No RfAs or RfBs reported by Cyberbot I since 2:29 8/9/2016 (UTC)
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Updated as needed. Last updated: 21:38, 16 August 2016 (UTC) |
Most recent poster here: SMcCandlish (talk).
Old stuff to resolve eventually
Cueless billiards
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Categories are not my thing but do you think there are enough articles now or will be ever to make this necessary? Other than Finger billiards and possibly Carrom, what else is there?--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 11:12, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
Sad...How well forgotten some very well known people are. The more I read about Yank Adams, the more I realize he was world famous. Yet, he's almost completely unknown today and barely mentioned even in modern billiard texts.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 13:47, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
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Look at the main page
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Look at the main page --Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 03:37, 31 January 2011 (UTC)
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Some more notes on Crystalate
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Some more notes: they bought Royal Worcester in 1983 and sold it the next year, keeping some of the electronics part.[1]; info about making records:[2]; the chair in 1989 was Lord Jenkin of Roding:[3]; "In 1880, crystalate balls made of nitrocellulose, camphor, and alcohol began to appear. In 1926, they were made obligatory by the Billiards Association and Control Council, the London-based governing body." Amazing Facts: The Indispensable Collection of True Life Facts and Feats. Richard B. Manchester - 1991[4]; a website about crystalate and other materials used for billiard balls:[5]. Fences&Windows 23:37, 12 July 2011 (UTC)
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WP:SAL
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No one has actually objected to the idea that it's really pointless for WP:SAL to contain any style information at all, other than in summary form and citing MOS:LIST, which is where all of WP:SAL's style advice should go, and SAL page should move back to WP:Stand-alone lists with a content guideline tag. Everyone who's commented for 7 months or so has been in favor of it. I'd say we have consensus to start doing it. — SMcCandlish Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ Contrib. 13:13, 2 March 2012 (UTC) |
Your free 1-year HighBeam Research account is ready
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Good news! You are approved for access to 80 million articles in 6500 publications through HighBeam Research.
Thanks for helping make Wikipedia better. Enjoy your research! Cheers, Ocaasi t | c 04:47, 3 May 2012 (UTC) |
Your Credo Reference account is approved
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Good news! You are approved for access to 350 high quality reference resources through Credo Reference.
Thanks for helping make Wikipedia better. Enjoy your research! Cheers, Ocaasi 17:22, 22 August 2012 (UTC)
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Circa
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This edit explains how to write "ca.", which is still discouraged at MOS:#Abbreviations, WP:YEAR, WP:SMOS#Abbreviations, and maybe MOS:DOB, and after you must have read my complaint and ordeal at WT:Manual of Style/Abbreviations#Circa. Either allow "ca." or don't allow "ca.", I don't care which, but do it consistently. Art LaPella (talk) 15:41, 28 December 2012 (UTC)
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You post at Wikipedia talk:FAQ/Copyright
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That page looks like a hinterland (you go back two users in the history and you're in August). Are you familiar with WP:MCQ? By the way, did you see my response on the balkline averages?--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 15:54, 6 January 2013 (UTC)
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Hee Haw
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Yeah, we did get along on Donkeys. And probably will get along on some other stuff again later. Best way to handle WP is to take it issue by issue and then let bygones be bygones. I'm finding some interesting debates over things like the line between a subspecies, a landrace and a breed. Just almost saw someone else's GA derailed over a "breed versus species" debate that was completely bogus, we just removed the word "adapt" and life would have been fine. I'd actually be interested in seeing actual scholarly articles that discuss these differences, particularly the landrace/breed issue in general, but in livestock in particular, and particularly as applied to truly feral/landrace populations (if, in livestock, there is such a thing, people inevitably will do a bit of culling, sorting and other interference these days). I'm willing to stick to my guns on the WPEQ naming issue, but AGF in all respects. Truce? Montanabw(talk) 22:40, 6 January 2013 (UTC)
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Redundant sentence?
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The sentence at MOS:LIFE "General names for groups or types of organisms are not capitalized except where they contain a proper name (oak, Bryde's whales, rove beetle, Van cat)" is a bit odd, since the capitalization would (now) be exactly the same if they were the names of individual species. Can it simply be removed? There is an issue, covered at Wikipedia:PLANTS#The use of botanical names as common names for plants, which may or may not be worth putting in the main MOS, namely cases where the same word is used as the scientific genus name and as the English name, when it should be de-capitalized. I think this is rare for animals, but more common for plants and fungi (although I have seen "tyrannosauruses" and similar uses of dinosaur names). Peter coxhead (talk) 09:17, 3 May 2014 (UTC)
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Current threads
3RR report
Moot, and the subtopic started by a third party is not a matter for my talk page. |
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Can you remove your report? It is giving me a headache. The disputed text was reverted. The report won't solve anything. QuackGuru (talk) 18:56, 16 March 2016 (UTC)
wtf?@QuackGuru: - Why are you on here pestering some editor into removing a 3RR report that has nothing to do with you? And why are you complaining about me and the ANI that I didn't file? Do you ever wonder why you are this → ← close to being banned from this project? It's because of nonsense like this. Just focus on building the encyclopaedia, without disrupting it. Do you think you can do that? - theWOLFchild 22:36, 16 March 2016 (UTC)
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Adjusting approach
There is something else that happened later that involves all of us. QuackGuru (talk) 22:16, 16 March 2016 (UTC)
- ? — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 22:22, 16 March 2016 (UTC)
- Editors are suggesting I should be banned and there are socks following me. I cannot tell you about it at the moment on Wikipedia. I can discuss this in private or in a few months. QuackGuru (talk) 23:11, 16 March 2016 (UTC)
- Might be time to walk away for a while and edit totally different stuff, not even vaguely related, like
sportscooking or animals or language articles. I've found various topics much easier to edit, after letting a tagteam have their way for a while, get bored, and move on, allowing me to return to what I was working on without all the heat and interference. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 23:17, 16 March 2016 (UTC)
- Might be time to walk away for a while and edit totally different stuff, not even vaguely related, like
- Editors are suggesting I should be banned and there are socks following me. I cannot tell you about it at the moment on Wikipedia. I can discuss this in private or in a few months. QuackGuru (talk) 23:11, 16 March 2016 (UTC)
@QuackGuru: Fringe topics like Chopra tend to lead to results like that. I'm not sure what was "controversial" about the sports figure article that people are trying to ban you over. I note that at both recent noticeboard disputes there were a lot of demands that you be "mentored". That seems both condescending and like it would be a lot of work for someone (it's not like any of them volunteered).
I don't have the time for it, but I can offer some advice, for what it's worth. It's based on 10+ years experience at this, as an editor in high-conflict areas (not solely, but often) in and out of mainspace. Like you, I do not shy away from arguments, and I do not concede that someone has policy correct when they clearly do not (though frankly I'm much more accurate in that assessment than you are yet. >:-) The caveat that comes with this advice (other that it's long; I write stuff like this as draft WP:ESSAY pages and may reuse it later) is that I am not one of WP's best-loved editors. For many people here, I'm one of the locks on the cookie jar they're trying to get into in the middle of the night. And I'm quite content with this. I treat this is as a form of work, in the public interest, not a social-networking pastime; not having a long "friends list" here is of no concern to me (though I have more than my detractors think I do).
Pursue important goals intelligently, not trivial ones randomly |
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(There are game-playing and warfare metaphors about this, like "be strategic not tactical", "choose your battles wisely", "don't win the battle to lose the war", "take the high ground", etc., but per WP:GAMING and WP:BATTLEGROUND that can send the wrong message.) My honest impression is that you have a bad case of WP:WINNING. I you're a competitive person like I am, this can be a hard instinct to suppress, but it needs to be done. You might try taking "no" for an answer more often; if there's more than token resistance, just drop it and move on, because time is precious. Start judging consensus on your own as if you were a neutral admin with no view on the topic (i.e., figure out what the probable outcome will be, not just what you want to see happen). If multiple editors on any page are against you, and you don't already have more backup from others agreeing with you, it is probably a lost cause no matter what it is. Just let it go, or add it to a to-do list and come back in a month or three months and see if whoever is paying attention then is more receptive. WP will not fall apart if one article has some nonsense in it for a while. If it's clearly a WP:TAGTEAM of editors pushing an unambiguous fringe, politicized, promotional/attack or otherwise bogus PoV and the matter is important, then build a case about it, and take it to the appropriate content-policy noticeboard (NORN, NPOVN, etc.). But never about trivial things. WP doesn't need noticeboard disputes or RfCs launched about whether to include the word "some" or "sometimes". There's a balance between just being a reverter on the hand, and, on the other, launching trivial RfCs and other "process" to "win" petty disputes. Because people get irritated by petty RfCs (which are advertised site-wide by WP:FRS), they tend to vote against whatever the proponent of a trivial one wants, even if it made sense. I know I suggested earlier that you need to use RfC more and revert less; I did not mean RfCs like the ones you opened at that sportsperson talk page (I was thinking more about the disputes that led to WP:ARBEC). Every time you launch an RfC that is trivial and/or which flops, it adds to a mental list of black marks in minds of other editors. "Oh, no, not another one those QG RfCs" is a reaction you don't want people to have. As a practical matter, RfCs should be opened because consensus is unclear and the community needs to form one; or because consensus is clear and some people will not accept it until the community tells them so; or policy or the real-world facts have changed and a local consensus or false consensus needs to be overridden by the community to conform better to reality. There is no sensible fourth reason, and the third requires a great deal of evidence preparation. This also applies to proposals, noticeboard actions, and other things that may arouse controversy. A regular talk page discussion: open that for whatever reason, including questioning current consensus and the rationales for it. I usually do not open one without doing the "homework" necessary to make my case and I often front-load it with that evidence. This puts the onus on people who habitually just resist change for the sake of resisting change to actually have to come up with a rationale for once, other than WP:IDONTLIKEIT. Use can use talk page discussions of this sort to gauge the reasoning level of who you're dealing with and what evidence they have (and it might even be enough to change your own mind, or shift you stance a little; always be open to that idea). |
Remind yourself you're dealing with real people, and try to work with them |
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It also helps to try to picture yourself sitting at a table having a conversation with these people, instead of fighting against faceless names who are full of nonsense. They're not all idiots, and have real reasons for taking the positions they do. Sometimes they're poor reasons, and it can take a lot of patient and non-aggressive work to get them to change their minds or at least yield because they've painted themselves into a reasoning corner (I take the logician approach to this, and it works fairly well, though it doesn't make me a lot of friends). But sometimes their reasons are better than yours. You can make friends quickly by conceding "I hadn't thought of if that way, good point", and can build on common ground: "OK, if if we take your point, and my idea, how about this compromise that would address most of what I'm concerned about, without undoing the part you care about?" Never fixate on exact wording. Something the answer to a problem in one sentence is to rewrite two entire paragraphs; sometime the problem with two who paragraphs is one wording in one sentence. Simply moving material around, and rewriting a sentence from scratch works. Don't feel proprietary about your wording. If someone reverts or makes major changes to something you wrote, forget that it was your wording, and look at the current wording as if you'd never seen it before. Does it still need work? If their objection was to your wording, try a different version, and make a point in the edit summary that you're trying to resolve their concern. |
Summarization and description of our sourcing isn't OR |
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Be mindful that not every word has to be sourced, every fact asserted about the topic (and topics intersecting it) has to be sourced. We are instructed for plagiarism and copyright reasons to summarize the sources in our own words. Sources are their own sources for what they say and, in the aggregate, for their interaction with other sources we use. The source review and summarization we do is necessarily an slight "OR-like" process in a sense – it involves analysis, evaluation, interpretation, and synthesis, but only about how to configure the information input (sources and what they say) to produce accurate and concise output (encyclopedia text), and how to characterize the nature of the input and how we're using it so we don't mislead readers about our content's level of source support (i.e. how much we're attenuating the signal, if you like). It's absolutely not OR to say that so-and-so is sometimes referred to as X, when we have a bunch of sources that use the term "X" for the topic, and some that do not. So, your RfC about "sometimes" at the sport article was off-base. The OR policy is about using OR to come to novel conclusions about the world, not conclusions about what our sources are saying; otherwise we would not be able to do anything but quote every single source verbatim, with no integration, just a collection of quotations. So, try to avoid wikilawyering over words like "some" or "many" and statements that X, Y, and Z sources agree on point A; we do not need a statement in source X "we agree with source Y and Z", we only need consensus that the statements in the three sources are in agreement. Also avoid lawyering over hair-splitting distinctions that are not meaningful to the reader (especially in leads). Your second RfC at the same page was also pointless and it was OR – you were arguing to include something from one source and attribute it to all of them. To me it looked like a WP:POINT exercise: "Well, if you think it's OK to include 'sometimes' even if the sources don't converge on using that word themselves, I'll show you how stupid that is by proposing we include a clarification only found in one source that the others don't agree with, so when you vote that down, you'll be proving me right on the first proposal! Gotcha!". That's game-playing. We definitely should stick to a strict approach to OR if people are trying to make the sources say something they clearly don't. Observing that only some sources sometimes use a term doesn't qualify; that's meta-observation about sources. |
A case study in OR | ||
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This all reminds me strongly of something resolved recently (by the pursuer of the OR getting topic-banned and eventually indeffed). You can gloss over some of the examples of what the OR was (I'm writing this all out as a reminder of what to cover at the affected article). An editor was advancing the view that one punctuation style is uniquely American, that another is intrinsically British, and that using the second style in the context of the first audience or vice versa is "wrong" or "incorrect", and proceeded to push this view at multiple articles here and in MoS (we're still cleaning up after this). Their basis for this was that some stye guides and grammar manuals would say things like "The traditional US practice is to ...", "Many British publishers use ...", "In American style ...", "Another style, common in the UK", etc., etc. On its face, this seems almost like a reasonable conclusion. But the editor, having seized upon this idea, ignored all evidence to the contrary, and there was a shipload of it:
You'll probably note how familiar all this is: It looks exactly like the tortured paths taken by OR/PoV pushers in MEDRS topics who mischaracterize and mis-extrapolate from what sources actually say, fail to distinguish one source type from another, mix-and-match statements that use the same words but have different meanings for those terms in different fields or contexts; draw connections that aren't there; assume that superficially similar statements in different sources are the same statement; etc., etc. I know you have the skills to detect such b.s. when others are doing it in your fields of interest. The trick is to not become one of them in other topics. |
Hopefully that's helpful. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 10:09, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- See "I believe that by working together and encouraging cooperative behaviors on Wikipedia -- that all of this bitterness online can grow a little more productive. Wikipedia, let's work it out together. See you on the page!"[9] COI and/or advocates were topic banned and/or indeffed. Chopra said see you at the talk page and now there is a new account who knows a lot about policy. It appears Chopra admitted to recruiting people to Wikipedia. I just finished improving the lede. I could gather the diffs if the counterproductive edits continue, but I do not have faith in ArbCom. The Current RfC is irrelevant because the question about the specific text was rewritten and improved. If the source does not make the claim and editors ignore my request for V and editors claim I was beating a horse then they are creating a distraction and violating a core policy.
- Maybe you could summarize some of what you wrote and add it to the user essay. I will ping you over on the talk page. QuackGuru (talk) 16:36, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- I agree with you that there are multiple serious problems going on at that Deepak Chopra page, and that seems like a good place for you to do what you do. But the sports figure disputation, all of it, was totally counterproductive and silly. If you target your tenacity at actual problems – like externally-controlled campaigns to push COI PoV stuff with a WP:FACTION – not at winning pointless micro-battles over words like "sometimes", then a lot of the objections to you will go away. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 17:16, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- To be honest, editors on both sides have caused problems with the Chopra page. But the COI/advocate problem is the main problem. I have moved on from the dispute at the Manning page. QuackGuru (talk) 17:24, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- I understand. I'm just urging you not to repeat it. The kinds of objections you were raising and demands you were making are sensible when applied to something that actually has to be sourced (alleged facts about the real world which are challenged or potentially controversial – remember that WP:V requires that non-controversial, non-challenged material needs only to be verifiable not already verified). When you apply this technique to something that does not have to be sourced – common knowledge (the sky is blue), the obvious (someone stopped writing novels after they died), internal consensus (this source is reliable, or primary, or agrees with this other source, or is one of several that make this point while some others do not) – then it will be a WP:BATTLEGROUND, WP:LAWYER, WP:GAMING, WP:DE, WP:TE, WP:COMPETENCE problem all at the same time, and this will (as you have seen and felt) produced a large amount of negativity in your direction. Editors like me who appreciate the tenacity you bring to real and serious WP:CCPOL problems at various articles cannot keep defending you if you misuse the same tactics to pester people with bullshit. That's the clearest way I can put it, and I'm confident you can handle this truth without taking it the wrong way. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 17:35, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- Editors were not saying that the words failed V and it is okay to include text that is unverifiable. They were saying it is sourced. There is a difference. If editors said it is unsourced and we want to IAR then that would of been a different story. I thought it would of been better to simply follow the sources. QuackGuru (talk) 17:44, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- Even if you're right on that nit-pick, being right on a nit-pick when people are pissed off at you for nit-picking will not stop them from taking action against you. Cf. above about "Pursue important goals intelligently, not trivial ones randomly". — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 19:01, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- At the top of the article it says "Encyclopedic content must be verifiable." when you click to edit. Many editors think V is not relevant. If editors were trying to add an unsourced non-controversial sentence that would be different. When there is a reliable source at the end of the sentence then there is a problem when editors think they can put words in the author's mouth. From the very beginning editors constantly rewrote neutral text and then blame me the text was misleading. It is like they programmed me to make sure the text accurately reflects the sources. QuackGuru (talk) 20:38, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- Repeat: "remember that WP:V requires that non-controversial, non-challenged material needs only to be verifiable not already verified)". "If editors were trying to add an unsourced non-controversial sentence that would be different." Except the "sometimes" RfC you launched was editors trying to add an unsourced non-controversial statement, and you went after it anyway. Saying that some sources say X or that sources sometimes say X is not putting words in the mouths of the source authors, it's meta-analysis by Wikipedia consensus about what the sources as a whole are indicating to us. We've already been over this three times now. I feel like what I'm trying to convey to you is not sinking in. You seem to be trying to defend your actions no matter what, to perpetuate your dispute with those people or the high you got off it, and to win an argument with me, when I'm trying to advise you how to still have an account her next month. I give up. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:47, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- They were not trying to add an "unsourced non-controversial statement". They are trying to add an "unverifiable statement" when the source at the end of the sentence failed to verify part of the claim. QuackGuru (talk) 20:54, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- I've explained 4 times why your interpretation is very obviously incorrect. This appears to be a WP:NOTGETTINGIT problem, so I'm done. Good luck. You're going to need it. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 21:10, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- They were not trying to add an "unsourced non-controversial statement". They are trying to add an "unverifiable statement" when the source at the end of the sentence failed to verify part of the claim. QuackGuru (talk) 20:54, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- Repeat: "remember that WP:V requires that non-controversial, non-challenged material needs only to be verifiable not already verified)". "If editors were trying to add an unsourced non-controversial sentence that would be different." Except the "sometimes" RfC you launched was editors trying to add an unsourced non-controversial statement, and you went after it anyway. Saying that some sources say X or that sources sometimes say X is not putting words in the mouths of the source authors, it's meta-analysis by Wikipedia consensus about what the sources as a whole are indicating to us. We've already been over this three times now. I feel like what I'm trying to convey to you is not sinking in. You seem to be trying to defend your actions no matter what, to perpetuate your dispute with those people or the high you got off it, and to win an argument with me, when I'm trying to advise you how to still have an account her next month. I give up. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:47, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- At the top of the article it says "Encyclopedic content must be verifiable." when you click to edit. Many editors think V is not relevant. If editors were trying to add an unsourced non-controversial sentence that would be different. When there is a reliable source at the end of the sentence then there is a problem when editors think they can put words in the author's mouth. From the very beginning editors constantly rewrote neutral text and then blame me the text was misleading. It is like they programmed me to make sure the text accurately reflects the sources. QuackGuru (talk) 20:38, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- Even if you're right on that nit-pick, being right on a nit-pick when people are pissed off at you for nit-picking will not stop them from taking action against you. Cf. above about "Pursue important goals intelligently, not trivial ones randomly". — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 19:01, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- Editors were not saying that the words failed V and it is okay to include text that is unverifiable. They were saying it is sourced. There is a difference. If editors said it is unsourced and we want to IAR then that would of been a different story. I thought it would of been better to simply follow the sources. QuackGuru (talk) 17:44, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- I understand. I'm just urging you not to repeat it. The kinds of objections you were raising and demands you were making are sensible when applied to something that actually has to be sourced (alleged facts about the real world which are challenged or potentially controversial – remember that WP:V requires that non-controversial, non-challenged material needs only to be verifiable not already verified). When you apply this technique to something that does not have to be sourced – common knowledge (the sky is blue), the obvious (someone stopped writing novels after they died), internal consensus (this source is reliable, or primary, or agrees with this other source, or is one of several that make this point while some others do not) – then it will be a WP:BATTLEGROUND, WP:LAWYER, WP:GAMING, WP:DE, WP:TE, WP:COMPETENCE problem all at the same time, and this will (as you have seen and felt) produced a large amount of negativity in your direction. Editors like me who appreciate the tenacity you bring to real and serious WP:CCPOL problems at various articles cannot keep defending you if you misuse the same tactics to pester people with bullshit. That's the clearest way I can put it, and I'm confident you can handle this truth without taking it the wrong way. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 17:35, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- To be honest, editors on both sides have caused problems with the Chopra page. But the COI/advocate problem is the main problem. I have moved on from the dispute at the Manning page. QuackGuru (talk) 17:24, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- I agree with you that there are multiple serious problems going on at that Deepak Chopra page, and that seems like a good place for you to do what you do. But the sports figure disputation, all of it, was totally counterproductive and silly. If you target your tenacity at actual problems – like externally-controlled campaigns to push COI PoV stuff with a WP:FACTION – not at winning pointless micro-battles over words like "sometimes", then a lot of the objections to you will go away. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 17:16, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
ogg file display
Sorry to trouble you, but you've always struck me as a knowledgeable and helpful chap.
Do you have any idea if this is a widespread problem and, if so, how to fix it? BushelCandle (talk) 02:16, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- Not right off hand. Chipmunkdavis have to provide basic configuration information for us to know what he's on about. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 07:00, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- Thanks for taking a peep. I've tried to reproduce his complaint using Firefox, Safari, Chrome, Edge and IE versions without success. If I wasn't trying to relentlessly assume good faith I would begin to assume that this was a spasm revert without checking whether the additional line spacing I introduced solved the mild obscuration of the descending part of characters where there is only one line break present... BushelCandle (talk) 07:22, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- Seems like a reasonable assumption if details are not forthcoming. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 10:13, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
- Thanks for taking a peep. I've tried to reproduce his complaint using Firefox, Safari, Chrome, Edge and IE versions without success. If I wasn't trying to relentlessly assume good faith I would begin to assume that this was a spasm revert without checking whether the additional line spacing I introduced solved the mild obscuration of the descending part of characters where there is only one line break present... BushelCandle (talk) 07:22, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:African-American Civil Rights Movement (1865–95)
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:African-American Civil Rights Movement (1865–95). Legobot (talk) 04:23, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
List of cat breeds
Hi. Just a quick apology for my edit on List of cat breeds. This was a direct transfer of content from the Cat article and I did not realise it contained an unreliable source. I hate creating work for other editors, so I'm sorry for doing that, but thankful that you picked it up. Oh, and I agree with your idea about "standardising" lists of domestic animal breeds. DrChrissy (talk) 15:54, 18 March 2016 (UTC)
- @DrChrissy: No worries; I didn't assume any nefarious faith or anything! It's better probably that we have a poor source that needs to be replaced but which doesn't seem to have an agenda, than no source.
