I would like to thank Wizardman for nominating me, [[User:Darwinek|Darwinek]] and everyone else for their support and comments. I'll continue with contributing to the encyclopedia's content (hopefully writing an FA here and there :) and will help out with admin-related tasks which you just entrusted me with. If you need any help, don't hesitate to ask!
Witam! Napisał artykuł o pewnej postaci ze Śląska Cieszyńskiego. Mam pewien problem - Zawisza był przez pewien czas wikarym w Niemieckiej Lutyni, tylko nie mogłem znaleźć odpowiedniego hasła na en wiki. Czy Niemiecka Lutynia to dzisiejsza Lucina?
Z góry dzięki za odpowiedź i ewentualne poprawki w haśle.
Witam! Na en wiki planuję od czasu do czasu zajmować się Śląskiem Cieszyńskim, głównie biografiami. Byłbym wdzięczny, jakbyś je sprawdzał, głównie pod względem języka i stylu. Właśnie kończę pisać hasło Józef Balcar. Pozdrawiam Sir Mmt (talk) 23:01, 5 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Re: Eva Bosakova
Darwinek:
Thank you so much for adding the diacritical marks to Eva Bosáková. I would have done it myself, but being a rather green Wikipedian, I didn't know how. Thank you also for your redirect of my redirect. LOL. I am learning, though.
I notice that you have also created some articles about Mississippi and the Civil Rights movement. THAT IS SO COOL. Even though I live in Toronto, I am originally from Mississippi, and I can definitely appreciate your work.
On 21 February, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Lemuel A. Penn, 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.
Hello there. Thanks for updating the Indonesian volcano articles. They really need a bit of work since the departure of User:Indon the Great. Hope to see you around more. regards --Merbabu (talk) 10:10, 22 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, Darwinek! Since you are on a roll formatting the templates (thanks for doing that, by the way!), could you also format {{Geo-Alexander}} when you get a chance? Thanks!
According to the information I have the current eruption started in September of 2007 and has not stopped since, therefore to be accurate the entry should read 2007 (Ongoing) or something similar. I based my latest change on the entry for [Jabal al-Tair Island|Jabal Al-Tair], we need to discuss this. Graham1973 (talk) 00:30, 3 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Got your message thanks for clearing that up with me. I've added a reference link the archive on Beltons website which has all the Jan-November 2007 news covering the start of the eruption. The current archive runs December - February. Graham1973 (talk) 00:52, 3 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That is an impressive and diverse list of articles you have created. I know I have linked to at least a couple of them in the past. If the list gets unmanageable you might want to consider using a format like I used on this page. Keep up the good work! --House of Scandal (talk) 17:47, 11 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
RfA - Toddst1
Hi, Darwinek, thanks for supporting my RfA, which passed with 42 supports, 0 opposes,
and 0 neutrals. I'm pleased that the Wikipedia community has trusted me with the mop.
Of course, special thanks goes to my nominator, Kakofonous. Cheers!
Toddst1 (talk) 15:19, 14 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your support!
Hello, and thanks for your support in my recent RFA! The final result was 61/0/3, so I've been issued the mop! I'm extremely grateful for your confidence in me and will strive to live up to it. Thanks again! —Scott5114↗[EXACT CHANGE ONLY]07:28, 15 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Greetings
Long time no speak - possibly i even had my earlier user name - your edits flow past me on my watchlists - please excuse any rude or impolite edit summaries as I check back on those arts on my watch list - trust all is well - and thanks for your cleanup of oz mountains - cheers SatuSuro11:40, 17 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hey there. Thanks for the changes to McFaulds Lake page, I couldn't figure out how to capitalize it for the life of me. As for the image, it is a screen shot from Google Earth, and I haven't a clue on how to go about the licence and author information that is being requested for the image. As you may be able to tell, this was my first page :)
Hi Darwinek. I notice you've been fixing a few dabs lately on ship articles I've worked on. That's great, thanks!
I wonder though if I could prevail upon you not to remove the carriage return between the references and the ship template at the bottom of the page? If a line of whitespace is not left, the template ends up very close to the text above, which makes it look cluttered. I deliberately put that line of whitespace there to prevent that from happening. Thanks, Gatoclass (talk) 16:59, 18 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I guess we are eventually going to have a huge ship database here at Wikipedia, but it's daunting to look at all the articles which haven't been done yet - in the US Navy alone!
ASIMOI would like to thank you for your participation in my recent RfA, which I'm very glad to say was successful at 81/7/0. Some of the very best that Wikipedia has to offer came out to support or oppose me and the kind words from all the editors has really given me confidence to be an admin and I can't wait to start. I will take the advice of the opposes and not jump into any content disputes immediately. As well, I will try to add more content myself. Anyways, in thanks for participating in my RfA, here's your very own personal humanoid robot. Enjoy! --ÐeadΣyeДrrow (Talk - Contribs) 14:08, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your offer of articles from JSTOR on this. I need to decided how much effort I want to exert on it, as so much of it goes back and forth. The article is way overloaded with too many sensational details, rather than providing deeper material on how the Klan came to be, in both iterations.--Parkwells (talk) 18:23, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
FAR nomination
Ku Klux Klan has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. OrangeMarlinTalk•Contributions23:17, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Darwinek! Long time no see.
I saw your recent creations of former municipalities of the Czech Republic. I thought we ought to set up a category for them, like Category:Former municipalities of Norway. After all, many former municipalities today constitute parts of a city, such as Fluntern.
But I noticed there were no category for municipalities, or communes (I don't know what to call them), of the Czech Republic. Only districts and regions. Shouldn't such a category exist? Punkmorten (talk) 19:51, 9 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Romanian electoral reform
I happened to see the message on Dahn's page - I hope neither of you minds if I try to give a quick answer. Last November, there was a referendum to do just that - change from a proportional system (common in much of Europe) to a French-style two-round majoritarian system. It got 81% support but failed because turnout was just 26%. In March, the Parliament approved a one-round majoritarian system (not identical to Britain's, though) and, assuming legal challenges are met, will be used in the November elections. Most parties, the president and most of the people are behind the idea because parliamentarians, as they are named on closed party lists, aren't directly accountable to the electorate, and there's a desire for more transparency - one vote for one MP (actually two, since the parliament is bicameral). A desire to avoid fragmentation might also be a factor but Romania has just 5-6 significant parties, which isn't that many. Biruitorul (talk) 04:35, 19 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanking Biru, I would like to add some other info which Darwinek might fight helpful. Unfortunately, the reform is so new that there does not appear to be any academic survey for it, in case you need a bibliography of some sort. But I was able to find a CEEOL doc in English, where the dispute leading up to the vote and the alternatives proposed are being discussed.
I was unsure about what the mixed plurality/majority we adopted exactly means (I had lost track of the debate), but I found some more details about the peculiarities of the system in place in a newspaper article by sociologist Marius Kivu ("Ce a rămas din legea votului uninominal", in România Liberă, March 8, 2008). He explains that Romanian counties are going to be divided into 10 colleges each, "three persons running for each of them from parties A, B and C. After voting, in the first college the candidate for party A receives over half of the votes, and in the second the candiadate for party C receives over half of the votes. In the other eight colleges, no candidate receives half of the votes. Presuming that all three parties surpass the national-level electoral threshold, these two candidates [A and C] are declared elected, receiving each a mandate." And: "In phase two, that of redistribution, all county-level votes for the candidates of each party are taken into account. Let's say party A received 40% of the vote, party B, 30%, and party C, 30%. Thus, party A has a right to four mandates out of ten, from which it has already received one. For all the other three mandates, the candidates are those nine party candidates who have received less than half of the college votes. They are ordered after the percentage of votes they received, and the three who have highest scores become deputies. In the same manner are distributed all three mandates to which party B is entitled and the two mandates left for party C (which had the right to three mandates, but had already received one, in the second college). The number of mandates received by the parties through this voting system will not differ significantly from the number of mandates it would have received in the old proportional [and] list-based system." Kivu notes that the resulting hybrid system was not the one proposed by supporters of plurality, and that it maintains much of the old system - the only differences, he argues, have to do with the fact that people may no longer be propelled into office solely by their party's will to have them elected (in the past, parties used to place their favorites on top positions on a list, which usually meant that they were elected no matter who they were). The article was form a time when the law hadn't been adopted, and Kivu announces that there is more to say about the "traps" of such a system.
