Earl Andrew, What's an "en dash? I thought it was em dashes or hyphens. I would say em dashes look nicer, but most people don't use them, so I'd favour em dashes with a redirect using a hyphen for each electoral district.--Doug MehusT·C15:57, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Earl Andrew, So, there's something in between a hyphen and an em dash? Talk about splitting CHs...Yeah, I'd definitely favour em dashes over en dashes, but still believe redirects should, or could, be created (where demand is there) using hyphens. Redirects using en dashes are unlikely typos, so probably not necessary.--Doug MehusT·C16:47, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Incorrect popular vote figures in articles on 2011 and 2015 federal elections
Recently I noticed that the vote counts by party were incorrect in our articles on the 2011 and 2015 federal elections: [1][2]. At least, Wikipedia's figures differ from those on the Elections Canada website; I assume that Elections Canada is correct and we are wrong. Probably what happened is, Wikipedia has been displaying the "preliminary" vote counts all this time, which of course have all sorts of errors, as opposed to the "validated" or "final" vote counts. It is easy enough to correct the infoboxes and charts in 2011 Canadian federal election and 2015 Canadian federal election. But let me suggest that we do a coordinated, systematic check to make sure that these "preliminary" figures do not appear in other articles, such as the article on each electoral district with vote counts for each election. Also I have no idea whether this type of error (leaving "preliminary" vote counts in an article after the final vote counts are available) also occurs in our articles on provincial/territorial elections, municipal elections, by-elections, and so forth. People rely on Wikipedia for accurate data; how can we make sure this error never recurs? Mathew5000 (talk) 00:41, 4 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
The problem, ultimately, is that people rush to fill in the article with the preliminary figures right away, but then there isn't always a thorough or sustained effort to actually update it with the final numbers once the novelty of the election has worn off. Ideally, what we really should do is institute a rule that we don't add any numbers at all until we have the final validated results from the election agency — but this would be very hard to enforce, because new editors will still swarm the article to add the preliminary numbers if they don't know or understand what the rule is or why. There are lots of things that amateurs mess up on here, creating more work for us to fix, because they don't understand things correctly — like the difference between municipal population and "population centre" population; the fact that the winner of the election does not instantly become the new incumbent prime minister or premier, but is still only a designate for at least another couple of weeks; the fact that PC after a politician's name means they're a cabinet minister, not a Progressive Conservative; and on and so forth. So the preferred solution would be to just hold off until we have the final numbers before we actually start adding any numbers to our articles at all — but how to actually enforce that effectively is a harder problem to solve. Bearcat (talk) 18:09, 4 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
(Raises hand) - I've been spending time adding preliminary data to Federal ridings in Ontario. I find even prelim. results are better than a blank table. I think the most salient point you make, Bearcat, is that "there isn't always a thorough or sustained effort to actually update [them] with the final numbers...." It would be a good challenge for a task force of some kind.......PKT(alk)19:03, 4 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Would it be feasible to create a "preliminary results" tag when election tables are being updated with non final results? This would also be helpful in other election-based articles as well. Grognard Extraordinaire Chess(talk) Ping when replying 01:17, 18 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@PKT: It would probably be helpful then to make a hidden category of "election pages tagged with preliminary results". Unfortunately I'm unable to do that due to unfamiliarity with template syntax. Grognard Extraordinaire Chess(talk) Ping when replying 20:22, 19 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Do you have a reliable source to verify the information? I've done a quick search and could not find any evidence that a Samuel Earl Lackey was ever mayor of Orangeville. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 19:58, 12 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Toronto Daily Star, Thurs. Feb. 10, 1966, page 2. Article from CP refers to "Mayor Samuel Lackey of Orangeville" attending a meeting of officials from 35 Western Ontario munipalities. A family business that he founded has its website here but doesn't mention his time as mayor of Orangeville. Mathew5000 (talk) 04:39, 14 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I just checked that source. So I can attest that it certainly says he was mayor in 1966, but it still fails to verify who was the mayor for the rest of the six year "unknown" period. Bearcat (talk) 17:52, 16 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Inconsistency around listing senatorial office
I've long noticed there were inconsistencies with how senators are listed in their infobox, but not until I started poking around in various senate and senator pages did I realize just how vast and widespread this problem is. The office is variously "Senator", "Canadian Senator" or sometimes "Member of the Senate of Canada"; some senators are "for" a province, while other senators are "from" a province; and their constituency (as it were) is variously Division, Province or Province (Division) or just Division (or Division senate division)… sometimes it's even left out entirely. In short, literally every part of a sentence as simple as, say, "Senator for Quebec (Gulf)" will vary between pages. It's a huge mess.
I checked to see if a specific form had been established by guideline or consensus, but didn't see anything (not that I really expected to). I think, given the state of this, we ought to decide upon this right now and start getting these pages in order.
I don't have any strong opinions on whether it should be Senator, Canadian Senator or Member of the Senate of Canada, nor on "for" or "from"; but I do have opinions on how constituencies. My view is that it should be standardized as "Province (Division)". This is how the website of the Senate renders senatorial divisions, and the listing of province first is also how various lists on Wikipedia do it. The other official source, PARLINFO, uses only the division (for example), but from my POV that construction does not give enough information at a glance, which is what an infobox is for. Meanwhile, despite being so common on Wikipedia, "Division, Province" doesn't appear in official sources at all, so we should probably move away from it.
@Mathew5000:, I went looking for an answer and came away even more confused. The Senate's website's big list has "designations", but then their bios frequently talk of "divisions" (eg: for Joseph Day's official bio: Senator Day represents the province of New Brunswick and the Senatorial Division of Saint John-Kennebecasis.) Meanwhile, PARLINFO has "senatorial division" when searching through its database, but then "senatorial region" on individual pages! So I guess inconsistent terminology is just inherent to the Senate, and isn't just Wikipedia's problem.
