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This page contains discussions that have been archived from Village pump (miscellaneous).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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Is it a lie?

Hi guys, i was wondering if you could help me out. Yesterday i was talking to my girlfriend and she mentioned something that shook me a little, something that i don`t know if i should take for a fact. She was telling me that her brother had visited a talk and discussion forum where some of the peoplr there were claiming that homosexualism could be treated through medication, and assured, it could be treated in such ways, they might be able to erradicate it. Is this true?, is it possible?, doesn`t this involve genetic manipulation?, I haven`t been able to find a straight answer, can you guys help me out? Luis Rosas (e-mail removed) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 189.128.114.75 (talk) 00:28, 18 February 2007 (UTC).

I've removed your e-mail to stop spam. You might want to try the article on homosexuality, or if that doesn't help, ask at the reference desk. Tra (Talk) 00:43, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Double re-directs

Any good way to fix double re-directs after moving a page?? If there's just 1 or 2, all you have to do is fix them. But, if there's 20 or so, it is kind of hard. Any new option?? Georgia guy 21:05, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

I think there's some sort of automated 'bot' user that does them. Or at least used to do them, I've come across them in page histories but the edits are several months old – Qxz 08:10, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
You can ask a bot at Wikipedia:Bot requests. - Patricknoddy 13:21, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Least Recent Wikipedia Articles

I know how to find the most recent Wikipedia entries, but I find myself drawn to the bottom of every article before I even begin reading it to check how long ago the article was updated. Is there a page somewhere that lists all of the oldest write-ups, or, rather, the write-ups which have had their last update longer ago than the majority of Wikipedia write-ups? I think that such a page would help us editors not only update the older information, but also help to make sure we do not simply leave topics behind out of lack of interest... (Also, if a reply to this could be made on my own user discussion page, I would be greatly appreciative.) Thanks! Joe 03:46, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Special:Ancientpages normally allows this, but unfortunetly updates have been disabled since December because of the strain it puts on the servers, and a spot check of the articles showed most of them have been edited since the last update. I have no idea when or if it'll be updated again. BryanG(talk) 06:06, 18 February 2007 (UTC)
The reason that a spot check shows that most of the articles (I'd guess most of the very oldest ones, anyway) have been updated is because of Wikipedia:WikiProject Abandoned Articles‎. Anyone is welcome to join. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 02:07, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Ban & block

Can someone tell me the main difference between {{Banned}} and {{Indefblocked}}? --AAA! (AAAA) 07:31, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Banned sounds a little stronger to me. :-) Steve Dufour 07:40, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
Banning is covered by Wikipedia:Banning policy and blocking by Wikipedia:Blocking policy. Bans are a community decision (unless Mr J Wales decides to ban someone) and blocks are a decision by an individual admin. Blocked accounts can be unblocked by any admin. Only the arbitration committee (or Jimbo Wales and the WMF in theory) can overturn a ban. Another difference is that bans may be partial (banned from editing particular things), although they can be total, while blocks can only be total. Angus McLellan (Talk) 11:14, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

American Dad slams Wikipedia

Did any of you watch the American Dad! episode "Black Mystery Month" last night? For some reason I personally feel offended by the slam at Wikipedia in the last act. I suppose the magnanimous thing to do here would be to just laugh it off and mention it in the applicable articles. Cromulent Kwyjibo 21:47, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

I hate to point this out, but it has become generally fashionable on the TV and radio to slam Wikipedia. Public radio programs, Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! and Whad'Ya Know? both regularly jab at Wikipedia, and to some degree I would say it's deservedly so... which is part of why I'm trying to do my part to make things better with the subjects I am knowledgeable on. (My biggest fear is that every other category is as badly written and misinformed as I encounter throughout the Video game meme. Sigh... BcRIPster 22:13, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
I guess that for me it feels more personal because I edit articles on American Dad! episodes. Something in the back of my mind says maybe Seth Macfarlane got pissed off because of something I put in one of those articles. Cromulent Kwyjibo 00:02, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
just so people know what we are talking about, in latest AmDad episode, Stan and Steve are in need of "(...) a place where you could make outrageous claims, without any proof, and millions of people would accept it as fact" to destroy a long going conspiracy by revealing a hidden truth to the world. This place turns out to be wikipedia. Actually I found this to be a quite good description of what wikipedia is. Of course wikipedia is not only that but it's also that. This is a well known wikipedia flaw, no way to deny it and no point in taking it personally. If I'm not mistaken this the very flaw is part of what originally that drove Larry Sanger, no less than the guy which came up with the idea of using a wiki to turn nupedia into wikipedia, out of wikipedia to build Citizendium [1]. I'm quoting the Larry Sanger article here: There was, he wrote, a lack of public perception of credibility, and the project put "difficult people, trolls, and their enablers" into too much prominence; these problems, he maintained, were a feature of the project's "anti-elitism, or lack of respect for expertise".. As an individual I'm now through the belief that wikipedia is reliable and should be believed, and nowadays I mostly use it as an alternative to google (which has really degraded over time) to find a website or a link related to a specific matter or as a starting point for a serious websearch. As a former active wikipedian, it has been quite difficult for me to accept the fact that wikipedia cannot achieve the goal of being an encyclopedia because it is flawed by design (and IMHO wikipedia also missed the purpose of an encyclopedia). -- not signed 'cause I don't have a wikipedian identity anymore.

Wikipedia and the GFDL?

Since this was apparently not a kosher topic for GFDL, let's try here...

I'm a little unclear on something. It seems to me that Wikipedia violates the GFDL license by which its content is licensed (Oversight classification comes to mind). Is this the case, and why or why not? I'm honestly curious; this is not intended to be a troll. Articles are wholly deleted without reference, causing section II to be of question:

2. VERBATIM COPYING
You may copy and distribute the Document in any medium, either commercially or noncommercially, provided that this License, the copyright notices, and the license notice saying this License applies to the Document are reproduced in all copies, and that you add no other conditions whatsoever to those of this License. You may not use technical measures to obstruct or control the reading or further copying of the copies you make or distribute. However, you may accept compensation in exchange for copies. If you distribute a large enough number of copies you must also follow the conditions in section 3.
You may also lend copies, under the same conditions stated above, and you may publicly display copies.

This suggests to me (and I am not a lawyer) that Wikipedia is violating the GFDL; "You may not use technical measures to obstruct or control the reading or further copying of the copies you make or distribute"--it seems to me that Wikipedia is attempting to control the reading of the material by not only removing it, but making it hard (if at all possible) for writers of content licensed under GFDL on Wikipedia to recover it if it gets Oversighted. Can anyone point out what I'm missing? Ed Ropple - Blacken - (Talk) 14:55, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Doesn't Wikipedia stop distributing the material in question when it's deleted or oversighted? Angus McLellan (Talk) 15:40, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
I believe that section is saying that you must allow the copies you provide to be freely distributed just as easily as you distributed them. The purpose of deletion and oversight is to cease distribution, so it doesn't really apply. -Amarkov moo! 16:13, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
Got it. Thank you! 130.111.178.173 17:04, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
that section is basicly meant to prevent you useing DRM on GFDL material.Geni 20:13, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

User page template

I've just created Template:UP Click here which users might find useful. If you post it on your usepage and/or user talk page it generates a box for new comments. Let me know what you think AndrewRT(Talk) 21:06, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Could be helpful. It's too bad, however, that more editors don't know that clicking on the "+" tab will do the same thing. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 02:10, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
Perhaps because it's easy to miss. We should make it bigger, and label it "new comment" instead of "+", or something. Except that would probably annoy experienced users – Qxz 08:13, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
User:Qxz is right, but some people already have put boxes like this on talk pages, sadly. - Patricknoddy 13:20, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
Good point! But this template also works from the user page itself as well as the user talk page AndrewRT(Talk) 18:50, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Some editors at Journey to the West (TV series) insist on keeping a gallery of images from the show. In my opinion this does not constitute fair use. Please weigh in. --Ideogram 23:48, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

No, it fails our fair use criteria. Mainly criteria 2 and 8. Garion96 (talk) 00:04, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

quoting from different parts of a verbiose webpage

Suppose i'm using as a source a very long webpage, which is rich in text. The cite web template allows to specify the exact quote used. However, i rely on two segments of text from different parts of the page. Do i use two instances of the cite web template, one for each segment? Do i quote both segments in the same template? Do i leave out the quote option all together? Itayb 22:59, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Personally, I'd either put the quote in the article or leave it out all together - but it's a matter of personal choice. ~ ONUnicorn(Talk|Contribs)problem solving 15:04, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Willy on Wheels

I wonder what happened to this guy? He used to have a page on WP:LONG. Drahcirmy talkget my skin 21:46, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

I suppose this makes a good venue to repeat my proposal that we just recreate a brief summary version of the guy's page (which was deleted per WP:DENY) because he gets more attention via these weekly village pump topics than he would if we could just point people to his supposed "Hall of Fame" page. --tjstrf talk 21:51, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Notability of honoured people

Note the spelling with a u, because I'm enquiring after the British honours system. Although there are many Orders and ranks, are people who are honoured likely to pass a notability test more-or-less automatically? Would it depend on what rank of which order, for example? (e.g. MBE is the lowest honour generally handed out, to people who have rendered service of distinction usually in some highly localised sphere; a classic, if legendary but not entirely without basis, example is the school cleaner who's been at it for 50 years. This is obviously non-notable as a career, but does the award of the MBE change all that?) If not all, then at what sort of level might we consider a standalone article? 'BE's come in M (member), O (officer), C (commander) and K (knight). Probably CBEs upwards are notable (as, I'm thinking are all those appointed Knight Bachelor, an honour not part of the BE series). Or, if there's a guideline lying around, you could just point me there. 137.222.189.198 16:33, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm not an expert, and certainly not a WP authority figure, however I would say that the person's story itseslf has to have gotten some attention, not just the honour. Steve Dufour 16:37, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
Well, getting an award is like getting hemmeroids... sooner of later every ass gets one. But seriously, to be put on the Honours list, one has to have done something note worthy. I would not say that recieving an Honour is in itself notable, but what they did to get it surely is. (They don't just hand them out for good attendance... you have to have done something to earn one). Blueboar 19:40, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
Then that seems to be the answer. Steve Dufour 20:27, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
I'd disagree, there is a threshold. The MBE example is probably quite a good one, in many cases it is for something along the lines of 50 years of doing your job but for others there is something distinctive above and beyond, a friend of mine picked one up at 25 (still wouldn't consider him notable though). I think it has become more difficult to distinguish over recent years though, since the honours system was popularised and to a large extent devalued.
In terms of the system itself I'd agree that C is about the right level, Ellen MacArthur etc, whereas O tends to be given out for similar things to the M but in a different social grouping. As ever it is actually the back story which sets the scene, if there is little distinctive about that then it's probably not notable.
ALR 20:31, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
I might be missing some of the fine points here, I am an American after all, but what if we say an honour is a signpost pointing to a notable person, but not notable in itself? Steve Dufour 20:38, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
The basic equation is that if a person has been noted they are notable. I imagine that everyone who receives an honour will have their achievements written up in something we can use as a reliable source. -Will Beback · † · 21:26, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
I have no problem with that. Steve Dufour 21:32, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
AFAIR if one receives a state honour then the honour itself has an associated citation which would be a primary source with respect to the reasoning for the award. tbh notability would need more than that in many cases, although the level of award may have an influence, for example the Victoria Cross which is awarded so infrequently, and the barrier to entry is so high, that it is notable in itself. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by ALR (talk • contribs) 22:40, 20 February 2007 (UTC).

Interesting replies. I think the one about "pointer to notability" is probably the way to look at it, for the lower-ranked honours. Honestly, there really are honours given out for shining shoes at airports for a long time, but then perhaps the argument is for a short article observing the surprising (imo!) fact that such a thing was honoured. As for the writing up of achievements, well, this is true in the case of the gallantry awards such as the Victoria/George Cross, but much less so for many honours, which read simply "For services to..." [2], and one would generally have to go digging to find out more. Or maybe the balance is that the people who would, had they not been honoured, have been non-notable, to get a mention in the article about the Honours List they appear in if their award is interesting/surprising/notable for some reason. If they'd have been notable anyway, or are caused to rise to other standards of notability by the award of the honour, then they warrant an article on that basis. For the higher-ranked honours and gallantry awards, I'd agree that the simple act of the award confers great notability in and of itself. Thank you for your thoughts. 137.222.189.198 00:29, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

The notability of cults?

I've been pondering this question for the last few days. Members of small, new religous groups (aka "cults") (disclaimer: I am a member of such a group myself) tend to think that their group is important because it is the one true religion, it will save the world, or whatever. Also opponents of such a group think the group is important, for whatever reasons they have. What happens here on WP is that both groups edit like crazy, spinning off a vast number of new articles, until a minor group of people is the subject of greatly exagerated WP coverage. For instance in the real world and in history Freemasonry is about 100 times more important than Scientology, yet in terms of WP coverage it is the other way around. Just some thoughts. Thanks. Steve Dufour 03:02, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Part of this is due to the fact that Scientology is new... while something like Freemasonry (which isn't a "cult", or even a religious organization, by the way) has been around for a long time. New things tend to attract more attention than old things. Something like Freemasonry is viewed as being a bit old fashioned, and frankly a bit boring. It only needs a few articles to cover the subject. Scientology, on the other hand, has movie stars joining it. It is new and exciting and generates a lot of hype - both favorable and in opposition. It is in the press frequently, and is a "hot" topic. I think it is natural that it recieves more coverage. Could some of those articles be merged and summarized? Probably... and with time they probably will be. But for now, I think you can expect a new Scientology article every time something that relates to it hits the papers. Blueboar 15:35, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
I agree with you. BTW Freemasonry had quite a few hot celebrity members too, back in its day. :-) Steve Dufour 16:34, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
Oh, it still does, some very famous ones. Not that they're going to tell you--why do you think the Freemasons plant all these Scientology articles on Wikipedia--to divert your attention of course :). BabyDweezil 18:07, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
Or is Freemasonry really a plant by the Scientologists? They can travel back in time you know (its all done with Thetan waves!), so we can't trust the historical record. There are no Freemasons... These are not the droids you are looking for.... Move along. Blueboar 19:35, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
It happens because of Wikipedia's systemic bias. Recent topics tend to have more coverage. Topics related to the Internet tend to have more coverage. Topics which have been in the media tend to have more coverage. These and other similar factors mean articles about Scientology grow much faster than articles about Freemasonry. --cesarb 22:19, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
Good points. Steve Dufour 23:07, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Afd problem

You just feel too afraid an article is going to be deleted per Afd, and simply voting yourself to keep doesn't help much. Anything to do?? Georgia guy 23:44, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

If you're talking about PBS idents, I'd say don't worry about it. Second nominations in general have a much greater burden of proof on the nominator than first time arounds. Cromulent Kwyjibo 00:00, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
First of all, BBC television idents is alive and well, even though BBC One logos was deleted. It was specifically referenced at the logos AfD, so I imagine people looked at it, and liked what they saw. Logos of Viacom got zapped and the BBC stuff seems to have been mentioned again. I think the PBS article is pretty close to the BBC idents one. Therefore, I'd expect it to be ok. One of the major issues could be the fair use logo images. If it's ok on the Beeb stuff, it should be ok for PBS, but I'd double-check that the image copyright tags are ok. One of them seems to have PD and fair use tags. Somebody will probably get upset at that sooner or later.
Like Cromulent Kwyjibo, I would expect this to be kept. Do make sure and link to Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/PBS idents though, at the top somewhere, otherwise people may not read it. Angus McLellan (Talk) 00:08, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
And there is always Wikipedia:Help, my article got nominated for deletion! -- John Broughton (♫♫) 21:37, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm contributing to an article about a living man. His notability is not contested. This person has published dozens of publications and will probably publish many more. His notability lies in part in these publications, but only in part. Most of the publications are not in English, and have no translation thereto. I'm debating whether to list his entire publications, or to give links to existing listings of his works (such as those at the Library of Congress). I could follow a middle course: list explicitly only his better-known works, and provide links for the rest. But i have no idea which of his works are the more prominent (if any...). I'd like to read other people's opinion on this matter. How have similar cases been handled, those of highly prolific, but rather obscure, writers? Itayb 18:42, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Usually a select bibliography is best, but a link to a site with a complete one can be a reasonable solution if it's very long and you don't know which to include. How about using a multi-column layout for the list? It won't make it any smaller, but it will make it easier to read if you eventually decide on including them all. Angus McLellan (Talk) 21:19, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
Thank you for the suggestion. Could you please direct me to a page, from which i can pick up the multi-column layout technique? Itayb 21:45, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

April fool's Main page?

