This page contains discussions that have been archived from Village pump (policy). Please do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to revive any of these discussions, either start a new thread or use the talk page associated with that topic.
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Just wondering if there was anything out there, perhaps MOS, that discouraged the linking of units of height or weight in infoboxes. Londo 06 14:55, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
You may want to join in the discussion at the Village Pump (proposals) about eliminating duplicated content from Wikipedia. This topic started in the talk page of the Summary style article. Emmanuelm ( talk) 19:02, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
Silly Rabbit,
I was the first one to make a refining change to the article. I would appreciate it if you would adjudicate the user WLU, who has reached the three revert limit. 208.188.2.101 ( talk) 14:38, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
Today, I was reading an article on policies that affect the current US economic situation in New York Times and I browsed through the reader comments made in response to these proposals. Many of the recommendations in the comments were also quite valid and interesting. After thinking about it, I thought, "What if Wikipedia started a 'Wiki Policy', where anyone could propose solutions to a current issue in the US? Then as people read these policies, they could point out flaws and solutions to these policies and propose "amendments" under the original policy. People can then vote for the most appealing amendments, and the amendment with the most votes could be modified and added into the original policy. The new, revised policy then becomes open for critique afterwards. After all, the best policies result from mutual collaboration, and no collaborative tool is better than Wikipedia. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 136.152.148.113 ( talk) 22:37, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
There's an argument at talk:Futurology over what that article should be called, and whether the policy WP:NAMING applies. Your opinion there would be appreciated. The Transhumanist 03:42, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
Is it necessary to put such a statement as "The historicity of <Book of Mormon person's name> is not generally accepted by non-Mormon historians or archaeologists" on every single page for individuals from the Book of Mormon narrative? Such a statement was added to a few pages some months ago, though to much disagreement. Now another editor has taken to including on all the other pages. In my opinion, such a statements comes off as needlessly and subtly POV. It should be sufficient for NPOV to simply state "According to the Book of Mormon..." or something similar at the start, as is done on such pages for biblical characters from Genesis and the Exodus, both which describe equally historically questionable events. I'm not against having such a statement on the Nephite or Lamanite page since the opinion of the historians and archaeologists is usually in direct relation to those groups, but putting something like this on Enos (Book of Mormon) seems overdoing it. Since this covers such a broad number of articles, and has implication on pages relating to individuals mentioned in other religious texts, I was hoping to see what the larger community thought. So, thoughts and directions on what policy would dictate? -- FyzixFighter ( talk) 06:25, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
Would there be any support for getting rid of the maintenance categories (things like "Articles with unsourced statements from...")? These get mixed in with the pertinent categories at the bottom of articles and make it more difficult for ordinary users to find the categories which are likely to be of use to them. They seem unnecessary anyway, since "What links here" (from the relevant template page) can be used instead.
This proposal has also been raised at
Wikipedia talk:Categorization#Maintenance categories (with nosome opposition so far).--
Kotniski (
talk) 15:06, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
There is disagreement on how to apply WP:Categorization of people when it concerns living people and religion. Please participate in the discussion here. Karanacs ( talk) 18:26, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
Within the last couple of days a specific "soft redirect" was placed for AFD discussion. In the middle of the discussion the redirect was A3 speedy deleted. I have strong feelings that this is not a proper A3 speedy, and have contacted the deleting admin about this before possibly taking the A3 to WP:DRV. But the wider issue of soft redirects, and how to handle them, remains. Do see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Omglolwtfbbq for some of my earlier comments on the situation.
There are currently over 1200 soft redirects on the project. Most are to Wiktionary, but a number are to other projects.
The key questions that I see coming out of the AFD/speedy situation are:
I'm not here to DRV argue the case of Omglolwtfbbq, but to start discussion on the larger issues of all the soft redirects in general, and how they should be handled. - TexasAndroid ( talk) 18:44, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
I would like to address the subject of the copyright status of movie and television studio portraits of actors. By these, I mean photographs meant to publicize the actor as a personality, and not still photos taken in costume or in character on the set of a particular production. The kind of photos studios and television networks would send out to newspapers and magazines to publicize the actor.
