Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)

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The policy section of the village pump is used to discuss existing and proposed policies.

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Getting rid of fair use

(see Wikipedia:Fair use criteria --NealMcB 18:37, 6 June 2006 (UTC))

I'm seeing this issue come up over and over again. Most wikipedias prohibit fair use. Although I can see legit reasons to include some truly fair use images on en, I've observed that in practice it just leads to a whole lot of problems. A lot of people are claiming fair use for any image that they want to include, regardless of the legitimacy of the claim. A lot of people are spending time arguing over what is/is not fair use. I'm beginning to think that it's really just not worth it and it's greatly reducing the freeness of the english wikipedia. I know that a lot of people will object to depreciating fair use on wikipedia, but I also know that I've heard a lot of people voicing similar concerns to mine. How can we move towards putting this bad idea behind us? Matt 00:37, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm all for it, with one exception: when the image itself is the subject of an article, such as Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima. --Carnildo 03:59, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Err, that would be throwing the baby out with the bathwater. If we remove all fair use images, we'll leave a great many articles with no illustrations (perhaps permanently):

• Almost all articles dealing with modern art. This includes basically all movies, TV shows, paintings and other graphic arts, etc.
• Almost all articles dealing with fictional subjects.
• Many articles dealing with aspects of modern history not witnessed by US government photographers. Note that this would probably include all situations where the exact copyright status is unclear (e.g. Nazi photographs).
• And various others.

Aggressively pushing for free content is very good, of course; but let's not forget that we also want to be an encyclopedia, and one that can be competitive with commercial ones. Decimating our image libraries isn't really going to help in this regard. —Kirill Lokshin 05:02, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

I am not convinced that the "baby" in this case is all that valuable. We might end up with articles without illustration, so what? It would be interesting to see what percent of EB's articles include illustration (I don't know the answer to this). EB's article on Salvador Dalí (from what I can see from [1]) has no images. To say that we need "fair use" to compete with non-free publishers seems to me to be an argument for why a free encyclopedia can't be done. But de.wikipedia.org is doing it, and by most measures has been more succesful than en (unless you measure an encyclopedia by the number of pokemon articles). Matt 17:50, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

EB gets less than 1% of Wikipedia's hits so it is really rather insignificant as a competitor. We are competing with the whole (very well illustrated) www. Osomec 16:40, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

There is so much abuse of the "fair use" that we need a stronger wording that currently exist to discourage uploaders. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 04:44, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

NO! Getting rid of Fair Use will cripple Wikipedia. The IP laws are already restrictive enough, I don't see any reason not to take advantage of the little freedom we are given under law. We should encourage replacing Fair Use images where possible, but there are many instances where it is NOT possible ever (such as articles on video games and movies), where Fair Use is absolutely essential for a good article. Loom91 15:17, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

It is possible ever -- when the copyrights expire. Wikipedia would survive. It would also be more free, and more reproducable outside the US, both of which are healthy aims. Sam Korn ^(smoddy) 15:28, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Copyrights only expire theoretically—no copyright has expired during the lifetime of Wikipedia. Passage of the Copyright Term Extension Act in 1998 (and its international counterparts), and the failure of legal challenge to it, virtually guarantees that another extension effort will occur before 2019 (the next time that copyrights might expire). Making policy decisions based on the assumption that copyrights will eventually expire seems overly credulous. I think we have to assume that nothing presently copyrighted will ever transfer into the public domain. --TreyHarris 16:31, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Actually, that is incorrect. Current copyright law for individual works protects them for the life of the author plus 70 years (unless the "author" is a corporation and the work was a work for hire, in which case copyright lasts 95 years from the date of creation) at which time they enter the public domain. As of now, the work of every author who was a natural person and died before the end of 1935 is in the public domain; at the end of this year, the work of every author who was a natural person and died before the end of 1936 will be in the public domain; and so forth it will progress. BD2412 T 17:03, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

If an author died in 1936, then didn't copyright already expire at the end of 1986 under the old (1976) act? The 1998 act did not revive already-expired copyrights, so I believe TreyHarris is correct. Robert A.West (Talk) 17:28, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

If a) the work was originally published outside the US, and it was not in the public domain on 1 January 1996 in the country of publication, or b) the work was originally published in the US, and the copyright was appropriately registered and renewed according to US formalities . . . then the copyright is still valid, unless 70 years have elapsed since the death of the author. Any work that meets those criteria, whose author dies in 1937, will go into the public domain on 1 January 2007. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 18:49, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

OIC. Thanks. Robert A.West (Talk) 21:31, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

I think there's some intermediate choices. We could establish an arbitrary limit, like one-per-article (with some sort of special procedure for granting exceptions). Right now, there's no incentive to make free images, because so many articles are already crammed-full of non-free ones, which are usually "prettier" than the free ones. --Rob 15:37, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree getting stricter on fair use is a decent idea. i disagree with arbitary limits though. Screenshots and suchlike are essential to proper critical commentry on software products.

As for copyrights expiring yes that will happen eventually but for many things probablly not in our lifetimes. ALSO if we get rid of non-free images now then we still won't have them when thier copyrights expire unless someone else archived them! Plugwash 16:25, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

I'd propose allowing fair use images only when the following conditions are all satisfied A) it is a genuine fair use claim; no legal problems for Wikipedia; B) there is a compelling argument that the image is necessary to illustrate the article, and C) there is a compelling argument that a free alternative is either impossible to obtain, or it is highly unlikely that we could ever obtain one through reasonable means (however you define that!) — Matt Crypto 23:38, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

Why not use fair use where it is permisible, and there is no more open alternative? Why not take advantage of rights that are given under existing copyright law? Aggressive deletion of useful images for copyright-panic reasons only impoverishes us. For great justice. 20:12, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

I think we need to keep fair use until technology makes long range digital camera a reality. --Masssiveego 01:25, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

What is "long range digital camera"??? Arniep 12:07, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

My main concern regarding this, although I oppose it as per Kirill Lokshin, is what it would do to the books included in Wikipedia. Right now, the WikiProject Novels template is to use an infobox on the page of articles relating to novels, and these infoboxes include a picture of the cover of the first edition of the novel. I am concerned regarding the complications the elimination of fair use would cause for this project. While getting stricter is a decent idea, anything that would eliminate illustrations from articles, book covers from articles on books, and other such truly legitimate, fair uses would, indeed, be throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Users do not have the right to upload whatever they feel like, but the concept of fair use is an extremely important one. Abhorsen327 03:43, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

I don't see any reason to restrict Fair Use images beyond what the law will allow. There is no compelling argument in Matt's original post beyond "it's not worth the hassle". If this hassles anyone, I urge you to go do something else. There are tons of articles to write and proof and merge. Concentrate on something out of the modern era and you won't run up against as many image copyright problems.

Matt goes on to say "We might end up with articles without illustration, so what?". Can Matt or anyone else make a case that an encyclopedia should be just words?? Images are not only snazzy, pretty, and make a fine looking article, but are absolutely essential for understanding some subjects (e.g. Modern Art). Period.

It is suicide to drop Fair Use images because "they aren't worth it". Sheesh Madman 20:56, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

What about a preference tab for which class of licenses for images you want? Then someone wanting to browse for material not legal in their jurisdiction could just not see the ones they don't want. For great justice. 04:21, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

keep the fair use. It's a legal issue and the law is on our side. Giving up our rights does not help us--or any one else. Fair use is essential to every reference work. Rjensen 05:00, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

There is no such thing as a fair use right. Fair use is only a defense against copyright infringement. Almost no use is 'fair' until it is challenged in court and upheld as such. There is nothing that prevents content owners/distributors from taking away your supposed rights. DRM does precisely this when it restricts you from copying a song onto your iPod (the court-established fair use of 'space shifting'). It is precisely this legal ambiguity which is such a bane to the goal of creating a FREE encyclopedia. Anyone seeking to freely use en content has to weigh the costs of verifying the free status of such content. As Lessig points out in Free Culture, independently produced movies sometimes have to edit out scenes featuring use that would clearly be considered 'fair'. When they sign a distribution deal, the movie's creators are required to enumerate EVERY shot that could conceivably constitute any kind of copyright infringement risk. They are then forced to buy copyright insurance, in case claims were ever brought against the movie. In this case, the very risk that content MIGHT not constitute fair use renders it completely unusable. Audiodude 04:55, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

we give up fair use and Wiki is dead. Indeed, all reference works are dead. Giving up fair use means outsideres control what we are allowed to say about them. It is the oldest and most prized right regarding reference books and the courts have (nearly) always upheld us. The advantages of forfeiture? close to zero. Rjensen 05:07, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

While I think we should retain fair use here, if I'm not mistaken, some of the other wikis don't allow fair use and are working just fine. For example (and someone correct me if I'm wrong) the Italian wiki doesn't allow fair use images. There isn't any need for hyperbole. JoshuaZ 05:10, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

Correct. Most foreign language wikis attempt to conform both to the laws of the US (where the servers live), and the laws of the most prominent country or countries speaking that language, so that wiki content can be easily reused there. Most countries outside the US don't have a fair use provision; instead, many European countries rely on the more stringent notion of fair dealing. Also, I think some wikis may, like Commons, allow neither fair use nor fair dealing, so that only truly copyright free content is allowed. Dragons flight 05:20, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

I think the bottomline of this discussion is that we should exercise tight control over the fair use claims (such as only allowing a fixed set of fair use templates, screenshots, Nazis, etc., with strict patrolling for misplaced templates) and attempt to minimize the fair use images used. Maybe it should be policy that if there is a free/copyleft image and a fair use image both illustrating the same subject, we will discard the unfree image even if it is of superior quality. We should aim at having articles that would still be good if they were stripped of nonfree images (for example for the purpose of a derivative product, future "purist" fork, WP 1.0 on CD, etc.) dab (ᛏ) 13:58, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

I just think there are way too many supposedly 'fair use' images that are used for strictly illustrative (rather than critical, comparative, or instructional) purpose, ESPECIALLY on articles discussing aspects of popular culture or media. I would go so far as to say that a copyrighted album cover is unnecessary (and in fact detrimental for the legal ambiguities it introduces), unless of course there is something notable about the cover art which is discussed in the article Audiodude 19:28, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

Retaining the fair-use limits is non-negotiable as removing that limitation has the potential to disrupt future derivative projects and in contradiction with the GFDL. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 00:09, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

Fair use is an absolute must. Kill it off and you kill off Wikipedia. We should be living within the law, not making up our own rules that are more restrictive than the law. That makes no sense whatsoever. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 14:33, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Kirill Lokshen and rjensen are absolutely right. Furthermore, if there is really a great need for a Wikipedia compatible with the laws of every country in the world, then maybe an automatic script can be used to generate a Wikipedia Censored Version specifically for those applications. Just strip out every image with a Fair Use tag. While you're at it, you can strip out troubling usages of terms like "Tiananmen" and "Jesus", and so on... Doesn't it make more sense to start with a Wikipedia that can be dumbed down on command than one which would have to become the object of a brand new US-Wiki-Fairuse project to spruce it back up again? Also, if people lie about whether content is "fair use", they could lie about whether it was "public domain". The industry has gotten everything it's asked for, including a power to send 48-hour DMCA take-down notices whenever they want - so isn't that level of blind obedience from Wikipedia sufficient? Mike Serfas 05:18, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

(arriving late to the conversation) Unfortunately, while I enjoy the images on Wikipedia, I sometimes think they're more trouble than they are worth. Note, as just one example, the edit war over the lead image at Wonder Woman that occurred recently. A similar case of musical images occurred at Audrey Hepburn. Then you have people using Wiki-webspace as their own personal storage site for images. But on top of it all there is also the fact that there are so many restrictions on Fair Use that it is making it very difficult to find images of anything that fits the criteria. For example, I am presently involved in an edit war (not really - I won't go to 3RR with it) at an article about a minor model. The issue - the fact that the illustration for the article is an example of her work -- a magazine cover. To remove the magazine cover pretty much removes any need for there to be an image on the page. Yet the image tag for magazine covers has been revised at some point recently to say that magazine covers can only be used when discussing the magazine, not the subject matter of the cover (or its photographer, for that matter). And I've already informed the user wanting to delete the magazine cover that he'll need to delete a bunch more in [[Category:American models]]. (He subsequently replied that this is indeed his plan - to remove all magazine images from Wikipedia that aren't specifically used in articles about said magazines. This upset me enough that I was about to put forward a policy suggestion to remove images in toto from Wikipedia. It just slows down things anyway -- think of the bandwidth this place would save if we went to all-text. And everyone in the copyright police would be happy ... sorry for sounding sarcastic, but we editors put in a lot of time and effort to find images that make this place worth using as a resource, with no intention of making monetary gain of any of them, and all we get for our trouble is people saying "sorry, you can't use it." To heck with it. I'm tempted to take down every image I've uploaded to this place. 23skidoo 04:07, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Template:Magazinecover has been in its current version since 02:30, 31 January 2006. There is no need to go all text under any conditions. We have many GFDL and PD images.Geni 04:42, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

arriving very late - I believe it is aquestion if it is for documentation purpose, or if it is really underminig a commercial service. Pictures of public available objects, in low resolution, are not very protectionworthy. Someone can take a picture of the eiffel tower easily. Nike sneakers (sorry) are in virtually 1000's of shops. Copyright restrictions are most likley there to sharply prohibit defacing usage (this is not scientific/documentary). This is my opinion of fair usage (not to take it literally). I am sourcing lots of things personally, i do not mind about things which are anyway provided for no charge, but might get unavailable at some point of time. However i know this is not allowed officially, even prohibited. I do include a visible tag of news agencies, in a way their representants would never do. In 70 years, these files become PD probably. Some things like egyptology are not meant to be a commercial stream, i believe sourcing from this is fair use in a meaning of sense. PD allows defacing etc., fair use does not. Check latest gas prices (political remark). See fansites/BBS (they source a lot of copyrighted data, this is tolerated, unwritten rules apply) - User:Akidd_dublin 8 may 2006

• I believe it would both help keep the community running well by limiting our interaction with laws that the community has proven to not understand very well and help us produce an encyclopedia with genuinely free content to eliminate our use of fair use, either with a grandfather clause or without. --Improv 17:24, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

  I agree with Kirill Lokshin. However, the two new CSDs for fair use images do constitute a tightening of the rules. If you take out fair use altogether, people will still keep uploading images, they'll just tag them as {{NoRightsReserved}} or some other tag that'll keep the bots off them; there are so few people on new upload patrol that it's trivially easy to bypass most restrictions anyway.

  Just a couple of other comments: fair use is definitely being unfairly abused at the moment. The most egregiously bad category is Category:Fair use magazine covers, followed closely by Category:Screenshots of web pages. Magazine covers can only be used under fair use in an illustration of or critical commentary on the magazine, not the person on the cover. Web screenshots, similar, except replace "the magazine" with "that website".

  Overall, we don't need tighter fair use policies, we need to enforce the policies we have. Stifle (talk) 08:50, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

  • It is NOT true that fair use of magazine covers requires a commentary of the magazine. In history articles they are used to demonstrate the importance of the person (as TIME person of the week). That is fair use. Rjensen 10:11, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

I think we should keep fair use. A lot of movie posters, etc. can't be replaced by non-fair use images (I'm 99.9% sure on that). --M1ss1ontomars2k4 | T | C | @ 04:26, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

I strongly support use of fair use. Thanks to it en-Wikipedia is much better illustrated then the more restrictive Wiki, and I have yet to see any serious problems stemming from it. We are worrying way to much about problems that have not happened yet. Once in every - what? thousand? - images we get a letter requesting that the image is to be removed. We do so, or negotiate a settlement that makes both parties happy. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 20:25, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Compare images on these English Wikipedia articles Beatles, Andy Warhol, and Batman to those on the German Wikipedia (de:Beatles, de:Andy Warhol, and de:Batman). You'll see what a big difference Fair Use makes. Madman 20:30, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

This is something that isn't widely understood on Wikipedia yet, nor is there a policy page yet addressing it, but without fair use, we couldn't substantively describe the story or characters from any work of fiction. Fair use is not just about pictures or verbatim quotes of text. Postdlf 17:34, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Quite correct. From my understanding, the German Wikipedia does permit the German equivalent of fair use, which happens to be much narrower. It bars fair use mainly, as far as I know, because it might be illegal for Germans to upload and view things that are illegal under German law but legal under US law. (The German copyright policy page says something to the effect of "Fair use is an American thing, so we don't use it", not "Fair use is unfree, so we don't use it".) Banning fair use entirely would be impossible if we want to have articles about copyrighted works. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 02:38, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Fair use is important; fair use is good. Fair use is an extremely important principle that balances the copyright against the rights of the public. It is wise, fair, and just that we avail ourselves of this.

My personal opinion is that copyright law, as it now stands, is just plain foolish; it needs a complete reworking, top to bottom. Nobody should be barred from experiencing a mediation simply because someone wants to profit from that experience. If food could be duplicated as easily and cheaply as we can duplicate digital photos and music, would we demand that any person starve? Is food more important than ideas?

But my personal opinion is irrelevant; we must work within the law as we find it. Within these restrictions, I wholeheartedly support all actions that extend maximum content to the largest possible audience.

Fair use does not form an effective defense under the law in many cases. Claims of fair use on user page content must almost certainly fail. Display of a copyrighted photo of an apple on Apple is not fair use. We ought not encourage invalid claims and should work to reduce them.

Fair use is a highly complex field of legal study and I suggest that we not play jailhouse lawyer here. We should retain the services of a copyright lawyer, experienced in the field; pay him what he's worth; and ask him to write competent guidelines for us. (I'm uninterested in volunteer labor here, even if the contributing editor can manage to prove his competence: free legal advice is worth what you pay for it.) Let's insert expert legal guidelines on fair use straight into policy and then resign ourselves to the continuous, ongoing task of enforcing that policy. John Reid 05:56, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Seems a sound suggestion to me. Legal advice before the fact is nearly always cheaper. Since this involved spending foundation money, how does one go about proposing it? Robert A.West (Talk) 17:32, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Generally you'd go ask some on the Board to bring it up at a meeting. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 18:58, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Two things here. First of all, I see no reason to retain a paid lawyer when we have several lawyers who are willing to work for us unpaid (see m:Legal department). Second of all, the WMF is not going to be liable for pretty much any copyvios anyone posts, unless they're formally asked to take them down—see OCILLA. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 18:58, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Trigger Happy

Dear Administrator:

I, like you, am an editor; I create articles and make edits. But, many, I am sure many other people out there, are tired, frustrated and angry with the behavior of many Administrators. I am certain that it is appallingly easy to revert an article, that someone has undoubtedly spent allot of time and effort writing. I have, in the past spent hours, researching, planning, writing, checking and revising an addition to an article only to have the whole lot deleted forever three minutes afterwards.

I know that deletion of material is essential in a free-to-edit encyclopedia, but if you see an article that someone has anonymously devoted their time to writing, why could you not revise it, change it or give a reason for you action? They deserve one.

I know all Administrators are not all Drunk-With-Power-Trigger-Happy-Nazis, many of you do an excellent job and you know who you are.

In closing: Create, don’t Destroy. Make a distinction between “what is right, and what is easy”. Be enriched and enrich others with the knowledge of other people.

And keep that finger off the trigger.

