This is an archive of past discussions about Wikipedia:Reference desk. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
The reference desks still occasionally appear to be protected, and the purge button provided above only works for the science ref desk -- not any of the others. Why not place a link on each one of the ref desks that allows users to purge the cache? That will let every user correct the problem for themselves. 67.169.177.176 (talk) 05:43, 18 June 2011 (UTC)
I have found that just refreshing the page (specifically by holding shift while clicking the refresh button, which does a complete refresh on most browsers) is sufficient to get the edit links back, although sometimes it does take two or three times (YYMV). -- 174.31.219.218 (talk) 18:11, 18 June 2011 (UTC)
When the tab says "view source", clicking it should still take you to the normal edit page. From there just replace &action=edit with &action=purge to make a purge link for any page. AvrillirvA (talk) 17:15, 19 June 2011 (UTC)
Computing Desk Gone Haywire?
Is it just me (on Firefox 5 - not beta anymore, but full of bugs) or is the Computing Desk acting a bit weird? It seems to be repeating itself over and over. --KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK)01:58, 23 June 2011 (UTC)
Looks like a problem, possibly Scsbot has gotten logged out and confused. I have a huge revert trying to decide whether it will commit or not, I'll clean up if it goes through. Franamax (talk) 02:19, 23 June 2011 (UTC)
Ah, cheers - I replied to a reply to one of my own questions, only to see it unreplied further down - a number of times. I'll put the reply back in tomorrow if you haven't done it. Time for bed for me. Good luck! --KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK)02:27, 23 June 2011 (UTC)
Well I - think - we've got it all back on track. Looks like the IP editor was having browser problems, and likely not Ummit's bot at all. One of the hazards of collaborative editing is that other people try to fix the same thing you are working on and e/c hilarity results. As best I can tell, two other editors have successfully restored the working state of the page following my blanket revert and attempted rollforward. Looks OK & thanks all others! Franamax (talk) 02:34, 23 June 2011 (UTC)
Yeah. I was pulling my hair out trying to figure out what was going on, because the bot (contrary to someone's scurrilous speculation :-) ) had gotten badly confused by (had not itself caused) the multiple sections. And then while I was trying to figure out where the multiple sections had come from, they disappeared -- because of course y'all were working on it at the same time. —Steve Summit (talk) 03:09, 23 June 2011 (UTC)
When in doubt, blame the closest bot. If we don't have an essay on that, we need one. :) Seems to have worked out and thanks for the human look-in... Franamax (talk) 04:12, 23 June 2011 (UTC)
De-personalised question
A legitimate question was asked at the Science Desk. Unfortunately the question unnecessarily named a living person. I edited the question to erase the identity of the person and replace it with a link to the disease. Diff. Wikipedia has understandably strict criteria related to anything biographical about a living person. Dolphin(t)00:55, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
The question had nothing to do with BLP criteria, which are aimed at preventing libel, gossip, privacy violations and poor sourcing. The person meant "Does someone with Stephen Hawking's disease" etc. I don't think the questioner expects anyone to know about Stephen Hawking's personal habits, and anyway, if Hawking did talk about them openly in a reliable source, it would neither be a privacy violation nor libelous to repeat it. I think you could have addressed this without altering the question. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 01:58, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
This question[1] is similarly speculative about Hawking's private life, although the IP seems to be from a different part of the country. But if you're going to "censor" the one, you should probably do likewise with the other. ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 02:11, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
I agree with Mwalcoff. No BLP criterion warrants the removal of Dr. Hawking's name. It is especially egregious to change a post, making it look like what you wrote is actually what 76.27 wrote. Buddy431 (talk) 03:51, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
I agree with Dolphin51. I think the original question was in violation of our BLP policies. But even if it was not, it was a poor wording. Asking the question in the way it was made it unnecessarily personal and also made it unclear. It could as well be interpreted as "Can a person of extraordinary genius usually detect......" Wanderer57 (talk) 04:58, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
Still not OK to modify someone else's post. If it really did violate BLP (which I don't think it did), it would be best to either delete the question entirely (with a note to the poster), or else put a big [redacted] in the statement, with a clear signature of who did the redacting (and also notifying the person whose statement you redacted). Poorly worded, perhaps, but we don't remove poorly worded questions, and we certainly shouldn't be so presumptuous to try to correct what the speaker said. Buddy431 (talk) 05:08, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
Wikipedia’s policy on information about living persons can be found at WP:BLP. It includes the following injunctions:
Editors must take particular care when adding information about living persons to any Wikipedia page. Such material requires a high degree of sensitivity, ... ...
Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced—whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable—should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion
... the possibility of harm to living subjects must always be considered when exercising editorial judgment. This policy applies to BLPs, ... ... and to material about living persons on other pages.
The italicizing and bolding in the above quotations has not been added by me. That is the emphasis given in WP:BLP.
There is nothing here to suggest adherence to this policy is optional, or that Users are granted discretion as to when considerations of BLP apply or not. It is clear that the Reference Desks are part of Wikipedia – they are not part of some other website – and so BLP is just as relevant to the Reference Desks as to any other Wikipedia page. It is also clear that it is not a defence to say “But this isn’t actually a biography, and so BLP doesn’t apply.”
It is also clear that if material about a living person is contentious, and is unsourced or poorly sourced, or is likely to attract additional material that is unsourced or poorly sourced, it should be removed immediately without waiting for discussion. If in doubt, remove the material and then ask for advice. There appears to be little defence for a User saying “It looked like it might contravene BLP but I wasn’t sure so I left it where it was.”
If Wikipedia has another policy that contradicts WP:BLP, particularly a policy that is relevant to the Reference Desks, I would be very interested to read it. I would be grateful if someone could use this space to post a link to that alternative policy. Dolphin(t)08:32, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
The difference here is that in an article you can just zap it, but in a ref desk, where there's dialogue, you would clobber someone's answer to what is (presumably) not a trolling question. I'm inclined to agree with Buddy that the better approach is to replace the name with [redacted], so that it's clear the editor's original comment was edited. That's already done frequently, when someone posts his personal e-mail, for example. If someone wants to know what was redacted, they can look in the history. If it were an extreme BLP violation, such as "is so-and-so still beating his wife?" it could be revdel'd if necessary, or then the entire dialogue could be zapped as it's likely a trolling question. Revdel doesn't seem to be needed here. But at least the name won't be visible on the active talk page. ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 11:13, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
Thanks BB, your suggestion about using redacted is a sound one. I will bear it in mind.
In the case we are considering at present, I disagree that zapping the person's name, as I did, was likely to clobber someone's answer - there was no answer at the time. In any case, re-wording a question won't clobber any of the answers unless it actually transforms the question - something I was careful to avoid. Dolphin(t)12:31, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
Talking about a living person's personal life, even if sourced to a reliable source is generally ill-advised per BLP. If that info doesn't belong in the article, then it's questionable if it belongs here. Notably this is the sort of stuff liable to be deleted from an articles talk page and that's noindexed. It's a common misconception that if something is supported by an RS then there's no possible BLP violation but this isn't true. Also while I agree it should have been made clear the question was modified, deleting the question is almost as bad as leaving it be and can easily lead to unnecessary debates, edit wars, and screams of censorship. Instead as I said last time we had the major blow up over modifying posts, we should do what the rest of wikipedia does which means redacting the unwanted info while leaving the rest intact. A policy which is practiced at a diverse range of pages from article talks pages to WP:ANI for a diverse range of things from BLP violations to outing and egregious personal attacks. Something of course which we also do here, e.g. when removing email addresses. Nil Einne (talk) 23:35, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
My own feeling on this is that we shouldn't be bringing living peoples' names into these personal-matters discussions unless that person him/herself has commented on it. I'm thinking of Christopher Reeve as an example of someone who was very much out in the open as to the kinds of issues he was dealing with. Hawking has said "I am a normal man with normal needs", and I expect he's not really interested in elaborating further on the details. ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 23:44, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
For clarification, my view is that even if there is some random RS someone digs up from somewhere that few have ever read where some LP has said something about his/her personal habits it's still best if we don't discuss them. It may be acceptable to link to said RS. If the person regularly discusses their habits then some discussion in the RD is probably acceptable. However from personal experience, I wouldn't trust everyone on the RD to be able to make such a distinction and judgement. Therefore it's best to discourage it. If we actually had a question concerning someone's personal habits then there may be some discussion worth having about how far to go. But in this particular case, since it doesn't appear the OP really cared about any particular LPs habits then simply redacting the name to discourage discussion is a simple solution. This also goes for other things like has celebrity X ever date celebrity Y. Of course if the info is in the article, e.g. like the Paris Hilton question then there's no reason it can't be repeated on the RD. Nil Einne (talk) 23:58, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
(Edit conflict) A couple of things need to be made clear here. First, if I recall correctly, the question did not ask about Stephen Hawking's personal habits. It asked what someone like Stephen Hawking does -- presumably, a paraplegic or person with ALS. The proper thing to do here would have been to say, "If by 'someone like Stephen Hawking' you mean a person with ALS, such a person would...". Secondly, as Baseball Bugs gets at, we should draw a distinction between private matters that someone is open about and those that someone is not. For example, I don't think it's right to name the accuser in the DSK case, even if she's mentioned in French newspapers. But there's nothing wrong with relating what Elizabeth Smart has shared publicly about her trauma provided that it's done in a responsible manner. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 00:00, 8 June 2011 (UTC)
BB asked for the original question to be restored to the Science Desk. I did so as a postscript, as follows:
Can people like name redacted usually detect a #1 or #2 coming on and, if so, do anything to hold it in?
If you are suggesting that Can people like Joe Smith does not contravene BLP, whereas Can Joe Smith does contravene, then I must say you are being unreasonably pedantic in attempting to defend the wording of the original question. WP:BLP is as clear and emphatic as it is possible to be. There is nothing in WP:BLP to indicate a statement that contravenes BLP can be defended by legalistic sophistry such as saying the question included the word "like" and therefore it does not contravene. A living person was named in the original question, and given the nature of the question, no amount of legalistic sophistry can detract from the observation that the original question contravened the following injunctions from WP:BLP:
Editors must take particular care when adding information about living persons to any Wikipedia page. Such material requires a high degree of sensitivity,
... the possibility of harm to living subjects must always be considered
If you know of some policy that exempts the Reference Desks from WP:BLP, or you know of some policy that a de-graded version of WP:BLP applies to the Reference Desks, please let us know where that policy can be found. Dolphin(t)03:42, 8 June 2011 (UTC)
Oh for cryin' out loud this is ridiculous. If we say that people with ALS can or can't control their bladders, then people will know that [certain people] the whole planet knows have ALS will be described this way. We aren't touching BLP unless we actually get information about the named person. It's ridiculous to change the question, but it's also nearly pointless to object to it, since it's still asked and answered. Come on, the people here aren't idiots - quit treating them like they can't add two and two together. Wnt (talk) 23:20, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
@Wnt: If you genuinely believe you have a point of principle, or you genuinely believe this is ridiculous, raise the matter at WT:BLP. Lot's of Users read that Talk page, and you have the opportunity to persuade all those Users of the merit of your point of view, and get some changes made. By comparison, hardly anyone is reading this thread. Dolphin(t)02:28, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
This debate has certainly stretched on a lot but I wouldn't call it ridiculous. The root problem as I see it, and the reason people discuss this particular matter at such length, is that there is a long history in Wikipedia of controversy between two types of editor. One, those who have an "overriding concern for" the rights of people famous enough to be included in Wikipedia, and two, those who have an "overriding concern for" the right of Wikipedia editors to have the truth published regardless of any other considerations. (Many editors are not strongly in one or the other group.)
(Rather than me writing "as I see it" again, please take it to apply to the rest of this note.) The present BLP policy puts the concern for people's rights ahead of the rights of editors, when they conflict. Editors of type two, being somewhat unhappy with the BLP policy, will argue in favour of restricting the scope of the policy, in effect saying, in one case or another, "it doesn't apply here." Type one editors resist such restrictions due to concern that they pare away at the policy..
Unfortunately, this is a strong and probably irreconcilable difference. It is the reason why an issue that you see as ridiculous is discussed at such length. IMO. Wanderer57 (talk) 00:09, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
While this specific question works perfectly well without the example, It would be ridiculous if the take-away from this discussion was that "always remove celebrity examples from the ref desk" became understood to be the consensus interpretation. Not only is that interpretation clearly not a consensus (See above debate), but it's absolutist and dogmatic and would interfere with the RD's purpose quite regularly.
If this absolutely has to be debated and decided right now, could the point we're settling on be closer to "Remove gratuitous celebrity examples when it doesn't change the meaning or clearness of the question." or words to the effect, please? APL (talk) 05:59, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
I would also like to point out that editing people's posts as if they'd done something wrong or otherwise badgering them to ask their question in the "right way", is not only uncivil but is simply a bad idea in an area of the encyclopedia specifically designed for 'outsiders' to use.
In cases that are not ridiculous slander, it might make more sense to let it slide while it's on the ephemeral front page, and then edit the permanent archive. That way the question asker is helped without confusion, perceived incivility, or time-wasting debate like this one, but the BLP problem is fixed, and frankly, fixed faster than it usually is in article space. In this way, all the rules may be followed, but at no loss to usefulness. APL (talk) 06:13, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
It is actually very simple and very clear. If a question or an answer names a living person but without contravening WP:BLP it should be left untouched. But if it contravenes WP:BLP, the offending text should be removed promptly, and then discussed. Anyone who disagrees with this approach should raise the matter at WT:BLP, explain that Wikipedia's policy on BLP is inappropriate to the Reference Desks, nominate a better alternative and get WP:BLP changed. Simple. Dolphin(t)00:20, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
Yes,yes,yes, but interpretation of the policy is typically not a science and will cause endless debates and wasted man-hours that could easily be avoided by waiting a couple of days and then censoring to your heart's content. Surely you've noticed that tendency around here. At the end of the debate one side or the other would get a wonderful self-righteous thrill, but that hardly helps answer questions, make the encyclopedia better, or make any lasting difference at all.
For example, I'm unclear on which particular line-item in the BLP policy you made this edit under.(The part you quoted above clearly doesn't work. It's not contentious that Prof Hawking has a degenerative nerve disease, he freely admits as much and it's well sourced in his article.) I may be wrong, but As far as I can tell after reading the BLP policy start-to-finish it was an inappropriate removal, and if you had made a question or confusing or unanswerable I would have reverted your edit on sight.
I suspect you may be conflating importance with scope and assuming that BLP should be interpreted far more broadly than its literal text because of its great importance. This is false.
However, there's no point debating that now. The point is that because you wanted to strictly enforce a policy in a way that you knew would be controversial, several editor's time was wasted, we were uncivil to a question-asker, and nothing was gained. The ref-desks are entirely ephemeral.
