Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous)

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The miscellaneous section of the village pump is used to post messages that do not fit into any other category. Please post on the policy, technical, or proposals pages, or - for assistance - at the help desk, rather than here, if at all appropriate. For general knowledge questions, please use the reference desk.

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Banned user User:Zephram Stark is trying to start an edit war on Law of the United States, both directly and through friends

Moved to Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Banned user User:Zephram Stark is trying to start an edit war on Law of the United States, both directly and through friends

Name of a Swedish city

I read a Chinese news report on a city in Northern Sweden that, according to the report, is the only female-only city in the world since 1820. However, the news only quoted the name in Chinese as 沙科保市, without its native name. Though "沙科保" (pinyin:Shakebo) suggests a three-syllable name starting with S, no such article under the relevant wikipedia list and category contains the description of male-free. We should create a wikipedia article for it if it really exists, provided we know its name. --Poeticlion (talk) 18:07, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia deems a few things as automatically notable and fit for articles. These include high schools and cities/towns. Feel free to create an article! Suomi Finland 2009 (talk) 19:02, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

No, some people deem them, though I don't believe there's an actual consensus for it. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 20:07, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

In my experience there certainly isn't consensus. Anyway, the issue here is finding the name. Maybe WP:Reference desk is a better place to ask. OrangeDog (talk • edits) 21:23, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

I guess I'll try to get help from Wikipedia:Reference desk/Humanities and see whether it is notable after I get its name. Thank you very much!!--Poeticlion (talk) 08:25, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Djäkneböle, could, when mangled through Chinese, come out something like "Shakebo". DuncanHill (talk) 09:05, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

I can guarantee you that there is no such town in Sweden. I haven't read the Chinese news about it, but Swedish news reported about the Chinese one and found it quite entertaining. To me it seems like the Chinese have created an artic variation of the classical amazon myth. Vigfus (talk) 23:22, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Yes, it a myth [1] I wonder where it came from. --Apoc2400 (talk) 13:19, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

Um, it defly is not Djäkneböle, for the Chinese news report claims 25,000 (all female)inhabitants, far more than the 161 suggested by the wp article. Also, it should be something like Yakenbo in Chinese. Btw, the correct spelling in Pinyin for 沙科保市 is Shakebao. I believe its a hoax. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Blodance (talk • contribs) 02:36, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

Mysteriouse-mail

I am not sure as to whether this is the best place to post this message. I have just received a rather strange e-mail:

Caro ACEOREVIVED, A página Cumbersa outelizador:ACEOREVIVED na Wikipedia foi criada a 09h29min de 11 de Outubre de 2009 por Chabi; consulte http://mwl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cumbersa_outelizador:ACEOREVIVED para a versão atual. Esta é uma página nova. Sumário de edição: Criou nova página com 'Template:Bienbenido --ACEOREVIVED (talk) 19:51, 12 October 2009 (UTC)' Contacte o editor: e-mail: http://mwl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contactar_utilizador/Chabi wiki: http://mwl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outelizador:Chabi Não haverá mais notificações no caso de futuras alterações a não ser que visite esta página. Poderá também restaurar as bandeiras de notificação para todas as suas páginas vigiadas na sua lista de vigiados. O seu amigável sistema de notificação de Wikipedia -- Para alterar as suas preferências da lista de vigiados, visite http://mwl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Watchlist/edit Contacto e assistência: http://mwl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajuda:Cuntenidos

I do not recognise this language. Can any one please help me? What is this all about? If

you understand what this is about, can you please leave a message at my userpage. Many thanks, ACEOREVIVED (talk) 19:51, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Is there some way to manage one's unified login / global account so you don't get welcome emails like this just for visiting (not even editing) a different language wikipedia? -- ToE^T 01:02, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Sounds like Portuguese... Draftydoor (talk) 15:10, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Macaronic Brazilian (?) Portuguese with spelling errors. --Xyzt1234 (talk) 20:37, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

mwl is the ISO abbreviation for Mirandese. --Danger (talk) 22:05, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Any new articles that need to be done?