Yes/no? -- Jeandré, 2007-02-25t20:15z

Acetaminophen

Does amoxicillin have a reaction with acetaminophen? --myselfalso 00:24, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

The Reference desk should be able to answer that question, and I'll copy it over for you. ~ ONUnicorn(Talk|Contribs)problem solving 19:36, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
Here is it's new location. ~ ONUnicorn(Talk|Contribs)problem solving

Reporting Admin Abuse

Hello, where do I report an Admin that is abusing their abilities? A page was vandalized, someone removed content that had appeared on it for at least a year, and had also deleted cited info without any explanations. I restored the content, but because my IP is similar to that of a blocked user, an overzealous admin actually restored the unexplained deletion and blocked my account. I have made several attempts to communicate with the admin without making a single personal attack, his response is to delete my comments on his talk page. How can I report admin abuse? I can't seem to find the correct forum to do so 74.230.195.63 09:14, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

I have replied on the user's talk page. -- ReyBrujo 12:45, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Acetaminophen

Does amoxicillin have a reaction with acetaminophen? --myselfalso 00:24, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

The Reference desk should be able to answer that question, and I'll copy it over for you. ~ ONUnicorn(Talk|Contribs)problem solving 19:36, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
Here is it's new location. ~ ONUnicorn(Talk|Contribs)problem solving

Fonts

What fonts do all web browsers support? My signature is in a specific font, but when I looked at it at school, the school computers did not have the font, so it displayed merely as arial font or something. What are the standard fonts that all web browsers support? Thanks a lot!! - Hairchrm 19:17, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Ariel and Times New Roman, I'm pretty sure. ~ ONUnicorn(Talk|Contribs)problem solving 20:27, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
Arial is a font, Ariel is a mermaid. Most modern browsers do not yet support mermaids. They may be specified as part of CSS 3, but the standard is still being developed. I therefore recommend that, Hairchrm, you not base your signature on mermaids. (You might, tangentially, consider the fact that it takes up 3 lines in the edit box at present, too). 86.148.127.202 21:26, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
That is the most completely (pile on the adverbs!) hilarious comment I've read in some time. GracenotesT § 21:44, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
BJAODN'd. --cesarb 22:18, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
FWIW, I understand seashells support Princess Ariel. (See image) V-Man737 05:10, 23 February 2007 (UTC)right|thumb
None. You can always use the generic serif andsans-serif aliases, but other than that there are no fonts that are installed by default on all common operating systems (Arial and Times New Roman aren't found on Linux systems unless the system owner installed an old copy of them from the Web core fonts or from somewhere else). You can always list several fonts (not with <font face>, however; you will have to use CSS). --cesarb 21:25, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Well, for example, what does my signature font show up as for your browsers? Is it just a normal font (like Arial, or whatever font normal signatures are), or does it show up in the "Bradley Hand ITC" that I have designated? And yes, 86.148.127.202, I know it takes up a lot of room, I plan to change it soon. Thanks for your responses!! - Hairchrm 23:01, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

I see it in the default serif font (unlike the rest of the page, which uses the default sans-serif font). Probably since it cannot find the specified font, and there's no fallback font, it uses serif by default. I'm using Firefox 2.0 on Ubuntu edgy, with no extra fonts installed. --cesarb 02:29, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
I see it sans-serif, but with big text, and orange. My guess for the font would be Arial. Sorry for the misspelling earlier. ~ ONUnicorn(Talk|Contribs)problem solving 15:58, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Common article practices I dislike

Feedback requested at User:Ideogram/Common article practices I dislike. Feel free to suggest additions on the talk page. --Ideogram 01:19, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

replied.Geni 22:16, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

Bias?

A very interesting page from a questionable source came to my attention today. For some strange reason, it attempts to detail "where Wikipedia went wrong" in terms of NPOV. I feel like commenting to them (as much as I probably shouldn't); does anyone else want to make a comment about the page? --JB Adder | Talk 23:10, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

HELP ME!!!!

Im in a group home in Colorado!!!! SAVE ME!!! ANYBODY! I live in B.C Canada and my name is Nicholas Belcourt HELP ME!!!!!! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Nick13b (talk • contribs) 19:21, 26 February 2007 (UTC).

More info on Baja Hungary

wanting to find history on the Gyurkovics and serges from that area please email with any info charlie11121@hotmail.com —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Tammie70 (talk • contribs) 21:46, 26 February 2007 (UTC).

From Ronin (film)

This article or section contains a plot summary that is overly long.
Please edit it to both contextualise the fictional nature of the work and focus on discussing the work rather than simply reiterating the plot. You may also discuss changes on the talk page. See Wikipedia's guide to writing better articles for suggestions. Insufficiently concise plot summations may constitute a copyright violation.

"Contextualise the fictional nature of the work...?" Could somebody translate that into English? And by the way, if it's not contextualize with a Z then it's some new word that's not in my dictionary. Cryptonymius 18:09, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

That's because you don't have a British dictionary :) (don't worry, neither do I!) Basically, the person who tagged that article thought that the article had information about the fictional world as though it's actually real (an in-universe perspective), instead of providing information in the context of treating the work itself as an entity, with plot elements and such (an out-of-universe perspective). An in-universe perspective often lends excessive detail to unimportant things (in the context of a work's importance to the real world). Reading WP:WAF should help. GracenotesT § 18:18, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Where to gather to research to make an article?

I would like to know if it is possible to have a forum to get together and discuse an issue for which there is no current article. If there IS one, I would like to find out where it is.

I have a few ideas, but despite my research into the matter, I have not been able to find and verifiable and reliable research done into them! Some of them are fully in fiction and use obscure terms most people would not of heard of, yet are in their own way very important in their areas. If anyone has any idea, contact me, PLEASE Corrupt one 03:43, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

You might try Wikipedia:Drawing board, but it doesn't get a lot of activity. If there is a relevant WikiProject, that would be a better bet. - Jmabel | Talk 08:16, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
You might also consider creating a subpage, in your own user space, for each article, where you can begin to collect information and write a draft. Google (and other search engines, I assume) does include pages in user space in its index, so having a subpage may attract other who are interested in the topic to your subpage because they find it in a search. (If you do this, it's good to make clear at the top of the page that you're looking for others to help out if they can.) -- John Broughton (♫♫) 15:42, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

April fool's Main page?

Yes/no? -- Jeandré, 2007-02-25t20:15z

Welcoming

Are all users welcomed (with a welcome template)? Simply south 01:35, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

Not all, but it is polite to welcome someone if you are going to post a note in their talk page (especially because it gives useful information). -- 04:27, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
There are something like 7-10,000 newly registered users every day, for what that's worth. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 15:48, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Alpabetical

How on earth shall we fix the alphabetical problem? I mean lists where people are sorted by order of first name and titles like "Brigadier" and "Cardinal"? I know it's not important for moving around from reference to reference via links, but it looks downright illiterate in a dynamic list of people. (Dynamic lists are a great feature, by the way.) I went to the MediaWiki FAQ and searched for the string "alphabet" but did not find it. Do they care? Axel 01:10, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

I think you're looking for sort keys. If, for example, I wanted Albert Einstein to appear in a category sorted by his last name, I could link to the category with [[Category:Really smart dudes|Einstein, Albert]] and it would sort him as Einstein, Albert, while displaying him as Albert Einstein. See also WP:MAGIC for the DEFAULTSORT magic word. --Sopoforic 00:12, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
I think Axel was refering to sortable tables, not categories. Sort keys can be applied to tables also: the sort key must be enclosed within <span style="display:none"></span>. So the cell containing "Harry Truman", for example, becomes: 
<span style="display:none">Truman, Harry</span> [[Harry Truman]]
See National debt by U.S. presidential terms for an example. Jwillbur 18:45, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

about the 210.213.138.211 vandalists.

I think the IP address: 210.213.138.211 may be at my high school! when I was browsing one day... I was not registered at the time and I had a new message. I thought "That's odd" and had a look, I saw warnings everywhere. Ashamed as I was I decided to make my own account- so any references to 210.213.138.211 have (hopefully nothing more to do with me...) PHEW! so where can you find other users anyway? user: Vogarth616

First (and so far, only) post, eh? You might want to start by reading WP:NOT, about Wikipedia not being a social networking site. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 21:43, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
I don't think this person is networking, I think he/she is saying some vandals may have logged in from the same ip, and (he/she) decided to create a userpage for some reason. SeriousCat 07:02, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

why do such stupid people continue to ruin the site for others. --Lerdthenerd 08:54, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Acronym mistakes

I often encounter articles with the following mistakes. It would probably be too much to hope for that the writers who make these mistakes will read this post, but perhaps a few who do read it could help correct the mistakes. First, a term that is sometimes given as an acronym causes people to capitalize the term for no reason. For example, a central processing unit is often called a CPU. This can lead to the article being named with capital letters, such as "Central Processing Unit" or, more frequently, it can cause the first appearance of the article title to be capitalized, like "Central Processing Unit" (after the first mention, terms are often never spelled out again in the article, so people think that they should be capitalized all the time). Also, terms with acronyms are frequently capitalized in links to the article, such as in the following sentence: "The Central Processing Unit is an essential component of the modern computer."

Another problem is that people give the acronym first and then put the full version in parentheses, like this, "CPU (Central Processing Unit)". Also, they link the acronym even though articles are almost never found at their acronyms*. Frequently, the acronym goes to a disambiguation page, a different article than intended or a blank page. Amazingly, the both the acronym and the full version are sometimes linked.

*You should check where a link goes the first time that you make it, whether you are linking the acronym or the full version. That way you will know if the page is actually a redirect or a disambiguation page instead of an article. This should be done whether it is an acronym or not, since many disambiguation pages are not acronyms. However, if you must be lazy, link the full version. You can make it less likely that you will link to a disambiguation page by setting your stub sensor between 500 and 1,000, which will cause likely disambiguation pages to be flagged as stubs. A setting of 800 seems to catch almost all disambiguation pages without flagging too many short articles. -- Kjkolb 14:11, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia and Wikipedians

Hi,

I've been thinking lately that Wikipedia is really great and all that, but the endeavour itself is pretty much the exclusive domain of nerds. I've been one of those nerds until lately, so don't take it personally. I guess I just wanted to air this greivence and see what people have to say. Thank you for not taking offense. Vranak

I would say that every encyclopedia (both print and on line) has been written by what today we dub "nerds". And that's a good thing. Blueboar 20:32, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
Yes, it is a good thing, but the fact that there are nerds to begin with leaves something to be desired. You know, living up to human potential and all that. Vranak
This is an interesting discussion. Although the difference is slight and disputed, I would term most Wikipedians as geeks rather than nerds. GracenotesT § 22:07, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
Whatever the terminology, the idea is the same: too much interest in intellectual matters, not enough joie de vive. Vranak
I have a problem with that definition. I, and many other people here, have lots of joie de vive (thank the gods Wikipedia isn't vive!) However, just like any other time-consuming, often-thankless endeavor, we do sometimes get too invested in maintaining perfect and somewhat arbitrary standards, etc. It's sort of like fandom - it's a way of life, and yet it's just a gosh darned hobby. -sthomson06 (Talk) 22:20, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

You're probably right, at least for the more active editors, but I'm not seeing how this is a bad thing. --tjstrf talk 22:25, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

I prefer geek. I'm a subspecies of the stereotype: the athletic-California-chick-with-long-flowing-hair-and-a-good-wardrobe variety. DurovaCharge! 03:13, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

The geek shall inherit the Earth! *Dan T.* 04:18, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Cool -- thanks for your responses everyone. :) Vranak

Calling Style experts: Template:main

I have a question about this template.

All over WP, I see sections in articles that describe something in a short paragraph. Heading the section is the {{main|big article}} tag. In other words, this links to a BIG article which is summarized in this SECTION of an article. Here is an example, taken from the Common Era article:

Main article: Anno Domini

The calendar practice prompting the coining of the term common era is ...

The use I'm seeing elsewhere on WP contradicts the documentation of the main template. It seems like they should generally be using {{Further | [[big article]]}}.

The talk page implies a hierarchy, like this:

The first case is obviously not a hierarchy of articles. Anno Domini is not a parent article to Common Era.


I'm not trying to start a debate, but I do want to know which is the correct way to go. Should I use {{main... when linking to the detailed article for a topic, or should I use the Further template?

If main IS being used correctly, then shouldn't the template's documentation be changed?

-- TomXP411[Talk] 00:36, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Note also {{details}}. --Random832 18:08, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

All-Caps user names

I want to know if anyone wants to make a template to put on Wikipedia user names with all caps, saying that their user names can be interpreted as yelling. Any objections?? Georgia guy 22:38, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

I object! That's just.. too hypersensitive to caps. This Interweb thing has been around for well over a decade now. I think we've evolved to the point where we can tell whether someone is shouting based on context, and not just the case of the letters. SubSeven 11:06, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
Name a few examples of names in all caps that are not shouting. Georgia guy 14:43, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
WHY ARE THINGS BEING INTERPRETED AS YELLING BAD? EVEN IF THEY ARE, SAID YELLING IS NOT INTIMIDATING. THERE'S A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN brion VIBBER AND THIS, WHICH IS WHAT SUBSEVEN WAS HINTING AT. Now, George guy, could you please provide some usernames that have provoked such concern from you? Thanks! GracenotesT § 15:00, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Make wikipedia approachable.

I think wikipedia is wonderful but sometimes an article goes beyond a person with average I.Q.Even basic concepts of physics & mathematics are not clearly explained and are often complicated.Keeping in view the universal outlook of wikipedia it should be able to cater to all brains. It will be excellent if you encourage editors to take a lucid approach to every article they edit. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 210.212.215.141 (talk) 10:55, 27 February 2007 (UTC).

Thankfully, there is a Wikipedia project out there in Simple English (no insult to anyone, yourself especially), which does allow people to gather the information they need without the concern of it going over their heads. I just wish I could remember where it is. --JB Adder | Talk 10:27, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page -- ReyBrujo 12:42, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
On the other hand, if an article on this wikipedia is too advanced for ordinary readers due to inadequate explanation, etc, feel free to tag it with {{technical}}. --Random832 18:19, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Glossary of the French Revolution

I have no idea where to take this up, so I am taking it up here.

Glossary of the French Revolution and its talk page were tagged a few weeks ago as having been transwikied to Wiktionary. Neither tag indicates any place to discuss the matter, and I have absolutely no idea why a tag should remain on the article page (this would seem to be of no interest to a not-editing reader). Furthermore, the tag on the talk page implies that the article is nothing but a dictionary definition, which is absurd. It includes (inter alia) lists of the various constitutions and government organs of the era and of events commonly known by their dates in the French Republican calendar. It is, precisely, a glossary, not a dictionary entry; in theory we could split this out to a dozen or so separate "list" articles, but it seems to me that would be of far less service to our readers.

Anyway, (1) I have no idea why the tag should remain on the article, but I am hesitant to remove it. (2) I think this is incontestably an article we should have, but the tag on the talk page seems to suggest that if I tamper with the tag it will simply be re-added, and strongly implies that the article as it stands is inappropriate (but gives no indication of who decided that, what the process was, or how I can dispute it.

Increasingly, when I deal with Wikipedia I feel like am dealing with a bureaucracy of pedants blindly following arbitrary rules, instead a community of scholars using their minds. - Jmabel | Talk 07:39, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Similarly (though perhaps more appropriately to be moved to Wiktionary) Humpty Dumptyism. Seems to me that there is article potential on the history of this term: for example, how exactly did it enter academic usage after starting out in a famous children's book? Again (1) why should the tag remain on the article and (2) where is one supposed to discuss the further disposition of the article on Wikipedia? - Jmabel | Talk 08:08, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
It's been 20 hours since I asked this. Is there no one with some insight into these tags who can help me? - Jmabel | Talk 00:57, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
It's now been over 48 hours, I will cross-post to Wikipedia:Village pump (assistance). - Jmabel | Talk 18:06, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Personal attacks on a user talk page

I've posted a message on WP:ANI on this issue, but if someone could come over and help resolve it - as it looks like others are busy with the other threads, I'd really appreciate it. Thanks. Xiner (talk, email) 21:56, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

LibraryThing

After a brief conversation on wikien-l, I finally got around to organising an English Wikipedia group on LibraryThing. There's a small equivalent group already organised for the German wikipedia; the idea is that we can use this to provide a listing of books which are immediately available to users in order to aid with fact-checking, reference work for articles, and so on.

