User talk:Pointillist/Archive 2009

Queen's Counsel

If you want to ask me to do something, please post the message on my talk page rather than my user page. Thank you. --Eastlaw ^talk ⁄ _contribs 01:59, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

• Thanks for expanding the citations so quickly and sorry about posting the suggestion on the wrong page. I think this section will need some more attention - I've put some notes onto the talk page. - Pointillist (talk) 15:56, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

Kew Panoramas

Is monochrome Pointillism cool?

Thanks for the compliment - much appreciated! Patche99z (talk) 19:35, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

By the way - the treetop walkway one is of course by Dillith - I just moved it to a more prominent place. Patche99z (talk) 19:53, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

• I suppose I was walking in your footsteps on monday (I got to Kew at lunchtime once it became clear that South West Trains would be a tad stretched) but I didn't have the intelligence/experience to attempt a panorama like that! In the end I managed some shots I like (e.g. Syon Vista with snow falling, right) but nothing useful for wikipedia, except a minor shot of a Monkey Puzzle tree looking very architectural. Such a shame that most of Chiswick House is closed right now - it would have looked superb in snow. - Pointillist (talk) 22:10, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, they are both great shots - well done! There was plenty of opportunity that day, and there were many people out with their cameras. I have been taking an occasional panorama for some time now, but normally of much narrower subjects, which simply will not quite fit on one wide angle shot. Dilith's work is something of an inspiration here - the treetop one is amazing, to be so clear when the subject is (moving) trees. Another point - you mention taking photos "useful to Wikipedia", which is something I think about a bit - many of my submissions are simply record photos, hopefully useful, made as well as I can, but by no means art. I suppose that your Sion vista is not useful in an encyclopedic sense, which is a pity, since it looks great. And many of the photos I see on Wiki are not very useful in that they do not contribute to knowledge of the subject. I am afraid Dilith's treetop pan is more or less in that category, because it does not show the walkway itself very clearly. I guess I am a bit picky there, since it conveys the feeling of being up there. How do you judge? Patche99z (talk) 11:43, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Brilliant Idea Barnstar

		What a Brilliant Idea Barnstar
		Your idea at Wikipedia:Notability/RFC:Reevaluation#Objectors_to_the_Proposal is so scathingly brilliant. Elegant and simple in the extreme. It would be a tremendous boon to Wiki to have newcomers know from the outset that their contributions are welcome. I hope to see you pursue it through to implemantation. Schmidt, MICHAEL Q. 21:39, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the barnstar

Thanks for starring my barn :) Equazcion •✗/C • 21:45, 13 Feb 2009 (UTC)

Well merited, IMO. You didn't carry over the adrenaline rush from the notability re-evaluation pages and you got the tone right. That combination passes the "Manners Makyth Man" test with flying colors. Good luck with your future interactions with that editor. - Pointillist (talk) 22:23, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Hazel Genn

Many thanks for the message. Am currently inundated with irritating midterm assignments, but when I get round to it I would be happy to have a go at putting together a short bibliography. BartBassist (talk) 02:40, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

King's School, Worcester

Many thanks for copyright help with logo. You're not an OV, by any chance, are you? BartBassist (talk) 12:00, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

No, I'm afraid I'd never heard of the school before. I had your Talk page on my watchlist (re: Hazel Genn) and when I saw the copyright warning I just thought that one good turn deserves another. I prefer not to write about things that are too close to home anyway (e.g. I've no connection with Prof Genn)—I learn much more by really having to work at understanding something and getting proper references for it. - Pointillist (talk) 12:28, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks

Thanks for the barnstar! You brightened my day right up :) Karanacs (talk) 22:00, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

You deserve it! Sorry it doesn't fit your user page very well but I guess it can go on your awards page now you've seen it. - Pointillist (talk) 22:27, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Fred Goodwin

greed

Thanks for your support. The admin that reverted and just assumed vandalism really p***ed me off. I have added a sentence to the preview about the public, political and media opinion. I would welcome your input leaky_caldron (talk) 18:57, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

could it be considered as WP:SYN? I've used sources referring directly to Goodwin's greed and/or hubris covering public, politial and media. There are many more leaky_caldron (talk) 19:07, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Seems OK to me - well done for bouncing back so positively! I've endorsed it on the Fred Goodwin talk page too. If need be, I will roll up my sleeves and find more sources, but four should be enough.... - Pointillist (talk) 22:56, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

many thanks for the barnstar! It's encouraging to know that work is appreciated!!!! leaky_caldron (talk) 22:32, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

pension "scandal"

