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Donald - We seem to be embroiled in a dispute at Design District - a part of miami wikiproject. Obviously Scaletail and I believe that 76.. and 173.. are putting spam in this article. Can you help us?--GroveGuy (talk) 03:46, 16 September 2011 (UTC)
I wanted to give you one last update on where we are this term, before my role as Online Facilitator wraps up at the end of this week. Already, there are over 800 students in U.S. classes who have signed up on course pages this term. About 40 classes are active, and we're expecting that many more again once all the classes are up and running.
On a personal note, it's been a huge honor to work with so many great Wikipedians over the last 15 months. Thanks so much to everyone who jumped in and decided to give the ambassador concept a try, and double thanks those of you who were involved early on. Your ideas and insights and enthusiasm have been the foundation of the program, and they will be the keys the future of the program.
Courses looking for Online Ambassadors
Still waiting to get involved with a class this term, or ready to take on more? We have seven classes that are already active and need OA support, and eleven more that have course pages started but don't have active students yet. Please consider joining one or more of these pods!
Active courses that really need Online Ambassadors:
Thank you Donald,
My Questions is can it be shown the proper way to cite a Factual Link, such as congressional Records that Specifically describe these people.
as shown in Google books, and this is not personal point of View, when the Information provided I refer to is sited!
They are described through out history as Darker, than normal creeks, and in Congressional Records as African. If i am not doing it right at least take the informational link provided and make the correct changes,
Hello Donald, re: my edit on the USS Adirondack (1862) page, please accept my apologies for this oversight, removing the 'so-called' from a quote. Was going through ship's lists and came upon the page, among many others, panning through many articles reading up on captured ships for a list I am putting together. Thanks for looking out. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 16:53, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
ITESM.-MX
Hi! thanks for the info on my talk page. In case you didnt know Matt Senate (dunno his name in WP, CA for California and Hawaii) visited my campus last week. Ive also started contact with Frank Schulenberg. Im interested in seeing about how to put something related to my school on the pages that we create or expand. My school is very PR conscious, so it will be easier to get more cooperation if they can see that they get credit. We did a bunch of articles in English and Spanish related to the Festival Internacional Cervantino including the Festival article, in English and Spanish, so a logical place to start is with these articles. You can see something about it here [2] It was a Club Wikipedia project but a number of students also talked their teachers into class credit for work on the articles. Four of them are mine. So its not really a "class assignment" Im working with the head of the International Baccalaureate program at my school. Students in that program must do projects that arent part of a class. Its community service. That doesnt quite fit under class assignment either.Thelmadatter (talk) 01:07, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
Interesting stuff. I was trying to broaden the range of examples given. The Tempers section is still very focused on areas north of Mexico. -- Donald Albury18:27, 6 November 2011 (UTC)
Osceola & Light a Distant Fire
Dear Mr. Albury, I'm pleased to see that wikipedia articles are being monitored. I remember the old days when even one of my articles was vandalized. I was not aware, however, that adding Light a Distant Fire to the lit.bibliography would be considered conflict of interest. It is topical and has been in print for 23 years. If a colleague added it for me would that be a conflict of interest. Lucia Robson173.69.136.58 (talk) 01:57, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
DYK for Fig Island
On 21 November 2011, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Fig Island, which you created or substantially expanded. The fact was ... that Fig Island includes one of the largest and most complex Late Archaic shell rings in North America, and one of the best preserved circular shell rings? The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Fig Island.You are welcome to check how many hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, quick check) and add it to DYKSTATS if it got over 5,000. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.
Well, there aren't many sites on the internet that do not have ads these days. I wouldn't think that would be an all-encompassing exclusion factor. There are 0 outbound links to pau d'arco sites on the Wiki page and that site is very informative and has quite a bit more information than the Wiki page. JayTTodd (talk) 18:33, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
Just in case you didn't bother to keep track on my talk page...
Donald, Fally Ipupa was added to the "Kinshasans" section of the Kinshasa article. You reverted him as "notability not established." Moyogo today replaced Ipupa in the list.
I was just about to take Ipupa out, as I saw no reference to Ipupa's notability, and his Wikipedia page is a one-sentence stub. However, I found that his bandmate, Koffi Olomide, has a well-developed Wikipedia article and seems unquestionably notable. Ipupa himself might be a borderline case. An external link on his Wiki page points to a site within the MTV family, which makes it seem like he's legit.
I have little experience with the guidelines for musician notability, though I am somewhat aware of the prickly minefield that awaits those who dare to enter that area. My own instinct is that we could add BOTH Ipupa AND Olomide, since they both have Wikipedia articles. That said, I also recognize that this should not be a list of every person in the world from Kinshasa. Thoughts? Thanks! Moishe Rosenbaum (talk) 22:18, 25 December 2011 (UTC)
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Sorry that I don't have a copy of Dohanos's contract with the Treasury Dept. in front of me. But several things are clear:
He was paid by the US Treasury for the artwork
There is no copyright symbol on the painting I uploaded and it was displayed in public (i.e. "published") - this alone is enough for PD status.
There likely was a contract - WPA artists were paid by the hour, so were extremely unlikely to have any special contracts retaining rights in the work (which might have even been illegal). Dohanos probably got his contract through the Section of Painting and Sculpture, but it was folded into a WPA successor.
Checking through the alphabet soup of Federal art projects of the time - there's no mention of artists retaining rights to the work, and it likely was a completely foreign concept at the time.
This is Public Art, displayed in Public, paid for by the US Treasury.
A couple of things on copyrights of paintings - as I understand it - prior to 1978 paintings had to have a copyright notice on them to be copyrighted. But, the copyright notice could be on the BACK of the painting. In the case of murals which are pasted on the wall, as in most cases of the Post Office murals, then the copyright on the back thing is impossible, so just look for a copyright symbol on the front, perhaps where the artist's signature is. If there is no copyright notice, then it is public domain if it has been published.
Publication, in the case of artwork, is display to the public in a situation where they are not prevented from photographing or otherwise copying it. Since the Post Office doesn't have signs up saying "No Photos Allowed" or have employees stopping folks from copying the mural, it is safe to assume that the Post Office murals have been published. Smallbones (talk) 15:15, 2 January 2012 (UTC)
The murals that I'm interested in, in the West Palm Beach post office, have not been accessible to the public in almost 20 years. The Smithsonian holds three of the studies that Dohanos made for the murals, but they are not on public display, and the images I downloaded from the Smithsonian 6 years ago were deleted as non-free, despite my fair-use claims (one of them was File:Barefoot-mailman-5-study.jpeg, i.e., this image, but I can't even access the deleted file). After consideration, I don't think it is worth my time to try that route again. -- Donald Albury16:20, 2 January 2012 (UTC)
And I was wrong. The murals are on public display again (in the third location since 1940), shown here on Facebook. Unfortunately, I no longer live there, so I can't go take pictures of them. -- Donald Albury02:00, 3 January 2012 (UTC)
there is a lot of cynicism among the deletionists, about photos of art with the PD tag on it. normally, it's a derivative work of the 2D painting, and copyright to artist until 70 years after death. hence the wrongful deletion. even for things in library of congress or smithsonian. however, this is a special case, because he was an employee of the federal government, therefore workproduct is Public Domain. we could upload the scans as that, however, complication - the smithsonian has put a Non-Commercial license on their scans of Public Domain art. so we could upload as "non free NC", but it would be a deletion fight with the NFCC cops here. let me see how the Deletion Review goes with Iroquois (di Suvero). maybe we can strategize with Sarah at glamcamp. Slowking4⇔ †@1₭02:41, 3 January 2012 (UTC)
Since the murals are on public display again, it would be easier for someone to take photos and upload them to commons. Unfortunately, I don't when, if ever, I would have an opportunity to do so. -- Donald Albury09:59, 3 January 2012 (UTC)
Shipwreck-Joke?