If you have a LT account, please do join or spread the word; we're sitting on 2,500 works at the moment, and the more material that's listed the quicker it'll become something we can actually make use of... Shimgray | talk | 21:07, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I just removed two sections from here

It is ok to remove posts that clearly have nothing to do with wikipedia or anything, right? --Random832 18:16, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, those were legitimate removals. SubSeven 21:38, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Translations

I have secretly translated over 8 000 Wikipedia articles from English to French. Why, if I had a dime for every article I built up, I would have 800 dollars. How's a bout a little recognition ? Now, I know YouTube does it, but I do realize that wikimoney is virtual. In any case, I think I deserve a Working Man's Barnstar. ADM

Maybe you've received barnstars in secret? Ah! SubSeven 11:02, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
I'm sure the editors of the French Wikipedia are grateful for any and all additions to it - have you posted to its equivalent of the Village Pump regarding recognition there? -- John Broughton (♫♫) 22:04, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

The South Bronx

Your article about the South Bronx has a number of errors. To begin the REAL South Bronx is the area south of 149 St. and bounded by the Harlem and East rivers. When the social scientists discovered this area it became fashionable to be "from" the South Bronx. Colin Powell did not grow up there. The area he lived in was more upscale than the REAL South Bronx. In addition this neighborhood was not 92% Jewish. On the contrary it was about 90% Irish with the rest being Italian, Polish, German and a small scattering of Jews. I do not have the time or inclination to go through all that is necessary to change this article.I can site as an authority on the subject myself having lived there during the 1930's, 1940's, and the 1950's. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 70.241.97.98 (talk) 19:17, 3 March 2007 (UTC).

You should post suggestions for changes to an article on the article talk page, not on this page.
Also, while personal experience can be very useful for identifying problems with an article, it is not Wikipedia policy to use personal experience as a source of information - see Wikipedia:No original research. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 21:13, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Category: American rapists

This category bugs me for some reason. I came across it from the Mike Tyson article. It seems to be implying that this is the most notable thing they're known for.

Would it be better to rename it as "Americans convicted of rape"?

I thought it would be better to flesh it out a bit before taking it to a formal CfD.--SarekOfVulcan 15:55, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

for various reasons that would probably be a good idea.Geni 18:47, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Editing non-English articles

My Mini Moke article recently made FA and is going up on the front page real-soon-now. Probably as a consequence of that I'm seeing articles in other languages appearing on the "in other languages" list. I notice that most of these have no photo of the car - so I thought it would be reasonable to stick at least the 'headline' photo from the English article into all of them. The trouble is that when I go to the 'zh.Wikipedia.org' page [3] (for example), all of the buttons and tabs are transformed into (for me) incomprehensible gibberish.

  1. Is there any way to edit non-English language articles using the English interface?
  2. If not - can I safely assume that the order of the labels and tabs and such are the same as in English Wikipedia so I can figure out their functions?
  3. Is it even reasonable of me to try to do this? These are all GFDL images - so there shouldn't be any legal issues. But maybe local standards of which I'm unaware might make this inappropriate.

Thanks.

SteveBaker 14:21, 4 March 2007 (UTC)
  1. Yes, make sure you're logged in on the foreign language wikis, then go to Special:Preferences and you can change the interface language by setting the drop down box on the first page to en - English. You can then click the button at the bottom-left of the screen to save these changes.
  2. Yes, they pretty much are in the same order. Another way of 'guessing' what the links do is to hover over them and look in the status bar for where they link to. You'll find that the URLs for Special pages are often quite similar to the English URLs.
  3. You could probably do it. If it doesn't fit in to the project for some reason then someone else can always revert it. Tra (Talk) 15:14, 4 March 2007 (UTC)
Ah! Many thanks! SteveBaker 16:49, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Rating template

Is their a template that can be used to rate articles that isn't associated with a wiki-project? The Placebo Effect 13:38, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

"Tell a friend" link?

dear manager, at the first i want to thank you so much for this website ... in fact i found it so useful and contains informations about everything if can say that ...

i know am not so good to advise you, but i think there is something missed in this site which is " tell a freind " link ... i found many things good and i want to send them to my friends but i cant because there is no link help me to do that ... i hope you be patient with me and take this thing seriously ...

thank you again for wasting your time with my message

yours,

khalil shalabi — Preceding unsigned comment added by Khello85 (talk • contribs) 11:02, 3 March 2007

In situations like these, you could always send the web address of the page to your friend. For example, to direct your friend to this particular page, send them an email with a link to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:_Village_pump_(miscellaneous)

—W. Flake (talk) 18:34, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Flag dispute at Saint-Pierre and Miquelon

I am involved in a dispute regarding the flag shown on Saint-Pierre_and_Miquelon and am conducting a straw poll. Some wikipedians believe the flag of France should be used, while others would prefer to see the unofficial flag of Saint-Pierre_and_Miquelon. Please help us resolve this issue by voting or leaving comments on the talk page. Thanks! Foobaz·o< 19:46, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

a bit of ignorance

Ok so we get a project and it says we may not use wikipedia as a source! Why? Because, (and I couldn't believe this) the information posted on this site comes from the poster's head and don't use sources to verify this information! This is somewhat true as there are articles without sources, but that is clearly stated at the top of the article. Who thinks this is true (what my teacher reasoned)? --Gama1274 04:04, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia has advantages and disadvantages. One of the advantages is that anyone can edit it. If you see an article and want to add something, you can. The good part is that we accumulate the knowledge of hundreds of thousands of people of all different interests and backgrounds and ages from all over the world. The bad part is that it can't be guaranteed that all the information will always be 100% right; most of us try to be as right as we can as much as we can, but nobody is perfect. For a school project, or for any other reason you might be doing research, you should feel free to read a Wikipedia article for background information—and Wikipedia may be very useful in leading you to more detailed sources that you can use for your schoolwork and other research, because every substantial article should contain references to good sources. I hope this is helpful. Any questions, leave a note on my talkpage. Newyorkbrad 04:13, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
Your teacher is correct. Wikipedia is not in general reliable. While Wikipedia can give you basic information about a topic, any information on Wikipedia should be checked with a reliable source. A well written Wikipedia article will reference the sources used so you can look them up. But you should not in general cite Wikipedia. JoshuaZ 04:14, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
Thank's, I guess I was a bit harsh, but the way our teacher said it I'm sure none of our class will use it to find other sources like you have stated, and it sounded like she has never really used it. This is really hindering them from using this site, which is still good even if you don't use it directly.--Gama1274 04:30, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
You might want to read Wikipedia:Researching with Wikipedia. - Jmabel | Talk 01:01, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

There are no absolutely reliable sources of information on any subject, because every source is filtered through a human brain and human's frequently commit every kind of inaccuracy and distortion of the truth, ranging from careless misstatements to deliberate misrepresentations. And that is why you should never rely upon any single source for information. And the next time your teacher impugns the reliability of Wikipedia, you might point out that books are published for one reason and one reason only: to make money. The fact that somebody's essay has been enshrined between the covers of a printed book is no guarantee that the author actually intends to tell you the truth. Cryptonymius 17:56, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Edit summary preview

I haven't edited in several days (weeks?), and I was delighted tonight to find a preview for edit summaries! Finally! Thank you! Why did it take so long to get out? J. Finkelstein 08:52, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Because we had to convince the developers (Gracenotes ducks) Nah, just joking. GracenotesT § 23:36, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia on BBC Radio 4 this morning

Congratulations Wikipedia. You came out way on top in the discussion programme with a pompous, whingeing representative of the new, fundamentalist Conservopedia today who was claiming you are too liberal

My opinion of Wikipedia has gone from useful tool to admiration

Keep up the good work. I will add articles when I feel able

Pete Milner 11:28, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Help with deleting my own template

Hi... I hope I'm posting this in the right place. I'm still kind of new to everything...

I'm wondering if a kindly Admin can please delete the Fu'un Series template ASAP, if that is not too big a deal? If need be, I can provide a link to it if it's not deleted by the time this is addressed...

There was no sense for it being nominated for deletion anyways, it's just two games... it's my fault entirely, I'll take responsibility for such a useless attempt. The least that could have done was that an admin could have disposed of it and left me a note on my talk page telling me in a kindly way why... it would have been nice. >_>

Please help. I would really, really appreciate it. I already asked one admin all politely, and he brushed me aside without so much as a care... it makes me feel as though I'm nothing to him, not to mention it was kind of rude.

Thanks in advance, again, I really appreciate it. --Ralf Loire 07:05, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

In the future, you can tag any page that you create and want to be deleted with {{db-author}}, and an admin will get around to speedily deleting it (see WP:CSD). 207.241.251.130 14:53, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Ah, okay. Thank you very much. -Ralf Loire 15:43, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

End of the World

From recent discussion of the deletion of Doomsday event, I think people have gotten a sense of a bit of disarray in the articles regarding the subject of the end of the world, doomsday, etc. I don't know that there's any specific proposal in mind, but I figured it was worth discussing somewhere. Hope this is a good place. If not, appreciate pointers to where else to try. Mister.Manticore 19:54, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedians are Overwhelmingly Libertarian

I've been curious about Jimmy Wales claim that Wikipedians are disproportionately liberal, and ensuing claims of Wikipedia bias. I used these categories to group a statistical sample of 901 Wikipedians by political affiliation:


Political Category Members
Category:Apolitical_Wikipedians 57
Category:Communist_Wikipedians 47
Category:Socialist_Wikipedians 58
Category:Liberal_Wikipedians 199
Category:Democratic (US) Wikipedians 81
Category:Social_Libertarian_Wikipedians 185
Category:Libertarian_Wikipedians 196
Category:Conservative_Wikipedians 68
Category:Republican (US) Wikipedians 10
Total 901


Summarizing the numbers and comparing the results to American averages, I find that Liberals are proportionately represented on Wikipedia (42% on Wikipedia, 49% in America), conservatives are very under-represented (8% on Wikipedia, 41% in America), and Libertarians are extremely over-represented (42% on Wikipedia, unknown in America).

If anyone is interested in this, and wants to check (or improve) my methodoloy, I summarized all my findings on this subpage User:Jonathan_Stokes/Wikipedians_by_Political_Party. Jonathan Stokes 21:17, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

There is obviously the very small fact that not all wikipedians are Americans. C mon 22:34, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
It may indicate that liberals are more outspoken and more willing to categorize themselves as such. I know a lot of user categories I could fit in, but don't bother with. GracenotesT § 00:05, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
There's also the problem that "liberal" means many different things, depending on who you ask, and some of those things sound exactly like "libertarian". Forcing political positions into groups is really not that statistically useful. -Amarkov moo! 00:32, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Wow. Libertarians make up only 1% of the U.S. vote, but they comprise 42% of Wikipedians, and no one finds this intriguing? I'm sure the methodology isn't flawless, but there is a curious trend here, no? Just thought someone besides me might find this interesting. Jonathan Stokes 18:22, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

It's not that nobody finds it interesting, but that the analysis is flawed.
Your analysis only includes those Wikipedians who choose to declare an affiliation, and takes little account of interpretation of that affiliation. Your analysis compares a participant group drawn from a potentially global, predominantly developed economy, candidate pool with a USian political system.
You've made no effort to inform your figures with any other information about those participants who have chosen to declare an affiliation, where are they most active in WP, if at all.
fwiw I'm in the UK and I'd consider myself an economic liberal.
ALR 18:34, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
I've decided to take a more scientific approach. I took a random sample of 200 active wikipedians with user names and tested your hypotheses: I found three important things:
  1. Wikipedians don't like to tell: Only 13% (with a confidence interval of 7%) explicitly stated their political views, by use of text, userboxes or categories.
  2. There is a lot of diversity in political views, but there is a clear leftwing bias. This can be seen in the table below.
  3. It would unwise to compare statistics about wikipedia with the US. 42% of the user pages I examined stated from which country they were. Of them only 45% were from the United States. 16% were from the UK/Ireland, 6% from Australia/New Zealand, 5% from Canada, 8% were from Asia and 19% from the rest of Europe.
One major statistical warning: due to the small sample size (only 200 persons), I have a confidence interval of 7%. This means that my estimates might very well be wrong by a margin of 7%. All the data I got gives is an indicator of the size of these groups.
In conclusion: wikipedians won't tell and if they tell, they are diverse, with a strong bias towards the left. C mon 21:34, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
Political Affiliation
Position Percentage Examples
Left 57% Labour, Liberal/Democrat (in the US), Socialist, Green, communist, anarchist, pacifist
Right 15% Republican (in the US), conservative
Libertarian 11% Libertarian, Capitalist
Independent 15% Independent
C mon, impressive work! Your findings are consistent with Jimmy Wales' claim that Wikipedia's political compass falls to the left of the US, as most of the first world nations are to the left of the U.S. I'm still deeply intrigued by the high number of Libertarians, although I have no statistics on the worldwide Libertarian population. Your findings suggest that Libertarians are more likely to self-identify than the average population.
If I limit the survey to Wikipedians self-identified by US Political group, we still find 10 Republicans, 14 Libertarians, and 80 Democrats. Though this is only a tiny statistical sample of the Wikipedian population, I still find it relevant and interesting how drastically these numbers differ from US totals.
I do find these statistics fascinating, but I also think this discussion is relevant to Wikipedia in our ongoing quest for NPOV. If the Wikipedian population is out-of-step with the general population, do we risk presenting information according to our own agenda? Thank you C mon for sharing your excellent findings. Jonathan Stokes 00:03, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
ISTR reading an article, probably in the Economist, about the breakdown of political affiliations in the US, which indicated a significant relationship between affluence and political affiliation. There is also clearly a relationship between affuence and the physical ability, and discretionary time, to participate in something like Wikipedia.
Notwithstanding that I find the left/ right description of limited use when you're talking about party affiliation.
I'd also point out that WP is not being written for a USian audience, but for an English Speaking audience.
ALR 17:05, 1 March 2007 (UTC)


I'm from Florida, USA and consider my self mostly Libertarian. I understand in some countries, Liberals are much like USA Libertarians. In the USA, our liberal leaders would better be decribed as Socialists, Fasciests, Athests or Communists. This does not seem to be true of non-political liberals who are often nice people except for being unaware of the dangers of the USA liberal movement. I suspect the different meanings of libertarian account for the large percentage of Libertarian Wikipedians. Neil

Just to interject with a view from overseas. From where I'm sitting, the US libertarian movement is what I would call a "militant liberal movement". That is they want to enforce a libertarian system on people with the same vigor as a conservative might want to enforce a conservative society on people, whether people want it or not. They want to give people more choices, but they also want to take away people's right not to be exposed to the choices made by other people. Personally, I find this as objectionable as somebody trying to force a theocracy or similar on me.
perfectblue 19:53, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
This is changing the subject, but I want to note that people who are more far left or far right are far more likely to proudly display their political views to the world. Perhaps Wikipedia is not heavily liberal or conservative but it instead contains politically far left or right people who like to brag about their political standing. Captain panda In vino veritas 22:40, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
It'd have to agree, the further over to one side you are, the more likely you are to tell people. You see plenty of pro-hunting bumper stickers, and plenty of anti blood sport ones too, but I've never seen a bumper sticker reading "Lets use hunting to manage wildlife".
perfectblue 08:49, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I wonder if the above proportions have anything to do with the fact that WIkipedia is still largely dominated by users in the US. A lot of other people in the world simply don't use these labels, or use them differently. For example. In Europe Left almost exclusively means "socialist" or "Communist", and Right is generally used to mean "Nazi" (seriously, you say Right in places like France and Britain and it means Far Right). Whereas the term Libertarian is virtually unknown, and is more associated with hippies wanting to throw away all the rules than with capitalism, which is seen as being centerist (somewhere between Republicans and Democrats, which doesn't really exist in the US).

perfectblue 08:58, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

With C mon's permission I have published his findings on my blog. I invite you all to view the rigorous methodology he used as his user subpage, User:C_mon/wikipedians_by_politics. Just my two cents, but as we collectively struggle to achieve an NPOV encyclopedia amidst ongoing claims of Wikipedia bias, it is probably worthwhile to examine where we stand on a political spectrum. Plus, I just find this stuff interesting. Jonathan Stokes 20:32, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

America is not the world. Sorry to ruin your worldview, but it really isn't. If you have figures for the whole world, or perhaps at a stretch the Western world, then... well, you still couldn't make a meaningful comparison, because the vast majority of users (quite sensibly, in my opinion) don't flaunt their political stance on the project; there will be a further bias among those who do declare their political stance as opposed to those who don't. This whole thing is, in words that have been used many times before, "divisive and inflammatory" anyway. Bad idea – Qxz 03:57, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Qxz, no offense, but I can't figure out who you're responding to or what you are talking about. Jonathan Stokes 00:55, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Help to review submissions to Wikimania 2007

Hello. I'm looking for people to join Wikimania's Program Team to review presentations about Wikimedia Communities and help to decide which ones should be accepted for Wikimania 2007 in Taipei. If you are interested, please let me know. If you'd prefer to review submissions on something else, please see the program teams page and contact Phoebe, James, Jakob, or TzuChiang.

