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This page contains discussions that have been archived from Village pump (miscellaneous). Please do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to revive any of these discussions, either start a new thread or use the talk page associated with that topic.

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Films - MPAA ratings, rottentomatoes

It seems a lot of Wiki movie pages I visit lack the MPAA rating and link to rottentomatoes. I'm not familiar enough to know if there's a template used for movies, but think it would be a good idea to add these. At the very least, the MPAA rating is standard info you'd expect to find - when it's not there, and a link to rottentomatoes is also missing, I have to re-Google, making Wiki somewhat useless. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.173.45.227 (talk) 20:25, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

First, if you think some information is missing, be bold and add it to the article. Second, Wikipedia is not US-centric (or at least shouldn't be), so ratings from other countries should probably be included, if MPAA's is. Third, if you think that rating information should be contained in {{infobox film}}, you can discuss it on that template's talk page. Svick (talk) 20:36, 20 February 2010 (UTC)
A problem with adding a rating is that many nations have their own rating system. For example, if you glance at the IMDb page for Plan 9 from Outer Space, it lists 12 different national ratings.—RJH (talk) 00:07, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
There's no reason we couldn't do the same sort of thing, if people think that it's worthwhile...
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 00:29, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
Perhaps it would work as an expandable sub-menu with a row for each national rating?—RJH (talk) 23:40, 23 February 2010 (UTC)
Sounds reasonable to me. Collectonian seems to be the "facilitator" of those types of articles though (or, she's at least one of the nosiest editors in that subject area), so I wouldn't be surprised if your edits meet some stiff resistance based on her reply below.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 01:17, 24 February 2010 (UTC)
This should be brought up at Template talk:Infobox film with a link to the discussion added to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Films. —Akrabbimtalk 02:35, 24 February 2010 (UTC)
No, one should not "be bold" and add it as per consensus it is inappropriate to include such information. MPAA rating is an American-centric and fairly arbitrary thing. It has been a long standing consensus of the film project tonot include such information, and per WP:MOSFILM it should not be added. We can not just add it for all countries as it then becomes excessive and the ratings are fairly meaningless. -- AnmaFinotera (talk · contribs) 03:13, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
Per Collectionan. This is what IMDb is for and most (if not all) articles have IMDb in the EL. The only time a rating should be mentioned if it received a lot of outside coverage (such as a film bein rated "X" and having to be cut down to a "R"; or if a film was banned from certain countries, etc). Also if a Rotten Tomatoes score is not listed, then by all means list it. That on the other hand is encouraged. —Mike Allen 05:33, 24 February 2010 (UTC)
Consensus is against merely listing the MPAA rating because it is systemic bias toward the United States. In the other end of the spectrum, listing all the ratings is indiscriminate especially because there is no context for a particular rating from a country. A template existed to list them, but it was deleted. The best way to use ratings in articles is to mention them where useful context exists, such as being the top-grossing R-rated film, having to edit the film to receive a more family-friendly rating, or the film being banned in a country. We have a section of the guidelines about ratings here. As for Rotten Tomatoes, it seems pretty widespread for me already. I'd usually include it if there are multiple reviews that cannot all be included in the Wikipedia article. If a Rotten Tomatoes web page has only two or three reviews, though, it may be best to consider referencing them in the article body and not worry about having RT as an EL. Erik (talk) 12:58, 24 February 2010 (UTC)
Thanks, this answered my question as to why they're not included. My bad thinking English-Wiki meant USA-Wiki. I am bold and add rottentomatoes links when absent, but skip it if there are not enough reviews to get a meter rating. I'm just surprised I find so many films without, maybe I'm just unlucky! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.173.45.227 (talk) 15:03, 24 February 2010 (UTC)
No problem! There do tend to be a lot of American editors (in the realm of film anyway), so it's natural. We just have to remember from time to time that this is an encyclopedia for the world, just in the English language. Another particular bias to avoid is use of "domestic" because it is particularly meaningless in a globally distributed article. A lot of American newspapers use "domestic" because their articles are circulated among American readers. Instead, it's better to be specific about the countries in which a film performed well or not well. Erik (talk) 15:44, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Why is it US-centric to use the MPAA rating on US movies? I would support the inclusion of one rating, from whichever country the movie is from. Has this been considered? Calliopejen1 (talk) 14:11, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Why is it so difficult to find templates?

Yet again I find myself with the same problem. I want to tag an article with "this section needs more references", but can I find the right tag? Of course not. (answers welcome by the way). I have had the same problem whan I wanted to edit the Indonesian Political Party Infobox, which ironically I created (!). How can I find it (apart from ploughing through "my contributions"?). Entering it in the search box results in "Republic of China (section Political status)" as the first item...

Am I the only person with this problem? Am I missing something really obvious? Davidelit (Talk) 18:48, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

{{Refimprove}} ? (Some of these take a "section=yes" parameter, this one doesn't appear to but could be modified). You'll have to do an advanced search and include templatespace to find this easily (e.g.). –xenotalk 18:51, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
All templates can be found on Wikipedia:Template messages (WP:TM) and linked subpages. -- Flyguy649 talk 18:55, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Thanks to xeno for the rapid response, and for the Refimprove pointer (which I would have put in the curly brackets had I been able to find the right letters to turn off WML), and to Flyguy649. I still feel this is a shortcoming of the Wikipedia search option. I have also had problems tracking down the "This article is about X. For Y, see Z." tag as well as numerous other WML bits. Does anybody esle feel there is something lacking in the search page? Or is it just me? Davidelit (Talk) 19:05, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Template:Otheruses lists most of the hats. As I indicated, by default the search page searches only articles. You can change this behaviour at Special:Preferences → Search options. –xenotalk 19:06, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
You can install friendly, that gives you some extra tabs at the top of the page, the "tag" one will show you all the Improvement templates, and allows grouping where possible.  Ronhjones  (Talk) 20:50, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

I think the answer to the question you're actually asking is here - the advanced search page, which allows you to search in other namespaces, which you can't do by default. I do not know if it's possible to configure your own settings to default to searching a different selection of namespaces, but if not it there may be a unique URL for template-namespace searches out there somewhere.--~TPW stands for (trade passing words?) or Transparent Proof of Writing 20:19, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

As indicated above, "You can change this behaviour at Special:Preferences → Search options." –xenotalk 13:39, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

I have gathered this list of government-run databases regarding buildings in New York City. These databases are of interest to anyone who is interested any article in any category within Category:Buildings_and_structures_in_New_York_City. I am trying to brainstorm ways to make them more accessible to these people, since their data is not accessible via google search. I have some ideas, and I would like your feedback.

  • I could create an article, Public databases on New York buildings, and put this under ==See also== in each of the individual articles.
  • I could paste these links at the top of the relevant categories. But I seriously doubt that people ever click on an article's categories to learn more information about the article.
  • I could manually paste these links into the eternal links section of each article. But I hate this idea.

Thoughts? Andrew Gradman talk/WP:Hornbook 05:52, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

  • If you use the info in one of the databases, then clearly that link belongs in a reference. If you simply want to mention the site, then you should add links to the sites with directly relevant information to the external links section. They appear to be useful links, but unless they contain directly relevant information then they're just like all other EL's (being "government-run" is not really important here, as there is a long history of agreement that there's nothing particularly special about government supplied information, which is a point that I more or less agree with). The short answer: "it depends".
    — V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 06:17, 28 February 2010 (UTC)
Extended content
  • Thanks Ohms -- that's a good answer; I asked my question poorly. Please bear with me as I give some extra background...
  • I'm taking a class on internet skills for lawyers; our first assignment was to use the internet to research the building in which our client lives. Since that building happens to be historic, I decided to create the article Graham Court to organize our research.
  • Amazingly, in a class of sixteen students, not one of us found the databases that I subsequently collected at User:Agradman/NY gov databases RE NY buildings; we only found the sources that were available by Googling the building's name or address.
  • Now, I have put these databases into Graham_Court#External_links, but this does not solve the systemic problem: "How do we help Wikipedians find information that is relevant to the CATEGORY that an article belongs to, but that is not accessible by Googling the name of the article itself?"
  • Here is the best solution I can think of: I created the template {{Free databases on New York buildings (overview)}}, which urges people to paste the navbox {{Public databases on New York buildings}}, into articles where appropriate. I then pasted the "overview" template into the tops of categories that would apply to Graham Court -- e.g., (Category:Buildings and structures in New York City, Category:Apartments in New York City, etc.
  • I have never seen this solution done, and I think we should promote it. Generally speaking, whenever the relevance of an external link to an article exists by virtue of its relevance to A CATEGORY THAT THE ARTICLE BELONGS TO , that external link should go in a navbox that is advertised via a template that appears in the category. For example, when the external link is an almanac that contains material on all members of Congress, it should go into a navbox entitled {{external links relating to members of congress}}; and that navbox should be advertised in some template such as {{external links relating to members of congress (overview)}} which appears in the larger category such as Category:Members of Congress.
  • And in the longer term, I think there should be a way so that the act of categorizing an article will cause that navbox to appear in that article. Andrew Gradman talk/WP:Hornbook 22:10, 28 February 2010 (UTC)
  • PS In retrospect, my argument is not limited to databases or other external links that are not easily accessible via google. Broadly, I think that (1) whenever a source relates to a category, that source should not be pasted directly into articles that are members of that category, but should appear in a navbox; (2) we should make it easy for that navbox to appear in articles that are assigned to that category. Andrew Gradman talk/WP:Hornbook 22:29, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

The "collapse" box contains my original response to Ohms Law. However, I thought about it some more and then rephrased my response into a proposal at Village pump (proposals). If you're interested, please continue the discussion there, thanks. Andrew Gradman talk/WP:Hornbook 00:54, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

You might like this ...

I think our navboxes will be better if we design them to correlate with, and be disseminated through, the categories that are assigned to the articles they belong in. For example:

I guess I should just start creating navboxes like this and hope the practice catches on. If you approve of this practice, I hope you'll help.  :) Andrew Gradman talk/WP:Hornbook 07:17, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Ubisoft images

Just informing you that the Ubisoft images are about to be deleted on Commons, see commons:Commons:Deletion requests/Template:Attribution-Ubisoft 3. The English language Wikipedia currently uses 66 images out of the category "Ubisoft images". If you want to keep using them, you need to transfer them here. --The Evil IP address (talk) 18:37, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

I've recently had a couple of experiences with articles' linking to other articles that they oughtn't to. Are there any policies, customs or the like for how to deal with such issues? Are there any technical tools (perhaps templates to flag them) that could help? Does anyone just have any reasonable advice or recommendations?

Here's an example—I suppose that, to some extent, one could just mark it down to "Hey, the article is a stub," but stubs never become anything more until people improve them. Anyway, the math article on conjugate variables included this sentence:

"A more precise mathematical definition, in the context of Hamiltonian mechanics, is given in the article canonical coordinates."

For background, I am a research mathematician and merely wanted to get a grasp of this topic. So, to learn more about conjugate variables, I followed the link to canonical coordinates. Well, far from being precisely defined there, the term "conjugate variables" doesn't even appear in the article! I decided I had to do something to remedy this situation, so I deleted the sentence (which was factually false), edited the talk page to add the {{Technical}} flag and explain the problem, and—on the off chance that somebody else might benefit from the hint that canonical coordinates might be somehow relevant—added a "See also" section and put in a link.

Here's a second example. The logic article on reification (fallacy), in its section contrasting reification and hypostatization, links (not surprisingly) to a (reputed) philosophy article on hypostasis. Sadly, the latter article deals entirely with religious (and, in particular, Christian) philosophy, and I can't find anything in it to suggest why anyone editing the article on the fallacy of reification would wish to link to it. Perhaps the editor assumed that (because the text "hypostatisis (philosophy)" showed blue when he previewed his edit) the linked-to article must be relevant, and never actually visited it to be sure. Anyway, I could just remove the link, but that leaves a section of the article using an obscure term but providing no hint of its meaning.

Words of counsel, anyone?—PaulTanenbaum (talk) 17:47, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

In your second example you might be tempted to start a stub hypostasis (mathematics) and edit the link to suit. As a general rule, if a wikilink is rubbish, just take it out. Also raise this issue at the mathematics wikiproject. Roger (talk) 17:58, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Avoiding plagiarism

I just recently expanded/edited the 3C 279 article. (Un)fortunately? this provided what I felt was a good example of how plagiarism could be avoided and/or why it's nearly impossible to do so in some senses, so I figured that I'd start a conversation about it. Now, my understanding of plagiarism is that it involves failing to cite the source for ideas, which makes actual plagiarism on Wikipedia a pretty rare (and normally easily and routinely resolved) problem since we require sources as a matter of course anyway. I've seen several instances where people criticize even cited quotes and/or paraphrasing though, which is what made me think to bring this up at all.

So, to cut to the chase, there is one fairly basic idea that several sources agree on, which I added to the article with this sentence fragment: , which is known in the astronomical community for its variations in the visible, radio, and x-ray bands.. [1] uses this sentence: , is quite famous because of its luminosity variations in the optical, radio, and X-ray bands., while [2] uses is well known for its past variations in the optical frequency band and in the radio and x-ray bands.. ...Comments?
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 04:00, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

If there's only a few ways to state exactly the same fact without making it sound like you're elucidating with an onomasticon, then using similar language for individual facts is not plagiarism.--Father Goose (talk) 04:25, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
LOL "onomasticon" is definitely going into my vocabulary toolbag, categorized under "ridiculous synonyms"!
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 04:29, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
That's not quite a synonym for "thesaurus", for the record. Good enough to make the point, though :). - Jarry1250 [Humorous? Discuss.] 20:37, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
It means a "A collection of names and terms" I corrected your title too. Kasaalan (talk) 20:46, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
Good mock-thesaurus writing always uses words that are not quite puissant.--Father Goose (talk) 10:01, 28 February 2010 (UTC)
See Wikipedia:Plagiarism and Wikipedia:Close paraphrasing for some existing guidelines. Dcoetzee 23:16, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Edits crossed out?

Why are these edits crossed out? See this contrib history. I've never seen this before on Wikipedia. Copana2002 (talk) 21:55, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

They were oversighted. –Whitehorse1 22:00, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

OK thanks, I had never heard of this. Copana2002 (talk) 22:17, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

If we were being pedantic, it was actually suppressed using revision deletion which people who have the oversight user right have access to. See WP:Oversight#RevisionDelete_vs_Extension:Oversight. Killiondude (talk) 00:10, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

experimenting with a cool new template, {{down arrow}}

I created a cool new template, {{down arrow}}, that I hope will improve the quality of organization in leads. It lets you put wikilinks around words in the lead while also indicating, by means of a downward arrow, that the wikilink jumps down to a section below where the material will get greater coverage. The most important thing is that it allows you to distinguish between wikilinks that jump to other articles, and wikilinks that jump down within an article.

I've tested it at (temporarily, before reverting) Morse v. Frederick and Callisto and Roe v. Wade and sun. Let me know what you think. Andrew Gradman talk/WP:Hornbook 07:30, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

I've been playing with the template a bit to minimize its impact on text flow. The initial design was a bit much⇩.--Father Goose (talk) 08:24, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
This may be a good idea, but there's no justification for testing it in high-profile articles - or, indeed, in any articles, without some discussion and userspace draft testing first. Rd232 talk 08:30, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
Don't worry, I reverted the edits promptly after inserting them. They're just there as demos. Andrew Gradman talk/WP:Hornbook 08:36, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
While this is technically neat, I'm opposed to the use of intra-page links like this. Articles already have a TOC, and ideally should be written in such as to obviate the need for links like this. The current implementation is also still too intrusive. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 10:16, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
I also am opposed to this - as Chris says, articles already have a ToC (and if they don't, they are probably too short to need to use this). If the intra-page link is needed, then that means that the section titles are adequately used. For example, if you want to use one of these links to "background", there should be a section titled Background, which the reader will be able to get to through the ToC. You've done a good bit of work here, but I don't think it is suitable (or required). -- PhantomSteve/talk|contribs\ 11:26, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
I urge you to keep an open mind. I'm not suggesting that we impose this on articles as a matter of policy. I'm saying that it should be made available as an option for authors who want to wikilink from the lead to the body.
Steve wrote, "Articles already have a TOC, and ideally should be written in such as to obviate the need for links like this". Ideally, yes! But huge inadequacies arise from both the concept of the "TOC" and "lead" on wikipedia. Right now, authors can't really use wikilinks in the lead to point to the body of an article, because readers think they're going to be taken to another article. Callisto (moon) is an example where that is desperately needed; the 500-word lead simply summarizes the subsequent sections, but you wouldn't know just how much the lead is purporting to substitute for the table of contents until you add some way of distinguishing the wikilinks.
Our leads essentially are trying to serve as a table of contents for the article. If we add this functionality, it will amount to giving users the ability to add an "annotated table of contents" alongside the automatic one which is generated without annotation. I believe that in long articles in the Britannica's "Macropedia" section, they annotate the leads of their articles with page numbers, too Andrew Gradman talk/WP:Hornbook 15:04, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
Actually, leads are supposed to be a summary of the article, per WP:LEAD. Meanwhile the ToC is a navigation tool into different parts of the article. Your template demonstrates how their functions could be merged into a summary of the article with embedded navigation to each corresponding section. It's an interesting re-think of how to approach the lead and/or ToC -- though as you can see so far, it's going to be unlikely that you'll get people to embrace it.
Perhaps you could re-think the template as a way to standardize the formatting for articles that already have intra-article links, such as Pneumonia#Investigations and its "(see below)".--Father Goose (talk) 23:12, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
Oppose: Sorry, but IMHO this is a solution in search of a problem. In any event as this would be a major change to layout and MOS standards, this discussion should be more widely advertised, for example in the {{cent}} template. – ukexpat (talk) 19:14, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
From a technical standpoint, this leaves a lot to be desired. If I'd seen the Callisto example, I'd have reverted it as vandalism -- you replaced a number of key words in the lede with "no such character" boxes. --Carnildo (talk) 23:14, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
I'm not sure why you're seeing "no such character" boxes. The template uses ⇩, which is just the "Downwards Thick Arrow" from Arrow_(symbol)#Arrows in Unicode -- further elaborated here. I just thought every browser could render unicode. Andrew Gradman talk/WP:Hornbook 00:01, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
Only if you have the fonts. Most don't come installed by default. For me, the Callisto test reads "It was discovery⇩ in 1610" instead of "discovered". OrangeDog (τ • ε) 13:14, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
The template documentation also heavily contradicts itself. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 20:05, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
And at the present time, the template itself appears to be busted. It's an intriguing idea but you really want to get your ducks in a row before you start pitching it.--Father Goose (talk) 21:09, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
I'm seeing "no such character" boxes because the font I'm using does not have the arrow-drawing characters. To me, the lede has phrases such as "Callisto is surrounded by an extremely thin � composed of..." (I've replaced the arrow with U+FFFD to increase the odds of you seeing like I do.) --Carnildo (talk) 23:49, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
  • I don't like it much and it's got glitches, and you can already do this without the use of templates, like this.↓

Test heading

See? Fences&Windows 22:09, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

Someone please fix this cartoon

Google was not even the first search engine. We all know what that caption should read. Amientan (talk) 21:24, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

I suspect, based on your question, that you found one of our over 6 million articles and thought we were affiliated in some way with that subject. Please note that you are at Wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia that anyone can edit, and this page is for asking questions related to using or contributing to Wikipedia itself. Thus, we have no special knowledge about the subject of your question. You can, however, search our vast catalogue of articles by typing a subject into the search field on the upper right side of your screen. If you cannot find what you are looking for, we have a reference desk, divided into various subject areas, where asking knowledge questions is welcome. Best of luck. Ks0stm (T•C•G) 22:19, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
Why are you using a help desk template for VPM? This is a request about re-doing a cartoon with s/Google/Wikipedia/ to make it reflect the reality of what life was like before Wikipedia. Back when we had Altavista but no Wikipedia, it was much harder to get in to unfamiliar topics as easily. 99.22.95.69 (talk) 06:46, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
But then why are they asking us, Wikipedia, to fix the cartoon we didn't create? Or am I missing something here? I used the astray template because regardless of the fact it mentions the help desk, it got across the message intended better than I could from free writing the response...that message being that we are not associated with that cartoon? Ks0stm (T•C•G) 07:04, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
It may be a joke. (i.e., "you guys know that Wikipedia is really where people get their answers"). Unfortunately it's sometimes hard to distinguish subtle humor from confused newbies. Dcoetzee 13:59, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

User:Onevalefan

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Can someone post a notice to User:Onevalefan to actually respond to me? His talk page is protected for no reason I can see. He undid a split I made to an article approaching 50kB and gave me a vandal warning for my efforts, and I can't talk to him about it.

