User talk:SMcCandlish/Archive 74

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January 2013

GOCE 2012 Annual Report

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Guild of Copy Editors 2012 Annual Report

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 – Both fixed.

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Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style

Resolved
 – I was already the first commentator on this one.

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CryptoRights Foundation

Resolved
 – Provided what I can.

Hi SMcCandlish. I saw your COI disclosure and felt for someone who has contributed so much to the project, yet resisted the temptation to edit your own article, I should be particularly inclined to improve the article. But even the references already listed on the article appear elusive. I was wondering if you had any specific knowledge on where I could find some better sourcing. CorporateM (Talk) 16:51, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

Hmm. I'm thinking just mailing list and newsgroup archives on crypto and cyberliberty issues, though I was interviewed more than once as CRF's communications director/CCO in the mainstream press, including AP (that article even included a color photo of me at my CRF desk :-). But, CRF never garnered the kind of constant media churn as EFF (where I'd previously worked for 9 years), because it was engaging in geeky development of security tools, not high-profile legal disputes. CRF itself is moribund right now due to lack of funding and its server dying. One of my tasks for 2013 is to get it back up on the Web and help Dave Del Torto figure out new ways to revitalize its mission this is "brave new world" of mobile computing that is partially supplanting "traditional" Internet access. Many of CRF's early tech projects are not longer very relevant (we don't need to develop a hand-held secure communications device, but rather apps for iPhone and Android). — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 20:43, 1 January 2013 (UTC)
Here are two quite different versions of the AP article: The one with the pic is more typical of how papers ran the piece; the other one was heavily edited by the local paper. There's probably a Squirrelmail mailing list that would have evidence of our participation (we produced the GPG plugin for it and released it as open source, even though we actually paid developers to create it, out of grant money). CRF produced or helped produce an IETF Internet-Draft (i.e., a de facto standard) for OpenPGP Multisig,[1] another on MIME Security with PGP, which later developed into the ["OpenPGP MIME" Internet-Draft and corresponding RFC[2][3] (another kind of de facto Internet standard), among others. Googling 'CryptoRights "Del Torto"' and 'CryptoRights McCandlish' turns up all sorts of things. Here's another AP piece by same author, interviewing Dave instead of me. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 21:06, 1 January 2013 (UTC)
Thanks. I saw a lot of media articles that only briefly mention it, but don't offer enough meaty content to expand the article. Some of these links may help; I'll need to cull through them. CorporateM (Talk) 21:49, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Organisms

Resolved
 – Invited input from the two suggested parties.

I really wouldn't advertise this generally yet. I have had bitter wrangles when editing articles on taxonomic subjects – there are some very expert and very aggressive editors out there, who jealously preserve differences between the Codes. Even I can see at least half a dozen places where what you've written is not correct under the ICN or uses problematic language to describe it. User:Curtis Clark and User:Sminthopsis84 are helpful professional botanists knowledgeable about the botanical code. Peter coxhead (talk) 13:37, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

Too late. :-) I'll contact them and ask for their input. Feel free to ID the issues you've already found, of course. This guideline badly needs to exist and to be correct. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 19:53, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

The WikiProject: Good Articles Newsletter (January 2013)

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The WikiProject Good articles Newsletter
Volume IV, No. 1 – January 2013

For past newsletters click here

In This Issue


This newsletter was delivered by EdwardsBot (talk) 14:30, 3 January 2013 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:File names

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 – BT,DT.

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I've already been involved in this one. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 11:06, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

Stop now, please

Resolved
 – Issue cleared up at WT:EQUINE.