What do you think about the broader WikiProject Breeds idea? — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 15:57, 18 March 2016 (UTC)
- I think it sounds like a good idea. I am generally in favour of some standardisation of "list" articles because we are almost certainly looking them up as reference articles. So, knowing where to look on a page can be very useful in navigation. I've just looked at List of sheep breeds for the first time, and that seems quite a useful arrangement. Of course, a project would be more than just list articles, but I think it would definitely benefit the encyclopaedia. DrChrissy (talk) 16:23, 18 March 2016 (UTC)
- @DrChrissy: I'll probably start the project. I've done it before, so I know how to do it (the proposal process, the templates, the categorization, etc., etc. It's a lot of work to fire one up properly). I have WikiProject English Language half-drafted now (can you believe that project was missing?!), so I'll do this one next. I had originally thought to do this about two years ago, but there was a lot of WP:DRAMA between various parties about nomenclature, and it was short on the heels of a huge amount of drama about common names of species (not a domesticants thing, but still just a lot of "fighting about animals"), so I just dropped the idea for a long time until tempers cooled sufficiently. I think it's really important to organize on this, because frankly our treatment of breeds mostly is at about the level of a fancier blog site, not an encyclopedia. There are of course some stellar individual articles, and some categories of them are in better shape than others, like the horse articles are mostly better and with more support materials than the goat ones, and the dog ones mostly better than the cat ones, etc. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:41, 18 March 2016 (UTC)
- That sounds great! I'm already aware that sometimes in discussions about breeds, things can get heated. Quite a while ago over at Mustang, I innocently raised the subject of whether the mustang horse should be upper-case "M" or lower-case "m". This quickly erupted into a volcano of polarised debate about whether the mustang is a breed or not. Let me know if I can be of any help. DrChrissy (talk) 21:25, 18 March 2016 (UTC)
- Yeah, I remember that one. Much of the problem is that the article at Breed is a big FAIL. It needs to be a WP:CONCEPTDAB since the word has more than one meaning. I can think of at least 7. When people argue for capitalization of breed names they're doing so usually on one of two theories: 1) A standardized breed is theoretically a proper name, being "official" and in a published standard. This is not a ridiculous view, but it has plenty of opposition. 2) All things anyone thinks of as a breed in any sense should be capitalized just because this is "traditional" or "a convention" among a certain set (who also capitalize all sorts of non-breeds, like hair color variants, groupings of breeds to what they're used for [Milk Goats vs. Milk Goats], etc., etc.). This is a specialized style fallacy and will never fly here in a million years. I myself remain strictly neutral on #1. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 23:11, 18 March 2016 (UTC)
- That sounds great! I'm already aware that sometimes in discussions about breeds, things can get heated. Quite a while ago over at Mustang, I innocently raised the subject of whether the mustang horse should be upper-case "M" or lower-case "m". This quickly erupted into a volcano of polarised debate about whether the mustang is a breed or not. Let me know if I can be of any help. DrChrissy (talk) 21:25, 18 March 2016 (UTC)
- @DrChrissy: I'll probably start the project. I've done it before, so I know how to do it (the proposal process, the templates, the categorization, etc., etc. It's a lot of work to fire one up properly). I have WikiProject English Language half-drafted now (can you believe that project was missing?!), so I'll do this one next. I had originally thought to do this about two years ago, but there was a lot of WP:DRAMA between various parties about nomenclature, and it was short on the heels of a huge amount of drama about common names of species (not a domesticants thing, but still just a lot of "fighting about animals"), so I just dropped the idea for a long time until tempers cooled sufficiently. I think it's really important to organize on this, because frankly our treatment of breeds mostly is at about the level of a fancier blog site, not an encyclopedia. There are of course some stellar individual articles, and some categories of them are in better shape than others, like the horse articles are mostly better and with more support materials than the goat ones, and the dog ones mostly better than the cat ones, etc. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:41, 18 March 2016 (UTC)
- I think it sounds like a good idea. I am generally in favour of some standardisation of "list" articles because we are almost certainly looking them up as reference articles. So, knowing where to look on a page can be very useful in navigation. I've just looked at List of sheep breeds for the first time, and that seems quite a useful arrangement. Of course, a project would be more than just list articles, but I think it would definitely benefit the encyclopaedia. DrChrissy (talk) 16:23, 18 March 2016 (UTC)
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Felis silvestris catus
Found this, thought of you - doi:10.1073/pnas.1410083111 The genetic analysis is very tedious, bypass it and go straight to "Results and Discussion", below Figure 2, the putative genes that differ in a domestic cat from a wild one. (They only did this for dogs last month, so cats have had a 1 year advantage - no more complaints from you about why dogs receive favourable treatment!) My take: the genes that differ affect the same "processes" as those that differ the dog from a wolf, as we would have expected but now it has been indicated through research. Regards, William Harris • talk • 08:18, 19 March 2016 (UTC)
- @William Harris: Woo, hoo! I'm almost surprised by the verisimilitude of the results, given that the prevailing theory has been that we essentially forced the domestication of the wolf into the dog, but that the cat essentially domesticated itself because we, by way of our grain and thus our rodent infestations, were a bounty for it. Thanks for this, I had no idea; I had not been looking for over a year due to having nose buried in other stuff. Did you integrate the equivalent dog news into an article yet? I should probably follow your lead on how to do that (feline biology and natural history is an interest of mine, not a professional specialization; my degree's in anthro, and even that's not may actual career). — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 08:25, 19 March 2016 (UTC)
- Crickey Mac, now that I see that you can talk Australian at an intermediate level - stone the flaming crows! - I should reveal that I am an accountant; this is just a hobby of mine, nothing professional, so you should go for it for the ankle-nippers. Yes, I have put a para from Cagan in the Origin article but it is very heavy going and so I have given it only the lightest of treatment. And now for some more feline horror: DOI: 10.1126/science.1139518 If you cannot access it let me know and I will "arrange something". Regards, William Harris • talk • 08:37, 19 March 2016 (UTC)
- PS - I don't think we forced the wolf to become domesticated. Our take: "For too long we have huddled in our huts with our fires in fear of the Cave Lion, Cave Hyena and the Scimitar Cat. Now we have found more teeth and now we fear them not!" Wolf take: "Every time one of these other big predators sneaks around after dark we howl, and this lot comes out of their huts with torches, spears and bows in response. Lets set up around their huts, rebadge ourselves as dogs, and let them do the hunting which they will do for free anyway. These people are idiots, so let's just outsource all the work to them!" What the cat thought? - I don't even want to go there! William Harris • talk • 08:45, 19 March 2016 (UTC)
- Of interest, have a look at the expanded Gray wolf#Domestic dog, in particular the last paragraph. Regards, William Harris • talk • 08:57, 19 March 2016 (UTC)
- PS - I don't think we forced the wolf to become domesticated. Our take: "For too long we have huddled in our huts with our fires in fear of the Cave Lion, Cave Hyena and the Scimitar Cat. Now we have found more teeth and now we fear them not!" Wolf take: "Every time one of these other big predators sneaks around after dark we howl, and this lot comes out of their huts with torches, spears and bows in response. Lets set up around their huts, rebadge ourselves as dogs, and let them do the hunting which they will do for free anyway. These people are idiots, so let's just outsource all the work to them!" What the cat thought? - I don't even want to go there! William Harris • talk • 08:45, 19 March 2016 (UTC)
- Crickey Mac, now that I see that you can talk Australian at an intermediate level - stone the flaming crows! - I should reveal that I am an accountant; this is just a hobby of mine, nothing professional, so you should go for it for the ankle-nippers. Yes, I have put a para from Cagan in the Origin article but it is very heavy going and so I have given it only the lightest of treatment. And now for some more feline horror: DOI: 10.1126/science.1139518 If you cannot access it let me know and I will "arrange something". Regards, William Harris • talk • 08:37, 19 March 2016 (UTC)
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- (edit conflict) I'm kind of slap-happy from such a long day, but too much coffee to sleep yet, and I have rambled and rambled below, sorry. Hopefully it's interesting, and I close with WP balance issue that you might have some insight on, since you've had to deal with a lot of similar balance and supposition problems in the dogs area.
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I can buy the wolf self-domestication story, but only to an extent. There is a major difference canine/feline difference: If you take a real wolf pup and raise it like a dog, it will behave to a remarkable extent like a dog, though it may pose some dangers, at least to inexperienced handlers/trainers. It can make a good companion animal under the right circumstances, though usually not an indoor one from what I've read and seen. If you raise a Felis silverstris wildcat from a kitten, by the time it reaches sexual maturity, it's prime interest may be in escaping from you, and while it may tolerate limited amounts of cautious human handling, done just the right way and for short stretches, it will probably frequently do notable violence to you at virtually any provocation, and will shred your house if you try to keep it indoors. Even F1 feline hybrids don't make good/safe pets except for very experienced (with wild & hybrid, not domestic) handlers, though they can be kept indoors. Meanwhile, F1 wolf-dogs often make great indoor/outdoor pets for experienced (dog, not wolf) handlers and are in high demand (too often by people who don't know what they're in for and can't handle it >;-).
So, with dogs I think there's likely to have been a broad two-way street in domestication. "We have killed this wolf, and found that she had cubs. We'll take them and raise them as guard-wolves, and kill any that attack our children." (But the mother wolf was probably close by for exactly the reason you gave.) That process of keeping a few and weeding out the ones who acted too wild would by itself easily produce docile dogs in a reasonable number of generations. Closely mirrors plant domestication (carry the ones that taste less bitter back to camp, their seeds grow in the nearby middens, and form a genetic bottleneck).But there's little evidence I've seen to date that humans ever did much of anything to selectively breed cats until well into written historical times (Egyptian temple cats, then a big gap, then the Persian/Angora among the sultans and sheikhs in the Ottoman Empire, then a big gap, then a few isolated cases in early modernity, then all hell breaks loose in the 1880s not long after the first cat show, at the Crystal Palace in London. Throughout most of history cats were barely tolerated (in the West, anyway), and sometimes subject to programmatic persecution (really awful stuff, like slowly burning alive in suspended baskets high above a fire to make the death as drawn-out and agonizing as possible, or crucified on trees and left to hang there until they died of thirst. Meanwhile, the dogs were often curled up inside by the fireplace. The indoor cat (that didn't temporarily sneak in) seems to have been a post-medieval invention, except among the nobility in Egypt and thereabout during certain periods, and in a few places in the Far East, though I can imagine that they might have been kept sometimes as pets not just tolerated as feral vermin hunters in Greece and a few other places. We just don't have a lot of historical source and artifact material on this, and what we do find often has wishful thinking projected onto it. E.g. the 7500 BCE burial of a wildcat with a human in Neolithic Cyprus keeps being billed as evidence of early keeping of pet cats, but it's nothing of the sort. Humans got buried with animals of all sorts, for widely different reasons. It may well have been a sacrifice to some grain god, or it may have been the personal totem animal of the person, or he may have just been a menagerie keeper and they sent him off with the only specimen that would fit in the grave, or maybe his name had a phoneme for "cat" in it, so they though it would be appropriate to include one, or ... There's no evidence of pet status whatsoever, though it's possible. And in Egypt, while some noble families kept cats indoors and even put jewelry on them, they had multiple cat goddesses, so this is probably religious behavior not "I love my cute kitties so much!" behavior. Where are the depictions of pharaohs petting cats in their laps? [10] They've found thousands and thousands of ritually sacrificed cats at one of the cat goddess temples, so it's not like they were loved and there was concern for their welfare; they were used for ritual purposes (and temple profit – cat mummies were sold as blessed charms) with no apparent regard for the cats' lives, just as we still use pigs and cattle as food. |
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- The WP problem for cat history is that there are so many "reliable" sources that make the "a wildcat in 9500 bp neolithic grave = ancient pets" leap (National Geographic is top search result for "cat burial ancient cyprus", for example, and does so for the most part), that it's going to be difficult to keep a balanced and scientific instead of "interpretive archaeology" (i.e. imaginative) view in our key cat articles. And I'm now done yakkin'; I think the caffeine's worn off. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 09:54, 19 March 2016 (UTC)
- Yes, there are many proposals that should be stated that way and not as fact. I always ask the same question - "what does the data tell us, and what is conjecture?" Sleep well William Harris • talk • 10:49, 19 March 2016 (UTC)
- The central problem is that, per WP:OR, we're not allowed to analyze the underlying data ourselves and conclude what it says, only what the sources, balanced in the aggregate, say about their analysis of it (or of other sources' prior analysis of it). As a result, if some questionable sources that have good public reputations say the wrong thing, a large percentage of editors will fight to include it, citing WP:V, WP:RS, and WP:TRUTH. When a whole bunch of semi-RS jump incorrectly or dubiously onto one side of the scale the balance in the aggregate sources is canted badly off-kilter, and this leads to bad encyclopedia writing that people here will defend half to death. As I'm sure you've noticed. If you haven't, wander for five minutes in any contentious medical/health topic like electronic cigarettes or GMOs. It's pretty unbelievable. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 11:29, 19 March 2016 (UTC)
- I have seen this type of thing before, but nothing on the scale of e-cigarettes! Plus, it has 144kb devoted to a First World problem - amazing. Perhaps I should saturation bomb the page with my favourite:[unreliable source?] William Harris • talk • 09:33, 20 March 2016 (UTC)
- I regret having gotten involved. It's a gladiatorial arena of drama and will continue to be one until several more topic-bans happen. But I was also participating on the talk page (I got drawn there in the first place by an RfC). If you just tag some unreliable sources (especially primary ones being used as if secondary, for WP:AEIS), you might not get sucked into the dramasphere. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 14:22, 20 March 2016 (UTC)
- I have seen this type of thing before, but nothing on the scale of e-cigarettes! Plus, it has 144kb devoted to a First World problem - amazing. Perhaps I should saturation bomb the page with my favourite:[unreliable source?] William Harris • talk • 09:33, 20 March 2016 (UTC)
- The central problem is that, per WP:OR, we're not allowed to analyze the underlying data ourselves and conclude what it says, only what the sources, balanced in the aggregate, say about their analysis of it (or of other sources' prior analysis of it). As a result, if some questionable sources that have good public reputations say the wrong thing, a large percentage of editors will fight to include it, citing WP:V, WP:RS, and WP:TRUTH. When a whole bunch of semi-RS jump incorrectly or dubiously onto one side of the scale the balance in the aggregate sources is canted badly off-kilter, and this leads to bad encyclopedia writing that people here will defend half to death. As I'm sure you've noticed. If you haven't, wander for five minutes in any contentious medical/health topic like electronic cigarettes or GMOs. It's pretty unbelievable. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 11:29, 19 March 2016 (UTC)
- Yes, there are many proposals that should be stated that way and not as fact. I always ask the same question - "what does the data tell us, and what is conjecture?" Sleep well William Harris • talk • 10:49, 19 March 2016 (UTC)
- The WP problem for cat history is that there are so many "reliable" sources that make the "a wildcat in 9500 bp neolithic grave = ancient pets" leap (National Geographic is top search result for "cat burial ancient cyprus", for example, and does so for the most part), that it's going to be difficult to keep a balanced and scientific instead of "interpretive archaeology" (i.e. imaginative) view in our key cat articles. And I'm now done yakkin'; I think the caffeine's worn off. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 09:54, 19 March 2016 (UTC)
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Synchronized swimming categories for Brazil, China
Moved these to a full discussion. Hugo999 (talk) 01:50, 20 March 2016 (UTC)
This week's article for improvement (week 12, 2016)
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Please comment on Talk:Monarchy of Canada
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Invitation
Hi, SMcCandlish - I'm here to extend an invitation to you to review [11], and consider participating as one of the project coordinators. I've been getting guidance from Wikicology regarding presentation of the proposal to WMF, but need more quality editors working with me to build our team. I have received some positive input from two of our most active admins but before I begin an intense promotional effort, I want to perfect the presentation and iron-out as many of the kinks as possible. Your input will be greatly appreciated. Oh, and if you prefer to correspond via email, that's ok, too. I have contacted one other editor, Smallbones, who I believe will be an asset in helping to launch this project. Atsme📞📧 20:04, 23 March 2016 (UTC)
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- @Atsme: I might as well answer here, since it probably would involve both of you. I just need a lot more details. An Editorial Review Board sounds like a very interesting idea and could be fun. But actually I think it could easily violate Wikipedia rules, such as forming some sort of exclusive club that others couldn't join without an invitation. If it's just another rating scheme (that anybody can participate in whenever they want) - well this could be done better than it is now, but I think I'd rather not - rating something properly takes a huge amount of time. Working up a consistent rating scheme and the organization to implement it would take a huge amount of time. Right now you're probably saying something like "I didn't mean that at all" so I'll go back to the beginning - I need a lot more detail. Thanks. Smallbones(smalltalk) 20:45, 23 March 2016 (UTC)
- @Atsme: Potentially interesting (modulo what Smallbones said), but I'll have to look into it when I have some time to devote to it, which isn't right this moment. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 21:35, 23 March 2016 (UTC)
- Thank you, SMcCandlish. I realize Project Accuracy will be extremely time consuming, and probably a full-time job which is why I decided to go with a grant proposal. I certainly understand time constraints, so when you get some free time, don't hesitate to ping. Smallbones, I will respond to you on my TP. Atsme📞📧 00:06, 24 March 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:Josip Broz Tito
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This week's article for improvement (week 13, 2016)
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Please comment on Talk:List of people who have opened the Olympic Games
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:List of people who have opened the Olympic Games. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
Could you let us know what you mean by "weird style that doesn't mean anything to anyone". Also why, "use a footnote" for the 2000 line, given that, as explained, none is needed? [12] Qexigator (talk) 09:58, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
- Done. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 19:11, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
Note from Cebr1979
I left a message for you on my talk page but, it got nuked off (by someone else this time, not me). Here's the link: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Cebr1979&diff=prev&oldid=712549884
Knock yourself out. Love, Cebr1979 (talk) 19:37, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
- Yes, I know. I was watchlisting that page. Nice to see that your anon edits in mainspace remain constructive so far, though your IP is liable to get blocked, for block evasion. Oh well. You brought this on yourself, and it's not my problem. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:00, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
- I don't go around chasing editors who make constructive edits--at least I don't go around reverting them automatically. If editors start calling other editors names, however, that's a different thing. It's bad manners and we simply cannot have that (*wag of finger*). Drmies (talk) 23:15, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
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- @Drmies: Yeah, I hadn't seen that. LOL. Well, he'll probably tire of the whack-a-mole game eventually. It's hard to imagine anyone with nothing better to do but drive around town to different cafés looking for WiFi to post again another IP address. That would be far too sad. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 03:45, 30 March 2016 (UTC)
Reference errors on 29 March
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He!
Before you break the template a third time, will you read Template_talk:Contradict-inline#Article_parameter? Debresser (talk) 10:21, 1 April 2016 (UTC)
- @Debresser: It was obviously just a typo, using the old magicword instead of the intended variable. Long since fixed, and I've gone way beyond that. Talk page of template has the details on the new features. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:57, 1 April 2016 (UTC)
- I reverted all of that. Maintenance templates don't need al those features, and if necessary, they can be added easily with features of {{Fix}}. Compare other maintenance templates, please, before you add 742 characters to a maintenance template. Debresser (talk) 17:00, 2 April 2016 (UTC)
@Debresser: Then do it the way you want it done, as long as it gets done. I don't recall having any noteworthy disputes with you before, so I'm wondering why this is looking more and more like a personal "stonewall and editwar against that SMcCandlish guy at all costs" mission. This is the third time in a row you've used blanket reverting to undo my work, instead of re-implementing it in ways you like better. And yes, maintenance templates do need features that a) make their default behavior non-senseless, b) reduce the profusion of redundant templates, and c) help actually pinpoint what the flagged problem is. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 19:38, 2 April 2016 (UTC)- Never mind here; I see you've reversed yourself on this in the time it took me to reply. I'll raise the remaining issues at the template talk page. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 19:58, 2 April 2016 (UTC)
- You added too much code and features, IMHO. The discussion was only about a redirect. You made the "Contradict-inline" template about the most complicated template of all maintenance templates, and that is overkill. Debresser (talk) 20:51, 2 April 2016 (UTC)
- Nah. There are considerably more complex templates. If you don't want to use the features, don't use them. Simple. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:56, 2 April 2016 (UTC)
- You added too much code and features, IMHO. The discussion was only about a redirect. You made the "Contradict-inline" template about the most complicated template of all maintenance templates, and that is overkill. Debresser (talk) 20:51, 2 April 2016 (UTC)
- Never mind here; I see you've reversed yourself on this in the time it took me to reply. I'll raise the remaining issues at the template talk page. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 19:58, 2 April 2016 (UTC)
- I reverted all of that. Maintenance templates don't need al those features, and if necessary, they can be added easily with features of {{Fix}}. Compare other maintenance templates, please, before you add 742 characters to a maintenance template. Debresser (talk) 17:00, 2 April 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:1948 Palestinian exodus from Lydda and Ramle
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This week's article for improvement (week 14, 2016)
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Please comment on Talk:History of South America
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:History of South America. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 6 April 2016 (UTC)
Some dim sum for you!
Thanks for your contributions to Wikipedia. North America1000 09:21, 7 April 2016 (UTC) |
- @Northamerica1000: Why thank ya very much! I was wiki-hungry. ;-) — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 10:03, 7 April 2016 (UTC)
- I like the way the dumplings kind of droop down, like gravity in action, so using it around town ... North America1000 10:07, 7 April 2016 (UTC)
- That's because they're trying to git in mah belleh!. Heh. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 10:52, 7 April 2016 (UTC)
- I like the way the dumplings kind of droop down, like gravity in action, so using it around town ... North America1000 10:07, 7 April 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Template talk:British colonial campaigns
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wtf?
