User talk:Michael Snow
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May I ask
Why you so willingly allowed ytourself to be decieved by Acharya S and her followers?
Look, Im not a stalker, Im not actign out of lien here, Im just a reporter who did an article on this lady.
I got all but the sons kidnappign form legal background searches needed for my article. Her son's informaiton I got from her own website. ( SHe posted the newslink in a bid for sympathy, then cliamed I got my informaitonabout her son from her ex lover...)
Her follwoers want to silence me. This is due to the fact that I oppose their agenda of makign the artilce a lgowong praise of thier hero. Rather, I want a real, neutral article that roesents facts. ( This they claim makes it s "Hit Peice" and I am out to slander her, but no actual slander exists in the article.)
Now, pleas see through the Nonsence.
Her follwoers will compaln abotu anyone who doesnt agree with them, and ocus on me. This doesnt make whatthey say bare substance.I am also not "Zarove03". Nor do I have a problem with peopel who disagree with me. ( Heck thats more lik the Acharyans...)
I even tried to avoid my personal beleifs for this artilce till James draggedthign sinto it.
And still avid my personal belifs.
Her follwoers often post personal attacks on me.
ZAROVE 04:53, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
New Wikipedia Statistics
I've had the opportunity to run some scripts on the December 13, 2005 database dump recently, and I've created some charts that I think others may be interested in. Is there some process for vetting charts before they appear on Wikipedia:Statistics? I'm asking you because you seem to be the one most closely following that page. The charts are at User:Dantheox/Stub percentages. Thanks! --Dantheox 06:35, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
- Thanks for the feedback -- I've added a link in the "Analysis" section, and I've mentioned the charts on the stub sorting project's talk page. --Dantheox 06:55, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
Signpost
Can you please help with Wikipedia Signpost/2006-03-06/Millionth article? I was jotting links and notes down as I was surfing the wave of excitement on the wiki last night, but the article isn't greatly cohesive as yet -- I'd welcome a touch of your elegant prose. Thanks! — Catherine\talk 22:08, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
legal threats
I'm sure this is hot air, but - you'd know who to contact about editors making legal threats against the foundation. [1] SchmuckyTheCat 22:10, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
-Ril-
-Ril- (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has emailed me protesting innocence. I am not about to start a wheel war, but this [2] appears to indicate that ArbCom have rejected the CheeseDreams allegation. Also posted at WP:ANI. Cheers, Just zis Guy you know? 23:33, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for your support
Thank you for supporting me in my request for adminship! It ended with a tally of 39/5/4, and I am now an admin. I'm glad to have earned the trust of the community, and I will make use of it responsibly. Of course, you can let me know of any comments or concerns you have.
Thank you, in particular, for the very eloquent defense against editcountitis in your comment. I believe that such a well-reasoned opinion by a respected Wikipedian helped put some sanity back in my RfA, and I truly appreciate it.
With a million articles in front of me, I'd better get mopping.
rspeer / ɹəədsɹ 05:11, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Hello,
An Arbitration case involving you has been opened: Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/ZAROVE. Please add evidence to the evidence sub-page, Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/ZAROVE/Evidence. You may also contribute to the case on the workshop sub-page, Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/ZAROVE/Workshop.
On behalf of the Arbitration Committee, --Tony Sidaway 00:41, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
When is an artwork published?