You have just screwed up over a dozen horse breed articles and yet more categories and you need to stop now and let a consensus build at WikiProject Equine. We have had a longstanding, stable (excuse the pun) consensus on breed naming conventions, categorization and other issues that you are going in and mucking around with. We have over 350-400 breed and "type" articles and without understanding what you are doing, you are creating a complete mess. Please cease renaming, moving and changing categories until we have a consensus on what, if anything needs to change. Montanabw(talk) 23:26, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

I disagree with your characterization, but recognize that you are objecting to my edits on these in this vein. You can lay off the personal invective. "Your" articles are not in a stable, consistent state, they are grossly inconsistent and messy, both in their naming and language and in their sloppy, misleading categorization. A very large number of them have factuality problems, like presenting landraces as formal breeds, uncritically mislabeling as "breeds" coat colors/patterns that are not breeds but just have some random yahoos with a studbook claiming they're a breed, incorrect disambiguation style that violates WP:AT and WP:DAB, and many other problems. The fact that your project has settled on being satisfied with such a ridiculous mess, which violates several policies, and doesn't like its boat rocked doesn't mean no one's going to rock your boat. Even if it was not a mess, as long as it directly conflicts with WP:AT and other major policies and guidelines, all you have is a WP:LOCALCONSENSUS which is overridden by site-wide rules anyway, again as a matter of policy (and previous ARBCOM decisions that rein in [pun again, sigh] recalcitrant wikiprojects). If you want to make a case that my attempts at cleanup have been unhelpful, feel free to do so, and maybe you are right. Good bloody luck making any kind of convincing case that a major cleanup effort isn't needed. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 23:42, 2 January 2013 (UTC)
I have opened the discussion at WPEQ, let's keep it all there. I agree there is some inconsistency, but your changes are going in the wrong direction. Montanabw(talk) 00:00, 3 January 2013 (UTC)
Oh, and on "random yahoos with a studbook" please see color breed which explains that some breeds that are all the same color are real breeds, and yes, some aren't and are just "random yahoos." (My personal favorite amongst the latter was the now-defunct Bay (horse) registry -- arrgh!) The Appaloosa folks put it well: it's a breed with a color preference. Same thing for the American Paint Horse. Some colors can be bred to be a homozygous trait and thus "fixed" within a breed, so long as other colors are not introduced; it's why the Cleveland Bay is always bay, the Friesian horse is almost always black (there are a few individuals who remain heterozygous black and thus the occasional chestnut (coat) slips in there) and the Haflinger horse is always chestnut. On the other hand, if you are talking about the Palomino, which is a coat color that is an incomplete dominant and so can never "breed true" - but that didn't keep them from having a registry, then I happen to completely agree with you on that. It has occurred to me that you really should not be so critical of WPEQ when you consider all the cruft that we have actually kept OUT of wikipedia! Montanabw(talk) 22:24, 3 January 2013 (UTC)
Sorry, I thought I'd been clear that I recognize that some "color breeds" are in fact real breeds in the conventional sense, like Apps and APH. Many dog, cat, etc., breeds also have color/pattern restrictions. I can't think of any other wikiproject that's been mixing these and things that aren't really breeds in a "color breeds" category, though. It strikes me as not just unhelpful to readers, but directly misleading, and it may encourage more of the yahoos to add more wannabe-breeds to WP. I'd have to look at Palomino in more detail to form an opinion (and picking on a particular alleged breed isn't my goal; general cleanup was, and I'm not singling horses out, I just went there next after cats). There are recessives in cats that lead to breeds that have formal recognition in virtually all cat registries, and are derived from long-standing landraces, but which do not breed true for their most defining trait. The Manx is one. (Short version: You can't breed two completely tailless "rumpies" together or the kittens are not viable. When bred properly, some of the cats will have tails, from stubs to full-length, and these non-rumpies are needed, or the breed would be extinct in one generation!) I apologize if I've been too critical. I was a professional activist for a decade, and have a "fix it now!" attitude about problems I encounter, which sometimes makes me forget that complaints and criticisms and less-than-polite suggestions are not always comfortably received. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 10:43, 4 January 2013 (UTC)
PS: We used to get along so well! :-) — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 13:46, 4 January 2013 (UTC)


