The page fumocy that I started was put up for removal during my holiday. You moved it under my personal pages instead, which I appreciate because it was a substantial amount of work to write. Anyway, the reason for removal was that it described a novelty, and "Wikipedia is not" a place for original research. And there is a whole washlist of things that Wikipedia is not - it is much more not than it was when I joined the endeavor.
Disregarding the issues for this particular case, my question now is: who gets to decide what Wikipedia is or is not? How are the criteria established, who enforces them? Who is really in charge on Wikipedia? I've been a contributer for over 2 years, but it is still unclear to me who is "behind" Wikipedia, and I am unpleasantly surprised when things like this happen. -- Tom Peters 17:56, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Thanks! It's good to be home. -- Brion 07:23, 1 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Graculus is refusing to believe that talk of creating a History of Germany-style series predated his involvement on the page. It would be great if you could tell him otherwise. Hours of back and forward sniping on the talk page demonstrate that he won't believe me. 172 12:59, 1 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Now that Lir/PP has agreed to shift to a new persona on the Village Pump page, I redirected his temp page to User talk:Pizza Puzzle/New Imperialism (temp). Would you like to list New Imperialism (temp) on the VFD page? I can?t do this myself since there might be suspicions that Lir/PP is being victimized. 172 06:57, 2 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Hi Mav. You are listed as having expressed an opinion on whether or not Daniel C. Boyer should be deleted. Can you please turn that opinion into a formal vote? Go to Talk:Daniel C. Boyer. Thanks. -- Tim Starling 09:52, Aug 2, 2003 (UTC)
Thanks Mav. You're right, it does make it look amateurish. I guess I just wanted an immediate response. I just thought that overstating the truth in the holocaust article would have been just as damaging as being in denial of the holocaust. I was just in a hurry to fix the problem. But thank you for being candid, and I will no longer write those types of comments but in the talk pages. Nostrum 08:14, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav, I know I had a shout at you earlier, sorry about that, but we need to get New Imperialism into some sort of order. The vote decided to have a link from the current version to Pizza Puzzel's version. I think we should uphold this vote by including the link and protecting the page (as much as I hate protecting pages). What do you think? CGS 11:15, 2 Aug 2003 (UTC).
Hello Mav- just been looking at the wiki textbook project- I'm not clear of the point of this project or how it will differ from wikipedia- won't there be lots of content duplication (then divergence as people edit one but not the other) which is needless? I've got horrible visions of having to re-do all the pages I've done on various aspects of organic gardening for example, which would seem to be appropriate content for a textbook on the subject? Hopefully you can clarify this for me (guess this should go on a talk page at the textbook wiki, but I havn't created a log in there as yet....) quercus robur 11:54, 2 Aug 2003 (UTC)
I submit once again a request for assistance from the puissant and knowledgable Mav. There are two articles, one thalassaemia, and one thalassemia (the former being a British spelling, the latter American. I edited thalassemia, and now it crashes my browser...I can't view it. I'm assuming this is either because I've accidently put something squirrelly in the article, or the mark-up is now too complicated to handle for my puny browser. I wonder if you would look at it and see if you have the power to make it work... then perhaps I can correct/merge the thing. -- Someone else 22:07, 2 Aug 2003 (UTC)
(btw, 35k on this page). I'm sure other countries have weather forecast services. Even if the US has the only hurricane centre (I would have thought SE Asia had something), US is still more appropriate to indicate where we are talking about.
I realise that it is possible that Radiojon checked that there were no other national weather services or hurricane centres before chosing his title, so I may have done him a disservice by assuming US-centricity.
However, about 90% of the articles that do not identify the country they are talking about are US (UK responsible for most of rest, Canada never), so I may have jumped to conclusions. Jim.
Hi Mav, could you please look at the taxo-box at Nyala? I'm not sure about the species and the binomial name. I based the classification on http://www.chaffeezoo.org/animals/nyala.html , but I've never been very good at biology. -- JeLuF 19:07, 3 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Remember the template system I told you about? I'm now working on the syntax details. What do you think of the following syntax for transcluding templates:
|Country table |Name=>Germany |Population => 80 million |Flag => Germany-Flag.png |Anthem => | |Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit |für das deutsche Vaterland... |____
Explanations:
If there is only one key to pass, it might be useful to do a call by value without any name:
|Image,left |Stars.jpg |__
Reasoning:
I thought about using a HTML syntax, but I wanted something that is quick, not too confusing and which lets the template stand out from the normal wikisource. The syntax proposed above should accomplish this; the only downside might be the need to type "|" before every line (but then again, templates probably shouldn't be used for very large texts anyway). —Eloquence 20:09, Aug 3, 2003 (UTC)
::Template:Country:: ::Name::Germany ::Population::80 million ::Flag::Germany-Flag.png ::Anthem:: Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit für das deutsche ::/Template:Country::
--mav
I'm not sure how valid any keyboard layout based arguments are, given the vast differences in these layouts across countries. The | is usually a bit harder to reach than more common characters, though. My problem with the double-colons is that they're really hard on the eyes -- they look like bird droppings and they do not stand out from regular text. I'm afraid this will lead to readability problems when used with text that has colons in it. Some templates might make the table cell names themselves values that can be changed, so you would end up with something like
::Caption:Size of Wikipedia: ::Field:Size:
The | may be harder to type, but that's the only way to get its advantage -- a relatively unusual character that stands out, and which is also a good separator because pairs of it form a straight line. That's my rationale at least. Hmhmhm. —Eloquence
Mav, There's a very new and I think promising site for birth/death date confirmation that you may want to give a try (you'll want the " This day in history" report.) It'll tend toward the distantly historical and European, but give it a shot and see what you think. -- Someone else 12:15, 4 Aug 2003 (UTC)
No, I was talking about the vote on dynamic content. Who do you think would support temp 4 but not temp 5? It took me a long time to update temp5, so I'm really annoyed, but I understand why we shouldn't use it yet. LDan 19:07, 4 Aug 2003 (UTC)
What do you think, should I go ahead and implement the __TOCHERE__ feature? The advantage would be that we could put TOCs inside DIVs, and thereby alter some of their properties, esp. width and float, or put them inside other tables. One possible disadvantage is that people might start adding __TOCHERE__ on top because they don't like the post-intro placement. Hmm. —Eloquence 06:09, Aug 5, 2003 (UTC)
Dear mav, i've been organizing the List of people pages, putting links to years, connecting them to anniversaries pages, deleting duplicates etc. Somebody told me that the years in the lists are not supposed to be linked. Is there any page i can see for refference about what i should/shouldnt do, say a wiki project? With the search engine down i can't find anything. And by the way, do you think this is a waste of time? Cheers, Muriel Gottrop 07:37, 5 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Thank you for approving my sysop status. It is sincerely appreciated. Mintguy 22:24, 5 Aug 2003 (UTC)
It's that link table problem I mentioned at Wikipedia:Village pump (now Wikipedia talk:Software updates). I should really fix that... After you undelete a page, you should edit it to trigger the link table update code. -- Tim Starling 04:08, Aug 6, 2003 (UTC)
Mav, I understand your concern but considering that the said person (I won't say gentleman, as that would insult to gentlemen, of which you are one) has called me rascist, anti-semitic, bigoted and presumably through stupidity took quotes I used to get a genuine anti-semite banned and interpreted them as my views on the person I described in farmyard terms, calling him that term was pretty reserved and controlled. My main worry is not that I may have offended him (type two letters together and he reads some insult into it) but that I cruelly and unfairly libelled an entire animal species by associating them with him. In any case his behaviour does more damage to wiki than a thousand farmyard references. wikilove, FearÉIREANN 10:08, 6 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav, why did you remove 1998 U.S. embassy bombings from the main page? Chadloder 18:53, Aug 7, 2003 (UTC)
Mav, RE: the "Don Mullins" entry, all of the information there was taken from his own biography which is wrote for the former "Far From Kansas" web page. Likely is is just paranoid about his sexuality being literally published for anyone to see because, as I recall, he was super-paranoid about his personal life. But everything there he openly discussed at FFK performances, so I don't think Wikipedia is any sort of legal danger. He's probably just trying to sound big and mighty to protect himself. *shrug* It's not like he's so very famous that the deletion of his entry in the Wikipedia would be some horrible loss, so I suppose the discretion is entirely up to you. -EB-