70.29.210.242 (talk) 11:47, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

Can someone also explain why I'm not allowed to use WP:BRD ? 70.29.210.242 (talk) 12:00, 4 March 2010 (UTC)


 Done This has been resolved. 70.29.210.242 (talk) 14:25, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Wow, I thought that site was reputable

"How come google is better than wikipedia?

google is better than wikipedia becouse wikipedia is pretty much a wanabe google and google has more information and it has gmail and images it has more features.

It is not necessarily better. Wikipedia is a repository of facts which are kept on its own computers. Google is a search engine which looks for information on many websites and does not store facts itself ". http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_come_google_is_better_than_wikipedia —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.54.207.207 (talk) 13:38, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

Google is a search engine. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia created by volunteers. Bus stop (talk) 13:42, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
Errmm, an encyclopedia is a repository of facts. Paradoctor (talk) 14:43, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
Importantly, it is but one such repository and only for certain classes of facts. --Cybercobra (talk) 16:42, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
Oh no! WikiAnswers said something bad about Wikipedia! I guess we'd better pack up guys, we've been rumbled. Fences&Windows 19:58, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
Oh noez! The shallow façade of 15 million articles (you know, the one we normally use to protect ourselves against such suggestions) is well and truly in tatters this time... - Jarry1250 [Humorous? Discuss.] 20:54, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
Pacefalms. –MuZemike 20:26, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
  • Google is better than Wikipedia because Google isn't evil, whereas Wikipedia is run by a dastardly cabal. Google is better than Wikipedia because Wikipedia allows horrible breaches of privacy, whereas Google, er... ah... never mind. Fences&Windows 22:14, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
  • Google is better than Wikipedia because Google charitably donated $2 million (USD) to the organization operating the world's greatest and largest encyclopedia. When was the last time the WMF donated that kind of cash to such a noble effort? ~ Amory (u • t • c) 22:22, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
And with all that cash, they still don't share! Paradoctor (talk)

Downsize images

How can I downsize images such as this one when integrating them into an article? Thx in advance Gun Powder Ma (talk) 17:01, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

Appropraitae description.
You can use the thumb parameter and/or specify the size of the image: [[File:Ornamental Bronze Plaque, Celtic Horse-gear, Santon, Norfolk (Detail).jpg|thumb|100px|Appropraitae description.]] Usually, the best way is to just use the thumb parameter and don't specify the size. See also Wikipedia:Picture tutorial or Wikipedia:Extended image syntax. Svick (talk) 17:46, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

#REDIRECT [[Web 2.0#Web 3.0]]

We have blocked Web 3.0 from being created. Instead, we should populate it with #REDIRECT [[Web 2.0#Web 3.0]] and then block that page from being edited.

If the content of The weather in london is #REDIRECT [[London#Climate]], this seems like a no brainer.

Andrew Gradman talk/WP:Hornbook 20:42, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

Seems reasonable. Done.--Father Goose (talk) 21:03, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

CE doesn't that mean "Creation Era" ?

CE doesn't that mean "Creation Era" from the Byzantine calendar? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.197.229.147 (talk) 22:57, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

Current Era. (the year 0, and all years following). --Kim Bruning (talk) 23:10, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
There was no year 0. CE stands for Christian Era or Common Era, and means the same thing in either case, with the year 1 CE directly following the year 1 BCE. Algebraist 23:21, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
Oops. --Kim Bruning (talk) 20:01, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

Temporary Autoblocking of Probable Vandalism Only addresses

Discussions are on here ▒ ♪ ♫ Wifione ♫ ♪ ▒ ―Œ ♣Łeave Ξ мessage♣ 19:44, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

Search options of the talkpage archives

I just found that some articles have that. Is it a new option? Is there a particular reason why most articles don't have one? -RobertMel (talk) 23:16, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

No, it's nothing new. I think it's not used that often just because most articles don't have extensive archives, so the search doesn't add much value. Both {{talk header}} and {{archives}} that are often used to list archives can be set to show the search box by setting search = yes. Svick (talk) 23:34, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

Free Wikipedia articles are on sale as printed books for 50 dollars each in Amazon.com with no prior warning

Resolved
 – Nothing more we can do here. Boldly marking this as resolved. – ukexpat (talk) 17:03, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Around 20.000 Free Wikipedia articles are on sale as printed books for 50 dollars each in Amazon.com with no prior warning

"All texts of this book are extracted from Wikipedia. [...] Please be advised that nothing found here has necessarily been reviewed by people with the expertise required to provide you with complete, accurate or reliable information. Some information in this book maybe (sic) misleading or wrong."

History of Georgia (country), by Alphascript Publishing, pp. 4 [3]

This is the kind of worst case scenario for wikipedia, where people are deprived from their hard earned money with false advertising. People are scammed via our free content.

Wikipedia articles are on sale as printed books for 50 dollars each in Amazon.com via a Publisher, with no prior warning in amazon page yet, as printed in 4th page of the "book" after you buy it [4]

We require a huge task force that can add a warning and link to Wikipedia for thousands of similar titles in Amazon.com as customer review so that people might be warned about this issue and not scammed. Read VDM Publishing House for details.

Not sure right place to post, but feel free to move or duplicate the thread elsewhere. Kasaalan (talk) 04:35, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

copied from Template talk:Announcements/Community bulletin board. -- Quiddity (talk) 07:38, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
This is now at least the 3rd time this has been posted about on the Pumps. See User:PrimeHunter/Alphascript_Publishing_sells_free_articles_as_expensive_books and these pages. Long story short, Amazon refuses to do anything about it, the WMF isn't looking like it'll do anything about it, and recourse via individual editors is limited outside of such vigilante action. In other words, Wikipedians are already aware of it. --Cybercobra (talk) 07:56, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Being aware doesn't solve anything, this is a huge scandal and I was about to buy 2 books, which turn out to be wikipedia articles. Consider they are used in academic thesis or dissertations. That is unacceptable. Then why do we keep making efforts for free for anyone, if some people charge and scam them for our efforts.
Solution is, we should create a task force, get accounts and leave some warnings as user comments in amazon, or better code a bot to do it for more than 17 thousand "books".
Morever, we may all mail customer service of amazon in protest. And if amazon still refuses and remove our comments or links to wikipedia articles, then we will inform media about this huge scandal so that how public opinion and trust changes about that site.
Selling scam will not turn out good for anyone. Kasaalan (talk) 13:18, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Well Amazon must be guilty of some kind of fraud because if you look at [5] then it lists "1,043 customer reviews" but if you see them then they are for the actual book !. The Alphascript book (cost 43 bucks) is the Wikipedia articles and it is 68 pages long but the actual book (hey a bargain at 10 buck) [6] is 368 pages long and also has the same 1043 customer reviews). And I thought Readers Digest was bad enough but that is some awesome compression. I just can't understand how in a country with a zillion frickin lawyers someone hasn't called Amazon's bluff on this crap. Ttiotsw (talk) 13:23, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
If this is the 3rd time, then the issue hasn't been properly solved yet. I just searched for the book review in amazon to find some info over it, found it is a wikipedia article and PrimeHunter's pages to saved a 100 dollars. But apparently some people scammed the same way, that is unacceptable.
Discussion Wikipedia:Alphascript
Also we should inform all the wikipedia founders, admins, sysops and executives about this situation. This why we elect themwikipedia foundation executives and members, and one of the reasons why they get their salaries. Actually we should mail or put an information bar at top to warn all community, users and readers. If village pump is not the right place, then please direct us where we can have a discussion with leading members of wikipedia on how we can deal with this serious issue.Kasaalan (talk) 13:35, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
I'm an admin, but completely unsalaried. :) I'm also as powerless in this situation as anybody else. It is completely legal to reproduce Wikipedia's content and sell it, under our licensing terms, so long as the authors are properly attributed and the license is carried forward. See Wikipedia:Reusing Wikipedia content. If they aren't giving proper attribution, then the actual contributors to articles being misused have legal recourse for copyright violations, but the Wikimedia Foundation itself has no claim as it does not own copyright in any of the content generated by its users. I agree it's a pretty shocking scheme to make people pay high dollar value for something they could get for free (and I'm particularly shocked that the "look inside" on the Devil Wears Prada product shows the original book, and not the Wikipedia content). Amazon lists content from almost anybody (see [7] for how easy it is); I don't know if they'd reject these people for having a shoddy product. Notifying the media might actually be a viable idea, though. I would imagine some news services would be very interested in a story like this. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 13:54, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Moonriddengirl you know I am a senior editor and I don't get paid either, Wikipedia foundation members getting payed montly to deal with issues about wikipedia. If the publisher would have put a warning about it is a printed version of a Wikipedia article titled ... and dated ... it would be a fair and nice service who likes to read wikipedia in printed fashion. This is just a scam with false advertising and no prior warning. I noticed 10 users with highest edit count members of wikipedia about the issue. Instead paying 50 dollars to some copy paste editors people might have donated to wikipedia for hosting.
Morever since they have more than 17 thousand titles listed in amazon, I suspect they only print "books" as they get order by someone who falls to their trap. Kasaalan (talk) 14:13, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
I meant no offense about the salary; I was just responding to your statement, which seemed to suggest that founders, admins, sysops & executives are paid. :) Print on demand is a common technique for vanity publishers. See Philip M. Parker; his "Icon Group International" does the same thing, mining Wikipedia and other usable online content to publish (see NYT article on him). It would certainly be fair and nice, but the question is, really, what we can do about it. It's not illegal, even if it unethical. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 14:44, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
I changed wording. It is unethical and false advertising if you put the notice inside the book where buyers can read after they buy via amazon where they are not pre-warned of such situation. read Wikipedia:Standard license violation letter Kasaalan (talk) 16:03, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
I don't really need to read it at this point; I'm sort of familiar with it. :) It's not a licensing violation if they acknowledge their source. Neither GFDL nor CC-By-SA require that attribution be acknowledged before the material is sold or otherwise distributed. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 16:17, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
We could go with my idea of printing Wikipedia on toilet paper. The ephemeral nature of the content would make it ideal for such a consumable. The trouble is that *some* might go jihad should certain articles end up printed in this way. Seriously though Amazon should fix the reviews where they are using the wrong book reviews. Ttiotsw (talk) 14:53, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
The Devil Wears Prada example is a common Amazon mistake of accidentally combining two listings into the same one. It often happens with one thing about another thing (I've seen it a couple times where a soundtrack is combined with the movie), and even occasionally with completely separate things. Calling it 'fraud' is a bit harsh. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 15:17, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
  • Do the books properly attribute the source to Wikipedia? If so, I don't think there's anything we can do here. Our material is freely licensed for commercial re-use. –xenotalk 14:55, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
  • I concur with Xeno. If you believe in liberty, in the freedom of information, you can't then turn around and start cherry-picking which reusers you do and don't want to disseminate your information. If people buy the book(s) and enjoy them, the world is a better place regardless of whether or not they could have got the same material for free on Wikipedia (or any other site). - Jarry1250 [Humorous? Discuss.] 15:55, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
The issue is I believe in liberty, not plagiarism, I do not defy re-users, I label copy paste commercial re-distributers who commits false advertising scams in amazon via thousands of free wikipedia articles, people who buy this do not enjoy but feel scammed and deprived of their hard earned money after they realized they pay overprice [50-100 dollars, which they can buy best quality books from best publishers] for "books" which are actually "freely available wikipedia articles" in printed form, according to their own blog and forum posts.Read how victimized readers actually feel after they get the book
Actually there are things we can do. This is a violation of wikipedia license as A More Perfect Onion suggests, read Wikipedia:Standard license violation letter
Also, since there are legal obligations, they put notice in the books inside pages. Yet they do not put the same notice via Amazon where readers buy the book without knowing the fact the "books" they buy are freely available in wikipedia and are just copy paste without any actual editing. 3 people are signing the books as editors though they did not edit the articles in any way.
We cannot leave them do whatever they like while they are scamming people by misusing our hard efforts. Kasaalan (talk) 16:03, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Our job is not to act as some moral authority or protector of the naive. Can you explain how that violates our license? –xenotalk 16:06, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
They sell freely available wikipedia content by misusing Creative Commons license which requires a protest by means of Wikipedia:Standard license violation letter, with false advertising and fake signatures as "editors" improperly attributing themselves as editors though they do not edit the context by any means and just copy paste, without noticing their customers before they buy with what actually they buy their "product". Kasaalan (talk) 16:25, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Our creative commons license allows for commercial re-use. If User:Moonriddengirl says there is no license violation when the material is properly attributed, then there is no license violation. False advertising is not our concern. Please raise your concerns with Amazon, they are malplaced here. –xenotalk 16:29, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Well, I'm not necessarily saying that, because I haven't seen the books. :) This isn't a licensing issue if they acknowledge the sources properly within the document as distributed. (There is nothing in Creative Commons or GFDL to require notification of attribution before distribution of content.) I agree that what they're doing is appalling, but if they credit their sources and maintain the free license it isn't a licensing violation. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 16:35, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
annoted –xenotalk 16:44, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Commercial re-use with proper attribution, and selling exact duplicates of 20.000 freely available wiki articles with your own signatures without pre-noticing buyers with overpriced bills are a clear misuse of Creative Commons, and a clear scam, that is why Wikipedia:Standard license violation letter exists. You may not just sell something and warn the user afterward. If you do not agree it is a scam, just provide me how can I contact lawyers of wikipedia about the issue.
The practice of law has some different interpretations, that is why judges and courts exist. It should be considered illegal, to sell a product without noticing. That is why they put notice in the book, to prevent scam lawsuits against them. Yet it is not possible for a reader to read the notice before they buy, and after they buy they cannot return it. Why, simply because they trust in amazon as a portal. What if a company loses customers trust.
Also even if it is legal to do so, we should still warn the public about the scam in a legal way. Amazon may be forced to put such a notice on the products' pages. Kasaalan (talk) 16:40, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
No, that is not at all our responsibility. User:Mike Godwin is the Wikimedia Foundation's general counsel if you think there is an issue here. –xenotalk 16:44, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
(edit conflict)"Commercial re-use with proper attribution" is in no way a misuse of Creative Commons, and that's not why Wikipedia:Standard license violation letter exists. It exists because people copy our content without attribution. I agree with you that what they are doing is an appalling practice, but it is not a licensing violation if they give proper credit even if it is inside the book. Wikipedia's lawyer is User:MikeGodwin. As I've explained to you above, though, the Wikimedia Foundation has no standing here, as it does not own copyright to any of its content. See WP:C. If it is not illegal, how do you propose we warn the public in a legal way? Feel free to write Amazon if you wish or notify the press, but I'd focus on the known issue: people may be mislead into believing they are buying work of scholarly merit. Wikipedia is not that. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 16:48, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

Moon people are selling free content without attribution via e-commerce, so that is a worse offense. It is same as, selling a replica of an ancient painting or statue for the same price as original, and sending the warning with a letter after customer purchased it or writing it under the statue or backside of the painting.

What you people don't understand is SPAM and scam always find a way to mislead people and law, that is why laws changes to prevent fraudulent acts. I remind SPAM were not considered illegal once, yet now it is considered as is, especially when it is committed in bulk fashion.

The issues are:

  • Buyers are not pre-warned about copy paste issues until they buy and read the book
    • "Books" are actually freely available articles copy pasted word-by-word
    • There are notice inside books, but not in e-commerce site of amazon
  • Books are over-priced even for actual top quality books by reliable publishers
  • The scam committed in a bulk fashion for 20.000 titles
  • They sign as editors even though they do not edit the content
    • 3 editors acts as if they edit over 17.000 titles an amount which is near impossible for them to read in such time
  • It is committed via amazon's search feature via bulk search spam
  • Info on amazon about books and reviews are fake or misleading
  • Amazon is aware of the issue and do not care
  • If it is not considered to be illegal, then we may
    • Warn media and public
    • Warn wiki community for awareness
    • Create a task force to bulk review, rate, warn and put actual wikipedia links to the wiki articles in amazon

Thanks for the link. Kasaalan (talk) 17:00, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