Wikipedia currently has a policy of almost never allowing the use of these images, out of the belief that they are under copyright. And so, Wikipedia editors must resort to using low quality screen captures of the actors from movie trailers that are not under copyright, or screen captures from public domain motion pictures the actors may have appeared in. Because of this over caution, many articles on actors are left without any photo at all.
As a law student going into the specialty of intellectual property, and as someone who formerly worked in the industry, I am very familiar with materials and the issues involved. And that is why I can state this was some confidence: the U.S. copyrights of studio and network issued publicity photographs published before 1964 were virtually never renewed after their first 28-year term. I have never found one instance of a copyright renewal for a pre-1964 studio or network publicity photograph in the online U.S. Copyright Catalog. This online catalog contains all renewals made from 1978 forward, hence it would contain the renewal (if it was made) of any work originally published from 1950 to 1963. (For works first published from 1964 through 1977, copyright renewal was automatic; works first published from 1978 onward are given one continuous term of copyright.)
If virtually no renewals exist for studio portrait photos first published 1950-1963, it is just as unlikely that any renewals exist for studio portrait photos first published 1923-1949.
I can perhaps understand Wikipedia's reluctance to consider still photos from motion pictures and television shows to be in the public domain, because even if the still photo itself was not under its own copyright, it may have a derivative copyright from the film or television program it depicts. But in the case of a studio portrait of an actor, not depicting any particular production, there can be no such derivative copyright. The portrait photo stands on its own.
Can it be stated with confidence that the copyright on a studio portrait photo has never been renewed? No, which is why I say "virtually never". It is always possible that a handful of the copyrights, out of thousands, have been renewed. But the vast majority have not. Thus it is a shame to let a valuable source of public domain images go by unused out of a fear of copyright infringement, a fear not justified by the facts.
Proposed: that studio and television network issued portrait photos of actors published before 1964 be considered, by default, out of copyright and permissible for the use of illustrating the actor in articles.
I welcome any discussion. — Walloon ( talk) 23:24, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
We already have a clearly established ethos that Wikipedia should avoid systemic bias such as US-centrism, westernism, anglophonism, etc; and we have cleanup templates ({{
globalise}}
, etc) and a WikiProject (
WikiProject Countering systemic bias) to deal with it, yet there is no specific guideline I can see that actually enshrines this widely accepted rule. Does anyone want to help write
Wikipedia:Avoid systemic bias as a potential guideline to fill this gap? I know that
WP:CREEP will be invoked, but I don't really see why: this is in many respects merely tidying-up around a rule which is already accepted as a guideline, not an attempt to create new policy or extend existing ones. It's already argued as a guideline, it already has its own shortcut (
WP:BIAS, which currently redirects to the WikiProject), and yet there is always going to be someone who extends the "it's only an essay" argument one step further and say "it's only a WikiProject, who cares?". I don't think it will be a controversial guideline proposal, and if it makes administrating the project easier, why not? Commments?
Happy‑
melon 21:11, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
I'd like to get some outside comment on Trivia section removals. I'm not a fan of trivia sections, but believe that generally they should not be indiscriminately deleted/blanked. Either work to incorporate information into the article as possible or leave it be (so someone else will). A new user (started 04 Feb as I can tell), WillOakland, has gone on a spree of deleting every trivia section he finds. I have discussed it with him on his talk page and encouraged him to work to improve articles through incorporation rather than simply deleting content, but he doesn't feel the need to not be unilaterally removing content in such a way. Am I too sensitive about it? Again, I do not like trivia sections, but I think this is just the wholly wrong way to go about the issue, and there is absolutely no policy prohibitin them. I'd appreciate outside observations, thoughts, and experiences. Feel free to bring it to my talk page to prevent this section/page from growing unmanagable big. Thanks! VigilancePrime ( talk) 08:19, 15 February 2008 (UTC) :-)
I am trying to resolve the removal of an external link. I run a website for the actors Joe, Paul, Mark and Stephen McGann and had an external link on each of their pages to the site (www.mcgannbrothers.org.uk). These links were recently removed but I believe under the terms of Wikipedia they were removed in error. The site I run is not a discussion or fan site, it is purely an information site run with the full knowledge and co-operation of the brothers. The site contains no advertising and I receive no money for or through it. To my mind, if people are interested enough to view the individual pages on Wikipedia they may like further information on current projects, which is where my site comes in. I would appreciate some feedback on this - I have, as advised by one of your editors, posted on each individual discussion page and on the blp page, without response. Thanks Micharris ( talk) 09:10, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Assessment ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs) has recently been edited to mark it as a guideline. This is an automated notice of the change. -- VeblenBot ( talk) 18:51, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:User talk page ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs) has recently been edited to mark it as a guideline. This is an automated notice of the change. -- VeblenBot ( talk) 18:51, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
See:
Otolemur crassicaudatus ( talk · contribs) believes he's on a cleanup crusade for userboxes, including ones that are already userfied. I'm trying to explain why they're generally acceptable, but it doesn't seem like I'm getting through to him. I pointed out WP:GUS and he told me he wanted to make a proposal to stop these kinds of userboxes, so I thought that was going to be the end of it. Then he nominated {{ User wikipedia}}. -- Ned Scott 09:09, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
I am almost afraid to ask a question, seeing as how I am new and don't really want to draw too much attention as yet.