I don't know how much of this will be useful to you; if you want me to look into the follow-up to this, I'll do my best to locate it and translate the relevant parts. I also found some stuff on the grounds for the law being contested by two small parliamentary parties, just in case you need this sort of detail.
Oh, and sorry for the delay: I had logged off just moments before you wrote on my talk page. Hope this helps, and best of luck on that paper. Dahn (talk) 14:09, 19 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You might like to know that there's a poll going on about modifications to the Hungarian-Slovak naming convention proposed earlier. Voting is open until 11 May 20:06. MarkussepTalk14:31, 7 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for correcting the "body" parameter in these templates. The {{navbox}} code has recently be revamped and the "body" parameter removed, but I hadn't realized this and updated the AWB settings I was using. They are updated now, though. Sardanaphalus (talk) 15:02, 2 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
New Project
Myself and several other editors have been compiling a list of very active editors who would likely be available to help new editors in the event they have questions or concerns. As the list grew and the table became more detailed, it was determined that the best way to complete the table was to ask each potential candidate to fill in their own information, if they so desire. This list is sorted geographically in order to provide a better estimate as to whether the listed editor is likely to be active.
If you consider yourself a very active Wikipedian who is willing to help newcomers, please either complete your information in the table or add your entry. If you do not want to be on the list, either remove your name or just disregard this message and your entry will be removed within 48 hours. The table can be found at User:Useight/Highly Active, as it has yet to have been moved into the Wikipedia namespace. Thank you for your help. Useight (talk) 06:10, 3 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Darwinek, I saw you changed the title, less appropriate I think, what convention is it?, I tried to revert it but it doesn't change. The name is just Oria; in case there is a conflict (there may be, I can't remember) there are the brackets for disambiguation and at any rate "river" can't have a first capital letter, it's just part of the description, not of the proper name. Iñaki LL (talk) 20:50, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oh God, it's really ugly..., in capital letters? (!!) OK, since it's the convention, don't going to argue about it. By the way, thanks for your mention of the article, sometimes a bit boring gathering so many data, but that's Wikipedia. Regards Iñaki LL (talk) 14:44, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hello! Your nomination is flattering and tempting, but at this moment I have to decline, mostly because I'll be moving from the USA to Japan to take a new job during the summer, so I don't think I'm ready to take on this new responsibility for now. I'll let you know if I've changed my mind in a few months once I've settled down. Thanks for your consideration! Chanheigeorge (talk) 14:07, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Adminship
Wow, I really wasn't expecting that. I would be happy to accept your nomination for adminship, but I think I would have to really familiarise myself with the tasks that an admin is expected to perform. Also, my disciplinary record is not so great. Just last week I was blocked for a day for a 3RR violation. Anyway, if you wish to nominate me for adminship, then please do, and we shall let the community decide. – PeeJay17:59, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I feel I had a justifiable reason for making the reverts, particularly given the slipshod nature of the edits being reverted. However, as they were not technically vandalous edits, I might suggest that opinion would be divided as to whether I was in the right or not. – PeeJay18:15, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
On a related note, I feel that most of the people who have seen my edits would agree that my edits are, overall, positive contributions to the encyclopaedia, and they know that I would never be a disruptive influence without a damn good reason. – PeeJay18:22, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You'll need to untransclude the RfA, as PeeJay2K3 hasn't accepted the nomination or answered the questions. He'll certainly need to explain the 3rr block before starting. Epbr123 (talk) 19:06, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Admindahn
Hi, friend. I'm touched by the proposal, but there are several reasons why I would have to decline it. For one, I want to keep being focused on editing, and I would have little patience for performing the tasks implied (and I am the first to admit I don't have much patience for the administrative process in general). Secondly, we'd never see the end of the ensuing debate - there are a few of my co-national editors here whose main purpose is to aggravate me, and they would have a field day making me seem a controversial choice. And lastly, it would mean going back on my word (I have already stated elsewhere that I do not intend to occupy such a position). But thank you for considering me for the job. Dahn (talk) 18:25, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Darwinek. I've removed you listing of PeeJays RfA because he hasn't accepted the nomination or answered the questions yet. Some people may have taken this as a refusal to answer the questions and opposed on that basis alone, so it's only fair to give him a clear run by allowing him the opportunity to answer the questions. I hope you understand my reasoning for this. Best wishes, Ryan Postlethwaite19:12, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Darwinek - just for future reference, technically the Isle of Man isn't part of the UK, and has its own stub type ({{IsleofMan-geo-stub}}). Not a big problem, but one worth remembering :) Grutness...wha?01:32, 25 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Cats
Hi, Darwinek! Have you somehow got a copy of my to-do list or what? :) Because these items are there, only at the bottom of it.
Anyhoo, I don't think it makes any difference as to how the North Ossetia cat is titled—both Category:North Ossetia or Category:North Ossetia - Alania are fine. The Sakha cat is called that only because the main article used to be called "Sakha" (instead of the current "Sakha Republic"). This one definitely could use a renaming. Finally, the Chita Oblast cat needs to be retained, but it should be cleaned up as well. Most of the items should be re-categorized to Category:Zabaykalsky Krai, but Chita Oblast-specific topics (such as Chita Oblast itself) should stay.
What I am getting at here is that if you are willing to put in time to have these three cats cleaned, I'll be able to cross three things from my to-do list, so you won't be hearing any complaints from me :) Do let me know if you need help or if anything is unclear, though. Thanks much!—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); 14:18, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Well, if you ever deplete your supply of mindless grunt work, just give me a hollar :) As for Sakha, it would be better to rename all of the cats to use "Sakha Republic", since that's the title of the main article. Cheers,—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); 14:34, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. I notice that you put the Russian version of the name in the article I recently added on Nikolai Markov. First of all, thanks for doing that. Secondly I wonder if you might be able to do the same for another entry I have added recently on Aleksandr Dubrovin. Unfortunately I have no Russian language skills and so would appreciate any help on this. Thanks in advance. Keresaspa (talk) 14:39, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
cape verde geo stub
Hi Darwinek. I saw you changed the image for the {{CapeVerde-geo-stub}} template, but I must say I don't agree with the new image. Not only it doesn't show the flag colors or shapes clearly, but also being a map of the islands, which are much spread in the ocean, the image is much less visible, especially in that small size. please consider restoring the previous image. Cheers, Waldirtalk17:59, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Darwinek, I see some articles were moved to Anglicised names, some others were moved back. Until there is no real concensus (at least among administrators) would you move Ágnes Szávay and Balázs Taróczy back to their Hungarian names? At least people will have a slight chance to pronounce these right... Squash Racket (talk) 03:19, 30 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I think one solution could be letting those who don't have the necessary keys on their keyboards write the name as they wish to and let the main article remain at the original name. Squash Racket (talk) 03:00, 31 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Karelians
Please keep an eye out for IPs from the University of Helsinki reverting the Karelians article. They are the banned user Jaakko Sivonen, and I have been reverting his edits on sight. I might have to semi-protect the article if he persists. Khoikhoi19:48, 30 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Chodowiecki
Darwinek, why you choose to support the decision of moving Chodowiecki into category "Germans" ? Szopen (talk) 14:57, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
In voting on moving "Polish-Germans" into "Germans of Polish descent". Szopen (talk) 15:16, 31 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You are saying you are supporting this move? He wasn't "German of Polish descent". He was Pole. (And German maybe too). Szopen (talk) 15:31, 31 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Listen all. Serbian Wikipedia users totaly agrre whit our statment. And I made a comment on mail list of Serbian Wikimedia. We must open some voting where! Serbian, Croatian, Slovak, Bosniak, Czech, Slovenian, and Poland speaking Wikipediand can vote. --Pockey (talk) 11:27, 1 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
No problem: as I said, that is a very constructive proposal, and I encourage you to add it. There are two issues other than the one I spoke about in my comment there. One is about people of disputed ethnicity - I really wish your proposal will not aid territorial pissers to POV-push in certain articles (meaning I would recommend the parameter not being filled in any of those cases). The other is generic: I wish they'd come up with a stable version or at least some editing process through which those boxes would be updated automatically updated (a bot or something); what they have now is time-consuming and subject to whims.