Have put my two-pennyworth on "scandal" FWIW on the Fred talk page. Cheers. Ironman1104 (talk) 10:03, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for doing that - I'll leave it a while to see what other points of view come up. All the best - Pointillist (talk) 11:07, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Your latest edit has stirred up a bit of an edit war - dare I say controversy! Can you take a look at the talk page? I have only reverted to try to get back to a stable position and to try to avoid a minor revert war! leaky_caldron (talk) 21:04, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks!

Thanks for cleaning up the vandalism on my user page. Themfromspace (talk) 11:26, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Thumperward's RfA and newpage patrol

I am able to quickly patrol large numbers of pages by the use of several cunningly-devised software scripts. They enable me to mark-as-patrolled all articles created by a given username. If someone has created +30 articles and a random sampling of 5 are all valid, then it is reasonable to conclude that the rest will be likewise. Patrol is not for checking if articles are perfect, it is for checking if they are valid articles.

The reason I did not oppose the other RfAs for having no entries in their patrol logs is because I was doing other stuff. I would have opposed them had they been brought to my attention.

It's useless to do NPP without clicking the button. DS (talk) 18:54, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Well, DS, thanks for coming over here to talk about NPP. I've also read the reason #54 comments. I think it is a tragedy that you are having to devote so much time to this task, I can imagine that it is tremendously frustrating and thankless, and I can see that it would be good if other editors would take up the burden. If for tactical reasons you want to introduce this line of thinking into future RfAs, I see where you are coming from, and it might make a difference if you just insert a boilerplate para asking other editors to support only those candidates who have visible patrol log activity. After all, 14 out of 2009's successful candidates did have pre-mop patrol log histories—I checked.

However, if you are bulk-approving e.g. 30 articles based on a sample of five, there we part company. If the NPP process doesn't find the obvious inaccuracies in Suicide Tuesday (DJ Hyper album) that I mentioned, I doubt it is worth flagging the article as patrolled. Who's going to come back and check it later? Anyway, good luck with your burden, I do feel for you. - Pointillist (talk) 19:25, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Colton

Pointillist, a) I've been an administrator longer than JulianC has. b) If you don't like how I'm handling newpage patrol, you're more than welcome to help out yourself. DS (talk) 23:16, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

I also advise you to check out JVbot's whitelist. DS (talk) 23:18, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Also, I don't feel "possessive" about NPP. I would be very, very pleased if more people would get involved. Please, I ask you. Get involved. DS (talk) 23:28, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, Dragonfly is far more experienced in the area than I am. Though it may seem like a trivial task, new page patrol is one of the most under-appreciated and difficult tasks on Wikipedia. Without DS' assistance, we'd likely have several thousand more low-quality articles. I do a bit of NPP from time to time, and I regret that I do so little. –Juliancolton ^{Tropical Cyclone} 00:29, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

I certainly don't think the task is trivial and I have nothing but sympathy for DS. His comments in the reason #54 section give the impression that he might be feeling excessively responsible for the backlog, not in a "possessive"/WP:OWN sense, but as a lonely burden. That isn't good. I don't expect I'd be able to make much difference to the backlog, though: I'd probably want to check each article too thoroughly. - Pointillist (talk) 12:23, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

Well, I've done my first four patrols—took me almost an hour, though. I just can't stop myself from checking and rewriting.... - Pointillist (talk) 14:19, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

Reached fifty-four patrols now. This has given me a much better appreciation of why DS would like all RfA candidates to show NPP experience. However, I still have reservations about the DS's block-marking approach. We may have to agree to differ on this one. - Pointillist (talk) 18:42, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

countries in 1851, 1852, 1853, etc.

