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Is there a policy that covers including information that the government might consider sensitive? See the reason provided for a recent change here. Vegaswikian ( talk) 19:40, 5 August 2008 (UTC)
Any claim that the information is sensitive is nonsense, given that it was all sourced to major reliable sources (as it should be) and therefore already publicly distributed. As long as we conform to WP:V and WP:OR, government secrecy or sensitivity is simply a non-issue. Postdlf ( talk) 20:16, 5 August 2008 (UTC)
The IP is way out of line. The so-called "sensitive information", well-known criteria that increase the chance of getting an SSSS on one's boarding pass, have been printed and reprinted in dozens of newspapers for years. Squidfryerchef ( talk) 20:22, 5 August 2008 (UTC)
Can somebody sort this out? It's used by valid articles such as grok but also as a cleanup category by {{ neologism}}. -- NE2 06:28, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
In many infoboxes, there's a section for citizenship. What should be inserted if the country that a person lived in changed? For instance Czechoslovakia split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia. As it absorbed more places, the Kingdom of England absorbed the Kingdom of Scotland and became the Kingdom of Great Britain which then absorbed the Kingdom of Ireland and became the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, until part of Ireland split off from it and that main body became the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland or United Kingdom for short. Should we put down the country that existed when the person was born, when they died, the largest period that they were alive? When a country splits or absorbs another country and a person's citizenship changes, do we need to wander through every article that has a likely citizenship marking and change it? Obviously, if someone has expressed a desire to be known as a particular nationality, we should follow that lead. A stalwart follower of William of Orange, for instance, probably would prefer their citizenship to be the Kingdom of Scotland and would probably turn over in their grave if we listed the UK. But what about the vast bulk of humanity? Personally, I think we should list citizenship according to what that area was called during the vast bulk of the person's life. Banaticus ( talk) 10:36, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
For the most part, this is an issue of common sense and I don't think an overarching rule is appropriate. If a person, such as Mr. Adams or Mr. Washington, has their notability entertwined with a specific country that they were a citizen of, that should probably be listed if there was a burning need to list something. It's not unusual for people to have held multiple citizenships during their lifetime anyway, so it doesn't seem to be one of those "quick and dirty factoids" that should go in an infobox in the first place. SDY ( talk) 14:53, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
Just a quick note to invite comment here on a proposal to create a new criterion for speedy deletion. The proposed criterion is that where an uploader has supplied a copyright tag but has specified a third party as the content owner, without any evidence that their permission was ever given, the media will be speedied seven days after the uploader is notified if no such permission is forthcoming. This is equivalent to the NPD process used at Commons, and parallel to our NSD and NLD. Please weigh in! -- Rlandmann ( talk) 21:02, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
...is being discussed here. I started the discussion out of the concern that such illustrations, which are necessarily speculative when based only on a fossil record, violate WP:OR, at least when no cites are provided to the reliable sources upon which the images are based. There seems to be a presumption in some of the comments that illustrations are categorically excluded from OR considerations, or that there's no difference between articles including speculative illustrations first published in a reliable source and speculative illustrations first published on Wikipedia. Postdlf ( talk) 01:45, 5 August 2008 (UTC)
I know that some K-12 institutions block pages like myspace. I was wondering if Wikipedia could also be blocked. I take that back. Blocked from editing, not viewing. This would prevent problems with multiple users discrediting an IP or IP range. Sometimes there are some legit edits while others people are just playing around. This would not exclude younger editors. They would simply have to edit elsewhere, preferably at home. Libro0 ( talk) 01:12, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
I agree, it would be a preventative measure given the higher potential at the elementary and middle school levels. Libro0 ( talk) 01:36, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
We can block schools. We have done so from time to time when there is a serious problem but we generaly avoid doing so for anything short of that (and we once got an apology for vandalism written on an actual typewriter from a schoolkid). Geni 02:11, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
We can and do block schools for periods of time, but we don't do it just because they're schools; in fact, we're more hesitant to block schools, seeing as they're, you know, schools, and only do it when it gets particularly bad. We do it because there has been a rash of vandalism from a specific range of IP address, and blocking that range of IP addresses is our last option. It doesn't have anything to do with them being a school; by your logic, we should also block workplaces, which suffer from similar problems. This is not 1984, we are not the thought police. We don't block people preemptively. We are the encyclopedia anyone can edit, and I don't see how your idea promotes that. In fact, it only contravenes it, as far as I can see. Celarnor Talk to me 12:35, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
Pages like myspace and facebook that don't really serve any educational value make sense to be blocked at a school, where you're there to learn. Editing an encyclopedia is quite the opposite; you can't get much more educational than that. There's no comparison between the two whatsoever. Celarnor Talk to me 12:42, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
Given recent issues over civility, I've started an RFC at Wikipedia_talk:Civility#Policy_or_guideline.3F. Comments are welcome. MBisanz talk 02:41, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
Hi, can anyone tell me when the current version of WP:N went into effect? I understand that the policy itself was rewritten some time last year and just want to know when exactly it ocurred.
S. Luke 23:46, 2 August 2008 (UTC)
Noob here. Hope I'm doing this right. Does this constitute libel or weasel words? From article: Antony Flew There was a short discussion between me and one other person over there that appears to have fizzled out.
"Journalist Mark Oppenheimer suggested that Flew, then 84 years of age at the time of Oppenheimer's statement, has been suffering from a mild form of senile dementia for at least three or four years.[6]"
The actual words "senile" and "dementia" don't occur anywhere in the article that I can find, though it may have been inferred. Thanks. Here is the article: [2] Rrand ( talk) 04:58, 6 August 2008 (UTC)
I've proposed that user and user talk pages should not be eligible for PROD. See WT:PROD#Prodding user pages -- Ned Scott 06:57, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
Hello, at Meta there is the project of a Manual to help new and small Wikipedias, and a set of Wikipedia pages and help pages every Wikipedia should have. I would like you to have a look and comment. Kind regards -- Ziko ( talk) 11:25, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
Hello, I am a recently registered user, although I edited as an IP for a few weeks. After all seeing a lot of the Wikipedia, I decided I am going to spend all my time on Wikipedia namespace stuff, like studying policy and procedures. I do not intend to do article work at all. DrugProblemm ( talk) 19:00, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
I am a very very fast learner, thank you. DrugProblemm ( talk) 23:53, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
There is a is now a Summary of statements from the Arbitration Committee RfC which had significantly more support than opposition. The summary clearly identifies suggested changes to the Arbitration Policy. And where further discussion is needed over the choice between some contradictory suggested changes. -- Barberio ( talk) 15:07, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
After seeing attempts to use WP:LOGOS to bypass the non-free content criteria, I have proposed a rewrite of the guideline. Comments are welcome on the guideline talk page. J Milburn ( talk) 14:19, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
There is a discussion as to whether {{ PROD}} should be allowed on User pages. Please comment at Wikipedia talk:Proposed deletion#Prodding user pages. ~ JohnnyMrNinja 16:37, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
The Commons Scope proposal now includes a suggestion, based on feedback so far, as to how Commons should handle Pdf and Djvu file types. Comments are welcome at Commons:Commons talk:Project scope/Proposal#Pdf and Djvu files. -- MichaelMaggs ( talk) 20:31, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
My attention was drawn to AN/I yesterday (due to a guest appearance) - and I noticed that another threat of violence had been made on wiki, was reported at AN/I and ultimately involved various authorities being contacted. I have noticed this occurring several times - and people seem to follow the exact approach outlined at this proposal.