- The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
- My talk page does exist for people, who nuke everyone's posts of their own talk pages, to use as their surrogate ranting ground. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 08:17, 10 April 2016 (UTC)
Seems you posted this on the wrong user's talk page. - theWOLFchild 07:35, 10 April 2016 (UTC)
- I just covered this at your talk page, but whatever. You're correct that I misidentified who wrote and reverted what; but a) Dicklyon has already receieved that WP:ACDS notice for WP:ARBATC, so I need not give him another (indeed, we're instructed to not leave duplicate ones), but b) you had not, and clearly needed one, since multiple editors complain you are casting uncivil and unsupportable WP:ASPERSIONS about other editors, at pages covered by WP:ARBATC. So, all is actually well. You're aware of the discretionary sanctions in the topic area, so is Dicklyon, so am I (obviously), and I think everyone else active in the area is, too. I expect, therefore, that the civility level will increase. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 07:53, 10 April 2016 (UTC)
DDG-121
That's quite a mess you've made of the talk page over there, while writing your novel (are you up to extended discussion #12 yet?). Don't alter the layout the discussion and especially do not move other user's comments out of place and context. Just say what you have to say and move you. You and your friends are becoming entirely to presumptuous with your actions of late. You need to remember that Wikipedia is massive consensus-based community, not a little clique that can change whatever they like, including the hard work of others and even guidelines, just to suit your personal tastes. You need and friends need to stop what you're doing and seek the approval of the community at large. - theWOLFchild 08:05, 10 April 2016 (UTC)
- If you nuke everyone's comments off your talk page and respond to them in WP:JERK fashion, you have no right to comment on anyone else's talk page. Now, go read WP:REFACTOR and WP:BLUDGEON. It's standard operating procedure to take back-and-forth blather like yours, especially when the formatting of it interferes with the ability to tell how many individuals have commented, and move it out of the main comments section into lower, extended discussion section(s). If you have no figured this out yet, try reading more and posting less until you absorb WP community practices better. "You and your friends", i.e. the four people who will not accept a site-wide RfC that ran for a month, was closed not just by an admin but one of the sitting Arbs, and the implementation of which has resulting in WP:SNOWBALLs in favor of it in RM after RM are the ones who are "differently clued" when it comes to consensus. Now, you stay off my talk page. Bye. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 08:15, 10 April 2016 (UTC)
- The above discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.
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Talk:MOS/BIos
This edit was more snarky then necessary. I have already warned WC to tone down his rhetoric and it would be helpful to lowering the overall temperaturw if you could ease up the sharpness of your own comments. Thanks. Spartaz Humbug! 10:52, 11 April 2016 (UTC)
- @Spartaz: Right-o. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 11:42, 11 April 2016 (UTC)
Let's clear this up and move on
@Thewolfchild: This is kind of a moot point now, but let's just air it out. Since you covered a lot of things in more than one place, I'll break this up topically for easier digestion and reply, if I dare hope you'll bother. (And yes, this is an invitation to discuss it here instead of your page, or Spartaz's, etc.; you seem to have an issue with me in particular, almost as much as with Dicklyon, so let's air it out.)
Source alteration
Dicklyon pointed out the source gaming [13], and the article edits confirm it. You even stated explicitly on that talk page that you'd used the consistent-within-the-article wording as an excuse to delete sources.[14] No one else in WP history, as far as I know, has ever advanced the idea that being consistent in the article text means altering source titles to show the styles you want to say they use, or deleting sources that don't have titles styled in a way that agrees with the style of the text. Indeed, both MOS and WP:CITE are explicit that citation style is not determined by style in the article prose. Since the MOS:JR loophole wording has been closed, we needn't go over this any further. Water under the bridge.
— SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 13:19, 11 April 2016 (UTC)
Taking it to ArbCom
You would not like the outcome. I have diffs for every one of the following unsupported accusations by you: conspiracy, gaming, editwarring, "disingenuous comments" (lying), hypocrisy, disruption, editwarring again to remove sources (that was you), changing MOS "to suit personal preferences", text-walling (also you - I tried to refactor your RM bludgeoning into an extended comments section and you reverted, and the entire article talk page is a forest of pink "Wolf" markers; you totally dominate the conversation), playing dumb, gaming, and many others. You have no evidence to back up any of those claims. I seriously think you'll get at least topic-banned if not indeffed (given your block log and the fact that you're subject to escalating blocks, the short ones you've already burned through, and many of the blocks are recent) if you keep pursuing any of this. If you really think you have a case for AE or ARBCOM, I can't stop you, but I'm very well prepared for it. Wouldn't it be better to just WP:DGAF and go do something less stressy, like work on a ship stub?
— SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 13:19, 11 April 2016 (UTC)
Everyone is supposedly on your side
You make claims at Spartaz's page about landslide support for your viewpoint and a whole army of people up in arms about this, but it's just not there. The entire scenario is not cogent at all. You claim (I have not checked) that Dicklyon (and/or someone else? It's unclear what you mean sometimes) have moved hundreds or thousands of articles since the MOS:JR RfC. Yet there are a total of about one dozen Jr./Sr.-related RMs open, and they're all snowballing in favor of no commas. Editors in favor of the commas are the same four guys, recycling the same arguments no matter how many times they're refuted and fall on deaf ears. If what you said was true, there'd be hundreds of RMs or at least requests to revert undiscussed moves, and by now there'd be a centralized discussion, probably a mass RM. to deal with them in sets. None of this happening, because no one cares.
— SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 13:19, 11 April 2016 (UTC)
The validity of the RfC
The RfC was based on a huge pile of sources, and concluded MOS should prefer the no-comma style. It was a followup to a weak and no-consensus RfC last year, with few sources and lots of OR and opinion. When sources were provided this time, the opinion-mongering stopped dead (except for 4 editors, maybe 5 (Randy Kryn was vacillating and still is), and they just don't have the sources to back them. MOS was updated to implement the consensus in the RM. Parts of the close are not reflected in the MOS wording because they are not MOS matters. "Grandfathering" is something that GAN and FAC do, and MOS can't make up some "grandfathering" policy out of thin air. People would shit flaming spiked bricks if such a thing were attempted, since it would lead to everyone making guideline-immunity claims for all sorts of things based on age of the article, with the insane result that the older an article was, the less we would improve it to comply with modern WP expectations. Articles written in 2005 could be reverted back to 2005 standards, and look like total crap.
RMs follow MOS recommendations absent a compelling case not to in a particular instance. You assail MOS:JR as a "crock of shit", claiming that the RfC is somehow invalid, and that the close (by an Arb, not just an admin) is somehow invalid. Well, good luck selling that story. I have no need of further strife with you, and have nothing against your work here. When I'm working on non-mainspace stuff, my primary interest here is project-wide stability. Stability is not "don't move comma-Jr articles to just-Jr". Stability is "do not try to foment weird, pointy insurrections against WP guidelines and RfC processes and their closers". I don't agree with Drmies's close either, but I didn't challenge it formally; we can just work around the supervoting and confused aspects of it. There is nothing disruptive about moving comma-Jr articles to drop the comma. The disruption is the campaigning, page by page, to prevent the guideline and the RfC (prefer no-comma except when current sources consistently use a comma for a particular subject) from applying anywhere at all. The point of MOS, and AT, and multi-RMs, is to avoid, not perpetuate, page-after-page rehash of the same nit-picking.
— SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 13:19, 11 April 2016 (UTC)
- <snigger> Shitting flaming piked bricks</snigger>. That's the funniest thing I read so far this week. Spartaz Humbug! 13:29, 11 April 2016 (UTC)
-
- I try to inject a little humo[u]r into tense situations when I can. Heh. (though that was supposed to be "spiked"; I fixed it above.) — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 13:54, 11 April 2016 (UTC)
Arby
Hey SMcCandlish, my arbness is really irrelevant--it doesn't make my close better or worse. Thanks, Drmies (talk) 14:57, 11 April 2016 (UTC)
- @Drmies: Technically, I agree. I raised it (and needn't again), because Thewolfchild and someone else was chanting "take it to ARBCOM!", but it's highly unlikely that ArbCom would overturn one of the closes of a sitting ArbCom member, even aside from the fact that ArbCom doesn't settle content disputes, even internal ones.
- Anyway, I rewrote the material to better reflect your close despite my misgivings about it (the text now notes the BLP thing as a statistical likelihood, not a prerequisite), and this should actually resolve the issue, but I'm extremely skeptical – tempers being the way they are – that it will not be subject to a bunch more revertwarring and tendentious denial that your close is valid, that the RfCis valid, that MoS is valid, than any consensus other than "give me that damned comma" is valid.
- I suspect a fourth RfC will ensue, all because four individuals will not stop beating the dead horse. I don't even really care about this comma (it's Dicklyon and RGloucester's show, perhaps the thing that will mend the very strained fence between them); I just sourced it because it's an interesting language question. I have even more style guides now, so if it comes to that and if I'm bored enough on a rainy weekend, I'll be able to probably double the sourcing level. (Would rather not; have other fish to fry.)
- My interest in this "Jr." thing is just the bogus attempts to pretend VPPOL RfCs can be ignored if one doesn't get the answer one wants. (Someone probably thinks I'm behaving that way about the "grandfathering" thing, but I've laid out a policy-based rationale at WT:MOSBIO, reiterated here, above, showing it's a GAN/FAC matter, not an MOS one, and no one's refuted this).
- I also suggested to Dicklyon to lay off the moves for a bit. Everyone needs to just calm down.
- PS: Now you have me thinking of Arby's Sauce. I need a sangwidge! — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 15:37, 11 April 2016 (UTC)
- Don't go there--it'll kill you. Look, that I'm an Arb has little to do with what ArbCom may decide, and I encourage that one forget I have a few different hats. I closed that one as an uninvolved admin. What might go before ArbCom, I don't know. If someone wants to challenge a close it's probably going to be kicked right back. But I have no doubt that there will be more misgivings about the MOS, esp., maybe, as we're getting more newer editors and the older ones--dinosaurs like you and me--die off. Take care, Drmies (talk) 15:47, 11 April 2016 (UTC)
- @Drmies: More rambling musings.... I'm sure you're right. One of my goals is to get our own articles on English usage better sourced; people (like someone recently indeffed) keep using the shite ones and the OR in them to push MoS-alteration agendas. Most of them really are in appalling shape.
But there's always a fire to fight at MoS, more so than any other guideline. It's because many native speakers (and quite a few non-) are convinced that the usage they were taught early on is the correct one, in an objective sense. (Or at most that there's one correct English, down to every possible detail, over here, and some weird foreign one over there which also has one exact set of correct rules.) It's a religious-like conviction.
Protecting the balance and stability is the important part. Which includes respect for the guideline as a guideline like the rest of them. If we have that, it doesn't really matter what the particulars are in most cases. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 16:29, 11 April 2016 (UTC)
DRN help needed and volunteer roll call
You are receiving this message because you have listed yourself on the list of volunteers at Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard/Volunteering#List of the DRN volunteers.
First, assistance is needed at DRN. We have recently closed a number of cases without any services being provided for lack of a volunteer willing to take the case. There are at least three cases awaiting a volunteer at this moment. Please consider taking one.
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Best regards, TransporterMan (talk · contribs) (Current DRN coordinator) (Not watching this page) Sent via MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:05, 12 April 2016 (UTC)
- I'll think about it. Still have a sour taste in my mouth. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 17:22, 12 April 2016 (UTC)
While you've been sleeping............
Bad news from the Lol-cat! Keep up the splendid work. William Harris • talk • 10:21, 13 April 2016 (UTC)Thanks. "Always blame the cat." — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 19:52, 13 April 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:State of Palestine
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:State of Palestine. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 14 April 2016 (UTC)
Request
I noticed that you were one of the more recent editors at WP:SPA. There is an important discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Editor Retention about possibly finding a way to salvage Single-purpose editors and transforming them into positive WP collaborators in the general mainspace. I'm sure you run in to many of them as you wander around WP. I'm also sure that every now and then one of the SPA editors rises above the crowd and seems worthy of more of your time and effort. Your personal insight and experience would be appreciated. WP:WER has become a relative ghost town (and I may be one of the few ghosts left in town) and User:Robert's idea may be just the boost the Project needs to revitalize. It's an opportunity for the Project to actually do something beyond handing out awards. I think Dennis Brown would like it. Buster Seven Talk 14:09, 14 April 2016 (UTC)
Books & Bytes - Issue 16
Books & Bytes
Issue 16, February-March 2016
by The Interior (talk · contribs), UY Scuti (talk · contribs)
- New donations - science, humanities, and video resources
- Using hashtags in edit summaries - a great way to track a project
- A new cite archive template, a new coordinator, plus conference and Visiting Scholar updates
- Metrics for the Wikipedia Library's last three months
You've got mail!
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{{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk}
01:46, 16 April 2016 (UTC)Please explain
Please explain where this edit was discussed, and if it wasn't, why you think it is uncontroversially a good idea. Debresser (talk) 17:57, 17 April 2016 (UTC)
- Per WP:EDITING policy, WP:NOT#BUREAUCRACY policy, and WP:BOLD, I don't need your permission before I can add features to temples. Certainty that an edit cannot potentially be controversial is not a prerequisite for making the edit, otherwise WP would have about 5,000 very short articles on boring things, and would have died the year it started. Tweaking templates to be flexible enough to actually comport with long-extant policies is hardly controversial anyway.
- More to the point you came here about, check out WP:SPS policy, WP:USINGPRIMARY, etc. The reason for the parameter is that primary sources sometimes are both permissible and reliable (WP:SPS: "Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established expert on the subject matter, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications", though the word "may" in that should probably be emphasized); we prefer WP:SECONDARY ones, even when WP:AEIS isn't involved, but when it's not, WP:PRIMARY ones are often sufficient and their use does not auto-generate an actual dispute. A frequent case is an attributed or verbatim-quoted claim in the conclusions of primary research that, while not yet the subject of literature reviews and other high-quality sourcing, is encyclopedic, or even notable (e.g. because the findings have aroused controversy). Ergo, not every self-published source constitutes an accuracy dispute; while we do often want them replaced, we do not want them clogging up dispute categories, which exist for far more serious matters that we need to contend with, like citations of random-schmoe blogs written by people with no credentials. There are thousands upon thousands of such genuinely unacceptable citations on WP, and they all have to go. Citations to permissible primary sources generally only need to be replaced during WP:GAN or WP:FAC review (and even then many of them actually remain accepted for various things).
So, what about the parameter triggers some concern for you?
— SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 19:13, 17 April 2016 (UTC)
- I asked for an explanation, and you gave one. If I thought you needed my permission, I would have reverted first. When I saw your edit, I understood more or less what you wrote here, but I wanted to be sure that we have the same functionality in mind.
- The first problem I see is that there is no category at all when the parameter is set to "yes". That is not so good, because as a rule it makes sense for a maintenance template to add a maintenance category, where all tagged articles can be found.
- What bothered me about the edit, is that you add functionality that is not trivial without discussion, meaning, without making sure that editors feel that there is a need for the functionality and that they will use it. That seems a bit arrogant, like saying: "People, I am providing you with a nifty functionality. Oh, you don't need it, or don't know how to use it? You are such simple people." As a rule, functionality should be added only if it serves a function. In this case, it seems pretty academic to me.
- Second problem. We already have {{Primary source inline}}, and the usage of {{Self-published source}} with the parameter set to "yes" come sdown to precisely that. That is redundant and confusing, and we should avoid that.
- On a technical note, the "expert" parameter will function as a "yes" even if the text is "no". That is not good! Debresser (talk) 22:04, 17 April 2016 (UTC)
- [Sorry this is long, but that was a long list of points in compact form.] Please do not project strange monologues like that as if they're in other people's heads; that's your imagination, not mine, and I don't think that way. When I create a template or add a parameter to one, it's because I'm going to use it, and I probably see that others might have a use for it. Same as almost all other template creations and parameter additions by other editors. Your expectations are seem unreasonable in this regard. You can't seriously be trying to tell me what my own motivations are and call me arrogant in the same breath. Seems kind of "unclear on the concept".
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- Lots of cleanup templates create no categories. Maint. categories are themselves a maintenance hassle, and we don't need more of them unless it's for something serious and urgent. Creating a new category for a parameter the entire point of which is to convert the template to a "fix it later, this is not urgent" usage, would defeat the purpose. Unless the template is flagging a large number of pages, and they need to be sorted by date so they can be prioritized, such a cat. would serve no purpose, since you can get the same list of pages by going to "What links here" at the template. The argument you present against adding template parameters without being very certain a bunch of people want it isn't exactly a strong one when it comes to template parameters, or we would have nearly no template parameters. It's a very strong argument against creating main. cats., though.
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- If you don't like the parameter, don't use it. If you really want to create a maint. cat. for it, I don't care any more than I've already indicated; I think it will be ignored, because we have so many already.
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- A primary source and a self-published one are not the same thing; I confused them in my earlier comment. The primary journal paper case would be primary, not SPS. The expert posts article on own blog case is SPS. Either way, it's a valid source in some context, for limited purposes. Sorry I did not keep them distinct; I was distracted by something off-wiki. Anyway, they're not redundant. Some SPS material is secondary or tertiary, and lots of primary (like new-research papers in journals) is not SPS.
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- All
|foo=y
parameters are really|foo=anything you put here, including "n"
, unless they're painstakingly coded to do positive/negative tests, which adds a great deal of processing overhead and is a waste of editorial time. If the documentation doesn't say you can reverse the parameter from neg. to pos. (or vice versa) there's about a 99% chance you can't – on any template. It's such a huge pain to implement that it's virtually always documented that this is possible when it is, and we all know it doesn't work if the /doc doesn't clearly say that it works. - — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 23:18, 17 April 2016 (UTC)
- All
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- Thanks for your reply. I am not convinced, but since nobody else is complaining, I'll leave it at this, for the time being. Which is, and I do feel I have to repeat this point, one of the reasons you should raise the proposal of adding new features on the talkpage before you make an edit. I strongly urge you to do so in the future. That would, as an additional benefit :), have spared you this post of mine. Debresser (talk) 07:59, 18 April 2016 (UTC)
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-
-
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- That didn't even actually parse in English; it's just a bunch of unconnected grammatical fragments. I think I get the gist, though. You're threatening to continue wasting my time with this gibberish if I don't do things your way, and you don't really have answer to anything I said. I don't know whether you intend that to be taken seriously, or are just trying to exit in a face-saving way and tripping over your own feet. It has kind of a Mr. Bean / Austin Power effect.
Repeat, in less uncertain terms: Neither I nor anyone else needs your or anyone else's prior approval to implement new things here. If you continue to pester me in this regard, you're just going to get the same answer. Most of what you wrote above in these posts indicates that, despite the amount of time you've been around, you've not absorbed a few key things:
- WP is not some kind of damned committee or parliamentary/congressional process. It is a volunteer meritocracy. If you don't like the shed I'm building of bricks, you are free to build your chicken coop of cinderblocks, too, but you are not in a position to stop my construction, and you need to find something else to occupy your time besides looking over my shoulder and complaining about my bricklaying or whether or not I should build a shed, especially given that we have virtually infinite "land" and "materials". The one limited resource we do have is time, and you're wasting mine and yours.
- You don't seem to fully understand how templates and their documentation work, and need to stop lecturing people about it. Either lead, follow, or get out of the way. Right now you are just lying in the road trying to blockade traffic for no clear reason. We all have better things to do than watch you flail around in the street, and are just going to drive around you.
- Using the rhetoric of collaboration to be individually obstructionist, to make it about getting your way instead of doing useful things, is not going to work here. "I am not convinced [etc.]" = "You presented refutations to every point I made, and I can't rebut them so I'm just going to hand-wave and posture, and vaguely threaten to keep filibustering and stonewalling you, because I want to WP:WIN." Well, no. If you don't have something constructive to do, quit following me around raising poorly conceived pseudo-objections to things you don't understand, either as to their rationales or at the code and documentation level. You're correct that no one else is complaining, because I know what I'm doing, and everyone else knows what I'm doing. Probably 99.5% of the edits I make in the template namespace stick, and thousands of people use templates and parameters I created, every day. (That said, I do suck at Lua, so the work I've done with the original MediaWiki template language will be entirely surpassed some day by all-Lua solutions, and that's fine. Everything we have is built on the prior work of others, in all aspects of life.)
- I have no idea why you decided to pick a slow-moving, weeks-long "nit-pick SMcCandlish's template editing to death" fight with me, out of the blue, but I don't come here for that kind of stuff, and I'm not playing that game. WP doesn't work the way you want it to. Not my problem.
I will continue coding as I see fit and building the encyclopedia content as I see fit. If you continue to demand that I get your or anyone else's approval first, I will continue to remind you that I don't have to, until that sinks in and the filibustering stops. If you raise a valid concern about something, I'm happy to entertain it and modify based on that, but this entire thread has been a total waste of time. You cannot articulate any actual problem to address, just your personal unease with the fact that things progress without your involvement or approval. I think you may be on the wrong project for your expectations. Try Sourceforge or GitHub; you're free to create a project of whatever sort you want there, and make it as hierarchical and bureaucratic as you like. WP is not that project. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 10:31, 18 April 2016 (UTC)
- I regret your hostility. Your claim that I don't know how things work is pretty insulting, being that I am active since 2007, with over 80,000 edits on my name, and that maintenance templates are sort of a favorite field for me. It seems to me, that you choose to do as you please, and don't care if your edits are actual improvements and if they have consensus. That is the reason we have ran into each other in the past, and that attitude of yours surely will cause more problems in the future. Debresser (talk) 11:34, 18 April 2016 (UTC)
- It's not hostility, it's exhaustion of patience. You own your own emotions. It's not my problem if you feel insulted by the observation that you don't fully understand templating. That is an observation, not an accusation. Your own comments above demonstrating that you don't even know that about 99% of the time any
|foo=yes
cannot be reversed with a|foo=no
, or vice versa, is a clear demonstration of this. So is the fact that you think that a huge discussion has to happen before people are allowed to add features they want to templates. It does genuinely surprise me that despite being around this long you have not figured this stuff out yet, and I commented as much already. The thing to do is to figure this stuff out, not to put on the "MY FEELINGS ARE HURT" T-shirt. My attitude is the WP:BOLD attitude. I'm not sure what yours can be characterized as, but it's definitely un-wiki from my point of view. And "sort of a favorite field for me" is probably the locus of the problem; its generating a proprietary sentiment, that things must be done a special way in things you feel are special, that this is a way you define, that failure to do it that Debresser way is some kind of actionable behavior problem, and that resistance to it is hostility. None of these things are actually true. That category of templates is not special, you don't get to impose your own rules, you trying to impose them is the problem, and people not going along with it isn't them being your enemy, it's them going about normal WP business the normal WP way. Your closing sentence is simply another threat to ramp up your stonewall/filibuster tactics. That's twice in a row you've waved your junk at me territorially. Please stop. Just go edit the way you like to edit, let others edit they way they like to edit. If I remove a template feature you depend on, then you have something legit to raise an issue about. Or if I implement a senseless feature like "|kitteh=y
= inserts a random LOL-cat picture into the template". But you don't have any reason to fight against parameters that aren't insane simply because they're ones you don't want to use. Simply don't use them and move one. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 02:14, 19 April 2016 (UTC)
- It's not hostility, it's exhaustion of patience. You own your own emotions. It's not my problem if you feel insulted by the observation that you don't fully understand templating. That is an observation, not an accusation. Your own comments above demonstrating that you don't even know that about 99% of the time any
- I regret your hostility. Your claim that I don't know how things work is pretty insulting, being that I am active since 2007, with over 80,000 edits on my name, and that maintenance templates are sort of a favorite field for me. It seems to me, that you choose to do as you please, and don't care if your edits are actual improvements and if they have consensus. That is the reason we have ran into each other in the past, and that attitude of yours surely will cause more problems in the future. Debresser (talk) 11:34, 18 April 2016 (UTC)
- That didn't even actually parse in English; it's just a bunch of unconnected grammatical fragments. I think I get the gist, though. You're threatening to continue wasting my time with this gibberish if I don't do things your way, and you don't really have answer to anything I said. I don't know whether you intend that to be taken seriously, or are just trying to exit in a face-saving way and tripping over your own feet. It has kind of a Mr. Bean / Austin Power effect.
