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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Can I promote my Website to WikiPedia?? if yes, what is process?

I want to Promote my website on wikipedia, is is possible to do it like Google adword?? Someone kindly guide me. I have a website about [Google Adsense Tips| Tips for New Blogger| SEO| Drive Traffic Tips| Copyright Articals | Sitemap]. So I need to promote it. my website is ^{<spam address removed Julia Rossi (talk) 02:19, 18 March 2009 (UTC)>} —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tiepk (talk • contribs) 21:52, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

If I hear you correctly, then no. See our guidelines on wikispam. MuZemike 22:04, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:VPR#Editnotice_for_creating_new_pages

I'd welcome any comments --DFS454 (talk) 13:03, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Random article selector?

I was viewing random articles this morning. After several minutes I noticed that I had been presented with no less than 6 articles on towns or districts in Poland. Looking back through my browser's history I see that the article selector lead to Adamów, Witów, Ostrzeszewo, Garczyn, Niekazanice, and Grzybowo, out of a total of only 74 random articles. Was there some connection or is this just an odd coincidence? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mixdenny (talk • contribs) 01:40, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

I've done several such tests over the years using the random article link and something odd always happens like that, sending me to a weird grouping of related articles. I just did 40 random articles and hit 4 Swedish footballers (I guess that's a soccer player or something). I did hit the Polish town of Maciejówka. I also counted 16 articles that should be deleted. Man there's a lot of crap out there. I bet if you did another random 74 articles there's a good chance you would find a different weird coincidence -- something to do with Wikipedia messing with your mind. Seems like a user here did some kind of research on the random article link and presented his findings here a few years ago; interesting read, but it was just plain randomness. --64.85.222.144 (talk) 13:32, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Later the same day I tried again, and quickly hit on Laziska, Zalesie, Lubocie, Skocze, Bruszewo-Borkowizna, Wólka-Mogielnica, and Wesola, all obscure Polish towns, most are stubs obviously written using the same template and extracted from the Polish Wiki. So that is 13 Polish towns out of maybe 200 random articles. During the same time, I had *no* geographical hits from large areas such as South America, Canada, Africa, Russia, all of Asia, etc. One from Great Britain. A couple from the US. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.118.13.250 (talk) 16:17, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Image question

Resolved

 – ukexpat (talk) 20:59, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

I couldn't find a noticeboard to discuss fair use, so I've come here. If this is the wrong place, could somebody point me to the correct place? File:Riste.jpg is from Commons, and is claimed to be the work of the uploader. But there is no evidence that the uploader is, in fact, the copyright holder, it looks like a posed studio photograph. Is this a valid use of fair use? Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 05:52, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Media copyright questions is the noticeboard you want. --64.85.222.144 (talk) 13:39, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Great, I'll try to file that away for future reference, if my leaky memory will let me.  :) Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 22:30, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Or just remember to check the "Copyrights" topic in the Editor's index. -- John Broughton (♫♫)

Span class=plainlinks

What is the point of putting a <span class="plainlinks"> tag around an external link, to disguise it to look like an internal link? Why does this ever need to be done? Mike R (talk) 18:50, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

It seems to me that practice should be verbotten- it suggests the link is internal, and it could be purposely deceptive, with the destination of the link actually with a similar look and feel to wikipedia. I don't know how many sites where I have seen text I have written copied over to xyzpedia sites with adverts. Anyway, you probably know this but the rationale given at mediawiki is for internal links, say you have a template with a link that launches an edit session of a page. You have to use fullurl and so this looks like an external link to the mediawiki engine. But you don't want the arrow thing junking up the final result, so you use plainlinks. -J JMesserly (talk) 19:15, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Aesthetics is one key point. IIRC class=plainlinked URLs appear in a different color to internal wikilinks anyway. It's already disallowed in mainspace (articles), per the pages discussing the feature, and is for talkspace(s). I sometimes use it for article permalinks. –Whitehorse1 11:01, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm sure there are many valid uses. For example: it is used in stub templates; those based on {{MetaPicstub}} use it so that [{{fullurl:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|action=edit}} expanding it] does not show the external link icon. What is not a valid use is when a true external link is hidden in such a manner. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 11:09, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Are you asserting that formatting an external link (within talkspace) in that manner – as in my example of an en.wikipedia.org permalink – is misuse, Gadget850? –Whitehorse1 11:50, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

That's not a true external link. Algebraist 11:54, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Arguably. :) To turn to links that we'll both agree are external then, I think the destination content is important—there's a difference between sites linked for 'shock value' or 'browser-crashing' vs., well, others; another important point (if I am recalling correctly that is—haven't checked), is 'plainlinks' do display in a different color and so aren't hidden (presumably the CSS or whatever would allow those using assistive technology for browsing to distinguish, too). –Whitehorse1 12:27, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