Dfrg.msc 01:44, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

• Seconded. You've expressed very concisely my dissatisfaction with a number of editors over the past, not only administrators. Obviously the admin who is most guilty of this is Tony Sidaway. THE KING 15:38, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
  • KING, consider this a warning: stop making personal attacks. Even when I'm not the subject myself,[2] I still get rather tired of seeing you wage your campaign against Tony every opportunity you have. You've had numerous people tell you your conduct along these lines is unacceptable; now knock it off or be blocked. Postdlf 01:10, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
• First, in addressing administrators you are addressing the wrong people. Anyone can do the edits that you are upset about, not just administrators. Second, I've taken a brief look at some of the contributions that you feel have been unfairly removed. They tend to sit in the area of literary criticism and the counter-arguments to your contributions seem to be 'please don't add your personal critique' or 'please no essays' or 'POV', that type of thing. When I first read your post here I thought "gee, someone is doing deep research, dotting i's and crossing t's and getting dumped on". As it is, your additions are on the borderline of acceptable encyclopedic content, sometimes crossing over that border; the surest way of ensuring the content 'sticks' is to contribute content that is notable, verifiable and supported by citations/references. You'll find that additions which have those three properties are very seldom subject to questionable removal, though they will be 'dry' compared to essays and critiques more appropriate for other venues. User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 00:52, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

• If THE KING is guilty of making personal attacks here, then the arbcom is guilty of the same thing everytime they make a ruling of someone with bad behavioir. And everyone who has ever left a {{test2}} message on talk page is also guilty of personal attacks. Saying that someone is not behaving appropriately is not a personal attack, especially when there is merit to the claim. Please review WP:NPA before you make accusations. Chuck^(contrib) 02:33, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

  I agree with Chuck. Criticism of someone's actions, provided it remains civil, isn't a personal attack. Whether Tony is actually guilty of these offenses, I won't comment on. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:00, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I also agree with Chuck, and I agree that there are many people who abuse the ability to revert. In my experience it is almost always admins, or people who have enough experience to be admins, who do it. In some cases I see people who have lots they want to do, and rather than take their time to do them well, quicken their pace to the point of incompetence. Editors, and especially admins, should be reminded that they are not wikigods, but are equal editors. I myself have been told that admins are above regular editors, with a note I believe was "don't kid yourself" or something to that effect. I won't mention names, cause I've done it in more appropriate places enough. Fresheneesz 00:38, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

• Please try to stay on topic here; it is quite easy to tumble off the reservation in short order. Being an avid contributor, I share the sentiments expressed by Dfrg.msc; as such, I would appreciate it if the conversation is centered around the initial concern which was expressed about a fortnight ago... --Folajimi 14:36, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps instituting something like a three vote rule on reverts? That would prevent unilateral action, and bad edits would still get reverted soon enough. RandomIdiot 14:32, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

A three-vote rule might work for other things, but that seems like a bit too much red tape for something as useful as a revert. For example, there are many people (I have been one) that did not understand the rules to Wikipedia and have made awful edits that simply needed to be removed immediately. If it had waited for three votes, some of the articles were sufficiently lacking in traffic that it would've taken weeks. Also revert wars would end with the side that had the most people on it, and just because more people argue for something doesn't mean it's correct. --Stellis 08:32, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Truer words have never been spoken; there is a redirect which I wanted to remove so I could create an actual article from scratch. This was over four months ago, and nothing new has occured in the interim. The additional bureaucracy is unnecessary. Folajimi 10:40, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Use of American v. British/Commonwealth English

Moved to Wikipedia:Village pump (perennial proposals)#Use of American v. British/Commonwealth English, since it has come up numerous times since I have been here. Steve block Talk 22:29, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Metric versus American/Imperial measurements

See also Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style#SI/Imperial measurements --Philip Baird Shearer 22:36, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Since this language's version of Wikipedia is the only to cover a country which does not use SI measurements (and in fact, a supermajority of native english speakers do not), it should be the policy of Wikipedia for all articles to include both metric and American units in all pages where measurements are used. If there is a page lacking in this, it should be noted by a template. R'son-W 07:14, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm inclined to very reluctantly agree. As horrible as the customary units are, Wikipedia can't change popular usage. On the other hand, I think that there are large categories of articles that do not need customary units (even if this proposal were implemented), such as those in astronomy. Ardric47 07:22, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm fine with people adding adding a conversion, but I don't want a new template, as it would just be needless clutter. People wishing to add conversions, can easily do so themselves. I don't want to see hundreds (even thousands) of pages tagged with a new template. --Rob 07:38, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

To clarify what I said above, I'm agreeing with the policy to include both units, not to have a template. Ardric47 07:41, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Since when did the US not use metric units? What is habitual and what is actual policy are two different things entirely, and the US government deisgnated the SI system as the preferred one 18 full years ago. Further, go right ahead and tell me the speed of light in feet per second. We all know it moves at 300.000km/s, meaning 300.000.000m/s, meaning 300.000.000.000mm/s. Now, equally swiftly, without a calculator, tell me what this is in miles/sec, yards/sec, feet/sec and finally, let's not forget the smallest (and my, how accurate it is too) unit available; inches/sec. To put some more emphasis on the great accuracy of the CUs, how many inches is an average sinarapan? Over a span of 3 unit denominators, it's 12,5mm, 1,25 cm, and 0,125m. How many inches, feet and yards is this? My points are; 1: If you want to trawl all Wikipedia articles for occurances of units not provided in customary units, go right ahead. However, the sheer volume of Wikipedia, and the complete lack of logic in finding the lesser unit of what you currently have, means you've got a nice life's work cut out for you. Enjoy. 2: In an encyclopedia, accuracy - not the habits and quirks of one user group (which by the way happens to claim majority (which is equally false, as you clearly know, and that cleverly adjusting your statistics to show native English-speakers won't change the fact that most of the world still uses BrE, having been, as it were, under British rule or influence for longer than the US has been a country.)) - should be priority. --TVPR 08:09, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Actually it's 299,792,458m/s. Fagstein 17:31, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

That's not the only thing (s)he's wrong on. Actually, the US gov't has supported the metric system since La Convention du mètre. But, the government isn't the same as its people, and only a negligable minority of Americans want to switch to metric. Also, "everyone" knows that the speed of light is 300,000,000 m/s? One, I didn't know that (and you were wrong about that anyways), and I doubt if you stopped anyone on the street, in a metric country or in America and said, "Hey! What's the speed of light?" I doubt they could respond. But that's beside the point. No, Americans don't use the metric system. R'son-W 00:27, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

The term "American units" is a misnomer. Most British people still use them in everyday usage as well, despite Britain being "officially" (and generally reluctantly) metric. And many things in the UK, including our roadsigns, are still officially in imperial units (it's actually illegal to use only metric units on roadsigns), so let's not have any false claims that it's only the United States that uses these units. -- Necrothesp 09:30, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Does Britan use US customary units? I realize they're similar, if not identical, but still. Starting 3 years from now, any product marked with non-SI units will be banned from import into the EU. That ought to help. --TVPR 09:37, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

The one thing Britain is is confused. I measure distance in mm, cm, m and mile... However, back to the point - Britain is very much a metric country, imperial units have not been taught at school for decades. The mile and pint really are the last remaining official uses...

Imperial units are taught in British schools, including conversions between metric and imperial. I know because I have taught it, and it is still on the National Curriculum. Captainj 21:50, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

However the Imperial units in Britain are different to "American units". Our pint isn't your pint (20 vs 16 fl oz), our gallon isn't yours, our ton isn't yours... Get the point? If not take a read of Comparison of the Imperial and U.S. customary systems/wangi 09:47, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Britain, as I said, is officially metric. But in practice it is not, even for those (like myself) who were taught metric units at school, but wouldn't dream of using them unless forced (the only people I've ever heard using metric measurements in day-to-day life have been scientists). Those who claim otherwise are usually evangelical (and rather delusional) metric fans who don't want to accept that their beloved system isn't popular. Also note that Imperial measurements of length, area and basic weight (the ounce and pound) are identical to the American. My main point, however, was not to claim that British and American systems were identical (although some parts of it are), but to counter the arguments that the United States is the only country that retains non-metric measurements. -- Necrothesp 10:03, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Well I guess It's personal/generation issue. I'd just like to make it known we're not all imperial unit monkeys ;) As for being evangelical or delusional, I personally couldn't care - I'd measure my height in feet and inches; my weigth in kilos; the distance to my house in miles; the size of a room to the nearest unit (e.g. 8ft x 6m); liquids in litres, unless I'm drinking a pint; and when shopping metric... /wangi 10:21, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm British. I accept that my beloved metric system (?) isn't popular in Britain. I think in the metric system. If I add some figures to an article, I'm not going to bother with non-metric units. If somebody wants to add a non-metric "translation", that won't bother me. If on the other hand somebody wants to give priority to his or her beloved antique metrology, thereby relegating my own beloved metrology to parentheses, I shall get annoyed. But of course I mustn't show my annoyance, must I? -- Hoary 11:11, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm always amused when people describe the Imperial system as an antique while favouring a system developed in the 18th century! -- Necrothesp 11:38, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Point taken. Me, I'm amused when the more antique mishmash is referred to as the "Imperial system". But then I reflect that there's some truth to it, as we're all under pax (?) Americana these days. -- Hoary 12:54, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Blah, common sense should prevail. We don't need Imperial units (or US Standard for that matter) in all articles, anything science related should be in SI, anything else should be in whatever people decide on the page. I'm 22 and from the UK, and I still use feet/inches, pints, stone etc. The decision of what to include should be worked out on article talk pages, but I would strongly object to a blanket policy of having Imperial or US Standard in parentheses. - FrancisTyers 22:49, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Units should be dealt with on the WikiProject level. A universal policy could never account for all the idiosyncracies you get in specialized fields. Melchoir 10:08, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

I think all articles should use metric. The English WP is available to billions of English speakers around the world, often speaking English as a second language. SI is international - that is its point. If people would like to add their own local units too (particularly when referring to local issues), I won't mind that. Stephen B Streater 12:33, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

How about:

Where the original form of a measurement is known it should be specified first with conversions in brackets. Where the original form is not known and there are no other overriding considerations (e.g. local conventions in local articles) metric should be placed first with the conversions in brackets. Ambiguous units like the ton and the gallon should be avoided where possible and when they are included they should always be clarified.

-- Plugwash 13:56, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Plugwash 13:56, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

All articles should use both metric and American units (in the case of ambiguous units such as gallons, clearly designated as being American if you can't use a more commonly-used non-SI unit). This provides maximum information with minimum clutter. Many of our readers are not familiar enough with the metric system to understand units given only in metric, and many (probably most) are not familiar enough with American units to understand units given only in American units. What governments say is completely irrelevant; it's our readers that we're here to serve.

As for specialized fields, Wikipedia serves a general audience, not just specialists. Even if American physicists always use the metric system for physics, other Americans/Brits/Canadians/etc. (almost no former British colonies are fully converted to SI) will also want to read and understand the article.

The only exception to this rule is when the units involved are so ridiculously beyond what we use in everyday life that normal units are insufficient or the differences are negligible; our readers don't need to be told that 1.41679 × 10³² K equals 2.55022 × 10³² °F, or that 130 light years equals 7.6427 × 10¹⁴ miles—nothing is gained in comprehensibility from that. But the density of mercury, that's something that should be in both metric and American/imperial units. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 03:59, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

Actually, a number of former British colonies such as India (AFAIK), Malaysia, Singapore are IMHO more or less fully converted to SI. What non-SI usage exists is predominantly not imperial either. I expect it's the same in other African former colonies as well (not sure about South Africa). Even here in NZ (although it'd difficult to say since I spent most of my life in Malaysia and I'm a scientist) I would say we're mostly metric. True the older generation may still prefer imperial but by and large, I would say the younger generation uses metric almost exclusively. Perhaps body weight and height might be one exception although even that probably not that great (common) an exception. I believe Australia is similar as well. Also, significantly I expect you're far more likely to find someone who understand metric in most instances but not imperial then someone who understand imperial but not metric. And as others have point out, our readers likely includes a very large number of non native English speakers (such as many of the Indians, Malaysian, Singaporeans that I pointed out as well as Chinese, French, Spaniards etc etc). These by and large will understand SI but not imperial. I'm not rallying against the inclusion if imperial but simply pointing out that SI in fact probably has much more merit then imperial and SI are probably preferred by most of our readers. Nil Einne 04:29, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

By "fully converted to SI" I meant that generally imperial units of some type remain in use at least in certain limited contexts (such as height and weight, or of course older people). I certainly agree SI would be the preferable system if we had to use only one (Americans are taught SI in school, so most could probably do conversions with some thought), but thankfully we don't. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 23:55, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Two points. I reinforce the plea that if a unit like the pint (which differs between the US and other countries) is used, it should be explained which is meant, ideally with a conversion into the other sort. And there is often more than one metric unit. The density of mercury is about 13.6 grammes (grams?) per cubic centimetre in cgs units and 13,600 kilogrammes per cubic metre in SI units; probably, most people would prefer the former, although scientists usually use SI. The official unit astronomers use to measure distances to stars is the parsec, although common usage prefers the light year; neither is strictly an SI unit. Runcorn 19:38, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

I'd love to use American or Imperial units but they get so complex once you get beyond basic stuff - working with measurements trying to work out if they are eights or twelths, long or short tons, and how many pints to the quart anyway? Not to mention fathams and furlongs, bushels and chains. But I'm an adult, and most of the time I've got a fair idea what people are talking about. If I want to know what the exact converion is, I'll pull out the calculator. I can cope with whatever anyone writes. One point though. English is the international language with probably more ESL speakers than native speakers. And SI is the international system of measurement. --Michael Johnson 14:35, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

I think the preceding discussion is well meaning, but short on facts. When people say things like "most of our readers" I wonder where the numbers are to back up these claims. Note that we have guidelines on this topic at Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Scientific style and Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Units of measurement which say sometimes SI units are mandatory and that conversions should not be removed. If you want to add conversions to articles, I suggest adding them as you find them or organizing a wikiproject to do so. -- cmh 15:39, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Just two points to add: all packaged goods in Britain are labelled in metric, although loose goods can be ordered in Imperial. I drink pints of beer but buy milk in litres, I think in Fahrenheit, but everybody else I know thinks in Celsius. Secondly, as Michal Johnson implies, Wiki En probably has a large ESL readership. In fact judging by many of the contributions, Wiki En is frequently written by non-native speakers (look at any article concerning a non-English speaking country). Recipe books can manage multiple measurements, why limit Wiki En to one continent?

The presumption that SI units are not widely used in the USA really applies to the household. Many industries have converted to SI, especially industries engaged in international trade. On the other hand, there is one area of high technology where inches are in common use, computer printers, with terms such as dots per inch and pixels per inch. Gerry Ashton 21:28, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

I think that in every place it is relevant that we should use both metric and American measurements. Metric may be used in the majority of the world, but a large percentage of people on the English Wikipedia are from the United States and have no sense of scale in the metric system, no matter how much they see it in their life. Foreign articles as well as American articles should use it. Finding conversion calculators online is ridiculously easy, so look one up, convert the two measurements, and put it into the article. And the wide availability of these things shouldn't be an excuse not to put them on here, as this is an encyclopedia and should be as NPOV as possible, and should accomodate as many people as possible. I don't want to look up a conversion calculator every time I see "163 kilometers" or "26 degrees Celsius" or whatever. I want to be able to know what the American measurement right there, and if I used metric measurements and it only had Imperial on the page, I would want to see the Metric conversion. bob rulz 23:54, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

I think that Wikipedia should explicitly favor metric measurements, as they are universal and (despite what Bob says) more easily understood and converted. As has been pointed out, there are significant divergences within US/Imperial units, in particular liquid measurement, but also the long/short ton, and not all units are widely understood (stone, furlong). I'd have no objection to customary units being given alongside metric ones.  ProhibitOnions  ^(T) 11:30, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

The problem with favoring any one system of measurements over another is that no single system is appropriate for all possible topics. The dimensions to Noah's Ark are specified in cubits, Hadrian's Wall used roman miles to space its milecastles, the National Maximum Speed Limit is specified in Miles per hour, and there is no Jules Verne book titled 111200 Kilometers Under the Sea. Other articles depend on sources that use acres, fathoms, hands, li, or picas. Trying to shoehorn these dimensions into SI units is not only elitist, but in many cases will violate Wikipedia:Verifiability. Instead of forcing everything into a single system, each article needing to list some type of measurement should use a measurement appropriate to the subject's nature, place, and time in history. It is only when this is done that conversions to aid the reader should be added. --Allen3 ^talk 13:58, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

No, this is the same anti-metric argument given by people who think we'd have to sing "I'd walk 1,609,300 kilometers for one of your smiles"... Of course, articles should use non-metric units if the article is a) about those units b) about something that frequently uses non-metric units (such as, say, pipe widths, or certain sports, although metric equivalents should be given), or c) uses historic material or direct quotations that refer to such units. But if none of these criteria are met, then metric units should be the primary ones used.  ProhibitOnions  ^(T) 22:39, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Your statement that metric units are "more easily understood" is quite simply wrong when it comes to a large percentage of our readers. Americans, as well as to a substantially lesser extent Brits/Canadians/Australians, do not understand metric units as well as they understand imperial units. You were born in Britain and currently live in Germany; if you were born and lived in America, you would not think metric units are more easily understood. The only thing that's easily understood by all our readers is metric plus imperial, and that's why we should always use that. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 04:47, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I'm a US citizen, and know well how "confusing" many Americans wrongly assume the metric system to be. However, starting from a position of unfamiliarity, metric units are more easily understood, as they are far more logical, are interrelated, and are based on multiples of ten, and are likely to be understood by a far greater number of the billion or so fluent speakers of English, including a good number of educated Americans. (Thanks for reading my biography, but I never make it clear how long I've lived anywhere. It's a little like the userbox debate.)  ProhibitOnions  ^(T) 08:06, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

In the UK, we are increasingly using metric units. Food has to be sold in metric units now, except in important cases (eg of beer). Petrol (!) is sold in litres. Energy is measured in kW hours. However, precious metal are still in $/Troy Oz. Are people in the US becoming increasingly metric as they get more internationalised? Stephen B Streater 08:23, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

There are exactly two metric units in everyday usage in the US: multi-serving bottles of soda are sold in liters, and electricity is measured in kilowatt-hours. Everything else is US Customary. --Carnildo 09:50, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

A large reason for the shift in the UK is due to European Economic Community's packaging regulations. Although European trade regulations have some influence on American companies (it's easier to make one package that is salable both in the EU and in the US, and the EU's regulations are more strict), the influence is not nearly so strong as in the UK. — Saxifrage ✎ 05:33, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

American packaging regulations mandate metric units alongside non-metric units. See Fair Packaging and Labeling Act and the US government fact sheet. bobblewik 00:14, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Don't forget that vast numbers of British people still prefer traditional units, and in many cases traditional units are generally used even by young British people, eg human heights in feet and inches and speeds in miles per hour. To a great degree SI has been imposed against the will of the British public, but Wikipedia is a public resource and does not have to defer to official dictat. "English as she is spoke" is just as valid as "English as Big Brother would have it spoke". Piccadilly 18:20, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

I strongly agree that SI and imperial units should be used alongside one another. This is simply for the benefit of those people who are not able to understand both systems easily, and there are a great deal of these. Many Canadians, for example, particularly the younger generation, associate no particular meaning with Faernheit temperatures. However, many Americans I have communicated with are extremely confused when I report thirty-five degrees Celcius as boiling hot, thinking it quite near the freezing point of water. Neither system is at all universal and therefore both should be used. Falcon 22:41, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Both systems, no tag. Conversion tools are widely available; use them. Don't tag problems; fix them. John Reid 06:07, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

It seems to me a similar issue occured with users preferred date format. In this case Wikipedia automatically displays the date in the users preferred format (assuming the date is wikified). Could we do something similar here. Set everything up in metric but use templates (or something) to either do the coversion on the fly or to provide a link to a page that gave the conversions.--MarkS (talk) 17:39, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Given that Wikipedia prohibits original research, most "measurements", I would think, would be taken out of other published sources. In which case, the appropriate thing to do is to provide them in the units in which they were originally presented--if the source includes SI units, so should the Wikipedia article, and likewise for the "traditional" units. Go ahead and provide conversions, but the conversion should be listed second and it should be clearly indicated that it is a conversion performed by Wikipedia editors. (If a source includes a measurement in multiple systems, then Wikipedia should take both measurements from the source).