Well, I wouldn't call it a football fever. Romania is feverish as a rule over one issue or the other, but my perception is that, although it's supposed to be "historical" (the first time that the Mutu-Chivu generation didn't screw up in the qualifying stage), people don't care as much as they used to back in the 1990s. There was as much fever over the local elections and (to stick to football) CFR Cluj winning the championship (the first Transylvanian team to so in Idunnohowlong a time). But, yes, I definitely will watch.
Fortunately, Romanians (me included) have a long tradition of self-irony, so, if we do lose, we'd be sure to make the best of it :). And, alas, it looks like we will lose: Piţurcă did brave it saying that we could make it out of the group stage, but he also said that we could come back home with no victories. Oh, believe me, I do wish we could at least tear up the Italians, but the tradition of it all is against us - whenever Romania met them face to face as far back as I can remember, they scored as many goals as the forwards they had :).
I feel embarrassed over asking you this, since we go way back, but it was never clear to me if you're from Poland or from the Czech Republic... I do apologize for my ignorance, but I simply forgot if I ever saw you discussing this subject, and I wouldn't want to assume (though, looking above on this page, I did notice polish-language messages). In my book, both countries are equally cool, so don't worry about me judging you on the basis of your answers :). Dahn (talk) 18:34, 4 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Wow, it seems you're both :). And quite an interesting community, if you don't mind me saying. Of the two countries, i only visited Poland (a long, long time ago), and I missed out on the Cz. Rep. just this year (I was in the vicinity, let's say, but I couldn't manage to get there and back in the time frame I had at my disposal).
Anyway, I'll use the occasion to say that I'm glad every time I get a chance to talk to an articulate and intelligent fellow Eastern (Central, Eastern-Central) European such as yourself. I've met open-minded people on all sides of the divides, but unfortunately all communities have a record of obnoxiousness and agenda-following that puts us all to shame. As a personal observation, my fellow Romanian users have been leading the bunch when it comes to vandalism and monotonous POV-pushing, which, I'm glad to say, is not representative of our country at large. Extremism always becomes over-represented in this area of the globe, particularly because it has the most committed of followers (which is probably why regional wikipedias are always on the verge of disaster). I have always dreamed of an extensive dialog between the able and sincere people from each community, abiding by a common set of values, determined by moderation, logic and a promotion of wikipedia rules.
Unfortunately, I don't know much about the Polish team ever since the Olisadebe years, and whatever I know leads back to Romania and this absurd friendly Ro and Poland had in 99 or 2000 (an empty stadium, as many changes as the coaches wanted, and both teams playing crap). I too have traditionally cheered for the Czechs and, at times, for the Turks. Well, except for when the Czechs neatly beat Romania - it gave me a chance to examine Koller, and, judging by what he did before and during the match, I'd say that the Czechs did not always project this image of self-confidence. I remember him being very reserved about the team's chances, going into the routine about how Romania is a good team, then playing efficiently and winning against a useless Romanian squad. In fact, he reminds me of Clark Kent or Hulk - glasses and a book in hand before turning into an unstoppable soccer machine. Too bad he doesn't play any more (and Nedved too).
Romanian commentators seem to have a different idea of the Czechs than the one you paint (though I do believe you know better). The cliche here, which reflects the view Romanians have of the Czechs in general, is of the "most German-like among the Slavic teams" (two terms of comparison which generally leave me indifferent, as cliches tend to do). But it's fun to see how the Romanians compare (themselves) to that: a team of talented egotistic individuals who play by the ear and tend to either shine or fail miserably, squandered intelligence, the promotion of mediocre players from the local league once the few stars become unavailable, a tendency to fake injuries, binge drinking while in training, a lot of hair gel... the works. If this compliments the view others have of Romanians in general, then I can assure you also compliments the view many Romanians have of themselves (check this out if you have the time - I do believe it explains some things about that). Sorry if I digress.
And yes, though I'm not so sure about Turkey and Croatia, I think Russia has a major card to play. But I also happen to think that Greece won only because nobody expected a team to play that kind of conservative, boring, stale football... (no offense, my Greek friends). And Czechia out of the World Cup was mostly bad luck, plus the fact that they had been waiting too long for a Cup to happen (which, as you say, may have made them arrogant). As for Romania: given my thesis above, it would seem to me that, no matter how high some teams look upon ours, and though we do have an unbeatable tendency to be unpredictable, the confidence we get from time to time surpasses the "third world" image others have of us and is most usually shattered. I still have the Ro television commentators' words ringing in my year from the last qualification campaign. They claimed that, since we were playing our last chance against Denmark, we were out only because the referee took a "controversial" decision. And then, as the match was ending, they were going: "Not like that, Mr. Referee. If we have to be going into Europe [sic] with our heads bowed, then it's best not to go at all." Yeah...
Please address me with as many questions and comments as you may have at any moment. I thoroughly enjoy these conversations, even though it may take me a while to respond now and then (Biruitorul and others have grown accustomed to my silences, but they mostly result from the fact that I don't know how much time I have at my disposal whenever I start editing). So, if you feel the need to, fire away. Dahn (talk) 20:34, 4 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Goran Vlaovic
hello,
thanks for your welcome message
I had a quick look at your page, and noticed that you started the article of Goran Vlaovic, who was one of my favourite players in the middle 90s. I knew that not much before the Euro 1996 he underwent brain surgery, so I looked after it now on the web, and found some references which I added to the article. since the article is currently bout Vlaovic's playing carreer only, I put it to a new fleck, but feel free to move it wherever you find it suitable
another fact which I read about him at that time, and could possibly added is that he was a devoted Christian. unfortunately I did not find any external references about this yet, but perhaps it worths some research
Hi, I saw your comment; more support = stronger consensus and fully agree with what you say. Where do you think we can "advertise" the discussion? I don't really know who would be interested in footy navboxes. Regards EP13:22, 8 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Seems like a good idea, alternatively we could start a "recent proposals" section on the main page, maybe under the AfD log. There is another straw poll further up the footy page about notable player sections so it wouldn't be a single link section. If we did it this way people would get used to checking there for links instead of scrolling through miles of text to find the relevant discussions. What do you think? EP13:42, 8 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, Darwinek.Please excuse the long delay: a close relative and good friend of mine is in the hospital - they just found out that he has cancer, and that nothing can be done to save him. I was shattered by the news, and spent most of the time at my disposal in the hospital, where I also did much of my sleeping. I can't picture doing much besides that, and I only entered wiki at this point to take my mind off these things - I'm probably not the best partner of dialog at this moment, and I cannot promise I'll be able to appear more often than this over the following period (months, but, alas, not that many months).
Thank you for the infobox thing - I haven't yet updated it in the articles you mention because it kept changing, and, given my editing hiatus, it may take me a while to do so. But I'll make a note of it for now.
That said, I could never dream of putting a stop to this exchange, nor, for all the awkwardness of the situation I'm in, your line of posts on my talk page. I will answer whenever I have the time, and I assure you I look forward to more on these subjects. But please excuse my delays, which are now getting longer than usual.
In my early years, I had an image of Poles and Czechs naturally getting along - before I learned about the territorial issue. But, from the little that I know on the issue, it looks to me like it's all in the past: I was recently watching a EuroNews report on how Poles in Poland set up businesses in the Czech Republic to get away from the supposedly excessive taxation in Poland. Capitalism, this great leveler... Then again (and I'm not being polemical), one may expect Poles in Czechia losing at least part of their overt identity. I always found it odd that minorities are expected to behave in ways that majorities are not, and present a textbook image of their national identity that the majority in either the country they inhabit or look to is not expected to adopt. If they still treasure that identity, I guess the best way to show it is by valuing it for themselves, in a way that they feel represents them best; if they don't, well, it's just how things go... I'm not saying this is the case with your fellow Poles in Czechia, but it strikes me as a symptom that the dividing lines will always move about the place.
In my country, the biggest problem is that people don't let go of what they consider the past to be, and a restrictive interpretation of 19th-20th century realities still seeps into modern-day discourse. Thank you for the kind words on the Mitică article (and not just): I enjoyed writing it not just because it is an interesting subject in itself, but also because it shows that, for all its nationalist emphasis on singularity and isolation, Romanian culture (like all cultures) is actually diverse and lively. For all his defects, Mitică is also a lifestyle that I would readily if self-ironically identify with - you'll have to leave out the image of Mitică as a centralist to get that image, and focus on the part where he wants them to play "Awaken Thee, Romanian" at his funeral :). Caragiale speaks about Romania in the same way as Čapek and Hašek (both of whom I love) speak about Bohemia and Moravia.