I am wondering, since non-US postage stamps are not covered under US copyright law, if therefore a person's image on a stamp, from a third world country perhaps may be used as an illustration? EraserGirl ( talk) 16:41, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
thanks sometimes it takes a WHILE to find the right page, it seems there are an infinite number of wikipedia internal pages. EraserGirl ( talk) 22:10, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
Hi, I'm sure this topic has been covered before but I couldn't find anything related to it. So here is my proposal/question: Why is it not possible to anonymize a registered account? When I say anonymize I think of
The process would be for example: A user decides to disable his/her account, meaning that one is no longer able to contribute with this account (maybe with exception of the talk page). After 30 days or so the contributions of the account will be associated with an depersonalized/anonymous account (to avoid that vandals are able to hide their actions by instantly disabling their account after their work). As an alternative to ultimately anonymizing contribution, Wikipedia could just hide the contributor by storing the information in a non-public database. So the information would not be lost but would be inaccessible for the web.
Why am I proposing this? Because people make statements, in the real world they will eventually be forgotten - Wikipedia does not forget. Maybe someone made statements and does not want to be associated to it by e.g. his human resources superior. I know it's illegal to not hire someone based on his view on politics/whatever etc. etc. but this is definitely an issue. OK, someone can respond that one should have used a non-personalized username which can not be linked back to a person in the first place but I say: If someone actively contributes to Wikipedia e.g. over mailing lists/etc, most people will at some point give out their real names. Wikipedia should respect the wish for privacy. Views and characters change but Wikipedia does not forget - do we really want this? If this process should be implemented there is perhaps an open question regarding licensing. Who has the copyright of a text if the authors are all unknown or do not wish to be named? Or is this no problem at all because it's highly unlikely that all authors of an article do not wish to be named? I'm looking forward for your views on this topic. -- ReallyNobody ( talk) 12:45, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
:D
Happy‑
melon 15:31, 16 February 2008 (UTC)Hi, I have noticed that we have bots which are going around tagging hundreds of images for deletion because of their licensing/rationales etc, such as the Betacommond bot. I can't see anything wrong with this as policy is policy and fair enough, however how these rules are coming out may come across as aggressive and hard towards many users, I would like to propose some possible changes to how this works.
For instance images without licensing and proper rationales are tagged for deletion by the bots, however many of the images are uploaded by new users who do not understand the rationales, licensings, etc, and they get instantly nominated for deletion by the bots, the bots slapping a template warning on the users talk page. Often since they are new users the very first message they recieve is a notification that the image they have uploaded is up for deletion. They are not going to understand it is a template message, and may recieve it as harsh. The way this is done could come up as WP:BITE, and I think seven days is a bit too soon, often the users will upload the image and not edit again, so shouldn't we consider that the way this is carried out could be done be softened?
Some things to consider
1) Shouldn't we Increase the length of time the image is tagged for deletion for, 10 days maybe? and perhaps increase the publicity and teaching of these policies?
2) What happens if a fair use image is in an article and removed by a vandal which does it slyly on a small article which gets no attention, the image is therefore tagged for deletion for not being in the article and deleted by accident.