Given that any measurement will have an uncertainty, and that unit conversions will often add to that uncertainty (the alternative is reporting the conversion with more significant digits than is warranted), publication of the unconverted values is key.

One place which might warrant presenting converted units ahead of unconverted units is the case where measurements from different sources (in different systems, and/or with different uncertainties) are compiled and aggregated into a single Wikipedia article. Displaying them with the same units, for presentation purposes, is appropriate. However, it should be obvious when conversions occur.

--EngineerScotty 17:50, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Without intending any disrespect, I'd suggest you don't fully understand what "original research" was intended to apply to. I find the largest problem among many Wiki-Police is not comprehending the intent of rules and regulations rather than the practical applications. On the other hand, I agree with using the original measurements (ie distances given in yards rather than metres when discussing, say, First World War battles) but the conversion of units from one system to another hardly constitutes "original research." Michael Dorosh 21:05, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

You might have misunderstood what I meant by "original research". I'm not suggesting that multiplying inches by 2.54 to arrive at centimeters constitutes "research" (and therefore Wikipedia editors ought to refrain from doing such); I'm merely observing that most quantities reported in Wikipedia are (per WP:NOR) necessarily taken from some other source; and suggesting that the units present in the original source ought to be preserved. I'm all for adding conversions for the benefit of the reader (in both directions, when appropriate). Quantities which aren't taken from external sources (or trivially derived from other sources, or patently obvious) would need to be justified as to their origins. Measurements taken by a Wikipedia editor clearly would be OR; calculations performed on existing data to derive new data may or may not be. As to what level of calculation on the part of an editor constitutes "research", I don't know. Certainly, units conversion, simple averages, and other stuff like that doesn't rise to the level of "research", though more advanced statistcal analyses of raw data, especially from disparate data sets, might well be. --EngineerScotty 17:49, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Just have to throw in my 2 cents: I learned the speed of light on the Imperial system, and it's easier to remember it in six digits rather than nine. I have to start doing lots of multiplication when I convert it to km/h, since all I remember 186,282 miles per second. I'd say, don't use a template, but convert when you see it so that both systems are in evidence. Sacxpert 08:23, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Userbox collectors

This is the 2nd time I run into a case of this. Can't remember the first user. But I would likt to mention User talk:Wootking. It seems this person is adding himself to any type of WikiProject he can find, and collecting userboxes of projects and other UBX. However he has not made ONE single edit to an article. His account was created only 2 weeks ago. Now the fact that he collects userboxes i can care less about, but the fact that he is adding himself to all those WikiProjects is annoying, in that it clutters up the Project. It's not a real problem, but I was wondering if other people have seen similar problems lately. It almost seems like a bot (considering the bad formatting of the page). - The DJ 14:41, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

• • Not to mention that the user also claims to have six batchelor's degrees, five masters', a doctorate and a law degree, and is studying medicine. Completely bogus, all of it. Wikipedia is being invaded by the mentally ill, the stupid, and the sociopathic. \ Fnarf999 \ talk \ contribs \ 20:22, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

I've not seen this particular problem. From looking at this user's page and writings, it appears that he may actually think he has to sign up as a participant in a WikiProject to make use of the articles. He mentions his research and doesn't generally seem to be going anything in bad faith. This may just be an opportunity for communication and understanding. Aguerriero (talk) 22:53, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Maybe he's the Walter Mitty type. ♥ Her Pegship♥ 03:56, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Looks completely harmless to me, unless it's significantly increasing server load.--Runcorn 19:35, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

he collects userboxes i can care less about, why do you care whether they collect them or not? What's it to you? Markb 13:02, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

"Avoid needless interference" Stencil it on your wall, if necessary. --Wetman 15:53, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Tell him that Wikipedia is for people to cotribute to writing an encyclopedia, not for lamez0r userbox hogging. -- Миборовский 20:59, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

set minimum age limits

Some users are so young they have not been around long enough to be able to accurately perceive the short or long term consequences of their actions. Therefore I think a minimum age limit needs to be set for users and sysops and bureaucrats, etc. so we do not have to waste so much time having to educate them on our positions that have years and years of experience behind them like the portion of an iceberg below the surface. ...IMHO (Talk) 05:32, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Um, no. "Not been around long enough to be accurately perceieve the short of long term consequences of their actions"? That's a massive and absurd overgeneralisation.--Sean Black 06:48, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Not that massive and not that absurd, I should think. --LucVerhelst 07:15, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

It is true that some young people have difficulty perceiving consequences, however we already require people to demonstrate suitability for sysops, etc., so why is this a problem? As for users, there are vandals at every age and people with good intentions at every age, so again, what's the problem? Brian Jason Drake 06:15, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Moreover, how would you institute such a thing? Based on having a credit card? There would be no other way to enforce it. Not even worth considering IMO due to the impossibility of implementing it.Michael Dorosh 06:21, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

I can think of one user who frankly we would be better off without. He's in elementary school and pretty much incapable of any real contributions (his grammar, spelling, et al are on an elementary level, understandably). He does a lot of goofing off and needs a bit of babysitting ... literally, babysitting. He's not violating any particular policies but an age limit would help to remove kids like him. --Cyde↔Weys 06:51, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

And I'm sure one can come up with a long list of people of advanced age who have also shown themselves to be unable or unwilling to make productive contributions here. What would be the point? *Dan T.* 14:49, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

The most exceptionally annoying and time-wasting contributors I can think of offhand have been middle-aged... Shimgray | talk | 15:32, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

How would you verify a person's age? Blaise Joshua 07:22, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

We've had respected members of the community at least as young as 13, so any bar would seem to need to be lower than that, at which point there is almost no one left to exclude. Which is not to say that I would want to anyway. I welcome any child who can make productive contributions. Dragons flight 07:55, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

I would go so far as to say that it is one of the wonders of the modern Internet that people so young that you'd never trust them face-to-face can be judged on their merits and actions alone. We are enabling these people to take responsibility for something that matters. If a minimum age limit were set for Wikipedia, I would quit the project in protest. Besides, it's technically infeasible. Deco 08:02, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Definitely a non-starter for users. Firstly, it's absolutely unenforceable. Secondly, each editor and indeed each contribution can be assessed on his/her/its merits. I've seen rubbish from people who seem to be mature adults. Admins and bureaucrats are different, but it would require careful identity checks to enforce, and again being 18 or 21 is no proof that you are mature and sensible.--Runcorn 08:31, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Strong agree. We've had very young respected admins (I've actually been surprised when I found out their age), and we've had fully grown and elderly assholesnegatively productive users. Moreover, if we want to collect all the world's knowledge, a kid's perspective can be rather useful, I think. --Stephan Schulz 08:39, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Not that this should have any weight relevant to our goals on Wikipedia, but allowing youth to take responsibility and contribute to projects in society gives them a stake in society and helps build good character and habits to support it. Rather than hiding from the destructive actions of a portion of irresponsible children, we should engage as many as we can in our project, because in the end it will do both our project and those involved a lot of good. If we aim to help society with our project, the more people that have a stake in our project, the better off we are, even if we have to deal with some roughness along the way. --Improv 14:22, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Dear people from Wikipedia,

I wrote an e-book about the War in Yogoslavia and some of the historical facts exposed in the book ( may be visited at www.peev.org ) I wanted to share with you. I started the edition on the Bosnian page, and I gave the historical facts about the Vatican implications at the Balkans (also to see im my e-book), but there is a 16-years old boy who accused me for vandalization ?! Please, I want that my message be re-examend by the people who knows and loves history and not by those who have a hobbis like this 16-years old boy. And I want to hear excuse, because I wrote you with all my respect and love. I just wanted to share the knowledge with you...nothing else..

Dr. med. Jasmina Peev —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Peev (talk • contribs) .

You raise various issues here, but I'll stick to the accusation of vandalism. A 16 year old or a hobbyist is no more or less eligible to accuse you of vandalism (a serious charge, of course) than is a 56 year old or a historian. If you specify the diff (or at least the article) in question, then somebody here will take a look at the accusation and judge it on its merits (if any). -- Hoary 14:38, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

It appears Peev is peeved that this nonsense/attack/vandalism was reverted, and then a (self identified) 16 year old left a message on the user's talk page properly warning them to stop vandalizing, and gave some constructive advice on how to participate. That probably shows the value of having a 16 year old. --Rob 14:40, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

A 16-year-old who cleans up vandalism is certainly more useful to this project than an older person who creates it. *Dan T.* 14:49, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

• There are going to be no age limits on Wikipedia. --Osbus 15:01, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

I would have been an amazing contributor if Wikipedia had existed when I was a kid =). I oppose any general criterion to exclude editors; it should always be done on a case-by-case basis. Ardric47 23:36, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

• There are numerous examples of flame wars involving apparently middle-aged adults. Likewise, there are teenagers who contribute much to the project, especially technically. --JChap 03:19, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

This question has me wondering... for US users, doesn't COPPA prevent anyone under the age of 13 from posting on a wiki? It provides the same sort of communication capabilities that any message board would, and PhpBB "requires" US users to be over 13 to register in compliance with COPPA. Of course, that legislation is a terrible piece of crap, and I wouldn't consider advocating that WikiMedia follow it, but... just wondering. ~ Booya ^Bazooka 00:31, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

Most forums require an email address, which could be considered personally identifiable information. Wikipedia doesn't require you to provide any information at all to edit. --Carnildo 07:46, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

COPPA does not apply to nonprofits such as the Wikimedia Foundation. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 00:01, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

• Although it is in theory possibly easier to prevent people who are exceptionally immature from editing in Wikipedia, this is neither practical nor really justifiable. The latter is very simply because Wikipedia is no exclusive community. The former is because there is no real direct correlation between an editor's age and their intelligence, capability, or comprehension of consequences. Surely you are aware of the number of adult criminals, or perhaps terrorists? I, for example, am only 16 years of age. Clearly my intellect is greater than some absurd commonly-held stereotypes, most particularly that of the essentially selfish, oblivious, loudmouthed, aggressive brute. I strongly feel that the same should go for any administrative priveleges regardless of magnitude: these are decided on merit. If someone is obviously lacking the maturity necessary for such a position, regardless of age, as much will show up quite clearly to those who have interacted or observed that user. It may be overly idealistic of me, but I don't think that it is in anyone's interest to destroy what ought to be a community of equals by adding ageist policies which restrict users in any way due in any part to their age. Falcon 20:29, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

As much as I'd like some of the more childish users to be kept from editing, it's an unfeasable proposal that would only hurt the project by removing decent contributors, such as Falcon here. It's about as stupid as any webpage that asks if someone is above above a certain age, as if that person would somehow be prevented from lying to the page. There's no way to verify someone's age over the internet unless you're charging them for access, and Wikipedia certainly isn't going to be doing that any time soon. – Someguy0830 (Talk | contribs) 20:39, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Childish does not = child. I would argue that there are just as many childish and idiotic 30 or 40 year olds, as 12 and 13 year olds. Perhaps that statement is more for rhetorical effect, but my point is that children can be good contributors, and banning them is just a way to discourage people from comming back. My roommate for example thinks all of you are pompous assholes, so he refuses to edit! Fresheneesz 00:45, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

I thought this was an OPEN project, allowing EVERYONE to contribute. marc4991

• I think that the problems that "Age Limits" tries to address are more significantly related to mental maturity rather than physical maturity. We have some excellent contributors here who won't be able to drive legally for several years...and some editors who are old enough to vote but couldn't be trusted with a goldfish, much less an encyclopedia. The good ones get better, the bad ones get bored and drift away. IMHO, of course (YMMV) Doc Tropics 04:35, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Vandalism

Moved to Wikipedia:Village pump (perennial proposals)#Vandalism as a natural sub section of Wikipedia:Village pump (perennial proposals)#Abolish anonymous users. Steve block Talk 22:38, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

When several editors insist on a wrong action

What is the appropriate action when several editors insist on a wrong action ? User:Futurix, in an edit summary, states: "rv ... for the very same reasons as Wikipediatrix, Stollery, and other editors." [3] That is accurate, User:Wikipediatrix has similar reversions: "rv ... - for the same reasons as all the other editors." [4] and "rv to previous edit, for reasons already discussed ad infinitum!" [5]. All of "the other editors" are citing a personal essay on a personal website as a secondary source of information. The editor who is following WP:RS is moving that information to "Exterior Links". The several editors are no longer discussing. They are simply reverting, quoting and citing a personal essay on a personal website into the article Suppressive Person. The link they are insisting on (without discussion) is titled, "Operation Clambake present: Fair Game". Obviously it is a personal essay on a personal website. When that information is moved to be an exterior link then the editors go wild, they refuse to discuss and revert again and again. What is the procedure to deal with this kind of editor behaviour? Terryeo 08:31, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

Wrong action?

User Terryeo was banned indefinitely from editing Scientology-related articles (including the article in question) as result of Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Terryeo#Log of blocks and bans. During the arbitration the website "Operation Clambake" was found to be worthy quoting source - while technically it is personal, it does contain important third-party publications (and no references to personal opinions of the website owner were ever made by editors). Terryeo and several other fellow Scientologists continue to twist official Wikipedia guidelines when it's convenient for them and continue to ask editors to explain their actions again and again and again and again... while completely ignoring all previous explanations. Futurix 09:13, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

If some user has been banned or not is not the issue here. Address the issue he discusses. Where does it say: "During the arbitration the website "Operation Clambake" was found to be worthy quoting source - while technically it is personal, it does contain important third-party publications (and no references to personal opinions of the website owner were ever made by editors)."? I interprete the above as that the third-party information (if valid material) may be used as source referencing, but this does not include the personal opinion utterings of the holder of that site. What you propose here is that when some holder of some website puts a lot of third-party material and such on his personal site, that all of a sudden the personal pages of the webdesigner are also valid reference sources? That deduction all by itself is quite manipulative and in fact absurd. --Olberon 10:15, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

That deduction exists only in your imagination - I never said anything like that. The point is that third-party information from xenu.net is perfectly acceptable as Wikipedia source. Personal opinions of xenu.net webmaster are obviously not acceptable and were never used on Wikipedia (despite Terryeo's claim).

And Terryeo's ban is part of the issue - his history of ignorance and Wikipedia abuse make his claim (on the very same subject) very dubious (while he presents them as proven fact).

Futurix 11:54, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

That is a major issue Futurix. "Third Party" information is not published when appearing on xenu.net. Hundreds of personal essays are held on xenu.net's servers. They are unpublished. They have never been published. Someone writes an essay, a website owner puts it on his website and it is not published. A personal website is not a source of publication, it does not fulfill WP:V and it does not fulfill WP:RS (this guideline). "Third Party" information is not published because it appears on a personal website. That is probably the major issue in the Scientology articles. WP:RS says one thing, editors read it and do another thing. It isn't appropriate no matter how many editors do it. Terryeo 18:50, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

If your arguments are sufficient you do not need any discrediting of some person. Where are your arguments? --Olberon 10:55, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

What Terryeo is saying here once again is, "I'm right, everyone else is wrong, and I want them all taken down because they're all wrong." Terryeo was reprimanded, warned, and banned as noted above, but he still insists he is right and everyone else reverting his edits to the Scientology articles -- and by everyone else I mean dozens of different Wikipedia users -- is wrong. --Modemac 19:53, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

Address the arguments forwarded, do not attack the person. Wiki rules are pretty clear about that! --Olberon 10:51, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Please don't raise article-specific conflicts in the form of a barely abstracted policy question. This kind of thing is what consensus-seeking and, as a last resort, RfA is for. Deco 23:16, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

I raise an issue. "What to do when several editors are convinced they are right but are doing a wrong action?" WP:RS discussions have made clear that personal websites maybe be used for repository, already published books. Clambake has unpublished essays and personal opinion mixed with documentation. It is a mix of a lot of information. That site is a mix of pages, it is always better to include the original publisher. Furturix refuses to reply to the issue but attacks me. Modemac refuses to reply to the issue but attacks me. Deco refuses to recognize the issue. The issue is present at Suppressive Person, has recently been present at Fair Game, has long been present at Template:ScientologySeries. Several editors state their POV and revert, revert, revert. They refuse to discuss the issue they are reverting on the discussion page. Their edit summaries hardly describe their edits. In the Template article those editors refer to a gesture in a court case as supporting their edits. Against that gesture is a large number of scholarly articles by Doctors of Divinity, scholars and people who testify before governements about the issue. But they won't discuss the issue. Much as is done here, the editors attack and refuse to discuss the issue which is driving their attack. They simply revert, revert, revert and use edit summaries as above, things like "revert POV". What is the appropriate action to take when a group of editors refuses to discuss and takes such actions? Terryeo 07:48, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

WP:RS has no problem with citing unreliable sources if you acknowledge them as unreliable (i.e., don't repeat what they say as fact, just say "X says Y[source]"). See WP:RS#Partisan websites. The edit here, as far as I can tell, was therefore inappropriate, because it cited xenu.net without noting the source's possible unreliability in the text. (And I'm with Olberon on the irrelevance of Terryeo's ban to the validity of his claims. Argumentum ad rem, please.) —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 03:10, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Thank you Simetrical. Terryeo 19:09, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

WP:RS recognizes that "published to the public" describes an action which a newspaper or a book or a court document does. A newsgroup, a blog or a personal website does not fulfill "Published to the public". WP:RS addresses that every day. The issue I'm raising is "What to do when several editors are convinced they are right and won't discuss". What to do when Several editors revert and call anything BUT their consensus vandalism, but won't discuss. This happens in several Scientology articles Terryeo 22:12, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Why do you think "published to the public" doesn't include websites? Obviously published doesn't mean "published in print", and websites are more publicly-available than any print publication is. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 01:39, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't follow how your question leads to an answer to the issue I raised but I'll answer it as I understand it. Personal Websites are not published by Wikipedia standards because they are not fact checked, they are not necessarily substantial, they are not necessarily legally sound, they might in fact be pure fantesy. There is no professionalism beyond the individual who creates the site. Whereas books and major newspapers and court documents have layers of fact checking, spell checking and (often) legal responsibility between the primary source and the published document. That's an issue for WP:RS, why do you ask my understanding of that guideline? Terryeo 05:50, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

WP:RS explicitly allows partisan or otherwise unreliable sources as primary sources only. By this logic, Xenu.net can be cited, but only as evidence of Xenu.net's views, which may or may not be correct. Yes? No? —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 07:50, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes, that is correct, as I understand WP:RS. With one single, additional exception. If Xenu.net has on their servers, an accurate copy of a published book or other publication, that link may be used when attributing that book or other publication. But it can't be a small part of a page and the rest of the page full of Xenu.net's opinion about that publication. Terryeo 18:43, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

As a further response to Simetrical, Xenu.net's views could be placed in an "exterior links" or "further reading" section. But their views could not be quoted within an article because their view has never been "published to the public". That is, their view doesn't meet the Wikipedia standards of having been published. But as an exterior link, perhaps even a subsection, "Exterior links, Xenu.net's views", that would fulfill Wikipedia standards, I think. Terryeo 18:57, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

The solution here is in WP:Consensus: get more users to look at the problem; most of the existing system of dispute resolution is intended to do this. At that point, a little group of willful editors will be unable to impose a false consensus. On the other hand, if Terryeo finds his facts and PoV excluded by a large group of editors, he "should at least consider that he may be mistaken". Septentrionalis 17:57, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Oh believe me, Septentrionalis, I have sure thought of that. A lot. They are beginning to use their favorite personal website, Clambake.org, as a secondary source of information a little less now. That's one thing. But it isn't the only wrong action. They communicate together on alt.net.scientology and are convinced that scientology is bunk, it colors their every edit but not every edit is plainly wrong. Only a few edits are plainly wrong by wikipedia standards. Terryeo 04:15, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Deleting bad articles about notable subjects?

