User talk:CalJW/Archive Apr-Oct 2005

Messrs Smith

I saw your changes to Samuel Smith and John Smith, I think they are fine its just that the articles are a bit schizophrenic about whether they are about a person or a brewery. But there isnt really enough information about either to split them into two articles. It would be helpful if someone could expand them significantly... Justinc 18:01, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Freud Museum

I probably didn't like the number of lines it took to get to the article title, but I'm not sure (I was looking at lots of pages very quickly). It certainly seems to be ok; I was being overly hasty. Algebraist 17:01, 19 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, I shouldn't have snapped at you. I was deliberately avoided my usual "The XXXXX XXXXX is..." opening. CalJW 17:04, 19 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Schools votes

I know the current school vfd situation is frustating, but please try really hard to assume good faith. Basically Neutrality messed up, but he was trying to do the right thing, not just make a protest. Kappa 23:22, 19 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Assume good faith in all circumstances/be a sucker. What's the difference? It was part of an ongoing aggression. I do not accept that is good faith. CalJW 16:57, 20 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Oi

I had the FA Cup page ready to edit and then it said I was involved in an Edit Conflict with you! =P I guess we were both eager to highlight Utd's losing.. sars 16:48, May 21, 2005 (UTC)

Jomanda

What is your point exactly? First off, if you look at what I've been doing lately (WP:FICT; Wikipedia:Schools; Wikipedia:Categories_for_deletion/Restructuring#speedy renaming) I hardly qualify as any kind of deletionist. Second, Jomanda exists and is a public figure in my country. And third, I had been meaning to expand it after doing some more research. And finally, WP:FAITH. R adiant _* 15:56, May 27, 2005 (UTC)

And do read the article again, you'd be pleasantly surprised. Radiant_* 16:08, May 27, 2005 (UTC)
- You have made many delete votes and deletion by merging is still deletion. It removes an article and hampers access to its content. WP:FAITH is a guideline not a policy and a proposal to upgrade it was overwhelmingly defeated. Please don't use it as a weapon. In any case, I don't doubt that you think you are helping Wikipedia, but since I think you are wrong on every policy issue on which I have seen you express an opinion I think the project would be better off if you didn't concern yourself with them. CalJW 22:42, 29 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  - In response to above, I never claimed WP:FAITH was policy, nor am I using it as a weapon. I'm simply asking that you assume good faith, by assuming that, like most 'pedians, if I start an article as a stub, I intend to expand it. I would be happy to hear your objections to any proposal I'm involved in; an important part of proposals is building consensus for them, and often they are changed to address objections or other issues. Yours, Radiant_>|< 10:54, Jun 9, 2005 (UTC)
    - Okay, but the whole point about that article is that you were the creator, and you are not any Wikipedian, you are who you are. You vote for deletion of many articles which are better than that one then was. I did do a google search and decide not to nominate it for deletion. CalJW 00:02, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      - But maybe who I am is not the same as who you think I am. My point is that you shouldn't judge an article by its author. R adiant _>|< 08:21, Jun 10, 2005 (UTC)
        The article was eligible to be condemned by the sort of criteria you apply anyway, but I don't normally worry about such things. The point is that it was yours and I was shocked that you posted something so feeble when you are so ready to damn other people's efforts. CalJW 00:09, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)
        No, it wasn't; apparently you are mistaken about the sort of criteria I apply. And note that I expanded it within mere hours. R adiant _>|< 12:32, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)
        Don't you ever let anyone else have the last word. You are a deletionist. You posted a feeble stub. I was amazed and I asked if it was a joke. That is all. There is no need to go on and on about it. CalJW 21:31, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Coast and countryside

Actually the result of the CfD was three delete and one keep. If you have an objection that's fine, but please stop being disruptive by unilaterally reversing the decision. Joe D (t) 13:22, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

That's debatable. Anyway, three is a pathetic justification for such a major decision. I don't think notices were put on all 50ish categories as they should have been. CalJW 22:42, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Hello?

I've only met you recently and I think we just started out on the wrong foot. Why are you so opposed to what I do, can we talk this out please? Yours, R adiant _>|< 10:54, Jun 9, 2005 (UTC)

How can we agree? You seem to want to make Wikipedia as much like a conventional encyclopedia as possible, and I don't. You are suspicious of short articles and I am not. Neither of us will change our minds, but since it is pretty clear that those of you with an academic bent are losing control of Wikipedia, if you ever had it, I'm pretty relaxed about that side of things.

What does annoy me that you seem to like to go to great lengths to present your personal preferences as a consensus when they are not, and you are in the minority. I don't see how you can think that a proposal to merge school articles represents "consensus" when that is virtually never the outcome of a vote. Surely you realise that merging is deletion in this context. Schools stubs are only nominated for deletion because they are independent articles; if they were part of larger articles they would not be nominated. You wrote a proposal which effectively said, "If you see a school stub, delete it" and tried to pass that off as representing the consensus view, when it is actually the view of a minority, to which you belong, and which is losing the tussle on schools in one vote after another. It may be well intentioned, but it still isn't on. The only feasible solution to all this time wasting is for the minority to defer to the view of the majority. CalJW 23:58, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure where you inferred that I want to make Wikipedia as much like a conventional 'pedia, or that I have an acedemic bent. Because I don't; a conventional 'pedia is far too strict to actually work (it was tried, nupedia, and it failed). What I do focus on is organization of information, because I believe it to be important.
The school article is not consensus per se, but it is a workable compromise. And it is consensual that compromise is appropriate here. It is not policy, nor is it indended to be. And frankly, I am not in the minority there, either - you are so far the only one who holds the opinion that merging equals deletion.
Wikipedia is not a democracy, and that means that it is not ruled by majority vote. Partially because the majority may well be wrong. For instance, if WP were democratic, then a small majority that held some POV for ethnical or religious reasons could force it as 'fact'. A rather silly example would be Pokemon... many 'pedians dislike them, and if a wikiwide poll was held on their inclusion, the answer would probably be no. But we cover them anyway, as a cultural phenomenon. However, the way in which we cover them is open for debate. For instance, look at List of Pokémon items and consider that each item used to be an individual article.
Instead of being a democracy, we try to reach consensus one way or the other. While I admit that school articles are generally kept by VFD vote, there is never a consensus that they should be kept (because if there were, there wouldn't be so many nominations). This has been one of the fiercest debate in the history of the 'pedia, and has in the past regularly led to shouting matches, and waves of alternating dominancy of keep-voters and delete-voters. However, that is not particularly productive, and shouting matches are a deterrent. Therefore, an attempt is being made to reach a compromise. Which may not be ideal from all sides, but should at least be workable. Many people do prefer compromise to argument, and most minorities aren't going to be quiet simply because they can be outvoted.
Radiant_>|< 08:15, Jun 10, 2005 (UTC)
- I still reject your approach and believe that you are misrepresenting the situation. Voting keep would be a more helpful contribution to ending the problem on your part. You spend a great deal of time doing things that I think are harmful to Wikipedia, and I can hardly be expected to appreciate that even if you are well intentioned. From my point of view you focus on making the organisation of information worse. Information about schools is best placed in category:schools not category:towns or wherever it ends up when you have finished with it and I think the Pokemon thing was better before. CalJW 00:07, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  - Well, then, I would advise you to join the discussions as appropriate. In many (though certainly not all) cases consensus tends to agree with me; and consensus certainly accepts my approach, and finds my presence helpful. If everybody would vote your way, there would be no problem - but that's a hypothetical situation only, and in practice discussion and compromise are better than repetitive arguing. Radiant_>|< 12:32, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)
    - Not if they lead to a bad result, and you seem to have endless amounts of time to devote to ensuring that they do. I think you could put it to better use writing articles. CalJW 21:27, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Rotten Row