http://www.discover.com/July_03/featlights.html Koyaanis Qatsi 00:51, 8 Aug 2003 (UTC)
I am a new user and you sent me a message. Definitely I'm staying in Wikipedia, Its interesting and a very good idea. Check this link too: [1] 17:08 UTC, 8 Aug 2003
Now the temp5 columns are of unequal length. :-/ Koyaanis Qatsi 20:26, 8 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav, I have removed the additional small tags you put in temp5. They make it unreadably small as already discussed on the talk page. I don't know if this is just browser issue but someone else noted it too. It appears half the size of the language links on the current main page. Angela 21:29, 8 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Hi, the redirection into user space to have time for a discussion without edit war is fine for me -- but I'd prefer it (and did so last time, but don't want to do it myself this time, because it could seen as POVed) that the redirect didn't link to Boyers user page, but to a copy of the last Boyer article (say, the last one about the surrealist Boyer) in the namespace of "User:Daniel C. Boyer". I think even DCB sees that there is a difference between autobiography and wikipedia entry, and one of the last revisions of the article (before the last edit war started) could be a good entry. Also last time I put a disclaimer in front of the article, explaining why it is in user space and where it can be discussed. What do you think about such a procedure? -- till we *) 22:28, Aug 8, 2003 (UTC)
Mav, could you take a look at Roman Catholic sex abuse allegations. I took a look at the article tonight and thought (as I had the first time I looked at it) that it was probably the worst written, monumentally inaccurate and extraordinarily POV article on wiki. For some reason the urge took me to rewrite it. I went through the original article to find things to salvage but I think 3 lines are most were passably NPOV (or could be made so; the rest was so biased they were beyond salvage. Seven hours and 31K later I had written an entirely new article which, including the three lines and some of the old links, much extended. I'd welcome your observations on it. BTW I also renamed it. 'Catholic' could also mean Anglo-Catholic but the article was strictly confined to Roman Catholic so I changed that. The sex abuse cases don't just involve priests (but also nuns, brothers and lay workers in church organisations) so that word in the old title was misleading, and some are still before the courts or could not be prosecuted for time reasons, so allegations gave the scope to cover those cases as part of the broad issue. The old name was as agenda-laiden and POV as the contents. Happy 31K reading! lol FearÉIREANN 03:22, 9 Aug 2003 (UTC)
If you think that Ex-gay is worthy of being listed among the new pages, perhaps you can add it. I'll add some other new pages later. —Eloquence 10:36, Aug 9, 2003 (UTC)
You'd be proud of me. History of Brazil is now a completed series and no longer a whopping 66 K monster! 172 13:44, 9 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav, I put the following on the page debating changing the main page. I'd be interested to know your views, lol. FearÉIREANN 22:08, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Part of the problem with the front page is that we are trying to do too many things on it. Why not use it as a more graphically intensive disambigulation page? In other words, it doesn't try to cram in everything but should contain links which a new user can follow explaining what wiki is and how it works. For example;
The front page should contain
Please see my response on meta:User talk:Brion VIBBER. -- Brion 00:03, 11 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav, Since you've taken an interest in the Recall, I've put an item of probable interest at Talk:2003 California recall-- Someone else 07:54, 11 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Hitchcock's birthday today. Koyaanis Qatsi 07:45, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)
I wasn't mentioned in you comments on the VFD page. What, you don't respect my opinions? 172 22:16, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)
It said "in general." To me, this meant "not just anybody." マイカル (MB) 22:50, Aug 13, 2003 (UTC)
Mav, your comments on the debate on Temp5 were grossly unfair. We have been voting for ages on temps, and all the votes were so ambiguous and unclear at the end we knew as little about what people actually want as at the beginning. The vote on temp5 was a classic. 17 endorsed it. 19 said no but in a way which could be interpreted as saying 'we want something else, just not this.' 8 unambiguously endorsed the current main page. All that produced was the likelihood of Martin producing another temp and another until people got fed up voting them down and a small hardcore remained, voted through one by default and his decision, with only a clique behind it, would be adopted.
All I did was to organise a proper professional vote, to give people the simple option of deciding do they want to keep the current front page or replace it, if replace it, when and with what. If those elementary questions had been asked in the first place, we would have been spared weeks of pointless voting that failed to clarify what do people actually want. And we will be spared endless hit and miss Temp votes in the future. I would have thought you of all people would have recognised the use of finally ending this pointless re-voting on new temps. There is every likelihood that people might either decide to keep your design, or adapt it slightly. For you to tell the community that they cannot vote to decide what they want, but most go through the endless charade of voting down what they don't want, I find astonishing. And BTW I am now getting emails from people who agree that this is the vote that should have been taken in the first place but who cannot vote because the link to the vote on the Recent Changes has been removed and they can't find the page to cast their vote. I've relisted it on the Recent Changes. FearÉIREANN 00:00, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)
I have had FOUR emails, 2 AIM messages and 1 message on my talk page. How they choose to express their views is none of your business. I don't know any of the email senders so it is quite possible that they are newbies who when Martin took the message of Recent Pages didn't know where to go to express their views. But since you don't believe me see User talk:jtdirl. I'm emailing you one of the emails. What has come over you all of a sudden, Mav? You are normally the one who works with people, not acting like an bossy teacher with a toothache. I've never seen you show such contempt for everyone who doesn't do what you want. FearÉIREANN 19:13, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav, in my time on wiki I am contantly finding debates where one person calls a vote unilaterally; Eloquence has called at least one vote. Martin has called votes. No-one ever questioned their right to do so. I was the one who tried to sort out the farce that was Martin's vote on Temp5; suggested that the vote be widely heralded so people knew about it, suggested that a clear date for the end of vote be stated, suggested a methodology for calculating the result, pointed procedural flaws in the vote, reverted unilateral attempts by two users to decolourise the page. I have seen plenty of votes on wiki, almost call called by one or two people, and not a single one was described as invalid. And I have not seen a single vote where more efforts have been made to contact people. I left messages on the pages of most of the the people who had showed an interest in the topic and had a draft letter to go onto the wiki list when a computer crash wiped it out. And plenty of people have come to express opinions even after Martin removed the Recent Pages link twice. Your attitude seems bizarre in the circumstances. I expect in the interests of consistency you will now go to the vast majority of votes that have taken place and which were called by one person, and retrospectively declare all of them null and void. If you don't, then there can be no question of claiming the Main page vote is invalid, without looking ridiculously inconsistent. FearÉIREANN 20:27, 15 Aug 2003 (UTC)
O great wise guru of Mount Wikipedia, I need your advice. :-)
As I am now starting to do national selections on the Eurovision entries (see: United Kingdom in the Eurovision Song Contest 1967) I will come into some difficulties with earlier years, as alot of information is either not known, not annouced, lack of information or just lost in time never to be known again. anyway more to the point, what do you think I should do when a blank piece of information comes up for example:
The UK in 1957 had 3 semi finals, alot of the song titles are unknown but it is known who sung in each semifinal. Do you think in the table I should leave it blank, put a "?". -fonzy
Let me simplify this whole dispute. If my sysop status is revoked that will be tantamount to banning. I promise that I will not continue editing in disgrace. If you people would rather deal with Nostrum than someone of my qualifications, it's the community's loss. I'll just devote this time to efforts that would be far more constructive and appreciated. I tend to edit and write articles while doing other work. This just spares me from a wrenching distraction. 172 05:36, 15 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Aside from the comment on MBs page, which was solely and appropriately retaliatory and reciprocated by his actions, where's your evidence of me going into the "gray area?" It sounds like total, unsubstantiated suspicions. It also sounds like you read a bunch of one-sided wining complaints about me not being nice enough to that poor newbie vandal without even analyzing this situation objectively. I expected much more out of you.