3) Shouldn't how to put a proper rationale on an image be simplier? because even if a rationale is there, betacommond bot will class it as "invalid" and have it up for deletion. Because for it to "leave the image" alone, it has to be a big complicated template
4) Shouldn't we make the bots deletion proposal less of a "threat", which is the manner it appears to carry out the edits and many a times betacommond will spam a talkpage with the same warning template intimidatingly.
5) Shouldn't the reasons why the bots tag the images for deletion be softer?
6) Has there been a wikiproject considered to sort out rationales, fair use and orphaned images?
7) should admins be allowed to run through them and delete them with bots, which such admins like User:Misza13 has been doing? AndreNatas ( talk) 15:56, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
Thank you. AndreNatas ( talk) 14:10, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
One of my ongoing gripes about Wikipedia is that while there are stated standards, these standards are frequently ignored. The guidelines governing NPOV, citations and notability may be strenuously enforced in regard to some entries while completely ignored in others.
I've just read, and provided discussion on, the entry American Patriot Party. The entry is obviously written by a partisan of the Patriot Party, it refers to no cited sources, and as a political party without recognition lacks notability yet it remains in place and without flags. Last night I read an entry about the Art Renewal Center which was flagged by an earnest SuperEditor as lacking notability.
While in two subject areas I note the difference in treatment, the ARC, the net's largest collection of online art, which has been referenced as a source by a number of Wiki contributors, lacks "notability", while some little political party operating out of a true-believer's basement is accorded unchallenged status.
My guess for the difference is that the SuperEditors are more likely to be intimidated by political kooks than by art critics.
If there are to be standards then let's see them universally applied, if not universally applied, then just let everybody write anything. LAWinans ( talk) 19:20, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
deletion, banning, locking, protecting... all censorship. The problem with all of the above is the amount of freedom provided to collaborators by the powers to be. The people locking, banning, deleting, etc are simply: 1. not perfect 1.1. not completely objective. 1.2. maybe with a hidden personall agenda Maybe putting an article against a government wouldnt be proper content and render the collaborator banned? Why not just ditch the 'proper content' thing. Maybe the person who locks articles is the most savvy and knowledgeable in the world? Why not simply put an official wikipedia page on that article and any subsequent edition just not being official. Who is to say what is notable and what is not? Archeologists treasure past-times trash mounds as an invaluable tool to unearth history. Vandalism? It happens. Just make a different version of each page. Or make a category called: vandalism and non-notable content. Banning and all of that is just a policy asking for trouble. Trouble being restricting knowledge. And what is an encyclopedia but a compendium of knowledge, ideally all knowledge? Verifiable? Like from the American Diabetes Association which for years said lowering blood sugar in diabetics prevents heart attacks and now finds out the complete opposite is true (GOOGLE IT)? Or what about the blasphemic thought that the earth is round? Very easy to find reputable references for the theory that the earth is not flat. Are rules good? Maybe, maybe not. But I would say -in principle- avoid messing with so many rules and just stick with advice. -- WonderingAngel-aesc78 ( talk) 16:19, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
Hi. Where can I find a discussion regarding audio samples like here and the involving copy right issues? -- Tantalos ( talk) 22:46, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
I've been watching and/or participating in various AfD discussions. Ostensibly, the results of these discussions are determined by some meaningful notion(s) of consensus. But I have repeatedly noticed that some closers are ignoring consensus in favor of their judgment of who has provided the best arguments, or even of for which side the best argument could be made. I don't know whether this same sort of thing is happening in CfD discussion and so forth, but I certainly can't rule that out.
I think that there needs to be either
— SlamDiego ←T 15:29, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
After this version of Economy of Ohio appeared at WP:FAC, discussion of a return to the previous long-standing wording at WP:FN and WP:CITE about footnote placement was initiated here. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 03:48, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
I would like to be able to share wikipedia articles on sies like facebook. Sites like these allow people to share articles from many news sources, and I consider Wikipedia articles to be article just like any other, though they are not always as timely.
Just my two cents. Thanks, Michael —Preceding unsigned comment added by Belgrade18 ( talk • contribs) 00:09, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
This page contains discussions that have been archived from Village pump (policy). Please do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to revive any of these discussions, either start a new thread or use the talk page associated with that topic.
