User:Silence/Archive0009

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This is the Talk page of zeppelin manufacturer and 'big steel' tycoon User:Silence. Feel free to leave a comment.

• Archive I: July 2004 to September 2005. Nothing important happened in this one.
• Archive II: October 2005. Nothing important happened in this one.
• Archive III: November 2005. Nothing important happened in this one.
• Archive IIII: December 2005. Nothing important happened in this one.
• Archive V: January 2006. Nothing important happened in this one.
• Archive VI: February 2006. Nothing important happened in this one.
• Archive VII: March 2006. Nothing important happened in this one.
• Archive VIII: April 2006. Nothing important happened in this one.
• Archive VIIII: May 2006 to December 2006. Nothing important happened in this one.
• Archive VV: January 2007. Nothing important happened in this one.
• Archive VVIIIIV: February 2007 to July 2007. Nothing important happened in this one.
• Archive IIIVXXXLCCCCDM: August 2007 to August 2009. In this one I edited Łobżany.
• Archive IIXV: September 2010 to September 2015. Nothing important happened in this one.

These are really the thoughts of all men in all ages and lands, they are not original with me,
If they are not yours as much as mine they are nothing, or next to nothing,
If they are not the riddle and the untying of the riddle they are nothing,
If they are not just as close as they are distant they are nothing.

―Walt Whitman

I wear a necklace, cause I wanna know when I'm upside down.

―Mitch Hedberg

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Sam Spade

Hi. The request for arbitration/Sam Spade has been accepted. This is the evidence sub-page, and this the workshop sub-page. Bishonen | talk 01:38, 5 May 2006 (UTC).

Thanks for the notification. -Silence 01:40, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

Please Help

Posted by (^'-')^ Covington 01:41, 10 May 2006 (UTC) on behalf of the the AID Maintenance Team

GA spam on featured template

hi, i see that the "good article" spam has been put back in Template:featured despite objections from several users. this seems to be the way the GA project works: boldly putting something into a page that doesnt want it, then claiming consensus is required to *remove* it again (consensus is never required to put it there in the first place).

this is exactly the same behaviour as witnessed on the attempt to create an article space "good article" star, which i & raul654 finally managed to have deleted (a huge effort since they had already spammed a 1000 articles with it), and on the Community Portal where this non-policy wikiproject has pride of place - its apparently far more important than any of the other dozens of collaborations!

they even had the cheek to remove the "non-policy process" template from the top of their project pages claiming they now had "enough support to be policy" - this is despite clear consensus on the talk page that its NOT policy. an attempt to put it back was quickly removed.

i would appreciate any comments on the template's talk page. i'm really fed up with fighting these GA spam battles everywhere, its quite tiring. why do they have to constantly spread their GA spam everywhere? hope you can help! Zzzzz 09:45, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Oy. How terribly obnoxious. -Silence 18:37, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Hello

I've noticed your comments on DRVU and wonder if you'd take a gander at Wikipedia:Mackensen's Proposal. Thanks, Mackensen (talk) 00:11, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. I wasn't planning to get involved, but since you asked, I'll voice my thoughts on the proposal there. -Silence 00:30, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Wikiproject Germany MIA

Hi!

Doesn't seem to be much doing on Germany, but being partial to, and well disposed towards, good looking virginal maidens, I followed you home anyway! <leer><G>

Ah, biz: I'd like to get an upgrade onto an EN from wiki DE. Anyone you can suggest to do translation?

re: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Th%C3%BCringer_Wald vs. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thuringian_Forest

(So if a tree falls in the forest, and there is no one around to hear it, does it still make a noise, or should I say, break Silence? <g> Guess the jokes on me— you're evidently cross-dressing!)

Thanks for your time, and nice to meetchya!

Best regards, FrankB 07:14, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Chinese Horoscope Userboxes

Nice work on the color scheming! I'm sort of a bit of a monochromatic-man, but I'm extremely pleased with the improvements you made. It's everything good about Wikipedia, in a nutshell! Fake User 10:09, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

User box asatruer change

I assume you are going to do the exact same thing with user boxes as User is Christian or User is roman Catholic? Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 20:58, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Yes, if possible, but {{user christian}} has already been deleted because it hadn't been changed accordingly, so such a move is impossible. A brand-new template, {{user christianity}} ("This user is interested in Christianity."), will have to be created if it's not undeleted. At this point, the only two options that seem to be available are (1) your template will be rewritten so as to express a Wikipedia-relevant interest or specialty, or (2) your template will be speedy-deleted. Assuming most people would be happier with a slightly reworded box than with a broken link, I'm making the change where possible. If I had more time, I'd prefer to subst the old version to the userpages of everyone, send them talkpage messages explaining the situation and what the available options are, etc., but it's looking like if there's anymore delay, there won't be anything left to move within the week. There's just noone willing to discuss this anymore. I apologize for any inconvenience. -Silence 21:02, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

