User talk:Maury Markowitz

Attention: Unless otherwise requested I will answer messages here on my talk page to keep conversations together in one block, it is my hope this will make it easier for others to read them.

Hello there, welcome to the 'pedia! I hope you like the place and decide to stay. If you need any questions answered about the project then check out Wikipedia:Help or drop me a line. BTW, I like what you have done to the place. Cheers! --maveric149

wickelrumph

wickelrumph is kind of hard to explain without a picture. basically, it used long strips or bands of plywood that were glued together side by side. then, another layer of strips were glued on top in a different direction.

my source says it's actually strips of plywood. see Pfalz Aircraft of World War I (Great War Aircraft in Profile, Volume 4) by Jack Herris, at pages 30 and 32. that said, after looking around some more, i think it might actually be thin veneer strips. From what i understand, Deperdussin used veneer strips of tulipwood. i guess i'll change the article.

thanks. also, i thought your article on the Mercedes D.III was excellent.

thanks for the kind words, and for writing such excellent articles on the Mercedes D.III (i added a picture) and the Siemens-Schuckert D series.

Pfalz rudder

If its all right with you, I'd like to delete the references in the Pfalz D.III article to the shape of the rudder and vertical fin. That was actually a pretty common shape in German planes. See the Roland D.XV, D.XVII, Halberstadt C.V, CL.IV, CLS.I, Pfalz D.XV, LVG CIV, C.V, C.VI, and Gotha G.I. If it was something really different, like the Hannover's biplane tail, it would certainly be worth mentioning. But the D.III, I kind of don't see it.

XPLANE

Hi Maury, I got your note about the XPLANE article. It has been deleted by an admin. Do you know where deleted articles go? I intend to propose it for deletion review but have no idea where to find it or how to reference it.

Avro Arrow revisited

Maury, the article seems to be better wrtiten but I still think there should be a proper notes and reference section rather than the "more reading and viewing" section that is presently there. What do you think? Other editors have left the section in place but the idea of POV is present. Bzuk 14:41 3 January 2007 (UTC). BTW Happy New Year.

Avrocar again

Maury, please look over the article again- I've made some changes based on a recent review. BTW thanks for your support on another issue, specifically, the de Havilland Comet research. Bzuk 17:43 17 February 2007 (UTC).

WHILE YOU ARE AT IT, PLEASE REMOVE THE 'SILLIPUTTY' FROM MY OPUSCALGARY SITE. You may want to consult with someone who understands ip addressing.

PzKpfw IV

I think I have found the reason of the claim that KwK 40 was incapable of penetrating Sherman's frontal armor at combat ranges. The former wikist was refering to M4A3 with 64mm hull front and 103mm turret. That would make a lot of sense. -Chin, Cheng-chuan

Help

Our mutal Italian friend requires some help in editing, he is now contributing to the Ki-61 Hien and Ki-100. I can sort out some of the grammar and spelling, but I have corrected this countless times. He continues to make the same mistakes, not capitalizing months, using measures such as "ltrs." and other basic errors. I have written to him by email, posted on his home page and asked for other help from the aviation group forum. There is also another major issue that I haven't fully addressed but that is that most of the submissions are POV and sound like they are copied from magazines as well as being wholly Italian-centred- go figure, but still, much of the stuff is useless but I don't want to just hack and slash. What do you think? FWIW Bzuk.

Re: Toronto Meetup

Toronto Meetup Next: Art and Feminism Edit-a-Thon March 23, 2019 at Art Gallery of Ontario 2018: Art and Feminism Edit-a-Thon March 24, 2018 at Art Gallery of Ontario

Orphaned non-free media (Image:Mandril.png)

Thanks for uploading Image:Mandril.png. The media description page currently specifies that it is non-free and may only be used on Wikipedia under a claim of fair use. However, it is currently orphaned, meaning that it is not used in any articles on Wikipedia. If the media was previously in an article, please go to the article and see why it was removed. You may add it back if you think that that will be useful. However, please note that media for which a replacement could be created are not acceptable for use on Wikipedia (see our policy for non-free media).