Censoring and harassing good-faith question-askers will ALWAYS be counter-productive. Please think before you act and only intentionally cause an edit war for things that are really important. APL (talk) 03:20, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
APL asks I'm unclear on which particular line-item in the BLP policy you made this edit under. My response on this thread at 08:32, 7 June 2011 says it all. (See above.)
In your reply immediately above, APL says if you had made a question or confusing or unanswerable I would have reverted your edit on sight. There must be a word or two missing because that means nothing to me. Dolphin(t)06:23, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
Regarding the previous two comments. Much of our discussion occurred because some editors think the question contravened the BLP policy and other editors did not. To say "It is actually very simple ....." suggests that there will be a consensus on whether the BLP policy is contravened. Clearly that is not the case.
Quote: "The ref-desks are entirely ephemeral." This is news to me. If so, why do the ref desks have a search engine and why are visitors asked to use it? Or is it APL's opinion that all Wikipedia is "entirely ephemeral"? Cuddlyable3 (talk) 11:08, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
Sorry, it was an exaggeration. The first time I mentioned that phrase it was to say that the front page is ephemeral, and that no one would be confused by editing the archive. APL (talk) 18:55, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
A banned user is a banned user. We have gone through this before, so starting this discussion all over again is not constructive. --Saddhiyama (talk) 21:59, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
According to his/her page the user was User:Epimetheusgoodbye. From a quick glance it looks like that account was made to complain about the blocking of their other account User:Thisuser2isblocked for an inappropriate user name. (You don't even need to read our username policy to guess such a username is likely to be seen as inappropriate.) From what I saw the user was never actually blocked before then, they were using IPs which were blocked I guess for vandalism or whatever. I don't see any evidence for a ban. I suggest therefore 5BYv8cUJ familiarise themselves with the difference between a ban and a block as well as the various reasons for blocks and what these mean for any user who may have been affected. In this particular case if my reading is correct 5BYv8cUJ was fully entitled to make a new account such as they did (without an inappropriate user name) without even disclosing the previous account. This is of course not at all comparable to a persistent troll who has been banned for several years but won't stay away and any attempt to compare the 2 is highly flawed. Nil Einne (talk) 06:38, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
Red Act should have informed the posters that he has removed their answers. I have done so [2], [3], [4]. When you remove people's comments (especially the good faith answers such as those of Jayron32 and StuRat) it is appropriate to inform them of this. Buddy431 (talk) 04:01, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
Concur with the removal. I didn't check the IP address when I commented on the thread, but a quick WHOIS check confirms that this is clearly Light Current. Red Act was right in removing the thread, and my comments within it. Goodonia... --Jayron3204:11, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
Someone has apparently hijacked Michael Hardy's account, as a user by that name has posed a nonsensical analogy and refuses to state what his actual question is. It's trolling, worse than anything Light Current has posted (LC at least asks discernible questions), so I've boxed it up. If someone wants to un-box it, knock yourself out. ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 14:39, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
I don't think there's necessarily any account hijack (some respondents indicated familiarity with an ongoing point of discussion), but I think boxing is probably for the best. — Lomn18:18, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
I'm being funny about the hijacked part. But even LC asks actual questions. Hardy wasn't asking a real question, he was hinting at something and wouldn't say what. So it's now boxed junk. ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 18:30, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
Investment advice and the criminal and civil legal implications
A few days ago I was surprised to see a request for investment advice and that someone had answered it. I deleted it as improper. At least in the US there are strict regulations (Sarbanes Oxley Act) regarding giving such advice and possible conflicts of interest, and legal requirements of full disclosure.
Given not only the moral but possibly quite serious legal ramifications for wikipedia it would seem quite wise to adopt a similar policy to the one regarding people asking for legal advice and medical opinions. I see today that the question has been restored. It had no header, so I created one, see this diff.
Agreed. Advice on investments could have drastic consequences, comparable to those possible with medical or legal advice.
Thinking about this more generally, there are other areas about which advice should not be given. Advice about how to build a treehouse somehow came to mind as an example. Wanderer57 (talk) 03:04, 19 June 2011 (UTC)
Why ? Does one need a license to give tree-house advice ? For that matter, does one need a license to legally give investment advice ? StuRat (talk)
One also doesn't need a license to say "I prefer ibuprofen over aspirin for my headaches", but that would still fall in the Refdesk-proscribed category. My understanding is that the prohibition on medical/legal advice is not that people would fall afoul of licensing laws, but more so that it is likely in those cases that advice given by random yahoos on the internet is likely to (inadvertently) cause the recipient harm. So I think it's with that standard the other types of advice should be metered. Inadvertently poor investment advice from random yahoos on the internet is highly likely to cause the recipient financial harm, and so should not be given. For construction of a tree house, aspects dealing with safety (e.g. timber sizing, weight capacity, etc.) could be wrong or ill advised for the person's conditions, and such recommendations should not be given. By the way, most jurisdictions I'm aware of require permits and inspections for new construction, and often this would include things such as tree houses. And while I'm not aware of jurisdictions where the homeowner themselves needs licensing (although they may exist), I believe there are a number of places where third-party contractors are required to be licensed and bonded. And while a third-party on the Refdesk might not fall afoul of the laws as they're not actually raising a hammer, "two-by-fours should be sufficient" is as much practicing construction as "extra strength aspirin should be good enough for most headaches" is practicing medicine. -- 174.31.219.218 (talk) 18:12, 19 June 2011 (UTC)
"If you need specific advice (for example, medical, legal, financial, or risk management) please seek a professional who is licensed or knowledgeable in that area."
That puts financial advice on the same taboo level as medical and legal, and that's how it should be. And like those other areas, it's valid to direct general questions to articles that generally discuss the subject. Like if someone asks, "What is the stock market?" we could send him to stock market. If he asks "What's a good stock to buy?" then the safest advice might be that someone who would actually trust the opinions of anonymous internet users probably ought not even be thinking about buying stock.
The only other good financial advice I can think of is something Will Rogers said, impersonating Calvin Coolidge: "Buy only good stock. Wait till it goes up, and then sell it. If it don't go up... don't buy it!" ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 06:31, 19 June 2011 (UTC)
The reference desk headers are based on a template. If we are going to add financial and risk management to legal and medical the template will need editing. I have no clue as to hot to go about doing this. Can someone either edit the template or advise me how to do it or whom to ask for help? μηδείς (talk) 16:45, 19 June 2011 (UTC)
The UK also has laws restricting who can give investment advice. As with medicine, providing general information should be fine, but we should be careful about providing customised investment advice based on an individual's circumstances. The particular question that prompted this discussion looks ok to me, though. I interpret it as asking for information on the practicalities of how to invest in a particular instrument, rather than a request for advice on what to invest in. --Tango (talk) 18:24, 19 June 2011 (UTC)
BTW, the problem is not necessarily who can give advice, but the full diclosure requirements, conflict of interest, and the liabilities and fines imposed by Sarbanes Oxley in the US. Having anonymous people say you should or should not consider investing in X is a problemμηδείς (talk) 22:17, 19 June 2011 (UTC)
I thought policy was that we weren't supposed to worry about Wikipedia's liability except for avoiding things specifically forbidden by the foundation lawyer?
Am I wrong? Granted, I can't seem to lay my finger on the policy I'm thinking of, so I may be imagining it. APL (talk) 22:01, 19 June 2011 (UTC)
There's not a formal policy I'm aware of. However, we also refuse to give medical and legal advice because we cannot act in that capacity. As anonymous voices on the Internet, we don't know the editor's situation beyond what they've written. Giving advice in that regard is reckless and could lead to serious harm. That is the main motivating factor in refusing to give advice on such subjects. We can provide facts, but not lead someone to a course of action. I'd say financial advice falls into the same category; I don't want to ruin someone by making a mistake in telling them what to do with their money. — The Hand That Feeds You:Bite22:17, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
Well, the general disclaimer does include financial and risk managament on the same terms as medical and legal - my concern at this moment is getting the Reference Desk template to reflect this (1) to discourage posters and responders and (2) to empower editors to delete inappropriate matters. Can anybody help editting the template? μηδείς (talk) 22:12, 19 June 2011 (UTC)
Despite any disclaimer and theoretical lack of legal liability on wikipedia's part, individuals who were sued for big bucks could trigger a (more) negative reputation for wikipedia. ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 03:31, 20 June 2011 (UTC)
I have {{subst:HD/fin}} amd {{subst:HD/risk}} created, tell me if they looks OK, and if they do, I'll update the documentation to include it. Avicennasis @ 05:55, 19 Sivan 5771 / 21 June 2011 (UTC)
Those templates look fine, but I don't see how they could ever possibly be applied to the original post in question[5]. It's not a request for financial advice, which would be "are Guaranteed Mexican Securities a good investment?"; nor for risk management advice, which would be "are GMS more or less risky than US Treasury Bonds?". It was a request for information, which may or may not be satisfiable. The first step would be figuring out what the heck a GMS is, and if there was an actual cite or site, going from the contents. I'm all for not answering requests that could carry unforeseen risks and I've stood up myself and shouted on at least two occasions (distilling heroin at the wholly unlikely behest of a prof asking students to isolate the active ingredient from their own prescription, which just happened to be OxyCodone; and asking for the correct cable size to hang an actual metal sign above an actual street with actual people walking under it), so I'm right there when it comes to avoiding real-world harm. But this is not the test case for the same principle when it comes to financial advicx. It doesn't even come close IMO, and I can't really recall any cases in the past of people asking screw-up-able financial questions. Franamax (talk) 01:45, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
This topic (sorry to be posting about it 5 days after the last poster) is always a little troubling to me. There are fields where the querent should clearly seek professional advice instead of asking here. Medical and legal advice are areas where it's easy to screw yourself by taking advice from non-experts, obviously. Financial advice? Sure; you could go broke. What about advice on building a house? Yeah, you could easily build something that's not to code, and your roof could fall down on you; so that, too. What about that guy Franamax mentions from a year ago or so who was trying to find out from us how to suspend a heavy sign over a road? Yeah, that guy should have gotten professional advice.
On the other hand, financial "advice" like "In the US, the S&P 500 has typically traded at about 16 times earnings over the last 50 years, so an S&P 500 index fund would seem like a good value if its P/E is at 12" is commonly seen at DIY-ish sites like fool.com. Is it so bad to post such a thing here? Personally I would hedge on even this timid of a statement, with disclaimers about past results not being a great indication of future results, especially in this economy; but that's just me.
Maybe the best route is to not expand our list of categories in which answers are forbidden, but to just note that there are many questions that demand a professional's response, or none; and editors who answer questions are expected to not answer — and even redact answers — that put people's well-being at risk. OTOH, that last phrase is very wishy washy and I'm too tired to think of the right phrasing. No direct help for people trying to hang heavy signs over a road. No direct help for people trying to decide how to invest their savings. Comet Tuttle (talk) 06:43, 28 June 2011 (UTC)
I can't. It looks like it could have been a mistake. I see you've asked him on his talk page - I suggest you wait for a response from him. We would only be guessing. --Tango (talk) 19:58, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
Discussing banned, blocked or current users in good standing on the Ref Desk.
I feel that this sets a very bad precedent. I would like to have seen a message put on the QP's page directing him/her to ask the block admin or group (with a link to that admin or group). Then the question should then be removed from the Ref Desk with no links. The answers that have been given in this case are not a problem, although there is a certain coyness to them. (I am also a little concerned about the timing given the ArbCom leaks and all that entails.) The principle of discussing users (past or present) is is one that I feel should have a bright line drawn before anyone gets to the Desk. Bielle (talk) 19:38, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
¶ Wherever (and whether) this should have been posted, it clearly didn't belong on the Ref. Desk's main pages, so I'm moving it below. —— Shakescene (talk) 20:06, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
Not just blocked, but banned. There was a lot of discussion during the first half of March on WP:ANI. He had been blocked several times for personal attacks and harassment, and I guess he laid down several final straws, which I noticed have been rev-del'd from the last page he was editing. FYI, I think this is more the kind of question you should ask a trusted admin rather than here. :) ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 05:41, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
If you look at his user page and the block log he was blocked by arbcom. There is a case here Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Rodhullandemu which concerned his administratorship but it was closed without a result because Rodhullandemu was blocked for reasons mostly unrelated to the case (as explained in the motion closing the case). I would guess as part of the case arbcom became further aware of something which made the prospect of Rodhullandemu remaining an editor at the time untenable, I think it's happened before. For privacy reasons, they are unlikely to say what the information is. If you read the discussion concerning the desysopping by arbcom which lead up to the case and Jimbo Wales's comments on the appeal (shown by the arbcom case), it's easy to guess what sort of information lead up to this decision but it would be inappropriate for us to discuss it here. Nil Einne (talk) 07:10, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
Seems to me they're trying to preserve Rod's dignity as much as possible, which is standard procedure. I've read enough of your links to convince me that Rod was, or had become, a pretty bad role model as admins go. At one time I had thought he was OK as an admin. But editors and admins alike can get burned out, and then can go off the deep end. ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 09:10, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
He? may very well have been a bad admin or even a bad editor. My point is the reason for his block appears however to have only been loosely because of this but more because arbcom had reason to believe there were issues which make him being an editor untenable both in terms of his ability to conduct himself in the manner expected of an editor and in whether it was a good idea for his personal wellbeing to be an editor. Nil Einne (talk) 17:07, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
If you can't ask the question except as a brand-new IP, I suggest the answer is yes, it still does, but the link on the OP's page could be to the article. Bielle (talk) 20:40, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
Sorry I don't have an account, didn't think it was mandatory; indeed my editing right now proves it isn't. I had a question about the topic you brought up and I posted it. I don't see how having or not having an extensive edit count is pertains to your topic or my question. 109.210.251.230 (talk) 20:46, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
It isn't mandatory. It is, however, unusual (a)that the first edit of a new IP would be to this talk page -which is generally difficult to find unless you know the site really well and (b) about an internal controversy. No doubt you have your reasons. Bielle (talk) 21:26, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
Does that mean that anonymous users are expected to lose their knowledge of Wikipedia when their IP address changes (or when they create an account)? Peter E. James (talk) 22:08, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
In what way did I pretend to be new? My post was well formatted and signed, I conveyed my familiarity with Wikipedia clearly by using phrases such as "notable editor", and showed knowledge of past Wikipedia internal incidents. The picture you are trying to paint of me is a false one. 109.210.251.230 (talk) 22:43, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
Incidents for which there are only reliable references within Wikipedia, or for which the answers can only be found in Wikipedia (such as the one that was removed), are probably not suitable topics for discussion on the reference desks, but I don't think there is a reason to exclude notable topics just because they are related to Wikipedia (with the possible exception of current events, as there may be more suitable places to discuss them). Peter E. James (talk) 22:08, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
I almost said in that discussion, "is this really the right place for this?" but I couldn't think of an alternative. Given the posting the OP put on my page this morning, I don't have a lot of confidence in the OP's sincerity in raising the question. ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 22:13, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
Wikipedia doesn't have a noticeboard for general discussion of editors. The obvious suggestion is to follow the links, and maybe ask the relevant administrator (or the Arbitration Committee) - but on this occasion the information was not published (apparently intentionally) so it's possible that no more information will be provided. Peter E. James (talk) 23:19, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
If you post any answer and leave the question, it will become a discussion, guaranteed. I am strongly in favour of removing the temptation to discuss people on the project at any of the Ref Desks. There may also be BLP considerations. 03:35, 27 June 2011 (UTC)
My first reaction to all this was: Of course people should be able to ask Wikipedia-related questions like this on the Reference Desk. I think the main objection people have to it would be that it turns the Reference Desk into an inappropriate forum for discussion of blocked users? Comet Tuttle (talk) 06:29, 28 June 2011 (UTC)
The ref desk, as I understand it, was kind of a spinoff from the help desk. I don't see any harm, in general, with asking questions about wikipedia here, although some questions might be better directed elsewhere, and sometimes have been in fact. Questions about other users, however, should activate your radar. ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 05:02, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
But do we even use these colors anymore? If we did, should we still? Would people reaching us from search results appreciate not seeing nonsense that we aren't even using?