Hi Cal,

You don't happen to know anything about the Lady's Mile in relation to Rotten Row do you. There is also a good period photochrome at [1] which is almost certainly PD, but I can't find any information on its source or dates. -- Solipsist 19:59, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I'm afraid not. I would just use the image. The chances of anyone complaining are miniscule, and if they do it will just get removed, no one will sue you. Incidentally, I have just found a site which may be prove to be a rich source of PD images on London, architecture and related subjects, though I haven't started looking through it yet [2] CalJW 20:05, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, I do quite a bit of image sourcing, but I like to give some information to justify the use of the image. The http://www.artandarchitecture.org.uk/ site is good. I'm sure I've used before, especially as a source of information on public sculptures. In particular, they've got some useful photographs of the original sculptures by Jacob Epstein which helped in writing the article on 55 Broadway, London (unfortunately their photos will mostly be copyright in that case). However just last week I was able to take some photos of the defaced sculptures on Zimbabwe House [3] which I will probably upload shortly. -- Solipsist 20:31, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Cricket

Hi there! I admittedly don't know that much about cricket (even if my country does play in the competition). But wouldn't you agree that if I wanted to learn about cricket, Wikipedia should be the place to start? In other words, if a naming or categorization scheme is confusing to layman, shouldn't it be changed? R adiant _>|< 07:49, Jun 15, 2005 (UTC)

I think accuracy and precision should come first. In any case, we are talking about the categories for domestic cricket. Beginners to cricket nearly always start out with the international game nowadays, unless they come from a cricketing background, and if they do they won't have a problem with the way things are done here. But really, the categories are just like those for players by football club, they aren't so hard really. It is only the intermediate categories like category:Players who appeared in English cricket by team that are a little offputting, but they are accurate and surely not that offputting. All the words are simple enough. The suggested new name is simply inaccurate as the category contains articles about cricketers, not articles about teams. CalJW 10:37, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Lansbury Voices?

I see that you started Island_History_Trust. Have you heard of Lansbury Voices? We have a Wiki now.... LV wiki LoopZilla 09:38, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I'm afraid not. I'm not local to the Isle of Dogs. I started that article because I am working on List of London museums. CalJW 10:38, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

UK related article

I've started a stub on the Silver Jubilee of Elizabeth II; would you be willing to help me with it? Mike H 20:18, Jun 15, 2005 (UTC)

I'm sorry but I don't really know anything about it except that I was there. I saw the Queen on the balcony at Buckingham Palace. Good luck with the article. CalJW 20:36, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I created Golden Jubilee of Elizabeth II if you're interested in reading it. Mike H 04:08, Jun 18, 2005 (UTC)

Category:History by country

Category:History by country has been listed on Categories for Deletion with a proposal to replace it with Category:History by nation. I note that you commented on the previous vote on this matter and your comments on this new listing would be much appreciated. - SimonP 18:35, Jun 24, 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/Asian Cup 2007

CalJW,
Your comments "Please don't try to cramp Wikipedia on the basis of some outdated notions derived from old fashioned reference works. CalJW 23:16, 9 July 2005 (UTC)" are unhelpful. If you believe that I hold views different to your own, a discussion that begins with an assumption of mutual respect would be more appropiate. To be overly Wikified, comments like the above are "hopelessly POV" and do not lend themselves to rational discourse.
Regards,
Aaron Brenneman
14:31, 10 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I reject your opinion. IMO you are being far too touchy and much more aggressive than I was. I gave a good reason for my vote and even said please. It was a perfectly rational comment and I have no reason to regret it. Please show more restraint in criticising other users. Thank you. CalJW 01:51, 11 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I see there is an obscenity in the first line of your user page yet you lecture on manners! CalJW 02:08, 11 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

CalJW,
Thank you for the bracing dose of irony. Since it appears no offense can be taken to any statement that follows the word please, I submit: Please show more restraint in applying pejoratives like "cramp", "outdated", and "old fashioned" to me in a public forum, and I will show more restraint in, to use your words, "lectur[ing] on manners".
Cordially,
brenneman ^(t)^(c)
15:33, 12 July 2005 (UTC) (UTC)[reply]

I continue to reject your opinion. CalJW 16:38, 13 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Ruth Parasol

Please do not remove Votes for deletion notices from articles or remove other people's comments in votes for deletion pages. The notices and comments are needed to establish community consensus about the status of an article, and removing them is considered vandalism. If you oppose its deletion, you may vote at the respective page instead. Thank you. -Harmil 16:08, 14 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I did not do so. 212.183.98.70 did. Please check the edit history before making allegations of this seriousness as this sort of mistake is liable to cause great offence. The false allegation will live on in the edit history and so far as I know I cannot have it deleted from there. CalJW 16:14, 14 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

You're correct that I made a mistake in identifying the editor that caused the problem. I looked at the edit history upside down (as I often do, sadly... the UI for diffing is horrible). I wouldn't get overly distressed about the edit history. It's not as if anyone is going to come to your door asking for your Wikipedia license back, and you can rightly point out that it was a mistake if anyone bothers you about it and/or send them my way. -Harmil 16:23, 14 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Cricket on VfD

Hiya. You previously voted 'keep' on the VfD for Nottinghamshire_v_Yorkshire_26_June_2005 and other subarticles of 2005 English cricket season. I just wanted to let you know that these pages have promptly been put back up for deletion, this time at Wikipedia:Votes_for_deletion/Essex_v_Glamorgan_15_May_2005. Those of us who have worked on these articles would value your continued support. Thanks and best wishes. --Ngb 19:47, 18 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Re: School articles

In most cases I am one for keeping articles, but when there's a school stub and the school is entirely non-notable, it doesn't belong here. I don't see why people want every single George Washington Elementary school in the country on wikipedia (in fact two countries because of the US and England). I really don't care what the majority of deletionists or inclusionists care about, this is my stance on this particular issue, and I don't feel it makes me either. Besides, I changed my vote when the article was expanded. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 16:37, 20 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Normally I don't respond to discussions on other people's talk pages, but I was watching this one due to a recent exchange, and thought I'd drop in. Schools that handle 100+ students per year are always notable, IMHO. Why? Because schools are a frame of reference for the people they educate. If a single school ends up having 20 famous physicists linked to it, that's notable, but it's not a fact you'll discover until long after you create the article. By the same token, most bus stations are not notable. If 20 famous physicists passed through the same bus station, there's no reason that you would care (unless it happened to be the bus station near Los Alamos in the 1940s). See the distinction? -Harmil 17:46, 20 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Charles Darwin

Dear Caljw,

Thank you for your keep vote in the "Darwin's illness" area of Wikipedia. It is appreciated. I did a lot of hard work. I did want to know what "Did you know?" is all about. I am not familar with that area of Wikipedia.

