Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 02:16, 30 June 2008

This is a Misplaced Pages user talk page. For the fictional wolf of the same name, see Carcharoth.

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CfD nomination of Category:Middle-earth calendars

I have nominated Category:Middle-earth calendars (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) for deletion. Your opinions on the matter are welcome; please participate in the discussion by adding your comments at the discussion page. Thank you. Judgesurreal777 (talk) 05:09, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Peter Wall

I think the difference between your approach and jbmurray's is that he wrote the article on Wall as cultural phenomenon whereas you want to rewrite it as a biography. Apart from anything else, the second approach is made impossible anyway by the lack of biographical information. A person's name at the top of an article doesn't mean it has to be a biography in toto. I've fielded plenty of criticism at Anton Chekhov for writing it as an impressionistic piece, modelled on the style of his short stories, rather than as a biography (though people have ruined that effect now, and I have caved in): but I felt that his biography was boring, while his literary style is what makes him extraordinary. I think editors should be allowed this degree of independence rather than being forced into the lumpen mould of conveyor-belt biography. It's the only way we are going to keep gifted editors from being ground down and put off the project.

Do you remember all the trouble I had at James I of England trying to research the birth and death dates of his children? The reason was that the historians could not be bothered with such stuff, even in lengthy books. Biographical information is not necessarily notable, and in my opinion we should avoid becoming obsessed with it on Misplaced Pages. I think jb should be allowed to do it his way, and even fail at FA his way, if it comes to that. Idiosyncrasy makes the whole place more fun, I think, and, after all, is justifiable on the grounds of ignoring all rules. qp10qp (talk) 14:01, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

"I think the difference between your approach and jbmurray's is that he wrote the article on Wall as cultural phenomenon whereas you want to rewrite it as a biography." Yes, this is a nice and succinct way of putting things. I do also have an extended allegory up my sleeve, that takes in village fêtes, little old ladies, and the difference between chocolate cakes and fruitcakes. But I'll perhaps leave that for another day... --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 21:16, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

colon

Thanks for your advice. TONY (talk) 02:09, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

As an FYI...

Sarcasticidealist (talk) 07:39, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

No problem as far as I'm concerned. That edit reflects more on him than anyone else. Thanks for letting me know, though. If you see anything else happen (outside of his userspace), please remind people that he was warned. Carcharoth (talk) 07:42, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Oh. Sorry. I thought he was reverting my warning there. I see now he was reverting your warning. I should have checked. I'll apologise for giving him that second warning. Carcharoth (talk) 07:44, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

I hand't noticed any of this, but, had noted the referred to edit. So warned . SQL 07:50, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks

Here's a {{WikiCookie}} to recharge your batteries after all the hard work you put in summarizing the MZMcBride situation. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 16:18, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Re: Longish post

I avoid AN/I because I strongly believe that it is harmful to the project as a whole and should be abandoned with all due haste. But as it continues to be used (and defended), one begins to realize that you can't always get what you want. However, that doesn't mean I need to feed the beast. And so, I don't.

You mentioned to me several times that I should discuss deletions before making them. Well, I should point out that speedy deletions are supposed to be things that don't require any discussion. ; - ) But even if I wanted to post somewhere, I guess my real issue is where. Do we have an appropriate forum to announce such things. And, I suppose there's also a concern that making announcements will simply bring out vociferous users who do nothing but drama-monger. The general housekeeping work that I do is (supposed to be) uncontroversial. Though, it seems I can't even do CSD#R1 deletions anymore without someone getting angry. : - /

I think your discussion about the "watchlist effect" is spot-on. Not only do deletions show up in watchlists now, they also show up when attempting to re-create a page. And the detriment vs. benefit of these changes is unclear. One thing that is for certain is that my talk page is certainly busier than it used to be. There's also a "volume effect." For better or for worse, had I made the deletions that I recently made a lot more slowly, fewer people would have noticed / cared. The watchlist updates would have been spread out over days, and the talk page complains would have been spread out over weeks. Which I think explains how a lot of these deletions have been going on for years without any real notice given to them.

You've asked for a deletion analysis previously. I should be able to create something, though I'm not really sure what you're after. A lot of my earliest deletions were a wide variety of speedy deletions. I'll probably have to have a DB query run to get the full list and then it shouldn't be too difficult to parse. I'll get back to you on this.

Thanks for the heads-up regarding AGK's talk page. I read what you wrote there. I don't understand how you have the stamina to write as much as you do... : - ) --MZMcBride (talk) 21:43, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. Sorry I haven't had time to answer yet, but it is good to understand things a bit better. I see AGK has a nifty "backlog of talk page posts to answer" system. I should try that some time! Carcharoth (talk) 07:34, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

I had one of the Toolserver folks pull all of my deletions from the database. There wasn't much I could do too easily to analyze them properly. However, I did remember that I've been writing a user subpage for a few months that you might find interesting. It's sort of technical, but it breaks down a lot of the maintenance work I do. It still needs quite a bit of updating, but it's a start. It's /CSD in my user space. Cheers. --MZMcBride (talk) 23:49, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Bot Approvals Group (3rd nomination)

There are better ways of resolving problems with the BAG, such as WP:CENT. The current looks of the MFD is a 9-0 tally (excluding the nominators), and I would just speedy keep this one per WP:BOLD and WP:SNOW, but there are multiple requests on the page to let it run longer. Please let me know if you still object to it being closed early. Useight (talk) 06:30, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree that CENT is one of the other options, but really, a 5-day discussion is not going to harm things. My view is that having the tag on WP:BAG for 5 days (drawing attention to the problem in a way that CENT would not - or do cent discussion tags get high profile visibility on a page?) is better than closing the discussion early and people edit warring again (it has been going on for months). People might say block or topic ban the edit warriors, but I've not convinced that would be the right course of action here because (a) Locke Cole does have a valid point; and (b) those reverting are BAG members, so it is difficult to judge neutrality. This is, again, partly why I didn't want to accept a BAG membership nomination. If the current tag were replaced by one to a discussion, then a close might be a good option. Finally, part of the problem is that Miscellany for Deletions are really sometimes just centralised discussions by another name. MfD came before CENT, and I'm not convinced that CENT solved all the problems or gets people's attention as much as it should. A visible tag on the BAG page itself and other location is the only way to get enough input, I think. Certainly, Locke Cole should have explored other options, but once the discussion is open, moving venue can sometimes be counterproductive. I'd still favour waiting to see what happens. Carcharoth (talk) 08:30, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Arghh, I got into some lengthy discussion with another Wpedian on other things whilst looking at the MFD. I was going to !vote "whatever Carch says" (with the option to say whatever I thought), but now it's closed. Dang! Sweeping under the table doesn't seem a good approach here, but I guess I'll wait 'til the next inevitable go-round. Cheers! Franamax (talk) 08:36, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Deletion of page move redirects that were a year old

Hi there. Could I ask you to look in on the discussion at the bottom of the section here? Thanks. Carcharoth (talk) 07:30, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I've replied but I can't see why this is an issue. --Kleinzach 08:00, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Appreciate

Thank you little Carchzilla. bishzilla _ROARR!! 12:05, 7 June 2008 (UTC).

Monthly updates

Thanks, that's kind of you to say so! TONY (talk) 13:21, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Your question...

.. has a reply - thanks! FT2  21:01, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

. . . BTW, your note at the bottom of the page

You wrote: " . . . BTW, your note at the bottom of the page . . . . There are ways to do this cleanly, probably involving transcluding from a subpage, but it can get complicated. Just letting you know there is a solution if you want to avoid moving it down to the bottom all the time." . Thanks indeed. How can I do this? --Kleinzach 23:10, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Library of Congress (loc.gov) Image Titles

The following Discussion/Talk about Image:Project Paperclip Team at Fort Bliss.jpg was posted elsewhere instead of at that image's Talk page:

I've come across a Library of Congress (actually, Historic American Engineering Record) picture similar to Image:Project Paperclip Team at Fort Bliss.jpg, which seems to have been taken at around the same time, but where the provided information contradicts what is said at Image:Project Paperclip Team at Fort Bliss.jpg. The image is here, and it says: "34. HISTORIC VIEW OF GROUP PHOTO OF THE GERMAN ROCKET DESIGN TEAM SHORTLY AFTER THEIR ARRIVAL AT THE REDSTONE ARSENAL IN 1950." The image is number 34 on the list here (click on the "53 B&W images" link at the top to get back to the pictures). ... User:Carcharoth (Commons) 20:39, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

However, the hyperlink identified as 53 B&W images" displays a page of thumbnails with captions -- captions that are themselves hyperlinks to the images. Please note that the hyperlink caption is what generates the inaccurate title for the image and that the actual image in question does not have a title. To illustrate, here is a link that has a different title for the image in question

Also, please note that the file Image:Project Paperclip Team at Fort Bliss.jpg has an Other Versions section, which is where an Edit is appropriate (instead of Discussion/Talk). Likewise, the Image page also identifies that there are differing captions for the Image. Mugs2109 (talk) 18:26, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Follow up on topic ban

Hi Carcharoth, I've tried to reach you by email but haven't heard back from you. I am curious to hear what conclusions, if any, you reached about my topic ban. (I've asked John about this too.)--Thomas Basboll (talk) 12:42, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your reply. I think the pages are currently imperfect in the ordinary way. That is, I think they need to be improved by ordinary, civil editing. On the current interpretation of the ArbCom ruling, however, the pages are likely to become biased in a different way. A particular POV has been identified and is now being actively marginalized. I don't even hold that POV, and I've been banned just for proposing to treat its proponents with a modicum of respect.--Thomas Basboll (talk) 19:46, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Comets

Yes, I think that probabably means old style/new style, since January would still have been in 1664. These were later comets than the one James saw in 1618, but, reading around this, it seems that Robert Hooke thought one of the comets was the 1618 one returning. Although he actually turned out to be wrong, he was on the right lines in believing that comets were a returning phenomenon, as Halley proved much later. Interestingly, it seems that the scientific community in 1664-65 did not consider the idea of the comet as a portent, which was still a big deal in 1618—shows how far scientific thought had advanced in the interim. One gets the impression from Pepys of a scientific age in full swing by then.

Awadewit and I have put Mary Shelley up for Peer Review, if you can find the time to have a look. Not really my period, but I've immersed myself in the books and tried my best to keep pace with Awadewit. I'd be very interested in your thoughts on the "Naples charge" (see "Italy" section): this is a true mystery, with several equal possibilities: I hope to do an article on it sometime. I cannot solve it, but I wouldn't put that past your intrepid self. I've become obsessed with cracking it. qp10qp (talk) 16:24, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, it looks like an insoluble mystery. Particularly as the child died young. In fact, it is rather depressing reading about all those children dying young. And then I got to the bit where her husband dies in that boating accident: Percy Bysshe Shelley#Drowning. That is a really fascinating mystery! :-) Carcharoth (talk) 00:29, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, I don't find that one so much of a mystery; I don't really believe any conspiracy theories about it. But what happened in Naples is extraordinary because clearly you had four people sworn to secrecy about what was going on. It's Elise who breaks ranks two years later. Basically, she says that Claire had Shelley's baby in Naples, and this is by far and away the biggest clue and the biggest likelihood, it seems to me, yet it seems none of the commentators go for it. My first principle is "never neglect the obvious", but that's exactly what everyone seems to be doing. The reason one has to be on top of one's game with Claire and the Shelleys is that in my opinion the threesome's journals are totally rigged. I don't think most scholars can quite grasp the fact that they are being blatantly duped by people who knew full well the power of diaries and the likely scrutiny of posterity. qp10qp (talk) 01:35, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Putting threat looming overhead behind me

It's not possible to put the threat behind me, because one of the biggest problems on Misplaced Pages, outside of the missing articles on major topics in tropical agriculture and its pests, is the amount of misinformation or poorly sourced information. This needs tagged. I'm not allowed to tag content as needing sourced on Misplaced Pages or I'll be banned. Looming threats lie overhead, not in front. I do hope you don't get whatever information you do have on tropical plant diseases from Misplaced Pages, though. ANd I'm sorry when I see so much bad information returned via google searches that find these Misplaced Pages wrongs. But, thanks for the note. --Blechnic (talk) 22:43, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

I'll just get banned if I point things out, so there's no benefit in it. Right now I edit crap, and it passes the time.