Hi there, I did not mean any harm to the article Shipwreck at all...I had just simply thought that since this article was called "Shipwreck", that I could include Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked in the "see also" section. Now thinking about it, I understand that the "see also" section is to get further information on the page topic, and the movie did not belong there. I just wanted to clarify that I did not mean that as a joke. Regards, 142.68.80.44 (talk) 23:35, 2 January 2012 (UTC)
Your recent revert at Chewbacca actually added a whole bunch of vandalism back in - but you're right, the IP who tried to fix it missed quite a bit. I've now reverted the article to the most recent version that hadn't been vandalised. As Chewie himself might say, "AwrAUUrraaaagh", which I think expressed the point more eloquently than I ever could. Cheers, Yunshui雲水14:04, 4 January 2012 (UTC)
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My ability to contribute to broad articles is limited, as my rather haphazard reading is about Florida, and to a lesser extent, the southeastern U.S. and the Caribbean. I do like to add details that help illustrate the complexity of the history of people in the Americas. -- Donald Albury23:31, 11 January 2012 (UTC)
Part of our goal at the Wikifriends of Viva Florida 500 is to add more hidden information from the writings of early explorers about these indigenous tribes. A research project is planned to the archives in Seville Spain where students trained to read ancient Spanish documents will discover more them. My hope is that after they get this information they will share it with the Wikipedia
community.--Ourhistory153 (talk) 14:31, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
You are receiving this message either because you expressed an opinion about the proposed SOPA blackout before full blackout and soft blackout were adequately differentiated, or because you expressed general support without specifying a preference. Please ensure that your voice is heard by clarifying your position accordingly.
This is my rebuttal to your call to delete this project.
That is not the entire picture. I'm working with Viva Florida members who are archivists and history professors. One of which is Dr. Francis of UNF who is sending 4 students to Seville Spain on a research project. We will be obtaining new information on ancient topics and updating Florida history articles here at Wikipedia of which this Wiki Project is the Landing page for their members. As I mentioned in the beginning, this project is not so much about promoting Viva Florida 500 to the Wikipedia community, as it is about promoting Wikipedia to Viva Florida 500 members. And frankly you need more accuracy in many of the Florida History articles, as there is many errors and need for embellishment. If you pull the plug on this project then I will pull the plug with promoting Wikipedia to Viva Florida 500. Let me know ASAP, as I have a conference call coming up with Viva Florida 500 with close to a hundred historians and archivists around the state of Florida, and there will be no need to promote this project if there is no page for it.--Ourhistory153 (talk) 14:20, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
Also you may want to note Mr. Danbury that I posted an inquiry back in Sept 2011 Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Florida about this project. I do all this work to it and you now want to delete it! I'm an author and a historian and I have better things to do with my time.--Ourhistory153 (talk) 14:44, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
Killian high graduation rate is subpar
Well Mr. Donald. Have you reviewed the cited source? Do you know the purpose of statistics especially when they are cited and verified by a cited source?
Statewideflorida touts a 95% graduation rate and Killian High(probably your old school) touts a substantiated 92% graduation rate. That is 3 full percentage points below the state average. When an average has been calculated and one of the participants has an average that is below the overall average that means that the average is drawn and pulled down by the subpar participant in the statistic population.
So, that brings me to my question...why do you insist on reverting edits that are 1) constructive 2) cited and verifiable 3) within Wikipedia's policy of NPOV and finally 4) why do you choose NOT to use the talk page and insist on reverting it until the cows come home?
Please address these questions and be constructive and a little open minded in your applying the rules and guildelines of Wikipedia.
Yes, I read the cited source. I did not see in the source where it said that Killian pulled down either the district's or the state's average. Any such conclusion that you may have drawn from the cited source is original research on your part, which is not allowed in Wikipedia articles. In fact, though, I see only the statewide and district graduation rates in that article, and nothing about Killian's graduation rate. -- Donald Albury19:56, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
DRV
A notification that the Templates for Discussion discussion (oy, repetition) has been taken to a deletion review discussion. The Article Rescue Squadron was notified, and as notifications to previous involved parties isn't normal practise, I and a few ARS members agreed that, in the interests of transparency and fairness, we should let everyone know...hence this talkpage message ;).
Please read the talk page at Wikipedia talk:Viva Florida 500 WP. Ourhistory has, not understanding how we work, removed the MfD notice. I'd appreciate it if you'd drop the MfD because I see no need for it anymore, as there is agreement on:"What I'd like to suggest has been suggested by someone else - keep this as a project but make it a subproject of Wikiproject Florida. Keep the current page but make it a redirect to the subproject. That way any links will still work, and the name is kept. I really think that is the best solution and shouldn't make any of the five months work lost in any way. I wish that this had been proposed earlier, particularly before any attempt to delete anything" Two editors including myself have proposed this, and OurHistory has agreed. Dougweller (talk) 18:33, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
He certainly does not understand how we work. It was this edit that led me to see the notice at the top of this page that attracted my attention to the project. I don't think that the project has benefited WP, but I will ignore it and him and let others enlighten him on the Manual of Style and related issues. -- Donald Albury19:43, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
Thanks. I've posted to him about the MOS, etc. And I didn't understand how Wikipedia worked when I started, so I can sympathise with others who don't. Dougweller (talk) 20:58, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
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My name is Victor and I work with the Wikimedia Foundation, the non-profit organization that supports Wikipedia. We're chronicling the inspiring stories of the Wikipedia community around the world, including those from readers, editors, and donors. Stories are absolutely essential for any non-profit to persuade new people to support the cause, and we know the vast network of people who use Wikipedia have so much to share.
I find stories that drive our annual fundraising efforts. It's important to convey the incredible diversity of people who've come to rely upon Wikipedia every day.
I'd really like the opportunity to interview you to tell your story, with the possibility of using it in our materials, on our community websites, or as part of this year’s fundraiser to encourage others to support Wikipedia.
I'm hoping you will elaborate on your story with me, either over the phone, by Skype, by facebook, by email, or any means you like. Please let me know if you're inclined to take part in the Wikipedia Stories Project and we'll set up a good time to discuss further.
