User talk:Lirani

Welcome!

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Hi lilly. Your topic looks weird. I have concerns. Lirani (talk) 18:23, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

Juan D. Bruce-Novoa

Hi, you can sign your comments automatically using four tildes ~~~~. Please add your messages to the bottom of the talk page, or they may be overlooked. There were two main issues with the article as it looked when it was deleted.

• The article was a copyright violation. Copyrighted text is not allowed in Wikipedia, as outlined in this policy. It was copied from here which is clearly marked Juan D. Bruce-Novoa from Dictionary of Literary Biography. ©2005-2006 Thomson Gale, a part of the Thomson Corporation. All rights reserved. and Copyright 2011 by BookRags, Inc.
• It did not provide independent verifiable sources to enable us to verify the facts or show that it meets the notability guidelines.

Adippoli, copyright violation, and Articles for Creation

Professor, I'm a campus ambassador in Los Angeles and a member of the "Articles for Creation" (AfC) WikiProject. I noticed Draft:Sweetie: The Internet Scamming Avatar and began to fix it in the process of reviewing it, as the subject appeared notable enough for acceptance. I didn't realize at first it was an assignment by your student, Adippoli. It would appear Adippoli had created Sweetie (The Internet Avatar), which was subsequently deleted by DragonflySixtyseven as an apparent copyright violation. As you can imagine, copyright violations are not tolerated here.

I noticed your course doesn't have a campus ambassador. If San Diego wasn't so far away I would've been happy to help. Jami (Wiki Ed) and Kevin Gorman are responsible for providing you help with monitoring your students' activities on Wikipedia.

As an aside, I recommend your students avoid using AfC. Reviews are often delayed for weeks or months. If your students work within their user sandbox they can draft at their own pace and then move the content into the article namespace. Often students learn more by editing existing articles so they can interact (and learn from) other editors. Chris Troutman (talk) 01:12, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

I feel I should point out that my deletion rationale was " apparent copyright violation", which means that I checked Google for a few randomly-selected phrases and could not find a specific source. However, the tone of the text felt like it had been taken from somewhere else. There were also certain oddities in the vocabulary and overall structure which lead me to suspect that someone took content from a pre-existing source, and then replaced significant phrases with synonyms or near-synonyms.

So. Can this work be saved? Possibly. Should Wikipedia have an article about Sweetie? Probably. Should Wikipedia have this as an article about Sweetie? No. DS (talk) 01:36, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Thank you both, Chris Troutman and DragonflySixtyseven, for the work you both do building and maintaining Wikipedia. Our class has actually been working a bit with NativeForeigner. We have also communicated with Jami (Wiki Ed). Respectfully, I strongly disagree that Adippoli violated copyright with this article for two reasons. First, I had all my students draft their pieces and submit them for peer review in a class on May 22. I have examined Adippoli's text and it has significantly expanded from what she submitted then, but some of the content in the final contribution was already drafted then and has revised. This isn't a last minute copy paste job, I assure you. Second, I am familiar with Adippoli's writing style from the midterm -- an exam where we validated submissions through TurnItIn (and I haven't taught this class before, so my questions are not floating around out there). Adippoli's writing style on the midterm was very very similar to the writing style in the Sweetie article, and that passed TurnItIn with flying colors. Adippoli is developing as a writer, so perhaps her style strikes you as choppy compared to what you're used to reading among those who fluently write for online audience. She actually reported to me that editing Wikipedia had caused her significant anxiety, as she is an undergraduate and building her writing skills. Unfortunately, your reaction to her article has shown her anxieties about Wikipedia to be well placed.

Further, I would like to argue that this article *should* be accepted into Wikipedia. As you have pointed out, the article is notable. As I have argued, I have every reason to believe it is not plagiarized. (The students will have their final submissions uploaded to TurnItIn on Wednesday, so I can provide some algorithmic support for that claim if you would like.) Even if the article can be improved, it is much easier to edit a work to make the writing smoother once it is there than to expect someone else to write it from scratch. I have seen writing very similar to or less skilled than Adippoli's on Wikipedia. If your concerns about copyright are allayed, then I don't know why you would turn away work on a notable subject that (like many wiki articles), is imperfect but easily improved by other skilled editors.

Adippoli's grade will not be hurt if you don't accept this article, so her future does not hang in the balance. But what is at stake for me is my faith in Wikipedia as a public compendium accessible to good-faith contributors with a range of verbal skills and styles. Lirani (talk) 07:00, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Update: I actually ran Adippoli's assignment through TurnItIn and I can confirm that the algorithm also does not believe that this is a copyright violation. Lirani (talk) 07:09, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Okay. I'll grant that it does not meet TurnItIn's criteria for plagiarism/copyvio. However, its overall feel is so unlike Wikipedia's standard style, and so like a feature piece in a news magazine, that I concluded it was in some way an adaptation of a feature piece in a news magazine. If I was wrong in my conclusion, I sincerely apologize — both to Adippoli, and to you. That said, there is still the issue of style and feel. We accept that our contributors have a range of skills, but we also prefer a certain specific style — neutral, cold, unemotional, flavorless. Adippoli's draft feels far too much like "EYEWITNESS NEWS... AND YOU! ARE! THERE!" The article has already been significantly rewritten by another editor (who approved the submission), and I plan to make further significant changes myself.