If all national identity is part-artificial, I for one say "you can't go wrong with losing some of it, and become what you think you should become instead of what you're expected to be". It is indeed a shame that people lose interest in a language, but, to me, that is primarily because a language is a means of expression that one should strive to preserve (rather than an obligatory mark of distinction).
Indeed, I will not disagree that German cultural elements are a strong presence in Czechia. In fact, that is a weird context within the former empire - if you think about it, you'll notice that most other regions have borrowed not the overtly German influence, but the diffuse and mellow identity associated with the Habsburgs (in a manner that made German nationalists angry). It's probably what also happened in areas of Transylvania, Hungary, and in Slovenia.
Local commentators like to think of Romanians as "Latin" footballers, so, from that perspective, the Portugal and Italy analogy isn't perhaps that far off. I mean, I don't know if the stereotype applies (and I tend to dislike its implications), but it may be that the people to whom it refers have found it to their liking. After all, Italy is where all Romanian players seem to go when they're any good... Indeed, mentality is a relevant factor, and I guess what Romania did for its debut on the Euro stage confirms your assessment that anything can still happen. 0-0, man... but let's not count our eggs before they're hatched ;). I've heard about Poland (sorry about that, but you have to admit they weren't any good on the pitch - as annoyed as I am to see the mediocre team that is Germany take the laurels in such a face-off), but, at the moment, I haven't managed to keep up with what who the Czechs play against and how they manage.
I share your irritation over the moronic comments about how "the Negroes cannot manage to beat the white man's team", especially since it's quite clear that most African teams we've heard of have the upper hand against any team from Eastern Europe - they play cleaner and more beautiful. And I'm not so sure that one of the few countries in Europe to have been made into a colony of its western neighbors some 60 years ago should be cracking jokes about the state of former colonies - Poles of all people should know that building stadiums is not what colonizers focus on... And I always believed in the Asian teams (I love opportunistic Korea in 2002, and I always hoped that Japan and China would score better at some world competition).
In Romania, this exact type of arrogance is rare - most likely because we rarely faced a team from one of "those" regions. It would seem that Romanian aficionados have a respect for the "exotic" teams that they have encountered - back in the early 90s, people spoke highly of Cameroonian and Nigerian players. But we do get a lot of (for now justified) ironic comments about players from Luxembourg and Andorra and whatever small team ends up in the same group for the qualifiers. TV reporters seem to find it enormously entertaining to crack jokes such as: "The Luxembourgian coach is making one change - I suppose the player warming up has just returned from his day job" or "Perhaps the goalkeeper should return to his career as a fisherman".
But what I do find entertaining myself is the Romanian-Bulgarian soccer conflict, which mostly manifests itself as jibes the Bulgarians aim our way. A while back, there was a hype when Stoichkov and his staff referred to us guys as "mamalidzhky" (or something like that), which I understand means "mămăligă-eaters". I "investigated" a bit, and, it turns out, Bulgarians are perplexed by the fact that a maize paste is (or more likely was) the staple food in Romania. Similarly, Romanians seem to quietly agree that this was not the best image to project, and the cliche about Bulgarians being "that nation of gardeners" partly results from jealousy (they ate what we could not afford, and many Bulgarians made fortunes as gardeners this side of the Danube). What's also funny is that it fits so nicely with the mămăligă-like color the Romania side picked for a main football equipment :D. (Coincidentally, ever since this, me and my friends have come to refer to the Romanian team as "a clockwork mămăligă", to match The Netherlands' moniker, hee hee).
To answer your last question: Bănel Nicoliţă is supposedly a Rom (I for one never looked it up if he identifies as such, just that he is commonly believed to be one). Incidentally, even Hagi was a minority player - here, Aromanians tend to be seen (quite abusively, if you ask me) as "a kind of Romanians", but even under that restrictive definition, he is not from the "ethnic mainstream". Indeed, there were a lot of Hungarians around back in the day (I honestly don't know why this changed since), and we had a number of Germans; in all honesty, it is hard to say if all of them really were Hungarians and Germans - names in Transylvania tend to "float" between communities, meaning that people who identify as Romanians may carry non-Romanian surnames and even first names, and, during the nationalist phase of communism, discussing their ethnic allegiance was anathema. Belodedici was, as far as I know, the only Serb to have made it on the national squad. Presently, there's also this guy, but I've never seen him play and he's just on some waiting list.
Well, I'm signing off now, and hope to hear more from you soon (as unsure as I am about being able to reply in reasonable time). Na razie! Dahn (talk) 01:00, 11 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
DO you mean what do I think about the templates? I think the continent specific tmeplate like Tourism in Africa look fine and in coordination with the other topics on wikipedia which are organized in the same way. What we need is consistency, and the Africa topic, Europe topic templates which work across a rnage of subjects and topics work well I think. The red links also I think encourage editors to start the articles. Recently created this morning was Tourism in Morocco. Haven't seen the Tourism in Asia plate yet but I think its on the right track. I;ve been adding a few articles from the public domain Library of Congress such as Agriculture in Laos and Agriculture in Mauritania. Articles on agriculture also should be covered in the same way. These are quite important articles which should have been started years ago, regards ♦Blofeld of SPECTRE♦$1,000,000?11:02, 14 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
200 countries in one template?? Urggh no. I created some global templates in the past for things like world cinema which only covers about half of places which actually have industries and even that is admittedly way oversized. If you are visiting the Tourism in Morocco page for example, all you need to do is type in Tourism in Thailand and voila you have the page. By continent is the best way to manage it I think, besides this they are linked by categories anyway. Thanks for noticing. ♦Blofeld of SPECTRE♦$1,000,000?11:08, 14 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Answer
I wholehartedly agree with you. If you look a bit further back into the history of the template, I actually removed all the links to the articles, though it was readded later by another editor, presumably the disruptive one you were speaking about. Cheers --I'm an Editorofthewiki[citation needed]13:04, 14 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Darwinek. I agree with you too. I've noticed {{Tourism}} in some "tourism in..." articles and thought that the template wasn't suitable for those articles. That template is too broad in scope for the country articles IMO. Also, every single in the country in the world can't fit on the {{Tourism}} template. Perhaps as a compromise, tourism could be linked to in the headers of all the continent specific templates ({{Tourism in Africa}} currently doesn't do this), and tourism could be wikilinked to in the leading paragraph of the articles? That way readers would be lead to more information about tourism. A "see also" section could be used either. I don't know if that will resolve the conflict, but it might be worth a try. All the best, Bláthnaid18:49, 14 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, can you please tell that in an article if I have to mention several historical organizations, original names of which are in non-English language, then what will be the format. Should I mention the non-English name first and English translation within bracket, or English translation first and non-English original name within bracket? Otolemur crassicaudatus (talk) 11:00, 18 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
For example here are two sentences:
“
Critics of smoking organized the first group in Germany named the Deutscher Tabakgegnerverein zum Schutze der Nichtraucher (German Tobacco Opponents' Association for the Protection of Non-smokers).
”
“
Critics of smoking organized the first group in Germany named the German Tobacco Opponents' Association for the Protection of Non-smokers (Deutscher Tabakgegnerverein zum Schutze der Nichtraucher).