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Just wondering if there was anything out there, perhaps MOS, that discouraged the linking of units of height or weight in infoboxes. Londo 06 14:55, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
You may want to join in the discussion at the Village Pump (proposals) about eliminating duplicated content from Wikipedia. This topic started in the talk page of the Summary style article. Emmanuelm ( talk) 19:02, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
Silly Rabbit,
I was the first one to make a refining change to the article. I would appreciate it if you would adjudicate the user WLU, who has reached the three revert limit. 208.188.2.101 ( talk) 14:38, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
Today, I was reading an article on policies that affect the current US economic situation in New York Times and I browsed through the reader comments made in response to these proposals. Many of the recommendations in the comments were also quite valid and interesting. After thinking about it, I thought, "What if Wikipedia started a 'Wiki Policy', where anyone could propose solutions to a current issue in the US? Then as people read these policies, they could point out flaws and solutions to these policies and propose "amendments" under the original policy. People can then vote for the most appealing amendments, and the amendment with the most votes could be modified and added into the original policy. The new, revised policy then becomes open for critique afterwards. After all, the best policies result from mutual collaboration, and no collaborative tool is better than Wikipedia. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 136.152.148.113 ( talk) 22:37, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
There's an argument at talk:Futurology over what that article should be called, and whether the policy WP:NAMING applies. Your opinion there would be appreciated. The Transhumanist 03:42, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
Is it necessary to put such a statement as "The historicity of <Book of Mormon person's name> is not generally accepted by non-Mormon historians or archaeologists" on every single page for individuals from the Book of Mormon narrative? Such a statement was added to a few pages some months ago, though to much disagreement. Now another editor has taken to including on all the other pages. In my opinion, such a statements comes off as needlessly and subtly POV. It should be sufficient for NPOV to simply state "According to the Book of Mormon..." or something similar at the start, as is done on such pages for biblical characters from Genesis and the Exodus, both which describe equally historically questionable events. I'm not against having such a statement on the Nephite or Lamanite page since the opinion of the historians and archaeologists is usually in direct relation to those groups, but putting something like this on Enos (Book of Mormon) seems overdoing it. Since this covers such a broad number of articles, and has implication on pages relating to individuals mentioned in other religious texts, I was hoping to see what the larger community thought. So, thoughts and directions on what policy would dictate? -- FyzixFighter ( talk) 06:25, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
Would there be any support for getting rid of the maintenance categories (things like "Articles with unsourced statements from...")? These get mixed in with the pertinent categories at the bottom of articles and make it more difficult for ordinary users to find the categories which are likely to be of use to them. They seem unnecessary anyway, since "What links here" (from the relevant template page) can be used instead.
This proposal has also been raised at
Wikipedia talk:Categorization#Maintenance categories (with nosome opposition so far).--
Kotniski (
talk) 15:06, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
There is disagreement on how to apply WP:Categorization of people when it concerns living people and religion. Please participate in the discussion here. Karanacs ( talk) 18:26, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
Within the last couple of days a specific "soft redirect" was placed for AFD discussion. In the middle of the discussion the redirect was A3 speedy deleted. I have strong feelings that this is not a proper A3 speedy, and have contacted the deleting admin about this before possibly taking the A3 to WP:DRV. But the wider issue of soft redirects, and how to handle them, remains. Do see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Omglolwtfbbq for some of my earlier comments on the situation.
There are currently over 1200 soft redirects on the project. Most are to Wiktionary, but a number are to other projects.
The key questions that I see coming out of the AFD/speedy situation are:
I'm not here to DRV argue the case of Omglolwtfbbq, but to start discussion on the larger issues of all the soft redirects in general, and how they should be handled. - TexasAndroid ( talk) 18:44, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
I would like to address the subject of the copyright status of movie and television studio portraits of actors. By these, I mean photographs meant to publicize the actor as a personality, and not still photos taken in costume or in character on the set of a particular production. The kind of photos studios and television networks would send out to newspapers and magazines to publicize the actor.