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This week's article for improvement (week 16, 2016)
Too late. | |
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Please comment on Talk:Ooty
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Ooty. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 18 April 2016 (UTC)
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Breaking changes on Template:collapse top
Your recent change (714883281) to {{collapse top}}, a template used on ~25k pages, caused lots of widespread breakage (my own user page included), as it was widely assumed that centering was the default behavior. As WP:TPE says, breaking changes that alter expected parameter behavior should be made ONLY after substantial discussion. Cheers, IagoQnsi (talk) 05:09, 19 April 2016 (UTC)
- Just taking note of this incident. For the reason why, see above. Debresser (talk) 07:31, 19 April 2016 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Eggs, omelettes. This should not have been centered by default to begin with; it's a serious usability problem. @IagoQnsi: I just tested left alignment on your userpage, at User:IagoQnsi/sandbox_left, and it broke nothing at all. Please do not make false accusations. @Debresser: since you ignore my multiple requests to stop harassing me on my user talk page with your pointless antagonism, I am now demanding you stay off my user talk page unless you have something constructive to discuss, per Wikipedia:User pages#Editing of other editors' user and user talk pages: "If a user asks you not to edit their user pages, it is sensible to respect their request". So, be sensible. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 13:11, 19 April 2016 (UTC)
- It's broken in the sense that I expected the text to be centered and line up with the navbox at the bottom, and it no longer is. If you think it's a serious usability problem, then start a discussion about it, but template editors should not be bold when it comes to changing the expected behavior of existing template parameters per WP:TPE. -IagoQnsi (talk) 13:18, 19 April 2016 (UTC)
- And, as was documented,
|center=y
would have restored that. This is crying over milk that isn't even spilled, just jostled slightly. I did not change the expected behavior of any template parameter. I changed the default behavior of the template, and added a parameter to re-enable the very poorly-thought-out former default behavior for unusual cases where someone is so insistent on centering that they want to force the matter. So, that's twice you've used hyperbolic, misleading accusations to mischaracterize my work here. Let's not make it three times. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 13:52, 19 April 2016 (UTC)
- And, as was documented,
Honshu - Japanese wolf
Hi Mac, the proposed WP:MOVE of the Honshu wolf to Japanese wolf after 7 days has unanimous approval. WP:MOVE, in its section titled How to move a page, tells me that "...the move will fail if a page already exists at the target name, unless it is simply a redirect to the present name that has never been modified, in which case you can move over the redirect....." The target page Japanese wolf is a disambiguation page that has been modified. It is unclear if I should list this as a technical move, a deletion of the Japanese wolf disimbag page altogether and a retitling of the current page, or some other process. Perhaps I could call upon the assistance of a tireless contributor who possesses File Mover rights for the next step? Else, some advice please? Regards, William Harris • talk • 09:23, 20 April 2016 (UTC)
- @William Harris: Normally, the extant DAB page would move to Japanese wolf (disambiguation), but since it only has two entries, then per WP:TWODAB it should just be deleted, after hatnotes pointing between the articles are added to each of them. (WP:DAB pages are supposed to have 3 or more entries.) I added
{{Confused}}
atop both articles for hatnoting purposes (if it had been a proper 3+ DAB page, they would have been{{Redirect|Japanese wolf}}
at Honshu wolf and maybe something like{{about|a wolf subspecies occasionally called "Japanese wolf"|other wolves also called that|Japanese wolf (disambiguation)}}
at Hokkaido wolf). Next you can either 1) ask the speedy RM admins to move Honshu wolf over the Japanese wolf DAB page, explaining the TWODAB and hatnote situation, or 2) change the DAB page into a redirect to Honshu wolf, then tag the redir with{{Db-move|Honshu wolf}}
, but check periodically over the next few hours to make sure the move was actually performed; some admins perform the speedy deletion without performing the move, leaving a hole to fill. If I were to be online for a few hours, I'd probably do it the second way, as more expedient (the first way can sit around for a while, since there are more admins active in WP:CSD cleanup than in RM cleanup). And the first way might trigger someone who doesn't follow WP:NOT#BUREAUCRACY closely enough to object and demand that the RM be re-run, because the RM didn't, technically, discuss the present Japanese wolf DAB page directly. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 09:58, 20 April 2016 (UTC)- Thanks Mac. Clearly, North America never sleeps............. :-) Regards, William Harris • talk • 10:02, 20 April 2016 (UTC)
- I just have a very recalcitrant sleep cycle. It's virtually impossible for me to sleep more than 1-3 hours if I go to bed before midnight. I pop awake as if infused with 5 cups of coffee, and then crash again around dawn. If I stay up until around 1 am, I sleep normally. I got up at dark:30 yesterday morning and was dead tired by 10:30pm, so thought maybe tonight would be an exception, and went to bed. Nope. Snapped awake about 1am. Left to my own devices, my natural sleep cycle is to sleep from a bit after dawn through mid-afternoon, but this of course is not conducive to being employed except as an off-site Web developer or the like, which is work I'm getting out of, so I'm trying to force myself to change my circadian rhythm. In prehistoric times, I would have been the tribe member who guarded the camp at night from smilodons and dire wolves. Which is what I often feel like I'm doing on WP. >;-) — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 11:31, 20 April 2016 (UTC)
- It is good that you can fit your work around your sleep/awake cycle; I have an engineer friend that does the same. There are still some smilodons and dire wolves predating on Wikipedia, but at least not all of wolfkind out here is unfriendly, even if they do get a little "bitey" sometimes. :-) William Harris • talk • 09:01, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
- I just have a very recalcitrant sleep cycle. It's virtually impossible for me to sleep more than 1-3 hours if I go to bed before midnight. I pop awake as if infused with 5 cups of coffee, and then crash again around dawn. If I stay up until around 1 am, I sleep normally. I got up at dark:30 yesterday morning and was dead tired by 10:30pm, so thought maybe tonight would be an exception, and went to bed. Nope. Snapped awake about 1am. Left to my own devices, my natural sleep cycle is to sleep from a bit after dawn through mid-afternoon, but this of course is not conducive to being employed except as an off-site Web developer or the like, which is work I'm getting out of, so I'm trying to force myself to change my circadian rhythm. In prehistoric times, I would have been the tribe member who guarded the camp at night from smilodons and dire wolves. Which is what I often feel like I'm doing on WP. >;-) — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 11:31, 20 April 2016 (UTC)
- Thanks Mac. Clearly, North America never sleeps............. :-) Regards, William Harris • talk • 10:02, 20 April 2016 (UTC)
Your GA nomination of William A. Spinks
Hi there, I'm pleased to inform you that I've begun reviewing the article William A. Spinks you nominated for GA-status according to the criteria. This process may take up to 7 days. Feel free to contact me with any questions or comments you might have during this period. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of Jaguar -- Jaguar (talk) 21:40, 21 April 2016 (UTC)
- @Jaguar: Thanks! :-) — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 15:46, 22 April 2016 (UTC)
The article William A. Spinks you nominated as a good article has passed ; see Talk:William A. Spinks for comments about the article. Well done! If the article has not already been on the main page as an "In the news" or "Did you know" item, you can nominate it to appear in Did you know. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of Jaguar -- Jaguar (talk) 17:01, 22 April 2016 (UTC)
- @Jaguar: Wow, that was quick! I was expecting a week of pain, ha ha. Thanks for the quick turn-around. I guess FA will be a tougher nut to crack. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 08:26, 23 April 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:Tamils
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Tamils. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 22 April 2016 (UTC)
This week's article for improvement (week 17, 2016)
I'll pass. | |
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Wikipedia:PMC retargeted
Just a courtesy notice because I boldly retargeted a redirect you created: the target of Wikipedia:PMC was changed from Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Original wording to Wikipedia:Page mover. I've also set up anchors with it in the WP:PM/C section. Best Regards,—Godsy(TALKCONT) 02:37, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
- @Godsy: I was compelled to WP:BRD that (without prejudice – I do bold stuff all the time, including occasional shortcut usurpations, but only when they don't make sense, are totally unused or have had all uses replaced, and are very unlikely to be used or expected by anyone at their original target). One should likely not usurp shortcuts from guidelines, especially for something important like the principle of minimal change, which directly affects article content site-wide, for some subsection at an internal information page that already has a shortcut, WP:PM/C. It's generally very undesirable for a MOS:FOO shortcut to not go to the exact same place as the WP:FOO one, since people do not consistently use only the MOS ones. The WP:PMC shortcut was not well-deployed yet because it's recent. If you think the community would prefer that WP:PMC by usurped from MoS in favor of the PM page, that should probably be proposed at WP:RFD. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 05:02, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
- I'll probably take it to RfD if the proposal passes (it looks like it will, but I don't want to presume). I'll drop a notice here in the event a discussion is started.—Godsy(TALKCONT) 05:16, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
- @Godsy: I didn't even notice that was just a proposal. That usurpation was doubly inappropriate, then, I would say. We need no shortcuts of any kind to proposals, since about 95% of them fail. I would oppose the usurpation, BTW. The section probably doesn't need a shortcut at all, and if it does, it can simply use a variant of the page's main shortcut, e.g. WP:PMVR#C. You could also just rename the section "criteria for redirect suppression" to better match what it's actually about (it is not about criteria for doing page moves, nor is it about criteria for granting the PM right, which is the section below that, so the present name is just confusing). This would yield the shortcut WP:CRS. While that is already used, it is does not actually make sense for what it is used for (WP:Feedback request service, WP:FRS), so it could be usurped without any problems. Same goes for "Criteria for suppressing redirects", since WP:CSR is not actually needed for WP:CFD#Speedy a.k.a. WP:CFDS. The present PM/C shortcut doesn't actually make sense for that proposal page, since WP:PM doesn't go there (the "WP:FOO/BAR" shortcuts are for subpages of pages with shortcuts of "WP:FOO"; e.g. WP:AC/DS points to a subpage of the page that has the shortcut WP:AC. In short, you're using shortcuts in multiple confusing ways that aren't going to make sense to other editors. If PMC were usurped from MOS, the MOS wording itself would need to change to something else (probably principle of least change, the phrasing from several years ago. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 06:05, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
- I'll probably take it to RfD if the proposal passes (it looks like it will, but I don't want to presume). I'll drop a notice here in the event a discussion is started.—Godsy(TALKCONT) 05:16, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:Pantomime
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Pantomime. Legobot (talk) 04:26, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
- I'm am afraid to do the Merge, because I've been sharply criticized at the Pantomime article's Talk page. If you do it, I'd be happy to review and comment. Then, you'll need to watch American pantomime to see if its original creator (or either of the new users at pantomime) tries to undo the merge. All the best! - Ssilvers (talk) 07:53, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
- I can, but I'm dead tired right now, and it would be better to wait for the RM to close, since the merge is now being discussed in the RM. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 08:00, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
- Yes, no rush. But I'd appreciate it if you would look into this at that time. All the best, and happy editing! -- Ssilvers (talk) 21:46, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
- Okay. Others seem to be supporting the merge idea. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 23:13, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
- Yes, no rush. But I'd appreciate it if you would look into this at that time. All the best, and happy editing! -- Ssilvers (talk) 21:46, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
- I can, but I'm dead tired right now, and it would be better to wait for the RM to close, since the merge is now being discussed in the RM. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 08:00, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:Annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 29 April 2016 (UTC)
Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Capital letters#The word "as"
I invite you to central discussion. --George Ho (talk) 05:18, 29 April 2016 (UTC)
This week's article for improvement (week 18, 2016)
I'll pass. | |
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Please comment on Talk:Panini (sandwich)
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Panini (sandwich). Legobot (talk) 04:26, 2 May 2016 (UTC)
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Korea-related articles. Legobot (talk) 04:27, 5 May 2016 (UTC)
This week's article for improvement (week 19, 2016)
I'll pass. | |
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Just saying
Hatting this per request and per resolution via e-mail. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 15:04, 17 May 2016 (UTC) |
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Sometimes I really wish you'd just raise a question at talk about changes, especially on an article you've never edited, instead of posting a RM or some other drama that is supposed to be used for conflict resolution or when admin tools are needed. Not everything has to be turned into an enormous bandwidth-eating, time-consuming drama-o-rama. Just saying. Sometimes a reasonable compromise can be created in about two seconds. You could have said, "hey, would anyone mind if I used the foundation stock redirect and made it into an article to cover the other critters that aren't horses?" And I for one would have had no problem with it, and probably few other people would have even cared. Montanabw(talk) 03:17, 9 May 2016 (UTC)
Why else do you think I've spent two years dissuading AT/MoS people from trying to decapitalize animal breed names? I remember the drama of WP:BIRDCON as if it happened yesterday. If you're not aware of it, I've headed off at least four RfCs that would have sought that result. The more I can get landrace and other not-really-breed articles decapitalized, with the capitalization limited to the published, formal names of standardized breeds, the more likely they are to remain capitalized and not attract the lower-case-everything-we-possibly-can crowd. The breed articles are tempting "plump and juicy" targets for that treatment, because the current (though progressively decreased, by me) habit of other "breed people" overcapitalizing every damned thing they can that has anything to do with livestock and animal husbandry (and horticulture, for that matter) looks like and is a very typical case of the WP:Specialized-style fallacy, while a defensible case for capping formal breed (and cultivar) names is actually fairly easy to muster and distinguish as legitimate. No rational case can be made that the Van cat is a proper noun, but the opposite appears to be the case for standardized Turkish Van. To that end, I've also gone to notable lengths to catalog the pro-caps arguments for standardized breeds, at WP:BREEDCASE. While I'm neutral on the underlying question, I lean in favor of retaining the caps for stability.PS: If your complaint above has been motivated by me minorly disagreeing with you on some article talk page the other day, please don't read into it. It's inevitable as active and independent editors that we'll run into each other here and there and not always agree. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 09:20, 9 May 2016 (UTC) @Montanabw: Forgot to ping you. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 09:30, 9 May 2016 (UTC) AGFYour personalizing of remarks at the RM at Talk:Foundation bloodstock is out of line. Way out of line. And inaccurate. You really need to learn to collaborate with other people and this is not the way to do it. I don't give a flying damn about you personally; it's content that matters, sometimes we agree and sometimes we disagree, and I could not care less about "getting even" with you. What I do object to is your creating silly, time-wasting dramafests with unnecessary RM requests when there wasn't even a disagreement. Just suggest a move at the article's talk page, the people who watchlist THAT PAGE discuss it, and the article could have been split a week ago. Just open up the foundation stock redirect, start working on it and move the content. If you do a RM on the article, I'm probably just going to recreate it with the horse-specific content anyway, so why go to all this waste? You do your thing, I'll do mine and with any luck, the encyclopedia as a whole is improved. (I really wish you'd work on your people skills, sometimes you can do good work if you'd just stop going ballistic at anyone who disagrees with you) Montanabw(talk) 19:21, 16 May 2016 (UTC)
Moving forward practicallyLet's just drop the he-said-she-said, and look at this practically. The article at hand is only partly about horses (and will be decreasingly about horses as more content is added), so it should not have special horsey naming (actually, it's not even horse-related naming, it's specifically thoroughbred-related naming). If you think it's necessary for the thoroughbred term to have its own article, I doubt anyone cares much whether you content fork it for a while, though it doesn't meet the WP:SUMMARY, WP:SPLIT, WP:SPINOUT, WP:DICDEF, and WP:NOT#INDISCRIMINATE criteria, so I expect it would be merged back in later. This is not just a horse-article problem; some other articles started as dog-related and are genericizing over time to include other species, but are misnamed and miscategorized. This is easily resolved by a) using the generic title, b) redirecting species-specific ones to the general article, and c) putting horse, dog, etc., categories on the species-specific (or even breed-specific) redirects. Standard operating procedure, regardless of topic area. It is not "drama".What probably needs to happen in the longer run is a glossary article, or more than one (there's no particular reason to commingle breeding terms and equestrian sporting terms, for example). We need articles on general notable concepts like foundation stock, not multiple articles at different titles on the same concept just because the terminology slightly differs from subtopic to subtopic. The only reason that would happen is if separate wikiprojects are trying to act in a WP:OWN manner. We just don't need or want that. Various key articles and some hierarchical glossaries – starting with breeding terms in one and animal sport terms in another, and spawning species-specific, more detailed glossaries for horses, dogs, whatever, on an as-needed basis – is probably enough to cover all the encyclopedic needs here. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 22:36, 16 May 2016 (UTC)
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thank you
Precious again, your diligent research!
- I do what I can. There could yet be arguments in favor of "Todesbanden", but I think the more obscure and specialized they are, the less WP-relevant they are. We turn to COMMONNAME by default for a reason. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:58, 9 May 2016 (UTC)
- There can be no argument for Todesbanden together with a BWV number. When the number was added, it became again Todes Banden, as it was in the beginning (Martin Luther). We have a series of articles, look at the navbox, of: title by NBA and number. It was explained in the lead in a footnote: "The two-word version was Luther's original and has again been adopted by the NBA." until the simplifications. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 21:33, 9 May 2016 (UTC)
- I just did Google News and Scholar searches and came to the same conclusion. When the BWV number is used, there are "hits" for "...Todes Banden" with BWV, but zero hits for "...Todesbanden" with the number. Re: "in the beginning" – You make a claim that it was originally "Todes Banden", FS claims it was originally "Todesbanden", and I'm simply working around that conflict, because I don't have all day to figure out who's getting that right. This is why I looked at things like "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight", etc. – what does English usually do with old titles that don't match what the modern usage would be? — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 21:41, 9 May 2016 (UTC)
- There can be no argument for Todesbanden together with a BWV number. When the number was added, it became again Todes Banden, as it was in the beginning (Martin Luther). We have a series of articles, look at the navbox, of: title by NBA and number. It was explained in the lead in a footnote: "The two-word version was Luther's original and has again been adopted by the NBA." until the simplifications. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 21:33, 9 May 2016 (UTC)
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- When I said "in the beginning" it was a pun on the doxology, and that Luther who wrote the hymn on which the cantata is based, wrote two words, "todes bande" (pictured). The article here, however, started as "Todesbanden" until I moved it in 2011. this has the strange combination, - the free scores are the old ones, naturally, but they should not use the BWV number. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 21:57, 9 May 2016 (UTC)
- I understand; FS's position is that the earliest published versions of the Bach piece use the "Todesbanden" spelling, and he seems to be right about that. So there are multiple arguments at play, and they're more fiddly than I want to deal with. This should be based on current usage, not what happened several centuries ago. The article prose itself is where to get into the history and nomenclature of the piece over time. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 22:17, 9 May 2016 (UTC)
- When I said "in the beginning" it was a pun on the doxology, and that Luther who wrote the hymn on which the cantata is based, wrote two words, "todes bande" (pictured). The article here, however, started as "Todesbanden" until I moved it in 2011. this has the strange combination, - the free scores are the old ones, naturally, but they should not use the BWV number. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 21:57, 9 May 2016 (UTC)
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Please comment on Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia:Village pump (policy). Legobot (talk) 04:25, 12 May 2016 (UTC)
My renaming proposals
Hatting this, since it's a long one-on-one chat, and of little interest to third parties. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 15:06, 17 May 2016 (UTC) |
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If you are opposed to my RMs, besides comma-based discussions and capitalization-based discussions, do you also mean Chinese names, relistings, and other types of discussions? If not, which types of RMs do you mean? --George Ho (talk) 08:45, 13 May 2016 (UTC)
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This week's article for improvement (week 20, 2016)
Ozone-oxygen cycle in the ozone layer. The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Gustaf Skarsgård • À la carte Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:09, 16 May 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI • |
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Diacritics
Hello, do you still float around in the world of diacritics on Wikipedia? Rovingrobert (talk) 01:15, 19 May 2016 (UTC)
- @Rovingrobert: More like swim it actively. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 04:43, 19 May 2016 (UTC)
- Cool. I'm interested in that sort of thing too. I hate the bastardization of foreign names. Rovingrobert (talk) 04:59, 19 May 2016 (UTC)
- Yeah, WP should not do it. The subject can do it (my name's McCandlish, after all, not Scottish Gaelic: mac Cuindlis), but WP should not follow lazy sources who do it to names of people who do not themselves diacritics-strip or otherwise over-anglicize their own names. If any English language reliable sources show that the subject prefers the proper spelling (in English), or that third-party source usage (in English) is mixed, that's sufficient for WP to use the proper spelling, not the "dumbed-down for rednecks" version. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:22, 19 May 2016 (UTC)
- And how about the argument that Wikipedia resists fitting into neat little categories, so there is no need for consensus on diacritics? People who use that kind of logic must know they are fighting a losing battle, since they conveniently bypass the fact the vast majority of articles do use diacritics. Rovingrobert (talk) 13:41, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
- Another thought: isn't claiming that a given individual prefers the absence of diacritics without concrete evidence WP:ORIGINALRESEARCH? The use of diacritics can be backed up by what one's website or social media account(s) infer. Thus, vice versa is impossible because it actually takes effort to put in diacritics, whereas not doing so could be simply due to negligence. Rovingrobert (talk) 06:29, 21 May 2016 (UTC)
- Agreed. I don't think there's any debate remaining about any of this. The WP consensus is to include the appropriate diacritics, except when they can be sources as being used in any English-language RS. Campaigners against this idea tried to even start a PoV-pushing, "canvassing farm" WikiProject to turn the tide of WP:RM against this consensus (i.e. they wanted to delete diacritics as being "foreign" and "un-English"), and the pseudo-project was deleted at WP:MFD, firmly. Basically, if we know the subject uses the marks, or some (even if not all) English-language sources do it (absent any evidence about subject preference), WP also uses them. We drop them only when it's demonstrable that the subject chooses not to use them (as is the case with many American actors with Spanish names that usually include a diacritic in Spanish), or when no sources can be found for the use in English.
Has some new anti-diacritics campaigning arisen? If so, where? — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 08:38, 21 May 2016 (UTC)
- It's been subtle, almost to the point of surreptition; manifested mainly in 'smaller' RMs, but definitely palpable. I would give you names but I'd be accused of canvassing. Rovingrobert (talk) 05:41, 23 May 2016 (UTC)
- Agreed. I don't think there's any debate remaining about any of this. The WP consensus is to include the appropriate diacritics, except when they can be sources as being used in any English-language RS. Campaigners against this idea tried to even start a PoV-pushing, "canvassing farm" WikiProject to turn the tide of WP:RM against this consensus (i.e. they wanted to delete diacritics as being "foreign" and "un-English"), and the pseudo-project was deleted at WP:MFD, firmly. Basically, if we know the subject uses the marks, or some (even if not all) English-language sources do it (absent any evidence about subject preference), WP also uses them. We drop them only when it's demonstrable that the subject chooses not to use them (as is the case with many American actors with Spanish names that usually include a diacritic in Spanish), or when no sources can be found for the use in English.
- Yeah, WP should not do it. The subject can do it (my name's McCandlish, after all, not Scottish Gaelic: mac Cuindlis), but WP should not follow lazy sources who do it to names of people who do not themselves diacritics-strip or otherwise over-anglicize their own names. If any English language reliable sources show that the subject prefers the proper spelling (in English), or that third-party source usage (in English) is mixed, that's sufficient for WP to use the proper spelling, not the "dumbed-down for rednecks" version. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:22, 19 May 2016 (UTC)
- Cool. I'm interested in that sort of thing too. I hate the bastardization of foreign names. Rovingrobert (talk) 04:59, 19 May 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:Full Service (book)
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Full Service (book). Legobot (talk) 04:23, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
This week's article for improvement (week 21, 2016)
A small whirlpool in a pond The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Ozone layer • Gustaf Skarsgård Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:08, 23 May 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI • |
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Please comment on Talk:Judith Wilyman PhD controversy
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Judith Wilyman PhD controversy. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 23 May 2016 (UTC)
Nomination for deletion of Template:Chicago 16th
Template:Chicago 16th has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Ricky81682 (talk) 07:13, 24 May 2016 (UTC)
name article: Arnaldo dell'ira or Arnaldo Dell'Ira ?