So I'm not 100% sure that "division" is the proper terminology in any context, just that it seems to be the most commonplace and accepted (it appears throughout Hansard and dovetails nicely with the actually-definitely-correct use the Senate having four regional divisions). For self-designated senators specifically, I don't know if there's proper terminology since it's kind of unofficial to begin with, but judging from Day's bio above it seems to be accepted usage. I certainly think it's best to stick with "division" for all members, unless there's strong evidence to say otherwise. — Kawnhr (talk) 06:25, 18 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I don't recall that there's ever been any discussion around standardizing the "consensus" format for a senator's infobox. Even for MPs, there's actually a lot more divergence than you would think — different people do different things according to their own personal preferences; some MP articles were created a long time ago before infoboxes became a thing at all, and have never actually had infoboxes added at all; and on and so forth. So even if there is a consensus to come up with a "standard" format for them, that's only half the battle — a project of actually applying the standard to senators' articles would still have to be undertaken. But on the basic question of whether there's ever been a formal consensus established in the first place, I don't believe there has. Bearcat (talk) 20:41, 18 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I've noticed a bit of inconsistency for MPs, too, but nowhere near as major… the big divide seems to be on whether the riding name should be in the office itself (eg "Member of Parliament for Toronto—York"), or if it should be in a separate constituency= field. Wouldn't be a bad thing to establish a standard format there, either, IMO. — Kawnhr (talk) 04:06, 21 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
OK I spent way too much time looking into this and here's what I found:
Senators from Australia, Ireland, France, Brazil, Chile, Nigeria and Mexico are keen to just use "Senator" without specifying national origin. The US specifies "United States Senator", and that may be to avoid confusion with the office of State Senator. (There are some that do list national origin, like Argentina, but they are rare.)
For seems more common than from, again with the major outlier being the United States. I also lean towards "for" because it's consistent with MPs being for a riding, and because it better reflects the common official language of a Senator "representing" a province.
As said before, the "Province (Division)" construction is official use. PKT also makes a good point that it's better for sorting and consistency for senators that do not have divisions.
In short, I propose using "Senator for Quebec (Gulf)".
Just to be clear, I'm not expecting everyone to make this a priority and rush off to edit literal hundreds of articles over what is, all things considered, a fairly minor thing. The impetous for this was me poking around on articles for senators, noticing the inconsistency and being annoyed by it, but also not wanting to unilaterally impose my own style guide. My hope is just to establish a consensus, edit something if I come across it and for others do the same. — Kawnhr (talk) 17:55, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Kawnhr, I haven't read everything here, but as I understand it, only Quebec has official Senatorial divisions. I don't think we need to say the senatorial division in their title; rather, we can note the division as a separate line item for their office in their infobox. Outside of Quebec, much of Ontario and the atlantic provinces, the senatorial divisions have been dissolved. For instance since Senator Nancy Greene Raine was forced into mandatory retirement, her replacement Senator Yuen Pau Woo, of Vancouver, has just been a senator for British Columbia. So, he is probably the closest thing to a Senator from the Thompson-Okanagan/Similkameen region. That said, Senators don't have constituency office responsibilities; they represent the residents of each province in the Senate of Canada.
So, I guess my !vote would be, in terms of stylization of titles and office names, Senator from Province, and then in the infobox, mention their senatorial division.
Dmehus,Kawnhr, I would agree with Doug here, since each Senator (besides QC ones) kind of do their own thing. One thing though, I would add Canadian. So, we should probably do 'Canadian Senator for Province', since it's the normal way and the most important thing. As for the division, I guess we put the division in the infobox, due to the fact that it may not be present at times. I'm basing myself on Senator Day's page since it's probably the one I've seen the most (I modified the infobox when the PSG was formed). - MikkelJSmith (talk) 13:14, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
MikkelJSmith2, Where would you add Canadian? I don't think that's necessary since the senatorial office is context-specific. It should be evident by the province they're representing, no? In the case of the U.S., U.S. Senators are commonly styled as that (i.e., U.S. Senate) whereas in Canada, you don't see Senators referred to as Senate of Canada Senator John Smith. ;-)
Dmehus: So, I guess my !vote would be, in terms of stylization of titles and office names, Senator from Province, and then in the infobox, mention their senatorial division. Right, yeah, I'm mostly concerned with the infobox; how it gets mentioned in the prose has a lot more leeway and I'm not concerned about setting a guideline there… basically anything works there so long as it conveys the correct information.
And yeah, I know that divisions outside of Quebec are self-described and mean nothing— as you say, Nancy Greene's de facto successor was not from the Interior— but they are official enough to be tracked by the Senate, which I think makes them worth chronicling. — Kawnhr (talk) 05:14, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
It's correct that Quebec is the only Canadian province that has senatorial divisions enshrined in law. In all other provinces, a senator is constitutionally appointed to serve the province, not a division — although senators do have the option of self-designating themselves as the senator for a particular "division", that designation exists only on paper, has no formal standing in law, and does not have any independent existence that outlasts the person's term the way an MP's "riding" does. So our practice on here has always been to denote senators as serving the province rather than a "division", since legally and constitutionally that's what they do — we'll note the self-designated division if the senator uses one, but we don't reify it into their official title. Bearcat (talk) 16:49, 9 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Alberta has long provided names for its senators. I don't know if it's a legal requirement, nor do I think they're elected. Also, in both cases, the PM is not required to accept the recommendations. Walter Görlitz (talk) 17:33, 9 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
GoodDay, my apologies for the reverts and lack of discussion. As for an explanation, I personally prefer the “infobox sports season” template to the “infobox league season” one currently used on CFL pages. “Sports season” is well maintained as it is used by the NHL, NBA, and MLB season pages, plus it contains useful parameters such as average attendance and regular season leaders. If your only concern is consistency with the other CFL seasons, I am happy to start converting the other CFL year pages. If you have other concerns, we can continue to discuss them here or elsewhere. BLAIXX16:43, 21 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Unfortunately I can't promise implementing the infobox on all the artciles in a timely manner as there are over 60 CFL seasons! What I can do is start at the present year and work backwards so there is only a single transition in styles for someone iterating through the seasons. I can also agree to not make any changes until after the Grey Cup as these pages are likely to experience high traffic this weekend. BLAIXX17:28, 21 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
An anonymous IP has been attacking me on North Mountain (film), over the inclusion of an actor's name in the starring= field of the film's infobox. The person in question, Johnny Terris, was not one of the film's main stars, but merely a supporting character — but when I tried to remove his name from the infobox on those grounds, the IP has been reverting me and making entirely unfounded accusations that I've been waging a personal vendetta against Terris "for years" to block him from having a Wikipedia article at all. Never mind that there have been two deletion discussions (neither of which was initiated by me, so I was the "instigator" of absolutely nothing whatsoever) which both reached a deletion consensus — and while I did comment in both of them, I merely commented on the article's lack of conformity to the notability and reliable sourcing standards that an actor would have to pass to become eligible for an article, and never once said so much as one single solitary word against Terris as a person. So their accusations are quite simply false.