Wikipedia currently has a policy of almost never allowing the use of these images, out of the belief that they are under copyright. And so, Wikipedia editors must resort to using low quality screen captures of the actors from movie trailers that are not under copyright, or screen captures from public domain motion pictures the actors may have appeared in. Because of this over caution, many articles on actors are left without any photo at all.
As a law student going into the specialty of intellectual property, and as someone who formerly worked in the industry, I am very familiar with materials and the issues involved. And that is why I can state this was some confidence: the U.S. copyrights of studio and network issued publicity photographs published before 1964 were virtually never renewed after their first 28-year term. I have never found one instance of a copyright renewal for a pre-1964 studio or network publicity photograph in the online U.S. Copyright Catalog. This online catalog contains all renewals made from 1978 forward, hence it would contain the renewal (if it was made) of any work originally published from 1950 to 1963. (For works first published from 1964 through 1977, copyright renewal was automatic; works first published from 1978 onward are given one continuous term of copyright.)
If virtually no renewals exist for studio portrait photos first published 1950-1963, it is just as unlikely that any renewals exist for studio portrait photos first published 1923-1949.
I can perhaps understand Wikipedia's reluctance to consider still photos from motion pictures and television shows to be in the public domain, because even if the still photo itself was not under its own copyright, it may have a derivative copyright from the film or television program it depicts. But in the case of a studio portrait of an actor, not depicting any particular production, there can be no such derivative copyright. The portrait photo stands on its own.
Can it be stated with confidence that the copyright on a studio portrait photo has never been renewed? No, which is why I say "virtually never". It is always possible that a handful of the copyrights, out of thousands, have been renewed. But the vast majority have not. Thus it is a shame to let a valuable source of public domain images go by unused out of a fear of copyright infringement, a fear not justified by the facts.
Proposed: that studio and television network issued portrait photos of actors published before 1964 be considered, by default, out of copyright and permissible for the use of illustrating the actor in articles.
I welcome any discussion. — Walloon ( talk) 23:24, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
We already have a clearly established ethos that Wikipedia should avoid systemic bias such as US-centrism, westernism, anglophonism, etc; and we have cleanup templates ({{
globalise}}
, etc) and a WikiProject (
WikiProject Countering systemic bias) to deal with it, yet there is no specific guideline I can see that actually enshrines this widely accepted rule. Does anyone want to help write
Wikipedia:Avoid systemic bias as a potential guideline to fill this gap? I know that
WP:CREEP will be invoked, but I don't really see why: this is in many respects merely tidying-up around a rule which is already accepted as a guideline, not an attempt to create new policy or extend existing ones. It's already argued as a guideline, it already has its own shortcut (
WP:BIAS, which currently redirects to the WikiProject), and yet there is always going to be someone who extends the "it's only an essay" argument one step further and say "it's only a WikiProject, who cares?". I don't think it will be a controversial guideline proposal, and if it makes administrating the project easier, why not? Commments?
Happy‑
melon 21:11, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
I'd like to get some outside comment on Trivia section removals. I'm not a fan of trivia sections, but believe that generally they should not be indiscriminately deleted/blanked. Either work to incorporate information into the article as possible or leave it be (so someone else will). A new user (started 04 Feb as I can tell), WillOakland, has gone on a spree of deleting every trivia section he finds. I have discussed it with him on his talk page and encouraged him to work to improve articles through incorporation rather than simply deleting content, but he doesn't feel the need to not be unilaterally removing content in such a way. Am I too sensitive about it? Again, I do not like trivia sections, but I think this is just the wholly wrong way to go about the issue, and there is absolutely no policy prohibitin them. I'd appreciate outside observations, thoughts, and experiences. Feel free to bring it to my talk page to prevent this section/page from growing unmanagable big. Thanks! VigilancePrime ( talk) 08:19, 15 February 2008 (UTC) :-)
I am trying to resolve the removal of an external link. I run a website for the actors Joe, Paul, Mark and Stephen McGann and had an external link on each of their pages to the site (www.mcgannbrothers.org.uk). These links were recently removed but I believe under the terms of Wikipedia they were removed in error. The site I run is not a discussion or fan site, it is purely an information site run with the full knowledge and co-operation of the brothers. The site contains no advertising and I receive no money for or through it. To my mind, if people are interested enough to view the individual pages on Wikipedia they may like further information on current projects, which is where my site comes in. I would appreciate some feedback on this - I have, as advised by one of your editors, posted on each individual discussion page and on the blp page, without response. Thanks Micharris ( talk) 09:10, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Assessment ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs) has recently been edited to mark it as a guideline. This is an automated notice of the change. -- VeblenBot ( talk) 18:51, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:User talk page ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs) has recently been edited to mark it as a guideline. This is an automated notice of the change. -- VeblenBot ( talk) 18:51, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
See:
Otolemur crassicaudatus ( talk · contribs) believes he's on a cleanup crusade for userboxes, including ones that are already userfied. I'm trying to explain why they're generally acceptable, but it doesn't seem like I'm getting through to him. I pointed out WP:GUS and he told me he wanted to make a proposal to stop these kinds of userboxes, so I thought that was going to be the end of it. Then he nominated {{ User wikipedia}}. -- Ned Scott 09:09, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
I am almost afraid to ask a question, seeing as how I am new and don't really want to draw too much attention as yet.