- Arnaldo - is the first name of this man, and - Dell'Ira - is his surname, oder the name of is family. In italian is written Dell'Ira as other surname, for example: Dell'Aquila, Dell'Acqua and many other (in english wikipedia: Alessandro Dell'Acqua (born 21 December 1962 in Naples) is a fashion designer; Angelo Dell'Acqua (9 December 1903 – 27 August 1972) was an Italian Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church) . In italian wikipedia the name is exactly written: Arnaldo Dell'Ira. thanks
~~triktrak~~ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Triktrak (talk • contribs) 18:28, 26 May 2016 (UTC)
- If the norm in Italian now is to capitalize the de[l[l[a]]] parts of names, so be it, but the RM respondents will expect to see this reliably sourced, as a general matter and for this subject in particular (not everyone with such a name uses the capitalization pattern you're advancing, even if it has become more common). Regardless, it certainly should not be "dell'ira". We know for certain that one is wrong. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 16:15, 27 May 2016 (UTC)
I've updated my comment at the RM to say the above. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 01:40, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
Edit War
Your recent editing history at Wikipedia:Stub shows that you are currently engaged in an edit war. To resolve the content dispute, please do not revert or change the edits of others when you are reverted. Instead of reverting, please use the article's talk page to work toward making a version that represents consensus among editors. The best practice at this stage is to discuss, not edit-war. See BRD for how this is done. If discussions reach an impasse, you can then post a request for help at a relevant noticeboard or seek dispute resolution. In some cases, you may wish to request temporary page protection.
Being involved in an edit war can result in your being blocked from editing—especially if you violate the three-revert rule, which states that an editor must not perform more than three reverts on a single page within a 24-hour period. Undoing another editor's work—whether in whole or in part, whether involving the same or different material each time—counts as a revert. Also keep in mind that while violating the three-revert rule often leads to a block, you can still be blocked for edit warring—even if you don't violate the three-revert rule—should your behavior indicate that you intend to continue reverting repeatedly. Mike V • Talk 18:43, 26 May 2016 (UTC)
- Old news, off-base, and moot. I raised the issue at WP:RFPP. A discussion has been ongoing for an entire month; WP:BRD, which is optional anyway, has already been satisified. Zero people have provided any rationale whatsoever for the confusing wording in question, and multiple editors object to its inclusion. It comes out. The only editwarring going on is by people trying to reinsert that wording without even having a reason to reinsert it, just to be pain-in-ass objectors to change for the sake of objecting to change. No thanks. WP does not work that way, as a matter of policy (see WP:NOT#BUREAUCRACY and WP:CONSENSUS). — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 16:19, 27 May 2016 (UTC)
- Note also that yet another editor has restored the version I put in, since you posted here. This is business as usual. Wording isn't perfect; someone objects, discussion happens, edits are made based on the discussion, there's maybe some back-and-forth about the exact wording and more discussion, and those with no rationale who don't want to accept any answer but their own find themselves reverted by multiple editors who do have rationales, and the no-rationale fist-shakers eventually knock it off. I'm marking this resolved, as it's basically moot. If you look at the current state of the discussion, it's clearly a WP:1AM of a single confused editor, Lugnuts, against everyone else, and his noise is distracting from the actual conversation, which is about how to use CSS, etc., to improve the layout. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 02:58, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
List of world eight-ball champions
Hi please can you reply to the last comment here. I still maintain that here is a Chinese 8ball world champs and it's getting more prestigious every year due to marketing and prize money. Lots of overseas pros are regulars on the Chinese tour now. Youtube it if you want! I also added the IPA world champs to that page. Sandman1142 (talk) 08:19, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
- You seem to be making an argument that a game called Chinese eight-ball pool, played with "American" (WPA) equipment except using snooker-style pockets, and the championship for this game, are notable. But that article is still a redlink. There are so few sources that an article probably cannot be written that will survive WP:AFD, because of the WP:Notability problems. ("Chinese eight-ball" is about an American folk game that doesn't actually have anything to do with China, but which has been well-documented for generations, unlike "Chinese eight-ball pool", which is a recent regional variation using hybrid equipment, and meant to be a competitive sport, not a recreational pastime).
What I would suggest is first writing a subsection on this variant of eight-ball, with a title of "Chinese eight-ball pool", under Eight-ball#Derivative games and variants. Change the hatnote atop Chinese eight-ball to point to that instead of the redlink. Also cross-reference it, under "See also", at Blackball (pool), to which Eight-ball pool (the folk name, vs. the world-standardised name) redirects. Then add a "Chinese eight-ball pool" section to the championship article. Adding one first is jumping the gun, since we have no article or even section about the game itself.
I've opened some more formal discussion about this at Talk:Eight-ball#Chinese eight-ball pool. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 09:39, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
- Thank you. I guess the ball's back in my hand to create an article on Chinese eight-ball first. The link to the obsolete American version should be diverted somewhere else or merged with another article. I will see when I can get some time for the Chinese eight-ball article. Sandman1142 (talk) 09:51, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
- @Sandman1142:, nah, just a section on the variant at Eight-ball. There's insufficient sourcing available to demonstrate enough WP:Notability for a stand-alone article on it. It would just get deleted at WP:AFD. A section on it in main article is much more defensible; sections only have to be properly sourced and relevant, not notable. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 14:58, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
- Thank you. I guess the ball's back in my hand to create an article on Chinese eight-ball first. The link to the obsolete American version should be diverted somewhere else or merged with another article. I will see when I can get some time for the Chinese eight-ball article. Sandman1142 (talk) 09:51, 31 May 2016 (UTC)
This week's article for improvement (week 22, 2016)
A photodetector salvaged from a CD-ROM. The photodetector contains 3 photodiodes visible in the photo (in center). The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Whirlpool • Ozone layer Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:06, 30 May 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI • |
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Please comment on Talk:Christopher Lloyd
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Christopher Lloyd. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
On RfC, the names of transgender/non-binary people in the lead section of biographies, and canvassing
This message is twofold. Firstly, I'd imagine you'd be interested in the discussion here which seems to continue a trend in questioning content guidelines related to people's personal identity. Definitely have a read and contribute, as I'm sure you will.
I'm new to RfC however, and I have no idea of what is an appropriate way to canvass for interest in the discussion. Having taken part in an RfC you recently attracted attention to successfully, if you're interested I'd appreciate it if you helped this RfC as well. Or perhaps just give me an idea of what I should be doing - anyone or anywhere in particular should I be pinging? This would be much appreciated. Let me know what you think NottNott|talk 10:06, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
- @NottNott: The spirit, not just the letter of WP:CANVASS is important. We pretty much always want more eyes and brains on such questions, so my approach is to notify aggregate areas, not individual editors, on the basis of which wikiprojects claim scope over the topic, what guidelines or policies cover the issue (and often skip those, unless the dispute is something that might actually change interpretation of a policy/guideline or some other site-wide practice, in which case I would also notify WP:VPPOL, maybe even WP:CENT if it's a huge pot of drama. In a recent case, I also pinged previous respondents (all of them, without regard to position) in two very recent and directly related RfCs, and was careful to link to WP:CCC when commenting that the current RfC aims to undo the results of a previous one (it's a fact that this was the intent of the new RfC, but such an overturn is permissible and is not automatically a red flag).
For an RfC about TG and wording used in relation to them, relevant projects' talk pages would be Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Politics, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Linguistics, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Sociology, and Wikipedia talk:WikiProject LGBT studies for starters. Relevant policypages for the exact case at hand would appear to be Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (the main MoS is where MOS:IDENTITY is), Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Lead section (this is entirely about the lead section), Wikipedia talk:No original research (since it involves what we present to our readers based on the sources, and this policy is also the home of WP:UNDUE), Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (biographies) (obviously, and this is where WP:BIRTHNAME lives), Wikipedia talk:Biographies of living persons (obviously, though it will not pertain to subjects who are deceased). If the dispute also involves WP:ABOUTSELF, then Wikipedia talk:Verifiability, too. When leaving notices at the talk pages, it is good to use a hatnote of something like
{{FYI|Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere}}
between the heading and message, to forestall the forking of separate discussions, and to include in the message the rationale for notifying the particular talk page in question (e.g. "Notifying this talk page because this policy is where WP:ABOUTSELF is, and it is central to the debate.", or whatever. Hope that helps. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 17:25, 1 June 2016 (UTC)- Thanks for your reply! I've messaged WP:VPPOL and recently WP:CENT about this discussion. Another editor thankfully linked to WP:LGBT and WP:BIOGRAPHY. As for the suggestion of WP:POLITICS and WP:LINGUISTICS I'll notify them right now. That should be enough attention for this particular RfC. Bit unsure if the current RfC reached the 'drama level' needed for a listing at WP:CENT, but I figured that enough editors would be interested in discussion for a listing. It's not an obscure topic and really has ramifications on even how the media could perceive WP - important enough.
-
- Thanks for all the brilliant help, I'm much more aware of what to do in an RfC now. Expect to see me hanging around the village pump more often as a result -NottNott|talk 10:21, 2 June 2016 (UTC)
- Given the amount of repeat drama (including a lot of off-WP people showing up as meatpuppets to push activism angles) about this issue, often in several high-profile RfCs per year, I think CENT is important in this case. As for RfCs, you might want to sign up for WP:FRS. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 16:40, 2 June 2016 (UTC)
- Thanks for all the brilliant help, I'm much more aware of what to do in an RfC now. Expect to see me hanging around the village pump more often as a result -NottNott|talk 10:21, 2 June 2016 (UTC)
WikiProject English Language
Hello! I see from User:SMcCandlish/WikiProject English Language X that you drafted a WikiProject around February. Are you interested in (eventually) launching this WikiProject, or was it more of an experiment with the tools? Thanks, Harej (talk) 15:01, 2 June 2016 (UTC)
- @Harej: Yes, it's meant to launch, and thanks for joggling me on that. I had put it on the back-burner and got busy due to a flood of real-life work, but I really do need to polish that up and get it live. There's not a lot more to do; mostly just need to set up the infrastructure for it (project banner, categories, etc.). — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 16:46, 2 June 2016 (UTC)
- Would it be okay if I moved it over to the project space? It will help with some of the setup, including setting up the signup form. Harej (talk) 21:14, 2 June 2016 (UTC)
- @Harej: I moved it over, so have at it! I'm not really up on how all the "WikiProject X" features work, so any help there would be cool. Most of the content for this project is actually at User:SMcCandlish/WikiProject English Language, and is not yet ported over into the draft WikiProject X setup for the project that was at User:SMcCandlish/WikiProject English Language X. If the page/tab structure, forms, etc., are set up, I can port the content over easily, including the already-extant participants list. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 04:46, 3 June 2016 (UTC)
- Much of it should be set up now. (Some of the bot-based sections may take a while to update.) I would recommend inviting the current participants you have signed on to join the WikiProject. Harej (talk) 16:57, 3 June 2016 (UTC)
- Thanks! Will look into it over the weekend; I'm stupid-tired right now (it's 4am my time, and I've been working all day then doing the grocery shopping at a 24-hour store). Zzzzz...
- Much of it should be set up now. (Some of the bot-based sections may take a while to update.) I would recommend inviting the current participants you have signed on to join the WikiProject. Harej (talk) 16:57, 3 June 2016 (UTC)
- @Harej: I moved it over, so have at it! I'm not really up on how all the "WikiProject X" features work, so any help there would be cool. Most of the content for this project is actually at User:SMcCandlish/WikiProject English Language, and is not yet ported over into the draft WikiProject X setup for the project that was at User:SMcCandlish/WikiProject English Language X. If the page/tab structure, forms, etc., are set up, I can port the content over easily, including the already-extant participants list. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 04:46, 3 June 2016 (UTC)
- Would it be okay if I moved it over to the project space? It will help with some of the setup, including setting up the signup form. Harej (talk) 21:14, 2 June 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:Abby Tomlinson
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Abby Tomlinson. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 3 June 2016 (UTC)
Respectful astonishment
Good grief, sir! How do you find the time / spoons for all that?
BTW, I noticed that you have the "less"/"fewer" userbox in two places.
(I apologize if this comment winds up on the wrong part of the page. I'm doing this on my smartphone and could not find another "edit" pencilicon or an "add comment" button.)
Please {{Ping}} me to discuss. --Thnidu (talk) 17:02, 5 June 2016 (UTC)
- @Thnidu: Not sure which "all that" you mean. My activity level on here is comparatively at a very low point lately due to work (the paying kind) and other projects; I'm often much more active. I make the time by not having much in the way of other hobbies (which has also been changing; I need to shake things up a little). I'm also single lately, I don't have kids, and I quit drinking several years ago, so I don't spend time going to bars and nightclubs and parties much, unless I have a specific reason to be there (someone's birthday, whatever). And I don't watch TV much. I also type fast, and have two huge monitors, which makes research and citation concurrent with editing pretty easy. I'm not subject to a disability that kicks in that "dwindling spoons" problem (a metaphor that never made sense to me, though I see the effect, as my housemate has it due to chronic fatigue syndrome, as do several friends with fibromyalgia and the like, and I empathize with it, because I'm in the hamster ball; it's the exact same kind of drainage, just for a different reason, but one which for me does not happen with online interaction, a not-unknown effect). I guess I need fewer less/fewer userboxes. Will fix. No worries about the post placement. I gave up on the WP mobile app myself, and if I need to mobile-edit, I always use Chrome and force it to give me the non-mobile version of the page. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 11:17, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
This week's article for improvement (week 23, 2016)
The Hilton Athens is part of the Hilton Hotels & Resorts hotel chain. The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Photodetector • Whirlpool Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:07, 6 June 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI • |
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Please comment on Talk:Cary Grant
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Cary Grant. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
Renaming Wikipedia:Naming character articles
Thank you for two years ago cleaning up the essay that I created beforehand. I'm thinking about renaming the essay. Shall it be "naming a character" or "naming characters" or "naming fictional characters"? --George Ho (talk) 06:59, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
- @George Ho: I would keep it as is. Wikipedians name articles; authors name characters. So we should have pages about naming articles about characters, not naming characters. If it's meant to go beyond article titles and cover in-article treatment of character names, maybe something like WP:Fictional character names? Also, might be worth seeing if the salient points can be integrated into MOS:FIC, and other fiction-related guidelines, if some of them seem "guideline-worthy". Including "fictional" is helpful, to distinguish from the linguistics and typography senses of "characters". — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 11:17, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
Reference books to buy to not only avoid bad RMs but also create very reasonable RMs in the future
I'm thinking about buying other reference books per WP:NCCAPS, but if the latest edition of New Hart's Rules is not reliable, what are reliable books to buy before I waste money on doing so? Therefore, I can make more efficient proposals and rationale, but I can also avoid bad ones in the future. --George Ho (talk) 07:20, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
- @George Ho: I rely most heavily on the following, and they have been the principal sources for MoS itself:
- Chicago Manual of Style (16th ed., 2010)
- The expansion of the grammar chapter, The Chicago Guide to Grammar, Usage, and Punctuation (2016) just came out, but I have not reviewed it in any detail yet.
- New Hart's Rules (ed. Ritter; 1st ed, 2005; reissued in 2012 as New Oxford Style Manual 2nd ed., with full text of New Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors [2005] included, and it is the same text as the 2014 edition of NODfWE).
- Fowler's Modern English Usage (ed. Burchfield; revd. 3rd ed., 2004)
- Garner's Modern English Usage (4th ed, 2016, sometimes listed as "1st ed." because of the name change and expansion from the older Garner's Modern American Usage)
- Scientific Style and Format (CSE; 8th ed., 2014)
- The Elements of Style (Strunk & White; 4th ed., 1999; 50th ann. hardcover reprint 2006) – beware self-published crap based on the public-domain 1st ed., masquerading as "updates"; I see ones dating to 2011, 2012, and 2015, and they're all unreliable except perhaps as kindling for starting your campfire).
- Oxford Style Manual (2003) – I keep this one because it includes the last published edition of the original Hart's, as The Oxford Guide to Style [also available separately under that OGtS title, 2002], before the New Hart's revisions, which were in places abridgements, not just updates).
- Chicago Manual of Style (16th ed., 2010)
- I do also keep around copies of the following, despite their flaws:
- New Hart's Rules (ed. Waddingham; 2nd ed., 2014). However, if you want to save money, get New Oxford Style Manual (3rd ed., 2016). This has the 2014 NHR and the 2014 NODfWE, which is not really an update from the 2005/2012 version despite the "revised edition" labeling).
- Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage (ed. Butterfield; 4th ed., 2015).
- My "technique" is to refer to these newest editions first, and go with them if they're sane. Where (quite often) they either don't give clear advice, or even directly contradict each other or even themselves in different sections, I go back to the 2004–2005 Ritter and Burchfield editions, which were much more sensibly written and edited, and have been much more influential. It's much like sticking with Windows 7 in a professional environment, because Windows 8, 8.1, and 10 are half-baked garbage despite some modern sheen intended to appeal to home users.
I have pretty much every style guide there is at this point, except for a couple of expensive textbook ones that are intended for the American college student market, and don't contain anything new, or authoritative, but I'll get those eventually, too. We don't much use the AMA, APA, MHRA, MLA, etc., guides, as most of what they cover that's of a language usage nature is already covered in the above (especially CSE, when it comes to scientific and technical matters like units); most of their content is about citation formatting, not style in the MoS sense.
All that said, "per NC:CAPS" doesn't really mean much. NC:CAPS is based on MOS:CAPS, and follows the same rules. It suggests some external guides as additional reading, but there's no need to resort to that unless MOS:CAPS (or MOS:whatever – MOS main, MOS:TM, MOS:FIC, etc.) rules are unclear on something, and MOS talk page discussion doesn't resolve to clarify it.
Oh! For an overview of style guides, dictionaries, and other such resources, see the section for this at User:SMcCandlish/WikiProject English Language (which is shortly going to be integrated into WP:WikiProject English Language which went live about a day ago and is still under construction (Harej was helping set up the layout). Sounds like your kind of project. :-) — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 11:17, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
- Can you tell me about the Fowler's editions please? George Ho (talk) 02:58, 7 June 2016 (UTC)
- The Burchfield one is straightforward, and is very similar to Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors, and Garner's Modern; they're all in usage dictionary format, as are most if not all journalism style guides, with alphabetical entries for frequently problematic terms and constructions. These all differ from works like Hart's and Chicago (and the CSE book, specific to the sciences), which are more like MoS: topical sections on how to construct written material. These are, in turn, different from the bulk of the organization-specific guides (AMA, APA, MHRA, etc.), which are primarily about citation formatting and the expectations of journals in particular fields. Anyway, the Butterfield edition of Fowler's suffers from the same malaise as the Waddingham ed. of New Hart's: They've both become confused as to their role, and take an increasingly descriptive instead of prescriptive approach. That is desirable in a linguistics volume about a language, but antithetical to the purpose of a style guide (of any format). Both Waddingham and Butterfield go to great lengths to describe pretty much every known usage variation, and then frequently fail to distinguish between any of them by genre, register, intended audience (age, specialty, etc.), except sometimes lapsing into unsupported nationalism ("Americans do X, British do Y" without any actual basis for such assertions). Garner's also suffers from this problem, but is otherwise much better in its descriptive approach, using a scale of language change based on actual data, and basing recommendations on formality level and how that intersects with the language change scale. Butterfield and Waddingham are a real mess. For much of their length it's as if someone tried to write some guidelines, and some linguistics-based editor later came along and rubbed it all out, and said, "No, we have to just throw up our hands and advise nothing because there's more than one way to do this that has seen print." I say "as if" with tongue firmly in cheek, because that's exactly what's actually happened. As one example, a particular quotation punctuation style is not attested anywhere at all except in one British newspaper, yet these books give it equal weight with all other quotation styles, even though in reality only three or at most four styles (out of around a dozen total) are actually pervasive in publishing at all, and each in different sectors. I seriously think that the publishing world is mostly going to ignore both Butterfield and Waddingham until subsequent editions rectify such deficiencies, which even include blatant self-contradictions, like the one I outlined before about musical work titles: Waddingham in one section says to treat them exactly like book and article titles (and there's a section on that, albeit an overly descriptive one), then says there are no rules for musical titles at all and that writers should just format such titles however they like, then in yet another section spells out a whole bunch of very specific rules, for one particular genre. It's confused, confusing and basically schizophrenic, the result of too many editors making changes and no one reviewing the sum total from a problem-solving perspective. Then Butterfield comes a long and, on that matter, simply defers to Waddingham. It's like asking a doctor for a diagnosis and prescription, and instead being told something like "there's nothing wrong with you, except whatever you imagine is wrong with you may be wrong with you, and I can't prescribe anything for you, except I'll prescribe a very complicated drug cocktail regimen for you, but only if we agree on what you think is wrong with you"; then you go to the next doctor, and say "that last doctor is clearly crazy; can I please have a proper diagnosis and prescription?", then being told "Sure, go ask the doctor you were just talking to; she's the expert." Well, no thanks. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 07:46, 7 June 2016 (UTC)
- Can you tell me about the Fowler's editions please? George Ho (talk) 02:58, 7 June 2016 (UTC)
Oh, dear. If Fowler's and New Hart's have problems, perhaps I must stay away from those? I could go to MOS:CT as usual unless it becomes unclear for various situations, like like for example. Most disagree with my proposals on as (I did a few total). What is your recommend source for like, yet, and as? I could buy more if MOS:CT is still unclear and the sources are less reliable to resolve such situations. George Ho (talk) 02:17, 8 June 2016 (UTC)
Neutral notice
As a participator in the discussion at Talk:Universal Monsters (2014 film series)#Requested move 25 May 2016, you maybe interested in a discussion regarding a similar topic at Talk:Godzilla-Kong cinematic universe#Requested move 3 June 2016.--TriiipleThreat (talk) 15:34, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:Yuri Kochiyama
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Yuri Kochiyama. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 9 June 2016 (UTC)
Single-player listed at Redirects for discussion
An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Single-player. Since you had some involvement with the Single-player redirect, you might want to participate in the redirect discussion if you have not already done so. -- Tavix (talk) 00:51, 11 June 2016 (UTC)
This week's article for improvement (week 24, 2016)
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Please comment on Talk:Caroline Overington
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June 2016
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MOSKorea comments
Just a heads up that I copied some of your comments from Talk:Baekje to WT:MOSKOREA. — AjaxSmack 14:33, 14 June 2016 (UTC)
- @AjaxSmack: Thanks, good idea. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 00:05, 15 June 2016 (UTC)
Books & Bytes - Issue 17
Books & Bytes
Issue 17, April-May 2016
by The Interior, Ocaasi, UY Scuti, Sadads, and Nikkimaria
- New donations this month - a German-language legal resource
- Wikipedia referals to academic citations - news from CrossRef and WikiCite2016
- New library stats, WikiCon news, a bot to reveal Open Access versions of citations, and more!