But, of course, if I sustain this into a revert war or try to editblock the IP for making personal attacks, I'll just look like I'm misusing administration tools for my own benefit. So is somebody else willing to step in and warn the IP against making unwarranted personal attacks? Thanks. Bearcat (talk) 23:45, 21 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
This is an interesting case. The guideline is that the infobox should match the poster's billing block, but the only poster I could find had no billing block. Clearly the individual is non-notable, so that's a good reason to exclude the name, but the underlying problem of the anon accusing you is separate from that. Walter Görlitz (talk) 20:25, 22 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Earlier this year, a user created List of Canadian women writers in French. The thing about this is, Wikipedia does not have a single other example of "List of [Nationality] writers in [Language]" for any other possible combination of those attributes, while we do have many other examples of the more general "List of [Nationality] writers" but Canada does not yet actually have one of those at all. So I'm not seeing a compelling reason why a list of francophone Canadian women writers would need to stand alone as a separate topic from starting a more general list of all Canadian women writers. Accordingly, I've proposed on the article's talk page that we move it to List of Canadian women writers, and expand it to include anglophone and indigenous-language women writers as well — so I wanted to ask if anybody else has any other input into the discussion. Bearcat (talk) 17:05, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I've been working on some of the pages for ministers (e.g. Minister of Transport (Canada)) and looking at some of the other minister pages, it seems like there is not a clear distinction in some cases when past positions should be merged into the current portfolio, or when past positions should be separated into their own articles. I was wondering if there was a way to build some consensus on this. I'll describe some examples to show what I mean since I'm sure not everyone dives this deeply:
Case 1: Completely merge into current 'successor' position
Minister of Agriculture (Canada), where the successor position is legally not the same but has most of the responsibilities of the former role. Includes all ministers from both roles, which is probably the most basic example.
Minister of Crown–Indigenous Relations, interestingly one of the more aggressive examples, since this ministerial role has existed (or not existed) in various forms, including periods where there wasn't a title that included reference to indigenous peoples (e.g. from 1936 to 1966, these responsibilities were part of the portfolio for Minister of Mines, Minister of the Interior, and Minister of Citizenship). Includes any minister who may have had this role, including people in those other roles I mentioned.
Minister of Fisheries, Oceans, and the Canadian Coast Guard, connects various fisheries related positions and defers to other minister articles when it seems appropriate to delegate the role to another position (e.g. deferring to Minister of Fisheries and the Environment for the 1971-1979 period)
Minister of Public Services and Procurement, mostly a successor to two positions that lasted for a while (which both have separate articles, one of which was a 130 year position)
Minister of Natural Resources, very firmly aligns to this, with separate articles for every precursor position (there was discussion about this on WikiProject Governments in Canada, but it mostly seemed led by one user 10 years ago)
Case 3: Sort of a hybrid or other case
Minister of Transport (Canada), this was my doing. Originally it only had transport ministers, but the Minister of Marine was about a 6 year offshoot of Fisheries that only dealt with marine transport and was completely merged into Transport after, so I have the Minister of Marine information on this page. But there's a separate page for Minister of Railways and Canals, and it's not clear if that should also be merged, since that position is basically just a precursor for the existing Transport portfolio.
Minister of Western Economic Diversification and all the other regional economic agencies, admittedly poorly cited articles that consider Navdeep Bains (the 2015-2019 successor to all these roles) as the current 'Minister of X agency', which is not correct
There are a lot more examples under each scenario, and not a lot of discussion about this through the noticeboards previously. I took a peek at how the UK does this and it also seems a bit mixed. I didn't go through every article, but the first 10 or so I opened seem to keep as much as they can on the existing minister page, keeping a tree of every reasonable main precursor position, but also have a bunch of pages for defunct ministers.
On one end of the spectrum, I could see a case where we only keep the current iteration of the ministry (and move all previous positions to separate articles), but at what point is it considered 'the current iteration'? On the other hand, we could try merging as many into the current position to give an idea of what the continuity is, but how much gets merged, especially if it was previously coming from multiple departments? What do people feel is the most reasonable way forward? ArmosNights (talk) 03:12, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
ArmosNights, I'd say I'd favour Case #1, without prejudice, of course, to renaming in the future. Otherwise, we'll end up with an unwieldy amount of former ministerial portfolios. We should, however, have separate articles for statutory departments—note that some portfolios are still named differently (by enabling legislation) than their minister.
I would actually merge the "Solicitor General of Canada" article into the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness article, as a separate section. It's unlikely that title is ever to be used again.Doug MehusT·C03:44, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Huh, I think the way Minister of Crown–Indigenous Relations is doing it is actually causing some accidental confusion. According to the PCO (archived— I can't find anything dealing with ministries on any current revision, unfortunately), "Superintendent-General of Indian Affairs" continued to exist as a title, and Crerar et al had it as one of their portfolios, it's just that there was a period of time where it was always held concurrently with another ministry. IMO the page should be edited to replace the "Minister responsible…" header with something more apt ("held concurrently with…"?) or even have the division deleted entirely and the situation explained in the prose.
Anyway… my opinion is that ministry pages should be merged provided there is a clear and unambiguous continuity between them. Agriculture → Agriculture and Agri-Food is a perfect example: assumes much the same responsibilities, has a similar/related name, extraordinarily unlikely the previous title will be revived as a separate portfolio, and it even has the same minister during the transition… it is effectively the same post, even if not legally. All the "Case 1" examples are similarly apt to me.