Michael, could you maybe comment on Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Fair_use#Art? Is an artwork (a painting) created before 1923 in the public domain in the U.S.? Lupo 13:37, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
- Thanks for the answer. That's what I'd already gathered, including the bit about the former legal situation in the U.S. All right, could you either tell me where to find information about the historical situation, or give me an overview yourself? (On the topic of copyright on artworks only!) I'll then draw my own conclusions to figure out whether we have to apply the "70 years p.m.a" to all paintings, or whether there is some cut-off date such that works created before it would be PD. Lupo 07:33, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
- I have meanwhile found the U.S. Copyright Act from 1909 (as amended); Ch. 1, sec. 5 clearly shows that it was intended to cover artworks if they were registered, and Ch. 1, sec. 2 seems to grant a copyright (for how long? perpetual? lifetime of author?) without registration on unpublished works. But I haven't found yet anything that would define what would constitute "publication" of an artwork. Since we have quite a number of digital images of paintings, I think we Wikipedians really need to know (or at least to have a reasonably correct idea of) which artworks are indeed in the public domain. So far, I have not found anything that would support the "created pre-1923" rule that apparently some people use. Nothing indicates so far that for artworks, "creation" equated "publication", and I would be very surprised if that were indeed true. I rather think we just have to treat them as unpublished works, and hence "70 years p.m.a." must be applied (assuming the painter is known, but that would be the case for most such images on Wikipedia). Thus only paintings of artists who died before 1936 would be in the public domain as of this writing. Do you think that would be a too strict interpretation? Do you know of any work of an artist who died later that is known to be in the public domain? (Side note: my reading of the 1909 Copyright Act raises another question: what if an artist did register a copyright on a painting? Was that equivalent to "publication", as the copyright would then run only for a fixed term starting at that date of registration?) Lupo 16:29, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
- In fact, I wonder... the 70 years were introduced only in 1998 by the CTEA; before it was "50 years p.m.a."... Hence, paintings where the author died before 1948 would be in the public domain, since the CTEA was not retroactive. Does that sound right? And of course, that applies only to paintings by U.S. artists. For artists of other nationalities, we'll have to apply 70y p.m.a. as the general rule. (e.g. EU copyright term, revived under TRIPS in the U.S. if still in copyright in the EU on Jan 1, 1996, and since the CTEA same copyright term in the U.S., too.) Lupo 19:53, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
I think we agree. I think I understand the difficulties of giving "legal advice", whence my comment above that I'd draw my own conclusions :-) I'm grateful, though, if someone helps me understand all this mess called "copyright law". On the 1909 act: yup, I found out after I'd posted the above that sec. 2 places unpublished works under state law (still the case today with pre-1972 sound recordings, to which you also alluded).
You wrote: "being on Wikipedia suggests that it probably has been published in some sense at some point". That again begs the question of what publication is in the case of artworks. As it appears that we can't answer that question (does the sale of art prints count? reproduction in an art book? publication of an image of the artwork?), I believe we will actually have to tread carefully and must consider such works unpublished. (Which at least is consistent with what we do know, namely the statements of the law and the U.S. Copyright Office as to what doesn't constitute publication, and also the comment you made regarding "no copies → no publication".)
I fully agree with your statement that "So it may be that Wikipedia's culture and public image, which needs to be that of a good project with respect for copyrights, has comparable importance to the challenge of figuring out the technicalities." Yes, Wikipedia should be "clean". Which to me means that we have to figure out the legal technicalities at least to the point where we can formulate some rules. Our rules should err on the side of caution: better to consider copyrighted some works that actually are out of copyright than vice versa. At the same time, the rules should not be gratuitously cautious. I also think we do need "hard and fast" rules: Wikipedians need guidelines they can turn to, both uploaders and the people patrolling uploads need to have a reasonable idea of what is considered allowed and what not. The Foundation's lawyers keep silent on such issues (at least, I'm not aware of any effort of theirs to institute any such rules), and so I attempt to figure this out as good as I can. I have turned to the Foundation's lawyers in one case ({{PD-USSR}}, which is wrong. Still no resolution, though. It's a slow-going process, but I guess a few months more won't matter much.), and maybe I'll have to ask them about this case, too.
It's not just a purely intellectual exercise for me, although I also enjoy learning new things. But I've come across several cases where I think wrong PD claims were made for paintings, and at the very least I should understand the issue well enough to decide whether or not I should take action and take those images down. (It's not just Andrew Wyeth. Georgia O'Keeffe is another case; c.f. commons:Category:Georgia O'Keeffe. Just take e.g. Maple Cedar, painted 1922: I don't think this is PD. O'Keeffe died in 1986!) Lupo 09:13, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
- Found a pretty good discussion from some art dealer here. Highlights a special case... and appears to show that printing an image in an exhibition catalog and then distributing this catalog is one method that does constitute publication of the artwork. Incidentally, it confirms my (our?) suspicion that (U.S.) paintings basically are unpublished works and thus fall under these rules—which, as the one case discussed shows, may in some pathological cases even mean that pre-1923 works are still copyrighted until 2047! (Of course, as a gallerist, the author would highlight such a case instead of writing about a 1922 painting that indeed were in the public domain... but it's still illustrative.) Maybe it's time to ask the U.S. Copyright Office directly what would constitute publication for an artwork? Lupo 11:35, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
Summary and further discussion (if you're interested) at Wikipedia talk:Public domain#Artwork. Lupo 08:59, 7 March 2006 (UTC)
WP in the news
Business section of today's P-I, "Wetpaint wants wikis to bring new life to group Web sites" or online at: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/261798_wetpaint06.html —WAvegetarian•CONTRIBUTIONSTALK• EMAIL• 13:46, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
Zarove Arbitration
Hi, I'm working on an evidence entry, and have a couple questions.