BTW, user Zog, that hard-banned racist vandal, just made a comeback as User:ZOG. I caught him right away and banned him after he exposed his IP. He hasn't come back, so I'm getting reassured that it isn't one of those shifting AOL IPs. Crisis averted. He's not going to fill up ban pages, vandalism in progress pages, and the mailing list again with complaints because I just acted quickly. You and others should appreciate that I chose to avert vandalism rather than encourage vandals.
However, in the spirit of unsubstantiated suspicions, with which I've been thoroughly victimized, I think that MB might have some sort of strange affinity with Nostrum's POV, prompting him to attack me for articulating the case for his ban. It's also possible that he's getting back at me for criticizing him for the way he dealt with Paektu, another vandal. Nostrum and MB just drummed up all these charges and other users are repeating them. What exactly did I do other than propose Nostrum's banning, which so far has been supported by more users than those who oppose it? Nostrum and MB are attacking me personally, and it seems like there's now an avalanche of criticism by users who haven't worked with me much and aren't really aware of the Nostrum controversy. 172 07:40, 15 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Pietro Carnesecci appears to be a mis-spelling - Google has no hits for that name, and tons for Pietro Carnesecchi. I didn't move or touch the page (other than to fix a mistake in the identiy of Pope Clement), because I am very touchy about renaming anything now. The only wrong spelling in the page itself is the one at the very start. I'm mentioning this to you because you're the only person who's worked on the page; I'd suggest moving it, fixing the pointed on the Carnesecchi, and then deleting the Pietro Carnesecci forward. Noel 21:12, 15 Aug 2003 (UTC)
You didn't answer my question, Mav! Is it because it showed the inconsistency in your stance? FearÉIREANN 00:32, 16 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Yeah man, The Panama City and Asuncion were listed in the August 15 Anniversary page, so I thought it'd be acceptable. I'll have to update those articles. Poor Yorick 01:10, 16 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Hey Mav, I have big news: I turns out that MB, who has been leading the attempts to revoke my sysop status, has been a personal friend of Nostrum all along. Weeks ago, I was invited to protect Catholicism from an ongoing edit war and POV vandalism. Uninvolved in the editing of the article and having received an invitation, I acted in good faith to protect the page; yet, my reputation hasn't recovered since. Now it seems that the coordinated attacks on my 'abusiveness,' promulgated by MB and Nostrum, and rehashed by other concerned users, was bogus all along. Allegations can be self-perpetuating, you know. You hear allegations and that clouds the thinking of even the far-minded.
The most serious charges against me have been the protection of the Catholicism article from Nostrum and my attempts yesterday to urge a ban on Nostrum. But my reactions to Nostrum were no different from past reactions to other users guily of adding absurd POV rants, such as Zog months ago and JoeM days ago. JoeM, for instance, was subject to auto-revert with less of a hearing than Nostrum ever got. I think that MB owes me an apology and the controversy over my sysop status needs to be seriously reconsidered in light of the revelations of this severe conflict of interests. I don't think that months of substantial contributions by a professional academic should be overshadowed by a kid who was protecting his vandal buddy all along. 172 01:11, 16 Aug 2003 (UTC)
re US, yes, unless it's obvious (like all the delta blues singers). Jim
Hi Mav, I was just bringing order to Wikipedia:Brilliant pictures visible, great picture you have there! ;-) Fantasy 11:12, 16 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav:
Do you want to know why I'm frequently involved in edit wars? It's because I've been working on history articles and articles dealing with contemporary politics. That's it. These are inherently contentious fields. Anyone trying to maintain proper encyclopedic standards will be dealing with partisans. That's why JT and I stand out as users frequently involved in edit wars. According to your profile, your fields of expertise are biological sciences and geological sciences. Had I been capable of contributing to these articles, which I am not, I would fade into the background and my reputation would fit my actual personal characteristics. I'm actually quite mild-mannered and quite polite. In the real world I'm not regarded as a "bull."
JT has been involved in edit wars too. And if you took the charges against him seriously you would regard him as an apologist for the Roman Catholic Church, a Communist historical revisionist, an anti-Semite, a hardline Likid partisan, a Brit-loving Irish-hating Tory, an ultra-nationalistic IRA sympathizer, a staunch Australian Republican, and a monarchist. I am merely one of the most active contributors who solely focus on history, contemporary politics, and social sciences. Please, take into consideration the plight of contributors who deal with contentious subjects. From time to time we're going to run into grotesque violations of POV, factually inaccurate rants, and uncompromising partisans.
In fact, Tannin was one of the best contributors to the history articles until he started focusing on completely different topics when he realized how bitter and contentious the disputes with ranting partisans could get. Please, quit castigating me as someone looking for trouble. A historian is going to get trouble whether he likes it or not around here. 172 16:26, 16 Aug 2003 (UTC)
When RK comes back I want to nominate him for sysop (again) I dont ask for much, but I ask that you support his nomination. Sincerely- 戴眩sv 23:06, Aug 16, 2003 (UTC)
Trust me. Consider that responsibility brings its own rewards. Gotta run -- campaigning. - 戴眩sv 23:18, Aug 16, 2003 (UTC)
Sorry for missing that guideline. I read it before it was updated mid-July. However, I don't understand why it needs to have a notice as well? This makes a lot more work. You need to list it, add the note, then remove the note if it is not to be deleted as oppsosed to simply listing it. Surely whoever is removing it from VfD should delete it there and then, which means there is no need for a note. Angela
Thanks Mav:
Although, you may delete all the images that I uploaded at the beginning. I don't mind; I've discontinued uploading because of all the hindrances. I've focused on just researching and writing for the timeline of video games and other articles.
As for the name election, I've discontinued with that too. Although the proposal is ethically just, Angela is also correct in that the organization currently just does not have the software and technical support to ensure that an election and vote by all Users are done properly (since they can cast multiple votes per multiple User names or IP addresses). Also understanding that this is a non-profit organization, the site has a much more prioritized agenda to do with the allocated funding than to pursue this topic further. Perhaps in future it may become viable. Although if the administrators are interested in how creative the community can be, there can be just a name competition, with only the administrators as judges.
I am concerned on how the Logo election is going to be handled since the same issues are present in this as well (all Users are able to cast multiple votes, as mentioned above).
Continue to make this website better, you guys rock.