If you have uploaded other unlicensed media, please check whether they're used in any articles or not. You can find a list of 'image' pages you have edited by clicking on the "my contributions" link (it is located at the very top of any Wikipedia page when you are logged in), and then selecting "Image" from the dropdown box. Note that all non-free media not used in any articles will be deleted after seven days, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. Thank you. BJBot (talk) 05:12, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Anti-gravity and Musha

For your information, Dr. Taaki Musha's IAA paper was published in the Journal of the British Interplanetary Society 61(9), 379-384. That peer reviewed journal did not appear to object to the fringe science citations in his work. Tcisco (talk) 23:01, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

I am referring to your comments in the Discussion page of Anti-gravity [1] that were made on October 3, 2007 at 12:44.Tcisco (talk) 19:45, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Requirement

Why did you delete Requirement (conquistadors) with out posing a notice on the page first? I could have made several inbound links if I had known that they were missing. You claim to have merged it, but into what - and without discussion? Please reconsider - the article describes a historical phenomenon of wide interest and importance. It deserves an article and could be expanded instead of deleted.·Maunus·ƛ· 05:17, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Ummm... Well to start with there was a merge notice on the page for the last year, asking that it be merged into Requerimiento. I'm curious how you noticed that the page was deleted without noticing the merge notice, or edit on the talk page about it? Maury Markowitz (talk) 12:45, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Well now that I know where it was merged to I have to say that I agree with the merger. Thanks for answering - maybe we should put a redirect at the previous article name? I noticed because it was on my watchlist and it was suddenly deleted - apparently I must have missed the fact that some one tagged it for merge awhile ago.·Maunus·ƛ· 16:25, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Ahhh, I didn't realize that dels showed up in watches. My watchlist has so many articles on it now (20k or so) that it's been rendered entirely useless so I don't keep up with tech changes on it any more. Maury Markowitz (talk) 16:29, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Little Sark

I see you had edited Little Sark some time ago, so you might be inclined to participate in the proposal to merge Little Sark with the main Sark article.  LinguistAtLarge  22:40, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Well done

Nice work collecting the stakeholders in the Sark articles. Maury Markowitz (talk) 04:11, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Blitter

Hi. I saw your work here. I've done some serious editing of this article myself. The blitter is of significant historical interest to Amiga fans and to computer historians. Well done. - Richard Cavell (talk) 04:44, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

DYK for ColorGraphics Weather Systems

On 14 December, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article ColorGraphics Weather Systems, which you created or substantially expanded. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

BorgQueen (talk) 16:07, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

DYK template

Maury, I noticed you were having some difficulties with the new DYK template; I'm sorry to hear that. The template is still very much an ongoing experiment, and I'm working with some other editors to try to make it simpler and make its usage clearer; there is an ongoing discussion at Template talk:DYKsuggestion about ways to improve the template. If you have any thoughts about what specifically you found difficult, or what might be helpful or make the template easier, you are welcome to leave a comment there or at my talk page. The problem right now is, as you probably noticed, the template does some nice things when you're used to using it and know how everything works, but if you're not used to using it then it can be pretty confusing, so I'm hoping we can find ways to make everything more transparent and user-friendly. Thanks, —Politizer ^talk/_contribs 17:55, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

DYK for Cromemco Dazzler

On 15 December, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Cromemco Dazzler, which you created or substantially expanded. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

BorgQueen (talk) 16:28, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Sainte-Marguerite

The coordinates were pointing to the wrong place. I've removed them. Obviously, there are several different Sainte-Marguerites in Quebec, but this particular one, by definition, is going to be closer to New Brunswick than to Montreal, because that's where Bas-Saint-Laurent is. The Sainte-Marguerites north of Montreal are called Sainte-Marguerite-du-Lac-Masson and Sainte-Marguerite-Estérel, but neither of those have articles here yet. I've added them to the dab page, however. Bearcat (talk) 15:25, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Gas Turbine-Electric Locomotives

Gas turbine-electric locomotive article needs some "professional help", several of the locomotives mentioned are Gas Turbine-Hydraulic, not electric, examples of these include the French RTG, the UAC TurboTrain, Amtraks Turboliners, and CN's "Turbo"Wuhwuzdat (talk) 02:11, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Hmmm, good point! If we split the article it might be fairly small when it's done, perhaps a better solution would be to make it "gas turbine locomotive" and remove the "electric" part from the title? Maury Markowitz (talk) 13:04, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Gas turbine locomotive article already exists, 2 solutions present themselves:

• Move the "hydraulic" examples to the proper article.
• Merge the 2 articles, & sort into 2 or 3 sections (electric, & hydraulic/mechanical) with proper transmission descriptions at the beginning of each. Wuhwuzdat (talk) 14:54, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Aerial lifts vs. ski lifts

Hi Maury,

I noticed that you changed the categories on almost all articles in Category:Aerial lifts to be Category:Ski lifts a couple of weeks ago. However, there is a significant problem with that: all aerial lifts are not used as ski lifts. They are used for many other purposes, including tourism (e.g. on mountains which have no ski areas, like Palm Springs Aerial Tramway and Mount Roberts Tramway, or going across rivers like Mississippi Aerial River Transit), construction, open-pit mining, etc. So all of those articles should retain Category:Aerial lifts, and some could be placed in Category:Ski lifts too.