We are a free encyclopedia. We are not a moral authority, nor a consumer watchdog. I agree that the practice is appalling, but it does not violate our license. Please, with due respect, take your soapbox elsewhere. –xenotalk 17:03, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
In the same sense, you may also take your soapbox over how this is soapbox or not elsewhere. Kasaalan (talk) 17:06, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
You're free to notify the press yourself, free to set up a website about this, and many other things. The point here is that, yes we all agree it's a scam and so forth, but there's nothing WE as Wikipedia members can do (nor the WMF can) because they aren't actually doing anything illegal, per se. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 17:15, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Sorry to say, but everyone else is right. As long as their publications note that the content came from Wikipedia and that it is licensed CC-BY-SA, then what they are doing is perfectly legal. Screaming about it here is not going to resolve anything. Resolute 17:23, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Yeah, but that's the point:You aren't informed it's a Wikipedia copy/paste until you already have the book. ;'Hey, thanks for the money. By the way, this is a direct copy from Wikipedia; you could be reading this for free.' HalfShadow 17:41, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Still not relevant to our goal as a free encyclopedia. Speaking personally, if I was taken in by a scam like that (though I wouldn't be because I would've researched it a bit before I dropped $50 on it) I would file a chargeback with my credit card company. –xenotalk 17:45, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Where do you draw the line? If half the book is available free online? 75%? One or two illustrations? That is the problem. - Jarry1250 [Humorous? Discuss.] 17:47, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
I am seeking some collaboration here since I cannot review, rank and add warning to 17.000 articles by myself, however a task force can easily accomplish such a task. Also without notifying all wikipedia community you cannot decide on behalf of users who aren't aware of such a scam which uses wikipedia content as a tool.
Those who doesn't care are free to ignore and don't contribute. Reminding me what I am free to do is another way of wasting time. Fraud and scam laws changes.
We at least draw a line where 100 percent is copied word by word and sell by a massive false advertising scam business. This is a bulk spam-scam which uses wikipedia as a tool. And it is about the credibility of wikipedia community, amazon, along with actual publishers and writers as well. "There is nothing we can do" is a petty excuse for people who don't directly admit they don't actually care much. I will contact User:MikeGodwin about what we can do in legal terms. If enough users help and contribute, I will handle media awareness myself on behalf of them. Kasaalan (talk) 18:21, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Add a warning to 17,000 articles? What are you on about now? –xenotalk 18:28, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
I am on ground are you on a throne or something. Kasaalan (talk) 20:58, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Not what are you on - what are you on about. As in what are you talking about, adding warnings to 17000 articles? Why would we? –xenotalk 13:38, 1 March 2010 (UTC)
I've been watching this discussion all day and concur with everyone who has said that this is perfectly legal. I disagree however with those that say that this is none of our business. This is "our" content after all. This is the fruits of our work. And it is being used in a manner that we all agree is a "scam" - not actually a scam, but we feel it is contrary to the good spirt of Wikimedia. I'm sure we all agree that we want our content to be reused and republished. Yet at the same time, we all agree, I'm sure, that this is not what we had in mind.
And yes, there is something that we can do about it. We have a huge PageRank. We are the fourth biggest site on the internet. People turn to us to find out stuff. We may not have a page on Alphascript Publishing (and they do not deserve one until this is reported in verifiable sources). But we can have a page in the project namespace that mentions them by name, explains the situation and (briefly) advises consumers on their rights. Living in the EU, I have the right to simply return this book and get a full refund without explaning myself - are there similar rights for US consumers and consumers in other countries?
While I agree it is not our place to act as a Citizens Advice Bureau, it is our place to answer questions about the work we do and to advise people on their rights with repsect to activities relating to our work (particularly those we do not agree with). I would certainly be annoyed if I paid US$50 for one of these books. I'd expect Wikipedia to have a page on this subject. Most people wouldn't understand how this could happen. They might think it was Wikimedia that published these books (indeed we publish similar ones for a faction of the price). We need to answer those questions.
Hopefully, with our high PageRank, we could head off a lot of people being taken in by these guys. Those that we didn't, with our high PageRank, we could advise them while it is perfectly legal (and explain why) that if they live in the EU they can return the book and demand a full refund no-questions-asked. We could even point them towards our own book publish division (with the profits going to us) and advice them that if they really did want this book, to return that one and buy ours
We don't need to tolerate these guys. And we can do something about it. -- RA (talk) 19:27, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
And what other consumer activism should we engage in? –xenotalk 19:29, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
None. I don't advocate that we engage in any kind of consumer activism. -- RA (talk) 19:40, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
You've suggested we leverage our PageRank to inform consumers about an ongoing, allegedly deceptive, sales practice. That seems like consumer activism to me (or maybe consumer advocacy, but two sides of the same coin). –xenotalk 19:43, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
If a company uses its website to inform the public about uses about 3rd party practices involving its product, that is not "consumer activism". I suggest that we inform the public that it is perfectly legal to reuse Wikipedia content in this way. That is not consumer activism. (We currently do so but from a redistributors point of view, not a "users".)
If a company uses its website to answer anticipated questions from the public regarding 3rd party practices involving its product, that is not consumer activism. I anticipate that people would ask who they should contact if they are aggrieved about buying one of these books and what can they can do about it. I suggest that we tell them they should contact the vendor and that they can return it to the vendor for a full refund. That is not consumer activism.
If a company uses its website to inform the public about 3rd party practices involving its product with the intention of influencing public behavior, that is still not consumer activism. I suggest that we could use our website to indicate republishers of Wikipedia content (including ourselves). If a person wishes to buy Wikipedia articles in book form from them, then good and we have indicated to them where they can buy Wikipedia content in book form. At the same time, some of those who do not want to pay for Wikipedia will be informed that publishers like Alphascript publish Wikipedia content. That is still not consumer activism.
Now, if you have finished muddying the waters, is there any specific aspect to my suggestion that you disagree with? -- RA (talk) 20:15, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Just the fact that it still has absolutely nothing to do with our goals as a free encyclopedia and is an inappropriate leveraging of our google juice. –xenotalk 20:28, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
It has as much to do with our mission as Wikipedia:About, Wikipedia:Contact us, Wikipedia:Reference desk and so on. All of which are valuable pages and aid the project in their own ways. We disagree. C'est la vie. -- RA (talk) 23:43, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
This is nothing new - how many photo books have been sold based on Flickr photos, how many commercial software products have been based on BSD-licensed open source code? Commercialization of Wikipedia is actually one of the project's primary goals. I agree that it would be prudent of the publishers to disclose in advertising that the books are based on Wikipedia material, but even if they did, for some people it's worth $50 to have a professionally selected and printed version of some Wikipedia articles (in particular, not everyone has Internet access). If they actually are failing to comply with the GFDL, that's a different matter and some of the many editors who are affected should send them letters as mentioned above.
I've seen OpenOffice retailing for $70 in stores at shopping malls ... relabeled on the box, with the OpenOffice attribution only given inside, much as is the case with these Alphascript people. —Soap— 15:56, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
Luckily, these guys are dumb enough to use unattributed Wikipedia text in their advertising. This allows us to easily identify the books and is by itself noncompliance with the license (most likely, they have no competent writers themselves). Dcoetzee 19:44, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Absolutely. -- RA (talk) 20:15, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
I would fully support if they advertise as printed version of wikipedia in amazon, it would be a fair commercial use. Though they do not, customers are getting scammed and only become aware after they buy the book, and if we ignore them amazon will surely keep ignoring the case while making a profit over unaware readers. No possibly they do not edit even a single comma to most of the books, their product do not base on wikipedia or a regular derivative work, it is just copy paste duplicates of 17.000 wiki articles along with lead sections as product descriptions, since there is no way 3 editors can edit 20.000 books or articles. And if it is all legal and smooth, we can check stock value or customer trust level of amazon after a few big newspapers make news from such a scam case. Kasaalan (talk) 20:56, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
By the way, Mike Godwin said he will check the issue. Kasaalan (talk) 20:58, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Maybe it's time someone writes an article about this publishing house? Let's see them edit THAT and publish it. --Kvasir (talk) 21:35, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Like VDM Publishing House? With redirects from Alphascript Publishing and Betascript Publishing. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) talk 21:45, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Very nice. I expect nothing less from my fellow wikipedians. :) --Kvasir (talk) 22:46, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

Where we can discuss these matter further then. Can you guide us what we should do next. I contacted the lawyer of wikipedia. On the other hand the community should also has a right to know about such fraud and the foundation executives should definately read the case. Kasaalan (talk) 22:29, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

Most of us already know, and most of those don't care. The remainder don't see the point in disrupting Wikipedia to express our moral outrage. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 00:17, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
I don't see how its disruptive to call a spade a spade (or a scam a scam in this case). As with anything on wikipedia, those who care not a whit should scroll on down.--Milowent (talk) 02:12, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
It is always amusing how people too though to get disrupted by aggravated fraud or White-collar crime, yet they get easily disrupted when some wikipedia editors share their concerns, yet cannot find time or strength to help them. Why can't you just ignore the discussion, like you ignore the 17.000 "books" ready to be published for frauding people worldwide. Kasaalan (talk) 19:51, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

Looks like crows-sourcing is working: look at these tags: scam marketing(14) wikipedia(8) kindling(6) liar(5) rip-off(4) ripoff(3) ancient egypt(2) egyptian history(2) egyptian mythology(2) egyptology(1) [8]. Rich Farmbrough, 01:02, 27 February 2010 (UTC).

Oh and how about this for a book title? Rekeying: Lock, Locksmithing, Two-factor Authentication, Lock Picking, Cracking, Security Engineering, Sargon II, Egypt, Dur-Sharrukin, Phoenicia, Tigris . Clowns. Rich Farmbrough, 01:07, 27 February 2010 (UTC).

N.B.: Most of the Alphascript titles are listed in Google Books, although they don't have content previews available [9]. If anyone wants to raise awareness of this issue, letting Google know that they have the right to show any CC-BY-SA contents without Alphascript's permission would be a useful way to start. — Gavia immer (talk) 01:28, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

Oh, and for Rick: I'll see your "Rekeying and Sargon II" and raise you Empowerment: Public Art, Empowerment (sculpture), Tibetan Buddhism, Empowerment (Tibetan Buddhism), Spirituality, Politics, Confidence, Decentralization, Self-ownership, Employee Engagement. Clowns. — Gavia immer (talk) 01:32, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
I thought this title of theirs was very fitting. :) AgneCheese/Wine 01:42, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
I added many customer reviews and complaints in Amazon.com about scam to the VDM Publishing House creating a customer reviews section, but it got reverted for non-RS, attack etc. concerns VDM Publishing article revert for creation of customer reviews section with amazon.com review links. Kasaalan (talk) 15:39, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

Trademark infringement discussion

The issue here is not copyright infringement, it's trademark infringement, and a false and deceptive trade practice. With respect to trademark, it is specifically, reverse confusion. If I go to a store and buy a dozen pairs of Reeboks, and then I create an "Alphashoe" logo, slap it on a dozen shoeboxes, put those shoes in the boxes, and sell them under my label, some jurisdictions will hold that I am committing an actionable violation of Reebok's trademark rights (not copyright) by falsely representing their product as the result of my labor. Whether to pursue a legal remedy is another matter, but there certainly are theories under which this is actionable. To the extent that these books are being sold (or offered for sale, as they clearly are) in the United States, it can't hurt to bring this to the attention of the Federal Trade Commission, which specifically pursues deceptive trade practices. bd2412 T 19:50, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

That's a specious analogy. It would only work if Reebok was "the free shoe that anyone can resize to their feet." The FTC isn't going to do squat. However, Amazon has buyer reviews and feedback for all their products. They also have a very progressive returns policy. Over time this problem will likely solve itself as disgruntled customers demand their money back and leave negative feedback. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:59, 28 February 2010 (UTC)
As you can tell you have to buy the "book" to actually evaulate it. Also not sure about the return policy of Amazon, since many purchasers use to resale their Alphascript products on cheaper price in amazon themselves. If they could have return the product they wouldn't sell them 2nd hand Kasaalan (talk) 10:00, 6 March 2010 (UTC)
Also, it's only trademark infringement if you market your own work as the work of another, not the other way round. You'd have to steal Reebok's trade marks and put them on your own cheap Alphashoe products. I don't think Reebok would complain if you bought their shoes and sold them on at a higher price (this is the whole point of retail). OrangeDog (τ • ε) 22:17, 28 February 2010 (UTC)
Reebok would definitely sue the company billions if they would draw 10.000s of their products from the market and replace their logo without any modification on the shoes to sell them overpriced and the company would be out of business. Kasaalan (talk) 09:52, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Proposed project namespace page

I've sand-boxed a proposed project page to address the questions raised by this issue. I've taken xeno's concerns regarding "consumer activism" into account and not advised any one that they may be able to return these books for a full-refund.

I know that the questions it answers are addressed elsewhere but I don't think they are addressed from the perspective of Joe Public. If there are no serious objections, I'll move it into the project namespace. The page is here. -- RA (talk) 12:37, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

consumer activism is good and we also add already accomplished consumer activism over internet in wiki.
Great work and thanks. We cannot just sit and wait for the foundation to do something before we do. Top priority should be developing the VDM Publishing article and the project page, before we notify foundation executives and media. I have created a sandbox myself in User talk:Kasaalan/Publisher with links to previous discussions about Alphascript, wiki articles that uses Alphascript as reference, wikilinks to related concepts, consumer complaints. I also added signatures of users who contributed and approached beneficially to the concerns we raised in discussion. Anyone who likes to remove his signature may free to do so. Kasaalan (talk) 13:02, 28 February 2010 (UTC)
The first reference in Action potential is a book that republished Action potential? And Action potential a Featured Article? (Update: I've removed the ref from the action potential article and left a note on the talk.) -- RA (talk) 13:11, 28 February 2010 (UTC)
They are a company founded in late 2009 and still causes much trouble. Read Wikipedia articles that uses or previously used Alphascript Publishing as a reference for other previous discussions that includes Alphascript references in wikipedia. Kasaalan (talk) 13:26, 28 February 2010 (UTC)
The other danger is VDM also publishes academics' thesis if they convince them to sign their terms. Was the source republishing of wiki article or a thesis. So always double check before removing any references about whether they are wikipedia article or a thesis, if it is VDM and not Alphascript. All Alphascript titles are wiki articles, therefore no RS. Generally a quick way to check is searching product description in wikipedia. Read: webcitation copy and Writer Beware Blog Official Blog of Writer Beware Kasaalan (talk) 13:30, 28 February 2010 (UTC)
The proposed projectspace page seems to sidestep the concerns I raised with respect to soapboxing/consumer activism/advocacy and I see no issues with it being moved into WP space. –xenotalk 13:36, 1 March 2010 (UTC)
Thanks, xeno. I've moved the page from my sandbox to Wikipedia:Buying Wikipedia articles in print or another form. -- RA (talk) 20:07, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Categorization of Bruce Lee as "Chinese"

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Village pump#Categorization of Bruce Lee as "Chinese" Svick (talk) 17:48, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

There is a fruitless discussion on Talk:Bruce Lee which mainly evolves around the question whether man could be categorized as a Chinese or not. The single-purpose account Undefeatedcooler believes yes, but I would like to see evidence that he held Chinese citizenship which he most probably did not (at least, no evidence to that effect has yet surfaced). Now I looked up what the WP guidelines say, but unfortunately they are somewhat contrary:

So "people are usually categorized by their nationality", but on the other hand "a race-specific category could be implemented where race has a specific relation to the topic". So what are we going to do? Gun Powder Ma (talk) 12:00, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

  • Was he born in China? If he was, his nationality is Chinese. (Domicility (basically where you live) has nothing to do with nationality.)
  • If he subsequently gained citizenship of any country you can mention he became a suchandsuch citizen in later life/year or adopted suchandsuch citizenship.
  • If he was American or French or whatever else and of Chinese extraction or Chinese descent having Chinese parents/ancestry, you could say Chinese American or whatever. –Whitehorse1 18:59, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
He was born in San Francisco, USA, raised in Hongkong, returned to the US-American West coast for his university studies, and made his career as a martial arts artist in Hongkong and the USA. The article also says that he is Chinese American (that is US American citizen of Chinese ancestry), but what about the categories now? Gun Powder Ma (talk) 20:02, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
What are the choices between please? E.g. Is it between "Chinese", "American", and "Chinese American"? Additionally, does "American television actors" (or "Hong Kong film actors") mean an actor from anywhere who stars in American television shows (or Hong Kong movies), or just an American person who's an actor in television shows? –Whitehorse1 20:24, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
The dispute is over these Chinese-related categories (see bottom). I am far from a specialist in categorization of actors, but Hongkong actor seems ok for me, since he definitely was one. But to categorize him as fully as Chinese as China mainland actors with PrCh citizenship appears to me stretching things and categories. Gun Powder Ma (talk) 20:29, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
Wow, is this dispute still going? Did anyone ever check what any of his biographies say after the last time I commented? OrangeDog (τ • ε) 20:31, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
Um, I was under the impression that he was a martial artist and actor, neither a sportsman nor a philosopher. Some sources for those quotes would be good. Britannica lists him as "U.S. film actor". Most other sources don't get obsessively bogged-down in trying to label him, and just present the verifiable facts. Wikipedia stands out like a childish sore thumb by comparison. [10] OrangeDog (τ • ε) 13:12, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
They're the editor-assigned categories not quotes, Orangedog. Incidentally, your link reads "this entry is from Wikipedia" at the bottom. Let's hope things can change from being bogged-down and resolved amicably. –Whitehorse1 20:57, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
So when I asked what a published biography of Bruce Lee says, you didn't actually check, but just put what Wikipedia editors said? Also, if you look closely, you will see that the link is to an aggregated collection of biographies from various sources, including the one we have here. My point was that the Wikipedia one (the one at the bottom) is the only one that starts excessively classifying him in the first sentence. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 14:50, 6 March 2010 (UTC)
They contradict. That says he's a "Chinese American sportspe[rson]", but a "Chinese philosophe[r]" and in category "20th-century Chinese people".
You've said his nationality is "American" (by virtue of being born in SF, USA; where he lived the first 3 months of his life), which we can refer to as "Chinese American" recognizing he is of Chinese extraction/ancestry.
You've further said he was raised in Hong Kong, where he lived from the age of three months to 3 years 11 months under Japanese occupation according to the article. The Japanese aspect does not seem to factor into the dispute. Thereafter, he grew up in Hong Kong until age 18 when he moved back to the USA.
As regards membership of the category "Chinese Jeet Kune Do practitioners", I'm not sure that's ideal in this case. This is because he (please correct me if I'm wrong) 'invented' Jeet Kune Do. We normally select the single most relevant category from each subject-area hierarchy. Toplevel categories are generally used, unless a child category exists that can be used instead. You may like to consider placing him in a parent category since, as inventor he is uniquely distinct from somebody that is merely 'one of the French practitioners' or 'one of the Ethiopian practitioners'. Perhaps that is a suitable compromise? As for being a "Chinese Wing Chun practitione[r]", I am unsure whether Chinese Wing Chun refers to a specific martial art/martial art style, or to a Chinese person who practices 'Wing Chun'.
The final paragraph of the Categorization guideline also bears some relevance. An alternative to using a subcat of Philosophers by nationality may be more suitable. Perhaps a Philosophers by tradition subcat based on what tradition reliable sources identify him as, or Philosophers by field subcat in the same way, or the Philosophers by century subcat, 20th-century philosophers? –Whitehorse1 21:53, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for your input. I may note though that the dispute evolves much less around the substantives, but the adjective "Chinese" as you will quickly realize once the flock from Talk:Bruce Lee swarms over here. Gun Powder Ma (talk) 23:09, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
It's true the dispute has focused on whether or not to have the wording "Chinese". There were nuances in my comment. When reading the talkpage I saw lots of speculating over what documents he would have had, what rights he was entitled to, whether he claimed those or not, how the details varied at different historic points, etc. It wasn't always clear what was being said, but there was certainly a lot being said. What those taking part have concentrated on, is trying to choose one way or the other if categories saying Chinese--noun should be included or excluded. I am suggesting, consider a third way.
It looks like you've general agreement on several things, such as the lead explaining he was Chinese American, the German ancestry on his mother's side being peripheral enough to not need mentioning in categories or the lead, his birthplace, that he was a Hong Kong actor, etc. Using alternative categories as I described above might be something you'd like to consider.
It seems to me no extra information is added with, say, the philosophers by nationality:Chinese subcategory over subcategorizing by philosophy tradition, field or (20th) century instead. That's because, the lead plus categories already point out he's an American writer, that specifically he's Chinese American, and that he was a Hong Kong film actor; the lead actually wikilinks to the Hong Kong people article. Undeniably, Hong Kong is geographically in China. It's crystal clear from the article he was Chinese American, plus a Hong Kong actor; it recognizes the multiple strands to his background, the culture and heritage that shaped him; when one among many categories instead concerns field or era, no parts of that identity are being denied. –Whitehorse1 20:57, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

There was one user (Gun Powder Ma) disagreed and disliked the contents on Talk:Bruce Lee.

There were plenty of explanations to this dispute by other editors as well, see Talk:Bruce Lee.

Gun Powder Ma couldn't comprehend the points and never read and participated in any of the previous discussions.