I shoot micrographs and have issues with false colorization for electron micrographs, except when the colors are for light micrograph sized critters and the colors are correlated with the LM, which is what I do: EM (SEM and TEM) and LM, as usual, then colorize my SEMs only according to my light micrographs. On Misplaced Pages it's done poorly by amateurs who know nothing about micrographs. For example, there's a featured picture where the carbon sticky tape has been elaborately colorized along with the bug. I was going to post some of my micrographs, but the quality of micrographs on Misplaced Pages is so poor and the editors so entrenched in keeping the poor ones that it seems pointless. There are excellent sources on-line about tropical agricultural pests, although in my area, tropical West Africa, most are in French--copyright laws in western Africa are diverse and complex. The limits are in the sources that describe the morphology of the pests and the ecology of the ecosystems. Still, there's good on-line material, particularly viruses. --Blechnic (talk) 23:12, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Priory of Sion Peer Review

Hello. You would be interested in participating in the peer review of the Priory of Sion article? --Loremaster (talk) 11:22, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Image work

Actually, after receiving some advice by e-mail, I'm going to just disregard Redvers' warning. It seems pretty plain from other opinions that the warning was not serious, and I'm sure Redvers got that message from what others have said. I don't anticipate any problems here. If Redvers replies to the concerns, that would be great, but I don't consider it necessary. Thanks for your work in defusing this, hopefully it results in improvements all around. I've certainly learned something. Kelly 14:21, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Ah, OK - Redvers has responded. However, it seems that Redvers has a minority opinion, and if I modify my approach, the threat can be safely disregarded as irrelevant, I think. Given that a huge proportion of my work has been moving free images to Commons, and the big notice on the top of Redvers' talk page, I now see where the vehemence has been coming from. I will simply avoid this user. I personally think that User:Redvers/Say no to Commons should be sent to MfD as an attack on the good faith of a sister project (most of whose editors are also contributors here) but I am definitely not the right person to do that. Maybe I will call attention to the essay elsewhere, but I will do nothing until receiving your advice. As a Commons contributor myself (I do most of my work there) I find the essay insulting and disruptive, but I can just ignore it if need be. Kelly 18:13, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Arbcom proposal

I'd be very interested in your take on this current proposed ArbCom decision. Until a few hours ago, the only place this was being discussed on-wiki appears to have been the related proposed decision page and its talk page. Notices have now been posted on WP:VPP and WP:BLP talk page. Risker (talk) 03:51, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

It's 19:59, 24 January 2006 all over again... I'm stunned by the facts that

1. ArbCom issues rulings that clearly create policy,
2. That there is such a strong chorus of "They can do what they want, live with it," and finally
3. That stewards appear to simply rubber-stamp ArbCom.

I thought that we, as a community, had outgrown some of this elitism/appeal to authority. I came back to write articles, and this is practically the first thing that I see. *shakes head*

brenneman 00:29, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Marked as resolved

Well, I sure wasn't expecting anything better. Save your wind from posting on my talk page in the future. Don't worry, I'll do the same for you. --Blechnic (talk) 06:59, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

At some point, the threads have to end. If you want your incident to be raised separately, by all means do that. I am currently tidying up some loose ends from that thread. Yours is one of them. Carcharoth (talk) 07:03, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Both incidents should be resolved now. There shouldn't have been a second incident because there was a month of no problems.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 07:29, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, maybe. I think it is more important to be diplomatic. You may have been right, I don't really care. The point is that Blechnic has got the wrong idea about how things work around here, and you should be making that clear, but not in the way you are. I would suggest an action you could take to help resolve things, but it needs to come from you, not me. Carcharoth (talk) 07:32, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

There's a month of no problems, because I'm not allowed to tag articles because you brilliantly harrassed me. Is this forum shopping? I've heard of it. And there's no resolution as long as I am under threat of one more wrong move and I'm permanently banned from Misplaced Pages. I got the wrong idea? That's what I was told by an administrator. If I got the wrong idea, I was lied to. --Blechnic (talk) 07:36, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

My images

I like my images, and don't care how long it takes to load the page. And I'm sick and tired of people criticizing my talk page. --Blechnic (talk) 07:41, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

OK, I'll leave it for now. Carcharoth (talk) 07:47, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

ANI subpages

I think it's a good thing the ANI subpages, as it keeps discussion surrounding that particular user centralized in one place. Of course, if any thing did happen in the future, it'd be best just informing ANI of it. Some discussions (that Kelly one) was bridging over 100kb, and some discussions, notable the Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents/User:Andyvphil discussion, has now gone to 120kb and beyond. Having that on the ANI page was seriously clogging it up - in fact, in that discussion I believe serious advances have been made, so in that case, it was probably justified for it to have a subpage. I'm only doing it to unclog the ANI page, and some times it bridges towards 300-400kb, due to the weight of one or two discussions, which could still be discussed in some weight on a subpage and also because it states it in the header. Anyway, I'll stop creating/moving subpages for now. Feel free to bring it up at WP:AN, as I think we need a consensus about this. Thanks, D.M.N. (talk) 07:44, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Large ones, yes. Not all the time, though. I think WT:AN is the right place for the discussion, with a link from ANI and AN for visibility. Carcharoth (talk) 07:47, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

OK. You go ahead and start the discussion, and I'll copy-paste my comment above. D.M.N. (talk) 07:54, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Would you mind starting the discussion? I need to do something else now. Carcharoth (talk) 08:03, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Done. I'll leave a note at WP:ANI and WP:AN for visibility. D.M.N. (talk) 08:37, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

E miail

No, I don't accept this as anything but what it was and remains now that Ryulong seems to think he wants to continue: a gang band of a bunch of established editors and admins against an unestablished editor. And your comment doesn't remove the threat of being being banned from Misplaced Pages that Hersford issued. --Blechnic (talk) 00:06, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough

Done. Neıl 龱 09:02, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

BLP remedy in Footnotes Arbitration case and Signpost coverage

Strictly speaking, the quote I used is exactly true. Whether it adequately summed up the effects that the remedy may result in is certainly another question. The remedy itself is vague, and upon initial reading, the "any and all means" quote seems to be aimed primarily at page protection and deletion, given the clarifying second sentence. Other actions like blocking would seem to encourage compliance with existing policies like the blocking policy. The second paragraph, particularly the "sanctions" part, seems to strongly encourage practices that are already in effect; my assumption given the ambiguous wording is that the sanctions have to hold community muster. The "emergency measures" part may be the only new part of the policy, by my reading, and even that is possibly "de facto" tolerated, assuming that such measures immediately go to community discussion.

Since I can't speak for the Committee, I certainly can't tell whether they meant to create new policy, or clarify existing policy. My understanding is that it was overwhelmingly the latter, and FloNight's recent comment seems to me to encourage that viewpoint.

You are right that I haven't done this much recently; while I handled the arbitration report from August 2005 until July 2006; David.Mestel wrote it from July 2006 until last month. I've been covering for him while he's been busy. Ral315 (talk) 22:41, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough. Thanks for the reply. Carcharoth (talk) 22:42, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

Footnoted quotes

Heh...I just realized now that I'm using footnoted quotes in my current work, for instance Utah State Route 9#References. Good thing the case didn't actually have anything to do with these :) --NE2 23:37, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

Re: Meaning of "special"

I suppose the real answer will be somewhat anticlimactic, but here goes:

The word was not intended to mean anything in particular; rather, I was looking for a suitable name for this remedy, and happened to come up with "special enforcement" as a term that wasn't already being used for anything else. The provision is modeled, in spirit, after the existing discretionary sanctions; but, because it's somewhat different in setup, I wanted a distinct name to avoid confusion down the road. Kirill 00:21, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Re: Wording of some proposals

I can't speak for the wording of the template, not having authored it, but a large part of the problem you see is essentially with my own writing style—which tended towards overly dense prose to begin with, and has gotten worse after a year of drafting the bulk of arbitration decisions. I try to avoid getting bogged down in my own verbiage, but obviously that doesn't work all the time.

To be quite honest, I'd almost be in favor of having more informal commentary by the arbitrators accompany the formal decision in a case, particularly for broad and contentious cases. This could give us an opportunity to outline our reasoning and motivation in more detail, and perhaps allow the community more insight into how we approach the case. The drawback, of course, is that such openness would quite likely undermine the community's regard for our decisions; we are often not as uniform in our opinions as the votes would suggest, and too much sausage-making out in the open has a way of disturbing people in any case. Kirill 01:12, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Comment; If arbcom was concerned about the community regard for itself, and its decision, we would have seen less of arrogance and pontificating and more humility (more in line with the demeanor of now sadly gone NYBrad and Paul August.) If one ArbCom member habitually Meh′s from the bench, the other has no shame in saying that he does not read the statements that are "too long" to his taste, the third boasts not bothering to read the workshop, the fourth has a habit of saying what he "would like to see", etc., this is not helping in bolstering the community regard. --Irpen 02:24, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

How is transparency going to undermine anything? ArbCom doesn't have power to begin with. It has agreement from the agents of Misplaced Pages. Letting people see them reason poorly would give people a chance to speak directly to the causes of the bad result, but demanding that people pronounce by fiat their decisions as if from on high is a sure fire way to give people a choice only of obedience or leaving. I can't argue with your faulty step, if you don't show the steps. If all that we see is nothing at all and then an erroneous idea delivered with utmost force, the result is people leaving or defying. ArbCom is not the U.S. Supreme Court. Utgard Loki (talk) 17:43, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Coker response

Please see my response at ] MBisanz 08:52, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Archive request

Can you archive this? I'm afraid that Bishonen and I were editing simultaneously and it was requested I repost this my request to have it archived, but I didn't realize it had been deleted, etc., etc., etc. I ask you as you seem to be online. Thanks. --Blechnic (talk) 23:28, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

There is a bot that archives it. I also see Bidgee is commenting in a new section. Hopefully someone will be able to come up with some response, as I don't have enough time to deal with it now. Sorry I wasn't around last night to reply earlier. Carcharoth (talk) 06:35, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

AE Post

Has a reply . MBisanz 08:26, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Coker and BLP

Hi. Thought I'd let you know I just banned myself. See the Coker talk page. I probably should have proposed standard medcab back in Jan. But on the other hand Alansohn never made any proposal at all that I can remember. Anyway, I hope you stay active in trying to settle this and hope other outside editors help settle this issue peacefully. Best wishes.12:23, 18 June 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Rlevse (talk • contribs)

You should still participate in discussions, just not edit to enact or enforce them, IMO. But thanks for taking this step. I think it will help. I will try and remain (or rather, start to be) active there. Please drop me a note if I fail to keep up with the latest developments. Carcharoth (talk) 12:52, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

When on the Coker talk page, you said "those previously involved"..."should not edit the article but should be free to use the talk page" (paraphrased), does that include User:Alansohn and User:Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ). I am simply trying to avoid misunderstandings here. — Rlevse • Talk • 21:01, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Anyone and everyone, but some people should avoid editing the page itself over the issue in question. At least for a period of time, and certainly not without discussing things first. Carcharoth (talk) 21:10, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Protection of User talk:Alansohn

May I ask what the reason was for protecting User talk:Alansohn? Does it harm anyone if he creates school articles while he is blocked? It might seem wrong, and maybe you are trying to enforce a break, but is it really going to help if it upsets him? Carcharoth (talk) 17:46, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, I haven't been bothered with an e-mail yet, so it obviously doesn't upset him enough. If you don't think it's necessary, remove it. I just was under the impression that the user talk page is only editable during blocks in order for the blocked party to contest his/her block (hence why you can't edit other pages in your userspace that are equally, and perhaps more, trivial). -- tariqabjotu 18:19, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Umm...no. That has never been the case. The practice has been that user pages are protected when the "unblock" template is being abused, or the edits are inflammatory or violate policies like WP:NPA or WP:HARASS. It is the exception rather than the rule. Risker (talk) 18:46, 18 June 2008 (UTC) Excuse me for butting in, sorry...I'll get my coat

Something needs to be done.

http://en.wikipedia.org/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#My_comments I've been waiting since the 16th June. Admin's are failing to do what they should be doing here. I've lost my patients with waiting. Some needs to be done now. Blechnic's issue was raised on the 15th of June and was resolved on the 17th, yet I've been now waiting longer and nothing! Bidgee (talk) 01:45, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

I'd like someone to place a note in Bidgee's block log, along the lines of what was palced in Blechnic's, since when I placed the blocks, I placed them on terms I considered equal for what I viewed as equal violations, since Blechnic's has been overturned after discussion, its rather unfair to keep penalizing Bidgee for being less vocal. MBisanz 01:50, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

OK. I'm uncomfortable about the precedent, but I'll do that. Carcharoth (talk) 01:51, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Copyright stuff

Originally posted here. Other editors invited to review the articles. Responses below.