Every reference desk category page has the exact same header except for the following:
the "Welcome to the…" text
which item in the right-side nav is bolded
the shortcut
the "ask a new question" button
Do we really need more than TEN templates to accomplish this? I'm thinking not.
Just thought I'd let the community know about my project. Please do help in any way you can. I will be working on this over the next couple weeks. All I ask is that you let me create the actual article. Any mistakes I have made do not need to be pointed out, simply revised. Have a great day Wikipedians! Schyler(one language)21:17, 2 July 2011 (UTC)
Two posters put the answer there anyway, after the dyoh template was added. Is there any reason not to redact such answers ? StuRat (talk) 04:51, 28 June 2011 (UTC)
Did you even read the page that your template cites (which, by the way, is neither policy nor guideline). I'll help you out:
Volunteers will guide you to a relevant article or online resource, or help you work out the answer.
If we look at what the actual editing guideline has to say, we see that
It should be made clear to questioners that we will give assistance in interpreting questions, help with ideas and concepts, and attempt to point them to resources that might help them to complete their tasks, but that in the end they should do the actual work themselves
I did not provide an answer with no explanation. I provided a reliable source (a "resource that might help them to complete their tasks") that, yes, did contain the answer to this question, but also contained additional information about this topic, exactly like StuRat's non-policy, non-guideline page suggests we do, and exactly as the actual editing guidelines suggest I do. I did exactly what the reference desk is for: I provided a reliable source about the topic at hand. Buddy431 (talk) 05:05, 28 June 2011 (UTC)
Honestly, I don't see anything wrong with Buddy's response. He specifically didn't answer the question, but did provide a link where the student could find the answer themselves. I don't see where that is against the DYOH practice. Also, DYOH isn't a directive we can enforce against other Wikipedia users to our own standards. Most ref desk regulars don't answer obvious homework questions with simple, direct answers, but forcing this standard on everyone, to the point of redacting good-faith answers, seems a bit rude. --Jayron3205:35, 28 June 2011 (UTC)
All the student had to do was pick Buddy's link and read the title to get the answer. How is that "doing your own homework" ? They learn nothing from that, including how to do web searches. StuRat (talk) 12:38, 28 June 2011 (UTC)
I always assumed that the interpretation of the "We don't do your homework" dictum was "you shouldn't ask", not, "volunteers are prohibited from answering". —Steve Summit (talk) 13:43, 28 June 2011 (UTC)
Wow pretty big double standard here: It is not ok to violate DYOH, yet it's perfectly acceptable to breach the "Don't edit others' questions or answers" part of the editing guideline. Royor (talk) 17:54, 28 June 2011 (UTC)
Redacting is not editing. The concern with editing is that you may change what somebody said to mean something else. StuRat (talk) 18:28, 28 June 2011 (UTC)
I think your missing the point. For starters that link has nothing to do with wikipedia policy or guidelines. More importantly editing someone's post in such a way that you may change the meaning is generally veborten (and there have been nasty disputes over this in the past) since posts are signed so you risk putting words into someone's mouth. If you completely remove the post that's not the same thing and not the primary purpose of the guidelines (which are wikipedia wide). Similar to when you redact specific parts making it clear the info was redact. As I say repeatedly whenever this comes up, we in fact do it all the time on the RD with things varying from medical/legal advice questions and answers to email address often without any dispute or discussion. Note this doesn't mean I think it was a good idea, I'm not getting involved in that part of the dispute in this instance. Nil Einne (talk) 09:25, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
Your (sic) still missing the point about it not being the form of editing that is intended to be covered by the prohibition on editing someone elses (sic) comments so whether true or not it's not germane to the discussion (which explains why you're linking to an article an note a policy page or guideline). Technically the bots (sic) archiving can also be considered a form of editing someone elses (sic) comments but again, not germane to the discussion. And to be blunt, Il'l (sic) do what I want. I do normally make an effort to prevent errors but they happen. And if your'e (sic) going to continue to be annoying about it, Im' (sic) going to reduce my efforts. Not because of WP:POINT but because you make me feel I should'nt (sic) bother. Since why waste my time when all its' (sic) doing is making people like you more pleased!? (sic) Which in case its' (sic) not clear, comments like that reduce the chance I will want to do so. And I was one of the few who has generally opposed any attempts to ban or sanction you for this sort of thing..!. (sic) Nil Einne (talk) 12:50, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
¶ Just because it's in a multiple-choice form doesn't necessarily mean it's homework or (worse) an academic test or quiz. It could also be a recreational quiz, or perhaps one from a site discussing the rights of women around the world. (And the answers that were edited out might be of general interest to many other readers and editors, as might any answers to the more-obviously homework question on War poets, where I told the enquirer to read the articles he or she had so carefully wiki-linked.) —— Shakescene (talk) 21:51, 28 June 2011 (UTC)
I think (as you might have guessed) that it's goofy to try to over-enforce this guideline as if it were some liability issue like medical advice or legal advice. Certainly not worth repeatedly deleting a reference provided by an established contributor!
I think Buddy's answer was within the spirit of the guideline , even if the multiple choice question made it difficult.
As Demiurge1000 pointed out, a moment's Google search could have provided the same answer, so even if you believed supplying the reference broke the guideline (because of the multiple choice nature of the question) the "danger" to the OP's education by buddy's answer is extraordinarily low. Not worth censoring another contributor.
APL (talk) 02:41, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
I haven't been involved in this dispute. But I will note from a quick look the IP is in the range (same geolocation and everything) commonly used by the well known persistent German troll who likes to ask stupid questions about why X can't be a word in language A as well as other questions that are either unanswerable or very difficult to answer (and also vandalise the encyclopaedia proper). Perhaps asking very easy to answer homework questions is their latest modus operandi. Nil Einne (talk) 09:21, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
I do not support redacting answers to supposed homework questions. For me, it's fine to decide not to answer a home work question. It's fine to post a DYOH. And it's fine to post an answer if you so choose. It is not fine for answers to be removed by third parties merely because they have particular views on answering homework questions. No policy exists that I'm aware of to support a ban on answering supposed homework questions. In general, posters to the RDs are better off respecting the answers that other give than setting themselves up as the grand Panjandrum of the RDs. --Tagishsimon(talk)12:24, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
I agree. The wording, "It should be made clear to questioners...in the end they should do the actual work themselves" is a guideline for what editors *should* do, not what they should not do. A redaction is a correction for something that should not have been done and is therefore inappropriate. Wikiant (talk) 13:15, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
I am happy to do people's homework for them, so far as pedagogical principles go. I fear only the effect on the ref desks, which, if we routinely did homework for students, would become clogged with homework questions, which are execrably boring things, which is why I disapprove of the whole institution of homework in the first place. It would be nice if the template didn't extol on my behalf a philosophy I don't agree with - the statements may be true as far as they go, but I think you will learn most of all if you get somebody else to do your homework, while you go and do something that interests you - and it would be nice if it didn't claim it was a policy, or even a rule, or implicitly a thing done by all right-thinking persons and violated only by naughty renegades. I'd like a template which says something more pragmatic, like "homework sucks - don't dump it on us", phrased somehow nicelier. Card Zero (talk)16:16, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
I've been royally pissed off a few times when an obvious homework question has been asked, I've posted a DYOH, and then another editor has come along and given the answer anyway; the very answer that I've told the OP we would not be giving. That shows a colossal disrespect of one's fellow editors (it's OK, though, if another editor disagrees with my assessment that the question is actually homework, and says so before giving their answer). But I think I'd be even more annoyed if I had given an answer and then another editor removed it. -- Jack of Oz[your turn]16:31, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
Well, I get the opposite: it pisses me off that, once the template is used, if I go ahead and answer the questions anyway (out of a spirit of solidarity with those stuck with nasty homework), I will look bad, like I'm opposed to learning and possibly a troll. I don't think I should answer them anyway, though, for the purely practical reason that it would turn the fascinating ref desks into a tedious homework-doing service. It's not actually disrespecting one's fellow editors to have a philosophical disagreement with them about the worth of being didactic - though I can see how it might come off that way, in the absence of explanation for one's actions. Card Zero (talk)16:34, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
That's my point exactly, Card Zero. Often, a whole pile of trouble can be avoided if people take a little extra effort to communicate why they're doing what they're doing, where the absence of such an explanation could reasonably cause offence. There can still be disagreement about whether or not the action is justified, but that's a different ball game and is played on a completely different emotional level, than the issue of people's noses being put out of joint by being apparently ignored. -- Jack of Oz[your turn]16:55, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
Communication high five. I suddenly find the issue seems substantially less important, somehow. I would love to do some radical pruning of the template, though. Card Zero (talk)17:18, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
I think Jack of Oz raises a very good issue, and it brings up the actual problem, which has nothing to do with whether it is just and proper to answer homework questions. The real issue at debate here is whether it is just and proper to contradict, redact, remove, edit, or otherwise countermand the actions of another editor without also having a good reason to do so and to explain the reason for doing so. Therefore BOTH of the following actions are wrong:
It is wrong to answer a question someone else has declined answering with the DYOH template (or a self-written response saying "please don't ask homework questions, we won't answer them) without a qualifying statement such as "Sorry, Jack, I don't see this as a homework question, so I hope you understand if I answer it" or "I understand this is a homework question, so I am not going to answer it directly, however it may be informative for the OP if they read articles X, Y, and Z and get the answer themselves." In other words, acknowledge that someon else has assessed the question as a homework question before you got there, have some common decency and at least acknowledge that they have left a response, don't just directly ignore or countermand their response as though they don't matter, or as though the DYOH "practice" isn't worth dealing with.
It is also wrong to remove the good-faith answers of other users except in VERY narrowly defined areas, medical advice, legal advice, clear BLP vios, etc. These specific and narrowly defined areas have clear justifications for removal of comments, and the fact that sometimes it is clearly appropriate to remove a person's comment doesn't mean that it is open season on removing comments simply because we don't like the response. That means that if Jack leaves a DYOH template, and Bugs goes ahead and answer the question anyways, even if Bugs was rude in ignoring Jack's DYOH template, and this is very important, it does not justify compounding the rudeness by removing Bugs's answert. Rudeness does not itself justify more rudeness, it only makes everyone else feel worse. The better way to handle this is either at the personal user talk page of the person who commited the act of rudeness, or if we must, perhaps here at the RD talk pages. It isn't ever acceptable for parents to have the fights in front of the kids, if you catch my drift, and question askers who show up here looking for honest help in answering their questions deserve better than to see us fighting about who is more wrong in answering or not answering or removing or not removing answers to questions.
In conclusion, my belief is this: It is wrong to ignore when somebody has denied a question as being a possible homework question, and it is just as wrong to remove answers which are given in defiance of the DYOH policy. What should be done is to reduce the overall tension at the ref desks, and instead go back to being helpful, whatever each of us decides being helpful means, without also imposing our own personal views of helpfulness on people who have different opinions than us. --Jayron3218:10, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
I largely agree with Jayron32 here. In particular while I didn't want to get in to this yesterday removing homework answers just for being homework answers seem a rather bad idea. Nil Einne (talk) 12:50, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
Suggested template change
How does this grab you, my didactic friends?
Welcome to Wikipedia. Your question appears to be a homework question. I apologize if that is a misinterpretation. Most editors here will not do people's homework for them, but will merely aid them in doing it themselves, reasoning that letting someone else do your homework does not help you learn nearly as much as doing it yourself.
The rest of the template would continue as before. The point of my changes:
It no longer claims to be a policy, so that's a source of contention out the window for starters.
It acknowledges that there is some dissent, so an editor such as Jack won't feel slapped in the face by some contrary editor such as, maybe, me, defying the rule in the same thread. Though I would tend not to, for reasons I've already given.
I see that there was a debate last month at Wikipedia_talk:Do_your_own_homework about whether the template should include the word "policy" or not, and the conclusion was clear that it shouldn't, although nobody actually rewrote the template, and it still says "policy". (I arrived at this thread from there, rather than the other way round, and I don't mean to derail the discussion about deleting other people's edits: hence, this new section.)
I like that proposal, but I'd put it a little bit differently...
Welcome to Wikipedia. Your question appears to be a homework question. I apologize if that is a misinterpretation. Most editors here will not simply answer homework questions for you, but prefer you to explain where you run into difficulty, so that they can help you learn the basic concepts you need to do it yourself.
I think that the propensity for people to answer homework questions is innately self-limiting - if many people start posting these questions, inevitably the answers will become less convenient. Wnt (talk) 18:18, 4 July 2011 (UTC)
Mention of images in header
Why on earth does the RD header say this:
The following images are being used under the GNU FDL and/or the CC-BY-SA license:
P computing.svg, P physics.svg, P mathematics.svg, P question.svg, P art.png, P literature.svg, P music.svg, P archive.svg
I agree it is very silly. I imagine it is done because you can't click through to the images themselves? But it is still very silly. --Mr.98 (talk) 00:18, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
I agree with the comments in the discussion linked above. Annoying it may be but necessary. The obvious solution would be either to find some images with less conditions e.g. without an attribution requirement at a minimum or ask the original contributor if they are willing to relicence their images as such Nil Einne (talk) 12:36, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
Surely we can do something a little more elegant, like something that just says: "Icon copyright status"? I don't see why we have to have all of that information linked to on every instance of the header, when our only "requirement" (if indeed it is a real one) is to make that information easily accessible. We can make it accessible without it being ugly. (Of course, I cannot do that, because the template in question is totally locked.) --Mr.98 (talk) 15:14, 1 July 2011 (UTC)
This page exists in order to comply with the licensing requirements of these images. As they are displayed on the header template, it is difficult to figure out their copyright status. If you have any questions about this page, please ask them at Wikipedia talk:Reference desk.