Hi Darwinek I've begun creating templates for each of the African countries and getting them started. Then I'd like to see no stubs and them all developed bwyond a start class. Thanks to the conservation sites there is often quite a bit of info about which is quite unusual for many parts of Africa. I aim to connect them all together so eventually we have a full set of African national parks up to decent status. I was considering setting up a WPAfrica National Park task force for it. If you are interested let me know. This area has a lot of potential and if wikipedia could get a full series and no stubs we'd be rockin. I;d imagine Bláthnaid, editor of thewiki, and a few others might be interested. ♦Blofeld of SPECTRE♦$1,000,000?20:01, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Turkish geo-stub categories
Hi Darwinek - I've moved the proposed renames of various Turkish geo-stub categories to WP:SFD - even speediable stub category changes should be listed at SFD not CFD. Grutness...wha?00:45, 24 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Ladislau Raffinsky
Ladislau Raffinsky, like many others, were Hungarians, because they were from the part of Romania which was until 1918 in Austria-Hungary. In 1918, after the Great Union of Romania, Timişoara, Arad, Oradea or Reşiţa, cities where the football was very popular, passed in Romania. The majority of the players at the national team were from the teams from Timişoara, like Chinezul, Ripensia, or Banatul, this is the fact why the national team was made, in majority, of players that had Hungarian ethnicity. In 1930, a half of the players from the Romanian squad were from Bucharest teams, like Venus, Juventus Bucureşti or FC Unirea Tricolor Bucureşti, but a lot of these players were took from the teams from Banat and Crişana (the western regions of Romania). --Razvanflorian (talk) 06:48, 25 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Re:Istanbul
Ciao! Actually I don't live in Istanbul, but I go often there because of personal reasons ;-) When my "reason" is working, I wander around the city...that's how I wrote my articles! Cheers, Alex2006 (talk) 12:31, 25 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I wish I didn't have to say this, but I reckon we should blacklist this website. It has caused havoc with incorrect info on population and altitude all across wikipedia. If wikipedia wants to be completely reliable that site should be blacklisted, most people who are up on the web see a reference to "fallingrian genomics" and think, ahem I doubt I'll be taking that as a fact. I've tried using it myself to fill out articles on many occasions and when other info has arrived it has shown it to be as useless as a sausage and seriously inaccurate in many places. I came across an "estimated population in a 7km radius "9,000" earlier. The population according to a government source was 41,000 for the town alone not including the municipality. I say scrap it. Unfortunately when people google a lesser known place this is what comes up. The thing is though is that the coordinates and nearest settlement thing has always proved quite accurate its just the rest of it ♦Blofeld of SPECTRE♦$1,000,000?00:58, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Re: Note
Better English, my skills in written Czech have suffered considerably since I left, though fortunately my spoken is still healthy (but less useful over the Internet). I'm somewhat embarrassed you read my site, I've been using that website for practicing web design and as my outlet for childish rants, principally owing to me not having all that much else to put up on it - busy busy.
I've been here sitting for 10 minutes trying to write down just how stupid I think the visa situation is, to no avail. So, I'll settle with the rant I've put up on my website. I do try and follow the news in the CR but with the headlines reading like they are stolen verbatim from The Onion (at least the ones I see on Novinky.cz - what site do you read?) it gets difficult.
Do you have msn, icq, aim, gtalk, 'Gadu-Gadu' or anything? I always feel guilty when I have non-Wikipdia related discussions on the site. Oh, and speaking of unrelated things, can I ask you if you know anything about the Polish border-town of Budzin (very close to Racibórz)? Wikipedia doesn't have an article for it, nor is it on Google Maps - in fact the only reference I can find to it is on the Targeo mapset (the one they use at Szukacz.pl [hehe, hihi]). Linkie. It is extremely hard to find info on such a little village though, so since I am talking to you I was wondering if you knew anything or anywhere I could have a look on the internet to find out. Sorry if this is an imposition, I don't want you to do anything, just tell me where I could find (szukaj! ... hehe) any further info. +Hexagon1(t)13:00, 3 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the link, I'll have a look at that site. TV news here is a complete catastrophe, no matter how bad the commercial stations in the CR are, they've got to be better than Ten News. Think Novinky.cz but televised, I was trying to think of a good headline in my previous post as an example but none came to mind as I was typing. My ICQ is 324031174, though it changes every once in a while when I forget the numbers (bloody numbers).
I think I may need to drop in at Budzin when I come through the CR in early 2010. Remember when you offered a beer? I may just take you up on that offer. :) All I know of Budzin is that it was on the other side of the Polish-German border from Racibórz (then Ratibor) in 1938, presumably meaning the residents of Budzin voted to become Polish in the Upper Silesian plebiscite, unless I am confusing places, which, knowing me, is very likely. Anyway, it is information that is less than helpful today. I'm off to bed now, it's 2:15am here... +Hexagon1(t)16:15, 3 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Renaming "Sports in Lebanon" to "Sport in Lebanon"
Hi, you recently renamed the article "Sports in Lebanon" to Sport in Lebanon, citing naming conventions. Could you provide me with which naming conventions cover that? The closest I could find was this, which lists "Sport (or sports if that is local usage)". Are you just assuming that "Sport" is the local usage over "Sports", or do you have some basis for this conclusion? Thanks! ← George [talk]20:51, 3 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Ahh, ok. When creating this article, I had done a quick Google search comparing the usages of "Sports" and "Sport" with "Lebanon" and "Lebanese", to try to figure out which to use. "Sports" seemed to be much more common, but basing it on categories seems to make sense... out of curiosity, why does the Sports in Israel article use the 's', while the category is "Sport in Israel", without the 's'? That was one of the articles I had also checked when creating this article and figuring out which to use, since it's a neighboring nation. ← George [talk]21:04, 3 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It looks like it was changed in August 2006 "to be consistent with other Sports in Blank articles in Wikipedia, I am moving this article to Sports in Israel. Notice the addition of the s in Sports." I assume that at the time most of these articles were titled Sports in blank, or the author who renamed it was just mistaken. In any event, your analysis of ties to the US probably makes sense, as Lebanon would have closer ties to France, which uses Sport, sans 's'. Cheers. ← George [talk]21:12, 3 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
These maps are really different in size and scale. I can't really tell how the area annexed is different between them. It should be narrower or shorter or what? - TheMightyQuill (talk) 23:51, 5 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hnojník
On 9 July, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Hnojník, 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.
Sure, you can count on me. However, my translation was lousy, I am not a poet, a prefer a more realistic approach to life. Tymek (talk) 14:10, 12 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Coal mines
Today I have toured the divine world
Humbled and begging
And bitter tears came to my eyes
Flowing ceaselessly
As the quiet cornfields of all villages
Have been changed into coal mines
I have toured a quiet patch today
Where flowers once used to grow
And where a ram and a sheep grazed
Along a footpath near the hut
And where today, instead of straight grasses
A day of bloody repayment roars
I stood today at the treshold of a shaft
In the worry of a steamy moment
When the miners black from coal
Went down into the drift
And my soul was touched by dry pain
As they took out a man broken to pieces
Heh nie jestem poeta, bierz jak chcesz. W zamian kufel zimnego Radegasta, jak zjade na Zaolzie, a musze kiedys tam pojechac. Tzn bylem w Czeskim Cieszynie ale dawno temu. Pozdro Tymek (talk) 19:20, 14 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Jak chcesz promowac poetyckie dziadostwo, to prosze (hehe).
Toughly, powerfully, persistently
I would like to be noisy in anger
I would like to rebel, to swear
In the chill, in the pain, cut down words
In shattering of my whole soul
To smash everything into no-memory
To smash to pieces, to destroy, to tear
To put the last feeling down into nothing
W zamian prosze krzynke Radegasta, butelke Becherovki oraz dla dzieci Arasidky v cukru i Lentilky. pozdrowienia Tymek (talk) 18:03, 16 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Re:Back again
Pómału do przodku ;) Z tymi koordynatami to mnie wczoraj tak napadło, bo przedwczoraj w Google Earth dali (wreszcie) nowe zdjyncia naszego regionu. D_T_G (PL) 17:23, 14 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Darwinek. I've just approved your DYK hook for this article to appear on the Main Page. Sorry to leave it sitting there so long, but DYK is chronically understaffed and sometimes hooks do slip by unnoticed. It should be appearing on the MP soon though. Best, Olaf Davis | Talk11:04, 15 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Jan Kubisz DYK
On 15 July, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Jan Kubisz, 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.
On 18 July, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Adolf Fierla, 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.
On 23 July, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Paweł Kubisz, 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.