The copyright thread at ANI is interesting. It got me thinking more about a series of articles I created back in April. They didn't get onto the main page, but they were created by effectively turning biographical data from a database into prose and wikilinking it and finding one or two other sources and tidying things up from there, though some were also built up from a PD DNB edition. The database in question is The Royal Society's Library and Archive Catalogues of brief biographical details of their Fellows. Would you be able to look at this list and have a look at a few of the ones from Augustus Matthiessen down to Thomas Lewis (cardiologist)? There are two points: (1) the copyright status of the biographical data; (2) the use of exact phrases. Regarding the latter, I'm afraid some of the phrases I used were not rewritten as much as they could have been. Compare the following:

• "'Augustus Matthiessen (1831-1870), chemist and physicist; studied at Giessen, 1852, and at Heidelberg, 1853; returned to London and studied with Hofmann, 1857; F.H.S., 1861; lecturer on chemistry at St. Mary's Hospital, London, 1862-8, at St. Bartholomew's, London, 1868: worked chiefly on the constitution of alloys and opium alkaloids." - User:Magnus_Manske/Dictionary of National_Biography/10
• "Worked with Bunsen in Heidelberg (1852-1856); isolated Calcium and Strontium in pure state; worked at the Royal College of Chemistry, London (1857); set up a laboratory at 1 Torrington Place to research the properties of pure metals; Lecturer in Chemistry, St Mary's Hospital, London (1861-868); Lecturer in Chemistry, St Bartholomew's Hospital (1868-1870); under severe nervous strain, committed suicide" The Royal Society entry plus biographical data in database form.
• "Augustus Matthiessen (2 January 1831, London; 6 October 1870, London), the son of a merchant, was a British chemist and physicist who obtained his PhD in Germany at Giessen in 1852. He then worked with Robert Bunsen at the University of Heidelberg from 1853 to 1856. His work in this period included the isolation of calcium and strontium in their pure states. He then returned to London and studied with August Wilhelm von Hofmann from 1857 at the Royal College of Chemistry, and set up his own research laboratory at 1 Torrington Place, Russell Square, London. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 1861. He worked as a lecturer on chemistry at St Mary's Hospital, London, from 1862 to 1868, and then at St Bartholomew's Hospital, London, from 1868. His research was chiefly on the constitution of alloys and opium alkaloids. For his work on metals and alloys, he was awarded the Royal Society's Royal Medal in 1869. Matthiessen committed suicide in 1870 under "severe nervous strain"." My initial version of Augustus Matthiessen

Note that the Royal Society lists its sources as "Bulloch's Roll; DNB; DSB", though they don't specify which edition of the DNB they are working from, or when the information in that entry was compiled. I've also quoted directly from the award citations, but I think that is something different, and OK (though I should have put references in at the time to make clear where the direct quotes were coming from). If you have any thoughts on this, I'd be interested. You might need to look at a few of the other examples though, as this one (with a large chunk of text in the "database") is not representative. Most are just straight database entries that have been expanded quite a lot. For example, John Allan Broun and the Royal Society entry. Carcharoth (talk) 07:42, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Copyright violation and plagiarism are not precisely synonymous. Then there's the issue of competing citation methods. Without spending too much time on this (I'm stretched a bit thin), the short answer is that if you're going to use another author's exact words, they ought to be attributed and in quotation marks. There are several ways to attribute paraphrasings, but it's not enough to mechanically change a word here and there. Take this example as a model for how not to do it. Durova 08:16, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

I just don't see a problem with that. The only real similarities are in the order, but this is, after all, chronological. It could use more sources, yes, but the prose is substantially different, and, so long as it's referenced, it's not really a problem. The problem in that ANI thread was that whole sentences and even paragraphs were being used without any substantial changes, which isn't the case here. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 09:34, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree (obviously). I think it is the difference between taking a collection of facts and turning them into prose (something User:Polbot did, by the way) and copying or only slightly rewriting a piece of prose that was itself written based on a set of basic data (in the ANI thread case about plants). Going back to the original data, or decomposing the prose and rewriting it, is OK, but it does need care. It is a problem though when some short stub entries in different publications use the same basic style and presentation (for good logical reasons), and it becomes difficult to transmit the same information in the same style without ending up with something substantially similar. Carcharoth (talk) 09:49, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

I chafed in exactly the same way until I got used to it. If a little practical advice is what you're seeking, here's what I do in a pinch: open a text editor, paste the relevant paragraphs from the sources, and then draw a line on the document. Beneath that line I write my own synthesis. In order to counter brief spurts of writer's block I'll pour iced tea and play some jazz. Best wishes, Durova 18:45, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

It helps me, actually, to read a passage, put it down and ask myself what did that passage just say? Sort of the classic reading comprehension exam in grade school. My memory is horrible enough that I can't remember actual passages, but instead I get the overall meaning. For technical terms, lists, or other words that I can't avoid, I use thesaurus.com pretty heavily. Every once in a while, I find myself using unmistakable words the source used, and I wonder if that's more of suggestion by proximity or association - as if reading it nearby snuck into my thought patterns. However, I do my best to change them when I find them. --Moni3 (talk) 18:50, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

(e/c maybe e/irrelevant) I can't seem to get at the DNB sources to properly evaluate this, free links? Looking at Matthiesen, on the face of it "the son of a merchant" would rouse my interest - curious phrasing for a writer in 2008. I'm a little biased since I was involved in the Broun and errors on the RS website thing though. Franamax (talk) 09:55, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

The DNB stuff is at User:Magnus Manske/Dictionary of National Biography. It is the Concise Dictionary of National Biography and the OCR scan is here, though they call it the "Dictionary of national biography : index and epitome (1903)". But looking at the phrase that caught your attention, yes "Son of a merchant" did come from the Royal Society website. Should that have been rephrased? Carcharoth (talk) 09:58, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Carcharoth, are you worried that you plagiarized? Or are you just curious what others consider plagiarism to be? First, I don't think that copyright violation needs to be determined. I think we can actually hold ourselves to a higher standard instead of feeling relieved if we figure out no laws were broken. I don't know how much of the text in the Everglades article was part of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britiannica, but that had to go. My goal was adding enough material to remove the tag. If it's been done, it's been done, regardless of copyright status. Second, what you did was take a skeleton of text and expand it into a paragraph. I think that's about the same as taking a graph and putting it into words using the numbers in the graph. I don't think that's plagiarism. That's more difficult to ascertain because the examples you gave were so short. It's a lot easier, of course, when there's more prose to compare. --Moni3 (talk) 13:19, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Am I worried I plagiarized? In some sense, yes, but I am also curious to see where others draw the line and where those articles I wrote come in the spectrum. I did try to aggregate information from at least three different sources, and to present the information in a different form, but sometimes a particular piece of information was only in one of the sources. Citing of sources are needed for verification, but also for attribution. As far as 1911, or other PD text, goes, I thought that the tag remained for ever, but in some ways removing the tag once it has been rewritten enough makes sense as well (the tag will still be there in old versions). Carcharoth (talk) 13:38, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

I will review and rewrite, as necessary, these articles for you:

• • Ramsay Heatley Traquair
  • William Carmichael McIntosh
  • Henry John Carter
  • Central retinal vein
  • La Ferté-sous-Jouarre memorial

I have had a couple of conversations on the issue with Carol Spears. In general, Curtis Clark has a good point, Misplaced Pages doesn't have a plagiarism alert, but this is usually the problem, plagiarism, not copyvios. Yet, I believe that Misplaced Pages copyrights its own work, and this makes plagiarism problematic, I believe. I'm not a lawyer.

(outdent:) For what it's worth, I looked at a couple of the articles, but as I couldn't access the original sources, couldn't comment. For the example you give above, it looks fine on the whole: you put the phrase "severe nervous strain" in quotation marks; you should also of course have an inline citation there, to make it clear which source you're taking the phrase from. HTH. --jbmurray (talk • contribs)

Copying distinctive phrases from books without quotation marks

Unique descriptions and phrases copied exactly from books must be put in quotation marks as I did with "in the rock crevices and water-receiving depressions". It is not enough to correctly attribute the source, if the same exact phrase is used it must be in quotation marks. --Blechnic (talk) 00:22, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

In this case I would add, in addition to unique descriptions and phrases, entire sentences or longer portions of text. It's a simple guideline. --Blechnic (talk) 16:01, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

I think one problem is that people when they are citing something, they are also implicitly saying: this is where I got the information from. But they sometimes forget that if you preserve the form of the writing, you need to quote and attribute, and well as give a source, but I don't actually think the articles I wrote need much if any rewriting. I'll watch and see what changes you suggest or implement. Carcharoth (talk) 16:25, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

When Misplaced Pages was young, the threshold for copying was similar to a blog or diary. Now that Misplaced Pages is established, firm and harsh rules must apply. Misplaced Pages must follow the same rules as print encyclopedias. No copying, no plagiarism, no moving a few words around. Those who do must be notified and asked to stop. We have to start acting like a trustworthy group, not a band of kids writing half-copied term papers. We also need to have good customer service and courtesy, not gossip, IRC, etc. Model710 (talk) 18:16, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree. Some actual examples would be nice though. Without plagiarising (obviously!) we need something with which to educate our readers. WP:PLAGIARISM/Misplaced Pages:Plagiarism or some similar title (maybe "avoiding" in the title?) would be good. I see the latter already exists and redirects to WP:Copyright problems, which has a section on plagiarism. We also have User:Andries/Wikipedia:plagiarism, but not much else. Carcharoth (talk) 19:15, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

• I've proposed we create a separate plagiarism guideline (or rather, how to detect, deal with and avoid it). Please contribute at Misplaced Pages:Village pump (policy)#Misplaced Pages:Plagiarism. Thanks. Carcharoth (talk) 20:11, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

• I think the point "distinctive phrases" is key here, as, again also previously pointed out, having important events in the subjects timescale in the same order is simply following a chronological convention; nobody is going to muck around too much with such a basic format (you can do something in the order of "Subject, the 2005 winner of Prestigious Award, was born in 1963 in..." where the notability comes first, but afterward everything will follow the timescale convention. It is when "distinctive phrases" are used without attribution you get into murky areas. Sometimes it is difficult to use appropriate phrases without it seeming to be echoing the source - but often in scientific areas you cannot substitute words like synthesize or reduce because they have a specific meaning within the context - and perhaps no meaningful substitute. Plagiarism will occur only if the original authors train of thought is transported wholly and without attribution into another article - Michael Faradays unwillingness to experiment in the same areas as Humphrey Davy until his mentor had died needs to be written in a dissimilar format to that of the source, because even thought it is true (and well known) it is a turn of phrase that truly belongs to the original author, so it needs to be said differently. This is where some knowledge of the subject is most useful - knowing what is precise and unalterable appropriate wording, and what is the original authors "distinctive phrases" when describing the article. The former must not be altered (as anything else will render it inaccurate) and the latter must be, to avoid suggestion of plagiarism. LessHeard vanU (talk) 20:21, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