I do not object the changes, but I was just wondering whether this would be done for all equivalent templetes as well. Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 21:06, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Userboxes

Why change the Baha'i Faith userbox, but not the Islam, Hindu, Buddhist, and others. The Baha'i Faith is not more or less controversial that those others. -- Jeff3000 21:06, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

I did change all of the examples you mentioned, except the Buddhist one. It's just that I got to the Baha'i one first. And the reason I didn't change the Buddhist one is because it was deleted before I could get to it. Which is the explanation you need for why I bothered with the others: they'd all have been deleted imminently too, if something wasn't done. I've been extremely hesitant to take such action, asking for months in failed attempts to gather lots of people's opinions on this compromise proposal, and I know it'll be bound to upset a few people (who I'll gladly help with switching to raw-code versions if they prefer their old userbox info), considering how many hundreds of people use these 'boxes, but at this point it seemed to be either that or let hundreds of users' pages be mass-broken by hasty implementation of a new proto-policy, so I'm willing to stick my neck out and make the needed changes if it means less grief for people. Since it sounds like noone objects specifically to the move, only to the fact that it's not consistent yet, I'll continue the transition for other 'boxes. -Silence 22:00, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

• • Thanks for detailing your explanation. You convinced me.--M@rēino 01:23, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Also thanks for the answer. It makes sense. My only concern was that it seemed initially that you had edited some of the supposed "more controversial" userboxes like Scientology and others (not that I'm singling out Scientology, but I'm just using it as an example), and left a lot of Christian and Islamic userboxes alone. Thanks for the effort you put in to fixing the userboxes. -- Jeff3000 03:03, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

It makes more sense to start with the more controversial ones since they are the ones in danger of being deleted. looks to me like a work in progress. David D. (Talk) 18:45, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Template:User notconfused

Erm, perhaps I was confused on this template (pun intended). I was trying to get it to dodge T1 myself, but it looks like I was misguided. Anyway you don't think someone could interpret it the wrong way? Yet another lame sig I came up with ^{T | @ | C} 01:41, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Certainly, I think someone could misinterpret it: you just did, for example. :) But isn't the solution to misinterpretation clarification, not deletion? Simply rewording the template as "This user is bisexual, not 'confused'." would clear up most possible misinterpretations. -Silence 01:45, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I think I screwed up and maybe I got caught up in the mist of the userbox war more then I wanted to. I like your proposal, but in this case is it better to be more precise, i.e. "this user dislikes being labeled as confused" or something - or is it better to simply do the minimum required to avoid confusion while remaining pithy :)? (and thanks for your comments and not attacking me :)) Yet another lame sig I came up with ^{T | @ | C} 01:53, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

I don't think it's necessary to go into a legalistic level of specificity. Just a little clarification should be sufficient to avoid significant misintepretations; brevity is a virtue. I see no reason why I would have attacked you: you're acting in good faith and making reasonable suggestions, and your confusion is understandable (I, too, was initially confused as to what the "notconfused" template was implying: it requires specific cultural knowledge to accurately interpret). Moreover, it may be necessary, after all, to delete the box in question at some point in the future, depending on how T2 evolves and is interpreted. It's best to avoid that firestorm for now, though: there will always be time to that issue out in the future, and it's always best to be consistent in such implementation, to avoid accusations of bias or unfairness. In any case, I'm glad we were able to resolve this so peacefully. If all the people involved in the userbox conflict were as reasonable and open-minded as you seem to be, I don't think the boxes would be a problem at all. :) Good talkin' to ye. -Silence 02:01, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

On second thought (after seeing it in action), that looks pretty good. Nice job :). Yet another lame sig I came up with ^{T | @ | C} 01:55, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks! -Silence 02:01, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Roman roads

could you please capitalize (Roman Roads)

Protestant Template

Thanks. Most people just say T1 or some crap, and can't be bothered to make it FINDABLE. The way all these damnable rule pages and votes are setup, its a wonder anyone can find anything. Zotel - the Stub Maker 22:08, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Glad to be of help. Now you know where to complain about it, too. :) -Silence 23:00, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Removal of 'User Elitist'

Hello. I see no reason for why to remove the ‘User Elitist’ template. Please provide me a reason, as I was using that template. --Hetzer 14:45, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

Why are you talking to me? I've never even edited that template. -Silence 16:42, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

Vestigial structure

Silence, I was wondering if you can give me a rough estimate of when you think you will put your next response on the Talk page for the Vestigial structure article. I see from your User page that you love to debate. I was hoping that when you do respond again, that you would make your thoughts more concise. Thanks. (Diligens 01:30, 22 May 2006 (UTC))

It has been about a week now and I am looking forward to your response. I wish to remind you of something you wrote on your User page where you say to the public, "Instead of just telling me I'm wrong and stopping there, explain to me why I'm wrong so I can see whether your criticism has merit, and, if it does, change my behavior accordingly."