Sincerely,

kdbuffalo

It's the section at the bottom right of the main page which features new articles - though there's a featured image instead at weekends now. CalJW 20:25, 26 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

School nomination

can you please look at Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/Duveneck School (2nd Nom.) it is being voted on again Yuckfoo 04:41, 11 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Categorization

In light of the recent CFD debate about fictional emperors and empresses, I decided that the issue was way overdue for a more global discussion. Thus, please join the talk at Wikipedia:Categorization/Gender, race and sexuality. R adiant _>|< 07:48, September 1, 2005 (UTC)

Chennai

Chennai is the fourth largest metropolitan city in India, and deserves to be included in the Category:India, so do all the metropolitan cities in India.

Instead, articles that need not exist in Category:India could be:

Those articles can be removed, but please do not remove any of the metropolitan cities, which would include Delhi, Chennai, Kolkata and Mumbai - Bnitin

No they don't. London isn't in category:United Kingdom and New York City isn't in category:United States. If people were allowed to make exceptions for things they decided were important, there would be no end of it. They could add the most important individuals, the most important religions, the most important sports, the most important rivers and so on and so on. I am in the process of clearing out the main India category, which had 240 articles in it when I started. I have already dealt with category:Pakistan. CalJW 01:27, 4 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Great to know that you've reduced the category on India. What you state defintiely makes sense, but it's a Category, not a list. Lists should be terse, but Categories need not be. Not all cities can be metros, so I doubt it would grow if we restrict it to just the metros and not to anything people deem important.

I had reverted your edit and also was adding in Mumbai and Kolkata. Delete the reference if you feel it's not required. - 130.126.130.161

This is not in accordance with standard practice for other countries. I am going to complete my work on the India category as I originally intended. CalJW 02:34, 4 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Good, that's fine with me! And, you've done a good job when I last saw. Thanks! :) - Bnitin 20:30, 4 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Wrong foot?

We seem to be communicating very badly. Is there a problem I am unaware of? Steve block talk 21:01, 4 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see any problem. I just didn't understand one of your sentences, that is all. CalJW 21:03, 4 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Fair play. Steve block talk 21:09, 4 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Mathematics in India

There is some discussion about this category which you created at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject Mathematics#Category:Mathematics in_India. I wonder what your thoughts are. Thanks. Oleg Alexandrov 22:27, 6 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Rugby League

First, don't you dare tell me to grow up. Who do you think you are?

Rugby league, despite its undeniable and unwarranted media presence, is an extremely minor sport. The Times newspaper, which is quite reputable I believe, carried out a survey of sports some time ago (maybe last year?) which found that there are only about 100,000 people in Yorkshire and Lancashire (out of 10 million) who are actively interested in RL. Its total for the rest of the UK combined was in four figures. Hardly a major sport, then.

And yet, it is very clear indeed that its handful of afficionados on WP are determined to organise a massive spread of categories and articles for it along the lines of major sports like soccer, cricket, etc. which is ludicrous given rugby league's status and is completely against WP's policy of granting space according to notability, which you can find if you care to look for it in the help pages.

My contention is that RL deserves one article, which it already has, to explain its rules, history and main competitions. That is as much as you ever find about it in any other encyclopedia and usually it is tucked away in a sub-section of rugby football.

I am not driven by prejudice here because I am a cricket fan (see my user page) but I am sick of hearing about rugby league in the northern media, especially its everlasting campaign against rugby union, which is something that should have been forgotten after the split in 1895 and was largely forgotten by RU. I came across the RL stuff on here because a friend of mine who reads WP pointed out some typically prejudiced RL articles and asked me to edit. I made a few edits and then noticed just how big the RL spread on here is and it is totally out of proportion. As a result, I voted for the category to be deleted but not the main article, which is fair enough.

If you are unable to understand this as a fair motive based on my desire to ensure that WP maintains its standards and is not swamped by minority interests, then I am wasting my time writing this. The fact is that RL is a very minor sport indeed, as the Times concluded, and for it to take up the same amount of space on here as cricket or soccer is frankly ridiculous and completely defeats the object of the WP exercise. --Jack 21:22, 10 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I'm a cricket fan too. You are confusing attendences and interest. Rugby league is the fourth most popular team sport in the United Kingdom, and the amount of coverage is in proportion relative to other sports. This is Wikipedia so forget about other encyclopedias; such a standard would require deletion of 99% of the cricket and baseball articles too. You should just leave sections of Wikipedia which don't interest you alone. The purpose of the category system is to organise articles, and there are many articles about rugby league. The nomination was pointless as it won't succeed, but you probably knew that when you made it, in which case you were in breach of the policy that one should not disrupt Wikipedia to make a point. CalJW 21:24, 10 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It is only in YOUR opinion that the nomination is pointless. When you say RL is the fourth most popular spectator sport in this country you are way out in your estimate. I presume you regard soccer, cricket and union as the first three? Well, RL only gets about 40-50,000 spectators on any given weekend excluding cup finals and that works out at about 100,000 active adherents, many of whom are casual fans who go a couple of times a year. Despite its media presence it is a very minor regionalised sport. It is not as popular as horse racing, motor racing, golf, tennis or athletics on a nationwide spectator basis. Indeed, it cannot even match air shows: the recent Yorkshire airshow drew crowds of 60,000-plus on each of its two days. No way can RL compete with that. In terms of participation, there are actually more RU clubs and players in Yorkshire than there are RL ones. Activities like darts, canoeing, rowing, hang-gliding, potholing, climbing, scuba diving, etc. all have greater nationwide participation than RL does. What about hiking and rambling as major mass participation pursuits? I am not "disrupting Wikipedia to make a point". I am trying to do what I think is best for Wikipedia by persuading the administrators that RL is attempting to take up a huge amount of unwarranted space proportionate to its actual notability. I have not objected to the large rugby league article but it belongs in category:rugby football. If we are going to have a sprawling RL category full of redlinks and tiny stubs about players who are unknown outside RL's own small community, we should have similarly sized categories about darts, potholing, scuba diving and even games like Monopoly and Cluedo!