If you have any ideas let me know. Thanks --TaRiX oF tAjUn 18:53, 14 October 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tarix of Tajun (talk • contribs)

Yep: Georgina Weldon. She's an interesting character on whom we have nothing at present. -- Derek Ross | Talk 19:28, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

thanks. I'll look her up. TaRiX oF tAjUn 19:57, 14 October 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tarix of Tajun (talk • contribs)

Here are some more biographies that need to be written. Kaldari (talk) 14:43, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

WP:Requested articles is always in need of helpful users, and you can pick your topic. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 15:25, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Average editors stats

Do we have an idea of stats for an average editor of Wikipedia? How long has s/he been registered, how many edits s/he has made, and so on? PS. Since we know how many editors there are in this project, do we keep the track of the total number of edits? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 19:47, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

WP:Statistics should have (mostly) everything you want, although you may have to do some number crunching with the figures available to get the exact values you want. A lot of that is of varying degrees out of date, though, so watch out. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 02:55, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

Newspaper front page images

The Philadelphia Inquirer article has an image of the newspaper’s front page, with indications that this is a fair use. I am writing an article on the ‘’The Public Record’’ newspaper, published weekly in Philadelphia, and I am being challenged on Wikimedia Commons on the copyright issue.

How do I make use of this kind of image, in the same way that currently The Philadelphia Inquirer and The New York Times are now appearing on Wikipedia? --DThomsen8 (talk) 18:53, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

Both the Philly and NYTimes images are non-free images because they contain copyrighted photographs and other elements. (And because they are non-free, they can't be shown on talk pages, so I've edited their appearance above for that. Your image would also be non-free and wouldn't qualify on commons but can be uploaded to en.wiki with a non-free rationale and license. --MASEM (t) 19:12, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. The front page is up, and included in my sandbox article. --DThomsen8 (talk) 20:07, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

Atlantic books plagiarizing Wikipedia

Anybody know anything about Atlantic books[2]? One of their books[3] that I looked at on Google Books consists mostly of material copied from Wikipedia articles. Anyone know the dirt on them? Are they legit and just have poor editorial standards or is the whole operation a scam? Kaldari (talk) 20:54, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia is available for anyone to reprint. This is not a scam. --DThomsen8 (talk) 21:04, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure they must be breaking our licensing terms though (unlike previous "scams" which were totally legal), but I did only look at it briefly. I can find no mention of where it came from/attribution. In fact, they even appear to exercise copyright over it. But what would I know. - Jarry1250 ^{[ In the UK? Sign the petition! ]} 21:09, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

(ec)However they are not entitled to claim copyright on WP text as they appear to be doing. No doubt some of our articles will shortly be removed as copyvios, as has happened so often with mirror sites. Johnbod (talk) 21:10, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

They do not even attempt to meet our licensing conditions or credit Wikipedia. Moreover, they are claiming copyright over our work which is copyfraud, i.e. a scam. Kaldari (talk) 22:01, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

There are two immediate ideas:

1. Are there other books like the one given as an example? Can we please compile a list of such violations?
2. Can we contact the publisher?

{{Nihiltres|talk|edits}} 22:36, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous)/Archive 20#The Alphascript-Amazon-Wikipedia book hoax. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 22:56, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

A significant editor to one of the feminism articles could send them the Standard license violation letter and go from there. --Cybercobra (talk) 23:46, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

I've left a note on Mgoodyear's page as he wrote most of the History of feminism article which is plagiarized at the beginning of the book. According to another review on Google Books, the section on sex-positive feminism is also copied from Wikipedia word-for-word, although it seems to no longer be available in the online preview. Kaldari (talk) 14:41, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

As I've noted on the review page over at Google Books, the book in question heavily plagiarizes Wikipedia. The "Sex-Positive Feminism" section of that book is a complete cut-and-paste of the Wikipedia article (which I wrote some parts of). I would not be surprised if many other parts of the book are plagiarized as well. Iamcuriousblue (talk) 00:15, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

Someone should contact Wikimedia's lawyer, User:MGodwin about this. --Blargh29 (talk) 14:43, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

He can't really do anything, the Foundation doesn't have copyright, the individual editors do. --Cybercobra (talk) 17:45, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Mike knows about it. Kaldari (talk) 20:08, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Outside rewrites

While conducting an academic study of Wikipedia, I have come into the possession of a large number of rewrites of Wikipedia articles by outside experts, as well as the notation of a great number of errors, omissions, etc. I have no particular interest in acting on the basis of any of this material myself, so please do not invite me to edit, however charmingly. I would, however, like to know if anyone would be interested in having this information with the understanding that the sources involved would remain entirely anonymous. If you would be interested in seeing some of these expert reviews, please leave your email address and I will get in touch with you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 163.1.214.112 (talk) 14:27, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

"I have compiled lots of information but refuse to do anything useful with it and will make only a limited effort to help anybody else do something useful with it." ... Yeah, sounds like an academic, all right. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 14:40, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

