (UTC)
How long will that take? J Milburn (talk) 15:33, 21 September 2010 (UTC)
Probably about as long as it would take you to find the original source and figure it out. <shrug> I do have some other things I'm working on too. VernoWhitney (talk) 15:37, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

Hi, guys. Sorry to butt in here, but I thought to fix this one myself. I thought I had found File:Hank3.jpg in the book in question, but actually I found File:Henry Grow.jpg. File:Hank3.jpg is a colorized version of the same with an expanded background. Obviously the picture is pre-1913, since the crop of it was published in 1913, but I'm not sure that I've handled the sourcing correctly.:/ What do y'all suppose I should put there? --Moonriddengirl (talk) 12:59, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

So Henry Grow looks to be fine if that's the one in the book. I'm not sure how to get more accurate for Hank without reintroducing the PII which was requested to be redacted in the first place. VernoWhitney (talk) 13:22, 22 September 2010 (UTC)
That's most definitely the one in the book. Good point about the history; it did include some information ("Retouched and colorized by Craig Ferroggiaro at Dmax Imaging in San Francisco, CA.") that I could restore. I don't think colorization adds enough creativity to constitute a problem, but images make me profoundly uneasy. :/ --Moonriddengirl (talk) 13:33, 22 September 2010 (UTC)
It may be out of date, but this summary I found regarding film colorization makes it sound like a definitive "maybe". In this particular case I agree with you and think it doesn't add sufficient creativity, but it could always go to MCQ or PUF for community input if anyone disagrees. VernoWhitney (talk) 14:14, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

Restored, thank you. - 2/0 (cont.) 22:42, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

Jesus Youth Temporary Article

Hi Verno, As per your comments on the Jesus Youth wikipedia article I created, I have edited the ones that may be a copyright infringement and added only the details that I personally have acquired about the movement. So could you please check the Talk page, Talk:Jesus_Youth/Temp and confirm if it can be moved to the original page. Thanks,Jyrejoice (talk) 12:39, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

I don't have time to look at it right now, but I've made a note so that it won't get overlooked. Thank you for your efforts in cleaning the article. VernoWhitney (talk) 12:56, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

Chord Overstreet

Hi. I have written the Chord Overstreet article from scratch. I think the copyvio template can be removed now, and the page moved. Thanks! Yvesnimmo (talk) 07:45, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Jigyasa (National Level Paper Presentation Competition DOMS IIT Roorkee)

Hi The material is available at the public domain and I have the permission of the author to use the material on Wikipedia. The material belongs to Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee and I am one of its students.

Divyegarg (talk) 08:41, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Publicly available does not mean public domain. Looking at http://www.iitr.ac.in/departments/DM/pages/Activities+JIGYASA_2010.html which also contains a copy of the material, we see that it is clearly marked "© 2010. All Rights Reserved, IIT Roorkee". If you do have permission from the copyright holder, then please have them follow the steps listed at Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials so that we can verify that. Thank you. VernoWhitney (talk) 10:49, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Richie Fitzgerald

Hi vernowhitney i rewrote text at link below Talk:Richie Fitzgerald/Temp is it possible to replace it with text above thanks for you help and apologies for the hassle regards sean —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sean McPhillips (talkcontribs) 18:44, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for rewriting it! VernoWhitney (talk) 19:30, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Confused...

Hi VernoWhitney, can you block O Fenian from edit-warring on the Giant's Causeway wp as he has been involved in vandalism. Thankyou. As for your warning, I am not sure what that is for?Factocop (talk) 16:30, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

I am not an administrator, so I cannot block anyone. If there is edit warring then it should be reported at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring. I left you the warning because you described another user's edits as "terrorism". That sort of comment is inappropriate no matter how disruptive an editor's actions may be. VernoWhitney (talk) 16:34, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

Help with a non-free image

I see that you are active at WP:NFR, so perhaps you can help me. If you look at Jeff Buckley, an unfree image (with a rather sketchy source) is being used in the infobox right now. Would I be able to switch that unfree image with another unfree image from jeffbuckley.com, where I would be able to attribute the source and copyright holder properly? Nymf hideliho! 21:04, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

There appear to be no free images, so replacing one non-free image with another is perfectly acceptable. In fact it would be preferable so that we could be sure of the appropriate attribution, as you pointed out. VernoWhitney (talk) 21:28, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

Permissions

Verno... Thanks for the heads up. I'll work on getting the permissions with correct information. Noles1984 (talk) 13:39, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

Verno... Does the declaration found at Wikipedia:Declaration of consent for all enquiries cover all images on a site or does one have to apply specific info per image. The owners, the nice people they are, gave me a blanket "yes" for their images. Thank you... Noles1984 (talk) 14:00, 25 September 2010 (UTC)
Where the consent form says "SPECIFY THE WORK HERE" they can fill in whatever they want: either a particular image or every image on their website or anything in-between. VernoWhitney (talk) 14:11, 25 September 2010 (UTC)
Perhaps I was unclear: the copyright holders need to fill out the consent form and send it in, we cannot simply accept their blanket "yes" and let you fill in the details. We require this so that we can verify that they understand exactly what they are agreeing to. VernoWhitney (talk) 15:59, 25 September 2010 (UTC)
Well that certainly makes the situation entirely different. I can see where an individual would state its alright for a single image and one occurance. If they have many images, would a single statement from them for their entire collection do? I can certainly see where a statement for every image would be problematic in that they are answering several emails. Get back to me. Noles1984 (talk) 16:26, 25 September 2010 (UTC)
Yes, as I said before: When they fill out the form they can state that it applies to their entire collection. VernoWhitney (talk) 16:30, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