Wikipedia has endless categories with similar or lower levels of interest. There is no point in debating this matter further. You will lose the vote and the articles will not be deleted. Please do something useful instead. CalJW 18:49, 11 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

This was closed as a "speedy keep". CalJW 08:56, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Kerela

I noticed you created Category:Kerela. It looks like a mispelling of Category:Kerala. Or is it something else? Nabla 17:33:32, 2005-09-11 (UTC)

It's a duplicate. CalJW 18:54, 11 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

OK. I requested a speedy deletion. Nabla 19:19:10, 2005-09-11 (UTC)

Vote on deletion of suburbs

Hi, I've provided updated information about the reasons for the deletion of the 5 suburbs below, which I would encourage you to please read and consider:

-- All the best, Nickj (t) 00:27, 12 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Edge Hill State School

Please qualify your statements on this articles VFD page. Also refrain from personal attacks please, I'm not a "deletionist". Gateman1997 22:16, 13 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

That is not a personal attack IMO. Please don't nominate any more schools. CalJW 22:17, 13 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Belgium

I thank you very much for the job you are doing on the Belgium categories. I lately tried hard to get Belgium to a featured article. I failed and now I intend to let a bit of grass grow over it. If you are interested in cleaning up the articles on Belgium, I will of course support you. Let me know. Vb 14:41, 14 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I'm afraid I don't know very enough about Belgium to be of any real use to you. It is one of many countries whose main category I have cleared. Good luck with the article. CalJW 16:22, 14 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Intermodal circular redirects

What is the purpose of Intermodal freight transportation and Intermodal passenger transportation? Bo Lindbergh 15:23, 14 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I've fixed them. CalJW 16:22, 14 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Cfd umbrella entries

Hi, I have converted a few of your latest entries to "umbrella" entries. Please take a look at Cfd howto, {{Cfdu}}, {{cfru}} and the templates associated talk pages, to see how to use these. This allows users to click on the "relevant entry" link on the category and go directly to its listing. With {{cfru}} you can specify individual names for each cat as well. Thanks. ∞Who ?¿? 21:52, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for doing that. I'll try brace myself to study it. I have to say that the instructions on the categories for deletion page are so unfriendly looking that I've avoided them - and I think many people do. The same applies to articles for deletion, or did last time I looked. These important tasks are more likely to be done if they are kept very simple. CalJW 21:58, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

You should have seen them before I rewrote them. I admit it does take a bit to understand them, but I tried to make them as clear as possible, and as short as possible. I used more detail on the individual template talk pages, which I feel is easier to understand, see Template talk:Cfru and see if it's a bit more clear. I welcome any improvements or suggestions. ∞Who ?¿? 22:21, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Hi again. I seen some more of you {{cfr}} entries, and wanted to go ahead and show you how to use all of templates since you mentioned the instructions were hard to read. When you added cfr to the cats you put in text below the nom what the new name was, this will mess with a bot if used.

For {{cfr}} do this: {{cfr|proposed name}} this will show the new name in the banner.
For {{cfru}} (umbrella renames) do this: {{cfru|proposed name|section name used on CFD}}.
For {{cfdu}} (umbrella deletions) do this: {{cfru|section name used on CFD}}.
For {{cfm}} (merge) do this: {{cfm|proposed merge category}}.

Please let me know if you still have problems understanding this. Thanks again. ∞Who ?¿? 20:50, 24 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Category:English Americans

cross posted from User talk:Who

I try to remain neutral when it comes to closings, I do not consider my feelings for the category, if you look at my voting/closing history, you will find that I have closed several discussions contrary to my vote. As for this one, I read the entire discussion, and it leaned toward deletion, I do not put a lot of weight on one user replying to another user if their comments do not sway the opinion. However, I missed a vote, but I count 11, not 12, which would make it 63% and not 70, so it would be a no consensus. I am not sure where you got the neutral vote, unless you count Angr's comment, inwhich he previously said delete. It was a simple mistake, and I appreciate you pointing it out. This is one reason I leave the discussions such as these up for a bit longer, even after closing. Either way, please understand the point that I remain neutral reguardless of my vote. ∞Who ?¿? 21:56, 24 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. By the way, I've recently used the categories for merger tag for the first time. CalJW 22:05, 24 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

How about letting people know

If there is a good reason for you changing the cats on articles (like New Zealand) then that's fine. But let people know. Don't make such changes which can be mysterious to many people unless you explain why, in an edit summary. You gave no edit summary. Moriori 08:32, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It was a minor non-controversial edit. I am sorting out the national menus for every country in the world (I've done about 30 so far) and I am not going to double the time it takes by writing explanations every time. Less than one edit in a thousand that I make is queried. CalJW 08:35, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

You may want to consider using a standard summary with a little more detail. You can actually be blocked for not doing so. Take a look at Wikipedia:Edit summary. I was going to say something about it before, but hadn't had a chance. It's just a good idea, even if you are doing a lot. Take a look at my main space contribs for an idea. ∞Who ?¿? 08:39, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It is not compulsory to use edit summaries. That is quite certain. It is only a guideline. The idea that I am the sort of user who should be blocked when Wikipedia is so soft on major vandals is well... what can I say! If that extraordinary decision was made I would just say good riddance to Wikipedia. I know you weren't actually threatening me, but just the mention of that sort of action is rather upsetting.

Most of the time I do type something anyway, but since I had to switch to the "guest" account on my computer because my own account has indigestion it no longer brings up summaries when I type the first few letters. But I am still doing it most of the time. CalJW 08:47, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I had a response, but Wiki timed out and it didn't get added.. Oh well. Yea, I was gonna say it is just a guideline, but it helps users and RCP know what the changes are. I have seen users get disclipined for not using edit summaries. It's just a helpful note mostly. I didn't want you to be offended by my comment, I was trying to be helpful, and did not intend ill will. I use Firefox so it remembers all the stuff I fill in the forms, so it's fairly easy to re-use old edit summaries. That edit mentioned above is a good example of why one needs an edit summary, when someone sees "External links" with no summary, they think spam. I personally wouldn't have rv'd the edit after I looked at it, but would have thought to myself "I wish they would have did an edit summary" :). It's just something that others think its a good habit to get in to. Thanks for understanding, and I appologize if I upset you in anyway. ∞Who ?¿? 09:03, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Public school (UK)

Request for comment re Talk:Public school (UK). There is unreasonable resistance to acknowledging Scottish linguistic differences.--Mais oui! 08:59, 26 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Category: Gay, lesbian or bisexual people

In the article about John Reith, 1st Baron Reith you removed the above category. Lord Reith was bisexual and there is no doubt about this because he wrote about his life in diaries which have been published.Damson88 15:16, 28 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Many people are undoubtedly heterosexual, but they don't get categorised for it. If you have a right to use the category system for propaganda purposes, I have a right to counter that on the grounds that it is a breach of the neutrality rule.CalJW 15:25, 28 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I don't accept your premise. Surely categorisation is one of the essences of an encyclopedia. Please explain exactly where the neutrality rule is being breached by categorising someone's sexuality.Damson88 15:51, 28 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I am perhaps the most active categoriser on here at the moment, but I don't use categories to promote an agenda. There is no point in debating this as there is no chance we can agree. Like religious people in Victorian times gay rights activists are no so certain of their moral rectitude that they are impervious to counter arguments. Let's not waste any more of each other's time. .CalJW 15:25, 28 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that it is incumbent on all contributors to try and maintain a neutral POV, and I strive so to do. I simply note that you have not explained how the neutrality rule was being breached. Damson88 16:29, 28 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