His/Her comments approached Wikipedia:No personal attacks, Wikipedia:Etiquette. I insisted that he/she was a racist (anti-Chinese) editor. Undefeatedcooler (talk) 13:21, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I saw. It's better to avoid speculating about other's motivations, and name-calling, even if you've made a deduction you really believe in. It makes people defensive. When that happens it can make everyone less likely to agree on things. Perhaps you can see how you feel about the suggestions above, Undefeatedcooler. –Whitehorse1 20:57, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

BBC citations

(I apologise if such a thing exists; I can't find it.) I come across citations to BBC web-pages like this all the time, as, I'm sure, many Wikipedians do. However, I'm never quite sure how to reference them. So first, it'd like to get that straight - whether the BBC is the author, or publisher, or even work, whether the word "website" should be be put in somewhere. Secondly, a template to make this easier would be particularly useful. To follow through on the above example, {{cite BBC |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/7202413.stm |title= Severn barrage details unveiled |date= 22 January 2008 |accessdate=5 March 2010}}. The work, author, publisher would be filled in automatically. Now, I'm sure, there is the disadvantage of differing the apparent page and the real one, but it's outweighed by the fact we'd get more references, more informatively. - Jarry1250 [Humorous? Discuss.] 20:59, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

As if to prove my point, the BBC website is referenced three or more different ways in BAE Systems, a Featured Article. Of course, I do understand that the primary aim has to be able to make sense of the reference, which in each case we can, but this is an improvement.- Jarry1250 [Humorous? Discuss.] 21:05, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
For a BBC news story, use {{cite news}}. The author is usually blank (as there is usually no byline), work is "BBC News", and the publisher is "BBC", but that's not really worth noting as it is obvious. Why complicate matters by introducing a new template? Fences&Windows 15:00, 6 March 2010 (UTC)
I just meant a little one. In any case, you've addressed how it might be referenced. I'll make a user page one and subs't it. That way, I'll standardise my contributions. Apparently, MediaWiki will not allow that to happen, which is a pain. - Jarry1250 [Humorous? Discuss.] 16:32, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Henry Banks

Why Henry Banks is not in the 1950 Drivers Championship final standings? Henry Banks was in 1950 Indianapolis 500-competition (position 25). 82.116.243.192 (talk) 00:30, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Find a source and add him then. It's very easy. :) OrangeDog (τ • ε) 13:06, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Tag for extensive used of the same source

Is there a tag which could be added to an article which concerns the extensive use of the same source? I came across searching one to use on the newly created article Exome Sequencing (For example, Sarah B Ng et al. is cited 12 times). -RobertMel (talk) 16:13, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

That's not really a problem in and of itself. If that's the only source and/or a primary source, there are templates for that. And if it's WP:REFSPAM, there are suggestions for dealing with it. --Cybercobra (talk) 16:41, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
Hmmm..., thanks for the reply. To clarify things, the article I gave as an example has 5 references, the first one is cited 12 times, the second is cited 10 times the third 6 times, the forth 9 times and the last 3 times. They're all scientific papers presenting results, so we can say they're primary sources, on the other hand, the intro of scientific papers make generally a review of the subject, so I suppose they can be used as secondary source if used for the review on the subject. The tag you proposed me, suggest some spamming intent, which here there does not seem to be one, unless the editor, who's user name starts with sarah, is the same Sarah who was cited 22 times in the article. In this particular case, primary sources are used, which leave the editor do the syntesis of the material rather than a synthesis already made by a secondary or tertiary source. What tags are appropriate here? -RobertMel (talk) 16:57, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
Especially since the page is new, why don't you just use a note about your concern on either the article's talk page or the editor(s) talk page? Maurreen (talk) 17:04, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
{{onesource}} is what you seek. Ks0stm (T•C•G) 17:05, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
Or, if I misinterpreted this when I first read it, it might be {{primarysources}}? Are either of these what you needed? Ks0stm (T•C•G) 17:08, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
Thank you, the second fits perfectly. -RobertMel (talk) 17:20, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

However, please note Maurreen's comment and don't JUST put down a tag (something that far too many editors do). Also leave a comment on the article Talk page to explain your concern and hopefully start a conversation with previous editors. Tags aren't the end of a response to a problem, they're the beginning. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 17:38, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

I see that you have already done this! -DavidWBrooks (talk) 17:44, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
I will work on this article. Thanks everyone for the reply. -RobertMel (talk) 17:58, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
Sorry, but what's wrong with an article correctly cited to a range of different peer-reviewed sources? OrangeDog (τ • ε) 20:00, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
They're all primary sources. -RobertMel (talk) 23:13, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
Since many cite other papers (including other references in the article), they are secondary sources. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 20:13, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

Living person task force IRC meeting

Hi everyone,

The Living Persons task force is having a meeting on IRC in about 4 hours, in the channel #wikimedia-strategy connect on the server freenode. If you need help accessing this channel, please see Wikipedia:IRC#Accessing IRC. The time of the meeting is 4:00 UTC on Monday, 8 March. The meeting will be publicly logged (see past chats) and will generally follow the structure laid out at the agendas page. strategy:Task force/Living people has more information if you interested.

I hope to see you there.

Yours sincerely, NW (Talk) 23:37, 7 March 2010 (UTC)

RfC on Temporary Autoblocking of vandalism only IP addresses

The RFC is progressing here ▒ ♪ ♫ Wifione ♫ ♪ ▒ ―Œ ♣Łeave Ξ мessage♣ 19:37, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

Articles to edit?

Hi, I know a real person runs SuggestBot and they have other stuff to do besides working on Wikipedia, but my username has been up there for about 4 weeks now and there's still no suggestions, even though it says on the page 'you'll get a reply within a week and probably sooner'. Why is this? When I do get my suggestions, where do they go?

Also, is there any articles that need spelling changes and cleanups? If so can anybody recommend some or show me where the list is. Thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Chevymontecarlo (talk • contribs) 16:52, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

Try going to Category:Wikipedia cleanup categories and looking at the choices there. The subcategory called Category:Wikipedia articles needing copy edit may be of particular interest based on your mention of spelling changes. --RL0919 (talk) 17:04, 8 March 2010 (UTC)
I'm that real person, and we're working on semi-automating its running. I'm also handing it off to a PhD student who has energy for making it run better (and is also looking at making it run on multiple instances of Wikipedia). Sorry you've had to wait; they'll show up on your talk page "soon". -- 128.84.103.49 (talk) 20:32, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Proposal auto display a unreferenced template for soccer squad templates

Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Football#New_proposed_major_change_to_Football_squad_system Gnevin (talk) 12:22, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

evolution of info-boxes

I am doing some research into the evolution of information transfer systems and was hoping you might be able to help me. Could you tell me where or how I can get statistics on

1) when info-boxes first appeared in wikipedia and how quickly they spread to their current levels, both in terms of total numbers and also in terms of unique catogories 2) what information was in those early boxes and how this has changed 3) how successful are info-boxes compared to free text in getting clicked when the same link is available in both the box and the text?

Please let me know if you want to know more about my research or if you have any questions about the kind of statistics I am looking for. Any help would be appreciated! Lasgomas (talk) 16:32, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Mediation or mediation?

Would somebody give me the nutshell version of the difference between formal mediation and the mediation cabal? Which is more likely to get action sooner? Maurreen (talk) 05:35, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Translation

Can anybody translate the name of the ship in File:Cuxhaven kry Schiff 01 (RaBoe).jpg to make it possible to find her IMO number? --Stunteltje (talk) 22:49, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Tulos Phil Bridger (talk) 14:53, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Unwelcoming error page for anonymous editors

When an anonymous editor tries to edit a non-existent page (e.g. [11]), it says "Unauthorized" for the title. I don't think it used to say that. Either way, can we think of ideas to improve that page to be more welcoming, and encourage people to sign up for an account? Note that I am aware that anons can not create pages, and I am not suggesting changing that policy, just the UI. Superm401 - Talk 23:47, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

The idea of a more welcoming screen there makes a great deal of sense; 'unauthorized' is pretty harsh. It presents an opportunity to encourage new users to sign up, and to point them toward good practice - WP:FIRST perhaps. I hope this can be considered.  Chzz  ►  23:50, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
The interface message in question is MediaWiki:Nocreatetext. Svick (talk) 00:11, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
That's the body text, but where does "Unauthorized" come from? Superm401 - Talk 00:13, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
My guess is that it's MediaWiki:Badaccess. Svick (talk) 00:58, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
I think that's a generic message. So it might be necessary to create a separate message for this particular situation (anonymous user trying to create page). This would require changes to MediaWiki. Superm401 - Talk 19:05, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Bizarre image behavior

File:Jews.jpg displays five people if its size is 245px and four at any other size:

Out of curiosity, does anyone know what's going on with this image?Prezbo (talk) 02:31, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

It displays 4 for me both times. Aiken ♫ 02:51, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
Sorry I accidentally made them the same size.Prezbo (talk) 02:55, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
Actually it looks like you changed the size of the second one?Prezbo (talk) 03:02, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
It looks like this image was changed on March 6 to add a fifth portrait, then reverted to the four-portrait version on March 10. Probably the 245px version was a stale thumbnail that has now been regenerated. — Gavia immer (talk) 03:17, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
My bad, I was testing in preview and forgot to change it back. It's probably a caching issue. Aiken ♫ 14:38, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the explanation. I guess this is not that interesting but it just seemed very strange to me.Prezbo (talk) 01:39, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

March is Women's History Month in the United States

I would like to highlight that March is Women's History Month in the United States (and maybe other places, too.) And March 8, is International Women's Day.

National Women's History Project's 2010 Theme is "Writing Women Back into History" and I think that is a good reminder that Wikipedia English has quite a few gaps in our coverage of topics including some gaps in our coverage of women's activity in military history. I encourage everyone to look for one or two biographies about women to create or expand this month.


And there is always the task of getting Florence Nightingale to FA ;-) FloNight♥♥♥♥ 07:09, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

Thank you for posting this, it's a really lovely idea. I blogged about it and will find a few biographies to work on! -- phoebe / (talk to me) 08:19, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
And here's a related analysis from user:reagle -- [12] -- phoebe / (talk to me) 21:02, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

When doing research for writing articles for United States Women's History Month, I found this list of potential articles.

Please feel free to send me elsewhere

if that's the best reply to my issue.
On Feb 14, 2006 I posted a picture in the Fielding Yost article. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fielding_Yost-1902.jpg Now, 4 years later, in somewhat of a coincidence (if there is such a thing) I ended up back at the shot and discovered that I am no longer given credit for posting it. You can find me in the article's history and probably figure out that it was that picture, but . ..... is this how it is supposed to work/ i have posted many pictures on wikipedia and I figure if nothing else, I get that credit for doing it. The picture was in the public domain, but still it was from my collection and if that is what is going to occur to any PD pic I post then I am going to pout and sulk a lot. Any thoughts? Einar aka Carptrash (talk) 04:20, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

You uploaded that image to Wikipedia and it was then reuploaded to Wikimedia Commons, so that other Wikimedia projects can easily use that file too. The original file was then deleted. (See the log.) So now, we use a file that was uploaded by someone else than you and because you don't own copyright to that image, Wikipedia isn't required to give you any credit. If you want to avoid this the next time, upload PD files directly to Commons. Svick (talk) 15:09, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for getting back to me. Perhaps I shall do that, upload to Commons, more likely I'll stop uploading this sort of material. Carptrash (talk) 16:29, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Old revisions

I just stumbled over this amusing talk page item. Seems everyone was a newbie once. The history of that talkpage is incomplete, and nost:Talk:Sanity has no history. Has anybody ideas where the missing revisions might be found? Paradoctor (talk) 12:13, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Many early revisions of pages have unfortunately been lost, for various reasons. You might like to ask User:Graham87, who I have seen importing various old revisions of pages, about it. Aiken ♫ 14:01, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
Will do that, thanks. Paradoctor (talk) 18:07, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
The old history is at the title Sanity/Talk on the Nostalgia Wikipedia, but it does not contain the text that Larry Sanger removed, neither does the only available entry for the talk page at the Wayback Machine. When Wikipedia used UseModWiki before February 2002, old edits would be deleted from the page history to make way for newer ones. Therefore, if the flurry of edits to the sanity talk page in December 2001 had not occurred, it is quite possible that the text that Larry Sanger removed would be available. If there's a database dump from before 12 December 2001, which I highly doubt, the text might appear there as well. Graham87 02:57, 14 March 2010 (UTC)
Entropy, you just got to hate it. ;) Thanks for the info, though. Paradoctor (talk) 03:29, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

Wikistress

While m:wikistress is entertaining, the phenomenon is real. Any resources relating to serious investigations of it? Paradoctor (talk) 17:20, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

I would check Google Scholar to see if any academic studies have been done on the topic. Ks0stm (T•C•G) 18:17, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
Arrgh, I use it and Scirus all the time, and still have to be reminded. At least give me some fish protein, I really deserve it.
Dementia aside, I am hoping for sources and cases like Grutness' other Wikipedians might recall. Paradoctor (talk) 18:57, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Or maybe it is time for the community as a whole to do some original research into this area? Carptrash (talk) 18:36, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Um, I'm not talking about article content. Otherwise we'd have to nuke WP:GROWTH, and I don't think anybody in here wants that. ;) Paradoctor (talk) 18:57, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Where's the stub count?

Hi, I hope this is the most adequate place to ask this. Where can I find the total WP stub article count? I believe Special:Statistics used to have a "Stubs" count that differentiated actual articles from stubs and other pages. But it's not clear to me where stubs actually are in the count now. Whether they're on the "Pages" count now, or the "Content" count (which would be kinda worrisome), shouldn't there be an independent count to highlight their potential as "Content" articles? Thanks in advance, Kreachure (talk) 16:07, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

The closest you'll get is Wikipedia:Version_1.0_Editorial_Team/Statistics, according to which there are just under 1.5 million stubs. The trouble is that, as you can see, the total articles figure given there is 2.6 million - when there are really 3.2 million articles. The shortfall of 600,000 is all articles that have not yet been tagged for any WikiProject. Then there are 379,000 unassessed articles. In total, then, about a million articles have no assessment (one in three) and the assessments that have been given may be outdated. Stubs may have grown, but not had the stub rating removed. Realistically, I think we can only say with any sort of certainty that there are 1 to 2 million stubs. Dinosaur Tantrum (talk) 23:51, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
What?!? I thought the 3.2 million article count was only for legitimate (i.e. non-stub) articles! And now you're telling me that most of these 3 million articles could be stubs? I cannot emphasize how depressing that is to me! :( Kreachure (talk) 00:12, 14 March 2010 (UTC)
Loads of them are also disambiguation pages ;) OrangeDog (τ • ε) 12:41, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
Or lists! ;) Paradoctor (talk) 13:31, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

Help needed explaining WP policies

On Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Burzese family goats the author of the article doesn't understand why WP policies would fobid an article on his family goatherd. It is a notable goatherd, going back over 200 years, but it is not documented in reliable sources. Thanks if anyone can help. Kitfoxxe (talk) 21:37, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

It looks like the AfD will default to keep. Well they are cool goats. :-) Kitfoxxe (talk) 08:09, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

Buscando familiares em Tarauaca

Boa tarde queridos acreanos. Em 1960 eu sai de Tarauaca, Acre minha cidade de nascimento para Porto Velho, RO, Brasil. Em 1986 deixei meu pais querido para viver em estados unidos. Estou indo ao Brasil por duas semanas agora em abril. tenho familia da parte de meu pai - familia PENHA e da parte de minha mae - familia VANDELEI ou WANDERLEI/WANDERLEY. Gostaria de saber se ha possibilidade de encontrar alguem das duas familias ou pelo menos de uma delas. Adoraria encontrar minha madrina de batismo - CHAGUINHA a qual tinha uma loja de roupas no centro comercial de Tarauaca. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.156.36.113 (talk) 23:01, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

Translation: Good afternoon. In 1960 I left Tarauaca, Acre, city of my birth to Porto Velho, RO, Brazil. In 1986 I left my parents wanted to live in the United States. I am going to Brazil for two weeks now in April. I have family from my father - family PENHA and part of my mother - or family VANDELÔ WANDERLEI / WANDERLEY. I wonder if there is any possibility of finding someone of the two families or at least one of them. I would love to find my madrina of baptism - Chaguinha which had a clothing store in downtown Tarauaca.

This isn't the place to ask, Wikipedia:Reference desk might be better, though I doubt Wikipedia will be able to help you.
Este não é o lugar certo para perguntar, Wikipedia:Reference desk poderia ser melhor, embora eu duvide Wikipédia será capaz de ajudá-lo. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 22:49, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

Why on earth does Surrealism in the United States redirect to this?

It's very misleading, and not at all what one would expect. The page it points to, Franklin Rosemont, is about an individual who seems to be a modern surrealistic poet. Can the very broad article title "Surrealism in the United States", which really should mean something else entirely, please be disentangled from the article about Mr. Rosemont? Artemis-Arethusa (talk) 00:25, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

I also note that Surrealist Movement in the United States redirects to the Chicago Surrealist Group, founded by the same Mr. Rosemont, which is a single small group in Chicago dating to 1966 and probably does not encompass all that is the US surrealist movement. Artemis-Arethusa (talk) 00:28, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
You can fix it. Maurreen (talk) 00:32, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps it's wikisurrealist art? Never overlook the obvious. Carptrash (talk) 00:39, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

That gave me a chuckle. Maurreen (talk) 00:45, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
Ha, funny. But oddly enough, I don't know how to fix this. Artemis-Arethusa (talk) 01:06, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
At first, I thought "to this" meant Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous), and I wondered: Why should that be inappropriate? Paradoctor (talk) 01:08, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
I would suggest that this get taken up at WT:WikiProject Visual arts (a guess based on the tag here). As far as I can tell, haiving little knowledge of the subject matter, there isn't any regional-specific information on the movements at this point to justify having links for the "in the US" titles. My first guess would be to delete them or redirect them to Surrealism. —Akrabbimtalk 04:29, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
Thank you. I've done just that. Artemis-Arethusa (talk) 13:24, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

Finding all content made by one user in an article?

Finding all content made by one user in an article? Septagram (talk) 00:35, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

Create a "userpage-in-a-box"?

I just had an odd thought about User Pages, and possibly, a way to increase use of them. What if someone (I) were to make a "userpage-in-a-box", that could be copied onto another user's page via subst: templates, and would be complete with tabs, subpages, etc., much like User:Example's. Would this be a violation of some policy? Do y'all even think it would be practical? Hmmwhatsthisdo (talk) 22:59, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

Do most editors find the need for tabbed subpages? I for one never have. --Cybercobra (talk) 23:05, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
Well, It's supposed to be an aesthetic thing. It's not a real tab system, just some fancy links. I envisioned it as a nice-looking User Page for the "wikichallenged". But anyway, it's supposed to work like this:
1. The user puts the install template on their main userpage.
2. That template has links to create new subpages with the desired content.
3. The user changes the main page to what it's supposed to be.
4. The user fills in the content, and removes the "Under Construction" templates.
Something like that. Hmmwhatsthisdo (talk) 23:33, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
I don't think new users routinely use/need user subpages. --Cybercobra (talk) 23:43, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
Well, not nessecarily new users. Perhaps those who just aren't that good at advanced wiki formatting, or those who just don't have the time to make one. Hmmwhatsthisdo (talk) 23:51, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
I doubt there'd be any policy violation; you're free to be bold and make the template. I just personally don't think it would be used much; but hey, maybe I'm wrong. Best of luck. --Cybercobra (talk) 00:13, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
Mmkay. Is there any sort of script / template repository that I could drop it when I finish? Hmmwhatsthisdo (talk) 04:08, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

An example of everything that is wrong with Wikipedia

Here is the current lead paragraph of the article antigen:

An antigen (from antibody generator) originally defined as any molecule that binds specifically to an antibody, the term now also refers to any molecule or molecular fragment that can be bound by a major histocompatibility complex (MHC) and presented to a T-cell receptor. "Self" antigens are usually tolerated by the immune system; whereas "Non-self" antigens are identified as intruders and attacked by the immune system. Autoimmune disorders arise from the immune system reacting to its own antigens.

And here is the definition from the MedlinePlus website of the National Institutes of Health:

"An antigen is any substance that causes your immune system to produce antibodies against it. An antigen may be a foreign substance from the environment such as chemicals, bacteria, viruses, or pollen. An antigen may also be formed within the body, as with bacterial toxins or tissue cells."