OTRS

Just a question if I may VernoWhitney I am looking through files with old OTRS pending notices and adding no-permission notices as appropriate, some have been waiting for over a year. In some examples I find that the OTRS ticket number has been added by somebody who does not appear to be an OTRS volunteer. An example is File:Economic Simulator.png which has an OTRS ticket number added by User:DieBuche who does not appear on the list of OTRS volunteers but has added the ticket number to a number of files. Should I be concerned or assume good faith when others add the ticket number, thanks. MilborneOne (talk) 15:17, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

First off, thanks for going through those old files and tagging them. That's something I've been thinking of automating but haven't gotten around to writing yet. Anyways, User:DieBuche is an OTRS volunteer - so those are okay. OTRS members aren't required to list themselves anywhere at least as far as Wikipedia goes, so there's really no telling. In my experience the people are adding OTRS tags to images they uploaded themselves are sometimes questionable, so you may want to ask someone to check up on those, but I haven't personally noticed a non-OTRS editor tagging a bunch of files they didn't upload themselves. VernoWhitney (talk) 15:32, 25 September 2010 (UTC)
OK understood, it would nice if the OTRS pending category was dated some how. Thanks for the reply. MilborneOne (talk) 15:41, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

… has been restored! Airplaneman 20:35, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

Close paraphrasing template

Bot question. Here. Can you help? :) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 20:48, 26 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads up. As an aside, I'm not sure whether to be sad that you've already forgotten that VWBot lists the close paraphrases or happy that it fits so seamlessly into the rest of the automagic around here that you just take it for granted. ^_^ VernoWhitney (talk) 21:12, 26 September 2010 (UTC)
You can go either way. :D Fact is, I have a woefully bad memory. I have come upon articles listed by VWbot at CP that were blanked and not listed and wondered irritably who had tagged them...only to find I had. :) To (probably mis)quote Sherlock Holmes: "I don't need a memory; I have notes!" That said, I am now fully taking VWBot for granted. :D --Moonriddengirl (talk) 21:35, 26 September 2010 (UTC)
I'll go with happy then. It's come in handier than I expected it would what with all of the new people working at CCI these days. VernoWhitney (talk) 21:55, 26 September 2010 (UTC)

Joseph J. Spengler blanked article

Hello, V. You do appropriate and necessary but surely not easy WP work.

Concerning Joseph J. Spengler (history · last edit), it looks like all that would be necessary to fix the problem is permission from Duke University to use http://web.archive.org/web/20061006120242/http://econ.duke.edu/History/Spengler/spengler.html material. (1) Is that correct? (2) The previous Edit should certainly have cited the source, whether copyrighted or not. Easy for me to say after the fact. I don't see any copyright notice at the above site. Is it a WP policy assumption that any material not expressly stated as waiving a copyright protection is presumed to be treated as though copyright protected?

I have come across another instance, the article on Ansley J. Coale, in which the article was started by citing the source used with permission at fn. 1. So, that should not be hard to come by if it is sought. I hope that the individual if s/he violated WP policy would be able to remedy the problem & intend to express sympathy on the user's page. Thank you. --Thomasmeeks (talk) 08:17, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

Hi! Yes, getting permission from the copyright holder would remedy the problem. The copyright holder is most likely Duke University, but it could also be an individual who wrote the article. If you would like to try getting permission, we have some steps outlined at WP:PERMISSIONS which you can follow to try and ensure that we get usable permission from the copyright holder without a lot of back and forth.
To continue, yes, they should have cited the source, but that alone wouldn't resolve the copyright problem. Copyright is granted automatically upon publication, and so a copyright notice is not required. I'm not finding the appropriate line in policy at the moment (it's still early for me), but Wikipedia:FAQ/Copyright gives a decent rundown of it and basically, yes, we need content to be explicitly released under a free license (CC-BY-SA) or into the public domain or for there to be other evidence that it is in the public domain (e.g., created by the US Federal Government, published before 1923, etc.).
As far as Ansley J. Coale goes, that quoted permission does appear on every Princeton Weekly Bulletin and it's fairly broad so it may be allowable. I'm not entirely sure, though, so I'll defer on that issue to a more experienced editor who also works with copyrights and get her opinion about it. VernoWhitney (talk) 12:48, 25 September 2010 (UTC)
OK, thank you. I should mention that I removed the above Archive link in favor of a later, more pleasing-looking link. I hope that permission is sought and granted in all cases for the specific pages identified. I'd be willing to seek it for the Joseph J. Spengler article, unless its creator would wish to. I was taken aback, so I'd guess that the creator was too. If you would have any suggestions as to what should have happen first before seeking permission for use of the Archive source as to the creator responding, I'd welcome them. --Thomasmeeks (talk) 13:58, 25 September 2010 (UTC)
I'm not sure what you mean by removing the archive link. I looked for a copy of the article on current Duke site but wasn't able to find it since they either moved it or removed it entirely.
There are very few editors who regularly work with copyrights so I'm afraid we just don't have time to request permission from every source we find. If you would like to go ahead and request permission for Joseph J. Spengler that would be greatly appreciated. The contributor of that material hasn't edited since March '09 and so will likely take no action. VernoWhitney (talk) 14:25, 25 September 2010 (UTC)
Good points. The previous page edit at the 2nd to last Ref. had this nice-looking link: http://econ.duke.edu/about/history/individuals/joseph-j-spengler. The earliest Edit I believe had a "Spengler Profile" link, now located at the top "archive" link but which became a deadlink before I before I removed it. I think it may still may be referenced in the Duke library online archives. Its inclusion from the start before any other links were added would indicate to me that the creator had good intents (otherwise why expose oneself to an unpleasant later discovery?).
I'll email Duke and see if it is agreeable to WP using its Archive or current material. The FAQ Copyright link above should have everything. Thanks for your help. --Thomasmeeks (talk) 15:32, 25 September 2010 (UTC)
Ah, clearly I missed that reference, I was looking at earlier versions of the article. Thanks.
Even if the creator had good intents they copied material from a wide variety of sources and when some of it was removed they only replied "no copyright violation", but there's no indication or evidence of permission from any of the sources they copied from, so I'm afraid that all of their contributions are being reviewed for copyright violations at Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations/Robertsch55. VernoWhitney (talk) 15:42, 25 September 2010 (UTC)
Uh-oh. As you suggest, good intents are not enough. Still in Frank Knight case, everything is transparent (not necessarily enough to save the edit), and the lack of a copyright notice at the New School site could explain an incorrect inference that it was OK to copy. A case is easy if it seems to use only a single source. Thanks. --Thomasmeeks (talk) 16:41, 25 September 2010 (UTC)
Yeah, that's why copyright has its own header under Assume good faith: WP:AGFC. VernoWhitney (talk) 16:50, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