I'm quite surprised that no has responded to the call for Wikimania program team members I made a week ago, so I'm trying again here in case there is more response than on the mailing lists. Feel free to copy this to other projects and languages.

Angela. 14:03, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Why is there a space before commas?

Why do we use a space before a comma on most WP pages? It does make selecting text easier but if your like me and like to use a text-to-speech application like the Opera browser it will pronounce the word "comma" instead of pausing briefly. Which gets annoying.

Do we have to use a space for coding syntax or is this maybe a new issue?

ErrorCraft 20:23, 7 March 2007 (UTC)ErrorCraft

We... do? Example? If it happens then it's an error. --Golbez 20:25, 7 March 2007 (UTC)
Yes, it's an error. I've edit hundreds, maybe thousands of articles (who counts these things?), and I would notice typos like these; I doubt I've seen more than one or two (in short, so few I can't really remember any). So I really, really doubt "most" is true here. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 14:00, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Article for a Friend

Hi, I'm new as a member, and I want to make an article about the life of a friend of mine, that took his life a little over 4 months ago, and would like to know if somone(s) could help me, and tell me if this is alright, and possible to do, Thanks. --BarrelEndDragon 00:30, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Take a look at Wikipedia:Notability (people). The guidelines there will help you decide if your friend is notable enough for an article here. At the very least, he would need to be mentioned in independent sources (newspapers, for example). If he fits the guidelines, then I'm sure someone will help you write the article. --Tango 17:29, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

He was in the newspaper, for getting awards, and such...so would that count? BarrelEndDragon 03:06, 3 March 2007 (UTC)BarrelEndDragon

Probably not. Wikipedia aims to be an encyclopedia, which means that things of fleeting 15 minutes of fame variety do not belong here and will probably be nominated for deletion. Being mentioned in a newspaper is not much of a feat (I have been mentioned several times over the years, but I still don't merit an article on myself). Even then, things which newspapers cover are not necessarily the same type of topics suitable for an encyclopedia. The criteria here is whether he has been documented in multiple sources, where the sources are independent of him and of each other, and where the coverage given is substantial (i.e. he is one of the subjects of the coverage and not used as an example or a drive-by mention). You might want to look at our general guideline on notability in addition to the one posted by Tango. Zunaid©® 15:41, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
Even if you friend is notable, you should also be aware of WP:COI and consider whether it is appropriate for you to edit an article on a life friend Nil Einne 10:48, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Biggest Wikipedia Article

Which article in the English wikipedia is the longest in bytes?N734LQ 01:47, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Special:Longpages lists List of former members of the United States House of Representatives as the longest, with 388,028 bytes. Tra (Talk) 01:56, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
Can't that page be broken down somehow? Maybe about 300 subpages, Former members of the 117th US Congress of whatever the proper phrase should be. Or replaced with a link to a Category: "Former US Representative"? Xaxafrad 17:52, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Croonies not accepting of Wikipedia?

As a student in evolutionary biology, I often find my professors saying "learn this but read it in your textbooks and don't look it up on wikipedia." Have you found that too? Why is is that professors make the (often wrong) assumption that textbooks are more accurate? How can I explain to my profs that wikipedia is great because information is made meaningful with bountiful links and by being embedded in concepts? Some of my more intransigent professors view wikipedia as simply something lazy college students use the night before a paper is due. Have any of you been frustrated by similar problems? Any views?

Well, you shouldn't believe everything you read in Wikipedia. We are not always right, you know. Perhaps you could read your textbook and look it up in Wikipedia to get the most knowledge you can about the topic. Captain panda In vino veritas 03:26, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
I haven't been paying real close attention, so I could be wrong, but it seems to me that Wikipedia has a bit of a cladist bias in its taxonomic information. Maybe less so now than a couple years ago. Maybe that's part of it? --Allen 03:50, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
By the way, what's a croonie? --Allen 03:53, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
A Moonie who sings? pschemp | talk 03:56, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
LOL... "Shine On, Shine on Sun Myung Moon..." Blueboar 15:22, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
We do sing that one sometimes. :-) Steve Dufour 06:38, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

College professors in the US often need to be published to gain tenure (publish or perish) and so they would much rather you buy the books written by their colleagues than utilize free information from the web. The professors with integrity are probably also trying to get you to go to primary sources, such as articles by people who actually did the research, rather than an encyclopedia essay, or, say, a news article written by someone with a journalism degree and little understanding of the subject they are attempting to address. Cryptonymius 18:14, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

That and the fact that since "anyone can edit", you often get "anyone" editing, whether they know what they are talking about or not (and, as we have recently discovered, you can not even trust those who appear to be experts... since editors can lie about their credentials on Wikipedia). College professors prefer that you actually do proper research, and get your information from sources that can be trusted. Wikipedia isn't one of them. Blueboar 18:26, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Even the best written and maintained pages on wikipedia are inaccurate for some portion of the time—the average duration needed for the work of youthful vandalism to be reverted. It's amazing what daft and sometimes subtle changes get made even to scientific, well-referenced pages on wikipedia. Books are more stable, and they can be used as a reference check later. Personally I'm very much looking forward to the apperance of more stable wiki-based encyclopedias where hours and days of careful research will stay put. Wikipedia clearly isn't going to go that far. I almost expect that many dedicated editors will jump ship once there is a decent, more protected alternative. Can't say what will happen to wikipedia after that... — RJH (talk) 21:27, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I'd like to see Wikipedia continue on as "the people's encyclopedia", while Civilopedia (or Civicendium, or whatever), be "the people's certified encyclopedia", if you catch my drift. I can accept that Wikipedia has a critical mass of editors, but not a critical mass of quality editors (I'm certainly not a quality editor, though I'd like to think I'm a decent minor editor). As Wikipedia approaches a critical mass of featured articles (those worthy of being printed and treated like any other encyclopedia, to be used in student's reports or not), I can easily imagine a fork of those articles being mirrored to a select pool of editors with credentials (maybe Jimbo could tour college campuses (campii?) around the world to enlist professors for the certified project, the more the merrier, as always!). Xaxafrad 18:26, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Please join the discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject China#Naming conventions. --Ideogram 19:02, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

How to clarify a Category Definition?

I had a brief discussion with someone regarding the category Corporate Crime [4], which is defined as "This category includes articles discussing corporations which have engaged in illegal activities." This other person appears to take the view that this category should only refer to articles about corporations which have violated criminal statutes and/or have been assessed penalties under criminal law. I take the view that "illegal activites" refers to any violation of law and whether it's the health law or international law or the Interstate Commerce Act or a dog licensing law is irrelevant. And I would like to see the definition clarified. So my question is do I just change it and see what happens or what? (This particular category has had about 6 edits since it's creation a year ago and there's nothing on the talk page so I don't really see any point in posting to the talk page.) Cryptonymius 05:36, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Hm. You may be looking for a third opinion on this manner, using the category talk page. By the way, you can link to a category using a colon... [[:Category:Corporate crime]] yields Category:Corporate crime. I would personally think that this category should be true to connotation in addition to denotation. "Corporate crimes" strikes me as being related more to ethics of running a business (e.g., Enron) than to breaking any old law. (However, please disregard my opinion, since I'm somewhat uninformed.) But asking for a third opinion should be helpful, or even starting a straw poll if other people are involved. Then, you can establish a good category definition and criteria for inclusion. Such criteria is extremely important, or else it would be indiscriminate. Finally, categories really aren't edited that much. They aren't part of an exciting namespace, like templates are! :) GracenotesT § 06:43, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
My first reaction is that if a corporation breaks any law that would be a corporate crime. Steve Dufour 17:35, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

"he" as a gender-neutral pronoun in Wikipedia

I would like to know if there's any good choice for removing the use of "he" as a gender-neutral pronoun. Sometimes it's easy to reword; sometimes it's not. Georgia guy 14:35, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

Depends. If the page is writen in british english "they" can be used. If writen in US english there isn't much in the way of alturnative options.Geni 22:07, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
Sometimes I try to reword. But I really have no problem with either "they" or "he". --Ideogram 22:54, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
It certainly isn't something that could be done automatically by a bot... the bot would not know the difference between a gender-specific reference or a gender-neutral one. It would have to be done on an article by article basis. If you have a problem on a specific article, raise the issue on the talk page and then be BOLD and edit to a more acceptable pronoun. The only thing I ask is that we not allow people to be turned into furniture (I refer of course to disreputable practice of changing the terms Mr. Chairman, Madam Chairwoman, and even Madam Chairman into "Mr./Madam Chair"... I hate that... the Chair is what the Chairman/Chairwoman sits in, not the person sitting in it. Harumph!)Blueboar 03:46, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
Oh, that's quite funny. ~user:orngjce223 how am I typing? 01:03, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
He is a gender-neutral pronoun. Why would you need to change it? --tjstrf talk 06:17, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
The term to use if you need gender-neutrality in your case, Bluebor, is chairperson. Georgia guy 14:38, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
Because some people don't agree that it is a gender-neutral pronoun, and take offence. Personally, I don't care, but some people do. Blueboar 14:08, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
Job titles of the form -man are gender-neutral. The fact that the prefix for referring to male humans has been dropped long ago does not change this. Chris cheese whine 18:26, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
I don't recall that "they" is any less appropriate for US english than british - it's a formal style thing, not a regionalism. If we're going to allow it there's no reason not to allow it for both. --Random832 16:24, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

What Percentage of Anonymous Edits are Helpful?

Whenever someone proposes that Wikipedia should block anonymous IP's once and for all, someone makes the rebuttal that 30% of anonymous edits are helpful. I'm pretty sure I've read this a few times, but I've never found the source of the statistic.

I can see that 31% of total edits are by anonymous users, but I can't find the statistic that 30% of anonymous edits are helpful. It seems that any argument for allowing anon IP's to edit Wikipedia would hinge on this statistic. Does it exist?

If it does exist, what was the methodology? If it doesn't exist, can we create an objective survey on anonymous edits?

If a rigorous and objective survey found that, for instance, only 10% of anonymous edits were helpful, that would present a very strong case for finally disallowing anonymous IP's once and for all. Jonathan Stokes 02:03, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

What problem do you solve with that? We'll drive off some vandals, yes, but we'll drive off many people who contribute well too. And many vandals will just register; they only don't because they don't have to. -Amarkov moo! 02:10, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
Would it not also defy the basis of Wikipedia to be "the encyclopedia that anyone can edit" if we limit it so that only registed people can edit? Captain panda In vino veritas 02:40, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
No; anyone who can edit can register an account too. It is Foundation policy, so it can't be decided here, but I don't think it would be completely non-negotiable. -Amarkov moo! 02:42, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Banning Anonymous IP's is a perenniel proposal, here and on on meta. I'm not suggesting we rehash this debate. I'm only asking if there is any hard statistical evidence to support the idea that Anonymous Edits are 30% helpful.

If this evidence does not exist, then I will start a proposal to create an objective survey. If we were to objectively find that, say, 90% of anon edits are harmful, that would be extremely relevant information for setting Wikipedia policy. Jonathan Stokes 18:37, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

It would be very interesting ... but how would you go about compiling the info? And how do you define "helpful" and "harmful"... I can think of a number of cases where an anon editor added something I disagreed with, but where I would not necessarily call such an edit "harmful" (the editor certainly did not think so). Blueboar 19:37, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
I'm sure those helpful anons wouldn't mind creating an account if they needed to. 129.120.94.151 21:31, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
I would claim the info of "helpful edits" would be of little interest, the claim is many make a user after having done a few edits as anons. I heard you, this is not the place to discuss, but why discuss if you entirely miss the point. Greswik 18:17, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Blueboar, that's the million dollar question. Each survey judge will have their own bias in interpreting the positive or negative intention of the edit. Perhaps the solution would be to encourage a number of different Wikipedians to conduct their own anonymous edit surveys, publish their tallies, and then average the total results.

A possible methodology might be for each judge to select 25 random articles from March 5, 2007, and tally the anonymous edits into three groups: Helpful, Harmful, Unknown. Jonathan Stokes 22:49, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:WikiProject Vandalism studies which is currently doing some tests on the vandalism of 100 random articles. --Salix alba (talk) 14:08, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for the link Salix alba! The preliminary results suggest between 80-87% of vandalism is done by anonymous users. However, we don't seem to have statistics on what percentage of anonymous edits are harmful/helpful. It seems this is the statistic necessary to determining if anonymous users should be blocked from Wikipedia once and for all. Jonathan Stokes 03:58, 7 March 2007 (UTC)
You might want to take a look at Wikipedia talk:Don't protect Main Page featured articles/December Main Page FA analysis, an analysis of anonymous edits of Main Page Articles for seven days. Among other things, it shows the difficulty in analyzing such edits - a revert of someone else's vandalism clearly is constructive, for example, but if the vandalism was done by another anonymous editor (almost always the case), should that be counted? What about small changes that are rejected (for example, revising a sentence in a way that makes it less clear, not more) - not vandalism, but not constructive. In short, at some point analysis only leads to speculation: what percentage of anonymous editors who do constructive edits would, if forced to, register first; what percentage of vandals, if forced to, would register so they could continue to vandalize? -- John Broughton (♫♫) 14:09, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
I have lots of thoughts on the issues of vandalism and anonymous editing (these are, in fact, two completely separate issues, although there is, no doubt, more or less overlap between them). I don't think it would be wise to sweepingly ban an entire subset of our editorbase. Actually, we have already banned an entire subset of users, but that set grows by one vandal/troll at a time. Rather than putting the onus on anonymous editors, put it on the vandals: how much vandalism comes from anonymous IPs, and how much vandalism is from registered editors? (should've read about the above project, first) I'll bet the cheap, easily reverted vandalism primarily comes from anonymous sources, while the more infuriating, creeping kind of trollish vandalism comes from editors.
I mean really, what's the real issue here? Is vandalism so rampant? I think Wikipedia's greatest problem has nothing to do with anonymous editors, but rather the wolves in sheepskin: those who pretend to abide by the Pillars, but instead have personal agendas. (I'm not making accusations, but I'd like to differentiate between the greatest problem of intentional subversion of the Wikipedia project, and the lesser problem of dilution of quality due to lack of proper sourcing, which I believe overshadow the minor irritation of removing profane words and reverting blanked pages.)
</soapbox> Xaxafrad 18:17, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

I've thought quite a bit about a related issue to this. The problem I was thinking about was how do you actually determine authorship of an article, at least in terms of compliance with the GFDL Section 2(B), which requires you to name at least five authors if you wish to reproduce GFDL'd content. The current approach is to simply list every unique contributor to a given page. This obviously would also include very blatant vandals and even people who are on RC patrol and reverting the vandals (and otherwise don't make any meaningful contribution other than standing as guardians). Or those who do other administrative action like marking NPOV violations or adding only category modifications and interlanguage links.

In theory, you can determine the authorship of each and every word in any given Wikipedia article. Or even each letter of each word (if you want to get that picky!) From a pragmatic aspect, such an analysis would only be done for research purposes, but I think this is one of those that would be very interesting. Certainly the analysis of anon edits could include some sort of similar analysis that would try to see how "permanent" any words were that were edited, as that would be the real test of meaningful contributions. Any contribution that lasted more than a month might be considered "meaningful", and is in theory something that could be determined algorithmically on this basis. Such analysis would not be a trivial program to write, but it would be interesting to see what sorts of results would come from it. --Robert Horning 21:07, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:2006 Wikipedia CD Selection

There is one week left for final comments on the 2007 Wikipedia CD Selection to be submitted. The 2006 CD has an estimated circulation of over 50,000 so its worth getting as good as possible. The most recent viewable copy is at : [5]. Changes planned are listed at Wikipedia:2006 Wikipedia CD Selection in terms of (1) articles currently included to exclude (2)articles to add (3) articles to update because the version listed is vandalised (4) sections to exclude (mainly on appropriateness to children) (5) string deletes and spelling corrections (to UK English) (6) redirects of common article names to the main article. Most proposals are coming to me by email (which is a bit easier to manage, so please do) but suggestions on the article page or discussion pages are also useful. Navigation and search pages are being sorted separately. --BozMo talk 10:21, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

some help?