"I have no interest in finding out what experts have to say about Wikipedia articles." ... Yeah, sounds like a Wikipedian all right. 163.1.214.112 (talk) 15:07, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Ouch ... touche! - DavidWBrooks (talk) 18:45, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

• What sort of subjects are covered? How many articles, & what format is the material in? Johnbod (talk) 15:15, 16 October 2009 (UTC)
• I'd be willing to give you my email address, but you'd have to give me yours first. 173.170.157.188 (talk) 17:49, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

I would be keenly interested in how academics or other experts have taken a surgical knife to the tumors within a set of Wikipedia articles. I'm not sure why personal e-mail addresses are necessary to enable the sharing process, though. Is there something that must be kept secret or private about these documents? If so, you surely know that e-mail is no guarantee of preserved privacy. I could give you my e-mail, then you send me the documents, then I post them on WikiLeaks, or myWikibiz, or Google Documents, and you're no better off than if you had just posted them yourself in the first place. In fact, why don't you post them somewhere safe, like Google Docs, then provide us with the link here? That would make more sense, unless you're up to something nefarious by trying to harvest e-mail addresses. -- Wandering Parsnip (talk) 02:43, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

I'd be interested, at least to the extent of seeing the set of topics that are included, in case any are in areas I would be interested in. Could you email me through Special:EmailUser/Mike Christie to let me know how to contact you? Thanks. Mike Christie (talk) 12:37, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

I would be happy to see this. Could you send it to apoc2400@gmail.com --Apoc2400 (talk) 22:10, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm interested to see whether this turns out to be a spam attempt of some sort or whether the person is indeed in possession of what they claim.Smallman12q (talk) 01:58, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Wouldn't these rewrites, without named rewriters, be copyright violations? Nobody could take these things and post them to Wikipedia claiming they were the author of the changes. And how would you identify just who was? 99.166.95.142 (talk) 16:33, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

New halloween template.

I created a Happy Halloween Template.

{{Template:Happy Halloween}}

Copy and past it to your user page. Have a safe halloween.--Zink Dawg -- 00:54, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

GFW and en.wp

Could anyone please confirm if the PRC govt tightened the GFW again? I'm now getting blockedfrom accessing en.wp(by blocked I mean deprived of access to the entire site, not WP:BLOCK.) for 5mins every time after I make my edit. Initially, I could get the edit i was trying to make done, and occasionally I could escape the block. But nowadays, most of the time I get blocked w/o actually getting the edit done. It's not the problem of my comp - I'm now on a public computer and the problem still persists, and I'm struggling w/ a loooong proxy list trying to get THIS edit done. I'd really appreciate it if anyone know a mean to get rid of this ridiculous censorship, such as a regular proxy(instead of the random ones I'm currently relying on)... And prolly even happier if told it is actually not the problem of GFW... :P Btw, could anyone else who can translates Japanese into English help me get the article Japan Airlines Flight 446 done? I'm changing my connection now and this issue is making me almost impossible to make any useful edit at all. Thx alot. Blodance (talk) 02:26, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

Adobe incontext editing

Recently, adobe unveiled "incontext editing". It'd be nice to see if wikipedia could allow for similar editing.Smallman12q (talk) 15:31, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

Three Audit Subcommittee vacancies: Urgent call for applications

The process to appoint the three non-arbitrator members of the Audit Subcommittee is underway. If you are suitably qualified, please see the election pages for the job specification and application arrangements. Applications close 22 October 2009.

For the Arbitration Committee,  Roger Davies ^talk 19:16, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

Search in new window

Not sure where the best place for this is but anyway. Have you ever wished that pages accessed through the mini search form in the sidebar could open in a new window/tab so you could keep the current page open? I've written User:Anakin101/search-new-window.js. It changes the mini search form behavior so that it opens in a new window (or tab, assuming your browser is set to prefer tabs) if you hold down ⇧ Shift, as you press enter/click.

To use it add this to your custom script file:

importScript('User:Anakin101/search-new-window.js');

(which will be, as always, dependent on the skin, monobook.js or modern.js or vector.js etc.) (Alternatively copy & paste the code directly (it's short) or put it in a Greasemonkey script.)