I'm dubious about clogging your space like this, but I'd appreciate it if you (or a suggested designee) could critique (possibly with a "yes" or"no") or rewrite the following indented paragraphs as an email request.

  1. I request permission of Duke University to grant Wikipedia use of http://web.archive.org/web/20061006120242/http://econ.duke.edu/History/Spengler/spengler.html to copy or adapt. It would be especially useful in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_J._Spengler (currently blanked). The permission would be in accepting Wikipedia-compatible form among those green-check listed at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:FAQ/Copyright#Can_I_add_something_to_Wikipedia_that_I_got_from_somewhere_else.3F with the statement there that "Only text that is licensed compatibly with the Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike 3.0 Unported License (CC-BY-SA) or in the public domain can be freely copied onto Wikipedia." (I would add "or adapted onto Wikipedia" to that quotation to make it less likely to be misunderstood.)
  2. Another great demographic economist is the subject of a Wikipedia article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ansley_J._Coale, based on an online article at http://www.princeton.edu/pr/pwb/02/1118/2o.shtml in Princeton Weekly Bulletin 92, No. 10 (Nov. 18, 2002) (per fn. 1 in the Wikipedia article, including the statement there that: "[The preceding link] is the original source of the biographical summary [on Coale] and is entered into Wikipedia based on the following statement in the Bulletin: 'Permission is given to adapt, reprint or excerpt material from the Bulletin for use in other media.'"). So, there's a related precedent for my request.


3. I thought (2) would help, but I'd drop it if so advised.

4. I didn't get into copy vio issues, because I thought that they were unnecessary.

5. Similarly, I was not going to enclose a form b/c I thought Duke would want to do that, possibly in an email attachment. Thank you for your help. P.S. There is no urgency as to a response for an obvious reason (i.e., we're all underpaid). --Thomasmeeks (talk) 15:36, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

Well, I'm busy avoiding real work at the moment so I can answer now. First, I would ask permission to use the http://econ.duke.edu/about/history/individuals/joseph-j-spengler page that you pointed me to since that's their current one - the Internet Archive one I really just used to confirm that it was copied from them to us and not from us to them. I'd probably leave off #2 since we're trying to double-check with Princeton that the use on Wikipedia is, in fact, allowed so that there's no ambiguity. If Princeton says no then we take down the other page and that could get awkward if the people from Duke then looked at it for an example. I agree that going into copyvio issues isn't really necessary since it's already blanked and tagged for removal unless we get permission. Finally, I would at least provide a link to and mention something like if they're willing to let us use it then here's a sample form which could be used. VernoWhitney (talk) 15:53, 27 September 2010 (UTC)
Nice opening line (: ). Good suggestions and leads. I like your optimism & will give it a try. Here's a revision incorporating suggestions above with the big one bolded.
1.1 On behalf of Wikipedia, I am requesting permission from Duke University to publish content on the following site: http://econ.duke.edu/about/history/individuals/joseph-j-spengler
It would be especially useful in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_J._Spengler (currently blanked). If Duke would be willing to grant such permission to Wikipedia, a form to be completed and other details are at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:CONSENT with an email address of permissions-commons@wikimedia.org where the form could be sent. I'd also appreciate a courtesy email copy as well.
1.2 The permission would be relative to a Wikipedia-compatible form among those green-check-listed at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:FAQ/Copyright#Can_I_add_something_to_Wikipedia_that_I_got_from_somewhere_else.3F with the statement there that "Only text that is licensed compatibly with the Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike 3.0 Unported License (CC-BY-SA) or in the public domain can be freely copied onto Wikipedia."
Any other comments would be welcome. If you think (1.2) is unnecessary, I'd be glad to remove it. Again thanks. --Thomasmeeks (talk) 18:06, 27 September 2010 (UTC)
I'd make it permissions-en@wikimedia.org instead of commons so it gets filed correctly from the start, but other than that it looks pretty good. VernoWhitney (talk) 18:12, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

Details matter. So, your 1st sentence above helped. For the record, here's what I emailed after first contacting by phone the person at Duke I thought could help (indicating that I'd be including little identifying personal information, which conceivably might reach become public information):

"[Name, title, and address of contact person + salutation]

"I didn't know to whom best to send this, but I'm confident that you would direct this to wherever it needs to go.

"On behalf of Wikipedia, I am requesting permission from Duke University to publish content on the following site: http://econ.duke.edu/about/history/individuals/joseph-j-spengler Content there would be especially useful in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_J._Spengler (currently blanked). If Duke would be willing to grant such permission to Wikipedia, a form to be completed and other details are at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:CONSENT with an email address of permissions-en@wikimedia.org where the form could be sent. I'd also appreciate a courtesy email copy as well.

"The permission would be relative to a Wikipedia-compatible form among those green-check-listed at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:FAQ/Copyright#Can_I_add_something_to_Wikipedia_that_I_got_from_somewhere_else.3F with the statement there that "Only text that is licensed compatibly with the Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike 3.0 Unported License (CC-BY-SA) or in the public domain can be freely copied onto Wikipedia."