Botanist input

Hi, sorry to take so long to reply. I'll be more-or-less offline for a while (travelling). I think it would be a good idea to open up the discussion to WP:Plants, because several editors there may have useful input. I don't think it's likely that I'll get a chance to go over your draft in detail for a while (there'll probably be a backlog of vandalism to revert by the time I get back to wikipedia) Yes, we've certainly crossed paths before in the cat world, not an area where I've done a lot of work though (my efforts have been almost entirely related to their genetics). Best wishes, Sminthopsis84 (talk) 21:35, 3 January 2013 (UTC)

I agree about WP:PLANTS; I think it's ready.--Curtis Clark (talk) 22:04, 3 January 2013 (UTC)
Good. They may well be the first project to invite, then. I don't want to "spam" all the biology projects at once or the "fix this, disagree with that" influx will be too much to manage all at once. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 10:28, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

Tortoiseshell cat

...sigh.. Well, with all the dramatic colic that has been kicked up with WikiProject Equine, it just makes me want to take a nerve pill. I could just cry. I cannot become a bigger fish to be fried, so by the time you see this I will have deleted the section on "Tortitude". I have no ownership to that article nor that section. I just made an edit to rescue the section which had (as it turns out) been properly deleted as ‎ →Tortitude: no references. Makes no sense. No evidence for any part of this paragraph. (from edit history). I discoved the page by the deleted section tag. Happenstance. By the way, just in case you believe by my user name that I am a rabid cat fancier, my name only tangentially has anything to do with cats per se. It is a veiled allusion to a scene in the movie Primer (film). I feel sure that I don't fit into any of the demographics you can categorize me into but I do have an entire toy box full of alphabet letters to match yours. Regards. Fylbecatulous talk 22:49, 3 January 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, I really flipped out some people over there at the horse project. I think I'm simply going to have to work around them, like the birds project, and just try to get everything else on WP consistent on these things. There are some strongly entrenched opinions in some of these projects, and as Curtis Clark points out in a thread above, people tend not to like to be told they need to revisit a process they've already been through and try to come to a new consensus, especially in response to demands that seem overly critical. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 10:21, 4 January 2013 (UTC)
Thanks, and wishing you all the best. Peace. Fylbecatulous talk 16:33, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