Other cases are murkier, though. The evolution of the Natural Resources portfolio is so roundabout, coming from a merger of two other positions that themselves were formed by the reorganizations of other posts as responsibilities were shuffled around, that including all its predecessors on a single page would be cumbersome, if nothing else. IMO a page like this would be best handled with the list covering only the modern incarnation, but with a History section that outlines the evolution (akin to the Fisheries page). Same with Public Services and Procurement: though a straightforward merger of two posts, those two posts have long enough histories that putting them all together would just be a bit much.
Western Economic Diversification looks like clear overcorrection. ISED may have taken over the duties, but the "WED minister" has clearly fallen by the wayside and I'm not aware of it being used for Bains, even quietly, in any official context. Industry is, I think, another portfolio where we should lean towards keeping things separate because it's so messy. — Kawnhr (talk) 06:18, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Really good feedback! I'm leaning similarly to both of you: merging where possible and having some sort of separation where necessary. I think some other feedback might be good, then maybe a guideline can be workshopped for ministries and departments because I can see it being overwhelming and causes some inconsistency for a lot of Canadian government pages. I wouldn't mind helping write this guideline. Mostly replied this early to let you know where the PCO ministries guideline moved! This is the new guide website, I've referenced to it on the ministerial history pages I've been working on. Seems to be the same format as the old one, just a new spot. It's been such a good quick resource and a good launching point for finding the appropriate statutes. ArmosNights (talk) 15:09, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, excellent, thank you for that! I perused the ministries pages many a time and was saddened to see its loss, so I'm happy to know I just missed the reorganization. Also, I just realized that I forgot to weigh in on the page you were actually editing, so: I think there's a clear succession from Railways and Canals (and Marine) to Transport that that makes sense as a single article, too. — Kawnhr (talk) 18:46, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
ArmosNights, I generally agree with what Kawnhr said, so kinda surprised she (apologizes if wrong pronoun) replied with "huh?" I would also say that some ministerial portfolios, especially junior ones, may not be notable (i.e., Middle Class Prosperity, which oversees virtually nothing; it's more or less a ministerial assistant, presumably, to the PM, to PCO, and/or the Minister of Finance). Thus, those should just be merged into the Cabinet of Canada article.--Doug MehusT·C19:53, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
It was a surprised "huh" at the Crown-Indigenous Relations article structure, cause it is a pretty odd way of structuring it, not at you. I'm not sure how I feel about merging smaller cabinet portfolios yet. I'd generally favour keeping whatever ones are current (even smaller ones, unless they're concurrent with other positions like Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, and older ones can be merged or standalone depending on whether they have some level of notability (perhaps a "List of defunct ministerial positions of Canada" or something along those lines for the ones with like, 1 or 2 people ever, with links to ones that have their own pages) ArmosNights (talk) 20:07, 28 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
ArmosNights, In the case of the Minister of Seniors, I'm OK with keeping that one, but if the Minister of Middle Class Prosperity ends up being only a single minister serving this ministerial assistant-type role, how is a full page only an infobox, a single sentence, and a list that includes only a single name helpful? I think in such cases, we can just note the office of the minister in the applicable person's article page infobox as a separate office (like we do for the Senators whereby we don't create a full article for Facilitator of the Independent Senators Group).
Yeah, I think we can keep strange existing ones like Middle Class Prosperity separate for now until there's legislation saying whatever they are (likely when Parliament is back). If it's just to be held concurrently with the other new post (Associate Minister of Finance) then I feel like the latter is a page worth having and the former would just redirect. ArmosNights (talk) 15:38, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
ArmosNights, Yeah, though, really "Associate Minister of Finance" has no justification in legislation. It just sounds official. Practically speaking, it's like the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance—with the Minister of Finance's Cabinet supplementary pay package (since Trudeau's government received criticism for paying "junior ministers," made up of mostly women, less than full ministers who have actual statutory responsibilities). Interestingly, even Chrystia Freeland as the reinvigorated Deputy PM has no added seniority. Will be interesting to see if she's also the primary minister to act for the PM in the event of his incapacitation.
To ArmosNights and Kawnhr, for the ministerial navbox template:s that are created and transcluded at the bottom of articles, what are your thoughts here? Do you think we should only create templates for ministers with actual portfolios—i.e., not those assigned as an assistant minister to a statutory minister, and those which oversee one or more federal departments, agencies, or Crown corporations? Doug MehusT·C16:47, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
The ones for specific portfolios? Like Template:CA-Ministers of Transport? I think there's space to do those for any continuous portfolio. For example, one could do one for Northern Affairs (even though they only look over part of a department) because that role has shifted between departments and positions in the past. Notability guidelines suggest that every historically elected MP will get a page at some point, so it would be easy to include for navigation purposes.
My thinking on those and with the earlier discussion on merging information in pages is to do connectivity by portfolio. If we use Fisheries as an example, and based off what I'm seeing already on pages: prioritize the current Ministerial post (e.g. Minister of Fisheries, Oceans, and the Canadian Coast Guard), include on the page a list of the ministers (or reference to other positions that have held those ministerial roles, e.g. Env ministers that also held Fisheries), then have a navbox for "Ministers of Fisheries and Oceans" and include all the precedent roles and links to ministers holding those roles in the navbox. It would help with the traceability of portfolios, and including every minister in the navbox is less onerous than including every minister on the page (for roles where there were multiple predecessor roles like those that Kawnhr mentioned). It also seems to follow the precedent used by some of the current pages, like Fisheries, where the idea is that going to the current Fisheries minister page will give you an idea of who held that kind of role previously, and include it there instead of on other pages where it's possible. ArmosNights (talk) 18:25, 29 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
That makes sense to me. Someone looking for a list of fisheries ministers is really just looking for who was in charge of the fisheries department and policy— so including ministers who were responsible for the portfolio during a period when the ministry was abolished is reasonable. I'm torn on whether it's better to include them right on the page or just grey it out and provide a link to the minstry in question— the former is undeniably more helpful but the latter feels "more correct" (to only list actual ministers)… — Kawnhr (talk) 04:10, 1 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
The Legislative Assembly seems to have recently changed the structure of its website urls; instead of "http://www.ontla.on.ca/web/members/members_all_detail.do?locale=en&ID=[###]", they're now at "https://www.ola.org/en/members/all/[NAME]". I just changed the template to the new structure, and used Gibson as a test case to see if I did it right, and it works correctly on him — but for obvious reasons, it's going to be a big multi-editor project to get all the MPPs changed over to their new URLs. Is there any commitment to getting it done, or should we just strip those URLs entirely because changing them over is too much trouble? Basically all that needs to happen on each article is replacing ID=### with the appropriate name, since the transcluded part of the template has already been corrected otherwise, but there are just so many MPPs to deal with.