Some nasty people might say that this editor is POV pushing, simply pushing France because all the articles just list one country, France. I suggested to the editor that one article be worked on not just listing a lot of articles with the country, France. Hopefully, this person will be productive. Spevw (talk) 20:30, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

Ah well, now s/he has received our gentle guidance maybe they'll get fixed in due course. I'm not a fan of this sort of list anyway: they typically lack citations, and even if they do, the references are hard to maintain. IMO the wiki software should support references for categories, so lists like these could be generated automatically. - Pointillist (talk) 20:48, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

Peer review of Oxbridge article

I'm broadly happy with your approach so far, but I am keeping an eye on it, and have semi-reverted one change so far. Jonathan A Jones (talk) 11:04, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Your revert was probably correct, on reflection (wood=trees^-1). Thanks - Pointillist (talk) 11:16, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

"worried you might not be amused..."

Worry not. The irony caught me just a little by surprise; much like the surprise of those around me startled by my unsuccessfully stifled half-chortle/half-snort when realization set in. ;-) As an aside, re: your query on the MSF talk page about PD and GFDL images, I'm looking in to it. Communications have been sporadic. Xenophrenic (talk) 17:44, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

That's a relief! I was so entertained by your user page that I couldn't resist "improving". Then the implications hit me like a bucket of cold water... o-m-g, what if he's not amused? ...quick, undo, wipe forehead, sigh. - Pointillist (talk) 17:51, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Hello, Pointillist. You have new messages at MichaelQSchmidt's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

User:Gameyoung18

Re your message, Hi sorry for the late reply, it seems you left that message on my archived page which I rarely check for new messages. However, I have reported the user to WP:AIV who knows if they'll do anything about it. Cheers! --DFS454 (talk) 09:58, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Dr Sushil Kumar

See my reply at User talk:EdJohnston#Proposed deletion of Dr Sushil Kumar. Thanks, EdJohnston (talk) 03:51, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Thistle

Thanks for all your help! Jonathan A Jones (talk) 17:02, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Okay...

If it wasn't a joke, WP:RFC and WP:RFAr are options open to you. Removing my talk page comments and calling me "discredited" is ridiculous. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 02:11, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

• Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/A Man In Black case opened on 17:06, 23 May 2009 (UTC) - Pointillist (talk) 14:09, 26 May 2009 (UTC)
  • Case closed (final decision) on 23:54, 30 June 2009 (UTC) - Pointillist (talk) 10:49, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Thistle/Thistlethwaite vandalism

Richie, there's been some vandalism (see examples below) from 131.111.139.102 and 131.111.139.104 inserting comments about someone called "Thistle" or "Thistlethwaite" who is apparently a student at Caius. The two IP addresses are blocked until next Saturday, and one of the admins involved thinks they are in Caius's address space. If that's correct, and if there is a student of this name at Caius, then the vandalism here might be a type of malicious action against the student, which could have real life consequences. As you have admin experience on Commons, and such a strong computer science background, I thought I should let you know of this possibility. - Pointillist (talk) 16:41, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

• Libertarianism in the United Kingdom: "Thistle (born Thomas Thistle Edward 'Thistle' Thistlethwaite, 1989), a student at Gonville and Caius College... is the prospective candidate"
• Thistle Tower Hotel: "renamed as a tribute to... Thistle... who was brought up in room 106 of the hotel since his birth"
• List of fictional Cambridge colleges: "Thistle Hall... used by the Shadwell Drama Society of Gonville and Caius College"
• Hildisrieden: "The town crier during the time of the Battle of Sempach, Thistle, was made mayor in 1389."
• Detroit Cyclecar: "The working name... was The Thistler".
• Jonathan A. Jones: "dismissed the prominence of Libertarian candidate Thomas Thistle Edward 'Thistle' Thistlethwaite." (referring to Prof Jones's Wikipedia account which had been reverting some of 131.111.139.102's edits).
• William Hague: "He loves Thistle" (this was by 131.111.139.104).

Thanks for letting me know about this vandalism spree. The 131.111.139.102/4 IP addresses are definitely used for members of Caius, but it will be hard to find out who it was. There is an undergraduate with surname Thistlethwaite currently at Caius. However, I don’t think there is anything I can do about this right now. Please let me know if you have any suggestions. — Richie 22:07, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for replying so promptly. The urgent concern is whether a living person is aware of being attacked via Wikipedia and is suffering in silence. If Caius has a central point for pastoral care (e.g. it might be the Junior Dean) it would be appropriate for you to alert him or her to the issue, in case the undergraduate needs support. It would also be perfectly reasonable for the Caius IT people, and maybe the JCR president, to broadcast a general warning about permitted IT uses. I expect that any concerns you raise would be taken very seriously, though of course you should explain that there is also a possibility that Thistlethwaite is positively involved in the vandalism (in which case the matter is much less urgent). I will stay involved and I'll also tell User:Jonathan A Jones about this interaction – maybe he can give you better advice as he is currently a Fellow at BNC Oxford (i.e. G&C's sister college) and will have a better feel for pastoral interventions (you can talk to him privately by email if necessary). - Pointillist (talk) 23:10, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't think I have anything helpful to say, but Richie is of course welcome to get in touch if he wishes. Jonathan A Jones (talk) 07:13, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. Pointillist (talk) 07:17, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Titan Arum