This week's article for improvement (week 25, 2016)
The aqueduct of Segovia, Spain The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: List of aqueducts in the Roman Empire Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Shelby Gem Factory • Hilton Hotels & Resorts Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:07, 20 June 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI • |
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Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (royalty and nobility)
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Wikipedia how to
I think that you broke {{Wikipedia how to}}
.
—Trappist the monk (talk) 00:29, 23 June 2016 (UTC)
- Also {{Information page}} [15]. Code is showing up in pages that transclude it. - Brianhe (talk) 00:31, 23 June 2016 (UTC)
- Yep. Self-reverting now until I re-sandbox it. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 00:32, 23 June 2016 (UTC)
- @Trappist the monk and Brianhe: Resolved; apparently my attempts to use
<nowiki />
strategically to stop unusual constructions from boogering the syntax highlighting actually didn't work, and this wasn't apparent without forcibly reloading the testcases page. Anyway, well past that now. Consolidated some of the code, and have documented both of these templates (one had no docs) with the same /doc page. Over time, hope to massage more and more of these things to have the same feature set so they can just be meta-templated. Did some earlier work toward that goal with the guideline banner variants a few months ago. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 04:19, 23 June 2016 (UTC)
- @Trappist the monk and Brianhe: Resolved; apparently my attempts to use
- Yep. Self-reverting now until I re-sandbox it. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 00:32, 23 June 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:Isaac Barrow
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FAC request
Hi Stanton - saying something like "I don't believe this article meets WP:WIAFA criterion 2 because (reasons)" is constructive criticism and that type of involvement is always welcome at FAC, whether the nominator agrees with you or not. My job as FAC coordinator is to determine consensus in cases where there is disagreement. However, I would prefer extended arguments about the MoS guidelines in general be held elsewhere, maybe a central location where other people can discuss the proper use of various templates. Would you be agreeable to hatting and/or moving that discussion elsewhere? I think SchroCat is well aware by now that some editors disagree with his usage of that template, and I'd prefer the litigation occur in an appropriate venue. --Laser brain (talk) 21:31, 26 June 2016 (UTC)
- @Laser brain: No problem; despite being around forever, I'm not well-steeped in the FAC discussion expectations (I spend more time working on stubs and stuff), and didn't mean to be off-topic at it. I wasn't going to continue the conversation with SchroCat or Cassianto any further (except perhaps at a noticeboard) because they've turned it very WP:ASPERSIONS- and WP:NPA-problematic very fast, including after I left the prescribed {{Ds/alert}}: [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21] [22] [23], etc. (Oh, and deleting my article talk page posts [24], [25]). All because I did the unspeakable thing of commenting at a grand total of two pages (following SchroCat's own references to the one in the other) against their anti-MoS lobbying of GAN and FAC. This constitutes WP:HARASSMENT and WP:DE on my part according to both of them. Obviously, continuing to interact with them will not be any use at an FAC page itself, or much of anywhere but a DR forum, but I have no patience for dramaboards, and my skin's thick, so the duo can rail on, I guess. SchroCat is aware of the MOS:BQ template problem, obviously, but is convinced MoS doesn't apply to him, judging by what he's posting on the matter (including still, at Cassianto's talk page). I have no objections to the thread at FAC being hatted; the point was made clearly and I agree it's not the forum for an extended discussion of such matters. I'm sure the FAC people know their own criterion #2 well enough. :-) — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 23:24, 26 June 2016 (UTC)
- It continues to escalate [26], [27] and not just against me [28]. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 23:46, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
This week's article for improvement (week 26, 2016)
Home page of Wikipedia The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: List of aqueducts in the Roman Empire • Shelby Gem Factory Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:07, 27 June 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI • |
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GMO RfC
Length
Thanks again. One other thing I noticed: I think that you are over the 800-word word limit. --Tryptofish (talk) 01:30, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
- @Tryptofish: Gahhh. All this damned WP:BURO. Since the clerks are patrolling it, they can trim it or hat it or talk-page it; I'm tired and don't care any more. This has been one long day of "go fuck yourself" and I'm worn out. :-/ PS: If they want a limit that short, they can't expect an open-ended RfC, where people can keep tacking on additional proposals, to be practical. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 03:59, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
- I'm sorry that you feel that way, and that you are being further lobbied below. Unfortunately, it's been like this a long time in the GMO area. My guess is that they will hat it, but not edit it. If you do decide to shorten it, please let me make this friendly suggestion, just a suggestion. I don't expect that there will be a template on the pages, but rather, that the consensus language will simply be one of the proposals, perhaps with minor revisions, and that it will be pasted on every affected page and kept there via AE and DS. So you don't necessarily have to recommend ways to combine proposals or ways to apply the language differently at different pages. Of course, the page-to-page differences you discuss will in fact exist, but they just will be in text outside of the short content arising from the RfC. Again, just a suggestion. Thanks. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:38, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
- Noted. I'll try to get to it later. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 23:40, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
- @Tryptofish: PS: I don't feel lobbied below; the issues raised are valid. I was referring to the two-editor attack tagteam I posted diffs about at #FAC request, above. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 00:47, 28 June 2016 (UTC)
- I'm sorry that you feel that way, and that you are being further lobbied below. Unfortunately, it's been like this a long time in the GMO area. My guess is that they will hat it, but not edit it. If you do decide to shorten it, please let me make this friendly suggestion, just a suggestion. I don't expect that there will be a template on the pages, but rather, that the consensus language will simply be one of the proposals, perhaps with minor revisions, and that it will be pasted on every affected page and kept there via AE and DS. So you don't necessarily have to recommend ways to combine proposals or ways to apply the language differently at different pages. Of course, the page-to-page differences you discuss will in fact exist, but they just will be in text outside of the short content arising from the RfC. Again, just a suggestion. Thanks. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:38, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
Complexities
Also, SMcCandlish, I noticed you were under the impression that there was edit warring at the articles (or something to that effect), and it seemed to weigh on your assessment. So I'd like to offer a correction, as Sarah SV noted, "Most importantly, there is no trouble at any of the articles".
- You may not be surprised to hear, but this issue is incredibly complex, including the history of the dispute on WP, and the dispute over this RfC specifically. I'm not sure everyone is getting their facts straight. Cheers, petrarchan47คุก 02:43, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
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- @Petrarchan47: I'm not at all surprised to hear it's complex; I'm aware of the complexity, I'm just not an every-day regular at GMO articles and don't care to get involved in the personality conflicts and the politics. A years-long "slow editwar" is still an edit-war, an editorial struggle of one WP:TRUTH versus another, even if no one breaches 3RR lately. No trouble at the articles right this moment is a good sign and an improvement, but there's been long-term trouble, rising to the ARBCOM level multiple times, and now one of the longest-winded RfCs in WP history (and if I call something long-winded, well day-um, as Will Smith would say.) I stand by my summary at the end of what I posted there, about what the goals should be and pitfalls to avoid, and by the flaws I identified in the proposals I objected to. The only thing that changed is my certainty about the solidity for the sourcing that there's a scientific consensus on GMO food safety has been shaken a little by some alternative sources ("a little" because it will take time and effort to sort out which are actually reliable presumptively, and which more reliable than others); my revision accounts for that uncertainty. I also stand by the fact that we should still use and link to that sourced term, even if it's to say "whether there is a scientific consensus is unclear", not use a made-up term with no definition. People can take what they find useful in my comments and ignore what they don't. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 03:59, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
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- As you know, I always appreciate your thoughtful responses on WP. I would never attempt to sway you, either, though we have never agreed 100%. I have in fact been on the GMO scene since the trouble began, and can assure you that people aren't getting the story straight (there has only been one ArbCom, but this is the 3rd RfC on the contested statement, and believe it or not, the "slow edit war" has actually been a mellow series of GF editors pointing out obvious misuse of sources resulting in attempts at obfuscation by escalating these confrontations to noticeboards, almost instantly). I also don't expect you or anyone to get involved in this mess enough to really get all the facts. The only downside to that is that word of mouth ends up filling in for research. You know how that goes.
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- I find your suggestion re "scientific consensus" interesting. I could support that idea. According to the literature I have seen, "it is unclear" is accurate and very well supported. petrarchan47คุก 05:04, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
- I went into this a bit more near bottom of talk page of RfC. I don't support substituting WoM for research, but the research evidence in the proposals is insufficient and contradictory, and needs to be re-examined with literature reviews that are less than a year old, and from high-quality journals. It is clear in the aggregate from what I've read so far that overall, science considers GMO food safe. GMO crops may raise other issues, but it's not about the safety of ingestion. There are also concerns that we can't be as certain some of us think we are about ingestion safety over the long term. I don't see any evidence yet of current GMO foods being found to cause disease, but I've also lost access to two journal sites in one month, so I'm not in a good position to be personally certain about that. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 23:40, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
- @Petrarchan47: forgot to ping on that one. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 00:47, 28 June 2016 (UTC)
- You won't find proof of GMO food safety as it concerns human health, because no tests are done on humans, and certainly no long-term feeding tests are performed, even on rats. Industry prefers 9 month rat studies. Claims of safety are based in general on "we've been eating this stuff for twenty years and have witnessed no deaths from it". In the U.S., no agency is tracking long term human health effects. We don't see evidence of disease, but is anyone is looking? I know that when Stephanie Seneff found links to autism and organ damage from glyphosate, her reputation and Wikipedia page were attacked. (Actually here is the last version I would trust without reviewing subsequent edits for npov, etc.) This is actually very common for any scientist who discovers problems in this area, strangely. Check this out. Nice chatting with you, petrarchan47คุก 21:12, 28 June 2016 (UTC)
- @Petrarchan47: I'll try to address this at sufficient length that it leaves no mysteries as to where I'm coming form on this. In science, especially complex science, there's rarely proof of anything, just evidence. Lack of evidence that it kills people is evidence it does not. Evidence against fetal mutation in rapid-breeding mammals is evidence against it in slow-breeding ones (and evidence of toxic effects of an herbicide in fast-metabolism mammals is evidence for it in slower-living ones). Maybe not the best imaginable evidence, but it can't be hand-waved away. The problem as I see it is there's hand-waving on both sides, two entrenched pro and anti camps (and lots of middle-ground people, both in the scientific and regulatory bodies, and here on Pickyweedia). That some of the pro camp are cranks is evidenced by things like attempts to harm the reputations of scientists who provide contradictory evidence, as you point out. Glyphosate, however, is a poison. As with DDT and Agent Orange, we should expect that it would have toxic effects on people. That doesn't seem to relate in any way to GMOs. An attempt to relate them looks rather like what the non-crank pro-GMO side think is a crank, luddite argument on the anti-GMO side ("it's science, and has all this chemistry stuff and lab coats involved, so it must be bad"). I don't think you hold that view, but I hope you can see that introducing "science erred over here in a different field, and it got political, ergo the same thing must be happening here even though we can't prove it" arguments aren't convincing about this other, separate field. But the anti-GMO crowd do this all the time: [29] [30]. Note that it's a confusion of GMOs with pesticides used on crops (and crops infused with the pesticide). Then a semi-news outlet reproduces the exact same brain-fart (can't link it, as it's in WP's URL blacklist: www.examiner.com/article/gmo-foods-cause-tumors-and-early-death-according-to-new-studies). It's transparently fallacious.
There are clearly cranks in the anti camp. Where I live (San Francisco Bay Area), I'm surrounded by millions of them. My neighbor has a "DRINK RAW MILK" bumper sticker, I live with a vegan, am within walking distance of 3 "organic" grocers, and I have mostly had to stop using Facebook for conversational purposes, because too many of my friends are activistically anti-GMO, anti-pesticide/herbicide, about half-and-half anti-vaccine, convinced that everything about climate change is humanity's fault, etc. (as you can probably guess, this crowd are mostly white, middle to upper-middle class, leftists with liberal arts educations, and smart enough to know that the science behind much of what they believe in simply isn't there; it's a post-modern form of religion).
With regard to GMOs I'm most concerned about source reliability, especially after watching and mostly staying out of the e-cig sourcing fights. What to look out for is behind-the-scenes data manipulation antics, like all the bogus studies paid for, for decades, by the tobacco industry to try to suppress evidence of the dangers of smoking; that is something that might actually port directly from one field to another, maybe even with the same PR firms managing it, the same corrupt labs doing the "research", etc. Monsanto and their ilk have a tremendous amount of money to throw at snowing both regulators and the general public if they want to.)
Anyway, my general position on this as a Wikipedian is root out the PoV pushing, even if its a PoV I lean toward in my private life. (I've made few fans over at WP:MEDRS by pointing out that they're trying to enshrine the position statements – primary sources – of various politicized medical and regulatory organizations as "ideal secondary sources", when they are neither. Many editors agree with me, but a WP:LOCALCONSENSUS totally WP:OWNs that page, so despite multiple extended discussions, it's still in there, and probably will not be removed without a Village Pump RfC, which I'll try early next year; I see it as impermissibly tendentious to keep re-testing consensus on a matter in rapid-fire succession.) As a private person, I think we treat, for example, far too many "religious" groups that are clearly scams and cults as legitimately religious, and write about them just like they were Shinto, Jainism, or the Methodists; but with my Wikipedian hat on, I'll continue to remove claims like "dangerous, criminal cult" from articles on Scientology, though I know from over a decade of research into and direct experience with them that they are in WP:TRUTH exactly what that phrase claims they are. On issues like that, and GMOs, and e-cigs, etc., I see myself, here, as a referee, not a player (or sometimes a retired player, in the case of CoS, but many refs in sports are retired players, so it's a good analogy anyway). There are issues in which I remain an active player, and I consequently stay away from editing articles on them, per WP:COI, other than routine, non-substantive gnoming.
You don't need my whole life story, I'm just trying to establish for you and any talk-page stalkers where I'm coming from on this. GMOs are necessary, or a very large number of people are going to starve to death over the coming century. It is not scientifically plausible that all GMOs are unhealthy. It's also not plausible that every potential GMO will be healthy. And we already know that there are environmental concerns with them. But if I were at risk of starving, I would rather live to 48 and die of a GMO-caused cancer, than to have died at 12 from malnutrition. As someone in the affluent West, I would also rather live comfortably to 48 and die of GMO-caused cancer, than live to 68 but in a world where a loaf of bread costs $20, I have to stand in line for 10 hours to get one, if I'm lucky, and I might get shot for my bread on the way home. Longevity takes a back seat to quality of life for most people. And where's the evidence GMOs cause cancer and other diseases anyway? Cigarettes and alcohol, high-fat-and-cholesterol diets and diabetes (in the developed world), and starvation/malnutrition (outside it) are killing and will continue to kill far more people than GMOs, especially given that GMOs don't seem to be killing any one, even when the news claims they are and gets caught with their pants down [31]. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 02:30, 29 June 2016 (UTC)
- I thought you said that very well indeed. Thanks! --Tryptofish (talk) 19:35, 29 June 2016 (UTC)
- @Petrarchan47: I'll try to address this at sufficient length that it leaves no mysteries as to where I'm coming form on this. In science, especially complex science, there's rarely proof of anything, just evidence. Lack of evidence that it kills people is evidence it does not. Evidence against fetal mutation in rapid-breeding mammals is evidence against it in slow-breeding ones (and evidence of toxic effects of an herbicide in fast-metabolism mammals is evidence for it in slower-living ones). Maybe not the best imaginable evidence, but it can't be hand-waved away. The problem as I see it is there's hand-waving on both sides, two entrenched pro and anti camps (and lots of middle-ground people, both in the scientific and regulatory bodies, and here on Pickyweedia). That some of the pro camp are cranks is evidenced by things like attempts to harm the reputations of scientists who provide contradictory evidence, as you point out. Glyphosate, however, is a poison. As with DDT and Agent Orange, we should expect that it would have toxic effects on people. That doesn't seem to relate in any way to GMOs. An attempt to relate them looks rather like what the non-crank pro-GMO side think is a crank, luddite argument on the anti-GMO side ("it's science, and has all this chemistry stuff and lab coats involved, so it must be bad"). I don't think you hold that view, but I hope you can see that introducing "science erred over here in a different field, and it got political, ergo the same thing must be happening here even though we can't prove it" arguments aren't convincing about this other, separate field. But the anti-GMO crowd do this all the time: [29] [30]. Note that it's a confusion of GMOs with pesticides used on crops (and crops infused with the pesticide). Then a semi-news outlet reproduces the exact same brain-fart (can't link it, as it's in WP's URL blacklist: www.examiner.com/article/gmo-foods-cause-tumors-and-early-death-according-to-new-studies). It's transparently fallacious.
- You won't find proof of GMO food safety as it concerns human health, because no tests are done on humans, and certainly no long-term feeding tests are performed, even on rats. Industry prefers 9 month rat studies. Claims of safety are based in general on "we've been eating this stuff for twenty years and have witnessed no deaths from it". In the U.S., no agency is tracking long term human health effects. We don't see evidence of disease, but is anyone is looking? I know that when Stephanie Seneff found links to autism and organ damage from glyphosate, her reputation and Wikipedia page were attacked. (Actually here is the last version I would trust without reviewing subsequent edits for npov, etc.) This is actually very common for any scientist who discovers problems in this area, strangely. Check this out. Nice chatting with you, petrarchan47คุก 21:12, 28 June 2016 (UTC)
- I find your suggestion re "scientific consensus" interesting. I could support that idea. According to the literature I have seen, "it is unclear" is accurate and very well supported. petrarchan47คุก 05:04, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
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- I see how confusing it was for me to have pointed to a glyphosate issue, when I could have showed you instead the early edit history of the Seralini Affair article, and this showing the other side of the story. [Seralini used glyphosate in his (now republished, peer reviewed) feeding study, by the way, as does Monsanto.] So I don't think it's fair to say the two are entirely separate issues, they aren't treated that way in all GMO safety studies anyway. Also remember, no one in this RfC or on WP is trying to say that GMOs are dangerous, let alone that they are shown to cause cancer or organ damage. Rather, we have been saying that sources used by this encyclopedia to claim there is absolutely no question in scientific literature that GMOs are safe have not actually said that, that the sources are being misrepresented, and that we should simply say what the sources say rather than to allow random editors to summarize the sources for us, after hand picking them.
- To get unbiased, accurate information, neither Snopes (run by a mom and pop with no training in anything besides how to use Google) nor Wikipedia should be serious considerations, imo. As for the "GMOs will feed the world", check this out:
- "in its report, the ERS researchers said over the first 15 years of commercial use, GMO seeds have not been shown to definitively increase yield potentials, and "in fact, the yields of herbicide-tolerant or insect-resistant seeds may be occasionally lower than the yields of conventional varieties" Reuters
- "in a new paper funded by the US Department of Agriculture, University of Wisconsin researchers have essentially negated the "more food" argument" (more proofs here)
- "genetically engineered crops...have not significantly improved the yields of crops such as corn and soy. Emily Cassidy, an EWG research analyst who authored the report, found that in the last 20 years, yields of both GE corn and soy have been no different from traditionally bred corn and soy grown in western Europe, where GE crops are banned. Additionally, a recent case study in Africa found that crops that were crossbred for drought tolerance using traditional techniques improved yields 30 percent more than GE varieties"
- "The report also said that in the two decades that GE crops have been a mainstay in conventional agriculture, they “have not substantially improved global food security” and have instead increased the use of toxic herbicides and led to herbicide-resistant “superweeds.”"
- while corn and soybeans take up the vast majority (about 80 percent) of global land devoted to growing GE crops, they are not even used to feed people but instead as animal feed or fuel." Ecowatch
- Again, you won't find this information on WP; I assure you without even checking first that this is true. I know how we roll. petrarchan47คุก 22:26, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
- But no one at all that I've seen has made anything like a claim that "there is absolutely no question in scientific literature that GMOs are safe"; that's not what scientific consensus would indicate, and this has already been discussed in considerable detail on the RfC talk page – the very meaning of scientific consensus permits some level of disagreement or skepticism, and it is not synonymous with "scientific agreement" (the very wording of that pseudo-term precludes disagreement). And I'm not going to shed any tears over or wave any flags for old studies that did not clearly delineate between glyphosate contamination in GMOs, and the GMO, as such, themselves. They're simply not reliable sources on the question, by definition. They may be reliable sources on, say, certain Monsanto product lines, but the tell us nothing about GMO crops or food unto themselves. Anyway, I'm tiring of this debate being weirdly centered on me and my RfC comments instead of the issue raised by the RfC. Please divert energy back to the RfC, the material's sourcing, and its source reliability. I'm not defending any particular sources and only leaning toward a generalized interpretation of the preponderance of them that I have seen so far, while the bulk of my comments in the RfC are about wording logic, avoidance of OR, style matters, appropriate linking, not using meaningless neologisms, etc. – issues of communication and presentation, not of Wikipedian research methodology. I'm also behind schedule on several off-WP projects, so I just don't have time for a lot of back-and-forth about this. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 04:12, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
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"Scientific Agreement" vs. "Scientific Consensus"
I wanted to briefly give you the history of how the language became "scientific agreement" in the GM articles:
We are presently at the 3rd RfC on the same sentence found in numerous articles since c. 2013.
Last year was a very lengthy RfC#2 (found here). The purpose of RfC#2 was to reaffirm the language saying "broad scientific consensus", but there was no-Wiki consensus for keeping it (or removing it). The author of RfC#2 said that if there was no consensus to keep the language, it would need to change. The closer appeared to agree:
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- Some of the opposes in this discussion appear to agree with the substance of this section but feel that the wording of the one sentence is overly broad; they might support more nuanced statements. I recommend that someone propose an alternative wording.
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- ... it may be helpful to refer to to some of the literature reviews to represent alternative views on the matter with respect to due weight.