The proposal does not require any editor to do anything, but simply offers what I consider to be good advice, and a concrete course of action if editors have unresolved concerns. It also has the benefit of accurately describing what is happening with regularity already. Is it time to mark this as policy? Privatemusings ( talk) 01:56, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
(This seems to me like the best place for this discussion, but feel free to let me know if it's more appropriate elsewhere. I'm still learning.) I have recently been removing flag icons from a number of lists of bands (for example, List of symphonic metal bands, List of progressive metal artists, List of power metal bands, and more) because I feel that they violated WP:FLAG. My arguments are mostly at Talk:List of black metal bands but I'll summarize them here:
A discussion at WP:FLAG ( in the archives here) seemed to indicate that they should not be used in lists of bands, but there weren't a large number of participants in that discussion. In any case, my edits have all been reverted (in a way that I feel almost borders on WP:OWN) and discussions on the Talk pages aren't going anywhere. I think it's in everyone's best interests to get a wider discussion going as to where flag icons are and aren't appropriate. Ideas? Wyatt Riot ( talk) 22:49, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
I work in the field of black metal, so, I will comment from that standpoint. In the genre of black metal, the origin of the band has a lot to do with the style of playing. For example, scandanavian metal sounds different from U.S. metal and Norwegian metal. (Compare Von to Dimmu Borgir and you might just see a difference) Now, the flags on the lists of music serve more than a decorative purpose, they tell you where the band is from. That information gives a brief detail of the playing style of that band. Here is a scenario. Little "Johnny" is looking for a band, but he has no clue of the name. He knows of wikipedia and he knows the style of playing and the origin of the band. He can look at the list for that genre, and associate the origin to the flag. He can then search for the band with a more limited area. It's not like we have obscure flags. (We don't have any micronation flags) The flags serve a purpose of informatio/education only. That does not violate the flag guidelines. Undeath ( talk) 04:30, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
Related to an earlier comment why flags maybe usefull. I tend to disagree the flag is the best suited symbol. For example in the Punkrock scene there were at one time three styles classified as "east coast" - "west coast" (Both USA) and "British" were dominant. How to distinguish between two very different USA subgenres using the flag? Furhtermore, international band tended to adopt these styles, for example the Dutch punkrock band Heideroosjes plays in a "west coast style" which you could not make out from the Dutch flag. So while there is some relation between nationality and subgenre; that maybe informative to some degree for the informed reader; it does not meet the requirement in WP:FLAG that Nationality is intimately tied to the topic. Arnoutf ( talk) 22:04, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
With the help of user:bstone, user:L'Aquatique, I've provided a re-write on WP:TOV as I feel this essay should most certainly be a guideline or policy. I've resubmitted it for policy, with three supports and no other interaction I'm not sure how to proceed...But I would like to see more community involvement. If the administrators check the history of the AN/I you'll see an incident just a few days ago, that clearly required attention to this as policy.
The original article is at WP:TOV and was previously denied as policy, L'Aqua, Bstone, and myself, are hoping the rewrite, will gain more consensus. I unfortunately have the feeling that because I am new, I'm being ignored for this sort of thing...I sincerely hope that's not the case, and that the Request for Feedback, will gain a positive result.
Thank you,
Neuro√
Logic 17:38, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
I think that TOV as a policy would be rejected, despite the clear logic and huge importance as keeping it as a policy. If we can settle on a guideline then let us do just that. It's absolutely horrifying that threats made by a psycho student of a high school which identify other students by name a targets for murder can be simply reverted and ignored. WP:RBI does not apply to such specific threats and anyone who thinks that this is the proper course of action is absolutely wrong. Just imagine for one moment if your daughter's name appeared on the article for her high school with a very specific statement that she will be murdered. Would you be perfectly content for Wikipedia editors and admins to simply revert and ignore this? Would you be more content if they reverted it but then put a note on AN/I asking/pleading for someone to report it? Or would you think the most appropriate course of action is for it to be reported, without delay, to the local police? Certainly option 1 is unconscionable and absolutely wrong by any measure. Two is perhaps the best we can ask for on Wiki. The third is the most appropriate and correct thing to do according to any sane, rational person. Anyone who passes off (and advocates passing off) these threats are simple vandalism ought to not get involved and find some article to write/edit. Bstone ( talk) 18:56, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Articles on elections ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs) has recently been edited to mark it as a guideline. This is an automated notice of the change ( more information). -- VeblenBot ( talk) 18:47, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
Dear Wikipedia (and wikipedians),
I don't see why there should be signatures of celebrity's (in particular political figures) on the wikipedia pages.
To begin:
I'm not asking that wikipedia should be placed under ANY censorship. However Wikipedia should remain to the point and be the best encyclopedia available without useless signatures that cause bandwidth which will need atleast 1 more server to serve, especially if it carries no function what so ever.
I hope more people can agree with me. I really like Wikipedia but i also remember Wikipedia to refuse useless content that does not meet the standards. Wikipedia can only remain high quality if it doesn't drift off to deep into the sea. You'll lose the shore view that way.
82.171.139.53 ( talk) 01:13, 8 August 2008 (UTC) also know as: MuisjeNL ( talk) 01:16, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
Is there a policy on the use of the "small" parameter in page-protection notices? I feel like the giant banner across the top of a protected article just makes the whole project look cheap, especially to the vast majority of readers who have no intention of even trying to edit it in the first place. Am I wrong? I Imagine this has been discussed before, but I couldn't find it. -- Coemgenus 14:49, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
I have found the lists at Lists of people by nationality, and I'm not sure about them. Those list simply enumerate "famous" or "notable" people, just by listing names.
The problem with those lists is that they are completely open (they could never be considered to be complete), no rationale to sort who belongs to it and who doesn't (except for the nationality itself), no order, no explanations or detail besides a "president" or "actor" single word note, they are not based over a given source that determines who would indeed be those "most notable" people of the country, and so on. All those disadvantages would make those lists strong candidates to be categories instead. However, such categories already exist anyway.
I thought about starting a deletion discussion, but it's really a huge number of lists. Before doing so, I would like to know if there is some consensus to start such deletion or consider it.
I have noticed that there was a previous discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Lists of people by nationality, the list of lists was not deleted because it's useful unless all the specific lists were deleted. I agree with that, of course, but I wouldn't be talking about just the list of lists but about all the lists in it. Benito Sifaratti ( talk) 02:38, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
I have started an essay at WP:SLUT. Its a work in progress and i dont have time to write more tonight. Feel free to add your thoughts on it though. Ritchie Family 78 ( talk) 03:57, 15 August 2008 (UTC)
Deleted. BJ Talk 04:10, 15 August 2008 (UTC)
A bot, User:Kotbot is creating innumerable unreferenced stub articles about villages in Poland, such as Kosiorów, Łódź Voivodeship. I am not specifically complaining about this one article, but about the whole series being created by Kotbot [3], which is growing at the rate of hundreds per hour. The only "source" is the corresponding Polish Wikipedia article. No Wikipedia constitutes a reliable source, so these myriad articles violate WP:V and have no reliable sources. It seems a big mistake to unleash a bot to create Wikipedia articles with no sourcing to any reliable source, such as a government census database. The result of this practice is that hoax articles about nonexistent hamlets will get translated into unsourced articles in all the other language Wikipedias. Even if we grant inherent notability to real census units, villages and hamlets, many such articles get deleted through AFD because they are non-notable neighborhoods within cities, or ar merely a street where a developer has erected a housing development, are are purely made up, or are fictional. The source articles in the Polish encyclopedia are themselves in some cases apparently without references, such as Bielawy, Łęczyca County and [4]. (Perhaps a bilingual editor can better evaluate the sourcing in the non-English article). Many of the source articles are just based on there being a name on an online map. This bot was approved by two editors at a thinly attended Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Kotbot 3, but it was supposed to include population and area, which seem to be missing, and there was no discussion there of the applicable policies WP:V or WP:RS. I have never been involved with bot approval or bot approval revocation. What is the forum for that? Edison ( talk) 17:13, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
We are both planning on adding additional relevant historical (post-WWII boundary changes, etc.) and geographical information (geographical mezoregions, rivers, etc.) to each entry. Currently KotBot adds national/regional parks that are adjacent/within the boundaries of the Villages.
No WP article is absolute, total and completed prior to it's posting. What you are complaining about are active works in progress.
In reply to the statement that is just producing useless articles, the Villages being created are the smallest administrative units within the Republic of Poland.
Ajh1492 ( talk) 18:30, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
Davewild offered a reasonable suggestion. I've updated and tested KotBot's code to include the GUS reference in the initial creation of the article, starting with Osiny, Łowicz County. We will catch the previously created articles on our next pass through.
I think Kotniski should be thanked for being BOLD and having a PLAN to increase useful content on EN.WP and PL.WP. Me? I'm assisting and adding my programming skills.
Ajh1492 ( talk) 19:14, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
Reply to Christopher Parkham, way back up there: There has been an unfortunate history of editors ignoring the notability guidelines when it comes to geographic locations. I've never understood why some feel that their particular interests are so special that they get get bypass the rules that others follow. In terms of this kind of issue, do you remember Fritzpolbot? It eventually became [
| GEOBOT], and that was approved only after it was agreed that the bot would only include towns with evidence of notability, and that it would not run automatically off a database. I don't see how this bot is any different. It should not have been approved, and, even if people want to apply
WP:IAR to this, the bot approval group cannot make that decision. This bot should be stopped now, and all of its edits rolled back until it is modified to only create articles about places that have evidence of notability.
