User talk:Collect/archive4

Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Mevish1

Can you please respond to my comment there? - Mgm|^(talk) 11:48, 13 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Did so. Collect (talk) 16:22, 13 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Can we stop people altering the political stance of the Daily Mail. There is a guy who keeps changing it to 'populist'. The Mail is NOT populist in the slightest, it is clearly Conservative. Is there a way we can stop him vandalising it? Thanks Christian1985 (talk) 20:46, 13 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I know. I asked on the Talk page for any solid cite for "populist" -- but I suspect the editor involved just does not care. Collect (talk) 21:46, 13 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I do care, actually. And I'm not a 'vandal'. I suspected that the Daily Mail's political allegiance would be a matter of contention, but I didn't realise just how quickly it would be jumped on. One has to wonder what the agenda is here. Whether the paper is 'populist' or 'conservative' or 'Conservative' is actually really a rather subjective question. I suppose it could be argued that 'populist' isn't strictly a political tag. However, there is NO way you can state that it is 'clearly' Conservative, Christian1985. And as for this, Collect: "try as I might, I could not find a cite for calling the Daily Mail "populist" for political views"... well, you obviously didn't search very hard. Here are just a few quotes:

"This is the modern Daily Mail, the paper that is becoming more populist by the week as it seeks to become Britain's biggest-selling daily title."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2005/jun/06/dailymail.mondaymediasection

"Philosophically it belongs to a tradition of emotional populism that has had many champions in the West..."

http://www.shakeupmedia.com/blog/2008/11/11/column-november-11th-in-defence-of-populism

"How on earth can a supposedly conservative paper take this editorial slant? Well, like fascism, it’s populist, and taps into the readers’ prejudices, fears, greed, selfishness and hatred..."

http://boatangdemetriou.wordpress.com/2008/09/14/why-the-daily-mail-is-a-fascist-not-a-conservative-paper —Preceding unsigned comment added by Suburbanslice (talk • contribs) 12:47, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Note that your cites do not say it is "populist" in political orientation, but that its "tone" or "slant" or "emotion" is "populist." As far as being aligned with any actual political group -- that alignmet is "Conservative." And it is alignment with a party or group which is what the infobox asks for. I would suggest the fact that a huge plurality of its readers call themselves "conservative" is sufficient. "Populist" is not a defined British party, organization or movement. Collect (talk) 13:11, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Who are you to say that a huge 'plurality' of the paper's readers call themselves "conservative"? More subjective opinion. Please also note my earlier comment about 'populist' not being a strictly political tag. I used those three quotes to demonstrate that there are actually references to the Daily Mail being populist. I originally made the change to see what kind of response would be generated, and you have mostly helped me to confirm my hypothesis. Suburbanslice (talk) 16:03, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The term is "political AFFILIATION"-- there is no "populist affiliation" in UK politics that I can find at all. Per cite in article, number of self-identified Conservatives reading the Daily Mail is way bigger than any other party. Hence a reasonable statement that the paper is Conservative. If you can show me any "populist party" in the UK, I would be delighted! Collect (talk) 16:15, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well congratulations, another meaningless victory for supporters of the Daily Mail. I'm *very* happy for you. I'm also quite capable of reading non-bold text. Suburbanslice (talk) 16:40, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry -- my keyboard colon and semi-colon do not always function as designed. Collect (talk) 16:42, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Barnstar

The Guidance Barnstar

"The Guidance Barnstar may be awarded to users who help others locate valuable resources, information, or assistance."

Thank you SO MUCH for helping me find a valuable page that I was only vaguely aware of before.

Best wishes, Inclusionist (talk) 20:55, 14 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The word Anent

Just a friendly suggestion: To get your point across more clearly use "about" next time. Anent is old English. Inclusionist (talk) 20:58, 14 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

<g> I guess I am older than you are. Collect (talk) 21:02, 14 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Per your cite -- the etymology is Old English, the usage is still current. Actually it is also apparently Scots. Collect (talk) 21:04, 14 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Bill White

Please respond to my posting on the Bill White talk page rather than repeatedly inserting the material you're inserting. If you can get a consensus there, great. But if not, please do not keep reinserting the disputed matter. David in DC (talk) 22:04, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Note that I did not revert your edit. I doi question whether the material about "possible" sentencing runs afoul fo WP:CRYSTAL, however. Thanks! Collect (talk) 22:09, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

<g>... whats that mean? i asked you on bill white, but maybe you didnt see. Brendan19 (talk) 01:46, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Dates back to early online usage for "grin". See also "LOL" and the like. I've been online for 26 years now, and these antedate the "emoticons" you probably are used to. Collect (talk) 02:08, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Do you believe in reincarnation?