(You wrote)
Dzięki za poprawki do artykułu o Kubiszu. Na talk page jego artykułu jest oryginalna wersja fragmentu jego wiersza. Jeszcze jedna drobnostka, istnieje w angielskim lepsze słowo do przetłumaczenia polskiego hutnik? Metallurgist i metalworker zdają się nie pasować. - Darwinek (talk) 16:52, 23 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Dzięki za dobre słowo. W Podręcznym Słowniku Polsko-Angielskim Wiedzy Powszechnej (Warszawa 1988) polskie słowo „hutnik” tłumaczone jest także jako „ironmaster”. Tymczasem Webster’s Dictionary (Chicago 1992) podaje również „metalist – one who works with or has special knowledge of metals”. Wybór należy do Ciebie. --Poeticbenttalk18:11, 23 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Translation
Dzięki. Chyba zostawię tak jak jest. Chciałem jeszcze zapytać, czy można poprosić Cię o kolejny przekład fragmentu jednego wiersza. - Darwinek (talk) 19:09, 23 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Faktycznie, bardzo to ponure. Ciekaw jestem, jak zamierzasz skorzystać z tego wiersza na naszych stronach, ale zacznijmy od przekładu.--Poeticbenttalk01:24, 24 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Darwinek - no, just leave it at SFD. It'll get done soon enough. The only concern is with the comma or parentheses one, and - unless there's any change to the article - that should probably follow the permcat, too. There's always a little backlog at SFD (there are only a couple of people who close discussions there), but it should happen within the next few days. Grutness...wha?02:13, 24 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Congress Poland - related mass moves in early July
(You wrote)
Witaj ponownie! Proszę o tłumaczenie wiersza Henryka Jasiczka. Najchętniej to bym wkleił pełny tekst jakiegoś wiersza, ale to zdaje się niemożliwe ze względu na prawa autorskie. Fragment wiersza Nie zdradzę:
On 28 July, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Gustaw Przeczek, 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.
Ah, I see. A non-diaspora population. I think that's fine then. By the way, would you be able to tell me how different Vendryně and Třinec are? The former seems to be village in/near the latter. BalkanFever11:58, 31 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, my Greek friends call me "Macedonian" all the time. Maybe it's only to my face, I don't know ;) But yeah, there are also nationalists here, from both sides. The funny thing is, most of the irredentists calling for Greek land are the children and grandchildren of those who were expelled from that land in the late 40's. Some have never even set foot in the area of what is now the Republic of Macedonia. A few of them went to communist Europe, like Pando Jankulovski, father of Marek :). BalkanFever13:24, 31 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, it's the epitome of hypocrisy for one minority to treat another minority badly. I believe the best situation would be if someone could take pride in being part of their minority and part of the whole nation, like I do here. Do you feel Polish and Czech (in whatever sense)? I have Polish and Czech friends here, but they've pretty much assimilated, and can only make basic conversation in their languages, if at all. BalkanFever13:51, 31 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The Balkans have had plenty of border switching going on too. I think the main difference is once a new country took over the area, they would get rid of most of the others. :( By the way, I've been hearing a bit about some Silesian nationality thing, and language (dialect?). Is that just another theory? BalkanFever11:28, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Translation
(You wrote)
Cześć. Proszę Cię uprzejmie o ostatnie tłumaczenie. Chodzi o wiersz obozowy Adama Wawrosza. Sądzę, że ma lepsze, ale ten akurat zapisałem będąc w bibliotece. Fragment wiersza Lato:
Hi, thank you for being a member of WikiProject Cuba. If you would like to remain as an active member please note so here, otherwise mark yourself inactive or semi-active. Thank you.
Well, wait no longer, because we have a project for you! WikiProject United States Government is where all the cool Wikipedians who watch C-SPAN hang out! Join the project today and help us get it off the ground and flying.
Help us get the project off the ground and flying.
DYK? nom
On 5 August, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Adam Wawrosz, 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.
I wish I could appreciate poetry more (or at least enough to appreciate Wawrosz's); anyways, great job on this article and making Wikipedia better -- CB (ö)07:17, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
For now I've moved the only two articles under the U.S. Virgin Islands categories to the original Virgin Islands category, since that one has more articles in it. We will decide on whether we want the IOC name or the more common name perhaps later. Chanheigeorge (talk) 05:46, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Okay Darwinek, thanks for keeping an eye on things and spotting this. My only concern is that your proposed renaming does not differentiate between citizens of Lebanon who are Armenian and Armenian expatriates in Lebanon. Mayumashu (talk) 02:04, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oly
Hi! Long time no talk. Unless you really want to, you don't really need to add the "Athletes at the 2008 Summer Olympics" category. I will go through all athletes, and do the necessary extra updates as well. Punkmorten (talk) 21:52, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Happy to help you! The Olympic Games poses a problem: influx of editors who have no clue how to edit, mass creation of ugly substubs. Luckily, people like you are there to clean it up. By the way, I do need help with the results pages, but once they're up I will go through the athlete bios. Punkmorten (talk) 22:03, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah weighlifting is a real problem on here at present. Very few people are working on the articles. I've started adding some of the biographies. there is an awful lot to do The Bald One White cat 15:56, 16 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Jak masz jeszcze jakies wiersze do tlumaczenia, to dawaj. Wtedy Ci nie przetlumaczylem, bom odpoczywal sobie na lonie natury, pozdrawiam Tymek (talk) 20:29, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Ahoj. Jestem wielkim kibicem sportu, sam gralem i do dzis gram w pilke nozna, wiec ogladam olimpiade kiedy moge. Polakow mozna tu zobaczyc, np wczoraj telewizja NBC pokazala caly mecz szczypiornistow Polska - Francja 30-30, dzis ogladalem Brazylia - Argentyna 0-3, dobry mecz. Co do artykulow o olimpijczykach - dzieki za podziekowania, ku chwale Ojczyzny. Tymek (talk) 20:52, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Darwinek. Excellent work on the olympics BTW. Just to let you know that this task force has been started and I thought you might be interested. Probably at present you are tied up with olympics stuff but if you are interested let me know The Bald One White cat 14:08, 20 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes I've been trying to add all of the weghtlifters and started some of the female hurdlers. SOme of the sports tend to get neglected and with all of the individual country articles to upkeep in all the sports it is a huge undertaking. I noticed your edits the other night and I thought. Phew!! Well done. Hey the swimming was good wasn't it!! I wonder how fast Bolt can run the 200m. I don't think he'll beat Johnson's record yet but he may run 19.50 I think if he stops jogging his races! The Bald One White cat 14:16, 20 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Wow thats amazing. Interestingly Johnson thought his old record was safe too despite being Bolt's biggest supporter. What amazes me is that it never looks like he is running flat out. He just looks so relaxed running. I think its because of his height but he never looks like he has the leg speed of the some of the shorter squatter sprinters. His strides are practically twice as long though The Bald One White cat 14:58, 20 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
IOC members
Category:IOC members to Category:International Olympic Committee members expand abbreviation — Darwinek (talk) 10:54, 18 August 2008 (UTC) This doesn't precisely meet the criteria, should I go ahead with it anyway? –xeno (talk) 18:47, 20 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hello Darwinek. I'm really sorry that I'm too late to help you. Your suggestion was more than reasonable, of course. Pitty it did not succeeded. All the best,--KoberTalk04:59, 26 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks a lot, dear Darwinek. Yes, Polish support in felt elsewhere in Georgia these days. We really appreciated that. I wish all the best to you and your people.--KoberTalk14:07, 26 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hey
Thank you so much for this award !! So I never received any and now I received two in two days, how cool is that. Maybe you can change it in Working "Woman" instead of man?? :) Thank you, AmandaT/C10:26, 26 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks so much! My Master's thesis is on Olympic athletes... maybe I should log all that as "research" time? Haha. Cheers, CP16:15, 26 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Cats:Booian people by Fooian descent
Darwinek, I hadn t seen your vote on the recent batch of pages nominated and wondered if you could weigh in. They are spread over a few days (Aug 28th and 29th). Cheers Mayumashu (talk) 00:12, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The Hebrew name of the second one you mention would appear to be מחזיקה התורה (lit. Upholding the Torah), a traditional transliteration of which would probably be "Machzikah Hatorah". Although this does not get any Ghits, there is at least one synagogue called "Machzika Hatorah" [1] (one of the transliteration issues being whether the ה on the end is transliterated as "a" or "ah". пﮟოьεԻ5715:15, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, the language to which it is transliterated is important, and the German aspect would explain why it is written Machsika and not Machzika (as the German "Z" would have been used for the Hebrew "צ", which in English is "Tz"). As for which one to use, I'll leave that up to you! пﮟოьεԻ5715:38, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
city of birth
Hey Darwinek, I just saw you changed the city of birth for Samuel Coco-Viloin. You made your change because the French interwiki said it was another city than our article tells us here. Actually our city was cited with a reference (the IAAF profile), so I really wonder wether we would have to trust an unsourced interwiki over a sourced profile page from the IAAF? Thanks, AmandaT/C01:10, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Alright, so what do we do ? You revert me again? I really don't care, but to me the sourced one sounded more logical, but I definitely see your point also. As long as we both agree feel free to decide what to do in this case. AmandaT/C09:42, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes I saw that option, I will try to think about it, but I know it will be something I will for sure forget a lot of times too. Hopefully you will be around to correct me where necessary. I do have the feeling that you are going faster than me now, so you might already be further. My next step is to complete the 200m for men but I have had some busy days and couldn't do much. AmandaT/C20:24, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
WP:RUSSIA roll call and your input required
Privet. You are receiving this message as you were listed on the membership list of WP:RUSSIA at Wikipedia:WikiProject Russia/Members. Recent times has seen minimal activity within WikiProject Russia, and there is an attempt to re-invigorate the project and have it become more organised into a fully-fledge functioning project, with the aim of increasing the quality of Russia-related articles across English wikipedia.