If there is a willingness, then obviously we should start with incumbent MPPs and past and present party leaders first, since they're the highest traffic articles in the bunch — but after that, the simplest thing would probably be for each person who gets involved to take exclusive responsibility for one letter at a time so people don't repeatedly bump into each other on the same articles. Bearcat (talk) 20:25, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for updating the template. Is there any way someone (not necessarily in this notice board), could script a replacement? Most new IDs are parallel to the page name. It wouldn't work with some entries like Thomas Dent (Ontario politician), which not only doesn't have the bracketed text, but also has a middle name, thomas-roy-dent, but it would work with most. -- Zanimum (talk) 22:03, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
That would be awfully tricky, precisely because of the sheer number of pages where our titles don't match theirs (either because of the disambiguator or because they include a middle name and we don't.) I suppose it might theoretically be possible, but a lot would still have to be done manually. Bearcat (talk) 23:30, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{proposed deletion/dated}} notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.
Ahunt does have a valid point; to an extent, the first few days after the announcement of a leadership convention are always a flurry of journalists just throwing every name in the book out as a potential candidate. There isn't necessarily any value in documenting that for posterity; we really should list only the people who are still being discussed as potential candidates after a couple of weeks, rather than everybody who ever had the question asked. But you're also correct that since listing everybody who was named by at least one reliable source as a possible candidate is the way things were done in the past, we would need a more active discussion about it rather than discontinuing it over the objections, valid though they may be, of one editor. And GoodDay is also correct that either way we require reliable sources; I caught (and removed) one person in the list whose potential candidacy was "referenced" solely to a Twitter tweet (and not even her own, but somebody else's), which is not appropriate sourcing for inclusion in such a list. Bearcat (talk) 14:45, 14 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Bio of Vic Fedeli
- don't really understand how to edit an article but was reading and it seems to be very one sided article. Like my Wikipedia fair and it seems this is a PR article. No mention of Fedli's role in the scandal that removed Patrick Brown from leadership race nor of the 8 million dollar lawsuit Fedeli filed against Brown. Not interested in a hachet job, just a fair and balanced article. https://globalnews.ca/news/4661141/patrick-brown-book/i — Preceding unsigned comment added by Northof401 (talk • contribs) 00:12, 15 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Andrew Scheer's status
Why is CBC news calling Scheer interim leader of the Conservative party? I thought he hadn't resigned as leader & won't do so until the party chooses a successor. GoodDay (talk) 16:04, 15 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
The Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment done by Keegantannahill has really made a mess of the Battle of Batoche article. The article is no longer formatted properly and features an overtly one-sided POV. It would be greatly appreciated if any editors specializing in Canadian history articles could make some necessary fixes. An article of this historical importance should not be so poorly maintained. TrailBlzr (talk) 04:15, 16 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, this is a weird situation because of the names involved— the portfolio originally being "Labour", then "Employment and Labour", but now "Employment" and "Labour" are separate, so what gives? But looking into it, "Employment, Workforce Development and Disability Inclusion" would seem to be the successor; the ESDC's organizational structure lists Employment first, and three of four deputy ministers are of Employment. It is also, of course, keeping the majority of the portfolios, and Qualthrough has more governmental experience than Tassi, which further hints at the hierarchy. So I agree with GoodDay, there needs to be a new "Minister of Labour" article for Tassi's role. — Kawnhr (talk) 20:28, 18 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Because "Employment, Workforce Development and Disability Inclusion" covers such an incredibly broad area, there's more than one minister responsible for different aspects of it — but Labour isn't actually a separate ministry, it's just a department of EWDDI. Essentially, the Labour department oversees things like employment equity, workplace harassment and violence prevention, workplace safety standards, that sort of thing — Carla Qualtrough basically oversees the economic broad strokes of the employment market, while Filomena Tassi oversees a lot of the particular workplace-oriented programs and policies. But again, Labour isn't actually a separate ministry — it's a department within ESDC/EWDDI, not a standalone ministry. Bearcat (talk) 15:29, 20 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Bearcat, Are you more or less favouring what I said above, that we don't need standalone articles for these junior ministerial portfolios that are essentially like ministerial assistants with small secretariats (some with a handful of staff or less)? I think we can list the office in the infobox of the applicable minister's biography, but honestly, do we need a Minister for Middle Class Prosperity that is essentially just a Minister of State with a handful of staff in either of the Finance or Privy Council Office departments/offices? --Doug MehusT·C02:09, 23 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I would agree that we don't need a separate article for Labour; however, the article about EWDDI does need to do a better job of explaining that labour is a separate sub-portfolio within the aegis of EWDDI and not just a discontinued old title for the minister of EWDDI. Bearcat (talk) 16:30, 24 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I'll go along with whatever yas decide on. Being as it's the Westminister system, cabinet positions are created out of thin air & easily abolished, without parliamentary consent. GoodDay (talk) 16:35, 24 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Image question
File:AerialArmstrong.jpg has been used for some time to illustrate our article about the Armstrong, Ontario in Timiskaming District — but earlier today, an anonymous editor altered the caption from "Aerial view of Armstrong" to "The other Armstrong (Thunder Bay District)". From the Google satellite view it looks like they might be correct, as the hamlet of Armstrong at the top of Ontario Highway 527 definitely looks closer to the geography depicted in the photo than Earlton does, but I can't say this with any definitive authority as I've never actually been to either place.