How do we get people to write like the latter definition (albeit without the word "your" to match our style) and not like what we have now? -- Mwalcoff (talk) 02:04, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

We hire professional writers and professional editors, and prevent the general population from meddling with articles. That would completely destroy wikipedia, tossing the baby out with the bathwater, but it would accomplish what you seek - mostly. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 02:29, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
Its much easier than that - You do it! Roger (talk) 17:44, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
I have only a basic knowledge of biology and medicine, and I have never seen or edited the antigen article, but I don't have much difficulty reading it. It's true that it doesn't have a "sixth-grade" reading level like the medline paragraph, but that's not a problem. It's reasonable to expect that a reader will take some time to read an article carefully; there's no reason to write articles for a 5-second glance.
When I looked at our antigen article, I saw it distinguishes between antigens and immunogens; it looks like the medline article is just discussing immunogens. So the medline paragraph is actually being inaccurate in the interest of being simple; that's exactly what we want to avoid here. Our goal is to write articles, not just to give people superficial summaries like the medline one.
My real advice is: if you find an article that needs improvement, edit it! If you don't feel comfortable editing it, leave a note on the article's talk page asking for someone knowledgeable about the subject to help you. — Carl (CBM · talk) 12:39, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
...you could also note the issue, with a {{confusing}}, or {{expert}} tag. But fixing it would be best.  Chzz  ►  23:53, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
I'm sorry; I didn't mean to sound flippant. My concern is that I even though I am among the best-educated 4% in one of the world's wealthiest countries, I couldn't understand the paragraph I excerpted. I didn't really know what an antibody was and certainly didn't know the definition of "T-cell receptor" or "major histocompatibility complex." You might point out that "antibody" and "major histocompatibility complex" are wikilinked, but the articles linked to may be even harder to understand, forcing people to click on yet another link to understand them, and so on until you're in a wild goose chase just trying to understand a single sentence.
This has been a concern of mine for a long time. Even though I consider myself to be a fairly well-educated person, I can't understand the vast majority of "hard science" articles on Wikipedia. I'd love to improve them myself but without the necessary background knowledge of the subject matter I'm afraid I would introduce inaccuracies.
I have long been of the belief that it needs to made clearer that the purpose of an encyclopedia is to provide information for people who don't know it already and that there's no need to cram all of the detail professional-level readers would need into an article when we have unlimited space to put such detail on what could be called subsidiary pages (as in "Main article: Whatever"). A couple of years ago I suggested that the Good Article criteria include a line that the article must be written so the "least-knowledgeable likely reader" would be able to understand it, or at least the enough to know what the article's subject is exactly. I'd love to be part of a Wikiproject that matches people with writing expertise (I have some) with people with scientific knowledge to improve the readability of science articles. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 04:47, 12 March 2010 (UTC)
I agree that this is a common problem, although not the worst of our problems.
Maybe you could volunteer at a science wikiproject? Maurreen (talk) 06:12, 12 March 2010 (UTC)
I find the lead totally confusing too. I read somewhere once in the guidelines that Wikipeda is supposed to appeal to a wide audience, and not to supplant available text books. The above case is a textbook exampe how the anjtigen article defeats that purpose. An encyclopedia, IHMO, is supposed to discuss things in a clear, untechnical manner in plain language - the medline article does that admirably.--Kudpung (talk) 00:15, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

Unreferenced living persons (BLP) list created daily for any wikiproject

You can add your wikiproject to User:DASHBot/Wikiprojects. This bot will update a list of unreferenced living persons daily related to your wikiproject. Okip 05:29, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure if this is that right place to ask…

I tried to make an account made purely out of numbers, and it didn't let me do so. Is there a specific reason to not be able to? Would I be able to make a random username and get a username change, so someone else can (possibly) deem it acceptable? If not, thank you anyway. -99.255.188.158 (talk) 02:22, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

Are you sure the username wasn't already taken? What error message did you see? --Cybercobra (talk) 02:36, 14 March 2010 (UTC)
Login error The name "31" is not allowed to prevent confusing or spoofed usernames: Does not contain any letters. Please choose another name.
Would it be the shortness of the name that would be causing this? I haven't checked a longer numerical name because the error message didn't say anything about length. -99.255.188.158 (talk) 02:57, 14 March 2010 (UTC)
You have to have something that's not a number, to avoid the username being confused with an IP address, hence "Does not contain any letters". OrangeDog (τ • ε) 12:35, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
I understand that, but would I be able to get a username change to a solid number, which wouldn't look like an IP address? -99.255.188.158 (talk) 17:10, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
Just out of curiousity, why is it so important to have a name that is made solely out of numbers?--Kudpung (talk) 05:53, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
No real reason, it's just my personal preference. -99.255.188.158 (talk) 16:30, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

Two questions

I'd like to find out if a consensus has been reached about the use of the Unicode character as a non-breaking space (nbsp) in an article (especially in an FA article, where the nbsp issue has come up during FAC). Since that character only displays as a normal space in my browser, I can't tell if an nbsp has been introduced. That appears to make it impossible for me to check for MoS compliance. Has there been a ruling that the Unicode character should be used? The Unicode form seems like a major nuisance to try to maintain; I'd much prefer to see a &nbsp; or a {{Nowrap}}.

Secondly, is it more appropriate to use a direct link to an article via a renamed link, or to use just the link to a redirect with a matching name. E.g. should we use [[Natural satellite|moons]] or [[moons]]? I'd always been told that the former is required, but now I see at least one editor making mass changes into the latter form. Is this another new change?

Thanks. RJH (talk) 22:54, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

On your 2nd point, neither is "required" as such. Either can be appropriate. Mass changes one way or the other are typically considered disruptive. (See WP:R2D, for example) Can you show me where this is happening? –xenotalk 22:59, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
This is one of many edits to the Mars article, but I've seen it elsewhere.—RJH (talk) 14:39, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
Unicode non breaking spaces should not be used per WP:NBSP. And you're right that it's hard to differentiate between them and normal spaces. Svick (talk) 23:08, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
Changing TO a redirect is almost never necessary, unless the redirect points to a specific section of the article. Changing FROM is usually not a problem if making other edits as well, but isn't necessary as the only edit. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 23:29, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
But one shouldn't bypass redirects that might one day become articles and definitely shouldn't just go around willy-nilly bypassing redirects without good reason just to "fix" something that's NOTBROKEN. –xenotalk 23:32, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

Lexical Ambiguity

On page 146 of the book The 1702 chair of chemistry at Cambridge: transformation and change, it states

Cumming literally shocked audiences with an electric shock and frequently executed a cat with an electric shock...

How should I interpret frequently executed a cat with an electric shock? Was a cat executed multiple times, did he execute one cat at a time, or is there some other interpretation?

This relates to a current DYK at Template_talk:Did_you_know#James_Cumming.Smallman12q (talk) 00:56, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

One cat at a time. It is impossible to execute any individual cat more than once. DuncanHill (talk) 01:00, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
DYK that cats have nine lives? ^_^ Paradoctor (talk) 01:07, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
You can't execute a cat more than once, but you can execute cat more than once. Dcoetzee 01:44, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
But to execute a cat just to get it running seems like overkill, seeing as merely startling them would suffice. Paradoctor (talk) 02:13, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
Also, beware of ambiguity as to whether the grammatical subject is a proper noun or a gerundive ... :) Andrew Gradman talk/WP:Hornbook 01:54, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
Nine tales Wow! what a lot of complication. I had never thought that anyone would think that the same cat was electrocuted twice or thrice. Still good to make it clear. As for "entertaining" ... it was a comment by Erasmus Alvey Darwin in a letter (I think to Charles) who described Cumming as "entertaining" - ("entertaining" its in ref 1, but strongly implied in all the sources) What is clear that there was some showmanship - the students were there because they chose (and paid) to be. I didn't mean to imply that the students were entertained by the electrocution. He was entertaining AND he electrocuted cats (multiple cats, one death per, :-) ). Please don't forget to approve or disprove the hook. Alts welcome if it gets too tricky Victuallers (talk) 08:39, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

Usability of GeoTemplate

Comments on the usability of {{GeoTemplate}} (the page listing mapping services found by clicking on coordinates in articles) are invited, at Template talk:GeoTemplate#Usability redux. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 17:27, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

"Live near San Francisco, or in the US, and have an hour to help Wikipedia?" - banner has just appeared.

No, I don't live in the USA; believe it or not, some Wikipedians are not in America. You can tell by our IP address.

Why is this spam permitted, and why is there no 'dismiss' option? Grr.  Chzz  ►  22:29, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

(Moving this to Wikipedia:VPT#Do I live near San Francisco? No I bloody well don't! - to keep rants in one place  Chzz  ►  22:34, 17 March 2010 (UTC))

List of newspapers by date

I am not entirely happy with the article's name. What do you think, does one of the following names (or any other) fit better?

  • List of newspapers by establishment date
  • List of newspapers by founding date
  • List of the earliest newspapers

Is there some guidelines on the use of the adjunct "by date" which may provide helpful? Thanks in advance Gun Powder Ma (talk) 14:10, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

In one sense I prefer the last because it is the shortest. However, it is also ambiguous (earliest in the morning?) so you might want to change it to "oldest". Also, I think it would make sense to significantly restrict the list criteria so that it does not include every newspaper ever published. As a reader, I would like to see a list of the earliest established newspapers along with the newspapers that have been published the longest. Thanks.—RJH (talk) 14:40, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
"By date" seems very vague indeed. I disagree with making it the last choice because once the article is complete, it won't all be earliest - there'll be newspapers from today. I think I prefer either the first or second choice. Aiken ♫ 14:47, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
Maybe "early newspapers" or "oldest newspapers". Maurreen (talk) 00:05, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
Does not sound "oldest newspaper" to English speakers like as if the newspaper were all still printed? Because that is for very many not the case. The criteria should only be the establishment date (for the longest printed I do not have enough info). Gun Powder Ma (talk) 01:28, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
What about List of the earliest established newspapers? Not too awkward a title? Gun Powder Ma (talk) 12:07, 18 March 2010 (UTC)
List of newspapers by establishment date, thus avoiding the need to define 'early' or 'old'. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 13:30, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

How can I solicit participation for my survey study on Wikipedians ?

Hi my name is Kay K. Lee, a Ph.D Student in University of Kansas.

I am currently conducting a research on the motivators of online collaboration. Hereis a survey page through which we are collecting data (17 Mar ~ 15 May 2010)

I was originally planning to leave messages around 200 randomly selected individual user pages (or talk pages). On the second thought, such messages might turn out to be spam. Is there any way I can more reasonably solicit participation for my survey study on Wikipedians?

Your answer will be greatly appreciated. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kay Kiljae Lee (talk • contribs) 05:19, 18 March 2010

Welcome to Wikipedia. Wikipedia talk:Research might be helpful. Please don't forget to sign your messages. ;) Paradoctor (talk) 08:26, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Need Help

1)User talk:Hokeman#Sorry

2)User talk:Mlpearc#Stop delinking golfer bios immediately

Thank you Mlpearc MESSAGE 04:49, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Sorry part 3). Please let me know the answer, But know one thing it;s not only Golfers "I" think this applies to it's all Articles. "redundancies" !

I'd have to say you've gone too far in mindless delinking. The spirit of the rule always trumps the letter of the rule. Refusing to stop after someone disagrees is also very disruptive. Having the same term linked both in the main text and in an infobox is perfectly fine and very useful. If anything, remove the link from the box, not the text. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 13:28, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Has Wikileaks shut down its CRS reports?

When I click on http://www.wikileaks.org/wiki/CRS_reports_by_date , I get a message, "404 - Not Found". This is strange, because there were big headlines about a year ago when wikileaks released thousands of CRS reports.

I'm also a little peeved. After wikileaks made the headlines last year, I pasted dozens of links to its CRS reports into article talk pages, using this template, which transludes the articles here'. If wikileaks folded its CRS service, then the templates on all these dozens of talk pages contain broken hyperlinks.

Does anyone have any info or advice about this? Andrew Gradman talk/WP:Hornbook 00:36, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

hey, does anyone have any info on this? This was a pretty sad loss for wikipedia Andrew Gradman talk/WP:Hornbook 16:11, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
The home page refers to a relaunch. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) talk 16:25, 20 March 2010 (UTC)

List of known wp mirrors?

When I search for online refs, the first few pages of a search for a not so notable thing (i.e. Battle of Athens (1864)) are clogged with wp mirrors. Is there any list avilable here that would help editors like me to know wihch ones are mirrors?

TIA, Buggie111 (talk) 14:18, 20 March 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Mirrors and forks. Note that that page is not at all complete, but it covers all the major ones. — Gavia immer (talk) 15:17, 20 March 2010 (UTC)

Flagged Protection: ready for more testing

Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#Flagged Protection: ready for more testing --MZMcBride (talk) 00:46, 21 March 2010 (UTC)

An idea on how to flesh out the anatomy section

Pun intended

I'm not really a Wikipedia regular (at least not logged in anyway), so maybe that makes my opinions irrelevant, but I had an idea I thought I might toss out there.

I've been taking an anatomy & physiology class and I've worked with a computer program called A.D.A.M..

It's a neat program because it lets you view the human body from different angles and zoom in through many hundreds of different layers.

Just now, I was thinking: Wikipedia has about as much raw information and lists of body parts as A.D.A.M., and probably at least as many images and diagrams (although the level of detail might not be as good).

Right now, there's an anatomy portal... But that's all just text and human body parts are arranaged visually in 3-D, not semantically.

So, would it be possible or even practical to make something similar to A.D.A.M. using image-maps? I know wiki code allows image-maps and I've seen them on pages before (like World/Clickable_world_map), so I figured that having a network of clickable anatomy-related image-maps might be an interesting addition and at least as useful as all the pop culture stuff.

Maybe somebody could copy & paste this over to some (hopefully active) medical or biology-related Wikiproject or something?

Just my two cents! ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 01:46, 21 March 2010 (UTC)

Also, I'm sorry if this belongs elswhere. I still haven't really completely figured out how to navigate the never-ending maze of pipes\the red tape continuum that is Wikipedia. If it doesn't belong here, you don't need to tell me. Just re-post it elsewhere, unless you're lazy like me, in which case no action at all is necessary. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 01:47, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
You might check in with Wikipedia:WikiProject Biology. Maurreen (talk) 05:44, 21 March 2010 (UTC)

Unknown airport in China

Hello!

Can somebody help with identifying this airport in China? I forgot where this was. Thanks! --High Contrast (talk) 08:14, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

Try a project, like WP:Aviation or WP:China Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 16:49, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
I don't speak Mandarin, but if I did, I would try reading the text on the buildings in the background, and perhaps make an educated guess off of that. Hmmwhatsthisdo (talk) 22:52, 21 March 2010 (UTC)

Is it "unreliable" to post as sources of "project community debating" the official forums of the project?

It's common sense to me that if an article contains 'the community of said project is debating on its official forums' to accept as a reliable source of that the official forums of the project; but someone removed a whole section of an article here because the official forums of the projects involved were deemed 'unreliable' according to him. WTF? I feel like being in 1984 here. --Leladax (talk) 18:35, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

It can be argued firstly that inferring a general overview of a community's process directly from the primary source is improper synthesis. Secondly, that a secondary source is required to demonstrate that what you say is significant/important/notable enough (i.e. not trivia) to include in the article. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 13:30, 24 March 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia has no JavaScript today

I'm suddenly viewing Wikipedia with no JavaScript. None of the "Web 2.0" features are present. I'm logged in, and I can edit. Was this some emergency measure in response to a security breach, or what? --John Nagle (talk) 17:36, 24 March 2010 (UTC)

It was a DNS problem at my end. I couldn't reach the "meta" site with the JavaScript. Unclear why. --John Nagle (talk) 17:38, 24 March 2010 (UTC)
Known DNS prefetch bug in Firefox 3.5.[13] --John Nagle (talk) 17:45, 24 March 2010 (UTC)
Nah, almost certainly related to the general DNS re-jig [14], should be fine now or in a couple of hours. mine has only just come back on. - Jarry1250 [Humorous? Discuss.] 20:43, 24 March 2010 (UTC)

Category:Islamic States

I posted this on WikiProject Islam, but nobody has responded. Could someone knowledgeable take a look at Category:Islamic States? Is the definition there at the top of the page a valid description? Is this an acknowledged term? Woogee (talk) 00:30, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Fixed, though I didn't review the category's content. Funny how we edit an encyclopedia, yet occasionally forget that we can read it, too. ;) Paradoctor (talk) 06:19, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Infobox for craters

{{Infobox lake}} {{Infobox crater}} was recently deleted (per Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2010 March 7#Template:Infobox crater). Given that we have templates for impact craters on the Moon, Mars and Venus; and for terrestrial features like mountains, caves and lakes, but no generic "Geographical feature" infobox (see Category:Geography infobox templates), what infobox template should be used on articles about terrestrial impact craters, such as Strangways crater? What about on articles about other kinds of terrestrial crater? Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 16:01, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

I think you made a typo - {{infobox crater}} was deleted by the TLD. {{Infobox lake}} is alive and well. Ikluft (talk) 22:01, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
Yes; fixed;thanks. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 22:43, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
The subject of the TLD dealt with the confusion of unqualified use of the term "crater", since it isn't specific to Earth/Moon/Venus/Mars/etc, nor to the geologic process that caused it whether by impacts, nuclear explosions, volcanoes, sinkholes or others that were proposed in that template. See the CFD for mass renaming of categories like "Craters of..." to "Impact craters of..." for info on what editors have been doing to reduce confusion over the unqualified use of the term "crater". Even for terrestrial impacts, it's a problem to label them as craters because most of them are so eroded that the crater isn't visible any more. Up until 50 years ago, most scientists didn't believe there were any craters on Earth because erosion made them so difficult to see. So most are considered impact structures. Suggestion: a "terrestrial impact structure" may be more along the lines of the term you're looking for. Ikluft (talk) 22:01, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
I suggest "Meteor impact structures on Terra". Otherwise, the hole left by Pan Am Flight 103 would have to be counted, too. Paradoctor (talk) 22:52, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
That does rather seem like overkill. Don't you think that such a condition could be dealt with in the template's documentation? Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 23:18, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
He's obviously joking. The definition of an impact structure will suffice for the template's definition. There are 50 years of science behind recognition and confirmation of sites of hypervelocity impacts from space. Ikluft (talk) 23:34, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
BTW, I created the navbox {{Impact cratering on Earth}}. I'm willing to help make an infobox for terrestrial impact structures. We first had to settle the issue over the confusion that {{Infobox crater}} would have caused. Ikluft (talk) 22:14, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
Thank you. To address perceived confusion; the deleted infobox could perhaps have been renamed. is there any reason it couldn't be undeleted, and that done? Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 22:43, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
No, TfD consensus has already settled that. It would really need to start from scratch. The previous template was trying to be everything everywhere and fuel the confusion, which turned out to be its downfall in the TfD. Ikluft (talk) 23:06, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
Actually, though I have some sympathy with concerns around the possible confusion over different types of crater, on various bodies, I don;t think the TfD did settle that by consensus - there were only five participants in total, and the issue of renaming rather than deleting was barely mentioned. Nonetheless, my interest is in how we can move forward to having a useful template for the kinds of crater mentioned in my initial post; not a post mortem of past debates. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 23:31, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
I'll get started on the template this evening (US Pacific Time). It should be based on {{infobox}} like {{infobox mountain}} rather than hard-coded tables like {{infobox lake}}. Possible names could be "Infobox terrestrial impact structure" or "Infobox terrestrial impact site". I have a slight preference for the shorter name even though it's a little less precise. The name is long enough anyway. Ikluft (talk) 23:54, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
OK, have a look at {{Infobox terrestrial impact site}}. Ikluft (talk) 04:46, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
Thank you. I've made some tweaks to the microformat classes, but otherwise it was fine. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 11:04, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
{{Infobox terrestrial impact site}} looks good. --YakbutterT (talk) 08:07, 19 March 2010 (UTC)
I still do not totally agree with the logic of infoboxes matching up with categories. Infobox templates are not intended to be organizational tools like categories. General infoboxes should be able to include a bunch of potentially pertinent fields that display when useful and are automatically hidden when not. This could encompass several 'categories' of whatever type of content as long as the sub categories shared some of the fields/parameters. This logic would yield fewer infobox templates each with more fields.
Following the each category needs its own template logic we will need to create additional infoboxes for craters form impacts, nuclear explosions, volcanoes, sinkholes ... While type could just be a single field in a general crater template {{Infobox crater}} that refers to a hole in the ground, any old hole in the ground that uses crater in its name. --YakbutterT (talk) 08:07, 19 March 2010 (UTC)
I suppose an advantage of using specialized infobox templates is that they would tend to need less logic to handle the variants than would a more general template. A drawback is that you can have more variation in style and layout between the specialized templates in a given general topic area.—RJH (talk) 18:43, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

www.sfgate.com vs articles.sfgate.com

Resolved

I've just come across an editor, Special:Contributions/pennyinkwell, whose last dozen edits (and possibly many more) are changing references from www.sfgate.com to articles.sfgate.com or inserting references to the 'articles' site. This doesn't seem to benefit the reader, in the case of the Wikipedia reference change that attracted my attention in House Swapping, the articles site has very much higher ad to editorial ratio. I haven't figured out if there is a problem here yet and I've left a query on the editor's talk page, but I thought somebody here may have some experience with this type of change. Sampling back through the contributions it looks like this editor has a single purpose, drive traffic to articles.sfgate.com Darrell_Greenwood (talk) 22:48, 24 March 2010 (UTC)