Kww (
talk) 00:30, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
I think the bot author should be commended for their good work in creating useful content for the project. I agree with Mr. IP above in that as real-life places recognized by a sovereign national governing body, these are a hundred percent notable. We have tons and tons of articles about podunk villages in Alabama; there's no reason we can't have articles about the lesser geographic locations in other countries as well if they can be verified. Celarnor Talk to me 02:10, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
The articles for villages generally have no "proof they are recognized" by anything other than some online map the article was automatically created from. The vendors of geographic data systems are far from infallible. WP:V requires a reference. Edison ( talk) 02:34, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
Ajh1492 ( talk) 03:28, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
To those people who think Kotbot is a gross tool that should be stopped. I can see why you might not be welcome to unreferenced stubs en masse, but the world isn't going to end. All of its articles are created with a valid infobox and data and links to Polish wikipedia and this is stated. Remain positive that it is a working progression and they will all be expanded in the future and referenced. It is a good thing that somebody has taken the initiative to add potential resourceful content. It really is quite upsetting to see users of bots which really are trying to improve wikipedia presented at the village pump in this way. Resourceful people, particularly Polish wikipedians on here would find the comment that wikipedia is not an atlas a short sighted one. I am willing to bet that many of the villages have their own websites (in Polish) and that potentially full articles could be written for just about everyone of the places Kotbot has created. When things progress at a later date. the atlas comparison will be an unfounded one. If a great deal can be written about these places, then starting them on wikipedia is the gateway to knowledge which I believe should be our goal and work towards the "impossible" by adding real world content on which little is currently known in english. ♦ Dr. Blofeld ♦ "Talk"? 16:08, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
One link would certainly help the good cause I agree ♦ Dr. Blofeld ♦ "Talk"? 16:27, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
The claim is made that these are inherently notable because they are " Sołectwo," which at least sets some lower standard, so that some small neighborhood in a Sołectwo or a sub-Sołectwo would not get an article created by this bot, But then the handwaving and false claims start, that the GUS is a references for particular villages, when they are not mentioned in it at all or that they are "incorporated" without any reference to that effect, or explanation of what it even means in that country. GUS should not be added to any article when the village is not mentioned in it. And if they are so notable, why is their population and other facts about them unknown and unreferencable? How many months or years are to pass before someone findsa a ref with this basic data, which was present from the first in the bot created articles about US cities and census units? Geographic information systems, such as the online maps behind these articles, are not infallible. Even in the US I have found things listed which do not exist, and have found the mapping companies not responsive to communications requesting corrections. The promise is given that someone in the future will add the missing information. Perhaps they can be improved to the level of the article about the 90 person Foosland,_Illinois article, say, in the U.S., but we are told we should avoid editing them, because that would make it hard for the bot to add information in the future. Sounds like permastubs which merely tell us the grid coordinates of dots on an online map. Edison ( talk) 03:11, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
It takes four primary sources whose goal is to be exhaustive, combines them, and generates a stub. This stub violates
WP:N, because
WP:N demands coverage in the form of a direct and detailed examination in multiple, reliable, secondary sources. This bot makes no attempt to comply with this ... it simply creates stub after stub without regard to the notability of the result, using only primary sources as input. None of the sources constitute a direct and detailed examination. It probably does get the simple facts correct, but that has no relationship whatsoever to whether those facts justify and independent article. This is exactly the same argument we had over Geobot, and Geobot's operators were required to insert a step justifying the notability of each article, by validating that the town actually was referenced in secondary sources and inserting them in the article. That's all that is necessary to fix this one: validate, prior to creation of the article, the existence of reliable secondary sources with a direct and detailed examination of the town, and insert those into the article.
Kww (
talk) 14:58, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
(the bot owner writes): Hi all, I'm just back from a Wikibreak and I see all this has erupted while I've been away. Don't have time to read all the arguments immediately in detail, just a few observations:
Anyway, I'm here and listening.-- Kotniski ( talk) 20:19, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
I always thought that for an article to meet notability requirements, it had to be mentioned in reliable, English language, secondary sources. This bot seems not to be doing that. The Polish Wikipedia is not a secondary source, or in English. Neither is the Polish source being used here. Nor is a map a reliable source, since it just mentions the existence of the place, and doesn't show whether it is notable or not. If proof of its existence on a map is all that is necessary, then I may as well write an article on my house, because we have a map of that. Clearly my house is notable then. I have to stand by Kww here, this bot is violating WP:N requirements, and if a stub is only sourced in primary/tertiary sources then said stub would fail an AfD.
The quote, "Ajh1492, are you creating Wikipedia articles that you now insist cannot be edited until you, the "owner" are done with them at some unspecified point in the future? That plain and simple is just not how Wikipedia works" by Franamax above, just says it all really. Deamon138 ( talk) 21:04, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
(unindent) When this is started up again the stubs will include an official source (for status as village within a particular municipality, unfortunately not for population), so these will no longer be anonymous dots on maps. I don't know why certain U.S. places are missing - I thought all the official census locations had been uploaded - but established practice is to consider all such places notable enough to have articles, and there are certainly many articles on U.S. places (and in other countries) of this sort of size or even smaller. What the bot is doing (or will do, with improved sourcing) is entirely in line with established Wikipedia practice.-- Kotniski ( talk) 07:18, 17 August 2008 (UTC)
Okay, I really have no objection to the removal of the "assistance" Village Pump page, since it has been merged into WP:Help desk. But what I miss is this box which was at the top of the Assistance page:
Off the top of my head, I don't know of any quick way of getting to any page that uses this template, from the main page. I used to go from the main page, to the Village Pump, to Assistance, and there would be this handy box pointing me to other pages where issues about WP are discussed, and help in specific areas could be obtained. This box is not on the Help Desk page.
In fact I think it was one level too deep when it was on the assistance page. I would have preferred to see this box on the village pump index page.
I wonder if this box is being deliberately obscured. Maybe someone thinks these pages are for administrator use, and there is no purpose in exposing new users to them. Frankly, I think that the more new users get to see of the behind-the-scenes work in keeping Wikipedia running, the better they will understand and appreciate how the whole thing works. I was a Wikipedia reader long before I made my first edit, and spent some time trying to understand what WP is all about before becoming a contributor. I was well aware of the pages linked from this template, and they gave me clarity in understanding what kinds of editing habits are problematic, for example.
Please consider putting this template back in a prominent place where I, and newcomers can find it! WP:Village pump (the index page) would be great. WP:Help desk would be almost as good. -- A Knight Who Says Ni ( talk) 01:05, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
Gentlemen,
MTV News reported (quite credibly) that a significant percentage of Wikipedians suffer from mild to sometimes severe mental illness, with the highest percentage of users who would be considered mentally ill being within Wikipedians who edit regularly citation needed. As someone who has spent time undergoing rehab for a mental affliction I am particularly attuned to the problems and opportunities that mental illness presents.