- How much time do I have to add evidence? How long do these things normally take?
- Is it acceptable and/or advisable to mention Zaroves history on other websites?
- Zarove has made numerous claims about himself, some self-aggrandizing and conflicting, and some just plain disturbing. Would it be at all useful to bring any of this up?
Also, FYI, I recently posted an extensive list of evidence on my user page.
^^James^^ 01:38, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
Most of the evidence is nohtign more than you sayin g"Zarove/cook said Acharya is so-and-so, shes not." Most pf the "Other website" informaiton will coem form internet stalkers I aquird and will be one sides. Im respectred on several sites, but about 4 or 5 years ago I aquired net stalekrs hwo , basiclaly, went form wensite to website to attakc me. But, they trash me so their valid.If I did the same thing with Dorothy, you woidl say its a smear campaign. Yet you do them to me? Oh, this sint a smear, its the truth...right...
Most pf yor "Extensive evidence" is not relevant to the case. It has nohtign to do with my "Disturbing" claism such as " I was a reproter" and " I wrote an artocle on her".
Likewise, my slf-agrandising is limited to actual rel;vant information.
Why not just admit it, your here to smear me, like a hypocritce, whiel claimign I smear her. I dont smear her, she, and you, go out of yor way to make sure everyone gets a bad imrpesison abu me to silnce me whole creatign a fluff aritcle for your mistress.
ZAROVE 20:18, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
Mr. Snow, why do you continue to allow this person Zarove to manipulate this page and to post personal attacks on the subject? The Wiki admins have stated that no personal attacks are to be allowed, but Zarove continues to make numerous such attacks on the subject, including some really nasty and vicious comments. Many of these vicious comments can be found here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:%5E%5EJames%5E%5E/evidence
Why is this being allowed when others are being banned for doing likewise to Zarove? There is quite a bias being displayed here, and it would seem that the Wikipedia organization is incapable of doing anything about it.
Holy crap! You wrote that from scratch? Very nice save, indeed. Good work! --Calton | Talk 06:56, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
Wikipedia/Wikimedia template
Hi Michael. I noticed you've been tagged as head of the Communications Committee. I was wondering, do we have a Wikimedia or Wikipedia template for Powerpoint slides? I'm giving a talk on Wikipedia for a class my friend is teaching, and would love to use something along those lines if it exists. If there isn't one already, we should consider making one, preferably based on the look and feel of the Wikipedia and Wikimedia websites. Isomorphic 06:01, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
- No worries. Your talk page tells the story... Isomorphic 04:45, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
Arbitration
The "Evidence" agaisnt me is generlaly a lengthy set of talk page uotes they disagre with.( Was it rlelay a violation fo her privact when I called her a Conspriacy theorist? Of ocruse it shows Im obsessed with her, right?)
Ive noticed Arbitration is slow. I hope you have noticed that the DIsiples of Acharya S ( I know, further proof Im obsessed) will distort anyhtign to make me look like a frothign lunatuc out to do her mentla and bodily harm that shou be banned so they can manipualte the artilce.
They are using standard Bully tactics.
I must be made ot be the villain and Dorothy Murdock the villain.
Most fo their rebutal is "Acharya is not a consoriacy theoristy." Well, she is. THey use DIctionary deifnitions to prove shes a Linguist and Hisotyran, and by dicitonary deifniton shes a COnsoriacy theorist as she advcates a COnspiracy theory. ( And published two boosk through a copnspiracy press to advocate the cpnspiracy.) Indeed, she makes a living off Conspriacy theory.