I'm sure it's crossed your mind, considering the nature of the material that was added to and deleted from this article, that User:Trizzat may be the same person as User:Shiversnyc. Why they would need to sock I don't know, considering that you unblocked Shiversnyc a couple of weeks ago, but the material Trizzat added was virtually identical to the stuff that Shiversnyc had in the article when that editor tried to usurp the original "The Shivers" article.
I did assume it was the same person, or someone associated with him. I did advise Shiversync to choose another name, but Trizzat had 3 edits back in October (2 or which have been deleted). Yeah, I guess a warning is in order. -- Donald Albury01:52, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
You may want to look into this edit and reblock the account and underlying IP. It does not seem as though they have heeded the warnings regarding the topic of legal trademarks nor their COI. NoformationTalk06:13, 4 February 2012 (UTC)
Just FYI, Noformation is referring to the same edit I referred to in my last edit in the thread just above this one. I've put a non-templated message about socking on the user talk pages of the IP, Shiversnyc and Trizzat. I do think they've had sufficient warning now that their legal claims cannot go into the article that thought should be given to blocking all three, since there seems to be a case of WP:IDHT going on. Donald's unblocking of Shiversnyc presented that editor with the opportunity to contribute to the article in a positive way, but they clearly chose to keep on in the manner which got them blocked in the first place. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:29, 4 February 2012 (UTC)
Ah didn't your edit. I'm on the side of blocking. At best they're an SPA with no intention of contributing to wikipedia and at worst they're disruptive. Considering the total lack of heeding any advice (including content advice) I don't have much faith. I'm curious about the page too, I don't know music notability standards that well, is this a band that's notable enough to have a page in the first place? At times I felt like we were cutting them a lot of slack simple so as not to WP:BITENoformationTalk08:25, 4 February 2012 (UTC)
Well, I generally have inclusionist tendencies, so I'm not personally inclined to AfD the article, although I can certainly see how other editors might feel differently. It may be that the one article in the Guardian -- which really is specifically about the band's one single -- could well be sufficient to pass our notability requirements. Popular music is full of "one hit wonders" that add significantly to the musical zeitgeist and I don't think we should neglect them simply because they haven't manage to have a apectacular career in music. (Having been involved with a very talented songwriter who was never able to break through, I'm sympathetic to the difficulties of making that happen.) Beyond My Ken (talk) 09:01, 4 February 2012 (UTC)
Fair enough, like I said I'm not too familiar with the music side of Wikipedia, mostly the science stuff for me. I interned for a woman in the early 2000s who had written songs for Bett Middler, Barbara Streisand, etc, and even she doesn't have an article so I can certainly share that sympathy. NoformationTalk09:04, 4 February 2012 (UTC)
I've only made 4 edits to the article in the past 3 1/2 years. Most of my edits were 5 to 6 years ago. It's nice to see an article I've worked on reach GA, but my contribution was mainly in helping to build a sourced and neutral short article. -- Donald Albury11:49, 6 February 2012 (UTC)
Request to act as Mentor for HG252: Langauge, Technology and the Internet
G'day,
I would like to ask you to act as a mentor for our class project on Language, Technology and the Internet. Over the next 6 or so weeks, 13 groups of 3 students will propose a topic, write, edit, and maintain a page about it. The aim is for all articles to reach the level of good articles, although not necessarily within the time-span of the class.
What kind of support are you looking for? I do not feel competent to help with content. I can help with the mechanics of editing and with understanding Wikipedia policies and guidelines. I also may not always have a lot of time to devote to the class. -- Donald Albury02:13, 8 February 2012 (UTC)
My name is Jonathan Obar user:Jaobar, I'm a professor in the College of Communication Arts and Sciences at Michigan State University and a Teaching Fellow with the Wikimedia Foundation's Education Program. This semester I've been running a little experiment at MSU, a class where we teach students about becoming Wikipedia administrators. Not a lot is known about your community, and our students (who are fascinated by wiki-culture by the way!) want to learn how you do what you do, and why you do it. A while back I proposed this idea (the class) to the community HERE, were it was met mainly with positive feedback. Anyhow, I'd like my students to speak with a few administrators to get a sense of admin experiences, training, motivations, likes, dislikes, etc. We were wondering if you'd be interested in speaking with one of our students.
So a few things about the interviews:
Interviews will last between 15 and 30 minutes.
Interviews can be conducted over skype (preferred), IRC or email. (You choose the form of communication based upon your comfort level, time, etc.)
All interviews will be completely anonymous, meaning that you (real name and/or pseudonym) will never be identified in any of our materials, unless you give the interviewer permission to do so.
All interviews will be completely voluntary. You are under no obligation to say yes to an interview, and can say no and stop or leave the interview at any time.
The entire interview process is being overseen by MSU's institutional review board (ethics review). This means that all questions have been approved by the university and all students have been trained how to conduct interviews ethically and properly.
Bottom line is that we really need your help, and would really appreciate the opportunity to speak with you. If interested, please send me an email at obar@msu.edu (to maintain anonymity) and I will add your name to my offline contact list. If you feel comfortable doing so, you can post your name HERE instead.
If you have questions or concerns at any time, feel free to email me at obar@msu.edu. I will be more than happy to speak with you.
Thanks in advance for your help. We have a lot to learn from you.
I now live in Saint Augustine, Florida, and plan to work with cultural organizations and institutions in the area. I see that you are listed on WALRUS as a FL contact and want to update you about some current stuff I'm working on related to FL.
In particular, I want to talk about coordinating the local Florida events related to Commons:Wiki Loves Monuments 2012 that will happen in September 2012. While living in Kentucky, my husband and I took and uploaded images of places on the NRHP so I have a general idea of the process. I'm most interested in finding the gaps in coverage of historical sites in FL, and figuring out the best way to get these covered with local events. Maybe road trips to get some images in the outlying areas. We have a good amount of lead time so I think that this is doable.
Additionally, I plan to work with the Saint Augustine 450 Commemoration (a four year initiative to celebrate the founding of Saint Augustine and settlement of FL through educational and legacy projects) to see how that we can add value to their current events, and possibly plan some joint initiatives.
I'm also working with User:LoriLee the U.S. Cultural Partnerships Coordinator for the
Wikimedia Foundation to create an listing of cultural organizations and institutions in the United States, and WMF volunteers interested in working with these organizations. The beginning stages of it are at Wikipedia:GLAM/US/Connect. We also plan to have State specific pages that link to the Wikiproject for each state.
I see that you have already found Ebyabe, which is good. Another user who sometimes works on Florida history is User:Cuchullain. I'm not sure how much I can contribute right now. I'm trying to maintain a presence in the Ambassador Program, and find more time to work on articles about the history (or, more often, prehistory) of Florida. I am a member of the historical society here in Gainesville, but my tentative proposal to them to donate images to Commons didn't go anywhere, and my work schedule limits when I can visit them. Any way, I'm willing to see what I can do. -- Donald Albury11:57, 17 February 2012 (UTC)
Hi! Thanks for the suggestion about who else to contact. Last week, I attended GLAMcamp DC and came away with loads of ideas and enthusiasm about ways we can partner with cultural heritage organizations and institutions. Maybe we can brainstorm together about an approach to get the Gainsville historical society on board to make a donation. Could you email me {sydney.poore(at)gmail.com} more details about what you proposed, who was your contact, and want obstacles prevented the donation? Otherwise, let me know anything else that occurs to you about how to work better with cultural heritage organizations in FL. FloNight♥♥♥♥21:31, 17 February 2012 (UTC)
User Talk: allykittencat
Hey Donald:)
Thanks for being so welcoming to our class and helping us learn how to edit Wikipedia! I am excited to learn and explore all that Wikipedia has to offer! Have a great weekend!