And then we've solved the problem without this goofy (and potentially confusing) list of images and licenses on every Ref Desk header. Anybody in favor? Any admin want to implement this? Alternatively, we could just make the copyright status link go to a subsection of the talk page, or something like that. Or just post the copyright info at the top of this talk page. But anything's better than the existing way, which is very ugly and much too verbose for the header. --Mr.98 (talk) 17:22, 1 July 2011 (UTC)
As Special:WhatLinksHere/Wikipedia:Reference desk/RD header/GNU shows, Wikipedia:Reference desk/RD header/GNU only appears on Wikipedia:Reference desk and Wikipedia:Reference desk/all (which is very unwieldy anyway so I suspect not used much) and a few other odd places not the header of each page. I'm pretty sure this isn't new since I've never seen it on the header of each page. The icons of course don't appear on the header of each page. In other words, if you want to change it go ahead. However I don't see why it's such a big deal since it doesn't occur on the header of each page as you've claimed but instead at the only occurence likely to be encountered (i.e. WP:RD) it's below most of the important stuff.
Note as I already said, this isn't primarily about making it easy for people to find the copyright status. Rather the images require attribution and it's questionable of we are really providing attribution in a resonable manner (as required by the licence) if there is no way anyone can find that attribution without some understanding of the underlying way wikipedia works. (GFDL also requires all changes to be logged and for the licence do be displayed and I also suspect it's questionable if these are met if there's nearly no way someone can find the image page without someunderstanding of how wikipedia works although of course we don't have to met the terms of both licences just one.)
Looking at a bunch of contributions from 188.28.*.* and 188.29.*.*, I'm seeing a lot of questions and replies that make me think we should be talking to this person - unfortunately, due to their IP hopping (which looks like it's due to them accessing via 3G) this is obviously difficult. Their "I don't believe in mathematics" question started off looking sadly legitimate, but pretty much the rest of their posts put them firmly on the disruptive side of things to me. What's the current policy regarding people like these, besides not feeding them and occasionally accusing them of being a known troll? Confusing Manifestation(Say hi!) 23:45, 4 July 2011 (UTC)
Date section headers?
We don't appear to have date section headers for 5th July, and the 6th is nearly upon us. I'd add them manually, but I don't want to break anything. Tevildo (talk) 23:39, 5 July 2011 (UTC)
I've often added date section headers manually. It doesn't break anything. Just make sure they have a single equals sign on each side thus: =July 5=. Angr (talk) 05:12, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
Scsbot (talk·contribs) normally takes care of such things, but sometimes it disappears for a day or two without explanation. In that case, if I see the header is missing, I'll just add it like this the last time I noticed it. Astronaut (talk) 15:11, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
Confusing feature of Reference Desk page organisation
Hi, I find it confusing that earlier sections of the main RD pages are transcluded archived pages. When you go to edit one of these sections there is initially no indication of this (unless you happen to notice the full path in the "Editing ..." heading, which of course no one ever would). Then, when you save, you're thrown out to a "Welcome to the Wikipedia Language Reference Desk Archives" which is completely unexpected and disorientating. It would be so much simpler if the main RD page was just the main RD page, and things were put on the archived pages when they got moved off the main page after x days. Is there any way this can be fixed? Alternatively, is there any possible reason why the current scheme is a good idea? 86.160.214.46 (talk) 20:12, 7 July 2011 (UTC)
The reason it's done that way is because of size. Otherwise, when editing an entire week's worth of questions at once (which, unfortunately, happens automatically when an edit conflict occurs on a section edit), the amount of data would lock up some browsers. I do agree that they need to both fix that edit conflict behavior and, if possible, return you to the page from which you entered edit mode, once you leave edit mode. StuRat (talk) 20:20, 7 July 2011 (UTC)
I know it kind of blew my mind the first time this happened to me. Basically, I was like, "How did I end up here???" Maybe there could be a more overt FYI for newbies. Of course, once you know what's going on, you know it. It's just that first time that throws you. ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 20:22, 7 July 2011 (UTC)
Perhaps a group editnotice could be added for the archive subpages. That would display a message above the edit window when editing the archives and let people know they're not editing the actual desks. AvrillirvA (talk) 20:28, 7 July 2011 (UTC)
The other thing that I didn't realize at first is that even though the main RD page is on your watchlist, the archive page isn't, which means neither what you just wrote nor any answers to it will be on your watchlist unless you specifically add the archive page to it. And you're not terribly likely to get any answers, because it isn't on anyone else's watchlist either, so no one knows you just made a comment. Angr (talk) 06:39, 8 July 2011 (UTC)
They will know, if they scan through the RD page and see the update. And if they respond, the archive page will go on their watchlist, just as it will go on the watchlist of the one who made the update. But you're right, it won't show on the watchlisted RD page, so it's much less likely to get a response from someone who's only going by the watchlist. ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 07:11, 8 July 2011 (UTC)
Removed questions
I removed the trolling questions "fish vs humans" and "eco wise inventions" by IP 41.18.78.100. I hope the following who gave good faith responses don't mind: Baseball Bugs, Shantavira, Static, Mr 98, Richard Avery, Bus stop, Chemicalinterest. Looie496 has removed[6] another question by the same troll. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 00:53, 7 July 2011 (UTC)
User:Bielle has been giving me a hard time in my latest question the Reference Desk (the one about New York). I deleted most of his posts (he keeps bringing them back though) because I found them rude, contained personal attacks, did not assume good faith, and so did not provide any help, all of which are against Wikipedia's policies. Willminator (talk) 02:52, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
I have re-undone your deletion of the Bielle's comment. Do not remove the posts of other editors. As a side issue, s/he has a point. Matt Deres (talk) 04:24, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
I don't know what you mean by that, but even if he or she may or may not have a point, that doesn't change the fact that he or she was being disrespectful. He or she called me a "sis." By the way, my deletion included my comments too, and it is my question. Why can't I delete things that include my comments, that don't help the question out? Willminator (talk) 13:54, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
Thank you, Larry Mac for letting me know about this discussion. Willminator, when you write about another user's work or behaviour, Wikipedia asks that you notify that editor on his/her talk page with a link to the discussion. Larry Mac has done that for you. You also need to be accurate in your reporting, backed up your claims by links to the content or behaviour. Rather than "keeps bringing them back" as you state above, I had, at the time of your writing, reverted your removal exactly once, here. Matt Deres has now also explained to you why above. The "sis", I explained in the last sentence of this diff to be a response to your prior use of "bro".
Larry Mac, by his link to the Ref Desk Guidelines, and Matt Deres, by direct comment above, have re-iterated my edit summary the first time I revert your removal of my posts to the Ref Desk. You do not remove the posts of other editors from the Ref Desk. If you wish to remove your own posts, a strikeout is the preferred method, so as not to make nonsense of any follow-up posts. You have again deleted my posts here and I have put them back here. Please do not delete them again; you may find yourself looking at a block. Bielle (talk) 16:13, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
Jimbo isn't going to involve himself in this. Your best option is to move on and act as though this series of events has no great significance in the greater story of your life. If you lack the basic skills to be able to do that, WP:DR is the other route. But it will not be as satisfying a result for you as "forgetting about it and moving on", which always universally produces good results in matters like this. --Jayron3216:40, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
Shouldn't I change or edit and editor's comment if they violate any Wikipedia policy? On Wikipedia:Five pillars, read pillars 2 and to some extent 4, and let me know what you think. When I think that there is an editor violating Wikipedia's policies, I take that seriously. I know that Jimbo will do what he thinks is right whether he decides to do something or not. Willminator (talk) 18:27, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
No, you shouldn't change other people's comments. If people do something offensive, it reflects badly only upon them singularly, so there's no need to alter their comments. You can respond to people's comments in an appropriate forum, you can ask them to strikethru and/or alter their own comments, but you cannot summarily remove their comments merely because it offends you. You aren't the "5 pillars Police" and enforcing your own personal view of what the 5 pillars means isn't productive. Just let other people be a problem, and work hard not to be one yourself. That's all you should do. If it reaches the level of being disruptive, bring the issue up in a forum like WP:DRN or something like that, but if you're the only one who seems bothered, maybe it's you... --Jayron3218:35, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
Ok, I've sent her a message in her talk page asking her if she could strike out the comments. Thanks for all your help. I appreciate it. Willminator (talk) 18:51, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
Willminator has been busy this afternoon: 10 edits to my talk page since I wandered AFK around 13:00 EDT and a further 8 to this section of this page, most of which he has now retracted. I think the upshot is that he confesses to having removed not just my comments, but also one of Googlemeister'shere which he hasn't restored. He seems to think I should make the restoration in some manner unknown to me that would subsequently delete all my comments and his related ones, too. At some stage after asking me to strikeout my comments and his (which is a request apart from his contention that by restoring Googlemeister's edit, these same edits would be deleted) he got impatient with my failure to respond -some of us have lives- and decided to do the strikeouts himself.
I am disinclined to strikeout anything, and especially given what has happened this afternoon, and inclined to remove Willimator's strikeout; however, I am open to counsel and comments. (I will notify Willimator of this comment as soon as it is posted.) Bielle (talk) 03:18, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
Counsel for you is the same as I counseled him: That you go away from the issue for a few hours to give yourself a clear head, and so you can properly formulate a plan on how to proceed, and then accidentally forget that plan and go about the rest of your business at Wikipedia. Conflict does not end when one person comes up with some new way to make their side of the arguement, or when one person comes up with some action to commit that will somehow ameliorate the wrongs of their opponent. Conflict only ends when one person in the conflict walks away and forgets about the entire thing. If this were a matter of significant importance, like a conflict over article text or a content dispute, it would be worthwhile to bring in extra people and work it out. This, however is petty bickering over literally nothing of any import at ALL. Just stop dealing with it and do something else. --Jayron3203:28, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
It looks like the OP has now removed himself, along with a lot of his recent posts, with the Edit summary "Taking my ball and going home. Wikipedia never fails in its quest to alienate, infuriate, and piss off participants". Oh well, life goes on. HiLo48 (talk) 04:48, 12 July 2011 (UTC)
I read the brain ping item & was composing a brief reply when it was deleted. My reply, such as it was, could never be mistaken for medical advice.
I've also read another recent item on the Science desk, "Question about scintilating scotoma", & note that two respondents discuss the "scintilating scotoma" phenomenon but specifically make the point that they will not give medical advice.
Why could not the brain ping item have been dealt with the same way? That is, discuss the phenomenon but stop short of giving medical advice (which imo the OP did not ask for.) Thanks, Wanderer57 (talk) 14:23, 12 July 2011 (UTC)
Describing the phenomenon is equivalent to diagnosing the questioner as having the phenomenon. The difference is clear. If I ask "What is a migrane?" and I avoid explaining that I have pains that I think are migranes and I want to know what they are because I want to diagnose my pains, then I am asking a simple question. If, instead, I explain that I have pains that I think they are migranes and I want help diagnosing my pains, then I am asking for medical advice. Many people argue that it is an argument of semantics, but pretty much all of law is an argument of semantics: Is it illegal to kill a person? What if the killer is in the military? What if the victim is also in the military? What if they are in the same military unit? What if the victim fired first? You can spend a lifetime arguing what is right and wrong. -- kainaw™16:14, 12 July 2011 (UTC)
I agree with Kainaw. In this case he's not asking about a particular medical problem. He's describing a set of symptoms, and asking us to tell him what medical issue (if any) those symptoms match. There's no way to provide a useful answer without first diagnosing his symptoms.
Thank you both. So, to paraphrase what I think you mean, if someone names a specific "medical condition" (for want of a better term) and asks about it, it is (probably) okay to answer (depending what they ask). But if they describe symptoms, it is out of bounds because replying could be construed as giving a diagnosis. Wanderer57 (talk) 01:41, 13 July 2011 (UTC)
That has been my understanding. With the one caveat that "I have condition X, what would be the best way for me to treat it?" is also a medical advice question, even though it contains no diagnosis, because it asks us to prescribe a treatment. These are usually easier to spot. ("I have condition X, what are some common treatments?" is theoretically ok.) APL (talk) 03:39, 13 July 2011 (UTC)
I use Kainaw's criterion as a basis for deciding what is or is not a request for medical advice. It is one of the few semi-intelligent things that idiot has written here. -- kainaw™14:29, 14 July 2011 (UTC)
I personally think this "medical diagnosis" stuff is being seriously overused. We should not be recommending any sort of treatment for a perceived problem, but I don't see why we should be forbidden to discuss anything that has the slightest relationship to human physiology. In this case, I don't see what harm would have been done by pointing the OP to our article on hypnic jerks, a well-known phenomenon with somewhat similar features. Looie496 (talk) 04:03, 13 July 2011 (UTC)
Directing the OP to a page on something which doesn't seem to be what they are experiencing is one of the reasons we don't like to give medical advice Nil Einne (talk) 09:22, 14 July 2011 (UTC)
It's not advice. It's objective and neutral information. IIRC Wikipedia's mission is to make that free to everybody. The name for restricting access to information on the reasoning "we have it but have decided that you aren't fit to have it" is censorship. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 13:48, 14 July 2011 (UTC)
By suggesting a page or any information, you are diagnosing the problem. Example: Some guy says "I have bad headaches." You say "Look at the migraines page." He does, decides he has a migraine, takes some tylenol, and dies a few days later from a bleeding concussion. Without doing a physical exam (in person), it is not acceptable to diagnose a person. -- kainaw™14:25, 14 July 2011 (UTC)
I think Nil's point was that hypnic jerk was not what the OP was asking about, but another condition entirely. Our ability to not correctly interpret what someone has said is yet another reason why providing advice is not a good idea. Matt Deres (talk) 17:00, 14 July 2011 (UTC)
(outdent) The discussion in Kainaw's criterion says that it isn't "against the guidelines to ask a medical question. It (is) against policy to answer a request for medical advice." If this is so, is the proper response, to a medical question that would require medical advice to answer fully, a) to delete the question or b) to leave the question in place but add a note that it cannot be answered due to policy? Wanderer57 (talk) 17:33, 14 July 2011 (UTC)
As demonstrated in multiple tests in the past years, if a question is left, it will be answered. Even if you collapse it and slap a big warning on it, it will be answered. The more you do to tell people that they shouldn't answer the question, the more likely it is that the question will be answered due to the general "You can't tell me what to do!" attitude of many editors. So, the absolute only way to avoid having users offer up their own medical advice is to completely delete the question. -- kainaw™20:06, 14 July 2011 (UTC)
The point I was trying to make is that this policy is being enforced with a rigor that sometimes approaches ridiculous. Query: When I run fast for a while, I start breathing hard; why does that happen? Answer: Sorry, we can't give medical advice. There must be some way to avoid descending to that level. Looie496 (talk) 03:11, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
I strongly disagree with the idea of farming people. If someone says they have bad headaches, it's alright to direct them to an article on migraines. They'll read it and maybe they have migraines and will be helped, or maybe they'll see their headaches are clearly not migraines and get attention. We can't be responsible for any rare mishap that occurs - we have to have faith that by and large giving people access to information is helping. We just have to not misrepresent ourselves as knowing what the person has, or able to know. We should not ever accept the arguments of those who claim that it is a bad thing to give people access to information.