"Sincerely, [My name]"

Thanks again. --Thomasmeeks (talk) 19:30, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

Happy to help. Cheers! VernoWhitney (talk) 19:50, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

Hi Vernon, I still have your talk page on my watch list and hope you don't mind me butting in.;-) I created a basic stub on the temp talk page above, so at least there will be something if the article has to get deleted. But frankly, with all the palaver of getting permissions, it seems to me that the time of the editors concerned would be better spent actually re-writing the article in their own words on the temp page, with a brief quote from the Duke source (or a longer one if permission is eventually granted). The blanked version as it's currently written isn't in encyclopedic style and reads like an appreciation from colleagues (which it is) rather than a biographical article. In fact, there's very little actual biographical detail in it. Best, Voceditenore (talk) 05:06, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

I don't know that I've ever minded people butting in. ^_^ Thank you for rewriting the article. I would spend more time re-writing articles myself except for the fact that I'm not very good at it. I can usually rewrite a couple of sentences, but more than that and it takes me hours or days to work out, so I generally spend my time on things I can do more quickly and efficiently. Anyways, thanks again for providing that so it doesn't all get tossed if permission doesn't come through. Cheers! VernoWhitney (talk) 11:56, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks

Thank you for your explanations. I guess, we need a special course of practical training in Wiki, because of numerous tools that are very helpful and necessary. The simple reading of rules without practice may not be enough for good results. And I think there may be some tool that helps to arrange the editing window with tools to be uniform in all language Wikis. I will try to practice with the rule you prompted, and if I will have questions, I will ask you, if you do not mind. Thanks, -- Zara-arush (talk) 13:05, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Glad I could help. I know the's a new admin school for training with their advanced tools, but sadly I don't know of any practical training courses for us mere editors. If you do have any questions feel free to drop me a line any time. VernoWhitney (talk) 13:41, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Received your instructions for moving pages

Thank you for explaining. Sorry for the trouble I caused. I inserted a warning in the talk page of the new and old article immediately after my cut and paste, and I copied there the "Class B" statement. I did not know that there was a more efficient and effective way to do the job.

As far as I can remember, in the recent past I created two pages (Five-limit tuning and Physiological cross sectional area) in which I moved only a part of other articles (Just intonation and Pennate muscle). Since the old articles were not totally deleted, this should not be a problem.

--Paolo.dL (talk) 14:05, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

It's completely understandable (and fixable) so don't worry too much about it. I'll just add some notes to those other pages you split out so that the original authors of the text are attributed appropriately and it'll all be taken care of. Cheers! VernoWhitney (talk) 14:09, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Montsant

Thank you for informing me about the fact that Wikipedia has a feature that allows pages to be moved to a new title together with their edit history.

I moved Montsant to Montsant DO because the former Montsant article was only about the wine and that was too ambitious a title for such a restricted field. The wine gets its name from the Montsant mountain region and the Montsant River in the same area. I regret the trouble that the move has caused and realize now that the talk page of the disambiguation is about the wine. Should I move it or should I leave now things as they are? Xufanc (talk) 15:14, 29 September 2010 (UTC)

I would leave the talk page alone until an administrator comes along and moves the edit history to catch up with Montsant DO - they should fix the talk page at the same time. VernoWhitney (talk) 15:35, 29 September 2010 (UTC)
Just in case you didn't notice, an admin fixed the edit history and the talk page, so everything's cleaned up now. Cheers! VernoWhitney (talk) 03:58, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

Me gone

Some men I don't recognize, expressing my appreciation.

Hi, Verno. I wanted to let you know that I'm going to be out of town at a conference (:P :P) this weekend, so I won't be available most of tomorrow (odds are good I'll log in before scooting out of town; if I'm running uncharacteristically late, I won't get on), all of Saturday and probably most of Sunday. I've asked User:CactusWriter and User:Mkativerata to help keep an eye on CP, so hopefully there won't be a backlog. (And maybe the open issue on that musician will close. :D) After you become an admin (and I trust you know that I plan to offer to nom you very soon), I imagine I'll be dropping it in your lap.

You know, I have to add that VWBot is not all that I'm taking for granted; I hope you never burn out this work. I can't remember how I got by without you around. Copyright cleanup on Wikipedia has had some major boosts recently (relative to my memory, which means "within the last two years or so") with new players entering the picture. You're certainly key among them. (Not to diss the old players, whose doors I knock on all the time. I couldn't get by without them either. :D) We're so lucky you decided to help us out. :) Hooray for us! --Moonriddengirl (talk) 12:52, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

I noticed you were going to be gone a bit earlier this morning—I have your talk header watchlisted for just such occasions. I'll try to work at CP some this weekend, but I've been letting SCV slide some with 3+ days built up for me to still go through, so I can't promise how much I'll be able to help. Thanks for the props, I appreciate being appreciated. ^_^ VernoWhitney (talk) 13:36, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

WP:RIBBON

Hello, VernoWhitney. You have new messages at NielsenGW's talk page.
Message added 14:33, 30 September 2010 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Two battlegrounders

I don't know whether you came across what I wrote at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents/Dream Focus over a year ago, but it should provide some valuable background to Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Dream Focus (2nd nomination). The other background, stretching over many months, you've probably already read (since you've edited Wikipedia talk:Article Rescue Squadron from time to time). At this point, after endless provocation, insults and name calling, templates, user boxes, multiple deletion nominations, this is silliness and battleground mentality on both Dream Focus' and Snottywong's parts, both of whom have acted divisively and provocatively. (Remember User:Verbal/userboxes/ARSbackfire (MfD discussion)?) I wonder whether, at this point, we have to find some way of telling them both to give it a rest, so that us peaceable grownups around here can have some respite from this constant sniping. Uncle G (talk) 15:46, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