LessHeardvanU's last point is very important and may have been the source of some problems with Carol Spears, namely her inability to distinguish a "distinctive phrase" due to limited knowledge of the subjects she was editing. This is, I think a problem with a lot of Misplaced Pages authors. I've removed phrases from articles that are so distinctive from single sources from well known authors, that no one in the field would fail to recognize the plagiarism, phrases that were used without attribution, without quotation marks, as if the Wiki editor just made it up themselves. I'm not sure what Curtis Clark meant about academics not editing Misplaced Pages because of the plagiarism, but this is why I hesitate to edit Misplaced Pages for the plagiarism: I come across articles where living scientists have had their work stolen and used to create an article that gives them no credit. I don't want to seem part of that, so I try to avoid editing articles where this issue arises. There are times in science writing where a distinctive phrase is precisely the choice to use, because altering it changes the meaning as LessHeardvanU points out, but you have to have enough knowledge of the subject to know which phrases are this, belonging to the subject, and which phrases belong entirely to that author. --Blechnic (talk) 23:00, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Your comments on Elonka's talk page

Carcaroth, thanks for your suggestion that Elonka and I should reach an agreement. I've posted a proposal which I think would be a reasonable compromise - see User talk:Elonka#Proposal. -- ChrisO (talk) 07:48, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

An invitation to show some balls

This is an invitation to use your real name and to divulge actual credentials, such as work history and education.

My supposition here is that it takes real balls to work with those things being splayed out for everyone to see -- not the splaying of balls, but the splaying of whatever makes you (or anyone else for that matter) think that they have any right to review, vote on and determine the quality of the work of anyone else.

The strength that seems to be felt from an anonymous internet does not seem to do so much to improve the content of 1)this chunk of the internet and 2)the rest of the internet.

I could be wrong, but I am right about this one thing, it takes balls to not work anonymously on the web. -- carol (talk) 10:06, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

That's truly amusing. The sum total is invested in Carcharoth, there is no more you need to know. Judge that persona, he has always been consistent, it's all there, take a look through the contribs of Carch. What does it matter who the personal identity is? Judge the editor by the edits, it's all there for you to see. Franamax (talk) 10:14, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Franamax. You said it better than I could have done. Carol is right that it takes real balls to use your real name on Misplaced Pages. I have every respect for those that do, but I don't (yet) choose to do that myself. I also respect others that choose not to use their real names, or work under a pseudonym. Carcharoth (talk) 10:31, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

What about when respecting the anonymous fails though? -- carol (talk) 10:37, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Keep in mind the difference between anonymous and pseudonymous though. We are real persons, with real personalities, just like you. We're not really anonymous, it's our same selves using the same names, over and over. You might know me as Franamax, a lot of my good friends call me franco, a long-time nickname. Carcharoth is not anonymous at all, there is only one Carcharoth, with many thousands of edits, and hopefully we will see Carch at Tranche Beta pretty soon (hints broadly:). I don't care so much about the name you use, I care a lot more about your ideas and contributions. However you choose to tag yourself, it's your mind that makes the difference in the end. Franamax (talk) 11:15, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

The beauty of Misplaced Pages is that anyone may participate. Carcharoth - or I, for that matter - could be a 12-year-old Ham radio enthusiast who has never stepped foot in the gardens of academe. None of that matters. What matters are the contributions each editor makes. We don't need letters after our names to publish material on what we find interesting. We just follow the MoS and cite guidelines and there it is for the world to see. Consequently, we can also review other articles and call into question any part of them. You may do that to mine, as can anyone who has access to the internet, including anonymous IP users. I see that as an advantage of Misplaced Pages. --Moni3 (talk) 12:42, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Some of the problems I have created and were pointed out in the recent admin thing were when I asked people to either use a word correctly (or think about the use of a word) and I admit myself that words I have used boldly and with the strength of the others around me using them as well in a way which defied their meaning and defeated their purpose. Another incident mentioned is when a claim was made that a software could magically adjust for an aging problem in paper and I asked that this claim be substantiated. In that same administrative call out, a really well written defense was authored by a wikipedian who might be using a real name for his wikiuser name -- that user also provided information which really assisted me in understanding the botany information. So, there was a real name (perhaps), the claim of experience in the scholastic world of the subject and a wiki foot print of actual assistence with the subject instead of the often suggested 'if you don't know what you are doing don't author articles'.

If the twelve year old is making good edits and learning as the child goes and being productive with the encyclopedia; well, god bless this child and I want to be on that team. If the twelve year old is claiming experience in the higher education system and not substantiating this and other huge claims made annoymously, I think that the child should keep watching tele-tubbies (or whatever) until he has improved his self-esteem enough to be happy with who he is and looking forward to being who he wants to be.

I am actually excited if the people being contacted to review articles in my watch list are being contacted to review mine. I would prefer that people who had problems with me because they could not prove their claims about themselves and their tools be stricken from that list and consideration made from the other admin about the qualities that make the group of admin credible or not to the eyes of the users who watch and wonder.

And actually, there should be some place to really thank people for the review? The family Asteraceae is a very large part of the botany section of the encyclopedia; I have been trying to clean it up and somewhat standardize the articles (the taxonomy boxes and giving some articles references that did not really have any -- separating the food from the species and the gardening delight from the scientific presentation) and on the outside chance that review leads to assistance with the goal, I am all that more happy about the situation. -- carol (talk) 19:08, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Did you forget to Sine?

Can't help but notice this. I've told slakr before that I'll never be so grown up that I won't want that handy bot signing after me when I get too enthusiastic for the tildes. He's got an "experienced" directive in there though, as an edit count cutoff for those who should know better. Could we form a posse to hunt him down and demand a software change? I miss having Sinebot around to change my own personal diapers ;) Franamax (talk) 10:08, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

I think I added myself to some list asking it not to follow me around. Mainly because I tweak stuff a lot and because there are times when you want to add text around something, or refactor a page, and not have a bot sign after you. Carcharoth (talk) 10:36, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Third party for Elizabeth Bentley

Would you act as a third party for the article Elizabeth Bentley. My additions to the article are still being reversed. There are three people reverting the deletions, that should constitute consensus. The three additions are: her employer, the spelling of her name, and material about whether her death passed with "relatively little notice" while having an obit in the New York Times and the Washington Post. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 20:44, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Another McCarthy-era article. I'll have a look. Carcharoth (talk) 20:50, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

At least he corrected his error, now that I pointed it out. He reverted back to his incorrect version multiple times, each time going back to an error he added. Everyone has pride in their edits, but reverting back to an error, just because you added it yourself, should not be acceptable . --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 21:13, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

OK. I'll pass for now. By the way, have you seen Julius and Ethel Rosenberg? Sounds like an interesting story. Carcharoth (talk) 21:17, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

It still could use a third party. There are other issues in the RFC. It could also use a person to massage the paragraph about whether her death passed with "relatively little notice". Maybe you can come up with a way to combine the 4 publishers of her obit into one or two sentences that captures the notability of her death. Its getting very hard to get people to come to RFCs. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 21:22, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

The Rosenberg article is great. I like to bring the people on the edges of that era a little closer to the light. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 21:23, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Very cool, where did you find her marriage certificate? --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 22:20, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Sorry. I was joking. She wasn't married, was she? having said that, I do see a glimmer of hope here. Turrill was her mother's maiden name, wasn't it? Has that been discussed before? Carcharoth (talk) 22:30, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

I have a subscription to ancestry.com that gives me access to birth, marriage and death certificates. That is where I find missing middle names. Ancestry also comes with the index to Who's Who which also is a great source for middle names and missing years of birth. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 16:08, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the third party changes. Its much better to find a compromise wording or placement of information than just deleting new information. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 16:05, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

RFC

Right, I hate to be a pain, but would you mind looking through the evidence I provided, and suggesting how I could best summarise it? I'm not very good at summarising evidence, I'm afraid; I think I tend to presume people are more capable of drawing conclusions from it than they are. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 21:14, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

The way you presented it at ANI was fine (I know, sounds strange). Just laid out slightly clearer, and with the ANI babble stripped away, if you know what I mean? :-) Basically, on a page, with discussion taking place separately from the evidence, without the evidence all intertwined with the discussion. Carcharoth (talk) 22:40, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Right. Should I start the RfC now, or wait until after Carol is unblocked and can comment? Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 06:42, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

As a courtesy, please wait until she is unblocked and can comment. If the RfC goes forward I can think of nothing worse than to smack her over the head with a page full of angry comments at her. --Blechnic (talk) 06:52, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Good point. I agree that you should wait. It is also sometimes best to start off with a draft in userspace. Framing an RfC the right way is tricky, and asking people to look at a draft first can help end up with an RfC that moves things forward, rather than increases the drama. Extensive evidence should still be on a subpage, otherwise no-one will bother to read it. Carcharoth (talk) 06:56, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Okay. =) Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 07:05, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Adminship

I'm not an admin, remember? I can't move pages over redirects, so had to leave German chamomile where it was. =) Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 08:50, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Sorry. As I said, might move it now, but the other chamomiles are at the common names. Need to check. You could always start a move disucussion or ask at WP:PLANTS yourself. Carcharoth (talk) 08:53, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Okay! =) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Shoemaker's Holiday (talk • contribs)

RfC

How does User:Shoemaker's Holiday/RFCprep look? The Evidence page will contain the other comparisons from the discussion, maybe a few more if any show up. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 10:52, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Looks fine to me. Incidentally, please ignore what I said about Durova being able to raise her concerns there. I had forgotten that This must involve the same dispute with a single user, not different disputes or multiple users. So I guess Durova gets to wait in the queue, which might be a weakness of the RfC system, but I think it is deliberate. Carcharoth (talk) 11:30, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Depends, though. There is some connection, by way of the bizarre accusations made. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 11:46, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Haha!

Lol! Anyway, I've left comments about it at WT:BIOGRAPHY. Feel free to comment at the link. D.M.N. (talk) 17:04, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Of course! :P D.M.N. (talk) 17:33, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Admin question

Carcharoth, sorry to bother you, but you've offered good advice in the past on admin actions. Is it appropriate for an admin to redirect questions about their actions, or anything else, to an obscure subpage in tneir userspace in order to avoid scrutiny? The page mentioned is linked from Stifle's signature. Kelly 20:44, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Tis a bit strange. I saw that a few weeks ago. I'd raise your concerns with the editor first before seeing what others think. Carcharoth (talk) 20:49, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Sorry again...

I'm sorry I was snippy to you on my talk page, I didn't realize that people were showing up there due to Jayvdb's link from the plagiarism discussion. Now that I realize that and I've re-read what you wrote several times I've realized that you may have even been lampooning the criticisms made. --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 10:08, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Stanovoy vs Anadyr

Interesting situation. The Stanovoys near Lake Baikal are well-attested everywhere, while my one not-so-detailed map of Anadyr's region doesn't name any of the smallish mountain ranges. It could simply be that there is a minor range of the same or similar name, and the EB editors in 1911 didn't mention the distinction. I would just edit out the ref in the Anadyr article, let somebody else with more info add the real scoop. Stan (talk) 10:29, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Wikinews Russert

I think the paper was trying to highlight the leaking of information. I wasn't aware that it was leaked onto Wikinews too. I suspect, also, they highlighted the project due to the common recognition of Misplaced Pages. Wikinews should get more coverage and things which Wikinews should be celebrated for shouldn't be assigned to Misplaced Pages. I'm not sure how to combat the situation except press releases, corrections when there are misassignments, and fostering partnerships with small newspapers and bloggers. --Oldak Quill 12:21, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

The people at #wikinews tell me that Wikinews hasn't had any exclusive or first-to-break stories. A lot of competition between news outlets, I suppose. --Oldak Quill 12:37, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Surname lists etc.