"Retrieved from"

I see "Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panchromatic_film"" in every page here. Change panchromatic film to an actual name of particular article. What is a purpose of telling me exact URL that I actually can see in an address bar of my browser? That meant for third party robots? But those robots will add filter for this phrase in no time. Just like they have filter for "From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia". I mean, what is a an actual meaning of it? And convenience of having that thing in the end of every page for a Wikipedia audience? Vitall (talk) 11:33, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Where do you see this? It isn't part of the default Wikipedia display. Algebraist 13:27, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

• That isn't the purpose, so your question, being based upon a false premise, is unanswerable. Your CSS is faulty, somehow. You've somehow made the class="printfooter" CSS class, which is normally not displayed, visible. I'm sure that, with a few moments' thought about the words "print" and "footer" you can make a good guess as to the actual purpose of that class and the text that it is applied to. ☺ Uncle G (talk) 13:28, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Ohh, Ok. It somehow have gone now. Just disappeared somehow. Was at the bottom of every Wikipedia page. Must have been weird glitch. Thank you and sorry. Vitall (talk) 14:11, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Template:Copypaste

The copypaste template contains the following sentence:"Please edit this article to remove any nonfree copyrighted content, attribute free content correctly, and be an original source." I'm not sure what this is supposed to mean. Should it be changed to:"Please edit this article to remove any nonfree copyrighted content and attribute free content correctly."? Charvest (talk) 17:16, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

I think it means "rewrite in your own words". Using a phrase like "original source" opens a big can of worms where we need to explain that the wording must be original but the facts themselves must not be. How about "Please edit this article to replace or remove any nonfree copyrighted content and attribute free content correctly."? That would cover the rewriting of non-free material. --DanielRigal (talk) 17:23, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Fine by me, but I can't edit it, the template is protected. Charvest (talk) 17:27, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Oh, yes. I didn't notice that. I will put the proposed wording and a link back to here on its talk page. --DanielRigal (talk) 21:02, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Adding {{editprotected}} to the template talk page will increase the likelihood that an admin will respond to your suggestion. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 00:25, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

New pages patrol competition!

I'm proposing a competition to encourage more people to participate in new pages patrol. Come and participate, join Team A or Team B, have fun and help clear the new pages patrol backlog! ☺Coppertwig (talk) 20:02, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

News News Site Listing

Friends,

we just launched a new site called irishcentral.com for st. patricks day and it's an important resource for the irish community around the world. The founder Niall O'Dowd has a very good listing on the wikipedia. There was a great deal of press around the launch, and you will quickly find reference through a google search and news search on the quality of joournalism here.

Would you consider allowing a wikipedian to research and write our listing?

Thanks for your consideration.

Cheers, E —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.132.151.216 (talk) 19:10, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

You may want to try articles for creation—a workshop for non-autoconfirmed users to get articles created. MuZemike 19:58, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

But please read WP:COI and WP:WEB first. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 20:57, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

Problem on Era conversion

This topic has been removed to Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)

artillery Cannon, not cannons

It seems that many wikipedia users do not understand that the plural of cannon is cannon, not cannons. I see 'cannons' in many articles, and honestly it's starting to drive me absofuckinglutely crazy. Is there anyway I can spread awareness about this, beyond making a post on WT:MILHIST!?!? --AtTheAbyss (talk) 03:12, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

The source used in the Wikipedia article states either form is correct. If there is another reliable source that states otherwise, incorporate it into the article and, if appropriate, address the issue on the talk page. Who knows, maybe that source will predominate the current usage of the term on Wikipedia; but without any backing sources, you are likely to run into a brickwall. --64.85.214.78 (talk) 13:56, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Generally I find cannons and guns being interchangable in historic references to land battles... I dont know if that helps...  rdunnPLIB  15:20, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

It would never have occurred to me that anyone would want to put an s on the end of cannon but my four sources, Langenscheidt, Larousse, Pocket Oxford, and Chambers 20th Century all say that Cannon +s is an alternative plural. The forces of erudition have lost another battle. --ClemRutter (talk) 17:14, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

PROD rationale/etiquette

I was reviewing the PROD list recently and came across this. An article was being PROD'd for containing no information beyond a basic definition. OK. But a review of the edit history reveals that the PROD'er is the one who removed all unsourced and unencyclopedic information (paraphrase) from the article (a month prior to the PROD). Now, I have no problem with that, either. But wouldn't etiquette dictate that the original content be displayed to give people reviewing the PROD the opportunity to find sources for the information? Should the edit history be reverted to the last version of the article that contained content, then PROD based on the unsourced/unencyclopedic rationale? am I babbling, or is this coming across? Vulture19 (talk) 03:13, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