I hadn't run across that page (before my time), so thanks for pointing me at it. I have seen the back and forth between the two of them and their supporters, including that lovely userbox. I completely agree that everyone needs to give it a rest, but as far as how to actually get them to do that... <sigh> If I knew that I'd try my hand at peace in the Middle East next. VernoWhitney (talk) 17:17, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
There will be peace in the middle east when everyone's dead. Hopefully this project will avoid that fate. Cheers, Jack Merridew 06:38, 1 October 2010 (UTC)
Yeah, something a little bit less drastic would be good. VernoWhitney (talk) 11:03, 1 October 2010 (UTC)
My userbox was better than snotties. In a normal AfD if dream or snotty go to war, its mostly ignored beyond any rational points they may raise. But by pitting them against eachother with no actual article content at issue, its just sound and fury signifying nothing.--Milowenttalkblp-r 13:00, 1 October 2010 (UTC)
You're all welcome to your opinions, and welcome to tell me to "give it a rest", however before you do so I would encourage you to look through my contributions for the last several months and try to find edits of mine that are evidence of a battleground mentality. I can't blame anyone for thinking like this about me, given the userbox I created and the subsequent MfD and that whole mess. However, since then I think I can say I've realized the futility of such actions, I deleted the userbox, and I think I can say I've minded my own business for the most part (perhaps with the exception of Colonel Warden's MfD, which was a misinterpretation by me but was absolutely in good faith, and Dream's MfD, which was only prompted by a personal attack directed specifically at me which he refused to remove). You won't find long drawn-out arguments by me at XfD's, nor will you find me engaging folks like Dream Focus, Colonel Warden, and Milowent in any significant discussion (and this MfD marks the first time I have ever engaged Dream Focus in any significant discussion, since my hand was forced, so I don't understand Milowent's comments about me and Dream "going to war" at an AfD). I make an effort to keep my comments civil, and I have never been blocked. So, again, I can understand why people would have these preconceived notions about my behavior, but if you look closely I think you'll find they are blown out of proportion. SnottyWong confabulate 13:52, 1 October 2010 (UTC)
For what it's worth as the apparent host of this spin-off discussion, I'm not trying to assign blame (I'd rather not wade through that much drama to figure out exactly who said/did what to whom when). Completely anecdotally, I just feel that every time I see one of either of your names show up on my watchlist the ensuing discussion generates more heat than light. VernoWhitney (talk) 14:28, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

I am slowly translating Spanish and Portugese sources... and have so far turned this into THIS. Has enough been done so far that perhaps your "weak keep" might become a bit stronger? Best, Schmidt, MICHAEL Q. 07:44, 2 October 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, not being able to confirm that the Spanish/Portuguese sources were in fact reliable was all I was really hesitant about. Good job on the article! VernoWhitney (talk) 11:40, 2 October 2010 (UTC)
And funny too, I began finding sources and making improvements before ever seeing your note on the article talk page. Your sense that notability was there certainly paid off. Thanks for pointing in the right direction. Schmidt, MICHAEL Q. 11:43, 2 October 2010 (UTC)

Jeffrey James

Restored and copyright tag removed. Note that there are still tags for other issues Jimfbleak - talk to me? 12:03, 2 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks! There are almost always other issues with donated material, but the deletion reason has been addressed, so now there's at least a chance that the rest can be fixed. Cheers. VernoWhitney (talk) 12:09, 2 October 2010 (UTC)

Enterprise Content Management

Hello Verno, you deleted a citation on the page Enterprise Content Management with the remark: 01:48, 30 September 2010 VernoWhitney (talk | contribs) (44,054 bytes) (→Characteristics: removing excessive quote in violation of WP:NFC) (undo) I just want to point out, that there was no violation of WP:NFC. The text was released by the orignal author who has all publication rights. Please review the discussion page respectivly and please restore the truncated text, because additional information got lost. Thanx. Ulrich Kampffmeyer —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.182.128.2 (talk) 16:12, 4 October 2010 (UTC)

Thank you for pointing that out to me, I had missed that portion of the discussion page. However, since identity is not verified when an article is created I'm afraid we require some evidence that you are the author before we restore that text to the article. Would you be willing to send an email to permissions-en@wikimedia.org so we can confirm that? VernoWhitney (talk) 16:27, 4 October 2010 (UTC)
Done - sent an email to permissions-en. The reason why I came back with this issue is, that the shortend text is not correct in wording and meaning (a naturally I do not like being "accused" of "copyright violations". Thanx for your understanding. Ulrich Kampffmeyer Kff (talk) 16:44, 4 October 2010 (UTC)
Thank you for your cooperation. I've restored the text, and I apologize for the inconvenience. Cheers! VernoWhitney (talk) 17:09, 4 October 2010 (UTC)

Ann Olivarius

Hello, I am new to this and one of my first pieces - Ann Olivarius - seems to have been tagged for copyright problems. However, I thought I had been very careful to cite everything I said because this is an article about a living person and needs to be referenced heavily. So, I made a point to do so but, given that there're only a few lines in the piece, it somehow came too close to this person's profile on another web site. How to resolve this? Many thanks for your help. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Pukkativa (talkcontribs) 15:53, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

Using citations is good, and as you pointed out especially important when it comes to biographies of living people. The problem is that the sentences you are using are very close to the same as those in the source that I cited. I gave an example and some suggested resources on the article's talk page. While the facts need to be supported by references, the words you use to describe those facts can not be taken directly from the references except for when used in brief, clearly marked quotations. While your sentences are not word-for-word copies of the source, they are close paraphrases of the source, which is still a problem as they constitute derivative works of the original copyrighted material. The content I blanked needs to be rewritten from scratch so that it does not resemble the source except insofar as it communicates the same facts. Does that help to explain things? VernoWhitney (talk) 16:01, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, yes it does! I've tried to change the section according to your comments. Thoughts? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Pukkativa (talkcontribs) 15:11, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