There is a war between the sick and the medical cartel which seeks to keep the sick entirely dependent on them for effective treatment, drugs, and if they had their way, even traditional herbal medicines and basic medical information. Currently it is a mostly economic war, with a large number of people eventually getting treatment at the cost of a large portion of their total wealth. I suspect it may be more likely than not, as intellectual property claims become more expansive and access to medicine for the poor becomes prohibited, this will slowly intensify into an actual shooting war, where hospitals are seen as guarded bastions of the wealthy and the mob turns out to cheer in jubilation each time one is truck-bombed. But such a future is opposed when people take control of the information, find alternative means of medicine, pirate the medicines, sap and weaken the monopolies, and eventually break down the bureaucracy entirely. Wnt (talk) 13:00, 19 July 2011 (UTC)
There's a difference between providing information and providing medical advice, but the line is very blurry. And because the consequences of incorrect medical advice are so dire, we should be extremely strict about it. There's a difference between "what causes severe headaches?" and "I have severe headaches, what could be the cause?" The former is a reasonable question (though they'll probably just get linked to Headache), while the latter is a request for advice that we should not give.
It may seem silly but, it's better to be overly strict than to give poor advice that injures or kills someone. I know it's anecdotal but, I work in an emergency department. You cannot rely on someone to make a reasonable decision about their health unless you've got them in the room to examine. We give zero medical advice over the phone precisely because people don't always tell you the full story and you don't know their medical history (which influences proper diagnosis). — The Hand That Feeds You:Bite12:19, 20 July 2011 (UTC)
This particular "question", or more accurately, petition for advice is particularly troubling for me. Technically, it has no place on Wikipedia, but I also feel like this in particular requires a different level of disgression, as to what answers should be given, what is appropriate, what is too little, and what is too much. Therefore, I wanted to post here that this issue is present, and would also encourage people to let me (or anybody else for that matter) know if you feel that our responses are not appropriate, especially in light of the nature of it being the Wikipedia Reference Desk. I obviously hope for a good resolution, but I also am very aware that ethically and practically, I am very limited as to what I can say here. Does anybody have any thoughts on the matter? Falconusptc02:31, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
Yeah. I encourage you to be a little more cynical. Most of the time when people ask strangers for advice, they know what kind of advice they want and frame the question in a way that will provoke you into giving that advice. Looie496 (talk) 02:44, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
It has been collapsed, so is no longer an issue. Looie, "be more cynical" is hardly helpful advice, I believe that we are called by the guidelines to Assume Good Faith, are we not? Falconusptc03:59, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
You should also remember to assume the assumption of good faith; there's no need to cite WP:AGF to experienced editors who are certainly already aware of it. Moreover, WP:AGF isn't a suicide pact—it doesn't require us to abandon our common sense at the door. In general, I've found that most of the folks here are willing to bend over backwards to help people asking questions—until we get the impression that someone is asking us to bend over forwards. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 16:36, 19 July 2011 (UTC)
Side discussion from "animal attacks" thread
I have collapsed the irrelevent side discussion regarding US-centrism at the "animal attacks" thread. The principals are free to continue the discussion here; if they feel the need to, but the discussion was doing absolutely nothing to help the OP get an answer to their earnest question. Please don't "fight in front of the children", if people must have a debate regarding meta-issues over the scope and nature of answers provided on the ref desks, have them here out of public view, and not in the actual threads where well meaning people come to get their questions answered, and not have to weed through silly debates over Wikipedia politics. People deserve better than that. Again, feel free to continue the discussion here, or perhaps on one of the user talk pages of the participants, but in the main refdesk the disscusssion was inappropriate. --Jayron3204:58, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
The discussion so far is reproduced here, then continues:
You guys are just begging to be taken to task by HiLo48 for the US-centricism apparent here. Many other countries have states. And whole countries themselves are referred to as states. -- Jack of Oz[your turn]03:39, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
The OP's IP geolocates to Athens, Georgia. The United States is the most logical conclusion to the OP's use of the word "state". The respondents shouldn't be chided. If anyone should be admonished, it's the OP. But then we'd be accused of biting newcomers... Dismas|(talk)03:52, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
I have no interest in checking out OPs' geolocality, nor should it ever be necessary. If they specify a place in their question, fine. If not, I generally take questions at face value. I might sometimes be astute enough to believe they're casting their net too widely and are really only interested in a smaller area or set of data or whatever, but I would always check in with them about that, rather than assuming my assumptions are correct about their precise interest. -- Jack of Oz[your turn]04:05, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
But why? Seriously, why? If I went to a real life library ref desk and asked some vaguely worded question, would the librarian just spout out a whole pile of stuff they assumed was relevant, or would they check with me first about exactly where/what/who I'm interested in. If the OP went to a US library and asked the above question, it would be more than fair enough for the librarian to believe and assume he was interested only in US states. But this is not a US library. Our OPs have some responsibility to tell us what we need to know to answer their questions properly. And it's not our responsibility to go digging around in the ether to discover what we can about where they're located or anything else about them. We're here to be of service, but that doesn't mean slavery; the OPs have to play their part too. -- Jack of Oz[your turn]04:35, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
I agree with you about the real life librarian scenario but here we don't have that instantaneous feedback. The OP may ask a question and then not come back for a day. And when they come back, what would be better? We answer their question with a question of clarification or we answer what we think they want to know and then they can clarify based on that? There are quite a few people who may be ignorant of the fact that these questions are not answered solely by US Americans. Just look at how many don't read the instructions and then post their contact details. Including phone numbers at times! Dismas|(talk)04:53, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
"There are quite a few people who may be ignorant of the fact that these questions are not answered solely by US Americans." - wasn't that sort of my point? This reveals the US-centricism I'm talking about, and that it's not just confined to the OPs. OPs either consciously assume that we're a US-focussed organisation, or they never think about it at all and just take it for granted, as if the USA is the world, or as much of the world that's ever really necessary to think about. We do Wikipedia a disservice by just buying into such assumptions; we allow ourselves to be taken for granted. From the respondents' side, questions about presidents are always assumed to be about the US president unless otherwise specified; questions about governments are always assumed to be about the US government unless otherwise specified; and so on and on. The USA is the world's default nation, it seems. Even aliens seem to think so too, because 99% of all movies depicting visitations from other planets show them arriving on the White House lawns or nearby. But those movies are all made in the USA, you cry. So what, I retort. Next time, the OP will ask another question about states, and they'll now have a reasonable basis for believing they don't need to specify which states they're talking about, because we legitimised their non-specificity this time round. (Btw, my apologies to HiLo48 for attributing this issue to him - this one is entirely my own rant, but I suspect he'd know where I'm coming from.) -- Jack of Oz[your turn]05:40, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
So why not through in something like "Assuming that you're referring to the US..." or "Being from Australia..." to cut off the reinforcement? I admit it happens but I don't know how much of an effect you'll have on the general perception of WP for these people. Dismas|(talk)05:48, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
Those sorts of conditionals are absolutely fine by me. Much of the time they'll be spot on, and it's all plain sailing. But they do need to actually be spelt out, so that everyone's on the same page. Questions on the ref desk involve more than just the OP and whoever's doing the answering. There are also zillions of readers, including other ref desk regulars. They are all part of the "audience", in a sense. The responses are directed to the OP, who's the immediate audience, but they should be framed with the listeners/readers in mind. Because it's just as easy to offend these supposedly uninvolved parties as it is to offend the main players in a particular thread. Spelling out assumptions (and sometimes even why you've made such an assumption) go a long way to heading off such offence before it gets a chance to take hold, -- Jack of Oz[your turn]06:07, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
OK, just discovered this discussion. I just find it amusing that I'm seen as the champion on US-centrism around here. But US-centrism IS an issue. Like Jack, I'm Australian. Just like the USA, we have states, a (federal) government, schools, police, etc. (We don't have a president, yet.) Many other countries have similar overlaps with America. Many questions are asked on the reference desks that use one or more of those common term without specifying a country. It's possible to assume that the questioner is referring to the USA, but to do that we are actually saying that it's only people from the USA who would be unthinking enough to not tell us where they're from. So, it's actually a bit of an insult to Americans to make such an assumption. So, is it really OK for us to make that somewhat insulting assumption? I'll be honest now and say that I am a little concerned. From experience I expect the slight complexity of the logic I have just expressed could be beyond some readers. (And I don't mean just Americans!) Simply summarising, I think we should always ask for further clarification about location, etc. Less insulting, and less danger of giving an irrelevant answer.
A recent question became derailed by a personal attack made on HiLo48 for his temerity in suspecting that a question was very American. The ad hominem fury that had to be boxed away demonstrates the insularity adopted by the few Americans prone to demonise people of other nations and cultures. In fact HiLo said nothing that was offensive. Anyone should be free to comment that Americans have their own historical perspective on some questions, such as those about politics, race, religion, gun law, abortion, etc. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 13:59, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
When an IP asks a question that is geographically ambiguous, we have the option to check the person's geolocation (not always accurate, but usually accurate enough). It takes three clicks of a mouse and no typing. It's not the best analogy, but it's somewhat similar to an OP who doesn't bother to "RTFA" before asking a question; we could look it up, but we chose not to. Matt Deres (talk) 14:23, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
See, I have at least 2 objections to the view that we now have the responsibility to use geolocation.
Firstly, unregistered users choose not to reveal anything about themselves, as is their right - heck, registered users have that right too. It's not for us to be tracking them down just because we can. We're not the police. Cuddlyable3 tells us we can't even use it for registered users. I didn't know that, but then, I wouldn't know the first thing about geolocating someone, and I do not want to know. But if registered users are immune from our forensic inquiries into their location, why are unregistered users deserving of any less privacy?
Secondly, the mere location of a user does not necessarily reveal the location of their interest. Take an American user who's asking about "the Queen" or an Australian who's asking about "the President" - is it necessarily the case that they're talking about Queen Elizabeth II of the UK or the President of the United States, respectively, unless other things in their question make that unambiguously clear? I say no. Far better to start out with "If/assuming you're asking about the US President ...". or something like that. That is, we can make a reasonable guess or even an assumption, as long as we check that with the OP. What's completely not on is when a question like "How long is a presidential term?" is given the answer "Four years". -- Jack of Oz[your turn]21:18, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
And I'm wondering where we could put the instructions on how to geolocate someone. I don't know how. It's something I would expect to do rarely. I'm old, so I forget things. Telling me here in this thread won't help. I'll forget, and being a very transient place, won't be helpful to others for very long. So, do we add instructions to every reference desk? (We know lots of people never read instructions anyway.) I don't know the answer. HiLo48 (talk) 22:24, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
When you find yourself on the user- or talkpage or the contribs page of an IP-user the links to geolocate are automatically shown in a grey box at the bottom of the page (the WHOIS, rDNS etc thingy). --Saddhiyama (talk) 22:31, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
And I already said " Telling me here in this thread won't help." Another thing I said in that post was "...lots of people never read instructions". Is posting those instructions after I said not to bother an example of that? HiLo48 (talk) 22:44, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
I am sorry, but I don't think you can't do disclaimers of "I don't what to hear that" in order to maintain a defence based on ignorance (at least I don't think they are valid when it is that easy to become informed on the subject). That being said I do agree with the objections being voiced here. At the very least a "I suppose you are asking for the figures from [insert country]" would be in order. We can't assume it is implied just because geolocating is so easy, after all there are such things as proxies, dynamic IPs and people posting from computers based outside their country of origin. --Saddhiyama (talk) 22:52, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
Right on. My main objection is fundamental: even if we had the capacity to find out the OP's current physical location, entire life history and knew exactly what they were thinking when they gave us their vaguely worded question, I would decline on principle to use that power. It's no different in principle from having access to police or social security records of all your friends and family and work colleagues, but not exercising that access unless there is a clear operational need to do so. One might argue that there is an operational need to get more info about the OP in order to better answer their question. Ask them. -- Jack of Oz[your turn]22:56, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
(EC) If a user asks a question, I'm quite willing to spend quite a few minutes on Google or flipping through my old books or whatever I figure might be useful. I imagine you're not so different. I've also answered questions where I only vaguely knew what the answer might be and then clarified it for myself by re-reading something or figuring it out based on prior knowledge. Again, I don't think your approach is radically different. As part of that research, I don't think it's any great leap to include checking where someone geolocates to if I think it will help. You're right; it might not help - and registered users can't be geolocated - but then we're no further behind than we were otherwise. And to my mind, it's no breach of privacy to learn that someone geolocates to the UK (or the US or what have you) - and even if it were, IP editors are warned every time they edit that they're potentially revealing their location when they press the save button.