This category exists to promote the idea that homosexuality is widespread, is associated with talent (more so than heterosexuality) and should be celebrated more than heterosexuality. Many people think it should be abolished, but I am aware that the gay rights crowd are too well organised to let this happen, and since it will mainly be them who see any related deletion proposal there is no prospect of a properly balanced vote taking place. Now can we please stop wasting each other's time? CalJW 16:35, 28 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Does "properly balanced" mean that your POV prevails :) Damson88 17:05, 28 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

No it means that yours doesn't because heterosexuals and homosexuals are treated the same. Since gay rights activists can be confident of their continuing ability to manipulate wikipedia in this way, it would be decent of them to at least admit to what they are doing. CalJW 17:09, 28 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I do not care for your assertion of bad faith.

I, for one, have no objection if you want to categorise most people as heterosexual. However it might seem rather tedious to do that. Damson88 17:28, 28 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

You might not like it, but I am confident it is correct. You openly state on your user page that you are an activist. On the other hand, I am neutral and spend my time on such matters of no personal relevance to me as reorganising the neglected main categories of developing countries because I am here to help to create a neutral encyclopedia. CalJW 17:30, 28 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Your assertion of bad faith is made not just against me but against the democratic principles upon which Wikipedia makes progress. I have already said that I try to maintain a neutral POV but that does not mean that I can't concentrate my contributions in a particular area, just as you do - albeit in a more abstract area. Damson88 17:49, 28 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

This is not a discussion forum. I correctly observed early on that this discussion is a waste of time. If you extend it further I will remove it from this page.

Don't rename articles that have been listed for deletion.

The AFD notice and the Wikipedia:Guide to deletion clearly ask editors not to rename articles that have been listed for deletion without being careful to rename the deletion discussion in parallel. Yet you did exactly that to CSLD. As a result, we have the messy situation where the same article now has two deletion discussions ongoing in parallel. Preventing this sort of mess is exactly why the instruction is there in the first place. Please read the guide to deletion and follow its instructions, so that no more such messes are created. Uncle G 16:10, 28 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It is a misguided rule when the renaming is so often patently obvious, and I believe that it was removed from the template at one point. That is certainly the mental note I made, with some relief that sense had been seen.
- I suggest that you look at the mess that your actions caused and think again. It's exactly to stop such messes that the Wikipedia:Guide to deletion requires what it does. It is far from misguided. Please read what the Wikipedia:Guide to deletion says. Uncle G 23:04, 28 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  - I had already looked and I still disagreed and I still disagree now. The "mess" only affected a couple of people on articles for deletion, and the chances of this happening must have been hundreds to one against. Improving the quality of Wikipedia for the huge number of readers is more important than avoiding a remote chance of a little inconvenience to a couple of editors. Many of Wikipedia's policies are wrong imo, and being policy is no sort of argument that something is evidently right. CalJW 01:19, 29 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Tudor and Plantagenet rename

Hi could I possibly ask you to reconsider your vote on at least one of these categories as I believe the Tudor category is intended to cover all things related to the Tudor period not just members of that Royal house so the suggested rename would be inappropriate in my opinion, a sub category should be created "House of Tudor" or "Members of the House of Tudor" and the royal persons moved into that category Thanks Arnie587 19:15, 28 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

"Tudor" is not an appropriate name for an overall category as it is too vague, just as it is too vague as a category for the royal house. The fact that it is a subcategory of two royal categories but not of any history categories is strong evidence that it was indeed created for the royal family as I assumed. There are hardly any non-royal articles in it, though I see it has given rise to a small amount of confusion. You will note that it is actually a sub-category of category:Tudor people, which itself would be a subcategory of the overall Tudor era category if it existed.

However I would strongly advise against the creation of any such category. There are no other categories for eras as such post 1066, and it is not likely that they would be used accurately if they existed. As evidence of this look at the confusion caused by the attempt to divide up category:History of England, category:History of Great Britain and category:History of the United Kingdom chronologically - an attempt that is widely ignored. I have been meaning to do something to address the problem for months. If you do create a Tudor era category, I will consider nominating it for deletion. Sorry, but I spend a lot of time on the category system, and I think I have a pretty good sense for what will work, and what will not. CalJW 01:12, 29 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Hi there is a category Category:Victorian era in Category:Historical_eras.

The Victorian category is in category:History of Britain, which seems to be much less used than the UK or England categories. After more than a year it contains 25 articles out of hundreds which might be in it, which suggests it is little known or valued. It is part of a great big mess, and it would probably be better to delete it. The chaos of the UK and Ireland history categories is one of the best examples of the organisational weakness of Wikipedia's collaborative system. In the command and control system of a professional encyclopedia consistency would be enforced on the whole area. CalJW 19:35, 29 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

CFD speedy for by-country conventions

Hi - Which objection do you think has not been favoured with a reply? If you want to change this policy you need to gain consensus to do so. You have not done this yet. You've made objections here and there - I believe the central point for this discussion is Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (categories). As far as can I tell, you are the only one arguing against using speedy for this which implies to me you'll have quite an uphill struggle to gain a consensus to overturn it. You are certainly free to try to gain this consensus, but you are not free to unilaterally change this policy. I think we want the same thing (consistency in the naming of the by-country categories). I don't understand your reluctance to use speedy to help with this. In any event, I ask that you stop reverting the addition of this criterion to the CFD/speedy page. -- Rick Block (talk) 03:22, 29 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

There is no policy to change because it was not declared policy before I intervened. Currently you are the only one arguing against me. CalJW 03:31, 29 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

As I've pointed out elsewhere, the policy declaration was this edit by user:Raul654 at 6:30, 25 Sept. My first nomination under this policy was 8:32, 25 Sept. Your first objection was 16:19, 25 Sept. I'm sorry, but you're mistaken in your claim that it was not policy. I don't understand why no one else has weighed in about this. I'll solicit some other comments. -- Rick Block (talk) 04:13, 29 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

The relevant section of the page in that edit is headed "This section and its subsections contain newly proposed rules, based on existing practice". I read that as a clear statement of exception from the status of the page as a whole. CalJW 04:16, 29 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

That sentence was in italics, and was meant to assist those reading the page when it was a proposal. I've removed all such editorial remarks. I've asked user:Splash to restore the speedy clause in Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (categories) and the criterion at Wikipedia:Categories for deletion/Speedy. You're fighting a losing argument and your actions are bordering on disruptive - I suggest you stop. -- Rick Block (talk) 19:16, 29 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