Thanks for your compliment - much appreciated! I was lucky to get the photos, though - I was chatting with one of the students working nearby and he told me it was in flower. They were well worth seeing. Patche99z (talk) 17:02, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

Promoted FPC

Your Featured picture candidate has been promoted Your nomination for featured picture status, File:Apollo 11 Launch2.jpg, gained a consensus of support, and has been promoted. If you would like to nominate another image, please do so at Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 03:17, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for nominating this! Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 03:17, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Mea culpa. I started promoting the wrong one, then went back and fixed it, but missed that mistake. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 14:59, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Cat delete

I'm sure it was a 'good faith' creation, but I had to put this Category:Wikipedians interested in Anglo-Irish nationality for deletion. There is no such nationality. purple (talk) 01:51, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

That's fine. - Pointillist (talk) 09:54, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Re: BEAR closure

Well, even so, there still would have been overwhelming consensus (both at the MfD and WP:ANI) to keep the page. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 18:31, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the prompt reply. I've added a tedious teacher-knows-best homily at "This metaphor could mean more than you intended" which should take most of the fun out of using the tag anyway. We can debate minimum elapsed time to WP:SNOW when it really matters. All the best - Pointillist (talk) 22:41, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

Sounds good. Regards, –Juliancolton | ^Talk 22:44, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

Re: International reactions

Well it wasn't that difficult really so I didn't have to try very hard - it's everywhere! Plus I needed to prove its significance so it could be posted on the Main Page... but thank you! :) --candle•wicke 18:25, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Cambridge

According to your user page, you assume good faith. My edits to that article were correct, and not vandalism. --193.128.72.68 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 09:49, 26 May 2009 (UTC).

I'm sorry if you were offended. Your copy reads...

The colleges are mostly kept separate from the rest of Cambridge by 10ft high walls, often with razor wire or broken glass on top. They remain completely apart from the local communities, except for a carefully selected underclass of cleaners and gardeners who keep things in pristine condition, and security personnel who keep the commoners out.

...which isn't the detached neutral tone expected in an encyclopedia, is it? BTW at Oxbridge "commoner" means a student who is not a scholar, which is obviously not what you intended. If you must use emotive language perhaps hoi polloi would serve your purpose better? But I think you are barking up the wrong tree anyway. Colleges are like Halls of Residence—places where young people live and keep their treasured iPods etc. There has to be some sort of security, and I doubt that the broken glass was put there to stop academically ambitious outsiders from consulting college libraries or listening in on supervisions. - Pointillist (talk) 11:16, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

NowCommons: File:Chiswick Eyot.jpg

File:Chiswick Eyot.jpg is now available on Wikimedia Commons as Commons:File:Chiswick Eyot.jpg. This is a repository of free media that can be used on all Wikimedia wikis. The image will be deleted from Wikipedia, but this doesn't mean it can't be used anymore. You can embed an image uploaded to Commons like you would an image uploaded to Wikipedia, in this case: [[File:Chiswick Eyot.jpg]]. Note that this is an automated message to inform you about the move. This bot did not copy the image itself. --Erwin85Bot (talk) 00:50, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

File:Green Goddess PGW248 emerging from Wellington Barracks.jpg is now available as Commons:File:Green Goddess PGW248 emerging from Wellington Barracks.jpg. --Erwin85Bot (talk) 13:21, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Talk:Disclosure of expenses of Members of the United Kingdom Parliament

Hi there. I wonder if you could look at the discussion on this article when you have a bit of time. I don't think you have contributed to it. There is a bit of a swell of opinion to include the word scandal in the title. Having considered this in the past for Fred Goodwin I would welcome your thoughts. The specific discussion is at Talk:Disclosure of expenses of Members of the United Kingdom Parliament#Article title part 2.