I've been busy this week. I've completely rewritten the scripts that I used to make the lists, and I've only just finished with them. Just 15 minutes before you left your message, I uploaded a new version of User:Eugene van der Pijll/surnames. I'm not yet happy about the formatting of that page, so I'm now doing a new run. Tomorrow, I will have all people on Misplaced Pages in a database, and I can easily run queries on them, e.g. to make indices.

Just to give you an impression of the scale of the database: I've found 477579 articles on individuals; they have about 175,000 distinct surnames. Of these surnames, 116,000 are redlinks (so they would be inlcuded on User:Eugene van der Pijll/surnames); 95,000 of those redlinked surnames are carried by only one person in the database. I think we'll have to think about how much work can be done by hand, and how much by a bot.

I'll upload some more lists in the coming days; if there are things you would like to see, let me know. I think I'm going to use the Misplaced Pages:Suggestions for name disambiguation project page to put my lists on. Eugène van der Pijll (talk) 16:43, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Hi, I'll upload the new, definitive list later today; I think we should invite other people to work on them then. At first, I think I'll only upload the proposed disambiguation pages, where there's more than one person with that name. I see these pages as navigational constructs; to help people go to the right page. That's why they are disambiguation pages; not full articles about the surname itself. That's why I use {{disambig}} instead of {{surname}}. But the preferred location of such lists of people is confusing; I wouldn't mind more feedback on that issue. Since it's only a matter of formatting, I can easily and quickly change this in the entire list. Let's discuss this in a central place later. -- Eugène van der Pijll (talk) 07:52, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

I've improved the filter to catch biographies, and now I have about 504,000 articles on people. Still 17,000 less than the WPBIO people; I may want to add articles tagged with a {{*-bio-stub}} template, but I'll leave that until the next time I run the filter; it takes about a day to parse the entire database on my computer.

The sample that is now at User:Eugene van der Pijll/surnames is almost the final product. I think it's ready for wider discussion, so I'll put it at Misplaced Pages:Suggestions for name disambiguation soon. I have some ideas about creating an index for these pages; I'll come back to that later -- Eugène van der Pijll (talk) 18:46, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments. I do check {{lifetime}} and its redirects (even though I don't like them); the problem with Pedro Abad Santos is that that template was only added on May 29, and the database dump I'm using was created on May 24... I think I have the Unicode problems under control now. The Macs and Mcs will be a problem; I take the sortkeys as the surname (if available), but they are not consistent. I get entries like this one for Maccarty, with possibly another one for MacCarty, McCarty, and Mccarty:

'''Maccarty''' is a surname. People with this surname include:
* ] (1943-?)
* ] (1969-?)
* ] (1972-?), Adirondack Red Wings player
* ] (1977-?)
{{disambig}}

That is not good; I'll have to think about those some more. -- Eugène van der Pijll (talk) 00:05, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

On the Mac/Mc business: for the moment, I'll let this rest. I know the output is not perfect, so we need some human supervision in adding these pages anyway. I may yet improve this in the next version of my scripts.

It's perhaps time to ask for other people's feedback. I've taken over the Misplaced Pages:Suggestions for name disambiguation, and put the first page of my list online. (These are all A's, so this does not include any Mc's.) Let's see if people like this thing. I'll spam some related pages with a link to my list in a few days... (I don't have enough time currently) -- Eugène van der Pijll (talk) 20:03, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Thank you

Thank you for notes (and related edits) like this. You consistently make helpful edits of that nature and provide thoughtful feedback in many discussions. I just wanted to thank you and let you know it is appreciated. Vassyana (talk) 01:52, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the thanks. It is also appreciated! :-) Carcharoth (talk) 01:59, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

wikisource work

Since you're serious about this, and also a busy person, I'll give you some bite size chunks of work to get you started, and try to give you a broadest possible understanding of Wikisource in a shortest possible period of time. Prepare for a bumpy ride.

1. On Latin Wikisource, sign in using your SUL account, and set your preferences to display English. Head to s:la:Liber:De_assensione_Stoici_quid_senserint.djvu, click on the yellow "18", and verify the page. The page has already been proofread, so it should be 100% accurate. All you need to do is verify that the text on the right is accurate version of the image on the left. - 10 mins max. Click edit. If there was only a minor tweak required, make the change. Down near the edit summary is a set of radio buttons called "Page status". Click green if it is perfect. Click blue if you find a major problem. Click Save.
2. Log onto English Wikisource as soon as possible. You need to be autoconfirmed in order to understand s:Help:Patrolling.

   Thanks for creating an account. John Vandenberg 11:53, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

3. Verify s:Page:A Concise History of the U.S. Air Force.djvu/7 and/or s:Page:NYT - Fatal fall of Wright airship - transcription.djvu/1; or s:Page:H.R. Rep. No. 94-1476 (1976) Page 216.djvu (this is a bigger task, but has a higher profile); or s:Index:Rusk note of 1951 (which is four images)
4. Proofread s:Page:Wind in the Willows (1913).djvu/163 and/or s:Page:Nietzsche the thinker.djvu/11 and/or s:Index:Publick Occurrences
5. Proofread s:Catholic Encyclopedia (1913)/Veni Creator Spiritus using the pagescan found on the accompanying talk page; it needs to conform closely to the actual presentation in the original. At least one correction is needed: the verse should be wrapped in <poem>Creator Spirit, ... worthy Thee.</poem>. Before you click save, there are a set of "Text advancement" radio buttons. These are the main namespace equivalent of the "Page status" radio buttons (mentioned above) which only appear in the "Page" namespace.

   Once that is done, you can edit Misplaced Pages page Veni Creator Spiritus, replacing the newadvent link with {{wikisource-lang|la|Veni, Creator Spiritus}} and {{wikisource|Catholic Encyclopedia (1913)/Veni Creator Spiritus|"Veni Creator Spiritus"<br/>in Catholic Encyclopedia 1913}}.

   Notice that the local Misplaced Pages page has English lyrics, without attribution. The Misplaced Pages talk page has a link, but those lyrics are slightly different. A google search brings up one Misplaced Pages, so it is probable that it is based on the edition listed on the talk page, and adapted by Wikipedians. i.e. it is OR. Misplaced Pages is littered with these. If I have time, I reconstruct the translation history from the Misplaced Pages edit history, in order to contact the contributors and try to establish that it is there own work or not, so that I can copy it over to Wikisource with only the appropriate attribution recorded for GFDL purposes, or ask those contributors to recreate the translation from a fresh slate on Wikisource. As often as not, the contributors either cant be reached, or the contributors reply that they copied it from a modern work (i.e. illegal) - I can send you evidence of this if desired. More thoughts on the yet to be written "Misplaced Pages is not Wikisource" essay here: Talk:Poetry_of_Catullus#Please stop tagging Catullus poems for (re)moval. Only in the most obvious cases do I bother to remove the lyrics from the Misplaced Pages article, because usually I am reverted.

6. While on the topic of translations, I suggest you take a look at s:Category:Works by original language, s:Category:Translations and s:Category:Wikisource translations. The last category consists of collaborative translations; sadly policy writing is our strongest point, so our guidelines are not indicative of our ability to manage this. Some of our better examples being s:Max Havelaar (Wikisource), s:Balade to Rosemounde (featured), s:Bible (Free) (specifically take a look at s:Talk:Bible (Free)/2 John), and s:Romance of the Three Kingdoms (this last one is a mind boggling effort - thousands of en.wiktionary entries have been created by the two Wikisource translators working on this project!). John Vandenberg 09:58, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Something got chopped off above? Anyway, cool! I went there and knew enough Latin to change my language, and I found a typo on page 20 - "Elcetram" (which I didn't fix) - does that make me qualified to help out too? I mean spotting the typo, not failing to fix it :) Franamax (talk) 06:09, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Nothing has been chopped off; I am going to be periodically expanding the list. Sure you can help. Sure you can help. If you have found a problem with s:la:Pagina:De assensione Stoici quid senserint.djvu/20, edit the page and mark it as a problem! if you cant figure out the correction to make, just add a "?" so someone else knows where the problem is. John Vandenberg 06:52, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Please advise

You weighed in at Talk:Reaction to Tim Russert's death, so I thought I would ask you for advice. The folks who argued (and lost) for deletion at the AfD are now tag-team blanking/redirecting the article. I'm at the edge of 3RR, I believe. Is it acceptable for them to do this, and then warn me (as Horologium did at his talkpage) about it? What, if any, recourse do I have about this? I've already started a thread at ANI about it. S. Dean Jameson 16:27, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

My advice would be to let it go now, and then revisit in a few months time, and then a year's time and then 5 year's time. At each stage, there will be more sources available to make the case for a separate article. It may be, though, that the sources never appear, and that this event (in terms of its media coverage) will become only a footnote in history, rather than a page or chapter, if you know what I mean. As with all events like this, time is need to give perspective. We are all too close (in time) at the moment to judge this. Carcharoth (talk) 16:49, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

So, should that not default to "keep" not "delete through redirect"? My problem is that these guys are trying to bully there way to a deletion after they failed at AfD, and have now put me on the edge of 3RR. This is patently anti-community behavior, in my view, as one (Tariq) is open about the fact that he doesn't feel they'll be able to develop consensus to merge, and yet he's now trying to do it anyway as well. Is there no recourse against such behavior? S. Dean Jameson 16:52, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry to butt in Carcharoth, but S. Dean's statement that "one (Tariq) is open about the fact that he doesn't feel they'll be able to develop consensus to merge" is taken out of context. What I said was "We will never achieve consensus for merging, because you will not recognize or accept it." Clearly, that's not the same point S. Dean is conveying. -- tariqabjotu 16:58, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Butt in all you like. I've offered to make a list of the 15-20 editors who have weighed in against deletion/merger, as you have attempted to paint it as if I'm the only one. And now one of your fellow deleter/mergers have done it again. Bully for you, right? pun intendedS. Dean Jameson 17:02, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

• And now Fletcher has joined the tag-team. This is ludicrous and tendentious in the highest degree. S. Dean Jameson 16:53, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
  • It would help if you were less confrontational. Talk to the other editors about this and see if you can find some common ground. I would try different angles to incorporate the material. One of the problems with the article was that it was written too soon. Articles written in the "aftermath" always tend too expand too soon. Wait for the sources to appear and take things slowly. You may not realise it at the moment, but a "no consensus keep" and then a later "merge" is not too bad. Unlike a delete, it can be undone later if a better article can be written, or more material emerges. My advice remains the same: don't get worked up and just see what things are like in a few months time. Carcharoth (talk) 17:30, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
    • When I began in the discussion, I was simply discussing. As it appeared that there were some who were going to enforce their views with or without consensus, I basically gave up. Then, today, I decided to try to keep them from simply steamrolling the requirements for consensus. It's apparently not working. If you have some time, look back through the discussion. You'll see that I've grown increasingly frustrated as those on the delete side made it clear they were going to get their way, whatever happened. S. Dean Jameson 17:34, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

I apologize for my attitude and tone

In looking back through my discussion with you (and others of your view), I recognize that I have advocated my position with such vigor that it has led to hard feelings and anger. I apologize completely for the role my tone and attitude have played throughout. This is my first real dispute on Misplaced Pages, and I have not handled it as I should have. Please accept my apologies. S. Dean Jameson 20:47, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

No problem. It's good that you can apologise. You'd be surprised how many people don't do that. Carcharoth (talk) 20:48, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. In looking back through the discussion, I could see how I became progressively more frustrated, and I let it affect both my acions and tone. S. Dean Jameson 21:19, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

• There is now an open RfC on the talkpage, should you wish to participate. You seem to be a clear-eyed editor, with no ax to grind in the situation, and I think we would all appreciate your input. S. Dean Jameson 13:11, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
  • Sorry. No more time today. Maybe later. Carcharoth (talk) 13:13, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
    • Oh, that's no problem. I'm sure the RfC will be posted for at least a few days, though I'm not exactly sure on the protocol for such things. S. Dean Jameson 13:14, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Blechnic

Thanks for the feedback. My response is that I already read right through the Blechnic case the other day, and then went right back to the beginning of his edit history. I would not have made the comments to him that I did had I not done so.