Thank you for being so suprisingly noble and unpredictable

Your behavior at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Guido den Broeder/Wikipedia, the Social Experiment reminds me of NulcearUmpf, a "mortal enemy" on Wikipedia who taught me how to edit war with acronyms. We fought for years, and one day, after I wrote an emotional essay, NulcearUmpf did a 180 ideologically, he betrayed his friends and became a staunch ally of those with marginal views. He died here, when those former allies got him indefinitely booted.

Collect, you are the last person I ever thought would vote "keep" on a MfD. The attributes and behavior I tend to respect the most is when someone does something so unexpectedly noble, a small act of kindness, something that, with all my flaws, I would never do myself.

Thanks for surprising me again. travb (talk) 16:44, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Check my history of votes <g>. I figure I am about 60% Keep, 20% "weak keep", 10% "comment only" and 10% "delete." Also on AfD and Tfd as well. On the other hand, I never met a long article which could not be shortened. I have saved some articles from AfD by adding refs to them as well or finding cites for notability. Did you read User:Collect/thoughts at all? Collect (talk) 16:50, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

i think travb meant 180. collect, thanks for the <g> explanation. i dont really know emoticons either- been online for # of years, but not too involved in chat. cheers. Brendan19 (talk) 18:09, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

RE: User:Collect/thoughts No, but I will now. travb (talk) 21:27, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

WP:BRD

After your edit of an article is reverted, it is entirely inappropriate for you to revert the reversion. The burden is on you to prove that there is consensus for your original edit, not on the person who reverted your original edit. See WP:BRD and WP:CONSENSUS. Accordingly, the Billie Jean King and Martina Navratilova articles are going to be restored. If you want to pursue your edits further, discuss them first on the appropriate article discussion pages.

As for your edits of those articles, you entirely eliminated well-referenced material without reasonable justification. Unfortunately, this appears to be something that you do on a recurring basis notwithstanding the objections of other editors. It is a disruptive strategy that should be ditched. 75.63.7.15 (talk) 03:47, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Kindly note that I had used the Talk pages in each case to discuss the changes (which included such major changes as removing your "well-sourced" "however"s.) And since I hsad asked PRIOR to making changes, and sicussed AFTER making the changes, I consider your changes without even an edit summary to be the problem. Clearly if you are set on keeoing the paeans to the stars in place, it is reasonable for youto have participated on the discussion page. Thanks! Collect (talk) 11:08, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Writegeist

Some of those quotes were really over-the-top. Did you ever consider taking this to the proper WP forum?LedRush (talk) 21:15, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Heck -- his were the mild ones -- you should see where I was checkusered, threatened, called names, accused of being s sockpuppet repeatedly, accused of being a paid whore and more. Heck -- why not look at User:Collect/actual summaries ... more if you want them <g>. Collect (talk) 23:46, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Someone mention my name? Ooh lovely! (<g> etc.) You know, LedRush, my old friend Collect has a very thick skin. Just as well, considering the flak he attracts. Eh, Collect? Glad to see you two getting along so well. Now if we could just extend that to everyone else... (<g>, <g> and <g>.)

Hm. "Paid whore" (supra!) - isn't that a tad, well, tautological? — Writegeist (talk) 23:57, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Your MFD votes