kind regards and enjoy your holiday! leaky_caldron (talk) 16:23, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Welcome back! We now have a scandal. UK parliamentary expenses scandal leaky_caldron (talk) 09:50, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Congratulations on all your hard work on that one - it looks like there was a lot of material to shape. - Pointillist (talk) 13:07, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Your note on my page

I am not arguing - only asking to interpret the existing references fairly. The 'misconducts' are crimes - which is clear even to a layman. No need for mentioning law libraries or asking for new references.--141.156.225.60 (talk) 01:01, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

Order of original titles of books vs. translated titles

You made an edit to an article of mine in which I cited the title of a German book, followed by the English translation in square brackets. You changed it so that the English title appeared first, followed by the original German title. Is this the agreed way of doing this in the Wikipedia, or is it just your personal opinion about what is "appropriate"? The point is that there is no existing English-language book whose title is the translated name of the German (at least not yet, since I am working on a translation of it). That is, the book you referred to DOES NOT EXIST. However, the German book very well does exist. A reader that does not know German would, of course, want to know the translation of the title, so it is appropriate to provide a translation. However, I find it much more logical to put the original title first, since it actually exists, followed by a translation that is merely explanatory, which is what parenthetical comments are for. In fact, I believe that this is the style that translators are taught. Are you following a standard Wikipedia style? Thomas.Hedden (talk) 01:00, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for your message, Thomas. I imagine you are referring to the Walter de Haas edits on March 20th? My main purpose there was to fix the red links some previous author(s) had created by failing to "inter-wikify" links when translating the de.wikipedia article. I don't have a strong opinion about the order of titles, and as both forms are in use on the English wikipedia (e.g. in Goethe#Literary_work and Herman_Hesse#The_First_World_War) do go ahead and adjust to your liking. It would probably make sense to adjust "Friends of Nature Club" (Gesellschaft der Naturfreunde) likewise. Grüss - Pointillist (talk) 12:39, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Brasenose BC

Even better than that, I can give you your own copy! It would be good to have a better BNCBC page, to match that of their earliest rivals. Let me know if I can help. Regards, Bencherlite^Talk 12:19, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

What a star! I looked for it in Google Books but only found "snippet" and "no preview" versions. I will add this to my "to do" list. Thanks - Pointillist (talk) 12:30, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

You might find the 1898 history of use; there is also (if you can find it) Volume II, Part II of the 1909 monographs, which the introduction to II.I says has a piece about rowing (Archive.org has Vol I and Vol II Part I only!) Bencherlite^Talk 20:04, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

POTD notification

POTD

Hello,

Just to let you know that the Featured Picture File:Apollo 11 Launch2.jpg is due to make an appearance as Picture of the Day on July 16, 2009. If you get a chance, you can check and improve the caption at Template:POTD/2009-07-16. howcheng {chat} 00:47, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for barnstar

Never been a "defender of the wiki" .... is there a coloured hood and a hat? anyway thanks. I was thrilled to see "we" were right and that the No 10 site was so arrogant that when you press "contact us" it assumes you want to moan at the government and not tell them their web site is wrong. Thx. Victuallers (talk) 13:45, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Transwiki

In light of the recent events I think it might be a good time to make a new project proposal at councils and organise a project which concentrates on trasferring content from other wikipedias but in a may which is much more efficient and can done with no community concerns. If I make a proposal in a day or two can you comment as I fele we both share the same view that it is important to transfer content from other wikipedias but done adequately as part of a project coordination. Dr. Blofeld ^{White cat} 19:04, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

I'll happily comment when you make your proposal. As you haven't gone public yet, here are some of my instincts:

1. I think there is—or should be—only one Wikipedia. Language differences shouldn't create silos of information: en.wikipedia is already edited by contributors from multiple states, likewise es.wikipedia and de.wikipedia. So I believe in the goal.
2. However, I don't like hard-to-verify articles, especially if they are about BLPs (that includes articles about scandals that refer to living people), so unreferenced stubs are worse than useless and I'm not comfortable with any article (on en.wikipedia) where most of the references aren't in English. I'd want those references to be policed by contributors who knew what they mean. That means either using English references (I'm trying to do that on Ludwig Marum) or ensuring that non-English references are policed by people who understand them.
3. I share the opinion that watchlists are often the principal line of defence against vandalism, so when a BLP article isn't on anyone's watchlist the risk of vandalism is significantly increased. A translator isn't going to watchlist every page s/he translates.