Example change from Fern bar:
Karola Saekel (2005-09-07). "Culinary Pioneers:From Acme bread to Zuni Cafe, the Bay Area has shaped how America eats". San Francisco Chronicle.
Karola Saekel (2005-09-07). "Culinary Pioneers:From Acme bread to Zuni Cafe, the Bay Area has shaped how America eats". San Francisco Chronicle.
Splits the article into 13 pages and multiplies the ads accordingly. Darrell_Greenwood (talk) 23:28, 24 March 2010 (UTC)
This issue seems to be resolved. Edits were made in good faith. Editor is reviewing and reverting where needed. The take-away from this seems to be if you have a choice don't use articles.sfgate.com for references as it drops photos, splits the article into many small pieces, and adds a lot of advertising. Darrell_Greenwood (talk) 22:45, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

April 2010 GAN backlog elimination drive

WikiProject Good Articles will be running a GAN backlog elimination drive for the entire month of April. The goal of this drive is to bring the number of outstanding Good Article nominations down to below 200. This will help editors in restoring confidence to the GAN process as well as actively improving, polishing, and rewarding good content. If you are interested in participating in the drive, please place your name here. Awards will be given out to those who review certain numbers of GANs as well as to those who review the most. Hope we can see you in April.

–MuZemike 17:28, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Credo provides 100 free reference accounts to Wikipedia volunteers

Credo Reference (formerly Xrefer) has generously agreed to provide up to 100 free accounts to their reference library (more than 2 million articles from countless reference works), for research purposes. If you might find this useful, please go to Wikipedia:Credo accounts and follow instructions to apply (minimum 600 edits, six months participation). These accounts will be given on a first come, first serve basis. There's no bigger underlying master plan - I've met with them a couple of times, and they want to help.--Eloquence* 16:51, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Before applying for one of the WP accounts, it is worth going to their site to see if you are already able to log in using a library account. No reason to take up two accounts! --RL0919 (talk) 17:19, 18 March 2010 (UTC)
Very good point -- turns out I already have online access via my public library.--Father Goose (talk) 21:27, 18 March 2010 (UTC)
Does your library give you the full list? It looks like more than I get. - Pointillist (talk) 22:47, 18 March 2010 (UTC)
Looks like it. When I log in, it says >3.2m articles in 479 reference books. Access via NYPL.--Father Goose (talk) 00:02, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
Any news as to when the accounts are to be awarded?Smallman12q (talk) 14:22, 19 March 2010 (UTC)
It seems that the accounts were awarded today.Smallman12q (talk) 22:18, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
:) Paradoctor (talk) 00:20, 27 March 2010 (UTC)

Catholic Church RfC

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Catholic Church has opened to decide which of several versions of the article has consensus, and how best to develop it. Input is welcome. SlimVirgin TALK contribs 00:37, 27 March 2010 (UTC)

Two articles about same person

Hi, guys. I have found two articles (the first one, and the second one) about the same subject, but I do not know what is the right way to resolve this? —Lampica (talk) 14:47, 27 March 2010 (UTC)

For articles like these, where the text of both was practically identical, you can just redirect the one to the other, as I did in this case. For more complicated cases, Wikipedia:Merging has an overview of what can be done. In short, you combine the best features of both articles and then take steps to ensure that the page history for both parents is visible. — Gavia immer (talk) 15:41, 27 March 2010 (UTC)

Vandalism

Should lock this man Francopedorro for this. --Eduardofoxx13 (talk) 00:43, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Report to WP:AIV. Aiken ♫ 00:54, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
Ready, the user is blocked. --Eduardofoxx13 (talk) 01:00, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

"Wikipedia, Critical Point of View" conference in Amsterdam

Has anyone hear about this conference taking place in Amsterdam on March 26-27? Is anyone going? I'll be there in case anyone wants to meet up :) JACOPLANE • 2010-03-12 14:52

Should have checked earlier. What was it about?--Kim Bruning (talk) 20:23, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
Hmm, looking at some of the summaries of presentations. I'm going "eh?" --Kim Bruning (talk) 20:32, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Amnesty International (Hong Kong)

Amnesty International (Hong Kong) is a total mess. I've tried to revert it back to the Amnesty International article where it has been for months, but it keeps getting reverted. I tried to explain to the User who's reverting me why it should be reverted, but they ignore me and just continue to write this POV, non-source, MOS-violating article. Woogee (talk) 07:58, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Proposal for creation of Village pump (development)

There is a proposal for a village pump development, please comment at the talk page. Cenarium (talk) 00:30, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

The Wikipedia Freedom Fighters

I have gotten emails from this entity asking that I hand over my account to them. I don't have any intention of doing so. Can someone give me the run-down on what this is? I have been out of the loop for some time, but there's always the chance I may return to Wikipedia when I retire or something.

--DanielCD (talk) 00:44, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

There's a thread on ANI at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Admin email phishing. DuncanHill (talk) 00:53, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
Is there a limit to the number of Wikipedia accounts that can use the same email address? That would be a simple way to slow down such initiatives. This user is now using wikifreedomfighter@googlemail.com. Fences&Windows 12:18, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
Are they an actual group, or is it just a disgruntled editor in his basement? 128.174.161.72 (talk) 17:38, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
Duplicate posting collapsed per WP:DENY
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

I am simply shocked

Friends, I would like to share a mail that has been received by me:

QUOTE

Dear Bhadani, We tried to get in contact with you almost a year ago, detailing our desires to utilise your account to help rid Wikipedia of the corruption and bureaucracy at every level that continues to plague it to this very day. We are hoping that, almost a year on, your circumstances may have changed and you may be more willing to aid us in achieving our goal. At the end of the day we all want the same thing - an encyclopedia that is informative and accurate, but one that is also run in a fair manner so all can contribute on an equitable level. As a reminder, here is an extract from our original message:

"We are currently expanding our portfolio of administrator accounts, and as yours remains dormant perhaps you could consider donating it to us - to do so will take you only two minutes: change the password (if desired) and then reply to this email with your login details. We'll do the rest!"

Once more, thank you for your time and consideration, and naturally do not hesitate to contact us if you have any questions.

Kind Regards,

UNQUOTE

It appears to be a dangerous solicitation on the part of the sender. I do not recollect having received such a mail one year before – if received, I may have missed it. Anyway, I am just amazed and simply shocked at this suggestion! Please feel free to move this information to more appropriate place, if any. Thanks. --Bhadani (talk) 08:12, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

Copy & Paste?

Hi there. The texts in Vidor, Texas seems similar to the one in here, but there is no proper citation. I am not sure if this is ok or not, so leave the judgment. Thank you! --Tomo_suzuki ( talk ) 05:50, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

You should report it at Wikipedia:Copyright problems. Svick (talk) 19:57, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

Samba school of Brazil

I'm create the article GRES Império da Praça Seca, version of Portuguese article. A member of pt-wiki, my "enemy", proposed fast deletion of article, but I asked for the restoration, which was granted, in my user domain [15] because the article was really bad and no sources, but has many sources in the Portuguese version.

Also in the Wiki in Portuguese, its reputation has been questioned by the same group of users, but the community largely defended the article, I understand that he was within the criteria of notoriety of the Wiki in Portuguese.see [16].

In Spanish wiki, the independent sources of the article, as in my case, were completely disregarded, and I have been blocked by an administrator tyrant. They argued that the article was propaganda, since the school has less than a year of existence, and moreover thought to myself, by the use of socks in the Wiki-uk (nothing to do with the Spanish language), as an excuse to delete article. See [17].

As I do not know the custom of the wiki in English, ask before: the article, the opinion came from you, is able to return to the main domain? Independent sources have it, because the school has wide coverage in the media specialized in Carnival, but in fact is not an old school. He was vice-champion of the sixth division last Carnival (2010), indicating notoriety at the least by the criteria of Pt.wiki.

Can I move the content, now with sources in the main domain? Quintinense (talk) 02:54, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Many sentences in the article are difficult to understand. I'm afraid that your English is not good enough to write articles for english wikipedia. Also the given sources prove only a small portion of the article: second paragraph, history section and names of all the producers, directors and singers are still unsourced. --tired time (talk) 17:12, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

I agree. But what I really wanted to know if an article or better referenced, have the potential to remain, or whether it would be regarded by the community as irrelevant or spam, how they came to acknowledge the Wikipedia in Spanish.

I am a composer and supporter of the school, but nonetheless wrote the original article partially. I think the quality of the article should be measured just by reliable sources, and not by assessment of who is writing.

The question is just whether it is worth trying to improve the article, or if not because it's a samba school small and recent, or the alleged "conflict of interest" also claimed.Quintinense (talk) 02:49, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

It's hard for me to determine whether the school is notable enough (since I don't know Portuguese language) and whether you are in a conflict of interest. You can try to do it yourself though. For possible conflict of interest see Wikipedia:Conflict of interest. For notability see Wikipedia:Notability (organizations and companies) and Wikipedia:Notability.--tired time (talk) 08:35, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
As this is the English Wikipedia, if there are no English sources then it does not meet our requirements. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 18:00, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
Um, since when were sources required to be in English? ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 18:06, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
Always, I thought - otherwise, what's the point? A reference that can't be read by the audience (which is the point, so readers can determine whether to believe what they're reading) isn't much of a reference. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 18:36, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
Neither WP:N not WP:RS claim that the sources have to be in English and I interpret that to mean that the language is not restricted. Also the language parameter of all widely used citation templates indicates this. Lastly, why should it be okay to require payment to get to the source (see WP:PAYWALL), but not paying for translation? Svick (talk) 19:54, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
There's also the fact that were lesser language WPs to implement that rule in their own languages, it'd probably be very very hard to find sources for a large percentage of articles. Just because English is English doesn't mean we should restrict sources to it. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 20:05, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
Hmm, maybe it used to say Notability was about what was notable in the English-speaking world. I agree with David that it would be pointless to have an article with no sources that the audience could read. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 21:50, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
"Did you know..." regularly put articles on the main page which are backed up by foreign language sources. The articles are approved using a mixture of using other editors who are polylingual, automated translation and good faith. If you look at this situation in reverse. Maybe there is no sources for Abraham Lincoln being a US president in say Welsh.... but he is still notable on the Welsh wikipedia. Hope this helps Victuallers (talk) 22:06, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
"The articles are approved using a mixture of using other editors who are polylingual, automated translation and good faith. If you look at this situation in reverse. Maybe there is no sources for Abraham Lincoln being a US president in say Welsh.... but he is still notable on the Welsh wikipedia." Exactly, Victuallers!

Is there a source in English, but does not show very well-known. Instead, sources in Portuguese demonstrate the notoriety, but not be able to appreciate fully all the information from the source.

The fact that the school be cited in the official guide to tourism in the city shows that it has relevance, it is by logical deduction. And it is easy to see in the article, while not speaking the Portuguese.

Even someone who does not speak Portuguese can also easily deduce some of the information sources, such as "president, Lúcia Costa" = "president: Lucy Costa," or "director of Carnival: sandro Avelar" = "Director of carnival: Sandro Avelar .


My biggest question is whether even the criterion to be based largely on sources overlap to being a samba school in fifth division. In Wikipedia in Spanish claimed that by fifth division to be contrary to these criteria, even with multiple reliable sources.

Notice that Spanish and Portuguese are two very similar languages, and a text in can be easily understood by speakers of another. Quintinense (talk) 11:44, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

Page checkers

Do we have enough page checkers to make sure another biography controversy doesn't happen again if IPs are allowed to create articles?174.3.113.245 (talk) 07:49, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

No, but there's also no plan that I'm aware of to let IPs create articles again. Mr.Z-man 23:19, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
That would be the reason.174.3.113.245 (talk) 03:45, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Stephen Urban article

I have a problem with the inline citation for the Stephen Urban article. Citation works in my sandbox, but not in this article. Please help. --DThomsen8 (talk) 22:25, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

Fixed. Missing a >. --DThomsen8 (talk) 22:37, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

OMGcom accepting new members

"This is one of the aims of the civility policies; to ensure that what would have been a simple content disagreement escalates into an all-out conflict over multiple fora." - Coren (original draft of his first ArbCom proposed decision)

In order to improve Wikipedia's dispute enhancement, WP:OMGcom is accepting new members. Durova412 05:11, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Flagged protection: weekly update

Just posted under policy: Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#Flagged_protection: weekly update

Would folks rather I post it in both places, or only here? William Pietri (talk) 01:05, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Seems WP:VPT (Technical) would makes the most sense, IMO. --Cybercobra (talk) 01:34, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
Not unreasonable, but the goal of posting is to keep the broader community updated, so I think I'll stick with this for now. Thanks, William Pietri (talk) 03:12, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

The population of Category: XXXX deaths

I just created this graph, which shows the population of each "Category: XXXX deaths" between 1900 and 2000. I figured for five minutes effort it would be interesting to see what I got. There were some things I expected and some things I didn't.

I expected two large spikes over WWI and WWII, which I got. I expected a gradual upward trend, which I also got, because a) more notable people are being born (and thus dying) as health care and so on improves and b) more focus is paid to more recent peoples, unavoidably, because they are more in the popular conciousness.

I didn't expect the trend to be so noticeable though, and I didn't expect the big spike in 1979, not sure what happened then? There is a slight bulge between 1968-73 which I think is the Vietnam War, and a notable period of calm between 1947 and 1956 (despite Algeria, Indochina and Korea).

Interesting, if albeit slightly useless :) SGGH ping! 13:15, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

Fascinating. Might I ask how you made it? A script of some sort, I presume? John.Limey12 (talk) 14:54, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

Regarding 1979, perhaps a large percentage of WWII veterans died in that year? On a related not it would be interesting to see a graph based on the same premises for the preceding couple of centuries as well. --Saddhiyama (talk) 17:02, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

Actually I just added the summary info from each category to an excel sheet and had it compute the graph. It's only accurate to the period I read it as articles are being added all the time. SGGH ping! 19:02, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

Why is there a giant spike in 1979? The figures from the cats for 1977 to 1981 are: 2,015, 1,986, 2,185, 2,170 and 2,054. No cat around that time suggests anything near the 2700-2800 deaths per year for any year (as the graphic seems to show was the case for 1979). Is there an error or was other data used also? --Jubilee♫clipman 20:40, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

It has begun. Paradoctor (talk) 21:10, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
LOL! More sensibly, it might be that SGGH inadvertantly used the figures for 1997 there instead of those for 1979. The two bars seem to match --Jubilee♫clipman 21:17, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
As of now, Category:1997_deaths has 2648 vs. 2185 for Category:1979 deaths. It was good idea, though. ;) Paradoctor (talk) 21:46, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
No cigar, then? :( --Jubilee♫clipman 21:57, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
Awww, you can have a cookie instead. Paradoctor (talk) 22:50, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
Aww shucks. Oh well, there was bound to be one typo :) SGGH ping! 09:52, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
Have you figured out what went "wrong" yet (if anything) so I can claim both cigar AND cookie? --Jubilee♫clipman 10:33, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
Not yet, must have been a typo. I moved progressively through each cat so I wouldn't have put 1997 for 1979, the most likely confusions would have been 1978 for 1979 or something, so I think I've just hit the wrong key for it. SGGH ping! 10:50, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Styleguide Taskforce audits have begun

WP's styleguides are in a sprawling mess. Editors at WT:MOS have banded together to form a Taskforce to audit the whole lot gradually, with a view to improving the writing, formatting and style, and critically to identify overlap and areas for merging. Feedback and participation by editors is most welcome.

We believe it is crucial that the styleguides as a whole become simpler and more accessible to editors, and ask for support and cooperation in what is going to involve a lot of hard work over the next six to 12 months.

We would be grateful for volunteers.

The details are here and below. Tony (talk) 01:54, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Flagged protection: weekly update

As requested, here's the weekly Flagged Protection update.

Feedback from users has dropped off, which we are taking as a sign that people are relatively happy with things.

If that's not the case, or if you'd like to test it for yourself, start on our labs site.

To see what we've changed this week, check out the list of items completed.

To see the upcoming work, it's listed in our tracker, under Current and Backlog. The backlog was relatively stable this week, so we are definitely moving closer to launch.

We expect to release again next week, and each week thereafter until this goes live on the English Wikipedia.

William Pietri (talk) 03:16, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Yue Chinese

See Talk:Yue Chinese ... there is a discussion on the neverending naming dispute, related unilateral moves, and the proper procedure to follow in a requested move.

76.66.192.73 (talk) 05:10, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Speedy deletion of image from 2005

By chance I noticed that File:MicrosoftJet.gif has been put up for speedy deletion. It is used as the lead image in Microsoft Jet Database Engine.

The procedure for deletion is rather confusing (for example, {{di-replaceable fair use}} says "please add one of the following" and then gives the reader only one choice) but it seems to give little notice to interested parties. Apart from the notice on the image page (which is not often visited), the only warning in this case is on the talk page of the editor who uploaded the image in 2005. Nowadays they only edit occasionally, and they get just 2 days notice (which - in the UK at least - is during a public holiday). It would be better to have a notice on the talk page of the article where the image is used (or even on the article itself) to allow the 31 people watching the article (or the 300 people a day who read it) the opportunity to comment.

I do not care much about the image (my only involvement with the article has been to tone down the "Jet is dead" POV), but I am concerned that something can be around for over 4 years and then be deleted with so little chance of discussion. JonH (talk) 16:01, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Evander Holyfied page errors

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evander_Holyfield contains two glaring errors. In 1993 he fought Riddick Bowe. The article says he won, but he lost by a split decision. The chart at the bottom says he lost by a unanimous decision. That's not correct. Does anyone care? I did enough to post this. The page is locked, so I can't touch it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Wrice (talk • contribs) 22:31, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

What are your preferred practices for coordinating articles whose topics overlap?