This sort of arrogant attitude to attempts to improve policy is likely to do great damage to the development of Wikipedia. The people who got in first aren't necessarily right. CalJW 19:23, 29 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I am sincerely hopeful we don't need to seek a fight here. Most things really can be rectified or reasoned out in discussion. You (CalJW, that is) do some sterling work on CfD and I hope we have not constructed rules that prevent you continuing. I think I have opted to support just about every change you have suggested. But the speedy criterion was part of the proposal that we discussed for about two months (?), although I know you were not involved in that, which is regrettable given your concerns with parts of it. Nevertheless, please do read the comments I left at CfD talk and Naming conventions talk (identical in both places; we should choose somewhere to do this) — your concerns are not permanently overriden as concerns on Wiki never are. The intent of the new speedy rules is just to save some of the kind of repetitive nodding-throughs that (imo) occupy quite a part of CfD at times. So, I've restored the speedy phrasings: before you head off to revert me, please carry on discussing as level-headedly as we have so far, and do take some time to take advantage of the existing get-out clauses as I explained in my responses. Thanks, and keep up the good work. -Splash^talk 22:49, 29 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I will carry on, but I won't use the new speedy renaming criteria. And since I intended, and still intend, to go through every national menu in the world and every categories by country menu, there will soon be little opportunity for others to use it, which will minimise the problem CalJW 22:54, 29 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

<carriage return> Ok. You'll find me, generally a supporter of standardizatiion even though Wikipedia is inherently inconsistent. Nevertheless, help me out: are you currently (and are you intending) proposing changes which pretty much align with the speedies anyway, or which run counter to them. Because if your changes run counter to them, but are receiving wide support at CfD, then clearly we need to revisit the speedies. If, on the other hand, you are basically aligning with the speedies, then might we not as well accelerate the process, in most but (importantly) not all cases?

That align with them. CalJW 23:03, 29 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

House of Plantagenet is not the usually used term

Hi you may not have seen my commment on the deletion page but I have stated that House of Plantagenet is not the usually used term for the descendants of Geoffrey, Count of Anjou, nicknamed Plantagenet, the correct term is House of Anjou. You can see this clearly by comparing the frequency of google occurences for the two phrases: "House of Anjou": 17,200, "House of Plantagenet" 907, if House of Plantagenet was the generally accepted phrase it would have far more matches than that. Thanks, Arnie587 19:19, 29 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, I'll comment on the other page. CalJW 19:36, 29 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

apology

Hi - I'm sorry that my responses to you about the CFD-speedy thing came across as arrogant. I am keenly interested in improving wikipedia's processes and, IMO, Wikipedia:Naming conventions (categories) is a significant improvement. CFD has for several years regularly entertained discussions about this or that by-country category with no formal record of these discussions and no corresponding procedure to prevent inconsistencies. Those of us who worked on the Wikipedia:Naming conventions (categories) proposal spent several months in often heated discussions about how to fix these issues. Adopting it as policy has brought a mechanism to record and, I think as importantly, enforce conformance to the naming conventions the community adopts for the by-country categories. Your work on these categories is distinctly appreciated. Your opinion on the procedures affecting them is valued as well. Again, I apologize for any arrogance I expressed. -- Rick Block (talk) 02:05, 30 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I agree with the overall idea. But I still disagree about the speedies. CalJW 02:06, 30 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

multiple listings

BTW - when you list several subcats of the same "x by country" supercat on cfd for renaming, I think it would be good to list them all together (with the proposed naming rule if there isn't one already). I've added a proposed rule to some of your recent cfd entries. -- Rick Block (talk) 03:22, 30 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

If you're referring to the religion categories, I did one and then there were only two more so I couldn't be bothered to go back and amend the first. But then no one else has nominated them at all. I have done some umbrella nominations previously and I will do more. I will continue to categorise every country in the world. I will also be dealing with the standardisation of all the by country categories in due course if no one beats me to it. I made these plans before I got involved in the discussions which have slowed things down. There are two dubious nominations under the new speedy critera. CalJW 03:40, 30 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

You currently have multiple separate listings for churches, religions, politics - these are what I'm referring to. The request is really to start using Wikipedia:Naming conventions (categories) as a tool to expedite the work you're doing anyway. In cases where there is no rule specified for a by-country supercat, one CFD entry mentioning the establishment of a rule is sufficient (and I agree it's probably best to mention all subcats that would be renamed as a result of adopting the rule). In cases where there already is a rule at Wikipedia:Naming conventions (categories) the idea is to use speedy to avoid cluttering CFD with renamings that are relatively automatic (these are "forced" in the same sense as renamings due to simple miscapitalizations). Over time, as the set of "x by country" category rules grows there should be fewer and fewer CFD discussions for by-country categories. Reducing the number of these discussions at CFD was one of the goals which led to the creation of the conventions page. In a sense, I think this is complementary to your country-by-country rationalization effort. Without recording the conventions in an enforceable way, the country-by-country effort becomes a perpetual task. As soon as you're "done" with one pass through all the countries, you'd need to start another pass to catch newly created categories since your last pass. If a complete set of conventions is established, on subsequent passes pretty much nothing should need CFD discussion. -- Rick Block (talk) 07:15, 30 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I've said I agree with the creation of conventions, but I think your approach and choice of words is too harsh. I don't agree that there will be a lot of exceptions in the future. Most categories are created by people who have a pretty good grasp of how things work. I am not going to change what I do, so it's up to you whether you let me get on with it, or continue to argue with me at the risk that I will get fed up and stop contributing to the improvement of Wikipedia. CalJW 07:23, 30 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Categorisation

Thanks a lot for your work! :-)

(PS: I had two questions about your job but in the meantime I've found the answers for them.)

-- Adam78 00:24, 2 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure about the latest academic ideas, but it is clearly relevant to the human geography side of geography and I seem to remember covering it as part of geography at school. The larger demography sections such as those for the UK and the US consist largely of population analysis for the places and subdivisions contained in the geography cateogories. Many demographics articles and sub-categories were in geography before I started my categorisation work. The category system is a navigation tool and there is no need to be over precise about academic distictions in my view. If there is a strong link and a good chance the average reader will expect to find something in a particular place, that is generally enough. Anyway, Category:Demographics is in category:human geography, which is in Category:geography. In some cases the national geography menus are only being used for physical geography, so perhaps that is where you are coming from. But I can see no justification for this and it doesn't comply with the usage of the most heavily visited national geography categories, so I have been amending it as I go along.

All the "institutions" categories are up for renaming as "organisations" and it looks like this is going to go through. Generally I wouldn't put entities which tend to operate on a single site in "organisations". I think that classification under culture, education and buildings and structures is sufficient for libraries. It isn't really important though, and if you really want to put it back I won't revert it. The national institutions/organisations categories are little used and some quite major countries don't even have either of them - there are more relevant subject area categories for anything which might be placed in them. CalJW 00:41, 2 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

The questions were removed while I was working on my response! We seem to agree now. CalJW 00:44, 2 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I removed my questions, but thank you for your aspects, they are good to know.