Thanks again,
Tonius 01:26|2003.08.16
Hello Maveric149 -
Thanks for the reminder about VfD notification re Guts. I appreciate your being diligent in spotting apparent errors. Here, the story is a bit different. I actually did include the VfD notice (in the correct wording, no less). Shortly afterwards, the article I had VfD'd was renamed Guts (anime) and a new article - with no history - was created with the previously used name Guts. Perhaps you could suggest to User:ZeWrestler a better way to handle this sort of aituation. Aug 17 User:NuclearWinner
I posted this at Wikipedia talk:Sites that use Wikipedia for content but you didn't respond, so I am posting it here:
I would like some feedback before purposing this on the mailing lists. Thanks. (Please post replies to my talk page) MB 18:02, Aug 8, 2003 (UTC)
Thanks Mav. You're right, it does make it look amateurish. I guess I just wanted an immediate response. I just thought that overstating the truth in the holocaust article would have been just as damaging as being in denial of the holocaust. I was just in a hurry to fix the problem. But thank you for being candid, and I will no longer write those types of comments but in the talk pages. Nostrum 08:18, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Still plugging away at it, are you? Koyaanis Qatsi 23:27, 17 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav, we already had an article on Gold Standard. That's why the page was redirected. 172 05:37, 18 Aug 2003 (UTC)
In case you didn't spot it, Billbell has made a comment on the Village pump which appears to be regarding the changes you made to various date pages. Angela 13:22, 18 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Hi Mav
I've been looking for statistics and possibly graphs about the rise of Wikipedia. I thought I'd seen some earlier. Could they be put in the FAQs for example - perhaps start up a new Development FAQ? Not sure if it's appropriate, but there could also be info about Wiktionary - my guess is that that's going much slower. When I last checked there seemed to be around 130,000 articles. A few other obvious questions include:
I'm currently looking at Open Source systems, and Wikipedia must still be one of the largest in terms of info. It'd be interesting to see the facts and figures as it goes.
Enough to be going on with I think. -- David Martland 13:25, 18 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Hope this helps and sorry for the late reply. --mav
Hello again Mav, my friend (if i can call you friend :-s). I don't suppose you have any suggestions for: Wikipedia:WikiProject Clouds (or any pictures). -fonzy
OK :-).
I'm sure this will cause you to roll on the ground giggling: check out Talk:Sharaku. Noel 04:36, 20 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Hi Mav,
It was already some weeks ago, but i nevertheless wanted to thank you for the support in my application for Adminship. I will try to do my best to make the people know that Admins are here to help. If you ever see me doing someting, that you think, an Admin should not do, let me know immediately. I look forward to a long time of good collaboration (for humankind ;-)
Thank you very much, Fantasy 08:30, 20 Aug 2003 (UTC)
PS: Hope to see you back soon with "full power" ;-)
Hi Mav,
I asked a question on the Wikipedia talk:Nupedia_and_Wikipedia about whether articles-in-progress on Nupedia qualify under the GFDL, or are they like the Nupedia "Chalkboard". I also asked at the Wikipedia:Village pump but I got no response (the question has since been moved to the Village pump archives). Some of these articles have been languishing since 2001 and it would be nice if it were possible to use some of them as a basis for articles (or at least good stubs) right now. I searched the Nupedia website, mailing lists, history etc. and there appears no mention whatsoever of the copyright or licensing status of the articles-in-progress on Nupedia. I was hoping that you might have some insight. Thanks. -- Lexor 02:21, 26 Aug 2003 (UTC)
I think Project Sourceburg should still be set up, and on it we can place lots of pointless data, documents etc. Documents like constituions which can be linked form Wikipedia. Data like weather data for the past 100 years (or something) this will nto be useful to the average man, but for someoen doing reserach on weather paterns it will be. It just needs more man power and for people to go get the data and put it in, the licenseing will probably be different. I know your busy at the moment so don;t expect a reply yet but what do you think of trying to get it up and running as at teh moment its quite dormant. - fonzy
that was quite funny to see you removing the software patent link from the main page for not being relevant. On the french wiki, the debate is raging because some want to put a big banner "Wikipédia supports free software" across the main page (I am hardly joking) or even replace the main page with a huge free-software supporting message. Curious he ? Anthère
We have quite few. In cars more and more often, but not in appartments or houses. The climate is temperate enough that we would need air conditionners only a couple of days a year. In truth, it was damn hot, but bearable to someone in good health. I have been living in AZ; over there, that is necessary. Not in France.
What happen is that old people loose the capability to realise they are losing their fluids too quickly. They don't drink enough, because they don't feel thirsty and after a few days, excretion is impaired, wastes accumulate, and body metabolism works bad, and have trouble to evacuate the heat. Solution is to drink more of course, and wet yourself to lower temperature. That is what we moms do with the kids over 40. But it seems that what is obvious to a mom toward her child is no more obvious to an old man or woman, and not even obvious to the adult children taking care of elders.
About a week after it got pretty hot, many old and diseased started feeling wrong (my father in law did so, we fed him only soups and yogurts for a few days), and then real bad. There were some incredible cases of people calling the medics for their old parents, and the doctors finding an old person just over 40°C and nothing special had been done to lower the heat at all and to rehydrate them.
In retirement houses, there were less workers than usual, because it is holiday times, so not enough people trying to make them drink, keep quiet inside, close all windows, curtains and such and wait for the evening to move again. And not enough to give them bath to cool down the body.
So, when all these people got real sick about 1 week after it started, they all got to the hospital at the same time, and then, it was sometimes too late or there was perhaps not enough people to assume the work to save them. There were not enough time and place to bury them. Too numerous.
On top of this, because of the heat, many cities had awfully high ozon pollution levels, which didnot help. My son being a heavy asthma sufferer was challenged. In some cities, strong speed limits were set, sometimes people respected them. Others didnot give a damn. Add the numerous fires (hence smoke), some of them just around cities, most due to human stupidity (lighted on purpose). Add the very unusually dry spring and summer on top of it, with many animals dying, no right to use water for anything else than home stuff in many department (hence, most gardens were yellow and dry, instead of perphaps providing a welcome shade)
Did I also mentionned that we nearly stopped our nuclear facilities providing the necessary electricity to make the air conditionner work because of the water level too low in rivers to properly lower the plant reactor temperature, and that many fishes died from the high water temperature in particular since the plants were exceptionally allowed to release water at higher temperature than usual ?
It is kinda easy to accuse the governement. Yes, it should have reacted sooner when the first unusual deaths occured.
But, in truth, this is just the result of the fact we don't know how to listen to our bodies and to react intelligently to the outside conditions. We wait for the government to tell us "be careful, it is hot outside, here is what you should do, and not do" instead of taking proper decisions by ourselves. And yes, some rely on technology to solve the issue.
If it's hot, stay inside. Don't move, keep quiet, close the window, drink a lot, take showers or sink in a lake, don't forget the babies, the kids, the sick, the elders. They can't take care of them themselves ? help them. Think of just helping. Just wait.
That is just what happened. Curious he ?. That made 11500 people died. Probably one being my husband god mother, over 90, in a retirement home in Paris.
I'll have a technical question about press releases btw, but I'll write privately :-)
Hi Mav. I don't have access to email, so I'm not up to date on the discussioon about wikibooks. But I've had an idea. Does wikibooks aim to produce discrete textbooks, or textbook-type articles? If the former, do we have one wiki per book, or many books in the single english wiki? If one wiki holds several "books", why not have have books in diffferent languages coexisting? We can split them apart later, or we could look into ways of making the user interface language a user-set option. Just a thought -- it would certainly solve the current problem :) -- Tarquin 20:26, 30 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Can you answer my questions/comments on Talk:Main Page regarding the listing of births and deaths? If we're going to list each event once a year, what's stopping us from listing someone's birth once a year? -- Jiang 05:07, 31 Aug 2003 (UTC)
The page fumocy that I started was put up for removal during my holiday. You moved it under my personal pages instead, which I appreciate because it was a substantial amount of work to write. Anyway, the reason for removal was that it described a novelty, and "Wikipedia is not" a place for original research. And there is a whole washlist of things that Wikipedia is not - it is much more not than it was when I joined the endeavor.