I am wondering, since non-US postage stamps are not covered under US copyright law, if therefore a person's image on a stamp, from a third world country perhaps may be used as an illustration? EraserGirl ( talk) 16:41, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
thanks sometimes it takes a WHILE to find the right page, it seems there are an infinite number of wikipedia internal pages. EraserGirl ( talk) 22:10, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
Hi, I'm sure this topic has been covered before but I couldn't find anything related to it. So here is my proposal/question: Why is it not possible to anonymize a registered account? When I say anonymize I think of
The process would be for example: A user decides to disable his/her account, meaning that one is no longer able to contribute with this account (maybe with exception of the talk page). After 30 days or so the contributions of the account will be associated with an depersonalized/anonymous account (to avoid that vandals are able to hide their actions by instantly disabling their account after their work). As an alternative to ultimately anonymizing contribution, Wikipedia could just hide the contributor by storing the information in a non-public database. So the information would not be lost but would be inaccessible for the web.
Why am I proposing this? Because people make statements, in the real world they will eventually be forgotten - Wikipedia does not forget. Maybe someone made statements and does not want to be associated to it by e.g. his human resources superior. I know it's illegal to not hire someone based on his view on politics/whatever etc. etc. but this is definitely an issue. OK, someone can respond that one should have used a non-personalized username which can not be linked back to a person in the first place but I say: If someone actively contributes to Wikipedia e.g. over mailing lists/etc, most people will at some point give out their real names. Wikipedia should respect the wish for privacy. Views and characters change but Wikipedia does not forget - do we really want this? If this process should be implemented there is perhaps an open question regarding licensing. Who has the copyright of a text if the authors are all unknown or do not wish to be named? Or is this no problem at all because it's highly unlikely that all authors of an article do not wish to be named? I'm looking forward for your views on this topic. -- ReallyNobody ( talk) 12:45, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
:D
Happy‑
melon 15:31, 16 February 2008 (UTC)Hi, I have noticed that we have bots which are going around tagging hundreds of images for deletion because of their licensing/rationales etc, such as the Betacommond bot. I can't see anything wrong with this as policy is policy and fair enough, however how these rules are coming out may come across as aggressive and hard towards many users, I would like to propose some possible changes to how this works.
For instance images without licensing and proper rationales are tagged for deletion by the bots, however many of the images are uploaded by new users who do not understand the rationales, licensings, etc, and they get instantly nominated for deletion by the bots, the bots slapping a template warning on the users talk page. Often since they are new users the very first message they recieve is a notification that the image they have uploaded is up for deletion. They are not going to understand it is a template message, and may recieve it as harsh. The way this is done could come up as WP:BITE, and I think seven days is a bit too soon, often the users will upload the image and not edit again, so shouldn't we consider that the way this is carried out could be done be softened?
Some things to consider
1) Shouldn't we Increase the length of time the image is tagged for deletion for, 10 days maybe? and perhaps increase the publicity and teaching of these policies?
2) What happens if a fair use image is in an article and removed by a vandal which does it slyly on a small article which gets no attention, the image is therefore tagged for deletion for not being in the article and deleted by accident.