I know about Wikipedia:Deletion_policy#Problem_articles_with_alternatives_to_deletion. But what if a cleanup tag is still present after more than half a year and the article is still not in a usable shape? In AfDs people vote keep and expand even in such cases. Is it really the goal of Wikipedia to keep really bad articles about notable subjects? I'm talking e.g. about The Seven Worlds in it's current state (the state of the article might be better when you read this). It really annoys me that people say in Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Seven Worlds Keep, but needs cleanup as noted on the page. (the article hasn't improved although it is tagged cleanup since half a year). And someone said in the AfD Keep until someone can tell me if this is true or not (the article doesn't cite it's sources). Is there really no lower limit on the quality of Wikipedia articles? And is this really intended? Adrian Bunk 00:38, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

There is a philosophical disagreement between immediatists and eventualists over this topic. In your specific example, it seems that people don't want to throw away potentially useful information, but nobody is sure how to best use it. So we tag it and hope that somebody will come along who knows what to do. The cleanup backlog is currently one year, so half a year is unfortunately a pretty normal waiting time. You can help and {{sofixit}}. For some articles that are really bad, one way to not delete them is to cut them down to short verifiable stubs and note that there was more info before on the talk page. Kusma (討論) 01:25, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

It seems Extreme eventualism has taken control of the English Wikipedia....

More than 16,000 articles are already waiting for someone addressing their cleanup tag with an increasing tendency and many other with other tags.

I might do the following: Players of the second German soccer league are considered notable in the English Wikipedia according to WP:BIO and their notability is verifyable e.g. through [6]. If I create a few hundred articles about players playing there in the 1980s only consisting of the unwikified text Foo Bar was a German soccer player, how much value is in this articles about the notable people?

I might be crazy enough to actually add such articles only for having a good laugh... Adrian Bunk 01:40, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree, Adrian. I get fed up with Keep votes for some absolutely awful articles just because the subject is notable (or semi-notable). Is this what we want for our encyclopedia? Is there no lower limit for quality? Apparently not. Disappointedly yours, Madman 16:36, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Note also that some articles are deletable through WP:PROD that would be kept at WP:AFD, for example machine "translations" (Although this is an abuse of process). In my experience, these are never cleaned up. However, stubbing them and listing them at WP:TIE usually produces a decent article in less than 4 months. Kusma (討論) 02:13, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

If something would be deleted WP:PROD but kept at WP:AFD that's a serious flaw in the deletion process. Adrian Bunk 02:17, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

WP:PROD is slightly more random and less even less consistent in what is deleted than WP:AFD is (which itself is pretty random and not consistent on borderline articles), especially since we don't have a centralized prod listing anymore. Kusma (討論) 05:55, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

What is wrong with Category:All articles proposed for deletion? Adrian Bunk 10:01, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

It doesn't show the reason for the proposed deletion, unlike the old listing on the toolserver. Kusma (討論) 19:29, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

Please oh please wipe them all from the slate! I've argued many times on AfD debates that Keep and rewrite votes should be counted as Delete unless rewritten. IMHO FAR TOO MANY articles survive AfD on "Keep and rewrite" without the rewrite susequently taking place. If an article is extremely poor/almost unsalvageable to begin with, it is better to delete it and start over. Zunaid 15:00, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Why must there be a time limit on when articles become good? Some articles might remain shitty for 5 days, until a mass of people come and spiff it up to pristine quality in a week. Why not let that process trancend months or even years. Deletion is not the answer, as that subject will come up again sometime, and the information will instead be lost. It is much better to use tags to mark the page as crap. There are many many such tags, and they not only let editors know that the page needs cleaning, but much more importantly, it lets readers know which articles to trust and which not to. Not to mention, readers can usually see crap - I know I can. Its those pages with no headers, science pages with no equations, badly formatted pages, and articles that read like text-books. A shitty article is not a reason to delete - its a reason to make it better. Fresheneesz 00:55, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Are fonts notable?

I recently tagged Everson Mono Unicode for deletion per WP:NOT, writing "Wikipedia is not a font catalog". Should it be? Realistically, the trouble with putting fonts into Wikipedia is that you probably can't show font samples without having copyright problems, and a font catalog without font samples is worthless. --John Nagle 05:48, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm Michael Everson and I didn't know that Tarikash had put up an article about my font until today. There are a number of other Unicode fonts which do have articles (Arial Unicode MS and Gentium for instance), also adding mine wasn't a new sin by any means. I'll be happy to improve the article, if you'll remove the tag for deletion. As far as notability goes, Everson Mono was one of the first fonts to try to have a large repertoire of characters, and in glorious monowidth. Evertype 07:42, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

If the font author will add an image with font samples, it will probably be an article worth keeping. --John Nagle 07:45, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

It's not necessary for the font author to make such an image, in fairness; any user of the font could do so. Shall we take this up on the article's Talk page? Evertype 07:49, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Scalar font samples would be legal to use in the United States, because of the rather insane fact that typefaces are uncopyrightable here. (Vector-formatted fonts may be different.) Fonts can, of course, be encyclopedia-worthy (I don't think anyone argues Times New Roman shouldn't exist); as an opponent of notability standards, I wouldn't have much problem with even non-notable fonts having well-written and -sourced articles here. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 07:53, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Absolutely! Of course; many fonts are worthy of articles. This is a question that could only be raised in an unthinking, teevee age. Fonts are the soul of the printed word. It is only in this brief time we now are forced to spend so much time staring at text on low-resolution screens that render fine type so poorly. Our fathers read and respected the word printed lovingly on paper; our sons will read from high-resolution screens. Only our debased generation is ignorant of the immortal beauty of fine typography. John Reid 06:44, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

If a particular font is not notable itself, surely it is a fit component of an article on fonts, or fonts of a particular sort. Midgley 21:41, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

People with knowledge and opinions on fonts can come to a consensus on whether a particular font merits an article. What's the problem? patsw 01:51, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Interwiki references inline

There are a few articles (most likely translated) that include an inline 'see also' or 'references' link to other language Wikipedias, for example François Cavanna, Wolfgang Schäuble, and Peter Harry Carstensen. Normally I'd just remove them per WP:ASR, but discussion on the talk page of one of those articles suggests that they serve a useful function. I can't find any specific policy information on the appropriateness of these links (specifically as it relates to ethics of citation and translation procedure), but hopefully someone here can clarify this point. Ziggurat 21:32, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

These actually aren't really self references - they're linking a Wikipedia as a source or reference, which I should hope is something we don't mind people doing. Of course it shouldn't be their only source or reference, ideally, or given excessive weight over other references. It's still seemingly redundant though, when there's already software support for specialized interwiki links with a standard interface. Deco 23:59, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Well, WP:RS indicates that "Wikipedia itself does not currently meet the reliability guidelines." On the other hand, there's also a section that says "Where editors use their own English translation of a non-English source as a quote in an article, there should be clear citation of the foreign-language original, so that readers can check what the original source said and the accuracy of the translation." Whether that applies to translated Wikipedia articles, I dunno... Ziggurat 00:13, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

I support this kind of links. We should give the source of translations in a way that is as obvious as possible, to not violate the original-language authors' copyright. Kusma (討論) 00:16, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

I think interwiki links should still be kept in their place. Crediting the original language version is better done in an edit summary. Wikipedia shouldn't be its own source, and any mere translation from another Wikipedia article should be seen as temporary. It needs, sooner or later, to be checked with reliable sources. I have seen articles translated into English which were uncited and not that great in their original version (heck, I've probably done it myself a couple of times), but this should not be seen as a permanent solution. At some point every language version of an article has to become directly reliant on external sources; at least for the English Wikipedia, where we have people reading a large variety of languages, that shouldn't really be a problem. Otherwise we risk ending up with circularity, where different language versions are "improved" based on the assumption that another version is better. People should not assume that the "native" version of an article is correct just because the authors presumably have access to good sources – far too often the good, native sources haven't actually been used. Tupsharru 01:31, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

As a minimum, the translation can surely copy over the reference list from the original. --Runcorn 21:21, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

If an article is present in two languages, couldn't the other language's article be referred to in a "further information" or a "see also" section? This would prevent circularity because it would allow each article to be developed independently. Yet it would allow a reader who uses both languages to read (or edit) both sets of information. Some topics are viewed quite differently in different areas of our globe. Terryeo 16:06, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

There are interlanguage links at the left of every page that has equivalents in other languages, below the toolbox. This page, for instance, is linked to pages on the ko, zh, and zh-yue wikis. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 04:51, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Left-Right dichotomy

Does the adherence to the Left-Right dichotomy constitute any POV on part of wikipedia editors? Clearly there have been alternatives posed, such as a 2D political compass or other variants. Since wikipedia editors cannot ascertain truth to any of these variants, but only verify that they indeed exist, the use of the left-right dichotomy is simply biased. Intangible 05:42, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Whatever is best at conveying the necessary information to the reader should be used. "Left" and "right" are statistical realities; social, fiscal, economic, and environmental conservatism are linked, say, as are their liberal counterparts. If a political party, say, tends to support 1) imposition of traditional moral standards, 2) a free-market economy, 3) comparatively low levels of civil liberty, and 4) comparatively great funding and use of military forces, it's simplest and most succinct to summarize it as being "conservative" or "right-wing". If something or someone doesn't neatly fit the mold, another term (such as "libertarian", say) should preferably be used.

If it's relevant to note correlations with political affiliation in an article, that would be fine too; "proponents of measures designed to counteract global warming are disproportionately liberal" would be a succinct way of saying "those who support measures designed to counteract global warming disproportionately support such goals as reduced military spending, international aid, strong government regulation of the economy, and the securement of civil liberties". The terms are pretty well understood and not at all POV, although they may not always be useful. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 08:05, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

I am not against using labels such as conservative, libertarian, royalist or any of that. My criticism is more against the ambiguous definitions present in right-wing or left-wing. How is a wikilink to those articles NPOV if the definitions set forth in those articles contradict each other? Intangible 17:50, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

I think you'd get a better response regarding this concern on Talk:Right-wing politics and Talk:Left-wing politics. Deco 20:56, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

I'll give an example: "Frederic Bastiat is a left-wing politican." Intangible 21:18, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

The labels are usually neutral because they're pretty vague. I don't think much of anyone would dispute that Ralph Nader is left-wing, say. If people might object to the label, it shouldn't be used; Dennis Kucinich should be described as libertarian, not right-wing. The definitions are ambiguous, but that doesn't make them worthless. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 23:17, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

It is essential that any categorization is not ambiguous. Saying that Ralph Nader is a left-wing politician would conflict with saying that Frederic Bastiat is a left-wing politican. Actually they are pretty much each others opposites. Although the addage can correct when looking at each individual article when no wikilink is used. This all of course is easily avoided by saying that Ralph Nader is a green politican and saying that Frederic Bastiat is a classical liberal politician. This is what all wikipedia editors should do. Intangible 04:01, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Okay, fair point. More specific characterizations are generally available. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:13, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Certainly in British politics, left and right wing are getting increasingly muddled. Some people feel that the Labout (or New Labour) Party is beginning to be to the right of the Conservative Party in some respects. Also, many policies are completely outside the simple left-right continuum; some right-wingers oppose immigration on "Keep British values" grounds, while others support it on free market grounds. --Runcorn 21:25, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

In some countries, though, it's very different; in France for example, the terms "la gauche" (the Left) and "la droite" (the Right) are extremely common in news reporting, common discourse, and parliamentary debate; politicians are identified as being on the Left or Right as often, sometimes more often, than as being a member of a particular political party. Most politicians openly identify themselves as "right-wing" or "left-wing," whereas this is relatively rare in the UK or the U.S. I believe France's situation also holds for countries like Spain and Italy. My point is that this sort of thing should be settled on a case-by-case basis rather than by setting a universal policy; calling Ségolène Royal or Romano Prodi a "centre-left" politician is more justified than applying the term to Hillary Clinton or Tony Blair. Andrew Levine 00:26, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

How about defining people based on how they define their opponents? Folajimi 00:36, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

American Spellings/Measurements be given preference in articles pertaining to the United States. Commonwealth English/Metric be given preference for articles pertaining to other nations.

Well, I thought this was obvious enough, but aparently, the Administrator Samuel Wantman didn't think it was. My proposal (which is largely in place anyways) is that if an article pertains to a certain part of the english-speaking world, that country's spellings and measurements be given preference. e.g. An article about a Canadian painter would talk about the "colour" of the paintings and the size in "centimetres" (and inches in parentheses). An article about the an American paiter would talk about the "color" of the paintings and the size in inches (and "centimeters" in parentheses). As I said, I thought this would have been pretty clear already, but I got a message from a certain admin on my talk page like I were five, so I guess I have to submit this. I apologize for the waste of time this may seem to be. R'son-W 09:55, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

It's not as simple as that. Many people in the UK (probably most people actually) still prefer Imperial measurements, and I understand that many people in other Commonwealth countries do as well. The USA/everyone else split is certainly not as clear-cut as our governments would like to think. And certain uses of Imperial measurements (e.g. road distances, speed limits, pub measures) are still enshrined in British law and have to be used in preference to metric equivalents (you won't see metric measurements on British roadsigns). It still seems incongruous to me to prefer metric measurements on British pages when many British people don't like them and don't use them. -- Necrothesp 10:27, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't know anyone under 60 in Australia who uses Miles/Inches and I don't know anyone who spells using color and not colour. So your generalisation about "many" in other commonwealth countries does not seem extremely clear to me. Ansell 11:20, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

If you care to reread my post, you will see that I said "I understand that many people in other Commonwealth countries do as well". I understand this to be the case since I have heard a number of people from other Commonwealth countries say that it is and feel that they should probably know. Anyway, do you exterminate everybody when they get to 60 (a sort of delayed Logan's Run)? No? In that case, there are many people who do use the Imperial system in Australia (or don't older people count?)! And as for color/colour, I think you'll find I didn't mention this at all (although an Australian colleague of mine did once swear blind, against all evidence to the contrary, that Australians pronounce the rank "lootenant"!). -- Necrothesp 12:37, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

How about the incongruity of using "Imperial" measurements when the only remaining empire is American and when many Brits (e.g. me) are happier with the metric system? The continuing use of "Imperial" measurements is [rolls eyes] understandable for intranational (parochial) British purposes, but WP is international and all the Brits I've met are conversant with the metric system. I think even Youessians manage to digest it, though I wouldn't know about the paleoconservative booboisie. (As for spelling, I really don't care either way.) -- Hoary 08:44, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Wp:mos#National_varieties_of_English - but I should add that in general, editing articles solely to change units, national spellings and so on is really frowned upon, unless it's as a result of discussion and community consensus. There are more important things for people to be doing than worrying about whether imperial or metric units come first, and given the multinational nature of Wikipedia people are just going to have to get used to the fact that sometimes it says "metre" and sometimes "meter". --ajn (talk) 11:32, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

regarding measurements IMO where known the original/exact measurement should be given first and conversions afterwards. An good example of this is the jack plug page. Plugwash 15:28, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Where? Exploding Boy 15:35, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

With regard to American or Rest-of-the-world English spelling, I have come across a number of articles which had words with spellings partly in one and partly in the other system. The spelling should of course be determined by the subject matter - if it is an American, a British or an Australian subject, for example, then the spellings of that country should prevail.

However, if a supranational subject is being discussed, such as philosophy, the sciences or general cultural items, then the spelling should be governed by that of whoever started the article - nothing worse than seeing a hothpotch of different spellings - and it is up to subsequent editors to make sure they continue in the same vein as that of the original.

If, however, an article of supranational content has already been compromised by mixed spellings then a quick count of the differently spelled words should determine their ultimate spelling in that the greater number of words spelled in a particular way should determine the rest of the article. That number of each different spellings should be given in the edit summary and/or discussion page by the editor who does the edit. If this has been decided elsewhere already, then there is no harm done reiterating it. It's not really so difficult, all it takes is a bit of co-operation and good will. Dieter Simon 23:25, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't quite see why it's necessary to count the words. Just look at the edit history to see which system the originator of the article (or the first editor to use a word with differing spellings in American/Commonwealth English) used and stick with that - if that involves changing many words back then so be it. Incidentally, in some articles divided into sections by nationality (see beret, for example) editors have used American spellings for the section on American usages and Commonwealth spellings for the sections on Commonwealth usages, as well as a mixture of spellings for usages by non-English speaking countries. Personally, I think we should apply the "one system" rule throughout (except for proper names, obviously, which should always be spelt in the way they're actually spelt). -- Necrothesp 00:15, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Also be aware that certain spellings, such as Canadian and Australian, are a mix of British and American spelling and these are just as acceptable as British or American. - SimonP 16:07, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Regarding Necrothesp's "I think we should apply the "one system" rule throughout...". That of course begs the question, whose "one system" you mean, doesn't it?. That is where the problem is. I suspect, you mean American spelling? I think, a lot of English speakers would find this very hard to swallow. Dieter Simon 01:17, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Er, why do you suspect I mean American spelling? I'm British, as a simple glance at my user page and indeed the post you replied to (how many Americans use "spelt"?) would have told you, and I'm the last person on earth (trust me) who would advocate switching to American spellings. But I actually meant throughout the individual article, not throughout Wikipedia, since that's what we were discussing. I have no desire to change the spelling of the entire Wikipedia to one system or the other (unless it's British - just joking). -- Necrothesp 23:17, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, Necrothesp, I have only just noticed your latest. What made me say the above was that I felt, it wasn't clear what you said (or I read it wrongly) "...Personally, I think we should apply the "one system" rule throughout (except for proper names, obviously, which should always be spelt in the way they're actually spelt)". Ok, point taken, you mean "within an article", and I agree. I am a Brit myself but haven't got my St George's flag out just yet at the moment. However that's by the way. Dieter Simon 23:38, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

And -- obviously -- Hanzi characters and the Lunar calendar should be given preference in all articles pertaining to China. John Reid 06:49, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

If someone has written an article using one spelling convention or set of units, I would consider it less than polite to alter the spelling or units just for the sake of it. Thus if an American had written an article about a British artist and said "color", I'd leave it. --Runcorn 21:30, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

In reply to the actual point you are making, Runcorn, yes, on the face of it, there is something in what you are saying. However, if this is an article about a British artist and someone has spelt certain words in American English, it is very likely subsequent editors, most likely British, will spell their contributions in British English unless they are very disciplined and routinely check how the same words have been spelt previously in the article, and we are going to be back at the very mess I have described in my later contributions: some words spelt in American and some in British/Commonwealth English, See below. Sorry, Necrothesp reminded me of answering your points. Dieter Simon 01:02, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Exactly. The article Mercenary had half the spellings organized/organization and half the spellings organised/organisation, so I changed it on 17 Feb. to all -ized/-ization as it had been started with the former, and subsequent editors used the latter spellings. That's what I meant in my contributin on 7 June: some kind of unified spelling within an article. Dieter Simon 22:59, 10 June 2006 (UTC). Dieter Simon

Not the same case though. Mercenary is a generic term, and therefore should use the system used by the originator of the article, but an article about a British person should use British spellings. This is quite clearly and unequivocally stated in the Manual of Style: "If an article's subject has a strong tie to a specific region/dialect, it should use that dialect." -- Necrothesp 23:30, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

That's exactly what I said in my original contribution to this subject on 07 June. I wish you'd read some of these things before you reiterate what another person has already said: "The spelling should of course be determined by the subject matter - if it is an American, a British or an Australian subject, for example, then the spellings of that country should prevail," I said. You are talking to the converted, you know.