I think it's okay, but an admin will look at it tomorrow and I'd like for them to double-check it before the article is restored. Thanks for your patience. VernoWhitney (talk) 19:50, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

'youths''[www.facebook.com/umukoyibo]

i saw ur msg i want to thank you very much this site has really helped me alot for various research work i have done or cary out once thank you —Preceding unsigned comment added by El faru (talkcontribs) 19:12, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

I'm glad it's helped you. Cheers! VernoWhitney (talk) 19:50, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

Talkback

Hello, VernoWhitney. You have new messages at Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Jsayre64 (talk) 21:43, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

Sant Roc d'Amer

I would like to rename the article Sant Roc (Cim) as "Sant Roc d'Amer", a better title for the English Wikipedia, but I don't want to do anything wrong. What is the easiest way?Xufanc (talk) 08:00, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

I have gone ahead and moved the page to Sant Roc d'Amer using the "Move" tab at the top of the page. More detailed instructions as well as other options are available at Help:Moving a page. Cheers! VernoWhitney (talk) 12:23, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Ribbon for ribbons!

The Working Man's Barnstar
For your great work in Wikipedia:Ribbons Skibden (talk) 12:54, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Ribbon alt:

I will work on making the small ribbons, as you can see I am well on my way. As you get things sorted, I will make more ribbons. Skibden (talk) 12:54, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks! And I'm glad to see more ribbons being created (even though I prefer the shadowed ones ). I'm working my way through them in the same order as on the barnstar/user award pages, and I should be able to do some more sorting every night, and hopefully finish up this weekend. I will point out that I may be overlooking some pre-existing ribbons, since it isn't always obvious which barnstar they go with, such as which may be for The Anti-Vandalism Barnstar already although I haven't tracked down a discussion for it yet, but hopefully you won't end up duplicating too much work. VernoWhitney (talk) 13:42, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
I am working on getting the Small Ribbons to be similar to the Shaded Ribbons. It makes no sense to have one kind of ribbon shaded and another small (For example the working man barnstar or the minor barnstar) Skibden (talk) 13:49, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
I hope it won't bother you too much since you're busy working on getting them similar, but I imagine that if I get around to making some of the larger ribbons which you've just made small ones for, I may very well take them in different directions. VernoWhitney (talk) 15:32, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
That's fair enough, as long as you make then better looking ;-) Then I'll just edit the smaller ribbons to match (after all the small ones are MUCH easier to edit than the large 3D/shadow Skibden (talk) 15:34, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
I won't be putting any new ones on the ribbons page until I'm at least mostly happy with how they look. Earlier I tried making File:Allaroundamazing Ribbon.png which looks pretty awful, so it's only sitting on my userpage until I get around to doing a complete overhaul so that there's no danger of causing blindness. VernoWhitney (talk) 15:38, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Paddy Monaghan

I'll put the deleted text here. Although the copyright has been resolved, it's not out of the woods yet. It has no wikilinks, it has no independent sources (should be difficult to find some for a boxing champ) and is written in a npov promotional style, eg This remarkable autobiography gives a unique insight. Incidentally, what autobiography? None has been mentioned. I do wonder if its worth getting OTRS for text, as opposed to images, because although copyright may be cleared, using hagiographic/promotional reviews as your text creates more problems than writing from scratch. I'll tweak the text a bit to give you some ideas, but it's not ready yet Jimfbleak - talk to me? 14:26, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Fair enough, the editors (other than those tagging for copyright violations and other problems) are all obvious socks of a coi editor, so I'm inclined to just leave it unless there is a request from another editor, since it needs so much work Jimfbleak - talk to me? 14:32, 8 October 2010 (UTC)
Judging from OTRS I doubt that they're intentionally disruptive socks so much as inexperienced editors. Of course, I have to tell them something now that permission has been granted which satisfies the most recent reason for deletion - if you userfy it somewhere I can tell them that it needs work before it can be moved to articlespace again, or if you reinstate it as an article it can go to AfD since I haven't actually seen significant coverage from independent sources, or if you're willing to go on record that it meets some other criteria for deletion and won't be reinstated because of that I can pass that along. Any of the three options (or something else I haven't thought of) would be greatly appreciated. VernoWhitney (talk) 14:42, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

 Done — Malik Shabazz Talk/Stalk 19:04, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Thank you! VernoWhitney (talk) 19:08, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Dear friend , I rewrote this Article, could you please check and let me know new situation. Thanks --Wipeouting (talk) 06:59, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

In short, it's still a problem. I've blanked most of the article and given some details on the talk page. VernoWhitney (talk) 14:43, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

why don't you solve this problem --Wipeouting (talk) 17:03, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

I already did here and you reinstated it. Taking copyrighted text and incrementally altering it or rearranging it creates derivative works which are still copyright violations. In order for the content to be usable it needs to be written from scratch in your own words and language without using anything from elsewhere except for bare facts or brief, clearly marked quotations.
If you're asking why don't I rewrite it myself, the answer is because it takes me a very long time to (re)write things at an acceptable level of quality, and so I generally spend my time in areas where I am both more productive and more interested. In case it helps, I have tagged it for rescue to try to attract attention from others who are much better at rewriting than I am. VernoWhitney (talk) 17:16, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Dear friend, could you please see new version of this Article and let me know Best --Wipeouting (talk) 04:10, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

I have reedited this article with out copy rights violations--Wipeouting (talk) 19:24, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Adding numbers to Ribbons

I just happened to stumble across User:VernoWhitney/Sandbox3, and thought I'd mention that

seems to work just as well without the empty space issues. HTH, HAND. :) —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 19:30, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

I'll have to try that on my userpage, thanks! VernoWhitney (talk) 19:48, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
Example for self:

VernoWhitney (talk) 15:36, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Kashmir Observer

I have undeleted what was there. Its a short article and promotional in tone though so I'd have just rewrote it. —Xezbeth (talk) 20:13, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Thank you. I've now added the appropriate permission tag. VernoWhitney (talk) 20:32, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Update on Bob Van Ronkel.