It does seem to be at least bad form for the same person to have removed much content and then prodded based upon little content. Aleta ^Sing 14:07, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Japanese TV navigational templates

Some user created navigational templates of the Japanese local television stations, something like TV-hokkaido, TV-kanto, TV-kinki and TV-kyushuoki. However, they are, speaking in evil, looks ugly. And for TV-kanto, it is duplicated with Kanto TV. -- JSH-alive ^{talk • cont • mail} 05:31, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requested templates is where the template guys hang out (and fix existing templates, despite what the page name may imply). -- John Broughton (♫♫) 17:08, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

'will probably' instead of 'will likely'

Hi. I am fairly new to this great Wikipedia, and I admit I'm prejudiced towards British English rather than American English . And you may think that what I'm suggesting is a small point, which in some ways it is ... but the text I'd propose be changed is seen by every editor, every time they create an article. If you go to an article that doesn't exist, for example jasdhfljhasdfk, and click "create this article", a message automatically appears at the top. It says:

• Before creating an article, please read Wikipedia:Your first article, or search for an existing article to which you can redirect this title.
• To experiment, please use the sandbox.
• When creating an article, provide references to reliable published sources. An article without references will likely be deleted quickly.

Now, to me, in that last sentence, the text "... will likely be deleted ..." is over-American, and I'd suggest it should be changed to "... will probably be deleted ...". This would read better for a British-English reader, whilst - I think I'm right in saying - still works fine for our US friends? Again, yes it's a small point but, as I said, it's seen by every editor, every time they create an article. Were the text in a template, I could be bold and change it. However, I don't think it's in a template, but somehow a function of the wiki software. I'd appreciate others' thoughts on this. Thanks. Trafford09 (talk) 10:49, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Better in what way? Likely seems better to me (from the U.S.) but there's also a subtle difference, in that likely doesn't have quite as much finality to it. What's wrong with it in the first place? ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 11:21, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

What's wrong with it is that, in standard British English, it's completely ungrammatical. It uses the adjective 'likely' as an adverb. I think our interface text should be valid in as many forms of English as can easily be achieved, so I'd support this change. Algebraist 13:31, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Wiktionary suggests "probably" is likely a better choice of a word in this usage. "Likely" is probably regarded as poor grammar, at least to the educated. So, are you saying you're better than me? I, better than I. --64.85.214.236 (talk) 15:05, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

I think we should reflect the truth. "... may be deleted ..." solves the problem, and is probably closer to reality. --ClemRutter (talk) 16:52, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

It's not particularly American or British. It's just ungrammatical. It should say...

• When creating an article, provide references to reliable published sources. An article without references is likely to be deleted quickly.

...then there would be no problem. "Probably" is not a good replacement because "probably" means there is "some chance" whereas "likely" means there is a "big chance". -- Derek Ross | Talk 17:03, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

"will likely" is incorrect in American grammar too. I agree that "is likely to" is a preferred usage, and I personally think that "may be deleted" would be most honest. Cool3 (talk) 20:04, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Next steps

Trafford09 (talk) 12:53, 26 March 2009 (UTC): Firstly, a big thank-you to all those who've offered a good spectrum of viewpoints, from both sides of the pond. The contributions seem to be dwindling now (but do please add your thoughts, no matter how late you are to the discussion). So, it's time to reflect. I seems to me that there is now a consensus that

• the existing wording is poor/ungrammatical, and that
• the wording should read: "... may quickly be deleted.".

This being so, if the perceived consensus remains as above after a day or so, then I'll undertake to follow this up on our behalf. I'm not too sure on WP protocol, but I imagine I'll need to raise it from an informal discussion to a formal WP-Proposal. Then I'll hope somebody knows how to make any necessary software change, to effect the proposed new wording. Thanks again to all contributors (and any further ones). Trafford09 (talk) 12:53, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

All that needs to be done is have the text changed for the MediaWiki interface page, which is something any admin can do. The talk page for this particular message can be found at MediaWiki talk:Newarticletext, and I've placed a message at the bottom asking an admin to change this. I think the discussion we've already had here is probably sufficient to establish the needed consensus. Cool three (talk) 14:56, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree it should be changed, per Trafford09. My preference would be; "is likely to be deleted" - which does indeed seem to satisfy everyone above, as far as I can tell. I would also be happy with "may be deleted".

While we're looking at it, I'd humbly suggest that the 2nd sentence would be better as;

• "An unreferenced article..." rather than "An article without references...".

--  Chzz  ►  15:33, 26 March 2009 (UTC) P.S. I am British-English

• The wording "article without references" makes clear the solution: add references. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 17:06, 26 March 2009 (UTC)