I am also saying the same thing as you: someone had started the "generic" article with one type of spelling, and others subsequently added spellings of a different kind which I then changed to that of the original writer's. Are we on the same line, after all? I think we are.Dieter Simon 22:59, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, did not sign my amendments. Dieter Simon 23:11, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Before you have a go at me, maybe you should take your own advice and read the post you were responding to. Runcorn said he believed that it was wrong to change American spelling to British spelling in an article about a British subject. You responded "exactly". Er...so what do you believe exactly? Since you now seem to be arguing for both points of view! -- Necrothesp 01:05, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

I am not having a go at you, Necrothesp, I agree with what you are saying as I said earlier. And I did reply to Runcorn, by giving an example of the article "Mercenary" where subsequent editors added material spelled/spelt differently from the original: "organised/organisation" when in fact the original editor(s) spelt it "organized/organization", half American and half British/Commonwealth spelling. However much I would have liked to keep the British spelling, it was only fair to the American spelling of American editors who were first. I didn't probably put it very well. Yes, ok, I only changed the additional differently-spelt stuff and not the original American-spelt stuff but for the sake of unity within the article, it should have been spelt "American" all along once it had been started that way. Phew!

Mind you there is another way, and I am not sure whether this has ever been broached, how about creating a prompt or template to insert in articles to the effect of warning readers that they may find a mixture of American and British/Commonwealth spellings due to diverse editorship. Dieter Simon 23:58, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

How to enter measurements

Does anyone know of any previous discussion which lead to a consensus of how to state measurements. I've seen it done many ways. It seems that the majority of articles use the metric system first (either meters or metres) and then have English units in parenthesis. I am also aware of articles having the cited measurement first and a mathematically converted measurement second in parenthesis. I'm sorry R'son-W did not like the comment on his talk page. I was truly trying to find out if there has been previous discussion on this topic. -- Samuel Wantman 09:28, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Use the system provided by the source you are citing as the primary measure, then provide a conversion in parentheses if desirable. This ensures that the first figure given is the most accurate representation of the source being referenced. Christopher Parham (talk) 06:31, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Qualifiers

Currently, there is a serious discussion going on about the use of qualifiers in titles, especially (epithet) after various political loaden terms, such as:

• Islamofascism (epithet)
• Wall of shame (epithet)
• Israeli apartheid (epithet)

I do not yet have an opinion about it myself, but I would like neutral input from editors and admins not involved in those pages on whether these qualifiers violate WP:NPOV. Thanks. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 03:18, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Disambiguation policy specifies that qualifiers should not be used except where necessary for disambiguation or clarity. We have plenty of articles with names offensive to their subjects - if it's the common name, that's what we use, and they really just have to live with it. Deco 17:15, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Word. Islamofascism (epithet) has already been moved back to its correct title, Islamofascism. The others, I expect, will follow soon as well. -Silence 18:15, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

I'd have said that all these violate NPOV. --Runcorn 21:44, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Parenthetical qualifiers should not typically be used except for disambiguation. It's unambiguous, so leave it at the correct title. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:18, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

See the page Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(slogans). This page is inactive and kept for historical reasons, but there was discussion about the idea (and I can't even figure out from it what the final decision on the subject was, if there was any). I think there's some support for using qualifiers in such cases. Ken Arromdee 16:18, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a slave to Google

I have seen the arguement so many times for a title, or even a word, be used over naming conventions because of the Google hits. What does Google hits have to do with Wikipedia and its policies? As far as I know Wikipedia is an independent entity from Google. It doesn't matter if the American spelling gets a billion hits while British spelling only gets a quarter billion. Wikipedia does not need to be shackled to Google searches. Google searches should get shackled to Wikipedia and other sources instead. And like other search engines, Google is biased, per their article here. Wikipedia tries not to be biased, so that means that Wikipedia articles and categories should not have to adhere or even take into account Google searches.

Using this argument in any name procedure or word choice seems to be a last stand move. Take it away so that the real issues over a name or word choice can be handled.
—Lady Aleena talk/contribs 14:52, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Moreover, due to the number of sites like answer.com that gobble up wikipedia's information and cut and paste it, you can hardly google anything anymore (unless you disallow wikipedia as a search term) without finding the first 25 hits made up of wikipedia clones. So you have a bizarre chicken and egg situation where you google up a term, and because it is already on wikipedia, even if incorrectly, the clone sites boost up the hit count dramatically.Michael Dorosh 15:02, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Michael, can you provide an example? I have not observed that behavior on Googel SERPs (Search Engine Result Page) ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 15:06, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

It may be limited to arcane topics; I just did a couple of searches on general knowledge military history stuff and while both wikipedia and answer.com come up, they were not overwhelming. I'm at a loss to provide the example I was thinking of - but the open source license is an interesting byproduct in that regard, as webmasters looking for easy solutions to content problems can perpetuate articles at wikipedia and in some cases skew search statistics. I'll see if I can recreate the search over the weekend - can't remember the specific topics I was researching at the moment when that behaviour exhibited itself most obviously.Michael Dorosh 15:24, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

I've got one. On the Eric Clapton page there's a bit about when, during a gig, he said something about voting for Enoch Powell to stop Britain becoming a "black colony", which has now got a {{fact}} tag after it. I googled a few different things along the lines of Clapton "Enoch Powell" "black colony" and couldn't find anything substantial that didn't refer to Wikipedia as a source. MightyMoose22 ^{>Abort, Retry, Fail?_} 17:36, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Google is one tool to demonstrate the popularity of one term or expression or another. It's not perfect but then neither is taking a poll of your friends. --JeffW 16:13, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

A search of that nature is might not fulfill WP:V, but it could be used to demonstrate to another editor that a word is in use ("informations", for example). Terryeo 17:06, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

I think the issue here is a position that google is biased in favor of American usage. This is a problem in discussions that involve naming choices when two different usages exist. Vegaswikian 17:20, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't think Google is biased, it just relfects what's happening online. What's biased here is the world of english speakers. It's just simple math...

Almost 75% of English speakers are North American. This means more american english is on the internet, and more people use american english to communicate with each other. -Quasipalm 17:37, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

That chart refers only to native speakers. Not to the billions of people who speak English as a second or third language. It does not represent "the world of English speakers" in any way, shape, or form. 81.178.65.121 16:03, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Point of order - Canadian english is still closer to British than American, but 68 percent is still respectable.Michael Dorosh 21:34, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Don't you mean "Point of information?" Besides, there are many Canadian spellings which use the British and American versions interchangably. Google, interestingly enough, is in fact biased to return local results - therefore, the version which any residents of the United States happen to be using is in fact biased significantly to American English spellings. But I still don't see why this matters: both spellings are quite legible, and this is the English wikipedia, not the American wikipedia. Falcon 22:37, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Ref Wikipedia:Google test. It's just a heuristic. Don't take it too seriously. Deco 17:12, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

"Slave to google" Wikipedia returns only 6 hits. So clearly, this idea is non-notable.  :-) Dragons flight 17:25, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

See Talk:3 (Soulfly album). It was renamed (from what I can tell) purely because most people don't know how to type ॐ, and I still disagree with that decision. MightyMoose22 ^{>Abort, Retry, Fail?_} 17:45, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

It is customary on WP not to use peculiar fonts and capitalization because some advertising executive has decided they are the "official look"; the company might change ad agencies tomorrow. While this is a weaker argument in the case of an already printed album, the album might be reissued with new artwork; so I think it applies. Septentrionalis 15:07, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Ah, but you're assuming that the actual title is 3 and that ॐ is just a fancy font (or whatever). I'm saying that the title is ॐ (as in aum) and that 3 is just the ignorant/simplified version. It's like claiming that the greek letter sigma ( Σ ) is just a fancy way of writing E, etc. etc. MightyMoose22 ^{>Abort, Retry, Fail?_} 02:21, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Widely-unreadable fonts are not used in article titles, even for official names. Otherwise, any number of pages would logically have to be in totally incomprehensible writing systems; People's Republic of China, for instance, would need to be at 中华人民共和国. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 04:54, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

If this was the reason given I would've agreed, but the argument for renaming was that Google (or iTunes, or whatever) gets more results from typing "Soulfly 3" that from "Soulfly ॐ" because to the ignorant masses it kinda looks like a 3. As I said on the talk page, I don't care about the actual move itself, but claiming that 3 must be the correct name because Google says so is equatable with the idea that "probly" must be correct because it gets 2,070,000 hits (try it). MightyMoose22 ^{>Abort, Retry, Fail?_} 02:21, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

That rationale, if indeed it was the one used, is faulty. That doesn't change the fact that apparently everyone agrees the page should be moved. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 21:29, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

As a post-script to my opening remarks, I have to say that I prefer the links provided by Wikipedia articles more than I do the search results from Google. If every article had an external links tab, like the talk page tab, and that was filled with all of the external links imaginable relevant to the article, I would never have to use Google again. - LA @ 20:40, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

But if every article had all of the external links imaginable, it would wind up being a lot like Google (or dmoz.org, anyway) and it would lose whatever it is you like. FreplySpang 21:31, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Good point FreplySpang, so let me qualify that statement. If every article had all the best of the external links imaginable. I can live without some of the pages out there, like those which are so bad grammatically they are hard to read.
—Lady Aleena talk/contribs 16:12, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Mmm, then we'd be a link directory, which is a good and useful kind of thing, but not the purpose of this particular project (i.e. Wikipedia). Keeping a good link directory going is a lot of work. FreplySpang 22:56, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I think the stats on this pie-chart are remarkable. It says that only about 1 in 20 people outside Australia, Canada, the US and the UK speak English. I work outside these four countries. English is the official language at work. We usually work with our partners in India, China, Philippines, Singapore and KL. The official language is still English. I would also be suprised if 94.5 pecent of contributors to English Wikipedia are from these four countries too. Wallie 12:26, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

The chart is of native speakers only. Most English speakers are non-native, including a large percentage of contributors here. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 22:33, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Exactly right.

• Also, many Americans speak three native languages, i.e., Spanish, English and Italian, which means these people are counted three times.
• If you are a Canadian, and live in Germany, you are also not counted.

All this makes the chart absolutely irrelevant and misleading. Wallie 18:37, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

As a post-post-script to my opening remarks, I say that Wikipedia naming conventions should trump Google searches every time. The naming conventions are there for a reason and should be adhered to. Also, I was not only referring to the Americanization of Google search results. I was also referring to the fact that Google will censor out searches depending on the locality. According to the article here, Google censors out all sites that show any political unrest in China from the Chinese people using the local version. If they do that there, what are they censoring elsewhere?
—Lady Aleena talk/contribs 16:33, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Google only censors content in China. It was quite controversial when they agreed to start doing it (obviously the alternative was to be blocked, as we are), and they may eventually decide to stop. (By the way, it's best to use — for an em dash, not a numerical entity, and certainly not a Windows-1252 numerical entity.) —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 22:33, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Usage is an important part of Wikipedia naming conventions, and Google is one (but only one) evidence of usage. Reliable secondary sources in English are more important; the consensus of native English-speakers, knowledgeable in the topic, is as good as any.

While I am on the subject, the problem of Wikipedia mirrors (like answers.com) is vastly reduced by the simple method of including -wikipedia in the search command; also, there are other search engines than google. If they agree on a distinction, it is almost certainly web usage. Web usage may not be English usage as a whole; but there should be evidence and argument to overrule it. Septentrionalis 15:01, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

The names of articles and categories should be what most people expect them to be. If "Wikipedia naming conventions" result in non-obvious titles then they should not be followed, at least in that case. (BTW, I'll respond to your comment on my talk page when I have time to gather my thoughts, but probably tomorrow). --JeffW 22:38, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

This is probably all based on the User:Lady_Aleena's failure to get her way on category:Disaster movies. She's American and she wants it to be films because that's Wikipedia standard for film categories. But Wikipedia should be flexible and a good number of users, some of them British like me, think that writing in normal English is more important, and disaster movie is normal English in the UK. Piccadilly 00:03, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

The phrase is equally normal in the United States. In reference to theatrical motion pictures, the terms "film" and "movie" are used interchangeably over here. When applied to made-for-television productions, "movie" is considerably more prevalent. For that reason, combined with the fact that many commercial motion pictures are no longer shot on film, I disagree with our naming convention. —David Levy 16:56, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

I just noticed the following section, in which it's indicated that apart from the phrase "disaster movie," the term "movie" is not commonly used in the UK. I was unaware of this when I wrote the above reply. —David Levy 18:02, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Since we're playing slam Google as a metasource, let me add my own issues:

• Google is biased towards now and many users really doesn't grasp the fact that a lot of history pre-dates the Internet, the web, etc.

• Google is subject to being gamed: see Google bomb, Googlebait, Argumentum ad Google and the other articles in the Category:Google patsw 01:47, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Google is frequently used because it provides THE best ratio of effort to usefulness out there. It is very quick (far faster than saying "polling your friends") while also being extremely useful (way more useful than any "polling your friends" could possibly be). It is not perfect, so stop trying to attack for not being perfect. Perfection would take forever to reach. Rather recognise it for what it is, something anybody can easily use and very quickly use while at the same time provide information that is of some use (unlike "polling" your friends, which would provide inoformation of very little benifit. As would most other methods that you could try to come up with, I'd expect none would quite reach the powerful ratio google provides.). Mathmo 17:47, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Guideline on not changing one's comments after the fact?

I've been dealing with an editor who has forsworn use of the preview button - he sometimes makes talk/AfD/etc. edits in 5-minute-instalments, changing what he's written before. Also, he has no problem with heavily editing his own previous comments, e.g. just deleting incivil comments after they've been pointed out to him. Do we have a standard prohibiting this around somewhere?

And if it turns out we do not, you are all invited to comment on my proposal to add something to that effect to Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines. Sandstein 19:41, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Certainly seems a good idea, maybe we should have a set style for edits to comments (say strikethrough for removals and bold for additions). Plugwash 19:54, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

My advice on this is to be found at Wikipedia:Instruction creep. Editing a comment after a minute or two, when you see a grammar error, seems ok to me if your edit summary is clear—in fact, I've been known to do it myself occasionally. Hiding one's own uncivil edits is pretty obviously not ok, and I'm not sure we need a guideline to say so. -- SCZenz 19:57, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. Erasing one's own uncivil comments after just a couple minutes is effectively saying, "I shouldn't have said that, I'm sorry." This seems like a positive thing to me. If it's been around long enough for anyone to read it, I would use strikeout (foo) instead. Deco 20:06, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

I think that the dividing line is whether or not the comment has been responded to. It is a discourtesy (at least) to other editors to allow them to look like they are making irrelevant comments, and at worst may be a tactic for setting up an RfArb. That is the objection as I see it. Robert A.West (Talk) 20:26, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree with all that's been said; strikethroughs are obviously ok. I can't speak for any of you, but my experience indicates that it needs to be written down somewhere, for the education of those new to the way of the wiki... Sandstein 21:07, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

I note that if we had a real discussion software support, preventing edits other than strikeouts after a post had received responses would be easy. Oh well. Deco 21:57, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

I think the deletion of uncivil comments is commendable, and should certainly not be prohibited. Do we want to maximise strife, or minimise it? The internet fosters more incivility than any other medium due to the lack of face to face or even voice to voice contact and the lack of time delays, so people need to be able to withdraw comments they regret and indeed they should be encouraged to do so. Piccadilly 00:09, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Deletion of uncivil comments would be acceptable, if the edit summary made that clear. However, I prefer strike through, as to me that says "I said this, but wish I hadn't", as opposed to "I never said that", plus simple removal is open to abuse by an offender adding and subtracting an uncivil comment to insult someone (who reads it/sees it on the diffs) but subsquently pleads that they had already "retracted" the comment. Regards, MartinRe 00:21, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree with this - actually deleting comments that others have already responded to just makes the whole conversation confusing. Like editing offensive comments, this can actually provoke the involved parties rather than help them settle their differences. If they really want to remove the comments from view, they can propose moving the entire discussion to someone's talk page - this works especially well for flame wars where just a couple people fill a whole page with back-and-forth. Deco 11:27, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Hm, I can kinda see both sides of that one. The biggest factor there is probably the motivation of the editor -- are they removing the offensive comments in a good faith effort to improve the situation, or are they removing them in bad faith, seeking to sneak a few jabs past other editors? Difficult to tell the difference, but on the bright side a guideline may not have to, we could just take notice of the apparent fact that many, but not all, editors may see such removals in a bad light, and suggest strikeout tags as a transparent alternative. Good idea? Luna Santin 17:32, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Page statistics

Can't we have some way of displaying a page view counter, I have no idea whether certain pages are being seen by one person a week, or a thousand day. A simple page counter would do the trick, though being able to link to a more sophisticated statistics package would let us see from which pages people come from, and go to, and provide averages, referrals etc. --Iantresman 19:59, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

That would probably take a rewriting of the Wikimedia software. You can always use the history page and see how frequently the page is edited to get an idea of how popular a page is. Cowman109^Talk 23:18, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

This is a good idea. It would be interest to see how many people view WP, and by article. No doubt the top 10 articles would attract vandals. I do notice the response on the article for Lindsay Lohan is slower than for some others... Wallie 15:09, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Page views are impossible to do. MediaWiki software allows it, but because of our cache servers, etc., it wouldn't be accurate. Ral315 (talk) 17:43, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

It would be better than nothing. --Iantresman 00:23, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

This is somewhat inaccurate. To decrease processing overhead, En has enabled caching of static versions of articles for anonymous users. One consequence of this is that if the hit counter were visible, it would appear to not update for anonymous users, but registered users should still see it updating (I think?). You can read more about it here. En has made the hit counter invisible and I'm not really sure why. Deco 19:56, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Actually, it is worse than that. A static version served from one of the squids (as opposed to the database cache, you mention) would not be counted as a hit at all (which is most of the traffic). Those page loads which are counted would add an extra database hit for every page load, which is presently regarded as an unacceptable burden on the servers. Dragons flight 20:19, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Ah, you're right of course. This information could be derived from the squid logs in bulk and used to update the database periodically, but nobody really cares enough. Deco 01:52, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Some smaller Wikis show page view counts.--Runcorn 19:42, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

• I personally can't wait for the inevitable "delete, no one's reading the page anyway." --badlydrawnjeff talk 19:48, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

AfD's of Current Events

I propose a moratorium on deletions of current event articles. Case in point How NOT to steal a SideKick 2. While this article may eventually be deleted (and or relegated to WikiNews); whether or not it is currently notable isn't the point (as the event and coverage is ongoing that is difficult to assess). What I believe the focus should be, is on Wikipedia's strengths. The long tail, not being paper, being up to date and relevant to what people want to research; and such articles serve as an ideal introduction to new users. To delete it quickly is unnecessary and contrary to those strengths, it also ignores that the article will be recreated, poorly, but other good faith new (potential) contributors. As such, they (new current event articles) shouldn't even be put up for AfD consideration, until such time as their ultimate notability – and their impact can be determined. - RoyBoy ⁸⁰⁰ 16:30, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I would disagree. A subject has to be notable before it gets an article. You can't just create an article and argue that it should be kept because it might become notable in the future. We have to draw a line somewhere. What other criteria would you suggest on whether a current event is worthy of inclusion or not. Ydam 17:05, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I would say that WP:V would be a fair guideline. "Widely published", if an event is widely published and followed then it might be worthy of an article, whereas an event which is covered by 2 newspapers for one day would not be. Terryeo 22:58, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm concerned with "current events" not "an article"; the point of the not allowing an AfD is to avoid speculating on its future notability, which is exactly what people are trying to do by deleting it now. Once it is no longer a current event, then an AfD can be created. - RoyBoy ⁸⁰⁰ 05:29, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

We are here to write articles. Even when something is part of a current event, we shouldn't be altering our standards or presentation because of that. Let Wikinews cover the news. Dragons flight 05:40, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia remains the first and typically only source the public will consult. If we linked/redirected the deleted article to its WikiNews coverage (assuming it exists), that would be fine with me, and is different from an all out delete. But I would add people come to Wikipedia for a summarized account; rather than another telling of the story from WikiNews; which is almost akin to another blog. Furthermore, I again see little harm in allowing the article to progress during the current event, then being moved to Wikinews. - RoyBoy ⁸⁰⁰ 17:14, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

This won't do at all. If deletion of current events articles is banned anyone will be able to post articles about cats stuck up trees in their street. The best time to catch an inappropriate article is when it is new, and if a few errors are made, that's a small price to pay for clearing up a lot of bilge. Osomec 23:47, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

There is nothing wrong with labelling them for future AfD consideration; based on verifiability... a cat up a tree simply wouldn't qualify as it couldn't be verified. - RoyBoy ⁸⁰⁰ 13:36, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Why on earth should anyone be expected to take the trouble of noting them and then remembering to come back after a gap of time that suits you? It's a massive effort for people to nominate all the rubbish by a one-stage process, so switching to a two-stage process would be folly. Osomec 04:05, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

They don't have to remember. A bot can do it automatically, after a set amount of time, or when the current event tag is removed. - RoyBoy ⁸⁰⁰ 15:12, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Even wikinews has standards. "People come here looking for this" does not mean "we should have this". Is there a demand for a wiki where you can post whatever you want? sure. Is wikipedia the place for that? no. Also, generally things can not be moved to wikinews because of licensing conflicts. Kotepho 13:50, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

You're right about licensing problems - the GFDL is much more restrictive than cc-by-sa - but I wonder, is it possible to move content in the other direction? I'm not sure if they're mutually incompatible or whether cc-by-sa is strictly more liberal. Deco 20:13, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

All sharealike schemes are mutually incompatible, unless they specifically exempt other licenses. GFDL works can't be redistributed as cc-by-sa, because that removes restrictions placed by the copyright holder; cc-by-sa can't be redistributed as GFDL, because that adds restrictions that the copyright holder has prohibited. Any sharealike license must prohibit the addition of restrictions beyond its own license, because otherwise it wouldn't be sharealike: a redistributor could just add restrictions saying no one could copy it, for instance.