One of the reasons gardens are walled

Unresolved
 – 'We really need an "intro to Wikipedia for academic and professional experts" guide.... Still do! Good potential project!
Extended content
Looking at Montanabw's reaction, I think sometimes you fail to look through the eyes of the editors in a narrow field, and end up with enemies instead of friends. I actually left off editing horse articles years ago because of the controversies, and the hammering out of consensus in that project has been decidedly non-trivial. It's important to remember that a local optimum is always optimal, locally, and that getting to a global optimum can involve considerable work, work that many editors thought they had already done. To me, the best way to start out is always "Here are some more general issues I perceive; I see that you do things differently. How can I help you deal with your problems in a way that will meet my goals?" In the case of the bird folks, this probably wouldn't have worked, but I think It's always a good place to start.--Curtis Clark (talk) 18:13, 3 January 2013 (UTC)
I agree in the abstract, but I've never been good at that sort of politics. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 10:25, 4 January 2013 (UTC)
PS: This may sound like a "my logic is bigger than your logic" nit-pick, but I consider it a serious issue: A major and worsening problem on WP, especially as the generalist editorship continues to decline in numbers and activity levels, is that wikiprojects are becoming increasingly balkanized into stand-offish blocs. Despite several ARBCOM decisions against projects bucking consensus and making up their own conflicting rules, and despite a comparatively recent but clear policy against it, at WP:LOCALCONSENSUS, they continue to do it anyway, with increased feelings of righteousness. Per WP:OWN, no topic or field on WP is a walled garden, but some projects do not appear to believe this. I don't know what the solution is, but I have serious misgivings about what WP is going to be like 5 years from now in this regard if something doesn't change. One idea I've had, inspired a bit by the undoing of WP:Esperanza and a CfD several years ago that move all the wikiproject "members" categories to read "participants", is to propose that we abandon the term "wikiproject" entirely, and use something more verbal, that doesn't sound like a club, or worse yet a militia, one can join. Maybe "wikiwork" or something like that: WikiWork Botany, WikiWork Cats, etc. PS: My Granny's garden wasn't walled, but sprawled all the way to the mailbox at the sidewalk. :-) — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 11:22, 4 January 2013 (UTC)
Some are more interested in methods, others in results.
Certainly, WP:OWN is a problem; otherwise it wouldn't have a shortcut. Randy in Boise is also a problem, and editors' reactions to that often appear from the outside to be WP:OWN. And over time they can turn into WP:OWN, when an editor starts to believe that's the only way to counter the Randys.
One approach is to wade in with policies, guidelines, and sanctions, whip up support from editors who have an abstract interest, and make life so miserable for the Randys and the "owners" that they leave Wikipedia. In my experience, the most knowledgeable editors are the first to leave (I almost wrote "best editors", but one solution to expert retention is to not care, and only retain compliant editors).
It seems that a lot of the pushback you are going to get at WP:EQUINE is over WP:COMMONNAME issues. You only meant to sweep the floor, but you knocked over a chess game. The word that immediately comes to mind is "inefficient".
My most memorable walled garden was the atrium in the house of Maurice K. Temerlin in Norman, Oklahoma, filled with lush greenery. My first thought was that it provided a safe place for Lucy, but as far as I could tell, they only let her into it under supervision.--Curtis Clark (talk) 16:31, 4 January 2013 (UTC)
You're right that my cleanup efforts have not been efficient when it comes to horses. (They have been in other areas, including donkeys, with direct cooperation from Montanabw, curiously enough, and in domestic cats, among others.) It is difficult to predict what projects will find article naming and categorization cleanup controversial, and on what points.

I understand the WP:RANDY problem, but I'm not part of it; WP:Manual of Style/organisms could not have been written by a Randy. One problem to me is that too many alleged experts treat everyone who disagrees with them about anything as a Randy, often very insultingly so. And by no means is every editor who claims expertise actually an expert; many, especially in biology projects, are simply fanciers, and others may have studied zoology or botany as an undergraduate, but that's it. I have a degree in cultural anthropology, but would never call myself an expert in that field. Large numbers of, e.g., WP:BIRDS editors don't even have that level of qualification, but will fight to the death to get their way on capitalization (and on a faulty basis – they continually claim that the fact that bird field guides capitalize common names means that the mainstream publishing world is honoring the IOU's convention, when in reality all field guides on everything have always capitalized this way, as ease-of-rapid-scanning emphasis, since at least the 1800s, long before IOU even existed; it's a coincidence, and they know this but pretend this fact was never raised.

Another related issue is that WP:Competence is required – not just competence in a particular field, but online community competence to work collaboratively toward consensus. Not all academics have this, and many are extremely competitive and debatory. Sometimes the only thing to do is not care if this sort leave the project (or even be happy that they've gone). The vast majority of expert editors are a boon to the project, but being such an expert is not a "Get Out of Jail Free" card in Wiki-opoly. As one example, several years ago, one alleged (and probable) expert on albinism was extremely disruptive at the page that is now Albinism in humans. He considered himself [writing live; I don't mean peer-reviewed joural articles he'd written] to be a reliable source, and basically refused to do the leg-work to provide source citations for the material he wanted to add, nor to show that material he wanted to remove was obsolete or otherwise wrong. I bent over backwards to try to get him to understand WP:V, WP:RS and WP:NOR, but he just would not listen. Myself and others kept having to prevent him from making the well-source if imperfect article a mostly unsourced mess, and he eventually left the project is "disgust" at other editors' "stupidity", much to a lot of people's relief. The article today is very well sourced and stable (aside from frequent "ALBINOESES LOOK STOOPID" vandalism). The disruptive expert's absence was a boon. I feel the same way about WP:DIVA expert editors who threaten wiki-retirement, WP boycotts, editing strikes, mass editorial walkouts and other WP:POINTy nonsense. We all know that in reality academics have zero problem adapting to in-house style guides of whatever venue they're writing for. Pretending that doing it on WP is onerous is a abuse of WP as massively-multiplayer online debate game.