The bottom line is that I don't believe in translating articles from other wikis to create a "fork" that must be separately maintained and supervised. I'm already concerned that the current "anyone can edit"/"everyone's a good guy" model could fail quite catastrophically, partly because the present population of active editors will eventually have better things to do than analyse subtle vandalism but also because the number of articles to patrol is growing much faster than the number of editors. We quite rightly tell new editors that they have to produce high quality well-referenced articles from day one, but that means they don't get the quick hit satisfaction that today's star editors used to get from excreting low value stubs in the old wild west days.

Anyway, I do have a nascent counter-proposal. As it happens early in my career I worked with the thought leaders in "value added republishing" using SGML/XML markup, and IMO that approach would help with this problem. For example, if we could agree global infobox syntax for politicians (and for actors, artists, authors, journalists, musicians, scientists, etc) then those infoboxes could be mirrored on every other language wiki entirely automatically through software. The "publisher" site would take care of maintenance and supervision, and each "subscriber" site would populate a default page using the machine-translated infobox. The default page would also contain links to the original article directly and via Google and Babelfish translators. The goal of transwiki-sharing would be largely satisfied without any need for high-maintenance translation, and there would be a stable starting point for custom-translation of the most important articles.

What do you think? - Pointillist (talk) 23:21, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

That is "exactly" how I feel. I've long thought of the wikiproject as one and I can't believe there isn't even a project on here running to trasnfer cotent methodically and more efficiently and ensuring standards ar eup to scratch upon creation. I really think we need a big project on this and contributors from various languages to help work as a team. The odd translation every few days by a single editor is never going to meet our objectives and while quality is of a great importance so is content and achieving our goals of distributing knowledge. There needs to be some actively trasnferring content on a daily basis but doing so in a much better way than before. Dr. Blofeld ^{White cat} 08:29, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Spam

Thanks Pointillist for your help, good job...Modernist (talk) 11:10, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Speaking of spam

Regarding [1], I still don't get it. However, that doesn't mean I am capable of knowing what you intended either. I've investigated, and I think the entire meaning from my perspective was lost on the A34 and I will simply never understand. So, rather than invite further embarrassment upon any of us, I'm chalking it up to a case of this. ATB to U2. Sswonk (talk) 05:15, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Now I'm intrigued: you're from Massachusetts, but you do your editing on the A34? Welcome to sunny England, in that case. I'm sorry if we were separated by a common language there. I'm an Americaphile—been up the Willis Tower, entertained in the John Hancock Center, walked from Times Square to Battery Park, lost my way around San Jose (really) and Philadelphia (scary), been amazed in Anaheim, mildly disappointed by the Space Needle, humbled by the history of Harvard, bowled over by the beauty of Boston (and eaten at Legal Sea Foods)—so I'll try to do better next time. - Pointillist (talk) 09:33, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

The A34 allusion came to me when I checked the location of the IP you complimented via the geolocation link at the bottom of his contribs page: Southhampton. I imagined the complete blank I was drawing was related to some inability I had to catch the meaning of your communication with IP, something like a dog trying to catch a car on the route between Southhampton and Oxford. Admittedly obscure.

I have not been to England, but did spend over a week on the continent at the end of secondary school. I confess to being an Anglophile tempered by both German and Irish ancestry. Having general appreciation anyone born in the 60s gained through the popularity here of the Beatles, I think I really started to get into England when, as a teenager, I bought a paperbound coffee table volume called NME Encyclopedia of Rock. I don't know what happened to the book but I can still see the pages and visualize a style very similar to Wikipedia, with a small photo and summary similar to infoboxen at the start of the articles. From there I discovered Small Faces, Fairport Convention, Pretty Things, King Crimson and things less well known in the US at the time like early Pink Floyd. I went on ultimately to collecting OS maps and reading Shakespeare, which combined with the fact that both parents were English teachers shapes my interests today. I occasionally listen to Kate Bush, which is a pretty hard sell to many including my wife.