In the meantime, I've reverted the IP's edits and removed the image from the Armstrong-in-Timiskaming article pending confirmation — if it's wrong, then the correct solution is to remove it from the article, not just to leave it there with a caption saying it's the wrong one — but I wanted to ask if anybody else has any input into this since I can't definitively say for sure which one it is. Bearcat (talk) 18:24, 24 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I've never been to either place, but I agree this is likely the community in Thunder Bay District. The three-way intersection of Highway 527 with King Street and 1st Avenue is quite distinctive, and the adjacent rail tracks match the satellite and map views of Bing and Google Maps (as do numerous structures and streets, and the escarpment or tree line just south of the tracks). There is a similarity with Earlton, in that 8th street has a similar shape (to the intersection of King Street and 1st Avenue), but the third intersection (the Highway 527 arm) is missing, and the road visible at the bottom of the pic is also missing. (The Earlton location also has the Trans-Canada highway at an angle to the tracks, which does not appear in the pic.) Mindmatrix19:04, 24 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I have been to both Armstrongs, and the IP editor is definitely correct. Armstrong in Timiskaming District is flat and rural, whereas Armstrong in Thunder Bay District is in the wilderness. The difference is easy to tell. I will restore the previous image for Armstrong, Timiskaming. Regards, -- P 1 9 9✉19:09, 24 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Earlier today, I noted the recent creation (within the past few days) of Berthier (Province of Canada electoral district) as a separate topic from Berthier (electoral district). I note that there are a small number of other standalone articles about the pre-Confederation electoral districts of the Legislative Assembly of the Province of Canada, as categorized at Category:Electoral districts of Canada East — but only for Quebec, and only for a small, random and non-representative sample of Quebec electoral districts. No electoral district in Ontario has such an article that I can find at all, and most Quebec districts don't either — instead, by and large, our articles about the Parliaments of the Province of Canada link mainly to the post-Confederation districts (or occasionally even just the city that a district was based in) even though those articles mostly don't adequately address their pre-1867 representation histories at all.
And, in addition, there's a remarkable inconsistency of naming format, with this one disambiguated as "Province of Canada electoral district" while with just one exception all of the others are disambiguated as just "Province of Canada" — which seems a bit of a bad choice, as a reader who was unfamiliar with Canadian political history might mistake that for a suggestion that confederated Canada has or had a province with that name rather than that it was an electoral district in something called "the Province of Canada".
Accordingly, I wanted to ask for some input from the rest of the Canadian contingent: should the pre-1867 electoral districts of the Province of Canada be treated as separate topics, with separate articles, from their post-1867 continuations in the post-Confederation Parliament of Canada, or should they be merged back to the post-1867 articles with some expansion to add content about the pre-1867 histories? Personally, I'm inclined to the merge approach, because I don't see how pre-1867 Berthier and post-1867 Berthier are really separate topics at all, but I wanted to ask for outside opinions since clearly a few people have thought differently in the past even though they've never really finished the job. Bearcat (talk) 20:16, 15 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
They should have separate articles, because which articles would you merge them to? The federal electoral districts or the provincial ones? After confederation, the districts basically doubled up, as the first few provincial parliaments in both Quebec and Ontario operated on the same boundaries as their federal counterparts. -- Earl Andrew - talk20:20, 15 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
As for why they are separate articles, it’s because the Province of Canada is not the same as Canada. The districts were created by different laws, to send members to different Parliaments, at different times. And, the Province of Canada districts were all abolished in 1867. The fact that they had the same name doesn’t mean they were the same district.
It’s inaccurate to link to federal districts, which were created in 1867, in an article covering the 1st Parliament of the Province of Canada, for members elected in 1841. How is the reader to make sense of that? For instance, Bonaventure is the next one in the table of Canada East districts in the article for the 1st Province of Canada Parliament. It currently links to the federal district of Bonaventure (electoral district). The opening of that article says that Bonaventure was an electoral district in the House of Commons, for the Province of Quebec, that was created in 1867. That is not accurate for the Province of Canada district, which was created in 1841, to elect a member for the Legislative Assembly of the Province of Canada. What is the reader to think of that? How can a member be elected in 1841 to a district that the link says was created in 1867, for a different province and a different body?
As well, the template for electoral districts has an option for Province of Canada districts, separate from both federal and provincial districts. Why is that an option, if they are considered federal districts?
The reason there’s only a few articles at the moment for the Province of Canada districts is because I just started working on this project. My plan is to go through all the districts and make articles for each one, as a Province of Canada electoral district. I started with Beauharnois because it came first in the list of Canada East districts. One must start somewhere. :). There are 42 districts for Canada East and Canada West, in the 1st Province of Canada Parliament, so it will take a while. Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 06:24, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Commenting on Earl Andrew’s point, there was a substantial change for Ontario at Confédération. Canada East and Canada West had the same number of seats in the Province of Canada parliament, but at Confederation, Ontario got more seats than Quebec, so the electoral map for Ontario in 1867 saw significant changes from the map used in the last Province of Canada Parliament. There had also been an expansion in the Parliament of the Province of Canada about the mid-1850s. All of which indicates that there will not be a one-to-one correspondence between the Province of Canada map and the House of Commons map. Some rural ridings, like Berthier, may have been similar, but I expect others will be different. I think it’s best to treat the districts for the Province of Canada as completely separate from the subsequent districts for Ontario, Quebec and the House of Commons. Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 12:50, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Well, firstly, it can't be random: if they need separate articles, then they all need separate articles — it's not "some need separate articles and some don't", it's "all or nothing". And secondly, if they need separate articles, then they have to all be disambiguated in a consistent naming format, rather than some being at one format and some being at another. Bearcat (talk) 21:00, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
If they require disambiguation then "Name (Province of Canada electoral district)" ought to be fine as a dab format, unless there are examples where two distinct ridings had the same name, in which case add the years. If there are some with unique names that don't require disambiguation, creating a {{R from unnecessary disambiguation}} at the disambiguated title is a good idea. I see there are quite a few in Category:Electoral districts of Canada East which are disambiguated with (Province of Canada). And shouldn't that category be consistent? If Canada East didn't have a separate legislature, the category should be renamed. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 21:23, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that all the electoral districts should have separate articles. However, there were 84 electoral districts in the 1st Parliament. I plan on working through the list, and creating new article to cover them all, but it's not something I have the time to do overnight. I'm going on the assumption that "There is no deadline."
I also agree with Ivanvector that the standard name for the articles should be "[Name of district] (Province of Canada electoral district)". That should cover most situations. To start that process, I think that all of the articles listed in Category:Electoral districts of Canada East should have that as their standard name. What is the process to re-name an article?