After about a year at Wikipedia, my biggest challenge has been finding ways to coordinate articles/sections that cover the same topic. I find it very frustrating to see how different articles develop redundancies, which then slowly diverge. I would like feedback on how other people handle the problem. Here's my take:

In special cases, where topics are "hierarchical", there are solutions which, if not perfect, are at least trivial. Some people insert a {{main}} template and perhaps a {{sync}} template, as I have done at Coffee#History. Other people would go ahead and move text from Coffee#History into History of coffee. However, I have often wished we could employ a more radical solution: Why not delete all the text at Coffee#History, leaving nothing but a {{main}} template? Or perhaps its contents could be TRANSCLUDED from some designated section of History of coffee? (I confess that I have no idea how that would work, either from a technological or a prose standpoint.)

I am more concerned about the cases where redundancies are NOT hierarchical (e.g. Hitler and World War Two). I don't think we have any guidance on the problem -- WP:SUMMARY and WP:SPLITTING and WP:CFORK and WP:SIZE speak about "subtopics", as though Wikipedia were hierarchical.

As a concrete example, I'll describe the articles that brought me here: Typing#Words per minute and Words per minute, which present a typical (if minor) example of this problem. At first, only a regular wikilink connected the former to the latter passage. My instinctive solution was to use the main and sync templates. But this doesn't really work here, because Words per minute is not a "main article" (subtopic) of Typing#Words per minute; Words per minute also addresses writing, reading, speaking and listening. So I substituted a {{further}} template. But you have to see that the problem is distinct: unlike an article (like History of coffee) that gets a {{main}} template, any article indicated by a {{further}} template is not a subtopic into which you can just start moving material.

Now, in theory, we could always create a subtopic-article. We could turn Words per minute into an umbrella page containing links to subarticles Words per minute (typing), Words per minute (reading), and Words per minute (writing). Then, typing#Words per minute could support a {{main}} template pointing to a true sub-article, Words per minute (typing). But then, who's to say we shouldn't do it the other way around -- i.e. turn typing into an umbrella article, with subarticles including "Typing (words per minute)", and a {{main}} article pointing to there from Words per minute#typing?" And worse, even if that kind of situation arises rarely, this strategy will cause articles to proliferate in such a way that they will dissociate information that ought to be associated.

I am not a computer programmer, but this dilemma is reminding me of stuff I've learned about relational databases. Out of sheer curiosity, I'm wondering if someone with experience in that area can point me to some formal theory on this, since I only know about it through working on wikipedia?

-Andrew Gradman, editing from an IP address (don't tell anybody -- I'm supposed to be studying.)

-128.59.179.162 (talk) 22:50, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

The simplest approach seems to be to insert HTML comments pointing editors in the direction of text that should be changed in sync.
Formal theory: Optimist. :) But if you're masochistic enough, try any or all of factorization, factor analysis, code refactoring, you can probably find more. ;) Paradoctor (talk) 23:11, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

Image size

I have a question about downloads of wikipedia articles with many images. Do you know if the entirety of each image is delivered during the download, then reduced in size? Or is the server sending a lean, scaled down version of each image? If the former, would it make sense (for download performance reasons) to display a thumbnail version of each image then link it to the main image? I know there are some image-rich pages that are quite slow to download, even with a high bandwidth pipe. Thanks.—RJH (talk) 14:31, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

It does the latter, using imagemagick or similar I presume. --Cybercobra (talk) 14:38, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
"some image-rich pages that are quite slow to download": "Download" or "load"? The latter depends on your computer, browser, and setup. Can you give us a few examples of particularly slow pages? Paradoctor (talk) 14:44, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
Well, any of the planet articles are fairly image rich. Saturn for example, or Earth. When I make an edit to those articles, it takes a noticable chunk of time for the page to fully appear in a browser (particularly if I don't have the images cached). I was guessing that the cause was image data transfer, and so I wanted to find out if the images were reduced in size prior to copying across the net.—RJH (talk) 16:43, 22 March 2010 (UTC)
What's a "noticable chunk"? Saturn is 9 MB, Earth 2.5 MB. With Firefox 3.7, the former took 16 seconds to load, about 10 of which are owed to download. This on a 5050e @ 1 GHz (yes one) connected to a 16 Mbit ADSL2+ line. Earth took slightly more than 4 seconds. At the rated speed of 2.6 GHz, Earth took less than 2. IE 7 64 bit took 10 and 2+ seconds at rated speed, respectively. So, as long as you don't habitually underclock, anything above that is owed either to a slow pipe, a really old computer, or to a bad setup/configuration. A common mistake I see is too little RAM, anything below 2 GB is too little, IMHO.
The images are the transmitted as the thumbnails that you see as compressed PNG. RAM should make little relative difference; I managed Saturn in about 4s on FF 3.6 with "only" 1.5 GB. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 20:23, 22 March 2010 (UTC)
Just to satisfy my curiosity: On what kind of connection? Paradoctor (talk) 21:03, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

[de-indent] So, stupid question time: is the lag because the page won't fully display until all of the images are loaded? I've seen many web pages that display immediately while streaming the (initially) non-displayed images in the background. Certainly the Wikipedia main page displays very rapidly despite the presence of multiple images and complex layout.—RJH (talk) 17:33, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Without any numbers to crunch, it is next to impossible to say. The three animated GIFs that Saturn displays might be the main problem, 6 MB is very unsual for this kind of animation. Paradoctor (talk) 19:13, 23 March 2010 (UTC)
Okay, that helps. So animations must be downloaded without size reduction then. Maybe that could be a helpful tip somewhere? Also, I'd imagine that forcing an image to a non-default size could also have an impact on the download speed.—RJH (talk) 16:31, 24 March 2010 (UTC)
I wouldn't know where people could find it. To be honest, you're the first user to complain about slow-loading pages. At least as far as I know, I've only seen a tiny fraction of the project, of course.
If you mean "generating a thumbnail" with "forcing an image to a non-default size", then the answer is "no". Thumbnails are cached, so subsequent requests require no further processing. We leave the stupid defaults to commercial software. ;) Paradoctor (talk) 16:52, 24 March 2010 (UTC)
Okay. Well I was mostly just curious. Thank you.—RJH (talk) 18:39, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

I checked several other articles and on those it turned out that the animated gif images were by far the largest downloads. For example, on the Mars article a relatively tiny animated gif is 228 Kb, almost as large as all the other images put together. There was a similar issue with a 496 Kb animated image on the Xenon article. It may be worthwhile checking pages with animated gifs to see how much of a download hog they are becoming.—RJH (talk) 23:04, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

It's because gifs were not being thumbnailed and you downloaded the full size image. gif scaling has just been turned on again (again) and lots have broken again (again, again). See WP:VPT#Re-enabled GIF scaling. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 20:23, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks. I tried adding an informational section at Wikipedia:Images#Consideration of image download size, but I'm sure it will need revision.—RJH (talk) 21:00, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Cross Wiki spam on Frederic Fappani  ?

... and Archetypal pedagogy ?

I suspect we have a case of Cross-Wiki spam here. Here's the message I let on Talk:Frederic Fappani :

See fr:Discussion:Frederic Fappani/Suppression (2010) & fr:Discussion:Frédéric Fappani/Suppression (2007). Look for : "Frederic Fappani" -wikipedia or : "Frédéric Fappani" -wikipedia on Googlesearch (and compare to the results for : "Clifford Mayes" -wikipedia to get a better understanding of the article Archetypal pedagogy). Should I add that Frederic Fappani has responsabilities in Ed. Cursus, which publish his books ?

I think it could be candidate for Article for deletion (for lack of notability) and Archetypal pedagogy should be reveiwed, but my english is way too poor to do it myself. Does somebody think I'm right about Frederic Fappani ? Chaoborus (talk) 00:14, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Thumbnail default text raised from 180 to 220px on the Commons

Dear colleagues, Derk-Jan Hartman has reported at Buzilla 21117 that MediaWiki developers have just raised the default at the Commons, following on from the same change made here in February (I think it was that month).

It's pleasing that an overwhelming consensus built late last year on WT:IUP at en.WP has received no serious hurdles in spreading to a program of gradual application throughout WikiMedia's sites. Tony (talk) 11:43, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

My very unpleasent experiences with Wikipedia

Allow me to explain first that I am an academic, the author of several books, and half a hundred scholarly artcles. I thought it might be useful to submit a brief three paragraph article. I followed the directions it was submitted and it was reviewed. I was given a place to see the reviewers comments. However, I could never actually reach the comments. I tried "helpme" and was told that someone would publish a reply in a few minutes; I recieved two notes sympathetic notes explaining how difficult it was to publish new articles, but no one could tell me how to access the site. I tried the chat room without success. Many of the people and places I contacted turned out to be blank; that is, there was no apparent place to leave a message. I worked at it for about twenty hours. I never did find the location which supposedly had comments on my submission, nor was I able to find anyone who could offer meaningful help.

At last I was able to reach what I think was the reviewer's home page. In his discussions there was nothing about my submission. The site did include his birthplace, "alphi Centuri." I guess this should have told me something.

Elkmilok (talk) 14:18, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Two users reviewed the page. The first one put their comments (which were just 1 sentence) directly in the page in the purple box. The second reviewer declined the submission (erroneously IMO), and left a boilerplate comment in the pink box on the page. Admittedly, it would be nice if the reviewer's username was included in the comments box. For future reference, the "history" tab at the top of each page gives the history of the page, including the users who edited it or in this case reviewed your article and links to their Talk pages. --Cybercobra (talk) 16:13, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
I agree with Cybercobra. There was no justifcation for rejecting that request. Looking at your edit history you should be autoconfirmed by now so there is no reason to stop you directly creating the page and I would advise you to do so. CrispMuncher (talk) 16:41, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Hi! I wanted to ask your opinion on whether a site can be used for external links in an article. E.g. this one [18] on an article about David Bell. There's more about this here: User_talk:Anon111#Recent_edits. --JokerXtreme (talk) 21:19, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Normally this type of request would go to the External Links Noticeboard, unless you think there is some sort of broader issue here that belongs at the village pump. --RL0919 (talk) 21:26, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

No, ELN will do. I just didn't know of an appropriate place, thanks for the heads up. --JokerXtreme (talk) 22:37, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

From my random reading

We all shake our heads & wonder what can be done to solve the problem of ethnic/nationalistic content conflicts. While doing research, I encountered this paragraph which shows that Wikipedia's problem is not unique, nor are other venues handling the problem undeniably better:

There can be few more sensitive or emotive subject-matters in the field of African studies today than the attempt to explore relations between Eritrea and Ethiopia in general, and between Eritrea and Tigray, in northern Ethiopia, in particular. Temperatures rise and tempers fray; accusation and counter-accusation fly with as much impunity as the academic arena can tolerate, which is actually a substantial amount; the term 'heated debate' is something of a polite understatement in a field where the search for 'objectivity' is as apparently fruitless as it is held to be in other areas of intense conflict between proverbial bad neighbours or presumed 'family members', as in Rwanda, Northern Ireland or Israel-Palestine. Virtually everyone who has written on Eritrea-Ethiopia laments the lack of objectivity in the field, usually only to find themselves accused (sometimes with justification, sometimes less so) of the very same failing. One is either a 'greater Ethiopianist', bitterly opposed to the aggressive, militaristic independence which Eritrea had the temerity to achieve, or an 'Eritrean nationalist', bitterly opposed to the aggressive expansionism of the Ethiopian empire-state. It is an apparently infinite debate characterised by polarisation, a discourse which has, at its very core, the old notion that 'if you are not with us, you are against us'. The intellectual and literary battlelines are as clearly drawn as any physical confrontation witnessed by the region at any time over the past two or more generations. An unwavering adherence to the formula 'if you are not with us, you are against us' has served many of the protagonists discussed in this paper very well in the crucible of armed struggle, survival in the face of seemingly overwhelming odds; it is less edifying in the context of informed, scientific discussion and, actually, in the end achieves nothing. (Richard Reid, "Old Problems in New Conflicts: Some Observations on Eritrea and Its Relations with Tigray, from Liberation Struggle to Inter-State War", Africa: Journal of the International African Institute, 73 (2003), p. 369)

For the record, Richard Reid was Assistant Professor of History at the University of Asmara, Eritrea, from 1997 to 2002 and at the time of this publication taught at the University of Durham. He is the author of the book, Political Power in Pre-Colonial Buganda (James Currey 2002). And, FWIW, Wikipedia doesn't have any vicious edit wars on this particular ethnic/nationalistic-based dispute. Yet. -- llywrch (talk) 22:09, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Anglosaxon takeover of Wikipedia

It's easy to hide behind a few 'it's to be expected' articles, but this has gone too far lately. Your refuse to show the Wikileaks case [in the news] because it makes US looks bad and now you have front page a mere renaming of British National Space Centre as something that's supposedly important. This is worse than propaganda gentlemen. Do something about it before you are completely ridiculed. --Athinker (talk) 18:28, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

The Wikileaks story was rejected for a very simple reason, one of which you decided to let lie for a week before complaining about it - there was no article update. That's the fundamental requirement for an ITN update; if you did not know that, then that is not our fault. Just throwing links at us then disappearing for a week to later complain that no one took your request seriously is not the way to have your requests taken seriously. Perhaps you would like to re-nominate it after the scheduled April 5 release of their damning video, and update their article accordingly if it truly is as world-shattering as people hope it is? Also, I'm offended by your characterization that Saxons have anything to do with the Great Anglo Coup d'Etat of Wikipedia. --Golbez (talk) 18:36, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
As an addendum for the vaults of history, the Wikileaks story was featured on the main page after the above comments and the article had been significantly added to. In fact, an image was also included. - Jarry1250 [Humorous? Discuss.] 10:50, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Flagged protection: update for April 8

As requested, here's the weekly Flagged Protection update.

More progress has been made, and new requests have tapered off substantially, which suggests that a release is within reach.

If you'd like to verify that for yourself, start on our labs site.

To see what we've changed this week, check out the latest list of items completed.

To see the upcoming work, it's listed in our tracker, under Current and Backlog.

We expect to release to labs again next week, and each week thereafter until this goes live on the English Wikipedia.

William Pietri (talk) 00:46, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Elockid closing tomorrow

Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Elockid is closing tomorrow. If you're interested, take a look. Thanks. ♪ ♫ Wifione ♫ ♪ ―Œ ♣Łeave Ξ мessage♣ 06:53, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

GCC v. gcc

Gcc redirects to GCC, a disambiguation page.

It appears that the majority of links to Gcc refer to the Gnu Compiler Collection, and the majority of links to GCC refer to the Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf.

I started going through the 84 links to disambiguate them, but after doing the first 7 I felt I was probably doing the wrong thing.

Would it make sense to have the direct links instead redirect to the favourite targets as above, and move the existing pages to Gcc (disambiguation) and GCC (disambiguation)? I don't know if there is a specific policy against case-dependent redirects, but at a rough count, this would fix all but some 20 of the existing links. Hv (talk) 10:00, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

The Gcc artifact is likely due to the fact that the program is called "gcc" and UNIX is case-sensitive, so any examples would say gcc. GCC should still remain the correct acronym for both Gnu Compiler Collection and Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf. The disambiguation you are doing is definitely correct, and there should be only one disambiguation page for GCC. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 11:49, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

The curious case of Miroslaw Magola

At the very least the article does not adhere to WP:BLP, but the proliferation of the article across various wiki's and the consistency of the main contributors IP adresses (all, except a french proxy server, from thailand) makes it more than just another article for deletion. I decided to get on this case after a checking out a newly created dutch article (nominated for deletion by yours truly) which made some remarkable claims. The results can be found on meta. On this wiki the claims have been significanlt toned down, but the gist of the article still exists. Is this a case for Article for Deletion? Speedy deletion? Is the community satisfied with the notability of the artist in question and the (rather wild) claims made in the article? I would appreciate some opinions. Kleuske (talk) 12:42, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Living People Task Force update: Phase two

Hello, Wikimedians.

This weekend I plan on finalizing the timeline for phase two of the Living Person Task Force: a community findings recommendation.

What we are interested in is people from all size wikis participating in discussing common interests and problems on interpersonal and intrapersonal interaction relating to Wikimedia projects. This includes statistics gathering, examination of how projects handle OTRS complaints/issues, image use, quotation use, and sourcing. It is very important that we get participation in these areas, if anything just to received feedback on the wiki. I have subpages set up for these discussion on the Strategy site, <http://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Task_force/Living_People>.

In six to eight weeks we'd like to develop recommendations from the Task Force that are more in-depth than the proposed recommendations to be submitted to the Board this month, to assist in developing projects identify and set up structures for the issues that come with societies.

If you have experience dealing with living people on any of our wikis, or if you have ideas on how policies can be established/improved, please participate in the discussions so that we can adequately asses the projects as a whole.

Thanks for your time, see you on the wiki!

Keegan (talk) 20:27, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Sharing Wiki Usernames

Hi,

I am a registered user of Wikipedia and has contributed to various pages. I would like to extend my services to the tamil wikipedia. Wonder why I am unable to use the same username?

Thanks Balaji

(User name: thebigbee) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Thebigbee (talk • contribs) 08:11, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

I think you're looking for m:Help:Unified login. Happy editing, Paradoctor (talk) 08:37, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks a ton! I am very impressed!

National anthems

Should texts, translations, transcriptions etc. of national anthems be on Wikipedia or on Wikisource? At the moment they are on both projects, which is not very good, I guess. Shouldn't Wikipedia have just an article and quotes of an anthem text (maybe even whole translation), and shouldn't the text be on Wikisource? —StephenG (talk) 19:09, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

If they are under a free license (which I doubt) or otherwise are public domain, then the texts of the anthem/lyrics should be on Wikisource. Translations may be a different case where there might be encyclopedic content as to how a certain anthem is translated. –MuZemike 01:47, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

About format for titles in the Spanish Wikipedia

Hello. I'm a Spanish wikipedian from the Wikipedia in Spanish. At present, we are having a long discussion about whether or not it's neccesary to start using italics for certain titles, i.e. the ones for the species. Several users state that it's more important to keep wordheads consistent (i.e., all the titles with the same typographical syntax regardless of their type) than complying with international rules regarding biological classification, and they support their point of view on the fact that, in case that Biology titles were changed to the italic format, the rest of the titles in the whole Wikipedia should be reviewed and changed consequently, according to the Spanish language rules, and thus overriding an old consensus, apparently established some years ago. They think that changing just the Biology articles is a kind of bias, and they also think that introducing italics in titles would cause a sort of chaos throughout the whole Wikipedia.

Of course I know that it's our decision, but, as you, as well as the German wikipedians, have introduced italics in titles yet, I'd like to know your opinion at that respect. Do you think you have a bias? Are you changing all the other titles requiring italics, not just the ones for Biology articles? Has it caused any chaos so far? Is perhaps our problem different from yours? Thanks in advance and regards. --Dalton2 (talk) 18:03, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Only the biology ones at present. Extensive discussion available at Template_talk:Italic_title#RFC:_Should_this_be_used.3F. --Cybercobra (talk) 18:40, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks again. --Dalton2 (talk) 18:51, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Brian Scalabrine

You know what's crazy? The article on Brian Scalabrine has been edited over 110 times since December 21, 2009, with zero net change. Since Rich Farmbrough delinked some dates, seemingly every edit has been vandalism, or a reversion of vandalism. Is this a record for most edits to an article with the least net change? Zagalejo^^^ 21:17, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Can't add a RfD tag for Angry German Kid no matter what.

This page is protected without a tag so I can't request for un-protection when I need to add an RfD tag for it. Can an administrator help me? --macbookair3140 (talk) 21:43, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Best to just start the RFD and ask an admin to add the tag. –xenotalk 22:30, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
I see you started Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion#Angry German Kid before posting here. I have tagged it. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:55, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Xooarticles.com?