Has wikipedia addressed this problem explicitly? What happens when a user, or even an administrator is severely mentally ill? Furthermore, I find it quite possible that famously persistent vandals and trolls (those that operate on Wikipedia for months, even years at a time) might be mentally ill. If so, does Wikipedia run afoul of the Americans with Disabilities act of 1991 by denying them access to Wikipedia? This story has opened up a lot of interesting questions -- perhaps we can resolve them before it's too late to. Pernambuco Boy ( talk) 01:41, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
Personally, I sometimes wonder if assuming good faith despite all evidence to the contrary isn't some kind of shared delusion. Delicious carbuncle ( talk) 03:25, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
Declined All editors of Wikipedia are insane; no action possible.-- Father Goose ( talk) 05:09, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
While searching to see if Wikipedia had an article about a website, I found a link to an article containing links to an illegal download of a movie. Upon further investigation, I realized that this was actually being used as a reference for the purpose of providing factual evidence that a movie was leaked a month prior to release. While I question whether or not that is relevant for Wikipedia (it is a pretty common occurrence with DVDs), it did raise the question: Is this an acceptable source? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gundato ( talk • contribs) 20:36, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
During the past several months there has been discussion on the WikiEn-l mailing list of "no-indexing" (i.e., excluding from Google and other search-engine results) pages in Wikipedia space and possibly in userspace. It has been suggested that this discussion be taken on-wiki to reach a consensus, and I hope this can be done. However, not having been active onsite recently, I don't want to create a duplicative discussion if this is already being discussed on-wiki elsewhere. If this is not the case, I will copy some of my WikiEn-l posts and attempt to summarize others' comments so that the discussion can get started. Thanks. Newyorkbrad ( talk) 01:10, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
I would be opposed to noindexing anything like Wikipedia:WikiProject Utah State Highways/Early state roads. It's not organized or complete enough for Wikisource, but is a useful resource not found elsewhere. -- NE2 12:37, 18 August 2008 (UTC)
I've been meaning to ask this for a while but never had gotten round to asking. Is it preferred to add specific page numbers in a citation of a source in a book or not? A fellow Wikipedian objected to me adding page numbers because there were several citations from the same book and he wanted all the footnotes to point to the same reference entry. I guess I'm just a bit set in my ways but I thought I understood that good practice dictated that a citation should always include a page number if possible. Is there an existing wikipedia policy on this question? Should we ignore page numbers in order to reduce the number of citations at the bottom of the page especially when there are a lot of references in one article to the exact same work?-- Onorio ( talk) 14:45, 18 August 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:WikiProject Micronations/Micronation convention ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs) has recently been edited to mark it as a guideline. This is an automated notice of the change ( more information). -- VeblenBot ( talk) 18:47, 18 August 2008 (UTC)
Discussion is under way at WP:Civility concerning changes to the second and third paragraphs of the introduction [7]. Wider community input is requested. Thanks.( olive ( talk) 19:27, 18 August 2008 (UTC))
The above thread, Users with noticeable mental illness, was obviously created by a Jean Latore sock. Everyone knows the pattern by now, right? And everyone seems to be enjoying themselves in the conversation, which I don't have a problem with. I guess my question is, should we have a standard procedure for dealing with these threads? We could remove the threads on sight, if we want to keep this board tightly focused on, you know, policy. Or we could just wallow around in the silliness until daddy takes the T-bird away. Thoughts? Darkspots ( talk) 07:14, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
... of "Popular Culture" (a.k.a. "trivia") sections, especially where there is valid attribution, is tantamount to exclusion of information that may advance understanding of information. The inclusion of any idea in a work of art, especially those that are experienced by many people, is indicative of its importance to both its author and his or her audience. Please change this policy immediately, and only enforce exclusion of "Popular Culture" sections where there is no attribution. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.134.45.7 ( talk) 02:38, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
As a geography-focused editor, I occasionally run into instances where people use GenWeb (a The Generations Network website) as a source. Here is an example: an editor used a GenWeb page ( here) to supersede the official local government site for Niobrara, Nebraska. I can't imagine a way in which the GenWeb site would be more authoritative than the local, so I tried to balance them, but I wonder: are GenWeb pages to be considered at all reliable, since (if you look at the bottom of the GenWeb pages) they appear to be individual user pages which anyone can post? Nyttend ( talk) 13:22, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
Can I suggest (and I know this is opening up a great can of worms) that we move every single "family guy" cultural reference to a page called "list of cultural references in family guy", thus removing the dire and pointless amount of Family Guy references on every other page which don't seem to be a relevant piece of information to have in any encyclopaedia. Then, if anyone wanted to find out if family guy referenced any particular thing, there would be one easy place to find so, and all the other pages wouldn't need to have a load of shoddy in-jokes on them? Bradley10 ( talk) 13:40, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
Note: thread created by blocked sock of JeanLatore Darkspots ( talk) 20:29, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
As you may have read, Daniel Ellsberg leaked the Pentagon Papers in 1971 to the New York Times, which caused a major uproar in both the courts and the Nixon administration. The attorney general, John Mitchell, issued an order to the times to cease publication, which was appealed in a landmark Surpeme Court case, and Nixon personally plotted all-out retaliation with tactics that eventually lead to Watergate. What does this have to do with Wikipedia in 2007 you might ask?
What would happen if a modern day Ellsberg leaked top secret documents, but instead of the old-fashioned leak to the press, what if he "leaked" them by posting to Wikipedia, either through an article, or even userspace, etc)?
What could happen to wikipedia and would it lead to criminal and civil liablity? What about for the editors who "revert" the article if others try to censor it on national security grounds. Even a court order could not prevent wikipedia editors from re-posting this material, if it got that far. Perhaps the government would try to shut Wikipedia down? The possibilities are many. Brown Univ 77 ( talk) 18:47, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Scientific standards
I have drafted a new proposal and would like help in clarifying, adjusting, adapting, and improving it. It is based on five years of work here at Wikipedia (not always the prettiest, I might add). I think it summarizes the opinions of a great majority of editors as to how to handle scientific situations. This proposal serves as a nexus between WP:NPOV and WP:RS for cases where we are dealing with observable reality. It is needed because there are a lot of editors who don't seem to understand what entails best-practices when writing a reliable reference work about observable reality. I don't pretend that this version is perfect, and would appreciate any and all additions, suggestions people may have for getting to some well-regarded scientific standards.
Note that these standards would apply only when discussing matters directly related to observable reality. These standards are inspired in part by WP:SPOV but avoid some of the major pitfalls of that particular proposal. In particular, the idea that SPOV even exists is a real problem. However, I think it is undeniable that we should have some standards for writing about scientific topics.
See also WP:SCI for another failed proposal that dovetails with this one. I hope this particular proposal is more in-line with the hole I see in policy/guidelines for dealing with these situations.
ScienceApologist ( talk) 19:52, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
I'll be the first say that I am a bit new to Wikipedia policy and what is/is not acceptable on the site. However I can across a User Page that seems completely inappropriate for Wikipedia. User:DarkFireYoshi's user page is being used for nothing more than personal web storage. The information on the page and his talk page are merely information of a fictional Survivor-like competition. I Googled some of the information on his page to check the legitimacy, and all that I found was a YouTube account under the same name, listing his talk page as the "official website" (seen here [9] and here [10]. So long story short... is this allowable? If not, what needs to be done about it? Thank you in advance for you help. Bvlax2005 ( talk) 04:25, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
I recently encountered User:Initialdesign who appears to be writing highly professional articles on borderline-notable doctors. The articles are entirely positive and include corporate photographs of the subject.
I strongly suspect that the user is from initaldesign, inc and is being paid to do this work. This is obviously bad for Wikipedia, but what I want to talk about is a proposed new policy. It would be a simple policy, though it might have to be fleshed out a bit:
Opinions? DJ Clayworth ( talk) 14:11, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
I bet also the Foundation is paying staff to remove any libel or other undesirables. Deamon138 ( talk) 00:49, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
Quite useless. Judge the contribution alone, not the authors' identity. NVO ( talk) 15:44, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
Talk:September 11, 2001 attacks#RFC on page title and comma - We need outside opinions on what the appropriate grammar and application of the manual of style is here in this situation. Should the page title and the article start out with "September 11, 2001 attacks" (no comma) or "September 11, 2001, attacks"? A third option is to rename the page to something like "September 11 attacks". We would appreciate comments on the article talk page. Thanks. -- Aude ( talk) 20:17, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
Posting this here, because it needs to be spotlighted and have more eyes on it.
The ArbCom RfC came up with two pretty clear statements in Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Arbitration_Committee#View_by_Celarnor_.282.29 Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Arbitration_Committee#No_New_Policy that gained a large number of endorsement that I view as an indication of consensus support. In light of that I've called for the BLP Special Enforcement to be marked historical because it's lost community support.
In response, User:Ncmvocalist has threatened to have me blocked for making "tendentious argument against the enforcement of a core policy".
Community input would be welcome. -- Barberio ( talk) 01:42, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
Please see discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Gregorian calendar.
Dates like 1582-10-10 appear to be in ISO 8601 format. This is especially true for autoformatted dates, because the user preferences window indicates this format with the text "2001-01-15T16:12:34", which is unmistakably in the ISO 8601 format. The ISO 8601 format requires the use of the Gregorian calendar, and for dates before that calender was introduced, the proleptic Gregorian calendar. Browsing a few articles suggests that many editors do not understand this convention, and are therefore presenting incorrect dates to readers. Also, a date in a non-numeric format such as 10 October 1582 will generally be presumed to be in the Julian calendar (since it is before the introduction of the Gregorian calendar) so if it is autoformatted, the meaning of the date changes depending on the reader's preference setting.
Please note that discussions on this matter have been quite amicable and this RFC is only to attract a wider audience.