Consider the not infrequent questions that pop up on the Misc desk that, in somewhat stilted English, ask about requirements for some weird initialism. Yes, we could ask them for further clarification, wait for a reply, then hopefully answer or perhaps ask for further clarification - or we could just see that they geolocate to Kochi, which suggests that when they say "AIMS", they probably mean AIMS - as opposed to AIMS or AIMS or AIMS and give them what they want. If we're wrong, we're no further behind than otherwise; they can still say "Sorry, no, I meant AIMS; I'll be immigrating in the fall." Matt Deres (talk) 02:32, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
Some good points there, Matt. I suppose I'm still countering the view that use of geolocation is often necessary for us to do our job properly. I say it's never necessary. It may sometimes be considered desirable, and is available for those who wish to make use of it. I have retreated from my view that it should never be used; others may wish to retreat from their view that there are occasions when we can't do our job properly unless we use it. -- Jack of Oz[your turn]00:22, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
How about we make geolocation automatic? Extend the automated signature of IP editors to show everyone where they are, every time they post? Shouldn't be too hard for the tech geeks here. HiLo48 (talk) 01:06, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
Just for Reference Desk users? Or alien nationals not subjects to the protections of the laws of Florida and the United States Constitution? Why not put some cookies on their hard drives, or better yet, do a deal with google to gather all pertinent information and post names, addresses, criminal records and penis sizes using little pink triangle and yellow star icons where appropriate? μηδείς (talk) 01:23, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
I think I detect an attempt at sarcasm, but not a constructive response. It was actually a serious suggestion. Knowing nothing of the aspects of the laws of Florida and the United States Constitution to which you refer, am I a debating victim of US-centrism here? Some have pointed out that the information I'm discussing is freely available anyway, via three mouse clicks. Why not eliminate those mouse clicks? HiLo48 (talk) 02:02, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
Some things merit sarcasm. Revealing user information is counter to wikipedia policy, regardless of whether that information might be available elsewhere. And given it's an American topic it's properly spelt "US-centerism", none of that putting on frenchy -re ending airs for US. μηδείς (talk) 02:13, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
I still don't know what's wrong with my suggestion. No user information is being "revealed". Maybe being made more obvious, but what's wrong with that? It's the point of my proposal. HiLo48 (talk) 02:38, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
The centerism comment was a joke. I think what we REALLY need is an icon that flashes the word Aspie after some editors usernames. μηδείς (talk) 03:45, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
I find I have to restrain from my tendency towards the use of withering irony when performing on the global stage here. Cultural differences prevent its proper appreciation. In other words, I didn't really get your joke. Sorry. HiLo48 (talk) 03:59, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
Was the reference to Aspies another one of your jokes, Medeis? Because it's pretty damn offensive, either way. You pride yourself on being an intelligent human being, that's very apparent from the tenor of many of your contributions here. You must therefore be aware that the vast majority of human communication is non-verbal. Some put it as high as 90% non-verbal. Whatever, it's a hell of a lot. But here, all we have is verbals. We miss out on all the vocal inflections and nuances, the eye movements, the facial expressions, the non-verbal sounds, the hand gestures and other body movements, all stuff that are the life blood of jokes. It's sometimes hard enough out there to "get" the real communication in among all the clatter; how much harder is it here? It's very often completely non-obvious here that a joke is being attempted. Which is why they came up with smileys, LOLs and other stuff, just so people don't misinterpret messages. You need to add them to your repertory of tricks, and use them when necessary. If the intended recipient of your communication doesn't receive it, it's up to you to do something to make it effective. It's not their fault, it's your responsibility. Resorting to calling people Aspies because they don't get non-obvious jokes, or for any other reason, is an insult to Aspies and non-Aspies alike. Congratulations, you've managed to offend everyone at one go. How about you withdraw that comment, eh? -- Jack of Oz[your turn]05:11, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
My first thought when I read Medeis's comment was a befuddled "Why would she want a flashing sign after her name? Do Aspies make a specific type of joke that needs signalling?" Oops, bad mis-read on my part there. Even if it were self-referential, it's still impolite. Removing it would be a collegial step to take. Bielle (talk) 05:35, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
I must say it did not occur to me it might be self-referential. But I stand by my comments that communication online is fraught with pitfalls, and special care needs to be taken, particularly if English is not one's native language - and this is a perfect example of that. -- Jack of Oz[your turn]06:24, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
Is it a constructive idea for a user to spell their name in greeky characters followed by a flashing icon to identify their disability? Cuddlyable3 (talk) 14:18, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
Reverting to racist and sexist comments while you bemoan your victimhood and demand special treatment is hypocritical, in case that wasn't already obvious. I don't accept the racist assertion that neurotypicals have some special duty to aspies. If your characteristics aren't your "fault" or responsibility, then neither are mine. But yeah, go ahead and call me a greeky girl and an English-challenged foreigner if those strange notions make you feel good. Until then, unless there is some reason not too, I intend to keep treating you as functioning human adults with free will and all the burdens that implies. You guys are actually fun when you have something to say about matters other than your feelings.μηδείς (talk) 02:24, 20 July 2011 (UTC)
You don't seem to like it when someone refers to you as a greeky girl and an English-challenged foreigner. Fair enough. I wouldn't like to be called that, even if I were any of those things. But you then defend your gratuitous use of aspies as a pejorative, or what could easily be taken as a pejorative. Not having a special duty to aspies is a world apart from introducing them into the conversation in the offensive way you did. I don't understand that seeming double standard. Can you explain this to me? -- Jack of Oz[your turn]11:37, 20 July 2011 (UTC)
"Gratuitous", "pejorative", "offensive"? (Compare here?) I am sorry, are you implying that I called aspies a name somewhere? If so, please provide the diff. Or are you saying you find the term itself pejorative? If so, it is you, not me, who thinks there is something inherently shameful about aspies as such. You are the one who started and continued this thread, featuring the bizarre assumption (which I opposed as counter to the spirit of wikipedia) that we should specifically tag the location of unregistered foreigners so that we can talk in terms they will understand. Now you are outraged at the ironic suggestion that those who self-identify as congenitally unable to identify irony also be identified according to that plan? Your selective,[8] self-serving capacity to feel outraged on behalf of some people for meanings you divine lay hidden behind the words of others is remarkable--morbidly fascinating--in the same way as a beggar's deformity intentionally revealed to garner public sympathy. And with repeated viewing, increasingly tedious. μηδείς (talk) 20:31, 21 July 2011 (UTC)
No, you're not getting what I'm saying. There's nothing inherently shameful about being an Aspie. No reasonable reading of my comments could come up with that interpretation. I'm defending Aspies here, 180 degrees away from putting them down.
It's referring to members of the general populace as Aspies when they don't get a joke - that's the offensive remark I'm talking about. It's like calling someone who displays one-off clumsiness a "retard" or a "spastic". The first mention of Aspies here was from you ("The centerism comment was a joke. I think what we REALLY need is an icon that flashes the word Aspie after some editors usernames."). Now, that could be read 2 ways: (a) You're identifying yourself as an Aspie. (b) You're calling those who didn't get your joke "Aspies". I initially didn't even consider (a), and even after the possibility had been brought to my attention, I discounted it because, although Aspies are renowned for not getting the jokes told by others, they are not renowned for telling jokes themselves. And this was about a joke that you had told. That leaves (b).
If you are saying that your mention of Aspies was solely to identify yourself as such a person, I will accept that, withdraw my imputation of offence, and move on. I've asked you before to spell this out for me (because it's not only Aspies who have difficulty in reading between the lines of ambiguously worded sentences). I do so again. -- Jack of Oz[your turn]21:42, 21 July 2011 (UTC)
(ec)It was unwise to introduce the term "aspie" which is at best a slang or informal term for a sufferer from Aspberger's syndrome, properly an aspergerian. Using it is about as sensitive as calling an amputee "limpy" or a half-blind person "dead-eye". Here is where Medeis introduced it explicitly in connection with what Medeis called a joke. Introducing this illness was unnecessary, it is irrelevant to what is discussed here and is therefore correctly called "gratuitous". I find it surprising that Medeis wants to remind us of this post that only demonstrates use of mockery. It contains yet more gratuitous items such as "penis sizes" and "little pink triangle" that are off topic and likely to cause offence. I see a pattern of continued provocations and nonsense being disowned by the facile "It was a joke". I see such defensive and melodramatic language in Medeis' latest offensive riposte that I don't think it comes from a stable mature person. To Medeis; I suggest that you begin making whatever points you want about geolocation, spelling, or whatever else that is constructive, in more mature language than seen hitherto. If you can't or won't then don't. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 22:27, 21 July 2011 (UTC)
It appears to me that the purpose of the question is to stir up a debate about the difference between who "actually" designed it and who is just credited with designing it. -- kainaw™19:08, 21 July 2011 (UTC)
The link you gave[[11]] is to a question about "differences ... between human and computer processing". You have added a response that is a jab at another editor whom you remark is not a child and whose response you "don't believe". I expect that all that will happen is that your contribution will be ignored. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 17:38, 2 July 2011 (UTC)
Aaarrrgghh!. For years I've been proudly and truthfully proclaiming on my user page that, while I'm a ref desk regular, I have never even visited the Computing desk and probably never will. So where does the OP's link take me? The damn Computing desk. Ah well.
Anyway, this question is about Tagishsimon's "You'll forgive me if I go with the body of experts rather than a snotty and dismissive "so what" response from a random kid on a message board". 88.14's reference to BenRG not being a kid was directly countering that bit of spleen from Tagish. She did confine her criticism to Ben's response, and did not attack Ben personally, so it's not an ad hominen attack. I'll just say that Tagishsimon has been a little testy lately (see Wikipedia:Reference desk/Miscellaneous#Sim Cards - 3G & video call enabled?), and maybe it's time she had a holiday. -- Jack of Oz[your turn]21:35, 2 July 2011 (UTC)
Yes, that was always my default assumption too, bolstered by the “Simon” part of the name (although that can also be a surname). I did check out User:Tagishsimon’s page, and may have been misled by the references to User talk:EllenTait nrm and User:Lornafrost nrm at the top. -- Jack of Oz[your turn]20:01, 4 July 2011 (UTC)
If a registered user has specified their gender in their preferences, all you have to do is enter {{gender:Username|A|B|C}} and the software will automatically output A if they've specified male, B if they've specified female, and C if they haven't specified. Tagishsimon is unspecified, while Cuddlyable3 is unspecified, JackofOz is male, Billreid is unspecified, and I am unspecified. Angr (talk) 20:16, 4 July 2011 (UTC)
Being groped can be an exquisitely pleasurable experience, particularly if the right person does it, and knows the finer points of the art. But "grope" is such an ugly word, isn't it. It makes it seem the especial province of vulgarians, but many of the finest people on the planet are given to this activity. Modesty and discretion forbid me to reveal how I know this. :) -- Jack of Oz[your turn]12:08, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
Which brings us back to Square 1. I can't for the life of me understand why Wikipedia would want to know any user's gender. Their sex, now that makes a bit more sense. -- Jack of Oz[your turn]03:23, 5 July 2011 (UTC)
Because a person's gender is what determines what pronouns they like to have refer to them, and whether (in languages other than English) they want the masculine or feminine form of User: prepended to their name, and things like that. So what gender a user identifies as is more relevant here than what plumbing they've got. Angr (talk) 05:53, 5 July 2011 (UTC)
Oh, absolutely. But no one seems to want to talk about the original topic, so the conversation has drifted away onto something else. It happens at proper RD questions, it happens in real life, and it happens here at the RD talk page. Angr (talk) 13:51, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
The reason why MediaWiki software may wish to know a User's gender is that, linguitically, it needs to label a users Userpage, and there are often different words, in terms of "gramatical gender" that the "user" word gets assigned to the top of the page. For languages where the "User" must take either a masculine or feminine gender, the MediaWiki software has an option for the user to specify their own gender. This is beyond and aside from the sort of "social" issues which go along with gender, and deals solely with the linguistic issue which, since English just about totally has no linguistic gender at all, makes no sense to native speakers of English; however the lack of gender in the English language is a equally nonsensical to people who speak langauges where the feature is prominent. --Jayron3201:27, 7 July 2011 (UTC)
I think it's a little overstated to talk of these differences being "nonsensical", Jayron32. Anyone who's had even the most basic exposure to a foreign language would very soon realise that it's not just a matter of replacing our word with theirs (or vice-versa) while the structure and idiom and word order and number of words all remain identical. Far from it. Even those who know nothing about any foreign language would have encountered immigrants or seen such people on TV etc, and would realise there's more to their way of expressing themselves than just a different accent. They will typically employ their own native idiom but say it using English words, which don't really fit together. So, I think very few people would be surprised to discover other languages use gender in a different way; and of those who are surprised, very few would consider it "nonsensical". -- Jack of Oz[your turn]13:23, 7 July 2011 (UTC)
An infallible gender test is to ask the subject to stand and write their name in the snow. Infallible that is unless it is a lady named Dot. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 08:32, 9 July 2011 (UTC)
When men urinate in the snow, the penis allows for a finer amount of motor control than when women urinate in the snow. Thus, men can use the urine stream to spell a legible version of their name fairly easily. Women, lacking a penis, don't have as much control over their urine stream, and so it isn't very practical for a woman to write her name in the snow in urine. Unless she stands still and lets the urine hit a single place, making a "dot", which is a homonym of the nickname "Dot", a common nickname for the woman's name "Dorothy". Jokes are less funny when you have to explain them. Not that it was that funny to begin with, but, you know...--Jayron3219:52, 14 July 2011 (UTC)
I am opposed to deleting, "archiving," or otherwise obscuring good faith questions which solicit medical advice or similarly deleting or obscuring answers which offer medical advice, but I do believe the Reference Desk guidelines forbidding medical advice are legitimate and important to shield volunteers and the Foundation from liabilities. I think the best way to uphold those guidelines is to use strikeout text. So I recently struck portions of this phrase:
"to lose weight, I'd eliminate all white flour, yes, but also limit carbs in total, getting most calories from protein and vegetable fats (and a little alcohol)"
The author un-struck it and claimed that dietary advice is not medical advice. I disagree. Is there any reason that dietary advice is not medical advice? 99.2.148.119 (talk) 00:49, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
There are any number of self-help books out there that purport to provide the long-awaited "one-size-fits-all" key to weight loss. Most if not all include some modification to diet. Some are about a total replacement of current eating habits with new ones, others are more about tweaking them. Some of these books are written by people with medical qualifications; some are not. Some rely on medical and scientific studies; others are more ancedotal. There is no law, afaik, that prevents non-medically qualified people from publishing these sorts of books. So already we can see it's not necessarily a medical issue. But then, we're all routinely advised to check with our GP before commencing a new diet and/or exercise regime. So that seems to put it back in the medical ballpark again. Safe to say that the medical fraternity always has a legitimate interest in people's dietary arrangements; but whether it can be described as strictly and solely a medical issue is an open question. Are dietitians considered to be members of the medical fraternity? -- Jack of Oz[your turn]02:29, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
The reason we don't give medical advice is not to shield the Foundation from liabilities; the site's disclaimers are designed to do that. (Honestly, it's pretty unlikely that someone would go to the trouble of hunting down and suing a random volunteer, so limiting the liability of volunteers also isn't a major purpose.) The two key motivations for barring medical advice are not legal, but social.
First, we want to avoid causing harm to the people who might happen across our Desks, and who might mistakenly believe that the volunteers here – appearing, as we do, under the Wikipedia name and banner – are providing better-qualified and more competent advice than other random strangers on the internet. In the months leading up to (and, frankly, in the years since) the implementation of the medical advice rules, we saw countless examples of well-meaning individuals on the Ref Desks who nevertheless did not know or understand the limitations of their own knowledge. Many of these people agreed with the rule in principle, but felt that it could be ignored as long as the advice they gave was 'good', or 'helpful', or 'harmless'. The problem is that untrained laypeople don't know what they don't know, and can inadvertently give harmful advice.