I tested it in IE6/Firefox/Opera but I'd be delighted if others could test it and give feedback. • Anakin ^(talk) 06:44, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Need help in fi-wikipedia

Hi! Do somebody have book "The Smithsonian Book of North American Mammals", ISBN 9781560988458. I need information of mustela erminea, I try that on featured article in fi-wikipedia. – EtäKärppä^{äl' yli päästä perhanaa} 09:54, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Try asking at Wikipedia:WikiProject Resource Exchange. Aiken ♫ 09:36, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Thanks you! – EtäKärppä^{äl' yli päästä perhanaa} 17:14, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia in other languages

Hello! I look for to a assign, who know, how was permit to the Wikimedia for exam. the Samgotian wikipedia, inasmuch as the Samogitian dialect have not ISO code. Doncsecz^znánje 15:32, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Per Meta:WM:LPP new projects should have an ISO-639 code. The Samogitian Wikipedia was created here before that rule was made. I think the code "bat-smg" was just made up ("bat" is ISO-639-5 for "Baltic"). Also see meta:Language code, which has a list of wikis without valid ISO-639 codes. I'm not sure how one would create a new wiki without a code, other than to get a code registered or to try inventing one. • Anakin ^(talk) 05:16, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Possiobly free images of Birmingham

Slides by Phyllis Nicklin of Birmingham in the 1960s are "available to download and redistribute for non-commercial purposes". Is there a project who batch-upload such stuff? Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 19:41, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

"For non-commercial purposes" means non-free. Phil Bridger (talk) 23:50, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

The typeface list collaboration

This collaboration is in need for people to help, this message is also posted in the wikiprojects Typography and Writing systems as well as in user namespace. Wikiproject talks may be inactive for medium-to-long periods, so it´s also advertised here to atract contributor´s help. Any suggestions are welcome.

Requesting editors' help There is currently an oppened collaboration which aims in improving articles related to typefaces and font categorization. If you´re interested in this subject, please visit the collaboration page, add your self and see how you can help.

- ☩Damërung ☩. -- 20:15, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

One would think that people interested in typography would also be interested in proper spelling. As well as readability. 99.166.95.142 (talk) 16:34, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Quotes of quotes

I have a history book that provides a brief biography of a certain viceroy and that may be useful for being used as a source to expand and check the article. But there's a point I'm a little confused. After providing the mere facts (did this, did that, was designated for this, died on such date, etc.) there's some analysis of the viceroy, but instead of analyzing himself the viceroy, the author quotes other historians and what do they said about him (in a style not unlike the one we would use ourselves here on wikipedia). It's clear who do the quotes belong to, but wich book should I cite? The original book of the cited author, wich I have never read, or the book I have read, where the cited author did not wrote anything, but is instead just being cited? MBelgrano (talk) 02:32, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Citing sources#Say where you found the material. PrimeHunter (talk) 02:36, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

How does one create a workgroup within a WikiProject?

I would like to create a workgroup on within the WikiProject:Pennsylvania that focuses on the politics and government of Pennsylvania. I have looked at Wikipedia:WikiProject Biography/Politics and government as a model for this possible workgroup, and I am wondering what it would take to create such a workgroup. Thank you,--Blargh29 (talk) 03:11, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

I believe you just find some people and do it. No official process is necessary. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 03:21, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Cool. What kind of coding would be required to get the fancy notifications (?) in the parent project's talkpage templates?--Blargh29 (talk) 03:30, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

It depends on how good with code you are - I suggest you just copy the template and modify it for your own needs. And give the original creator credit of course. Aiken ♫ 09:34, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Double linking of birth/death categories

Hello, I linked the birth and death categories on a number of articles at the top of the page like this because I thought this would be a more helpful location for these links rather than stuck somewhere at the bottom.

Nobody objected to this for several weeks until User:John removed them saying that they were duplicate links, and sent me a link to WP:OVERLINK as a reason. However when I looked at this it appeared to support what I had done: To quote.

Repeated links

In general, link only the first occurrence of an item. This is a rule of thumb that has many exceptions, including the following:

• where a later occurrence of an item is a long way from the first.
• where the first link was in an infobox or a navbox, or some similar meta-content.