I am reletively new (about five months, and I have been wondering, where do you get the userboxes? Avatar of Nothing 00:38, 16 March 2007 (UTC)Avatar of Nothing

See Wikipedia:Userboxes. Garion96 (talk) 10:20, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
THANK YOU! Avatar of Nothing 12:27, 16 March 2007 (UTC)Avatar of Nothing

Help with auto edit summary

How do you activate the "Undo" edit summary? --AAA! (AAAA) 04:48, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

It depends on what you mean by "activate". GracenotesT § 22:41, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
Well, to activate the page blanking one, you have to delete everything in the editing field. Or to activate the page creation one, you just need to create a new page. So basically, what do you have to do to make the Undo summary appear in your Edit Summary? --AAA! (AAAA) 23:55, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
When viewing a diff, at the top right side of the page, next to "Current revision", there is an "undo" link. Click it and the change will be reverted with the edit summary filled in automatically. Jwillbur 22:45, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Lumpers and splitters

I've noticed that almost every time we have a choice of "lumping" things together or "splitting" them apart, we opt for the latter. Sometimes I agree wholeheartedly—I'm entirely supportive of the recent trend toward separate "in popular culture" articles—but I still believe we "split" too often. Is the reader really well served by having separate articles (rather than separate sections in an article) on a book and on the film made from the book? Or on a play and three separate films made from it? On the high school in a one-high-school town, separately from the town? - Jmabel | Talk 20:27, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

I think it all depends on how much information there is in any given article/section. Some sections deserve their own articles, and some articles should only be a section within another article. Did you have any specific examples? I could understand a case where the only high school in town is more notable (on a regional/state level, that is) than the town itself. However, notability is only the criteria for inclusion, not the criteria for a dedicated article. I think that if a given topic can be talked about in so many aspects (one aspect per section), it should be an article, but if it's just an off-hand, singular kind of notable aspect, it should be a subsection within it's parent concept. Somebody should be able to think of the policy page that covers merging and splitting. Xaxafrad 03:00, 11 March 2007 (UTC)
I'm really hot for this topic. In fact, I think this topic is so important as to merit its own page which I shall create forthwith, moving this discussion there. No, on second thought, perhaps its better placed here. Oh my, oh my, what to do? (Just kidding!) Dave 15:03, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Fan reaction

I'm having trouble with a page where there is a small section on fan reactions to the relationship between two characters in a long running series (4 seasons + 2 movies/feature length editions).

I've kept things short and concise (a single paragraph), it meets WP:V, WP:RS and contains no WP:OR or WP:POV but a couple of people keep deleting it because they appear to have a personal reaction with the topic (a fans view of romance subplot). Are there any precedents from past cases of arbitration or discussion etc that I can direct users to in order to show that fan reactions are valid if kept in proportion to the rest of the page?

(In this series, fan reactions were crucial in the reversal of an earlier decision to end the franchise with season 3).

perfectblue 09:35, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Try an article content request for comment to bring in some fresh opinions. It's difficult to offer specific commentary without a link to the relevant article, so it's impossible to gauge from this summary whether the actions are due to some editors' topical POV or something more worthy of discussion such as a generally deletionist approach to editing. It's also impossible to gauge the significance of fan reactions to that particular show. Sometimes fan input changes the way producers handle a series. DurovaCharge! 02:04, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Multilingual counterparts for disambiguation pages

I just found the funniest thing. On the disambiguation page for the term core I noticed links on the left for counterpart articles in German, Japanese, Slovene, Ukrainian, and Chinese. Since the whole point of a disambiguation page is to deal with terms with multiple meanings, this seemed misguided and impractical. For example, the German link goes to an article on , which translates "core" in the sense of "nucleus", but in the sense of an acronym for a particular digital animation studio. There could be multiple meanings each of which would have its own translation in the other language, and the selection of one of them as the counterpart is entirely arbitrary. —Largo Plazo 21:25, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

That does seem improper. I think that disambiguation pages should only interwiki link to other disambiguation pages. —W. Flake (talk) 22:12, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
Well—they shouldn't link to any interwiki pages at all. If the word "gork" has five unrelated meanings in English, all having distinct translations into German, and all five German equivalents themselves needing disambiguation in German, which of the five unrelated German disambiguation pages should be linked to? There isn't one correct destination. So it's absurd to have interwiki links on disambiguation pages. —Largo Plazo 13:30, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Information about the history of Wikibooks

This is a special request for those who are into archane knowledge and might know where I might be able to dig up some of the discussions. I don't need references to obvious things such as the Wikimedia mailing lists or things like the b:Staff Lounge, as those are fairly easy to try and dig up.

What I am looking for is some parts of the original discussions that got b:User:Karl Wick pushed off of Wikipedia and allowed to create his own Wiki for what is currently known as English Wikibooks. Specifically, I'm looking for older AfD/VfD discussions from back in 2003 and other discussions, including things in the Village pump, that would be from about that same time period. While there is an effort to archive some of this stuff, I know other parts may have simply been deleted altogether... even though they may be accessible via administrator rights.

The motivation for this is to gather source material for a book about the history of Wikibooks (another book about b:Wikipedia is also being written, BTW). I'm sure there must be a couple of old hands still left here on Wikipedia from 2003 that might remember where some of this historical information is located at. I am especially interested in user discussions as they would be (in this context) original source materials for reference purposes. Recollections and private e-mails (if you have permission and are willing to GFDL the contents) would also be useful.

As Wikibook started here on Wikipedia, the justifications and rationale for starting a completely independent wiki project would seem to be found here somewhere. I just need to be pointed in the right direction. If you want to contact me on my user talk page, you can do that here on Wikipedia or on on my Wikibooks account. I will also be watching this space. --Robert Horning 23:52, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Recruiting Azeri Speakers for Wikitravel Language Expedition

Greetings,

I am looking for people to work on the Azeri Wikitravel Language expedition, but have been unable to find anyone to help with it as of yet. If anyone is intersted, please visit the langage expedition page at http://wikitravel.org/shared/Azeri_Wikitravel_Expedition. Thanks a lot for everyone's help on this project!! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Jowa58 (talk • contribs) 14:42, 12 March 2007 (UTC).

Cow tipping: Discussion on role of humor in articles

Thought some might be interested in the ongoing discussion at Talk:Cow tipping#Request for Comment: Inclusion of image of cow & related caption regarding the general role of humor in articles (good vs. bad), especially as it relates to this image and caption in this article. Input is welcome. --ZimZalaBim (talk) 00:04, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Which is worse?

Which is worse, Nazism or Scientology? Please check out their WP articles. Steve Dufour 16:27, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

If you have to ask a question like that, I have to ask if you're joking, because if you are it ain't funny. Cryptonymius 17:50, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
I hope it's ok to make a point on this page. What I was trying to get at is the WP article on Scientology is more hostile towards its subject than the article about Nazism. Steve Dufour 18:03, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
Neither of them should be hostile at all; NPOV applies to Nazis and Scientologists too. -Amarkov moo! 18:06, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
I agree that that should be the case. Steve Dufour 18:16, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
The phrasing of your original question suggested to me that you were actually questioning whether a group (Nazis) responsible for mass murder on a cosmic scale might be better or worse than a group (Scientologists) who appear to consider themselves as members of a religion, and, last I heard, have not engaged as an organization in any crimes against humanity. And if you're really saying which article is worse, okay, that's a perfectly legitimate question and I agree everything should be NPOV. Cryptonymius 19:41, 11 March 2007 (UTC)
Thanks Cryptonymius. I should have been more clear. Steve Dufour 00:31, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

I have started the Wikiproject History of Bangladesh, and am looking for appropriate barnstars that participants can give away. I found barnstars for science, society, geography and lot more, but couldn't find one that may be given to outstanding contribution in the area of history. Can someone help me with it? Aditya Kabir 18:05, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

From Wikipedia:Barnstars "The Epic Barnstar may be awarded to an editor who makes particularly fine History and Events - related contributions" The code for it is {{subst:The Epic Barnstar|message ~~~~}}. GhostPirate 14:48, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
Thanks. Aditya Kabir 19:27, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

template image, need feedback

A new image was added to Template:LGBT,[6] that I'd like to get general community feedback on. Anyone who's interested, chime in at Template talk:LGBT#New Image? — coelacan — 04:06, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

100 most viewed Wikipedia articles

After I found a Wikimedia tool for displaying the most viewed pages on a wikipedia, I decided to categorize them (you know, to find out how many juveniles try to educate themselves on Sex (ranked 18th, after List of Pokemon (15th), World War II (14th), and Naruto (11th)). The top 10 is filled with 8 Special: and wiki pages (Wiki, Wikipedia, Special:Watchlist, etc), and 2 pages related to the 300 (film). See the rest of the list and other categories (Wikipedia seems to be mostly used for researching TV shows). Xaxafrad 02:38, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Do OED and Random House dictionaries have precedence over Google hits in a naming dispute?

We have a newly introduced foreign word—for an apparel worn in South and Central Asia—for which Google hits (by a 666,000 to 207,000) favor one spelling, "salwar," while two dictionaries, OED and Random House Unabridged prefer another, "shalwar." Websters Unabridged and American Heritage Dictionary don't include the word in any spelling. (For a discussion, see Shalwar vs. Salwar Redux). Can OED over-rule Google hits? Fowler&fowler«Talk» 21:48, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I think we should trust the dictionaries over Google, which is more based on how many webpages someone creates containing a word than the actual proper use of said word. On the other hand, there's no guideline I know of covering the topic; it might be a good precedent for a guideline, though. How is the word pronounced? Does it use the English "sh" digraph? —Cuiviénen 23:07, 7 March 2007 (UTC)
OED over Google any day, absolutely. After all, Google gives 3 million hits for the misspelling "seperately" (115 million for the correct spelling). - DavidWBrooks 01:11, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
To the responders, especially, Cuiviénen. Well, the word is originally Persian, and was later absorbed into the South Asian languages, Urdu and Hindi, in both of which, at least in the dictionaries, the "sh" diagraph is used in the pronunciation entries. From Urdu and Hindi, it made its way into English. However, it seems that in India now, especially in Indian English, the "sh" has been dropped, but not so in Pakistan (the two major South Asian countries). Since there are many more Indian English language websites than Pakistani ones, the Google hits favor the Indian version. Complicating matters further, (which I discovered yesterday), the 2004 edition of the Concise Oxford Dictionary of Current English, now favors the "salwar" spelling. The big OED hasn't been updated since the late 1970s (I'm told), so I don't know if the spelling is transitioning perhaps. Complicating matters still further, Britannica favors "shalwar," but Encarta prefers "salwar!" Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:30, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
fwiw I'd go for the OED rather than the google test. Google makes no assessment of accuracy, or origin.  ::I think all the reasoning probably constitutes OR though....
ALR 14:54, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
For those interested, the definition on the OED website (taken from the 1989 second edition) is: "shalwar; Also salvar, salwar, shalvar, shulwar, shulwaur [Urdu šalwār, Hindi salvār, ad. Pers. šalwār; Cf. SHERRYVALLIES, SHERWAL]" MrBeast 18:25, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
As long as we're transliterating, and if the natives can't agree, let's use the simpler of the forms: salwar (shalwar can redirect, or vice versa if somebody complains). Xaxafrad 18:35, 9 March 2007 (UTC)
As far as I am concerned, the OED is an authority on spelling in the English language, whereas Google is not an authority on anything whatsoever. Also, the OED self-identifies as "descriptive" rather than "prescriptive". Chris cheese whine 04:37, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

592 × 599 pixel

On image pages, we currently see annotations like:

Size of this preview: 592 × 599 pixel
Image in higher resolution (1195 × 1210 pixel, file size: 541 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg)

Emphasis added. In English, the plural of "pixel" is "pixels". 207.176.159.90 01:14, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Answers needed for celebrities

Apologies if this is off-topic, but I thought it might be of interest to the wikipedia community.

I've put together an experimental engine which will correlate a user to a variety of famous historical figures. By answering a series of questions, you find if you are roughly more similar to Bertrand Russell, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Napolean, etc. If you want to try the site, it's here.

The correlations between you and these celebrities are based on the answers that you give, and the answers that each celebrity "would have" given. Anyone is allowed to modify the "answers" of a celebrity at any time -- we trust the community to be as accurate as possible in supplying information about these people. Some of the questions have straightforward factual answers ("Are you married?"), while others may require some intuition to answer: ("How much do you like chocolate?").

I'm posting here because I thought this community might enjoy filling in the answers for some of the celebrities used. To do that, go to the list of celebrities, and click on the name of whomever you know something about; then, answer questions as if you were they.


Thanks for any help,

-ed —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 70.231.234.250 (talk) 01:02, 17 March 2007 (UTC).

Bottled water investigation underway on Wikipedia

Environmental Working Group [http://www.ewg.org] is launching a new investigation into bottled water--where it comes from, what's done to "purify" it, and if it's even worth the expense. We need help building our label database and have begun creating a publicly editable list at bottled water. If you've got any water bottles handy we'd appreciate it if you took a few minutes to add your information to the list.

Using Wikipedia presents a few problems. Since we'll be dumping the contents of the list into a database at some point, we need the fields to be consistent and as typo-free as possible. We're open to comments and suggestions on improving our methods. --Environmentalwg 21:11, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I suggest doing it elsewhere. There is no guarantee that the information in the bottled water article will be retained, and there is certainly no guarantee that it will stay in the format you want it in. Please read WP:NOT. Wikipedia is not a webserver. Corvus cornix 21:26, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
The mutability of the format was understood and was a risk worth taking. As for WP:NOT, duly noted. --Environmentalwg 21:58, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
If you're interested in using a wiki to do this sort of thing, you might want to install your own version of MediaWiki on a server you own. Tra (Talk) 22:41, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for the advice, Tra. We were trying to engage the Wikipedia audience rather than squat on server space, so no worries. ([http://www.ewg.org/issues/bottledwater/ Our form] can fill the data collection role.) --Environmentalwg 15:29, 7 March 2007 (UTC)
My only concern is WP:NOR. If, for instance, you plan to put the information back to Wikipedia once the data is collected, this is the very definition of original research. If, instead, you're just using Wikipedia as a data collection point, then I think WP:NOT becomes applicable - regardless of your attempt to include the WP community, what you're really doing is server squatting. I have some concerns... Philippe Beaudette
What I'd originally posted is not on the bottled water page any longer, Philippe. (Corvus cornix removed it post haste.) We'll be sure to update the page with the results of our research, though! --Environmentalwg 22:32, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
Goodness, I hope not, unless it's published elsewhere - that would fall under our "No Original Research" policy. Get it published, THEN add it and source it. Philippe Beaudette 22:43, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
It should be of note regarding original research issues that Wikiversity is considering a limited role in conducting and allowing the development of original research. There are some very strict guidelines that are being written right now that would govern this activity, but if you are interested in that sort of thing, I would strongly suggest that you drop a note on v:Wikiversity:Colloquium. There is also the Academia Wikia to look at for original research. --Robert Horning 15:51, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

I've removed the list developing on the talk page where people were asked to add info on brands of water bottles. Mass original research is not exactly in line with site policies. This is remove-on-sight stuff, as far as I'm concerned, to keep the article from becoming a marketing/research tool for an advocacy group. - BanyanTree 21:03, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Image on Template:Maintained

Template:Maintained, currently contains an image of the admin mop. I am proposing that this image is changed to Image:Crystal xedit.png. I feel that the admin mop is unfitting for this template because one does not have to be an admin to be active in maintaining and improving an article. However, Quadzilla99 has stated that "A precedent was set in template:done, indicating that the fact that someone might confuse the two, with no proof that it has ever happened is not a good reason to change a symbol." I am seeking some opinions on the change of the image. --24fan24 (talk) 03:02, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

As of yet there is zero evidence that that the two are being confused. See here and here for similar discussions. Basically I find it extremely unlikely that the two are being confused, which no one has shown through evidence to be the case in either situation. The fact that they should be changed because they might be confused is dubious in both cases in my opinion. No one is confusing the two at all as far as I can see. Quadzilla99 03:15, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
  • I think it would be better if the template did not have the administrator symbol on it unless it refers directly to administrators in some way. It certainly could cause confusion, if used on a user page. Perhaps there is a better symbol that can be used? Kukini hablame aqui 03:45, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Footballers - Mere Curiosity

Not sure if this has been brought up before, and didn't really know an effective way to search, but I noticed that there is a large number of articles about "footballers" (aka "soccer players") being posted lately. Being an American who doesn't follow international football, I personally have no way of knowing notability of these players, and I can only assume the same can be said for the vast majority of North American editors. I wasn't sure if footballers were considered "encyclopedia material" or not, especially as there seems to be a very large number of teams all across the world. Maybe I am just an un-cultured American, but it seems to me that these articles are no different than if I were to list every player for every minor-league and farm baseball team in the United States. Please don't get me wrong, I really have nothing against soccer/football. This is just something I have been pondering for a while.  F  Aviation  S  U - T - C 19:46, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

The numbers are high because pretty much every country on the planet has a national team who's memebers are noteable. Any country of any reasonable size his a top devision all of who's players are likely noteable (certianly there will be no shortage of information writen about them). Below that level the judgement cal becomes harder but every player in say the UK championship is probably noteable. Where exactly the line is drawn will depend on the country ( in the case of the UK I would probably go for the confrence) You've got to remeber that world wide association football is a much bigger than any US sport. Another difference is that all the leagues tend to be connected. It is technicaly posible for a team playing at local sunday league level to over rather a lot of years get promoted to the top league in the country. Won't happen but it is posible.Geni 20:03, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
If you have concerns over any specific articles, drop a note at WikiProject Football. The usual guideline is Wikipedia:Notability (people). Oldelpaso 14:41, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Interesting poll on the German Wikipedia

Well, I figure here is as good a place as any to mention this. On the German Wikipedia, an interesting proposal was made: article creation is to be disabled for one week per month, and the time is spent improving the quality of existing articles. Unfortunately, the conservatism and wariness towards bold new ideas that we're stricken with on enwiki carries over there - and the proposal is being soundly trounced at 173-93 against. More than that, I can't say, because I know approximately ten words of German; the poll is at de:Wikipedia:Meinungsbilder/Nichts Neues for anyone whose interested. Picaroon 01:55, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Different language Wikipedias have different rules. What ever the poll may be on the German Wikipedia has no effect on what happens on the English language Wikipedia. And I can't see that ever flying here. Corvus cornix 04:53, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Also, not every contributor to Wikipedia is good at improving articles. We should not prevent good-faith edits from occuring when we can help it. Sorry if you weren't interested in opinions, but I thought I might offer mine. Captain panda In vino veritas 01:28, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

What about non-existing links?