So far it appears you have a problem with the biological description of something being "imperfect" and you therefore prefer to use the term "rudimentary" instead, even though the very definition of the latter expressly includes the description of the former anyway. Apparently the concept of "imperfect" is offensive to your ears. Though you may not be able to discern it from what I have written so far, I think your intuition is a praiseworthy one because I believe that nothing in nature is imperfect, and I think the biological definitions are wrong because they are based on the theory of evolution. My previously posted arguments, therefore, are purely ad hominem (in the legitimate and classical sense), meaning that I am arguing based on what evolutionists believe, not on what I do. Truth must be consistent and logical, so if someone believes something is true, it cannot entail a consequent inconsistency. --Diligens 14:14, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Userboxes/Religion

Where are the ones that have been deleted being discussed? Ardric47 02:20, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Mathematics

Posted by Pruneau 21:34, 23 May 2006 (UTC), on behalf of the AID Maintenance Team

Welcome back

I thought you had forgotten about us or had gone on to greener pastures. I hope you stick around and help with many of the H5N1 and flu articles. WAS 4.250 23:04, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Please help on Ancient Egypt

Posted by Pruneau 18:44, 29 May 2006 (UTC) on behalf of the AID Maintenance Team

Template:User satanist

Based on your discussion on Template:User Christian at TfD, I listed Template:User satanist at Wikipedia:Deletion review. I thought you'd like to know, as it was your idea. _{e.g., I'm not trying to advertise here} --Disavian 04:34, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

Template:User Muslim

Hi Silence,

It's a matter of historical fact that these changes were made to preserve the network of marked users from justified deletion. "This user is interested in so-and-so" contributes nothing legitimate to wikipedia, and in practice only serves to virtually maintain and perpetuate the original purpose of the userbox.

That's my take, anyhow. {{User Muslim}} ought not be redirected, but deleted. Any feedback?Timothy Usher 08:06, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

{{user Muslim}} is only a redirect; there is no purpose in deleting it. Presumably you mean that {{user islam}} should be deleted, since you're railing against "interest" userboxes; if you feel that way, then simply nominate it for deletion at TfD. It is nonetheless the case that interest userboxes are actually very valuable for Wikipedia, however: knowing that someone is interested in architecture, or Judaism, or Renaissance history, or communism, is both clearly innocuous and potentially very useful, and userboxes are a popular and efficient way for users to identify such interests (for people like you who don't like them, obviously you are entirely free to not use them :) win-win!). The current main problem causing conflicts with the transition from 'belief' to 'interest' is twofold: first, because WP:CSD is in a state of flux and T2 keeps getting added and removed back and forth, it's impossible to determine whether belief-expressing userboxes are permitted or not, and it will remain ambiguous until the problem is cleared up; second, perhaps even more significantly, no users have taken the time to bother to mass-subst the original versions of these templates to the userpages that had them to begin with. That was a key compontent of my original recommendation to switch belief userboxes for interest boxes, and one that's consistently gone ignored: there's no point in such a move if we're not going to subst the original versions of the userboxes to people's pages, then make the switch! As soon as we do so, the change will become much more meaningful and useful, as it'll clear out the users who had the old version of the template and leave things open for people who don't share the ideology but share the interest (which is much more important for Wikipedia's purposes; you don't have to be a communist to be interested in editing Wikipedia's communism articles!). See my Talk-page comments at the various UBX pages for more details. Certainly your assumption that "interest in Christianity", for example, equates to "Christian", is profoundly mistaken: I'm interested in Christianity and have never been a Christian in my life, or even close to it. :) What matters for Wikipedia much more than one's POVs is one's expertise and interests in various topics, and this is an excellent method for shifting the focus of many of the userboxes to such a beneficial theme. -Silence 08:31, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

Adminship

Would you like me to nominate you for adminship? I see that Encyclopedist offered a while back, but he's been vaporized. I promise I could write a really cool nomination, especially for such an interesting Wikipedian as yourself. Oh, and I have a perfect record for adminship nominations. (Two out of two have succeded with nearly unanimous support.[1][2]) If you want me to, I bet I could sucker those fools over at WP:RFA into letting you get your hands on the sysop tools. What do you say? --TantalumTelluride 21:40, 1 June 2006 (UTC)