In the case of cc-by-sa, the relevant passage is "You may not offer or impose any terms on the Work that alter or restrict the terms of this License or the recipients' exercise of the rights granted hereunder." No exemption is granted for GFDL. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:05, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Bots

Who has the right to create bots? And are bots subject to the 3RR ruling? Wallie 18:43, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Bots are subject to the 3RR, but they don't realise that they are.--Runcorn 19:42, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Anyone can create a bot, but running it is another matter. There is a whole page set in the Wikipedia namespace devoted to this; you might start at Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approvals considering your question. User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 21:32, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

I would say start reading at Wikipedia:Bots. Stefan 13:59, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Notability and deletion

I have noticed a decent amound of deletions happening because a subject is "not notable". There is no official policy about notability, but people seem to think there is. I have asked a few people about what is wrong with keeping non-notable pages, but noone seems to have any answer for me. One reason I read on the Wikipedia:Notability page, is that non-notable pages are hard to keep up to quality. But I can't imagine why that would matter, a simple tag or two would label the page as needing improvement, or mark it as generally a junky stub page.

Theres plenty of other tags to say what wrong with a page - but deletion isn't a tag. It removes history, removes information and work done on an article. How does it help the *readers* (thats who wikipedia is for) if we delete valid but "non-notable" information - a classification that is quite subjective.

Does anyone have a real answer for what is wrong with keeping non notable pages? I would like to propose that we actually make *policy* concerning non-notable articles - hopefully one that discourages censorship and allows wikipedia to become an encyclopedia that doesn't just contain a popularity-contest's worth of content. Fresheneesz 01:09, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

The deletion of non-notable (and also poorly written) content is the center of the neverending philosophical debate between the inclusionists and deletionists. You can read about some of their rationales on Meta. A number of them seem to be intended to address notability. For me the motivation for deleting non-notable content is simply that it has limited impact on the world, and so relatively few readers will care about it. Since every article comes with a cost in maintenance and resources, it's best to focus our effort on the topics the most people will derive benefit from. Personally, though, I'm pretty lenient about notability and would happily accept a topic that affects only a few thousand people. Deco 01:49, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

The question is where does one draw the line. I can document the existence of my mailbox with photographs, but should I write an article about it? Existence does not guarantee that an article should be written. And then there's the question of whether Wikipedia is being used for free advertising. A garage band might create a website which talks all about them and their goals and what songs they play, and they may get a hundred or so people to see them play at the local county fair, but do they deserve an article? What about a person who self-publishes his own novel? User:Zoe|^(talk) 17:52, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

I think vanity pages (like all the example you describe) are considered beyond non-notable and by definition POV. Thats a different issue. I think many people say that if something is non-notable, it probably will be POV, it probably isn't verifiable, it probably has OR. The thing is, those aren't always true, and my point is that non-notability isn't a fault in itself, but form a group of articles that are more likely to have faults. Just as unregistered editors are less likely to produce good edits, but many still do. Fresheneesz 20:05, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. A vanity page, despite the name, is not necessarily POV, although many are - you can talk about yourself or your obscure garage band in a neutral way, incorporating many references to verifiable sources. You don't see this much because most editors experienced enough to follow these rules also avoid writing articles on non-notable topics, but it's anything but impossible. This is just one potential justification; the link and discussion above lists some others. Deco 20:11, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Nothing whatsoever is harmed if we make Zoe's mailbox; no one will read it, and so it will just gather cyber-dust. What actual downside is there to permitting such an article? Server load isn't a valid reason; current Chief Technical Officer Brion Vibber (who now "maintain[s] overall responsibility for all technical functions of the Foundation, including both hardware and software", although the position didn't exist at the time) has said: "'Policy' shouldn't really concern itself with server load except in the most extreme of cases; keeping things tuned to provide what the user base needs is our job." So what's the actual cost to us?

On the other hand, there are certainly benefits to having a very loose notability policy. (As loose as Zoe's mailbox, perhaps the benefits wane, but it's simpler to just not draw the line at all.) You need only compare Eric Burns' opinions about Wikipedia as of November 1, 2004 and as of November 20, 2005 to see how deletionism drives away contributors. No costs, nontrivial benefits: let's set the notability bar low, if we keep it at all. There's no point arguing over what's notable when there's no advantage to deleting things that aren't notable; it's a waste of time and effort. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:17, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

• Official policy on notability is contained in WP:NOT, which states that Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information. That something is 100% true does not mean it is suitable for inclusion in an encyclopedia, that Biography articles should only be for people with some sort of fame, achievement, or perhaps notoriety. One measure of achievement is whether someone has been featured in several external sources (on or off-line). Relatively unimportant people may be mentioned within other articles, that Wikipedia is not the yellow pages and that Wikipedia articles should not exist only to describe the nature, appearance or services a website offers. These points establish the concept of notability within wikipedia. However, no-one has managed to define it in policy beyond WP:NOT, since the term polarises debate and discussion of the issue becomes fractured. Steve block Talk 22:45, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

  I'm surprised that it's so old. Regardless, I think it is fair to say that consensus is currently in favor of notability requirements; WP:CSD shows that pretty clearly. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:17, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I think it might be a valid and interesting point to bring up the potential costs of *deleting* non-notable pages. I'm not talking about the hypothetical loss of information - but rather the huge waste of people's time arguing over *how* notable something is, and if its notable enough to keep, or non-notable enough to delete. I think its fair to say that hundreds or thousands of man-hours have been wasted over things that could have been completely avoided had their been clear policy to keep non-notable articles, if thats the only "issue". Fresheneesz 06:59, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

In that case though, some of these people would probably also quit the project, believing that it could not attain a worthwhile goal. Some have proposed a technical solution involving a notability level for articles such that readers can filter which ones they want to see, but this presents issues for disambiguation and would probably cause similar conflict over what notability level to make an article. Deco 08:49, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

That doesn't answer the question of why those people will leave the project. And frankly, I doubt very many people would; they would just start ignoring non-notable articles instead of prodding and AFDing them. As for filtering, I don't really think that's necessary, provided the rule that links should only go to items of interest is maintained. (For instance, categories that include exhaustive catalogs of Dragon Ball Z stuff would be subcategories of Category:Dragon Ball, and anyone who browses to that category would want to see subcategories containing DBZ trivia.) —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:05, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

IMHO it is extremely important that there are some sort of notability guidelines and that these are adhered to. Without these Wikipedia becomes simply an indiscriminate collection of information. Above all else, if Wikipedia wants to be taken seriously in the academic world (and thus far I don't think it has been) as a reference tool, it must avoid becoming a collection of facts and trivia. (This is a multi-pronged problem, we need good articles on noteworthy topics.) As an example I could write a verifiable article about myself, as my university website has a page containing info on me. Would this add any value to Wikipedia? Or would it detract from its worth? WP:NOT is the only policy we have in this respect, but there are well-established guidelines (WP:WEB, WP:BIO, WP:MUSIC, etc) which are often used in deletion debates, and rightly so. Zunaid 09:29, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

• I think if people couldn't use notability as a reason to delete they would start using something esle. You'd see the argument shift over to relaible sourcing, which is what, ultimately, notability boils down to; notability is somewhat shorthand for positing the question of whether there are enough reliable sources to write an encyclopedic article on a topic. It's all just a subjective debate, everyone has a different idea of what Wikipedia is. However, since Wikipedia is a work in progress it doesn't matter. Steve block Talk 13:24, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I think it would be excellent if people switched over to reliable sourcing, and verifiability. The problem now is that people use notability to mean those things, but when something is verifiable and reliably sourced, notability changes to mean something entirely different - importance. Notability is a term that is floated around and used to mean whatever the hell people want it to mean. Its a simple politicians trick. Fresheneesz 21:59, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree that notability is a difficult term to use, as it implies subjectivity; a stated rather than implicit emphasis on reliable sourcing would be ideal, as it targets the editor/s involved to improve the article in a productive way (see my essay for my thoughts on the semantics of AfD). Ziggurat 22:04, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I wrote a proposal to shift the emphasis to sourcing. People appeared to be so opposed to even the mention of the word notability it died on its feet. Do you think there's much to be had from resurrecting it? Steve block Talk 23:39, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

All the better reason not to use the word; my essay is about the pragmatic problems with using 'notability', not the ideological ones (which have been boiled to the bone). I was sorry to see your proposal fail, but I think that this would best be covered by explaining the existing policies better. It appeared to be a restatement of the basic principles rather than an addition.Ziggurat 00:03, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

• Well, the proposal was mainly an attempt to restate the basic principles, since they seem to have got lost in the wordiness of WP:V, WP:NOR and WP:NPOV. It seems to me Wikip[edia policy is drifting far from WP:KISS, and also that Wikipedians are drifting far from policies. Perhaps the proposal would do better as a statement of the principle that third party sources are required, Wikipedia:Independent sources? Steve block Talk 13:31, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes, the fact that your proposal used the word notability was probably a large part of its failure. Notability has a very real definition in English, and changing its meaning in the context of wikipedia would be confusing at best. I think rather than resurecting that sort of policy, we should enforce the current policies of NPOV, NOR, and verifiability - not by adding a synonym, but by forcing people to use those policies to base their arguments, rather than allowing people to use such wishy-washy terms as "notability" and "importance". Fresheneesz 00:38, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree with that. Maybe I'll try drafting an essay sometime, but I'm dubious of the results it will get. Notability is ingrained in Wikipedia culture, whatever its validity. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:05, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Why do you think that an article on Zunaid or Zoe's mailbox would make an article on, say, Helium less trusted or reliable? Our respectability will come from stability and verifiability, thence reliability. If our information is reliable, we will become respected as a reliable source. No one will care that some of our reliable information is utterly worthless to them, provided that the rest is sound. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:05, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Well, add me to that group of noone. Wikipedia currently isn't reliable, and I wouldn't doubt that many think it can never be reliable because of the source of the information (us). Marking something as "not reliable" I think serves the same purpose as deletion, and is better because anyone interested can use a crappy article as a springboard to study or verify information thats in wikipedia, outside of wikipedia - and maybe even improve the article in the process. Fresheneesz 05:41, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't follow. If all information on Wikipedia were reliable, but some of that reliable info was non-notable, you would discard Wikipedia as a reference source just because of the non-notability of some of its content? —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 21:36, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Part of our problem with reliability, however, is WP's fear of using anything primary in a NPOV fashion, as well as WP's general fear of things not printed on a dead tree. Reliability improves when our views on reliable sources improve. --badlydrawnjeff talk 13:39, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Jeff's got a good point here. I can appreciate that when discussing scientific research the standards need to be higher, but when we're discussing cultural issues, there really needs to be some mechanism by which we can recognise certain commentators as reliable sources and not disregard them simply because their comments are posted on the web. Steve block Talk 14:06, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia can work if 2 standards are kept in place. One standard is about what powers editors and admins have. Another standard is about what consitutes a published, reliable source. As long as editors understand those and they are kept it place it can work. At one time, democracy was not okay, there was feeling that the common man didn't know enough to intelligently decide how he should be governed. When all publication was on paper in bound encylopedias, the subjects of articles were not decided by the common person. Here they can be. But we have to keep a bottom threshold for inclusion. Admittedly that is an arbitrary decision but it is the foundation of quality. Terryeo 23:10, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand what you're saying. We have to keep a bottom threshold for inclusion in terms of notability, because any article about something non-notable is of poor quality? Or we have to keep a bottom threshold for inclusion in terms of reliability, because any unreliable article is of poor quality? The latter I would agree with, the former certainly not. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 21:36, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Guideline template

I think that the current wording of the template underemphasises the importance of guidelines and encourages wikilawyering, and so I have proposed an alternative wording based on the definition of a guideline at WP:POL. See Template talk:Guideline for discussion. --bainer (talk) 01:57, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Abbreviation of United States

According to Wikipedia policies, which abbreviation of United States should we use? US, U.S., USA, or U.S.A.? CG 13:15, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia policy is to not abbreviate. --JeffW 16:33, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

But when we use it in tables or as a small indication between parenthesis, which one should we use? CG 17:24, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

See WP:MOS#Acronyms and abbreviations. User:Zoe|^(talk) 17:56, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

U.S. Rich Farmbrough 09:29 14 June 2006 (GMT).

The policy is to use the abbreviation most common to the location being abbreviated. So, "United States" becomes "U.S." while "United Kingdom" becomes "UK" - Davodd 23:55, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Commas in headings

This does not seem correct: The Revolt, 1915 as a section heading. How can I convince the page writers of this? They see nothing wrong with it and changed their headings to include commas. KarenAnn 15:54, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

I see nothing wrong with it. Official Battle Honours, for example, include the comma - ie "Somme, 1916". To do an article on the named Batle Honour, you would need the comma.Michael Dorosh 16:04, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Incidentally, you might have provided a link for us. Is this in fact a British Army Battle Honour of some kind?Michael Dorosh 16:05, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

O.K., you are right. It just looked odd to me. The link incidently is Armenian Revolution which probably is an example of what you mean. KarenAnn 16:25, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

International versions

I have noticed that the international versions of Wikipedia articles are not just translations, but often completely different articles with different information. Is NPOV defendable when local Wikipedia version are significantly different? Obviously the FDL allows different versions, but I think it would be good if everything under the Wikipedia flag represented a single collection of facts, and not local interpretations. (I'm not sure if this belong to policy, so please redirect me to the appropriate discussion page if not) Robert John Kaper 16:29, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Each Wikipedia is a separate work, and that is the only way that Wikipedias in a wide range of languages can conceivably be created. The same fundamental polices apply to all of them, but each Wikipedia is the responsibility of its own editors. That's just the nature of the beast. Osomec 04:10, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

It would be tremendously impractical to keep different languages in sync. Every single edit would have to be immediately translated to all other versions for it to work. It's just completely impossible, logistically speaking. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 04:48, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

What about weekly or monthly synchronization? ...IMHO (Talk) 05:35, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Even that would take a staff of thousands. If you're a billionaire maybe you could employ one. Otherwise, it just ain't going to happen. Calsicol 04:19, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

File Synchronization

Action	New	Updated	Renamed	Deleted
Synchronize	copy both ways	copy both ways	repeat both ways	repeat both ways
Echo	copy left to right	copy left to right	repeat left on right	repeat left on right
Subscribe	-	copy right to left if already there	-	-
Contribute	copy left to right	copy left to right	repeat left to right	-
Combine	copy both ways	copy both ways	-	-

...IMHO (Talk) 06:08, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Assuming you "speak" n languages you might be able to keep a small number of articles in sync across that group, with collaborations across a larger group. But to some extent the language barriers stop POV warriors going across the whole set of projects. Having said that, both commons and interwiki links make it easier. Rich Farmbrough 08:59 14 June 2006 (GMT).

P.S. They are not "local" versions, although they will show bias towards there language group's locality, they are language versions. Rich Farmbrough 09:00 14 June 2006 (GMT).

I don't think you fully grasp the magnitude of your proposal. There are 229 Wikipedias; the English Wikipedia contains over a million articles. To keep it in sync with all others over the scale of a month, you would need to translate at least a hundred million articles per month. That's something like six orders of magnitude above the level of being remotely practical. Even syncing with one Wikipedia, such as German or Simple, would require hundreds of thousands of translations a month. Where are you going to get the translators? —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:08, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

I suggest we use genetic engineering to create and breed a race of monkeys specially designed for translation. We then put them all inside a dark, cold room in Florida and force them to translate 22 hours a day with electric whips. Mmmm, burning monkey. Deco 10:38, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

On a less negative note, its worth mentioning the existence of Wikipedia:Translation into English. If you notice an article where it looks like an international version has more information than the English one, then placing a translation request can help in getting the English article improved. And as you'll see from the interwiki links, many of the other language projects have a similar translation request pages for translations in the other direction.

In the past I've had good success with translation requests, encouraging Marginated tortoise to be translated from the German article and Artemisia Gentileschi to be translated from the Italian. -- Solipsist 21:28, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

copyright question.