We really need an "intro to Wikipedia for academic and professional experts" guide, to help prevent incoming specialists from falling into such pitfall patterns (not to mention the one identified at WP:SSF). — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 20:45, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

Just wanted to let you know that I did read this, started an unproductive reply, and then decided I needed to think about it a while.--Curtis Clark (talk) 02:40, 7 January 2013 (UTC)
@Curtis Clark: It's a been a while, but I thought I'd get back to you about this. If I resume editing, I may in fact try to draft an "intro to Wikipedia for academic and professional experts" guide. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 20:54, 21 March 2014 (UTC)
Actually, Wikipedia:Ten Simple Rules for Editing Wikipedia might be good enough. Didn't know that existed. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 21:59, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

American (cattle breed)

Resolved
 – Answered.

Hello SMcCandlish. I did the technical move as you requested. What do you think about the surviving redirect from American (cattle breed) to American (cattle). Is it superfluous and should it be deleted? Thanks, EdJohnston (talk) 02:48, 5 January 2013 (UTC)

I would make sure nothing links to it, and then toast it. This can be trashed as well: Lucerna (cattle breed). — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 03:21, 5 January 2013 (UTC)
Thanks. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 22:34, 6 January 2013 (UTC)
Speaking of an article about something of dubious notability, sigh... It's not really even a cattle breed, it's a bison hybrid. But I'm not going to dive into that one. (Nonetheless, if you wanted to merge with Beefalo and make a new article on bison hybrids, I would not object in the least, though someone else might-- doubt anyone would, though, as the WP:Agriculture folks are all pretty mainsteam and I'm the only member in bison country, I think. Montanabw(talk) 22:48, 6 January 2013 (UTC)

Apteva and friends

Resolved
 – Moot; Apteva has been topic banned, as I sadly predicted.

Evidently, you are of the opinion that the point for any sort of compromise here has long been passed; I am not so sure that I disagree with you any longer. Still, would it be possible at all to give the four users who you've suggested be banned a chance to voluntarily abstain themselves from the dash dispute? I understand you're not sold on Apteva's willingness to do so; I actually think he's sincere. At the very least, could it be tried with Enric Naval and LittleBenW? dci | TALK 20:41, 5 January 2013 (UTC)