This appears to apply to this case, so am I within the rules or not? Cabbawoo (talk) 11:17, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

It also says "Unless they are particularly relevant to the topic of the article, avoid linking terms whose meaning can be understood by most readers of the English Wikipedia, including plain English words, the names of major geographic features and locations, religions, languages, common professions, common units of measurement, and dates". Neither those categories, nor dates in general, are relevant to the topic at hand. I'd reckon that having those categories linked is extremely unlikely to be useful, and it's clearer without them. Also see WP:Linking#Chronological items and MOS:UNLINKDATES. • Anakin ^(talk) 12:21, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Another point, per WP:Piped link#Intuitiveness: it's non-obvious and possibly confusing if 17 January 1863 links to a list of people who were born in the same year. Not all browser viewing modes, web-capable devices, etc., will make it easy to see the title text or URL of the link to figure out where it goes. • Anakin ^(talk) 12:29, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Suffix: prefix:

I keep seeing new articles with " prefix:<valid page name>" at the end of their titles, for example: Roblox prefix:Talk:Main Page. Here is a list of some. They seem to have been created by different people. Is there some article creation wizard that leads people to do this? Not a serious problem just a puzzle that I would like answered. — [[::User:RHaworth|RHaworth]] (talk · contribs) 22:48, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

They come from archive search boxes like the one at the top of Talk:Main Page. Somebody makes a search with such a box and then clicks the red link in the search result message. A possible solution would be to change the search function so a prefix part is not included in the red link. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:23, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Indeed, from the top of this page. Many thanks. If they start arriving faster than one a day, I might report it as a bug. — [[::User:RHaworth|RHaworth]] (talk · contribs) 23:37, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

It is a bug. The search form oughtn't really to be including special parameters like prefix: in that link. • Anakin ^(talk) 17:41, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

I see the issue was brought up with no reply at MediaWiki talk:Searchmenu-new#Breakage with fulltext search. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:06, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Audit Subcommittee elections: Urgent! Final call for applications

Time is rapidly running out. The closing date for completed applications is 23:59 (UTC) 22 October 2009. If you are interested in becoming one of the three non-arbitrator members of the Audit Subcommittee, see the election pages now for the job specification and application details.

For the Arbitration Committee,  Roger Davies ^talk 17:39, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Active users

Is there some estimation on how many active users does Wikipedia have? "Active" means performing at least a minimal number of edits each day (or at least without very big gaps between edits, and with the last one being somewhat recent). It's not needed to be an exact number, an estimation for getting the idea would suffice MBelgrano (talk) 13:13, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Special:Statistics OrangeDog (τ • ε) 13:44, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

"Last 30 days" is hardly active though. Someone who corrects the occasionally typo every couple weeks isn't really 'active', certainly not what MBelgrano asked. There's probably no way of knowing the real answer though -- I'd be curious myself. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 14:17, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

The logic for trawling a database dump would be reasonably simple, though it would be incredibly slow. Alternatively, a site message reading "If you're an active editor then sign this page" should give a good estimate. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 14:29, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Google Maps window

Hello, I'd like to create a Google Maps window or API-like, like in http://routes.wikia.com (e.g. A36). Otherwise, I have to draw a map under Google Maps, hardlink it to the article, and nobody can contribute to modify it... Such a feature would be nice for wikipedia. I had a look at {{fr:KML}}, but it is rather limited (only points, not lines). Regards, Jack ma (talk) 13:55, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

You can't use Google Maps images in Wikipedia anyway, due to licensing issues. Powers ^T 15:20, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

however, Open Street Map would be appropriate. Aiken ♫ 09:31, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

WikiTrust to colorize Wikipedia

[4] - makes one wonder how they determine that an editor is reliable. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 20:04, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Per RTFA -- "It's a simple concept: The more often a person's contributions are thrown out, the less reliable they're likely to be."--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 20:11, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

So the person whose hoax article remained for ten months would be considered ultra-reliable. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 20:37, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Only if they don't contribute anything else that's overwritten before or during those 10 months. Basically you're talking about one in a million. The vast majority of vandals can't help themselves, so I don't think we have anything to worry about. On balance this will do far more good than harm. -- Derek Ross | Talk 04:54, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Suspicous

Does this seem suspicious to anyone? Would it be worth emailing that address to explain that I see no problem with the loading of the image, or is it likely to be a spam/phish attempt? OrangeDog (τ • ε) 15:31, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Likely an IP editor unfamiliar with the signature system. I would redact the email address off the talk page and respond there. For what its worth, I also have no problem loading the image. Livewireo (talk) 19:05, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I don't see anything particularly suspicious, but if you are worried then you can send a message from a disposable email address. Phil Bridger (talk) 19:11, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Geocaching

Has there been any discussion about random geocaching references being made to text as in Cleckheaton, please? I think these look a bit odd and out of place in an encyclopedia.--Harkey (talk) 21:12, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

They aren't at all appropriate. Someone has removed the references in that article already, and if you see it popping up anywhere else, you should feel free to remove it in an aggressive fashion :) Shereth 21:15, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Google is not the be-all and end-all of notability for an article