Is it okay on wikipedia and also is it legal to link to from a wikipedia article to a TV show for download (or sections of the show? The show is very much a reference for part of the article and notable and needed and all that. I'm asking about copyright rules and such. Basically the article has a show as a reference source and then there's places online that for one give clips of the show that relate to the subject of the article. Another since the whole episode relates to the article, there's a whole show to download. DyslexicEditor 15:07, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Our style guide at Wikipedia:External links discourages linking to pages which contain copyright violations, but doesn't prohibit it. User:Zoe|^(talk) 15:23, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I've editted that page. There are at least three cases where knowingly and intentionally directing others to websites hosting infringing content was found to be a violation. I know of nothing to contradict that. Simply put, we should not be directing people to content if we believe that content is a copyright infringment. Dragons flight 16:05, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I would argue that linking to obvious copyright violations is more than discouraged. It does not do any good to Wikipedia's reputation if we do so. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 15:53, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Referencing something doesn't mean that you have to link to the full version online - many books and articles are referenced without such a link, and a reference is only supposed to provide a 'signpost' for how to find the source (online or offline). While WP:REF/ES is a little vague on citation styles for TV shows, there are APA guidelines for doing so that could probably be followed here. Ziggurat 20:49, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Copyright Rules

Is there a table that lists the various copyright types according to the rules or sets of conditions that apply to and define each type? ...IMHO (Talk) 15:22, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

There is some good info at Wikipedia:Copyright_problems, and Wikipedia:Fair_use ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 15:48, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

As I mentioned on my talk page, the copyright status of various works (i.e., whether they're public-domain or copyrighted) is summarized in a handy chart here. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:11, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Categories of administrators by country

See: Category:Wikipedia administrators... Is it a good idea to have subcategories of administrators by nationality? What is that saying, exactly? Has this been discussed before, and if so where? Pointers gratefully accepted. Something just seems a bit "off" by doing this, even if it's been round a while... or maybe it's me. ++Lar: t/c 17:36, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't think this should be encouraged. Divisive and inflammatory? Oops - wrong debate. Stephen B Streater 18:30, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Is it not OK for admins to say on their user page where they're from? If they can say that, what's the difference if they add a category? Many users have categories saying which English county they're from.--Runcorn 19:53, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Why devisive and inflammatory? No one care where you are from these days. The internet is cutting down the big fish, and giving small fish a chance. Wallie 20:45, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I think they grew organically from the old lists we used to have, which then grew into categories. The australian one was first, coming off of the old Wikipedia:Wikipedians/Australia, where it was added without discussion in April 2005. Declaring bias as creator of Category:English administrators, I can't see how they are divisive or inflammatory, and they seem a logical intersection of Wikipedians by location categories and Wikipedians by Wikipedia status categories. What is it saying? That I'm an admin from England. What's the problem with that? Steve block Talk 21:41, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

What should it matter where you're from? Surely you should be impartial and neutral regardless. I think that's the the OP is hinting at. And i'd agree - I see no need to categorise where admins are from. I mean, should be have Category:White Wikipedia administrators, Category:Black Wikipedia administrators, Category:Christian Wikipedia administrators, Category:Muslim Wikipedia administrators... ?? /wangi 21:46, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

It's called community building. You meet someone in a club or bar, you ask them, what's your name? Where are you from? Do you enjoy pumpernickle? Just getting to know one another. Don't worry about it. Deco 22:07, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

• This is more akin to a workplace, in that with a bar you can decide not to get along with someone and you likely won't run into them, so you're more likely to say things that might rely on being on the same side of divides in society. In workplaces, people and workplaces typically try to avoid that kind of thing, which is why talking about salary, religion, etc are typical taboos there. While deeper ties with others on the Wiki is useful, it should be entered into carefully, with more care taken not to offend or emphasise difference. --Improv 22:46, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Um, maybe where you wrok is like that, but don't generalise. Where I work, that sort of stuff is the main source of conversation. Perhaps my workplace is more diverse and that therefore stimulates conversations on such subjects, I don't know, but those topics certainly aren't off limits. We just can't harass anyone for their views. However, it's unlikely your workplace needs categories like Black supervisors, since you can easily identify that. Why would you imagine categorising by race or belief would be such a problem? If they aren't mandatory, I don't see where the problem lies. Next we'll be told we shouldn't use our real names for fear of offending someone. Steve block Talk 23:03, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I wanted to know if it had been explicitly discussed before or not because I was curious. Just like with other things that let you find people quickly, there might be concerns if people were using a category as a way to unduly influence things... not sure that's really very likely? ++Lar: t/c 22:36, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't know if that's a legitimate concern. An admin who is going to abuse their powers is going to do so one way or another, and I don't see such categories increasing the liklihood, nor do I see the community solution being impeded by the existence of the categories. However, if this descends into another Userbox type mess I'll quite happily vote delete here and now just to settle the issue one way or the other. Steve block Talk 23:03, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Don't do that! I was just wondering about it and whether it had been talked about before... ++Lar: t/c 04:24, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

The only issue I see with the categories is that unless some sort of 'bot is used to add people to them, being listed in under a category has to be seen as a voluntary thing, so the category can never really be considered complete. I'm an admin and I'm not listed under any categories (and wasn't even aware the categories existed until just now). One possible risk is that a vandal or someone with an axe to grind could decide to be juvenile and add someone to, say "Gay administrators" who isn't, etc. But that said the first page any Wikipedia editor should add to their watchlist is their userpage. 23skidoo 23:14, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

ISTR this was supposed to be a practical thing, helpful for finding admins who would be awake at a given time. FreplySpang 00:11, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Now THAT'S a great idea! but maybe time zones would be an even better way? ++Lar: t/c 04:24, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Frankly, I think the best solution to "I need an admin right now" is to encourage more admins and users to participate in the IRC chatroom. Deco 10:40, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, Lar, "Why not use time zones" was my reaction too. Deco, God knows I like IRC, but I don't think it's feasible for everyone. It would be better to make the on-wiki admin request pages (WP:RAA, WP:AIV) more responsive. FreplySpang 14:47, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

The problem with timezones is that it only tells you what time it is at the admin's location; without knowing what time that person is normally on, you're not any more likely to reach them, and even if you knew that you couldn't be sure something else didn't come up. At least on IRC the people who are there really are always there right now, and we could have an easy-to-use Java applet that connects up to a channel reserved for admin assistance. Too often we try to poorly duplicate other technology using wiki. Deco 00:35, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

A new policy/naming convention/directory tree/etc.

Offline I am currently typing up a proposal for a new policy which includes a naming convention, directory structure, and more. The proposal is getting long, so I don't want to post it here, as it would get cluttered with the more specific issues. Would it be acceptable to put it on its own page for discussion, expansion, contraction, etcetera? I would like to have comments and additions from various users interested in related topics and from users who are not that interested. It needs to be discussed at length before implimentation just to make sure that once done, all parties will be happy with the result.

Another reason I need to know where to put this is so that I can inform users through various articles talk pages. With a central discussion arena, a lot can be accomplished.

And in case anyone is interested, the subject of my propsal is Locations in fiction and Fictional locations. If you are not interested in the topic, but interested in the proposal, I will try to post the wikilink here too, once I know where to put it.

Its current length is 7838 bytes.
—Lady Aleena talk/contribs 22:37, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Put it in the Wikipedia: namespace, such as Wikipedia:Naming conventions (fictional locations), or a less permanent name such as Wikipedia:Naming conventions change proposal, and add {{proposal}}. See Wikipedia:How to create policy. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:14, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

It's important to note also that we probably should not have a lot of these articles because the fictional locations are, in themselves, not often encyclopedic. --Improv 14:26, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

The proposal is much larger than just fictional locations, but also real locations used in fiction, and dismbiguating settings. Fictional locations is only a part of the overall proposal. I hope you participate when I put it up. It is hoped that a uniform system will be adopted from this, and many people from many disciplines will join in the discussion. The reason I would like a seperate place for it, is the fact that it is so large.
—Lady Aleena talk/contribs 19:53, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

The proposal is at Wikipedia:Locations in fiction, fictional locations, and settings (talk).
—Lady Aleena talk/contribs 20:25, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Underage users

Do we have any policy on underage users? I mean, I know we allow them but it concerns me to see users who are 11 or 12 and list their age, gender, and full name on the Wikipedia. Do we have a page we could direct these users to in order to point out why it may not be a good idea? I'm also concerned that some categories make it perhaps easier than it should be to track down underage users. Please note that I'm not saying we should ban these users; many of them contribute quite productively to the Wikipedia. --Yamla 23:10, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't think so.Geni 00:07, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

I would just drop a friendly note on their talk page concerning privacy and let them make the decision. They'll pay more attention to a friendly personal note than a boilerplate template pointing to a random page. Many of these users have prior Internet experience though, despite their age, and know what they're doing. Deco 00:30, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

I might guess its possible they're giving support to young editors - but I would definately drop a note to those doing things like that, if someone hasn't already. Fresheneesz 01:03, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

This discussion has come up a great number of times, but in the context of protecting Wikipedia from them. Werdna (talk) 01:13, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

While it is certainly true that teenagers in general seem to commit rather a lot of vandalism (I am forever reverting it), I find that a number of younger editors also produce some very high-quality edits. They tend not to understand copyright and fair-use but as far as general edits go, there's often some good stuff. Deco's comment about hand-writing a friendly note is a good idea and probably right on the mark. --Yamla 02:07, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

We also have several teenaged admins, and even a former arbcom member (User:Grunt). User:Zoe|^(talk) 16:21, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

And at least on 'crat who's younger than I am (I'm 15). Will (message me!) 21:19, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Underage is in mind, not in birth. Well-bred people talking politics, sports and sometimes only religion show their age and nothing can be done. --DLL 23:18, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Deleting Articles without General Utility

Wikipedia:Utility is a new guideline/proposal, and an alternative to the Not Notable essay. Please take the time to review or edit it.—Pengo 01:29, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Linkification of Years and Decades in Articles

I'm not sure if there is already a policy on this, but I propose that the first instance of a each year and decade in an article should be linkified, and that the instances after should not be linkified. --Shanedidona 03:14, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Manual of style (dates and numbers). —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:15, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

New proposal about Music samples

Hello everyone. I made a guideline proposal about music samples used in music related articles in Wikipedia:Music samples, to regulate there use and prevent copyvios. But we need users who know enough about copyrights and fair use in one hand. and audio formats in other hand. Thank you. CG 07:41, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Proposed change to MOS/Biography

I have proposed a change/clarification in the handling of royal honorifics at the MOS (biographies) page to state that honorifics should not be used inline (but should be mentioned) for royalty. Please comment at the link above. Thanks. --Improv 14:48, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

No Legal Threats-mitigation of damages

WP:LEGAL contains the following sentence:

"But, if you really feel the need to take legal action, we cannot prevent you from doing so. However, we ask that if you do so, then you do not edit Wikipedia until the matter of law is settled - one way or the other - to ensure that all legal processes happen via proper legal channels."

As I wondered on the talk page: wouldn't someone who needs to take legal action also be obligated to edit Wikipedia because of mitigation of damages?

(We don't seem to have a Wikipedia article on the subject.) Ken Arromdee 15:55, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

• The "wherever possible" comes into play. We do not intend to make it possible for users who are taking legal action to edit the encyclopedia. --Improv 02:35, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes, but the page is phrased as "we ask that you" and not "we don't let you", implying that Wikipedia doesn't prevent people from doing such editing, but rather considers such editing a violation of policy and punishes it after the fact. Moreover, that *is* the case. Someone who sues Wikipedia can still edit anonymously or through a sockpuppet. And it's quite possible for someone's lawyer to tell him that he's legally obliged to violate Wikipedia policy and mitigate damages that way. Granted, I don't think that anyone has done that yet, and the article would probably get edited via WP:OFFICE anyway, but something seems strange about a policy telling people not to do something that the law may demand that they do. Ken Arromdee 05:51, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

• I can't provide legal advice, but I suspect that applying a "reasonable person" test might suggest that if we make efforts to block you, you won't be obligated to get around them. Phrases like "we ask that you" are part of an overemphasis on politeness that lead to lack of clarity on policy (which has grown to be a problem.. sigh). The law doesn't provide a must either though, AFAICT, although IANAL. --Improv 13:36, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Disclosing "conflict of interest"?

I own a company that makes medical devices. In an article about a medical disorder I wrote a short summary of a scientific study that used my company's devices. The study was done independently by a university hospital and published in a peer-reviewed journal. I didn't specify the name of the device or the name of my company. Someone told me that I should have put in a "conflict of interest" disclosure. I'd be happy to do that, but a complete disclosure would specify the name of the device and the name of the company, which someone else might think was advertising. A vague disclosure, such as "a person who edited this article works in a field related to the subject of this article" would be so broad that half the articles on Wikipedia would have such a disclosure. People who work in a field tend to be experts in that field.

Is there a policy about disclosing a conflict of interest?--Tdkehoe 18:25, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

In all sincerity, who is "someone" and why are you listening to them?Michael Dorosh 18:31, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Policy may differ, but if the independent source was cited, and the article is not POV, I don't see any problem. BTW, it's generally good policy to leave a link to the article you're asking about when bringing it up on VP.SB Johnny 18:35, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Here's the article in question, and the "disclosure" someone named "Bardi" added: Stuttering.--Tdkehoe 03:35, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Nobody should be placing disclosures in article space (as was done, before I removed it). If something's bias, it should be fixed, or a {{POV}} tag placed, which gets other editors involved. Sometimes, a disclosure of bias on a talk page is appropriate. If something favors your company, you should ask for a change on the talk page. But regardless, this doesn't go in article space. --Rob 04:01, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for removing the "disclosure." I agree with you: if something is biased (wrong, out of date, whatever) then fix it. Don't disparage the author. E.g., if I saw something that was out of date, I wouldn't post a warning: "The author of this material hasn't kept up with the latest developments." If I saw wrong material, I wouldn't post a warning: "This author doesn't know what he's talking about."--Tdkehoe 18:10, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

This is off-topic, but I have to say the graphics in that section are pretty awful. The 3-D nature of them distorts the numbers (in the first one, what's the actual comparison after 4 months?) and adds non-data ink (per Tufte), and the actual data comparison is trivial--two or three pairs of numbers. Way too much screen space is used for such a small amount of information. Just thought I'd point this out while people's eyes were on this article. · rodii · 18:28, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Personally, I would recommend that if there's a possible conflict of interest, you post the suggested addition on the talk page and ask if anyone thinks it merits addition, rather than adding it yourself. I don't think there was a strong conflict of interest here, but it's better to at least try that first. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 21:44, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Doubled stub tags

I am forever seeing articles with more than one stub tag affixed to them (usually two). I am wondering if perhaps this practice should stop, because they look terribly awkward and disorganised stacked one atop the other. My question, then, is twofold:

• (a) should we allow more than one stub tag on an article, and
• (b) if so, should we prohibit redundant ones (where one tag is a subset of another, eg. one for a politician stub and one for an Iranian politican stub)? Falcon 20:15, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Same as categories, the case is not rare, of a national politician that was involved in WWII, or a place related to historical events ... For subsets, it would be easier to ban them (just try to see if there is ordering enough in stubs to find subsets). --DLL 23:13, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

While I understand your frustration, it is helpful to have multiple stub tags on entries. As the entry is improved, those tags can be removed, and it makes it easier to find appropriate/relevant categories for the entry. Folajimi 14:41, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

The best ever stub is this revision of Ambrosius Stub. Kusma (討論) 15:05, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Excellent example, Kusma! I'm suprised that it even passed for a stub.

However, I do wonder why the other categories are left out of the current revision... --Folajimi 15:17, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

WP:WIAGA rule 5

I was part of a debate over that rule about wether constant vandalism qualifies as instability or not. Thoughts? False Prophet 02:26, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

No vandalism per se doesn't mean an article is unstable (it probably means it is just popular). A threat to stability would be the addition or alteration of a substantial part of the prose - that would qualify as instability. Davodd 04:48, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Question about external links

Yes, I read the page about ext. links, and my question was not answered there. My question: I originally placed a ton of ext. links to videos on the internet in the Brokeback Mountain parodies article. They have been removed, the remover arguing that my links violate the rule that says 'Wikipedia is not an Internet directory.' I understand that, and I've read all the rules on it- I understand that, whenever possible, Wikipedia should only link internally. However, in the case of these videos, that is impossible; and furthermore, I absolutely believe that this data- a brief descrip. of each vid, with a link to each one- is absolutely relevant to the article and worthy of Wikipedia. Here's a link to the page as it looked previously when my links were still in it: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Brokeback_Mountain_parodies&oldid=55259986 . Let me know what your consensus is.

And, if indeed you do decide that such linkage is improper, my other article, re-cut trailers, will have to be changed as well. Andrewdt85 18:23, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

• A half-dozen links is usually appropriate; any more than that has a tendency to raise eyebrows. --Folajimi 18:28, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Without bothering to take tpo much time and look at each of these links, I'll just quickly ask instead if there is a webpage out there (other than wikipedia) that gives a listing of these parodies? If so then you can exclude all of those ones listed and just link to that page instead. Alternatively, another alternative is to create yet another seperate page in wikipedia that is a listing of these links. And then link to that in the main article. Which makes the main article appear cleaner. Also you could try breaking up the links into sections acording to type if that is at all possible. Again it will appear neater if it has some organiisation like that, rather than one big jumbled up heap of links. So think about these ideas and try applying whatever mix of them you feel will work best in your case. Mathmo 18:29, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

"I'll just quickly ask instead if there is a webpage out there (other than wikipedia) that gives a listing of these parodies?" - yes, there is a page that lists all the Brokeback ones- well, all but a few. Still though, I haven't heard any good reasons yet why my data can't stay on the page. Andrewdt85 20:30, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Reverts to remove inflammatory comments?

I'm helping keep things calm on a controversial topic that was listed on the front page. Someone just put an obviously inflammatory anonymous comment on the Discussion page. Is there any policy on reverting to remove flames, or do we just let it all hang out? I have no problem either way, I was just curious if this is ever done. I can imagine a controversial article drowning in flames otherwise... :) Anon Y. Mouse 19:39, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

I would personally let it stand if it provides any constructive criticism. It's on the discussion page, not the article - readers understand that it's just the opinion of one person. But others disagree with me. Deco 19:42, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Em and en dashes in article titles

I have noticed that a large number of articles with hyphens in the article title were recently moved to titles using em or en dashes. The relevant MoS entry about dashes in article titles indicates that em and en dashes in aritcle titles are to be avoided (unless it's absolutely necessary to use them for some reason).

Policy issues aside, is a move request for the affected pages necessary, or is moving the pages something that can be done by an administrator without going through requested moves? – Swid ^{(talk | edits)} 19:46, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Moving pages can be done by any editor who has had an account for more than four days. User:Zoe|^(talk) 22:05, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

There is nothing in the linked MOS entry that I read as a desire to generally avoid en-dashes in titles. Jack-in-the-box ought to be typeset with hyphens (as the MOS wishes), but Hasse–Minkowski theorem is correctly titled using an en-dash. The MOS entry simply says that in this context, there needs to be a redirect from Hasse-Minkowski theorem. Arbor 20:52, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

In my opinion, using em and en dashes in article titles should be generally avoided, as the use of dashes in article titles provides a very small increase in the "perfection" of an article's title over the same title using a hyphen, while sharply increasing the probability of linking to a redirect page. The vast majority of casual (and a sizable percentage of experienced) editors will see that using a hyphen creates a valid link and won't bother to see if that link is being redirected. For an article that has a lot of articles pointing to it (for example, the University of Nebraska–Lincoln), using an em or en dash guarantees that most of the links to it will be made to a redirect page. While I'm a fan of tpyographic accuracy, I believe that this is one situation where the tradeoff between absolute accuracy and ease in casual/everyday use should be resolved in favor of the latter. – Swid ^{(talk | edits)} 15:17, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Getting a Barnstar for good work

If a user has made many contributions to an atricle or project in particular in a very good way and also helped it get improved should the user get a barnstar for good work or do they have to do something major that has improved the article such as adding new tasks for the project or coming up with a great idea for the project. I am not being greedy or anything but I feel I can get something like this. Anyone can look at my contributions and see I have made MAJOR contributions particularly for the Wikipedia EastEnders and Indian Cinema projects and feel sometimes I am not being appreciated for it. (Shakirfan 20:15, 16 June 2006 (UTC))

I assure you that your work is appreciated. Frankly, Barnstars are little more than a friendly gesture made by people who know you that has become rather out-of-style. I've never gotten one and I've been an admin since 2003 and have many thousands of edits and dozens of new articles under my belt. Also, Barnstars are generally given for cleanup work, rather than writing new content. Deco 20:20, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Barnstars are handed out at the giver's discretion. They could be given to anyone, by anyone, for anything, so long as the giver feels it's justified. I suggest you visit WP:ESP if you're feeling unappreciated. There are plenty of good people there who are more than happy to help. MightyMoose22 ^{>Abort, Retry, Fail?_} 20:27, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Wow. I've never seen that before. Deco 20:30, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

I only stumbled upon it when curiosity led me to click on a random little green thing in someone's signature a few months ago. That's why I've got one in mine now. MightyMoose22 ^{>Abort, Retry, Fail?_} 01:22, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Date formats

As a resident of the United States, I am used to seeing dates as month/day/year and they tend to be formatted on Wikipedia as such (which, I admit, is rather counter-intuitive.)