What I've seen right from the outset, as I said at Misplaced Pages talk, is a user who is chronically sarcastic, abrasive and generally uncivil and who manages to piss off virtually everyone he comes into contact with. So for example, while his prior blocks were technically incorrect and were cancelled, I have little doubt that the real reason he got blocked was because of what Rylong termed his "vitriolic" rhetoric. He seems to leave a trail of upset and ill-feeling wherever he takes himself, and the DYK pages have been no different in that respect, DYK has a bunch of about the friendliest admins you could come across and he managed to piss off virtually all of them in the space of a few posts.

Yes, I'm sure he is an expert in his particular field and has made some valuable contributions, but it appears to me that the damage he is doing on his way equals if not outweighs whatever benefits he may bring. Furthermore because I think his caustic personality is unlikely to be modifiable, I think he is probably inevitably headed for the door whatever the outcome of the current fracas. Just consider that in little more than a month he has already managed to alienate at least half a dozen established admins - that's quite an achievement!

So, you are entitled to see things differently but I have to call it as I see it. His article contributions might be worthwhile, but his interactions with others are problematic. If he is able to modify his behaviour to interact more civilly, then he might become a net contributor, but quite frankly I have little reason to believe he is capable of doing so. Regards, Gatoclass (talk) 10:17, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

OK. Just making sure you were fully aware of the history. Just one warning. It is important to get the balance right. If you continue to predict that Blechnic is unlikely to make it here, I will continue to point out that you seem to have made up your mind already, and are not giving Blechnic a fair chance. In other words, I think what you are doing here is making a self-fulfilling prophecy that is a breach of WP:BITE (specifically, "It is impossible for a newcomer to be completely familiar with the policies, standards, style, and community of Misplaced Pages (or of a certain topic) before they start editing. If any newcomer got all those things right, it would be by complete chance."). Misplaced Pages admins and editors need to be able to work with a wide range of personalities, not just the "nice" ones. Carcharoth (talk) 10:28, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

would you consider posting something to Blechnic's talk page to show that you want Blechnic to stay

No, I'm sorry, I am not going to state a falsehood. I am not particularly concerned about whether or not Blechnic stays or goes at this point, I just don't particularly want to have anything more to do with them personally. As long as he stays out of my way, I'm happy. Unfortunately, that probably means that either he or I will have to quit contributing to DYK, because I am simply not interested in trying to collaborate with someone with such a gift for obnoxiousness. I have my doubts whether too many other DYK regulars will long be interested in such an arrangement either, but that's just my opinion.

As for considering "what Jay Henry said", perhaps you should consider the response he got to his very generous apology. In it, Blechnic explains that while he accepts Jay's apology, there is no question of he, Blechnic, apologizing in turn because Blechnic was fully justified in being "really pissed off" at Jay for the latter's transgression. That ought to give you some insight into where Blechnic is coming from, but if you need some help, note the total failure to take any responsibility for the unpleasantness of the initial exchange. It was all Jay's fault. Blechnic is right; others are wrong; and as long as you understand that, you and he will get along just fine.

One final comment: while I do appreciate your eagerness to keep an obviously knowledgeable contributor aboard, I think you are making a serious misjudgement here. Blechnic in my opinion is a bully, and even if you manage to patch things up and entice him back to the project now, it will only be a matter of time before he either leaves or is shown the door, but how many other decent contributors he drives off in the meantime will be your responsibility. Perhaps you should also bear that in mind whilst weighing the equation of "civillity versus competence" as you put it. With respect, Gatoclass (talk) 12:44, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing out Blechnic's response to JayHenry. I am aware that the balance works both ways, but I'm dismayed that you have reached such a damning verdict about another contributor without actually justifying it. If you came across one editor calling another editor a bully, what would you do? Again, look at the decent contributions (do you want me to list them for you?) and the articles started or expanded (on the now-deleted user page). I'll also note that you seemed to get on OK with Blechnic at first. Is there any particular reason why this has got you more worked up than if this was another editor on another topic? If Blechnic did apologise and started commenting at DYK again, would you still walk away from DYK? Would you like it if someone else came out with a "it's you or me" comment? I've encountered those before, and it can be deeply disturbing to the person receiving such comments that there are areas they feel they can't go to because someone they've fallen out with is there instead. Carcharoth (talk) 13:09, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

"Without actually justifying it?" I'm sorry, but I'm not about to prepare a case just for your benefit. If you want to go ahead with your RFC (although I can't imagine what you think you will achieve by that), I guess I will have to compile a case then. I'm not going to do it for the benefit of just one user.

As for reaching "such a damning verdict" - I wouldn't quite put it as strongly as that. I can only go by the evidence I've seen, and on that evidence it's not a pretty picture. Obviously though, I haven't examined every diff he's ever been responsible for. Maybe I was just unlucky, and all the diffs I happened to click on the other day were negative ones. However, the law of averages says that's unlikely. So at this point I am obliged to maintain my position.

it can be deeply disturbing to the person receiving such comments that there are areas they feel they can't go to because someone they've fallen out with is there

From my POV I am just expressing the way I feel, and I feel that raising the possibility of leaving the field to one's protagonist is about as unconfrontational as it gets! So I'm kind of suprised you would try to construe this as confrontational. I simply don't want to work with the guy, and if he is hanging around DYK I may have to find some other place to make a contribution. And I think I'm entitled to say so. Gatoclass (talk) 15:03, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, from the discussion that ensued, it looked as if he had changed his mind about that retirement. I will refactor it, though, to where he sort of implies that, despite the fact that he seems to think we're all a lot less competent than he could be at reviewing DYK hooks, he's only willing to verify stuff that he personally knows something about. The whole point of including sources is so that anyone can verify these things regardless of subject (I suspect what he means is he that he wants to verify every single fact in the article, whether it's part of the hook or not).

I'm sorry, but that position really ticks me off, and I tend to agree with Gatoclass there about Blechnic and his attitude. Daniel Case (talk) 14:16, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

The fact is, he left, and even if he was uncivil, he was still a great mainspace contributor. And I feel partially responsible for that. I'm an Editorofthewiki 17:40, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Let's be very clear about what is going on on Misplaced Pages. When I post a simple comment that something is wrong with an article, it is ignored. The only way to get the sort of attention to anything important on Misplaced Pages that is necessary is by throwing a fit. AN/I is home to the drama/rama.

"As long as he stays out of my way, I'm happy," says Gatoclass, and this is spot on accurate. The issue to Gatoclass was not the plagiarisms, or the currently wrong fact highlighted on today's DYK, but that anyone would question him or get in his way of winning more and more awards for DYK.

I fail to see what is wrong about only verifying what I know. Since others are having difficulties verifying what they claim to know, like the African article disasters, it seems the safe way to go about it, working within my won knowledge, and the best way to maximize a contribution. I know the sources, I know the styles, I know the background. There are already so many articles it requires more than one editor, yet the only way anyone will be satisfied I am willing to participate is if I devote 100% of my time to DYK, stop writing about the African tropics and quit my job to work full time fact checking? How about I check what I know and other people check what they know?

And, again, I point out, I don't need to check the sources to find the plagiarism. I find the plagiarism first, then I go looking for the sources, and it takes about 5-30 minutes to find the source of the plagiarism. And I always find it, because I am doing what I know.

No matter how poorly the Third World is represented on Misplaced Pages, there is always something more important than writing about it and filling the blank spots, isn't it? Maybe Gatoclass could slow down in his quest for awards and advance fewer, but accurate, DYKs?

Also, let's face it, I posted the copies, and their sources, and they still ran on the front page. Gatoclass, don't be a pussy, this is about your ego being bruised, and you want me as far away from being able to do that again as possible. You weren't willing to listen to calm posts about issues at DYK, and you're willing to fan the flames to whatever heights are necessary to get rid of me.

Don't be a dick, indeed, but do keep fanning the flames of dickdom.

Meanwhile, African agriculture, viruses, tropical plants languish in the absence of editors, so that Gatoclass can get pretty picture awards for DYK quantity not quality.

--Blechnic (talk) 20:49, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Calm posts? You mean like this one and this one? That was what you were pinged for, the double whammy on a user in good standing who was obviously already feeling embarassed and humiliated by the minor transgression you picked up. You spoke to a long established user and administrator as though he were some kind of contemptible criminal, when what I saw was a valued contributor who at worst just happened to get a little lazy and borrow a couple of phrases.

So that is the first point I want to make: that if you haven't done so already, then I think you desperately need to read WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA, in the latter of which you will find the golden rule of Misplaced Pages, to wit: comment on content, not on the contributor. Unfortunately, your contributions to talk pages up until now have been a litany of "comments on contributor" and that is something you are really going to have to work on if you want to stay the course.

The second problem I see with your conduct is closely related to the first, which is the bossiness. You appear to like to take charge, and when others resist your moves, you quickly find ways to humiliate and crush them and thus force them to tacitly acknowledge your intellectual superiority. Well - perhaps you've had a lot of success with this approach in life, some people apparently do. The problem is that this is not how wikipedia works. The leadership model here is quite different, and the people who end up leaders here are those who are best at getting along with others and getting different groups of people to work constructively together. So again, if this is how you are used to dealing with people, then that is something I think you will find you have to drop here too. (I'm hoping, incidentally, that I'm mistaken in this impression).

Finally, while I'm not nearly so confident of your potential value to the project as Carcharoth apparently is, I think everyone acknowledges that a person of your obvious knowledge and intelligence could be a fine asset here. In fact, I think it at least as likely that you will ultimately find this project wanting than the other way around, especially once you realize that Misplaced Pages is actually dominated by fourteen year old kids zealously protecting articles like this. I'd just like to see you contributing your best to the project rather than something else. Let's face it, nobody's perfect, but there are plenty of avenues on the internet for venting one's spleen or demonstrating one's intellectual superiority. This just doesn't happen to be one of them. So my suggestion to you, if you like to engage in such pastimes, is to take that to another venue and bring your more constructive energies here. That way we should all get along much better. Regards, Gatoclass (talk) 23:30, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

First, please, read both WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA before the next time you decide that your administrative duties include fanning the flames by calling someone a dick.

And, speaking of WP:NPA, you don't know my personal life, and you need to get out of it, and out of speculating about my life off Misplaced Pages, and talking about my personality, rather than providing diffs that show examples that support your comments. Your entire paragraph, after you advise me of Misplaced Pages's golden rule, is an attempt to invade and speculate upon my personal life. You haven't given any diffs or examples of "bossiness," you've merely commented upon me, rather than the content of any of my posts. If you had posted something and showed how I could have done it better, that would have been a comment upon the content, instead you ascribed a negative adjective to me personally, without any proof. This is the opposite of what you preached just before, when you recommend I read NPA and you point out its golden rule to me.

You then question how this applies to my personal life--how is this a comment upon anything else but the contributor? Is my personal life on Misplaced Pages? Is the article about my personal life? No, it's not.