Sure, with regad to Enric Naval and Wikid77, but I would like to see the latter at least administratively warned. I already struck Enric Naval out because he publicly disavowed Apteva's position and behavior . As I said plainly, I think he stills suffers from some of the consensus confusions and attitudinal "I'm gonna prove you wrong!" WP:WINNING viewpoints, but maybe that will wear off. Yes, there is no more room for compromise with Apteva. He's simply playing with us now, making sport of the whole situation and continuing to make his point, wiki-suicidally, while saying he's dropped the matter and won't raise it again out of the other side of his mouth. He is provably already not being genuine, and the AN hasn't even closed yet! It's downright pathological. Those of use who have been dealing with him for longer have already seen this act before. LittleBenW is in the same boat. He got topic banned for doing exactly the same thing but with regard to diacritics only a week or two ago. I'm if he gets topic banned on this, he'll probably just pick capital letters, or semicolons, or italics or whatever, to start more psychodrama about and continue doing this until he just gets banned. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 23:30, 5 January 2013 (UTC)
Well, I guess all I have left to say is that I sympathize to an extent with you and those others frustrated by Apteva's party. The fact that there is such a "party" in itself is problematic. But, as I've said before, I'm just not comfortable slapping him down with a topic ban when I still think voluntary, self-instigated change can happen. At any rate, I am finished with this discussion unless it boils over into some other forum; it's best now to let a consensus be determined sans any more long comments, proposals, and subsections. dci | TALK 23:40, 5 January 2013 (UTC)
Unless he's lying, they'll amount to the same thing. If he's topic banned voluntarily or involuntarily it still amounts to "Apteva will stop beating this dead horse and go do something constructive". The only reason, really, to oppose the involuntary ban is if he intends to ditch the voluntary one (even stigma isn't a reason - the stigma is already there, from being RFC/U'd and WP:AN'd with landslides against him in both cases). Honestly, I kind of think you should not get involved in AN and AN/I discussions if you are that uncomfortable with topic-bans, since they are a standard sanction agreed upon there. It's a heat/kitchen thing, if you see what I mean, or "if you don't like beef, don't bite the burger". — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 00:19, 6 January 2013 (UTC)
Regarding topic bans/voluntary abstention, I really have no issue with topic bans or sanctions in general. In most cases that they're given out, they are the only reasonable alternative given the sanctioned editor's disruptive or unhelpful behavior. However, I think that even late into disputes, voluntary resolutions are better than topic bans, etc. In Apteva's case, I'm also a bit uncomfortable with the intensity of some of the opposition to his "party", which strikes me as the development of a battleground. Also, I don't share the skepticism that he's automatically going to go against the terms of a voluntary abstention. There's other reasons, of course, but that's the gist of my opposition to a topic ban when other solutions are possible. dci | TALK 00:31, 6 January 2013 (UTC)
The only way you could come to this conclusion about Apteva, I feel, is lack of direct experience of his nearly year-long campaign of canvassing and tendentious, verbal aggression, but I'm disinclined to try to convince you any further. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 06:34, 6 January 2013 (UTC)

Please comment on User talk:PortlandOregon97217

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 – Just abuse of RfC tag on someone's user talk page.

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Disambiguation link notification for January 8

Disregard
 – Bot brainfart.

Hi. Thank you for your recent edits. Wikipedia appreciates your help. We noticed though that when you edited William A. Spinks, you added a link pointing to the disambiguation page William Hoskins (check to confirm | fix with Dab solver). Such links are almost always unintended, since a disambiguation page is merely a list of "Did you mean..." article titles. Read the FAQ • Join us at the DPL WikiProject.

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Um, no I didn't. I put that link in there years ago before the DAB page existed. Stupid bot. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 22:24, 8 January 2013 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Copying within Wikipedia

Resolved
 – Done.

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An invitation for you!

Resolved
 –  Too many projects already.

Hello, SMcCandlish. You're invited to join WikiProject Today's article for improvement. If you're interested in participating, please add your name to the list of members. Happy editing! Northamerica1000(talk) 01:54, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Thanks, but I'm already in too many "article improvement" projects as it is. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 09:44, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Talkback

Resolved
 – Responded at WT:AN.

Did you mean to use a different link in your message? It's not a big deal, as I found what seems to be the right discussion at the noticeboard. dci | TALK 23:52, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

You didn't answer my questions there; they were not rhetorical. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 01:07, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

Flag icons, etc.

Resolved
 – Fine by me.

SMC, I have noted your requests for a structured RfC with subparts that lend themselves to quick comments and !voting. Given that this issue has festered for four years since the current MOS:FLAG language was added, I think it's important to let every concerned editor give vent to as many perspectives as possible. Quick !voting does not lend itself to in-depth discussion. I am inclined to permit editors to continue to comment for another week or so, but I am also already preparing a more structured RfC that will provide examples of flag icon use in multiple contexts (e.g., athlete infoboxes, infobox medal tables, team infoboxes, event infoboxes, player rosters for team and event articles, lists of world records, event locations, different sports, etc.), and that will permit definitive !voting for each example. Personally, while I support the limited use of flag icons in some sports contexts, I also believe that other uses are either simple overkill or completely inappropriate. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 04:19, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