Your comment about Philadelphia made me grin with recognition. I have never spent time there but traveled through the airport twice in the early 90s stopping between Virginia and Toronto, and to this day recall the harsh, and I mean harsh, contrast between the Philly airport and Pearson, especially related to the grins and politeness at the Toronto airport. Of the five big east coast cities, Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia, NY and Boston, Philly is the only one I have not actually visited, NY less frequently than the other three and having lived in or within a city of Boston for over fifteen years. One thing I will say: if you love American things, and don't want to piss me off, never use the term Boswash to describe this area. It is a coinage of a French urban scholar of the early sixties that I believe has been usurped by eurotrash and people from far away in this country that is totally baseless as a usage and a description. I don't like the original theory either. My comments at the talk page will give you insights; I think it is an attempt to mimic Benelux but reminds me of hogwash and is likely the pet name favored by this gentleman (delay/ads precede 6+ minute comedy video). How would you like to be known as someone who lives in Lonbirman? I didn't think so. So, yeah, Wikipedia is great for all of us to be able to communicate about the language this way, and I will certainly try to do better as well—it's a great pursuit. Sswonk (talk) 16:00, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for that - I can't stop grinning now. "Bosny Balti" sounds like an Indian dish you'd eat in Lonbirman, "Phillywash" could be mild detergent for lingerie, etc. Mind you, his original "Megalopolis" term isn't much better either, is it? - Pointillist (talk) 17:07, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

WikiProject TRANSWIKI

Hi. In light of recent events and community concerns about the way in which content is transferred I have proposed a new wikiproject which would attempt to address any of the concerns and done in an environment where a major group of editors work together to transfer articles from other wikipedias in the most effective way possible without BLP or referencing problems. Please offer your thoughts at the proposal and whether or not you support or oppose the idea of a wikiproject dedicated to organizing a more efficient process of getting articles in different languages translated into English. Dr. Blofeld ^{White cat} 12:55, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Thank you...

...both for the barnstar, and for the kind words. They are greatly appreciated.

I just needed a couple of days to back off and cool down. Though this really wasn't a spur-of-the-moment decision...it's been a while brewing, and things just came to a head with the ANI. Ah, well...I'm back, now, and don't intend leaving any time soon. :-)

Once again, many thanks. --User:AlbertHerring ^{Io son l'orecchio e tu la bocca: parla!} 02:28, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Sausages

Thanks for the sausage box. Now I know where to get a quick snack. Thanks again. Enter CambridgeBayWeather, waits for audience applause, not a sausage 22:08, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

I've been tempted to feed you a couple of times before—you seem to trail good feelings behind you. Cheers - Pointillist (talk) 22:13, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

signature

Hehe, thanks for noticing that [2] - apparently if you forget to subst the requested move template it just displays the ~~~~ rather than your signature... strange. ~ mazca ^talk 17:53, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Hahaha, timed perfectly with your post to my talk page. Cheers ~ mazca ^talk 17:53, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

A perfect storm of overlapping edits! - Pointillist (talk) 17:54, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Who am I?

Damn I'm forgetful. I have the photo on my camera but I'm in a hotel just now, so I'll not be able to upload it until tomorrow. Thanks for the reminder. Alan16 (talk) 22:21, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

I'll upload the picture sometime tomorrow afternoon - if you have a Commons account would you be able to upload it there if I put it on Wiki? Thanks, Alan16 (talk) 22:31, 1 August 2009 (UTC).

Thanks!

Much appreciated. Tom Harrison ^Talk 00:23, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

No idea what the above was for, but I sincerely echo the sentiment: many thanks for the unexpected barnstar. All the best, Steve ^T • C 22:22, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Your barnstar was for seriously hard work on that article, which had been a red link on Richard Asher for too long. Much appreciated. My exchange with Tom was recognizing his smart thinking when some editors were getting hot under the collar (the edit comment on this diff): good for collaboration but nothing like your effort. - Pointillist (talk) 22:34, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Climate table vandalism by Special:Contributions/210.50.107.95

Thanks I hadn't noticed that. All I saw was that the table and the source didn't match up. I'll keep an eye out and deal with them if they continue. Cheers. Enter CambridgeBayWeather, waits for audience applause, not a sausage 12:37, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Tmbox