However, I disagree that the category of "Electoral districts of Canada East" should be eliminated. It's true that there was no Canada East legislature, but the Union Act, 1840, drew a distinction between Canada East and Canada West, and said that each of them had to have the same number of seats. Since the Union Act drew that distinction for the representation in the Parliament, I think it's important to maintain it for the categories of electoral districts. I hope to eventually start working on articles for the Canada West electoral districts, and at that time would want to create a category for the Canada West electoral districts.Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 09:49, 18 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Right, I've checked out Wikipedia:Moving a page and discovered I have authority to move a page, as an autoconfirmed user! Learn something new every day: I thought only admins could do that. Based on the discussion here, I propose to re-name all articles in the "Category:Electoral districts of Canada East" that are in the pattern "Name (Province of Canada)", to the more explicit pattern "Name (Province of Canada electoral district)". (Just to be clear, I've been using "Name (Province of Canada electoral district)" for all the ones I've created. If an article has the other format, it was created by someone else.) Is there a consensus for that proposal? Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 16:35, 20 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I say go for it, there doesn't seem to be any disagreement here and it's doubtful you'd find anyone watching those really pretty obscure pages who's not also watching this one. For the most part you should be good to go, but you can run into technical problems that prevent you from moving pages. If you do, feel free to post about it here and one of us will take a look. Don't worry about getting anything wrong, anything can be undone on Wikipedia.
According to the guidelines (Wikipedia:Disambiguation) you shouldn't add a disambiguator (the bit in parentheses) to any title which is already not ambiguous. For example the title Kings—Hants is sufficient to identify that riding, so Kings—Hants (Nova Scotia electoral district) is unnecessary. I don't think you'll have that issue with any of the titles you're working on though, since they're all ambiguous with their predecessor or successor ridings, but just so you know. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 16:52, 20 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Have started changing them, and get this message afterwards: "Your move should now be reflected in the Wikidata item language link. We ask that you check this has occurred." I have no idea what that means? Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 19:21, 20 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Just a quick issue that I wanted to bring to everybody's attention. Over the past several years, a banned user has repeatedly used sockpuppets to conduct a slow-motion edit war, reinserting content into Global Television Network which is not relevant to the topic — specifically, in the "NTV" section where the 1969 launch of Telesat Canada gets mentioned as a factor in the failure of the first network application, the user has repeatedly tried to digress into an extended discussion of the ongoing ownership status of Telesat Canada literally all the way up to the present day. But Telesat's ownership status in the 2010s has absolutely nothing to do with its torpedoing of Global's original 1968 license application — so I've removed the digression each time I've seen it, because it's tangential and not relevant to the television network at all, only to have it come back again at a later date.
The real core issue here is that even though the page has 84 watchlisters according to its page information data, I have consistently been the only editor who has ever actually noticed this at all — the most recent time it was readded to the article again, I missed it and it stayed in the article for weeks until I caught it again today. So most likely, a large percentage of those 84 watchlisters are occasional or inactive editors, and accordingly I wanted to ask if some more active editors are willing to add it to your watchlists to help monitor for this in the future. Thanks. Bearcat (talk) 21:29, 25 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Bearcat, Thank you for the head's up. To be honest, that page isn't on my watchlist (maybe it should be as I do monitor Bell Media Radio). Anyway, I concur with the removal; it's, perhaps, worthy of the sort of mention at Telesat Canada but not there. I'm wondering, though, what I've often found works is when editors remove otherwise useful explanatory information I had added is to add it to a footnote (either in a reflist or a notelist). This removes it from the article as it's unneeded bulk; however, interested readers can mouse over the footnote superscript and read the note. Could something like that work instead? --Doug MehusT·C22:08, 25 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I don't see the value in retaining it as a reflisted or notelisted footnote either, since it's simply not relevant to Global at all. Bearcat (talk) 22:54, 25 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Hi everyone - I found No Fly List Kids Legislation (Canada) while reviewing new pages this morning. It's a mess at the moment, and I'm not sure it's worthy of an article, but on the other hand it could develop into something. The article could use an experienced hand to make it a proper article, or to initiate deletion if that's the better course of action. Regards, PKT(alk)13:50, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
This article has many problems. The title is meaningless, and doesn't match the name of any legislation in Canada. The article doesn't refer to the Passenger Protect Program (the official name of Canada's do-not-fly list), and frankly, the subject of the article should be merged to the (currently-redlinked) target I mentioned (if any of it were to be salvaged, that is). Third, twitter is not a reliable source, irrespective of the accountholder. And to top it off, it appears this is written as a news article or school essay masquerading as an encyclopedia article. I think the subject warrants mention, but not its own article. Mindmatrix20:18, 29 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
They were not flying to Canada so why would it mention that list?
Why does the title need to mat that of some legistation? It's discussing a WP:COMMONNAME of the term.