When I saw your extensive job, I felt just the opposite of the "broken windows" effect: my numerous edits (along with others') made it meaningful for you to improve the Hungary-related category system to an adequate level. Thanks again. I'm starting to be satisfied with it now... with one exception: the Hungarian people by occupation. Do you think it could be eliminated? In my opinion, it's really tedious. No other Wikipedias have this intermediary category between the specific profession types and the People category.

Adam78 01:09, 2 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It does look a little odd for countries where there are few other categories in the main people category, but if you look at something like Category:British people where there are all sorts of sub-categories, you will perhaps see the sense of it. In any case it is a standard category and I don't think there is any chance that a nomination for deletion would succeed - and if it did Hungary would be missing from category:Nationalities by occupation. CalJW 01:13, 2 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Ottawa City Councillors

You didn't properly list it when you put it up for deletion. Bad boy. --File:Ottawa flag.png Spinboy 16:25, 2 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for spotting that, but try to avoid breaching the rule against making personal attacks. CalJW 00:34, 3 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

personal attacks

Perhaps you didn't mean I strongly object to your habit of latching onto any category names that you approve of ... as a personal attack, but it comes across as one. In general, please try to avoid comments about people and/or people's motives. If you have a problem with anything I do or say that you'd like to discuss, my talk page is always open. I would very much like for us to be able to get along with each other. From what I can tell we have very similar goals. -- Rick Block (talk) 23:31, 3 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It was necessary for someone to challenge your approach vigorously and the risk that you would be offended by that was worth taking, though if you actually were that is regrettable. CalJW 23:37, 3 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Cfr entries

Hey, I wanted to ask if you mind using either {{Cfr2}} (listed on the how to section of Cfd) or just typing out the format of Cfr entries to look like this:

====[[:Category:Original name]] to [[:Category:Proposed name]]====

It just makes it easier to see the propsed new name, and especially makes it easier for me to close when I copy the text. I wasn't going to ask, but this discussion was a bit to confusing at first, trying to find the categories actually involved in the renaming. Thanks for your understanding. ∞Who ?¿? 05:28, 4 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I'll give it a go, but I did try to use the cfd2 thing once and it didn't work. CalJW 06:19, 4 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. If you have any probs, let me know, and I will try to help out. I'm still out of town, so my response maybe slow. ∞Who ?¿? 06:35, 4 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

American football

Hi,

I had to revert to an edit before yours on American football. Whatever you did to the category thing, you can do again. Thanks. Mwalcoff 00:41, 5 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. I've done it. CalJW 11:45, 5 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Apology

I apologize if you construed my quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson as a personal attack against you. I assure you it was not intended as such. I have removed it. However, since this was a misunderstanding, not a deliberate malicious personal attack, I do not feel the need to resign as administrator. --Angr/_{tɔk tə mi} 10:11, 5 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, but Emerson is much less read in the UK than in the U.S. and there is little reason either why I should have recognised the source, or indeed been less offended if I had. CalJW 11:49, 5 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Torii Station, Okinawa edit

Hi CalJW,

I'm curious as to the reason for giving a military base a geography stub. Haven't checked other bases, but it strikes me as uncommon.

Fg2 07:29, 7 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I didn't add the stub notice, but I did categorise it. The only alternative for bases of foreign militaries is "buildings and structures". CalJW 08:15, 7 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Speedy renames

Sorry to be slow to reply; I only just realised I had your message. I honestly do not understand your objection to renaming the categories the way you proposed. They had no objections after two days, and were unlikely in the extreme to receive any, or even any further votes. I know you don't like the new speedy renaming policy, but like many policies they still exist. It is already common practise on, for example, AfD to simply deal with debates that are clearly part of the speedy criteria even though a full AfD debate has been started. It saves time of other editors, and gets things the way we want them to be quickly. If you were proposing things that were contrary to the naming conventions page, I wouldn't speedy-rename them, obviously. But since they are in line with it, there is benefit neither to the Wiki not to CfD nor to your nominations in letting them sit around for 5 days longer than they need to. There is also a cosmetic/accessibility point. By creating full-blown nominations for things that can be done in a single line in the speedy section, the list of CfDs to consider grows much longer than it needs to be. That makes it harder to sift through and find debates that really need attention.

Maybe you could try using the new speedy rename rules for one or two nominations, and see if things go really wrong? -Splash^talk 00:15, 12 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I guess it was a pointless comment, but what has happened since the new rule was introduced has only strengthened my opinion. I believe it is almost certain that several erroneous renames would have gone ahead if I wasn't watching the page. CalJW 09:35, 12 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Personal attack

What personal attack? siafu 19:03, 15 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Calling me foolish. CalJW 19:04, 15 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
- I called the application of a principle foolish. Sorry if you took that to be a personal attack, as I didn't mean to upset anyone. siafu 19:08, 15 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  - Since I was the person defending the principle, I don't see how else I was supposed to take it. But thank you for apologising. CalJW 19:10, 15 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Checkuser proposal

Could you please re-read the proposal? What's being suggested is not what you're objecting to: the proposal is for an additional ability that users who are already admins can apply for, similar to bureaucratship. --Carnildo 04:18, 18 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

The ability to apply for it is a privilege, and I don't think admins should have it. Ideally I would like admin status to be abolished. CalJW 09:16, 18 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

a heads-up on the List of Guantanamo Bay detainees

Greetings,

Since you voted to keep the article List of Guantanamo Bay detainees I thought I would give you a "heads-up". A copyright violation was filed against the article, on October 11th. It was filed by someone who had voted to delete the article on October 5th.

I believe that the copyright violation is entirely bogus. I believe it is bogus because, as explained in Feist Publications v. Rural Telephone Service, lists of facts, like lists of names, cannot be copyright. This Feist v. Rural case went all the way to the US Supreme Court, which made the possibly counter-intuitive ruling that the amount of effort someone put in to compiling a list plays no role in determining whether that list is eligible for copyright protection.

Even if alphabetic lists of names could be copyright, I believe the wikipedia list would not be violating copyright since the list was compiled from various sources.

Yes, I have considered that this user invoked a bogus copyright violation to achieve a result that failed in the {AfD}. Yes, I asked them to terminate the copyright violation process, in light of Feist v Rural. They declined. The backlog in the administrators dealing with copyright violations seems to be on the order of a month long.