Thanks for your help. I'll keep your changes. They look good. How can the Tmbox be aligned to the left, on the same line as the boxes above it and the TOC? Debresser (talk) 09:21, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm afraid I don't know how to force the left-alignment. I tried adding the row |style = float: left; to the template, but it had no effect. Indeed, when I inspected the message box with Firebug, the style instruction wasn't in the HTML for the box. You could try asking at either the technical village pump, or the Tmbox talk page. This might be a deliberate restriction to avoid browser-specific hiccups. - Pointillist (talk) 10:17, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

IBDP improvements

Hi Pointillist-I noticed the improvements you made on the IBDP page and was wondering if you could give us some advice on how to improve that page in particular, and the IB series in general. When you have a moment, please respond on that talk page so that the other editors can benefit as well. Love the hexagon, btw. Cheers! La mome (talk) 21:45, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

You're very kind, but I'm afraid I don't have an opinion about how to improve it "top-down". I mostly go for the detail, trying to ensure clean prose and good sources, then that leads in the direction of improving consistency, which may bubble up to the top sometimes. Thanks for the kind words about the hexagon ...it was such an obviously important graphic that I felt I should upload something even if it isn't a work of art :-) Pointillist (talk) 16:38, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

IB series

Just wanted to drop you a line to thank you for the work on the IB series. I'd wanted to change the template all summer and never knew where it lived, so it's nice to see that's done! Truthkeeper88 (talk) 01:50, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm happy to help. Templates live in their own "Template:" namespace, so you can find them using the search box: just enter (e.g.) Template:IB to find the template (typically a page of documentation), and then click the "Edit" tab to modify it. The IB template was simple but some are horribly intricate and easily broken, so do tread carefully.... Cheers - Pointillist (talk) 16:47, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the info. Yes, I've seen some intricate templates and most likely wouldn't need to change one, but as we'd changed "IBO" to "IB" in all the articles, it was a glaring discrepancy that had been bothering me. Anyway, again, nice work on the articles. Truthkeeper88 (talk) 16:56, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks again for your help on the IB pages. I hope you will continue. I never would have guessed that decapitalization would start off such a firestorm! The little buggers comment cracked me up. Thanks for the laugh.

La mome (talk) 00:51, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Unused bitmap once SVG has been created?

{{helpme}} When a PNG or JPG bitmap image on en.wikipedia has been replaced—for months or years—by an SVG version on commons, and the bitmap isn't used anywhere, should I request that it be deleted? If so, what is the correct way to request deletion? Does it make any difference whether the bitmap was created by me (e.g. File:Boat Race map 700px.jpg) or someone else? BTW {{Db-f8}} doesn't apply because it is only for redundant files of the same format. - Pointillist (talk) 22:34, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Hi Pointillist. WP:CSD#F8 ({{db-f8}}) does not apply to duplicate images (in fact, the file type does not have to be the same, but deletability is to be addressed on a case-by-case basis) on Wikipedia but rather applies to duplicate images uploaded to both Wikipedia and Commons. This image you describe could be deleted deleted under deletion criterion F1 as being a duplicate of an image already on Wikipedia in an improved format (svg in this case). Feel free to let me know if you have any other questions/comments or are in need of assitance. Cheers, FASTILY ^(TALK) 23:15, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for that though apparently F1 insists on "in the same format", too. Anyway, in the spirit of scientific method, I'll try nominating it using F1 and see what happens! Cheers - Pointillist (talk) 00:55, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

AfD nomination of List of schools offering the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme

An editor has nominated List of schools offering the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme, an article which you have created or worked on, for deletion. We appreciate your contributions, but the nominator doesn't believe that the article satisfies Wikipedia's criteria for inclusion and has explained why in his/her nomination (see also "What Wikipedia is not").

Your opinions on whether the article meets inclusion criteria and what should be done with the article are welcome; please participate in the discussion by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of schools offering the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme (2nd nomination) and please be sure to sign your comments with four tildes (~~~~).

You may also edit the article during the discussion to address the nominator's concerns but should not remove the articles for deletion template from the top of the article; such removal will not end the deletion debate. Thank you. TerriersFan (talk) 22:51, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Cuppers

You may be interested in this article and the related AFD. Colonel Warden (talk) 09:13, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

IB Diploma Programme

Hi Pointillist,

Could you please visit my talk page, read and comment on my recent section about the IB Diploma Programme.

Many thanks, --Candy (talk) 21:32, 2 September 2009 (UTC)