I frequently am finding articles which contain internal links to non-existent articles. Of course, these appear in red on the article page. Should these links be removed? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by J. Bryant Evans (talk • contribs) 18:40, 14 March 2007 (UTC).

Usually, no - they're a prod for editors to create new articles. Click on the link and create away! - DavidWBrooks 18:42, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
See Wikipedia:Red link. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 00:02, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Looking to interview Wikipedians

Researcher seeking to interview Wikipedia contributors of any and all levels of experience and involvement. In-depth, one hour interviews will be conducted over the phone or email beginning March 27. Compensation for your time will be provided – a $10 gift certificate to Amazon.com. Must be 18+ and U.S. resident. Contact Benjamin Johnson, Department of Telecommunication, Information Studies and Media, Michigan State University, by email at john2429@msu.edu or by phone at 517.230.1272.

John2429 16:23, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

List of Wikipedians by number of total starsList of users by number of total stars

I have just started a article with the title mentioned above. Perhaps it would be interesting contributing\starting with me to this list; it might be fun if their is some kind of a competition between several users, to be on top of that list! Maybe some people would go and work harder, do more, contribute more, and vandalise less! Not take it 'too seriously; its just for fun, and feel free to add yourself to the list! So, what do you say?

the Old and respectable Kashwialariski 16:09, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

A Question (complaint) from Tacoma, Washington

Well, I find that I'm starting to learn a very tiny little bit about how this website works. A little bit ago, I submitted the "question" (complaint) below. At that time, I failed to note the box where one is suposed to write a subject title, so my "question" wound up appearing attached to a question that has been posted under the title: "A queston from sweden" I happened solely by accident to sumble upon its presence there. (Being of Swedish ancestory, I was curious enough to read that question.) So now I am posting my "question" (complaint) all over again with a proper subject title. I guess this is also where I'm suposed to look for a reply to my complaint.

. . . . The "question" (complaint) . . . . Earlier this evening, I made a one word correction to a factual error in an article. I followed the instructions---as I understood them---to edit the error and explain my change. The change did not take. The article is still in error. It still has my home town located in the wrong part of the state. I used this same forum (at least I believe it was this forum) to note the problem I experienced. After submitting my "complaint," I suddenly realized I had no idea where to look for a reply. I have looked all over the Wikipedia site to try and find the answer to my second question, where do I look for a reply, but (as I complained in my earlier "complaint"), this site is too complicated for this 79 year old geezer to comprehend. I can find no simple answer to that question. So now I have no idea where to look for a reply to this complaint either. So I guess the article will just have to remain with the error in it unless someone else catches the error and has the knowledge as to how to correct it. 24.19.92.118 02:34, 20 March 2007 (UTC)William J. Erickson

Unless the article is currently protected, you should be able to fix the problem. First, go to the article, click the "edit this page" tab, and correct the error. Then write in the summary box a short explanation of what you are doing, and click "Save page". Finally, to get sure your change was "taken", click the "history" tab, and check if you see your IP (which right now is 24.19.92.118) in the list of contributions, as the newest one. If so, the article has just been corrected. And yes, usually when you edit in a page, you should check the same page for the answer. -- ReyBrujo 02:42, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
Can you tell us what edit you made? I don't find any edits to the Tacoma, Washington article which meet the criteria you indicated. Was it a different article? Corvus cornix 17:20, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:We aren't Citizendium

An essay, Wikipedia:We aren't Citizendium, has been written in response to a recent blog post by Larry Sanger. Please make appropriate changes and place feedback on the talk page. Written mostly by User:Merzul. MahangaTalk to me 21:23, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Rumba and Rhumba

Whoever has written the article Rumba, an afro Cuban form of music based on drumming and chants, has got it confused with Rhumba a 1950s Cuban American form of jazz that is not the same thing, (Check this to confirm). The article Rumba therefore mixes the two in a way that is too difficult to extract on first glance. It needs to be rectified fast because its a major error on the part of wikipedia. Help would be welcomed.-- Zleitzen(talk) 05:04, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Zleitzen, I'd like to try and help. Should we discuss this more at Talk:Rumba? --Iamunknown 17:01, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Things requiring daily maintainence

Tennisdude92 wants Yone Minagawa‎'s current age in years + days to be included in the article, and this would require daily maintainence. Anyone have any info?? Georgia guy 22:54, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Replied on Talk:Yone Minagawa. —W. Flake (talk) 23:47, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Final Fantasy Forever

Who is your Favorite Final Fantasy Character and why? My favorite character is Tidus because he kicks but at blitzball.Gogoboi662 18:22, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

This isn't the appropriate place for this discussion. I'm not sure there is any place on Wikipedia that is the appropriate place for this discussion. Maybe on your User Talk page or a subpage of your User space. Corvus cornix 18:39, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

A question from sweden

Hello, in the swedish version of wikipedia the administrators have begun using their administrative powers to ensure that the content of the articles are in their own personal liking. This expresses itself in the form that they may for example remove scientific sources which results they dislike and those who dare to protest get blocked if they dare to try to stop it. My question is simple, did something like this ever happened here and how did you solve it? And if not, is there any advice you could give for how to solve problems as these? Thanks. Drogheda 20:35, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Not a long-term Wikipedian so I wouldn't know, but if you have a problem with another Wikipedia, go to them first. If that doesn't work, I suppose you can go to m:We need your help, m:Meta:Babel or contact User:Jimbo Wales personally. x42bn6 Talk 23:26, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
Thanks, I'll try one of your links aswell. More comments are welcome. Drogheda 00:17, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
Just so you know, I have no idea of the response time on Meta so if you don't get a reply you might want to talk to svwiki's Ambassadors if you haven't done so - in this case, m:User:Dan Koehl and m:User:Pralin m:User:Snillet/sv:User:Pralin. See m:Wikimedia_Embassy#S. x42bn6 Talk 13:45, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
( ... Pralin just left Wikipedia. ... ) --83.253.36.136 09:11, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

What happened to List of English prefixes, suffixes...???

I don't know if this is the place to talk about deleted Wiki articles... Why was List of English prefixes deleted? I thought at first it had been transwikied, but there's no page like this over there, either! I tried looking for other articles that I remember having visited too, like List of English suffixes or something, but now I can't find anything remotely similar!

What reason could there be for deleting a feature that is usual for physical encyclopedias (at least as appendices)? Is there a better place than this to complain about this? (I'm not sure how effective would requesting for this article again be...) Thanks... Kreachure 20:58, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

It was deleted in October 2006. I don't know why. Georgia guy 20:59, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
It was moved to Wiktionary. It is now at wikt:Appendix:English prefixes. You can trace the fate of transikied articles on Wiktionary by going to wikt:Wiktionary:Transwiki log. Hope this helps. Angus McLellan (Talk) 21:21, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Oh, that's great! So now instead of an article that explained the meaning and uses of the prefixes, we have a useless list that doesn't explain anything! That was no 'move', that is just unjustified deleting. And Wikipedia is not a dictionary is not good enough of an excuse, because it was not just an appendix of words, it was a list with encyclopedic information. Check the appropiate guidelines at the "not dictionary" guideline page if you want, you'll see that an article like this isn't simply "for a dictionary". Kreachure 22:26, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

There's nothing preventing the creation of an article on affixes in English, so long as it isn't "substantially similar" to the one that was deleted. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Log/2006 October 2#List of English prefixes has a pretty strong consensus for transwikying, so it would be hard to describe the deletion as "unjustified". Angus McLellan (Talk) 23:46, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

The transwiki was agreed upon, but as of today the corresponding page in Wiktionary doesn't exist anymore. That's why I said that the move was unjustified: because the move led to the complete deletion of the information on any Wikimedia project. As for creating a new page similar to this one, it seems Greek and Latin roots in English is trying to do just that, but since the original list was deleted, they started from scratch, and still have a long ways to go. I already pointed them there to the original list. All of this points me to say that even if some ten people agreed that the list was to be transwikied, and then someone else decided to get rid of it completely, the fact that some of us (including those making the new list) want it back in Wikipedia means that the deletion of the information was indeed unjustified in the first place. Kreachure 00:26, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

You can recover some of the content by using the Internet Archives, but I would have to agree that this doesn't explain why it was deleted on Wiktionary. I would note that in general this is a huge problem on Wikipedia, where transwikied content is often not accepted into the target project. In addition, even under the best of circumstances and intentions, the act of moving content can get mixed up (or have an incomplete import) and data will still be lost. That you know about this problem means that you can also try to fix it. Certainly there should be much more information (and encyclopedic information) than what exists in this 2005 snapshot of this page. --Robert Horning 00:56, 23 March 2007 (UTC)
The content continues to exist and can be edited on Wiktionary by any interested person. wikt:Transwiki:List of English Prefixes contains the complete history of the page, as required by the transwiki process. In contrast, the Internet Archive version has no article history and is unusable as the GFDL requires that authors be credited, which is not possible without the history. Angus McLellan (Talk) 01:17, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Could someone write an essay which explains why we don't need ... in popular culture sections in articles or as their own article? The Placebo Effect 20:50, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

But we do. - DavidWBrooks 21:35, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
See the featured list Cultural depictions of Joan of Arc. It began as one of those ... in popular culture sections. When well developed, that sort of page has several values. It can serve as a starting point for an art history student's research or a comparative literature term paper. Teachers and parents can make use of it to introduce a historical topic to a child in an accessible way (a whole lot of people got their first introduction to composer Richard Wagner through the Apocalypse Now soundtrack or a Bugs Bunny cartoon). Wikipedia is uniquely suited to documenting references in new media: when I researched the Joan of Arc list ours was the only one of its type to include manga, graphic novels, anime, and computer games. For a comparison of how equivalent information got disregarded as ephemera until it was very difficult to retrieve, note that in the late twentieth century a doctoral dissertation was necessary to list all occurrences of Joan of Arc in cinema. Had Wikipedia existed a century ago - and had people recognized value in such information - that would be easily retrievable for everyone. Wikipedia should exist in 2107. Let's not eradicate this information willy-nilly. DurovaCharge! 22:38, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
Wow - well said. Eliminating "ephemera" is a symptom of the we-needtobe-taken-more-seriously ailment that often afflicts denizens of wikipedia. Having said that, I'll agree that the "popular culture" sections attract far more than their share of guff, vandalism and idiocy. But that's not a reason to get rid of them. - DavidWBrooks 23:20, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
The old popular culture section at Joan of Arc collected entries for two years without any particular editorial oversight. The information was disorganized, incomplete, and occasionally repetitive. Many of the entries needed copyediting. Yet not a single one of them proved false when I researched the verifications for featured article candidacy. DurovaCharge! 02:23, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
On the other hand, many "in popular culture" sections are full of truly trivial references. The article on Wagner should not be burdened with a mention of every single "You-Tube" vidio that uses something he wrote in it's soundtrack. There does need to be some criteria for inclusion ... some degree of cultural relevance and notability. Blueboar 13:51, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
That's absolutely true. But YouTube links are almost never suitable at Wikipedia. That material isn't notable unless it gets covered in the mainstream press (as happened with a recent political ad). WP:NOT, WP:RS, and WP:V all apply. A television episode, on the other hand, gets watched by millions of people. Yes, The Simpsons once aired a parody with Lisa Simpson in the role of Joan of Arc. If a teacher plays that DVD to get the class interested in French history, maybe they won't fall asleep during the lecture. DurovaCharge! 21:39, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Edits to articles for SD

What happens to the edits for articles I nominate for SD? I do this frequently, yet after the article is deleted, the edit doesn't appear in my contributions list. The Placebo Effect 01:05, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

If an article is deleted, all of your contributions to the article are removed from your contributions list. This is because if they stayed in your contribs list, someone could look at the diffs and read the text of the deleted article. mrholybrain's talk 12:47, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
So there is no doccumention of those edits? I frequently spend time New Page Patroling for SD articles. I'll keep doing it, but I'd like to know that those edits are still visable somehow. The Placebo Effect
They are visible to administrators. The edits aren't gone, just marked as deleted and thus invisible to non-sysop users. Angus McLellan (Talk) 21:23, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
However, I remember one of the edit counters running off the toolserver could count deleted edits. How does that work? mrholybrain's talk 01:44, 23 March 2007 (UTC)
Absolutely. Tools such as http://tools.wikimedia.de/~interiot/cgi-bin/count_edits do it by querying a replica of the database directly, and can give a count of deleted edits. However, the replica of the English-language Wikipedia's database they use was last updated on 23 January 2007, so the information is a bit outdated. For other language Wikipedias, the replication delay varies from a few hours or a few days.
Things like the http://tools.wikimedia.de/~interiot/cgi-bin/Tool1/wannabe_kate? edit counter work by scraping the "my contributions" directly from Wikipedia, so no deleted edits are counted by these, but they are up-to-date. Angus McLellan (Talk) 10:11, 23 March 2007 (UTC)
So the toolserver has the deleted page tables? mrholybrain's talk 10:13, 23 March 2007 (UTC)
It may not have all the details, but it has some. But I would be surprised if the oversighted (Wikipedia:Oversight) edits were replicated. Angus McLellan (Talk) 10:38, 23 March 2007 (UTC)
It can't replicate oversighted edits if they are removed from the database. And from the wording about only developers being able to restore oversighted edits, it sounds like that is true. mrholybrain's talk 14:02, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Rumba and Rhumba

Whoever has written the article Rumba, an afro Cuban form of music based on drumming and chants, has got it confused with Rhumba a 1950s Cuban American form of jazz that is not the same thing, (Check this to confirm). The article Rumba therefore mixes the two in a way that is too difficult to extract on first glance. It needs to be rectified fast because its a major error on the part of wikipedia. Help would be welcomed.-- Zleitzen(talk) 05:04, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Zleitzen, I'd like to try and help. Should we discuss this more at Talk:Rumba? --Iamunknown 17:01, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Why?

I have never once edited any page on Wikipedia, and certainly never vandalised them. I went to edit a page today though, and it told me my IP address was banned. Now first of all, why would I be banned if I never did anything (I only use Wikipedia to look up not to edit, except for today when I wanted to add something relevant to an article), and also the IP address it said was banned isn't even my IP address! Please help.