3) Shouldn't how to put a proper rationale on an image be simplier? because even if a rationale is there, betacommond bot will class it as "invalid" and have it up for deletion. Because for it to "leave the image" alone, it has to be a big complicated template
4) Shouldn't we make the bots deletion proposal less of a "threat", which is the manner it appears to carry out the edits and many a times betacommond will spam a talkpage with the same warning template intimidatingly.
5) Shouldn't the reasons why the bots tag the images for deletion be softer?
6) Has there been a wikiproject considered to sort out rationales, fair use and orphaned images?
7) should admins be allowed to run through them and delete them with bots, which such admins like User:Misza13 has been doing? AndreNatas ( talk) 15:56, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
Thank you. AndreNatas ( talk) 14:10, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
One of my ongoing gripes about Wikipedia is that while there are stated standards, these standards are frequently ignored. The guidelines governing NPOV, citations and notability may be strenuously enforced in regard to some entries while completely ignored in others.
I've just read, and provided discussion on, the entry American Patriot Party. The entry is obviously written by a partisan of the Patriot Party, it refers to no cited sources, and as a political party without recognition lacks notability yet it remains in place and without flags. Last night I read an entry about the Art Renewal Center which was flagged by an earnest SuperEditor as lacking notability.
While in two subject areas I note the difference in treatment, the ARC, the net's largest collection of online art, which has been referenced as a source by a number of Wiki contributors, lacks "notability", while some little political party operating out of a true-believer's basement is accorded unchallenged status.
My guess for the difference is that the SuperEditors are more likely to be intimidated by political kooks than by art critics.
If there are to be standards then let's see them universally applied, if not universally applied, then just let everybody write anything. LAWinans ( talk) 19:20, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
deletion, banning, locking, protecting... all censorship. The problem with all of the above is the amount of freedom provided to collaborators by the powers to be. The people locking, banning, deleting, etc are simply: 1. not perfect 1.1. not completely objective. 1.2. maybe with a hidden personall agenda Maybe putting an article against a government wouldnt be proper content and render the collaborator banned? Why not just ditch the 'proper content' thing. Maybe the person who locks articles is the most savvy and knowledgeable in the world? Why not simply put an official wikipedia page on that article and any subsequent edition just not being official. Who is to say what is notable and what is not? Archeologists treasure past-times trash mounds as an invaluable tool to unearth history. Vandalism? It happens. Just make a different version of each page. Or make a category called: vandalism and non-notable content. Banning and all of that is just a policy asking for trouble. Trouble being restricting knowledge. And what is an encyclopedia but a compendium of knowledge, ideally all knowledge? Verifiable? Like from the American Diabetes Association which for years said lowering blood sugar in diabetics prevents heart attacks and now finds out the complete opposite is true (GOOGLE IT)? Or what about the blasphemic thought that the earth is round? Very easy to find reputable references for the theory that the earth is not flat. Are rules good? Maybe, maybe not. But I would say -in principle- avoid messing with so many rules and just stick with advice. -- WonderingAngel-aesc78 ( talk) 16:19, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
Hi. Where can I find a discussion regarding audio samples like here and the involving copy right issues? -- Tantalos ( talk) 22:46, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
I've been watching and/or participating in various AfD discussions. Ostensibly, the results of these discussions are determined by some meaningful notion(s) of consensus. But I have repeatedly noticed that some closers are ignoring consensus in favor of their judgment of who has provided the best arguments, or even of for which side the best argument could be made. I don't know whether this same sort of thing is happening in CfD discussion and so forth, but I certainly can't rule that out.
I think that there needs to be either
— SlamDiego ←T 15:29, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
After this version of Economy of Ohio appeared at WP:FAC, discussion of a return to the previous long-standing wording at WP:FN and WP:CITE about footnote placement was initiated here. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 03:48, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
I would like to be able to share wikipedia articles on sies like facebook. Sites like these allow people to share articles from many news sources, and I consider Wikipedia articles to be article just like any other, though they are not always as timely.
Just my two cents. Thanks, Michael —Preceding unsigned comment added by Belgrade18 ( talk • contribs) 00:09, 19 February 2008 (UTC)