Thanks for checking out my edit. I was struggling with rephrasing "longbows and poisonous arrows" but i figured if I cited it, it wouldn't matter... but i guess not! I really liked rereading how you edited the page, it really helped me understand what I was supposed to do. I'm still trying to get comfortable with editing wiki... It's kinda scary! Anyway I'll read those wiki copyright rules. Thanks again!
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Hi Donald, this is my first day using Wiki and the terms 'confusing' and 'daunting' are understatements. It took me about 15mins to find a way to contact you. Hopefully with time and lots of practice I will be able to master Wikipedia just as it seems many of my classmates have. Thank you in advanceCcaynes11 (talk) 01:04, 28 February 2012 (UTC)
Rock Hall (Colebrook, Connecticut)
Hello. Re your speedy deletion of Rock Hall (Colebrook, Connecticut): Aside from the fact that I wasn't notified, my understanding is that once a speedy tag has been removed by other than the article's creator, it should not be put back. Instead the article should be proded or AfD'd. This is a legitimate topic, on the NRHP, and I rewrote the original editor's copyvio. Could you restore the article? Thanks. Station1 (talk) 19:33, 1 March 2012 (UTC)
My name is Lauren Tobin and I just wanted to thank you for everything that you are doing for our class in helping us be a part of the Wikipedia world! Everything you are doing is extremely inspiring and I cant wait to work with you some more!
Donald, you sent a memo to me about promoting a book. I'm sorry; that was not the intention; and I will be happy to delete the link(s) if you deem that best. The reference was meant as informative, as the book(s) in question contain factual data about culture, atmosphere, geography and history in a manner few fiction works (and even tourist guides) have yet done. If this is still a violation please let me know and I shall reedit the pages to reflect a more neutral position.
I have also added other links to commercial organisations which are a viable part of the local culture. If these are objectionable, again, you have only to let me know and the content will be edited.
FYI-- I am not the writer; only a reviewer. Can you suggest another kind of link to serve as reference for the addition?
They revolve around the submission by one of the members of the "Online Ambassadors Selection Committee" of her article for review Talk:Douglas W. Owsley/GA1 The article contained heavy plagiarism, close paraphrasising and copvio. She became irate when I pointed this out. She solicited the opinion of three outside editors who all supported me. She proceeded to attack me and even followed me to my mentor's page and posted untruthful information there.[5][6][7][8][9][10]
Today the article was again turned down at GA review by another editor for the same problems Talk:Douglas W. Owsley/GA2. Therefore I conclude she still hasn't learned what close paraphrasing, plagiarism etc. is. I think that an editor who is unaware of these issues should not be an Online Ambassador, never mind on the "Online Ambassadors Selection Committee". Thank you, MathewTownsend (talk) 22:50, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
Main Project
Hey! Do you think that going into more detail about village and regional corporations in Alaska is a good idea for my main project in this class? --Jules823 (talk) 12:05, 22 March 2012 (UTC)
Hi. Thanks for explaining your reversion of my edit to this article. I'm aware that "ape" covers a wider range of primates than just the genus Homo, but didn't think that my edit suggested that ape and Homo were synonymous. There are lots of examples of articles where we've used a similar form of words to help readers place the article taxonomically: Savi's Warbler to pluck one at random. What I was trying to achieve was to place the word ape into the article so that most readers could place humans taxonomically, without having to navigate away from the page, to Homo, and then to primates etc: I felt that ape was a sufficiently widely understood term which could achieve this. Maybe there is a better way of achieving the same end result - any ideas? SP-KP (talk) 12:17, 6 April 2012 (UTC)
My name is Jaie Laplante, and I am the executive director of the Miami International Film Festival. I have currently assigned an assistant to expand the Wikipedia article on our entity in the spirit of sharing knowledge with people who are interested in the work we are doing, to capture the spirit of the learning and teaching that Wikimedia Foundation is all about. We have been quite mindful of complying with Wikipedia's regulations and procedures so I'm a little mystified about why you have deleted Igor's updates and blocked/prevented him from continuing to work on the article? The material he is referencing is our own, and as a staff member he has been cleared to use it for informational purposes of contributing to the knowledge pool about Miami International Film Festival.
Please let me know how you would prefer that we proceed, so that we may continue on with the project. My contact information is below, I look forward to your positive reply.
Hi Donald. Would you take a look at the Manasota article I started and make sure I haven't bulloxed things up too severely? Also, I couldn't make heads or tail of the midden v. mound distinction. Thanks. Take care. Candleabracadabra (talk) 14:03, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
I think the emphasis of the article should be on the Manasota culture. "Manasota people" is shorthand for "people of the Manasota culture." We have no idea what those people called themselves or what they were called by their neighbors, or if anybody had a single name for all the people who practiced what we call the Manasota culture. After all, the name "Manasota", as applied to anything in the prehistory of Florida, was invented less than 35 years ago. I added some items under the Further reading heading that I think will be useful in expanding the article. The material from the State of Florida Office of Cultural and Historical Programs was prepared under the direction of Jerald Milanich, and I believe the book is the more current source of that material. -- Donald Albury21:32, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
Have been doing some cleanup of Southern and Gulf Coast Mississippian culture articles lately as I try to figure out/research what and where exactly South Appalachinan Mississippian culture was so I can finish an article about it. Noticed this (Pensacola culture) was missing and ran across some info so put it together, noticed it was on your to do list. Have also recently rewrote/wrote Wulfing cache, Etowah plates (both in preparation for Mississippian copper plates, you wouldn't happen to have a good pic of the Solar Ogee deity plate from Lake Jackson other than the line drawing that shows up everywhere? hoping to do an illustration similar to one to right) Lake Jackson Mounds Archaeological State Park and Fort Walton culture. Also just got a book on Bottle Creek Indian Mounds by Dr. Ian Brown yesterday, so hoping to eventually do revamping/expansion of that sometime, but getting the Pensacola culture article up and running is fine for now, lol. Hope you are well, Heiro23:16, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
Per my talk, it helps to have books, lol. I had almost nothing on Southern cultures, so recently found a bunch on Amazon for around $5 each, so ordered a few. Some of the more expensive ones would probably be a help for the South Appalachian Mississippian article, but I spend too much on books as it is so I try to not let myself order the expensive ones unless they look really good, lol. Anyway, if you notice anymore Florida sites (with articles) for Pensacola or Fort Walton culture, just add them to the sections I made on their respective articles. I managed to locate about 5 apiece, but it seems like we should have more and I know there are lots of NRHP articles for the state with no categorization or text explaining their cultural affiliation. Anyway, glad you like it and I'll let you know if I add more similar articles. Heiro01:42, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
Hi Donald!