Second, we wish to avoid harming the project's reputation. About five years ago, Wikipedia went through the Seigenthaler incident. It involved the creation of a hoax biographical article spuriously linking a journalist to the Kennedy assassination. While the article was created by a single individual (not even an account holder) and went undetected for several months, when it did come to the press' attention, Wikipedia spent a couple of weeks getting its name dragged through the mud. For better or worse, the actions – and errors – of small numbers of individuals get attached to the reputation of the project as a whole.
So I guess what I'm saying, in a very long-winded way, is that whether or not a legal liability might exist is far from the most important consideration guiding our actions and rules here. Deciding whether or not a particular sort of advice should be permitted should not be based on whether or not someone might be sued. As an aside, the reason why we remove (rather than strike out or box up) text seeking or offering medical advice is because long experience has taught us it's the only thing that works. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 02:49, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
I agree that refraining from causing harm should be the top priority. Those are the sorts of liabilities to which I referred; whether they result in actual legal liabilities matters much less. Is this long experience supporting deletion instead of strikeout text based on measurements? Has anyone observed anything adverse from strikeout text? 99.2.148.119 (talk) 07:02, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
Striking out text catches the eye and just makes readers curious to read what is so remarkable that someone struck it out. It's like the childish taunt I know a secret and I'm not telling yooooo!. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 12:30, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
If we draw attention to the fact that requests for and offers of medical and legal advice are not allowed instead of vanishing them, things might go smoother. Is there a way we could measure the effective difference between upholding the no medical advice guideline using strikeout, collapse boxes, deletion, and archive warnings? That seems pretty difficult. But on reflection I like the archive box a lot more, now. We aren't supposed to edit others' comments, and strikeout does that. 99.2.148.119 (talk) 16:28, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
Fully support, WP:NOT#FORUM. Question to real life library reference desk:"What's the maximum time limit in prison in Norway?". The group of librarians promptly turn around and discuss the moral ramifications of life imprisonment and capital punishment among themselves. *insert Mastercard AD BGM* Priceless. Royor (talk) 12:50, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
I've now broken off my question as a separate one, since I really am interested in the justification used in Norway for releasing serious criminals after 21 years. I also find the argument between the extreme POVs (immediate release vs. death penalty) unhelpful. StuRat (talk) 13:24, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
I don't see anyone in that thread arguing for immediate release. And I think in Europe, 21 years is not considered a short sentence, so your section heading "Justification for mandatory short sentences?" doesn't seem accurate in context. As an American living in Germany, I'm often surprised at how short sentences are here compared to the U.S. (I'm hardly a fan of throwing away the key, but even I was recently incensed when a German court sentenced a convicted to rapist to something like 3 years.) Our article Life imprisonment in Germany states (unfortunately without a source) that the average time actually served for a life sentence here is 21½ years. Angr (talk) 13:54, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
Re-Hatting irrelevant forum discussion [12], I really want to put StuRat's post under "Back to topic please" inside the hat but then whole bunch of answers below wouldn't make sense. Royor (talk) 14:06, 25 July 2011 (UTC) Damn it looking back my edit summary it's sorely not solely.
Understood that Wikipedia is Global...
But chill out about the American-centrism business. I am not American or in the US, but I don't get a bug up my ass when someone asks a question that seems to assume an American POV. It's distracting and uncivil to butt into a discussion or question and answer without adding any other substance. More of the question Don't ask, Don't tell is about this argument than actually answering the question, especically when, as mentioned in another response, it is a fairly well know US policy that no one else even has under that term. This reminds me of another argument a few months back about another editor constantly correcting grammar, which eventually cooled down. Mingmingla (talk) 06:15, 23 July 2011 (UTC)
While I agree that it's counterproductive to get over-aggressive and obsessive about it, I think there can be positive value in gentle hints to the "guilty" OP (regardless of nationality) that their question is ambiguous in a global context. We claim to be "virtual librarians", and part of a librarian's function is, surely, to be educative generally rather than focussing narrowly on specific queries, in order to help a querant frame better queries and improve their learning efficiency.
Over-estimating one's centrality in the World is an ubiquitous trait: infants think they are the World, children begin to learn they aren't; adolescents sometimes forget (and/or haven't fully taken on board the desirability of smoothing the path of those they ask for help - aka "manners"); adults accept they aren't, and thus function better within it </cod sociology>. Thus, while we needn't get our knickers in a twist over the issue, such reminders (or when necessary, requests for clarification rather than wild-assed guessing) are, I suggest, indirectly supportive of our mission. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.197.66.33 (talk) 11:54, 23 July 2011 (UTC)
I'll agree with the part about requesting clarification, but with the strong caveat that unnecessary (essentially fake) "requests for clarification", are really just making a WP:POINT and can even be considered harassment. At least one refdesk user was very nearly blocked for "requesting clarification" on grammar errors in this way.
The other part about "gentle hints" sounds like "nagging" to me, and should be avoided. We shouldn't start preaching to people about whatever pet peeves we happen to have under the very weak guise of "educating generally". (As an example, we've already come to a consensus that we should not be lecturing question-askers on spelling or grammar unless it's necessary to answer their question. Why do lectures on nationalism get special treatment?) APL (talk) 01:39, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
I think we would all agree that getting everyone to recognise the global nature of Wikipedia should be a common goal. You may not have liked my approach, but surely some gentle reminder is always appropriate. Would you do nothing, and have the OP ask another myopic question down the track? Or can you suggest a nicer approach? HiLo48 (talk) 04:08, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
Actually, nearly everyone was indeed going to do nothing, possibly because doing otherwise would be yet another source of disruption to this august desk. Orange Suede Sofa (talk) 04:38, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
HiLo48, I would not agree to that. While I would agree that it would be nice for everyone to know that, there are many facts that it would be nice for everyone to know. For example, Wikipedia's status as Free Content is even more central to the project and much less understood than its global nature. However is that an excuse to bring it up at all times? What about general English proficiency? Is it the RefDesk's calling to educate people, unasked, about their misuse of the English language? (Consensus has answered this one with a resounding "No".)
And why restrict ourselves to WP-related topics? Linux is better than Windows, maybe we should make a habit of telling that to people who don't seem to know it? Internal combustion engines are destroying our climate, and yet some people ask questions that strongly suggest they intend to use one, perhaps we should set them straight!
While we can agree that knowledge is better than ignorance, this does not give you license to nag, remind, lecture, harass, or rant on any topic you happen to be passionate about. APL (talk) 05:38, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but you folks have lost me with all those irrelevant references to poor grammar, nagging, harassing, ranting, etc. This started off with an attack on me re American-centrism. Now I'm being attacked for all sorts of things I have never been guilty of. Have a deeper think here folks. A rational one. I don't like anybody-centrism. US-centrism is the worst we see here. UK-centrism does exist, but to nowhere near the same extent. I deliberately avoided posting "Go Cadell" in the ITN thread on The Tour de France, precisely because he and I are both Australian. I do deplore ignorance, and think it's worth reducing it. I will continue to do my best to do so. The stupidity of some of the comments in this threads has simply made me more determined. HiLo48 (talk) 06:17, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
I'm starting to wonder if you're intentionally missing the point.
The point is that you've got a bee in your bonnet about a particular topic and you won't shut up about it.
It doesn't matter what that topic is, it's disruptive. I don't care what crusade you're fighting. I don't care what you think the public need to be "Educated" on.
The ref desk is not a platform for you to "educate" people about your pet cause unless that's specifically what they asked for.
I had hoped that by giving examples of other crusades no less worthy than yours, I might communicate to you how incredibly annoying you've been lately.
If you recall, A different otherwise respected RefDesk editor, was moments away from being blocked forever because he felt, as you do, that he needed to fight a crusade against ignorance. He (or she?) only came to understood that the ref-desk is not a place for these sorts of efforts after a huge drama, a long thread at AN/I, and the threat of a longterm block. It would be best if we could skip those in-between steps this time and just move on to the phase where you realize your efforts in that direction (and only in that direction) are not appreciated. APL (talk) 07:08, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
Thinking about it for a moment, I see my post here is unnecessarily strong. I'm not by a long-shot suggesting that you should be blocked or anything. I've exaggerated a bit for effect, and I suppose I shouldn't have. However, I stand by the fundamental point that unnecessarily pointing things out or asking pointed questions for the sake of "educating" people is inappropriate, and if we let everyone do it on all topics we'd descend into the same unreadable quagmire that typical blog comment threads sink into. APL (talk) 08:36, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
You know what I find interesting, and a little confusing? You're going to an awful lot of trouble here to try to educate me, but don't want to educate less skilled users of Wikipedia. Not having a go or anything, just trying to get your philosophy straight in my head. I may have come on a bit strong in the post that triggered this discussion, but I still cannot see the harm in guiding all users towards being better Wikipedians, in a diplomatic way. That just leaves us to argue about what we mean by diplomatic ;-) HiLo48 (talk) 08:49, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
An editor above introduces my name gratuitously. Diffs in several fora give me reason to regard that editor as a vicious person bent on provoking me. In that it will fail. See WP:DENYCuddlyable3 (talk) 14:34, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
Sorry, no offense was intended. I wanted an example of a similar issue that that caused lots of drama but has since been resolved happily, with everyone going back to useful ref-desking. I felt my point was strengthened by specifics, but I've since removed it. APL (talk) 19:52, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
HiLo, I again suspect that you're intentionally missing the point, but I'll play along and spell out the basics of "my philosophy" as relates to this thread :"Stay on-topic." Most topics on the ref-desk are not about educating random people that the internet is global, however this thread is about your behavior. (And one or two others, I'll grant that you've been unfairly singled out.)
In this thread, It is on topic to discuss the pros and cons of unnecessary inserting of random anti-nationalist jabs and pointed-questions.
In most ref-desk threads, it is not on topic to "guide all users towards being better Wikipedians".
It's perhaps beneficial to look at this in another way. A user asks a question that is ambiguous, and to get a reasonable answer the responder either has to know a reasonable amount about the subject, cuff it or go away and read up on it. The latter assumes that the casual responder even realises that there is a need to go away and read up on it.
In this instance everyone is assuming that only the US uses the term DADT. In practice three other militaries have a similar approach, and use the DADT term, partly a reflection of the US having come up with the approach first.
So by asking an ambiguous question the response could end up incorrect. In this instance highlighting that the US isn't the only country with a DADT policy, given the dates and concurrent events, could be considered excessive.
Trovatore quite reasonably highlighted that my response didn't indicate that I have some experience of using the US policy. I'd suggest that the likelihood of someone who has had to employ the policy coming on the question at just the time it's posted. It could just have been someone articulating what is blindingly obvious from the coverage of the recent decision, or cuffing it...
If one asks the question one wants answered then the likelihood of an accurate response is increased.
What I wish is that people understand that human nature is ubiquitous in, well, humans. The people coming to these desks do not know everything. They do not know the answer to their question, and, in the general case, they do not understand our guidelines. Expecting them to ask their question just they way we want it asked (so that we don't have to waste time asking for clarification) is, to my mind, just about as unreasonable as expecting them to already know the answer to their question, so that we don't have to trouble ourselves answering it.
People are going to come here asking poor or poorly-worded questions. They're going to neglect to mention what region they're asking about, they're going to forget to define their terms, they're going to omit all sorts of vital details about their problem. They're confused -- about those details, and others -- which is why they're coming here asking for help! If you're not willing to help them (where helping them includes asking for clarification when necessary), then you and the question askers and the rest of us are all going to have a frustrating experience. —Steve Summit (talk) 15:38, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
I agree. HiLo48 asked the OP to clarify which army they wanted to know about. That is directly relevant to handling the OP's question so I think it was incorrect to hide HiLo48's question in a box titled "irrelevant to answering the OP's question". The attack on HiLo48 that followed viz. "Don't be tiresome...you've been living under a rock" displays these fallacies:
A presumption that the OP plus everybody else who ever reads the archived question recognizes the context of the phrase don't ask, don't tell that was coined by a military sociologist referring to US Defense Directive 1304.26.
The attack was a pretext for escalating rude posts by Trovatore viz you have a bug up your butt...your real motivation... which lead to gratuitous resurrection of Trovatore's recent and particularly gross attacks on HiLo48 for "unprovoked and unacceptable musing" in responding to the unrelated question about two half-black US celebrities.
I hope to see the ending of aggressive pseudo US patriotic outrage directed at an editor who tries to clarify a question for everybody's benefit. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 15:44, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
This thread does seem to have become a vehicle for some editors to simply and repeatedly list all the actions and all the people they don't like. Not really a constructive discussion. HiLo48 (talk) 16:08, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
The question asker specifically mentioned a US law by name that was recently in the news and was clearly a reference to that current event. My objection is based on the premise that HiLo was not confused, he was clearly asking for the sake of making a point. (He practically admits as much above. He feels that users need to be "guided" into something something.) Since this one incident is part of a larger pattern I feel confident in this premise. APL (talk) 19:52, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
And there we go again. Slurringly mentioning some alleged "larger pattern", with no details, and with no attempt to discuss the many points I have made. Not constructive discussion. Just proof that you don't like me. HiLo48 (talk) 20:49, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
I don't believe that I have ever had substantial interaction with you before, so allow me to say that I disagree with your action purely because you have justified it thusly, not because I have a personal history with you. I wish that the personal barbs flying here (from all sides) would cease, but I do think that there is a valid discussion to be had regarding the value of genuinely asking for clarification vs. attempting to address issues that fall outside of the goals of this project. Regards, Orange Suede Sofa (talk) 21:30, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
Having been the one that posted in the first place here, I'm glad to see this argument happening on the talk page where it belongs. That was part of my point. Gently asking for clarification is all that is needed, so long as you actually intend on answering the question. Any argument about that attempt belongs on the talk page. That, Cuddlyable3, is why it should be boxed. Half that box is an argument, not a helpful answer.
However, 'educating' querents on anything other than their question can come across to them as insulting, no matter how kindly you try to help them. Believe me, you need to tread carefully. Like in real libraries, as a reference librarian you need to avoid insulting whatever intelligence they might have (even if they seem bone-headed they have their pride) or they will ignore everything that comes afterwards.