Are there articles on Wikipedia that are not in our recommended style? Yes. Should there be? No. They exist because we've got literally millions of articles that have been submitted over a +13-year period, and because the people who maintain article quality are volunteers, and because the AfC/Draft protocol (experienced users reviewing drafts by neophytes) is quite new (and was introduced partly as a result of neophytes creating too many articles with too many significant flaws). We're fixing them as fast as we can, but we're just volunteers who do this because we enjoy it. DS (talk) 15:39, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for your respectful reconsideration and your apology. I've spent the quarter training my students in writing precisely, avoiding superlatives, and avoiding overreaching statements (e.g. modern life, the world, amazing). Wiki takes neutrality a step further with passive voice, and particular ways of avoiding claims by the enyclopedic author. It is super hard for you all, and for me.

One of the things I've become hyperaware of through teaching Wikipedia this quarter is actually how unusual Wikipedia style is. It is really a unique literary form. It seems modeled after the neutral passive voice I learned 20 years ago in how to write scientific reports, but that voice actually does not appear in public life anywhere else that I can tell. (This is not a critique, but just an observation.) This has made me notice how FULL even the high-production world of media is with overinflated prose. For example, website talk blurbs for the Commonwealth Club (a prominent California cultural organization) are full of huge "THIS IS SO EXCITING CLAIMS!" I blame TED and a media environment that needs passion and ratings because there isn't funding for investigation and careful reporting.

As a result, there aren't really examples of good Wikistyle out there much of anywhere else in public life. Even Wikipedia is full of substandard Wikistyle. How and where is the public -- the everyone who potentially *could* contribute to Wikipedia -- supposed to learn this literary form when it is so out of step with vernacular culture? (Doesn't mean that it is bad, just unusual.) It's an interesting pickle.

Very concretely on my end, I will try to identify well-written Wikipedia articles next time we do this and have the students analyze its style. Then, when they do their peer review in class, I'll ask them to compare the style of the piece under review to that quality exemplar. That should make the style lesson more powerful than me circling superlatives on the midterm and telling them not to do that.

On your end, who can say. It might be too hard for volunteers to keep the purity flame of Wikipedia alive by damming up contributions that don't match the style. I would argue it is also undemocratic and is one of the reasons Wikipedia has so much trouble getting entries from women, people in India (I did fieldwork there and am familiar with Wikimedia Foundation's efforts there), and others who don't have the training in neutral scientific and academic literary forms. Could there be design alternatives to the dam approach? For example, what if there was a little meter on every article indicating the edited quality of it? WP currently has the good article ratings, but why not also label messy articles that need help on the same scale. That way, readers can attune their sense of style/taste to the WP ideal style as they read. By the time they take the plunge and contribute, they will recognize the quality hierarchy in WP more easily. A loyal critic and contributor, Lirani (talk) 16:10, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

We do have tags that get added to articles, in big obvious boxes at the beginning; they say things like [["this article is too promotional in tone", or "this article is too colloquial" or "this article feels like an editorial". Some people ignore them. Some people get very upset when their articles are tagged with these boxes early on. Anything more specific than that... I don't know if it could really be automated or quantified. As for the Sweetie article, I've been reprocessing it significantly -- as a teaching tool for your students, I've made several discrete changes, each with its own distinct rationale. It's not finished yet, but have a look. DS (talk) 18:36, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Last day rush

Hello! I wrote to your class at Posting to a Wikipedia article is the beginning of an assignment, not the end. I see that the class has a deadline tomorrow and suddenly lots of people are submitting content. Have you accounted for Wikipedia community review? If you have questions, please go to the Wikipedia:Education noticeboard. Thanks. Blue Rasberry (talk) 13:57, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Hi there

They were supposed to play with small edits in wp to learn the code and then edit in their sandboxes for a while. They are submitting material that has at least been through a round of anonymous peer review for the class so I hope the content is at least minimally a contribution rather than a mess. I had asked them to begin editing the actual article last week, but it looks like not everyone listened. If you need me to talk to any individual students, let me know. I can also email your message to the class.

Also, your last day rush request sounds fine. I am sorry I did not know about the volunteer rush issue. I modeled my assignment after two other longstanding instructor assignments. I also requested help and talked at varying lengths with NativeForeigner (talk · contribs), Jami (Wiki Ed), and Kevin Gorman.i also read the educator guides. Nowhere were these volunteer issues pointed out. My timeline and syllabus was up for all wp education volunteers to see all quarter/ As a wp occasional contributor, one sort of imagines that each article is managed by a very different set of volunteers and so contributions to different places will not accumulate stress to a few. I am sorry about that.

is there a special reviewing procedure because these students are enrolled on a class? I have made edits here and there and I didn't realize anyone was reviewing every edit.