Dear Ma'am, I'm trying as hard as I can to write a good article about this amazing person, Mr. Van Ronkel. Of course, my point of view cannot be 100% neutral, otherwise why would I bother writing an artice about someone? (If I wasn't interested or didn't care about the outcome.) It is 99,9% neutral.

It only "looks like an ad", but it by no means is. How does the actual statement of facts in the biography and professional field and basic enumeration of particular events makes "an article look like an advertisement"? I honestly don't understand what unacceptable can be seen in distinct statements. (It's not blatant lies or ads, imho.)

I take your comments seriously, but I don't like to be accused of posting blatant advertisements and being threatened with a speedy deletion of the material, I've put so much effort into.

I promise to improve the article, though. I'll mprove and update it when I can gather new,verified relevant information.

Thank you, Pobedochka. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Pobedochka (talkcontribs) 22:05, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

I don't believe that it is blatant advertising which is why you have not been "threatened" with speedy deletion of the article. I tagged it so that it would be improved, either by you or others. I tagged it as I did because of the lengthy enumeration of events. While listing notable events is a legitimate part of a biography, events such as "Spent three days with Mickey Rourke in Moscow during his visit to promote The Wrestler." strikes me personally more as name-dropping than an actual notable event. One of the key parts of maintaining a neutral point of view is the principle of undue weight. Among other things, this means that notable events should be those reported by reliable sources, which is to say those sources which are not the subject's own website. VernoWhitney (talk) 22:20, 8 October 2010 (UTC)
Dear Ma'am,
please tell me you have good news for us? :)
I've updated BVR article, by removing small or irrelevant events, possible self-promotion elements, any "emotional" character, etc. Also I've added a lot of new ::references and incorporated that into the body of the article.
(I've posted the update on the Talk Page here too.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Pobedochka (talkcontribs) 18:52, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

Close paraphrasing

After looking at that page...

I'll see if I can rewrite it again.

But when there's a single source I find it very difficult to escape the narrative structure of that source. Usually articles begin to diverge once multiple sources are used. I intended that article to be a stub and wanted other people to expand it, but in this case I'll have to do it myself. I'll see if I can get another source and use it so that there cannot be any way that it can be interpreted as "close paraphrasing"

WhisperToMe (talk) 23:08, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

That template is for issues which probably don't rise to the level of copyright violation, but should still be reworded. I chose to blank it purposefully. I am aware that it is difficult to avoid closely paraphrasing a single source, but that does not mean it is acceptable. VernoWhitney (talk) 23:10, 9 October 2010 (UTC)
For an example of the problem compare your article:

Donaldson has a death row, with a capacity of 24 prisoners, for condemned prisoners who need to be incarcerated in the Birmingham judicial area.

with the source:

Donaldson has a death row with a capacity for 24 inmates that need to be incarcerated in the Birmingham judicial area.

VernoWhitney (talk) 23:12, 9 October 2010 (UTC)
From my understanding that template is intended for copyright concerns. The template has the copyright symbol on it. The paragraph mentioning the template, Wikipedia:Close_paraphrasing#Detecting_and_dealing_with_close_paraphrasing clearly says "Unlike straightforward copyright violations, close paraphrasing is notoriously difficult to detect" - The template is to be used to mark it for cleanup.
I didn't say it was acceptable, but my point is that it's difficult to avoid, and that it's also sneaky and ambiguous.
I'll see if I can rewrite it. Lemme make a subpage on my user page.
WhisperToMe (talk) 23:17, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Alright, please look at User:WhisperToMe/Donaldson WhisperToMe (talk) 23:23, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Yes, close paraphrases can be difficult to detect, but it's also most of what I've been doing on Wikipedia for the past seven months. The documentation for {{Close paraphrasing}} specifically states "If you believe the paraphrasing is close enough that it may infringe copyright, please follow the procedures at {{copyvio}} instead." That is what I did. I'll look at your rewrite now. VernoWhitney (talk) 23:24, 9 October 2010 (UTC)
Your rewrite looks clean, so I have no objections to you replacing the blanking with it. Thanks for rewriting it. Cheers. VernoWhitney (talk) 23:28, 9 October 2010 (UTC)
About the rewrite: Good. Lemme replace it right now.
About the template instructions: Aha, I see. In that case that information should also be added to Wikipedia:Close_paraphrasing
So, when would a close paraphrasing not violate copyright? Does it have to do with the proportion of close paraphrasing within an article? Or is it something else?
To be honest, I didn't know about that close paraphrasing page and that template, and I'd been on Wikipedia for years. It's somewhat embarrassing, but now that I know about it I'll take in mind. Thank you
WhisperToMe (talk) 23:31, 9 October 2010 (UTC)
I hadn't though of adding that to the essay, so thanks for that. I'll see if some of the other copyvio regulars have any input which can make that association on the essay page clearer.
To answer your question: Yes, close paraphrasing can be not a copyright violation if it's a small amount of text when compared to both the article and the source. Closely paraphrasing all of a short source in a long article, for example, can still be a problem. It gets fuzzier in that a copyright violation is not exactly the same as copyright infringement. We don't want to have to rely on fair use to incorporate close paraphrases of copyrighted sources (similar to the reason that our non-free content criteria for images is more strict than the usual fair use requirements), and so that middle ground of where it's likely a policy problem but probably not a legal problem is where the {{Close paraphrasing}} tag comes in; when it could be a legal problem is when blanking or simply removal (or speedy deletion) come into play to remove the content as quickly as possible.
I'd say it's probably a good thing you haven't run across the close paraphrasing page/template, since it doesn't really come up in conversation unless you're either tracking down that kind of problem or creating them (even if inadvertently). Anyways, thanks again for clearing that up. Cheers! VernoWhitney (talk) 23:51, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Ukrainian Brazilian