I believe that link to lightphotos.net which you removed from lighthouse page is valuable resource for people who'll be interesting in lighthouses. At the moment it contains information about 3000 lights world wide with detailed info/photos/historical data and the number is growing every month. I think you can find only 2-3 such resources in whole web. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.100.171.226 (talk) 17:16, 5 May 2012 (UTC)
Hello Donald - Sorry, I'm struggling through trying to figure out how to change the seal. I work for Charlotte County Administration - the seal you have on the article is not the official seal. That one came from the property appraiser's web page. The official seal may be found on the county's website, at the bottom of the page. It's very small, so I don't think it's suitable to post.
I've finally had a chance to try your instructions to upload the correct version of the County Seal. Unfortunately, since I had tried it before and it was removed, Wikimedia won't allow me to re-upload it. Any suggestions?
I don't believe I can share with you the contact information without permission, but if you would like to pursue it, I will request permission.--SPhilbrick(Talk)22:14, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
I think we have good news. The original email was sent to us because the original slide was clearly marked copyright. However, our contact at the Smithsonian decided to double-check, and now believes that information is in error. I've sent a follow up email to be sure I understood the status, but I note that
And an anonymous user has added catalog information from the Smithsonian to the Commons file. Please pass on my sincere thanks to your contact for looking further into the situation. I really do appreciate it, even if it does turn out that the Smithsonian owns the copyright. -- Donald Albury22:08, 21 May 2012 (UTC)
Hi Donald. I read the source you used for your changes but I am having difficult believing that a river that covers more than 20 miles can accurately described as a tidal channel. Doesn't this imply that the ocean tides reach its entire length? I will try to look into it more when I have some time. I found it surprisingly difficult to find good sources for these rural panhandle rivers. Take care. Candleabracadabra (talk) 18:54, 26 May 2012 (UTC)
Well, its an article in a scholarly journal, and a more reliable source on the river than any other I have found, and it says that the Crooked River is a double ended tidal channel. According to the article, the two ends of Crooked River connect to the "tidal estuaries of the Ochlockonee and Carrabelle Rivers." It also says that, "there are frequent reversals of flow along the whole length of the channel," i.e., water can flow from one estuary to the other, in either direction. What triggered my quest was that I found that the Crooked River was already listed in Wikipedia as a tributary of the Ochlockonee River. Now, a river may be difluent, splitting and contributing waterflow to two different watersheds, but this is different, as the flow between the two estuaries is reversible. -- Donald Albury19:12, 26 May 2012 (UTC)
Dear Donald
Dear Donald,
Not sure what bookspam is, but pages 14-15 of Physical Signs is specifically about the European diseases brought over by Hernando de Soto. It is a correct and accurate reference. Hope that helps. Best, Lisa — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lisawalsh (talk • contribs) 23:50, 28 May 2012 (UTC)
Sorry, I see no such thing in the pages I looked at on-line at Google Books. It would be easier to assume good faith about your edits if you were actually adding something to the articles rather than just adding citations to the same book to many articles without contributing anything else. -- Donald Albury00:55, 29 May 2012 (UTC)
Why did you delete the page about my Dreamies music?
Hi Donald, I was shocked to see the WIKI page about my electronic music LP dreamies was deleted. Can you tell me why? This really is disappointing.
Hello there. I was wondering if you'd be interested in helping me out with this article? It looks like there was a dispute over black electors in the post reconstruction era and Pearce was one of thsoe caught up in it. I added a bit from the congressional record about his being disqualified over a bribery conviction. I also saw some mentions about a pardon, but I can't find a good source that gets to the crux of what went down. The book about the founding of the AME has lots of detail about Pearce, but I don't have time at the mo to read all of it. Anyway, if you're interested I'd be happy to have your help (or anyone elses who is interested). Thanks. Candleabracadabra (talk) 21:14, 5 June 2012 (UTC)
I'm not familiar with him, and I don't really have anything on that time period. I do see an engraving of him at Florida Memory. That image is old enough to be in the public domain, and so is usable in WP. There is a little bit of biographical detail at Nowcomment, but it looks like that is an open edit site, and so not a reliable source in the WP meaning. There was another argument for disqualifying him as an elector, that he was improperly appointed, in the House. More of the same here. This page shows he was a state senator (District 8) from 1868 through 1874. And now I have found this, an MA thesis at the U. of Central Florida, which seems to have quite a bit about him. I hope some of this helps. -- Donald Albury01:42, 6 June 2012 (UTC)
Interesting reading. Thanks very much for your help. I saw the print portrait and linked to it, but it's above my paygrade to know best to upload it. Take care and thanks again. Candleabracadabra (talk) 20:33, 7 June 2012 (UTC)
You should be able to upload the image yourself. The tricky part about images is copyright, but anything that was published before 1923 is safely in the public domain. Copy the image down to your PC, then go to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page]. If it doesn't show you logged on, then go ahead and log in. Click on "Upload file" in the left sidebar. There are just 2 or 3 steps after that. Select that the image is not your own work, then that it is in the public domain. Then paste in a link to the site you copied it from, and a brief description. Then put it in a category, such as History of Florida, and finish. You will then see a link you can paste into his article. -- Donald Albury11:52, 8 June 2012 (UTC)
Cauveren
I am puzzled by your claim that User:Cauveren is spamming "his" book when he seems to have been inserting references to a book by A. L. Rowse to relevant articles. He has inserted reference to an article he (Cauveren) wrote in The Contemporary Review I'll grant, but they seem to be relevant and The Contemporary Review is a somewhat reputable publication. DuncanHill (talk) 13:30, 16 June 2012 (UTC)
The user has made 36 edits inserting a reference to the one book, without adding anything to the bodies of the articles. I think that it is very clear that these edits are book spam, as defined in the content guideline at Wikipedia:Spam. -- Donald Albury13:37, 16 June 2012 (UTC)
Well not all his links are to one book, and it's not his book (even though you wrongly claimed it was), and the books he inserted are relevant to the articles he inserted them into. So I don't think it's spam at all, but of course if you'd rather not include mention of books by historians about historians into the articles about those historians, well it's a point of view I suppose. DuncanHill (talk) 13:40, 16 June 2012 (UTC)
So, when you falsely claim that someone is promoting their own book, regardless of the fact that you are telling an untruth, and regardless of the fact that the books are relevant and written by a reputable authority, it is still spam? DuncanHill (talk) 17:15, 16 June 2012 (UTC)
(talk page stalker)Donald Albury was accurate in his call and identification of the editor's behavior regarding the addition of book spam. A review of the applicable guideline should provide clarity. I would recommend that you review the guideline on assuming good faith and the policy regarding personal attacks. Your edit summary is inappropriate in calling another editor a liar and asserting that administrators are conspiring to undermine Wikipedia in any capacity. Best regards, Cindy(talk to me)18:04, 16 June 2012 (UTC)
Why did you remove the Overtowner.com link from the Overtown Wiki?