Aye, while checking a modification to Gilgit, there was a reference to a web page, namely http://www.xooarticles.com/Story-of-Gilgit-Manuscripts.html.

I did not find any mentions in WP besides this single ref, anyone familiar with Xooarticles?

WHOIS record doesn't promise much: 

  XOOARTICLES.COM WHOIS
  Updated: 47 days ago
  Registrant:
  Xoo Article
  625 Kampuchia
  Nhompenh,  02142
  Cambodia
  Registered through: GoDaddy.com, Inc. (http://www.godaddy.com)
  Domain Name: XOOARTICLES.COM
     Created on: 22-Sep-06
     Expires on: 22-Sep-10
     Last Updated on: 07-Jan-09
  Administrative Contact:
     John, David  Email Masking Image@gmail.com
     Xoo Article
     625 Kampuchia
     Nhompenh,  02142
     Cambodia
     +1.7364354287332      Fax --
  Domain servers in listed order:
     NS27.DOMAINCONTROL.COM
     NS28.DOMAINCONTROL.COM

--Rayshade (talk) 00:18, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

RfC on Christ myth theory

There is a dispute as to whether Christ myth theory—an article about the theory that Jesus may not have existed as a historical figure—ought to be included in the "pseudohistory" category. Input would be appreciated here. Many thanks, SlimVirgin talk contribs 01:54, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Larry Sanger, Commons, Pornography, and the FBI

Folks may want to take a look at this story. It seems that Larry Sanger has reported Commons to the FBI for hosting illegal child pornography. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.207.105.218 (talk) 18:53, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

See meta:Sanger's Message to the FBI, before the deletion discussion ends, for the Foundation legal counsel annihilating Sanger's understanding of the terminology he's using.
Also, see Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2008-05-12/Pornography#Virgin Killer album cover for the last time someone prominently announced that they were reporting a project for child pornography. - BanyanTree 12:26, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

User in search of a template to say thanks

Hey, can anyone tell me where I can find a template to thank someone for reviewing improvements I made to an article?

Many thanks, Dockofusa (talk) 17:52, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

You could use {{smile}} or a barnstar. –xenotalk 17:56, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
A simple File:WikiThanks.png ([[File:WikiThanks.png|right]]) with a note of appreciation works for those times when you don't feel like plastering a large template on someone's talk page but would like to add a little color. - BanyanTree 12:31, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Vandalism

I don't know if it is true or not : [19], [20]... if it isn't, we should reconsider all the contributions of Special:Contributions/155.91.28.231 Kyle the hacker (talk) 21:43, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Looking for drawing program similar to Microsoft Paint but a bit better

Does anyone know of drawing program similar to Microsoft Paint but a bit better? I am looking for a program to use in drawing line diagrams, graphs, and schematics. Not interested in complex programs using layers like Inkscape, Gimp and Paint.Net.

I want something simpler and intuitive like Microsoft Paint where erasing and picking up parts of a drawing and moving them elsewhere in the drawing is extremely simple. The only thing about Microsoft Paint that needs improving upon (for my purposes) is the ability to draw smooth lines at other than vertical, horizontal and 45 degrees ... and the ability to draw smooth circles and ellipses. Can anyone point me to the type of program I seek? mbeychok (talk) 04:16, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

I do maps rather than graphs, but I've actually never found Paint.Net to be that complicated. It looks a bit intimidating at first, but after a few hours of messing around you get the hang of it, and it's a godsend as far as getting rid of most of the major shortcomings of Microsoft Paint (stair-step diagonal lines, etc.) The magic wand tool is another really cool feature that is confusing at first but really comes in handy once you figure it out. I can even do layers now without much problem. (And you don't have to do work with layers, it's just an option.) Plus it's free, which is nice. Perhaps someone will come by with a better program specifically for diagrams, but I would honestly say at least give Paint.Net a shot. AlexiusHoratius 04:35, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Seriously, Paint.NET is not a complex program. In fact, it's similar to Microdoft Paint but a bit better. However, if you're doing diagrams for Wikipedia (or other Wikimedia projects), you should probably get Inkscape and make SVGs instead (smooth lines and curves at all scales). OrangeDog (τ • ε) 11:50, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
I've been trying to use Paint.NET for over a week and still cannot find out how to make erasures simply (and the erasures use a round brush which is clumsy with 90 degree corners) ... nor have I yet found out how to select and remove or move parts of a drawing to a new location. There are many tutorials but none of them are for complete newbies ... whereas, in MS Paint, a tutorial isn't needed because it is so intuitive. Horatius and Orange Dog, do either of you know of a good tutorial for a beginner at Paint.NET ?? mbeychok (talk) 15:37, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
GIMP is free, powerful, and not very complex. Available for most platforms, including Windows. — Frεcklεfσσt | Talk 17:55, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
(ec) GIMP is also pretty heavyweight, often slow, and is complex. Your three Paint.NET problems are solved by using a combination of the "Rectangle select" tool (top left), the "Delete" key and the "Move pixels" tool (top right). All the help you probably need is here. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 18:05, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Cpedia, an automatic encyclopedia

Cuil, the company which launched the search engine no one uses, or can pronounce, have launched an automatic encyclopedia engine - Cpedia. It tries to create a synopsis of all useful information regarding the search subject and present it in an encylopedic manner, all using the power of search and algorithms.

Some relevant posts -

It's not very good. It's almost appallingly bad, but it's a start, and a different direction for an Encyclopedia. Have a play, try searching for people who aren't on Wikipedia. - hahnchen 22:45, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, as I mentioned on the mailing list, take a look at http://www.cpedia.com/wiki?q=Barack+Obama for example and weep. It is mindblowingly bad. –MuZemike 16:25, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
I've sometimes heard people who are burned out on Wikipedia say they hope a better model is out there. Cpedia is a good reminder that every model has its flaws and there isn't necessarily a better one than that of open collaboration.
Also, http://www.cpedia.com/search?q=Julius%20Caesar. The disambiguation pages are even better; try [21], which leads to [22]. —Emufarmers(T/C) 20:09, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
My favourite so far has been our dear leader, http://www.cpedia.com/search?q=jimbo+wales - there's a nice surprise lower down. I think the direction it wants to take is a solid one, but I doubt they have the funds or expertise to realise it. - hahnchen 21:12, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

I could use some help

Uhh... ...there's a heapload of vandalism at the moment, could someone help a little? I only get to do half the things, the backlog is growing.--Newbiepedian 20:50, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Bot to edit close to 200,000 articles to deploy a new parameter

A new parameter has been added to {{Infobox settlement}} known as |coordinates_region= to accurately provide region information (country-prov/state) to the {{coord}} template and account for unrecognized markup in subdivision_name/name1. It has been proposed to have a bot provide this parameter to the around 200,000 articles using this infobox. Please see Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Xenobot 6.2 and raise any concerns or objections regarding this task. –xenotalk 01:59, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Flagged protection: update for April 15

As requested, here's the weekly Flagged Protection update.

Thanks to the developer meetup in Germany and mid-term exams for Aaron, there has been no significant change since last week. However, the lack of new requests suggests we're pretty close to something releasable.

If you'd like to verify that for yourself, start on our labs site.

To see the upcoming work, it's listed in our tracker, under Current and Backlog.

We expect to release to labs again next week, and each week thereafter until this goes live on the English Wikipedia.

William Pietri (talk • contribs) 22:38, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Thank you for the update. I look forward to the live-fire test. –xenotalk 02:00, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Me too! As useful as the labs testing has been, there's nothing like the real thing. William Pietri (talk) 16:41, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

New people enter here if need help

An example.

Hello I'm starting this. I'm new here and would like to know how to insert pictures cause it's not letting me. Anyways I hope this place has good people. I've used Wikipedia in the past and wish to help make stuff that's incomplete. #15 ::P (4 eyes is plenty) (talk) 02:13, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

An overview of how to use images is at Wikipedia:Images. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 12:03, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Copying from Wikipedia - Plagiarism by the Slovenian government Secretary General?

Secretary General of the government of Slovenia Milan M. Cvikl is facing allegations from a law expert that he copied an entire section of his book on reforms of EU legislation from Wikipedia.[23] --Eleassar my talk 12:44, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

If anyone can find out which article he is supposed to have plagiarised, then we can check the page history to make sure it wasn't the other way round. Hans Adler 22:13, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Accetto presented his findings here (links to Wikipedia provided).[24] It seems like Cvikl copied sentence after sentence from Wikipedia as it was in the middle of 2008 before his book was published. Another possibility is that both Mr. Cvikl and the authors of Wikipedia articles copied the contents from a third source.[25] Mr. Cvikl denies plagiarizing from Wikipedia and says he appropriately cited all the sources he used. --Eleassar my talk 10:38, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
The article was created Spaak Report basically in one piece by an editor who specialised on EU material. Relevant stages:
I can't read Slovenian. Can you check if the passage in Cvikl's book contains the material that was added in the last two edits of the list above? If it says exactly the same things in the same order, it's probably plagiarism from Wikipedia or a Wikipedia mirror. If not, then we and Cvikl are more likely to have plagiarised from a common source. Hans Adler 11:13, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
It's similar for Amsterdam Treaty. The plagiarised passage is the first paragraph of the "Contents" section. It was already present when the article was created in 2004, and was almost completely unchanged in August 2008. [26] This is consistent with Cvikl plagiarising from Wikipedia, but also with both plagiarising from a third source.
Overall it appears most likely that he did plagiarise from us or a mirror, and that that we need to do. Hans Adler 11:27, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
I'm sorry to not have the original book at my hand, only the passages from it as cited by Accetto. Judging by this, as to the Spaak Report, the sentences are very similar, sometimes even the same, but in some cases with minor additions in the book. As to the Amsterdam Treaty, the Cvikl's book follows the Wikipedia article sentence by sentence. --Eleassar my talk 12:27, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Question about querying article category vs. template

Other than by writing my own bot, is there a simple way to generate a list of articles that are categorized under a certain tree (say Category:Astronomy) but do not have a particular WikiProject template (say template:WPAstronomy)? I know such non-templated articles exist because I've run across them. But I'm loath to go manually searching through tens of thousands of articles and talk pages. Thank you.—RJH (talk) 18:43, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

You can use the new CatScan (your example values prefilled). Svick (talk) 22:06, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Very nice! Thanks mate.—RJH (talk) 16:06, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

1 billion edits

In the past few hours, Wikimedia hit its 1 billionth edit! Congrats to all and keep up the good work. –Juliancolton | Talk 19:51, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Applying Sturgeon's (2nd) Law, that means there have been 100 million useful edits. Still an impressive total.—RJH (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 15:58, 17 April 2010 (UTC).

Something, just something

I've done a little something here, where I dumped in all the quick links and trancluded all those useflu templates so that RCPatrollers and NPPatrollers can use them more easily. I'm planning to add the csd templates as well. If this is redundant to any other page, I'm not surprised. This is just a notice to tell everyone about it. Kayau Voting IS evil 10:40, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Lindsey report on wikipedia's FA quality

FYI: external link to the report

The article appeared in First Monday, an UIC journal, on 4 April 2010. The researcher concludes that "for Wikipedia, then, it seems that if the featured article process is to serve as an effective means of quality control, it must be changed." Skäpperöd (talk) 13:44, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

See also #First Monday, above. - Jarry1250 [Humorous? Discuss.] 13:53, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Application for BAG membership (Xeno)

I have accepted Kingpin13's nomination for membership in the Bot Approvals Group, and per the instructions invite interested parties to participate in the discussion and voting. Thank you, –xenotalk 19:24, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Helped needed at Talk:Christ myth theory

Input would be appreciated to settle a dispute at Talk:Christ myth theory#RfC: Should the lead contain a dissenting voice?

The Christ myth theory is the argument that Jesus did not exist as an historical figure. This is a small-minority view within academia. Some Wikipedians and biblical scholars say it is a fringe view. There is therefore a disagreement as to whether the lead should contain a dissenting voice, and if so, what it should say.

Should the lead contain the following sentence? "The philosopher Michael Martin of Boston University writes that, while the historicity of Jesus is taken for granted by Christians and assumed by the majority of non-Christians and anti-Christians—and anyone arguing against it may be seen as a crank—a strong prima facie case can be constructed that challenges it." The source is Martin's The Case Against Christianity 1991, pp. 36–37. SlimVirgin talk contribs 04:28, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

How atrocious should atrocities be ?

Hi, I'm not a native English speaker so I might get it wrong. For me, "atrocities" involve blood, death, torture, etc. Apparently, some contributors consider that burning old rocks and closing churches should be considered as atrocities. As there may be some subtilities between English and French words (in French, these couldn't be considered as "atrocités", which is supposed to be the French word for "atrocities" — even "simple executions" wouldn't be), I prefer to ask native English people to give their opinion about that rather than engage myself in an edit war. So, is "Reported atrocities" the right title for this section ? Thanks. Skippy le Grand Gourou (talk) 16:37, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

In a political situation like this, "atrocities" is all too often a propaganda term for "actions by the opposition". That seems to be the case here, which is to be avoided in a neutral encyclopedia. Quite honestly, that whole section is pretty bad, not only the section title but the bulleted format that makes it only a list of bad things. If you are editing that section, I would simply replace it with natural prose. — Gavia immer (talk) 16:57, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Some but not all of the specific items listed seem reasonable to describe as atrocities, if the descriptions are taken at face value. Events with multiple extrajudicial killings would certainly be valid candidates for description as atrocities. That said, I am suspicious of the whole Spanish "red terror" concept as a lot of it sounds like Nationalist and/or Catholic propaganda. Each is referenced but I don't have access to the reference material. It would be interesting to know if the reference material substantiates the atrocities as facts or merely reports them as allegations. --DanielRigal (talk) 19:25, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Right, I agree that some of the items (like raping nuns, which appears to have a reference) are indeed atrocious if true. I was mostly addressing the point about the section title, which appears to be just one problem with a very poorly constructed section in general. — Gavia immer (talk) 19:38, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
"Atrocities" is too loaded and colorful a word, regardless of how atrocious the events may or may not have been. It should not be used anywhere in a section title; a more neutral word should be used. Shereth 21:24, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Agree with Shereth. --JokerXtreme (talk) 21:27, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
Right, we all seem to be in agreement that "atrocities" is too loaded a term. So, what do we replace it with? I don't know the story fully, and perhaps we don't need to know it, but that still leaves the problem of a suitable replacement. Wouldn't any synonym be equally objectionable? How could any reduction in severity be graded or measured? Dieter Simon (talk) 00:14, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments, I will draw the main author's attention to this discussion. I agree that some facts can be described as "atrocities", I just wanted to point out the fact that some items of the section make the title inaccurate. As for a replacement, I proposed "exactions", which seems to me both more neutral and less "strong". I won't modify the article though, I don't have time to argue with the main author at this very moment, I hope some of you will find the time and will to improve this section, as you pointed out other issues. (Edit : whoops ! Should have checked, Jubileeclipman already took over.) Skippy le Grand Gourou (talk) 09:31, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

"Reported acts", "Documented events", "Known occurrences" or any combination thereof? OrangeDog (τ • ε) 11:41, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Atrocities is a term comonly used by the sources of all points of view. The murder of thousands of innocent of priests, monks and nuns falls clearly within the term, but the sources also describe the burning of hundreds of places of worship as atrocity. Especially when scores of them in one city alone are burned in one night. In terms of human rights, the destruction of people's places of worship, as the Klan did to black churches, synogogues and Catholic churches in the 19th and 20th century, is typically considered a violation of human rights and an atrocity. In any event, the sources use this terminology for this type of activity by both the Nationalists and the Republicans in the Spanish Civil War. For example Guernica is an atrocity not only because of the 200-400 people who were killed but because the homes, schools and places of worship of noncombatants was destroyed. Of course when one's place of worship is destroyed because of hate for the victims race or religion, as in the Klan actions mentioned above, or the Red Terror or Krystalnacht, additional human rights are implicated. Mamalujo (talk) 21:46, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Following the apparent consensus reached on this, the above editor has gone and reverted to "Atrocities". As has been pointed out, much of the section in question is based on what I consider "documented hearsay", which might be considered reliable sources by POV pushers, but surely Wikipedia aspires higher?--Technopat (talk) 00:33, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
We all agreed here that "atrocities" shouldn't appear in the heading. Mamalujo's opinion can't override that. I would suggest you change it back. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 11:53, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
You will note that the term atrocities is not only used by the sources but is also used in the White Terror article and used, including in a heading, of the Spanish Civil War article, as well. Mamalujo (talk) 18:55, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Atrocities may be an accepted term for news reports, but it shouldn't be for an encyclopedia. We must use less emotionally charged terms and simply state the facts. After reading the article, the reader should be able to decide for himself without us dictating him what to feel. --JokerXtreme (talk) 19:15, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Must admit that I can't think of a "better" way of describing such acts. Though Mamalujo's argument that they are used in other articles doesn't hold - they are equally emotionally charged articles. How about "Alleged atrocities"? That said, I'm not so sure they should be included in the article. Even though they are sourced, ie they are referred to in a published work, they are still based on hearsay. And hearsay obviously has no place in an encyclopedia. Maybe on someone's blog but not here... --Technopat (talk) 19:37, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Ok. I try something else : dividing the section so that "minor" events (including simple murders) are in a separate section. But Mamalujo is clearly POV-pushing, and since it does not seem to bother people enough here for them to modify the article themselves and there is clearly no chance to reason with Mamalujo, if this attempt is reverted I'll just file a case of POV — I don't have time to engage in an edit war. Skippy le Grand Gourou (talk) 13:27, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Misuse of Wikipedia logo on a website

Hi, you all should know that the WP logo is a property of the Wikimedia Foundation (as explained here). Now, in the website of OriginLab which produces the Origin software they use the logo as a link to their internal wiki. How can we report this misuse? Shouldn't we drop the a mail? -- CristianCantoro (talk) 15:21, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

They seem to be using a "W" there which to the best of my knowledge is still fair use. The Wikipedia logo is at [27]. Crispmuncher (talk) 05:19, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
I dropped them an email and they changed to using one of the alternatives I suggested from Wikimedia Commons. Fences&Windows 16:34, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Correcting errors in another language version

I don't write Russian well enough to make corrections or additions but I read it well enough to note factual errors. I am tempted to post the corrections and additions in English on the Russian pages. Any suggestions? AkilinaL (talk) 13:00, 18 April 2010 (UTC)Akilina

You could try asking for help at Russian Wikipedia's embassy talk page or from one of these editors. Phil Bridger (talk) 13:09, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

How to "name" or "anchor" a reference, then reuse it with varying page numbers

I post this here because I don't see a better place.

I'm working on a couple of psychology articles, both of which use footnoted citations. Some of these citations get reused via the <ref name="..."> convention. I've spent at least 2 hours trying to see how to employ this re-use trick while also citing varying page numbers for each citation. I realize this won't work, but this is the sort of thing I want to so:

<ref name=miller2006 |page=45 />

This would generate a citation note with the indicated page number.

This sort of thing isn't hard to do when using Harvard citation templates - something like [[#{id}|Miller, 2006, p. 45]] will do it. It's how to do it when the article convention is the footnoting system that I cannot figure out.

Any ideas would be appreciated!

Tom Cloyd (talk) 13:29, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

The only way to include page numbers with standard footnotes are to create separate cites for each use with the page number, to use {{rp}} or to use {{r}} if using list defined references. You can also look at shortened footnotes. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) talk 13:33, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks very much for the quick, detailed, and (I think) helpful response. It looks like a solution may be at hand. Will pursue it.Tom Cloyd (talk)
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