Hmm, apparently I spent so much time searching for sources that I got distracted into a (related but) different subject. As for common name, what I see is legislation created as a result of advocacy from the group 'No Fly List Kids' (or 'No-Fly List Kids', depending on the source), but nobody seems to be calling it 'No Fly List Kids Legislation'. Mindmatrix21:31, 29 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I've listed the page for AFD at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/No Fly List Kids Legislation (Canada), because I agree that it's a mess — while the "No Fly List Kids" campaign could certainly be mentioned in the appropriate places (i.e. Passenger Protect Program and/or National Security Act 2017), this article as written is both misrepresenting the nature of the legislation (which was an omnibus update to Canadian security and anti-terrorism legislation in general, not a law specifically about kids being erroneously placed on the no-fly list) and not properly establishing the notability of the real topic (which is a lobbying campaign, not a law in and of itself.) Bearcat (talk) 14:57, 4 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Babysitting articles
As a followup to Bearcat's post about Global Television Network, I'm sure we all have a number of articles that each of us is babysitting against vandalism, POV, and other spurious editing. I figured we'd all appreciate a few more eyballs on these articles. I've listed a few articles on my watchlist which pop up annoyingly constantly. If you have any such articles on your watchlist, add them here. Don't feel compelled to add these to your watchlist, but having a few more people watchlisting each article is welcome. Mindmatrix16:32, 29 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
There are tables on the List of villages in Canada article that have multiple columns of numerical data with no column headings and no labels elsewhere I can see, so it's not possible to know what they represent. I've left a slightly more detailed note on the article talk page, but it doesn't give the impression of being a highly watched page. Thryduulf (talk) 10:41, 4 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for flagging this. It looks like the columns are population, population change, area, and density. I'll verify and add headers now. -- P 1 9 9✉13:55, 4 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
What's happening there is that for some reason the headers are present in the actual template coding in edit mode, but for some reason they're not displaying to the reader in pageview mode. I'm not sure how to fix that, and it may require some outside assistance from WP:VPT — I've posted a request there for a template coding aficionado to take a look and see if there's anything that can be done to fix it. Bearcat (talk) 14:38, 4 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed. Since the tables are transcluded, the headers were "replaced" by new headers on the page. I changed those to table captions, and now the transcluded headers are shown. -- P 1 9 9✉15:51, 4 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I created an article today about musician Joshua Haulli, an Inuk singer-songwriter who received three Canadian Folk Music Award nominations in 2019 — but when I attempted to add his name to List of Canadian Inuit, I found myself completely mystified by the structure of the list. Specifically, most columns are using the {{sort}} template to control how the list sorts if a user attempts to rearrange it from default sort order, but the sort templates are using completely random number codes as the sortkeys — for example, Eva Aariak's birthdate of 10 January 1955 is sortkeyed as "112", her birthplace of Arctic Bay is sortkeyed as "008", Nunavut is sortkeyed as "039", and then there are blank entries sortkeyed as "053", "042" and another "042" in the death columns that she obviously doesn't have information for yet. Accordingly, I'm at a total loss for what these sortkeys are, or which sortkeys to even attempt to use in a list entry for Joshua Haulli.
Frankly, my only plausible guess about this is that the numbers might be trying to manually control the sort orders literally entry by entry — such that every number in the entire list would have to be readjusted every single time any new entry is added to the list at all, and thus turning the act of adding a new entry to the list from a straightforward addition into a three hour job of manually readjusting every sortkey in the entire list one by one.
That's obviously not how we should be doing this kind of thing, but I can't think of any other explanation for the random numbers. Can somebody else take a look at this and tell me if you agree with this assessment, and maybe help to tackle reorganizing the list in a more transparent and less labour-intensive way? Thanks. Bearcat (talk) 16:02, 6 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'd like to add that I've basically just confirmed that my guess was correct; if I re-sort the list on birthdate, the next entry after Eva Aariak becomes Enoki Irqittuq — and then if I go into edit mode, the sortkey on Enoki Irqittuq's birthdate is indeed "113", the next number after Eva Aariak's. And the four people in the list whose "region" is given as Manitoba (Susan Aglukark, George Hickes, Jordin Tootoo and Lucy Tasseor Tutsweetok) are indeed sequentially sortkeyed in the region column as "003", "004", "005" and "006". So the list is definitely trying to manually impose a sort order by sequentially numbering each individual entry, which is definitely not how we should be doing this. Bearcat (talk) 16:08, 6 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
For dates, it may be useful to have a numeric key in YYYYMMDD format so the table can be sorted chronologically. For cases where just the year is shown, YYYY0101 could be used. For cases where it says "after YYYY" or "c. YYYY", I guess the same could be done. When two years are shown, I suppose use the first year. It wouldn't necessarily be truly chronological, but would help people find entries in any case. isaacl (talk) 18:45, 6 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I just came across this article about a First Nations poet. It seems to have significant COI contributions. Could someone with an interest in First Nations writing (and access to reliable sources that I can't seem to find) take a look at it, and either add a few sources to the bio, or nominate it for deletion if warranted. I think this article probably merits inclusion on WP, but I simply can't find much in the way of sources to confirm this. Thanks. (There may be info about him in Native Poetry in Canada: A Contemporary Anthology (editors: Jeannette Armstrong, Lally Grauer) and Handbook of Native American Literature
(Andrew Wiget), but I can't access the texts.) A Google Books search suggests other potential sources. Mindmatrix15:57, 8 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The problem with that source, however, is that it does not represent coverage about him — it simply represents a piece of his own work being used as metaverification of its own existence, which is not how you demonstrate that a writer is notable. There are, in fact, literally zero sources present in the article that represent notability-building reliable source coverage about him, so it's been nominated for deletion accordingly. And you're correct about the COI; in fact, Keonw was the article's original creator, so it's definitely an WP:AUTOBIO. Bearcat (talk) 18:16, 8 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
C-SPAN
An anonymous IP, 68.227.160.152 (talk·contribs), has been hitting a significant number of Canadian politicians today with external links to pages on C-SPAN that compile short video clips of the subjects speaking in Question Period. I don't know (or care) whether this would be considered a valuable addition to an American politician or not, but I certainly don't see the value in it being comprehensively present as an external link on Canadian politicians — C-SPAN is an American media outlet, not a Canadian one, so its curation of a random partial selection of clips from Question Period is neither a reliably representative gauge of the importance of those speeches, nor an accurate reflection of the totality of the polticians' careers.
However, I wanted to ask for other input before I start attempting to remove the links: do other people agree with me that they're not useful or relevant additions to Canadian politicians, and if so is anybody willing to help remove them so that I'm not tackling the job entirely on my own? They've already hit more than 50 articles and are still going as I type this.
Semi-protecting Athletics Canada and University of Guelph pages
Hi everyone!
I was wondering if it would be possible to semi-protect the Athletics Canada and University of Guelph pages, as I believe one or both pages may be vandalized or be disrupted, due to a recent story published by The Globe and Mail. The story was published this past weekend and is expected to continue gaining attention as it spreads across social media. While neither page has been hit yet, semi-protecting them may prevent it. Additionally, I will be editing both pages later today to add details about the story, which may result in individuals vandalizing either or both pages.
Hi @Torontopedia: - the place to make requests like that is Wikipedia:Requests for page protection, where it's a pretty simple process. However in the two cases you mentioned, semi-protection would probably not be granted because there's been no vandalism yet. That being the case, the next best thing to do is what you did - mention your concerns here, to give a "heads up" to other Canadian editors. PKT(alk)17:34, 11 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