Disregarding the issues for this particular case, my question now is: who gets to decide what Wikipedia is or is not? How are the criteria established, who enforces them? Who is really in charge on Wikipedia? I've been a contributer for over 2 years, but it is still unclear to me who is "behind" Wikipedia, and I am unpleasantly surprised when things like this happen. -- Tom Peters 17:56, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Thanks! It's good to be home. -- Brion 07:23, 1 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Graculus is refusing to believe that talk of creating a History of Germany-style series predated his involvement on the page. It would be great if you could tell him otherwise. Hours of back and forward sniping on the talk page demonstrate that he won't believe me. 172 12:59, 1 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Now that Lir/PP has agreed to shift to a new persona on the Village Pump page, I redirected his temp page to User talk:Pizza Puzzle/New Imperialism (temp). Would you like to list New Imperialism (temp) on the VFD page? I can?t do this myself since there might be suspicions that Lir/PP is being victimized. 172 06:57, 2 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Hi Mav. You are listed as having expressed an opinion on whether or not Daniel C. Boyer should be deleted. Can you please turn that opinion into a formal vote? Go to Talk:Daniel C. Boyer. Thanks. -- Tim Starling 09:52, Aug 2, 2003 (UTC)
Thanks Mav. You're right, it does make it look amateurish. I guess I just wanted an immediate response. I just thought that overstating the truth in the holocaust article would have been just as damaging as being in denial of the holocaust. I was just in a hurry to fix the problem. But thank you for being candid, and I will no longer write those types of comments but in the talk pages. Nostrum 08:14, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav, I know I had a shout at you earlier, sorry about that, but we need to get New Imperialism into some sort of order. The vote decided to have a link from the current version to Pizza Puzzel's version. I think we should uphold this vote by including the link and protecting the page (as much as I hate protecting pages). What do you think? CGS 11:15, 2 Aug 2003 (UTC).
Hello Mav- just been looking at the wiki textbook project- I'm not clear of the point of this project or how it will differ from wikipedia- won't there be lots of content duplication (then divergence as people edit one but not the other) which is needless? I've got horrible visions of having to re-do all the pages I've done on various aspects of organic gardening for example, which would seem to be appropriate content for a textbook on the subject? Hopefully you can clarify this for me (guess this should go on a talk page at the textbook wiki, but I havn't created a log in there as yet....) quercus robur 11:54, 2 Aug 2003 (UTC)
I submit once again a request for assistance from the puissant and knowledgable Mav. There are two articles, one thalassaemia, and one thalassemia (the former being a British spelling, the latter American. I edited thalassemia, and now it crashes my browser...I can't view it. I'm assuming this is either because I've accidently put something squirrelly in the article, or the mark-up is now too complicated to handle for my puny browser. I wonder if you would look at it and see if you have the power to make it work... then perhaps I can correct/merge the thing. -- Someone else 22:07, 2 Aug 2003 (UTC)
(btw, 35k on this page). I'm sure other countries have weather forecast services. Even if the US has the only hurricane centre (I would have thought SE Asia had something), US is still more appropriate to indicate where we are talking about.
I realise that it is possible that Radiojon checked that there were no other national weather services or hurricane centres before chosing his title, so I may have done him a disservice by assuming US-centricity.
However, about 90% of the articles that do not identify the country they are talking about are US (UK responsible for most of rest, Canada never), so I may have jumped to conclusions. Jim.
Hi Mav, could you please look at the taxo-box at Nyala? I'm not sure about the species and the binomial name. I based the classification on http://www.chaffeezoo.org/animals/nyala.html , but I've never been very good at biology. -- JeLuF 19:07, 3 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Remember the template system I told you about? I'm now working on the syntax details. What do you think of the following syntax for transcluding templates:
|Country table |Name=>Germany |Population => 80 million |Flag => Germany-Flag.png |Anthem => | |Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit |für das deutsche Vaterland... |____
Explanations:
If there is only one key to pass, it might be useful to do a call by value without any name:
|Image,left |Stars.jpg |__
Reasoning:
I thought about using a HTML syntax, but I wanted something that is quick, not too confusing and which lets the template stand out from the normal wikisource. The syntax proposed above should accomplish this; the only downside might be the need to type "|" before every line (but then again, templates probably shouldn't be used for very large texts anyway). —Eloquence 20:09, Aug 3, 2003 (UTC)
::Template:Country:: ::Name::Germany ::Population::80 million ::Flag::Germany-Flag.png ::Anthem:: Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit für das deutsche ::/Template:Country::
--mav
I'm not sure how valid any keyboard layout based arguments are, given the vast differences in these layouts across countries. The | is usually a bit harder to reach than more common characters, though. My problem with the double-colons is that they're really hard on the eyes -- they look like bird droppings and they do not stand out from regular text. I'm afraid this will lead to readability problems when used with text that has colons in it. Some templates might make the table cell names themselves values that can be changed, so you would end up with something like
::Caption:Size of Wikipedia: ::Field:Size:
The | may be harder to type, but that's the only way to get its advantage -- a relatively unusual character that stands out, and which is also a good separator because pairs of it form a straight line. That's my rationale at least. Hmhmhm. —Eloquence
Mav, There's a very new and I think promising site for birth/death date confirmation that you may want to give a try (you'll want the " This day in history" report.) It'll tend toward the distantly historical and European, but give it a shot and see what you think. -- Someone else 12:15, 4 Aug 2003 (UTC)
No, I was talking about the vote on dynamic content. Who do you think would support temp 4 but not temp 5? It took me a long time to update temp5, so I'm really annoyed, but I understand why we shouldn't use it yet. LDan 19:07, 4 Aug 2003 (UTC)
What do you think, should I go ahead and implement the __TOCHERE__ feature? The advantage would be that we could put TOCs inside DIVs, and thereby alter some of their properties, esp. width and float, or put them inside other tables. One possible disadvantage is that people might start adding __TOCHERE__ on top because they don't like the post-intro placement. Hmm. —Eloquence 06:09, Aug 5, 2003 (UTC)
Dear mav, i've been organizing the List of people pages, putting links to years, connecting them to anniversaries pages, deleting duplicates etc. Somebody told me that the years in the lists are not supposed to be linked. Is there any page i can see for refference about what i should/shouldnt do, say a wiki project? With the search engine down i can't find anything. And by the way, do you think this is a waste of time? Cheers, Muriel Gottrop 07:37, 5 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Thank you for approving my sysop status. It is sincerely appreciated. Mintguy 22:24, 5 Aug 2003 (UTC)
It's that link table problem I mentioned at Wikipedia:Village pump (now Wikipedia talk:Software updates). I should really fix that... After you undelete a page, you should edit it to trigger the link table update code. -- Tim Starling 04:08, Aug 6, 2003 (UTC)
Mav, I understand your concern but considering that the said person (I won't say gentleman, as that would insult to gentlemen, of which you are one) has called me rascist, anti-semitic, bigoted and presumably through stupidity took quotes I used to get a genuine anti-semite banned and interpreted them as my views on the person I described in farmyard terms, calling him that term was pretty reserved and controlled. My main worry is not that I may have offended him (type two letters together and he reads some insult into it) but that I cruelly and unfairly libelled an entire animal species by associating them with him. In any case his behaviour does more damage to wiki than a thousand farmyard references. wikilove, FearÉIREANN 10:08, 6 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav, why did you remove 1998 U.S. embassy bombings from the main page? Chadloder 18:53, Aug 7, 2003 (UTC)
Mav, RE: the "Don Mullins" entry, all of the information there was taken from his own biography which is wrote for the former "Far From Kansas" web page. Likely is is just paranoid about his sexuality being literally published for anyone to see because, as I recall, he was super-paranoid about his personal life. But everything there he openly discussed at FFK performances, so I don't think Wikipedia is any sort of legal danger. He's probably just trying to sound big and mighty to protect himself. *shrug* It's not like he's so very famous that the deletion of his entry in the Wikipedia would be some horrible loss, so I suppose the discretion is entirely up to you. -EB-
http://www.discover.com/July_03/featlights.html Koyaanis Qatsi 00:51, 8 Aug 2003 (UTC)