As you know I have a very different approach to what that sentence should say, and I agree with the closer of the first RfC that differing opinions on GMO safety from the scientific reviews should be included. --David Tornheim (talk) 09:29, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
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- Whether "broad" should be used is indeed debatable. But "scientific agreement" is the wrong phrase. What can it mean other than "agreement among scientists"? But this is clearly not the same as "scientific consensus"; a "consensus" allows for dissenters; "agreement" doesn't. You can say "There's a consensus on X, although not everyone agrees", but not "There's agreement on X, although not everyone agrees". Peter coxhead (talk) 10:06, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
- @David Tornheim and Peter coxhead: My principal concern about this sub-topic of the overall RfC thread is this: We have a well-sourced article at scientific consensus, so anything we say about a scientific consensus (pro, con, or debated) is easily subjected to WP:V, WP:RS and (in this context) even WP:MEDRS tests. If we make up our own "scientific agreement" language, this has no concrete shared meaning that can be reliably sourced; it means whatever you want it to mean, and will thus both be confusing to readers and subject to PoV pushing. I really don't care much (though I appreciated the diffing work) why a bad decision was once arrived at to try this "agreement" language (wording which to me sounds like a pact or a contract). It was still a bad decision regardless of the arguments made at the time. WP operating on a loose consensus basis means that we arrive at bad decisions frequently, and we have the WP:CCC principle, obviously, because they have to be undone later. At any rate, what we've run into here is a conflict between the fact that we're generally free to write up the facts in our own wording (especially to avoid plagiarism), versus the fact that when writing about "technical" (including medical, legal, and other jargon-laden) topics, we have to be careful to use concretely, contextually meaningful wording that is not likely to misunderstood or to misrepresent. Per the WP:ENC and WP:COMMONSENSE principles, the latter of these two modes obviously takes precedence, even if it means linking to a sourced article about a term, citing sources for a term directly in situ, or even using verbatim, attributed quotations (or any combination of these). In this particular case, just linking to the article scientific consensus is sufficient. I agree with Peter's summary of why this term should be preferred anyway, since it provides room for dissent, while (for many readers, anyway) "agreement" may wrongly imply unanimity. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 01:37, 28 June 2016 (UTC)
- I have not looked carefully at the Wiki-article on "scientific consensus". However, the word "consensus" suggests something stronger that a "general agreement" which is why people like me thought it preferable. Consensus often means near unanimous support. See: Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Genetically_modified_organisms#Consensus_is_not_the_same_as_Majority_or_General_Agreement --David Tornheim (talk) 03:58, 29 June 2016 (UTC)
- David, I found what you said there very interesting, in a very good way, so thank you for that. People familiar with the "scientific consensus" concept actually do not see it as something stronger than "general agreement" or "broad agreement". Those latter two phrases seem to imply that most scientists agree, and that's that. On the other hand, science is actually built on the principle that "scientific consensus" is something that is fluid over time. Example: today, pretty much everybody feels that Albert Einstein got it right when he replaced Isaac Newton's physics with relativity. But in the years after Einstein published special relativity, the "scientific consensus" was still very much that Newton was right and this new stuff was speculative. In a sense, then, the scientific consensus circa 1905–1910 was actually wrong about this point. Consequently, when I argue that we should use this phrase in the GMO content, I'm seeing it simply as a direct report of what most sources are saying (whereas the sources are not calling it an "agreement"), but I'm not seeing it as Wikipedia declaring some sort of Ultimate Truth. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:45, 29 June 2016 (UTC)
- I agree with your use of the word "scientific consensus" about Newtonian physics v. Modern Physics at the time mentioned, which is the kind of thing Thomas Kuhn talked about in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. And that is why using the word "scientific consensus" is too strong. Agreement is too strong as well. It was a compromise at the time and a slight improvement over "broad scientific consensus" which is not indicative of the RS as I have demonstrated over and over: Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_comment/Genetically_modified_organisms#On_the_existence_of_.22scientific_consensus.22 here, here and here, as did Montanabw here. I am not going to defend the old justification for "agreement" over "consensus" as a slight improvement, since there is little support for use of the compromise word "agreement". I simply wanted those who saw it to understand why it is there. I see little chance that it stays. --David Tornheim (talk) 20:20, 29 June 2016 (UTC)
- OK, I guess we continue to just disagree about some things. I don't see it as "too strong". I just see it as what the sources seem to me to say. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:30, 29 June 2016 (UTC)
- Right. "Scientific agreement" is what's too strong. There's scientific agreement that the reason your pencil falls to the floor when you drop it is gravity. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 21:28, 29 June 2016 (UTC)
- FYI, I just put a link to here on the RfC talk page. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:35, 29 June 2016 (UTC)
- Right. "Scientific agreement" is what's too strong. There's scientific agreement that the reason your pencil falls to the floor when you drop it is gravity. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 21:28, 29 June 2016 (UTC)
- OK, I guess we continue to just disagree about some things. I don't see it as "too strong". I just see it as what the sources seem to me to say. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:30, 29 June 2016 (UTC)
- I agree with your use of the word "scientific consensus" about Newtonian physics v. Modern Physics at the time mentioned, which is the kind of thing Thomas Kuhn talked about in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. And that is why using the word "scientific consensus" is too strong. Agreement is too strong as well. It was a compromise at the time and a slight improvement over "broad scientific consensus" which is not indicative of the RS as I have demonstrated over and over: Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_comment/Genetically_modified_organisms#On_the_existence_of_.22scientific_consensus.22 here, here and here, as did Montanabw here. I am not going to defend the old justification for "agreement" over "consensus" as a slight improvement, since there is little support for use of the compromise word "agreement". I simply wanted those who saw it to understand why it is there. I see little chance that it stays. --David Tornheim (talk) 20:20, 29 June 2016 (UTC)
- David, I found what you said there very interesting, in a very good way, so thank you for that. People familiar with the "scientific consensus" concept actually do not see it as something stronger than "general agreement" or "broad agreement". Those latter two phrases seem to imply that most scientists agree, and that's that. On the other hand, science is actually built on the principle that "scientific consensus" is something that is fluid over time. Example: today, pretty much everybody feels that Albert Einstein got it right when he replaced Isaac Newton's physics with relativity. But in the years after Einstein published special relativity, the "scientific consensus" was still very much that Newton was right and this new stuff was speculative. In a sense, then, the scientific consensus circa 1905–1910 was actually wrong about this point. Consequently, when I argue that we should use this phrase in the GMO content, I'm seeing it simply as a direct report of what most sources are saying (whereas the sources are not calling it an "agreement"), but I'm not seeing it as Wikipedia declaring some sort of Ultimate Truth. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:45, 29 June 2016 (UTC)
- I have not looked carefully at the Wiki-article on "scientific consensus". However, the word "consensus" suggests something stronger that a "general agreement" which is why people like me thought it preferable. Consensus often means near unanimous support. See: Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Genetically_modified_organisms#Consensus_is_not_the_same_as_Majority_or_General_Agreement --David Tornheim (talk) 03:58, 29 June 2016 (UTC)
- @David Tornheim and Peter coxhead: My principal concern about this sub-topic of the overall RfC thread is this: We have a well-sourced article at scientific consensus, so anything we say about a scientific consensus (pro, con, or debated) is easily subjected to WP:V, WP:RS and (in this context) even WP:MEDRS tests. If we make up our own "scientific agreement" language, this has no concrete shared meaning that can be reliably sourced; it means whatever you want it to mean, and will thus both be confusing to readers and subject to PoV pushing. I really don't care much (though I appreciated the diffing work) why a bad decision was once arrived at to try this "agreement" language (wording which to me sounds like a pact or a contract). It was still a bad decision regardless of the arguments made at the time. WP operating on a loose consensus basis means that we arrive at bad decisions frequently, and we have the WP:CCC principle, obviously, because they have to be undone later. At any rate, what we've run into here is a conflict between the fact that we're generally free to write up the facts in our own wording (especially to avoid plagiarism), versus the fact that when writing about "technical" (including medical, legal, and other jargon-laden) topics, we have to be careful to use concretely, contextually meaningful wording that is not likely to misunderstood or to misrepresent. Per the WP:ENC and WP:COMMONSENSE principles, the latter of these two modes obviously takes precedence, even if it means linking to a sourced article about a term, citing sources for a term directly in situ, or even using verbatim, attributed quotations (or any combination of these). In this particular case, just linking to the article scientific consensus is sufficient. I agree with Peter's summary of why this term should be preferred anyway, since it provides room for dissent, while (for many readers, anyway) "agreement" may wrongly imply unanimity. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 01:37, 28 June 2016 (UTC)
- Whether "broad" should be used is indeed debatable. But "scientific agreement" is the wrong phrase. What can it mean other than "agreement among scientists"? But this is clearly not the same as "scientific consensus"; a "consensus" allows for dissenters; "agreement" doesn't. You can say "There's a consensus on X, although not everyone agrees", but not "There's agreement on X, although not everyone agrees". Peter coxhead (talk) 10:06, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
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- @Tryptofish: I will, though not without a strenuous objection on the talk page, per WP:IAR, WP:BURO, WP:COMMONSENSE, etc. No RfC should ever be operated this way again. Any closer who was competent and sensible would take my section into account when closing anyway (they would basically have no choice, since others' sections cite it as containing part of their own rationales). But we have too many admins who are neither, so I suppose I'll kneel and kiss the ring. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 05:23, 5 July 2016 (UTC)
- Thanks. Actually, insofar as registering your disapproval with the guilty party, you just did – me! There were discussions about the rules prior to the opening of the RfC, and it was I who initially pushed for 800, although everyone else also agreed at the time. I've seen so much filibustering by editors whom I consider to be POV-pushers, that I was, and still am, convinced that a strict word limit is needed, to prevent the RfC from degenerating into a tl;dr that results in no consensus. By the way, no need to kiss my ring! As for my competence and sense, I'll leave that to others to decide. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:11, 5 July 2016 (UTC)
- @Tryptofish: D'oh. I already talk-page posted about it; hopefully it was less intemperate than the version above. Well, you are not one of those that I worry about, I assure you (either in the competence and sense way, or the expecting obeisance way). There are 3 admins I know for sure who want to hang me high, which probably means there are 20 who are less obvious about it; then again, all three have left me along lately, so that's progress. A potential 4th is being raked at ARCA right now and has bigger problems than me. Anyway, it's not so much that a length limit exists (and I certainly understand the PoV-pushers problem), it's that it can be gamed by just adding more and more proposals. It's also exasperating to spend hours poring over the material only to be hard-pressed to find room to spell them out clearly. My main concern is that some particular proposal will get approved as most-supported, despite clear flaws in it, when a massaged-together combo approach would produce something better. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:15, 5 July 2016 (UTC)
- Well, I double-checked, and you are safely down to 799. As for the talk page, I already replied to you there. I can imagine an admin hatting it or reverting us both, but, whatever. Thanks for the kind words, and the same back to you. Anyway, I am sick of the entire GMO topic, having had it eat up way too much of my editing time for the past year, and I really hope that I will soon be able to put it behind me. Thanks for your thoughtful (even if constrained) contributions to the RfC discussion. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:21, 5 July 2016 (UTC)
- Looks like a POINTy number, but it was lower in the word-counter I used (depends on whether it counts hyphenation, whether is counts by average word length or by analyzing string-whitespace-string-whitespace, how it handled numerals, etc.). I don't even get into the GMO thing much, and already feel drained by it. Much like e-cigs. My input on the RfC was constrained by my own standards, I guess, but maybe it will parse OK even compressed like that. It pains me because I'm a step-by-step analyst about these things (comes from having been a professional policy analyst of US legislation, back when). Anyway, glad I didn't pull out your feathers. :-) — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:42, 5 July 2016 (UTC)
- Well, I double-checked, and you are safely down to 799. As for the talk page, I already replied to you there. I can imagine an admin hatting it or reverting us both, but, whatever. Thanks for the kind words, and the same back to you. Anyway, I am sick of the entire GMO topic, having had it eat up way too much of my editing time for the past year, and I really hope that I will soon be able to put it behind me. Thanks for your thoughtful (even if constrained) contributions to the RfC discussion. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:21, 5 July 2016 (UTC)
- @Tryptofish: D'oh. I already talk-page posted about it; hopefully it was less intemperate than the version above. Well, you are not one of those that I worry about, I assure you (either in the competence and sense way, or the expecting obeisance way). There are 3 admins I know for sure who want to hang me high, which probably means there are 20 who are less obvious about it; then again, all three have left me along lately, so that's progress. A potential 4th is being raked at ARCA right now and has bigger problems than me. Anyway, it's not so much that a length limit exists (and I certainly understand the PoV-pushers problem), it's that it can be gamed by just adding more and more proposals. It's also exasperating to spend hours poring over the material only to be hard-pressed to find room to spell them out clearly. My main concern is that some particular proposal will get approved as most-supported, despite clear flaws in it, when a massaged-together combo approach would produce something better. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:15, 5 July 2016 (UTC)
- Thanks. Actually, insofar as registering your disapproval with the guilty party, you just did – me! There were discussions about the rules prior to the opening of the RfC, and it was I who initially pushed for 800, although everyone else also agreed at the time. I've seen so much filibustering by editors whom I consider to be POV-pushers, that I was, and still am, convinced that a strict word limit is needed, to prevent the RfC from degenerating into a tl;dr that results in no consensus. By the way, no need to kiss my ring! As for my competence and sense, I'll leave that to others to decide. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:11, 5 July 2016 (UTC)
Invitation to the Bay Area WikiSalon series, Wednesday, June 29 at 6 p.m.
Hi, Stanton.
The last Wednesday evening of every month, wiki enthusiasts gather at Bay Area WikiSalon to collaborate, mingle, and learn about new projects and ideas.
We make sure to allow time for informal conversation and working on articles. Newcomers and experienced wiki users are encouraged to attend. Free Wi-Fi is available so bring your editing devices. We will have beverages and light snacks. We will also have:
- A brief report on Pride edit-a-thon recently held at the San Francisco Publice Library, coordinated by Merrilee:
- What topics might we cover in a follow up?
- Find out more about resources your public library provides to help with editing (hint, it's more than just books!)
- Special announcement (secret for now but come and find out more!)
- Join in on an in person Wikidojo!
- Are you curious how your peers approach writing a Wikipedia article? This exercise, pioneered by Wikipedians Nikola Kalchev and Vassia Atanassova in 2015 and conducted in many places around the world, will help us all - from first-time wiki users to veteran Wikipedians - share ideas, while building an article together. If you have ideas (relating to Bay Area history, ideally) about a new article we could build (stubs and short existing articles are fine), please submit them ahead of time to coordinator Pete Forsyth. (User talk page or email is fine.)
- Announcements and impromptu topics are welcome, too!
Please note: You must register here, and bring a photo ID that matches your registration name. The building policy is strict.
For further details, see: Wikipedia:Bay Area WikiSalon, June 2016
See you soon! Pete F, Ben, Stephen and {{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk}
03:52, 27 June 2016 (UTC) | (Subscribe or Unsubscribe to this talk page notice here)
- Hopefully I can actually make it to this one! Depends on when I get out of work. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 04:33, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:Indian massacre
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Indian massacre. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
Submitting draft
Hello, Sam Sailor has recommended that I ask you about a (fairly minor) tech problem. In recent articles I've submitted, I've placed the code {{Userspace draft|source=ArticleWizard|date=Month Year}}
at the top of the mark-up page and this would previously have produced the 'new article awaiting review' tag at the top of the page. (Latest example is Keith Holland (racing driver)). However, on the last three or four pages I've created, this has not appeared. It may be something blindingly obvious I'm doing wrong (or lack of knowledge) but it's a bit baffling. Can you assist in any way? Thanks. Regards, Eagleash (talk) 16:46, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
It's an error introduced somewhere in the series of edits SMcCandlish made; the sandbox version is currently the one before these edits and works correctly at Keith Holland (racing driver).- I've now undone the last edit and the message now appears. I leave it to SMcCandlish to fix whatever was the problem or else explain why the "new article awaiting review" message should not appear. Peter coxhead (talk) 17:46, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
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- Peter coxhead I'm still a bit baffled SMcC hasn't edited the page as far as I can tell and it looks like you put 'sandbox' into the 'template' and then took it out again which made the tag appear. Eagleash (talk) 17:51, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
- Sorry it wasn't clear. The issue was an edit made to the template {{Userspace draft}}, which altered its behaviour. There was nothing wrong with your edit to the page. I've gone back one step in the template, which restores the message everywhere. Peter coxhead (talk) 20:07, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
- Peter coxhead I'm still a bit baffled SMcC hasn't edited the page as far as I can tell and it looks like you put 'sandbox' into the 'template' and then took it out again which made the tag appear. Eagleash (talk) 17:51, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
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- Will look into it when I get a chance. What it's supposed to do is not trigger Article Wizard code if it's not a draft article, but a draft of something else (wikiproject, template, whatever). There may have been a syntax problem in the code. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 23:27, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
- I think the problem is that the if statement added in the edit I undid encloses the penultimate case of the switch statement that forms the body of the template, but the nesting of the {{..}}s is hard to follow! Peter coxhead (talk) 05:34, 28 June 2016 (UTC)
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-
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- I don't know if it helps at all, but I first noticed this happen with drafts I submitted on 30 April 2016. Eagleash (talk) 06:49, 28 June 2016 (UTC)
- @Eagleash:: Thanks; we know when it was introduced, it just wasn't clear what the exact coding bug was. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 08:58, 28 June 2016 (UTC)
- I don't know if it helps at all, but I first noticed this happen with drafts I submitted on 30 April 2016. Eagleash (talk) 06:49, 28 June 2016 (UTC)
-
-
-
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- @Peter coxhead:: I figured so too; I've already started unraveling the mess in it (we need nested indentation of
if
andswitch
statements, not of the parameters of called templates), at Template:Userspace draft/sandbox, but then got distracted by a comma-related sourcing run I'm still in the middle of. The code should be fixed and reinstalled correctly, since we do actually want to exclude non-article drafts from Article Wizard and related processing. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 08:58, 28 June 2016 (UTC)
- @Peter coxhead:: I figured so too; I've already started unraveling the mess in it (we need nested indentation of
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Please comment on Talk:History of Gibraltar
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:History of Gibraltar. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 30 June 2016 (UTC)
Another CITEVAR issue
CITEVAR is interpreted to mean that although the MOS is opposed to smallcaps, this doesn't apply to citations. Sigh... Peter coxhead (talk) 05:57, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
- @Peter coxhead: Yeah, we seem to have given up on that, and I guess logically we have to. If we accept that CITEVAR permits people to exactly mimic particular external citation standards (and that does appear to be the consensus, even if it's been heavily steered by WP:LOCALCONSENSUS lobbying), as long as they do it consistently in the article, and some of those specs use that style for certain elements of the citation, it necessarily means there's an MoS exception for SC in that case. And that's okay; MoS makes various exceptions for various things (including even some other uses of SC). I detest that citation style, but it's not worth fighting over. The ironic thing is that the anti-MOS PoV-forking campaign over at WP:CITE was created and fuelled almost entirely by that specific dispute, and the MoS regulars just gave up on it several years ago and today really DGaF, but the WP:CITE-focused editors still act like there's a war on. It's like those Japanese soldiers found in Pacific island jungles decades after the end of WWII who did not want to believe it had ended (except it's even more daft, since the CITE crew actually got what they wanted; it's more like a bunch of Londoners in a Picadilly park who still think ze Germans are coming, listening for the air-raid sirens).
I've just written off the matter for the next few years. If it has to be raised again, I would do it via WP:VPPOL where the !vote can't be so easily stacked. The only thing I would go to bat about right now would be if someone tried to use CITEVAR's tolerance for a made-up citation "style", that just randomly came out of one editor's head, as an excuse to do anti-MoS things in that "style", then that would not be acceptable, and it would furthermore be a good rationale to do away with permitting fake citation styles, limiting them to either WP's own or any modern, RS-published one like Harvard, AMA, MHRA, etc. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 16:05, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
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Please comment on Template talk:Infobox company
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Template talk:Infobox company. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
Tone in Cary Grant
I suggest you watch your tone in edit summaries. You come across as a nasty asshole in your Cary Grant summaries. Edit constructively without snarky comments and you're more likely to get somewhere.♦ Dr. Blofeld 08:50, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
- @Dr. Blofeld: Fair enough, though people should also try to grow a sense of humor; when someone makes a joke about big-dick contests it's pretty obviously a joke, albeit a pointed one.
When it comes to civility at that page, I'm hardly the principal problem. It (along with others) is being abused as an anti-MoS WP:SOAPBOX by a tag team (see diffs at #FAC request, and I'm just getting started) whose verbal viciousness knows nearly no bounds, as even a brief stroll through the top pages of their contributions shows. There's a difference between a) suggesting that a discussion is unproductive territorialism and that trying to use random article talk pages to change guidelines is quixotic, versus b) a constant river of direct personal attacks and aspersion-casting at specific editors, including me, PBS ([32], [33], [34]), Light_show ([35], [36]), and many others (I'll save the diff pile for a noticeboard). I may be a curmudgeon in a diffuse "youse guys all need to knock it off" way, and sometimes a direct "I know policy better than you do" way, but that's not really comparable to "go fuck yourself"-attitude, ad hominem nastiness. My goal is to get people on the same page, even if I'm poor at it; theirs is to keep anyone from touching "their" articles or contradicting their roving, two-person pseudo-consensus. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 11:01, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
MOS concerns
Read the discussions on the article talk page where I raised MOS concerns over and over <g>. Skilled GA writers don't need no MOS bollocks. ([[37]]) I fear you will find this attitude a tad pervasive (sigh). Just be glad there is no "shaming campaign" yet. [38] Collect (talk) 11:58, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
- Not worth any further effort or attention, unless the hostility escalates. It is curious to me that one of them likes to cite MoS all the time in his edit summaries, then blow off anyone else's MoS concerns if it doesn't line up with his personal style preferences. It's the same thing as the common "traffic laws don't apply to me, but that guy who just did a rolling stop in front of me is a total asshole" attitude. <sigh> — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 14:21, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
I've promoted articles to Featured Status with "pull boxes" as have others so obviously the "traffic laws" which you claim to exist are invented as they'd not have passed FA status otherwise. That none of the people at FAC have a problem with it says it all. You have how many featured articles been you both? You're the ones claiming to be technical experts here, not me.♦ Dr. Blofeld 17:11, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
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- @Dr. Blofeld: Everything in all WP policies and guidelines is "invented"; God did not show up in a flash of thunder and impose it all. But to move on to what I think you're trying to convey: FAC is not the Guideline Enforcement Bureau, and individual reviewers care anywhere from tremendously to not one whit about compliance with any particular guideline, or line item in one, that they're familiar with (and usually toward "not one whit" if they're not familiar with it). FAC's principal concern is WP:CCPOL compliance, and regardless what any particular reviewers individually care about, it's essentially a wikiproject, a coming-and-going group of editors forming a consensus to praise or not praise an article, by giving it an icon and a new category. The principal purpose of FA is editorial encouragement; the vast majority of our readers never notice the icon, and they don't know what the criteria are, so it is basically meaningless to them. FA is not a WMF-official "guideline and policy exception bureau", either, and it does not freeze one byte of any article. Any editor is free to improve the MoS- or other WP:POLICY-compliance of any FA at any time, and this is in fact a constantly ongoing and necessary process, since our P&G are not static. All that aside, most FAs abusing pull-quote boxes for block quotations (or worse, for short quotes that should be inline and in-context in the prose) pre-date MoS having anything to say about the matter. You're simply making a WP:OTHERCRAPEXISTS argument of the least convincing sort: "'My' article doesn't have to comply with guideline X because articles Y and Z didn't comply with it before it existed." Does not compute. Virtually no one ever, ever makes an argument like that about FAs when it comes to other guidelines or policies; it's almost invariably petty, stand-offish, insular "down with MoS" soapboxing, from either over-controlling wikiprojects, or over-controlling individual would-be page owners, who don't seem to understand that WP:OWN and WP:LOCALCONSENSUS are policies, that WP:IAR does not mean "ignore what you disagree with", and WP:MERCILESS applies to them just like everyone else.