Overtowner.com is the web home of "Overtowne: Inside/Out," a scholarly project created as my master's thesis project at the University of Miami. It is designed to, and indeed does, provide viewers with a contemporary view of Overtown from the "inside out," ie. from the point of view of the residents of Overtown. Residents of Overtown viewed the films on multimedia kiosks in their community and left their own video commentary.
Have you looked at the site? Can you tell me why you're deleting the link?
It is clearly within the bounds of what is acceptable as an external link by Wikimedia.
I am writing to you as you have signed up to the Education Meetup at Wikimania 2012 and perhaps are interested in how Wikipedia links to education. Wikimedia UK is now running a education related event that may be of interest to you: the EduWiki Conference on 5-6 September in Leicester. This event will be looking at Wikipedia and related charitable projects in terms of educational practice, including good faith collaboration, open review, and global participation. It's a chance to talk about innovative work in your institution or online community, and shape the future of Wikimedia UK's work in this area!
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Fisheating Creek
Hello Donald Albury
RE: Changes to the Fisheating Creek (FEC), Florida, article that i made a few days ago.
I confirmed my idea that the majority of the land in question is NORTH of SR70 with a person who has followed the business of the recent USDA conservation lands very closely. I cannot easily find a published source, or map, that will confirm my correction. A USDA document exists, no doubt. Perhaps the original author of the FEC artilce could do more research to find a published source. The published source, Highlands Today newspaper, that stated that the land is SOUTH of SR70, has made compass errors in the past. And, the reporteer may have been confused because some earlier FEC conservation land efforts concerned land that is SOUTH of SR70. Good luck with rectifying this error. Flohrer (talk) 00:11, 2 September 2012 (UTC) FLohrer
As I said in my comment on your talk page, we go by what is in reliable published sources. Newspapers are generally accepted as reliable sources, unless they are satire sites or have a reputation for regularly publishing wrong information. To establish that the newspaper in question makes errors in compass directions would require linking to a published reliable source that says that. -- Donald Albury13:18, 2 September 2012 (UTC)
Language categories for ethnic group articles
Hi Donald, hope you are doing well. I came across your reversal of any anonymous IPs removal of language categories from several articles tribes. I actually agree that tribes shouldn't have categories that are for languages and have been pulling them myself. To partially solve the problem, I created Category:Dhegiha Siouan peoples, which I can add to the appropriate tribal articles. (I've also been pulling tribe article out state history categories and lawsuits out of tribal categories, so hopefully some distinction emerges from these cats, instead of being a confusing hodgepodge). Cheers, -Uyvsdi (talk) 15:58, 2 September 2012 (UTC)Uyvsdi
OK, I understand that logic. Sometimes, though, articles about tribes mention the language, and there is no separate article for the language (particularly if there is nothing to say about the language beyond what family it may have belonged to). -- Donald Albury16:46, 2 September 2012 (UTC)
Newbie - Dinner Key Edits
Hi Donald,
New user here. I did some updates in the Dinner Key, Miami, FL article. If you could take a second and look at what I did I would appreciate it.
Just want to make sure I have met the required standards.
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Great that you made this! I've thought about it a few times myself, but never came across any reference for putting it together. While putting this article together, did you run across a list of the numbers which apply to the individual states? It seems like the list was numbered alphabetically for the first 48 states when it was created. I know Alabama is 1, Arkansas is 3, Georgia is 9, Indiana is 12, Kentucky is 15, Louisiana is 16, Mississippi is 22, Missouri is 23, South Carolina is 38, Tennessee is 40 and Texas is 41. I've included the trinomial in most of the archaeological site articles I've edited, when I can find the number anyway. Ohio and Illinois don't seem to use them, at least not in the literature, although they may actually be given numbers in the system. I have just never run across them when researching sites in those states. Heiro23:58, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
Actually, a quick google search turned up this list. And this blog has some interesting stuff [11] but not sure if could be considered a RS.Heiro00:09, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
There is a map showing the numbers here. I did cite that blog, although I agree that it isn't a RS. A little over a year ago I was trying to incorporate something about Smithsonian trinomials, and added a note (which I just removed here) to a couple of articles, citing the only source I could find on-line then. I was able to find a lot more this time. There are a number of WP articles that cite Smithsonian trinomials. I've been trying to find them and add links. -- Donald Albury01:09, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
User:Heironymous Rowe/sandbox 6 I turned into a table the list you put together with a few more that I found with cites and a few uncited that I know use the system. I had a 3rd field in the table that I just filled with state abbreviations like the source I found had, but they can be dropped or the field used for something else more pertinent. I felt having a table would be a good way to include the number with the state. Thoughts? Feel free to use if you want, I actually have some real world stuff I'm supposed to be working on but got distracted by this, lol, and I need to get back to it. Hope you are having a good new year, Heiro01:18, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
I figured the list would eventually turn into a table, I just wasn't sure what to put in. One thing I would add is links to pages like this, which shows the codes for counties in Alabama. -- Donald Albury01:57, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
I think at least 2 of the cites I found for other states included such information, but dont remember which 2 right off, lol.Heiro03:25, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
Per your message at my talk, I wasn't sure if you had added info to the list on the actual article and was afraid to just copy my table over, lol. I had a thought for the third field, instead of postal abbreviations like in the source (which would really be pointless for our article), why not include a link to the list of counties for the state, i.e. List of counties in Alabama?
I went ahead an copies it over, I assume the info you added was what I would have copy and pasted over, lol. I haven't had my coffee yet, just got up, was up late last night working on an illustration for a book about "Medieval Mississippians". Anyway, I went ahead and added the list of counties to that 3rd field, short of having each states counties with their specific abbreviations(which aren't standard abbreviations for counties, they have their own "system", eyeroll), I think this is the best way to do it. Let me know your thoughts, Heiro
What it would look like with county abbreviations added to table. Since many of the states have MANY counties, the table could get quite large, but it would save viewers from having to flip over to the list of counties and decipher the abbreviation from the list of counties. And so far we only have lists for a few of the states. I did two of them here as an exampleHeiro00:27, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
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Thanks very much for this article. I wanted to write it a good while ago, but I could never find enough reliable sources to be able to put together something. Nyttend (talk) 16:26, 5 February 2013 (UTC)
Thanks! I looked a little over a year ago and found very little on the I-net about trinomials, so I resorted to a footnote in a couple of articles (see Note 1 in [14]). When I searched this time I found a lot more information. There are still a lot of holes, and there may be some publications not yet accessible on-line that would help. I think a template that would parse a trinomial for a mouse-over would be useful, but I have no experience writing WP templates. -- Donald Albury13:02, 7 February 2013 (UTC)
Use of trinomials
I'm requesting a uninvolved and neutral opinion on a matter connected with the trinomials at Talk:Hansen Site. The trinomial is linked to the article on trinomials, as are several hundred other articles which employ the trinomials, I've been linking many of the articles I created or edit to the article you created about the numbering system.