I am a new user and you sent me a message. Definitely I'm staying in Wikipedia, Its interesting and a very good idea. Check this link too: [1] 17:08 UTC, 8 Aug 2003
Now the temp5 columns are of unequal length. :-/ Koyaanis Qatsi 20:26, 8 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav, I have removed the additional small tags you put in temp5. They make it unreadably small as already discussed on the talk page. I don't know if this is just browser issue but someone else noted it too. It appears half the size of the language links on the current main page. Angela 21:29, 8 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Hi, the redirection into user space to have time for a discussion without edit war is fine for me -- but I'd prefer it (and did so last time, but don't want to do it myself this time, because it could seen as POVed) that the redirect didn't link to Boyers user page, but to a copy of the last Boyer article (say, the last one about the surrealist Boyer) in the namespace of "User:Daniel C. Boyer". I think even DCB sees that there is a difference between autobiography and wikipedia entry, and one of the last revisions of the article (before the last edit war started) could be a good entry. Also last time I put a disclaimer in front of the article, explaining why it is in user space and where it can be discussed. What do you think about such a procedure? -- till we *) 22:28, Aug 8, 2003 (UTC)
Mav, could you take a look at Roman Catholic sex abuse allegations. I took a look at the article tonight and thought (as I had the first time I looked at it) that it was probably the worst written, monumentally inaccurate and extraordinarily POV article on wiki. For some reason the urge took me to rewrite it. I went through the original article to find things to salvage but I think 3 lines are most were passably NPOV (or could be made so; the rest was so biased they were beyond salvage. Seven hours and 31K later I had written an entirely new article which, including the three lines and some of the old links, much extended. I'd welcome your observations on it. BTW I also renamed it. 'Catholic' could also mean Anglo-Catholic but the article was strictly confined to Roman Catholic so I changed that. The sex abuse cases don't just involve priests (but also nuns, brothers and lay workers in church organisations) so that word in the old title was misleading, and some are still before the courts or could not be prosecuted for time reasons, so allegations gave the scope to cover those cases as part of the broad issue. The old name was as agenda-laiden and POV as the contents. Happy 31K reading! lol FearÉIREANN 03:22, 9 Aug 2003 (UTC)
If you think that Ex-gay is worthy of being listed among the new pages, perhaps you can add it. I'll add some other new pages later. —Eloquence 10:36, Aug 9, 2003 (UTC)
You'd be proud of me. History of Brazil is now a completed series and no longer a whopping 66 K monster! 172 13:44, 9 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav, I put the following on the page debating changing the main page. I'd be interested to know your views, lol. FearÉIREANN 22:08, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Part of the problem with the front page is that we are trying to do too many things on it. Why not use it as a more graphically intensive disambigulation page? In other words, it doesn't try to cram in everything but should contain links which a new user can follow explaining what wiki is and how it works. For example;
The front page should contain
Please see my response on meta:User talk:Brion VIBBER. -- Brion 00:03, 11 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav, Since you've taken an interest in the Recall, I've put an item of probable interest at Talk:2003 California recall-- Someone else 07:54, 11 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Hitchcock's birthday today. Koyaanis Qatsi 07:45, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)
I wasn't mentioned in you comments on the VFD page. What, you don't respect my opinions? 172 22:16, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)
It said "in general." To me, this meant "not just anybody." マイカル (MB) 22:50, Aug 13, 2003 (UTC)
Mav, your comments on the debate on Temp5 were grossly unfair. We have been voting for ages on temps, and all the votes were so ambiguous and unclear at the end we knew as little about what people actually want as at the beginning. The vote on temp5 was a classic. 17 endorsed it. 19 said no but in a way which could be interpreted as saying 'we want something else, just not this.' 8 unambiguously endorsed the current main page. All that produced was the likelihood of Martin producing another temp and another until people got fed up voting them down and a small hardcore remained, voted through one by default and his decision, with only a clique behind it, would be adopted.
All I did was to organise a proper professional vote, to give people the simple option of deciding do they want to keep the current front page or replace it, if replace it, when and with what. If those elementary questions had been asked in the first place, we would have been spared weeks of pointless voting that failed to clarify what do people actually want. And we will be spared endless hit and miss Temp votes in the future. I would have thought you of all people would have recognised the use of finally ending this pointless re-voting on new temps. There is every likelihood that people might either decide to keep your design, or adapt it slightly. For you to tell the community that they cannot vote to decide what they want, but most go through the endless charade of voting down what they don't want, I find astonishing. And BTW I am now getting emails from people who agree that this is the vote that should have been taken in the first place but who cannot vote because the link to the vote on the Recent Changes has been removed and they can't find the page to cast their vote. I've relisted it on the Recent Changes. FearÉIREANN 00:00, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)
I have had FOUR emails, 2 AIM messages and 1 message on my talk page. How they choose to express their views is none of your business. I don't know any of the email senders so it is quite possible that they are newbies who when Martin took the message of Recent Pages didn't know where to go to express their views. But since you don't believe me see User talk:jtdirl. I'm emailing you one of the emails. What has come over you all of a sudden, Mav? You are normally the one who works with people, not acting like an bossy teacher with a toothache. I've never seen you show such contempt for everyone who doesn't do what you want. FearÉIREANN 19:13, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav, in my time on wiki I am contantly finding debates where one person calls a vote unilaterally; Eloquence has called at least one vote. Martin has called votes. No-one ever questioned their right to do so. I was the one who tried to sort out the farce that was Martin's vote on Temp5; suggested that the vote be widely heralded so people knew about it, suggested that a clear date for the end of vote be stated, suggested a methodology for calculating the result, pointed procedural flaws in the vote, reverted unilateral attempts by two users to decolourise the page. I have seen plenty of votes on wiki, almost call called by one or two people, and not a single one was described as invalid. And I have not seen a single vote where more efforts have been made to contact people. I left messages on the pages of most of the the people who had showed an interest in the topic and had a draft letter to go onto the wiki list when a computer crash wiped it out. And plenty of people have come to express opinions even after Martin removed the Recent Pages link twice. Your attitude seems bizarre in the circumstances. I expect in the interests of consistency you will now go to the vast majority of votes that have taken place and which were called by one person, and retrospectively declare all of them null and void. If you don't, then there can be no question of claiming the Main page vote is invalid, without looking ridiculously inconsistent. FearÉIREANN 20:27, 15 Aug 2003 (UTC)
O great wise guru of Mount Wikipedia, I need your advice. :-)
As I am now starting to do national selections on the Eurovision entries (see: United Kingdom in the Eurovision Song Contest 1967) I will come into some difficulties with earlier years, as alot of information is either not known, not annouced, lack of information or just lost in time never to be known again. anyway more to the point, what do you think I should do when a blank piece of information comes up for example:
The UK in 1957 had 3 semi finals, alot of the song titles are unknown but it is known who sung in each semifinal. Do you think in the table I should leave it blank, put a "?". -fonzy
Let me simplify this whole dispute. If my sysop status is revoked that will be tantamount to banning. I promise that I will not continue editing in disgrace. If you people would rather deal with Nostrum than someone of my qualifications, it's the community's loss. I'll just devote this time to efforts that would be far more constructive and appreciated. I tend to edit and write articles while doing other work. This just spares me from a wrenching distraction. 172 05:36, 15 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Aside from the comment on MBs page, which was solely and appropriately retaliatory and reciprocated by his actions, where's your evidence of me going into the "gray area?" It sounds like total, unsubstantiated suspicions. It also sounds like you read a bunch of one-sided wining complaints about me not being nice enough to that poor newbie vandal without even analyzing this situation objectively. I expected much more out of you.