Re: this edit, you seem to misunderstand the crux of the keep arguments in Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:JamesMLane/George W. Bush substance abuse controversy. If the page was five, ten, fifty, or even a hundred years old, I would have voted to keep it. The reason is that it was *not* James' preferred version of the article; it was in fact a compromise version, as he said at the George W. Bush talk page. The fact that it is linked to by a talk page archive is also important - Wikipedia tries to minimise link rot where possible. I do not support the idea that people should be allowed to keep preferred versions of articles in their userspace for three years, and that is not the consednsus of the community. The length of time I would allow for a user to archive their preferred version of a page depends on the situation. If a user was constantly active, six months would be a reasonable amount of time. If a user was less active, or had other reasons not to edit Wikipedia for extended amounts of time (e.g. illness, holidays, family emergencies), then I would allow a little more leeway. Applying bright line rules to every situation in Wikipedia is neither useful nor helpful, and it can sometimes be better to ignore all rules. For a recent example of this in action, see Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/lustiger seth. Requests for adminship are rarely successful unless a user has more than 2,000 edits; however, lustiger seth became an admin with less than 50 edits because people took his adminship on the German Wikipedia into account. Graham87 12:15, 25 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I am unsure as to the reasoning behind your post. I endeavor to use my 26+ years of online experience in giving any opinions. In the case at hand, there is a concurrent debate on "userfication" which is on point for this issue. Had the material been placed in the archive congruent to the GWB discussions, I am sure the person nominating it for deletion would not have done so. Instead, it is in userspace, for which guidelines exist and are continually being discussed. I think the "userfication" discussion would benefit form your "even a hundred years old" comment in determining a consensus there. As for admimships - I did not participate in discussions for several reasons -- first, I was a "Jimbo" in a set of forums which had roughly four million messages, and had up to 100 "admins" under me. Second, I regard giving power to those who ask for it to be problematic at best. And in the case you cite, I suspect the experience is not just "edits in English" but that the user involved had far more than "50 edits" overall wen you consider his total experience on the German version. Lastly, the usage of talk page archives is quite minimal - check how often they are referred to or used according to the stats programs. Thanks! Collect (talk) 12:38, 25 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I was mainly trying to tell you that three years is not a hard and fast rule for keeping user pages, and that hard and fast rules shouldn't be followed to the letter on Wikipedia. Discussions about what is and is not appropriate in userspace have been going on in Wikipedia for as long as userspace has existed. They heated up considerably with the introduction of userboxes in late 2005. The idea that Wikipedia is not Myspace has been unchallenged for two years, and userpages of users with no Wikipedia contrfibutions outside their user page are regularly deleted at MFD. I'm not sure when the idea that userspace is not a place to store your preferred version of articles became popular, but the discussion about the George W. Bush page is just another step in clarifying and optimising that part of the user page policy. Regarding requests for adminship, I rarely participate unless I know a user well enough to give an honest and informed opinion about them. Re: talk archives, I've probably read hundreds or thousands of them by now. Occasionally vandalism to talk page archives can last for many month or even years, because no-one is interested them and no-one puts them on their watchlist. However, Wikipedia's archives contain the history of the site and how its norms have evolved over time. Thus it is important to make sure archives are as well-preserved as possible for Wikipedia historians, people who are trying to find out how a Wikipedia page evolved, or people who are just looking for past discussions. Graham87 13:14, 25 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yet each time I point out prior discussions, I get told that prior consensus on any issue is meaningless <g>. As for taking any guideline as rigid, I would hope you have looked at my voting patters on xFD in general. Thanks! Collect (talk) 15:29, 25 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, consensus can change, but that doesn't mean archived discussions should be obliterated or are always unimportant. I'd invite you to check out Wikipedia:Historical archive/Wikipedia chat; the page is over six years old, but some of the discussion, like which style to use for years, is still relevant to Wikipedia today. Archives can also be useful for tracking how a process evolved; for an example of that, see User:Raul654/Featured Articles. As you probably know, people come and go all the time in online communities, and a different mix of people might edit an article in 2008 as compared to, say, 2005, and might have a different set of opinions. Graham87 09:28, 26 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"Might" is a very vague word. In MfD, the word is not used -- and many similar articles routinely get deleted (I tend to think that six months is fine, but that some period of time will eventually get to be "too long." The fact that "content forks" are specifically singled out as not belonging in WP is also important. As I understand it, having multiple versions of articles or substantial parts thereof in space which is indexed within WP and by outside search engines is not desireable. The case at hand, while billed as an "alternative proposal," happens to fit the definition of "content fork" quite superbly. As for needing all proposals to be on hand perpetually, I have found, in general, that once the discussion is done, the proposal gets deleted. WP does have one peculiar exception -- that a featured article is kept in stasis - the newer revisions are not considered that same as the "featured article" when it was singled out. I find the rationale for this exception to be invalid, but WP still does it. Collect (talk) 14:31, 26 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Re: the adminship request, the revolutionary thing about the request was precisely that people took into account the user's experience on the German Wikipedia, despite his minimal experience in the English Wikipedia. People who made comments in requests for adminship would sometimes take into account experience on other wikis, but they would ask for as much experience on the English Wikipedia as they would of someone who only edited en.wp. That is another step in the consensus-gathering process on Wikipedia. Graham87 13:20, 25 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Again - I would trust I am not one who looks at rigid rules where they make no sense to me. Did you read User:Collect/thoughts? Collect (talk) 15:29, 25 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No, I hadn't. They sound fair enough to me. Re: the idea of a sympathetic point of view, you might be interested in Wikinfo, if you haven't already seen it. Graham87 02:00, 26 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Need a bot