As we don't know which listed members are active within the project and Russia-related article, all listed members are receiving this message, and are requested to re-affirm their active status on Russia-related article by re-adding their username to Wikipedia:WikiProject Russia/Members by adding:
# {{User|YOURUSERNAME}}
to the membership list. You may also like to place {{User Russian Project}} on your userpage, as this will also place you in Category:WikiProject Russia members.
Hello again! While finishing the results pages for the Olympic shooting finals (1988–2008), I have also created a list of redlink finalists. My intention (which, admittedly, will certainly be a long-term intention) is to create all these biographies. Now, it would be a good idea to get all the names correct before I start doing this, so we can avoid unnecessary page moves. And that's where I came to think of you. A lot of the names are Slavic, many of them Cyrillic in origin. As you are very experienced when it comes to these things, I thought I'd ask you if you might like to have a look at the list, or at least the top of it (which is probably where I will begin), and correct the spellings where needed. It would be nice to get rid of the inconsistencies in this list (Russians called both Dmitri and Dimitri, and both Aleksandr and Alexander, for instance), but I don't know what to make of it all. Thanks in advance! -- Jao (talk) 16:18, 29 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hexagon1's plwiki user translation
Could you do me a favour and translate the following into Polish for my plwiki user page? "Hello! If you wish to leave me a message, it would probably reach me sooner if you left it at my English Wikipedia talk page." If you don't have the time, that's fine too, no worries. Cheers! +Hexagon1(t)03:28, 4 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Dzięki! I'm flattered you consider me a friend, I consider you one too. One doesn't usually meet good people on the Internet, and you have certainly earned my respect. Thanks for the translation. +Hexagon1(t)11:52, 4 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
On 23 November, 2008, In the news was updated with a news item that involved the article Nevado del Huila, which you created. If you know of another interesting news item involving a recently created or updated article, then please suggest it on the In the news candidates page.
Hallo Darwinek!
I don't know yet, maybe after Xmas. Unfortunately I got some health problems, and the doctors don't understand yet what's going on. Are you already there? Cheers, Alex2006 (talk) 06:42, 11 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It is not life threatening :-), but it bothers me a lot, and it's going to be a long story. Anyway, I hope that you are already enjoying the City on the Bosphorus, and I hope to meet you there soon! Cheers, Alex2006 (talk) 16:58, 11 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hello Darwinek! I just wanted to wish you and your family a merry Christmas! May this Christmas be full of great cheer and holiday spirit. Have a great day and a wonderful New Year, from The Bald One White cat 11:20, 25 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the warm welcome, the tips and advice on my first start page Citânia de Briteiros! I learned quite a bit just from looking at your and other edits to the page. But I have a couple of residual questions about style/format, which I have posted on my talk page. If you have time and it's easy, I would appreciate a quick look and explanation. Thanks again. TarichaRivularis (talk) 09:55, 17 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Resizing references
Thanks for your interest in the Murzuq Desert article where you changed the size of the references. While personally I find that size doesn't matter, you should be aware that there was an extended discussion of this issue at Wikipedia talk:Footnotes#Resizing references and Wikipedia talk:Footnotes#New consensus?. The result was no change in the guidelines, which means that if there are less than ten footnotes don't change what the original editor put in place for the /* Notes */ field (or equivalent field). This is similar to the rule-of-thumb don't change spelling from American to Commonwealth or vice-a-versa unless the article has a particular relation to the United States or to a British Commonwealth country. --Bejnar (talk) 17:50, 17 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Darwinek - thanks for your edit on the Hugo Perls article. I wondered if you could give a hand with the referencing section? There is still the red template...or point me in the direction of how I can correlate the references.Ernstblumberg (talk) 03:46, 28 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I saw you moved Birim River (Ghana) to Birim River. There is also a Birim River (New Guinea), for which I just started an article, another river with mining problems. The New Guinea one is interesting in being close to a mountain, Mount Fubilan, that has been razed to the ground. But I suppose the Ghana river takes the main name since that is what people will mostly be looking for? I certainly expect to expand it much more than the New Guinea one, although I expect I will tinker with both. Aymatth2 (talk) 02:32, 19 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
No problem with the move, now I think about it. The article on the river in Ghana (to be expanded) is much more likely to be what a reader would be looking for. I put a {{for}} link into the Ghana one pointing to the New Guinea one. This is the best naming / structure. Aymatth2 (talk) 14:07, 19 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
RFA thanks
My RFA passed today at 61/5/4. Thanks for participating in my RFA. I appreciate all the comments I received and will endeavor to justify the trust the WP community has placed in me. Have a nice day. :-) AdjustShift (talk) 21:22, 11 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Hakan Yakin
I've amended the article Hakan Yakin again regarding his Turkish spelling. Can you tell me if you are pleased with the way it stands at the moment. See the second paragraph if nobody as altered it once you return. Thanks. Evlekis (talk) 16:31, 12 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Question on translations on Dominican Republic articles
MRDU08 (talk·contribs) has been adding information, in an extremely bad English, to articles on Dominican municipalities; that information is a translation of articles in the Wiki Dominicana website. I do not know the copyright policy of that site because they do not say anything about it. MRDU08 (talk·contribs) has been also copying to Wikipedia the provincial maps of that website. Some examples of those bad translations are Jimaní (Municipio Jimaní) and Duvergé (Municipio Duvergé). What should I, or anybody, do in these cases? --Jmarcano (talk) 17:36, 19 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Mosques
Hi Darwinek, I think you mean to keep the template but split it into cities in Turkey. That's ok, pretty good idea, especially when we think that numerous historical mosques have still not taken place in the template. Teşekkürler, kolay gelsin. --Chapultepec (talk) 23:48, 22 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
It's ok, probably we will be in need of a couple of other cities later on, such as Bursa and Edirne. But, for the moment it is quite sufficient. Thank you. --Chapultepec (talk) 23:31, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for your enthusiastic welcome, but I am an ond unregistered user of Wikipedia, since 2004. I use English Wikipedia a lot to make translations for Portuguese Wikipedia, where I am in since 2005. Best regards, Fasouzafreitas (talk) 17:31, 1 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your little fixes to Osaka Maritime Museum, much appreciated. I hoped that getting it onto DYK would get editors to have a look at it and it seems to have worked. Also, I like your photos of Split - I was there last year and it's beautiful, like the rest of the Dalmatian coast. Cheers, Bigger digger (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 14:10, 14 May 2009 (UTC).[reply]
Dzieki za dobre slowo o artykule Jablonkow Incident. Planuje teraz kolejny artykul zwiazany z Twoim heimatem, dotyczacy pewnego wydarzenia z 1919 roku. Dam znac jak tylko skoncze i licze na Twoja fachowa pomoc. pozdrowienia Tymek (talk) 17:10, 18 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
O tej masakrze tez myslalem, ale to moze pozniej. Teraz chce opisac Bitwe pod Skoczowem, ktora jest epizodem raczej malo znanym, a szkoda, bo przesadzila o tym ze Zaolzie stalo sie czescia Czechoslowacji. Pomyslow mam mnostwo, np planuje tez opisac bitwe pod Czaca w marcu 1939, szkoda tylko, ze czasu tak malo. Wikipedia powinna powstac dziesiec lat temu, gdy bylem studentem. Wtedy czasu mialem wiecej. Tymek (talk) 17:45, 18 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Pisalem, ze planuje artykul o bitwie pod Skoczowem, ale dalem sobie spokoj, bo materialow jest bardzo malo. moze kiedy indziej. pozdrawiam. Tymek (talk) 01:54, 4 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
English
Can you please help to name this category in correct Wikpedia-English?