BTW, user Zog, that hard-banned racist vandal, just made a comeback as User:ZOG. I caught him right away and banned him after he exposed his IP. He hasn't come back, so I'm getting reassured that it isn't one of those shifting AOL IPs. Crisis averted. He's not going to fill up ban pages, vandalism in progress pages, and the mailing list again with complaints because I just acted quickly. You and others should appreciate that I chose to avert vandalism rather than encourage vandals.
However, in the spirit of unsubstantiated suspicions, with which I've been thoroughly victimized, I think that MB might have some sort of strange affinity with Nostrum's POV, prompting him to attack me for articulating the case for his ban. It's also possible that he's getting back at me for criticizing him for the way he dealt with Paektu, another vandal. Nostrum and MB just drummed up all these charges and other users are repeating them. What exactly did I do other than propose Nostrum's banning, which so far has been supported by more users than those who oppose it? Nostrum and MB are attacking me personally, and it seems like there's now an avalanche of criticism by users who haven't worked with me much and aren't really aware of the Nostrum controversy. 172 07:40, 15 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Pietro Carnesecci appears to be a mis-spelling - Google has no hits for that name, and tons for Pietro Carnesecchi. I didn't move or touch the page (other than to fix a mistake in the identiy of Pope Clement), because I am very touchy about renaming anything now. The only wrong spelling in the page itself is the one at the very start. I'm mentioning this to you because you're the only person who's worked on the page; I'd suggest moving it, fixing the pointed on the Carnesecchi, and then deleting the Pietro Carnesecci forward. Noel 21:12, 15 Aug 2003 (UTC)
You didn't answer my question, Mav! Is it because it showed the inconsistency in your stance? FearÉIREANN 00:32, 16 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Yeah man, The Panama City and Asuncion were listed in the August 15 Anniversary page, so I thought it'd be acceptable. I'll have to update those articles. Poor Yorick 01:10, 16 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Hey Mav, I have big news: I turns out that MB, who has been leading the attempts to revoke my sysop status, has been a personal friend of Nostrum all along. Weeks ago, I was invited to protect Catholicism from an ongoing edit war and POV vandalism. Uninvolved in the editing of the article and having received an invitation, I acted in good faith to protect the page; yet, my reputation hasn't recovered since. Now it seems that the coordinated attacks on my 'abusiveness,' promulgated by MB and Nostrum, and rehashed by other concerned users, was bogus all along. Allegations can be self-perpetuating, you know. You hear allegations and that clouds the thinking of even the far-minded.
The most serious charges against me have been the protection of the Catholicism article from Nostrum and my attempts yesterday to urge a ban on Nostrum. But my reactions to Nostrum were no different from past reactions to other users guily of adding absurd POV rants, such as Zog months ago and JoeM days ago. JoeM, for instance, was subject to auto-revert with less of a hearing than Nostrum ever got. I think that MB owes me an apology and the controversy over my sysop status needs to be seriously reconsidered in light of the revelations of this severe conflict of interests. I don't think that months of substantial contributions by a professional academic should be overshadowed by a kid who was protecting his vandal buddy all along. 172 01:11, 16 Aug 2003 (UTC)
re US, yes, unless it's obvious (like all the delta blues singers). Jim
Hi Mav, I was just bringing order to Wikipedia:Brilliant pictures visible, great picture you have there! ;-) Fantasy 11:12, 16 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav:
Do you want to know why I'm frequently involved in edit wars? It's because I've been working on history articles and articles dealing with contemporary politics. That's it. These are inherently contentious fields. Anyone trying to maintain proper encyclopedic standards will be dealing with partisans. That's why JT and I stand out as users frequently involved in edit wars. According to your profile, your fields of expertise are biological sciences and geological sciences. Had I been capable of contributing to these articles, which I am not, I would fade into the background and my reputation would fit my actual personal characteristics. I'm actually quite mild-mannered and quite polite. In the real world I'm not regarded as a "bull."
JT has been involved in edit wars too. And if you took the charges against him seriously you would regard him as an apologist for the Roman Catholic Church, a Communist historical revisionist, an anti-Semite, a hardline Likid partisan, a Brit-loving Irish-hating Tory, an ultra-nationalistic IRA sympathizer, a staunch Australian Republican, and a monarchist. I am merely one of the most active contributors who solely focus on history, contemporary politics, and social sciences. Please, take into consideration the plight of contributors who deal with contentious subjects. From time to time we're going to run into grotesque violations of POV, factually inaccurate rants, and uncompromising partisans.
In fact, Tannin was one of the best contributors to the history articles until he started focusing on completely different topics when he realized how bitter and contentious the disputes with ranting partisans could get. Please, quit castigating me as someone looking for trouble. A historian is going to get trouble whether he likes it or not around here. 172 16:26, 16 Aug 2003 (UTC)
When RK comes back I want to nominate him for sysop (again) I dont ask for much, but I ask that you support his nomination. Sincerely- 戴眩sv 23:06, Aug 16, 2003 (UTC)
Trust me. Consider that responsibility brings its own rewards. Gotta run -- campaigning. - 戴眩sv 23:18, Aug 16, 2003 (UTC)
Sorry for missing that guideline. I read it before it was updated mid-July. However, I don't understand why it needs to have a notice as well? This makes a lot more work. You need to list it, add the note, then remove the note if it is not to be deleted as oppsosed to simply listing it. Surely whoever is removing it from VfD should delete it there and then, which means there is no need for a note. Angela
Thanks Mav:
Although, you may delete all the images that I uploaded at the beginning. I don't mind; I've discontinued uploading because of all the hindrances. I've focused on just researching and writing for the timeline of video games and other articles.
As for the name election, I've discontinued with that too. Although the proposal is ethically just, Angela is also correct in that the organization currently just does not have the software and technical support to ensure that an election and vote by all Users are done properly (since they can cast multiple votes per multiple User names or IP addresses). Also understanding that this is a non-profit organization, the site has a much more prioritized agenda to do with the allocated funding than to pursue this topic further. Perhaps in future it may become viable. Although if the administrators are interested in how creative the community can be, there can be just a name competition, with only the administrators as judges.
I am concerned on how the Logo election is going to be handled since the same issues are present in this as well (all Users are able to cast multiple votes, as mentioned above).
Continue to make this website better, you guys rock.