Proposal:
-- Gerry Ashton ( talk) 18:00, 18 August 2008 (UTC)
Note: This discussion was initiated by another sock of Julie Dancer; see also Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Julie Dancer. Pretty much anything in the 71.100 range that posts to the Village Pump can be considered trolling. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 01:23, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
Back in 2003, the idea of the Wikipedia was that an article could be started even if it did not meet most of the requirements for an article and from there be lovingly edited by users until whatever problems it had eventually went away in a collaborative effort toward eventual perfection of the article. Today, however, no such thing is possible. All articles whether new or existing are not treated as Wiki articles anymore but rather as printed publications sent to a publisher for review. The idea of online collaboration and perfection, which is what a Wiki is suppose to be all about, has been abandoned in favor of treating all works as a submittal to a publisher for acceptance or rejection. Rather than as a bee hive where honey is produced the Wikipedia seems to be now more like a pool full of piranha looking for the next article to attack. The Wikipedia has gone from being a place where content providers can collaborate to the mindset of a printed publication where articles not already perfected are simply destroyed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.100.13.184 ( talk • contribs) 15:17, 21 August 2008
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Is there a policy that covers including information that the government might consider sensitive? See the reason provided for a recent change here. Vegaswikian ( talk) 19:40, 5 August 2008 (UTC)
Any claim that the information is sensitive is nonsense, given that it was all sourced to major reliable sources (as it should be) and therefore already publicly distributed. As long as we conform to WP:V and WP:OR, government secrecy or sensitivity is simply a non-issue. Postdlf ( talk) 20:16, 5 August 2008 (UTC)
The IP is way out of line. The so-called "sensitive information", well-known criteria that increase the chance of getting an SSSS on one's boarding pass, have been printed and reprinted in dozens of newspapers for years. Squidfryerchef ( talk) 20:22, 5 August 2008 (UTC)
Can somebody sort this out? It's used by valid articles such as grok but also as a cleanup category by {{ neologism}}. -- NE2 06:28, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
In many infoboxes, there's a section for citizenship. What should be inserted if the country that a person lived in changed? For instance Czechoslovakia split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia. As it absorbed more places, the Kingdom of England absorbed the Kingdom of Scotland and became the Kingdom of Great Britain which then absorbed the Kingdom of Ireland and became the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, until part of Ireland split off from it and that main body became the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland or United Kingdom for short. Should we put down the country that existed when the person was born, when they died, the largest period that they were alive? When a country splits or absorbs another country and a person's citizenship changes, do we need to wander through every article that has a likely citizenship marking and change it? Obviously, if someone has expressed a desire to be known as a particular nationality, we should follow that lead. A stalwart follower of William of Orange, for instance, probably would prefer their citizenship to be the Kingdom of Scotland and would probably turn over in their grave if we listed the UK. But what about the vast bulk of humanity? Personally, I think we should list citizenship according to what that area was called during the vast bulk of the person's life. Banaticus ( talk) 10:36, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
For the most part, this is an issue of common sense and I don't think an overarching rule is appropriate. If a person, such as Mr. Adams or Mr. Washington, has their notability entertwined with a specific country that they were a citizen of, that should probably be listed if there was a burning need to list something. It's not unusual for people to have held multiple citizenships during their lifetime anyway, so it doesn't seem to be one of those "quick and dirty factoids" that should go in an infobox in the first place. SDY ( talk) 14:53, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
Just a quick note to invite comment here on a proposal to create a new criterion for speedy deletion. The proposed criterion is that where an uploader has supplied a copyright tag but has specified a third party as the content owner, without any evidence that their permission was ever given, the media will be speedied seven days after the uploader is notified if no such permission is forthcoming. This is equivalent to the NPD process used at Commons, and parallel to our NSD and NLD. Please weigh in! -- Rlandmann ( talk) 21:02, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
...is being discussed here. I started the discussion out of the concern that such illustrations, which are necessarily speculative when based only on a fossil record, violate WP:OR, at least when no cites are provided to the reliable sources upon which the images are based. There seems to be a presumption in some of the comments that illustrations are categorically excluded from OR considerations, or that there's no difference between articles including speculative illustrations first published in a reliable source and speculative illustrations first published on Wikipedia. Postdlf ( talk) 01:45, 5 August 2008 (UTC)
I know that some K-12 institutions block pages like myspace. I was wondering if Wikipedia could also be blocked. I take that back. Blocked from editing, not viewing. This would prevent problems with multiple users discrediting an IP or IP range. Sometimes there are some legit edits while others people are just playing around. This would not exclude younger editors. They would simply have to edit elsewhere, preferably at home. Libro0 ( talk) 01:12, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
I agree, it would be a preventative measure given the higher potential at the elementary and middle school levels. Libro0 ( talk) 01:36, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
We can block schools. We have done so from time to time when there is a serious problem but we generaly avoid doing so for anything short of that (and we once got an apology for vandalism written on an actual typewriter from a schoolkid). Geni 02:11, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
We can and do block schools for periods of time, but we don't do it just because they're schools; in fact, we're more hesitant to block schools, seeing as they're, you know, schools, and only do it when it gets particularly bad. We do it because there has been a rash of vandalism from a specific range of IP address, and blocking that range of IP addresses is our last option. It doesn't have anything to do with them being a school; by your logic, we should also block workplaces, which suffer from similar problems. This is not 1984, we are not the thought police. We don't block people preemptively. We are the encyclopedia anyone can edit, and I don't see how your idea promotes that. In fact, it only contravenes it, as far as I can see. Celarnor Talk to me 12:35, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
Pages like myspace and facebook that don't really serve any educational value make sense to be blocked at a school, where you're there to learn. Editing an encyclopedia is quite the opposite; you can't get much more educational than that. There's no comparison between the two whatsoever. Celarnor Talk to me 12:42, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
Given recent issues over civility, I've started an RFC at Wikipedia_talk:Civility#Policy_or_guideline.3F. Comments are welcome. MBisanz talk 02:41, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
Hi, can anyone tell me when the current version of WP:N went into effect? I understand that the policy itself was rewritten some time last year and just want to know when exactly it ocurred.
S. Luke 23:46, 2 August 2008 (UTC)
Noob here. Hope I'm doing this right. Does this constitute libel or weasel words? From article: Antony Flew There was a short discussion between me and one other person over there that appears to have fizzled out.
"Journalist Mark Oppenheimer suggested that Flew, then 84 years of age at the time of Oppenheimer's statement, has been suffering from a mild form of senile dementia for at least three or four years.[6]"
The actual words "senile" and "dementia" don't occur anywhere in the article that I can find, though it may have been inferred. Thanks. Here is the article: [2] Rrand ( talk) 04:58, 6 August 2008 (UTC)
I've proposed that user and user talk pages should not be eligible for PROD. See WT:PROD#Prodding user pages -- Ned Scott 06:57, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
Hello, at Meta there is the project of a Manual to help new and small Wikipedias, and a set of Wikipedia pages and help pages every Wikipedia should have. I would like you to have a look and comment. Kind regards -- Ziko ( talk) 11:25, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
Hello, I am a recently registered user, although I edited as an IP for a few weeks. After all seeing a lot of the Wikipedia, I decided I am going to spend all my time on Wikipedia namespace stuff, like studying policy and procedures. I do not intend to do article work at all. DrugProblemm ( talk) 19:00, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
I am a very very fast learner, thank you. DrugProblemm ( talk) 23:53, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
There is a is now a Summary of statements from the Arbitration Committee RfC which had significantly more support than opposition. The summary clearly identifies suggested changes to the Arbitration Policy. And where further discussion is needed over the choice between some contradictory suggested changes. -- Barberio ( talk) 15:07, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
After seeing attempts to use WP:LOGOS to bypass the non-free content criteria, I have proposed a rewrite of the guideline. Comments are welcome on the guideline talk page. J Milburn ( talk) 14:19, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
There is a discussion as to whether {{ PROD}} should be allowed on User pages. Please comment at Wikipedia talk:Proposed deletion#Prodding user pages. ~ JohnnyMrNinja 16:37, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
The Commons Scope proposal now includes a suggestion, based on feedback so far, as to how Commons should handle Pdf and Djvu file types. Comments are welcome at Commons:Commons talk:Project scope/Proposal#Pdf and Djvu files. -- MichaelMaggs ( talk) 20:31, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
My attention was drawn to AN/I yesterday (due to a guest appearance) - and I noticed that another threat of violence had been made on wiki, was reported at AN/I and ultimately involved various authorities being contacted. I have noticed this occurring several times - and people seem to follow the exact approach outlined at this proposal.