Anyhow, I wanted the people who had shown interest in the article to not freak out, or feel betrayed, by seeing the copyright violation tag. -- Geo Swan 11:17, 19 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. :-)

Personal attack

How was that a personal attack? At any rate I apoligize if I personally attacked you. You can remove personal attacks according to policy too, you know. Anyway, if you have a problem with anything I say you can take it to my talk page too! Ryan Norton ^{T | @ | C} 01:45, 20 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Category standardization

Hi there! I was looking over CFD and noticed the many standardisation entries. I just wanted to say, excellent work in establishing that, and keep it up! R adiant _>|< 16:34, 20 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Expansion

Sorry I have reverted your change to Category:Articles to be expanded and several of your edits. The category is the only thing out of synch. Wikipedia:Requests for expansion, Wikipedia:Template_messages/Talk_namespace, and the template itself all say talk page have all long stated that this is a talk page template. Moreover this is in keeping with the general principle of having meta templates on the talk page as stated at Wikipedia:Templates. There was a poll only a few months ago at Wikipedia:Template locations, where there was a strong majority for keeping it on the talk page, if not consensus. There was a strong consensus against just letting users place it where they like. - SimonP 16:20, 22 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

As you say, there was no consensus. I believe that putting them on the talk page is harmful. I will continue to fight your attempt to impose your will. Your edits to the first page seem to have been an attempt to creat the impression that it is normal for them to be on the talk page, but if one looks later in the alphabet, this is patently not the case. CalJW 16:24, 22 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I have literally been moving these, and many other meta templates, for years. The poll at Wikipedia:Template locations is technically still open. I suggest rather than edit warring you add your vote, or perhaps join the extensive discussion on its talk page. - SimonP 16:27, 22 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I have done so. If you have been doing this for years, but many hundreds are not where you want them to be, that only goes to show that you are attempting to eradicate a widespread preference. I am as entitled to move them to my preference as you are to yours. Please be wary of implying that the length of time you have been on wikipedia is evidence that you are right. CalJW 16:31, 22 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

If you look at the poll you just voted in it was pretty much universally agreed that template locations should not be left up to personal preference. I accept that you disagree with this, but you should accept that the majority of Wikipedians and several policy pages disagree with you. Please stop moving the templates. - SimonP 16:41, 22 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

How do you know that that poll is representative? It is close and unscientific. Usage of the template suggest the opposite is the case. You change the policy pages as you want them to be, and are prepared to misrepresent one to change another. You accept that there is no consensus. I suggest that you stop. CalJW 16:43, 22 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

The vast majority of people in recent months have been placing the template on the talk page. Note that many of the articles listed in the category are due to {{expandsect}}, which does belong in articles. If you want to change the policy then feel free to start that discussion, if as you say people reject it, then I'm sure getting consensus for such a change would be straightforward. Moving templates one by one in contravention of the policy is not the proper way to proceed. - SimonP 16:51, 22 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

As you have said yourself, there is no consensus. This template isn't even listed on the main template policy page. You are trying to enforce a policy in the face of that. It is naive to pretend that consensus is attainable on all matters. You are doing great harm to wikipedia by reducing the chance of articles being expanded promptly. CalJW 16:53, 22 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I feel justified in moving templates as tradition, policy, and the majority of Wikipedians all seem to agree with my view, and I will continue to do so. Consensus is the foundation of Wikipedia, unilateral action is not. Please stop moving the templates. - SimonP 17:04, 22 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I do not accept that most people agree with you. You have said yourself that there is no consensus, yet now you say that there is. You are taking unilateral action yourself. "Tradition" is just another way of saying that your views count for more because you have been around longer.

If you are right that most people disagree with me, it should be relatively easy to build a consensus that these pages belong in articles. Please do this, rather than moving templates. - SimonP 17:14, 22 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Of course it won't be. You know perfectly well that there is no consensus either way. The template text referred to the talk page well under half of the time before the poll opened, and nearly all of the time that it did was down to you. You created the "tradition" yourself in the face of counteredits by several users. In my opinion you have done wikipedia great harm byattempting to make what should be a valuable expansion tool largely invisible to the average reader. But I will leave off for now, and leave the damage you have done in place. It is a sad state of affairs that people can be so passionate for bad causes, but the articles which deserve expansion will get it, albeit later on average than if you had not become involved. What a fine thing to have achieved. It is upsetting to see such counterproductice activity carried out with such determination when we should be getting on with positive work to construct a better encyclopaedia. CalJW 17:24, 22 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. My basic view is that Wikipedia's main problem is not with generating content. Wikipedia is one of the most effective generators of large quantities of content in history. Our main problem is with ease of use and credibility. Having meta messages in articles serves no use to readers, and is merely a cause of distraction and confusion. Having such messages also impugns on the quality of articles. In most cases those with the expansion template are of decent quality, and are only lacking length. - SimonP 17:29, 22 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I disagree on all points. Many articles are dreadful. Many of the areas of content I am interested in are thinly covered. This template does not reduce ease of use. Readers are not some separate species, but potential contributors. Warnings about article quality are very necessary. Expansion notices should simply be removed when they are no longer necessary.

Looking at it from your perspective, I think it would make more sense to argue for the abolition of the expansion template than the relocation of it. Clearly it has wasted a good deal of time and created much ill feeling, and if it is hidden, it will never do much good. This has been a sorry saga and has wasted much time. It would have been better if it had never started as the template will never achieve much if it is not seen. CalJW 17:41, 22 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statistics of wikipedia article hits

I noticed your comment on Dcoetzee's list of articles with at least 1000 hits, and it got me very interested in those other lists you have seen. I've been trying to find good statistics for wiki article hits for many months, but Dcoetzee's list was the only thing I could find. Please point me to any other stats you know... -- Mihnea Tudoreanu 21:48, 22 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

There used to be one on the statistics page that links from the number of articles on the main page under "Log analysis for the English-language Wikipedia, including most commonly accessed pages" but it hasn't been updated for months and right now it isn't working. It showed numbers which were higher than Dcoetzee's, and I believe they were for a single day. It contained a more credible list of articles too. Wikipedia currently gets 12.8 million unique users a month per last week's wikipedia signpost story, and I am almost certain that is in the U.S. only. So say at least thirty million worldwide (only just over a quarter of wikimedia traffic is from the U.S., but of course a fair amount of the non-U.S. traffic goes to the other language sites). The main page must be clicked on more times than 30 million per month. A fair number of those 30 million must see it hundreds of times. I do for one. I read a while back that page hits were over 800 million a day, so they are probably over a billion now. Thus Dcoetzee's figures are absurdly low, especially the one for the main page. But as for up to date and reliable figures for hits on particular pages, I don't know of any. The statistical side of wikipedia is in a poor state. Few things are updated regularly apart from a few graphs that a non-techie like me can't understand. I think it would be great to have hit counts for all pages, and I suspect that people would be very surprised at how high they were. A billion hits a day divided by say 5 million pages of all types across all projects (may not be very accurate) is 6000 a month for the average page. There must be many that get more than ten times the average, and surely some that get more than a hundred times the average. But it's all guess work as the stats aren't available. CalJW 00:50, 23 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Maryville Middle School

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Maryville Middle School appears in danger of being trumped by a conspicuous and concerted effort on the part of deletionists. Please review the nomination and vote at your convenience.--Nicodemus75 05:28, 24 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]