Thanks again,
Tonius 01:26|2003.08.16
Hello Maveric149 -
Thanks for the reminder about VfD notification re Guts. I appreciate your being diligent in spotting apparent errors. Here, the story is a bit different. I actually did include the VfD notice (in the correct wording, no less). Shortly afterwards, the article I had VfD'd was renamed Guts (anime) and a new article - with no history - was created with the previously used name Guts. Perhaps you could suggest to User:ZeWrestler a better way to handle this sort of aituation. Aug 17 User:NuclearWinner
I posted this at Wikipedia talk:Sites that use Wikipedia for content but you didn't respond, so I am posting it here:
I would like some feedback before purposing this on the mailing lists. Thanks. (Please post replies to my talk page) MB 18:02, Aug 8, 2003 (UTC)
Thanks Mav. You're right, it does make it look amateurish. I guess I just wanted an immediate response. I just thought that overstating the truth in the holocaust article would have been just as damaging as being in denial of the holocaust. I was just in a hurry to fix the problem. But thank you for being candid, and I will no longer write those types of comments but in the talk pages. Nostrum 08:18, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Still plugging away at it, are you? Koyaanis Qatsi 23:27, 17 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Mav, we already had an article on Gold Standard. That's why the page was redirected. 172 05:37, 18 Aug 2003 (UTC)
In case you didn't spot it, Billbell has made a comment on the Village pump which appears to be regarding the changes you made to various date pages. Angela 13:22, 18 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Hi Mav
I've been looking for statistics and possibly graphs about the rise of Wikipedia. I thought I'd seen some earlier. Could they be put in the FAQs for example - perhaps start up a new Development FAQ? Not sure if it's appropriate, but there could also be info about Wiktionary - my guess is that that's going much slower. When I last checked there seemed to be around 130,000 articles. A few other obvious questions include:
I'm currently looking at Open Source systems, and Wikipedia must still be one of the largest in terms of info. It'd be interesting to see the facts and figures as it goes.
Enough to be going on with I think. -- David Martland 13:25, 18 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Hope this helps and sorry for the late reply. --mav
Hello again Mav, my friend (if i can call you friend :-s). I don't suppose you have any suggestions for: Wikipedia:WikiProject Clouds (or any pictures). -fonzy
OK :-).
I'm sure this will cause you to roll on the ground giggling: check out Talk:Sharaku. Noel 04:36, 20 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Hi Mav,
It was already some weeks ago, but i nevertheless wanted to thank you for the support in my application for Adminship. I will try to do my best to make the people know that Admins are here to help. If you ever see me doing someting, that you think, an Admin should not do, let me know immediately. I look forward to a long time of good collaboration (for humankind ;-)
Thank you very much, Fantasy 08:30, 20 Aug 2003 (UTC)
PS: Hope to see you back soon with "full power" ;-)
Hi Mav,
I asked a question on the Wikipedia talk:Nupedia_and_Wikipedia about whether articles-in-progress on Nupedia qualify under the GFDL, or are they like the Nupedia "Chalkboard". I also asked at the Wikipedia:Village pump but I got no response (the question has since been moved to the Village pump archives). Some of these articles have been languishing since 2001 and it would be nice if it were possible to use some of them as a basis for articles (or at least good stubs) right now. I searched the Nupedia website, mailing lists, history etc. and there appears no mention whatsoever of the copyright or licensing status of the articles-in-progress on Nupedia. I was hoping that you might have some insight. Thanks. -- Lexor 02:21, 26 Aug 2003 (UTC)
I think Project Sourceburg should still be set up, and on it we can place lots of pointless data, documents etc. Documents like constituions which can be linked form Wikipedia. Data like weather data for the past 100 years (or something) this will nto be useful to the average man, but for someoen doing reserach on weather paterns it will be. It just needs more man power and for people to go get the data and put it in, the licenseing will probably be different. I know your busy at the moment so don;t expect a reply yet but what do you think of trying to get it up and running as at teh moment its quite dormant. - fonzy
that was quite funny to see you removing the software patent link from the main page for not being relevant. On the french wiki, the debate is raging because some want to put a big banner "Wikipédia supports free software" across the main page (I am hardly joking) or even replace the main page with a huge free-software supporting message. Curious he ? Anthère
We have quite few. In cars more and more often, but not in appartments or houses. The climate is temperate enough that we would need air conditionners only a couple of days a year. In truth, it was damn hot, but bearable to someone in good health. I have been living in AZ; over there, that is necessary. Not in France.
What happen is that old people loose the capability to realise they are losing their fluids too quickly. They don't drink enough, because they don't feel thirsty and after a few days, excretion is impaired, wastes accumulate, and body metabolism works bad, and have trouble to evacuate the heat. Solution is to drink more of course, and wet yourself to lower temperature. That is what we moms do with the kids over 40. But it seems that what is obvious to a mom toward her child is no more obvious to an old man or woman, and not even obvious to the adult children taking care of elders.
About a week after it got pretty hot, many old and diseased started feeling wrong (my father in law did so, we fed him only soups and yogurts for a few days), and then real bad. There were some incredible cases of people calling the medics for their old parents, and the doctors finding an old person just over 40°C and nothing special had been done to lower the heat at all and to rehydrate them.
In retirement houses, there were less workers than usual, because it is holiday times, so not enough people trying to make them drink, keep quiet inside, close all windows, curtains and such and wait for the evening to move again. And not enough to give them bath to cool down the body.
So, when all these people got real sick about 1 week after it started, they all got to the hospital at the same time, and then, it was sometimes too late or there was perhaps not enough people to assume the work to save them. There were not enough time and place to bury them. Too numerous.
On top of this, because of the heat, many cities had awfully high ozon pollution levels, which didnot help. My son being a heavy asthma sufferer was challenged. In some cities, strong speed limits were set, sometimes people respected them. Others didnot give a damn. Add the numerous fires (hence smoke), some of them just around cities, most due to human stupidity (lighted on purpose). Add the very unusually dry spring and summer on top of it, with many animals dying, no right to use water for anything else than home stuff in many department (hence, most gardens were yellow and dry, instead of perphaps providing a welcome shade)
Did I also mentionned that we nearly stopped our nuclear facilities providing the necessary electricity to make the air conditionner work because of the water level too low in rivers to properly lower the plant reactor temperature, and that many fishes died from the high water temperature in particular since the plants were exceptionally allowed to release water at higher temperature than usual ?
It is kinda easy to accuse the governement. Yes, it should have reacted sooner when the first unusual deaths occured.
But, in truth, this is just the result of the fact we don't know how to listen to our bodies and to react intelligently to the outside conditions. We wait for the government to tell us "be careful, it is hot outside, here is what you should do, and not do" instead of taking proper decisions by ourselves. And yes, some rely on technology to solve the issue.
If it's hot, stay inside. Don't move, keep quiet, close the window, drink a lot, take showers or sink in a lake, don't forget the babies, the kids, the sick, the elders. They can't take care of them themselves ? help them. Think of just helping. Just wait.
That is just what happened. Curious he ?. That made 11500 people died. Probably one being my husband god mother, over 90, in a retirement home in Paris.
I'll have a technical question about press releases btw, but I'll write privately :-)
Hi Mav. I don't have access to email, so I'm not up to date on the discussioon about wikibooks. But I've had an idea. Does wikibooks aim to produce discrete textbooks, or textbook-type articles? If the former, do we have one wiki per book, or many books in the single english wiki? If one wiki holds several "books", why not have have books in diffferent languages coexisting? We can split them apart later, or we could look into ways of making the user interface language a user-set option. Just a thought -- it would certainly solve the current problem :) -- Tarquin 20:26, 30 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Can you answer my questions/comments on Talk:Main Page regarding the listing of births and deaths? If we're going to list each event once a year, what's stopping us from listing someone's birth once a year? -- Jiang 05:07, 31 Aug 2003 (UTC)