Remember, there are plenty of people reading these answer who haven't asked anything yet, and may decide not to because of our little arguments that are not relevant, are are only tangentially related to the question. Mingmingla (talk) 17:27, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
A double standard is applied in HiLo48's disfavour. It is condescending to assert that you somehow "know" that an OP is insulted merely by asking them which of a large number of armies they want to know about. It is presumptuous to judge on just two words posted by HiLo48 that HiLo48 is not volunteering time and effort towards the shared goal of responding to OP's as best we can. I do not criticize the boxing of the unhelpful argument that followed HiLo48's question. I maintain my criticism of categorizing HiLo48's good faith question "Which army?" the same as the attacks on it. Further, I see no reason why we may not assume that an OP has an open interest in the subject raised plus any related information and references that any of us cares to contribute. Do you really believe that the free service from the ref. desks leaves a trail of wounded and intimidated souls? Cuddlyable3 (talk) 21:50, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
There is sometimes a need to clarify if the question is specific to any one country before any answer can be provided. More often than not, even without further clarification, a partial answer can be given along the lines of "If you are asking about the U. S. . . ., then here's a reference . . .". Is there harm or damage if another editor comes along and offers, "There is a similar . . . in Greece where . . ."? Even if the original questioner was only interested in the U.S., how is the Ref Desk the poorer for having broadened the response? I don't see any problem with the questioner's assumption that the Ref Desk will know what country, state, city is being referenced, nor do I see any need to be snarky about requesting clarification where it is necessary over all or even just important to that responder. And I particularly don't see any point in ever challenging a politely worded request for clarification (which does not involve any suggestion that the questioner has, in any way, let the side down.) I am at one with those who feel that, as responders, we provide as thorough an answer as we can, first as individuals, and then as a group. We are the ones who need to remember that there is a whole world of possibilities, and to respond accordingly. If one responder has only indicated a source in England, for example, what's to stop others providing more information from India, Peru or Canada? Frankly, if any of us thinks our time is being unjustifiably wasted by imprecise questions, then I suggest we find some other way to contribute to the project. Bielle (talk) 22:32, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
I must say (as an obvious American imperialist lackey) that the recommendations by Bielle and Mingmingla seem pretty on spot to me. Picking a fight over whether someone has been sufficiently clear is counterproductive and silly — the OP is trying to get an answer, not an education in the fact that they should be extremely specific at all times when asking questions. It's easy to answer questions in the manner Bielle recommends and it is how I have been doing it for some time ("For the US, the answer would be X."). If you're really unsure (it happens sometimes) it's easy to gently ask for clarification. And sometimes it makes sense to just make a guess, if it leads to answering the question. The worst possible outcome from guessing is guessing wrong — a pretty minor consequence to anybody other than yourself (since you've wasted a little time). It's certainly not worth an argument over every time someone assumes that an OP is indicating the United States as their country of reference.
Before I would believe that this is actually a practical issue (and not just an ideological one), I'd love to see any examples of an answerer responding with a US-specific answer when a more global answer was desired. I've yet to see such a thing. Usually those of us who are answering US questions are pretty good at ferreting out when the question is about the US — and yes, sometimes that's because we, as Americans, can spot the familiar. In just the same way, I can usually tell when a question is asking about the UK without Googling about or IP checking. Why? Because it doesn't make any bloody sense! ;-) --Mr.98 (talk) 01:49, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
Here's a thought experiment: carry a banner "Repeal DADT!" through little America and you will immediately gain friends and opponents. Everybody there knows what DADT means. It's in the tabloids and on the TV so everybody is likely to have an opinion about it too. Indeed they should because that is how US democracy works. But carry that same banner through almost any other country and people will have no idea what it means. In this world, far more people are not Americans updated on LGBT policy slogans than are. The real problem here is not that HiLo48 asked a question that reminded the OP of that gap. The problem is the jingoist knee-jerk of those whose world view is the dumbed-down one that the US media hands out. They are the source of the America-centrism that drives this sterile argument. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 12:18, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
Well, Wikipedia is an International project, so sometimes you will be exposed to topics of which you are not already aware. Luckily, there is an encyclopedia where you can look them up very quickly and easily. Even more fortunately, no one is required to answer questions on topics that they are not familiar with. APL (talk) 10:01, 29 July 2011 (UTC)
I agree with what Bielle said, except that I still think that asking about nationality when the questioner asks about a specific law or television show or whatever that could easily be looked up on this very encyclopedia smacks of doing it to make a point and not to help answer the question. Making a question-asker answer a question that you could easily look up in half a second does not actually make sense to do on a reference desk. APL (talk) 10:08, 29 July 2011 (UTC)
Deleting hat
I've deleted the hat ([13]) on the Congressional pay question because I've tried to refocus the thread in an RD-acceptable manner. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 23:14, 27 July 2011 (UTC)
For a wonderful moment, I thought this section was going to be about a special hat you wore when you deleted something. APL (talk) 15:03, 31 July 2011 (UTC)
Hi, for some reason when I visit the archives page, everything stops at May 2011. I'm sure we've just had June, and even July here, so does this mean the northern hemisphere just hasn't caught up? No, seriously, does it mean there is some change like a new Javascript version of the archiving system, and since I turn JS off (it crashes Firefox any time I edit) I can't get it? Or is the bot just taking its time to archive? It's been emotional (talk) 11:56, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
A reminder that the archives do not just happen: they are the generous work of Steve Summit, with the help of his friendly bot. If you've noticed something hasn't happened that should, especially if you're a registered user and hence nobody will 'helpfully' revert you, you can just sort it out yourself. Items missing from a list? Links not there? A little intelligent copying and pasting is well within most people's capacity, unless they are profoundly lazy or on a limited connection/limited device.
Also, there is little point bringing up archiving bot problems if you don't add a note to Steve's talk page, since the conversation will simply be made up of people proposing that the cat should be belled with no action taken. 86.163.1.126 (talk) 16:07, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
I do (of course!) monitor this talk page, so I'm likely to see an archiving-related thread here. A note on my talk page isn't mandatory, but it doesn't hurt. (Please don't leave a note on the bot's talk page, though -- that stops the bot.)
It never seemed (to me) to be worth automating: the updating needs to happen at most once per month, or as infrequently as once per year. So it's not too bad if someone has to do it by hand. (And I always figure it's a good idea to leave the humans something to do once in a while, so they don't get too complacent and dependent on the automation. :-) )
It's a harder task to automate, because of the complicated structure of the page, and because of my passion for idempotence. (That is, I insist that the bot figure out what needs doing, quietly doing nothing if nothing needs doing, rather than being preprogrammed to blindly go in and do exactly what's theoretically required based on the instant it's run. This ensures that that bot won't break anything if it accidentally gets invoked twice, or if for whatever reason, by the time it runs, someone else has already manually done its work for it.) —Steve Summit (talk) 21:25, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
I have deleted the question from WP:RDM about jacking off on the train. It seems patently obvious this was asked by User:Light current based on the subject matter. I fully expect that every single person except me will object to this, but I felt it in the best interest of Wikipedia to prevent the disruption caused by LC. Feel free to a) return the question b) unblock User:Rocolabettic and c) start a discussion at WP:ANI to have my admin access revoked and have me permanently banned from Wikipedia for this action. Feel free to start disagreeing with me.... (wait for it...) NOW! --Jayron3222:33, 3 August 2011 (UTC)
Most likely LC or an unreasonable facsimile. Something to ponder, though: He didn't say in a train, he said on a train. I would think that tossing anything on a train would be a safety hazard and hence punishable under the law. ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 22:38, 3 August 2011 (UTC)
I am fairly certain that Bugs is referencing a routine by George Carlin about airplanes. Do a YouTube search for "George Carlin Airlines" and you'll get his reference. --Jayron3222:55, 3 August 2011 (UTC)
"On a train" is perfectly standard here in USA as well. "In a train" would sound weird unless it's being used for some special emphasis or in some special situation. APL (talk) 03:53, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
By the way, I hopes I'm not the only one that thinks the victim routine here is tedious and reminds me far too much of television political 'commentary'.
Some people disagreed with me about a specific case once! Therefore they disagree with everything I will ever do and the basic tenets of our society!!!!! APL (talk) 03:57, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
Its amazing how anything that people object to and not directly attributable to any one else, is immediately attributed to Light current. Should not these accusations be proven first?--88.96.129.174 (talk) 15:01, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
Can you explain why you have such a strong desire to increase idiocy on the reference desk? Should we delete all of the questions and just have it be a place to discuss shooting tomatos out the butt and making jokes about Uranus? I'm sure that would be a great benefit to all of the users. -- kainaw™15:14, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
There are two issues here: (a) Any edit by a banned user may be deleted out of hand, even if the edit itself would appear to pass all our acceptability tests. Otherwise, there would be little meaning or purpose in banning people. Hence, it is of value to identify that the editor is banned. (b) Those acceptability tests apply to all edits, regardless of who makes them. -- Jack of Oz[your turn]20:02, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
Here's the link, which I believe should be given when a question is deleted, so those of us who weren't privileged enough to see the question will know what the hell you're talking about. I applaud Jayron32 for notifying User:Mwalcoff that he deleted his comment as well. Buddy432 (talk) 06:04, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
Thank you Buddy432 for providing the diff that Jayron32 neglected to give. Jayron32's action was right but its routine of self-abasement is tiresome. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 12:08, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
Huge list on main RD page
What's going on here? Do we really need huge lists of lists on the first ref desk page? Most of these don't strike me as the answer to what any of our questioners are typically looking for. Alternative media? Freedom of Information? List of blogs? Why is this here? There are 40 some links on there, plus on dead external link. --Mr.98 (talk) 19:18, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
I agree, there are too many links. The old version only had 6 links, all of which were very related to reference desks and their function. I think it was a lot easier to navigate for someone just trying to find a place to ask a question AvrillirvA (talk) 09:37, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
I'm ambivalent about it. On the one hand, it doesn't do any harm, but on the other hand, I don't know how much good it will do. The list of Google products seems a little out of place on the list as well. While we're on the topic of the RD front page, are we not supposed to notice the poster above me has a username that obviously recalls a vandal that defaced that front page and later trolled the desks? Matt Deres (talk) 15:46, 6 August 2011 (UTC)
Wow. A large unsorted list of resources, most of which will only be of use to a tiny fraction of individuals seeking help, pretty much ensures that no one will consult the list before asking a question. I get the impression that the long list of links is meant primarily to be more of a resource for people answering questions, rather than the people asking them. Perhaps we could find a better place to put this stuff? TenOfAllTrades(talk) 16:17, 6 August 2011 (UTC)
I don't think we need 90% of those and I'm going to be bold and cut out the ones that look irrelevant. --Mr.98 (talk) 20:24, 6 August 2011 (UTC)
Troll?
I have removed [16]. I'm having big trouble WP:AGF considering the history [17][18][19] (last is what I removed). I was suspicious after the first question but didn't notice anything obvious in the edit history although I now realise I missed [20] and the fact many of their contribs to the encyclopaedia proper appear to be changing sourced facts. I have informed the OP of the removal and suggested they seek professional help if the questions are genuine. Nil Einne (talk) 07:51, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
A few days ago, a thread on women interested in mens bottoms was removed (anyway I cant find it). Why was it removed? I thought Wikipedia was not censored? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.96.129.174 (talk) 14:56, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
Until you can find the removal, how can anyone answer that. Perhaps you can answer this for me: One of the new building here, I'm not sure which one, doesn't have a connector to it. Why? I think it would be nice to connect them all. -- kainaw™15:08, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
It was a question asked by a blocked user. Blocked users are not allowed to ask questions - regardless of what the question may be. -- kainaw™15:54, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
And, yet again, the person removing other editors' responses - editors who have responded reasonably, and in good faith, have not been notified that their responses have been removed without their consensus. Is it really so hard to click on the link to each editor's talk page (conveniently and automatically contained in their signature) and leave some sort of note that you're canning their response?
Yet again, I will be doing over the next couple minutes what the censor should have, so that the people who's thoughtful and (in some cases) appropriate responses you have deleted will at least know that you have deleted them. Buddy432 (talk) 05:44, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
Buddy432, you can invent any kind of rule you want for dealing with persistent trolls, and you're free to follow it yourself. Others use a simpler approach, RBI. Implicit in that approach is spending as close to zero time of one's own life dealing with the way in which someone else chooses to waste theirs. People who unwittingly made a good-faith response to a trolling question (or question posed by a troll) are not being harmed when their responses are removed along with the source of the disruption. You propose an extra segment of effort on the part of those defending the wiki, which effort is dictated by how ingenious the troll is at eliciting GF responses from many other editors. I don't see that as a workable solution. When I remove trolling, I just remove it and get on with things. Franamax (talk) 06:05, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
Sorry, I don't buy that analogy at all, and if my own comment suggested anything about "life during wartime" then I need to backtrack it. My thesis is that having one's own RD posts removed by another editor removing trolling, however subtle it may be, does not represent an actual harm to the GF editor whose response post is simultaneously removed. I don't see that as anywhere near the same as the common usage of "collateral damage", i.e. "killed some bad guys and blew a few arms off innocent civilians" or "from 10,000 feet it looked like a gathering of militants, sorry to interrupt your wedding, maybe you can find someone else to marry?". In wiki-terms, collatreal damage would be when I come across complex vandalism that I can't disentagle from interlaced well-meant edits. In that case I most certainly would blanket revert and ask the good editor(s) to roll their own work forward. When it's a good clean case that I can surgically remove, I guess I don't see what the problem is. Yeah, you got trolled, so what? Franamax (talk) 01:44, 8 August 2011 (UTC)
It appears that Fran and myself and possibly Jayron do not require notification, and Cuddly does. I assume Buddy is going to start compiling a list of who wants it and who doesn't, for future reference. :) ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 12:22, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
Yeah, you can delete my posts anytime. Even the good stuff. Except Cuddly can't fix my grammar errors. Otherwise, the rest of you can delete posts without telling me, if its a troll. --Jayron3201:49, 8 August 2011 (UTC)
Bugs, I would never ask you to babysit my children if I had a safe alternative: you really do find the whole 'ignore the boring behaviour and they will get bored and stop' thing very hard. 86.163.0.19 (talk) 21:36, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
I am wondering, since you seem very aware about your own psychological profile, why you just don't stay away? Is it some kind of special need to lay the blame on strangers? --Saddhiyama (talk) 21:48, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
You think I'm them? No, I'm not. But I wish people would just follow the standard procedures that work, rather than cutely bringing his name up, or cute nicknames, given that he just wants attention. I'd have quietly removed the obviously block-evading thread here, rather than respond to them and feed them more, but I know that the people who've replied here would protest, and it would cause even more heat and noise. It frustrates me to watch people throwing dry branches on the fire, and then loudly protest about how it mysteriously won't go out. 86.163.0.19 (talk) 21:58, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
I gave LC a chance, and he let me down. His "ignore the behavior" theory doesn't work, because if he's ignored, he just tries harder. If he actually has children, I feel sorry for them. ←Baseball BugsWhat's up, Doc?carrots→ 22:05, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
(e/c)Difficult to tell, as it seems you are another dynamic IP. But I since I am AFG I guess not (I can only urge you to register), and as such I would agree with your statement. WP:DENY is not a joke, it does really hit home regarding the rationale of the troll. --Saddhiyama (talk) 22:08, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
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