I also noticed that you emptied Category:Surface lifts, which resulted in its deletion a few days ago. The issue here is murkier, since it appears that all of the devices which had been in Category:Surface lifts are used only as ski lifts, without much (if any) application outside the ski industry. Even the main article surface lift refers exclusively to skiing. However, even in this case, I see no harm in retaining the useful subdivision of Category:Surface lifts. so I'm undeleting that category, and re-adding it to the appropriate articles.

I know that you've been a longtime admin here, many years longer than I have, so I'm a little mystified by your series of edits which produced these issues. I noticed that some of your edit summaries said "unsplitting cat", but hopefully I've clarified the main issue now: Category:Aerial lifts and Category:Surface lifts are not merely two halves of Category:Ski lifts, and although Category:Surface lifts may be a subset of Category:Ski lifts, Category:Aerial lifts is not a subset and is a completely separate (partially overlapping) category.

I hope you don't mind me reverting many of those recent edits. Thanks. --Seattle Skier (talk) 18:10, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm sure you've come across articles where the author(s) have linked to practically every word that has an article, whether or not it has anything to do with the topic. Over-linkification is bad for several reasons, it makes the article more difficult to read (studies show that many users click on every link out of habit), and it pollutes the search engines by promoting a topic link that doesn't really exist.

The same is even more true for categories. Cats are intended to help the user navigate between related articles if there is no other linking, while making it easier on the editor by automating much of the process. But it is important to ensure the topic collection is actually useful. In an article on chairlifts, for instance, the user will likely want to navigate to articles about other forms of ski lift. They simply aren't going to want to navigate to elevators, yet I see that such a cat is currently in that article. This is precisely the sort of polluting that overlinkfication within the article creates; people will search on ski lifts and get hits on elevators because Google will considering the inward-pointing links to make it authoritative. These sorts of false positives lower the value of the searches.

So then the question is simple: does the value of the cat overweight the negatives of search engine pollution? I think you would agree that the value of this cat, by itself is very close to nil. The ski lift cat has only 20 entries, with 100% overlap. Does sectioning out these particular articles add value to the reader? No, they are almost certainly interested in other sorts of lifts as well. Does it help reduce clutter? No, it actually increases it by having two pages when the second is tiny. Does it help the search engines? No, there's already an authoritative article on the topic. So it seems the value is low, and the downsides obvious. That is an argument to remove.

From what I can tell, and from what you say above, it appears this cat does not exist because of any user need. From what you state above it appears the thought process was something along the lines of "well gondolas can be used for non-skiing purposes, so we need to have a cat for those, which is aerial lift. And since that one exists, we need to put all the other similar lifts in it. And since that exists, then we need another to differentiate between aerial and others". So if one thinks the Wikipedia is a collection of categories it makes sense, but if you think it's a collection of articles, it doesn't.

To put this another way, there is an argument that says that the chairlift article should be placed in a cat called "articles that start with the letter C". Why isn't it? Because the value of such a cat is zero. I argue the same is true here.

Maury Markowitz (talk) 16:26, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

well done

		The 25 DYK Medal
		Well done MM. I think you are well on your way to the next one, but you can leave that until next year. Thanks from me and the wiki Victuallers (talk) 21:10, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Re: 320 mm

Sorry about that. I was in the middle of rolling back because I thought the new ref system was pointless, then realized it and canceled the rollback. Apparently it didn't work... ErikTheBikeMan (talk) 02:36, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

I figured it was something like that, but I'd figure I'd ask just to be sure I wasn't going to spark a revert in case I was wrong! Maury Markowitz (talk) 03:27, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

H8

In the article, only part of the hook is verified (with ref 5) Was that ref just misplaced or should you add a ref for the rest of the facts in the paragraph? - Mgm|^(talk) 11:17, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Well then an ALT tag is more appropriate than a reject. Maury Markowitz (talk) 15:37, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

19th century pictures of windmills

I noted your past interest in the wind turbine article. Possibly you might have an opinion on Talk:Wind turbine#History photo- which is better for the article?. If not fine, I just wouldn't like the effort expended on retouching the 19th century photo go to waste if it is indeed the better choice I believe it is. Thanks. -J JMesserly (talk) 22:54, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

DYK for McIDAS

On 31 December, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article McIDAS, which you created or substantially expanded. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

Cirt (talk) 23:31, 31 December 2008 (UTC)