Hmmm - based on recent discussion at Talk:Joe the Plumber, I think we need a bot to go through the articles of all deceased persons. Their occupations need to be changed to Corpse, Skeleton, or Dust. As an example, the Ramesses II article should show his current occupation as Mummy. Kelly ^hi! 23:43, 26 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You know, there's a difference between someone who's alive, and a dead person when it comes to "what are they doing now" vs. "what were they known for during their lives".Mattnad (talk) 20:03, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You might try having a sense of humo(u)r ... many living people do have their former occupations listed. The idea of "corpse" was not intended as a serious suggestion. Collect (talk) 20:07, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What do we do for Bela Lugosi then? Collect (talk) 00:00, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ugh - that opens a can of worms. What do with the occupation for deceased vampires? Dracula has apparently been slain, so what is his current occupation? Clearly he is no longer a licensed vampire. Extensive illegal records searches by employees of the state of Ohio have revealed that Vlad Tepes did not pay his dues last year to Bloodsuckers and Undead Local #1313. Kelly ^hi! 20:10, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Dracula is in the business of repairing vlad tires. He used to be in the used coffin trade. I think his nickname was "Spike." (ducking) Collect (talk) 20:24, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, I reported TheBossOfCollect (talk · contribs) at WP:UAA. Kelly ^hi! 20:13, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Many thanks -- I feel honored to have socks going after me. <g> Collect (talk) 20:24, 27 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Cohort

I have taken demography and it is a term of demography. It may also be used by other people to stand for other types of people. In the precise sense, it means all who are born at the "same" time. But I guess sameness can apply to a 19 year period for American baby boomers 1946 to 1964 is 19 years. It may be a boom but it is certainly "More" than one generation. The wiki article on post World War 2 demographic boom of births, the canadian boom begain in 1947 and ended in 1966 which is 20 years. However that very same article also states that the boom in birth rates ended in 1957. Very stramnge. It may be due to the wishy-washy-ness of all pop culture terms. As it gains widespread use, it stands for many diffedrent things. Some of which may conflict. It is fun nonetheless to wonder how our cultural terms have become what they are Hammer of the year (talk) 16:37, 30 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would consider "demography" to consist substantially of statistics. My background is heavy in applied math and sciences, and I tend to like really simple words whenever possible. Thanks! Collect (talk) 16:46, 30 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, just didn't know that's your use of the word. The interesting thing about words and meanings are whether two words share secondary and tertiary meanings as well as primary meanings. The word "right" stands for the opposite of "left" as well as a "legal right" in French and Spanish as well. This means that the concept of the right hand side may have been connected with properness as well. Hammer of the year (talk) 17:44, 30 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Not to mention ancient Latin <g>. "Left" is "sinister" which has a negative meaning. Collect (talk) 19:26, 30 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Millenium '73

Hi there. Thank you enormously for your help with the Prem Rawat article. I don't know how you did it, but that blue pencil of yours is a truly splendid tool. Would you care to take a look at the above page? Mattisse is helping, but we (or perhaps I) have reached the stage of simmering and spluttering. Thanks anyway. Rumiton (talk) 12:17, 2 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