The facts of this matter are, there is rampant plagiarism in DYK. You don't act in a way that indicates you want anything done about it. Even though I posted the exact sources from which the plagiarism came, and pointed out an additional problem with the one article, these articles ran on the main page with the plagiarisms and problems still in them. You spent a lot of time searching my edit record, but you spent no time addressing very real concerns I raised, or reviewing the plagiarisms I posted, and when people attacked me for raising the concerns, you did not act like a leader and ask that they focus on content. Instead, you demand that I stop personally attacking, after you've fanned the flames sky high with threats, and you encourage and support their personal attacks by completely ignoring all attacks on me. And by ignoring the plagiarisms to allow DYK to continue running non-Misplaced Pages writing on the main page.

Your focus is not on the articles. Your concern is not on the articles. When I gave examples of articles I could work on I was insulted for not agreeing to drop everything and devote my life to DYK. Why should I, when you intend to run articles with plagiarisms and unsupported hooks in them, even when they're pointed out? This seems like a bad idea for Misplaced Pages: I stop writing articles I'm qualified to write, and tell people who aren't interested about plagiarisms in DYK, then the articles run with the plagiarisms and unchecked facts anyhow. What has been accomplished? Nothing.

I don't see you qualified to speak about leadership on Misplaced Pages, when you tell me to read a policy you break in the next paragraph, and you suggest I waste my time accomplishing nothing, and you allow and encourage the placement on the main page of badly written articles that have been plagiarized from mainstream sources. I used the tool the poster provided and inserted the sources from the DYK articles, and they each returned hundreds of exact matched words, including, in each source, dozens of multiword phrases, excluding things like company names. You allowed this. You encouraged it, by driving me away. Your behavior towards me is not an example of leadership I would follow.

I also don't see you qualified to make guesses on Misplaced Pages about my personal life.

And, because you are doing that, making guesses on Misplaced Pages about my personal life. No amount of speculation by you about how I am in my off-Misplaced Pages life will ever show that you support that you've read and understood WP:NPA.

And you failed to address the important point, again, the articles on the main page that have been plagiarized. There's more plagiarisms queued up to appear, by the way.

I've read some good articles by apparent teenager editors on Misplaced Pages.

And, I remind you again, of the most important point in this matter: I spotted and continue to spot plagiarized articles in DYK because I am an experienced writer. I don't need the software I used, although it will be convenient to use to find sources. I don't need it, because I am an experienced writer and reader. Other experienced writers and readers are reading these DYK articles and knowing the same thing I know: Misplaced Pages publishes the work of other writers and claims it as their own.

A leader would have taken the rampaging bull by the horns, not called the person on the sidelines saying, "look there's a bull lose," a dick. If you can't focus on the plagiarism issue, which you appear unwilling to address as long as I am not requiring you to do so, please do consider how you demonstrate your leadership when you start calling people male genitalia.

--Blechnic (talk) 06:05, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Struck the speculative comments about your personal life, I agree they were inappropriate.

I don't see you qualified to speak about leadership on Misplaced Pages, when you tell me to read a policy you break in the next paragraph

"Comment on content, not on contributor" is the general rule, it's not an absolute. Sometimes unfortunately we have to comment on behaviour, when behaviour becomes an issue. Like it or not, it's part of an administrator's job to address behavioural issues when users step out of line. However, when an administrator criticizes a user's behaviour, that user is obviously extended the reciprocal right to criticize the admin's behaviour in turn, as you have just done in my case. And no-one is about to deny you that right.

I'm sorry you found my comments above offensive, but what I have tried to do is give you some feedback, to try and indicate to you how someone else is perceiving your behaviour, in hopes that you might accept the need to modify it somewhat. I'm not trying to make any claims about you personally, I am simply trying to indicate to you how you are coming across. You are pissing people off with your caustic responses, and if that sort of thing is identified as a pattern of behaviour on this project, it will usually be considered as disruptive.

It's clear you are not about to concede any misbehaviour on your part, I do hope however that when you've had a little more time to reflect, that you might be prepared to privately acknowledge at least that the sarcasm which you are prone to employ in exchanges with other users may not be helpful on a collaborative project like this. Because it seems to me at least, that your natural aptitude for the withering rejoinder is inevitably leaving behind a trail of ill feeling that is obviously not helpful. I'm just trying to prevent that occurring if possible, for the sake of everyone involved. Regards, Gatoclass (talk) 12:41, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure I believe what you say here, Gatoclass, particularly after your flaming encouragement for me to leave. Exactly why would I take advice and insights from you? You didn't call the guy to task who screamed at me, "I DEFY YOU!" You didn't bother with the poster who frantically focused on one plagiarism and attacked me for it, in fact you defended his behavior and promoted his article to the front page with the plagiarisms and unverified "fact." The only behavior you seem concerned with is mine, yet you seem to be implying that I'm setting a bad example, while you were not equally concerned about the plagiarism I brought up, and you celebrated my leaving as an excuse to ignore the plagiarism. So, now, you feel comfortable that you aren't simply fanning the flames by acting the daddy role and discussing my behavior? In fact, at this point, you are the single person least qualified to discuss my behavior, you know glass houses/penises/dicks.

The fact remains, no one listens to my simple posts about problems on Misplaced Pages. No one even heard me until I started getting nasty. You didn't bother listening until then. No one on Misplaced Pages can be heard when they speak quietly because they are drowned out by the cacophony of voices about 3 year old arguments concerning sock puppets and reinstating some user--conversations that a search of AN/I archives show occur more than a few times a year, every year, and gather the tangential attention of dozens of administrators, while problems like plagiarism and abusive admins who go around slapping users with DICK! get ignored. I will try posting something quiet some time in the future, and just see if I don't get totally ignored. You ignored me the first time I complained about DYK.

If people listened to other voices before they became loud and sarcastic, maybe they wouldn't become sarcastic.

"Sorry I found your comments offensive" is not an apology, it is simply meant to further antagonize the situation. Someone on Misplaced Pages wrote an essay much less offensive than the penis all the admins like to slap people in the face with, called a no-apology apology. You don't know if I find your comments "offensive," but what you can own is when you are offensive. Then, when you tell other people they are offensive, you might have a leg to stand on.

It's clear you're not about to concede any misdeed on your part, but that you will continue to take every opportunity to fan the flames about misdeeds on my part.

It might make you cough and choke on the smoke during your victory dance, though, so be careful. And I am as concerned about that as you are about me. So, when you can come up with some behavior worth following, I'll think of being less of a phallic symbol/dick/penis/piece of male genitalia.

Sorry you're only sorry that I was offended, not that you acted offensively, --Blechnic (talk) 16:52, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

As an outside observer (Carch's page is on my watchlist), I think you're being willfully obtuse. You know very well he's not calling you a "piece of male genitalia." That essay is about "being a dick" in the context of acting like a jerk, which you are certainly doing. Were you right on the facts of the matter, initially? Yes. Is your behavior now completely unbecoming? Most definitely. I can personally attest to the fact that a true apology for tone and attitude (without sacrificing the merits of an argument made) can go a long way towards healing rifts. For the record, I have interacted with neither of these two users previously, at least to the best of my knowledge. S. Dean Jameson 17:14, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Once a man starts throwing his genitalia around all bets are off. Having a linkable essay titled "don't be a dick," is about as lame and low as Misplaced Pages could descend to, except for having administrators who actually throw it at people. If you want to write an encyclopedia get your head out of your crotch and that other guy's crotch. No example of anyone else's behavior comes well from someone who supports genitalia graffiti. It could just as readily be called, "Don't be a jerk," and be the sort of essay one could actually use in a community that claims its primary mission is writing an encyclopedia. But, no, it's not called that; and guess what, there's one called, "Don't be a pussy," also, which is about being weak. I should be more surprised and disappointed than I am. --Blechnic (talk) 23:14, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

My concern here is that with the possible exception of BorgQueen, nobody devotes more of their time and energy to the quality of the Did you know project than Gatoclass does. Gato has spent literally hundreds of hours going through hooks, checking against sources, and I've personally seen him stop probably hundreds of articles with problems from going onto the main page. Gato cares more than almost anybody. To me actions speak a lot louder than words. Let's not lose sight of the fact that those actions tell us that Gato class is the one who cares so much he's devoted a huge portion of his real life to the problems. --JayHenry (talk) 18:04, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

For the record, I was supporting Gato above. I think that Blechnic has been acting like a jerk. S. Dean Jameson 18:13, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

My comment wasn't specifically to Dean. We've gotten a little off track now anyways. The important thing is we all care about plagiarism and stopping it. Let's turn the focus back to that, and come up with ways to work toward that solution. Let's keep in mind that we're all opposed to plagiarism, but it doesn't mean we're going to agree on how best to stop plagiarism. A good rule going forward might be not to talk about ourselves or about other editors, and keep it focused on plagiarism, systems that could stop plagiarism, and potential flaws in those systems. No need for any first person singular or second person pronouns in such discussions :) --JayHenry (talk) 19:02, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

(outdent) Oh shit, what a mess. Look, I have quite limited tolerance for wikidrama, and it was certainly not my intention to drive Blechnic from the project - a possibility I'm afraid I never even considered beforehand - and I feel this has all spun into a much bigger deal than I really intended to make it. I just felt I couldn't tolerate Blechnic's sheer fucking arrogance any longer and something had to be said.

On reflection however, while it's true that she manages to piss off quite a few people who cross her path, including me, and while I suspect she may quietly enjoy causing a little friction, I'm not sure her level of disruption is all that serious. And I am also keenly aware of Carcharoth's desire to keep her on the project. Perhaps it would seem a little selfish then, to make my irritation with Blechnic the central issue here.

So at this stage, I am willing to try and put aside the wikidrama of the last day or two, and see if we can perhaps start over. I must add however, that I'm still not persuaded that I personally will be able to work constructively with Blechnic, and I'm pretty unhappy about the current proposal floating around to have Blechnic checking the next update page for plagiarism. If that's what the current proposal is, then I think I might just sit on the sidelines for a while to see how well that works out. If that is not the current proposal, then I guess there is either going to be a discussion about what needs to happen as an alternative, or else it's business as usual. Whatever the case, I'm thinking that I myself might be taking a break from DYK for a few days anyway, as I'm afraid the drama over the last few days has, one way or another, managed to somewhat diminish my enthusiasm. Regards, Gatoclass (talk) 20:47, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

I think we should not loose sight of the main problem this is all about. The quality of the DYK maintenance is unacceptable. Poorly referenced, POV-pushing and otherwise unacceptable entries get to the mainpage on a regular basis, users who protest get railroaded by the article's authors and DYK admins doing too little to help this mainly because they are too few.

Their being too few has everything to do with a pity shape of the admincorps overall, as there is just a handful of admins who concern themselves with the main part of this project, its content, while there is a plethora who are here to merely "run things", block, hanging out at IRC and drama-boards. My experience is that Gatoglass personally is trying to do the best job he can but with too little help, he cannot resolve this problem. He got too defensive from Blenchic's way of dealing with it while Blenchic was too blunt. Overall, I think we should make every effort to retain a volunteer who takes it upon himself to do some fact checking of DYK candidates and should try to accommodate him in whatever reasonable way. The job he is trying to do is in a great need to be done.

I tried to be more involved in helping ensure DYK quality but I stopped doing this since it is too stressful to deal with the authors of contentious articles who are committed to ensuring their stuff gets to main page whatever it takes. Some examples of my past attempts can be found at the archives of another DYK admins User_talk:Carabinieri/Archive8#DYK_checking, User_talk:Carabinieri/Archive8#Relevance.3F. If there is any hope that we may see an improvement, I will try to help again. --Irpen 21:13, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

"The quality of the DYK maintenance is unacceptable. Poorly referenced, POV-pushing and otherwise unacceptable entries get to the mainpage on a regular basis, users who protest get railroaded by the article's authors and DYK admins doing too little to help this mainly because they are too few."

It seems there are some people that get my point. A number of other posters on AN/I, in e-mails to me, on my talk page, and on DYK have posted this same sentiment.