FYI, I did oopen a talk page discussion here, although it wasn't followed up on. Which is fine with me - the article seems stable.Faustian (talk) 13:06, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

I did see that, and I appreciate it, so I apologize if you felt I was saying that neither of you had tried to have a discussion. An RfC is just a bit excessive and difficult to establish when both sides aren't participating, which is why I removed the posting from the request board. Cheers! VernoWhitney (talk) 13:11, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

tenfu tea museum

The goal of this article is to simply identify the tea museum; therefore I think the simplest thing to do is to re-write. Wrote a new article without infringing material, follow this link to the temporary subpage. icetea8 (talk) 14:51, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

The Ramrods (punk band)

Thanks for this [3], for some weird reason i have been unable to open any pages for about half an hour mark nutley (talk) 19:39, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

I was having odd connection issues this morning, so no worries. VernoWhitney (talk) 19:47, 10 October 2010 (UTC)
Apologies for messing up the move and disambiguation page.  :-( Ghmyrtle (talk) 19:51, 10 October 2010 (UTC)
An admin's already fixed it and now you know for next time, so it all worked out. Cheers. VernoWhitney (talk) 19:53, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

For you to

Please look here, you might also be able to help: User_talk:SMasters#Ribbon_merge.. Skibden (talk) 14:20, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Re. [4] - fair enough, but should the BLP-PROD still apply too?

Noting that I tagged it previously as G11 and it was deleted [5], then recreated...I'm just concerned that it might hang around forever.

It's probably A7 too.

Anyway - no worries; I just wanted to mention it because I was checking things I had CSD'd. Cheers,  Chzz  ►  07:33, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

You're right: even though it's copied from a source it's not a reliable source so BLP PROD still applies, although there are plenty of editors at WT:STICKY that feel that any source at all rules it out (since the proposal to explicitly exclude facebook/myspace sources didn't even pass). I don't really agree with their interpretation, but I tend to follow it and err on the side of caution so I only got as far as "If it's copied then there's a source". I doubt it will survive the copyvio process anyways. <shrug> VernoWhitney (talk) 11:54, 8 October 2010 (UTC)
It didn't have any references at all though. It didn't state the source as a reference. Just because we happened to notice it was copied from elsewhere, wouldn't preclude the sticky - unless the ref was added as a source, I suppose. But, as you say, probably doesn't matter, assuming tagged possible copyvio's are dealt with reasonably promptly. G11 might've been best all-round, (or G12). But, yeah...I was only commenting because I came across it, in patrol; no big deal.  Chzz  ►  11:57, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

Barnstar of Diligence


The Barnstar of Diligence
For your great work in AFD I award you this barnstar. Many editors base their AFD votes on what others voted, but you take your votes case by case, being neither a deletionist or a inclusionist. I applaud that. Thank you for your work. Alpha Quadrant talk 18:28, 11 October 2010 (UTC)
Thanks very much! I know I try to make an effort to judge each case on its own merits, but I must admit I'm fairly surprised to be noticed given my intermittent participation at AFD. Can I ask what brought me to your attention? VernoWhitney (talk) 18:47, 11 October 2010 (UTC)
I was looking through AFD archives for a particular debate and I noticed you. I decided you deserved a barnstar, so I gave you one. Best, --Alpha Quadrant talk 16:49, 12 October 2010 (UTC)
Okay, I was just curious. Thanks again! VernoWhitney (talk) 17:09, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

Tag

I work for the company who's page this is and I have permission to copy and past from their websites history page —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lawhorn's Seasonings (talkcontribs) 22:52, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

We appreciate your contribution, but in order to verify that you have permission to use the material we need you to follow the steps listed at Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials. Thank you. VernoWhitney (talk) 02:35, 13 October 2010 (UTC)

Mick keith money1.jpg

Hello VernoWhitney in my efforts to challenge a lot of the images pending otrs permission most have been deleted or sorted out but deleted image File:Mick keith money1.jpg has been re-uploaded with a text of an email sent into otrs with an acknowledgement email and number out from the OTRS system Ticket#2009111610003902. Any chance of checking this for me please. Thanks. MilborneOne (talk) 13:51, 13 October 2010 (UTC)

Permission was not usable, so I have tagged it again as no permission and left a new message on the contributor's talk page with some more details about what is required and directed them to contact me if they have further questions, so hopefully that can be cleared up. VernoWhitney (talk) 14:03, 13 October 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for that, appreciated. MilborneOne (talk) 14:23, 13 October 2010 (UTC)
Not a problem. It's the least I can do to help out someone sorting through all of those old images. VernoWhitney (talk) 14:53, 13 October 2010 (UTC)

Identify age of a page?

Hi, Verno. Is there anything you know of to help identify the age of [6]? At this writing, Wayback is being spectacularly uncooperative with me, and I would prefer to resolve the question of copyright provenance clearly at Asset Management Plan if I can rather than dropping a notice on the contributor. I've had to delete one of his articles because I could not verify that we had it first, but I will be surprised if this fellow has used any content on Wikipedia that he did not author himself, even if published elsewhere first. Mind you, it wouldn't be the first time I've been surprised. But still and all, I'd rather not drop a second issue on his lap before he's even read about the first issue if it can be avoided. (This is in regards the lingering issue from Wikipedia:Copyright problems/2010 October 1.) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 16:41, 13 October 2010 (UTC)

I saw your note about that and was just looking it up myself. The archived content of that webpage only goes up through March '08 and is only a web store - no information about the company or anything even remotely resembling the blanked text. VernoWhitney (talk) 16:45, 13 October 2010 (UTC)