The very fact that the unstructured discussion has rambled on and on and on for four years with precisely zero motion toward a conclusion is virtually empirical proof that is needs to be re-cast in the structured way I suggested, so I'm glad you're working on that. Another week or so of rambling argument won't kill anyone, I guess. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 01:06, 12 January 2013 (UTC)
Yes, SMC, it is important to give everyone the opportunity to vent, especially when few of the concerned parties were given a real opportunity to express their opinion four years ago. If we want settled guidelines and a real, lasting and stable consensus, we have to give everyone who has an opinion the opportunity to express it and be heard. Most people are willing to accept a decision with which they disagree when they have had their say and the process is transparent. Many people are willing to fight to the death, even in a losing cause, when they sense the game is rigged by insiders. In the words of WP:CONSENSUS,
"Wikipedia has a higher standard of participation and consensus for changes to policies and guidelines than to other types of articles. This is because they reflect established consensus, and their stability and consistency are important to the community. . . . The community is more likely to accept edits to policy if they are made slowly and conservatively, with active efforts to seek out input and agreement from others."
Clearly, MOS is one of those guidelines to which a "higher standard of participation" should be applied and for which "active efforts to seek out input and agreement" should be sought to achieve a stable and long-lasting consensus. What was done four years ago fell far short of that participatory standard and simply perpetuated the underlying dispute. A small tactical victory led to long-term strategic stalemate, and did precious little to curtail the more egregious uses of flag icons. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 14:44, 12 January 2013 (UTC)
I can buy that, except your last clause (MOS:ICONS has actually been very effective; I remember in detail what a lot of articles looked like before it, and how many of them that looked like such farcical messes of icon decoration). — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 23:28, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:List of people who have been called a polymath

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Your comments at the admins' noticeboard

Resolved
 – Fixed.

I think we can both acknowledge our disagreements on how best to resolve the dash issue and the related disruptions. I am not particularly offended by your remarks; however, I admit that I was surprised by your accusation that I have "written in support of the same anti-MOS, anti-dash nonsense as the parties subject to this WP:AN case." I have not, and I have no idea why you might think that. If it's because I mentioned that Apteva &co. have "legitimate" concerns in userspace conversations, I can clarify that I never stated (nor do I believe) that they are correct. Nor have I, at any time, defended their disruptive approach, and I am not part of some conspiracy to "wipe the slate clean" for them. Thank you, dci | TALK 17:53, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

D'oh! That was a mis-paste; I was writing a response to you and someone else in same edit. Will go fix it! — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 23:09, 12 January 2013 (UTC)
No big deal; thanks for clarifying. DCI2026 (unsecured connection) (talk) 00:47, 13 January 2013 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (geographic names)

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Disambiguation link notification for January 15

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Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Article titles

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Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Pronunciation

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GOCE mid-drive newsletter, January 2013

Disregard
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Extended content
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Please comment on Talk:Pondicherry

Disregard
 – Moot; the RM that this RfC was a part of was closed before I got to it.

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Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Notability (people)

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Category:Snooker venues

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Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Categorization

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Cite4Wiki

Resolved
 – Answered.

Hello

First I apologize for my English. I want to tranlate the tool Cite4Wiki in French but I dont know where to download the source code. Can you help me?

Regards. Rabah201130 (talk) 22:57, 26 January 2013 (UTC)

It is still being re-written for compatibility with newer versions of Firefox. A beta version is available; see Wikipedia talk:Cite4Wiki#Cite4Wiki and Jetpack for a link to it. — SMcCandlish  Talk⇒ ɖ⊝כ⊙þ Contrib. 01:24, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion of Template:Talkback

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 – Speedily kept.

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Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Moderators/Straw poll

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Disambiguation link notification for January 30

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