-Inkubus — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.173.62.122 (talk • contribs) 15:40, 26 March 2007

Please say exactly what the block message says. mrholybrain's talk 16:02, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Money machines

Has anyone noticed the recent proliferation of what is commonly being refered to as money machines? Until recently, money machines, other names include cash booths, cash cubes, wind booths, were an occasional novelty on television game shows. Lately, however, they are being implemented in a wide variety of promotional and marketing venues.

A money machine is a booth that a contestant enters. An air blower is then turned on and paper money, coupons, etc, are blown about the booth. The contestant attempts to grab as much as possible during the alotted time, usually 10-30 seconds. It seems the concept has great appeal not only in the promotions arena but in the employee incentive/awards area as well. One company, [redacted].com, even offers a miniature money machine that they claim is very effective at gathering contact info at trade shows, etc.

I would love some feedback from anyone with knowledge about the units and their effectiveness as it relates to sales and increasing customer awareness.

Phridge —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Thephridge (talk • contribs) 04:30, 27 March 2007 (UTC).

Please try Wikipedia:Reference desk for specific questions of this nature. I have removed the site link. - BanyanTree 04:53, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Regarding unwatched pages

So I've had a look at the rationale for keeping Special:Unwatchedpages restricted to admins, and I have to say I'm still not convinced. What exactly makes this feature so much more vandal-enticing than, say, Randompage? If it were open to us all and well-publicized enough, I'm certain that the added vandalism would be far outweighed by the added attention from conscientious users. In a sense, by definition, these pages would be "unwatched" no longer, or at least far, far less "unwatched" than they were before. What do admins think of Koweja's thought on limiting the visibility to well-established users, as with editing privliges on partially protected pages? Lenoxus " * " 09:52, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

It seems like it runs the risk of degrading the quality of the list. Many users would attempt to "adopt" these pages and put them on their watchlist, and eventually there wouldn't be any pages listed at Special:Unwatchedpages. This wouldn't be a problem, but some users might leave and become inactive. While this happens anyway with most pages, these would be pages that have been unable to attract watchers up until now, and are probably unlikely to do so in the future. --YbborT 12:57, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
I think I'm getting some of the complexities here… it's not like the software yet has the ability to figure out such things, all right. So my next question is, how is the special page useful even to admins, given that they can't tell whether an article's watcher is active? Lenoxus " * " 01:55, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:We aren't Citizendium

An essay, Wikipedia:We aren't Citizendium, has been written in response to a recent blog post by Larry Sanger. Please make appropriate changes and place feedback on the talk page. Written mostly by User:Merzul. MahangaTalk to me 21:23, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Messedrocker's Contest

Introducing Messedrocker's Contest, which is centered around improving articles to Good Article status. See that page for more details. —Signed, your friendly neighborhood MessedRocker. 21:04, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Good worthwile contest. Thank you, Messedrocker. MahangaTalk to me 21:22, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

User talk page protection

Just out of curiosity, how often are user's talk page protected? And what are the general reasons for said protection? If a user left and didn't want people to post on his or her talk page, is it appropriate to protect the page? --Iamunknown 17:36, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia offline reader for Palm OS

Hi, I've just finished a wikipedia offline reader for the Palm operating system. It is going to be either free or GPL'd.

Question : Where should I discuss this further?

Details: It uses a converted version of the the article .bz2 dump file, and comes out at as a single ~1.7Gb datafile + .prc file. It also requires zlib library (free for Palm). The program itself is 22k.

Takes about 4 hours to do a full converstion (on a PC) - uses cygwin (and I guess linux would work too). Mainly perl scripts.

Supports: links, history, full "article title" name search - character by character convergence, some basic html formatting.

Doesn't support : tables, pictures, funny wikimedia formatting (references, notes, definitions, fancy formatting - so you end up with basically the text body with some formatting, but readable), lists, chapters (direct # jumps) not all articles survive the conversion, these are due to technical issues (strange formatting in the article title), unicode (soz, ASCII only - some ugly palm characters appear.... but most are clean).

I'm planning on doing some of the above depending on how good I get at it, and much I feel I need them plus :- full screen view for article (turn off silkscreen if possible on Palm PDA's that support it), different fonts.

I've only tested it on the TX and the simulator (runs nice on my laptop) and it is still in beta stage, there is a lot more work to do. And I'm still learning Palm programming, so the code may not be ...optimal.

Summary : As I've written it primarily for myself, it currently does what I want to do, i.e. all ( well ~99%) of the articles in a readable format. I can delve into a subject without having to be connected to the internet.

I need to find a nice page in wikipedia that describes all the formatting commands that I'm likely to encounter (moving target?). Currently {{ -> }} are dropped - but this keeps the datafile smaller too...

Let me know if you want to test it, I can create a small datafile for a couple of 1000 articles in. [It's still beta so use at own risk etc.]. I'm going to set up a website with screen shots.

I'd also like to know if there is a discussion forum somewhere where I can discuss this further (user requests for new functionality etc).

Also, how regular as the enwiki dumps? Every two months?

Thanks for reading! Alun Liggins 18:49, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Super Mario Bros. 4 re-direct

I think we need some kind of discussion. Until recently, this page was a re-direct to Super Mario World. Several Internet sites reveal that this was a working title of Super Mario World. Someone changed it recently to Armadillo (video game); the reason appears to be that a fan-made alteration of the game was made under that title. Any discussion on what Super Mario Bros. 4 should re-direct to?? Georgia guy 17:08, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

The discussion is at the Mario 4 talk page. May be it should be a disambiguation page to prevent future edit warring? -Haikon 19:23, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

WW2: a long article, or a really, really long article?

Long, longer, and the difference. Any thoughts on which version reads better? TIA Xaxafrad 15:52, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks

I'm not sure where to post this, I just want to say how much I appreciate the quality and utility of Wikipedia. I've been using it for many years now.Kevin

You're welcome! :) DurovaCharge! 01:54, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

umm... I'm new in here and I think wikipedia is very useful. May I asked something? If I forget my password what should I do?--I just posted this message to wrong subject, sorry to messedrocker--Thanks to everyoneHwie 07:47, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject Spam actively promotes violating WP:CIV, WP:AGF and WP:Consensus

I'd appreciate third-party comments on what I think is the strong suggestion on the Spam project's page that its members don't need to abide by the assume good faith guideline and comments on the project page that seem to denigrate WP:Civility and WP:Consensus. I'm trying to resolve this by stating my case on the Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spam page, and the response has been disappointing.

I know I sound like a crank to even bring this up: Wikipedia:WikiProject Spam is featured on Wikipedia's Community contents page, and if I was reading some other editor asserting that a project group was denigrating one of the "five pillars" of Wikipedia (Civility) on its project page, my first thought would be that the editor was probably wrong and probably a crank. Here's the short version of my case:

Much (not all) of the project page has a tone I'd call beligerant. That's not altogether bad, and I can see a good motive in describing the group as a "spam fighting" force, for instance, but you go too far when you butt up against Wikipedia rules:

spammers love to take advantage of the fact that Wikipedians assume good faith, luring us into discussing their links with them "on the merits" as if they had nothing but the good of Wikipedia at heart.

Except that as a Wikipedian you're supposed to assume good faith. This sentence appears to be a suggestion not to engage in discussions. If you think someone is spamming and you revert the edits, you should be able to discuss the matter on the merits. I've brought up the fact that there's actually no good purpose to this sentence other than to violate Wikipedia policy, and no one on the talk page has contradicted me. But they don't want to get rid of the sentence. So I'm coming here hoping that the wider community might comment. If we're going to have a policy and then our prestigious project teams are going to promote violations of it, we should either change the policy or fix the violations.

My other objections are minor compared to that sentence, but taken together they add up to encouragement to violate WP:CIV and WP:Consensus, and that's the way I've found some project members acting. If you're interested, the full discussion is at [[here. I hope Wikipedians outside that project will participate in the discussion on that talk page, but of course feel free to tell me I'm all wet either here or there. Noroton 05:01, 24 March 2007 (UTC) (self-edited shortly after posting, Noroton 05:11, 24 March 2007 (UTC) )

Remember Esperanza. Xaxafrad 15:34, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Wow

Why was this vandal so famous? Is there a page dedicated to him? What on earth in the history is going on here? 147.197.138.239 11:19, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

There is a page dedicated to everyone who registers as a WP editor. If he is a vandal I am pleased to see that he is now permanently blocked. Steve Dufour 12:58, 27 March 2007 (UTC)
User:Willy on Wheels was a famous vandal who would pages around. He has many socks and imitators, and his user page and talk page are, of course, vandalized a lot. mrholybrain's talk 15:36, 27 March 2007 (UTC)
I think the word is infamous rather than famous. x42bn6 Talk 15:42, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

To Steve: Willy is permanently (i.e. indefinitely) blocked but also indefinitely banned. That's the good stuff. To anon: Willy moved pages around quite a bit, usually to PAGENAME on Wheels! (with any assorted number of exclamation marks, 'e's or swear words to boot). There used to be a page *ahem* shrine *ahem* to him/her/it, which was mfd'd a while ago per WP:DENY. I could find it if you want. --Iamunknown 17:39, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

And that MfD guaranteed we have to answer this question every single week... Why couldn't we just keep the page as a one paragraph summary or something again? --tjstrf talk 21:11, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Attribution/Poll

Per comments on the Talk page here, and in other locales, it appears groups of editors are specifically against Jimbo's specifically requested public poll to gauge thoughts/support on the idea of the ATT merger. As it has been stated that the Poll is "dead" per users such as User:WAS 4.250, I am nominating this. If there is wide spread support to run this poll, this page should be kept. The MfD is here:

Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Attribution/Poll

Thank you. - Denny 16:16, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

The result of the Wikipedia:Miscellany for Deletion poll was speedy keep. 38.100.34.2 18:06, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Contact Us Complaint

I find it appalling that a button labelled 'Contact us' actually leads to "here are several hundred FAQs, none of which are the Q you are asking, but this should keep you from contacting us and wasting our time." page.

Has anyone at Wikipeadia measured how many clicks and how many minutes it takes to find anyway of asking Wikipedia (as an organisation) a question?

After 50 or so clicks and 20 minutes, this is the only place I can find to type, let alone ask a real question with any confidence that it will be answered by anyone in authority.


Wikipedia may wish to refer to Wiktionary:
Contact
Transitive verb: to contact
definition 2) To establish communication with something or someone

and Communication
the concept or state of exchanging information between entities.
Note the use of the word 'exchange', this implies a 2 way process.

Nic Williamson
Azteck

Wikipedia isn't an organisation. It is a website, of which most of its content is user-contributed. It is run by the Wikimedia Foundation, and their email addresses are linked from the 'Contact Us' page where it is relevant, such as the "press enquiries" page, "copyright violations" page, and most of the items on the "other queries" pages. There are not email addresses listed on most pages, for example the "how to edit a page" or "resolving disputes" sections, because the Wikimedia Foundation isn't involved in the day to day changes of the actual content of Wikipedia, so to email anyone would be pointless.
What is the actual question that you wanted to ask? -- Chuq 13:06, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
I just saw your message at Village pump (policy), which implied you were looking for information about creating pages about commercial entities. The first item under "Top questions" section is about creating an article, and links to Wikipedia:Your first article, which is full of the information that you are after. -- Chuq 13:15, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
If you really need to get in touch with The Wikimedia Foundation, for example to report a copyright dispute or get copyright permissions, you can go to http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Designated%20agent, or to report an article that contains incorrect information about a company you represent or about you, you can go to Wikipedia:Contact us/Article problem/Factual error (from subject).

38.100.34.2 17:19, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

requesting peer review

I wish to request peer review for the article Washington Metro because I feel that it should eventually become a Featured Article. The article was rejected for Featured Article status in the past, probably for good reason, but there have been many edits since then. Note that I am a reader of the article, and although I too have edited it, I am not one of the principal authors.

I followed the process at Wikipedia:Peer review (as preparation for possible future featured article candidate nomination, but it would not let me do the second step (open a new discussion page), and because I could not perform the second step, it would not let me do the third step either. I put in an Wikipedia:Articles for Creation request for the peer-review discussion page to be created, but the request was rejected as not suitable for Wikipedia.

Anyway, when I proceeded to the fourth step, the Empty page created per this request by 69.140.164.142 (talk · contribs) template on the Wikipedia:Peer review page did not expand. Why did the peer review request not go through?

If there is a Wikipedia policy or guideline that prohibits anonymous editors from nominating articles for peer review, then please advise. 69.140.164.142 02:20, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Anonymous users can't create pages, a change implemented after the Segilemther {sic} incident in September 2005. You'll have to ask an established user to simply make the page, then you can edit. Or...you can register an account! *insert dialogue about benefits of registering* Hbdragon88 06:19, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Peer review/Washington Metro page created so you can now complete the peer review request. Angus McLellan (Talk) 13:05, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Izehar

Can anyone tell what happened to User:Izehar. He was one of the Wikipedians which enjoyed a huge amount of respect from my side. Anyone knows what happened to him? --PaxEquilibrium 22:17, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, according to his contributions, he stopped editing on January 16. On January 30, he deleted his user and user talk pages on ([7], [8]). Then, he created the page User:Izehar/meta, which seems to be some sort of confirmation page that he is the same user as m:User:Izehar on meta.wikimedia.org; he created its meta counterpart a little while later. That seems to be the last edit he made anywhere that I can find. -- Robert See Hear Speak 03:40, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Need More Information!

Hi,

I am working on a project for my English Class in which we had to edit or create an article on Wikipedia. We are in the revisions stage of the project, and even though it is due for completion soon, I could still use information on my topic even after the deadline to enhance my article. The article that I'm working on is 'Blink', so there's nothing tooo stimulating, anything I did find is in there now! So if anyone has any ideas to add to the article or how to edit it to make it better stylistically, or anything please let me know!

Thanks Baleyp Baleyp 06:05, 29 March 2007 (UTC)baleyp

This might help Wikipedia:Five pillars.--Paloma Walker 00:29, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
Hey. That sounds like a very interesting project -- I wish my teachers assigned us stuff like that ;-). It looks like you've added some great content to the article. Here's a page I found [9]; I don't know if you've seen it, but it might have some stuff you can use. I also found these two articles with Google Scholar Search: [10], [11]. Anyway, if there's anything I can help you with, please let me know! I hope you decide to become a permanent Wikipedian. -- Robert See Hear Speak 02:16, 31 March 2007 (UTC)
Although a bit technical, this page seems to have a detailed physiological analysis. --YbborT SURVEY! 02:30, 31 March 2007 (UTC)
Discussion continued from the WikiProject Television talk section.

The proposal is that the IMDb and TV.com sections of Infobox Television should be removed. The reasoning is that the infobox should not favour IMDb or TV.com. The amount of traffic that television show articles receive is high, and linking to commercial entities in infoboxes is a form of advertising. It is also anti-competitive for these two commercial websites to receive high amounts of traffic via wikipedia, as opposed to competitors that provide similar services. There is also no justification for the links' existance in the main infobox, when they also appear in the external links section. The basic outline of reasons are:

  1. WP:MOS states that links such as these belong in the External Links section (Wikipedia:External links).
  2. It is anti-competitive to include these commerical entities in the infobox, and we obviously can't include all television websites.
  3. An External Links section is linked at the TOC, which means it is highly accessible.
  4. Infoboxes are generally used for quick, at-a-glance-facts and not navigation.