You see, this sint abotu me brakign the law or violatign her privacy or her safety. No matter hwat she says, its abotu makign me look liek a terible person, gettign me banned, then contorlign the Wikipedia content.
Of coruse to ehar her this will be diffrent, btu pelase look over the "Evidnce" againt me. Several pages of "Damning" proof only hsow me to present her in a manner they dislike.
Ive dropped the arile Ive written ( Eys they got hreir way, yay...) but tthis only enheartened them to attakc any of her other cirtics and elevated me as a vilalin tot he porin pof threats otban me from Wikieodia. This si why I push so har dint he aritlce ot begin with. They ar eonly here to "Defend Acharya", not to present anyhtign remotely close to facts.
ZAROVE 16:40, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
Reputable sources?
What would you consider reputable sources? I added a section to Jack Thompson (attorney), fully referenced (the Florida Bar investigations), and you reverted it. Why? Or were you just reverting the other edits that were made following my addition? Jabrwock 17:13, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
I would argue that by restricting your sources to mainstream print media only, you are biased against on-line only news sources. I can understand not wanting entries from blogs such as GamePolitics (even though the writer *is* a freelance print-media journalist for the Phili Inquirer and other print-media), but GameSpot or AMN are hardly "sub-par" news sources, especially if all they're doing is quoting/reprinting Thompson's own press releases. CNN is never going to reprint "A Modest Video Game Proposal" because it's childish. Does that mean Thompson never did it? Of course not, he sent a copy to every gaming website out there. So why shouldn't it be referenced? He was even interviewed about it on a podcast.
Personally I think you are setting your bar a little too high. Skepticism about reference authenticity is one thing. Dismissing an entire set of references because they are not "mainstream media or better" is using a sledgehammer to filter out the bad nails in a bunch. Mainstream media is not as reliable as you make them out to be. Jabrwock 17:28, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
So how do I reference his "Modest Proposal", which was emailed to and reprinted by many gaming sites. He was even interviewed about it by several others. How many sources quoting his proposal do I need before you consider it "credible"? I think if 2-3 news sites reprint the exact same press release, and several others interview him about it, you would think at that point it would be safe to assume that he actually wrote it. Jabrwock 17:49, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
I agree that "A Modest Proposal" deserves it's own article. The problem is that the linked articles keep getting labelled as "fancruft" and added to AFD. AFD discussions usually dance around the idea of merging the proposal and other articles back into the main one. Which gets us back to our original problem, how to keep the basic page clean, yet covering more than just the legal activities that got covered by sites like CNN & 60 Minutes. Jabrwock 18:14, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
Jack Thompson
I noticed you reverted my changes to the Jack Thompson article, as being unverifyable.
http://www.stanford.edu/group/WLHP/papers/reno.pdf is not verifyable? It comes off of Stanford's website, and is part of the Woman's Legal History Biography Project, both of which are extremely respected sources. The source THEY cite is:
Chuck Philips, The ‘Batman’ who Took on Rap; Obscenity: Lawyer Jack Thompson put his Practice on Hold to Concentrate on Driving 2 Live Crew out of Business In Southern Florida, He is Loved and Loathed, LOS ANGELES TIMES, June 18, 1990, at F1.
Which I am having trouble creating a hyperlink to. =/
Edit: Sorry, I forgot to sign my edit. In addition, I noticed the Chuck Philips article was already used as a reference. Figuring out how to re-cite it now. KiTA 19:02, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
- Same article: you chave been reported for 3RR on this. Are you claiming WP:OFFICE priv for doing your reverts? If so, why isn't that indicated? If not, why shouldn't you be blocked? William M. Connolley 23:18, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
ABA Journal
You should see this hilarious picture in the article of him sitting next to his TV with a remote control, recording the show. He looks so serious, and I love the caption: "Jack Thompson records "The Neil Rogers Show" on video cassettes in order to log all references to him on the show." I couldn't believe it. --Maxamegalon2000 04:53, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
- Both of the stories I got the information from are abstracts; the Miami Herald doesn't release full articles to LexisNexis, so that's all I have. The article uses the terminology "plead guilty", though I think you're right about the correct usage. --Maxamegalon2000 00:40, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
Hitler
Hi there my friend, since you seem to be very good with pov. can you please fix these npov paragraphs on hitler
"Despite this there have been instances of public figures referring to his legacy in neutral or even favourable terms, particularly in South America, the Islamic World and parts of Asia. Future Egyptian President Anwar Sadat wrote favourably of Hitler in 1953. Bal Thackeray, leader of the right-wing Shiv Sena party in the Indian state of the Maharashtra, declared in 1995 that he was an admirer of Hitler.