The proposal does not require any editor to do anything, but simply offers what I consider to be good advice, and a concrete course of action if editors have unresolved concerns. It also has the benefit of accurately describing what is happening with regularity already. Is it time to mark this as policy? Privatemusings ( talk) 01:56, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
(This seems to me like the best place for this discussion, but feel free to let me know if it's more appropriate elsewhere. I'm still learning.) I have recently been removing flag icons from a number of lists of bands (for example, List of symphonic metal bands, List of progressive metal artists, List of power metal bands, and more) because I feel that they violated WP:FLAG. My arguments are mostly at Talk:List of black metal bands but I'll summarize them here:
A discussion at WP:FLAG ( in the archives here) seemed to indicate that they should not be used in lists of bands, but there weren't a large number of participants in that discussion. In any case, my edits have all been reverted (in a way that I feel almost borders on WP:OWN) and discussions on the Talk pages aren't going anywhere. I think it's in everyone's best interests to get a wider discussion going as to where flag icons are and aren't appropriate. Ideas? Wyatt Riot ( talk) 22:49, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
I work in the field of black metal, so, I will comment from that standpoint. In the genre of black metal, the origin of the band has a lot to do with the style of playing. For example, scandanavian metal sounds different from U.S. metal and Norwegian metal. (Compare Von to Dimmu Borgir and you might just see a difference) Now, the flags on the lists of music serve more than a decorative purpose, they tell you where the band is from. That information gives a brief detail of the playing style of that band. Here is a scenario. Little "Johnny" is looking for a band, but he has no clue of the name. He knows of wikipedia and he knows the style of playing and the origin of the band. He can look at the list for that genre, and associate the origin to the flag. He can then search for the band with a more limited area. It's not like we have obscure flags. (We don't have any micronation flags) The flags serve a purpose of informatio/education only. That does not violate the flag guidelines. Undeath ( talk) 04:30, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
Related to an earlier comment why flags maybe usefull. I tend to disagree the flag is the best suited symbol. For example in the Punkrock scene there were at one time three styles classified as "east coast" - "west coast" (Both USA) and "British" were dominant. How to distinguish between two very different USA subgenres using the flag? Furhtermore, international band tended to adopt these styles, for example the Dutch punkrock band Heideroosjes plays in a "west coast style" which you could not make out from the Dutch flag. So while there is some relation between nationality and subgenre; that maybe informative to some degree for the informed reader; it does not meet the requirement in WP:FLAG that Nationality is intimately tied to the topic. Arnoutf ( talk) 22:04, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
With the help of user:bstone, user:L'Aquatique, I've provided a re-write on WP:TOV as I feel this essay should most certainly be a guideline or policy. I've resubmitted it for policy, with three supports and no other interaction I'm not sure how to proceed...But I would like to see more community involvement. If the administrators check the history of the AN/I you'll see an incident just a few days ago, that clearly required attention to this as policy.
The original article is at WP:TOV and was previously denied as policy, L'Aqua, Bstone, and myself, are hoping the rewrite, will gain more consensus. I unfortunately have the feeling that because I am new, I'm being ignored for this sort of thing...I sincerely hope that's not the case, and that the Request for Feedback, will gain a positive result.
Thank you,
Neuro√
Logic 17:38, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
I think that TOV as a policy would be rejected, despite the clear logic and huge importance as keeping it as a policy. If we can settle on a guideline then let us do just that. It's absolutely horrifying that threats made by a psycho student of a high school which identify other students by name a targets for murder can be simply reverted and ignored. WP:RBI does not apply to such specific threats and anyone who thinks that this is the proper course of action is absolutely wrong. Just imagine for one moment if your daughter's name appeared on the article for her high school with a very specific statement that she will be murdered. Would you be perfectly content for Wikipedia editors and admins to simply revert and ignore this? Would you be more content if they reverted it but then put a note on AN/I asking/pleading for someone to report it? Or would you think the most appropriate course of action is for it to be reported, without delay, to the local police? Certainly option 1 is unconscionable and absolutely wrong by any measure. Two is perhaps the best we can ask for on Wiki. The third is the most appropriate and correct thing to do according to any sane, rational person. Anyone who passes off (and advocates passing off) these threats are simple vandalism ought to not get involved and find some article to write/edit. Bstone ( talk) 18:56, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Articles on elections ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs) has recently been edited to mark it as a guideline. This is an automated notice of the change ( more information). -- VeblenBot ( talk) 18:47, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
Dear Wikipedia (and wikipedians),
I don't see why there should be signatures of celebrity's (in particular political figures) on the wikipedia pages.
To begin:
I'm not asking that wikipedia should be placed under ANY censorship. However Wikipedia should remain to the point and be the best encyclopedia available without useless signatures that cause bandwidth which will need atleast 1 more server to serve, especially if it carries no function what so ever.
I hope more people can agree with me. I really like Wikipedia but i also remember Wikipedia to refuse useless content that does not meet the standards. Wikipedia can only remain high quality if it doesn't drift off to deep into the sea. You'll lose the shore view that way.
82.171.139.53 ( talk) 01:13, 8 August 2008 (UTC) also know as: MuisjeNL ( talk) 01:16, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
Is there a policy on the use of the "small" parameter in page-protection notices? I feel like the giant banner across the top of a protected article just makes the whole project look cheap, especially to the vast majority of readers who have no intention of even trying to edit it in the first place. Am I wrong? I Imagine this has been discussed before, but I couldn't find it. -- Coemgenus 14:49, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
I have found the lists at Lists of people by nationality, and I'm not sure about them. Those list simply enumerate "famous" or "notable" people, just by listing names.
The problem with those lists is that they are completely open (they could never be considered to be complete), no rationale to sort who belongs to it and who doesn't (except for the nationality itself), no order, no explanations or detail besides a "president" or "actor" single word note, they are not based over a given source that determines who would indeed be those "most notable" people of the country, and so on. All those disadvantages would make those lists strong candidates to be categories instead. However, such categories already exist anyway.
I thought about starting a deletion discussion, but it's really a huge number of lists. Before doing so, I would like to know if there is some consensus to start such deletion or consider it.
I have noticed that there was a previous discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Lists of people by nationality, the list of lists was not deleted because it's useful unless all the specific lists were deleted. I agree with that, of course, but I wouldn't be talking about just the list of lists but about all the lists in it. Benito Sifaratti ( talk) 02:38, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
I have started an essay at WP:SLUT. Its a work in progress and i dont have time to write more tonight. Feel free to add your thoughts on it though. Ritchie Family 78 ( talk) 03:57, 15 August 2008 (UTC)
Deleted. BJ Talk 04:10, 15 August 2008 (UTC)
A bot, User:Kotbot is creating innumerable unreferenced stub articles about villages in Poland, such as Kosiorów, Łódź Voivodeship. I am not specifically complaining about this one article, but about the whole series being created by Kotbot [3], which is growing at the rate of hundreds per hour. The only "source" is the corresponding Polish Wikipedia article. No Wikipedia constitutes a reliable source, so these myriad articles violate WP:V and have no reliable sources. It seems a big mistake to unleash a bot to create Wikipedia articles with no sourcing to any reliable source, such as a government census database. The result of this practice is that hoax articles about nonexistent hamlets will get translated into unsourced articles in all the other language Wikipedias. Even if we grant inherent notability to real census units, villages and hamlets, many such articles get deleted through AFD because they are non-notable neighborhoods within cities, or ar merely a street where a developer has erected a housing development, are are purely made up, or are fictional. The source articles in the Polish encyclopedia are themselves in some cases apparently without references, such as Bielawy, Łęczyca County and [4]. (Perhaps a bilingual editor can better evaluate the sourcing in the non-English article). Many of the source articles are just based on there being a name on an online map. This bot was approved by two editors at a thinly attended Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Kotbot 3, but it was supposed to include population and area, which seem to be missing, and there was no discussion there of the applicable policies WP:V or WP:RS. I have never been involved with bot approval or bot approval revocation. What is the forum for that? Edison ( talk) 17:13, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
We are both planning on adding additional relevant historical (post-WWII boundary changes, etc.) and geographical information (geographical mezoregions, rivers, etc.) to each entry. Currently KotBot adds national/regional parks that are adjacent/within the boundaries of the Villages.
No WP article is absolute, total and completed prior to it's posting. What you are complaining about are active works in progress.
In reply to the statement that is just producing useless articles, the Villages being created are the smallest administrative units within the Republic of Poland.
Ajh1492 ( talk) 18:30, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
Davewild offered a reasonable suggestion. I've updated and tested KotBot's code to include the GUS reference in the initial creation of the article, starting with Osiny, Łowicz County. We will catch the previously created articles on our next pass through.
I think Kotniski should be thanked for being BOLD and having a PLAN to increase useful content on EN.WP and PL.WP. Me? I'm assisting and adding my programming skills.
Ajh1492 ( talk) 19:14, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
Reply to Christopher Parkham, way back up there: There has been an unfortunate history of editors ignoring the notability guidelines when it comes to geographic locations. I've never understood why some feel that their particular interests are so special that they get get bypass the rules that others follow. In terms of this kind of issue, do you remember Fritzpolbot? It eventually became [
| GEOBOT], and that was approved only after it was agreed that the bot would only include towns with evidence of notability, and that it would not run automatically off a database. I don't see how this bot is any different. It should not have been approved, and, even if people want to apply
WP:IAR to this, the bot approval group cannot make that decision. This bot should be stopped now, and all of its edits rolled back until it is modified to only create articles about places that have evidence of notability.