A few weeks ago I reverted a newish editors uncited edit here at Mound. They even added their own "cite needed" tag with the edit. After my reversion, they retaliated by picking an article at random from a list I keep on my userpage and began an editwar over the trinomials (see page hist [15])
Maybe the other editor has a point. Seeing as how this matter has the potential to come up at other articles (there are hundreds with the trinomial in the position the other editor objects to), what are your thoughts on the matter? I've never seen a discussion on the matter anywhere onwiki before. I, and every other editor I've seen, just use standard practice from the literature and add the trinomials in parenthesis after the site name. It is also how I've seen the NPS and NRHP use the numbers. Now that you have taken the initiative and created the trinomial article, we at least have an explanation to link them to, and personally I think that suffices with no need to explain what the numbers mean on every article. Should we start a thread at Talk:Smithsonian trinomial and hammer out a consensus on the issue? Any thoughts on the matter would be appreciated. Thanks, Heiro19:43, 23 February 2013 (UTC)
are missing a description and/or other details on their image description pages. If possible, please add this information. This will help other editors make better use of the images, and they will be more informative to readers.
If the information is not provided, the images may eventually be proposed for deletion,
a situation which is not desirable, and which can easily be avoided.
are missing a description and/or other details on their image description pages. If possible, please add this information. This will help other editors make better use of the images, and they will be more informative to readers.
If the information is not provided, the images may eventually be proposed for deletion,
a situation which is not desirable, and which can easily be avoided.
"I reverted your edit to Common Myna, as the material did not seem relevant to the section. I also was not clear whether the material was original research, i.e., something you had observed for yourself. If you can cite a reliable source for that behavior, it might be usable in the Breeding section of the article."
"not relevant?" The article said that Mynas "[build] their nest in a hole in a tree or wall." I added the widespread (and, I might add, observable to anyone who cares to simply look/observe) behavior in Hawai'i of building nests in palm trees.
With an earned Ph.D. from Stanford, and above-average eyesight, many would consider me a reliable source for simple observation of such behavior. Of course, there are always pedants who need the trappings of scholarship to satisfy them. This type of demand for "documentation" is silly and is one of the things that sets Wikipedia back. Must one "document" the fact that Mynas fly, have wings, eat, lay eggs, hop on the ground, and engage in other obvious behaviors?
Bottom line: the article mentions the building of nests in holes, and the occupation of existing nests. Nest-building in trees was omitted, and leaves a deficient picture of Myna behavior. Anything that fills in the deficits should be welcomed, not deleted. In any case, it definitely is relevant. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Drwin808 (talk • contribs) 17:27, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
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Love history & culture? Get involved in WikiProject World Digital Library!
Hi Donald Albury! I'm the Wikipedian In Residence at the World Digital Library, a project of the Library of Congress and UNESCO. I'm recruiting Wikipedians who are passionate about history & culture to participate in improving Wikipedia using the WDL's vast free online resources. Participants can earn our awesome WDL barnstar and help to disseminate free knowledge from over 100 libraries in 7 different languages. Multilingual editing encouraged!!! But being multilingual is not a necessity to make this project a success. Please sign up to participate here. Thanks for editing Wikipedia and I look forward to working with you! EdwardsBot (talk) 14:33, 25 May 2013 (UTC)
are missing a description and/or other details on their image description pages. If possible, please add this information. This will help other editors make better use of the images, and they will be more informative to readers.
I must admit that at this point I have no idea what you are referring to. As I noted in my last comment, the original article made a statement about where Mynas nest, a statement which oddly omitted nests built in trees--a common behavior. I added to that incomplete statement. I wrote nothing in any section about threats to native species.
Anyone who cares to look upward can observe Mynas building nests in palm trees on O'ahu. It is absurd, if not idiotic, to require "documentation" for such common behavior, which is obvious to everyone. And it is both offensive and counterproductive when anyone appoints him/herself as guardian of the gates of knowledge. This is one of the huge drawbacks of Wikipedia--self-appointed experts. If you were indeed qualified to edit articles about Mynas, you would know that they build nests in palm trees. They also have feathers, fly, and lay eggs. As for skepticism about credentials, it is tempting to tell you where to put your skepticism, but I will refrain from doing so. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Drwin808 (talk • contribs) 01:10, 4 June 2013 (UTC)
are missing a description and/or other details on their image description pages. If possible, please add this information. This will help other editors make better use of the images, and they will be more informative to readers.
Hi. Thank you for your recent edits. Wikipedia appreciates your help. We noticed though that when you edited John McKee, you added a link pointing to the disambiguation page St. Marys River (check to confirm | fix with Dab solver). Such links are almost always unintended, since a disambiguation page is merely a list of "Did you mean..." article titles. Read the FAQ • Join us at the DPL WikiProject.
are missing a description and/or other details on their image description pages. If possible, please add this information. This will help other editors make better use of the images, and they will be more informative to readers.
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Hi. Thank you for your recent edits. Wikipedia appreciates your help. We noticed though that when you edited Diego antigen system, you added a link pointing to the disambiguation page Warao (check to confirm | fix with Dab solver). Such links are almost always unintended, since a disambiguation page is merely a list of "Did you mean..." article titles. Read the FAQ • Join us at the DPL WikiProject.
testing revealed that Di<sup>a</sup> occurred in groups of Native Americans in the United States]] and in people of [[Chinese people|Chinese]] and [[Japanese people|Japanese]] ancestry.<ref>
of the inlet. The height of the inlet jetties was raised, and, in 1937, a sand transfer plant ( was installed on the north jetty to pump sand past the inlet. The transfer plant pumped an average
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up to four positions: a ''tesorero'' (treasurer), who guarded money on hand and made payments; a ''[[wikt:contador|contador'' (accountant or comptroller), who recorded income and payments, maintained
Hey, I'll take a break from the Yustaga article for now, if you want to work on it. Please double check my use of the sources you'd added, and re-add anything I've left out due to my carelessness. The main things I want to add (both here and at Northern Utina will be material before and after the rebellion and the chiefdom's eventually collapse.--Cúchullaint/c15:30, 5 November 2013 (UTC)
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Hi. Thank you for your recent edits. Wikipedia appreciates your help. We noticed though that when you edited Safety Harbor culture, you added a link pointing to the disambiguation page Uzita (check to confirm | fix with Dab solver). Such links are almost always unintended, since a disambiguation page is merely a list of "Did you mean..." article titles. Read the FAQ • Join us at the DPL WikiProject.
I would suggest that you update the page to focus on the commencement of new non-stop services by Delta and Southwest scheduled to commence on 13 October 2014. 110.147.182.243 (talk) John Steven Lasher —Preceding undated comment added 01:57, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
are missing a description and/or other details on their image description pages. If possible, please add this information. This will help other editors make better use of the images, and they will be more informative to readers.
While I appreciate this notification, I currently have limited access to the Internet, and will not participate in the discussion. -- 217.41.230.125 (talk) 08:31, 8 April 2014 (UTC)
Mr. Albury - Worth's study of the Timucua missions of Spanish Florida is the fundamental text used by professional archaeologists concerning the missions of Florida. If you will review Volume 1, from pages 26-29, you will see that there was NEVER a "visita" founded in the original town of Potano prior to the founding of San Buenaventura de Potano in 1608 - the mission referred to as "Apalua" in the Ore visitation accounts is one and the same as San Buenaventura de Potano of 1608. Worth's historical research in the Archive of the Indies in Seville has made that very clear.