To wrap up, I don't recall claiming to be a "technical expert" about anything under discussion here. I simply see what the guideline says, and that the FAC in question does not comply with it (nor does the Cary Grant GA to which that FAC discussion led me). You wouldn't be razzing me about this if it were a RS, MEDRS, CITE, SAL, SPAM, or other guideline concern; you just have an issue with a guideline you don't want to apply to you. It requires no FA badge-holding to observe whether an FAC complies with a guideline or not. And we're not all interested in FA work. I don't knock it, but plenty of editors – probably a majority of them, judging by what people actually work on here – consider it more important to the project to improve embarassingly crappy stubs to basic encyclopedic quality, than to re-polish the chrome of already-shiny GAs. Some of us don't even care about GA labeling; I only took William A. Spinks, of which I wrote about 99%, to GAN because someone else pestered me to (it's been GA quality since the year I wrote it, and this has always been self-evident simply by reading it). — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 19:51, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
- @Dr. Blofeld: Everything in all WP policies and guidelines is "invented"; God did not show up in a flash of thunder and impose it all. But to move on to what I think you're trying to convey: FAC is not the Guideline Enforcement Bureau, and individual reviewers care anywhere from tremendously to not one whit about compliance with any particular guideline, or line item in one, that they're familiar with (and usually toward "not one whit" if they're not familiar with it). FAC's principal concern is WP:CCPOL compliance, and regardless what any particular reviewers individually care about, it's essentially a wikiproject, a coming-and-going group of editors forming a consensus to praise or not praise an article, by giving it an icon and a new category. The principal purpose of FA is editorial encouragement; the vast majority of our readers never notice the icon, and they don't know what the criteria are, so it is basically meaningless to them. FA is not a WMF-official "guideline and policy exception bureau", either, and it does not freeze one byte of any article. Any editor is free to improve the MoS- or other WP:POLICY-compliance of any FA at any time, and this is in fact a constantly ongoing and necessary process, since our P&G are not static. All that aside, most FAs abusing pull-quote boxes for block quotations (or worse, for short quotes that should be inline and in-context in the prose) pre-date MoS having anything to say about the matter. You're simply making a WP:OTHERCRAPEXISTS argument of the least convincing sort: "'My' article doesn't have to comply with guideline X because articles Y and Z didn't comply with it before it existed." Does not compute. Virtually no one ever, ever makes an argument like that about FAs when it comes to other guidelines or policies; it's almost invariably petty, stand-offish, insular "down with MoS" soapboxing, from either over-controlling wikiprojects, or over-controlling individual would-be page owners, who don't seem to understand that WP:OWN and WP:LOCALCONSENSUS are policies, that WP:IAR does not mean "ignore what you disagree with", and WP:MERCILESS applies to them just like everyone else.
Troll somewhere else, Cassianto. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 19:51, 3 July 2016 (UTC) |
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
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This week's article for improvement (week 27, 2016)
Hello, SMcCandlish.
The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Home page • List of aqueducts in the Roman Empire Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:07, 4 July 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI • |
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Please comment on Talk:Accompong
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Notification of RFC for Korean MOS in regard to romanization
Hello! You contributed in some capacity to at least one of the recent discussions concerning romanization of Korean for historical topics. Should we use McCune-Reischauer or Revised for topics relating to pre-1945 Korea? If you are inclined, please contribute here. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 06:27, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
Fixed shortcut bug on policy templates
While editing WP:LAWYER today I noticed that the 4th shortcut was duplicated and the 5th one wasn't displayed. I traced that to your syntax changes to {{Essay}} of 23 June and fixed the typo. Applied same treatment to {{Guideline}} and {{Policy}} which had the same bug; didn't touch {{Information page}} and {{Wikipedia how-to}} which allow just 3 shortcuts. Just FYI — JFG talk 17:00, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
- @JFG: Ah! Thanks. Sorry 'bout that. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 18:26, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
ARCA errata
Note that here I believe you wrote "Collect" in three places where "Coffee" was intended. alanyst 18:14, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
- @Alanyst: Fixed, thanks. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 18:27, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style
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This week's article for improvement (week 28, 2016)
An ear of rye The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Answering machine • Home page Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:07, 11 July 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI • |
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July 2016
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Please comment on Talk:Mary Lou McDonald
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"|via=Google Books" ??
Hello, SMcCandlish. Thank you for your edits on Rye. The cleanup you've done plus the imposition of a citation style have definitely improved the article. I'm curious about one change you made. You added the parameter "|via=Google Books" to a book citation, which results in "– via Google Books" being displayed prominently at the end of the citation on the page. If one adds "|via=JSTOR", the reader is at least warned that he will be able to read only the abstract if he is not a JSTOR member. What is the purpose of the "|via=Google Books" parameter? If one clicks on the link involved, one will immediately recognize that the information is "via Google Books", so why is it part of the citation? Those more immediately cynical than I am might venture the opinion that adding "|via=Google Books" amounts to advertising for Google Books (which, by the way, advertises sellers for the book). However, I hesitate to form an opinion until I have more information. What is the purpose? Is this now formally a WP policy? Thank you very much for your attention. Akhooha (talk) 16:02, 13 July 2016 (UTC)
- @Akhooha: WP:SAYWHEREYOUGOTIT, basically. The parameter exist for the explicit purpose of identifying the intermediary supplier of a digital copy of something when one does not have the physical, paper copy at hand, and the site from which one obtained it is not the publisher (e.g. if you cite a public domain film, but are using the YouTube-hosted copy of it as your source, you put Youtube in
|via=
, in case it differs in some way from the version available on DVD or direct from the producer's own site). It also prevents people from mis-identifying Google Books (or YouTube, or Project Gutenberg, or whatever) as the value of the|publisher=
parameter, something I have to fix dozens of times per week (would be hundreds, if I actually searched for it instead of just fixing it when I run across it randomly). One should not have to click and load a link to find out that the source cited is one of a zillion high-speed scans at Google Books, which are not always accurate (I've found plenty of them with missing pages, or – since they're usually old library books – defaced pages with illegible bits in them. The OCR is also often incorrect; someone may have cited what the OCR says, based on search results not a close examination of the actual scanned print. People re-use WP content, sometimes in print form; the fact that the source is available free at Google Books is valuable information to preserve when the article is printed out and links to sources are neither functional nor visible. If I'm reading a printed (or reused-elsewhere, without all links and formatting preserved) article, and it cites an 1847 source, I'm liable to be skeptical, but less so if I see that the work was found via Google Books, not in a trunk in the attic of a Victorian mansion. :-) For much newer works, all the Google Books cites are actually to snippet views, which often do not provide full context, or even complete quotations, so an editor here may actually be misciting, and its important to know in such a case, at a glance, that the cite is to Google Books, again. PS: We should probably have a bot track down every single citation that has a Youtube URL but does not have|via=YouTube
(or some variant thereof, like|via=youtube.com
), and have it add the parameter. We could then use this as a flagging mechanism for checked YT content that is known to not be a copyvio (about 90% of material on YT that isn't some silly person's cat videos is copyvio material ripped from TV, DVDs, or some other commercial source). By doing something like|via=YouTube<!--cv checked: legit, 2016-07-16-->
we could obviate the need to re-check YT content, and if it's not legit, we could remove it, or if uncertain, do<ref>{{cite video|...
|via=YouTube
...}}</ref>{{copyvio inline|date=July 2016|reason=Looks like a rip from a commercial news broadcast.}}
— SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 07:50, 16 July 2016 (UTC)- Thank you for your informative reply. I hadn't considered many of the issues you've raised. Akhooha (talk) 16:06, 16 July 2016 (UTC)
- @Akhooha: No prob. Oh, I forgot to mention that many of the journal search sites (Highbeam, etc.) that provide limited numbers of free accounts to us through WP:LIBRARY expect us to use the
|via=
to credit them. (We should also use applicable parameters about accounts and paywalls if the URL isn't something the average reader can reach). — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:55, 17 July 2016 (UTC)
- @Akhooha: No prob. Oh, I forgot to mention that many of the journal search sites (Highbeam, etc.) that provide limited numbers of free accounts to us through WP:LIBRARY expect us to use the
- prevents people from mis-identifying Google Books as the value of the
|publisher=
parameter, something I have to fix dozens of times per week This is actually the result of a (at least previously) bad implementation in WP:Citoid. --Izno (talk) 11:45, 18 July 2016 (UTC)- @Izno: Lawdy. Wonder if it's still doing that, and what else it's doing wrong? — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:13, 18 July 2016 (UTC)
- @Izno and Salix alba: I raised a question about this at Wikipedia talk:TWL/Citoid. I don't see anything problematic at User:Salix alba/Citoid.js, but I'm not sure what the total codebase of Citoid is. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 01:59, 24 July 2016 (UTC)
- I'm not entirely sure why TWL has taken 'ownership' here for Citoid, but mediawikiwiki:Citoid is probably where you want to start. --Izno (talk) 02:13, 24 July 2016 (UTC)
- @Izno and Salix alba: I raised a question about this at Wikipedia talk:TWL/Citoid. I don't see anything problematic at User:Salix alba/Citoid.js, but I'm not sure what the total codebase of Citoid is. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 01:59, 24 July 2016 (UTC)
- @Izno: Lawdy. Wonder if it's still doing that, and what else it's doing wrong? — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:13, 18 July 2016 (UTC)
- Thank you for your informative reply. I hadn't considered many of the issues you've raised. Akhooha (talk) 16:06, 16 July 2016 (UTC)
With my Citoid.js tool it does show the full data which the citoid server returns. It a little small at the bottom of the window. Looking at the data returned for the URL https://books.google.com/books?id=HEQ9AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA11 the Citoid server returns
[
{
"itemType": "book",
"notes": [],
"tags": [
{"tag": "Nature / Natural Resources", "type": 1 },
{"tag": "Technology & Engineering / Agriculture / General", "type": 1 },
{ "tag": "Technology & Engineering / Environmental / General","type": 1 }
],
"numPages": "314",
"url": "https://books.google.com/books?id=HEQ9AAAAIAAJ",
"ISBN": [ "9780521237932"],
"publisher": "Cambridge University Press",
"title": "Wheat Science - Today and Tomorrow",
"language": "en",
"abstractNote": "First published in 1981, Wheat Science - Today and Tomorrow was intended to survey the past, assess contemporary circumstances in the early 1980s and project the future course of wheat improvement in the last part of the twentieth century. The book begins with the origins and genetic resources of the most important crop, before discussing both known and potential techniques for wheat breeding. The use of these in the improvement of wheat quality and rust resistance is then described. The contribution of crop physiology to breeding for great yield and improved performance under stress is then considered, together with alternative approaches to agronomy. The book was based on papers presented as a Symposium in honour of Sir Otto Frankel's 80th birthday. It will be of great interest to graduate students and professionals in plant breeding, agronomy and crop physiology.",
"date": "1981-03-19",
"libraryCatalog": "Google Books",
"accessDate": "2016-07-24",
"author": [
["L. T.","Evans"],
["W. J.", "Peacock"]
]
}
]
In that there is a "libraryCatalog": "Google Books",
item. My code could potentially convert that into a via=Google Books
parameter for {{cite book}}. It would require a bit more testing to see exactly what the libraryCatalog parameter produces. --Salix alba (talk): 06:59, 24 July 2016 (UTC)
- That would likely be useful, Salix alba, at least for certain values (Google Books, PubMed, and other full-text sources). I'm glad it's not mistaking that for
|publisher=
. I would surmise at this point that someone else's Citoid-using tool is mis-parsinglibraryCatalog
as|publisher=
, or that the Citoid is sometimes passing "Google Books" as thepublisher
value for some reason, otherwise Izno would not have seen "Template:Publisher" output from Citoid. Without having seen it myself, I dunno. I'm kind of acting as a "so, I hear there's some kind of problem ..." intermediary, with second-hand reports. :-) (My interest in it is that I very frequently encounter the "Template:Publisher" error in actual citations.) — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 07:42, 24 July 2016 (UTC)- I've now added the via parameter. --Salix alba (talk): 20:35, 24 July 2016 (UTC)
- @Salix alba: Huzzah! — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 04:31, 25 July 2016 (UTC)
- I've now added the via parameter. --Salix alba (talk): 20:35, 24 July 2016 (UTC)
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Please comment on Talk:Hilton Worldwide
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Nomination for merging of Template:Interwiki redirect
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This week's article for improvement (week 29, 2016)
RMS Olympic's deck The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Rye • Answering machine Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:08, 18 July 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI • |
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Please comment on Talk:Margaret Hamilton (scientist)
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I thought that you might like this
In breaks between edits, you may enjoy listening to Wikipedia as it is being created and destroyed. Regards, William Harris • talk • 12:28, 21 July 2016 (UTC)
- @William Harris: Kind of soothing. Not sure what the chords represent yet. Maybe someone creating an account. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:19, 21 July 2016 (UTC)
- http://techland.time.com/2013/08/09/like-a-nerdy-wind-chime-real-time-wikipedia-edits-set-to-music/ Being a thinker, I thought you would find it interesting. Regards, William Harris • talk • 20:50, 21 July 2016 (UTC)
- Yeah, it doesn't say what the occasional long, dramatic chords are, though. There might be even more than one kind (at a guess I would think page deletion, page creation, and account creation). 20:45, 23 July 2016 (UTC)
- http://techland.time.com/2013/08/09/like-a-nerdy-wind-chime-real-time-wikipedia-edits-set-to-music/ Being a thinker, I thought you would find it interesting. Regards, William Harris • talk • 20:50, 21 July 2016 (UTC)
- Very cool. I have copied this conversation to my user page (User:David_Tornheim#Interesting), referring back here. I hope no one minds being quoted. If so, let me know... --David Tornheim (talk) 21:12, 23 July 2016 (UTC)
-
- — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 01:54, 24 July 2016 (UTC)
Korean romanization bs again
After over two weeks, our little misadventure has led to exactly one more outside contributor commenting on the issue. Of course that user took our side, but still...
What's the next step in attempting to form a consensus?
Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 12:43, 21 July 2016 (UTC)
- I don't think one is going to form at this time. I would drop the matter for 6 months and try again with an RfC at WP:VPPOL, noting that two previous discussions failed to attract enough commentary to produce a clear consensus. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:21, 21 July 2016 (UTC)
-
- I took a look at the RfC. Interesting. I think you need more background material--I didn't look at the previous RfC's. Maybe two high quality articles from academic journal articles, each arguing for or against each standard? Do they exist? I always find it a bit odd that nearly every language has a different name for every country, creating almost O(n^2) names for O(n) countries. Seems like for respect we should call countries (and the people) by the name they call themselves; but at the same time, I understand there are problems with that, especially if the name is unpronounceable in the other language, we lack the character set such as Cryllic, and that a name like Schmidt in German really means Smith in English, or Peter has a different spelling in different languages [39]. With strong reasons for one method or the other, I can see why you are having trouble getting many people to vote, unless they know the subject well. --David Tornheim (talk) 02:19, 24 July 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:Rolfing
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This week's article for improvement (week 30, 2016)
Closeup view of a Squeegee The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Sun deck • Rye Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:08, 25 July 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI • |
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Please comment on Talk:Novak Djokovic
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Category:User templates about userboxes
Hi, following the discussion about Category:User templates about userboxes, I've purged N-Z. Will you do the rest soon-ish? Otherwise I'd post it at WP:CFDWM. – Fayenatic London 15:56, 30 July 2016 (UTC)
- @Fayenatic london:: I will try to get to it soon, but I've been taking a kind of forced wikibreak for the most part (had a tooth problem, turned into jaw infection, and cost me two weeks of real-world work, so I'm focused on working extra to make up the lost income). Later this week I can probably find the time. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 13:10, 1 August 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:Gruffudd
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This week's article for improvement (week 31, 2016)
History of the constellations, Ursa Minor constellation map The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Squeegee • Sun deck Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:07, 1 August 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI • |
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As it turns out...
Gulangyu was a sockpuppet of Kauffner, a site-banned user with a strong anti-diacritic and anti-consensus bias, a grudge against me specifically. So I reverted them on MOS-KOREA, as they were the only one to oppose the second RFC, and likely if another RFC ever takes place Kauffner socks and a tiny group of ROK nationalists will again be the only ones to oppose the use of MR. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 22:20, 2 August 2016 (UTC)
- Well then! I guess, be on the lookout for anyone "new" showing up and pushing hard on this, and writing with too much knowledge of WP policy to be a real noob. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 01:15, 3 August 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:Philippines v. China
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Please comment on Talk:Truck
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This week's article for improvement (week 32, 2016)
One of many icons associated with The Sims The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: History of the constellations • Squeegee Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:07, 8 August 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI • |
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Advice needed
Hi! I found you among WP:LINGUISTICS members. I see you're interested in English and its development and even Proto-Indo-European; perhaps you can help me with a problem: just a few questions which you can answer here (I'll watch your page), I only need to understand the answers myself. I'm currently looking for etymology of the word "lead" (the metal) for the article lead, which is mostly done and is not far from its FAC (the research is done, and it is only left to fill the article with the info still not there). I was easily able to trace its origin to Proto-Germanic *laudą (question 1: what does that diacritic under "a" mean?). But what next? I was able to find this great Proto-Germanic dictionary (see page 368 of the pdf file; by the way, question 2: why is that diacritic missing here?), it mentions the Celtic origin of the word. And then it says "The same word through a different (Pre-Indo-European) route also served as the basis for *blīwa- 2". Question 3: what "same word" are we talking about and how could this possibly happen? Could you describe the chain of transmutations in detail here? I understand *blīwa (p. 107) is pre-Indo-European in its origin, but no such thing is mentioned for *lauda. Also, there is another hypothesis that says there is Proto-IE word *lAudh- ("lead"; why is that "A" capitalized? and why both Proto-Germanic and Proto-IE words are often given with finishing hyphens, what are these meant to say?); could this be related?
And one more question. Why are the words "lead" (the metal) and "to lead" pronounced differently despite the exact same spelling? Both words are Germanic in its origin, so probably you could understand it.--R8R (talk) 16:18, 14 August 2016 (UTC)
- @R8R Gtrs: That's a lot to cover. The diacritic presumably indicates something about pronunciation, but I'd have to see the transliteration key being used by that source (which is evidently not used by the other one, thus the mark is missing). When citing sources, you need to give the printed page number in the source (328 in this case, not 368) because PDF viewers and e-book viewers all paginate differently, if at all. For a source with no page numbers in it, cite the entry name (which is, after all, more specific than a page number anyway). But this source's citation should not include a URL to this copy, since it's obviously a copyright violation; there's no way "bulgari-istoria-2010.com" has permission to post a full-text scan of an expensive recent academic dictionary, to the whole world for free, like that. [Kinda wish they'd put up the Proto-Celtic one, which I would have had more use for. >;-] Anyway, "the same word" apparently means whatever the unreconstructed, non-IE origin word was for both Celtic *φloud-io- (i.e. *pʰloud-io-) and PGm *blīwa- 2 (see p. 69), also meaning "lead". I.e., it's being suggested that two divergent PGm words for lead, *blīwa- 2 and *lauda (or *laudą) ultimately come from a single ("the same") non-IE word we don't know, the first directly, and the second via a [Proto-]Celtic intermediary word. But we only care here about the second of these two which gave us the word lead; our article need not concern itself with *blīwa- 2 and its origin at all. When everything under discussion begins with "*" (meaning "reconstructed, not attested"), it's all very speculative, anyway. The "A" in *lAudh- is capitalized because, again, it's a phonetic representation of something in some particular pronunciation key that may differ from others. No idea what specific sound it means without a copy of the key from the source in question. If mentioned in our articles, it would ideally be normalized to current IPA, but can be given exactly as it appears in the source, and I guess someone else can IPA-ize it later. Neither the "A" nor the "ą" appear to be standard IPA, or even part of any well-known superset of IPA. Our article at Ą suggests that the latter is often used (in natural languages) for one of two nasalized vowels, but this doesn't help us be certain what the author intended with "*laudą", and it's almost certainly not a nasal. The capital-A, I dunno. It might even be an OCR or transcoding error of some kind, unless you're looking at the original book or a graphical scan of it. Moving on: The hyphens at the ends of many of these indicate they are combining forms (i.e., prefixes) not stand-alone words; this is the style for these in general, and has nothing to do with markup for [P]IE languages in particular, and doesn't relate to anything under discussion here. Lead the metal and lead the verb are spelled the same way by pure accident; English is not a particularly phonetically spelled language, and just "is the way it is" after centuries of amalgamation, into a very simple alphabet, of several forms of Germanic, multiple influxes of Latinate/Romance that came centuries apart (thus guarantee and warranty, the same word borrowed twice without realizing it), and bits and pieces of all sorts of other languages, especially Celtic, Greek, and later Romance languages like modern Spanish and Italian. Hope this helps. I would check several recent (i.e. 1980s+), good dictionaries and etymological dictionaries. Some may trace the English metal term more specifically than just to Anglo-Saxon then a big, undifferentiated jump back to Proto-Germanic. The "*lAudh-" hypothesis might also appear (maybe in IPA), or it might be consistently absent, indicating it's fallen out of favor. I'm not sure there would be much difference between a *laudh[a]- theory and a *laud[a]- one, anyway; they might still both resolve back to Proto-Celtic *pʰloud-[io-] I would try to help further, but all the relevant books I have are packed away right now due to renovations in my building (my bookshelves were uncomfortably close to some pipes they've been working near, very roughly). — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 18:53, 15 August 2016 (UTC)
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- Thank you very much for your reply! I'll definitely find a use for this great text.--R8R (talk) 11:17, 16 August 2016 (UTC)
- YW. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 11:46, 16 August 2016 (UTC)
- Thank you very much for your reply! I'll definitely find a use for this great text.--R8R (talk) 11:17, 16 August 2016 (UTC)
ANI notice
There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. Thank you.
I suspect it's going to be closed as a vexatious boomerang, but thought you'd like to know. Discussion is here Tazerdadog (talk) 09:33, 15 August 2016 (UTC)
- @Tazerdadog: Thanks for the note. In the discussion on the page in question, at least two other parties are convinced it's a sockpuppet of a banned user. Regardless, I'm just treating it as a troll and moving on. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 18:56, 15 August 2016 (UTC)
Please comment on Talk:Murray Bartlett
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Murray Bartlett. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 16 August 2016 (UTC)
Tertiary proposal...
...on the Balkan nationality and/or ethnicity of the mother of a now-Serbian tennis player when she was born, a question almost as distressing as it is desperately obscure. Perhaps we should omit any reference to the nationality/ethnicity of either him or his parents at all? I will only advance this proposal on the talk page if you think it will be well received ;) Kudos for actually wading into that... -Darouet (talk) 19:18, 16 August 2016 (UTC)
- @Darouet: I think the ethnicity/nationality of the parents should definitely be omitted as pointless cruft, and his own nationality included (as basic info), but not alleged ethnicity/ethnicities. It's just a recipe for fighting unto death, as everything dealing with former-Yugoslavia usually is. I don't know how Tito did it for as long as he did. (Oh, yeah, actually I do: If you didn't cooperate, you got shot.) — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 20:52, 16 August 2016 (UTC)
- Yeah, I don't actually have a strong opinion, but I suspect you're correct. It's just sad to me to know that so much of what motivates editing on this subject is something other than "building the encyclopedia." Cheers, -Darouet (talk) 20:56, 16 August 2016 (UTC)
- It's only going to get worse. Much of my very infrequently updated mini-newsletter at User:SMcCandlish/On the Radar is about programmatic abuse of WP for WP:GREATWRONGS or WP:SOAPBOX purposes. The more WP becomes one of the world's primary information sources, the more pressure, from more directions, there is to bend the truth in it for propaganda and marketing purposes. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼ 21:05, 16 August 2016 (UTC)
- Yeah, I don't actually have a strong opinion, but I suspect you're correct. It's just sad to me to know that so much of what motivates editing on this subject is something other than "building the encyclopedia." Cheers, -Darouet (talk) 20:56, 16 August 2016 (UTC)