Kww (
talk) 00:30, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
I think the bot author should be commended for their good work in creating useful content for the project. I agree with Mr. IP above in that as real-life places recognized by a sovereign national governing body, these are a hundred percent notable. We have tons and tons of articles about podunk villages in Alabama; there's no reason we can't have articles about the lesser geographic locations in other countries as well if they can be verified. Celarnor Talk to me 02:10, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
The articles for villages generally have no "proof they are recognized" by anything other than some online map the article was automatically created from. The vendors of geographic data systems are far from infallible. WP:V requires a reference. Edison ( talk) 02:34, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
Ajh1492 ( talk) 03:28, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
To those people who think Kotbot is a gross tool that should be stopped. I can see why you might not be welcome to unreferenced stubs en masse, but the world isn't going to end. All of its articles are created with a valid infobox and data and links to Polish wikipedia and this is stated. Remain positive that it is a working progression and they will all be expanded in the future and referenced. It is a good thing that somebody has taken the initiative to add potential resourceful content. It really is quite upsetting to see users of bots which really are trying to improve wikipedia presented at the village pump in this way. Resourceful people, particularly Polish wikipedians on here would find the comment that wikipedia is not an atlas a short sighted one. I am willing to bet that many of the villages have their own websites (in Polish) and that potentially full articles could be written for just about everyone of the places Kotbot has created. When things progress at a later date. the atlas comparison will be an unfounded one. If a great deal can be written about these places, then starting them on wikipedia is the gateway to knowledge which I believe should be our goal and work towards the "impossible" by adding real world content on which little is currently known in english. ♦ Dr. Blofeld ♦ "Talk"? 16:08, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
One link would certainly help the good cause I agree ♦ Dr. Blofeld ♦ "Talk"? 16:27, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
The claim is made that these are inherently notable because they are " Sołectwo," which at least sets some lower standard, so that some small neighborhood in a Sołectwo or a sub-Sołectwo would not get an article created by this bot, But then the handwaving and false claims start, that the GUS is a references for particular villages, when they are not mentioned in it at all or that they are "incorporated" without any reference to that effect, or explanation of what it even means in that country. GUS should not be added to any article when the village is not mentioned in it. And if they are so notable, why is their population and other facts about them unknown and unreferencable? How many months or years are to pass before someone findsa a ref with this basic data, which was present from the first in the bot created articles about US cities and census units? Geographic information systems, such as the online maps behind these articles, are not infallible. Even in the US I have found things listed which do not exist, and have found the mapping companies not responsive to communications requesting corrections. The promise is given that someone in the future will add the missing information. Perhaps they can be improved to the level of the article about the 90 person Foosland,_Illinois article, say, in the U.S., but we are told we should avoid editing them, because that would make it hard for the bot to add information in the future. Sounds like permastubs which merely tell us the grid coordinates of dots on an online map. Edison ( talk) 03:11, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
It takes four primary sources whose goal is to be exhaustive, combines them, and generates a stub. This stub violates
WP:N, because
WP:N demands coverage in the form of a direct and detailed examination in multiple, reliable, secondary sources. This bot makes no attempt to comply with this ... it simply creates stub after stub without regard to the notability of the result, using only primary sources as input. None of the sources constitute a direct and detailed examination. It probably does get the simple facts correct, but that has no relationship whatsoever to whether those facts justify and independent article. This is exactly the same argument we had over Geobot, and Geobot's operators were required to insert a step justifying the notability of each article, by validating that the town actually was referenced in secondary sources and inserting them in the article. That's all that is necessary to fix this one: validate, prior to creation of the article, the existence of reliable secondary sources with a direct and detailed examination of the town, and insert those into the article.
Kww (
talk) 14:58, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
(the bot owner writes): Hi all, I'm just back from a Wikibreak and I see all this has erupted while I've been away. Don't have time to read all the arguments immediately in detail, just a few observations:
Anyway, I'm here and listening.-- Kotniski ( talk) 20:19, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
I always thought that for an article to meet notability requirements, it had to be mentioned in reliable, English language, secondary sources. This bot seems not to be doing that. The Polish Wikipedia is not a secondary source, or in English. Neither is the Polish source being used here. Nor is a map a reliable source, since it just mentions the existence of the place, and doesn't show whether it is notable or not. If proof of its existence on a map is all that is necessary, then I may as well write an article on my house, because we have a map of that. Clearly my house is notable then. I have to stand by Kww here, this bot is violating WP:N requirements, and if a stub is only sourced in primary/tertiary sources then said stub would fail an AfD.
The quote, "Ajh1492, are you creating Wikipedia articles that you now insist cannot be edited until you, the "owner" are done with them at some unspecified point in the future? That plain and simple is just not how Wikipedia works" by Franamax above, just says it all really. Deamon138 ( talk) 21:04, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
(unindent) When this is started up again the stubs will include an official source (for status as village within a particular municipality, unfortunately not for population), so these will no longer be anonymous dots on maps. I don't know why certain U.S. places are missing - I thought all the official census locations had been uploaded - but established practice is to consider all such places notable enough to have articles, and there are certainly many articles on U.S. places (and in other countries) of this sort of size or even smaller. What the bot is doing (or will do, with improved sourcing) is entirely in line with established Wikipedia practice.-- Kotniski ( talk) 07:18, 17 August 2008 (UTC)
Okay, I really have no objection to the removal of the "assistance" Village Pump page, since it has been merged into WP:Help desk. But what I miss is this box which was at the top of the Assistance page:
Off the top of my head, I don't know of any quick way of getting to any page that uses this template, from the main page. I used to go from the main page, to the Village Pump, to Assistance, and there would be this handy box pointing me to other pages where issues about WP are discussed, and help in specific areas could be obtained. This box is not on the Help Desk page.
In fact I think it was one level too deep when it was on the assistance page. I would have preferred to see this box on the village pump index page.
I wonder if this box is being deliberately obscured. Maybe someone thinks these pages are for administrator use, and there is no purpose in exposing new users to them. Frankly, I think that the more new users get to see of the behind-the-scenes work in keeping Wikipedia running, the better they will understand and appreciate how the whole thing works. I was a Wikipedia reader long before I made my first edit, and spent some time trying to understand what WP is all about before becoming a contributor. I was well aware of the pages linked from this template, and they gave me clarity in understanding what kinds of editing habits are problematic, for example.
Please consider putting this template back in a prominent place where I, and newcomers can find it! WP:Village pump (the index page) would be great. WP:Help desk would be almost as good. -- A Knight Who Says Ni ( talk) 01:05, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
Gentlemen,
MTV News reported (quite credibly) that a significant percentage of Wikipedians suffer from mild to sometimes severe mental illness, with the highest percentage of users who would be considered mentally ill being within Wikipedians who edit regularly citation needed. As someone who has spent time undergoing rehab for a mental affliction I am particularly attuned to the problems and opportunities that mental illness presents.