Gatoclass, you're missing one major point (well, quite a few) that I keep making: I don't want to fact check DYK. I just want DYK to stop posting plagiarisms and unverified facts on the main page. I want to occasionally read a hook on something interesting on the main page and go to a short, well-written article, that isn't plagiarized. An article about something obscure that I've never heard of or know nothing about. I want you to get it right so that I can enjoy reading DYK.

What I want to do on Misplaced Pages is to rewrite all of Misplaced Pages's articles on tropical agricultural plant pathogens (well, African ones) and write another couple of thousand, mostly stub or start class with a few planned necessary big articles, for tropical laymen who grow these plants who have to research the pests and could use readable articles with proper links to peer-reviewed and scientific research laboratory publications on the topic.

And, while I'm doing it, I want to occasionally roam Misplaced Pages for something interesting to read. But I want it to be something written by a Misplaced Pages editor, not by one of my colleagues who doesn't write for Misplaced Pages.

--Blechnic (talk) 23:08, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

And I want a hippopotamus for Christmas. I find it frankly incredible that you demand that Gatoclass do a job that you're unwilling to do yourself. He is not your employee. What's more, Gatoclass is demonstrably the one who cares about plagiarism and about the quality of DYK as he spends hours working on it and I've personally witnessed him stop dozens if not hundreds of flawed articles from reaching the main page. His actions speak much louder than your words. You are allowed to fine tune and review the process, but that has nothing to do with barking orders and insults at other volunteers. Brainstorming how to fix it is very welcome. Blechnic, please, I completely agree there's a problem. It's obvious to me that Gatoclass cares the most, and that you care, and that the rest of us care as well. We agree there's a problem; it doesn't mean we will agree with every proposed solution. I can state with a great deal of certainty that yelling at Gatoclass is not even a small component of a solution (nor him at you). He has agreed to no longer make this personal, can you please do the same, so that we can move forward? --JayHenry (talk) 01:04, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

That's what I was trying to do, since one of the issues Gatoclass brought up was that he didn't want me to do the plagiarism checks.

"...and I'm pretty unhappy about the current proposal floating around to have Blechnic checking the next update page for plagiarism. If that's what the current proposal is, then I think I might just sit on the sidelines for a while to see how well that works out."

But, no matter what I say, you and others will find some way to damn me for it. I'm damned if I do plagiarism checks, I'm damned if I don't devote my whole life to it.

Please explain to me why the only way a problem can be identified on Wikiepdia without being bullied and badgered for identifying it is if you agree to fix it 100% yourself?

Maybe, when he agreed to no longer make it personal, had he not included the personal comment about me, JayHenry, I would not have replied to it. However, again, no matter what I do or say, someone will damn me for it, and protect Gatoclass for doing the exact same thing.

So, in other words, the only way this moves forward is if I agree to do 100% of the plagiarism checks on all articles and Gatoclass quits?

And, yes, why all of you are crapping about me, why didn't one single one of you get any one to back off of me? You won't ever, JayHenry, because it's a one way street: everyone established on Misplaced Pages can shit on anyone relatively new, but not vice versa. So, people can slam dicks at me, scream at me, make it personal while saying they're not, and demanding that I do, and nothing I say will ever be good enough.

And, yes, that makes perfect sense, Misplaced Pages's virus articles are a disaster, so take the viral editors and force them by being as disagreeable as possible to them to do something outside of their area of knowledge that no one already working in the area is doing. Maybe if I'm the only one who can do DYK plagiarism checks it ought to come off of the front page. --Blechnic (talk) 01:15, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

My intention was not to damn you. I disagree with some of the things you're saying. But just because I criticized aspects of your behavior does not mean my intent is to crap on you. I want to discuss this, and I want to fix it, and along the way there will be disagreement. When I disagree I will express this -- something I've done to Gatoclass many, many times on the DYK talk page in the past. As for nobody sticking up for you, Carcharoth made a sincere and concerted effort to get people to back off of you. I also made an attempt to de-escalate, even though I was angry that you accused me of not caring. I really care a lot, and I really am trying to move this forward to finding some solutions. I want to get this focused back on how to improve DYK, but I don't know how to do that at this point. --JayHenry (talk) 01:31, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

How you could start doing it at this point is stop your damn picking on me. Just stop it. Once you decide that you simply cannot pick on me, you'd be surprised the ideas that will flow. You close one door, and you see that the room has thousands of other doors to select from, because you're no longer blinded by the light from the open door.

I wasn't yelling at Gatoclass in my last post, I wasn't making it a personal attack on him, I was trying to focus on the most important thing: making DYK a quality part of Misplaced Pages. Pointing out that I'm not the only person on the planet who can spot the plagiarisms as clear as a bell: others are reading these, too, and saying, well that wasn't written by the Misplaced Pages editor. This is something almost all trained writers of nonfiction learn: how to spot plagiarism. It's not a natural skill: it's training.

I was also pointed out something that keeps getting me slapped around: I don't want to search for plagiarism. It's unwelcome coming from me, and the plagiarisms run anyhow, so there's no way in hell I'm going to waste my time with it. So, why doesn't everybody lose the stance that I can't point out how bad the plagiarism is (rotten bad), unless I correct it all then run around damning me for correcting it? My corrections are ignored and the problem is too big and Gatoclass clearly doesn't want me to correct the plagiarisms--he said just that.

And, you know what else can't seem to make a dent? If you have someone who writes well about a topic that they know that is poorly developed on Misplaced Pages, don't have them do tasks that other editors can do. The articles I've added details on about plants and viruses have sat around underdeveloped and wrong for ages. Articles about big major African trees that no one on Misplaced Pages knows are trees. Rare hippo reserves that appear in articles, but no one knows these are places where hippos live. Want a hippo all you want, but if you never know where to find them, you're not getting one. --Blechnic (talk) 01:57, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Blechnic, I am truly and sincerely sorry that I insulted you in the course of this. My anger at being accused of not caring clouded my judgment. I did not intend for my disagreement to ever come across as picking on you. --JayHenry (talk) 02:01, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

I don't even know what to say. It seems from an outsiders point of view that the people editing DYK don't care if plagiarisms get in or not. This comes across in the many posts and the attacks on me. It also comes across loud and clear every time I read a DYK and see a plagiarism in it.

It's the primary reason I don't want to check for plagiarisms there: the plagiarisms will still be posted, and I will be part of it. For all I've been accused of, you don't think I get a little angry, too? --Blechnic (talk) 02:12, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

PS That little edit conflict with Bidgee was a good idea of the crap I get accused of and hounded about on Misplaced Pages. You know, it's hard to get over a bad attitude, when what led up to it never ceases. --Blechnic (talk) 02:16, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

It seems there are some people that get my point

With all due respect for Irpen - and he's an editor whose contributions I do by and large respect - he has his own POV on one or two subjects too, and I don't necessarily agree with him when he sees bias in an article. I do try to check for POV issues in DYK submissions before I promote them, and if I have doubts I will generally reject them, ask them to be rewritten, handpass them to a relevant wikiproject, or sometimes try and fix them myself on the fly. So I don't think that too many examples of POV editing get through.

I don't want to fact check DYK

Well then we have at least one thing in common, because neither do I! More importantly, I simply don't have the time to fact check articles, and I don't have time to check them for plagiarism either. DYK is a 24-hour, 7-days-a-week project, and on any given day probably around 60 articles have to be reviewed, about half of which will fail. Even if only five minutes is spent on each article, that's around five hours work total - and we really only have three regular hands there - me, Borgqueen and Daniel Case. So that's approaching two hours work apiece right there. But then there are always the articles that one has to spend 15, 20, 30 minutes or more on, trying to rectify issues that arise. And then hooks have to be trimmed and rewritten, links have to be checked, updates balanced, pictures uploaded and protected, errors rectified, hooks archived, notifications done, etc etc.

There's only so much a few people can do, or are willing to do, on a volunteer project like this. So from my POV, talking about multiplying the time I spend on each article by perhaps an order of magnitude while I try to scan multiple references for plagiarism is just ludicrous. It ain't gonna happen. And if suddenly this is what DYK is going to be all about - laboriously combing references to look for possible copyvios - I'm afraid they are going to have to find somebody else to do it. Either that or they are going to have to start paying much better wages. That's how your proposal looks from my perspective.

On the broader question though - as I've said elsewhere, I'm not sure I see the point in trying to eliminate all possible incidences of plagiarism from DYK submissions, when over 1,000 new articles per day are added to en.wiki overall. I mean, even if we managed to get rid of it all at DYK, it's clearly only the tip of the iceberg. One might as well stand on the beach like King Canute and order the tide to retreat. So what is actually achieved by all this additional effort? Will anyone even notice?

Additionally, I wonder if your position on this is not in part due to some misconceptions about what DYK is about. DYK is not a place that features "Misplaced Pages's best new articles", it's just a place that features "Misplaced Pages's newest articles". It's there to give readers a rough idea of what sort of subjects people are writing about and what a basic new article looks like. The idea being that someone might look at some of these new articles and think, "I could do as good as that!" So it serves to remind readers that you don't need a PhD to contribute here, or to have your contribution valued. It really is an everyman's project. We already have a spot for featuring Misplaced Pages's best articles, and that is the FA spot. DYK serves a different purpose - in my opinion, anyhow.

What I want to do on Misplaced Pages is to rewrite all of Misplaced Pages's articles on tropical agricultural plant pathogens (well, African ones) and write another couple of thousand, mostly stub or start class with a few planned necessary big articles

Great! I'm sure we'd all be very happy if you did that! All I have tried to impress upon you, is to please try not to bite other contributors while you are going about it. Not only because we want this to remain a fun place that people actually want to come and spend their time working on, but because if you continue to irk other contributors, eventually enough of them will be pissed off that they will move to have you kicked out or otherwise sanctioned. Because folks tend to have long memories around here. And I'm explaining this for your own sake as well as anyone else's, because plainly you are here because you'd like to keep contributing as well. Regards, Gatoclass (talk) 01:47, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Again, you know, you keep targetting my bad behavior but you seem to have enjoyed the attacks on me well enough, that I'll take your last paragraph about as much as you've shown I should. If you want to explain something for someone's benefit, start by showing you're not biased against them, it's something you would do with/for other editors, and it's something you routinely do, and, clearly, in this, when you've ignored the attacks on me, that's not the case. --Blechnic (talk) 02:05, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Plagiarism software

I'm not sure if Blechnic is contributing anymore or I'd ask there. Can anyone tell me the software they are using to find plagiarism? Ref. above "I used the tool the poster provided..." and "I don't need the software I used, although it will be convenient...". I'd sure like to know what that is. Sorry for interrupting this thread! Franamax (talk) 06:29, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Franamax, Someone posted (at the ANI thread I think) http://www.copyscape.com/ . I didn't try it myself. --Hroðulf (or Hrothulf) (Talk) 07:15, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Introductory articles

There is a discussion at Template_talk:Introductory_article#What_does_generally_accessible_mean.3F about what the introductory article template really means. It will be helpful if you weighed in. Thank you. Loom91 (talk) 21:15, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Any Idea

...where CBD disappeared to since Jan?? Or why? // FrankB 07:14, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

RedSpruce and RAN

Hiya, I see that you've been helping out at Talk:Elizabeth Bentley. I was trying to help out at Talk:William Remington too, but it's becoming increasingly obvious that the dovetailing of these two users has gone into WP:LAME territory (and I see that you mentioned that at the Bentley page). They are clearly exhausting community patience.

I've been thinking about how to deal with things, that doesn't involve just blocking both users. Aside from the fact that they disagree, one of the things that seems to keep causing problems, is the technique of using "revert" as an idea of compromise. So I'm thinking that maybe we should put both of them on 0RR restrictions when it comes to each other. They can change edits, but not just blanket delete/revert. Think that might help? --Elonka 00:14, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Something interesting from Mackensen

You might wish to comment on Misplaced Pages:Devolution, a proposal to address some issues related to Arbcom workload. Risker (talk) 02:05, 29 June 2008 (UTC)