At current, a high majority of participants in the discussion agree that the IMDb and TV.com links should be removed. However to gain a higher consensus I have brought the issue to the Wikipedia Village pump. Please discuss below. Thanks. Stickeylabel 10:19, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Should external links be inside Template:Infobox Television. See WT:TV#Infobox Television Links. -- Ned Scott 18:02, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Oldest Image

Anybody know what the oldest image uploaded to Wikipedia is? -- Robert See Hear Speak 05:56, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

Isis (talk · contribs) probably has some of the oldest contributions, all dating back to 2002. Unfortunately, she contributed back when there weren't the nice new logs that we have now (there isn't even a block log entry), so it's kind of hard to track what images she might have uploaded. The first one I found was Image:Tulip_redoute.JPG, which was uploaded on 26 August 2002. Hbdragon88 06:15, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Never mind, I found it. Image:Gracieal.jpg was uploaded on 9 August 2002. Anybody up for finding anything eariler? Hbdragon88 06:18, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

The Canada article seems to have had an image added on on March 26, 2002. That image, ca.gif, has since been deleted and no record remains, but my guess is it was a Canadian flag. - SimonP 15:18, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia mention by Michael Scott in "The Office"

Is there any discussion in Wikipedia on this humorous and very high profile mention on the April 5 show? I thought it was very funny, because the principle of Wikipedia does sound pretty silly when you say it like he did, that "anyone in the world can edit it" and that's a good thing. I happen to think it is a great thing, but it does sound ridiculous when you outright say it like he did. It was perfect for that character and show. Spalding 17:08, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

It's mentioned on Wikipedia:Wikipedia on TV and radio, but I haven't seen it anywhere else. --Joelmills 22:01, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Darkness of Meta

I just got a message (reprinted here) through my wiki email. Anyone else get this? I was just wondering if I have to register to "establish the ultimate scourge" or if I'm automatically enrolled as a member of the cabal?--Isotope23 15:27, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

When do I get my share of the world? Corvus cornix 22:37, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

January 4, 2007

I went to RC and got a message saying:

All users should register their credit card at Wikipedia:Credit Card Registration by noon on 1.4.07. Otherwise their editing privileges will be suspended. Members of the cabel are, of course, exempt.

January 4, 2007 was almost 3 months ago. Please fix this. Georgia guy 00:14, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm English. It 1st April 2007. Hope this clears things up. Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 00:45, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
Now Theresa, I know this is supposed to be an International encyclcopedia, but can you quit it with the humour and guerilla spelling campaigns? --Iamunknown 00:49, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
You are asking the impossible. Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 01:10, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Broader input on naming of Tea tree oil

Hi there. I'd like to get some broader community input on the naming of the Tea tree oil article. There is a disagreement between me and User:Siraj555 about whether the name should be Tea tree oil (the current name) or Tea tree oil (melaleuca oil). If you have an opinion one way or the other, please comment at Talk:Tea tree oil#Concerning the Recent Rename. Mike Dillon 19:03, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Statistics

Has anyone here done or know of any polls on how many users are registered only for vandalism? This would be a very interesting thing to read, as then it would help people know who to look more at. As common sense, edits by newly registered users may be more suspicious, but is there any real analysis of this? Also, if you know of any other statistics about wikipedia, I would love to look at them. Thanks!! - Hairchrm 04:30, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

I don;t know where you could find vandlaism statistics, but WP:STAT lists many kinds of studies, starting with Special:Statistics. --YbborTSurvey! 12:54, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
I don't think they have a study quite like what you've asked for, but you may be interested in Wikipedia:WikiProject Vandalism studies. -- Rick Block (talk) 17:22, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

April Fools 2007

Was there any big event that occured on Wikipedia this year, like in 2005 and 2006? I haven't noticed anything other than maybe the George Washington coffee featured article. Just wanted to know. --FlyingPenguins 03:25, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Try this list on BJAODN. 69.179.47.147 06:04, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

The source used "early in 2007" to state an approximate date

When we quote a source stating that something is expected to happen "early in 2007", when should editors change the tense from present to past -- that is to was expected? Is March 31 the Wikipedia-standard end of "early in 2007"? patsw 23:05, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Should we be reporting predictions in the first place? Steve Dufour 05:02, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
An expectation is not the same as a prediction. The conditions that fulfill the expectation are under the control of the source. When does early 2007 end? patsw 17:10, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Let me offer my own definitions:

  • Early January 1 through April 30
  • Mid May 1 through August 21
  • Late September 1 through December 31

What do think? patsw 00:07, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

The category "terrorists"

There is a simple problem which confused me greatly, and I am unable to persuade myself successfully. I hope a more experienced wikipedian can care to help me on this.

I came across a category Terrorists. I am quite surprised that this category actually exists on Wikipedia - and it seems to have survived many suggestions for deletions - given that this term is generally considered to be a negative - and relative - one. Isn't that "One man's terrorist may be another's freedom fighter/liberator", possibly in somewhere, some time?

What confused me even more, is that bin Laden - a "popularly acknowledged" "terrorist" - is not among that list, while it contains many more people I don't even know. Yes, I acknowledge my knowledge is extremely shallow, but I wonder...

Are those listed in the category have, in an NPOV way, been CERTIFIED to be a terrorist?? Are they categorized as "terrorists" just because someone (or some organizations) believe they are?? If so, why are President Bush and Chairman Mao not categorized as one, despite a significant number of people believe that they are? (despite the fact that they are [or were] heads of government, are their actions considered "actions of a state(s)" instead of "actions of one person"?

I am not implying any definition of the meaning of "terrorist" here, nor anyone is one.

Any suggestions to explain this is very much appreciated. Thanks a lot. --155.198.13.29 00:57, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Osama is on the list, under the subcategory al-qaeda members. Additionally, the category has a disclaimer on it. mrholybrain's talk 01:18, 28 March 2007 (UTC)
I didn't see the disclaimer mentioned by mrholybrain (probably because it is so small). Regardless, there are significant issues which cannot, unfortunately, be overcome when deciding to categorize people. This is the product one of them. The category may also be indicative of the bias of most Wikipedian editors of the English-language Wikipedia based largely on our demographics. I imagine (though cannot currently prove) that some editor or anonymous user has added George W. Bush to this particular category. I would also imagine that said editor would be flamed, labeled a "troll", etc. by the active editors. That is, likely, what the consensus of established editors of the article agree upon. While it may be viewed as unfortunate or as biased, it may also be viewed as good, at least to the extent that it can be interpreted to show that consensus works.
Anyways, I'm just rambling now, but those are some of my thoughts. --Iamunknown 01:28, 28 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Oh boy, hm. You'd think such a category would be a bad can of worms to open up, eh? The term "Terrorist" seems pretty subjective. I'm frankly surprised that the category survived a CSD. .V. [Talk|Email] 14:18, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

592 × 599 pixel

On March 17, I posted a succinct item here indicating an error:

On image pages, we currently see annotations like:
   Size of this preview: 592 × 599 pixel
   Image in higher resolution (1195 × 1210 pixel, file size: 541 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg)
Emphasis added. In English, the plural of "pixel" is "pixels".

It is still wrong, and nobody even replied here. Was this the wrong place to post this? I assume that the relevant text does not come from a page that "anyone can edit". 207.176.159.90 23:37, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

The text can be changed at MediaWiki:file-info-size but only by an admin. Tra (Talk) 23:46, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
Units of measurement don't always have to be expressed as plural just because there's more than one. For example, if a flagpole is 8 feet tall, you could refer to it as "an eight-foot flagpole". A vinyl LP is referred to as a "twelve-inch record", not a "twelve-inches record". It depends entirely on the context. If you were referring to the image in a full sentence, you would say "this image is 592 pixels wide and 599 pixels tall", but when giving the measurement as point-form data, the singular isn't necessarily "wrong". - Ugliness Man 23:50, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
As you say, the correct form is context-dependent. However, in the context described I believe the plural is correct. If you were to read the above you would say "Size of preview, five hundred nintey-two by five ninety-nine" in which case "pixels" is clearly correct. I believe this should be changed, but it is in fact rather unimportant. Cool3 01:02, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
It's "rather unimportant", but it's text that people see all the time, so when it's wrong it looks dumb. (It could be that the thing was edited by someone with a foreign accent, or someone who had in mind something like metric symbols where "3 m" never takes a pluralizing "s"; but it looks dumb.) Therefore it's worth someone's time to fix it (and look for any other places where this may have been done). 207.176.159.90 06:13, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Watchlist error

I can access many other pages but every time i try to access my watchlist, a Wikipedia error page keeps coming up. Whats going on? Simply south 18:30, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

It works fine for me. What does the error message say? That might provide a clue. Have you put any pages on your watch list? — RJH (talk) 18:43, 3 April 2007 (UTC)
Its started working fine now. It was about the foundations servers experiencing technical difficulties. (I have a copy from trying to access my page so many times). Simply south 18:47, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Per nom and per?

Hi. Although I am not new, but I saw "per nom" and "per" in barnstar discussions. What do they mean? If you know the answer, please answer my question on my talk page. --Jacklau96 09:06, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

Per can be closely said as in accordance with. In this case, I guess that per Person means that the user agrees with Person's arguments and draws the same conclusion. x42bn6 Talk 13:26, 4 April 2007 (UTC)
... and "nom" means "nominator". -- Rick Block (talk) 18:14, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

User:The Transhumanist

Is there any other users with userspaces that serve as a similar tour de force through Wikipedia? Aditya Kabir 07:52, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Not quite the same thing, but I do have an index. For different approaches, see User:Thunderhead/Bookmarks and User:*Kat*/organizing. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 20:15, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
WOW! Double wow!! Thanks. Now, is there any users who have attempted summarizing or clarifying the wiki-labyrinth of history, culture, community, codes, guidelines, policies, collaborations, traditions and what not on their userspaces? Aditya Kabir 16:50, 3 April 2007 (UTC)
Also, is there any system of recognizing best userpages? If there is none, are there any user with a particularly breathtaking (more for beauty and such stuff, if not for usefulness)? Aditya Kabir 15:06, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Main Page alternatives

I stumbled across the above page months ago and didn't think about it. After becoming more understanding of wiki-philosophy, I wondered why all the pages listed were articles. Would it just be O-Kay to move them straight to the Wikipedia namespace because they don't meet any article qualifications and inflate the article count by 20? The Placebo Effect 19:30, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

Tagging articles about places, but with no coordinates

There's a new, template, {{LocateMe|April 2007}} (for example), for articles about specific places, but with no coordinates. Should it go on their talk pages (as in the few examples currently tagged) or on the articles themselves (like other clean-up tags, such as clean-up itself, or "uncited" and so on? Andy Mabbett 23:29, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't see any reason why it would go on the talk page if it's a cleanup related message. --YbborTSurvey! 23:58, 31 March 2007 (UTC)
Thank you. May I ask for additional comments? We've tagged over 500 articles, and met vociferous opposition from 3 or 4 editors, on this point. I'd consider that a fairly low number, given the number and variety of articles tagged, but they clearly don't see it that way. Andy Mabbett 23:54, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

I need help finding a topic for Political Philosophy project

Basically, the title says it all. I need to find a topic that I can talk about for 30 minutes that is within the realm of Political Philosophy. I have to make my presentation before May 16th and it's a big part of my grade so it has to be good. Anyone who has any suggestions is much appreciated. Thanks! --Pirateslife14 19:20, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

Just look at Communism, you could talk about that for hours. The Placebo Effect 19:30, 4 April 2007 (UTC)
Wow, I guess we really do have a category for everything: Category:Political philosophies --YbborTalkSurvey! 01:00, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
Libertarianism would be my choice. It is probably the most simple. (I didn't say "simple-minded".) Good luck on the project. Steve Dufour 20:03, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
"The influence of John Rawls on the contemporary developments in political philosophy" would be a good subject. The difference between positive liberty and negative liberty. As would the relevance of Plato's Republic or Aristotles' Politics for current political philosophy/politics. Or the relationship between libertarian and communist conceptions of the self (see analytical marxism and especially Gerald Cohen). Alternatively the debate between utilitarianism and deontological liberalism. The conception of labour in the works of Marx and Locke. Enjoy! C mon 20:47, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Looking to Interview Wikipedians

I am a researcher seeking to interview Wikipedia contributors, especially occasional, new, or “average” editors. In-depth, one hour interviews may be conducted over phone or email. Compensation for your time will be provided – a $10 gift certificate to Amazon.com. Must be 18+ and U.S. resident. Contact Benjamin Johnson, Department of Telecommunication, Information Studies and Media, Michigan State University, by email at john2429@msu.edu or by phone at 517.230.1272.

John2429 16:13, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

How do you time a one-hour interview over email? - DavidWBrooks 16:37, 3 April 2007 (UTC)
It took me a little over an hour. This is a great chance to express your opinions about WP. I passed on the gift card, however. Steve Dufour 01:30, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Average Watchlist Size

Just out of sheer curiosity, is there some ancient poll somewhere that asked people how many articles are on their watchlist? Is there some commonly accepted number, or formula (i.e. Edit count / 100)? --YbborT 21:03, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Never heard of one, though I'd be interested to know as well. (Mine is 2120 right now, and I cleaned a couple hundred redlinks off of it yesterday.) --tjstrf talk 21:07, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
I think it would be nearly impossible to get an "average" of any sort, but if you're curious, mine is currently 97. I wish there was some way for Wikipedians to allow others to see their watchlist. - Ugliness Man 21:13, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
I am not sure if that information is public (as in, it is found in the database dumps), although administrators can see a list of articles that are not being watched (as in, no contributor having it in a watchlist). In my case, the "formula" would be edit count / 10 (3000 items, and I always try to keep it as close to 3000 as possible, because that is my limit, around 500 items in a 3-day watchlist). -- ReyBrujo 23:16, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
Ugh, how can you people stand such large watchlists? I can barely survive with my 700-or-so watchlist. My "number of days to show in watchlist" option in Special:Preferences is set to 0.010416666667...which I forgot how many minutes that is. --Iamunknown 23:19, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
A lot of the pages on mine are redirects, old AfD discussions, deleted pages, talk archives, etc. that really shouldn't need to be edited much if at all. They don't clutter the watchlist view, but in the rare cases where someone vandalizes an old AfD or archive, or recreates some long-dead POV rant page, there's a chance I'll notice. --tjstrf talk 01:41, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
Maybe I'm a fool, but I only have 38 pages on mine. Captain panda In vino veritas 23:53, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
Worry not, I have 48, having purged about 30 from it because it was too "difficult" to keep watching them all. I guess I am just lazy now, seeing everyone elses' numbers. x42bn6 Talk 16:10, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
I think someone had like 20k (there was a question where his watchlist was missing some items, and wondered if it was due its size). As I said, I notice 3k is the biggest I can handle, that gives around 150 "last changes" to review when I arrive home from work, and review them all in around an hour (giving me like 40 edits, including {{unsigned}} templates, answers, deleting offtopic questions, some vandalism leftovers, and answering talk page). Breaking the total, 90 categories, 1 portal, 80 templates, 1874 articles, 182 pages in the Wikipedia namespace and 833 images. So, in my case I can say that, every day, 10% of the articles I have in my watchlist are modified. -- ReyBrujo 01:12, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
I've trimmed mine down to 555 from 1000-ish over the past year, sticking to articles I know something about, losing topics I only find intriguing. Maybe 3/4 are real articles, the rest are redirects etc. I'd love a way to order them by last edit, so I can see what articles that I started are the most dormant. - DavidWBrooks 17:30, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
1500 and counting. From time to time I join in the fun that is WP:NPP, and tend to leave the nonsense pages on my watchlist so I can see when they get recreated. Chris cheese whine 01:57, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
This seems to merit further investigation. When I get back from vacation I'll make a page trying to gather this information on a larger scale. --YbborT 02:13, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
Interesting question. Mine currently stands at 9,108 pages, although I'm attempting to whittle it down somewhat. The majority of pages on my watchlist are either not edited often or are archived debates. However, the number of changes per day is roughly 500-600, so I have my and bot edits hidden to keep it manageable.--cj | talk 10:21, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

FWIW - 4213 articles on mine. I don't check every single one of them, unless it is a suspicious looking edit. -- Chuq 05:39, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Mine's five. It's normally four, though. On that note, I have never seen it enter double figures, ever. At the moment, two articles, one userpage (my own), and two Wikipedia pages (one of which is temporary, the "fifth" page). I suspect this is ridiculously low, compared to most administrators and editors :) Daniel Bryant 09:59, 27 March 2007 (UTC)
Boy, if a list ever does get compiled, it's going to have a standard deviation larger than the mean! - DavidWBrooks 14:31, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm back from vacation, and created a survey page here, and started off with the information provided here. Help spread the word, and if you haven't done so already, please respond. --YbborT SURVEY! 21:33, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

See also meta:Watchlist sizes for enwiki 2004-08-11. Also Help:Watching pages#Size limitation suggests ~9800 pages is the upper limit for a functional watchlist.--cj | talk 05:43, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

There are featured articles and featured lists. Is it possible to get featured disambiguation pages? Simply south 21:25, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

I can't imagine any case in which a disambiguation page would merit a featured distinction. Wikipedia:Featured content only lists

so: no. If there's some page that really merits consideration I suppose you could bring it up at Wikipedia talk:Featured content, although I doubt it would meet to warm of a reception. --YbborTalkSurvey! 21:58, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Maybe it could but i guess it would just qualify under featured lists as they are almost the same. Simply south 11:10, 6 April 2007 (UTC)
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