Has wikipedia addressed this problem explicitly? What happens when a user, or even an administrator is severely mentally ill? Furthermore, I find it quite possible that famously persistent vandals and trolls (those that operate on Wikipedia for months, even years at a time) might be mentally ill. If so, does Wikipedia run afoul of the Americans with Disabilities act of 1991 by denying them access to Wikipedia? This story has opened up a lot of interesting questions -- perhaps we can resolve them before it's too late to. Pernambuco Boy ( talk) 01:41, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
Personally, I sometimes wonder if assuming good faith despite all evidence to the contrary isn't some kind of shared delusion. Delicious carbuncle ( talk) 03:25, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
Declined All editors of Wikipedia are insane; no action possible.-- Father Goose ( talk) 05:09, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
While searching to see if Wikipedia had an article about a website, I found a link to an article containing links to an illegal download of a movie. Upon further investigation, I realized that this was actually being used as a reference for the purpose of providing factual evidence that a movie was leaked a month prior to release. While I question whether or not that is relevant for Wikipedia (it is a pretty common occurrence with DVDs), it did raise the question: Is this an acceptable source? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gundato ( talk • contribs) 20:36, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
During the past several months there has been discussion on the WikiEn-l mailing list of "no-indexing" (i.e., excluding from Google and other search-engine results) pages in Wikipedia space and possibly in userspace. It has been suggested that this discussion be taken on-wiki to reach a consensus, and I hope this can be done. However, not having been active onsite recently, I don't want to create a duplicative discussion if this is already being discussed on-wiki elsewhere. If this is not the case, I will copy some of my WikiEn-l posts and attempt to summarize others' comments so that the discussion can get started. Thanks. Newyorkbrad ( talk) 01:10, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
I would be opposed to noindexing anything like Wikipedia:WikiProject Utah State Highways/Early state roads. It's not organized or complete enough for Wikisource, but is a useful resource not found elsewhere. -- NE2 12:37, 18 August 2008 (UTC)
I've been meaning to ask this for a while but never had gotten round to asking. Is it preferred to add specific page numbers in a citation of a source in a book or not? A fellow Wikipedian objected to me adding page numbers because there were several citations from the same book and he wanted all the footnotes to point to the same reference entry. I guess I'm just a bit set in my ways but I thought I understood that good practice dictated that a citation should always include a page number if possible. Is there an existing wikipedia policy on this question? Should we ignore page numbers in order to reduce the number of citations at the bottom of the page especially when there are a lot of references in one article to the exact same work?-- Onorio ( talk) 14:45, 18 August 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:WikiProject Micronations/Micronation convention ( | talk | history | links | watch | logs) has recently been edited to mark it as a guideline. This is an automated notice of the change ( more information). -- VeblenBot ( talk) 18:47, 18 August 2008 (UTC)
Discussion is under way at WP:Civility concerning changes to the second and third paragraphs of the introduction [7]. Wider community input is requested. Thanks.( olive ( talk) 19:27, 18 August 2008 (UTC))
The above thread, Users with noticeable mental illness, was obviously created by a Jean Latore sock. Everyone knows the pattern by now, right? And everyone seems to be enjoying themselves in the conversation, which I don't have a problem with. I guess my question is, should we have a standard procedure for dealing with these threads? We could remove the threads on sight, if we want to keep this board tightly focused on, you know, policy. Or we could just wallow around in the silliness until daddy takes the T-bird away. Thoughts? Darkspots ( talk) 07:14, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
... of "Popular Culture" (a.k.a. "trivia") sections, especially where there is valid attribution, is tantamount to exclusion of information that may advance understanding of information. The inclusion of any idea in a work of art, especially those that are experienced by many people, is indicative of its importance to both its author and his or her audience. Please change this policy immediately, and only enforce exclusion of "Popular Culture" sections where there is no attribution. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.134.45.7 ( talk) 02:38, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
As a geography-focused editor, I occasionally run into instances where people use GenWeb (a The Generations Network website) as a source. Here is an example: an editor used a GenWeb page ( here) to supersede the official local government site for Niobrara, Nebraska. I can't imagine a way in which the GenWeb site would be more authoritative than the local, so I tried to balance them, but I wonder: are GenWeb pages to be considered at all reliable, since (if you look at the bottom of the GenWeb pages) they appear to be individual user pages which anyone can post? Nyttend ( talk) 13:22, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
Can I suggest (and I know this is opening up a great can of worms) that we move every single "family guy" cultural reference to a page called "list of cultural references in family guy", thus removing the dire and pointless amount of Family Guy references on every other page which don't seem to be a relevant piece of information to have in any encyclopaedia. Then, if anyone wanted to find out if family guy referenced any particular thing, there would be one easy place to find so, and all the other pages wouldn't need to have a load of shoddy in-jokes on them? Bradley10 ( talk) 13:40, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
Note: thread created by blocked sock of JeanLatore Darkspots ( talk) 20:29, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
As you may have read, Daniel Ellsberg leaked the Pentagon Papers in 1971 to the New York Times, which caused a major uproar in both the courts and the Nixon administration. The attorney general, John Mitchell, issued an order to the times to cease publication, which was appealed in a landmark Surpeme Court case, and Nixon personally plotted all-out retaliation with tactics that eventually lead to Watergate. What does this have to do with Wikipedia in 2007 you might ask?
What would happen if a modern day Ellsberg leaked top secret documents, but instead of the old-fashioned leak to the press, what if he "leaked" them by posting to Wikipedia, either through an article, or even userspace, etc)?
What could happen to wikipedia and would it lead to criminal and civil liablity? What about for the editors who "revert" the article if others try to censor it on national security grounds. Even a court order could not prevent wikipedia editors from re-posting this material, if it got that far. Perhaps the government would try to shut Wikipedia down? The possibilities are many. Brown Univ 77 ( talk) 18:47, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Scientific standards
I have drafted a new proposal and would like help in clarifying, adjusting, adapting, and improving it. It is based on five years of work here at Wikipedia (not always the prettiest, I might add). I think it summarizes the opinions of a great majority of editors as to how to handle scientific situations. This proposal serves as a nexus between WP:NPOV and WP:RS for cases where we are dealing with observable reality. It is needed because there are a lot of editors who don't seem to understand what entails best-practices when writing a reliable reference work about observable reality. I don't pretend that this version is perfect, and would appreciate any and all additions, suggestions people may have for getting to some well-regarded scientific standards.
Note that these standards would apply only when discussing matters directly related to observable reality. These standards are inspired in part by WP:SPOV but avoid some of the major pitfalls of that particular proposal. In particular, the idea that SPOV even exists is a real problem. However, I think it is undeniable that we should have some standards for writing about scientific topics.
See also WP:SCI for another failed proposal that dovetails with this one. I hope this particular proposal is more in-line with the hole I see in policy/guidelines for dealing with these situations.
ScienceApologist ( talk) 19:52, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
I'll be the first say that I am a bit new to Wikipedia policy and what is/is not acceptable on the site. However I can across a User Page that seems completely inappropriate for Wikipedia. User:DarkFireYoshi's user page is being used for nothing more than personal web storage. The information on the page and his talk page are merely information of a fictional Survivor-like competition. I Googled some of the information on his page to check the legitimacy, and all that I found was a YouTube account under the same name, listing his talk page as the "official website" (seen here [9] and here [10]. So long story short... is this allowable? If not, what needs to be done about it? Thank you in advance for you help. Bvlax2005 ( talk) 04:25, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
I recently encountered User:Initialdesign who appears to be writing highly professional articles on borderline-notable doctors. The articles are entirely positive and include corporate photographs of the subject.
I strongly suspect that the user is from initaldesign, inc and is being paid to do this work. This is obviously bad for Wikipedia, but what I want to talk about is a proposed new policy. It would be a simple policy, though it might have to be fleshed out a bit:
Opinions? DJ Clayworth ( talk) 14:11, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
I bet also the Foundation is paying staff to remove any libel or other undesirables. Deamon138 ( talk) 00:49, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
Quite useless. Judge the contribution alone, not the authors' identity. NVO ( talk) 15:44, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
Talk:September 11, 2001 attacks#RFC on page title and comma - We need outside opinions on what the appropriate grammar and application of the manual of style is here in this situation. Should the page title and the article start out with "September 11, 2001 attacks" (no comma) or "September 11, 2001, attacks"? A third option is to rename the page to something like "September 11 attacks". We would appreciate comments on the article talk page. Thanks. -- Aude ( talk) 20:17, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
Posting this here, because it needs to be spotlighted and have more eyes on it.
The ArbCom RfC came up with two pretty clear statements in Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Arbitration_Committee#View_by_Celarnor_.282.29 Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Arbitration_Committee#No_New_Policy that gained a large number of endorsement that I view as an indication of consensus support. In light of that I've called for the BLP Special Enforcement to be marked historical because it's lost community support.
In response, User:Ncmvocalist has threatened to have me blocked for making "tendentious argument against the enforcement of a core policy".
Community input would be welcome. -- Barberio ( talk) 01:42, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
Please see discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Gregorian calendar.
Dates like 1582-10-10 appear to be in ISO 8601 format. This is especially true for autoformatted dates, because the user preferences window indicates this format with the text "2001-01-15T16:12:34", which is unmistakably in the ISO 8601 format. The ISO 8601 format requires the use of the Gregorian calendar, and for dates before that calender was introduced, the proleptic Gregorian calendar. Browsing a few articles suggests that many editors do not understand this convention, and are therefore presenting incorrect dates to readers. Also, a date in a non-numeric format such as 10 October 1582 will generally be presumed to be in the Julian calendar (since it is before the introduction of the Gregorian calendar) so if it is autoformatted, the meaning of the date changes depending on the reader's preference setting.
Please note that discussions on this matter have been quite amicable and this RFC is only to attract a wider audience.
Proposal:
-- Gerry Ashton ( talk) 18:00, 18 August 2008 (UTC)
Note: This discussion was initiated by another sock of Julie Dancer; see also Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Julie Dancer. Pretty much anything in the 71.100 range that posts to the Village Pump can be considered trolling. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 01:23, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
Back in 2003, the idea of the Wikipedia was that an article could be started even if it did not meet most of the requirements for an article and from there be lovingly edited by users until whatever problems it had eventually went away in a collaborative effort toward eventual perfection of the article. Today, however, no such thing is possible. All articles whether new or existing are not treated as Wiki articles anymore but rather as printed publications sent to a publisher for review. The idea of online collaboration and perfection, which is what a Wiki is suppose to be all about, has been abandoned in favor of treating all works as a submittal to a publisher for acceptance or rejection. Rather than as a bee hive where honey is produced the Wikipedia seems to be now more like a pool full of piranha looking for the next article to attack. The Wikipedia has gone from being a place where content providers can collaborate to the mindset of a printed publication where articles not already perfected are simply destroyed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.100.13.184 ( talk • contribs) 15:17, 21 August 2008