RFC at WP:NOR-notice

A concern was raised that the clause, "a primary source may be used only to make descriptive claims, the accuracy of which is verifiable by any reasonable, educated person without specialist knowledge" conflicts with WP:NPOV by placing a higher duty of care with primary sourced claims than secondary or tertiary sourced claims. An RFC has been initiated to stimulate wider input on the issue. Professor marginalia (talk) 06:21, 3 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

your recent edit on Rick Warren page

Hello, i did not wish to undo your recent edit on the Rick Warren page, but it seems like there might be an error or an inaccuracy in what you said: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rick_Warren&diff=prev&oldid=261689844 http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rick_Warren&curid=735151&diff=261689844&oldid=261687934 ("right wing politics" not supported by any RS I could find - has not endorsed candidates and has supported global warming initiatives etc.) But when i check with a search engine, i find immediately: http://www.google.com/search?q=Right+wing+politics,+Rick+Warren

The first few search results are showing discussions on CNN and AOLnews and other places where they debate which flavor of right wing politics and which sort of conservativism is favored by Rick Warren. They all describe his conservative and right-wing stances, and i couldn't see any instance in which he could be called 'left-wing' nor anything very far away from 'right-wing'.

Do you think maybe CNN and AOLnews are reliable enough, and their information sufficiently clear at first glance, so we could agree that Rick Warren is extremely involved in Right Wing Politics? This doesn't seem like a synthesis of original research, this seems (to me) like a rather plain sort of description which only gives a generic label and doesn't necessarily cause controversy if it is only mentioned in this kind of generic summary? Please forgive me if i am making some mistake about all this, i still don't know where some people want to draw the line between a good concise summary versus a bit of unnecessary Synthesis which could resemble Original Research. Thank you for your consideration, i am still learning how these standards work around here.

Teledildonix314 ^talk 21:35, 3 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

No cite for making the claim was furnished. Second, I found no evidence that he has ever endorsed any political candidate. Third, on at least a few issues, his position is not that expected for a person in "right wing politics." In order to make a claim in a BLP (Biography of a Living Person) on WP, the requirements for using specific reliable sources for specific claims is clear. Googling a phrase does not count as a "reliable source" nor do entries in blogs etc. count as reliable sources. Thanks! Collect (talk) 21:41, 3 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, thank you for making it more clear. You seem to be saying i can't use the term because it isn't cited. However, i disagree with you. Another editor wisely wrote: We are perfectly at liberty to draw inferences in writing an encyclopedic article. If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck etc. If it fits the definition as above then use it. That's why i was so certain i had a right to use the words "Right-wing politics", because of the good fit to the dictionary definition. But you are more experienced than i am, so perhaps i am just not catching on to some kind of nuance here. I will read more articles written by other people so i can see how they go about resolving this type of disagreement. I wouldn't want to conflict with you, i won't edit or alter anything you've said, and i won't edit any other pages where i might fail to make the proper understanding that you are suggesting. Could you suggest any references or Wikipedia Help Guides which have good examples of how to summarize accurately with concise words appropriate to the specific topic but without straying into any possible Original Research Synthesis? This seems to be where i have the biggest difficulties with language in articles. I want to use the best word, but people keep rejecting my choices of words if they sound like they might come with a value-judgement attached. Of course, i should probably stay away from anything political whatsoever, whether BLP or otherwise, because my mistakes are likely to keep smashing hornets' nests if i don't do things properly. Sorry to ramble, but you seem like you are good at showing new people how to be concise and accurate. Thank you. Teledildonix314 ^talk 22:06, 3 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I do not know which editor would so casually disregard WP:BLP. And please feel free to edit what I write! I am certainly fallible! All I ask is that you use "reliable sources" and that the claim is supported by the source. You might also look at WP:WTA (words to avoid) which explains why some groups of words will attract lightning. Thanks! Collect (talk) 22:20, 3 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Collect about your use of the term "right wing". First, that is an ambiguous term and it is hard to use a label that gets thrown around so vigorously within the political media. It would be better to simply state things issue by issue instead of a broad label that is pejoritive at best. Lastly, Warren is not within what could be classically termed the right-wing of politics. In fact, he has come under considerable fire from those on the right for his stance on the environment, his friendship with Obama, not being an activist in anti-abortion circles, etc. He is, however, Biblically conservative in his views and therefore holds many of the same beliefs of those on the religious right even though he is not a political activist. CarverM (talk) 01:17, 4 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]