The "despite this" is adding in a pov making it seem as if you can't have the two together, obviously again the writers opinon. putting the "even favorable" line is 100 percent pov, it implies that it is amazing that someone could like Hitler.
"While some Revisionist historians note Hitler's attempts to improve the economic and political standing and conditions of his people and claim his tactics were in essence no different from those of many other leaders in history, his methods and legacy, as interpreted by most historians, have caused him to be one of the most despised leaders in history."
According to who has his legacy caused him to be one of the most despised leaders in history, we either need a source or remove it, the writers opinon doesn't count as a source.
Thanks mike! 203.112.2.212 20:07, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
Thompson
Why do you keep reverting my edits to the Jack Thompson article? Father Time89
OK please tell me how the source is unreliable it is from a page posted by a mod concerning why the Jack Thompson paged was blanked, it is akin to an official statement regarding the matter, are you saying that wiki is an unreliable encyclopedia, or that the Jack Thompson article was Office protected for reasons other than what was said in the talk page? Father Time89
Can you Archive the talk pages again? Or post how to do it? I know they are 2 days long but most of it is bitching and its getting kinda long.--Tollwutig 02:29, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
The opera corpus
Hi. I have reverted the Opera Corpus and would like to explain why. The idea of doing this list was to try to define the basic 'corpus' hence the title rather than just 'A list of operas . . . ' of which there are others.
If you have some suggestions which you would like to share, I'd be pleased if you could make them on the Talk page of the article. I am sure improvements can be made but we should discuss them first.
Regards. Kleinzach 01:13, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
- I take your point about using sentence style lower case in the title and have changed it.
- Please note: Opera is a unique, international field. Those working on the Opera Project are all people with special knowledge of opera and the languages in which they are written. The opera corpus page represents a large amount of successful work. During past months a large number of red links have been turned blue. Out of 370 composers listed, 360 now have entries.
- Please respect the effort that is going into the project. If you are interested in the work being done then by all means read the material - in full - and make friendly, constructive suggestions. That way everybody will appreciate your contributions. If you are not interested in opera, then there are lots of other areas that merit your attention. Regards
Moving opera title articles
I see you have also been moving at least one opera title article. Please don't do this without doing proper research. Many opera subjects have been set by more than one composers. In some cases, there may be a dozen or more treatments under the same name, hence the name of the composer in parentheses after the title.
Kleinzach 14:48, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
Hi Michael, I've got a question for you. I remember that you opposed Celine Dion's FAC because of over-reliance on AMG. Was that due to a lack of diversity in the sources, or the quality of AMG itself, or both? I've objected to the latest music FAC (Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Rush (band)) because I don't consider AMG particularly reliable, but I don't have good data suggesting that it isn't. What do you think? —Spangineer[es] (háblame) 12:30, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
Deletion
I was just wondering why you deleted the page List of Roger Ebert's Great Movies. The deletion log mentions something about copyright issues? Estrose 20:54, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
Deleted image of Officer McCoy
I appreciate the explanation, it does confirm what other Wikipedians who worked on the Charles Whitman article whispered, that John Moore, who has been banned from Wikipedia as "User:subwayjack" 8 times for vandalising the article to very strong bordering-on-propaganda limits, as well as personal attacks, threatening lawsuits and disrupting WP to make a point. This really is just one more example of that, I sense. In my understanding of copyright, fair use, and "etcetera", it is not in McCoy's right to deny the use of a 40-year old image of himself that has been published by newspapers, and is held in the Austin Historical Archive. A similar case I remember was John Stockwell's request for us to delete his article, which seemed to summarise quite well that I'm afraid it isn't relevant whether someone wants to be in Wikipedia or not, only whether they should be. and the subject's desire to be documented is (thankfully) irrelevant. Just to give you a touch of background Sherurcij (talk) (Terrorist Wikiproject) 06:44, 31 March 2006 (UTC)