Currently we are placing way too much trust in Google to be the deciding factor in AfD discussions.. We come across an AfD on an unsourced article on a foreign subject we know absolutely nothing about. First thing we do is a quick Google search for any mentions in (mostly American) sources. And that's usually all that is done.. if nothing can be found we are most likely to !vote "Delete, cannot find any coverage, no hits on Google" The question I have is, can Google alone be counted on in all cases to be the definitive method to establish whether a subject is notable or not? What about really old references? subjects that have not been digitised? These sources cannot be found on Google, does this mean the article should be deleted for failing WP:V? What about foreign subjects in other languages? This ties in with Wikipedia:Systemic bias and Wikipedia:Arguments to avoid in deletion discussions#Subjective importance yet there's no mention in either of these pages that Google is what's behind it all. I think anyone who participates AfD needs to be educated about not relying primarily on Google to determine how they !vote. Except I don't know how else it can be done?? -- œ^™ 08:10, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

btw, although I don't necessarily disagree with the result, this afd was what influenced me to write the above: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Dr Prabhat Das Foundation. -- œ^™ 08:14, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

We could let, or better educate, the closing admin in the low usefulness factor instead. - Jarry1250 ^{[ In the UK? Sign the petition! ]} 08:41, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

There may be such sources, or may not. If there are, they should be provided. If no sources are mentioned, and google does not provide any, we can suspect the subject is not notable and act that way; wich does not mean a definitive statement about the subject not being notable. If the user requests a restore bringing the needed bibliography that failed to provide before, or a new user writes the article again citing such sources, then the article can be kept regardless of the previous AFD. MBelgrano (talk) 12:55, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

So let's say the user brings it to DRV, this time citing a multitude of reliable-looking offline sources, book, journals, etc. The editors commenting on it will still doubt the authenticity of the sources because 'they can't be found with Google' and will again !vote delete as failing WP:V or failing WP:N because 'if it's not online then it must not be notable'. Again they rely too much on Google alone, whether it be the closing admin or the participating editors. I'm sure there are other resources on that internet that can be used besides just Google but it seems no one bothers to look anywhere else. Maybe it's just my lack of faith in the resourcefulness of Wikipedia's editors that could use an adjustment. -- œ^™ 00:52, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

If you have a bunch of offline lines 1) add them to the article to assert notability but more importantly 2) people, particularly closing admins, need to AGF that you aren't lying about those sources that they actually exist and say what you think they say. In most cases, even if the work is not available easily, it can be proven to exist and then the step of AGF can be used. If there are editors flatly denying sources that aren't online, they are very mistaken and need to be told that we do not require online sources.

Also, remember that google exists in other languages, (eg, [5] [6], etc.) and I do believe IIRC that google gives more weight to sources in the native languages on those pages. --MASEM (t) 01:11, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

New master sockpuppet template

Hello. With the proliferation of various flavors of sockpuppet and sockpuppeteer templates, I have worked on consolidating. When it came to {{Sockpuppeteer}}, there were no inherent contradictions between parameter naming and usage between the variations, and I was able to adjust the existing template to be both backwards compatible and pretty much totally inclusive. However, when it came to {{sockpuppet}}, that was not the case. I worked on a new template, which can be found at User:Avraham/Sandbox/SPOM with many (but not all) permutations of its usage. However, this would call for a re-mapping of existing parameters. The mapping can be found at WT:SPI#Single sockpuppet template. While it is not complete, it should cover >99.9% of the 49K+ instances of the templates. We have discussed this many times at WT:SPI (see Wikipedia talk:Sockpuppet investigations/Archives/Archive4#First stab at combined sockpuppet template, Wikipedia talk:Sockpuppet investigations/Archives/Archive5#New combined sockpuppet template, and Wikipedia talk:Sockpuppet investigations/Archives/Archive6#Are we giving up on the combined sockpuppet template? for examples. Recently, the issue arose again at WT:SPI#Sock template cleanup. At this point, we would like some more input whether or not there would be any serious opposition to a bot-driven replacement and re-mapping of the templates, that would break most of them while the process is in progress. Thank you. -- Avi (talk) 16:58, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

pleas punish WikiProject Russia

i left them messages but they ignore them and do not reply. They are also lazy and do not assess their pages i mean i found five with no effort which were not tagged at all and they have thousands unassessed. Pleas notify the local authorities and tell them that that Wikiproject's "members" are not improving this encyclopaedia and their project is a failure if they don't get cracking asap!--anonimous