I would name it 'Fur tails' or 'Fur skin tails' - a Wikipedia-commons-category where the pictures are listed with tails of fur skins, used by furriers respectively the fur trade. Maybe I would name other categories the same way, for example 'fur paws'. There are already categories for all kinds of fur, for example called 'Mink fur-skins" or 'Fox for-skins' (also 'Mink (clothing)' and so on.
I've been working on Territorial changes of Poland trying to find links for each Territorial changes. I wondering if you know where I can find out more information about the following Territorial changes:
The Orawa and Spisz regions that were passed to Poland at Conference of Ambassadors in Spa, Belgium on 28 July 1920. I can't find any references on A)If they were passed to Poland and B) If they were given to Poland why were they requested by Poland
Can't find any references that say, "an additional exchange of territories in Orava - the territory around Nižná Lipnica went to Poland, the territory around Suchá Hora and Hladovka went to Czechoslovakia. The new frontiers were confirmed by a Czechoslovak-Polish Treaty on April 24, 1925 and are identical with present-day borders."
Can't find any references that for the 1948 transfer of the Village of Medyka near Przemyśl was transferred to Poland
Would you like me to provide you an English-language sources or you would be satisfied with Polish-language? The problem is that from the "Western" perspective all of these territorial changes are small, thus usually there is a real problem to find good or extensive materials in English about it. - Darwinek (talk) 11:22, 30 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Well English would be best but if all you have is Polish sources, that is fine too. Actually an actual map of the transfers for the Orawa and Spisz adjustments would be great. -- Esemono (talk) 13:23, 30 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
There is an article about the dispute on Czech WP: [2]. It is referenced. If you need to translate some specific parts or facts, just let me know. - Darwinek (talk) 15:38, 30 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
OK, so according to that Czech article are the following statements true (I included the refs with nowiki tags too):
At the Conference of Ambassadors it was also decided that Czechoslovakia would cede to Poland a number of villages from the Orawa and Spisz regions including the municipalities of Oravy Srnie, Podvlk, Harkabúz, Nižná Zubrica, Vyšná Zubrica, Oravka, Bukovina-Podsklie, Pekelník, Jablonka, Chyžné, Hladovka, Suchá Hora, Vyšná Lipnica a part Nižné Lipnice, and 4.2% of the rather Belá new communities, with Fridman (Falštin settlement), Krempach, Tribš, Durštín, Čierna Hora, Jurgov, Repiská, Vyšné lapse, Nižné lapse, Nedeca, Kacvín and Lapšanka.<ref>pg 13 - Borak, Mečislav; Žáček, Rudolf (in Czech). Stolen (1993 ed.). village. Český Těšín : Muzeum Těšínska. ISBN 80-85491-43-5.</ref>
This image was on the Czech page (I translated it) According to it #2 Lipnica Wielka territories were traded for #4 Hladovka and Suchá Hora territory but I can't find any reference for the trade17 December 1923 Council of the League of Nations did not support the Polish position and Javorina remained part of Czechoslovakia.<ref>pg 15 - Borak, Mečislav; Žáček, Rudolf (in Czech). Stolen (1993 ed.). village. Český Těšín : Muzeum Těšínska. ISBN 80-85491-43-5.</ref>
In late November 1938 special Polish military groups attacked and seized the Skalité, Javorina, and the Lesnica territories (Regions 1, 6 and 8 on the map) . The Polish authorities have begun the annexed territory to carry out violent assimilation of the population. Polish was introduced as the only official language and the Slovak Intelligence were displaced from the territory.<ref>pg 21-22 - Borak, Mečislav; Žáček, Rudolf (in Czech). Stolen (1993 ed.). village. Český Těšín : Muzeum Těšínska. ISBN 80-85491-43-5.</ref>
On May 20, 1945 in Trstená an agreement for a return to the 1938 borders of Poland was signed and the following day the Czechoslovak border guards moved to the old Czechoslovakian border. At several places there were fights between Polish and Slovak militias, but the situation calmed with the arrival of Polish troops on July 17, 1945. <ref>pg 28 - Borak, Mečislav; Žáček, Rudolf (in Czech). Stolen (1993 ed.). village. Český Těšín : Muzeum Těšínska. ISBN 80-85491-43-5.</ref>
Image copyright problem with File:George h thomas.jpg
Thanks for uploading File:George h thomas.jpg. The image has been identified as not specifying the copyright status of the image, which is required by Wikipedia's policy on images. If you don't indicate the copyright status of the image on the image's description page, using an appropriate copyright tag, it may be deleted some time in the next seven days. If you have uploaded other images, please verify that you have provided copyright information for them as well.
For more information on using images, see the following pages:
Image copyright problem with File:Gideon welles.jpg
Thanks for uploading File:Gideon welles.jpg. The image has been identified as not specifying the copyright status of the image, which is required by Wikipedia's policy on images. If you don't indicate the copyright status of the image on the image's description page, using an appropriate copyright tag, it may be deleted some time in the next seven days. If you have uploaded other images, please verify that you have provided copyright information for them as well.
For more information on using images, see the following pages:
Image copyright problem with File:Gordon parks.gif
Thanks for uploading File:Gordon parks.gif. The image has been identified as not specifying the copyright status of the image, which is required by Wikipedia's policy on images. If you don't indicate the copyright status of the image on the image's description page, using an appropriate copyright tag, it may be deleted some time in the next seven days. If you have uploaded other images, please verify that you have provided copyright information for them as well.
For more information on using images, see the following pages:
Witaj! Widzę, że niektórzy już tutaj pisali do Ciebie w języku polskim, także i ja zaryzykuję ;-) Chodzi mi o tę grafikę: File:Afghanistan elections 2004.jpg. Z historii pliku widzę, że Ty ją umieściłeś w Wikipedii, niestety (z tego co ja widzę) zrobiłeś to jedynie na en wiki i dlatego nie można jej wykorzystać w polskim projekcie. Czy byłbyś w stanie coś zrobić, aby przenieść ją na Commons? Z góry dziękuję :-) Załączając pozdrowienia, triskaidekafildiscussion? or e-mail?01:12, 20 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Czech municipalities and villages
Hi. I took for granted you had started these years ago. Would you be interested in helping get a few onto here? Hopefully there will be me and at least another person adding them in the coming weeks but if you can help out this will be great,Dr. Blofeld White cat 19:27, 5 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Don't worry, I think the links are all ready for starting in the templates. I'll try to make a start on them in the coming weeks. I thought you had already started them!Dr. Blofeld White cat 10:29, 7 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I'll create categories for all settlements by district as I start them but don't worry I' won't interfere with the existing cateogries on cities and towns and villages as I am aware that a town and market town is elevated above a village for instance. I am creating additional categories by district just for convenience purposes.Dr. Blofeld White cat 21:12, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. I noticed you removed a line of text here. Please don't do that as when I go back through them later I will be adding the information like I have just done. If you edit them can you import any photos and coordinates?Dr. Blofeld White cat 15:42, 19 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Tell me about it! I did ask as the whole lot should really be done by bot first time but as usual the amount of people who want to use bots to expand our content is very limited. I seem to have been doing a lot of work you used to do of later, with Czech and Russian towns and rivers!Dr. Blofeld White cat 15:47, 19 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, yeah I just wish I knew how to run bots myself. I did ask Kotniski actually before I started the task see his talk page. I asked many bot operators and few if any replied or seemed to care unfortunately. Kot did raise interest a day or two ago but siad his bot is out of action because he is on a different computer or something. I had hoped somebody would run a bot to do it but as it seemd like to no avail I started on them myself. I'm making good progress I've also kiitted out most of the districts with nice infoboxes and locators a lot of them didn't even show ehre they were!Dr. Blofeld White cat 16:00, 19 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Cieść Darwinek, jak se máš? I came across this stub and was wondering if you might be able to expand it, since biographies of Poles seem to be your thing :) Regards, BalkanFever12:27, 7 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Naturalnie. --Poeticbent talk 22:45, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
Thank you. My pleasure. --Poeticbent talk 15:30, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
Thank you for the email and your kind words. I sent you one also. And, here's the translation. Cheers, Poeticbent talk 16:45, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
.svg)