Lirani (talk) 15:37, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Hello! In response -

• No, there is no special reviewing procedure for classes except sometimes people volunteer to specifically help a class. All edits anywhere on Wikipedia in any context are reviewed by multiple people - it just happens.
• No worries about the volunteer rush issue because now you understand the issue. A big part of the burden is on the Wikimedia community, because we invite classes here and then cannot fully accommodate them. Perhaps you can incorporate that fact into your class somehow. In any case, the best thing that you can do in response is be understanding if content gets deleted and if the class found this meaningful and you decide to do this again, then plan to have them submit 3 weeks before the end of the assignment, respond to community feedback for two weeks, then submit the reflection a week after that. Part of the reflection should include getting a response from a stranger who just showed up on the Internet, and how that felt. When you have human to human conversation that means something, and to understand Wikipedia is to understand that humans are volunteering their time to help other humans share something. All problems are forgiven if you just acknowledge volunteer time going into things.

NativeForeigner, Kevin, and Jami all know their stuff but their time is tight. It takes a community to manage these things. Perhaps contact any of them or me for a voice chat and we can suggest ways to get fast community review on a schedule. Something that comes to mind is posting the content live in an article space, then sending the students somewhere like to the WP:TEAHOUSE to say, "I am new, can someone review my content?" If that happens and the students all get review before the deadline and have time to respond, then almost every problem goes away.

Email me if you want to have a brief chat by voice or video - that is a standing offer. I think it only makes sense at this point to encourage but not obligate the students to try to follow up, and otherwise, the typical review process will take its course. I just regret to say that some content will probably be deleted outright if there is no response to feedback. Sorry for the negative experience you had when you sought feedback and did not get it - we have a chaotic environment here and sometimes people need to ask twice, but you could not have known that. Thanks. Blue Rasberry (talk) 19:23, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

That's one wy to go about this. Sorry, I read through past assignments and saw similar format to this, hence assumed it would be satisfactory. Regardless encouraging some form of follow-up on behalf of the students would undoubtedly be ideal. I'll think on this but the rest of my day is going to be more or less taken. NativeForeigner ^Talk 20:06, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

I will take you up on the voice chat later in the summer once things settle down around here. And thanks for your suggestions. Once the course evals and a survey I did are in, I'll know whether students found it valuable. I care deeply about internet, publics, and how micropolitics shape inclusion so the wikipedia assignment is for me more than a way of gathering info. One thing I've noticed that makes this tough is just the nature of open source and massively distributed -- there are 2 or 3 ways to do things. I didn't know about the teahouse, but some students used the sandbox processes, others are relying on those watching the page. I'll be thinking of ways to provide a good garden path if I do this again. A longer voice chat will help a lot with that. *Thanks for your work and support, Blue Rasberry and NativeForeigner. I've learned a lot. By the way, the students' grades are not affected by their entry getting rejected so you don't have to feel bad about that. They know that I look favorably on trying to engage editors, but that also you can't ultimately control the editors on the other end. Lirani (talk) 23:20, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

It would be very helpful if you see any trend in responses among your students to share descriptions of common experiences at WP:Education noticeboard. If you decide to do this again, there are a lot of people at hand who could share short tips in just a few minutes about increasing engagement with the Wikipedia community. I hope the students have a positive experience and I hope their edits stick. Good call on not tying the permanency of their edits to staying on Wikipedia - from your syllabus it was not clear that this was the case, but it sounds like you have better intuition about our community culture than most other professors who come here. Thanks. Blue Rasberry (talk) 18:06, 12 June 2014 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of Carl Countryman

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A tag has been placed on Carl Countryman requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section A7 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because the article appears to be about a person or group of people, but it does not indicate how or why the subject is important or significant: that is, why an article about that subject should be included in an encyclopedia. Under the criteria for speedy deletion, such articles may be deleted at any time. Please read more about what is generally accepted as notable.

If you think this page should not be deleted for this reason, you may contest the nomination by visiting the page and clicking the button labelled "Click here to contest this speedy deletion". This will give you the opportunity to explain why you believe the page should not be deleted. However, be aware that once a page is tagged for speedy deletion, it may be removed without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag from the page yourself, but do not hesitate to add information in line with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. If the page is deleted, and you wish to retrieve the deleted material for future reference or improvement, then please contact the deleting administrator, or if you have already done so, you can place a request here. Tchaliburton (talk) 01:11, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Carl Countryman

Lirani, I have added an Infobox person to the page. Could you fill in any missing information you know. I have make the birth and death days html comments. If you have the actual dates add them and then remove the html comment delimiters, (look at the source of this comment. Edit the section to see it)

Also normally references are sited inline with the text of the aritcle. You have used the . Some more text using the same reference<ref name=foo \>.

Then in the ==References== section you use:

to generate the reference list.

At least this is how I learned how to do it.

Thanks RLH --Robert.Harker (talk) 01:41, 1 September 2014 (UTC)