But I also know that many other countries (most?) use the day/month/year format. Is there any set Wikipedia policy on it? An example of an article with many dates formatted like this is A_Bigger_Bang_Tour. I think there should be a policy such that dates have to be formatted to avoid ambiguity, with perhaps even the use of a template so that users could have a personal setting or so that they could all be changed easily in case of a future policy change. --Stellis 00:59, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

If you wiki a date, like so (10 February), it'll be formatted according to the prefences you have set. In other words, what you suggest exists.

Of course, wikifying every date isn't done because it's irrelevant to most articles, so in general consistency should be kept throughout a certain article. Dates are understandable in any case, since the format is to use actual month names, making each field unique regardless of placement. – Someguy0830 (Talk | contribs) 01:04, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Where all-numeric date formats are concerned, my own preference is YYYY-MM-DD, like 2006-06-18. That has the advantage of sorting correctly in a pure ASCII sort, and can be extended with time like 2006-06-18 00:47:06 (using 24-hour time; time zones can still be an issue, however, if UTC is not used). *Dan T.* 04:48, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

I too prefer the YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS format, for the very same reasons. By the way, why did the default date used with "~~~~" end up being the way it is? One can always change the format afterwards, but it's irritating to have to do that. --Cultural Freedom (Talk) 2006-06-18 07:13 (UTC)

Probably because by specifying the month name, it's impossible to confuse it with anything else. But with your format the day and month could be mistaken for each other. For example, is 2006-03-08 the 8th of March of the 3rd of August? I think it would be better not to change it, because it goes away from the standard format, makes more work for you, is slightly more confusing and it might cause problems for bots that are expecting dates to be in a certain format. Icey 18:14, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't think I've ever seen YYYY-DD-MM, so it's probably not very common at all, which means it's unlikely to confuse people. But we could also change the format to 2006 June 18, at least (very) automatic sorting would get the years right, and with a slight tweak for the months, the whole date and time would be easily sortable. And note that "the" standard format is not at all standard for a lot of readers.... --Cultural Freedom talk 19:26, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

My choice of words was a bit dodgy, by "standard format" I meant a format that can't be confused with anything else. "18 June 2006" can only refer to one day. I like the YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS format as well, but it could be mistaken for something else. If it would be useful to you, I could write a PHP script that will sort lines based on various date formats. Icey 23:57, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, I can just modify the ancient Word macros I use for things like sorting (I do almost everything in Word, oddly enough).

But wouldn't it be relatively easy to modify the software so that the dates created with "~...~" commands were wikied, and thus their appearance could be determined by a user setting? That capability already exists in other contexts, right? (I'm new here, so pardon my possibly not quite correct use of the relevant terms to describe this stuff.) --Cultural Freedom talk 08:28, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes, it does. An example was posted earlier in this thread. I agree though, I think that would be the best option, because we could have dates in our chosen format. It would lead to a whole lot of date links in comments, but I suppose the idea is to change them to the chosen format, so they wouldn't need to be linked. Icey 12:28, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Would this be canvassing?

I am planning on filing an RfC against a user and was thinking about going back through their edit history and contacting users (most likely through email) whose talk pages he has edited to ask them to contribute to the RfC. Would this be considered canvassing against Wikipedia policy? I'm perfectly willing to contact ALL such users without regard for the details of their interaction if that makes any difference. Ideogram 21:33, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

• The following is an excerpt from WP:RFC:

"A user-conduct RfC informs the community of a dispute between editors and invites comments from the community."

The act of issuing an RfC in and of itself is a sufficient site-wide announcement. Attempts to contact "allies" to your cause may be perceived as "campaigning", or an underhanded attempt at ballot-stuffing. Either way, your actions may be deemed excessive... --Folajimi 02:17, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

I Don't think it is uncommon for, say 2 or 3 editors of a common view about an editor to communicate via email and thereby, more or less at the same time, create an RfC. The one brought against me, User:ChrisO posted that he had created an RfC on the several editors Discussion pages whom he felt was sympathetic to "his" point of view. Like, prepare the RfC and prepare the standard post that will go on several "sympathetic" editor's discussion pages. Post the RfC, go down the list of pre-prepared "sympathetic" editors and post the same notice to all of their discussion pages. Efficient, and it isn't quite canvassing because those editors are of course, interested parties. Terryeo 05:28, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Direct to video films

Is there any sort of notability policy on direct-to-video films? Should they have a different notability from those that actually show in theaters, or does it matter? I'm specifically referring to Chubby Killer, which, according to imdb, is direct-to-video. User:Zoe|^(talk) 23:42, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Notability. Currently, we don't seem to have guidelines for films at all, just fiction in general. Deco 23:51, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

There has to be some kind of guideline, since we can't have every student film in the world on here. A $15k budget, no notable actors, no notable director, having an article notwithstanding (and could probably be AfD'd), and according to the IMDB it's not even out yet? Yikes. We need a film answer to WP:MUSIC, which has served us quite well. --Golbez 23:53, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

WP:MUSIC isn't *that* great, it's got a whole pile of flaws that need to be addressed. --badlydrawnjeff talk 02:00, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Well, I don't know if there's anything set in stone, but ones that are distrubuted by major houses should be fine, as Chubby killer is distributed via Lion's Gate. That should be worth something. --badlydrawnjeff talk 02:00, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Request for clarification

On the page which explains policies and guidelines it states that guidelines are "actionable." Does this mean that users must follow them or face blocking? Is it ever permissible to refuse to comply with an official guideline? Exploding Boy 00:57, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

....Anyone? Exploding Boy 02:28, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

no see WP:Block#When_blocks_may_be_used.Geni 02:35, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I'm aware of the blocking policy. I'm looking for something specific about guidelines. For example, what, specifically, does "actionable" mean if not "blockable"? Exploding Boy 02:45, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Who knows. It isn't covered by blocking policy so admins can't block you for not following it. I supose arbcom could wack you but they can pretty much do whatever they like.Geni 02:55, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

That's not true either. Users can be blocked for things not covered by the blocking policy. Exploding Boy 02:58, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

• Do you have any records of such occurences? If so, could you please provide such? --Folajimi 03:01, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Of which? Blocks for things not mentioned in blocking policy? No. People refusing to comply with guidelines? Yes, but I'd rather not identify them at this time. Exploding Boy 15:11, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Users can be blocked for "disruption". Persistently going against generally accepted guidelines without good reasons can sometimes be considered "disruption", and thus might be a reason for a block. There's also the "exausting the community's patience" clause on another page. --cesarb 21:52, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

When a user is probably never coming back...

Hi, I was wondering if there is any sort or deletion policy for users who have abandoned Wikipedia, but whose userpages are still taking up space. For example, User:Billcica was here for a total of three days back in early April, broke just about every rule in the book, was subsequently blocked for 48 hours, and never came back. Is his usepage just going to stay for an indefinite amount of time, being modified now and then by bots and other automatically generated changes, or is there something that is usually done in such cases? Thanks, romarin [talk ] 01:17, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

• Can you say with absolute certainty that said user will never return to the project? There is a list for "Missing Wikipedians"; it might be appropriate to include that user's name on the list. --Folajimi 01:33, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

My understanding is that inactive accounts have almost never been deleted before. There's a proposal to delete inactive accounts, but that's only if they've never edited at all. So deletion in the case of an editor who was once active probably won't happen for a long time. --Allen 01:45, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

I question the notion of "taking up space." Space in some notional "login space," file storage, what? It's a vanishingly small number of bytes in the larger scope of Wikipedia, and it uses zero bandwidth or close to it. But it's a potentially useful addition to the history--if someone says, hey, this case reminds me of that Billcica thing, or wants to investigate an incident that Billcica took part in, the information is there. So the cost of keeping seems almost infinitesimal, and the benefits are potentially real. This question seems to come up on every site that allows users to login, as if there's a risk of running out of accounts. · rodii · 01:58, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the responses, this information helps clarify things. As for the "taking up space" thing, you have a good point, but I was only bringing this up because there seems to be a lot of argument lately about using space, bandwidth, etc. (such as the policy against unnecessary images, the importance of subst'ing templates, those who want to delete userboxes based on their taking up template space, just to name a few). I just wasn't sure if unused userpages were important enough to become a part of this dialog as well.

Regarding the list of missing Wikipedians, as i mentioned, this particular user broke just about every rule in the book (vandalism, personal attacks, page blanking, using wikipedia for advertising, uploading unsourced images, among others) in a matter of three days before disappearing, so I don't think he really warrants a place on that list! Thanks again for the comments, romarin [talk ] 02:25, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

A user involved in conflict we have all the more reason to retain the page of, for the purpose of documenting that conflict. A user page is not a shiny reward they get for good contributions and that we revoke if they misbehave; everybody gets one and they help keep track of users and information about them, bad or good. Hell, even User:Willy on wheels still exists. Deco 06:32, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Anyone who cites space or bandwidth concerns for anything whatsoever should be thwacked. Virtually none of us know what effects anything will have, since we haven't run benchmarks (or have you?). There's a Chief Technical Officer appointed to make decisions like this, and he's said we shouldn't generally worry about it. There is no policy against excessive image use for space reasons (as opposed to fair-use or aesthetic reasons), there is no policy to subst anything on the basis of server load (except signatures . . . but there, you'll notice, the developers installed a hack themselves to make it outright impossible to transclude them, something they're perfectly capable of doing without much effort for high-use templates if they felt it was important), and anyone opposing userboxes on the basis on server load deserves to be smacked with an enormous cluestick. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 21:56, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Around 6,000 accounts are created each day now, and that will probably continue to rise. Deleting a few to save a miniscule amount of space would be a total waste of time and effort. CalJW 06:41, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Google Earth screenshots

Do we have a policy on using Google Earth or Google Maps screenshots to illustrate place articles? --Ludraman 13:52, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes. They're copyrighted, therefore we cannot use them. User:Zoe|^(talk) 20:57, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Bear in mind, however, that it may be possible to obtain a freely-licensed shot of equal usability through NASA World Wind... Shimgray | talk | 21:10, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

New essay

Hi. I just wrote Wikipedia:On assuming good faith (terrible title, I know, please feel free to move it). It's a wiki-essay I've been mulling over for a little while about the relation between WP:AGF and WP:VAND. Feedback and constructive edits are quite welcome. Thanks! -GTBacchus^(talk) 20:07, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

verifiability, not truth

I am having difficulty in an argument over differing points of view regarding some definitions.

I have provided two citations from textbooks directly supporting my definition. My opponents are primarily reasoning from indirect sources to support their definition.

The problem is compounded by the fact that they all know more and are smarter than me. One participant in particular has repeatedly stated his disrespect for me.

My point is that their reasoning, while perfectly valid, is not as important as providing citations, since citations can be used to improve the quality of the article. So far all my opponents have been unable or unwilling to provide citations that directly support their definition.

Nevertheless, since I am alone, I am prepared to yield the point and try to reach some compromise wording that accomodates both definitions. My problem now is that no one seems to want to discuss with me. The wording as it presently stands is in line with their definition and I am frankly afraid to edit it due to the history of conflict. But I also cannot see why my definition, with two directly supporting citations, should be completely ignored. Ideogram 05:39, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Can you provide some context, like what article are you talking about? -GTBacchus^(talk) 05:41, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Well, the article is programming language but I wouldn't recommend trying to read the (archived) debate as it is very long and tedious.

If you are familiar with computer science, the debate is whether we should say that programming languages are by definition those that are all equally powerful in a mathematical sense (Turing-complete) or whether less powerful languages like SQL and HTML are also programming languages. Ideogram 05:52, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

I have never heard it asserted that a language must be Turing-complete to be a programming language, but if you have two citations, you have two citations. On the other hand, I can see your fellow editors' point: the term, "special purpose programming language" is often used for non-Turing-complete languages, as well as languages whose Turing-completeness is not obvious, and the term would be purposeless if your point were universally accepted.

Technically, their proper response should have been to cite sources. On the other hand, I can sympathize with their response, "Come on now! We use these terms every day and that is not how the term is used on a daily basis." A simple check of some tertiary sources would have confirmed that they are not talking nonsense. For example, the Brittanica lists SQL and HTML among its programming languages, and AbsoluteAstronomy.com lists several programming languages whose Turing-completeness is not known.

Verifiability is one of our three touchstones. It is non-negotiable, and tertiary sources are not normally considered reliable sources. On the other hand, the policy wasn't created to make people run around finding secondary sources for statements that can readily looked up in obvious places. My view only. Robert A.West (Talk) 06:42, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

I have long since abandonded any attempt to favor my definition over theirs. My points are:

• They really should provide citations for the good of the article.
• We should be working towards a compromise that accomodates both points of view, not ignoring my citations.

Thank you. Ideogram 06:49, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

As I read the current lead, the Turing-complete point is mentioned, but I haven't gone through the citations. Perhaps more "For the good of the article" and less "verifiability, not truth" might get more cooperation? Robert A.West (Talk) 06:54, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

At this point I am feeling very timid and avoiding the article, but when I return I will keep your point in mind. Ideogram 07:01, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

X massacre vs. X Massacre

Currently there is no policy on capitalising of "massacre" in article names (see google). I think there should be one. I don't see how one article can have capital M, and the other lower-letter m. Now, my question is, is there a right solution and a wrong solution, or are both solutions correct, and we should conduct a vote? --Dijxtra 13:35, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

From a practical point of view, some 3/4 or more of articles have lowercase "m", so (unless there are prevailing arguments for the opposite), it would be far easier to move uppercase ones. I'm far from an expert on English orthography, but I don't see why would uppercase be justified—most of those names were given "ad hoc" and/or "post-festum". And further, when in doubt, there's WP:NC#Lowercase_second_and_subsequent_words. Duja 15:09, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Something like the Boston Massacre probably deserves capitals, as it refers to a specific event bearing that name, not just a massacre which occurred in Boston. Generally speaking, if you can't capitalize it, I think you should rename it, because "massacre" isn't a very neutral word if it isn't part of the name. Deco 21:48, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

For comparison, something that would not have capitals would be Watergate scandal, because that's not the "official name" of the scandal, it's just a scandal involving/called Watergate. Deco 21:50, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Point of Information: Vote hawking or pawning

Are there any rules regarding the bartering [or selling] of votes on AfDs, RfAs, etc? How about guidelines? --Folajimi 03:44, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

• I don't know of any precisely on point, though the observation that Wikipedia is not a democracy is clearly relevant. We function through discussion and the building of concensus and for that reason, I am sure that admins will agree that the buying/selling/bartering of "votes" is not appropriate. Dragons flight 04:21, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
  • Generally speaking, any type of vote coercion would be strongly frowned upon and likely justification for administrative action if repeated. I can't cite the relevant policy, but you might ask on Wikipedia talk:Articles for deletion. Don't panic too much though - if it comes out that such coercion occurred, just note it on the nomination page and the closing admin should take it into account. Deco 04:23, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
    • Thanks for the constructive feedback. My greatest concern is relating to those who are trying to pull a Duke Cunningham with their votes. Should such incidents be addressed in isolation, or is it more expedient to have a notice included in the appropriate templates? At least it will not be said that the project failed to acknowledge the appearance of impropriety relating to such conduct. --Folajimi 13:19, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Rules have long since been established in the real world to deal with such activities as conducting a meeting or voting on an issue. Yet the Wikipedia does not seem to want to embrace these solutions for one reason or another as if these problems might somehow be new. Ask yourself how the bartering of votes would be handled in the real world. The answer should be not different when asked about the Wikipedia. Yet it seems that as with many, many other issues the policies that are followed on the Wikipedia and the policies that are followed in the real world do not always jive. Perhaps the Wikipedia needs to look seriously at its system of governance and consider ideas that exist in the real world like parliamentary procedure and the like. Otherwise I fear the Wikipedia may be in for some very serious trouble ahead. ...IMHO (Talk) 05:12, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

impression

After extensive discussion on a topic and pursuing reasonable alternative solutions without success and having looked at the self posted credentials of some of those in opposition I am now left with the impression the Wikipedia is nothing more than a glorified grade, middle and high school teacher/student endeavor which has been exposed to the public without regard that the rules which the public are obligated to follow and the rules which students and teachers are obligated to follow are vastly different. For example: in the real world or public world it is perfectly legal to accuse anyone of anything without being in danger of committing an act of slander or libel so long as the accusation is true whereas in the Wikipedia any accusation is regarded in the same manner as would be talking back to the teacher in the school environment. What is truly disturbing about this is the effect on the content of some articles. It appears that some articles are being guarded by teachers from editing so that they might use them as a special online resource for their own students rather than permitting any edit that is not in line with their particular usage of the article. For instance: if a teacher wants to refer his students to a certain topic so that he can assign a task of say writing a basic computer program to perform the computation of the mathematical formula the article relates then he will naturally be opposed to anyone including such code in the article or on any other page or in an article of its own. The absence of a speller function tends to uphold this idea. I certainly hope that this is not the true nature of the Wikipedia and that conveyance of knowledge and truth is its ultimate goal rather than it’s serving as merely an online classroom aid for teachers and students in difference to the rules we must abide by in the real world. ...IMHO (Talk) 04:47, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

If a teacher wanted to reference a stable article for the purpose of a class, they would simply use a permalink to the desired version - there's no need to "guard" an article. Also, it seems clear that you're referring to some specific conflict and it'd be helpful if you could link it and tell us more about it instead of speaking in vague generalities. If you feel intimidated by a protective user, just remember that nobody on Wikipedia carries authority over content. Deco 06:54, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Again as in the past my concern is not so much for specific cases but rather for policy in general. Your comment assumes that a teacher would know about a permalink and their acknowledgement that they do not have authority over content. Although there is a specific case which relates to this discussion I am reluctant to share it with you since my experience has been that you likewise reject computational examples and data because they apparently clutter up a pristine presentation based solely upon mathematical notation although you have embraced publication of computer code elsewhere. Suffice it to say that I am highly disappointed in the Wikipedia for failing to require that articles include real world examples to the detriment of all users. I have the knowledge. My only concern is that others may have the knowledge as well. ...IMHO (Talk) 07:38, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure if I understand the need for a new policy; if a user is interfering with your ability to contribute Wikipedia, you can always seek out one of a many options for dispute resolution. You could even offer them a permalink; if they're unaware of the option, we can always let them in on the secret. If they ignore an article's talk page or just don't know it's there, placing a message on their user talk page will give them that orange box on their next pageview. Could any of those options potentially solve your problem(s)? Regards, Luna Santin 09:45, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

FYI see [7] and related discussions/articles. 69.9.30.178 11:29, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Could you provide an example of a 'talking back to the teacher' type of problem? I've found that we generally have no problem with accusing article subjects of things, providing there is some sort of citation of sources. With respect to accuastions aimed at other editors, admins on Wikipedia are generally willing to intervene—again, as long as the accusations are clearly explained (diffs are very useful here) and civil. General complaints about 'some articles' aren't helpful, as such complaints don't indicate where the problem lies.

Please be aware that in general, Wikipedia is not a how-to guide or course textbook and it's not surprising that computer code, detailed methods and protocols, and classroom-type example problems are trimmed. (...With the exception of places where code is directly relevant, as in articles like bubble sort. Even then, we would be better off having an animation or flow chart rather than a lump of code.) That type of writing is more appropriate to our sister project, Wikibooks. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 14:09, 20 June 2006 (UTC)