Also: when the peer-reviewed journal articles on the Richardson/UF Village site are published, I will provide links to them. That should be in January (2015). For now, the State report on the discovery of the human remains and the mission church at the Richardson/UF Village site, as well as the paper published at SEAC, provide stronger documentation of the de Soto/mission discovery for anyone who is interested. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 138.210.111.102 (talk) 15:03, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
Donald, I just did a bit of snorkeling at Sand Key Light. There was no light in the tower and there was a smaller structure just west of the older structure with a light in it. I assume a hurricane damaged the light since 1996?
Hi Donald! Remember me from the old Education Working Group? We're organizing Wikipedia:Meetup/Florida-Gainesville/ArtAndFeminism 2016 on March 6 as part of an international campaign, and they could use the local help of an experienced Wikipedian like yourself. Please sign up on that page if you can, and if you email me I'll put you into direct touch with the organizers.--Pharos (talk) 14:34, 25 January 2016 (UTC)
Hello, I'm BracketBot. I have automatically detected that your edit to Cedar Key, Florida may have broken the syntax by modifying 1 "[]"s. If you have, don't worry: just edit the page again to fix it. If I misunderstood what happened, or if you have any questions, you can leave a message on my operator's talk page.
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Ambrister incident|Alexander Arbuthnot and Robert Ambrister]] used the Cedar Keys to delivery suppl[es to the [[Seminole]]s.<ref>Fishburne. 7</ref>
Hello, Donald Albury. This message is intended to notify administrators of important changes to the protection policy.
Extended confirmed protection (also known as "30/500 protection") is a new level of page protection that only allows edits from accounts at least 30 days old and with 500 edits. The automatically assigned "extended confirmed" user right was created for this purpose. The protection level was created following this community discussion with the primary intention of enforcing various arbitration remedies that prohibited editors under the "30 days/500 edits" threshold to edit certain topic areas.
In July and August 2016, a request for comment established consensus for community use of the new protection level. Administrators are authorized to apply extended confirmed protection to combat any form of disruption (e.g. vandalism, sock puppetry, edit warring, etc.) on any topic, subject to the following conditions:
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Please review the protection policy carefully before using this new level of protection on pages. Thank you. This message was sent to the administrators' mass message list. To opt-out of future messages, please remove yourself from the list. 17:47, 23 September 2016 (UTC)
Latin American 10,000 Challenge invite
Hi. The Wikipedia:WikiProject Latin America/The 10,000 Challenge has recently started, based on the UK/Ireland Wikipedia:The 10,000 Challenge and Wikipedia:WikiProject Africa/The 10,000 Challenge. The idea is not to record every minor edit, but to create a momentum to motivate editors to produce good content improvements and creations and inspire people to work on more countries than they might otherwise work on. There's also the possibility of establishing smaller country or regional challenges for places like Brazil, Mexico, Peru and Argentina etc, much like Wikipedia:The 1000 Challenge (Nordic). For this to really work we need diversity and exciting content and editors from a broad range of countries regularly contributing. At some stage we hope to run some contests to benefit Latin American content, a destubathon perhaps, aimed at reducing the stub count would be a good place to start, based on the current Wikipedia:WikiProject Africa/The Africa Destubathon. If you would like to see this happening for Latin America, and see potential in this attracting more interest and editors for the country/countries you work on please sign up and being contributing to the challenge! This is a way we can target every country of Latin America, and steadily vastly improve the encyclopedia. We need numbers to make this work so consider signing up as a participant!♦ --Ser Amantio di NicolaoChe dicono a Signa?Lo dicono a Signa.00:32, 27 October 2016 (UTC)
Wikipedia:WikiProject United States/The 50,000 Challenge
You are invited to participate in the 50,000 Challenge, aiming for 50,000 article improvements and creations for articles relating to the United States. This effort began on November 1, 2016 and to reach our goal, we will need editors like you to participate, expand, and create. See more here!
Two-Factor Authentication now available for admins
Hello,
Please note that TOTP based two-factor authentication is now available for all administrators. In light of the recent compromised accounts, you are encouraged to add this additional layer of security to your account. It may be enabled on your preferences page in the "User profile" tab under the "Basic information" section. For basic instructions on how to enable two-factor authentication, please see the developing help page for additional information. Important: Be sure to record the two-factor authentication key and the single use keys. If you lose your two factor authentication and do not have the keys, it's possible that your account will not be recoverable. Furthermore, you are encouraged to utilize a unique password and two-factor authentication for the email account associated with your Wikimedia account. This measure will assist in safeguarding your account from malicious password resets. Comments, questions, and concerns may be directed to the thread on the administrators' noticeboard. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:33, 12 November 2016 (UTC)
A new user right for New Page Patrollers
Hi Donald Albury.
A new user group, New Page Reviewer, has been created in a move to greatly improve the standard of new page patrolling. The user right can be granted by any admin at PERM. It is highly recommended that admins look beyond the simple numerical threshold and satisfy themselves that the candidates have the required skills of communication and an advanced knowledge of notability and deletion. Admins are automatically included in this user right.
It is anticipated that this user right will significantly reduce the work load of admins who patrol the performance of the patrollers. However,due to the complexity of the rollout, some rights may have been accorded that may later need to be withdrawn, so some help will still be needed to some extent when discovering wrongly applied deletion tags or inappropriate pages that escape the attention of less experienced reviewers, and above all, hasty and bitey tagging for maintenance. User warnings are available here but very often a friendly custom message works best.
Hello, Donald Albury. Voting in the 2016 Arbitration Committee elections is open from Monday, 00:00, 21 November through Sunday, 23:59, 4 December to all unblocked users who have registered an account before Wednesday, 00:00, 28 October 2016 and have made at least 150 mainspace edits before Sunday, 00:00, 1 November 2016.
The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.
Following an RfC, an activity requirement is now in place for bots and bot operators.
Technical news
When performing some administrative actions the reason field briefly gave suggestions as text was typed. This change has since been reverted so that issues with the implementation can be addressed. (T34950)
Following the latest RfC concluding that Pending Changes 2 should not be used on the English Wikipedia, an RfC closed with consensus to remove the options for using it from the page protection interface, a change which has now been made. (T156448)
The Foundation has announced a new community health initiative to combat harassment. This should bring numerous improvements to tools for admins and CheckUsers in 2017.
JohnCD (John Cameron Deas) passed away on 30 December 2016. John began editing Wikipedia seriously during 2007 and became an administrator in November 2009.
A recent RfC has redefined how articles on schools are evaluated at AfD. Specifically, secondary schools are not presumed to be notable simply because they exist.
Cookie blocks should be deployed to the English Wikipedia soon. This will extend the current autoblock system by setting a cookie for each block, which will then autoblock the user after they switch accounts under a new IP.
A bot will now automatically place a protection template on protected pages when admins forget to do so.